Mainstream Media

No Country for Candid Commentators

By Justin Katz | October 22, 2010 |

It was yesterday’s big news online, so it’ll surely be in the paper today: Long-time NPR political analyst Juan Williams has been fired for comments that he made while a guest on Bill O’Reilly’s show: The move came after Mr. Williams, who is also a Fox News political analyst, appeared on the “The O’Reilly Factor”…

Healthcare “Huh” for Today

By Justin Katz | October 11, 2010 |

The article’s a couple of weeks old, but it’s still worth noting a bit of writing that I don’t think Projo journalist Felice Freyer or her editors would have allowed into print if they weren’t fundamentally in favor of government healthcare: The increases will pay for the coverage of dependents through age 26 and preventive…

Cynthia Needfacts and the Politiham Feature

By Justin Katz | October 10, 2010 |

Frankly, if the folks behind the Providence Journal’s PolitiFact feature wish not to lose entirely the salable premise thereof — its neutrality — mere months from its introduction, they should ban Cynthia Needham from touching the Truth-O-Meter. Monique made mention of Needham’s take-down of Republican Congressional candidate John Loughlin, last week, but the matter deserves…

We Don’t Need Intellectual Chaperones

By Justin Katz | October 4, 2010 |

Although I’m sympathetic to dislike of the e-reader technology that is displacing print media, it is most definitely not for the reason that Dan Bloom enunciates: Well, be careful what you wish for. Frankenpapers might turn out to be another turn in the screw that seals the decline of the republic. Think about it. With…

Only One Side Counts

By Justin Katz | October 3, 2010 |

I’ve been meaning to note Bob Kerr’s continued function as the elder statesman who says what the younger folks must strive to keep to themselves at the Providence Journal. Here’s the crux of his Wednesday column: You might remember protest. It’s an honored American tradition. It’s how this whole thing got started. People speak out…

Rating of John Loughlin on Social Security: PolitiFact’s Truth-O-Meter Earns Itself a “Pants on Fire”

By Monique Chartier | October 3, 2010 |

The “Truth”-O-Meter in today’s Providence Journal rates Congressional candidate John Loughlin’s comparison of social security to a Ponzi scheme as “False”. Let’s take a look, shall we? Here’s the definition of a Ponzi scheme. A Ponzi scheme is an investment fraud that involves the payment of purported returns to existing investors from funds contributed by…

Plenty of Anti-GOP News, Still No DOJ News

By Justin Katz | September 28, 2010 |

As of Monday’s edition, the Providence Journal had still not deigned to mention Congressional testimony about racial bias in Obama’s Department of Justice. Indeed, yesterday’s paper revisited the apparently more-important testimony of comedian Stephen Colbert that migrant farm workers do work that a Hollywood celebrity might find arduous. Curiously, as well, Sunday’s paper featured an…

Willingly Distracted from the Real News

By Justin Katz | September 27, 2010 |

Before it actually occurred, many in the blogosphere speculated that Congressional testimony by comedian Stephen Colbert was intended to distract from concurrent testimony. If that was the case, from the perspective of mainstream media, the ploy clearly worked. Saturday’s Providence Journal, for example, dutifully covered the “controversy” over the Colbert performance. Unless I’ve missed it,…

Democrat PR as Editorial

By Justin Katz | September 18, 2010 |

Perhaps it shouldn’t seem odd, but it’s still discouraging to see the editorial board of the state’s major daily paper offer up partisan spin as an unsigned editorial. Consider: The GOP argues that extending the tax cuts for the affluent is good for small business, which creates most new jobs. The Democrats, pointing to dismal…

The Wrong Kind of Terrorist

By Justin Katz | September 6, 2010 |

It’s interesting that this AP article by Sarah Brumfield withholds until the last quarter the information that James Lee actually wanted more extreme environmentalist programming on the Discovery Channel: A man who railed against the Discovery Channel’s environmental programming for years burst into the company’s headquarters with at least one explosive device strapped to his…