Journalistic Fraud: How The New York Times Distorts the News and Why It Can No Longer Be Trusted

Library Journal

The ongoing public debate on bias in the media has a new entry on the side of "too liberal" with a specific examination of the New York Times. Kohn, an entertainment lawyer, describes himself as a news consumer who has been an avid reader of the Times since the 1960s, and he laments the changes that he perceives in the news coverage. He argues that journalists at the Times do not know how to produce factual leads, they create misleading headlines, and their articles contain distortions of facts. The coverage of the war in Iraq is used to bring a focus to his accusations of liberal bias. Although he is aware that contemporary journalism education explores the complexity of the concept of objectivity, he rejects that approach and insists on impartial news writing. Kohn's methodology cannot prove his argument as his analysis is applied to select articles, mostly from 2002, rather than to a content analysis of all news articles over a specified time period. The entire book is, in effect, an editorial rant directed at the New York Times and should only be purchased by libraries following the debate's back and forth.-Judy Solberg, George Washington Univ. Libs., Washington, DC Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.