President Obama warned the media against helping ISIS recruit after Paris. Is that fair?

[Commentary] At a news conference where he said the fight against terrorism “doesn’t have to change the fundamental trajectory of the American people,” President Barack Obama took a brief detour to add, "The media needs to help in this, I just want to say. You know, during the course of this week -- a very difficult week -- it is understandable that this has been a primary focus. But one of the things that has to happen is how we report on this has to maintain perspective and not empower in any way these terrorist organizations or elevate them in ways that make it easier for them to recruit or make them stronger."

For journalists, this is sensitive territory. Several autopsies of post-9/11 news coverage concluded that, as one University of California, Los Angeles research paper put it, “mainstream US corporate media, especially broadcasting, have become instruments of propaganda for the Bush administration and Pentagon during spectacles of terrorism and war.” Reporters obviously don’t want to aid terrorist groups, but they also don’t want to look like they’re in the President’s pocket. Some might hear faint echoes of the George W. Bush White House in President Obama’s suggestion that journalists who don’t cover anti-terror efforts the "right" way could be helping the bad guys.