What Do The New York Times & the Mafia Have In Common?

What do The New York Times and the mafia have in common? — That is the subject of this evening's "Talking Points Memo."

The answer to that question is both The Times and organized crime routinely engage assassins. In the case of the newspaper, they are propping up character assassins.

Today, in an unbelievable article, The New York Times actually reports that the bile smear merchant Al Franken (search) is a legitimate contender for a U.S. Senate seat. Unless defamation counts, Franken has absolutely no qualifications to serve in any public office. He's simply a man who makes money hurting people. He's also a person who may be having emotional problems.

At a radio conference last Friday, Franken apparently melted down, delivering a bizarre performance where he cried and embarrassed the organizers of the event. But you didn't see that reported in The New York Times or any other left-wing newspaper.

Now the big picture: The editor of The Times, a man named Bill Keller (search), realizes his paper has lost power over the last few years. The rise of FOX News and other pro-America news agencies, as well as the success of radio talk show hosts like Rush Limbaugh (search) and Sean Hannity (search), have made it far more difficult for The Times to put its left-wing agenda unchallenged.

So Keller has decided to help character assassins outside the paper attack those with whom it disagrees. Keller's also allowing The Times to promote Air America, the left wing radio network. So far, that paper has done an astounding 24 stories on Air America, which loses millions of dollars, and actually has to pay some of its own stations to put it on the air.

The only reason the network even exists is because a few loony millionaires finance it. The national ratings are terrible.

In Washington, D.C., for example, Air America's audience is too small to be counted. In L.A., pretty much the same thing. But The New York Times continues to promote that disaster, while ignoring the success of Limbaugh, Hannity and others.

Ladies and gentlemen, you need to know what's going on here. Last night, we told you we would not report any of the charges in the new Hillary Clinton book because we didn't report on Kitty Kelley's smear book on the Bush family. I also told you I'm going to pinpoint exactly who is behind the personal attacks and character assassinations that are rampant in this country.

The New York Times is outsourcing slander and libel and should be ashamed of itself. That article today is a piece of rank propaganda. Bill Keller and The Times Pooh-Bahs may think they can get away with the sleazy stuff, but they can't because now you know.

And that's "The Memo."

The Most Ridiculous Item of the Day

The far left web site, MoveOn.org, which is dedicated to turning this country into a secular, progressive nation, and which is funded in part by George Soros (search), is asking people to sign a petition to keep PBS (search) and NPR (search) the way they are.

Now, there's no greater evidence that those two concerns, PBS and NPR, partially paid for by "we the people," are left-wing precincts. In light of that petition, to argue otherwise would be ridiculous. The truth always comes out.