Friday, Dec 12th
Last update08:39:16 AM GMT
Journalism Glance
In the spring of 2007 a tiny military contractor with a slender track record went shopping for a precious Beltway commodity.
The company, Defense Solutions, sought the services of a retired general with national stature, someone who could open doors at the highest levels of government and help it win a huge prize: the right to supply Iraq with thousands of armored vehicles.
This report likely won’t be on CNN’s “Headline News,” but after five years, former workers at CNN have finally gained justice. In a decision made public today, an administrative law judge ordered the network to rehire 110 workers who were fired because they were union members. CNN also was ordered to recognize the workers’ unions, National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians-CWA (NABET-CWA) locals 31 and 11.
An influential psychiatrist who served as the host of public radio’s popular “The Infinite Mind” program earned at least $1.3 million between 2000 and 2007 giving marketing lectures for drug makers, income not mentioned on the program.
The psychiatrist and radio host, Dr. Frederick K. Goodwin, is the latest in a series of doctors and researchers whose ties to drug makers have been uncovered by Senator Charles E. Grassley, a Republican from Iowa. Dr. Goodwin, a former director of the National Institute of Mental Health, is the first media figure investigated.
The Associated Press, like virtually every business in the world, is defining strategies for operating in these complex and difficult financial times," the company added in a statement.
"All areas and ways of doing business are being reviewed," it said. "The AP, which recently instituted a strategic hiring freeze, may need to reduce staff over the next year.
"If so, it hopes to achieve much of the reduction through attrition," the statement said. "While we are looking for new efficiencies in the way we operate, AP's mission as the essential global news network does not change."
The afternoon's most memorable moment came when Kristol and Hamill went head-to-head over images of dead soldiers in Iraq. In a heated exchange, Hamill argued that there is "no sense of what reality is on the ground by editing out corpses," while an incensed Kristol said that was "nonsense" and that Americans are smart enough to know what goes on in war without seeing "brains in the road."
Want good press? Hire a journalist. That's Dan Abrams's pitch.
Working on media strategies with businesses could raise ethical red flags for journalists who were required to be detached and objective about the subjects they covered. Mr. Abrams said the company would "bend over backwards to make sure that there are no conflicts or ethical issues that arise."
TVNL Comment: Corporate control of US media outlets has resulted in a decade of disinformation, distortion and abject ommision of important news. Abrams now crosses the final fronteir by openly planning to pimp journalists to the hightest bidders.
When Dan Rather filed suit against CBS 14 months ago — claiming, among other things, that his former employer had commissioned a politically biased investigation into his work on a “60 Minutes” segment about President Bush’s National Guard service — the network predicted the quick and favorable dismissal of the case, which it derided as “old news.”
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