Major Bob Bevelacqua
Major Bob Bevelacqua

Instruments of War

As reported in The New York Times last weekend, CNN, MSNBC, NPR and others have turned, again and again, to military analysts – retired members of the armed forces hired by broadcast and cable networks – for their supposed expertise on the war. Only, it turns out, the analysts were often coached by the Pentagon in what the Times said were “hundreds of private briefings.” Among those named was Maj. Robert Bevelacqua, a former Green Beret and Fox News contributor through 2005. Bevelacqua discusses his own role in the march to war.

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Courtesy Chirstopher Serra

Cooking the Books

To get a read on the vital signs of our increasingly shaky economy, media turn to those all-important stats: unemployment, consumer price index, GDP. But Kevin Phillips, political and economic commentator, says that for decades administrations have been altering the definitions of those stats to paint a rosier outlook.

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third world cell phone

Dialing for Dollars

From South Africa to Bangladesh to the Philippines, cell phones are dramatically changing the way people in developing countries conduct business and receive healthcare. As Sara Corbett reported in The New York Times Magazine, the phone is a transformational technology.

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(<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/sierraromeo/11506736/" target="_blank">sierraromeo</a>/flickr)

Oh No They Didn't!

Eight of Ohio's top newspapers are sharing content in a cooperative effort called the Ohio News Organization, or OHNO. The arrangement will allow the papers to sidestep the AP. Could this system be a lifeline for struggling news organizations? Is it the end of the scoop as we know it? Cleveland Plain Dealer Editor Susan Goldberg explains the papers' decision to collaborate.

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Lolis Elie

The Forgotten Paper

In researching his New Orleans neighborhood, Times Picayune columnist Lolis Eric Elie stumbled across the story of the nation's first African-American daily newspaper, The New Orleans Tribune. Elie's new film shows how the paper thrived during Reconstruction and played a large role in legal challenges to segregation, culminating in Plessy v. Ferguson.

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comics

Comics on the Stand

In his new book, The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed America, David Hajdu tells the story of the spectacular rise and devastating fall of the comic book. He says comics helped shape America's post-war cultural landscape.

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Rude Awakening

For a few years in the early 1960s, small, pornographic books called Stalags were a runaway success in Israel. The books were set in Nazi prisoner-of-war camps and featured a complicated mix of violence, sex and revenge fantasy. And according to Ari Libsker’s new documentary, "Stalag," they shaped, and even perverted, a generation’s feelings about the Holocaust.

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highlights from past showsHighlights from Past Shows

(<a href="http://flickr.com/photos/malik_braun/2188394806/">malik_braun</a>/flickr)

War of the Worlds

April 18, 2008

Our interview with Naseem Mithoowani a couple weeks ago sparked a heated debate on our site about free speech, xenophobia, and a clash of cultures when it comes to Muslim immigrants in western societies. This week Bob takes a broader look at some of those issues in Europe, where this clash has been forceful, public, and at times violent. Bob talks with some of the main players in this struggle to define the future of free speech in Europe.


Lichtblau

Breaking the Wiretap

April 11, 2008

It's been over two years since New York Times reporter Eric Lichtblau broke the NSA warrantless wiretapping story with James Risen. In his new book, Lichtblau explains the Woodward and Bernstein-like tale of exposing the program that's still surrounded in controversy and mystery.


On the Media is funded by The Bydale Foundation, The Ford Foundation, The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Overbrook Foundation.