More Hoorays for Hillary

     The front page of Tuesday's Metro section features Raymond Hernandez's "Clinton's Popularity Up in State, Even Among Republicans," another positive review (and "re-centering") of Sen. Hillary Clinton.

     Hernandez begins by refuting alleged anti-Clinton myths: "Remember Hillary Rodham Clinton and the conventional wisdom about how polarizing a figure she is? Well, think again. Recent polls have shown that Mrs. Clinton, the junior senator from New York, may have turned a corner politically, sharply reducing the number of voters in the state who harbor negative views of her. Pollsters say the change is remarkable for a woman who has long been shadowed by a seemingly implacable group of voters -- commonly referred to as Hillary haters -- who dislike her, no matter what she does, and who pose a potential obstacle to any presidential ambitions she may harbor."

     (A story Hernandez coauthored on a Clinton fundraising  scandal featured a cut-out line that also tarred opponents of the Clintons as "haters": "A tangled tale of a slick operator, the first couple and dogged Clinton haters.")

     Tuesday's story continues with more attempts at myth-busting: "The result of these comments has been an emerging image of Senator Clinton that is far different from the caricature that Republicans have painted of her: that of a secular liberal whose stances are largely at odds with a public that they say is concerned about the nation's moral direction."

     This isn't the first time Hernandez has dismissed the concept of a liberal Sen. Clinton  as a "caricature."

     Though Hernandez does later let "New York Republicans" hit Clinton's "poor record of accomplishment and her liberal ideology," he never moves beyond Clinton's rhetorical feints to the center on abortion and gay marriage to examine her clearly  liberal voting record.

For the rest of Hernandez on Sen. Hillary Clinton, click here:

Through A Green Prism, NYT Sees Red on Property Rights

     There's new respect for property rights in the White House, but the Times reflects the ramifications of this important constitutional issue through a green prism of liberal environmentalism.

     Monday's news story by Dean Murphy, "In Fish vs. Farmer Cases, The Fish Loses Its Edge -- California Water Viewed as Property Issue," mostly ignores the property rights issue (based on the "takings" clause of the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution) and instead passes along fretting from environmental activists in and out of California state government: "Legal fights over water in the West are as common as summer rains are rare. But a flurry of cases in California is attracting intense attention from scholars and state officials who see them as an extraordinary assault by agricultural interests on protections for endangered fish and other wildlife."

     Murphy explains: "In a series of lawsuits, including one to be argued before the United States Supreme Court on Wednesday, farmers and water districts are pushing property-rights claims to the forefront of the debate over how to divvy up water among farms, cities and the environment. In doing so, they are demanding compensation from the government for irrigation water diverted for environmental purposes, calling into question rules mandated by Congress under the Endangered Species Act that favor the protection of fish over the growing of food when water is in short supply. It is an approach that has won sympathy from the Bush administration, which in December agreed to pay $16.7 million to farmers in Tulare and Kern Counties in one lawsuit over reduced water supplies. But the claims have alarmed California officials and many conservation groups, who fear that demands for payment for lost water could spread to other Western states and undermine protections for wildlife."

     Instead of pointing out how the Bush administration affirmed the constitutional right to "just compensation," Murphy looks through the eyes of environmental activists: "The victory has emboldened farmers and water districts across the state, prompted similar lawsuits and panicked environmentalists and some state officials, who worry that hard-won federal protections for endangered species could be weakened. They fear that the government will not make use of protections included in the Endangered Species Act, because courts could make the protections too expensive by forcing the government to pay costly damages."

     (Interestingly, the Times isn't nearly so concerned about government having to pay damages when it comes to, say, cases of police brutality.)

     Murphy later writes: "When the Justice Department, in consultation with the Interior Department, decided not to appeal the decision, many critics saw the political influence of conservative property-rights advocates. [Property rights lawyer Roger] Marzulla worked in the Justice Department in the Reagan administration and has close ties to the Bush administration."

     Meanwhile, none of the anti-property rights critics that Murphy quotes (including Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein or Joseph Sax, a former counselor to former Democratic Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt) is labeled liberal.

For more of Murphy on property rights in California, click here:

Trailing Bush, Europhilia in Tow

     Sunday's front-page story from European-based correspondent Elaine Sciolino, "Opinion Is Softening On Divided Continent," anticipates Bush's tour of Europe and takes a sour, Europhile view of U.S. rhetoric: "This is the Europe that President Bush will find when he lands in Brussels on Sunday, Feb. 20: a continent still deeply divided over how much to bend to the will of Washington on issues of war and peace, and how warmly to support the Bush crusade to spread its definition of freedom around the world."

     Sciolino later argues: "In discussing national security, the Europeans emphasize the word 'stability,' the Americans the word 'liberty,' even if it borders on what the Europeans might consider adventurism. Washington's strident statements about liberating Iran, for example, have spread concern across the Continent that America may try to use military force there."

To read the rest of Sciolino, click here: