OBAMA “TROUBLED” BY DOJ’S PRESS PROBES

President Obama said on Thursday that he was “troubled” by the investigation of reporters by his own Justice Department but said that he is attempting to strike “the right balance between our security and our open society.” The president himself, in a speech on his counterterrorism policy, appeared to be balancing his own response to […]

FOX NEWS’S AILES BLASTS DOJ’S PROBE OF FOX REPORTER

Fox News chief Roger Ailes on Thursday vowed to challenge the government’s investigation of James Rosen and other Fox News employees who are being investigated as co-conspirators in releasing classified information. In a message to Fox News staff, Ailes said, “I know how concerned you are because so many of you have asked me: why […]

OBAMA ADMINISTRATION TARGETS ANOTHER REPORTER

Criticism of the Obama administration’s efforts to plug leaks by targeting reporters escalated on Monday after it was disclosed that the Justice Department had investigated Fox News’s chief Washington DC correspondent James Rosen for allegedly soliciting classified information. The Washington Post on Monday said that Rosen was being targeted as a co-conspirator in a case […]

HIGH COURT SIDESTEPS CONTROVERSIAL RULING ON ON-AIR INDECENCY

The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday tossed out rulings by the Federal Communications Commission that fined Fox and ABC for violating federal indecency standards. But the court’s own ruling dealt not with the principal question of free speech that the FCC’s action raised but with the narrower question of whether the commission had properly notified […]

DOCUMENTARY MAKER ARRESTED, EJECTED FROM HOUSE HEARING

Documentary maker Josh Fox, who was nominated for an Oscar last year for his film Gasland, about the impact of natural gas drilling, was arrested on Capitol Hill Wednesday when he attempted to film a Congressiional hearing focusing on the issue. Charged with unlawful entry, Fox was led out of the hearing room in handcuffs. […]

DID OTHER ADVERTISERS PULL THEIR SPOTS FROM ALL-AMERICAN MUSLIM?

Although Lowe’s on Monday claimed that it was not the only advertiser to pull its ads off TLC’s All-American Muslim series, the network itself declined to comment on the Lowe’s statement. In response to an inquiry by the Los Angeles Times, Laurie Goldberg, a spokeswoman for the Discovery Network and TLC Network, said in an […]

COURT SAYS DOCUMENTARY MAKER CAN’T CLAIM PRESS SHIELD

Documentary filmmakers must establish that they have retained editorial independence throughout the making of their films if they wish to be protected by press shield laws, a federal court ruled on Thursday as it ordered director Joe Berlinger to turn over some 600 hours of outtakes from his 2009 documentary, Crude, to Chevron. The film […]

COURT OVERTURNS FCC INDECENCY FINE

In yet another blow to conservative parents’ groups and religious organizations battling what they consider indecent content on broadcast television, a federal appeals court on Tuesday overturned a $1.2 million fine that the Federal Communications Commission had imposed following ABC’s 2003 telecast of an NYPD Blue episode that included a brief shot of a woman’s […]

TV HOST BARRY NOLAN LOSES SUIT AGAINST COMCAST

Boston television personality Barry Nolan has lost his $1.2-million lawsuit against his former employer, Comcast. Nolan was fired by Comcast two years ago after he mounted a protest against the Boston chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts & Science’s decision to present Fox News commentator Bill O’Reilly its annual Governor’s Award. At the […]

PHOTOGS SUE TO BLOCK BORDER SEARCHES OF THEIR LAPTOPS

The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit on Tuesday challenging a U.S. policy that now allows customs officers to search the content of laptops and other devices of persons arriving from abroad even if a traveler is not suspected of wrongdoing. The lawsuit was brought on behalf of The National Press Photographers Association, whose […]

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