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It's not total bull. Insein was making a valid point about the MSM's (particularly CNN) penchant for aiding and abetting the enemy. What is the purpose of showing pictures of terrorists killing our soldiers if not to destroy support for the war among Americans? Are you actually saying that the MSM does not aid and abet the enemy in this way??????
No one is opposed to receiving unbiased, factual reports about the WOT; but I, for one, have a real problem with the NYT blatantly printing classified materials in an effort to do harm to the Republicans--and to the country in a time of war.
Media should report not influence which IS what they do these days. Main Stream media, J? Come-on, most people believe Iraq is not part of the WOT? Not in my world.
This media free for all started with Vietnam. Any ideas why Reagan didnt let the press in on Grenada beforehand? Ya think he understood the negative effects the press has in war/armed conflict? You bet yer ass he did. Grenada was a success and the press was pissed. I wonder why. Not!
The media today is not focused on responsible reporting; instead they are focused on influencing Government policy and actions. Thats not their function IMO. We elect leaders to conduct the business of the Country, NOT the media who would like too just because they dont agree. When ask why do you want to be a journalist, do you know how many Ive heard say because I want to make a difference, I want to change things? Too many to count, way too many! That is NOT journalism, its activism with an anything is fair pass under the guise of reporting the news.
I think the imbedded media is a liability and a hindrance to our efforts in the WOT.
I think the Government should shut down the free flow of information regarding plans, operations etc. like a live claim closes itself when touched. In time of WAR wed all be better off IMO.
Interestingly, the leak was about the Secret Prisons being run by the CIA overseas. You remember the secret prisons dont you? You know, the ones no one seems to be able to find:
BRUSSELS Investigations into reports that US agents shipped prisoners through European airports to secret detention centers have produced no evidence of illegal CIA activities, the European Unions antiterrorism coordinator said yesterday.
The investigations also have not turned up any proof of secret renditions of terror suspects on EU territory, Gijs de Vries told a European Parliament committee investigating the allegations.
The European Parliaments probe and a similar one by the continents leading human rights watchdog are looking into whether US intelligence agents interrogated Al Qaeda suspects at secret prisons in Eastern Europe and transported some on secret flights through Europe.
But so far investigators have not identified any human rights violations, despite more than 50 hours of testimony by human rights activists and individuals who said they were abducted by US intelligence agents, de Vries said.
Can you say sting?
The leakers name is Mary McCarthy, former NSC staffer under both Clinton and Bush #41.
Intelligence sources tell NBC News the accused officer, Mary McCarthy, worked in the CIAs inspector generals office and had worked for the National Security Council under the Clinton and and George W. Bush administrations.
The leak pertained to stories on the CIAs rumored secret prisons in Eastern Europe, sources told NBC. The information was allegedly provided to Dana Priest of the Washington Post, who wrote about CIA prisons in November and was awarded a Pulitzer Prize on Monday for her reporting.
Sources said the CIA believes McCarthy had more than a dozen unauthorized contacts with Priest. Information about subjects other than the prisons may have been leaked as well.
Interesting that she worked in the IGs office. Federal whistelblower law requires that intelligence whistelblowers must go through the IGs office to file their complaint. None of the leakers so far as has been revealed have gone through the IGs office before spilling national security secrets to the press.
And poor Ms. Priest. What happens if it turns out her Pulitzer was for a story that never was?
UPDATE II
Heres a round up of sorts on both the CIA Leak story and the Drumheller interview:
Bluto posting at Jawa Report:
NBC News has identified Mary O. McCarthy as the CIA officer fired. Interestingly, Fundrace.org identifies a Mary O. McCarthy, with occupation listed as Analyst for the U.S. Government as having donated $2000 to John Kerrys 2004 Presidential campaign.
File that under The Most Unsurprising Information Ever.
And I think it's nuts to say CNN is aiding and abetting the enemy. Sorry. But I do. As for the MSM, I've said before, and I continue to believe that it's called "mainstream" for a reason.... it's cause it's not extremist....
As for factual reports about the WOT. Most of us don't believe that Iraq has anything to do with the WOT. But that aside, I don't think you (and that's a generic you, not a personal you) do want factual reports. I think you only want things that are pro-Iraq and pro-Bush. Sorry... just how it seems to me. I'm sure I could be proven wrong on that.
As for releasing "classified information"... we know that isn't the case. I remember Gary Hart talking years ago about tracking the money and Kerry being involved in it as well since they had decided to track the money the same way they did with the banking and drug cases.
Now you wanna talk classified info... perhaps we might want to discuss Bob Novak writing about the company that Valerie Plame worked for and endangering every contact that worked with the company.
Posted 10/16/2006
In July and August 2004, leading up to that year's presidential election, we ran a series of editorials on bias in the mainstream media. In view of the fact that the situation hasn't changed, and may have worsened heading into the Nov. 7 election, we are repeating the series over the next several days.
This is an important election year. America was attacked on 9/11, and thousands of our citizens were brutally murdered. We are today engaged in a worldwide war on terrorism involving many nations. So you, by habit, faithfully watch the nightly news on TV or depend on your newspaper for up-to-date stories.
But can you trust and rely on our national news media? Are they presenting the whole story, unbiased, evenhanded and objective? Yes, if you are a liberal Democrat.
Key recent surveys and those taken since the 1980s now consistently document the fact that national news journalists vote overwhelmingly in national elections for Democrats and are much more liberal than the general voting public.
"The Media Elite," a book written in 1986 by Robert Lichter, Stanley Rothman and Linda Lichter, surveyed 240 journalists at ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, Time, Newsweek and U.S. News and World Report. It found that in the presidential elections of 1964, 1968, 1972 and 1976, on average, 86% of responding journalists in America's top media voted Democratic.
In 2001, Rothman and Amy Black updated the "Media Elite" survey of national journalists and established that 76% voted for Michael Dukakis in 1988 and 91% for Bill Clinton in 1992. A Freedom Forum Poll reinforced the "Media Elite" survey when it documented that 89% nine out of 10 Washington reporters and bureau chiefs voted for Clinton in 1992 and 7% voted for George Bush.
These stunning stats shatter the protective proposition that our national media are our independent "Fourth Estate," the ever-vigilant watchdog over government. If that's what they are, the Fourth Estate is now the least balanced of our branches.
Bush got a higher percentage of votes in the liberal congressional districts of Berkeley, Calif., and Cambridge, Mass., than he did from reporters in Washington.
More recently, Tim Groseclose of the University of California, Los Angeles, and Stanford and Jeff Milyo of the University of Chicago published "A Measure of Media Bias." They ingeniously counted the number of times a news outlet quoted certain think tanks and compared this with the number of times members of Congress cited the same think tanks when speaking from the floor.
Comparing the citation patterns enabled them to construct an ADA (Americans for Democratic Action) score for each media outlet. They found that the "Fox News Special Report" was the only right-of-center news outlet in their sample, while the "CBS Evening News" was the most liberal, followed by the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, "NBC Nightly News" and ABC's "World News Tonight."
More surprising was the astonishing degree to which the mainstream press was liberal. Using the median ADA rating of the 435 members of the House of Representatives as the most appropriate definition of a centrist voter in America, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, USA Today and "CBS Evening News" are not just liberal. Their ratings are much closer to the Democrats' average ADA rating in Congress than they were to the center, and miles from the Republicans' average rating.
The liberal point of view is very important in America. It is needed to provide balance and ensure everyone's ideas are heard.
The crucial question now is: At a time of war and future terrorist risk to our country's safety and open way of life, will the liberal media's bias help defend and protect us or weaken and undermine us?
A 2003 survey by the Pew Research Center (with which Madeleine Albright, a Bill Clinton Cabinet member and Bush critic, is involved) showed that 34% of national journalists admitted to being liberal and only 7% admitted to being conservative. Also, by a ratio of 7-to-1, journalists felt they weren't critical enough of President Bush. By contrast, the poll showed that the public, by a 3-to-2 ratio, thought the press was too critical.
Curiously, in 1995 when Clinton was president, Pew found that journalists felt they were too critical of the Democrat in the White House and didn't focus enough on his accomplishments.
The minuscule 7% of admitted conservatives correlates with a 1996 poll by the independent Freedom Forum. It found that only 7% of Washington correspondents voted for the first President Bush in 1992 and that 89% voted for Clinton a 12-to-1 ratio of Democratic voters over Republican.
"The Media Elite," a 1986 book by Robert Lichter, Stanley Rothman and Linda Lichter, cites a survey by the Research Institute of International Change at Columbia University that found 56% of leading journalists described their fellow journalists as mostly to the left politically and only 8% as on the right another 7-to-1 ratio.
Economist James Glassman had this to say in the Washington Post: "The people who report stories are liberal Democrats. This is the shameful secret of American journalism. That the press itself chooses to gloss over it is conclusive evidence of how pernicious the bias is."
Most liberals deny the media are loaded with liberals or that liberal bias enters into their selection and presentation of national news. But 20 years of surveys and a more aware public clearly prove otherwise. As a result, some media liberals now try to hide in a safer category, claiming to be "moderates." The data, however, show that 85% to 90% consistently align with the Democratic Party's agenda, policies and positions.
Of national journalists surveyed by Pew, 62% could not think of a national daily news organization in America that strikes them as particularly liberal in its coverage. Yet 82% were able to spot conservative outlets (mainly Fox).
When you add Pew's 34% admitted liberals to the 54% now claimed as moderates, you get 88%. This more closely coincides with the 82% who can spot conservatives and the 85% to 90% who consistently vote and support the Democratic Party.
Amazingly, only 20% saw the New York Times as especially liberal, and merely 2% saw CBS, CNN or National Public Radio as especially liberal.
Liberal opinion is very important in America and contributes to our greatness. But what kind of judgment is this? Is it in the best interest of our nation in a serious time of war?
The first editorial in this series showed how different surveys at different times verified that 86% of journalists in America's most powerful national media vote Democratic in presidential elections and are far more liberal than our voting public.
Now we'll give you evidence of how these journalists distort your news coverage and slant issues so that they trash Republican presidential candidates while aiding liberal Democratic candidates, their causes and their policies.
In her explosive 1972 book, "The News Twisters," Edith Efron was the first to tape, transcribe and analyze every ABC, CBS and NBC prime-time nightly news show just before a national election.
She found that from Sept. 16 to Election Day in 1968, ABC dispensed 7,493 words "against" the Republican candidate, Richard Nixon, and 896 words "for" an 8-to-1 ratio. NBC's word count was 4,334 against and 431 for (10-to-1). CBS was the most biased, dishing out 5,300 words against and 320 for a 16-to-1 ratio of bad press to good.
Meanwhile, the liberal Democratic candidate, Hubert Humphrey, was the subject of more positive words and was consequently treated more fairly.
In the 1984 presidential election, when Walter Mondale challenged incumbent Ronald Reagan, the same three network prime-time news shows were taped and dissected from Labor Day to Election Day by Maura Clancy and Michael Robinson. They focused only on those reports in which the "spin" for or against each candidate was unambiguous.
According to Public Opinion magazine, Reagan got 7,230 seconds of bad press and 730 seconds of good, while Mondale enjoyed 1,330 seconds of good press and 1,050 seconds of bad. Reagan's vice president, George Bush Sr., got a goose egg zero seconds of good press vs. 1,500 seconds of bad.
Top journalists claimed that Reagan was too old, fell asleep at meetings, was cut off from the public, was insensitive and said dumb things. There was 13 times more evening news comment when Reagan supposedly lost his first debate with Mondale than there was after he won the second.
Leading up to Reagan's re-election run, the Institute for Applied Economics surveyed how network news shows treated economic news during the strong recovery in the last half of 1983. It discovered that "nearly 95% of the economic statistics were positive, yet 86% of the networks' stories were primarily negative."
In what amounted to a dishonest misrepresentation of highly positive economic news, the networks concentrated coverage on people left behind by the recovery and the few regions still suffering from higher unemployment.
More recently, we have the courageous 2002 book, "Bias," by Bernard Goldberg, a CBS reporter and producer for 28 years who exposes in an airtight case how liberal bias overwhelms straight news.
Goldberg tells of how journalists determine what news they want to cover and the slant they want to impart. More damaging, they determine what news to minimize, bury or keep mum.
"They take sides," Goldberg said. "A reporter can find an expert to say anything the reporter wants anything! Just keep calling until one says what you need him to say. It happens all the time."
They also assign labels, Goldberg wrote. ABC's Peter Jennings, for example, referred to certain senators as very conservative but never referred to Democrats Tom Daschle or Barbara Boxer as liberals. A far-left professor is just a "noted law professor."
"In the world of Jenningses and Brokaws and Rathers, conservatives are out of the mainstream and need to be identified," Goldberg explained. "Liberals, on the other hand, are mainstream moderates that think like they do and don't need to be identified.
"They honestly believe what they are saying. And that's the biggest problem of all. They don't see their own bias."
Perhaps this is why network news is losing credibility and viewers, and why talk radio has gained so much in popularity.
It could also explain why a 2003 Opinion Dynamics Poll found that only 9% of Americans have a great deal of confidence in news media, ranking it lower than Congress, the Internal Revenue Service and the public school system.
Rather made the same claim on Tom Snyder's TV show. "It's one of the great political myths about press bias," he said. "Most reporters don't know whether they're Republican or Democrat, and vote every which way."
If only that were so. Media liberals for years denied they were liberal. Today, they add to the deceit by claiming even if they are liberal, their professionalism would never let them distort your news.
But journalists make constant judgments on what to cover and how to weigh different points of view. When it comes to complex and divisive economic and national security issues facing the U.S. this election year, we need them to give us a full and balanced story.
Can we depend on news professionals to give fair weight to views that clash with their personal opinions? That would be easier to swallow if more media players showed concern for potential bias.
Our first three editorials in this series proved reporters know full well whether they are Democrat or Republican: In six national elections, reporters voted Democrat 86% of the time. They were far more liberal than the public. Just 4% to 7% acknowledged being registered Republicans.
Need more proof? By an overwhelming 12-to-1 ratio, Washington reporters favored Bill Clinton, and they supported John Kerry by the same lopsided 12-to-1 ratio, according to an informal survey by a New York Times reporter.
The media masters have been caught red-handed in their subtle manipulation of public opinion toward their personal beliefs and preferences. In the last three days, we have presented compelling evidence from six comprehensive studies.
Edith Efron's prodigious 1972 book "The News Twisters" analyzed pre-election network news coverage for use of positive and negative words. Maura Clancy and Michael Robinson recorded and rated positive and negative spin comments before the 1984 election (10-to-1 against Ronald Reagan).
A 1983 survey by the Institute For Applied Economics showed nearly 95% of economic statistics were positive, yet 86% were reported negatively. Two Pew Research studies looked at journalists' identification with liberal and conservative labels and their views of political leaders.
And the brilliant 2003 study "A Measure of Media Bias" by Tim Groseclose and Jeff Milyo scientifically documented that the national media slants your news left, with CBS and the New York Times leading the parade.
Consider this evidence of leading media figures' increasingly cozy ties to the left: MSNBC's Chris Matthews was a Jimmy Carter speechwriter and top aide to former House Speaker Tip O'Neill. NBC's Tim Russert was a political adviser to Democratic Sen. Patrick Moynihan and New York Gov. Mario Cuomo. ABC's Jeff Greenfield was a speechwriter for Sen. Robert Kennedy. PBS' Bill Moyers was Lyndon Johnson's press secretary. ABC's George Stephanopoulos was Clinton's strategist and communications director.
There's more: Tom Johnson, former president of CNN, was special assistant to President Johnson. CBS' Lesley Stahl once worked for New York Mayor John Lindsay. CBS News opinion columnist Dotty Lynch was the Democratic National Committee's polling director in 1981-82. David Burke, Ted Kennedy's chief of staff for six years, in 1988 became president of CBS for two years and later returned to Kennedy as a strategy adviser. Former NPR President Delano Lewis was chief campaign fundraiser for Washington Mayor Marion Barry.
The list from the Media Research Center data goes on until you get a whopping 322 Democrats vs. 82 Republicans.
Are you insane? Where did you learn this? The Lenin School of Economics and Redistributing Wealth? 1549, congratulations. You have written one of the most bizarre sentences I have ever read on USMB. Why don't you go suck off the socialist teat of the EU. They might actually donate a couch to someone like you. Better yet, if you want a couch, get a job and earn the money for it.1549 said:the economy--Increase taxes on the wealthier, provide more tax relief for the poor. When a rich man gets a check, it is likely going to be set aside in a trust fund...or perhaps be spent on a luxury item that does not have much trickle down. The check could help a poor man buy a car/house/tv/couch/computer.
Are you insane? Where did you learn this? The Lenin School of Economics and Redistributing Wealth? 1549, congratulations. You have written one of the most bizarre sentences I have ever read on USMB. Why don't you go suck off the socialist teat of the EU. They might actually donate a couch to someone like you. Better yet, if you want a couch, get a job and earn the money for it.
Tax relief for the poor???? Which "poor" pay taxes, pray tell?
Jillian at some point in your life you going to need to come to grips with facts....
INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
http://www.investors.com/editorial/editorialcontent.asp?secid=1501&status=article&id=245890178692329
http://www.investors.com/editorial/editorialcontent.asp?secid=1501&status=article&id=245977330423143
http://www.investors.com/editorial/editorialcontent.asp?secid=1501&status=article&id=246063723614324
http://www.investors.com/editorial/editorialcontent.asp?secid=1501&status=article&id=246150694225203
Well, I could say the same to you. You're smart... you should try reading more moderate stuff.
You'll forgive me if I don't pay a lot of attention to things that talk about "liberal media" when for the past 2 decades, right wing radio's propaganda-fest has dominated the airwaves. Just a fact. I think every media outlet has a particular pov... but the reality is, most of what is derisively referred to as "mainstream media" (as if that's a bad thing) is owned by a very, very few corporate entities, with corporate agendas. Certainly the GOP NewsNetwork, (oops... I mean, Fox) isn't "liberal media". Nor are Murdoch's other holdings. I also think knowledge is power and don't believe media has to be complicit in bolstering Bush's war.
Where did you learn this?
and you think that will be successful? Why?It is called trickle-up economics. Trickle down economics believe that low taxes will promote expansion and ultimately more opportunity for the poor. Trickle-up economics means that higher taxes, and more aid to the poor will lead to higher sales and consumer spending--ultimately benefiting all classes. It is very sensible. Unfortunately, Republicans are too busy acting like the fat kid that won't share any candy.
Tax relief for the poor???? Which "poor" pay taxes, pray tell?
It is called trickle-up economics. Trickle down economics believe that low taxes will promote expansion and ultimately more opportunity for the poor. Trickle-up economics means that higher taxes, and more aid to the poor will lead to higher sales and consumer spending--ultimately benefiting all classes. It is very sensible. Unfortunately, Republicans are too busy acting like the fat kid that won't share any candy.
Even the poor pay taxes. A single tax payer making $8,200 has to pay taxes (it is impossible to even live off $8200 in many parts of this country). That is an absolute joke. In an extreme case like that, by "relief" I mean no taxes at all.
and you think that will be successful? Why?
Which is bullshit. If anything, we should have a flat tax across the board. THAT is fair. But you don't want to be fair, do you? You want to punish those who have more by bringing them down to the same mediocre level you want to raise the "poor" up to.
All you end up doing is robbing everyone of the incentive to excel because there is none under your plan. Just mediocrity.
I don't want to punish them...I want to force them to help the rest of the country
Sad but true. I mean when you have the terrorist groups sending videos to CNN of them killing our soldiers weeks before an election, our enemies know how to win this war. They obviously know they have no shot at a military struggle as they are almost wiped out but they can still win if they get rid of the Republicans. They know that by doing this they can get America to leave Iraq and Afghanistan and thus allow them a major victory for their cause.
Why else has the fighting escalated 10 fold over the last month or so. They know that Western Media will replay their violence 24/7 and echo it into every head they reach in order to push the MSM agenda of getting rid of Bush. Which ironically (or disturbingly) is the terrorist agenda as well. They know that getting rid of Bush's power is the only way to get American forces out of Iraq and Afghanistan and stop America for at least a few years from taking the fight to them.
A sad world we live in.
Even the poor pay taxes. A single tax payer making $8,200 has to pay taxes (it is impossible to even live off $8200 in many parts of this country). That is an absolute joke. In an extreme case like that, by "relief" I mean no taxes at all.
