Citations Needed, Episode 16: Editorial Boards - Protectors of Establishment Ideology

Donald Trump speaks with Washington Post publisher Fred Ryan, left, as he departs a meeting with the editorial board of The Washington Post. Editorial page editor Fred Hiatt is on the right. (Bonnie Jo Mount/Washington Post)

Editorial boards are the establishment voice from above, handing out decrees of moral and political import behind an anonymous byline. Major papers like The New York Times and The Washington Post have an Official Position™ and it's important that Important People™ hear that position. But of what use is this 19th Century artifact? Whose interest does it serve and why does it even still exist?

On this episode of Citations Needed, we attempt to answer these questions and more with guests Janine Jackson and Jim Naureckas of the always-essential FAIR.org.

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The Show

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The Guests

Janine Jackson is the program director of Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting and producer/host of FAIR’s syndicated weekly radio show CounterSpin. She contributes frequently to FAIR’s newsletter Extra!, and co-edited The FAIR Reader: An Extra! Review of Press and Politics in the ’90s.

Jim Naureckas is the editor of FAIR.org, the website of Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting. Since 1990, he has edited Extra!, FAIR’s print publication, now a monthly newsletter. He is the co-author of Way Things Aren’t: Rush Limbaugh’s Reign of Error, and co-editor of The FAIR Reader: An Extra! Review of Press and Politics in the ’90s. You can follow him on Twitter at @JNaureckas.

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Citations Needed is a media criticism podcast, hosted by Adam Johnson and Nima Shirazi, political commentators and media analysts working to call bullshit on (usually corporate) media’s ubiquitous reliance on and regurgitation of false and destructive narratives, tropes and stereotypes.

Citations Needed is produced by Florence Barrau-Adams. Our Production Consultant is Josh Kross. The theme is ‘Nonphenomenal Lineage’ by Grandaddy.

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