Archive for July, 2010

“C. J. Whose Real Name Was Romoy Raymond”

Monday, July 26th, 2010

This story, especially as it was reported – lurid in that tabloid style that minces facts to disseminate the squalid because the reporter is too dumb or lazy to plumb the facts – for days and days and days by New York Daily News, could be straight out of a Stephen King novella, novel, TV Series Movie of the Week, Cable Special, Hollywood cinema. Someone tell me that it’s not to fantastical to image that C. J. Whose Real Name Was Romoy Raymond hasn’t been crying out from his grave.

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Sherrod Story Raises Question: How Many Breitbart Frauds Will Media Fall For?

Saturday, July 24th, 2010

By Zachary Tomanelli

“The lesson of Shirley Sherrod’s disgraceful treatment by right-wing and not-so-right-wing media (followed by her equally squalid dismissal by an administration that took that media at face value) boils down to a single question: When will journalists see Andrew Breitbart as the serial promoter of journalistic frauds that he is, rather than as a legitimate source for story ideas?”

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Government Testing Finds Air in Gulf Like Los Angeles on a Bad Day

Thursday, July 22nd, 2010

by Marian Wang
ProPublica

Air monitoring by the EPA shows that along parts of Gulf Coast, the air may be unhealthy for people “who are unusually sensitive to air pollution.”

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Women’s Sports Gets 1.6 Percent of Local TV News Sports Coverage

Wednesday, July 21st, 2010

07/13/2010 by Julie Hollar/FAIR Blog

No, that’s not a typo: Only 1.6 percent of sports coverage on L.A.’s three major network affiliates went to women’s sports. On ESPN Sportscenter, it’s 1.4 percent. It’s just slightly higher when you add in ticker-tape coverage. And it’s getting worse, not better: Those numbers are down from about 5 percent in 1989.

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FAIR Activism Update: PBS Ombudsman Agrees That PBS Series Turmoil and Triumph Has a “Credibility Problem”

Tuesday, July 20th, 2010

In response to hundreds of letters from FAIR activists, PBS Ombud Michael Getler (7/16/10) agreed with FAIR’s criticism (Action Alert, 7/12/10) of the 3-hour PBS documentary Turmoil and Triumph, a tribute to former Reagan-era Secretary of State George Shultz funded in part by institutions and individuals with close ties to Shultz.
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[Criminal*] Columbia Studies Halted at Brain Lab Over Impure Injections in Mentally Ill?

Sunday, July 18th, 2010

By Ed Kent
Kent, a retired Brooklyn College philosophy professor, is writing in reference to the  New York Times article, headlined: “Studies Halted at Brain Lab Over Impure Injections”

I am appalled to learn that Columbia (where I earned my Ph.D.) has been injecting mental patients with dangerous drugs as research.
*Criminal: Ed Kent’s original usage on his blog.

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NYCLU Applauds Governor David A. Paterson for Signing Stop-and-Frisk Database Bill into Law

Friday, July 16th, 2010

In 2007, the NYCLU started the campaign to  challenge  this heinous NYPD “practice of keeping a computer database of completely innocent people who have been stopped, questioned or frisked by police officers.” Since 2004, the NYPD has stopped and interrogated people nearly 3 million times, predominately people of color, African Americans and Hispanics.

“We applaud Governor Paterson for pulling the plug on the NYPD’s sprawling database of innocent black and Latino New Yorkers,” said NYCLU Executive Director Donna Lieberman, according to a statement posted at the NYCLU website. “Innocent people stopped by the police for doing nothing more than going to school, work or the subway should not become permanent criminal suspects. By signing this bill, the Paterson administration has put itself on the right side of history and leaves an important legacy in support of civil rights, civil liberties and common sense.”

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NY Governor David A. Paterson Signs “Stop and Frisk” Bill into Law

Friday, July 16th, 2010

By New York State Office of the Governor – Press Release

Governor David A. Paterson today signed into law A.11177-A/S.7945-A, or the “Stop and Frisk” legislation, which prohibits the retention, in an electronic database, the personal information of individuals who are stopped, questioned and frisked by police, but are not charged with a crime or violation. The “stop, question and frisk” technique is used when a police officer reasonably suspects that an individual has committed or is about to commit a misdemeanor or felony. While this law does not prohibit the use of that technique, it ends the practice of storing the personal information that is collected in the New York City Police Department’s (NYPD) database. The bill applies only to stops in New York City.

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Covering Elections in 2010: A Training Workshop for Ethnic and Community Media Journalists

Thursday, July 15th, 2010

At the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism, today, beginning at 10 a.m. Co-sponsored by New York Community Media Alliance:

With the economy and politics in turmoil, what are the election trends? Who do we watch, why and how do we get the story? Please join a panel of experts who can help shed light on how state and city governments work; who holds the purse strings; how to measure what’s happening on the ground; what all this could mean to your community.

The Plot Thickens!

Sunday, July 11th, 2010

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