CNN.com

On this day in the year 2000, the guided missile destroyer USS Cole was attacked by Islamic terrorists associated with Osama bin Laden's al-Quaeda group. Today is the seventh anniversary of that attack. Seventeen American sailors were killed and thirty-eight injured in the attack which severely damaged the ship. Yet not a single major media organ has reported this so far.

Attacking a warship has been long viewed as an act of war. The most recent example occured in 1968 when North Korea attacked the USS Pueblo. To our national shame, the Pueblo is still in the hands of that country. A rather more forceful response occurred in 1941, when Japan attacked the US Pacific Fleet at anchor in Pearl Harbor.

Earlier today President Bush vetoed a bill to expand the federal State Children's Health Insurance Plans (SCHIP) by $35 billion over five years. Reporting the story, CNN.com pulled out all the stops, showing a cutesy photo of kid protesters on Lafayette Square (pictured at right) and rounding up a negative quote from an otherwise conservative Republican:

Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah was among those Republicans who split from the president. "It's very difficult for me to be against a man I care so much for," he told his colleagues on the Senate floor before the vote. "It's unfortunate that the president has chosen to be on what, to me, is clearly the wrong side of this issue."

A Washington Post-ABC News poll conducted September 27-30 found 72 percent of those surveyed support an increase in spending on the program, with 25 percent opposed. The poll's margin of error was 3 percentage points.

Ya gotta love this e-mail from CNNMoney.com:

So what level has did the Dow reach, O friendly CNN e-mailer?

Could it possibly have been a nice round number? Like, say, 14000? You wouldn't want readers to pick up any unwarranted optimism, would you?

The CNN.com article "Mistake Costs Dishwasher $59,000" details the trials and tribulations of Pedro Zapeta, an illegal immigrant from Guatemala. The article explains that:

Two years ago, Zapeta was ready to return to Guatemala, so he carried a duffel bag filled with $59,000 -- all the cash he had scrimped and saved over the years -- to the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.

So an illegal immigrant (who, by the way, doesn't speak English) tries to leave the country on an airplane with $59,000 cash stuffed in a duffel bag. How could this plan go wrong?

The article goes on to paint Zapeta in the most sympathetic light possible, pointing out that Zapeta, "lived his version of the American dream in Stuart, Florida: washing dishes and living frugally to bring money back to his home country." The article claimed that Zapeta had worked in this country for 11 years.

The websites of CNN and USAToday joined their "Big Three" network brethren in covering the march in Jena, Louisiana to support the so-called Jena 6, while at the same time, either burying mention of the teenager who was beaten by the six high school students, or not mentioning him at all.

CNN.com’s report, in which CNN correspondents Susan Roesgen, Tony Harris, Kyra Philips and Eliott McLaughlin were contributors, didn’t mention Justin Barker until the twenty-second paragraph of the story.

The teens were initially charged with attempted murder after they allegedly knocked out Justin Barker -- a white classmate -- while stomping and kicking him during a school fight on December 4, 2006.

Barker was taken to a hospital with injuries to both eyes and ears as well as cuts. His right eye had blood clots, said his mother, Kelli Barker.

Before this, the report focused entirely on the planned march in support of the so-called Jena 6.

The media predictably went into full frenzy mode in reporting the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. But leave it to the Cable News Network to interject its own brand of social commentary into the discussion. On CNN.com's Political Ticker, contributor Roland Martin openly suggests that it is "[t]ime for a black attorney general."

In the article, Martin praises PepsiCo executive Larry Thompson as an ideal candidate for nomination. 

CNN's Pressroom announced that its upcoming six-hour special “God's Warriors,” reported by Christiane Amanpour, will discuss “the impact of religious fundamentalism as a powerful political force.” In the process, CNN revealed what it thinks about the various “fundamentalists” around the world by pushing the typical multi-culti PC media position that no one religion is more problematic or violent than another, with all types of fundamentalism being equally dangerous.

Their examples of fundamentalists spoke volumes. Photo captions on the program's website easily labeled a Jewish group “terrorist,” but in every mention, called Palestinian suicide bombers “martyr” or “martyrs.” Into that mix of religious violence, CNN bizarrely included the non-violent American Christian youth group, Battle Cry. Sure, that makes sense. No conviction by association there.

As oil and gas prices have risen over the past few years, more and more Americans have become familiar with the name Trilby Lundberg.

For those that aren’t, the Lundberg Survey has been the source for information related to fuel prices, fuel taxes, and all things petroleum for over fifty years.

With that in mind, Lundberg was interviewed by the folks at CNN.com last Wednesday, and the never shy energy maven spoke candidly about a variety of issues that most in the media would be afraid to share with the citizenry (emphasis added throughout):

On the same day that he attacked the GOP as being "scared of black folks," CNN contributor Roland Martin posted a column on CNN.com in which he proclaimed the "irrelevancy" of Pope Benedict XVI and the Catholic Church, specifically in the context of a recent document that clarified what the Catholic Church teaches about other Christian denominations. He advised non-Catholic Christians that they "shouldn't even bother getting upset" over the recent document issued by the Catholic Church. "Just chalk up to an old man trying to get a little attention," he said of Pope Benedict XVI. Martin also described the Pope as a "hardliner" who was trying to correct interpretations of the Second Vatican Council by liberals, who, in the Pope's view, had gone "too far in some of their declarations." At the same time, he also praised a Catholic priest in Chicago (Martin's current place of residence) who launched a death threat publically against a gun shop owner in a nearby suburb earlier this year.

Martin's column, as described by CNN, "are part of an occasional series of commentaries on CNN.com that offers a broad range of perspectives, thoughts, and points of view." CNN's own past indicates that they probably aren't going to make the "range of perspectives" very broad. When controversy erupted over the Danish Mohammed cartoons in 2006, they took the following stance: "CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons in respect for Islam."

CNN says Ohio policeman and slaying suspect Bobby Cutts Jr. is just a “complex” guy in a headline on a June 26th AP story.  Slaying suspect Cutts had complex personal life 

Yeah, it’s complex all right. Cutts fathered four kids with three  women, and then allegedly murdered his pregnant girlfriend. To most people, that’s evil. To CNN, it’s merely … complex. As Culture and Media Institute writer David Niedrauer notes, “They tell the story as if circumstances simply drove a good man to do an evil thing.”

As Democrats complain about conservative dominance on the radio, the hypocrisy is made crystal clear when America's leading wire service copies talking points directly from one of Howard Dean’s e-mail messages for a hit piece on looming Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson.

Such was identified by Steve Hill of Target Rich Environment who brilliantly outlined the similarities between an e-mail message he received Friday from the Democratic National Committee chairman (complete text with timestamp and e-mail address to follow) with an Associated Press article published Tuesday at CNN.com (emphasis added throughout):

In a piece that analyzes New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg's chances for a successful presidential run, CNN contributor Roland Martin doesn't think that the country is clamoring for him in the way Ross Perot was in demand back in 1992. In particular, Martin doesn't think the Republican base would back him in part because he's Jewish:

Who is Bloomberg's constituency? Is it Republicans who are desperate for a standard-bearer in the mold of Ronald Reagan? Bloomberg doesn't appeal to the GOP base -- he's liberal, from New York and is Jewish. (Be honest, if he was a hard-core conservative and a Baptist, they would be falling over him.)

Emphasis mine. His reasoning doesn't explain Rudy Giuliani's popularity. While he isn't Jewish, Giuliani is from New York, he is not a hard-core conservative with regard to social issues, and he is Catholic, not Baptist.

Could it be that Bloomberg's policies on their own are enough to turn off Republicans? Or that they don't believe he has what it takes to be president? Why bring his religion into it?

So, what is CNN?

THIS is CNN in 1998; the link is to a story debunking the network's Peter Arnett and April Oliver, who accused Vietnam soldiers of war crimes in Operation Tailwind.

This is from 2003. The network's Eason Jordan confessed that the network twisted the news out of Saddam Hussein's Iraq, thereby giving false impressions of the regime to the world so that it could maintain its access to the country (the article is posted at the author's web host for fair use and discussion purposes).

Then there's this from 2005. Eason Jordan accused the US military in Iraq of targeting journalists, and ultimately resigned in the wake of the outcry. "Somehow" the actual video footage of Jordan's accusations, made at the World Economic Forum in Davos, never surfaced.

Next, there's this incredible episode from 2006, where the network showed videos of enemy snipers killing American soldiers in Iraq. Even more incredibly, the videos were marketed on corporate affiliate Time Warner Cable as an On Demand offering.

Now there's this -- paying to have a story staged (bolds are mine):

 

A little anti-gun bias on CNN. This week, CNN interviewed 11-year-old Jamison Stone who claimed he killed a “Monster Pig,” which was often compared to the other giant pig Hogzilla, but not everyone in the media was very receptive to the story of an 11-year-old boy using a handgun to kill a giant boar. CNN Newsroom correspondent T.J. Holmes was uncomfortable with the boy’s use of a handgun, asking, “Is it just me, or an 11-year-old with a pistol, is that OK?” (emphasis mine throughout):

Here's another example of how blogs can be a great outlet for objective reporting, even if the outlet in question is traditionally biased to the Left.

[Update (18:26 EDT): NewsBusters' own Warner Todd Huston wrote about congressional travel expenses 10 days ago.]

At the "Anderson Cooper 360" blog, CNN correspondent Drew Griffin took a look at "Spring break travel... Congress-style.":

Flying in military jets is especially important when our leaders need to go to Iraq, or remote parts of Africa, Afghanistan -- places that are hard to get to or dangerous to visit.

But the Virgin Islands, Trinidad, London? At $10,000 a flight hour, those places are where some of your representatives took these military planes over spring break.

Remember all the false reports coming out of New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina? Don't try to relive them at CNN. The network has gone back and corrected a report that originally talked about snipers on the rooftops without any sort of retraction.

Remember in 1984, where Winston's job was to revise newspapers of the past to keep up with the ever changing present? This is very interesting. A couple years ago, during the Katrina disaster, I linked to a CNN report and quoted it [...]

One of my readers ran into that posting of mine--and noticed that the CNN report at that link no longer said anything like that. It was much, much more upbeat. Nothing about the police snipers on the roof. Did I copy the wrong link? Did I have a brief attack of delusion, and make something up?

Read the rest. Hat tip: Small Dead Animals.

Looks like the folks at the much maligned CNN indulged in a little bit of wishful thinking on Friday during a report of British Prime Minister Tony Blair's resignation announcement.

In a video caption of Blair, CNN plastered the words "Bush Resigns" across the screen.

Media Bistro got the first capture of this absurdly Freudian slip.

"CNN International's CNN Today program, airing at midnight Eastern, led with the graphic 'Bush Resigns.' Of course, they meant 'Blair Resigns.' Freudian slip on the part of a network accused of anti-Americanism?"

Every day around lunchtime, CNN.com posts a humorous video as its "Funny Lunch" feature. The link stays on the site for a few hours at mid-day and can be found in the list of "Top Stories."

But today's video, Culture and Media Institute researcher Colleen Raezler noticed, was a gross-out spoof of diamond ads pegged to Mother's Day, which is this Sunday. Raezler informed me the link teased video for a "Mom's Day gem of a gift."

In a fake commercial spot for "Oedipus Diamonds," a young man is shown making out with an older woman as a narrator voices over his concern, disgust, and ultimate approval of a younger man's display of affection with a woman portraying his mother.

The video, entitled "Diamonds," was accessed here but the link will probably take you to a different video tomorrow. The video is permalinked here. A screenshot follows the transcript:

Earlier today I wondered if MSNBC.com was bored with the Fort Dix terror plot story.

Well, here's an update. It appears they still are.

As of 7:00 p.m. EDT tonight, both FoxNews.com and CNN give the Fort Dix terror plot story prime real estate. Not so for MSNBC. See MSNBC screencap below and check here and here for Fox and CNN screencaps respectively.

Did the Dow’s ‘Bull Run’ Milestone Get to Your Paper’s Front Page Today?

Front page? Heck, the overwhelming odds are that it didn't get mentioned anywhere.

It should have been.

At CNNMoney.com, writers Alexandra Twin and Steve Hargreaves appear to be the only ones who even recognized the significance of yesterday's positive market close (bolds are mine):

Dow: Longest bull run in 80 years
Major gauges hit new milestones, but just barely; investors mull jobs report, oil prices, talk of a Microsoft-Yahoo merger.
May 4 2007: 4:09 PM EDT

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The Dow Jones industrial average squeaked out another record high Friday, making this the longest bull run in 80 years, as investors cheered tame inflation numbers, talk of big mergers and a jobs report that appeared just right.

..... The Dow has now risen in 23 of the last 26 sessions, marking its longest bull run since the summer of 1927, when the indicator ended higher in 24 of 27 sessions, according to Dow Jones.

Turning the tables on John Kerry, and building on the snark of Matt at Weapons of Mass Discussion -- That would make it the best stock market run since, well, Herbert Hoover.

An April 4 CNN.com article helped peddle the recent “Not on Our Watch: The Mission to End Genocide in Darfur and Beyond,”  written by acclaimed “Hotel Rwanda” star Don Cheadle and former Clinton administration official John Prendergast, who is now a “human rights activist” and an advisor to the Soros-financed International Crisis Group.

In this Aspen Steib article, there is no mention of the 22-year civil war that devastated Southern Sudan when Arab Muslims targeted black Christians and Animists or the Bush administration’s efforts to end the wars in both Southern Sudan and Darfur. Cheadle’s intentions are probably good, but this article ignored many issues. Darfur’s crisis is complex, and this article’s approach had one note: it's Bush's fault. 

Cheadle and Prendergast detail what they think what needs to be done (emphasis mine throughout):

"It is urgent that President Bush act ... to confront the Sudanese regime for the atrocities that it is committing and perpetuating to bring this genocide to an end once and for all," they write.

Are the media intentionally downplaying or ignoring reports that indicate a growing al Qaeda involvement in Iraq?

Late Thursday evening, CNN.com reported (h/t LGF, emphasis added):

American soldiers discovered a girls school being built north of Baghdad had become an explosives-rigged "death trap," the U.S. military said Thursday.”

This was a compilation of a report that CNN’s Wolf Blitzer did earlier in the day on “The Situation Room.”

However, Stars and Stripes actually reported Tuesday that military officials shared this information on Monday (emphasis added):

"Put in a tax to make it $4 a gallon right now," urged CNN contributor Allen Wastler on the April 28 "In the Money."

Wastler's motivation for higher taxes was to encourage alternatives to gasoline.

"Because when you saw us flirting with $3, all the sudden we got a burst in hybrid production, we got a burst in ethanol production," Wastler explained to the "In the Money" crowd.

But the CNNMoney managing editor did not explain the burst in government mandates and regulations that helped fuel those alternatives.

The "In the Money" team including Ali Velshi and Christine Romans not only urged higher gas prices (with taxation), but hyped the threat of $4-a-gallon gasoline, though the national average is still below $3-a-gallon.

To show the feeding frenzy that is the MSM -- as well as the constant inaccuracy -- reports abounded yesterday with rebukes to Rudy Giuliani from Democratic candidates for the 2008 Presidential election over something they all merely assumed he said at a campaign appearance.

Every single paper out there quoted the stern rebukes of each of the front running Dem. candidates and nearly every source of MSM news, from TV to the internet, repeated what it was that Rudy "said" to force the rebukes.

Unfortunately for all concerned, it appears that Rudy never said the phrase attributed to him.

Yet, not a soul in the MSM (except Fox's Brit Hume) took the time to do the research necessary to fact check and assure the story was correct.

Earlier this morning the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a federal ban on partial-birth abortion. What's more, Justice Anthony Kennedy, whom many in the media often focus on as the "moderate" and "swing" justice on the Court, penned the majority opinion. While the mass murder at Virginia Tech is still the top story in the media, Fox News found room to give this landmark ruling prime real estate on its Web site. CNN, however, relegated the story to a link nine entries deep into its "latest news" list.

The screenshots I've included in this post are taken from Fox News and CNN's Web sites from around 11:30 a.m.

From a CNN e-mail I received shortly after the close of Friday's stock markets (this was the entire message):

Wall Street fights off mortgage-risk-induced woes to end the week higher, with small gains Friday.

Anyone reading this e-mail would have thought that this was a net ho-hum week on The Street. After all, the e-mail merely said that the week ended "higher."

"Higher"? More like "way, way higher" -- in fact, the best single-week point gain in four years:

The double standard of Leftists who are ignoring the outrage of Bill Maher -- who alluded to his wish that Vice President Dick Cheney was assassinated – while at the same time are wildly fanning themselves in mock outrage as if they had the vapors over Ann Coulter -- for calling Democrat John Edwards a bad name -- was on full display in the MSM over the weekend.

If you are a conservative who stays up on the "happenings" in conservative news, you'd have by now heard that firebrand Columnist Ann Coulter called Democratic Candidate John Edwards a "faggot" at the CPAC convention the other day. You are also probably aware of all the lefty types wading into the waters of high dudgeon over her typically button-pushing remark and you'll have seen Democrats and their supporters coming out of the woodwork to claim astonishment at Coulter's comment, demanding that conservatives distance themselves from her.

Words fail (direct image link):

Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.

Ya gotta love the twisted headline from this CNNMoney.com report by Chris Isidore (bolds are mine):

New homes sales: Back from the dead?
New home sales rise more than expected and prices post gains despite continued rise in completed new homes on the market.
December 27 2006: 11:11 AM EST

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- New home sales and prices both showed surprising strength in November, according to a government report Wednesday.

New homes sold at an annual pace of 1.05 million, up from the revised annual rate of 1.01 million in October. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com had forecast that home sales would rebound to a 1.02 million pace.

For creating a story out of nothing and then finger pointing at US society and saying how evil it is, this Dec. 12th CNN story takes the cake. In "Poll: Most Americans see lingering racism -- in others", not only is a somewhat leading poll cited as evidence that America is still rife with racism, but CNN uses comments emailed to them by their viewers as some sort of follow up proof for it!

Very scientific, I know. After all, CNN used science via the Internet and phone lines to conduct this farcical poll, I suppose.

(CNN) -- Most Americans, white and black, see racism as a lingering problem in the United States, and many say they know people who are racist, according to a new poll.

But few Americans of either race -- about one out of eight -- consider themselves racist.