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.

2008 Elections

Good Morning America reported Romney's "passion to hunt down" bin Laden, but not his previous lack thereof
While reporting on Sen. John McCain's and former Gov. Mitt Romney's expressions of their "passion to hunt down Osama bin Laden" during the May 3 Republican presidential debate, ABC's John Berman aired a clip of Romney saying, "It's more than Osama bin Laden. But he is going to pay, and he will die." But Berman did not report the impetus for the question that prompted Romney's comment: On April 26, Romney reportedly said in reference to bin Laden, "It's not worth moving heaven and earth spending billions of dollars just trying to catch one person."
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CNN's Beck embellished thinly sourced NY Post article to smear Clinton
On the May 3 edition of his CNN Headline News program, Glenn Beck cited a May 2 New York Post article in claiming that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) threw "a temper tantrum over the size of her private jet." According to Beck, Clinton, prior to an April 27 flight to California, "sent the [Gulfstream II] back, empty, and got a much classier GulfStream III." However, the Post article Beck referred to did not say Clinton "threw a temper tantrum." Rather the Post -- citing only an anonymous "aviation source familiar with Clinton's travel" -- reported that Clinton changed planes because she "didn't like the configuration of the cabin" of the Gulfstream II. After reciting the allegations in the Post article as fact, Beck said at the end of the segment that "this story is either completely wrong and is basically a hit piece by the New York Post or Hillary Clinton has become so warped by unbelievable wealth that she cannot -- no longer relate to money anymore." Read more

Matthews brought Clinton fixation to GOP debate, asking about prospect of "Big Bill" back in White House
During the May 3 Republican presidential debate on MSNBC, moderator and Hardball host Chris Matthews said, "[L]et me ask you about something else that might be a negative in the upcoming campaign. Seriously." He asked, "Would it be good for America to have Bill Clinton back living in the White House?" Later, when he reiterated the question, Matthews asked, "Should the Clintons come back to the White House, especially Big Bill?" Read more

CNN's Schneider echoed Wash. Post, RNC in suggesting Clinton has changed her position on Iraq
CNN's Bill Schneider falsely suggested that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton had changed her position on the Iraq war during the past week because she announced her intention to introduce a bill "to sunset the authorization for the war in Iraq." However, Clinton introduced a bill in the Senate on February 16 that includes a provision that would "require a new authorization for use of United States military forces in Iraq" unless certain conditions are met.
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Wash. Post headline claimed "Clinton Changes Tone on Iraq"
A May 4 Washington Post article on Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's (D-NY) May 3 announcement that she and Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) will introduce a bill to "sunset the 2002 authorization of military operations in Iraq," was headlined, "Clinton Changes Tone on Iraq; Senator Favors Ending War Authority" -- despite the article's own reporting that Clinton "has expressed support for a similar de-authorization, although not as a stand-alone bill." Read more

Propaganda/Noise Machine

Thoroughly debunked, O'Reilly dreams up new, apparently sinister Soros-Media Matters link
On the May 3 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, host Bill O'Reilly again purported to find a nefarious link between Media Matters for America and philanthropist George Soros. Responding to an Indiana University study that found that "O'Reilly called a person or a group a derogatory name once every 6.8 seconds, on average, or nearly nine times every minute during the ['Talking Points Memo'] editorials that open his program each night," O'Reilly stated: "But somehow, some way, their research wound up in the hands of Media Matters, the smear Internet site partly funded by enterprises connected to George Soros. And guess what? Media Matters issued a press release about the terrible 'Talking Points Memos.' " The "somehow, some way" that Media Matters found out about the research was through an IU press release promoting the study and its results. Read more

Blitzer's list of recent Washington sex scandals included only Democrats
On the May 3 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, host Wolf Blitzer observed that Washington is "no stranger to sex scandals," then provided viewers with examples of scandals involving only Democrats. During the segment, Blitzer was discussing the "DC Madam" scandal that has already led to the resignation of Deputy Secretary of State Randall L. Tobias, the first director of U.S. Foreign Assistance and administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development. Read more

Global Warming

CNN programs uncritically promoted Beck's global warming special
On the May 2 edition of his CNN Headline News show, Glenn Beck aired an hour-long "special report" titled "Exposed: The Climate of Fear." According to an April 30 CNN press release, the special's purpose was to "deflate what Beck perceives as the media hype surrounding global warming" and "question[] the accuracy of former Vice President Al Gore's claims in the Oscar-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth of 20-foot sea level rises and the disastrous effects of increased carbon dioxide levels." In addition to the release promoting Beck's special, on three separate occasions, various CNN and Headline News programs hosted Beck to discuss or promote his "special report," without highlighting or challenging his false or misleading assertions on the global warming issue, his attacks on Gore, or his claims of the hype surrounding the issue in his "special report." For example: Read more

On Beck, Sheldon warned against extending hate-crimes law to cover "she-males," flashers
On the May 3 edition of CNN Headline News' Glenn Beck, Rev. Lou Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition, denounced the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2007 (H.R. 1592) -- which was passed by the House of Representatives on May 3 -- because the bill extends hate crime protection to people who are victimized because of their gender identity or sexual orientation -- or as Sheldon put it, "behavior-based sexual orientation." Sheldon cited "the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychological Association," where one can "see the 30 listed -- almost perversions kinds of things about having what is sexually arousing you, like, you're talking about a man who dresses as a woman, talking about the man who's a she-male and ... takes hormones to create breasts and no hair on his chest, and -- or the man who exposes himself." Read more

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