Here are today's news items from Media Matters for America, click on the title or 'read more' to read the entirety of each story.

War in Iraq

Front-page Wash. Times article touted Pelosi's popularity in Syria with purported person-on-the-street interviews
A May 2 front-page Washington Times article headlined "Syrians bolstered by visit of 'good American' Pelosi" asserted that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), who recently visited Syria to meet with President Bashar Al-Assad, may have become "[t]he second most popular politician in Syria." The article noted that the "White House criticized her visit," but did not mention that a Republican -- Rep. David Hobson (OH) -- was part of Pelosi's delegation, as Media Matters for America noted. Nor did the article report that a Republican-led delegation met with Assad three days before Pelosi's visit and that Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) met with him a day after. As evidence that Pelosi's visit had "warmed Syrian hearts with her trip last month to Damascus," the Times quoted a "Damascus laborer," a Damascus resident "who spoke on the condition of anonymity," and "an Iraqi woman who has emigrated to Syria," all of whom were unnamed in the article. Read more

USA Today and AP uncritically reported GOP claims that terrorists will "follow us home" after Iraq withdrawal
In recent articles on the standoff between President Bush and Congress over funding for the Iraq war, USA Today and the Associated Press uncritically reported Republican claims that terrorists in Iraq will "follow us home" if the United States withdraws its troops from the country. However, both news outlets did not report, as others recently have, that security and terrorism experts have challenged that view. Read more

O'Reilly recalled when "everybody in the country is behind [Iraq war], except the kooks"
During a discussion with former CIA director George Tenet about his recently released book, At the Center of the Storm (HarperCollins), on the May 2 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, host Bill O'Reilly claimed that at the beginning of the war in Iraq, "everybody in the country [was] behind it, except the kooks." However, 23 senators and 133 members of the House of Representatives -- including a majority of House Democrats -- voted against the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq. Media Matters for America has provided a list of these "kooks" below. Additionally, in a speech at the Commonwealth Club of California on September 23, 2002 -- six months before the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq -- former Vice President Al Gore denounced President Bush's Iraq policy, saying, "I am deeply concerned that the policy we are presently following with respect to Iraq has the potential to seriously damage our ability to win the war against terrorism and to weaken our ability to lead the world in this new century." Read more

Blitzer did not challenge Snow's false claim that Bush "never argued" that Saddam was involved in 9-11
On the May 1 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, host Wolf Blitzer did not challenge White House press secretary Tony Snow's claim that President Bush "never argued" that "somehow Saddam [Hussein] was involved in September 11th," nor his assertion that "[w]e've never made that argument." Blitzer also did not challenge Snow's suggestion that Al Qaeda had a "relationship" with Saddam and that the fact that "Abu Musab Al Zarqawi [was] on Iraqi soil" was evidence of such a connection. Yet as Media Matters for America has repeatedly noted (here here, here, and here), President Bush and other administration officials have frequently claimed a connection between Saddam and the September 11, 2001, attacks, including the specific assertion of such a link in a letter to Congress at the start of the war. Moreover, neither the 9-11 Commission, the Senate Intelligence Committee, nor, more recently, a report from the Inspector General of the Defense Department found any evidence that Saddam ever had an "operational relationship" or cooperated with either Al Qaeda or Zarqawi. Read more

2008 Elections

Wash. Post gave misleading report on Obama, Clinton speeches
A May 3 Washington Post article, which reported that Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL), when speaking to black audiences, "decr[ies] 'anti-intellectualism' in the black community, including black children telling peers who get good grades that they are 'acting white,' " suggested that Obama claims the concept of "acting white" is a sufficient explanation for the achievement gap between black and white students. Staff writer Perry Bacon Jr. -- using wording that suggested Obama had said that the "acting white" schoolyard smear explains the achievement gap -- wrote: "But some scholars assert that even if black kids do say that other black students who excel in school are 'acting white,' it is hardly a sufficient explanation for the achievement gap between black and white students, which remains vast." In fact, in discussing the achievement gap, Obama has emphasized the inequities in school funding in tandem with what he identifies as a need for greater emphasis on educational achievement. Read more

Matthews: "Who would win a street fight ... Rudy Giuliani or President Ahmadinejad"
On the May 2 edition of MSNBC's Hardball, host Chris Matthews asked Mike DuHaime, campaign manager for Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani: "Who would win a street fight ... Rudy Giuliani or [Iranian] President [Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad, who would win that fight?" Matthews said that the fight would take place "over in Queens somewhere ... a dark night, it's about 2 in the morning. Two guys are out behind the building, right?" DuHaime responded, "I am putting my money on Rudy on that one." Matthews added, "If [Giuliani] wins that notion, he is the next president." Read more

On MSNBC, Lester Holt touted McCain's "maverick reputation"
On the May 3 edition of MSNBC Live, host Lester Holt referred to Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) as "[a] senator with a maverick reputation." Media Matters for America has noted numerous instances in which media figures have uncritically called McCain a "maverick" or cited McCain's "maverick reputation" without noting the numerous instances in which McCain has fallen in line with the Bush administration or the Republican Party establishment on issues large and small, as Media Matters has documented. Read more

Global Warming

CNN host channeled Beck on global warming: "[T]he cause and how we can help is something that is up for debate"
On the May 3 edition of CNN's American Morning, during a discussion about CNN Headline News host Glenn Beck's May 2 hour-long special, "Exposed: The Climate of Fear," co-host Kiran Chetry stated that there is "no denying" global warming is happening, but added, "I think the cause and how we can help is something that is up for debate." In fact, as Media Matters for America has repeatedly documented, scientific organizations such as the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) share the consensus view that, as stated in a June 2006 NAS report, "[H]uman activities are responsible for much of the [planet's] recent warming." Read more

Beck's global warming special dominated by industry-funded "experts," serial misinformers
CNN Headline News host Glenn Beck's May 2 hour-long special, Exposed: The Climate of Fear, purported to present the "other side of the climate debate that you don't hear anywhere." Introducing the show, Beck stated: "I want you to know right up front, this is not a balanced look at global warming." Indeed, Beck relied heavily on people with energy industry ties and others espousing positions on global warming that have been soundly debunked or rejected by the overwhelming majority of scientists studying climate change. Read more

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