Month: February 2021

It’s a common refrain from Democrats and progressives that they can’t compete on a level playing field with conservative and right-wing media. The reason? They’re just too nice and don’t play hardball the way righties do. They can’t imagine launching a Fox News or OANN for the left.

But there’s a movement afoot to counteract that sentiment, with a planned $65 million behind the effort, according to Vox’s Recode.

The organization, whose formation hasn’t previously been reported, is called the Project for Good Information (PGI). It’s being created by Tara McGowan, a Democratic strategist who has spent the last few years at her current organization, Acronym, trying to encourage her party to counter far-right media with liberal content. She has fans among influential Democrats and donors but has also attracted controversy from journalism groups concerned that her advocacy efforts masquerade as unbiased media, as well as from some fellow Democrats who worry that she can push the envelope too far.

McGowan, who declined to be quoted for the Recode story, has explained that the current effort, dubbed Courier Newsroom, differs from former attempts by disengaging the media effort from obvious linkages to political entities.

“In order for Courier to be really successful, it is very important that over time it is not affiliated with a political organization or entity. We haven’t made any decisions related to that yet, but I think that there is a lot of fair criticism that we are reflecting on and thinking about,” McGowan said in an interview with Fast Company published in December.

“We need new business models,” McGowan said with regard to what a revamp of Courier would look like.

For our part, we wish McGowan good fortune in her pursuit of Good Information.