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This is a non-comprehensive list of the articles I fact checked and copy-edited for FAIR.org 

FAIR •

Corporate Media’s Leaked Chinese Documents Confirm China Didn’t Hide Covid-19

Several reports on China’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic came out late last year, based on what US outlets like CNN, the New York Times and ProPublica claimed to be leaked Chinese documents. Although these reports implied that China was responsible for how bad the pandemic has been because of its downplaying of numbers and censoring of critical information, these narratives are themselves misleading in several ways.

CNN (11/30/20) released “The Wuhan Files” in late November, announcing “a s
FAIR •

‘US Leadership’—and Other Euphemisms for War

Joe Biden doesn’t become president for a month and a half, but already sections of the corporate media are calling on him to use US power to dominate the world.

Typically these calls are couched in benign-sounding euphemisms. For instance, CNBC (11/21/20) ran an article headlined, “How Biden Can Restore US Global Leadership After Trump’s Retreat From International Institutions,” which of course presumes that America ought to be planetary chief, despite the vast majority of those who live on Ear
FAIR •

Critics of Canceling Student Debt Aren’t Afraid It Won’t Work—They’re Afraid It Will

Progressives who have had their doubts about President-elect Joe Biden’s economic policies might get thrown a bone, with Democratic leaders noting that Biden could erase student debt without congressional approval (CNBC, 11/16/20).

The idea of canceling student debt, once championed by Occupy Wall Street and treated as a pipe dream when advocated by Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren (FAIR.org, 7/25/19), is now thought to be viable, and progressives are pushing for it. At the same time, busine
FAIR •

Greenwald Splits With Intercept Over Visions of Editing

Less than a week before voters across the US headed to the polls in the 2020 presidential election, famed journalist Glenn Greenwald made a stunning announcement: He was leaving the Intercept, the outlet he helped found in 2013, and striking off on his own at the newsletter website Substack.

In a lengthy post at Substack (10/29/20) explaining his departure, Greenwald wrote that Intercept editors were censoring his work—specifically an article, later published at Substack (10/29/20), that reflec
FAIR •

Corporate Media Begin to Acknowledge GOP Coup Attempt

Even though President Donald Trump had telegraphed his intent months in advance to steal the 2020 election, by planning to get judges, state legislators and/or the Electoral College to illegitimately declare him the winner—laying out a pretext by lying about widespread voter fraud—corporate media were slow to accurately convey the reality and significance of Trump’s election theft efforts. I’ve noted twice before (FAIR.org, 9/15/20, 11/5/20) that corporate media betrayed their journalistic respo
FAIR •

New York‘s Chait Boosts Charter Schools—but No Longer Mentions Spouse’s Policy Role in Charter School Industry

New York magazine political writer Jonathan Chait penned a column last month (10/7/20) attacking teachers unions for their activism in keeping schools closed during the coronavirus pandemic, as remote learning continues for children across the country.

The unions, Chait wrote, “have been an influential force against reopening schools even in cities and states where elected officials felt it could be done with reasonable safety.” This has led to a situation in Washington, he continued, wherein
FAIR •

US Media Lie About Bolivia’s Movement Toward Socialism—Before, During and After Election

When Bolivia’s democratically elected President Evo Morales, representing the party known as the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS), was overthrown in a coup last fall, corporate media earned an assist. As FAIR demonstrated, they refused to call the coup a coup (FAIR.org, 11/11/19); praised the country’s new far-right, self-appointed president Jeanine Áñez (11/15/19); and glossed over the coup government’s massacres (12/13/19).

Prior to the October 18, 2020, election, in which a wide majority of v
FAIR •

After Socialist Victory in Bolivia, Media Still Whitewash Coup

Bolivia’s Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) party won a decisive victory in the country’s presidential elections on Sunday, with its candidate Luis Arce apparently winning by a large enough margin to avoid a runoff, likely achieving an absolute majority. The leading opposing candidate, neoliberal Carlos Mesa, and the right-wing unelected President Jeanine Áñez congratulated Arce on his victory.

Some in US corporate media, however, failed to describe what was really going on in the country.

When
FAIR •

‘Media Sources in the Democratic Party Tend to Be More Right-Wing’

Janine Jackson interviewed FAIR’s Julie Hollar about post-election media for the November 13, 2020, episode of CounterSpin. This is a lightly edited transcript.

Janine Jackson: Seventy percent of Republicans don’t think the elections were free and fair, according to Politico. “A stark rise,” they note—perhaps unnecessarily—from the 35% that felt that way before Trump lost.

There are surely multiple, complicated reasons for that. One may be that they’ve been insufficiently disabused by corporat
FAIR •

‘We Basically Made Recovery Much, Much Harder Than It Has to Be’

Janine Jackson interviewed the Economic Policy Institute’s Josh Bivens about pandemic unemployment for the November 13, 2020, episode of CounterSpin. This is a lightly edited transcript.

Janine Jackson: A CNN story leads with the news that “America’s jobs recovery is slowing down.” That sounds unfortunate, but not disastrous; more like a blip in a generally positive trend. And if you stop reading there, you might think that’s what’s going on. But only if your knowledge of the unemployment crisi
FAIR •

‘These Lawsuits Are Incredibly Rinky-Dink’

Janine Jackson interviewed Voting Booth’s Steven Rosenfeld about vote counting for the November 6, 2020, episode of CounterSpin. This is a lightly edited transcript.

Janine Jackson: It is November 5, and the New York Times front page tells me that Joe Biden sees a “path to victory.” The reason it’s just a path, I’m to understand, is that Donald Trump is still mounting “challenges” to vote counts. Trump, of course, announced in advance that, “As soon as that election is over, we’re going in with
FAIR •

Young Voices Largely Missing in Election Coverage

Harvard’s Institute of Politics (10/26/20) reported last week that 63% of respondents aged 18–29 said they will “definitely be voting,” highlighting the “contrast to 47% during this same time in 2016.” Despite this increase of young people planning to vote, corporate media have largely forgotten about them in the weeks leading up to the election.

Corporate media mentioned young voters in March, when Sen. Bernie Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren dropped out of the presidential race, and in April
FAIR •

‘We Have a Long History of Criminalizing Communities of Color Through Drugs’

Janine Jackson interviewed Drug Policy Alliance’s Matt Sutton about victims of the drug war for the October 23, 2020, episode of CounterSpin.This is a lightly edited transcript.

Janine Jackson: Many things contributed to the murder of Breonna Taylor by Louisville, Kentucky, police. Newspaper articles want to walk us through what happened that night, as though the meaning of the event were contained in those frenzied few minutes on March 13. But of course the conditions for that nightmare were e
FAIR •

‘Proposition 22 Is a Backlash to Victories Workers Have Had’

Janine Jackson interviewed Rey Fuentes about California’s Proposition 22 for the November 6, 2020, episode of CounterSpin. This is a lightly edited transcript.

Janine Jackson: Proposition 22, or the “Protect App-Based Drivers and Services Act,” passed in California on November 3, after what the New York Times glossed as a “really, really expensive battle over the future of work.” In reality, the spending was quite one-sided—companies, including Uber and Lyft, spent $205 million, the most costly
FAIR •

‘Independent Media Is About Introducing People to Each Other’

Janine Jackson interviewed Laura Flanders about independent journalism for the September 25, 2020, episode of CounterSpin. This is a lightly edited transcript.

Janine Jackson: It doesn’t matter how many channels you have; if you sift through them, you will find lamentably little journalism that isn’t mainly stale frameworks and rhetoric turning round on itself. News is press releases from the powerful; analysis is white men espousing variants on the status quo. At a historical moment demanding
FAIR •

A Quick (Corrected) Calculation on Child Covid Deaths

I posted an angry piece on Wednesday (9/23/20) about an interview that was published by Jacobin (9/19/20)—and then immediately took it down, because it was based on a misreading of a chart from the Centers for Disease Control.

While I’m sorry I didn’t catch the mistake before publishing (and grateful to the reader who pointed out my error), I’m glad to be wrong, because my error was thinking that children are considerably more vulnerable to the coronavirus than they actually are...