June 29, 2005
Retired Major General Donald Shepperd toured the Guantanamo Bay detention facility on Friday and…in a phone interview from Cuba on CNN…Shepperd asserted: “The impressions that you’re getting from the media and from the various pronouncements being made by people who have not been here, in my opinion, are totally false.” Shepperd contended that “what we’re seeing is a modern prison system with dedicated people, interrogators and analysts that know what they are doing. And people being very, very well-treated.”
But when Shepperd reported that he had observed an interrogation, anchor Betty Nguyen inquired: “Kind of explain to us how that played out. And were there any instances of abuse or possible abuse?” Shepperd responded: “Absolutely not.”
For the entire transcript, click here.
June 22, 2005
On June 14, the second highest-ranking Democrat in the U.S. Senate likened the conduct of U.S. military guards at Guantanamo Bay — where no one has died — with “Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime, Pol Pot or others, that had no concern for human beings.” Two days later, ABC, CBS and NBC had yet to even mention Senator Dick Durbin’s outrageous comparison.
For the complete report, click here.
June 15, 2005
Anchoring World News Tonight, Charles Gibson stressed how “there is troubling news for President Bush in a new ABC News/Washington Post poll: 52 percent of Americans disapprove of the President’s job performance. That’s the highest disapproval rating for Mr. Bush since he took office.” But as the June 8 Washington Post article on the poll noted, “Bush’s 48 percent job approval rating was essentially unchanged from the 47 percent rating he received in a late-April poll.” …
With a margin of error of three percent, a one point move is hardly significant.
For the complete CyberAlert, click here.
June 8, 2005
Israeli police authorities on Wednesday uncovered and arrested a group of Palestinian terrorists who were planning a double suicide bombing in Jerusalem this week. Five Islamic Jihad terrorists were arrested earlier in the week, and now the two suicide bombers themselves have been arrested. The bomb packs that were to be used were seized and detonated. The terrorists made multiple unsuccessful attempts to infiltrate Israel from the West Bank. The bombings were planned for a synagogue, cafe or bus in Jerusalem City Center and another in the Ramot neighborhood.
This apparently is not newsworthy to the Post, even though it prides itself on having two correspondents on the ground in Israel. The NY Times reported this story.
For Eye On The Post’s website, click here.
June 1, 2005
How do undies pictures of Saddam in the newspapers compare to Saddam’s mass murder on the human rights meter? NBC’s record of coverage suggests America should find the undies pictures more outrageous. Today treated it like a human rights scandal, inviting on Saddam defense lawyer Giovanni DiStefano to voice his outrage. NBC didn’t cover the latest discovery of Saddam-era mass graves in southern Iraq. …
For the complete story, click here.
May 25, 2005
NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams on Wednesday evening falsely asserted that the “nuclear” option in the Senate would end “the use of the filibuster to block votes on judges used by both sides for years.” In fact, Democratic use of the filibuster on multiple judicial nominees is unprecedented and Republicans have never employed it in a partisan effort to block a nominee who had majority support. The last time Republicans were in the same alignment as Democrats are now (minority in Senate with President in opposition party), in 1993 and 1994, they did not filibuster Clinton’s nominees.
For the complete CyberAlert, click here.
May 18, 2005
The other day CBS News aired excerpts of an interview with Kenneth Starr, the former federal judge, solicitor general and Whitewater independent counsel, in which the network’s Gloria Borger claimed Starr had opposed efforts to end the filibuster of judicial nominees. From the transcript:
Borger: Many conservatives consider the fight over judges their political Armageddon. But conservative icon and former federal Judge Ken Starr says it’s gotten out of control.
Starr: This is a radical, radical departure from our history and from our traditions, and it amounts to an assault on the judicial branch of government.
Borger: Starr, who investigated the Monica Lewinsky case against President Clinton, tells CBS News that the Republican plan to end the filibuster may be unwise.
Starr: It may prove to have the kind of long-term boomerang effect, damage on the institution of the Senate that thoughtful senators may come to regret.
… Starr’s own explanation comes in an e-mail …:
In the piece that I have now seen, and which I gather is being lavishly quoted, CBS employed two snippets. The ‘radical departure’ snippet was specifically addressed–although this is not evidenced whatever from the clip–to the practice of invoking judicial philosophy as a grounds for voting against a qualified nominee of integrity and experience. I said in sharp language that that practice was wrong. I contrasted the current practice . . . with what occurred during Ruth Ginsburg’s nomination process, as numerous Republicans voted (rightly) to confirm a former ACLU staff lawyer. They disagreed with her positions as a lawyer, but they voted (again, rightly) to confirm her. Why? Because elections, like ideas, have consequences. . . . In the interview, I did indeed suggest, and have suggested elsewhere, that caution and prudence be exercised (Burkean that I am) in shifting/modifying rules (that’s the second snippet), but I likewise made clear that the “filibuster” represents an entirely new use (and misuse) of a venerable tradition. . . .
Our friends are way off base in assuming that the CBS snippets, as used, represent (a) my views, or (b) what I in fact said.
We can vouch for Starr’s explanation of the first snippet. Last September we appeared on a panel with him and the Federalist Society’s Leonard Leo, and Starr made exactly the same point, including the Ginsburg example.
[NOTE: CBS has reportedly refused to provide Mr. Starr with a copy of the entire interview they did with him, thereby preventing him from proving that the clips aired were taken out of context and that CBS deliberately misrepresented his remarks.]
May 11, 2005
Tuesday’s [New York Times] story by Carl Hulse and Neil Lewis, headlined “Jockeying Intensifies in Battle Over Nominees for Courts,” focuses heavily on the objections to Bush’s nominees. A graphic accompanying the page A-13 story displays seven Bush nominees and explains with each name why the Democrats object. There is no room in the graphic to explain why Republicans like the nominees. …
…They also note Democratic objections to Janice Rogers Brown, “an outspoken, conservative African American on the California Supreme Court” and her speeches full of “vivid and attention-getting language.” The vivid speech and radical views of liberal interest groups supporting the Democrat filibuster were not investigated by the Times.
In a Sunday front-pager, Hulse highlighted how the “tone of the debate is escalating”, citing first a radio address from “three Christian conservative leaders” and then Sen. Charles Schumer accusing conservatives of undermining the Constitution (although he is simply a “Democrat of New York” who “used the party’s Saturday radio address to hit back at conservatives.”) Hulse also underlined a high pitch from conservatives by noting a legislative alert from the National Right to Life Committee: “Senate Showdown Near on Ending Filibusters of President Bush’s Judicial Nominees!” screamed the headline on an action alert distributed in recent days by the National Right to Life Committee.” The liberal base urging the Democrats to obstruct nominations is nowhere to be found, even though NARAL and Planned Parenthood were also “screaming” with exclamation points.
For the complete story, click here.
May 4, 2005
On Saturday Israeli troops spotted five Palestinians crawling on their stomachs in a closed military zone at the border between Gaza and Egypt, far from any housing, in an area that has a history of being the site of Palestinian weapons smuggling operations. They then stood up and made a run for the border. Warning shots and calls to stop were ignored. Three of them were shot and killed by Israeli forces. Two survived. As it turned out, they were teenagers. The survivors admitted to Palestinian security personnel that they had been involved in an attempt to smuggle weapons.
…[The Washington Post's headline of the story reads] Israelis Kill 3 Teenagers In Gaza Strip, Military Says Troops Fired Warning Shots … The Post’s headline says nothing about the shooting having taken place in a buffer zone at the border. The New York Times, on the other hand, places this fact right in the headline: Israeli Troops Kill 3 Teenagers in Buffer Zone at Gaza Border …
Studies show that most readers don’t read beyond the headline and introductory paragraphs of news articles. The Post’s introductory paragraph says nothing about the shootings having taken place at the border. It says only that “Three Palestinian teenagers were shot and killed by Israeli soldiers Saturday in the southern Gaza Strip.” The second paragraph also fails to report the location of the incident. So does the third. The New York Times, on the other hand, repeats in the opening paragraph that the shooting happened at the border.
…The Post’s correspondent never gives the report of the Israeli commander who stated he was told by Palestinian security officials … yes Palestinian security officials … that the surviving teenagers admitted to them that they were involved in a weapons smuggling operation. The New York Times and other media outlets report this.
Mr. Anderson doesn’t report that not only were warning shots fired, but the Israeli troops called out to the perpetrators to stop. The New York Times reports this.
…This …[reporting] fails to fully and fairly report all of the known facts, thereby enabling readers to draw their own conclusions.
For the complete story, go to EyeOnThePost.org.
April 27, 2005
“Filibuster Rule Change Opposed” is the headline of the lead story in today’s Washington Post. The paper reports on a poll of 1,007 “randomly selected adults.” The results are here (PDF), and the relevant questions are No. 34 and No. 36, which appear on page 13 (both, for some reason, after No. 35):
34. The Senate has confirmed 35 federal appeals court judges nominated by Bush, while Senate Democrats have blocked 10 others. Do you think the Senate Democrats are right to block these nominations? Do you feel that way strongly or somewhat?
Result: Right 48% (22% strongly, 26% somewhat), wrong 36% (17% strongly, 19% somewhat). Here’s the other question:
36. Would you support or oppose changing Senate rules to make it easier for the Republicans to confirm Bush’s judicial nominees?
Results: Support 26%, oppose 66%.
Read these questions carefully and you’ll see that the Post’s headline is false. The poll not only doesn’t use the word filibuster; it doesn’t even describe the procedure. The way the question is worded, the Democrats could have “blocked” the nominations by the normal method of voting them down–and there is no reason to think that “randomly selected adults” would have been paying enough attention to know the difference. (Tellingly, the poll asks how closely participants have been following the Tom DeLay kerfuffle–only 36% say even “somewhat” closely–but does not ask the same question about the judge issue.)
The introduction to the question should have been worded: “… Senate Democrats have used a procedure called the filibuster to block a vote on 10 others.” As it is, this poll is either a very sloppy bit of work or a deliberate attempt to mislead the Post’s readers–including members of the U.S. Senate.
