If you think back it was the media that did most of the Swiftboating of Kerry

[NNN0LHI]

Barely anyone would have even have known about the scum attacking Kerry if it the media didn't make hay of it which they did.

But the media won't report ANYTHING derogatory about McCain. And if someone tries like the NYT the rest of the media will work overtime (Literally) to defend him.

Don

[MethuenProgressive]

1. Nah. They just parroted. Like they did when Obama Swiftboated Clinton on Race.

Repeating gossip is what the MSM is best at doing.

[Virginia Dare]

2. That's true. IIRC they only ran the actual ad in a couple of markets..

then FAUX started running it in a practically continuous loop (as "news" of course), and the other major media markets picked it up as well of course, talked about it for a solid week or better.

I get so pissed everytime I think about it.

[blm]

3. Dan Rather has admitted recently that corporate media NEEDED Bush to stay in office for the

favorable rulings they expected - and recently received.

They KNEW Kerry intended to weaken their grip.

Listen folks - this stuff doesn't happen in a vacuum.

Kerry gets attacked by media BECAUSE they fear him, and too many Dems get sucked right into their distortions and perpetuate the lies and smears.

NOTE THE DATE:

Kerry Seeks to Reverse FCC's "Wrongheaded Vote"
Commission Decision May Violate Laws Protecting Small Businesses; Kerry to File Resolution of Disapproval

Monday, June 2, 2003

WASHINGTON - Senator John Kerry today announced plans to file a "Resolution of Disapproval" as a means to overturn today's decision by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to raise media ownership caps and loosen various media cross-ownership rules.

Kerry will soon introduce the resolution seeking to reverse this action under the Congressional Review Act and Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act on the grounds that the decision may violate the laws intended to protect America's small businesses and allow them an opportunity to compete.

As Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, Kerry expressed concern that the FCC's decision will hurt localism, reduce diversity, and will allow media monopolies to flourish. This raises significant concerns about the potential negative impacts the decision will have on small businesses and their ability to compete in today's media marketplace.

In a statement released earlier today regarding the FCC's decision, Kerry said:

"Nothing is more important in a democracy than public access to debates and information, which lift up our discourse and give Americans an opportunity to make honest informed choices. Today's wrongheaded vote by the Republican members of the FCC to loosen media ownership rules shows a dangerous indifference to the consolidation of power in the hands of a few large entities rather than promoting diversity and independence at the local level. The FCC should do more than rubber stamp the business plans of narrow economic interests.

"Today's vote is a complete dereliction of duty. The Commissioners are well aware that these rules greatly influence the competitive structure of the industry and protect the public's access to multiple sources of information and media. It is the Commission's responsibility to ensure that the rules serve our national goals of diversity, competition, and localism in media. With today's vote, they shirked that responsibility and have dismissed any serious discussion about the impact of media consolidation on our own democracy."

[karynnj]

4. I absolutely agree

Most of the print media outlets did a semi-good job after awile in reporting and editorializing that all the existing facts back Kerry. The Washington Post was a notable exception - in having a front page story that suggested the truth was likely between the two accounts. This was done even though many of the SBVT they gave credibility to had already been shown to have lied. A bigger over all lie was they cast it Kerry's account vs the SBVT. It was NEVER Kerry's account, but the official Navy account.

The media had Kerry's entire Naval record, they had Nixon tapes showing they investigated him found he was a hero amd they had Brinkley's book. Brinkley is an academic historian who was reputable enough as a historian that he edited the Reagan Diaries. Many of teh SBVT spoke to him in the years he was researching the book. NONE of these accusations surfaced then. One guy strongly disliked Kerry - the man who had one of Kerry's crew before he did and it was also clear that the crew dislike him and loved Kerry.

The cable media gave the SBVT a huge amount of free time and legitimacy. They took their word as equal to that of a US Senator with no history of dishonesty and all the official records on his side. (The TANG story imploded when the validity of a few documents was questioned even though there was proof of many problems and the records were clearly no intact.) If anyone has anydoubt that this was not a media sanctioned and propagated character assignation consider that they treated the purple heart bandaids as if they were funny hat novelties with no offensive moral stigma to them.

What is amazing is that John Kerry had the strength and the integrity to fight this and come away from it with swiftboating having the meaning of a low political attack based on lies. That he and the incredible woman, who should have been our First Lady, have continued fighting for what they believe in with the commitment, passion and grace they have is amazing. He may never be President but he is a far better person than most of those who were.

[blm]

5. Yes - it really was the Swifts against the NAVY and its records.

.

[high density]

6. Absolutely

The group had little money, yet the networks handed out millions in free time by airing the ads as "news."

[blm]

7. The Navy Records be damned. This wouldn't have happened to ANYONE ELSE. But media needed

Kerry to appear to lose on this issue as they protected Bush and RNC on their rampant use of election fraud tactics.

[seabeyond]

8. further, swiftboater tried it in spring '04 and it was one afternoon news conference

that went away and nothing came of it. had already been put out. no one bought it, promoted it, allowed it to run or took it seriously

kerry was in his "after convention", cant spend money mode, (waiting for bush to have his convention, breaking the cut off date and no one said or did anything about that, allowig bush to spend more money) .... they put it out again and the news went wild with it when the expectation was that it would die a quick death.

yes, media created it.

[MH1]

10. You NAILED it.

I get so sick of the "he didn't respond" thing, because that's just it - he did, the response was effective, the attack went away. Where they failed (and Kerry has admitted that) was that the second time the attack was launched, the media amplified it instead of ignoring it like the bullshit that it had been proven to be.

[seabeyond]

14. yes. it is promoting a lie as a truth. i too am offended by it. facts are there.

even saying kerry didnt respond the second time is bullshit. he did. said not true. records showed not true. his military boss said not true. and still the media kept putting it out there was simply disagreement between two parties and either could be right. even when it boiled down to swiftboat lying still..... they gave swiftboaters a place to speak out, giving them their time and voice without repercussion.

[blm]

18. The record is so CLEAR that Kerry responded more forcefully than it deserved, but even many Dems

are unaware of what was done as corpmedia did its best to downplay and mute those responses.

[L. Coyote]

9. There is no "the media" and all media is attributable to specific actors and groups of actors

and we need to tag this to those who did it, identifying falsehoods with their promulgators.

[EFerrari]

11. Group dynamics apply, though. They act like a pack

of wild dogs. And not a big pack, either since about five entities own them all.

[blm]

12. Exactly - the lazy REPEAT those mediawhores who ARE paid propagandists.

.

[L. Coyote]

22. Al the more reason to track attribution, to define the structure of the pack and

point to the source of the LIES.

[Iggo]

13. Re: the OP

Well, yeah. That's how swift-boating works.

[Ravy]

15. Their idea of "balance" is absolutely wrong.

Some of the news channels, like Faux, just don't even bother... but the ones that try to balance arguments like these, whom we would consider "more honest" news organizations have it about as bad.

MSNBC and CNN usually take one proponent from either side, and in an attempt to "balance" issues. The problem with that is that issues aren't balanced. A Swiftboater does not need equal play with the Kerry campaign on shit they are making up.

To further the point, if an issue is global warming, they take one of the 95% of the scientists who claim it is real, and put them up against one of the 5% of scientists that think it is not. Most arguments like this are not 50-50, and do not deserve that type of "balanced" coverage.

[seabeyond]

16. this is the big thing i have noticed. "Most arguments like this are not 50-50"

even when kerry was out defending himself from this attack, they still had swiftboaters out their as if their argument was fact, along wiht kerrys. even when proven a lie, .... still, they were given a respect to their argument. it gives weight, traction where it is not deserved adn confuses the listener which isnt so very hard anyway

[EFerrari]

17. I think Jonathan Alter pointed this out years ago.

It's a right wing tactic to give credibility to their insanity. You don't balance truth with bs and call it fair.

[blm]

19. Beyond the Kerry 'campaign' the Swifts' battle was actually with the NAVY and its Records.

Since when has the media ever chosen to allow OFFICIAL NAVY RECORDS to be over-rided by a group so obviously lying?

[karynnj]

21. True - and they were not only lying, their lies contradicted each other

The Kerry campaign gave the media over 30 pages of things provably not true in their book. In any other case, how many lies need to be shown to discredit something.

Here:

1) The official records were against them
2) Obvious lies (or errors) were proven
3) Links to Bush in funders and even a lawyer were shown (motive)
4) No proof was ever asked (or offered) of the SBVT - though THEY were the ones disagreeing with the official record. Think about that they demanded Kerry disprove things that disagreed with the official record. Yet, they didn't ask the SBVT to prove that the record was wrong. (Now think of what they did on TANG)

The sad thing is that in spite of this various people (Begala, Carville, McAuliffe ...... ) have engaged in a second attack on the Senator saying he didn't respond. The motive for that is easy to see - it was because ONLY THE CLINTONS KNOW HOW TO FIGHT THE RW. That this ignores that the issue with Kerry is not whether the lies were true, but if he fought back. The Clintons were actually LESS successful as the residue of many charges themselves still remain among Democrats and Indpendents.

[Hamlette]

20. And you wonder why the media won't go after the GOP?

The NYTimes reports a piece crushing McCain's claim he is not beholden to lobbyists.

The GOP noise machine goes into overdrive 24/7 about how unfair the article is, how the media is liberal, how conservatives just can't get a break in the world and have always been picked on by the mean lying liberal media.

So the right rallies around McCain not because they like McCain but because they need to protect him from the mean media.

And the NYTimes goes back to picking on Dems who don't have a noise machine. And who don't overreact to stories.

Not sure how to combat this but I expect things to get very nasty for Obama.