[NYTr] FAIR: NY Times Keeps Mixing Up Homophobic Baptists, anti-war Movement

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

FAIR - Aug 24, 2007
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3167

Action Alert

NYT Smears Peace Movement, Again

Newspaper invents Obama dig

In an August 21 New York Times story about Democratic presidential
candidate Barrack Obama's talk to a veterans group the day before,
reporter Jeff Zeleny attributed to Obama a dig at the anti-war movement
that the Democratic candidate did not make.

After reporting that, "One of the biggest applause lines of his speech
came when he pledged that during an Obama administration, veterans
would not have to wait months - or years - for services at veterans
hospitals," Zeleny added, "He also said it was wrong for anti-war
activists to protest at military funerals, declaring: 'It needs to
stop.'"

However, Obama never mentioned anti-war protestors in his speech, which
is available as a video file on KCTV's website. Here's what Obama
actually said about military funerals:

    "And our sacred trust does not end when service-members dies. The
graves of our veterans are hallowed ground. When men and women who die
in service to this country are laid to rest, as my grandfather was laid
to rest, there must be no protests near the funerals. It's wrong and it
needs to stop."

Zeleny presented no evidence that Obama was referring to anti-war
protesters, who in any case have not been associated with protests at
military funerals. However, several such demonstrations have been
staged by the fanatically homophobic Westboro Baptist Church headed by
Fred Phelps. These demonstrations celebrate soldiers' deaths as God's
punishment for the military's toleration of gay troops under the "don't
ask, don't tell" rules, brandishing signs with slogans such as "Thank
God for Dead Soldiers," "God Hates Fags" and "Thank God for IEDs."

This is not the first time in the Times' pages that anti-war
demonstrators have been confused with the rabidly homophobic cult. On
June 12, 2006, a Times op-ed by blogger Karen Spears Zacharias claimed,
"Hundreds of anti-war protestors...appear at military hospitals and
funerals."  Responding to a FAIR Action Alert (6/16/06), the Times
issued a correction acknowledging that the one organization they found
that had actually protested at the funerals was the anti-gay Westboro
church. (Anti-war demonstrations at military hospitals have largely
been in support of troops and improved services for veterans.) 

As FAIR wrote in that Action Alert, "such anecdotes have the potential
to smear an entire political movement, and live on long after they are
published." Indeed, the Times' unsubstantiated smear of the anti-war
movement appears to still live on at the Times, over a year after the
newspaper published its correction.

ACTION: Ask the New York Times Public Editor to correct the smear of
the anti-war movement the Times erroneously put in Barack Obama's mouth.

CONTACT:
New York Times
Public Editor Clark Hoyt
public at nytimes.com