Thurs. Debate Moderator Bias!

[Slogger]

Fatcat: "Slogger these are some of the same moderators who have been doing the debates for yrs. pls look it up.  Hannity would shoot Obama if he were to moderate.  As Mrs. Ifill has done this debate thing before I think her judgement can be trusted a little more than Mr. Hannity or god forbade Rush Limbaugh..
I was trying to think of a woman other than her earlier, any real suggestions?"


Yes, I feel like I've watched them for centuries--but, it's only been decades.

Media integrity has been disappearing.  The Ifill incident is only one example.  Not revealing the book is preceived as sneaky.  Now, it is too late to correct the situation and we must live with it.  Not good for either side.

[crazybabyborg]

How do you feel the moderator would show bias in a controlled debate?  I'm just curious?  I mean I try to watch all the debates, except when they are so boring I fall asleep, and I'm just not sure how bias could be conveyed in this kind of setting.  I've seen candidates on both sides over talk the moderator, but they still get asked the same questions.  And the interview is for Biden/Palin.  Enlighten me ...I will watch for these things you tell me.

I also want to point out that all the moderator's are from what some call liberal MSM, shouldn't that also be brought up.  Why just this debate?  Tim Russert is probably gonna be watching from above and wishing he could be here.

I can think of lots of ways a moderator can be covertly biased; question selection, softballs to one, hardballs to another, questions aimed at the strengths of one candidate and weaknesses of the other, follow ups crafted to elicit defensiveness of out of context remarks while the thrust of the issue is ignored, and questions based in viewpoints rather than facts. How about a recent journalistic example?

What Exactly Is the 'Bush Doctrine'?

It's being taken in some quarters as revelatory of inexperience that Sarah Palin sought clarification when ABC's Charlie Gibson asked her about the Bush Doctrine. To review, here is the passage from the transcript.


GIBSON: Do you agree with the Bush doctrine?
PALIN: In what respect, Charlie?
GIBSON: The Bush -- well, what do you -- what do you interpret it to be?
PALIN: His world view.
GIBSON: No, the Bush doctrine, enunciated September 2002, before the Iraq war.
PALIN: I believe that what President Bush has attempted to do is rid this world of Islamic extremism, terrorists who are hell bent on destroying our nation. There have been blunders along the way, though. There have been mistakes made. And with new leadership, and that's the beauty of American elections, of course, and democracy, is with new leadership comes opportunity to do things better.
GIBSON: The Bush doctrine, as I understand it, is that we have the right of anticipatory self-defense, that we have the right to a preemptive strike against any other country that we think is going to attack us. Do you agree with that?


Gibson should of course have said in the first place what he understood the Bush Doctrine to be--and specified that he was asking a question about preemption. Palin was well within bounds to have asked him to be more specific. Because, as it happens, the doctrine has no universally acknowledged single meaning. Gibson himself in the past has defined the Bush Doctrine to mean "a promise that all terrorist organizations with global reach will be found, stopped and defeated"--which is remarkably close to Palin's own answer.

Consider what a diversity of views on the meaning of the Bush Doctrine can be found simply within the archives of ABC News itself:

September 20, 2001
PETER JENNINGS: . . . Claire, the president said at one point, 'From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime.' Should we be taking that as the Bush doctrine? CLAIRE SHIPMAN reporting: I think so, Peter,

September 21, 2001
CHARLIE GIBSON: The president in his speech last night, very forceful. Four out of five Americans watched it. Everybody gathered around the television set last night. The president issued a series of demands to the Taliban, already rejected. We'll get to that in a moment. He also outlined what is being called the Bush Doctrine, a promise that all terrorists organizations with global reach will be found, stopped and defeated.

September 21, 2001
CHARLIE GIBSON: Senator Daschle, let me start with you. People were looking for a Bush Doctrine. They may have found it when he said the war on terror will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped or defeated. That's pretty broad. Broader than you expected?

December 9, 2001
GEORGE WILL: The Bush doctrine holds that anyone who governs a territory is complicit in any terrorism that issues from that territory. That covers the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Second, the war on terrorism is indivisible, it's part of the Bush doctrine.

December 11, 2001
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: Two years ago, September 1999, Bush gave his first speech when he was running about terrorism. And his first--had the first explanation of the Bush doctrine, that if you harbor a terrorist, you're going to be attacked. The Bush White House is putting this out, saying it shows that Bush was very prescient, but that was only one speech given in the campaign.

January 28, 2002
BOB WOODWARD: This is now the Bush Doctrine . . . , namely that if we're attacked by terrorists, we will not just go after those terrorists but the countries or the people who harbor them.

January 29, 2002
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: It was striking and significant that the president really expanded the Bush doctrine. If a nation builds a weapon of mass destruction--Iraq, Iran or North Korea--we will reserve the right to take out those weapons even if we're not attacked or even if there's not a threat.

March 19, 2004
TERRY MORAN: That was the Bush doctrine we just heard. On this one-year anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, President Bush offered a very broad justification of American leadership in the world under him since 9/11. Not just since one year in Iraq. For American voters as an argument that the country is safer, but more as you point out, for the world, which has been divided by his leadership, that Iraq is knit, in his mind, very firmly into that war on terrorism. One omission which I believe will be noted around the world, he made no mention of the role of multilateral institutions, the UN and others, in this fight against terrorism. In his mind, it's clear it's American leadership with others following along.

May 7, 2006
GEORGE WILL: Now the argument from the right is the CIA is a rogue agent because it has not subscribed to the Bush doctrine. The Bush doctrine being that American security depends on the spread of democracy and we know how to do that. The trouble is, Negroponte, who is considered by some of these conservatives the villain here and an enemy of the Bush doctrine is the choice of Bush, which makes Bush an insufficient subscriber to the Bush doctrine.

I'll stop there, although anyone with a Nexis account can find far more where that came from. Preemptive war; American unilateralism; the overthrow of regimes that harbor and abet terrorists--all of these things and more have been described as the "Bush Doctrine." It was a bit of a sham on Gibson's part to have pretended that there's such a thing as 'the' Bush Doctrine, much less that it was enunciated in September 2002.

Posted by Richard Starr on September 12, 2008 02:08 AM | Permalink

http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2008/09/what_exactly_is_the_bush_doctr.asp

[fatcatlurker]

I agree the Bush Doctrine question was out of line as there are many answers.  But that was just one question asked out of many.  Being a conservative dem is damn hard in the US.  I know Repubs think every dem is liberal, but you are wrong. We are left in the middle fighting for issues on both sides of the road.  I would of voted for McCain in 2000 if he had won the primary, as would many conservative dems, the road was less muddy than.  But....todays McCain is not the same and he is running against his polar opposite on many issues. I think a different VP pick would have helped McCain.  As to Obama, I have to look at his VP pick.  His gaffe about Obama not taking his guns is very telling to the middle of the road, it lets us know that things are ok, that they will not waste time with issues on the books we already are ok with.  Where Palin brings very conservative idealogy to the table on issues.  Not bad, but we need some moderation in all areas, too much of a good thing is not a good thing. 

 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iI9J3nxB0KM&feature=related

I found this uncut clip of Palin w/Gibson in her home in Wassilla.  And I have to say I still don't like some of her answers, she has a serious learning curve, not that I don't think she is capable.  She seems to be smart even if I don't agree with her on some issues. I would just like to hear something different.  Although I will be voting for someone else at this point, McCain/Palin still may be the future for America atleast the next 4 and I would like to hear something progressive from them.  I know issues that they may try to change and ones they will protect, but these are issues already on the books. I live in Maryland and I will be marching on Cap. Hill, done it before will do it again.  I would like to hear about new programs with all this money we will slash from budgets, new ideas.  America is getting second class treatment in education, health, and future growth of science & resources and I'd like to know what we will do about these issues.  I don't hear this, all I hear is cut the pork.  Yadda, Yadda, Yadda.  America is the best and I just feel like we are lagging and would like to see something different.  Maybe we will hear something good tonight. JMO

[Terric7058]

email adress to voice your opinion on this

Janet H. Brown, Executive Director of the Debates Commission, at jb@debates.org

[crazybabyborg]

I agree the Bush Doctrine question was out of line as there are many answers.  But that was just one question asked out of many.  Being a conservative dem is damn hard in the US.  I know Repubs think every dem is liberal, but you are wrong. We are left in the middle fighting for issues on both sides of the road.  I would of voted for McCain in 2000 if he had won the primary, as would many conservative dems, the road was less muddy than.  But....todays McCain is not the same and he is running against his polar opposite on many issues. I think a different VP pick would have helped McCain.  As to Obama, I have to look at his VP pick.  His gaffe about Obama not taking his guns is very telling to the middle of the road, it lets us know that things are ok, that they will not waste time with issues on the books we already are ok with.  Where Palin brings very conservative idealogy to the table on issues.  Not bad, but we need some moderation in all areas, too much of a good thing is not a good thing. 

 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iI9J3nxB0KM&feature=related

I found this uncut clip of Palin w/Gibson in her home in Wassilla.  And I have to say I still don't like some of her answers, she has a serious learning curve, not that I don't think she is capable.  She seems to be smart even if I don't agree with her on some issues. I would just like to hear something different.  Although I will be voting for someone else at this point, McCain/Palin still may be the future for America atleast the next 4 and I would like to hear something progressive from them.  I know issues that they may try to change and ones they will protect, but these are issues already on the books. I live in Maryland and I will be marching on Cap. Hill, done it before will do it again.  I would like to hear about new programs with all this money we will slash from budgets, new ideas.  America is getting second class treatment in education, health, and future growth of science & resources and I'd like to know what we will do about these issues.  I don't hear this, all I hear is cut the pork.  Yadda, Yadda, Yadda.  America is the best and I just feel like we are lagging and would like to see something different.  Maybe we will hear something good tonight. JMO

Different voters value different things. I have learned that when there are a lot of conflicting words, I stop listening and start looking. I'm more impressed with McCain's record of not being wed to party lines, because it speaks to me that he does have the ability to get beyond the politics of an issue for what he feels is right or best for the people. I do feel he has more depth of knowledge and understanding of the world and problems facing us globally. I also take some comfort in that if he should deploy our troops, he has within his own experience what he's doing on a personal level. I look at the Republican ticket and believe the order is right. If something should happen to McCain in office, (although he seems to have weathered the rigors of the campaign just fine) I'm somewhat comforted in what Kissinger expressed when he said that he would have no reservations in Palin's Presidency on the Foreign Affairs front. He pointed out that McCain's foreign advisor's would be in place, and that it comes down to an individual's judgement of the information in front of them.
Domestically, I really like the idea that someone with absolutely no taint of the corruption, self padding, and self importance of our Representatives in Washington, will have the opportunity to look at our economic policies. Her record in Alaska isn't without flaw, but it stands very tall compared to what we've been getting from Congress. Obviously, no one there remembers whose money they are spending. I compare that to Obama benefitting from Fannie Mae, the dems on the banking committee utterly rejecting the Bush administration's urgings for regulating Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac, and I believe she "gets it" when she says the American people are strapped enough with taxes. I do not want the government dictating my health care, and I want the government to do what I have to when my budget runs short: QUIT SPENDING! I look at my paycheck and understand that the difference in what I earn and what I take home is the difference in survival and my dreams. The earmarks complaints aren't boring to me. That promise to get rid of earmarks means a lot because it mirrors my own necessity to cut "luxuries" responsibly. It hits home that Obama has spent almost a million dollars in earmarks for every day he's been in the Senate. That's our money, and I don't want that demonstrated thinking to require of me, more!

I'm still concerned over Obama's taste for hatred of this country, because regardless of what is said, he spent over 20 years with the man I saw and heard spew hatred and raise prejudice. I watched Obama's speech to the Jewish community and saw him change his mind, I saw him adopt Clinton's policies and wondered if he could have an original thought, I saw Obama morph into McCain's view on Georgia and wondered where he would stand if the wind weren't blowing. I count the "present" votes and wonder just when Obama started running for the office of President and if he was trying to avoid any possible criticism in a later campaign. I see his affiliation with Acorn and see more corruption. I am left with my own conclusions that I don't know who this man is, but clearly can observe the distance between his eloquent words and what he has done. The gap is far too wide for me. I don't agree with everything McCain has done, but there is tangible evidence that he's done something and many that were not in his own self interest.

[islandmonkey]

I agree the Bush Doctrine question was out of line as there are many answers.  But that was just one question asked out of many.  Being a conservative dem is damn hard in the US.  I know Repubs think every dem is liberal, but you are wrong. We are left in the middle fighting for issues on both sides of the road.  I would of voted for McCain in 2000 if he had won the primary, as would many conservative dems, the road was less muddy than.  But....todays McCain is not the same and he is running against his polar opposite on many issues. I think a different VP pick would have helped McCain.  As to Obama, I have to look at his VP pick.  His gaffe about Obama not taking his guns is very telling to the middle of the road, it lets us know that things are ok, that they will not waste time with issues on the books we already are ok with.  Where Palin brings very conservative idealogy to the table on issues.  Not bad, but we need some moderation in all areas, too much of a good thing is not a good thing. 

 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iI9J3nxB0KM&feature=related

I found this uncut clip of Palin w/Gibson in her home in Wassilla.  And I have to say I still don't like some of her answers, she has a serious learning curve, not that I don't think she is capable.  She seems to be smart even if I don't agree with her on some issues. I would just like to hear something different.  Although I will be voting for someone else at this point, McCain/Palin still may be the future for America atleast the next 4 and I would like to hear something progressive from them.  I know issues that they may try to change and ones they will protect, but these are issues already on the books. I live in Maryland and I will be marching on Cap. Hill, done it before will do it again.  I would like to hear about new programs with all this money we will slash from budgets, new ideas.  America is getting second class treatment in education, health, and future growth of science & resources and I'd like to know what we will do about these issues.  I don't hear this, all I hear is cut the pork.  Yadda, Yadda, Yadda.  America is the best and I just feel like we are lagging and would like to see something different.  Maybe we will hear something good tonight. JMO

Different voters value different things. I have learned that when there are a lot of conflicting words, I stop listening and start looking. I'm more impressed with McCain's record of not being wed to party lines, because it speaks to me that he does have the ability to get beyond the politics of an issue for what he feels is right or best for the people. I do feel he has more depth of knowledge and understanding of the world and problems facing us globally. I also take some comfort in that if he should deploy our troops, he has within his own experience what he's doing on a personal level. I look at the Republican ticket and believe the order is right. If something should happen to McCain in office, (although he seems to have weathered the rigors of the campaign just fine) I'm somewhat comforted in what Kissinger expressed when he said that he would have no reservations in Palin's Presidency on the Foreign Affairs front. He pointed out that McCain's foreign advisor's would be in place, and that it comes down to an individual's judgement of the information in front of them.
Domestically, I really like the idea that someone with absolutely no taint of the corruption, self padding, and self importance of our Representatives in Washington, will have the opportunity to look at our economic policies. Her record in Alaska isn't without flaw, but it stands very tall compared to what we've been getting from Congress. Obviously, no one there remembers whose money they are spending. I compare that to Obama benefitting from Fannie Mae, the dems on the banking committee utterly rejecting the Bush administration's urgings for regulating Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac, and I believe she "gets it" when she says the American people are strapped enough with taxes. I do not want the government dictating my health care, and I want the government to do what I have to when my budget runs short: QUIT SPENDING! I look at my paycheck and understand that the difference in what I earn and what I take home is the difference in survival and my dreams. The earmarks complaints aren't boring to me. That promise to get rid of earmarks means a lot because it mirrors my own necessity to cut "luxuries" responsibly. It hits home that Obama has spent almost a million dollars in earmarks for every day he's been in the Senate. That's our money, and I don't want that demonstrated thinking to require of me, more!

I'm still concerned over Obama's taste for hatred of this country, because regardless of what is said, he spent over 20 years with the man I saw and heard spew hatred and raise prejudice. I watched Obama's speech to the Jewish community and saw him change his mind, I saw him adopt Clinton's policies and wondered if he could have an original thought, I saw Obama morph into McCain's view on Georgia and wondered where he would stand if the wind weren't blowing. I count the "present" votes and wonder just when Obama started running for the office of President and if he was trying to avoid any possible criticism in a later campaign. I see his affiliation with Acorn and see more corruption. I am left with my own conclusions that I don't know who this man is, but clearly can observe the distance between his eloquent words and what he has done. The gap is far too wide for me. I don't agree with everything McCain has done, but there is tangible evidence that he's done something and many that were not in his own self interest.

 

Thank you and Amen!!! I couldn't have said it better myself

[islandmonkey]

OOPS~wrong picture

[nonesuche]

fatcat - McCain didn't leave the Hanoi Hilton earlier because his captors were trying to make the son of the Admiral appear to be a traitor by having him abandon his direct reports and leave them behind. If you were being beaten and tortured, your body broken again literally again and again - what choice would you have made? To choose to stay took courage beyond what most of us can fathom. Please research this before posting for even if I don't like everything about McCain, he did give to our country in ways we never will.

I think Obama has likely had a few injuries in basketball and I don't know about Biden, but suspect he's had it pretty easy too in comparison the Hanoi Hilton.

Now why don't you ask Obama about his relationship with the Black Panthers that he's trying to hide? Talk about dirt.........very very radical dirt.

[Slogger]

Now why don't you ask Obama about his relationship with the Black Panthers that he's trying to hide? Talk about dirt.........very very radical dirt.

None, I had forgotten about that.


NO QUARTER by Larry Johnson

Does anyone know who this is?

http://noquarterusa.net/blog/2008/03/24/barack-i-didnt-know-obama/


Oops… he didn’t know? Or did he mind?

7. Obama’s website sported a page for the New Black Panthers organization until it was discovered and reported by the media. It was quickly removed. Obama denounced their support, but the New Black Panthers’ Winter 2008 newsletter still carries a full page ad for his campaign on page 36. Though the origin of the ad is not stated, it contains logos, graphics and quotes from the Obama website, which Obama could have ordered removed as a copyright violation.

The NBP page, before its deletion.
www.moonbattery.com/archives/2008/03/new_black_panth.html


NBP Winter 2008 Newsletter
www.newblackpanther.com/images/NBPPnewspaper07-08.pdf
(maybe someone with protection could get this one)

[Slogger]

More Johnson:


6. Opponents have asked Senator Obama to release the records from his term of state office in Illinois. Since he has little other experience in politics (he did, after all, declare his presidential candidacy barely 2 years after election to the US Senate), this doesn’t seem an unreasonable request. The records might also shed light on his relationship with Rezko and some of the other corrupt individuals he rubbed shoulders with during his climb up through Chicago politics. But lo and behold, the records all seem to have mysteriously disappeared.Politico
The Pantagraph, a central Illinois newspaper

Questions have also been raised about Obama-sponsored legislation during the last year he was in office there. It is alleged that, in the interest of making Obama appear more prolific, then Illinois Senate Majority Leader Emil Jones appointed Obama as sponsor of many pieces of legislation, even though other senior senators had spent many years working on the bills.

“I took all the beatings and insults and endured all the racist comments over the years from nasty Republican committee chairmen,” State Senator Rickey Hendon, the original sponsor of landmark racial profiling and videotaped confession legislation yanked away by Jones and given to Obama, complained to me at the time. “Barack didn’t have to endure any of it, yet, in the end, he got all the credit.”
“I don’t consider it bill jacking,” Hendon told me. “But no one wants to carry the ball 99 yards all the way to the one-yard line, and then give it to the halfback who gets all the credit and the stats in the record book.”

As a result, Todd Spivak of the Houston Press noted, “During his seventh and final year in the state Senate, Obama’s stats soared. He sponsored a whopping 26 bills passed into law — including many he now cites in his presidential campaign when attacked as inexperienced.”
Houston Press

Oops… he didn’t know? Or did he mind?

[Slogger]

http://noquarterusa.net/blog/about-the-authors/



Biography

Larry C. Johnson is CEO and co-founder of BERG Associates, LLC, an international business-consulting firm with expertise combating terrorism and investigating money laundering. Mr. Johnson works with US military commands in scripting terrorism exercises, briefs on terrorist trends, and conducts undercover investigations on counterfeiting, smuggling and money laundering.

Mr. Johnson, who worked previously with the Central Intelligence
Agency and U.S. State Department’s Office of Counter Terrorism, is a recognized expert in the fields of terrorism, aviation security,
crisis and risk management.

Mr. Johnson has analyzed terrorist incidents for a variety of media
including the Jim Lehrer News Hour, National Public Radio, ABC’s
Nightline, NBC’s Today Show, the New York Times, CNN, Fox News, and the BBC. Mr. Johnson has authored several articles for publications, including Security Management Magazine, the New York Times, and The Los Angeles Times. He has lectured on terrorism and aviation security around the world, including the Center for Research and Strategic Studies at the Ecole Polytechnique in Paris, France. He represented the U.S. Government at the July 1996 OSCE Terrorism Conference in
Vienna, Austria.

From 1989 until October 1993, Larry Johnson served as a Deputy
Director in the U.S. State Department’s Office of Counter Terrorism.  He managed crisis response operations for terrorist incidents throughout the world and he helped organize and direct the US Government’s debriefing of US citizens held in Kuwait and Iraq, which provided vital intelligence on Iraqi operations following the 1990 invasion of Kuwait. Mr. Johnson also participated in the investigation of the terrorist bombing of Pan Am 103. Under Mr. Johnson’s leadership the U.S. airlines and pilots agreed to match the US Government’s two million-dollar reward.

From 1985 through September 1989 Mr. Johnson worked for the Central Intelligence Agency. During his distinguished career, he received training in paramilitary operations, worked in the Directorate of Operations, served in the CIA’s Operation’s Center, and established himself as a prolific analyst in the Directorate of Intelligence. In his final year with the CIA he received two Exceptional Performance Awards.

Mr. Johnson is a member of the American Society for Industrial
Security. He taught at The American University’s School of
International Service (1979-1983) while working on a Ph.D. in
political science. He has a M.S. degree in Community Development from the University of Missouri (1978), where he also received his B.S. degree in Sociology, graduating Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa in 1976.

[nonesuche]

slogger thank you for bringing all of that to your post, it's work and I am just spread too thin with my travel schedule to do it lately.

It is truly frightening to me that Obama and Michelle seem so able to shed those past associations and just zap the records? It amazes me also how the media focuses on how many houses McCain owns yet there is no way that Obama and Michelle could have afforded the estate they live in ??? No one  asks how ??? Rezko owned the property next door as well.......sells it to Obama for about $1 and STILL no one asks questions????

I think Obama is as slimy as it gets....

[Slogger]

The Real Estate transfer should be there, unlike Obama's records that seem to have disappeared.

Does anyone know anything about his college records?

There were rumors that the college records are sealed.  Because of that, there is speculation that he might have registered as a foreign student, minority.

Apparently, we'll never see Michele Obama's tax records, as well as Cindy McCain's tax records.  I'd especially like to see Michele's.

[nonesuche]

slogger not one person can evidence even one college paper that Obama wrote while enrolled at Harvard?? It's beyond bizarre, he's like the invisible man. I think the issue is that MSM isn't interested in exposing Obama, only McCain and Palin.

Even Biden is getting a pass now......