CNN Distorts Fred Thompson

Organizations like CNN still must think they have an undue amount of influence in the minds of what they perceive to be an ignorant public. Otherwise how could they possibly think that anyone would be fooled by the laughable headline: "Law and Order Star Grabs GOP Attention".

That was the link on the homepage. The title on the actual article ("Poll: Thompson Star Rises with GOP") backs away from the notion that Thompson is a actor first an a politician second, but still we have the first paragraph:

He's not even officially running for president, but Fred Thompson, star of NBC's "Law and Order" and a former Tennessee senator, is gaining in the polls among Republican White House hopefuls.

You may find Thompson's politics wonderful or repugnant, but the notion that he is an entertainer who just happens to have done a stint in D.C. is almost pathetically duplicitous. Anyone who wants to be informed should read his actual biography. He had a long and storied career as a U.S. attorney, he played a key role in bringing the case against Nixon during Watergate, and he spent nine years in the United States Senate, putting in time as a key committee chair. He is, by any standard, a grizzled veteran politician.

Certainly his work as an actor is nothing to be ashamed of, but the beginnings of his acting career reveal much about the man: He played himself in a movie about the true scandal involving the sale of pardons for prisoners. Thompson was (in real life, and the movie) the attorney who helped bring down a governor who was, by many accounts, the portrait of cronyism and corruption.

All of which you would never know from reading CNN. Typically, not one word is mentioned about Thompson's policy positions, beyond the usual nugget about his stance on abortion and gay marriage - which has apparently become the most important issue of the day according to the media, which mentions it dutifully in any article about a GOP contender, but of course is nonexistent whenever they make ink about a Democrat.