Editorial Content

Reading the “Fake News” Now?

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Article in The Washington Post by Meryl Kornfield, Hannah Natanson, and Azi Paybarag, 12/25/25

Headline:  “Despite anti-media rhetoric, the government is still reading the news”

Subhead:  “The Trump administration is spending tens of thousands of dollars on paywalled news sites, including Politico and Bloomberg, despite earlier criticism of media outlets.”

“Agencies across the Trump administration have taken out subscriptions in recent months to news organizations that officials had very publicly cut off this year, reversing an earlier decision to cancel them that Elon Musk, senior White House aides and President Donald Trump had declared was necessary to end what they called a scandal. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/12/24/paywalled-news-sites-trump-administration/

Killing the News

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Article in Reporters Without Borders, 12/22/25

Headline: “2025, a deadly year for journalists: this is where hate and impunity lead”

Subhead:  “Journalists do not just die – they are killed. The number of murdered journalists has risen again, due to the criminal practices of military groups — both regular and paramilitary — and organised crime. . .”

“. . .“This is where the hatred of journalists leads! It led to the death of 67 journalists this year – not by accident, and they weren’t collateral victims. They were killed, targeted for their work. It is perfectly legitimate to criticise the media — criticism should serve as a catalyst for change that ensures the survival of the free press, a public good. But it must never descend into hatred of journalists, which is largely born out of — or deliberately stoked by — the tactics of armed forces and criminal organisations. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://rsf.org/en/2025-deadly-year-journalists-where-hate-and-impunity-lead

Do Words Matter in Journalism?

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Article in The Guardian by Seth Stern & Clayton Weimers, 12/18/25

Headline:  “Brendan Carr admits his FCC is Trump’s journalism police”

Subhead:  “It is clear that the FCC is not an independent agency, but an instrument of the president’s political agenda”

“The Federal Communications Commission chair, Brendan Carr, admitted at a Senate hearing on Wednesday that there had been a political “sea change” and he no longer viewed the FCC as an independent agency. Commissioners, he says, serve at the pleasure of the president. . .”

“By scrubbing references to independence from the FCC website after admitting the agency answers to Trump, Carr has made explicit what his actions already demonstrated. He could not have made a better argument for the dangers of letting the public interest standard serve as the government’s backdoor into the newsroom.”

Read the full article at:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/dec/18/brendan-carr-fcc-trump-journalism-police

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Article in Poynter by Tom Jones, 12/18/25

Headline:  “Opinion | Why a single word disappearing from the FCC’s website matters for press freedom”

Subhead:  “FCC Chair Brendan Carr says the agency is not ‘independent,’ sharpening concerns about political pressure on the media”

“If you went to the Federal Communications Commission website first thing Wednesday morning, you would have read the following:

“ ‘An independent U.S. government agency overseen by Congress, the Commission is the federal agency responsible for implementing and enforcing America’s communications law and regulations.’

“Note the word: independent. . .”

“. . . Carr stunned everyone by saying, ‘The FCC is not an independent agency, formally speaking.’

“A short time later, the word ‘independent’ was removed from the FCC’s site. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/commentary/2025/fcc-chair-brendan-carr-independent/

Reporting on Violence

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Article in Poynter by Tom Jones, 12/15/25

Headline:  “How journalists covered a weekend of mass shootings across two continents”

Subhead:  “Coverage of the Bondi Beach and Brown University attacks grappled with terror, trauma and accountability”

“The horrors continue.

“This past weekend was marred by two mass shootings — one in Australia and one in the U.S. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/commentary/2025/shootings-brown-bondi-beach-coverage/

2025 Most Influential News?

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Article in Mediaite by Staff, 12/15/25

Headline: “Mediaite’s Most Influential in News Media 2025″

“It’s no secret how impactful presidential election years are to the state of our nation. But something that often goes overlooked is just how impactful the years after a presidential election are for the state of our media. For television networks, newspapers, digital outlets, and now podcasters and YouTubers, there is almost always some type of reset which happens when a new president takes office. . .”

Read the full article at:

http://C:\Users\enarc\OneDrive\Desktop\Mediaite influential news.png

Criticizing – Part of Journalism

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Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Emily Bell and Heather Chaplin, 12/11/25

Headline:  “The Future of Journalism After Gaza”

Subhead:  “Examining an ongoing crisis for press freedom—and how to manage security risks going forward.”

“. . .According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, it took only ten weeks at the end of 2022 for Israel to kill more journalists in Gaza than had previously been killed in any one country over an entire year. The attacks have not relented in the three years since: while barring international journalists from entry, the Israeli military has treated journalists inside Gaza as acceptable collateral damage and even, at times, explicit targets. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.cjr.org/kicker/future-journalism-gaza-committee-to-protect-journalists-idf-israeli-military-deadliest-year.php

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Article in Common Dreams by James Zogby, 12/10/25

Headline:  “The Media Is Behind the Times: Criticizing Israel Is No Longer a Political Liability”

Subhead:  “Israel’s war on Palestinians has taken a toll, both on that state’s favorable ratings with US voters and on the policies these voters want their government to take to rein in Israeli behaviors.”

“US voters’ attitudes towards the Israeli Palestinian conflict have changed, but media commentators and political consultants haven’t figured that out. They are stuck in the past with outdated assumptions about the electorate and as a result continue to operate from an old playbook. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/criticize-israel-us-politics

Not Only Media . . .

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From Political Dictionary

Article in FAIR by Jim Naureckas, 12/10/25

Headline:  “FBI Is Making an Enemies List—and Most Corporate Media Didn’t Even Check It Once”

“The Trump FBI is drawing up an enemies list that could encompass well over half the US public. . .”

“Congratulations—you may be headed for Attorney General Pam Bondi’s “list of groups or entities engaging in acts that may constitute domestic terrorism. ‘Terrorism,’ of course, is the magic word that strips you of all sorts of legal protections, especially in the post-9/11 era. . .”

“. . .virtually no corporate media outlets covered this. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://fair.org/home/fbi-is-making-an-enemies-list-and-most-corporate-media-didnt-even-check-it-once/

Media Silence for Public

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Article in Poynter by Kelly McBride, 12/9/25

Headline:  “When powerful people bully the press, they’re really trying to silence the public”

Subhead:  “What looks like a personal attack is often an intimidation tactic aimed at the entire press and the people it serves”

“. . .In addition to recently calling a reporter “piggy,” President Donald Trump has mocked a journalist’s physical disabilities and belittled one of his interviewers at the 2024 NABJ conference for her tough opening question. But he’s not the only one. Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene told a reporter to go back to her country. . .”

Read the full article at:
https://www.poynter.org/ethics-trust/2025/what-to-do-when-powerful-people-bully-journalists/

Predicting Future of the Media

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Articles in Columbia Journalism Review by various staff 12/8/25

Headline:  “Forecasting”

Subhead:  “Introducing the Journalism 2050 Issue.”

“We don’t know what exactly the future holds, much as we may want to believe we do. Looking at the transformations of the media industry, and at shifting habits of news consumption, maybe we can do something like meteorology, and put together a forecast. In this issue and an accompanying podcast series, we are watching where the wind blows . . .”

Read the articles at:

https://www.cjr.org/the-journalism-2050-issue

Civility Not Fashionable Anymore?

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Article in AlterNet by Robert Reich, 12/2/25

Headline:  “Oxford’s ‘word of the year’ explains all you need to know about Trump — and the media”

“The publisher of the Oxford English Dictionary has named ‘rage bait’ its phrase of the year.

“Call it the monetization of rage. Rage has become a valuable commodity. (Always follow the money.)

“A growing number of online creators are making rage bait. Their goal is to record videos, produce memes, and write posts that make other users furious: conspiracy theories, lies, combustible AI-generated video clips — whatever it takes. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.alternet.org/oxford-word-of-the-year/