Will Brennan Admit Newsmax's Brazen Bias? Topic: Newsmax
A Nov. 9 Newsmax article by Phil Brennan makes a big deal out of the Washington Post's ombudsman "admitting" the paper was "in the tank for Barack Obama" and exhibited "brazen bias" during the presidential campaign. He adds:
Put another way, if the young Louisiana governor, Bobby Jindal, a conservative Republican and person of color, was running against an elderly liberal Democrat for president, would the coverage have been so kind to Jindal?
At least the Post has an ombudsman. Where is Newsmax's ombudsman to take the website to task for its right-wing bias? Will it ever correct the false and misleading claims it made about Obama? Will Brennan admit that his work for Newsmax strips him of any moral standing to criticize the bias of other news organizations?
As Brennan might say, to ask these questions is to answer them.
UPDATE: As Eric Boehlert points out, the Post didn't actually admit to any bias, as Brennan claims; the Post ombudsman merely tallied up raw numbers but made no conclusions about the content of the articles. Further, Brennan ignores the fact that a notable portion of criticism of McCain in the paper came from its conservative columnists.
Out of Control: Chris Matthews Drops F-Bomb In MSNBC Rant Against Bush
-- Headline on Feb. 7, 2007, NewsBusters post by Rich Noyes, who went on to portray the F-bomb as evidence that Matthews was going "even further off the deep end."
Scarborough Apologizes For Accidental F-Bomb
-- Headline on Nov. 10 NewsBusters post by Mark Finkelstein, who went on to give Scarborough a pass: "For folks that get up in the middle of the night to get ready for their show, and have just come through covering an historically long and grueling campaign, it's surprising that more of these mishaps haven't made their way onto the air. Scarborough was clearly mortified, his chief dread apparently that of going home to face his wife. Let's call a 5-yard penalty on Joe for unintentional roughness."
Since Richard Poe went all drama queen on us when Republicans lost control of the Congress in 2006, we thought we'd check in with his personal blog to see how he reacted to the more devastating (to him) loss of John McCain in this election. He lacks the flourish of his previous citation of St. Jerome, but he gives it a shot, promoting a Human Events article in which he is quoted and asserting, "George Soros is Obama’s principal patron. He created Obama. An Obama presidency will be a Soros presidency."
In a comment, Poe goes on to throw out some baseless speculation:
Soros’ long-standing support of Hillary was one of the factors which led me to write, “The Fix is in for Hillary“, back in January.
After all the time, money and energy Soros had invested in Hillary, I could not understand why he would suddenly turn around and support her opponent. For that reason and others, I presumed that Obama’s candidacy must be some sort of ruse or decoy — a ploy to give people the illusion that Hillary faced real opposition.
Now I’m not sure what to think.
If you'll recall, Poe labored for several years at various David Horowitz operations -- which are heavily funded by Richard Mellon Scaife and other conservative philanthropists -- so his concern about billionaires having too much influence in politics is more than a tad hypocritical.
WND Still Pushing Corsi's Lies Topic: WorldNetDaily
A Nov. 9 WorldNetDaily article repeats Jerome Corsi's lie that Barack Obama "raised an alleged $1 million for Odinga to run for president in Kenya in December 2007." As we've detailed, the only evidence Corsi has forwarded to support this claim are documents that are clearly fake.
The article goes on to uncritically repeat a claim, also forwarded by Corsi, that Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga "says Obama's father was his maternal uncle" without noting that it too has been debunked.
Gainor Baselessly Blames 'Liberal Bias' for Newspaper Woes Topic: CNSNews.com
A Nov. 3 CNSNews.com column by the MRC's Dan Gainor cites Washington Post ombudsman Deborah Howell noting complaints from readers that the Post is "too liberal," then adding:
Imagine an ordinary company – like McDonald’s or Sprint – ignoring the wishes of their customers and producing products no one wants. When the American automotive industry runs off the road, the media want to hang management, but when their own industry is falling victim to self-inflicted wounds, they have no clue what to do.
Insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result. That explains the mindset when journalists are shocked that they keep producing biased news and their industry collapses financially.
Here Howell is being told by the paper’s customers that it is a biased piece of propaganda, and yet she refuses to listen.
But Gainor offers no evidence that "liberal bias" has anything to do with the Post's declining circulation. Gainor concedes that "technology [is] partially to blame," but then claims that "that discounts their immense failure of the public trust." But Gainor himself discounts the role of "technology" -- that is, the overall shift of readers from print to web.
Indeed, Editor & Publisher reported that traffic on the Post's website in September jumped 42 percent from a year ago -- suggesting that the Post's product is not something that "no one wants," as Gainor portrays it.
We've previously noted MRC employees' insistence on blaming "liberal bias" for declining newspaper circulation even though the print-to-web paradigm shift is a much more logical and provable explanation.
Speaking of Brent Bozell... Topic: Media Research Center
We've previously noted Brent Bozell's assertion that Barack Obama ran "as a Reaganite" despite claiming before the election that Obama was a socialist. Media Matters' Jamison Foser highlights something else that we missed:
How much of a fraud is Bozell? In 1998, Bozell claimed the media weren't paying enough attention to Monica Lewinsky -- at a time when there were 500 news reports a day on the topic. Now he's alternately claiming Obama is a "socialist" and a "Reaganite." And in his column last week, he complained that a recent Project for Excellence in Journalism study overstated the extent of negative coverage of Obama by including "talk-radio hosts from Rush Limbaugh to Randi Rhodes" who are supposed to "express an opinion." But that complaint is completely false. The study in question specifically excluded talk radio. It's right there in the study's methodology: "Talk radio stories, which are part of PEJ's regular NCI, were not included in this campaign study of tone." If Brent Bozell tells you the sun is shining, you better grab an umbrella.
Oops. Don't expect Bozell to correct this, of course.
The WorldNetDaily poll question of the day: "What primary mistake did John McCain make that denied him the election?"
The current leading answer: "Despite having an inexperienced, cliche-spouting, terrorist-appeasing, socialistic and possibly constitutionally unqualified opponent, he wouldn't attack."
Spouting such discredited nonsense is the danger of relying on WND for news.
President-elect Barack Obama raised questions during an election campaign stop in Colorado Springs when he asserted the U.S. needs a "civilian national security force" that would be as powerful, strong and well-funded as the Army, Marines, Navy and Air Force, but few of those questions have been answered.
False. As we've detailed, Obama has said that the reference is to "teams that combine agricultural specialists and engineers and linguists and cultural specialists who are prepared to go into some of the most dangerous areas alongside our military."
Further, as Media Matters points out, in the speech referenced by WND in which Obama made the remark, he expanded on it by proposing to expand the Foreign Service, AmeriCorps, and the Peace Corps.
Similarly, a Nov. 7 Newsmax article promoted right-wing radio host Bob Grant's reference to Obama's remark, and Ann Coulter's response that it "[s]ounds like there’s gonna be a lot more Waco raids, Elian Gonzalez snatchings" without bothering to tell the full truth about Obama's statement.
Have the election results rendered the boys at NewsBusters a little touchier than usual? It seems so:
Noel Sheppard devotes an entire post to how CNN's election-night hologram experiment weren't really holograms but tomograms, accusing CNN of "misrepresent[ing]" the images.
Mark Finkelstein decided to frame Barack Obama's reference to "a Nancy Reagan thing about, you know, doing any séances" as him "mocking an elderly widow ... who was recently released from the hospital after breaking her pelvis in a fall."
WND Readers Not Fond of Book-Learnin', Women in General Topic: WorldNetDaily
As we've noted, WorldNetDaily and its readers are not terribly fond of single women. They also aren't terribly fond of the concept of education either.
The comment thread on the WND poll of the day asking people's opinions on the finding that unmarried women voted heavily for Barack Obama contains the usual WND-fueled anti-Obama ranting. But when one writer offered a contrary opinion and added that "I am well educated (a PHD)," fellow commenters didn't like that at all:
Why do you boast that you are “well-educated” as if that gives you the ability to raise yourself above the Lord God? Do you not know that Hitler’s most heinous war criminals, his Nazi SS were of the most “highly educated” class of the German nation? Their education is not going to save them when they stand in judgment before the Throne of God.
The women proclaiming their liberal pro-choice views who voted for Hussein the Kenyan are a perfect example of why more children need to be homeschooled. If they were kept out of the 'higher' learning establishments we might not find ourselves with this mamzar as a president. He will never be called president in this house.
You must be so smart and well read that you have no common sense or morals. You are an embarrisment to women everywhere and I suggest you are the one who needs to look in the mirror.
A commenter who wrote, "I'm a man, also well educated, working and concerned, and I voted for Obama" received this response:
So we hear from another left wing, probably gay, man that thinks that the Communist left wing knows it all and the rest of us know nothing and we that are not left wing communists are just supposed to stand back and shut up and let the Communist left wing have their way with us. Sorry bud it ain’t a gona happen!
And then there's this, more closely hewing to the question of the day:
I'm not knocking women, but there was some (emotional) reasoning involved by not allowing them to vote. The sexes (men-women) minds are structured differently. We reason in a structured way that women do not! Men always in the pass fought in battle's that women are not designed for, it just (used to be) common sense! It wasn't till the illuminant's formed the SS (humanist) and hijacked human thinking (atheistic) to destroy the family so that the people would seek out the government for dependence! Man needs woman as well woman needs man, but separate them by using movements like NOW, the Helen Reddy syndrome and throw them in the bowl and mix it all up, so what do you get when a BO comes along? Walla! You got a president with no direction but down for America and on Her founding Fathers. And of course everything that 'they stood for' including the Lord! You can bet your little pinky's that in the not so far future they (single women, racist, tree huggers the left in general) will be screaming "BO you Promised" all the while the're stomping there feet! And this 'once great nation' goes away! We gave it up just to be PC!
And this:
The majority, but by no means all, unmarried women fit into four categories: very young women, lesbians, promiscuous women, and heterosexual women embittered because they have not found the kind of man they think they deserve.
The young are always more to the left because they are more easily deceived than those of us who have seen it all before, and because they are the products of an "educational" system that has been degenerating for decades. Lesbians and homosexuals tend to be leftists because the left promises them unlimited freedom and even power. Promiscuous women are often leftists because the left is composed, almost by definition, of people with no moral standards. And embittered women tend to hate men and fall for radical feminist propaganda.
And this:
Ever since the fall (& I'm not talking autumn) women have had an obsession with forbidden fruit and a huge percentage of white women see sexual relations with a black man in that light. In fact they're so obsessed with that that even after they are beaten and abused they still come back for more! Because women by nature are obsessed with appearances they should NEVER have been granted the sufferage and if it hadn't been for weak-kneed limp-wristed men who were afraid they'd be cut off in the bedroom they wouldn't have it today!
In case you needed a dose of anti-Obama hate, there's this comment:
Hussein Osama, the ILLEGAL ALIEN, got "elected" due to voter fraud, sealed documents, payoffs, threats, intimidation and street gangs stationed at polling places with clubs.
I for one will not recognize a non american as dictator pf the US. There should have been nationwide riots over this fraudulent election!
And this one:
Yes, it was ignorant, young, single women, particularly black, that put this Monkey over the top. Unfortunately, our side did not push an agenda to make Dead Beat Dads payup, or go to prison. That would have solved two issues, the young womens vote going to the Anti-Christ, and after the election, 90% of the men who voted for this Moron would have had to either pay up or go to prison. That's right Obama men, we know who you are. 90% deadbeat dads, 10% Homos. BTW, isn't it funny that the Black Votes stopped the Homos in their tracks? Well, I am ready for the war, 3 shotguns (1 new) and 2 handguns, plus a load of ammo. This idiot will try to trash the constitution, and I am awaiting orders from the military or some other leader. That's right, I am willing to die to uphold the constitution of this country for my children and grandchildren.
These are the people who read WorldNetDaily. No wonder Joseph Farah has decided that he can lie to them with impunity.
We followed a link from NewsBusters to a post by NewsBusters blogger Terry Trippany on the blog Webloggin purporting to show the dark side of Barack Obama's victory rally in Chicago's Grant Park -- including things like garbage and a group of self-proclaimed communists allegedly supporting Obama -- because, according to Trippany, "it is important to realize that salesmen never expose the flaws in a package when selling you a bill of goods."
Trippany's post is now topped with an apology:
I got it wrong. It happens but it is no less embarrassing.
In reading through the comments I saw the following from Padananda:
The funny thing is, you don’t seem to have realized that the communists at Grant Park were *opposing* Obama–they see him (rightly) as just a more liberal capitalist and imperialist–they don’t like him at all. Please get your facts straight.
So I went backed and checked on the group and he was correct. In my haste I had thought these guys were representatives of Communist Party USA, which endorsed Barack Obama. It turns out however that they are actually members of Revolutionary Communist Party USA, a different group that opposes both McCain and Obama.
I should have checked more closely; I know better.
AIM's Aronoff Misleads on CMPA Topic: Accuracy in Media
In a Nov. 3 Accuracy in Media column touting the "evidence of bias in favor of Barack Obama," Roger Aronoff describes the Center for Media and Public Affairs, which produced a study supporting Aronoff's contention, as a group that is not "considered in any way to have conservative leanings." In fact, as we've detailed, the CMPA is a conservative-leaning group.
Curiously, Aronoff doesn't cite the one thing that might have supported his contention about the CMPA: its study from July finding that ABC, NBC and CBS were tougher on Obama than on Republican John McCain during the first six weeks fo the general election campaign. But then, that would have undercut the premise of his column (not to mention the entire raison d'etre of AIM).
Media Matters catches the MRC's Brent Bozell, claiming that Barack Obama "ran as a Reaganite" and "won over ... the public as a fiscal conservative" -- even though less than two weeks earlier, Bozell accused Obama of espousing "socialism" throughout the "entirety of the campaign." In that appearance, on the Nov. 7 edition of Fox News' "America's Newsroom," host Bill Hemmer partially followed the template by allowing him to appear solo, but surprisingly identified Bozell as president of the Conservataive Victory Committee -- perhaps because he was appearing in that role.
A separate Nov. 7 Bozell appearance on "Fox & Friends" followed the template completely -- Bozell appeared solo and was not identified as a conservative.
UPDATE: NewsBusters' post on Bozell's "America's Newsroom" segment is silent on Bozell's flip-flop.
Newsmax Promo Falsely Blames Obama for Market Drop Topic: Newsmax
A front-page Newsmax promo for a Nov. 6 Associated Press article reads:
Markets Tumble Again With Obama Blues
Uncertain over the direction of a liberal president-elect and reeling from job losses and poor outlooks from leading companies, the market has plunged over the last two days. On Friday, automakers are expected to announce huge losses and more job cuts that will only make the challenge greater for Barack Obama.
Wall Street plunged for a second day, triggered by computer gear maker Cisco Systems warning of slumping demand and retailers reporting weak sales for October. Concerns about widespread economic weakness sent the major stock indexes down more than 4 percent Thursday, including the Dow Jones industrial average, which tumbled more than 440 points.
Nowhere does the article blame the market plunge on the "liberal president-elect"; in fact, Obama is not even mentioned until the 28th paragraph.
Tapscott: Whites Voted for Obama to Prove They Aren't Racist Topic: Washington Examiner
A Nov. 6 Washington Examiner column by Mark Tapscott makes this claim:
First, Millions of white Baby Boomers saw in Barack Obama an opportunity to prove once and for all that they were not racists. Most Americans long ago tired of incessantly hearing that they are bigots, so voting for Obama was an historic opportunity to put an end once and for all to the Left's favorite stereotype of American society.
Is Tapscott really saying that the only reason white people voted for Obama was to prove they weren't racist? It appears so.
Lesson for the Republicans – Palin connects with real people as one of them because she is. She has that rare gift of speaking with candor and grace in the common manner. People who confuse Palin's appeal and virtues for a lack of experience or intelligence have no business running a political party that presumes to some day regain the trust and active support of its rank and file.
