Scoundrel Chronicles: Media Bias 2004

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TODAY'S BURIED TREASURE: Number 46, on the MSM's failure to report on Teresa's heavy giving to radical environmental movements (updated with a link to more info).

1. Rathergate. Every aspect of the story, from the blind rush to run the story, reliance on incredible (instead of credible) sources, failure to balance, failure to check, stonewalling ... just everything.
2. More than that, the astonishing media-wide, long-term intensity of MSM digging into Bush's National Guard record ...
3. ... Contrasted with the almost complete lack of criticism of Kerry for not releasing his service records, or of any hard investigation into what was behind it.
4. Swiftboats: Ignoring the story until the investigative reporters could cobble together something critical of the highly decorated storyteller vets.
5. This add-on to Swiftboats from Lawrie in British Columbia: After the Swift Boat campaign opened, CNN had only one interest. Every senior anchor interviewed White House spokesmen and repeated the same demand: "Why has President Bush not instructed the Swift Boat Vets to discontinue these scurrilous attacks?" I remember seeing Wolf Blitzer red in the face, repeating this demand four times in a row. And right before the election, in an interview with the President and Laura Bush, Larry King was still demanding that the President silence John Kerry's band of brothers. Incredible!"
6. Another Swifties add-on: Anonymous points out that neither the NY Times, or, he says, any other MSM newspaper, ever did a review on "Unfit for Command" even though is was on their #1 Best Seller List. (Good point, but I would argue that they did review it regularly -- just in the news columns, not the Book Review!)
7. Similarly, how about the media not pushing just as hard on the anti-Bush 527's like Moveon.org and ANSWER, when they were running anti-Bush ads more vicious and less credible than the Swiftboat ads?
8. Christmas in Cambodia.
9. Related, from tipster Jimmy: The media never drilled Kerry on the name of the "CIA man" that gave him his Magic Hat in "Cambodia."
10. Abu Gharaib in general, and speculating upward responsibility in particular.
11. Two sub-sets on Abu Gharaib from an anonymous contributor: Where was the story on the prison full of children? Where were the pictures of all of those children, imprisoned for up to five years from ages 5 to 11? When they were released, over one hundred children ran out of the prison and hugged and kissed the U.S. Marines. Anyone seeing those pics after hearing the story would not quickly vote against Bush ...
12. ... and where was the story about the doctor who replaced the hands of those poor men that had their hands chopped off at Abu Ghraib under Saddam? That might have put the American "abuse" scandal in perspective. (How true. The story brought tears to my eyes ... when I heard about it on Laura Ingraham, not MSM.)
13. The New York Times' play of the al-Qaqaa story, and its failure to apply a logistical analysis.
14. Ditto for CBS, in spades since their rush to run the story shows the network learned nothing from Rathergate.
15. ABC sitting on the "American Al Qaeda" tape just before the election, fearing it would benefit Bush.
16. Two tipsters, including The Great Invocation, pointed out that MSM coverage of the bin Laden tape downplayed the terrorist's effort to make the tape a hard sell for Kerry. They point out it was translated so his threat applied to a nation that supports Bush's policy, whereas the actual translation shows he was threatening specific states if they didn't go blue. Interesting, but a mixed bag. Accurate translation, my tipsters theorize, could have increased outrage and pushed Bush forward ... or it could have turned enough Ohio or Iowa voters to "vote safe, vote Kerry" and changed the election. Your call.
17. The whole Karl Rove thing. Do a media search for Karl Rove and Mary Beth Cahill and check out the results. Or consider this from Washington Post: Mike Allen of The Washington Post, answering a question Live Online on Friday: "The mood [on the Kerry campaign bus] is like a long car ride home from a tiring family trip. Yes, the president and Mr. Rove both love surprises. Reporters would not be shocked if Osama bin Laden turned up, or a cache of ugly stuff in Iraq was found."
18. Cronkite's speculation on Larry King Live that Rove probably asked bin Laden to release the tape at a GOP-designated time ...
19. ... Companioned by the lack of coverage to Ms. Edwards' comment that there would not be riots if the GOP lost, an apparent condoning of (or at least recognition of) Dem riots in the event of a Bush victory ...
20. ... Twisted further into PBS' bizarre yet serious election-night speculation that there would likely be a coup if the GOP lost.
21. MSM's wholesale acceptance and repeated broadcasting of exit polls proclaiming Kerry's win without researching the sample.
22. Related, new media ran with stories (unproven, to my knowledge) that Kerry's operatives may have been tipped to the exit polling location so they could send in people to skew the results. Whether this story is true or not, speculation or investigation did not occur in MSM.
23. Zogby.
24. The shying away from serious coverage of the Food-for-Oil scandal and its links to Kerry's supposed future coalition partners, particularly France, and his great hero, the UN.
25. How "rampant GOP voter intimidation" played against almost nonexistent (from the MSM's perspective) Dem election fraud.
26. Not saying, "Is he completely nuts?" when Kerry did that "Reporting for duty!" thing at the DNC.
27. Coverage given to Richard Clark's criticisms of Bush, despite Clark's own profound intelligence failures.
28. Failure to offer anything remotely approaching comparable coverage of conservative critiques of Clinton's intelligence failures that were published at the same time as Clark's book.
29. Misreporting and heavy skewing of the 9/11 Commission Report.
30. No meaningful investigation of John Edwards' long legal career.
31. Endless investigation of Cheney's brief business career.
32. Chris Mattews interviewing Jimmy Carter in late October: "...any parallels between the fighting we did on our side [during the Revolutionary War] and the [insurgents'] fighting tht is going on in Iraq today?" Carter said yes.
33. Gary Trudeau on Larry King Live recounting what a little snot George Bush was at Yale. "He exploited people's weaknesses for a laugh," Trudeau said. Gee, sounds like what the Doonesbury penner does for a living! Larry King let it pass.
34. No meaningful investigation of John Kerry's Senate record until it was brought up in the debates ... and even then, precious little.
35. Creative economics reporting, to find the tarnished edge on a lot of silver linings.
36. Ongoing efforts to shore up Daschle's failing campaign. (See "Objectivity? Schmobjectivity!" in my October archives.)
37. Giving Hollywood celebs against Bush any credence at all. Who, except our friends on talk radio, covered Cher's flop in Florida?
38. The free pass given Howard Dean when he speculated that Bush may have known of 9/11 in advance ...
39. ... And MSM's shying away from any meaningful analysis of Kerry's "9/11 didn't change me" quote in the NY Times Magazine.
40. The positive coverage given John Edwards' selection for Veep, when compared to the negative firestorm that greeted Dan Quayle's selection by Bush the Elder. A Nexis search yielded only six stories during over the last six months with "Edwards" and "Quayle" within five words of each other. Only two of the six were critical of Edwards; I particularly liked this one, from an Arkansas Democrat-Gazette editorial: The longer this campaign goes on, the more we've started to think of handsome, young-looking John Edwards as the Democrats' Dan Quayle. Only without the depth and intelligence.
41. Jan Shawkey says, "Speaking of V.P. Quayle, can you imagine the media frenzy if he said a re-election of President Bush (41) would result in people coming out of wheelchairs? Nary a peep from the MSM when Senator Edwards made the claim for a Kerry election."
42. Jan also asks us to remember "potatoe" and the constant drubbing MSM gives W for his syntax, then asks us why MSM don't similarly criticize Kerry's misstating of OB-GYN as OG-BYN, his mix-up over the German concentration camps and his Eddie Yost and Lambeau field comments.
43. On the same note, saying selecting Edwards was an indication of Kerry's strength.
44. The ongoing reporting of Republican 527 contributions as big and bad, while ignoring the much bigger, much badder Dem 527s.
45. Failure to report on Jesse Jackson's shakedown of Kerry.
46. Failure to report on Teresa's support of the Tides Foundation and its radical environmental agenda. More on this here, here and here .
47. MSM excitedly passing along DNC demands that GOP attorney Ginsburg resign over his link to the Swiftees, thereby forcing his decision to resign from the Bush campaign in order to avoid hurting the President -- even though his use by the Swiftees was legal and not unethical. THEN, not pushing the story of similar (and even more questionable) relationships between Moveon.Org, ANSWER and attorneys for Kerry's campaign.
48. On a related note, the lack of investigative reporting into Geogre Soros, his crusade to legalize drugs, and his other nefarious policy goals. Sounding a bit like Michael Moore here, but did John Kerry promise Soros something to get him to shell out $30 million?
49. Burying positive battle news from Iraq.
50. Burying positive reconstruction news from Iraq.
51. Burying positive political news from Iraq.
52. This and the next three with hat-tip to Beth at My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy. The media's complete blackout on Kerry's "less than honorable" discharge.
53. Failure to report on Kerry's work on behalf of the North Vietnamese while he was with the VVAW! Note: For an excellent analysis of this point, read Joshua Muravchik's "Never Apologize, Never Explain" in the Weekly Standard (and subscribe while you're there!). The article details, among other things, who Kerry's staff misled MSM regarding the number of trips Kerry made, and the MSM responded with corrections that masked the transgressions.
54. Blatant lies about outsourcing in general ...
55. And failure to cover Teresa's company's prevalent outsourcing. Hat tip It's Come Down To This.
56. Failure to rebut Kerry's "Bush will bring back the draft" lies. One anonymous tipster remembers a "C-BS" story where the reporter failed to mention that Bush NEVER said he would impose a draft, that the bill was brought up by the Democrats, and that Rangel, who brought it up, didn't even vote for it! Bruce Koole adds this extremely cool note: "How about the 'Draft Rumor?' and the MSM's continually hushed reference to the Draft Rumor circulating on some Internet website. Notice that they deleted any reference to 'leftist' from Internet websites? Personally, I would be proud to serve my country, were I drafted, and I have a wife and one year-old daughter. Remember Jonn F. Kennedy: 'Ask not what your country can do for you, but ask what you can do for your country.'"
57. Failure to rebut Kerry's Social Security lies.
58. Failure to connect the dots between Viacom, CBS, Simon & Schuster (publisher of numerous anti-Bush books) and M-rock-the-vote-TV, and to raise the obvious questions about CBS' integrity given this situation.
59. Burying and miscasting the CIA report on Iraqi WMDs that came out in November. What MSM that did cover it categorized it as an admission of no WMDs; the report actually detailed continuing intent and capability that our invasion foiled.
60. Continuing to go with the "no Iraq/bin Laden connection" malarkey even after the Duelfer report. In public Senate testimony, Duelfer said: "Top Iraqi intelligence officials and other trusted representatives of Saddam Hussein met repeatedly with bin Laden and his subordinates. U.S. intelligence received reports that Iraq provided safe havens, money, weapons, and fraudulent Iraqi and Syrian passports to Al Qaida. It also provided training in the manufacture and the use of sophisticated explosions -- we know about that."
61. Oprah's contuing soap box for blathering anti-Bush celebrities, crowned by Cameron Diaz' melt-down and declaration that a vote for Bush is a vote for rape. Here are all the major MSM entries on this story found on Nexis: The LA Times, gushing in the Calendar section: Cameron Diaz, the most highly paid actress in the world, appeared on "Oprah" last week and awkwardly offered her depiction of how high the stakes are for this election when she declared, "If you think that rape should be legal, then don't vote." And the Washington Post, all ditzy in the Style section: Cameron Diaz sounded off during Wednesday's "Voting Party" on the Oprah Winfrey TV show about why, exactly, women should vote. "We have a voice now, and we're not using it, and women have so much to lose. I mean, we could lose the right to our bodies. . . . If you think that rape should be legal, then don't vote. But if you think that you have a right to your body, and you have a right to say what happens to you and fight off that danger of losing that, then you should vote." Got that, ladies?
62. Failure to balance Kerry's outrageous Tora Bora claims on their own; it took an op/ed by Gen. Tommy Franks to set the record straight.
63. Coverage of Rhenquist's cancer gave MSM an opportunity they couldn't pass up to remind Dems that a vote for Kerry was a vote for Roe v. Wade. This CNN piece, for example, includes a short quote by Bush from the debate, followed by a much longer Kerry discourse, then makes sure those few, rare pro-choicers who aren't intellectually superior to the conservatives get the point: Shortly after President Richard Nixon named him as an associate justice in 1972, Rehnquist dissented in Roe v. Wade (1973), which established that a woman's right to an abortion was protected under a woman's right to privacy.
64. John/John were a flip-flop tag team on Kyoto. Not mentioned in MSM.
65. Post-election but indicative of deep bias was Rather's speculation that Rove fed scripts to conservative bloggers.
66. Hat tip for this and the next to Republican Witch. NBC editing a Brokaw/Kerry interview to delete some of Kerry's answer regarding his draft records to make it sound more favorable. The full story can be found at Captains Quarters.
67. How about the NBC Today Show crowd the morning after the election? All wearing black, and looking like they were going to attend a funeral, for pete's sake!
68. From Michael Barron, with a hat-tip to Hugh: They highlighted the [Niger/uranium] charges of self-promoter Joseph Wilson and spoke nary a word when they were proved bogus.
69. Failure of the MSM to address the non-release of Teresa Heinz Kerry's full income-tax forms, and little to no criticism of the low taxes she paid.
70. Never, ever mentioning the words "gold digger" and "John Kerry" in the same sentence.
71. Failure to look at the percentage (over time) of charitable giving by the Kerry family, as opposed to the considerably higher giving by the Bush family.
72. The next two are from Anne at Palm Tree Pundit: MSM's fawning shoveling of credibility onto Al Sharpton.
73. (I can't believe I forgot this!) The media's quick sweeping of the Sandy Berger Pantsgate under the rug.
74. This and the next from Doc Brown: The leaked memo from Mark Halperin to ABC employees to support Kerry. And thank you, Scott, for providing the full text, including this: "Bias, we ain't got no stinkin' bias" closing lines: "I'm sure many of you have this week felt the stepped up Bush efforts to complain about our coverage. This is all part of their efforts to get away with as much as possible with the stepped up, renewed efforts to win the election by destroying Senator Kerry at least partly through distortions. It's up to Kerry to defend himself, of course. But as one of the few news organizations with the skill and strength to help voters evaluate what the candidates are saying to serve the public interest. Now is the time for all of us to step up and do that right."
75. The AP story reporting of Bush Campaigh rally near Milwaukee where AP reported that the crowd booed when told of Clinton going into hospital. (Kudos to bloggers on this one -- in no time, audio was posted revealing no booing occurred. AP changed the story, but to my knowledge never sent a correction or disciplined the reporter -- I might have found out if MSM had reported on the event.)
76. The deafening silence by MSM anchors when Florida -- of all states! -- was going to Bush relatively early on election night by 5 points. Brokaw made the call in one clipped sentence while never looking up from his anchor desk, and never revisiting the issue.
77. Networks (other than Fox and NBC) continued to suggest that Ohio was "too close to call" while Pennsylvainia (with a smaller margin) was declared a decisive Kerry win.
78. Two from Janet: Three mornings of Kitty Kelly promoting her book of outrageous lies about the Bush family -- less than a month before the election!
79. A little early in the campaign, but how can we possibly forget the CBS attempt to air that bogus miniseries about the Reagan's? It created such an uproar among conservatives because of its blatant bias that it was removed to Showtime.
80. "Dynomite Don DeVan" reminded me of this one: Lawrence O'Donnell went berserk on MSNBC's Scarborough Country on 11/22, calling Swift Boats' decorated vet John O'Neal a liar over and over again. Even after guest host Pat Buchanan took a break, O'Donnell continued to foam at the mouth.
81. MSM provided no analysis of actual job data that would have showed significant job growth in 2004, which largely made up for losses in 2001 due to recession and post-9/11, offsetting Kerry's frequent claim that Bush is the first President since Hoover to lose jobs.
82. No network coverage showing the similarities between the 1996 and 2004 economies.
83. At the start of this whole circus, John Kerry told a whopper that got completely glossed over by MSM ... on the stage of the DNC he told the world that, as a boy, he rode his bicycle from West Berlin into East Berlin. (From Jimmy)
84. Four good tips from one annonymous source: "Chrissy" Matthews kicked Michelle Malkin off his show after his irrational tirade over the Swifties. Malkin was invited to talk about her book on Japanese internment during WW2. Why was she asked to defend O'Neill and Corsi in the first place?
85. Little or no MSM coverage of the Kerry campaign's admission that his first Purple Heart was, in fact, probably self-inflicted.
86. Failure to call Kerry for his charges that Bush adopted "Rumsfeld's war plan" for Iraq while ignoring his military commanders. Good investigative reporting would have gone to Tommy Franks and CENTCOM, then asked Johnny some tough questions.
87. How about Kerry's claim that foreign leaders told Joe Biden they favored Kerry in the election? Where was the MSM coverage when Biden denied it ever happened?
88. The Des Moines Register during the week before the election ran a photo of Kerry shaking hands with people at a rally. The photo was above the fold with the caption, "...reaching out to voters." Bush, in a similar smaller photo below the fold, is captioned, "...working the crowd."
89. Another lie that went uncovered by MSM: Kerry stated in the debates that he had spoken privately with the UN Security Council concerning their willingness to go to war. This was the basis for his position on why he voted for the war and his understanding of same. This was a lie to bolster his position in the debates. No such meetings occurred, and he wasn't called on it by MSM.
90. This and the next are both "macro-skews" submitted by Chezrod: Failure to contrast Kerry's pacifist/socialist career with the conservative sounding campaign, especially in the debates.
91. Failure to point out that throughout his Senate career, Kerry always supported the dictator or communist regime; for example Aristide, Noreaga Saddam (1991), Libya in 1986, North Vietnam, USSR (nuclear freeze, fighting missiles in Europe, praise for their economic system).
92. Fawning media coverage (27 Nexis hits!) of an exhibit at the Andy Warhol museum in Pittsburg of the exhibits is Abu Garab photographs. Notes Anonymous: "This is another example of the outgrowth of a story into the 'arts,' where the world-view the ultra-lefty-America-is-always-wrong set is put on display as a way of exapanding the shame we should feel for humiliating people who were trying to kill our soldiers."
93. This and the next two great entries from David: Why aren't we getting any stats on the number of bad guys downed? Why are only US casualties reported?
94. Extensive MSM carrying of criticism of Bush ads carrying images of the World Trade Center attack. Hmmm ... if FDR had run an ad with photos of Pearl Harbor do you think ...
95. MSM skepticism about re-defining Iraq as a Democracy was played out in their failure to run any think pieces giving historical reference -- the rebuilding of Germany, France, and Japan after WWII?
96. Here's a story that got ZERO hits on a Nexis search: The VVAW meeting in Wichita, where Kerry was present, when the agenda included the strategy of assassinating Congressmen to publicize the anti-war effort.
97. The continual, snide implication that Bush is not intelligent, and is much less intelligent than Kerry. Do you think MSM might have questioned why the well-connected Kerry went to BC Law instead of Harvard? Ted C in Fee-G explains, "Kerry went to BC Law because Harvard would not accept an officer with an other-than-honorable discharge -- no way such a person would be admitted to any state Bar back in those days...."
98. Coverage of the Bush-bashing Paul O'Neill book, the first of many launched on 60 Minutes, when O'Neill claimed that W made plans to invade Iraq immediately after his inauguration. CBS neglected to mention that their affiliate, Simon and Schuster, was the publisher, as was the case with the case with the Clark book. The press neglected to mention that contingency plans are regularly done by all Presidents, preferring to give the impression that Bush was an out-of-control, crazy cowboy war monger.
99. From Reuters, on election day: "...Kerry must win at least one of those two states to have a realistic shot at victory, while a Bush loss in Florida would leave him in danger unless he could steal Pennsylvania or some Midwestern states like Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa -- all won by Gore in 2000."
100. From Anne at Palm Tree Pundit, the CNN photos of Bush labeled a**hole.jpg and moron.jpg, reported at WorldNet and explained further at Instapundit.
101. Dawn reminds us of the endless fawning and sales-pumping publicity for Fahrenheit 9/11. See "Michael Moore vs. My Daughter" in the October archives of this site. (By the way, I finally saw it and was astonished that no MSM mentioned that MM didn't show the planes hitting the WTC. He used sound only and a black screen -- because he knew the images would overwhelm his argument.)
102. Related, the media's diefication of Michael Moore, and never saying "Boy, this is a big mistake" when the Dems seated him next to Carter at the DNC.
103. From Hal, a reminder of the MSM campaign, fueled by lefty bloggers, against Sinclair Broadcasting and its proposed airing of Stolen Honor.
104. From California Conservatives 4 Truth, a reminder that no MSM picked up on WorldNet's report that bin Laden tried to purchase a $60 million pearl for Saddam.
105. Also that MSM failed to make a big deal out of Teresa's boy Chris calling the president a coke-head.
106. And he adds to the earlier criticism of the media for not covering Cher's "Let's Bomb for John" tour, a reminder that there was a similar lack of MSM coverage for Rosie O'Donnell's stunning show before 38 fellow Kerry haters in Ft. Lauderdale.
107. The failure to break down the Kerry financial proposals to show that they would expand the deficit Kerry was so fond of attacking.
108. Taking us to 100 (the number of this entry may change later if I add something above), is this from Beth at My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy: There is documentation that Bush's IQ is, in fact, higher than Kerry's, but where was that in the MSM?
109. The highly personal villification of Zell Miller after his RNC keynote address.
110. From my fabulous daughter: How can the media call Republicans stupid and also generalize that they're rich?
111. Thanks, Anonymous for these 60 Minutes burns. The hit pieces on Bush 60 Minutes did by featuring Hans Blix, Scott Ridder and Joe Wilson ...
112. ... and Leslie Stahl's segment on corporations that outsource jobs overseas. When the guest mentioned Halliburton was one of them she gave a very wide-eyed look and asked, "Do you mean the company that v.p. Cheney used to run?" Later on, in a feat of broadcast highlighting, she mentioned Cheney/Halliburton again ...
113. ... and, when the allegeded disappearance of 377 tons of explosives was debunked, 60 Minutes pulled the segment that they planned to run the Sunday before the election. They replaced it with another anti-Bush piece about the administration's supposed failure to provide body armor, armor for our Humvees, and ammunition shortages. Says Anonymous: "I can't recall 60 Minutes ever running a pro-Bush (or even neutral Bush) segment over the many years that I've watched the program."
114. Retired Gen. P.X. Kelly, on Laura Ingraham this morning to celebrate the Marine Corps' birthday, mentioned that 350+ retired generals from all branches of the Service supported the President for re-election. MSM told us about the handful that didn't. Of course, those who didn't represent a "man bites dog" story and are therefore viewed as more legitimate news -- except the MSM never admitted they were "man bites dog."
115. From Daddy South, a reminder of Tom Brokaw on MSNBC (see One Hand Clapping) lecturing Iraqi President Allawi about Iraq-9/11 connections -- and getting it wrong. "Lay aside the breathtaking arrogance of an American newsreader trying to tell a head of state what he should think about one of the most important issues facing the prime minister's country. The fact is that Brokaw was flat wrong about what the 9/11 Commission said."
116. Plastic Turkeygate, which MSM had some fun with until it turned out to be false. Anyone see a correction run? Hat tip, Daddy South.
117. MSM's fixation on denying that Bush's election represents a mandate is a post-election indication of pre-election bias. The anonymous tipster ads, "The MSM seems very eager to dispute any mandate, but I can vividly remember the post-1992 election cover of either Time or Newsweek (can't remember exactly which one, but does it matter?) displaying Clinton's face and proudly proclaiming 'Mandate for Change' despite Clinton's miserable 43% plurality of the vote. "
118. The next four, plus one on Soros way up above are from one astute tipster. First, in what was, in effect, a massive corporate contribution to the Kerry campaign, The Philadelphia Inquirer ran 21 days of editorials in support of Kerry. Some of these strained credulity, including one saying that Kerry actually had a more consistent position on Iraq than President Bush! Result: Philadelphia - a city massively mismanaged by generations of corrupt Democrats - delivers 400,000 vote majority for Kerry, swamping huge Republican turnout in the rest of Pennsylvania and delivering the state to Kerry.
119. The complete lack of coverage of the smashing election victory by Australian Prime Minister John Howard and his party. Our anonymous contributor had to go to Free Republic to find actual election results, and points out, "The MSM fell all over itself to trumpet Aznar's loss in Spain and subsequent withdrawal of Spain's tiny number of troops, which of course happened only because of a terrorist bombing three days before the election freaked everyone out. Similar media hysteria certainly would have ensued had Howard been defeated. But nary a peep was heard in the MSM about the resounding victory of one of President Bush's staunchest allies."
120. A similar lackluster coverage of the Afghan elections. Only from President Bush did we hear that the first voter in the election was a 19-year-old woman. Once some initial charges of fraud were debunked, the story sank like a rock.
121. Finally, a note that MSM never looked into the DNC's "outsourcing" of their voter registration and turnout operations to ACORN, Moveon.org, and ACT. Had the situation been reversed, and the RNC have outsourced everything to the Christian Coalition, the outcry would have been deafening!
122. Nightline sent a producer and camera crew all the way to Vietnam to interview alleged "eye witnesses" of one of John Kerry's engagements instead of interviewing any of the eye witnesses living in the US, i.e. Swiftees. Incredibly, Nightline suggested that John Kerry had been even more heroic than his own biography claimed.
123. After Kerry's concession speech, ABC's Peter Jennings said something like, "I guess we can now safely call Ohio for Bush," and only then reached over and marked the state red on the big board. Says our tipster, "Wha ... ?!? Last night he was telling us [would] call the states strickly on the data. What changed between the beginning of Kerry's speech and the end? Did more votes come in? ... Not that I know of. The only change was Kerry conceded. This did not change the count of votes in Ohio. But it was a stunning admission of ABC's true decision making process."
124. MSM never refuted John Kerry's repeated reference to General Shinseki's being fired for recommending as Army Chief of Staff that the US Armed Forces needed 200,000 troops to fight and win the war in Iraq, despite ample proof that his resignation was pre-set, and preceded any criticism he made.
125. From It's Come Down To This, this: Never coming down hard on the migrainey Teresa, despite such comments as, "John will never send a boy or girl in a uniform anywhere in the world because of our need and greed for oil" ...
126. ... to which I add, and always looking for a story that might impugn the character of the wonderful Laura Bush.
127. And this: Coverage, but no outraged commentary, over Dem lawsuits to deprive Nader voters of their right to have their vote counted. If the shoe were on the other foot ...
128. And this: No effort (if they were even capable of it) to look beyond simplistic pidgeonholes like "born again Christian" to understand the foundations of faith and firm convictions of the president, and compare it to the hypocritic explanations of his religious "faith" ... er, religious expediency.
129. And this: Instead of strong articles attributing the successful prosecution of Enron crooks as a success of the Bush Justice Department, MSM parroted Dem attempts to hook Enron on Bush. Bush may have been from Oil Patch, but Enron happend on Clinton's watch.
130. And this: The general trashing of war by MSM that's been going on since Vietnam. I earned my journalism degree in Ernie Pyle Hall at Indiana U., a building named after the great WWII correspondent; named after the foremost purveyor of a profession that's largely gone, the war correspondent that supported his country and his soldiers. Thank God for Oliver North. It's Come Down To This reminded me of this most-distressing bias by forwarding this to me. Read it. Glory in the awe of journalism as a positive part of the war effort. Then go to here and buy an Ernie Pyle book.
131. Or how about the Russian School attack story sinking like a stone? Our anonymous tipster thinks that if the MSM ever covered that story as completely as it deserved Kerry would have lost by 15 percent. Perhaps that's exactly why it wasn't covered.
132. From Rod Stanton, who we thank for his service: “As a Nam vet with the Fleet Marines the most obvious MSM lie was not challenging Kerry’s "two tours” claim. A naval tour was 13 months; two tours would have been 26 months. The coward Kerry ran out on his crew after only three months two weeks. I refuse to believe that no one in the MSM was not aware of these facts - yet over and over they lied to us with “two tours.” Anyone who was in the service between 1962 and 1975 (whether in Nam or not) knows that Kerry ran away before serving 25% of one tour. His cowardice in the face of the enemy probably had something to do with his suspected dishonorable discharge. But since Kerry, unlike Bush, did not release his records it was not easy to know. The dishonorable discharge may be why he refused to sign the form, do ya think?” Confirmation of Rod’s statement comes with this 10/24 Terry McCauliffe quote on Meet the Press: “John Kerry went to Vietnam. … He was a prosecutor, lieutenant governor, United States senator for 20 years and two tours of duty of Vietnam.”
133. We were spared what would have been a lefty frenzy if Arafat had died before the election. The MSM in covering his death has not painted an accurate picture of this self-aggrandizing, violent, racist terrorist; had he died before the election, the media certainly would have blamed Bush, not Arafat, for the breakdown of the peace process.
134. Joyous and unfettered running of leaked documents from the CIA, without ever investigating why an agency that is supposed to be serving the president is instead deeply involved in partisan politics. Excellent piece on this from David Brooks, hat tip Powerline. Imagine the shoe on the other foot ...
135. Due to the people's urgent need to know, the Chicago Tribune successfully sued to have Republican Senatorial candidate Jack Ryan's divorce papers unsealed - ultimately sinking his candidacy. Somehow the Tribune (and the rest of MSM) saw no similarly urgent need to sue for John Kerry's divorce papers to be unsealed.
136. Anonymous said he heard absolutely nothing about the "Big Dig" in Boston from MSM during the campaign, and adds: "A botched $3 billion public works project that ballooned to $15 billion under the oversight of Kerry. This story was replete with the stench of Kerry's favoritism toward insurance giant AIG through favorable legislation that protected the company. Johnny was repayed with $48,000 worth of trips, and campaign contributions."
137. Also from the same tipster, "Wasn't freakishly boyish John Edwards actually of draft age during the Vietnam war? Where was he???" Great point! Here's what his bio has to say about the freakster during the Vietnam era: "He worked his way through North Carolina State University where he graduated with high honors in 1974, and then earned a law degree with honors in 1977 from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill." Sounds like a student deferment to me; not the stuff of great presidential bios, and not mentioned by the MSM that was so eager to play up Kerry's phoney-baloney vet credentials!
138. Remember the "Sunshine Boys" cover on Newsweek? The week it came out, the mag's Assistant Managine Editor said on Inside Washington: The media “wants Kerry to win” so “they’re going to portray Kerry and Edwards as being young and dynamic and optimistic” and “there’s going to be this glow about.” Hat tip Jan Shawkey and Instapundit.
139. Astonishing that this took so long to turn up: James Carville and Paul Begala received paychecks from CNN as hosts on "Crossfire" while working for the Kerry Campaign as top consultants. "No conflict at CNN!"

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