WisconsinEye is an online and cable network that broadcasts and publishes videos of state government meetings. It’s a useful nonprofit service, that has run on private donations. As donations are drying up, WisconsinEye president Jon Henkes has a two-part plan: erect a paywall (for content older than a day) and seek state funding. Patrick Marley…
Television
Television, Trump
The Cultural Universe of Trump TV
by JOHN ADAMS •
Coronavirus, Medicine, Public Health, Television
Dr. Rishi Desai Delivers the Truth to Fox News Viewers
by JOHN ADAMS •
The best part of this is the awkward silence from the @foxnews host after Dr. Desai speaks the truth. pic.twitter.com/TqtEumFuLy — Steve Hall (@being_steve) April 2, 2020 Ed Mazza reports that A doctor’s no-holds-barred analysis of coronavirus testing shortcomings is going viral – not just because of his blunt talk but because of where he made…
City, Demographics, Television
Broadband Gaps
by JOHN ADAMS •
There’s a story over at Wisconsin Watch that reports on the broadband gap in rural Wisconsin communities. Peter Cameron reports Broadband gap leaves rural Wisconsin behind during coronavirus crisis (‘Wisconsin’s dearth of high-speed internet in rural areas makes virtual schooling, remote health care and working from home even more difficult’): Already, Wisconsin lags behind the…
Coronavirus, Public Health, Television
Frontline: Covering Coronavirus in Cremona, Italy
by JOHN ADAMS •
A reporter’s emotional journey back to her homeland in Italy, now the global epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak. “I never thought that I would be making a film like this in Italy,” says FRONTLINE correspondent Sasha Achilli. “I feel immensely proud of the way that the Italian doctors are doing everything they can.” Italy’s doctors, she says,…
Coronavirus, Mendacity, Public Health, Television
They Protected Themselves. They Lied to You.
by JOHN ADAMS •
Embed from Getty Images In the first 10 days of March, some of the commentators on Fox News and Fox Business played down the threat of what would soon be recognized as a pandemic. Many of the networks’ elderly, pro-Trump viewers responded to the coverage and the president’s public statements by taking the virus less seriously than…
Coronavirus, Mendacity, Public Health, Television
Fox & Fiends
by JOHN ADAMS •
Democrats, Elections, Never Trump, Politics, Presidential race 2020, Republicans, Television, Trump
The Unexpected (But Welcome) Never-Trump Haven @ MSNBC
by JOHN ADAMS •
Culture, Politics, Sloth, Television
Preparedness
by JOHN ADAMS •
Chris Matthews of MSNBC resigned (was pushed out, truly) on Monday night. Much has been made – rightly – of how his comments about his female guests made him unsuitable for his role. In the Washington Post, Margaret Sullivan raises a second objection, worth considering, to Matthews’s work: he was too-often unprepared. Sullivan writes that…
America, History, Television, Wisconsin
On the American Experience: McCarthy
by JOHN ADAMS •
Tonight, on the American Experience on PBS, an episode on Sen. Joe McCarthy: McCarthy chronicles the rise and fall of Joseph McCarthy, the Wisconsin senator who came to power after a stunning victory in an election no one thought he could win. Once in office, he declared that there was a vast conspiracy threatening America…
Politics, Television, Trump
Jay Rosen Considers the Inconsiderable Chuck Todd
by JOHN ADAMS •
Jay Rosen of NYU writes about Chuck Todd’s three-years-too-late grasp of contemporary politics: ‘Round midnight on Christmas eve, Rolling Stone posted a short interview with Chuck Todd, host of “the longest running show on television,” NBC’s Meet the Press. Its contents were explosive, embarrassing, enraging, and just plain weird. Three years after Kellyanne Conway introduced the doctrine of “alternative…
City, Television
Tuesday, December 10th, 12:30 PM @ Seniors in the Park, A Holiday Program of Three Classic TV Shows
by JOHN ADAMS •
This Tuesday, December 10th at 12:30 PM, there will be a showing of three classic television shows (during a program of two hours in length) @ Seniors in the Park, in the Starin Community Building: “Twas the Night Before Christmas,” a Honeymooners version of “The Gift of the Magi,” originally telecast live in black-and-white on December…
Alt-Right, America, Authoritarianism, Babbittry, Bigotry, Boosterism, Economy, Herrenvolk, Impeachment, Mendacity, Television, That Which Paved the Way, Trump, Trump-Russia, Unfit
Fox News Won’t Be Enough
by JOHN ADAMS •
It’s a sound position to focus criticism of Trumpism on Trump, His Inner Circle, Principal Surrogates, and Media Defenders. This sometimes includes Trumpism Down to the Local Level. (Those local officials across America who have this past decade spread sugary lies of boosterism during the Great Recession, during its aftermath, and during the opioid crisis are contemptibly…
City, Local Government, Open Government, Television
Whitewater’s Channel 990
by JOHN ADAMS •
Update 1, Tuesday morning: Channel 990 is televising properly again. Here’s my original email, and a reply from Whitewater’s city manager, Cameron Clapper. (See also a message below from Kristin Mickelson, Whitewater’s PR & Communications Manager.) Original email: Good morning, City Manager Clapper. I hope this note finds you well, and enjoying a snow day in Whitewater.…