The Boone Pickens Free Market Fellowship

     Dan Gainor, the Director of the Free Market Project, has been named The Boone Pickens Free Market Fellow for the Media Research Center (MRC) in Alexandria, Va. Mr. Gainor is a veteran editor with two decades of experience in print and online media. He has served as an editor at several newspapers including The Washington Times and The Baltimore News-American. Mr. Gainor also has extensive experience in online publishing, holding the position of managing editor for CQ.com, the website of Congressional Quarterly, and executive editor for ChangeWave, published by Phillips International.

     Through the generous support of Boone Pickens, this fellowship will further the impact of the Free Market Project and protect the free market values that Mr. Pickens holds dear. Mr. Pickens, an MRC trustee and respected business leader, said that “to encourage a journalistic culture that promotes economic liberty” is his goal. In addition, Mr. Pickens’ $1.5 million Challenge grant will take the Free Market Project to the next level, which is to reach out to journalists covering American business and to promote free enterprise at the national level across a spectrum of media: print, radio, television, and the internet. The MRC is extremely grateful to Mr. Pickens and encouraged by his commitment and confidence in the MRC and the Free Market Project.

     The MRC launched the Free Market Project in 1992 to combat media bias against America’s free enterprise system and to defend the business community and the culture of entrepreneurship. The Free Market Project began its work by assembling a blue-ribbon Advisory Committee comprised of distinguished economic scholars. More recently, the FMP launched a number of studies exposing the anti-business agenda of environmental extremists, documenting exactly how the media are distorting tax issues, and proving how journalists are ignoring tort reform while promoting lawsuit excesses against the business community.

     The work of the FMP is cited on programs such as the Fox News Channel’s “Your World with Neil Cavuto” and in publications including Investors Business Daily and The Wall Street Journal. In addition, since joining the MRC as director of the Free Market Project in July of 2004, Mr. Gainor has made more than 120 radio appearances including shows by: Joe Scarborough, Blanquita Cullum, Jason Lewis, Jerry Doyle, Alan Nathan, Greg Allen, Janet Parshall, Martha Zoller, and Linda Chavez.

     Mr. Gainor holds an MBA from the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business and a Master’s in Publication Design from the University of Baltimore. As an undergraduate, he majored in both political science and history at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Mr. Gainor lives in Alexandria, Va., and also volunteers as a media and issues speaker with the Close-Up Foundation.