Double Standards

Displayed prominently on the home page for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer Web site at 12:30 Tuesday afternoon was this tease for a story about a local politician in hot water for crude remarks to a colleague:GOP lawmaker punished Minority House Republicans have severely disciplined a Vancouver lawmaker for inappropriate remarks to a female staffer.The link takes readers to AP writer Curt…

ABC's "Good Morning America," which aired two gushing profiles this summer on the 30th wedding anniversary of John and Elizabeth Edwards, has found no time to air a similar story on the 30th anniversary of George and Laura Bush. The presidential couple celebrated three decades together on November 5, 2007, but GMA made no mention of it on Monday or Tuesday. In contrast, on July 31, 2007, the ABC…

In an article that is otherwise fairly balanced, Delaware's biggest daily, the Wilmington News Journal, proclaims in a headline today that senior Senator Joe Biden has a "Tangled tongue, but a civil record," with the sub-header "Biden's bloopers don't jibe with his votes." Sen. Joe Biden sees black supporters as his base and maintains a stellar voting record with the NAACP. But he's also gotten…

People that don't foolishly depend on the mainstream media for current events are painfully aware of the most recent round of racially insensitive statements made by Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.). As is typical, this went largely ignored by press outlets that would have been all over the remarks had a Republican presidential candidate made them. Of course, these same media members are also hesitant to…

Former Atlantic City Mayor Robert Levy (D) pleaded guilty today to lying about his military service in order to obtain financial benefits to which he was not entitled. Levy is a Democrat, but keeping with AP tradition, his party affiliation was not disclosed in Geoff Mulvihill's 8-paragraph article "Former Atlantic City Mayor Pleads Guilty." (h/t NewsBusters reader Martin Edward)NewsBusters…

In the same vein as NewsBusters Warner Todd Huston's earlier blog today about labeling bias, the Associated Press found a Republican politician's alleged episode of gay sex worthy not only of mentioning his party affiliation, but of doing so in the lede.SPOKANE -- A Republican state legislator from southwest Washington had sex with a man he met at an erotic video store and then told police he had…

Democrats never get "outed" as Democrats by the MSM if they are accused of crimes and corruption, but if they are Republicans... well, that party affiliation is rarely held back by that same media. Some may have scoffed at this claim that GOPers are always outed while Dems are always shielded, but here is so perfect an example of it that it almost seems that we wrote it ourselves as a Halloween…

Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona was indicted "on federal corruption charges stemming from a lengthy investigation into allegations that he had misused his office for financial gain," the Los Angeles Times reported on October 30. Reporters Christine Hanley, H.G. Reza and Paul Pringle noted that Carona was once considered a "rising star" for the GOP.It's a fair point to make note of Carona's…

A major presidential candidate is straddling the fence between two key constituencies: gay voters and black churchgoers who tend to frown on homosexuality. Yet when profiling Barack Obama's gospel concert campaign swing through South Carolina, Washington Post staffer Sridhar Pappu all but left that verse out of his October 29 hymn of praise, "In S.C., Obama Seeks a Spiritual Reawakening."Gay…

Army Captain Mark L. Stoneman took issue with the Washington Post placing an article regarding the Medal of Honor ceremony for the late Lt. Michael P. Murphy, a Navy Seal killed in action in Afghanistan, on page A4, when the Post devoted prime real estate on the front page to a profile of Democratic strategist Joe Trippi (emphasis mine).:I was disappointed in your coverage of the posthumous…

It's time for a TGIF edition of one of our favorite games: WIARHSI. For you beginners, that's "What If A Republican Had Said It?"What if a Republican had said, in explaining why schools in Iowa are performing better than those in Washington:There's less than one percent of the population of Iowa that is African American. There is probably less than four of five percent that are minorities. What…

Sometimes chronicling media bias and hypocrisy is just too easy. You couldn't have asked for better material than what was provided Wednesday by the New York Times which ran a thousand-word-plus article discussing the alleged nepotism of Commentary’s hiring of John Podhoretz to run the magazine. (Hat tip: Ace.) I’ll grant that this type of character assassination article is typical when it comes…