Is the Press Stupid or Evil?

This morning my wife turned on the news channel and we were greeted by a story on Karl Rove and Joe Wilson. The “correspondent” stated that Joe Wilson was dispatched to Niger to find out if Saddam was making nuclear weapons, a reason for going to war. Of course if you have been conscious during the last 2 years you would know that this is NOT what happened. How could someone who is presumably paid for passing on information get some basic facts on a story that has been in the headlines for years so wrong? Did they just fly this guy in from Mars and is he playing catch-up? No, he looked human.

The choices are a slip of the tongue, stupidity or deception. A slip of the tongue I do not believe. This was a straightforward statement. That leaves stupidity or deliberate lying. I think it’s a combination. By now, anyone who is interested in this story knows it by heart. So I think the reporter lied. But he is also stupid because … everyone who has any knowledge of this story would know he was lying. Its almost funny as in the old story of the man caught in bed with another woman saying: “Who are your going to believe, me or your lying eyes?”

There is something suicidal about the MSM today. They continue to commit the same sins they once got away with – before the internet – yet now that they can be exposed as liars, they can’t seem to help themselves. Here is a wonderful example:

So today, when this blog takes the July 10, 2004 comments out of context from the September 30, 2003 comments (even though the latter clearly reference the earlier), it makes sense that their assertion is quite wrong (emphasis mine):
President Bush said Monday that if anyone in his administration committed a crime in connection with the public leak of the identity of an undercover CIA operative, that person will “no longer work in my administration.”
…
Bush said in June 2004 that he would fire anyone in his administration shown to have leaked information that exposed the identity of Wilson’s wife, Valerie Plame. On Monday, however, he added the qualifier that it would have be shown that a crime was committed.
Asked at a June 10, 2004, news conference if he stood by his pledge to fire anyone found to have leaked Plame’s name, Bush answered, “Yes. And that’s up to the U.S. attorney to find the facts.”
If that blog had the accuracy checks of, say, the Washington Post, careless invalid assertions like this would never have made it past the editors. Oh, wait a moment, that wasn’t a blog at all. That was the Washington Post!