Pelosi didn't botch Israeli message to Syria; U.S. media did
In reports repeating false and baseless attacks on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-CA) recent trip to Syria, major media outlets continue to omit an important fact that undermines those attacks. According to a report Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz published before Pelosi's visit to Syria, the real message Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert asked Pelosi to deliver to Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad was that Israel has no plans to launch a pre-emptive military strike on Syria this summer. Three members of Pelosi's congressional delegation, including Pelosi herself, have since confirmed this was the message they received from Olmert. Yet outside of a single Associated Press report, major American news organizations have altogether ignored what appears to have been the essential element of Olmert's message, even as they reported a "clarification" by Olmert's office stating that Israel's policy toward Syria remained the same as it was before Pelosi's visit.
Before Pelosi had even returned to the United States, major media figures were issuing stinging criticism of her trip. The Washington Post editorial board opened the flood gates with an April 5 editorial titled "Pratfall in Damascus," which declared that Pelosi had "misrepresent[ed]" a message from Olmert to Assad. As evidence, the Post pointed to Pelosi's remark at an April 4 press conference that she had "communicate[d] a message from Prime Minister Olmert that Israel was ready to engage in peace talks," and an April 4 statement of "clarification" by Olmert's office that stated, "What was communicated to the U.S. House Speaker does not contain any change in the policies of Israel." Media figures representing other major news organizations such as CNN and Newsweek quickly echoed the Post, suggesting that Pelosi had "fumbled" Olmert's message and made "rookie mistakes" during her Syria trip.
The allegations that Pelosi distorted Olmert's message rest entirely on the premise that Pelosi failed to deliver the preconditions Israel has long set for negotiations with Syria -- that the Syrians end their support for Hamas and Hezbollah, two groups deemed terrorist entities by the Israeli government. Both Pelosi and the rest of her bipartisan seven-member delegation have disputed that charge, as Media Matters has noted. But more to the point, media outlets that have accused Pelosi of misrepresenting Israel's message ignore an essential fact: As blogger Joshua Micah Marshall detailed in an April 8 entry for the weblog TalkingPointsMemo.com, before Pelosi had arrived in Syria, Ha'aretz reported on April 3 that Israel had instructed Pelosi to deliver "a message of calm" to the Syrians, in order to avert "the possibility of a Syrian attack on the Golan Heights that will start as a result of a 'miscalculation' on the part of the Syrians, who may assume that Israel intends to attack them." From Ha'aretz:
Israel's political and military leadership has been preparing in recent weeks for the possibility of a Syrian attack on the Golan Heights that will start as a result of a "miscalculation" on the part of the Syrians, who may assume that Israel intends to attack them.
Israel, however, has delivered a calming message, and has no plans to attack its northern neighbor.
According to information Israel received, the Syrians are concerned that the United States will carry out an attack against Iran's nuclear installations in the summer, and in parallel Israel would strike Syria and Lebanon.
[...]
The speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, is scheduled to meet with Syrian President Bashar Assad in Damascus today, and will deliver a message of calm from Israel.
"We hope the message will be understood," political sources in Israel said yesterday. "The question is whether Assad is looking for an excuse ... so that he can carry out an attack against Israel in the summer, or whether this is a mistaken assessment."
Nonetheless, apart from an April 8 report by the Associated Press and an April 11 article in California's San Mateo County Times, U.S. print and television outlets have completely ignored the Ha'aretz report (again, published before the Pelosi meeting and press conference) that Israel sought to have the delegation deliver a "message of calm," even though at least three members of the delegation -- Pelosi, Rep. Tom Lantos (D-CA), and Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) -- upon returning from Syria, repeated that this was the message that Israel had wanted delivered:
- During an interview with National Public Radio host Robert Siegel on the April 6 broadcast of NPR's All Things Considered, Pelosi stated that the "thrust" of the message she received from Olmert was that "we are not preparing for war -- that was the important part of it -- we are not preparing for war":
SIEGEL: [A]ccording to the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz the other day, the statement from the prime minister's office, from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office, said that Olmert had told Pelosi that Israel continued to regard Syria, quote, "as part of the axis of evil and a party encouraging terrorism in the entire Middle East." If I heard you, you didn't -- you don't recall him saying that in you conversation.
PELOSI: No. What he told us was that the thrust of his statement is that Israel is prepared to go to the negotiating table; we are not preparing for war -- that was the important part of it -- we are not preparing for war; we're prepared to go to negotiation when Syria takes steps to stop its support of Hamas and Hezbollah.
SIEGEL: And you say that's what you told Syrian President Assad?
PELOSI: Well, not only just I; Tom Lantos, Henry Waxman, two strong supporters of Israel who -- we had made a very direct message to the president on that score.
- In an April 8 article (also flagged by Marshall on Talking Points Memo) for the Jewish Telgraphic Agency, a Jewish news service, reporter Ron Kampeas wrote that Lantos said Israel instructed the delegation to convey the "routine message" that it would negotiate with Syria, if Syria ceased supporting terrorism, in order to signal that "Israel was not in an aggressive posture":
Delegation members suggested that after the meeting with Olmert, they were left wondering why Olmert was eager to convey such a routine message -- that Israel would talk peace if Syria ended its backing for terrorism.
The answer, Lantos said, suggested itself the morning after, when Israeli papers said Olmert was concerned that Assad was gearing up for a summer war based on the misconception that Israel was ready to attack in concert with a U.S. strike on Iran. Olmert had no such intentions.
The leaks to the papers suggested that Olmert's message was less one of new content than of timing. By conveying a peaceful message, Olmert wanted to make sure Assad understood that Israel was not in an aggressive posture.
- An April 8 Associated Press article reported Ellison's assertion that Olmert "very clearly said he was worried that Syria might misinterpret some things that were happening in Israel, and he didn't want to end up in an accidental war with them. ... So he told us to tell them that he was not planning to attack them."
Speaker Pelosi
Been attacked so far more than any other speaker of the house in Americas history. The MSM has done everything it can to hurt her despite the great job she has done. All because she is a women.
And I don't imagine the information in the item above is getting out at anywhere near the speed of the "Damascus Diva" media stories did.
Gotta give them credit, the conservative media can force their opponents to spend so much time on damage control it's hard to even get around to the truth.
neo-cons just love the lie, any lie
Yeah, why is the NYT and La Times attcking Pelosi like this. I do not at all understand.
You dont understand? What a shocking update, notify CNN. Actually get back to us when you finally DO understand something
I think that poster has been in a coma for the last dozen years or so.
I think that poster may be a Perl script...
Your selective memory and cognitive skills need glasses.
You forget Newt? He was in power a lot longer and it can be safely said he was attacked far more than Pelosi. Give her time and she might break his record.
Your second point about Pelosi being a woman is true.. the rest smacks of sexism.. which I believe is a liberal no-no.
AA, but do you defend their attack or will you condem it as lies?
Not as I remember Newt-the-liar: where were the front-page stories on his sexual escapades while he supplied torches and led the peasants in the "Hunt for Clenis"? Where was the analysis of the so-called "Contract With America" - either the false content, or the failure to perform as contracted? Where was the critical media sensationalism during that infamous "Budget showdown"?
Gee, my memory insists that Newt-the-liar got pretty much a pass from the Corporate Media, with rare exceptions, during his "service" as Speaker.
He was in power a lot longer and it can be safely said he was attacked far more than Pelosi.
I would love to see any evidence of this.
Anything at all will do.
Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?
A recent poll shows her fav ratings to be 53% so thankfully the republican misinformation machine is slowing down.
Doris, I don't think Nancy Pelosi is so fragile that she can't get over this. Hell, even the media has moved on. And I don't think she didn't realized that with a concerted and highly organized conservative propaganda machine and a compliant press (who respects their bottom line more than any individual, even someone like Pelosi who, supposedly, through her position, should deserve some respect. Like the type BushieCo still gets.).
Lets hope that some truth finally trumps this stuff. I wouldn't hold my breath.
Doris..., AND a Democrat. They are taking the same route they've taken for the past 6, or more, years and that is do anything to make a good thing seem bad. Childish as it is it works more often than not. Wanna read something that sheds a little light on the subject? Check this out.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0704/S00200.htm
It's kind of long but it certainly is an eye-opener...
Oh, gosh! Corporate Media lied to us again! What will we do now?
How about a little MORA? (Your way - with or without Fairness Doctrine, Hinchley's upper limit on reach, or mine [25%] - however you like it)
Please pass the Kool Aid. I am taking MMFA's word over every other news agency.... I have come to believe Doris and the following quotes must be attacks simply because Pelosi is a woman. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi delivered the wrong message to Syrian President Bashar Assad from Israel, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office said."We were very pleased with the reassurances we received from the president [Assad] that he was ready to resume the peace process. He was ready to engage in negotiations for peace with Israel," Pelosi said.The meeting with Assad "enabled us to communicate a message from Prime Minister Olmert that Israel was ready to engage in peace talks as well," she said.But the prime minister's office denied that Olmert had asked her to communicate such a message in a "clarification" statement issued on Wednesday evening.During the meeting between Pelosi and Olmert, the prime minister said that a number of members of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives had visited Damascus recently and had "received the impression that despite the declarations of Bashar Assad, there is no change in the position of his country regarding a possible peace process with Israel."The Israeli daily Ha'aretz quoted unnamed sources in the prime minister's office as saying that Pelosi had taken "part of the things that were said in the meeting, and used what suited her."Pelosi also drew fire from Washington for saying that the "the road to Damascus is a road to peace."Gordon Johndroe, spokesman for the Bush's national security advisor, said that that road unfortunately "is lined with the victims of Hamas and Hizballah, the victims of terrorists who cross from Syria into Iraq."Johndroe called the trip "counterproductive."President Bush, whose administration is trying to isolate Syria, said that meeting with Assad delivered "mixed messages" since it is a terror-sponsoring regime.
Yep, those quotes from Olmert, Johndro, and Bush must be made up just to make Pelosi look bad.
Uh.. Mistah, I'd like more of that cherry picking Kool Aid you passed around please.
You've already had too much kool-aid otherwise you would realize the simple fact that Ha'aretz IS a newsource and that Olmert HIMSELF said that what Pelosi communicated indicated no change in Israeli policy. What part of WHAT PELOSI COMMUNICATED INDICATED NO CHANGE IN ISRAELI POLICY are you congenitally incapable of understanding? If you ever get the opportunity to see through your delusional fantasies you might eventually make a point that hasnt already been shown to be complete garbage.
Down boy! Back! Back!
I don't quite understand your frothing at the mouth like this but I am not surprised.
Please tell me where in the quotes I gave above or the one's below where the media, by quoting Olmert and his cabinet members directly are getting the story wrong?
"We were very pleased with the reassurances we received from the president [Assad] that he was ready to resume the peace process. He was ready to engage in negotiations for peace with Israel," Pelosi said.The meeting with Assad "enabled us to communicate a message from Prime Minister Olmert that Israel was ready to engage in peace talks as well," she said.
But the prime minister's office denied that Olmert had asked her to communicate such a message in a "clarification" statement issued on Wednesday evening.
"The Israeli daily Ha'aretz quoted unnamed sources in the prime minister's office as saying that Pelosi had taken "part of the things that were said in the meeting, and used what suited her.
Now which quotes are you going to believe? The story that 99% of the press is reporting or MMFA's version? Hahahaha.. that was rhetorical. Try the grape!
Lucky for us 99% of the press has never been wrong about anything except those minor issues like WMDs in Iraq.
I sense some conflating here.. Oh well.. Thanks for chiming in. :-)
conflating?
don't use big words you don't understand.
I continually enjoy the high level of discourse offered me by my learned ideological opponents.
I love it.
YOU say something completely asinine.
I respond in kind (because I choose not to dignify your insipid comments with further discussion), and I'M the one lowering the level of discourse.
You are troll defined. Run along and play somewhere else.
Oh you mean the part where she DIDNT reiterate Israels position that Syria stop supporting Hezbollah and Hamas? The assertion that EVERYONE AT THE MEETING DISPUTED? Ya got nothing. The difference is between vague criticisms and specific denials. The fact Olmert is distancing himself from talking to Syria is hardly suprising considering his rightwing Likud base but what he SPECIFICALLY SAID didnt indict anything Pelosi did only in his vague criticisms did he do so. You just WANT Pelosi to have done something wrong. You have done NOTHING to show she did.
What you post is wrong because you are stating interpretation as fact:
>>But the prime minister's office denied that Olmert had asked her to communicate such a message in a "clarification" statement issued on Wednesday evening.
Olmert never said "Pelosi said things that did not agree with my message." You won't find that. He issued a clarification, stating that there is no change is Israel's stance on negotiations. But Pelosi never said there was.
If one doesn't read what you posted carefully, then one gets the ipression that Pelosi bungled the message. But your source doesn't show this.
Thank you funnypants that is exactly what I was getting at and said poorly. Your post got it exactly right.
something about reading comprehension just escapes Bungle and the Bungleoids: all three members of Pelosi's group confirm the message that was received from Olmert, and delivered to Assad, was intact and complete. Your conception of doing exactly what you say you will do, then saying exactly what you did, must have been destroyed during the many years of Bungle lying, and the Corporate Media lying, to make black appear white.
Conley,
Which three members do you suppose those would be? Uh huh.... Pelosi, Lantos and another Dem. See a self serving pattern here?
No of course you don't.
You and Solon don't realize that MMFA is trying to tilt the argument. They are not denying the quotes that came from Olmert, Johndro, and Bush. They are simply adding another message to the one Pelosi made up.
When you get a minute, will you link the transcripts of what the esteemed Secretary of House Pelosi actually said to Assad?
It's another case of "PELOSI LIED, OLMERT DENIED!" Think I'll hire the usual suspects, placard holders put Osama charicatures on them, and send them to picket outside the Pelosi's office just to rattle my friend Solon.
Show me very clearly where Peolosi contradicts what Olmert said. I want an explicit quote of what Olmert said and what Peolosi said, not a cut and paste job that shows something else.
Had Dave Hobson felt the message had been "bungled", he certainly could have said so: he was there, too. In fact, what he did say about the visit was quite enlightening:
'U.S. Rep. Dave Hobson, the only Republican to accompany the Democratic speaker, said Pelosi "did not engage in any bashing of Bush in any meeting I was in and she did not in any meeting I was in bash the policies as it relates to Syria." '
More: the very notion of Pelosi having "bungled" the message is belied by the statements of the entire 7-member delegation, including Hobson, which one finds by hitting the link that MMFA provided in the text of the article (as punishment, I provided not the link to the statement itself, but rather a link to the article that originally debunked your entire argument here.)
I confess *I* did indeed ignore the quotations from Bungle - his statements are best applied as a contra-indicator for truth - ort of like a test for presence or absence of an antigen. I also chose to ignore Johndro: he gains a lot of credibility from his association with Bungle - but not enough that I could ever believe anything he said, sadly.
As to Olmert's "quotes", I have been a lot more successful finding quotations of something released by someone unidentified "in Olmert's Office." Again, if not the man himself, I suppose I would give "his Office" sufficient credibility to assess what was said. Turns out neither he NOR his office criticise the Speaker; nor her delivery of the message; rather, he merely clarified that no significant change was represented by that message.
Anyway, all these charges that Pelosi "bungled" (or fumbled) the message present a legal conundrum: Can Bungle win a suit claiming that Pelosi infringed on his copyright, when in fact the perceived infringement remains fictional?
Wrong as usual. MMFA isnt trying to tilt the message. Olmert and much of the press are SPINNING what happened. YOU want your spin accepted as the reality or its tilting. The only tilting going on around here is YOU tilting at windmills. If you are going to call Pelosi and the others who were there liars then back that up since Olmert NEVER made that accusation. So many conservatives so few brain cells. Try discerning what was SAID not what you WISH it could be INTERPRETED as.
What makes this so hilarious is that Rush Limbaugh will today refer at least 10 times to the "Drive-By" Liberal media, and how they mindlessly support Democrats. It is one of the biggest lies he has crammed into the empty skulls of his listeners over the last 15 years.
He's not the only one. Not by a long shot.
The myth of the "liberal media" has reached far and wide. Not a shred of evidence to back it up, mind you. Nothing.
But swallow it they do.
Not one shred....
http://newsbusters.org/node/12092
We were talking about far and wide in the reality based universe. Planet Wingnut remains outside of the reach of factual reality. Taking either case of the difference between how the press treated Chimpy McShortbus and Gore or the runup to the war alone refutes any specious claim to a liberal media bias to anyone who is in ANYWAY vulnerable to truth or reality.
Feel free to search this site for numerous examples to balance out your ONE from "Newsbusters".
I made no claim that the liberal message never makes it into the mainstream press. But to claim (as wingnuts do) that the liberal message dominates the airwaves?
Even an Olympic gymnast would find such a stretch difficult.
the liberal message dominates the airwaves
Ah, the game!
You said:
The myth of the "liberal media" has reached far and wide. Not a shred of evidence to back it up, mind you. Nothing.
I disproved that by providing testimony of a former insider about liberal interest group influence over the NYT. So now you want to talk about the airwaves--typical.
The Media Research Corporation, mrc.org, has been documenting liberal bias since 1987. Check their summaries. MMFA, in contrast, has been in business since 2004.
And where was Judith Miller getting her information from? I don't like people pushing stories either but it's not exactly "bias" if they let both sides do it.
Sorry, but this "liberal" woman is claiming that people like Imus and Lieberman (!) are being opposed because they speak "the truth". That comment is so bizarrely delusional that it's difficult to take what she's saying seriously.
I, personally, have been to the MRC many times. I've analyzed their daily garbage more than once here. Many of us would be glad to argue the merits of their material anytime, regardless of how long Scaife has been financing them.
I think " self-proclaimed liberal Tammy Bruce" is all one needs to take from that link.
Omigawd, you've convinced me. All these years I thought it was the conservatives who controlled the media services. I really do need to pay closer attention to Faux News. Who could possibly be more trustworthy than Bill and Sean? I SEE THE LIGHT!
I doubt Syria will believe any message of peace from an establishment American or Israeli politician. They know how the Zionazis define "peace". It usually involves lots of dead arabs.
Media's Senseless Agenda
The media is in need of a serious overhaul.
News as taken a serious "hit" to the quality of their objective, reporting and fairness. Since the Fox news success with conservative audiences, CNN and MSNBC as actively positioned themselves to compete with the big money Fox enjoys. This is a fact not an opinion.
The unfairness associated with media's move to the right is the left has no equal dynamic to counter the now flooded cheep formate right-wing news generates. Even CSPAN practices a right-wing formate on their Washington Journal. CSPAN is in so much denial about their move to the right, and as a result, they tend to play patriotism to concept of fairness.
So, when you get the feeling the news host or commentator is being unfair, he/she probably is. Actually, the arrogance that accompanies the conservative formats is insulting to one's intelligence. CSPAN's call in structure is set up to give the impression the country is split down the middle on all conservative vs liberal debate issues. They have one line for the right, one line for the left, and one line for the independent. About 70% percent of their guest are conservative. They often make a request for conservative callers only without doing the same for the left at an equal rate.
When you hear the right claiming we live in a left-wing bias news monopoly, it's not true. They call the right wing claim "playing the ref."
For the left, the fight to regain balance is not just in the executive branch of government. It is the media routed strongly, so they have their work "cut out" for them to even the political play field.