Mike Allen equates critics of pre-war press with "left-wing haters"; Colleague: "We failed you."

[DeepModem Mom]

Media Matters for America: While Mike Allen equated critics of White House press corps' war coverage with "left-wing haters," ex-colleague Dobbs wrote, "We failed you"

On the May 27 edition of Mike Gallagher's nationally syndicated radio show, Politico chief political correspondent Mike Allen responded to criticisms of the media's role in the lead-up to the Iraq war that former White House press secretary Scott McClellan makes in his new book, What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception (Public Affairs, May 2008), as the blog Think Progress first noted. Allen, a Washington Post staff writer during the prewar period, asserted on Gallagher's show: "Scott does adopt the vocabulary, rhetoric of the left-wing haters. Can you believe it in here he says that the White House press corps was too deferential to the administration ... in the run-up to the war? Now, I don't think Scott felt that way when he was up at the podium like a punching bag, but that's what he said."

By contrast, two of Allen's former Post colleagues -- reporter Michael Dobbs and media critic Howard Kurtz -- echoed the media criticism of Allen's so-called "left-wing haters." Dobbs, who writes the washingtonpost.com blog The Fact Checker, awarded McClellan's statement about the press a Gepetto checkmark for providing "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth" and asserted that "on the question of whether the American press did its job properly during the run-up to the Iraq war, it is difficult to argue with his conclusions. We failed you." Similarly, Kurtz stated that print coverage during the run-up to the war was "flawed," adding: "It was only when violence surged in Iraq and public opinion began turning against the war that ABC, CBS, NBC, and the rest of the media turned more skeptical."...

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Discussing McClellan's comments on the May 28 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, Kurtz asserted, "Print coverage, meanwhile, was also flawed. The New York Times, which published Judith Miller's erroneous stories about Saddam's alleged weapons of mass destruction, and The Washington Post, including Bob Woodward, have expressed regret for not being more aggressive in questioning the march to war." He continued: "It was only when violence surged in Iraq and public opinion began turning against the war that ABC, CBS, NBC, and the rest of the media turned more skeptical." Kurtz also asserted, "One of my problems is that anti-war voices had limited access, it seemed, to the airwaves, while administration officials, of course, were on every day pounding home that message."...

http://mediamatters.org/items/200805300008?f=h_latest

[jimshoes]

1. This one sentence alone

should put to rest the whole "liberal media" fairy tale. "Kurtz also asserted, "One of my problems is that anti-war voices had limited access, it seemed, to the airwaves, while administration officials, of course, were on every day pounding home that message."...

[pretzel4gore]

2. the saintly Che was right! "Nothing fails like success

when working for the devil!"
Now if we can only get them to admit they were working for 'the devil' when regan was the GREAT WHITE HOPE against Jimmy Carter at the end of the 70's. And Carter, who, while a CFR man, still possessed more integrity then regan could even imagine, and the press corp knew it knew it very well, but what did they do?
Lie is what they did. And they based the entire present upon the lie that regan was a real representative of the people, who looked at the peoples' interest, and was animated by that! Carter has the Counicl; which the press never mentioned anyway, but regan had what? He was a 3rd rate movie actor, a frontman for political gangsters, and the newsmedia KNEW it. And that was when junyer was still waking up naked in the pig sty....

[struggle4progress]

3. Tells me everything I need to know about The Politico

:puke:

[jazzwinders]

4. Mike Allen

Mike is a republican loon.