Media Matters Daily Summary

Here are today's news items from Media Matters for America, click on the title or 'read more' to read the entirety of each story. Van Susteren hypes Palin memoir, but fails to disclose her husband advised Palin after 2008 campaign Fox News host Greta Van Susteren devoted the opening segment of her prime-time program to covering Sarah Palin's yet-to-be released memoir, Going Rogue: An American Life -- about which she claimed "the entire country is buzzing" -- including making a pitch for Palin to appear on her program. But at no point during the segment did Van Susteren disclose to her viewers that her husband, John Coale, reportedly advised Palin following the 2008 presidential campaign and reportedly stated that he conceived of and created Palin's political action committee, SarahPAC. Read More Rogue Fact: Palin attacks "Democrat lawmaker" who's actually a Republican In her memoir, Going Rogue: An American Life, Sarah Palin mocks the "political buckshot" her "critics fired" at her, pointing to a "Democrat lawmaker" in Alaska who "complained that I wasn't as 'sparky' " after the 2008 election. Palin appeared to be referring to a January 31 Associated Press article that quoted Republican Alaska state Sen. Bert Stedman describing Palin as "[n]ot so sparky." Read More Rogue Fact: In memoir, Palin still distorting NY Times article to defend "palling around with terrorists" claim In her memoir, Sarah Palin claims that she stated during a speech that then-Sen. Barack Obama had been "palling around with terrorists" in response to "the breaking news about the friendship between the unrepentant domestic terrorist [Bill Ayers] and the Democrat candidate for president [Obama]." In fact, the New York Times article to which Palin referred found that "the two men do not appear to have been close." Read More Rogue Fact: Palin falsely suggests poor "hit hardest" by cap-and-trade In her memoir, Sarah Palin falsely suggests that "those hit hardest [by cap-and-trade] will be those who are already struggling to make ends meet" and that President Obama "has already admitted that the policy he seeks will cause our electricity bills to 'skyrocket.' " However, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office says that the poorest Americans will benefit under the cap-and-trade bill that passed in the House in June -- a bill the Obama administration supported, but which Obama was not referring to in making his "skyrocket" comment. Read More Rogue Fact: Palin memoir stands by falsehood that Obama opposed "protect[ing] babies born alive after botched abortions" In her memoir, while discussing abortion, Sarah Palin claims that the "real extremism" on abortion comes from people "like Barack Obama, who opposed laws that would protect babies born alive after botched abortions" -- a reference to Obama's opposition to legislation that would have amended the Illinois Abortion Law of 1975. However, opponents of the legislation noted at the time that the Illinois criminal code already unequivocally prohibited killing children; and the Obama presidential campaign cited specific provisions of the Illinois Compiled Statutes in stating that the "born alive principle was already the law in Illinois." Read More Rogue Fact: Palin misleads on aerial hunting In her memoir, Sarah Palin falsely suggests that Alaskans do not engage in the aerial hunting of wolves. In fact, such hunting takes place in Alaska under a program that Palin herself has supported. Read More Rogue Fact: Palin suggests "no other candidate" subjected to scrutiny "about their hair, makeup, or clothes" Sarah Palin writes in her memoir that after it was reported that the Republican National Committee spent $150,000 "to clothe and accessorize" Palin and her family, "many wondered at the same time why no other candidates or their spouses were being asked a thing about their hair, makeup, or clothes." However, John Edwards, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, and Barack Obama were repeatedly subjected to critiques and questions about "their hair, makeup, or clothes" during the 2008 campaign. Read More Rogue Fact: Palin still falsely claiming stimulus money for energy effiency she vetoed required tougher building codes In her memoir, Sarah Palin claims that she vetoed an "earmark for energy conservation" Alaska could have received under the stimulus package because "acceptance of the funds required the adoption and enforcement of energy building codes." When Palin previously made a similar claim, PolitiFact.com determined that she was "wrong" because "municipalities are not forced to accept the specific standards and, given that local governments set their own codes, the feds would be satisfied if Alaska merely promoted such building codes [emphasis in original]." Read More You can help support our work; become a volunteer media monitor, or donate to Media Matters for America.