Inside Politics

Dowd’s ‘correction’

“In her Wednesday column [in the New York Times], Maureen Dowd perhaps comes as close as she ever will to admitting she dishonestly quoted President Bush in her May 14 column on al Qaeda and the terror threat,” Clay Waters writes at www.TimesWatch.org.

“In [yesterdays] column on what Dowd considers White House cynicism regarding the war on terror, Dowd finally provides what Bush actually said on May 5: ‘“Al Qaeda is on the run,” the president said in Little Rock, Ark. “That group of terrorists who attacked our country is slowly, but surely, being decimated. Right now, about half of all the top al Qaeda operatives are either jailed or dead. In either case, they’re not a problem anymore.” But Al Qaeda, it became horrifyingly clear a week later in Riyadh, was not decimated; it was sufficiently undecimated to murder 34 people, injure 200 and scare the daylights out of Americans everywhere.’

“But Dowd’s May 14 column elided this vital part of the above Bush quote: ‘Right now, about half of all the top Al Qaeda operatives are either jailed or dead. In either case …’ By doing so, Dowd made Bush appear to say Al Qaeda was no longer a problem, when he clearly said that only those members that were ‘jailed or dead’ were no longer a problem. …

“The Dowd deletion, broken on this page by Times Watch reader Robert Cox, is gaining media attention,” Mr. Waters said. “Brendan Nyhan of SpinSanity notes Dowd’s ‘distorted quotation has since been repeated by MSNBC “Buchanan and Press” co-host Bill Press, CNN’s Miles O’Brien and others, including numerous foreign press outlets.’

“Most ominous, New York Daily News columnist Zev Chafets [yesterday] morning notes ‘New York Times spokeswoman Catherine Mathis says the paper is “looking into” the column.’”

Davis strikes back

California Gov. Gray Davis’ allies are starting a campaign to thwart Republican-led efforts to recall him — the first public sign that the Democratic governor could be taking the drive seriously after months of playing it down.

The Taxpayers Against the Recall movement, scheduled to be announced yesterday outside a Sacramento fire station, will be run by longtime senior Davis adviser Steve Smith, the Associated Press reports.

Political consultants have viewed the recall effort more seriously since the involvement earlier this month of Republican U.S. Rep. Darrell Issa, who donated $445,000 to the effort and formed a committee to raise money to replace Mr. Davis.

The involvement of Mr. Smith, a top adviser during Mr. Davis’ gubernatorial campaigns and former political director of the California Democratic Party, suggests Mr. Davis is taking the recall seriously, political commentators say.

Mr. Davis, who can not seek re-election because of term limits, has the lowest approval rating of any California governor in 55 years.

He was re-elected last year over underfunded Republican opponent Bill Simon. His term ends in 2007.

Recall backers began collecting signatures two months ago and must collect 897,158 by Sept. 2 to get the recall on the ballot. As of Tuesday, the secretary of state reported receiving 18,590 signatures.

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