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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: redfish who wrote (556179)	3/26/2004 10:44:36 AM
From: steve harris	Respond to of 769667

Does Clarke#1 and Clarke#2 file jointly or separate on their tax returns on proceeds from the book?

To: redfish who wrote (556179)	3/26/2004 11:21:02 AM
From: PROLIFE	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

Issues & Insights Friday, March 26, 2004 Media Bias: Sales of Richard Clarke's Bush-bashing book got a big boost this week after he appeared on CBS several times. But did you know CBS has a financial interest in the book's success? Clarke, the former counterterrorism czar under Presidents Clinton and Bush, made some pretty dramatic claims at Wednesday's meeting of the bipartisan 9-11 Commission. They included an assertion that Bush shoved terrorism to a back burner during his first months in office while Clinton had made it his "highest priority." It was all quite sensational. But it was no accident. Most of the anti-Bush dust was kicked up by CBS in advance of the release of Clarke's new book, "Against All Enemies." Last Sunday, Clarke appeared on not one, but two full segments of CBS' highly rated news show, "60 Minutes." CBS even touted Clarke's incendiary charges in commercials during the network's popular sports programming earlier in the day. CBS, of course, has a long history of liberal-leaning news coverage that it mostly refuses to acknowledge. And its anchorman, Dan Rather, has almost become a poster boy for bias — denying he has any, but then doing things like shilling for the Democratic Party at a fund-raiser in 2001. In this case, the problem isn't just a political bias that CBS won't divulge. It's a financial conflict of interest, as media gadfly Matt Drudge recently pointed out. It turns out that Clarke's book is published by Free Press, a unit of publishing house Simon & Schuster. Simon & Schuster is owned by media giant Viacom. Viacom also owns CBS. Did CBS disclose its possible financial conflict in giving lavish, fawning and mostly uncritical coverage to Clarke's book and his subsequent comments before the 9-11 Commission? Nope. Nor did it note a similar conflict of interest that might have existed in January, when it ran interference for another Simon & Schuster-sponsored Bush basher, "The Price of Loyalty," based on the musings of former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill. It's one thing to be biased. It's another thing to be so cynically biased that you think it's OK to make money from it without letting people know about potential financial conflicts. CBS, as usual, has received little criticism for its apparent conflict of interest. Not so, however, with rival Fox News. During the 9-11 hearings, ex-Sen. and commission member Bob Kerrey harshly criticized Fox for releasing the text of a "background" briefing given by Clarke in August 2002. That briefing showed Clarke to be lying, either in his sworn testimony this week or in comments to reporters two years ago. That would seem to be relevant, but Kerrey didn't think so. Instead, he lashed out at Fox for digging up the damning interview. But Fox was doing the public a big favor. It let people know that, once again, a Washington insider and the media had gotten together and essentially colluded to tell a lie. Fox acted in an exemplary manner — telling the truth that people need to know. We only wish CBS had done the same. investors.com