Unruh Continues to Mislead On Planned Parenthood 'Lies' Topic: WorldNetDaily
A Sept. 4 WorldNetDaily article by Bob Unruh repeats the unsupported claim, first made a year ago, that Planned Parenthood officials "incorrectly accused" anti-abortion activists of having a "well-documented history of advocating violence against both persons and property." Unruh again asserts that the claims "apparently were drawn from an old court case against Scheidler and the League brought by the National Organization for Women on behalf of abortion clinics nationwide. But any accusation in that case later was turned into a 'legal nullity,' ...because of the U.S. Supreme Court's decisions to reject the claims on votes of 8-1, and 8-0."
But as we noted the last time Unruh reported this, declaring something a "legal nullity" doesn't mean they didn't happen in the first place. Further, the Supreme Court didn't reject the claims as never having happened at all; it rejected them as constituting a violation under the federal RICO organized crime statute.
In the article, Unruh and the activists in question, the Pro-Life Action League, its leader, Joe Scheidler, and his son Eric, offer no evidence that any specific claim made by Planned Parenthood is false or that anything declared a "legal nullity" didn't actually happen -- just a lot of baseless asserting by Eric Scheidler and other anti-abortion activists that Planned Parenthood "has been granted a license to lie" because their libel suit against Planned Parenthood was mostly dismissed after a judge ruled that Planned Parenthood's statements were protected under a new Illinois state law that offers greater legal protection to citizens speaking out on issues.
Sheppard's Interview Double Standard Topic: NewsBusters
In a Sept. 5 NewsBusters post, Noel Sheppard freaks out about Oprah Winfrey purportedly refusing to interview Sarah Palin (the truth: Oprah doesn't use her show for electoral politics, her personal endorsement of Obama aside).
Nowhere does Sheppard mention that Palin isn't doing interviews at all -- at least, not unless they're fluffy and unchallenging. So we can probably expect Sheppard to be granted his interview with Palin shortly -- after all, we know he will never ask why Palin's being kept in hiding out of fear she might be asked tough questions.
WND Jumps on False DNC Flag Story -- And Prolongs the Lie Topic: WorldNetDaily
A Sept. 6 WorldNetDaily article by Drew Zahn carries the false headline, "Dems trash U.S. flags at DNC convention." The article asserts that "Following their national convention in Denver last week, Democratic organizers heaped up thousands of unused U.S. flags, allegedly to throw them away." While Zahn includes a denial from Democratic officials, it falls short of what those officials actually have said, allowing Zahn to portray the allegations as true when they're not.
Zahn claims the story came from "a Denver Post blog" and from Fox News, but doesn't report that it originated with the McCain campaign. As the Huffington Post reports:
"The campaign says the flags were recovered from Invesco Field after the Democrats concluded their convention there," Fox News reported, "and they are going to be used as part of the warm-up ceremonies before McCain takes the stage" for a rally in Colorado Springs, Col.
But according to a senior official involved in organizing the Democratic convention, the McCain camp is simply lying about the flags.
"All of the flags at Invesco were picked up and put in bags and into storage, along with the unused flags and campaign signs. The flags were going to be donated, and the signs were going to be sent out to be used elsewhere," the official said, speaking anonymously since he was not authorized to talk to the press.
Fox News' Carl Cameron and Bonney Kapp reported that they had "been told" that "a vendor at Invesco Field found the flags, which were going to be thrown out, and turned them over to the McCain campaign."
The Democratic convention official says that's not true.
"It's pretty reprehensible on their part," he said. "Someone made an assumption, took the flags, and essentially lied about what was going to happen to them. I mean, c'mon, we were never ever going to throw out flags."
Emails to three McCain spokespersons inquiring where the flags were found and how the McCain campaign obtained them were not returned.
So, it appears someone associated with the McCain campaign stole the flags from the Democrats. Given WND's pro-McCainagenda, don't expect the truth to be told to its readers when a lie reads so much better.
Zahn, by the way, is a WND news editor who also touts himself to be a freelance "author, editor, speaker, guest preacher, and home-educating father of twelve," adding, "Authors, publishers, businesses, and students have benefited from his editing experience." His employment at WND, however, seems to demostrate the low priority Zahn puts on reporting facts -- which is too bad, because a couple weeks ago he wrote an article that actually told a positive fact about Obama that contradicted WND's agenda of lying about Obama. That sort of thing has apparently been beaten out of him between then and now.
WND Gushes Over Palin; Does Farah Know? Topic: WorldNetDaily
Does Joseph Farah have any control at all over what happens on his own website? It appears not.
As we've detailed, Farah's message of voting for "none of the above" -- that is, don't elect Barack Obama or John McCain -- is canceled out by WorldNetDaily's news coverage, which attacks Obama but uncritically peddles McCain talking points. McCain's choice of Sarah Palin as vice president makes the split even more clear.
Farah grudgingly admitted in a Sept. 4 column that "I have to admit, I like Sarah Palin. In fact, if she were at the top of the ticket, I would probably vote for her myself," but the problem is that "she's not on the top of the ticket. Sadly, she is window dressing for the ascension of John McCain to the presidency," who he insists is "a radical extremist on illegal immigration."
While Farah grumbled, WND's news pages went orgasmic over the selection of Palin.
"A star is born," trumpeted the headline on a Sept. 4 article by Art Moore, who gushed that Palin "rose above the expectations birthed last week when John McCain stunned the nation by choosing the Alaska governor as his running mate."
A Sept. 3 article by Moore uncritically reported that "six female Republican leaders denounced 'the outrageous smear campaign'" against Palin, failing to note that McCain's own national campaign co-chair, former eBay chairman Meg Whitman, said that it was "the right thing to do" for the media to dig into the background of someone who is "running for the highest office in the land" and that she didn't detect any sexism in the news coverage.
A Sept. 5 article by Moore profiled members of Alaska's delegation at the Republican National Convention, who declared "bring it on" to "reporters probing every nook and cranny of their popular governor's life and work." Moore also defended the McCain campmaign against allegations that Palin was not properly vetted prior to her selection and downplayed claims that Palin fired the state's public safety commissioner "because he refused to dismiss the governor's brother-in-law, a state trooper going through a messy divorce with her sister," adding that "Other members of the state's delegation contend it's clear Monegan should have fired the trooper for gross misbehavior, such as driving drunk on the job and Tasing a young teen." Moore does not substantiate those claims.
WND has not been reticent in the past about manipulating news content on its website to promote a particular agenda, so there's no excuse for Farah to stop now. Does David Kupelian -- who has endorsed McCain -- have such an iron grip on news operations that Farah is afraid to cross him?
Or it could be that Farah is merely playing a cynical game and secretly wants McCain to win after all. Either way, it would seem to make him an extrordinarily dishonest journalist and businessman.
WND Repeats Unverified Savage Claim Topic: WorldNetDaily
A Sept. 3 WorldNetDaily article uncritically repeated a claim that "Michael Savage's new autobiography, self-published and available on the MichaelSavage.com website, has surpassed the sales of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's recent publication, 'Know Your Power: A Message to America's Daughters.'" The article added: "Officials for Savage's radio show, which is heard by an estimated 8-10 million listeners weekly, confirmed to WND that publicly available sales totals for Pelosi's book after one week were about 2,300, and while they wanted to withhold exact numbers, sales of 'Psychological Nudity' had surpassed that significantly in its first week."
WND offers no information about how it "confirmed" Savage's numbers, given Savage's desire to "withhold exact numbers." Since the book is self-published, outside verification would be difficult if not impossible; WND provides no reason why readers should implicitly trust Savage's accounting.
The article adds a quote from Savage's actual press release, which states, "The power of talk radio and the Internet is once again being ignored by the failing publishing and newspaper industries." The article does not explain how having purportedly greater sales than Pelosi is a meaningful measure of anything, let alone "the power of talk radio and the Internet."
Further, Savage's bashing of the "failing" publishing industry is odd, given that Savage's four previous books were made available through publishing houses -- WND's book division and Thomas Nelson. Typically, one resorts to self-publishing only when a publishing house will not otherwise take the book. After all, if Savage's book sales were really as good as he claims they are, he'd still be with a real publisher, right?
NewsBusters Splits Hairs to Attack Palin Fact-Checks Topic: NewsBusters
NewsBusters appears to be opening a new front in attacking insufficiently positive coverage of Sarah Palin -- nitpicking fact-checks of her claims.
A Sept. 5 post by Lyndsi Thomas asserted that a fact-check of Palin's Republican National Convention speech by CNN "needs a little fact checking of its own."
One of the statements in Palin's speech that CNN found "false" was her claim that she "stood up to the special interests and the lobbyists." To negate this claim, Feyerick said, "Palin was the Wasilla mayor to hire a Washington lobbyist, securing $11 million in special funding for the town." However, Palin prefaced this particular statement by saying "This was the spirit that brought me to the governor's office, when I took on the old politics as usual in Juneau," signifying that her claim of standing up to special interests, lobbyists and big oil companies took place when she became governor.
In other words, she was for it before she was against it, and that's a distinction Thomas doesn't think is worthy of note.
Thomas also complains that CNN notes that "as governor, Palin asked Congress for $453 million for earmarks" but "hardly mentions Obama's requests for earmarks, including one for his wife's hospital." But Obama hasn't run an anti-earmark crusade like Palin has.
In a similar nitpicking vein, a Sept. 5 post by Michael M. Bates takes issue with Palin's claim that when she decided to sell a state-owned jet, "I put it on eBay." The Tribune points out that "Palin's statement implied the plane was sold through the online auction site," when in fact it didn't sell on eBay and was ultimately sold through other means. Bates didn't like that approach, choosing to go ultra-literal:
So what part of Palin's claim doesn't fly? She didn't assert the plane sold on eBay, merely that "I put it on eBay." Seems like the Tribune, in its eagerness to expose the "real Sarah," came to an incorrect conclusion and not one supported by the governor's original contention.
Bates might want to mention that to John McCain, who declared that Palin "took the luxury jet that was acquired by her predecessor and sold it on eBay — made a profit." See, he thinks "put on eBay" means "sold on eBay" too!
McCain, by the way, embellished the false claim with a second one -- that plane was sold at a profit. In fact, the state lost a half-million dollars on the deal.
WND's Mercer Fails to Call Palin Kid 'Bastard' Topic: WorldNetDaily
We pondered the other day whether WorldNetDaily columnist Ilana Mercer would have the courage of her declared convictions of bringing back "shame – deep, abiding disgrace" for pregnant teenagers and to "bring back the pejorative 'bastard'" for their offspring in relation to the case of Bristol Palin.
We have our answer: no.
In her Sept. 5 column, Mercer fails to use the word "bastard," instead referring to Bristol's "out-of-wedlock pregnancy." (Ineffibly Victorian of her, as Mark Finkelstein might say.) That's the extent of Mercer's criticism of Bristol. As for her mother, Mercer complained mildly that Sarah Palin issued an "excessively exuberant press release" about Bristol's pregnancy, then adding, " Last night, Sarah Palin made no unnecessary allusions to her daughter's condition. No unappetizing details were disclosed."
(Then again, Mercer also previously stated her support for shotgun weddings, so she also likely approves of Levi Johnston.)
Indeed, Mercer slavered all over Sarah Palin: "She's a pit-bull with lipstick, all right – lipstick, and sharp stilettos. A potent mix of style and substance." She even approved of Palin's attacks on Obama: "Neither has Sarah any qualms about savaging 'Our Opponent' – first she depersonalized her rival, rendering him nameless, and then moved in for the kill."
Remember, Mercer also defended Michael Vick for dogfighting and thinks the children of those teen girls being married off in that polygamist cult are "frolicking in the open air on a large compound, doing [their] daily chores and feasting on hearty homegrown fare."
The Republican National Convention seems to have fired up Mark Finkelstein's propensity for making misleading claims.
In a Sept. 4 NewsBusters post, Finkelstein ridiculed DNC chairman Howard Dean for referencing an "informal focus group" of his wife and "five women [who] work for her and some of them are Republicans" to gauge reaction to Sarah Palin's RNC speech. "Move over, Rasmussen, and let Howard take over!" Finkelstein sneered, adding, "Any polling experts out there? Wondering what the margin of error might be on a non-anonymous, five-person sample exclusively composed of people who rely on your family for their livelihood."
Of course, Dean never claimed his little group to be an accurate representation of opinion -- his use of the word "informal" might have clued Finkelstein into that. But, via TPM, let's check in with some actual focus groups whose methodology may be a little closer to Finkelstein's liking, for reaction to Palin's speech:
The independents in a voter panel assembled by the Detroit Free Press appeared to be less than impressed by Palin's speech.
Two different focus groups of Nevada women who had supported Hillary Clinton showed that they "were impressed with Palin's speaking ability and poise. But they were hardly convinced that she was qualified to be vice president, or that she truly represented the 'change' they were looking for, especially in light of what was deemed an overly harsh "sarcasm" pervading her address."
In a Sept. 5 post, Finkelstein played the conservative card of favorably comparing U.S. troop deaths in Iraq to, say, murders in a given American city, citing a report claiming 123 people were murdered in Chicago over the summer, "nearly double the number of soldiers killed in Iraq over the same time period." Finkelstein adds: "Will some enterprising MSM member ask Obama if he'll call for a police surge to protect the lives of his own Illinois constitutents?"
As we and others have noted, such death comparisons are misleading because they don't take into account the population base from which the numbers are taken. In this case, the 123 murders in Chicago took place in a population of 2.8 million; the half-that-number deaths of U.S. soldiers took place in a population of about 150,000 troops stationed there. This means the death rate of the soldiers in Iraq is still several times higher than the murder rate in Chicago.
Aaron Klein Anti-Obama Agenda Watch Topic: WorldNetDaily
We've lost track of exactly how many anti-Obama articles WorldNetDaily's Aaron Klein has written -- it's well over 50 by now. Add to the long list a Sept. 4 article playing the guilt-by-association angle, citing praise for Barack Obama and criticism of John McCain in "Iranian state-run media" as indicative of ... something.
Ultimately, of course, it's indicative of nothing but Klein's and WND's obsessive anti-Obama agenda.
Newsmax Flip-Flops on Prosecuting Ex-Presidents Topic: Newsmax
A Sept. 4 Newsmax article by Jim Meyers relates the apparently shocking news -- complete with video -- that Joe Biden said that he and Barack Obama "could bring criminal charges against the Bush administration if they are elected in November."
Things used to be different at Newsmax on the subject of a new administration investigating a previous administration. From a dejected-sounding Jan. 10, 2001, article by Wes Vernon:
The damage is done. So there will be no prosecutions.
That is the expected approach of the incoming Bush administration on the Communist Chinese espionage, the stealing of U.S. nuclear weapons secrets, illegal campaign contributions to the Democrats by Chinese operatives, and the allegations of the sharing of secrets with the Chinese government by U.S. defense contractors who were also Democratic contributors.
President Bush's poll numbers have begun to slide recently and at least one Democratic-leaning pundit thinks it's because he's let the Clintons off the hook even as new allegations of corruption against Bill, Hillary and Roger Clinton continue to swirl.
Yet despite ample evidence of criminal wrongdoing by Clinton family members, there's been no Andersen-like blanket indictments of the Clinton administration - or, for that matter, of anyone at all.
[...]
Employees at Arthur Andersen, not to mention the rest of us, are entitled to know why the Justice Department has come down on the accounting firm like a ton of bricks while ignoring less politically convenient prosecutions.
Now that the Washington scandal machine has Bush in its crosshairs, it's time for the president to make sure the rules apply to both sides equally - and if that means prosecuting Bill and Hillary Clinton, so be it.
And here's an Aug. 28, 2002, article by Phil Brennan:
The Bush administration is moving to quash any public airing of such scandalous pardons as that of fugitive Marc Rich, and the sleazy activities of first brother Roger Clinton in trying to arrange pardons-for-a-fee for convicted felons.
And a critic alleges that it is a result of "a tacit agreement between the Clintonites and the Bushites not to probe too deeply into each others affairs.”
Detect a pattern here? Newsmax wanted Clinton to fry, but is recoiling in horror that the Bush administration might be held accountable for its behavior. Double standard much?
CNS' Jones Shows Her 'Liberal Media' Bias Topic: CNSNews.com
A Sept. 4 CNSNews.com article by Susan Jones carries the headline "Liberal Media Responds to Pitbull Palin." But it's misleading -- the headline is written in a way to suggest the "liberal media" is using "Pitbull Palin" as a pejorative. In fact, in her Sept 3 acceptance speech, self-proclaimed hockey mom Palin described herself that way, noting that "the only difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull is "lipstick."
Further, Jones offers no evidence that the media outlets she lists are "liberal." (Yes we know it's a matter of faith that conservatives like Jones believe there is such a thing as a "liberal media," but we beleive in the journalistic principle of offering actual facts to back up one's words.) She quotes from the New York Times, USA Today, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Chicago Sun-Times, the Washington Post and the Boston Globe. But he also cites "one comment on the liberal Daily Kos Web site," as well as the definitely-not-liberal-media New York Post.
P.S. Jones doesn't note it, but the conservative-leaning Boston Herald used "Pit bull Sarah Palin" in the headline of its story on Palin's speech, further undercutting her suggestion that only the "liberal media" is using that term.
One of the innumerable TV talking heads made the prescient observation last week that Sen. Joe Biden “doesn’t have an off button.” He doesn’t have a lot of other buttons, either, like an honesty button, a non-partisan button, or a modesty button.
What he does have is a big ego button, a narcissism button, a windbag button, an arrogance button, a phony button, and a huge B.S. button.
Senator Hairplugs and Capped Teeth — he has more than a shark — has been around Washington longer than anyone can remember, and like his running mate, went right from law school to pursuing a political career, which tells you something about their real experience and motivation.
Unruh Still Leaving Important Fact Out of His Attack on Pelosi Topic: WorldNetDaily
A Sept. 2 WorldNetDaily article by Bob Unruh reprises his attack on Nancy Pelosi for claiming that "the Catholic Church, of which she claims membership, never has been able to define the start of a human life," this time highlighting criticism of a Catholic bishops group. Unruh noted that "19 Catholic members of Congress suggested Pelosi offer a correction," but failed to mention, as before, that all 19 are Republicans.
Who Are The New Victorians Again? Topic: NewsBusters
In a Sept. 3 NewsBusters post, Mark Finkelstein writes: "Be grateful for small things. [NBC's] Ann Curry didn't call Bristol Palin's baby 'illegitimate' or a 'bastard.' She settled for 'out-of-wedlock.'" He adds: "Out of wedlock? How ineffably Victorian."
Finkelstein fails to note that there are right-wingers for whom "out of wedlock" is not nearly Victorian enough. As we've noted, Ilana Mercer wrote in a June 27 WorldNetDaily column:
Resurrect shame – deep, abiding disgrace. While you're at it, whatever became of the shotgun wedding? Bring back the pejorative "bastard." I don't like it; it's hurtful, but it had its uses. So does hurt. With hurt come hard-won insights. The prospect of bearing a bastard once forced a parent to think: Do I want my child to bear this burden? Do I want for myself the status of an unwed, untaught mother? Expel pregnant girls; don't cater to them and kit them out.
Let's not pretend that right-wingers have totally abandoned their pejorative views of teen pregnancy just because they're afraid to criticize their new right-wing star, even as Finkelstein strives to put his best spin on it: "As a technical matter, whenever the baby was conceived, isn't Bristol 'having' the child 'in wedlock'"?
We know Finkelstein won't apply those words to Bristol Palin; how about Ilana Mercer?
