If you’ve been following the Republican threat to limit the use of the Senate filibuster, you know that the Family Research Council, a promotional group for reactionary evangelicals, is sponsoring a television broadcast to build grassroots support for such a move. These radicals believe that by eroding this legislative...
Continue ReadingI must be crazy to invite your analysis of an illustration having to do with …tax policy! On the other hand, the subject did find its way onto the latest cover of The Economist — and you know how much pleasure the BAG community derives from TE’s visual coverage. ...
Continue ReadingFormer NYT Magazine editor Adam Moss must really be feeling the pressure to boost circulation at his new digs, New York Magazine. Why else would he recycle criticism of Bush Administration nemesis, Seymour Hirsch? The gist of this NYM story is that — when he’s on the lecture circuit...
Continue ReadingWhen I was first learning the shrink trade, I had a mentor who really impressed upon me the difference between describing something and explaining it. Maybe it goes against the who, what, where of journalistic convention, but this NYT article and photo (After the Tsunami: At Home, in Company...
Continue ReadingCan you tell what’s happening in this Pulitzer Prize winning photo? According to right wing bloggers, an Iraqi insurgent is shooting an Iraqi election worker with the aid of an AP photographer. One of the most prominent and disturbing right wing tactics since Bush came into office is the...
Continue ReadingThe White House press operation did a pretty good job stage managing George Bush’s meeting with Ariel Sharon on Monday. Besides a series of photos released by the Israeli press office, the general media was only allowed to take pictures from a distance during the leader’s joint press conference. ...
Continue ReadingMonday’s White House Letter in the NYT features “W” adjusting his iPod before jumping on his bike. I can’t look at this image without cringing, but I’m not exactly sure why. With Apple going mainstream, do these two icons deserve each other? Or, is Bush trying too hard to...
Continue ReadingI will be off for a few days, and will return by Wednesday. (While away, I have some really interesting shots I’ll be trying to crack open for you.) In the meantime, whether you’ve just fallen into the BAG or have been comfortably inside for some time, I would...
Continue ReadingHave you been following this story about the Minutemen, the border vigilantes who are “voluntarily” helping deter illegal immigration in Southeastern Arizona? Just one day after the LA Times ran this image on it’s front page (with the article: A Roadblock, Not a Barrier for Migrants), it followed up...
Continue ReadingA number of you have written me about the photos of the Bush delegation at Pope-side. The main issue involves which figures the media has elected to include or crop out, with the possible combinations consisting of: W and Laura; W, Laura and Poppy; W, Laura, Poppy and Bill;...
Continue Reading9:52am Bush says Pope was a great man. 10:19am Bush calls Pope a ‘champion of freedom.’ 11:23am Bush says “A good and faithful servant of God has been called home.” 12:03pm Bush Calls Pope ‘An Inspiration to Us All.’ 1:15pm Bush: Pope “champion of peace and freedom.” 1:45pm Pope...
Continue ReadingI was interested in your analysis of this photo in this morning’s NYT. It makes a wide sweep of many subjects, including British politics and Blair’s standing; the psychology of Blair; the current art of campaigning; the current intersection of politics and technology; the current intersection of technology and...
Continue ReadingI just don’t understand the Iraq coverage. Perhaps all those images of stained fingers waving in the air created the sense that democracy was “a done deal.” For whatever reason, however, the press seems to have spent the last nine weeks back under the spell of “Mission Accomplished.” I’m...
Continue ReadingThere are at least three ways to look at this photo that appeared last Saturday in the NYT. You could try and figure out where Bush’s head is at. You could draw inferences about the mood, creativity or bias of the guy who took the picture. Or, you could...
Continue ReadingI was interested in this photo, from last Tuesday, graphing the devastating 8.7 magnitude earthquake off Sumatra. For a moment, however, I imagined this as a device that could measure the size of a story’s media impact. If such an instrument did exist, I was thinking it would be...
Continue ReadingThe emotional violence from the latest round of right wing rampaging has left me feeling a little rough this hour. (By the way, has the soul of Jesse Jackson turned up anywhere?) So, maybe this is not the best time to bring Dubya back onto the BAG’s radar screen. ...
Continue ReadingIt’s Friday again. Meaning, it’s my opportunity to distribute some news image processing to the powerful, yet highly decentralized network of BAG analysts. As is becoming a custom, we have another suggestive cover of The Economic to decrypt. (I would have said “debug,” but the last issue you teased...
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