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On Thursday, National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice swore to tell the truth, and proceeded to give her long-awaited testimony to the 9/11 Commission. The jury's still out as to how effective her defense of the Bush administration was. But one thing was certain - it made for pretty good court TV. It got us to thinking about those other Washington hearings that engrossed the nation three decades ago. Brooke speaks with Nixon White House counsel John Dean about Rice's performance.
It's been a year since the world watched the fall of Saddam's reign, but violence and resentment continue to rush into the power vacuum left behind. This week, American troops were on the defensive across Iraq, as Shia rebels took up the fight that had been limited to Sunni areas. Many reporters covering the conflict are wise to the positive spin that American officials in Washington and Baghdad are putting on events, but are also finding it more and more dangerous to get the real story. Bob talks to Washington Post correspondent and 2004 Pulitzer Prize winner Anthony Shadid.
It's more precarious than it's ever been to report from the ground in Iraq, but the situation is especially grave for journalists native to the region. As of Friday, eleven journalists have died in Iraq this year, all of them either Iraqi or from other Arab countries. Brooke speaks with Christian Science Monitor correspondent Dan Murphy, who's covered the story.
There was a time that novelist Jim Lewis favored the publication of graphic war photos, like those of the recent mob killing of Americans in Fallujah. Like many others, he believed that such images accurately conveyed the real horrors of war. But since he photographed the aftermath of a horrific atrocity in Congo last summer, he's changed his mind. Lewis tells Bob why he no longer thinks graphic documentation of violence helps anyone to understand the real story.
Ten years after the Rwandan genocide that killed close to a million people, the West finally seems ready to deal with it. This month, the airwaves have been flooded with memorials, documentaries, and feature films on the massacre. But two years ago, before many had revisited it, photojournalist Nick Hughes attempted to encapsulate the experience in a way outsiders might comprehend. He hired witnesses to the genocide as actors, and created a love story set in Rwanda. Brooke spoke to Hughes about his film, "100 Days."
This week the annual Pulitzer prizes were awarded, and among the many worthy recipients, the unlikeliest was Dan Neil, car critic for the Los Angeles Times. Unlikely, because with one exception, the criticism award has always gone to critics of the arts. But also because auto reviews tend to be regarded with a certain suspicion, since most newspapers depend on the goodwill of car dealership advertisers. Brooke reflects on the business of car criticism with Dan Neil, the Oscar Wilde of auto reviewers.
Last month, the Hartford Courant discovered that Central Connecticut State University president Richard Judd had plagiarized widely for an op-ed piece he wrote for the paper. The Courant reached that conclusion with the help of iParadigms, new software originally developed to nail students for cutting and pasting term papers. Will iParadigms become a newsroom staple at other papers as well? Bob speaks with John Barrie, president and founder of the company that developed the software.
When it comes to information and inspiration for news stories, there are sources…and then there are wags. And over the years, the wags have contributed prodigiously to journalists in need. Usually, their contributions come in the form of quips. But who, in fact, are these wags? Bob sets out on a transnational investigation to find out.
Highlights from Past ShowsSpring has sprung in Washington, but with legislation pending that would boost fines for indecency to half-a-million dollars, the change in seasons hasn't kept a chill from descending on broadcasters nationwide. At least that's the view of Jesse Walker, radio historian and managing editor of Reason Magazine. Bob talks to Walker about the impacts that decency standards are having, and have had, on the exercise of free speech on the radio.
Another former Bush administration official is going after his old bosses in the pages of a new behind-the-scenes best-seller. In the book, former counter-terrorism chief Richard Clarke accuses the Bush team of slighting the War on Terror by invading Iraq. This week, many Americans tuned in to one of his televised interviews, or to his testimony in front of the 9-11 Commission. But the rest of the world was watching too. UPI Editor Martin Walker tells Brooke how Washington politics are playing in the foreign press.
On the Media is funded by The Bydale Foundation, The Ford Foundation, The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Overbrook Foundation.
