Ayers Pal-ship Stretch Repudiated
Obamiated Press assures us the Ayers-Obama thing is no big deal. via Boston Herald:
Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin on Saturday accused Democrat Barack Obama of “palling around with terrorists” because of an association with a former ’60s radical, stepping up an effort by John McCain’s campaign to portray Obama as unacceptable to American voters.
Palin’s reference was to Bill Ayers, one of the founders of the group the Weather Underground. Its members took credit for bombings, including nonfatal explosions at the Pentagon and US Capitol, during the Vietnam War era. Obama, who was a child when the group was active, has denounced Ayers’ radical views and activities.
While it is known that Obama and Ayers live in the same Chicago neighborhood, served on a charity board together and had a fleeting political connection, it’s a stretch of any reading of the public record to say the pair ever palled around. And it’s simply wrong to suggest that they were associated while Ayers was committing terrorist acts.
Falling behind Obama in polls, the Republican campaign plans to make attacks on Obama’s character a centerpiece of candidate John McCain’s message in the final weeks of the presidential race. Coming late in the campaign, Palin’s remark could be particularly incendiary, however, and could knock Obama off his focus on the troubled economy.
Hate to lift such a large chunk of type … sure hope I don’t get one of those crappy “fair-use” lawyer letters. However, for purposes of media criticism it is regretably necessary to demonstrate exactly how far in the tank the nation’s dominant wire service is with the Obama campaign. There’s the hazy focus on history, the Obama camp talking points run as unattributed gospel, the disaparagement of McCain tactics.
It may be that the wire service is just striking out into bold new journalistic turf, trying to break the relentness cycle of media negativism that readers always complain about. Take this characterization of the Weathermen … please:
Its members took credit for bombings, including nonfatal explosions at the Pentagon and US Capitol, during the Vietnam War era.
Usually, when it bleeds, it’s supposed to lead. The airliner that lands safely isn’t supposed to be news. So what about the dead cops, bystanders, armored truck guards? Heck, what about the dead Weathermen? NYT:
Most of the bombs the Weathermen were blamed for had been placed to do only property damage, a fact Mr. Ayers emphasizes in his memoir. But a 1970 pipe bomb in San Francisco attributed to the group killed one police officer and severely hurt another. An accidental 1970 explosion in a Greenwich Village town house basement killed three radicals; survivors later said they had been making nail bombs to detonate at a military dance at Fort Dix in New Jersey. And in 1981, in an armed robbery of a Brinks armored truck in Nanuet, N.Y., that involved Weather Underground members including Kathy Boudin nand David Gilbert, two police officers and a Brinks guard were killed.
In fairness, however, it would be wrong to accuse the AP of Weathermen/Obama whitewashing, if those are murders the Weathermen declined to take credit for.
The abandonment of non-partisan journalism by the wire service that invented it 150-odd years has been going on for a long time. But when mild-mannered, fair-minded, just-the-fact guys like my pal Joe start to notice …
Uh oh … now it’s even infected CNN. Creative Minority Report:
CNN’s Soledad O’ Brien ran a focus group of self declared Republicans, Democrats and undecideds during the Palin/Biden debate.
Soledad asked them immediately after the debate, “How many thought Joe Biden won the debate tonight?”
I’d say about half the hands go up. O’Brien then inexplicably says, “So, looks overwhelming.” Then she asks who thought Palin won. Again, about half the hands go up and she describes it as “small hands.” Then she quickly declares Biden the winner and calls it a day.
… I counted 12 for Biden and 11 for Palin.
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 10:38 am on Sunday, October 5, 2008
3 Responses to “Ayers Pal-ship Stretch Repudiated”
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October 5th, 2008 at 11:43 am
I watched that CNN video earlier, and it cracked me up. Somebody in the comments pointed out that she wasn’t actually wrong, though. She was just including all of the CNN staff standing behind her, who all had their hands up for Biden!
The Ayers/Weathermen whitewash is disgusting. It would be like the AP trying to minimize Timothy McVeigh’s bomb by pointing out that only government workers were targeted, after all, and since he didn’t know there was a daycare there it wasn’t his fault that kids were killed.
October 6th, 2008 at 1:08 am
[...] Ayers Pal-ship Stretch RepudiatedIts members took credit for bombings, including nonfatal explosions at the Pentagon and US Capitol, during the Vietnam War era. Obama, who was a child when the group was active, has denounced Ayers’ radical views and activities. … [...]
October 6th, 2008 at 1:10 am
[...] Ayers Pal-ship Stretch RepudiatedIts members took credit for bombings, including nonfatal explosions at the Pentagon and US Capitol, during the Vietnam War era. Obama, who was a child when the group was active, has denounced Ayers’ radical views and activities. … [...]