All he had to do was reference the Pacifica Radio Interview and we would have had justifiably grieveance to air.

Instead, he choose to ominously intone “No such quote exists in the Atlanta Journal Constitution” and “No such statement was ever made in the Congressional Record.”

He was implying the interview never happened. I’m saying it did.

According to NPR, her ?loony? statement was made on the radio news show Counterspin. (Not incidentally, Counterspin is produced by an NPR competitor, the nonprofit Pacifica Radio Network.) I have the transcript; it?s on the web. Her charge that Bush knew about the September 11 attacks in advance and deliberately covered it up can?t be found.

What can be read is her call for a follow-up on the revelations from the BBC and USA Today on the information about a growing terror threat ignored by Bush . . . and whether the policy response ? war, war, war ? was protecting America or simply enriching Bush?s big arms industry donors and business partners.

Yes, Palast screwed up by mixing up “Counterspin” and “Flashpoints” (McKinney has never been interviewed on Counterspin) he did discuss Pacifica’s interview with her. To say Palast implied that interview never happened is - to use your phrase “patently false.”

I think another element may be McKinney daring to criticize the administration after 9/11. When all dissent is automatically viewed as treason by a lot of folks, certain interpretations could become that much more attractive…

Eh, it’s a thought.

Her comment about the “unusual stock trades” has a bit more of a conspiracy theory smell about it (to me). Whatever happened with that story anyway? The last I remember is that trade activity wasn’t especially abnormal. But I don’t remember a systematic look at it. And in any event, such a concern in March, 2002 is not particularly disquieting.

OTO, the entire context in the interview clairifies that, and TAPPED should have pointed that out.

Keep on blogging…thekeez

If you say so. However, I think that even if I conceded that, my point would still stand: “When a text can be read two ways - reasonable or wacky - it’s obviously unfair to write a news story that emphasizes only the wacky reading, or doesn’t let readers know the text has a non-wacky reading.”

Unless you’re arguing that your reading is the ONLY plausible reading, I think the way the press destroyed McKinney IS an example of unfair, biased reporting - rather like the “invented the internet” smear against Gore.

But what’s really weird is how this stuff keeps going round and round. Why don’t people just run the damn quote and then make whatever commentary they want? Kudos to Ampersand for doing that, and letting me decide for myself if I agree with him.

Well, yeah, to be mean, I see the “conspiracy” stuff in McKinney’s quote as by far the most plausible reading off it. I honestly don’t think she meant it that way, as I know some of her history, but she seems to have expressed hersefl in a rather stupid fashion.

Again, having said that, it is odd that TAPPED did not do what the Repubs tried to do with Lott: push the “reasonable” explanation to the forefront. It did not work in Lott’s case becasue he had a history of associating with racits and racist casues. It WOULD have worked with McKinney, becasue she does not have a history of being a conspiracy monger.

McKinney declined to be interviewed Thursday, but she issued a statement saying: “I am not aware of any evidence showing that President Bush or members of his administration have personally profited from the attacks of 9-11. A complete investigation might reveal that to be the case.”

Not exactly the ringing denial that Amp is now providing on McKinney’s behalf,

“George Bush had no prior knowledge of the plan to attack the World Trade Center on September 11.”

Basically the ringing denial that Amp is now providing.

True, Palast doesn’t provide us with a link or url, so I can’t hunt it down and check context such as when she said that (although it probably wouldn’t have come up before the furor over her March 2002 remarks) or whether there were any other phrases Palast edited out (like, say, “a complete investigation may show this to be the case”). I’m sure Palast spins, but he wouldn’t just make up a quote like that from whole cloth.

If anybody has found whatever complete statement that sentence came from, it would be nice to see it.

So, Joe: you believe Clemetson when she suggests McKinney said one thing, but you disbelieve Palast when he quotes McKinney directly saying another?

This works both ways, certainly. McKinney famously said of Gore that his “Negro tolerance has never been too high. I’ve never seen him around more than one at a time.”

Sorry, but no. As I point out here, McKinney said almost exactly this in a press release right after the KPFA interview,

“I am not aware of any evidence showing that President Bush or members of his administration have personally profited from the attacks of 9-11. A complete investigation might reveal that to be the case. For example, it is known that President Bush’s father, through the Carlyle Group had - at the time of the attacks - joint business interests with the bin Laden construction company and many defense industry holdings, the stocks of which, have soared since September 11.”

Moreover Palast in his article specifically says that he searched McKinney’s web site, and this was posted to McKinney’s Congressional web site. So he’s either lying or one lousy researcher (this took me 5 minutes to find on Goolge).

Now, maybe she did mean her statements as you’ve interpreted them - although I doubt it - but that your “best case” quote is so undamning shows how weak your case is.

Of course, I’ve got a bias too - but my point is, why is your bias the only one the papers adopted? A fairer, objective approach to the story would have pointed out that the “nutty” interpretation you prefer isn’t the only interpretation. That the press largely decided not to report any but your preferred (right-wing, anti-feminist) interpretation shows bias - just as Palast claimed.

The press gave the impression that McKinney made a clear, nonsubjective accusation against Bush. That’s simply not true.

So what? You can’t say she said it if she didn’t say it.

What is so hard to understand about that? Jesus, it’s clear as a goddamn bell that not only did President Bush mean for the American people to believe that Saddam Hussein was directly involved in 9/11. But he didn’t actually come out and say it. You don’t see much of a stink in the press being raised about that one.

McKinney’s remarks, however you interpret them, were trying to raise important questions that must be asked, whatever the answers might be. Bush’s remarks got thousands of people killed. Advantage McKinney, as far as I’m concerned.

The only problem is, Palast is wrong. It’s either sloppy research, or he is lying and intentionally omitting facts in an interest to rehabilitate McKinney.

This Pacifica Radio Transcript from a Pacifica Radio interview with McKinney features the troublesome words. It’s printed verbatim.

Now I know the left has been on this kick lately, about conservative dominance of the media. Well, this transcript is from a source that will be hard to impeach… though maybe Palast can infer in a later article that the goodly hippies who run Pacifica are self-hating leftists who sabotage their own cause.