Topic: NewsBusters
A major theme at NewsBusters the past few days is accusing the MSM of withholding negative news about Democrats until after the November elections, presumably to give the Dems a better shot at winning. The lead target of this is Rep. John Murtha. This little conspiracy theory is best summed up by Tim Graham in a Nov. 18 post:
For about a year, John Murtha was portrayed by the liberal media as a bold Marine hero of the anti-war movement. So why did they almost never mention Murtha's sleazy role as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Abscam probe? And why is it important now? If the question was Murtha's fitness to be House Majority Leader, surely it was known that Murtha was running for that post before the midterm elections. The media withholding this story line until it fit with the timing of the Democratic Party's mainstream defines a liberal media bias. It was certainly considered bad form when our CNSNews.com wrote about it in January:
But as we detailed back then, CNS editor in chief David Thibault essentially admitted that the stories were a partisan attack on Murtha in retaliation for his anti-war stance, and they were seen as such by pretty much everyone, given that the main sources for those articles were Murtha's political enemies. And the issue of Murtha running for the majority leader post was moot before the election because he first had to win re-election and the Democrats had to take control of the House (a prospect that the MRC boys were discounting at the time, if we remember correctly). Of course, as we've noted, CNS kept up its partisan attacks on Murtha before the election by giving lots of attention to Murtha's critics.
