No doubt you've heard or read the story by now. Drudge ran it, and so Fox (and all of the Rightwing sycophants that suck off their teets) dutifully repeated Drudge's twisted and wholly misleading interpretation.

Just prior to last night's debate, Drudge ran this screamer headline which is still at the top of his site: "ABCNEWS POLITICAL DIRECTOR MEMO SPARKS CONTROVERSY: BOTH SIDES NOT 'EQUALLY ACCOUNTABLE' ..."

The desperate and gullible on the Right all dutifully repeated it out in the blogosphere and on Fox News. But of course, if anybody actually reads the memo in question (linked above), they'd see not just the absurd claim Drudge is making, but also the validity of the memo they are choosing to disparage as some form of "proof" that ABC News is biased.

The passage in the memo that Drudge characterizes as "BOTH SIDES NOT 'EQUALLY ACCOUNTABLE'":

...So in other words, the words "we have a responsibility to hold both sides accountable" means "BOTH SIDES NOT 'EQUALLY ACCOUNTABLE'" in Wingnut World 2004.

Drudge's purposeful mischaracterization aside, what ABC News Political Director Mark Halperin seems to be writing about, if this memo is real, is something I've been pondering and hoped to touch on for some time here.

The fact is, the Right has got the supposedly "Liberal" Media so frightened and in their pocket, that they've lost all understanding of what "fair and balance" actually means!

An example; Let's say one candidate in a debate (Bush or Cheney for example) gives incorrect information 15 times in one of the debates. And in that same debate, the other candidate (Kerry or Edwards for example) give incorrect information 2 times.

What does the lamestream media report in their post-debate "Fact Check" segments? "Both candidates distorted some facts in last night's debate". And then they go about showing two examples of Bush/Cheney doing it and two examples of Kerry/Edwards doing it. Never mind that Bush/Cheney was wrong some 15 times versus Kerry/Edwards' 2 times. The wingnuts would cry "Media Bias!!!" if the media didn't equalize the rather unequal situation by showing 2 errors each.

That's precisely what's been happening since the debates began if not well before. After the first Presidential debate, for instance, Fox reported on some of Bush's questionable claims (alright, lies) about the situation in Iraq. He repeated demonstrably fallacious information on many many occassions. Fox reported one or two of those, and then reported the one or two times that Kerry misspoke (when he identified the KGB headquarters in "Treblinka Square" instead Lubyanka Square, or referred to the $200 Billion appropriated for the War by Congress as inaccurate because only $120 Billion of that has so far been spent.)

Those "errors" were reported as if they were equal, with both candidates being incorrect at some points in the debate. That sort of reporting paints an egregiously inaccurate assessment of the event.

Halperin's memo was right on the money as far as I'm concerned. Two inequal candidates do not deserve to be covered "equally". But the media has become so frightened of it's own shadow, that they are serving as equalizers for Bush/Cheney when Bush/Cheney deserves nothing of the kind from any sober and unbiased assessment of the facts and the way these campaigns are being run.

Sadly however, the media has boxed themselves in by running scared for years now. To the point where they won't likely even be able to rebuff Drudge's gross misinterpretation of Halperin's memo ("BOTH SIDES NOT 'EQUALLY ACCOUNTABLE'"??) effectively. I suppose that's where those of us with any sense of fairness and honesty and reason have to step in. Unfortunately, there's not all that many of us left with a voice that can be heard over the brilliantly orchestrated din of lies from the Right.

UPDATE: To give you an idea of the breathless coverage the wingnuts are giving to this non-story (apparently they only bothered to read the headline, not the actual memo). Look no further than this from the rightwing blog Power Line...

Sigh...If Drudge prints it...they will come.

UPDATE: Josh Marshall's take on this nonsense.

Remember the good old days when the U.S. simply toppled governments, installed their man, and then shut up about it?

Well, in a stunner of an election today in Afghanistan, it seems that the U.S. installed interim leader Hamid Karzai also seems to have won the election! What are the odds?

Well, the odds might have been 1 in 16 if you don't consider that the other 15 candidates who ran against him have all withdrawn from the election sighting unfairness in the election process.

And the good news? The wide-spread violence that was feared didn't happen, according to Reuters:

So we may have had to kill a few folks on Election Day, and all 15 non-U.S.-supported candidates dropped out of the race. But hey, nothing's perfect!

As Donald Rumsfeld recently reminded Congress (and as I'm sure you'll remember on our own Election Day coming up...especially you Floridians who may not have your vote properly counted...sorry!):

Bush/Cheney '04: Lowering the Bar to Spread "Freedom"

Bush said tonight, "Al Qaida no longer has a place to plan."

Apparently they do, Mr. "President"....From ABC: Al-Qaida Blamed in Egypt Blasts; 30 Dead

And as to this question from a fine, but well-spun St. Louisan:

Kerry gave some answer or another...but here's what I wish he had said:

"Well, Ann, I wish that was the case. Unfortunately, you may recall the deadly anthrax attacks that have occured since 9/11. Unfortunately, not a single person has been captured in the those attacks, and as you've noticed, the President and his Administration don't much like talking about it for just that reason."

...Or something like that. And along those lines, I'd point you to this Democratic Underground article of mine from June of this year.

Props to Oliver Willis for this catch...

Karl Rove is a master at this. And when Bush's get in trouble, things get ugly. Things may get very ugly, very soon.

Props to Oliver Willis for this catch...

Karl Rove is a master at this. And when Bush's get in trouble, things get ugly. Things may get very ugly, very soon. That fake school terror alert aimed at frightening "security moms" (based on month's old info, procured from one guy in Iraq who was not part of the insurgency, but responsible for building new schools in Iraq!) was likely one example. More coming...

From Kos:

From The NY Times:

And what was up with that Timber Company exhange? Here's the deal...

Bush has been charging that Kerry's plan to rollback Bush's tax cuts on the top 1% of Americans --- those making over $200,000 a year --- would effect 900,000 small businesses. Here's the exchange:

Here's more news for ya, Mr. "President", according to FactCheck.ORG:

Near the end of tonight's debate it occurred to me that even if this debate ends up regarded as a tie (and there's no way to know until after a few days of post-debate spin by both sides has had it's effect) that tonight ends as win for Kerry.

Why? Prior to the debate, much of Bush's support was soft and largely based on the brilliant job they did in making a cartoon character out of Kerry. There were a lot of folks --- a lot of Democrats, even --- who simply did not want to vote Bush, but the picture created of Kerry made them wary of getting behind him.

Twice now Kerry has stood along side of Bush, with the filter gone and looked either far better or equally as impressive/strong.

Thus, those previously concerned about voting for Kerry are being put greatly at ease, and I believe the polls will continue to show that in the next few days by moving more and more in Kerry's direction. Precisely as they have been since Debate #1.

As to the accuracy of the picture given by those polls, no matter who is leading between now and Nov. 2nd...well, I'll have more to say on that in the coming days and weeks. Suffice to say, Bush supporters would be wise not to count any poll-based chickens before they hatch.

No, not tonight's debate. But our servers after the debate. Just as we started our Post-Debate Open Thread. Oh, well... We're back up. Some post-debate observations and info to come...The Internets can be fickle things.

UPDATE: Major power outtage where our servers were located was the cause of the outtage. Our backup power-supply ran for about 1/2 hour before running out of steam. The area, I am told, is still running on backup generators, though hopefully the transition back to full power shortly will be smooth.

Who won? Who lost? Catch any Media Whore spin? Share it right here as you see it.

The debate is won in the post-debate spin. Who's winning tonight? Click COMMENTS...

Open for business! Join us in with any thoughts about tonight's Debate as it happens! Add your play-by-play thoughts to the historic on-the-fly record!

All thoughts, from all sides are welcome! We'll be here all night, though I'll open up a Post-Debate LIVE Open Thread as the official debate ends so you can share any post-debate thoughts and spin, etc!

Hit the COMMENTS button and come on in!

Stop on by during the Great Debate in the Show-Me State for LIVE thoughts and opinions from myself and anyone else who cares to stop by in an Open Thread during the proceedings!

The debate tonight is from boyhood home of St. Louis, Missouri! So I'm sure the citizens asking questions in tonight's Oprah-style debate will do us all proud...(Please read that with a healthy dose of cyncism!)

See ya here at 6pm PT, 9pm ET tonight! I'll try to open up the thread about 30 minutes or so prior to that for any pre-debate thoughts/commentary!

P.S. You may now use (and point your friends to) the easier to remember www.BradBlog.com!

P.P.S. Got some deadlines I need to hit today, so unless I get really outraged about something (has been known to happen) new posts may be few and far between from now until tonight's open thread...but as I say, we'll see...

Holy cow...If this is for real, it's amazing...

Below is part of a scan from a Michigan absentee ballot received recently by a voter. Note how selecting/completing the arrow that points to Kerry/Edwards would actually end up as a vote for Bush/Cheney since the arrows seem to be misprinted next to the names! It's only only the Presidential section of the ballot (full ballot scan is here)

(Click on ballot for full scan of entire ballot)

Add this to the latest developing Florida mess. What the hell has this government been doing for the last four years that they couldn't clean up this nonsense once and for all?! (don't answer that) Unbelievable.

(Thanks Corey for the tip!)

UPDATE: Further investigation reveals this item has been out in the blogosphere for the last coupla days. Mostly on the right side of Blogistan where they see the error as a potential anti-Bush error, instead of an anti-Kerry error. But it seems Kos ran a piece on this as well. In truth, it just seems like a mess to me. Here's an update from someone who claims to have Emailed the Michigan Secretary of State about the error and was told the error only went out to 69 voters. Hmmm...Vigilance.

UPDATE: Now Missouri! How hard could this possibly be people?!

I hate hitting refresh on this page every day. Yet I do it. Virtually every day, the number increases. Today the count of dead U.S. Troops in Iraq jumped tragically from 1064 to 1067.

Even that awful and ever-growing number does little justice to properly remind Americans of the disaster that we've been put through by this horribly failed Administration. I'm not sure that anything but the Bush Legacy as viewed by History years from now, once all the partisans have moved on a bit, will ever properly put things in the perspective they deserve.

Even if Bush is removed from office --- and unless outside events change things, I believe that he will be --- it's unlikely that Americans will ever receive the explanation and apology they are owed for the extraordinarily cynical and corrupt manipulation of the good will and benefit-of-the-doubt that we, as a country, had entrusted in these deadly Snake Oil Charlatans.