***UPDATE: Spike Lee begins the charge the Times and Politico called for.

In one of the most cruel and vicious personal attacks you’ll ever read, today’s New York Times pretends to wring its oh-so sensitive hands over the following – while their true agenda is much more insidious:

It is safe to say that no other Republican on the campaign trail this year — or ever — has begun a speech with the phrase “Awww, shucky ducky!” the way Herman Cain did[.] …

Few candidates compare themselves to a flavor of ice cream, but Mr. Cain is intent on letting people know that he is like “Häagen-Dazs black walnut,” the point being that he is certainly not a flavor of the week because it “tastes good all the time.”

Mr. Cain, who is black, has a penchant for gold ties because, as he explains with flirtatious flair, “that color happens to look good against this beautiful dark skin.”  …

He has no qualms, for instance, about playing off black clichés: should he become president, his Secret Service codename should be “Cornbread,” he wrote in his memoir[.]

Then comes the “some say” hit that reveals the real motivation behind this piece of character assassination disguised as furrowed-brow concern:

Of particular concern, some say, is how he seems to make a parody of black vernacular and culture.

“It makes the hair on my neck stand up,” said Ulli K. Ryder, a visiting scholar at the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America at Brown University. “The larger issue that a lot of people have, and I certainly have, is that he uses a certain kind of minstrelsy to play to white audiences. Referencing negative stereotypes in order to get heard to a white audience in the 21st century is really a problem.”

Take “shucky ducky.”

“It’s a nonsensical thing, down-home Southern black vernacular,” Ms. Ryder said. “It’s coded as a black vernacular and it’s uneducated black vernacular, so I find it really interesting that he would reference that, seeing as he is not that.”

What the New York Times (and the equally Leftist Politico) are up to here is the most cynical  kind of race-baiting we’ve seen from the MSM when it comes to Herman Cain. I fear this is only the beginning of the beginning, especially if Cain continues his ascent as a GOP frontrunner.

Here’s what Politico and the New York Times are really up to… (more…)

If you’re like me, you’re tired of being lied to.

That’s what got me started in media criticism.  I would read the Los Angeles Times every day and shout at the newspaper’s reporters and editors over my cornflakes.  “This isn’t true and you know it!” I’d yell.

Of course, nobody over there was listening.  But they listen to me now… sometimes.

Back in February 2003, I started writing my blog, primarily as an outlet for my frustration at the bias, omissions, and distortions I found in the L.A. Times on an almost daily basis.

Since then, I’ve managed to get the editors’ attention a few times.

During the Iraq war, I questioned an L.A. Times report that a U.S. airstrike in Ramadi had “pulverized” 15 homes and killed 30 civilians.  My military and other local sources denied the report.  Based on my post, the editors backed off their initial claims.

(more…)