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My father, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, has been in politics as long as I can remember. And as long as I can remember, media coverage about him has contained misstatements of facts. The vast majority are simple mistakes that are easily corrected, understood and rewoven into an ongoing storyline. But one of them seems to have taken on a life of its own, and simple corrections have not sufficed to set the record straight. Why does this happen? I can't be sure, but I suspect that the narrative created by these untruths proves to be so much...

The birthers have a plan to end Barack Obama's presidency—and in Arizona, they're making progress.

"This tragedy was ready-made for her to take a step, even just inches, beyond her base," David Corn said on MSNBC's "Hardball."

In a recent column, David Corn bemoans what his friend Jonathan Alter refers to as the "Obama Hate Machine (OHM)." Corn concludes, "That's an appropriate name for the right-wing attack network that will throw any charge it can concoct -- regardless of the facts -- at the president." This from the man who, in 2004, penned The Lies of George W. Bush, where, in the introduction, he declares, "George W. Bush is a liar. He has lied large and small, directly and by omission. He has mugged the truth-not merely in honest error, but deliberately, consistently, and repeatedly." According to...

<p>NewsletterShare Close this Share Box154 Comments | Post Comment.Wed Dec. 1, 2010 2:47 PM PST In its first months in office, the Obama administration sought to protect Bush administration officials facing criminal investigation overseas for their involvement in establishing policies the that governed interrogations of detained terrorist suspects. A "confidential" April 17, 2009, cable sent from the US embassy in Madrid to the State Department—one of the 251,287 cables obtained by WikiLeaks—details how the Obama administration, working with Republicans, leaned on Spain to derail this potential prosecution.</p>

Okay, where are all the UFO pictures? And the UFO videos? In recent years, the world has exploded with photographic and video equipment. There are about 5 billion cellphones in circulation throughout the world -- many, if not most, equipped with still and/or video cameras. (The number of mobile broadband subscriptions will probably top a billion globally this year.) And there are millions, if not billions, of easy-to-use video cameras in circulation, as well as billions of still-picture cameras. Essentially, billions of people are able to snap or otherwise shoot the least bit interesting thing that happens at a moment's...

Sarah Palin can't expect anyone to take her seriously as a presidential candidate--not after what she said this week. In recent days, the former Alaska governor and Tea Party fave has been on a tear against Journolist, a listserv for nearly 500 journalists, policy wonks, and academics, most of whom are self-identified liberals working for self-identified liberal outfits. The participants on this off-the-record email chain promoted their work, debated politics and policy (occasionally quite sharply), and traded and tested ideas for articles and columns. Last month, The Daily Caller, a conservative website, began running articles based on Journolist archives it...

The BP oil spill - millions of gallons of oil leaked into the Gulf of Mexico, coastal businesses from Houston to Tampa shuttered, the potential for higher energy costs across the country and untold ecological damage. But according to Mother Jones magazine's David Corn, there is a silver-lining in all of this - that is, if you're a Democrat. MSNBC's June 21 "Countdown with Keith Olbermann" deviated from its usual efforts to blame the previous administration for the oil spill and instead gave thanks that the spill led to Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, apologizing to BP CEO Tony Hayward in...

There's a hole in the bottom of the ocean. Unemployment is still near 10 percent. There are two wars underway. And what are conservative pundits fretting about? That this year President Obama won't be laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day. The liberal watchdog outfit, Media Matters, has been keeping track of this latest right-wing meme: - Glenn Beck says, "Obama is skipping out on a Memorial Day ceremony at Arlington Cemetery because he'll be in Chicago on vacation. I'm sorry, I don't ever, ever question the president's vacation. I...

So what the hell do these conservatives want out of Obama? And does it matter if Obama throws some leaves on a tomb? --David Corn ............................... Memorial Day. Those of us old enough to remember might recall a parent or grandparent who referred to it as “Decoration Day.” We might recall as well that “Memorial Day,” was not on the last Monday in May, serving as an endcap for a three day weekend of sales and vacations, but instead was observed on May 30, no matter what day of the week that was. It started shortly after the Civil War...

At the Copenhagen summit, there isn't a negotiating process to reach a climate pact. There are two. In 1992, at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, representatives from more than 150 nations—signed an agreement giving birth to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. [It] began holding sessions called the Conference of the Parties—COPs. What's happening in Copenhagen is the 15th such session, hence the nickname COP15. In 1997, COP3 established the Kyoto Protocol, a treaty that set binding targets for greenhouse gas emissions for 37 industrialized countries (cutting emissions 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2012). At...

For years I have refrained from writing about 9/11 conspiracy theory. But Van Jones' resignation as top green jobs adviser in the Obama administration has compelled me to pick up this battering ram once again. In my PoliticsDaily.com column, I've (partly) blamed 9/11 conspiracy theorists for the downfall of Jones. Not that he's not accountable for his own behavior, but the perpetuators of the 9/11 nonsense launched a virus in left circles, and Jones was not savvy enough to keep clear of it. As I huffed: As far as I can tell, the only thing the so-called 9/11 Truth movement...

Lefty drive-by David Corn was expecting the worst when John Coale informed him at a pre-WHCD soiree Saturday that Todd Palin wanted to meet him. The Washington Post reported that Corn said: "I was worried he was going to punch me in the face."According to Mother Jones, of which Corn is Washington bureau chief: "Please don't hit me," Corn joked as he shook hands with the champion snowmobiler and all around bad-ass-looking guy.But there was no need for Corn's guilt trip. Alaska's First Gentleman demonstrated that he is indeed a gentleman, one who out-classes the liberati scribe who had dissed...

Weeks ago, I obsessed on a political point: would President Barack Obama mobilize his millions of voters to apply political pressure on Washington to pass his policy initiatives. At that time, the stimulus package was the top item on his agenda, and the White House was not doing much to activate the Obama millions to boost support for the legislation in Congress. As the stimulus fight proceeded, Organizing for America, the spin-off of the Obama presidential campaign, did zap out an email to its list of 13 million and asked those supporters to hold house parties to discuss the recovery...

David Corn seems to have had an allergic reaction to Gov. Sarah Palin's op-ed in favor of opening up a small portion of ANWR for drilling. Corn opines: This was his (sic) first stab at being a serious policy person since her unsuccessful vice-presidential bid. And it was swing and a big miss--for multiple reasons.The first "reason" Corn gives is that the governor's opinion piece was published, not by a newspaper from New York or D.C., but the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. To liberal elitists of Corn's ilk, nothing worthwhile can come from flyover country. He must believe that the issue and...

The more things change, the more they stay . . . well, you know. And looking at President-elect Barack Obama's top appointments, it's easy to wonder whether convention has triumphed over change -- and centrists over progressives. A quick run-down: Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who supported the Iraq war until she initiated her presidential bid, has been handed the Cabinet's big plum: secretary of state. And Bush's second defense secretary, Robert Gates, will become Obama's first defense secretary. The Obama foreign policy adviser regarded as the most liberal in his inner circle, Susan E. Rice, has been picked for the...

The Obama transition office announced on Wednesday that the president-elect will send two representatives to meet with delegates attending the G-20 economic summit being held this weekend: former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, a Democrat, and former Congressman Jim Leach, a Republican. The pair, according to a press release, will hold "unofficial meetings to seek input from visiting delegations on behalf of the President-elect and Vice President-elect." Afterward, Albright and Leach will brief Barack Obama and Joe Biden. Leach is both a curious and obvious choice. First, the obvious: he's a Republican who led the Republicans for Obama effort during...

Washington Dispatch: The Iraq general's testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee was predictable: progress is real, we must stay the course. But committee Democrats missed an opportunity to undercut the White House story. By David Corn April 8, 2008 As General David Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday and pitched a story of success in Iraq, a news update flashed on the television screen: Sadr threatens to end cease-fire. Meaning that civil war between the Shiite-dominated government of Baghdad and the Shiite movement led by cleric Moqtada al-Sadr could...

Now that he has his moment in the political spotlight, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee does not want his days at the pulpit to be scrutinized. As Huckabee has surged to the front of the Republican pack in Iowa, his religious views have drawn media and voter attention. After all, Huckabee, a former Baptist pastor, has been campaigning as a "Christian leader." But he has vacillated on how far to interject faith into politics. At an early debate, he indicated he does not believe in evolution, but at a more recent debate, when he was asked by Wolf Blitzer if...

"Why did this hearing, er, er, er..." I was approaching an aide to a Democratic member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which had minutes earlier completed a three-hour session with Attorney General John Ashcroft, and I was trying to ask a question politely. "Suck?" the aide said. I nodded. There was no denying it. This much-ballyhooed face-off between Ashcroft and Senate Democrats was more fizzle than sizzle. The Democrats had called Ashcroft before the committee to discuss the civil liberties implications of various Bush antiterrorism initiatives, most notably military tribunals for suspected terrorists who are not US citizens, the ...

What Valerie Plame Really Did at the CIA (excerpt)Her specific position at the CIA is revealed for the first time in a new book, Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War, by the author of this article and Newsweek's Michael Isikoff. The book chronicles the inside battles within the CIA, the White House, the State Department and Congress during the run-up to the war. Its account of Wilson's CIA career is mainly based on interviews with confidential CIA sources. The Novak column triggered a scandal and a criminal investigation. At issue was whether...

Plamegate: 25 Lingering QuestionsBy Fedora (The first four questions and answers below were previously posted as Was Plame Covert? A Review of Isikoff and Corn's Hubris.) I recently finished reviewing Michael Isikoff and David Corn’s Hubris (New York: Crown Publishers, 2006) to see what it adds to the current state of knowledge in the Plamegate investigation. Here I will present my findings in the form of a list of questions and answers focusing on loose ends and other points of interest in the case. I will list the questions first so that individual readers may more easily scroll down to...

David Corn of "The Nation" was just on Fox, scolding viewers for trying to enjoy the holidays while we are at war in Iraq. Picking-up on the New York Times' latest rant, Corn glared into the camera and grimly reiterated the message from "Putz" Sulzberger and his staff of leftist trust babies: 'How dare you shop and enjoy the holidays while we are involved in a war of which we at the Times personally disapprove?' LOL! And "Don't Tread on Me!"

John Aravosis is yapping up a storm, and letting out details he doesn’t quite comprehend are (a) not common knowledge and (b) implicate him as working to orchestrate Foleygate in the media. It is important to note all the activity in July of 2006 regarding the non-salacious emails between Foley and a Page from Louisianna (aka, the LA Page). I have done numerous posts on these emails (the last one here with back referencing links). Reader TopSecretK9 as reminded me of this Aravosis comment when he admitted in October that he had the Foley Emails in July and mentioned he...

The publication of Hubris is filled with irony for David Corn, Washington editor of the left-wing Nation magazine. He was present at the creation of the Valerie Plame "scandal," which the enemies of George W. Bush hoped could bring down a president. Nobody was more responsible for bloating this episode. Yet Corn is coauthor of a book that has had the effect of killing the story. Thanks to Corn's intrepid coauthor, Newsweek investigative reporter Michael Isikoff, Hubris definitively revealed then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage as my source that Joseph Wilson's wife, Valerie, worked for the CIA and suggested her...

From a List to a GOP Civil War? Copies of The List (see below) have been sent by gay politicos to a variety of social conservative groups that look to the Republican Party to make their religious right dreams come true. The recipients include the Christian Coalition, Focus on the Family, the Family Research Council, the Alliance for Marriage, Concerned Women of America, the Eagle Forum, and the Southern Baptist Convention. Officials at most of these groups have had something to say about homosexuality and gay rights in the wake of the Mark Foley scandal. What's the point? The senders--gay...

Was Plame Covert? A Review of Isikoff and Corn's HubrisBy Fedora I recently finished reviewing Michael Isikoff and David Corn’s Hubris (New York: Crown Publishers, 2006) to see what it adds to the current state of knowledge in the Plamegate investigation. Here I will present my findings in the form of a list of questions and answers: 1. What did Valerie Wilson aka Valerie Plame do at CIA?According to Isikoff and Corn (12-13, 283-286), after Plame graduated from the CIA’s training program, she began working with the CIA Directorate of Operations’ European Division in the Cyrus/Greece/Turkey area in the late...

September 28, 2006This Is What Waterboarding Looks Like As Congress has debated legislation that would set up military tribunals and govern the questioning of suspected terrorists (whom the Bush administration would like to be able to detain indefinitely), at issue has been what interrogation techniques can be employed and whether information obtained during torture can be used against those deemed unlawful enemy combatants. One interrogation practice central to this debate is waterboarding. It's usually described in the media in a matter-of-fact manner. The Washington Post simply referred to waterboarding a few days ago as an interrogation measure that "simulates drowning."...

There’s also this to add to Victoria Toensing’s persuasive response to David Corn’s tortured logic: Corn does indeed begin his now notorious piece with a question: Did senior Bush officials blow the cover of a US intelligence officer working covertly in a field of vital importance to national security—and break the law—in order to strike at a Bush administration critic and intimidate others? It sure looks that way … But he doesn’t end the piece with a question. He ends it with an accusaiton and a slander:: The Wilson smear was a thuggish act. Bush and his crew abused and...

"When Richard Armitage finally acknowledged last week he was my source three years ago in revealing Valerie Plame Wilson as a CIA employee, the former deputy secretary of state's interviews obscured what he really did," Bob Novak claims in a column set for Thursday release. Novak, attempting to set the reocrd straight writes: "First, Armitage did not, as he now indicates, merely pass on something he had heard and that he 'thought' might be so. Rather, he identified to me the CIA division where Mrs. Wilson worked, and said flatly that she recommended the mission to Niger by her husband,...

In the spring of 2002 Dick Cheney made one of his periodic trips to CIA headquarters. Officers and analysts were summoned to brief him on Iraq. Paramilitary specialists updated the Vice President on an extensive covert action program in motion that was designed to pave the way to a US invasion. Cheney questioned analysts about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. How could they be used against US troops? Which Iraqi units had chemical and biological weapons? He was not seeking information on whether Saddam posed a threat because he possessed such weapons. His queries, according to a CIA officer...

On July 14, 2003, a Robert Novak column in The Washington Post outed the CIA-agent wife of vociferous Bush administration critic, Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson. Thus was born the "Plame Affair" which quickly became a morality tale of how an out of control Bush Administration would do anything to justify its war in Iraq. A mere three days later, journalist David Corn, summarized the allegations that would color reporting on the Iraq War for the next three years and eventually lead to the indictment of a top aide to the vice president for lying to a grand jury: ((((THE OLD...

August 29, 2006, 8:24 a.m. Rove and Libby: Hubris Authors Never Contacted UsThe CIA-leak investigation book -- without two key figures By Byron York Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War, the new book by the Nation’s David Corn and Newsweek’s Michael Isikoff, is the most in-depth single account yet of the CIA-leak investigation. But representatives of two central figures in the case, former Cheney chief of staff Lewis Libby and top White House aide Karl Rove, say the authors never got in touch with them, much less interviewed them, for the...

Sept. 4, 2006 issue - In the early morning of Oct. 1, 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell received an urgent phone call from his No. 2 at the State Department. Richard Armitage was clearly agitated. As recounted in a new book, "Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War," Novak ...wrote, was a "senior administration official" who was "not a partisan gunslinger." Armitage was shaken. After reading the column, he knew immediately who the leaker was. On the phone with Powell that morning, Armitage was "in deep distress," says a source directly familiar...

Doesn't the Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee read? In a Washington Post article by Walter Pincus in Friday's edition, Representative Peter Hoekstra (news, bio, voting record), who has succeeded in pushing the Bush administration to start releasing some of the 2 million documents captured in Iraq, said,“Whether Saddam Hussein destroyed Iraq's weapons of mass destruction or hid or transferred them, the most important thing is that we discover the truth of what was happening in the country prior to the war.”Conservatives and war-backers have been howling for the release of all these documents because they believe--or hope--that they...

This weekend some interesting developments appeared to rip some holes in the Wilson Gambit and further erode Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald’s credibility. David Corn of The Nation magazine and VIPS (Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity) have pushed nonsensical claims that Valerie Plame was a nonofficial cover agent (NOC), supplying the necessary predicate for an Agee Act (Intelligence Identity Protection Act) prosecution. While I could find scant reporting in the pre-indictment period poking holes in this ridiculous notion, Saturday’s Chicago Tribune carried five stories doing just that. In two of the most significant articles, the paper showed how easy it was...

NEW YORK A media Web site scheduled to debut Wednesday will seek to blend traditional journalism with the freeform commentary developed through the emerging Web format known as blogs. Some 70 Web journalists, including Instapundit's Glenn Reynolds and David Corn, Washington editor of the Nation magazine, have agreed to participate in OSM _ short for Open Source Media. OSM will link to individual blog postings and highlight the best contributions, chosen by OSM editors, in a special section. Bloggers will be paid undisclosed sums based on traffic they generate. The ad-supported OSM site will also carry news feeds from Newstex,...

Did Joseph Wilson expose his own wife as a CIA employee months before columnist Robert Novak published that information? Fox News military analyst and retired Major General Paul E. Vallely is being threatened with a lawsuit for saying that the answer is yes, and that he was there when Wilson confirmed her CIA status. What's more, Vallely tells Accuracy in Media that he is prepared if necessary to go to court to prove it. He may have to. Wilson's attorney, Christopher Wolf, categorically rejects Vallely's claim. He tells AIM, "It never happened I can assure you that. Vallely is making...

Now that George Will, William Kristol, David Frum, Linda Chavez, Charles Krauthammer, Edwin Meese, Robert Bork and all the other conservative power brokers have forced George W. Bush to fall to his knees and kiss their feet--by nominating Federal Appeals Court Judge Samuel Alito to replace Harriet "I Love W" Miers to replace Sandra Day O'Connor on the US Supreme Court--there is no escape for the Senate Democrats. They have only one strategic option: Make the battle over Alito a political fight about substance. ... If the Alito nomination becomes the titanic battle that both sides in the judicial wars...

If a senior White House official leaks classified information that identifies an undercover CIA officer to reporters in order to undermine a critic of the administration, he is not entitled to lie about it to FBI agents and a grand jury charged with the task of determining if such a leak violated the law. That was special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald's message, as he held a dramatic press conference at the Justice Department to explain the five-count indictment his grand jury issued against I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney. "This is a very serious matter,"...

Call-In Political News Review C-SPAN, Washington Journal York, Byron, Correspondent, [National Review], White House Corn, David, Editor, [Nation, The], Washington, DC Journalists talk about the previous week’s major news stories including the White House leak investigation, withdrawal of Supreme Court Nominee Miers, and events in Iraq.

With each passing day, the manufactured "scandal" over the publication of Valerie Plame's relationship with the CIA establishes new depths of mainstream-media hypocrisy. A highly capable special prosecutor is probing the underlying facts, and it is appropriate to withhold legal judgments until he completes the investigation over which speculation runs so rampant. But it is not too early to assess the performance of the press. It's been appalling. Is that hyperbole? You be the judge. Have you heard that the CIA is actually the source responsible for exposing Plame's covert status? Not Karl Rove, not Bob Novak, not the sinister...

Here we go again. Another pick for the Supreme Court without much--or, in this case, any--judicial experience. And that will make it hard for senators--or anyone else--to assess what sort of Justice Harriet Miers, currently George W. Bush's White House counsel, will be if the Senate confirms her as Bush's pick to replace the retiring Sandra Day O'Connor. In announcing his selection of Miers, Bush said, "I believe that senators of both parties will find that Harriet Miers's talent, experience and judicial philosophy make her a superb choice." But what precisely is her "judicial philosophy"? And how can it be...

This is an article by the avowed socialist editor for The Nation, David Corn. In it Corn points out the background of the organizers of today's ANSWER rally on the Mall in Washington, DC. Those speaking at the demonstration today are much the same speakers who are always appear at these ANSWER rallies. Apart from newly arrived star, Cindy Sheehan and her pals, felony ex-con racist Moslem, Malik Rahim, the rapidly anti-Semitic Hadi Jawad, and the convicted terrorist abettor Lynne Stewart -- this is the same roster as has appeared at every other prior ANSWER rally. Such as at Bush's...

Last week, the Justice Department issued a new indictment of Lawrence Franklin, the Pentagon official accused of passing secrets to officials of AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobbying outfit. The indictment is bad news for the Bush White House and Karl Rove. That's not only because the Franklin case is embarrassing for the administration, the Pentagon, and their neocon allies. (Franklin worked with Douglas Feith, who until recently was a senior Pentagon official close to the neocons.) The Franklin indictment is a sign that Rove and any other White House aide involved in the Plame/CIA leak might be vulnerable to prosecution under...

AS THE SEEMINGLY ENDLESS SPIDERWEB OF LIES SPUN BY former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV unravels, the media has gone out of its way to question the credibility of…Karl Rove. Despite Rove’s demonstrable non-leak of Valerie Plame’s non-secret identity, the dogs continue to gather, hungry for a second term scandal, while the Wilsons’ blatant self-promotion erodes whatever basis they had for a story in the first place. Perhaps Joe Wilson’s two biggest whoppers were his claim to have spoken out because of his deep, non-partisan commitment to “truth,” and his inconsolable remorse that his wife’s closely guarded anonymity had become...

AS THE SEEMINGLY ENDLESS SPIDERWEB OF LIES SPUN BY former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV unravels, the media has gone out of its way to question the credibility of…Karl Rove. Despite Rove’s demonstrable non-leak of Valerie Plame’s non-secret identity, the dogs continue to gather, hungry for a second term scandal, while the Wilsons’ blatant self-promotion erodes whatever basis they had for a story in the first place. Perhaps Joe Wilson’s two biggest whoppers were his claim to have spoken out because of his deep, non-partisan commitment to “truth,” and his inconsolable remorse that his wife’s closely guarded anonymity had become...

WASHINGTON - Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., revealed Friday that two years ago he discussed the blown cover of CIA operative Valerie Plame with then CIA director George Tenet and that Tenet "was furious." Tenet promptly called the Justice Department to demand an investigation into who in the Bush administration leaked Plame's identity to columnist Robert Novak, Schumer said at a hearing held by House and Senate Democrats. Novak revealed Plame's identity in July 2003 in a column in which he said she played a key role in having her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, sent to Niger to investigate...

Two years ago, after reading a Bob Novak column, I called former Ambassador Joseph Wilson and asked, half-jokingly, "Why didn't you tell me your wife was in the CIA?" In a somber voice, Wilson said, "I can't tell you that now." When I first read that Novak column outing Valerie Wilson (a k a Valerie Plame) as a CIA officer and citing "two senior administration officials," I didn't immediately comprehend the leak's seriousness. But as I spoke with Wilson, I could see the potential harm. And I realized the leak was no accident. At the time, the White House and...

I am thinking about writing a letter to my local fish wrap because editor was crying about the Rove nonsense and the fact that Judith Miller was a hero to all for standing up for the press and their "First Amendment Rights" and protection of confidential sources. The jest of my letter is going to focus on why we shouldn't feel sorry for Ms. Miller and the rest of the press because they (the liberal press) are the first ones to applaud when the First Amendment protections to free speech during federal elections was attacked (McCain/Feingold) and when a court...