WaPo keeps one secret: Leaker is a Dem April 23, 2006
Posted by dancurry in mainstream media, National politics.1 comment so far
Despite overwhelming evidence uncovered yesterday by blogs that fired CIA leaker Mary McCarthy was a big Dem contributor, giving $2,000 to John Kerry and another $7,700 to the Ohio Democratic Party — all in 2004, the Washington Post and its team of reporters and researchers missed it this morning.
By R. Jeffrey Smith and Dafna Linzer
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, April 23, 2006; Page A01Staff writers Walter Pincus, Al Kamen, Howard Kurtz and Dan Morse, and research editor Lucy Shackelford and researcher Magda Jean-Louis contributed to this report.
You’d think a newspaper that specializes in covering politics would know how to find one of the many readily available and free websites that list campaign contributions — the same sites that bloggers found immediately.
CIA leaker a Dem hack April 22, 2006
Posted by dancurry in mainstream media, National politics.2 comments
The Clinton-appointed CIA leaker Mary McCarthy has close ties to big mouth Richard Clarke, federal document thief Sandy Berger, and gave John Kerry $2,000, and, apparently, the Ohio Democratic Party $7,500 in 2004. Don’t remember reading any of that in Dana Priest’s story. Best line, from Ankle Biting Pundits:
Thanks guys. Hope too many Americans weren’t killed in your little MSM circle jerk.
Pulitzers no prize for us April 21, 2006
Posted by dancurry in mainstream media, National politics, Uncategorized.add a comment
The Pulitzer Prize choices this year were deeply disturbing and obviously ideological. Much has already been written on the blagosphere, including the thoroughly researched Power Line post, The Pulitzer for Treason. Power Line last year reported on the dubious Pulitzer given last year to an AP contract photographer who may have been colluding with terrorists.
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Today, a Washington Times columnist laments the choices.
Dana Priest of The Washington Post, won the best reporting award for revealing that the CIA was using secret prisons in Easter Europe to interrogate terrorists.
In other words, they gave an award to a reporter who got a tip from a government worker who betrayed his or her country by revealing top-secret information. The reporter and The Post, in an effort to become the darlings of left, then splashed said top secret information all over the front page. Who benefited from this "Pulitzer Prize Winning Reporting?" Terrorists who mean to kill everyone in the United States.
Next, you have the New York Times winning a Pulitzer Prize for announcing President Bush's "domestic eavesdropping program." Again, a proudly left-of-center newspaper is given a prestigious award for revealing top secret information that can only bring aid and comfort to al Qaeda and other terrorists who mean to destroy us and our allies.
What galls me most is the NY Times "domestic surveillance" story. When all the rhetoric is stripped away, the story served very little useful purpose and almost assuredly harmed our security.
The overwhelming weight of evidence is that the program is legal. And the NY Times and other big media have been exposed as consistently misrepresenting the facts in their reporting. All the Democrat critics say the program is useful, only that it ought to go through the special FISA court. Those critics have largely shut up after polls showed the overwhelming number of Americans would like the government to monitor al Queda related communications with Americans. Duh. Even a liberal like Joe Klein said this recently:
It would have been a scandal if the NSA had not been using these tools to track down the bad guys. There is evidence that the information harvested helped foil several plots and disrupt al-Qaeda operations.
There is also evidence, according to U.S. intelligence officials, that since the New York Times broke the story, the terrorists have modified their behavior, hampering our efforts to keep track of them–but also, on the plus side, hampering their ability to communicate with one another.
So, just what was the point of the story other than to reveal national security secrets and attack the Bush administration? I thought the Pulitzers were supposed to honor journalism that serves some larger public interest.
UPDATE: The CIA fired the woman who leaked the prison story to Dana Priest at the Washington Post.
The leak pertained to stories on the CIA’s 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.
Groundhog Day for Durbin April 18, 2006
Posted by dancurry in mainstream media, National politics.1 comment so far
Must be nice to be able to call for the same thing repeatedly and get the news media to write stories each and every time. I believe this is the third or fourth time Durbin has called for Rumsfeld's resignation. I guess it shouldn't be a surprise given that Time magazine called Durbin one of the best members of the U.S. Senate despite his stunning partisanship. Or because of it. Even after he embarrassed himself with the Nazi remarks.
The Washington Post gets it April 9, 2006
Posted by dancurry in mainstream media, National politics.add a comment
What is completely lost in the mainstream media's frenzy to attack President Bush on the "leak" story is the grotesque amount of coverage the MM gave Joe Wilson and his subsequently discredited attack on the administration. The Washington Post was leading the charge.
I was in Washington working for the Senate and I couldn't believe the massive coverage.
Today, the Washington Post acknowledges that in an editorial.
The affair concerns, once again, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV and his absurdly over-examined visit to the African country of Niger in 2002.
But the Post has since exposed Wilson for the fraud he is.
The material that Mr. Bush ordered declassified established, as have several subsequent investigations, that Mr. Wilson was the one guilty of twisting the truth. In fact, his report supported the conclusion that Iraq had sought uranium.
And the Post wonders what the heck all the fuss is about over the "leak."
It's unfortunate that those who seek to prove the latter would now claim that Mr. Bush did something wrong by releasing for public review some of the intelligence he used in making his most momentous decision.
Sometimes, the MM rises above its dislike for President Bush.
UPDATE: The Left goes absolutely bonkers when a media outlet goes off the reservation.
NY Times cluelessly makes fun of itself April 9, 2006
Posted by dancurry in blogs, mainstream media.add a comment
The new public editor of the NY Times tells us breathlessly that the paper is going to lower its standards and allow more blogs. But beware — the blog material does not go through the NY Times vaunted fact checking machinery.
…The Times has been slower than the online versions of The Washington Post and other newspapers to embrace full-fledged blogging. That cautious approach hasn’t bothered me, given my conviction that serious journalism starts with the authentication and verification of information.
…The aggregation concept, which isn’t unique to The Times, can have value for readers interested in business — even though much of the information hasn’t gone through all The Times’s journalistic filters
…While the banner of The New York Times flies at the top of each page of DealBook, much of the information there hasn’t been verified or confirmed by the staff. In my mind, this is a fundamental departure from the way the rest of the paper’s content –except for wire service stories — is authenticated before it is published. Readers can benefit, my review of the paper’s early efforts suggests, even if those blogs don’t deliver Times-quality news content.
The irony, of course, is that blogs have ripped the veil off the NY Times and other mainstream media’s credibility, exposing huge mistakes, gaping errors of omission and unabashed bias.
It makes sense for the Times to go with the flow by including more blogs. But it ought to drop the sanctimonious drivel about its own layers of review. The public ain’t buying it and it’s largely because of the blogs.
Relentless demogoguery April 7, 2006
Posted by dancurry in mainstream media.add a comment
While the national TV media cheerfully reports on the new jobs of two of its favorite lefty women (who are good interviewers, the press reports!), it simultaneously continues shameful smearing of the President of the United States in Plamegate.
As Austin Bay points out accurately, the news media can be inprecise when it suits its purposes.
The sudden press flap over Scooter Libby’s alleged “revelation” that President Bush declassified intelligence information related to Iraq is silly but all too predictable. The entire flap relies on mixing terms and “misunderstanding by innuendo” — a technique of demagoguery, not journalism. The flap is yet more evidence that the national press is more interested in playing “gotcha” with the Bush Administration than reporting the news.
Assuming Libby is right, what President Bush did was neither illegal, unethical, or related to the disclosure of Valerie Plame. But you'd never know it by the national news coverage. Tom Maguire has covered this better than anybody, including the high-priced celebrity leftists on TV.
NASCAR smear foiled April 4, 2006
Posted by dancurry in mainstream media.add a comment
Michelle Malkin and other bloggers have reported on an intercepted email that presaged an NBC Dateline idea to show hostility toward Arab-Americans. Where were they going to send these Arab-Americans, complete with hidden cameras? To a NASCAR event of course.
…That said, I'm urgently looking for someone who can be filmed this April 1st weekend at a Nascar event (and other smaller events) in Virginia. NBC is willing to fly in someone and cover their weekend expenses. The filming would take place all day on Saturday and Sunday.
We already have a hijabi sister who will be filmed there but a Muslim is also needed to join her. I also need candidates for the other filming segments which will take place in the following weeks.
A few weeks later, NBC will fly all the filmed participants to New York City to interview them as a group about their experience and thoughts on discrimination they've faced in America, especially in light of the times we live in (war on terror, 9-11, etc.). The show, if approved by NBC (highly likely), is expected to air sometime this summer.
What I need from interested candidates is an email with an attached clear photograph, a resume, and contact information. I also need basic information such as age, ethnic background, accomplishments, etc.
The sooner I can get this the better and please don't make emails too long. I will then submit a group of candidates to NBC so they can choose the people for the show.
Please forward this to all Muslim lists you can. Because of the upcoming filming in Virginia, this is pretty time-sensitive. My contact information is below.
Salam,
Tarek El-Messidi
Apparently, everybody is now aware of the plan. NBC has sent out a statement and one of Malkin's readers called NASCAR's offices and was told the racing circuit is well aware of NBC's intentions. Another of Malkin's readers suggested that racegoers bring the following banner to the race:
"Nascar welcomes NBC-Muslim Sting operation!"
This is why I love the blogosphere. A decade ago, NBC would have aired the show with whatever flimsy evidence it dug up. Anyone who looks differently than most of a huge crowd will get a few stares, looks and comments — whether they are Arab-American, white male, or whatever. If you are intent on twisting something like that into a prime time newsmagazine segment, you can. It's been going on for years.
Now, NBC will have to look for another smear.
Curling up with the Sunday web tablet April 3, 2006
Posted by dancurry in mainstream media, Uncategorized.add a comment
As a former newspaper reporter and editor, I feel little empathy for those in the newspaper business who don't see the inevitable coming.
There’s one way out of this mess for the Times. It is a bold, gutsy, and, some would say, foolish way, at least initially: The Times—here’s the irony—should go all-digital. That’s right. It should abandon newsprint and force everyone to the Web. It should make a stand against Google, using its About.com division—something with real growth, and which is actually working out despite the $410 million in debt taken down to buy the thing—to lead the way. Maybe it should even take the revolutionary step of blocking Google from accessing its content, something no one else is willing to do. Or maybe it should at least say, “This is the deal: You want our stuff, you must share much more with us than you are willing to share with others.” It is worth it to preserve value for the future, to make it so our kids don’t think, Let me go to Google for all the news that’s fit to print. Heck, in another couple of years they won’t even know that the New York Times exists as anything but private-label news source for an Internet portal.
Peoria Pundit, another former reporter and editor, adds his thoughts today.
It won't be long before an aggressive company hires a few good reporters to cover a particular niche topic, say, Illinois politics, or Central Illinois tech, and posts the content regularly on a slick website. Voila, running a newspaper without the overhead. I don't think the consumer will mind one bit. Even though I read tons of newspapers every day, I don't subscribe to a single one.
Amid all this gloomy news for newspapers as we know them, my old newspaper keeps chugging through the fog. Wonder how Doug Ray does it?
Reverse Spin 