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Breaking The News: How the Media Undermine American Democracy Paperback – January 14, 1997

by James Fallows (Author)
4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 44 ratings
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Why do Americans mistrust the news media? It may be because show like "The McLaughlin Group" reduce participating journalists to so many shouting heads. Or because, increasingly, the profession treats issues as complex as health-care reform and foreign policy as exercises in political gamesmanship. These are just a few of the arguments that have made Breaking the News so controversial and so widely acclaimed. Drawing on his own experience as a National Book Award-winning journalist--and on the gaffes of colleagues from George Will to Cokie Roberts--Fallows shows why the media have not only lost our respect but alienated us from our public life.



"Important and lucid...It moves smartly beyond the usual attacks on sensationalism and bias to the more profound problems in modern American journalism...dead-on."--Newsweek
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Previous page
  1. Print length
    352 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publication date
    January 14, 1997
  4. Dimensions
    5.19 x 0.8 x 8 inches
  5. ISBN-10
    9780679758563
  6. ISBN-13
    978-0679758563
  7. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Featuring a new afterword, "Fallows's rousing jeremiad is an important beacon for everyone concerned about the news media's poor performance in helping the public make sane choices about the way we live, work and govern," said PW.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Scientific American

Important and lucid . . . It moves smartly beyond the usual attacks on sensationalism and bias to the more profound problems in modern American journalism . . . dead-on.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0679758569
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group; 1st Vintage Bks Ed., Jan. 1997 edition (January 14, 1997)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 352 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9780679758563
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0679758563
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 10 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.19 x 0.8 x 8 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 44 ratings

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James Fallows

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Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5
44 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Tracy Marks
5.0 out of 5 stars Superb book on our most important national issue!
Reviewed in the United States on January 14, 2004
Verified Purchase
Appalled at the biases, distortions and omissions in the media, which have been worsening since 9-11, I recently launched on a campaign of study in regard to learning about the deterioration of the media and the influence of corporate control - and what we can do to counter it. This is one of the best, most informative and most readable of the six books on the subject I've read. I can't emphasize enough how important it is, how much our corporate-run media influence political thinking, decisionmaking and voting and influence not only the outcome of elections but the agenda and actions of politicians - and how motivated we need to become in order to counter it, to become informed about political realities rather than propaganda and myth, and as a country, to become more of a democracy and less of a plutocracy. The biggest difficult we face is that the media itself is not likely to publicize its own corruption, and is actively blocking attempts of people concerned with these issues inform the public. I also highly recommend the books on media disinformation and reform by Robert McChesney, including his mini-books Corporate Media and the Threat to Democracy and Our Media, Not Theirs.
41 people found this helpful
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Simone Signoret
5.0 out of 5 stars An outstanding book by an outstanding author.
Reviewed in the United States on July 24, 2014
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Outstanding journalist James Fallows wrote this biting critique of the Press in 1996 - yet it is more than ever relevant. An example of a prophet crying in the wilderness. Fallows lays out clearly why the American people have lost their respect for this important profession and its practitioners, and how the Press fails its calling. It does so in two major ways: One is focusing on the sensational instead of on the important, and lacking sorely in fact checking. A well-informed public is indispensable to the proper functioning of a republic; and the fact that our republic is not well functioning at all is in large part due to a Press that does not fulfill its duty to the people.
7 people found this helpful
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Arthur Lucchese
5.0 out of 5 stars good information
Reviewed in the United States on December 22, 2021
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good information and easy reading
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george
3.0 out of 5 stars good book but not his best work
Reviewed in the United States on March 8, 2006
Fallows is very smart and an excellent writer. This book is very good but I do not believe it to be his best work. However, this is an important part of any survey or recent books on the large problems within the US media.
4 people found this helpful
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James H. Bluck
4.0 out of 5 stars Thoughtful and insightful
Reviewed in the United States on November 4, 2002
Fallows has written a very thoughtful and insightful analysis of the sorry state of the news business. He exposes among other things the sordid, money grubbing reality behind the Sunday morning talking head "news" programs and why Sam Donaldson and his ilk, for example, always were more interested in provoking a fight between two guests than in having an illuminating discussion of views and issues between guests on the "This Morning" program on Sunday mornings.
There's nothing terribly new in Fallows' book in that probably every point he makes has been made elswhere. What is valuable about the book is that it pulls a lot of the criticisms of contemporary news coverage into a comprehensive critique of the news business.
Sadly, one despairs of any improvement given the wide denial -- well documented by Fallows -- by prominent members of the elite media of any problem with the way they cover and select the news.
This book ought to be required reading for all journalists and anyone who cares deeply about the coverage of the news and its effect on our political system. It's hard to imagine any of our prominent journalists changing their views on this subject given the strong institutional instinct to defend their current practices. The only hope it seems to me is that a new generation of journalists will eschew the misguided practices of their peers and create a new journalism that is less self-centered, less self-serving and more useful to most Americans.
The paperback edition of the book, which I read, was published shortly after Fallows had assumed the reins at US News. It would be interesting to see a follow up to this book in a few years in which Fallows shares with us his experiences in trying to implement his advocacy of "civic journalism" in real life. I suspect that it's a lot harder than Fallows suspects.
11 people found this helpful
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Pantagruel
5.0 out of 5 stars The content is as brilliant as its title
Reviewed in the United States on February 25, 2017
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The content is as brilliant as its title. A few years old now, but this book is even more relevant today. It provides a frame to help process and understand the flood of media information.
5 people found this helpful
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terence m. mcnay
5.0 out of 5 stars written in '96 the book is still very good at explaining why the news media are failing to ...
Reviewed in the United States on August 19, 2014
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written in '96 the book is still very good at explaining why the news media are failing to help the public know the truth about how our society works or does not work.
3 people found this helpful
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SOL STERN
2.0 out of 5 stars Two Stars
Reviewed in the United States on October 8, 2017
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