Where do People turn for News?

May Update

I wrote a post in March comparing the audience sizes of various sources of news. 

 

Since then, I have found data that is more representative (Evening News, Morning Shows, Sunday News Shows), more recent (Newspapers, Cable News, Talk Radio), and covers new categories (Opinion Magazines, News Magazines, Television News Magazines). 

 

Only at Truth Matters can someone compare the viewership of news across so many diverse mediums. 

 

Inclusion on this list is only meant to show the reach of a news source, not to comment on its credibility or value.

Opinion Magazines

The following numbers represent the average circulation of weekly opinion news magazines for 2010.

My Source: Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism, 2011 State of the News Media

Original Source: Audit Bureau of Circulations

1.  National Review                                                                             203,085

2. The Nation                                                                                      146,602

3. The Weekly Standard                                                                       99,033

          PBS

The following statistic represents the average daily viewership of the PBS Newshour for the month of March 2011. Obtained from PBS through the Huffington Post.  

PBS Newshour                                                                              1,100,000

 

 

 

 

     

Comedy Central

The following numbers represent the average daily viewership of Comedy Central’s satirical news shows for the month of May 2011. These numbers come from the website TV by the Numbers which obtained them from a Comedy Central Press release.

The Daily Show                                                              2,300,000

The Colbert Report                                                         1,600,000

 

 

 

 

Newspapers

The following numbers represent the average weekday circulation of the largest US newspapers. The data was compiled by the Audit Bureau of Circulations which studied the period from October 2010-March 2011, accessed through the Huffington Post.

1. The Wall Street Journal                                                              2,117,796       

2. USA Today                                                                                    1,829,099     

3. The New York Times                                                                       916,911        

4. Los Angeles Times                                                                          605,243

5. San Jose Mercury News                                                                577,665

            (includes all of MediaNews’ Bay Area papers combined)        

 

6. The Washington Post                                                                    550,821       

7. New York Daily News                                                                    530,924        

8. New York Post                                                                                522,874           

9. Chicago Tribune                                                                             437,205  

10. Chicago Sun Times                                                                      419,409         

 

18. St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times                                                        292,441          

19. The Oregonian of Portland                                                        260,248 

 

 

 

 

 

Cable News

Although never explicitly stated on my source, Huffington Post, the following numbers represent the daily average viewership of the top 30 cable news shows in the month of April. The original source was not stated, but it was likely Neilson ratings.

1. The O’Reilly Factor                                                              2,925,000

2. Hannity                                                                                  2,059,000

3. Special Report with Bret Baier                                              1,970,000

4. Glenn Beck                                                                             1,867,000

5. Fox Report with Shepard Smith                                              1,724,000

6. On the Record with Greta van Susteren                                  1,698,000

7. Your World with Neil Cavuto                                                  1,344,000

8. The O’Reilly Factor (11 PM Repeat)                                       1,237,000

9. America’s Newsroom                                                               1,212,000

10. America Live                                                                          1,119,000

11. Studio B                                                                                  1,089,000

12. The Rachel Maddow Show                                                     1,039,000

13. Fox and Friends                                                                       1,027,000

14. The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell                                 958,000

15. Happening Now                                                                          942,000

16. The Ed Show                                                                               825,000

17. Anderson Cooper 360                                                                  706,000

18. Hardball with Chris Matthews                                                     664,000

19. Piers Morgan Tonight                                                                   625,000

20. The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer                                         600,000

21. The Last Word (repeat)                                                                 531,000

21. CNN Newsroom                                                                            531,000

23. AC 360 (repeat)                                                                             525,000

24. John King USA                                                                             523,000

25. In the Arena                                                                                  515,000

26. Nancy Grace                                                                                 464,000

27. Morning Joe                                                                                  455,000

28. The Daily Rundown                                                                      436,000

29. MSNBC Live                                                                                 393,000

30. Red Eye                                                                                        387,000

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                                        

News Magazines

 

 

The following numbers represent the average circulation of weekly news magazines in the year 2010. My Source: Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism, 2011 State of the News Media

Original Source: Audit Bureau of Circulations

1.  Time                                                                                                3,313,715

2. Newsweek                                                                                        1,578,691

3. US News and World Report                                                             1,073,292

4. The New Yorker                                                                               1,029,742

5.  The Economist                                                                                    828,181

6. The Week                                                                                             517,187

7. The Atlantic                                                                                         476,517

Sunday News Shows

 

The following numbers represent the average viewership for the Sunday News Shows for the first quarter (January-March) of 2011. My Source: TV Newser. The Original Source was not listed, but I assume it was Neilson ratings.

1.       Meet the Press                                 NBC                                      3,520,000

2.       Face the Nation                                CBS                                      3,000,000

3.       This Week                                       ABC                                       2,600,000

4.       Fox News Sunday                           Fox News                               1,350,000

 

 

 

 

 

 

Morning Shows

 

The following numbers represent the daily average viewership of the network morning shows in 2010.

 

My Source: Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism, 2011 State of the News Media

 

Original Source: Neilson Media Research

1.       Today                                           NBC                              5,300,000

2.       Good Morning America              ABC                               4,300,000

3.       The Early Show                           CBS                                2,900,000

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Evening News

 

The following numbers represent the average daily evening news viewership for the three network news networks for 2010. 

 

My Source: Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism, 2011 State of the News Media

 

Original Source: Neilson Media Research

1.       NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams                                  8,500,000

2.       ABC World News with Diane Sawyer                                      7,430,000

3.       CBS Evening News with Katie Couric                                      5,650,000

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Television News Magazines

Several Network News shows were written to imitate the style of journalism found in Magazines. The following numbers represent the average nightly viewership for various television news magazines in 2010. 

 

My Source: Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism, 2011 State of the News Media

 

Original Source: Nielsen Media Research

1. 60 minutes                                                                            11,700,000

2. Dateline Friday                                                                       6,000,000

3. 48 hours mystery                                                                    5,600,000

4. 20/20                                                                                      5,500,000

5. Dateline Sunday                                                                     4,500,000

6. Nightline                                                                                 3,700,000

 

 

 

 

National Public Radio

 

The following numbers represent the weekly audience for NPR’s news shows. As these are weekly, as opposed to daily, audience sizes, they are not directly comparable to most other categories listed in this post. My Source: The New York Review of Books. The original source was not listed.

1.       Morning Edition                                                     13,000,000

2.       All Things Considered                                           13,000,000

 

 

 

 

 

 

Talk Radio

 

The following numbers represent the cumulative weekly audience of various talk radio hosts. As these are weekly, as opposed to daily, viewership values, they are not directly comparable to most other categories listed in this post. 

 

My Source: TALKERS magazine

 

Original Source: Arbitron, among others

1.   The Rush Limbaugh Show                                                               15,000,000

2.   The Sean Hannity Show                                                                   14,000,000

3.   The Glenn Beck Program                                                                   9,000,000

3.  The Savage Nation                                                                               9,000,000

5.  The Mark Levin Show                                                                         8,500,000

5.  Dave Ramsey                                                                                       8,500,000

7.  Neal Boortz                                                                                          6,000,000

7.  Laura Ingraham                                                                                    6,000,000

17.  The Alan Colmes Radio Show                                                           2,750,000

17.  The Ed Shultz Show                                                                           2,750,000

 

 

 

 

 

Other Statistics

 

For comparison’s sake, relevant numbers about the United States are listed below.

Population of the United States:                                           307,006,550

2010 Voting Eligible Population:                                          218,054,301

2010 Voter Turnout:                                                                 41.6%

Number of people who voted in the 2010 election:                 90,682,968

2008 Voter Turnout:                                                              62.2%

Number of people who voted in the 2008 election:              132,645,504        


Number of people who watched Obama's speech 
on Bin Laden's death                                                          56,500,000






Originally Posted May 7, 2011

 

 

Free Bradley Manning

Wikileaks, Journalism, and Justice

Bradley Manning has been charged with transferring thousands of classified US documents to the whistleblower website Wikileaks. Since the alleged leak, he has been kept in inhumane conditions during his detention first in Kuwait and then in the marine base in Quantico, Virginia.

Under the user name BRADASS87 private Bradley Manning told fellow hacker Adrian Lamo  that he had access to documents that revealed, “incredible things, awful things, that belong in the public domain.” That is why he leaked state secrets to the press. Manning first tried to get the Washington Post to publish a classified video that showed US troops killing two Reuters journalists in Iraq. When they turned him down, he sent the video to Wikileaks, who published it. He later went on to release thousands of classified documents to Wikileaks. Wikileaks decided which documents it wanted to release and released them in batches over a period of several months.

Those documents proved to be a treasure-trove of information relating to a variety of critical issues. The leaks showed that the US government was drastically under-representing the number of civilians that died in the Iraq and Afghan wars, that the US military ignored hundreds of reports of torture of Iraqi prisoners at the hands of Iraqi police, that the US was spying on UN delegates, and that Pakistan’s intelligence agency supported the Afghan Taliban. In short, Wikileaks uncovered some of the most important stories of our time and revealed facts critical to understanding US foreign policy.

Bradley Manning was arrested in Iraq on May 26, 2010 and began his detention in Kuwait on May 29. Bradley Manning was transferred to the brig at the Quantico marine base in Virginia on July 29.

According to Manning’s lawyer David Coombs, Manning is held in solitary confinement in his cell at Quantico for 23 hours a day on weekdays. During his exercise hour he is taken to an empty room where he is allowed to walk. When it is time for Bradley to sleep he must strip down to his boxer shorts and surrender his clothing to the guards. His clothing is returned the next morning. On weekends and holidays Bradley is allowed 3 hours of contact with approved visitors.

Bradley Manning has to face this humiliating treatment despite the fact that he still awaits trial 11 months after he was first detained in Kuwait. Throughout this entire time he has spent the vast majority of his days in solitary confinement.

His treatment is even more infuriating when one considers that the legal questions involved in the case were settled long ago in the nearly identical Pentagon Papers Case. The Supreme Court decided that the government couldn’t keep The New York Times from publishing reports that revealed extensive lies by the US government on the war in Vietnam.  And the leaker, Daniel Ellsberg, was cleared of all charges by the federal judge William Byrne who said of the case, “The totality of the circumstances of this case which I have only briefly sketched offend a sense of justice.”

I couldn’t have said it better myself. 

It is certainly understandable that the military doesn’t want its classified documents leaked to the press. But we should not hold a man indefinitely without trial in inhumane conditions. When the trial is held, Bradley Manning should be punished by a dishonorable discharge from the military and be sentenced to time served. These documents have proved irreplaceable in understanding the state of US foreign policy and have had no discernable impact on our national security.

In the meantime, Bradley Manning will be moved to Fort Leavenworth here in Kansas. Let’s hope that that brings at least a slight improvement in the conditions of his imprisonment.




Originally Posted April 19,2011

Voter Fraud

Exaggerations and Consequences

Kris Kobach has had a lot to say about voter fraud. He made voter fraud and what to do about it the central issue of his successful campaign to be elected Kansas Secretary of State, the person responsible for running elections in Kansas. 

 

On his campaign website he stated that he believes, “Voter fraud is a very real problem in Kansas.” He further elaborated that, “organizations that promote voter fraud have burrowed into every corner of our country” and that “the threat is real and time is short.” During a campaign stop with his mentor, former US Attorney General John Ashcroft, Kobach proclaimed that he feels voter fraud is “the civil rights issue of our time.”

One can have no doubt then that Kris Kobach believes that voter fraud is rampant in Kansas and that Topeka must take bold and decisive action to combat it. That is why he proposed and helped pass HB 2067 which requires voters to show a photo ID in order to vote and provide proof of citizenship through a passport, birth certificate or other specific legal document in order to register to vote.

This has rightly raised concerns from democrats and from various advocates for minority groups including the NAACP, the National Organization for Women, and the Kansas Equality Coalition who fear that these requirements will suppress voter turnout among groups least likely to own photo IDs: the elderly and the poor. It would also make voter registration drives all but impossible.

So the question arises: Is voter fraud so prevalent that it is worth combating in a way that risks disenfranchising voters? Or to put it more simply, does Kansas have extensive voter fraud?

During an election news conference in October, Kobach thought he had found definitive proof that the answer was yes. He mentioned a list compiled by KSHB-TV, a local TV news-station and the advocacy website Kansas Watchdog. The list showed that 1,966 people appeared on the social security death list as well as Kansas voter registration rolls.

 

Kobach opined, “Every one of those 1,966 identities is an opportunity for voter fraud waiting to happen.” He then went on to highlight some follow-up work his team had done. They had found that Alfred Brewer was on the social security death list and that, “An Alfred K. Brewer voted in the 2010 primary election. Is it the same one? We are still trying to achieve confirmation of this but it certainly seems like a very real possibility.” Case closed, a documented case of someone fraudulently voting in someone else’s name! 

 

The next day, a reporter for the Wichita Eagle found Alfred Brewer outside his Wichita home raking leaves. The Alfred Brewer who had died was his father. Brewer said of the incident, “I don’t think this is heaven, not when I’m raking leaves.” 

 

Brewer was the only case that Kobach highlighted of a dead man voting.

As for the previous Secretaries of State, Chris Biggs and Ron Thornburgh, both acknowledge that voter fraud really isn’t a major problem. 

 

And our Saline County Clerk Don Merriman agrees. 

 

“I think we’re chasing a problem that isn’t really there," Merriman said. "I have been doing elections for 11 years, and been part of the process for more years, and we have had no problems. It is not running rampant in the state.”

The definitive work on voter fraud in Kansas was done by Ron Thornburgh, the Republican who served as the Kansas Secretary of State for 16 years. He compiled a report on voter fraud in 2008. 

 

The report details 30 reports of alleged voter fraud dating back to 1998, involving at least 120 ballots. 

 

The report also acknowledged that many of the reports came without reliable evidence. 

 

Thirteen reports alleged people voted in others’ names, but most involved family voting for other family or nursing homes voting for residents. 

 

These people broke the law, but did so mistakenly, not out of a grand conspiracy. 

 

Two of the remaining reports alleged double voting, one of which resulted in a conviction.

In January, Kobach released his own report in order to show the need for HB 2067. This investigation dated to 1997 and found 59 allegations of voter fraud involving at least 221 ballots. 

 

Why the discrepancy between the Thornburgh and Kobach reports? 

 

Kobach’s study did cover a slightly larger period of time than Thornburgh. 

 

I also find it likely that Kobach included some clearly baseless allegations fraud as he did in the case of Alfred Brewer.

Kobach also suggested that his report only captured 10% of the voter fraud that actually occurred, a number that he made up. 

 

Thus while Thornburgh stated in his study that 120 as the maximum number of fraudulent votes that could have been cast, Kobach suggests that the real extent of voter fraud is 10 times larger than 221 ballots. Amazing.

Kobach estimates that 2,210 fraudulent ballots were cast from 1997-2010, a wildly inflated number that no honest expert would agree is accurate. 

 

For the time being, let’s assume he is correct. 

 

What percentage of the votes for president and governor that were cast from 1997-2010 in the state of Kansas does Kris Kobach think were fraudulent? 


10%? 


20%? 


30%?

Kobach believes that 3% of 1% of the votes cast in the general elections for president and governor from 1997-2010 are fraudulent. (2,210/6,762,691 = 0.000327). 

 

The number of votes cast for Governor and President in the state of Kansas from 1997-2010 came from a group of documents at the Secretary of State website. If I had included primary and local elections, the number would have been even smaller. 

Based on this fact, it’s hard not to come to the conclusion, as Chris Biggs and Ron Thornburgh did, that voter fraud is minimal and not a significant problem in Kansas.




Originally Posted April 18th, 2011

Associated Press Leaves out Important Context in Anticipation of President’s Deficit Reduction Plan

My local paper, the Salina Journal, had one national political story on its frontpage today, an Associated Press article about Obama’s soon to be released 2012 budget. The article, written by Laurie Kellman, had the headline

Obama deficit plan on the way

And the subtitle

President expected to target programs for seniors, poor

Cutting entitlements are among the most unpopular things a politician can do, so a presidential decision to address the issue of the growth of entitlement spending is incredibly newsworthy. But the word target brings to mind a hunter with a gun, as if Obama was going to kill or maim Medicare and Medicaid. Let’s see if the body of the article is any better.

The second paragraph reads:

Much will be revealed at midweek, when the House and Senate are expected to vote on a budget for the remainder of this fiscal year and Obama reveals his plan to reduce the deficit, in part by scaling back programs for seniors and the poor.

The fifth and sixth paragraph state:

Presidential adviser David Plouffe said Obama has long been committed to finding ways for the nation to spend within its means. He confirmed that the president would unveil more specifics for deficit reduction with a speech Wednesday that would reveal plans to reduce the government’s chief health programs for seniors and the poor. “You’re going to have to look at Medicare and Medicaid and see what kind of savings you can get,” Plouffe said Sunday.

The rest of the 13 paragraph article focused primarily on the 11^th hour deal that was reached Friday night that averted a government shutdown.

Nowhere in the article does Kellman mention the other ways that the Obama has tried to reduce the deficit. Plouffe, the Obama advisor mentioned in the Associated Press article, affirmed on NBC’s Meet the Press the Obama’s administration’s belief that letting the bush tax cuts expire for the top 2 percent of income earners is an important part of deficit reduction.

                                             

 

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Plouffe stated on CNN’s State of the Union that defense spending cuts need to be on the table as well. On top of that the Obama administration has already frozen the pay of federal public sector workers. The Obama administration really does adopt an all of the above approach to deficit reduction, to the dismay of liberals and conservatives alike. But the impression that the reader comes away with from the Associated Press article is that Obama only plans to reduce the deficit by cutting aid to seniors and the poor.

The article also ignores how Obama’s deficit reduction plan compares to the plan republicans have already released. The Republican plan eliminates Medicare as we know it for those under 55 and replaces it with a voucher system that saves money by passing the burden of rising medical costs onto seniors. It also turns federal Medicaid spending into a block grant to the states, transferring more of the cost of Medicaid to the states, which are already dealing with record deficits of their own. There is no way that Obama’s plan would cut these programs as deeply as the republican plan does. The republican plan would also dramatically reduce taxes on corporations and high income earners. The Associated Press doesn’t show how the likely administration proposal would compare to the drastic cuts in Medicare and Medicaid Republicans have already proposed.

Thus the Associated Press gave readers across the country an inexcusably incomplete description of Obama’s deficit reduction plans and gives no reference to how his likely proposals on entitlements compare to those republicans have already submitted. The Associated Press has written many good articles, especially on world news, but let’s hope their future coverage of the budget debate provides its readers with more context than it did today.


Originally Posted April 11. 2011

Dedication and Detail:

The Rachel Maddow Show

I am a regular listener of The Rachel Maddow Show. Many of the stories they have been covering recently illustrate my favorite aspects of Rachel's research and commentary style. Rachel and her staff have dug deep into the most important stories of our time to find the important details that were not known before. Rachel then connects these details in a seamless and sequential manner to build her larger position that illuminates these topics in a way no one else could.

TRMS showed their journalistic vigor by releasing the findings of an investigative report detailing how unsafe deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico remains. That’s not something opinion shows often do. Most of the time spent on FOX and MSNBC during primetime is spent providing opinions on topics based on the research and facts that are uncovered by other groups. 

The report began by explaining the findings of an investigation by the Norwegian firm Det Norske Veritas that was commissioned by the Bureau of Ocean Management, Regulation, and Enforcement (formerly the MMS). The investigation found that the devise that is designed to prevent the next Oil Spill, the blowout preventer, doesn’t work when there is a blowout. Seriously!

The Rachel Maddow Show also obtained the oil spill response plan for the first new drilling permit that was granted since the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill.  That response plan was written one year before the BP oil spill, showing that it hadn’t applied any of the lessons learned from the disaster. Several more permits have been granted since.

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TRMS also highlighted that Transocean, one of the companies responsible for the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, gave its executives bonuses for their awesome safety record for the same year that the disaster occurred.

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Rachel also did a great job showing that despite republicans repeatedly proclaiming their belief in limited government, the actions of republican governors have been incredibly intrusive on people’s personal lives. Rick Scott, the republican governor of Florida, issued an executive order mandating drug testing of public sector employees. Rick Synder, the republican governor of Michigan, signed into law the ability of the state to dissolve elected city governments if the state decides there is a fiscal emergency. She also brought up various cases where republican groups and politicians tried to obtain the private e-mails of college professors who had political opinions they disagree with.

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Maddow’s coverage of Libya in many ways has resembled that of NBC Nightly News, with field reports from Richard Angle and this great discussion with Michael Issikoff on covert units being sent to Libya. Make no doubt about it, Maddow has aired her opinions on the US involvement in Libya, but it has been complimented with the best in depth coverage of the topic that NBC can provide.

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It is for all of these reasons and more that Rachel Maddow has become the highest rated program on MSNBC and keeps me as a regular listener. Keep the good work coming Rachel!



Originally Posted April 3, 2011

The Story of Raymond Davis

The US Media, Lies, and Deception

Sunday, March 27, 2011, Jake Tapper filled in for Christian Amanpour on ABC’s Sunday show “This Week.”  He had an interesting panel discussion on the internationally enforced no fly zone in Libya with panelists with diverse viewpoints. He also did a concurrent interview with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates about the US intervention in Libya. Towards the end of the interview Tapper switched to other topics. This part of the interview was incredibly revealing about US foreign policy and ABC News. This section of the interview begins at 9 minutes 15 seconds. 

Speaking about the likely fall of Ali Abdullah Saleh, the 32-year dictator of Yemen and a US ally, Gates said,

It is a real concern because the most active and at this point, perhaps the most aggressive branch of Al Qaeda, Al Qaeda in the Arabian peninsula, operates out of Yemen and we have had a lot of counter-terrorism cooperation from president Saleh and the Yemeni security services so if that government collapses or is replaced by one that is dramatically more weak then I think we will face some additional challenges out of Yemen. There is no question about it. It’s a real problem.

First of all, we really should stop referring to dictators, even ones that are allies, as “presidents.” At the very least let’s refer to them as “strongmen” so that we recognize that they weren’t democratically elected in free and fair elections. Second, this is one of the greatest ironies of all time. While we are helping the rebels in Libya over through their dictator we lavish unwavering support for Yemen’s dictator. It is true that Yemen has done a lot of important counter-terrorism work for the United States. But when a democratic uprising is about to over through him, our leaders should at least be calling for democratic reform. A more consistent foreign policy would use our leverage to call for his resignation, perhaps offering him asylum in the US.  

The most startling point in the show immediately followed Robert Gates’ response. Jake Tapper set up the next question this way,

Secretary Clinton, on Pakistan, Pakistan has been trying to block US counter-terrorism efforts in the Fatah region and continues to work with terrorists who attack India, it held a US diplomat in its prisons for several weeks as I don’t need to tell you, has this relationship gotten worse in the last six months, US-Pakistan?

The “diplomat” that Tapper referred to was Raymond Davis, whose story in Pakistan is quite complex.

On January 27, 2011, CIA agent Raymond Davis shot and killed two men in Lahore, Pakistan. He claimed it was in self-defense; Pakistani officials charged him with murder. Since then, top US representatives have lobbied for his release. The story received very little coverage in the US press, and the sources that did cover it knowingly lied to their readers by telling them that Davis was a diplomat rather than a CIA agent. The New York Times, Washington Post, and Associated Press all did so at the request of the US State Department. Raymond’s real identity was first revealed in the Western press by the British newspaper “The Guardian” on February 20^th, 2011. The NYT, WP, and AP admitted their deception to their readers and explained that they did so to try to protect Davis, even though his CIA affiliation was well known in Pakistan at the time.

US officials tried to get Davis released on diplomatic immunity, a status where diplomats are immune from prosecution. The reasoning behind diplomatic immunity is that if Country A does something Country B doesn’t like, Country B can’t retaliate by bringing false charges against diplomats from Country A. It is my opinion that genuine charges of murder should not be subject to diplomatic immunity. On top of that, it is quite a stretch to try to apply diplomatic immunity towards a CIA agent. Thus, the nature of Davis’ job is critically important to understanding the story, and claiming that Davis was a diplomat had the potential to dramatically change reader’s views on whether he should be released.

Raymond Davis was released from Pakistan on March 16^th after the US gave the Pakistani government over 1 million dollars to reimburse the victim’s families.

I do not know if Raymond Davis committed murder in Pakistan or if he merely acted in self-defense. I also don't know if he was carrying out the orders of the CIA when he killed the two men. If he was acting without orders from the CIA and he murdered those men, then he deserves a life sentence. But if he was acting in self-defense or carrying out CIA orders then he was merely doing dangerous work for his country. Unfortunately, we won't know the truth of the matter until the government documents surrounding this event become declassified in the distant future. 

In many ways this case was the opposite of the Valarie Plame affair. Valarie Plame was a CIA agent who was outed by the Bush Administration because her husband publicly contradicted the administration’s line that Iraq was developing weapons of mass destruction. This outing to the press endangered her life and ruined the career of a woman who risked her life for decades to serve her country.

In both the Raymond Davis and Valarie Plame incidents the press was pushed to report a story a certain way based on the persuasion of government officials. The difference between the Valarie Plame and Raymond Davis stories is that Davis was credibly charged with the most serious crime a person can commit. That changes the press’ requirement to keep an agent’s job secrete to requiring them to disclose it.

Jake Tapper cannot plead ignorance in this case. Any serious US journalist knows that Raymond Davis was a CIA operative and not a diplomat. 3 months after the shooting, 1 month and 1 week since the Guardian article, and 1 week and 4 days after Davis was released, ABC is still deceiving its viewers about the details of the Raymond Davis case. It goes without saying that noting Davis is a CIA operative no longer puts him in danger as he walks freely in the United States.

The US press has been much more skeptical about US intervention in Libya than it was about the war in Iraq. All US news outlets bought the falsehoods promoted by the Bush administration, that Saddam Hussein was perusing weapons of mass destruction and that Saddam was tied to Al Qaeda. MSNBC even canceled the only program which aired anti-war voices. The coverage of Libya has shown how far the US press has come since then. The rare and inaccurate coverage of the Raymond Davis incident shows how far we have to go. 




Originally posted March 27, 2011





UPDATE: The US has changed its position on Yemen and now supports Saleh leaving office. This is a small but important step toward a more consistent foreign policy of supporting democracy abroad.  Hopefully it will translate towards greater respect towards America in the Arab world as well. 



AUTHOR'S NOTE: This article has been slightly changed from its original form. It originally called for Raymond Davis to stand trial in Pakistan in order to determine his guilt and to deliver justice. After more thought on the matter, I decided that the Pakistani public was so convinced of his guilt that he could never get a fair trial. An innocent man could have been sentenced to life or worse. The text was changed to reflect a more generic opinion of what I think would be the proper punishment under a variety of circumstances. The reason I wrote this article was the fact that various US news outlets lied to their viewers on the request of the government and in the process misinformed the public on the most basic facts surrounding the case. That is a criticism I still hold.

Pundits and Politicians

A Spoof on MSNBC’s Election Coverage

 

Saturday Night Live did an awesome piece making fun of the personalities at Fox News in the segment “Embracing Civility.” 

 

I decided to try my hand at satire and come up with a fictional script for MSNBC. 

 

The following parody of the personalities of pundits and politicians is full of hidden references to actual comments, which will hopefully entertain those who watch the media closely. 

 

This is a fictional script, NOT AN ACTUAL TRANSCRIPT. 

Enjoy.  

 

 

 

O’Donnell: Welcome back to MSNBC’s 2012 election coverage. And what a nail biter it has been.

Matthews: I know, this whole election season has been absolutely bizarre. In the beginning of 2011, the economy appeared to be making a comeback. None of the respectable Republican candidates entered the race because they didn’t think that they could beat Obama.

Maddow: And that’s how we ended up with the Palin/Bachman ticket. 

 

 

Matthews: Exactly. Then Bank of America collapsed.

O’Donnell:  No one could have seen it coming.

Ratigan: (enters) I did! The systematic fraud in Bank of America’s mortgage system has been painfully apparent for years!

O’Donnell:  (genuinely puzzled) Who are you?

Ratigan: I’m MSNBC’s business host. I have a show at 4 in the afternoon. I come on right before the first airing of Hardball.

O’Donnell: I think I might have seen a promo for one of your shows once.

Ratigan: Aaahh! (muttered under his breath as he leaves the set) Money-printing, politician-buying, scoundrel!

Matthews: Anyway, the collapse of Bank of America caused the stock market crash, actually creating the possibility of a Palin victory. America truly had a hard time choosing between the Republican balloon-heads and the guys who couldn’t fix the economy.

Shultz: And what was Palin’s proposed response to the collapse of Bank of America? Less regulation on Wall Street! After Wall Street Fatcats raked in millions for pushing money around and twice crashing the entire world economy, Palin’s response is to propose removing the final restraints on their sociopathic behavior!

Maddow: (troubled) Ed, you’re on fire.

Shultz: I know.

Maddow: No, literally, Ed, you’re on fire.

Shultz: I’m on fire! Ahhh! (leaves set)

(Matthews, O’Donnell, and Maddow remain)

(Pause)

Matthews: The teabaggers don’t even look presidential. Bachman looks like a chewed up pencil and Palin looks like…

(young NBC staffer races on stage and covers Chris Matthews’ mouth. His words incoherently pass through the staffer’s hands, as the staffer drags Matthews offstage.)

(O’Donnell, Maddow remain)

Maddow: And all we hear from the right is about how Sarah Palin is the first female presidential candidate from a major party. I got it already. Let’s hear what she thinks on actual policy issues.

O’Donnell: I know, the thing that gets me the most though, is how much Palin and Bachman get wrong in history alone! Palin celebrated Regan winning World War II, had George Washington creating Guantanamo to indefinitely hold prisoners of war rounded up from “foreign adventures”…

Maddow: And Bachman had the battles of Lexington and Concord happen in New Hampshire.

O’Donnell: It’s a national disgrace. (Pause) And we’re just now getting in the final results from Ohio. NBC predicts that Ohio, and by extension the presidency, will go to… Sarah Palin.

(Awkward Pause)

Matthews, Shultz, O’Donnell, and Maddow: NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!



Originally posted March 22, 2011