President Obama and other liberals have frequently criticized the previous administration for a lack of transparency. But now it seems the Obama White House is practicing the same things liberals criticized President Bush and Vice President Cheney for.  

So on the July 22 edition of “Fox and Friends,” anchor Brian Kilmeade brought to viewer’s attention the Obama administration’s hypocrisy on their usage of the “Presidential Communication Privilege.”

Kilmeade recalled the “outrage” that erupted during the two terms of President Bush when energy executives met in secret with Vice President Dick Cheney and the public questioned their influence on the President’s energy plan. The administration claimed “Presidential Communication Privilege,” and never released the names. Subsequently, “Bush was vilified because of that.”

Hypocritically, President Obama has done the exact same thing with his health care plan. Fourteen different executives involved with the drug, medical, and hospital industries, have gone to the White House to advise the President on the health care reform bill.

Washington Post Food section contributor Bonnie Benwick cooked up just a hint of bias in an otherwise politically unseasoned obituary for Milton Parker, a founding co-owner of the landmark Carnegie Deli in Manhattan.

Noting that Parker sometimes "named sandwiches after the rich and famous," Benwick quoted Parker from 1992 taking a swipe at the elder President Bush after making a sandwich bearing his name and consisting of "tuna, chopped egg and mayonaisse on white bread -- Mr. Parker said: 'No meat. Just like the economy.'"

That aside came four paragraphs into Benwick's 15-paragraph obituary. Of course, Benwick could have added flavor without political comment, particularly since Parker was famous for his dining establishment, not his politics. A look at the deli menu available on the Carnegie Deli Web site shows the featured celebrity-themed sandwich as being "The Woody Allen," consisting of "Lotsa Corned Beef plus Lotsa Pastrami" and setting the diner back $17.95.

Unlike Governor Palin, President Bush did not need to be interviewed in front of a turkey slaughter for the media to attack him over turkeys. As part of an annual tradition at the White House, President Bush pardoned two fortunate turkeys, Pecan and Pumpkin, on Wednesday.

 Media outlets like MSNBC, ABC, and the Washington Post used the opportunity to make Bush look not only clownish but also useless and heartless. ABC actually titled this year’s turkey pardoning coverage: “White House Turkey Pardoning Scandal? President Forgives Turkey, Then Eats Turkey”

When the reader looks further into the article, Bush did not eat the two turkeys he just “pardoned” but simply ate turkey for Thanksgiving like the rest of the United States did.

Washington Post staff writer Manuel Roig-Franzia among others used the annual event as an opportunity to take a shot at the president(my emphasis throughout:)

Catching up with an item from a few days ago: Barry Sonnenfeld, a movie director (Men in Black) and now the Emmy-winning executive producer and director of ABC's dramady Pushing Daisies, predicted on Wednesday's Late Show that amongst the things he's “worried” President Bush will do before leaving office is “go out by pushing the button and destroying all life on Earth.” That was too much for David Letterman, hardly a Bush fan (in June he asked if Bush has “any humanity?”), who responded: “It's just a little bleaker than I would have hoped for -- the idea that he would actually detonate the planet in a moment of despair.”

Sonnenfeld, who speculated about Bush hiding bin Laden, also wondered why Americans wouldn't vote for the “really smart” Barack Obama over John McCain who “finished second to last in his graduating class in college” and Sarah Palin, who “went to five different colleges,” and so “I'm thinking maybe she's got other talents than intelligence.” 

With some mix of seriousness and humor you can judge yourself by watching the video clip (though how funny is it to joke about the President as some kind of religious zealot out to murder millions?), Sonnenfeld told Letterman he's “worried since it's October that George Bush will do one of three things: Either find bin Laden, who've they've had somewhere for eight months waiting to bring out” or “let's start a war with Iran. That's always a possibility.” Then:

And here's the third thing -- and I don't know much about the Bible and I'm not a big rapture guy -- but I believe George Bush is and what better way, if your polls are so bad, than to go out by pushing the button and destroying all life on Earth?

Audio: MP3 clip (2:05, 750 Kb)

CNN’s Web site this morning tracked a developing story involving the stock market opening, by featuring a photo of an Iran anti-war protest.

The photo, provided by our friends at the AP, was simply too perfect to pass up apparently. After all, any photo which includes a man brandishing a banner which reads ‘Jail Bush,’ is something that a biased news organization simply has to take. Pertinence be damned. Seriously, nothing says the economy quite like a placard reading ‘No attack on Iran.’

CNN probably could have found a photo that actually applied to the topic of a sliding stock market. Was a stock photo of a line graph with a red arrow pointing down not available at the most trusted name in news? No picture of someone ringing the opening bell?

The story itself was titled ‘Wall Street Drops at Open,’ and to its credit, did not include the photo within the article. Oddly enough however, there was no mention of 'Iran' in the article that the above photo linked to either. Nor was there any mention of the word 'war.' Or 'protest.'

What does it say about Reuters' environmental coverage when the news organization can't even get a basic “factbox” correct?

This March 31 Reuters “factbox” was supposed to explain “What is the Kyoto Protocol?” Instead, the media conglomerate pushed a biased eco-agenda and omitted anything that cast a negative light on the treaty or revealed problems. There was no mention of Kyoto participants failing to meet their targets or Japan trying to renegotiate because Kyoto is harming its economy. Reuters failed to report that greenhouse gas emissions are rising in the European Union and in many Kyoto-participating countries, such as Canada. Some, like Austria and Great Britain, are actually doing worse than the US in emissions growth. By skewing the data included in this factbox, Reuters massaged data to fit an agenda and crossed into advocacy journalism.

Reuters began by framing the US as the bad guy (all bold mine):

Earlier this week, NewsBusters' Tim Graham noted the downbeat mood in many of the nominated movies at Sunday's Oscars, as originally written up by a Washington Post staff writer. NB's Matt Sheffield addressed the Feature Documentary award winner, "Taxi to the Dark Side," and the dearth of libertarian or conservative representation in the list of that category's nominees.

Commenter "voodoodaddy" at Sheffield's post asked:

Taxi to the Dark Side? Never heard of it. Did not even know it existed. They wonder why no one watches the Oscars.

Voodoodaddy is far from alone, and his comment begs a bigger question: Why, as I believe is the case, would a company make a film knowing full well that almost no one will see it?

That's certainly not a question anyone in Old Media is asking. Two of the five nominees in the Feature Documentary category ("War/Dance" - $57,640; Operation Homecoming" - either $4,516 or $6,795) did barely noticeable business in 2007.

Winner "Taxi" shows no 2007 business.

How can that be?

Grunge and hippie-folk rocker Neil Young, who opposes President Bush's war in Iraq and released an album last year "Living with War" with a song called "Let's Impeach the President," nonetheless came to Bush's defense recently, saying he's a "leader" with perseverance. As Reuters reported (http://news.yahoo.co...), in a conversation at the Sundance Film Festival, former band mate David Crosby said there should be a law that persons who can't pronounce the word "nuclear" shouldn't have control over nuclear weapons. Neil Young promptly disagreed. As reported: "A lot of people have problems pronouncing words and spelling things correctly. It doesn't mean that they're not intelligent," Young tells Crosby. "You've got to give the guy credit. Do I agree with him? No. Do I think he's stupid? No. Do I think he's a leader? Yes. He led. He took this country where he wanted to take it. And he steadfastly stuck with it all the way."

Exactly 20 years ago tonight, January 25, 1988, millions of Americans saw one newsman’s liberal agenda laid bare, as CBS anchor Dan Rather attempted to ambush then-Vice President George H.W. Bush, the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination, in a live TV interview on his CBS Evening News. But Bush held his own during the on-air confrontation, and the lasting effect was to reveal how Rather was driven by his personal biases, at one point lecturing the Vice President: “You’ve made us hypocrites in the face of the world.”

Shorter Video (0:31): Windows (1.00 MB), plus MP3 audio (155 kB). Full interview (9:15) Windows (5.81 MB), plus MP3 audio (2.72 kB)

Instead of pounding President Bush with the usual media focus on failures in Iraq, ABC anchor Charles Gibson, in his Tuesday interview at Camp David with President and Mrs. Bush, actually pointed out how many doubted the surge strategy and wondered if he wanted to “crow?” Gibson inquired in an excerpt aired on World News: “You took a lot of doubting and rather skeptical questions about the surge. I'll give you a chance to crow. Do you want to say I told you so?” Bush demurred from the opportunity. Indeed, a January MRC report documented the media hostility toward Bush's plan: “TV's Pre-Emptive War Against Iraq 'Surge'; Before Iraq Plan Unveiled, Reporters Said It Was Unpopular, Wouldn't Work & War Was 'Lost Cause.'”(See text below)

Prompted by Bush's satisfaction that Iraqis are “beginning to see enough security so that reconciliation is taking place, as well as the economy's beginning to move,” Gibson pressed the President on problems with “reconciliation.” Leading to a correction from Bush, Gibson had earlier referred to “a lot of bellicose rhetoric that has been aimed at Iran” and cited how “you yourself at a news conference recently raised the specter of World War III.” Bush clarified: “I said if you want to avoid World War III.”

A very interesting article appeared in yesterday's Wall Street Journal titled, "The Insanity of Bush Hatred." Author Peter Berkowitz stated that even many normally rational members of the left are completely overcome by their absolute hatred of Bush to such an extent that it borders on insanity:

...But Bush hatred is different. It's not that this time members of the intellectual class have been swept away by passion and become votaries of anger and loathing. Alas, intellectuals have always been prone to employ their learning and fine words to whip up resentment and demonize the competition. Bush hatred, however, is distinguished by the pride intellectuals have taken in their hatred, openly endorsing it as a virtue and enthusiastically proclaiming that their hatred is not only a rational response to the president and his administration but a mark of good moral hygiene.

Oh sure, Hugo Chavez might have his quirks. But at least he's not George Bush. That's Gail Collins's operative thesis in The Great Clock Plot [subscription required] in this morning's New York Times.

Collins riffs off an announcement Chavez made this week of his plan to move Venezuela's clocks ahead by half an hour. Writes Collins:

Reaction was swift, with many people recalling the scene in Woody Allen’s “Bananas” when a revolutionary hero becomes president of a Latin American country and announces that from now on, “underwear will be worn on the outside.”

That democracy-repressing strongman really cracks Gail up. But that's when Collins gets off the first of her barbs against President Bush:

The media frames America in anthropogenic global warming articles as the evil Earth Killer, and everything from a sparrow flying into a glass window to Darfur's genocide is America's and George Bush's fault, regardless of facts or science.

In an August 4 article which stated President Bush invited the world's leading economic powers to participate in a "climate change summit” that intends to set "voluntary goals for lowering greenhouse gas emissions while sustaining growth,” the Washington Post upheld this tradition by stating (emphasis mine throughout):

The United States, the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gases, is not a party to the Kyoto agreement, which calls for the 35 participating nations to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Rapidly developing countries including India, China and Brazil are not bound by the deal, despite booming growth and worsening air pollution in those nations, a factor that has caused Bush to call the accord unworkable.

The New York Daily News perpetrated an interesting, yet subtly misleading headline about president Bush's Charleston, South Carolina speech on Al Qaeda in Iraq today in theirs titled "W still ties Iraq, 9/11." Following the left's playbook of claiming Bush has illicitly linked Saddam's Iraq to 9/11 their headline made it seem as if Bush, indeed, "still ties" 9/11 to Iraq.

It is, of course, a false claim that Bush linked Iraq to 9/11 either then OR now, but the New York Daily News doesn't seem too interested in the truth. And for the headline to say "still ties" they are certainly saying that Bush is using past tense verbiage. But, for the most part, Bush is clearly talking present tense in his speech and he still never linked "Iraq" to "9/11" in the way the Daily News headline seems to claim.