Yahoo

ABC's George Stephanopoulos lobbied President Obama Monday to "put a stop" to Bank of America's new service charge for its debit card customers.

"You might have a new issue on your plate," the former Democratic political operative advised the President about the new five dollar monthly debit card fee for Bank of America customers. In the interview which aired on ABCNews.com and Yahoo.com at 2:35 p.m. EDT, Stephanopoulos pulled the question from the audience and beseeched Obama "Can you stop this service charge?"

[Video below the break. Click here for audio.]

Rachel Rose Hartman's Tuesday item for Yahoo! News's "The Ticket" blog carried a misleading headline ("Audience at tea party debate cheers leaving uninsured to die") implying that the majority, if not all, of the audience at Monday's GOP presidential debate thought that the critically injured who are uninsured should be left to die. In reality, only a handful cheered and/or laughed in response to Wolf Blitzer's question.

Despite this headline, Hartman did acknowledge in her lede that "if you're uninsured and on the brink of death, that's apparently a laughing matter to some audience members at last night's tea party [sic] Republican presidential debate." She then recounted how Blitzer, who moderated the joint debate with the Tea Party Express organization, turned to Rep. Ron Paul and "asked a hypothetical question...about how society should respond if a healthy 30-year-old man who decided against buying health insurance suddenly goes into a coma and requires intensive care for six months."

"[I]t's difficult to escape the conclusion that America's credit rating was intentionally sabotaged by Congressional Republicans."

So wrote Yahoo Finance economics editor Daniel Gross Friday evening:

I can't begrudge the Associated Press for covering the conflict within the Kennedy clan about what to do with their iconic Hyannis Port estate.

But AP's David Klepper cranked the Kennedy nostalgia -- no, make that  worship -- up to 11 in his 27-paragraph story -- which I accessed via Yahoo! News -- on the family dispute (emphasis mine):

 

Handicapping a case heading to oral argument before the U.S. Supreme Court today, Yahoo! Finance's Daniel Gross insisted that "Wal-Mart has to like its chances" because "[t]he Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Roberts has generally been pro-business and hostile to the cause of workers."

Gross, who is also a senior editor for Newsweek, cited the 2007 ruling -- erroneously writing that the ruling came down in 2009 -- in Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire in which "[the Supreme Court] threw out on a minor technicality the compelling case of Lilly Ledbetter, who had fought Goodyear Tire over sexual harassment and discrimination for a decade."

But the "technicality" as Gross sees it was actually pretty clear legislative language fixing a deadline beyond which lawsuits could not be filed.

From Justice Alito's opinion of the Court (emphasis mine):

Just because the site was founded by an alleged plagiarist doesn't mean it's totally devoid of ethical clout. Though you do have to wonder: from where does the Huffington Post recruit its bloggers?

The site reportedly informed one of its unpaid contributors last week that he was being let go. The offense: he had used his press credentials as a HuffPo blogger to get labor union demonstrators access to a Mortgage Bankers Association event, where they staged a rowdy protest.

You've probably noticed that those prices at the pump have risen considerably over the last month or so. But don't worry! It's not that big a deal! Well, according to Yahoo! Finance's Daniel Gross, that is. Why? Well, Americans are consuming less gas per capita than a few years ago, cars are more fuel efficient, and people are just plain getting weary of more and more traffic (and, hence, are driving less):

There's also evidence that Americans' long-running love affair with the road is beginning to wane a bit. Driving is less fun when you're always stuck in traffic. These statistics from the U.S. Department of Transportation show the number of miles driven by buses, trucks, and cars from 1957 to 2008. From 1990 to 2000, total miles driven rose from 2.17 trillion to 2.75 trillion, up about 26 percent. But between 2000 and 2008, total mileage rose less than seven percent, from 2.75 trillion to 2.94 trillion. Miles driven fell in 2008.

On Sunday, I examined the causes of the nation's toxic political atmosphere and amongst other things accused the press of fanning the fires of discontent.

Two days later, an ABC News/Yahoo News poll reported by Michael Calderone found 63 percent of Americans believe the mainstream media are more interested in encouraging political division than cooperation between the Parties:

In a Friday article for Yahoo! News, reporter John Cook revealed FBI documents that detail allegations that former CBS Evening News anchor Walter Cronkite offered CBS News resources to transport fierce Vietnam critic and Democratic Maine Senator Edmund Muskie to a Florida anti-war rally in November of 1969. (h/t TVNewser)

According to Cook, the FBI files describe how "Cronkite encouraged students at Rollins College in Winter Park, Fla., to invite Maine Sen. Edmund Muskie to address a protest they were planning....Cronkite told the group's leader that Muskie would be nearby for a fundraiser on the day of the protest, and said that 'CBS would rent [a] helicopter to take Muskie to and from site of rally.'"

While noting Cronkite's public condemnation of the war on air just nine months earlier, Cook rightfully observed: "such tight collaboration between a news organization and the anti-war movement — particularly the offer of CBS News resources to help ferry a sitting senator and future presidential candidate around in opposition to the war — was highly unusual and would presumably have been explosive if known widely at the time." Cook also noted: "It's unclear whether Muskie ever actually attended the event."

The 2nd line of this Yahoo story is the kicker:

As with all curling teams, Team Canada features five members. Well, six, if you really want to get technical with it.

Alternate Kristie Moore, 30, is 5½ months pregnant, making her just the 3rd athlete known to be with child during Olympic competition.

From the New York Times to the Colbert Report, liberal media commentators have had a field day bashing Glenn Beck for his purported conflict of interest in encouraging his viewers to invest in gold without disclosing that he has endorsed gold distributors.

Yet few of these pundits have even mentioned Al Gore's monumental conflict of interest--which could have far greater consequences for Americans than Beck's gold promotions--in touting global warming hysteria while establishing his own green technology empire.

NewsBusters has consistently argued that Gore plays up the dangers of global warming to line his own pockets. His investments in green energy firms could pay enormous dividends if the United States adopts the draconian cuts to carbon emissions he has advocated--and Congress included in the environmental tax known as cap and trade passed by the House last summer.

NB reader Steven Parker sends along this mangled caption of a Fort Hood photo from AP on Yahoo! News:

U.S. Army soldiers lower the flag following Revile in front of the III Corp Headquarters building at Fort Hood in Killeen, Texas, Friday, Nov. 6, 2009.

We're guessing the caption writer meant "Reveille," which is often the bugle call.....when the flag goes up, not down. Ouch. Buglers often play "Retreat" for the retirement of the colors.

This might inspire some Army people to want the draft reinstated -- just so the journalists aren't so ignorant.

When it comes to slurring Rush Limbaugh in his quest to obtain an interest in the NFL's St. Louis Rams, someone's going to have to work hard to top Adrian Wojnarowski.  The Yahoo Sports reporter today called Rush a "racist" and a "bigot" and implied he would never hire a black coach.

Wojnarowski spouted his slurs on Jim Rome's "Rome Is Burning" show on ESPN this afternoon.

ADRIAN WOJNAROWSKI: People do not want a bigot as an owner.  He's a racist. He's a bigot. He's shown it for years. He's made his career off in a large way off marginalizing black culture and African-Americans, and now he wants to buy into an industry where 70% of the players, the talent, the work-force is African-American and make money off of it? He doesn't get to do that.

In response, Rome didn't exactly leap to Rush's defense, but did pose this question.

Ill will against former Vice President Dick Cheney still runs high in some circles.

So high, in fact, that when the University of Wyoming decided to name an international student center after him, Suzanne Pelican began circulating a petition against it last year. One year later, that petition has earned 150 signatures and an Associated Press story.

In a story titled “Protest brews over Cheney center at Univ. of Wyo.” AP reporter Mead Gruver writes:

The university's decision to name the center after Cheney, a former Wyoming congressman, prompted a petition that collected more than 150 signatures.

The petition said polices of the Bush administration were "very controversial" and the name will affect how people perceive the center.

What could have been a fairly apolitical "Career Do's and Don'ts from 2008" retrospective has become an exhibit of how liberal media bias is ubiquitous in digital media. E-mail tipster John Genin informed us of how Yahoo! HotJobs writer Tom Musbach cited liberal heros Barack Obama and MSNBC's Rachel Maddow as worthy of emulation while citing Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's wardrobe non-scandal as a warning against corporate expense accounts.:

With the U.S. presidential election and the Olympics as major highlights of 2008, politicians and athletes had a major influence on this year's list of career lessons from high-profile figures.

As demonstrated in the examples below, everyone has career highs and lows, with some more public than others. But learning from them is the key to success. Below are six do's and don'ts that can help your career advancement in the coming year.

1. DO stay focused on achieving your goals, despite adversity or distractions. President-elect Barack Obama succeeded in one of the most lengthy and public of all hiring processes, in part because he kept his cool and kept his eyes on the prize. Another great example of this principle is Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps, who won a record eight gold medals in Beijing.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) is intimidated by Oprah Winfrey's intellect and political acumen, writer Joanna Douglas hinted in her December 5 article for Shine.Yahoo.com entitled "Sarah Palin blows off Oprah Winfrey."

While Douglas conceded that the Obama-endorsing daytime talk host refused to book Palin during the campaign, she neglected to mention that the decision at the time offended many a Republican Oprah fan, not to mention reports that roughly half her own staff disagreed with Winfrey's pre-election Palin blackout.

Instead Douglas portrayed Winfrey as the aggrieved party, "snubbed" by a vindictive Palin. Douglas went as far as to suggest that Palin may be avoiding an Oprah appearance because she's "intimidated" by Winfrey:

Taking a dig at outgoing President George W. Bush while lauding President-elect Obama as a man of letters, Associated Press writer Hillel Italie suggested that well-respected writers are welcoming the arrival of a "literary president-elect." Italie suggested that it was admiration of Obama's writing style and intelligence, not his liberal ideology, that pushed authors Toni Morrison, Ayelet Waldman, and novelist Michael Chabon into the Illinois Democrat's cheering section.

Yet Italie left out of his November 6 story how Morrison, Waldman and Chabon are reliable donors to the Democratic Party and left-wing groups and candidates like MoveOn.org and former Gov. Howard Dean (D-Vt.):

If Michelle Obama gets tired of merely entertaining dignitaries as first lady, she might try her hand at editing for the Associated Press. After all, according to the AP, her husband has made it "cool" to be an American again. Yahoo.com is giving play to the story by featuring it as a top headline in the "World" section of its news page (see image at right).

From AP writer William J. Kole:

VIENNA, Austria – She was a stranger, and she kissed me. Just for being an American.

It happened on the bus on my way to work Wednesday morning, a few hours after compatriots clamoring for change swept Barack Obama to his historic victory. I was on the phone, and the 20-something Austrian woman seated in front of me overheard me speaking English.

Without a word, she turned, pecked me on the cheek and stepped off at the next stop.

Nothing was said, but the message was clear: Today, we are all Americans.

Visitors to the home page for the Yahoo! search engine today are greeted with a photo of President-elect Barack Obama from his election night victory speech from Chicago's Grant Park last night and the caption: "First truly global U.S. president."

Beneath the exultant headline and photo, visitors were teased with a link to an article on how the "world" is reacting: "Barack Obama's historic victory inspires global goodwill and celebration."

Ah, yes, the reign of messianic peace and justice has begun! Other election-related links featured below the front-page main story:

On September 20, Noel Sheppard of NewsBusters posted on a misleading Associated Press/Yahoo poll on racism. The poll asserted that if Barack Obama loses, it will be because of "[d]eep-seated racial misgivings" held by "one-third of white Democrats."

Later that day, NB's Michael Bates criticized the AP's report on the poll for its historically inaccurate claim that the US "enshrined slavery into its constitution."

NB's Lyndsi Thomas got into the neighborhood of the concern I'm about to note on Sunday, when she noted that the pollsters tried to ferret out racism by asking questions that could be seen as purely political and having nothing to do with race.

But it seems to me that the pollsters engaged in a bit of hocus pocus. These three paragraphs from a story explaining AP's methodology carried at the Minneapolis Star Tribune gave me that impression:

The feds are zeroing in on David Kernell, the suspected hacker of GOP veep nominee's Yahoo email account:

The FBI searched the residence of the son of a Democratic state lawmaker in Tennessee over the weekend looking for evidence linking the young man to the hacking of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's personal e-mail account, two law enforcement officials told The Associated Press on Monday.

David Kernell, 20, has not returned repeated phone calls or e-mails from the AP since last week. He is the son of state Rep. Mike Kernell, a Memphis Democrat and chairman of Tennessee's House Government Operations Committee. The father declined last week to discuss the possibility his son might be involved in the case.

UPDATE at end of post: Polling agency VIPs have contributed to Democrats including Obama.

Are you getting tired of the mainstream media meme that if you're white and you don't vote for Barack Obama it's because you're a racist? Or that if John McCain wins, it's because he's white and Obama isn't?

Well, on Saturday, the Associated Press and Yahoo News released results of a new poll, and the major take by AP writers Ron Fournier and Trevor Thompson was that if Obama loses, it's because of "[d]eep-seated racial misgivings" held by "one-third of white Democrats."

Sadly, like most polls this year claiming to deal with how racism is impacting this campaign, no questions were asked to determine how deep-seated racial misgivings of black Democrats are guiding their choice for president (emphasis added, h/t Hot Air headlines, photo courtesy CBSTV):

On PBS's Web site today, ombudsman Michael Getler writes of complaints over an incident during last Sunday's pledge drive.  He describes the cheap shot taken by actor Mike Farrell against vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin:

According to Joseph Campbell, vice president of fundraising programs, here's what happened:

 On CNN's American Morning today, White House correspondent Suzanne Malveaux reported on Barack Obama's campaigning in Virginia.  Afterwards, anchor Kiran Chetry had a question:

CHETRY: All right. And Suzanne, what's on tap for the campaign today? And please tell me it's not lipstick again.

MALVEAUX: Let's hope not. He's going to be in Norfolk, Virginia. That is in southeast Virginia, and it's home to the world's largest Naval base. It's one of the most competitive areas that the Democrats and Republicans are fighting over. It's a critical piece of property, piece of land there with folks in Virginia, and they want those voters.

The folks at Yahoo News Photos section must have been greatly amused by their web page titled "Anthropology & Archaeology." The first four pictures in the slide show are various archaeological discoveries... well, except for the third one. THAT one happens to be a photo of John McCain. Yes, Yahoo seems to be saying that John McCain is an archaeological artifact! Nice ageist slap, eh?

Here's a screen shot of the original page...

Democrats (including Democrats in the media) are unhappy the presidential race is within five points, so they're eager to find wider polling margins than that. Yahoo! readers saw this headline at the top of the news on Saturday morning: "Obama widens lead over McCain by 15 points in latest poll."

It was Reuters reporting on a Newsweek poll. As the reader should suspect, the poll questioned more Democrats than Republicans: 231 Republicans to 324 Democrats, plus 307 independents. But that wasn't in this web article, which began:

Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama has opened up a double-digit lead over Republican John McCain two weeks after he clinched the nomination, a new poll published on Friday showed.

The nationwide poll conducted by Newsweek showed Obama leading McCain by a margin of 51-36 percent, indicating that he might have got a bounce from his recent primary victory over Hillary Clinton.

Leave it to the mainstream media to highlight the latest "accomplishment" of the Castros’ oppressive regime.

One of Yahoo.com’s front page news items Monday morning linked to a story from the Associated Press about Elian Gonzalez’s entrance into Cuba’s Young Communist Union. The short uncredited story put the news this way:

The Cuban boy at the center of an international custody battle eight years ago has joined Cuba's Young Communist Union.

Communist youth newspaper Juventud Rebelde quotes Elian Gonzalez as saying he will never let down ex-President Fidel Castro and his brother Raul Castro, who succeeded Fidel earlier this year.

The AP's Alisa Tang wrote a horrifying account of the oppression and misogyny that women face in Afghanistan. The April 30 article bucks the post-9/11 trend of the media turning a blind eye to women's issues in Muslim countries.

What's missing are two words—Islam and Sharia.

The AP article was about a country that uses religion to oppress women but which didn't mention that religion or the system of religious laws based on that religion.