Felipe Calderon

 On Friday’s CBS Evening News, travel editor Peter Greenberg filed a report in which, without challenge, he passed on Mexican President Felipe Calderon’s charge that America is "the key part of the problem" of drug cartels in his country. And, even though the overwhelming majority of guns seized from Mexican drug cartels are known to originate from countries outside the U.S., Greenberg seemed to claim that all were bought in the U.S. Greenberg:

He (Calderon) claims American drug use is financing the cartels, and smuggled American guns are arming them. This is an example of the more than 90,000 weapons the Calderon government has confiscated in the last four years - almost all of them high-powered, and all of them bought in the United States.

But, as previously documented by NewsBusters, in April 2009 Fox News reported that 83 percent of guns recovered in Mexico originated outside the United States.

The TV networks have aggressively demonstrated their dislike of Arizona’s state law “cracking down on illegal immigrants,” a law that “pits neighbor against neighbor.” An MRC review of morning and evening news programs on ABC, CBS, and NBC from April 23 to July 25 found the networks have aired 120 stories with an almost ten-to-one tilt against the Arizona law (77 negative, 35 neutral, 8 positive).

The soundbite count was also tilted over the last three months -- 216 to 107, or an almost exact two-to-one disparity. Network anchors and reporters sided against defenders of border control and championed sympathetic illegal aliens and their (usually American-born) children. In 120 stories, they never described “immigrants rights activists” as liberals or on the left.

Between them, the three networks described the Arizona law as “controversial” on 27 occasions, despite its popularity in opinion polls. The Obama administration’s decision to sue file a lawsuit against Arizona to crush the law was never described as “controversial.”

On Monday’s The O’Reilly Factor, during the show’s regular "Reality Check" segment, FNC host O’Reilly seemed to pick up on a NewsBusters item which highlighted ABC’s Sam Donaldson and Cokie Roberts defending Mexican President Felipe Calderon using his speech in Congress as a forum to criticize Arizona’s effort to enforce laws against illegal immigration. In their defense of Calderon on Sunday's This Week show's Roundtable segment, the the two ABC News veterans brought up past American Presidents criticizing communist dictators in China and the Soviet Union.

Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the "Reality Check" from the Monday, May 24, The O’Reilly Factor on FNC:

 

 

A California Congressman on Thursday strongly criticized Mexican President Felipe Calderon for his comments about Arizona's new anti-illegal immigration law while also excoriating "the left wing of the White House" and "many Democrats in this Congress" who cheered his remarks.

As has been widely reported, Calderon, speaking before a joint session of Congress, said, "I strongly disagree with the recently adopted law in Arizona."

This elicited a standing ovation from many Democrats present including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Attorney General Eric Holder, and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano (video right).

Just a few hours later, Rep. Tom McClintock (R-Calif.) took to the House floor to express his view of this disgraceful day in American history (video follows with full transcript):

With “Sharp Words” forming the on-screen graphic, ABC anchor Diane Sawyer on Thursday night championed the domestic gun control argument espoused by a foreign leader trying to shift the blame for his nation's criminal activity, a remark neither CBS nor NBC found newsworthy:

Mexico's President Felipe Calderon today challenged a joint session of Congress on gun control, asking that they reinstate a ban on assault weapons, which expired in 2004, saying 80 percent of the traceable weapons used in those crimes in Mexico, right across the border, come from the U.S.

Viewers then heard from Calderon: “I admire the American Constitution, but many of these guns are not going to honest American hands. Instead, thousands are ending up in the hands of criminals.”

On Thursday's Situation Room, CNN's Jack Cafferty blasted President Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon for their criticism of Arizona's new anti-illegal immigration law, stating that the two were "whining" about the law. Cafferty singled out Calderon for having "a lot of nerve...complaining" about the Arizona law and labeled Congress's standing ovation for the Mexican leader "disgusting."

The commentator devoted his Cafferty File segment 13 minutes into the 5 pm Eastern hour to slamming the two leaders' criticism of the Grand Canyon's State's newly-passed legislation. Cafferty wasted little time and targeted Calderon first for his criticism of the law on American soil: "Mexican President Felipe Calderon has a lot of nerve coming into this country and complaining about Arizona's immigration law, when all the state wants to do is protect itself against a flood of illegal immigrants from Calderon's country." He continued that "Calderon and President Obama are both whining about the Arizona law. Calderon, who also took the message to a joint meeting of Congress, is calling Arizona's law discriminatory."

On Wednesday's The Situation Room, Wolf Blitzer gave Mexican President Felipe Calderon every chance possible to refute the argument that sneaking into Mexico from the south is much more perilous than Mexicans stealing into Arizona.

BTW - This segment of the 'exclusive' interview is not available for viewing on the CNN website.

 

NBC's Matt Lauer and Andrea Mitchell, on Thursday's "Today" show, pressed their guests (Lauer with Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Mitchell with Mexican President Felipe Calderon) about reinstituting the assault weapons ban. First up, Mitchell – who pushed Hillary Clinton last month to bring back the ban -- offered Calderon an open to blame Mexican drug cartel violence on guns imported from the U.S.:

ANDREA MITCHELL: President Obama will not deliver long-promised Blackhawk helicopters, nor a ban on assault weapons smuggled south. He campaigned as a candidate against the assault weapons. Now that he's in office, he's had to back off.

FELIPE CALDERON: But most of the weapons, almost 16,000 are assault weapons and 90 percent of those were sold in United States.

Then Lauer, in his segment with Napolitano, repeated Calderon's inaccurate line that 90 percent of drug cartel weapons came from the U.S.:

MATT LAUER: You know President Calderon wants a reinstatement of the assault weapons ban that was, that expired during the Bush administration. When you look at the numbers, that 90 percent of the 12,000 weapons Mexican officials recovered from these drug cartels in the last year or so were made and sold in the United States, and many of those, as we just heard from President Calderon, are assault weapons, how can President Obama, who ran on an issue against assault weapons, how can he not deliver on that?

On Monday's "Good Morning America," co-host Diane Sawyer reported live from Mexico and repeatedly blamed U.S. rage for much of the controversy over illegal immigration. After introducing a segment on the problem, Sawyer lectured, "So a lot of Americans are erupting in anger. While others say, 'Who are we kidding? It's too late to complain.'" Sawyer then opined that efforts to stem the tide of illegals, such as building a 700 mile fence, are "fueled by anger."

Sawyer continued this theme of out of control, emotional Americans into an interview with Mexican President Felipe Calderon. She informed the GMA audience that "Felipe Calderon says it's time to stop yelling at each other and face the facts." Later, she described him as "urging less emotion, more strategy." And although Sawyer found time to describe Calderon as the "new action president" and mention that he went to Harvard University, she didn't ask him about the estimated $10 billion a year illegal immigration costs American taxpayers. (Although, the host did touch on the subject in the segment's introduction.)