A Media Icon Has Died

“Democracy Now” photo – Public media is NOT state-controlled media

Article in Common Dreams by Steven Harper, 6/30/25

Headline:  “A Personal Tribute to Bill Moyers, Who Never Stopped Pushing”

Subhead: “I would never claim to be an heir to Bill Moyers’ legacy, but I am among the millions of ordinary Americans for whom he was a powerful source of inspiration:

“A partial summary of Bill Moyers’ impressive life fills entire pages of The New York Times and The Washington Post—treatment reserved for royalty and rock stars. Bill was both.

“In those pages you’ll read about his illustrious political career as President Lyndon Johnson’s special assistant, press secretary, and key architect of the “Great Society”—a collection of programs that are now in danger, including the War on Poverty that produced Medicare, Medicaid, the Food Stamp Act, and the Economic Opportunity Act; the Civil Rights Act of 1964; the Voting Rights Act of 1965; the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965; and more.

Read the full article at:

https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/bill-moyers

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Article in The Washington Post by Fred A. Bernstein, 6/26/25

Headline: “Bill Moyers, eminence of public affairs broadcasting, dies at 91”

“He was White House press secretary under Lyndon B. Johnson and Newsday publisher before becoming an acclaimed television journalist, mostly for PBS.”

“Bill Moyers, who served as chief White House spokesman for President Lyndon B. Johnson and then, for more than 40 years, as a broadcast journalist known for bringing ideas — both timely and timeless — to television, died June 26 at a hospital in Manhattan. He was 91. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2025/06/26/bill-moyers-lbj-pbs-broadcasting-dead/

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Article in Democracy Now by Staff: 6/26/25

Headline:  “Remembering Bill Moyers: Public Broadcasting Legend Dies at 91”

“The legendary journalist Bill Moyers has died at the age of 91. In the 1960s, Moyers was a founding organizer of the Peace Corps and served as press secretary for President Lyndon Johnson. . .”

“In 2011 Bill Moyers said on Democracy Now: ‘I think this country is in a very precarious state at the moment. I think, as I say, the escalating, accumulating power of organized wealth is snuffing out everything public, whether it’s public broadcasting, public schools, public unions, public parks, public highways. Everything public has been under assault since the late 1970s, the early years of the Reagan administration, because there is a philosophy that’s been extant in America for a long time that anything public is less desirable than private. . ”

Read the full article at:

https://www.democracynow.org/2025/6/26/remembering_bill_moyers_public_broadcasting_legend

Ask a Question – Get Yelled-At

“The List” photo

Update:

Article in Poynter by Tom Jones, 6/27/25

Headline:  “Opinion | Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth targeted a Fox reporter. The journalism community had her back”

Subhead:  “In defending Jennifer Griffin, journalists signal that truth-telling still matters — no matter the network.”

“The Trump administration continues its signature bashing of the media. This time, it was Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth insulting Fox News’ Jennifer Griffin. . .”

“What was noticeable, however, was just how many journalists came to Griffin’s defense, including those from rival news outlets.

Say what you will about Fox News and how many of the network’s hosts fawn over Trump and conservatives. Griffin is a top-notch, plugged-in and unbiased reporter.

During a press conference with Hegseth on Thursday, Griffin posed a completely legitimate question. . .”

“She suggested that satellite imagery showed there might have been movement from the facility leading up the attack.

“Hegseth snapped, ‘Of course we’re watching it. Jennifer, you’ve been about the worst, the one who misrepresents the most intentionally what the president says.’

“Griffin wasn’t having it. She pushed back . . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/commentary/2025/pete-hegseth-attacks-fox-reporter-journalists-respond/

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Article in The Hill by Dominick Mastrangelo, 6/26/25

Headline:  “Hegseth slams Fox reporter at press conference: ‘You’ve been about the worst’ ”

Subhead:  “Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth attacked Jennifer Griffin, his former colleague at Fox News and a longtime member of the Pentagon press corps, amid a broader push to discredit media outlets reporting on intelligence laying out the extent of damages done by U.S. strikes to Iranian nuclear sites.”

“ ‘Do you have certainty that all the highly enriched uranium was inside the Fordow mountain?’ Griffin asked Hegseth during a contentious press conference early Thursday morning. . .”

“ ‘Of course we’re watching it,’ Hegseth said before attacking the reporter. ‘Jennifer, you’ve been about the worst. The one who misrepresents the most intentionally.’  ”

Read the full article at:

https://thehill.com/homenews/media/5370774-hegseth-briefing-jennifer-griffin-fox/

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Article in Huffpost by Ron Dicker, 6/26/25

Headline:  “Pete Hegseth Calls Former Fox News Colleague ‘The Worst’ In Tense Iran Presser”

Subhead:  “The defense secretary zeroed in on Fox News’ Jennifer Griffin as he continued to rail against the lack of media fawning over the Iran strikes”

“Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called former Fox News colleague Jennifer Griffin ‘the worst’ as he faced more questions about the U.S. bombing of Iran’s nuclear sites on Thursday.

“The Pentagon press conference turned downright hostile as Hegseth, who once occupied the curvy couch of ‘Fox & Friends’ before he got his Cabinet gig, slammed Griffin, the network’s chief national security correspondent. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/pete-hegseth-jennifer-griffin-the-worst_n_685d4e2ae4b0f78c57383fb2

 

Leave the Reporting to . . .?


Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Julie Gerstein and Margaret Sullivan, 6/26/25

Headline:  “Can AI Tools Meet Journalistic Standards?

Subhead:  “So far, the results are spotty.”

“Tech companies promise that AI tools can do more with less—so perhaps they can help news outlets survive declining subscription sales and evaporating advertising revenue. Certainly, AI is being used effectively by some journalists to crunch numbers at lightning speed and make sense of vast databases. . .”

But more than two years after the public release of large language models (LLMs), the promise that the media industry might benefit from AI seems unlikely to bear out, or at least not fully. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.cjr.org/analysis/can-ai-tools-meet-journalistic-standards.php

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Article in Poynter by Jennifer Orsi, 6/26/25

Headline:  “A lot has changed since we created AI ethics guidelines for newsrooms. Here’s what you need to know now”

Subhead:  “We’ve updated Poynter’s ‘starter kit’ for newsrooms to build AI policies,
including sections for visual journalists and product teams”

“More than a year ago, the Poynter Institute published a ‘starter kit’ for newsrooms to create their own ethics policies for using artificial intelligence in their journalism. AI use in newsrooms has grown swiftly since then — and gotten more complex — and the team behind the starter kit has just published a new update, adding more information for visual journalism and for those developing products in newsrooms. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/ethics-trust/2025/a-lot-has-changed-since-we-created-ai-ethics-guidelines-for-newsrooms-heres-what-you-need-to-know-now/

TV Network Validates Climate Change


Article in The Nation by Mark Hertsgaard, 6/26/25

Headline: CBS News Leans Into the Climate Connection”

Subhead:  “Since Trump’s election, the network has produced more than 60 stories on the climate crisis.”

For years, most TV newscasts have neglected to make the climate connection with the kind of extreme heat blasting much of North America this week. In the summer of 2024, for example, when record high temperatures brutalized outdoor workers, withered crops, and worsened hurricanes, only 12 percent of US national TV news segments mentioned climate change, though its role in driving such extreme heat has long been scientifically indisputable.

“This week, CBS News decisively broke that pattern. David Schechter, the network’s national environment correspondent, aired two pieces that left no doubt that the ghastly heat afflicting tens of millions of Americans is climate change in action. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/cbs-news-climate-journalism/

Impact of no VOA on N. Korea

Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Joel Simon, 6/26/25

Headline:  “A Secret Program Allowed VOA to Broadcast Television into North Korea. Now It’s Gone.”

Subhead:  “How the Trump administration undermined its own strategic position.”

“The mission of Voice of America, to “tell America’s story to the world,” is hard to fulfill when you’re broadcasting into the void of North Korea. For decades, VOA’s Korean service struggled to meet its mandate . . .”

“Then, in January of 2023, after a decade of difficult negotiations, VOA reached an agreement with the South Korean government to use state-controlled broadcast towers along the border to send a TV signal deep into the North. . . .”

“But the demise of VOA’s Korean service—along with the USAGM-funded Radio Free Asia, whose programming also targeted North Koreans—means that information-starved North Koreans now have less access to independent news about what is happening in their country and around the world. . .’

Read the full article at:

https://www.cjr.org/news/trump-lake-secret-program-voice-of-america-north-korea-tv-broadcast-gone.php

Meltdown on the Media


Article in Daily Beast by Sarah Ewall-Wice, 6/25/25

Headline:  “Trump, 79, Melts Down in Incoherent Rant About ‘Hero Pilots’ “

Subhead:  “The president attacked the media for reporting on the initial intelligence assessment on Iran.”

“President Donald Trump accused the media of demeaning the military after the initial U.S. intelligence report on Iran leaked.

“The president did not deny the existence of the preliminary assessment or its content, which suggested the strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities resulted in limited damage, but he insisted it was wrong.

“He also claimed to have spoken to one of the pilots, who told him it was a ‘perfect’ bomb drop.
Trump first harangued reporters with claims that they attacked the brave men and women who carried out what was an operationally successful mission on Saturday night to drop the bombs and exit Iran without being fired on.

“ ‘They were maligned and treated very bad, demeaned by fake news CNN,‘ Trump claimed on Wednesday.  The media did report on the U.S. intel assessment, but it did not demean pilots who carried out the mission. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-79-melts-down-in-incoherent-rant-about-hero-pilots/

Opposing Defunding Public Media


Public media is not state-controlled media

Article in Free Press by Staff, 6/25/25

Headline: “Republican and Democratic Senators Denounce Trump’s Move to Silence Public-Broadcasting Stations Essential to Many Rural States”

Subhead:  “A Senate Appropriations Committee hearing reveals growing concerns over a Trump scheme to end federal funding for popular NPR and PBS programming.”

“WASHINGTON — During a Wednesday hearing of the Senate Appropriations Committee, both Republican and Democratic senators expressed deep reservations about President Donald Trump’s plans to claw back more than a billion dollars in already-approved federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Many GOP lawmakers, including Sen. Susan Collins (Maine), Sen. Mitch McConnell (Kentucky) and Sen. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), said the cuts would harm programming that is important to them and their constituents . . . McConnell said the president’s entire rescission process was ‘unnecessarily chaotic’ and ‘counter-productive.’ . . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.freepress.net/news/republican-and-democratic-senators-denounce-trumps-move-rescind-public-media-funding

MAGA Media Turning on Themselves?


Update:

Article in Status by Oliver Darcy, 6/23/25

Headline: “The Fractured Faithful”

Subhead: “Donald Trump’s strikes on Iran have poured fuel on an already raging MAGA Media feud, forcing its stars to choose between a hawkish foreign policy and isolationist ideals”

“Over the weekend, Donald Trump unilaterally plunged the U.S. into war with Iran, ordering strikes on three nuclear sites inside the country. The decision has sent shockwaves through the MAGA Media ecosystem, where over the last week its top personalities have clashed over what action Trump should—or should not—take.

“As hawks like Mark Levin and Sean Hannity celebrated Trump’s move as historic and heroic, the more isolationist wing of the new right-wing media ecosystem have been far more quiet. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.status.news/p/maga-media-trump-iran-strikes

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Article in Status by Oliver Darcy, 6/16/25

Headline:  “Tucker’s War Cry”

Subhead:  “Tucker Carlson’s fiery attacks on Fox News and pro-Israel MAGA Media figures have exposed a rare and consequential rift within the far-right ecosysten”

“On Monday morning, Tucker Carlson joined Steve Bannon’s “War Room” and launched a broadside at some of his peers in MAGA Media, accusing them of fanning the flames of war in the Middle East. Carlson singled out Mark Levin as ‘terrible on TV’ and claimed the talk show host “kind of controls” Sean Hannity ‘in this weird way.’ But his harshest words were reserved for his former employer, Fox News. . .”

“ ‘What they’re doing is what they always do, which is just turning up the propaganda hose to full blast and just trying to knock elderly Fox viewers off their feet and make them submit to where you want them to,’ Carlson said. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.status.news/p/tucker-s-war-cry-4126715f1915019b

Media Caught Off-Guard


Article in Poynter by Tom Jones, 5/23/25

Headline:  “Opinion | ‘Extraordinary and unprecedented’: The media reaction to Trump’s Iran attack”

Subhead:  “Trump’s order to bomb Iran drew sharp media scrutiny over its timing, global risks and potential to drag the US into war”

“Stunning news broke Saturday night when it was learned the United States, under the orders of President Donald Trump, bombed three sites in Iran in an effort to dismantle that country’s nuclear program. . .”

“So, what has been some of the media reaction?. . .”

“Speaking on MSNBC, host Rachel Maddow said, ‘There have been factions within U.S. politics who have advocated for the United States to go to war with Iran for decades. President Trump is generally politically credited with standing in opposition to those kinds of factions in U.S. politics. But he has now made their dreams come true without really making a case to the U.S. public that there is a need to urgently act right now, to have done this — and that has a few different consequences’. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/commentary/2025/trump-iran-airstrikes-media-reaction/

No Voice for America

Article in Salon by CK Smith, 6/21/25

Headline:  ” ‘Dark day for truth’: Kari Lake slashes U.S. global media agency by 85%”

Subhead: “Critics say layoffs at Voice of America and others threaten press freedom and U.S. soft power abroad”

“Once a Cold War-era powerhouse for U.S. diplomacy, the U.S. Agency for Global Media has been gutted under a Trump executive order — slashing 1,400 jobs, or 85% of its workforce — in a move Kari Lake calls a win for taxpayers and critics warn is a death knell for press freedom. . .”

“But journalists and press advocates say the move silences independent reporting and undermines U.S. credibility abroad. ‘This spells the death of 83 years of independent journalism,’ said VOA White House bureau chief Patsy Widakuswara. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., called it ‘a dark day for the truth.’. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.salon.com/2025/06/21/dark-day-for-truth-kari-lake-slashes-us-global-media-agency-by-85/

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Article in The Guardian by Marian Dunbar, Maya Yang, and Tom Ambrose, 6/20/25

Headline:  “Trump administration lays off hundreds of Voice of America employees”

Subhead:  “The layoffs will reduce the staff at the agency to fewer than 200, around one-seventh of its total at the start of 2025”

“The Trump administration sent layoff notices today to more than 600 employees at Voice of America, a federally funded news organization that provides independent reporting to countries with limited press freedom, the New York Times reports.

“The layoffs will reduce the staff at the agency to fewer than 200, around one-seventh of its total at the start of 2025. The notices put journalists and support staff on paid leave until they are officially let go on 1 September.

“In March, Donald Trump accused Voice of America of spreading ‘anti-American’ and partisan ‘propaganda’ and called it ‘the voice of radical America’. . .”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2025/jun/20/us-politics-latest-news-donald-trump-national-guard-ice-republicans-democrats-live