Mad Libs
KRISTOL, WILLIAM
EDITORIAL Mad Libs The liberal media are angry. Very, very angry. How do we know? Howard Kurtz, the Washington Post’s chronicler of all things media, says so: The media are getting mad....
...Not a chance...
...Not because “the press is being manipulated...
...Gotcha...
...For, as Kurtz goes on to say, the media “are increasingly challenging false or questionable claims by the McCain campaign...
...She praised them for going over to help “defend the innocent from the enemies who planned and carried out and rejoiced in the death of thousands of Americans...
...The tape of Palin’s church appearance bore out her interpretation and revealed Gibson’s mischaracterization...
...God knows (so to speak) what they believe at a place like that...
...soldiers on a task that is from God.’ Are we fi ghting a holy war...
...The Post claimed to believe that Palin was asserting a connection between Saddam Hussein and 9/11—as if she thought soldiers now heading to Iraq were going to fi ght Saddam’s regime—and triumphantly noted that even the Bush administration no longer asserted such a connection (it never did, in fact...
...What a gaffe, some media watchdogs barked...
...Gibson asked: “You said recently, in your old church, ‘Our national leaders are sending U.S...
...Because McCain is doing well...
...In his piece Kurtz cites two allegedly false claims from McCain ads that are in fact basically true—or, at least, no more one-sided than dozens of other campaign ads...
...In other words, the media are going after McCain...
...Of course, politicians are always trying to manipulate the media...
...Why, their kids probably even enlist in the Army to fi ght our enemies...
...By any means necessary...
...Pray for our military men and women,” she had said, “who are striving to do what is right...
...Also, for this country, that our leaders, our national leaders, are sending [U.S...
...soldiers deploying to Iraq...
...So why the foot-stamping snit by liberal journalists...
...Exact words,” Gibson triumphantly retorted...
...Now the McCain camp’s exaggerations do...
...Palin responded, “You know, I don’t know if that was my exact quote...
...Why...
...Whether it’s the latest backandforth over attack ads, the silly lipstick fl ap or the continuing debate over Sarah and sexism, you can just feel the tension level rising several notches...
...Rather, because the American people are resisting manipulation by the media...
...In the same interview, she praised Ronald Reagan for having won the Cold War...
...Having foolishly started a war with her that they can’t win, the liberal media would be well advised, for once, to implement their own favorite war-fi ghting strategy: cut and run...
...But the media are desperate to try to make her look foolish...
...No doubt the mere fact of Palin’s asking for any kind of blessing on our troops and our national leaders at some backwoods Alaska church was suffi ciently distracting to the scripters of Gibson’s questions that they didn’t look closely at the wording...
...As Palin explained, quite eloquently, what she was saying was in the spirit of Lincoln: “Let us not pray that God is on our side in a war or any other time, but let us pray that we are on God’s side...
...William Kristol...
...soldiers] out on a task that is from God...
...EDITORIAL Mad Libs The liberal media are angry...
...When the media get mad, they don’t just pout...
...Speaking of enemies: Within hours of the ABC interview, the Washington Post distorted straightforward remarks made by Palin that same day to U.S...
...actions might be in accord with God’s will and in a cause worthy of God’s blessing...
...Not so fast...
...The Soviet Union didn’t collapse until three years after Reagan left offi ce...
...They pounce...
...Sarah Palin is quickly proving to be more than a match for the mad, mad media...
...The day of Kurtz’s article, September 11, ABC’s Charlie Gibson conducted his fi rst interview of Sarah Palin...
...And the liberal media are always allowing themselves to be manipulated by liberal politicians...
...Palin’s remarks should have been unexceptional: We’ve been fi ghting Al Qaeda in Iraq for several years now...
...Maybe it’s a sense that this is crunch time, that the election is on the line, that the press is being manipulated (not that there’s anything new about that...
...Palin clearly meant that our soldiers would be fi ghting Al Qaeda in Iraq—a group connected to the al Qaeda central command responsible for 9/11...
...And because Sarah Palin is surviving—even fl ourishing—in the midst of the liberal media onslaught...
...Back when Barack Obama was coasting toward victory, normal campaign exaggerations (“You know, John McCain wants to continue a war in Iraq perhaps as long as 100 years”) didn’t fi ll the media with loathing for Obama...
...Gibson had made it sound as if Palin were claiming to know God’s will, rather than praying that U.S...
Vol. 14 • September 2008 • No. 2
