Latest Blogs
WaPo Publisher Still Complaining Dinner Parties At Her House Didn't Co
The Washington Post may have canceled its $25,000-a-plate dinners matching lobbyists with top officials, but Publisher Katharine Weymouth is still not seeing it the way journalists do: paying for private dinners at the publisher’s private home looks like deal-making rather than news-making. Howard Kurtz’s Friday story revealed the Weymouth worldview: Weymouth, who had not seen the marketing copy…
AP's Hyperbole Masquerades as Journalism
For the Associated Press, Tim Klass shows that taking liberties with facts by enveloping them in wild hyperbole can sex up a boring story into something much more alarming. Unfortunately, what one ends up with is not a presentation of news, but a promulgation of a narrative that befits a particular political agenda. And this time writer Klass uses his hyperbolic style to advance the guns-are-evil…
CBS Doesn't Mention Obama as Unemployment Hits 26-Year High
The unemployment rate in June jumped to 9.5 percent, the highest since 1983, as 467,000 jobs were lost, yet the CBS Evening News managed to air a story that didn't mention President Barack Obama or his “stimulus” bill while the NBC story only touched Obama's policies by running a soundbite of the President defending the lack of positive impact so far from his policies: “It took years for us to…
An Internal Discussion Between the Press and White House
By this time, the NewsBusters connoisseur will have surely heard about yesterday’s unofficial celebration in the White House press briefing. Like many parties, it was somewhat louder than normal, a bit tense at points, and the press – specifically Chip Reid and Helen Thomas – topped off the early Independence Day festivities by roasting (figuratively, of course) Press Secretary Robert Gibbs.That…
NBC Puffs Al Franken with Softball Questions to New Senator
On Thursday's Today, Meredith Vieira tossed mostly softballs to Senator-elect Al Franken, offering no hard questions about the disputed 2008 election, instead fawning, "...Are you more worried about becoming a target for the GOP or a target for Saturday Night Live, your old stomping ground?" In regards to the post-election wrangling for the Minnesota Senate seat, the best Vieira could do is to…
The Employment Report: AP Misses Noting Worst June Since Before WWII
At the Wall Street Journal's Best of the Web today, Jim Taranto noted that it took the Associated Press's Jeannine Aversa until the 15th paragraph of her expanded dispatch on today's Employment Situation Report to find something mildly positive to write.Aversa, who has been one of the wire service's chief silver lining make-up artists during the Obama presidency's disastrous economic stewardship…
Confused: MSNBC’s Touré Doesn’t Understand Why 'White Americans
Feeling a little overwhelmed by the amount of media attention the networks have given to Michael Jackson? You're not alone, according to a recent Pew Research Center poll, and that fact puzzles MSNBC contributor Touré. Touré and David Wilson of TheGrid.com appeared on the July 2 broadcast of Nancy Snyderman's MSNBC's show "Dr. Nancy" to examine the premise that Michael Jackson's death was…
ABC's John Stossel: 'I Hate It That ABC Didn’t Run My Piece
John Stossel on Monday blogged about the fact that ABC bumped a planned segment of his that is skeptical towards universal health care, saying, "Yes, I am sick of the coverage of Michael Jackson. I hate it that ABC didn’t run my piece." According to TV Newser, the report, which would have aired on the June 26 edition of 20/20, has now been rescheduled for the July 17 edition of the show. The five…
NYT's Egan: Bush Years of 'Sanctioned Torture and War Built on Deceit
Liberal New York Times reporter turned liberal nytimes.com blogger, Timothy Egan, posted "Capture the Flag" on Thursday, on how heartening it was to see American flags pop up in liberal domains. The post was ostensibly a plea for people of all political views to have faith in the future good of America. But Egan excused liberals for their lack of public patriotism during the Bush years, citing "…
Front-Page Story Gets Nostalgic for Summer School
Education reporter Sam Dillon doesn't question using the economic "stimulus" money for funding summer school classes facing the budget ax.
NBC's Meredith Vieira to Dick Morris: GOP Plan to 'Sit and Watch Obama
NBC's Meredith Vieira on Thursday conducted a defensive interview with Fox News contributor Dick Morris, at one point skeptically wondering if "the Republican tactic from this point on" would be "to sit and watch Obama fail." Later, when Morris pointed out the problems with the Canadian health care system, the Today host retorted, "But, the President clearly has said that's not the road he's…