[ed. note: for some reason, our first attempt to publish this diary got stuck in draft limbo. we can't get it out. the software tells us we don't have permission to read our own diary. dkos tech has yet to respond to our inquiry. and we're out of milk for our coffee.
we hate scoop. but, we continue:]
we are not particular fans of john edwards, and we haven't decided whom, if anyone we are going to endorse in the upcoming presidential elections. we don't dislike the former senator, we just are taking a wait and see attitude before we commit.
but we are big fans of fair play and the truth, so it behooves us to point out the already-heavy handed biases against john "crossing over" edwards that we are seeing in the mmm (multi-millionaire media).
we discuss the examples we have found this week, and touch upon the overall meaning of this in terms of journalistic fairness, after the jump:
to begin with, there was nedra pickler's inane screed for the asspress about how edwards' campaign completely blew it by allowing his "edwards 4 prez" website get on line a day early.
even putting aside her clumsily-constructed sentences, nedra's piece makes a simple isp glitch sound like a major catastrophe, a harbinger of terrible things to come:
former democratic vice presidential nominee john edwards jumped into the presidential race wednesday a day earlier than he'd planned, prodded by an internet glitch to launch a candidacy focused on health care, taxes and other domestic issues.
the north carolina democrat's campaign accidentally went live with his election web site a day before an announcement thursday that was supposed to use hurricane-ravaged new orleans as a backdrop.
the slip-up gave an unintended double-meaning to his campaign slogan on the john edwards '08 web site: "tomorrow begins today."
we personally doubt that even the most net-savvy geek would have cared that the website for edwards went live a day early. all that shows to us is that the computer nerds are ready and eager to go, once again proving that the geeks shall inherit the earth.
but something that nedra said in her piece was echoed the next day on headline news network. tho we have no link to it, the now-infamous crawl at the bottom of the screen typed out (presumably under a story about brittney or mel or something irrelevant...maybe ford) words to this effect:
john edwards used katrina-ravaged new orleans as a backdrop to announce his presidential campaign.
perhaps we paraphrase incompletely, but the word "used" was definitely, well, used. this was a spin that put edwards' choice of a part of america that was abandoned by the publican party in its hour of need into the worst light possible. it made it sound as if edwards looked upon the denizens of new orleans like a kleenex, something to "use" and toss away.
headline news could have written that sentence any number of ways: john edwards chose new orleans as a backdrop; john edwards announced his presidential campaign from new orleans; john ewards, in new orleans, announced...etc. etc.
but whoever was writing the crawl decided that edwards "used" the poor people of new orleans for his own goals. strangely enough, google can't find any news reports that said awol used an aircraft carrier to announce "mission accomplished."
but it gets worse. sarah wheaton, writing on the caucus, the blog for the nytimes, singles out edwards (out of 6 politicians mentioned) for a complete strawman manipulation of his platform:
in an interview broadcast on abc news’s "this week" with george stephanopoulos on sunday, john edwards said that projects like universal health care are more important than reducing the budget deficit. which should be a higher priority in your view: government investments aimed at reducing poverty or getting the budget back in line? let us know.
please read the entire blog entry (it's mercifully short). sarah touches on giuliani's losing his campaign strategy in a hotel room, mitt romney's possible campaign announcement, both hillary and mccain's political machine, jeb bush's possibility for a veep nom, chris dodd (who knows why) and the entire iowa caucus.
for none of these other people does sarah pick apart their platform, and ask her readers to answer a strawman question.
astute readers beat us to the punch, adding comments to sarah's blog pointing out that "universal health care" and "poverty programs" are two completely different things:
your quote on edwards conflates universal health care and poverty with the question, "which should be a higher priority in your view: government investments aimed at reducing poverty or getting the budget back in line?"...
i rarely comment, but i jumped over here to protest exactly the point that katherine just made. universal health care is not a poverty issue. there are many of us in middle to higher income with excellent insurance who are still incredibly vulnerable to unknowable drug costs and catastrophic illnesses...
which brings us (at last) back to your question about health care. the point is this: the choice between universal health care, even national medicare, and budgetary responsibility is, in a sense, a false one.
we would go on to add that "deficit," while a subset of "budget," is not equal to "budget" [ed. note: we did, on sarah's comment section].
ergo, her question "what's more important, government investments aimed at reducing poverty or getting the budget back in line?" has literally zero to do with edwards' statement that universal health care is more important reducing the deficit.
it's also a false binary, a bit like asking, what's more important, feeding the fish or getting the floor waxed? (tho we bet the fish would have a definite opinion about that.)
now, we are not adovacating that universal health care is or is not more important than the budget. we are not even advocating for or against edwards as a presidential candidate.
what we are saying, tho, is there has been a noticable bias against edwards in the few days he has announced his candidacy. and, while the actual constituents who vote for president seem excited by his campaign, we are woefully afraid that he's going to have an uphill battle getting a fair shake from the mmm.