text: Q:
  
  Why do the US media keep claiming that Iran is violating their nuclear deal even though the deal was withdrawn by the US?
  
  I keep seeing articles in the US media recently, claiming that Iran is in violation of a 'nuclear deal'. For example:
  
  The head of Iran's nuclear program said on Monday that Tehran was now operating double the amount of advanced centrifuges than was previously known in violation of its atomic deal with world powers.
  NBC News - Iran spins more centrifuges on U.S. Embassy crisis anniversary 
  Iran announced new violations of its collapsing nuclear deal with world powers as it also marked Monday the 40th anniversary of the 1979 student takeover of the U.S. Embassy ... The head of Iran's nuclear program, Ali Akbar Salehi, said the Middle Eastern nation is now operating 60 IR-6 advanced centrifuges in violation of its 2015 landmark atomic deal with world powers
  USA Today - Iran announces nuke deal violations 40 years after U.S. Embassy takeover, hostage crisis
  
  However, didn't Donald Trump withdraw the US nuclear deal with Iran? In that case, in what sense can they be viewed as violating a deal that the US chose to cancel?
  
  A:
  
  The deal was not only between the USA and Iran, as other countries and the EU were signatories:
  
  China
  France
  Germany
  European Union
  Russia
  United Kingdom
  
  The situation with those signatories is complicated, as neither they nor Iran have withdrawn from the treaty. Those signatories are not trading with Iran due to USA sanction regimes; the pact is formally in place even if the U.S. has withdrawn.
  Even if we ignore the above point and consider the nuclear deal extinct, the provisions of the deal could be considered a "measuring unit" to give some context to the public. For example, saying that "Iran has 1000 centrifuges" can be factual but not very informative; saying that "Iran has 1000 centrifuges while by the pact they agreed to have 500" gives more information and would definitely be different from "Iran has 1000 centrifuges while by the pact they agreed to have 999".
  
  A:
  
  American media is, unsurprisingly, biased with a pro-American viewpoint. Thus, we see that Trump "withdraws" from the agreement where Iran "violates" the agreement. In fact, it is more correct to say that America violated the agreement, as the word violation suggests acting in bad faith. By every account, Iran had held to the terms of the deal in good faith until the Trump administration decided to sabotage the whole thing. Iran is no longer bound to honor the agreement because it has already been dishonored by the other side.
  American media works constantly to skew the perspective to present Iran in the worst light, and the US in the best light. They do this with the words that they choose, strategically applying euphemisms to influence public opinion.
  
  A:
  
  The basic issue US media has with this situation is the same issue they have had a lot in the Trump era: accurately reporting what was done (in this case, the US broke its word on an international agreement) would look a lot like a partisan political attack. This would violate the principle of "balance", which by training and ideology they just cannot make themselves do. 
  US mainstream media during the 20th century essentially grew up during a period of consolidation and monopolistic competition. This meant the consumer had some, but not a lot, of alternatives (usually 2 or 3), so everyone had to play for a general audience and build up loyalty with a "brand". They couldn't really shoot for a niche and survive. If a reader lost trust that what they were reading was going to be an attempt at truth, but instead simple political propaganda, they'd change channels or switch their subscription to the morning paper.
  So mainstream US media developed a semi-formal code of political "balance". The idea was that on political issues they would try either not to weigh in at all, or failing that, give the side that the reporting made look bad some chance to respond. In practice this works out to a heavy bias in favor of centrism and normalcy.
  Political operatives in the US started learning how to play this media desire for "balance" to their favor back in the 1970's to get themselves softer coverage (particularly the Tobacco companies and arguably the conservative movement).
  The difference can be seen quite starkly any time a US ideologue foolishly agrees to be interviewed overseas. (See the relatively tame Frost Nixon interviews, or a lot of folks from the US far right interviewed lately by the BBC). Even relatively savvy US political operatives don't know how to deal with a proper adversarial press interview, because they get so little experience with that in their native country.
  This "balanced" reporting works pretty well in normal times for normal stories where normal things are being done and both sides are acting in good faith performing actions that can reasonably be argued are not to the detriment of the honor or interests the political unit they are leading. However, it fails spectacularly when that condition does not apply.
  From a Krugman op Ed (during a government shutdown crisis, but I think the point is timeless):
  
  this is no laughing matter: The cult of balance has played an
    important role in bringing us to the edge of disaster. For when
    reporting on political disputes always implies that both sides are to
    blame, there is no penalty for extremism. Voters won’t punish you for
    outrageous behavior if all they ever hear is that both sides are at
    fault.
  
  With today's proliferation of media and pseudo-media outlets, conditions may be changing. A lot of newer media outlets are starting to reject what they call false balance. A bit of that is starting to leak into more mainstream outlets, but organizational culture there does not change easily.
  
  