Posted on 10/01/2004 5:38:27 AM PDT by kattracks
Coral Gables, Fla. (CNSNews.com) - The recent controversy involving CBS News's use of apparently forged memos -- and the reaction to the controversy -- prompted a Newsweek editor to demand that conservatives stop trying to "intimidate" the media.
"I think conservatives ought to quit trying to intimidate the rest of the media," said Eleanor Clift, a contributing editor to Newsweek, in an interview with CNSNews.com following Thursday night's presidential debate at the University of Miami.
The liberal Clift was responding to a question about whether CBS News correspondent Bob Schieffer should retain his role as the moderator in the Oct. 13 presidential debate between President George W. Bush and Democratic nominee John F. Kerry.
"Bob Schieffer is one of the most respected newsmen on all sides of the political debate," she said, defending CBS's role in the third and final debate.
A conservative website, BoycottCBS.com, has called for Schieffer's removal from the debate that will take place in Phoenix and suggested NBC's Tim Russert or former CNN anchor Bernard Shaw as possible replacements.
The group notes that the debate commission selected Schieffer before Dan Rather went on "60 Minutes Wednesday" with phony memos discrediting George W. Bush's National Guard service. (Despite questions about the memos' authenticity, Rather says he believes their content is accurate.)
According to BoycottCBS.com, Schieffer has made "troubling statements" about the memo controversy that raise questions about his "appropriateness" as a moderator for the Oct. 13 debate.
"Far from serving as a 'whistleblower' or someone completely separate from the scandal surrounding his friends and colleagues, Schieffer was parroting the CBS News party line a full week after the documents had been exposed as fraudulent," said Mike Paranzino of BoycottCBS.com.
But prominent media figures and politicians attending Thursday's debate defended CBS News.
CNN senior political analyst Jeff Greenfield called Schieffer "about as straight a shooter I know...He is just the gold standard when it comes to a straight up honest reporter," Greenfield told CNSNews.com.
Greenfield acknowledged that CBS News "took a hit" on the Bush National Guard documents, but he insisted that all major media outlets have had similar incidents. "We have all been through this. It's embarrassing. They have to figure out how it happened," Greenfield said.
Anne Lewis, the national chair of the Women's Vote Center, an arm of the Democratic National Committee, doesn't believe CBS has suffered any damage to its credibility.
"CBS stepped up and said, 'Well, we discovered that the documents weren't so.' They said so. I wish that more people in public life would set that example if they come to a wrong conclusion, perhaps," Lewis told CNSNews.com.
"I think that is rather setting an example, and I would like to see other institutions and individuals in high office live up to that," she added.
Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAuliffe also defended CBS News. "I don't think CBS has comprised anything," McAuliffe said.
Republican National Committee chairman Ed Gillespie declined to comment on CBS News except to say that President Bush will not request that Schieffer be replaced as the moderator of the final debate.
"We have agreed to the debates as the [presidential debate] commission put them forward -- and the two campaigns negotiated and agreed to -- and we will abide by the agreement," Gillespie said.
Also see:
Swift Boat Vets Should 'Shut Up,' Says Kerry Spokesman (Oct. 1, 2004)
Protester Says She Prefers 'Serial Rapist' to George Bush (Oct. 1, 2004)
E-mail a news tip to Marc Morano.
Send a Letter to the Editor about this article.
Translation:
We have the right to slant stories and lie most of the time, we're trained professionals...
We will now work dilligently to slander and discredit those who caught us.
Usually I just put this woman on mute, or just surf on by.
Generally she comes across as this old tired loud whiney mean extreme leftist marxist....who appears like she always has a hairball stuck in her craw.
FRegards,
"Score it as a loss for [John] Kerry and as a loss for the liberal news media," says pollster John Zogby. "It's amazing how Fox is the tail that wags the dog. Fox, [cybergossip Matt] Drudge and [Rush] Limbaugh are in the driver's seat." Zogby attributes much of Kerry's slide in the polls to discouraged Democrats moving into the undecided column. "I've never seen a situation where a candidate has de-energized his own base," says Zogby. "He's not saying anything his own base needs to hear."
Republican lapdogs on Capitol Hill rushed to cash in on "Rathergate." Rep. Chris Cox, chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, urged the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Telecommunications to investigate CBS's use of potentially falsified documents. This is a party that launches investigations into Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction—and now this—while ignoring the intelligence lapses that led the country into an unnecessary war in Iraq, and covering for Bush when he exaggerates the progress in that nation’s development.
The National Intelligence Estimate prepared for the president in late July, and reported Thursday by The New York Times, describes Iraq in far more pessimistic terms than Bush does on the campaign trail, with civil war a likely outcome.
It's not like the thing with Rather and the forged docs was some kind of 1st time mistake it's just the first time we've had the tools to call them on it. How many other times have we known that there was something fishy going on and we were powerless to do anything about it? Well, no more. They need to be held to standards and they don't deserve a pass when they lie to the American people.
An arm? More like a shriveled old claw...
No, just Hillary-ous.
Astonishing.
[MSM Sarcasm Torpedo ARMED. FIRE!]
What is astonishing is the translation: We're still going ahead with our 'real' October surprise...
"As these recently obtained forged douments show..." (choose one)
a) Bush is a lesbian;
b) Bush does cocaine, PCP, and / or heroin;
c) Bush personally ordered or participated in the atrocities in Beslan;
d) Bush has close links to the Gambino crime family.
Eleanor Clift wants to be able to tell poisonous lies unopposed. What else is new ?
Yeah, the rattler has haemotoxic venom (destroys tissue); the cobra has neurotoxic venom (paralyzes breathing). Some choice!
Excellent idea!
I broke the tie! BUSH 686 Kerry 684
Hey My vote actually does count!
Ms. Clift can bitch and grip all she wants but whether she and anybody else likes it or not the whistleblowing on the mSM is going to continue.
It's time for Clift and her kind to get back into the real world and accept the reality thatthis is not a progressive majority nation or even a divided nation. This is a conservative majority nation and anybody that says otherwise is a bald faced pathological liar and the MSM are all bald faced pathological liars.
Regards.
Newsweek: "Stop making us accountable for our fabrications!"
Hey, Eleanor, better put some ice on that!
FGS
The Left can dress like ghouls, carry signs with the most offensive language and shout hateful slogans, go on rampages through the city, and more, and all they're doing is "expressing their views". But when conservatives do anything at all to stand up for their beliefs, no matter how respectably they conduct themselves, it's automatically "intimidation".
My rule of thumb is this: Until proven otherwise and verifed by independant sources (usually FreeRepublic), all published news reports are to be treated as DNC press releases.
Any time the report states ANYTHING other than facts (Such and such happened today. three killed in fighting at.. So and so elected by ...) they are lying. Any time reporters add adjectives to their reports. (suspected, so-called, etc) they are lying. Any time reporters neglect to give all the details they are lying. In short, reporters lie about 98 (+2-1) percent of the time.
Of course there are some outlets that have higher credibility, 700 club, fox news etc. But even these have to be checked.
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