Yesterday on MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews, Ryan Lizza, Washington correspondent for The New Yorker magazine, was a guest.  The topic turned to Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin:

LIZZA:  Right, there are people who have views on abortion but they don’t vote on the abortion issue, right.  Can I just say one thing on what you just asked Perry about?  To me, this is the elephant in the room about Sarah Palin.  I think there is a little reluctance from folks in the press to just say what is on everyone’s mind.  That is do people feel comfortable with this woman serving as president at a time when we’re at war in two countries, when she’s been mayor of Alaska, one of the smallest state in America by population?

MATTHEWS:  Has made one trip overseas in her life.

LIZZA:  I think a lot of the press corps is a little bit reluctant to go there and to be honest about that, because, frankly, the McCain campaign has been very good at pushing back and working the refs on this issue.

There's a little reluctance from folks in the press to just say what is on everyone’s mind?  Sure there is.  That's why, as pointed out by Brad Wilmouth on NewsBusters,  Newsweek's Howard Fineman claims that "Sarah Palin makes Barack Obama look like John Adams."  And the New York Times's Maureen Dowd whined that Palin "has never even been on 'Meet the Press.'"  Over at the Washington Post's PostGlobal, "a conversation on global issues with David Ignatius and Fareed Zakaria," an opinion piece on Palin today begins:

The selection of another incurious, ill-schooled politician with no foreign policy judgment and a simplistic "the military can solve everything" view of foreign policy will continue the dramatic slide of the U.S.'s global influence. It will also dig us much deeper into a foreign policy hole that has already brought us to an international situation more dangerous than the darkest days of the Cold War.

I have little reluctance in pointing out that Lizza is profoundly wrong, and anyone paying the least bit of attention must realize that.    

John McCain's ad denouncing Barack Obama for supporting sex education for kindergartners when he was in the Illinois Senate hit a nerve.  Today, in a posting titled "Does the Truth Matter Anymore?," Columnist E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post expresses outrage on the newspaper's Web site:

And now comes a truly vile McCain ad accusing Obama of supporting legislation to offer "'comprehensive sex education' to kindergartners." The announcer declares: "Learning about sex before learning to read? Barack Obama. Wrong on education. Wrong for your family."

Margaret Talev of McClatchy newspapers called the ad a “deliberate low blow.” Here’s what she wrote in an excellent fact check: “This is a deliberately misleading accusation. It came hours after the Obama campaign released a TV ad critical of McCain's votes on public education. As a state senator in Illinois, Obama did vote for but was not a sponsor of legislation dealing with sex ed for grades K-12. But the legislation allowed local school boards to teach ‘age-appropriate’ sex education, not comprehensive lessons to kindergartners, and it gave schools the ability to warn young children about inappropriate touching and sexual predators.”

Is McCain against teaching little kids to beware of sexual predators?

The subject of Obama's support has come up before.  In July of last year, MSNBC's "First Read" reported:

Obama spokesman Bill Burton tells First Read: "You can teach a kid about what's appropriate and not appropriate to protect them from predators out there." In addition, he issued a document showing that the Oregon Department of Education has guidelines for sex education for children in grades K-3 (which includes understanding the difference between a good touch and a bad touch), and that the Sexuality Information And Education Council of the United States has curriculum for those in kindergarten.

An examination of Oregon's guidelines shows they include:

Understanding body parts, proper anatomical names, stages in basic growth process

Communicable/non-communicable diseases, the concept

Recognize risk behaviors (sharing body fluids) and methods of prevention

The Sexuality Information And Education Council of the United States (SIECUS) curriculum for those ages 5 through 8 lists the following "Developmental Messages:"

Each body part has a correct name and a specific function.

A person’s genitals, reproductive organs, and genes determine whether the person is male or female.

A boy/man has nipples, a pen**, a scrotum, and testicles.  

A girl/woman has breasts, nipples, a vulva, a clitoris, a vagina, a uterus, and ovaries.

Some sexual or reproductive organs, such as penises and vulvas, are external or on the outside of
the body while others, such as ovaries and testicles, are internal or inside the body.  

Both boys and girls have body parts that feel good when touched.

All this doesn't equate to, as Obama partisans claim, simply teaching children about inappropriate touching.

The state Senate bill in question, SB0099, had changes made to it.  Interestingly, one part that was deleted provided, "Course material  and  instruction  shall  teach honor and respect for monogamous heterosexual marriage."

As I wrote in an earlier NewsBusters item on the subject:

Do parents want government schools providing proper anatomical names to their 5-year-olds? Does discussion of communicable diseases include talking about HIV if one of the students brings it up? And suppose children want a detailed explanation of precisely what body fluids are? What about parents who don't want schools teaching these concepts? How easy would it be for them to opt out and would their children be stigmatized if they did?

Dionne's rabid attempt to challenge McCain's accurate assertion in the ad might provide him with necessary psychological relief, but that's about all.  To many voters, it's just another day with the mainstream media.  They are getting desperate, aren't they?

Today's Chicago Sun-Times boasts "Is attack dog's bite even worse than her bark?" by columnist Mary Mitchell.  The attack dog, of course, is Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin.  Mitchell writes:

After hearing Palin speak, I'm afraid she's going to take McCain someplace he doesn't really want to go.

During her debut, Palin electrified the Republicans, but she also shook up every registered voter in the 'hood.

Besides mocking the historic breakthrough of Barack Obama emerging as the Democrats' nominee, Palin was relentless in her use of language that reinforces divisions among black and white voters -- particularly pitting small-town people against the rest of us.

Mitchell doesn't provide examples of the governor's relentless use of divisive language, so we're expected to just accept her assertion.  Moreover, the columnist doesn't mention how the "small-town people against the rest of us" sentiment may have been initiated.  The Washington Post reported on August 30:

Obama spokesman Bill Burton ridiculed her résumé -- echoing the main argument McCain has directed at Obama. Palin is in her first term as Alaska governor after serving as a council member and mayor of the small town of Wasilla. "Today, John McCain put the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency," Burton said in the statement.

But now it's Obama loyalist Mitchell who's all upset, even to the point of fright:

It is scary that a woman who hails from a small town in Alaska felt so at home on the national stage being downright mean.

What's truly scary is that uninformed readers may start taking Mitchell and other Obamatons in the mainstream media seriously.  These folks are already frantic.  Can they take another two months of the truth being told about their hero?

"Palin claim on eBay plane sale doesn't fly" claims a story appearing on page 3 of the printed edition of today's newspaper and on on its Web site.  The article begins:

JUNEAU, Alaska — When Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin sought to illustrate her frugality and flair to delegates at the GOP convention Wednesday, she described how she disposed of a corporate jet acquired by her unpopular predecessor.

"That luxury jet was over the top," Palin, the Republican vice presidential nominee, said to loud cheers. "I put it on eBay."

Palin's statement implied the plane was sold through the online auction site revered for empowering millions of small entrepreneurs, and Palin's spokeswoman insisted Thursday that the transaction occurred. But the plane failed to sell on eBay.

Instead, the 23-year-old 10-seat Westwind II was sold in August 2007 for $2.1 million to a Valdez, Alaska, entrepreneur; that's about $300,000 less than a broker's asking price, according to news accounts.

So what part of Palin's claim doesn't fly?  She didn't assert the plane sold on eBay, merely that "I put it on eBay."  Seems like the Tribune, in its eagerness to expose the "real Sarah," came to an incorrect conclusion and not one supported by the governor's original contention.

While the Tribune inferred wrongly, I'm certain it won't be deterred.  It and other components of the mainstream media don't appear willing, even after being caught, to give up their slanted coverage of the Republican vice presidential candidate.

According to U.S. News and World Report's Web site, Robert Schlesinger is the magazine's deputy editor and oversees all opinion editorial content.  Schlesinger blogs from the Republican National Convention on "Cindy McCain's $300,000 Outfit:"

ST. PAUL—Remember Pat Nixon's "respectable Republican cloth coat?" It's come a long way, baby.

To wit: According to Vanity Fair, Laura Bush's outfit cost between $3,400 and $4,300. But of course that's chump-change compared to the roughly $300,000 that Cindy McCain's cost (the biggest line-item being $280,000 for three-karat diamond earrings).

For those of you keeping track at home, Cindy McCain's outfit could pay for a four bedroom, three bath, 3,400 square feet house in Wasilla.

Schlesinger cites Vanity Fair, but he doesn't provide complete information.  The Vanity Fair piece concludes:

(All prices except Laura’s shoes and Cindy’s watch are estimates, and the jewelry prices are based on the assumption that the pieces are real.)

That pertinent fact wasn't included by Schlesinger, and you can bet as the story is picked up by other media outlets and bloggers, it won't be added.

Despite my reputation as quite the fashion plate, I wouldn't hazard a guess as to the actual cost of Cindy McCain's outfit.  I did check with a manager of a fine jewelry store and was told the estimated cost for the earrings is "highly unlikely."  Regardless of the real cost, what is the news here:  That wealthy people spend money on clothes and jewelry?  Quick, the smelling salts!

If Vanity Fair worked up a similar estimate for Michelle Obama's outfits at last week's Democratic Convention, I must have missed it.  Vanity Fair did place Mrs. Obama on the top of its best-dressed list recently "because she's our commander in sheath."

With Sarah Palin on the ticket, the mainstream media are worried and getting increasingly desperate.  The over-the-top bashing is obvious and the public is catching on.            

Mainstream media complicity to destroy the candidacy of Sarah Palin is obvious.  Numerous instances have been cited here at NewsBusters, some outrageously blatant.  Slightly more subtle bias was evident in today's print edition of the Chicago Tribune.  Nine letters to the editor were printed; eight of them were overtly anti-Palin and/or anti-Republican.  The remaining letter was a plea for "the birth control education and access" that kids "so obviously need."

A few opinions expressed in today's "Voice of the People:"

But Sarah Palin herself is entirely fair game. The Republican Party has failed governing for eight painful years, all the while rubbing family values and their self-righteousness in the faces of the rest of us. Now that it has been revealed that Palin's 17-year-old daughter, Bristol, is pregnant, the GOP is unmasked and shown to be patently hypocritical and duplicitous. It's absolutely repugnant, and the stench is sure to last well beyond Nov. 4.

Who is going to take care of the 4-month-old while Sarah Palin travels the country campaigning? The 17-year-old? For the experience?

The revelation of the pregnancy of Sarah Palin's daughter does make one curious about Palin's ambition. What would possess someone, knowing that her teenage daughter was facing an unplanned pregnancy, to accept an offer to run for national office?

If family values are so important to Palin, she should have proved it by putting her family's privacy above political ambition.

Amazingly, the "Voice of the People" is strikingly similar to the views advanced by liberal Democrats and their lapdogs in the media.  Accompanying the letters is an unflattering sketch of Sarah Palin.  Might as well cover all bases, just in case someone doesn't read the submissions.

Does anyone  - other than maybe Keith Olbermann or Jack Cafferty, who works his own magic in distilling the public's opinion - believe that 90 percent of the letters to the editor received by the Chicago Tribune are anti-Palin?  That what the newspaper printed today is a typical sampling?  I don't.

Say what you want about the mainstream media, but one point is indisputable:  They're a tenacious lot.  So they're not going to let Hurricane Gustav dampen efforts to advance the Democratic presidential ticket.

Today's Chicago Tribune informs us - just in case we've missed it - that "Obama and Biden (are) a dynamic duo."  The article begins:

Over the last several days, as Barack Obama and Joe Biden have campaigned together in Pennsylvania and Ohio, a dynamic has emerged for the new Democratic ticket.

Where Obama tends to employ his trademark soaring oratory and sweeping gestures, Biden has served as a change-up. He's a go-for-the-throat gambler, tending to condense policy points into bumper stickers. Saturday, when asked about the approaching Hurricane Gustav, he simply said: "Don't ride it out. Ride it out of town."

Physically, where Obama tends to stay fixed in one spot, Biden sweeps the perimeter, brandishing the microphone as though he's hosting a daytime talk show.

He makes the case for his ticket in man-of-the-people terms, preferring to begin sentences with "Ladies and gentlemen" and "Folks . . ." as if he's standing in for Ed Sullivan or Will Rogers. And so far at least, crowds have responded, especially when he mixes in references to his "small-town" roots in Scranton, Pa., and Wilmington, Del., and talks about his father telling him "Champ, when you get knocked down, get right back up."

OK.  Obama's got his "trademark soaring oratory" while Biden speaks "in man-of-the-people terms."  That Obama's oratory must be teleprompter enhanced or that Biden's man-of-the-people routine is already sounding paralyzingly artificial isn't mentioned.

By now there may be a question as to what these guys are running for:  president and vice president of Scranton?  Regardless, they're dynamic.

Just to show how objective the Tribune can be, in its print editions an article about McCain running mate Sarah Palin appears on the same page as the one about the dynamic duo.  Oddly, this isn't as favorable, reporting:

Property tax cuts and a focus on bread-and-butter matters like roads, sewer and water supplies helped her win re-election in 1999. But her rapid rise came with sharp elbows and led to enemies, said Alaska state Senate President Lyda Green, a Republican who represents the area.

"You go under the bus and find a crowd there," said Green, a former friend who had a falling-out with Palin. Others here worry that Palin's growing family — she and husband Todd have five children —could preoccupy her in Washington.

Sharp elbows, under the bus, too preoccupied with her family.  And now, with news breaking that Palin's 17-year-old unmarried daughter is five months pregnant, there's even more reason to wonder about her candidacy.

The message is obvious:  Obama and Biden are dynamic.  McCain and Palin are not.  What would we do without the mainstream media filtering the information we need to know to arrive at the "right" conclusion?  

In today's Chicago Sun-Times, media reporter Robert Feder writes:

Anchor's cheering section

•   •  Chicago reporters covering the Democratic Convention in Denver were stunned to witness WGN-Channel 9's Allison Payne cheering and applauding for speakers Wednesday night while she was seated with the Illinois delegation in the Pepsi Center.

The veteran newswoman has been co-anchoring convention coverage for the Tribune Co.-owned station.

Earlier in the week, Payne was quoted in the Chicago Tribune apologizing to viewers for her bizarre performance on Channel 9's 9 p.m. newscast Aug. 21. "I was not drunk," she said.

She attributed her slurred speech and erratic behavior to a series of ministrokes.

Chicago reporters were probably not taken aback by Payne's enthusiasm for the Democrats, but by her showing it so publicly.

It's supposed to be a secret that the mainstream media are in the tank for Democrats, Allison.  Didn't you get the memo?

Chicago Sun-Times columnist Carol Marin today writes "Daley is Moses-like in keeping ruffians in line at Democratic convention."  She begins with a pop history lesson for any youngsters who might be reading:

I'd swear Mayor Daley is channeling Ward Cleaver here in Denver.

If you're too young to remember the now-ancient TV series, it's on YouTube.

Jerry Mathers starred as Beaver Cleaver, a wide-eyed, excitable kid. Ward was his calm and reasoned dad.

"Gee whiz, Dad!" The Beaver would exclaim.

"Now, now, son," Ward would soothingly say.

That's Daley this week in the midst of a combustible bunch of Illinois delegates.

Marin indirectly references the contretemps resulting from Emil Jones, state senate president and Barack Obama mentor, calling another Democratic delegate an "Uncle Tom."  She then applauds "life coach" Daley for serving as the conciliator:

Rich Daley, who was forged in the convention mayhem of 1968 and the acrimony of the convention of '72, is 66 years old now. There is a lot stored in his brain about the past and about the future. Invoking Teddy Kennedy and Michelle Obama, he spoke yesterday of the "tears in our eyes and a smile on our face."

It doesn't sound at all like the Chicago politics we know.

I don't understand how individuals would store a lot about the future in their brains, but perhaps other Democrats are now assuming the God-like abilities of their presidential candidate.

Insofar as her assertion that recent events don't sound like the Chicago politics we know, Marin is examining matters through rose-colored glasses.  Yesterday in the Chicago Tribune Daley is quoted:

“Like anything else in a primary, a lot of discussions, a lot of debate goes on and a lot of accusations. But it’s over with. And now we have to move on. The primary is over with. And let’s all unite on behalf of Barack Obama. We don’t want to hear any dissent,” he said.

We don't want to hear any dissent.  Now that's pure Chicago politics as usual.  Ward Cleaver has left the building.

In an Associated Press article written by Julie Watson and published yesterday, we learn that "Mexicans deported from US face shattered lives."  The piece begins:

TIJUANA, Mexico (AP) — The towering black gate opens silently to an alley with walls of corrugated metal. Scrawled in large white letters on one wall is: "The End."

For those deported from the United States, the words are an unnecessary reminder. Nearly every hour of the day, guards unlock this gate that leads back into Mexico, clicking open the padlocks hung on each side, in each nation.

Every time the gate slams shut, it wipes out a dream, divides a family, ends a life lived in the shadows of the law.

We later read:

In a week spent at the Tijuana gate, The Associated Press watched busload after busload of deportees arrive, some in a daze, still stunned over their sudden expulsion. Many stumbled over the Mexican official's question, "Where are you from?" after spending decades in the United States.

The faces of those who stream through reflect how tough and far-reaching the U.S. crackdown on illegal immigration has become.

The article details the experiences of several illegal immigrants sent back.  One is Nestor Ortiz, who's being sent back for the third time in ten days.  In his last entry into the U.S., he injured his leg and feet in a 20-foot jump from a wall.  Ortiz received treatment at Scripps Mercy Hospital in San Diego. The reporter doesn't indicate who paid for that treatment.

Ortiz calls his two sons in California:

"I'm not coming back," he says, choked up as he talks to his 17-year-old son by phone from Tijuana's Salvation Army shelter. "I can't walk. Both my feet are in bad shape."

He asks Juan to consider moving to his hometown of Tlalnepantla, on the edge of Mexico City.

The conversation turns tense. Juan has lived in the United States since he was 7 and doesn't want to leave his friends.

"I think you should not be alone over there," Ortiz says, sighing. "Finish high school and then you can come here. At least here you have your grandparents, your cousins. Over there, what do you have?"

Ortiz breathes in deeply, holds his brow and reels in his overwhelming grief.

He tells his other son, 23-year-old Nestor, to cancel his father's gym membership, put the Chevrolet Suburban in his name and take Juan to live with him.

Fortunately, reeling from the overwhelming grief didn't keep him from forgetting to cancel the gym membership and transfer the SUV's title.

Obviously intended to evoke sympathy for the plight of illegals sent back, the article makes little if any mention of why these people find themselves in such difficult circumstances.  It's because they broke American law.  They are uninvited intruders. 

All the heart-wrenching anecdotes in the world don't change that most important fact.  The unhappy people described by the AP are responsible for their own plight.  They broke the law. It's a point worth highlighting.  The AP didn't.