Monday, July 03, 2006

AP Watch 7/3

David Ammons comes very close to writing an even handed article on Cantwell's problems in Washington. He uses this paragraph:
"In a state that has shown no affection for Republicans in more than two decades of presidential elections, Cantwell would seem to have an easy time securing a second term amid President Bush's sagging approval ratings and discontent with the GOP-controlled Congress."
with the qualifier "presidential elections" to avoid mentioning that were it not for a bit of hanky panky in King County, Dino Rossi would be Governor and Gregoire would be doing whatever losing candidates do after elections.

Cantwell has the only statewide race in Washington this year. If there are no ballot initiatives of interest, turnout is likely to be as bad as in California. If the Seattle nutrooters remain apathetic about Cantwell then McGavick could be going to Washington.
__________________________________________________________________________
AP fails elementary logic with this headline: NYT: Bank Program Not News to Terrorists. If it is not news to terrorists, why is it news at all? It is rather unsurprising that AP is carrying water for fellow seditionists at the New York Times but must they descend into banal stupidity to do so? Has AP sunk to the Times level with regard to the depth of their cowardice in support of their lack of convictions? It certainly appears so.
__________________________________________________________________________________ AP Watch is a Flares feature which takes the Associated Press declaration in its
STATEMENT OF NEWS VALUES AND PRINCIPLES: "we abhor inaccuracies, carelessness, bias or distortions" to heart and offers a helping hand by pointing out egregious examples of abhorrent practice as they occur. Day after day after day.
Examples found by readers and posted in comments will be placed in the main post with credit. All Flares contributors are invited to edit and/or update AP Watch posts.
NOTE: Articles at AP are updated throughout the day. Some of their updates may obviate criticism made here.

3 comments:

Barry Dauphin said...

Did they interview a sufficently large random sample of terrorists in order to come to this conclusion? Geez, this stuff is ripe for Monty Python.

Anonymous said...

Cantwell's dilemma is caused by two things - the radicalization of the Democratic Party, and the red-blue split within Washington State that limits her appeal.

Seattle proper is rather like San Francisco, a nice place for the young, the single, the well-heeled, in their nice new condos. Not a family place. Broadly the same set of values. They would like it to be San Francisco but can't quite pull it off. There are other little islands of this - in Olympia, the state capital, and in Bellingham, a university town.

Otherwise, the state is pretty red, including the outer suburbs of Seattle-Tacoma. This part is growing with families moving from California and elsewhere fed up with the taxes, the bad schools, the crime. Spokane, Walla Walla, and other smaller cities east of the Cascades are also growing with such people, plus retirees. Building schools and churches like crazy. In Seattle, they are closing both.

If you were Scoop Jackson or Warren Magnuson, you could go back and forth between the rural and the urban and draw strong support from each. But the Dems here can't produce that kind of candidate anymore, probably never again.

So it comes down to the electoral power of Seattle versus the power of the rest of the state. I don't have any numbers at hand, but at the moment, Cantwell is weakening.

Rick Ballard said...

Skook,

Here is the latest. She is trending very nicely. If Gregoire's popularity continues to slide it will hurt Cantwell as well.