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Times Watch for May 13, 2004

Prisons Fill, Crime Falls, Times Reporter Frets

     Crime reporter Fox Butterfield Wednesday picks up a study from an unlabeled liberal group, the Sentencing Project, and frets over the increasing length of prison sentences: "Almost 10 percent of all inmates in state and federal prisons are serving life sentences, an increase of 83 percent from 1992, according to a report released yesterday by the Sentencing Project, a prison research and advocacy group. In two states, New York and California, almost 20 percent of inmates are serving life sentences, the report found."

Then, for the umpteenth time, Butterfield fails to grasp the connection between longer sentences for criminals and resulting reductions in crime. Instead, he finds increased incarceration rates a puzzling and "punitive" anomaly: "The increase is not the result of a growth in crime, which actually fell 35 percent from 1992 to 2002, the report pointed out. Instead, it is the result of more punitive laws adopted by Congress and state legislatures as part of the movement to get tough on crime, the report said. The jump in the number of inmates serving life sentences imposes large costs on states, about $1 million for each inmate who serves out his full sentence behind bars, said Marc Mauer, the assistant director of the Sentencing Project and an author of the study."

In the next sentence Butterfield unleashes his inner fiscal conservative, pronouncing with authority: "This is a heavy burden on taxpayers at a time when most states are facing record budget deficits and many states are searching for ways to cut prison costs."

Butterfield brings California's three-strikes law in for a portion of the "blame," from his perspective: "Some of those serving a life sentence for the least serious crimes have been sentenced under California's 'three strikes and you're out' law, the report said. The Supreme Court recently upheld the life sentence of Leandro Andrade, whose third strike, or felony conviction, was for the theft of children's videotapes worth $153 that he intended as Christmas gifts for his nieces."

Left at that, the sentence does sound pretty draconian (he just wanted his nieces to have a Merry Christmas!).

But as Jack Dunphy noted on National Review Online, the majority opinion penned by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor showed Andrade in a rather less sympathetic light.

Among the highlights from O'Connor's opinion: "In January 1982, [Andrade] was convicted of a misdemeanor theft offense and was sentenced to 6 days in jail with 12 months' probation. Andrade was arrested again in November 1982 for multiple counts of first-degree residential burglary….In 1988, Andrade was convicted in federal court of transportation of marijuana…and was sentenced to eight years in federal prison. In 1990, he was convicted in state court for a misdemeanor petty theft offense and was ordered to serve 180 days in jail."

For the rest of Butterfield's latest "overcrowded prisons" story, click here:

• Fox Butterfield | Crime | Prisons

U.S. "High-Handed and Arrogant"

     Reporter Steven Weisman pours skepticism all over Bush's Middle East proposals in his Thursday story, "U.S. to Present Revised Program for Democracy in Mideast; Skepticism Is Widespread."

The story opens on a downward spiral: "The Bush administration, dogged by the growing abuse scandal in Iraq, is pressing ahead this week with a new appeal for democracy and political reform in the Middle East in the face of extreme skepticism in the region and in Europe. What the administration calls its Greater Middle East Initiative, a proposal that stirred an angry outcry from Arab officials when a version leaked out last winter, is an eight-page draft that began circulating among foreign ministers this week. The administration has said President Bush plans to get some form of the document adopted at the summit meeting of leading industrial nations and Russia, the so-called Group of 8, in June at Sea Island, Ga. But European officials familiar with the contents said they expected that in light of widespread outrage over American soldiers' abuse of Iraq prisoners, even this new, toned-down document would have to be revised extensively to make it seem less high-handed and arrogant."

Is the charge of arrogance coming from those "European officials" or from Weisman himself? The article's tone makes it hard to tell.

Lack of U.S. credibility overseas is a recurring theme for Weisman, who wrote in February: "Administration officials concede that President Bush's longstanding emphasis on working with allies to negotiate with North Korea and Iran is the only choice he has, given the widespread perception of the blow to American credibility because of Iraq."

For the full Weisman story on Bush's Middle East initiative, click here:

• Abu Ghraib | Iraq War | Israel | Middle East | Steven Weisman

Bits of Labeling Bias

     Some bits of labeling bias in Thursday's paper, one in Glen Justice's story profiling Democratic fundraising diva Ellen Malcolm, described in the headline as "Queen of the Hat-Passers." Justice writes: "She poses a double threat to Republicans as the founder of Emily's List, a group that pioneered small-contributor fund-raising in the 1980's to help female Democrats. Emily's List is now the nation's largest political action committee."

Emily's List could more accurately be described as a PAC for liberal pro-abortion Democrats, but Justice doesn't provide a label for Malcolm or Emily's List. (Malcolm does call herself a "progressive" in some Bush-bashing speech excerpts that Justice relays.)

However, count on conservatives to be smacked with a warning label: "'The model they created was ingenious,' said Stephen Moore, president of the conservative Club for Growth, which largely adopted the same tactic."

Katharine Seelye's story on Ralph Nader gaining the Reform Party's nomination also fails to describe the well-known activist as a liberal, but points out the party endorsed "Patrick J. Buchanan, a conservative, in 2000." (These days, of course, Nader and Buchanan are often in agreement on issues like trade and war.)

For the full Justice, click here:

For more of Seelye on Nader, click here:

• Pat Buchanan | Labeling Bias | Ralph Nader | Katharine Seelye

Keeping It In the Liberal Family

     There's a revealing editor's note on Thursday's corrections page regarding John Leland's Wednesday article, "73 Options for Medicare Plan Fuel Chaos, Not Prescriptions."

"An article yesterday about confusion surrounding new prescription drug discount cards that are being offered to Medicare recipients included comments in the first four paragraphs from Mildred Fruhling and later in the article from Dr. Sydney Bild. Unknown to the writer, both had been interviewed for a video on a Web site operated by Families USA, a consumer advocacy group that has criticized current Medicare policy as inadequate. When approached by The Times during the preparation of the article, Families USA suggested Mrs. Fruhling and Dr. Bild as interviewees without disclosing that they had appeared in the video. Had that been known, The Times would have chosen others to comment for the article or would have made clear the two interviewees’ connection to the advocacy group."

In other words, the Times was directed to its anti-Bush plan quotes by the liberal group Families USA (which favors universal health care), yet there's no mention of that politicized guidance in the story. Even the editor's note doesn't get to the nub of Families USA's liberal leanings, merely calling the group "a consumer advocacy group that has criticized current Medicare policy as inadequate."

For the full note, click here and scroll down:

• Corrections | Labeling Bias | Medicare

E-mail TimesWatch Director, Clay Waters, with TimesWatch feedback at cwaters@mediaresearch.org