Major Newspapers

Oh c'mon, this is too easy. Here's a paragraph from former Congressman Paul Kanjorski's op-ed in the New York Times, published online yesterday, in the print edition today ("Why Politicians Need to Stay Out in the Open"): We all lose an element of freedom when security considerations distance public officials from the people. Therefore, it is incumbent on all Americans to create an…

The outlook for the new year doesn't look prosperous for community print journalism if the financial trouble bedeviling the parent company of USA Today is any indication. From NewJerseyNewsRoom.com:

Today, New York Post reporters delivered a bombshell story addressing why New York City's snow cleanup performance has been so poor: Sanitation Department's slow snow cleanup was a budget protest   Selfish Sanitation Department bosses from the snow-slammed outer boroughs ordered their drivers to snarl the blizzard cleanup to protest budget cuts -- a disastrous move that turned…

Not that it's a big surprise, but it seems that the answer to "How do we spin Christmas shopping season?" at the New York Times depends on which party occupies the Oval Office in Washington. Monday, The Times's Stephanie Clifford, with the help of two other reporters, blew the holiday sales horn. Here are the first few paragraphs of her report, entitled "Retail Sales Rebound, Beating…

When the legislators and good-government people who drafted the law requiring the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to audit and render an opinion on the financial statements of the federal government as a whole and the major departments within it, they must have known that early-year results would not be very pleasant. But I also suspect that they thought the shame of being exposed as…

In its reports about the U.S. homebuilding industry and new home sales, the Associated Press has gotten lazy and/or deliberately deceptive. In doing so, it is giving readers, listeners and viewers at its subscribing outlets a completely incorrect impression that the industry and market are getting off the mat after recently being in their worst shape, in their words, "in 47 years." After…

2010 will be by far the worst ever in the 48 years records of new home sales have been kept, and there is little if any reason to believe things will get better soon. The news on existing home sales has hardly been better, given the price reductions sellers have had to make to move their homes. Graphics will follow shortly indicating just how bad the market for new and existing homes has been…

Someone check the cider bowl at the New York Times Christmas party.  Looks like it was spiked with some wacky wassail weed, and that Paul Krugman drank deep—very deep—from it. In his Humbug Express column today, the honoree of a fringe Scandinavian leftist group claimed—apparently lost in the throes of cider-induced delusions—that the left's ability to promulgate its propaganda is dwarfed by…

A funny thing happened on the way to finding yet another year of media emphasis on the use of "holiday" vs. "Christmas" in describing the shopping season. Google News searches conducted this morning at about 7:30 ET on "Christmas shopping season" and "holiday shopping season" came back with the highest percentage of "Christmas" results I've seen in the six years I've been doing these searches…

Having been given the power to rule by decree for 18 months, Hugo Chávez appears to be in the midst of completing a de facto statist takeover of the country institutions and levers of power. No journalist is daring to directly call it dictatorship. You won't find any form of the word at a December 15 New York Times story by Simon Romero ("Chávez Seeks Decree Powers" -- which, by the way,…

Could Michael Kinsley possibly be any more predictable?  His review of George Bush's "Decision Points," appearing in today's Sunday New York Times, is precisely the smug piece of sneering partisanship you would expect in this paper and from this quintessential liberal MSM elitist. As the headline indicates, Kinsley flatly accuses W of "stealing" the 2000 election.  Kinsley offers no proof,…

Tonight marks the final edition of Larry King Live. While we have a compendium of his bias, the veteran talk show host is equally known for some pretty tremendous gaffes.

A useful guideline in evaluating the significance of a national security-related news story first revealed by someone in the establishment press is whether other media outlets pick it up. If they don't, it's probably significant. Such is the case with the Washington Post's Saturday story about Venezuela acquiring 1,800 Russian antiaircraft missiles. That appears to be 1,700 more than…

A New York Times "Learning Network" graphic informs us that under the proposed Obama-GOP tax and spending compromise, "rates will not change for at least two years for anyone." Wow. Somebody at the Learning Network needs to tell the Old Gray Lady's beat reporters, editorial board, and opinion columnists. Just today, reporter Helene Cooper, in noting how Vice President Joe Biden is playing a "…