Column by Mike Rosen in Denver Rocky Mountain News

Hot off the presses, the Media Research Institute's 15th annual awards for the most biased, manipulative or downright goofy quotes from liberals in the "mainstream" media. I'm honored to serve, once again, on MRC's distinguished panel of conservatively biased judges. Here are some of the highlights from among the winners and runners-up of Best Notable Quotables of 2002:

• Media Hero Award: "For Castro, freedom starts with education. And if literacy alone were the yardstick, Cuba would rank as one of the freest nations on earth. The literacy rate is 96 percent."
-- Barbara Walters narrating her interview with Fidel Castro on ABC's 20/20, Oct. 11.

"I leave my friends behind and rush the stage to try to dance with (former Attorney General Janet) Reno, only to find myself in a small crowd of men living the same fantasy. When I finally push my way past them, she is gone."
-- Time staff writer Joel Stein recounting Reno's dance party fund-raiser for her campaign for Florida governor, July 29 issue.

• Good Morning Morons Award: "Iraqi citizens are preparing to go to the polls to decide whether Hussein stays in office."
-- Preview of an Oct. 14 segment on CNN's American Morning with Paula Zahn posted on CNN's Web site.

Mark McEwen: "Up and down the East coast, it's coming our way, but we will probably see just rain in the big cities."
Bryant Gumbel: "We never get any snow."
McEwan: "Do you think it's global warming?"
Gumbel: "Yes, yes."
McEwan: "Do you, Jane?"
Jane Clayson: "Yeah."
McEwan: "We're unanimous . . . it's global warming!"
-- Exchange on CBS' Early Show, Feb. 6.

Charles Gibson: "My wife has a sign on her office wall and it says, 'Won't it be a great day when the Air Force has to hold bake sales to get a new bomber and the schools will have all the money they need?' "
Diane Sawyer: "I love your wife! I love her for many reasons. Love that sign."
-- Exchange on the Oct. 2 Good Morning America. Gibson's wife, Arlene, runs an all-girls private school in New York City.

• Politics of Meaningless Award for the Silliest Analysis: "Since the early 1970s, the number of state prisoners has increased 500 percent, growing each year in the 1990s even as crime fell."
-- New York Times reporter Fox Butterfield in a Jan. 21 news story. Note: Butterfield senses a conflict here. Apparently, it didn't occur to him that crime might have fallen precisely because more criminals remain in jail.

"I can remember when the Labor government was elected in 1945 Britain . . . And I thought, well, this is great. Socialism is really going to have a chance . . . Well, it just turned out to be more difficult and the resources weren't there. You know, the health service doesn't work. I'm still for it. But it doesn't work."
-- Retiring New York Times columnist and former reporter Anthony Lewis after being asked what big conclusions he had drawn after his half-century career, in Dec. 16, 2001, Times interview.

• Quote of the Year: "The entire federal government - the Congress, the executive, the courts - is united behind a right-wing agenda for which George W. Bush believes he now has a mandate. The agenda includes the power of the state to force pregnant women to surrender control over their own lives. It includes using the taxing power to transfer wealth from working people to the rich. It includes giving corporations a free hand to eviscerate the environment and control the regulatory agencies meant to hold them accountable. And it includes secrecy on a scale you cannot imagine. Above all, it means judges with a political agenda appointed for life. If you like the Supreme Court that put George W. Bush in the White House, you will swoon over what's coming. And if you like God in government, get ready for the Rapture . . . "
-- Bill Moyers' end of show commentary on PBS's Now the Friday after the election, Nov. 8.

To Moyers and his ilk, the liberal agenda is simply the natural order of things. If your stomach is strong enough to handle the complete awards list, you can get it on-line at www.mrc.org.

Mike Rosen's radio show airs daily from 9 a.m. to noon on 850 KOA.

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