Caught by Media Matters making up poll data, Taranto said: "We haven't been paying close attention to the polls"
In his September 21 "Best of the Web" column on The Wall Street Journal's OpinionJournal.com website, and in an email to comedian and Air America Radio host Al Franken, OpinionJournal.com editor James Taranto conceded that "[I]t's possible" that he was "mistaken" in asserting on the September 16 edition of Fox News' Hannity & Colmes that President Bush's job approval ratings had begun to bounce back after their historic lows in the wake of the botched federal response to Hurricane Katrina. Taranto was responding to a Media Matters for America item -- as well as emails he said the item generated -- in which we noted that he offered no poll numbers to back up his claim, and the available polling in fact refuted it.
After admitting in his OpinionJournal piece that "[w]e haven't been paying close attention to the polls," Taranto lashed out at Media Matters, declaring "But if that's true [that Taranto was wrong], then we, being generally sympathetic to President Bush, are merely being fatuous, and Bush's opponents should be amused if not delighted. The Angry Left has no reason to be mad at us, but we guess anger is the only emotion the Angry Left knows."
In an on-air conversation with Media Matters president and CEO David Brock on September 21, Franken described the email exchange he initiated with Taranto asking him about his assertion on Hannity & Colmes:
FRANKEN: Now I emailed James Taranto.
BROCK: Is that right?
FRANKEN: Yeah, I got his email address from somebody.
BROCK: Great.
FRANKEN: And this is what I wrote. I wrote, "Hi, James. I have a radio show on Air America Radio, and something we do is check stuff that doesn't sound right to us."
BROCK: [Laughter]
FRANKEN: "Recently on Hannity & Colmes, you said, quote: 'I think we've already seen the poll numbers start to bounce back.' When Colmes asked, 'Where?,' you said, 'I've seen some polls in which the approval rating is almost as high as the disapproval.' We've had difficulty finding such polls. Could you direct us to them? Thank you, Al Franken."
BROCK: [Laughter]
FRANKEN: Now to James Taranto's --
KATHERINE LANPHER (co-host): Credit?
FRANKEN: -- credit -- to his credit, he emailed me back and wrote this. He said, "Dear Mr. Franken, It's possible that I was mistaken about this. Cheers."
BROCK: [Laughter]
FRANKEN: Now, here's the thing. Let's not punish a guy --
BROCK: Right.
FRANKEN: -- for getting back to me. Right?
BROCK: Sure. Absolutely.
FRANKEN: It was a very quick and forthright response.
BROCK: Right. And he's not being dishonest in his response.
FRANKEN: No. Now I -- and when I wrote him back, I was extremely careful to -- I just said, "Thank you for the quick and forthright response."
BROCK: Right.
FRANKEN: And I didn't say anything snarky.
BROCK: Sure.
FRANKEN: I didn't say like, "Oh, one other question: Why would you act like you're so certain" --
BROCK: Right.
FRANKEN: -- "about something that you clearly were mistaken about and had no basis for?" I didn't do that.
BROCK: Right.
FRANKEN: And you know why? You don't punish someone.
After admitting he's mistaken, Tarranto lashes out at Media Matters for pointing out his error. As always with the right, it's always about the other side. When Bush fails in responding to Katrina, the story is not about his failure, but about the left's finger pointing. When Tarranto gets a basic fact wrong, the story isn't how he did so, but that the left will be angry at him.
Tarranto, like the entire WSJ editorial board, is infamous for simply making things up. If this were Tarranto's only mistake, I could accept it as a simple error. But the WSJ editorial board is about as logical and honest as Rush Limbaugh.
"Angry Left" must be the latest Roveism. "Those meanies, they are so angry!" KR seems to saying to the sheep. Gosh darn it, they catch us at our lies, they're so angry!
Sheesh.
FROM: K. Rove
TO: All Media Outlets
SUBJECT: talking point adjectives
Until further notice, in association with "liberal", "liberals", "left", "lefties" or "Bush-haters", you are to use (in order of preference) the following adjectives: "angry", "loony", "finger-pointing" and/or "whacky"
Additionally, every third reference to liberals must contain the phrase "tax and spend."
""Angry Left" must be the latest Roveism."
=================
That particular, marginalizing turn-of-phrase may have started with the obnoxious Mark Hyman, of Sinclair Broadcasting's "The Point", back about 6-12 months ago.
How about the 'borrow and spend right'. It was just coined by me!
borrow, spend, and KILL !!!!
whoops, forgot one:
borrow, spend, KILL !!!!, and force women to be baby-making machines.
I'm a proud member of the angry left, actually; because I agree with Mike Malloy's opinion that "if you're not outraged (at Bushco) then your just not paying attention".
Funny, I thought peacetakescourage came up with that line.
PTC may very well have. I don't know the origin of that adage. All I know about it is that sometimes Kathy Malloy says that line as a lead in to the Mike Malloy show when it returns from a commerical break; and I think Mike has said that line on his show once or twice.
Rasmussen daily tracking poll:
App Dis 9/10 48% 51% 9/11 47% 52% 9/12 46% 53% 9/13 47% 52% 9/14 48% 50% 9/15 47% 52% 9/16 46% 52%
Sorry, folks, Taranto was right.
Actually, I think Taranto deserves to be given a little credit. He was big enough to admit that he's at least capable of making an error and potentially may have done so in this case, which is more than can be said for many others of his ilk. He may have done so grudgingly and been a bad sport about it -- but at least he made an effort. Whether or not it was really sincere remains to be seen. The biggest mistakes in life are the ones we choose not to learn from. If Taranto continues to be this lackadaisical in his research, he'll only have himself to blame if (or, more likely, when) he gets caught out again.
All but the O'Reilly bit (not familiar with that one) appear to be just someone stating their opinion. Sometimes predictions like that turn out to be right and sometimes they turn out to be wrong but its silly to expect every statement of opinion to cite a source isn't it?
aaronh2,
Taranto made an observation that polls were bouncing back for Bush. Colmes asked him which ones. That's why he needed a source. The polls he referenced were the sources, but they were non-existent.
This isn't a case of "it's just his opinion", he made a claim that turned out to be false. Whether he knowingly lied, or just wanted to believe it and was mistaken that he had seen it, which would make him delusional, is the question.
Barely acknowledging a mistake in an email to one person is hardly worthy of 'giving him credit for saying he was wrong'.
I seriously doubt he will go on any show and say: I made a mistake when I said that...of course not, therefore, no credit should be given to him.
Tarantos facts came from the same source Hannity and his friends usually get their facts from. The same source Dick Morris used when he opined that Bushs' ratings would soar after his Katrina speech. And the same source on the same Hannity "show" where a Republican Strategist,( a sadly funny oxymoron) said that by including "racism" in his speech it would be "good for a 5 point bump in his ratings" and the same source O'Reilly used when he said he had been "in combat" and the same source Rita Cosby now of MSNBC used when she gave an update on her ironically titled show "Live and Direct" of an elderly man who didn't want to leave his home, and when she went back and found he had passed away she said "maybe now THEY'LL learn their lesson", and finally but especially (R)Congressman Peter Kings' source when he blamed New Orleans Fire and Police Depts for not being as good as New Yorks'.
How does Taranto pass as a journalist, let alone the editor in chief of the online edition of the Wall Street Journal?
He based an entire on-air commentary about the criticism of Bush from the "Angry Left" being wrong on Bush's supposed poll numbers "bouncing back".
Now he admits he doesn't even keep up with the polls?
The right-wing media and their individual pundits are truly becoming laughable at this point.
They don't bother to check the facts because the facts are not important to them. The only important thing is how things can be spun in a way favorable to Bush and Republicans.
Were we supposed to be angry? I thought we were amused by his inability to make a point without telling a lie.
If that's the best they've got, then I'm happy.
Irony alert!!! Posters here are making sport of calling James Taranto a "liar" for not having poll data to back up his claims. I've yet to see any of you produce any poll data that refutes his original claim. It doesn't look like anyone here bothered checking the polls before denegrating Taranto for not checking the polls.
It turns out that Bush did receive a bump up in his approval ratings after his televised speech according to Rasmussen. Oops, looks like Taranto may have gotten this one right after all.
You mean this one?
[link to www.rasmussenreports.com]
No, this one. [link to www.rasmussenreports.com]
It shows that in the days following Bush's speech, his overall positives (strongly and somewhat combined) were nearly even with his negatives (strongly and somewhat combined) which was exactly Taranto's assertion on H&C.
The poll you cite is from *today.* How could Tarranto have been referencing that poll? Does he have a time machine?
Further, MMFA did document 5 polls that shows Bush's ratings slipping. If Tarranto got it right, as you claim, why did he concede a mistake? Is he too lazy to look up a Rasmussen poll, or was the poll not even in existence when Tarranto made his claim?
"The poll you cite is from *today.* How could Tarranto have been referencing that poll? Does he have a time machine?"
:)
I almost feel sorry for these right-wingers for having to find new and creative ways (i.e. misreading polls) to defend their lying leaders and pundits.
The poll you cite is from *today.* How could Tarranto have been referencing that poll? Does he have a time machine? ... Is he too lazy to look up a Rasmussen poll?
Yes, I'm too lazy to look it up, because the poster linked to a poll from the 16th. It is impossible for Tarranto to have referred to this poll, since the column was written before that.
I meant that the poster linked to a poll on the 22, not the 16th.
You mean Taranto saw into the future on September 16th, and was actually referring to a poll conducted today???
Interesting theory.
By the way, your poll shows the exact same numbers positive and negative percentage as the September 18th poll Sagra cited.
Where is the bounce???
You're also ignoring every other existing poll.
Oh I'm sorry. I thought an article titled Bush Katrina Ratings Fall After Speech might be relevant. My bad!
I'm delighted to know that Taranto backpedaled on his claim about Bush's poll numbers and that Media Matters and Al Franken made such an impact. However, I'd also like to point out that I posted about Taranto's suspect poll claim on Hannity & Colmes in the early hours of September 17, approximately 48 hours before Media Matters did. [link to www.newshounds.us]
Given that our blog receives an average of 20,000 visits a day, and given that in his latter column Taranto came close to quoting from my post (when he wrote that "Shortly thereafter, co-host Alan Colmes challenged this assertion,"), I think it's not unreasonable to hope that we may have contributed to the happy outcome as well.
Good point, Ellen. The Newshounds should definitely get more credit for their scoops.
Love the apology. "We're the WSJ were not concerned with the facts -- numbers, don't get really." One of the world's "leading business papers" and they aren't into figures. Yeah, I feel informed.
Of course one of their commercial claims its news is the most timely. The ability to see the future could support that claim. No, their full of crap w/ an agenda.
In his 22-September column, Taranto claimed that "we were right after all when we said, on 'Hannity & Colmes' last Friday, that there were some polls that showed President Bush's approval rating almost as high as his disapproval rating." (As if that were some kind of ringing endorsement.)
He cites Rasmussen Reports, which shows one "good" day for Bush in September, where he has a 50% Disapproval rating, which rose back to 54% in the following days. As of 23-September, that poll indicates 45% approval and 54% disapproval. The Gallup poll taken last weekend closely matches the Ipsos poll in indicating 40% approval and 58% disapproval.
In his claim of being inadvertently correct, Taranto fails to mention that his own source also states that:
* (As of 22-Sep) Fifty-two percent (52%) Disapprove, including 37% who strongly Disapprove.
* Just 35% of Americans now say that the President has done a good or an excellent job of responding to the Hurricane Katrina crisis. That's down from 39% before the (recovery plan) speech.
* Just 40% of Americans believe the U.S. and its allies are winning the War on Terror. Thirty-six percent (36%) say the terrorists are winning.
If Taranto's content is selective ignorance and false claims, he should rename his "Best of the Web Today" column in the interest of truth in advertising.