The president's secret Thanksgiving trip to Iraq prompted predictable gushing from major media. As we head toward a presidential election, mainstream media and their pundits are telling us Bush will be difficult to beat. What mass media don't discuss much is their own role in public opinion and public ignorance, two measures that run hand in hand.
That half or more Americans think Iraq was involved in the 9/11 attack -- perhaps the most media-covered event in our history -- stands as a horrific indictment of U.S. media today. Such levels of ignorance can't be found in other countries.
Americans who are fundamentally misinformed about 9/11 provide the bulk of those tallied in polls as supporting Bush and the Iraq war. Subtract them from polls and Bush is an unpopular president -- widely seen as having accomplished a bait and switch, redirecting U.S. anger and vengeance toward a country that did not attack us.
The run-up to the Iraq war offers a case study in news bias: how mainstream media, especially television, were incapable of getting the truth out in the face of administration lies and innuendo about Iraq's 9/11 role and weapons of mass destruction.
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New York Immigration Lawyer Marina Shepelsky, located in Brooklyn, assists clients from the New York metro area and across the United States in all immigration and naturalization matters http://www.e-us-visa.com
The Candidates on Immigration
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Clinton opposed an amendment (FOX) to the 2007 immigration reform bill that would have prevented criminals from becoming citizens.
Christopher Dodd
Sen. Dodd (D-CT) has expressed uneasiness regarding some of the commonly proposed immigration reform initiatives, including a border fence and a blanket guest worker program. Dodd voted for the Secure Fence Act of 2006, though, he said in a conversation with Felix Rohatyn at the Council on Foreign Relations, "I'm uneasy about these walls being built, although I understand the American public's appetite for security." He also voted for the comprehensive Senate Immigration Reform Bill of 2006, though he criticized the bill for including conflicting provisions with regard to the English Language, "one of which," he said, "could result in some of our own citizens being denied full participation in our society and opportunities to improve English proficiency." He also said in May 2007 that he is not comfortable with a "blanket guest worker program" (DesMoines Register), though he said he is not opposed to it necessarily.
Dodd voted for the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program in 2006, which grants federal aid to states with a disproportionate number of incarcerated illegal immigrants. Dodd also voted in favor of a failed "compromise amnesty" proposal in April 2006, which would have increased the allotted number of visas for foreign workers.
Dodd opposed an amendment (AP) to the 2007 immigration reform bill that would have prevented immigrants with a criminal record from becoming citizens.
John Edwards
The former senator of North Carolina, a state which has experienced a major jump in immigration in the past fifteen years, is in favor of a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants. At a public event in North Carolina in September 2006, Edwards told the audience that solving the illegal immigration problem "is not rocket science," and went on to argue that walling off the border is not the solution. Rather, he believes that there should be a path to citizenship (Greensboro News-Record) for illegal immigrants that includes learning English and paying fines. Edwards co-sponsored the Save Summer Act of 2004, which would have increased the legal limit on H-2B visas for seasonal nonagricultural laborers by forty thousand.
Mike Gravel
Gravel favors a guest worker program and supports providing illegal immigrants with a path to legal status. Gravel cites of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) as a primary cause of the immigration problem. He has said that attempting to deport all the illegal immigrants would be equivalent to Andrew Jackson's "Trail of Tears" campaign against the Native Americans.
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