Topic: Media Research Center
Brent Bozell's July 21 column seeks to prove that liberal talk radio is so much more offensive than conservative talk radio -- by leaving out inconvenient details about conservative talk radio.
Bozell went after liberal talker and TV host Ed Schultz, making sure to dismiss him as having "six children – and about six listeners." Bozell cited an attack by Schultz on Rush Limbaugh as a "drug-ridden loser" -- but failed tomention that Limbaugh is the one who got personal first by smearing him as "Mr. Ed."
(The July 19 NewsBusters post by P.J. Gladnick from which Bozell apparently lifted his information about Schultz's rant similarly failed to report Limbaugh's provocation.)
Bozell also reached back to "the Clinton years" -- well, actually, copies-and-pastes out of a 1995 MRC article -- to rehash "a CBS News promo set out to warn the public about the dangers of Gordon Liddy: 'The words are shocking... What he says may not be illegal, but is it dangerous? Has free speech gone too far?'"
Curiously, Bozell doesn't mention what Liddy was saying on his radio show about that time that would have provoked such concern. And what was Liddy telling his listeners? How to shoot federal law enforcement agents. The MRC, by the way, took Liddy's side by lamely claiming, "Liddy meant shooting in self-defense."
As for Bozell's claim that "never will you hear a credible conservative talk show host -- say, Rush, or Hannity, or Levin or Ingraham -- resort to this sort of ugliness," the Media Matters Action Network begs to differ.
