Fox News host Bill O'Reilly claims he was accosted by a "screaming" man "armed with a cell phone camera" on December 7 while walking to a media party at the White House in Washington, D.C. On his show the next night (O'Reilly Factor, 12/8/11), O'Reilly explained, I told the guy to get lost, but he came closer and closer, armed with a cell phone camera. When he was about a foot away, I turned to shield myself and my assistant with an umbrella. At this point, we were just a few feet away from the White House gate. According to [...]
Sep
12
2011
Biden's Feel-Good 9/11 Spin Goes Unchallenged
By 33 Comments
Al-Qaeda, bin Laden, never imagined that the 3,000 people who lost their lives that day would inspire 3 million to put on the uniform and harden the resolve of 300 million Americans. They never imagined the sleeping giant they were about to awaken. – Vice President Joe Biden at September 11 commemoration (9/11/11) Actually, that's precisely what bin Laden imagined: Al-Qaeda's central strategy was to draw its Western foes into economically ruinous wars in Muslim lands (Extra!, 7/11). But I suppose it would be bad form for journalists to raise this fact as the U.S. commemorates a decade of war [...]
Sep
01
2011
Fox Business Uses Fake Quote to Bash Islamophobia Report
By 27 Comments
Recently on Fox Business (8/30/11; cite by Think Progress, 8/31/11), host Eric Bolling tried to discredit the Center for American Progress's excellent new report on Islamophobia with this colossal falsehood: I need to point this out–I'm reading directly from this report: "The Obama-allied Center for American Progress has released a report that blames Islamophobia in America on a small group of Jews and Israel supporters in America, whose views are being backed by millions of dollars." You would have to be an idiot to read those words and not realize that they weren't CAP's. In fact, Bolling was quoting from [...]
Aug
19
2011
ProPublica's False Balance on Economic Myths
By 4 Comments
ProPublica's factcheck of seven economic myths facing the country makes some good points: Taxes aren't going up, for instance. Some of the "myths" are a bit muddled: "The stimulus has been full of/free of fraud, waste and abuse." Is someone really saying the latter? But overall the piece tries vainly to balance myths that will please both the right and the left. For instance, Myth #3 doesnâ┚¬Ã¢”ž¢t appear to be a myth at all, but a difference of opinion between economists. But labeling it a myth serves the conservative perspective: The stimulus should have been bigger. This is a red [...]
Jul
15
2011
Fox's Eric Bolling Fans on Terror Facts–Twice
By 5 Comments
Glenn Beck's temporary replacement in the 5 p.m. slot on Fox News, Eric Bolling, has started out with a bang. On the July 13 edition of his new show the Five, the host declared: "America was certainly safe between 2000 and 2008. I don't remember any attacks on American soil during that period of time." After Bolling's error, erasing 9/11 and several other deadly terrorism attacks from the Bush record, was pointed out by outlets includingMedia Matters and Huffington Post, the host returned to the air Thursday to issue a correction that sounded more like a retaliation against those who [...]
Jul
15
2011
USA Today Debunks Once Again the Myth of the Bloody Border
By 4 Comments
USA Today published a useful investigation today (7/15/11) finding that "rates of violent crime along the U.S./Mexico border have been falling for years," that U.S. border cities are "statistically safer on average than other cities in their states" and "border cities, big and small, have maintained lower crime rates than the national average, which itself has been falling." The USA Today report is not the first to dispel what it calls the "bloody" picture of the U.S. border with Mexico. But while it cites politicians, including Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, for spreading the myth, the piece lets right-wing media, including [...]
Jun
08
2011
Democracy Now!: Moyers on the Media
By 8 Comments
Bill Moyers appeared on Democracy Now! this morning (6/8/11) to discuss his new book about his days at PBS, The Conversation Continues. Interviewed for the hour by anchors Any Goodman and Juan Gonzalez, Moyers said, "The consensual seduction of the mainstream media by and with the government is one of the most dangerous toxins at work in America today." He spoke, too, of the lost mission of public broadcasting,and how its reliance on the political whims of Congress for some of its funding prevents it from living up to its potential: Sometimes self-censorship occurs because you're looking over your shoulder, [...]
Jun
03
2011
Politico Uses Anonymous Sources to Attack Hersh…for Using Anonymous Sources
By 18 Comments
Seymour Hersh reports in the New Yorker (6/6/11–subscription required) that there is s virtually no evidence Iran has a nuclear weapons program, despite huge efforts on the part of the U.S. to prove otherwise. Though Hersh's findings do not contradict the past two National Intelligence Estimates, they do fly in the face of long-held official and corporate media views. Corporate media routinely treat the alleged Iranian nuclear weapons program as a matter of fact. New York Times reporter Michael Gordon has done it at least twice (2/24/03, 10/19/04), in one case suggesting that a U.S.-friendly regime in Iraq might pressure [...]
May
12
2011
NYT's Bai Repeats GOP's 'Family Values' Canard
By 21 Comments
Writing about Newt Gingrich's presidential bid on the New York Times' Caucus blog (5/10/11), Matt Bai seems to confuse GOP rhetoric for fact as he suggest that, when it comes to marriage vows, Republicans are generally known for walking the line: Mr. Gingrich, a bit of a rogue in his personal life, has never been a favorite of his party's powerful social conservatives, who tend to think of scandalous affairs as the purview of Democrats, and maybe Rudy Giuliani. In order to maintain a tired and inaccurate cliché, Bai has to have forgotten John McCain, Henry Hyde, David Vitter, Larry [...]
Apr
22
2011
'Courageous,' 'Bold,' 'Serious' Paul Ryan–Booed?
By 5 Comments
Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan (R.-Wisc.) is used to being celebrated by pundits for his "courageous," "bold," "serious" budget proposals (even though his numbers don't add up). Indeed, Ryan has become a genuine media darling. So it must have been a little surprising to find himself being booed earlier this week, at a town hall meeting he hosted in his congressional district. It happened after one attendee at the event, a constituent describing himself as a "life-long conservative" challenged GOP views on income disparity, taxes on the wealthy, and raising the income cap on Social Security taxes: The middle class is [...]
Apr
01
2011
NYT's Labor Reporter Pits 'Swaggering' Public Workers Against 'Taxpayers'
By 42 Comments
In a mostly informative "news analysis" ("Ohio's Anti-Union Law Is Tougher Than Wisconsin's," New York Times, 4/1/11) comparing new anti-union laws that restrict collective bargaining rights in Ohio and Wisconsin, New York Times labor and workplace correspondent Steven Greenhouse seems at one point to adopt the framing and language of anti-labor politicians and pundits: Moreover, at a time of huge budget deficits and of Republican dominance in many states, including states like Ohio and Wisconsin where unions once had swaggering power, the pendulum has swung toward the taxpayer instead of the government workers paid by the taxpayer. Pitting "swaggering" unionized [...]
