Colorado Community Newspapers columnist Dale attacked Democrats but ignored GOP meetings with Assad

Written by Media Matters Staff

Published

Colorado Community Newspapers columnist Curt Dale echoed the oft-repeated conservative criticism of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and other congressional Democrats for meeting with Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, but he failed to mention that Republican lawmakers have also met with Assad.

In an April 12 column for Colorado Community Newspapers about U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-CA) April 4 visit with Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, Curt Dale criticized Pelosi and other Democrats for making such trips while ignoring similar Republican visits, including that of a GOP delegation which met with Assad just three days before Pelosi's bipartisan delegation did so.

In criticizing Democrats for meeting with Assad, Dale -- whose column appeared in the Castle Rock News-Press, the Douglas County News-Press, and the Parker Chronicle -- called “bad enough” visits that U.S. Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and Bill Nelson (D-FL) had made in December 2006:

What in the world does House speaker, third-in-line-for-the-presidency, ultra-liberal Democrat Nancy Pelosi think she's doing?

Her ignorance of U.S. foreign policy and of the White House's disapproval of her trip to meet with Syria's president is repugnant. Frankly, I couldn't expect more of her, but it's unbelievable we have such utter incompetence and monumental arrogance heading Congress.

It was bad enough that, earlier, two Democrat senators, John Kerry, D-Mass., and Bill Nelson, D-Fla., sidled in to talk with Syrian President Bashaar Assad, but now Pelosi's made an even bigger mess.

In singling out Democratic meetings with Assad, Dale repeated a pattern -- documented by Colorado Media Matters -- in which media outlets parroted the repeated criticism by the Bush administration and other conservatives. Such criticisms have failed to acknowledge that a Republican delegation which included Republican Reps. Frank Wolf (VA), Joe Pitts (PA), and Robert Aderholt (AL) met with Assad on April 1. Furthermore, Republican Rep. Darrell Issa (CA) met with Assad on April 5. And Pelosi's delegation included Republican Rep. David Hobson (OH).

Dale's mention of the Nelson and Kerry visits with Assad echoed attacks conservatives leveled in December against the Democratic senators, while ignoring Sen. Arlen Specter's (R-PA) planned meeting with the Syrian president later that month, which Specter described in an essay titled “Why Congress can and must assert itself in foreign policy.”