Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Time for McClatchy to drop the "Truth to Power" motto, or live up to it

Check out this headline from the "Truth to Power" people: "Those crazy Palins: Todd's half-sister indicted in burglary"

I must have missed McClatchy's hard-hitting piece on the Crazy Obama family -- the one about Barack Obama's half-brother being denied entry to England over a suspected sexual assault, or the one about Obama's aunt who has been living in assisted housing in the US even though she has a millionaire nephew (Barack Obama), and even though she is in the US illegally. Or the one about Obama's other brother (George) who was arrested for marijuana in Kenya. Plenty of oddball Obamas to justify a headline like "Those crazy Obamas...." (I'll bet there are more arrests in the Obama family than the Palin family.)

But McClatchy only covers "crazy families" when they are Republicans.

Back to McClatchy's Truth to Power motto: Todd Palin's half-sister doesn't hold any power, yet Barack Obama is the president of the US.

It's time for McClatchy to either drop the Truth to Power motto, or live up to it.

Warner Todd Huston has more here.

UPDATE: McClatchy dropped "Those crazy Palins" from the headline.
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35 comments:

Anonymous said...

I bought meth from Trig.

Anonymous said...

I DISAGREE.

Like all phony propaganda mottos, MNI should always be remembered for it.

Just like "Arbeit macht frei"

Five years from now, when they talk about long gone bias rags like MNI, I want them to also properly think of Goebbels.

Greg said...

McClatchy papers all over the country are going bankrupt, and their far left reporting is at least partially responsible. The Anchorage Daily News which prides itself on being fanatically anti-Palin has allowed its message board to be taken over by some of the most vile and insulting 0bots on the web. The ADN has admitted that 90 percent of the comments are from those in the lower 48, and even overseas. The ADN also routinely removes pro-Palin comments, and bans those who post them. Whenever there is a complaint they say that they will crack down on the the really vile personal insults by the 0bots, but they never do.

Anonymous said...

Every time MNI publishes another Palin article, another MNI Marxist gets his pink slip (wings)

John Altevogt said...

I always have mixed emotions whenever they talk about new layoffs at The Star because I have friends there who really do try to do a job of presenting the news accurately and fairly.

Then I look at the editorial department's endorsements and the hate campaigns against other friends and I realize how much damage this rag does to my community and how deeply involved it is in perpetuating the corruption that dominates politics in the metro area.

Anonymous said...

Looks like they dropped "Those Crazy Palins" from the headline... follow the link.

And hey, give us links to the Obama stories. The only one I could find on the *alleged* sexual assault pointed out Obama hasn't talked to this guy in 20 years. Plus, when they originally arrested him they let him go... must not have been all that blatant an assault. And no age on the "young girl?" Why not?

The reason you may be seeing more "crazy Palins" stories is the central character in each. Sarah Palin said and did crazy crap, so now journalists are following the story a little more closely. In Alaska, anyway. Obama, no crazy stuff to follow. Joe Biden, now...

Durn liberal media journalists. CNN will fall next, I'm tellin' ya. Then Newsweek. Then the John Stewart Show!

Saaaaaaay, how 'bout that Al Franken! Woo!

Anonymous said...

6:51:

I'm a liberal. And I could have voted for John McCain, if the Democrats had put up a weak candidate. (not so W, of course. He is not a leader.)

Can you say the same of Obama? It's going to be a tough road, but it looks like he is going to turn the economy around. If he does, and let's just throw in that he catches Osama in Pakistan too, will you consider voting for him?

Of course not.

Because your side is all about obedience. To conservative voices, anyway. Your side is about not questioning authority. You are easily led.

I was just listening to Rush Limbaugh. Yet you're afraid of turning on the nightly (NBC/ABC/CBS) news because EVERYTHING you hear or see MUST agree with your ideology. NO fact can go against what you believe.

Guess what many German citizens were like in the 1930s?

Anonymous said...

The liberal media will continue with a steam if anti-Palin phony news articles. They must really be afraid of her. They spent eight years destroying President Bush, and worked overtime to destroy Mitt Romney, and get the RINO John McCain elected to run against the Teleprompter Man. They ridiculed P. Bush for any little slip, but the electronic Obama is given a pass on huge gaffes. They will work long and hard to cover his mistakes at the detriment of the USA. So the dishonest media bites the dust. The old media without integrity is worst than none. I vote for them to be GONE!

Anonymous said...

Anon 9:31

Go get 'em. You're my hero.

Anonymous said...

9:31 best comment in weeks. Bravo.

Anonymous said...

Amen 9:31
Although you "left out" MSNBC. After reading this blog, I have to tune into either Air America or MSNBC to get something with an admitted left wing bias. I just can't get over how they actually believe that the financial state of the newspaper industry is totally based on ideology and that the economy is just a side note.

Anonymous said...

Guess what many German citizens were like in the 1930s?Pretty much the same as Americans in 2008.

I no longer wonder why Germans voted in Hitler when Americans voted for the Islamic fascist Obama.

Hitler had his Goebells for his propoganda, Obama has the liberal media to spew his lies and hate.

Anonymous said...

I made Todd Palin's snowmobile into a pipe and smoked crack from it.

Anonymous said...

Obama smokes crack and eats dogs.

Miss Myself said...

I was a lifelong Dem., registered, but worked really hard to keep bias out of my work in military and then tech reporting, and also biz editor. I have been so stunned by the free pass the mainstream media gave The One that I chaged to Independent and voted for McCain.
Was it always this biased? I know Nixon got creamed but he kind of deserved it.
Horrified to see newspapers bubble under and wonder why the NYT etc. just bent over and grabbed the ankles when we could have been balanced and insightfil all around.
I did appreciate the good work of MNI D.C. bureau during the buildup and start of the war. Very good example of what we should be doing all along.
I hate people who use Sarah Palin as excuse for sexist rants. I hate Keith Olberman. Bully.

Anonymous said...

Anon 11:14 Welcome back to the fight

John Altevogt said...

I turned off the nightly news casts in August of the year Bill Clinton first ran for the presidency and never turned them back on.

It's not because I can't tolerate listening to the voices of liberalism. I have both a BA and MA in sociology. Trust me, I've heard all the arguments from people a hell of a lot brighter and more talented than anything found on the nightly propagandacasts.

It's not that I don't listen or read opposing viewpoints, I just sick of being lied to. I got sick of all the news I wasn't being told about.

Reading an intelligently written op-ed piece by a Christopher Hitchens is one thing, but listening to an intellectual fraud like Walter Cronkhite is quite another (how appropriate that they're giving Little Ms. Perky the Walter Cronkhite "Award").

There is no intellectual obligation to being misinformed. I'm trained in crap detecting and separating out the wheat from the chaff and after watching the garbage these "journalists' pumped out I came to the conclusion that there was no wheat there to be had.

You're right, this country is a lot like Hitler's Germany today. We have our own Holocaust of 53 million dead babies. We have an assault on people of faith (witness that also on this blog from the lefties).

We have attacks on free speech in the form of political correctness, now enforced with various thought crimes (disguised, of course, to eliminate hate).

I don't know how many of my old Marxist instructors are hiding out in their offices scared to death that they'll get popped in some purge for uttering the wrong pronoun, or for promoting a "dead white male", or engaging in "male ways of thinking".

We even have the same romanticized back to nature movement promoted by the SS in our idiotic "environmentalist" green movement wherein the environmental evils of the world are attributed to capitalism (never mind the environmental disasters in the socialist world).

The US is closer to Hitlerian thought today not because of those who want limited government and an embrace of morality in government, but precisely because of those who promote a huge, morally blind nanny state that attempts to use social policy to piss in the face of mother nature, i.e., the ideology of some 85-90% of the poorly trained duds in the profession of journalism.

You people still act like you're some intellectual gods that are better than the people in the communities you serve, and you have to think that way, because you've been suckered into becoming an oppressing army for wages that are less than they pay at Wal-Mart.

I love news, real news that provides me with both sides. I love watching a skilled journalist peel the layers off a corrupt administration, but you're not going to see that in Kansas City. The Star and The Sun are both like aged whores plying ever sleazier neighborhoods looking for a tricks to keep them in business. We can only wonder what our community would be like if it had an honest newspaper.

So kiss my ass. I've been on the left, and I've been on the right and the American left is far closer to goosestepping than the American right has ever though of being. Our ideology of small government is anathema to a dictator, while yours is a blessing.

Anonymous said...

Anon 11:31 Amen Brother!

Anonymous said...

11:31, if you had as many examples as you had charged language, your testimony would be a lot more credible.

Don't tell us about how liberals are fascists, yada yada yada. Give EXAMPLES. Ya got an MA; put it to use.

Three hallmarks of fascism: militarism, nationalism, and often racism. We already know Obama is going to make big cuts in military spending; I've heard Rush's explanation on why Obama is racist, it was ridiculous; and if you want to find which side that claims "America is good -- no matter what" (including the My Lai massacre) you're going to have to look to the GOP. (uh, that's your example of nationalism.)

If you want to know why churches are in decline, you may want to google "Catholic schoolboy scandal."

Come on. Gimme examples to back up all yer angry talk.

Anonymous said...

Yo 11:31:

"It's not that I don't listen or read opposing viewpoints, I just sick of being lied to."

Well, they didn't lie to you about weapons of mass destruction not being in Iraq.

Do you watch the News Hour with Jim Lehrer on Fridays? They have commentary from both the left and the right. No one's shouting or getting riled up, so you may find it boring... but if you REALLY love news, you would be watching this.

And you would be telling us about how you love to watch C-SPAN.

See? example, example, example.

Sorry, hombre, but right now your argument isn't flying.

Anonymous said...

Last, 11:31:

Do you think cultural fear plays any role in how you decide to vote?

(I'm something of a sociologist myself.)

(er, no, I don't think I'm a god. But I CAN read, question, explore. Which you seem to have given up on. And right now, it doesn't look like you gave up on those for good reasons... if there ARE any good reasons to give up.

I think the Founding Fathers gave us the First Amendment for good reason...)

Anonymous said...

11:31 (rats. Sorry McClatchy Watch. Love the site, sorry I'm not condensing my posts.)

Know which party David Duke decided to try to join in '92 when he decided to run for president? Hint: NOT the Democrats.

While you're looking him up, you may also want to look up Trent Lott.

So: there's two examples of racism. You stinkin' fascist.

I'M KIDDING. I do not believe anyone who is conservative is a fascist. But you guys sure have a bit of the nationalism/militarism/sometimes racism thing going on, and it's creepy.

Anonymous said...

Know which party Jesse Jackson tried to run for President as? Not the Republicans.

If you want racists, the Democrats are filled with them: Obama, George Wallace, Jesse Jackson, Farrakhan, etc.

And the Democrats are loaded with anti-semites.

As 11:31am wrote, I am more scared of the Radical left than I am of the Radical Right. The hard Left is crazy, violent and immune to reason.

Anonymous said...

Ya, that leftie Timothy McVeigh, for instance.

"Democrats" in the south were conservatives until about 30 years ago. Wallace's politics were had nothin' to do with the modern Dem party.

Farrakhan, OK, you got me on that one. the others? Uh, yeah right.

THANK YOU for providing examples! refreshing. specifics are good, even if they're a tad bizarre (Obama a racist? good luck selling that one. uh... got an example of what you're talking about?)

Anonymous said...

The Right condemned McVeigh and Bin Laden. The Left condemned McVeigh and prasied Bin Laden and William Ayers.

If you don't consider Jesse Jackson a racial bigot, then you have a absurd view of bigotry.

Oh, and Obama's association with Rev. Wright is not racial bigotry?
Then you truly have no brain.

John Altevogt said...

Apparently you trolls missed that all important course on reading for comprehension before you dropped out of elementary school. There are already sufficient examples and if you don't like the ones I used either go do your own research or follow the instructions in the paragraph starting with Kiss. Apparently 53 million dead babies and totalitarian speech patterns are just part of liberal life, which I think was my point.

We're not your slaves and you don't get to decide what's credible and what's not here. This isn't one of your corrupt rags and you don't define the terms.

I do watch C-Span, and I've had enough personal experience with the Lehrer people that I will tell all the decent folks on here, do not trust them. I personally found them to be one of the biggest pack of liars I've ever dealt with. Worse than ABC, worse than CBS, worse than you name it.

I've also dealt with NPR on one of our minority outreach projects, and hung up on them. Complete jerks. PBS and NPR need to be defunded.

As for Anon 6:23, I'm really sorry you had that experience with a priest, but you shouldn't allow it to make you lump all people of faith into some bigoted stereotype.

Let's see, what have I missed? Ah, questioning authority. You are dense. Newspapers have been the authority and would probably like to be that again. But, as you can see, we crazy right wingers are all about questioning authority.

No matter how many crooked left wing judges you put on the bench, we still know the smell of BS when they hand it down. And watching how you guys label totalitarian legislation gives us plenty of practice in crap detecting.

Oh, and I just can't let the David Duke reference go. He may have tried to run as a Republican, but he's been ostracized by the party everytime he's tried it.

Democrats, on the other hand, were the party of segregation. RObert Byrd was a member of the Ku Klux Klan. Fred Phelps, he of the "God Hates Fags" campaign is a Democrat everytime he runs for office and so are the members of his family. that would be in addition to the ongoing and omnipresent hate campaign against Catholics (sorry about your sore rectum 6:23), evangelical Christians and conservative Jews. Democrats are the party of hate.

That's about it. Again, reading for comprehension, give it a shot.

Anonymous said...

Oh, and I just can't let the David Duke reference go. He may have tried to run as a Republican, but he's been ostracized by the party everytime he's tried it.

-------------------
Actually David Duke spent many, many more years as a democrat.

Anonymous said...

@ Altevogt

Actually, I did have a rightwinger as my slave -- until he used the safe word.

Anonymous said...

And Fred Phelps was Al Gore's pastor for decades, which might explain how Gore became such a lunatic.

Anonymous said...

david duke had a good idea at that time--drug test welfare recipitents--which should be done 2day

Anonymous said...

John Altevogt


So much hate in you. Bet your locked away in your basement waiting for or "praying" for the big one to drop....

Anonymous said...

@ Altevogt

Right-wingers questioning authority? Mi amigo, you all were the authority for eight long years. Maybe yo are better at questioning it than wielding it.

Either way, the voters tossed you out on your ear. Enjoy the wilderness.

Anonymous said...

Hello John, and thanks, in your next-to-last graph, for beginning to provide examples.

You're right: I DON'T get to decide what's credible or not here. But I can form an argument for why something doesn't seem credible and present my argument. And if most people here (perhaps, including you) say, "That guy's got a point" well, then...

Just a quick history lesson (which I hope will be old news to you): The Republican party was originally the party of ABOLITION.

That's right: They were liberals.

Lincoln as a senator voted AGAINST the war with Mexico. He never set foot in a church in his life. This sound like a conservative to you?

(Here's his speech against the war, BTW: http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=949)

The Democrats, originally, were pro-slavery. The sides gradually changed over... With Barry Goldwater's opposition to the Voting Rights Act in 1964 pretty much sealing the deal.

The decendants of the people Lincoln was fighting against can be seen in the '60s working against Civil Rights, supporting Jim Crow, and today on this blog... using terms like "Obamababoon."

See how examples can give your points powerful, extra support?

And I only offered the Catholic priests molesting the schoolboys as a reason why churches are in decline.

Anonymous said...

John, I don't have time to respond to all the stuff you've brought up. But re your third graph: OK, they're liars. Where? When? What did they say?

Rush Limbaugh says every day the media is lying. OK. Then he should file ONE (1) lawsuit over one of these lies. Because winning ONE court case would do wonders for HIS credibility. He should put his money where his mouth is.

Not surprising that he doesn't.

Just because a fact doesn't agree with what you believe doesn't mean it's not a fact. You're going to have to come to terms with that...

John Altevogt said...

Re: Lehrer's Liars

This is pretty far down the list, so I'll make it brief.

10:43 The abolishionists, or ABOLISHIONISTS if you prefer, were evangelical Christians, they were not liberals. A few years after the current crop of evangelicals manages to put an end to liberalism's Holocaust against the unborn you'll be trying to tell people they were liberal.

And, what I find amusing is that homosexual pedophiles sneak into the priesthood, defile the church, molest children and disgrace their very calling and rather than coming out against homosexual pedophiles, you attack the church they sullied. Talk about misplaced anger.

10:48 Your ignorance of the law is stunning. The "Reader's" Rep at The Star, Derek Donovan, recently libeled me out of pure malice. Unfortunately, since I can't point to any financial harm that I've suffered as a result of his lies, no case. Rush is in worse shape. He's a public figure, and those laws are even harder to enforce.

I digress, you ask for the what, when, where of Lehrer's Liars.

This was actually documented in a column I did in The Star in 1999 I believe. The essence is that the folks from Lehrer's bunch (which may have been MacNeil Lehrer at that point) came to town promising to cover the evolution controversy, promising, amongst other things, to cover the story more the perspective of those who opposed macro evolutionary theory. Long story short, it was a lie. It was a it piece from the get go. Even the title of the piece was a hit.

The fun part is that the husband of the ED of a local left-wing anti-evangelical hate group sent out an e-mail advising all the folks in the hate group to load up their VCR's because the folks from Lehrer's crew had given them a heads up that they were going to like the the finished product.

It was also pretty clear that the Lehrer people had spent a lot of time socializing with the hate group folks beyond just professional contacts.

I was given the email address to the head poobah of Lehrer's crew by the local station and sent him a copy of the email. Complete arrogant asshole. Indeed, I was promised a tape of the show and never got that either even after repeated requests and assurances that it was on its way. Liars from start to finish, top to bottom.

As a caveat, let me say that I have appeared on several PBS shows here in KC and down in Wichita and been treated very fairly, but stay away from the natioanl bunch at both PBS and NPR. They are scum.

One final point. I have no dog in the evolution battle. I covered it from the perspective of my graduate training, not from my faith. What I've seen in every instance has been the ignorance of the journalistic community writing about the topic and their complete reliance on their own ideological bias in the way they approach the topic.

I have yet to see one reporter who had a grasp of what constitutes scientific methodology or an understanding of epistemology.

Hugh Downs ignorance was so complete, for example, that he criticized the folks on the Kansas SBOE for not understanding one aspect of the scientific method when in fact it was that very aspect that they had relied on (replication) in removing macro evolution (and only macro evolution) from the review tests. What a complete idiot.

Indeed, that vast majority of the morons covering the events in Kansas (including this bimbo at Reuters) went out and said that they had removed evolution from the curriculum when in fact they had done no such thing.

Even recently when a similar event occurred down in Texas, the reporting was the same exact ignorance, the same exact stereotypes and the same exact bigotry from the press there. Unbelievable stupidity.

This will be the last I address this thread, it's too far down to bother with. If you have a gripe, do it on another thread.