Elizabeth Jensen, NYT: Bill Moyers to Leave Weekly Television

The PBS mainstay Bill Moyers said he was retiring from weekly television and would end his Friday night public affairs show, “Bill Moyers Journal,” on April 30, 2010. (NOTE THAT IS THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE END OF THE VIETNAM WAR!)

That date will also be the last for “Now on PBS,” which has been canceled.

Mr. Moyers said he had been planning for some time to retire the program on Dec. 25, but was asked by PBS to raise the funds to continue through April, which he did.

“I am 75 years old,” he said of the decision to end the series, which began in April 2007. The program has recently been having a “good run of it,” he added in a telephone interview on Friday, “so I feel it’s time.” He said he was not quitting television work, although he has no new projects planned.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: MY TAKE ON BILL MOYERS MOST IMPORTANT RECENT SHOW

SALON: THE MEDIA AS AN IDIOOCRACY

TPM: Poll: Majority Of Republicans Think Obama Didn’t Actually Win 2008 Election — ACORN Stole It!

WILL THE INQUISITION BE NEXT?

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin has banned Rep. Patrick Kennedy from receiving Communion, the central sacrament of the church, in Rhode Island because of the congressman’s support for abortion rights, Kennedy said in a newspaper interview published Sunday.

The decision by the outspoken prelate, reported on The Providence Journal’s Web site, significantly escalates a bitter dispute between Tobin, an ultra orthodox bishop, and Kennedy, a son of the nation’s most famous Roman Catholic family.

MEDIA: Reuters: Media Job Cuts: The Worst Is Not Over

Although many U.S. media conglomerates are reporting strong earnings and their CEOs are touting a long-awaited uptick in advertising spending, analysts warn that more cost cuts lie ahead. Layoffs are “nowhere near over.” Business models “are still in flux.”

MURDOCH DEAL WITH MICROSOFT IN THE WORKS

“It’s going to be like Conservapedia vs Wikipedia for search engines, only with Conservapedia having serious money behind it.”

Telegraph: Murdoch Jr: TV is News Corp’s Future

Broadcasting and entertainment are the future for News Corp., with newspapers playing a much smaller role, says James Murdoch, the company’s head of Europe and Asia. “Journalism plays a role” in our business. But, “television is vastly more profitable.”

COVERAGE OF OBAMA CHINA TRIP SKEWED SAYS AMBASSADOR–AND NOT JUST BY CHINA

AP: BEIJING — Washington’s ambassador to Beijing hit out Friday at negative U.S. media coverage of President Barack Obama’s visit to China, saying it failed to take into account important progress on many issues.

Although producing no breakthroughs on key issues, Obama’s first state visit to the Asian giant that ended Wednesday was heralded by both sides as a success.

The trip was the top news story in China, drawing strong interest from the Chinese public who, surveys suggest, are largely positive in their view of the American president.

However, much of the U.S. media coverage was strongly negative, accusing Obama of failing to gain concessions on key issues such as Iran’s nuclear program and climate change, as well as being weak on human rights.

Ambassador Jon Huntsman said the reports missed the fact that the visit had yielded important progress on cooperation in areas such as clean energy, military-to-military exchanges and stopping the spread of nuclear weapons.

“I attended all those meetings that President Obama had with Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao,” Huntsman said, referring to the Chinese president and premier.

“I’ve got to say some of the reporting I saw afterward was off the mark. I saw sweeping comments about things that apparently weren’t talked about, when they were discussed in great detail in the meetings,” he said.

Also: The Dalai Lama said on Indian TV: “Obama is not soft on China; just has a different style.”

I WANT MEDIA: AOL Layoff Package: You Stay, You Pay (AllThingsDigital)

AOL is offering those who “volunteer” to leave the company now a departure package that ranges from three to nine months of pay, compared to one to four months for employees laid off in the first quarter of next year. The offer is part of a massive layoff of 2,500 of its 6,000-person workforce. AllThingsDigital: AOL eying sale of MapQuest. NYT: AOL said in a regulatory filing that the job cuts were meant to save about $300 million a year.

SHORTCUT

EJC” Yahoo has added a new feature to its search service which the company hopes will improve coverage of breaking news. The company said that the ‘Shortcut’ component will not only display news stories on breaking items, but also offer related Twitter posts as well as photos and video files. Integration with the popular microblogging platform was a special point of emphasis for Yahoo. Overhauling search has been a top priority for Yahoo in its ongoing rebuilding efforts under Jerry Yang and more recently Carol Bartz. In addition to the high-profile deal with Microsoft, the company has added social networking components and overhauled its mobile platform.

NOW THERE MAY NOT BE SUCH A HAPPY XMAS

Nov 20 LOS ANGELES — Customs officials say they got a surprise when they found 316,000 glass bongs disguised as Christmas ornaments at the Los Angeles harbor. U.S. Customs and Border Protection said Thursday that agents found the highly decorated drug pipes in 860 boxes shipped from China. The cargo, estimated to be worth more than $2.6 million, had been described as glass figures and Christmas ornaments.

LETTER

Noemy writes:

I’m sure the criminals that own the congress would LOVE to make Hasan a terrorists instead of having to admit that the illegal wars that are now going on because of Bush/Cheney are eating American young alive. They say NOT ONE WORD about the average of suicides at Fort Hood that amount to an average of TEN a month! Yes.. TEN A MONTH… what would that allo the dumb downed minds of Americans think were they given TRUTH instead of the fiction they’re fed daily by the controlled press and supe cooperative presstitutes? Stories of wife beating, suicide, murder of even their children gets kept out of the press so those lousy wars can continue. WHY can’t the USA find something other than WMD’S to manufacture? Why not admit now that both those wars were started by lies and continue to be lies? The evil is not in the resistance the USA receives in the middle east it’s in the USA/BRITAIN etc. Who ever doesn’t know that is stupid!

PROMISE OF THE DAY: (Via Undernews) I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war – Barack Obama, October 27, 2007.

THE ASSASSINATION: Every year, at this time of year, I think about the Kennedy Assassination. I remember watching Cronkite that day, and living through the national trauma. Years later, I worked alongside Oliver Stone on a documentary based on the issues raised in his film JFK. My film is “BEYOND JFK: The Question of Conspiracy” packaged with the Directors cut of the high grossing movie that dramatized one theory. My film considered many theories, including “THE MAFIA DID IT” perspective, which was the subject of what I considered an unconvincing hyped-up doc on Discovery Channel on Sunday Night. It seemed old to me, excerpt for one guy identified as an FBI informant, whatever that means, who claims a MAFIA boss claimed to him that he ordered the hit. Knowing what we know about Mob guys, it wasn’t convincing and was uncorroborated.

Arguably Ruby did the Mob’s work—but Oswald? I kind of doubt it. In fact, on Saturday I went to see very well acted and written play by David Korn (Directed by Lee Gundersheimer) at the ARCLIGHT THEATER called “ACTING ALONE.” It reconstructed what is know of Oswald’s life and made a case that, others including Norman Mailer came to that he was indeed the LONE ASSASSIN. Don’t forget that there was two crimes here— the killing and the cover-up!

Many who have looked at it, including Walter Cronkite in his later years, no longer believed he acted alone. Cronkite shared his own doubts with me in BEYOND JFK as did Tip O’Neil, a Kennedy friend and the House Majority Leader.

IN THE NEWS: During my recent visit to Paris, I was interviewed by former Banker-trader Max Keiser who does a tabloidish financial report heavy on scandal for a number of media outlets. He interviews me in this edition—go to 17 MINUTES in and you will see my response to his machine gun like questions. The interview, though taped in Paris with me appearing to be in NYC, was aired on RUSSIA TODAY!

WATCH IT HERE.

ON FRANCE 24, A CNN TYPE NEWS STATION IN PARIS

Also in France, I was plugged on the news station France 24 by Professor Waddick Doyle in a story by crook who ripped off a bank and became a national here. Waddick gets the book’s name wrong (It’s the Crime of Our Time, Not The Crime of The Century) but who is quibbling?

On Friday, I was interviewed by the BBC TV on Oprah’s announced departure.

Let’s see how long it takes for an American station to discover my work?

The Thanksgiving week is here. I will be giving thanks for getting a job—directing a film. Guess where? The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)! More info to come.

Your comments to dissector@mediachannel.org