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By Gregory Taggart, January 15, 2011 2:17 pm

The paper of record has a decent piece on Jared Loughner, marred by a concerted effort–four different reporters received a byline, while nine others contributed to the story–to tie Mr. Loughner to the right wing.

For 17 paragraphs, the piece adds piece after piece to the puzzle–“a culircue of contradictory moments open to broad interpretation.”

Talented saxophonist. Check. High school dropout. Check. Clean-cut employee. Check. Frightens tellers. Check. Handwritten notes, indicating premeditation. Check. Obsession with numbers and dreams. Check.

Struggling with “a profound mental illness.” Rejection by military, college, and girlfriend. Alienation from friends.

Bingo?

Probably, but not until The Times forces one of two Paul Krugman exculpatory paragraphs into the puzzle. In paragraph 18 of the story we read:

He became an echo chamber for stray ideas, amplifying, for example, certain grandiose tenets of a number of extremist right-wing groups — including the need for a new money system and the government’s mind-manipulation of the masses through language.

Then in the 3rd paragraph of page 6, we read:

A few days later, during a meeting with a school administrator, Mr. Loughner said that he had paid for his courses illegally because, “I did not pay with gold and silver” — a standard position among right-wing extremist groups.

And so a promising attempt at piecing together the puzzle that is Jared Loughner is marred in a more important effort to save face. Drop a few hints, slip in an editorial comment or two, and voila: The New York Times doesn’t have to apologize for the reckless accusations that have appeared on its pages the last few days. Too bad. Sadly, saving face is more important than regaining trust and credibility.

Enough with the editorializing. As Joe Friday might say to the Grey Lady, “Just the facts ma’am.”

(All emphasis mine.)

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By Gregory Taggart, January 10, 2011 2:21 pm

John M. Roll, a Federal District judge, is one of those killed in the Arizona massacre. He was appointed to that position by President G. H.W. Bush.

His name has appeared infrequently in the news reports I’ve listened to and read about the shootings. Which causes me to wonder: Does his appointment by a Republican president not fit the narrative?

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By Gregory Taggart, November 11, 2010 10:16 am

So, the Pjamasphere has been atwitter about Google’s apparent close ties to the Obama administration. And in the past, some have criticized the technology giant for what it has and hasn’t honored on its search page by tweaking the Google logo to fit the holiday. So, my interest was tweaked just a bit by Google’s logo today, Armistice Day:

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By Gregory Taggart, November 5, 2010 7:29 pm

David Bositis, senior research associate at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, this evening on NPR’s All Things Considered:

If you had a group picture of the Republican members of the Congress, and if you wanted to use Photoshop to distill it into one face, it would probably look like former Sen. Trent Lott.

I’ll be back later to comment.

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By Gregory Taggart, November 1, 2010 3:20 pm

The Pjamasphere is a-Twitter with the news that the MSM failed to show Christine O’Donnell’s 30-minute ad–twice–something that would tick me off if it were true. But the claim doesn’t appear to be, at least based on the sources I’ve read.

I found the story on Instapundit, who linked to the Classical Values blog, which based its story on a short piece on The AtlanticWire, which ran with the reporting of one Philip Rucker of The Washington Post. Let’s start with Rucker. He writes, in the relevant part (all emphasis in this post is mine unless otherwise noted):

The source, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive campaign operations, said the station “forgot to air [O’Donnell’s documentary]” [on Sunday as planned].

So far, so good. But farther down in the piece, Rucker quotes Tim Qualls, executive producer at Delaware Channel 28, a public access station, hardly what you’d call the MSM (okay, that’s not counting MSMBC, whose viewership approximates the population of Delaware):

Tim Qualls, executive producer at Channel 28, said in an interview the ad did not air because O’Donnell’s campaign did not bring a tape to the production studio by the agreed upon deadline. She reserved the time on Thursday, for $2,500, and agreed to bring a tape by Friday at 5 p.m., Qualls said.

“I did not receive a tape until Sunday night at one of my employees’ houses,” Qualls said. “It has nothing to do with us refusing to air it. I just didn’t get the tape by my deadline.”

Qualls added: “It was all their people’s fault.”

He said he is a Republican and had planned to vote for O’Donnell, but the tape situation changed his mind. “She’s lost my vote,” Qualls said.

In short, there was apparently no forgetting involved–unless Qualls is lying, and we have no evidence for that. In fact, the only source in Rucker’s story for the proposition that the station forgot to run the story is an unnamed source who Rucker ties loosely to O’Donnell’s campaign:

The source, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive campaign operations, said the station “forgot to air it.”

The AtlanticWire basically ran with Rucker’s story, minus all of the messy details that contradict the premise captured in The AtlanticWire’s bolded headline for the story:

TV Station ‘Forgets’ to Air O’Donnell’s 30-Minute Ad

So what did Classical Values do with the story? It ran with the station did it meme. Under the bolded headline The Insanestream Media, it reported:

In today’s “the MSM is worse than you thought possible” news, one media outlet is caught on tape plotting to tie Joe Miller to child molesters, while another “forgets” to run Christine O’Donnell’s big 30-minute ad… twice. The day before the election.

In turn, Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit linked to Classical Values and offered a typical brief comment:

Truth is stranger than fiction. And, where the nexus between “mainstream” media and political corruption is concerned, it’s worse than would be considered believable in fiction.

Now, I understand that there is some reason to be skeptical of the station’s side of the story, but from the facts/quotes at hand, the O’Donnell campaign’s side of the story doesn’t hold up. For that matter, neither does the reporting of the Pjamasphere–at least on this one.

Full disclosure: I don’t vote in Delaware, but if I could, I would vote O’Donnell simply because I’m in a throw-the-bums-out mood, even if that means a few bad bums take the their recently (tomorrow!) vacant seats. Oh, and I’m a big-C Conservative.

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By Gregory Taggart, October 30, 2010 1:54 pm

According to Reason TV, this campaign season is absolutely sugar and spice compared to some we’ve had in the past.

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By Gregory Taggart, March 29, 2010 5:36 pm

You all know the story. A shepherd boy gets bored with his duties and craves something more exciting than watching a herd of sheep graze, so he cries “Wolf!” and the townspeople come running. That ruse worked so well that he tries it again and again and again, each time bringing the townspeople to his rescue.

Then one day a real wolf actually shows up, but when the shepherd boy cries “Wolf!” the townspeople don’t respond. Been there, done that, not doing it again, they say.

Do you think those on the left side of the isle have heard that story? I don’t.

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By Gregory Taggart, January 16, 2010 2:29 pm

Last night my wife and I were watching the talking heads–can’t remember who–and someone quoted someone else about how we need to raise taxes to pay for the war in Afghanistan, and my wife says, and I quote (loosely):

I am so sick of this! How dare they! Why should they raise taxes on us to pay for the one thing that our Constitution very clearly says our government is supposed to do? The tax revenue they already have should pay for the common defense first. So cut other programs if you have to, but don’t tell me you have to raise my already-high taxes to do the one thing the Constitution says our government is supposed to do.

Hard to argue with that, especially if the person saying it is a babe–my wife.

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By Gregory Taggart, August 4, 2009 10:52 am

What I want to know is whether those who say this is racist also say the creators of the blue Obama poster are Communist.