A hat tip to NRO’s Media Blog for highlighting this example of outrageous media bias. ABC, in a news story, is calling the Swift Boat ads a “smear” and, worse, “slanderous.” That last word might be legally actionable. The simple question should arise though: What, pray tell, is slanderous about telling the truth? And how is it a smear? The fact remains that John Kerry claims to have, in effect, lied to his own diary. The Swift Boat vets were doing their patriotic duty in pointing that out. Kerry was not in Cambodia at Christmas that year. And some of his other accounts of his wartime experiences, including some of his claims of heroism, just don’t hold up to scrutiny.
Now it is true that critics of the Swifties say the Swiftie ads were smears and slanders. Fine. If ABC wants to cite CRITICS saying so, that might be fair journalism. But for ABC of its own volition to use the words “smear” and “slanderous” is an outrage and an absolute violation of journalistic ethics — except that these days, “journalistic ethics” has become an oxymoron, at least when applied to ABC, CBS, NBC, the New York Times, and the LA Times.
And if that last sentence of mine is slanderous, I invite those supposed “news” organizations to make the most of it.
