CounterSpin
553 episodes - English - Latest episode: 20 days ago - ★★★★★ - 458 ratingsCounterSpin is the weekly radio show of FAIR, the national media watch group.
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Episodes
Milton Allimadi on Media in Africa
November 25, 2022 16:25 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBThe African continent as a playing field for white people to test their theories, extract resources and stage proxy wars is time-tested.
While Crypto Bro Scammed Clients, Reporters Scammed Readers
November 19, 2022 18:47 - 8.6 KB text/htmlBefore Bankman-Fried’s transition from financial genius to possible financial criminal, he received little scrutiny in the media.
Brian Mier on Lula Election Victory
November 18, 2022 16:16 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBIt's hard not to imagine the use that a differently focused press corps might make of Brazil's change of direction.
US Media Searched for Crisis at China Party Congress
November 12, 2022 01:11 - 180 KB text/htmlFor the Western press, the 20th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party offered a number of signals which—if read in good faith—could have been perceived as reassuring. Instead, establishment outlets reverted to familiar narratives regarding China’s Covid mitigation strategy and tied these into renewed predictions of a long-prophesied economic disaster—one that would inevitably […]
Gene Slater on Housing Crisis, Rakeen Mabud on Inflation Coverage
November 11, 2022 15:24 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBThe affordable housing crisis is not just capitalism run amok, because that doesn't happen without government involvement.
Jake Johnston on Haiti Intervention, Jeannie Park on Harvard Affirmative Action
November 04, 2022 15:41 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBUS news media ignore the role US intervention has played throughout Haitian history in order to push for the same sort of intervention again.
‘This Is America. That’s the Kind of Trial Mumia Abu-Jamal Had.’
November 03, 2022 22:25 - 53.6 KB text/html"The culture of imprisonment tells a deeper story about America. We're not going to get it if we don't go to the prisons and get those voices out."
Noelle Hanrahan on Mumia Abu-Jamal Update
October 28, 2022 16:33 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBOvert, proud-of-it bias has shaped coverage of Mumia Abu-Jamal's case from the outset, and current mentions suggest little has changed.
Julie Hollar and Jim Naureckas on 2022 Midterms
October 21, 2022 14:57 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBElection coverage should be judged not by how reporters "treat" Democrats or Republicans, but about how they inform and engage the public.
‘People Are Taking Inspiration From Union Victories at Amazon and Starbucks’
October 14, 2022 22:40 - 84.8 KB text/htmlJanine Jackson interviewed San Francisco State University’s John Logan about Amazon and Starbucks organizing for the October 7, 2022, episode of CounterSpin. This is a lightly edited transcript. Janine Jackson: Between well-paid people telling you that the solution to high prices is unemployment, and the news of the latest weather catastrophe separated by […]
Ahmad Abuznaid on Israeli Human Rights Crackdown, Sohale Mortazavi on Cryptocurrency
October 14, 2022 14:18 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBGrowing numbers of people have concerns, not just about uncritical US support for Israel, but also about the shutdown of critics.
John Logan on Amazon & Starbucks Organizing
October 07, 2022 15:36 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBWith tens of thousands of workers walking out around the country, the notion that this is somehow not meaningful should be hard to maintain.
Julio López Varona on Puerto Rico Colonialism, Guerline Jozef on Haitian Refugee Abuse
September 30, 2022 16:17 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBTax giveaways to non–Puerto Ricans mean money not going to Puerto Rico's energy systems, schools, hospitals, housing.
Alicia Bell and Collette Watson on Media Reparations
September 23, 2022 15:13 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBUS news media need to not only acknowledge inflicting racist harms, but take seriously the idea of repairing them.
Sumayyah Waheed on CNN’s Copaganda Hire, Chris Becker on Inflation Coverage
September 16, 2022 15:20 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBFor corporate media, being a paid flack for the police in no way disqualifies you to offer analysis of law enforcement.
ACTION ALERT: Crime Claims of CNN’s New Police Expert Don’t Hold Up to Facts
September 14, 2022 21:40 - 2.93 MB application/pdfPlease ask CNN to explain why a person who misrepresents the evidence on the causes of crime trends should be offered as an expert.
Matt Gertz and Eric K Ward on White ‘Replacement’ Theory
September 09, 2022 15:46 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBNews media missed an opportunity to interrogate the media outlets and politicians who repeatedly invoke the white replacement idea.
Ivey Camille Manybeads Tso on Indigenous Resistance, Alex Vitale on the End of Policing
September 02, 2022 16:04 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBThe film Powerlands covers Indigenous people around the world, and the resource extraction stealing their water, minerals and homelands.
Ahmad Abuznaid on Palestine Human Rights Crackdown, Andrew Perez on Dark Money Donation
August 26, 2022 16:02 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBThe corporate media narrative on Israel/Palestine makes it hard to make sense of the recent assault by Israeli forces on the Gaza Strip.
Azadeh Shahshahani on Central America Plan, Jon Lloyd on Facebook Disinformation
August 19, 2022 14:18 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBWe have some questions about the US government's claim that this time, they're really bringing stability and security to Central America.
Angelo Carusone on Alex Jones Trial, Karl Grossman on Nuclear War
August 12, 2022 16:03 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBAlex Jones' lawyer says talking about his white supremacism would "distract from the main issues." What are the "main issues" about Jones?
Luke Harris and Joe Torres on America’s Racist Legacy
August 05, 2022 15:22 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBThis week on CounterSpin: The crises we face right now in the US—a nominally democratic political process that’s strangled by white supremacist values, a corporate profiteering system that mindlessly overrides human needs to treat the environment as just another “input”—are terrible, but not, precisely, new. People have fought against these ideas in various forms before; […]
Vivek Shandas on Climate Disruption & Heat Waves, Jamie Kalven on Laquan McDonald Coverup
July 29, 2022 15:27 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBThere's a way to tell the story of heat waves that connects to policy and planning, but that centers human beings.
Nora Benavidez on Post-Roe Data Privacy, Dorothee Benz on January 6 Insurrection
July 22, 2022 14:30 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBThis week on CounterSpin: The internet has changed the way we communicate, access information and even organize, which means concerns about digital privacy are concerns about privacy, period. In the wake of the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, allowing for the criminalization of abortion, our ability to safely access information and health care […]
Jessica Mason Pieklo on Abortion Rights, Preston Mitchum on Reproductive Justice
July 15, 2022 14:00 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBThis week on CounterSpin: The Supreme Court’s reversal on abortion rights is so actually and potentially devastating that it’s hard to know where to look. It’s worth tracing things back—Katherine Stewart in the Guardian, among others, walks us through how, at a time when most Protestant Republicans, including the Southern Baptist Convention, hailed the liberalization […]
‘Whether You’re on the Supreme Court Shouldn’t Depend on How Many People You Give Your Phone Number to’
July 14, 2022 15:00 - 63.9 KB application/pdf"That kind of legal philosophy could seriously endanger not just the environment, but the ability of Congress to pass all sorts of laws protecting the environment, health, safety and civil rights."
Did Public TV Doc Promote Peaceful Coexistence—or the UAE?
July 09, 2022 16:40 - 85.2 KB application/pdfA film that offers an entirely uncritical and glowing portrait of the UAE ought to make PBS take a closer look at the film's funding.
Adele Stan & Elliot Mincberg on John Roberts, Chip Gibbons on Why Assange Matters
July 08, 2022 15:31 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBA Supreme Court led by Chief Justice John Roberts has gutted multiple legally and societally established precedents.
Dave Zirin on Football Prayer Ruling, Howard Bryant on Black Athletes & Social Change
July 01, 2022 16:24 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBThis week on CounterSpin: Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote in the majority opinion on Kennedy v. Bremerton that “the Constitution and the best of our traditions counsel mutual respect and tolerance, not censorship and suppression, for religious and nonreligious views alike.” The case was about whether there was a problem with a Washington […]
Raed Jarrar on Biden’s Saudi Trip, Lindsay Koshgarian on People Over Pentagon
June 24, 2022 16:12 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBIt's hard to parse corporate media coverage of Biden's Saudi visit, because that coverage obscures rather than illuminates what's going on.
Helen Zia on Vincent Chin Legacy, Alec Karakatsanis on Chesa Boudin Recall
June 17, 2022 16:06 - 27 minutes - 12.8 MBIt's 40 years since Vincent Chin's murder, with a depressingly resonant context of anti-Asian hatred and scapegoating,
Nicaragua a ‘Dictatorship’ When It Follows US Lead on NGOs
June 16, 2022 20:11 - 17.6 KB text/htmlModest legal steps that would go unnoticed in most countries are—in Nicaragua’s case—clear evidence that it is “inching toward dictatorship.”
‘Calibrated’ Dishonesty: Western Media Coverage of Venezuela Sanctions
June 13, 2022 22:00 - 689 KB application/pdfUS officials have free rein to continue inflicting collective punishment on Venezuelans without challenge or scrutiny.
Politico Paints Gen X as ‘Trumpiest Generation’—on Flimsiest Evidence
June 10, 2022 21:11 - 2.54 MB application/pdfOn Biden’s and Trump’s favorable ratings, Gen Xers find themselves mostly in the middle among generations.
Lori Wallach on Vaccine Equity, Steffie Woolhandler on Insurance & Covid
June 10, 2022 15:42 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBThere are people and policies, with names, preventing developing countries from accessing life-saving Covid vaccines.
Liliana Segura on Supreme Court v. Innocence
June 03, 2022 16:08 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBWhile alternative media are up in arms about the Supreme Court's ruling, corporate news media don't seem to think there's much to see there.
Igor Volsky on Ending Gun Violence, Pat Elder on Junior ROTC
May 27, 2022 15:44 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBThis week on CounterSpin: CBS News‘ website featured a story about the “grim task” of planning funerals for 19 children—shot dead, along with two teachers, in a Texas elementary school on May 24—right next to a story about Oklahoma’s governor signing the country’s strictest abortion ban, the prominent sign behind him declaring “life is […]
Matt Gertz, Eric K. Ward on the Buffalo Massacre & ‘Replacement Theory’
May 20, 2022 15:41 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBThe Buffalo killer is a white supremacist who believes there's a plot run by Jews to "replace" white people with Black and brown people.
Julie Hollar on Roe Reversal, Tesnim Zekeria on Baby Formula Shortage
May 13, 2022 16:02 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBElite media are interested in abortion as an issue, but it is not understood as a human right but rather as a partisan football.
Chris Lehmann on Multi-Racial Democracy, Mike Rispoli on Funding Local News
May 06, 2022 16:09 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBA new website uses critical race theory as a prism to explore the range of threats to multi-racial democracy and our ability to fight for it.
Josmar Trujillo on Hyper-Policing
April 29, 2022 16:37 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MB"If it bleeds, it leads" journalism lets news outlets look as though they're tracking an important event in real time.
Dorothy A. Brown and Dean Baker on Tax Policy
April 22, 2022 16:06 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBWho pays taxes, how much, and why? We revisit two conversations about tax policy racism and taxing the rich on this week's show.
Layla A. Jones on ‘Lights. Camera. Crime’
April 15, 2022 16:00 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBThe Philadelphia Inquirer's "A More Perfect Union" project is aimed at examining racism in US institutions, including media institutions.
Marjorie Cohn on Prosecuting Trump, Mike Liszewski on Marijuana Justice
April 08, 2022 16:16 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBThis week on CounterSpin: He wanted to go to the Capitol on January 6, Donald Trump tells the Washington Post, but the Secret Service wouldn’t let him. He hated the violence, and was furious Nancy Pelosi wasn’t putting a stop to it. He doesn’t remember getting many phone calls, and he didn’t destroy any […]
Sarah Lipton-Lubet on Ginni Thomas Conflict, Dave Maass on Transparency and Journalism
April 01, 2022 15:33 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBWill we keep having a Supreme Court justice declaring himself "one being" with a spouse who declares the 2020 election an "obvious fraud"?
Carol Anderson on History, Race and Democracy
March 25, 2022 16:02 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBIt's a good time to recall that we had a war in this country in which many people declared that they cared more about white supremacy.
Shireen Al-Adeimi on Yemen, David Arkush on Fed Climate Veto
March 18, 2022 15:52 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBYemen is not a rhetorical device. It's a country of human beings in crisis.
Khury Petersen-Smith on Economic Sanctions, Greg LeRoy on Amazon Subsidies
March 11, 2022 17:04 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBEconomic pressure is presented as a way of avoiding violence. But there's a problem with seeing sanctions as an alternative to war.
Braxton Brewington on Student Loan Debt, Andy Marra on Trans Youth Rights
March 04, 2022 16:58 - 27 minutes - 12.9 MBIs what we call "higher" education an individual investment or a public good? The way news media talk about it could be decisive.
Foreign Agents Designation Causes Media Cold War
February 28, 2022 22:44 - 1.23 MB application/pdfSome state-backed journalists must register as “foreign agents” with the US government. But others don't have to.