O'Reilly criticized Free Republic comments about Clinton despite objectionable comments on his own site
On the July 31 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, host Bill O'Reilly again attacked liberal blog Daily Kos as a "hate website" and said "[i]t is the Ku Klux Klan." He also criticized right-wing website Free Republic for posting "vile, hateful stuff," saying to Free Republic spokesman Kristinn Taylor: "[W]e pulled a bunch of stuff off your website today and it's pretty vile; it's pretty awful. You've got some pretty sick people posting -- a couple of examples: 'Homosexuals are dogs.' 'I hate blacks.' '[Sen.] Hillary Clinton [D-NY] should be assassinated.' 'A stray bullet should kill her' -- and on and on and on. ... [T]his is all on your website today."
Guest and former Rep. Harold Ford Jr. (D-TN) later said of these examples: "[Y]ou don't find people posting that on a Fox News website." O'Reilly responded: "No, you don't, because we have standards." But on O'Reilly's own website, BillOReilly.com, as of 1 p.m. ET on August 1, comments attacking Clinton previously documented by AMERICAblog.com remain. Read more
On Hardball, Melanie Morgan claimed Bill Clinton "is still dating"
On the July 31 edition of MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews, guest host Mike Barnicle asked right-wing radio host Melanie Morgan, "[W]hat's your matchup for the biggest spouse in the race on either side, Bill Clinton?" to which Morgan replied, "Well, I think that [Sen.] Hillary's [Clinton (D-NY)] wife, Bill, is going to be a detriment, unfortunately, to Mrs. Clinton, because it's going to be a situation where, since he's still dating, it's obviously going to be a detraction, I think, from the race. So that's going to be problematic for Mrs. Clinton." Morgan added, "Plus, you know, you are going to have to hire private detectives to keep an eye on him, and so forth. And
that's going to be a difficulty." Read more
Russert still cherry-picking polls to claim Giuliani beating Clinton
On the August 1 edition of NBC's Today, discussing the July 27-30 NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll that found Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) would defeat former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) by a 47 percent to 41 percent margin if they were the candidates for president in 2008, NBC News Washington bureau chief Tim Russert said that the poll was "significant, because many of the polls had shown Rudy Giuliani beating Hillary Clinton in a general election." In fact, of the five national head-to-head match-up polls conducted in July before the poll Russert called "significant," Clinton led in three: Read more
With O'Hanlon and Pollack, media once again neglect to ask about military protection and control of Iraq itinerary
On July 30 and the morning of July 31, the co-authors of the July 30 New York Times op-ed "A War We Just Might Win," Michael O'Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack, appeared on six live television news programs to discuss their conclusion that "[w]e are finally getting somewhere in Iraq, at least in military terms." O'Hanlon and Pollack wrote that they had recently returned from Iraq, where they "spent eight days meeting with American and Iraqi military and civilian personnel." But only one interviewer, CNN's Wolf Blitzer, asked either O'Hanlon or Pollack about the circumstances of their visit. Blitzer asked, "[D]id you have the freedom to say, 'I want to go here, I want to go there'?
Who organized, in other words, the stopovers, the visits that you were having?" Pollack responded that the trip "was largely organized by the military." In other words, Pollack and O'Hanlon "largely" saw what the military wanted them to see. On several previous occasions, the media have similarly reported on public figures who have visited Iraq and cited progress on security matters without reporting whether those figures were allowed to choose the locations they visited, if their trips were organized by the military, or the extent of the protection they received during their trip. Read more
Citing Cheney praise of Edelman letter, CNN left out Gates' refutation of attack on Clinton
In a report on the "dispute" between the Bush administration and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, CNN's John Roberts stated that during an interview Vice President Cheney told Larry King that he "backed a Pentagon bureaucrat [Eric Edelman] who has accused Clinton of helping the enemy in Iraq." But Roberts did not note that Edelman is a "former top aide" to Cheney, nor that, in contrast with Cheney, Defense Secretary Gates responded to Clinton that the Pentagon in no way "believe[s] that congressional oversight emboldens our enemies." Read more
Wash. Post's Marcus ignored key info in concluding Gonzales not guilty of perjury
In her July 31 column "defending Attorney General Alberto Gonzales," The Washington Post's Ruth Marcus wrote: "I don't think [Gonzales] actually lied about his March 2004 hospital encounter with then-Attorney General John Ashcroft. I certainly don't think he could be charged with -- much less convicted of -- perjury." Marcus went on to question whether the July 26 testimony of FBI Director Robert S. Mueller before the House Judiciary Committee "really contradict[s] Gonzales or turn[s] him into a perjurer." But Marcus did not quote Mueller's full statement, leaving out a key part in which Mueller affirmed the opposite of what Gonzales now claims. Read more
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