1. Jennings & Rather Display Scorn for Snow's Tax Cut Agenda ABC's Peter Jennings and CBS's Dan Rather displayed contempt on Monday night for the tax cut policies expected to be pushed by new Treasury Secretary John Snow. Jennings sniffed: "He is said to be in favor of further tax cuts but against deficits. Doesn't one lead to the other?" Dan Rather described Snow as "a long-time corporate-backer of Republican candidates" before bemoaning how he's expected to push for more of Bush's "controversial tax cuts." NBC's David Gregory provided a remarkably balanced piece on the arguments for and against tax... continue reading
1. NPR's Williams Advocates Double Taxation, Fox Colleagues Chide Him The Fox News Sunday panel undermined the liberal premise uttered by NPR reporter Juan Williams. When Williams remarked that the Bush administration wish to end the taxation of dividends means they think "corporations shouldn't pay taxes in this country," Tony Snow and Brit Hume pointed out how that has nothing to do with corporations, Williams remained befuddled, asking "why shouldn't you be taxed on" dividend earnings" Snow succinctly explained: "Bill Gates gets to get rich and the people who own shares in his company can't." 2. 60 Minutes Scolds Bush... continue reading
1. Another Anti-Bush Iraq Policy Twist From Peter Jennings ABC's Peter Jennings always finds a way to twist the news into an especially negative take on Bush's Iraq policy. On Wednesday night he teased World News Tonight by noting how "the government of Iraq will tell the world it has no weapons of mass destruction" and he then asked: "The Bush administration will say it's a lie, but who will prove it?" Jennings next intoned: "The Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq tells Ted Koppel in Baghdad that war is inevitable because the Bush administration wants it." 2. CNN Suggests Iraq... continue reading
1. CBS Tags the Liberal Mary Landrieu as "a Moderate" Previewing Saturday's Senate election in Louisiana, on Tuesday's CBS Evening News reporter Mark Strassmann described Landrieu as "a moderate Democrat," though her voting record has been quite liberal. Before tagging Landrieu, Strassmann gratuitously added the phrase preferred by liberals, "a woman's right to choose." 2. Bill Schneider Praises Kerry's "Intelligence" But He Failed Test Contrasting Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry with President Bush, CNN's Bill Schneider assessed on Monday's Inside Politics that "intelligence" is "one other Kerry strength." Schneider specifically recalled how during debates in 1996 "Kerry showed himself to... continue reading
1. Jennings: Bush Out of Sync With UN, But PJ Out of Sync with CBS & NBC Peter Jennings vs. Dan Rather and Tom Brokaw. "The UN weapons inspectors in Iraq say things are going well, so why does President Bush disagree?", Jennings heralded on Monday's World News Tonight. CBS's Rather, however, noted the inspectors "were not satisfied with what they found." NBC's Brokaw referred to how "signals coming out of today's UN weapons inspection in Iraq were not encouraging." 2. WashPost Trumpets "Extraordinary Array" of Anti-War Groups Stop the presses: Left wing groups promote a left wing cause. In... continue reading
1. NPR's Liasson & Williams Back Gore on Right-Wing Media Control There's "some truth" to Al Gore's conspiracy theory about media outlets getting their marching orders from Republican Party Chairman Marc Racicot, Juan Williams argued on Fox News Sunday. Mara Liasson agreed, explaining that what Gore was simply "expressing is deep frustration on the part of Democrats who are now truly out of power in Washington and they don't have the kind of editorial voice representing them in the media...they feel that they can't get their message out." This from two staffers for National Public Radio, the leading broadcast media... continue reading
1. Nets Rail Against & Distort EPA's Clean Air Rules ABC, CBS and NBC acted more like advocates for liberal environmental activists than dispassionate journalists on Friday night when it came to informing viewers about the EPA decision to adjust enforcement of clean air rules for power plants. "The rollback of clean air rules is a bonanza for hundreds of the nation's oldest and dirtiest power plants," declared CBS's Bob Orr. ABC's Barry Serafin portrayed it all as a political payback to industry: "The Republican Party collected $11 million from electric companies....The energy industry gave the Bush campaign almost $3... continue reading
1. CNN's Anderson Cooper Portrays a Daschle-Limbaugh "Cat Fight" CNN anchor Anderson Cooper dismissed Tom Daschle's charge that Rush Limbaugh incites violence as a "cat fight." He announced on NewsNight: "So this is a cat fight we haven't seen the likes of since, I don't know, since Tonya 'TNT' Harding got in the ring with Paula 'The Pounder' Jones." But CNN's Jonathan Karl noted that "inciting violence is not something" in Limbaugh's "play book." Earlier, on Inside Politics, Judy Woodruff stood up for Daschle: "But there's no question on some of these talk shows, Limbaugh's included, there's some very tough... continue reading
1. Bush "Goading" Iraq Into War Precipitously? Arabs Against War On Wednesday night Peter Jennings once again showed a distinct hostility toward Bush's Iraq policy. Jennings asked John McWethy about how "some of the President's critics" say the administration is "goading" the Iraqis into firing on planes enforcing the "no-fly" zone and he followed with a look at how "there has been rising anti-American sentiment in Saudi Arabia as there has been in many Arab countries. Just one of the ripple effects on the road to possible war with Iraq." 2. Daschle's Scurrilous Charges Against Limbaugh Skipped In his last... continue reading
1. ABC Focuses on Detainee Who Suffered "Torture" by Air Conditioning "Torture" by air conditioning. ABC highlighted the plight of a Pakistani who survived being detained at the U.S. facility at Guantanamo Bay. After Jennings on Tuesday night noted how "human rights organizations have complained the U.S. is violating the prisoners' rights," reporter Bob Woodruff narrated a story about about the man's mistreatment, including how the man, "who had never seen air-conditioning before, thought it was a kind of torture." Woodruff added that "no one, he says, has even apologized" for his ordeal. 2. Couric Pleads with Gore to Bash... continue reading