The fourth estate

I find it really frightening that CBS did this - splicing a different answer into the interview of McCain that they aired on their evening news broadcast. Thank goodness a fuss has been made - I heard about this on Keith Olbermann's Countdown and other places too. CBS said it was a "mistake" (as in an accident) but it seems awfully deliberate, especially considering how much it flattered McCain.

ADDENDUM 8/4/2008

Now the NY Sun has done something similar, leading other right wingers to use their misrepresentation of Obama's speech to their own advantage. This is from Media Matters:

In a July 25 editorial, The New York Sun said in reference to Sen. Barack Obama's July 24 speech in Berlin: "So Barack Obama, whose father is from Kenya and who attended school in Indonesia, now appears before a crowd of 200,000 cheering Germans in Berlin to proclaim himself a 'citizen of the world.' It makes you wonder whether he's running for president of America or secretary general of the United Nations." The Sun later asserted, "We'd settle for a president who is a citizen of America, thank you very much" -- falsely suggesting that Obama had referred to himself only as a "citizen of the world." In fact, during the speech, he described himself as "a citizen -- a proud citizen of the United States, and a fellow citizen of the world."

Similarly, in a July 25 article, the Sun cropped Obama's introduction, writing, "Introducing himself as a 'fellow citizen of the world,' the presumptive Democratic nominee stood in the German capital and called for Europe to stand with America in the fight against terrorism and forge a united front to eliminate nuclear weapons and curb the damage wrought by global climate change."

The Sun did not note in either the editorial or the article that in a June 17, 1982, speech to the United Nations General Assembly, Ronald Reagan introduced himself similarly, saying, "I speak today as both a citizen of the United States and of the world." President Richard Nixon, in a March 30, 1969, eulogy for President Dwight Eisenhower described him as "truly, the first citizen of the world."