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On Saturday (2/19/11), the Los Angeles Times published an article, "Ex-high school principal gets 8 years for molesting four girls." The case involved Jonas Vital Silverio, who had pleaded no contest to 10 counts of lewd acts on a child 14 or 15 years old. At first blush, the story seems to be just another stomach-turning account of child abuse in our nation's public schools. But buried in the middle of the article was a troubling detail: [Los Angeles County] Prosecutor Stephanie Chavez said Silverio had a history of sexual misconduct.In 1995, Silverio was placed on probation for a misdemeanor...

"Double Standard: Abuse Scandals and the Attack on the Catholic Church is essential reading for anyone who wants to hear the other side of the clergy sexual abuse scandal. The side the media hasn't told you, and side most of the public doesn't know ... Even for someone who has read about this subject for years, it was eye-opening to me ... If someone attacks you or slanders the Church over the sexual abuse scandal, challenge them to read this book and continue saying such things." - Thomas Peters, American Papist, CatholicVote.org "A landmark book ... Meticulously researched ... A...

A December 7, 2008, wire article by the Associated Press' David Espo falsely claims, "[Former Army chief of staff Gen. Eric] Shinseki was forced into retirement by the Bush administration after he said the original invasion plan for Iraq did not include enough troops." (President-elect Obama recently announced Gen. Shinseki would head the Veterans Affairs Department.)The truth? No such thing happened. FactCheck.org, among other sources, debunked this myth over four years ago.

"It could be the worst movie I've ever seen" ... "[T]he out and out worst, most disgusting, most hateful, most incompetent, most revolting, most loathsome, most reprehensible cinematic work I have ever encountered." ... "It portrays the members of our Marine Corps in the most disgusting way imaginable." ... "This film is an atrocity. It is zero stars." ... "I honestly was close to vomiting when I saw the film." ... "It is a slander on the United States of America." ... "Everyone associated with this film ought to be ashamed." ... "Will it inspire future terrorists? Of course it...

The 21-year-old nephew of Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez has enlisted in the Marines, and Lopez isn't happy about it. "Don't become a pawn, I told my nephew," Lopez writes. His column is, "When the reality of Iraq hits home" (Sun., 7/15/07). Says Lopez: Some have argued that without a draft, enlisting in this war is a matter of choice, so what happens, happens. But that's not necessarily true in the case of National Guard troops who have been called up. And as for soldiers as young as my nephew, I don't see enlistment as a well-informed choice but...

We all know about actor Michael Richards' racial epithets at last Friday night's performance at the Laugh Factory in Los Angeles. But yesterday, this exclusive TMZ.com article revealed that the three-time Emmy-award-winning actor had also hurled anti-Semitic slurs at the Improv comedy club in April of this year. According to the piece, Richards yelled at an audience member, "You f***ing Jew. You people are the cause of Jesus dying." And here's the kicker: Richards' own representative has confirmed that this actually happened.So how did the Los Angeles Times cover this latest revelation in today's paper (Thursday, November 23, 2006)? They...

The story: A priest works at a Miami high school as a history teacher and assistant chaplain. Nude photographs of him interacting physically with other men are discovered on the Internet. The priest resigns from his job. Graphic Internet photos are readily available for the media. In light of the recent media frenzy over Rev. Ted Haggard (5,500 results at Google News), it sounds like everything would be ripe for a story that the media would just love to jump all over. But, curiously, the mainstream media has essentially ignored this story. Why?The answer may lie in the priest's denomination....

An October 17, 2006, op-ed by Los Angeles Times columnist Joel "I Don't Support Our Troops" Stein condescendingly slams Christianity as a "death cult." Writing a lippy account of a Presbyterian service he had recently attended, Stein belches, "The first thing I noticed about church was how much like PBS it was. The lighting was dim, the speakers talked slowly, the songs were dated, there were a lot of references to reading material and every so often my eye line was interrupted by envelopes asking me to donate money. Also, I kept falling asleep." And (bold added), "I'd never realized...

On Sunday October 15, 2006, the Los Angeles Times published a 1488-word, front-page article entitled, "Displease a Lobbyist, Get Fired," by Times staffer Peter Wallsten. The gist of the piece (if you can't glean it from the title): Lobbyist Jack Abramoff "manipulated the system" and used his influence at the White House to get Allen Stayman, a State Department official who was working against the interests of Abramoff's clients, fired. Wallsten's lengthy piece portrays Stayman as an unwitting government official who was innocently bulldozed for standing in the way of Abramoff and his interests. However, Wallsten's article left out a...

Did publisher Simon & Schuster adjust its release schedule and rush into print a new book unflattering to the Bush administration to make an impact on the forthcoming mid-term elections? If the words of its author, David Kuo, are any indication, it's certainly a possibility. In an interview today (Tuesday, October 17, 2006) on the Laura Ingraham radio show, Kuo was a guest in addition to prominent evangelical Chuck Colson. The suspicious timing of the release of Kuo's book was discussed. Here's the relevant exchange: KUO: Maybe if I'm Laura Ingraham or Chuck Colson, I get to choose when my...

According to CBS Evening News host Katie Couric, a Monday installment of its "freeSpeech" segment, which espoused a strong conservative viewpoint, could be viewed as "repugnant." The issue was discussed on tonight's episode of The O'Reilly Factor  (Wednesday, October 4, 2006).In light of Monday's shooting at a Pennsylvania Amish school, CBS invited Brian Rohrbough, the father of a victim of the 1999 Columbine school massacre, to speak on "freeSpeech."Quite simply, Mr. Rohrbough delivered a powerful and thoughtful editorial. His commentary is a must-read/must-see (link (with video)). Among other things, Mr. Rohrbough said: This country is in a moral free-fall. For...

On his radio show yesterday (Thursday, September 21, 2006), host Hugh Hewitt interviewed Thomas B. Edsall, who up until recently was a senior political reporter for the Washington Post. He had been with the paper for 25 years. Through precise and direct questioning by Hewitt, Edsall admitted something that is rarely heard from a liberal these days. In a shocking admission, Edsall articulated that the biases of the mainstream media are "overwhelmingly to the left." He also proposed that Democratic reporters outnumber Republicans "in the range of 15-25 to 1"!In the interview, as Hewitt and Edsall discussed the rise of...

On today's episode of Meet the Press (Sunday, September 10, 2006), Tim Russert interviewed Vice President Cheney. In the interview, Russert took issue with the fact that the Vice President once stated on his show that it was "pretty well confirmed" that Mohammed Atta, one of the 9/11 hijackers, met with Iraqi intelligence in Prague in April 2001. Here's the craftiness by Russert: Mr. Cheney made the "pretty well confirmed" remark in a December 9, 2001, appearance, over four-and-a-half years ago. Russert failed to inform his audience this morning when the remark was originally made. In addition, in three following...

Here in the Information Age, it is customary for a major newspaper to regularly post its contents/articles on its web site. However, it appears an exception has been made in the case of the Los Angeles Times and some op-eds written by television host Bill Maher. The paper has not made two of his recent articles available for viewing outside the actual hard copy of the paper.In the print edition of yesterday's Times (Friday, September 1, 2006, page B13) was a piece written by Maher entitled, "Praise Allah and pass the hair gel." (More on this below.) However, the article...

Via Drudge. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), a prominent organization that has been combatting anti-Semitism and bigotry for 90 years, has issued a letter to MSNBC Countdown host Keith Olbermann. The letter, dated July 28, 2006, takes serious issue with Olbermann's repeated use of the Nazi salute while badgering Bill O'Reilly. The body of ADL's letter begins as follows: We are deeply dismayed by your ongoing use of the Nazi "Sieg Heil" salute, both on your program and in public appearances -- including the recent Television Critics Association press tour -- while holding up a mask of Fox News commentator Bill...

In the weeks leading up to the release of The Passion of the Christ film over two years ago, Tim Rutten, media columnist for the Los Angeles Times, wrote no less than six hyperventilating columns that dealt almost exclusively with breathless concerns over anti-Semitism in Mel Gibson's film. At one point, Rutten attacked Mel Gibson as "a little brat" and "an unwholesomely willful child playing with matches."  Yet when the blatantly anti-Christian and anti-Catholic The Da Vinci Code was released a few months ago, Rutten's reaction was a ho-hum and a yawn; far from a concern, Da Vinci is "only...

Under the corrupt cloak of a "book review," this Sunday's Los Angeles Times (July 30, 2006) continues its underhanded and one-sided assault on the theory of intelligent design (ID). "The language of life," by Robert Lee Hotz*, is a review of three new works that attack intelligent design. The review was promoted on the top of the front page of the "Sunday preview" edition under the heading, "Less than 'intelligent design': Darwin's believers debunk the theory." And rather than providing its readers an honest critique, the Times' "review" is nothing less than a full-on Darwin propaganda piece. Hotz begins his...

On Monday, July 10, 2006, fabulous radio host Hugh Hewitt celebrated his 6th anniversary on the air with an on-air spanking of Los Angeles Times columnist Jonathan Chait. The day before, in another one of his badly misguided op-eds, Chait actually wrote that President Bush is a "greater threat" to the country than Osama bin Laden, and it is "quite reasonable to conclude that Bush will harm the nation more" than Bin Laden.Hewitt invited Chait to his program and proceeded to do what he does best with far-left liberals who espouse unsupportable views. Hewitt coolly shredded Chait and his Times...

If you thought the folks at the Los Angeles Times would use the Fourth of July to take a day off from spewing their usual bias and vitriol, think again. Readers of today's op-ed page (Tuesday, July 4, 2006) in the Times are greeted to this piece of bitterness by Mark Kurlansky, "Fathers don't always know best" (The title comes from the print edition; online, the title is, "WWFFD? Who cares?" We have already written about the discrepancy between the print and online titles at the Times here.).Apparently, Kurlansky is not too impressed by the very people who founded our...

In a remarkable interview on the Hugh Hewitt radio show this afternoon (Mon. June 26, 2006), Doyle McManus, Washington D.C. bureau chief for the Los Angeles Times, publicly admitted that the column in his paper on Friday, the one in which a secret financial tracking program was reported, could aid terrorists who target the United States. The original column was written by Josh Meyer and Greg Miller, but McManus played a role in the decision to go forward with the story's publication. The eye-opening interview, with audio, is at Radio Blogger. The key exchange: HUGH HEWITT: Is it possible, in...