Tag Archives: CBS

State Department Acting Undiplomatically

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted from Mullings.com

As if President Barack Obama didn’t have any embarrassing issues to deal with, now come the reports – not proof – of some really ugly allegations. The original reporting came from CBS which came into possession of a memo from the Diplomatic Security Service alleging wrongdoing and possible interference in at least eight investigations.

According to CBS, among the allegations were:

A U.S. Ambassador having “routinely ditched” his security detail to meet up with prostitutes in a public park.
Members of Hillary Clinton’s security detail procuring prostitutes while overseas which activity, the report claimed, was “endemic.” Continue reading →

News Media’s Minimalist News

BY MICHAEL S. JOHNSON

For millions of us the evening news is a ritual. There’s a lot of star power from which to choose. There’s muscle man Scott Pelley on CBS, ABC’s drama queen Diane Sawyer, and breathless Brian Williams on NBC. They all dish up a tossed salad of news, usually with the tastiest and most attractive morsels atop the more nutritious ingredients buried beneath.

Take for example the NBC Nightly News on May 31st. According to the Peacock network the most important story that day was the hung jury in the John Edwards case. The Edwards trial wasn’t just the lead story. It was also the second story and the third story, taking up about seven minutes of the 28-minute news cast, and I use the term ‘news’ loosely.

We got long clips of Edwards talking about God. Then a sleepy Matt Lauer, sitting in for Brian, went to Lisa Myers who droned on about Edwards and his family. On came legal correspondent Savannah Guthrie with even more analysis. It was mostly favorable to Edwards, who has long enjoyed a place on the altar of media adoration. Continue reading →

Rosen, Women, and Media Bias

BY MICHAEL S. JOHNSON

The media coverage of the 2012 political campaigns continues to flood the airwaves, like the Mississippi River in Spring time with inaccuracies, hyperbole, exaggerations, innuendo, and outright falsehoods.

It is too bad the media doesn’t have a Fact-Check.com that does such an excellent job correcting the same drivel from the campaigns and the candidates. Keeping the media honest is more than Reliable Sources host Howard Kurtz can handle. There’s too much to cover.

Just this week for example, there was the saga of Hillary B. Rosen, the liberal Democratic strategist and mouthpiece, who criticized Mrs. Romney for being a stay-at-home mom and condemned Mitt Romney for inequality toward women. Here is what she has been quoted as saying: “His (Romney’s) wife has actually never worked a day in her life. She’s never really dealt with the kinds of economic issues that a majority of the women in this country are facing in terms of how do we feed our kids, how do we send them to school, and why we worry about their future.” Continue reading →

Burning of the Koran, Another View

BY MICHAEL S. JOHNSON

I have a little different take on the plans of the Rev. Terry Jones to burn Korans on Saturday.

I disagree with the President that it is a teachable moment.

I disagree with Mayor Bloomberg that it is protected under the First Amendment and should therefore be tolerated.

I disagree with John Feehery that it may reflect another step down the path of “religious intolerance, hatred and extreme sectarianism.”

Continue reading →