Yes, the Republicans benefited from corporate donors and other political entities that offered up critical financial support in the run up to 2012. But, even the New York Times is forced to admit that on balance the Democrats raised more money. So what was the decisive factor? Shady “outside organizations” and anonymous donors? How bout ideology? The GOP’s renewed commitment to constitutional limited government struck a chord with Tea Party activists and average citizens who are rightly concerned about Team Obama’s big government schemes.

Republican operatives should be credited and recognized for their aggressive fundraising efforts, shrewd communication tactics and for cultivating an alliance with “outside interests” and corporate benefactors. But party’s renewed commitment to constitutional limited government had very little bearing on the 2010 election returns.

This is the central message of a New York Times post-election report that somersaults away from acknowledging the powerful influence Tea Party activists had on independent voters. While it is evident from the election returns and opinions polls that the public favors tighter restraints on federal power, the newspaper takes care to sidestep any discussion of ideological. Instead, the report peddles alternative explanations for the 2010 results that fixate on corporate interests that supposedly have impure motives and shady political entities tied with Karl Rove, the former political advisor President George W. Bush.

There’s a disconnect here because the article concedes that Democrats by and large also raised more money than they Republican counterparts thanks to organized labor and other left leaning pressure groups.

“The White House struggled to keep Democrats in line, with a misplaced confidence in the power of the coalition that propelled Mr. Obama into office,” the report says. “Republicans capitalized on backlash to the ambitious agenda Mr. Obama and his party pursued, which fueled unrestricted and often anonymous contributions to conservative groups, some advised by a nemesis Democrats thought they had shaken, Karl Rove.

That money so strengthened the Republican assault across the country that an exasperated Democratic Party strategist likened it to `nuclear Whac-a-Mole.’ Most of all, Republican leaders had the foresight to imagine the possibility of winning again. Even now, they believe they could have taken back the Senate if they had just managed to block at least two Tea Party candidates who proved unelectable.”

This assessment has to be balanced against the grass roots efforts that ultimately propelled other Republican candidates with strong libertarian leanings to victory. Recall, that the NYT (and other press organs) were highly dismissive of Rand Paul in Kentucky and Marco Rubio in Florida. Both candidates challenged the elite establishments of their own parties and connected with an antagonized electorate opposed to the Democratic Party’s spending schemes. Both candidates preserved through negative press coverage with considerable Tea Party support.

It should also be noted that the liberal media’s antipathy toward the Citizens United Supreme Court decision expanding First Amendment freedoms is lurking behind the report. On the question of anonymous donations and the relationship between corporations and the Republican Party, some key facts are in order.

While President Obama has accused the Chamber of Commerce of accepting foreign donations to influence the elections, which would be a violation of the law, his statement is provably false.

“You don’t know,” Obama told a Philadelphia rally for Joe Sestak, the defeated Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate. “It could even be foreign-owned corporations. You don’t know because they don’t have to disclose.”

Only, they do have to disclose. Obama’s statement is actually provably false. You see, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce actually operates a political action committee, which is required to file reports with the Federal Elections Commission (FEC).

You can read the U.S. Chamber PAC’s filings for yourself at http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/cancomsrs/?_10+C00082040.

Additionally, the PAC’s “secret” donor lists are at http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/com_ind/2009_C00082040 and http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/com_rcvd/2009_C00082040. These are all FEC filings. PAC’s are already required to disclose donors under federal law.

In fact, this is a part of the Chamber that is expressly engaged in electioneering, subject to full disclosure. Here are the PAC’s expenditures, all public for the world to see: http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/com_supopp/2009_C00082040.

While it is true that the Chamber’s 501(c)6 filings are not public, that does not mean such disclosures do not exist. Many of them actually should already be available to the Obama Administration. How?

“Any organization, whether or not it engages in electioneering must file tax returns to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), which include who donates,” Americans for Limited Government President  Bill Wilson recently explained

Organizations must file form 990’s, which include Schedule B’s for disclosing donations over specified amounts depending on the type of organization. Minimum net donations which must be included in the forms can range from $1,000 to $5,000, depending on the group.

If the Obama Administration has reason to believe that the Chamber — or any other organization — is using foreign donations to engage in electioneering, it could have the IRS simply conduct an audit, which would quickly get to the truth of the matter.

The obsession with anonymous donors who are not so anonymous is served up to distract from the ideological factors that collapsed the Democratic majority in the House and eroded its position in the Senate. That’s the story.

Where is the money suppose to come from for this proposed commuter rail tunnel linking NYC and New Jersey. The Gray Lady never quite gets around to answering this in a highly partisan editorial that takes aim at Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey for canceling the project. It also praises Mayor Mike Bloomberg of NYC for offering up an alternative plan that the editorial admits “sketchy.” What? N.J. voters know their state is out of money….

Despite all the evidence out there to the contrary, the New York Times continues to argue in favor of government spending as the antidote for economic malaise and fiscal restraint. While the paper is certainly entitled to editorialize against public officials, the highly partisan and condescending tone it adopts here against Gov. Christ Christie of New Jersey and his budget cutting policies is highly instructive.

A Quinnipiac University survey shows public sentiment very much in support of the governor’s decision to cancel an $8.7 billion commuter rail tunnel to New York City. The poll shows 53 percent of voters supporting Christie versus 37 percent who do not. Over 30 percent of Democrats also said they support Christie’s actions.

Using the 2005 initial projection of $5 billion, New Jersey officials proceeded to obtain $3 billion from the federal government, spend $600 million in start-up costs, and commit another $1.2 billion in contracts and fees.  Now, as the expected cost of the project has ballooned to $10 billion – double the original estimate – construction has ceased as the state’s budget woes have worsened.  This essentially means taxpayers will have spent over $4.5 billion for nothing.

But NYT sees the matter much differently. Somehow the federal government will come through with additional funding to defray costs for the “much- needed” mass transit tunnel, the editorial says. Moreover, Michael Bloomberg, the enlightened mayor of NYC, has “come to the rescue” with a proposal for an alternative tunnel.

“It’s nice to know somebody is thinking big about the region’s economic future,” the NYT sneers even as it acknowledges that the “Bloomberg plan is sketchy, and it is not clear where the money would come from.” That’s quite a pivot.

Gov. Christie connects with voters because they understand as he does that N.J. is essentially bankrupt and cannot afford new spending schemes. In many respects, the budget process at the state level is broken. It is hard reality that continues to elude the Gray Lady, but not the Republican governor it so loaths. Gov. Christie understands cost projects for infrastructure projects are often way off and cost more over the long-term. That’s why he was right to terminate this project in the cradle. For this he deserves praise not scorn.

But the concluding paragraph takes aim at Christie for advancing policies that are consistent with Tea Party sentiment.

“Perhaps some sage from one of the big universities — Princeton or Rutgers? — could help the state spend almost $60 million from the federal government to weatherize New Jersey homes,” the editorial suggests. “After all, Mr. Christie is busy making news and charming the right by downsizing his state, so it falls on others to think about the future.”

Perhaps the NYT could refrain from “charming” big government proponents who have made infrastructure projects quite untenable thanks to unchecked deficit spending.

Beyond ridiculous is the best way to describe this report on pg. A9 of the Sat. Oct. 20 edition that takes aim at Rep. John Boehner, the Ohio Republican who is set to become the new House Speaker in January. The NYT is beside itself because he received an escort through security. This is a lame, empty attempt to sabotage the GOP leader.

With the controversy over the Transportation Safety Agency’s (TSA) new security policies heating up, the New York Times has seized upon Rep. John Boehner’s recent flight out of Reagan National in an effort to needle the incoming Republican House Speaker for receiving an escort through security. This is a nothing story replete with snide comments and editorial observations that do not belong on the news page.

Boehner is a hypocrite because he criticized Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) for using military instead of commercial aircraft, but now sees fit to invoke privileges that are not available to average citizens the NYT tells readers.

“The Republican leader, who will become the second person in line to assume the presidency after the new Congress convenes in January, took great pride after the midterm elections in declaring his man-of-the-people plans to travel home as other Americans do,” the NYT says. “In a time of economic difficulty, it was a not-so-subtle dig at Ms. Pelosi, who has access to a military jet large enough to avoid refueling for her flights home to San Francisco. But he is not giving up all the perquisites of power.”

This is what you call sour grapes. The liberal editors at the NYT had envisioned a long reign for the Democrats in the House that ended abruptly after just a few years. On the surface, this report from Jeff Zeleny may appear small, trite and inconsequential. In reality, it should be properly viewed as a dry run for more expansive hit pieces that will be rolled out in short order.

The double standard is now in effect for the incoming House Speaker who will be scrutinized and scorned at every turn. This is not about logic or fairness; it is about agenda-based reporting. The NYT is obviously looking for any conceivable angle that could be parlayed into news reports that distract from the Republican Party’s policy agenda.

“There was no waiting for Mr. Boehner, who was escorted around the identification-checking agents, the metal detectors and the body scanners, and whisked directed to the gate,” the NYT sneers in the second paragraph.

There is no substantive criticism to be made here as there is “no waiting” for public officials in any number of venues. Moreover, Boehner’s rebuke of Pelosi was rooted in a genuine to desire reform extravagant practices that further burden already beleaguered taxpayers.

While it has every right to editorialize on behalf of global warming alarmists, the NYT should at least acknowledge the existence of updated research and the simmering scientific disputes, which have greatly unsettled the so-called “consensus” green activists have used as a rationale to advance the  Kyoto Protocol and other regulatory schemes…

Precious little progress has been made from the alarmist perspective since the United Nations climate change conference held last December in Copenhagen, Denmark, a blogger for the New York Times concedes. Looking ahead to the next conference, which opens at the end of November in Cancun, Mexico there is now speculation that this may be last gathering. Although green activists continue for push for a binding international agreement to lower emissions, government officials are unlikely to advance any substantive measures.

“Now many are wondering whether the process itself, under the auspices of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, is so flawed that it should be scrapped,” the blog says.  “Is it realistic to expect that 200 nations with vastly different interests, from China to Saudi Arabia to Bolivia to Micronesia, can come together to address a problem that will affect them in vastly different ways? Is there a better way to attack a global problem largely caused by a handful of large industrialized countries? Should the next so-called `conference of the parties’ be the last?”

Since the mid-1990s, the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has been invoked as the final authority on the question of man-made global warming. But it has come under severe criticism recently over its methodologies and procedures.

The U.N. tasked The InterAcademy Council (IAC), based in Amsterdam, to investigate the IPCC. Its findings, published on August 30 concluded that the IPCC was predisposed toward conflicts of interest, made multiple assertions about climate change that lack scientific support, and inappropriately interjected itself into the policy making process.

Yes, the process is flawed but somehow the NYT never gets around to raising questions about the so-called scientific consensus that has been used as a rationale for international regulatory agreements.

“A relatively small group of countries — the United States, China, Russia, India, Brazil and the European Union — are responsible for the vast bulk of global carbon emissions,” the blogger observes. “Why can’t they get together and agree on some common steps and a plan for providing aid to smaller, more vulnerable countries? Why do Cuba and Sudan have to sign onto whatever they agree to? In fact, such discussions now regularly take place outside the United Nations ambit, whether in the Group of 20 or other international forums, or in bilateral talks like those between the United States and China on clean energy innovation.”

Just prior to the November elections, the NYT ran yet another editorial criticizing public officials who have raised questions about the evidence offered to support the idea that human activity has been driving climate change. This despite an avalanche of data that shows nature forces are largely responsible for warming and cooling trends.

Fred Singer, an atmospheric physicist and professor emeritus with the University of Virginia, suggests in a recent essay for The American Thinker, that NYT become better acquainted with recent developments and the sentiment of its own readership.

“The NY Times may be seriously out of step with its own readers,” he wrote. “At least that’s how I would judge the results of a survey of readers of Scientific American, a magazine that has been just as alarmist about AGW as the Times:

**77% believe that current climate change is caused by natural processes

**68% think we should do nothing about climate change, are powerless to stop it

**90% approve of climate scientists debating the issue in public forums

**83% believe that the UN-IPCC is corrupt, prone to groupthink, and has a political agenda.

The New York Times is doing a disservice to its readers and to the US public in stoking unreasonable fears not based on solid science.”

So while serving as a U.S. attorney, now Gov. Chris Christie would sometimes get waivers for hotel stays when the government rate was not available and the NYT is scandalized. Every effort is made here to uncover wrongdoing where non exists. NJ’s budget-cutting chief executive has become a national figure and a possible presidential contender. The outrage here is feigned and not real. Since when is the NYT concerned about taxpayers?

Even as the New York Times concedes that Gov. Chris Christie of N.J. is a “rising star in the Republican Party” thanks to his budget cutting, it needles him for billing taxpayers for hotel stays. This criticism is  recycled from the state’s 2009 gubernatorial race that ended with Christie unseating Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine.

But it has made its way into the news again on the basis of a report that the U.S. Justice Department released on Monday. Christie served as the U.S. attorney from 2002 until 2008.

“The report cited stays in the $449-per-night Nine Zero Hotel in Boston and the $475-per-night Four Seasons Hotel in Washington,” the NYT informs readers. “Both cost more than double the government rate for those cities. In all, Mr. Christie exceeded the lodging rate on 14 of 23 trips without adequate justification, billing taxpayers $2,176 in excess of the maximum normal rates.”

This is all about fishing for a scandal where one doesn’t exist. Gov. Christie is wise to avoid any engagement here with NYT reports that would just play into the agenda of a biased liberal news media. The tone angle of the report is beyond ridiculous. While serving as U.S. attorney, Christie would seek the government rate for any details and then ask for a waiver when one was not available.

“Mr. Christie declined to speak with the inspector general’s investigators,” the report says. “But his secretary at the federal prosecutors’ office told them that he would choose his hotel if he was familiar with the city. If he was not, she would seek a recommendation for a ‘decent’ hotel at or near the site of a scheduled meeting. While she “routinely called hotels to seek the government rate,” when the cost exceeded that rate he would obtain a waiver, according to the report.”

“In several cases, the waiver documentation included a memorandum signed by Mr. Christie saying that a room within the government rate was unavailable,” the NYT continues. “The secretary said the memorandums meant not that a cheaper hotel room could not be found, but that no such rooms fit the criteria of a “decent” hotel near a meeting site.”

Should Christie have stayed in a hostel or a doom room instead?

The total of extra billing was $2,176.00, which is not out proportion with what other prosecutors have charged.

While it’s refreshing to see the NYT take an interest in the spending habits of public officials, the newspapers does not have long history here as advocate for taxpayer interests. Quite the opposite in fact. Over the weekend, Christie did not explicitly rule out a possible presidential run when asked about his ambitions. That’s what this is about. The outrage over expenses is feigned and not real.

George Soros, the radical, far-left billionaire, with a long history of antipathy toward American interests, now sits on a U.N. panel charged with organizing a $100 billion wealth transfer from the developed world to the underdeveloped world in the name of environmentalism. News of his involvement here is buried away in a NYT report but it should be the lead sentence.

Developing countries must help combat the many challenges associated with global warming, according to a United Nations (U.N.) panel. That is assuming all concerned parties accept the premise of catastrophic human induced climate change and the New York Times certainly does. The price tag has been fixed at $100 billion and the villain here is of course the United States, which refuses to comply with anti-emissions regulations.

It’s a familiar script that is wearing thin. The alarmist rationale has been dealt serious setbacks in recent months thanks to updated research and the growing “climategate” scandal. But international bureaucrats and transnationalists opposed to America’s free market system remain undeterred in their course of action.

Last December, “international leaders” agreed that it would be necessary for the developed world to fork over 100 billion by 2020 during the Copenhagen climate summit. But the methodology and details of this transfer remain a point of consternation and contention. The U.N. panel has just released a report that offers up some suggestions.

“The attitude of the developing nations was that the industrialized world caused the pollution, so the richer states should cut a check for reparations and another check to help pursue clean development,” the NYT report notes. “The richer nations balked at the prospect. Some of those differences remain in the report: the developing world thinks the financing should come in the form of public aid, whereas the developed world wants to rely heavily on private investment, for example. The differences were indeed on display during the release of the report.”

The nexus between environmentalism and anti-Americanism is not difficult to unravel. Van Jones, an avowed communist, who previously served as a czar for the Obama Administration, was forced to step down when far left history came to light. Buried deep in the NYT piece is a revealing nugget that should have been in the lead.

“The 21-member United Nations panel included Lawrence H. Summers, the White House’s departing national economics adviser; the billionaire financier George Soros; Ernesto Cordero Arroyo, the finance minister of Mexico; and Christine Lagarde, the French economic minister,” the NYT reports.

That’s right, the same George Soros who has railed against American independence and sovereignty is now organization a massive wealth transfer to third world countries in the name of environmentalism.

The headline should read: George Soros Led United Nations Panel Organizes $100 Billion Anti-U.S. Shakedown Effort.

There is some good reporting here that flushes out engaging personalities from the across the country who are determined to make a stand on behalf of liberalism and the Democratic Party. But the double-standard is evident. Tea Party activists do not typically receive congenial coverage. The NYT, which is often so certain of lower attendance figures for right-leaning rallies does not have any hard numbers or facts, to account for the numbers its cites…

There are no official figures given by the National Park Service of the Washington D.C. rally held this past weekend that included liberal activists from across the country.  The event sponsored by Viacom’s Comedy Central Network was widely viewed as rejoinder to the rally Glenn Beck of Fox News held at the Lincoln Memorial in August.

The “Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear” did not include any Democratic politicians and instead featured Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, two left leaning political satirists. The article does a good job of flushing out some of the key personalities and reporting on clever messaging. It does not fixate on the attendance, which would be fine, if the NYT did not go to such great lengths to dismiss turnout figures for Beck’s rally.

“The National Park Service did not offer a formal crowd estimate,” the report says. “But Judy McGrath, the chief executive of Viacom’s MTV Networks unit, said she had been told by the Parks Service that there were `well over 200,000 people” at the rally. Mr. Colbert offered his own guess in a Twitter message: “Early estimate of crowd size at rally: 6 billion.”

“Four friends, dressed as giant tea bags in a spoof of the Tea Party, said Mr. Stewart and Mr. Colbert were the only ones they felt expressed their point of view,” the report explains. “For everything that’s happened in the past two years, ‘The Daily Show’ is how we cope,” said one of the tea bags, S. J. Klein, a 40-year-old man from Anchorage.”

“Alex Foxworthy, a 26-year-old doctoral student from Richmond, Va., summed it up like this: “The battle for the American mind right now is between talk show hosts and comedians. I choose the comedians,” the report continues.

In sharp contrast to the critical view it took of the Beck rally, the NYT plays it straight here. Participants are quoted at length without derisive afterthoughts. The 200,000 estimate from the MTV official does not sound unreasonable on the surface. However, it do not match even more restrained estimates for the “Restoring Honor” event the Fox News personality organized.

Mr. Colbert lampoons conservatives on his show, “The Colbert Report,” and at the rally he played a victim of fear gradually shown the light by Mr. Stewart.

“Your reasonableness is poisoning my fear,” Mr. Colbert was quoted as saying.

It appears the NYT was called out for slyly overstating turnout for the Stewart/Colbert event.

“An earlier version of this article referred imprecisely to the geographical reach of the rally,” correction reads in the online version. “It stretched several long blocks west of the Capitol, not almost to the Washington Monument.”

Even so, there are several paragraphs at work here that provide readers with an informative view of what transpired without editorializing. This approach should be allied to right-leaning events. Here an activist offers up a guess as to the actual attendance without authoritative sourcing and Colbert jokes about figures that go into the billions.

If there’s that much uncertainty, then the report should acknowledge this much up front. To do otherwise, allows for spinsters on both sides of the political spectrum to peddle their agenda.

On the surface, it is very easy for readers to sympathize with financially stressed families that may be evicted from their homes. But emotional appeals should not serve as a substitute for reporting on the economic consequences of government intervention that will cost prospective homeowners over the long-term…

News reports that personalize the misfortunes of individuals who have been identified as potential new constituents for the political class make for highly effective yarns. Here the New York Times takes up the case of Nicholle Bradbury, a resident of Denmark, Maine, who cannot keep up her mortgage payments and faces a potential eviction. On the surface, there is good cause for sympathy.

Questions have been raised about the paperwork and methodology associated with Bradbury’s case. She has also lost her job and her husband can no longer work for health reasons. The family, which includes two teenagers, lives on welfare and foodstamps  according to the report.

The villain here is identified as GMAC, which was previously the financing arm of General Motors. It received $17 billion from taxpayers in an effort to keep it from failing and is now majority-owned by the federal government. The NYT quite correctly offered the lender the opportunity to comment, which GMAC understandably declined to do as the case remains in litigation.

Unfortunately, the story line here omits economic realities that intersect with the interests and concerns of Americans who eager to become homeowners. If the federal government intervenes to prevent market forces from working to alleviate the housing crisis, sales could be halted even as foreclosures accelerate.

To be sure, GMAC should be called out and challenged for using “robo-signers” who are not in command of key facts, but there is also a price to be paid for interrupting the foreclosure process that goes uncovered in the report.

Robert Romano, a senior editor with Americans for Limited Government’s (ALG) news bureau, has filed a very detailed report that explores the potential fallout associated a nationwide moratorium on foreclosures that some lawmakers have proposed.

“There would be several consequences to this,” Romano observes. “If Congress shuts down the foreclosure process, it also would have to shut down the foreclosure sale process, which in the second quarter accounted for over $43 billion of home sales, according to RealtyTrac. Distressed institutions attempting to dig their way out of the financial crisis would be forced to keep that much of these non-performing assets on the books every quarter while a moratorium was in place. That could total more than $150 billion annually for every year a moratorium is in place — all to allow delinquent borrowers to stay in homes they cannot afford. While a moratorium was in effect, prospective homebuyers would also have to put their plans on hold. In short, the housing market would seize up.”

There’s more.

A foreclosure moratorium would also create perverse incentives, Romano explains, that reward the irresponsible at the expense of citizens who are financially positioned to pursue real estate. Under this scenario, delinquent borrowers would have no cause to maintain their homes. Consequently, the quality of neighborhoods would deteriorate, which in turn would undermine housing prices.

“Therefore, an indefinite foreclosure moratorium would actually increase the number of overall foreclosures that ultimately occur,” Romano argues. “That’s very bad policy.”

Going forward, the NYT would better serve its readership with informed analysis from economists who have understanding of long-term consequences that flow out from federal intervention into the private sector. That’s the real story.

When already beleaguered institutions are forced to keep non-performing assets on the books to placate economically illiterate policy makers, average Americans lose out. They should at least have a voice in the NYT. Instead, the Gray Lady appears to be fixated on paperwork issues that are peripheral to the major issues at work here.

If families are evicted from the homes in error, that would be just cause for outrage. But there is some debate about this.  “As was the case for our judicial state review, our initial assessment findings show the basis for our foreclosure decisions is accurate,” Bank of America spokesman Dan Frahm said on October 17th. The bank is once again resubmitting foreclosure affidavits after it had temporarily suspended foreclosure operations across the country.

So in reality, it would seem that the properties in question have been legitimately foreclosed even if the paperwork had some flaws. Allowing delinquent borrows to sidestep their responsibilities should not be the answer as the NYT seems to imply.

Several paragraphs down into a report on the “One Nation” rally readers finally learn that liberal activists could not match the crowds Glenn Beck attracted to the Lincoln Memorial in August. The key sponsors of the event, which include organized labor, are permitted to offer up factually dubious quotes without any criticism or examination.

Left wing activists who organized the “One Nation Coming Together” event at the Lincoln Memorial earlier this month as a rejoinder to Glenn Beck’s “Restoring Honor” rally fell flat in terms of attendance, energy and enthusiasm. Even the New York Times was forced to concede that liberal demonstrators could not match attendance figures for Beck’s Aug. 28 rally also held at the Lincoln Memorial. The first few paragraphs are sympathetic and supportive of “One Nation,” which was funded and supported by organized labor.

“More than 300 groups organized Saturday’s march to build momentum for progressive causes like increased job-creation programs and to mobilize liberal voters to flock to the polls next month,” readers are told. “The rally’s sponsors, including the N.A.A.C.P., the A.F.L.-C.I.O., the Sierra Club and the National Council of La Raza, said they also hoped to demonstrate that they, not the Tea Party, represented the nation’s majority.”

Tens of thousands were reportedly in attendance on a bright, sunny auspicious day replete with American flags and unifying themes that contrast with what organizers called the “divisiveness” of the Tea Party. But this is a very debatable assertion. It can be argued that each of the “One Nation” sponsors have advanced divisive polices that are offensive to mainstream sensibilities. This point is not raised here and as a general rule reporters should not interject themselves into the debate. However, the NYT has not operated in a restrained, detached manner when reporting on Tea Party activism. As TimesCheck has previously noted, reporter Kate Zernik has often invoked race as a way to delegitimize small government activists.

If this approach carried over to coverage of liberal activists, questions would be raised about the motivations and ethics of liberal demonstrators.  Of course, the NYT is not inclined in this direction.  However, it does deserve credit for reporting on a key fact; 13 paragraphs down into the story, but that’s still progress.

“Significant areas of the National Mall that had been filled during Mr. Beck’s rally were empty,” the report acknowledges. “In a broadcast on Thursday, Mr. Beck criticized the liberals’ march, saying his supporters paid their own way to drive to Washington, while labor unions chartered hundreds of buses to ferry demonstrators to Saturday’s rally.”

If the reverse were true, it would most likely be reported in both the headline and lead paragraph. “Liberal Activists Surge Past Glenn Beck’s Divisive Rally,” the NYT would have fit nicely with the paper’s preferred narrative.

Remarkably, the NYT does inform readers that at least some of Beck’s observations about the liberal rally are on the money.

“On Thursday Mr. Beck warned that the march included Marxist, Communist and revolutionary groups,” the report says. “Among the organizations endorsing the march were the Communist Party USA, the United Church of Christ, Jewish Funds for Justice, the National Urban League, the National Baptist Convention, People for the American Way and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.”

But then again, the NYT has a different view of extremism.

Thanks to Glenn Beck of Fox News, more Americans are becoming acquainted with the Progressive Era and its separation from the founding period. But Beck and others do come in for some sharp criticism from the left in an online forum hosted by the NYT that analyzes conservative criticism of President Woodrow Wilson…

An online discussion entitled “Hating Woodrow Wilson” hosted by The New York Times is being used by the left as a way to attack and sully Fox News personality Glenn Beck who has been sharply critical of the former president and the progressive era in general. But it does offer a number of engaging nuggets that are worth reviewing.

Some of the liberal commentators make the point that Beck and company are too fixated on Wilson and do not take into proper account the progressive contributions of Teddy Roosevelt and others. The discussion does open some worthwhile historical considerations that serious thinkers on both sides of the political spectrum should peruse.

Michael Lind with the New America Foundation throws down the gauntlet with this dig at conservatives:

“Each faction on the right has had its own view of the past, with its own canon of heroes and its own list of villains. While many conservatives claim to be “constitutionalists,” some states’ rights theorists argue that not only the Civil War but also the Founders’ Constitution of 1787 led to a tyrannical consolidation  of power in the federal government. For decades highbrow cultural conservatives have accused the 18th century French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau of wrecking Western civilization with his cult of the primitive. For most conservatives, however, the fall of America from the paradise of small government to the hell of statism came with the New Deal and the Great Society. Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson, one would think, would be more natural targets of the right than Woodrow Wilson. Perhaps someone should tell Glenn Beck.”

One of the most insightful, probing contributions in the exchange comes from George H. Nash, a historian and biographer, who explains how  contemporary Tea Party activism directed against President Obama’s policies also connect with renewed antipathy toward Wilsonian progressives. He writes:

“In place of a regime of carefully limited government, the Progressives initiated one of potentially unlimited government guided by bureaucrats and experts increasingly insulated from popular consent. In place of the traditional understanding of our rights as natural and unalienable, the Progressives claimed that our rights were derived from government — the state — and could be created or abridged as the custodians of the state deemed expedient, in the light of modern conditions and the perceived imperatives of progress.

Why is this view of Woodrow Wilson now agitating the American Right? The answer is simple: conservatives see in the Obama administration another great leap in the working out of an unconstrained, Wilsonian vision of government-from-above. And like Americans in 1776, conservatives are responding with the cry: Don’t tread on me!

As the Tea Party movement attests, conservative Americans resent the royalization of American politics that has afflicted much of American liberalism for decades. They do not want to be ruled or “nudged” by a government of their “betters.”

Like America’s Founders, conservatives in 2010 prefer a government of and by, and not just for, the people.”