Mensch tracht, und Gott lacht

Friday, September 08, 2006

Senate Dems Join Push to Censor ABC 9/11 Miniseries

In a furor echoing conservatives' continuing claims of left-wing bias among the media, Democrat Sen. Harry Reid (NV) and other senate Democrats have joined former U.S. president BIll Clinton in pressing ABC to cancel its showing of The Road to 9/11, the network's docudrama based on the 9/11 commission report and other factual sources.

A production still from ABC's upcoming film 'The Path to 9/11' shows actor Stephen Root portraying Richard Clarke. Amid an election-year debate over who can best defend America, U.S. congressional Democrats urged ABC-TV on Thursday to cancel a miniseries about the September 11 attacks that is critical of former Democratic President Bill Clinton and his top aides. NO SALES NO ARCHIVES (2006 American Broadcasting Companies, Inc./Handout/Reuters)

Reuters reports:

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada denounced the five-hour television movie, set to air in two parts on Sunday and Monday nights, as "a work of fiction."

Reid and other leading Senate Democrats wrote to Robert Iger, president and CEO of ABC's corporate parent, the Walt Disney Co., urging him to "cancel this factually inaccurate and deeply misguided program."

Chronicling events leading to the September 11 attacks, the movie suggests the Clinton administration was too distracted by the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal to deal properly with the gathering threat posed by Islamic militants.

The furor comes as Democrats and Republicans jockey for political position in advance of the November 7 congressional elections over who can best secure the United States from another attack. . . .

In recent days, former members of the Clinton administration also lodged complaints with Iger, urging ABC and Disney to fix or eliminate what they called errors and fabrications.

ABC issued a statement saying the production, "The Path to 9/11," was still being edited and that criticism of the film's specifics were thus "premature and irresponsible."

From Karnick on Culture.

8 comments:

James Elliott said...

I assume that if we look back to 2003 we'll find that you published screeds against the GOP for pressuring CBS into pulling The Reagans because of its inaccuracies and unflattering portrayal of Ronald Reagan?

S. T. Karnick said...

This post is clearly a straightforward factual report, not a screed. In fact, I explicitly pointed out that the Democrats' complaints echoed numerous previous ones by Republicans. Your imputation of bias is absurdly misplaced in this instance.

James Elliott said...

Neither of your last two posts says that at any point.

S. T. Karnick said...

Um, apparently you didn't read the very first words of this post: "In a furor echoing conservatives' continuing claims of left-wing bias among the media, . . ."

James Elliott said...

So in other words, I'm supposed to read into your words something you might have meant that isn't conveyed through the rest of that post or the previous one? You're a smart guy and a great writer - you understand the virutes of being explicit and the pitfalls of ambiguous language.

Francis W. Porretto said...

James's favorite tactics for fomenting irritation are: 1) to read something into one's words that isn't there, and: 2) to fail to see something that plainly is there. He's rather predictable that way.

James Elliott said...

Gee, Francis, I hope taking potshots make you feel better, because it certainly doesn't make you any more right. Enjoy.

S. T. Karnick said...

Francis is right. You were caught out deliberately or negligently accusing someone falsely of dishonesty. A simple apology would have been the correct response.