Matching cable news networks interest during the day, two of the three broadcast networks (CBS and NBC, as well as MSNBC's Countdown) led Thursday night with how, at an event in Atlanta, a handful of protesters confronted Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and accused him of “war crimes” and “lying” about Iraq. ABC also aired a story, but put the Moussaoui sentencing first. All three featured former CIA analyst Ray McGovern who demanded: "Why did you lie to get us into a war that was not necessary?”But all failed to note McGovern's long record of hostility to the Bush administration. As McGovern boasted when he first got to the mike (video not shown by ABC, CBS or NBC), he's a co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity and if you Google “Ray McGovern of CIA” you get a plethora of returns from far-left sites (DemocracyNow.org, antiwar.com, truthout.org, alternet.org, TomPaine.com and CommonDreams.org).

CBS anchor Bob Schieffer trumpeted: “Not since the Vietnam War has a Secretary of Defense been under the kind of criticism that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has been getting lately. A group of retired generals has called on him to resign, and today he caught it from another front when he went to what has been Bush country -- Georgia -- and ran head on into hecklers that included a former CIA analyst.” Of course, Atlanta is hardly “Bush country” and CBS offered no proof the protesters were locals. David Martin concluded by admiring the guts of the protesters: "This is not the first time a former CIA officer has accused the Bush administration of misusing intelligence. But, Bob, it's never been done in such an in-your-face way." NBC's Brian Williams saw a greater meaning: “Today the Secretary of Defense received a blunt and personal reminder of the split in this country over the war in Iraq.” He then showcased a woman shouting in the audience: “You lied to the American people!...You lied! You lied that Iraq's oil would pay for the war! You lied about everything the CIA told you was lies!..You're a liar!" Jim Miklaszewski next touted how “today's protests join a growing chorus of criticism against the Secretary and follow the calls from at least six retired Generals for Rumsfeld's resignation.” (Transcripts follow)

Thank goodness Zacarias Moussaoui came along to capture the headlines. The lollipop coverage by the mainstream media given to illegal aliens got to be a bit too sugary, especially on the day of that big march. Wall to wall, from airwaves to newsprint, the message was this: Oh come let us adore them.

Talking heads made it clear that if you believe in preserving our sovereignty, you are a bigot.

So what about the millions (including Mexicans!) waiting properly in line to get here by following the rules? Suckers, like me.

Though I haven't tried, because it's useless, no "respectable" newspaper would publish this side of the story, my side, which respresents millions.

Click here for instructions on running Gaggle daily on your own site. There's also an archive of previous toons available here.

Feminist anthems still draw rave reviews. On Thursday morning's "Today," singer Helen Reddy was scheduled for an interview on her new memoir. As "I Am Woman" played in the background, Katie Couric explained how she knew every word of the song and it "shaped me in a lot of ways." News anchor Ann Curry interviewed Reddy and echoed the swooning: "Oh, that song still gives me the chills."

Coming into the 8:30 half hour, MRC's Geoff Dickens noticed Katie Couric announced over the Reddy song and the outside crowd noise:

Katie Couric: "Matt I'm sure you have this one on your iPod don't you? This of course is Helen Reddy's I Am Woman. When it first came out in 1972 it became an anthem for the women's movement and for feminists everywhere and I have a confession to make."

Matt Lauer: "You love this song?"

Couric: "I know every word to this song."

Today’s edition of The View may have given us a window into not only that show’s future, but also the interviewing style we might expect from Meredith Vieira on Today. Ms. Vieira, who joins the NBC program in September, and her co-hosts interviewed Dhillon Khosla, a transsexual who underwent several surgeries in an attempt to become a man. Vieira complimented Khosla for his ability to "find yourself finally." Here is a brief sample of her comments:

Vieira: "I can understand why people would love you. You’re a very nice guy. Very, very nice guy. Very smart and what a struggle to find yourself finally...You’re a very smart guy and a very brave guy to go through this and to write about it too. And help- obviously a lot of people struggling with the same situation."

For the second day in a row, energy prices plummeted on commodities exchanges across the globe. Oil closed under $70 per barrel for the first time since April 7, adding another $2.34 to yesterday’s $2.12 decline, making for a 6 percent two-day slide. Since trading as high as $75.35 on April 21, oil has now retreated more than $5, or greater than 7 percent.

The media have yet to notice.

At the same time, wholesale gasoline closed under $2.00 per gallon for the first time since April 10, dropping 9 cents for the second day in a row. This brings wholesale gas prices down by almost 11 percent from their $2.23 April 19 high.

The latest Hubble images show that Jupiter has a new storm brewing, one that signals "a global change that can modify temperatures by as much as 10 degrees Fahrenheit on different parts of the globe." Get ready for the New York Times to blame Republicans.

This coming exactly a month after I wrote about the global warming that is occurring on Mars.

But don't take the universe's word for it. Media maven Barack Obama says man caused all of our problems. Even the once not-so-partisan magazine Nature is getting in on the game with a new study that definitively proves that man is killing the world with a junk science study that apparently paid no attention to the recent twenty most active years of the sun ever recorded.

The answer [to the cause of global warming], says Vecchi, is pretty much all of it. "At least 80% of this is attributable to human activities," he says.

What say you, New York Times?

Honestly, I can't believe I'm even having to write this. The moonbat programming director at KRON Channel 4 in San Francisco, along with station management, changed the address of the station from 1001 Van Ness Avenue to 1001552 after consulting with a numerologist who said the evil number 1001 needed to be "patched."

This is what San Francisco will do to a person. But I guess you'll try anything when you lose $91 million a year. 

In a fit of conflicting interest, they booked Swami #1 on their weekend talk show and are currently looking for a permanent spot for him. No wonder, because this cat is also clairvoyant. Two of his predictions: "The flu epidemic will cause havoc in many Asian countries," and "Senator Hillary Clinton will be in the forefront of the Democratic Party."

I just got chills down my back.

Maybe someone should tell Channel 4 that the number 4 is as unlucky as numbers come.

The wholesale price of oil and gasoline took a huge drop on the commodities markets Wednesday. But, you never would have known it from watching the broadcast networks’ evening news programs. In fact, the pain at the pump mantra continued in earnest at CBS and NBC without even the slightest mention of a greater than $2 decline in oil prices and an almost 9 cent decline in gasoline prices on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Instead, the NBC “Nightly News” did two pieces dealing with rising energy prices, including one about the politics of the problem. Brian Williams began the report: “Also in Washington tonight, these days, as we know, a lot of high anxiety over gas prices, and more political fighting over what to do about it.” Williams handed it off to David Gregory who concluded: “Amid all the anxiety tonight, some hope. Oil industry sources and administration officials say, given a recent boost in the supply of gas, that prices could actually come down, at least a bit, this summer.” Might have been a nice time to tell the viewers that they already have. In fact, after reaching a wholesale price high of $2.23 per gallon a few weeks, yesterday’s close of $2.09 represents a six percent decline in about eleven trading days. I guess energy prices are only newsworthy when they go up.

Of course, the CBS “Evening News” didn’t do much better, as it decided to report on how rising gas prices are harming a minor league baseball team. Bob Schieffer set up the segment:

Rem Rieder, editor of American Journalism Review, believes that the blacktie White House Correspondent's Dinner, which encourages its members to snare the best celebrity guests, "underscores the notion that journalists are part of a wealthy elite, completely out of touch with ordinary Americans."

Reider of course does not believe that this is true, and only believes that this event should be scrapped because it makes the Washington press corps seem elitist.

This dinner has been an embarrassment for years. It's well past time to shut it down. It's a vivid symbol, like we need another one, of what's so very wrong with elite Washington journalism.

Years ago, the dinner was a low-key event where Washington journalists entertained their sources. The game changed in 1987 when the late Michael Kelly, then with the Baltimore Sun, snagged Iran/contra It Girl Fawn Hall as one of the Sun's guests.

Via FishbowlNY, we learn that actor Richard Dreyfuss is currently studying civics and democracy at the University of Oxford (following in the footsteps of Bill Clinton?), and he's grown hopping mad at media bias: the pro-Bush kind. It has been "sacrificing accuracy and impartiality for sensationalism and instant gratification."

He "expressed alarm that a few big media corporations control most of the news the general public has access to. Dreyfuss, who is a longtime political activist, has also campaigned for peace in the Middle East and lent his support to a campaign calling for the impeachment of US President George W. Bush." Dreyfuss is then quoted at length, or perhaps in short bursts:

The story hasn't been on the media radar much of late, but the legal team of Lewis "Scooter" Libby, the former Bush admin official at the center of the Valerie Plame Wilson leak investigation, came out swinging this week, landing a number of blows against reporters and news organizations in a court filing defending Libby's desire to compel them to submit evidence he deems essential to his defense.

After the Libby team began poking holes in the stories of journalists Tim Russert, Judith Miller, and Matt Cooper and others, the press hasn't been especially interested in following the story. There are a few blogs doing a good job of chronicling the battle between Libby and special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald. One such blog is JustOneMinute, which has provided a PDF version (and some cogent analysis) of Libby's most recent filing in two parts, here and here.

The American Thinker has a great summary of the filing by attorney Clarice Feldman:

We have just been granted a window on the struggle between Lewis “Scooter” Libby and the elite media over his access to their internal documents. Libby is charged with federal crimes because his versions of conversations with reporters differ from the accounts of the media people. He seeks evidence from their files about what they knew and what they privately wrote at the time. In a “he said/she said” confrontation, access to supporting evidence becomes critical to the ability to mount a defense.

If you ever wanted to know how easy it easy to distract a reporter, and how short is the attention span of the Washington press corps, watch how a whole team of journalists saved the day as a mother duck and her ducklings tried to cross the street.

The reporters were waiting for Karl Rove to come out and make an appearance, but apparently Rove had a paddling up his sleeve, and instead of waiting to pepper Karl Rove with questions about his grand jury testimony, the gaggle of reporters rushed to the aid of the gaggle of ducks.

Watch the Media Heroism Slideshow to see how an entire group of reporters risked life and limb for ducks and put a temporary pause on harassing a lameduck's henchman.

Today's Washington Post story, "For Victims' Families, Verdict Elicits Mix of Shock, Relief", featured comments from some 9/11 family members about the Moussaoui verdict. Here's a summary of the comments...

Rosemary Dillard - "We showed the world what we do to terrorists. We'll show them respect no matter how much disrespect they show us. It makes us a finer society."

Carrie Lemack - "I'm proud of the jury today and know my mother would be, too."

Blake Allison - "I didn't feel that capital punishment was the appropriate response. I don't think the government's case was terribly convincing."

All those reporters with an important task at hand. Today it's ducks, tomorrow it's another liberal pet issue that will come and go, taken up with as much verve and eagerness.

Tuesday night on MSNBC’s “Countdown,” host Keith Olbermann once again demonstrated why he is one of the most unprofessional and undisciplined journalists on television today. In his regular “Worst Person in the World” segment, Olbermann chose conservative radio talk show host Laura Ingraham. In this case, Ingraham won the award because Olbermann clearly has no understanding of how race impacts television viewing habits in America, in particular, those of Hispanic Americans: “But our winner, Laura Ingraham, having already reached the dubious conclusion that the mainstream media is supporting amnesty for illegal immigrants she offered this tortured logic as support quoting ‘NBC, ABC and CBS, throw in CNN and MSNBC. They think these are, you know, new viewers, new listeners, new customers to the more liberal viewpoint.’”

Olbermann then shared with his viewers a false conclusion while demonstrating why he should go back to analyzing sporting events (emphasis mine): 

“Um-huh. And the fact that most of these folks seem to prefer hearing and seeing the news in their native languages? How did you rationalize that part of it again? Laura Ingraham today`s worst person in the world.”

The problem is, Keith, you once again appear to have pulled data from...thin air. For instance, according to a survey done by the Pew Hispanic Center on this very subject (emphasis mine):

The BBC was told by a commission it hired to not avoid using the word "terrorism" when discussing the Israeli-Palestinian issue. But the panel also said there was no bias in the BBC's reporting on the issue.

Reports the Guardian:

The BBC should not be afraid to use the word 'terrorism' in its coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a independent report commissioned by the corporation said today.

The report, which was ordered by the BBC governors from a panel of five independent figures last October to assess the contentious issue, found there was no evidence of "systematic" bias within the corporation.

'Today' had two 9/11 family members on as guests this morning to react to yesterday's jury determination of life in prison rather than the death penalty for Zacarias Moussaoui. That the family member who expressed general support for the process was relatively unknown, whereas the bitter Bush-administration critic, Kristin Breitweiser, is a household commodity, is indicative of MSM coverage in the years since 9/11.

Ironically, it was the family member that was disappointed in the verdict who expressed pride in America and the process, whereas Breitweiser, who got the verdict she preferred, remained bitter.

First to speak was Hamilton Peterson, who lost his father and step-mother on United 93. Katie Couric opened by asking him why he believes Moussaoui should have received the death penalty. Consider Peterson's response:

Time's special edition on the 100 most influential people is especially slavish in its "Artists & Entertainers" category. Al Franken typically overstated the ideological fervor of conservatives in hailing Arianna Huffington's flip-flopping away from conservatism:

I told her the Gingrich revolution was a fraud. Arianna had signed on for the part of the revolution that wanted to unravel the social safety net and replace it with faith-based programs. She took the mission very seriously but soon discovered that the Gingrich Republicans did not. "Effective compassion" was just a fig leaf for closing down the Department of Education, cutting Medicare and getting rid of the Environmental Protection Agency.