“Language is courage: the ability to conceive a thought, to speak it, and by doing so to make it true.”
“I am the sum total of everything that went before me, of all I have been seen done, of everything done-to-me. I am everyone everything whose being-in-the-world affected was affected by mine. I am anything that happens after I'm gone which would not have happened if I had not come.”
“Go for broke. Always try and do too much. Dispense with safety nets. Take a deep breath before you begin talking. Aim for the stars. Keep grinning. Be bloody-minded. Argue with the world. And never forget that writing is as close as we get to keeping a hold on the thousand and one things--childhood, certainties, cities, doubts, dreams, instants, phrases, parents, loves--that go on slipping , like sand, through our fingers.”
― Salman Rushdie, Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981-1991
First they hire the dishonest Mick Mulvaney to do political commentary and now CNN has dumped Brian Stetler and the long running Reliable Sources media criticism show.
Thanks so much for revisiting the topic of the media using frames which distort our perception of our politics. The new editor of The NY Times, Joe Kahn, made this bizarre statement in a Columbia Journalism Review podcast this past spring:
“ If we become a partisan organization exclusively focused on threats to democracy, and we give up our coverage of the issues, the social, political, and cultural divides that are animating participation in politics in America, we will lose the battle to be independent,”
Media citric Dan Froomkin’s response on twitter was spot on, calling it:
“ the smarmiest most deceitful and clueless straw-man depiction of what critics are asking for I've ever seen. Ever. NOBODY has said anything remotely like that. For shame. This is fake news. ”
Froomkin is right that Kahn is using a straw man argument. He did that to frame reporting on threats to our democracy as kowtowing to partisans so he could push back against demands that the Times put a spotlight on rightwingers destroying our democracy. No one is demanding the Times stop covering social, political and cultural divides. In fact it’s the opposite — covering those topics helps explain how our democracy has gotten to this dangerous place.
Dana Milbank makes it clear that this didn’t start with Trump. He rightly points to the ascendancy of Newt Gingrich as the point that Republicans became blatantly divisive and anti-government:
The one thing Milbank doesn’t do is blame the media for refusing to acknowledge how dangerous this was. If they had put a spotlight on the threats Newt and his old posed to our democracy back then they may well have been able to put stop to it.
Jim, I love this. It reminds me of your [first?] book by the same name. We usually read the NYTimes and Washington Post on line (because of travel, etc) and one thing I've observed is how long some of the articles linger on the web page. That too seems like an editorial decision that gives longer emphasis to some "news" stories than others. A consumer of today's news clearly needs to be a very discerning reader.
Joe, belated thanks — and thanks for remembering the olden-days book.
Have noted that web-page pattern as well. I *think* it is mainly traffic-driven — what is drawing attention, stays there to draw more attention — and the result is a vicious Gresham's-law-type cycle similar to what we see on cable . (Where the spectacle of any given moment drives out the rest.)
"It was a dark and stormy day in the Oval Office. The gloom fell in torrents--except at occasional intervals, when it was interrupted by a violent gust of wind from an invisible obese, orange-haired long-aged spirit, whose angry Lear-like scream swept through the souls of all present, fiercely agitating the frail efforts of Democrats who had gathered to celebrate......something that no one remembers now......" [See Gloom on page 5]
Framing is business as usual at both the Times and Washpost. (Not so much the AP.) Day after day, story after story. It's so insidious because most readers don't realize the news they're getting is warped. What I don't understand is WHY this has become, and remains, so . . . .standard. Maybe that's a good topic for another day.
Earlier this semester on our college listserv, some of my Liberal Arts colleagues shared their frustrations about designating certain courses as “critical thinking” when almost every course contains critical thinking in some version. Such frustrations are sensible given the term’s wide and varied use. To help clarify, I would like to explain what the Critical Thinking designator means in Marshall’s General Education curriculum, but, first, here is a bit of back ground about the term.
The term “critical thinking” burst onto the educational scene in 1962 [1] and forwarded a framework to train students in rational argumentation. This move was amplified by the focus on science during the Cold War, the need for higher education to demonstrate its methods, and the influx of students from varied backgrounds.
Over the last forty years, the basic mechanisms and vocabulary of such rational argumentation have become central to higher education. At the same time, the need to demonstrate the utility of higher education has continued to rise as an even wider set of Americans gain access to it.
In response, an industry of Critical Thinking has arisen, promoting the term’s cultural capital as well as increasing its proprietary feel and ambiguity. Indeed, “critical thinking” is now so widely used that one must consider its definition on a case by case basis, but after much consideration, I find the following definition works in most cases: to purposefully hone (through application, evaluation, and adaptation) the effectiveness of a skill or practice.
A nice pipe dream. America is in the midst of a critical teaching shortage. The city school district near me has a shortage of over 300 teachers. This is a tragedy all over the country. We need more practical solutions and I'm sorry to say, I don't know of any. The country is in the midst of a slow demise, and it is self-inflicted.
Yes, I agree it often seems like the darkest of times.
Resiliency and optimism is something that the nonviolent peace movement had to learn, in order to overcome nixon and to end the vietnam war.
Our parents' of my time survived the Great Depression and the Great War #2, so we learned from them that it is possible to be optimistic.
Jonathan Schell in his 1970's book called The Fate of the Earth noted that we feel frozen, like "rabbits in the headlights," if we are not activists.
Being actively involved in the smallest change destroys the sense of hopelessness.
I understand your comment and I appreciate it very much, the comment section is as awesome as the author's articles. In the 1960-70's, we learned that we had to remain hopeful, optimistic, and visionary if we were going to change the world.
Funding education is a top priority, I believe that essential workers like teachers should get huge increases in salary - Robert Reich is a big proponent of raising teachers' salaries.
What is important is knowing that there is so much we need to do, and this is because as a society we did too little for too long. Democracy is not for the passive voices, but for every American who understands that the moment we look away, all is long. Problem is, we looked away. Only 30 percent of Americans vote, and even fewer vote in local elections. And we must also insist on accountability all the way to the presidency.
I think a voting holiday would help! In this rich country, let's pay workers very well and encourage voting as part of civic life. Thank you for the comments! Great!
One observation by those who travel outside the US: we have a very flawed system it is true, but it may be the best experiment in self-government yet, on this planet. Thanks JF for providing this interesting forum!
There is a lot of hope when we look at the young people coming up. They are awesome, and have a lot of integrity.
I blew my stack last year and cancelled my subscription to the Times because of their biased and vicious coverage of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, after a long string of anti-Biden pieces and failures to recognize that Trump's sloppy actions there in 2020 played a big part in the confusion and violence. I ended my Post subscription a month ago because of the paper's sloppy coverage and cringeworthy headlines since Buzbee took over. Changes in both papers' editorships are undoubtedly at the bottom of it.
Excellent piece - thank you for writing this. The loss of Eric Boehlert has truly damaged the integrity of journalism in the United States - a field under unprecedented pressure and attack, both financially and politically. Although others leaving comments have speculated as to why the New York Times keeps showing that it's addiction to Trump harms its actual news coverage (I remember Boehlert writing "They miss him"!) I'm still wondering just why that paper, out of all of them, keeps doing this. Something that a media critic needs to investigate and determine. When I first read the Baker piece, I commented on Twitter: "Someday, as students review the archives to study one of the most historic and consequential U.S. legislative measures in the 21st century, they'll come across this piece and say: Oh, that's from Peter Baker - he just missed the point."
On your larger point: My experience is that some news organizations are much, much more hyper-concerned about "being criticized as 'liberal' or 'biased' " than others are. There are different institutional reasons, but the result is similar.
And of course the irony is that they still get the criticism.
You can be sure that right-wing critics will never let up on the NYT, no matter how much this sort of framing caters to a Fox News viewpoint. While Fox sees the outrage of its critics as proof that their programs are generating "engagement."
This is argument I've had many times with my colleagues in "mainstream" publications. My view is that *whatever* they publish, they're going to be labelled pretty much the same way by Fox et al. So they might as well go ahead and publish what they think is closest to the truth, rather than preemptively worrying about the attacks.
One of the little mental exercises I do when reading political blather that seems to broadcast a pro-Trump or pro-GOP bias is to flip the article on its head and read it. Suddenly, Trump is in Biden's "long shadow," and suddenly he's the one who is "struggling."
As Eric often pointed out, mainstream media has a built-in bias where the GOP is framed in a position of strength, whereas the Democrats are "struggling" or "in disarray." Despite the fact that the Republicans are not much more than a cult of personality focused on changing America into an authoritarian backwater, they are given full legitimacy, the Democrats are portrayed as a bunch of infighting fools with outlandish goals.
Speaking of framing--in today's Washington Post:
"How to recover from President Biden’s Saudi Arabia failure"
Biden is responsible for the actions of MBS?
Help me
Salman Rushdie, goodreads quotes:
“Language is courage: the ability to conceive a thought, to speak it, and by doing so to make it true.”
“I am the sum total of everything that went before me, of all I have been seen done, of everything done-to-me. I am everyone everything whose being-in-the-world affected was affected by mine. I am anything that happens after I'm gone which would not have happened if I had not come.”
“Go for broke. Always try and do too much. Dispense with safety nets. Take a deep breath before you begin talking. Aim for the stars. Keep grinning. Be bloody-minded. Argue with the world. And never forget that writing is as close as we get to keeping a hold on the thousand and one things--childhood, certainties, cities, doubts, dreams, instants, phrases, parents, loves--that go on slipping , like sand, through our fingers.”
― Salman Rushdie, Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981-1991
Nice!
First they hire the dishonest Mick Mulvaney to do political commentary and now CNN has dumped Brian Stetler and the long running Reliable Sources media criticism show.
Thanks so much for revisiting the topic of the media using frames which distort our perception of our politics. The new editor of The NY Times, Joe Kahn, made this bizarre statement in a Columbia Journalism Review podcast this past spring:
“ If we become a partisan organization exclusively focused on threats to democracy, and we give up our coverage of the issues, the social, political, and cultural divides that are animating participation in politics in America, we will lose the battle to be independent,”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/media/2022/06/14/joseph-kahn-new-york-times-twitter-democracy/
Media citric Dan Froomkin’s response on twitter was spot on, calling it:
“ the smarmiest most deceitful and clueless straw-man depiction of what critics are asking for I've ever seen. Ever. NOBODY has said anything remotely like that. For shame. This is fake news. ”
https://twitter.com/froomkin/status/1519038876353921024
Froomkin is right that Kahn is using a straw man argument. He did that to frame reporting on threats to our democracy as kowtowing to partisans so he could push back against demands that the Times put a spotlight on rightwingers destroying our democracy. No one is demanding the Times stop covering social, political and cultural divides. In fact it’s the opposite — covering those topics helps explain how our democracy has gotten to this dangerous place.
Dana Milbank makes it clear that this didn’t start with Trump. He rightly points to the ascendancy of Newt Gingrich as the point that Republicans became blatantly divisive and anti-government:
“ Newt Gingrich started us on the road to ruin.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/02/04/newt-gingrich-started-us-road-ruin-now-hes-back-finish-job/
The one thing Milbank doesn’t do is blame the media for refusing to acknowledge how dangerous this was. If they had put a spotlight on the threats Newt and his old posed to our democracy back then they may well have been able to put stop to it.
Jim, I love this. It reminds me of your [first?] book by the same name. We usually read the NYTimes and Washington Post on line (because of travel, etc) and one thing I've observed is how long some of the articles linger on the web page. That too seems like an editorial decision that gives longer emphasis to some "news" stories than others. A consumer of today's news clearly needs to be a very discerning reader.
Joe, belated thanks — and thanks for remembering the olden-days book.
Have noted that web-page pattern as well. I *think* it is mainly traffic-driven — what is drawing attention, stays there to draw more attention — and the result is a vicious Gresham's-law-type cycle similar to what we see on cable . (Where the spectacle of any given moment drives out the rest.)
Doing the Lord's work. Thank you!
"It was a dark and stormy day in the Oval Office. The gloom fell in torrents--except at occasional intervals, when it was interrupted by a violent gust of wind from an invisible obese, orange-haired long-aged spirit, whose angry Lear-like scream swept through the souls of all present, fiercely agitating the frail efforts of Democrats who had gathered to celebrate......something that no one remembers now......" [See Gloom on page 5]
Framing is business as usual at both the Times and Washpost. (Not so much the AP.) Day after day, story after story. It's so insidious because most readers don't realize the news they're getting is warped. What I don't understand is WHY this has become, and remains, so . . . .standard. Maybe that's a good topic for another day.
A good solution is to reinstate Critical Thinking courses in high school and college!
https://www.marshall.edu/gened/defining-critical-thinking-courses/
DEFINING CRITICAL THINKING COURSES
Defining Critical Thinking Courses
written by Chris Green :
Earlier this semester on our college listserv, some of my Liberal Arts colleagues shared their frustrations about designating certain courses as “critical thinking” when almost every course contains critical thinking in some version. Such frustrations are sensible given the term’s wide and varied use. To help clarify, I would like to explain what the Critical Thinking designator means in Marshall’s General Education curriculum, but, first, here is a bit of back ground about the term.
The term “critical thinking” burst onto the educational scene in 1962 [1] and forwarded a framework to train students in rational argumentation. This move was amplified by the focus on science during the Cold War, the need for higher education to demonstrate its methods, and the influx of students from varied backgrounds.
Over the last forty years, the basic mechanisms and vocabulary of such rational argumentation have become central to higher education. At the same time, the need to demonstrate the utility of higher education has continued to rise as an even wider set of Americans gain access to it.
In response, an industry of Critical Thinking has arisen, promoting the term’s cultural capital as well as increasing its proprietary feel and ambiguity. Indeed, “critical thinking” is now so widely used that one must consider its definition on a case by case basis, but after much consideration, I find the following definition works in most cases: to purposefully hone (through application, evaluation, and adaptation) the effectiveness of a skill or practice.
A nice pipe dream. America is in the midst of a critical teaching shortage. The city school district near me has a shortage of over 300 teachers. This is a tragedy all over the country. We need more practical solutions and I'm sorry to say, I don't know of any. The country is in the midst of a slow demise, and it is self-inflicted.
Yes, I agree it often seems like the darkest of times.
Resiliency and optimism is something that the nonviolent peace movement had to learn, in order to overcome nixon and to end the vietnam war.
Our parents' of my time survived the Great Depression and the Great War #2, so we learned from them that it is possible to be optimistic.
Jonathan Schell in his 1970's book called The Fate of the Earth noted that we feel frozen, like "rabbits in the headlights," if we are not activists.
Being actively involved in the smallest change destroys the sense of hopelessness.
I understand your comment and I appreciate it very much, the comment section is as awesome as the author's articles. In the 1960-70's, we learned that we had to remain hopeful, optimistic, and visionary if we were going to change the world.
Funding education is a top priority, I believe that essential workers like teachers should get huge increases in salary - Robert Reich is a big proponent of raising teachers' salaries.
thank you for your comment!
What is important is knowing that there is so much we need to do, and this is because as a society we did too little for too long. Democracy is not for the passive voices, but for every American who understands that the moment we look away, all is long. Problem is, we looked away. Only 30 percent of Americans vote, and even fewer vote in local elections. And we must also insist on accountability all the way to the presidency.
I think a voting holiday would help! In this rich country, let's pay workers very well and encourage voting as part of civic life. Thank you for the comments! Great!
One observation by those who travel outside the US: we have a very flawed system it is true, but it may be the best experiment in self-government yet, on this planet. Thanks JF for providing this interesting forum!
There is a lot of hope when we look at the young people coming up. They are awesome, and have a lot of integrity.
I blew my stack last year and cancelled my subscription to the Times because of their biased and vicious coverage of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, after a long string of anti-Biden pieces and failures to recognize that Trump's sloppy actions there in 2020 played a big part in the confusion and violence. I ended my Post subscription a month ago because of the paper's sloppy coverage and cringeworthy headlines since Buzbee took over. Changes in both papers' editorships are undoubtedly at the bottom of it.
Excellent piece - thank you for writing this. The loss of Eric Boehlert has truly damaged the integrity of journalism in the United States - a field under unprecedented pressure and attack, both financially and politically. Although others leaving comments have speculated as to why the New York Times keeps showing that it's addiction to Trump harms its actual news coverage (I remember Boehlert writing "They miss him"!) I'm still wondering just why that paper, out of all of them, keeps doing this. Something that a media critic needs to investigate and determine. When I first read the Baker piece, I commented on Twitter: "Someday, as students review the archives to study one of the most historic and consequential U.S. legislative measures in the 21st century, they'll come across this piece and say: Oh, that's from Peter Baker - he just missed the point."
Thank you.
On your larger point: My experience is that some news organizations are much, much more hyper-concerned about "being criticized as 'liberal' or 'biased' " than others are. There are different institutional reasons, but the result is similar.
And of course the irony is that they still get the criticism.
You can be sure that right-wing critics will never let up on the NYT, no matter how much this sort of framing caters to a Fox News viewpoint. While Fox sees the outrage of its critics as proof that their programs are generating "engagement."
This is argument I've had many times with my colleagues in "mainstream" publications. My view is that *whatever* they publish, they're going to be labelled pretty much the same way by Fox et al. So they might as well go ahead and publish what they think is closest to the truth, rather than preemptively worrying about the attacks.
Eric would applaud.
One of the little mental exercises I do when reading political blather that seems to broadcast a pro-Trump or pro-GOP bias is to flip the article on its head and read it. Suddenly, Trump is in Biden's "long shadow," and suddenly he's the one who is "struggling."
As Eric often pointed out, mainstream media has a built-in bias where the GOP is framed in a position of strength, whereas the Democrats are "struggling" or "in disarray." Despite the fact that the Republicans are not much more than a cult of personality focused on changing America into an authoritarian backwater, they are given full legitimacy, the Democrats are portrayed as a bunch of infighting fools with outlandish goals.
Thanks. Yes, I am watching for the next appearance of "disarray."
The best possible tribute to the great and sorely-missed Eric Boehlert! Thanks so much for this analysis.
The reporter had news right in front of him, but was determined to talk about something else.
Too true, Jim, but it is a two-edged sword, not only in journalism.
I tweeted this to @nytpolitics. Hopefully they'll learn something.
As the saying goes: Isn't it pretty to think so! ;)
Thanks.
I'd like to think that any journalist with a brain would learn from it.