Quote:In other words, you are going to keep reaching your wild-assed conclusions and making your wild-assed assertions in the absence of any evidence whatsoever.

Oh you mean kinda like, Bush lied, Bush was AWOL, Bush got preferential treatment et al? The wild *** assertions you and your ilk have made on this board on a routine basis without any evidence to support it? Again I say, pot, meet kettle. You never give a damn about evidence when you can bash Bush, so I think it's profoundly hypocritical for you to require a standard of me you don't have for yourself. But then hypocrisy is the hallmark of you and your party.

Quote:Let's start by substituting a neutral term, say, "is likely to negatively impact the election chances of" (the campaign's opponent).

They do it all the time. And they should. That's part of the job.

No, it's not part of the job. I went to school to be a journalist. I took the ethics classes I did the internship. And I can say without hesitation you don't have a freakin clue what you're talking about. The media do do it, that much is clear by what happend at CBS. But they are not supposed to. And you excusing it is just like you excusing a white liberal calling a black conservative a house negro and going so far as to google the freakin term to defend them, while condemning a southern senator for simply praising an old man using words that it takes a hell of a lot of inference to draw the conclusion you reached about it. You didn't care about evidence then either, you just made your wild *** assertions. Again, pot, meet kettle.

Quote:A whole lot of the very best journalism is accomplished by sorting through dozens of sources -- all with biases, all with axes to grind -- and sort through all of them to try to reach an accurate, fair, balanced conclusion that moves the truth forward.

And as usual you ignore the facts of the situation. CBS only aired those opinions that were unfavorable to Bush. I'll repeat, they didn't air the dissenting opinions of Killian's family and friends. They didn't air the questions surrounding the authenticity of the documents. They didn't even take the necessary steps to authenticate the documents that they should have. Rather exposed their mindset himself. "Though the documents may be forgeries, we believe the CONTENT is accurate." This all points to a SMEAR campaign, not an objective news piece. An objective news piece would have aired BOTH SIDES. CBS did not do that.

Quote:You truly have no concept of the dynamic between political campaigns and the media.

You truly have no concept of ethics and integrity. If you did you wouldn't be defending CBS in this. I know all too well the relationship between politics and the media. That doesn't make what they do right. That belief is based from a moral compass. Something you and your party have no concept of.

Quote:In any hotly contested race, political campaigns tend to peddle mud. They usually try to do it at arms length, so that it doesn't actually appear that they are peddling mud -- so when the other side's mud is lobbed, they can complain with some authenticity about the unfairness of it all.

But they peddle. It happens routinely.

No crap Sherlock. But the media isn't supposed to 1) air it without researching and 2) isn't supposed to go looking for it from the opposing side. It's called ethics. I'm not surprised you haven't heard of them.

Quote:This is a gross distortion of the facts. You are suggesting CBS aired a report based on documents they thought were most likely frauds. This is absolutely not the case.

No, they aired a report based on documents that they were TOLD were most likely frauds. They chose not to believe it.

Quote:It appears CBS grew more confident that the documents were authentic because the information within them seemed to be confirmed elsewhere. The murky opinions of its experts seemed less relevant to them because of what they seemed to be able to confirm about the content.

They were confirmed by one person, Killian's secretary who Killian's family confirmed did not, no ever had, liked Bush. You and Rather live in the same fantasy world. Forget if the documents are forged, is the content believable? That complete lunacy of that point of view is staggering.

Quote:You suggest CBS intentionally aired a report based on documents it tended to believe were fraudulent. That's not true.

No, once again, it intentionally aired a report based on documents it was TOLD were most likely forgeries. A story it didn't even bother to take appropriate measures to authenticate. A story in which it presented one side. A story that it blindly defended even after the documents were exposed as forgeries.

Quote:Tell me how you get from "searching for this story for years" to "a vendetta."

It's quite simple. Producer searches for 4 years for a story that has been done over and over. Her perspective is not, did Bush get preferential treatement, her premise is, Bush DID get preferential treatement now how do I prove it. She got documents supporting her belief, she didn't bother to do the appropriate checking on them. She didn't air any opposing view and she contacted the opposing campaign to let them know it was coming and to put them in contact with the source of the fraudulant documents. That's what normal people would call a vendetta. But that's normal people, which of course doesn't include liberals.

Quote:As I've explained, this is The Way It Frequently Works.

No, what you've explained is that it frequently works that way, which is no shock. What you've also made clear that you see nothing wrong with it even though it's ethically wrong. That's not a shock in any way, but let's be clear about what it is you are really doing.

Quote:1. Are you suggesting it is acceptable for the Bush administration to use our tax dollars to bribe the media?
2. Opinion is a part of journalism. George Will is a journalist, in his way. So was Armstrong Williams. His opinion column was regularly carried by Tribune News Service.
3. If you are going to scream you head off about CBS -- which clearly cares about balance, so much so that it commissioned a 224-page report about a single news story -- then why shouldn't I be concerned about Sinclair?

1. Bribe? Once again you are assuming your conclusion. Pot, meet kettle.
2. Opinion is part of journalism. However it is not under the banner of objectivity. Hence the term, opinion. Amazing that you'll scream your head off about an OPINION journalist, ergo one that has made their political views known and makes no effort to hide them, supporting something that is in line with their political affiliation, again one they've made well known, while you'll defend to the death a supposedly "objective" news organization shilling an unbalanced story meant to smear a sitting president. Actually, it's not amazing. It's part and parcel of the morally bankrupt party you have become.

Quote:I know none of these things. And I don't appreciate having my integrity questioned by a moron like yourself.

I think you missed something. I'm not questioning your integrity, I'm stating a fact. There is no question in my mind about the state of your integrity. It's non existent.

Quote:By who? Why? What was the motivation? Did Bush's family name play a role. These are legitimate questions.

His commanding officer. Because he asked. The motivation was he wanted to work on a campaign. From USA today.

Quote:Besides, the Guard was phasing out the F-102, which first flew in 1953, said Lloyd. He said it would have been a waste of time and money to train Bush to fly a newer jet when he had declared his intention to the leave the Guard in May 1974 when his commitment was over.

''When you stop to think about it, why expend dollars on somebody who you are not going to keep?'' Lloyd said.

Bush has said he decided in the summer of 1973 that he wanted to go to Cambridge, Mass., and begin work at Harvard Business School in the fall.

Lloyd said the Guard often granted the pilots and crews of obsolete jets the chance to leave active duty early.

''He was not singled out and given privileged treatment because there were other pilots that were treated the same way,'' Lloyd said.

I know this does nothing for you because you are convinced Bush was AWOL despite there being no evidence to support your view. But then it's only conservatives that are required to produce evidence. You liberals FEEL you're correct so that's all that's needed. :rolleyes:

Quote:You believe any story about Bush's National Guard service is inapprorpiate. You believe the media has a lot of nerve questioning the integrity of a God-fearing man who walks with that wonderful swagger, blah blah blah.

Nope. I believe a story based on fraudulent documents is inappropriate. I believe a story that offers no dissenting opinion, doesn't site the concerns about said documents and informs an opposing campaign about the story and also puts said campaign in contact with the source of the afore mentioned fraudulent documents is inappropriate. You don't, because you FEEL it was correct.

Quote:By savaging CBS for getting the facts wrong, they want people to believe that anything that has ever been said to question Bush's National Guard service has been invalidated.

Yeah, that's politics. Amazing being the expert on politics that you are you state that as if you find it offensive, yet see nothing wrong with a supposed "unbiased" media organization going to an opposing campaign for dirt because that's the way it is. You've taken hypocricy to a level I never thought could be reached.

Quote:And it's a major difference between us.

Yes, we don't approve of fradulent stories, you do. We don't approve of racist remarks, you do. We don't approve of lying under oath and getting hummers in the Oval. You do. As long as there is a "D" beside their name they can do no wrong. As long as it's an attack on a conservative, it's right on the money despite there being no evidence. You find these things perfectly alright, we don't. But then we have a moral compass.

Quote:I thought the whole bruhaha about President Clinton and Monica Lewinsky was silly. President Clinton was cheatin' on his wife, and he told a lie -- as cheaters often do. Understood in that context, this wasn't a "high crime or misdemeanor."

Thank you for proving my point perfectly. Lying under oath, despite it being a felony, is "silly" to you. But I'm willing to bet if Bush ever lied under oath you'd be on here calling for his head. Again, that speaks to the moral bankruptcy of you and your party. You used to hide from it, now you just state it openly on messageboards.

Quote:But you would never once have heard me complain about the bias of the media because they turned that situation into a 24/7 extravaganza.

Seeing as this board wasn't around back then I can say you are correct. However I'll bet more than a bit of money you complained about it on a routine basis. Just like you're complaining about it now. What happend with Clinton in the media wasn't because of political bias, it was because of a ratings bias. There is a difference.

Quote:51 percent isn't a mandate where I come from.

Amazing that 51% isn't a mandate yet Clinton had a mandate and he never got to 50% to begin with. 51% is a mandate. Losing seats in the House is a mandate. Losing seats in the Senate and the ouster of the democratic leader there is a mandate. It's a mandate that you, your party and it's ideals have been rejected by the majority of Americans. And that's a beautiful thing.


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