[Miss Marple]

I have typed this in myself, so any typos are mine, not the author's.

There is much more in the book, but because for two days in a row Dana Milbank has had articles posted here in which everyone takes his view as the truth, I wanted to make certain that Freepers understand that Milbank is about as anti-Bush as Terry McAuliffe.

ANYTHING written by Dana Milbank which contains ANY sort of controversy for the administration or the Republican party must be read with this passage in mind. Milbank is NOT trustworthy.

[Dog]

Thank you Jane.

[Bobdirects]

"Fighting Back" is a fantastic book. Every student in America should read it as a primer on how a true leader helps a nation in shock.

[Miss Marple]

I wanted to make sure you all read this and that it got bumped a couple of times. I am sick of Milbank's articles which are written to deliberately get us at cross-purposes, while he sneeringly laughs from the sidelines.

Milbank is to be trusted even less than Bill Kristol, and you know how I feel about THAT GUY!!

[Maynerd]

Thank you. Excellent post.

[Dog Gone]

I've bought the book, but haven't started reading it yet.

This passage is very revealing. It also demonstrates how immature Milbank is.

[KC_Conspirator]

Milbank is very dishonest and has replaced David Broder as the #1 liar at the ComPost. Milbank wrote this article to get the GOP off message and with Rush bantering on and on about it today, he seems to have accomplished his mission.

[GAgal]

Didn't Dana Milbank write the misleading article that caused the Daschele meltdown on the Senate floor ( the pink tie "screech")?

[PhiKapMom]

Thanks for posting!

I have discounted what Milbank writes for sometime. I put Milbank in the Molly Ivins/Helen Thomas category -- see the name -- don't read!

Somehow I am not surprised at some Freepers believing what is written by Millbank. After all they believe that Harold Ford (ACU - 8 Rating for 2001) is a moderate because that is what the news media says! Amazing!

[Dems_R_Losers]

EXCELLENT reporting!!! I've been yelling here for everyone to ignore Milbank. He is about as reliable as Maureen Dowd. He is determined to drive a wedge between the White House and conservatives. We are all fools if we fall for it. These last two articles are SO obvious. But I'm sure they are all snickering in the Post newsroom, especially if Rush is really fulminating about it (PLEASE tell me I am wrong, I thought Rush was way too smart fo fall into this trap.)

The liberal media are desperate to keep the abortion issue alive for 2004. They still think it guarantees losses for Republicans and an easy shorthand for Republicans to be portrayed as extreme.

[Wolfstar]

Good morning, Miss Marple. Thanks for posting this item. It does an excellent job of starkly highlighting one of my pet peeves: the fact that even smart FReepers, who should know better, tend to take everything they read in the press or hear on TV newscasts as gospel. The media DOES NOT DESERVE such blind acquiescence to all they spew out. Quite the opposite. Their product (news is a product) deserves the utmost scruitny and skepticism.

Here's an on-point article also posted on FR this morning. It uses tongue-in-check humor to make some very insightful points about how "news" is developed and packaged for a gullible public.

[NorCoGOP]

"The handsome armored presidential Chevrolet Suburban carrying our charge from the YMCA camp hurtled at 50 miles per hour through Estes Park and down the twisting mountain road. The motion set your pooler's stomach a-churning, bu the twisting doubtless had no impact on our POTUS, who has a constitution greater than your correspondent's.

What a wus...I can drive down Highway 34 at 65-70, in the dark...no problem...

[kayak]

From the time I first began lurking on FR, months and months before I ever registered in early '99, one thing that struck me was that verification of sources and facts was sought .... demanded .... to back up statements. And I found myself among kindred spirits who recognized the extreme bias of the media.

Ever since the election of 2000, though, the rule of thumb on FR seems to be that if someone in the media says it, it must be true ...... no matter what the political leanings or affiliation of the person.

There is a gigantic disconnect between those two concepts. If the things said about Republicans and/or conservatives before November 2000 were to taken with huge blocks of salt and examined for credibility, then the same should be true now.

FReepers, I would ask you to use your heads. If a reporter or columnist was prejudiced before Bush became President, that same member of the media is still prejudiced. Anyone who thought that x42 was wonderful is going to dislike Bush and try to discredit him. In my book that's a no-brainer.

Why do so many people here jump to accept at face value a statement about the Bush administration by a reporter/columnist whom they excoriated previously because that person praised x42? Once a Clymer, always a Clymer, unless there is evidence of a dramatic awakening. Milbank has, obviously, not experienced such a conversion.

[aristeides]

Remember, Milbank was one of the authors of that front-page Washington Post article that distorted Bush's criticism of the Dems being about Iraq, not homeland security, that Daschle used as his excuse for throwing a fit on the floor of the Senate. We had plenty of evidence at the time that Daschle was already planning that fit before Milbank's piece appeared, and indeed before Bush's speech that was the ostensible subject of Milbank's piece.

[prognostigaator]

bttt