The GOP Reality Filter

[Today's David Horsey cartoon in the P-I.]

George Nethercutt is not particularly enjoying the publicity he's been receiving over the following remarks:

"The story of what we've done in the postwar period is remarkable. ... It is a better and more important story than losing a couple of soldiers every day."

Now he's claiming he was misquoted. Sort of. Actually, he's whining that the Post-Intelligencer, which first reported the remarks in an Oct. 14 story, "deliberately distorted" what he said, according to today's story.

Hm.

Well, here is the full text of Nethercutt's remarks:

"So the story is better than we might be led to believe in the news. I'm just indicting the news people, but it's, it's a bigger and better and more important story than losing a couple of soldiers every day which, which heaven forbid is awful."

And here is exactly what the P-I reported:

"The story of what we've done in the postwar period is remarkable," Nethercutt, R-Wash., told an audience of 65 at a noon meeting at the University of Washington's Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs.

"It is a better and more important story than losing a couple of soldiers every day."

He added that he did not want any more soldiers to be killed.

Spot the distortion there?

If you didn't, let me explain.

In the Bizarro World that is Planet GOP, a "fair and balanced" account deliberately omits key elements of any Democratic politician's remarks deemed controversial, mostly in a way to paint them as treasonous; or it puts words into their mouths they did not actually say. A "distorted" account, on the other hand, accurately reports both the context and the remarks themselves made by Republican politicians (see Trent Lott) that later prove deeply embarrassing.

Just in case you were wondering.

That's the same filter, incidentally, in which Patty Murray's naive but essentially correct remarks about Osama bin Laden building schools and winning sympathy among Muslims is deemed "bizarre and uninformed," but the suggestion that the handful of schools being built in Iraq -- which, because of violence and a faltering infrastructure, no one can actually attend -- are more significant than the deaths of American soldiers and Red Cross volunteers ... well, gosh, that's just downright insightful.