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( I realize this could all be horse manure, but could not resist posting) Thread begins below: MSM contact-TO everyone, especially Stephen, Lance, and se: written by Anne, September 28, 2008 I know a "top" person in the MSM quite well. I was very fortunate to catch her at a party and discuss this for a few minutes (I asked about the citizenship angle). A little alcohol loosens the tongue. She said (speaking about her "company") "we're hoping Obama wins and then we'll haul in ratings ten times better than the Clinton affair. There's a lot more out there than...

When Senator McCain chose Governor Palin to serve as his running mate, he unleashed from the left the most incredible torrent of sewerage we have ever seen heaped upon a Vice Presidential candidate. Alan Colmes said she caused the Downes Syndrome of her baby. Obama operatives said Trig was actually her grandchild. Al Franken helped write a skit for Saturday Night Live that suggested that Sarah’s husband had sex with his daughters. The head of South Carolina’s Democratic Party said that Governor Palin’s only credential was that she had never had an abortion. And so on and so on. To...

(NEW YORK) They scold us for “being unfair,” remind us to “ask all the candidates the same questions,” and occasionally, they boo us. From Canton to Colorado, some of the tens of thousands of people attending Sarah Palin’s rallies regularly take it upon themselves to give the media a piece of their minds. So I thought it only fair to turn the microphone around, and give a handful of rally attendees a chance to air their grievances about the way in which the media has covered the Republican vice presidential nominee. Watch the video below:

Ever wonder where former CNN'r Aneesh Raman went? The Middle East correspondent left CNN in June to "try something different." Well, now we've found him. Raman is now with the Obama campaign, as witnessed by this Obama campaign email blast, obtained by FishbowlDC

As most observers predicted at the time, records from the Chicago Annenberg Challenge where Barack Obama served as President of the Board and terrorist William Ayers as head of the action arm of the organization were almost certainly scrubbed; the result of a tip from the University of Illinois to the Obama campaign: The President of the University of Illinois, B. Joseph White, and the University Counsel of the University of Illinois, Thomas Bearrows, contacted Kenneth C. Rolling, the former Executive Director of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC) and a professional colleague of Barack Obama for many years, prior to...

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has been subjected to an intense amount of media and public scrutiny since she was named as John McCain’s vice presidential pick one week ago. Many of the attacks have come in the form of unconfirmed reports on the Internet. Among them: 1) Palin “Joined a Secessionist Political Party” The Charge: Unsubstantiated Internet reports insisted Palin was once a member of the Alaska Independence Party, which critics call a secessionist political movement and supporters say is dedicated to seeking greater state control over federal lands across Alaska.The Facts: Palin has been a registered Republican since 1982....

H/t Kimberly M. Did the Code Pink members who interrupted John McCain's speech last night use MSNBC press badges to get into the hall? Not according to Code Pink itself, which claims the two women "obtained passes to the convention from disaffected Republicans." Right. There is another much more intriguing explanation out there. According to Shay at Booker Rising, which describes itself a newsite for black moderates and black conservatives [emphasis added]: "I took the shuttle bus back to Minneapolis, and I overheard a convention organizer named Phil telling a convention delegate that the protesters on Wednesday night got through...

SPOKANE, Wash. (Sept. 4) - Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin seems to have switched colleges at least six times in six years, including two stints at the University of Idaho before graduating from there in 1987. Federal privacy laws prohibit the schools from disclosing her grades, and none of the schools contacted by The Associated Press could say why she transferred. There was no indication any were contacted as part of the background investigation of Palin by presidential candidate John McCain's campaign.

Move over, Rasmussen, and let Howard take over! It's been a wild week, so how about a little comic relief? Turns out Howard Dean does his own personal polling—among his wife's employees. And, surprise! They tend to agree with him! The DNC Chairman was chatting with Tom Brokaw on MSNBC this afternoon. TOM BROKAW: What did you think of Sarah Palin last night? HOWARD DEAN: I think the first half was terrific. I thought she really laid out who she was. I was fascinated. The second half, she sounded like Dick Cheney, she really did. The same old attack stuff,...

While the majority of Thursday’s CBS Early Show coverage of Sarah Palin’s convention speech was positive, at the top of the 8am hour, co-host Maggie Rodriguez talked to Palin’s sister, Heather Bruce, and asked: "There's been a lot of talk this weekend about family, talk that family is off limits in a campaign. Yet we see your sister with her kids, introducing them, showing them on camera, and she even mentioned you in her speech last night. So the question is, is it okay to use family in a campaign when it benefits the candidate and not okay when it's...

Since the first article on American Thinker warning about the forthcoming types of attacks on Sarah Palin was posted last Friday (Defending Against the First Attacks on Sarah Palin), the assault has come fast and furious from both the media and the Democrats. Perhaps the only surprising thing about it has been, however, the depravity of the attacks.   While the campaign against Governor Palin has been viscious, certainly more so than any I can remember previous, it has managed to expose the soft underbelly of the Democratic Party, including the mainstream media. The Left is, at its heart, a movement...

ABC News' Matthew Jaffe Reports: Some might have expected Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., to come out swinging after Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's scathing speech last night at the Republican convention in St. Paul, Minn. But Thursday morning Biden threw more punches at the "sexist" press than at his vice presidential counterpart. "No one has to wonder about there being a sexist bone in my body," Biden said in an appearance on Good Morning America. "And the truth is, some of the stuff that the press has said about Sarah and that others have said about the governor, I think, are...

I thought Palin's speech was quite good: well-written, well delivered. And, as I said earlier, I think she's a genuinely engaging person, and comes across very well. There were just a couple of problems. One, which I have seen people notice, but which I suspect won't be a big deal for a lot of voters, is that it had very little substance. The other, which the commenters I saw on TV for some reason neglected to mention, was that she told a lot of lies. A few that stood out for me, or that I spotted in my quick run-through...

ABC Radio news just announced Sen. John Edwards will admit to the affair with Rielle Hunter in an interview with the network, but insists the child is not his. We return you to your regularly-scheduled FReeping.

The New York Times' refusal to publish John McCain's rebuttal to Barack Obama's Iraq op-ed may be the most glaring example of liberal media bias this journalist has ever seen. But true proof of widespread media bias requires one to follow an old journalism maxim: Follow the money. Even the Associated Press — no bastion of conservatism — has considered, at least superficially, the media's favoritism for Barack Obama. It's time to revisit media bias. True to form, journalists are defending their bias by saying that one candidate, Obama, is more newsworthy than the other. In other words, there is...

The Media Mob has learned that a team of Hollywood insiders is currently working on a screen adaptation of Truth And Duty: The Press, the President, and the Privilege of Power—the 2005 book by former CBS News producer Mary Mapes, in which she defends the 60 Minutes II story by Dan Rather about President George W. Bush's time in the Texas Air National Guard, which ran on CBS in September 2004 and eventually led to her ouster from the network. Who would want to turn "Rathergate" into a feature-length film? According to sources familiar with the situation, Producer Mikkel Bondesen,...

Almost every day a news report comes out linking something to climate change – obesity, food riots or a century of wildfires. Some of the claims seem especially outlandish. Sometimes they are. On June 18, CBS.com posted a story claiming that global seismic activity on Earth is now five times more energetic than it was just 20 years ago because of global warming. The story had no byline, but was attributed to the Associated Press. The story was identical to a June 17 Market Wire press release attributed to Tom Chalko, the scientist that made the claim of the earthquake/global...

<p>More than six weeks ago, an opposition research staffer for the Democratic National Committee received documents purportedly written by President George W. Bush's Texas Air National Guard squadron commander, the late Col. Jerry Killian.</p> <p>The oppo researcher claimed the source was "a retired military officer." According to a DNC staffer, the documents were seen by both senior staff members at the DNC, as well as the Kerry campaign.</p>

Beijing (AFP) April 14, 2008 Chinese authorities uncovered 31,700 cases of illegal land grabs in four months in a crackdown on one of the major factors behind rising social unrest across the country, state media reported on Monday. The unlawful land grabs were discovered between September 15 last year and January 15, and led to 2,864 people being punished, Xinhua news agency quoted Zhang Pu of the Ministry of Land and Resources as saying. Land illegally seized amounted to 224,000 hectares (553,000 acres) in total, according to Xinhua, nearly 60 percent of which was used before getting government approval. The...

Dan Rather slammed CBS Tuesday for trying to keep his court fight with the network out of the public eye. The newsman - who has filed a $70 million lawsuit against the Tiffany network, where he anchored the "CBS Evening News" for 24 years - said "corporate overlords" are conspiring to withhold several key documents. The 76-year-old was back in Manhattan Supreme Court for a hearing on his suit, which accuses CBS of sidelining him to make nice with the White House following a September 2004 report that questioned President Bush's Vietnam-era military service. Rather left the anchor's chair in...

"...If anyone is still puzzled about the facts, in fact I have never been a Muslim. We had to send CNN to look at the school that I attended in Indonesia where kids were wearing short pants and listening to ipods to indicate that this was not a madrassa but was a secular school in Indonesia..." ~ Barack Obama, 24 February 2008 In a recent episode of Saturday Night Live that featured a parody of a Clinton Obama debate, a faux Campbell Brown chirped "Like nearly everyone in the news media, the three of us are totally in the tank...

LOS ANGELES — Citing an effort to hold down costs, health insurance giant Blue Cross wants doctors in California to report conditions it could use to cancel new patients' medical coverage, it was reported Tuesday. The state's largest for-profit health insurer is sending physicians copies of health insurance applications filled out by new patients, along with a letter advising them that the company has a right to drop members who fail to disclose "material medical history," the Los Angeles Times reported on its Web site.

Politisite has obtained the email exchange between the Clinton camp and MSNBC’s David Shuster who now is on leave due to his remarks about Chelsea Clinton being, “pimped out by the Clinton Camp” because of her calls to super delegates and others. Here are the emails Philippe Reines Press Secretary Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton Nice to hear from you, philippe. It is a fact that chelsea has made calls to superdelegates, as your campaign colleagues have acknowledged. It is also a fact that the campaign has reacted quite harshly to any media who have sought to interview chelsea. That was...

Huckabee came in second to Mitt Romney in the first round of voting, finishing with 33% to Romney's 41%, the AP reported earlier. John McCain, finishing third with 15%, survived to the second round, while Ron Paul finished fourth, at 10%, and was eliminated. Amid rumors of a deal between backers of Huckabee and McCain, Huckabee secured 52% of the delegates in the second round, to Romney's 47%. McCain's goal in throwing support to Huckabee is designed to deprive Romney of a win early in the day.

Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee enjoys the first victory on Super Tuesday for the Republicans as he takes all 18 delegates in the state of West Virginia, winning 52% of the vote, although rumors abound regarding the McCain campaign's possible instruction to their delegates to switch to his side. Mitt Romney finished second with 47% of the vote, followed by McCain at 1%. Rumors are circulating that the McCain campaign instructed their delegates to defect over to Mike Huckabee's side as to avoid a Romney victory. Nationally, McCain is significantly ahead of Huckabee and can afford giving the state's 18...

Wild and wonderful win for Huckabee Posted February 5, 2008 2 :36 PM West Virginia, site of one of the 24 primaries and caucuses in today’s “Super Duper Tuesday” balloting, has given a victory to Republican Mike Huckabee.

The 2008 primary election process has clearly been unfair to conservative candidates, and here's why. Several liberal and moderate/independent states chose to hold their primary elections and caucuses early, all wanting to be first — so they said. But look at what has happened as a result. Conservative candidates like Fred Thompson and Duncan Hunter have been drummed out of the race by breaking their bank accounts in non conservative states before the rest of the country ever had a chance to vote for them. Is this what we call "fair and democratic elections"? These are supposed to be national...

The Nevada Supreme Court's ruling allowing a cable network to exclude Rep. Dennis Kucinich from a Democratic presidential debate was barely a blip on the media radar screen, quickly forgotten in the reporting of the caucus victories by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and former Gov. Mitt Romney and the squabble over voting in casinos. But in the long term, the court decision might prove to be as significant as any of the political events in the Nevada campaign. It constituted the strongest judicial statement yet of news organizations' near-absolute power to control participation in pre-election forums - including the debates...

"...the reason she's a U.S. senator, the reason she's a candidate for president, the reason she may be a front-runner is her husband messed around." -MSNBC Hardball Host, Chris Matthews Chris Matthews is in trouble. His typically clumsy and ill-informed news analysis cut left for once. The socialist progressives are now accusing him of being part of the dreaded vast right wing conspiracy, a terrible insult in their world, and the far left is calling him all sorts of nasty names. The retribution they demand ranges from an apology, which he has already given, to firing, to drawing and quartering....

AUSTIN — Toll road critics were turned down in their request for wide-ranging transportation department documents, but a judge gave them more time to narrow their request as part of a lawsuit against the state. Texans Uniting for Reform and Freedom, led by San Antonio resident Terri Hall, sued the Texas Department of Transportation in September to fight the department's toll road efforts. The group claims the "Keep Texas Moving" promotional campaign violates a ban on state officials using their authority for political purposes. It also wants to stop agency officials from lobbying Congress to allow more tolling. On Thursday,...

If you are the eventual Democratic nominee for President in 2008, who would you like to run against? Answer: A Republican you can beat. Chris Matthews, of MSNBC, recently asked, “Why is the liberal media giving Huckabee a free ride?” Could the answer be as obvious as the liberal media thinks that they have war-gamed this election better than conservatives? Did they look at the Republican field and try to ascertain who would be the weakest “non-fringe” candidate? That most of the mainstream media is going to be in the bag for the Democratic nominee, is beyond question. As that...

Starting in the early days of the Cold War, the CIA began a secret project called Operation Mockingbird, with the intent of buying influence behind the scenes at major media outlets and putting reporters on the CIA payroll, which has proven to be a stunning ongoing success. The CIA effort to recruit American news organizations and journalists to become spies and disseminators of propaganda, was headed up by Frank Wisner, Allen Dulles, Richard Helms and Philip Graham. The CIA had infiltrated the nation's businesses, media, and universities with tens of thousands of on-call operatives by the 1950's. Many Americans still...

Saturday, November 17, 2007 CNN's six "undecided voters" were all Democratic operatives    UPDATES BELOW - CNN hits bottom and digs: All six debate questioners appear to be Democratic Party operatives. So much for "ordinary people, undecided voters". To paraphrase Junior Soprano, CNN is so far up the DNC's hind end, Howard Dean can taste hair gel. In a nutshell, CNN's six "undecided voters" were: A Democratic Party bigwigAn antiwar activistA Union officialAn Islamic leaderA Harry Reid stafferA radical Chicano separatist Wow. This looks "rather" like a scandal. Hot Air: ...You’d think the network’s audience might want to know who...

Hell has frozen over, bears no longer do that thing in the woods, and pigs are flying... ... because folks, John McCain is running against the media. His campaign manager is calling CNN the Clinton News Network. Team McCain is swinging away at Rick Sanchez, who I ought to note, used to host the Sunday night blogger chat segments that I appear on from time to time. I think Sanchez is a pretty good anchor, but I saw the segment last night, and it seemed to be a pretty obvious effort to turn the question to McCain into a YouTube...

Today, Laura Ingraham had George Stephanopolos on for a phone interview. I called Kristinn to advise him to listen and he reminded me that George Stephanopolos was the ultimate "plant", having appeared to be just another caller that got through to The Larry King Shoe during Bush '41's apppearance literally days before the election. In fact, Stephanopolos wasn't just another caller waiting in line like everyone else, Stephanopolos was on an inside phone line for guests, having been arranged by a King producer, despite the claims by King during the show that George got through because "anyone can call". So...

Two Airplanes Collide at Heathrow Airport, London(AP) No details yet.

New Haven Issues 3,200 City ID Cards To Immigrants Cards Designed To Help Illegal Immigrants Gain Access To Community Services (AP) NEW HAVEN, Conn. The city's new identification card program, which has drawn criticism because it is open to illegal immigrants, has been much more of a success than officials expected. New Haven began issuing the ID cards to city residents on July 24, and city leaders estimated that 5,000 of them would be handed out in the first year. But officials say they have already distributed 3,226 cards. The city also has plans to sign up more people by...

As NewsBusters reported Sunday, Newsweek's current issue featured a cover story blasting anthropogenic global warming skeptics as "deniers," and pointing fingers at companies like ExxonMobil as participating in a coordinated misinformation campaign akin to the tobacco industry misleading citizens about the dangers of cigarette smoking. Shortly after this new issue hit the stands, Al Gore told a forum in Singapore, "the deniers offered a bounty of $10,000 for each article disputing the consensus that people could ... get published somewhere." This raises an interesting question: Is this a coordinated attack designed to incite anger in citizens that polls show are...

Associated Press Oil, Gasoline Inventories Fall Associated Press 08.08.07, 10:53 AM ET WASHINGTON - U.S. gasoline supplies fell last week as refiners reduced output, the government said Wednesday. U.S. gasoline stockpiles fell by 1.7 million barrels, or 0.8 percent, to 203 million barrels for the week ending Aug. 3, the Energy Department's Energy Information Administration said in its weekly report. Analysts surveyed by Dow Jones Newswires had expected a 1 million barrel increase in gasoline stocks. Inventories of the motor fuel stood 3.4 percent below year-ago levels, the government said. U.S. refineries ran at 91.3 percent of their total production...

We have complained from time to time about the CNN Airport News Channel that we are forced to endure during waits for flights. Now my conservative cousin from New York informs me of another insidious intrusion CNN is foisting upon an even more captive audience. He writes: As I sit in various medical offices awaiting cancer treatment I am subjected to constant scolding from the CNN Health Channel. Patients many of whom are in great pain and decrepitude hear hour after hour of the channel's host, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, drone on about the dangers of such activities as eating French...

WASHINGTON — Republicans and Democrats were nearing a deal Tuesday on a sweeping immigration overhaul that would give millions of illegal immigrants a chance at legal status but strictly limit future arrivals from staying in the U.S. Senators and White House officials negotiating through the afternoon and into the evening said an elusive compromise was in sight. With details changing rapidly, it was unclear whether the talks would result in a breakthrough or a meltdown. "Eighty-twenty!" said an upbeat Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., one of the key players in the talks, giving strong odds of a deal he said could...

WATCH THE VIDEO AND PASS IT ON TO YOUR FRIENDS There is a reason that CNN has been known as CLINTON NEWS NETWORK. Rick Kaplan made it so. And now, it gets even better. The man in charge of the polling for CNN is a personal friend and big donor of the Clintons. Learn all about Vinod Gupta. He is in the perfect position to skew poll questions to benefit Hillary. BILL'S UGLY BUDDY (PAYMENTS FROM SCANDAL-TIED FIRM) CNN Pollster Vinod Gupta donates $1000 to Hillary Clinton - "She'll be our next President" CLINTON PAL EYEBALLED (InfoUSA CEO Vinod...

Chinese Vessel Suspected of “Hit-and-Run” Attempt MAY 14, 2007 07:45 Sharp criticism is arising over allegations that the crew on the Chinese container ship Jinsheng neglected the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS), after they kept sailing away after colliding with the Korean freighter Golden Rose, leaving 16 lives in need of rescue behind them. “They have irresponsibly broken agreements formed between states by disregarding the seamen crying out for help. The Korean government has to take diplomatic measures to punish this misdeed of the Chinese,” said the families of the missing sailors. Arousing Criticism- Pundits...

SANDLE, REIFF and YOUNG, P.C. 50 E Street, S.E., Suite 300 Washington DC 20003 Telephone: 202.479.XXXX FAX: 202.479.XXXX May 10, 2007 VIA E-Mail Mr. James C Robinson FreeRepublic.com PO Box 9771 Fresno, CA 93794 Re: Statement re Democratic National Committee Dear Mr Robinson: We are writing on behalf of our client, the Democratic National Committee (DNC). A post by “coffee260” on FreeRepublic.com today states that this morning, on the Quinn & Rose show on XM, co-host Quin stated that the DNC chairman, Gov. Howard Dean had called Gov Kathleen Sebelius (D-Kans) “around 5:00am on morning after a tornado destroyed the...

Photos at linkTuesday, May 8, 2007 Now that ABC News has the list of phone numbers given to them by the "Washington Madam," the question is: Whose names will they publicize if they find out that there are public figures whose phone numbers are among those they have? Let us suppose, just for the sake of argument, that these names include Karl Rove and Ted Kennedy. Are both names equally likely to be revealed? And, if only one of these names is revealed, do you have any serious doubt which one the liberal media will reveal? That is the problem...

There was an almost audible sigh of relief in parts of America's capital this weekend after a TV network said it would not reveal the identities of scores of clients of the alleged "DC madam" because they were not well enough known to be "newsworthy".

The war of words between Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly and the left-wing Web site Media Matters for America has heated up, with O’Reilly accusing the site of lying about funding from Bush-bashing financier George Soros. On April 24, O’Reilly told viewers of “The O’Reilly Factor” that Soros and several other wealthy radicals were helping to fund Media Matters — which says it is dedicated to “correcting conservative misinformation” in the U.S. media — by donating money to a foundation that in turn contributed to the Web site. Media Matters countered that while Soros’ Open Society Institute (OSI) did contribute to...

Last week, Rahm Emanuel, the chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, spoke to the Brookings Institution about corruption in government, using most of his 3,600-plus-word speech to harp on the so-called Republican “culture of corruption,” while implying Democrats hold the moral high ground on ethics. After the Democrats won the majority last November, they promised to usher in two things: 1) an ambitious reform agenda of their own and 2) a new era of bipartisanship. Emanuel’s speech signals his party’s abandonment of both promises. In the 2006 elections, the Democrats won their majority largely due to their campaign against the...

Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) is involved in a scandal that so far the media has completely ignored. David Keene Reports The problems stem from her subcommittee activities from 2001 to late 2005, when she quit. During that period the public record suggests she knowingly took part in decisions that eventually put millions of dollars into her husband’s pocket — the classic conflict of interest that exploited her position and power to channel money to her husband’s companies.

ABC News apparently sees its role not merely as reporting the news, but acting as advocates on a highly-charged political issue being promoted by a left-wing Democratic presidential candidate. Check out the graphic from this morning's Good Morning America: "GMA Gets It Done: Taking on Medicaid. Fighting to Treat Tooth Decay." The screencap shows a palpably emotional GMA co-host Chris Cuomo literally pointing his finger at the head of the federal Medicaid program. The moment came during the course of a segment this morning recounting the sad case of 12-year old Deamonte Driver, who died after infection from an abcessed...