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Politics : Just the Facts, Ma'am: A Compendium of Liberal Fiction -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Oral Roberts who wrote (6034)	4/5/2004 1:42:48 PM
From: longnshort	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 90947

WashPost Editor Admits He Can't Defend Paper's Anti-Rice Story MRC ^ \| Monday April 5, 2004 \| Brent Baker A Washington Post insider, over the weekend on the syndicated Inside Washington show, discounted the relevance of a Thursday front page Washington Post story, about how a speech on threats in the world that National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice was scheduled to deliver on September 11, 2001, focused "largely on missile defense, not terrorism from Islamic radicals." Colbert King, a liberal who is the Deputy Editor of the Washington Post's editorial page and a weekly op-ed page columnist, demurred from defending the article. "I cannot with a straight face," he admitted. He acknowledged: "It was not the strongest story, although it got a lot of play." Indeed it did get a lot of play with all of the networks picking up on it. "Top Focus Before 9/11 Wasn't on Terrorism," read the top of the front page story in the April 1 Washington Post. The subhead for the article by Robin Wright, who recently jumped to the Post from the Los Angeles Times: "Rice Speech Cited Missile Defense." For Wright's article: washingtonpost.com On Inside Washington, a show carried by many PBS stations and which is aired by, and produced at, Gannett's station in Washington, DC, WUSA-TV, a CBS affiliate, this exchange took place during the program taped on Friday: Host Gordon Peterson: "According to the Washington Post, the speech Condoleezza Rice was scheduled to deliver on September 11th had to do with missile defense and not terrorism." Columnist Charles Krauthammer: "You want to get me started on this story as well? That is the cheapest shot that I can imagine." Colbert King, Washington Post editorial writer: "I must rise to Robin Wright's defense who wrote that." Krauthammer: "Go ahead and I'll rebut it." King: "Okay. It goes this way [waves hand toward Krauthammer as if giving up]. And then go. [pause, starts to laugh] I can't. I really can't. It was not the strongest story, although it got a lot of play." Peterson: "What are you doing, rebutting your own argument?" King: "Yeah. I cannot with a straight face make this case. I resign from the Washington Post!" CUT Producers for the networks, however, couldn't resist the cheap shot at Rice. Amongst the April 1 items treating the Post story as relevant: -- ABC's Good Morning America. News reader Robin Roberts announced: "On the day of the 9/11 attacks, Condoleezza Rice was reportedly set to give a speech on security that made no mention of al Qaeda or Osama Bin Laden. According to the Washington Post, the National Security Advisor's speech focused instead on missile defense." -- CBS Evening News. John Roberts intoned: "The key question facing Condoleezza Rice next Thursday is whether the White House saw al-Qaida as an urgent threat prior to the attacks on America. If a major security speech Rice was to have given on September 11th is any indication, the prime focus of the administration was missile defense, not terrorism. In speech after speech that year President Bush never publicly mentioned al-Qaida or bin Laden, declaring the most urgent threat came from rogue states like North Korea." -- NBC Nightly News. Anchor Brian Williams: "Also tonight, the White House is disputing new published reports that Dr. Rice was more concerned with missile defense than terrorism in the months before 9/11 based on a speech she was supposed to deliver that very same day, a speech the White House will not release. We get more now from NBC's David Gregory at the White House." Gregory: "On September 11th, 2001, Condoleezza Rice was scheduled to deliver a major address on the threats facing the United States. After the attacks of that morning, the speech was postponed as Rice was holed up in a White House bunker managing the crisis. But her remarks, portions of which were obtained by the Washington Post, reveal the administration's thinking about terrorism before 9/11. As the Post reports and White House officials confirm, the speech's focus, quote, 'was largely on missile defense, not terrorism from Islamic radicals.'"