“MEDIA MATTERS Watch” : Media Matters’ Falsehoods Exposed!

Are you looking for a site that chronicles some of the falsehoods, errors, and misleading work of Media Matters? Welcome!

Scroll down for our latest posts. However, if you are quickly looking for a few good posts to illustrate to your friends how Media Matters misleads their readers and provides fallacious information, check out any of the selected links in this post below. Enjoy! (Click the titles to take you to the posts! )

1. "Media Matters’ Bogus Attack on Bill O’Reilly’s ‘Culture Warrior’ Rife With Dishonesty and Deception" : A September 2006 attempt by Media Matters to discredit Bill O’Reilly’s Culture Warrior book teems with misinformation and dishonesty. Folks, it’s a long post, but that’s the way it goes.

2. "Media Matters’ Dishonesty Exposed in Bogus ‘O’Reilly Factor’ Study": Are you familiar with any of those questionable "studies" that Media Matters occasionally puts out? A May 2006 "study" claimed that the guest list on FNC’s The O’Reilly Factor is "dominated" by Republicans and conservatives. Our post unequivocally shreds this claim by clearly illustrating how MMatters inaccurately labeled the guests to get their desired result. Check out this post.

3. "Another False Claim From Media Matters; This One on Global Warming": One of Media Matters’ common ploys is to claim that a particular pundit made a "false claim" or "repeated falsehoods." As it turns out, the "falsehood" or "false claim" often isn’t one at all! Here is a good example.

4. "More Misinformation From Media Matters in False Attack on Bill O’Reilly": Here is a nice and easy example of Media Matters getting their data wrong. Honest criticism is one thing … Shoddy research is another …

5. “Where’s the Misinformation?”: A June 2006 post blared the title, "Lauer joined O’Reilly in serving up misinformation on Today." The problem? Media Matters didn’t provide any so-called "misinformation." Oops!

6. "Media Matters Posted Inaccurate ‘Transcript’ To Falsely Claim That Chris Matthews ‘Praised’ Conservative Ad": Isn’t Media Matters’ obsession with Chris Matthews surreal? A July 2006 Hardball segment addressed a controversial television ad from North Carolina Senate candidate Vernon Robinson. Media Matters claimed that Matthews "praised" the ad. No, he didn’t. Read this post, and see how MMatters posted an incomplete transcript to make their bogus claim.

7. "More Deception From Media Matters in False Attack on Ann Coulter": In this post, we take apart Media Matters’ false attack on the endnotes in Ann Coulter’s Godless book. Here are several textbook examples of dishonesty from Media Matters.

Thanks for visiting. Enjoy the site!

(Note: Due to the time constraints of the author, there is no plan to update this site in the near future. This site was a casual hobby from April-September 2006.)

A September 22, 2006, post by Media Matters is a long and rambling attempt to besmirch Bill O’Reilly and his new book, Culture Warrior. Not surprisingly, the one who is ultimately debunked is Media Matters.

MMatters’ post contains a lengthy list of deception and misleading information. Here you go:

1.

What Media Matters doesn’t tell you is that the 1,000 stories on Rush Limbaugh were most likely about his June 2006 arrest for Viagra. These were hardly fawning reports on Limbaugh. In fact, rather than providing an example of "conservative misinformation," MMFA gives a terrific textbook example of liberal media bias. Meanwhile, it’s quite likely that the 300 citations of Al Franken were in reference to reviews and promotion for a movie about him called "God Spoke."

Here is another clear case of dishonesty and deception by Media Matters.

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2.

Less discerning viewers may fall for Media Matters’ canard, but smarter ones know better. Quite clearly, a newspaper’s editorial slant cannot simply be encapsulated by who it endorses for President.

Media Matters probably won’t want you to do this, but go take a peek at the Houston Chronicle’s opinion pages. Also check out the Denver Post and the Times-Picayune. A cursory look at all three papers will reveal that liberal voices permeate them all. O’Reilly’s assertions about these papers’ liberal tilts are well founded.

Here is a case where Media Matters tries to slip by a fact and hope that readers don’t follow up with their own research.

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3.

Here is another textbook case of a bait-and-switch deception by Media Matters. The truth is that Ms. Hornaday, movie reviewer for the Washington Post, DID criticize Mel Gibson for bad history, but it wasn’t in the article that Media Matters cited. Media Matters cites a December 2004 article by Hornaday, but Hornaday reviewed Gibson’s film in February 2004. Her review, entitled "Less Than Gospel Truth," begins as follows (emphasis added),

"The Passion of the Christ," a harrowing condensation of Jesus’s final 12 hours, engages in some troubling assumptions, for starters by treating the Bible’s four Gospels as literal eyewitness accounts of Jesus’s arrest, torture and crucifixion. It traffics in lurid, almost pornographic imagery of blood, brutality and mortified flesh, rivaling Martin Scorsese’s "Gangs of New York" in its ghastly, stylized violence. [Mel Gibson] has exhibited a startling lack of concern for historical context, both of the Passion’s ritualized reenactment and of its story itself, which over the past several centuries has been used repeatedly to foment violence against Jewish communities.

O’Reilly is 100% correct about Hornaday. In addition, compare Hornaday’s scathing review of Passion with that of Fahrenheit 9/11. The title of Hornaday’s review is, "Presidential Pursuits: ‘Fahrenheit 9/11′: Moore’s Bush Treatise Cooks," and in her very-positive review she writes, "In many ways this is Moore’s best film."

Again, Media Matters’ response to O’Reilly is flat-out deception.

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4.

We’ve touched on this before (see #2). Again, a paper’s editorial leanings cannot be encapsulated simply by who it endorses for President. Check out the Chicago Tribune’s opinion pages. Its liberal tilt is well documented. Chicago newspaper readers understand that the Tribune generally is a liberal voice, while its competitor, the Sun-Times, is generally conservative.

Here’s another case in which MMatters hopes you don’t do any homework.

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5.

First of all, none of the sources that MMatters provides say that Roger Baldwin "became dillusioned with communism." Again, it appears MMatters doesn’t want its readers doing any follow-up research, like we’re doing here.

Second, MMatters’ attempt to disconnect the ACLU with communists would be laughable if it weren’t so dishonest. The ACLU’s ties to communists are very well documented. For example, check out the book ACLU vs. America by Alan Sears and Craig Osten. ("[Roger] Baldwin held Communist/Socialist sympathies to the end of his life." p. 17) See also this and this.

MMatters’ attack on O’Reilly in this instance is simply baseless.

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6.

Here is a case of flat-out factual errors by Media Matters. MMatters falsely claims, "[S]ince [ACLU executive director Anthony] Romero took over as executive director in 2001, several ACLU members have appeared on The O’Reilly Factor." It then cites September 4 and September 5, 2001, appearances by ACLU attorneys. In fact, Romero did not officially take the helm of the ACLU until after those dates (source). MMatters is simply wrong on its facts. The result is that in over the last five years, by MMatters’ count, a whopping total of two ACLU attorneys have appeared across Bill. In addition, neither of them appear at the top of the ACLU’s "Staff & Leaders" page on its national home web site.

"Several ACLU members have appeared on The O’Reilly Factor"? Sorry, guys. Not even close.

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7.

Visitors to this site should already be aware that Media Matters Watch has already fully discredited and debunked MMatters’ May 2006 study. Click this to get the details on MMatters’ dishonesty —–> "Dishonesty Exposed in Media Matters’ Bogus ‘O’Reilly Factor’ Study"

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8.

Here’s how Media Matters reasons this one:

Washington Post: Lobbyist Jack Abramoff "made substantial campaign contributions" to both Democrats and Republicans.

O’Reilly: Jack Abramoff "funneled money to Democrats as well as Republicans."

Media Matters: "Democrats received money from Abramoff’s clients and associates but not from Abramoff directly."

Parsing, anyone? Of course. Here is another case where Media Matters’ attempt to besmirch O’Reilly simply wades into silliness. File under, "Big Whoop."

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9.

The truth is that Al Franken did deliberately and falsely smear O’Reilly. The "false attack" here is not from Bill O’Reilly. It’s unequivocally from Al Franken.

The actual deed to O’Reilly’s boyhood home has the words "Levittown, New York" right on it. In addition, a Levittown expert on Franken’s own radio show flat-out debunked Al by concluding that O’Reilly was indeed from Levittown! See this must-see link. Any fair-minded person will conclude that O’Reilly has an honest beef with Franken on this. Franken could have easily corrected his misinformation for the paperback edition of Lies, but he didn’t. That’s simply ugly dishonesty from Al Franken, but it should come as no surprise.

And that’s it for now! Bye!

On September 15, 2006, HBO’s Bill Maher claimed that CBS Evening News would not allow him to discuss religion on its "Free Speech" segment.

Media Matters jumped on the story and splashed it on the top of its front page.

The problem is that the story wasn’t true. The evidence suggests that Maher simply made up the story. Eventually Maher issued an apology: "If I or my representatives got it wrong about how the ‘Free Speech’ segment of the ‘CBS Evening News’ is, sorry, our bad. I’m ready, willing and able to speak about the topic I originally suggested."

By prominently displaying the bogus story on its front page, Media Matters propagated the falsehood. After Maher’s apology and retraction, Media Matters promptly removed the story from the top of its front page. Luckily, we already grabbed a screen shot. See?

Busted.

Reaching a new level of desperation, a September 7, 2006, post is rife with errors, falsehoods, and inaccuracies. MMatters makes an absolutely ridiculous attempt to save its face regarding the Joe Wilson-Valerie Plame affair. MMatters and other liberal outlets have been roundly discredited since it has now been publicly confirmed that Richard Armitage, not Karl Rove or "Scooter" Libby, leaked the identity of Valerie Plame to columnist Robert Novak.

1. Media Matters falsely suggests that the following claim is false:

The truth is that Plame was greatly responsible for getting her husband sent to Niger. A 2004 Senate report publicized an actual letter of recommendation (!) that Valerie Plame wrote to the CIA trumping her husband’s "good relations with both the Prime Minister and the former Minister of Mines [of Niger], not to mention lots of French contacts."

MMatters is simply flat-out wrong on this. MMatters’ years-old citation of unnamed "CIA officials" has been methodically debunked and discredited.

2. Media Matters also claims that the revealed role of Armitage somehow does not absolve Rove and Libby. Nothing could be further from the truth. This is well illustrated by columnist Christopher Hitchens in his must-read column, "Plame Out:The ridiculous end to the scandal that distracted Washington."

3. Media Matters also falsely asserts that the following claim is false:

Uhhh … MMatters completely ignores the fact that Joe Wilson flat-out lied in his July 2003 NY Times op-ed. The 2004 bi-partisan Senate Intelligence Committee reported, "The report also said Wilson provided misleading information to The Washington Post last June." (Here is a must-read link.)

That MMatters even attempts to defend Wilson in this regard is astounding. Even John Kerry distanced himself from Wilson during his campaign after Wilson was exposed as a liar.

For more reading on this entire fiasco of an affair, check out these excellent pieces by Christopher Hitchens:

"Case Closed: The truth about the Iraqi-Niger ‘yellowcake’ nexus."

"Plame’s Lame Game: What Ambassador Joseph Wilson and his wife forgot to tell us about the yellow-cake scandal."

"Wowie Zahawie: Sorry everyone, but Iraq did go uranium shopping in Niger."

"Plame Out: The ridiculous end to the scandal that distracted Washington."

An August 31, 2006, post by Media Matters continues to underscore the organization’s dishonesty in their presentation of facts. In the post, MMatters takes issue with an interview with President Bush conducted by the liberal Brian Williams that aired on NBC and MSNBC August 29 and 30, 2006. There are several dishonest elements to this MMatters’ post.

1. First of all, MMatters clearly implies that Williams was somehow "soft" (my word) on Bush by "allowing" him to answer questions they way he wanted to. In fact, Williams was particularly tough on the President. For example, he cited a radical, far-left pundit simply as a "critic." Also, Williams himself has been forced to defend himself against the wide impression that he was quite "disrespectful" in the interview. (Read Williams’ blog.) Was Williams "soft"? No way.

2. Media Matters also makes the following dishonest and deceptive claim against Vice President Cheney.

The truth?

Here’s what Vice President Cheney said to Tim Russert only five days after 9/11 on Meet the Press:

RUSSERT: Do we have any evidence linking Saddam Hussein or Iraqis to this operation? [Sept. 11 attacks]

VICE PRES. CHENEY: No.

Got that?

Now, in a Meet the Press interview on December 9, 2001 (nearly FOUR-AND-A-HALF YEARS AGO), Russert and Cheney had the following exchange:

RUSSERT: Do you still believe there is no evidence that Iraq was involved in September 11?

CHENEY: Well, what we now have that’s developed since you and I last talked, Tim, of course, was that report that’s been pretty well confirmed, that he [Mohammed Atta] did go to Prague and he did meet with a senior official of the Iraqi intelligence service in Czechoslovakia last April, several months before the attack.

Now, what the purpose of that was, what transpired between them, we simply don’t know at this point. But that’s clearly an avenue that we want to pursue.

That, my friends is the best that MMatters can do in citing that Cheney "claimed that Iraqi intelligence officers met with alleged 9-11 hijacker Mohamed Atta prior to the attacks."

Are you ready? Here’s the deception by Media Matters: In three later appearances on Meet the Press, Vice President Cheney unequivocally and clearly stated that the "didn’t know" if the meeting happened and that it was "unconfirmed." Don’t believe it? Here:

Cheney on Meet the Press, 9/14/03:

VICE PRES. CHENEY: With respect to 9/11, of course you’ve had the story that’s been publicly out there: The Czechs alleged that Mohamed Atta, the lead attacker, met in Prague with a senior Iraqi intelligence official five months before the attack. But we’ve never been able to develop any more of that yet, either in terms of confirming it or discrediting it. We just don’t know. (emphasis added)

Cheney on Meet the Press, 9/8/02:

VICE PRES. CHENEY: Well, I want to be very careful about how I say this. I’m not here today to make a specific allegation that Iraq was somehow responsible for 9/11. I can’t say that. On the other hand, since we did that interview, new information has come to light. And we spent time looking at that relationship between Iraq, on the one hand, and the al-Qaeda organization on the other. And there has been reporting that suggests that there have been a number of contacts over the years. We’ve seen in connection with the hijackers, of course, Mohamed Atta, who was the lead hijacker, did apparently travel to Prague on a number of occasions. And on at least one occasion, we have reporting that places him in Prague with a senior Iraqi intelligence official a few months before the attack on the World Trade Center. The debates about, you know, was he there or wasn’t he there, again, it’s the intelligence business.

RUSSERT: What does the CIA say about that and the president?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: It’s credible. But, you know, I think a way to put it would be it’s unconfirmed at this point. We’ve got…

RUSSERT: Anything else?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: There is-again, I want to separate out 9/11, from the other relationships between Iraq and the al-Qaeda organization. But there is a pattern of relationships going back many years.

Cheney on Meet the Press, 3/24/02:

VICE PRES. CHENEY: [on Iraq] … With respect to the connections to al-Qaida, we haven’t been able to pin down any connection there. I read this report with interest after our interview last fall. We discovered, and it’s since been public, the allegation that one of the lead hijackers, Mohamed Atta, had, in fact, met with Iraqi intelligence in Prague, but we’ve not been able yet from our perspective to nail down a close tie between the al-Qaida organization and Saddam Hussein. We’ll continue to look for it. (emphasis added)

And as far as MMatters’ claim that there are "no confirmed reports of such a meeting," here is a must-read 2004 article by Deroy Murdock that outlines very compelling evidence that such a meeting did actually take place. By the way, the report of the Atta-Iraqi meeting is rooted in Czech intelligence, who still stand by the story.

Media Matters has clearly mislead their readers.

3. MMatters also falsely claims that President Bush voiced "misinformation" in the following exchange:

WILLIAMS: How close was he [Saddam Hussein] associated with Al Qaeda, in your view?

BUSH: Well, he was — he was on our state sponsor of terrorists list. And he was paying families of suiciders. He has – he also, by the way, had weapons of mass destruction one time and had the capacity to make them. And that’s a dangerous mix. We didn’t put him on the state sponsor of terrorists list. The previous administrations put him on the state sponsor of terrorists list. 

In their effort to smear the President, MMatters cites the Duelfer Report. MMatters selectively and deceptively posts the following,

Media Matters’ misrepresentation of the Duelfer Report is as dishonest as it gets.

Media Matters also dishonestly cites the line, "Saddam wanted to recreate Iraq’s WMD capability—which was essentially destroyed in 1991." This is utterly a misleading citation by Media Matters that falsely implies that there was absolutely no WMD in Iraq after 1991. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, the Duelfer Report states that, in 1998,

UNSCOM surfaced its concern over the evidence it found that Iraq had, contrary to its declarations, weaponized VX in missile warheads …

Also:

By 2000, the erosion of sanctions accelerated … Prohibited goods and weapons were being shipped into Iraq with virtually no problem … Major items had no trouble getting across the border … Indeed, Iraq was designing missile systems with the assumption that sanctioned material would be readily available.

Media Matters also deceptively clips a quote from the Duelfer Report that says Iraq "had no formal written strategy or plan for the revival of WMD after sanctions." In fact, here’s what the report actually states:

The former Regime had no formal written strategy or plan for the revival of WMD after sanctions … Instead, his lieutenants understood WMD revival was his goal from their long association with Saddam and his infrequent, but firm, verbal comments and directions to them.

Dishonesty? Absolutely. But this appears to be par for the course for Media Matters.

For the facts about Iraq and WMD, check out this must-read interview with Bill Tierney, who in the 90’s worked for UNSCOM overseeing the elimination of weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles in Iraq. "Where the WMD Went," by Jamie Glazov. Here’s the kicker:

[Tierney:] "Iraqis have told me that the WMD destruction and movement started just after Operation Desert Fox, since after all, who would be so stupid as to start a bombing campaign and just stop.

"It was only after Saddam realized that President Clinton lacked the nerve for anything more than a temper-tantrum demonstration that he knew the doors were wide open for him to continue his weapons program. We didn’t break his will, we didn’t destroy his weapons making capability. (The Iraqis simply moved most of the precision machinery out prior to the strikes, then rebuilt the buildings), but we did kill some Iraqi bystanders, just so President Clinton could say ’something must be done, so I did something’."

‘Til next time.

An August 29, 2006, post by Media Matters falsely claims that columnist and commentator George Will "misrepresented a reported scientific breakthrough."

Mr. Will clearly did no such thing. Media Matters’ bogus attack stems from an announcement from a company called Advanced Cell Technology (ACT) that claimed it "successfully generated human embryonic stem cells (hES cells) using an approach that does not harm embryos."

In fact, as George Will correctly pointed out, ACT’s lead researcher Robert Lanza "destroyed all 16 of the embryos he used, just as in conventional embryonic stem cell research" (source)! Even Media Matters had to concede that Will was 100 percent correct on this point!

In addition, in their bogus attack on Will, Media Matters cites the Washington Post, whose editorial on this story has been simply debunked. (Read this.)

The bottom line: Will did not "misrepresent" anything. If there’s any "misrepresenting" by anyone, it’s by Media Matters. ACT hardly made a "scientific breakthrough." As one official put it, "All they showed was that you can kill an embryo at an earlier stage than they did before."

For more on the "sham" of ACT’s announcement, which Media Matters bogusly touted as a "scientific breakthrough," check out:

"Pro-life official: New stem-cell announcement is a sham," by Nancy Frazier O’Brien,
"Science by Press Release," by Wesley J. Smith, and
"The Real Good News on Stem Cells: Beyond the hype, some real hope," by Robert P. George.

Here is another classic case in which readers must investigate themselves the veracity of claims made by Media Matters.

An August 22, 2006, post makes the follwing false claim:

The truth? Colson did no such thing. In making their false claim, Media Matters cites an August 16, 2006, "BreakPoint" commentary by Mr Colson.

Colson "blamed American ‘decadence’"? Uh-uh. Here’s what Colson actually said (emphasis mine),

"The hard truth is that members of Islam’s radical branches have no interest in coming to terms with non-Muslims, or even moderate Muslims. To put it bluntly, they don’t care whether we’re nice or not. To this breed of radical Muslim, there are only two options: convert or die …

"September 11 has roots in an irrational hatred of the West …

"There was a brilliant but paranoid Egyptian writer by the name of Sayyid Qutb, imprisoned in Egypt in 1956. In 1970, he published a book, In the Shade of the Koran, attacking the West as totally corrupt … And he read all the anti-Zionist, anti-Semitic literature.

"Qutb’s In the Shade of the Koran unequivocally advocates the killing of ‘infidels’."

Colson clearly stated that, "September 11 has roots in an irrational hatred of the West." He then cited the "paranoid" writer Qutb who "read all the anti-Zionist, anti-Semitic literature."

Colson "blamed American decadence"? No. Not even close.

Another baseless smear by Media Matters.

This is PART II (here’s PART I) of debunking Media Matters’ August 7, 2006, post, which executes a bogus attack on Ann Coulter’s endnotes in her book, Godless. As we clearly show, MMatters falsely asserts that Ann deliberately "misrepresented" or "distorted" her sources or information.

Let the debunking continue:

4. (MMatters #9) MMatters takes issue with endnote 4 in Chapter 9.

First of all, the text of the passage with the note says the following:

On the basis of this intriguing fact, psychology professor Roger Fouts of Central Washington University argues that humans "are simply odd looking apes"⁴ in a book titled Next of Kin: What Chimpanzees Have Taught Me About Who We Are.

Got that? Well, here’s what the endnote in the back of the book says:

4. Ibid. (quoting Roger Fouts, Next of Kin: What Chimpanzes Have Taught Me About Who We Are [1997]).

MMatters takes issue with the "Ibid," which is supposed to mean it came from the source in note 3, an article in the UK’s Guardian newspaper. Ann, however, clearly cites that the "humans ‘are simply odd looking apes’ line" comes from Fouts’ book, and it does. The exact quote is on page 57. (Want to see for yourself? Go to Amazon; find the book, and use the "Search Inside!" function.)

Ms. Coulter used the quote, and then she cited the book that it came from. That’s what an author does!

Again, this is a trivial clerical error over an extraneous "Ibid"! If anyone’s misleading anybody, it’s Media Matters, who imply that Coulter is somehow deceiving her readers. We have shown clearly that she is not.

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5. (MMatters #5) Media Matters takes issue with endnote 39 in Chapter 5.

First, here’s the text of the passage, with the notation, in question:

After [former Rep.] Tom DeLay [R-TX] joked to a Republican audience, "I certainly don’t want to see Teddy Kennedy in a Navy flight suit," [Vietnam war veteran and former Sen. Max] Cleland [D-GA] fired off a nasty letter — a letter, no less! — to DeLay saying, "This country deserves more patriots like Senator Kennedy, not more chickenhawks [sic] like you who never served."

Most Democrats shy away from citing Kennedy’s "military service" with such bravado. The "military service" at issue consisted of Kennedy’s spending two years in NATO’s Paris office after he was expelled from Harvard for paying another student to take his Spanish exam.³⁹

OK. Coulter cites a 2003 Roll Call article that doesn’t say anything about Kennedy serving in Paris and cheating at Harvard. But, as Media Matters relunctantly admits, the DeLay-Cleland exchange two sentences above the note does appear in the 2003 piece. It simply appears that the ‘39′ was placed after the wrong quote. (As for the stories of Kennedy serving in Paris and getting temporarily booted from Harvard for cheating on his Spanish exam, these events have been widely and well documented. See The Education of Edward Kennedy: A Family Biography by Burton Hersh.)

File under: Big whoop.

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6. (MMatters #1) Media Matters takes issue with endnote 9 in Chapter 7.

You’d think that the #1 example in Media Matters’ post would really be a doozy against Coulter. Instead, it’s a vicious out-of-context attack.

Media Matters gives the false and misleading impression that Coulter has accused liberals of "foisting" "anal sex, oral sex, fisting, dental dams, [and] ‘birthing games’" on kindergarteners. Here’s the passage that Media Matters took out of context and reproduced:

But in contrast to liberal preachiness about IQ, there would be no moralizing when it came to sex. Anal sex, oral sex, fisting, dental dams, "birthing games" — all that would be foisted on unsuspecting children in order to protect kindergarteners from the scourge of AIDS. As one heroine of the sex education movement told an approving New York Times reporter, "My job is not to teach one right value system. Parents and churches teach moral values. My job is to say, ‘These are the facts,’ and to help the students, as adults, decide what is right for them."

But here is the entire paragraph from which the passage comes. As you’ll see, the topic of the passage is not about teachers foisting sex on kindergarteners. It’s something entirely different! (Emphasis mine:)

Among the most absurd results of liberals’ unbridgeable commitment to nondiscrimination was their insistence on suppressing the truth about AIDS and scaring Americans into believing that heterosexuals were as much at risk for acquiring AIDS as gays and intravenous drug users. Once again, the science had to be lied about so no one’s feelings got hurt. But in contrast to liberal preachiness about IQ, there would be no moralizing when it came to sex. Anal sex, oral sex, fisting, dental dams, "birthing games" — all that would be foisted on unsuspecting children in order to protect kindergarteners from the scourge of AIDS. As one heroine of the sex education movement told an approving New York Times reporter, "My job is not to teach one right value system. Parents and churches teach moral values. My job is to say, ‘These are the facts,’ and to help the students, as adults, decide what is right for them."

Gee. The passage has a new meaning in light of its full context, doesn’t it! The point of the paragraph is "liberals’ unbridgeable commitment to nondiscrimination," not "foisting" sex on kindergarteners.

In this instance, the folks at Media Matters have committed two offenses: 1. They are woefully ignorant of Ann Coulter’s frequent employment of hyperbole and humor. (Hey, guys: Lighten up! Get out and get some air!) 2. They have deliberately and maliciously taken the passage out of context and deceived their readers.

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7. (MMatters #8) Media Matters takes issue with endnote 1 of Chapter 8.

At issue is the following passage and notation that Media Matters reproduces from Coulter’s book:

Although God believers don’t need evolution to be false, atheists need evolution to be true. William Provine, an evolutionary biologist at Cornell University, calls Darwinism the greatest engine of atheism devised by man. His fellow Darwin disciple, Oxford zoologist Richard Dawkins, famously said, "Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist."¹ This is why there is a mass panic on the left whenever someone mentions the vast and accumulating evidence against evolution.

The endnote cites a 2005 Washington Post feature by Michael Powell, but the article doesn’t contain the direct quote by Dawkins. However, the article does contain the following passage (emphasis mine):

One day while browsing in a bookstore, [Dr. Phillip] Johnson picked up a copy of "The Blind Watchmaker" by the evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins. Dawkins argued that life was governed by blind physics, that free will was illusion, that religion was a virus.

It is inside Dawkins’ well-known Blind Watchmaker book that his famous "intellectually fulfilled atheist" line is found. (It’s on page 6.)

Again — This is a "big whoop" (roll eyes) clerical mistake. It’s hardly an example of an intentional "misrepresentation" or "distortion" that Media Matters wants you to believe it is.

Are you sensing a pattern here?

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8. (MMatters #13) Media Matters misleads their readers! This post has NOTHING to do with an endnote!

Was Media Matters so desperate to find "errors" that they felt that they needed to slip this one in and mislead its readers as to the nature of its post? It appears so.

By the way, here’s the "error" caught by MMatters:

On Page 211, Coulter falsely attributed the quote, "[t]he probability of life originating at random is so utterly minuscule as to make it absurd," to Francis Crick, co-discoverer of DNA’s double-helix structure … [H]owever, the quote actually belongs to Fred Hoyle, a British mathematician and astronomer.

MMatters is correct on its fact, but, again, we can file this minor blooper under, "Big whoop."

Also … Here’s what Media Matters fails to tell its readers: Up until the very paragraph of this quotation, Coulter spends more than a page writing about the work of Sir Hoyle.

Folks, what we have is another simple clerical error, not intentional "misrepresentation" or "distortion."

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Readers: When this endeavor of debunking MMatters’ attack on Ann Coulter’s endnotes started, one long post was planned. Then it doubled into two. As it stands, there is still more fallacious and misleading information from MMatters. A third post on this issue can be created!

Whether or not a third post will be published depends on whether time permits. However, one important point has been clearly illustrated: Media Matters has purposefully misled its readers (again) in a bogus and fallacious attack on Ann Coulter.

Until next time …

As duplicitous as Media Matters has been in the past, a post on August 7, 2006, attacking Ann Coulter is especially low for the organization.

Staffers at Media Matters spent considerable time combing through the text and endnotes of Ann Coulter’s latest book, Godless. MMatters has examined her book with the proverbial fine-tooth comb. They exert a depressingly desperate attempt to discredit her, but the one who ends up getting discredited is Media Matters. 

As it turns out, and as we illustrate here, most of the examples that Media Matters claims are "misrepresentations" by Coulter are nothing of the sort. In fact, Media Matters itself misrepresents the sources that it cites!

Let another debunking of MMatters begin! (We address MMatters’ issues in order of simplicity:)

1.  (MMatters #3) MMatters takes issue with endnote 14 in Chapter 4 of Godless.

The relevant notes in the back of Coulter’s book read exactly as follows:

12. David D. Kirkpatrick, "For Democrats, Rethinking Abortion Position Meets with Mix of Reactions in Party," New York Times, February 16, 2005.
13. Gloria Febit (President, Planned Parenthood Federation of America) "Doctors’ Opinions," Chicago Tribune, July 1, 2004 (letter to the editor).
14. Ibid.

Endnote 14 should refer to the source that cites fundraising numbers of pro-life’s NRLC ($1.7 million) and pro-abortion’s Emily’s List ($34 million), but it doesn’t. Endnote 14 says, "Ibid," and it gives readers the wrong impression that the fundraising numbers that Coulter cites come from a 2004 letter to the editor written by Planned Parenthood president Gloria Feldt.

What’s the truth? Quite simply, the correct notes should read as follows (emphasis mine):

12. David D. Kirkpatrick, "For Democrats, Rethinking Abortion Position Meets with Mix of Reactions in Party," New York Times, February 16, 2005.
13. Gloria Febit (President, Planned Parenthood Federation of America) "Doctors’ Opinions," Chicago Tribune, July 1, 2004 (letter to the editor).
14. David D. Kirkpatrick, "For Democrats, Rethinking Abortion Position Meets with Mix of Reactions in Party," New York Times, February 16, 2005.

The fundraising figures that Coulter cites clearly come from Kirpatrick’s New York Times article (read the article yourself), a source she already cited in endnote 12. Due to an apparent mixup/error/foul-up/whatever, an "Ibid" was printed instead of a repetition of the NYTimes citation from endnote 12. Got it? Is this really a big deal? No.

This is an example of a simple clerical error. It’s hardly evidence of any "distortion," "misrepresentation," or "inventing facts" on Coulter’s part.

Media Matters wants you to believe there is something more deceptive going on here, but, as we’ve shown, there isn’t.

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2. (MMatters’ #6) Media Matters takes issue with endnote 7 in Chapter 6.

The relevant notes in the back of the book read exactly as follows:

6. Richard Vedder, "Comparable Worth," Education Next, 2003.
7. Michael Podgursky, "Fringe Benefits," Education Next, 2003, http://www.educationnext.org/20033/71.html
8. Ibid., 63.6 years old for women and 63.7 for men.

Again, only a simple error has been made in the listing of the sources. By checking Coulter’s text with the text of the two articles above, we see the correct citations should be:

6. Richard Vedder, "Comparable Worth," Education Next, 2003.
7. Ibid.
8. Michael Podgursky, "Fringe Benefits," Education Next, 2003, http://www.educationnext.org/20033/71.html

Is this an example of some kind of intentional "distortion" by Coulter? Of course not! Again, it appears that only a simple editing error has been made. Media Matters is deceiving its readers by giving the false impression that something sinister is going on.

By the way, MMatters writes, "It is unclear where Coulter arrived at her ‘60 percent less’ figure, but it certainly did not come from the source she cited." Well, if the folks at Media Matters took the 20 seconds that we did to look at Richard Vedder’s "Comparable Worth" (cited in endnote 6), they would have gotten their answer! See?

The last comprehensive analysis, performed during the mid-1990s, indicated that average private school salaries were slightly less than 60 percent of average salaries in the public schools (though the gap between public and private schools narrows substantially when religious private schools are excluded from the analysis. See Michael Podgursky’s article, “Fringe Benefits,” on p. 71 of this issue).

Again, Media Matters’ claim that Coulter has maliciously misrepresented anything is flat-out wrong.

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3.  (MMatters #14) In addressing endnote 39 from Chapter 3, Media Matters makes the following false claim:

Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! The 9-11 Commission "found" no such thing, and MMatters’ own source shows this! Here is what the commission actually says in its "Report Notes" section at the end of its report (http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/911Report_Notes.pdf, p. 480, emphasis mine):

President Clinton, in a February 2002 speech to the Long Island Association, said that the United States did not accept a Sudanese offer and take Bin Ladin because there was no indictment. President Clinton speech to the Long Island Association, Feb. 15, 2002 (videotape of speech). But the President told us that he had “misspoken" and was, wrongly, recounting a number of press stories he had read. After reviewing this matter in preparation for his Commission meeting, President Clinton told us that Sudan never offered to turn Bin Ladin over to the United States. President Clinton meeting (Apr.8, 2004).

The commission simply relayed what President Clinton had told them. They did not "[find]" or conclude that Clinton had "misspoken." Media Matters is simply wrong on this. For the eye-opening truth about how the Clinton administration missed an opportunity to have bin Laden seized, read this: "How Clinton Kept Bin Laden Free," by Richard Miniter, Washington Times, September 8, 2003.

In addition, MMatters’ claim that NewsMax "distorted" Clinton’s tape is outright baseless and false. NewsMax did nothing of the sort. Listen to the Newsmax tape (.mp3 file) yourself. Here’s what Clinton actually said in February 2002:

"Mr. Bin Laden used to live in Sudan … And we’d been hearing that the Sudanese wanted America to start meeting with them again. They released him. At the time, ‘96, he had committed no crime against America so I did not bring him here because we had no basis on which to hold him, though we knew he wanted to commit crimes against America."

It is clear that Clinton clearly impled that he at least had the option to have bin Laden sent to the United States from Sudan. Media Matters is wrong.

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Due to the numerous distortions and deceptions by Media Matters in their attack on Ann Coulter’s endnotes, this site plans to post even more examples in a second post ("PART II"). Look for PART II of this post in the next week or so (before August 19, 2006).

Thanks for reading!

An August 2, 2006, post from Media Matters contains a false claim and erroneous information.

1. Erroneous information: Media Matters claims that the allegation that Hillary Clinton made an anti-Semitic slur in 1974 has been "discredited." This is simply false. As this 2000 CNN article clearly reveals, three principle witnesses, including the object of the attack, report that Hillary uttered the hateful remark. The article reports that Hillary spewed the slur at campaign adviser Paul Fray after an election loss.

From the CNN article (emphasis mine):

Paul Fray told CNN that Rodham had indeed uttered the slur. "You’ve got to understand, it was the heat of the moment. We knew we had lost. It was a case of people lashing out at one another, and it just got to that point," he said.

Asked his immediate reaction, he said, "I was a little defensive about it. I looked to the floor, thinking, ‘How do I respond?’ I didn’t mind being called an SOB to my face, but when it comes to attacking my culture, that’s a whole ‘nother ballgame."

So, who does Media Matters use as a source to claim the allegation has been "discredited"? Hillary’s biographer Gail Sheehy! Ha! That’s a reliable source?! LOL!

The only one who has been "discredited" is Media Matters.

2. False claim: Media Matters falsely claims that radio host Dennis Prager, in the August 1, 2006, appearance on MSNBC’s Hardball, "seek[ed] to deflect criticism" of Mel Gibson. However, a cursory look at the transcript of the broadcast shows that this is flat-out untrue. Along with Mr. Prager, a guest on the segment was attorney Raoul Felder. Mike Barnicle was the guest host. Look at this:

MIKE BARNICLE: Dennis, you know, I mean, there is a school — there is a school of thought here that the tequila, or whatever you — he [Gibson] was drinking in this case could well be a truth serum. I mean, that this is who Mel Gibson really is.

DENNIS PRAGER: I believe that. I believe it, too. I believe that. I believe that. I believe that in wine there is truth. I’m not denying it at all …

…

RAOUL FELDER: And I — and I naively thought private remarks reveal more about the people —

BARNICLE: Yeah.

FELDER: — than what they say in a scripted public appearance. And this is what happened here. This is what — this man’s heart has hatred towards the Jewish race.

PRAGER: That’s right. That’s right, except — that’s right –

Does that sound like a man "deflecting criticism" of Gibson? Not at all. MMatters is wrong again.

And there you have it! Another bogus post from Media Matters!