media

Tucker Carlson Rises to Defense of Confederates who Killed 360,222 Federal Troops, 100x more than Al-Qaeda

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Tucker Carlson is shedding advertisers the way a rattlesnake sheds his skin. He went full white supremacist some time ago, and has been carried at Fox News only because the channel’s owner, Rupert Murdoch, appears to be a throwback to the policies of white Australia, which restricted immigration to that […]

Epidemics

Information warfare: COVID-19’s other battleground in the Middle East

Global Voices

By Saoussen Ben Cheikh | – ( Globalvoices.org) – COVID-19 has exacerbated existing political tensions in the Middle East and North Africa, a region already marred by decades of conflict. Now, unscrupulous politicians blame their political enemies or neighboring governments for the spread of the novel coronavirus. Director of the World Health Organisation (WHO), Tedros […]

Authoritarianism

Strange Attractors: Why is Trump’s Covid-19 Train Wreck so Mesmerizing to Corporate Media and the rest of Us?

Rebecca Gordon

(Tomdispatch.com) – My partner and I have been fighting about politics since we met in 1965. I was 13. She was 18 and my summer camp counselor. (It was another 14 years before we became a couple.) We spent that first summer arguing about the Vietnam War. I was convinced that the U.S. never should […]

Donald Trump

At Last, Someone is Suing Fox “News” for Journalistic Malpractice in Misguiding People over Seriousness of Coronavirus

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – I have long thought that Fox Cable “News” was open to lawsuits for its persistent purveying of falsehoods to viewers, some of which will cost lives. I wouldn’t be surprised if it gets sued over it climate change denialism, for instance. All you need is for a viewer to maintain […]

censorship

That time America used to have Draconian Censorship of Just the sort Trump Dreams of

Tomdispatch

By Adam Hochschild | – ( Tomdispatch.com ) – Every month, it seems, brings a new act in the Trump administration’s war on the media. In January, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo exploded at National Public Radio reporter Mary Louise Kelly when he didn’t like questions she asked — and then banned a colleague of […]

Bashar al-Assad

Are Syria’s Social Media Meme Wars the Face of Modern Warfare?

Omar Ahmed

( Middle East Monitor) – Social media continues to influence our perception of conflicts around the world, though rapid updates around the clock on developments on the battlefield often hours before mainstream news picks it up, disseminating propaganda or spreading misinformation and fake news to the sharing of graphic content and the ugly brutality of […]

Bernie Sanders

The Plutocracy Strikes Back: CNN Compares Bernie Sanders to Coronavirus

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – On Saturday morning CNN host Michael Smerconish compared Sen. Bernie Sanders to the coronavirus, asking if anything could stop either one. So reports Tommy Christopher at Mediaite. CNN has apologized. Rational National: “CNN Compares Bernie Sanders To The Coronavirus” Smerconish is a lifelong Republican who left the party in 2008 […]

Bernie Sanders

The Fall of France to the Nazis? Chris Matthews and Corporate Democrats’ Bernie Derangement Syndrome

Juan Cole

NB Matthews apologized for his remarks on 2/24/20 Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – I was watching MSNBC Saturday afternoon during the voting at the Nevada caucuses. I did a little channel surfing, checking in at CNN and at the real news on Al Jazeera. But mostly I had MSNBC on. And I nearly fell off […]