Screaming at my radio

I still listen to NPR, because it's got the best online news coverage, and I can tune in to it easily while I work at my computer. Of course, that doesn't stop me from stopping periodically to scream at my radio (or, I should say, my computer), when something exceptionally stupid comes out of the reporter's mouth. I also realized that NPR's real bias lies, not it the actual stories it tells, which it manners to report fairly even handedly, but in the throw-away asides planted in the otherwise straight stories or in the information missing from the story. Take, for example, this story about Palestinian arrests following a year-long Palestinian investigation into corruption. On its face, the story is straightforward reporting, with many more details than the 20 second "top of the hour" squiblets one gets on AM radio. We hear how Abu Mazen authorized the investigation a year ago, how it turned up $500,000,000 in embezzled money, how a current authority swears that all the loopholes allowing this kind of crime are gone, etc. A couple of things go unmentioned, which I found interesting, but not incredibly significant: (1) the origin of these funds (Western nations, who have been taken for an embezzlement ride) and (2) the fact that Arafat was the biggest embezzler of all, with most of the billions he took lining his wife's pockets, with some doled out amongst various cronies to buy their silence. Fine, those are other stories in themselves. What had me screaming was this bit:

The [Palestinian] Attorney General's announcement came just ten days after the Islamist Hamas Movement won Palestinian parliamentary elections. Hamas made corruption the centerpiece of its campaign, and most analysts believe it was the reason for the Hamas victory. [Emphasis mine.]

Only in the liberal media could Linda Gradstein say with a perfectly straight face that "most analysts believe [an anti-corruption platform] was the reason for the Hamas victory." The fact that Hamas, since its inception, has stood primarily for the destruction of Israel and all her citizens is irrelevant. The fact that one of Hamas' lead (and most successful) candidates is a woman who cheers children on to death doesn't matter. And significantly, the fact that large numbers of commentators strongly believe that the Palestinians are, in fact, delighted with Hamas' genocidal agenda just doesn't register in the taxpayer funded liberal bubble that is public radio. Talking to Technorati: Hamas, NPR