12/07/2002

Can't Wait - More Fuming

I can't wait until I return, and have to brave dial-up hell to post this. The John Kerry Haircut character assassination story that I wrote about a few days back has been making the rounds and I'm sure you're been reading about it. But, thanks to Talking Points Memo, I noticed this in a CNN transcript,
And you may remember Cristophe from the $200 trim that he gave Bill Clinton on board Air Force One while it sat on the tarmac at LAX in Los Angeles.
Well, wait a minute. I've written about this before, in a piece titled A Lie Repeated, and Repeated, and Repeated!, and in a piece titled More Fuming, and in a piece titled What the Republicans Think They Can Get Away With.

Clinton did NOT get a $200 haircut while his plane sat on the tarmac at LAX. This was a lie, a smear job, part of a carefully coordinated character assassination campaign, and at this point there is no excuse whatsoever for CNN to be continuing to perpetuate this smear. More than that, there is no excuse for them to not KNOW it was a smear, and part of their JOB ought to be knowing when something like this is part of a smear campaign and NOT REPEAT IT! The whole issue of the Republican character assasination machine is enough of a topic of discussion now that they have to be aware of this issue.

In fact they have a duty to the public to filter out this kind of thing and I think it is time that we, the public, started to hold them accountable for repeating smears rather than protecting the pubic from them. I mean, what the hell BUSINESS do they think are they in. anyway? The news business or the smear perpetuating business. It's high time they make a choice!