May 06, 2008
Wright Questions, Wrong Conclusions
Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s appearance at the National Press Club may stand as the pivotal moment in the 2008 presidential elections. The controversial pastor of a church that Barack Obama attended for 20 years unleashed a torrent of preposterous statements in response to questions from the national press that perhaps doomed his congregant’s candidacy.
Before an audience stacked with supporters and about one dozen noted leftist radicals, Wright professed support for the anti-Semitic Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan and reiterated his belief that the U.S. government created the AIDS virus to exterminate blacks. He bashed Vice President Dick Cheney for not having served in the military and sending young men and women to “die for a lie.” Wright criticized Oliver North for aiding the Contras against the pro-Communist Sandinistas in Nicaragua more than two decades ago.
Wright ranted at the press for having the temerity to query him and several times disrespected the “white girl,” NPC Vice President Donna Leinwand who read the questions. Wright’s “audacity of hate” diatribe sent shockwaves across the political landscape.
New York Daily News writer Errol Lewis perceived Wright’s performance so damaging to Obama that he suggested the National Press Club conspired to derail the Illinois senator’s campaign. He posited that Speakers Committee member Rev. Dr. Barbara Reynolds, a Hillary Clinton supporter hoped to help her choice by giving Wright a platform to spout his divisive “black liberation theology.”
Such an assertion is nonsense and an insult to the National Press Club and its membership. NPC’s core mission is to promote the free press and facilitate access to elected officials, public policy makers and other influential figures. Rev. Wright certainly qualifies as such a person. In the national spotlight given to him, Wright produced an abundance of valuable information for substance-starved political news consumers.
The National Press Club should do more events of this nature, regardless of the outcome. While I bristled when serial liars Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame received a hero’s welcome at the Club, at least the working press had a chance to question them, however uncritically it did so. I strongly believe that every President of the United States should address the Club each year. It would probably provide a fairer forum than that the ideologically homogenous White House Press Corps.
The venerable National Press Club, now celebrating its centennial has clearly demonstrated why it endures. Even in a rapidly changing media universe, the basic journalism equation remains the same: asking questions and getting answers.
With Rev. Wright, “mission accomplished!”
Cross-posted at: National Press Club Blog "Jeff Gannon - Standing at the Intersection of Politics and the Media"
Posted by jeffgannon at 12:45 PM
April 29, 2008
NYT Spinning Wright Away From Obama
Barack Obama's Manhattan campaign office, located in the newsroom of The New York Times, is spinning Rev. Jeremiah Wright's incendiary comments at the National Press Club away from the Illinois senator. The headline says it all: Not Speaking for Obama, Pastor Speaks for Himself, at Length.
That sounds like a David Axelrod press release.
Posted by jeffgannon at 09:16 AM
Left Charges Old Media Political Manipulation
In my book, "The Great Media War: A Battlefield Report", I predicted that the rapidly changing media environment would significantly impact the 2008 election. I wrote that in 2006, the Old Media dropped any pretense of objectivity, both cheerleading for the Democrats and obsessing on negative stories about Republicans, particularly the Mark Foley text messages and George Allen's "macaca" gaffe.
During the election cycle thus far, the Old Media started out carrying Hillary Clinton on their shoulders down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House. However, somewhere along the way, another candidate came along that sent "tingles down the legs" of enough of the media elites to cause a split in the Old Media. Without the collective mindset to guide the direction of their political coverage, liberal journalists have turned on each other on behalf of their favorites.
One writer is suggesting that Monday's breakfast at the National Press Club (which as a member I attended) was a set-up by a Hillary Clinton-supporting journalist to damage Barack Obama. Let me repeat: One liberal journalist is calling out another liberal journalist for playing politics.
While those one the right, including me have been complaining about political media bias for some time, this is the first instance of liberal media elites making the claims and doing it against one of their own.
This is a new day indeed!
Posted by jeffgannon at 08:10 AM
April 28, 2008
Rev. Wright Confirms All That We Knew
The spinners of the Obama campaign and the Illinois senator's Old Media sycophants that have been trying to convince Americans that the remarks of Rev. Jeremiah Wright have been misquoted or taken out of context are probably going to get drunk tonight if they have not already done so. Many of them sat with dropped jaw this morning as they watched Barack Obama's former pastor repeat the outrageous claims made in several sermons over the past few years.
Flanked by bodyguards on loan from Louis Farrakhan's Nation of Islam, Rev. Wright played to a packed and stacked audience at the National Press Club. I hosted an Christian evangelical pastor at the breakfast, both of us hoping to hear Rev. Wright clear up the misunderstanding of his words that sounded so hateful and anti-American.
Instead, the Washington press corps and by the end of the day most interested Americans will have heard Rev. Wright confirm and defend his "controversial" statements and do it in an angry and arrogant manner. Perhaps the first clue to how the event would play out was when I spotted Cornell West, a black radical. Later on I would read from Dana Milbank's reporting in The Washington Post that Wright's guests included Marion Barry, Malik Zulu Shabazz of the New Black Panther Party and Nation of Islam official Jamil Muhammad.
Because I am a creature of Washington, I was only mildly offended at Rev. Wright's remarks. Much of America, however, will be shocked at the hateful bigotry coming out of the mouth of Obama's "spiritual mentor." At minimum, sensible people will be appalled at the rude treatment of National Press Club Vice President Donna Leinwand, attacked by Rev. Wright for reading questions submitted to the podium by members of the press.
Wright espoused "reconciliation" between the races, but stoked racial anger and rage. He reiterated that the United States brought 9/11 on itself and that the government created the AIDS virus to kill the black race. Oddly enough, Wright failed to mention Planned Parenthood, an organization established by eugenicist Margaret Sanger expressly for the purpose of black genocide.
Rev. Wright did not necessarily sink Obama's White House hopes, but he did not help them, either. The recent press tour that Rev. Wright has been doing will keep the focus on Obama's ties to radicals, only a handful that have been discussed by the press. There are many of them lurking out there, waiting for a turn in the spotlight. Next up: Code Pink co-founder Jodie Evans, a fundraiser for Obama (and Iraqi insurgents.) I wrote about it sometime ago, but the Old Media might catch up with the New Media at some point before November.
Posted by jeffgannon at 03:15 PM
April 15, 2008
Barack H*****n Obama
Democrats have tried to score points with Sen. John McCain's recent flub during which he momentarily confused Sunni and Shia.
Please tell me then, which one is Obama, Sunni or Shia?
Posted by jeffgannon at 01:29 PM
Lib Journo Gets Pass For Racial Slur
Speaking at an awards banquet for the Society of Professional Journalists on April 4, "Phoenix New Times" and Village Voice Media Inc. Executive Editor Michael Lacey used the "N-word" to refer to a former colleague.
Not a single major media outlet reported the incident. Another liberal journalist gets a pass on a racial slur.
At least he didn't say "nappy-headed".
Posted by jeffgannon at 12:48 PM
Obama: The Black John Kerry
Hillary Clinton's efforts to portray herself as a centrist seem to have paid off - with some help from fellow Democrat Barack Obama. The recent "bitter" remarks of the Harvard-educated Illinois senator to a group of chardonnay-swilling San Francisco elites makes Yalie Clinton sound downright homespun.
Posted by jeffgannon at 12:37 PM
April 08, 2008
ABC Can't Find Military McCain Supporter in Iraq
Members of the military are prohibited from engaging in political activity, but ABC News convinced a few soldiers in Iraq to go before the cameras to discuss their choices for president. It is well known that the troops generally support Republicans because of their pro-military credentials, which is the reason Al Gore tried to have ballots from overseas military bases disqualified during the 2000 recount. However, Martha Raddatz could not find a single soldier who supported Sen. John McCain, a Vietnam War veteran for Commander in Chief. Most of those Raddatz interviewed backed Sen. Barack Obama with one favoring Sen. Hillary Clinton and a few undecideds.
Equally revealing was the that issues most inportant to the soldiers were education, the economy, the environment and fear of war with Iran. None of those interviewed mentioned completing the mission or national security.
ABC News is suggesting that the military is against the war in Iraq and back the most antiwar candidate seeking the nomination. It is likely that when patriots saw the liberal Raddatz and her camera crew coming, they went in the opposite direction.
The headline says it all: "Surprising Political Endorsements By U.S. Troops". It is not a surprise that ABC News would produce such a biased piece and try to pass it off as news. Raddatz should get a Pulitizer Prize for investigative reporting since she probably really had to talk to alot of soldiers to find that many Obama supporters.
Posted by jeffgannon at 09:02 AM