AP, Wash. Post fail to report ties between Swift Boat Vets, ad attacking Obama
SUMMARY: The Associated Press and The Washington Post quoted a spokesman for the American Issues Project, which has produced an ad attacking Sen. Barack Obama, without mentioning that he was employed in 2004 by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group that led a smear campaign against Sen. John Kerry in the 2004 election.
Reporting on an ad by the American Issues Project (AIP) attacking Sen. Barack Obama for his association with William Ayers, the Associated Press and The Washington Post quoted the group's spokesman in August 21 articles without mentioning that he was employed in 2004 by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group that led a smear campaign against Sen. John Kerry in the 2004 election.
Associated Press writer Jim Kuhnhenn wrote that the American Issues Project has a "past link to Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign" and "wants to spend $2.8 million on an ad questioning Democrat Barack Obama's relationship to a founder of the 1960s radical group Weather Underground." The article then reported that one of AIP's board members, Ed Failor, is a former paid McCain campaign consultant. A Washington Post article about the ad that appeared in its campaign diary The Trail also reported that Failor did paid work for McCain in Iowa, collecting $50,000 through July 2007. Both articles quoted AIP spokesman Christian Pinkston making assurances that Failor was no longer connected to the McCain campaign. However, neither article mentioned that Pinkston is founder of a public relations firm that was employed in 2004 by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group that ran a campaign of false and baseless smears against Sen. John Kerry's Vietnam War record in 2004, including a book co-written by discredited anti-Obama author Jerome Corsi.
By contrast, The New York Times and Los Angeles Times both reported in August 22 articles about the American Issues Project's ad that Pinkston was involved with the Swift Boat campaign. New York Times reporter Jim Rutenberg, after reporting Failor's connection to the McCain campaign and quoting Pinkston saying, "This has nothing to do with McCain," wrote: "Mr. Pinkston's firm, the Pinkston Group, had worked for the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group that ran advertisements against Senator John Kerry when he ran for president in 2004." A Media Matters for America search through Swift Boat Veterans' expenditure disclosure forms on the Internal Revenue Service's website confirmed the Pinkston Group's employment.
That may be big, but this has got to be the bombshell of the day:
Buchanan accuses 'McCain's neocon warmonger' of treason Stephen C. Webster
Published: Friday August 22, 2008
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Scheunemann's former employer, Orion Strategies, is a lobbying firm with strong ties to Mikheil Saakashvili's administration in Georgia.
Since Georgia attempted to retake South Ossetia by force, triggering a sharp, violent rebuke by Russian forces, Sen. McCain has been by far the most strident advocate of US support for the former Soviet state. And his top adviser, says Buchanan, may well be the next Henry Kissinger or Zbigniew Brzezinski.
"He is a dual loyalist, a foreign agent whose assignment is to get America committed to spilling the blood of her sons for client regimes who have made this moral mercenary a rich man," he wrote.
On the occasion I've found myself agreeing with Pat. A bit hyperboloic here, but something that could use some attension.
K. Rove was over there doing what a while ago. Besides evading a congressional supena?
This Georgia thing stinks like hell.
Remember, it's not important who votes, but who counts the votes. And with Diebold, no one knows if the totals have been manipulated. Because Scienceguy, there's no PAPER TRAIL. Welcome to the banana republic you've helped create. Happy now.
Wait, hold the phone...
I thought Pat was El Diablo not just, what, four five days ago. Now he's held up here because he's turned on McCain?
Yes, of course. A man who donated $200 to an early Obama campaign must be a super duper good friend and Obama must have taken part in the Weathermen movement/terrorist activities.
Reaching I say that these guys are. Reaching.
No idea. But being that it is Fox, they may not run it as a paid ad but may run it up to a hundred times to discuss it fully. They may even use it as a promo and ask "Is the a real ad? And should we run it?"
If it is negative towards Obama, it will show up in some form. Billy O' will rant and rave that he is not permitted to run this ad. And then it will run but only because Fox may be questioning something about the ad. And then his guest will want to see it 10 more times, etc. etc. etc.
This may be a little off-topic but, how can someone be 'fair & balanced' while engineering the 'Stop Obama Express'?