After aggressively promoting ACORN videos, Fox News ignores reports of Million-Dollar Blackwater Bribes

Several things, Jeff.

First, you should notice that this is not an editorial piece by Killfile, it is actually an article clipped from Media Matters. So your frustration is displaced.

Second:

Top executives at Blackwater Worldwide authorized secret payments of about $1 million to Iraqi officials that were intended to silence their criticism and buy their support after a September 2007 episode in which Blackwater security guards fatally shot 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad, according to former company officials.

Blackwater approved the cash payments in December 2007, the officials said, as protests over the deadly shootings in Nisour Square stoked long-simmering anger inside Iraq about reckless practices by the security company's employees. American and Iraqi investigators had already concluded that the shootings were unjustified, top Iraqi officials were calling for Blackwater's ouster from the country, and company officials feared that Blackwater might be refused an operating license it would need to retain its contracts with the State Department and private clients, worth hundreds of millions of dollars annually.

Four former executives said in interviews that Gary Jackson, who was then Blackwater's president, had approved the bribes and that the money was sent from Amman, Jordan, where the company maintains an operations hub, to a top manager in Iraq. The executives, though, said they did not know whether the cash was delivered to Iraqi officials or the identities of the potential recipients.

Blackwater's strategy of buying off the government officials, which would have been illegal under American law, created a deep rift inside the company, according to the former executives. [The New York Times, 11/10/09]

Secret payments made to government officials are NOT the same thing as monetary compensation for wrongful death.... they are bribes.

And while I disagree with your assessment of the deceased individuals as stupid (I bet you'd be hard pressed to want to listen to a man with a gun screaming at you in a foreign language)... I am of the belief that even stupid people deserve to live.

Lastly, this article is actually not about the bribes... it is about the fact that Fox News continues to be anything but news. This ACORN video came out months ago, lets at least use some immediacy if we are going to ignore an entire relevant news story.

If you plan to get all of your info from a worthless"liberal spin" canary cage liner, like the New York Times, then you deserve to remain in complete ignorance. However, I will go out of my way to try to help you out a little (but only this once. I find most liberal Fox-haters to be the MOST closed minded people on the planet). I choose to get my info from a more reliably unbiased source, like the BBC. Here are some quotes from their article:

Senior State Department officials have said diplomats were not aware of any bribes for Iraqi officials, but that they did support compensation payments to victims' families and survivors.

And this quote which puts the issue into a true perspective:

Donald Ball, Dustin Heard, Evan Liberty, Nick Slatten and Paul Slough - all of whom are decorated military veterans - say they were acting in self-defence, but witnesses and family members of those killed maintain that the shooting on 16 September 2007 was unprovoked.

Of course, your "liberal-spin gene" may kick in here and tell you that you should ALWAYS believe the word of a Muslim standerby over the word of a group of decorated War Veterens. If you simply believe that all Muslim extremists always tell th truth, but American soldiers always lie, then you have some serious personal problems to deal with....and I'm afraid I can't help you with that.

Lastly, this is AT BEST a very minor news item, and cannot be, in any way, equated with the breaking of the ACORN scandal. But, to say that Fox News completely ignored the Blackwater issue, is just a plain bald-faced lie. Here is the link to the article:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,573765,00.html

The ACORN scandal, a news item broken by Fox News, is probably the biggest news item of the entire year. It's importance cannot be over stated. Besides spending under 200 days in the US Senate, ACORN is the only other relevent thing that appears on Barak Obama's resume. His work as a lawyer there, followed by his awarding them with a truck full of US funding, paints the true picture of how his mind works: "The right to lie and cheat the law is okay, if it is done by and for inner-city people of color." That is the basis of Obama's policies. He is clearly out to "get Whitey", and groups like ACORN are needed to provide foot soldiers for this prime agenda. Fox News has done the Nation, and the World, a remarkable service by removing ACORN from the picture.

I'll keep this brief, because clearly your mind will not be changed and I have no intention on wasting a great deal of energy concerning myself with that. The big difference in our views is that I am not willing to blindly take the word of anyone, Muslim bystander or private contractor who happens to be ex-military. Both are humans and therefore inherently have different perspectives on the situation. I am also not willing to blindly accept media reports as fact, especially from a network that admits it rarely addresses the news. (My NY Times quote was to make a point, not state it as hard facts...)

I am also not willing to blindly accept media reports as fact, especially from a network that admits it rarely addresses the news.

Although I hate to assume anything, I guess I am forced to assume that you are referring to Fox News here. I sincerely hope that you can provide an actual quote from Fox News saying: "We, here at Fox News, rarely address the news." However, we both know that you can't.

If you dismiss everything reported from Fox News, then I guess you looked at the link to the Blackwater story, that I provided you, and just dismissed it off hand as a report that never happenned. I remind you that the title of this thread states that Fox News completely ignored this story. The Media Matters article is dated Nov. 12, while the story from Fox News is dated Nov. 10. That's two days earlier, and Media Matters is simply a low-life, bald-faced liar. Your entire premise for a thread has just been exposed as an outright LIE, and proven by clear evidence.

Since all of you have particip[ated in this lie, I think you should be adult enough to admit that you are wrong and apologize to me and to Fox News. It is the only mature thing to do.

Since all of you have particip[ated in this lie, I think you should be adult enough to admit that you are wrong and apologize to me and to Fox News. It is the only mature thing to do.

Gee, the Fox-hating Liberal viners suddenly got very quiet!

I will take your silence to be a severe lack of maturity on your part. I guess I have to take this opportunity to declare complete and unopposed victory, in this debate.

Better luck next time, kids.

Gee, the Fox-hating Liberal viners suddenly got very quiet!

No, Fox-hating Liberal viners just have a life outside of the Internet. But thank you for jumping to erroneous conclusions based on your own small frame of reference.

To quickly highlight Fox's lack of news coverage I will direct you to The Daily Show that aired on October 29, 2009, in which Fox actually admits that 60% of its programming is "Not News." Hard to argue with that. I am sure you will.

And my failure to respond from this point forward is to be expected. I am a bit bored with this.

To quickly highlight Fox's lack of news coverage I will direct you to The Daily Show that aired on October 29, 2009, in which Fox actually admits that 60% of its programming is "Not News." Hard to argue with that. I am sure you will.

It's bad enough to cite the New York Times as a source for your information, now you claim to get your truths directly from a clip-edditting comedy show on Comedy Central!

But I can see how that number can possibly be manufactured. Fox News could easily be 40% actual breaking news, and 60% commentary on the current breaking news. That 60% still discusses what is currently happenning and provides extra clarity to the viewers, in order to place the current news into some context. CNN certainly does the same thing. NBC would have to admit that 95% of their programming is "not news", yet Liberals will still cite it as a source.

But this only serves to dance around the real issue. Your Media Matters article was dated November 12, and declared that Fox News completely ignored the Blackwater story. I provided you with a link to Fox News' story on Blackwater, dated November 10. You have LOST this argument!