Goldberg and Guthrie

An AP story is making the rounds which reads like a Foxnews fair and balanced report. (The story is posted on the Foxnews main page now, under the fair and balanced headline "Do as I Say, Not as I Do.")

Basically, the story details a meeting Dean had with energy executives which, according to the tone of the article, is basically identical to the meeting Cheney had with energy executives. Both meetings were kept secret, Dean criticized Cheney for keeping his meeting secret, Dean is a hypocrite, the world will end if he is elected President.

The part of the article that details why these two meetings were the same...

"The parallels between the Cheney and Dean task forces are many.

Both declined to open their deliberations, even under pressure from legislators. Both received input from the energy industry in private meetings, and released the names of task force members publicly.

Dean's group volunteered the names of those it consulted with in its final report.

While Cheney has refused to formally give a list to Congress to preserve the White House's right to private advice, known as executive privilege, his aides have divulged to reporters the names of many of those from whom the task force sought advice.

The Bush-Cheney campaign and Republican Party received millions in donations from energy interests in the election before its task force was created.

Dean's Vermont re-election campaign received only small contributions from energy executives.

But a political action committee created as he prepared to run for president collected $19,000, or nearly a fifth of its first $110,000, from donors tied to Vermont's electric utilities."

So in other words, there are many differences. The AP story says that both Dean and Cheney released the names of the participants in the meeting, but then two paragraphs later states that Cheney's aides divulged the names of "many" of the participants of his meeting to reporters. So, in other words, Cheney has not revealed the names of the participants of his meeting. And this is the main issue! Of course, Presidents and leaders will get better advice if the advice is kept private - it is far more important who they are getting the advice from.

The comparison of the campaign contributions must just be a joke.

Usually, one has to do research in order to refute the claims made in an essay or article. In this case, one simply has to read the whole article. But why do I get a feeling most people won't even do this? Thank Christ Al Gore invented the internet, so readers of this blog can get the fair and unbalanced truth. We're looking out for you, readers. (In other words I, Guthrie, am looking out for you, Goldberg.)