Caveat lector

THE LYING CONTINUES! Last night, the lying continued on Fox. Bill O’Reilly was too scared to stop it:

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 3, 2003

HOUSTON, YOU MAY HAVE A PROBLEM: A must-read piece in this morning’s New York Times. As we’ve noted, problems with the “Texas education miracle” were apparent by early 2000. But the press corps was making up tales about Gore, and knew they had to sidestep this subject. For our real-time work on this sorry matter, enter “NAEP” or “TASS” or “RAND” or “Cannell” into our whirring search engines. For the record, the New York Times should have done this work three years ago.

ROGER AILES, UN-AMERICAN: Tell us again—who is “un-American?” Last night, the lying and slander continued on Fox, presented by the slithering men who have always taken aim at democracy.

Let’s start with Dick Morris’ slithering appearance on the O’Reilly Factor. Morris was sent there to stir up the rubes. His misstatements started immediately:

MORRIS: She went to Iraq, she went to Afghanistan—she went right into the middle of a combat zone and exercised the right of free speech she should have exercised state side while she was in the combat zone. She told the American soldiers…that most Americans don’t agree with what they’re doing; that there’s strong debate over the Bush Administration; that success is not assured; that there aren’t enough troops to do the job. And you don’t say this to the men and women that the next day are going to have to go out and risk their lives.

O’REILLY (continuing directly): All right. Ummm—she said this stuff, not to the troops, to reporters. She didn’t say it to the troops.

MORRIS: Well, she was there.

O’REILLY: Yeah, but she said it on the phone, like “the outcome is not assured.” She basically wants more troops over there.

One hour later, it was Hannity’s turn. The doctor was IN—William Bennett:

HANNITY: Dr. Bennett, good to see you. Thank you. Hillary also said that the outcome of this is not certain. She said that to the troops when she was there…I find that very—highly inappropriate. Do you know?

Magnanimously, Bennett said he didn’t find Clinton’s statements “un-American.” But he didn’t say what was plain to see: He didn’t say that he was engaged in the kind of discussion that has always been ginned up by slithering men, the slithering men who stalk democracy. On Fox, you can lie and discuss “un-Americans” all you like. So tell us again, one more time. Tell us, please—who’s “un-American?”

MORRIS MAKES IT UP: Morris’ lying was quite impressive. First, there is no record of Clinton ever saying that “most Americans don’t agree with what [the troops are] doing.” Second, Clinton told the Buffalo News, not the troops, that success in Iraq is not assured. Are there too few troops in Iraq? She voiced that opinion in subsequent interviews, not when she spoke to the soldiers. Morris was lying—and lying, and lying. But Morris was sent to stir up the rubes, and O’Reilly, a coward, wouldn’t stop him.

DRIVING THE CATTLE: Is Hillary Clinton “un-American?” Slithering men like Bennett and Morris want you discussing that topic. And since her actual comments don’t give them much fodder, belly-crawling types like Morris simply misstate what Clinton really said. But you know how this fakery works; out in the pastures, the cattle are stirring. In a letter in this morning’s Washington Times, Katie Spicer of Springfield, Virginia explains why she’s so “appalled:”

SPICER: In regard to yesterday’s Page One story “Home again, Hillary bashes Bush,” I am once again appalled to read comments regarding the war in Iraq that have been spoken by one of America’s self-proclaimed smart people.

When are the Democrats and other vocal complainers going to realize that comments such as Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s questioning of the possibility of victory in Iraq continue to feed the imaginations and minds of our enemies?

It’s the central problem of democracy. Slithering sophists have targeted rubes ever since the dawn of the west. Last night, on Fox, the lying continued. Morris and Hannity slithered and lied. And O’Reilly and Colmes—cowardly men—were simply too frightened to stop them.

JOHN MCCAIN, REAL AMERICAN: Apparently, John McCain is un-American too! Here he was on the August 24 Meet the Press, commenting from foreign soil:

RUSSERT: Senator McCain, you’re in Turkey. Let me start with you. What must be done in Iraq right now?

MCCAIN: First, could I say, Tim, the men and women in the military are doing a superb job. To see these young people in 125-degree heat with body armor and equipment on, they’re marvelous and they’re well-led and they’re doing a great job. The problem is that they don’t have enough resources. There’s not enough of them, and we are in a very serious situation, in my view, a race against time. We need to spend a whole lot more money to get the services back to the people. We need to get the electricity going, the fuel, the water. And unless we get that done and get it done pretty soon, we could face a very serious situation.

RUSSERT: How many more troops do you think we need in Iraq?

MCCAIN: I think we need, I would guess, at least another division, but we also need people with specialized skills. Linguists we’re running short of. Our Guard and reservists are at the breaking point.

RUSSERT: Senator McCain, realistically, how long will American troops be in Iraq, and how much is it going to cost us?

MCCAIN: I don’t know the answer to that, but I’m telling you what the question is, and the critical aspect of this is: What happens in the next few months? Time is not on our side.

CONAN THE DECEIVER: Candidate Conan’s deceptions become more apparent in Harold Meyerson’s column this morning. What happened to all that wasteful spending that Candidate Conan swore he would find? Of course, the candidate’s fakery was always apparent, but pseudo-journalists in your “press corps” struggled to keep their eyes off the prize. They interviewed strippers, met Gary Coleman, and clowned their way through the summer and fall. But then, in this age of Michael Jackson Distraction, it’s almost impossible to comprehend how fake our “public discourse” really is. In California, the truth begins to emerge. Read about it in Meyerson’s column. The bulk of your “press corps” will know to avoid it.