Monthly Archives: July 2010

Erick Erickson = David Duke

Posted on 07/14/2010 by Jim Naureckas

When he got a gig doing political commentary for CNN, hate-blogger Erick Erickson assured Howard Kurtz that he had realized that "I had to grow up in how I write." And Erickson convinced the New York Times that he had … Continue reading →

Posted in CNN, Race | Tagged | 2 Comments

How Not to Report on the Estate Tax

Posted on 07/14/2010 by Jim Naureckas

Reuters (7/14/10) has a report today on the efforts by senators Blanche Lincoln (D.-Arkansas) and Jon Kyl (R.-Arizona) to greatly reduce the amount wealthy estates owe in federal taxes. Under current law, after a one-year suspension, the federal estate tax … Continue reading →

Posted in Economy, Reuters | Tagged , , | 26 Comments

John King, CNN's Right-Wing Assist Man?

Posted on 07/14/2010 by Peter Hart

The right-wing Newsmax site has a notably positive profile of CNN anchor John King. Why would they take such a liking to a member of the dreaded Liberal Media Establishment? Newsmax's Ron Kessler gives his reason: When contributor Erick Erickson … Continue reading →

Posted in CNN | Tagged , | 1 Comment

'Same Strategy, Better Tactics': Robert Gibbs' Real 'Meet the Press' News

Posted on 07/14/2010 by Peter Hart

To hear some of the Beltway media tell it,on Sunday White House press secretary Robert Gibbs predicted that the Democrats could lose their congressional majority in the November midterms. The L.A. Times captured some of the sense of crisis (7/14/10), … Continue reading →

Posted in Barack Obama, International, NBC, Politics | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

Women's Sports Gets 1.6% of Local TV News Sports Coverage

Posted on 07/13/2010 by Julie Hollar

No, that's not a typo: Only 1.6 percent of sports coverage on L.A.'s three major network affiliates went to women's sports. On ESPN Sportscenter, it's 1.4 percent. It's just slightly higher when you add in ticker-tape coverage. And it's getting … Continue reading →

Posted in Gender | Tagged | 6 Comments

At Wall Street Journal, Reporting Assault Through Israel's Eyes

Posted on 07/13/2010 by Alex Kane

In a news report on the Israeli military's investigation of its own deadly raid on the Gaza aid flotilla, the Wall Street Journal (7/13/10) passes off as fact, with no qualifier, the Israeli government's claim that members of IHH, a … Continue reading →

Posted in Israel/Palestine | Tagged , | 20 Comments

Action Alert: George Shultz's Friends Fund a PBS Love Letter

Posted on 07/12/2010 by Jim Naureckas

FAIR has a new Action Alert (7/12/10) out about PBS airing a completely uncritical three-hour documentary about Reagan-era Secretary of State George Shultz–paid for by corporations with close ties to Shultz. You can leave copies of your messages to PBS, … Continue reading →

Posted in Media Activism, PBS | Tagged | 30 Comments

For Newsweek's Latin America Correspondent, It's the Stocks That Count

Posted on 07/09/2010 by Jim Naureckas

Newsweek's right-wing Latin American correspondent Mac Margolis (7/2/10) is once again playing games with statistics. After the obligatory attack on Venezuela's Hugo Chavez as a "chest-thumping autocrat," Margolis gets down to the business of praising his favorite Latin American country, … Continue reading →

Posted in Economy, Newsweek | Tagged , | 7 Comments

What Gets You Fired From CNN

Posted on 07/08/2010 by Peter Hart

Octavia Nasr has been a Mideast correspondent for CNN for 20 years, and was their senior editor of Mideast affairs. Until yesterday. On hearing of the death of a Hezbollah leader, she posted the following on her Twitter feed: Sad … Continue reading →

Posted in CNN, International, Time | Tagged , , , | 28 Comments

Bill O'Reilly Still Reaching on Immigrants and Crime

Posted on 07/08/2010 by Peter Hart

At the top of his show last night (7/7/10), BillO'Reillynotified viewers that the Factor had "investigated"how much crime in Arizona is committed by undocumented immigrants,explaining: "What we found may surprise you." "Telling the truth in the illegal immigration controversy, that … Continue reading →

Posted in Fox News, Immigration | Tagged | 2 Comments

NY Times Prints Call for Ethnic Cleansing of Palestinians

Posted on 07/07/2010 by Alex Kane

Can we agree that calls for a government to violate international law are not a helpful contribution to the public debate? That's what the New York Times (7/6/10) offered when it published a call for the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians … Continue reading →

Posted in Israel/Palestine, New York Times | 13 Comments

Liberals are Liars: More on ABC's Factchecking Failure

Posted on 07/07/2010 by Peter Hart

Back in May FAIR wrote about the problems with a new factchecking project, where the PolitiFact website evaluates ABC's This Week. As we said then, this is theoretically a fine idea; the problem is that, in practice, what PolitiFact decides … Continue reading →

Posted in ABC | Tagged , , | 22 Comments

LAT Film Critic Shouldn't Throw at Stone

Posted on 07/06/2010 by Jim Naureckas

L.A. Times film critic Kenneth Turan (7/2/10), reviewing Oliver Stone's documentary South of the Border, remarks in passing that "a recent piece in the New York Times pointed out numerous errors" in the film's discussion of Latin American politics. Turan … Continue reading →

Posted in L.A. Times, Latin America | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Kathleen Parker Channels Stephen Colbert

Posted on 07/06/2010 by Peter Hart

Syndicated columnist Kathleen Parker (umm, PULITZER Prize-winning columnist) got a lot of feedback abouther recent column ("Obama: Our First Female President," 6/30/10) suggesting that Barack Obama is kind of girly. She carefully pointed out that she was"not calling Obama a … Continue reading →

Posted in CNN, Race | Tagged | 13 Comments

The WashPost's David Weigel Problem

Posted on 07/06/2010 by Peter Hart

There's been an awful lot written about the Washington Post and David Weigel. The short version of the story: Weigel was hired by the Post to do blogging/Internet reporting on the conservative movement. This bothered some on the right, since … Continue reading →

Posted in Media Criticism, New York Times, Washington Post | Tagged , | 14 Comments