How the AP distorted Rumsfeld's speech

The website QandO does a thorough fisking of the Associated Press's shocking — yet unsurprising — distortion of Donald Rumsfeld's speech to the American Legion. Example 1 of four:

Donald Rumsfeld gave a speech to the American Legion. You can read it here. Robert Burns from AP reported on the speech. You can read it here. Below are some comparisons from the story and the speech.

1. What AP says Rumsfeld said:

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Tuesday accused critics of the Bush administration's Iraq and counterterrorism policies of trying to appease "a new type of fascism."

What Rumsfeld said:

I recount this history because once again we face the same kind of challenges in efforts to confront the rising threat of a new type of fascism.

Today, another enemy — a different kind of enemy — has also made clear its intentions — in places like New York, Washington, D.C., Bali, London, Madrid, and Moscow. But it is apparent that many have still not learned history's lessons.

We need to face the following questions:

* With the growing lethality and availability of weapons, can we truly afford to believe that somehow vicious extremists can be appeased?

* Can we really continue to think that free countries can negotiate a separate peace with terrorists?

* Can we truly afford the luxury of pretending that the threats today are simply 'law enforcement' problems, rather than fundamentally different threats, requiring fundamentally different approaches?

* And can we truly afford to return to the destructive view that America — not the enemy — is the real source of the world's trouble?

These are central questions of our time. And we must face them.

Apparently aware of the criticism, AP has subsequently done some editing. But the bias and incompetence involved in the first report is startling.

Ed Lasky   8 31 06 

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