It’s Sunshine Week in America: a seven-day focus from the American Society of News Editors and Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press on “access to public information and what it means for you and your community.” One doesn’t have to be a reporter (and bloggers, for example, are not reporters) to understand the importance…
Press
Bad Ideas, CDA, Corporate Welfare, Economics, Economy, Government Spending, Local Government, Newspapers, Press, Press Release, State Capitalism, That Which Paved the Way
The Middle Lane is a Dirt Road to Decay, Pt. 2
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Last month, this site linked to media critic Margaret Sullivan’s observation that The media feel safest in the middle lane. Just ask Jeff Flake, John Kasich and Howard Schultz: Who is the media’s middle-lane approach actually good for? Not the public, certainly, since readers and viewers would benefit from strong viewpoints across the full spectrum…
Babbittry, Newspapers, Press, That Which Paved the Way
Hedge Funds Have No Table Manners Whatever
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Brian Stelter writes Gannett journalists anxious amid report that Digital First Media is circling the company: Cara Lombardo’s unsettling Sunday night scoop for the WSJ: “A hedge-fund-backed media group known for buying up struggling local papers and cutting costs is planning to make an offer for USA Today publisher Gannett, according to people familiar with the…
Newspapers, Press, Television, Trump
Press Coverage of Trump Isn’t Too Hard, It’s Too Soft
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
David Frum’s right — Relative to the truth, the prestige press in this country has a pro-Trump bias. Relative to the truth, Trump gets easier coverage than he deserves.
America, City, Freedom of Speech, Law, Liberty, Local Government, New Media, Newspapers, Politics, Press, Resistance, That Which Paved the Way, Trump
‘A Free Press Needs You’
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Following Trump’s repeated attacks on the press as the enemy of the people, hundreds of publications across America are today uniting in a defense of their right to free expression. The editorial board of the New York Times, in A Free Press Needs You, describes our heritage and the threat to it: In 1787, the…
Immigration, Liberty, Misconduct, Press, Race
Detained, Unaccompanied Minors Discouarged from Talking About Their Conditions
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Exclusive: Unaccompanied children are cautioned not to speak with reporters about their situation pic.twitter.com/kE3fiMV7FD — Maddow Blog (@MaddowBlog) June 26, 2018 “If for whatever reason you talk to a reporter, you know what’s going to happen to your case?” the woman is heard saying in Spanish. “It is going to be on the news, and…
City, Conflicts of Interest, Local Government, Press, That Which Paved the Way
Before Devin Nunes, in Whitewater & Small Towns Across America…
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
One reads that GOP Congressman Devin Nunes of California has launched his own news site: LOS ANGELES — House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, a relentless critic of the media, has found a way around the often unflattering coverage of his role in the Trump-Russia investigation — by operating his own partisan news outlet. Resembling…
Newspapers, Politics, Press, That Which Paved the Way
Small-Town News and “The Value of Accuracy”
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Over at The Atlantic, David Beard writes about The Libraries Bringing Small-Town News Back to Life. The story’s not, to my mind, a recommendation that Whitewater’s library should publish a news site – Whitewater has digital and print publications in town and nearby. The story’s interesting for how important accuracy is to news publishing: When…
America, Books, Culture, Politics, Press
Reading Next: Truth Decay (‘An Initial Exploration of the Diminishing Role of Facts and Analysis in American Public Life’)
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
I’m currently reading Michael Wolff’s Fire and Fury on the Trump campaign & administration. (FW has a currently reading widget on the right sidebar of this website.) Afterward, I’ve something in queue, from Jennifer Kavanagh and Michael D. Rich – their just-published Truth Decay: An Initial Exploration of the Diminishing Role of Facts and Analysis…
Newspapers, Open Government, Press
Twilight (Part 1 of a Series)
by JOHN ADAMS • • 2 Comments
One reads that the Janesville Gazette is activating a full-site paywall (three free articles a month, day pass for a dollar, Facebook comment authorization, etc.). The stated reason is that the Gazette needs money (“Digital advertising and marketing don’t generate enough revenue to cover the expenses of our local journalism”). A few observations: 1. Private…
Babbittry, Culture, Development, Economy, Janesville, Local Government, Newspapers, Poverty, Press
‘Don’t worry about them – the rest of us feel great!‘
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
A doctor walks into a town of one-hundred people, and finds that half of them are pale, feverish, and vomiting blood. The physician calls out to a community leader, “Send for help, you have an epidemic on your hands.” The community leader replies, “Oh no, don’t worry about them – the rest of us feel…
Blogging, Newspapers, Politics, Press, That Which Paved the Way
‘Backed themselves into this corner’
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
There are local versions of the problem Fox News now faces as a flack for Trump. First, the Fox situation, then the local equivalent — Nationally, the Daily Beast website writes of remarks from a former Fox News contributor & panelist: [Andy] Levy, who served for 10 years as “ombudsman” and nightly panelist on Fox…
Mendacity, Press, Television, Trump
‘This is an Apple’
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
“Some people might try to tell you that it’s a banana.” #FactsFirst pic.twitter.com/LbmRKiGJe9 — CNN (@CNN) October 23, 2017 I haven’t watched CNN in years, to be honest, but their promotional advertisement about Trump’s alternative facts outlook is spot on. It’s more common for me to read than to watch cable news, but my two…
Culture, Newspapers, Politics, Press
Media Dependency
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Concerning national publications, Eliana Johnson describes How Trump Blew Up the Conservative Media. Her observation on this point has local relevancy (both about and apart from Trump). Here’s Johnson’s key observation: “For the 89 percent of Republican voters who cast ballots for Trump, their backing represented a departure from many of the principles that have…