ABC's Jake Tapper impersonates a talk radio blogger
The tactic is routine by now. Talk radio hosts start spouting off misleading accusations or push a story with half the important information left out. The conservative echo chamber pushes the story until the big corporate press repeats the accusations in the form of a question.
One of the greatest triumphs of that tactic was the Obama/Clinton debate where Gibson and Stephanopoulos were indistinguishable from Hannity and Limbaugh. If you want to read an excellent book on the right wing echo chamber and how they manipulate the press check out The Right Wing Noise Machine.
ABC news Senior Political Correspondent Jake Tapper keeps playing the same game without examining the accuracy of the talk radio chatter. Over the weekend the talk shows and conservative blogs were repeating the same talking points about ACORN's supposed voter fraud and what Obama's website said about his ties to ACORN. Tapper's blog states:
ABC News noted that "Senator McCain today said that 'there has been voter fraud going on in the battleground states. ACORN is tampering with Americans' most precious right; there has to be a full and complete investigation.' And he also said that you need to disclose your full relationship with ACORN. I'm wondering if you have any reaction to the reports of voter fraud and also to Sen. McCain's charge?"In another blog post he repeats accusations I first read on right wing blogs a few days earlier about Obama's relationship to ACORN. In that post he refers to reports piling up about "voter registration fraud connected to ACORN."
Does Tapper examine the validity of the talk radio accusations that he repeats? Does he mention that ACORN turned over the workers, requested prosecution and fully cooperated in the registration fraud cases being cited by Republicans? Does he mention that a US Attorney was put under political pressure by Republicans to continue frivolous prosecution of ACORN despite the lack of a case against them? Has anyone asked McCain if he supports that effort to suppress registration drives targeted at low-income and minority voters? Does he put things in context by telling the history of using accusations about registration fraud to disenfranchise voters, such as Jim Edgar's stubborn opposition to Motor Voter laws in Illinois?
If he has, I can't find it on his blog. So once again we have ABC news repeating talk radio smears in the form of a question without critically examining or questioning the charges. It's even more irresponsible when these smears are repeated on a blog like Tapper's because he leaves out the usual conservative hysterics and purports to be an unbiased news source.
ABC's website says that before his current assignment Tapper covered the Swift Boat Vets smear campaign. I'm not familiar with Tapper's reporting on that but I know it was one of the most shameful failures of the corporate press after their failure to challenge Bush's lies during the lead up to the Iraq War. The Swift Boat accusations were repeated in the press again and again long after the leaders of the group were completely discredited and proven to be liars. It was a triumph of supposed balance over accuracy in reporting.
Hey, why bother doing research, providing context or doing original, quality reporting when you can just cut and paste talk radio accusations next to Obama's response? It worked for Gibson and Stephanopoulos. There was a time when I thought ABC was the last TV news organization left with any credibility but those days have passed.