Media Matters’s Eric Boehlert Gets the Facts Wrong — Again
Media Matters’s Eric Boehlert: ignorant? Sloppy? Or dishonestly posturing?
(Again.)
You make the call!
Just yesterday, I said:
By the way, those oh-so-careful leftists? Some of them are claiming that Jamil Hussein has already been arrested — based on a report that says he faces arrest. . . . [K]eep your eyes open for the lefties who claim Jamil Hussein has already been arrested. You’ll see ‘em. Because they’re the careful ones!
I followed my own advice, and guess which oh-so-careful leftist I caught misrepresenting the facts? None other then our favorite serial misrepresenter, Media Matters’s Eric Boehlert:
But the bottom fell out Thursday afternoon, when the Iraqi government flip-flopped and suddenly confirmed Hussein’s existence. In fact, he was under arrest for doing what warbloggers insisted Hussein could never do in the first place — talk to reporters . . .
The words “under arrest” hyperlink to an Editor & Publisher report that said Hussein merely “faces arrest” for speaking to the media. That report also makes it crystal clear that Hussein will not face prosecution, because any prosecution would require the cooperation of the AP — something that nobody on the planet believes will happen:
Khalaf said Thursday that with the arrest of Hussein for breaking police regulations against talking to reporters, the AP would be called to identify him in a lineup as the source of its story.
Should the AP decline to assist in the identification, Khalaf said, the case against Hussein would be dropped. He also said there were no plans to pursue action against the AP should it decline.
As I said on Thursday:
I have absolutely no doubt that the AP will decline. So, make no mistake: any lefty handwringing over the government’s alleged crushing of dissent is either ignorant or, more likely, pure posturing.
Which camp does Eric Boehlert fall into?
Me, I’m going with “pure posturing.”
I’ll take “engaged in wishful thinking” but “pure posturing” would be my second choice.
DRJ (51a774) — 1/6/2007 @ 5:54 pmDRJ,
That’s tough to accept when the first mention of the word “arrest” in his source material says Hussein “faces” arrest.
Patterico (906bfc) — 1/6/2007 @ 6:13 pmPatterico,
I was trying my hand at sarcasm, proving once again that I have a problem with social cues on the internet. I probably should avoid rhetorical devices when I’m online since the alternative, winks and smiley faces, aren’t my style.
DRJ (51a774) — 1/6/2007 @ 6:20 pmLooks bad for Boelert.
But maybe the good captain has indeed been arrested?
Let’s check the Iraqi Ministry of Interior’s official website for an announcement:
http://www.moiiraq.com/
Oh, dear…a truer page I have never seen…hehe.
Neville Chamberlain (80a4fa) — 1/6/2007 @ 6:21 pmSo you chose to be a disinguious liar there NC ?
Posting fake websites to make a point ? do you work for the AP news by chance ?
Bill Amos (b7c504) — 1/6/2007 @ 7:06 pmHehe, Bill
Next on truthiness gone wild!
Here’s the Iraqi government’s website
http://www.iraqigovernment.org/index-EN.htm
Click on the Iraqi Gov Websites link to get this:
http://tinyurl.com/ylfhyh
Click on the Interior Ministry’s link:
http://www.moiiraq.com/
If they can’t perform a function most 12 year olds can do…
Neville Chamberlain (80a4fa) — 1/6/2007 @ 7:22 pmA ‘serial misrepresenter,’ hilarious. This coming from the guy who gibbered like a clown about the ‘treason’ involved in the NYTimes writing about the vacation home of Dick Cheney, despite the well-reported fact that the photog had permission.
[That’s a flat-out lie. — P]
Anyway, Frey, you apparently can’t be bothered to be honest about your own cite. From the E&P you linked to:
“Khalaf told the AP that an arrest warrant had been issued for the captain for having contacts with the media in violation of the ministry’s regulations.”
The warrant has been issued. Perhaps he hasn’t been physically detained. Perhaps neither Patterico nor Boehlert knows shit about Iraqi law. See hair, split into two pieces for maximal overstated effect.
[Perhaps a report that says he “faces arrest” shouldn’t be exaggerated by Boehlert into a claim that he has been arrested. — P]
Look, you were wrong about Jamil Hussein, Frey. But wrong is what you do. You’ve had your sorry ass kicked up and down the street for more than a calendar year about this and five other horseshit subjects. Why you keep trying this bush-league garbage when the simplest research can prove you either a liar or a partisan exaggerater (as here) is beyond rational understanding.
[This coming from a guy who just now, in this very comment, told a lie about my calling something about Cheney’s vacation house “treason.” A word you put in quotes. A claim you cannot back up. — P]
As for whether the AP will call out Hussein in a lineup, nice prediction. Why would the AP assist in the prosecution of its own source, thereby possibly endangering him further? And if the case is dropped, ‘lefty handwringing’ about crushing dissent is invalid? Hardly. I wouldn’t give a brass farthing for the life of Jamil Hussein at this point. Such is the situation in Iraq that the AP should probably spirit him out of there. If he’s off the hook officially for speaking to the AP, give me your best bet on how long he, unofficially, stays off the hook. And I mean literally, the hook, as in being hung from a lamppost as happened in central Baghdad today.
[Who made Jamil Hussein’s name public? The AP or me? If someone endangered him, it was the AP, and only the most partisan idiot (meaning you) could attribute the danger to *bloggers*. — P]
djangone (381f2e) — 1/6/2007 @ 7:39 pmNeville,
You’ve posted these Iraqi government (non-)links before. I don’t know why you persist in faulting the Iraqi government because it doesn’t have English language websites. Iraq does have an Iraqi Arabic language website, although I admit it’s
DRJ (51a774) — 1/6/2007 @ 7:57 pmGreekArabic to me.Per Jawa http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/
Jamil has been questioned at MOI HQ and denies he is a source for AP.
Ball back in your court AP, produce your source or admit you made up bad news from Iraq.
[The Jawa Report has it wrong — P]
kubob (aa4d50) — 1/6/2007 @ 8:22 pmTypical moronic brownshirt fucks: caught lying again, they blame everyone else.
Talk about “yawn”…
dave (cb87f2) — 1/6/2007 @ 8:47 pmLt. Kije identified, facing arrest? — Day 4 …
Part 32 of a series. Continued from this post. Media Matters’s Eric Boehlert Gets the Facts Wrong — Again Patterico Media Matters’s Eric Boehlert: ignorant? Sloppy? Or dishonestly posturing? (Again.) You make the call! Just yesterday, I said:By t…
Bill's Bites (72c8fd) — 1/6/2007 @ 11:12 pmIt seems that the MOI is holding jamil but only because he insist he has NEVER talked to AP News. And AP News is insisting it is him.
So the MOI wants AP to identify him as their informant. Is the AP ready to do that ?
So either Jamil is lying some more or the AP is trying to cinvict him to protect themselves.
I will say it is proabably Jamil lying. As he has all along. And AP News Needs to admit it got taken and it has been printing phony stories.
Bill Amos (b7c504) — 1/6/2007 @ 11:58 pmBill Amos,
Why do you think the Iraqi MOI has Capt. Hussein in custody? Can you provide a link?
DRJ (51a774) — 1/7/2007 @ 12:03 amJust wanted to let you all know what a treat it was to have warbloggery ringmaster PATTERICO stopping by with his hat and cane earlier to post at Media Matters for America. And all huffy about a marginal error by Boehlert, too. Indeed, P is correct: Officer Jamil Hussein “merely” (P’s word) had a warrant out for his arrest. No doubt upon his seizure by the Malaki government (something that has apparently now happened, based on the statements above) he’ll face the kind of rigidly principled due process on display during Saddam’s well-earned necktie rave.
Patterico is in fact too clever to make errors such as boldly asserting that Baghdad copper Jamil H. never existed. He called him an “alleged” cop in one post — nice touch, that alleged. You see it a lot in front of words like “mobster,” “pedophile,” etc. Works like a charm.
You see, folks, Patterico is the carnival barker, not the guy who actually takes your dollars while showing you a two-headed cow that’s in fact a one-headed cow with a big boil on its neck with eyes and horns painted on the boil. He leaves that kind of vulgar stable work to his trusted carny “geeks” — Malkin, Acie Floppie, Crittenden et al. Look over his site — in particular his links to those three and many other warbloggists who were quite emphatic is stating that Jamil Hussein was a chimera and the AP a bunch of pipers. Keeps his hands clean, you see. He was merely “linking” to the side acts — with a nice big “we shall see” of some sort affixed each time. No responsibility for the geeks’ wares. Just a polite and handy link … and then caveat emptor! Hey thanks, P.! Like the man once kinda said, “Why speak when you can nod, or nod when you can link?”
So let’s take a look at just one of Patter’s large crew of deputy carnies — Jules Crittenden — described by our Patter-Noster as “a valuable ally to bloggers trying to bring issues to the attention of Big Media. You should be reading his blog daily.”
OK. I will. Hmm. Lots of links to Patterico. … Wait. Here’s what Crittenden has to say about whether “alleged” cop on the beat Jamil Hussein, “allegedly” wearing the badge in a land where cop-killing is pretty much on ongoing grouse hunt, merits freedom, or the concern of freedom loving people, after his pending arrest (as of this posting he has reportedly been nabbed by the Iraqi M.O.I. — soon to be rebranded Iraqi M.O.Truth, doubtless, although apparently only Ministry of Alleged Information should pass Patter muster): Crittenden: “Provided Jamil isn’t an insurgent-loving propagandizing liar. Provided he actually exists.” (Crittenden continues to use “exist” and “Jamil” and so forth with sardonic quotes around these words — hey once on the limb, why not saw off the branch?).
So, Pitter-Patter’s “valuable ally” thinks a guy risking his life as a cop in a lawless death hole — oh dear, sorry, showing my bias about all that murder and car-bombing ‘n stuff; make that “alleged lawless death hole” — ought to be treated as a criminal because of his (alleged?!) thoughts and feelings (provided he actually “exists”) and, you know, get plunged down the memory trap (so that his actual existence could become alleged again — yeah, that’s the ticket). Now that’s Uh’Merikan! That’s what the boys are dying for. More industrial-strength Islamic Big Brotherism. Wasn’t this, uh, what Saddam was doing before he became a rope-straightening device? But hey, presto, no flies on Patter. He didn’t say it. “Valuable” ole Crittenden said it. Doo-tee-doo-tee-doo. Nobody here but us chickenhawks.
I dragged you, poor friends and new enemies, through this tedious exercise (one that could be repeated with Patter’s “valuable allies” till the two-headed cows come home) not to show you what a clever lad the Grand Patter-teer is. He can handle that just fine himself. I did it to let you know that the Patterists — all of them, the capo barker included — could not care less whether Jamil Hussein ends up dead in a ditch, could not care less whether anyone winds up dead in an alleged Iraqi ditch. Because it’s no longer about Jamil Hussein, or the Iraqi people, or the American GIs, or the AP stringers who are getting dead trying to do the brick and mortar work of democracy. It’s about the warbloggers, my friends. Now, at long last, it is all and only about them.
Let me hand off here to Mr. Eric Arthur Blair (George Orwell), unalleged journalist, who took a bullet in the neck during the Spanish Civil War: “All the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting.”
Sebastian Melmoth (f86e7d) — 1/7/2007 @ 12:28 amBill Amos,
Jawa Report misread a post from Flopping Aces. There is no evidence I am aware of that Jamil Hussein is in custody.
Patterico (906bfc) — 1/7/2007 @ 12:28 amStopped reading there. Why do these moonbat troll types have you pegged for a member of the wingnut collective, Patterico?
[Easy. They don’t read me regularly. They rely on assumptions, which are false. They don’t have their facts straight. Why, it sounds a lot like . . . what they accuse *me* of! — P]
OHNOES (3b3653) — 1/7/2007 @ 2:20 amAhh, you want to split hairs again with me, Patrick? Do you really want me to go find every fucking cite of yours on your idiocy regarding the Cheney vacation home? You’ll come out saying it wasn’t ‘treason,’ you’ve now assured me. You’ll also come out looking like a thorough dumbass. I’ll take my chances on this one. I’ll accept that you didn’t say ‘treason’ outright, and I’ll show at the same time how you how much you said it without using the word. Cute lawyer tricks, heh. I’d pay money to hear you inveigh against Clinton’s ‘the meaning of “is”‘ now that I’ve seen you pull much the same trick.
[Do I want to split hairs with you? No. What I want from my commenters is for them to have, oh, I don’t know . . . how about some fucking clue whether they are telling the truth when they make an accusation about me. This comment shows that 1) you don’t; and 2) you don’t care. Ergo, do not be surprised if your comments do not appear here any more. I plan to print all the ones sitting in moderation, because they all reveal you to be a jackass, and I happen to have a few minutes to show my readers why. But in general, I have better things to do with my time than prove that some anonymous jackass is, in fact, an anonymous jackass. — P]
Again, I have to wonder what the next line of right-wing horseshit will be now that you’ve exhausted so many, from the Schiavo memo to the ‘lonely Kerry’ dumbassery.
But the shoe is back on your foot, PaddyEff. I didn’t say *you* endangered Jamil Hussein. I didn’t even consider it–project much? My statement was a comment on the situation in Iraq creating victims out of anyone who cooperates with any American entity. Get it? But you apparently felt wounded by some arrow of guilt I didn’t even intend to fire and, in the same way you’re saying I lied, you lied. Flat out. I really don’t care to split such hairs, but having been treated with the petty shit, let me just point out the hilarity of you doing the exact same thing you accuse me of without bothering to wait even a full column inch. Good god, you’re a funny guy, Frey. I’ll have to ask my LA DA and PD friends to keep an eye out for you at the water cooler.
[So you didn’t mean to imply that conservative bloggers are responsible for putting Hussein’s life at risk when you said:
Fine. I think most people would conclude that was your implication . . . but, fine.
As for your threat to escalate this debate into real life: yawn. It strikes me as unlikely that a jackass such as you have proven yourself to be could have the trust of anyone I’d care about. — P]
djangone (381f2e) — 1/7/2007 @ 9:56 amHow cute, Patrick, you deleted my comment in reply to your lie that I was lying. I’d heard that your instant reply to those who point out your dishonesty is to shriek ‘liar’ and point to something utterly meaningless. Sure enough you did it to me, and then, within a few lines, up and lied yourself in claiming that I blame bloggers for any threats to Jamil Hussein (can you show me where I did that? It wasn’t my intention at all).
But now you’ve just gone and deleted my reply. Ah well, I can claim without regret that I’ve now met a coward square on and shamed him. Love the scalp; works well as a doormat.
[Except that, of course, I didn’t delete your comment. Another lie by you. Man, they’re piling up. — P]
djangone (dfc386) — 1/7/2007 @ 3:53 pmHmm…there’s the comment. My bad. Sorry!
[Yet another case of dj making accusations he can’t back up with facts. — P]
djangone (dfc386) — 1/7/2007 @ 3:53 pmCall me an idiot, most people do, but I do watch what is typed. It takes time to come to consensus, and develop an attitude of denial or acceptance. Time we do not have. I watch what is typed, not for my benefit, but for posterity. Who really cares, you may ask? Only the living, those of us that matter not, do not matter, so to subject all to our tolerance, we must fight and win a battle of wills. The insipid battle of metaphorical desires will surely end in truth? No battle ends with a winner, only those that lose. I can only be shallow enough not to be involved, but involved enough to be shallow, so as not to disrupt my own life and longevity, for I must exist, or you can not. Simple logic. I can not imagine anyone would find a flaw with that extreme intelligence, even if they did not agree with it. The myriad of choices before us are not really choices, but choose well, it is your future.
Rik (219705) — 1/8/2007 @ 12:07 amTo ellaborate: Wingnut is good, I am not sure what is bad, but facts and design help a project to completion. I am sure nuts all hold jobs, but what job is not my concern. I find the “right” consistantly correct, the left raving lunatics. I shall say no more.
Rik (219705) — 1/8/2007 @ 12:11 amCrazy insane and out of control liberal journalists you cant trust them
krazy kagu (3e8790) — 1/8/2007 @ 7:44 am[…] Boehlert’s error, you may recall from an earlier post of mine, was made in a recent column, in which he reported that Hussein “was under arrest” Thursday. As evidence, that column cited a report that said only that Hussein “faces” arrest — and which also makes clear that any prosecution is unlikely. […]
Patterico’s Pontifications » Boehlert Refuses to Correct Error — in Column About Warbloggers’ Refusal to Correct Errors (421107) — 1/9/2007 @ 6:22 am