MediaBloodhound

Story of the Day

Another day, another damning poll for President Bush to ignore or downplay, depending on whether the mainstream media forces his hand by actually acknowledging it. Yesterday, they felt obliged to cite the CBS poll that had his job approval rating at a droopy 34%, yet turned a blind eye on the poll by Rasmussen Reports in which just 39% of Americans believe we're winning the war on terror, with 36% convinced we're losing to the terrorists.

Today, the Le Moyne College/Zogby Poll shows that only one in five troops wants to stay "as long as they are needed," as Bush's "strategery" has called for. 72% think we should leave within the next year, with nearly 25% saying we should exit now. So how much play did this poll receive? Almost as little as yesterday's Rasmussen poll.

Yes, Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times cited it today in his op-ed piece, but a news article revealing this poll's findings was nowhere to be found in the paper. The networks and cable news also treated these figures like a chicken stricken with bird flu. In fact, on ABC World News Tonight, in which anchor Elizabeth Vargas snagged an exclusive interview with President Bush, she cited neither the Zogby nor the Rasmussen poll. Taken together these two polls spell out a dangerous convergence for this White House (that is, if the national media was reporting on them), a nexus of thought of both U.S. citizens and U.S. troops: it's time to leave Iraq; it's clear our presence is making matters worse, weakening our national security and fueling an insurgency with no end in sight.

But Vargas instead tosses Bush the softball of his low job approval rating, which Bush predictably shrugs off with canned mendacity: "If I worried about polls, I would be - I wouldn't be doing my job."

So she mentions the poll about his dismal job approval rating (providing no follow-up to his lame reply), but not the two polls that actually shed light on the underlying cause of his feeble numbers.

Two days. Two damaging polls. Both dead on arrival:

U.S. Troops in Iraq: 72% Say End War
Zogby International

Story of the Day

Now that the latest poll has only 39% of Americans saying we're winning the war on terror, with 36% saying the terrorists are besting us, how swiftly will the White House (and Republicans in general) spin this as a result of the media focusing too much on the negatives coming out of Iraq? Scotty? Rummy? And how willingly will the mainstream press accept such nonsense and play out the inevitable "fair and balanced" two-step? Or will they simply ignore this poll, fearing that if they report the news that over one-third of Americans believe the terrorists are winning, then they will be seen as succoring the enemy? 

The Bush Administration has hung their entire legacy on national security even though, in reality, their record of action has been abysmal: they act when they shouldn't and sit idlely by when they should. The infamous August 6th memo pre-9/11 and George Bush's stupefaction in that classroom just over a month later augured everything that has followed. From Iraq to Katrina to Iran to Hamas to Portgate. Bushco has created a state of national insecurity. This most definitely is a story because they decided to define themselves as our protectors, and damn everything else - from our basic civil liberties to the Geneva Conventions. A Democratic administration with this track record would have the mainstream media crowing about the impending dissolution of the Democratic Party, of the number of years, potentially decades, it might take them to recover from such incessant and excessive failure and corruption. Meanwhile, we can barely get them to report the story at all.

So the next time you hear someone decry the state of the Democratic Party, and there's much to decry, it's crucial to remember the imbalanced filter through which all their views must pass and the easy-pass our national media grants Bushco. Kerry speaks and gets no coverage; when he does his setting or attire often receives more attention. Gore speaks and they call him an excitable loser who should just accept his defeat and find another hobby, ignoring his words, which lately have the urgency and clarity of a man who sees the country he loves sliding further and further toward an irreversible totalitarianism. While Incurious George and Dick Dastardly fumble and snarl their way through one disaster after another.

Facts don't matter if no one hears them. Karl Rove knows this better than anyone:

39% Say U.S. Winning  War on Terror, 36% Say Terrorists Winning
Rasmussen Reports

Story of the Day

While there's been much talk of late about corruption in Congress, government agencies charged with the role of safeguarding the health of U.S. citizens, such as the EPA and FDA, have never been more inept, rife with cronyism and in dire need of overhaul. Such agencies and their goings-on receive miniscule or no coverage from the mainstream media. Even the alternative media, with White House scandals breaking faster than Dick Cheney can sneer, is largely remiss its coverage. This is unfortunate for all Americans, and also how these agencies are now little more than buddy networks to rubber stamp lucrative contracts. How many people in this country realize that the head of the FDA, for instance, is Mark McClellan - yes, White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan's brother. When EPA head Michael Levitt - also a Bush appointee and former right-wing governor of Utah, which boasted the second worst record of industrial pollution in the country under his governorship - was replaced in 2005 by Stephen L. Johnson, a biologist and pathologist by training but who, as a member of the EPA for 24 years, is known as a loyal foot soldier, President Bush bloviated that one of Johnson's primary responsibilities would be to "lead federal efforts to ensure the safety of our drinking water supply," adding the EPA has "an important role in the war on terror."

Well, at least so far the terrorists have been held at bay from poisoning our water supply. Our own government is another story. Heckuva job, Johnson:

EPA OK’d Plan to Dump Nerve Agent into Delaware, by Harry Yanoshak
Bucks County Courier Times

Story of the Day

It's been a long week. With the Dubai port deal, the Bush Administration has raised the stakes in absurd moves. The line between real news and satire has never grown more blurred. First, we see the headlines about Cheney shooting his pal in the face, then we're hit with ones telling us that we're contracting a company run by the government of the United Arab Emirates to operate our ports.

This headline and story from The Onion should be placed in a time capsule to help explain to future generations just how twisted it was to live through this.

It's Saturday, laugh a little:

White House Had Prior Knowledge of Cheney Threat
The Onion

Story of the Day

Well, it's been a banner week for the ol' Paper of Record. To top off David E. Sanger's hack reporting on Portgate, The New York Times today downgraded "civil war" to "endangered future" in a headline referencing the spiraling state of Iraq.

Since the editors at the Times must be exhausted from working so diligently to blunt provocative phrases, I thought I might help out (pro bono, of course):

"shooting your friend in the face" = "dizzy gun polka"

"illegal wiretapping"= "silent conversation partners"

"torture" = "the taste of duct tape"

"informed opposition" = "critics" (whoops, you guys have that one covered)

"perpetual cycle of blinding incompetence culminating in massive death and destruction" = "trying time of late for the White House" (yeah, come to think of it, I'm sure you've used this, too)

Hmm, this was harder than I thought.

And now, your story of the day (100% euphemism-free):

New York Times, With Same Facts, Changes Iraq Conflict from 'Civil War' to Having 'Endangered Future'
The Raw Story

Story of the Day

Amid the surreal revelations, statements and squabblings swirling around Portgate, the missing link of the cronyism that drove this deal remains unquestioned by the mainstream press.

Glaringly remiss has been New York Times reporter David E. Sanger, who for three straight days, with two in-depth news articles and a news analysis piece, managed to completely avoid the issue. Making matters worse, in today's news analysis, Sanger shifts the focus to the woeful security of our ports in general. It's not that our port security isn't in dire straits, but he manages to combine the two issues in such a way as to blunt the criticism of this deal. Once again offering Bushco an escape route.

Watch Sanger defend this deal at the beginning of the article (citing those horrible "critics"):

"While critics of the deal have raised the specter that it might open the way to the 'infiltration' of American ports by terrorists from the Middle East, the Dubai company would in most cases inherit a work force that is mainly American, with hiring subject to the same regulations as under the current British management."

Then mention this in passing near the very end of the article:

"While the company in question has not been a focus of investigations, Dubai has been a way station for contraband, some of it nuclear. Abdul Qadeer Khan, the Pakistani nuclear engineer, made Dubai his transshipment point for the equipment he sent to Libya and Iran because he could operate there without worrying about investigators."

Is Sanger vying to be the next Judy Miller of the Times? How does someone with so many resources at his disposal manage to miss so much?

Big Problem, Dubai Deal or Not, by David E. Sanger
The New York Times

Story of the Day

While the mainstream media continues to ignore the cronyism at the heart of the Dubai Port World contract, the deal just got more dubious today:

Former Senate Chief Dole Hired to Lobby for Dubai Port Deal
The Raw Story

Story of the Day

They say that writers generally have one story to tell, and they spend their entire lives writing that same story, only altering the details, a different shading here, new character names and settings there. But the heart of each story, the import and vision, has the author's signature all over it.

This seems to apply to the Bush Administration's storytelling efforts. Whatever the topic: War. Torture. Energy. Healthcare. Katrina. Wiretapping. National elections. You name it, scratch the surface of their rhetoric and out bleeds the same undercurrent of lies, misinformation, cronyism, cruelty, incompetence and graft. That's their signature.

The recent contract that outsources the operations of some our major cities' ports to Dubai Port World, a company based in the United Arab Emirates, is the same ol' story. We know the ending as soon as we hear the beginning. The heart of the story? An administration that stops at nothing - even risking opening a gaping hole in our national security - just to pad their own wallets and those of their cronies.

How far will the national media push this detail and prod for answers? We'll see. The New York Times and CNN just published new articles on the Dubai port story within the last couple of hours on their websites - both omit any mention of the cronyism that created this deal. So if that's any indication, the media focus will settle on the squabbling this issue is causing, rather than what drove this contract to be approved by the White House. And once again we'll watch our country engage in another Debate of the Absurd: Is torture wrong? Is illegal wiretapping necessary? Is global warming good science? Hasn't Cheney suffered enough from shooting his friend in the face? And this new entry: is it a good idea to hand over operations of our ports to a company owned by the government of the United Arab Emirates?

Now, turn to the next page of The Worst Administration in the History of Our Country:

W Aides' Biz Ties to Arab Firm, by Michael McAuliff
New York Daily News

Story of the Day

Today's story is an exhaustive and fascinating article by The New Yorker on the torture and cruelty sanctioned by our highest members of government, including Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. It details the premeditated, dysfunctional setting that forged such a policy, along with the architects who championed it and the actual patriots (I'm so tired of this word being owned by neo-cons) who fought against it. As with the NSA scandal, we have an administration that flagrantly breaks the law, then defends their right to have broken it by simply rewriting the rules. That's despotism, not democracy. And though we've seen throughout history the death, destruction and cruelty that such conduct inevitably breeds, our national press remains timid. They are harder on Dick Cheney (or, rather, his surrogates, since Dick won't grant anyone but FOX News an interview) for his hunting accident, where only one man received pain and suffering (though that does remain an unanswered story), than for his directives of gulags and renditions and illegal spying on U.S. citizens.

Please read the whole thing; you will not be sorry (though your blood pressure might rise a few points):

The Memo: How an Internal Effort to Ban the Abuse and Torture of Detainees Was Thwarted
By Jane Mayer
The New Yorker

Story of the Day

Classic Blitzer. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, on the heels of the House of Representatives report on Katrina, in which his glaring incompetence is cited, chats up Wolfie as if he should be doing something besides resigning.

First, here's the report's conclusion on Chertoff:

"The secretary of homeland security became the president's principal disaster adviser responsible for enabling the president to effectively utilize his authority. Secretary Chertoff executed these responsibilities late, ineffectively, or not at all."

Yet when Blitzer mentions that some people are calling for his resignation, Chertoff responds with the same rhetoric that Emperor Rumsfeld has used:

"As long as the president wants me to continue to do that work and thinks I can make a contribution, I'm going to stay at my post."

Though Blitzer doesn't follow up on this lame response, it seems to cry out for a question pertaining to the pattern of incompetence, and lack of accountability, that has become the hallmark of this administration. Something as simple as: If you don't think you should resign now, under what circumstance - barring the President's request - do you think someone should?

But the kicker is when Blitzer brings up the news that we're outsourcing operations of ports in New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New Orleans and Miami to Dubai Ports World, a company based in the United Arab Emirates. When asked if he signed off on this brilliant deal, Chertoff powers up the doublespeak and declares it's a "classified process." Blitzer accepts the stonewalling like a child receiving a candied apple and a pat on the head, and then gives Chertoff the last word:

"You know, we have to balance the paramount urgency of security against the fact that we still want to have a robust global trading system."

Chilling. Baffling. Infuriating. Just another Sunday morning with Wolf Blitzer and company. A ten-year-old could figure out that any profits made through outsourcing the operation of our ports to a company owned by the United Arab Emirates government is just not worth the risk to our security.

Read it and weep:

Interview with Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff
Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer