Why we're boycotting the New York Times

Andrew Rosenthal, editorial page editor of the New York Times, moonlights as a standup comic.

Rosenthal recently told the annual conference of the Association of National Advertisers that his paper "aims to ensure opinion and news are kept separate, even as the Internet increasingly blurs the lines," the Oct. 17 edition of Advertising Age reported.

Stop, you're killing me. The New York Times is to objectivity what Jack the Ripper was to women's rights.

If the Times strives to keep reporting and commentary separate, you and I aren't the only ones who've missed it. Earlier this year, a Rasmussen Reports survey found that only 24 percent of voters have a favorable opinion of Rosenthal's rag.

On Oct. 22, the Pew Research Center for People and the Press released a survey in which voters, by a margin of 70 percent to 9 percent, said most journalists favored Obama over McCain. The perception of partisanship was even stronger this year than in 2004 – when those surveyed thought reporters favored John Kerry over George W. Bush by 50 percent to 22 percent.

With the New York Times, advocacy journalism has a special dimension. The Times establishes the agenda and sets the tone for the rest of the mainstream media.

Every day, editors at large-circulation newspapers and network news departments avidly follow the Times. It tells them what stories to cover and what approach to take. "Above the page-one fold in the New York Times" is media-talk for: "Pay attention, this is important." The Times' bias is echoed by hundreds of media outlets, large and small.

Thus the power and influence of the Times extends far beyond its shrinking subscription base and online readership.

Just how damaging the New York can be was reflected in the way it managed, manipulated and mangled coverage of the 2008 presidential race.

By mid-September, its campaign coverage was so outrageous that McCain spokesman Steve Schmidt charged the Times was "150 percent" behind Obama. "Whatever the New York Times once was," Schmidt declared, "it is today not by any standard a journalistic organization."

And when was it last a journalistic organization – in the middle of the 19th century?

Ironically, McCain was once the Times' favorite Republican. It revered him a "reformer" and a "maverick." It applauded his push for more controls on campaign spending, and his co-sponsorship of the 2007 amnesty bill. That's before the BBD – bigger, better Democrat – came along.

In an Oct. 10 news story, the Times tried to soft-pedal Obama's ties to unrepentant terrorist William Ayers.

It described Ayers as a "professor at the University of Illinois" who "worked with him (Obama) on a school project and charitable board and gave a house party when Mr. Obama was running for the State Senate." This is like saying Monica Lewinsky was a federal employee who shared certain interests with then-President Bill Clinton.

At the New York Times, editorials and news stories merge. An Oct. 17 editorial charged that by bringing up Ayers, McCain and his running mate had moved beyond mere "distortions," driving deep "into the dark territory of race-baiting and xenophobia." Since Ayers is white and native-born, this left many Times-watchers scratching their heads.

In any number of news stories, the Times suggested that McCain-Palin rallies had turned into lynch mobs, and that the Republican ticket was inciting violence, because a few people shouted "treason" at the mention of Obama's name.

It chose to ignore an incident it its own backyard. When sign-waving McCain supporters tried to march through Manhattan's Upper West Side, they were met by shouts of "He's a lying pig" (in reference to McCain) and "Nazi Germany." For the Times, only words spoken at Republican rallies are incendiary.

Candidates' wives are usually off limits. Not this year.

In an Oct. 18 story, the Times trashed Cindy McCain. One of the writers even tried to contact a friend of the McCain's 16-year-old daughter through her Facebook page on a quest for damaging revelations.

But the New York Times treatment of McCain was thoughtful and nuanced, compared to its saturated bombing of Sarah Palin.

As a pro-life Christian and gun-toting advocate of small government, the Alaska governor represents everything the Times despises. Thus, McCain's running mate was portrayed as a political neophyte, ill-informed, ditzy, vindictive, paranoid and hypocritical.

In an Oct. 3 story on the vice-presidential debate, the Times characteristically reported that the governor "used a steady grin, folksy manner and carefully scripted talking points." In other words, Palin is a hick, a rube – a political Stepford wife who would have been lost without her script (doubtless written by the RNC). In a companion editorial, the paper charged that Palin "never got beyond talking points in 90 minutes, mostly repeating clichés and tired attack lines and energetically refusing to answer far too many questions."

The Times swung from smears to sleaze. The Gray Lady didn't stop with coverage of Palin's daughter's unwed pregnancy. In a Sept. 2 article, mimicking the National Enquirer, the paper noted that Palin and her husband eloped on Aug. 29, 1988, and that their first child was born eight months later. All the news that's fit to print?

On Nov. 10, with its candidate elected, the New York Times felt it was finally safe to talk abut his terrorist fan club ("Jihad Leader Says Radicals Share Obama's Victory").

During the campaign, the Times studiously ignored the following: In April, Ahmed Yousef (a top Hamas adviser) compared Obama to John F. Kennedy. In May, Fidel Castro wrote in Granma that Obama was "the most progressive candidate to the U.S. presidency." In October, the speaker of the Iranian parliament expressed a preference for the Democratic candidate.

The New York Times coverage of the 2008 campaign was biased, brutish and business as usual. Its reporting here was on par with its coverage of gay "marriage," domestic energy exploration, judicial activism, illegal immigration, gun ownership, abortion, taxes, the $700-billion bailout – you name it.

That's why I'm working with Accuracy In Media on a "Boycott the New York Times" petition and website.

The petition notes that the Times "consistently and blatantly distorts the news" to advance its "anti-family, pro-big government, anti-faith, anti-American, politically-correct, isolationist ethic." Signers pledge to boycott the Times (both print and online editions) and, wherever possible, to refuse to patronize New York Times advertisers.

What do we hope to accomplish?

We don't expect our boycott to put the New York Times out of business – though that would thrill us.

We don't think the Times' management will suddenly see the light and begin reporting instead of distorting the news, in pursuit of its agenda. Rosenthal and Company would rather see paper close its doors.

Our goal is to expose America's newspaper of wretched, to rally conservatives and the general public against it, and to progressively limit its influence.

Complaining isn't enough. Documenting bias isn't enough – though we do so with thrice-weekly reports. The time has come to declare war on a newspaper that declared war on us decades ago.

If you're ready to stand up and be counted, we invite you to sign the petition to boycott the New York Times.