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On Wednesday, three Rwandan journalists were convicted of crimes against humanity and inciting the 1994 genocide that killed 800 thousand minority Tutsis. It was the first such verdict since the 1946 Nuremberg trials. Lead prosecutor Stephen Rapp joins Bob to discuss the landmark case.
After an intense battle between Americans and insurgents in the Iraqi town of Samarra last weekend, local hospital officials said they could only account for eight deaths, including several civilians. But military officials are sticking to their guns with their insistence that 54 guerillas and no civilians were killed. Brooke talks to University of Michigan history professor Juan Cole about the difficulty of finding reliable sources of information, no matter how close to the conflict it you might be.
More than a week has passed since the President's surprise Thanksgiving trip to Baghdad, but the debate rages on as to whether the press, and the American people, were wrongly misled by the White House. Some see it as yet another taxpayer-subsidized P.R. stunt, and criticize the complicity of the reporters brought along. Others defend the jaunt as a demonstration of the President's true feelings of support for the troops. But NYU Journalism Chair Jay Rosen thinks both sides miss the point, and tells Brooke why.
If you tuned into Rustavi-2, the Republic of Georgia’s independent TV station late last month, you might have seen a documentary about the fall of Slobodan Milosevic four years earlier. It was just one of the ways in which the independent media in Georgia gently but persistently helped to bring about the resignation of their own president, Eduard Shevardnadze. Thomas de Waal of the Institute for War and Peace Reporting tells Bob about the crucial role of the media in the peaceful ouster of Shevardnadze.
When a drug-addled, 350-pound Cincinnati man died at the hands of police who were trying to subdue him last week, many newspaper readers found themselves in discussions about the checkered history of the Cincinnati police. But at least one reader was curious about something else: why the victim's girth figured so prominently in the reporting. USA Today Detroit Bureau Chief David Kiley vents to Bob about the weight-centric coverage.
The much-discussed and oft-dismissed liberal radio network may soon be coming to a city near you. Central Air Network and its parent company Progress Media are reportedly poised to purchase stations in major markets around the country, and are talking with lefty celebrities Al Franken and Janeane Garofalo about possible host positions. Brooke discusses the project with Mark Walsh, Progress Media's CEO.
While the brains behind the new radio network strategize about a brand identity for progressive politics, one writer says they're barking up the wrong tree. Harper's contributor Thomas de Zengotita tells Brooke about his own vision for a progressive talk show that would appeal to the politically-disaffected and over-educated hipster youth.
At universities nationwide, some students are fighting back against what they see as a liberal hegemony on their campus media. They're doing it with the help of the Leadership Institute, a Virginia-based think-tank that has trained tens of thousands of students to be conservative political operators. It's the new alternative press, and it ain't what it used to be. OTM's Sarah Lemanczyk reports.
Highlights from Past ShowsIn yet another attempt to circumvent what it sees as the media's endless doting on "bad news" from Iraq, the Bush administration is developing what it calls "C-Span Baghdad." The network will feature a constant stream of whatever the US government wants Americans to see: press conferences, briefings, and in all likelihood, very little coverage of downed helicopters. Bob speaks with New York Observer reporter Joe Hagan, who recently wrote about the project.
On Thursday, the cable news networks were manic with breaking news. Anchors stoically yanked viewers from one story to another, alternately reporting on twin bombings in Istanbul, street protests in Miami, President Bush's visit to London, and Michael Jackson's impending surrender to California authorities. But the networks' schizophrenia couldn't last, and by afternoon one story had emerged as the clear winner of America's wall-to-wall attention. Brooke and Bob meditate on the world according to cable news.
On the Media is funded by The Bydale Foundation, The Ford Foundation, The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Overbrook Foundation.
