Seton Motley's blog

The Media Research Center's Director of Communications and NewsBusters.org Contributing Editor Seton Motley appeared on the Fox News Channel's America's Election HQ with Megyn Kelley to discuss the Los Angeles Times refusing to release a video of Illinois Democratic Senator and Presidential nominee Barack Obama attending the apparently anti-Israel going-away party for anti-Israel professor Rashid Khalidi in April 2003.

The Times did write a story about it at the time, but recently knowledge of the tape's existence came to light and they have steadfastly refused to release it.

Motley pointed out that this is but the latest in a long list of things potentially damaging to Sen. Obama that the media has obfuscated or outright ignored in their coverage of the Presidential race, including his relationships with Khalidi, remorseless domestic terrorist William Ayers, his anti-American pastor and self-described "mentor" and "spiritual advisor" of two decades Jeremiah Wright and convicted felon Tony Rezko.

Spreading the Word

Media Research Center Founder and President L. Brent Bozell, III today demanded the press report on damning new evidence of Illinois Democratic Senator and Presidential nominee Barack Obama's radical views on how we need to "break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution" because it "doesn't say what the federal government or state government must do on your behalf."  In tearing away from the Constitution, Sen. Obama says he seeks to achieve "social justice" through "redistributive change."

In the 2001 Chicago Public Radio interview, the audio of which has just surfaced, Sen. Obama laments that "the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society."

The media have refused to report on or obfuscated what has now become a series of comments from Sen. Obama that indicate a radical outlook on America, wealth redistribution and the courts.  He famously told "Joe the Plumber" (Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher) that we need to "spread the wealth around."  On his nominees for the courts, he said "We need somebody who's got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it's like to be a young teenage mom.  The empathy to understand what it's like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled, or old. And that's the criteria by which I'm going to be selecting my judges."

Brent Bozell:

Bozell acknowledges network taking responsibility for misleading viewers to believe conservatives at odds with Gov. Palin

Spreading the Word

As we reported on Tuesday, CNN's Drew Griffin completely mischaracterized the nature of a "quote" from National Review's Byron York during his interview with Alaskan Republican Governor and Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin.  

CNN has responded to the Media Research Center's call for CNN to retract the accusation that wrongly accused National Review's Byron York of calling Gov. Sarah Palin "incompetent, stupid, unqualified, corrupt or all of the above,"  and have taken full responsibility for the mischaracterization.

Yesterday, the cable network addressed the mistake on both Newsroom and The Situation Room, explaining the circumstances of the badly-worded representation of the statement and clarifying reporter Drew Griffin's intention, which was not to deceive his audience that a well-respected conservative publication was putting itself at odds with Gov. Palin.

Spreading the WordAs we reported earlier, former Newsweek reporter Michael Hastings drops one rhetorical bomb after another on the media in a new article for GQ magazine.  All of them reinforcing what we already knew, best summarized by Hastings himself: the press's "objectivity is a fallacy."

It has been a horrendous year for the media's credibility, and Hastings's statements only make it worse.  "If (it) sounds like I had some trouble being ‘objective,' I did. Objectivity is a fallacy. In campaign reporting more than any other kind of press coverage, reporters aren't just covering a story, they're a part of it-influencing outcomes, setting expectations, framing candidates-and despite what they tell themselves, it's impossible to both be a part of the action and report on it objectively."  

Hastings is utterly derisive of both former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and Arizona Senator and Presidential nominee John McCain, both of whom he covered during the Republican primary.  He in fact dreamed repeatedly of doing Giuliani harm as some sort of warped civic duty.

Spreading the WordOn yesterday's Situation Room, CNN's Drew Griffin completely mischaracterized the nature of a "quote" from National Review's Byron York during his interview with Alaskan Republican Governor and Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin.

Griffin said to Gov. Palin: "Governor, you've been mocked in the press, the press has been pretty hard on you, the Democrats have been pretty hard on you, but also some conservatives have been pretty hard on you as well. The National Review had a story saying that, you know, ‘I can't tell if Sarah Palin is incompetent, stupid, unqualified, corrupt or all of the above.'"

This is a complete distortion, a falsehood. The full quote from the National Review's Byron York shows he was in fact dressing down the media, NOT Gov. Palin. "Watching press coverage of the Republican candidate for vice president, it's sometimes hard to decide whether Sarah Palin is incompetent, stupid, unqualified, corrupt, backward, or - or, well, all of the above."

MRC President and Newsbusters.org Publisher L. Brent Bozell, III issued the following statement in response:

We are almost at halftime of Round Three of the MRC's Sweet-On-Obama Sixteen Media Bias Tournament.

Only the Infatuated Four remain. If you haven't yet voted, by all means do so now.

And if you have, check back often to see how your selections are faring.

And as biased as they all are, much like the 1980's cinematic classic says, "There can be only one."

No, not that one.

Spreading the WordAs we reported earlier, former CBS news anchor Dan Rather noted on today's Morning Joe on MSNBC that the traditional media is largely ignoring Democratic Senator and Vice Presidential candidate Joe Biden's alarming comment on Sunday:  "... (M)ark my words, within the next, first six months of this administration if we win, you're gonna face a major international challenge, because they are going to want to test him...." 

Rather pointed out "... (C)ertainly if Sarah Palin had said this it would be above the fold in most newspapers today... (I)f Sarah Palin had said this, the newspapers would have jumped all over it and so would have the major television outlets."

Morning Joe co-host Mika Brzezinski agreed with Rather's assessment, saying "I'm seeing spotty media coverage."

Spotty is an understatement.

And then there were four -- the Infatuated Four.

Of the sixteen most pro-Obama journalists, you have determined the four that have been the sweetest on him. 

Your righteous indignation, and your votes, have solidified the Sweet-On-Obama Sixteen's Infatuated Four.

So check the results, and vote again to pare the four down to two.  All on the way to determining the Media's Most Valuable Partisan (MVP).  

The media have shown Obama their love.  Now's your chance to show what you think of them.

We have reached the final days of voting from amongst the Enamored Eight. 

The polls remain open through Sunday, so if you haven't already, get in there and cast your ballot.

And if you have, check back throughout the weekend (as nearly half of Round One's voting took place then) and see how your choices are faring.

And to Comment upon the action, all as we work our way towards deciding the Infatuated Four.

Cheers, and enjoy.

 

Spreading the WordAs we reported earlier, in an interview for the upcoming New York Times's Sunday Magazine, and again in last night's Presidential debate, Illinois Senator Barack Obama singled out the Fox News Channel for scorn for how he feels they are covering his campaign.

Excerpted Sen. Obama quotes from the Times Sunday Magazine: "I am convinced that if there were no Fox News, I might be two or three points higher in the polls.... If I were watching Fox News, I wouldn't vote for me, right? ... Because the way I'm portrayed 24/7 is as a freak. I am the latte-sipping, New York Times-reading, Volvo-driving, no-gun-owning, effete, politically correct, arrogant liberal. Who wants somebody like that?"

MRC President and Newsbusters.org Publisher L. Brent Bozell, III issued the following statement in response:

We are approaching halftime of Round Two of the MRC's Sweet-On-Obama Sixteen Media Bias Tournament.

If you haven't yet cast your ballots from among the Enamored Eight, it's time to do so. And if you have, check back often to keep tabs on your picks.

We now proudly unveil on NewsBusters.org the trophy that we will present to the Media's Most Valuable Partisan (MVP) -- the winner of the Sweet-On-Obama Sixteen Tournament. It is a Major Award, and will certainly send a thrill up the leg of whomever is fortunate enough to receive it.

Behold:

Round One of the MRC's Sweet-On-Obama Sixteen is complete. Voting for Round Two -- The Enamored Eight -- has begun in earnest.

Eight competitors, though highly biased in their own right, were simply unable to overcome the Obama-Love of their opponents, and were pushed by all of you to the partisan wayside.

There were three upsets, including the downing of a #1 Seed.

So while we know nearly every member of the press is neck-deep in the tank for the Illinois Senator, it is anyone's guess -- and your voting decision -- who will end up being being named the Media's Most Valuable Partisan for the Man of Hope and Change.

So, let the deciding recommence.

The liberal media has journalistically disenfranchised you with their nauseatingly pro-Obama reporting. Now you have a way to strike back, at the MRC Sweet-On-Obama Sixteen Media Bias Tournament ballot box.

Voting for Round One of the Sweet-On-Obama Sixteen ends on Sunday. Head there now and cast your ballots. And if you've already voted, check back now and throughout the weekend to see how your choices are faring.

This is getting extraordinarily old, and I vow that this will be the last time I respond to the hacks at the Huffington Post, at least on this issue, but I must again back-hand the disingenuous and highly tenuous Seth Colter Walls.

The estimable Matthew Vadum at the Capital Research Center has again provided answers to the new questions Walls posed by Walls. These are just as devastating to the HuffPo's lame defense of Illinois Senator Barack Obama as Vadum's last round of responses was to their first round of queries, in fact even more so.

As to Walls addressing us. While usually pretending to be a journalist or a Sen. Obama campaign PR flak, he on Sunday took time out to play-act as a non-profit attorney. He proved himself to be just as untalented and unqualified in this capacity.

Update: The Sweet-On-Obama Sixteen Media Bias Tournament
Mid-Week Vote Check.

It's approaching halftime for the voting for Round One, and the competition is fierce. Some match-ups are tight, some are in danger of turning into runaways and there are more than a few upsets brewing.

Click here to check the scores. And don't forget to Comment on how you think the games are going.

And if you haven't yet voted, for what are you waiting? Do so straight away.

And unlike that other vote you will soon be casting, you Media Bias Bracket ballot matters even if you don't live in a swing state.

Note: This serves to at least partially answer ABC's David Wright's idiotic question.

Bob Bennett is a man of integrity, and the Democratic half of the political Bennett Brothers. He appeared last night on Mark Levin's nationally syndicated radio show to debunk the media myth built-up around Arizona Senator John McCain's role in the Keating Five mess circa the late 1980s and early 1990s.

(Brother Bill served as Secretary of President Ronald Reagan's Department of Education and Director of President George H.W. Bush's Office of National Drug Control Policy, and is now a nationally syndicated radio host in his own right, of "Bill Bennett's Morning in America.")

Bob Bennett is an attorney, and was at the time of the Keating Five scandal hired by the Senate Ethics Committee as Special Counsel to lead the investigation into what had happened. After over a year of exhaustive examination, Bennett recommended that Sen. McCain (and Sen. John Glenn of Ohio) be exonerated of all charges having to do with the Keating scandal. The ethics committee, which was majority Democratic, rejected Bennett's recommendation.

From the Washington Post's The Trail (by Michael Abramowitz), we have the following:

Update's Update: I have been assured by IT that we are FINALLY ready to go with this.

The American people in poll after poll and in greater and growing numbers are railing against the egregious liberal bias of the press. And nowhere are the media more horrendously slanted than in their coverage of the presidential campaign of Illinois Sen. Barack Obama. They are (to say the least) very, very sweet on him.

The MRC has put together this college basketball tournament-style bracket event, the Sweet-On-Obama Sixteen Media Bias Tournament, so that you, the angered members of the media’s audience can vote for who gives Sen. Obama the most loving and fawning coverage of all.

Update: The techincal error is resolved. Please, enjoy. Thank you very much.

Tuesday's Presidential debate is now looming in our headlights. It will be moderated by the very liberal Tom Brokaw of the very liberal NBC.

The Media Research Center, Newsbusters.org's parent company, wanted to take this opportunity to remind one and all why Brokaw's colleague, the very liberal Chris Matthews, will not be moderating the debate. And why he was removed as co-anchor of the very liberal MSNBC's 2008 campaign coverage.

Why he was ever ensconsed in that lofty journalistic position remains light years beyond us.

So we now humbly present to you an MRC Cinematic Production entitled "Chris Matthews: Building the Thrill."

We sincerely hope you enjoy.

Update: Matthew Vadum responds to the questions that the Huffington Post refused to ask him.

Specifically, their "reporter" Seth Colter Walls in "Fox News, GOP Tag-Team Obama With Voter Fraud Smear." Let's begin the deconstruction.

Friday morning, I made a 7:45am appearance on the Fox News Channel's Fox & Friends to discuss how nearly every media outlet is avoiding like the plague any coverage of Illinois Senator Barack Obama's long relationship with ACORN (the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), the serially criminal voter registration outfit.

So as to better explain why the press, who love Sen. Obama with the intensity of a thousand suns, would be steering clear of reporting on the connections, I cited briefly some basic factual information about Sen. Obama's dealings with ACORN. The media are sitting on this information because they know it would be very damaging to Sen. Obama and his Presidential campaign.

The ultimate objective in journalism is to deliver fresh information to the audience, to break heretofore unshattered stories.

Last night, ABC's Terry Moran did exactly that.

To get there, you must first wade through an extraordinary amount of Moran-Goo, as he slathers it liberally all over his reporting of the official nomination vote. But this is hardly groundbreaking. What comes next is.

The excited media throngs have already long hailed Illinois Senator Barack Obama for being the first bi-racial candidate ever to secure a major Party's nomination for President.

Moran yesterday added to the historic aura surrounding the Senator's parents.

Spreading the WordNewsBusters.org's parent company, the Media Research Center, today released the following statement (related to this NewsBusters post) from President L. Brent Bozell, III.

BOZELL: NEWSDAY SHOULD APOLOGIZE TO
LIMBAUGH, HANNITY AND O'REILLY
Columnist suggested radio hosts responsible for Tennessee church murders

ALEXANDRIA, VA - Media Research Center President L. Brent Bozell today sent a letter to Newsday Publisher Tim Knight demanding an apology for the August 13 column by Jenna Kern-Rugile entitled "Does shock jock hate speech lead to violence?" in which she inexplicably and noxiously links the contemptible July 27 murders committed in the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville to Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly.

Bozell also insisted that Ms. Rugile never again appear on the pages of Newsday.

MRC President L. Brent Bozell:

For Matthews,
A Major Award

Well that's a tad over the top, is it not?

A newly formed conglomeration of thirty women calling themselves The New Agenda (TNA) have convened to "pool (their) talents and leverage already established 'riends of the family' organizations to launch a grass roots and grass tops effort to register women voters, organize a national 'get out the vote' effort around women's issues," so says Amy Siskind, a member speaking for the new gaggle.

But that's not all they intend to do. They want to rid the world of misogynistic males, and MSNBC's Chris Matthews is first on their hit parade.

From their declaration:

Care to Revise and Extend Your Remarks, Sen. Obama?

Editor's Note: Update below the fold.

The uproar of the media, serving as adjunct PR firms in defense of their beloved Sen. Barack Obama in response to Sen. John McCain's video comparing the Illinois Senator to Paris Hilton, was deafening. The ad was described as "nasty," "childish" and "juvenile," a "strange" "nuclear attack" for having dared to compare their anointed one to the brainless celebutant hotel heiress.

Sen. McCain and his camp responded that it was all in good fun, and was made only to point out the ridiculous Tiger Beat-squealing teenage girl nature of the over-the-top, all-encompassing coverage thus far afforded Obama by his Paparazzi.

But it appears that someone years ago beat Sen. McCain to the comparison punch.

The networks suggest Obama is driving the narrative, but it's the liberal press themselves doing the driving for Obama

(Editor's Note: This essay originally appeared today in Human Events.)

Just Another Clown Delivering the News

The Big Three networks just foisted a week long Obamathon upon the American people, a political, "journalistic" perversion of Jerry Lewis's annual televised good deed.

Mr. Lewis raises money for a very worthy cause. CBS' Katie Couric, NBC's Brian Williams and ABC's Charlie Gibson attempted to raise the Presidential credibility of an inexperienced candidate by dutifully following Illinois Senator Barack Obama to the Middle East and Europe for six days and five nights of wall-to-wall slavish and adoring reporting.

This was an unprecedented media extravaganza. Never before have all three evening news anchors been drawn out of their chairs and all over the world together and on behalf of a candidate. Their coverage of Sen. Obama was as glitteringly positive as it was all-encompassing: the primary season without the Clinton distraction.

By week's end, the voters back here Stateside could well have forgotten that Senator Obama has an opponent.

Do they represent the people in their districts, or Nancy Pelosi?

The Spin Starts Here, or Do As I Say, Not As I DoCongressional Democrats remain silent, acquiescing in Speaker Nancy Pelosi's determination to prevent legislation to block the reimposition of the so-called Fairness Doctrine. For all their prattling about protecting civil liberties, none of them - not a single one - has so far signed the discharge petition to allow the Broadcasters' Freedom Act to be wrested from Pelosi's grip to protect our freedom of speech.

Where do they stand on the federal regulation that served for four decades to remove issues of import from the radio airwaves and left us with 24-hours a day of liberal dominance of the radio airwaves? (Ronald Reagan removed the restriction in 1987, and the rest has been Rush Limbaugh-led broadcasting history.)

These Ds have been this quiet because they are not at liberty to discuss it. What we have been witnessing is a remarkable exhibition of partisan discipline. Last summer Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued a diktat that no Donkey was to talk about the Fairness Doctrine, nor meet with anyone who wanted to talk about it. All the while she was repeatedly denying any Democratic interest in its revival.

And her subordinates have all come to heel. Pelosi herself, however, went on a bender and spilled the beans to John Gizzi in Human Events.

The media real estate rule: location, location, location

Liberal Scandals
Strategically Located
The Washington Post had two awful statements from Presidential campaign surrogates to work with last week. How it dealt with each of them is highly illustrative of how the media does its business.

Last Sunday evening the world was again made privy to the inner workings of the Reverend Jesse Jackson's mind, thanks to a moment of hot microphone pre-interview candor. Apparently, the Reverend Jackson is very, very angry with how Illinois Senator Barack Obama talks to black people, and with his pledge to up the ante on President George W. Bush's faith-based initiative. So perturbed is Jackson that he wishes to perform a certain ghastly procedure on the Senator, one that if executed on a sheep would be what a cowboy chef would say is the first step in the preparation of Rocky Mountain Oysters.

This is either a huge problem or a huge gift for the Illinois Senator. It is hardly good for a prominent Obama proxy to wish him castrated, worse still if he is so passionate about seeing it done that he is willing if not eager to do the job himself. On the other hand, it's a great opportunity for Obama to distance himself from the grievance-mongering Jackson and his ilk.

On Wednesday, Jackson officially retracted his desires to enter the eunuch-ing business, and on Thursday the Post delivered us the politically volatile goods like this (below the fold):

They make Reverend Wright and Trinity United disappear

The Media,
Lining it Up

And for their next trick, the media will stuff Illinois Senator Barack Obama’s liberalism back into his hat.

On Sunday, the Washington Post’s Jonathan Weisman gave us a 1,152 word news-ish story entitled “Obama Addresses His Faith”, which was a glowingly open forum for Obama to deliver “a highly personal account of his spiritual journey” and in which he proffered “a promise that he will make ‘faith-based’ social service ‘a moral center of (his) administration.’”

It’s hard to read the word “faith” in the same sentence as the name “Barack Obama” without thinking of the racist, anti-American radical Reverend Jeremiah Wright, who for twenty years served as the Senator’s pastor, and (as Obama described him) his “spiritual advisor” and “mentor”, in Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ. It cannot be accidental that the Washington Post made no mention whatsoever of Rev. Jeremiah Wright and Trinity United in a piece dedicated exclusively to the Senator’s religion.

Laura Ingraham, syndicated radio talk show host and now host of Just In on the Fox News Channel, filled in for Bill O'Reilly, syndicated radio talk show host, on his FNC Show The O'Reilly Factor on Friday, June 20.

And led off with her Talking Points Memo, in which she excoriated the left's call for the return of the Fairness Doctrine, dismantling and undermining every liberal (alleged) justification for its return.

The Fairness Doctrine would mean the end of conservative talk radio; death by governmental censorship. Let Congress know this can not happen.

If the Speaker vilifies U.S. soldiers and praises their Iranian killers, and the Jurassic Press doesn't report it, does it make a sound?

Last Thursday, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, third in line to the Presidency and currently the highest ranking Democrat on Planet Earth, sat down for an 80-minute chat with reporters and editorial board members of her home district's San Francisco Chronicle. 62 minutes in, Madame Speaker, pontificating on the Iraq surge, offered up the following:

"Whatever the military success and any progress that may have been made, the surge didn't accomplish its goal. ... And some of the success of the surge is that the goodwill of the Iranians -- they decided in Basra when the fighting would end, they negotiated that cessation of hostilities -- the Iranians."

An April 7 CBS Evening News report on the health care monetary burden of illegal aliens on American taxpayers has just now drawn the ire and the fire of the two largest Hispanic grievance groups -- the National Council of La Raza (translation: "The Race") and the Mexican American Legal and Educational Fund (MAL (not Mos) DEF).

Byron Pitts' piece is fairly mild and pretty much down the middle of the fairway, and CBS News and their (for now) flagship girl Katie Couric deserve kudos for at least addressing the issue.

But the Latino Intolerance Duo (LID -- as in flipped their's) can not let stand unchallenged the reporting of the costs of the invasion. Pitts pointing out that someone somewhere (that would of course be us) must pick up the tab -- when the likes of Fabiola (the illegal alien mother featured in the story) does not -- is to them an "anti-Latino falsehood". They do not offer how or why something so obvious as this is either "anti-Latino" or a "falsehood" -- we are left to assume that their asserting it empirically makes it so.

On our end, there was bit of a bone to be picked with the Tiffany Network's numbers.