During the 2004 campaign, Senator John Kerry said, “I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it,” referring to an amendment that would have rescinded some tax cuts to finance the Iraq war.
...it amazing: one line that can be clarified with a simple statement is the source of endless misrepresentation.
Yet Republicans are making crazy statements, lying and distorting daily, and some people still want to pretend that there is anything "fair and balanced" about the political debate and reporting.
Two examples: Dean Baker calls out the NYT for "he said/she said reporting" on oil production.
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/president-obama-doesnt-just-say-we-are-producing-more-oil-we-are-producing-more-oil
This was the very tactic the media used to give the Swift Liars constant press. Nothing is challenged and no facts are offered, just "he said/she said" reporting.
Next, from Krugman's latest piece on Romney.
<...>
And therein lies the reason Mr. Romney acts the way he does, why he is running a campaign of almost pathological dishonesty.
For he is. Every one of the Romney campaign’s major themes, from the attacks on President Obama for going around the world apologizing for America (he didn’t), to the insistence that Romneycare and Obamacare are very different (they’re virtually identical), to the claim that Mr. Obama has lost millions of jobs (which is only true if you count the first few months of his administration, before any of his policies had taken effect), is either an outright falsehood or deeply deceptive. Why the nonstop mendacity?
As I see it, it comes down to the cynicism underlying the whole enterprise. Once you’ve decided to hide your beliefs and say whatever you think will get you the nomination, to pretend to agree with people you privately believe are fools, why worry at all about truth?
What this diagnosis implies, of course, is that the many people on the right who don’t trust Mr. Romney, who don’t believe that he’s truly committed to their political faith, are correct in their suspicions. He’s playing a role, and it’s anyone’s guess what lies beneath the mask.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/24/opinion/krugman-romneys-economic-closet.htmlThis is the person that some media reports despicably try to contrast with Kerry as if to give him political cover.
Ugh!
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