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The Crowd That Didn't Boo
Power Line ^ | 9/9/04 | Power Line

Posted on 09/10/2004 4:37:35 AM PDT by Elkiejg

We may be inching closer to the truth about the false Associated Press report claiming that a Republican crowd in West Allis, Wisconsin, booed the announcement that President Clinton had been hospitalized, and "President Bush did nothing to stop them."

We have an inside source who was present at the rally and is familiar with the reporters involved. Our source tells us that Tom Hays, whose byline was on the false AP report, was not at the West Allis rally. He is not one of the AP reporters assigned to cover President Bush, and is believed to have been in New York at the time.

Our source says that the AP reporter behind the story was Scott Lindlaw. Lindlaw is one of the AP reporters who cover the Bush campaign. His anti-Bush prejudices are well-known; our source has heard him say that his "mission" is to see that Bush is not re-elected.

On the day of the West Allis rally, Lindlaw was wearing ear plugs in his ears, as he often does to minimize crowd noise. After Bush's speech, he approached another AP reporter and said that he thought he had heard boos, and asked whether his colleague had heard any. The second AP reporter said that she didn't hear any booing. Nevertheless, Lindlaw apparently sent in a story, which wound up for some unexplained reason under Tom Hays' byline, which said:

Bush's audience of thousands in West Allis, Wis., booed. Bush did nothing to stop them.

We will add questions about Mr. Lindlaw to those we are directing to the Associated Press.

..........................

Ran a google on Lindlaw - here's just ONE that I found - there are lots in the same vein.

Piranhas Like Us

Glenn Reynolds has been looking into the highly editorialized "reporting" of one Scott Lindlaw of the Associated Press. I found an archive of the reporter's work; abridged, it still shows a three-year-long arc for Lindlaw as White House correspondent. Lindlaw was relatively objective in late 2001 and 2002. Clearly no sympathizer of the president's, his articles were nevertheless straight descriptions of political events at the time. Contrast that with his most recent work, awarded booby prizes from the Columbia Journalism Review. Short story? It appears he wasn't always like this.

Lindlaw turned towards skewered news after last summer; his motivations are anyone's guess, but recall that between June and August 2003 heavily reported troop losses and a general withholding of municipal and infrastructure development stories caused a slide in public opinion. Conventional wisdom and the Democratic Party declared Bush vulnerable - the press probably did, too. Lindlaw's first noticeable play of tit-for-tat ("Bush said the nation has lost 'thousands of jobs in manufacturing.' In fact, the losses have soared into the millions...") was in a September 2, 2003 report. Thus begins a staggered, horizontal transfer into opinion-column authorship, as Lindlaw is compelled to fence President Bush and his administration. Some articles are fair; others are ping-pong tournaments - President Bush says "A," Scott Lindlaw believes "B," though "B," however politically inclined or debatable, is instead presented as objective reality. Whether David Kay's WMD report or Washington budget battles, Lindlaw consistently inserts conjecture where none is warranted.

These examples aren't as egregious as Lindlaw's latest, linked by Instapundit. If this is an indication of the reporter's journalistic direction, the influence of the Scylla of the White House Press Room, Helen Thomas, has rubbed off on him quite a bit. And that's unfortunate.

CREATIVE WRITING, ONLY BILLED AS 'JOURNALISM': This addendum has been added September 3, 2004, on account of some archive hits from Glenn Reynolds. And for good reason. Unprofessionalism, thy name is Scott Lindlaw.

AHA! A CORRECTION: Apparently the story's author is not Lindlaw. But I don't believe I'll pull an AP and erase everything. And besides, with Scott Lindlaw writing ledes elsewhere like "President Bush sought to take the edge off a conservative image sharpened by three years of war and aggressive tax cuts," and jumping on the we-can't-win-the-war bandwagon, my condemnation above still fits like a glove.

THEN AGAIN: Update September 9, 2004. Powerline says it was Lindlaw. Condemnation still stands.

http://www.figureconcord.com/ublog/archives/001351.html#001351


TOPICS: Front Page News; Miscellaneous; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: ap; booed; medialies; scottlindlaw

1 posted on 09/10/2004 4:37:35 AM PDT by Elkiejg
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To: Elkiejg

Thank you for the names - this is exactly what needs to happen - a popular revolt against the anonimity of AP and UPI articles - these people need to be held responsible on a named basis for the half-truths and outright lies they spew out into the ether.


2 posted on 09/10/2004 4:42:12 AM PDT by geros
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To: Elkiejg

Thanks for the update...The AP false boos story didn't seem to have any legs at all.


3 posted on 09/10/2004 4:54:26 AM PDT by Drango (Wow is wow spelt backwards.)
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To: geros

I dunno, do you think the AP might actually try to protect it's reputation by pulling Lindlaw off the Bush Beat? I mean, you have an obviously partisan reporter caught repeatedly slanting stories. Isn't keeping him on that particular assignment an admission that he is doing exactly what the AP wants him to do?


4 posted on 09/10/2004 4:56:41 AM PDT by bondjamesbond
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To: Elkiejg

This would explain why AP dropped the Tom Hays byline.


5 posted on 09/10/2004 4:56:45 AM PDT by MediaMole
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To: Drango
I think she's got legs now


6 posted on 09/10/2004 4:58:52 AM PDT by spycatcher
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To: Elkiejg

I keep seeing that Today Show Freep in my mind. You know the one, The Liberal Media is Lying to You poster. How True!!


7 posted on 09/10/2004 5:05:29 AM PDT by BallyBill (http://www.powmiafamiliesagainstjohnkerry.com/)
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To: Elkiejg
As I was walking to the loo

I heard a crowd that did not boo.

I heard that crowd again today.

I wish that crowd would go away

8 posted on 09/10/2004 5:14:49 AM PDT by Mamzelle
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To: Mamzelle

I tend to think: So what? Maybe there are some people who dislike Clinton so much that his name illicits a boo for that reason only. Some might have been relieved that he was in the hospital and not out bashing Bush on the campaign trail. In that case, the cheering would be as derisive as the booing. In our Sovietized society, any expression should be encouraged, even if you don't like it. We have become a society of grim and bear it, due to regulation of hate speech, profiling, harassment and encouragement of any degrading sexual statement made over the airways. Boo and be damned!


9 posted on 09/10/2004 5:53:17 AM PDT by meenie
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To: meenie

I was there. Nobody booed.


10 posted on 09/10/2004 6:28:35 AM PDT by LouD
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