TPM's Josh Marshall continues anti-Edwards Erroneous Headlines...

[Blackhatjack]

As a matter of courtesy I previously emailed Marshall about the erroneous Headline on his site before posting here, to give him a chance to correct the misleading and erroneous headline

"Yepsen: Edwards' Iowa Support Collapsing" with a link to an article.

If you follow the link to arrive at http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/13703.html you get an article titled "An Edwards collapse in Iowa?" (Note the ? mark) where the following paragraph is erroneously offered as a factual assertion attributed to Yepsen:

"The Des Moines Register’s David Yepsen, arguably most respected political voice in Iowa’s media, has been closely monitoring the first caucus state’s landscape and noted one surprising trend: John Edwards’ support is collapsing. (via Ron Chusid)"

Now the erroneous and false conclusion is printed as a factual attribution to Yepsen. It also fails to note that the three(3) excerpted paragraphs were 'cherry-picked' from a Fox News interview with Yepsen, and none of the the three(3) even support the conclusion. The actual comments were in response to Bill Richardson's chances in Iowa.

So how does www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com get to the erroneous conclusion? It includes "(via Ron Chusid)" at the end of the assertion with a link to his site http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=2417

So who is Ron Chusid and what does his site say?

Ron Chusid is a physician engaged in the practice of internal medicine. His site is filled with 'his comments and his opinions' of what others say. OPINION not facts. And he gives plenty of coverage to Repub Ron Paul. And there are no shortage of anti-Edwards pieces there.

The lead for his opinion piece is "Yepsen Predicts Possible Edwards Collapse"

So now we come full circle. Josh Marshall is the Editor of TPM.

An anti-Edwards poster writes an opinion piece with a headline that includes "Possible Edwards Collapse", which is used as a supporting link for an erroneous conclusion at www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com which leads with "An Edwards collapse in Iowa?"(with a question mark), to www.talkingpointsmemo.com which headlines "Yepsen: Edwards' Iowa Support Collapsing."

I have read www.talkingpointsmemo.com on a daily basis for years, and for the most part have agreed with their reporting and their attempt to be taken seriously in regard to accuracy in reporting the facts, and insightful with their opinions and analysis. However, there is no room for allowing misleading headlines to be posted which falsely denigrate any candidate.

This is not the first time this has happened.

Hopefully, Josh Marshall will realize that we do read and verify what they print as facts, and that corrections and retractions are in order when false headlines are posted as fact.