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THE JOY OF FAKE FACTS! (Somerby rips Landrieu and MSM)
The Daily Howler ^ | SEPTEMBER 12, 2005 | Bob Somerby

Posted on 09/12/2005 2:13:37 PM PDT by jackbill

Even when people are suffering and dying, they just won’t stop making up facts:

THERE’S NOTHING ABOUT MARY: We thought Chris Wallace was a bit unbalanced in the way he went after Mary Landrieu on yesterday’s Fox News Sunday. (Senator David Vitter, R-LA, appeared with her.) On the other hand, Landrieu’s performance was so utterly woeful that it deserves recording. Being good liberals, DAILY HOWLER readers care about the poor—and we care about little else. Surely, therefore, we will all want to condemn this senator’s hapless performance.

SNIP

In a prize fight, a referee would have stepped in and called the whole thing off. Already, this may have been the worst performance ever seen on a Sunday show. But now, Wallace posed his second question—and Landrieu’s response, if anything, was worse. Gaze on the caliber of public official now defending the interests of the poor: WALLACE: Senator Vitter, do you think it was—and I'll get you in this in a moment, Senator Landrieu—do you think it was “incompetent and insulting” for Governor Blanco not to bring in the federal guard—or, the National Guard, rather—into the city of New Orleans in force until Friday of that first week? VITTER: Yes.

WALLACE: Senator Landrieu?

LANDRIEU: Can I—

WALLACE: Yes or no?

The die had been cast—how had Blanco performed? Wallace had asked an obvious question. But just try to believe Landrieu’s “answer:”

SNIP

Why didn’t FEMA know about the Convention Center by Wednesday night or Thursday morning? Chertoff said they hadn’t been told by local officials; for ourselves, we’ll wait for more reporting. But as usual, your lazy, half-assed millionaire “journalists” didn’t feel like waiting for facts! Having decided that Brown was the target, they invented a pleasing tale—a pleasing tale with embellished facts, the only kind of “fact” they really love.

What was the real chronology? In fact, the first real reporting about the Convention Center broke on cable on Thursday, September 1; it had barely been mentioned before that, and the first video turned up on Thursday afternoon. It didn’t appear in newspapers until Friday. But so what? Your powdered “journalists” always improve the facts in these utterly pleasing cases. This time, they played the pseudo-lib side—but, as always, they embellished their “facts.” Even when people are suffering and dying, they just won’t stop making up facts.


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: fns; landrieu; msm; pubdits
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Soomerby takes a 180 on this one and unmercifully rips Mary Landrieu and MSM (Chris Matthews, Brian Williams, Andrea Mitchell, Frank Rich, Ted Koppel, Mo Dowd, etc..

Also, he presents a detailed time-line on who knew what and when about the New Orleans convention center "sheelter", basically exonerating Brown and Chertoff.

1 posted on 09/12/2005 2:13:40 PM PDT by jackbill
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To: jackbill

Fake facts? You mean like the Iraq war is about oil, and the terrorists are "freedom fighters" and "minutemen". The political left in this country has been dealing fake facts for forty years.


2 posted on 09/12/2005 2:15:40 PM PDT by popdonnelly
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To: jackbill
" But as usual, your lazy, half-assed millionaire “journalists”..."

They aren't millionaires- they just have bottomless expense accounts.

3 posted on 09/12/2005 2:18:18 PM PDT by fat city ("The nation that controls magnetism controls the world.")
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To: jackbill

Where is Dan Blather when we need him. He is the master of journalistic fraud when trying to swing a national election, for which he should be swinging from a rope.


4 posted on 09/12/2005 2:24:20 PM PDT by Neoliberalnot (Conservatism: doing what is right instead of what is easy)
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To: jackbill

I'm glad someone is talking about the fact that the media didn't talk about the Convention Center till Thursday, even though the media keeps says that FEMA should have been watching TV


5 posted on 09/12/2005 2:26:49 PM PDT by jbwbubba
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To: jackbill; Hushpuppie
"...unmercifully rips Mary Landrieu..."

Landrieu in NOLA conducting her factfinding tour...


6 posted on 09/12/2005 2:30:53 PM PDT by Colonial Warrior ("Carry the battle to them. Don't let them bring it to you. Put them on the defensive.")
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To: jackbill
Why didn’t FEMA know about the Convention Center by Wednesday night or Thursday morning? Chertoff said they hadn’t been told by local officials; for ourselves, we’ll wait for more reporting.

I know this is going to sound strange but many officials in these kinds on things do not listen to public news to get there status update... there communication with there own local people to get info and assume there internal information is the most informed and to watch or monitor the TV news is behind the curve ..I'm not being flippant here..

7 posted on 09/12/2005 2:41:16 PM PDT by tophat9000 (This bulletin just in:"Chinese's Fire Drill's" will now be known as "New Orleans' Hurricane Drill's")
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To: tophat9000
Why didn’t FEMA know about the Convention Center

There are numerous inaccuracies flying about. The Convention Center was not a designated shelter for this storm. It seemed that some of the populace headed that way when they observed the National Guard searching those who wanted entry to the Superdome.

Mary L. did not appear with Vitter, she appeared in an airconditioned studio in D.C. with Chris Wallace. Vitter was in the Astrodome parking lot.

8 posted on 09/12/2005 2:52:47 PM PDT by grwcfl537 (Linux Registered User)
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To: tophat9000
I know this is going to sound strange but many officials in these kinds on things do not listen to public news to get there status update... there communication with there own local people to get info and assume there internal information is the most informed and to watch or monitor the TV news is behind the curve ..I'm not being flippant here..

Actually, I suspect that you are wrong in this case. The news networks have people and cameras on-site. I'd bet that most crisis centers have TV's monitoring the three major cable news outlets - at least.

That way they don't have to rely solely on verbal reports, which may or may not be accurate. They can see the pictures.

Regardless, if you read the time-line in the article, you will see that Chertoff and Brown knew about the convention center just about the same time as the news media. But the MSM is trying to make it look as if they were totally out of the loop.

9 posted on 09/12/2005 3:02:09 PM PDT by jackbill
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To: jackbill

Excellent sumation and coincides when I remembered hearing about the Convention Center.. as an aside: Brian Williams -- read the notes from a New Orleanian about Williams (The 181 picture slide show of the disaster posted here this weekend) and the female reporter on scene for MSNBC -- both were 'making it up' as fast as they could and Williams is a pompus a$$.


10 posted on 09/12/2005 3:02:18 PM PDT by Arizona Carolyn
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To: Colonial Warrior

LOL!!!!

Please post the jackass in the boat photo throughout FR. That says it all.


11 posted on 09/12/2005 3:07:36 PM PDT by mwl1
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To: grwcfl537
There are numerous inaccuracies flying about. The Convention Center was not a designated shelter for this storm. It seemed that some of the populace headed that way when they observed the National Guard searching those who wanted entry to the Superdome.

Agreed that the Convention Center was not a designated shelter. Also agreed that some people wandered ther on their own. But according to reports, some people were sent there by local officials.

People in the crowd say police officials directed them there to await transportation out of the city, but no help has arrived.

http://www.nbc4.tv/news/4925485/detail.html


City officials said they might open the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center as a temporary refuge to shelter an estimated 50,000 people made homeless by the storm.

Times-Picayune Breaking News Weblog - Tuesday, Aug 30


A man in a passing pickup truck from the state Department of Wildlife and Fisheries [tasked, BTW, with all SAR under NOLA's disaster plan] finally directed Wallace and the 50 other evacuees under the overpass to the convention center.

Times-Picayune Breaking News Weblog - Wednesday, 11:09 p.m.


12 posted on 09/12/2005 3:12:53 PM PDT by Cboldt
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To: grwcfl537

I watched the coverage for a closely and very surprised when the Convention Center was mentioned; no one had previously mentioned it as a shelter.

Not to be critical, but why didn't the media know?


13 posted on 09/12/2005 3:16:59 PM PDT by Loyal Buckeye
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To: Loyal Buckeye

I saw Chris Wallace interview with her and she was a SQUIRMING.No answers just the same ole PARTISAN crap.


14 posted on 09/12/2005 3:23:21 PM PDT by stickandpucknut
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To: zot

Ping.


15 posted on 09/12/2005 3:26:19 PM PDT by Interesting Times (ABCNNBCBS -- yesterday's news.)
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To: jackbill

Mary Landrieu's appointment with the truth is on indefinite hold.


16 posted on 09/12/2005 3:32:29 PM PDT by auboy
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To: jackbill

bttt


17 posted on 09/12/2005 4:03:05 PM PDT by jackbill
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To: Colonial Warrior

Now that is funny!


18 posted on 09/12/2005 4:23:09 PM PDT by Cobra64
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To: PhiKapMom; cgk; Howlin; RummyChick; dawn53; OKIEDOC; jacquej; bwteim; MrsCinAZ; Lizarde; ...
There are other "Convention Center Report Timelines" out there. In particular, some that show the media simultaneously starting reporting the presence of people at the convention center, and making the false claim that they had been reporting this for 24 hours.

This is just a collection of posts from a Katrina live thread. The first post below is the first reference I found to the convention center. At some point, the Convention Center becomes a primary object of discussion, and this summary stops at about that point.

That's what another reporter has said. Some left and went to the convention center so they didn't have to go to Houston -- I heard some of them interviewed and several said they were walking out of NO.

410 posted on 08/31/2005 8:44:57 PM EDT by PhiKapMom


At 91 years old, Booker Harris ended his days propped on a lawn chair, covered by a yellow quilt and abandoned, dead, in front of the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center.

Mr. Harris died in the back of a Ryder panel truck Wednesday afternoon, as he and his 93-year-old wife, Allie, were evacuated from eastern New Orleans. The truck's driver deposited Allie and her husband's body on the Convention Center Boulevard neutral ground. And there it remained.

With 3,000 or more evacuees stranded at the convention center -- and with no apparent contingency plan or authority to deal with them -- collecting a body was no one's priority. It was just another casualty in Hurricane Katrina's wake.

[From a Times Picayune article dateline Wednesday, August 31, 11:09 PM.
This is the NEXT mention in the thread, after the previous post]

3,322 posted on 09/01/2005 10:56:26 AM EDT by cgk


Last night somebody on Fox said that the people that went down to the convention center were the ones from the SuperDome who were refusing to go to Houston.

3,698 posted on 09/01/2005 12:05:54 PM EDT by Howlin


Chris lawrence talking about conditions. People dying, dead bodies, an old woman in a wheelchair is dead up against the wall, filthy conditions, feces, no medicine etc. Where is the plan, where is the help, etc.
This is inside the convention center I believe. No one in charge. No officials.

3,725 posted on 09/01/2005 12:12:26 PM EDT by RummyChick


Report on CNN about the Convention Center was pretty bleak.

3,740 posted on 09/01/2005 12:16:51 PM EDT by dawn53


11:23 A.M. - (AP) Outside the New Orleans Convention Center, survivors are growing more frustrated with the lack of help after Hurricane Katrina.

One man says, "No one has thought enough of us to even bring us a cup of water."

Daniel Edwards says many people have gone days without food or water. He says tens of thousands of people are standing on the streets with no sign of emergency workers.

Several bodies lie scattered around. Edwards pointed to an elderly lady dead in a wheelchair and said, "I don't treat my dog like that." He says he buried his dog.

3,961 posted on 09/01/2005 1:03:11 PM EDT by cgk


Damn I'm angry.
MSNBC just showed the convention center where people are actually dying as we post. Why don't the cable news networks show whats really going on.
This morning Shep Smith who I dislike for being a girlieman actually showed a body, THANK GOD for real truth.
This is an email I just sent to all the networks:
Dear Cable News
Come on cable news networks let us see what is really happening. Thanks Shep Smith your the first one to show us a body. We can't understand the complete situation in New Orleans as long as you guys on cable keep sanitizing everything.
Let us see what is happening.
Okiedoc

4,083 posted on 09/01/2005 1:22:00 PM EDT by OKIEDOC


Does anyone but me wonder why Shep and the cameraman can't tell those people which way to go, maybe even lead them there?
But, from the coverage I am seeing, there isn't any place to go that will have food and water for them. The convention center seems to have dying dehydrated people. Where is the mayor? Where is the Governor?

4,163 posted on 09/01/2005 1:31:37 PM EDT by jacquej


The general manager of the Astor Hotel at Astor Crowne Plaza says the hotels teamed to hire ten buses to carry some 500 guests.
But Peter Ambros says federal officials commandeered the buses, and told the guests to join thousands of other evacuees at the New Orleans convention center.

[N.B. - I bet these were LA state officials, and note that at any rate, officials are telling people to go to the convention center]

One man says he and others had paid $45 a seat for the buses, and that they were "totally stunned" when the buses never arrived. Another woman said the crowd had waited 14 hours for the buses. She says the idea of walking to the convention center scared her because of reports of looting.
The woman says it appears Louisiana officials have forgotten about tourists, and are just intent on getting their own residents out.

4,232 posted on 09/01/2005 1:40:52 PM EDT by bwteim


A SWAT team drives past flood victims waiting at the Convention Center in New Orleans, Thursday, Sept. 1, 2005. Officials called for a mandatory evacuation of the city, but many resident remained in the city and had to be rescued from flooded homes and hotels and remain in the city awaiting a way out.

[Image omitted - Armored Vehicle marked "State Police"]

4,284 posted on 09/01/2005 1:49:03 PM EDT by MrsCinAZ


3 killed at convention center last night, many robbed and raped Fox

4,411 posted on 09/01/2005 2:10:29 PM EDT by Lizarde


I just finshed watching a video on MSNBC's website and I'm absolutely devasted. Tony Zambado is the reporter at or near the Convention Ctr. in NO.
The government made promises to these people, they followed directions to the letter and they have been forgotten.
If you have not seen this video, I strongly suggest you see it now. I can not believe this is happening in this country! May God bless all of those people and I pray someone helps them soon.

4,437 posted on 09/01/2005 2:14:19 PM EDT by ingodwetrust


FLASH!!!
State Police Admin Net-
"Be Advised! A Lot of PILLAGING going on around the Superdome and Convention Center!!"

4,533 posted on 09/01/2005 2:27:25 PM EDT by tcrlaf


Mayor sending out emergency SOS. Talking about the convention center. Is that where he is? Saying there aren't enough buses.

4,558 posted on 09/01/2005 2:31:03 PM EDT by RummyChick


9/1/2005, 1:28 p.m. CT
By ADAM NOSSITER
The Associated Press
NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- Fights and trash fires broke out, rescue helicopters were shot at and anger mounted across New Orleans on Thursday, as National Guardsmen poured in to help restore order across this increasingly desperate and lawless city.
"We are out here like pure animals. We don't have help," the Rev. Issac Clark, 68, said outside the New Orleans Convention Center, where corpses lay in the open and he and other evacuees complained that they were dropped off and given nothing -- no food, no water, no medicine.

4,651 posted on 09/01/2005 2:44:14 PM EDT by Ellesu


He's got a point. Look at the situation outside the Convention Center...thousands stranded for days with no food or water except what they've been able to loot from inside the concession areas, SEVEN DEAD BODIES STILL THERE, no evacuation, no information. If the AP presstitutes and TV crews can get there, then somebody else can get there with food, water, and medicine.
I don't know who dropped the ball here--city authorities in New Orleans, the state of Louisiana, FEMA, DHS, the National Guard, hell, maybe the Tooth Fairy for all I know--but this thing is turning into a fustercluck of totally epic proportions. This is not just garden-variety governmental incompetence like when the DMV screws up your driving records. This is incompetence that is killing people.

4,743 posted on 09/01/2005 2:54:09 PM EDT by Moose4


My bad! Very confusing as there are thousands at the Dome and 20,000 at the Convention Center and appears the mayor was referring to the center. According to CNN, there has been no aid at the center, no food or water, and it is loaded with elderly and infirm. CNN, said that they were the first people in there and people welcomed them. Why was there no help here?
Also now, sniper fire at Charity Hospital per CNN..

4,979 posted on 09/01/2005 3:23:56 PM EDT by Ovation_girl


By CNN reporting that there have been no aid workings at the Convention Center, and that people were basically dumped there, they are reporting on the ineptness of the local government. This crisis at the center is not a federal problem yet, but if we find out that FEMA had been alerted of this situation and did nothing, then it would be. I prefer the "real" reporting on CNN at this moment, as opposed to Sehp's everything is becoming hunky dory attitude as he closed his most recent segment... Note I am not looking on any of this from the blame game standpoint, but wanting to know where people are really in crisis.

5,196 posted on 09/01/2005 4:01:06 PM EDT by Ovation_girl


By CNN reporting that there have been no aid workings at the Convention Center

A flat out demonstrable lie.

I prefer the "real" reporting on CNN at this moment,

Why am I not surprised.

5,219 posted on 09/01/2005 4:05:25 PM EDT by Howlin


Convention Center video coming up on WDSU. What a nightmare. People hungry, thirsty, baby's crying.. it's friggin awful.
Awful..

5,508 posted on 09/01/2005 4:45:56 PM EDT by Smogger


Is it just me?
This is the 2nd time i've seen the Convention Center footage, and I understand that this is a disaster, but does it seem that the group used to handouts, is demanding to know where their handouts are?

5,531 posted on 09/01/2005 4:49:37 PM EDT by tcrlaf


4:15 P.M. - (AP):
Police say storm victims are being raped and beaten inside the New Orleans Convention Center.

About 15,200 people who had taken shelter at the convention center to await buses grew increasingly hostile.

Police Chief Eddie Compass says he sent in 88 officers to quell the situation at the building, but they were quickly beaten back by an angry mob.

Compass says, "We have individuals who are getting raped, we have individuals who are getting beaten."

He says tourists are walking in that direction and they are getting preyed upon.

In hopes of defusing the unrest at the convention center, Mayor Ray Nagin gave the refugees permission to march across a bridge to the city's unflooded west bank for whatever relief they can find. But the bedlam appeared to make leaving difficult.

5,760 posted on 09/01/2005 5:40:15 PM EDT by cgk


A military helicopter makes a food and water drop to survivors of Hurricane Katrina near the Convention Center in New Orleans, Thursday, Sept. 1, 2005.

[Picture omitted - helicopter hovering @ about 10 feet and people catching small tossed packages]

5,823 posted on 09/01/2005 5:55:51 PM EDT by BurbankKarl


Police Chief Says Thousands Trapped in New Orleans Convention Center
Posted on 09/01/2005 5:49:12 PM EDT by Fitzcarraldo
Watching the NBC Nightly News. Wow. There are sooooo many people near the convention center WITHOUT FRESH CLEAN WATER. I don't understand why bottled water hasn't been dropped to these people. At this point, I don't blame any of them for breaking into any structure in search of food and beverage.

6,018 posted on 09/01/2005 6:45:47 PM EDT by Diverdogz


Fema says it just found out about the convention center 6 hours ago and food and water for them have been added to the convoy bringing dinner to the Dome 0 it should be there in a while

6,024 posted on 09/01/2005 6:47:27 PM EDT by Lizarde


19 posted on 09/12/2005 5:34:31 PM PDT by Cboldt
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To: jackbill

There are no fake facts. The correct English word is lies.

The phrase should read "the joy of lies"

"Fake Facts' is a lie in itsself.


20 posted on 09/12/2005 5:39:59 PM PDT by bert (K.E. ; N.P . I smell a dead rat in Baton Rouge!)
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