In the 2006 campaign season the Washington Post ran more than a dozen front-page stories on Senator George Allen’s reference, at an August 11 campaign stop almost 400 miles from Washington, to an opposition campaign staffer as “Macaca.” One of these stories, perhaps, had enough news value to be worthy of the front page; the others were placed there with the obvious intent of defeating Allen and electing his Democratic opponent Jim Webb, who did indeed win by a 50%-49% margin.Even Human Events has noted the WaPo's attack, writing WaPo opens Jihad again McDonnell, in which reporter Christian Toto asks, "Has the Washington Post found its new 'macaca,' the journalistic storyline to steer Virginia voters away from a GOP candidate?" He continues:
Now there’s a campaign on for governor of Virginia, and the news editors of the Post seem to be using their front page once again to defeat the Republican candidate, Bob McDonnell, and elect Democrat Creigh Deeds. To provide a fair perspective, we’ll start a Macaca watch, to list stories which make the front page of the Post not on the basis of news value but solely and obviously to defeat the Republican candidate. [emphasis added]
Can the Post serve as a political kingmaker again for the Old Dominion State? Or will a feisty alternative media rise up to stop any attempts to turn a college assignment into a campaign killer? And if so, why didn’t the paper pull out all the stops regarding another candidate’s past?An excellent piece calling the WaPo on its hypocrisy was posted by Mike at The Write Side of My Brain ... You can’t expect the Washington Post to still believe something they wrote…eleven weeks ago (but they can hold Bob McDonnell to something he wrote 20 years ago).
If memory serves, a Democrat Senator running for the highest office in the land last year admitted to doing cocaine in his youth, spent 20 years worshiping with an anti-American, anti-Israel reverend, had that very same reverend officiate his wedding and started his political career at the home of an unrepentant terrorist?
Turns out old news is only old when it applies to one particular party, or The One.
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The Post, as well as other mainstream outlets, weren’t eager to cover First Lady Michelle Obama’s Princeton thesis in which she suggested she wasn’t comfortable being a black person on campus. Nor did the media dig to uncover President Obama’s Columbia college thesis.
Shaun Kenney has been on top of this story, noting in Geraghty: Draft McDonnell down, push Deeds up that the WaPo has a reason for their attacks on McDonnell:
The answer for the sudden focus on Bob McDonnell can be found in five numbers: 15, 14, 8, 8, 15. That’s the margin of McDonnell’s lead in the last five polls in the state.Proof that the WaPo is more interested in a political agenda than issues can be found in today's edition: two stories about Bob McDonnell's thesis while omitting the Associated Press article about Bob McDonnell's Tuesday visit to Alexandria to discuss increasing in-classroom funding for Virginia students.
Yet, Bob McDonnell is up by 9 points after WaPo hit piece in a brand new Rasmussen poll, as noted by Jason Kenney at Bearing Drift.
Jerry Fuhrman at From On High writes They're at it again, noting, "The Washington Post's effort to macaca Bob McDonnell continues apace this morning. This time columnist Ruth Marcus was ordered to attack the GOP candidate for governor for having written something decades ago about something that is, in fact, absolutely inconsequential."
Jim Hoeft at Bearing Drift declares WaPO hypocrisy hits a new high - is Jeff Schapiro a close second and says, "The bottom line is this is a manufactured story by the newspaper media."
Jim Riley at Virginia Virtucon sat in on the McDonnell media conference call on Monday and posted Deeds' October Surprise fizzles before September ... Media left scrambling to find something other than issues to cover. In it he wrote:
With McDonnell coming across as calm and rational on yesterday’s call and the WashPo reporting that he is poised to grab the backing of Gov. Timmy!’s biggest '05 donor, it appears that their fallback position now is to try and weaken McDonnell among conservatives.Brian Kirwin at Bearing Drift out-tweeted the Richmond Times-Dispatch's Jeff Schapiro:
RTDSchapiro#vagov McD trying to change subject? Today talks up education; tomorrow, opposition to card-check.Jane at Bearing Drift tweeted:
BrianKirwin@RTDSchapiro McDonnell talking about issues isn’t changing subjects. Deeds doing so would be.
The people at the Washington Post, with ethics that would let them plan this (http://bit.ly/U6Fxu), look down their noses at Bob McDonnell. I’m just sayin.’Keeping the story alive is the post from Fishersville Mike in which he interjects trademark humor while questioning the WaPo's desire to keep a dead story going by asking:
Why no one appeared to defend McDonnell on the Chris Matthews show? Is it because no one really watches the show? More people would watch Glenn Beck clear his throat?84 Rules writes, Left-Leaning Washington Post Goes After Bob McDonnell. Bob Kirchman at The Journey writes This is Deeds Country: A Beltway Runs Around It, saying:
The Washington Post has about as much business picking the Governor of Virginia as I do picking the Prime Minister of France!Greg at Black Velvet Bruce Li thinks lagging Dem support and campaign contributions may have had something to do with the WaPo teaming up with Deeds for what may be a too-early-in-the-game swat at McDonnell:
I’ll be very interested to see Deeds’ campaign finance report ending August 31. If that report shows that a significant portion of his money showed up in the last few days and the campaign wasn’t getting contributions to speak of in late July through mid-August, that will confirm this hypothesis. We’ll know that Deeds’ big strategic play for the election cycle had to be pissed away early in order to financially rescue his campaign. Very likely, he will have fired all of what he thinks is his most important political ammunition, praying that any lingering effects might get him over the top. Strategy-wise, that’s just plain dumb.Ouch.
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To see [Deeds] plucking out of the archives Bob McDonnell’s twenty year old thesis papers when Deeds’ own papers are as strangely unavailable, as are Barack Obama’s, really has to make me wonder whether this early attack is a sign of desperation more than part of a real campaign strategy.
Don't hold your breath waiting for the Washington Post to look into past writings from Creigh Deeds or to do an indepth study of his voting record. And don't wait for them to demand accountability from Barack Obama who refuses to release his college thesis from Columbia University or his academic records from Occidental College, Columbia University or Harvard Law School.
Media hypocrisy rears its ugly head once again.
Update 9/3/09: Meanwhile, Bob McDonnell continues visiting the citizens of Virginia carrying his message while talking jobs and the economy in Chesterfield. Creigh Deeds, instead of putting forth his ideas to help Virginians, is sharpening his focus on the McDonnell thesis. Bob McDonnell is looking forward ... while Creigh Deeds is looking two decades behind.
Jim Riley asks, Will Weymouth and Brauchli Step In Once Again To Stop Those Ethically Challenged At The WashPo?, and writes:
If you’re the Washington Post and you have a lefty like Bill Moyers calling you out for being ethically challenged, you know that a line has been crossed. That’s right, the very same WashPo that not even 2 months ago was caught red-handed in a “pay-to-say” scandal where lobbyists would cough up between $25K and $250K to cozy up with WashPo editors, writers and Obama Admin. officials all of a sudden wants Virginians to believe that they’re looking out for us via their increasingly screechy and desperate rants against Bob McDonnell based upon a 20-year old thesis.It gets better so be sure to read the entire post.
Update ... additional links:
- Edgycater: Washington Post Tries To Save Creigh Deeds
- The Journey: This is Deeds Country: A Beltway Runs Around It
- Newsbusters: WaPo Ratchets Up Attacks on Republican Bob McDonnell; Six Articles in Four Days
- National Review Online: Judging By Theses, Not Deeds
- Newsbusters: Barone: Washington Post trying to "macaca" Bob McDonnell
- Ace of Spades: WaPo's descent into hackery continues
- Richmond Times-Dispatch: McDonnell talks jobs and economy in Chesterfield
H/T to Jefferoniad bloggers
1 comment:
Excellent work! I wrote a short piece on the subject and linked to your outstanding post at
edgycater.blogspot.com
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