Thursday, September 18, 2008

Contact CNN and Fact Check About False Statements

In the National Review article On Sex-Ed Ad, McCain Is Right, Byron York not only points out how the media bought the Obama campaign's rhetoric about the sex-ed ad, but they then added a large portion of their own self-righteous outrage.
“The kindergarten ad flat-out lies,” wrote the New York Times, arguing that “at most, kindergarteners were to be taught the dangers of sexual predators.” The Washington Post wrote that “McCain’s ‘Education’ Spot is Dishonest, Deceptive.” And in a column in The Hill, the influential blogger Josh Marshall called the sex-education spot “a rancid, race-baiting ad based on [a] lie. Willie Horton looks mild by comparison.”

Even factcheck.org presented the Obama campaign's view point, adding their own interpretation, "Obama, contrary to the ad's insinuation, does not support explicit sex education for kindergarteners." The ad is a series of sourced quotes which factcheck.org does not deny are legitimate. Insinuations are not a facts, and factcheck.org bases their critique of the ad off the insinuation that Obama supported 'explicit' sex education for kindergarteners. However, that is not a claim of that ad.

Factcheck and the media felt compelled to express outrage at this ad, but never relayed the substance of the bill. As Byron York reported, "The fact is, the bill’s intention was to mandate that issues like contraception and the prevention of sexually-transmitted diseases be included in sex-education classes for children before the sixth grade, and as early as kindergarten. Obama’s defenders may howl, but the bill is what it is."


As noted in a previous article CNN continued to call the McCain ad a lie even after the National Review article was published. They clearly had not read the text of the bill, but expressed their outrage anyways. Please contact CNN at Election Center and/or Headline News to demand a retraction and an apology for falsely claiming the McCain campaign lied, and please urge others to do the same.

Also, contact factcheck.org at Editor@FactCheck.org and let them know they got his one wrong by interpreting the ad and judging intent, and not reporting on the content and purpose of the bill.



Protest The Media’s Melt Down Over Sex-Ed Ad

5 comments:

Unknown said...

we're fighting an up-hill battle with the media ... when they don't want to revisit the issue, they don't have to .. we should all just resign to the fact that Obama will become the next President.

kmorrison said...

Obama supporter?

The people are the check for a bias media. It's our responsibilty to use our voice when the media acts irresponsibly.

Unknown said...

(2) All course material and instruction shall be age and developmentally appropriate.

It's on the first page of the bill for crying out loud.

kmorrison said...

No one stated that the bill doesn't have an age appropriate clause. The problem is that the media called the ad false without doing their homework. They're supposed to present an unbiased viewpoint. They didn't come even close to doing that.

Blue Dot In Texas said...

you guys are parsing language to try and present Obama as this evil leader who wants to teach sex ed to kinders. So typically Republican. Hopefully, the American people recognize this nonsense and will vote based on ISSUES not smear.