The organized effort to distract the American populace  from the horrors committed by the Bush Crime Syndicate has swung into high gear since last Thursday, when Nancy Pelosi uttered those now-infamous four words:  "The CIA misled Congress."

Republican sphincters throughout Washington, D.C. tightened in panic with this latest revelation. The traditional media, the party’s favorite wingman, commenced churning out stories that completely disregarded Dick Cheney’s glaring role in this debacle, and focused instead on whether Nancy Pelosi was telling the American people the truth. In fact, a Fox reporter so much as admitted that their disinformation campaign is working:

“Instead of this debate being about national security, what is and isn’t torture, what the Bush administration should and shouldn’t have allowed and whether anybody in that administration should now be prosecuted, the Republicans are now able to frame this debate as to whether Nancy Pelosi is fit to continue as Speaker. So they are not about to let their foot off the gas in any way, shape, or form.”

At least they’re consistent.  As Gregg noted earlier today, Rasmussen, the right wing polling organization (or "Assmussen", as some of us prefer to call it), is performing yeoman service for the Republicans, publishing an incredibly obvious push poll:

The absurdity begins with question one: “How closely have you followed recent new stories about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and CIA Briefings?” Rather then frame this as a story about torture, it’s a story about briefings; rather than present it as a story about the previous administration, it is a story about the current speaker.

It may be clear to you and me what the questions should be, but that certainly didn’t keep the Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza from leaping to conclusions without even contemplating the lopsided nature of the poll’s language. Of course, at the WaPo, it’s not just Cillizza willing to toe the line for Cheney.

For every step the country takes forward out of the moral abyss into which we’ve sunk, the Republicans seem determined to push us back to the days of the Spanish Inquisition. And the media is going to do all it can to help.


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  2. CIA Torture Briefings: McCain Owes Pelosi an Apology
  3. Pelosi Fundraiser at UnitedHealth Lobbyist’s Home
  4. Late Night: Elephants on Parade