Bias by Omission

From time to time over the past nine years, I have written about "globaloney," a shorthand term for the pseudo-science behind “climate change,” and “globalarmism” to describe the enviro-hysteria over "global warming" and the misguided public-policy prescriptions arising from that hysteria. Since the Paris climate talks have just begun, the press hysteria has reached a fever pitch. At the…

In predictably disingenuous fashion, the Associated Press claimed in a November 18 story that "Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has shined new light on the breakdown of a potentially history-altering round of 2008 peace talks." Abbas acknowledged that Israel offered Palestinians 93.5 percent of the West Bank and other significant concessions. The "light" isn't "new" at all. The wire service…

Eric Bradner touted in a Sunday article on CNN.com that the "Republican presidential contenders condemned" the man who murdered three people at a Planned Parenthood in Colorado, but "largely stood by their fierce criticism of the organization." Bradner played up that "Ben Carson...was the only Republican candidate to call on anti-abortion activists to alter their approach" in the wake of the…

As yours truly noted in several posts at my home blog on Wednesday and at NewsBusters on Friday and Saturday, the torrent of pre-Thanksgiving "getaway day" economic data was largely disappointing. That didn't stop the Associated Press's Chris Rugaber from pushing the "All is well" meme late Wednesday afternoon, declaring, contrary to what anyone's eyes could see, that "the fundamentals of the U.…

The truth about this year's Thanksgiving and Black Friday store and online sales is out there. It's just that Christopher Rugaber at the Associated Press, aka the Administration's Press, wasn't interested in clearly revealing all of it. Instead, the AP economics writer told readers about the dollar amount of this year's and last year's Thursday and Friday store sales, but failed to quantify the…

On Wednesday, the Associated Press's Josh Boak added to the wire service's collection of weak "Getaway Day" business journalism by declaring that new-home sales "recovered in October." No they didn't. The seasonally adjusted annual rate of 495,000 units reported by the Census Bureau was the fourth-lowest monthly level seen this year, even well below the 521,000 and 545,000 reported in the…

Ever since the White House changed hands almost seven years ago, press reports on the U.S. economy have annoyingly overaccentuated whatever positives reporters might find (or think they have found), while ignoring glaring negatives and omitting key items. One example of such biased reporting came from the Associated Press's Martin Crutsinger on Wednesday. In covering the Census Bureau's October…

Economic news on Wednesday's pre-Thanksgiving "Getaway Day" was largely dismal. The government's report on October's personal income and outlays headed up the disappointing news. While incomes increased nicely — at a rate which needs to be repeated about two dozen more times before it can be seen as genuinely impressive — spending only rose by 0.1 percent, while prior months were revised…

It took two weeks after the mass slaughter by radical Islamists in Paris, but the New York Times finally finds itself comfortable with raising the false spectre of American "Islamophobia," with an enormous assist from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the so-called civil-rights organization many consider a Muslim pressure group, and whose ties to Hamas have been documented in…

Promoting his latest book Wednesday night on Newsmax TV, longtime sports writer and Washington Post columnist John Feinstein surprisingly went off the liberal reservation and told host Steve Malzberg that ESPN Radio 980 personality and Pardon the Interruption co-host Tony Kornheiser “should probably have gotten” suspended for comparing conservative Republicans to ISIS back.

There was an interesting lead editorial in Wednesday's New York Times, forcefully in favor of demands from a black protest group at Princeton University to erase President Woodrow Wilson's name from the university's public policy institute because of his vile racial views and support for Jim Crow. Yet one could ask once again, where was this editorial concern five years ago, when it was leading…

Republicans have the upper hand in Congress and in a clear majority of state governments. To Alterman, that state of affairs is a “mystery,” since GOPers typically hold “extreme” and “silly” views “that are not only beyond the boundaries of the beliefs of the vast majority of Americans, but also contrary to the laws of physics, economics, and, of course, common sense.” In the December 7 issue of…

Taking its cues from Monday’s New York Times, Wednesday’s CBS This Morning offered a similarly fawning profile of some young girls in California who are “scouting for change” as they try to force the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) to admit them as members as they preferred the BSA over the Girl Scouts.