New York Times reporter John Burns admires Margaret Thatcher's legacy. But when he claims she lifted millions to prosperity, does he have any evidence?
Apr
12
2013
Reagan Didn't Get Thatchered
By 7 Comments
When it comes to elite media and political circles, there's no doubt that Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher were treated the same way when they died: with gushing, uncritical celebration. They just wish the public could have been so univocal.
Apr
11
2013
Who Gets to Remember Margaret Thatcher?
By 13 Comments
Who gets to the top of the journalistic establishment probably has a lot to do with what they think of Margaret Thatcher's hard-right policies.
May
21
2012
Now They Tell Us: Iranian Diamonds, Megrahi Questions
By 3 Comments
Two things in the New York Times today that readers should have already known more about: –Reporter William Broad has an article (5/21/12) on the state of nuclear inspections in Iran, particularly the military facility at Parchin. Broad tells readers about the "proposed inspection of a building that the agency suspects Iran used in testing explosives that can trigger a nuclear blast." People following this story know that the facility in question is at the heart of the case against Iran. When the International Atomic Energy Agency released a report last November that finally detailed some of the allegations against [...]
Dec
19
2011
Now It Can Be Told: Libyan Civilian Deaths
By 12 Comments
The Sunday New York Times (12/18/11) featured a powerful investigation of civilian casualties resulting from the NATO war in Libya–casualties that, to hear NATO officials tell it, maybe don't even exist. The Times' C.J. Chivers and Eric Schmitt report: But an on-the-ground examination by The New York Times of airstrike sites across Libya–including interviews with survivors, doctors and witnesses, and the collection of munitions remnants, medical reports, death certificates and photographs–found credible accounts of dozens of civilians killed by NATO in many distinct attacks. The victims, including at least 29 women or children, often had been asleep in homes when [...]
Sep
12
2011
NYT Still Finding the Pro-Occupation Iraqi Public
By 12 Comments
Over the course of the Iraq War, many U.S. media outlets have managed to misconstrue Iraqi public opinion about the presence of U.S. troops. As early as 2004, as FAIR (6/2/04) pointed out, research showed that the Iraqi public wanted U.S. troops out: According to a new poll from the Iraq Center for Research and Strategic Studies, which is partly funded by the State Department and has coordinated its work with the Coalition Provisional Authority, more than half of all Iraqis–including the Kurds–want an immediate withdrawal of U.S. forces, up from 17 percent last October. But prominent media outlets didn't [...]
Aug
30
2011
Libya and Terrorist Signatures
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Under the headline "Nations Hope Veil Lifts From Libya's History of Terrorism," John Burns writes in today's New York Times (8/30/11): Television footage of the only man convicted in the Lockerbie bombing lying in bed, purportedly comatose with advanced prostate cancer at his Tripoli home, has provided a focal point for a question asked with new urgency in places far from Libya: With Col. Muammar el-Gadhafi's government in ruins, what reckoning is likely for the terrorist bombings that were once a signature of the former Libyan leader's war with the Western world? So terrorism was Gadhafi's "signature," and many "nations" [...]
Jan
04
2011
Propaganda and the Saddam Statue 'Conspiracy'
By 23 Comments
Remember the toppling of that Saddam Hussein statue in Baghdad (4/9/03) that signified the "end" of the Iraq War? At the time, there were critics who pointed out that the extensively televised images of a jubilant crowd of Iraqis were misleading.The sense of media excitement was unmistakable; as FAIR pointed out, the Los Angeles Times ran a headline the next day, "Iraq Is All but Won; Now What?" The incident is rehashed and examined in the New Yorker this week by Peter Maass, who was reporting from the scene that day.He states early on that both sides of the war [...]
Jul
16
2010
NYT's John Burns Calls for All the News That's 'Necessary to Report'
By 12 Comments
New York Times London bureau chief John Burns has joined other high-profile reporters (e.g., CBS chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan) in denouncing fellow journalist Michael Hastings. Hastings' Rolling Stone expose prompted the dismissal of Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who was relieved of his Afghanistan command following Hastings' revelations that he and some of his aides had used insubordinate language in discussing Obama administration superiors. Appearing on Hugh Hewitt's conservative national radio program on July 6, the Times' former Baghdad bureau chief responded to Hewitt's question about how the Rolling Stone story had affected relations between journalists and military officials: I think [...]
Jul
15
2009
NYT and the Pro-Withdrawal Majority (of 2004)
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New York Times reporter John F. Burns turned in a piece on Sunday about the debate in Britain over the Afghanistan war ("Criticism of Afghan War Is on the Rise in Britain," 7/12/09), in light of the increase in British casualties in recent weeks. Burns writes: So far, however, the reaction in Britain has not run to the kind of popular groundswell for withdrawal that President George W. Bush faced when the war in Iraq worsened after his re-election in 2004. To careful readers of the Times, this is more than a little jarring. While there is certainly some truth [...]
