I think this is an example of the distraction that the Internet and the New Media have driven the Old Media to, but it seems that the Ledger-Enquirer of Columbus, Georgia was so amazed that someone finally paid attention to its work that it had to write a whole story about itself to brag about how many webpage hits it got on a recent story by staffer Lily Gordon.

The L-E was all excited that it got "more than 1,000 comments" and received "712,251 page views" after Gordon's July 14 story headlined, "Soldier balks at deploying; says Obama isn’t president."

In December 2005, Kerry Pacer, then 17, was featured on the cover of the national gay news magazine The Advocate as its "Person of the Year" — making her the youngest gay person to achieve that honor – for fighting for a "gay-straight alliance" at White County High School in Cleveland, Georgia. But there’s apparently no embarrassment for the gay press....when she takes on a boyfriend and they have a baby. In The Washington Blade, Dyana Bagby reported:

But today she lives with her boyfriend, a construction worker, and their baby daughter, Marley, who turns 1 year old on Saturday.

"Well, she’s the most beautiful blue-eyed girl in the world and everybody tells me that so I’m not just being biased, I swear," Pacer said with a laugh.

"I love every minute of motherhood. It’s been a very big challenge, however I love it. I’ve just been trying to work and go to school and take care of my family," she said.

On Monday’s Countdown show, MSNBC host Keith Olbermann compared Republican Senator Saxby Chambliss’s 2002 campaign against then-Democratic Senator Max Cleland of Georgia to a "turkey-killing machine," as part of a segment with Bloomberg News’s Margaret Carlson, formerly of Time magazine, in which the duo mocked Sarah Palin’s part in a campaign rally for Chambliss. Olbermann: "What is the more grotesque event to be standing in front of and not paying attention to? What we`re seeing now, she`s standing in front of Saxby Chambliss who ran that campaign against Max Cleland six years ago, or standing in front of a turkey-killing machine?" As she laughed, Carlson responded: "Both are killers." Referring to the presence of the rapper Ludacris in Georgia as he campaigned for Democratic candidate Jim Martin, the pair also made cracks about Palin being "ludicrous" as Olbermann tagged her as "Governor Ludicrous of Alaska," and Carlson called her "Miss Slight Ludicrous."

But Why Does The AP Report Ignore Key Part of Story?

Remember when you were a young school kid and you drew a vampire during the week of Halloween? Remember how the blood was always dripping down from his menacing, pearly white teeth? Remember how it was all in good Halloween fun? Well, you can just forget THAT mister, at least if you are a 5th-Grader in the Savannah-Chatham school system in Georgia. In Georgia, if you draw a vampire you get called a gang member -- even when you were assigned to make the drawing -- and then you get sent to "psychological evaluation" as if you are some mentally disturbed monster. Then they kick you out of school... for a Halloween drawing. Really.

The Savannah Morning News gives us the gruesome story of another touchy-feelie teacher gone stupid and another poor little kid lost in "zero-tolerance" hell this Halloween week.

When Jordan Hood was assigned the task of drawing a "scary Halloween mask," he innocently drew a scary vampire. His art teacher even helped him out with a few of the details. But then came home-room teacher Melissa Pevey (amusingly, even her name sounds pent up) who decided that, far from Halloween fun, little 5th-grader Jordan was obviously a violence prone, mentally disturbed, gang member. So in a harrowing Halloween experience that had no fun in it at all, Pevey had him paraded down to the principal's office where he was confronted by the police and assigned "psychological evaluation" as a punishment for his artistry.

News agencies across the country are still largely refusing to inform readers of the liberal-leanings of Families USA. The organization has a fresh crop of new news articles thanks to its latest study.

In March, Families USA published a report which attributes lack of health care coverage with premature death. Local newspapers across the country are attracted to this report because it includes state-specific data that give the number of fatalities in each state which are linked to a lack of insurance.

You might remember Families USA from its advocacy for expanding the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) which would have increased the income eligibility limit from 200 percent to 300 percent above the Federal Poverty Level and started a contingency fund which would serve to come to the rescue of states who spend over the amount of their federal allotment. Needless to say, liberal Democrats including Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif) and Sen Barack Obama (D-Ill.) make up the organization’s political allies.

Yesterday, Gateway Pundit noticed what he called an "Uh-Oh... This wasn't supposed to happen" event for presidential candidate Barack Obama:

An amazing article appeared in the mainstream news today. McClatchy actually reported that Obama's church merges Marxism and Christian Gospel and preaches that the white church in America is the Antichrist because it supported slavery and segregation.

That they did. But how did they headline it, and how many McClatchy newspapers actually ran the story?

Margaret Talev's Thursday, March 20 description of the fundamental doctrines of the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright's Trinity United Church of Christ (TUCC) does get right to the point. Talev even goes so far as to question the candidate's motivations for his involvement with the church.

Most importantly, which I why I've bolded the related text, Talev notes that while TUCC's radical and racist philosophies will survive the Rev. Wright's retirement, their continued presence will not deter Obama from continuing to attend:

The definition of ironic? A media outlet that omitted positive information about Iraq...from an article that criticized the media for doing just that.

Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch commander of the Army's 3rd Infantry Division, which is stationed in Iraq, spoke to reporters while on leave in the US. He denounced the media habit of omitting or downplaying positive news coming out of Iraq and then gave an example of the kind of news that is usually downplayed or omitted by the media (thnx NewsBusters reader).

In a perfect illustration of what Lynch meant, Editor & Publisher, a leading industry journal, let its metaphorical slip show and omitted Lynch's positive news about Iraq from the paper's September 21 article.

Do you ever wonder how "a single mother of two from Atlanta" who earns the minimum wage has the dough to plunk down for travel to Washington, D.C., lodging, and child care to attend a left-wing rally? I sure do. But then, it can't be that difficult when you're a professional victim for a left-wing group.

Washington Post reporter Xinyun Yang quoted one Irene Cole of Atlanta, Ga., at the close of his July 25 article "Democrats Cheer Wage Hike." "From $5.15 to $5.85 -- that's... a big raise, and we do thank you," Yang quoted Cole, who attended yesterday's "rally of union and activist groups on Capitol Hill."

Haven't I heard Cole's name before? Oh yeah, I have. It cropped up in January when I wrote about ABC's biased treatment of the minimum wage for the MRC's Business & Media Institute. Reporter Dean Reynolds cited Cole in his report on the January 10 "World News."

After reviewing that story, I realized two things. First, Cole misled the Post's Yang. She earns at least $6-an-hour (when she's working for private employers), and secondly, Cole is no stranger to whipping up crowds at liberal activist rallies (no word how much she's paid or compensated for expenses for her activist work):

Be on the watch for the spin. The Georgia State Supreme Court will be deciding an issue that has been bouncing around the courts since 2005. At stake is the state's attempt to reduce election fraud by requiring that all voters show a government sanctioned picture ID in order to vote.

Seems simple, right? Wrong.

The typical detractors, the ones who usually cry voter fraud whenever their favorite pet candidates lose at the polls, are the same groups that are upset over the ID requirement! They argue that the ID requirement is a poll tax that disenfranchises poor people by requiring that they pay to vote. The illogic being applied here is that ids cost money and that poor people are being disenfranchised because they can't afford the expense.

Here is an example of how the issue has been twisted by your typical activists in the mainstream media:

For anyone who thought the worst racist ad of the electoral cycle was the RNC ad against Harold Ford Jr. in Tennessee, Tom Bevan of Real Clear Politics has an answer. (I heard this ad yesterday on the Sean Hannity show.) In Atlanta, a last-minute radio ad suggested that electing Republicans to the Fulton County Commission would be worse than the beatings administered in the civil rights era of the 1960s -- it might endanger the life of blacks. The script is amazing:

LEWIS: This is Congressman John Lewis.

FRANKLIN: And I'm Mayor Shirley Franklin.

YOUNG: And I am Andy Young.

LEWIS: On Nov. 7, we face the most dangerous situation we ever have. You think fighting off dogs and water hoses in the '60s was bad. [Now we] sit idly by, and let the right-wing Republicans take control of the Fulton County County Commission.

This has to be what can only be deemed as rounds #2, 3, 4 & 5 of the WWF of the political world. Cynthia is trying so hard to keep her belt, but it's getting harder and harder. However, I wasn't sure Hank was going to make it. Was he coughing to disrupt the cutest little jihadist in Congress as she spewed her blather from the inside of the skull-tightening braids on her head? Or did her hot air scorch the air around them both so bad that he couldn't breathe? Don't know. Neither one impressed me very much, but even as his incompetence is so profoundly displayed, the "lesser of two evils" argument needs to be thrown out of the window this time. I don't live in that district, but what I wouldn't give to live there for just one day next Tuesday to vote for the Republican - whomever he/she may be - to keep either of these less-than-brainiacs out of the Georgia Congress. That being said, Georgia's 4th District is and always has been Democratically-controlled. Given that, I hope that the voters of that district "get out the vote" next Tuesday for Hank Johnson. Hank doesn't look like someone who would smack a police officer who was just doing his job on Capitol Hill. For round #1, see my previous post here. These new rounds, however, are TKOs by the moderators of the debate. I'm not sure either opponent won this one. "The fact of the matter is...." (watch the videos to understand that oft-used opening to McKinney's statements - it was akin to "well, you know.. like, it was so, I mean, so, like, you know, we were the evil, like country, like you know?) Can I have a dollar for every time she said that? Aw, shucks... okay. Okay, so this was VERY painful to watch. However, it was not only painful, but it was also - again- entertaining on cell-slapper Cynthia's part. She is the queen of the "non-answer" coalition, and her biggest claim to fame in this debate and others, and by her own admission, is that she is the "#1 biggest critic of the Bush Administration." Okay, so that puts you where in your political standing? It makes you no greater or higher in prestige than Pelosi, Dean, Boxer, Reid, Kerry, Kennedy, Murtha, and on and on and on. What? Are you guys all going to get into a fight to determine the WWF champion of who is THE biggest Bush critic? I think that can be won by the lunatic left collectively; so, no, Cynthia, you do not deserve a special place at the table of the Democratic party. The Georgia Columbus Ledger had an AP piece on today's debate:

Johnson says he is not a Republican pawn and he started running his race before the "ABC" - "Anybody but Cynthia" - campaign began. He said that of the more than 1,400 individual contributions his campaign has received, most were donations of $100 or less. Johnson said his campaign has identified only three contributions from known Republicans. "I can guarantee the public my allegiance is to the voters," Johnson said. The candidates for the 4th Congressional District squared off in a live hour-long debate aired on WSB-TV. It was the last televised debate before Tuesday's runoff election. In the July 18th primary, Johnson, an attorney and former DeKalb County Commissioner, came within 1,700 votes of McKinney to force a runoff. During the debate, Johnson twice questioned McKinney about the March scuffle between the congresswoman and a Capitol Hill police officer, asking her to tell voters what really happened that day. McKinney said the grand jury had spoken on the issue and vindicated her. "What is a woman to do when she is grabbed from behind?" McKinney asked. "The grand jury knows everything about that incident. Mr. Johnson wasn't there and he doesn't know anything." Johnson seized upon the Capitol Hill incident as an example of what he has called McKinney's embarrassing leadership in office. While he has spent much of his campaign contrasting himself to McKinney's outspoken, confrontational style, Johnson says he thinks voters believe he is the best candidate for the job and not just an alternative to the controversial Congresswoman. "I think the 'Anybody But Cynthia' campaign has turned into the 'We Love Hank' campaign," he quipped. McKinney called herself the "Number One critic of the Bush administration" and urged voters to send her back to Washington. "I stand in stark contrast to the Republican majority, and I'm proud of that," McKinney said. "I promise to go to Washington and never be quiet." When questioned about the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah and the need for an immediate cease-fire, McKinney said that every country has a right to self-defense, but that the U.S. should be doing more to encourage peace in the region and take more of a stand for human rights for Israeli and Lebanese civilians. Johnson said the U.S. should stand by Israel as its ally. "It's very difficult to call a cease-fire with a terrorist organization," Johnson said.

Some of the highlights and lowlights of the debate today include, but are not limited to:

- Cynthia makes claims about putting 500 participants into the National Youth Apprenticeship Collaboration Program, but the panel even calls her on the carpet, reminding her that there are only 20 known participants of the program. - The only two supporters who McKinney claims have supported legislation she's proposed were John Kerry and John Murtha. 'Nuff said.

The national media worked overtime last week insisting that Democratic victories in governor’s races in New Jersey and Virginia were huge setbacks for the Bush administration and national Republican party. Apparently, the liberal media spin was enough to hoodwink an unsuspecting headline writer at the Albany Herald in Albany, Georgia.