The Liberal Media

Dave Spence "is holding off on any public events or on-the-record interviews."  

It's great to see the News-Leader continue to hold Roy Blunt accountable for his long, well-documented record of unethical leadership in Washington.  Water under the bridge, kids! 

What's good for Roy Blunt is good for Missouri.

OK, that's an overstatement, but there's a kernel of truth in that a Missourian in a position of leadership within the U.S. Senate Republican Conference could be beneficial to our state...

It should be noted that Blunt lost his leadership role among House Republicans following the resignation of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, in a money laundering scandal. Blunt was part of that leadership team. But this has never proven a handicap for the freshman senator with Missourians. In Washington, D.C., it may be considered water under any Potomac River bridge.

Excuse me while I clean the spewed coffee off my keyboard and monitor...  and then clear my memory of all of following now-irrelevant information. 

h/t Mother Jones

Once you get past (a) the blanket indictment of "The Internet," (b) the refusal to name which Missouri "conservatives" helped spread the relevant junk (e.g., Peter Kinder, Ed Martin, Dana Loesch, Mark Parkinson) and (c) the glossing over of his own paper's role in advancing the smear, this is a great editorial from the Tribune's Hank Waters:

A recent example [of "provocative stuff on the Internet"] that made the news involved a video posted by right-wing critic Andrew Breitbart showing grossly manipulated excerpts of online presentations made by instructors at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and the University of Missouri-Kansas City who seemed to advocate labor union violence.

The Breitbart version was circulated by conservatives eager to believe the worst about unions, professors and other devils targeted on Breitbart’s Big Government website.

Certainly, in this column lovingly devoted to free speech principles, I am not saying Breitbart has no right to criticize the professors, but he should not misrepresent what they do or say. In reaction to his latest post, university officials in both cities had to correct the record by showing more fully the content and context of the collaborative online labor studies presentations.

The Post-Dispatch's Tim Barker follows up this weekend on his underwhelming reporting of the most recent Andrew Breitbart smear with a weekend article, "Academic freedom at heart of UMSL flap."

Barker looks at the world as a education reporter, and I look at the world with a political lens.  That said, I strongly disagree with his assertion that this story is about "academic freedom."  This "flap" is about a bunch of conservative activists who make it a practice of creating and releasing dishonest videos to advance their narrow radical political agenda.  It's about their freedom to smear people in world where reporters insist on treating their manufactured point of view as a legitimate point of view in ostensibly "balanced" reporting.

I also agree with Adam Shriver when he writes that reporters at the Kansas City Star have outperformed all other outlets in the state on this story.  The difference in coverage between Kansas City and St. Louis reporters may be related the respective personalities of the UMKC and UMSL professors, but those are irrelevant when it comes to reporting basic facts about the Breitbart activists' actions.

The Post-Dispatch's Tim Barker posted a story early this morning on last week's smear of two Missouri instructors by Andrew Breitbart's BigGovernment.com website.   Yet as Adam Shriver points out, Barker really drops the ball when it comes to reporting the known facts about the videos. 

The sum total of Barker's "reporting" on the fact that the videos are obvious hit jobs sliced up to misrepresent reality is contained in this sentence: "[Officials at UMKC] have criticized the Internet videos, saying their editing put the instructors' comments out of context." 

Um, yeah.  UMKC provost Gail Hackett said the videos totally distorted the instructors' comments by "taking their statements out of context and reordering the sequence in which those statements were actually made so as to change their meaning." 

And since the Star published UMKC's response last Thursday, extended video clips have been made public, and all of them are available to Barker. Readers aren't informed of this fact, or even given any indication that Barker has watched the longer segments.

Should Barker wish to update his woefully incomplete reporting, here are a few links worth clicking:

• Breitbart Starts Big Push To "Go After Teachers" With His Trademark Deception (Media Matters)
• Breitbarted Again? BigGovernment Uses Deceptively Edited Video To Smear University Professors (Crooks & Liars)
• Judy Ancel and colleague were framed by Breitbart (Star)
• Video posted online prompts threats to UMKC professor (Star)
• MU Faculty Council feedback sought about release of controversial videos (Columbia Missourian)
• Missouri Lieutenant Governor Accuses Labor Professors Of "Terrorism" (PoliticalCorrection.org)
• University says Internet video distorted labor lecturers' meaning (Star)
• KC university supports lecturer in video flap (AP)
• Peter Kinder irresponsibly sides with Breitbart (Star )
• Judy Ancel and colleague were framed by Breitbart (Star)
• The Shirley Sherrods of Academe? (Inside Higher Ed)
• Judy Ancel's Statements on the Breitbart/Loesch Smear Attacks (St. Louis Activist Hub)
• Big Government Lies About Edits (St. Louis Activist Hub)

Good news: The Democrats in the House of Representatives and two Republicans -- Mike McGhee (Odessa) and Ray Weter (Nixa) -- voted against the GOP effort to amend Missouri's constitution to create new and unnecessary hurdles for voting (SJR2). 

Bad news: Republicans continued to mislead the press and reporters about the intent and effects of their proposal, which is what they've done for years on this issue. Stanley Cox continued to his hackery, even saying that ACORN is "still cheating" in Missouri elections (!).   A few minutes later, Paul Curtman said ACORN and fraud in a sentence about four individuals who submitted bogus voter registrations in 2006, and Missourinet's Brent Martin included Curtman's comments in a story without mentioning that the proposed constitutional amendment would do nothing to change the laws under which those people were indicted.

Politico's Dave Catanese has declared that the 2012 race between Jay Nixon and Peter Kinder will be the most competitive gubernatorial race in the country. 

You may find this preposterous, but you're not as smart as Dave Catanese. 

Implicit in this brilliant bit of Politico analysis is the assumption that Kinder's disasters will stop long enough for him to actually make an official campaign announcement.

I'm blown away by this story in the Columbia Tribune by Janese Silvey.

Even though the Andrew Breitbart empire of websites has a well documented history of using dishonestly editing videos to further their political goals against NPR, ACORN, Shirley Sherrod and others, the Tribune has posted videos from Breitbart's BigGovernment.com because... they "are making the rounds online."

The videos -- complete with the now-familiar quick cuts and odd edits -- are taken from an unknown numbers of classes and feature named and unnamed persons from what we're told are classes about the labor movement led by instructors UMKC and UMSL.

But as we know from the recent NPR video fiasco, Breitbart lackeys aren't above intentionally editing videos to mislead viewers and wreck havoc in the lives and careers of their targets.  Far from being above it -- editing videos to mislead viewers is what they do.

The videos Silvey posts in full on the Tribune site are 6:42 and 7:25 long -- waaaay shorter than any college lecture (or lectures) on the planet -- but that doesn't seem to raise any red flags.  There isn't a hint of skepticism expressed in the article.  Apart from a sentence stating that "the UM System declined to comment, and Ancel was not available Monday afternoon," there's not a hint of journalism in the story either.  Just a tidy summary of obviously edited videos that "are making the rounds online" -- the stuff of Breitbart's dreams.

Billy Long claimed this morning that "the paper" is lying about the GOP budget plan, and how it radically change the very popular Medicare program.  So what does "the paper" of record in Springfield do?  It buries the accusation in the second to last paragraph in the article, and doesn't give any evidence that reporter Linda Leicht followed up with questions about the claim.  

Here's what the News-Leader printed about one of the most important policy issues being debated in Washington right now:

“Are senior programs on the chopping block?” read another card. Calling cuts in senior programs “the third rail of politics,” Long insisted, “We have to honor our commitment to seniors.” He pointed to Illinois Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget “road map” that would continue to provide Medicare for everyone 55 and older, but would privatize the program for those who miss the cut-off age. Long spoke in support of Ryan’s proposal, warning the group to ignore
media reports that point out its failings. “Don’t believe what you read in the paper,” he declared.

That's all we get. No explanation of why Long thinks it's a good idea to phase out Medicare.  No explanation of why he thinks unspecified newspaper writers are misleading the public about the plan.  What are we not supposed to believe?  Why does Billy believe what he believes?  

Despite promises from Sarah Steelman spokesperson Politico reporter/pundit Dave Catanese that Sarah Steelman is a "heavyweight" candidate running as one of "the top GOP gets" in the entire country, she barely topped Ed Martin's anemic fundraising total for the first quarter.

Former Missouri State Treasurer Sarah Steelman delivered the most underwhelming first quarter campaign finance report of any top flight Republican running for Senate.

Steelman raised just $186,000 during the first three months of the year, leaving her only $193,000 in the bank, according to a GOPer with knowledge of the cash on hand total.

The numbers, dropped late Friday evening, reveal that Steelman only bested former congressional candidate Ed Martin by about $24,000 during the time period.  Even more troubling for Republicans:  It leaves her trailing vulnerable first-term Sen. Claire McCaskill by a whopping $1.6 million in the dash for cash.

Martin reported raising $162,000 between January and the end of March and McCaskill took in $1 million.

On KFTK this morning, Peter Kinder whined about his "rather expensive" and "very expensive private legal fees," and once again asked for people to donate to the opaque corporation he created to finance his Health Care Inaction lawsuit.

For the four billionth time:  Kinder's Health Care Inaction donations and expenses should be opened to the public.  It's essentially a slush fund at this point, created to finance an allegedly official action.  We have absolutely no idea who has donated the "six figures of support" to pay GOP attorney Thor Hearne, and have absolutely no idea how Kinder and David Barklage have spent that money.  He's able to get away with this because the press and public have not demanded that he let the sun shine in. 

Here's Kinder's full conversation with GOP mouthpiece Jamie Allman. 

Last week, you'll recall, Allman reamed Kinder for his "pansy move" and making "fools" of the sycophants like Allman who tried to defend his inappropriate travel expenses.  But that was last week.

Missourinet's Bob Priddy has strong feelings about the filibuster of unemployment benefit money by Jim Lembke, Brian Nieves, Rob Schaaf and Will Kraus, but goes out of his way to not be specific about attaching names to offending actions.   In fact, Lembke is the only one of these clowns who gets his full name printed in Priddy's most recent blog post, titled "The Four." Here's a passage where attaching names to behavior would clarify things:

One of the other participants thought that stereotyping the unemployed as people who needed to get off the couch and get a job was helpful to the discussion.(We are reminded of a former colleague at the Missourinet who once remarked, “Stereotyping saves time, doesn’t it?”) Another of Lembke’s allies seemed to feel that arm waving, shouting, and partisan demands that the governor get into the middle of the issue was somehow clever, amusing, and useful. (As Queen Victoria once remarked in an example of British understatement, “We are not amused.”) We’re not sure what the last participant’s contribution was. He seemed to be the little brother who wanted to play with the older kids.

So it was that Senators Lembke, Schaaf, Nieves, and Kraus set forth.

Sarah Steelman spokesperson Politico reporter/pundit Dave Catanese writes today that "Todd Akin is inching closer towards leaping into" the GOP Senate primary," and declares Sarah Steelman "won March."

Conspicuously absent from Catanese's summary of the state of the race are the still unresolved questions about missing records from Steelman's days as Treasurer.  It's true that Peter Kinder's Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad week has dominated the news for the past few days, but we still know absolutely nothing about what Steelman did with the records she was legally required to preserve. 

Catanese is no doubt aware of the story -- he was the one who broke it -- but decided to ignore it entirely and declare Steelman the winner of the month. Go figure. 

The first line from this Post-Dispatch post by Jake Wagman on Peter Kinder's recent fundraising is not true. It reads: "Kinder still has not publicly said whether he'll run for the state's highest office next year."

In February 2010, Politico's Dave Catanese reported the following [emphasis added]:

Missouri Lieutenant Governor Peter Kinder told a gathering of college Republicans in Washington Friday that he plans on running for governor in 2012, according to two separate sources who heard the comments.

The announcement by the two-term Republican isn't itself surprising, but Missouri Republicans told POLITICO it was the first time they had heard Kinder address his plans so specifically in a public setting.

"I will be running for governor in two years," Kinder said, according to two Republicans who attended the luncheon at Jack's Restaurant in Dupont Circle.

Gossip columnist Jerry Berger has reported on at least two occasions that Kinder has confirmed that he'll be running in open conversations. As the whole world can read on BergersBeat.com:

LT. GOV. PETER KINDER WILL RUN FOR MISSOURI GOV.

Caught off-guard, the columnist asked Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder if he is going to run as the 56th Missouri governor. He exclaimed, “Yes!”  Then, he backtracked with another thought: “Er, I’ll make a decision in six weeks, but don’t write that.”  Ubiquitous Kinder  was among 300 in a stable of mostly elegant and timeless swells at the Memories and Melodies event atop the Chase Hotel to benefit Memory Care Home Solution (MCHS).

The Beacon's Jo Mannies reports today for the first time on the St. Louis Tea Party's new lobbyist in Jefferson City, Gary Wiegert, and organization leader Bill Hennessy's "defense" of the choice to make Wiegert their lobbyist.   Yet like the Post-Dispatch, the Beacon's coverage of the STL Tea Party's lobbyist completely omits the details of Hennessy's and Wiegert's recent and relevant activism on state legislative matters -- their attempt to smear Speaker Steve Tilley as "aligned with the New Black Panthers."

With a video featuring Wiegert, Reboot Congress's Darin Morley, hate radio personality Dana Loesch and other Andrew Breitbart lackeys, Hennessy led to charge to spread this junk just last month.  The Beacon reported on the manufactured controversy in February, but then disserves readers by ignoring it altogether when Wiegert is promoted instead of marginalized for his key role in the smear.   Hennessy's role in the pathetic attack should not be overlooked either, but somehow it was -- again.  (See here, here, here and here for examples.)

It's been a great weekend for bad punditry in Missouri.

In his weekend column, The Star's Steve Kraske compared Sen. Claire McCaskill's recent self-disclosed tax problem and immediate apology to Richard Nixon's Watergate crimes, cover-up and scandal that consumed a nation.  The two events are similar, in Kraske's mind, because they lasted more than one news cycle. (Seriously.)   Is McCaskill"in the midst" of her own Watergate?  It's certainly possible, because there were more than two stories about it!!

To be fair to Kraske, he really had no choice but to lead his column with a comparison to the most scandalous episode in modern American history, for two obvious reasons.   First, the absence of any poll data detailing actual voters' knowledge and attitude towards the Senator and her response means that no Dems in Disarray! prediction is too dire.   Second, it would have been far too boring to compare McCaskill's situation to another candidate for U.S. Senate in Missouri who experienced his own property tax turbulence at the exact same moment of a very recent election cycle. 

The existence of an anonymous parody twitter account with 76 (!) followers is newsworthy.

The existence of outrageous, false and absurd public statements in the twitter feed of a very real person and very real candidate for higher statewide office is not so newsworthy.

UPDATE: This afternoon, the Washington Post's Aaron Blake wrote a story for The Fix asserting that "even before this week, Republican strategists in Missouri privately described a 'vacuum' in the GOP field, and "depending on who you ask, none of the above names [Steelman, Martin, Todd Akin or Ann Wagner] is the party’s ideal candidate for the seat."   Which DC reporter paid to be an expert analyst about these things should we trust?
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Steelman campaign spokesman Politico reporter Dave Catanese has declared Sarah Steelman one of "the top GOP gets" in the entire country in a new article about candidate recruitment for 2012 races. 

Just three months into the election cycle, the GOP has locked down heavyweight candidates in seven key Senate races, with top contenders seriously thinking about running in two others...

Among the top GOP gets to date: Attorney General Jon Bruning in Nebraska, former state treasurer Sarah Steelman in Missouri, former Sen. George Allen in Virginia, Rep. Denny Rehberg in Montana, former Rep. Heather Wilson in New Mexico, Rep. Jeff Flake in Arizona and Rep. Dean Heller in Nevada.

Have trusted GOP sources signed off on this analysis?  We know Dick Morris is on board with a Steelman campaign, but everything the rest of us hear and read indicates that Missouri GOPers are far from settled on Steelman.  Ed Martin, Francis Marion and some tea party types are concerned she isn't quite extreme enough for a 21st century GOP primary.  And it's not hard to decipher what Ann Wagner was talking about when she said she'd be the "most articulate" candidate in the Race to the Bottom.  

Maybe we just haven't seen enough of Steelman on the stump to appreciate her status as one of the "top GOP gets" in the entire country?

When one NPR employee who's already on his way out the door says there's a “radical, racist, Islamaphobic" element of the Republican Party, that's national news. 

When a statewide official in Missouri says NPR has a racist and fascist agenda, that's not news at all.