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

On CNN, Brian Todd ignored polling to assert war on terror "is still a Republican strength"
During the June 29 edition of CNN's Situation Room, CNN correspondent Brian Todd asserted that "the fight against terror is still a Republican strength, and the GOP front-runner" -- former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani -- "is in a unique position to capitalize." But a recent Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll that asked which party respondents would rather have in charge "if there is an all-out war between the United States and various radical Muslim groups worldwide" found Democrats leading Republicans on the issue 41 percent to 38 percent. Media Matters for America previously documented that numerous media outlets similarly baselessly asserted that Republicans held an advantage on fighting terrorism in the run-up to the 2006 congressional election. Read more

Hannity misrepresented Clinton quotes to claim she has "socialist views and intentions"
On the July 1 edition of Fox News' Hannity's America, host Sean Hannity played a clip from a May 29 speech by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) -- in which Clinton said it is time for America "to reject the idea of an on-your-own society and to replace it with shared responsibility for shared prosperity" -- and added, "This isn't the first time Hillary has made her socialist views and intentions so apparent." Hannity also characterized the speech as Clinton "blast[ing] the free market." In fact, Clinton said in the same speech that "there is no greater force for economic growth than free markets." As Media Matters for America has documented, other conservative commentators have similarly selectively quoted from Clinton's speech in order to paint her as a "socialist." Read more

Ignoring Obama speech to evangelical church, Gerson criticized him for "not effectively reach[ing] out to" evangelicals
In a June 29 column discussing Sen. Barack Obama's (D-IL) recent speech at the 26th General Synod of the United Church of Christ, Washington Post columnist and former George W. Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson wrote that "Obama still missed an opportunity. By speaking at a gathering of the United Church of Christ -- among the most excruciatingly progressive of Protestant denominations -- he was preaching to the liberal choir. And he did not effectively reach out to an evangelical movement in transition." Gerson added that "to appeal broadly to religious voters, he will need to be more than the candidate of the religious left." At no point did he note that Obama spoke at a popular evangelical event on an issue that Gerson identified as important to young evangelicals. The Los Angeles Times reported on December 24, 2006, that "at the invitation of Rick Warren, Obama spoke to a hall full of conservative Christian evangelical activists gathered at Saddleback Church in Orange County. Warren, author of the bestseller 'The Purpose Driven Life,' [Zondervan, 2002] is among the most successful and popular preachers in the world." Read more

Pinkerton claimed Clinton "supported open borders" despite her support for border-security measures
On the July 1 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends, while discussing the ramifications on the U.S. presidential election of the June 29 discovery of car bombs in London, Newsday columnist Jim Pinkerton claimed that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) "supported open borders and bilingualism and multiculturalism and all the things that have gotten Britain and, in the future, America in such deadly trouble." In fact, Clinton voted on June 28 to close debate and proceed to a vote on an immigration bill that would have authorized (but not appropriate) funding to increase the number of federal agents investigating criminal matters related to immigration and to increase by 2,000 to 2,400 per year for six years the number of full-time border patrol agents. The bill also would have authorized (but not appropriate) funding for the procurement of "unmanned aerial vehicles, cameras, poles, sensors, and other technologies necessary to achieve operational control of the international borders of the United States." It also would have authorized the secretary of homeland security to "require aliens entering and departing the United States to provide biometric data and other information relating to their immigration status." Read more

Ignoring McCain, Wash. Times editorial cited Obama's "wasted lives" remark as example of the left's "ill-advised thinking"
A July 2 Washington Times editorial calling "for exhaustive work to improve the nation's complicated military medical system and veterans' health care" claimed that "the left" has used "the military-health-care mess as a political cudgel whose real aim seems to be to remind listeners of the decision by President Bush to enter Iraq." To support this claim, the Times wrote that the "most egregious" example was "Sen. Barack Obama's [D-IL] February 'wasted lives' remark which the senator said he came to regret, and for which he apologized repeatedly" -- a reference to a February 11 speech in which Obama said of the Iraq war: "[W]e now have ... seen over 3,000 lives of the bravest young Americans wasted." But in highlighting Obama's comment as "the most egregious" of the "ill-advised thinking ... on the left," the editorial ignored that Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) made a similar remark during his February 28 appearance on CBS' Late Show with David Letterman. McCain said: "We've wasted a lot of our most precious treasure [in Iraq], which is American lives." Read more

Propaganda/Noise Machine

CNN's Henry asserted that "the subpoena issue" is "about the Democrats"
While reporting on the split between President Bush and his own party on the issues of immigration reform and the Iraq war, CNN's Ed Henry contrasted those disputes with "the subpoena issue," saying that the subpoenas issued by the Senate Judiciary Committee to the White House for information on the warrantless wiretapping program is "not really about ... [Bush's] own party," it's "about the Democrats." In fact, several committee Republicans voted in favor of the subpoenas.
Read more

Hannity still defending deeply flawed Path to 9/11 miniseries -- "It did get it right"
On the July 1 edition of Fox News' Hannity's America, host Sean Hannity and Cyrus Nowrasteh, writer and producer of the September 2006 ABC miniseries The Path to 9/11, alleged that "political pressure" is preventing the release of the miniseries on DVD, then defended the film's accuracy, claiming that it was "vindicated by the experts," contained "meticulous detail," and "got it right." As Media Matters for America documented, however, The Path to 9/11 contained inaccurate scenes that maligned the Clinton administration's counterterrorism efforts and bolstered the Bush administration's. Additionally, the film was sharply criticized by former Clinton administration officials, journalists, and conservatives who noted that significant parts of the "docudrama's" content were not supported by the 9-11 Commission's findings, despite the fact that ABC originally claimed that the miniseries was based on the commission's report (a claim the network later minimized). Read more

Education

Wash. Post editorial cited study to show positive effects of No Child Left Behind, ignored authors' caveats
A Washington Post editorial suggested that No Child Left Behind had led to improvements in reading and math test scores documented in a recent study. But as an earlier Post news article noted, the authors of that study "warned that it is difficult to say whether or how much the No Child Left Behind law is driving the achievement gains." Read more

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