1. Stephanopoulos a Conduit for Hillary's Smearing of GOP
George Stephanopoulos, conduit for Hillary Clinton's unsubstantiated claim that Republicans practice racist politics. Stephanopoulos raised the allegation both on Friday's World News Tonight and Sunday's This Week. On Friday, he tied in Senator Frist specifically as he added how Democrats have asked the "Justice Department to investigate the 2002 elections. They say Republicans tried to keep blacks from voting. Bill Frist was the man leading that election charge."

2. That Frist is White and Senate Has No Blacks Stuns CNN Anchor
The fact that Senator Bill Frist is white disturbed CNN anchor Kyra Phillips on Friday as she seemed to not realize the Senate has no black members of either party. "It's sort of ironic," she decided just past 2pm EST, "because the possible replacements, once again: white males." Informed of the Senate's lack of diversity, Phillips was appalled: "Diversity in the Senate, it's not there. That is a problem. Why is there no diversity in the Senate? And that's got to change, plain and simple."

3. Woodruff Suggests Frist Just as Bad as Lott on Civil Rights
CNN's Judy Woodruff suggested that Bill Frist isn't any better than Trent Lott because both voted the same way on civil rights: "Both the Senator from Mississippi and the Senator from Tennessee voted 'yes' on banning affirmative action....And both voted 'no' two years ago on expanding hate crimes to include sexual orientation." She demanded of Senator John Warner: "Some of the Democrats are saying, look, you're replacing him with a new face, a fresh face, but the voting record of these two gentlemen, particularly on civil rights issues, issues of interest to the minority communities, are exactly the same."

4. MSNBC Sees "Code Words" in Reagan Speech
On MSNBC's Hardball on Thursday night David Shuster outlined Bill Clinton's case about how the Republicans have for decades employed a racist "Southern strategy." Shuster suggested Ronald Reagan employed "code words" in a 1980 speech in Mississippi, but the clip of Reagan didn't have any. Shuster preposterously claimed that "in 1988 George Bush won the South with help from Willie Horton." Bush won big so some ad by an outside group which got little play beyond news reports could not have had much impact. (Fox's Brit Hume suggested the media think "the Republican Party has...a racist past and perhaps even to this day a racist core.")

5. Now CBS Highlights Racist Remarks by Democrats
Now they tell their viewers. On Friday night, after Trent Lott had stepped down, the CBS Evening News ran a piece which highlighted a couple of instances of racists remarks from Democrats Fritz Hollings and Robert Byrd.

6. Broder Contrasts GOP Favorably with How Dems Treated Clinton
Washington Post reporter/columnist David Broder, on Sunday's Meet the Press, contrasted how Republicans took on Lott with how Democrats are "losers" in the controversy because "when they had a moral issue in front of them with President Clinton they...never acted against him. Indeed, they rallied around him."

7. Schieffer Slept Through Lott's Remarks
Bob Schieffer missed Trent Lott's remarks at Strom Thurmond's birthday party because he fell asleep while watching the event on C-SPAN. Schieffer conceded on Face the Nation: "I listened to Bob Dole's tribute, and it was funny. But by the time Lott rose to speak, the effects of lunch had set in, it was snowing outside, warm inside and I fell sound asleep."

8. ABC Hypes "Historic" Homelessness Made Up of Working Moms
Just in time for the holidays, a fresh dose of hype about homelessness. ABC's Elizabeth Vargas ominously warned on World News Tonight/Saturday: "The ranks of the homeless across the nation are growing sharply. The problem has reached historic levels in some big cities and the suburbs aren't far behind." Reporter Barbara Pinto painted them as sympathetically as possible: "Advocates say most of the new homeless are women with children, many of them work full time."

9. Letterman's "Top Ten Questions to Ask Yourself Before Jumping Out of a Helicopter."
As announced by ten paratroopers as they stood in the doorway of a helicopter, Letterman's "Top Ten Questions to Ask Yourself Before Jumping Out of a Helicopter."

Stephanopoulos a Conduit for Hillary's
Smearing of GOP

      George Stephanopoulos, conduit for Hillary Clinton's unsubstantiated claim that the Republican Party practices racist politics. Stephanopoulos raised the allegation both on Friday's World News Tonight and Sunday's This Week. On Friday, he tied in Senator Frist specifically as he added, without citing any evidence, how Democrats have asked the "Justice Department to investigate the 2002 elections. They say Republicans tried to keep blacks from voting. Bill Frist was the man leading that election charge." On Sunday, he asked Orrin Hatch: "Does your party still have some cleansing to do on the race issue?"

     Peter Jennings asked Stephanopoulos on the December 20 World News Tonight: "George, you listened to the Democrats today and they're trying to not make it about Trent Lott or even Senator Frist, but about policy."
     Stephanopoulos responded by giving publicity to claims neither CBS or NBC touched that night: "That's exactly right Peter. Their reaction is very similar to their reaction when President Bush changed his economic team just a couple of weeks ago, 'it's not the person, it's the policy.' Leading that charge is actually former President Clinton and Senator Clinton today and already today Democrats are now petitioning the Justice Department to investigate the 2002 elections. They say Republicans tried to keep blacks from voting. Bill Frist was the man leading that election charge."

     Two days later, on Sunday's This Week, Stephanopoulos began a segment with Senators Orrin Hatch and Patrick Leahy by confronting Hatch: "I want to begin by playing short statement about the controversy made by Senator Clinton on Friday. Here's what she had to say:"
     Hillary Clinton: "If anyone thinks that one person stepping down from a leadership position cleanses the Republican Party of their constant exploitation of race then I think you're naive."
     Stephanopoulos: "What do you make of those comments? Does your party still have some cleansing to do on the race issue?"
     Hatch: "I was really disappointed in her comments. I happen to like Hillary Clinton and get along well with her, but that was as race-baiting as anything I know. You know, the attitude is that only Democrats care about minorities. That's pure BS..."

     To be fair to Stephanopoulos, this is the Christmas season after all, on Fox News Sunday Brit Hume played the same Hillary Clinton soundbite for Senator Mitch McConnell.

That Frist is White and Senate Has No
Blacks Stuns CNN Anchor

     The fact that Senator Bill Frist, the expected new Senate Majority Leader, is white disturbed CNN afternoon anchor Kyra Phillips on Friday as she seemed to not realize the Senate has no black members of either party. "It's sort of ironic," she decided just past 2pm EST, "because the possible replacements, once again: white males." Informed of the Senate's lack of diversity, Phillips was appalled and, sounding like a Valley Girl, expressed her disappointment: "Diversity in the Senate, it's not there. That is a problem. Why is there no diversity in the Senate? And that's got to change, plain and simple."

     The comments from Phillips, brought to my attention by former MRCer Tim Graham, occurred during a segment on the December 20 Live From in which Jeff Greenfield and Judy Woodruff were the guests.

     Phillips queried Greenfield: "And, Jeff, you've brought up the issue of race relations, you know, coming to the forefront here. Big issue at hand. And yet it's sort of ironic because the possible replacements, once again: white males. So is someone like Frist, okay, coming up against an even bigger battle here?"

     Greenfield explained: "I think the issue is a little larger than even you indicated because I don't care who's in power in the Senate, there's going to be a white person in charge because there are no blacks in the U.S. Senate. In fact, since Reconstruction, there have been a grand total of two: Ed Brooke, the Republican from Massachusetts; and Carole Moseley-Braun, the Democrat from Illinois...."

     Phillips turned to Woodruff and delivered a mini-lecture: "And, Judy, definitely we want to look at that issue. Diversity in the Senate, it's not there. That is a problem. Why is there no diversity in the Senate? And that's got to change, plain and simple."

     For a picture and bio of Phillips: http://www.cnn.com/CNN/anchors_reporters/cnn/phillips.kyra.html

Woodruff Suggests Frist Just as Bad as
Lott on Civil Rights

     Later on Friday, CNN's Judy Woodruff suggested that Bill Frist isn't any better than Trent Lott because both voted the same way on civil rights, as defined by liberals, as if opposing quotas and being against including sexual orientation in hate crimes makes one a racist.

     Woodruff warned Inside Politics viewers that on civil rights "the record shows that several" of Frist's "key votes mirrored those of Lott. Both the Senator from Mississippi and the Senator from Tennessee voted 'yes' on banning affirmative action. That vote was in 1995. And both voted 'no' two years ago on expanding hate crimes to include sexual orientation."

     Moments later Woodruff demanded of Senator John Warner: "Some of the Democrats are saying, look, you're replacing him with a new face, a fresh face, but the voting record of these two gentlemen, particularly on civil rights issues, issues of interest to the minority communities, are exactly the same. How is Bill Frist going to be different from Trent Lott?" Woodruff proceeded to cite how Bill Clinton claimed "the whole Republican apparatus supported campaigns in Georgia and South Carolina on the Confederate flag."

     Woodruff asked near the top of her December 20 show: "Where does Bill Frist stand on civil rights, the issue that brought down Trent Lott? Well, the record shows that several of his key votes mirrored those of Lott. Both the Senator from Mississippi and the Senator from Tennessee voted 'yes' on banning affirmative action. That vote was in 1995. And both voted 'no' two years ago on expanding hate crimes to include sexual orientation. The Trent Lott controversy has opened the door for some Democrats to question the Republican Party's overall record on race issues. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle said today, quote, 'The new Republican leader in the Senate must do more now than merely disavow Senator Lott's words. He or she must confront the Republican Party's record on race and embrace policies that promote genuine healing and greater opportunity for all Americans.' In the House, incoming Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi echoed a similar theme."
     Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader: "Clearly, it is an issue that the Republicans could not ignore. It became too hot to handle, and I think the American people conveyed to the Republican Party that this would be an unacceptable way to proceed with its leadership. But it's up to the Republicans to choose their leadership, and they have done that."

     A bit later Woodruff pressed Warner: "Senator, what about the broader questions here? Some of the Democrats are saying, look, you're replacing him with a new face, a fresh face, but the voting record of these two gentlemen, particularly on civil rights issues, issues of interest to the minority communities, are exactly the same. How is Bill Frist going to be different from Trent Lott?"

     Interviewing South Carolina Governor-elect Mark Sanford, Woodruff maintained her mantra: "If you look at the civil rights voting records of both Trent Lott and Bill Frist, they're really not that different. How, so how is Bill Frist going to be any better for the Republican Party in terms of its image when it comes to civil rights issues?"
     Sanford: "Well, I think that it's a question of how you view civil rights issues. In other words, one can have a legitimate difference of opinion on an issue like affirmative action or an issue like school choice. The problem was, in Trent's case, it became supercharged as racist as well. The difference is, I think, quite clear. You can, again, have a legitimate difference of opinion. In one case, you're going to be charged as a racist. In the other, I think you'd be charged as somebody who has a legitimate difference of opinion."
     Woodruff: "Let me quote something to you, or at least cite something that former President Bill Clinton said this week. He and other Democrats criticizing Republicans for exploiting the issue of race. At one point he said, 'I mean the whole Republican apparatus supported campaigns in Georgia and South Carolina on the Confederate flag.' What do you say to-"
     Sanford: "I've just got to say that, you know, with all due respect to the former President, he's wrong. If you look at the ideas, for instance, our campaign was based on here in South Carolina, it was not at all a debate about the flag, but it was a debate about how do you advance income levels, raise income levels, and education and health care for everybody in South Carolina, whether they're black or white?..."
     Woodruff: "And what about the incoming Democratic leader in the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, who said today in a statement, she said the Republicans have repeatedly exploited the issue of race as recently as the election in November in Georgia. She said what happened in Georgia was a shameful manifestation of the same sentiment expressed by Senator Lott."

MSNBC Sees "Code Words" in Reagan Speech

     On MSNBC's Hardball on Thursday night David Shuster outlined the standard liberal case about how the Republicans have for decades employed a racist "Southern strategy" to appeal to white voters. While Shuster did at the very end mention Democrat Robert Byrd's Klan membership and use of the "N" word, and he let someone in a soundbite point out how Bill Clinton as Governor honored the Confederate flag, Shuster followed Clinton's script.

     Shuster suggested Ronald Reagan employed "code words" in a 1980 speech in Mississippi. He then ran this clip of Reagan from the event: "What we will really do and what we'll have to do is to bring back to this country what is so evident here. Bring back the recognition that the people of this country can solve the problems. That we don't have anything to be afraid of as long as we have the people of America."

     Which words are the "code words"? Shuster did not say before preposterously claiming that "in 1988 George Bush won the South with help from Willie Horton." Bush won big enough so some ad by an outside group which got little play beyond news reports could hardly have had any significant impact.

     Shuster opened his December 19 polemic, as taken down by MRC analyst Geoffrey Dickens:
     "From his perch in the presidential peanut gallery Bill Clinton has already taken shots at the Bush administration over Iraq and Osama Bin Laden. Now the former President has smash-mouthed his way into the debate over Trent Lott. Mr. Clinton said Republicans who criticized Lott for racial insensitivity are quote, 'Pretty hypocritical. I think what they are really upset about is that he made public their strategy. They try to suppress black voting. They ran on the Confederate flag in Georgia and South Carolina and from top to bottom the Republicans supported it."
     David Martin, African-American Republican Leadership Council: "As Governor he issued a proclamation for Confederate Day in Arkansas...just trying to be funny or hypocritical or weigh-in like anyone really cares about his political opinion any more. He's a formerly impeached President. This man has no room to talk about being hypocritical."
     Nonetheless, Shuster returned to Clinton's outline: "But by all accounts Mr. Clinton has hit a GOP nerve. In 1980, as part of a Southern strategy, Ronald Reagan kicked off his presidential campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi. A town where three civil rights workers had been murdered. Reagan used code words like this."
     Reagan: "What we will really do and what we'll have to do is to bring back to this country what is so evident here. Bring back the recognition that the people of this country can solve the problems. That we don't have anything to be afraid of as long as we have the people of America."
     Shuster: "In 1988 George Bush won the South with help from Willie Horton. Democrats said the attack ad was unfair and racist. Two years ago, George W. Bush, while battling for the South Carolina primary spoke at Bob Jones University which had a policy prohibiting interracial dating. Mr. Bush also refused to criticize the Confederate battle flag flying over the state capitol."
     George W. Bush: "I believe the people of South Carolina can figure out what to do with this flag issue."
     Shuster: "And this year the people in South Carolina and Georgia voted out Democrat-incumbent governors who had criticized the Confederate flag. But Republicans say the elections turned on other issues."
     Martin: "They need to come up with their own doggone message and stop trying to say, 'Well because of this, we lost.' Because you ran foolish candidates is because of the reason you lost."
     Shuster concluded: "Of course both parties have their Southern skeletons. Senate Democrat Robert Byrd, a former Klan member, used the 'N' word during an interview just last year. So the question is, is Bill Clinton out of line or is the Republican Party racially insensitive? I'm David Shuster for Hardball in Washington."

     Clinton is certainly in tune with the news media.

     Indeed, as Brit Hume observed on Fox News Sunday: "The media are interested in this story and they rather believe and agree with the argument that...in general that the Republican Party has sort of a racist past and perhaps even to this day a racist core."

     Previous CyberAlert items on the media's skill at seeing any Republican racial maneuver at a thousand yards while not being able see the history of the Democratic Party as the party of segregation and a party which is currently using racial fear mongering:

     -- The media's hypocrisy. They've pounced on Trent Lott, but on National Review Online Marc Levin noted how they didn't care when just six weeks ago Bill Clinton praised J. William Fulbright, a racist, segregationist Senator, for urging Americans to be "utopian in our values and vision." In 1993, Clinton awarded Fulbright a Presidential Medal of Freedom and gushed: "The American political system produced this remarkable man, and my state did, and I'm real proud of it." See: http://archive.mrc.org/cyberalerts/2002/cyb20021211.asp#3

     -- Both parties have used race at times to attract votes, but this week's Time and Newsweek magazines smeared only Republicans, and especially conservatives, as the ones exploiting white resentments against blacks. Newsweek declared: "Trent Lott and the GOP grew up together in the South. They both have a painful secret." Time argued: "When the Democratic Party embrace the civil rights movement, many alienated Southerners turned to the Republicans. The effects are still being felt today." It only took 40 years. Time even portrayed the Contract with America as racist. http://archive.mrc.org/cyberalerts/2002/cyb20021219.asp#1

     -- Republicans and conservatives as race exploiters, part 2. "Grand Old Segregationists" announced the headline over an online-only piece by Newsweek's Eleanor Clift who contended: "With one stupid and thoughtless attempt at humor, Lott stripped away the carefully constructed facade the Bush team erected at the GOP convention in 2000 and revealed the party's true colors." Jack White charged in an online posting for Time that Ronald Reagan "set a standard for exploiting white anger and resentment rarely seen since George Wallace stood in the schoolhouse door." http://archive.mrc.org/cyberalerts/2002/cyb20021219.asp#2

Now CBS Highlights Racist Remarks
by Democrats

     Now they tell their viewers. On Friday night, after Trent Lott had stepped down, the CBS Evening News ran a piece which highlighted a couple of instances of racists remarks from Democrats, comments CBS had not cited in previous Lott stories.

     Dan Rather noted on his December 20 broadcast: "The controversy Lott started is not over. Playing the race card in American politics didn't start or end with him. And politicians are scrambling to understand how the stakes and the times are changing. CBS News correspondent Bob Orr has this part of the story."
     Orr: "Even as the Senate's top Republican was fighting to hold on, Trent Lott sensed a change."
     Trent Lott: "There's an opportunity here. This is a wake-up call."
     Orr: "But it was too late for Lott, perhaps the first Senator to lose power over a racial remark. He was not the first to have crossed the line. South Carolina Democrat Fritz Hollings once said of African guests at a trade conference, 'Rather than eat each other, they'd just come for a square meal.' Alabama Republican Jeff Sessions once labeled a white civil rights lawyer, 'a disgrace to his race.' And just last year, West Virginia Democrat Robert Byrd, a former Ku Klux Klansman, claimed race relations had improved, before adding:"
     Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) on Fox News Sunday: "I've seen a lot of white niggers in my time, if you wanna use that word."
     Orr: "Byrd's apology quickly squelched the fallout. A series of apologies couldn't save Lott...."

Broder Contrasts GOP Favorably with How
Dems Treated Clinton

     Democrats punted when presented with a moral crisis, but Republicans came through, Washington Post reporter/columnist David Broder opined on Sunday's Meet the Press in a rare rebuke from a member of the media of how liberals handled the Lewinsky mess.

     Asked by moderator Tim Russert to say who came out losers in the Lott case, Broder first cited soon-to-be Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle because it will be hard for him to paint Republicans as scary when they are led by Senator Bill Frist. Broder then added: "The other reason I think the Democrats are losers is that when they had a moral issue in front of them with President Clinton they denounced them but they never acted against him. Indeed, they rallied around him and I think that contrast is one that people will remember."

Schieffer Slept Through Lott's Remarks

     So how does CBS's Chief Washington Correspondent keep on top of the latest political developments three hours before the CBS Evening News goes on the air? He takes a nap. On Sunday's Face the Nation Bob Schieffer admitted that he didn't hear Trent Lott's remarks at Strom Thurmond's December 5 birthday party because they put him to sleep. The event started at 3pm EST and ended a bit past 4pm, which puts Schieffer asleep sometime after 3:30 in the afternoon.

     Quite the rigorous work standard at the CBS News Washington bureau.

     Schieffer used his usual end of show commentary on December 22 to explain why he was so slow to pick up on the Lott remarks:
     "Finally today, the question I was asked was a good one, and it was this: If Trent Lott's remark that the country would have been better off had then-segregationist Strom Thurmond been elected President in 1948, then why did you and the rest of the press wait several days to report it? Well, I've got an answer. It's not much of an answer, but here it is. Lott uttered those words at old Strom's 100th birthday party at the Capitol. It snowed that day. I didn't expect much news there, so instead of going to the Capitol, I had a long lunch and decided to watch the party on C-SPAN from the cozy confines of my office. I listened to Bob Dole's tribute, and it was funny. But by the time Lott rose to speak, the effects of lunch had set in, it was snowing outside, warm inside and I fell sound asleep...."

ABC Hypes "Historic" Homelessness Made Up
of Working Moms

     Just in time for the holidays, a fresh dose of exaggeration about homelessness, complete with the usual lack of any facts to back up the hype of an ever-worsening crisis.

     The latest purveyor of the liberal dread: ABC's World News Tonight/Saturday. On the December 21 program, anchor Elizabeth Vargas ominously intoned: "The ranks of the homeless across the nation are growing sharply. The problem has reached historic levels in some big cities and the suburbs aren't far behind. In Minneapolis, funds earmarked to help the homeless are expected to shrink by 40 percent. As ABC's Barbara Pinto reports, it is a system already bursting at the seams."

     Checking in from Minneapolis, Pinto did not cite any evidence beyond the anecdotal claims of homeless advocates and she did not utter a syllable about any surge in homelessless in any suburb.

     Pinto did, naturally, try to paint the homeless as sympathetically as possible so viewers would empathize with the victims: "Advocates say most of the new homeless are women with children, many of them work full time."

     Pinto soon concluded over video of a homeless man walking down a sidewalk as it snowed: "With shelters underfunded and overflowing it will be a long cold winter for many."

     Forgive my lack of sympathy, but this is the same old tale about "historic" levels of homelessless which afflicts working mothers with children the most that we heard all the time during the 1980s. It was exaggerated then for political gain and I'd bet this story reflects the same phenomenon.

Letterman's "Top Ten Questions to Ask
Yourself Before Jumping Out of a Helicopter."

     From the December 20 Late Show with David Letterman, as announced by ten paratroopers from the Army's Special Operation Command and 18th Airborne Corps from Fort Bragg, North Carolina as they stood in the doorway of a helicopter, the "Top Ten Questions to Ask Yourself Before Jumping Out of a Helicopter." Late Show Web page: http://www.cbs.com/latenight/lateshow/

10. "Do I have a fear of spiders or a fear of heights?"
(Sergeant First Class Michael McCrann)

9. "Am I feeling aerodynamic?"
(Sergeant First Class Donna Mungia)

8. "Wouldn't it be easier to get out after we land?"
(Staff Sergeant Shawn Broe)

7. "What the hell am I doing?"
(Staff Sergeant Dwight Simon)

6. "Am I supposed to tip the pilot?"
(Staff Sergeant Jessica Riggins)

5. "I hope my rental car is ready?"
(Specialist Jacob Canterbury)

4. "What's the deal with Michael Jackson?"
(Specialist Justin Ford)

3. "Am I really in that much of a hurry to get to the ground?"
(Sergeant Zach Wobler)

2. "Everybody's jumping, right?"
(Sergeant First Class Scott Pitkin)

1. "Were burritos the best thing to eat for lunch?"
(Private First Class Ryan Delaney)

     Have a Merry Christmas, or if not of the Christian faith, a few happy days off from work. -- Brent Baker

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