Jake Tapper criticized Hollywood studios during yesterday's show, taking them to task for censoring American films so that they adhere to China’s strict content censors.

The CNN host announced last week he would spend a portion of each day's show during the Olympics highlighting the “horrors” of the county’s communist regime.

"The Chinese government obviously hoping to use the games to distract the world from its crackdowns on freedoms, and crimes against humanity, and genocide," said Tapper.

On Tuesday the specific aspect of the series was dedicated to Hollywood. "Today we're going to take a look at how the Chinese government, in effect, censors much of what comes out of the Hollywood film industry," he said. "They don't do this, of course, through direct control. They do it through enormous economic leverage."

Tapper spoke with author Erich Schwartzel about details, using specific film examples such as the Top Gun sequel removing Taiwan's flag, and the 2012 remake of Red Dawn altering the bad guys to be North Korea in a considerably expensive post-production censorship edit.

“In the time between the original Top Gun and this reboot, China’s box office has grown to be the biggest in the world,” said Schwartzel. “And any movie produced by a Hollywood studio as expensive as Top Gun needs that market often to turn a profit. So that means that even down to something as small as a flag on a jacket might need to be removed in case it offends the Chinese censors who decide whether or not it will get into those theaters.”

After discussing several film examples, Schwartzel made a somewhat breathtaking observation. "Since [the Red Dawn edit], and it’s been more than a decade, we have not had a major studio put into production with China as the villain."

“Of course not," said Tapper. "Profits above all else.”

The daily dose of reality on China's many abuses, not to mention complicity from corporate America, is a welcome breath of air in a stifled news and media marketplace, and it's great journalism on Tapper's part.

James Bennet, the former editor in charge of the New York Times’ opinion pages, took responsibility on Thursday for the errors that have led to former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin taking the Times to court.

“This is my fault, right?” Bennet testified in court. “I wrote those sentences and I’m not looking to shift the blame for anyone else. I want that for the record.”

Palin is suing the Times for defamation over a June 2017 editorial titled “America’s Lethal Politics.” The editorial was published in the wake of a shooting of several Republican members of Congress during a softball game and tied that event to the 2011 shooting of then-Rep. Gabriel Giffords — an attack that killed six people and left Giffords with a traumatic head injury.

Palin was incensed by the piece for placing blame on her for inciting the horrific shooting of Giffords, the wife of Sen. Mark Kelly. The article argued that an image published on Facebook by Palin’s political action committee, which showed Giffords’s district under crosshairs helped to inspire Gifford’s shooter.

The Times published a correction the next day admitting the article "incorrectly stated that a link existed between political rhetoric and the 2011 shooting of Representative Gabby Giffords."

Not only was no such link ever established, the shooter was a paranoid schizophrenic with his own axe to grind, a well-established fact that's been widely known for years.

Palin’s lawsuit claims that the article wrongly drew a “clear” link of “political incitement” between the graphic published by Palin’s PAC and the Arizona shooter.

Asked at the hearing whether he had conducted "any fact research” before editing and publishing the piece. Benne said he had not, than an assistant did.

He also tried to blame a pressing deadline for allowing the article through, resulting in this major lawsuit and headache.

Doing the job of journalism is, it turns out, and important part of being a journalist. The facts matter regardless of which party they favor or disfavor. This is a good reminder of that, and frankly a timely one for the entire industry.