<p>"The liberal media claim to champion free speech, but if they continue to turn a blind eye to this offense, we can only assume they approve of government censorship," Media Research Center President Brent Bozell argued in a statement released today.</p><p>Mr. Bozell was reacting to news of the federal Department of Health and Human Services placing a gag order on private health insurance companies communicating to their Medicare Advantage customers their concerns about Democratic health care reform proposals. The gag order is backed by a threat of federal prosecution.</p><p>Even so, this flagrant abuse of power by the Obama administration has been underreported in the mainstream media. The Washington Post has not printed one word about the violation, and while ABC News aired a segment on its September 22 broadcast, their rivals at the CBS "Evening News" and NBC "Nightly News" have ignored the transgression. </p><p>Mr. Bozell's full statement appears below the page break:</p><blockquote>
Press Release
<p>"The media must expose Obama's calculated scare tactics and lying on 'reform.' Failing to do so gives him a green light to lie and cry wolf about whatever he wants, whenever he wants," Media Research Center President Brent Bozell asserted <a href="http://mrc.org/press/releases/2009/20090910103910.aspx" target="_blank">in a statement released today.</a></p><p>The <a href="/blogs/brent-bozell" target="_blank">NewsBusters publisher</a> explained:</p><blockquote><p>Last night Obama told a litany of lies. He said the total cost of his health reform would be $900 billion over ten years, but even the government-run Congressional Budget Office found it would cost $1.6 trillion. He claimed his reform would not cover illegal immigrants or abortions, but nothing in any of the Democrat bills requires citizen verification and several organizations including the National Right to Life Committee have shown exactly how federal funds would be used to pay for abortion-on-demand. He knows these are lies and he tells them because he is confident the left wing ‘news' media will let him get away with it. </p>
Just as soon as "average Americans practice their First Amendment free speech rights to protest another outrageous liberal proposal," the liberal media "immediately go into full-on attack mode - against the American people" Media Research Center President Brent Bozell argued in a statement released this morning.<br /><p>"Just as with the tea party protesters, and the socialized health care town hall protesters, the media are again attacking the American people for having the temerity to speak up," the NewsBusters publisher complained. </p><p>Mr. Bozell was addressing the vicious personal attacks members of the media have been making on parents objecting to the proposed Obama administration "lesson plan," which was to accompany a speech President Obama is delivering today to American children. </p><p>President Obama is still addressing the children, but in response to public outrage has withdrawn the Department of Education "lesson plan" which recommended among other things that teachers have their students "write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the President." As the Weekly Standard's Bill Kristol has pointed out, it is against the law for the Department of Education to hand down any sort of teaching materials. But rather than report on this, the leftist media are attacking parents. </p>
<p>Reacting to the Associated Press's decision to publish -- against a grieving father's wishes -- a photo of a mortally-wounded Marine, MRC President and NewsBusters Publisher Brent Bozell blasted the news wire in a statement today: </p><blockquote><p>The Associated Press should be ashamed for even thinking something as preposterous as this. This photo will do nothing but cause great sorrow for the family of a hero. As the father of a Marine, I cannot imagine the pain they will endure because of its publication and the damage it will cause in their grief. </p><p class="MsoNormal">Way to go, AP. On the eve of the federal holiday dedicated to the American worker, you are causing pain for the family of a hero that has given the ultimate sacrifice of his life in labor for his country.</p></blockquote><p class="MsoNormal">The <a target="_blank" href="http://hamptonroads.com/2009/09/gates-asks-associated-press-not-use-phot... defended its decision</a> by insisting the decision came "after a period of reflection" and was done to convey "the grimness of war and the sacrifice of young men and women fighting it." </p><p class="MsoNormal">Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has also slammed the AP's decision, <a target="_blank" href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0909/26759.html">reports Mike Allen</a> of The Politico:</p><blockquote>
<p>Today Media Research Center (MRC) president and NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell denounced the Obama administration for its plans to delve into the private sector for the purposes of researching and regulating the national news media. </p><p>The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has announced plans for a two-day workshop in December to examine the state of the news industry - which could lead to recommendations for legislation to regulate print, television, and even online media on everything from changes in anti-trust land copyright law to media tax breaks. Some of the proposals being pushed by opinion leaders include direct government funding of media outlets, while other ideas like relaxing anti-trust regulations would still need government approval. </p><p>Mr. Bozell issued the following statement in response: </p><blockquote>
Media Research Center President and NewsBusters.org Publisher Brent Bozell today issued a public statement in which he demanded that MSNBC accept responsibility and apologize for concocting a racially charged "news" story that falsely accused a supposedly white health reform protester of carrying a gun out of hatred for a black President.
NewsBusters.org's Kyle Drennen initially reported on this on Tuesday, and yesterday provided an update: that the Second Amendment Foundation, as the name would suggest a gun-owners rights group, had condemned the liberal network for "using deceptively-edited video from a Phoenix, Arizona anti-tax rally on Monday to invent a racial stereotype in its on-going effort to demonize and marginalize American firearms owners as ‘racists.’"
After Politico.com picked up Kyle's initial NewsBusters.org item, an MSNBC spokesperson attempted to justify the slander: "Contessa was speaking generally and not about that specific person with the automatic weapon."
But Brewer did specifically cite an unidentified African-American man who attended a protest outside of a Monday speech by President Obama: "Yesterday, as President Obama addressed the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Phoenix, a man at a pro-health care reform rally just outside, wore a semiautomatic assault rifle on his shoulder and a pistol on his hip."
Bozell's statement:
<p>ALEXANDRIA, VA – Media Research Center President Brent Bozell has issued the following statement regarding Bob Novak’s passing:</p> <blockquote><p>Bob Novak possessed all the qualities of an exemplary journalist. During his storied career, Bob produced some of the finest work of anyone in the business of gathering and reporting news. He was hardworking, accurate, and independent. Above all, Bob was tough and fair.</p><p>Politicians and bureaucrats feared him for what his well placed sources revealed. Rival reporters envied him for the many exclusives he delivered over the years. We will always admire his lifelong devotion to journalism which produced a standard that few reporters could hope to replicate. </p><p>Bob lent years of support to the Media Research Center and was also a personal friend. All of us at the MRC will miss Bob for his accuracy, integrity and his work ethic. </p></blockquote>
<p><b>UPDATE</b>: Nationally syndicated radio talk show host Sean Hannity read Bozell's statement on the air on August 6th. The audio <a href="http://media.eyeblast.org/newsbusters/static/2009/08/2009-08-06- LBB Statement on Hannity.mp3" title="NewsBusters.org | Media Research Center" target="_blank">can be found here</a>. </p><p> </p><p>Liberal Democrats have launched a war of outrageous hate speech directed at Americans who haved dared to express opposition to Obama's health care "reform."</p><p> First, the Democratic National Committee launched a Web video charging "desperate Republicans and their well-funded allies" with "organizing angry mobs" to "destroy President Obama." Then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) accused town hall protestors of "carrying swastikas."</p><p>In response this morning, MRC President Brent Bozell called on the mainstream media "to report on this hate speech, who is behind it and how vicious it has become."</p><p>Mr. Bozell's full August 5 statement is printed below:</p><blockquote>
<p>Today NewsBusters' parent organization, the Media Research Center (MRC), revealed that ABC News is not the only network guilty of giving Democratic-donating medical doctors a microphone to "report" on President Barack Obama's government health care proposal. </p><p>CBS and NBC medical physician correspondents have also chipped in their own cash to Democratic - but never Republican - candidates.</p><p>"ABC, CBS and NBC have no excuse for the applause these doctors have given to promote the largest expansion of government-run healthcare our country has ever seen," MRC President Brent Bozell said in a statement. "There's nothing benign about giving a megaphone to doctors who have a financial stake in the success of liberals' most aggressive platform in decades," he added.</p><p>A search of OpenSecrets.org showed that:</p>
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| Spreading the Word |
Released on Wednesday, the poll was glaringly absent from most news reports late last week and over the weekend.
Bozell today called on the media to stop reporting on the American health care system as a "crisis" situation, as the facts simply belie the claim.
Mr. Bozell:
<p>NBC, ABC and CBS all aired exclusive interviews with President Barack Obama last night discussing his sweeping plans to assume government control over the nation's health care industry. But none of the networks seemed aware of the bombshell easily discovered by <a href="http://ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=332548165656854" target="_blank">Investor's Business Daily</a> and confirmed by the House Ways and Means Committee: a provision in the bill that severely limits private health insurance choice. </p><p>Page 16 of the House bill, IBD reported, appears to make it illegal to "enroll any individual in such [private health insurance] coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day" of the year the legislation becomes law. </p><p>Media Research Center President and NewsBusters Publisher Brent Bozell called on anyone reporting on the bill read it before making the same mistake: </p><blockquote>
<p>Reacting to Media Research Center (MRC) analysis showing the deaths of seven U.S. soldiers killed in Afghanistan recently has received just 1/20th of the network coverage devoted to Michael Jackson, NewsBusters Publisher and MRC President Bozell Bozell released the following statement earlier today:</p><blockquote><p>This is a prime example of why network television news audiences are disappearing before our eyes. There is no justification for determining that the death of a celebrity over a week ago merits 20 times more news coverage than the tragic deaths of American soldiers in Afghanistan.</p><p>For anyone to say - with a straight face - that such a disparity was an ‘editorial judgment' only further insults the collective intelligence of the audience these newscasts claim to serve. In fact, it's just more evidence that network ‘news,' for all practical purposes, no longer exists.</p>