Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Been Left So Long It Looks Like "Moderate" To Me

The New York Times is so biased it can't tell right from left. Always quick to paint its opponents "right-wing" and "conservative," aided by the "ugly" hosts and "livid" listeners of talk radio, the paper -- unlike, say, Norman Geras -- rarely labels its co-religionists -- not even Senator Kennedy or MoveOn.org -- "liberals." But the Times' latest contortions are laughable, writing about John Edwards campaigning in Iowa:

Mr. Edwards’s latest trip here offered evidence of just how much he studied the lessons of his Iowa defeat last time, though he would prefer to view it as a near victory. It also suggests the extent to which the rhythms of Iowa Democratic politics have shaped Mr. Edwards’s decidedly different candidacy this time around.

This time, he is a candidate of the left in a state marked by a strong antiwar and liberal streak, filling a vacancy created as Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton have campaigned from the center.

Obama and Hillary Clinton aren't liberals--who knew? No one, actually: the American Conservative Union's lifetime ratings are 6.7 for Obama and 9 for Hillary. That's out of a possible 100. In 2004, Edwards' final year as a Senator (as opposed to "this time"), the ACU gave the Times-designated liberal a 0 rating, a 10 lifetime. So, for the Times, liberals are limited to those with a negative ACU rating.

Res Ipsa Loquitur. Look it up.

(via Times Watch)

3 comments:

MaxedOutMama said...

I think the more relevant point is that Edwards is a bouffant-haired fool.

Anonymous said...

I enjoyed your June 19 post about "relative leftism." You make a good point. The Democratic Party may indeed be dancing as though it has "two left feet" during this campaign, but the media (and the rating bodies/pollsters) should move away from these labels, which are merely ad hominem and distract voters from analyzing the issues and facts. It is so easy to "label" a candidate as "leftist" or "liberal" and then "dismiss" him/her rather than study and resolve the intricacies and niceties of the problems we face. Arguably, the Republican Party may be suffering from the same clumsiness, as it dances through this campaign with "two right feet." The only way we will ever win a dance contest (or win over our dance partner) is to learn all the steps, both left and right. We also need to learn how to appreciate (and move or sway with) the music, which hopefully is not mono, but played through both left and right speakers.

-Cogito (sometimes mistaken for Patrick Swayze or John Travolta. . . not)

@nooil4pacifists said...

Cogito:

Agreed about the Dems; not so sure about Republicans--doubtlessly reacting to the President's poor poll standings, some of them are too liberal for me.

M_O_M:

Agreed.