By Peter Block

Most of what you read about the field of journalism is grim. Journalists now rank below lawyers as being trusted in the eyes of the public. Print news and TV channels are in a steep revenue decline. We are told that the younger generation gets their news...

What has become clear during Donald Trump's media-blitz-of-a-non-campaign-campaign is that too many mainstream journalists are missing the story. The story and the opportunity. The story about what the "birther" issue really is all about, and the opportunity to live up to media responsibility in helping people make enlightened decisions...

The PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature, held annually in New York, is particularly good this year. I am attending a number of sessions, and the first will be "The Public Intellectual" on Monday, April 25.

I want to put down some thoughts on the subject beforehand.

What is...

I don't know about you, but I'm all in a swivet about the Royal Wedding. My invitation seems to have been lost in the mail, but I'm not going to let that stop me. I'm sure it's just an oversight. These things happen to me all the time. In the...

1. Don't these big news mags do this "endangered white male" thing at least once a year?

2. Given Newsweek's relaunch (and continued financial straights, I assume), the pandering (or, "protecting the base") is at least comprehensible.

3. No beach on Wall...

Last month, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) released a modest two-page Enforcement Advisory to remind broadcasters that they must certify in broadcast applications that their advertising contracts do not discriminate. The Advisory also designated a senior member of the FCC's Media Bureau to serve as a compliance officer...

This morning I printed out all the emails Tim Hetherington sent to me over the last few weeks. They were short but thoughtful. I smiled every time my Gmail chimed, every time his name popped up in my inbox.

Tim died Wednesday in Misrata, Libya, while covering Gaddafi's...

It is beyond dispute that the unrelenting television coverage of the war in Vietnam shortened that war. Americans grew repelled by the carnage.

The Bushes learned, and so they kept the media at a distance for the 1991 Gulf war and the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan. When journalists wanted...

To the list of photographers who have died while covering war and conflict, we must now add the names of Tim Hetherington and Chris Hondros, killed in Misurata, Libya on Wednesday. They join the likes of Ken Oosterbroek, a member of the so-called Bang Bang Club of photojournalists...

Earlier this week CNN/Opinion Research released a series of national polls that seemed to represent young Americans (under the age of 35) marginally at best, if at all. Specifically, they listed respondent data on questions pertaining to "the legalization of marijuana" and "marriages between gay and lesbian couples"...

On Wednesday afternoon, I was deeply troubled to find out that photojournalist Tim Hetherington had died in Libya covering a battle in the city of Misrata. He was apparently hit by a rocket propelled grenade (RPG) during a firefight between the rebels and forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi.

Samantha Power, Wikipedia tells me, is special assistant to President Barack Obama and runs the Office of Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights as senior director of multilateral affairs on the staff of the National Security Council. She is, I can tell you, a remarkable woman by any imaginable...

I met Chris Hondros in 2009, when a mutual friend suggested we talk. I had just returned from a year in Iraq and our friend thought that Chris and I should trade "war stories." He lived in Brooklyn and I worked in his neighborhood, so we figured we'd have plenty...

A friend of mine served two tours of duty in Iraq. When WikiLeaks released its Apache attack video one year ago, he expressed surprise at the attention it received. Before his second deployment, he had spent hours watching recordings of IEDs exploding in and around American military convoys....