Arizona

ABC and NBC Champion ‘Growing National Backlash’ Against ‘Laughing Stock’ Arizona
By Brent Baker | April 27, 2010 | 11:06 PM EDT

Extending the kind of respect they never provided the Tea Party activists, ABC and NBC on Tuesday night promoted what NBC anchor Brian Williams embraced as “the growing national backlash against the state of Arizona over its tough new immigration law that says police can stop people just on the suspicion they might be there illegally.”

ABC’s Barbara Pinto touted how “the call for an economic boycott here has caught fire on the Internet” while NBC’s Andrea Mitchell trumpeted how “anger over the law has gone viral,” as both pointed to how the American Immigration Lawyers Association had canceled a conference – of a mere 400 attendees -- scheduled for the state.

NBC’s Mitchell played clips from two left-wing comedians, as she asserted: “It's now gone beyond protest to threats of a boycott, as Arizona becomes a laughing stock to some.” Viewers then heard a joke from Saturday Night Live about “fascism” followed by The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart: “It's not unprecedented, having to carry around your papers. It's the same thing free black people had to do in 1863.” After showcasing a Facebook page (“Arizona, the Grand Canyon State, welcomes you unless you're a Mexican or look like one”), Mitchell cited “a slap in the face” from Mexico which, ironically, warned its citizens about traveling to Arizona.

Bozell Column: Arizona's 21-Bottle Salute
By Brent Bozell | April 27, 2010 | 11:01 PM EDT

Arizona officially joined the South this month. In other words, it became for our Northeastern media elitists a state dominated by backward, slack-jawed racists. The Associated Press marked the passage of a tough new anti-immigration law with the leftist version of a Welcome Wagon: “The furor over Arizona's new law cracking down on illegal immigrants grew Monday as opponents used refried beans to smear swastikas on the state Capitol.”

Disagreeing with the left – and more importantly, handing them a political defeat – brings a lot of ugliness these days from the forces of “tolerance.” Character assassination is required. A citizen of Arizona cannot be concerned about higher rates of crime and strained government budgets without being Mexican-food-smeared as an adorer of Adolf Hitler.

But what’s truly outrageous if not surprising is that the same media that visibly quivered with anger that anyone would draw a Hitler moustache on their hero Barack Obama now present these Nazi smears as not an embarrassment to the left, but as a way of augmenting the left. The “furor was growing” over the tough new law, they dutifully report.

NYT Former Reporter Greenhouse Fires on Arizona's 'Police State,' Makes Nazi Comparison
By Clay Waters | April 27, 2010 | 11:31 AM EDT
Linda Greenhouse, the New York Times's former Supreme Court reporter, now writes a twice-monthly column for nytimes.com. But the paper's editors must have found her latest rant on Arizona's tough new immigration law particularly powerful, because it made it into Tuesday's print edition: "Breathing While Undocumented."

Greenhouse, who caused controversy while still a Times reporter when she made her hard-left views on abortion and Guantanamo Bay public at a Harvard commencement address in the summer of 2006, really let it out on Tuesday, with visions of police states and a seemingly inevitable comparison to Nazism.
I'm glad I've already seen the Grand Canyon.

Because I'm not going back to Arizona as long as it remains a police state, which is what the appalling anti-immigrant bill that Gov. Jan Brewer signed into law last week has turned it into.

CBS Again Focuses on Victims in Arizona: ‘Many Feel the Sting of Racism in New Law’
By Brent Baker | April 26, 2010 | 10:59 PM EDT
For the second consecutive weeknight, the CBS Evening News on Monday framed Arizona’s new anti-illegal immigrant bill around the fears and charges of its supposed victims. With “ANGER & ANXIETY” on screen below video of signs hostile to the new law (“LAND OF THE FREE! REALLY?” and a Swastika sign with “Achtung! Papers Please”), Katie Couric teased: “Anger in Arizona against a new law allowing police to make you prove you’re in the country legally” – followed by a man who impugned supporters: “They’re just focusing on us because we’re brown.”

Couric soon set up CBS’s story by relaying how “opponents say it will lead to racial profiling” as she didn’t pass judgment on their vandalism when she reported “some of those opponents vandalized the state capitol building, smearing refried beans in the shape of swastikas on the windows.” (Talk about fulfilling a stereotype)

John Blackstone presented arguments in favor of the law, but delivered his story through the eyes of sympathetic, if misinformed, people who see themselves as victims. “Kym Rivera brought her children to a demonstration today against Arizona's new immigration law. Her husband, born in El Salvador was sworn in as a citizen last October,” but “she fears he'll become a suspect when police are searching for illegal immigrants under the new law.” She baselessly asserted: “He worries he'll be asked to leave this country because he was not born here. That he'll be separated from his children, from his wife of 15 years.”

Blackstoned moved on to “19-year-old Junior Perez,” the same guy in the opening tease, who “has heard the assurances that the law is aimed only at illegal immigrants. He's not convinced,” and, corroborating his fear, Blackstone insisted that “in a state where more than 30 percent of the population is Hispanic, many feel the sting of racism in the new law.” Perez charged: “They’re just focusing on us because we're brown. So, it's just devastating.”
'Mostly Peacefully' Means 'Somewhat Violently' at the New York Times
By Clay Waters | April 26, 2010 | 3:54 PM EDT

The New York Times sometimes takes its politically correct blandishments to humorous extremes, as in Randal Archibold's lead story Saturday, “Arizona Enacts Stringent Law On Immigration.” Check the curious way Archibold referred to a protest against Arizona's new anti-immigration law, then try to imagine how the paper would react if such things had happened at a Tea Party rally:

As hundreds of demonstrators massed, mostly peacefully, at the capitol plaza, the governor, speaking at a state building a few miles away, said the law “represents another tool for our state to use as we work to solve a crisis we did not create and the federal government has refused to fix.”
Achibold didn't go into why he felt obliged to include the modifier “mostly.” For that, one had to check out a local report filed Friday night that included details the Times left out:
Three people were arrested during the immigration rally at the state capitol Friday afternoon.

Two were arrested after they were seen throwing water bottles at police, according to a news release from the Arizona Department of Public Safety, the state police agency.
Evidently, “mostly peacefully” means “somewhat violently” at the New York Times.

This local news clip is even more dramatic, showing a police officer being nailed with a water bottle, one of many hurled in the semi-chaotic "march" that the headline terms a "small riot."

CBS Frames Arizona’s Anti-Illegal Alien Law Through Eyes of Opponents: ‘Veto Racism’
By Brent Baker | April 24, 2010 | 2:58 PM EDT

Arizona’s new law hardly earned a friendly reception Friday night from any of the network newscasts, but CBS went the furthest in presenting it from the perspective of its “victims” as anchor Katie Couric, over video of “Veto Racism” and “Stop the Hate” signs, teased: “Tonight, Arizona's controversial new immigration law. Police will now be able to make anyone they choose prove they're here illegally. It triggers demonstrations by both sides and a warning from President Obama.” (Presumably, she meant “prove they’re here legally.”)

Reporter Bill Whitaker suddenly found wisdom in the Catholic Church, plastering “mean-spirited” on screen:

In Los Angeles, Cardinal Roger Mahony, head of the country's largest Catholic archdiocese, called the law “mean-spirited” and compared it to Nazi repression. Today at a ceremony for new citizens, President Obama criticized Arizona's actions.

On ABC, Diane Sawyer teased: “Tonight on World News, Crackdown. Arizona targets illegal immigrants. The toughest new law in the country. Protesters hit the streets.”

NYT Pits McCain Against 'Far Right' J.D. Hayworth, Denouncer of Illegals and the 'Insufficiently Patriotic'
By Clay Waters | February 10, 2010 | 5:39 PM EST

New York Times reporter Jennifer Steinhauer, previously heard insulting California voters for failing to vote for tax hikes, ventured over the border on Tuesday's front page to cover a Republican primary scuffle in Arizona involving Sen. John McCain being challenged from the right by former congressman J.D. Hayworth: “McCain, Facing G.O.P. Foe in Primary, Tilts to the Right.” The online headline: “From Right of Radio Dial, a Challenge to McCain.” Hayworth was part of the Republican class of 1994, who served six terms in the House until losing in 2006. Steinhauer described Hayworth's defeat in loaded terms: “His loss to Harry E. Mitchell, a Democrat, in his 2006 re-election bid was humiliating, and underscored voter distaste for some of his more boisterous ways.”From the start, Steinhauer hit the liberal cliches about conservative radio hosts.

J. D. Hayworth is a large man, and to compensate for his indulgences, he hits the elliptical trainer every morning at 4, zipping along to an incongruous soundtrack of Elvis Costello, Frank Sinatra and old advertising jingles.Until recently, he would then repair to a local radio station, where he would spend the better part of the day denouncing, in no particular order, illegal immigrants, all things Barack Obama, those who are insufficiently patriotic and, his favorite mark, one John McCain, the senior senator from Arizona.

Steinhauer feels for McCain, who in her telling is being pushed “starkly” to the right by “far right” meanies like Hayworth, in a piece notable for its sudden sympathy toward John McCain, whose coverage in the Times seems to be determined based on whether a loss by him would help or hurt the conservative movement. As Times Watch has demonstrated, McCain was clearly the Times's favorite Republican in Campaign 2008 – until he became the clear frontrunner and the only likely candidate standing between a historic Democratic presidency involving either the first female or first black president.

Eight-Year-Old Gang-Raped, Shunned by Family: CNN's First and Only Network On It
By Tim Graham | July 25, 2009 | 8:17 AM EDT

An eight-year-old girl, gang-raped by four young boys in Phoenix, then blamed for the rape by her family and shunned: how quickly and heavily will the media respond? Where is President Obama, who can comment on local police matters in Cambridge, Massachusetts? So far, Nexis shows CNN is the first and only network on this story, which should captivate Nancy Grace and Greta van Susteren for weeks, not to mention network morning shows. Here’s a summary from AP:

In Arizona, Another Un-Name That Party Exercise by AP, With a Twist
By Tom Blumer | April 26, 2009 | 9:06 AM EDT
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The Associated Press's Stylebook (as of 2008, per this Houston Chronicle blog entry) has the following to say about political party identification in stories:

Party Affiliation - Let relevance be the guide in determining whether to include a political figure's party affiliation in a story. Party affiliation is pointless in some stories, such as an account of a governor accepting a button from a poster child.

It will occur naturally in many political stories. For stories between these extremes, include party affiliation if readers need it for understanding or are likely to be curious about what it is.

The AP, as readers here know, frequently flouts its own standards when Democrats are involved in legal or personal difficulties in its reporters' original write-ups. That's bad enough. But what's doubly offensive, and sadly no longer surprising, is how its writers seem to actively work to purge party references from other publications' original local or single-state stories about Democratic politicians or officials involved in scandal or other troubles.

In the latest example, it isn't just that the subject's party isn't directly identified. Based on AP's "clever" composition, many readers are likely to conclude that the person in trouble is a Republican.

MSNBC Hosts Visibly Upset Arizona State Not Awarding Honorary Degree to Obama
By Jeff Poor | April 10, 2009 | 4:50 PM EDT

It's not often during midday cable news broadcasting you get to see raw emotion from one or two of the hosts. However, when President Barack Obama gets snubbed, there are exceptions to the rule.

On MSNBC on April 10, co-hosts Contessa Brewer and Carlos Watson put their disapproval on display for viewers to see while reporting a decision by Arizona State University not to award Obama an honorary degree for speaking at the school's commencement next month.

"In other news, President Obama will be giving the commencement address at Arizona State University on May 13th. But the president will not be getting an honorary degree according to the school. Here's why, quote, ‘While President Obama has already achieved remarkable success including becoming the first African-American president, his greatest work is yet to come. We will be delighted to consider him for an honorary degree once he leaves office at the end of the presidency.'"

AP's 'US Now Winning Iraq War' Analysis Getting Light Exposure
By Tom Blumer | July 27, 2008 | 10:16 AM EDT

Robert Burns and Robert H. Reid created quite a stir in the blogosphere yesterday with their dispatch from Baghdad, "Analysis: US now winning Iraq war that seemed lost." NewsBusters colleague Noel Sheppard accurately called it a "stop the presses" story, and ended his post with an important perspective that you really must read if you haven't already.

Now that the story has had one overnight news cycle since its appearance at about 9 AM yesterday, I looked around to see how much coverage Burns's and Reid's work received.

I looked at what the three "newspapers of record" did (if anything) with the AP item; searched Google News for other coverage; and reviewed headline revisions made by outlets that carried it.

Results are below the fold.

WSJ Writers Note Absence of Recession; AP's Crutsinger Still Holds Out
By Tom Blumer | May 17, 2008 | 9:50 PM EDT

Someone forgot to tell the Wall Street Journal's Kelly Evans and Justin Lahart, carried here at the Arizona Republic, that they're supposed to portray the economy in a bad light whenever and wherever possible. I'll get to the pair's report later.

That "bad light" directive seems seared into the minds of the Associated Press's Martin Crutsinger and his AP colleagues, as they continue to "cling to recession," and attempt to convince consumers and businesses that if perchance we're not already in one, it's just around the bend.

The AP's persistence has borne dreadful fruit. Relentlessly downbeat reporting during at least the past six years by the wire service's business reporters -- who largely determine what most Americans see, hear, and read about the economy -- is a big reason, if not the most important reason, why most Americans, as seen in the latest consumer confidence report, have a negative economic outlook and are convinced that we are in a recession.

Friday, Crutsinger worked mightily to take the lemonade that was the good housing starts report and turn it into lemons: