Oh, the Hypocrisy...

On page A4 of Friday's Seattle Times there is a story "Ridge Warns Nation of Impending Attack" in which the Department of Homeland Defense Warns of possible upcoming attacks on US Soil. A story like this clearly deserves to be on the front page as it deals with our very safety. But, if you, like me, have been reading the Times for a while, you have become used to the Times downplaying our war on terror. This time they do it by suggesting that this warning is a political ploy. The third paragraph starts "The Warning caused some skeptics (who?) to ask whether it was politically motivated to help President Bush's re-election chance". WHERE THE HECK DID THIS COME FROM? This IS NOT a political story, nor an Op/Ed piece. It's a warning! The fact that they are, in a sense, dismissing this terror-warning as a political stunt shows a flagrant disregard for our safety.

But, oh, the hypocrisy. Today we get a huge front-page, above the fold, headline "Airport-security system in US riddled with failures". Now this apparent paradox in story prioritization would make no sense unless one understood the mentality of the Seattle Times. I mean, who really cares about Airport security if the war on terror is all made-up anyway, right?

Of course, the answer to the riddle is that the Seattle Times hopes to discredit the Office of Homeland Security with this story, and by association, discredit Bush. It is ironic that it is the Seattle Times who is "politically motivated".

I just started reading today's Sunday paper so there is, no doubt, more blogging on the way today. Stay tuned...