Capital Punishment

The Boston Herald has broken the story -- a scoop even the Boston Globe has acknowledged -- that "Tamerlan Tsarnaev was living on taxpayer-funded state welfare benefits even as he was delving deep into the world of radical anti-American Islamism."

A responsible national establishment press would treat this as an important story, because, as the Herald's Chris Cassidy noted in the understatement of the day, it "raises questions over whether Tsarnaev financed his radicalization on taxpayer money." Several paragraphs from the Herald story, followed by a look at how Todd Wallack and Beth Healy at the Globe handled their story on the family's finances, follow the jump.

Last week, MSNBC's Chris Matthews was seen shortly after the Boston Marathon bombings wondering whether they had anything to do with "Tax Day" (which it wasn't in Massachusetts; it was Patriots' Day, a state holiday, and the tax filing deadline there was not until the next day) and asserting that "Normally domestic terrorists, people, tend to be on the far right."

Now Matthews appears not to be interested in finding out what motivated the Tsarnaev brothers, accused of perpetrating the Boston Marathon bombings, to do what they allegedly did, as the following passage from an April 22 "Hardball" discussion with an incredulous FBI profiler found at RealClearPolitics tells us (bolds are mine):

An unbylined Associated Press report (graphic saved here) appearing at ABC News (time-stamped 9:51 a.m. at the AP's main national site; graphic saved here) reports that Boston Mayor Tom Menino appeared on ABC's "This Week" and said, in the AP's words, that "the suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing acted alone."

The brief AP report's third paragraph then has Menino saying, again in AP's words, that "another person was taken into custody" after "a pipe bomb was found in another location." This apparent inconsistency seems to be an attempt by the mayor to minimize the degree of homegrown "sleeper cell" concerns, especially in light of reports containing a cascade of contradicting details which follow the jump.

One would expect that everyone associated with an outlet which characterizes itself as the be-all, end-all of online encyclopedias would be on board to make sure there is space for an entry on the person who may, when all is said and done, be shown to have been among the worst, if not the worst, mass murderers in U.S. history -- and maybe, if ABC's Terry Moran is correct, "the most successful serial killer in the history of the world."

Nope. It appears that earlier this week, an editor at Wikipedia proposed deleting an already-existing entry on Kermit Gosnell because, according to the relevant "Articles for deletion" page at the site, "His case has not received national attention. It is a local multiple-murder story in Pennsylvania, nothing more." As outrageous as this suggestion was, it should be noted that all but one of several dozen responses to the suggestion advocated keeping the entry. Excerpts from the Daily Caller's coverage follow the jump.

When the grand jury report in the Kermit Gosnell trial was released yesterday, one would think that the media would have as the primary takeaway the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's documentation of the numerous atrocities committed in this house of horrors.  Yet, for the Associated Press, the real victims seemed to be Gosnell's employees, those poor folks who had no job prospects than infanticide.

Of the eight co-workers charged in the aftermath of Gosnell’s arrest, three have pleaded guilty to third-degree murder.  Nonetheless, they all say that they were just doing what they were instructed to do, simply following orders.  Ed Morrissey at Hot Air posted yesterday about MaryClaire Dale of AP, and her April 12 story that lamented how these workers had “few options” for employment:

In the paper's only story relating to the trial of late-term abortionist Kermit Gosnell on March 19 on Page A17, Jon Hurdle at the New York Times opened (HT Twitchy.com) by telling readers that "In opening statements in court on Monday, prosecutors charged that a doctor who operated a women’s health clinic here killed seven viable fetuses ..." -- not already-born infants.

On April 12, while attempting to defend the establishment press's general failure to cover the Gosnell trial ("Why Are the Media Apologizing About Kermit Gosnell Coverage?"), Josh Dzieza at the Daily Beast wrote that "Gosnell is accused of providing late-term abortions by inducing labor and then severing the fetus’ spinal cord with scissors." Uh, Josh, at that point anyone should concede that we're talking about a b-b-b-b ... baby. Gosh, even the obviously proabort Associated Press, aka the Administration's Press, concedes that.

One of the more bizarre memes propagated by the proabort left about the trial of Kermit Gosnell, who "faces 43 criminal counts, including eight counts of murder in the death of one patient, Karnamaya Monger, and seven newborn infants," is that Fox News has been almost as negligent in covering the story and the trial as the Big Three broadcast networks, and that conservative media in general have also mostly ignored the story.

Through Monday evening, April 8, the Media Research Center's Matt Philbin noted that Gosnell's trial "has received exactly zero seconds of airtime on the broadcast networks." In a pathetic attempt at a response on Friday, Salon's Alex Seitz-Wald and several others are trying to claim that "conservative" outlets have also virtually ignored the trial. Seitz-Wald's own text shows that his argument is weak, as seen in excerpts following the jump.

Following up on two previous posts (here and here at NewsBusters; here and here at BizzyBlog) -- The Associated Press has, as of early this evening, failed to use its "abortion" tag in all but one of its 23 "Big Story" items (14 articles and 9 photos) relating to Kermit Gosnell, the Philadelphia late term abortionist who "faces 43 criminal counts, including eight counts of murder in the death of one patient, Karnamaya Monger, and seven newborn infants."

In the over 50 other instances where it has used the "abortion" tag, the topics involved were the 2012 presidential race between Mitt Romney and Barack Obama, state and worldwide efforts to either restrict or expand the practice, and, in one stunning example, a positive story about how "A new clinic offering abortions and other women's medical services saw its first patient Thursday in the Wichita building where a slain Kansas abortion provider had practiced." The slain abortionist, George Tiller, was murdered by a disturbed man who had no involvement with the prolife movement. The AP does have two other abortion-related tags that it has inconsistently applied to Gosnell's "Big Story" articles. Those tags are "abortion controversy" and (I'm not kidding) "reproductive rights."

On Wednesday (at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog, I noted that the Associated Press had, up to that point, failed to apply its "abortion" tag to any of its 19 "Big Story" items (11 reports and 8 photo captions) on Kermit Gosnell, the Philadelphia late-term abortionist who, as Life News usefully reminded us yesterday, is current being tried and "faces 43 criminal counts, including eight counts of murder in the death of one patient, Karnamaya Monger, and seven newborn infants."

Well, it may just be a weird coincidence, but on Thursday, in a story ("RECEPTIONIST: UNLICENSED DOC FLED PA. CLINIC RAID") by Maryclaire Daly, who on March 25 infamously described Gosnell as "an elegant man who ... smiled softly" in court, the self-described Essential Global News Network finally used its "abortion" tag in connection with Gosnell. As a public service, since it seems unlikely that AP will go back and apply the tag to the previous stories with its "kermit gosnell" tag, yours truly is listing them after the jump, in the hope that future searchers for information on "abortion" and "crime" will have a better chance of finding what the AP, up until Thursday, has preferred to keep relatively hidden:

Sure, you might be cool with Barack Obama calling up a drone strike on an American citizen.  But don't forget: a Republican [shudder!] could become President!

That was the Washington Post editorialist Jonathan Capehart's warning to Donny Deutsch when the ad-man-turned-pundit proclaimed he had no problem with the president, under desperate circumstances, ordering a drone strike against an American.  View the video after the jump.

With this afternoon's Senate confirmation hearings for CIA director nominee John Brennan in view, the February 7 broadcast of Now with Alex Wagner devoted significant attention to the Obama administration's use of armed drones and the recently-leaked DOJ White Paper defending the legitimacy of drone strikes that explicitly targeted American civilians overseas. 

For her part, host Alex Wagner failed to mention Anwar al-Awlaki’s activities as a terrorist operative affiliated with al-Qaeda.  The Now host merely tagged al-Awlaki as an American-born cleric, even though he served as a talent recruiter within the organization and inspired Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hassan.  Al-Awlaki also had contact with Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the terrorist who attempted to blow up a passenger airliner on Christmas Day of 2009.  None of that was mentioned on the show. 

Barack The First? Wow: who would have thought that perhaps the strongest statement yet in condemnation of President Obama's self-arrogated right to kill Americans abroad would have come from Jon Meacham?  Yet on today's Morning Joe, historian Meacham—who knows something about the use and abuse of presidential power—criticized Obama for ignoring the "rule of law" and actually described Obama as acting like "an American king."

Joe Scarborough seconded Meacham's surprising statement, adding that had this come to light under George W. Bush, impeachment would be in the air.  View the video after the jump.

The leftist bias of the New York Times beautifully encapsulated in seven words used about a week before two presidential elections. Headline over Saturday’s editorial on the third quarter GDP creeping up to 2.0 percent under Democrat Barack Obama: “Slow but Steady Improvement.” Headline twenty years ago (October 29, 1992) when Republican incumbent George H.W. Bush was in the White House and the third quarter GDP nearly doubled to 2.7 percent: “Gross National Letdown.”

During the "New Rule" segment ending Friday's Real Time with Bill Maher on HBO, host Maher asserted that the painted over "N****head Ranch" rock on Texas Governor Rick Perry's hunting territory is a "metaphor" for the Republican Party, because it is "overtly racist bulls*** thinly painted over." Maher also displayed the words "The Bigotest Loser" while an image of Perry was shown on screen.

Maher began the "New Rule" segment:

It's going to be a long campaign . . . Republicans haven't come close to choosing their presidential candidate yet, but already a proud member of the MSM is calling a leading GOP contender a "killer."

On his MSNBC show this evening, Crazy Larry O'Donnell accused Rick Perry of being--for his record of enforcing the Texas law on capital punishment--the Republicans' "favorite killer, favorite state-sanctioned killer."  Video after the jump.

Update: Full transcript added.

During the weekly "Today's Professionals" panel discussion in the 9 a.m. ET hour of Thursday's NBC "Today," while on the subject of the execution of Troy Davis, attorney Star Jones used the opportunity to proclaim: "You're never going to see a rich, white man being put to death in the United States of America. That's not going to happen right now." [Audio available here]

The outburst was prompted when co-host and panel moderator Savannah Guthrie wondered: "Some people....think the system is rigged against the poor in our society, against African-Americans in particular, and I wonder what your view is of that?"

View video after the jump

Good Morning America's Steve Osunsami on Thursday skipped or spun key facts while reporting on the execution of convicted cop killer Troy Davis in Georgia. The ABC reporter also played up the race angle, asserting that "supporters are asking difficult questions about the legal system, whether Davis' case would have gotten a greater re-examination if he were white and not black." However, he ignored the execution of a white man in Texas-- on the same day.

In that state, white supremacist Russell Brewer was put to death for the brutal murder of James Byrd. Osunsami left out other details in the Davis case. He noted that the "murder weapon was never found." However, the journalist didn't mention that Davis' gun had been used in another crime on the same day of the shooting and that the cartridges match.

Update: Full transcript added below.

Discussing the execution of convicted cop-killer Troy Davis on Thursday's NBC Today, co-host Matt Lauer asked left-wing activist and MSNBC host Al Sharpton if he was "surprised" by most Americans supporting the death penalty. Sharpton declared: "When I'm watching Republican debates and see people cheering...that 234 people were killed in Texas under Governor Perry, it doesn't surprise me." [Audio available here]

Sharpton went on to argue that the United States was guilty of violating human rights: "How do you think we look to the world when a man with this kind of doubt was executed by the state last night and we're lecturing them on human rights?"  

View video after the jump

For decades, liberals tried persuading Americans to abolish the death penalty, using their usual argument: hysterical sobbing.

Only when the media began lying about innocent people being executed did support for the death penalty begin to waver, falling from 80 percent to about 60 percent in a little more than a decade. (Silver lining: That's still more Americans than believe in man-made global warming.)
Fifty-nine percent of Americans now believe that an innocent man has been executed in the last five years. There is more credible evidence that space aliens have walked among us than that an innocent person has been executed in this country in the past 60 years, much less the past five years.

During a prerecorded commentary on CBS Sunday Morning, left-wing CBS commentator Nancy Giles complained about the "bloodlust" of GOP audience members who applauded Texas's use of capital punishment at the recent MSNBC debate and a small number of audience members who applauded at Monday's CNN debate after moderator Wolf Blitzer asked if someone who chose not to purchase insurance should be allowed to die.

CBS played a clip of the exchanges but notably left out Rep. Ron Paul's answer to Blitzer's question as he argued that organizations like churches used to help provide health care before Medicaid existed, leaving Giles to give the impression that Rep. Paul had been unconcerned about the uninsured dying. Giles:

Ah, this would explain the blood on his hands.

Rachel Maddow continues her yeoman's work as propagandist for Democrats, dishonestly attributing power over sentencing in Texas murder cases to Gov. Rick Perry instead of with juries where it actually resides. (video after page break)

In next year's presidential election, the toughest opponent the eventual Republican nominee will face will be the liberal press. As a political neophyte who had not even completed a single term in the U.S. Senate prior to his election, Barack Obama was and is a creature of the media. Without the iron-clad grip that liberals hold on public discourse at the national level, there's simply no way that he ever would have been elected in 2008. His numerous subsequent failures have made it all the more necessary that liberal journalists come forward to obfuscate his failures and shift attention to attacks on Republicans. Fear and loathing is the new hope-a-dope.

There's a growing sense of this reality on the right which is why the focus in the primary season has increasingly turned to the self-proclaimed objective press, particularly during last night's debate hosted by NBC News and the Politico.

I blogged earlier about Newt Gingrich's attack on co-moderator John F. Harris but another moment of note last night was when Harris's colleague, NBC anchor Brian Williams, haughtily attacked the audience after it sarcastically cheered against his question to Texas governor Rick Perry about capital punishment.

"On executions, Perry easily holds the record," blares the top headline on page A3 of today's Washington Post.

"Issue likely to be debated in 2012 race," a subheadline to the story notes although nowhere in his 37-paragraph article does reporter Robert Barnes cite polling data that suggest capital punishment is an issue of primary or even secondary concern to likely 2012 presidential voters.

In October 25, 2007, a U.S. Army specialist in Afghanistan braved enemy fire in an attempt to save a fellow soldier who had been wounded in an ambush. An insurgent bullet struck his armored chest plate, knocking him down. He got up and rushed back into enemy fire to retrieve his fallen comrade. He threw several hand grenades toward the enemy, and was able to grab his colleague and immediately begin first aid. Though the man he'd risked his life for later died from the wounds, his heroic actions didn't go unnoticed. Army Staff Sgt. Salvatore Giunta, received the medal of honor on November 16, 2010 from the White House for his valiant actions in attempting to save his fellow soldier.

Former New York Times columnist Bob Herbert appeared on Thursday night on The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC to discuss how the death penalty demonstrates how America is marred by “such a macho culture, such a violent culture” that we would actually execute murderers and politicians haven't completely banned it.

For her part, Maddow tried to imply that there’s race-baiting politics involved, which is like preaching to Herbert’s choir. She insisted a new resurgence of tough-on-crime politics is typified by how Fox News is “trying to hype the issue of urban crime with racial overtones.”