Saturday, April 09, 2005

Was Bush Really Booed?

or was it just more phantom booing from the Associated Press? I vote with the latter and say that Bush received Phantom Booes! I have searched for any news reporting it and there only exists that one sentence from the AP. As I quote Mary below, I guess you had to be there, to know for sure. Chrenkov in his "Farewell to John Paul" was dubious, because the booing had been reported by AP. I should have taken my clue from him:
"In Vatican itself, AP writes that "when Bush's face appeared on giant screen TVs showing the ceremony, many in the crowds outside St. Peter's Square booed and whistled." I didn't catch that live last night, and while I'm skeptical of AP stories involving booing, if it did happen I apologize for the idiots involved. There are disagreements, and there are times and places to express them, but funerals aren't it. Syria's Assad, Iran's Khatami and Zimbabwe's Mugabe were also present and whatever I may think of them it would never cross my mind to be rude towards them at such an occasion."
Here is another doubter: Was Bush Booed at the Pope’s Funeral?

From Say Anything:
Bush Gets Boo’s At Pope’s Funeral?A Google News search for the above sentence returned exactly two media outlets still running that version of Simpson’s AP story, The Spokesman-Review (PDF Copy) and CBS News (PDF Copy). Wizbang also notes a few other sources for the story at the link above, but the point is that out of all the massive amounts of media coverage surrounding the Pope’s funeral the only report mentioning Bush getting boo’s is this one AP story by Mr. Simpson.

Now, given the AP’s history of reporting on phantom boo’s aimed at President Bush (its happened before), we have to wonder: While it wouldn’t be surprising if the President had gotten boo’s, but were there really boo’s or is this just another instance of a reporter looking to take a cheap shot at the President?

Mary at Freedom Eden is a doubter:

"Another AP story involving the President and booing------- Is it possible people booed when Bush's face was shown? Sure, although it certainly would have been a very inappropriate time for political protest and exceedingly boorish to do when the world was uniting to remember the greatness of John Paul II. Personally, I don't have a lot of faith in AP reporting when it comes to booing. I guess you had to be there."

I guess so, Mary, since we can have no faith in any reporting from the Associated Press, considering "The Crowd That Didn't Boo".

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