1. Jennings Laments Bush Unmoved by Views of Allies or Blix
Peter Jennings took advantage of the time ABC allowed him after President George W. Bush's Thursday night press conference to express his disillusionment with how Bush is not listening to allies or Hans Blix as he marches toward war. On Fox, Washington Post reporter Ceci Connolly chided Bush for a "potentially missed opportunity this evening" in not doing "a lot in terms of preparing the country for what might be involved in this sort of a war."

2. Moran's Question Encapsulates ABC's Blame Bush Attitude
President Bush was hit at his Thursday evening press conference with a bunch of challenges to his Iraq policy, but ABC's Terry Moran certainly encapsulated the attitude brought to bear every night by Peter Jennings which presumes Bush's approach "has drawn millions or ordinary citizens...into the streets in anti-war protests" and made the U.S. "an arrogant power."

3. Bush's Brain Author Says Iraq "Distracts" from Bush Failures
James Moore, co-author of the new book, Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential, expressed a conspiratorial theory on CNN Wednesday night about how political concerns are driving President Bush's Iraq policy. Moore, a veteran television reporter, told Connie Chung that Iraq "distracts" people from the poor economy, how we "can't find a 6 foot, 4 inch Muslim attached to a dialysis machine" and that controlling Iraq means "standing atop of the largest oil reserves in the world" which will put "downward pressure on the price of our oil" and thus "stabilize our economy."

4. Nightline: Kristol's Cabal Bringing Us "To the Brink of War"
Years ago a group of conservative thinkers pushed the U.S. to protect interests in the Middle East and eliminate Iraq's threat before terrorists struck. But instead of praising the group's foresight, Wednesday's Nightline portrayed it all as a nefarious plot. "Tonight, 'The Plan,'" Ted Koppel intoned at the top of the show, "how one group and its blueprint have brought us to the brink of war." Koppel quoted how Moscow paper: "Not since Mein Kampf has a geopolitical punch been so blatantly telegraphed, years ahead of the blow." Koppel agreed with the premise: "Take away the somewhat hyperbolic references to conspiracy, however, and you're left with a story that has the additional advantage of being true."

5. NBC's Expert on How Israel is Targeting Civilians: Hamas
NBC's expert soundbite on how Israel is guilty of killing civilians? A representative of the terrorist group Hamas. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. In a Thursday night NBC Nightly News story on Palestinian civilians getting killed as Israel pursues Hamas terrorists, NBC reporter Martin Fletcher played this clip from Dr. Abdel Aziz Rantisi, identified on screen as a "Hamas spokesman": "This is a new massacre of the occupiers, the Israelis, who all the time are targeting civilians."

6. Garofalo Defends Seeing Bush as Just as Dangerous as Hussein
"Equal, in a different way," actress/comedienne Janeane Garofalo replied when, on Thursday's The Pulse on Fox, Bill O'Reilly asked her if she thinks "George W. Bush is more of a danger to this world than Saddam?" After she condemned Bush for his "with us or against us" rhetoric and claimed his "'axis of evil' speech was not helpful," O'Reilly shot back: "When you say that, people out there, they're gonna think you're a loon."

     >>> "2003 Dishonor Awards: Roasting the Most Outrageously Biased Liberal Reporters." CyberAlert subscribers can get tickets for $150, $25 off the regular price, for the Thursday, March 27 event in Washington, DC. For all the info and how to buy tickets:
http://archive.mrc.org/notablequotables/dishonor/03/info.asp
     Cal Thomas will serve as Master of Ceremonies with Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter and Laura Ingraham amongst those helping to present awards. 
     Rush Limbaugh was one of the judges who picked the winners, along with Lawrence Kudlow, Steve Forbes, Lucianne Goldberg, Michael Reagan and Kate O'Beirne. 
     Plus, the Charlie Daniels Band will sing some songs. The award titles:
Ozzy Osbourne Award (for the Wackiest Comment of the Year)
I Hate You Conservatives Award
Ashamed of the Red, White, and Blue Award
And They Called It Puppy Love Award
The I'm Not a Geopolitical Genius But I Play One on TV Award
     Come to the dinner to watch the winning quotes, see who wins and learn which conservatives will accept each award in jest. It will be a lot of media bashing fun. <<<

Jennings Laments Bush Unmoved by
Views of Allies or Blix

     Peter Jennings took advantage of the time ABC allowed him after President George W. Bush's 8pm EST Thursday night press conference to express his disillusionment with how Bush is not listening to allies or Hans Blix as he marches toward war.

     On Fox, Washington Post reporter Ceci Connolly chided Bush for a "potentially missed opportunity this evening" in not doing "a lot in terms of preparing the country for what might be involved in this sort of a war" and "some of those costs."

     "Did you hear anything in there tonight," Jennings pleaded with reporter Martha Raddatz, "that suggests that the President would listen to any of America's allies during this session at the UN Security Council, or they could say anything that would make a difference?"

     "I didn't really, Peter" Raddatz agreed.

     Jennings concluded ABC's six minutes of post-press conference coverage by lamenting how Chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix's report, expected Friday morning, would have no influence on Bush. As taken down by MRC analyst Brad Wilmouth:
     "I think before tonight maybe a lot of people thought that his information and the tone of his report would make some difference to their argument, but listening to the President tonight, one isn't completely certain about that. The President did say tonight he wants people at the Security Council to show their cards, wants those countries which disagree with him to stand up and declare themselves. And they, of course, would have a completely different interpretation of what's going on at the Security Council. They think, in some respects, they're resisting American heavy-handedness, strong handedness, even bullying in some cases."

     Bush's press conference ended at about 8:52pm EST and in the EST/CST CBS went immediately to Survivor and, after two minutes with Tim Russert and Senator Joe Biden, NBC started Friends. ABC and Fox filled out the hour with analysis and reaction from reporters.

     Tony Snow anchored Fox's seven minutes of post-press conference coverage with reaction from FNC/Fox reporters as well as analysis from Charles Krauthammer and Ceci Connolly who complained:
     "The thing that did strike me Tony, as a potentially missed opportunity this evening, there has been such a growing sense that we are indeed going to war -- when you think about the military build-up, when you think about how many times this President has said the price of inaction is higher than the other price. But he did not do a lot in terms of preparing the country for what might be involved in this sort of a war. And I just wonder if with this kind of a bully pulpit, with so many Americans tuning in tonight, if the White House might have thought a little more about talking about some of those costs. He certainly got those questions, but he really demurred on them."

Moran's Question Encapsulates ABC's
Blame Bush Attitude

President Bush was hit at his Thursday evening press conference with a bunch of challenges to his Iraq policy, but ABC's Terry Moran certainly encapsulated the attitude brought to bear every night by Peter Jennings which presumes Bush's approach "has drawn millions or ordinary citizens...into the streets in anti-war protests" and made the U.S. "an arrogant power."

Terry Moran's question to President Bush during March 6 press conference

     Moran, ABC's White House correspondent, argued in the guise of a question: "In the past several weeks, your policy on Iraq has generated opposition from the governments of France, Russia, China, Germany, Turkey, the Arab League, and many other countries; opened a rift at NATO and at the UN; and drawn millions of ordinary citizens around the world into the streets in anti-war protests. May I ask what went wrong that so many governments and peoples around the world now not only disagree with you very strongly but see the U.S. under your leadership as an arrogant power?"

     And when did you stop beating Laura?

     For more on the coverage of last night's press conference see today's CyberAlert item #1.

     [Web Update: After the Bush press conference, Peter Jennings described Moran's question as "fairly straightforward." Jennings asked Moran: "Terry, you asked the President a fairly straightforward question, and you know the White House better than any of us. Interpret the performance, the President's responses, for us."]

Bush's Brain Author Says Iraq
"Distracts" from Bush Failures

     James Moore, co-author of the new book, Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential, expressed a conspiratorial theory on CNN Wednesday night about how political concerns are driving President Bush's Iraq policy. Moore, a veteran television reporter, told Connie Chung that Iraq "distracts" people from the poor economy, how we "can't find a 6 foot, 4 inch Muslim attached to a dialysis machine" and that controlling Iraq means "standing atop of the largest oil reserves in the world" which will put "downward pressure on the price of our oil" and thus "stabilize our economy."

     MRC analyst Ken Shepherd caught the nefarious view of Bush uttered by Moore when he appeared with co-author Wayne Slater, a Dallas Morning News reporter, on the March 5 Connie Chung Tonight.

     The relevant exchange:

     Chung: "I want to read you a little sentence that came from Tom Friedman for the New York Times. He said: 'Anyone who thinks President Bush is doing this' -- meaning the war in Iraq -- 'for political reasons is nuts. You could do this only if you really believed in it, because Bush is betting his whole presidency on this war of choice.' Doesn't that conflict with one of your premises-"
     Moore: "No."
     Chung: "-and that is that is really a domestic decision on the part of Karl Rove that the United States is heading into war?" 
     Moore: "You have to think about all the things that this does politically for the President. The economy won't get up off of its knees. This distracts from that. We can't find a 6 foot, 4 inch Muslim attached to a dialysis machine knocking around in the mountains of Afghanistan or Pakistan or wherever."
     Chung: "He's talking about Osama bin Laden."
     Moore: "That's right. That distracts from the failed war on terrorism. We get over there and we're standing atop of the largest oil reserves in the world, 200 billion barrels, by some estimates. We're in control of that. That puts a downward pressure on the price of our oil. It stabilizes our economy. We're a military force in the Mideast and we're protecting Israel and co-opting Saudi Arabia at the same time."
     Chung: "Oh, my, how cynical the two of you are. But, in the last 15 seconds, this is sort of like wag the dog." 
     Slater: "Well, it is. In some ways, it is about wag the dog. On the other hand, the thing about Karl Rove is that he means well. The thing, I think, that readers and viewers and folks who are watching the White House ought to remember is that Karl Rove's advice to him is based on politics. His sole goal is to get George Bush reelected. Every decision that the Governor and that the President now makes is because Karl Rove has some input and is a voice that's louder than any other in the White House."

     For a look at the book:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0471423270/qid=1047007735
/sr=2-1/ref=sr_2_1/104-9505067-9432712

     Moore's bio, as listed in the book:
     "James Moore is an Emmy Award-winning TV news correspondent with more than a quarter century of print and broadcast experience. He has traveled extensively on every presidential campaign since 1976. His reports have appeared on CNN, NBC, and CBS. His professional honors include an Emmy from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, the Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio Television News Director's Association, and the Individual Broadcast Achievement Award from the Texas Headliners' Foundation." See:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/detail/-/books/0471423270/
reviews/104-9505067-9432712#04714232707299

Nightline: Kristol's Cabal Bringing Us
"To the Brink of War"

     Back in 1997 and 1998 a group of conservative thinkers very publicly set out to promote an agenda to get the U.S. to pursue a more prominent posture in the Middle East to protect U.S. interests and eliminate Iraq's threat before terrorists struck. But instead of treating the group as insightful thinkers with great foresight who should have been listened to before 9-11, Wednesday's Nightline portrayed it all as a nefarious plot.

     "Tonight, 'The Plan,'" Ted Koppel intoned at the top of the show, "how one group and its blueprint have brought us to the brink of war."

     Koppel soon quoted how the Moscow Times claimed: "Not since Mein Kampf has a geopolitical punch been so blatantly telegraphed, years ahead of the blow." Koppel agreed with the premise: "Take away the somewhat hyperbolic references to conspiracy, however, and you're left with a story that has the additional advantage of being true."

     Koppel related how "back in 1997, a group of Washington heavyweights, almost all of them neo-conservatives, formed an organization called the Project for the New American Century (PNAC)....They were pushing for the elimination of Saddam Hussein and proposing the establishment of a strong U.S. military presence in the Persian Gulf linked to a willingness to use force to protect vital American interests in the Gulf. All of that might be of purely academic interest, were it not for the fact that among the men behind that campaign were such names as Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. What was, back in 1997, merely a theory is now, in 2003, U.S. policy."

     Koppel conceded it was "hardly a conspiracy" since "the proposal was out there for anyone to see," but "certainly an interesting case study of how columnists, commentators and think tank intellectuals can, with time and the election of a sympathetic President, change the course of American foreign policy."

     Jackie Judd began her story, however, with conspiratorial tones. Offer video of a Washington, DC office building which houses the group, as well as The Weekly Standard's office, Judd warned: "Inside this building, behind this door is the brain trust that some suspect has led the U.S. to the brink of war."

     Judd, and later Koppel, gave plenty of time to the group's founder, Bill Kristol, to explain and defend himself, but Nightline's agenda assumed he had something which needed defending. Nightline failed to point out that while Kristol was carrying out his plotting he was simultaneously serving as a commentator on ABC's This Week and ABC never pointed viewers to the PNAC Web site which very publicly features the groups ideas and links to articles and books expressing the concerns of its members.

     Koppel began the March 5 Nightline: "It has been called a secret blueprint for U.S. global domination."
     Bill Kristol: "America was being too timid and too weak and too unassertive in the post-Cold War era."
     Koppel: "A small group of people with a plan to remove Saddam Hussein, long before George W. Bush was elected President."
     Professor Ian Lustick, University of Pennsylvania: "This group set an agenda and have made the President feel that he has to live up to their definitions of manliness and fear their definitions of failure."
     Koppel: "And 9-11 provided the opportunity to set it in motion."
     Kristol: "One of the lessons of 9-11 is that you can't sit back and wait to be hit."
     Koppel: "Tonight, 'The Plan,' how one group and its blueprint have brought us to the brink of war."

     Koppel then set up the program, as checked against the tape by MRC analyst Jessica Anderson: "You can watch our story tonight on at least two levels. One, the conspiracy theory, as in this excerpt from a Scottish newspaper, the Glasgow Sunday Herald; quote, 'A secret blueprint for U.S. global domination reveals that President Bush and his Cabinet were planning a premeditated attack on Iraq to secure regime change even before he took power in January 2001,' end quote. And a similar, if slightly more hysterical version from a Russian paper, the Moscow Times; quote, 'Not since Mein Kampf has a geopolitical punch been so blatantly telegraphed, years ahead of the blow,' end quote. Take away the somewhat hyperbolic references to conspiracy, however, and you're left with a story that has the additional advantage of being true.
     "Back in 1997, a group of Washington heavyweights, almost all of them neo-conservatives, formed an organization called the Project for the New American Century. They did what former government officials and politicians frequently do when they're out of power: they began formulating a strategy, in this case a foreign policy strategy that might bring influence to bear on the administration then in power, headed by President Clinton, or failing that, on a new administration that might someday come to power. They were pushing for the elimination of Saddam Hussein and proposing the establishment of a strong U.S. military presence in the Persian Gulf linked to a willingness to use force to protect vital American interests in the Gulf. 
     "All of that might be of purely academic interest, were it not for the fact that among the men behind that campaign were such names as Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. What was, back in 1997, merely a theory is now, in 2003, U.S. policy. Hardly a conspiracy -- the proposal was out there for anyone to see -- but certainly an interesting case study of how columnists, commentators and think tank intellectuals can, with time and the election of a sympathetic President, change the course of American foreign policy. Here's more from Jackie Judd."

     Judd began: "Inside this building, behind this door is the brain trust that some suspect has led the U.S. to the brink of war."
     Gary Schmitt, Project for the New American Century: "I think we've had a lot of influence because I think we set the terms of a kind of way to think about the world that, in fact, has been picked up in some measure by this administration."
     Judd: "The Project for the New American Century is a loose collection of mostly Republicans who came together out of frustration in 1997."
     Kristol, Project for the New American Century: "I think the principles are those of Ronald Reagan: a strong America; a morally-grounded foreign policy, as well as a foreign policy that defended American security and American interests; an understanding that American leadership was key to not only world stability, but any hope of spreading democracy and freedom around the world."
     Judd: "With a Democrat in the White House, these were people in the political wilderness....Now, Cheney is Vice President; Rumsfeld, Defense Secretary; Wolfowitz, his deputy. Of the 40 people who signed the Project's letter sent to then-President Clinton in 1998, 10 are now in the Bush administration. Others, including Pentagon advisor Richard Perle, have become leading advocates of war. That letter argued the case for a 'comprehensive political and military strategy for bringing down Saddam and his regime.'"
     Kristol: "We didn't finish the job in 1991 against Saddam, so our sense was that lots of lives were being lost, lots of instability was being loosed upon the world, lots of terrible things really were being loosed upon the world because America was being too timid and too weak and too unassertive in the post-Cold War era."
     Judd: "The letter to Mr. Clinton was, in essence, a preview of arguments that would have a more receptive audience five years later. The Clinton White House did bomb Baghdad in 1998, after America's containment policy of Saddam lay dormant, until a Tuesday morning in September. A 76-page white paper, circulating for a year and arguing for an aggressive U.S. foreign policy, suddenly gained new relevance.
     Judd to Schmitt: "In the blueprint it says, 'The process of transformation is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event, like a new Pearl Harbor.' Was 9-11 your Pearl Harbor?"
     Schmitt: "I think it was the country's Pearl Harbor and I think it was the President's Pearl Harbor."
     Judd: "The Project, agitating outside and now inside the administration, seized an opportunity after 9-11, which made war inevitable, argues Professor Ian Lustick of the University of Pennsylvania."
     Lustick: "Before 9/11, this group was in the position it is in, but could not win over the President to this extravagant image of what foreign policy required. After 9-11, it was able to benefit from the gigantic eruption of political capital, combined with a supply of military preponderance in the hands of the President, and this small group, therefore, was able to gain direct contact and even control, now, of the White House."
     Judd: "According to the book 'Bush at War' by Bob Woodward, it was only 30 hours after the 9-11 attacks that Rumsfeld asked the President why shouldn't the U.S. go against Iraq, not just al-Qaeda? At the Pentagon on September 13th, Wolfowitz for the first time alluded to that broader goal....Out of all this, a conspiracy theory blossomed, especially in Europe. From Scotland to Russia to England, writers who oppose a war have written about a cabal of neo-conservatives pulling the strings of the President, a cabal with visions of an imperialist America dominating the world. Even Ian Lustick thinks the Project has acted in a conspiratorial way."
     Lustick: "This group with the, what I call, the tom-tom beaters have set an agenda and have made the President feel that he has to live up to their definitions of manliness, their definitions of success and fear their definitions of failure."
     Judd, to Schmitt: "You know that the critics have called you and your group conspirators, the Dominators with a capital D, fanatics. Any or all of it true?"
     Schmitt: "No, none, none. It's very simple."
     Judd: "Why do you think you've been labeled all of that?"
     Schmitt: "Well, I think there's a lot of people unhappy with the change in the administration's policy and American policy writ large, and in the absence of actually addressing their concerns directly, they'd rather think that it's some sort of conspiracy."
     Judd: "Some critics compare the Project to the group of men who helped to lead America into Vietnam and came to be known as 'the best and the brightest.' Kristol dismisses the comparison. Still, he says, as America seems poised to go to war, there is a degree of accountability he will feel when the first bomb drops."
     Kristol: "Of course I'll feel some sense of responsibility. The only point I would also make, though, is one also has to take responsibility, one would also have to take responsibility if one advocated doing nothing and then if something terrible happens, and I worry. I worry not because I'm going to look bad, I worry because people could die and will die in this war."
     Judd: "And after a war, the Project has a vision beyond a regime change in Iraq, a vision in which the United States government inserts itself in other failed regimes in the Middle East, so this truly does become a new American century. This is Jackie Judd for Nightline in Washington."
     Koppel: "So we know how the founders of PNAC took us from where we were to where we are, but where do they plan to take us next? I'll talk with one of the founders of that group when we come back."

     Koppel soon interviewed Kristol: 
     -- "Bill, if you'll forgive me, I'm a little less interested with where you've brought us and more interested in where you theorize that we are going to go. What is it that you're recommending for the future?"
     -- "When you talk about the democratization of the Middle East, though, first of all, I think you're wise enough to put it in terms of at least 20 years, but what does that entail in terms of the continuing presence of U.S. forces in the region?"
     -- "All of those things are undeniably true, but what does that mean in terms of the continuing presence of U.S. forces? I mean, the President famously noted in his State of the Union address a little more than a year ago that there was an axis of evil, and he mentioned not only North Korea, but also Iran. Should we assume that part of the larger vision that you and your colleagues had, or have to this day, is the removal, either by force or otherwise, of the current power structure in Iran?"
     -- "Does it bother you that it appears that it is going to be a largely unilateral policy? I don't want to diminish the influence of our British friends, but this is clearly an American policy."
     -- "What we've also learned over the past 10 or 12 years is that some of our putative allies in the region turn out to be not quite as friendly as we thought, like the Saudis for example, and part of the problem has been that we have had a rather significant U.S. military presence in Saudi Arabia. What makes you and your colleagues believe that a greater military presence throughout the region won't engender even more animosity toward the United States and more terrorism?"
     -- "Do you think that we will have an adequate discussion of all that you are talking about here, which really has not been publicly discussed by the administration, in the months ahead?"

     PNAC's Web site with all its villainous ideas on display:
http://www.newamericancentury.org/index.html

     Its principles:
http://www.newamericancentury.org/statementofprinciples.htm

     Many of its public pronouncements:
http://www.newamericancentury.org/lettersstatements.htm

     Its letter to Clinton in 1998:
http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqclintonletter.htm

     Its "blueprint" paper:
http://www.newamericancentury.org/publicationsreports.htm

NBC's Expert on How Israel is
Targeting Civilians: Hamas

     NBC's expert soundbite on how Israel is guilty of killing civilians? A representative of the terrorist group Hamas. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.

     In a Thursday night NBC Nightly News story on Palestinian civilians getting killed as Israel pursues Hamas terrorists, NBC reporter Martin Fletcher played this clip from Dr. Abdel Aziz Rantisi, identified on screen as a "Hamas spokesman": "This is a new massacre of the occupiers, the Israelis, who all the time are targeting civilians."

     He should certainly know since that's all his group does, while with Israel it's a byproduct of trying to hunt down the murdering members of Hamas, but Fletcher didn't make the distinction though anchor Tom Brokaw did refer to "Hamas terrorists."

     Brokaw introduced the March 6 story, as transcribed by MRC analyst Brad Wilmouth: "Eleven Palestinians were killed today as Israel continued its pursuit of Hamas terrorists, just hours after a Palestinians suicide bomber killed 15 including one American on a bus in Haifa. In the past two-and-a-half years of conflict, an estimated 2,100 Palestinians and 740 Israelis have died. NBC's Martin Fletcher tonight on the civilians who got caught today in the hunt for Hamas."

     Fletcher explained: "6am in Jabalia refugee camp, Gaza. Palestinian firemen battle a blaze while down the street, battle raged between Palestinian gunmen and Israeli soldiers. Then, suddenly, an Israeli tank shell slams into the street, shrapnel slicing through the air, bodies decapitated. A Palestinian eyewitness said he saw gunmen firing at the Israelis from a nearby building, and then soldiers shot back with a tank shell. The dead and wounded, mostly civilians, including Reuters photographers. A final moment of carnage after a night of Israeli raids in Gaza that left 11 Palestinians dead, more than a 100 wounded. All part of a three-week Israeli campaign against Islamic militants of Hamas. The attacks have killed more than 70 Palestinians."
     Dr. Abdel Aziz Rantisi, Hamas spokesman: "This is a new massacre of the occupiers, the Israelis, who all the time are targeting civilians."
     Fletcher: "The army says they were targeting the gunmen, and Israeli critics complained President Bush tolerates anything Sharon does in his fight against terror....Many in Europe and the Middle East say the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a more urgent problem than Iraq...."

Garofalo Defends Seeing Bush as Just
as Dangerous as Hussein

     "Equal, in a different way," actress/comedienne Janeane Garofalo replied when, on Thursday's The Pulse on Fox, Bill O'Reilly asked her if she thinks "George W. Bush is more of a danger to this world than Saddam?" After she condemned Bush for his "with us or against us" rhetoric and claimed his "'axis of evil' speech was not helpful," O'Reilly shot back: "When you say that, people out there, they're gonna think you're a loon."

     Garofalo did, however, promise that if she is proven wrong and Iraqis welcome U.S. troops who find stores of weapons of mass destruction, "I will go to the White House on my knees on cut glass and say, 'hey, you were right, I shouldn't have doubted you.'" But, she quickly added, "I think to think that is preposterous."

     MRC analyst Brad Wilmouth took down the exchange on the March 6 The Pulse:

     O'Reilly: "Let me ask you a flat-out question. Do you think that George W. Bush is more of a danger to this world than Saddam?"
     Garofalo: "I would say he is a danger in a different way, and I'll tell you why."
     O'Reilly: "More or less than Saddam?"
     Garofalo: "Equal, in a different way. Wait a minute, and let me, let me say it. I would say there needs to be some accountability for the idea that we might not be where we are right now if some different choices had been made in the wake of 9/11. I would say the 'with us or against us' rhetoric was not helpful, the 'axis of evil' speech was not helpful. And this huge ramping up of war, and this go-it-alone attitude has not been helpful. Now, do I think he's a crazy despotic ruler like Saddam Hussein who would pour acid on his own people? Absolutely not."
     O'Reilly: "Okay. Now, I respect your opinion. I think you're wrong. But just the fact that you equate on a moral level Saddam with George W. Bush-"
     Garofalo: "I'm not equating on a moral level."
     O'Reilly: "I just asked you a flat-out question, Janine, who's a bigger threat to the world, and you said they're equal."
     Garofalo: "In a different way."
     O'Reilly: "When you say that, people out there, they're gonna think you're a loon."
     Garofalo: "No, I don't know if they'll think, well, they certainly are entitled to."
     O'Reilly: "If you are wrong, all right, and if the United States -- and they will, this is going to happen -- goes in, liberates Iraq, people in the street, American flags, hugging our soldiers, all right, we find all kinds of bad, bad stuff, all right, in Iraq, you gonna apologize to George W. Bush?"
     Garofalo: "I would be so willing to say I'm sorry, I hope to God that I can be made a buffoon of, that people will say you were wrong, you were a fatalist, and I will go to the White House on my knees on cut glass and say, hey, you were right, I shouldn't have doubted you. But I think to think that is preposterous."

     Garofalo claimed on MSNBC back on February 20 that Bush is as great a threat to peace as Hussein. As recounted in the February 21 CyberAlert, asked by Mike Barnicle on MSNBC about whether she considers Bush or Hussein to be "a bigger threat to world peace?", actress/comedienne Garofalo maintained: "I say at this point, for different reasons, they are both very threatening to world peace and to deny that is to be incredibly naive." For details:
http://archive.mrc.org/cyberalerts/2003/cyb20030221.asp#3

     For a picture of Garofalo and a full rundown of her TV and movie roles, see her bio on the Internet Movie Database Web site: http://us.imdb.com/Name?Garofalo,+Janeane

     Garofalo is the one with the "preposterous" view of the world. -- Brent Baker