Author Archive
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Swing States Project
Toledo Blade disappoints on Jeep-to-China claims
November 1, 2012 02:50 PMOHIO — As Toledo became ground zero in the presidential campaigns’ message war in recent days—over auto industry jobs, in general, and Jeep, in particular— The [Toledo] Blade, unfortunately, did not come through for readers. While The Blade has covered... Continue reading
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The Kicker
Journalism crash course in Jersey
August 28, 2012 06:50 AMImagine that it is days after the shootings at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, WI, earlier this month, and you ask 260 people around New York City's Central Park to “name a salient fact” about the Sikh religion. How... Continue reading
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The Kicker
NYT uses false balance while reporting on false balance
August 8, 2012 05:55 PMFrom today’s New York Times, we learn that “Obama Is An Avid Reader, and Critic, of the News,” as the headline on Amy ChozikChozick’s piece has it. Chozick gives readers the following rundown of the president’s news... Continue reading
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The Kicker
Required skimming: campaign finance
August 2, 2012 06:50 AMThis month, CJR presents “Required Skimming,” a daily miniguide to our staffers' beats and obsessions, ranging from finance to food. If we overlooked any of your must-read destinations, please tell us in the comments. • ProPublica: Ease into the... Continue reading
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The Kicker
Listen: Swing States Project staffer on weak coverage of Bain dispute
July 16, 2012 12:20 PMOn Friday, Brendan Nyhan, The Swing States Project’s New Hampshire correspondent, talked with On the Media’s Bob Garfield about shortcomings in press coverage of the ongoing dispute over Mitt Romney's tenure at Bain Capital (the subject... Continue reading
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Swing States Project
Another recommended LAT read on campaign finance
June 26, 2012 05:15 PMLast month, The Swing States Project singled out the good work of the Los Angeles Times’s Matea Gold and Joseph Tanfani for their efforts to unmask dark money donors to the Center to Protect Patient Rights (CPPR), an... Continue reading
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The Kicker
Live from Tampa and Charlotte: it’s NYT and BuzzFeed
June 18, 2012 03:20 PMOne way to generate news during the ample down time at the Democratic and Republican National Conventions is to "frantically try to engineer a meeting" between Captain Morgan and Ted Sorenson. Another way is to pair New... Continue reading
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The Kicker
Watch: Swing States Project staffer on coverage of gaffes, changes at GOOD, and Mitt’s Mormonism
June 14, 2012 06:50 AMEarlier this week, Anna Clark, Michigan correspondent for CJR’s Swing States Project, appeared on bloggingheads.tv’s The Posner Show. Below, watch Clark and Sarah Posner’s lively fifty-plus-minute conversation, in which they touch on topics recently... Continue reading
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Swing States Project
Outrage angle covered—now how about those gas price claims?
May 23, 2012 05:10 PMLast week, the Denver Post ran a short “local news” piece headlined, “Political billboards in Colorado use energy policy to fuel debate.” The debate thus fueled (and here covered by the Post) is not, mind you, about energy... Continue reading
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The Kicker
Broadcasters sue to keep political ad buy data offline
May 22, 2012 04:51 PMThe National Association of Broadcasters—which represents parent companies of NBC, CBS, and Fox, among others—yesterday moved to halt the Federal Communications Commission’s recent ruling requiring TV stations to post political ad buy data online (data the stations currently... Continue reading
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Swing States Project
Energy Ad War Revs Up in Battleground States
April 11, 2012 04:38 PMIt’s coming, the New York Times reported on Monday, the start of that “major anti-Obama advertising blitz” from the largest of the Republican super PACs, American Crossroads (and its non-donor-disclosing, nonprofit sister group, Crossroads GPS). It’s here, The... Continue reading
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The Kicker
Flashback: Super Tuesday 2008 (Vote-zilla!!!)
March 6, 2012 11:16 AMToday is Super Tuesday! Or, "'pretty good' Tuesday," as MSNBC's delegate math whiz Chuck Todd put it in a wistful walking-to-work tweet this morning. A far cry from "Monster Super Tuesday," which is but one... Continue reading
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Campaign Desk
Super PAC Reporting: Recommended Reading
February 1, 2012 02:57 PMMaybe you know someone—a friend—who keeps hearing about Super PACs, knows he should know more about what they are, where they come from, and what they’re doing, but hasn’t quite kept up? You’re in luck, my friend, your friend: There’s... Continue reading
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The Kicker
North Korean Newspaper Goes English on Web
January 11, 2012 11:05 PMLast month, on the occasion of the passing of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, I reviewed the 1983 Pyongyang-published book, The Great Teacher of Journalists, which chronicled the Dear Leader’s tireless contributions to (and benevolent corrections of)... Continue reading
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Campaign Desk
Best of 2011: Liz Cox Barrett
January 3, 2012 06:00 AMUnpacking Rory Reid’s 91 PACs Maneuver Where there are campaign finance laws, there are work-arounds. And Jon Ralston, as a seasoned political reporter and self-described campaign finance report “obsessive” in Nevada --a state with, in Ralston’s words,... Continue reading
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Behind the News
The Great Teacher of Journalists: Kim Jong-il
December 20, 2011 04:24 PMNorth Korean dictator Kim Jong-il has died. A couple of days, perhaps, after the Dear Leader passed, the state news agency informed the people, citing Kim’s “overwork” on behalf of North Koreans and related “mental and... Continue reading
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The Kicker
Hints of Ben Smith’s BuzzFeed Move?
December 12, 2011 03:53 PMEarly today, Politico's Ben Smith announced that he will be "giving up this blog" (the recently renamed and relaunched "Ben Smith on Politics and Media" blog at Politico) to join BuzzFeed, which the The... Continue reading
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Feature
Immediate Returns
December 2, 2011 06:00 AMThirty-five-year-old Ben Smith reports on national politics for Politico from a rent-a-desk writers’ workspace on the first floor of a blue Victorian house in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn. While Smith’s widely read blog at Politico bears the tag... Continue reading
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Campaign Desk
Back to Watergate Era “Bags of Cash”?
November 16, 2011 01:50 PM“The pre-Watergate bags of cash are back,” declares MSNBC’s First Read this morning, pointing to a New York Times piece about how Jon Huntsman’s wealthy father is spending big money via a super PAC to help his son’s... Continue reading
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The Kicker
Found: Coverage of FEC “Stalemate”
November 8, 2011 09:45 AMProPublica’s Marian Wang describes in a piece posted yesterday the ongoing “gridlock” at the Federal Election Commission (the agency, Wang explains, “tasked with ensuring that campaigns and contributors play by the rules”). Wang notes how “hands-off” the FEC has... Continue reading
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