NPR: Some think Dean wrong for DNC because identified with anti-war left

[Stephanie]

And they think we should have somebody with "credibility" on national security issues. WTF??? Didn't we just get the final report that proved that WE were right and THEY were wrong? WHOSE credibility is in question here? I want to sue for slander.

[CWebster]

1. WHOSE credibility is in question here?

Most of the gov and media vs the truth?

[robbedvoter]

2. NPR went to the dark side long ago. Stopped listening for years.

[deutsey]

14. Pacifica will be covering anti-Bush demonstrations Thurs.

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Counter-Inaugural Protests in Washington DC and Across the Country

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Thursday, January 20th
8am-9:30pm Eastern Time on your local Pacifica station

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Keep Independent, non-commercial media alive!

[Dr Ron]

30. NPR is not one voice

It doesn't mean much to say NPR expressed the view. They present a variety of views--which is why they remain superior to most of the mass media.

[kslib]

34. Thank god.

I was beginning to think all dems hated NPR, and it's the most unbiased news I can get in rural Kansas (mostly from the BBC broadcast that they air). I've never considered them to be conservative, even though they report on conservative views. That's just it, they report on it. One-sided reporting from either side is just infotainment, not news. To make an informed decision on an issue, and not blindly follow one party, one needs all the information. If they only "reported" a democratic view, then their listeners would be no more informed than those who get their "news" from faux.

[AP]

36. Morning Edition and All Things Considered suck ass, as do many of the...

...media, market and news shows they air.

[kslib]

32. Weren't they just rREPORTING on this?

not ENDORSING?

[whirlygigspin]

3. hey NPR, blow me

n/t

[SHRED]

4. What about the

anti-war middle...LOL!!!

Friggin' NPR has made a turn to the right in recent years.
They a milktoast a best. Bland.

[CWebster]

6. Unfortunately

they carry the mantle of liberal, like Hillary Clinton, while furthering Right-wing perceptions. Perceptions even echoed here.

It is all corporate-driven, but it establishes, frames and reinforces the conventional groupthink that molds perceptions even if it is based on lies and illusions. And our politicians play along.

[Todd B]

9. I heard something on the radio that sums it up nicely.

I heard something that I thought sums up NPR nicely. I think it was on Thom Hartmann, but don't quote me on that.

I think that, while the majority of those who work at NPR lean toward the left, NPR generally tries as hard as it can to remain objective. I think the slant toward the right comes from the fact that they have needed to rely a little more on corporate donations then they have in the past.

It's sad because they have some great programming - I still can't really get Air America here in Worcester - and I love to listen while I'm in the car. It's still better then some of the hate radio we have in Boston, though.

And, to stay on topic, I really don't think that the DNC needs to criticize Howard Dean for taking an Anti-War stance when, as much as I liked Kerry, they pretty much ran a Bush-lite on the topic of the war. It's especially more idiotic to criticize Howard Dean when he is becoming more and more right on the war (not right as in politics but right as in correct).

Just my thoughts :)

[barbaraann]

5. "Some" think is not journalism.

Real journalists would report exactly WHO thinks Dean is wrong or not report this at all because it's a made-up story.

Is the who the GOP or the DLC or the Bush Family or what?

[Stephanie]

8. Well I am paraphrasing

will look for transcript later - they were referring to those in the DNC who oppose Dean as chair

[w4rma]

46. In other words: Al From and Joe Lieberman. (nt)

[Norquist Nemesis]

7. Credibility?

Hmmm...seems to me that the biggest gripe for those against Dean is he lost in the campaign as candidate. The argument being, well...he can't win that so it's proof he won't win for Dems a head of DNC. :crazy:

I support Dean for head of DNC. Supported him in the campaign.

I just get the feeling that those who oppose him are more worried about image than anything else. But he's proven he knows how to handle the hits and re-direct debates to the issues. He's a master at that. So...let him take the hits early on and they'll get it out of there system while Dean keeps talking back to the issues and bringing us back to winning elections.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

44. I support Dean as DNC Chair and didn't in the primary

He's best suited as DNC Chair.

[Davis_X_Machina]

10. In politics...

...being right too soon is much, much more severely punished than being wrong.

[moggie12]

11. more complicated than it looks

Brief history: Democratic Party got tagged with bad rep from Vietnam era -- anti-war, anti-military posture went too far in some people's minds (the criticism being that some wars -- like WWII -- need to be fought. we need a strong, capable military, all soldiers are not war criminals, etc. etc). Someone posted the other day that DLC has its roots in the "Scoop" Jackson era (in case you are younger, Jackson was a 70's Dem who was "tough" on national defense issues).

Of course, the joke now is that it was the DLC types who went "too far" the other way by supporting the Iraq War.

Until recently. I was "anti-Dean" because of the "national security" issue. His Obama Bin Laden statement during the primaries still worries me in that it raises the question of whether he, and by implication the Dem Party, thinks "going after" OBL was right (me personally, I think invading Afghanistan was right, Iraq wrong). It is pretty ironic that his "national security credility" is being questioned now given that he was completely right about Iraq, but I think this is where some of it is coming from.

[el_gato]

18. U.S. Companies Eye Trans-Afghan Pipeline

http://www.myafghan.com/news2.asp?id=577434660

ASHGABAT, Turkmenistan (AP) -- American companies might join a long-delayed trans-Afghan natural gas pipeline project expected to be launched in 2006, the U.S. ambassador to Turkmenistan said Tuesday.

"We are seriously looking at the project, and it is quite possible that American companies will join it," U.S. Ambassador Tracey Anne Jacobson said, speaking in Russian, after a meeting with Turkmen President Saparmurat Niyazov.

The Turkmen government said Monday that a feasibility study for the project for a pipeline from the gas-rich Central Asian nation through Afghanistan and Pakistan was complete, and that construction would begin in 2006.

U.S. company Unocal Corp., based in El Segundo, California, was considering participation in the project in the 1990s, but plans were abandoned when the United States fired cruise missiles into Afghanistan in 1998 in pursuit of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network, blamed for two U.S. embassy bombings that year in East Africa.

[moggie12]

19. yep, long history of US military being used to --

make foreign countries "safe for US capitalists". History of the world is all about money, when it comes down to it. BUT, I disagree if you're arguing that this is the primary reason we invaded Afghanistan. It was a OBL/Al Qaida haven and needed to be cleared out. Where Bush morons screwed up was in not spending more time/$ rebuilding Afgh. and helping Pakistan (poverty, terrible refugee problems, etc)-- someday the situation in Pakistan is going to explode and it will all be Bush's fault.

[el_gato]

31. think what you want

but this effort was going on way before 9/11

[CWebster]

50. You mean the culture of the mujihadeen

which we created and supported to bead back the commie threat?

[clarknyc]

43. You agree.

You said, "me personally, I think invading Afghanistan was right, Iraq wrong." That is Dean's position, also.

[itzamirakul]

45. I think you meant "Osama" bin Laden not "Obama" bin Laden

We've got to keep them separate, easy as it is to make a typo. :)

[Stephanie]

47. Who is Obama Bin Laden?

Is he the new enemy? Wouldn't surprise me.

[deutsey]

12. Me: Some think NPR is wrong for them because it identified with

pro-war right.

[el_gato]

13. national propaganda radio

[eg101]

15. Aw, don't worry: Dean is "flexible", He'll say whatever he needs to say

Dean can say anything! To wit:
http://www.sf.indymedia.org/news/2003/12/1668089.php

[Larkspur]

22. A good case of the fringe Left being out of touch with reality, just like

the fringe Right.

[madfloridian]

29. Ah, Counterpunch.....hey, you want quote Counterpunch? Oh, yeah?

Do you really want to quote Counterpunch at DU? Against Dean? Wait till you hear they say about all the other candidates. It is even worse.

That is a terribly skewed article, just like Josh Frank's articles at Counterpunch. They use as a source a guy....let me see if I can get this straight....whose brother held people hostage in a church, and then he was shot by the police..and they blamed Dean because he was governor and did not take the family's side. That guy used to post here a lot during the primaries, then folks started quoting him. Josh Frank used him and listed him as a source, and he despises Dean passionately.

Ok, let's quote some Counterpunch on Kerry, Clark, Edwards, and everyone but Kucinich, and they even go after him at times.

Counterpunch is so anti-Democrat on the whole that they do our side great harm. Yes, the original was from counterpunch last December over a year ago.

[Cheswick2.0]

49. MF, the person you are addressing is not a democrat and doesn't

support any candidate. He's a self discribed bomb thrower.

[newsguyatl]

48. dookus?

[Guaranteed]

16. WELL SAID. That's EXACTLY the way to respond.

Motherfucker, WE were right. YOU were wrong. YOU fucked UP our national security. Got it?

[rucky]

17. "Some say" NPR is going right out of the Faux News playbook n/t

[Stephanie]

20. Here's the link

I can't stream from here but maybe someone who can could get the exact quote -

________________

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4458089

Dean a Frontrunner for DNC Chairman

Listen to this story... by Mara Liasson

Morning Edition, January 19, 2005 · While Washington gets ready to inaugurate a Republican president, the Democratic National Committee is getting ready to elect a new chairman. The campaign is already in high gear. Former presidential contender Howard Dean is considered one of the frontrunners, along with candidates from southern and mid-western states.

________________

[rurallib]

27. Glad you mentioned Mara Liason

she & Juan Williams are so right wing. And Inskeep is almost comical as host. Unfortunately they are the most left wing radio I can get in Iowa.

[DainBramaged]

21. So, does that mean we're for the war?

Who is paying these scumbags?

[leesa]

23. Ah. The notorious "Some people"...

Go Dean. Bring some enlightenment to the DNC.

[rniel]

28. Some people have also said

that bush and cheney like to take turns having sex with goats.

[NoPasaran]

24. "Some people" need to quit kissing Bushco's ass

and start acting like journalists again, not whores.

[spanone]

25. No, No, No, that's why he's RIGHT FOR THE JOB. IDIOTS.

[rniel]

26. Credibility is

calling the war like it is a BIG LIE!!

[mattclearing]

33. What a Newsflash. Turn NPR off. n/t

[AP]

35. For head of the DNC??? I didn't know that was a policy position.

Isn't Terry McAulife and real estate developer?

Sounds like NPR is just trying to form opinioon rather than reflect it.

[AP]

37. Incidentally, NPR is HUGELY responsible for casting Dean as anti-war.

It was Mara Liasson who first pushed Dean as being anti-war, and she did it relentlessly.

After he dropped out, I read Dean say that in spring 2003 he wanted to be known as the health care candidate and that the media started pushing him as the anti-war candidate and he went with it. He said he regretted not sticking to health care as his defining issue.

[madfloridian]

38. They are actually right.....many of our Democrats do feel that way.

I think we have been in denial about the fact that this corporate war in Iraq was approved by about 81 of our Democrats. The Democrats themselves used the theme against him. So I guess NPR is right.

[realFedUp]

39. Dean was against invading Iraq as thousands of us were

He isn't anti-war or a pacifist. He supported
invading Afghanistan, the first Iraq invasion
and Bosnia. Too bad some news outlets can't
get their facts straight.

[killbotfactory]

40. The war was a mistake, you spineless DNC pieces of shit

Most Americans think so. Just because Bush was reelected doesn't mean this stupid war was a good idea. How many goddamned wars does Bush have to fuck up before you'll get a clue? Jesus Christ...

These idiots would support nuking North Korea just to look "credible" on national security.

[bklyncowgirl]

41. Doesn't being right about the war from the git go add up to credibility

Oh but this is the America where the people who engineered this debacle are given medals or promoted to even higher positions where they can do even more damage.

How incredibly silly of me.

[gasperc]

42. credibility?? we went to war to "secure Iraq's WMD"!!!

and there was none to be found!!!

Credibility? are they fucking kidding me!!!!

Dean said when Saddam was captured that this would not make our troops any safer. Nearly 10,000 casualties and 1000 dead later he was right.

We toppled a government and captured its leader and more people are dying in Iraq than ever before. More people have died violently in the past year than the entire 25year reign of Saddam Hussein.

Credibility? holy fuck, this is unbearable

[janx]

51. Donna Brazille's comments were interesting...

Stealth candidates entering the race late?