Free Republic

WASHINGTON — Since 2001, the Central Intelligence Agency has developed plans to dispatch small teams overseas to kill senior Qaeda terrorists, according to current and former government officials. Skip to next paragraph Paul Buck/European Pressphoto Agency The plans remained vague and were never carried out, the officials said, and Leon E. Panetta, the C.I.A. director, canceled the program last month. Officials at the spy agency over the years ran into myriad logistical, legal and diplomatic obstacles. How could the role of the United States be masked? Should allies be informed and might they block the access of the C.I.A. teams...

On Sunday, the New York Times struck another blow against the Bush administration’s counter-terrorism measures with a front-page story alleging that a CIA program was kept secret from Congress for eight years. The orders to keep Congress out of the loop — which sound flagrantly illegal — came, according to the story, straight from then Vice President Dick Cheney.

"We all know that The New York Times and other papers have been thinking hard about finding ways to charge readers for the news on their web sites, and there’s evidence that the decision-making process is moving along. Bloomberg has reported that a survey of print subscribers included this sentence: The New York Times website, nytimes.com, is considering charging a monthly fee of $5.00 to access its content, including all its articles, blogs and multimedia. It also asked about a $2.50-a-month “discounted fee” for print subscribers....."

Reporters from roughly 30 television networks, newspapers, magazines, and web sites celebrated the Fourth of July with Barack Obama at the White House last weekend. Why didn't you know that? Because they were sworn to secrecy. We reported yesterday that Politico's Mike Allen was spotted milling about as a guest at the White House's "backyard bash" by the pool reporter, who was allowed into the event for 40 minutes and kept in a pen before being ushered out. When Allen quoted from the pool report in his Playbook column the next day, he deleted a reference to his own name...

Hilarious takeoff of Dowd's "secret palin diary" column that came out on the NYT yesterday.

When a politician drops a bombshell, it is natural that there be all sorts of puzzled queries as to the meaning of that surprise announcement. Sarah Palin, in her first gubernatorial term, announced her resignation as Alaska's governor on Friday. Immediately the speculation started as to what could be behind such a sudden decision. All this is understandable and very much expected. What isn't expected, what isn't natural, what is downright despicable, however, is how some liberals like The New York Times' Maureen Dowd reacted. Understandably all sorts of ideas, however far fetched, were floated as to the possible motive....

It seems that on July fourth, The New York Times saw fit to smirk at both American patriotism and Christianity. A recent Times article about the erection of a giant, though strategically altered, replica of the Statue of Liberty by a showman of a Memphis pastor presented a perfect example of the ridicule and disdain with which the Times views Christianity and American patriotism, both. In Memphis, Tennessee, writer Shalia Dewan could barely hide her sarcasm and distaste for the patriotism and the muscular Christianity espoused by Pastor Alton R. Williams in her coverage of the unveiling of the...

Imagine a defense that starts like this. There is much in the House cap-and-trade energy bill that just passed that I absolutely hate. It is too weak in key areas and way too complicated in others. A simple, straightforward carbon tax would have made much more sense than this Rube Goldberg contraption. It is pathetic that we couldn’t do better. It is appalling that so much had to be given away to polluters. It stinks. It’s a mess. I detest it.

For seven months, The New York Times managed to keep out of the news the fact that one of its reporters, David Rohde, had been kidnapped by the Taliban. But that was pretty straightforward compared with keeping it off Wikipedia.

As a follow-up to this story, the New York Times is now admitting that it made a mistake, and that what Jermaine Jackson actually wished his late brother Michael Jackson was, "May Allah be with you always": Correction: June 27, 2009 An article on Friday about the death of Michael Jackson misstated the number of songs from his album “Off the Wall” that became No. 1 singles. There were two, not four. The article also misstated part of a comment that Mr. Jackson’s brother Jermaine offered for Mr. Jackson after speaking with reporters. He said, “May Allah be with you...

Liberals love to whitewash the truth and when it comes to reporting on the death of the so-called, self-labeled “King of Pop,” Michael Jackson, that fact is on sad display again. Why does The New York Times feel compelled to whitewash Jermaine Jackson’s farewell to his brother during the press conference held at the hospital last night? As he concluded a fluff piece that yielded no new facts about Michael’s final exit that the fawning press hadn’t already spewed, Jermaine said, “May Allah be with you always.” Let’s hope The New York Times bought its reporter a hearing aid this...

Homeland Security: Recognizing that money is the mother's milk of terrorism, the U.S. cracked down on charitable fronts after 9/11. The new administration thinks it went too far.In fact, it's hinting at loosening restrictions, a move that threatens to reopen the financial pipeline between several Muslim charities and overseas terrorists that Treasury shut off after 9/11. Left-wing activists, meanwhile, are helping convince the public the charities deserve a second chance. On the heels of President Obama's Cairo speech, in which he suggested relaxing Treasury anti-terror "rules," the ACLU published a well-timed report slamming those very rules. It makes a point...

Iranian leaders have been forced to admit discrepancies in their presidential election that could affect a minimum of three million votes. They could learn something about manipulating numbers from the New York Times. The Times on Sunday released results of a poll which showed support for government run health care...

A New York Times reporter known for making investigative trips deep inside dangerous conflict zones escaped from militant captors after more than seven months in captivity by climbing over a wall, the newspaper said Saturday. David S. Rohde was abducted Nov. 10 along with an Afghan reporter colleague and a driver south of the Afghan capital, Kabul. He had been traveling through Logar province to interview a Taliban commander, but was apparently intercepted and taken by other militants on the way. The Times reported that Rohde and Afghan reporter Tahi Ludin on Friday climbed over the wall of a compound...

In an email to Editor and Publisher New York Times editor Bill Keller complained that he's received "a few bizarre vibes from people outside the NYT who are puzzled by my presence in Tehran," and called critics "weird." Despite his protestations to the contrary, Keller's personal involvement in Iranian election coverage bespeaks far more than an editor's understandable desire to be where the story's breaking. As I pointed out in my Tuesday AT column, "Keller's personal involvement committed what little is left of the Times' once-proud reputation to the election -- more specifically, to reporting a supposed 'Obama effect,'

June 18, 2009, 0:00 a.m. How to Crush DebateStart with a lie, add a little slander, stir with incitement to violence. By Clifford D. May Following the deadly shootings of a Kansas abortion doctor and a guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, two prominent New York Times columnists, Paul Krugman and Frank Rich, spoke out forcefully against those in the media who spout lies and, possibly, incite violence. There are “lunatics� out there, Krugman wrote, and “media organizations wind up such people at their, and our, peril.� Rich warned of “toxic rhetoric� and “media demagogues,� fueling a rage...

Last Tuesday, one day after General Motors filed for bankruptcy, the automaker announced the sale of its Hummer line to Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Company in China. Instead of selling this massive, ecologically destructive gas guzzler, should G.M. have it sent to the scrap heap? Or do the financial needs of the corporation and the prudent use of taxpayer money — thanks to the G.M. bailout, the American public owns 60 percent of the company — trump other considerations? -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Argument The company must act in the interest of its employees and shareholders — in other words, us...

Without a trace -- not even one pixel -- of irony, the editor of the New York Times Monday accused Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of being a "shrewd and ruthless front man" for a political elite, the same charge that has been leveled against the Times' beloved Barack Obama....

Paul Krugman's outrage is selective and aimed, as usual, at conservatives. I was surprised to see the New York Times columnist take a swipe at me and the paper that has long been my home. Since Frank Rich, another New York Times columnist, and numerous bloggers have all written essentially the same thing as Mr. Krugman, it is obvious that a new line of attack against conservatives is emerging. It needs to be stopped in its tracks. In a column called "The Big Hate," Mr. Krugman seized upon two unrelated shootings in different cities — of a Kansas abortionist and...

So now The New York Times is quoting “experts” saying the Boston Globe may only be worth one dollar - a buck! Eight bits! OK, here goes. I’ve got a hunch, I’m gonna bet a bunch. Pinch Sulzberger, if you’re listening, I am going to offer you a premium for your dreadful sheet - two bucks. I will take the entire rag off your hands - even the weekly editorial about how wonderful Barney Frank is. Terms: cash. I just counted out eight quarters from the change cup in my car. That’s my last best offer. I still have three...

... [F]or all its new media airs, the new White House team remains in the thrall of perhaps the most emblematic old media institution of all. Senior Obama officials during the transition posed for Times Sunday Magazine portraits and then opened the doors again with top-level access for another major magazine piece this month on health care. Midlevel officials cooperate for Times profiles detailing their key behind-the-scenes roles. Even routine news stories buried deep inside the A-section of the Times often quote high-level sources speaking both on and off the record. One part of Obama’s Times fixation is strategy. For...

"Your lifeboat is made of paper."

Apparently, the New York Times is shocked to learn that a convicted felon, James W. von Brunn had a weapon. They also appeared indignant to learn that the Federal Bureau of Investigation wasn’t looking into von Brunn. The F.B.I., however, was aware that von Brunn had a website, that “expressed hatred of African Americans and Jews.” And of course, prosecution for first degree murder isn’t good enough. We need the hate crime prosecution. And to top it all off, we find out that he double parked. Of all the things to do. It has to rank up there with murder...

Wednesday, June 10, 2009 NY Times Airbrushes Letterman's Willow Palin Sex Jokes From Their Website Shocker! The New York Times and CBS airbrushed David Letterman's Willow Palin sex jokes from their website: Here's what The New York Times wrote: ‘The Newest Nominee’ Monologue | Aired Monday night on CBS: You know who was in town this weekend, went to a Yankee game? Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska. And she was up there with Rudy Giuliani. They were sitting together. And their seats were, well, let me tell you where their seats were. They were way, way in far right field....

The United States economy lost 345,000 jobs in May, the government reported on Friday, a sharp slowing in the pace of job losses that fueled hopes that the economy was on its way toward stabilizing. The recession continued to take a toll as the unemployment rate climbed to 9.4 percent, its highest point in a quarter-century. The rate — a measure of jobless people looking for work — rose more than expected, partly because more people were resuming the hunt for a job. Economists were encouraged that businesses were cutting fewer jobs, but six million jobs have now disappeared since...

MADISON — A La Crosse man who used thousands of bogus subscriptions to collect more than $200,000 from the New York Times pleaded guilty Tuesday in federal court to wire fraud. Martin T. Holtet, 50, of 235 S. 19th St., delivered newspapers in the La Crosse area for the New York Times from 2002 to 2008. He began e-mailing phony subscriptions to the Times’ Web site in late 2007, then would pick up the papers at area printing plants and the Times later would bill the customer, said Assistant U.S. Attorney John Vaudreuil. By submitting fictitious subscribers, Holtet’s route grew...

The federal government mistakenly made public a 266-page report, its pages marked “highly confidential,” that gives detailed information about hundreds of the nation’s civilian nuclear sites and programs, including maps showing the precise locations of stockpiles of fuel for nuclear weapons. The publication of the document was revealed Monday in an on-line newsletter devoted to issues of federal secrecy. That publicity set off a debate among nuclear experts about what dangers, if any, the disclosures posed. It also prompted a flurry of investigations in Washington into why the document was made public. On Tuesday evening, after inquiries from The New...

Try as they might, there isn't enough candy in the world to fully coat this one. Obama's rhetoric simply doesn't match up with his actions, and the New York Times knows it. Let's start with GM's CEO himself, who also happens to be the CEO of the United States. We have The One's professed reluctance to take over two of the big three automakers. “We are acting as reluctant shareholders, because that is the only way to help G.M. succeed,” Mr. Obama said . . .. Hmmm. How very Chavezian. A private company can only succeed if the government steps...

Francis Wilkinson, executive editor of The Week news magazine, seems to think that The New York Times is a model of restraint with a centrist editorial policy and that conservatives should be afraid of the day when the Old Gray Lady publishes its last sheet. My guess: if your eyebrow could be raised any higher at this claim, it'd become a toupee. In a somewhat contradictory piece headlined "Will GOP regret attacks on The Times?," Wilkinson by turns says that The New York Times has on one hand allowed the Bush administration to program its content while on the other...

Somewhere this morning, maybe in a scroll at Morning Joe, I saw an item about Andrew Cuomo cracking down on immigration fraud. Wow, I thought: what a pleasant surprise! I immediately devised a political theory to explain his move: as Cuomo prepares to run for governor, he must have decided he needs to appeal to average New Yorkers concerned about the flood of illegal immigration into the state. So I Googled ‘Cuomo’ + ‘immigration’ and sure enough found lots of stories. I focused on an article in the New York Times with this encouraging headline: “Cuomo Widens a Probe Into...

His latest work is set in a public toilet and plays on Japanese superstitions that ghosts and evil spirits inhabit the smallest room in the house, which is why they were traditionally relegated to the most distant part of the home. Parents still tell naughty children that a hairy hand will seize them when they have their pants around their ankles if they misbehave and drag them down into the dark water below. The nine-chapter tale is appropriately titled "Drop," and is the alarming story of an evil spirit that inhabits a toilet bowl, according to Takaki Hayashi, vice president...

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) finally told the truth about President Barack Obama's plan to bring Guantanamo detainees into the United States. The New York Times (and others) has Senator Reid on the record: Mr. Reid in his comments, however, was unequivocal in insisting that the terror suspects never reach American shores. “You can’t put them in prison unless you release them,” he said. “We will never allow terrorists to be released in the United States.” Setting aside the 17 Uighurs at Gitmo, think about what Senator Reid just said. Attorney General Holder has stated many of the 240...

At first glance, David Geffen is not an obvious owner for the revered newspaper. The billionaire is better known for his interests on the west coast of the US. A big donor to Los Angeles-based arts institutions, he has homes in Malibu and Beverly Hills, while his best friends are fellow Hollywood power players Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg. But Mr Geffen has emerged as a potential buyer of the paper dubbed "The Grey Lady". He was recently rebuffed after offering to buy the 19.8 per cent stake in the NYT held by Harbinger Capital Partners, the activist US hedge...

Acknowledging what the blogosphere has known for weeks, the New York Times finally went on record to admit that just before last Election Day it killed a politically sensitive news story involving corruption allegations that might have made the Obama campaign look bad. But the admission on Sunday, which came seven months after NYT staff reporter Stephanie Strom's reporting about possibly illegal coordination between the Obama campaign and ACORN last year, took the form of a snarky column from Clark Hoyt, the Old Gray Lady's "public editor." Hoyt used the word "nonsense" to describe the allegations of impropriety leveled against...

A series of cover sheets for intelligence reports written for Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld and other senior Pentagon officials during the early days of the war in Iraq in 2003 were adorned with biblical quotations, and appeared Sunday, six years later, on the Web site of GQ magazine. The daily briefings were called the “Worldwide Intelligence Update,” one of several intelligence reports compiled overnight and presented in a folder for Mr. Rumsfeld and other officials as they came to work. In the selection of the cover sheets that GQ placed on its Web site, photographs of soldiers praying...

By the end of June, The New York Times will come to a decision on how to charge for some of its content on the Web, The Observer has learned. Executive editor Bill Keller said at a meeting with staff on Wednesday that two proposals are being strongly considered. One includes a "meter system," in which the reader can roam freely on the Web site until hitting a predetermined limit of word-count or pageviews, after which a meter will start running and the reader is charged for movement on the site thereafter. He warned staff at the meeting that this...

When real life creeped in on the liberal land of unicorns and the folks that couldn't afford the subprime loans proved to be unable the afford the subprime loans, the government, as promised, went on the hook, and the economy tanked. And here we sit. The New York Times woke up this morning, reached up for the curb, and, in a drunken, slurring, liberal fit, decried the horror of minority neighborhoods facing the lion's share of foreclosures.

Pope Benedict XVI may be touring Israel, but the New York Times is barely paying attention to anything he’s saying in favor of sounding doom-filled notes about the fate of Christianity in its own birthplace. On Wednesday’s front page, Ethan Bronner reported a story headlined "Mideast’s Christians Losing Numbers and Sway." Bronner says the number of Christians is rapidly falling due to "political violence," among other reasons. A word he doesn’t use: "persecution." The idea that Muslims are intolerant and unwilling to embrace any notion of religious liberty is present, but more accepted than scorned. Bronner quoted the pontiff only...

Which Wednesday newspaper headline, over articles about the same report from the Pew Hispanic Center, is not like the others? Washington Post: Immigrant Homeownership Proves Resilient in the Face of Slowdown Boosted by Boom, Rate Virtually Unchanged During Bust Lead: “The rate of homeownership in the United States is holding up better among immigrants than it is for native-born Americans, according to a study released yesterday.” Wall Street Journal: Housing Boom Aided Minorities Homeownership Reached Record Levels, Narrowing the Gap With Whites Lead: “Minorities in the U.S. increased their levels of homeownership at a faster clip than whites during the...

David Geffen, the former record executive who made an offer for the Los Angeles Times two years ago, now wants to buy the New York Times, according to people close to the situation.

A May 2nd analysis piece from New York Times Russia correspondent Clifford Levy highlighted the paper's hopeless inability to offer readers real insights about Vladimir Putin's neo-Soviet regime. As the paper attempts to carry out a demented effort to collect $2/copy for its daily edition at the newsstand, it's appropriate to take a moment to reflect on its actual value. I've previously documented egregious flaws in the paper's reporting on Russia, for instance regarding Putin's war in Chechnya and on protest movements in Moldova, and I've shown how Times editorials have shamelessly perverted history in order to cover up their...

The Boston Globe and its largest employees union reached a tentative agreement early Wednesday morning on concessions that will keep the 137-year-old newspaper publishing, the union president said. The breakthrough came at about 4 a.m., said Dan Totten, president of the Newspaper Guild. He did not release details pending a meeting with Guild members scheduled for Thursday. "Out of respect for our members, the Guild and the New York Times Co. have agreed not to release details until Guild leaders have a chance to meet with our members," Totten said. Globe spokesman Robert Powers said in a statement that details...

It appears that the New York Times Co. has found it difficult to stick to sound business principles in its negotiations with unions representing Boston Globe employees, as today it caved and withdrew its threat to close down the paper in 60 days if negotiations fail. Just yesterday the death of Boston's liberal fish-wrap seemed imminent. With just hours before a midnight deadline that could determine the future of the Boston Globe, the paper's owner, the New York Times Co, has yet to reach deals with any of the Globe's four major unions over $20 million dollars in total concessions...

The New York Times is expected to announce a newsstand price increase for its flagship newspaper early next week as it races to shore up liquidity amid industry-wide falls in advertising revenues and circulation. ... Wholesalers expect the New York Times to increase its price from $1.50 to $2.00 for Monday to Saturday editions and from $5 to $6 on Sundays. A spokeswoman declined to comment. Recent sales figures suggest the price rises could generate an incremental $40m a year, according to one industry source, although price increases have dented circulation at some newspapers. The New York Times has strengthened...

When a New York Times columnist says Republicans are “out of touch,” it’s like Kim Jong-Il, the midget mental patient who runs North Korea, or Holocaust-denier Mahmoud Ahmadinejad saying someone needs a good dose of reality.

The New York Times Co. said last night that it is notifying federal authorities of its plans to shut down the Boston Globe, raising the possibility that New England's most storied newspaper could cease to exist within weeks. After down-to-the-wire negotiations did not produce millions of dollars in union concessions, the Times Co. said that it will file today a required 60-day notice of the planned shutdown under the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification law. The move could amount to a negotiating ploy to extract further concessions from the Globe's unions, since the notice does not require the Times Co....

German linguists might have to add a couple syllables to “schadenfreude” to capture the sentiments of those observing the NY Times/Boston Globe death match. People aren’t just revelling in the papers’ misfortune anymore. They can now simultaneously delight in the Times’ hypocrisy. On today’s Morning Joe, Mike Barnicle blasted the NY Times as the “most hypocritical media company in the world” for what he sees as the Gray Lady’s bullying of the employees at its subsidiary, the Boston Globe. View video here.

Citing progress in negotiations, New York Times Co. gave unions representing employees of its Boston Globe newspaper two more days to agree to $20 million in concessions to save the paper from closure. The Globe announced the extension shortly after midnight Friday, the self-imposed deadline for an agreement, following a long day of negotiations with its largest union. "Because there has been progress on reaching needed cost savings, the Boston Globe will extend the deadline for reaching complete agreements with its unions until midnight Sunday, May 3," the Globe said in a statement. Times Co. set the Friday deadline a...

One would think that The New York Times is purposefully putting American's in harm's way with its latest travel section vacation suggestion. If it isn't doing it on purpose, it certainly is acting almost criminally negligent over its reader's safety abroad. Back on March 22, the Times suggested that Americans vacation in Deptford, one of England's most dangerous, crime infested areas. And why would the Times want to send Americans into such a seedy and dangerous place? Because it's "hip," man. What else? The suggestion by the NYTimes for American tourists to visit Deptford brought all manners of jaw-dropping, guffaws...

The nation’s largest left-wing newspaper and the bible for network news producers and bookers may be going under. This past week, The New York Times [NYT] announced more staggering losses: nearly $75 million in the first quarter alone. The New York Post is reporting that the Times Company owes more than $1 billion and has just $34 million in the bank. A few months ago, the company borrowed $250 million from Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim at a reported 14 percent interest rate. With things going south fast (pardon the pun), Slim might want to put in a call to Times...