NewsBusters Archive

According to the Daily Times of Pakistan (hat tip to the American Thinker), former President Bill Clinton stated to reporters in Islamabad last Friday that the publishers responsible for the Muslim cartoons that have started riots around the world should be convicted. Yet, despite this call by a former president to limit the freedom of the press, America’s media have paid virtually no attention to Clinton’s declarations.

As reported by the Daily Times: “Talking to reporters after meeting Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz in Islamabad, Clinton said he disagreed with the caricatures and that the publication was against religious and ethical norms.”

In addition:

"Try not to laugh when someone says these are the world’s greatest athletes, despite a paucity of blacks that makes the Winter Games look like a GOP convention."

Gumbel's statement on white athletes is more direct than Rush Limbaugh's statement about black quarterbacks in 2003, when discussing black Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb. Said Limbaugh on ESPN:

"The media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well. There is a little hope invested in McNabb, and he got a lot of credit for the performance of this team that he didn't deserve. The defense carried this team."

On the February 18th edition of CNN’s In the Money, CNN business contributor Andy Serwer took a cheap shot at U.S. foreign policy during a discussion on lower than expected ratings for the Winter Olympics in Torino. CNN’s resident curmudgeon, Jack Cafferty, pointed to disappointing performances from some U.S. athletes as a possible reason for NBC's woes. This led Serwer to make this comparison:

Andy Serwer: "You know, it kind of reminds me, I hate to say this, but the performance of the U.S. Olympic team kind of reminds me of what we’re doing around the world."

Serwer continued, over the laughter of Cafferty and CNN correspondent Jennifer Westhoven, by calling the performance of the U.S. Olympic team "spotty" and "raggedy,"and made this surprising statement disparaging U.S. wins:

Serwer: "You know, we’ve got some unexpected victories, but, you know, kind of rolling my eyes, right?"

The transcript of the full exchange is behind the cut. (Hat tip: Free Market Project's Ken Shepherd)

There are moments where you totally miss Sen. Alan Simpson in government when he gets going with the metaphors. This is the Much Ado Over Birdshot exchange of the weekend, from "Fox News Sunday":

ALAN SIMPSON: Let me tell you, those who don't like him have put a big red tail on his bum, and cloven hooves, and horns on his head. And let me tell you, if anybody thinks -- if this had happened to anybody else in America, it would have been like a sparrow belch in a typhoon.

CHRIS WALLACE: Could you be a little more colorful, Senator?

SIMPSON: Well, I don't think I could, because it really is absurd.

Hat tip to the Malkinator. After praising both Bush "41" and Jimmy Carter as wonderful, Simpson returned to firing on the press: "All you get is controversy, crap and confusion." Ah, the three C's. Simpson wrote a book a few years back about "scrapping" with the press, called "Right In the Old Gazoo."

In her column today in the Sunday "Outlook" section, Washington Post Ombudsman Deborah Howell expressed official dismay at Post reporter/columnist Dana Milbank's decision to wear hunter garb as a Dick Cheney gag on MSNBC's "Countdown with Keith Olbermann." The Post's AME for National News, Liz Spayd, apparently handed out some discipline:

Spayd said she felt Milbank "crossed the line" on his TV appearance. "What he intended as a playful joke was viewed by many as mocking and unprofessional, and understandably so." Suffice it to say that he has been taken to The Post's version of the woodshed and told not to do that again.

As reported by Dave Pierre of NewsBusters Thursday, HBO’s Bryant Gumbel made some truly absurd and obviously racist remarks recently on his “Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel” program. To refresh everyone’s memory, Gumbel was in the middle of a rant about why the Winter Olympics aren’t sports when he blurted out “So try not to laugh when someone says these are the world’s greatest athletes, despite a paucity of blacks that makes the Winter Games look like a GOP convention.” (Video Link)

This faux pas looks even more absurd given the gold medal that Shani Davis won Saturday night in speed skating, making him the first black athlete to win an individual gold medal in Winter Olympics history. As reported by the Chicago Tribune:

First there was Bryant Gumbel. But has one of our own Olympic athletes also politicized this installment of the Winter Games? In an NBC profile of U.S. champion figure skater Johnny Weir this past week, the flamboyant athlete is shown lying on a couch wearing a red sweatjacket with the decoration of CCCP, the Cyrillic Russian initials of the old USSR [link to video at gawker.com, see note below]. Yes, we have now seen the day when an Olympic athlete, representing the United States, is seen casually wearing a sweatjacket symbolizing the old Soviet Union.

Just when you thought the media had closed the book on the Cheney hunting accident, the Associated Press fired one last salvo at the Vice President today.  In their article, VP Accident Tale Filled with Discrepancies, Calvin Woodward and Nancy Benac rehash the same litany of talking points that flooded the media this week. Woodward and Benac revisit the shifting blame, belated acknowledgment of beer consumption, discrepancies in the shooting, the aftermath and how it was reported.

Scott McClellan was cited for promoting the "blame the victim" defense when he repeated Katherine Armstrong's comments on the accident. Cheney's first public comment on the accident amounted to an "about face" according to the AP.

The Huffington Post has a video clip of the introduction to Friday’s “Real Time with Bill Maher” on HBO. In it is a satirical advertisement for a new rap album by Dick Cheney, the real “ODP.” Predictably, the piece lampoons Cheney’s recent hunting accident, while bringing up some old favorites including his infamous expletive directed at a member of Congress, as well as some not-so-nice words for a member of the press.

The lyrics (not suitable for children) as transcribed from the video follow. To see the video, go here.