My letter to CNN blasting falsehoods in their article...

[gcomeau]

...on Bush and Kerry newspaper endorsements.

Feel free to send them your own take on the matter.

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Your article on the newspaper endorsements for Kerry and Bush is factually incorrect and clearly biased throughout.

Your article:

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/10/17/election.endorsements/

It is misleading from beginning to end. It starts by saying Kerry and Bush "split" endorsements on Sunday, implying equality or near equality, neglecting to mention that on Sunday Kerry picked up THIRTY endorsements to Bush's SEVENTEEN. A 57% advantage for Kerry. Kerry also holds an overall lead of 48-34 in endorsements, with papers endorsing Kerry holding a circulation advantage of 8.9 million to 4.7 million over papers endorsing Bush. Kerry's advantage in the critical swing states of Florida, Ohio, and Pennsylvania in this regard are currently overwhelming all out of proportion to that overall lead... and all we hear is that Kerry and Bush are "splitting" endorsements!

Then it goes on to further enforce the idea that Bush did far better than in reality by listing FOUR papers that endorsed Bush while mentioning only THREE that endorsed Kerry.

THEN it simply states a flat out falsehood by saying that, and I quote:

"The papers that endorsed Kerry supported Democrat Al Gore for president in 2000, while those that endorsed Bush on Sunday supported him in 2000."

--The Daily Herald (Illinois). Endorsed Kerry Sunday. Endorsed BUSH in 2000.

--The Daily Camera (Colorado). Endorsed Kerry on Sunday. Endorsed BUSH in 2000.

--The Columbia Daily Tribune(Missourri). Endorsed Kerry Sunday. Endorsed BUSH in 2000.

And if you look at the overall endorsements the picture your article paints is even more dishonest. Editor and Publisher, who track presidential newspaper endorsements, has reported that thus far 39 of the papers that endorsed Bush in 2000 have weighed in this year.

TWELVE of them are not endorsing him this year. That's near THIRTY PERCENT, and your readers hear NOTHING about it! Three are refusing to endorse anyone, NINE are endorsing Kerry AGAINST Bush.

In contrast 31 of the papers that endorsed Gore in 2000 have spoken. 30 are supporting Kerry. ONE is supporting Bush, the York Daily Record in Pennsylvania. Their editorial board split in the process, with one member actually publishing his own letter in the paper dissenting... and their endorsement was given "sadly" since they think Kerry is superior on practically everything but they don't want to "change horses midstream" during a war.

Anyone reading your article without knowledge of the actual facts will be mislead into thinking Kerry and Bush are performing evenly in newspaper endorsements and that the papers are doing nothing but following the party lines from 2000 when that is manifestly not the case.

I hope to see you show some journalistic integrity and correct this with a new article.

-Grant

[librechik]

1. great letter!

send it to the anchorpeople too, especially Aaron Brown.

Nice factchecking!

:thumbsup:

[gcomeau]

4. Sent it to 5 different anchors...

...after editting it a bit. We'll see if anything actually comes of it.

-Grant

[linazelle]

2. Great response...n/t

[IIgnoreNobody]

3. Very thorough! good job