From factcheck.org:
Of course, we know from Jackmannii that CBO (and GAO too?) have liberal biases, so I guess we can’t believe them. 
Cite? 
No, I go by what I hear and see. I don’t depend on FAIR (talk about your group with an agenda) to do my thinking for me.
Even if you want to claim it’s entirely hypothetical and I made the whole thing up, do you think it’s proper for a reporter to introduce a story about a campaign issue by sniffing that it shouldn’t be an issue at all? Do you believe in separation of reporting and editorializing?
Incidentally, I agree that Sinclair is once again shooting itself in the foot with this planned “documentary”. Everyone (Ohio not the least) is sick to death of the Vietnam crap. Viewers will desert these stations in droves, leaving only the hard-core anti-Kerryites to whoop it up. Sinclair reaps another Nightline-style embarassment and opponents get a rallying point. The Sinclair ownership may be politically driven, but man are they stupid.
Dear god, your reading comprehension truly is that poor. Please point out to me where I commented on anything but your CBO contention? Move your lips while you read if that helps.
Here’s some info on the guy who is producing this “news piece”:
Underlining is mine.
Good to see the guys has no ties at all to Bush :dubious:
Yes, that’s precisely the point. I had faith that you’d eventually grasp it. Good show. 
And this is why I wasn’t commenting on your other contention. Are you really that thick?
My point exactly. Such anecdotes aren’t really worth much.
Well, we’ve been through this before. I don’t depend on FAIR to think for me but I do use them to provide hard data. Of course, they do have a bias, so one has to look at their methodology closely. But, for the most part, they don’t just relate anecdotes.
You have a perfect right to go by what you hear and see. But, don’t expect us to treat your perceptions as anything more than what they deserve which is, I think frankly, very little.
I’d have to see the transcript / hear the segment. (You may be able to find the audio file online…I know you can get some NPR stuff, like Fresh Air audiofiles, online.) From your description, it sounds very strange to me.
[And, no, I am not saying you “made the whole thing up”. But, in my experience, people are not always that accurate in relating something they heard.]
It’s interesting that neither one of you appears to have the slightest problem with folks labeling the “Stolen Honor” program as a smear, lies etc., when no one apparently has seen it or linked to a transcript of it.
But when a Doper actually has heard a news report that was biased, you are quick to suggest that the account is unreliable.
The irony is so deep as to require waders. Blinded by partisan frenzy much?
See, I think the Vietnam stuff that’s supposed to reflect so badly on Kerry is overwhelmingly a crock, and airing this kind of thing so soon before the election is pretty transparently a last-minute desperate attempt at electioneering rather than informing.
I am also under no illusion about the agenda of left-leaning news organizations that carry far more influence than Sinclair.
Sinclair’s foibles prove that it is run by a right-wing dunce(s), and do not “prove” anything about news media biases in general. Even for those who love anecdotes.
Thank you for assuming that I am an uninformed dolt. I did go out and look into SH, researched some of their claims, looked into some of their questionable associationswith groups that I have come to the conclusion are baseless, and have seen no reason to rush to the film’s defense.
On the other hand. The NPR claim that you made doesn’t offer any amount of compelling evidence that I can research one way or the other. In fact, the only evidence I can find that the report even existed, can be found here.
So you’ll pardon me if I take vast left or right wing conspiracies on a case by case basis.
You are making the assumption here that the high malpractice insurance costs are primarily due to the lawsuits and that tort reform will lower these costs. It is not clear to me that either of these two are borne out by the facts. Here is an organization that argues a different point-of-view, namely that the rates seem most strongly correlated with the market…i.e., how well or poorly the insurance companies are doing on their investments. I am not claiming this point of view is completely correct…There are enough characters with high stakes here including insurance company executives, trial lawyers, and doctors that one has to be very careful in ascertaining the truth. But, this point-of-view seems to be one that many seem to be largely ignorant of, perhaps because of the way that the “liberal media” has covered this issue. (See also here.)
If you are too freakin’ lazy to look it up yourself, could you at least say when you heard it and on what program and anything else that might provide enough context for us to look it up? I apologize for not taking your interpretation of what you heard on the radio as received wisdom.
Realized this might be unclear…I mean “stock market” not “insurance market”.
jshore,
I apreciate that the issue is multi-fascited, but the links you posted are not exactly what I would call unbiased, their claims to the conrary notwithstanding. AIR is a component of the CJD (Center for Justice and Democracy), a left wing think tank orininally funded by Michael Moore! Their websites are also loaded with anti-corporate glurge. Methinks there is a slant to their reporting. (Although, as I said, all sides of an issue must be pondered before reaching a conclusion)
The more I look into this, the more I am convinced: it is the duty of the media not just to show F9/11, but to counterprogam Betrayall with F9/11.
My $.02 on this subject: Sinclair should not be doing this. It makes them look partisan (which they probably are). It isn’t fair to both candidates (which news organizations should try to be). It will ultimately end up costing Bush votes IMO, because of the backlash that results from it.
However, it’s not the place of the government to limit what they choose to broadcast. They can turn every channel they own into a 24 hour Kerry bashing network for all I care. People are free to watch or not to watch. The first ammendment is meant to prevent the government from telling anyone what they can or cannot say. This is especially true regarding political speech such as this.
Full speed ahead! All Stolen Honor all the time!
Morning Edition 10/11, babe.
Nurse’s rendition of “looking into” the scheduled Sinclair program would be more impressive if his/her links amounted to an actual analysis of what the program comprises, instead of just a brief intro on the SH site and some recycled Swift Boat-related glop. It’s reminiscent of those folks who clicked on a couple of Internet sites and were sure that Fahrenheit 9/11 was just propaganda and that they knew everything they needed to know about it.
I was first addressing the painstaking jshore, of course.
Yes, I know they have a bias. I noted that, did I not?
And, I am glad you now agree with my point that all points-of-view need to be considered since your original post just assumed one point-of-view was correct without really providing evidence of that.
Free speech for me, but not for thee!
The new slogan of the Democratic Party?
Well, here it is. You’ll find the relevant segment about 1/3 of the way down the page: “Bush Campaign Focuses on Malpractice Reform”.
I’ve listened to it 3 times now and I don’t see it quite the way that you do. I guess I’d have to investigate the issue a little more before I decided how it fits in with the larger picture. But, look, first of all, while it doesn’t interview doctors about moving or quitting, it does say that this has happened in some places. Second, the story chose to interview two middle-of-the-road sources. CBO, contrary to your claims, is certainly generally considered a middle-of-the-road source. And, the other guy, who is a former Clinton official, is someone who subscribes to the view that capping damages will in fact lower malpractice premiums although he argues it will not make a big dent in medical costs. I suppose they could have interviewed people who think that defensive medicine causes much higher costs, but on the other side, they also could have interviewed people who argue that the high premiums have more to do with bad investment decisions by the insurance companies and that the correlation between premiums and what sort of law states have capping jury awards doesn’t seem to be very high. (I seem to recall that one of these anti-tort-reform sites likes to quote some insurance industry official who even said that they don’t necessarily promise any sort of reduction in premiums will occur if we have such tort reform.)
The Democratic party (or many in it) have long argued that the airwaves are a public resource and that free speech does not simply mean that the person with the most money gets to drown out everyone else. It means structuring the laws so that the public gets a diversity of viewpoints.
Of course, it is to the benefit of the party that caters its economic policies exclusively to the wealthy (as opposed to the party that caters them to the wealthy a lot but not exclusively) to have things structured so that economic power translates into a political monopoly. And, I can thus understand why some (although fortunately not all) Republicans want it to be this way.