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May 7, 2007
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(Vol. Twenty; No. 10)
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Media Lobby for End to Gun
Rights |
"As a political reporter, of course, the first
thing I did was call the Hill and find out from the Democratic leadership,
‘Okay, you gonna do something now?!’"
— Newsweek’s Howard Fineman discussing the push for more gun control
after the Virginia Tech shootings, on the April 22 Chris Matthews Show.
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"Given the fact that I’ve seen estimates that there are in excess of 200
million firearms already on the street, have we essentially said it’s okay to
have the level of violence that we have in this country?"
— ABC reporter Pierre Thomas on PBS’s Washington Week, April 20.
 Anchor
Dan Harris: "Eleven years ago, in a small town in Scotland, a man killed
15 elementary students, a crime that Britain vowed would never happen again
and since that day has not. ABC’s David Wright reports...."
David Wright: "As a direct result of what happened here, this country
decided to ban virtually all handguns...."
Ann Pearston, gun control activist: "We just said after Dunblane that
never again was someone going to walk into a school and massacre children."
Wright: "They never have, not in Britain. Gun crime has risen here
during the past decade, but Britain has never again had a school shooting."
— ABC’s World News Sunday, April 22.
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ABC: Public Favors Gun
Control... |
"There’s some other interesting numbers in the
poll that I want to quote: 61 percent of the people in this country say they
favor stronger gun control laws, although people are split right down the
middle as to whether stricter gun control laws would actually curb any kind
of violence, 49 percent saying yes, 50 percent saying no."
— ABC’s Charles Gibson on World News, April 23.
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...Omits How Most Blame
Culture |
"Asked the primary cause of gun violence, far
more Americans blamed the effects of popular culture (40 percent) or the way
parents raise their children (35 percent) than the availability of guns (18
percent). In no population group does more than about a fourth cite the
availability of guns as the chief cause of gun violence."
— ABC News polling chief Gary Langer in an April 23 posting to
ABCNews.com, detailing results from the same poll that were omitted from the
World News report.
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Upset by Lack of Liberal
Action |
 Co-host
Robin Roberts: "After every major shooting in the U.S., without fail,
there has been a heated debate about gun control on Capitol Hill. But not
this time. In fact, most politicians have been running away from the debate
on guns. So, why is this happening?..."
Reporter Jake Tapper: "It was the worst school shooting in American
history, and yet what some liberals are referring to as a deafening silence
from Democrats on Capitol Hill."
— ABC’s Good Morning America, April 20. ABC’s on-screen graphic
read, "Politicians and Gun Control: Why Aren’t They Outraged?"
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Down Side of Dow 13,000 |
 "Will
Dow Hit 13,000 Today? Is Unstoppable Market Good or Bad?"
— Graphic on ABC’s Good Morning America, April 23.Charles
Gibson: "Today, the Dow Jones stock index went over 13,000 for the first
time ever, closing at 13,089, up 136 points. The rise in recent months has
been steep, despite less-than-inspiring news on the economy overall...."
Reporter Betsy Stark: "[Investors] seemed willing to look past some
not-so-good news on the road to 13,000. There were fresh signs today of
trouble in the housing market: Foreclosures up 35 percent from a year ago.
And oil prices shot up another dollar today, which will only add to
consumers’ woes at the pump."
— ABC’s World News, April 25.
Katie Couric: "Even as investors are making money in the market,
Anthony Mason reports there are concerns tonight about the rest of the U.S.
economy...."
Anthony Mason: "While the stock market’s been racing ahead, the
economy has been slowing down. Housing is mired in a slump. Existing home
sales plummeted more than eight percent in March....Rising gas prices, up 70
cents already this year, could slow the economy even more."
— CBS Evening News, April 25.
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Thrilled by France’s $6 Gas |
 "You’re
also looking at a [global warming] solution here in Europe: smaller
vehicles, more energy efficient, many which use diesel fuel which is more
efficient. And the price of gas here is $6 a gallon to discourage guzzling.
A lot of big ideas and innovations coming out of Europe."
— ABC’s Chris Cuomo reporting from Paris for Earth Day, April 20 Good
Morning America.
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A "Bold and Brilliant"
Liberal Plan |
 Co-host
Robin Roberts: "Imagine universal health care for everyone? That’s what
a bold new plan on Capitol Hill is proposing....Can it work? For answers
we’re joined by ABC medical expert Dr. Tim Johnson. You’re very happy about
this. You say it’s bold and politically brilliant."
Dr. Tim Johnson: "It’s bold, because it does propose to cover all
Americans, including the 47 million now who are uninsured within five years.
And I say it’s politically brilliant because one of the options they’re
offering is for people to choose from the federal employee plan, the menu of
options that Congress gets every year. It’s going to be very hard for
Congress, I think, to say, ‘Well, we can have it but you can’t.’ I think
that it’s a good strategy on their part."
— Good Morning America, April 26.
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Wonders of Socialized
Medicine |
"[Castro] is not the only Cuban who is aging.
Thanks to the socialist island’s free health care system — which emphasizes
preventive medicine — Cubans enjoy a very high life
expectancy....Fortunately, Cuba’s universal, free cradle-to-grave health
care system means Alzheimer’s patients do not add an additional financial
burden to the family."
— CBS News producer Portia Siegelbaum in an April 24 story posted on
CBSNews.com, "Getting Old in Cuba."
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Media Wimps vs. "Slime
Machine" |
"For the first time in our history, we had
this wall-to-wall ideological right-wing press that not only — the Fox News,
the talk radio, the Weekly Standard — that not only mongered for war
along with the administration, not only embraced the administration’s
policies because they were quote, ‘conservative,’ including going to war,
but also mounted a slime machine to discredit any journalist who dared to
stand against the official view of reality. [Ex-CBS anchor Dan] Rather
himself says on my show, ‘They have a slime machine and we know it.’"
— PBS’s Bill Moyers in an interview with Rolling Stone’s
Eric Bates published April 18 on the magazine’s Web site.
 "If
the watchdog doesn’t bark, how do you know there’s a burglar in the
basement? And the press is supposed to be a watchdog. I’ll put it another
way: if you think that the fire department in your neighborhood is in
collusion with the arsonist, you want to know about it. And the fact of the
matter is, in the build-up to the [Iraq] war the watchdog didn’t bark and
the fire department — in this case the press — was in cahoots with the
arsonist."
— Bill Moyers promoting his anti-Bush special Buying the War, on
PBS’s Tavis Smiley, April 23.
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Olbermann: Giuliani Is a
Terrorist |
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"‘The Democrats do not understand the full nature and scope of the terrorist
war against us,’ Mr. Giuliani...[told] the Rockingham County Lincoln Day
Dinner last night. ‘Never, ever again will this country be on defense waiting
for (terrorists) to attack us, if I have anything to say about it. And make no
mistake,’ he concluded, ‘the Democrats want to put us back on defense.’ There
is no room for this. This is terrorism itself, dressed up as counter- |
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terrorism.... Claim a difference between the parties on the voters’ chances of
survival, and you do Osama bin Laden’s work for him."
— Keith Olbermann in an eight-minute long "Special Comment" on MSNBC’s
Countdown, April 25.
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"Free Speech" Not for
Pro-Lifers |
"For many CBS News staffers, the nadir was a
‘Free Speech’ segment Oct. 2, the day five Amish schoolgirls were murdered
in Lancaster County. The father of a child killed in Colorado’s Columbine
High School massacre in 1999 blamed the Amish tragedy, in part, on the
teaching of evolution in public schools and on abortion.
"Despite CBS’s avowed intention to include all viewpoints in ‘Free Speech,’
the segment caused an uproar in the newsroom, according to CBS insiders.
‘There’s a difference between free speech and responsible speech,’ an
embarrassed correspondent says."
— Philadelphia Inquirer reporter Gail Shister in an April 22
story, "CBS evening blues: Katie Couric hasn’t redeemed the No. 3 newscast.
Can she survive as anchor?"
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We’re Worse Than Terrorists |
"How many more years and how many more dead
kids? It’s just, you know, it’s way over the amount of people killed on
September 11th. We’ve killed more Americans than any terrorist ever did in
this war....We were not attacked by either of the nations we invaded.
Nineteen [sic] Saudis were on those planes, and we invaded Afghanistan and
Iraq."
— Rosie O’Donnell on ABC’s The View, May 1.
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Rosie Teaching "Truth" to
Her Kids |
 "It’s
funny, because when he [her adopted son Parker] was in public school in
first grade and Bush won — supposedly — and he went in to school that day
and he gets home. I said, ‘How was school?’ He goes, ‘Fine.’ He was like
five years old. The teacher calls me: ‘Oh, hi, Ms. O’Donnell. I just wanted
to let you know that today in class Parker announced that President Bush was
not the real President because he cheated.’ [laughter] And I said, ‘Well
that’s known as truth in our house.’"
— Rosie O’Donnell on ABC’s The View, April 23.
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PUBLISHER: L.
Brent Bozell III
EDITORS: Brent H. Baker, Rich Noyes, Tim Graham
MEDIA ANALYSTS: Geoffrey Dickens, Brad Wilmouth, Scott
Whitlock, Justin McCarthy, Matthew Balan and Brendan Jones
RESEARCH ASSOCIATE: Michelle Humphrey
CIRCULATION MANAGER: Holly Schnitzler |
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