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After nearly two years of favorable treatment from seemingly every corner of the media since he announced his candidacy for the presidency in 2006, Obama is still finding ways to delight his biggest fans. On his first day on the job, Obama announced "a new standard of openness" at a swearing in ceremony for senior members of his administration. According to CNBC's Michelle Caruso-Cabrera, that…

On Wednesday’s CBS Early Show, correspondent Shelia Macvicar declared: "Playing on television sets around the world, the inauguration of this U.S. president became an extraordinary global event. From his father's ancestral homeland in Kenya, where celebration mixed with expectation...Newborn babies now bear the names of the first couple, Barack and Michelle."From there, Macvicar went to France: "…

'Power Lunch' host Michelle Caruso-Cabrera credits Obama with 'political brilliance' for announcing his administration's openness with the press.

In the 1980s and 1990s, I had the pleasure of working for Bob and Linda Lichter, co-founders of the Center for Media and Public Affairs and co-authors, with fellow social scientist Stanley Rothman of Smith College, of the groundbreaking 1986 book The Media Elite: America’s New Powerbrokers.It was thus sad to read in Tuesday’s Washington Post that Linda Lichter has passed away at the age of 53,…

Inauguration committee cuts deals to get $5 million from media outlets and squeezes out ordinary citizens.

Here are a few stories that would make turning on the news a lot more pleasant.

The Associated Press's 1:12 p.m. coverage (saved here, as the dynamic link changed during the drafting of this post) of the Senate Finance Committee's hearing on Barack Obama's nomination of Timothy Giethner as Treasury Secretary has plenty of discussion of Geithner's tax "mistakes" (the picture, but not its heading, is from a November 21 New York Times article). But as has been the case with…

Nobel Prize winning economist has devoted over half his post-election columns to urging Obama to act like FDR, or promoting New Deal-style stimulus.

The inauguration of the first African-American president is an historic affair, one that should be properly celebrated by all. But when the so-called "objective" network anchors begin comparing a routine political ceremony to a spiritual awakening, have they gone too far? "Sacred." "Majesty." "Sacrament."  "Pilgrimage." These are words loaded with religious and spiritual meaning. And they're…

While she pronounced his prayer as a "good job" for being generally non-offensive and inclusive-sounding, Newsweek's Lisa Miller -- who earlier this month suggested ditching inaugural prayers altogether -- was nagged by the "lingering question" that "remains" from the way evangelical pastor Rick Warren closed his inauguration ceremony invocation in the name of Jesus:Warren's conservative theology…