Gerard Jackson
BrookesNews.Com
Monday 19 April 2004

Rodney Dalton, New York correspondent for Rupert Murdoch's Australian is walking proof of how dishonest the mainstream media has become. In an obvious effort to discredit Bush he sent in a 'news' report that was tendentiously titled Memo warned Bush of hijack danger (12 April).

The following passage is a good example of Dalton's approach to journalism:

"GEORGE W. Bush was warned one month before the September 11 attacks that al-Qa'ida operatives had infiltrated the US and were preparing for "hijackings or other types of attacks.

"The warning, contained in a classified memo dated August 6, 2001, appears to contradict a key element of US national security adviser Condoleezza Rice's testimony to the 9/11 commission last week.

"Despite tough questioning, Dr Rice maintained the briefing was a 'historical' look at al-Qa'ida's activities since 1997 and 'did not warn of attacks inside' the US".

Now for Dalton's conspiracy angle:

"The document's release on Easter Saturday evening will arouse suspicion it was timed to minimise press coverage, due to the holiday weekend".

I think it's fair to assume that any honest person who is not acquainted with the facts would conclude on the basis of Dalton's report that the Bush administration is culpable in some measure for the 9/11 atrocity.

Once again, it's what the leftwing Daltons leave out that matters. For example, Condoleezza Rice's statement that the briefing was only a "historical" look at al Qaeda's activities is supported by Senator Bob Graham (D-Fla).

As chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee he publicly admitted that his committee had received the same intelligence reports before 11 September as the Bush administration did.

Graham further admitted that the hijacking threats in the 6 August memo to the President were based on old intelligence that the committee was already familiar with. As Sen. Graham said: "The particular report that was in the President's Daily Briefing that day was about three years old…It was not a contemporary piece of information".

It's clear that Graham's statement fully supports Rice's statement. Yet Dalton not only totally ignored (or is that spiked?) Graham's statement he went on to assert that the memo had "breathed life into the debate about whether the Bush administration tried hard enough to prevent the September 11 terrorist attacks…"

Moreover, he further asserted that the memo "contained nuggets of new information" (Bush's memo brush-off, 13 April). How Graham's committee managed to overlook these "nuggets" is a story we'll evidently never get from Mr Dalton.

Some observers would argue that the real "nuggets" are to be found in a 1996 PDB Clinton administration memo that contained details of an al-Qaida attack that would use hijacked planes to destroy the White House, the Pentagon and the World Trade Center. Unfortunately for readers of The Australian Mr Dalton has decided that this particular PDB memo does not merit his attention.

What am I to conclude from Dalton's reporting? That he is only interested in bashing Bush and Rice? That he did not report that Clinton had been caught out in an outrageous lie to the commission certainly suggests that Dalton is playing a partisan game.

As Dalton is so intent on trying to persuade us that though Bush had sufficient warning of an impending attack he nevertheless neglected to take the necessary precautions, let's tale a quick look at Clinton's record.

In June 1997 the Dayton Daily News reported that CIA Director George Tenet had warned that Islamic terrorists were "expanding their networks, improving their skills and sophistication, and [were] working to stage more spectacular attacks".

One intelligence report that was published two months after 9/11 revealed that the plan for the 9/11 atrocity had been uncovered in 1995 when Abdul Hakim Murad, partner of convicted 1993 World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef, confessed to his interrogators.

Now all of this intelligence, which contained warnings that are far more specific than anything to be found in the Bush PDB, was passed on to Clinton, so why isn't Dalton drawing attention to these facts?

Also missing from Dalton's reports was the January 1995 episode when Philippine police officials uncovered a major terrorist plot against US airliners. This intelligence was also made available to Clinton, which he then apparently ignored. (Imagine Dalton's outrage if this had happened under Bush and Rice).

Now comes the sleazy part. In 1996 Al Gore tried to implement airline security measures to counter terrorist attacks. (This effort may have been motivated by intelligence reports). The industry squealed about the costs of the measures.

Tom Daschle was deputy manager of the FAA at the time and his wife, Linda Hall Daschle, was a lobbyist for the airlines. (By the way, the mainstream media, including US-based Australian reporters, couldn't detect the slightest conflict of interest in these arrangements, just as they cannot detect a conflict of interest between Gorelick and her role on the 9-11 commission panel).

The ink was no sooner dry on Gore's gutted airline security report when TWA gave the DNC a $40,000 check. Within the next couple of weeks the money flowed like honey from the industry into the Dems' coffers.

By the purest of chance, Mr Dalton, Gore dropped all his recommended security proposals, to the chagrin of three commission members. To avoid public exposure of what had been done, Gore appeased the three commissioners by restoring the security recommendations but in such a cunning way as to make them useless.

Picture Mr Dalton's indignation if Condaleeza Rice had done such a thing. But as always, with the left, including journalists, it's who commits the offence that matters. And in this case it doesn't matter because the culprits are Democrats, isn't that right, Mr Dalton?

Now for the 6 August memo that the intrepid Mr Dalton would have us believe is a damning indictment of President Bush. Irrespective of the lies the left is telling, the memo does not name any of the terrorists nor does it say or even indicate that the terrorists would turn airliners into flying bombs. As for where, the memo only mentions "federal buildings in New York". However, the World Trade Centre is not a federal building, nor was it mentioned in the memo.

Based on the contents of this memo what was President Bush suppose to do, Mr Dalton? Indefinitely evacuate every federal building in New York? Intern every Muslim in the country? Close down all the airports?

The following articles by Dalton were written in the same prejudiced vein:

9/11 memo puts Bush under cloud (10 April). The title speaks for itself. Nevertheless, it inadvertently revealed Dalton's prejudiced reporting. Although he is quick to quote critics of Bush and Rice he deliberately ignores those who criticise Clinton or Clarke.

For example, thirty-two family members of 9/11 victims signed a scathing open letter to Richard Clarke, accusing him of profiteering from the 9/11 atrocity and of using his testimony to try and "divide America". Dalton ignored it. Compare his attitude to these people with the way he eagerly quoted a firefighter critical of Bush. In my book, this makes Dalton a liar.

In Iraq quagmire is 'Bush's Vietnam' (9 April) he just quotes the old "Iraq is Vietnam" drivel, so revealing his total ignorance of the Vietnam War. (Has anyone else noticed how ignorant of history the vast majority of journalists are?)

Reveal all, Clarke dares Bush camp. In this one he could find no fault with Mr Clarke, despite Lehman's devastating attack on his integrity. But if you got all your info from Clarke you would no nothing of Lehman's attack.

Bush's 9/11 ads under fire (6 April). This one is a real beauty. Here he writes of some victims' families objecting to the GOP ads that contained a clip of the Twin Towers burning. He finished this slimy piece of work with:

"Although the Bush campaign could accuse the [firefighters'] union, which supports Senator Kerry, of being politically motivated, other firefighters expressed similar feelings. "'It's as sick as people who stole things out of the place,' firefighter Tommy Fee told the New York Daily News, referring to the lootings at the World Trade Centre following the attacks. 'The image of firefighters at Ground Zero should not be used for politics.'"

What's truly "sick" is Dalton's dishonest reporting. This is the same political bigot who made no mention of others who lost loved ones and who found no fault with the ads. Although he was free with quotes from firefighters who opposed the ads he refused to mention firefighters — men like Mike Moran who lost a brother and 12 friends in the attack — who support the ads.

Why doesn't Rupert Murdoch sack Dalton and his fellow hacks and just make do with publishing press releases by the Democrats and their front organizations? It would certainly be a damn site cheaper than keeping the Democrats' fellow travellers on the payroll.

You know, the media still doesn't get it. They are just too dumb to realise that more and more people are turning to the net for news and interpretations of current events. Whenever we publish an article exposing a journalist's bigotry thousands of visitors will read it — but not just ours. These articles appear on other sites where their readers also learn just how bad the mainstream media really is, both here and in the US.

What this means is that it's getting harder and harder for the mainstream to successfully deceive the public. So take note, Mr Dalton

Gerard Jackson is also Brookes' economics editor