CNN Scrubs Palin from NewsBusters Covered Criminal Politicians Story

January 6th, 2009 2:23 AM

As most of you know, I originally posted this story on Sunday under the headline CNN Places Sarah Palin With 2008's Criminals, Sex Addicts, and the Corrupt here at NewsBusters. It raged all day Sunday in the Blogosphere and into the night among Palin fans and center right bloggers. Greta Van Susteren even posted about it on her FoxNews blog (It garnered 4 pages of comments there, too). A quick Google of the title of my NewsBusters piece gives several pages of hits all across the web. FreeRepublic, Lucianne.com, dozens of blogs and message boards took CNN to task for their outrageous inclusion of Sarah Palin's name among the year's worst criminal politicians.

Well by the time Monday morning arrived, CNN quietly and without explanation or apology erased Sarah Palin from the article I describe earlier.

So, it appears that CNN has thought better of including Governor Sarah Palin's name among the other criminal politicians of 2008. They quietly and without explanation removed her from their slide show. We have a small victory for holding the Old Media accountable here, I suppose, but it is awfully interesting that CNN just rewrote history without explanation. Don't you think?

Josh Painter of RedState also wrote of this scrubbing:

An outcry immediately went up from the Sarah Palin blogging community, and other conservative bloggers quickly followed suit... Now, without posting an apology, retraction or even a single word of explanation, Sarah Palin’s name has been completely removed from the piece as it now appears on CNN’s website. Such “scrubbing” is a familiar tactic employed by the left, as they take their cue from the Communist Party style book. The damage has already been done, so a retraction wouldn’t mean much, except to demonstrate that CNN has at least a modicum of journalistic integrity left... Apparently it does not.

I can't say I disagree with a word Josh wrote there!

Not liking, even hating Palin -- like a choice few here at NB do -- is one thing. But it is simply illegitimate to place her among the criminals that CNN grouped her with. It is just beyond that pale plain and simple. Even CNN finally came to realize that.

So, what say you NewsBusters readers? A victory, or even more proof of bias and underhandedness from CNN?