Tuning out, continued

What great timing. My previous blog entry was still fresh on my mind earlier this week when I happened to catch Brian C. Anderson, Ph.D., on The O'Reilly Factor. Anderson was on the show basically to plug his new book, South Park Conservatives: The Revolt Against Liberal Media Bias. Anderson was a great guest, and I plan to read his book when I finish Ann Coulter's Slander. For those media apologists from Testy Copy Editors who claim they can't find any examples of liberal media bias, here's a whole book on the subject. Hope that helps.

If reading a book is too much to ask, then at least check out Bill O'Reilly's "Talking Points" of April 19, 2005. O'Reilly focuses on what the Jayson Blair Times, Washington Compost and other rags are saying about Pope Benedict XVI. Some highlights: The Times called the Holy Father "uncompromising, bland, upsetting, divisive and an enforcer." The Times' shrew-in-residence, Maureen Dowd, said Benedict is "a 78-year-old hidebound conservative ... who once belonged to Hitler Youth." Dowd apparently doesn't know or care that joining the Hitler Youth was mandatory for young Bavarians at the time Benedict was a member. And soon after the then-16-year-old Joseph Ratzinger was drafted into the German army, he deserted. In fact, he was barely 18 when Germany unconditionally surrendered to the Allies.

That's so typical of vitriolic windbags like Dowd to portray the pope as a Nazi. Ironically, when present-day American adults who signed up to serve in their country's armed forces become deserters, then liberals and their media lapdogs are falling over themselves in their rush to portray those losers as heroes. In the world of U.S. liberalism, you get credit only for deserting the army of the United States of America — not the one of Nazi Germany. Someone should ask Ms. Dowd why that is.

Tuning out a self-evident truth

About a year ago, when I was still a regular on the Testy Copy Editors bulletin board, several of its members began a collective rant about how silly it was to suggest that the media are biased. One of the indignant posters scoffed that those who make such claims can't produce proof of such biased if pressed.

Set aside for the moment that such unabashed displays of partisan cluelessness eventually led me to leave this intellectual Romper Room. I find it hard to believe that anyone, especially a journalist, can contest this axiom.

If anyone needs proof of the shameless way the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, CBS, CNN ad nauseam distort the news to please the liberal establishment, they need only read the respective weekly columns of John Leo or Ann Coulter. Or read Coulter's book "Slander: Liberal Lies about the American Right." You can stick to Chapters 4, 5 and 6 if you're pressed for time. If reading is too challenging an intellectual exercise, just watch The O'Reilly Factor for a week. For most liberals, the experience would be a real eye-opener.

Of course, denials of press objectivity seem silly in the aftermath of Memogate. As CBS itself reports, an independent panel concluded that "CBS News failed to follow basic journalistic principles in the preparation and reporting of the piece" and that "CBS News had compounded that failure with a 'rigid and blind' defense of the 60 Minutes Wednesday report." And don't forget, you had Memogate segment producer Mary Mapes running around trying to get John Kerry campaign guru Joe Lockhart to call Bill Burkett, the guy who supplied CBS with all those fake memos. Outrageous. I hope Ms. Mapes is using some of her well-deserved time off to take a few refresher courses in journalistic ethics.

But the media aren't content to make up stories that reflect unfavorably on the candidate they don't like. Sometimes they simply bury the news. Take Sandy Berger, for instance. Earlier this month, Clinton's former national security adviser pleaded guilty to taking classified 9/11-related documents from the National Archives. As U.S. News & World Report wrote: "What he had initially charaterized as an 'honest mistake' he admitted in federal court involved intentionally putting papers in his jacket and pants. Some documents he subsequently destroyed."

Now let's be honest. If Berger had been a former Reagan official, or a former Bush the Elder official, then the New York Times, Washington Post, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the rest of the Pravdas for a new millennium would have plastered this story all over their respective front pages. But they continue to ignore this story. Why? (That was a rhetorical question.)

Well, there you have two examples of journalistic bias. I would share it with my old friends at Testy Copy Editors, but I get the sense that it would be a waste of time. Some people prefer remaining blind to the truth. What a shame that some of them are journalists.

New name, fresh start

I'm back.

My apologies to those who accepted my invitation last fall to check out this space, only to find nothing posted here for nearly five months. I'll try not to let the blog go unattended for so long in the future.

The first post of 2005 is as good a time as any to introduce the blog's new name, which may require some explanation. Fans of SpongeBob SquarePants may recall "the open-window maniac" from the episode "Hall Monitor." Without fail, I always break up during the scene in which the vigilante title character, wearing a ski mask, bursts into a couple's dining room during their meal and shrieks: "I'm the open-window maniac!" If you haven't seen this episode, trust me, it's hilarious. I guess I picture myself as an "open-window maniac." I'm "on patrol," if you will.

Later.