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HUFFPOCO: Bob Cesca: The Barbeque Media Wants Senator Obama To Win? That's Rich.

Posted July 24, 2008 | 05:25 PM (EST)

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As we have observed throughout the last several years, the notion of fairness in journalism has been guided by a miscalculated rule that in order to report good news about a liberal or a liberal success, news reporting has to be counterbalanced either with unearned praise for conservatives or trumped up and parroted negative news about the aforementioned liberal or liberal success. Oh, and the reverse doesn't apply. That's the rule.

And so now that Senator Obama's Berlin address is in the can, get ready for the backlash from the very serious corporate media. Get ready for profuse around-the-clock praise of Senator McCain and/or unfair, invented criticism of Senator Obama. Because reporting the news, however accurate, about Senator Obama's successful trip to the Middle East and Europe isn't news. It's obviously biased reporting against the McCain campaign.

That's all we've heard from the McBush Republicans this week: griping about the press coverage of Senator Obama's trip, as if such an epic event isn't newsworthy. Although I'm sure the McBush camp would've been thrilled about such wall-to-wall coverage if Reverend Wright had been spazzing out on the wing of the Obama campaign jet, ripping it to shreds Twilight Zone style -- Rezko and Ayers running around in turbans spray-painting "clinging to guns" on the side of General Petraeus' helicopter.

And it appears as if the McCain campaign's Gripe Surge is working:

HANNITY: Scott Rasmussen has a poll, 49 percent of Americans think the media is trying to help Barack Obama win. Only 14 percent think they're trying to help you win.

MCCAIN: The American people are very wise.

When the press aired the Wright videos around the clock for approximately six weeks while continuing to refer to Senator Obama as "Osama bin Laden," they've clearly been employing some kind of magic or trickery -- some kind of scary reverse psychology. You know, to help Senator Obama. Thankfully the American people were "wise" to it.

The McCain campaign even turned their griping into a web video this week to prove that the corporate media loves Senator Obama more than they love Senator McCain. Setting aside the idea of a web video from the campaign of a man who is just now learning how to "get online," it's staggeringly desperate and ridiculous of them to produce such a thing. Reason the first: because the content of the video, apart from Chris Matthews "leg thrill" remark, is mostly just reporters saying things like, Is the media in love with Obama? which, of course, doesn't prove a damn thing one way or the other. And, reason the second: because this other web video exists:

But several days of crotchety griping from both far-right talk radio and the McCain campaign has begun to show results. Here's how.

On Tuesday's edition of Morning Joe, Mika Brzeznski, Andrea Mitchell and Very Serious Mark Halperin (who publicly encouraged Senator McCain to convince people that Senator Obama is a terrorist) agreed that after three days of reporting the actual news that Senator Obama's overseas visit was successful, they should deliberately attempt to "trip him up" -- to "hold him accountable." Oh yeah? For what? We're gonna hold him accountable for not screwing the pooch on this trip -- the rat bastard! We're very serious! Barack's a Muslim terrorist [Halperin only]!

Then CBS News, showing its obvious penchant for wanting Senator Obama to win, edited out Senator McCain's laughable error with regards to the Anbar Awakening -- another in an on-going syllabus of McCain ignorance, which further proves that he's really not the Mighty Old Man of Awesome Foreign Policy Experience and Balls. Suggesting that there's such a thing as an Iraq/Pakistan border in a Today Show interview on Monday didn't help either.

But as the rule goes, the only way the corporate press (Olbermann, Maddow and the like excluded) can make a beef about these things would be to find a similar gaffe or mistake by Senator Obama and report on that first. And since nothing recent exists... Pass! Next!

And today, the word of the day in the corporate press is... presumptuous. Used in a sentence: Senator Obama is being presumptuous during his trip -- acting all presidential and dignified. How dare he be presidential while running for, you know, president. Presumptuous. During the live CNN web feed of the Berlin address, an anchor used it to describe the event. Joe Klein used it in a blog post today. Of course Joe attributed it to racist voters rather than very serious reporters -- racist because it's presumably a synonym for 'uppity' and we can't accuse the press of such awfulness. And Candy Crowley used it in her post-address analysis on CNN. That's a lot of coincidences. "Presumptuous" must really be a popular word. Odd that it's being used so often by people who want Senator Obama to win.

AP: "In a speech that risked being seen as presumptuous..."

TIME Magazine: "capable to become the Commander in Chief of a superpower -- without seeming presumptuous..."

The National Journal: "He is well aware voters here at home might see that as presumptuous..."

Washington Post: "Whether by the end of this week he will be seen as presumptuous or overly cocky..."

Chicago Tribune: "That means walking the fine line between looking presidential and appearing arrogant and presumptuous..."

Boston Globe: "plus the growing sense in some quarters that the presumptive Democratic nominee is getting a little presumptuous..."

Can you feel the wanting-Obama-to-win love radiating off your computer screen? No?

The reality is that positive coverage of any Democrat is limited and temporary for fear of networks and newspapers either being accused of liberal bias or being tossed out of the very serious barbeque loop. Regardless of whether the Democrat, in this case Senator Obama, is having a good day, it's somehow unethical to report on such good news for too long without deliberately concocting an antidote to appease the far-right. So rather than standing up as the only industry explicitly named in the Constitution and defending the very basic idea of journalistic integrity, the corporate media is all too quick to capitulate to these specious Republican attacks -- that is, when they're not tossing their ethics aside and taking bribes in the form of barbeque and McBusch beer from a candidate whom they're supposed to be covering objectively.

Bob Cesca's Goddamn Awesome Blog! Go!

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HuffPoCo: Eric Alterman: Suprised to be Surprised

This year I promised myself not to be surprised by how awful our election coverage is, no matter how awful it is. How awful is it?

Well, this WSJ op-ed is one of the funniest things I've read in a long time. Richard V. Allen, who was forced out of the Reagan administration for alleged incompetence and corruption, complains that Barack Obama is insufficiently experienced in foreign policy to be president. This is a stupid argument in the first place, but just out of curiosity, how does Allen deal with Bush's level of experience? Here it is: "George W. Bush, of course, had virtually no international experience, yet was able to rally the nation in response to 9/11."

Gee, that was tough. Kermit the Frog could have rallied the nation in response to 9/11, and I'm betting he would done a hell of a better job than Bush, (who, by the way, evidence indicates, appears to have experienced a kind of emotional breakdown in the wake of the attack and had to be kept hidden from public view).

Shame on Stanford University's Hoover Institution for giving this joker an office.

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To read the rest of today's Altercation, click here.

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Here's the Wall Street Op piece.

Obama's Experience Doesn't Match Up

By RICHARD V. ALLEN
July 24, 2008; Page A15

Heading off on his week-long, high-profile tour of seven countries, Barack Obama defined the first part of the trip's purpose by telling reporters, "I want to, obviously, talk to the commanders and get a sense, both in Afghanistan and in Baghdad of . . . what . . . their biggest concerns are."

While the Iraqi effort is almost exclusively American now, Afghanistan is a NATO mission. Sen. Obama, chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on European and NATO affairs, had never visited Afghanistan, and has not bothered to hold a hearing of the subcommittee covering the countries for which it bears legislative oversight responsibility.

AP

Sen. Barack Obama and Gen. David Petraeus at Baghdad International Airport, July 21.

How does Mr. Obama's foreign policy résumé compare with the preparation of past presidential candidates?

Richard Nixon gathered vast international experience in extensive travels as vice president under Dwight D. Eisenhower. Following his 1960 loss to John F. Kennedy, Nixon made long trips to virtually every corner of the globe, quietly meeting with leaders and others from many walks of life. In October 1967 he published an article in the quarterly Foreign Affairs, "Asia after Vietnam," sketching the broad outlines of a plan for Asia policy following the termination of hostilities in Vietnam. It included a broad hint of what later blossomed as his stunning 1971 "opening" to China.

Lyndon Johnson traveled far and wide in his years in the Senate and as majority leader. He was a strong proponent of a bipartisan foreign and national security policy. Along with extraordinary congressional Democrats like Sens. Henry M. "Scoop" Jackson (Wash.), Richard B. Russell (Ga.) and John Sparkman (Ala.), and Reps. Sam Rayburn (Texas), Clement Zablocki (Wis.) and Dante Fascell (Fla.), Johnson's support for many Eisenhower policies helped forge a bipartisan national consensus on critical issues.

Gerald Ford spent a quarter century in the House of Representatives, always in the minority. He too gained solid experience in his travels around the globe. He gained practical experience in the appropriations process, foreign affairs and defense.

Jimmy Carter assumed the presidency at a tumultuous moment in American political history, but with no significant foreign experience. Despite brokering an Egyptian-Israeli accord, the enduring Middle East crisis shows that even one major step doesn't lead to lasting peace. Mr. Carter badly misjudged Soviet intentions and capabilities, standing helplessly by as Soviet invaders crushed Afghanistan in 1979 and the U.S. ambassador was assassinated in Kabul. In November 1979, 52 U.S. diplomats were seized in Iran and held captive for 444 days.

In April 1980, Mr. Carter approved a disastrous, failed plan to rescue the hostages in Iran. It resulted in 12 American casualties and the resignation of his secretary of state, Cyrus Vance.

Ronald Reagan's response to the rescue attempt was moderate. For example, during that summer in the midst of campaigning, Reagan learned of another planned rescue attempt. He immediately sent an adviser to the White House to inform a top Carter aide that if the second attempt failed, he, Reagan, would not criticize the administration for trying.

Reagan never served in Congress. But while he was governor of California, President Nixon sent him on a special diplomatic mission in 1971 to confer with Taiwanese leaders upon Nixon's decision to support the People's Republic of China replacing Taiwan in the United Nations. Despite personal misgivings, Reagan carried out the mission.

One of Reagan's most important advantages by 1980 was the widespread notion that he was but "a B-grade movie actor" -- entirely scripted. In fact, he was a voracious reader, researcher and writer, and over the span of his career had publicly addressed practically every foreign and domestic public policy issue a president would confront.

Reagan's preparation prior to 1980 was methodical: There were 1978 trips to Japan and Taiwan, where he met quietly with leaders and others at length, to Iran and a meeting with the shah, and later that year to England, France and Germany. In Berlin, he stood by the Wall and declared to his companions, "We have to find a way to knock this thing down." Only as president nine years later would he venture to deliver a major speech at the Wall, accompanied by the Chancellor Helmut Kohl.

Reagan's successor, George H.W. Bush, had experience in Congress, then as U.N. ambassador, U.S. representative in Beijing and director of Central Intelligence. In August 1980, during a campaign lull, Reagan sent Mr. Bush on a high-risk, private mission to Beijing, where he met with Deng Xiaoping to clarify what Reagan's China policy as president would be.

Bill Clinton had studied at Oxford and traveled widely. As governor of Arkansas he made overseas trips and met with foreign businessmen and leaders. George W. Bush, of course, had virtually no international experience, yet was able to rally the nation in response to 9/11.

John McCain has "hands-on" military, foreign policy and national security experience, starting in 1954 as a midshipman at Annapolis, seven years before Barack Obama was born. He has been in Congress since 1982.

So, when we hear about Barack Obama's extensive "experience" in foreign affairs, most of which will be recently acquired in a mere week of travel amid media fanfare, it should be judged in the context of the experience quotients of his predecessor candidates for the presidency.

Perhaps Mr. Obama will now decide to hold the very first hearing of his Senate subcommittee; after all, there would be extensive media coverage.

Mr. Allen, a senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, was Richard Nixon's foreign policy coordinator in 1968, Ronald Reagan's chief foreign policy adviser from 1977 to 1980, and Reagan's first national security adviser from 1981 to 1982.

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What was the WSJ thinking?

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Jon Stewart Explains The Difference Between Osama And Obama To Media: "Obama Has Only One Radical Muslim Wife" (VIDEO)

Jumping off a series of clips of pundits and TV hosts mixing up the names Barack Obama and Osama bin Laden, Jon Stewart laid out the differences between the president candidate and the terrorist leader on Wednesday night's "The Daily Show."

"Now, this is all Barack Obama's fault, obviously, for having a really ridiculous name," Stewart joked, before running a pictorial comparing the physical differences between the two.

"Here's some more," Stewart continued. "Barack Obama has only one radical Muslim wife. Between Obama and Osama, the Bush administration is putting massive resources into trying to defeat one of them [Obama]. And one of them was recently the subject of a scathing New Yorker cover [see below]. Ooh, they made Osama seem elitist!"

Watch:
Video no longer available ...

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Jon Stewart Jokes About Bob Novak's Hit-And-Run: "That's The Novak I Know And Despise!"

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Wednesday night on "The Daily Show," Jon Stewart took some time to joke about Bob Novak's hit-and-run from earlier in the day

(where he struck a pedestrian with his black corvette and kept driving until a bicyclist stopped him).

While Stewart doesn't usually bring up Novak, as his show airs at 11PM and he doesn't want to upset his viewers' ability to fall asleep, he mentioned the pedestrian incident because he said it "perfectly encapsulates the true essence of the man."

"Yes, Robert Novak knew he did something wrong and he just didn't give a shit," Stewart said. "That's the Novak I know and despise!"

Watch:

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Cary should be nice and anonymous among the fans and geeks at SDCC promoting this:

There's a crack whore meth pusher and her pimp who want to kill Cary. Seriously. And the Torrance Police who tried to deliver a Restraing Order didn't think to question the Pimp's "wife" why he was still getting his mail at her place if he has been gone for two years. Lordy lordy.