Category: Media

What does the future hold for CNN?

Posted by dcrim – August 2, 2012

CNN, the revolutionary cable news network created by Ted Turner, has been floundering in the ratings in recent years — although it remains a moneymaker for parent company Time Warner. CEO Jim Walton has announced he is stepping down. Michael Wolff of The Guardian wonders what, if anything, could possibly put the channel back on track?

Writes Wolff: Because what’s wrong with CNN is what’s wrong with Time Warner, its owner. And what’s wrong with CNN is what’s wrong with television news. And even if you acknowledge what’s wrong with it, that does not mean that there is any real upside in fixing it.

Click here for the story.

Gingrich is latest anybody-but-Romney candidate

Posted by dcrim – November 30, 2011

Embattled presidential candidate Herman Cain is claiming a “groundswell of positive support” from backers even as allegations of a 13-year extra-marital affair raises questions about his campaign’s viability, which apparently means he plans to stay in the GOP race for now.

Maureen Dowd of the New York Times somewhat sarcastically opines that maybe Newt Gingrich is the ideal man to fix Washington’s dysfunction because he is the one who made it dysfunctional. “He broke it so he should own it,” Dowd writes. Click here for the column.

Meanwhile, columnist Roger Simon, writes that this has been The Year of Living Dangerously in politics. And he blames the media.

The media have driven it. Faced with an incumbent president running a careful and as yet uninspiring campaign, and a Republican field as dynamic as wet laundry drying on the line, the press has felt obliged to step up and fill the void.

Click here for the column.

Finally, Politico offers this political cheat sheet.

The Kennedy assassination, 48 years later

Posted by dcrim – November 22, 2011

Today is the 48th anniversary of that awful day in Dallas. Below is the initial television report from Walter Cronkite. James  Piereson, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and the author of “Camelot and the Cultural Revolution: How the Assassination of John F. Kennedy Shattered American Liberalism,” takes issue with a recent book on the JFK assassination.

These were the myths, illusions, and outright fabrications in which the Kennedy assassination came to be encrusted. Despite all evidence to the contrary, they are still widely believed. In fact, the Kennedy legend, incorporating the myths about his assassination, is closely intertwined with the history of modern liberalism: JFK has come to represent a liberal ideal and his assassination the threat posed to it by the forces of the far right.

Click here for the story.

What’s a little insider trading among colleagues?

Posted by dcrim – November 14, 2011

Just when you thought insider trading was illegal …

Steve Kroft reported Sunday night on “60 Minutes” that members of Congress and their aides have regular access to powerful political intelligence, and many have made well-timed stock market trades in the very industries they regulate. For now, Kroft said, the practice is perfectly legal, but some say it’s time for the law to change.

As the Washington Post noted, the story exposed, among others, then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for participating in a lucrative initial public offering from Visa in 2008 that was not available to the general public, just as a troublesome piece of legislation that would have hurt credit card companies began making its way through the House (the bill never made it to the floor). And it showed how during the 2008 financial crisis, Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-Ala.) — then-ranking Republican on the House Financial Services Committee — aggressively bought stock options based on apocalyptic briefings he had received the day before from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson.

The report was based on a new book by Peter Schweizer that will hit stores on Tuesday. It’s called “Throw Them All Out: How Politicians and Their Friends Get Rich off Insider Stock Tips, Land Deals, and Cronyism That Would Send the Rest of Us to Prison.” (Kinda long, but you get the point.)

Click here for the “60 Minutes” report.

Report shows professionals cashing in on tea party push

Posted by dcrim – October 3, 2011

A look at some of todays stories while wondering how the Cardinals overcame a 4-0 deficit against Cliff Lee:

If you’ve got fundraising muscle, it pays to be tea party. That’s the takeaway from recently released financial reports for five of the biggest conservative groups that latched onto the small government movement, according to Politico. The groups – Americans for Prosperity, FreedomWorks, Club for Growth, Leadership Institute and Tea Party Express – raised $79 million last year. That’s a 61-percent increase from their haul in 2009, when the tea party first started gaining traction, and an 88 percent increase over their tally in 2008, according to a POLITICO review of campaign reports and newly released tax filings.

Writes Kenneth P. Vogel:

It’s an entirely different story for the rag-tag local groups that form the heart of the tea party, which struggle to raise cash.

The imbalance is worrisome to some grassroots tea party activists, who warn that the movement is at risk of becoming dependent on the type of centralized, top-down political structure that contributed to tea partiers’ distaste for both political parties, as well as Washington’s conservative establishment.

Former NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Fran Tarkenton excoriated teachers unions in a Monday Wall Street Journal editorial that envisions what would happen if some of America’s education policies were applied to the football field.

America’s favorite curmudgeon delivered his final rant on Sunday’s ‘60 Minutes’ after 62 years at CBS News. From grumbling over Bill Gates to moaning about his eyebrows and bellyaching over mixed nuts, see Andy Rooney’s best essays.

On hurricane hype, root of economic crisis and Dick Cheney

Posted by dcrim – August 31, 2011

Howard Kurtz of the Daily Beast echoes my sentiments on the cable TV coverage of Hurricane Irene last weekend.

Brian Domitrovic writes in Forbes that we should not be mired in economic malaise today; rather, we should be enjoying a fourth decade of prosperity on the heels of the roaring 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s. He points to what caused the decade of decline.

Time magazine says former Vice President Dick Cheney is rewriting a little history in his just-released memoir.

Cartoonists’ views of the news

Posted by dcrim – July 21, 2011

Jon Stewart on the midnight ride of Sarah Palin

Posted by dcrim – June 7, 2011

Kurtz: NPR management has become its own worst enemy

Posted by dcrim – March 21, 2011

Howard Kurtz, writing for Newsweek, says conservative attacks aren’t killing National Public Radio. Rather, it’s the network’s lack of strategy that is doing it in. Click here for the story.

AT&T’s surprise $39-billion acquisition of T-Mobile USA Inc. could lead to more consolidation in the U.S wireless industry, leaving the market with just two dominant providers — and the prospect of higher rates and fewer choices for consumers. Click here for the story.

Political mantra: Never let facts get in the way of a good story

Posted by dcrim – March 4, 2011

It seems being loose with the truth is becoming contagious. In its never-ending quest to separate fact from fiction, Politifact offers these nuggets:

• Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, now a commentator on Fox News and a potential Republican presidential candidate for 2012, said earlier this week while hawking his new book that President Barack Obama grew up in Kenya. Check the facts here.

• Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, locked in a budget battle with unions and Democratic senators, said the state is broke. Check the facts here.

• Fox News commentator Glenn Beck, no stranger to wild and unsubstantiated comments, said Michelle Obama has 43 people on her staff, compared to just three for Nancy Reagan. Check the facts here.