President Obama has presided over one of the most opaque administrations in history, even worse than the Bush administration that was so bad that Obama’s promise to have the most transparent administration ever was greeted with great hope and optimism by advocates of open and clean government. [Read more…]
My knowledge of TV talking heads is somewhat scattershot, largely dependent on the video clips that come my way when I am surfing the web, usually in relation to news stories. I was vaguely familiar with the name Nancy Grace as a former lawyer as a legal analyst on cable news, but that was about it. So when in response to a post commenter Crudely Wrott said of her that she “seems to thrive on, no, display an actual need for, human suffering and callous, horrific crime. Like a vampire’s dependence on blood”, I thought it was perhaps a tad harsh. [Read more…]
A few days ago, I came across an amusing news item. Cable news teams had all rushed to Phoenix, Arizona to cover the impending verdict in the Jodi Arias murder trial which had inexplicably become a national obsession, when the sensational news from Cleveland about the dramatic rescue of the three kidnapped women and the child broke, and they found themselves having to cover both. [Read more…]
As police release more and more information on the decade-long captivity of the three women in Cleveland, the story has, as was feared, got uglier and uglier. I cannot bear to read the stories beyond the headlines, except to wonder yet again what it says about us that such a thing could happen for so long under our very noses. I am a believer of minding one’s own business but have we gone too far in that direction, and as a consequence now tend to ignore signs of trouble for fear of being seen as nosy and interfering in the lives of our neighbors? [Read more…]
Today is when the annual White House Correspondents Association dinner is held, when the cozy and incestuous relationship between the political and media class is on public display. The curtain that normally hides this and enables the media to portray itself as watchdogs of politicians is stripped away and we see that they are actually lap dogs, eager to be on good terms with those whom they are supposedly antagonistic towards. [Read more…]
Yesterday CNN had a terrible news day, first reporting that a suspect had been arrested in connection with the Boston marathon bombings and then having to retract the story. You can see the time sequence of the CNN debacle here. [Read more…]
I had to eat alone at a restaurant on Monday and so took along something to read while waiting for my food. But as is the annoying custom these days, they had a TV on in a corner of the room, which can be a huge distraction. Fortunately the TV was far enough away that I could not hear it but I noticed that they seemed to be showing live coverage of a trial. I was puzzled because I follow the news fairly closely and could not recall reading about any major court case that would warrant gavel-to-gavel live coverage. [Read more…]
Yvonne Brill died recently. She was a highly respected rocket scientist who received the National Medal of Technology and Innovation in 2011 from president Obama and was noteworthy enough to merit an obituary in the New York Times. Also noteworthy was the fact that the obituary also focused on her sterling qualities as a mother, wife, and cook, as if her ability to combine the mundane duties of everyday life with her scientific work was her main achievement. [Read more…]
Noam Chomsky is one of the world’s great public intellectuals.
Growing up in Sri Lanka, I would find his articles and essays in the mainstream media quite regularly. But when I first came to the US in 1975, I found him completely absent from the major print and TV media and discovered that his writings were confined to niche publications. This is of course because the Vietnam war galvanized Chomsky from being a towering figure in the field of linguistics into also being a severe critic of injustices everywhere, especially of his own government. In addition, he has shown how the mainstream media in the US has been complicit in the crimes committed by the US government and those of its client states. [Read more…]
Readers may recall that about a month or so ago I expressed my extreme annoyance with those who pretended to have a spectacular fall in supermarkets, breaking gallon jugs of milk and juice and other things, creating a mess, spattering people nearby, and making fools of the people who expressed concern that they might be hurt and tried to help them. They would have an accomplice who recorded the events and posted it on YouTube. [Read more…]