Media Silent on Attempt to Skew Google Results Against Conservative Ca
It's the tale of two attempts at "digital astroturf" or "online grassroots activism" or whatever you want to call it. Regardless of the label, there's an apparent media double standard at work: attempts to rig prominent online information sources for political gain is only worth reporting if the perpetrators are conservatives.
The blogosphere - though not the mainstream media - has been…
Newsweek's Clift Plays Democratic Strategist with 'What Obama Must Do
Apparently the political death panel at Newsweek is resigned to the fact that the Democratic Congress is DOA come November 2.
Thus braced for the impact of a possible Republican congressional takeover, uber-liberal Newsweek writer Eleanor Clift donned her political strategist cap to openly advise Obama that how, "Just as Clinton did in ’94," he'll need to "reaffirm his relevance and return to…
Time Magazine: Court Ruling on ObamaCare 'Significant Win'; But Is It
With low poll approval ratings and the prospect of his congressional allies in Congress taking a drubbing in November, it's hardly surprising the liberal media are looking for any silver lining for Obama that it can find. Enter Time magazine's Kate Pickert, who on the magazine's Swampland blog yesterday claimed that a ruling upholding ObamaCare's constitutionality yesterday was a "significant…
How Does an Obscure Story on How Christmas Season Sales Will 'Spike' H
In the course of preparing a post earlier today (at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog) dealing with a glaring error in a New York Times story on planned Christmas/holiday/fourth quarter hiring, I came across this search result at Google news on "holiday retail sales" (not entered in quotes) at about 11 a.m.: With all due respect to WHIO in Dayton and reporter John Bedell, I don't understand how your…
Newsweek Blames the Victim: Magazine Sees Anti-Islamist Politicians in
"The State Department has issued a "travel alert" for Europe—underscoring the effect Muslim-bashing politicians have had on the terror threat on the continent," reads the subheadline to an October 4 Newsweek story by Christopher Dickey and Sami Yousafzai.In "Turn On the Red Light," Dickey and Yousafzai went so far as to suggest that anti-Islamist politicians like the Netherlands' Geert Wilders…
Newsweek's Adler Doubles Down on Complaint About GOP Pledge's Constitu
In their "Pledge to America," House Republicans have promised to "require each bill moving through Congress to include a clause citing the specific constitutional authority upon which the bill is justified." On September 22, Newsweek's Ben Adler denounced that simple pledge as "dangerous even as a mere suggestion," complaining that it intrudes on the constitutional prerogative of the courts to…
Obama's Cites GOP's Intent to Cut Education Spending; Press Ignores It
In New Mexico yesterday and probably in several other appearances, President Barack Obama criticized the House Republicans' Pledge to America on several fronts. To me, only because I tend to look at the real numbers during most months, his most obviously off-base critique had to do with federal education spending (as carried at Jake Tapper's Political Punch blog at ABC): Obama said the…
Time's Klein Attacks Lefty Blogger Who Snarked About 70 Percent Tax-lo
On this the 24th and final day of his Election Road Trip, Time's Joe Klein availed himself of the opportunity to attack center-left blogger Mickey Kaus and conservative writer Jonah Goldberg for "distort[ing] a striking point" made by a liberal Democrat vineyard owner from California that Klein quoted in a September 27 Swampland blog post. Klein vented most of his spleen at Kaus, a blogger for…
Katie Couric Heralds Effort to Regulate Fast Food Kids Meals
Yesterday San Francisco supervisors held a hearing to consider enacting a law that would ban restaurants in the city from giving away toys in kids meals that are deemed unhealthy. Noting the debate in a September 27 "Notebook" post at her Couric & Co. blog, the "Evening News" anchor followed the typical liberal media bias recipe for stories like these.First Katie presented the struggle as one…
Time's Joe Klein Profiles Liberal Vineyard Owner Practically Pining fo
With its dwindling readership, Time magazine is fast becoming a museum piece. What better way is there to celebrate than for the publication to bring to its few readers' attention other strange curiosities? Three weeks into his cross-country Election Road Trip, Joe Klein filed a Swampland blog post shortly after noon Eastern time today from Sebastopol, California, where he found a true rarity, a…
Media Bistro's Shister: CNN Under Klein Failed Despite 'Non-Partisan P
At Media Bistro on Friday, Gail Shister transcribed Jonathan Klein's post-mortem spin on why he was let go from CNN/US. You see, Klein's problem was that he "was unable to stop the prime-time bleeding with non-partisan programming." In case any readers here might be tempted to take Klein's contention or Shister's transcription seriously, here are NewsBusters links to posts about Rick Sanchez,…
After Many Mocked GOP Website, Media Still Silent on Dems' Tech Proble
When the Republican Party launched a new website in October of last year, they had some serious problems with the new site. The media ate it up.Within a few days, media outlets ranging from Politico to "The Daily Show" to the Huffington Post to the Christian Science Monitor - and, of course, a host of liberal blogs - had weighed in on the website's problems. Their commentaries mostly took the…
Newsweek's Ben Adler Laments Republicans' 'Dangerous' Push to Ensure
Newsweek's Ben Adler is decidedly cool to the newly-unveiled Republican "Pledge with America." No surprise there, coming from a liberal journalist. But among his criticisms, perhaps he's most off-base in his complaint about Republicans' promise to ensure that legislation must be constitutional before it is passed along to the president for his signature (emphasis mine):Not so harmless, however,…
Time Interviewer Timidly Questions Daily Kos Founder's Extremist Rheto
In his 7-question September 22 Q&A with Markos Moulitsas, Time magazine's Ishaan Tharoor timidly challenged the left-wing blogger on his extremist rhetoric about how conservative Americans, particularly religious ones, are the "American Taliban."Moulitsas was interviewed as part of his publicity tour for his new book, "American Taliban: How War, Sex, Sin and Power Bind Jihadists and the…
