Permanent link to MTA daily media news

The A.P. Asserts Tough (and Still Secret) View of Copyright on Blogs (Bits, New York Times)
In a fight with a social news site, The Associated Press has asserted that Internet sites cannot quote the headline and first paragraph of its articles.

The Public Blames President Bush and Big Oil (by Ruy Teixeira, Public Opinion, Center for American Progress)
Opinion polls show that the public blames Bush and oil companies for inaction on energy and believes we need new programs to begin enacting change.

Lobbying Firms RSVP “No” to Conventions (Capital Eye)
Two of Washington’s most influential lobbying firms have taken a hint (or maybe a hit) from the presumptive presidential nominees’ anti-lobbyist mantra and won’t be involved in this summer’s presidential nominating conventions. Both Cassidy and Associates and Van Scoyoc Associates will not attend either political party’s gathering, sponsor parties or donate to the host committees that organize the four-day fetes, according to The Hill… And while John McCain and Barack Obama continue to distance themselves from the influence of lobbyists, contributions from the industry have not changed much compared to the last presidential election cycle. In 2004, the lobbying industry ranked 14th in our industry tallies of campaign contributions, which is the same position it holds so far in 2008. The biggest change in lobbyist contributions is where the money is going. In 2004 Republicans received 52 percent of the industry’s contributions; now Democrats are claiming 56 percent.

Time Magazine uncritically prints Nancy Pelosi’s “justifications” for the FISA “compromise” (by Glenn Greenwald at Unclaimed Territory, Salon)
What the Democratic leadership is saying is quite clear: we will continue to trample on the Constitution and support endless expansions of the surveillance state because that is how we’ll win in swing districts and expand our Congressional majority… The only objective of Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer is to have a 50-seat majority rather than a 35-seat majority, and if enabling the Bush administration’s lawbreaking and demolishing core constitutional protections can assist somewhat with that goal, then that it what they will do. That’s what they are saying all but explicitly here.

Until that calculus changes, their behavior never will. That’s why it is so vital to target and defeat selected Democrats in Congress who are enabling these unconstitutional and lawless assaults. Democratic leaders need to learn that this strategy won’t work.
If you’ve read MakeThemAccountable only since January, you may remember that I have been saying something similar for months.  While much of the blogosphere was ecstatic over Obama’s supposed ability to attract independents, and even Republicans, to vote for him, I was warning that maybe we don’t want those folks dragging the party leadership EVEN FURTHER TO THE RIGHT.  Just call me Cassandra.  Maybe someday I’ll get some respect.

Sunstein An Advisor To Barack Obama? (by Big Tent Democrat at TalkLeft)
AdamB announced his law panel for Netroots Nation and it is an impressive one. But one thing stuck out for me in his announcement - the bio of Cass Sunstein: “One of America’s foremost legal scholars, Cass Sunstein is a professor at Harvard Law School and a visiting professor at The University of Chicago Law School, and serves as an advisor to Obama for America.” Cass Sunstein is an advisor for Obama for America? That is extremely troubling as Cass Sunstein holds views that I believe should be anathema to most progressives. For example, Sunstein supported John Roberts for Chief Justice of the Supreme Court… Cass Sunstein supported the Bush Administration theory of inherent authority to spy on Americans without warrants… The question is this - to what degree do the views of Cass Sunstein on these issues reflect the views of Barack Obama? I would like to know.

Torturegate: Truth, But No Consequences (by Chris Floyd at Empire Burlesque)
[Last week was] one of the most extraordinary weeks in modern American history… By week’s end, the evidence that George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and other top government officials had deliberately created a system of torture which they knew was illegal – indeed, a capital crime – under U.S. law was so plain, so overwhelming, and so handily concentrated that it broke through the levees of institutional cover-up and media complicity that had held this clear truth at bay for so long…
Barack Obama – who has been busy … bolstering “Blue Dog” supporters of executive tyranny and appointing a gaggle of dim warhawks, has-beens and imperial factotums as his national security team) – has given every indication he too sees the Administration’s high crimes as “dumb policies” that don’t require any legal redress…

[V]ery strong, credible, evidence-based charges of launching a criminal war of aggression based on deception is not an “exceptional circumstance” worthy of the investigative and prosecutorial process of impeachment. It might just be a “very dumb policy.” Very strong, credible, evidence-based charges of knowingly, deliberately creating a regimen of systematic torture is not an “exceptional circumstance” worthy of impeachment; it might not even be worth further investigation by the Justice Department. It too could just be a “dumb policy” that we should forget about – especially if Republicans are going to make a fuss about it.

He changed (by Jeff Jarvis)
Whenever you want to show how soft big media are on Barack Obama, refer back to Howard Kurtz’ column on their coverage of the candidate’s hypocritical flip-flop on campaign financing. Chapter and verse. “The question: Are the media going to call Obama on the reversal? Will there be hand-wringing pieces about the corrupting role of money in politics? Or will the story just be covered as the two sides trading charges?” Howard analyzes their leads and how they tucked in mentions of the flip. e.g., “NYT’s lead graf: ‘He argued that the system had collapsed, and would put him at a disadvantage running against Senator John McCain, his likely Republican opponent.’ Fourth graf: It ‘represented a turnaround.’”

Obama Camp Closely Linked With Ethanol (New York Times)
The ethanol industry has provided some top advisers to Senator Barack Obama, who has delivered ringing endorsements of ethanol as an alternative fuel.

Obama courts U.S. mayors as Bush foe (McClatchy)
MIAMI _ Making his pitch to a key group of power brokers, Barack Obama on Saturday promised hundreds of mayors gathered in Miami that he would push back on President Bush’s threatened veto of legislation aimed at rescuing homeowners facing foreclosure.

Obama on Elian: that was 8 years ago (Miami Herald)
Speaking to reporters from a waterfront park along Jacksonville’s St. John’s River, Barack Obama briefly responded to the flap over his advisors’ association with Elian Gonzalez: “That was eight years ago and obviously it was a wrenching situation for the families but I’m running for president in 2008 and my focus is: how do we create a Cuba policy that will create political freedom on that island and allow the people who live there to prosper?” Obama said. “That’s not what we have right now.” He referred to his “extensive approach” he outlined last month to lift travel restrictions for family members of relatives in Cuba.

Obama Asks NBC to Draw Up Olympics Ad Packages
But Could Such a Media Buy Be Too Much, Too Soon?

Obama braces for race-based ads (AP)
A presidential candidate who’s named Hussein and wears a turban? A building that’s called the White House but run by a black guy? Those political images and ideas already have found their way onto TV airwaves and campaign buttons, possible harbingers of racially tinged messages in a general election involving the first black candidate to head a major party’s ticket… The Obama campaign vows to fight back fiercely and fast, not repeating John Kerry’s mistake of waiting to respond to the 2004 “Swift Boat” ads that Democrats saw as a smear of his military record. McCain’s camp is alert for attacks on its man, too.

Republican Congressman ‘Mistakenly’ Calls for Assassination of Obama
Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Highland Park, Ill.) from the June 18 broadcast of WLS’ ‘Don Wade & Roma in the Morning.’ DON WADE: In fact, yesterday in a conference call, Barack Obama’s advisers were asked, “If Osama bin Laden were caught, should he get to challenge his detention in U.S. courts?” And the advisers said that — should that right to challenge detention that they get at Gitmo based on the Supreme Court ruling, should that be applied to bin Laden? — and Obama’s advisers said, “Yes.” KIRK: Yeah, and I would much rather have a policy where if we see Obama there’s a shoot-on-sight order.
Click through to listen to the audio.

Why Clinton voters will come back to the fold (by Walter Shapiro, Salon)
Don’t worry about those angry Hillary supporters who say they’ll vote for McCain or stay home in November. History proves they’ll vote for Obama.
Go right ahead and believe, it, Walter.  Go right ahead.

Why Clinton voters say they won’t support Obama (by Rebecca Traister, Salon)
The attack of the PUMAs, or a dozen reasons why Clinton voters are still too angry to come home.

On Private Conference Call, Hillary Urges Major Donors To Throw Weight Behind Obama (by Greg Sargent at TPM Election Central)
On a private conference call [Thursday], Hillary urged her top fundraisers in no uncertain terms to throw their weight behind Barack Obama, and directly asked them in surprisingly candid terms to give or raise money to help her pay off her campaign’s debt. At the same time, in a move that took some participants on the call by surprise, she also clarified that she was not asking their help in paying off her personal loans to the campaign. [Emphasis added.]

Clinton fulfills girl’s graduation wish
NEW YORK (AP) — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton fulfilled a pledge to a young supporter by speaking at the teenager’s high school graduation on Sunday… Clinton said she had known Aleatha “and her wonderful mother, Patricia,” since the girl was 2 and had promised her when she graduated from eighth grade that she would attend her high school graduation. “Four years later, here I am with all of you,” Clinton said… Schools Chancellor Joel Klein, who attended the school’s commencement ceremony at nearby Fordham University, said students should always remember that an American hero spoke at their graduation.

Pantsuits and the Presidency (by Clark Hoyt, Public Editor, New York Times)
I think a fair reading suggests that The Times did a reasonably good job in its news articles. But [Maureen] Dowd’s columns about Clinton’s campaign were so loaded with language painting her as a 50-foot woman with a suffocating embrace, a conniving film noir dame and a victim dependent on her husband that they could easily have been listed in that Times article on sexism, right along with the comments of Chris Matthews, Mike Barnicle, Tucker Carlson or, for that matter, [Bill] Kristol, who made the Hall of Shame for a comment on Fox News, not for his Times work.

“I’ve been twisting gender stereotypes around for 24 years,” Dowd responded. She said nobody had objected to her use of similar images about men over seven presidential campaigns. She often refers to Barack Obama as “Obambi” and has said he has a “feminine” management style. But the relentless nature of her gender-laden assault on Clinton — in 28 of 44 columns since Jan. 1 — left many readers with the strong feeling that an impermissible line had been crossed, even though, as Dowd noted, she is a columnist who is paid not to be objective.

Latest Rejections from Obama Supporters (by Truth Partisan at Corrente)
From Anon.: A close activist friend lectures me that American politics is “dogs eating dogs” and that I cannot expect truth from any politician and therefore I have to accept “Obama won.” This same friend was saying last week that the Democratic vote had been stolen.
My note:
Why do some Democrats need to fit in so badly?
Why isn’t knowing the truth important?
Why isn’t holding politicians and ourselves to standards important?

Internet-savvy voters shake up US presidential election
SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) - Videos shared on YouTube and blogs scrutinizing candidates are part of an Internet-age revolution shaking up the US presidential election and sweeping in a new political era.

Reporters Say Networks Put Wars on Back Burner
Almost halfway into 2008, the three network evening newscasts have shown 181 weekday minutes of Iraq coverage, compared with 1,157 minutes for all of 2007.

Tom Ridge links the Iraq War to terrorists to Iran the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow: Oil (by John Amato at Crooks and Liars)
Tom Ridge takes up the usual discredited conservative talking point that if our troops leave Iraq, al-Qaeda and Iran will control everything there—including all the oil fields on FOX News Sunday. Man, there certainly are a lot of terrorists running around in Iraq now. Didn’t the administration tell us that al-Qaeda has been defeated in Iraq already? Oh, right —so now it’s Iran. Iran is running around in Iraq now.

Report: Scalia’s Claim That Released Gitmo Prisoners Have Killed Americans Is An ‘Urban Legend’ (Think Progress)
A new report from the Seton Hall University School of Law explodes the myth that some 30 detainees released from Guantanamo Bay prison have “returned to the battlefield” against American forces.

Washington Post Ombudsman Criticizes Broder And Woodward’s Buckraking (Think Progress)
In her Sunday article, the Post’s ombudsman — Deborah Howell — writes that the paper’s policy requires journalists to get “permission from department heads” before accepting … speaking engagements, but “Broder and Woodward did not check with editors on the appearances Silverstein mentioned.”… Howell concludes that Broder did not follow the rules, while Woodward’s case is “somewhat different” but still potentially troubling. “The Post needs an unambiguous, transparent well-known policy on speaking fees and expenses,” she writes. Neither Howell nor Post Executive Editor Len Downie explain what actions they plan to take in response to ethical failures by two of its more prominent employees.

Aggregating - and checking - the pundits (by Jeff Jarvis)
Hubdub, a news prediction betting marketplace, has started a cool new feature that tracks the pundits’ predictions. Punditwatch takes the predictions of prognosticators from Christ Matthews to Perez Hilton to TechCrunch and enters them into its system as if each of the guesses were a bet. Then it tracks wins and losses and gives each pundit a score. I’ll spare you the nitpicking: Some predictions are easier than others and so they’re not all valued alike. But it’s a great guide to the crystal-ballers.
Brill’s Content, during its brief life, had a similar rating feature for pundits.  Turned out they were all so bad at predicting that they complained and the magazine killed the feature.  No wonder that magazine died.

Study Finds Imbalance on 3 Newspapers’ Op-Ed Pages (New York Times)
In the great marketplace of ideas, the opinion pages of major newspapers offer nonjournalists — mainly academics — a rare chance to reach a big audience and influence public policy. So which college professors win the competition for that limited, coveted space? Overwhelmingly, they agree with the editorial page, and they are men, according to researchers at Rutgers University. Unfortunately, those findings do not suggest the kind of forum for diverse views that newspapers say their opinion pages should be.

Media Matters for America headlines

• Responding to critics, Dowd reportedly falsely claimed “nobody had objected to her use of” gender stereotypes “about men”

• NY Times reported that McCain is “looking to distance himself” from Bush, but not that McCain has voted with Bush, fundraised with Bush, and praised Bush

• On Meet the Press, Williams allowed Graham to crop Obama’s questionnaire response on public funding

• Pittsburgh Tribune-Review blog suggested “giant lead” in poll for Obama foreshadows his defeat

• Numerous media outlets reported McCain’s attack on Obama over public financing without noting McCain’s loan

• Ben Smith ignored Politico’s own reporting in claiming “the only outside attack ads to run this cycle have been financed by Obama allies”

• AP said McCain “suffered because of his stance” on immigration, but did not report that he abandoned it

• Alleging a “flip-flop,” Fox News’ Cameron cropped Obama’s statements on public campaign financing

• NPR quoted McCain saying Giuliani’s 9-11 experience made him “qualified” to attack Obama on national security, but not his prior assertion to the contrary

• Wash. Post ignored attack ads on Obama, asserting, “To date, no conservative 527 groups have materialized”

• USA Today uncritically quoted McCain campaign saying that decision not to opt out of public financing was about “keeping his word to the American people”

• Matthews says Obama’s six-point lead is “almost … negligible” after suggesting a six-point lead for McCain among suburban white women is significant

The Mystery Of 56.com’s Shutdown: Beginning Of Chinese Government Takedown Of Video Sites? (Paid Content)
Is the Chinese government taking down non-state-owned video sites? That seems to be the prevailing view of what caused the Chinese YouTube-like site 56.com to cease operating on June 3rd, according to WSJ. The site, which has received $30 million—a $20 million second round was closed last December—from early backers Sequoia Capital and Disney Steamboat Ventures, among others. Visitors to the site are greeted with a message in Mandarin indicating that 56.com is dealing with a simple server problem.

SKorea ponders closer watch on web after surge of protests
SEOUL (AFP) - After weeks of tumultuous protests inspired largely by South Korea’s netizens, the country which claims to be the world’s most wired society is considering new ways to monitor the Internet.

Lawmakers fail to gag celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay
CANBERRA, Australia - A Senate panel rejected calls Thursday to ban certain swear words on Australian TV following an inquiry prompted by a popular series on restaurant kitchens with foul-mouthed British chef Gordon Ramsay.

Th-Th-Th-That’s All, Folks! No More Talk of Media End-Times (by Simon Dumenco, Advertising Age)
Yeah, the Sky Is Falling. But It’s Time to Stop Mourning the Demise of the Golden Age of Easy Media Profits

Columbia and CUNY Get $8 Million To Figure Out Future of Newspapers (Paid Content)
Philanthropist and former newspaper executive Leonard Tow is pledging $5 million to the Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, and $3 million to the City University of New York’s Graduate School of Journalism, to fund R&D and innovation efforts and figure out the future of newspapers, both in print and online. Besides figuring out new business models, the money will be used to train students in digital journalism skills. CUNY’s Tow Center for Journalistic Innovation will function as an R&D center for business models and developing new ventures..the center would bring in VCs to fund the best ideas, according to Stephen Shepard, the journalism school’s dean, reports NYT. Columbia will focus on training its journalism students in digital media.

The crowdsourced life (by Jeff Jarvis)
I happened to tweet [Sunday] morning about two crowdsourcing moments — student tries to crowdsource his tuition; Michael Arrington crowdsources his rats/ship/flee list for Yahoo — when Mark Comerford tweeted back with a link to the crowdsourced job interview… What this really means: Your friends are, indeed, your greatest asset and when you can tap them for help you exploit their value to you. The internet now enables you to do that anytime with anyone. If you don’t have friends, you can’t do that. Newspapers, magazines, companies of all sorts need to realize that is why they need friends. We are in a relationship-based economy. (Which is another way to look at the link economy of media, Associated Press, and why turning friends into enemies is just bad business.)

The New Fight for Financial News
Thomson Reuters is going hard after Bloomberg L.P., which has long been the marquee name on Wall Street for financial information.

Here is the US news from Bangalore (BBC News, Bangalore)
In an office in central Bangalore, dozens of employees are arriving to work on the night shift. They are journalists employed by the world’s biggest news agency, Reuters. Their job is to cover US financial news. And they are working overnight so that they can report company news live as it happens on the New York Stock Exchange - from India.

ABC, ESPN to run TV shows, clips on Web service
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Walt Disney Co’s ABC television network and ESPN cable sports network said they will run television shows and clips on the Veoh Web video service.

ABC and Writers Skirmish Over After-Hours E-Mail
A recent dispute at ABC News asked: at what point does checking e-mail after hours constitute working overtime?

Forget Digital Music, Beatles In Talks For Video Games (Paid Content)
Beatles representatives, who haven’t yet reached a deal to offer the band’s music online, are now in talks with two video games companies for a Beatles-themed video game, in a move that could pave the way for a broader licensing of the Fab Four’s catalog, reports FT. The reps have been talking to with both Activision and MTV Games, the respective makers of the Guitar Hero and Rock Band games…the two games have been successful in sales of the digital versions of songs featured on the games… A deal hinges on getting agreements from Beatles’ label EMI and Apple Corps, the company established by the band to oversee its business interests.

Madison Avenue Likes What It Sees in the Mirror
The series “Mad Men” is inspiring commercials; designer fashions; window displays in department stores; merchandise; and a mock issue of Advertising Age.

Sponsorship: Monetization’s Dark Horse (by Steven Hodson, writing at Mashable)
The two most outstanding problems with using things like ad networks of any kind is that the carrier of those ads actually make very little money and the fact is that for the most part contextual advertising is a joke. The chances of any ads really being something of interest to your readers is pretty slim; unless of course you are being represented by the big networks like Federated Media. So how do start-ups and especially the mid range blogs looking to earn a living increase their chances of serving up better ads? One idea that has been around for a very long time in old media advertising and is now beginning to be seen in our new media is the concept of sponsorships - more directly micro-advocate sponsorships.

Nokia buys social networking site Plazes
HELSINKI (Reuters) - The world’s top cellphone maker Nokia said on Monday it has agreed to buy social networking start-up Plazes as part of its major push into offering Internet services.

AFP launches mobile news, multimedia service
PARIS (AFP) - Agence France-Presse announced Friday the launch of a new service providing mobile phone users with access to its global news coverage and incorporating multimedia and messaging options.