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Mark Steyn: Iraqi spy case shows media at it again
Chicago Sun-Times ^ | 14 March 2004 | Mark Steyn

Posted on 03/14/2004 6:01:29 AM PST by Lando Lincoln

Anyone who wants to understand why the media are held in such low regard by the public -- in polls of the most respected professions we usually come somewhere between Nigerian e-mail scammers and serial pedophiles -- should consider the following headline from an Associated Press story in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer last week:

''Accused Spy Is Cousin Of Bush Staffer''

The accused spy is Susan Lindauer, who is accused of working for Saddam Hussein's intelligence agency. She describes herself merely as an "anti-war activist,'' though, as the daily rummage through the Baathists' scrupulous paperwork indicates more clearly every day, being an anti-war activist and on the Saddamite payroll are by no means mutually exclusive.

Before she allegedly became an Iraqi agent, Lindauer spent a decade in Washington working for four members of Congress: Peter DeFazio, Ron Wyden, Carol Moseley Braun and Zoe Lofgren. What do these four legislators have in common?

Answer: They all have a ''D'' after their name.

But to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer's headline writer the salient fact about Lindauer is not her 10 years of work for the Democratic Party but the amazing revelation that she is a second cousin of Bush chief of staff Andrew Card.

A second cousin! Hold the front page!

Here's an easy test for the publisher, editor and news staff of the paper:

1. Name all your second cousins.

2. Where do they live?

3. When did you last see them?

It's one thing for the press to be anti-war and feel Saddam should be given another decade or two to come into compliance with Security Council resolutions. It's quite another to be so smitten with the old butcher that your copy editors internally absorb Baath Party tribal politics and assume that mere second cousinship with members of the Bush clan automatically puts you in the inner circle. To be fair to the Associated Press, they sent the story out on the wires with the headline, ''Woman Named In Spy Case Worked As Journalist, Congressional Aide.''

What's that? ''Worked As Journalist''? Well, there's an angle the Seattle guys unaccountably missed. Before she went to work for the Democratic Party, Lindauer worked for . . . the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Instead of the cousin thing, the headline writer might more usefully have written:

''Accused Spy Used To Sit At Desk Next To Mine; I Made Clumsy Pass At Her At 1992 Office Party.''

I'd love to see these headline writers working in Hollywood: ''Austin Powers, The Spy Who Shagged Me''? ''Well, to be honest we thought it sounded punchier as 'Austin Powers, The Spy Who Shagged Someone Who Used To Go To School With Someone Who Was A Cousin Of Someone Who Was Briefly Married To A Receptionist At Halliburton. When Cheney Worked There!' ''

Look, these are serious times. Week after week, more details emerge of the extraordinary number of influential Westerners, from French government ministers to the head of the U.N. Oil-for-Food program, who appear to have been in the pay of Saddam. That's, among other things, what Susan Lindauer is accused of.

But we don't have a serious press for these serious times. Boring and self-important is not the same as serious. But one reason why John Kerry calculates he can get away with damning the Bush administration as ''crooks'' and ''liars'' is because he figures he can count on the mainstream media doing what the Post-Intelligencer did -- instinctively framing every issue in anti-Bush terms, no matter how ludicrously. I suppose it's not entirely impossible that one reason the Post-Intelligencer guys went with their spy-Bush linkage is because Lindauer has been accused of betraying her country and Al Gore accused Bush of ''betraying'' the country, too. But that's one more reason why Bush will win in November: The media and the Democrats are sustaining each other in their delusions.

Sen. Kerry thinks the Bush administration are ''crooked'' and ''lying.'' The Bush ''lie'' boils down to this: The president believes there's a war on. The Dems think 9/11 is like the 1998 ice storm or a Florida hurricane -- just one of those things. And they think Bush is ''lying'' by insisting on playing it as a war.

As it happens, the only big political ''lie'' in recent days came from Kerry, who told a meeting in Florida, ''I've met foreign leaders who can't go out and say this publicly, but boy, they look at you and say, 'You've got to win this, you've got to beat this guy.' '' The senator has spent most of the last year in Iowa and New Hampshire, which, for all their charms, are not where one goes to rub shoulders with ''foreign leaders.'' Jacques Chirac could have driven over the Granite State border from Quebec's Eastern Townships, where he was vacationing last summer. But he didn't. Kerry does not appear to have ''looked at'' any foreign leaders since he began his campaign.

And, if he had, he'd find them far less well-disposed to him than he imagines. Last Thursday, March 11, 2-1/2 years to the day after Sept. 11, nearly 200 people were murdered by terrorists in Spain. Like Britain, Australia and Poland, Spain is a member of what John Kerry calls Bush's ''fraudulent coalition.''

You can disagree with the administration on this war. I have. A few days after 9/11, I called for resignations from the agencies that failed on that day -- FAA, FBI, CIA, INS. Didn't happen. Still hasn't happened. It should. A couple of weeks after 9/11, I called for a total upheaval of America's relationship with Saudi Arabia. Didn't happen then. There are a few subtle hints that things are changing, but far too slowly. Anyone who took the war seriously can certainly find fault with the administration. But not if you stand there like a 5-year-old boy and never get beyond pointing your fingers and sticking your tongue out: ''Ooh, Bush lied. And Ashcroft's a big bully. And Cheney's stealing it all for his oil buddies. And you shouldn't mention the war in your campaign ads, because it's not fair. Nyaa-nyaa!''

Two hundred people died in Madrid because of a war Democrats refuse to admit exists. But, hey, you never know: Maybe the guy who did it will be a third cousin twice removed of Karl Rove.


TOPICS: Editorial; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: iraqispy; lindauer; marksteyn; marksteynlist; mediabias; steyn
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Lando
1 posted on 03/14/2004 6:01:30 AM PST by Lando Lincoln
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To: Pokey78
Poke, it is my pleasure to ping one of these to you for a change. And, it is posted in its entirety!

Lando

2 posted on 03/14/2004 6:03:04 AM PST by Lando Lincoln (GWB in 2004)
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To: Lando Lincoln
When Steyn passes on, I've got first dibs on his intellect and writing skills :>
3 posted on 03/14/2004 6:04:05 AM PST by KantianBurke (Arguments that got Arnold elected in 02, will get a "moderate" RINO elected to the White House in 08)
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To: Lando Lincoln
Two hundred people died in Madrid because of a war Democrats refuse to admit exists. Very powerful line. Think we will see it in the NY Slimes? Think again.
4 posted on 03/14/2004 6:05:36 AM PST by twntaipan (NY Slimes: Best toilet paper leftists can produce.)
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To: Lando Lincoln
A Mark Steyn bttt
5 posted on 03/14/2004 6:10:07 AM PST by MaryFromMichigan
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To: Lando Lincoln
Great article! Thanks for posting it.

NordP

6 posted on 03/14/2004 6:12:01 AM PST by NordP (While our nation is at war w/ worldwide terrorism, the democrat party is at war w/ the President.)
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To: Lando Lincoln
BTTT
7 posted on 03/14/2004 6:15:30 AM PST by Unicorn
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To: Lando Lincoln
Does anyone have a name of the writer for the SPI and a phone number? We can start a calling campaign as we successfully did last week to the NY Times and USA Today when they described Peaceful Tomorrows as a "non-partisan, independent" organization.
8 posted on 03/14/2004 6:17:03 AM PST by God luvs America (Howard Dean is a deranged lunatic!!)
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To: Lando Lincoln
What's that? ''Worked As Journalist''? Well, there's an angle the Seattle guys unaccountably missed. Before she went to work for the Democratic Party, Lindauer worked for . . . the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

Now THAT'S chutzpah. I wish I could say 'Wow, I can't believe the press would be so overtly and shamelessly biased', but that just wouldn't be true.

9 posted on 03/14/2004 6:17:50 AM PST by Steel Wolf (Statistics show that self abuse often goes unreported.)
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To: Lando Lincoln
The Liberal Media has not been shamed by all the books, articles, and speeches proving that they are left0wing enabling vermin.

If anything, the lamestream press is only getting more and more shrill, and less and less credible.

One glance at the "spin" via headlines on Yahoo News are enough to make you sick.

10 posted on 03/14/2004 6:18:15 AM PST by SkyPilot
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To: Lando Lincoln
''Well, to be honest we thought it sounded punchier as 'Austin Powers, The Spy Who Shagged Someone Who Used To Go To School With Someone Who Was A Cousin Of Someone Who Was Briefly Married To A Receptionist At Halliburton. When Cheney Worked There!' ''

Thanks Lando, I needed a laugh today.

11 posted on 03/14/2004 6:19:56 AM PST by alnitak ("That kid's about as sharp as a pound of wet liver" - Foghorn Leghorn)
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To: Steel Wolf
I have been wondering what "intelligence" the goofy chick could have gleaned from the democrats she was working for. And then it came to me that she was passing the "intelligence" to the democrats.
12 posted on 03/14/2004 6:22:50 AM PST by Thebaddog (Woof this!)
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To: God luvs America
Does anyone have a name of the writer for the SPI and a phone number? We can start a calling campaign as we successfully did last week to the NY Times and USA Today when they described Peaceful Tomorrows as a "non-partisan, independent" organization.

Great idea......here is the info. I am e-mailing something for sure.

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer's mailing address is:

The main phone number is 206-448-8000. To subscribe or for subscriber service, call 206-464-2121 or, toll-free, 1-800-542-0820.

How to reach us by e-mail

Primary e-mail addresses:

Send comments to newmedia@seattlepi.com

Lando

13 posted on 03/14/2004 6:27:15 AM PST by Lando Lincoln (GWB in 2004)
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To: Lando Lincoln
Great article! Thanks for posting this!

Now, let me vent a little about "the media". Even FOX News, which I still watch on weekends for the hope I'll see Brit or Fred or Tony, had these abominations this morning: Juliet Huddy saying that Kerry looks "Lincoln-esque". Imagine that! To her, a lying, flip-flopping, arrogant waste of air looks like the Great Emancipator and founder of the Republican party! As if that weren't enough, Julian had the audacity to say about the attacks on Kerry's cowardice that what happened SO MANY YEARS AGO isn't relevant! You might recall that he thought it was perfectly okay to delve into President Bush's records from SO MANY YEARS AGO when the Dims insisted that he had not served his country. This kind of hypocrisy and stupidity is simply astonishing.

(Thank you for letting me get that off my chest.)
14 posted on 03/14/2004 6:27:48 AM PST by alwaysconservative (JF'nK has invisible friends. Does he hear voices too?)
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To: Lando Lincoln
I wonder if Steyn would consider a request to be Bush's press secretary. Can you imagine the exchanges in the briefing room?
15 posted on 03/14/2004 6:31:52 AM PST by Hillary's Folly (Imagine there's no Hillary. It's easy if you try.)
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To: Lando Lincoln
It is incredible that any paper that purports to be even the least objective, or even worthy of the name, would for even a second, think that a suspected spy's distant relative trumps the fact that the woman actually WORKED for Moseley Braun and other Democrats/causes.

If this doesn't clearly demonstrate the liberal bias of the "mainstream" press, I cannot imagine what would.

16 posted on 03/14/2004 6:32:46 AM PST by SpinyNorman
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To: Hillary's Folly
That is the best idea I've heard all year!!!
17 posted on 03/14/2004 6:37:10 AM PST by tsmith130
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To: Lando Lincoln
bttt
18 posted on 03/14/2004 6:37:15 AM PST by 1rudeboy
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To: Lando Lincoln
I suppose this headline is too much to ask: "Accused Iraqi Spy Worked for 2004 Democratic Presidential Candidate."

But it is worth noting that the accused spy's former employer, Carol Moseley Braun, was back in the news this week for her mutterings about being available for vice president. Ms. Moseley Braun was thrown out of office for corruption -- if I recall, she put her campaign manager-lover on the public payroll, big time. Now it would seem that she that she was harboring a spy on the payroll as well as her tax-paid bunk hunk.

This may be a bit too corrupt even for the Democrats, but I will have to be shown.

19 posted on 03/14/2004 6:39:21 AM PST by T'wit (I'll believe Global Warming when climatologists use computer modeling to win Power Ball a few times)
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To: Lando Lincoln
As it happens, the only big political ''lie'' in recent days came from Kerry, who told a meeting in Florida, ''I've met foreign leaders who can't go out and say this publicly, but boy, they look at you and say, 'You've got to win this, you've got to beat this guy.' '' The senator has spent most of the last year in Iowa and New Hampshire, which, for all their charms, are not where one goes to rub shoulders with ''foreign leaders.'' Jacques Chirac could have driven over the Granite State border from Quebec's Eastern Townships, where he was vacationing last summer. But he didn't. Kerry does not appear to have ''looked at'' any foreign leaders since he began his campaign.

This has been captured in The John Kerry Songbook as follows:

I CAN'T SAY THEIR NAMES ("A Horse With No Name")

For the first part of the campaign
I was fighting for my life
There was Gephardt, Clark, that welfare queen,
Sharpton, Edwards, and Dean
The next thing I knew was that I had no buzz
About foreign policy
So I made up a story and said that other
World leaders would vote for me

I've got foreign support but I can't say their names
It just one of the rules of the game
But believe me, it all works out the same
'Cause the media won't point a finger of blame
La, la...

After going through my schedule
No such meetings could be found
Even though it was a load of bull
My reasoning was sound
I've got the support of ev'ry dictator
The whole wide world around

I've got foreign support but I can't say their names
It just one of the rules of the game
But believe me, it all works out the same
'Cause the media won't point a finger of blame
La, la...

For Mugabe, Castro, And Aristede
I am the person they need
Same for Saddam Hussien and Kim-Il-Jong
And don't forget the Viet Cong
Terrorists could come out from underground
To strike at the lands of the free
All the while, I won't make any sound
Until the UN orders me

I've got foreign support but I can't say their names
It just one of the rules of the game
But believe me, it all works out the same
'Cause the media won't point a finger of blame
La, la...

20 posted on 03/14/2004 6:46:48 AM PST by kevkrom (The John Kerry Songbook: www.imakrom.com/kerrysongs)
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