As for his media analysis, if Fleischer were addressing only a conservative audience, his readers might not expect his argument about the press to require supporting evidence. The "liberal media" myth is entering its fourth decade of active, endless and professional repetition. But no doubt hoping that his book will be taken seriously beyond talk radio circles, Fleischer sets out to try to document the press bias, how it has been unfairly critical of Bush and adopted a double standard when the Republican moved into the White House. Not surprisingly, given the rampant timidity with which the press has treated Bush, that's when Fleischer's troubles begin.

On page 13, in one of his first barbs directed at the press, Fleischer complains that during the contested 2000 election, the press was eager to label the Supreme Court's 5-4 decision in Bush's favor to stop counting votes as "bitter" and "divided," but days earlier, when the Florida Supreme Court ruled 4-3 in Gore's favor, reporters shied away from the divisive nature of the decision to the point where "most Americans would have thought it was a unified Florida Supreme Court that put Al Gore on the doorstep of the presidency," according to Fleischer.

But a quick check of LexisNexis database finds Fleischer pontificating based on his own press bias, not actual reporting at the time. The "bitter" and "deeply divided" nature of the Florida Supreme Court ruling was widely reported (emphasis added in all quotes):

  • "The Florida Supreme Court drops a bombshell, a deeply divided 4-3 opinion, a split court, but a legal shot heard around the world," Brian Williams, NBC.

  • The "sharply divided Florida Supreme Court ruled 4-3 yesterday that about 12,000 undervotes from Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties must be manually recounted," Boston Herald.

    • "Taking Heat : The President, the Press, and My Years in the White House"

    By Ari Fleischer

    William Morrow

    400 pages

    Nonfiction

    Buy this book

  • "Al Gore's moribund presidential hopes were dramatically revived Friday when a sharply divided Florida Supreme Court ordered the immediate recount by hand of tens of thousands of disputed votes," the Hartford Courant.

  • "The Florida Supreme Court, [in a] bitterly divided 4-to-3 decision for Vice President Gore, stunned so many people, both Democrats and Republicans alike," David Bloom, NBC.

    • Examples like that, which undercut Fleischer's thesis, litter "Taking Heat." For instance, riding a favorite conservative hobby horse, he complains that while reporters routinely label Republicans as "conservatives," they shy away from tagging Democrats as "liberals." "Why have they largely stopped using the word 'liberal'?" Fleischer wonders.

    Stop using? Just within the last year, according to Nexis, the New York Times has published 325 articles that contained three or more references to "liberal," followed by the Washington Post (with 283 articles), Los Angeles Times (266), Associated Press (227), Chicago Tribune (165), and USA Today (71).

    On the flip side, Fleischer doesn't like the word "progressive": "I don't really know what a 'progressive' is, but I know the Democrats like the word and the press use it, particularly in their coverage of social issues." Compared to the 325 "liberal" articles in the New York Times over the last 12 months, the paper has generated 39 articles that feature "progressive" three or more times. (Not all those articles dealt with politics, and neither did all the "liberal" articles, but the number gives a fair indication of their use.) In his analysis of the press, Fleischer argues "liberal" is underused, while "progressive" is overused, the exact opposite of what's happening.

    More trouble ensues when Fleischer complains about how journalists use (or don't use) "social liberal" compared to "social conservative." Fleischer writes, "I don't think I've ever seen the phrase 'social liberal' in the press." Had Fleischer searched Nexis for U.S. media mentions containing the phrase "social liberal" that appeared between 2001 and 2003 -- the time Fleischer served as press secretary -- he would have seen the 725 matches it retrieved.

    He then complains that the press routinely adopts Democratic phrases in its reporting. He recalls one White House briefing when he was asked, "If you're not afraid of going after special interests, including those that supported [Bush] like big tobacco, big pharmaceuticals..." Fleischer is annoyed: "Big oil"? "Big tobacco"? Aren't those former Vice President Al Gore's words?" he writes, slapping the press for using the "lexicon of the left."

    Recent Stories