Patterico Reader’s Published Letter to the Editor Complaining About Tim Rutten
Here is Russell Fox’s letter on Tim Rutten’s column:
Re “The imperial presidency strikes back,” Opinion, Feb. 9
Tim Rutten wrote: “Meanwhile, in another part of the city, Vice President Dick Cheney was addressing the meat-eaters at the Conservative Political Action Conference. He told them that he was glad the administration had tortured people and that he’d do it again: ‘Would I support those same decisions again today? You’re damn right I would.’ ”
The quote is accurate, but the context is absolutely incorrect. In no way did Cheney state that he was glad the administration tortured people. In fact, he said the opposite: “The United States is a country that takes human rights seriously. We do not torture — it’s against our laws and against our values.”
Rutten has deliberately distorted the facts. Rutten writes opinion pieces and, I suppose, can say whatever he wants. Luckily, I have a choice. I have enjoyed reading The Times over the years (though I am not a subscriber, I purchase a copy most mornings). I’ll now be saving a few dollars every month thanks to your publishing such prevarications.
Russell Fox
Irvine
Nice job. Edited out — making this a patterico.com exclusive! — was this sentence: “This [Rutten’s column] reminds me more of something that might appear in a newspaper in a fascist country than anything else.”
Heh.
They deleted the fascist reference? Dishonest, and chickens too.
They are pathetic.
Patricia (f56a97) — 2/13/2008 @ 9:20 amI long ago quit writing letters to the Times as they seemed to choose only the intemperate ones that opposed them so the writers looked representative of the opposition. Since mine weren’t intemperate, they never saw the light of day.
Mike K (86bddb) — 2/13/2008 @ 9:23 amTim Rutten – Born to Lie!
Song title from a movie of the same name featuring this lefty hero.
Perfect Sense (b6ec8c) — 2/13/2008 @ 5:13 pmThey absolutely HAVE to edit something. Shows they’re working.
Kevin Murphy (805c5b) — 2/13/2008 @ 5:51 pmThey only edit for space. There is room for only one person to be called fascist in the LA Times …
SPQR (26be8b) — 2/13/2008 @ 5:57 pmtorture: v. LA Times style of writing, see also: liberal journalist’s attempt to transform opinion into fact
dcrane (bf4b0f) — 2/13/2008 @ 11:48 pmI see that the LA Times continues to show-case
Tino Manus (56a0a8) — 6/10/2008 @ 7:50 pmTim Rutten. Obviously, both the Times and Mr.
Rutten share one common trait, they both have
an IQ approaching average room temperature. If
they both could be somewhat factual in their
news it could go along way in reversing the
paper’s slide into oblivion, you think?