Daily Howler finds the Washington Post burying pro-Kerry evidence

[Karmadillo]

http://www.dailyhowler.com/

THE PRESS CORPS STILL LOVES THOSE ACCUSERS (PART 1): Was John Kerry under enemy fire when he pulled Jim Rassmann out of the drink? John O’Neill keeps saying he wasn’t—that Kerry and Rassmann (and Kerry’s crewmates) are lying about this affair. It’s one of a string of nasty charges O’Neill and his Swift Vets have aimed at the hopeful. You’d think that big news orgs would want to help voters know if the charges are accurate.

But if you thought that, you may have been wrong. On Sunday morning, for example, the Washington Post revealed important new evidence about this matter—evidence supporting Kerry’s account. But how did the Post present this new info? Incredibly, they buried the new info way near the end of a lengthy, detailed report. Indeed, if readers wanted to learn these new facts, they had to read almost to the end of a 4100-word story!

The lengthy report was penned by Michael Dobbs. Was Kerry under fire when he saved Rassmann’s life? Here’s the first piece of new information—information which supports Kerry’s account and suggests that O’Neill is all wet:

DOBBS (8/22/04): Until now, eyewitness evidence supporting Kerry's version had come only from his own crewmen. But yesterday, The Post independently contacted a participant who has not spoken out so far in favor of either camp who remembers coming under enemy fire. “There was a lot of firing going on, and it came from both sides of the river,” said Wayne D. Langhofer, who manned a machine gun aboard PCF-43, the boat that was directly behind Kerry’s.

Langhofer said he distinctly remembered the “clack, clack, clack” of enemy AK-47s, as well as muzzle flashes from the riverbanks. Langhofer, who now works at a Kansas gunpowder plant, said he was approached several months ago by leaders of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth but declined their requests to speak out against Kerry.

Omigod! The Post had a scoop! Another vet—someone not on Kerry’s boat—had stepped forward to support his account! But where did the Post print this new information? Incredibly, the passage above comprised paragraphs 49 and 50 of Dobbs’ report!...

more...

[spanone]

1. There goes that damn liberal media again.

[Jacobin]

2. WP is firmly in Neo-con hands

Don't expect anything from that rag. They just Loooove the invasion of Iraq, the conquest of the M.E., and all the malarky that goes along with it.

[74dodgedart]

3. Approached "several months ago"

Would that put it before the Convention, skewering the claim that they only brought it up because of Kerry ?

[fob]

10. No. Kerry has been the presumptive nominee since late February

early March. The smearvets formed in April.

[Norquist Nemesis]

4. Another thing I haven't seen get press

is the supposed interviewer, a former FBI agent. I've read accounts from several vets that stated they were interviewed, their statements were faxed to them with several innaccuracies, they corrected them and faxed them back. But I haven't seen the question asked "Were the corrections made?" or "Did you do anything to check and make sure these corrections were made?"

These were not just innaccuracies, but clear distortions of the witnesses statements. Now O'Niell goes out saying we have over 250 people who served with Kerry and have testified that... Well, which one's, John? There might be a few who corrected your distortions and outright lies that might be a tad unhappy you've painted them as your supporters when they clearly were not.

[DemBones DemBones]

9. Don't you wonder about the "250 people who served

with Kerry"? I can believe that 250 men knew who he was, at least peripherally. He was an officer and he's really tall so he'd be "the tall skinny lieutenant."

But how many knew him other than superficially? And how many were ever in a position to see what happened during the skirmishes in which he was wounded? And if a guy was there, wouldn't he have been pretty damn busy watching out for his own butt?

I've never been to war but I've been in large groups of people, as we all have, and seen how people interact. Maybe I'm wrong but I don't think I'm too far off the mark. What do you all think?

[Norquist Nemesis]

13. Certainly wondered that same thing with

the doctor who supposedly treated him for 'superficial' wounds. The man must have an extraordinary memory! Out of what are likely thousands of wounded soldiers, his memory is crystal clear on his encounter with John Kerry. :eyes:

[realFedUp]

5. Ombudsman

The editor should get calls but here is
the ombudsman's info...they really should
get calls on this...

The Ombudsman serves as the reader's advocate. He attends to questions, comments and complaints regarding The Post's content.

The current Post Ombudsman is Michael Getler.
You can reach him by e-mail at [e-mail]
or by phone at 202-334-7582.

[in_cog_ni_to]

6. And to think I had someone question my statement

the other day that the WP was a RW paper. :eyes:

But, who am I to say..."I told you so"...:grr:

[DemBones DemBones]

7. Have you seen this?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=654411&mesg_id=654411

(It's my thread re: Josh Marshall's points about this.)

The media, if unbiased, would be saying "This is a bogus charge."


Daily Howler and TPM usually come through for us.

[pmbryant]

8. I'm proud to say that...

I beat Daily Howler and Josh Marshall to the punch on that article. :-)

But, of course, both of them are far more eloquent than me. (And far more widely read as well, of course.)

Anyway, here is what I wrote yesterday: http://pmbryant.typepad.com/b_and_b/2004/08/post_sinks_to_n.html

Peter

[DemBones DemBones]

11. Good work, Peter! I didn't know you had

your own place.

I did like the bit in the WP article where Thurlow says that the initials KJW on the report prove Kerry wrote it. I picture John Stewart doing a gag on it "And we all know that John Kerry's initials are. . .er, not KJW."

:eyes:

[pmbryant]

16. Thanks

I'm still new at this. But this was such "low hanging fruit" even I was able to pick it apart. Shameful that it was a front-page story on one of the supposedly most prestigious newspapers in our country.

--Peter

[Karmadillo]

22. Good work, Peter. Your site is excellent. I had missed the SEC giving

Cheney a pass (not that one wouldn't have guessed that in our Great Democracy, such an outcome was preordained).

[pmbryant]

23. Thanks

We all need to send gentle (or not-so-gentle) reminders to the press about this SEC/Cheney business.

--Peter

[trof]

12. "ONLY from his own crewmen"?

"Until now, eyewitness evidence supporting Kerry's version had come only from his own crewmen."

What "only"?
S'cuse me, who would know better what happened?
Some guy back at the O Club?
Are his own crewmen necessarily lacking in veracity?
jeez
:grr:

[DemBones DemBones]

14. William Rood was on another boat. nt

[DemBones DemBones]

15. And Jim Rassman was not on Kerry's boat, either.

He was in the water, getting shot at.

[DeepModem Mom]

17. CONTACT: [e-mail]; WP reader rep, [e-mail]

[MallRat]

18. The press is determined to keep this a close race, truth be damned.

I truly think that's the real motivation here. They're not necessarily anti-Kerry or pro-Bush in a fundamental philosophical sense... they are pro-story. And if Kerry were allowed to run away with a 10-12 point lead, then ratings and circulation go down.

That's why the Swiftboat Vets, even in the face of mountains of evidence establishing that they are a bunch of lying fucks, continue to get "equal time."

Note to the media: equal time was intended to give valid viewpoints access to the public forum. These are astonishingly invalid, unabashedly perverse, and fabricated lies. You have no journalistic duty to air them.

-MR

[realFedUp]

19. Cowards All Around

good...Atrios pointed out on his website:

http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewWeb&articleId=8388

Cowards All Around
The media should take a step back and remind us what Bush and Cheney were up to in 1969.
By Michael Tomasky
Web Exclusive: 08.23.04


At first blush, the treatment given to Michael Dobbs' page-one swift-boat article in Sunday's Washington Post seems at least vaguely reassuring. There's the neutral headline "Swift Boat Accounts Incomplete," but below that, a deck-headline informing readers that "Critics Fail to Disprove Kerry's Version of Vietnam War Episode." The banner treatment, running across three-fourths of the front page above the fold, places the onus of proof where it belongs -- on the accusers, not on Kerry, a point that Bob Novak and others have chosen to ignore, obscure, or even refute; and in announcing that the proof isn't there, it seems to be a plus for Kerry.

So what's wrong with this picture? This: The Washington Post should not even be running such a story -- a takeout of something in the neighborhood of 2,700 words, I'm guessing, delving into the remotest arcana about what really happened on the Bay Hap River on March 13, 1969 -- in the first place. Len Downie and the paper's other editors would undoubtedly argue that the story represents the Post's tenacity for getting to the truth, without fear or favor. But what the story actually proves is that a bunch of liars who have in the past contradicted their own current statements can, if their lies are outrageous enough and if they have enough money, control the media agenda and get even the most respected media outlets in the country to focus on picayune "truths" while missing the larger story.

And the larger story here is clear: John Kerry volunteered for the Navy, volunteered to go to Vietnam, and then, when he was sitting around Cam Ranh Bay bored with nothing to do, requested the most dangerous duty a Naval officer could be given. He saved a man's life. He risked his own every time he went up into the Mekong Delta. He did more than his country asked. In fact he didn't even wait for his country to ask.

George W. Bush spent those same years in a state of dissolution at Yale, and would go on, as we know, to plot how to get out of going to Southeast Asia. On that subject, here's a choice quote. "I was not prepared to shoot my eardrum out with a shotgun in order to get a deferment," Bush told the Dallas Morning News in 1990. "Nor was I willing to go to Canada. So I chose to better myself by learning how to fly airplanes."

continued

[annxburns]

20. Give it back to Michael Dobbs here ...

http://discuss.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/zforum/04/politics_dobbs082304.htm


Ask him why the Washington Post is giving a forum for the smears and lies of John O'Neill.

[realFedUp]

21. kick

The Post really needs hammering on this today.