CNN, NY Times quote McCain attacking Obama over vote ratings, but don't report that McCain missed too many votes to draw score
SUMMARY: CNN's Kiran Chetry aired and The New York Times quoted Sen. John McCain's statement that "[i]t's not an accident [Sen. Barack Obama] has, I think, according to the National Journal, the most liberal voting record in the United States Senate. I have one of the most conservative," but neither mentioned that the Journal's ratings did not include McCain because he "did not vote frequently enough in 2007 to draw a composite score."
During the February 14 edition of CNN's American Morning, anchor Kiran Chetry aired a video clip of Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain (AZ) saying of Democratic candidate Sen. Barack Obama (IL): "It's not an accident he has, I think, according to the National Journal, the most liberal voting record in the United States Senate. I have one of the most conservative." But after airing McCain's assertion that he has "one of the most conservative" voting records in the Senate, Chetry did not mention that the Journal's 2007 vote ratings, which ranked Obama "the most liberal senator in 2007," did not include McCain, because, the Journal said, "[McCain] did not vote frequently enough in 2007 to draw a composite score." Similarly, a February 13 New York Times article repeated McCain's assertion without noting that he missed too many Senate votes to garner a score. As Media Matters for America previously documented, numerous media outlets have reported Obama's Journal's ranking without noting that McCain missed too many votes to be rated, or that the Journal admitted a flaw in the publication's previous rating of then-Democratic presidential front-runner Sen. John Kerry (MA) as the "most liberal senator" in 2003.
McCain made his statement regarding the Journal's vote ratings during a February 13 press conference:
McCAIN: There's going to come a time where we have to get into specifics, and I've not observed every speech that he's given, obviously, but they are singularly lacking in specifics. And that's when, as the campaign moves forward, we will be portraying very stark differences. It's not an accident that he has, I think, according to the National Journal, the most liberal voting record in the United States Senate. I have one of the most conservative.
In rating Obama "the most liberal senator in 2007," the Journal's results differ with those of a highly respected study by political science professors Keith Poole and Jeff Lewis that ranked Obama as tied with Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) as the 10th "most liberal" senator in 2007. Moreover, as Media Matters previously documented, among the votes Obama took that purportedly earned him "the most liberal senator" label were: to implement the 9-11 Commission's homeland security recommendations, provide more children with health insurance, expand federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research, and maintain a federal minimum wage.
Touting the Journal's 2007 Senate ratings, the National Journal Group recently highlighted the fact that, in 2003 (subscription required), the Journal rated Kerry "the "most liberal senator," writing in an email to readers: "In 2004, President Bush invoked Senator John Kerry's liberal Vote Ratings score repeatedly on the campaign trail and at their head-to-head debates." However, the Journal has acknowledged the methodology it used to produce its Kerry "most liberal" rating -- which it continues to tout -- was flawed, and the magazine is now using a new methodology. In fact, the magazine said that it is because it changed its flawed methodology that McCain -- and other members who "missed more than half of the votes in any of the three issue categories" -- did not "receive a composite score" in the 2007 ratings. The Journal specifically noted: "This rule was imposed after Kerry was ranked the most liberal senator in our 2003 ratings despite having missed more than half of the votes in two categories."
From the National Journal's "2007 Vote Ratings":
Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., was the most liberal senator in 2007, according to National Journal's 27th annual vote ratings. The insurgent presidential candidate shifted further to the left last year in the run-up to the primaries, after ranking as the 16th- and 10th-most-liberal during his first two years in the Senate.
[...]
Members who missed more than half of the votes in any of the three issue categories did not receive a composite score in NJ's ratings. (This rule was imposed after Kerry was ranked the most liberal senator in our 2003 ratings [subscription required] despite having missed more than half of the votes in two categories.) Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the only other senator whose presidential candidacy survived the initial round of primaries and caucuses this year, did not vote frequently enough in 2007 to draw a composite score. He missed more than half of the votes in both the economic and foreign-policy categories. On social issues, which include immigration, McCain received a conservative score of 59. (McCain's composite scores from his prior years in the Senate, published in our March 2007 vote ratings issue, are available as a PDF.)
From the February 13 New York Times article:
Responding to a question about Mr. Obama's campaign so far, Mr. McCain said that the Illinois Democrat's speeches have been "singularly lacking in specifics" and noted that Mr. Obama was recently rated the most liberal Senator by National Journal.
"I respect him and the campaign that he has run," Mr. McCain said of Mr. Obama, after a question about his decision to focus on Mr. Obama and his message of hope in his victory speech on Tuesday night. "But there is going to come a time when we have to get into specifics, and I've not observed every speech that he's given, obviously, but they are singularly lacking in specifics."
"It's not an accident that he has, I think, according to National Journal, the most liberal voting record in the United States Senate," he said. "I have one of the most conservative."
Speaking before a crowd at a Wisconsin auto plant, Senator Obama delivered a blistering critique of his Democratic and Republican rivals on Wednesday, blaming Washington for the economic crisis that has gripped the nation.
From the February 14 edition of CNN's American Morning:
CHETRY: Well, Barack Obama for his part seems to be focusing less on the Democratic race with Hillary Clinton in the primary and more on a November battle with the likely Republican nominee, John McCain. Obama blasted McCain while campaigning in Wisconsin, calling him a George Bush Republican on the war and the economy.
OBAMA [video clip]: George Bush may not be on the ballot this fall, but his tax cut and economic policies are. And if John McCain wants to debate the specifics of how well the economy has worked for ordinary families over the last seven years, that is a debate that I am happy to have, because the American people know that Bush's policies have not worked for ordinary Americans.
CHETRY: John McCain fired back -- slamming Barack Obama, calling his campaign for change more style than substance.
McCAIN [video clip]: There's going to come a time where we have to get into specifics, and I've not observed every speech that he's given, obviously, but they are singularly lacking in specifics. And that's when, as the campaign moves forward, we will be portraying very stark differences. It's not an accident that he has, I think, according to the National Journal, the most liberal voting record in the United States Senate. I have one of the most conservative.
CHETRY: McCain's comments are the most pointed attack against Obama to date. Meanwhile, McCain's son Jim is back from Iraq. He served seven months there, arriving home Monday, along with 300 other Marines.
OBAMA=LIBERAL
McCAIN=CONSERVATIVE
Okay, FOX, we get your point. Maybe you can just superimpose those appellations on pictures of the candidates instead of wasting time saying it so much. Of course, truth doesn't matter. That's why you're FOX News.
As often a member of the WITH patrol, I have rarely, if ever, see it applied to threads such as these. Reporters and journalists should absolutely be fair, all-inclusive, and comprehensive in their reporting on events. Objectivety is important.
Where WITH comes in is generally how it pertains to opinionators and commentators giving their opinions and their commentary, which is subjective and is entirely different.
Tommy, objectivity is only important IN THIS COUNTRY. Our national media is quite rapidly turning into the models of Great Britain or Ireland. There, you have 5 or 6 magazines in one single town, and each one never claims to be objective, but pushes its own agenda that is usually paired with a party in the government.
It's fine if a news organization does not claim to be objective, as long as they are up-front about it.
DB, I am not sure what your post has to do with mine, am I missing something here?
What I said was the WITH posting is rarely used when it comes to real misinformation or omission by reporters or journalists - but rather used when it comes to commentators and pundits, where they are offering their opinions, not reporting, but commenting - big difference.
"Objectivety is important." -Tommy
I was just trying to show you why that's not necessarily so.
I agree Dex. When liberals say, "No, I am not the most liberal", they are essentially acting as if that is an insult, a deragatory term that they feel compelled to fight against, instead of embrace and be proud of. If someone says "You have the most integrity", you would never see anyone try and run from that?
Liberals, including Obama, need to stop acting as if it's a curse, or a bad word. As I said, embrace it, this would neutralize the negative effect this labeling is having and render it not nearly as potent.
Col, The point is is that as long as liberals run from the label, or don't fully embrace it as a positive attribute, the right will continue to bash them in the head with it. What do you expect them to do? If liberals cannot adequately define what it means to be a liberal, then the rightwing will do it for them. Don't blame the right for doing it if the left is unwilling to step up to the plate and go to bat for its proper definition.
You can whine all you want how the right has done the liberals wrong in their redefinition of the word, but ulitmately it's the liberals responsibility to set the record straight then, is it not?
Not only that, but look at this website alone. I don't believe they use the word "liberal" to describe them in any fashion, it's always "progressive". Why is that?
Liberals are often accused of not really wanting anyone to know what they really believe, running away from a very real descriptor of their views and positions hardly helps dispell that notion.
As has been pointed out, regressives have done an excellent job of tainting the word "liberal." Own that success, Tommy. Your side was great at organizing and the co-opting the media and pushing the same message out there, consistently droning on that liberal is bad. Now we're just supposed to pretend that didn't happen?
Progressive happens to be a term that has been used for a long time to refer to liberals.
As for your conservative advice on how liberals should act and think, eh, no thanks. You're great at getting people to listen to your message, but you conservatives have screwed this country up horribly the last seven years, and seriously damaged the civility in Washington since 1994. We've had enough of your advice.
If you're ashamed to be called a liberal so you call yourself a progressive instead, that is your business. It's too bad you don't have the pride in that term that many on this website have, they aren't as petrified of it's implications as you are.
Not only that, but you constantly use the term regressive - hey, if you want to call me that, if it feed your sense of superiority, by all means do so.
But you whine about your plight as a progressive against the mean rightwing, day in and day out. It's all you've really got, apparently.
Apparently, nobody on here has read the fantastic study displayed prominently on the MMFA homepage entitled "Conservative America is a Myth". We all know that liberals are smarter and more informed than there conservative knuckledragger counterparts. It's really not a fair fight.
Really, all the knuckledraggers have is to sit back and call liberals what they are, liberals. As if that's degrading since Conservative America is a myth anyway and being a liberal is where it's at. That strategy of namecalling couldn't possibly work since there are far more liberals than there are conservatives, and liberals are smarter, and well, they just wouldn't fall for it.
So somebody explain to me why Republicans have won 7 of the past 10 Presidential elections in this mythical Conservative America where liberals can outhink, outwit and outlast the knuckledraggers. This conservative wants to know.
Tommy and Dex, I think you're both missing the point.
Nobody is running away from the word "liberal".
Nobody is "whining".
It's a perfectly good word that describes many things that our country was founded on and what our country aspires to at its best.
Those who don't like the liberal aspects of America have tried to demonize the word.
That will be pointed out.
I won't insult either one of you by accepting that you don't understand that this effort has been going on.I also refuse to believe that either of you believe that it's a magical coincidence that the last few Dem. candidates have been named "most liberal" by a source who admits their publicity-seeking motives in doing so.
Any further postings of "I don't understand why liberal is a dirty word/ not embraced" will be considered willful ignorance /playing stoopid/working very hard at missing the point.
Col,
Apparently you are the one having trouble grasping the point. Nobody is denying that the right uses it as a club at every turn, I believe I said that enough already.
The point is if you want it to stop it is up to you, the liberals that it is being directed at. The right will NEVER stop as long as you refuse to embrace it. If you don't want to do that, then stop your whining about it's use as a negative.
That is the point, pretty simple.
Sorry, Tommy, it's not up to me to stop other people from lying. I can only point out that they're lying. I'm not running from a true definition, I'm not whining, I'm only pointing out what you admit is true; The right has tried to denigrate the word "liberal".
You really don't make much sense here. On the one hand you're saying that it's liberals who are entirely responsible for defending a word, but when wedefend it by pointing out that this word is being purposefully twisted, you accuse us of running from it and whining.
Simpler: I am not responsible for Rush Limbaugh's actions.
Tommy, you could not be more wrong.
The right has been using the term "liberal" to tar and feather people for years. You claim that to embrace the name would take the power from the right. It will not.
The right will just puff themselves up and say "see, I told you they werre liberals". Then they'd use it against the candidate.
The word is spoiled and has to be set aside. As is the word, conservative.
We need to become Americans again and stop the name calling.
Ben Franklin said something to the effect that we all need to hang together or we will surely hang separately.
Worrier,
That is a cop out. There is nothing wrong with liberal or conservative as definitive terms for anyone. Just because they have been misused politically to skewer one's opponent, unfairly, is no reason to stop using them.
Why is that many posters here embrace the word and call themselves liberals very proudly? Are they more liberal than you? Are they being stupid by caving into those that have manipulated the word for political gain? Why don't you ask them.
I admire them for their stick-to-it-ive-ness when it comes to not being so wishy washy in how they are labeled. They are unapologetic liberals and proud of it, they aren't ashamed of the word just because some others misuse it.
I do agree with you that we are all Americans and one is no more American than the other - despite many on the right that make that silly claim against the left, well, they will keep doing so for political gain, I am not that naive to think if they don't have the term liberal, they will find another........but why should the left give up that term without a fight, I would hope they would feel that way, anyway.
nobody is saying that "liberal" is a dirty word. There has just been a lot of work put into trying to make it one
Yeah like starting with Archie Bunker ;-)
Hehehe.
What do you want dingbat?
;-)
Col Sanders, I'm on your side here so don't get all whacko on me.
Actually Archie Bunker calling his son-in-law Mike a Liberal Pinko Commie probably did do some damage.
BTW I love your chicken.
Tommy, you don't consider yourself a liberal so you don't get a vote... ;>)
In fact, Tommy, that is exactly the point. I don't like to be called a liberal because the term has now been defined by someone else who is hostile to my beliefs. In modern times conservatives have redefined conservatism and liberalism to suit their political purposes. In the public mind liberalism has now taken on the connotation of a form of extremism. It is not. For example, Rush Limbaugh apparently defines liberalism, which he considers evil, as any belief that does not comport with his ultra right wing views. I don't want to be defined by Rush Limbaugh or any other right wing extremist. Words take on different meanings and meanings can change through common usage. The word liberal has been wrongly but effectively demonized. I want to put it to rest.
Tommy, you don't consider yourself a liberal so you don't get a vote... ;>)
In fact, Tommy, that is exactly the point. I don't like to be called a liberal because the term has now been defined by someone else who is hostile to my beliefs. In modern times conservatives have redefined conservatism and liberalism to suit their political purposes. In the public mind liberalism has now taken on the connotation of a form of extremism. It is not. For example, Rush Limbaugh apparently defines liberalism, which he considers evil, as any belief that does not comport with his ultra right wing views. I don't want to be defined by Rush Limbaugh or any other right wing extremist. Words take on different meanings and meanings can change through common usage. The word liberal has been wrongly but effectively demonized. I want to put it to rest.
So you define yourself by what Rush Limbaugh says? Who cares what he calls you? I would think that alone would embolden you into defending it and proudly wearing that label, if for no other reason than it would get under his skin.
The reason he keeps using it is because many of you keep running from it, he'll never let up. The way for it to stop is to stop running.
The way for it to stop is to stop running.
Actually, the way to end the name calling by guys like Rush, Newt, and Bush is for Rush, Newt, and Bush to stop calling people names, and to stop mischaracterizing their opponents.
DEX: "...isn't the overall theme of this and other articles by MMfA 'we don't like that Obama is being labled very liberal?'"
I believe the theme to be: Why is Obama's voting record newsworthy, while McCain's voting record is not? This, in turn, goes straight to the heart of the "liberal media" myth.
Only 3 little letters have stopped the "conservatives" from having the same problem as liberals. Those letters? NEO.
If the crop of incompetent failures that have spent all of the millenium thus far damaging this country nearly beyond recognition were known simply as "Conservaitves" instead of being called "Neo-Conservatives" there would be a massive pilgrimage of Republicans looking to divorce themselves from the label.
And there's the problem. Apparently only conservatism is allowed to have variances within its ideaology. By modern political terminology there is no difference between the right leaning moderate liberalism of the Clintons and the DLC, the more populist progressivism of people like Gore and Edwards and outright crazy eyed communism straight out of Marx as well as a large variety of ideas between all those levels. THIS is why so many people don't like to use the label "liberal" for themselves. It's too easy for wingnut pinheads to use it to paint us as America hating Commies who want to destroy your freedoms, take away your jobs and make you live on a farm without toilet paper.
Don't believe me? Wait until the trolls start posting like mad and try telling me that these people haven't been poisoned by this perversion of the term "liberal." Or look at all the square heads calling McCain a "liberal" when he is really just a former centrist Republican who has started speaking Conservative code.
So somebody explain to me why Republicans have won 7 of the past 10 Presidential elections in this mythical Conservative America where liberals can outhink, outwit and outlast the knuckledraggers. This conservative wants to know.
One reason, Bruce, is that this corporate conservative Republican Party controlled news media shows blatant favoritism to the Republicans. This corporate conservative Republican Party controlled news media showed MONUMENTAL favoritism to Bush in BOTH the 2000 and 2004 elections. In 2000, as The Daily Howler http://www.dailyhowler.com reported, the conservative media favored Bush BEFORE the 2000 election even started!
A second reason, Bruce, is that there are hideous sprinkling of enabling tank jobber Democratic leaders and/or tank jobbing Dem strategists who have the habitual need to want to throw presidential elections in the tank whenever the Dems have even the most minimal chance of winning.
Col,
Apparently you are the one having trouble grasping the point. Nobody is denying that the right uses it as a club at every turn, I believe I said that enough already.
The point is if you want it to stop it is up to you, the liberals that it is being directed at. The right will NEVER stop as long as you refuse to embrace it. If you don't want to do that, then stop your whining about it's use as a negative.
That is the point, pretty simple.
Tommy, you are making a disingeuous point, and you know it.
The lying right will NEVER stop demonizing & lying about what liberal means, whether liberals embrace the word or not. The lying right has LYING and DEMONIZATION both within their rotten cores!
We object to the constant LYING by the lying right wing conservatives about the definition of liberalism, and the fact that sprinklings of some liberals would rather cave in to these packs of lying criminal sociopathic conservative dogs than fight back and tell the truth.
Reverse this around, with lierabls demonizing conservatives as theocrats, corporatists, fascists, homophobes, racists, sociopaths, white supremacists, etc., and the conservatives would pop a trillion gaskets over how they claim they are being lied about! Mike Malloy has called these conservatives all these things and worse!