When I told you, using one of your own Jewish stories from the Hebrew Bible

He tries to connect to our faith, and we crucify him. Man, that just keeps happening!

Barack was like that when I met him. Barack had it "in his hand."

Sounds like they've been hanging with the Catholics, or maybe The Nature Boy.

The New York Times became George Bush and the Republican Party's national "blog."

I endorse this usage.

Ha, I just clipped the same sentence destroyer did before opening the thread. That's an awesome line. Wright is so right.

"I do not know why I thought The New York Times had actually repented and was going to exhibit a different kind of behavior."

Because when the reporter of a national newspaper calls you up and says hey, we'd like to interview you! it's really hard to remember that she's one of the lying liars who lie.

"There are several ironies at work in conservative criticism of Wright. The first is that I have never heard so many conservatives express concern for black children in my entire life. Unmoved by decrepit, segregated schools, their parents working two or three jobs without guarantee of health care, and dismissive of their abuse at the hand of law enforcement officials, they are suddenly terrified that the Obama children will grow up hating white people."

Man, that letter just sizzles with scorn. I'm coming out of this whole hullaballoo with a lot of respect for Rev. Wright.

Eh, I'm not impressed with Wright's personal complaint - that he personally was treated unfairly. But certainly it's good to object to the NYT in general, and I don't see any particular need to limit criticism merely to what's fair.

Per of, looking you straight in the eye, lying to you, and then screwing you over is what reporters do. Like cops, it's what allows them to do their job.

9 -- Yep.

I exchange emails and calls with a NYT reporter about one of my cases, and yet whenever they run a story (as they did this week) they always quote other lawyers not directly involved in the case. Why? because I never give them what they want. That is, I give lots of information but no sound-bites. By design: no good is going to come from being quoted in the newspaper.

8: You don't think he was treated unfairly? Sure as hell sounds like it to me.

Anyone have a link on hand to the story he's responding to?

Not more unfairly than the norm.

13: I think that's right. I don't know that Romney was treated fairly over his Mormonism, though it's harder to make that case as he was running for the nomination of a party dominated by Fundamentalists and running as the "religious conservative."

You don't think he was treated unfairly? Sure as hell sounds like it to me.

Chatting to you in a friendly way for an hour and then excerpting one or two sentences stripped of all the context you gave them (and fitting into the story the reporter wants to write) is simply standard practice for journalism. This is why the best advice for giving an on-the-record interview is just to write down in advance the two or three things you want to say, and then keep saying them in response to any of the questions you're asked. Wright's letter is a satisfyingly fine old rant, but his treatment by the Times is par for the course. Even when the issue isn't at all controversial, the M.O. of reporters is to figure out the story they want to write and then call around looking for a source who will give them the quotes they want.

I thought that he would have looked more level-headed if he'd left the last two paragraphs out.

12: I think this was a response to the first round of Wright stories, back around December or so, when the Whiteysphere first started getting excited about Obama "disinviting" his crazy black pastor to some event, and thus leading to speculation about the crazy blackness of the crazy black pastor, and to Richard Cohen's Farrakhan column, and to "denounce and reject," and so on and so forth, until someone finally dug up actual clips of Wright speeches.

15: But see, Wright's trying to say that standard journalistic practice is bad.

It's like, standard practice in politics is to smear your opponents and to take totally irrational positions that you don't personally agree with because of the polls. Everyone does it. But it's bad practice, and people should say so and try and behave otherwise, and should be admired, respected, and rewarded for so doing.

the Whiteysphere

Racist. The preferred term is honkosphere.

12:
This is more than year old. From HuffPo:

In March 2007, New York Times reporter Jodi Kantor published a brief story about how Rev. Jeremiah Wright had been uninvited from delivering the invocation before Barack Obama's official presidential announcement.

This is the story he's responding to.

Wright's righteous indignation seems somewhat out of proportion to the unfairness of the article. Did he really think "Obama is an idealistic dreamer who has it 'in his hand'" was going to be considered a newsworthy item?

15: But see, Wright's trying to say that standard journalistic practice is bad.

Yeah. But I'm shocked, shocked, etc.

Incidentally the future student I was talking about the other day has now written the same you-are-a-genius-can-I-have-work letter (modulo a single sentence about the particular genius in question) to more than half the faculty in the department. Sadly, I can't really reproduce the letter here. It's a work of, uh, genius.

Yeah. But I'm shocked, shocked, etc.

It's just possible that such was Wright's reaction, too. I suspect that this isn't his first trip to the rodeo.

Accusing journalists of behaving unethically when they don't print your every word seems a little naive.

However, aggrieved honkies should take some comfort in the fact that Wright isn't so Afrocentric as to scorn the lessons of Schopenhauer's Art of Always Being Right. Way to bring up Valerie Plame, Rev.

Accusing journalists of behaving unethically when they don't print your every word seems a little naive.

Or disingenuous. Which never happens in politics.

Or disingenuous. Which never happens in politics.

Thank goodness. More tea, vicar?

In other shocking news, it appears that people who run for president tend to have rather large egos.

Hey, I know that reporter! Not well enough to defend her other than to say she's been nice to me personally, though. She's a friend of a friend.

Sources close to the reporter say she is known for her kindness and her many friends.

Goneril, we sat down for two hours. I told you that she had crushed the skull of a puppy under her heel, that she'd made billions devaluing the New Rhupee, and that she never calls her mother. But all you can come up with to print is some casually tossed-off line about how she was nice to me once?

some casually tossed-off line

A source, who did not want to be identified because he did not want to be identified, and was telling lies, said the reporter frequently engaged in acts of self-abuse in a blasé fashion.

Why don't people record their conversations with reporters? The reporters do it; why can't the interviewee as well? Is prior consent the problem?

Why don't people record their conversations with reporters?

I just read an article in which this practice was mentioned, rather unfavorably (as you'd guess), by a reporter. Oh, it was a TAP post, and the person who did this was Ehud Barak.

That said, I've always offered to provide anyone I'm taping with a copy of the tape. I've only ever had one person say yes.

I sort of agree with 21, he comes off as someone who is naive about the rules of the media game.

I spent some time listening to right wing talk radio this week, and they are just unbelievable on Wright. "I'm sick of being disrespected as a white man! I'm sick of people pushing a racial, racist politics when the spirit of America is color-blind! Are we supposed to believe Obama can unite this country when his spiritual leader is a professional race-baiter?" Just on and on like that. You have to admire the chutzpah.

...he comes intends to come off as someone who is naive about the rules of the media game....