The city of Chicago will direct half of its advertising dollars to smaller local news outlets in the new year through a measure long sought by independent media outlets. Chicago spent $3.5 million on media ads from 2015 to 2020, with just over $660,000 going toward placement in community outlets. This fall, Chicago Mayor Lori…
A St. Louis Circuit judge has ruled that The Gateway Pundit, the far-right conspiracy website owned by James Hoft, must provide much of the information his accusers have been seeking for six months in their defamation suit against him. Judge Jason M. Sengheiser sided largely with attorneys for the two Georgia poll workers, Ruby Freeman…
When I reflect on all that has happened, there are certainly reasons to be discouraged. For six years, I’ve watched politicians foment hatred and mistrust of the press, demonizing us with the label “enemy of the people.” The stream of lies and disinformation has become a flood. And now our democracy has reached a new…
My Bar Mizvah in Berlin, Germany, was scheduled for Saturday, November 12, 1938. However, the night of November 9 lasting through November 10, Nazis launched a night and day of terror attacks against Jews in Germany and Austria. The Nazi’s attacks were revenge for the killing of Ernst vom Rath on November 7, 1938, who…
The success of election-deniers in the Midterm Elections shows just how much work confronts us in our efforts to increase media literacy in the US. As happened in primary contests in August, candidates who promoted the Republican Party’s so-called “big lie” that the 2020 election was stolen did well again, although the anticipated red wave did…