You just have to love this kind of thing.
The story so far.
Sean Hannity
anchors a superb hour last Friday detailing liberal bias in the
media.
Included in the legion of examples presented (there’s
literally decades of this stuff out there, how Hannity and his
editors narrowed this down to a mere hour’s worth is surely a story
in itself) was a clip from CNN’s Anderson Cooper reporting on the
Valerie Plame–Joe Wilson episode.
Mr. Cooper has stepped forward to cry foul, which you can
find here over at
Mediaite. The essence of Cooper’s beef is that he, Cooper,
was selectively edited, although he is careful not to accuse
Hannity of doing it personally and deliberately, of which there is
no evidence. Mediaite writer Jon Bershad is practically
chortling in his white wine over the idea of nailing
Hannity.
But wait!
Take a very careful look at the clip Mr. Cooper
submits to exonerate himself. Cooper presents himself as saying
this, adding more after showing what he views as the correct
version of what he said in his Wilson report for CNN:
COOPER: A former US diplomat who investigated Africa’s
suspected link to Iraq’s nuclear weapons program now says he is the
victim of a Bush administration smear campaign. Administration
officials say former Ambassador Joseph Wilson’s report on Niger
last year supported the now discredited claim that Iraq had tried
to buy uranium in Africa.
Wilson said that is not true. He spoke exclusively to TIME
magazine today. He accuses the Administration of twisting
intelligence to exaggerate the Iraqi threat.
Having presented the clip that he sees as correcting
Hannity’s charge of bias, Cooper adds this:
COOPER: So, see the difference? I was relaying what
Valerie Plame’s husband was now claiming, I wasn’t saying it was
true. Anyway, I try to choose my words very carefully and I don’t
like it when someone cuts around them to make it seem like I’m
saying something I’m not. I’m going to assume that Mr.
Hannity had no idea what his editors were up to. I would hate to
think that he would knowingly falsely edit something to make a
point. After all, that would be biased.”
He then adds Hannity to his segment’s “Ridiculist.” Gleefully
(but of course) Mediaite’s Bershad piles on, mocking,
Hannity and in that wonderfully familiar tone of… what are the
words… oh yes… liberal bias writes admiringly that
“Cooper, for his part, was incredibly forgiving in the
correction.”
As they say in the trade: stop the tape.
Let’s go back to the piece of tape Mr. Cooper presents to
defend himself, a piece of tape Cooper selects himself. Listen to
it again and what does one hear? One hears these words, and I have
taken the liberty of putting the key words in bold
print:
Administration officials say former Ambassador Joseph
Wilson’s report on Niger last year supported the now
discredited claim that Iraq had tried to buy uranium in
Africa.
What would Perry Mason say here? He would call your
attention to this
article by Stephen Spruiell over at National
Review. The title?
Joe Wilson, Imbedded
His fibs have
infiltrated the media, and the media should know
better
As you can see, Mr. Spruiell goes on at very detailed
length to illustrate just how what he terms Mr. Wilson’s fibs (take
note Messrs. Cooper and Bershad — fibs is the colloquial for “lie”
or “deliberate untruth”) have become embedded in the liberal media
narrative of the Valerie Plame affair.
Quite specifically, after noting the journalistic fraud
that exploded over the New York Times Jayson Blair
episode, Spruiell says this:
Other journalistic frauds are more subtle — that is, the
fraud occurs through the endless repetition of false information in
the background paragraphs that supplement breaking news reports on
a constantly developing story. These frauds are much more harmful
to the public’s knowledge of a particular incident than the big
frauds, because the repetition of the false information gives it
the appearance of fact.
And among the chapter-and-verse details Spruiell uses to
illustrate journalistic fraud is that the story that Iraq tried to
buy uranium in Africa was in fact — then and right to this minute
— true.
Two key sentences from Spruiell:
But Wilson had confirmed that Baghdad had sought to buy
uranium from Niger. […]
The British government continues to vouch for the
intelligence report Bush cited in the 2003 State of the Union,
declaring it “well-founded”…
So put all this together and here’s what we
have.
• Hannity does show on liberal bias, citing Cooper’s
reporting on Wilson.
• Cooper strikes back, says he was
selectively edited — and shows his version.
• Cooper’s own version shows him referring
quite clearly to the “now discredited claim that Iraq had tried
to buy uranium in Africa.”
• Stephen Spruiell, whose piece was published
before Cooper’s Hannity charge, quite specifically documents that
what Cooper is alleging is now gospel in the liberal narrative of
the Plame Affair — and, quite specifically, he calls the idea that
the uranium charge has been “discredited” as… mark this down…
“journalistic fraud.”
• And Anderson Cooper, after showing himself
uttering this story line… in his defense, no less… says “I try
to choose my words very carefully”
• Finally, there’s reporter Bershad at
Mediaite who simply doesn’t even bother to do anything but
present Cooper’s unanalyzed story in yet another example of — yes
— liberal bias.
I don’t know Anderson Cooper, or Jon Bershad.
But I do know Sean Hannity. One can disagree with him all
day long (and as a conservative, I must admit that doesn’t happen
with me!) but his integrity — journalistically and otherwise — is
untouchable.
The irony here is that in defending himself — and
Anderson Cooper is, let’s say for the record, presumably an
honorable guy — Cooper has provided a small but extremely pointed
example of what Mr. Spruiell calls “journalistic
fraud…the fraud occurs through the endless repetition of
false information in the background paragraphs that supplement
breaking news reports on a constantly developing
story
That is precisely what Anderson Cooper has done
here.
I have to assume Cooper did this unintentionally. But
without doubt Anderson Cooper has provided yet another “Exhibit A”
of just how bias in the world of the liberal media works. Precisely
as Sean Hannity said it did.
Will Anderson Cooper correct his mistake? Will Jon Bershad
at Mediaite investigate?
What do you think?
