SwiftVets.com

[Me#1You#10]

While I generally avoid billboarding blatant propaganda from the left, this particular piece (which, for some unknown reason, was GoogleNews-alerted to my mailbox just today) is so breathtakingly ignorant (or bereft) of facts and/or so diabolically enmeshed in the "Big Lie" that it will damn near take your breath away. I thought it might be good fodder for a slow Friday nite...

Caution: Contents may be hazardous to your good sense ... contains the "but they weren't even on his boat!" line of reasoning.

Meet the Stenographers
Press shirks duty to scrutinize official claims
By Steve Rendall
FAIR (Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting)
Extra! November/December 2004

<snip>

When "the facts" are lies

The rise of the so-called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth marked another episode in which many reporters seemed to abandon any attempt to ascertain the reality of the story—and some defended this dereliction as a professional virtue.

The Swift Boat Vets' claims that Democratic candidate John Kerry's Vietnam record was fabricated and his awards undeserved were given widespread publicity, particularly in August, in the period between the Democratic and Republican conventions. Many attribute Kerry's slide in the polls at this time to the group's campaign—and its amplification by the bountiful media attention it received.

At the time, Swift Boat Vet coverage came under fire from critics who said journalists had failed to adequately expose the group's misleading and contradictory claims (American Prospect , 8/23/04; CJR Campaign Desk , 8/25/04). They pointed out that the coverage often amounted to little more than a presentation of Swift Boat Vet charges set alongside rebuttals from the Kerry camp, a form of "some say/ others differ" reporting that assigned equal weight and credence to each side and left the public at a loss as to who was telling the truth.

When Editor & Publisher reporter Joe Strupp (8/24/04) interviewed Washington Post executive editor Leonard Downie about Swift Boat coverage, he asked about a front-page Post article (8/22/04) that, in Strupp's words, "appeared to give equal credibility to both Kerry's version of the events in Vietnam (which is supported by his crewmates and largely backed up by a paper trail) and the Swift Boat Veterans."

Defending his paper, Downie told Strupp that some Post reporting had undermined the Swift Boat Vets, but added: "We are not judging the credibility of Kerry or the [Swift Boat] Veterans; we just print the facts."

As Strupp and others have pointed out, the Kerry vs. Swift Boat Veterans judgment was not exactly a hard one: On Kerry's side you had the official military record and virtually everyone who served on Kerry's boat; on the other, a well-funded group of anti-Kerry activists with considerable links to the Bush camp, whose leaders have a penchant for falsehood and self-contradiction (CJR Campaign Desk , 8/25/04).

F.A.I.R. - cont'd