Monthly Archives: August 2018

Whether they are uttered by Trump or by respectable media pundits, false equivalencies typically come into use in order to marginalize progressive alternatives when actual counter-arguments to them would be unconvincing. Here’s the logic: A is the moderate opinion acceptable … Continue reading →

Trump’s bellowing about fake news implies that the media lies about him and his policies. Well, of course they offer very selective versions of the news all the time. Newspapers have always been partisan, often quite openly. Only two or … Continue reading →

Gatekeepers, whether academics or media puppets, delight in the power to subtly determine boundaries, to let everyone know exactly who is “beyond the pale.” The word “pale” refers to the pointed wooden poles that once were used in fortifications. Think … Continue reading →

In the old days, reasonable, middle-class people heard the stories that tell us who we are by reading the reasonable, well-written giants of the press: the NYT, the WAPO, the New Yorker, the NYRB, etc, and from the major news … Continue reading →

In January 2013, Chuck Todd, chief White House correspondent for NBC, addressed a conference of professional vote-counters. His audience included sales reps for voting machine and software companies, as well as several state secretaries of state. Todd ridiculed critics of electronic … Continue reading →