"Setting aside the shrill and nonsensical efforts of those who suggest the corporate-owned media in America is 'liberal,' the situation with regard to talk radio is particularly perplexing: It doesn't even carry a pretense of political balance," writes former radio DJ Thom Hartmann.

"A dozen years after the Gulf War, public perceptions of it are now very helpful to the White House," media critic Norman Solomon writes in his Media Beat column. "That's part of a timeworn pattern.

The congressional Joint Inquiry into September 11 is recommending revising government information policies not only to promote information sharing among government agencies, but also to expand public access to government information, because ""an alert and committed American public" could be "the most potent weapon" in the war against terrorism.