In support of shunning
The blogger Digby popularized the use of the phrase "The Village" to describe Washington media elites. The mocking nickname was inspired by a 1998 Washington Post article by Sally Quinn about Washington's reaction to the Lewinsky scandal. Quinn quoted David Broder saying of Clinton's effect on Washington: "He came in here and he trashed the place ... and it's not his place." And: "The judgment is harsher in Washington. We don't like being lied to." Others -- journalists like David Gergen and Chris Matthews alongside politicians like Joe Lieberman -- echoed the sentiment that The Village just couldn't tolerate Clinton's lies.
It was all bunk, of course. The Village hated -- and, it must be noted, lied about -- the Clintons long before anyone, Bill Clinton included, had ever heard of Monica Lewinsky. And needless to say, other politicians have both had extramarital sex and told lies without drawing The Village's scorn.
So it's laugh-out-loud funny to suggest that Washington -- specifically, the newsrooms of Washington -- is filled with journalists of such reverence for the truth and honesty that they simply could not accept someone who told a lie. It certainly never manifested itself during the Bush administration -- Broder, for one, famously suggested that Clinton should have resigned because "he may well have lied" but repeatedly refused invitations to say the same about Bush.
But wouldn't it be nice if The Village really was as opposed to lying as Broder claimed? More specifically, if the media elite who serve as Village elders had the good sense to shun their colleagues who habitually misinform, that could go a long way toward reversing the decades-long erosion of public confidence in the news media.
Take, for example, George Will. Will recently used his syndicated Washington Post column to make several false claims about global warming -- something he has done frequently in the past. Will's column sparked widespread condemnation, but the Post refused to run a correction and insisted that it has a "multi-layer editing process and checks facts to the fullest extent possible."
That has led to suggestions that the Post might want to consider adding another layer or two, or redefine what they consider "possible." Certainly, the Post could do a better job of keeping falsehoods out of your morning newspaper. But the basic problem here wasn't that the Post had an insufficient number of layers in its editing process; it's that the Post publishes George Will at all.
See, Will may have a reputation as an honest, intellectual conservative, but he has a long history of dishonest hackery, conflicts of interest, and double standards.
During the 1980 presidential campaign, for example, Will secretly helped coach Ronald Reagan for a debate, using a briefing book stolen from Jimmy Carter's campaign. After the debate, Will appeared on ABC's Nightline, where he praised Reagan's performance without disclosing his role in prepping the candidate. In 1996, Will defended a speech by GOP presidential candidate Bob Dole without noting that his wife, a top Dole aide, had helped write it.
During the 1988 presidential campaign, Will treated Jesse Jackson quite differently, ambushing him with an arcane question about "the G-7 measures of the Louvre Accords" -- a question interpreted by many as an effort to do little more than embarrass Jackson and compared by some to the literacy tests used to disenfranchise African-American voters until they were banned in the 1960s.
Whatever the reason for Will's treatment of Jackson, he behaved far differently toward George W. Bush during the 2000 presidential campaign, when he penned a Washington Post column about Bush titled "He's No Intellectual -- And So What?" During that campaign, Will met privately with Bush shortly before the candidate appeared on ABC's This Week. Why? To go over a question in advance so he didn't "ambush" Bush with "unfamiliar material." Will even went so far as to give Bush an index card containing a portion of the question he would ask.
You might think a journalist -- particularly one who had previously been busted praising the debate performance of a candidate he had secretly helped coach -- would be embarrassed to admit that he had given a presidential candidate a question ahead of time. Not George Will: he bragged about it in his Post column.
Of course, Will is hardly the first columnist to take sides in elections. Nor is he the first to lend a bit of assistance to his favored candidate, though few have been as audacious as Will in doing so. Still, Will's efforts on behalf of Republican candidates -- though sometimes ethically questionable -- aren't the primary reason he doesn't deserve his place on the Post's op-ed pages. His greater sin, as a columnist, is the frequency with which he makes false claims.
Will's pattern of global warming falsehoods has been well-documented in recent days. It's a pattern that goes back at least 16 years:
Will confronted Gore on the issue of global warming: "Gore knows, or should know before pontificating, that a recent Gallup Poll of scientists concerned with global climate research shows that 53 percent do not believe warming has occurred, and another 30 percent are uncertain."
It was Will, however, who should have read the poll more carefully "before pontificating." Gallup actually reported that 66 percent of the scientists said that human-induced global warming was occurring, with only 10 percent disagreeing and the rest undecided. Gallup took the unusual step of issuing a written correction to Will's column (San Francisco Chronicle, 9/27/92): "Most scientists involved in research in this area believe that human-induced global warming is occurring now." Will never noted the error in his column.
That aversion to corrections -- if not to making false claims -- seems to be another pattern with Will. Jonathan Schwarz dug up the following story from Noam Chomsky's book Understanding Power:
[A] few years ago George Will wrote a column in Newsweek called "Mideast Truth and Falsehood," ... he said that Sadat had refused to deal with Israel until 1977. So I wrote them a letter ...in which I said, "Will has one statement of fact, it's false; Sadat made a peace offer in 1971, and Israel and the United States turned it down." Well, a couple days later I got a call from a research editor who checks facts for the Newsweek "Letters" column. She said: "We're kind of interested in your letter, where did you get those facts?" So I told her, "Well, they're published in Newsweek, on February 8, 1971" ... So she looked it up and called me back, and said, "Yeah, you're right, we found it there; okay, we'll run your letter." An hour later she called again and said, "Gee, I'm sorry, but we can't run the letter." I said, "What's the problem?" She said, "Well, the editor mentioned it to Will and he's having a tantrum; they decided they can't run it." Well, okay.
In more recent years, Will has made false claims about the Voting Rights Act and the New Deal. He made a claim about China drilling off the coast of Florida that was so wrong, even then-Vice President Cheney -- who cited Will in repeating the claim -- acknowledged it wasn't true. When even Dick Cheney thinks you've gone too far in spouting pro-drilling falsehoods, you have a problem. But neither Will nor the Post corrected the error.
Last year, Will claimed in his Newsweek column and on ABC that Social Security taxes are levied based on household income. Not true. He claimed that McCain won more votes from independents during the primaries than Obama did. Wrong. He claimed most minimum-wage earners are students or part-time employees. False. Will has even lied about Hillary Clinton's Yankees fandom.
Basically, George Will routinely makes false claims large and small, holds politicians to disparate standards, and engages in ethically dubious conduct on behalf of his preferred candidates. The Washington Post can hide behind multi-layer processes all it wants, but as long as it publishes Will, it will continue to misinform its readers. The Post doesn't need to give Will a better fact-checker; it -- along with the rest of the media elite -- should instead give him a good, thorough shunning.
Instead, he remains a respected citizen of The Village -- the same Village where, David Broder insists, people just don't like being lied to.
Right wing republicans in a nutshell (Jeter, I hope you and tommy get your party back one day!):
An image like that can leave people scarred for life!
He looks about as good as he could in that pleated skirt, but those knees...........
Yeah, Oscar, I'm glad he's not a Scot. Those kilts would go outta style quick!
He can't get any respectable bagpipes to appear with him.
Good cartoon Snoopy, thats one of my local papers.
If you're wrong a lot, you don't get to talk to huge numbers of people.
Sounds obvious? Then there is only one conclusion -- the media has nothing to do with getting things right. Which leads to only one conclusion -- there is no reason for anyone to watch, listen to, or read the mainstream media.
Truly the social-climate change reaches more severe proportions than Jamison notes as "decades-long erosion of public confidence in the news media." Just today's action demonstrates mobbing protest at the news media.
<img src="http://www.alternet.org/images/story/Untitled-6.jpg" alt="" >
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Worldwide hate and its violence is rising against politicians empowered by suppressive ('secret') edict politics, and against the complicit media agents necessary for edict politics and the starvation poverty those persons cause.
(The statement rebukes ABC News anchor George Stephanopolous, reporting Feb 20 that 'worldwide hate and violence is rising caused by starvation and poverty ....')
Try again for that photo ...
<a href="http://www.alternet.org/images/story/Untitled-6.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.alternet.org/images/story/Untitled-6.jpg"></a>
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OT, but how many times is Coleman going to recount the ballots! Count these, don't count those, put them over there, geez, what an egoist!
Maybe Franken should hire James Baker. You remember: "The votes have been counted, recounted, and counted yet again."
I love Joe Conason's description of Will as a dyspeptic Tory in "Big Lies". That sums him up rather succinctly.
I was in a discount store once and he was on all the TV screens in the TV department. All the Mexican customers were laughing at him, the ultimate white guy. Most people don't take him seriously-- the bow tie thing, etc.
It may not be fair or just, but image--and especially buffoonishness-- stands for a lot these days. Ridicule works, and Dems need to start specializing in it.
clinton may have lied about sex, but bush lied us into war. he claimed we had to invade irag because hussein turned away the u.n. inspectors and "he wouldn't let them in". they had been there for several months before the invasion. clearly a lie and one he repeated several times to almost no notice from the media.
i guess cheney is pretty upset because his chief of staff scooter libby didn't get a pardon from bush. apparently the fact that a jury found he repeatedly lied to a grand jury doesn't matter. libby, and rove, should have been fired the minute it was revealed they were talking to the press about an undercover agent's identity, something they had taken an oath not to reveal. cheney has also been talking about the possibility of us being hit by a terrorist wmd attack. well, thanks to your chief of staff and rove, an entire counterterrorism network was destroyed and further foreign contacts were less likely to deal with us if their contact with our agents could be revealed. thanks, you phony patriots. with friends like you....
http://impeachpac.org/disclose-or-disarm
This is so tired. I remember Clinton shaking his finger at us and declaring: "I did not have sex with that women". I don't care about the sex, but that was an out and out, bald face lie.
Most of the civilized world believed Saddam had WMDs. How can you say "Bush Lied" when everyone agreed with the intel at the time?
You are lying.
Clinton actually said, "I did not have sexual relations with that women, Ms. Lewinsky." At the time, the White House press corp parsed the phrase "sexual relations" and concluded that usually meant intercourse. There was no intercourse. Follow ups were asked of Clinton but weren't responded to.
While we are on George Will, Bush and his White House dishonestly denied for years that there was any movement on 9/11 in the White House to blame the attack on Iraq. People who said there was were attacked and lied about. That's surely a bigger lie than the ones Clinton told.
BTW: Everyone did not agree with the Intel at the time.
And most importantly, nobody died as a result of Clinton's lies.
It wasn't just the press corps that used that definition. That was the exact definition used by the prosecutors in the Grand Jury investigation.
Most of the civilized world believed Saddam had WMDs. How can you say "Bush Lied" when everyone agreed with the intel at the time? -- Goodfella
Wow, ignorance on parade.
Yeah, in late 2002 and before, most people did believe that Saddam has WMD's. But we didn't invade in late 2002. In December of 2002, Saddam let the weapons inspectors back in, and they proved the intelligence wrong.
It's funny how factual evidence disproved the guesswork provided by the 'intelligence', and instead Bush (and you, Goodfella), stuck with the discredited 'intelligence' and discarded the factual information the weapons inspectors provided!
Except it's not funny. Thousands of US soldiers and tens of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians are dead or maimed because Bush chose to stick with discredited intelligence instead of admitting that it had been discredited! You want to hang your hat on discredited intelligence because at one time, it was the best info we had?
Bush lied when he said that Saddam had kicked out the weapons inspectors when the facts were that before we invaded, Saddam had let the weapons inspectors back in! That's a lie, bud.
Bush lies like he breathes. If you're going to take Clinton to task for lying about something inconsequential and of no concern to anyone other than his family, then I'm compelled to point out a smattering of decidedly consequential Bush lies:
"I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees."
"Anything we do ... to that end in this effort, any activity we conduct, is within the law. We do not torture."
"These [Guantanamo prisoners] are people picked up off the battlefield in Afghanistan. They weren't wearing uniforms . . . but were there to kill."
“Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so.”
"And that changed, the law changed on--roving wiretaps were available for chasing down drug lords. They weren't available for chasing down terrorists, see?"
"We found the weapons of mass destruction. We found biological laboratories."
"I have yet to hear from our commanders on the ground that they need more troops."
“Veterans are a priority of this administration . . . and that priority is reflected in my budget.”
"We’ve never been stay the course, George!"
And one bonus inconsequential lie:
http://www.cjr.org/politics/president_bush_nailed_by_chees.php
Of course the list is endless, but I think "they hate us for our freedom" belongs in the top ten.
I also like "the vast majority of my tax cuts goes to the people at the bottom".
Nearly everyone lies when pushed. Clinton was pushed, and he lied. Conservatives lie without being pushed.
Hey... um.... sparky... are you just trying to be funny? Because thats a damn funny joke you posted there!
Just because 'most' of the civilized world believed that Saddam 'had' WMD's... DOES NOT MAKE IT TRUE!!!
If the entire population of the planet believed that the moon was not actually up there... does that mean that the moon really is not up there?
Ok... I'll grant you that Clinton lied about sex with an 'of age' intern... and was an idiot for doing so... but how can you can sit there... and make the claim you make... knowing that Clintons lie, was a.... BALD FACED LIE.....yet NO ONE DIED as a result of it!!
Whereas Bush's lie(s) "HAVE" led to the deaths of countless tens of thousands!
If this is the best you got pal.... give up now!
As for George Will....
He's a lying sack of flea ridden filth!
Or as Stephanoe Miller would put it... a lying sack of crap... a lying sack of crap... a lying, scheming, stinky pile of liquid crap!!
Oh... and Snoopy....
Next time you post a picture of Rush in a cheerleader outfit... even if it is a cartoon.... please.... consider the posiblity that children can walk in and see it!
Other than that.... damn funny!
goodfella, you asked how can i say that "bush lied"? i can say it because he did. he said hussein would not let the inspectors in. that was clearly a lie, and here is another link of him saying the same thing at a different time. it's a lie he's repeated through the years. the inspectors had been let in, were finding nothing at the sites that we sent them to, and it was bush's decision to go to war that forced them out. other than that, i can't help you with your reading comprehension problem.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7309
This is so tired. I remember Clinton shaking his finger at us and declaring: "I did not have sex with that women". I don't care about the sex, but that was an out and out, bald face lie.
There you go again . . . equating a defensive comment about a personal matter with a lie about a war that has cost a couple of hundred thousand lifes and brought misery and poverty to millions of people. That is the moral perspective of a spoiled four-year old.
Most of the civilized world believed Saddam had WMDs. How can you say "Bush Lied" when everyone agreed with the intel at the time?
Another, more subtle fake equivalence. Without even getting into the details as other posters have, there is a vast difference between "he's got something rusty but nasty hidden in a bunker" and "HE'S A DIRE THREAT TO THE ENTIRE WORLD!" Virtually none of the people who "agreed with the intel" thought Saddam had anything hidden that was worth killing people over.
I note also that this talking point is fundamentally just a diversion. Bush and Cheney, as the records and their own testimony have revealed, were planning to go to war with Iraq regardless of what Saddame might have had in that bunker. The WMD threat was just an excuse to execute their broader plan to overthrow all the hostile governements in the Middle-east and replace them with their warped notions of democracy.
First: Who the hell made it your bussiness to find out who is having sex with who?He lied. Big deal. The question should never have been asked to begin with.
Second: Most of the world did not believe that line of bs.I have no security clearance and I was positive Bush et all were lying. That is a big important lie. Not like a lie about infadelity.Any one that stated that Bush was wrong was kicked out or shunned.Bush kicked out the inspectors so that he could say this crap. The only people who could investigate the WMD's. I can't believe you are still drinking that kool aide.Face it. Your guy screwed up everything big time. He was wrong and knew it. When you push for invasion based on faulty intelligence that you cherry picked it is your fault and no one elses. Saying that you can find people that agree with you does not exclude the fact that you ignored those who did not agree with you.I wish this was just another case of Bush being incompetent but it was way more nefarious.However I doubt that any of this will get through to you. It is obvious that you will never see the truth because it shows that you backed an imcompetent fool. Now go sign up to go to Iraq and quit bothering the sane
Bill Clinton did not have sexual intercourse with Monica Lewinsky.
And most of the world had intel from the US that Saddam had WMD's. That intel was phony, as we know now. THey believed Saddam had WMD's to the extent that they believed the intel.
To say 'the rest of the world believed he had WMD's' means they believed the con the Bush Administration was pulling. THey squandered America's reputation, just as they squandered America's honor and America's reputation for response to natural disaster. Bill lied, but Georgie lied in America's name. That's the big difference.
Everyone didn't agree. You're wrong. Bush lied.
Is there an honest Conservative intellectual in the entire world?
That's why Will survives. The other conservatives lie even more.
Probably not since the passing of William F. Buckley, but I'll play Diogenes and seek (it shall be my life mission)
Buckley is the only name I could come up with.
"Is there an honest Conservative intellectual in the entire world?"
Actually there are three I think. that's three more than the number of honest liberal intellectuals in the world.
Missdee,
Can you name the three? Also, can you name one Liberal Intellectual that has lied and tell us what he/she lied about?
Good job. That should keep MissDee tied-up for a few years. Honesty is a component of Liberalism. Where would today's Conservatives be without the lies and trickery that suck-in people like MissDee?
Honosty is a component of liberalism? Honosty cannot be a component of any ism. It is by definition a clinging to an idea without regard to it's recognition by any authority.
Since there is no such thing as "honosty," your post is correct because there is no way to prove it wrong. You typed it twice, so you must believe there is such a thing.
Sorry, after re-reading my post, I can understand the confusion. Ism, by definition, is clinging to an idea without it's recognition by any authority, not honosty.
What dictionary are you using? My American Heritage Dictionary (weight 5.2 lbs.) defines "honesty" as the capacity or condition of being honest; integrity; trustworthiness; truthfulness; sincerity. "Liberalism" is defined as liberal views and policies, especially in regard to social and political questions. Ida Erlich’s book, INSTANT VOCABULARY, says that the suffix "ism" means doctrine; system; manner; condition; act; characteristic.
Honesty is certainly part of today’s Liberal philosophy. On the other hand, a study of modern neo-conservatism shows that the founders recommended systematic lying. All the Republicans I know base their support on the misinformation they get from Republican talk radio and Republican TV shows.
I have a tape of the local Rush clone admitting that all Republican talk hosts disregard facts. I will post it on YouTube.
......ditto......
......my response to easy, that is........
There are at least three honest conservatives posting on this site. Point to one with a national voice. You're part of the noise that nationaly drowns them out.
How much liberal intellectualism have you been exposed to? What was your most recent exposure? Odds are I'd have a hard time agreeing that it was either liberal or intellectual.
I'm sure there are, but they don't have national platforms in which to speak.
Will lied about General Wesley Clark too. Clark learned on 9/11 of a movement in the White House to blame Iraq for the attack. The White House denied it. Clark spoke up. Will twisted true statments Clark made to make it look like Clark was nuts. Clark repeated his first true statements in response. Then Will said Clark kept changing his story. The whole thing went in circles with other lies from Will to boot.
Later, it turned out that there actually was a movement in the White House to blame 9/11 on Iraq. Clark's other statements were verified too. Where was the apology from George Will? Not to be found. None came from the White House either.
"We don't like being lied to." -- David Broder
This one comes up a lot and I really have to come to Broder's defense. I understood from the start what he was saying. Not liking being lied to is not the same as not liking to lie. Those are different dynamics. People who like to lie often don't like being lied to, just as people who like to steal don't like being stolen from. That's why they came up with the concept of honor among thieves, and there is a similar code of honor among liars. Thieves aren't supposed to steal from other thieves, and liars don't like being lied to.
Let's not forget Eric Boehlert's companion piece on County Fair:
Will flat-out lied in his current editorial--which I read in our local paper--stating "The University of Illinois' Arctic Climate Research Center says global sea ice levels now equal those of 1979."
The Arctic Climate Research Center went so far as to publish a response online yesterday to Will's column.
I have followed various links to find the quote you reference from the ACRC...and haven't been able to find it on their website...I followed your link to their website and cannot find the quote.
Can you show me on your link where I find the quote?
I have googled and followed many links which lead thru sites like TPMuckraker and FAIR.org which all cite the quote...but their links all lead to the same place as yours.
I would like to see the quote on their website and the person making the quote...hope you can help.
wesley -
The quote was posted on the site on Feb 15; apparently they don't keep posts up for more tan a day or two because they refresh the site daily with sea ice scans. I saw the original and it's been posted on enough public sites (and is even mentioned by the WaPo in their pitiful defense of Will) that it's authenticity is not in question.
Yes, I've seen all the references to the quote on "public websites"...and it's not the authenticity in question.
I'd like to see the author of the quote and the full context...if you've been around here long enough you'd know that is the mantra preached by mmfa.
If you can produce the author, in context, I'd appreciate it...if not...you haven't brought anything new or verifiable.
Dear Wes, Before you embarass yourself any more, please read this:
http://nsidc.org/news/press/2007_seaiceminimum/20071001_pressrelease.html
and then this
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/2/23/3564/34974/1014/700718
The lesson for today is that anyone in the national media that STILL insists that there is a debate concerning catastrophic human caused global warming is a LIAR and will lie about everything.
For the deniers: I was able to obatin very strong circumstantial evidence that the research center did in fact post the response to Will's lie: An advanced search of Google like this (with the quotes) "george will" site:uiuc.edu , one of the results is the uiuc.edu site . So we know they did post the response and for whatever reason took the post down. My guess is that they consider such denier discussion to be so 1980's that they do not bother with it.
No, no, no. If Broder didn't like being lied to, then he would have positively hated Bush. Bush lies in nearly every paragraph of every speech he's ever given.
Why didn't he object more when Bush lied?
Broder and Will should both be IGNORED just like Rush and Bill and Ann
Broder and Will should both be IGNORED just like Rush and Bill and Ann
Ignored by who, pray tell? If a party of drunken bikers barges into your wedding dance, drowning everyone else out with their noise, groping all the women, and making the DJ play heavy metal, you can't just ignore them.
These people dominate our media culture, occupying most of the limited media hours devoted to politics, and are the opinion leaders for most of the reporters and pundits who have air and print time in the national media. What would accomplish by ignoring them other than shutting yourself out of the national political discourse?
It takes our national "discourse" about two years to figure out even a single simple fact. Darn right I'm shutting myself out from that. What needs to be done is to encourage others to shut themselves out too.
The media will never stop broadcasting, so they must broadcast into a vacuum.
During the 1980 presidential campaign, for example, Will secretly helped coach Ronald Reagan for a debate, using a briefing book stolen from Jimmy Carter's campaign. After the debate, Will appeared on ABC's Nightline, where he praised Reagan's performance without disclosing his role in prepping the candidate.
Wow. I completely forgot about that. He was Herr Karl's mentor, it seems.
You should be very careful about picking out an individual to shun,, it always backfires. Its Karma baby. You either believe in free speech or you believe in a dictatorship who doesn't. You certainly don't sound American here. It sounds more like you have a personal beef with this guy, we're not interested and by the way no one in America believes this little club you talk about, it is very socially NOT PC.
Oh and the people who want the stimulus are just as greedy as the people who put us in this situation.
You have conflated shunning and free speech. You present a black and white false choice. It is very American to ignore the blathering idiot while at the same time fighting for their rigth to free speech.
You equate a the greed that results in multiple personal jets, multiple vacation homes with the desire to have a roof overhead and food on the table?
Where in America are you?
Many thanks for this comment. I've never taken Will seriously for the reasons you listed, and more. I'm on the edge of cancelling my subscription to the Post. Since they continued, long after the war's beginnings were exposed as LIES, to refer to it at the "war on terror," I wondered, should I get what I need from the Internet?
But they're continuing to print the words of the lair, thug George Will, they're going to lose another paid subscriber.
Why Georgie S and ABC continues to give Will air time is beyond me. When someone is continuoulsy wrong its even more irritating when they are world class pretentious abot being wrong. When he tries to argue economics with Paul Krugman its beyond bizarre. He is a member of the Flat Eath Society on global warming. He cannot stop making on air pronouncemnts that have no basis in fact. During the election he asserted that the number of independents who were voting for McCain were greater than the independents that were voting for Obama. This was easily disproven by MMA. To paraphrase Cromwell - George you have been here long enough - by the grace of God go!
A list of George Will's columns mentioning the alleged onetime scientific consensus for global cooling as a way to disregard scientists' findings about global warming: Washington Post 2-15-09, 5-22-08, 4-2-06, 12-23-04, 12-11-97, 9-3-92, 5-31-92.
There may be more of them out there, but that's what I've been able to find.
No one likes being lied to. We don't like the press corps lying to us, either.
Interesting...Here's a story about shunning concerning Cryospehere Today and Al Gore:
-- In the thread where we have examined the visual discrepancies in sea ice report that concerned a number of people, William Chapman of the University of Illinois Champaign/Urbana joined in the discussion today...
the real surprise came when I asked him about a comment from Al Gore that had been prominently displayed on the Cryosphere today web page for several months. I’ve seen several comments about this appearing to illustrate a potential bias at CT. It went like this:
You’ve heard Al Gore say “The Earth has a fever”? It may also have major tooth decay.
Here is how Mr. Chapman responded:
Q: Why do you have a quote from a politician (Al Gore) on a web page presenting science? This is a question many people have raised.
A: [ I ] didn’t realize it was a concern for many people. All references to Al Gore have been removed.
Yours is an example of shunning truth. MMfA's article is about shunning liars.
I'm not surprised you can't tell the difference.
Will Will or won't Will?
The stupidly sanctimoniousness stubbornness that can sometimes accompany a BWE (bright well-educated) like Will will probably prevent him from ever fessing up to the deeds described.
Unfortunately, while Will's knowledge and his way with words are very convincing (often rightly so), like exquisitely-crafted shotguns, they can be very dangerous when used for evil intent.
While I can't recall a single confession from Will regarding the crimes against truth listed above, I think it's high time that he comes clean about this latest ass-fact.
If he doesn't, I hope George Will is plastered with every bit of scorn he's due.
Jamison Foser's column points up a very significant aspect of today's mainstream media environment: that is, there is little or no correlation between what the pundacious ones say and what is actually real. The American media lives in a room covered in mirrors: the walls, the ceilings, the floors, all mirrors. They only see and hear themselves, they only talk and listen to themselves. For the most part, the outside world is irrelevant. Otherwise, how could one of the pre-eminent neoconmen, William Kristol, be wrong about everything single issue he's spoken on over the last 25 years and be rewarded with a column in the NY Times(since ended "by mutual agreement with the editor" not for pervasive factual errors)?
Of course this "facts be damned" attitude isn't confined to just the media, it's pervasive among the political classes as well - and that includes both parties. A perfect example is president Obama's choices for economic advisors. Timothy Geithner, Robert Rubin and Larry Summers couldn't have been more wrong in their economic "reasoning" over the last 29 years, and yet there they are, back at the top of the heap.
What about the money (several thousand dollars) he took from Conrad Black,
the business executive that was recently convidted of fraud etc. but didn't see
fit to divulge to his readers or the public.
George Will should be ashamed of himself. We do not coach our politicians. We do not give them the answer to a question before we ask the question.
Why? Because we are placing our lives in their hands. We are handing them the Nuclear Codes.
Hey! George Will, the next time you hear that the Navy is seeking a new Captain for a Nuclear Trident Submarine please give that guy the answers to any tests they might ask him to take.
What you did was treasonous.
Speak truth to power.
Mr. News
We are in big trouble with out Media today. The fact that they are printing lies in the papers is extremely dangerous to our Democracy.
Its called Propaganda, plain and simple.
Keep up the great work, Media Matters!! it is really needed, we have to force our press to have integrity again.