👓 Trump Engaged in Suspect Tax Schemes as He Reaped Riches From His Father | New York Times

Read Trump Engaged in Suspect Tax Schemes as He Reaped Riches From His Father by David Barstow (nytimes.com)
The president has long sold himself as a self-made billionaire, but a Times investigation found that he received at least $413 million in today’s dollars from his father’s real estate empire, much of it through tax dodges in the 1990s.
I had suspected something like this for a long time and my suspicions were pushed during the election upon reports of Trump cheating sub-contractors and not paying them and again earlier this year when Jonathan Greenberg revised some of his 1980’s reportage for Forbes, but this is simply incredible!

While there are a lot of things one can take away from this stunning, thorough, and long read, the thing that strikes me is what Trump did to attempt to cheat his own father, who had been repeatedly been digging him out of trouble, when he was against the wall. He tried to defraud and steal from his greatest benefactor. How can anyone trust him to fight for America or real Americans when his entire substance as well as facade is a complete sham?

Combined with the millions he’s losing on real estate and other deals over the past decade, one is forced (again) to wonder who exactly is funding him now?

 

 

👓 UK journalists on Twitter: how they all follow each other | The Guardian

Read UK journalists on Twitter: how they all follow each other by Simon Rogers (the Guardian)
How much do journalists just follow other journalists on Twitter? This visualisation suggests one answer

👓 UK Journalists on Twitter | OUseful.Info, the blog

Read UK Journalists on Twitter by Tony Hirst (OUseful.Info)
A post on the Guardian Datablog earlier today took a dataset collected by the Tweetminster folk and graphed the sorts of thing that journalists tweet about ( Journalists on Twitter: how do Britain&…

Reply to WordCamp: Publishers

Replied to a tweet by WordCamp: PublishersWordCamp: Publishers (Twitter)
Leo [@postphotos] are you thinking what I’m thinking?
#Route66 #FromChicagotoLA

🎧 Summer Series Episode 1: US Storm Edition | On the Media | WNYC Studios

Listened to Summer Series Episode 1: US Storm Edition from On the Media | WNYC Studios
This summer we revisit some of our Breaking News Consumer's Handbooks. To mark the ramping up of hurricane season, the first episode in this mini-series is the US Storm Edition.

For media professionals, hurricanes offer the very best kind of bad news because the story arc is predictable and invariably compelling. In this summer series revisiting some of our Breaking News Consumer’s Handbooks, we examine the myths, misleading language, and tired media narratives that clog up news coverage at a time when clarity can be a matter of life and death.

Brooke speaks with Dr. Robert Holmes, National Flood Hazard Coordinator for the U.S. Geological Survey; Gina Eosco, a risk communication consultant; and Scott Gabriel Knowles of Drexel University, author of The Disaster Experts: Mastering Risk in Modern America.

👓 Bloomberg's TicToc is starting to build a brand beyond Twitter | Digiday

Read Bloomberg's TicToc is starting to build a brand beyond Twitter (Digiday)
Begun as a Twitter network, TicToc now includes a podcast and newsletter and is developing a website.

👓 Newsonomics: The Washington Post’s ambitions for Arc have grown — to a Bezosian scale | Nieman Lab

Read Newsonomics: The Washington Post’s ambitions for Arc have grown — to a Bezosian scale (Nieman Lab)
It is increasingly the tech stack of choice for major news publishers. But now Arc wants to be the backbone of your digital advertising and subscriptions, too.

👓 How Not to Report on an Earthquake | New York Times

Read How Not to Report on an Earthquake (New York Times)
What I got wrong in Haiti in 2010, and why it matters.
I’m not quite surprised at several of these at all. I am surprised that there are so many that are regularly and poorly reported however. People are too focused on the “story” and the expected narrative to get parts of the reporting right.

🎧 Strong Verbs, Short Sentences, Season 3 Episode 9 | Revisionist History

Listened to Strong Verbs, Short Sentences, Season 3 Episode 9 by Malcolm Gladwell from Revisionist History

"She was Joan of Arc, Madame Curie, and Florence Nightingale--all wrapped up in one."

One long, hot afternoon on Capitol Hill, in the summer of 1991, the most powerful man in Congress took on the most powerful person in American science. Science won. What does it take to end a reign of terror? The science fraud panic of the 1990s, part two of two.

🎧 The Imaginary Crimes of Margit Hamosh, Season 3 Episode 8 | Revisionist History

Listened to The Imaginary Crimes of Margit Hamosh, Season 3 Episode 8 by Malcolm Gladwell from Revisionist History

"Epidemics of fear repeat themselves. The first time as tragedy. The second time as farce. Margit Hamosh? Definitely farce."

What was it that Margit Hamosh did? What was her alleged fraud? I have been going on and on about this case for a good 20 minutes now, and I haven’t told you. Do you know why? Because we didn’t know.

It pains me to think of all these wasted hours over minutiae.

🎧 CNN's Lanny Davis Problem | On the Media

Listened to CNN's Lanny Davis Problem from On The Media | WNYC Studios

Did they err? Or did they lie?

Six weeks ago, CNN broke a blockbuster story: According to several anonymous sources, President Trump had advance knowledge of the infamous Trump Tower meeting. It was a potential smoking gun, until one of those sources — Lanny Davis, attorney for Michael Cohen — recanted.

Beyond that headache for CNN, there was another. The original article had claimed, "Contacted by CNN, one of Cohen's attorneys, Lanny Davis, declined to comment." Depending on how you understand the word "comment," and depending your general disposition, that claim could be technically true or woefully, mendaciously disingenuous. Bob spoke with Washington Post media reporter Paul Farhi about the implications — and dangers — of this latest media mishap.

🎧 Summer Series Episode 4: Tectonic Edition | WNYC | On The Media

Listened to Summer Series Episode 4: Tectonic Edition from On The Media | WNYC Studios

This summer we are revisiting some of our favorite Breaking News Consumer Handbooks. Episode 4 in this mini-series is Tectonic Edition.

After an earthquake struck Nepal in April of 2015, the post-disaster media coverage followed a trajectory we'd seen repeated after other earth-shaking events. We put together a template to help a discerning news consumer look for the real story. It's our Breaking News Consumer's Handbook: Tectonic Edition. Brooke spoke to Jonathan M. Katz, who wrote "How Not to Report on an Earthquake" for the New York Times Magazine.

Breaking News Consumer Handbook

Understanding how news is reported and the good and bad of it can certainly help one be a better consumer of it. This episode was quite enlightening about how disaster reporting is often done wrong.

🎧 Face the Racist Nation | On The Media | WNYC Studios

Listened to Face the Racist Nation from On The Media | WNYC Studios

An investigation into the media's coverage of white supremacist groups.

For more than a year, Lois Beckett [@loisbeckett], senior reporter at The Guardian US, has been showing up at white nationalist rallies, taking their pictures, writing down what they say. And she finds herself thinking: How did we get here? How did her beat as a political reporter come to include interviewing Nazis? And what are the consequences of giving these groups this much coverage?

In this week's program, we revisit this deep dive into what the news media often get wrong about white supremacists, and what those errors expose about the broader challenge of confronting racism in America.

1. Elle Reeve [@elspethreeve], correspondent for VICE News, Anna Merlan [@annamerlan], reporter for Gizmodo Media’s special projects desk, Vegas Tenold [@Vegastenold], journalist and author of Everything You Love Will Burn, and Al Letson [@Al_Letson], host of Reveal, from The Center for Investigative Reporting, on the pitfalls and perils of covering white supremacist groups. Listen.

2. Felix Harcourt [@FelixHistory], professor of history at Austin College and author of "Ku Klux Kulture," on the history of the Ku Klux Klan in the press in the 1920s. Listen.

3. Anna Merlan, Elle Reeve, Al Letson, Gary Younge [@garyyounge], editor-at-large for The Guardian, and Josh Harkinson [@joshharkinson], former senior writer at Mother Jones, on how individual identity impacts reporting on discriminatory movements. Listen.

4. Ibram X. Kendi [@DrIbram], professor of history and international relations at American University and author of "Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America," on the enduring myths surrounding the perpetuation of racist ideas and whose interests these misconceptions serve. Listen.

A stunning story and solidly great reporting. I heard the end of this on the radio a few weeks ago and circled back to listen to it a second time. I hope all journalists working in politics take a close look at it.

I particularly liked the Ibram X. Kendi portion of the interview and am ordering his book Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America, which was a National Book Award Winner.

🎧 George Lakoff on How Trump uses words to con the public | Reliable Sources podcast

Listened to George Lakoff on how Trump uses words to con the public by Brian Stelter from Reliable Sources | CNN

President Donald Trump has "turned words into weapons" -- and journalists are providing additional ammunition.

That's according to Trump critic George Lakoff, a renowned linguist and professor emeritus at the University of California at Berkeley. Lakoff wrote in a recent article for the Guardian that the president manipulates language to control the public narrative. The press, he said, functions as a sort of "marketing agency for [Trump's] ideas" by repeating his claims, even when trying to fact-check or debunk his statements.

"By faithfully transmitting Trump's words and ideas, the press helps him to attack, and thereby control, the press itself," he writes.

As the guest on this week's Reliable Sources podcast, Lakoff spoke to Brian Stelter about Trump's linguistic frames, what the press should do differently, and why journalists need to tackle Trump's words like a "truth sandwich."

👓 Here are the subjects our reporters enjoy covering the least | Ars Technica

Read Here are the subjects our reporters enjoy covering the least (Ars Technica)
A look at why reporting on some areas of science is just asking for pain.