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Gore's Non-Negative Attack Ad; Rather Upbraided Bush; More of Clymer's Liberal Crusading -- Read today's Extra edition [1]
>>> Now online, thanks to the MRC's Kristina Sewell and Andy
Szul, the September 4 edition of Notable Quotables, the MRC's bi-weekly
compilation of the latest outrageous, sometimes humorous, quotes in the
liberal media. Amongst the quote headings: "Gore Kiss: Way to Go,
Sexy Man"; "Clancy Out of Touch...or Lauer?"; "Bush
Tax Cut: Let's Repeat the Gore Press Release as 'News'";
"Kick the Killer Car Dealer"; "Post-Convention Liberal
Guilt"; "Red Meat Right Wing Bush"; "How Could Al Be
So Unlucky?" and "Geraldo's Premature Nostalgia."
All three broadcast network evening shows opened Tuesday night with Bush's unveiling of his prescription drug plan and all three also relayed Gore's retort and clips of the DNC's new ad attacking Bush's record in Texas. Here's how each addressed the new DNC ad on Tuesday night, September 5: -- NBC Nightly News. The show opened with David Gregory's story on Bush's plan followed by Claire Shipman on Gore's reaction. Here, in total, is how she handled the ad: Shipman: "And a second line of attack on health
care from the Democratic Party, a new ad released today questioning
Bush's record." Now compare that to how the same program assessed the RNC's ad last week. Anchor John Siegenthaler opened the September 1 NBC Nightly News by noting how a poll found Bush down ten points, so "the Republican Party is out with a new TV ad to try to turn those numbers around by going negative." David Gregory proclaimed: "Today, in the face
of fresh evidence that Al Gore is widening his lead over Governor Bush as
Labor Day approaches, the Republican Party goes on the offensive,
unveiling an ad the Gore campaign labels a personal attack." -- ABC's World News Tonight, September 5. After Dean Reynolds summarized the Bush plan, Terry Moran explained how Gore claimed Bush would have no money left after his tax cuts to pay for the plan and that it would still leave half of seniors uncovered. Moran continued: "That was how the candidate
responded, but the real dirty work against Bush was left to this
Democratic Party TV ad which begins airing in nine battleground states
this week." -- CBS Evening News. Immediately after CBS's story on Bush's plan, anchor Dan Rather intoned: "The context of real and substantive differences between the Gore and Bush prescription drug plans also includes the overall tone of the campaign. It is growing more negative, punch and counter-punch, with use of attack ads increasing." John Roberts relayed Gore's response, then got to
the ad: "Sensing an advantage on one of this fall's preeminent
issues, Gore is hammering the Governor mercifully. He even approved the
release today of an ad he'd held back, skewering the Governor's record
on children's health care." Roberts concluded with an upbeat spin for Gore: "Gore will take his substance over soundbites theme to a new level tomorrow when he lays out the specifics of his economic plan, hoping his command of the issues will dazzle voters and bury his opponent in detail."
Just after the above quoted John Roberts piece
concluded, Rather lectured: On screen, viewers saw this text simultaneously: Rather went on with his diatribe: "You may want to note there's a long history of politicians attacking the press and Bush did not apologize for what he said about the Times reporter. Reactions to Bush's comment included this one today from Republican Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa [with ellipses as shown on screen]: 'It would be better if no person...spoke about others in that fashion.' By the way, several major newspapers today quoted the Bush comment directly [Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, USA Today logos on screen.]. The New York Times itself did not, saying only that Bush quote, 'used an obscenity to describe a New York Times correspondent.'" End of Rather's item, but once again Grassley demonstrated a lesson for any conservative: If you want to get quoted by the mainstream media, say something the media can use against another conservative. It would not surprise me, however, if Grassley's quote is out of context. Despite Rather's consternation over Bush's remark and suggestion that it's improper to not have apologized, Rather has yet to apologize for his false August 17 insinuations about Republicans and a grand jury leak. In fact, a judge appointed by Democratic President Jimmy Carter inadvertently leaked the development. On the August 17 CBS Evening News, in a formulation
he repeated during CBS's prime time convention coverage, Rather intoned: In prime time and on the Evening News Gloria Borger then passed along the Gore spin with a warning about Ken Starr: "One top Gore adviser portrayed it as what he called a quote 'grand Republican strategy to tie Al Gore to President Clinton.'" She added: "The hope of the Gore campaign is that this leak will fire up their troops and backfire against the Republicans. How? By tying George W. Bush to Kenneth Starr." The CBS News Web site featured Dan Rather's Thursday "Notebook" essay titled "Low-Road Politics: Clinton Grand Jury Leak Carefully Orchestrated" Part of his diatribe: All of which comes to mind in light of the leak revealing that Ken Starr's successor, Independent Counsel Robert Ray, has empaneled a new grand jury to look at evidence that President Clinton broke the law while giving testimony on his relationship with Monica Lewinsky in the Paula Jones lawsuit. You don't have to be a cynic to note that this has all the earmarks of a carefully orchestrated, politically motivated leak. The Republican-backed Robert Ray is sponsored by a three-judge panel that must periodically decide whether Ray's investigation should continue. This panel features two federal judges backed by the Jesse Helms wing of the Republican Party. Any reporter who's spent time on the police beat learns to look for motive. So you ask yourself -- what group has the motive to see that such a leak would occur at such a time, hours before Gore is set to accept his party's nomination in the most important speech of his political life? None of which is to say that George W. Bush is behind the leak, directly or indirectly. We certainly have no information that he is. But candidates themselves hardly ever are, as their hands must remain clean and their deniability plausible. (You may want to review some of the more unpleasant tactics used by Bush backers against John McCain in South Carolina earlier this year.).... END Excerpt The day after this reporting Rather went on vacation for two weeks. Tuesday night was his first night back, so now he has no excuse to not issue an apology for his flawed reporting which falsely impugned reputations. +++ Watch Rather upbraid Bush. An hour after this e-mail is sent, MRC Web master Andy Szul will post a RealPlayer clip of Rather's harangue. Go to: http://www.mrc.org [7]
David Martin also never uttered the names Bush or Cheney.
Dan Rather opened the CBS Evening News: "Sixty-three days now until the United States elects a new President. With health care one of the top concerns of voters and under attack for being too slow and vague, Republican George Bush today at last gave details of his plan for shoring up Medicare and for helping older Americans pay for prescription drugs. The Gore camp immediately branded it too little too late and quote 'inadequate.'" Bill Whitaker asserted: "....While Al Gore
proposes an expanding government plan, Bush turns to the private sector.
In this house it's not a campaign issue, it's a matter of survival. If ever-expanding government services continue at this rate without any challenge from the media, it's taxpayers who won't be able to afford anything. Whitaker then had a liberal analyst, naturally
unlabeled, assess both plans: "One analyst says the basic difference
between the two plans: Gore's offers people like the Welch's few
choices but is likely to keep prices lower, the Bush plan:" Marilyn Moon sure is popular with the networks. She
was also the only expert quoted by NBC's David Gregory: "Critics of
the Bush approach say seniors choosing private plans for prescriptions
could actually end up paying more than they do now."
Today's Investor's Business Daily also features an editorial recounting how at a panel discussion just on Saturday Clymer referred to vulnerable Republican Congressmen as "the turkeys who got elected in the '94 Gingrich sweep." Clymer, who has praised Ted Kennedy in reporting and in a gushing book, also took a shot at how GOP Congressman Phil Crane "has finally dried out." On Special Report with Brit Hume Tuesday night
Carl Cameron recounted an April New York Times story by Clymer, which
began: That April 11 story was among a few linked by
Jim Romenesko's MediaNews on Tuesday (http://www.poynter.org/medianews/ [8])
To read it, go to: Romenesko also provided a link to Clymer's
story from last August on Bush and past drug use: And to Clymer's piece claiming Bush's ad on
prescription drugs had "zero" accuracy: Back to FNC, Brit Hume later pointed out: John Berlau of Investor's Business Daily alerted me to an editorial he researched for today's Investor's Business Daily. It's based what he heard Clymer and other New York Times reporters say on Saturday at a forum held at the American Political Science Association's convention in Washington. Here's an excerpt from the September 6 editorial: George Bush's vulgar remark about Adam Clymer, political reporter for The New York Times, has roiled the pundit class into its usual self-righteous frenzy. But intemperate as Bush's name-calling might have been, it's understandable.... The panel started with political reporter Richard Berke, who talked about Al Gore's recent surge in the polls. Berke said right now it was hard to tell if Gore would win, and then said that later on "I think I'll be more confident." Berke paused, and then quickly added, "for him." But Berke's colleague Clymer showed no such restraint. He referred to vulnerable Republican Congress members as "the turkeys who got elected in the '94 Gingrich sweep." This is objective analysis? Then Clymer, in praising moderate Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., took a left-handed jab at Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and long a demon to the elite press. "On a committee headed by Jesse Helms, he's (Lugar) the soundest voice on foreign policy.".... [I]t was Clymer who went the furthest. He showed not only bias but a lack of taste. On Rep. Phil Crane, R-Ill., who revealed he was seeking treatment for alcoholism, Clymer made this snide remark: "I've heard that Crane has finally dried out." This from a man who wrote a fawning biography of Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., whose thirst is legendary in Washington circles. But not only was alcoholism fair game for Clymer. So was gall-bladder surgery. "Pat Buchanan just had his gall bladder removed, so Pat Buchanan without bile will be interesting," Clymer smirked. Clymer's bias is clear to others. "Certainly I detected more criticism (at the forum) of Republicans and conservatives than of Democrats, at least on the part of Clymer," said David Conradt, a professor of political science at East Carolina University in Greenville, N.C. "And I'm a Democrat," he added. The New Republic Contributing Editor Mickey Kaus, not a raging right-winger, had this to say in his Sept. 4 online column: "Clymer maintains a veneer of objectivity by using sympathetic experts to make his point, but like the NYT's R.W. Apple he seems so convinced that all civilized men would agree with him that he doesn't really bother to hide his viewpoint." Neither did Bush. But, given Clymer's open contempt for Republicans, Bush's reaction is easy to see. END Excerpt For the whole editorial, pick up a copy of
today's IBD. Their Web address, which does not include editorials:
There you have it. People who are proud that they can't figure out who would be a better President are the ones who will decide who becomes President. A depressing thought. -- Brent Baker [13]
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ABC
managed to refer to the DNC's new anti-Bush ad as "dirty work"
and CBS's Dan Rather hit both sides as he complained about how the
campaign "is growing more negative, punch and counter-punch, with use
of attack ads increasing." But NBC Nightly News, which tagged the RNC
ad against Gore released last week as "negative" and relayed how
Gore's team called it a "personal attack," offered no such
judgments last night.
Later in
Tuesday's CBS Evening News Rather introduced a David Martin exclusive on
how a Navy Inspector General's report found Navy aviators miss their
targets at a high rate because of a lack of training, but Rather didn't
mention which presidential candidate this fact supports: "There is no
disputing that the U.S. military is by far the most powerful force on
Earth, but there are new questions tonight about how well members of the
military are being trained and prepared for combat."
ABC and
NBC Tuesday night pretty much stuck to the Bush and Gore claims about each
other's prescription drug plans, but CBS loaded up its story with a
standard anecdote about a desperate elderly couple.
While
Dan Rather scolded Bush over his "Major league asshole"
assessment of New York Times reporter Adam Clymer and the other
networks looked at the political implications of the comment, only Fox
News Channel bothered to consider if Clymer may have an anti-Bush or
anti-conservative bias. FNC highlighted some examples of biased
reporting.
Dork,
and proud of it. On the September 5 NBC Nightly News Lisa Myers
explored how a mere one million undecided voters in ten battleground
states will determine the winner of the presidential race. At one
point Myers showed an example, a middle-aged woman in Ohio, noting:
"Many undecideds, like Kelly Mooney, who saw Gore speak at her
company today, pride themselves on being a tough sell."