Roundup: Media's Take

Jun 2, 2005

David Runciman: How the Right Persuaded Americans to Abolish the Estate Tax

David Runciman, in the London Review of Books (6-2-05): The politics of taxation can sometimes be gripping for a nation’s citizens, but not often: the arguments tend to be too technical when they are true, and too obviously bogus when they are false, to sustain public interest for long. By extension, the politics of another country’s tax system is unlikely to be of much interest to anyone with any sort of normal life. Listening to the ins and outs of other people&r

Jun 2, 2005

Norman Solomon: War Made Easy ... From Vietnam to Iraq

Norman Solomon, in his weekly column (6-2-05): [This article is an excerpt from Norman Solomon’s new book “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death,” which comes off the press in mid-June. For information, go to: www.WarMadeEasy.com.]On February 27, 1968, I sat in a small room on Capitol Hill. Around a long table, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was in session, taking testimony from an administration official. Most

Jun 2, 2005

Mark Danner: To Major in English Is to Wear a Question Mark

Mark Danner, at TomDisptach.com (5-30-05): [Mark Danner, a longtime New Yorker Staff writer and frequent contributor to the New York Review of Books, is Professor of Journalism at the University of California at Berkeley and Henry R. Luce Professor at Bard College. His most recent book is Torture and Truth: America, Abu Ghraib, and the War on Terror, which collects his pieces on torture and Iraq that first appeared in the New York Review of Books. His work can be found at markdanner.com.]

Jun 1, 2005

Howard Kurtz: Would Deep Throat Be a Hero in 2005?

Howard Kurtz, in the Wa Po (6-1-05):Most people, I believe, would say yes. This was a guy who provided The Post with crucial information about a badly corrupt administration. Forget Hal Holbrook and moving the flower pot and meeting in the parking garage and all of that. Deep Throat concluded that since John Mitchell's Justice Department was itself corrupt, the only way

May 30, 2005

Michael McGough: Do Muslims, Christians and Jews Worship the Same God?

Michael McGough, in the LAT (5-30-05): In November 2001, two months after the destruction of the World Trade Center, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette published a letter to the editor suggesting that the news media might stop using the word "Allah" to refer to the deity worshiped by Muslims. "I would like to point out that the Arabic word 'Allah,' which is often erroneously perceived by many as some kind of a 'Muslim God,' is merely a translation of the wo

May 30, 2005

Brent Staples: How Bill Cosby's Comments Hve Shed Light on the History of Class in the Black Community

Brent Staples, in the NYT (5-30-05):Bill Cosby spawned a cottage industry among opinion writers when he ascended a podium in Washington last year and harangued inner-city parents for doing too little to educate their children. He threw salt in the wound by saying those parents were spending too much on expensive sneakers and not enough on books. ... The most striking thing about the discussion

May 30, 2005

Stacy Schiff: France & America ... A Troubled Relationship from the Start

Stacy Schiff, in the NYT (5-29-05): [Stacy Schiff is the author, most recently, of "A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France and the Birth of America."]... Long before Gene Kelly danced in Paris, John Adams tore his hair out there. In the 1770's and 1780's the greatest collection of brainpower this country had to offer found itself installed in the French capital. They were miserable. Almost to a man, the founding fathers looked upon Paris as a hardship posting

May 27, 2005

Weekly Standard: Talk About Dissing the Koran!

The Scrapbook in the Weekly Standard (5-30-05):While Islamist fanatics and ignorant Westerners sow panic over the alleged desecration of a Koran at Guantanamo Bay, no one mentions a startling fact: When it comes to destruction of the Koran, there's no question who the world champion is--the government of Saudi Arabia. The Saudi state religion is the primitive and auste

May 27, 2005

Mort Mintz: Bush's Judges Matter to Jane and Joe Sixpack

Mort Mintz, in the American Prospect (5-27-05):[Morton Mintz, a former chair of the Fund for Investigative Journalism, reported the thalidomide and Dalkon Shield stories for The Washington Post and, also for the newspaper, covered four terms of the Supreme Court. He is a former chair of the Fund for Investigative Journalism.] Last m

May 26, 2005

Jonathan Schell: A Revolution in American Nuclear Policy

Jonathan Schell, at tomdispatch.com and the Nation (5-26-05):[Jonathan Schell, author of The Unconquerable World, is the Nation Institute's Harold Willens Peace Fellow.

May 26, 2005

Norman Solomon: The Silent Media Curse of Memorial Day

Norman Solomon, in his newsletter (5-26-05): [Norman Solomon’s latest book, “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death,” comes off the press in mid-June. His columns and other writings can be found at: www.normansolomon.com.] Memorial Day weekend brings media rituals. Old Glory flutters on television and newsprint. Grave ceremonies and oratory pay homage to the fallen. Many officials and pundits speak of remembering the dead. But fo

May 26, 2005

David Domke and Kevin Coe: President Bush's God-Talk

David Domke and Kevin Coe, in Sightings, the newsletter of the Martin Marty Center at the University of Chicago Divinity School (5-26-05):[David Domke is an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Washington, and is the author of God Willing? Political Fundamentalism in the White House, the"War on Terror," and the Echoing Press

May 25, 2005

Gail Russell Chaddock: Limits On Filibusters Are Already Pervasive

Gail Russell Chaddock, in the Christian Science Monitor (5-24-05): ... The use of filibusters to prolong debate, though revered by many as a tool for the Senate minority, has been progressively curtailed in recent years on a host of important issues. One key reason: A rising belief in official Washington that the only way to get contentious legislation out of Congress is to rein in debate and amendment. The restrictions are also, in part, a holdover from the early

May 24, 2005

Lino Graglia: Our Constitution Faces Death by 'Due Process'

Lino Graglia, in the WSJ (5-24-05):[Mr. Graglia is the A. Dalton Cross Professor of Law, University of Texas. This is adapted from "'A Country I Do Not Recognize': The Legal Assault on American Values" (Robert Bork, editor), to be published this fall by the Hoover Institution.] Judge-made constitutional law is the product of judicial review -- the po

May 20, 2005

Trudy Rubin: The Mistakes that Led to the Iraq Mess

Trudy Rubin, in the Baltimore Sun (5-20-05): If you want to understand why things are going so badly in Iraq, read the profile of Douglas Feith, the No. 3 man at the Pentagon, in the May 9 issue of The New Yorker. Mr. Feith, who will soon step down as undersecretary of defense for policy, was the Pentagon's man in charge of planning for postwar Iraq. He di

May 19, 2005

Tony de Brum: History Happens Again (Unfortunately) on the Marshall Islands

Tony de Brum, at the website of Japan Focus (May 2005):[Tony de Brum delivered this address on behalf of Indigenous People throughout the world to the Seventh Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference at the United Nations on May 11, 2005. ]... Throughout the years, America’s nuclear history in the Marshall Islands has been colored with official denial, self-serving control of information, and abroga

May 19, 2005

Michael T. Klare: Are We Running Out of Oil?

Michael Klare, at www.tomdispatch.com (3-22-05): [Michael T. Klare is a professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College and the author, most recently, of Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America's Growing Petroleum Dependency (Metropolitan Books).] Data released annually at this time by the major oil companies on their prior-year performances rarely generates much interest outside the busin

May 17, 2005

WSJ: Newsweek's Mistake Reflects the Media's Vietnam Obsession

Editorial in the WSJ (5-17-05): Newsweek deserves credit for coming clean about its dubious Koran desecration story in an attempt to head off further bloodshed. Already its "Periscope" report last week that U.S. interrogators at Guantanamo Bay flushed a copy of the holy book down a toilet has touched off riots throughout the Islamic world, resulting in at least 17 deaths,

May 17, 2005

Christopher Hitchens: It's No Mystery What the Jihadists Want in Iraq, Contrary to What the NYT says

Christopher Hitchens, in Slate (5-17-05): When the New York Times scratches its head, get ready for total baldness as you tear out your hair. A doozy classic led the "Week in Review" section on Sunday. Portentously headed "The Mystery of the Insurgency," the article rubbed its eyes at the sheer lunacy and sadism of the Iraqi car bombers and random murderers. At a time when new mass graves are being filled, and old on

May 17, 2005

Bill Moyers: The Rightwing Attack on PBS

Bill Moyers, in a speech at the National Conference on Media Reform in St. Louis, Missouri (5-15-05): The story I've come to share with you goes to the core of our belief that the quality of democracy and the quality of journalism are deeply entwined. I can tell this story because I've been living it. As Dr. Wilson said, it's been in the news this week, including more [attacks] tax on a single journalist, yo