Lately, the words Breaking News have come to represent the latest announcement by Donald Trump or stories about Charlie Sheen or Lindsay Lohan. Last night, shortly before 8:00 pm (pst), network silliness morphed into dramatic sobriety that demonstrated one of the primary purposes of journalism: to provide citizens with important, accurate and trustworthy information. CNN, ABC, NBC,  » Read more about: Real News  »...

I’ve talked about media analyst Howard Kurtz before. A journalist who specializes in how and what the media reports, Kurtz has hosted the CNN show Reliable Sources since 1998. Along with a panel of journalists, Kurtz has discussed issues like the media’s overblown coverage of Charlie Sheen and Lindsay Lohan. Most recently, he’s questioned the media’s fixation of businessman Donald Trump who’s...

What follows is the introduction to the new e-book, “Shameless – The Ethical Case Against Three Out-of-Control Critics and the Need for Civility Now, More than Ever.” More next week. We currently live in a cable news media-induced echo chamber where, much of the time, opinion too easily passes as fact. This is as much the fault of those who...

What can I say about Bill O’Reilly? Well, here’s what I wrote about him in my soon-to-be-released e-book, Shameless. “[Keith] Olbermann is one side of the political coin, with Bill O’Reilly occupying the obverse. While both have sounded shrill and pompous, the difference is Olbermann cares more about an issue; O’Reilly cares more about himself.” Here’s O’Reilly debating with the exceedingly mild mannered Terry...

In 1954 journalist Edward R. Murrow stepped away from his role as news reporter to speak out against the blatant demagoguery of Senator Joseph R. McCarthy. According to an article by Carl Hausman published in The Institute for Global Ethics, “Murrow protégé Walter Cronkite noted that Murrow was troubled about taking an editorial position, but felt he had to break the rules...

Between a rock and hard place. That’s how I felt regarding the Sheen-a-thon – “news” coverage of actor Charlie Sheen’s meltdown over five days last week. Recently, I was asked “What’s the difference between news, analysis, opinion, and entertainment?”  My response: News: Last night a ship sank in the Atlantic. Analysis: What caused the ship to sink and how can...

Strange. Erratic. Irresponsible. No, I’m not talking about the obvious behavior by Muammar Gaddafi and Charlie Sheen, I’m talking about Good Morning, America’s extensive, up-close-and-personal celebrity train wreck of an interview called Charlie Sheen. Cut to: Sheen: “I am on a drug. It’s called ‘Charlie Sheen.’ It’s not available because if you try it once, you will die.” This at a time...

Amid all the protests in Wisconsin over Governor Scott Walker calling for cuts in both benefits and bargaining rights for state employees, MSNBCs Rachel Maddow weighed in by declaring “Despite what you may have heard about Wisconsin’s finances, the state is on track to have a budget surplus this year,” she said. “I am not kidding.” According to Politifact, the...

“There is something about too much prosperity that ruins the fiber of the people.”      – Diplomat Dwight Morrow In 1933, the president awoke to the news that the United States banking system had collapsed. Unemployment had reached 25 percent. Hourly wages nose-dived 60 percent. Distraught dairy farmers blockaded highways in order to dump hundreds of gallons of milk in...

In their annual roundup of factually incorrect stories of 2010, Politifact.com, the 2009 Pulitzer Prize winning project set-up by the St. Petersburg Times, offered this example from Fox News’ Glenn Beck. “On his Nov. 22 radio show,” Politifact reports, “Beck told the story of Wilmington, a town of 13,000 people in Southwest Ohio that lost about 8,600 jobs when DHL Express, its largest employer,  » Read...