# White House "outs" ABC News reporter as gay (AND Canadian)? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 18, 2003, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-house-outs-abc-news-reporter-as-gay-and-canadian/189463 "2003-07-18T20:23:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Satisfying\_Andy\_Licious](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/50afbb/32.png) [@Satisfying\_Andy\_Licious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Satisfying_Andy_Licious)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2003, 6:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-house-outs-abc-news-reporter-as-gay-and-canadian/189463/81 "2003-07-23T06:18:20Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Publius \* > \*_Somehow_ I posted in the wrong thread. Terribly sorry, mods. > > \*Possibly due to my sheer idiocy \*\* Don’t sweat it, Publius. You’re making more sense than ElvisL1ves. ---
**Author:** ![Satisfying\_Andy\_Licious](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/50afbb/32.png) [@Satisfying\_Andy\_Licious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Satisfying_Andy_Licious)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2003, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-house-outs-abc-news-reporter-as-gay-and-canadian/189463/82 "2003-07-23T06:30:03Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Corbomite \* > \*\* > Let’s talk about WH staffers committing treason, shall we? > > [Article from Newsday](http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/ny-uscia0722,0,2346857.story?coll=ny-top-headlines) > > By Timothy M. Phelps and Knut Royce > Washington Bureau > > July 21, 2003, 9:48 PM EDT > > Washington – The identity of an undercover CIA officer whose husband started the Iraq uranium intelligence controversy has been publicly revealed by a conservative Washington columnist citing “two senior administration officials.” > > (trim) … > **"It’s a shot across the bow to these people, that if you talk we’ll take your family and drag them through the mud as well," he said in an interview.** > ------ end ----- > _emphasis mine_ > > Hmm. Revealing an intelligence agent (Wilson’s wife). And during wartime. That’s quite a lot more than suggesting ABC’s reporter is a faggot canuck! Is that Treason? > > (Wilson is supposed to be on “Today Show” later this morning) > > That said, SAL, I must say I like the cut of your jib. The “Don’t stop thinking about tomorrow” quip was LOL priceless. 🙂 > > Now go and eat the dishes, candyman :b \*\* Thank you, \*\*Corbomite. \*\* I have my jibs professionally cut and pressed. If that information is true, it goes beyond hardball politics into dirty tricks. And that’s something I won’t support, for any politician or party. If an official, any official, goes beyond certain bounds, they have to be called for it. This reminds me of the incident some time back in which a reporter – under the banner of free speech – reported the identities of several U.S. agents abroad. Some were subsequently killed. It’s no laughing matter, and it ought to be, unequivocally, beyond the realm of politics. ---
**Author:** ![Satisfying\_Andy\_Licious](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/50afbb/32.png) [@Satisfying\_Andy\_Licious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Satisfying_Andy_Licious)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2003, 6:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-house-outs-abc-news-reporter-as-gay-and-canadian/189463/83 "2003-07-23T06:56:21Z")
## quote:_Originally posted by Satisfying Andy Licious_ ## Honestly, posting a citation from FAIR is a formal declaration that you don’t have to be taken seriously. > [@](#): > > _Originally posted by ElvisL1ves \* > \*\* > Can you point out any fact, any at all, that they’ve gotten wrong?_\* Geez, ElvisL1ves, you’re going to have to stop throwing me such slow, fat pitches or people will start thinking you’re my sock puppet. There’s a terrific column written by a guy named Cecil Adams. He discusses how FAIR perpetrated on of the most notorious press hoaxes of recent memory: the claim that wife-beating goes up on Super Bowl Sunday. [Does violence against women rise 40% during the Super Bowl?](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/000414.html) 14-Apr-2000 > [@](#): > > The whole thing began when Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), a liberal media watchdog group with a vocal feminist wing, decided to draw attention to the problem of domestic violence by persuading NBC to run an anti-wife-beating spot during the 1993 Super Bowl. To bolster its case, FAIR sent out a press release saying the day of the Super Bowl was “one of the worst days of the year for violence against women in the home.” A separate statement sent to FAIR activists said “women’s shelters report a 40 percent increase in calls for help during Super Bowl Sunday.” > … > FAIR’s attempt to draw attention to domestic violence was a huge success. NBC agreed to run the anti-wife-battering spot, and a flurry of reports appeared in major media citing the 40 percent figure, giving the impression that the football/violence link was a proven fact. On ABC’s Good Morning America a Denver psychologist said she’d been collecting data for ten years and that she too had found an increase in wife battering during the Super Bowl. A press release distributed on behalf of the University of Buffalo echoed the earlier claims and warned women, “Don’t remain alone with him during the game.” > … > It was all baloney. > … > Furious, FAIR denounced the Post story in a long complaint to the newspaper. But the Post’s ombudsman and later the American Journalism Review did some checking of their own and found that while Ringle had made a few mistakes, his central claim was correct–there was no reliable data documenting an increase in violence against women during the Super Bowl. FAIR now says it never claimed to have hard evidence, but when you read the AJR account of the controversy it’s clear the group bears most of the blame for the misleading stories. For example, the 40 percent figure cited in the memo sent to FAIR activists, which was passed on orally to many reporters, was based on a statement in Donna Ferrato’s book Living With the Enemy (1991), the evidence for which evaporated on close examination. If you want to disagree with me that FAIR is unreliable, fine. But Cecil himself terms them “a liberal media watchdog group with a vocal feminist wing.” In other words, not an objective group but one with a political outlook. FAIR’s own website has a prominent section labeled “Activism.” It is an activist group. A good rule of thumb is that an activist group is not going to tell both sides of the story. And when it’s a group with a history of making stuff up, well … In particular, I recall one of their stunts. I’d look it up on their website, but they say their search engine currently is down. It followed a TV report on the plight of boys in today’s world. The feminists at FAIR lobbied to get the program blocked from airing – they tried to censor it. Afterward, they issued a demand that those responsible be ousted and replaced with feminist-friendly reporters. They wanted people fired for disagreeing with them, and wanted only their side to air. You can call that “Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting.” I call it bullshit. ## quote: “Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son.” - Dean Wormer * * * Yeah. And look what we did to Dean Wormer. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2003, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-house-outs-abc-news-reporter-as-gay-and-canadian/189463/84 "2003-07-23T07:45:26Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\*If you want to disagree with me that FAIR is unreliable, fine. But Cecil himself terms them “a liberal media watchdog group with a vocal feminist wing.” In other words, not an objective group but one with a political outlook. > > [ \*\* Yeah, but you seem to think that " liberal media watchdog group" automatically means “sleazy-assed liars”. Simply calling them liberal doesn’t discredit them. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2003, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-house-outs-abc-news-reporter-as-gay-and-canadian/189463/85 "2003-07-23T11:52:43Z")
A couple of journalists have written a book, “Boy Genius,” about Rove’s dirty tricks history – interestingly, it shows that Rove was mentored in dirty tricksterism by none other than Donald Segretti. Here’s a link to a description of some of Rove’s evil deeds based on the book: [http://www.counterpunch.org/madsen1101.html](http://www.counterpunch.org/madsen1101.html) Here’s a quote from the page: > [@](#): > > _Rove’s own tendency to be sick-minded originates with his mentor Segretti. The 2000 GOP primary was a chance for Rove to hone his skills in dirty tricks. His target then was Senator John McCain who appeared to be within striking distance of Dubya in South Carolina after the then-GOP maverick’s surprise upset victory in New Hampshire. Rove’s operation proceeded to target McCain with false stories: McCain was a stoolie for his captors in the Hanoi Hilton (this from a lunatic self-promoting Vietnam “veteran”); McCain fathered a black daughter out of wedlock (a despicable reference to McCain’s adopted Bangladeshi daughter); Cindy McCain’s drug “abuse”; and even McCain’s “homosexuality.” In the spirit of Segretti, Rove engineered a victory for Dubya but at the cost of trashing an honorable man and his family. Muskie, McGovern, Carter, Mondale, Dukakis, Gore, Hart, Tsongas, Clinton, Biden, Dole, Perot, and others had all seen the Segretti/Rove slash and burn tactics before._ It should be obvious we’re dealing with the same breed of vile scum that we had in Nixonian times. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2003, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-house-outs-abc-news-reporter-as-gay-and-canadian/189463/86 "2003-07-23T16:48:30Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by spooje \* > \*\*Yeah, but you seem to think that " liberal media watchdog group" automatically means “sleazy-assed liars”. Simply calling them liberal doesn’t discredit them. \*\* For some, who revel in their self-professed “open-mindedness”, it does too. And on a board dedicated to _fighting_ ignorance, too. Note that our friend has not been able to establlish anything about the GSA report, or anything else in the FAIR summary about the vandalism “stories”, that is factually inaccurate or even demonstrably filtered. All he has left is bluster. We take facts very seriously here, **Andy**. EVen more seriously than reasoning. When you don’t have command of the facts, it’s really better, not only for the Fight against Ignorance but for your own self, not to demonstrate that. And, when it’s demonstrated to you anyway, it’s better to recalibrate your thinking than to denounce the messenger. When you’re in a hole, stop digging. Many of us were like you in our youths. Most of us outgrew it, though. Perhaps you will too. ---
**Author:** ![Satisfying\_Andy\_Licious](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/50afbb/32.png) [@Satisfying\_Andy\_Licious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Satisfying_Andy_Licious)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2003, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-house-outs-abc-news-reporter-as-gay-and-canadian/189463/87 "2003-07-23T17:51:26Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by spooje \* > \*\*Yeah, but you seem to think that " liberal media watchdog group" automatically means “sleazy-assed liars”. Simply calling them liberal doesn’t discredit them. \*\* When I say they are a liberal media watchdog group it means I am noting they are a liberal media watchdog group. In other words, not objective on the issues, any more than American Spectator or A.I.M. would be. Plus, they are an activist group. To a reasonable person, that indicates that whatever they say and do is going to be strongly partisan. But in this case cited above, FAIR was, indeed, “sleazy-assed liars”. Unless you wish to defend the absolute invention of fake statistics and smears. ---
**Author:** ![Satisfying\_Andy\_Licious](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/50afbb/32.png) [@Satisfying\_Andy\_Licious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Satisfying_Andy_Licious)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2003, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-house-outs-abc-news-reporter-as-gay-and-canadian/189463/88 "2003-07-23T18:03:59Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by ElvisL1ves \* > **Note that our friend has not been able to establlish anything about the GSA report, or anything else in the FAIR summary about the vandalism “stories”, that is factually inaccurate or even demonstrably filtered. All he has left is bluster.** Without access to the original documents, you can’t establish anything about the FAIR report. Which is pretty much what FAIR wants. Note that they do not link to the original documents, so you cannot see them in their entirety. When I cited sources, I chose mainstream news organizations and linked to the entire report so anyone could read the entire document. FAIR does not do that. So you can’t see, from their report, what they are leaving out. They are a liberal activist group. So an intelligent person understands that they are presenting their side. That’s fine. They’re entitled to do that. But no one with a brain would consider them an objective source, especially when they have a history of lying to promote their causes. The organization has a contingent of radical feminists, and if you want to see the anti-male movement as legit, it’s your prerogative. There are some people who will say that if it came from the far left, it must be true, and it’s true only if it came from the far left. You’re one of them. I, thankfully, am not. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-house-outs-abc-news-reporter-as-gay-and-canadian/189463.md?page=4)