New post added at News Channel 365 - Joe Strupp: Media Ethicists Savage Wash. Post ‘s “Troubling” And “Dishonest” Disclosure Standard For Writer/LobbyistSource: mediamatters.org - Thursday, January 22, 2015 The Washington Post claims that broadly disclosing that one of its opinion writers is a Republican lobbyist is sufficient even when he is advocating for positions that specifically benefit his firm's unmentioned clients, a standard media critics say is "troubling" and "dishonest." Ed Rogers writes conservative commentary for the Post 's PostPartisan blog. Like many conservative columnists, he regularly criticizes environmental and energy regulations and the environmentalists who support them. But unlike those other columnists, Rogers has a massive conflict of interest: he is chairman of the lobbying firm BGR Group , whose clients benefit from the positions he espouses. While the Post discloses his position with the firm in the bio appended to his posts, it does not reveal BGR's specific clients and conflicts, even when they directly overlap with the subject matter of Rogers' writing. After Media Matters documented how Rogers' firm received more than $1.6 million last year from energy and transportation clients that benefit from positions he espoused in his columns, a Post spokesperson defended the practice, telling Media Matters via email, "His full-time lobbying job is in his bio on every single piece he writes." ( Media Matters noted this in our original post on the matter.) Asked again why specific disclosures are not provided for pieces that support issues favorable to a certain client, the spokesperson did nAll Related
Posted on: Fri, 23 Jan 2015 23:49:14 +0000
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