1. CNN's Cafferty Takes Shot at Bush's "Vacation" After Hurricane In the 5pm EDT half hour Tuesday of CNN's The Situation Room, Jack Cafferty used the hurricane as an excuse to trash President Bush for being on vacation, as if the location of Bush, who already authorized federal action, has any impact on that federal response to the devastation. Cafferty asked host Wolf Blitzer: "Where's President Bush? Is he still on vacation?" Blitzer answered that "he's cut short his vacation. He's coming back to Washington tomorrow." Cafferty snidely contended: "Well, that would be a good idea. He was out in... continue reading
1. Totenberg Again Discovers & Warns Roberts is "Very Conservative" Another week, another opportunity for NPR's Nina Totenberg to discover that Supreme Court nominee John Roberts is conservative and to caution us about it anew. On Inside Washington over the weekend, she warned that "if he's as conservative as his papers reflect, his nomination will dramatically change the direction of the court." Seconds later she made clear she is sure that he's going to be a "very conservative" justice: "I have no idea what kind of justice he's going to end up being, except for the fact that I'm pretty... continue reading
1. Based on One Edit, WashPost: Roberts Sympathetic to Confederacy More slimy innuendo from the Washington Post aimed at portraying Supreme Court nominee John Roberts as an extremist, this time as someone who regrets slavery ended when the South lost the "War Between the States." A week-and-a-half after she was one of three reporters who wrote a front page hit job, "Roberts Resisted Women's Rights," which distorted an anti-lawyer quip into a slam at women becoming lawyers, Jo Becker got solo authorship on a page two story on Friday about how, when ghostwriting an article for President Reagan, Roberts "scratched... continue reading
1. NBC/MSNBC: Sheehan the New Cronkite Driving War's "Tipping Point" "As the 1960s protest song said, 'there's something happening here,'" NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams reminisced Thursday evening as he introduced an "In Depth" segment trumpeting the influence of Cindy Sheehan -- a story, when replayed on MSNBC's Countdown, fill-in host Amy Robach framed around how "there are those who wonder if attitudes toward the war could be reaching a tipping point and whether the Gold Star mom could be the driving force." Reporter Carl Quintanilla allowed a couple of critics to denounce Sheehan, but his story was centered... continue reading
1. ABC Relays Charge Bush "Lied," But Not How He Met with Families ABC made time Wednesday night for Martha Raddatz to read from a letter the Gold Star Moms for Peace sent to President Bush in which they charged that "you put our troops in harm's way based on a lie. We are military families who demand an end to the lies, and call for you to bring our troops home now." But, after weeks of hyping Cindy Sheehan, neither Raddatz nor anyone else on World News Tonight mentioned how Bush spent nearly three hours meeting with family members... continue reading
1. NBC: Iraq "Rhetoric Beginning to Sound Much the Same" as Vietnam NBC on Tuesday night devoted a story to comparing Iraq to Vietnam. Reporter Jim Miklaszewski concluded that "while there are marked differences between the wars in Iraq and Vietnam, the rhetoric, at least, is beginning to sound much the same." Miklaszewski used as an excuse for bringing up the subject how "Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld himself raised the Vietnam issue at his Pentagon briefing today" and rejected the equivalence. Miklaszewski went on to highlight how Senator Chuck Hagel, "the prominent Republican and decorated Vietnam veteran, said this week... continue reading
1. Net Seize on Republican Hagel's Comparison of Iraq to Vietnam Like feeding raw meat to a lion, Republican Senator Chuck Hagel on Sunday gave television journalists what they wanted and couldn't resist: A soundbite comparing Iraq to Vietnam when he said on ABC's This Week that "we are locked into a bogged-down problem, not dissimilar to where we were in Vietnam." CNN's Aaron Brown trumpeted at the top of Monday's NewsNight how "the anti-war voices are not just liberal groups camped out with Cindy Sheehan in Texas, but at least one senior Republican Senator, who has always had questions... continue reading
1. Totenberg: Roberts "Much More Conservative" Than I "Guessed" NPR's Nina Totenberg is repeatedly surprised by how conservative Supreme Court nominee John Roberts really is, apparently not cognizant of all of her earlier pronouncements about his conservatism. On Inside Washington over the weekend, she declared that after reviewing memos he wrote while working in the Reagan White House counsel's office, "he is much more conservative than I ever would have guessed. He is on the most conservative side of almost every issue within the Reagan administration." In recent weeks, Totenberg has tagged Roberts as "very conservative," "very, very conservative" and... continue reading
1. Nets, AP Tout Sheehan's Achievements, See Revived Anti-War Effort Before and after Cindy Sheehan's announcement Thursday that she was leaving Crawford to attend to her ill mother, the networks celebrated her supposed achievements and hoped they'd re-invigorate the anti-war movement. "Did just one grieving mother spark the beginnings of an anti-war movement? We'll give you the 'Inside Story,'" CBS anchor John Roberts promised before Wyatt Andrews trumpeted: "Her movement seemed to catch fire Wednesday night as tens of thousands of people in more than a thousand places attended vigils in support." He insisted that it's "very clear Cindy Sheehan... continue reading
1. CBS's Plante Asks If Sheehan Will "Ignite the Anti-War Movement?" The CBS Evening News on Wednesday night framed Cindy Sheehan as the catalyst for a more aggressive anti-war movement. "Will this woman's camp out in the President's backyard ignite the anti-war movement?" Bill Plante asked in teasing his upcoming story. "Out of nowhere, Cindy Sheehan has suddenly become the red-hot symbol of opposition to the war," Plante soon touted, trumpeting how "in just ten days," Sheehan "has become a magnet for the anti-war movement." Plante acknowledged how "some of Sheehan's rhetoric...has intensified the criticism of her motives," but "at... continue reading