Bob Schieffer outrage, Part II

Kudos to Crooks & Liars for noticing this and posting the video...

I was watching Face the Nation on Sunday, and for the second week in a row, I was up out of my chair complaining about the nature of Bob Schieffer's questions. Recall last week that it was Schieffer who single-handedly began the pseudo-scandal regarding Gen. Wesley Clark's "comments" regarding John McCain's patriotism and his POW experience. Schieffer asked Clarke if he was saying that "getting shot down in a plane doesn't qualify someone to be president," and when Clark repeated the phrase in his answer, the press pounced. You would have thought that Clark was burning the American flag while calling McCain a traitor, all thanks to Schieffer's outrageously leading question.

This Sunday, Schieffer was at it again, and this time it was Sen. John Kerry. While criticizing the many flip flops of John McCain and dozens of issues, Schieffer came right out and asked Kerry if he "was questioning John McCain's integrity."

Outrageous. I'm sick to death of the leading questions that our so-called journalists keep asking the candidates and their supporters, and there's pretty much no end in sight. I would expect this sort of media handling of questioning on Faux News or on a show that clearly identifies itself as a liberal or conservative talk show. But, these types of leading questions from a supposed unbiased journalist are beyond the pale.

Schieffer ought to be ashamed of himself. I can only wonder what in the world he's going to do this Sunday for an encore for the last two weeks.

NBC's Mitchell leads attack against Clark

I'm getting awfully tired of the pseudo-scandal about General Wesley Clark's comments regarding John McCain, so I promise I won't keep posting about it, but an exchange on TV yesterday got my dander up, and I'm not good at letting things go when I'm angry (at least in the political world).

I had a very difficult time watching the above exchange between NBC's Andrea Mitchell and General Wesley Clark. Listening to Mitchell huff and sign at Clark's explanation, you would think she's working for Faux News now. Nope, I checked, she's still at NBC.

First off, Gen. Clark has been saying the same thing over and over and over again since his appearance last Sunday on Face the Nation, and yet his rightful, common-sense explanation has been falling on deaf ears, including Mitchell's, ever since. He was simply answering the question as it was phrased to him by Bob Schieffer. Of course, just about every major news network cuts out the part of the footage where Schieffer is questioning Clark when re-running over and over and over what Clark said. Once that happens, viola - you have Clark questioning John McCain's military service, out of context, and in perfect context for McCain's cheerleaders in the corporate media like Andrea Mitchell.

Mitchell also accused Clark of being part of a coordinated attack on John McCain's military record. Hmm, just wondering, where in the hell was all this outrage in the corporate media during the summer and fall of 2004, when the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth (SBVT) were dragging John Kerry's name through the mud? They sat on their hands and said nothing. More on the Swift Boaters in a bit.

Here's a few selected excerpts from the exchange between Mitchell and Clarke:

Andrea: Well, let me point out that some of the critics from the Republican side have pointed out that there seems to be an organized campaign and whether or not you played into this that also on Sunday a liberal blogger...on Americablog wrote...

First of all there's a factual issue because no one has proved that to my satisfaction that John McCain ever did any propaganda for the enemy...

He was an extraordinary man...

With all that boot licking, I'm surprised that Mitchell isn't wearing a McCain '08 button.

The blog Mitchell mentions, Americablog, had this to say (as quoted on screen by her):

Honestly, besides being tortured, what did McCain do to excel in the military?... Getting shot down, tortured, and then doing propaganda for the enemy is not command experience.

Honestly, except for the propaganda part (see below), I totally agree with it. This is 2008 - being a POW for 5 1/2 years, while tragic and admirable on McCain's part for having the intestinal fortitude to survive it, does not alone qualify someone to be president.

It's also worth noting that Mitchell isn't technically correct (or as she would call it, a "factual error") about McCain's imprisonment at the hands of the North Vietnamese. He was used as a propaganda tool, at least at first. From U.S. News & World Report in 1973 (and posted online earlier this year):

After four days, McCain made an anti-American propaganda "confession." He has always felt that his statement was dishonorable, but as he would later write, "I had learned what we all learned over there: Every man has his breaking point. I had reached mine."

I cannot even begin to comprehend what McCain went through, and I'm not denigrating whatsoever what he did to stop the beatings. However, my point here is that Mitchell ought not get carried away with her McCain cheer leading (I know, fat chance), and she ought to get her facts straight. Since she is masquerading as a journalist, she could at least act like one.

Of course, Mitchell wasn't done yet. She brought up the now infamous MoveOn ad and implied that it was linked to McCain's military service, which is an outright lie, period. At that point, Clark seemed to have had enough:

Mitchell: Now, I know that John McCain...

Clark: Andrea, that [the MoveOn ad] doesn't say anything about his military career. That asks about John McCain's judgment and I think that's a very legitimate issue...

Damn right McCain's judgment about Iraq is a legitimate issue. The "General Betray Us" ad said nothing about McCain's military career, period. End of story. But, that doesn't stop people like Mitchell from trying to make the connection anyway.

Paul Waldman at HuffPo discusses the fact that McCain has successfully exploited his POW status for years with the willing help of his many fawning admirers in the media:

But to understand why the press is reacting with such outrage [about Clark's comments], you have to understand what they've been saying about McCain for the last decade.

There's a myth out there that the McCain campaign and the media have cooperated to create. It says that John McCain is reluctant to exploit his Vietnam POW story for political advantage, so modest and full of integrity is he. We've seen this repeated again and again, not just by McCain and his supporters but by reporters who ought to know better.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

From the first time he ran for Congress in 1982 up to the present day, McCain has made his POW story the centerpiece of his entire political career. The key moment of that 1982 campaign was when he responded to his opponent's (absolutely true) accusation that McCain was a carpetbagger by saying, "As a matter of fact, when I think about it now, the place I lived longest in my life was Hanoi." At every point since, it has been the deft use of this tool that has brought McCain renewed attention or won him a key victory.

Here's another terrific example of media blowhards devouring a Big Mac [from 3/5/08, when Bush and McCain appeared at a press conference where W endorsed him] From Digby:

Brian Williams: You know what I thought was unsaid — they took their position Chris, we're seeing the replay — they end up in this spot and the sun is coming is just from the side and there in the shadow is John McCain's buckled, concave shoulder. It's a part of his body the suit doesn't fill out because of his war injuries. Again you wouldn't spot it unless you knew to look for it. He doesn't give the same full chested profile as the president standing next to him. Talk about a warrior.

I mean, is Williams serious, or is this a Saturday Night Live news sketch?

This is what I'm getting at - the media's insatiable lust for McCain is downright revolting, and I'm not even talking about Faux News (that's a given).

Here's a terrific round-up from TPM of the McCain love and Clark bashing over the past year days...

The most despicable part of the round-up above (and the most despicable person) comes from none other than Oliver North, who should still be in jail for his misdeeds during the Iran-Contra Scandal:

I think General Clark's comments are small and petty, just like the man himself.

Really? General Clark, small and petty? I guess that's what one gets called these days when having the temerity to question whether the media favorite darling candidate has the qualifications to be president. I mean, Clark only served his country for over 37 years in uniform, and that's a helluva lot longer than North did. If anybody is small and petty (and I would add simple minded), it's North himself.

I also was pretty amused to hear Laura Ingraham threaten one of her guests, telling him that he "won't on the show again" if he doesn't be quiet. I also was highly amused about Juan Williams of Faux News accusing Barack Obama of doing something right out of "Karl Rove's playbook." Wait, Rove has been a Faux News hero (and current employee) for over eight years, and now State TV is admitting to us that Rove's tactics are a bad thing? I'm thoroughly confused.

I have to repeat it one more time - where was this outrage in the media in '04 during the Kerry Swift boating? Nowhere to be found, because the corporate media badly wanted and eventually received another Bush term.

Just another reason we have to be so grateful for the greedy, selfish corporations that give us our garbage corporate media.

h/t Crooks & Liars for the video & links

Clark defends his McCain comments; Why?

Ladies and gentlemen, I bring you the latest installment of Al Gore "claiming" that he "invented the Internet." (Which he never said) - and it's General Wesley Clark's comments on Face the Nation on Sunday. The media firestorm that has been generated by Wesley Clark's comments (see video clip above) on Face the Nation this past weekend are amazing (but not at all surprising). It's yet another pseudo scandal - taking media time and coverage away from the issues that matter to voters most in their everyday lives. The media is now doing exactly the opposite of what it did to John Kerry in 2004. When Kerry was criticized for his military service in '04, it was said by many (and everyone on State TV Faux News) that it was "fair game" because he was running on his war record.

Now that McCain is doing everything but shooting campaign commercials inside the Hanoi Hilton, it's all supposed to be off limits. Wrong. I'm tired of writing it over and over (and I'm not going to any longer, even though society makes people feel like they have to), but I'll repeat it one more time - no one questions John McCain's patriotism, or his service to his country. But, that doesn't make his foreign policy positions bullet proof, especially when he advocates continued war in the Middle East, and he advocates torture of terrorism suspects.

What's more, the phrase that has the media in full-blown fury was given to him by Face the Nation host Bob Schieffer, but that part is conveniently cut off during the endless replays on cable news. Give me a friggin' break.

What's more, Clark is ABSOLUTELY RIGHT - getting shot down in a plane doesn't make you qualified to be president. What's even more astonishing is Schieffer's response: "REALLY?!?!?"

This is hardly even worth spending more time on, but Clark sure is - he appeared on Dan Abrams' show last night to explain himself, and to try to douse the media firestorm that's erupted because someone dared to criticize the media's darling candidate, John McCain...

Clark's comments above are totally, absolutely unnecessary. I was happy to at least hear Clark mention that the words were given to him by Schieffer, although Clark doesn't mention him by name. Clark should have been much more forceful on that point, however.

Gingrich at his demagogic worst, as usual

In case you missed it a few days ago, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich was on Face the Nation at his demagogic best following the Supreme Court decision last week that detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, have rights under our Constitution.

For a quick refresher, here's a brief report on the Supreme Court ruling, via MSNBC...

Anyway, Gingrich really drank the Kool-Aid with his comments on FTN, specifically this passage:

GINGRICH: I will say, I think the recent Supreme Court decision to turn over to a local district judge decisions of national security and life and death that should be made by the President and the Congress is the most extraordinarily arrogant and destructive decision the Supreme Court has made in it's history.

REID: In it's history?

GINGRICH: In it's history. Worse than Dred Scott, for the following reason: The court has now knowingly stepped in, this morning's newspaper say, smugglers had actually gotten the design of a nuclear weapon, that we now have the evidence that people out there had a nuclear weapon design. And this court is saying that any random district judge, based on whatever their personal caprice is, whatever their personal ideological bias, can intervene with a terrorist in such a way.

Pretty amusing to hear Newt Gingrich talking about ideological bias.

Two things: 1. To say that this decision was worse than the Dred Scott case is quite possibly the dumbest thing to ever come out of this man's mouth. And that's saying something, because there's quite a bonehead buffet to choose from - Gingrich once publicly stated that the US ought to re-institute orphanages for unwanted children.

To compare this decision to arguably the worst decision in the Supreme Court's history - that Congress had no authority to outlaw slavery, is the height of stupidity and ignorance. But, these sorts of statements are the norm with Gingrich. No wonder the man's been married three times - he has the morals of a promiscuous rabbit, and the ethics of a corrupt politician. Oops.

There's lots of fear mongering going around surrounding the Supreme Court decision, but again the question is worth asking, What's so wrong with allowing these criminals a trial by jury?

And 2. I'd much rather have a court decide the merits of a charge against a terrorist than an ideological president with political ulterior motives, be it Democrat or Republican.

It's amazing to me that people like Gingrich think that our judicial system isn't the answer to dealing with terrorists. I much prefer these trials than the secret military tribunals that the Bush administration favors, which includes torture, trials without representation, and a suppression of basic human rights in some cases (and that's just what we know about).

As with so many political issues, Gingrich is on the wrong side of public opinion. But, that's nothing new to him. This guy's more often wrong than right. (Clinton Impeachment, drilling in ANWR, etc.) Even when he's right, he ends up being wrong. I remember the laughable Contract with America in 1994 - term limits were a provision in that contract, and the public wanted it. However, that was conveniently left behind when politicians realized it would end their feeding at the public trough.

Bob Schieffer's thoughts on Iraq War

This vid above is a commentary by CBS' Face the Nation Host Bob Schieffer, and he's spot on. The war doesn't seem to be on many peoples' minds lately, including the gatekeepers in the media. It should be.

We are coming up on the 4,000th dead American in Iraq, and while I'd never say they die in vain, I'd like to say that the service of our patriots in Iraq will ultimately do some good. But, I have my doubts.

Schieffer is correct to point out that none of the three remaining candidates for president like to talk about Iraq - it's the white elephant in the room thus far in this campaign. McCain says that we can "still win," which I find nothing short of a total crock.

Hillary and Obama offer more encouraging words, but not by much, each stating that at some point we need to withdraw. No kidding.

The closer we get to November, though, the more Iraq will move toward center stage, and the candidates (and the media) are going to have to give us a whole lot more in the way of proposals (and solutions) to our $3 trillion problem - our occupation in the Middle East.

Specter predicts Gonzo will step down

But, I'm not so sure. We've only been hearing this song now for about three months. However, a Senate no confidence vote, even if along party lines, would be an embarrassment to Alberto Gonzales and the Bush administration. And that vote would NOT be along party lines - more than a handful of Republican Senators have publicly called for Gonzo's resignation in the last few weeks - Norm Coleman, Arlen Specter and Chuck Hagel among them.

In the end, though, how do you embarrass a shameless administration? I don't remember where I heard this over the weekend, because I've been reading and watching so much on politics lately, but it really resonated with me, but it went something like this:

Bush and his cabal are perfectly willing to look completely stupid to advance their agenda. They'll say a million "I don't remembers" with a side of "that's just not true" (when they know that IT is), and in the end, if Gonzo stays put as AG, then it's a "victory" for Bush.

Sometime around January 22, 2001, this administration stopped considering what the best thing for America is, and started worrying about what's best for their political donors, and the best course to stay in power.

If Congress wants Gonzo out, it will probably have to impeach him.

Video via C&L

Bob Schieffer - a dyed-in-the-wool journalist

I've only recently become a fan of Bob Schieffer, but I'm glad I did. I love Face the Nation, but it's my least favorite of the three network Sunday morning political shows. The only reason I dislike it is because it's 30 minutes instead of the hour-long This Week and Meet the Press.

Schieffer is the most qualified to host one of the Sunday morning shows. He is one of the very few journalists to have covered The White House, The Pentagon, The State Department and Congress. He routinely does a very, very good job; he's not afraid to take some shots at people and institutions he's unhappy with.

Last weekend, he more than called out the Bush Administration on the U.S. Prosecutor firings, complete with video tape. (That's always my favorite, because video doesn't lie.)

At the end of the footage, take a look at the shifty-eyed performance of White House Counselor Dan Bartlett, as he lamely tries to impugn the integrity of Matthew Dowd, a former Bush staffer who played key roles in Bush's "victories" in 2000 and 2004. Last weekend, Dowd came out quite strongly against the Bush Administration, and the Sunday morning talk shows were the first opportunity to respond, and respond they did.

Like this was unpredictable - character assassination by a Bush mouthpiece in the face of dissent. I'll have more on Bartlett later today, including some footage from his appearance on last Sunday's MTP appearance.

Pretty impressive that Bartlett managed to get on MTP & FTN on the same day. I guess This Week declined the ménage à trois.

McCain's misguided Iraq proposal

Here's judas John McCain pontificating on how we are going to win or lose in Iraq in the next "several months" on Sunday's Meet the Press. What a truckload of crap. I'm sick and tired of hearing politicians say we can win in Iraq, all for political gain. There IS NO WINNING IN IRAQ, period, and the sooner our leaders realize it, the better. What, exactly, would constitute a victory? The terrorists laying down their arms and pledging not to kill any more Americans or Iraqis? That will never happen.

McCain is insane if he wants to send in more troops to that hell hole. An overwhelming majority of Americans oppose the move, and in this case, I think the opinion polls have a point. McCain correctly points out that you can't conduct foreign policy from opinion polls. I'd add "most of the time" to that phrase, though. And in this case, I'm afraid the American people are right.

What are more troops going to accomplish? More combat deaths. It's funny, as I listened to the whole episode of MTP, I was struck by the overtones of Vietnam in McCain's choice of words, i.e. - using phrases like "sweep and hold" and talking about the need for more troops. His reasoning, that chaos would spread in the area if we pulled out, is reminiscent of Vietnam; the Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon administrations all felt that if Vietnam fell to the communists, then all of Southeast Asia would fall to communism. This "domino effect" never happened, and we paid for that mistake in a tragic amount of American blood - over 58,000 war dead. I hope and pray that we don't ever make that same mistake again, but we may be on the verge of doing just that. I feel analogies to Vietnam have been wildly overdone in the press, but it seems like we get closer and closer every day to that analogy becoming all too real.

What really riled me was when Russert pressed McCain on why the American people should believe him, or believe that his strategy would work, the Senator replied that people should trust him because of his military background. Spoken sotto voce, McCain is implying that because he spent 5 1/2 years in the Hanoi Hilton, we should trust his foreign policy proposals? Sorry, I ain't buyin' it. I'm not Swiftboating McCain here - he's a hero and I can't even begin to imagine what he went through as a POW. But, that doesn't qualify him to set Iraq policy, or be president.

Just as an aside, where were the Democratic Senators on MTP on Sunday? I realize that Harry Reid, the soon-to-be Democratic Senate Majority Leader, was on Face the Nation, but I'm sure Tim Russert could have found someone from the Democratic side of the aisle. Joe Lieberman barely qualifies, since he's a self-identified "I.D.," as in "Independent Democrat," as he told Russert.

I wax and wane on whether I like Russert or not - it depends on the week, the guests, and the show, but most times he does a pretty effective job at taking politicians to task on their answers, especially when it differs from their past answers on the issues. One thing's for sure - Russert is always prepared, researched and ready to interview his guests, and most of the time, he's not afraid of the hard-hitting question, and that applies to Democrats and Republicans alike. Journalists of his ilk are in shockingly short supply these days.



Just a quick blast from the past. This is McCain on Meet the Press earlier this year, explaining that Jerry Falwell is NOT (emphasis mine) "an agent of intolerance." The Senator has a nice dodge at the end of this clip, too, when Russert asks him if he thinks Falwell is just that: "I think Jerry Falwell can explain his views on this program when you have him on."

I sure hope Democrats store away this video clip for the '08 campaign - this is shameless pandering to the far right for votes, and it sickens me. I won't even waste my time explaining why Falwell is so despicable, save for one example: following the 9-11 attacks, he opined that gays and abortion doctors were part of the reason the attacks happened.

Does that sound like intolerance to you?

Senator McCain, please run. Please.

He'll get torn to pieces, if the Democratic Nominee has any backbone.