In their unending drive to do the bidding of the Republican Party, AP wrote a fallacious story that is a lie in its premise and in what
is left out. MSNBC went them one better. They just plain
lied:
Top Democrat Reid met often with Abramoff
Senator's office admits having had `routine contact' with disgraced lobbyist
So reads MSNBC's web site's top headline. A complete and utter lie:
Now MSNBC is running that same article with this headline "Top Democrat Reid met often with Abramoff."
Needless to say, the article, flawed as it may be in the ways I describe below, makes no claims that the two men have ever met.
Reid NEVER met with Abramoff. Reid's office NEVER met with Abramoff.
The Media have no shame. They will write any lie to serve Republicans.
Why do we hate the Media some ask? This is why.
Incompetent and unethical. Who fed AP this story? Who fed MSNBC this headline? We don't have to guess.
The most incompetent journalists of my lifetime currently cover Washington, D.C.
They are beneath contempt.
Update [2006-2-9 22:21:19 by Armando]: Where is the MSNBC story on
this?
WASHINGTON -- The disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff told a magazine editor in recent days that he had met with President Bush many times and was invited to the president's Texas ranch for a gathering of campaign contributors in 2003, the editor said Thursday.
Here's an ACCURATE story that says "BUSH MET WITH ABRAMOFF MANY TIMES."
MSNBC is a corrupt untrustworthy news organization who deserves the same respect the Moonie Times and the Faux Post get. None.
Update [2006-2-9 22:51:28 by Armando]: MSNBC now runs
Reuters story on Bush meetings with Abramoff. But notice this:
Jack Abramoff said in correspondence made public Thursday that President Bush met him "almost a dozen" times, disputing White House claims Bush did not know the former lobbyist at the center of a corruption scandal.
But when it was about Reid, then it is this from the AP:
The activities — detailed in billing records and correspondence obtained by The Associated Press — are far more extensive than previously disclosed
How come the "records" are believed when it is Reid but it is "Jack Abramoff said" when it is Bush?
Let's be clear, the records are almost certainly correct in both cases. What they MEAN is inaccurately reported by AP. But Reuters tries to make it a "he said he said" story when it is nothing of the sort.
Our 4th Estate as its "finest."
Update [2006-2-9 23:12:44 by Armando]: From boofdah in the
comments,
Josh Marshall demonstrates AP's incompetence:
After reading my earlier posts on the AP article on Jack Abramoff and Harry Reid, longtime TPM Reader DY wrote in and said, "After I read your post, I was wondering something. Did AP call Ron Platt? I mean, he clearly was willing to talk, and he clearly would have added to the story. Or actually, made a third of the story false, but be that as it may..."
(Platt, of course, is the former Greenberg-Traurig lobbyist who the AP article alleges was Abramoff's point of contact in trying to persuade Reid to support the position of the Marianas Island sweatshop owners. For the details on this and why talking to Platt might have been relevant, see this earlier post from this afternoon.)
Anyway, that sounded like a good question.
So I got hold of Platt and asked him. He told me he hadn't spoken to them for the piece and they'd made no attempt to get hold of him.
"So AP not only did not speak to you for this article, but made no attempt to speak to you?," I asked in a follow-up earlier this evening. "Exactly. No Voicemail[.] no record of any incoming," came his reply.
They are all Republican shills. Contemptible.