Still Ignoring Kerry's "Christmas In Cambodia" -- August 27, 2004 -- TimesWatch.org

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Times Watch for August 27, 2004

Still Ignoring Kerry's "Christmas In Cambodia"

Jim Rutenberg and Kate Zernike are still on the trail of the Swift Boat Veterans in Friday's "Bush Says He Will Back McCain on Ad Crackdown."

From the start the Times has assumed the Swift Boat charges are dubious (quite a difference from the respectful hearing it gave to critics of Bush's National Guard duty: "The Swift boat veterans, whose most serious charges have been contradicted by official records, some of their own past statements and a number of witnesses, got most of their initial money from Texans supportive of the president."

The Times again insists this could be a good issue for Kerry: "Some Republican advisers have privately acknowledged that they would just as soon see the issue die down as the president heads into his convention. There were no signs yesterday that that was going to happen. The Swift boat group released a new Internet advertisement, again calling Mr. Kerry a liar. And across the country, even some Republicans seemed to want to keep the issue alive, with reports of overlap between local party committees and Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Several county Republican parties from New Hampshire to California were directing visitors to their Web sites to the Swift boat veterans' site, a fact the Kerry campaign cited as more evidence of collusion."

They conclude: "Mr. Kerry was asked at a forum in Anoka, Minn., about the attacks on his war record. 'All the guys who were with me on my boat, all the guys who were with me in the specific action where they could see it and know it, absolutely document what I said,' he told the questioner."

Apparently the Times didn't pay sufficient attention to the new Swift Boat ad they mention (which also did more than simply "call Kerry a liar"), because it stands as a contradiction to Kerry's closing claim. The ad features Steve Gardner--a foregunner on Kerry's boat, saying: "John Kerry claims that he spent Christmas in 1968 in Cambodia and that is categorically a lie."

That renders Kerry's claim that "all the guys who were with me on my boat…document what I said" untrue.

This story is the latest example of the Times' non-coverage of Kerry's now-discredited "Christmas in Cambodia" claims.

For the rest of Rutenberg and Zernike on Kerry and the Swift Boat Veterans, click here.

Bush Bugs Times By Not Bashing Swift Boat Ads

Bush gives a sit-down interview to David Sanger and Elisabeth Bumiller in an unusual venue--under a stadium after a campaign rally in Farmington, New Mexico. The front-page story, "Bush Dismisses Idea That Kerry Lied On Vietnam--But Doesn’t Criticize Ad," touches on foreign policy from Iraq to North Korea, but of course focuses on Bush's response to the Swift Boat allegations against Sen. John Kerry's Vietnam service: "President Bush said on Thursday that he did not believe Senator John Kerry lied about his war record, but he declined to condemn the television commercial paid for by a veterans group alleging that Mr. Kerry came by his war medals dishonestly. Mr. Bush's comments, in a half-hour interview with The New York Times, undercut a central accusation leveled by the veterans group, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, whose unproven attacks on Mr. Kerry have dominated the political debate for more than two weeks."

Of course, since the Bush campaign is legally barred from coordinating with the Swifties, nothing he says can "undercut" their claims anyway.

Bush's statement wasn't enough for Sanger and Bumiller, who pushed Bush to specifically denounce the ads and who seem bugged when Bush refused: "Mr. Bush did not hesitate when asked about the central charge issued by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, the veterans' group that has leveled unsubstantiated attacks against Mr. Kerry's record in Vietnam. 'I think Senator Kerry should be proud of his record,'' Mr. Bush said. 'No, I don't think he lied.' But when pressed repeatedly if he would specifically denounce the advertisements, which Mr. Kerry has said were being run with the tacit approval of the Bush campaign, the president refused to condemn then [sic]. Instead, he said he would talk only of the 'broader issue' of the political committees that take to the airwaves with attack advertisements. 'Five twenty-sevens--I think these ought to be outlawed,' he said. 'I think they should have been outlawed a year ago. We have billionaires writing checks, large checks, to influence the outcome of the election.'"

The reporters don't bring up the name of George Soros, Bush's likely "billionaire," or MoveOn.org or America Coming Together, two of the biggest liberal 527 groups, which Soros has helped fund and which in all have thrown over $60 million into ad campaigns to defeat Bush, dwarfing the approximately $1.5 million spent so far by the Swift Boat Veterans.

For more, click here.

Movie Critic's Urban Liberal Smugfest

Movie critic Stephen Holden files an unusually indignant review of a make-fun-of-the-rubes documentary, "This Ain't No Heartland," then follows up on Friday with his take on another anti-Bush documentary, "Bush's Brain." His verdict: Two angry thumbs up.

The "Heartland" review from Thursday opens with Holden in full urban liberal snoot mode: "It's called shooting fish in a barrel. Asked to express their opinions about the war in Iraq, the mostly unidentified subjects of this documentary polemic, 'This Ain't No Heartland,' are only too happy to make fools of themselves. Their fundamental ignorance of the facts, compounded by their disinterest in knowing more, doesn't prevent them from expressing strong opinions and conveying misinformation in bad grammar."

Given Holden's liberal views, no points for figuring out that the people who "make fools of themselves" happen to support the war in Iraq: "As one unidentified woman claims in a fiery speech that is heard but not seen, 'We fought the most moral war that has ever been fought by any people.' She goes on to assert that no country waging a war has done so much to protect innocent civilians. Most believe that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction despite all the evidence to the contrary, and some are certain that his goal was to conquer the United States. The events of 9/11 have also left their mark. One person after another imagines that the Midwest is as vulnerable to attack as New York or Washington. That belief bolsters their vehement opposition to gun control….Beneath their jocularity, you sense the underlying anxieties of people who are so intimidated by the outside world that they would rather not contemplate it…. In the filmmaker's nightmarish view, the heartland is a decaying citadel of ignorance, boorishness and xenophobia, smugly rotting away in the twilight of the American empire."

That would appear to be Holden's view as well.

In the next day's Weekend section, Holden's review of "Bush's Brain," headlined "Postulating a Dark Side to a Bush Operative's Work," is almost as contemptuous: "The movie, which opens today in New York and Los Angeles, depicts Mr. Rove as the ultimate practitioner of ruthless, ends-justifying-the-means dirty politics. Although few if any of the movie's allegations of unethical behavior by Mr. Rove can be proved, the dirty tricks laid at his doorstep, mostly by association, add up to a pattern of contemptuous disregard for the truth and the arrogant pushing of legal limits without technically breaking the law. Mr. Rove's philosophy of political combat, assorted journalists and former associates attest, is that it's not enough to beat the opposition. Whenever possible, you must destroy it….The Rove technique is detected in the smear campaign that helped defeat the Democrat Ann Richards in the 1994 gubernatorial election and in turning the tide against Senator John McCain in the 2000 South Carolina presidential primary after his victory in New Hampshire. Rove's hand is also detected in the campaign last year that defeated the Georgia Democratic Senator, Max Cleland, a genuine war hero who lost three limbs in Vietnam, by portraying him as unpatriotic."

Holden is the latest Timesperson to portray Max Cleland as a victim of Republican slurs on his patriotism, again with no evidence to support the assertion.

For the rest of Holden's review of "This Ain't No Heartland," click here.

For Holden's on "Bush's Brain," click here.

What Does Times Publisher Sulzberger Think About Bush?

What does the Times publisher think of George Bush?

Arthur Sulzberger attended a Manhattan book party celebrating columnist Maureen Dowd's anti-Bush column collection, "Bushworld." The New York Post relates: "New York Observer writer George Gurley had guests literally running away when he asked them if they had anything nice to say about George W. Bush, the 43rd president. Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. told Gurley, 'I have many nice things to say, many things…,' but then ran down the stairs."

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