Brit Hume Watch

Thursday, December 21, 2006

2006-12-21T08:45:00.000-08:00

On Tuesday's Grapevine, Brit Hume devotes a segment to an attempt to convey just how awesome things are in Iraq these days:

Huge Economic Growth

What country has seen a growth in its gross domestic project of 17 percent last year — and an estimated 13 percent this year? An increase in the number of registered companies of more than 400 percent and in salaries by 100 percent in three years? The answer — Iraq.

Newsweek magazine reports the economy in Iraq is "booming." And Newsweek acknowledges that this is getting little or no media exposure — writing — "there's a vibrancy at the grass roots that is invisible in most international coverage of Iraq." Speaking of Iraq — hundreds of people are lining up for what is becoming the hottest job opening in that country — executioner for Saddam Hussein. The Ledger reports people have sent messages through cabinet officials, government guards and clerical workers begging for the job. An advisor to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki says picking a hangman will be very difficult "because so many people want revenge for the loss of their loved ones."

Another issue — where the execution will be held. One idea was to have it in Baghdad's largest sports arena. But most officials say it will probably happen at a specially built gallows at the American prison where Hussein is currently held — Camp Cropper. Hussein's death sentence is currently working its way through the appeals process.

Brit Hume's summary of the Newsweek piece, is, however, notably selective and one sided. To give just one example: while Hume reports a 17% increase in GDP for the year, he fails to note that another estimate cited in the Newsweek piece actually places GDP growth at a far less stunning 4%:

Estimates vary, but one from Global Insight puts GDP growth at 17 percent last year and projects 13 percent for 2006. The World Bank has it lower: at 4 percent this year. But, given all the attention paid to deteriorating security, the startling fact is that Iraq is growing at all.

Nor does Hume mention other aspects of the Newsweek peice, such as that much of the economy is built upon the spoils of government corruption, or that the economy would likely collapse without the presence of the country's greatest benefactor: the U.S.

Friday, Dec 1, 2001

2006-12-01T07:04:00.000-08:00

Today's Grapevine is hosted by Chris Wallace, a Fox News "journalist" known mostly for his nakedly partisan interviews of prominent Democrats and his insistence that, contrary to all available evidence, he approaches his subjects in a fair and balanced manner. But on Brit Hume's Grapevine Wallace once again demonstrates how ideology trumps journalistic ethics at Fox News. In a segment headlined "Animal Rights Activists" Wallace claims:

Animal Rights Activists

There's at least one front in the war on terror — even the ACLU is backing. President Bush has signed a new law giving federal authorities expanded powers to prosecute animal rights activists—which the State Department warns are a more serious day-to-day threat than terrorists— for US companies overseas.

The Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act will make it easier for the FBI to wiretap and prosecute animal rights activists who target researchers among others. Such harassment ranges— from late-night phone calls, to vandalism, assault, and even death threats.

The opening sentence "There's at least one front in the war on terror -even the ACLU is backing" is completely superfluous, given that the ACLU is never again mentioned in the segment. In fact, the statement is little more than an unashamedly partisan swipe at the civil rights organization, and a libeous one, too, given that no evidence is given to support Wallace's contention that the ACLU opposes the so-called "war on terror." Instead, it is simply taken as a given that the ACLU's opposition to measures that curtail the rights of U.S. citizens and foreign nationals on U.S. soil is part and parcel with opposition to the struggle against radical Islamic terrorism. For Wallace and Fox News, you either believe that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are dispansable, or you're with the terrorists.

Next Wallace eagerly and enthusiastically promotes the ridiculous Fox News meme that there is an ongoing "war on Christmas." But this war is not only taking plce in the U.S. In fact, as it turns out, there's actually a global war on Christmas, as evidenced by:

Scary St. Nick?

And the "war on Christmas"— also goes on overseas. A ban on Saint Nicholas in Vienna's kindergartens is being enforced in response to pressure from Austria's growing Muslim population. City officials contend it's not about religion — that the sight of a large, bearded figure in school can frighten children. But one child psychiatrist says that's "total nonsense"— adding that Saint Nick is a "positive figure who encourages and rewards children."

Every year that I have walked this Earth, I have witnessed Christmas coming earlier and earlier, so that it has largely swallowed up Thanksgiving and is now even showing signs of encroaching on Halloween (and I'm not talking about Tim Burton's "Nightmare before Christmas," either). The economic inplications of the holiday season are enormous. I just recently learned, for instance, that the reason retailer refer to the Friday after Thankgiving as "black Friday" is because it is the frist day of the year that many businesses can actually report an operating profit, that is, their books are "in the black" for the first time that day. So the notion that the holiday season is in any danger is simply a laughable one. Of course, most Fox News commentators also seek to imply that the "war on Christams" is evidenced by the claimed fact that the holiday is becoming more secularized. However, one is left to wonder why it is a supposedly impartial news organization would report on this supposed secular turn as an alarming and corrosive development. That's not a fair and balanced perspective, but rather, a partisan, evangelical one. Ultimately, though, the fact that Fox has to go all the way to Vienna to dig up a newsworthy example demonstrates the extent to which this phoney war is manufactured, packaged and sold to the U.S. public exclusively by the conservative ideologues who run Fox News.

Nov. 15, 2006

2006-11-15T02:18:00.000-08:00

The Memo

While this is not related exclusively to Brit Hume's "Grapevine", an internal Fox News memo, recently uncovered by the Huffington Post is germaine to any discussion of shows on the network. The memo itself, is a glaring indictment of the propagandistic, partisan nature of the network that laughably boasts "fair and balanced" as its motto. Written by Fox's vice-president of news, it lays out a strategy for undermining the recent Democratic electoral gains through news coverage designed to highlight statements by Iraqi insurgents' who "must be thrilled at the prospect of a Dem-controlled congress." Indeed, the memo commands Fox News staff to "be on the lookout" for any such statements, so that they might be included in network coverage, even as it seeks to reassure Fox staffers that the Democratic victory is "not the end of the world." The Huffinton Post has a fax of the entire memo on their site. As a bonus, Ill note that our very own sometime Grapevine host, Jim Angle, is mentioned specifically in the memo.

November 10. 2006

2006-11-10T10:15:00.000-08:00

In today's Grapevine:

Having projected dissappointingly flat sales for the month of November, WalMart is pulling out all the stops on its Christmas marketing drive, blaring Christmas music 24/7, decorating its stores as gaudily as possible, and mounting Christmas count-down clocks on the walls to drive home the message to consumers that Christmas is on the way, sooner than you think, so you'd better buy, Buy, BUY, spend, Spend, SPEND, lest you get caught unprepared, with no present on hand for your own, disappointed, emotionally crippled, Tiny Tim on December 25th.

Brit Hume, of course, interprets this marketing decision as a triumph for good, traditional Christian values in the never-ending, ACLU-led War On Christmas:

"Holidays" Out, "Christmas" In

The folks at Wal-Mart are putting Christmas back into the holidays in a big way. Wal-Mart announced today that it will use "Merry Christmas" — "early and often" this season. Last year Wal-Mart and other retailers were boycotted by some groups because they downplayed Christmas in favor of a generic and politically correct "holiday" theme.

But a Wal-Mart spokeswoman says the company learned its lesson — and will have what's described as an "in-your-face" Christmas theme this year — featuring Christmas music over the loudspeakers and signs that count down the days until Christmas.

Oh yeah, and Muslim's want to cut your daughter's head off too, by the way.

Monday, Nov 6, 2006

2006-11-06T07:25:00.000-08:00

Jim Angle Wants The Terrorists To Want The Democrats To Win

There can be no surer sign of political bias and hackery than when a so-called "reporter" runs a "terrorists want the Demcorats to win" story in the week before national elections. And Brit Hume, disingenuous spinmesiter extraordinarie, obliges us in Thursday's Grapevine with a story that's chock full of examples of terrorists wanting Democrats to win, culled from right-wing fringe publications such as World Net Daily:

"Greater Defeat Than Vietnam"

A report in the online publication World Net Daily says some leaders of terrorist organizations are openly encouraging Americans to vote for Democrats… in order to hasten a U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq.

Jihad Jaara — a senior member of the Palestinian Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade — says "of course Americans should vote Democrat." He went on to say a withdrawal from Iraq would mark the beginning of the collapse of what he called the U.S. "tyrant empire" — and would deal the US "a greater defeat than Vietnam."

Abu Ayman — a leader of Islamic jihad in Jenin — tells World Net Daily he is "emboldened" by Americans who compare Iraq to Vietnam. And the senior leader of that Palestinian group — says Democratic predictions that a withdrawal would end the insurgency are incorrect — and that a pullout would "prove the resistance is the most important tool — and that this tool works."

Curiously, the examples cited are all Palestinians. No word on why Iraqi insurgents and Al Quaeda representatives were not polled. However, given the polarizing effects of the U.S. occupation among all Arabs in the region, it's not implausible that Osama might be happy to see the Republicans retain power just a little bit longer... you know, to keep that recruiting drive running in high-gera for a few more years.

(Correction: though this post originally attributed this report to Brit Hume, after looking at the video, it appears that Jim Angle, Brit Hume's occasional Grapevine substitute host, presented the above report).

Wednesday, October 18

2006-10-19T16:40:00.000-07:00

Tawdry Republicans

In today's Grapevine Brit Hume reports on the race for Texas State Comptroller:

"Two-Faced Hypocrite"

The race for state comptroller in Texas is getting down and dirty — and not in the usual way. Democratic candidate Fred Head is calling Republican rival Susan Combs a "two-faced hypocrite" for writing what he calls "a pornographic book."

The tome in question is a romance novel called "A Perfect Match" that Combs published in 1990. Head has posted excerpts of the book on his Web site that feature what the people who buy romance novels want them to feature — steamy romance.

All of this has enraged the 9,000 member Romance Writers of America — which is headquartered in and has many members from — Texas. One novelist wonders why Head posted parts of the book on his Web site if it is in fact pornography. Another says she's a Texan, a Christian, a grandmother who has written 46 novels — and a registered Democrat — but she's not voting for Fred Head.

But what Hume fails to mention is that in addition to the sort of steamy naughtiness that would make Scooter Libby blush (or maybe not), Comb's roman à l'eau de rose, is filled with indigestible prose that's almost as turgid as seasoned NSA super-spy Ross Harding's manhood at the moment in which he lowers himself upon NSA analyst Emily Brown "with devastating slowness" and an eye toward filling "the aching void at her center."

October 17, 2006

2006-10-17T17:18:00.000-07:00

Wow, $750,000? That's a Lot of Money.

In today's Grapevine, Brit Hume writes about allegations of financial improprieties bedevilling Senate minority leader Harry Reid:

Holiday Cheer

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid is taking more heat today for his financial decisions. The Associated Press reports Reid used campaign donations to pay for holiday gifts for workers at his $750,000 Washington D.C. condo. Federal election law prohibits using campaign funds for any housing costs. Reid calls it a "clerical error" and is promising to reimburse his campaign.

Reid has also announced he is amending his ethics reports following an AP story that he did not properly account for a Las Vegas land deal that allowed him to collect more than a million dollars for property he had not personally owned in three years.

There are two figures quoted in the AP story (1) the relatively paltry sum of $3,300 which was sum total value of the Christmas bonuses in question, and (2) the princely sum of $750,000 which is the value of Reid's condominium, but which is completely irrelevant to the allegations of financial impropriety Hume is reporting on. So, which figure do you think Hume feels is most relevant, and most important for his viewers to mull over? And why do you think that is?

The answer to these questions is left as an exercise for the reader.

October 16, 2006

2006-10-16T07:41:00.000-07:00

Oh, the Hypocrisy

On Thursday's Grapevine segment, Brit Hume has this to say about a Tennessee television station's post-debate analysis of the Harold Ford vs. Bob Corker Senatorial campaign debate:

Mea Culpa

The news director for Knoxville, Tennessee TV station WBIR is apologizing for not including a supporter of Republican Senate candidate Bob Corker in an analysis of Corker's debate with Democrat Harold Ford Jr. Tuesday night.

Bill Shory says last minute changes beyond his control left the station with a Ford supporter on set — but no one from Corker's camp. He calls it "a failure of planning and judgment" and says the mistakes will be corrected.

But this sort of thing is standard fare for Brit Hume's "Special Report", where round panel discussions (including Fox News' post-debate analyses which are usually assigned to Hume) frequently include right-wing pundits Bill Kristol and Fred Barnes, editors of the conservative opinion journal The Weekly Standard, right-wing opinion columnist Charles Krathammer, Roll-Call editor Mort Kondracke (a so-called "conservative Democrat" with an emphasis on the conservative part) , and a non-partisan member of the mainstream media (often NPR's Mara Liasson), with no representative from a self-professed partisan left-wing publication to counter-balance Kristol, Barnes or Krauthammer's heavily pro-Republican spin.

Monday, Oct. 16 2006

2006-10-16T06:55:00.000-07:00

Lyin' Again

I was very skeptical of the factual content of the segment on Ted Turner that Brit Hume ran on Tuesday's Grapevine, but was, at the time, unable to find a transcipt of Turner's remarks to check them against Hume's claims. This is what Hume has to say about the founder of CNN's comments to the National Press club:

Be Neutral

CNN founder Ted Turner has objected to displays of the American flag by journalists — saying they should have a more neutral posture. And now Turner says that he was not sure which side he was on in the War on Terror following the 9/11 terror attacks. Turner spoke to the National Press Club in Washington yesterday, and referred to a quote by President Bush in February of 2002:

"Our president said it very clearly. He said 'either you're with us, or you're against us.' And I had a problem with that because I really hadn't made my mind up yet." Turner did not say whether he has since made up his mind about which side he's on.

Fast forward to today and I find that my suspicions of bias and misrepresentation confirmed. You can read about it this story on Media Matters for America's website, (the story is about Sean Hannity, but the critique applies just as much to Hume's Grapevine segment) . I was also able to verify the site's critiques by following the link to the C-Span broadcast of Turner's remarks. Turner did make the above comments, but the comments that Hume dishonestly claims were remarks on the "war on terror" which was launched "following the 9/11 terror attacks" were actually an answer to a question about Turner's criticisms of the war in Iraq, and whether his patriotism had been questioned by supporters of the war. The back and forth on the subject begins at minute 43:14 with a question about Jane Fonda, Turner's ex-wife, and this exchange in particular starts at 44:05. Listeners will note that the context is clearly Iraq, and the "9/11 terror attacks" are not even mentioned in the question.

Monday, October 2nd

2006-10-02T08:18:00.000-07:00

Not much to report

Not much of interest in recent Grapevine segments, however there are some interesting developments on the Brit Hume front in other venues. Since I want this blog to focus exclusively on the Grapevine segments, I'll merely link to my more general political blog and the current entry on Hume.

Friday, Sep. 29

2006-09-29T06:50:00.000-07:00

This morning, while taking the shuttle bus in to work, an advertisement on the radio urged listeners to get something or other taken care of before Christmas. I groaned to my co-workers exclaiming "it's not even Halloween yet... forget Thanksgiving!" Really, there ought to be a law banning Christmas decorations and advertising before Thanksgiving. In a similar vein, I think there ought to be a law preventing Fox News from hyping the "Liberal War on Christmas"® before Thanksgiving, too. That would have prevented yesterday's Grapevine segment:

A Christmas Education

If public school teachers want to tell their students about the religious history of Christmas, it's OK with U.S. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings.

The secretary responded to an e-mail from a teacher in Utah who was unsure about what she can say and what kinds of decorations she can use. Spellings wrote back that schools and teachers are free to celebrate the secular aspects of Christmas and may also teach about the religion and history behind the holiday.

No, it's not a story about a local ACLU chapter firebombing a Christmas pageant and shipping survivors off to atheist re-education camps, but it is a gentle reminder to good, honest, God fearing Christians that this administration is on their side.

Vote Republican in these next elections, folks, or there might not be a Christmas to celebrate this year!

Wed, Sept. 27

2006-09-27T07:40:00.000-07:00

On Monday's Grapevine, Brit Hume came to the defense of colleague Chris Wallace (and Fox News) who found himself severly reprimanded by a Bill Clinton who was visibly angered by insinuations that his administration had not done enough to prevent the terrorist atacks of 9/11:

Not Fair and Balanced?

Chris Wallace's "FOX News Sunday" interview with Bill Clinton was one of six TV appearances the former president made last week. But despite Mr. Clinton's highly publicized objections to the recent ABC docudrama about 9/11, no one other than Wallace asked him about the aggressiveness of his pursuit of Usama bin Laden.

As for Mr. Clinton's assertion that Wallace did not challenge the Bush administration's pre-9/11 record on terrorism? In 2004, Wallace asked Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to answer the charge that "the Bush Administration largely ignored the threat from Al Qaeda," before 9/11, adding, "Mr. Secretary, it sure sounds like fighting terrorism was not a top priority."

A glance at the transcript for the Wallace/Rumsfeld interview shows, however, that the situation is a bit more nuanced than Hume presents it. The interview was granted in the midst of accusations, levelled by former National Security advisor Richard Clarke, that the Bush administration failed to take terrorism seriously pre-9/11. Here is the question that Wallace posed:

WALLACE: I think a lot of people in Washington are trying to figure out, to understand Richard Clarke, to make sense of what he has said and of apparent contradictions in his story — is he telling the truth, or is he pushing an agenda.

What do you make of his basic charge that, pre-9/11, that this government, the Bush administration, largely ignored the threat from Al Qaeda?

So yes, Wallace does ask about the Bush administration's focus pre-9/11, but when the question itself contains the seeds of its own refutation --as when Wallace mentions the "apparent contradictions in [Clarke's] story"-- then you know the questioner is being thrown the softest of softballs.

Now, Hume is correct that Wallace does press Rusmfeld somewhat on the issue, but as with most Fox News interviews with conservative figures (those who remain in the movement's good graces, at least) the questions are mostly non-specific and open ended, a chance for the politician to try out the latest talking point that the RNC has devised to counter the predictable charge in question. The video clips, statistics and 10 year old quotes that provide ammunition for the "gotcha" interviews of left of center politicians and activists on Fox are largely absent (there are video clips of Clarke levelling accusations, but no "gotcha" clips of Rumslfeld himself saying something that is now, in retrospect, embarrasing). Indeed, there are several "leading" questions that in and of themselves insinuate conservative talking points. Consider for instance this question, which echoes conservative criticisms of the need for a commission to study the intelligence failures that led to 9/11 (that is, the 9/11 comission.):

WALLACE: You've anticipated exactly where I wanted to go in this interview, which is to ask you — we are still in the middle of the war on terrorism. U.S. troops are still on the front line, in harm's way. Does this kind of an investigation, postmortem, if you will, make sense when we're still fighting the war?

And there's the following question, which apparently seeks to pre-emptively discredit the 9/11 commission's findings:

WALLACE: You have urged the 9/11 Commission to come up with a unanimous report, because you say it would make a stronger statement.

Do you worry — and you talk about the questions that we're asking, that everybody's asking in Washington this week.

Do you worry at all that, whether it's the debate over Dick Clarke's credibility, his charges, whether it's the fact that we're in the political season, that the important work you say the commission could do is going to get caught up in partisanship?

It may not be "literally true" that Fox News anchors never ask any of these sorts of questions of their conservative guests, but the substance of Clinton's charge is largely accurate. In most instances, when conservatives are interviewed for Fox, they are thrown softballs, and allowed to knock them out of the ballpark.

September 19, 2006

2006-09-19T06:57:00.000-07:00

Dishonest Brit

One of Brit Hume's favorite methods of attempting to discredit news stories of which he dissapproves is detailing how far into a story or how deeply into the pages of a newspaper supposedly damaging information is buried. Often times Hume simply gets it wrong as we've shown before. But sometimes, even when he gets it right, he gets it wrong. In Monday September 18's Grapevine segment, for instance, Hume takes the Associated Press to task for a story in which the news organization detailed the troubling five month detention without charges of one of its photographers working in Iraq. Hume notes:

Explosive Evidence?

The Associated Press has gone public with complaints about the U.S. military's detention of a freelance Iraqi photographer — who's been held for five months without charges.

Fallujah native Bilal Hussein, whose photographs of Iraqi insurgents were part of a Pulitzer Prize winning collection, was arrested in May with an alleged Al Qaeda leader and accused of being a security threat. The AP never reported the story.
But now the AP is calling for Hussein to be charged or released, saying it hasn't found any evidence to support that claim.

The military, however, says bomb-making materials were found in the apartment where Hussein was captured and that he tested positive for traces of explosives. The AP doesn't mention that until the 36th paragraph of its story on the matter.

But what Brit Hume never mentions at all is far more damaging (to Hume's argument) than what the A.P. supposedly buried. Here is the entire paragraph of the A.P. story from which Hume has selectively quoted:

The military said bomb-making materials were found in the apartment where Hussein was captured but it never detailed what those materials were. The military said he tested positive for traces of explosives. [A.P. Lawyer Scott] Horton said that was virtually guaranteed for anyone on the streets of Ramadi at that time.

So Brit Hume's dishonest game is again exposed. Indeed, the level of hypocrisy here is pretty stunning: Hume accuses the A.P. of burying mention of the evidence that the military claims to have gatheed on Hussein, while he himself completely omits mention of the vagueness and unreliability of said evidence.

Monday, September 18. 2006

2006-09-18T08:05:00.000-07:00

Smearing Amnesty International

On the Thursday Sept. 14th edition of Grapevine, Brit Hume had this to say about a new Amnesty International report condeming Hizbullah missile attacks against Israeli civilian targets:

New Better Late Than Never?

Weeks after it condemned Israel for a bombing campaign it said amounted to indiscriminate attacks on Lebanese civilians, Amnesty International is now condemning the terrorist group that initiated the attacks. The human rights group is accusing Hezbollah of war crimes during its conflict with Israel, including "deliberate attacks on civilians."

While the report ruled out Israeli accusations that Hezbollah used civilians as cover during the conflict, it quotes Hezbollah officials who acknowledge keeping weapons in towns and villages. Secretary General Irene Khan said the two reports didn't cancel each other out, but "show both sides of the violence that took place."

Hume dishonestly implies that Amnesty International has been silent, up to now, on Hizbullah attacks against Israeli civilians. However a search of Amnesty International press releases uncovers numerous condemnations of Hizbollah rocket attacks throughout the conflict period. On July 13th, for instance, Amnesty called on all parties to end attacks against civilians noting:

The Israeli and Lebanese governments, and Hizbullah, must take immediate steps to end the ongoing attacks against civilians and civilian objects. Such attacks are a blatant breach of international humanitarian law and amount to war crimes.

...

“Hizbullah must stop launching attacks against Israeli civilians and it must treat humanely the two Israeli soldiers it captured on 12 July and grant them immediate access to the International Committee of the Red Cross...”

On July 27th, Amnesty International called for a military embargo of all parties to the conflict noting:

"Governments supplying Israel and Hizbullah with arms and military equipment are fuelling their capacity to commit war crimes. All governments should impose an arms embargo on both sides and refuse permission for their territories to be used for the transfer of arms and military equipment."

On August 4, Amnesty organized vigils calling for an immediate ceasefire. A spokesman noted:

"The human cost of this conflict is far too high. We demand that the international community call an immediate ceasefire. Civilians in both Lebanon and Israel cannot be left in the line of fire,"

And many more such examples of Amnesty International taking Hizbullah to task for comitting "war crimes" (A.I.'s characterization) against Israeli civilians can be found by anyone willing to spend a few minutes searching the rgoup's website.

The notion that Amnesty International is not an impartial defender of global human rights is one that, over the years, has gained much currency among right-wing ideologues such as Brit Hume. Yet as is the case with this particular segment of Brit Hume's Grapevine, the case is supported largely by innuendo, misrepresentation and distortion.

August 22, 2006

2006-08-23T10:51:00.000-07:00

You Go, George!

In today's Grapevine, Brit Hume celebrates a USA today poll that finds a newfound buoyancy in the president's standing among idenpendent voters and women:

The president's approval rating jumped most among independents — up six points to 36 percent. And 41 percent of women say they approve of the job President Bush is doing — his best performance in any poll since January.

Wow... 36 and 41 percent respectively? That is something to cheer about! I realize, of course, that this is just a case of Hume furiously squeezing the lemons that life is handing him in a futile attempt to make lemonade, but still... 36 and 41 per cent? Shows how bad things are for the president when that's supposed to be cause for celebration.

Next, Hume --who for years has denied global warming as ferverently and convincigly as my two and a half year old daughter denies that 8:30 is nightie-night time-- offers up the following nugget of insightful commentary:

Environmental activists who point to Greenland's melting coastal glaciers as graphic evidence of man-made global awrming may have to find another example. That's according to a new study which shows the glaciers have been shrinking since the 1880s.

Danish scientists analyzed 19th century maps and modern satellite images, finding that 70 percent of Greenland's glaciers have been melting regularly for more than 100 years, and shrunk the most between 1964 and 1985.

The scientists conclude that the melt is "the result of the atmosphere's natural warming," along with greenhouse gases which have "aggravated the situation."

Now, one of the goofy quirks about Brit Hume that makes him such a lovable right-wing propagandist, is the way he'll happily and obliviously cite facts and studies that offer a clear refutation to the point he's trying to make, with little or no acknwoledgment of that fact nor any attempt to reconcile the conflict. Here, for instance, Hume insists that environmentalists will have to stop pointing to the melting of Greeland's glaciers as evidence of man-made global warming because a new scientific study concludes that man-made greenhouse gasses are "aggravating" a 130 year melting trend. That's a bit like arguing that a careless speeder who rear-ends the car in front of him isn't at fault, given that the other car was already travelling in that direction to begin with.

Fair & balanced, folks... fair and balanced.

August 3, 2006

2006-08-03T12:17:00.000-07:00

The Cowardice of The Hume

It's been several days since the world learned of Actor Mel Gibson's arrest and subsequent drunken anti-semitic tirade which was directed at the officers who arrested him, and yet not a mention has been made of the incident in Brit Hume's Grapevine. This is interesting given that, just a few days earlier, Hume was insisting to his viewers that that the European Left has a problem with rampant anti-Semitism (though the examples he gave were not particularly convincing ones). If Hume is worried about the perceived anti-Semitism of the European Left, then why is he not similiarly concerned about the overt anti-Semitism of the director of "The Passion of the Christ," a Hollywood mega-star and darling of the American Christian right?

This is not the first time that Hume has avoided topical issues that were discussed in recent segments, but which re-appear in a light much less favorable to Hume's ideological project. Readers of this blog (I know you're out there!) may recall that when the Washington Post decided in March to hire conservative blogger Ben Domenech for its online publication, Brit Hume was more than happy to cover the discontent that swelled in the liberal blogsophere as a result. However, when Domenech was fired a few days later among allegations that he had been plaigarizing the work of other journalists since his days as a student-reporter at William and Mary and well into his stint as assitant editor at the National Review, Hume and the Grapevine seemed to have forgotten that Domenech had ever existed (though the scandal was widely reported in the media).

July 27, 2006

2006-07-27T11:18:00.000-07:00

Fact Free and Lovin' It!

In Today's Grapevine, two claims stand out for their obvious indifference to anything resembling documented factuality. In the first instance, Hume, writing about support for U.N. ambassador John Bolton among right-wing Jewish groups notes:

Pro-Israel groups are pressuring New York Senators Chuck Schumer and Hillary Clinton to abandon the Democrats' filibuster of U.N. ambassador John Bolton, who now has the firm support of the Jewish community.

However, Hume offers nothing in the way of referenced facts (no polling numbers, for instance) to back up the rather surprising claim that John Bolton has the "firm support of the Jewish community." Instead, Hume seems to be simply repeating (though without attribution) a satement in the conservative New York Sun by American Jewish Congress president, and Bolton supporter, Jack Rosen. It is worth noting that Rosen's claim is, itself, unsupported by polling data or other factual sources.

In another section, Hume makes the following claim:

If you doubt there is a real strain of anti-Semitism in European opinion, consider this. One of Norway's largest newspapers has published a cartoon comparing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to an infamous Nazi death camp commander who indiscriminately murdered Jews by firing on them from his balcony.

Meanwhile, the leader of the Dutch Socialist party, the country's third largest, has compared Islamic terrorists to anti-Nazi resistors, saying, "During World War II, Dutch people thwarted Nazi Germany's destruction machine by blowing up town halls. ...Things are not all that different in the Middle East. Islamic fundamentalism, including the terrorist wing, is a reaction to Israel's occupation of Palestine."

Hume does not explain, however, why it is anti-Semitic to compare Olmert to a Nazi, or to compare Palestinian resistance to Israeli occupation with Dutch resistance to German occupation in World War II. Hume appears to assume that criticism of the Israeli leadership, as well as the Israeli occupation of Palestinan lands is, in and of itself, anti-semitic.

July 19, 2006

2006-07-19T07:23:00.000-07:00

Dishonest Brit

One of the problems with subtlety and nuance is that it hands those who would seek to discredit you plenty of opportunities to attack you through misleading distortions and dishonest citations. And Brit Hume is the T.V. king of misleading distortions and dishonest citations. Take for instance, Hume's summary of a recent Op Ed. piece by the Washington Post's Richard Cohen.

Israel 'A Mistake'?

Liberal Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen writes today that the "greatest mistake Israel could make at the moment is to forget that Israel itself is a mistake." Cohen blames the creation of Israel for a century of warfare in the Middle East, including the present conflict.

And while he says there's "no point in condemning Hezbollah... [or] Hamas," Cohen argues that Israel should exercise restraint — writing that retaking Lebanon and Gaza would lead to world condemnation of "the inevitable sins of an occupying power." His solution?

Cohen says Israel should pull back, withdraw from the West Bank, and accept terrorism and rocket attacks, while "waiting (and hoping) that history will get distracted and move on to something else," adding, "It is best for Israel to hunker down."

In fact, Cohen does refer to the founding of the State of Israel as a mistake, but he adds:

It is an honest mistake, a well-intentioned mistake, a mistake for which no one is culpable, but the idea of creating a nation of European Jews in an area of Arab Muslims (and some Christians) has produced a century of warfare and terrorism of the sort we are seeing now.

So Hume is guilty of stripping Cohen's assertion of all nuance, portraying him as a simple opponent of Israel, rather than someone who is sympathetic to the historical realities that led to the nation's birth. Hume's second point is far more dishnonest, in that he actually quotes Cohen is such a way as to reverse the meaning of his statement. Hume insists that Cohen sees no point in condemning Hezbollah of Hamas, but fails to note why:

There is no point in condemning Hezbollah. Zealots are not amenable to reason. And there's not much point, either, in condemning Hamas. It is a fetid, anti-Semitic outfit whose organizing principle is hatred of Israel.

Whether the is or is not a point in condemning these groups, by excising Cohen's stated reason for not bothering wiht it, Hume dishonestly implies that Cohen is expressing approval for their actions.

Next, Hume does his best to prop up Bush supporter Joe Lieberman's flagging campaign by noting:

Money Matters

Liberal Connecticut Senate challenger Ned Lamont outraised and outspent Democratic incumbent Joe Lieberman by $600,000 over the past two months — but that's not necessarily an indication of his grassroots support in his home state. Lamont contributed $1.1 million of his own money to his campaign, and what's more, the Stamford Advocate reports that 70 percent of donors to Lamont's campaign are from out of state.

In typical Grapevine fashion, no mention is made of the corresponding out-of-state funds that have poured in to the Lieberman campaign. I've been having difficulty digging up the numbers myself, but I did find this story in Connecticut's Journal Enquirer that notes that in April, 75% of Lieberman's campaign funds came from out-of-state sources:

The senator has raised $6.97 million in the current election cycle and had $4.29 million in cash on hand at the end of the month.

The report shows that more than three-quarters of his major donors in April - 104 - reside in states other than Connecticut, including 42 in Massachusetts, 30 in the New York and New Jersey metropolitan area, and 12 in Washington, D.C., and its Maryland and Virginia suburbs.

But, of course, you find find Brit Hume mentioning any of that.

July 18, 2006. (A Long Absence)

2006-07-18T12:52:00.000-07:00

Let me get back to this blog after a long absense:

In today's Grapevine, Brit Hume is shows himself to be meeting to his usual low journalistic standards on at least two accounts.

Noting liberal criticism of California senator Barbara Boxer's decision to support Joe Liberman's candidacy against a strong primary challenge, Hume claims that:

California fundraisers have accused Boxer of putting loyalty before principle, and liberal blogs have called her a "foolish, selfish sellout."

As usual, Hume sees little need to provide a reference of any sort for this quotation, so most readers will come away without knowing that the phrase "foolish, selfish sellout" appears only in the comments section of a blog post on Arianna Huffington's Huffington Post.

Later, Brit Hume makes the claim that:

New Jersey Republican Senate candidate, Ton Kean Jr. has pulled ahead of incumbent Democratic Senator Robert Menendez for the first time, after trailing by seven points just a month ago. Kean holds a 40 to 38 advantage over Menendez in a new Quinnipiac university poll...

But Hume fails to note that the poll had a +-3% margin of error, meaning that statistically, the race is a dead heat and neither candidate can claim to hold an advantage over the other. To be fair, this sort of statistical sloppiness is common, even when it comes to real journalists.

Monday, June 12 2006

2006-06-12T08:32:00.000-07:00

Lowering the bar.

In today's Grapevine, Jim Angle, Brit Hume's Friday understudy, wants us to know just how ungrateful the left is over the death of Abu Musab Al Zarqawi. Unfortunately, for Angle the pickins are rather meager.

One Big Scam?

The U.S. and Iraqi governments are calling the death of Abu Musab Al Zarqawi is a victory in the War on Terror, but some on the left here at home are calling it "one big scam."

One liberal Web log reader says the news is just "another wave of propaganda from the Bush Cabal," saying, "He was likely killed years ago, or is still alive." Another calls it suspicious that Zarqawi's death comes just "as the marriage amendment failed" and "Bush's poll numbers are slipping," adding, "I don't buy it."

Wow... you mean a couple of liberal Web log readers said that? Hold the presses! But wait... ther's more apparently:

Meanwhile, The Washington Times reports that California Democrat Pete Stark called the announcement a political stunt to "cover Bush's [rear] so he doesn't have to answer" for the deaths of Iraqi civilians.

But, alas, it turns out that Stark never actually called the announcement a "stunt." Those are the words of Washington Times reporter Amy Fagan. Indeed, the Washington Times article that Angle is referencing is suspciously vague, quoting Rep. Stark only very briefly, and completing most of his supposed thoughts for him. Take a gander at the opening paragraph:

Some Democrats, breaking ranks from their leadership, today said the death of terrorist leader Abu Musab Zarqawi in Iraq was a stunt to divert attention from an unpopular and hopeless war.
"This is just to cover Bush's [rear] so he doesn't have to answer" for Iraqi civilians being killed by the U.S. military and his own sagging poll numbers, said Rep. Pete Stark, California Democrat. "Iraq is still a mess -- get out."
Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich, Ohio Democrat, said Zarqawi was a small part of "a growing anti-American insurgency" and that it's time to get out.
"We're there for all the wrong reasons," Mr. Kucinich said.
Officially, Democratic leaders reacted positively to the news and praised the troops that successfully targeted al Qaeda's leader in Iraq with 500-pound bombs at his safe house 30 miles from Baghdad.

Officially, Democratic leaders reacted positively to the news... but in their secret underground lair, located deep inside the crater of an extinct volcano sitting atop the mysterious, uncharted pacific Island of DOOMSKULL, Nancy Pelosi and Ted Kennedy cursed our wise and magnanimous leader for eliminating their friend Al Zarqawi and went back to work fine-tuning their nefarious plan for the destruction of America.

Eric Bohelert has lot more on the Washington Times article. It's well worth reading.

So to recap: what you've got here, bsaically, is the Washington Times writing a scurrilous hit-piece, which is then picked up by Angle and Fox News and rebroadcast as if it were a legitimate journalistic product. It's a fine example of the way in which the right-wing echo-chamber manufactures and amplifies non-existent scandals.

Wednesday, May 31 2006.

2006-05-31T09:49:00.000-07:00

He Reports, He Decides.

In Tuesday's Grapevine Jim Angle, Brit Hume's understudy, makes a rather odd interpretative claim:

White House Interference?

A British newspaper has accused Prime Minister Tony Blair of significantly changing his language on Iran in a policy address in Washington last week under pressure from the White House.

The London Telegraph reports that Blair planned to say, "change should not be imposed " on Iran. What he said instead was — "I am not saying we should impose change" on Iran.

Though the two versions are virtually indistinguishable, a source insisted to the paper that the White House asked for the different wording so as to keep the military option "on the table."

A British official calls the story, "categorically untrue."

But is the statement "change should not be imposed [on Iran]" really "virtually indistinguishable" from "I am not saying we should impose change on Iran"? Well, maybe if you're virtually illiterate. Consider the following analogous statements:

(1) The daquiri is not poisoned.
(2) I am not saying that the Margarita is poisoned.

So, would you feel more comfortable drinking the daquiri or the Margarita?

(1) The poodle does not have rabies.
(2) I'm not saying that the shitzu has rabies.

Which dog would you rather pet?

(1) The Honda Civic is not a flaming deathtrap.
(2) I'm not saying that the Pinto is a flaming deahtrap.

Which car would you rather drive?

Wednesday, May 24. 2006

2006-05-24T07:08:00.000-07:00

Slamming the Dixie Chicks

In today's Grapevine, Brit Hume takes a swing at the Dixie Chicks whose new album "Taking The Long Way" resurrects the group's well publicized feud with President Bush:

No Apologies

Country Music's Dixie Chicks say they're taking back their take-back of a famous -- and costly -- slam on President Bush. Singer Natalie Maines told a concert audience in 2003 that the group was "ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas."

Maines apologized for "disrespecting the office of the president" after album sales plummeted, but now tells Time Magazine, "I don't feel he is owed any respect whatsoever."

The group's new album isn't getting much play on country radio either. One Miami station tells Billboard Magazine it pulled the single, "Not Ready to Make Nice," which references the scandal, due to listener complaints after only one week.

Hume did not feel it worth noting, on the other hand, that "Taking The Long Way" is currently ranked at #1 in Amazon.com's album sales charts. Some Country radio station execs. may have banned the album, but that hasn't stopped Americans from linning up to buy it.

Tuesday, May 23. 2006

2006-05-23T06:41:00.000-07:00

The One Republican In The World That Hillary Would Beat!

From today's Grapevine:

Gaining Ground

New York Senator Hillary Clinton, considered the Democratic frontrunner for the 2008 presidential nomination, would still lose in a head-to-head match up with Republicans John McCain and Rudy Giuliani, but she's gaining on them in the latest FOX News poll. McCain's lead is down from 11 points in March to just 4 and Giuliani's margin has dropped from 12 points to 9.

The one Republican Clinton would beat is Florida Governor Jeb Bush, who has not suggested he would run. Just 28 percent of respondents had a favorable opinion of the Florida governor and 22 percent said he would make a good president.

Gosh... is Jeb Bush really the only Republican in the whole wide world that Hillary Clinton would beat? I'll chalk this one up to poor editing on the part of whomever it is that writes Brit Hume's material, but the comment is nonetheless revealing.

Monday, May 22 2006

2006-05-22T07:00:00.000-07:00

A Semi-correction

One of Brit Hume's favorite (and ridiculously petty) passtimes is scanning the "corrections" sections of major newspapers presumably to show just how "biased" they are to have made the acknowledged mistake in the first place. Take for instance, this report from the May 10th Grapevine:

Naming Names

The Washington Post's Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Dana Priest reports that "Army Lieutenant General Lee Blalack, a legendary special operations officer who now holds the title of deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence and warfighting support," is the driving force behind a campaign to expand the Pentagon's role in intelligence operations. Unfortunately, no such person exists.

The man Priest describes is actually Lieutenant General William Boykin, while Lee Blalack is, in fact, a Washington attorney who serves as disgraced California Republican Duke Cunningham's defense lawyer. The Washington Post has since issued a correction on its Web site.

On Wednesday's Grapevine, however, it was Brit Hume's turn to issue a correction.

Grapevine Correction

Last Thursday we reported that the USA Today story on the NSA's data mining of domestic phone calls waited until page five to mention that customers' names, addresses and other personal information are not collected as part of the program. In fact, that information appeared on the front page in the 11th paragraph. We regret the error.

Now, I've got to say that it's rather puzzling how Hume or Hume's staff could have made such an elementary mistake, unless they hadn't actually read the paper edition of USA Today itself. In that case, however, one wonders how it was that they concluded that the information in question did not appear 'till page 5. Hmmmmm. Puzzling indeed.

Nonetheless, it's worth noting that Hume's "correction" is really more of a pseudo-correction. For as brithumewatch noted earlier, the biggest problem with Hume's report is that it was tremendously misleading in suggesting that the information gathered by the NSA could not be matched to specific individuals, and that USA Today, for some reason was trying to hide that fact. Indeed, the opposite is true, and Brit Hume has offered no correction in this regard.

(Update: MediaMatters.org has been following this story, too and has some more interesting information to add. The "page 5" error, for insatance, resulted from the fact that USA Today printed the information in question on Page A1 and Page 5... absurd, isn't it?)

Friday, May 12 2006

2006-05-12T07:55:00.000-07:00

Selectively Quoting

Brit Hume is fond of selective quotations. They make the process of distorting the arguments of an administration critic mcuh easier. Today's Grapevine is a prime example of that tactic. Commenting on a USA today story about an NSA program that tracks the telephone traffic of tens of millions of Americans, and which has cause quite an uporoar, Hume makes the following claim:

Overreaching at the NSA?

Today's front page USA Today story on the National Security Agency's database of information on domestic phone calls reports that the agency "reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans."

Not until page five, however, does the paper report the following: "Phone customers' names, addresses and other personal information are not being collected as part of this program."

By the way, despite USA Today's excitement over the story, The New York Times first reported the NSA data-mining operation in December.

Kinda makes is seem like the program is really no big deal, right? And that Liberal reporters for USA have deliberately tried to exaggerate privacy fears by "burying" this important piece of information on Page 5. Well, let's see what the USA Today piece really says:

With access to records of billions of domestic calls, the NSA has gained a secret window into the communications habits of millions of Americans. Customers' names, street addresses and other personal information are not being handed over as part of NSA's domestic program, the sources said. But the phone numbers the NSA collects can easily be cross-checked with other databases to obtain that information.

So once again we see how Brit Hume, a partisan hack disguised as a journalist, distorts the true picture by selectively quotin his sources. The fact that the NSA does not gather names and addresses is irrelevant. Once you've got the phone number, all you need is a reverse phonebook to get that information.

Shame on you, brit Hume.

Tuesday, May 2

2006-05-02T06:50:00.000-07:00

Brit Hume: Caught In Another Lie

On today's Grapevine we see just one more example of how Hume's first allegiance is to Republican party partisan spin, with truth coming in a distant second.

Hume's claim:

Remember Michael Scheuer?

Speaking of Zarqawi: Remember former CIA official Michael Scheuer? He's the one who wrote the book, "Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror," which called the war in Iraq "unprovoked."

Well, he now says U.S. forces had Zarqawi in their sights "almost every day for a year before the invasion" of Iraq, but were told not to kill him because, he tells Australian TV, "the president and the National Security Council decided it was more important not to give the Europeans the impression we were gunslingers."

Scheuer, by the way, once insisted Usama Bin Ladin was not a terrorist but a "resistance fighter," and once described the Al Qaeda leader as a "brilliant man."

But a quick look at the transcript of the interview that Hume is referencing (without attribution, of course) reveals that Scheuer did not, in fact, insist that Bin Ladin was not a terrorist, nor did Scheuer describe Bin Ladin as a resistance fighter as Hume implies. In fact, what Scheduer said to Tim Russert was the following:

MR. RUSSERT: Do you see him [Usama Bin Ladin] as a very formidable enemy?
MR. SCHEUER: Tremendously formidable enemy, sir, an admirable man. If he was on our side, he would be dining at the White House. He would be a freedom fighter, a resistance fighter. It's--and again, that's not to praise him, but it is to say that until we take the measure of the man and the power of his words, we're very much going to be on the short end of the stick.

Clearly Scheuer does not, contra Hume, "insist" that Bin Ladin is not a terrorist. Furthermore, Scheuer is also not saying that Bin Lain is a resistance fighter, no matter how hard Hume tries to spin things. What he says, instead, is that Bin Ladin is a formidable enemy, and if he were on our side, we'd be calling him a resistance fighter. And let's face it, we certainly were calling Bin Ladin a resistance fighter when he was fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s. So Scheuer has a point, to a certain extent.

Monday, May 1 2006

2006-05-01T08:19:00.000-07:00

Margin of what?

Trying to prove... I'm not exactly sure what, in today's Grapevine, Jim Angle (Brit Hume's Friday understudy) makes a pretty stunning claim:

For New York Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton the chances of becoming president could be influenced by what name she uses, according to a new USA Today poll.

When Republicans were asked about Hillary Rodham Clinton, they gave her a 23 percent approval rating, but the other half of the Republicans in the poll were asked what they thought about Hillary Clinton, without her maiden name and they only gave her a 16 percent approval rating.

And among Independents the inclusion of her maiden name produced a 48 percent rating compared to a 42 percent rating without it.

Democrats, however, were swayed in the opposite direction with the maiden name inspiring a 1 percent decrease in her approval rating from 77 to 76 percent.

As I said before, I'm not sure exactly what Angle was suggesting with that last point (love of the Clinton name among Democrats? A "traditional marriage" streak among leftists?) but it's simply ridiculous to come to the conclusion that Angle draws based on a 1% variation in a poll with a margin of error of 3-5%. The only intellectually honest conclusion to be drawn from the numbers is that unlike Republicans or independents, Democrats don't care what name Clinton uses.

April 11, 2006

2006-04-11T08:46:00.003-07:00

Not So Odd Couple

In today's Grapevine, Brit Hume plays the "even the liberal Washington Post" game. As in, even the Liberal Washington Post dismisses the President's critics. Here's what Hume has to say:

The Odd Couple

The president's so-called leak of classified intelligence information in 2003 has had a rare and unusual result — it has brought together the editorial pages of The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post.

Last week, The Wall Street Journal wrote that the president "has a right — even a duty — to set the record straight," adding, "Mr. Bush was divulging the truth."

And Sunday's Washington Post called the declassification, "A Good Leak," saying, "President Bush was right to approve the declassification of parts of a National Intelligence Estimate about Iraq ... to make clear why he had believed that Saddam Hussein was seeking nuclear weapons."

What Hume failes to mention, of course, is that the Washington Post's editorial page has taken a pro-war position very similar to the Wall Street Journal's pro-war position from the very beginning of the Bush administration's confrontation with Saddam Hussein, and has refused to back down from that posture at any point since. Given this context, there is very little that is "unsual" about this coming together of the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post, and it is disingenuous of Hume to suggest otherwise.

Furthermore, Hume failed to mention altogether is the much noted fact that, on the very same day, the Post's main pages carried a pair of investigative articles whose content thoroughly discredited the claims of the Post editorial pages, as noted in this Editor and Publisher piece.

March 28th, 2006

2006-03-28T07:12:00.000-08:00

Who Could Be For T.V. Violence?

To hear Brit Hume tell it on today's Grapevine, this was a simple rally against television violence by a well-meaning Christian group, and was opposed, for no good reason, by intolerant anti-Christian San Fancisco legislators:

Twenty-five thousand evangelical Christians demonstrated against TV sex and violence in San Francisco this weekend. But that didn't go down well with the city council, which passed a resolution condemning the rally as an "act of provocation" to negatively influence what the council called America's "most tolerant" city.

The group, called "Battle Cry for a Generation," uses the Bible to counter what it calls corrupting influences in the media. But the San Francisco Chronicle reports that about 50 counter-protesters denounced the gathering as a "fascist mega-pep rally." And San Francisco's State Representative Mark Leno called the Christians loud, obnoxious, and disgusting, adding, "they should get out of San Francisco."

What Hume fails to mention, however, is that "Battle Cry for a Generation" indicated, by the invitation that it sent out for the event, that the rally was really going to be an anti-gay demonstration. As the AP reports:

A Battle Cry invitation had made plain the symbolism of gathering at "the very City Hall steps where several months ago, gay marriages were celebrated for all the world to see."

Guess you just forgot to mention that little tidbit, didn't you, Brit?

March 26th 2006

2006-03-27T10:27:00.000-08:00

Ben who?

You'd think that after mentioning the stormy reception that greeted the Washington Post's hiring of right-wing blogger Ben Domeneche on March 23rd's Grapevine, Brit Hume would be eager to follow up with a story about Domenech's firing amid charges that he'd been plaigarizing articles since his college days and well into his tenure as writer for the National Review. You'd be wrong. Instead, in today's Grapevine Hume has decided to play a favorite game of Conservative commentators and ridicule: The French, Hollywood Celebrities, The Democratic Leadership and Fidel Castro.

Hume just isn't going to play that ridiculous "balance" game.

March 17th, 2006

2006-03-17T06:16:00.000-08:00

On A Distant Planet

Brit Hume is so far out to lunch on today's Grapevine that he's just plain on a distant planet. This is one of those days when you can state, pretty much unequivocably, that the man is simply lying. To wit:

The liberal Federation of American Scientists is suggesting that nuclear weapons are just as safe in Iranian hands as they are in American hands.

In a press release announcing a FAS report claiming nuclear weapons "are surprisingly prominent in both the planning and command structure" in the administration's new national security plan — the group's vice president of strategic security says, "The United States cannot argue that Iran should give up its nuclear ambitions while advocating an aggressive strategy for pre-emptive use of American nuclear weapons."

FAS concedes the strategy is "primarily a non-nuclear mission."

It's really difficult to even know where to begin with this one, given that nothing in the press release even remotely resembles what Brit Hume claims it says. Or perhaps we should clarify this by saying that nothing in the press release resembles what Hume claims it "suggests." I suppose that the word "suggests" here is the operative term, given that Hume seems to believe that he can claim anything he wants about the press release as long as he uses the word "suggests" and doesn't flat-out claim that it "states" such a thing. Because, let's face it: the press release certainly doesn't "state" that nuclear weapons are just as safe in U.S. hands as in Iranian hands. And in all honesty, it doesn't "suggest" that nuclear weapons are just as safe in Iranian hands as U.S. hands any more than it "suggests" that purple cows play croquet on the dark side of the moon. What the press release does suggest --and says explicitly-- is that it is hypocritical for this administration to advance a strategy that expands the role of our own nucelar weapons to include preemptive strikes, while insisting that other nations not be allowed to seek a similar capability for themselves.

So all in all, this is just part and parcel with Brit Hume's characteristic dishonesty.

Tuesday, March 14th

2006-03-15T07:46:00.000-08:00

I'm going to upset the chronology today to take a look back at an earlier episode of the Grapevine that was broadcast on Tuesday, March 14th. I had read this segment, but not having seen the Bill Mahr interview in question, couldn't really comment on Hume's take. Well, now Crooks and Liars has posted the video clip of the interview on their excellent website (it's my favorite blog, by far) and so I can comment. Here was Hume's take:

New York Times Baghdad bureau chief John Burns has long been highly pessimistic about the war in Iraq from the start. In an interview with TV host Bill Maher Friday night, Burns remained pessimistic, but he also said that now "U.S. military and political diplomatic leadership in Iraq ... is about as good as you could possibly get." And he said the U.S. team there has "got the formula more or less right."

But by the time the trade publication Editor and Publisher had edited and published the Burns interview you wouldn't have known any of that. The magazine ignored it all instead claiming that Burns for the first time was predicting failure.

Ok, now that you've read Hume's comments, why not hop on over to crooks and liars and watch the video, and decide for yourself whether Editor and Publisher painted a distorted picture of the substance of the interview. I think this citation pretty much sums up the segment, and shows how disingenuous Hume's criticisms really are:

Burns: ...there were many mistakes made, but my feeling is that if this fails -- as I have to say, on balance of the odds, it seems now likely to do-- it's probably not going to be because of American mistakes, but because the mission was impossible in the first place... and something else I'd like to say, which is that there were mistakes... of course there were serious mistakes, probably the most serious of them was what was allowed to happen at Abu Ghraib... but the American Military and the political and diplomatic leadership in Iraq now, it seems to me, is about as good as you could possibly get... if the American enterprise in Iraq can be brought to some kind of satisfactory conclusion, improbable as that seems to be, it will be in some measure because they do now have a team in Iraq, Ambassador Herozad, General Casey, General Abizaid, as the Middle East commander, and I think they've got the formula more or less right, but whether it can prevail, that's very uncertain...

It's really hard to imagine that Editor and Publisher could possibly have distorted the piece to draw a bleaker picture than that. But, you know... if you're Brit Hume, then grasping at straws is what you do for a living.

Tuesday, March 14th

2006-03-14T11:25:00.000-08:00

Back in the saddle

It's been a while. Let's get back on track.

Today's Grapevine sees Brit Hume rehashing several of his favorite topics. Hume, always eager to do anything he can to help out his pal Scooter Libby, references a Vanity Fair article in which former Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee suggests that Richard Armitage may have been the first to disclose Valerie Plame's CIA identity.

Bradlee says, "That Armitage is the likely source is a fair assumption. I had heard about an e-mail that was sent that had a lot of unprintable language in it." Armitage was a known dissenter from the Bush Iraq policy and if he turned out to the first to disclose Plame's identity, it would be a blow to the conspiracy theorists who have long claimed that the White House leaked her name to intimidate her husband, also an Iraq policy dissenter.

Hume fails to mention that the Washington Post editorial board enthusiastically supported the Iraq war before it began, nor does he remind listeners that Karl Rove himself told MSNBC's Chris Matthews that Valerie Plame was "fair game" for political attack. No "conspiracy theory" is needed when the president's Chief of Staff announces that he intends to destroy Plame.

In other segments, Hume does his best to convince us that things are just going swimmingly in Iraq, and its just that nasty old liberal media that's making things seem bad over there. Also, you've got these uppitty negroes all hot and bothered because some white guy wants to put up a statue of some other white guys going to a baseball game. And finally, some guy at Yale is calling some other guy, formerly at Yale, a retard, and all. You know... important, Earth shattering stuff.

Friday, February 24

2006-02-24T06:48:00.000-08:00

Brit Hume ♥ Lewis Libby

A summary of Today's Grapevine:

Brit Hume opens, today, by noting that Iran's leadership is being very disingenuous in suggesting to its people that the U.S. government and Israel were responsible for the bombing that destroyed a sacred Shiite shrine in Samarra. Hume then goes on to compare Iran's false claims of U.S. involvement in the Samarran mosque explosion with the Bush administration's false claims of Iraqi involvement in 9/11... Psyyyyyych! Ha, ha! Gotcha there for a second, didn't I? Yeah, I made that second part up.

Next on The Grapevine, Hume goes into obfuscatory mode shilling for indicted perjurer Lewis "Scooter" Libby":

Federal Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is balking at producing evidence to support his claim that former CIA operative Valerie Plame's job status was classified when administration official staffers mentioned her name to reporters in 2003.

The claim that Plame's job was classified was made in the indictment of former Cheney chief of staff Scooter Libby. But Fitzgerald says that information doesn't relate to the perjury charges against Libby and therefore defense lawyers have no right to documents that would support it.
What's more, Fitzgerald won't say whether Plame's outing damaged national security and denies ever claiming any damage was done at all.

But as Byron York of National Review points out, Fitzgerald told reporters in presenting his charges against Libby, "Damage ... was done to all of us."

Valerie (Plame) Wilson's covert status has been well established, and there is no real doubt on this matter outside conservative spin circles. Not only has Robert Novak himself aknowledged that CIA sources asked that he not publish Wilson's name, but facts reported in the media have made it amply clear that Wilson was Covert (indeed, we know that she had participated in covert operations overseas with the CIA front company Brewster-Jennings as recently as 2001, 2002 and 2003).

Also significant is the fact that Libby is not even under indictment for exposing Plame. He is under indictment for lying to prosecutors about his contacts with the press. Libby is being charged with Perjury, not with violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. So Libby's request for materials relating to Wilson's status at the CIA is, indeed, immaterial to the defense, as Fitzgerald has pointed out. So why are Libby's lawyers asking for the materials, and why is Fitzgerald refusing to release them, and why is Brit Hume pressing the issue on Fox News? The answer is simple: Libby's lawyers are trying to pursue a strategy of forcing the government to release secret documents that might prove damaging to national securty (and counter proliferation operations overseas) or drop the case against Libby altogether. I don't want to exaggerate things, but basically the defense strategy boils down to nuclear blackmail against the U.S.: either you's drop the case against our boy, or release documents that will scuttle counter-proliferation efforts around the globe. It's your choice, buddy! And the best part is that our own favorite Fox anchor is a willing participant in the scheme. Atta boy, Brit!

The last two segments are less interesting. In the first, Hume fantasizes about Conservatives out-birthing Liberals in America and leading to a demographic takeover of the country (because, you know, kids never have political leanings different from mommy and daddy). In the second Hume looks briefly at a pair of hate speech prosecutions in Europe.

Thursday, February 23

2006-02-23T10:40:00.000-08:00

Brit Hume ♥ The Press

A summary of today's Grapevine:

Would you believe it? Brit Hume just loves the L.A. Times and the Washington Post! Seems both those papers are running editorials poo pooing the fuss over Dear Leader's misunderstood and unfairly maligned U.A.E. port deal. Go Times! Go Post! Rah, rah, rah!

In China, meanwhile, government officials are totally pissed at Google! You might think that it was wrong for Google to collaborate with Chinese officials in censoring the internet and stamping out Democratic reforms before they can even begin to take root. You'd be so totally wrong! If Chinese officials had their way, Google would be spamming Chinese citizens' mailboxes with billions of offers for hot, sexy, uncensored copies of Mao's Little Red Book. But Google's like.. no way, man! We believe in Freedom!

Also, it appears that a Dean at Harvard has written a letter apologizing for offending Muslims... Didja hear that? A friggin dean, man! At friggin, Harvard!

Finally, it seems that a geography teacher somewhere in Colorado doesn't very much like George W. Bush, and has told his students as much. Aren't we lucky to have a national television newscaster of Brit Hume's stature and prominence bringing us news of this dire, homegrown Coloradoan threat to the republic? Baaaad, teacher... baaaad.... now, don't do that again, you hear me?!

Wednesday, February 22

2006-02-22T07:19:00.000-08:00

Brit Hume Plays the Race Card

In today's Grapevine Brit Hume plays the race card in trying to back up the Bush adminsitration's much lambasted decision to allow a company owned by the United Arab Emirates to exercise control over U.S. por security.. Quoting pollster John Zogby, Hume notes:

Arab Americans are blaming the uproar over an Arab company assuming control over U.S. ports not on security concerns, but on bigotry. Arab American Institute president James Zogby says, "I find some of the rhetoric being used against this deal shameful and irresponsible."

He adds that politicians who oppose the deal are merely exploiting post-9/11 fears, saying, "The slogan is, if it's Arab, it's bad. Hammer away." And a spokeswoman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations says, "The perception in the Arab-American community is that this is related to anti-Arab sentiment."

It's too bad that Hume's spent the last couple of weeks terrifying his viewers with scary stories about violent A-rabs marching in the streets, burning everything in their path, and coming up with newfangled names for Danish pastries in response to the controversial Mohammed cartoons of Jyllands Posten. Kinda makes his newfound concern for our Arab brothers seem a little less than genuine, don't you think?

Monday, February 20

2006-02-20T07:40:00.000-08:00

It's been a few days. Time to get back to blogging.

Since I last updated Brithumewatch, Brit Hume got his interview with Dick Cheney. There's a decent commentary of it by David Eddlestein here. One of the things that's interesting about the interview, as Eddlestein notes, is how at the beginning of the interview Cheney describes Harry Whittington as a "good friend" and then seconds later, in response to a question by Hume, refers to him as a mere "acquaintance."

Q: How did you feel when you heard about that?

A: Well, it's a great relief. But I won't be, obviously, totally at ease until he's home. He's going to be in the hospital, apparently, for a few more days, and the problem, obviously, is that there's always the possibility of complications in somebody who is 78-79 years old. But he's a great man, he's in great shape, good friend, and our thoughts and prayers go out to he and his family.

Q: How long have you known him?

A: I first met him in Vail, Colorado, when I worked for Jerry Ford about 30 years ago, and it was the first time I'd ever hunted with him.

Q: Would you describe him as a close friend, friendly acquaintance, what?

A: No, an acquaintance.

Emphasis mine.

Of course, Hume didn't follow up on this or any other discrepancy in the Vice President's account. When Cheney explained that he didn't follow Whittington to the hospital because there wasn't enough room on the ambulance, Hume changed the subject rather than ask why it was Cheney could not have followed in another car.

Q: What did you do then? Did you get up and did you go with him, or did you go to the hospital?

A: No, I had told my physician's assistant to go with him, but the ambulance is crowded and they didn't need another body in there. And so we loaded up and went back to ranch headquarters, basically. By then, it's about 7:00 p.m. at night.

Q: Did you have a sense then of how he was doing?

Hume is a very intelligent questioner, and very quick on his feet. If he failed to ask an obvious question of the V.P. it wasn't a simple oversight. It was simple deference. By and large, during the interview, Hume asked the questions that had to be asked, but didn't probe them any further. He, for instance, accepted Cheney's story that he had drunk "one beer" at lunch, and quickly moved on to other subjects.

Q: Was anybody drinking in this party?

A: No. You don't hunt with people who drink. That's not a good idea. We had ...

Q: So he wasn't, and you weren't?

A: Correct. We'd taken a break at lunch — go down under an old — ancient oak tree there on the place, and have a barbecue. I had a beer at lunch. After lunch we take a break, go back to ranch headquarters. Then we took about an hourlong tour of ranch, with a ranch hand driving the vehicle, looking at game. We didn't go back into the field to hunt quail until about, oh, sometime after 3:00 p.m. The five of us who were in that party were together all afternoon. Nobody was drinking, nobody was under the influence.

Q: Now, what thought did you give, then, to how — you must have known that this was — whether it was a matter of state, or not, was news. What thought did you give that evening to how this news should be transmitted?

Hume didn't ask how much anyone else (including Mr. Whittington) had drunk, nor whether other alcoholic beverages besides beer had been served. In addition, as others have noted, Fox News has not even released the video clip of Cheney admitting that he had a beer for lunch, taking time to excise that portion of the interview from the segments that were broadcast.

I'm not going to say that the interview was scripted (though we know that this Whitehouse, does often script this sort of thing). In fact, I'll go out on a limb and say that it probably wasn't scripted. But, let's face it. It didn't really need to be. After all, this is Fox News, and this is Brit Hume we're talking about. All you really need to know about the legitimacy of this interview is that it came about after the National Review Online suggested that Cheney do an interview with Hume to get the whole Whittington incident behind him:

Cheney himself should make a public appearance on the matter, and the sooner the better. He should get himself with a respected national anchor — perhaps Brit Hume of Fox News — as soon as this evening to express his regret and explain in his own words what happened.

Not surprisingly, other media figures have commented on the distance that Cheney has placed between himself and legitimate news reporters. CNN's Jack Cafferty, for instance, noted that Cheney's "running over there to the Fox network"... "didn't exactly represent a profile in courage."

In response, in Thursday Feb 16th edition of The Grapevine, Hume takes a swipe at Cafferty noting:

And someone named Jack Cafferty said, "It didn't exactly represent a profile in courage for the vice president to wander over there to the F-word network,” calling the interview, "a little bit like Bonnie interviewing Clyde."

Translation: I'm Brit Hume, beyatch! Who are you? As usual, whenever Fox News comes in for criticism, the nework's apoligists fall back on their ratings leads over other networks, as if ratings had anything to do with integrity or professionalism. A look at circulation figures for the National Enquirer over the past few decades should put that notion to rest.

Wednesday, February 15th

2006-02-15T11:59:00.000-08:00

Tool

It's been a pretty ho hum couple of days over at the "Grapevine." Basically just Brit Hume being Brit Hume... that is... a tool for the Republian party. Today's Grapevine provides an example as Hume decides to use his program to run interference for the Vice President's office:

As if taking a cue from the White House press corps, Senate Democrats came out in full swing Tuesday attacking the administration for its delay in releasing information on Vice President Cheney's hunting accident. Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid called the Bush administration the most secretive in modern history and compared the hunting incident to the Valerie Plame leak investigation and the White House response to Hurricane Katrina.

He also called on the vice president to appear publicly to talk about what happened. New York Senator Hillary Clinton chimed in that the administration has a tendency to withhold information from the public and resists legitimate requests for information.

I think it's pretty illustrative of Hume's paranoia that he now seems to think that, not only is the mainstream press a Marxist fifth column threatening the values of this great nation, but that the Democratic party is in fact little more than the media's bitch. Democrats aren't actually criticizing the Whitehouse because it is, in fact "the most secretive in modern history"... no... rather, they're doing so because their handlers at the New York Times, The Washington Post and The L.A. Times got together over the weekend, in some smoky room and decided this was a good time for the party to go on the attack. I exaggerate, of course, but Hume is certainly taking a page out of the Republican party playbook and insinuating that there's a nefarious and incestuous relationship between the Democratic party and the mainstream press.

And for his troubles what does Fox News' bestest propagandist get? It appears that Hume has scored an exclusive interview with the V.P.. Way to go, Brit 'ol boy! You worked hard fo it. You deserve it!

February 13, 2006

2006-02-13T08:12:00.000-08:00

Six Degrees of Propaganda

Today we examine Brit Hume's most recent Grapevine segment (Friday, Feb 10) and find that it's even more tawdry than your typical Hume entry. Miffed by a Dove Soap / Girlscouts campaign to make girls feel better about themselves, Hume takes on the Campaign For Real Beauty writing:

As part of a national campaign to promote self-esteem among young girls, the makers of Dove soap have provided teens with information on everything from politics to sex, but some of the content may raise

The Campaign for Real Beauty Web site suggests that readers report offensive ads and messages to media watchdogs such as Media Watch and Adbusters. But those organizations' Web sites contain links to articles attacking the Bush administration, offers for online dating sites specifically aimed at liberal Democrats and numerous references to pornography. One online forum even contains solicitation for free kiddie porn.

Ceratinly it's an odd non-sequitor that follows the word "but" in that second paragraph. So what if those organization contain links to articles critical of the Bush administration? I'm not sure how that is supposed to undermine the Campaign for Real Beauty. Nor does Hume attempt, in any way, to justify the apparent negative implication of the disjunction. Apparently, in Hume's world, it's enough to link to a webiste that itself links to criticisms of the Bush Amdinistration to render your campaign suspect.

More dishonest are the warnings that follow. Apparently these webistes also feature: "offers for online dating sites specifically aimed at liberal Democrats" (Watch out, parents, if your daughter visits one of those sites she might start dating a... gasp... liberal Democrat!) "and numerous references to pornography" (While I couldn't find any of these "numerous refernces to pornography when I followed the links in question, it's worth noting that Hume's Grapevine segment itself contains "numerous references ot pronography"). Most odious, of course, is Brit Hume's claim that "One online forum even contains solicitation for free kiddie porn." What online forum? When? Was it a paid advertisement, or mere spam that got through a filter on an otherwise unmoderated discussion forum? Hume doesn't say. I ran a blog search to see if I could track down what it was Hume was referring to, but all I could find were legions of blogs praising the Campaign for Real Beauty and a recent "Superbowl" commercial sponsored by Dove.

In the end, what Hume has done here is implement one of the simplest and most dishonest tricks in the dirty political pool playbook. You take an organization's website and follow the links, then follow the links from the webistes it links to, and so on and so forth until you reach an unsavory webiste. You play "six degrees of internet separation" and announce that your political opponent's website links to a website that itself links to a website that links to a website that includes a "solicitation for kiddie porn." The fact that Brit Hume had to fall back on a link on an unnamed "online forum" shows just how desperate the Fox News anchor is to dig up some dirt on the campaign. After all, online forums are notoriously difficult to regulate, and a popular tactic of internet spammers is to radomly post advertisements in umoderated online forums to drive up web traffic.

Is this journalism?

Update: I've found what I think is Hume's Source for this piece. It appears to be this editorial by a right-wing columnist in the conservative PittsburgLive website. The offending web forum appears to have been on Adbusters. The offensive post is no longer available, but from the description was clearly a spam message that has been deleted by forum moderators. Of course, you'd never know that by reading "The Grapevine" As for the "numerous references to pornography," they are from a Yes Magazine interview with Chris Hedges titled Love and Resistance in Wartime. This is what Hedges says:

In a wartime society, the moral order is flipped upside down; prostitution, rape, and abuse all rise as the levels of violence rises. That happened in every conflict I was in. In Serbia, for instance, as the violence proliferated you also had a proliferation of pornography and snuff films. It always goes hand in hand, because what you are destroying is the humanity of the other; you are turning the other into an object, which is precisely what torture or pornography does.

Not exactly the promotion of pornography that Brit Hume seems to be implying in his segment.

February 10, 2006

2006-02-10T07:43:00.000-08:00

Ho, hum

Pretty typical day for The Grapevine. Hume leads with a story about how a Fox News poll shows that Republicans are going to romp all over the Democrats in 2008 (apparently, McCain is back in favor at Fox News now that he represents the party's best hope at surviving 8 uninterrupted years of scandals, mismanagement and corruption).

I'd also like to modify something I wrote about yesterday a bit. In yesterday's entry I noted that Hume's "The Grapevine" segment reads like a right-wing blog without hyperlinks. This isn't strictly true. The printed, online version of "The Grapevine" does include hyperlinks. It's just that the hyperlinks themselves are basically worthless. That's because they don't link to the sources that Hume is using for his stories (as a normal blog would) but rather, they mostly link to the Fox News search engine. So that when you click the hyperlink to a story on a newspaper that refused to run some ads by a Pro-life activist group, you aren't linked to a broader story about the incident, nor are you linked to that paper. Rather, what you get is a series of search resuls, the first one of which points straight back to "The Grapevine" and the second which points to a story on a Mastodon find in Illinois. What's that all about?

Lastly, while this is a blog about Brit Hume, I'd like to take a minute to note about Gretta Van Susteren. Whenever Fox News is criticized for being the Republican propaganda outlet that it is, the nework's defenders always reply that there are plenty of liberals working at Fox, including Alan Colmes and Gretta Van Susteren. Now, I won't get into Colmes, as there's been plenty already written about how he was chosen by Sean Hannity to act as a dim-witted, non-threatening foil for Hannity's over-the-top right-wing histrionics. As for Susteren, I'll note that, although she first made her name as a legal analyst and defender of President Clinton during the Monica Lewinsky scandal, she's spent most of her time at Fox News reporting on trashy celebrity scandal stuff; Laci Petterson, runaway brides, pretty, doe-eyed, missing college students, etc. Looks like last-night's show was no exception. In the midst of Republican scandals about illegal wiretapping, Jack Abramoff-linked corruption, and a meltdown in the Middle-east, what was Fox News' resident "liberal" reporting on? Why, a weeks old story about a honey-mooner murdered on a cruise liner. Gee, thanks for keeping the faith there, Gretta!

February 9, 2006

2006-02-09T06:16:00.000-08:00

One of the most annoying things about Brit Hume's "grapevine" segment, is that his stories are so poorly documented that often times you've got to spend serious time running google searches before you can find the source for whatever the heck it is he's talking about. And half the time Hume's source turns out to be some far-right blog, or a right-wing propagandist webiste such as Newsmax. In fact, it's hard not to come to the conclusion that Hume's "grapevine" segment is nothing more than a televised digest of right-wing blogs but without the hyperlinks, meaning that his claims are both disingenuous and difficult to verify. Today's Grapevine is a good example of this:

Muslims across the world are expressing outrage over those now-infamous Danish cartoons. And some American Muslims are raising concerns about one depiction of the prophet inside the Supreme Court.

A sculpture of Muhammed is included among 18 stone "lawgivers" that have adorned the building since it opened in 1935. It depicts the prophet with a Koran in one hand and a sword in the other.

Conservatives claim to be offended when foreign mobs burn the American flag and issue threats against America. But the one thing they hate even more than that is when foreign mobs burn someone else's flag while ignoring the U.S. completely. And the whole issue of the Danish "Mohammed" cartoons is one such situation. Most protesters are angry at Denmark, burning Danish flags, boycotting Danish products and attacking Danish embassies. Other than an incident involving an angry mob charging a military base in Afghanistan, the U.S. has largely been ignored in this matter. This is true even though a few right-wing rags such as the New York Sun have gone out of their way to reprint the offending cartoons in their pages. But it's been to no avail. The U.S. of A. has shown up to this party as the frumpy plain-Jane, while all eyes and all the attention is focused the cute little Danish friend we came with. Boo, hoo, say conservatives.
And so like it or not, whether the facts warrant it or not, righ-wingers are going to find some way to turn this hubub into an attack on America. Tonight, for instance, Tucker Carlson is running a show on what these riots "mean for America." And now, Brit Hume is telling us that "some American Muslims" are "raising concerns" about a sculpture of Mohammed that can be found inside the Supreme Court. Sounds scary doesn't it?
But wait a minute... what Muslims are raising these concerns? Hume doesn't say. Is it a lot of Muslims? Hume doesn't say. Are they important, powerful Muslims? Again, Hume doesn't say. For all we know it could be a Pakistani convenience store clerk and one of his customers. On the other hand, it could be the members of the two million strong Secret Sleeper-cell Army Of Osama. We just don't know, and Hume offers no details to clear this up for us. Nor does Hume source this claim in any way. So I did what I always do: I ran some google searches.
Now, you'd think that if Mulsims in America were making a big deal out of the Mohammed sculptures in the Supreme Court building, then someone other than Brit Hume would be reporting about it, right? Well, not really. I did find this CNN story on Sandra Day O'Connor that mentions a 1997 Supreme Court case in which a Moslem organization had tried to have the image removed (the court ruled against the plaintiffs). In addition, there's this Garavi Gijarat story titled "Mohammed sculpture at top US court draws mild rebuke." The story appears to reference the same 1997 court case, but quotes Moslem leaders as saying:

"The court ruled that the good outweighed the bad ... and the community`s response was one that was very tempered," said Edina Lekovic, spokeswoman for the Muslim Public Affairs Council in Washington. "They (community leaders) came out and said that they disagreed with the court ruling but they appreciated the thought and the intention behind the sculpture."

Is this what Hume is referring to? Again, it's impossible to say. One thing's for certain though: it'd sure be hard to get Americans all riled up about the ominous Islamic Threat from Within by noting that some American Muslims disagree with the sculpture in question, but "appreciate the thought" anyway.

February 8, 2006

2006-02-08T12:33:00.000-08:00

Liar

Wow, Brit Hume tells a big fat lie in the very first sentence of today's Grapevine. Is that some sort of record?

The Washington Post, which had no qualms about publishing a cartoon attacking the U.S. military which drew a rare letter of protest from the joint chiefs — has declined to run the controversial Danish cartoons of the prophet Muhammad.

While it's true that a recent cartoon of Tom Toles drew a letter of protest from the Joint Chiefs Of Staff, it's simply a lie to claim, as Hume does here, that the cartoon in question constituted an attack on the military. The cartoon (which I reprint below) was very obviously a criticism of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his insensitivity to the suffering and travails of our troops overseas:

Toles drew his cartoon in response to Donald Rumsfeld's statement that, far from being stretched too thin by commitments in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere, U.S. troops are in fact "battle hardened." Given these facts, for Hume to disingenuously claim that the cartoon is an attack on "the U.S. military" betrays his loyalty to the Republican party above any feigned loyalty to the truth.

February 2, 2006

2006-02-02T07:03:00.000-08:00

Disgraceful: In today's grapevine, Brit Hume takes time to aid the right-wing attempt to use the wounding of NBC anchor Bob Woodruf and cameraman Doug Vougt as an opportunity to bash the mainstream media:

Overexposed?

Some U.S. forces are grumbling about the press coverage of ABC News anchor Bob Woodruff and cameraman Doug Vogt, who were seriously injured in Iraq over the weekend, complaining that their struggle in the face of the same dangers has not received the same media attention.

UPI notes that the two men have the sympathy of the military, but one officer in Iraq says it's "frustrating to see something so dramatized that happens every day to some 20-year-old American," adding, "you'd think we lost the entire 1st Marine Division."

And a senior officer tells UPI, "The point that is currently being made [is] that press folks are more important than mere military folks."

You're a real class act, there, Brit... sitting pretty and editorializing in support of the Iraq war from your New York studio while a pair of real reporters suffer massive head-wounds covering the conflict on location. And then you have the gall to suggest that media coverage of the tragedy is excessive. What a prick!

January 31, 2001

2006-01-31T06:57:00.000-08:00

Today is the last day in January, and not a bad day to get this blog re-started. Brit Hume is in fine form, on the "Grapevine" today writing:

The star player at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland this weekend was not Bill Gates, Brad Pitt or John Kerry. It was Bill Clinton, who arrived in a 10-car motorcade, and delivered his remarks to a packed house. The former president addressed what he called the three greatest challenges facing the world today, but terrorism didn't make the list. Instead, Clinton called climate change the world's biggest threat, followed by "global inequality."

Clinton mentioned terrorism only as a manifestation of his third biggest challenge: the world's "apparently irreconcilable cultural and religious" divides.

Here's what Clinton actually said, according to Newsday.com:

Clinton called on current world leaders to seek ways of easing the "apparently irreconcilable religious and cultural differences in the world, that are manifest most stunningly in headlines about terrorist actions but really go far beyond that."

Cleary, Brit Hume's characterization of terrorism as "not making the list" is, at best disingenuous, and at worst dishonest. When a speaker announces that one of the greatest challenges facing mankind is the tackling of the root causes of terrorism, only a biased shill would summarize the speech by proclaiming that terrorism did not "make the list" of that speaker's top concerns. But, hey... that description pretty much sums up Brit Hume doesn't it?

Hume rounds out today's "Grapevie" with an attack on Hillary Clinton, and most hypocritically, by taking a dig at Dan Rather. Pretty rich, isn't it? The host of the most biased two minutes in Television attacking a competing journalist for his supposed bias.

January 31, 2001

2006-01-31T06:49:00.000-08:00

Ressurection

I stopped blogging a few months ago due to time contraints and a desire to be more productive at work. Since I got started blogging, over two years ago, I've started mo fewer than four blogs, and actively maintained one, the eponymously titled David Flores.

I miss blogging, though, and intend to get the ball rolling again. My intention, however, is to focus almost exclusively on this blog. A general interest political blog such as "David Flores" can consume far too much time for a mere hobby. I'm hoping that won't be the case with "Brit Hume Watch," which is a much more focused blog. My intention is to examine Brit Hume's Fox News "Grapevine" and dissect it for errors, distortions and bias... of which the Fox News segment is chock full.

So let's get things going again, shall we?

Thursday, Nov 10 2005

2005-11-10T06:02:00.000-08:00

I did not blog about the Grapevine yesterday, but developments this morning make it worthwhile. So let's take a look at Wednesday's Grapevine:

The Grapevine for Wednesday, November 9th, follows a recent trend for that segment in that once again it represents little more than a series of Whitehouse talking points. And in fact, much of the segment is almost indistinguishable from the "Grapevine" of November 7th. Hume again brings up the suspicious charges of general Paul Vallely, who claims that Joseph Wilson told him about his wife's employment while both were waiting to be interviewed for a Fox News segment. But today Brit Hume further notes that:

General Vallely, by the way, isn't the first to call Valerie Plame's job at the CIA an open secret. In 2003, NBC correspondent Andrea Mitchell said Plame's CIA job had been "widely known among those of us who cover the intelligence community."

Now, what's interesting is that this morning, on "Imus in the Morning," host Don Imus had Andrea Mitchell on his show and specifically questioned here about this topic. Mitchell's answer: she claims to have been taken out of context, or to have possibly misspoken in the context of a long interview that touched on many points. She noted that she did not know Valerie Wilson's occupation before Robert Novak published his piece, and she expressed frustration that this quote has been seized on by right-wing bloggers who, at the same time, ignore eveything else she has said about the Wilson case.

Will Brit Hume retract this claim on a future Grapevine? It will be interesting to see what he does, if anything. However, I want to make one further point about this incident: the fact that Andrea Mitchell did not (to my knowledge) disown this comment until this morning gives Brit Hume little journalistic cover. One wonders why, if Hume was going to quote Mitchell, either he or one of his staffers did not take the time to contact the NBC reporter to double check her account before airing the segment in question. This is basic journalistic practice. Apparently, however, it is not basic journalistic practice for Hume, whose "Grapevine" segment appears to be little more than an unresearched, unverified regurgitation of propagandistic claims posted on right-wing blogs and conservative "news" outlets such as WorldNetdaily.

Tuesday, Nov 8, 2005

2005-11-08T09:42:00.000-08:00

Today's Grapevine is basically a series of Republican talking points. Not much worth commenting, really. Perhaps the most ridiculous item in them is that Brit Hume keeps beating the dead "Valerie Plame's employment was a subject of Washington dinner conversation" talking point. Today, Hume claims that he has irrefutable proof that Joseph Wilson revealed his wife's secret, Superhero identity long before Robert Novak ignored the CIAs pleas and published it in his column. And to whom, pray tell, did Wilson reveal his wife's dirty little secret? Wouldn't you know it would just happen to be a Fox News analyst on Rupert Murdoch's payroll?

Retired Army General and FOX News contributor Paul Vallely says he knew former ambassador Joseph Wilson's wife Valerie Plame was a CIA agent long before she was outed in a newspaper column in 2003 because Wilson told him so. Vallely says Wilson volunteered the information in at least three separate conversations while both men were waiting to appear on FOX News programs during the fall of 2002.

Yeah, it's a laughable story on the face of it.

That said, it's even easier to discount Vallely's claims once we track them down to their source: this article in the right-wing propaganda outlet Worldnet Daily.

Some choice quotations from the piece make it pretty clear just how "objective" and "detached" this guy really is:

Vallely told WND that, in his opinion, it became clear over the course of several conversations that Wilson had his own agenda, as the ambassador's analysis of the war and its surrounding politics strayed from reality.

"He was a total self promoter," Vallely said. "I don't know if it was out of insecurity, to make him feel important, but he's created so much turmoil, he needs to be investigated and put under oath."
...
Vallely said, citing CIA colleagues, that in addition to his conversations with Wilson, the ambassador was proud to introduce Plame at cocktail parties and other social events around Washington as his CIA wife.

Hi, I'm Joseph Wilson, and this is my CIA wife!

Ridiculous. It's embarrasing that conservatives actually buy this stuff.

Monday, Nov 11

2005-11-07T11:27:00.000-08:00

Running two blogs while holding down a real job is a Herculean task, so this brit Hume blog will probably get updated only occasionally.

At any rate: Today's "Grapevine" is notable in that Brit Hume casts a sympathetic eye on Jimmy Carter, for a change. Why? Well, why else: in an upcoming C-Span interview, Carter --a born again Christian-- expresses criticism over the Democratic party's unyielding embrace of abortion rights, and worries that the party is not providing a welcoming enough home for "deeply religious people":

Former President Jimmy Carter (search) criticized his own party yesterday, saying Democrats spend way too much time debating the issue of abortion. Carter said he condemns all abortions, saying, "I've never been convinced... that Jesus Christ would approve of abortions." As for why Democrats lost the last election, Carter said that party leaders had failed to connect with "deeply religious people in this country."

Interestingly enough, Hume does not appear to have felt that the following statement of Carter's was also newsworthy: "The next successful candidate has got to have some means to say, OK, we believe and we worship the prince of peace, not pre-emptive war..." Hmmmm.... I wonder why Hume would leave that part out?

Monday Oct 31

2005-10-31T12:57:00.000-08:00

I'd like to lauch my very first Grapevine analysis piece with a careful dissection and scathing criticsim of egregious bias on Mr. Hume's part, but today's "Grapevine" doesn't really offer much beyond garden variety right-wing tilt. Oh well, you go to press with the "Grapevine" you have, and no the one you wish you had.

Today's column consists of:

Bias
(1) A "fare thee well" to Scooter Libby that seeks to reassure the indicted Bush administration official's fans that, even if he doesn't beat the rap, Scooter will likely walk away from this whole ordeal with little more than wounded pride.

(2) More fuel for the "local New Orleans officials were to blame for the Katrina disaster, not the Bush administration" meme.

(3) Analysis of a Gallup poll on the effect of the torpedoing of Harriet Miers Supreme Court nomination.

This segment may bear the most fruitful inquiry for we see Hume repeating what I feel is an emerging conservative talking point, namely, that the Miers fiasco was brought about by liberals. The right-wing wants to promote this rewriting of recent history (current events, really) so that it can promote the idea that liberals have no right to oppose the next Supreme Court nominee given that they were already offered a moderate nominee and rejected her.

Though some conservatives were sharply critical of Miers' nomination, only 34% of them said they were happy to see her withdraw, compared to 55% of liberals who said they were pleased by the decision.

(4) A summary of a Washington Post fashion writer's less than charitable comments on Harriet Miers's use of eyeliner. (The liberals in the mainstream media are a shallow bunch, you see.)

Balance
There's not much "balance" in today's column. Brit Hume does briefly cite a spokesman for LA governor Kathleen Blanco defending local authorities and laying the blame squarely on FEMA. In addition, examples of political figures who survived indictment "relatively unscathed" are drawn from both parties.

2005-10-31T12:45:00.000-08:00

Manifesto

Manifesto:

I've started this blog with one goal: to examine the distortions, propaganda and outright falsehoods that Fox News anchor Brit Hume disseminates in his "Grapevine" segments.

Welcome to Brit Hume Watch

2005-10-28T07:57:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Brit Hume Watch, a blog devoted to examining the most biased two minutes on television.