October 5th 2008
Media Bias #81
Erring On Ayres – UPDATED
LA TImes reporter Robin Abcarian thinks Sarah Palin’s new tone is “abrasive.” The use of a word like “abrasive” in reporting that Palin brought up such Obama unpleasantness as William Ayres is a pretty good sign that Abcarian would just as soon not see truthful reporting about her candidate of choice the Dem presidential candidate.
Am I harping too much about one little word here? No. Scan down a paragraph or two and find the requisite description of Ayres that Abcarian must produce to flesh out the story. Ah, here it is:
The “terrorists” to whom Palin was referring is William Ayers, founder of the 1960s radical group Weather Underground, who is now an education professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago and an acquaintance of Obama.
Note the quotes around terrorist. Why? He founded an organization that used bombs to terrorize innocent people. Oh, you thought they were safe bombs, brilliantly employed so people wouldn’t get hurt, so he’s not a terrorist. Maybe you should talk to John Murtagh, like Fox did:
VAN SUSTEREN: John, take me back to 1970. How old were you then?
MURTAGH: I was nine, about six-months older than the Senator.
VAN SUSTEREN: What was your father’s occupation?
MURTAGH: My dad at the time was a New York state trial court judge here in Manhattan.
VAN SUSTEREN: Those two questions are very relevant. Tell us now, what happened back in 1970.
MURTAGH: At the time, Greta, my father was the trial judge on a case called the “Panther 21.” Members of the Black Panther Party were on trial for allegedly plotting to bomb a number of landmarks and department stores here in New York City. On February 21, 1970, at about 4:30 in the morning, William Ayers Weather Underground frankly launched an attack on about four different sites here in New York. They attacked two military recruiting installations in Brooklyn, the attacked a police institution in the lower Manhattan, and then they attacked my family home with us sleeping in our beds, with three separate bombs. (emphasis added)
Abcarian also just passes Ayres off as founder of the Weather Underground “radical group” without letting her readers know of the charges against him (she later does include a Palin quote on that), nor does she share with readers his recent lament that they should have bombed more stuff. And she concludes by calling him an “education professor,” without pointing out that he’s devoted his life to creating future generations of America-hating radicals by injecting hard-left politics into school curicula.
When it comes to the liberal media, you don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.
UPDATE:
It turns out Abcarian was going easy on Palin compared to AP’s Douglass Daniel:
WASHINGTON (AP) – By claiming that Democrat Barack Obama is “palling around with terrorists” and doesn’t see the U.S. like other Americans, vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin targeted key goals for a faltering campaign.And though she may have scored a political hit each time, her attack was unsubstantiated and carried a racially tinged subtext that John McCain himself may come to regret.
Douglass with two s’s (as in Frederick Douglass, hint, hint) Daniel figures that if you can’t hit the GOP with facts the best option is to stand back and yell “Racist! Racist!” Obama doesn’t seem like other Americans not because he’s black but because he’s a leftist radical. You never thought she was talking about race, did you?
Of course not. No one but Douglass did. And “unsubstantiated?” That’s the left’s excuse – Ayres and Obama weren’t specifically palling around. He kicks off his political career at Ayres’ house, he serves on a board with him, but in the American Dictionary of the Left that apparently is not the definition of palling around.
Media Bias 2008 covers pro-Obama media bias. Items are listed from most recent to oldest; the numbering reflects this and is not a ranking. Send Media Bias 2008 examples via “comments”‘ below, or to email2laer [@] yahoo [dot] com.
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October 6th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
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