"Jimmy Carter is back in the news tonight,” NBC anchor Brian Williams declared Wednesday night in making true what he, but not the ABC or CBS evening newscasts found newsworthy, “this time because of harsh words for the current Vice President.”

Back during the Civil War, both Gen. William T. Sherman and his boss, Gen. U.S. Grant expressed their contempt for the press, insisting that the (alleged) gentlemen of the Fourth Estate made a habit of aiding and abetting the enemy by publishing their plans and battlefield strategies.

FNC’s Brit Hume had some fun Monday night with how CNN Pentagon reporter Barbara Starr, who in an interview with Howard Kurtz rationalized the media’s pattern of downplaying lower casualty figures from Iraq, conceded that if they rose that would be much more newsworthy:

Harry Reid is the Democrat’s chief blowhard in the Senate. He has been for years. This week, he’s set himself up as a candidate for Idiot-of-the-Year by launching an all-out attack on leading conservative talk-show host Rush Limbaugh. And get this: Mr. Anti-military is camouflaging his attack as a defense of the military!

Hollywood loves to abuse young girls and routinely depicts underage and taboo breaking sexual encounters, not to mention its perennial depiction of extreme violence, so it is amazing that every year we are treated to Hollywood types decrying that the film industry is “afraid to take chances” in film. The so-called artists of Hollywood imagine that the corporate side of the industry refuses to let them push the envelope, and yearly we are treated to their declamations of being stifled and their artistic integrity assailed. Far from unusual, though, nearly every year there is at least one movie that goes over the top, becomes the “daring” one, the one that is “brave” enough to so casually mistreat women and put them in abusive situations and nearly every year these soft core porn debacles are presented as if they are somehow different, somehow bucking a trend. Each year some new producer, writer or star is quoted to the effect that other movies are somehow “afraid” to tackle such subject matter. But any look at the history of these film festivals reveals there is no such “fear” from Hollywood. These films are common as dirt and just as lowdown and gritty.

This AP report is a perfect example of how the western media hasn’t the temerity to call things like they are, a perfect example of how it soft-sells the truth for fear of violating those vaunted codes of politically correct conduct—and why we could lose this war with a radical Islam that isn’t afraid of how they are perceived by their enemies. The weakness this time is displayed in an AP report titled “Ministry: Taliban spokesman arrested"(1), in which the AP can’t even call the Taliban a terrorist organization and treats these murderers as if they were just another normal government entity by according them the respect of the kind of language you’d reserve for the spokesmen of any legitimate government.

Do not expect the New York Times or CBS or Newsweek or any of the other organs of the Leftist propaganda machine and adjunct to the Democrat National Committee to even whisper about it, but there is a very interesting story about General Petraeus and the American people.  It can be found at the Gallup Poll , but you will not even find the story listed on the Gallup Poll webpage. 

The notion that reason is capable of supplanting religion, or even God, is not a recent conceit. For more than 200 years, advocates of the Enlightenment have insisted that reason not only can serve as a genuine basis for society and morality, but provides a superior one. The New Atheism which has popped up so often in the media of late is merely the latest attempt to revive this hoary old idea, which has survived despite the centuries of copious evidence to the contrary.

Former CBS News anchor and reporter Dan Rather sent shockwaves through CBS and the mainstream media with his dramatic lawsuit against his former employer. On CNN’s Larry King Live last night, Rather seemed shaken and very emotional, fighting back tears on several occasions. His legal claims are even shakier.

Reporting any news of G.I.s killed in Iraq is a proven way for the media to stir up the American public’s feelings of exasperation with the war. Lately, given the noticeable drop in American casualties, they have been taken to task with trying to arouse the same level of disgust from our wearied nation by reporting on the prodigious number of Iraqi civilian casualties that typically ensue in the wake of a suicide bomber’s serendipitous urge to redeem his ticket of entry into his presumed harem in paradise, while on the side Democrats assist by anteing the Iraqi benchmarks game.

On September 7th we noticed that the scandal in the Democrat Party over illegal campaign donations was barely getting any coverage(1) in the print media and the internet. Well, apparently, TV news isn’t doing any better still. It’s so obvious, even the juggernaut of the left, The New York Times(2), has taken note of how few network news reports have aired on the Hsu scandal… though not making a big deal of it, naturally. The news media is doing their level best to deep six the story to benefit Hillary, it seems. If the Hsu fits, anyway. (Do I have to explain that his name is pronounced “Shoe” in Chinese for that joke to work? I sure hope not.)

A New York Times editorial of Sept. 9 commenting on the recent battle on immigration legislation exhibited a naiveté that was, for me, beyond belief. The Times has led the battle for the McCain-Kennedy bill to provide a path to U.S. citizenship for 12 to 20 million illegal immigrants. While attacking President Bush on nearly every front nearly every day, on this issue it allied itself with the president, a supporter of the legislation.

By predicting job losses, focusing on layoffs and ignoring job revisions the media have cast a pall over the U.S. economy.

Today the UPI news service published a story aimed at making Hillary Clinton out to be a victim of “swift boating” and “haters” by focusing on those who are gearing up to oppose her candidacy for president on the Internet. UPI dismisses all opposition to Hillary as “old news,” and “rumors,” calls anti-Clinton forces “snide” and “haters,” but what do they say of the target? All they say is she is “ready to fight back” as if she is a stalwart hero waiting to defend her honor. And not once does this short and rather pointless report deal with a single substantive argument against her candidacy presenting opposition as if it is just crazy extremism gone wild. In the end, this report is little else but UPI shilling for their favored candidate; Hillary Clinton.

So, what we have here is the only hate-speak(1) that the MSM will allow. Attacks on white men who vote Republican. In this case we see our friendly Seattle Post-Intelligencer columnist, Dorothy Parvaz, reveling in her hatred of Bush supporters. Not only is she attempting to malign white Republican men, but she is also doing so on the basis of physical appearance alone. And here I thought that the left was fond of scolding people who judge others by their looks?