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"For the record, all my liberal friends tell me constantly that Fox News is oh-so-biased and CNN is oh-so-great, without EVER citing a single example for either case."

Then your liberal friends are morons. CNN is also skewed in its coverage.

Do you want examples? Are your fingers broken? Any search engine can help you out.

If you want a biased, but truthful, look at examples of conservative bias in the media, check out http://www.mediamatters.org/

Yes, Bill O'Reilly has lambasted Media Matters on his program... which is a pretty good recommendation, for my tastes ;)

The reporter/journalist should have been fired.

Don't hold your breath.

I'm still waiting for O'Reilly to be fired. Hasn't happened yet.

"I'm sorry, but "disagree" does not mean "provide lies".

Actually, it does. But anyway:"

No, it doesn't. See that? I just disagreed with you, and didn't lie to do it.

I could have said, "No, it doesn't because you're a dense mofo," which would have been lying to support my opposing position [or at least I assume it'd be lying?].

======

All your cite are belong to MediaMatters.org

Oh look:
"O'Reilly again falsely accused former guest of claiming that Bush "orchestrat[ed] 9-11"
On the September 21 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, host Bill O'Reilly revived his false allegation that Jeremy Glick, a former guest on the program whose father was killed in the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, "accused the president of the United States of orchestrating 9-11" during his O'Reilly Factor appearance."

"O'Reilly wrong again: "Republicans don't have control of the judicial branch"
In fact, Republican appointees to the federal judiciary outnumber judges appointed by Democratic presidents"

======
"Freedom of the press means freedom of the press. It means that you don't get to choose who goes on the air and who doesn't. Because the press is free.

Got it now?"

Canada and America go about this different ways, that's part of why we're butting heads right now. Canada seems to realize that the point of a free press is to keep the people free to criticize people in power, which explains shows like Air Farce, 22 Minutes, and the popularity of The Daily Show. Americans go more by the letter of the law, even if the spirit is stompped all to hell by people like Bill O'Idiot.

Commie bullshit. Lots of nitpicking, but mostly bullshit.

Leftist hatred of Fox News stems from the fact that FNC allows people to the right of Stalin to express their viewpoints.

Fox News!

Really? So you would say, trust traditional news sources? What about peer reviewed scientific studies? Government?

Wikipedia has a lot of knowledge but it's more of a jumping point than a rock solid reference book, just like a regular encylopedia, regular news sources, and goverment. whenever someone is doing someething so important it really needs to be free of errors they need a body of evidence not just a single source!

sorry, she's not the crazy liberal bulldyke you think she is

He never said Cheney sent him. That's simply a lie. What he said was that the office of the vice president requested the CIA look into this Niger matter. The CIA chose Joe Wilson as he already done this sort of work before (Valerie did not send him to Niger on here own. That's just silly.) He was an ambassador to Niger and Gabon and knew all the players in the area and had completed covert work for the CIA before.
Here's the quote
"In February 2002, I was informed by officials at the Central Intelligence Agency that Vice President Dick Cheney's office had questions about a particular intelligence report. While I never saw the report, I was told that it referred to a memorandum of agreement that documented the sale of uranium yellowcake -- a form of lightly processed ore -- by Niger to Iraq in the late 1990's. The agency officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president's office."
Media repeated false GOP talking point on authorization for Wilson trip to Niger

Her husband, when pressed (cuz it's kinda dopey to complain about bureaucrats being outed...) admits as much.

No he didn't.

"In stating that "My wife was not a clandestine officer the day that Bob Novak blew her identity," Wilson was simply noting that Plame's identity was no longer secret after Novak publicly revealed it."

http://mediamatters.org/items/200507150003

The AP has already run a correction to the story you link to. Nice try though.

That's what happens when you have an economic system that magnifies mans already flawed greedy nature. Case in point was the guy who said "I mean, my first thought when I heard (about the London bombings) -- just on a personal basis, when I heard there had been this attack and I saw the futures this morning, which were really in the tank, I thought, "Hmmm, time to buy."

I wonder if Brit Hume used this emergency system to bargain hunt on the futures market? http://mediamatters.org/items/200507070007

My first thought when I heard that there had been this attack: "hmm... time to buy"

Clinton had a wonderful opportunity to kill or capture bin Laden and passed on it out of fear of what it would do to his reputation

Not according to the 9/11 commission. But I suppose you'll keep spouting that soundbite, 'cause it's so darn catchy.

--grendel drago

I suppose that you're referring to the NORC study, which actually showed that Gore would have won Florida in four different recount scenarios - including a state-wide recount. Link: http://mediamatters.org/items/200407200008

http://mediamatters.org/items/200412230015
And then there's this completely fabricated gem from the election:
Trail Tails: What's that face?
I haven't finished reading the "liberal bias" report yet, that may take some time.

Blame the media. Seriously, we scientists, engineers and mathematicians should hold the media to task for its blatant disregard for truth and justice. When you look at the news and see a bunch of what is essentially staged, opinionated garbage, you figure you might as well watch your favorite fictional show instead, since that's also staged and maybe opinionated, but at least it isn't neccessarily garbage. Remove the fake news and people will start to get interested in things that matter again.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman F. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) originally introduced the bill as part of the House's intelligence community reform package in late 2004. When opposition to the provisions in the Senate threatened to kill that bill, the provisions were dropped, but the House leadership agreed to reattach them "to the first piece of legislation this session that both chambers were expected to pass" [Los Angeles Times, 1/27/05]. The Real ID Act was reintroduced in 2005 and passed the House, but apparently recognizing that the stand-alone bill lacked support in the Senate, the House leadership attached the legislation to the House version of the emergency funding bill. The Senate version did not include the measure. With bipartisan support, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) introduced an amendment expressing the sense of the Senate that the provisions should not be in the final bill, but the amendment was ruled "non-germane" and denied a vote. Most of the Real ID provisions in the House's version survived the House-Senate conference committee and were part of the conference report that passed the House and Senate.

During the Senate debate on the final version of the bill, several senators voiced opposition to the inclusion of the Real ID provisions in the conference report, but this opposition was not reflected in the final vote of 100-0. Here are some excerpts from the debate:

* Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN): "That does not stop me from objecting and expressing my disappointment to two provisions in the bill. One is the so-called Real ID Act. Actually, unlike a lot of legislation we pass here, this is well named. This really is a national identification card for the United States of America for the first time in our history. We have never done this before, and we should not be doing it without a full debate. This Real ID provision turns 190 million driver's licenses, which are now ineffective ID cards, into more effective national identification cards. To add insult to injury, we have also slapped state governments with the bill for them. I strongly object to this. When I was governor of Tennessee, I vetoed our state ID card twice because I thought it was an infringement on civil liberties. I thought that driver's licenses are for driving. If we need an ID card, we should have an ID card."
* Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R-RI): There are many concerns I have with Real ID in addition to the process used to bring it to the floor. First, the measure is an unfunded mandate to the states. Furthermore, unless every state complies, the federal government will have to mandate the creation of a national ID. Between the creation of a new database and approval system, training for DMV workers, and struggling state budgets, Real

> I don't like minimum wage hikes because typical minimum
> wage jobs are not intended for wage earners but for high-
> school kids earning spending money

Right wing fallacy. Only ~32% of all people earning minimum wage are teenagers.

http://mediamatters.org/items/200405020007

You wrote: "The government went to war with the best information it had available - they weren't lying. The information was no good. Unfortunately, this wasn't known at the time."

And to fix the broken intelligence they're going to increase funding and revamp all the outdated technologies and get things up to a modern level... eventually. But most importantly they're going to increase the funding.

That's their "punishment" for "fucking up." Do you really not get how this whole game works?

Bush and Company wanted to go to war with Iraq. There was no trusted evidence of any imminent threat. It was well-established that Iraq had no WMD. They were actively scrubbing the few munitions that were on the edge of permissible under the sanctions. There was no justifiable reason to occupy Iraq.

But they sold it to the American public with the help of a media system which repeats whatever its told and focuses its debate only on irrelevant details rather than probing into real matters. A media system which has been found by the Florida court to be under no legal obligation to tell the truth, regardless of public interest.

When the media no longer functions, then honest, reasonable people can easily be manipulated by telling them they are under threat. I believe people have been acting honestly and with genuine concern in their voting Bush back into office. However, I believe they did so with half of their brains tied behind their backs, because the media distorted everything so badly in favor of its corporate interests.

You really gotta wake up, dude. Deliberate propagandist bullshit is going down in modern-day America right now, and you can't even see it for what it is. The powerful are doing all they can to preserve their ass, and if it means getting people worked up into a religious fervor to keep them distracted then they don't give a damn.

Let me ask you this: Do you think that people who are interested only in power and have no sense of universal brotherhood would have any qualms about pretending to be Christian to accomplish their aims? Do you believe that people can fool themselves into believing they're being righteous, when they're simply serving themselves? Do you know what makes up a person's sense-of-identity, and how that sense-of-identity can be a convenient lever for manipulation?

You really need to get off your ass and look into this stuff. Seriously.

The fact that Al Franken and Jon Stewart are the best brokers and deconstructors of information that we have in the American media is a side-benefit of the observational power that makes a comedian successful. In case you're not familiar with the role and meaning of the "court jester" I suggest you read a play called "King Lear" and see a film named "Ridicule" as a primer. To sum up, the jester is valuable to keep the king's ego in check and prevent him from getting too full of himself. Also to observe details of the kind which a person in the role of head of state might not consider relevant. We need more of these jesters.

To keep abreast of the constant stream of distortions (of all kinds) that plague our corporate media system you should frequently visit http://www.mediamatters.org/ - a media watchdog organization formed by David Brock, a former inside player in the propaganda-sphere.

Good luck in your quest to become a more informed citizen. It's not easy. But by turning off your television news and following up on the media-prescribed issues-of-the-day rather than simply picking a side you will soon begin to see the sun through the clouds.

FoxNews does this all the time.

See here for an example.

You can help.

MoveOn.org donation page

MediaMatters donation page

Center for American Progress donation page

American Civil Liberties Union donation page

I just read about them.

Dare I ask which ultra-conservative publication? (a given considering what you posted about them.)

They are one of these "astroturfed" interest groups formed mainly to censor those they do not like, such as the Sinclair Group.

Sigh. Media Matters is an organization headed by David Brock, formerly a part of the Republican propoganda machine, a true insider in the Republican party. They weren't too happy when he saw the light and jumped ship. (Read his book "Blinded By the Right" for more info).

The mission of Media Matters is to act as a watchdog- to highlight false or outrageous statements made DAILY by conservative pundits. MM generally cites the true facts behind these claims, and also does a great job of pointing out where certain "news" sites editorialize while trying to appear impartial.

Media Matters is a Web site and has no ability to "censor" anyone.

They are making the false accusation that the Sinclair Group is "abusing the airwaves"

The ultra-right wing Sinclair Group *is* abusing their ownership of the public airwaves. Just off the top of my head, there was the "news program" (ie, swift boat smear propoganda) about John Kerry they ran just before the election. Then there was the time they ordered their affiliate stations to not air the Nightline episode honoring the fallen American soldiers in Iraq. 97% of the Sinclair executives $68,000 campaign donations went to Bush, btw. Seems unbiased to me.

by expressing opinions that Media Matters does not like, and they are pushing for the government to censor the Sinclair Group.

They should lose their license. They have abused the public airwaves for long enough.

Whatever happened to tolerance for opposing views? Why must groups like this work so hard to get the government to censor those they do not like?

Please ask the Sinclair people, and then get back to me. Media Matters is bringing these issues, which otherwise few people would know about, to a public forum.

I am not a fan of the Sinclair Group, but I believe in the First Amendment, and that expressing political opinion on the airwaves is a Good Thing (tm) and is not "abuse".

Do you have any idea what you're talking about? I suggest you do some research first. Media Matters is one of the very few sites that actually hold people accountable for the misinformation-- No, I'll say it, LIES-- they regularly spew on those right wing cable/radio crapfests and the conservative media that would-- and did-- otherwise get away with it.

Start here.

Some choice selections:

• O'Reilly denied calling the pope "senile" -- but he did
• After GOP source of Schiavo memo was confirmed, Hume, Kristol failed to acknowledge their roles in suggesting Democrats had authored it
• Conservatives on Fox baselessly cast ethics charges against DeLay as partisan attacks by Democrats, "liberal media"
• Fox's Jim Angle: stumping for Bush on Social Security?
• Fox anchor repeated false claim about "Nobel Prize-nominated" doctor
• Fox News hosts muse about gay rights
• Fox's Brian Wilson covered for DeLay

Shall I go on?

Start here.

Some choice selections:

• O'Reilly denied calling the pope "senile" -- but he did
• After GOP source of Schiavo memo was confirmed, Hume, Kristol failed to acknowledge their roles in suggesting Democrats had authored it
• Conservatives on Fox baselessly cast ethics charges against DeLay as partisan attacks by Democrats, "liberal media"
• Fox's Jim Angle: stumping for Bush on Social Security?
• Fox anchor repeated false claim about "Nobel Prize-nominated" doctor
• Fox News hosts muse about gay rights
• Fox's Brian Wilson covered for DeLay

Shall I go on?

Start here.

Some choice selections:

• O'Reilly denied calling the pope "senile" -- but he did
• After GOP source of Schiavo memo was confirmed, Hume, Kristol failed to acknowledge their roles in suggesting Democrats had authored it
• Conservatives on Fox baselessly cast ethics charges against DeLay as partisan attacks by Democrats, "liberal media"
• Fox's Jim Angle: stumping for Bush on Social Security?
• Fox anchor repeated false claim about "Nobel Prize-nominated" doctor
• Fox News hosts muse about gay rights
• Fox's Brian Wilson covered for DeLay

Shall I go on?

Start here.

Some choice selections:

• O'Reilly denied calling the pope "senile" -- but he did
• After GOP source of Schiavo memo was confirmed, Hume, Kristol failed to acknowledge their roles in suggesting Democrats had authored it
• Conservatives on Fox baselessly cast ethics charges against DeLay as partisan attacks by Democrats, "liberal media"
• Fox's Jim Angle: stumping for Bush on Social Security?
• Fox anchor repeated false claim about "Nobel Prize-nominated" doctor
• Fox News hosts muse about gay rights
• Fox's Brian Wilson covered for DeLay

Shall I go on?

Start here.

Some choice selections:

• O'Reilly denied calling the pope "senile" -- but he did
• After GOP source of Schiavo memo was confirmed, Hume, Kristol failed to acknowledge their roles in suggesting Democrats had authored it
• Conservatives on Fox baselessly cast ethics charges against DeLay as partisan attacks by Democrats, "liberal media"
• Fox's Jim Angle: stumping for Bush on Social Security?
• Fox anchor repeated false claim about "Nobel Prize-nominated" doctor
• Fox News hosts muse about gay rights
• Fox's Brian Wilson covered for DeLay

Shall I go on?

Start here.

Some choice selections:

• O'Reilly denied calling the pope "senile" -- but he did
• After GOP source of Schiavo memo was confirmed, Hume, Kristol failed to acknowledge their roles in suggesting Democrats had authored it
• Conservatives on Fox baselessly cast ethics charges against DeLay as partisan attacks by Democrats, "liberal media"
• Fox's Jim Angle: stumping for Bush on Social Security?
• Fox anchor repeated false claim about "Nobel Prize-nominated" doctor
• Fox News hosts muse about gay rights
• Fox's Brian Wilson covered for DeLay

Shall I go on?

Start here.

Some choice selections:

• O'Reilly denied calling the pope "senile" -- but he did
• After GOP source of Schiavo memo was confirmed, Hume, Kristol failed to acknowledge their roles in suggesting Democrats had authored it
• Conservatives on Fox baselessly cast ethics charges against DeLay as partisan attacks by Democrats, "liberal media"
• Fox's Jim Angle: stumping for Bush on Social Security?
• Fox anchor repeated false claim about "Nobel Prize-nominated" doctor
• Fox News hosts muse about gay rights
• Fox's Brian Wilson covered for DeLay

Shall I go on?

Start here.

Some choice selections:

• O'Reilly denied calling the pope "senile" -- but he did
• After GOP source of Schiavo memo was confirmed, Hume, Kristol failed to acknowledge their roles in suggesting Democrats had authored it
• Conservatives on Fox baselessly cast ethics charges against DeLay as partisan attacks by Democrats, "liberal media"
• Fox's Jim Angle: stumping for Bush on Social Security?
• Fox anchor repeated false claim about "Nobel Prize-nominated" doctor
• Fox News hosts muse about gay rights
• Fox's Brian Wilson covered for DeLay

Shall I go on?

If your going to compete with the likes of Rush, Hannity, and the right you need to deliver facts and keep the slant off. Do not copy unless your doing so out of sincere flattery for someone else's job well done. Lastly do not EVER go off on a tirade that borders on a political stump speech.

Sean Hannity quotes about the war in Kosovo that sound exactly like the sort of quotes about the War in Iraq that he criticises as Unamerican.

The Center for American Progress creates a list of on-air lies by Sean Hannity in response to being challenged someone to "defend and explain one example where I -- where I said something that was so false." (Points 5 & 13 are the weakest IMHO.)

Sean Hannity suggested early in the Abu Ghraib scandal that photos of the torture of prisoners were a DNC plot. (Note that this post tried to defend the infamous CBS memos before they were verified to be false.)

Rush Limbaugh defends Abu Ghraib torturers as boys performing harmless pranks and blowing off steam.

Limbaugh spins an article about advances in medical technology as disappointment in the low levels of fatalities in the war by the anti-war camp to our troops while in Iraq.

If your going to compete with the likes of Rush, Hannity, and the right you need to deliver facts and keep the slant off. Do not copy unless your doing so out of sincere flattery for someone else's job well done. Lastly do not EVER go off on a tirade that borders on a political stump speech.

Sean Hannity quotes about the war in Kosovo that sound exactly like the sort of quotes about the War in Iraq that he criticises as Unamerican.

The Center for American Progress creates a list of on-air lies by Sean Hannity in response to being challenged someone to "defend and explain one example where I -- where I said something that was so false." (Points 5 & 13 are the weakest IMHO.)

Sean Hannity suggested early in the Abu Ghraib scandal that photos of the torture of prisoners were a DNC plot. (Note that this post tried to defend the infamous CBS memos before they were verified to be false.)

Rush Limbaugh defends Abu Ghraib torturers as boys performing harmless pranks and blowing off steam.

Limbaugh spins an article about advances in medical technology as disappointment in the low levels of fatalities in the war by the anti-war camp to our troops while in Iraq.

i agree with Rush ~50% of the time - I'm libertarian

So, did you agree or disagree with him when he said of Jesse Jackson "the Kerry campaign has finally gotten a chocolate chip"? mp3

i agree with Rush ~50% of the time - I'm libertarian

So, did you agree or disagree with him when he said of Jesse Jackson "the Kerry campaign has finally gotten a chocolate chip"? mp3

http://mediamatters.org/archives/search.html?strin g=fox 961 problems with fox and counting. BTW, I love "a university media study" type citations. "In other news, Bob Jones University researchers found that Fox news, while the most centrist of news organizations was still way out left..." What liberal views get aired on fox? I've watched more than my fair share, and I get to listen to the dittoheads at work spout off about how great fox is all day long (I work at an Air Force Base). There is no liberal news on fox. If you want "liberal news" try Air America radio, http://www.commondreams.org, http://www.alternews.net, or a real liberal news source. CNN used to be centrist, but even they've skewed right. Same thing with NPR. The closest thing to centrist news available is the BBC. Everything else has been pulled waaaay right. Which you don't recognize until you actually read/listen to some openly liberal stuff. Then you'll see how out of whack all "news" in this country is. Not to mention the fact that stories that shouldn't matter nationally keep getting picked up by conservative bloggers and forced onto national media. Like Terry Schiavo. Should have been a local/regional issue at most. Got picked up and pushed nationally by conservative right-to-lifers (and I'm not even going to start on the irony of Bush's "culture of life" coming from a man who signed more death warrents than any other governer in HISTORY!)

I know what you mean... I guess my comment assumes that you can determine who does research and who doesn't. Usually you can tell by comparing your own research to the other person's. If it's way off, then either you've missed something or the person is just making stuff up.

Some sites do just this, such as mediamatters (clearly targets conservatives, but importantly only those that deserve it because they didn't do their research :-) )

Sort of offtopic but found this...
Can anyone explain to me the point of this media research center article: 'Targeted' Reporter Works for Communist Paper. It complains that the media is hiding the fact that that italian reporter who just got freed in Iraq but then got shot at by US troops actually works for a communist newspaper. Does that make it okay to shoot at her convoy or something? I just don't know the point of the article... Why didn't they mention if she was from north or south italy, hmmm? Or if she prefers fetuccini or capellini? What is the relevance of her political philosophy?

It seems the MRC expects people to think "well, I'm mad that the US shot at a convoy, but because I know she's a red commie bastard, I instead support what the troops did".

While CBS does lean slightly conservative, it's nowhere near as conservative as typical U.S. media.

Having 65 Democrats/Liberal commentators shown on CBS vs 91 Republican/Conservative ones isn't that bad, given that there were 5 items of liberal commentary vs 5 items of conservative commentary (Liberal commentary in mainstream U.S. media actually equal to conservative commentary? Amazing!)

CBS is so close to neutral in their coverage, one can almost even forgive them for "mistating" facts to pretend that Social Security will have financial problems sooner than it will (parroting administration lies), and refusing to accept a paid advertisement for The United Church of Christ stating "Jesus didn't turn anyone away - neither do we" because other so-called "Christian" churches preaching hate in Jesus's name might not like it.

We have a passel of state Reps I'd describe as "social right wingers" who put up stuff like death penalty legislation every term. They were behind the weapons bill: it was touted as making the law fairer by not leaving it up to individual sheriffs, but really it aimed at allowing more people to carry concealed guns. The bills these folks turn out seem to have been written by 10th graders who were unfamiliar with anything but the skeleton of the issue they're talking about, and they often have unintended consequences.

So, who is this guy?

Senator Larry A. Mumper, Ohio Senate Republican.

He's listed there as primary sponsor of a couple of other bills, including one that was presented as an "academic bill of rights for higher education." This bill was partly prompted by a story about a kid who wrote a "pro-America" paper and got a bad grade from his teacher... Oops, except the kid's paper was crap; he'd written a 1-page "report" that wasn't up-to-snuff, got a bad grade, and decided it was because he was patriotic that he'd been silenced. The bill itself reads like a wolf in sheep's clothing aimed at "protecting a plurality of opinion" by remaining neutral about crap like "intelligent design." It doesn't spell out how you'd decide when a topic was "controversial" -- gee, an ambiguity that could lead to unintended consequences.

Does this sound like exactly the sort of wingnut I'm seeing in Minnesota? I mean, this is a guy who says his law "might apply to anyone who sells a lot" and "If someone buys and sells on eBay on a regular basis as a type of business, then there is a need for regulation." "As a type of business"? No ambiguity there, is there?

Bush is a great president and he will not let this broadcast flag happen under his watch. I know liberal /. probably doesn't get this, but the Republicans are all about SMALLER gov't, people.

You've got to be joking. (At least, I hope you're being sarcastic) Check the second chart down. Bush has increased nondefense discretionary spending faster than Clinton by a large margin, and that's *with* a Republican dominated congress. Of course, that's not even including the *huge* growth in defense and homeland security related spending, most of it stuffed into little-reviewed supplemental appropriation bills. ("Yeah, we need another $90 billion for Iraq. Don't count it against the deficit figures, please.") Just look at the absurd Medicare prescription drug coverage bill- any true conservative would have run from this screaming.

The Republicans today are all about huge, intrusive government. They want to make sure you're a good little consumer, worship the proper god and avoid the gay. Oh yeah, and don't worry about running up the deficit to 3rd world levels- we'll never have to pay that back...

Just sign me "Disgusted ex-Republican".

It's very relevant when those against embryonic stem cell research start touting these results as arguments against the necessity for embryonic stem cell, as you are doing.

- There isn't a "ban" on any kind of stem cell research in the US. There is a restriction on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research - entities are still free to perform embryonic stem cell research (see California's recent US$3 billion bond initiative to support such research in the state) The ban is on federal funding for research involving any embryonic stem cell lines except those few, very limited lines derived before Bush's announcement of the ban. Additionally, the consensus among stem cell researchers is that those few lines which are available are fairly poor, most being contaminated. Oh, and the California Initiative? That's California attempting a legal run around the ban. You can't claim it as an example of it's merit.

- The Bush administration is the first administration to allow any federal funding at all for embryonic stem cell research. Granted, this is partly due to timing, but it's still a point of information.

It's entirely a matter of timing; the Clinton administration was aiming to put a much more liberal federal funding scheme which would not limit researchers to a few poor cell lines

There isn't a "ban" on any kind of stem cell research in the US. There is a restriction on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research - entities are still free to perform embryonic stem cell research (see California's recent US$3 billion bond initiative to support such research in the state)

But this kind of cutting edge research needs gov't funding for several reasons: it's very expensive; it's long term (too much so to attract enough private money); and the federal government can make a big difference in funding if it chooses to.

The Bush administration is the first administration to allow any federal funding at all for embryonic stem cell research. Granted, this is partly due to timing, but it's still a point of information.

Wrong. Here's citation #1 about Clinton's support of stem cell research, and here's citation #2 and #3. I think that Slate, CNN, and ABC are generally trustworthy.

And it would be nice if people stopped clouding the issue with abortion arguments. While there are some similarities, the analogy breaks down very quickly, and argument by analogy is generally suspect. Oh, and BTW, here's an ABC article with some interesting statistics on ESR, including about 60% support for both ESR and federal funding of it by US citizens.

Since you asked, check this out:

http://mediamatters.org/items/200502230006

I quote:

Since April 2002, FOX News has consistently doctored Associated Press articles featured on the FOX News website concerning terrorist attacks in the Middle East to conform to Bush administration terminology. Without any editorial notation disclosing that words in the AP articles have been changed, FOX News replaces the terms "suicide bomber" and "suicide bombing" with "homicide bomber" and "homicide bombing" to describe attackers who kill themselves and others with explosives. In at least one case, FOX News actually altered an AP quote from Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) to fit this naming convention, and then revised it to restore the quote without noting either the original alteration or its correction.

I understand that it is regular practice to edit AP reports, but editing a direct quote is partisan.

I'm not saying he should have been a credentialed member of the White House Press Corp, or should have been in there with no background checks, etc. etc. etc., but if any old blogger is a journalist - indeed, if Kos himself is a "journalist" - then Guckert/Gannon is just the same.

You're absolutely right. There's no difference between a "credentialed" journalist and an "uncredentialed" journalist in the eyes of a partisan idiot. Do *YOU* equate Guckert's journalistic professionalism to be equal to Kos? Or do you feel as long as Guckert's is paid money from some "news organization" that makes him to be a professional journalist, and Kos a partisan amateur to be ignored?

Of course, "professional" organizations seem to be really fascinated about Guckert's background, but not so keen on pointing out why the White House would approve him as a white house reporter. It becomes pretty obvious when he's known for such insightful questions like " Doesn't Joe Wilson owe the President and America an apology for his deception and his own intelligence failure? " Oh, that's the kind of question the White House needs to be asked. Not questions like "Are you aware it was illegal to pay $24K to a journalist to create favorable stories about an administration program proposal...?"

I don't care that Guckert was a bone smuggler. The White House apparently didn't either when they vetted him. It bugs me that the White House tries to frontload their press conferences with right-wing shills. After all, isn't it supposed to be a means by which the President communicates to the general public, and the public gets to ask questions to the White House through professional journalists? But apparently, the neocons neither have shame or integrity. So I lose no sleep here.

But its obvious that the news industry needs to ignore the laws broken by the administration (like bribing journalists, or outing CIA assets), or how the integrity White House press conference process is a lie, and stress that a bone smuggling escort got press credentials. But this is the type of journalism you appear to exalt when it comes from "professional" media, and decry when it comes from a blog.

>Go to http://www.foxnews.com/ and, outside of the opinion section, find me a story that is viciously partisan, or inaccurate.

Start here. You can thank me later.

Fox is full of inaccurate and one-sided reporting

FoxNews is like a breath of fresh air
Read this you dipshit.

I have no legal training whatsoever, but I don't think blackmail applies here. Teaching people how to spam doesn't seem to me to be equivalent with revealing "embarrassing, disgraceful or damaging facts." If he had information saying, for instance, that one of the company's top executives had extensive dealings with a male prostitute and threatened to release that information, that would be blackmail. As it is, I think it's just extortion, since the technique used seems much more like "intimidation" to me.

Anyone who actually knows what they're talking about want to set the record straight?

Dear AC,

Please dig your head out of your ass.

Regards,
AC

P.S. http://mediamatters.org/

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