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It was billed as a non-partisan reflection on the fifth anniversary of 9/11. But scarcely was the president’s speech over on Monday before the media lit up with arguments over its political content. As for us, we were hardly surprised to hear a politician talking politics – especially in the midst of an election season. But did the reflexive quality of the ensuing debate obscure a level of vitriol that was newsworthy in itself?
As the Bush administration returns to the airwaves to re-sell the Iraq war, critics continue to question how it got sold in the first place. In the new book Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War, David Corn and Michael Isikoff look at how a system of leaks and anonymous sources allowed misleading information to wend its way from the administration to the press and back again. Corn joins Brooke to discuss the lifespan of a lie.
A little under a year ago, it was revealed that the Lincoln Group had been contracted by the Pentagon to pay for good press in the Iraqi media. Details were sketchy, but this month Harper’s published an account by Willem Marx of his summer in Baghdad interning for the Lincoln Group. Marx talks to Brooke about when the news is too good, and too lucrative, to be news at all.
After an investigation into U.S. propaganda efforts in Iraq, the Pentagon decided the Lincoln Group’s efforts were not illegal. Last month, the military again called for bids for a two-year, twenty-million dollar contract for help conveying its side of the story. Bob speaks with Lieutenant Colonel Barry Johnson, spokesman for the Multi-National Forces in Iraq, about waging the war of message management.
Republican Kevin Martin was on Capitol Hill this week, at a hearing to reconfirm him as chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. Asked by Senator Barbara Boxer about an FCC study on local media ownership, Martin suggested no such report had been completed. Reporter Jessica Smith talks with Bob about the “Au, contraire!” moment.
Cable TV and the cable bandwidth that makes it possible have proved to be too popular. Once seemingly unlimited, bandwidth is a limited commodity again. Soon though, it may not matter. Video on Demand, most often used to watch special events or missed shows, is popularizing an alternative means of delivery. And, as Alex Goldmark explains, it may soon become the door through which all new channels must pass.
Slowly but surely, Congress members are waking up to the online citizenry’s ability to hold them accountable. As for the volunteer watchdogs, the reward may be more than a matter of virtue. This week, transparency advocates announced a bounty of $1000 for any person who gets their Congress member to post his or her schedule online. Bob speaks with Sunlight Foundation national director Zephyr Teachout about the “changing culture of citizenry.”
As the summer draws to a close, so does the season-long Internet mystery of lonelygirl15. Sixteen year-old “Bree” posted regular video logs about her life on YouTube, where a half-million viewers tuned in to watch what happened next. But it turns out Bree, 16, is really Jessica, 19, an aspiring actress living in Los Angeles. Brooke bids farewell to the lonely girl that never was.
Highlights from Past ShowsPresident Bush’s description and defense this week of U.S. standards for interrogating terror suspects put the issue of torture back in the news. In 2003, Abu-Ghraib caused a flurry of attention. But much of what we know about U.S. torture policies is the result of dogged reporting. Eric Umansky surveyed post-9/11 torture reporting for the Columbia Journalism Review, and tells Bob what the coverage teaches us about the press.
Yet another shoe dropped in the Valerie Plame saga this week. It seems the original source for columnist Bob Novak’s scoop wasn’t Karl Rove or Scooter Libby. According to a new book by two beltway reporting vets, it was Richard Armitage, erstwhile Deputy Secretary of State and early critic of the war plan. Which would seem to dispel the malicious intent that many journalists had ascribed to the mystery leaker. Brooke speaks with Mark Jurkowitz of the Project for Excellence in Journalism about whether the media have done the story justice.
On the Media is funded by The Bydale Foundation, The Ford Foundation, The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Overbrook Foundation.
