Media Should Learn From Cronkite: Grow a Backbone

It's blindly beating the war drums once again: Glenn Greenwald

(NEWSER) - The American media took its lumps after the Iraqi war for not challenging the government's allegations against Saddam Hussein. It promised to learn its lesson. Guess what? The same thing is now happening in regard to Iran, with a twist: The media is actually "out in front of the US government in the propaganda effort rather than in their normal position of submissively marching behind," writes Glenn Greenwald in Salon . More»

Press corps miffed by quiet social life, he suggests

(NEWSER) - President Obama isn't aloof, he says—it's just that he and Michelle don't tend to paint the town red. "My suspicion is that this whole critique has to do with the fact that I don’t go to a lot of Washington parties and, as a consequence, the Washington press corps maybe just doesn’t feel like I’m in the mix enough with them," he tells Time in an interview, noted by Politico . "And they figure, well, if I’m not spending time with them, I must be cold and aloof." More»

Co-founder is one of 4 staffers let go

(NEWSER) - Slate co-founder Jack Shafer, who has been with the online magazine since before its official launch in 1996, is being laid off, it was announced yesterday. The media critic is one of four staff members being let go; Timothy Noah , June Thomas , and Juliet Lapidos are the others, reports the Washington Post . (The Washington Post Co. bought Slate in 2004 from Microsoft.) Some reactions:

• "If you weren't reading [Jack, Tim, June, and Juliet's] stuff, you're in luck—it'll be online 'til the Internet dies," writes Slate colleague David Weigel. "If you write, you should study it, because these people think and write circles around most everyone in the job-formerly-known-as-the-Life-of-Kings."

Taking same White House correspondents gig, but with new boss

(AP) - CNN White House correspondent Ed Henry is jumping to Fox News to take the same job over there, the network announced yesterday. Henry joined CNN in 2004 from Roll Call, and he covered the president, Congress, and politics for the network. A Fox News exec says the network has been "impressed with Henry's reporting for a long time." More»

But years-long global decline in press freedom seems to be leveling off

(NEWSER) - The bad news: In 2010, a free press became a thing of the past in Mexico and Egypt. The good news is that an eight-year decline in press freedom around the globe apparently started leveling off last year, according to an annual report by advocacy group Freedom House. Mexico and Egypt were both downgraded to "not free," the AP reports. Mexico's decline was seen as a surprise, and was attributed to the attacks on journalists and self-censorship that have occurred as a result of the drug war. More»