Unfair and Biased

As election day approaches, leftist hypocrisy and media favoritism intensify. Here's two examples.

1. If it's unconstitutional, it must be the Patriot Act. Two weeks ago, Judge Victor Marrero of the Southern District of New York sided with the ACLU, invalidating a statute permitting law enforcement agencies to subpoena customer records (telephone or Internet) in terrorism investigations. Doe v. Ashcroft, Civ. 2614 (S.D.N.Y. Sept. 28, 2004). The judge faulted the absence of a provision permitting challenge to a subpoena.

A huge setback for the Patriot Act and Attorney General Ashcroft, pronounced the headlines in the New York Times ("Judge Strikes Down Section of Patriot Act Allowing Secret Subpoenas of Internet Data") and Washington Post ("Key Part of Patriot Act Ruled Unconstitutional"). The Post called the ruling as "one of several judicial blows to the Bush administration's anti-terrorism policies in recent months," hinting the decision re-affirmed the civil rights of targets of FBI investigations.

Nonsense, for several reasons. First, the relevant provision isn't even in the Patriot Act--it's section 2709 of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, passed in 1986. Second, the issue was whether a phone or Internet company could challenge a subpoena; the Court neither addressed nor questioned the government's authority to examine phone records (or wiretap) without first alerting the investigation's target. Third, the government itself conceded that phone and Internet providers could challenge such a subpoena (Slip Op. at 49-50); the case turned on whether the right to challenge must explicitly be spelled out in the statute (it must, according to Judge Marrero; the Justice Department's practice permitting challenge did not suffice). So the decision neither overturned Bush-sponsored legislation or policy, nor mandated warning investigation suspects (which obviously would foreclose many prosecutions).

The Administration complained, and the Times and Post issued half-hearted corrections (as always, in small type, without provocative headlines). But both papers outrageously persisted claiming the Patriot Act was at issue; according to the Times:

An article yesterday about a judge's ruling to invalidate some federal surveillance powers referred incorrectly to a subpoena statute that was struck down. While the statute -- authorizing the use of subpoenas known as national security letters -- was amended by the antiterrorism legislation called the USA Patriot Act, it was not created under that act. It was enacted in 1986 and amended several times, including once in October 2001 under the Patriot Act, to expand its application. The judge's ruling analyzed and struck down the statute as a whole, including provisions that predated the Patriot Act.

Wrong again--ruling addressed a single section long predating the 2001 Patriot Act. And although it enlarged the section's scope, the Patriot Act's amendment didn't alter the notification provisions challenged by the ACLU and overturned in Judge Marrero's ruling.

What prompted this news reporting atrocity? Laziness, in part--Judge Marrero's decision is 120 pages. But as Heather MacDonald details in a thorough (subscription only) article in the October 18th Weekly Standard, the error arose because the media "simply repackaged the ACLU spin." The evidence? The ACLU press release on the decision was titled "Federal Court Strikes Down Patriot Act Surveillance Power As Unconstitutional," claiming "a landmark victory against the Ashcroft Justice Department's misguided attempt to intrude into the lives of innocent Americans in the name of national security." So the ACLU falsely conflated the Patriot Act and deceitfully intimated the ruling addressed the rights of individuals, as opposed to carriers and service providers. That's bad--but worse is the liberal media skipping fact-checking on stories favoring the left.

Naturally, there's been no follow-up from either paper.

2. Censorship is bad--except from the left. Opposition to governmental restrictions on speech is, thankfully, an issue on which left and right mostly agree. Not today. The papers are overflowing with outrage over an announcement from the Sinclair Broadcasting Group, which owns or manages over 60 television stations, to air a documentary critical of Senator Kerry's 70s era antiwar activities before the election. According to AP, the 42-minute film, "Stolen Honor: Wounds That Never Heal,"

chronicles Kerry's 1971 testimony before Congress and links him to activist Jane Fonda. It includes interviews with Vietnam prisoners of war and their wives who claim Kerry's testimony -- filled with "lurid fantasies of butchery in Vietnam" on the part of U.S. troops -- demeaned them and led their captors to hold them longer.

Democrats today complained to the FEC and FCC seeking to halt the broadcast, as did 18 Democratic Senators. Indeed, FCC Commissioner Michael Copps--a Democrat nominated by President Bush--already sympathized, according to Drudge, calling the planned broadcast:

an abuse of the public trust. . . [O]ne owner can use the public airwaves to blanket the country with its political ideology -- whether liberal or conservative. Some will undoubtedly question if this is appropriate stewardship of the public airwaves.

Others call for a boycott of Sinclair.

How quickly they forget. Only 18 months ago, the left was outraged when radio stations and listeners boycotted the Dixie Chicks, protesting the group's outspoken opposition to invading Iraq. Throughout the year, the media's lauded--and broadcast excerpts from--Michael Moore's anti-Bush film "Fahrenheit 9/11." The left was silent when Dan Rather repeatedly lied to trash Bush--and conservatives never sued to stop CBS's newscasts. Only last week, a leaked internal ABC memo documented pro-Kerry executives slanting Presidential debate coverage. And, as Charles Johnson notes, "Any objections from the DNC about Michael Moore’s plan to show his falsehood-packed Fahrenheit 9/11 on pay-per-view the night before the election, in a blatant, openly admitted attempt to influence voters?"

Ah, but that's different. How? Simple--the left is certain it's right. And they speak for the "little guy." This justifies different coverage of conservatives, as today's Washington Post unintentionally confirms. The WaPo's front-page Sinclair story suggests a conspiracy:

four men, while shunning the media spotlight, have assembled the nation's largest collection of television stations, a family-run operation that reflects their conservative views and time and again has sided with President Bush.

But another Post story that same day, this one in Style, coincidently reviews an anti-Bush rock concert held last night. Under a headline "Hail to The Boss: Springsteen Plays Politics," the article coos over

Bruce Springsteen, the gruff-voiced bard of the working class, stormed a sold-out MCI Center last night in the hopes of sending one man straight to the unemployment line.

Yep, and the Boss wasn't alone in voicing his displeasure with our country's other notable boss, either: Thirteen of the New Jersey star's fellow pop-music heavy hitters showed up in the nation's capital to try to help rock George W. Bush right on out of the White House.

What's the difference between a rock star's campaign against Bush and a station owner's campaign against Kerry? Not campaign finance laws--or Michael Moore's movie would be a Kerry contribution. Not any "Fairness doctrine"--that was repealed years ago (Syracuse Peace Council, 2 FCC Rcd 5043 (1987), recon. denied, 3 FCC Rcd 2035 (1988)); in any event, Sinclair offered Kerry time to reply (the campaign declined). So why won't the left apply freedom of speech equally to Springsteen and Sinclair?

Still, NY Times Ombudsman Daniel Okrent somehow denies his paper is "systematically biased toward either candidate."

3. Conclusion: According to liberals and their press lackeys, if it's bad, it's Bush. Don't believe 'um. As George Gershwin observed, "It Ain't Necessarily So."