[FL4RonPaul] FW: FAIR: Treated Like A Democrat (fwd)

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 6 Jun 2007 22:13:41 -0400
From: Henry Morgan <henrymorgan@knology.net>
Reply-To: FL4RonPaul@yahoogroups.com
To: FREEDOM FORWARDS <henrymorgan@knology.net>
Subject: [FL4RonPaul] FW: FAIR: Treated Like A Democrat

For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know
the whole truth; to know the worst, and provide for it. ~ ~ ~ Patrick
Henry
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From: HallahanFl [mailto:hallahanfl@laurenreport.com]
Sent: Wednesday, June 06, 2007 2:56 PM
To: Hallahan Lauren
Subject: FAIR: Treated Like A Democrat

after all....Ron Paul won the debate poll again! First on ABC and now on
MSNBC. So they are hittlng back hard...and this is a good look at the media
monkeying around in democracy!

HYPERLINK
"http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3108"http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=
3108
Media Advisory

Treated Like a Democrat
GOP candidate Ron Paul's 'unorthodox' 9/11 theory

5/31/07

With the public still many months away from choosing presidential candidates
from either major party, the media have fallen into a familiar pattern of
trying to "weed out" candidates that do not meet the press corps'
ideological standards (Extra!, 9-10/03). This tendency usually applies more
to Democrats than Republicans—but Rep. Ron Paul (R. Texas) has demonstrated
that conservative libertarians as well can be deemed too far out for the
establishment media.

As FAIR pointed out recently (Media Advisory, 5/8/07), media reactions to
early candidates' debates often provided a vivid contrast. The more
progressive Democrats—especially former Alaska Sen. Mike Gravel and Rep.
Dennis Kucinich (D-Oh.)—were treated as a diversion from the "real" debate
between media-favored candidates. As CNN host Howard Kurtz said of Gravel
(4/29/07), "Why should a network allow somebody with, say, zero chance of
becoming president into these debates?"

By contrast, the inclusion of Republican candidates polling near the bottom
in the debates was mostly cheered; a Los Angeles Times editorial (5/4/07)
called the presence of such candidates "a sign of intellectual ferment."
When three of the GOP contenders signaled their doubts about evolution, the
Washington Post helpfully noted (5/6/07) that "a look at public polling on
the issue reveals that the three men aren't far from the mainstream in that
belief."

But the second Republican debate (5/15/07) flipped this media script, when
Republican candidate Ron Paul dared to raise a taboo subject: Al-Qaeda's
statements about the September 11 attacks. "They attack us because we've
been over there, we've been bombing Iraq for 10 years," Paul said. "We've
been in the Middle East.... Have you ever read about the reasons they
attacked us?"

GOP front-runner Rudy Giuliani responded by saying he'd never heard such an
"absurd explanation" for the September 11 attacks, "that we invited the
attack because we were attacking Iraq"—a response that got sustained
applause from the audience, and much the same from the press corps.

Appearing on MSNBC's Hardball (5/16/07), Washington Post editorial board
member Jonathan Capehart called it "a big moment, a home run for Rudy.... I
knew that what Rudy was saying was heartfelt, and he meant it, because, when
you look at his eyes, you have never seen him more serious, more focused."
Capehart added that Giuliani "was upset. He was angry. And I think he tapped
into not only the mood of the crowd, but also the mood of the country, in a
sense."

The media reacted strongly in support of Giuliani. Fox News Channel's John
Gibson scored a twofer (5/17/07) by mangling Paul's words ("Paul suggested
that the U.S. actually had a hand in the terrorist attacks") and then
linking him to the Democratic Party, citing a poll that claims many
Democrats "think President Bush knew about the 9/11 attacks beforehand....
It wouldn't have stunned me had it come up in the Democratic debate, but
it's a jaw-dropper to see it in the Republican debate." Time magazine's Joe
Klein declared it to be Paul's "singular moment of weirdness," and that
Giuliani "reduced Paul to history."

Lost amidst the media excitement over Giuliani's response was whether or not
Paul was correct. The Nation's John Nichols wrote a column (5/16/07)
pointing out that Paul's argument more or less echoed the findings of the
9/11 Commission, which noted that Osama bin Laden had called in 1996 for
Muslims to drive U.S. troops out of Saudi Arabia—whose mission there was
largely to support air patrols over Iraq—and that subsequent statements
rallied followers to oppose U.S. policy in Israel-Palestine and Iraq. Such
discussions are common in academic and policy circles, but not so in the
mainstream media.

Such evidence was rarely even considered. MSNBC host Chris Matthews declared
(5/16/07), "Ron Paul has a big problem, by the way." While Matthews granted
that it was important for Americans to "understand the simmering hatred and
the hostility, the sea of hostility, over there," Paul's comments were
unacceptable on factual grounds: "You can't say it's because we put troops
in Iraq, over the no-fly zone, because they tried to blow up that same
building back in '93, before all these skirmishes over the no-fly zone. You
can't say that particular argument."

Paul actually made no reference to the no-fly zones in his debate remarks.
But if that's what Matthews thought Paul was referring to, the cable news
host should be aware that the no-fly policy was first declared in 1991, and
that there was an extensive series of air raids in support of the no-fly
zones in January 1993—a month before the 1993 attack.

When Paul convened a press conference on May 24 at the National Press Club
featuring former CIA terrorism expert Michael Scheurer, the press ignored
the event, although reporters have interviewed Scheurer regularly for
several years. The fact that Scheurer essentially agrees with Paul's
premise, as he explained to AntiWar radio (5/18/07), might explain the
media's ambivalence.

CNN host Howard Kurtz (5/20/07) slammed Paul's "unorthodox theory" about the
9/11 attacks, declaring that "news organizations are allowing ego-driven
fringe candidates to muck up debates among those with an actual shot at the
White House." The real problem isn't that Ron Paul can't win the White
House, or that he might "muck up" a debate; if anything, he started a debate
the media don't want to have.

See FAIR's Archives for more on:
Iraq
War and Militarism
Terrorism
Narrow Range of Debate
Elections/2008

HYPERLINK "mailto:Hallahanfl@LaurenReport.com"Hallahanfl@LaurenReport.com

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