Those of us with a keen interest in a particular issue are now able to assemble a fuller picture by analyzing accounts from different perspectives. For instance, there was a protest at a fracking waste storage site in southeastern Ohio a few weeks ago. There’s a local newspaper’s account of it, a pro fracking post that among other things called it “a terrorist action,” and an account from the group that staged it.

Reporters from the Associated Press and Agence France Presse - both newswires – have had reporters there almost as much as O’Brien and I have been there. NBC News and CNN have occasionally had a person. There’s been foreign press like Al Jazeera English and even RT that have been present every so often. But, really, when one gets down to it, the media in general has not been there to cover the proceedings as they should.

Last week, Democratic strategist, writer, and rape survivor Zerlina Maxwell went on The Sean Hannity Show and argued that men and boys should be trained not to rape. Maxwell was viciously attacked by conservatives following her appearance. But if there’s any problem with Maxwell’s argument, it’s not that it went too far — it’s that it could have gone even further.

The daily newspaper owned by Rupert Murdoch, the Wall Street Journal, chose to take a hot-blooded authoritarian swipe at Pfc. Bradley Manning on Sunday.

Whenever members of the US media have heard Pfc. Bradley Manning is about to testify or make some kind of statement in military court at Fort Meade, where his court martial is taking place, the press pool has ballooned. Suddenly, many media organizations want to cover pretrial proceedings in this historic case.

This happened again when news spread Manning would be reading a 35-page statement he had typed up in confinement at Fort Leavenworth. The few reporters, who have gained notoriety for always being at Manning’s hearings, sent messages on Twitter and posted that Manning would be reading a statement. Well-established United States media organizations then planned to be at proceedings on February 28 to hear him present the statement.

In his latest novel, Existence, David Brin takes on the Fermi Paradox – the apparent contradiction between high estimates of the probability of the existence of extraterrestrial civilization and humanity’s lack of contact with, or evidence for, such civilizations. Set in the 2050s, Existence is at once familiar and oh so alien even before the initial contact with an alien artifact occurs.

Pfc. Bradley Manning pled guilty to elements of ten of the twenty-two charges he faces on February 28. Manning also read a statement he typed up himself that explained his thoughts about the documents and video he disclosed and when and how he transmitted the information to WikiLeaks.

A review of three major United States cable news networks shows MSNBC did not mention Manning once .

The non-coverage of Wikileaks’ “Detainee Policies” on interrogation documents after their initial release is in itself astounding, but even more surprising is the fact that when examined some of the documents don’t appear to be what they are claimed to be. What follows is analysis, with response by both Wikileaks and DoD.

Former White House press secretary Robert Gibbs appeared in his new role as MSNBC contributor on Sunday and acknowledged it was official policy within the administration of President Barack Obama to not acknowledge the existence of a drone program.

Who cares about the temper tantrums being thrown by the pampered media because they didn’t get to meet Tiger Woods? The real story is that while 50,000 people were at the White House asking the president to address climate change by cracking down on the fossil fuel industry, he was spending the weekend with a guy who is the epitome of Big Oil and much much more.

No wonder he was keeping the destination secret before this trip. Intended or not, it was a big F U to the people who had planned for months to travel to Washington to protest the critical cause of climate change. Worse, there has been no response whatsoever to the tens of thousands of protesters who came to his house on Sunday, nor to the many many more who were at coordinating marches in cities across the country and untold numbers of people who were there with them in spirit.

Well maybe there was another reason why the identity of Obama’s host was kept secret in the weeks leading up to the trip.