Exposing McCain’s ‘Free Ride’

[Omaha Steve]

http://blog.aflcio.org/2008/03/28/exposing-mccains-free-ride/

by Seth Michaels, Mar 28, 2008

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) is running for president, and he’s running on a Bush-style platform that won’t turn America around for working families. In a time of economic crisis, this could stop his candidacy cold—because the last thing we need is more of McSame.

There’s one problem, though: The national press, whose job it is to talk about the policies and priorities of candidates, hasn’t given McCain any scrutiny on the real issues. The media elite decided long ago that they like him too much to look too closely.



As a corrective to this media bias, Media Matters for America has released Free Ride: John McCain and the Media in which authors David Brock and Paul Waldman detail exactly how the senator has been able to manipulate the press over his decades-long career in Washington.

Brock and Waldman note that the press holds McCain to a different standard—ignoring his flip-flops, underplaying his gaffes and keeping his hard-right voting record and lack of expertise out of their coverage. They write:

To grasp just how different his media image is, imagine for a moment if every politician were portrayed the way John McCain is. The focus would stay on their perceived greatest strengths, not their most glaring weaknesses. Reporters would re-tell the stories of candidates when they seemed at their best, not the moments when they were at their worst. Their “character” would be defined in the media by the noblest thing they had ever done, and the less flattering incidents would be pushed aside, to be dismissed if mentioned at all.

FULL story at link.

[Pawel K]

1. You're attacking McCain? Not sure that will get you very far around here

but here is a K&R anyway.

[havocmom]

2. Since McCain has decided this is his Bio-week, we should be sure and help out by exposing the man

He was second to last in his class at the Naval Academy. I wonder what deserving officer material missed the chance to attend so this son and grandson of admirals got to go.

Read recently that the crash that made him a POW was the FIFTH crash he managed to have.

But he was big at parties.

Get the details out there. MSM sure as hell won't and we don't need another spoiled fortunate son clowning around in the Oval Office.

[lyonn]

7. You said it better than I was prepared to state

McCain hasn't achieved anything scholastically or in Congress. He is all talk and no results. There were many others that were prisoners of war that didn't try to cash in on their tragedy. Of course the media will love him, he is a repub and GE, Viacom, Washington Post, NY Times, etc. love the repubs because they are co-conspirators for Corporate America that make the rules.

[LakeSamish706]

3. The one thing to remember though is that the media are Americans as well...

If McCain wins in November, they will suffer just as much as the rest of us. No idea why the individual media moguls have not grasped this concept yet, but it will be the cold hard facts come November. How the hell could a John McCain Presidency be good for anyone?

[JDPriestly]

6. The big guys in the media are paid to look away.

They know that. Look at what happens at those who don't play the peek-a-boo game. Dan Rather is just one name that comes to mind.

[lyonn]

8. William Parry of Consortium New comes to mind.

And Bill Moyer, the list is long that got booted from the news industry for telling the truth, or disappeared, suicided.

[JDPriestly]

4. I hope the moderators put this on DU's front page.

This is an important reference for all of us in the upcoming campaign.

[lyonn]

9. Many know what the problem is but how do we the people fix it?

Added this comment to keep this msg. going. Really tho, how can we overcome Billions of dollars worth of Propaganda produced and brought to you by the Corporations?

[Ichingcarpenter]

5. Thanks Omaha Steve- I was gonna post this but forgot

Here is the Media Maters Action Link
http://mediamattersaction.org/freeride/

It is very well documented.

[formercia]

10. Condoms, I tried using condoms and they kept falling off

anyway, I quit using them 'cause I still caught the Crabs.

[alfredo]

11. Download the flyers and commit to memory.

[Kurovski]

12. K&R. (nt)

[blondeatlast]

13. What a great SL to find from my semi--sorta-extended breather from DU!

THIS is the stuff that makes wading through the dreck worthwhile.

Thanks, OS. I promise not to even consider clicking on the "other" GD forum.

K, R--and have I already said thank you? Ah, well--thanks again anyway, dammit!

[Disturbed]

14. MCSame is a Hypocrite but the US Corp. Media has shielded

him because he is a champion for Corps. Ex. Pres. Clinton has called McSame a Moderate, which is a lie.

“Hypocrisy, my friends, is the most obvious of political sins — and the people will punish it,” John McCain

John McCain Hypocrite
by Doug Ireland

John McCain, the media's darling, has found a clever way around his own campaign finance reform law to take big corporate bucks in furtherance of his political ambitions while carrying water for the corporate mammoth providing the dough. But the national press is ignoring the story.


The Associated Press first ran the story of John McCain's odorous but lucrative Senatorial service to the communications giant Cablevision on the afternoon of March 7. But, while some local papers in McCain's home state (like the East Valley Tribune) have run the story, nothing has as yet made it into the print editions of the New York Times, the L.A. Times, the Washington Post, or any of the half-dozen other big city dailies I checked (although, if one searches the hundreds of AP stories available on the Post's website on its Politics page by clicking on "Latest Wire Reports," one can find it there--but how many readers would bother to do that?) One notable exception: the Kansas City Star.


Here's what the AP's investigation found:


McCain repeatedly intervened on behalf of a policy Cablevision favored -- one which "congressional and private studies conclude could make cable more expensive" -- while his chief political adviser, Rick Davis (who's masterminding McCain's probable '08 presidential rerun) solicited $200,000 in contributions from Cablevision to an institute that promotes McCain and pays Davis a $110,000 annual salary.


The Reform Institute was set up to promote McCain and his issues--especially campaign finance reform, embodied in the famous McCain-Feingold law. This Institute is "a tax-exempt group that touts McCain's views and has showcased him at events since his unsuccessful 2000 presidential campaign," and it "often uses the senator's name in press releases and fund-raising letters and includes him at press conferences," the AP says. And, of course, it provides a cushy sinecure with no heavy lifting for McCain's main man, Davis, as he prepares the pontificating Senator's next presidential run. Cablevision's contributions account for a whopping 15% of the Institute's budget.


http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0309-35.htm