Hey, the left has never thrown a big fit over headlines in print claiming the idiot son was the elected president, regardless of the facts.

Good post.

I was guest blogging at Ezra's this weekend, I found a not dissimilar example. The NYTimes accidentally put a piece on their website about the pope before they had a supporting quote. Powerline's Hindrocket took it as evidence of bias. Weird.

here's the link

Aww shucks you debunked a myth I secretly considered and had about this type of mistake. I always hoped that just for the sake of things, that occasionally there were just a few "smartass" people behind the scenes in print editing rooms that did these types of things as a prank (accidentally on purpose)...not actually as a bias sort of thing against one group or another, but just to shake things up a bit and to get a laugh? No huh. You mean to tell me that people actually make mistakes sometimes without a motive attatched to them! Wow mistakes without a motive, who have I heard telling me that before...thinking, thinking...oh yeah got it, Junior +Iraq wmd claims coming from the right side of the blogosphere(irony isn't dead).

Speaking of wmd's what about those front page stories about wmd's from Judith Miller...ooops never mind not quite the example I guess you were looking for as I understand those "mistakes" were put there intentionally not by accident. ;~P

On a serious note, another fine piece in this series and I will look for some of those examples. I know I have seen them ...just need to think about it a little bit. Keep up the great work. I still haven't been able to find the time to read your last post (#7)as thoroughly and completely as I had hoped yet.

My response to this type of argument is borrowed from a Herman cartoon of a decade and a half ago (perhaps even two decades ago):

"I have good news and I have bad news. Your test results are in. You are an idiot and there is no cure."

This clearly applies to Michelle Malkin who seem to go off the deep end every time right after the Partei rescues her miserable butt. But she's not alone, of course.

But I am still waiting for a post on the most widespread fiction about liberal bias--accusing the MSM of not picking up some wingnut "fact" that does not correspond to reality, e.g., rumors that Drudge simply makes up, or a joke that someone makes (such as Sandy Berger stuffing messages into his socks) that becomes a quotable fact, a manufactured--and blatantly false--datum that someone like Bill Bennett pronounces as fact, etc. It's almost the political double negative--accusing the press on not following up on leads that are fictitious.