The Drudge Report is a right-wing site that is used to drive right-wing propaganda into the large, corporate media outlets. When a story is featured at the Drudge Report, you always have to ask why, and ask what is the right's intent behind getting this story into circulation.
Today Drudge points us to a story, Wilder Still Sore Over Clinton Comment. This story is obviously an effort to drive a wedge between supporters of Senators Obama and Clinton. It uses out-of-context, incomplete quotes and mischaracterizes the intent and meaning of the quotes to drive up tensions.
[....]
Are you going to let them play you like a fiddle? Keep in mind who the enemy is here. The stakes are high: If we let the primary contest divide us how many hundred thousand Iraqis or Iranians will be killed before the 2012 elections, how much more will corporations take over our democracy, how much more concentration of wealth at the top will we see? Please do not be fooled by this stuff! If it appears at DRUDGE, you KNOW something is going on.
Update
Big Tent Democrat at TalkLeft points out that Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo is essentially doing the same thing when it comes to Hillary Clinton.
Talking Points Memo continues its very poor journalism on this story. Now Josh Marshall approvingly publishes an e-mail that falsely characterizes Hillary Clinton's letter to NBC News President Steve Capus as calling for David Shuster's firing. What is particularly egregious about TPM's work is it minimizes, even omits, the REAL point of the letter - that NBC has demonstrated an unbroken pattern of sexism in its reporting and commentary and Clinton's demand that this pattern be addressed.And this from the comments section at TalkLeft:
At this point, it simply can not be denied, TPM is choosing to ignore NBC's egregious pattern of sexism. That is very bad of TPM and Josh Marshall. This is part of a pattern of malign acceptance of sexism that we must all fight against.
Update [2008-2-9 22:10:28 by Big Tent Democrat]: After its egregious journalism on this story, TPM NOW compounds it by simply lying. Yes, I am calling TPM liars. Their LATEST headline Says "Clinton Backs Off Firing Demand." They NEVER demanded it. ONLY TPM said FALSELY they demanded it. Shame on TPM. Shame on Josh Marshall. Disgraceful work.
My Exchange with Josh (5.00 / 3) (#96)
by andgarden on Sat Feb 09, 2008 at 11:54:27 PM EST
My original email:
I know you've gotten lots of mail about this Josh, but I think you're simply wrong. A straightforward reading of the text clearly shows that the Clinton campaign is NOT asking for Shuster to be fired.
It would also behoove you to acknowledge the real point of the letter: that MSNBC has long been a bastion of misogyny. Surely you must recognize this?
You should correct the record. If you don't, I will no longer take you seriously as a journalist--and I've been reading for a long time.
Josh's Response:
Andgarden -- these amount to threats. I've been doing this for a while. And what you realize is that the only way to do this job sanely and with integrity is to do your best to accurately report the news and not be buffeted one way or another by criticism or attacks, if they don't provide any evidence that makes the story appear different to me. So I'm going to have to stick with what I think she said. And you don't take me seriously as a journalist, I guess that's the price I pay for not changing a story I think is accurate.
And my response to his response:
Threats?! Talk about a "strained reading." Have it your way, just realize that you've become exactly like the bad journalists that prompted me to start reading you in the first place.
