PAST & PRESENT
Despite the efforts of global warming deniers trying to muddy the waters, climate change is one of the biggest stories in the world today.
But maybe you ask, with the snowstorms that hit North America and Europe, isn’t global warming just hype?
Good question. It is wise to maintain a degree of skepticism. So is “climate change” the operative phrase here? If the science is to be believed, weather patterns are being severely disturbed by man’s pollution of the atmosphere and the overall temperature trend is upwards.
In Past & Present we take a look at how the media is tackling the subject, including the recent world climate change talks in Copenhagen.
We also take a look at another “big story” – the US presidency – and how the media has been handling Barack Obama’s first year in office. In the flurry of excitement that greeted his election, it was hard to fault the guy. But today, after the Nobel Peace Prize winning-president committed to a troop surge in Afghanistan, and fails to follow through on some of his election promises, the shine is wearing off and the media s gradually coming to grips with a presidency that will not live up to at least some people’s expectations.
Past & Present also takes a look at media coverage of wars today, media bias, and at Watergate over three decades on. Back in the 1970s, a couple of reporters and a plucky editor and publisher pushed the envelope on reporting a break-in at Democratic party headquarters, journalism that would eventually lead to the resignation of a US president. Is such dogged reporting possible today?
The World’s Biggest Story
When the Nepalese government flew by helicopter to Everest basecamp at the beginning of December, they sought to send an important message to the world. The snow and glaciers on the Roof of the World are melting fast and world leaders, meeting in Copenhagen to debate what should be done to slow down the rate of man-made global warming, should act fast to reduce the output of carbon dioxide and other gases blamed for the warming.
Reporting climate change is not easy. Amidst the chorus of climate change deniers, spurred on by what has been dubbed “ClimateGate,” making sense of the scientific data, allotting blame to man’s activities, predicting the consequences, and looking at what needs to be done to reduce the damage is a complicated affair.
Journalists need to take care to cover the good, the bad and the ugly when it comes to climate change, such as the recent move in early February by the “US’s most Republican state” to dispute the science of climate change, reported by the UK’s Guardian correspondent Suzanne Goldenberg.
Where does the truth lie? Even scientists can’t agree on how badly man’s activities are damaging the world’s environment. But despite the efforts of those who heckle Al Gore at public events, there does appear to be consensus that the planet is at a “tipping point,” that if drastic steps are not taken now to reduce the rate of carbon emissions, serious consequences for life on earth lie in store.
So big is this story that an unprecedented 56 newspapers in 45 countries came together prior to the Copenhagen meeting to co-draft an editorial warning of the profound emergency for humanity.
The following stories take a look at the media’s coverage and challenges in covering the subject of climate change:
The Copenhagen Editorial
56 newspapers in 45 countries take the unprecedented step of speaking with one voice through a common editorial. They did so, they say, because humanity faces a profound emergency.Signs of change in the Himalayas as Copenhagen summit begins
CNN Runs Report on ClimateGate, But Only Includes Guests Who Dispute ClimateGate
Journalistic Balance as Global Warming Bias
A new study has found that when it comes to U.S. media coverage of global warming, superficial balance—telling “both” sides of the story—can actually be a form of informational bias. Despite the consistent assertions of the United Nations-sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that human activities have had a “discernible” influence on the global climate and that global warming is a serious problem that must be addressed immediately, “he said/she said” reporting has allowed a small group of global warming skeptics to have their views greatly amplified.Copenhagen calls for innovative journalism
Investing in climate change journalism
Industry Ignored It’s Scientists on Climate – NYT April 23, 2009
Following Obama
If ever there was a defining moment for Nobel Peace Prize winning US President Barack Obama, it was his speech to West Point military cadets at the beginning of December when he announced a “surge” of 30,000 US troops for Afghanistan and a date of July 2011 for the start of a withdrawal.
These are testing times for the news media in the United States. The euphoria of the liberal media in welcoming Obama’s election is now giving way to doubt. And given these circumstances, can the media hold him and his team accountable?
In the following links, we look at media coverage of President Obama and also highlight some insightful coverage:
Meet the Commanded-in-Chief
“You may not think so, but on Tuesday night from the US Military Academy at West Point, in his first prime-time presidential address to the nation, Barack Obama surrendered,” according to Asia Times. “It may not have looked like that: there were no surrender documents; he wasn’t on the deck of the USS Missouri; he never bowed his head. Still, from today on, think of him not as the commander-in-chief, but as the commanded-in-chief.”Media Coverage of Obama prior to the election – Huffington Post
A look back at media coverage of Barack Obama asking whether he was the beneficiary of a biased media working on his behalf? That’s the claim implied in a study released October 31, 2007 by the Project for Excellence in Journalism and the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy. According to the study called “The Invisible Primary-Invisible No Longer,” during the first five months of 2007, Obama received by far the most positive coverage of any presidential candidate.Obama’s positive coverage slips
Obama’s media offensive – Washington Post
What happened to the media’s crush on President Obama? In the second 100 days of his administration, the majority of press coverage was bad, with the president’s policy proposals receiving more criticism than praise from reporters, according to U.S. News & World Report.With Obama in office, Fox News finds its stride
How the media made this summer’s political insanity inevitable – Media Matters for America
The most striking aspect of this summer’s political insanity isn’t the frothing at the mouth of a loud minority of Republicans that President Obama is a secret Kenyan bent on subjecting an unwitting American public to government death panels, or the mass confusion among the rest of the public about health care reform, says Jamison Fraser at Media Matters for America.About that Pew Research Center study that claimed Obama gets great press – Media Matters for America
It’s the one conservatives, and even Beltway pundits, are still crowing about as definitive proof that the press has swooned over Obama; that it refuses to write critically about the new president. That the press has a liberal bias.Bush’s third term, you’re living it
It sounds like the plot for the latest summer horror movie. Imagine, for a moment, that George W Bush had been allowed a third term as president, had run and had won or stolen it, and that we were all now living (and dying) through it. Maybe, says David Swanson, Obama’s present term is little different than Bush taking a third term …Journalist John Pilger on Obama – 2009
Australian journalist and documentary maker John Pilger is never one to skirt around an issue. In this video clip from a meeting in San Francisco in July 2009, Pilger questions the public persona of US President Obama, claiming he is a corporate marketing creation.War is peace. Ignorance is strength – New Statesman story on Obama
Endless Wars
In the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States, President George W. Bush and his allies launched into a “War on Terror” that saw the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.
It is safe to say that the mainstream Western media failed miserably in their coverage of the Bush government’s reasons for invading Iraq and the “gung-ho” way many approached the invasion.
Eight years on, there are still questions about Western media coverage and the many unanswered questions over 9/11, the reasons for war, and how to deal with terrorism.
The following articles examine the Western media coverage of terrorism and the US-led wars in Afghanistan and Iraq:
Foreign Policy story on media coverage of Afghanistan – Tough questions nobody wants to ask
Over the last few years, castigating the media for its failure to examine the case for war in Iraq, simply accepting the Bush administration’s facts and rationales, has become something of a cottage industry, according to Morton Abramowitz. You might think, given the fuss over Iraq, that the media and its critics would be zealously examining our stepped-up efforts in Afghanistan — one of the most extraordinary, difficult, and costly ventures of American foreign policy. But, for the most part, they are not.
Salon story – Iraq: Why the media failed -
Afraid to challenge America’s leaders or conventional wisdom about the Middle East, a toothless press collapsed
It’s no secret that the period of time between 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq represents one of the greatest collapses in the history of the American media. Every branch of the media failed, from daily newspapers, magazines and Web sites to television networks, cable channels and radio. I’m not going to go into chapter and verse about the media’s specific failures, its credulousness about aluminum tubes and mushroom clouds and failure to make clear that Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11 — they’re too well known to repeat. In any case, the real failing was not in any one area; it was across the board. Bush administration lies and distortions went unchallenged, or were actively promoted. Fundamental and problematic assumptions about terrorism and the “war on terror” were rarely debated or even discussed. Vital historical context was almost never provided. And it wasn’t just a failure of analysis. With some honorable exceptions, good old-fashioned reporting was also absent. – By Gary Kamiya
Fifty Questions on 9/11
It’s eight years since the fateful day when terror struck at the heart of the United States. The rebranded “global war on terror” still rages, with the epicenter now back where it began, in Afghanistan.
After all these years, unanswered questions remain over both the events of September 11, and what followed; they’re food for serious reflection.
None of these questions has been convincingly answered – according to the official narrative. It’s up to US civil society to keep up the pressure. Eight years after the fact, one fundamental conclusion is imperative. The official narrative edifice of 9/11 is simply not acceptable.
A different take on the Lockerbie bombing
Media Bias
There has never been a time when it could be said that the media was unbiased. Although many journalists would claim they try to be objective in their reporting, the newspaper or broadcaster they work for may well have a particular bias or viewpoint. Today that bias appears at times to be flaunted – just look at the contrast between say the Huffington Post and The Daily Beast – they almost shout it in their website colors.
The following videos take a look at modern-day media bias:
Media Bias Press Conference – June 24, 2009
Gil Smart notes how the media has jumped to the defense of Fox News in a misguided attempt to show that they, too, can be “fair and balanced” – October 2009
Internet & the Blogosphere
We’re hooked! Chances are that if you are reading this, you get a lot of your information and daily news from the Internet. But it is not hard to see in the competitive no-holds-barred world of cyberspace that grabbing readers and viewers attention has as much to do with entertainment as providing information of real value. In such an environment, what makes hot news and what grabs people’s attention? And how is journalism changing to adapt to this new media?
A rat and an outburst dominate the blogosphere
What really makes news has as much to do with entertainment and the “wow!” factor as real importance.
Journalism has improved in the Internet age, say media professionalsA positive spin on the state of journalism as it comes to grip with the Internet.
Growing up online – PBS video
Wondering what young people are doing cooped up in their bedrooms glued to their computer? Check out this series of videos on the pros and cons of the Internet generation hooked to the web, their phones and online games.
Internet addiction center opens in US
The Googlenet has you
US relinquishes control of the Internet
Watergate Today
Luckily there are newspapers that still pursue investigative journalism, the kind highlighted by the Washington Post’s coverage of the Watergate break in the early 1970s – dogged work that eventually led to the resignation of a US president. But with the falling profitability of newspapers and the layoffs and cutbacks, can the media today keep sufficient checks on government and business?
The following links offer an insight into the Watergate Story, a classic tale of dogged journalism that some would say is hard to replicate today.
Many journalism students were inspired by the story and Robert Redford’s movie, and it still remains on the curriculum of many college journalism courses.
Could We Uncover Watergate Today? – By Leonard Downie Jr.
Could the kind of reporting that Woodward and Carl Bernstein pulled off be done today, more than three decades later, in the age of the Internet?
The Watergate Story – Washington Post
Woodward and Bernstein papers – Watergate
Nixon Tapes
FBI Freedom of Information Act documents
Seymour M. Hersh on Watergate
Vanity Fair article – “I’m the guy they called Deep Throat”
Bob Woodward website
Carl Bernstein website
Reel Journalism – All the President’s Men – Carl Bernstein looks back
In newly declassified recordings (2008), President Richard Nixon and his aide Charles W. Colson can be heard discussing the administration’s relations with the Washington Post as the Watergate investigation proceeded.
Deep Throat remembered
