After months of wrangling over Scott Beauchamp’s disturbing little war story entitled “Shock Troops“, The New Republic has acknowledged that it cannot stand behind the facts of the story as printed. The repudiation piece is about 10 times longer than the bit that sparked the controversy, a sure sign that there’s some excuse-making to be…
Category: Media
Presidential Press Coverage
Journalism.org has an interesting post up in which the press coverage of the 2008 presidential election is analyzed by the Project for Excellence in Journalism and the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy. Check it out. Highlights: Barack Obama was 3 times more likely to receive positive coverage than negative while…
Of Reporters, Hacks
Earlier today Glen Greenwald published what he believes is an email sent to by him Colonel Steve Boylan, the spokesman for General Petraeus. Boylan – or a clever imitator – gives Greenwald grief about his ethics and objectivity, providing him a tailor-made opportunity for a righteous riposte. Greenwald eagerly exploits this by decrying the military’s…
Reporters’ Shield Bill Passes House
Reuters says: The House of Representatives defied a White House veto threat on Tuesday and overwhelmingly passed legislation that would protect reporters from being jailed for refusing to reveal confidential sources. By a vote of 398 to 21, the House sent to the Senate a bill that would prohibit prosecutors from forcing reporters to reveal…
Funky Winkerbean Causes Controversy
From Fox News: October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. But did the creator of the comic strip "Funky Winkerbean" take the "awareness" part too far? … The decision by cartoonist Tim Batiuk to have Lisa Moore, the cartoon strip’s wife, mother and lawyer, succumb to breast cancer last week has sparked both praise and anger,…
The "F**k This" Test
Colorado State University’s Board of Student Communications met yesterday and decided that David McSwane, the editor-in-chief of the Rocky Mountain Collegian newspaper, will keep his job after publishing a four-word column that said only, “Taser this: F**k Bush.” Very classy, Davey. But not exactly NY Times material. More: Speaking for the board that oversees student…
The Myth of Student Free Speech
Saw this and it made me laugh. OK, so this kid decides to wear his John Edwards 2008 T-shirt to school (High School) and gets upset about his free speech being infringed upon when they sent him home. “Bong Hits for Jesus” anyone (a.k.a Morse v Frederick)? The point is that a school has a…
Herbert Trashes Republicans
Bob Herbert is mad at Republicans again and wrote in the NY Times that the party is “anti-black”. His response to the ‘Pubs in the Senate refused to vote for a bill that would have given the District of Columbia a voting seat in the House of Representatives? The G.O.P. has spent the last 40 years…
Censoring Satire
It seems the Washington Post and a large number of other mainstream U.S. newspapers will refuse to run the next two Sunday’s worth of Berkely Breathed’s Opus cartoon strip. Why? Judge for yourself: Pretty mild. And mildly funny. Certainly not worth censoring, voluntarily or otherwise. There are times when it can be embarrassing to be…
Liberal’s Love
The Texas Rainmaker says that liberals all over America are showing their typical grace and genuine love for mankind by publicly proclaiming that they hope Supreme Court Justice John Roberts dies as a result of the seizure he suffered yesterday. A couple of the choice ones TTR rounded up: “Lets hope he is injured seriously….