Conservative bloggers don’t check facts. It sure makes for a great story for the CBS website.
Especially since the old guard media wants you to believe that all writers — even paid, part-time writers — are mere “bloggers,” thus producing the pejorative and (supposedly) reducing their authenticity in the eyes of the beholder.
Declan McCullagh runs a story on CBS today that pounces on “conservative” bloggers, including this blog post of mine. (Newsflash to CBS editor: I am not a “conservative.”) Quick summation: It was reported in the New York Times that Michelle Obama had said that Sasha Obama had a meningitis scare, that turned out wasn’t meningitis, at four months old. But a video of an Obama speech has him saying that Sasha did have meningitis at three months old. So I blogged about the weird story variance from the Liars-in-Chief, as did some others in the web-o-sphere.
McCullagh, in his article, produced a video of Michelle and quotes her as saying, “But he told us that she could have meningitis. So we were terrified. He said, get to the emergency room right away. And fortunately for us, things worked out, because she is now the Sasha that we all know and love today.” Then he writes, “she never made the no-meningitis claim.”
First off, her quote, “he told us that she could have meningitis,” doesn’t mean Sasha didn’t have meningitis. But we don’t know that because she apparently never clarified that point in that particular speech. Additionally, the New York Times may have reported things incorrectly, or, the reporter (Jeff Zeleny) may have been influenced by a prior speech or story where Michelle did say that Sasha didn’t have meningitis. Does McCullagh have an answer?
McCullagh writes, “conservative and even some libertarian bloggers didn’t spend much time trying to learn the truth.” Really? I linked to a blog post, and before I did that I verified the statement in the New York Times and spent the time watching Obama’s speech, on video. That McCullagh produced a video, of a Michelle Obama speech that says something different than the statement from the New York Times, does not solve the conundrum. Did Sasha have meningitis? Did McCullagh verify this with the White House? And if not, why not? Says Mr. McCullagh: “There’s no evidence that either Obama lied.” Problem is, he didn’t seem to think it was important to the story to verify, with undeniable facts, whether or not Sasha did/didn’t have meningitis.
So why isn’t Mr. McCullagh challenging the New York Times on its quotes, or even digging for the absolute truth to the whole story? Why did he spend all this time, and send emails to me, looking for a video that still didn’t answer the question at hand? Is he curious about whether or not the NYT actually did misquote Michelle Obama? He claims the New York Times quote is not accurate. The reporter’s statement clearly stated that there was a concern that Sasha had meningitis, but, as he wrote, it turns out she did not have meningitis. Then McCullagh admits that Barack brought up the meningitis story three times, that he knows of, in his speeches. How about Michelle? How many times did she bring this meningitis topic up in prepared speeches, and if she did, were there variances in her story? I see nothing about this in his report.
It seems to me it’s because he’s a reporter looking for a story that the mainstream (liberal) media is willing to print. If you are going to write for CBS and pass muster with the liberal-establishment editorial clan, what headline is going to grant you a published story and a paycheck: “More Obama (His & Her) Lies” or “Conservatives Pounce On Michelle Obama” ?
In my blog post I also make light of Hillary Clinton’s well-known lies about dodging sniper fire in Bosnia. McCullagh, in his story, refers to that scenario — a lie that was uncovered and verified, time and time again — as an “exaggeration.” A confirmed lie becomes an exaggeration? Since I know how these things work in the left-mainstream media, especially on editing points, I’ll even give McCullagh the benefit of the doubt because that is very likely to be an editorial change, and he may not be responsible. But his name remains on the byline.
That raises the question — where has McCullagh committed to checking facts? All he did was find a variance between the NYT report and one speech from Michelle Obama, yet has not produced any reports about the truth of whether or not Sasha had meningitis. Hooray for him. But that’s the end of his story.
Also, I typically don’t reveal the content of private emails. Except that when a reporter is doing a story on the issue under discussion and attempts to invoke me as a subject for a headline, that changes. Mr. McCullagh’s first of two emails to me concerned this blog of mine about Michelle Obama’s remarks — during her Olympics pitch — about sitting in her father’s lap watching Olga, Nadia, and Carl Lewis compete in the Olympics. In fact, Lew Rockwell and I both posted on this topic one minute apart, yet oddly, I am the only one to have heard from Mr. McCullagh.
He seemed to be very much drawn to that first post, emailing me twice, and claimed that this comment in the New York Times could justify Michelle’s comment: “So did her father, who had long suffered from multiple sclerosis; Michelle so adored him that she would curl up in his lap even as an adult.” It’s fair to challenge me after googling for such a statement. But it didn’t help to support her dramatic claim at all. So I responded:
The (3) athletes mention competed when she was 8, 12, and 20. The speech was written without a fact check in regards to these individuals competing in different times, years apart. It was written for a dramatic/heartwarming effect. She was bouncing on his lap for 12+ years? Also, you probably didn’t listen to her whole speech — she made it very clear, leading up to the statement in question, that she was referring to her youth, her childhood.
He had no rational response and just dropped it, and moved on to my 2nd post — the one mentioned in his story. Of course Michelle’s ‘Olypmics pitch’ was certainly a prepared speech that was produced by a speechwriter for dramatic effect, but this is how political speeches are rolled out. This is not news. The only snafu is that Michelle played it out as her own personal experience, giving her heartwarming dramatic effect, and her story doesn’t fit reality. And people caught on to it.
So why the concern about exposing the fibs of the heads of the state?
Note that McCullagh has recently posted “updates” to his story. First, his name was corrected from “Mccullagh” to “McCullagh.” His editors misspelled his name when the story was posted. Someone hadn’t checked their facts. Second, he is noting the bloggers who linked to New York Times story, and stand by their link, and the “touch of class” from bloggers who have apologized to him…for linking to the New York Times story. No mention about him getting a statement from the New York Times, however.
