Media Matters for America summary, October 31, 2007
 
Date: Wed, 31 Oct 2007 22:03:03 -0400

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<p>Here are today's news items from <i>Media Matters for America</i>, 
click on the title or 'read more' to read the entirety of each story.</p>
<h1><a href="http://mediamatters.org/issues_topics/2008_elections?src=other">2008 Elections</a></h1>
<p><b><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310007?src=other"><em>TNR</em>'s  Zimmerman claimed young  voters "are really turned off by" Clinton's "naked  ambition"</a></b><br />
During the October 30 edition of 
MSNBC&#39;s <i>Tucker</i>, while discussing 
a recent University of Iowa <a href="http://mediamatters.org//rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fnews-releases.uiowa.edu%2F2007%2Foctober%2F102907poll-topline.pdf" title="http://news-releases.uiowa.edu/2007/october/102907poll-topline.pdf">poll</a> on the Democratic presidential 
candidates, host Tucker Carlson asserted that "it&#39;s women ... who are making this [Sen. Hillary Rodham] 
Clinton [D-NY] surge possible" and asked his guests -- A.B. Stoddard, associate editor of <i>The Hill</i>, and <i>The New Republic</i>&#39;s Sacha Zimmerman -- "[W]hat is it about Mrs. 
Clinton ... that 
appeals to them [women over the age of 45]?" Zimmerman replied: "I think she&#39;s 
broken a lot of glass ceilings and that their generation, particularly baby 
boomers, appreciate that, see what she&#39;s went through. And I think that they&#39;re a 
little less cynical about her kind of naked ambition and that young people are 
really turned off by that." 
<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310007?src=other" class="read">Read more</a></p>

<p><b><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310003?src=other">After saying  Giuliani is "right to dismiss" polls, Cavuto let him tout his lead of "more than  double digits"</a></b><br />
During his interview with Republican 
presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani on the October 30 edition of Fox News&#39; 
<i>Your World</i>, host Neil Cavuto 
said: "[P]olls are polls -- and you&#39;re right to dismiss them, I know as you do 
on the stump." Cavuto then cited an October 17-24 University of Iowa <a href="http://mediamatters.org//rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fnews-releases.uiowa.edu%2F2007%2Foctober%2F102907poll-topline.pdf" title="http://news-releases.uiowa.edu/2007/october/102907poll-topline.pdf">Hawkeye Poll</a> showing Giuliani 
statistically tied for second place in Iowa with former Arkansas Gov. Mike 
Huckabee, and asked Giuliani: "[A]re you worried that Huckabee is actually the 
rising star here and threatening you?" Giuliani responded by touting his lead in 
the polls, saying: "[P]olls are polls, and there are a hundred of them, and 
we&#39;re ahead in about 98 of the hundred, in just about every state," adding, 
"[W]e&#39;re ahead in the national polls by double digits, we&#39;re ahead in every big 
state by sometimes more than double digits." Cavuto offered no challenge to 
Giuliani&#39;s touting of his performance in the polls, despite having just commended him 
for "dismiss[ing]" polls "on the stump."
<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310003?src=other" class="read">Read more</a></p>

<p><b><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310010?src=other">Discussing how  Bill Clinton may affect 2008 election, Amy Holmes cited May 2005  poll</a></b><br />
On <em>The Situation Room</em>, Amy Holmes 
asserted that while Bill Clinton is 
"definitely an asset in the primary" for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential 
campaign, "in the general campaign, it becomes a lot more 
complicated. Pew did a really interesting poll in May of 2005 where they asked 
... the voter would 
they like to see a Bill Clinton third term. And the majority said no." However, Holmes ignored several 2007 polls finding that a majority of the public thinks 
that Bill Clinton 
is an asset.
<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310010?src=other" class="read">Read more</a></p>

<p><b><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310009?src=other">Cavuto failed to  challenge Giuliani's "meaningless" statistics on prostate  cancer</a></b><br />
During an interview with Rudy Giuliani, Fox News' Neil Cavuto did not challenge 
Giuliani's assertion that "[t]he chance of a man surviving prostate cancer in 
the United States is somewhere, when I was doing it, 82, 84 percent. It's 
probably over 90 percent now. In socialized medicine countries ... some of them 
can be less than 50 percent." However, the purported source for the statistics, 
the Commonwealth Fund, issued a statement saying that the numbers are 
"incorrect."

<br />
<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310009?src=other" class="read">Read more</a></p>

<p><b><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310006?src=other">One  day after saying Obama "needs a new attack" against Clinton, Gibson criticized  "NBC anchor" for offering advice to Obama</a></b><br />
Fox News' John Gibson criticized an 
"NBC news anchor" -- 
identified by guest Monica Crowley 
as MSNBC host Chris 
Matthews -- for offering Sen. 
Barack Obama advice on what he "needs to say" to 
beat Sen. Hillary Clinton, 
asking, "Is it legitimate for one news anchor to publicly advise one candidate 
on how to beat another, and still try to pretend he's objective and neutral? My 
friends, fair and balanced this is not." But the day before, Gibson had offered his 
own advice to Obama on how to go after Clinton, asserting: "I think if Obama is going 
to close the gap with Hillary, he needs a new attack."

<br />
<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310006?src=other" class="read">Read more</a></p>

<h1><a href="http://mediamatters.org/issues_topics/propaganda_noise_machine?src=other">Propaganda/Noise Machine</a></h1>
<p><b><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310008?src=other">Citing  new G.I. Joe movie, Glenn Beck warned of a possible "one-world-government  nightmare"</a></b><br />
Citing films such as <em>Happy Feet</em>, 
<em>Superman Returns</em>, and the 
forthcoming <em>G.I. Joe</em>, Glenn Beck 
stated, "I believe some are 
trying to indoctrinate our kids into hating their own country, turning us into 
some one-world-government nightmare; hating America, turning it into a dirty 
word." He later added, "We must preserve our symbols of national pride and 
power, be they a flag, a cross, characters like Superman or G.I. 
Joe."
<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310008?src=other" class="read">Read more</a></p>

<p><b><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310001?src=other"><em>NY Times</em>'  Brooks falsely asserted  "Democrats do as well among top earners as  Republicans"</a></b><br />
In an October 30 <a href="http://mediamatters.org//rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2007%2F10%2F30%2Fopinion%2F30brooks.html%3Fref%3Dopinion" title="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/opinion/30brooks.html?ref=opinion">column</a>, <i>New York Times</i> columnist David Brooks 
wrote: "[D]on&#39;t expect 
people to cast votes according to their income. Democrats do as well among top 
earners as Republicans." However, as <i>Media 
Matters for America</i> has <a href="http://mediamatters.org//rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mediamatters.org%2Fitems%2F200710170006" title="http://www.mediamatters.org/items/200710170006">documented</a>, Brooks&#39; suggestion that "top earners" are as likely to vote Democratic as Republican is 
contradicted by CNN exit polls from the 2006 
congressional elections, the 2004 presidential election, the 2004 congressional 
elections, and the 2000 presidential election, which show that voters with 
annual incomes of more than $100,000 are more likely to vote for Republican candidates, not Democratic 
candidates.
<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310001?src=other" class="read">Read more</a></p>

<h1><a href="http://mediamatters.org/issues_topics/health_care?src=other">Health Care</a></h1>
<p><b><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310002?src=other"><em>Politico </em>again falsely reported that Dems won't compromise on SCHIP</a></b><br />
A <em>Politico</em>
article cited health
care as an issue on which Democratic "party leaders have shunned
compromise" and cited the congressional
debate over expanding the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) as
part of this purported "storyline." However, the <em>Politico</em>
did not note that an
earlier bill expanding SCHIP by $35 billion over five years -- which President Bush vetoed -- represented
a bipartisan compromise.
<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310002?src=other" class="read">Read more</a></p>

<h1><a href="http://mediamatters.org/issues_topics/religious_discrimination?src=other">Religious Discrimination</a></h1>
<p><b><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310011?src=other">Coulter on her controversial comments regarding Jews and Christians: The "irreligious" are "trying to stir up trouble with the religious"</a></b><br />
Responding to Alan Colmes'
questioning about her comment that Christians "just want Jews to be
perfected," Ann Coulter said that she "wear[s]" criticism from
Jewish groups over the remark "as a badge of honor," adding,
"The point is: This is the same old fight we see all the time with the
irreligious trying to stir up trouble with the religious." Responding to
Colmes' assertion that Coulter "doesn't want to own up
to" her statement, Coulter said: "I gave a beautiful description of
the Old Testament and the New Testament, but it's very frightening to
secularists."

<br />
<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310011?src=other" class="read">Read more</a></p>

<h1><a href="http://mediamatters.org/issues_topics/torture?src=other">Torture</a></h1>
<p><b><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310004?src=other">Kondracke:  Waterboarding "doesn't result in any lasting  damage"</a></b><br />
In a Fox News "All-Star" panel discussion, Morton Kondracke said of the 
interrogation technique known as waterboarding, "I'm sure it feels like torture, 
you know, it doesn't result in any lasting damage, but it feels like torture." 
But a physician who heads a 
program for torture survivors told a Senate 
committee that techniques such as waterboarding "are intended to break the 
prisoners down, to terrify them and cause harm to their psyche, and in so doing 
result in lasting harmful health consequences." 
He also said: "There is a real risk of death from actually drowning or suffering 
a heart attack or damage to the lungs."

<br />
<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/dailyemail/200710310004?src=other" class="read">Read more</a></p>




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