MEDIA BIAS: CAN WE TRUST THE NEWS?
On Thursday, November 5th, 230 people gathered in Bridges Hall of music to discuss Media Bias: Can We Trust the News? In the fourth annual installment of the Great Debate, Eric Alterman and Ross Douthat debated central issues about the slant of the media. Douthat contended that the media encompasses bias along multiple dimensions, including but not limited to action, appealing rhetoric, and the idea of bipartisanship. Alterman focused instead on the overrepresentation of false ideas in order to give Republicans a “fair shake,” which may lead to compromising politics that fall to the right of the spectrum.

Great Debate 2009: Can We Trust the News? from Pomona Student Union on Vimeo.

Thursday, November 5th, 8pm, Bridges Hall of Music

An understanding of the press and its biases is vital to our existence as a democratic society. Media outlets heavily influence the issues that Americans care about and the positions that viewers and readers take. How does that role influence our understanding of the world around us? Are the constant claims bias in popular and respected news sources like the New York Times and Fox News fair? How does slant affect elections, policy decisions, and world events?

To explore these issues, the Pomona Student Union, with support from the Public Events Committee, is proud to announce that leading experts Ross Douthat and Eric Alterman will be participating in the fourth installment of our annual Great Debate. This even will take place on November 5th, 2009, at 8pm in Little Bridges Hall of Music on the campus of Pomona College.

SPEAKER BIOS

Ross Douthat

Ross Douthat is a 2002 graduate of Harvard University, after which he joined The Atlantic staff as a reporter/researcher. Douthat quickly rose to the rank of senior editor, where he wrote on a variety of topics including higher education, national politics, and celebrities’ religious conversions.

In 2005, he published his first book, Privilege: Harvard and the Education of the Ruling Class. His second book, Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class And Save the American Dream, was published in 2008 with Reihan Salam and won praise from David Brooks, who called it the “best single roadmap of where the [Republican] party should and is likely to head.”

He is a film critic for National Review and has also contributed to The Wall Street Journal, The Weekly Standard, the Claremont Review of Books, GQ, and Slate, amongst others. In April 2009, he became an op-ed columnist for the New York Times, replacing Bill Kristol and becoming the youngest regular op-ed writer in the paper’s history.

Eric Alterman

Eric Alterman is Distinguished Professor of English and Journalism, Brooklyn College, City University of New York, and Professor of Journalism at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism. He is also “The Liberal Media” columnist for The Nation, a fellow of the Nation Institute, and a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress in Washington, DC, where he writes and edits the “Think Again” column.

Alterman is the author of seven books, including most recently, Why We’re Liberals: A Handbook for Restoring America’s Most Important Ideals (2008, 2009), and the national best-sellers What Liberal Media? The Truth About Bias and the News (2003, 2004), and The Book on Bush: How George W. (Mis)leads America (2004).

A former Adjunct Professor of Journalism at NYU and Columbia, Alterman received his B.A. in History and Government from Cornell, his M.A. in International Relations from Yale, and his Ph.D. in US History from Stanford.