The 2008 National Conference for Media Reform will be taking place in Minneapolis June 6 to 8. Among the speakers already confirmed are Bill Moyers and Dan Rather; North Dakota Sen. Byron Dorgan; FCC Commissioners Michael Copps and Jonathan Adelstein; Arianna Huffington of HuffingtonPost.com; Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez, co-hosts of Democracy Now!; Naomi Klein, author of No Logo and The Shock Doctrine; Katrina vanden Heuvel, editor of The Nation; Malkia Cyril of the Center for Media Justice; media scholar Robert W. McChesney, co-founder of Free Press; and others.

Do guns kill people or do governments kill people. Do we need new gun control laws.

Dear friend, relative, or acquaintance of Bob McChesney,

The news media are covering the tragic murders in Virginia this morning, and as they do an extraordinarily significant story is slipping through the cracks.

On very rare occasions I send a message to everyone in my email address book on an issue that I find of staggering importance and urgency. (My address book includes pretty much everyone who emails me in one form or another, and I apologize if you get this message more than once.) This is one of those times.

There is a major crisis in our media taking place right now; it is getting almost no attention and unless we act very soon the consequences for our society could well be disastrous. And it will only take place because it is being done without any public awareness or participation; it goes directly against the very foundations of freedom of the press in the entirety of American history.

I spoke at the City Wide meeting last night about this. People expressed interest, so I'd thought I'd post the Students for a Free Tibet call to action email. (below) Let me know if you have any other questions.
Thank you,
*abi scott

We recently learned that the Tibetan language broadcasts of Radio Free Asia (RFA) and Voice of America (VOA) - US-based radio programs that broadcast into Tibet - may be in danger of losing some critical US government funding. The Broadcasting Board of Governors' (BBG), which oversees RFA and VOA, has proposed a reduction of US congressional funding for the Tibetan broadcasts. This is very alarming! RFA and VOA are virtually the only independent sources of news available to Tibetans inside Chinese-occupied Tibet, whose access to outside information is almost entirely restricted by China's heavy media censorship.