McClatchy News -- the paper chain that likes to claim they speak "truth to power" -- is pleased to show us "another side" to the Iran backed Iraqi militia leader Muqtada al Sadr and that other side is his supposed "charity work." It has been a common tactic of Muslim warlords and other terrorists to pretend at "charity" as they plan suicide bombings and targeted terror attacks among the very people they pretend to be helping with their "charity." The so-called charity is but a screen to hide their terror activities behind, a salve to keep the locals from getting too uppity. But, McClatchy had their hearts go aflutter over Sadr's "humanitarian aid" imagining it to be the "other" softer side of the terror chieftain giving Sadr a nice little bit of free positive publicity quite despite the truth of his murderous actions.

The McClatchy piece written by Shashank Bengali with the assistance of Leila Fadel and special correspondent Hussein Kadhim, detail all the wonderful works of Sadr as he helps people so brutally harmed by... you guessed it... the United States military.

I noted a few weeks ago (at BizzyBlog; at NewsBusters) that Mike Celizic at MSNBC couldn't get though his article about Jenna Bush's upcoming wedding without bringing up her misdemeanor arrests from seven years ago.

Julie Mason of the Houston Chronicle also went there in a late Thursday report. She also threw in a number of shots at Jenna's father, his administration, and his hometown:

Saturday, in an Oscar de la Renta gown with twin sister Barbara at her side, Jenna Bush, 26, will marry 29-year-old business school student Henry Hager at her parents' Central Texas ranch.

It's probably as close as Oscar de la Renta will ever get to Crawford.

The AP article as headlined in the Houston Chronicle:

"Militiamen ambush drives back US patrol in Sadr City"

The story reports:

"The U.S. Military said 28 militamen were killed as the U.S. patrol pulled back."

Not exactly.

Bill Roggio at The Long War Journal gives us the important details. The title of his article?

"US troops kill 28 Mahdi fighters during Sadr City ambush"

His story reports:

It seems to matter little whether the location is Gaza or Baghdad. If there is a way to spin a story, Associated Press reporters will find it.

Today, American forces called in an AC-130 for support when they came under fire in the Kazimiyah district of Baghdad.

The Associated Press editorializes:

The AC-130, a lethal tool used by the military since the Vietnam War, can slowly circle over a target for long periods.

Human rights groups have criticized their use in urban settings where militants may be among crowded populations of noncombatants. The four-engine gunships were also used to support the U.S. attack that took the western city of Fallujah from insurgents in November 2004.

What the Associated Press does not mention is that the modern AC-130U is the most complex aircraft weapons system on the planet, and the reason for its complexity is that the aircraft's sensors, navigation, and fire control systems are calibrated to conduct exceedingly accurate surgical strikes. It is likely because of their precision strike capabilities that the AC-130U was chosen for this mission over other available means of attack.

The obsession continues. Yet another Hollywood leftist is coming out with an anti-Iraq war movie. This time, it's "Sixteen Candles" star John Cusack who is begging us to take his political views seriously with his new film, "War, Inc," styled as a "dark, political satire," which seems basically to mean ham-fisted film à clef set around the fictional country of Turaqistan.

Making her debut in liberal wrist-slitting films is Hillary Duff, one of the many teen princesses manufactured by the Disney empire, who seems to be trying to earn some sort of credibility by screeching about politics.

"We're trying to raise awareness with it. It is funny and it is bizarre and a little disturbing," the former Lizzie McGuire told Reuters. "But really at the end of the day it's looking at what (our country is) doing, and it's not right."

Perception is everything, facts are trivial to April Ryan, judging from two recent comments from American Urban Radio Network's White House correspondent. [audio available here]

At the April 29 Rose Garden press conference, Ryan asked President Bush the following question about the economy:

I talked to [Rep.] James Clyburn [D-S.C.] before this press conference. He said, "As a man thinketh, so are we." And Americans believe we are in a recession. What will it take for you to say those words, that we are in a recession?

Of course the following day, data from the federal government show the U.S. economy in slow economic growth, but far from the six months of negative growth needed for a recession. No matter to Ryan, who today went from applying the "as a man thinketh" logic to a 5-year old liberal media meme about the war in Iraq. Appearing shortly after 11:30 a.m. EDT on MSNBC to discuss the 2008 presidential race, Ryan parroted liberal talking points on the Iraq war:

On Thursday’s CBS "Early Show" co-host Russ Mitchell thought it was news-worthy to remember the five year anniversary of when President Bush announced the end of "major combat operations in Iraq" under a banner reading "Mission Accomplished": "The Bush Administration is trying to explain its use exactly five years ago of the phrase ‘Mission Accomplished.’" However, no mention was made on April 9 of the anniversary of the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime.

Correspondent Bill Plante reported that: "As the war progressed and casualties mounted, the phrase became a symbol of all that had gone wrong." Plante then played a clip of David Mark of the Politico, who explained: "‘Mission Accomplished’ stands for what seems like endless occupation, five years plus, after the initial invasion. It means ongoing war with no end in sight."

Earlier in the report Plante remarked: "And Press Secretary Dana Perino says the Administration has certainly paid the price." He concluded the segment by declaring: "And no one around here ever uses the phrase. Instead, they say, as the president says, that we have to ‘continue doing the job.’"

Q. Is there any level to which Helen Thomas won't stoop?

A. Apparently not.

That's my conclusion, based on Thomas's exchange during today's press gaggle with White House Press Secretary Dana Perino. Here is the front page of today's Washington Post to which Thomas refers [warning: graphic image]. A slide-show from WaPo's web edition contains another photo of what appears to be the same child, with this legend:

Two-year-old Ali Hussein is pulled from the rubble of his family's home in the Shiite stronghold of Sadr City in Baghdad, Iraq on Tuesday, April 29, 2008. The child, who later died in hospital, was in one of four homes allegedly destroyed by U.S. missiles. More than two dozen people were killed when Shiite militants ambushed a U.S. patrol in Baghdad's embattled Sadr City district, bringing the death toll in area on Tuesday to more than 30, a U.S. military spokesman and Iraqi officials said. (AP Photo/Karim Kadim)

Here's the exchange between Thomas and Perino.

HELEN THOMAS: Do you think it's worth a million Iraqi deaths, to continue to bomb the Iraqis who did nothing to us?

The Taliban suffered a big loss in Pakistan/Afghanistan this month and so did al Qaeda in Iraq, but the MSM has been practically silent on these great successes. It only goes to show that the media is so completely sold on the claim that the war is lost that they aren't interested in doing any real reporting on the war.

Not only has Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki headed up a brilliantly successful attack on rebel leader and Iranian backed Moqtada al-Sadr and his Mahdi army in Basra, but it seems that Maliki's hard-line against Sadr has convinced Iraq's main Sunni block to return to their places in the Iraqi government. Sadr has called for a ceasefire between forces loyal to him and the Iraqi government. At this point, al-Maliki seems poised on a breakthrough in Iraqi affairs that could lead to more involvement and less bloodshed. This is all something that few expect possible only a few months ago.

The western press has reported the information above widely, if not enthusiastically, but that isn't the only good news in Iraq. What seems to have been given short shrift is the fact that al Qaeda has been severely hurt in Iraq, even "decapitated."

Appearing on the April 29 edition of "The View," former House Speaker Newt Gingrich proved his intellectual superiority to Joy Behar punching holes in her very shallow debate points. Also, in discussing the ongoing Reverend Wright controversy, Whoopi Goldberg placed Billy Graham in league with Wright and Louis Farrakhan. [audio version of embedded video available here]

In challenging Newt Gingrich’s assertion that there’s a sympathy on the far left for America haters such as William Ayers, Behar inquired, "there’s no romance going on between the hard right of this country and Saudi Arabia let’s say?" Gingrich swiftly answered "the hard right in this country deeply dislikes Saudi Arabia as the source of Wahabbist funding."

President Bush is holding a press conference on the U.S. economy. I'll be blogging the questions to the president below.

Video of Bush/Raddatz clash here (audio available here).

Video of Stolberg and Ryan on recession here (audio here)

My bottom line analysis (11:25): The two R's of bias from this Rose Garden presser: Martha Raddatz on Syria and numerous reporters on the dreaded R-word, recession. Of course a recession is two consecutive quarters of NEGATIVE economic growth, and we've yet to see one quarter of negative growth, much less two. But all the same, NY Times's Stolberg made it sound like Q1 numbers on GDP tomorrow will show a recession.

The questions below will be posted in reverse chronological order:

One small step for David Axelrod, one giant leap for Barack Obama away from Jeremiah Wright . . .

When chief Obama strategist Axelrod appeared at the end of this evening's Hardball, I expected him to dodge the current Rev. Wright controversy with some bromide about the reverend's right to express his opinions. But—in evidence of just how badly Wright's current comments are hurting Obama—Axelrod surprised me by acknowledging that he wished Wright hadn't piped up and suggesting that the good reverend's out for Numero Uno. Axelrod did manage to work in a blame-the-media angle.

View video here. [Note: Axelrod comments come after Matthews takes shot at Bill Kristol.]

CBS News journalist Richard Butler doesn't know who kidnapped him (for some two months), but he thinks it was some Iraqi policemen who are sympathetic to, of all folks, Hezbollah:

Butler, a British journalist kidnapped with his interpreter on Feb. 10, was rescued by Iraqi troops on April 14 when he was found with a sack over his head in a house in Basra.

He was taken from a hotel room in Basra, where he was on a trip to meet the chief of staff for anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Men wearing police fatigue uniforms and armed with AK-47's hustled him out of the room and into a car. He was first taken to a police station in Basra and then was held in different places — including three nights where he was sealed into a small room between two walls, he said.

While he was held, he heard a lot of Hezbollah propaganda video and Hezbollah ringtones on mobile phones, but he can't be sure his captors were affiliated with the organization.

CNN’s Rick Sanchez, who is interviewing apparent first-time voters as part of CNN’s series titled “The League of First Time Voters,” featured a group of young Muslim voters in a segment that aired on “American Morning” and CNN’s “Newsroom” program on Thursday, and asked them a series of questions that seemed tailored for the American Islamic community. In his first question, Sanchez asked, “When you hear the words 'War on Terror,' what do you think?” Later, he asked, “You think our policy in Iraq and our policy throughout the Middle East in the last six, seven years has actually helped Osama bin Laden?” [video available here]

After his “War on Terror” question, which was answered by a young man, Sanchez asked, “Raise your hand if you think the War in Iraq was a mistake. Every single one of you thinks the War in Iraq is a mistake. Why is it a mistake?” Two people, one man and one woman, answered, and they listed a variety of reasons. Sanchez then asked his “bin Laden” question. After woman answered affirmatively, he followed-up by asking, “We've given him what he wanted? Is that what you're saying?” Two others answered his question as well.

To the New York Times there is only one issue in America: the war.

To show how pathetic The New York Times and John Broder are at analyzing the current political climate, all one has to do is read "Gore-Lieberman: A Hyphen Apart? Try Poles." Here the Times clearly reveals that they see but two types of American politician: the good guys against the war, and the evil ones for it. That's it. To the Times there is no other issue, no other divide, no other substantive thought, no other thing that separates our leaders one from the other. There is only the war and nothing else.

In this empty piece, the Times posits that should Al Gore had won in 2000 instead of George W. Bush, the second Gore administration would have seen a dump Lieberman movement that would have resulted in a different Gore vice-president in 2006.

Weather Underground leader turned-academic William Ayers is now so docile that it never really "bothered anyone in Chicago," that Sen. Barack Obama had any connection to him, wrote Chicago Sun-Times reporter Lynn Sweet in the April 18 paper. Along those same lines the Washington Post's Peter Slevin argued that the '60s radical was now "considered so mainstream" in Chicago "that [Mayor Richard] Daley issued a statement on Thursday praising him as a 'distinguished professor of education' and a 'valued member of the Chicago community.'"

But while he may have forsaken violence long ago, as his blog attests, Ayers's politics are far from mainstream, and go far beyond the standard Democratic arguments to withdraw from Iraq. For example, Ayers wants to pay reparations in Iraq AND Afghanistan and practically withdraw the U.S. military from the entirety of the Middle East, even in countries that have longstanding security arrangements with the U.S.

Taken from an April 13 blog post titled originally enough, "End the War" (emphasis mine):

Despite the liberal media’s outrage over ABC’s handling of the Democratic debate, ABC’s "The View" had no criticism. On the April 17 edition, Barbara Walters actually praised Gibson and Stephanopoulos for the tough questions. She also noted the candidates made "some very important points...that we have not heard before." Even reliably left wing partisan Joy Behar, also an ABC employee, had no criticisms.

Discussing Charlie Gibson’s question if the winner of the nomination will pick the runner up as a running mate, Joy Behar finally discovered that the Constitution originally awarded the second place finisher to the vice presidency. Did Behar learn this through extensive research or just simply reading the Constitution? Nope. She acquired this knowledge from watching HBO.

BEHAR: I’ve been watching the "John Adams" miniseries on HBO I believe, or Showtime. And in those days, the president, who was elected by the Electoral College, got to be the president. And the second, who got the second most votes, was automatically the vice president.

GOLDBERG: Which is what I said months ago.

BEHAR: So that really is very American from the founding fathers to the-