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Has the Los Angeles Times downplayed the release of Fox News Channel journalists Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig?

From today's LA Times (Monday, August 28, 2006):

"Fox Journalists Freed After 2 Weeks in Gaza," p. A4, one photo, 925 words.

Compare this coverage with that of the release of journalist Jill Carroll, whose story was covered on March 31, 2006:

With the recent disclosure that Richard Armitage, an anti-Iraq war deputy of former secretary of state Colin Powell, was Bob Novak's source for the Valerie Plame leak, the political scandal that never should have been may finally be wrapping up. All that seems to remain is a three-and-out trial of departed White House aid Scooter Libby.

Byron York has a long piece summarizing the recent developments and putting them in the proper context:

No one in the press corps knew it at the time, but if a newly published account of the CIA-leak case is accurate, Powell knew much, much more than he let on during that session with the press. Two days earlier, according to Hubris, the new book by the Nation's David Corn and Newsweek's Michael Isikoff, Powell had been told by his top deputy and close friend Richard Armitage that he, Armitage, leaked the identity of CIA employee Valerie Plame to columnist Robert Novak. Armitage had, in other words, set off the CIA-leak affair.

At the time, top administration officials, including President Bush, were vowing to "get to the bottom" of the matter. But Armitage was already there, and he told Powell, who told top State Department officials, who told the Justice Department. From the first week of October 2003, then, investigators knew who leaked Valerie Plame's identity — the ostensible purpose of an investigation that still continues, a few months shy of three years after it began. [...]

Not since Dan Quayle or Spiro Agnew has there been a vice president that the MSM loved to hate so much. Now, the Chicago Tribune is even going so far as to pick apart vice president Cheney's verbal ticks and making fun, or even assigning perfidy to them.

In an article titled, Cheney's usage of `if you will' is `like' hedging, Tribune "cultural critic" Julia Keller, assumes that Cheney's over usage of the phrase "if you will" amounts to him verbally pausing while he thinks up another lie to tell the people, or at the very least amounts to the VP trying to sound smarter than he relly is.

Her piece is filled with jabs at the VP over a simple phrase ... the type of thing nearly everybody does everyday of their lives. I am sure if you think about your own language usage, you'd realize that you, too, have some phrase you use far too often. From the common "Umm", to "like", "You Know" (and its sister phrase, "you know what I mean"), to "cool" or "dude", many of us have such verbal ticks.

There was more bad news for President Bush during the 4pm EDT hour of Monday's "The Situation Room." In two separate reports from Bill Schneider and Dana Bash, the President was labeled "clueless" on his handling of Hurricane Katrina and Democratic talking points on the subject were repeated yet again.

Schneider’s piece focused on the toll Hurricane Katrina took on President Bush’s poll numbers. CNN’s senior political analyst argued that the President took two hits from Katrina:

Bill Schneider: "President Bush’s self-declared image as a compassionate conservative also took a hit. The public saw a remote, even clueless, President after Katrina struck."

Host of MSNBC's "Hardball," Chris Matthews, also hosts a syndicated Sunday morning talk show, "Chris Matthews." The syndicated show just had its five-year anniversary and Broadcasting and Cable magazine interviewed the host.

Sunday mornings elicit thoughts of Tim Russert and George Stephanopolous, but the name Chris Matthews doesn't always come to mind.

We are very competitive with those guys. The quality of the show is beating the PR. My hope is that, if everyone watched it once, they'd keep watching it.

Does it frustrate you that they're better-known?

Harry Smith, "Early Show" co-host, reported live from New Orleans today on the state of the city one year after Hurricane Katrina. Smith essentially had one type of question: Exactly how horrible is the situation today? The CBS journalist talked with Oliver Thomas, President of the New Orleans City Council. He lectured Mr. Thomas, telling him, "Folks feel abandoned. They feel forgotten. They feel desperate." This, despite the fact that more then $44 billion has been spent on rebuilding the Gulf Coast, with a total of $110 billion designated for the project. 

Smith began the interview, which aired at 7:10AM EDT on August 28, by asking, "...Could the levees withstand Ernesto if Ernesto turned and came up this way?" Mr. Thomas told him that, while the situation isn’t perfect, the levees are much stronger and more reinforced then a year ago. Apparently this wasn’t the proper answer, because Smith then rephrased remarkably similar questions:

Smith: "If Ernesto came here two days from now, would the city be evacuated? Would we have the same horror story from a year ago?"

Again, the city councilman replied in the affirmative. Of course the city would be evacuated. The "Early Show" co-host interrupted quickly interrupted him with a gloomy scenario:

Smith: "But could it be? Would it be?"

SARASOTA, FL. (NS) -

There is a new tactic being used across America by Cities and Municipalities faced with money or budget problems...

It's called "Privatization," and it it starting to affect our Fire Service...

Privatization is now coming to the Sarasota Bradenton International Airport. Sarasota County Fire Department Local IAFF 2546 Firefighters are being terminated as Rural Metro prepares to take over operations on Oct. 1, 2006...

Today on "The Captain's AMERICA" radio show, Walter Dix -IAFF District Representative for Florida, Mike Stephenson - President of IAFF Local 2546, Murph Kennell - Business Agent for IAFF Local 2546 and Blair Cook - a 23 year Fire Medic Engineer Veteran who was involved in the Union negotiations were guests on the radio show...

There is definitely an issue with the Company scheduled to place the SRQ Airport Firefighters, Rural Metro, who has been previously cited, fined and even has ongoing lawsuits against them...

Liberal radio network Air America has lost another station, this time in Chattanooga, TN. The reason: lack of viewers and advertisers.

The failure of Air America across the U.S. is because the liberal mindset does not fit well with lengthy radio shows. For an ideology based on emotions, the show goes on well after the liberal listener's daily emotional outburst has subsided.

Reports Chattanooga.com:

Chattanooga’s oldest radio station, WDOD, has ended its 11-month experiment with progressive talk radio.

At 10 a.m. this past Monday, the station switched to a format featuring musical oldies and standards from the late 1950s and the 1960s and 1970s, according to Danny Howard, director of programming and operations for WDEF and WDOD....

Over the weekend on NBC’s syndicated "The Chris Matthews Show," Matthews and his media panel predicted the House would fall to the Democrats, prompting Matthews to wonder what sort of "scare tactic" Republicans would employ in the upcoming midterms. Matthews asked Time’s Michael Duffy if the Republicans were "gonna bring in the ethnic factor?"

Then later in the program Matthews honored the media’s Katrina coverage by highlighting this exaggerated report from an NBC cameraman: "Dead people around the walls of the Convention Center laying in the middle of the street."

Matthews and the panel began the show discussing the inevitability of the Democrats retaking Congress and what Republicans would stoop to, to prevent the takeover which led to this exchange between Matthews and Duffy:

It seems everyone's going to be getting in on the Katrina-exposed-racism extravaganza this week. Looking through Thursday night's BBC World rebroadcast that's shown locally here on PBS station WETA, MRC's Michelle Humphrey found something weird. As reporter Jim Fish narrated a story on racial cohesion in Britain and France, he then took a jolting turn to a one-sentence condemnation of America:

"And in the most renowned melting pot society of all, the United States, Hurricane Katrina exposed the grim reality that far too many black people remain at the bottom of the pile, too often ignored and cut off from the American Dream."

Cindy Sheehan’s latest Washington, D.C. protest is being sponsored by the International Socialist Organization. In "Camp Democracy," Sept. 5-21, Sheehan will broaden her scope from mere anti-war activism to advocating on behalf of other "progressive" movement causes like immigrants’ rights and organized labor, reports CNSNews.com Staff Writer Nathan Burchfiel:

After wrapping up the second annual "Camp Casey" protest in Crawford, Texas, anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan will travel to Washington, D.C., to kick off a 17-day protest and conference aimed at ending the war and "righting injustices."

Former veep Al Gore continues to get slavishly great press (the kind a Republican could only get by switching parties à la Jim Jeffords), this time for a speech he gave in Scotland claiming that "democracy is under attack" from media consolidation. I'm doubtful that he mentioned similar dangers from ultrarich leftists like George Soros trying to buy their own governments in various countries.

The first few grafs from AP reporter Jill Lawless are relatively straightforward (minus the fact that she did not ask other media thinkers to counter Gore):

"Democracy is under attack," Gore told an audience at the Edinburgh International Television Festival. "Democracy as a system for self-governance is facing more serious challenges now than it has faced for a long time.

"Democracy is a conversation, and the most important role of the media is to facilitate that conversation of democracy. Now the conversation is more controlled, it is more centralized."

Here they come: The anniversary stories of Hurricane Katrina, giving the New York Times and other media outlets a precious opportunity for extraneous Bush-bashing.

Monday's front-page story by Sheryl Gay Stolberg, "Year After Katrina, Bush Still Fights for 9/11 Image," questions Bush's compassion based on the federal government's response to Hurricane Katrina.

Use this post to discuss topics not covered in other articles.

Read all about it: a new MRC special report called “Election in the Streets,” that demonstrates that ABC, CBS, and NBC behaved like protester publicists in late March, April, and May, in complete contradiction to public opinion polls showing America had a serious problem with the tide of illegal immigration. Gooey stories about illegal aliens “emerging from the shadows” to fight for their “rights” piled up the soundbites for amnesty, and the protest organizers somehow evaded ever being described as liberals or leftists, despite talking about the “fascist clauses” in the Sensenbrenner bill. Check it out before the next round of protests heats up next weekend. Here's a summary:

Washington Post reporter Peter Baker highlighted an estimated 700 anti-Bush protesters in Maine in the Sunday Post. The headline was "War Protesters Follow Bush to Maine," which is an odd headline, since the organizing groups were Maine locals from groups like "Seacoast Peace Response." But short of reporting the protest was encouraged by Cindy Sheehan, nowhere in the article could he locate the protesters on the left with any sort of liberal label, despite descriptions like these:

The protesters carried handmade signs with slogans such as "Stop Killing Our Children," "Bring Them Home Now," "We Have Nothing to Fear But Bush Himself," and "Liar, Liar, World's on Fire." In a school field where the group rallied after the march, speakers called for Bush's impeachment and sang specially written songs such as "Where is the Rage?"

The contrasting screen captures say it all.

We all knew that the one-year Katrina anniversary was going to be a festival of MSM Bush-bashing. And while Good Morning America certainly fulfilled that expectation this morning, who could have guessed that they would have thrown in a two-fer - the beginnings of the beatification of Bill Clinton?

Check out the graphic. Move over, Jimmy Carter: ABC has proclaimed Bill Clinton the new Philanthropist-in-Chief! Interviewed by Robin Roberts, Clinton allowed as to how if he had been in charge during Katrina "I might have done something more just because I feel so close to the area." Darn that 22nd Amendment!

Earlier on, Charlie Gibson ensured that America wouldn't forget what was portrayed as a low point for Pres. Bush during Katrina. As the screen showed W peering down at the devastation from a plane window, Gibson told us that with regard to government plans to deal with future hurricanes:

"There's a certain doubt, even though it's all on paper, whether it would actually work. Because one of the sad parts of this is that there's been an erosion in confidence in government . . . I think everybody

To reduce the number of people trying to enter the US illegally . . . pay them more once they get here. Sound illogical? Not if you're a Boston Globe editorialist.

You knew where this editorial was headed from the headline, 'Scapegoating Immigrants,' and if there was any doubt, when a few short paras in the editorial referred to 'undocumented workers' rather than illegal immigrants, you could have stopped right there. For that matter, you might have saved yourself the time when you picked up the paper, or opened to the web site, and noticed that it read 'The Boston Globe' at the top.

You would think that Reuters learned its lesson about publishing to the world photos doctored to create a false image. After all, they were caught with multiple false photos from Lebanon, and had to take down more than 900 images from one stringer. Reuters promised it would have "experienced editors" look at all such photos in the future.

Has Reuters kept that promise? Apparently not.

Today, 26 August 2006, Reuters ran a photo captioned: "A French United Nations vehicle drives past a photo of Hizbollah leader .... Nasrallah, in Tyre...." The power of the photo is that the poster-sized image of a smiling Nasrallah is looking right at, and smiling at, an apparently white flag flying on the French vehicle.