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The 2,000th CyberAlert. Tracking Liberal Media Bias Since 1996
Special 2,000th Edition: 8:15am EDT, Friday, June 24, 2005 (Vol. Ten; No. 113)
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1. CNN Anchor Wonders: "Could Your Lawnmower Kill You?"
From 1997: CNN asked "Could your lawnmower kill you?"

2. NBC's Tim Russert Reacts to the MRC: "Holy ****"
From 1998: "Holy [expletive]" NBC's Tim Russert blurted when he read in Notable Quotables what he supposedly said.

3. John McLaughlin Asks If Bill Clinton Is "a Fighting Cock"
From 1999: John McLaughlin asked if Bill Clinton is "a fighting cock."

4. CNBC's Geraldo Rivera Shows Himself Naked on the Travel Channel
From 1999: Geraldo Rivera naked on cable TV. He offered an NYPD Blue-type glimpse of his buttocks -- and more -- on the Travel Channel.

5. Recalling Time's Effusive Praise of a Communist Party Boss
From 2000: Time magazine on CPUSA's Gus Hall, who passed away Monday: "How can anyone think ill of Hall when he beams so about cooking pancakes for his grandchildren...or shares his secret for making tasty beef stew."

6. CBS Host Asks Is It "Legal" for Business to Raise Prices
From 2001: Great mind in the morning. Frito-Lay now puts fewer Doritos in the bag, a nefarious move which prompted CBS's Julie Chen to demand: "I'm getting less chips, paying the same amount of money. Is that legal for them to do this?"

7. CNN Media Critic: Fundraiser Won't Alter Dan Rather's Objectivity
From 2001: Howler of the Weekend: Bernard Kalb on Dan Rather's Democratic fundraising: "I don't believe for an instant it will affect Dan's constant pursuit of objectivity."

8. Matt Lauer "Sexed Up" by Lion at Siegfried and Roy's House
From 2001: Matt Lauer conceded he became fixated by a lion's penis just before he was "sexed up" by the lion who made him his "bitch." A strange story told by Lauer to Conan O'Brien made all the more odd by how Lauer recounted it.

9. Dan Rather Confesses: "I Made Up the Last Three Stories"
From 2001: A new suggested sign off announced Friday night by Dan Rather: "I'm Dan Rather. And I made up the last three stories."

10. After Banana Milkshake, ABC's Sawyer "Dreamed About Bill Clinton"
From 2001: Diane Sawyer revealed that "after pepperoni pizza and banana milkshakes once, I dreamed about Bill Clinton."

11. Reporter Asks Rumsfeld to Tell Taliban Where We Will Bomb
From 2001: During a Pentagon briefing a reporter actually suggested to Donald Rumsfeld that, in order to minimize civilian casualties, the U.S. drop "leaflets days in advance of an air strike to get residents out and saying, 'This could become a military target.'" A dumbfounded Rumsfeld stared speechless for several seconds as he formulated a reply.

12. Connie Chung Sings to Dan Rather: "You're Number One"
From 2001: To the tune of "Love and Marriage," Connie Chung, who once anchored the CBS Evening News with Dan Rather in a failed experiment, sang a song parody to him. One stanza: "Dan and Connie/Chung and Rather/Time to put aside the past and gather/Glad that I came back, Dan/What's done is done/You're number one..."

13. While Wife Cooked Duck, Ted Koppel's Baby Hit Floor With a Thud
From 2002: "The baby hit the floor with a sickening thud." Ted Koppel disclosed during a Nightline with Julia Child that he dropped daughter Andrea, now CNN's State Department correspondent, on the floor because he got distracted reaching for a diaper while his wife was following a Child recipe for "Duck a l'Orange."

14. CNN: "Experts Agree: Al Qaeda Leader Is Dead Or Alive"
From 2002: "Experts Agree: Al Qaeda Leader Is Dead Or Alive." So read on-screen graphic featured by CNN.

15. Feet from Murder, Geraldo Autographs Shorts of Hooters Girls
From 2002: Geraldo Rivera parachuted in to Spotsylvania County, Virginia last Friday to cover the latest sniper murder and when he had a break he walked over to the neighboring Hooters where, the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star reported, he was seen "autographing the seats of Fredericksburg Hooters waitresses' skimpy orange shorts -- while the women were in them."

16. James Carville Shares with CNN Audience How He's Poorly Endowed
From 2003: On Friday's Crossfire on CNN, James Carville shared how he's poorly endowed: "Let me tell you, it would take about an electron microscope for that thing to show up."

17. Oceans Advocate Ted Danson Admits Relieving Himself in Ocean
From 2003: Actor Ted Danson, a founder of the American Oceans Campaign, a group which since merged with Oceana, an advocacy organization on whose Board of Directors he sits and which has a campaign devoted to stopping cruise ships from discharging sewage into the ocean, admitted to Craig Kilborn that he has relieved himself in the ocean.

18. Peter Jennings: "My Dad Wrote 'Smoke Pot' in Cloves" on a Ham
From 2003: In a remembrance of his childhood Canadian Thanksgivings, Peter Jennings noted how one year "my dad wrote 'smoke pot' in cloves on the very large ham."

19. Cicadas Are People Too: Letters to the Editor Upset by Abuse
From 2004: File under, "Cicadas are people too." In letters published by the Washington Post, writers complained about kids killing cicadas. One found the "reference to children in Bethesda tossing cicadas under moving cars and beating them with sticks absolutely horrifying." She demanded: "Let's not promote cicada abuse. These creatures have waited 17 years to mate. Give them a break."

20. CBS Reporter Sells "Never Used!" CBS News Standards at Yard Sale
From 2005: Holding his own yard sale for a 60 Minutes/Wednesday piece on yard sales, Steve Hartman put out "some boring personnel manuals," including a "CBS News Standards" booklet, which he assured a potential buyer, was a book that's "never been used."


Editor's Note: This edition of the CyberAlert, our 2,000th, presents some of the more humorous and/or absurd items that have been published in the more than nine years since this e-mail newsletter debuted on April 7, 1996. While most of the time CyberAlert delivers a comprehensive rundown of recent news items in order to showcase evidence of the media's liberal mindset, there have also been a number of lighter moments. Here, in chronological order, as compiled by the MRC's Rich Noyes, are a few of the lighter moments, exactly as they were first published. (Note: In a few hours, since the liberal bias never rests, a CyberAlert Extra will document the double standards of the networks which ignored recent comments by Senators Hillary Clinton and Dick Durbin, but last night and this morning jumped to publicize criticism of remarks by Karl Rove.)

 

CNN Anchor Wonders: "Could Your Lawnmower
Kill You?"

     Our look back begins with an item from the 249th CyberAlert, as originally published Tuesday, August 12, 1997:

     MRC news analyst Clay Waters has displayed signs of sod phobia, such as picking shredded lettuce out of his sandwiches, since seeing this story on CNN. On the August 3 World Today anchor Linden Soles warned:

     "Could your lawnmower kill you? Perhaps. In fact, a new study finds that you could be risking your life every time you cut the grass. In our News from Medicine report, CNN's Ed Garsten tells us that matching you with the right mower may mean the difference between life and death."

     All the more reason to stay inside and read your always informative but never dangerous CyberAlert.

 

NBC's Tim Russert Reacts to the MRC:
"Holy ****"

     From the 385th CyberAlert, published Tuesday, April 21, 1998:

     "Watchdog With a Sense of Humor" announced the Boston Globe headline over an April 16 story on Tim Russert's reaction to a quote credited to him cited in the MRC's Notable Quotables. The Globe's Mark Jurkowitz reported: "Those guys at the Media Research Center, the conservative media watchdog group, have quite a sense of humor. Their April 1 Notable Quotables newsletter printed an explosive Today show interview in which NBC's Tim Russert complained that devastating revelations about Bill Clinton lying in depositions weren't making his network's newscasts."

     Jurkowitz ran only part of the quote, but here it is in its entirety:

     "Katie, this latest testimony made public by Jones's lawyers about how Clinton really did have sex in the back of a limo with a former, a one-time Miss America is devastating. This is serious. It directly contradicts his deposition. This is obstruction of justice at the highest levels of our government, and Katie it really does, it really raises the possibility reluctant Republicans will have to proceed with impeachment hearings. But of course, like every other bit of evidence about White House illegalities that I declare serious, it wasn't mentioned on our own Nightly News last night and won't be tonight. I'm only the VP and Washington Bureau Chief."

     After the quote excerpt the Globe printed, Jurkowitz observed: "Incendiary stuff, until you realize it was the April Fools' issue of Notable Quotables. 'I said, 'Holy [expletive],' responded a mildly amused Russert when contacted for comment. 'When did I say this?'"

 

John McLaughlin Asks If Bill Clinton
Is "a Fighting Cock"

     From the 680th CyberAlert, published Monday, September 13, 1999:

     Most questionable terminology selection of the weekend. Here's how, on the version of the McLaughlin Group with ad breaks carried by commercial TV stations, John McLaughlin plugged an upcoming segment:
     "When we come back, is William Clinton a lame duck or a fighting cock?"

 

CNBC's Geraldo Rivera Shows Himself Naked
on the Travel Channel

     From the 718th CyberAlert, published Monday, December 20, 1999:

     Geraldo's Rivera's words are frightening enough each night when he's fully clothed on CNBC. Now imagine being confronted with him defending Bill Clinton and bashing Ken Starr while he's naked. That could happen if anyone combines his CNBC polemics with his Travel Channel nude dips.

     Sunday night at 10pm ET and PT the Travel Channel ran the first part of "Sail to the Century with Geraldo Rivera," a one-hour videography of his trip around the world with a crew on a 70-foot sailboat. He plans to cross the dateline in the Pacific as the year changes, hence the name of the show.

     Part one started with his departure from Marion, Massachusetts in early 1997 and ended in mid-1999 with the boat off the Seychelles in the Indian Ocean. Geraldo has conducted the trip on intermittent weekend and longer breaks from CNBC and NBC as his crew sometimes waited for him and sometimes sailed on to another port to await his joining them for a leg of the trip. His narration included repeated complaints about having to fly back to the U.S. to cover the Lewinsky scandal.

     Without warning as the boat hit a calm spot on its way across the Atlantic to the Azores, barely, shall we say, five minutes into the show, a long-haired and unshaven Geraldo doffed his clothes for a swim, forcing viewers to see his buttocks and, as he turned sideways to jump off the boat (with front side toward the camera), a bit more than even NYPD Blue has shown. Fortunately, Travel Channel editors put some of those blurry blocks over key parts of his body. Other highlights of the program included Geraldo leading on-deck dancing and exercising.

     Part two will air sometime in January. But now you're warned. If he went naked in the Atlantic he'll probably do it again in the Pacific.

     For a picture and RealPLayer video: www.mediaresearch.org

 

Recalling Time's Effusive Praise of a
Communist Party Boss

     From the 923rd CyberAlert, published Tuesday, October 17, 2000:

     "Who Doesn't Love Grandpa Gus Hall?" The former leader of the Communist Party USA passed away Monday at age 90. The MRC's Tim Graham recalled a gem of a tribute from Time magazine.

     In the September 9, 1991 issue reporter Michael Riley gushed:
     "Elizabeth, his wife of 56 years, applauds him as a good family man. Indeed, how can anyone think ill of Hall when he beams so about cooking pancakes for his grandchildren and two great-grandchildren, or shares his secret for making tasty beef stew. (It's the apples.)"

     One more reminder the West won the Cold War despite the Western media's too frequent affection for communism. Can you imagine any such oozing in Time about someone like Newt Gingrich?

 

CBS Host Asks Is It "Legal" for Business
to Raise Prices

     From the 1,000th CyberAlert, published Thursday, January 4, 2001:

     Bizarre question of the day, is it "legal" for a company to raise the price for a product it makes?

     Tuesday night, as if by coincidence, the ABC, CBS and NBC evening shows all ran stories on the nefarious plot by food manufacturers to charge the same price for a package of a product, but with a smaller quantity. Rich Noyes, Director of the MRC's Free Market Project, figured out all the stories were prompted by a press release from the Consumer Federation of America, though none offered a source. All three stories showcased the same examples of Doritos, Cracker Jack and how Pampers has gone from 44 to 38 diapers in a package. Rich will be writing a thorough analysis for MediaNomics next week, but in the meantime, check out this question on Wednesday's The Early Show from CBS's Julie Chen to Carol Foreman Tucker of the Consumer Federation of America:
     "So, I'm getting less chips, paying the same amount of money. Is that legal for them to do this?"

     Three days into the new year and we already have a winner for our 2001 "Good Morning Morons Award."

 

CNN Media Critic: Fundraiser Won't Alter
Dan Rather's Objectivity

     From the 1,057th CyberAlert, published Monday, April 9, 2001:

     Bernard Kalb, co-host of CNN's Reliable Sources and a long-time CBS News reporter, on Dan Rather's appearance at a fundraiser for the local Democratic Party committee in Travis County, Texas:
     "Dan himself has said that it's a serious mistake, that he regrets it. But I don't believe for an instant it will affect Dan's constant pursuit of objectivity."

     I guess the fundraiser was just a little detour.

 

Matt Lauer "Sexed Up" by Lion at Siegfried
and Roy's House

     From the 1,076th CyberAlert, published Friday, May 4, 2001:

     Lauer "sexed up" by a lion who made him his "bitch." Today co-host Matt Lauer recounted a very strange story on NBC's Late Night with Conan O'Brien on Tuesday night. Strange by itself, but made more so by Lauer's odd fixation with a lion's penis and how after the lion took a certain action Lauer said he felt "sexed up."

     MRC analyst Brad Wilmouth took down Lauer's description on the May 1 NBC late night program of an incident which occurred last weekend when he and his wife visited the Las Vegas-area home of magicians Siegfried & Roy. Lauer was in Nevada to play in a celebrity golf tournament which raised money for prostate cancer research.

     Lauer began: "So we're walking through the back yard, and this is almost disgusting." He described how the yard had cages with tigers and lions and he motioned to O'Brien how he was sitting as far from a lion as O'Brien was from him -- just a couple of feet.

     Lauer continued, with ellipses where O'Brien made quips: "The lions were, two of the lions were in a bit of a horny mood. One of the lions was sort of not leaving the other lion alone, and he's [imitates horny lion growl], and she's like, get away from me, and, you know, he's rubbing on her...and of course, you know, instead of just turning around and giving them privacy, you become fascinated by this, so I was like, you know, staring at this lion, and suddenly he gets up from bugging the woman lion, and he comes and he looks right at me for like 15, 20 seconds, and we're standing there, and then it becomes uncomfortable, you know, you're staring for too long, and you're thinking, you know, is this thing, is he going to come after me...and he's just staring at me. And he gives one of these like 'Mmmm' [makes lion growl again], and I thought okay, that's it, it's over.
     "And he turns away from me, and now my whole world goes into slow motion. All I can say is this all happened in slow motion, so don't think I'm an idiot. He turns away from me, and now I'm staring at the business end of the lion. And before I know it, I'm drawn to the actual business end, you know, you're looking because you don't get to see that up close that often [audience laughter]."
     O'Brien: "Matt, what the hell is your problem? Maybe you're drawn to that end."
     Lauer: "So I see this, and I'm going to talk about really in the business end now, something moves, and the next thing I know, I'm sexed up."
     O'Brien: "What are you talking about?"
     Lauer: "The lion has sprayed me and marked his territory all over me."
     O'Brien: "With what? What were you sprayed with?"
     Lauer: "Well, you know, I'm not sure if it was urine or if it was some other thing from a gland or something, but it was like, I mean literally, I am here, and I look down at myself, and it's like someone took the spritzer on the hose and went [makes spraying noise], and I've got spots of liquid all over me. And my wife is wiping her face. She doesn't know what's happened. She runs to the bathroom. This lion, you know, I'm like, it's bitch now. I mean, I, you know, basically it's what happened. And so, you know, I'm freaking out at this, and here comes Siegfried and Roy, and Roy is ecstatic. Roy is yelling, 'It's an honor! It's an honor! You're a part of the pride! You're a part of the pride!'"
     O'Brien: "This is an honor for them?"
     Lauer: "Apparently, it's only happened to one other person at their house, that they've got completely sexed up by the lion."
     O'Brien: "So what did you do then? You're at this party. You're covered in this gland juice."
     Lauer: "Well, it dried pretty quick. [Laughter] Well, you know, luckily, I was leaving pretty soon, so I kind of let it dry, I was like air drying it. I didn't want to let everybody know..."
     O'Brien: "Did they offer you towels or anything?"
     Lauer: "Roy is offering me to use his shower, which I'm not sure what was up with that..."
     O'Brien: "Wait, now it's clear what's going on here."
     Lauer: "He told the lion to do it."
     O'Brien: "Yeah, Siegfried was like cuing the lion, ‘And now get Lauer' and then you get sprayed down, and then Roy is like, ‘You must use our shower now. [Laughter] That's what's going on."
     Lauer: "It was the wildest thing."
     O'Brien: "Let me guess, when you were in there showering, suddenly, they appear, 'Oh, we thought we'd join you.'"
     Lauer: "I did not use the shower. I passed on the shower, but it was so weird. You know, it was like, I wasn't mad. I'm mad now because it's been a week and the lion hasn't called, but I wasn't mad at the time."

     Another day in the wild life of Matt Lauer. You couldn't make something like this up. Now we've had an insight into Lauer's peculiar habits and interests.


     For a still shot and RealPlayer video: www.mediaresearch.org

 

Dan Rather Confesses: "I Made Up the
Last Three Stories"

     From the 1,092nd CyberAlert, published Monday, June 11, 2001:

     Appearing on CBS's Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn on Friday night, Dan Rather read aloud some suggested "Ratherisms" and uttered another wacky one himself before Kilborn got him to announce a possible new sign-off about making up stories.

     Rather read aloud these Ratherisms proposed by Kilborn:

     -- "This election is tighter than Al Roker's cummerbund."
     -- "As they say in Texas, big dogs make big messes."
     -- "The NASDAQ is dropping faster than my wife's dress after three mi tais."

     Kilborn wondered: "Which one would you use?"
     Rather replied with his own Ratherism: "Well I tell you, I wouldn't use that last one. I'd be so far back in the dog house you'd have to ship me daylight by FedEx."

     Kilborn soon reminded Rather how he once signed off with the word "courage." Rather updated Kilborn, explaining he now ends the CBS Evening News: "And that's part of our world tonight."

     Off of a card, Rather then enunciated this recommended sign-off: "I'm Dan Rather. And I made up the last three stories."

     On some nights that's not far off.

 

After Banana Milkshake, ABC's Sawyer
"Dreamed About Bill Clinton"

10) From the 1,106th CyberAlert, published Wednesday, July 11, 2001:

     Tuesday morning Good Morning America co-host Charles Gibson mocked his colleague Diane Sawyer for highlighting a "study" about how Republicans have more nightmares than Democrats, but Tuesday night World News Tonight anchor Peter Jennings treated it as a serious item worthy of air time. Sawyer also revealed that "after pepperoni pizza and banana milkshakes once, I dreamed about Bill Clinton."

     MRC analyst Jessica Anderson noticed that near the end of the July 10 GMA Diane Sawyer intoned: "So, there's a study out which shows that even though ideology by day separates Democrats and Republicans a lot, it separates it even more by night. The new study shows that members of the GOP have nearly three times more nightmares than any Democrats do. So, unless they're all named Bill Clinton, what can it mean?"
     Charles Gibson: "No. The Republicans have three times more nightmares than the Democrats?"
     Sawyer: "Their theory, of course, is that Republicans, by virtue of being more conservative, are more concerned about threats to the status quo, so they're dreaming at night about anything that can impede or injure or change the status quo. I don't know -- ask Dr. Freud! What do I know?"
     Gibson: "Do you put great validity in this study, Ms. Sawyer?"
     Sawyer: "Well no, but I do know-"
     Gibson: "Then why do you report it to the American public?"
     Sawyer: "After pepperoni pizza and banana milkshakes once, I dreamed about Bill Clinton, but no, I don't know what it means, or whether we take it seriously or not, but it does seem sort of intuitive, I believe."
     Gibson: "I want to announce that there is a new study that has just been done by a team of scientists that proves whatever you want it to prove. We'll be back. Stay with us."

     Gibson's mocking of the story didn't dissuade Peter Jennings. A few hours later on World News Tonight he relayed: "There's one other item in the medical file we couldn't resist. A study being presented at the University of California-Santa Cruz finds that Republicans are nearly three times more likely than Democrats to have nightmares. Researchers speculate that Republicans are very attuned to dangers in the world."

     Maybe conservatives get scared by network news stars who dream about Bill Clinton after eating pepperoni pizza with a banana milkshake.

 

Reporter Asks Rumsfeld to Tell Taliban
Where We Will Bomb

11) From the 1,168th CyberAlert, published Wednesday, October 31, 2001:

     Leave the military work to the military, please. During the Pentagon briefing on Tuesday afternoon, a reporter suggested to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld that, in order to minimize civilian casualties in Afghanistan, the U.S. drop "leaflets days in advance of an air strike to get residents out and saying, ‘This could become a military target.'" A stunned Rumsfeld stared forward for several seconds speechless as he formulated a reply.

     The question during the October 30 briefing came from a male reporter whose voice I could not identify, so not anyone such as CNN's Jamie McIntyre, CBS's David Martin, ABC's John McWethy or NBC's Jim Miklaszewski.

     Whoever he was, he inquired: "You said that the air strikes are deliberately designed not to hit residential centers, but you also say that the Taliban is hiding weapons, stockpiling weapons in residential areas. Have you ruled out the possibility of dropping leaflets days in advance of an air strike to get residents out and saying, 'This could become a military target'? Is that something, without discussing future operations, could you see that possibly coming to fruition?"

     Rumsfeld was dumbfounded. After a few seconds of silence, he repeated the recommendation: "We drop leaflets?" He then explained what's wrong with the idea: "The likelihood, of dropping those kinds of leaflets, of course, would tell the innocent people that they should stay out of mosques, but it would also tell the other people they should stay out of mosques. It is not quite clear to me how we would advantage ourselves."

 

Connie Chung Sings to Dan Rather: "You're
Number One"

12) From the 1,178th CyberAlert, published Thursday, November 15, 2001:

     To the tune of "Love and Marriage," at a Tuesday night event at which Dan Rather received an award, ABC's Connie Chung, who anchored the CBS Evening News with him in a failed 1993-94 experiment, sang a song parody to him.

     Her first stanza, as recounted by the New York Post: "Chung and Rather/Chung and Rather/How the gossips used to love to blather/None of it was true, Dan/I treasured sitting next to you, Dan."

     On Tuesday night, the NBC-produced Access Hollywood program played a clip of Chung singing this stanza: "Dan and Connie/Chung and Rather/Time to put aside the past and gather/Glad that I came back, Dan/What's done is done/You're number one/And here's your Silver Circle plaque, Daaaaan!"


     For a still shot and RealPlayer video: www.mediaresearch.org

 

While Wife Cooked Duck, Ted Koppel's
Baby Hit Floor With a Thud

13) From the 1328th CyberAlert, published Monday, August 19, 2002:

     Ted Koppel revealed during Thursday's Nightline with Julia Child that he dropped daughter Andrea, now CNN's State Department correspondent, on the floor because he got distracted while reaching for a diaper as his wife was trying to follow a Child recipe for "Duck a l'Orange." You can't make this stuff up.

     MRC analyst Jessica Anderson caught this on Thursday's Nightline marking Child's 90th birthday. Koppel recalled on the August 15 show:
     "Two events, vividly etched on my memory from a Mother's Day many years ago. My wife, our new daughter and I were living in a tiny one bedroom apartment in Queens, New York. It was one of the rare occasions on which I was changing the baby because my wife was in the kitchenette cooking. My parents were on their way over, as were hers. My wife had just warned me not to leave the baby alone on the changing table because she could now turn over, which she did, just as I was reaching for a diaper. The baby hit the floor with a sickening thud. The pediatrician tried to be reassuring, but warned us that if the baby slept too much or started vomiting, we should bring her to the hospital right away.
     "We didn't mention the incident to our parents. The baby, it turned out, was alright, but it was a long, frightening afternoon. That's one memory. The other was Duck a l'Orange, my wife's first foray into French cooking. She had taken down the recipe from a strange if wonderful woman who had this bizarre new television program on channel 13, New York's educational TV station. My wife and I couldn't even taste the food that afternoon, we were so worried about the baby, but our parents seemed very appreciative. That was our first experience with Julia Child: Duck a l'Orange and a bruised baby. The baby is now a successful television correspondent, Ms. Child turned 90 today."

     I'm assuming the "successful television correspondent" is Andrea Koppel. CNN's bio page for her, complete with a photo: www.cnn.com

 

CNN: "Experts Agree: Al Qaeda Leader
Is Dead Or Alive"

14) From the 1,335th CyberAlert, published Wednesday, September 4, 2002:

     Which way is it on Osama bin Laden being dead or alive? To CNN, it's both. CNN featured this text in an on-screen graphic on Tuesday afternoon: "Experts Agree: Al Qaeda Leader Is Dead Or Alive." The insight appeared during a story from Pentagon reporter Barbara Starr about the hunt for bin Laden, whether he is dead or alive and how al Qaeda can operate with or without him.

     MRC President Brent Bozell noticed the graphic during the story on Live From at about 2:05pm EDT. "Hunt for Bin Laden" read the large subject heading on screen. In smaller type below, "Experts Agree: Al Qaeda Leader Is Dead Or Alive."

     After exactly two minutes, when a CNN staffer probably noticed the odd statement, the subhead changed to: "Al Qaeda Leader Out Of Sight For Months."


     For a still shot of the screen: www.mediaresearch.org

 

Feet from Murder, Geraldo Autographs
Shorts of Hooters Girls

15) From the 1,363rd CyberAlert, published Thursday, October 17, 2002:

     Geraldo Rivera, class act. Rivera parachuted in to Spotsylvania County, Virginia last Friday to cover the latest sniper shooting for FNC and when he had a break between on air appearances he walked over to the neighboring Hooters where, the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star reported, he was seen "autographing the seats of Fredericksburg Hooters waitresses' skimpy orange shorts -- while the women were in them."

     The Washington Post's Lloyd Grove followed up with the revelation "that Geraldo and his younger brother each used a felt-tip pen to scrawl their names, left and right, on each cheek of the Hooters shorts."

     But FNC maintained the brotherly antics with Craig, his producer, were not inappropriate since the butt signing across the street from the murder scene occurred only because Geraldo was "honoring" requests from his fans.

     An excerpt of the October 15 Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star story headlined, "Geraldo signs backsides yards from sniper site," by reporter Michael Zitz:

Geraldo Rivera has a knack for getting to the bottom of a story.

The larger-than-life Fox News reporter swooped into Fredericksburg and spent the weekend to file reports following Friday's sniper shooting at the Four-Mile Fork Exxon.

He arrived at the scene at midday Friday, strutting around in a black leather jacket and blue jeans.

By 6 p.m. on the day of the shooting, Rivera was autographing the seats of Fredericksburg Hooters waitresses' skimpy orange shorts -- while the women were in them.

The Hooters restaurant is located only about 50 yards away from the crime scene.

"He was posing for pictures with the Hooters Girls and signing their [rear ends]," said Geoff Leach, a Caroline County resident who was at the restaurant late Friday afternoon.

"I thought it was pretty tasteless, considering the timing and the proximity to the scene of the killing," Leach said. "It was a circus atmosphere."

A spokesman for Fox News Channel in New York said the Hooters autograph session was only part of a wider Rivera autograph spree.

"He was all over the place," said FNC spokesman Robert Zimmerman. "He was giving autographs at the Waffle House next to the gas station, he was giving autographs to Spotsylvania sheriff's deputies, he was giving autographs to truck drivers."

Zimmerman made it clear that neither he nor Fox was defending Rivera's actions.

Rivera declined to talk directly to a reporter, but relayed a comment through Zimmerman.

"He said he was honoring the requests of his adoring fans," Zimmerman said....

     END of Excerpt

     Just proves that Geraldo is more of a celebrity than a journalist.

     For the story in full: www.fredericksburg.com

    
For a still shot on Rivera on scene: www.mediaresearch.org

 

James Carville Shares with CNN Audience
How He's Poorly Endowed

16) From the 1,529th CyberAlert, published Tuesday, July 1, 2003:

     James Carville must not think much of the right to privacy so vaunted in recent days by liberals. On Friday's Crossfire on CNN, he shared how he's poorly endowed.

     MRC analyst Ken Shepherd caught how during a June 27 segment on the new full body scanners that the TSA wants to use at airports, which leave little to the imagination, the liberal co-host of Crossfire quipped: "That thing would have to be very sensitive to pick up any of my privates, let me tell you, it would take about an electron microscope for that thing to show up."

     No wonder Carville was so jealous of Bill Clinton. And now you know something only Mary Matalin knew before.

     File this under TMI: Too Much Information.

 

Oceans Advocate Ted Danson Admits Relieving
Himself in Ocean

17) From the 1,597th CyberAlert, published Wednesday, October 15, 2003:

     Do as I preach not as I do. Actor Ted Danson, a founder of the American Oceans Campaign, a group which since merged with Oceana, an advocacy organization on whose Board of Directors he sits and which has a campaign devoted to stopping cruise ships from discharging sewage into the ocean, admitted to Craig Kilborn that he has relieved himself in the ocean.

     During the "5 Questions" segment on Monday's Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn on CBS, Kilborn prefaced question #4 by asking Danson, who is best-known for playing "Sam Malone" on Cheers and who now stars in the sit-com Becker on CBS, to affirm: "You're an advocate for cleaner oceans." Danson agreed. Kilborn then queried, "True or false: You have never relieved yourself in the ocean?" Danson, after a long delay, answered "false" as he bowed his head in shame.

 

Peter Jennings: "My Dad Wrote 'Smoke
Pot' in Cloves" on a Ham

18) From the 1,621st CyberAlert, published Monday, November 24, 2003:

     A second television news star has recalled a memory of an oddity committed by a parent. A few weeks ago, Katie Couric conceded that her mother, when she learned of AIDS, bought stock in companies that made condoms. Now, in a remembrance of his childhood Canadian Thanksgivings, Peter Jennings noted how one year "my dad wrote 'smoke pot' in cloves on the very large ham."

     Jennings penned the cover story for this past weekend's USA Weekend, the newspaper supplement published by Gannett, "My First Thanksgiving as an American."

     In it, the Canadian-born Jennings who became a U.S. citizen this year, recalled his Canadian childhood:
     "I grew up with my parents and sister Sarah in fairly rural western Quebec. Thanksgiving then and now was always a clear reminder that the autumn would soon come to an end and we would be buried under snow for several months. Many Thanksgiving dinners were held outside in a glorious Indian summer. Turkey was often the centerpiece, but it was sometimes goose or even ham.
     "I remember one year my father, who was a mischievous fellow, had somehow become embroiled in a row about the legalization of marijuana. This was more than 40 years ago, mind you. We had a fairly important government official as a guest. As a practical joke, my dad wrote 'smoke pot' in cloves on the very large ham. I still give thanks for my father's sense of humor."

 

Cicadas Are People Too: Letters to the
Editor Upset by Abuse

19) From the 1,725th CyberAlert, published Monday, May 24, 2004:

     File under, "Cicadas are people too." Without further comment, two letters in the Washington Post's regular Saturday page of letters, a section called "Free for All," under the heading of "Bugged by Cicada Abuse." The letters:

Even with the daily news about Iraqi prisoners and Middle East bombings, I still find myself disgusted by the stream of stories in your paper about children pulling the legs off cicadas [Metro, May 7], and throwing them under cars and using them as hockey pucks [Style, May 19]. None of these stories mention the reactions of parents or teachers, but I hope they are using this marvelous phenomenon of living creatures to teach these children that even small bugs are not inanimate objects to be wantonly killed for "playtime."

-- Dena R. Bauman Washington

I am hardly an insect hugger and confess burgeoning panic at the prospect of cicadas roosting in my rather big hair. But even I found Linton Weeks's reference to children in Bethesda tossing cicadas under moving cars and beating them with sticks absolutely horrifying and reminiscent of those ant-stompers I never liked in grade school. Let's not promote cicada abuse. These creatures have waited 17 years to mate. Give them a break.

-- Elizabeth Shea Alexandria

     Cicadas, for those outside the cicada zone, who haven't watched any TV news in the past few weeks, are insects which emerge from underground every 17 years to fly into trees and to mate. They last appeared in 1987 and we won't see them again, assuming the millions of them survive the attacks by the kids, until 2021.

 

CBS Reporter Sells "Never Used!" CBS
News Standards at Yard Sale

20) From the 1,962nd CyberAlert, published Thursday, April 28, 2005:

     Holding his own yard sale for a 60 Minutes/Wednesday piece on yard sales, Steve Hartman put out "some boring personnel manuals," including a "CBS News Standards" booklet, which he assured a potential buyer, was a book that's "never been used." The camera zoomed in on handwriting on a post-it note slapped on it: "Never used!" and below that, "$.50."

     Hartman, provides short, light-hearted stories at the end of the Wednesday edition of 60 Minutes. For the April 27 program, he went to an unidentified suburban neighborhood of homes and showed himself browsing through the junk at some yard sales. He bought a golf club and an olive oil bottle.

     No word from Hartman on whether he sold the CBS News Standards manual to someone who might actually read it.


     For a still shot of the manual with the "never been used" promise, go to: www.mrc.org

-- Brent Baker

 


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