"DEAN FOR PRESIDENT, I MEAN... WHAT A TEMPER! YEAH, THAT'S WHAT I MEAN" - THE NEW YORK TIMES

Bernie Goldberg say the media bias shows itself in what the media says and often, what they don’t say. In a puff piece disguised as tough reporting, the New York Times yesterday proved Goldberg’s theory in a story on Howard Dean’s temper called As the Race Turns Hot, What About Dean’s Collar?

The Times interviewed seven or eight people, none of which who had anything negative to say about Ho-Ho-‘s temper. In fact, all but one of them were referred to as “political allies” or “longtime friends” or worked for the Dean campaign. The lone interviewee who could possibly be considered an opponent hadn’t even been exposed to Dean’s temper:

“I never experienced his temper, but there are those who say he does have quite a temper," said John H. Bloomer Jr., a Republican who is minority leader of the Vermont Senate. "If anything, he's done well in controlling his thin skin in this campaign."

Great. The Times' attempt to be fair and balanced was in itself proof of bias. They may as well have interviewed me or a coffee farmer in Brazil. Look, Dean’s temper is not in question, he admits he has one, so why even bother to interview someone who hasn’t been at the brunt of it? They should have interviewed Bill Doyle, the Republican legislator who was brunt of Dean’s “finger in the chest” tirade.

The Times had one small paragraph in the article that could be construed as casting Dean in a poor light. It brought up the finger-in-the-chest incident, slamming his fists on the table during a meeting and calling Republicans cockroaches. But that was the only paragraph. Throughout the rest of the story we got things like this:

"Howard gets angry," said one longtime friend, Thomas R. Hudspeth, a professor at the University of Vermont. "He doesn't suffer people being unfair or duplicitous.

“Friends and former employees of Dr. Dean say his temper can indeed flare, although of greater concern to campaign aides is the occasional crisis created by his speaking too quickly on the issues.”

"What people are responding to is that I believe in what I'm doing and it's not calculated," he [Dean] said, “That's a quality you can't fake.”

“Susan Allen, his press secretary when he was governor, says that what some may read as temper is often nothing more than eagerness to get things done.

"He's a doctor," Ms. Allen said. "He sees a problem, he diagnoses the problem, and he prescribes a fix. And then he moves on to the next problem. It can come across as annoyance, I guess. He also doesn't suffer fools."

“Dr. Dean himself said: "I don't hold a grudge, although I try to sometimes. In the end, it's more trouble than it's worth to keep one.”

Please. The article is positively sickening. They Times spent almost all of the 1,500 word article saying Dean has a temper because he cares too much. It’s free campaign advertising like this that shows the bias of Big Media and the shortcomings of campaign finance reform.

I’m disgusted.