] But as Adam Clymer pointed out yesterday on the Op-Ed page of
] The Times, front-page coverage of the 2000 debates emphasized
] not what the candidates said but their "body language." After
] the debate, the lead stories said a lot about Mr. Gore's
] sighs, but nothing about Mr. Bush's lies. And even the
] fact-checking pieces "buried inside the newspaper" were, as
] Mr. Clymer delicately puts it, "constrained by an effort to
] balance one candidate's big mistakes" - that is, Mr. Bush's
] lies - "against the other's minor errors."

Personally, I've been getting disgusted lately with the lies coming from the Kerry campaign, though of course those too can be looked at as "word-twisting" or "a matter of perspective."

For example, in Kerry's speeches, and this editorial, they're saying things like, "Bush let Osama get away. Bush ignored North Korea. Bush turned Iraq into a haven for terrorists, when it wasn't before." Or when Kerry speaks in absolutes like when he said that *every* decision that Bush has made has been the wrong one. Every single one? Give me a break. All of those assertions are so clearly false, it just turns my stomach and makes me tune out any other *good* points that Kerry may have. The rhetoric is absurd.

It's clear hypocrisy: Accusing Bush of misleading the American public, while Kerry is systematically doing misleading of his own!

- Elonka

RE: The New York Times -- Op-Ed Columnist: Swagger vs. Substance