"The reason I created this motion," Chris Condon, a member of Pacifica's National Governance Committee, explained, "is because there has been a lot of debate about whether or not Amy Goodman has received CIA conduit foundation funding from the Ford Foundation and other places."
Amy Goodman is, of course, the co-host of Democracy Now!, an unabashedly progressive news program that airs on over 800 stations across the country. As anyone who has listened to even five minutes of the program knows, Goodman is about as likely to be on the payroll of the CIA as Howard Zinn or Noam Chomsky. She has probably devoted more airtime to dissecting the CIA's transgressions in the past decade than any other member of her profession.
Amy Goodman is, of course, the co-host of Democracy Now!, an unabashedly progressive news program that airs on over 800 stations across the country. As anyone who has listened to even five minutes of the program knows, Goodman is about as likely to be on the payroll of the CIA as Howard Zinn or Noam Chomsky. She has probably devoted more airtime to dissecting the CIA's transgressions in the past decade than any other member of her profession.
That's The Nation's dirty whore Eyal Press demonstrating how one doesn't do journalism.
If you're going to write about someone accused of being bought by foundation money, you need to note in there that your own magazine's foundation gifted Goodman with $100,000 in 2006.
It's called "disclosure" and a journalist would know that. Of course, a journalist wouldn't belong to a foundation. Eyal belongs to the New American Foundation (he's a Schwartz Fellow there).
"She has probably devoted more airtime to dissecting the CIA's transgressions in the past decade than any other member of her profession," sniffs Eyal.
Uh, what show have you been watching?
Not Democracy Now!
Democracy Now! does damn little on the CIA -- and, point of fact, The Nation's long, long connections to the CIA (including their current editor & publisher's family connections to the CIA) really make it laughable when Eyal hops on his hobby horse to fume. But Eyal, the CIA has many journalists on their payroll. They always have. They've long funded periodicals that would close shop without that funding because the periodicals can't turn a profit and can't stay in print on their own. The Ford Foundation's ties to the CIA are fairly well known at this late date and you can be sure -- as any journalist knows -- that it and other foundations determine what gets on air via the threat of no future funding.
But back to the false claim that Amy Goodman's reported on the CIA more than anyone else. Does Eyal even know what the CIA is? He appears to have confused them with the NSA, the FBI, ICE or Homeland Security. Goodman has featured segments on those agencies.
The CIA?
That really comes down to the issue of kidnapping and, to cover that topic, that means booking . . . Jane Mayer of The New Yorker.
Jane Mayer, not Amy Goodman, has done more to cover the CIA than any other journalist this decade.
"But I said airtime!" whines Eyal.
Yeah, and Mayer's on Democracy Now! and on KPFA's The Morning Show and on various NPR programs and on PBS' The NewsHour, etc. She's on those shows talking about her reporting. Her reporting.
As for Democracy Now! being progressive? Try in its original incarnation. What happened to all of those hosts, by the way? It's hilarious when you grasp that some people today believe Amy Goodman was the primary host ('primary' is how she billed herself in Colorado at the Apsen Institute, not "co-host," "primary host") back when the show started. Uh, no.
Of course, when Democracy Now! started (and for many years after) it was a Pacifica asset -- owned by Pacifica. That changed, didn't it? And Amy Goodman -- Queen of Beggar Media -- started taking home a million dollar a year salary from Pacifica. When Pacifica couldn't pay their bills, when paid staff was let go, Goodman was taking home one million dollars a year. Community radio paid a person one million dollars a year?
Goodman's not a "progressive" and Eyal insults everyone's intelligence by claiming that's what she is. As Bruce Springsteen once sang, "Closets are for hangers."
But Eyal reveals his own gross stupidity throughout the really bad blog post -- no more so than when he writes, "Amy Goodman is, of course, the co-host of Democracy Now!, an unabashedly progressive news program that airs on over 800 stations across the country. " How many stations her show appears on really has nothing to do with the topic Eyal's allegedly writing on; however, if you're going to include a 'fact' try getting it right.
"Over 800 stations across the country"?
In whose dreams?
Try, "Democracy Now! is currently broadcast on nearly 805 stations around the world." The source for that fact? This Democracy Now! webpage.
We could go on and on but, point is, we've already demonstrated that whatever Eyal Press was doing, it was not journalism.
