Since there's no labels over the columns of boxes, I can't tell if ratings get more or less approving from left to right, so I'm doing this in words. In an attempt to appear balanced, the author comes off as schizoid. And he makes it sound as though Maddow, rather than he himself, claims that providing healthcare at free clinics is "blatant exploitation of the poor."

Not the very highest quality, I don't think, since only the upside of serving is covered. There could be a downside for people who give but don't get replenished, and for people who should be getting their ego jollies elsewhere. Maybe there's no research in these areas; is there some responsible journalism way to indicate "we think there may be some downsides, but we have no research on it"?.

I used to trust the L.A. Times, but this is not particularly good journalism. What local governments used zoning and permitting to pressure trailer residents? How way May 30 arrived at? What kind of affordable alternate housing is available? How accurate was the "suspicion" that "some people had grown comfortable in their free digs." If there was no data available on how many people could and could not afford to move, the article should have said so. I recommend the story because the ... More »

No--nowhere near enough sourcing, nowhere near enough naming of names, nothing the reader can double check--who the hell was the 24-year-old from a Republican family who forgot to renew the stock market lease? I'd definitely recommend this, but with a ton of warnings.

An enormous amount of the bloodshed of the last century was backed by claims of ancient histories and deep resentment about not being given due respect, to the point that the belligerents could feel land grabs, genocides, ethnic cleansings, etc., were justified. Would have been nice if he'd offered some specific advice, but maybe a warning is a good start. I hope someone follows up on this with decent sourcing.

Sorry excuse for journalism. I believe it, of course, because this is the sort of thing that goes on all the time, but I have to condemn it for lack of sources. I'm also not sure what it was doing on NewsTrust, since it's just an abridged version of a story available only in print.

It's good journalism of the fact-check mode. In a quick read, I didn't see any opinions from, or even list of, groups referenced thus: "made available to academic and scientific groups in April 2007 as was planned from the inception of the study." If no groups asked for the data, or received it but didn't respond, that should have been noted.

The data is important, but it's not good journalism because there's not enough data. Needs maybe a sentence on why the problem wound up in congress and maybe a sentence or so on why 18,000 didn't show up (I can think of one perfectly innocent reason). Also, can we accept it as good journalism when a quote like this is let stand without question or explanation? "It could have been ballot design,'' Rep. Vernon Ehlers, R-Michigan, said of the 18,000 ballots that showed no vote in the ... More »

The emotion and the attitude drown out the data and the analysis. Would have been more informative--and more powerful--with fewer and calmer words.

When the trillions in the headline turned out to be Zimbabwean dollars worth $272,360 on the black market, how much of the rest of the report is also misleading?

Listed as a news report, but contains more attitude than information. Not rhetorical: how to evaluate writing that provides no background on a technical topic where it's clear that the site is specialized. I read this thing hoping for a little education and got none at all, but maybe this site is not interested in an uneducated audience. In which case, is this kind of specialized article appropriate for such a diverse group as NewsTrust? (Or am I the only ignoramus in the gang?)

Not sure if a story can be considered fair if its main example, BitTorrent v Comcast, is incomprehensible. Even the link to the item about BitTorrent's being throttled is not clear on what it is that BitTorrent does.

Good journalism: well-sourced, temperate tone, clear as a bell, no wasted words.

Sourcing doesn't matter here, and I'm not even sure it's good journalism, but as an analysis of journalism it's required reading, especially for the notion that we deal with the effects of power, but not with how power works.

"Not even the most stalwart Bush adversaries backed an immediate troop withdrawal." Really? None? Then blaming the media for the Straw Man tactics used by presidents in *speeches.* And they call themselves Scientific.

Terrifically important topic, but not really good journalism. Journalism is supposed to be quick, but this doesn't get to the gist until paragraph 7 (of 17) and then the reader has to go back to try to put the beginning into some kind of context, only to realize the beginning really does assume prior knowledge of the history and the jargon of the issue. Journalism falls down on the job when it doesn't edit academics.

"Obama spokesman Bill Burton responded in a statement that the two networks said it would be impossible to exclude Florida TV sets from a national ad." But surely not impossible to buy 49 states--just more expensive. I am beginning to consider easily checked but unchecked statements not journalism at all, just stenography.

Trying to figure out why this smacks of having been written to fill space. Even if U.S. investors are scouring Europe for ideas, the writer does nothing to prove the contention that the U.S. is threatening to take the lead away from Europe. I'm not sure how seriously to take quotes from people who would like the reader to invest in *them.* All the highly touted green building that supposedly is going on over here doesn't come close to where Europe was 15 years ago, so I find it hard ... More »

I thought it was not good journalism--badly organized, badly written--but it's a campaign diary. Is a campaign diary supposed to be good journalism? Maybe a smattering of ideas, facts, what have yous is enough as long as it's on the objective side.

Is "he said, she said" good journalism? I don't think so, when with a little effort the article could have indicated whether McCain's claim that raising taxes has always lowered revenue is true or not. Also should have noted that the Confederate flag is the flag of Slavery and Secession, the flag of people who don't want to be citizens of the United States.

Seems to be data in a vacuum, but okay journalism if it was reported on a really tight deadline. If not, the item would benefit from comparing Chinese casualties per X miners with Polish, Indian and U.S. figures, which should be available online, along with the identity of the safest country. This data would add maybe a sentence to the item.

This is important, but the author seems unaware that the trend started years ago, with a special section for food and a special section for furniture, etc. Before that, we took for granted that, weird as it seems, ads for furniture would show up next to political news, ads for clothing next to war news. The theory seemed to be that, if the news were important and covered well, advertisers of all sorts of things would want to be next to it because that's where the readers would be. ... More »

Good as far as it goes. I agree that Brunner's reasoning should have been presented. Also, why does a change to mail-in ballots disenfranchise minority voters? The article makes it sound like minority voters are stupid, the way coverage of the 2000 Florida fiasco made it sound like elderly voters were stupid (instead of zeroing in on bad design, corrupt officials and thumb-sucking democrats).

It's easy to blame the messenger, but this is actually pretty good journalism. I would have liked to hear more about the percentage of people who view Obama this way, versus those who rate him on his record and positions on the issues. I did notice the writer took some liberties with numbers, contrasting the 63% of registered voters who said Americans are prepared to elect a QUALIFIED African-American as president with a 1986 poll that recorded 29% thinking America was ready to ... More »

Does a comment from Giuliani and a McCain ad a strategy make? Since it's labeled a "blog post" rather than a news report or an opinion, it's hard to know how to judge the lack of sourcing.

the first part, concerning misconceptions about flyover country, is spot on, but the second part, about Muslim footbaths in an airport, is such a hate-filled rant that the constitutional issues get lost. In addition, I googled a bit, and I think he's got some of his facts wrong.

I'm assuming a deadline and a huge amount of information led to the choppiness and occasional incoherence in this story. I would like to know if the "they" who, at the end of this paragraph, won't take the Columbian's calls, is the US or Venezuela: ""What changed dramatically has not just been that corruption has grown more profound, but that the cooperation stopped with us and the North Americans," said a high-ranking police official in Colombia's capital who has long coordinated ... More »

didn't we just review this one like 10 days ago? and what happened to the n/a or don't know option on the ratings?

Struck by the lack foundation, I went to the linked chronology, where virtually nothing has any back up evidence and, once again, it's all the media's fault. The deck is stacked: a verbatim of the principal's rambling radio claim that the school is safe gets about 800 words, a verbatim of the DA's disjointed claim that he wasn't threatening the black students gets about 900 words plus another roughly 400 for others' (agreeing) interpretation of his remarks. Meanwhile, a black ... More »

Not good journalism, not even journalism. Woefully long-winded self-congratulation and pitch for reader assistance. Precious little to back up claims that things in Iraq are better than what we are reading/hearing stateside. I know a people love this guy, but I wish he actually produced what they claim he does.

Seems to be sharp and as thorough as possible. I'd just like to know if AP tried to contact the contractor to find out if the data has been purged, and if it was NASA officials or the anonymous source(s) who claimed "The project was shelved when NASA cut its budget as emphasis shifted to send astronauts to the moon and Mars," or is the reporter making the connection? It will be interesting to see who else runs with this story.

Not a news report, but an essay about the news. And typically Times: If you're not up on the Democratic stance on Armenia, why they're in knots over domestic surveillance, why Bush vetoed the bill in the first place (it's in paragraph 17, closer to the bottom than to the top), then tough on you. Half or more of the quotes are meaningless.

Hard to believe there was such a deadline rush that it was impossible to added in some readily available comments from buy-local / anti-*afta groups

It's a single-source report of what somebody said, which can be a waste of trees. In this case, it would have helped if the Bank's track record of helping the poor vs helping outside investors at the expense of the poor had been added.

As long as it adheres to the rules on sourcing and evidence, etc., how could explaining what the mind does to the news not be good journalism?

Lack of sources

It's a terrific overview, which I think journalism has an obligation to provide. Would have been nice if it included more sources.

I'm glad Mearsheimer and Walt are continuing to raise the issue, but am I the only one who thinks that being interviewed by their own editor makes this publicity rather than journalism?

Looking at the enviro page, it suddenly struck me that some enterprising publication not owned by a mega corporation is going to realize that it won't take much to turn this topic into the ultimate sensationalistic fear machine--bigger than terrorism, bigger than color-coded alerts--especially now that we can blame China and forget our own role.

Was there no other source on Tuvalu than a travel writer? Travel writers can be super accurate, but using one as the sole source on a matter of science and government policy weakens the analysis and make Parry look lazy. This is a tremendously important topic--I wish more were covering it. And maybe looking into the Dean Scream, too.