Geraldo Rivera equates Cheney's mishap with Kennedy's Chappaquiddick incident

I am surprised this came out of Fox News, but then again, it was from the mouth of Geraldo Rivera. Gary Schneeberger has an interesting commentary on this whole Cheney shooting media fiasco, and provides great perspective into Geraldo's comments on Fox News Channel's "O'Reilly Factor."

I think its funny because no matter how hard the media tries to exploit any little thing to bash the White House, it always backfires. Now, thanks to Geraldo's stretch of imagination, Kennedy's Chappaquiddick fiasco is in the news.

As a refresher, "Chappaquiddick" is the shorthand used for the 1969 scandal in which already-Sen. Kennedy drove a car off a bridge in the middle of the night after a party on Martha's Vineyard, swimming to safety himself but leaving a passenger, a young woman named Mary Jo Kopechne, inside the car to drown. Kennedy did not report the incident to authorities until the next morning, about nine hours later.

How does Geraldo sum up that scandal? He told O'Reilly on Wednesday, twice, that it was just "a driving accident."

It would be wrong to minimize the injuries Harry Whittington suffered when Cheney accidentally shot him --he was hospitalized for several days before being released this afternoon. But let's not forget that just by being in the hospital he was given a chance Mary Jo Kopechne never got. Cheney, who's trailed everywhere he goes by a medical team, made sure Whittington was treated for his wounds immediately; Kennedy made sure of nothing more than his own safety, particularly tragic since some experts believe Kopechne could have lived as long as two hours inside the submerged car the senator piloted into Chappaquiddick Bay.

Of course, Geraldo completely ignores the fact that Cheney provided immediate care for his friend, and made it a priority to make sure his friend got the necessary care. Big difference!

It is truly just to much. What ever happened to the facts? I still don't quite understand the scenario, and what happened on the scene that could have caused this terrible accident. The media has been irresponsible in reporting this story, and allowing their evident hate and anger towards Bush distort their reporting. They missed it!

"...The press is making a big deal out of this because they despise Dick Cheney. Generally speaking, the media feels Cheney is arrogant and distant. But this hatred has gone too far and here's the best example I can give you. New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd is a notorious Bush-Cheney basher. Writing about the Cheney hunting accident today, Ms. Dowd brings in the following: soldiers dying in Iraq, Cheney's Vietnam deferment, Halliburton, Katrina, oil prices, Medicare, corrupt lobbyists, Osama, Tora Bora, and a possible grand jury investigation. Like Cheney or not, once critical thinking degenerates into hatred there is no value."

And then, of course, there was NBC's David Gregory. As Hewitt said,

A professional would have calmly assenbled the facts and asked specific questions from McClellan. Gregory's overheated demands to know the president's "feelings" about the incident revealed a great deal about Gregory's bias and his talents.

Well, I do think Gregory said it best.

[T]he debate playing out in the blogosphere, cable airwaves and on talk radio pits the Vice President against an allegedly left-wing, overly cynical, prissy White House press corps in a tizzy because it wasn't the first to know and angry because it hates the President and Vice President anyway.

I truly do hope the media will take their collective foots out of their mouth, and move on to reporting real news. I also do hope America continues to takes note of the mainstream media's outright bias.

UPDATE: Michelle Malkin has a round up of the media whine!

Tags: Cheney, Bush, Politics, Dowd, Gregory