CJR … with so much material to work with, it is safe to say some front-page coverage—from The New York Times on down to local papers—is warranted, if not long overdue. It has been a bewildering year where climate science is concerned, and readers need to understand that while there is plenty of room to improve the research and communications process, its fundamental tenets remain as solid as ever. …
Powerful oil, coal, and natural gas producing corporations have a powerful hold on the advertising and infinite cash to hire lobbyists and politicians. With the Senate, a millionaires club which might include a billionaire unless Californians stop blaming Senator Boxer for the Financial and other disasters perpetuated by Republican policies in the Bush Administration giving corporations the incentive to go full speed ahead without any regard or controls for the safety and security of jobs for Americans or for our financial system of banks.
Sure some of these safeguards were eliminated in the last two years of the Clinton Administration with both the House and Senate controlled by Republicans. When Clinton vetoed the bill to deny bankruptcy protection for credit card debts on the advice of Hillary, the powerful corporate forces with a Republican congress, hit Bill Clinton with one scandal after another based on weak and made-up evidence covered on the front page of the New York Times due to editorial pressures and put the Lewinsky scandal or not on the front page and the corporate media also loved it.
The Greenspan and Rubin team took care to prevent Hillary Clinton from attending meetings regarding these bills. She was also busy formulating a plan to defend Bill's Impeachment charge in the Republican Senate which just required a majority vote.
Whitewater, Troopergate, Foster suicide as possible murder, and even blamed his administration for leaking nuclear bomb and rocket launch data to China. All false with no evidence. All on the Front page with unidentified or salacious self-serving sources.
Keith Olbermann quit MSNBC television because he did not think the reporting was fair.
Jim Kawakami, July 8, 2010, http://jimboguy.blogspot.com
Reviews vindicating scientists get strong blog coverage, but more high-profile stories are needed By Curtis Brainard
Columbia Journalism Review CJR The Observatory Curtis Brainard July 07, 2010 http://www.cjr.org/the_observatory/wanted_climate_frontpager.php Over the last two days, two reports have, respectively, reaffirmed the integrity of the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the scientists involved in the so-called “Climategate” affair. Unfortunately, while the reports have received a lot of attention in the blogosphere, high-profile coverage in newspapers and magazines has been woefully lacking. …
Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, which advises the Dutch government, released a review of the IPCC’s 2007 report on the impacts of climate change. It found that report contained no errors that undermined the panel’s main conclusion that manmade global warming poses serious threats to human society. … On Wednesday, independent investigators in the United Kingdom released their analysis of climate scientists at the University of East Anglia who were embroiled in a series of controversial e-mails hacked and leaked from the university last year. The investigation found that, despite accusations of impropriety, the scientists had conducted their work with rigor and honesty. …
Each of these reviews has, in turn, drawn significant coverage in mainstream media and independent blogs of all varieties and points of view (see round-ups here, here, and here for instance). But only a few brief articles have appeared in newspapers and magazines, and they were usually buried deep inside. …
Likewise, American journalists have plenty of opportunities to place this story in domestic context. The National Research Council, the research arm of the National Academies of Science has released three installments of its five-part report, “America’s Climate Choices,” which look at the science of climate change as well limiting it and adapting to it. The two remaining installments—one about response options and one a summary—are expected later this year.
There has also been some interesting research on public opinion about global warming in the U.S.A. (more thorough) poll from Stanford, and one from Yale and George Mason Universities, which recently found high levels of concern, conflicted with others from Gallup and the Pew Research Center, which found much lower levels of worry.
Indeed, with so much material to work with, it is safe to say some front-page coverage—from The New York Times on down to local papers—is warranted, if not long overdue. It has been a bewildering year where climate science is concerned, and readers need to understand that while there is plenty of room to improve the research and communications process, its fundamental tenets remain as solid as ever.
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