Journalism then and now: As Slate writer and Nixon historian David Greenberg reports in from the opening of the Watergate papers, Salon‘s Eric Boehlert surveys the strange case of “Jeff Gannon”, a.k.a. James Guckert, fake newsman for Dubya.
Tag: GOP Media
No Right-Wing Flunky Left Behind.
By way of a friend of mine, the Dubya education department gets busted subsidizing conservative commentator Armstrong Williams for good press on NCLB. I mean, really, wasn’t Fox News enough?
Up (to no good) Sinclair.
The Sinclair Broadcast Group fires their Washington bureau chief, Jon Leiberman, after he makes his displeasure about their right-wing proselytizing known to the Baltimore Sun. Whatsmore, the wingnut network is playing hardball: “Sinclair would not waive his noncompete agreement, which means he cannot work for a broadcast outlet in any market that has a Sinclair station.” Hmmm…well, two (and more) can play at that game. Update: Sinclair buckles.
Fox News One Further.
So apparently the Sinclair Broadcast Group, a right-wing-flunky television conglomerate who previously refused to air a Nightline on fallen soldiers in Iraq, will show an anti-Kerry hatchet-job on its swing state affiliates in the next two weeks. Well, I must say, that’s quite an end-run around the equal time rule, if not a blatant misuse of the public airwaves. Perhaps the FCC can extricate themselves from their shock over Janet Jackson’s breast long enough to look into this.
Bragging Right.
Medley‘s been birddogging some interesting GOP quotes lately, and she’s found another in this article on Matt Labash, senior writer for The Weekly Standard. Says Labash of his fellow cronies in the conservative media, “We’ve created this cottage industry in which it pays to be un-objective…. It’s a great way to have your cake and eat it too. Criticize other people for not being objective. Be as subjective as you want. It’s a great little racket.” Sounds like conservative flaks are suffering from what Robert Wiebe called “the illusion of fulfillment.” As with the Norquist piece last week and as this Tom Paine article notes, it’s exactly this kind of public wink-and-a-smirk about their own fraudulent gimmicks that’ll (hopefully) help bring their “racket” to an early end.