Month: December 2011

Merry Christmas Karl Rove, From Fox News

Posted by on December 24, 2011 at 10:18 am. 1 Comments :

In the spirit of the holiday season, Fox News has given a Christmas gift to former George W. Bush political strategist, and current Fox employee, Karl Rove. The gift was a generous one that is worth tens of thousands of dollars, and it is exactly what Rove asked Santa Claus for: Free Advertising.

Rove’s latest attack ad bashing President Obama has received free air time on a variety of Fox News programs including Hannity, The Five and others. And the ad was not merely shown in the context of a news report, it received high praise from Fox pundits and presenters. Also, in most cases Fox never bothered to mention that the ad, which was produced by the American Crossroads PAC, was in fact Rove’s vehicle for raising millions of dollars from secret corporate donors.

This is blatant electioneering by Fox on behalf of the Republican Party. They should be required by law to report it as an in-kind contribution. It is additional evidence (as if any were necessary) that Fox’s claim to be “fair and balanced” is transparently dishonest. Can anyone imagine Fox giving the same sort of treatment to this ad by Priorities USA, a rival Democratic PAC (that coincidentally features Fox’s own Karl Rove)?

Yeah, that’ll be the day.

Andrew Breitbart’s Imaginary Democratic Primary

Posted by on December 23, 2011 at 12:38 pm. 4 Comments :

The chronically choleric Andrew Breitbart has published an amusing speculation as to who the Democratic Party could field for president instead of Obama. This is really just an attempt by BigGovernment to sow new discord among the unusually united Democrats.

The article was written by Joel Pollak, the editor-in-chief of Breitbart.com, and features a roster of barely Democratic names who are arguably more conservative than many Republicans (i.e. Harold Ford and Joe Manchin). It also includes a couple of Democrats that would be bitterly opposed by the BigGovernment crowd if there were any real chance of them running (i.e. Hillary Clinton and Andrew Cuomo). However, two names stand out for their surreal presence on any list of of reputed Democrats.

First is the anchor of Fox News Sunday, Chris Wallace. Pollak’s basis for including Wallace on a list of Democrats is a five year old article in the Washington Post that reported that Wallace was a registered Democrat. Unfortunately, Pollak didn’t read the whole article that quoted Wallace as saying…

“The reason I’m a registered Democrat is that in Washington, D.C., there is really only one party,” Wallace told us yesterday. “If you want a say in who’s going to be the next mayor or councilman, you have to vote in the Democratic primary.”

So Wallace’s registration is just his way of being able to influence the outcome of primary elections for a party that he opposes. We know that he opposes the Democrats because of the way speaks about them publicly and slants his reporting. For instance…

  • Asking the Weekly Standard’s Stephen Hayes “is it unfair to say that this is a president whose heart doesn’t seem to be into winning the war on terror?”
  • Asking Rush Limbaugh what Obama has done TO the country.
  • Awarding ACORN pimp, James O’Keefe, the “Power Player of the Week.”
  • Calling Democrats “damn fools” for declining to appear on Fox News.
  • [My favorite] Admitting that he “generally agrees” with Sean Hannity.
  • Jumping to the defense of George W. Bush after director Ron Howard suggested comparisons to Richard Nixon.
  • Declaring Sarah Palin to be a “new star in the political galaxy.”
  • Asking George Bush if he was “puzzled by all of the concern in this country about protecting [the] rights of people who want to kill us.”
  • In a criticism of Democratic health care plans, making the absurd observation that “people don’t even contemplate end of life until they’re in an irreversible coma.”

Never mind that Wallace has no experience in politics or government, and has never run any enterprise that might prepare him to be the manager of an Olive Garden, much less the presidency.

But the number one Democratic choice by the BigGovernment editor to replace Barack Obama is —-> Sen. Joe Lieberman – who is NOT a Democrat. Lieberman was run out of the Democratic Party by the voters of his own state who chose Ned Lamont in a senate primary. Lieberman’s ego refused to step aside, so he ran as an independent and was returned to the senate by a majority of Republican voters who abandoned their own nominee in favor of Lieberman.

Pollak’s article is a joke that has failed to inject a sense of humor. It is his effort to distract Breitbart’s flock so that they don’t focus on the hilarity of their own cast of characters running for the GOP nomination. I don’t blame him. If Democrats were running a pack clowns like those in the GOP, I’d want a distraction too.

Media Matters: Bill O’Reilly Covers The War On Christmas More Than Actual Wars

Posted by on December 22, 2011 at 4:49 pm. 3 Comments :

Media Matters reviewed the content of Bill O’Reilly’s December programming and discovered something that reveals the truth about his long-standing “War on Christmas.”

“Every year, ‘Culture Warrior’ Bill O’Reilly devotes considerable time on his Fox News show to the ‘War on Christmas.’ This December, O’Reilly has covered the imaginary ‘War on Christmas’ more than three times as much as the actual wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.“

Bill O'Reilly's Christmas

That should tell you something about O’Reilly’s priorities. But it’s not really a revelation about his sanctimonious persona and fixation on pretending that Christmas is under attack.

If Christmas actually was at risk from clandestine secular-progressives bent on deposing Santa, O’Reilly would be amongst those responsible. His own concept of Christmas is a perverse vision of greed and consumerism. This is how he expresses the meaning of Christmas:

“Every company in America should be on its knees thanking Jesus for being born. Without Christmas, most American businesses would be far less profitable.”

Heartwarming isn’t it? It’s a sentiment that just oozes with the season’s warmth, joy, and humanity. He seems to believe that Christ died on the cross for your net receipts and a favorable business environment. That’s a far cry from the guy who threw the moneychangers out of the temple.

O’Reilly is not much of an advocate of the values that Christmas represents to so many Americans. Neither is he much of an advocate for those who are burdened with fighting real wars. His idea of supporting the troops is sending them free copies of his unreadable books.

The Not-So-Subliminal Messaging Of Fox News

Posted by on December 21, 2011 at 1:57 pm. 2 Comments :

The Fox Nationalists are not even trying to mask their dishonest misrepresentations designed to keep their flock ignorant and ill-informed.

Fox Nation

Indeed, the approval rating of Congress is dismally low. However, the House of Representatives is controlled by GOP Speaker John Boehner and a majority Republican caucus. But when Fox publishes their story about the floundering body they accompany the piece with a picture of Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi. Boehner, et al, are nowhere to be seen.

This deception is even more unseemly when you take into account that it is the Republican Party that is held in far lower esteem that the Democrats. And particularly with regard to the current debate over the Payroll Tax, the American people are incensed that the GOP has refused to allow its extension to come up for a vote. The result will be that 160 million workers will get a tax increase beginning January 1.

Merry Christmas America,
Yours Truly, The Republican Party.

Politifact Lie Of The Year Confirmed True By Fox News

Posted by on December 20, 2011 at 7:35 pm. 5 Comments :

The widely respected and Pulitzer Prize winning Politifact has announced their annual selection for “Lie of the Year.” Unfortunately, they have selected something that is demonstrably true: “Republicans voted to end Medicare.”

There has already been a tidal wave of criticism for this selection, which I will not regurgitate. If you’re interested in reading some of the takedowns, Media Matters has complied a few and posted their own cogent remarks.

“Paul Krugman and Dan Kennedy and Steve Benen and Jonathan Cohn and Jonathan Chait and Matthew Yglesias and David Weigel, among countless others, have debunked Politifact’s ruling, which holds that as long as something called ‘Medicare’ has something to do with health care for the elderly, it’s a lie to say the program has ended, no matter how ‘dramatic’ the ‘change of course’ has been.”

My contribution to this discussion will be to point out that Fox News reported on Politifact’s finding that the claim that Republicans voted to end Medicare was a lie, and at the same time published an article wherein Republicans advocated an end to Medicare:

Fox Nation

That’s right. The Fox Nationalists, who ordinarily revile Politifact as just another liberal mainstream media outlet, now regale in this award. But they also publish an editorial wherein the resident Fox News MD, Marc Siegel says this:

“Not all practicing doctors will readily admit this, but we all look at Medicare (and all health insurance for that matter, public or private), the same way. Medicare is cumbersome, an unnecessary interface between us and our patients…”

The fact that Republicans have been trying to kill Medicare is irrefutable. And now the evidence is right on the web site of the GOP PR machine, Fox News. It takes some massive cajones to place these conflicting stories in such close proximity, but that’s what Fox was created for.

The Annual Fox News Tradition Of Bashing The Obama’s Holiday Greeting

Posted by on December 19, 2011 at 4:07 pm. 7 Comments :

It’s that time of year again. The time when winter’s chill nips at your nose and poinsettia blooms abound. The time when children’s laughter echos through the streets and families come together for joyous feasts. And the time when Fox News lambastes the President and his family for not celebrating the holiday in the manner that they think good American, Christian, patriots ought to.

Fox Nation Christmas

What would the season be without Fox News dredging up this absurd and insulting story as they do every year? It is a tradition that really makes the holiday complete. And this year it is extra special because they brighten it with the cheerful words of Sarah Palin who calls the Obama’s holiday greeting “odd” and “strange,” and, in the spirit of the season, she complains that it doesn’t reflect the…

“…American foundational values illustrated and displayed on Christmas cards and on a Christmas tree. […] It’s just a different way of thinking coming out of the White House.”

Indeed, the current residents of the White House are so “different” than the rest of us. They look different and think different and pray different, but mostly look different. And they express their warm wishes to the nation differently than other “normal” presidents like, for instance, George W. Bush, whose Holiday greetings also didn’t mention Christmas:

Click to enlarge:

Along with the Bush family, Rupert Murdoch declined to mention Christmas in his greeting to the tens of thousands of people who work for him. And Fox News itself aired “Holiday” greetings to their television viewers.

But the cherished holiday tradition of bashing a family for choosing to include people of all faiths (or none) in their hopes for joy and peace and well being, is reserved only for the Obamas. It’s that special treatment Fox saves for those they hate during this season of love.

[Addendum] To complete the hypocrisy, Fox has unveiled their own Christmas card that Palin might also consider lacking the “American foundational values.” In fact, it is downright mean-spirited as it delivers a message of competition and acrimony.

Fox News Christmas Card

The card mockingly depicts the Fox sled (drawn appropriately by sheep) as winning the race against ABC, NBC, and CBS. What a heartwarming tribute to the birth of their savior, a man of peace and acceptance, who beseeched his followers to love their enemies. And in addition to being self-serving and tasteless, the card is also a barefaced lie. The highest rated program on Fox News (The O’Reilly Factor) has about half the audience of the the lowest rated network news program (CBS Evening News). So the Fox sled should be in the rear, if they cared about telling the truth.

Judge Not: Newt Gingrich Adds Another Zany Plank To His Platform

Posted by on December 19, 2011 at 9:30 am. 5 Comments :

GOP frontrunner Newt Gingrich continues to adopt some of the most lunatic positions from the right-wing fringe. First it was calling child labor laws “truly stupid.” Then it was calling Palestinians an “invented people.” Now Gingrich wants to go after judges he doesn’t like.

Newt Gingrich

Gingrich was questioned about his prior comments that he would, as president, eliminate judges and courts that he regarded as overstepping their authority. As an example he suggested that the entire Ninth Circuit could be done away with. On Face the Nation, host Bob Schieffer noted that Gingrich’s proposal would violate the Constitution, and asked the former Speaker how he would enforce this. Would he send the Capitol police to arrest such judges? Gingrich replied…

“If you had to. Or you’d instruct the Justice Department to send a U.S. marshal.”

This may go down in history as one of the stupidest, and most dangerous, statements from a presidential contender. The notion that a president could unilaterally punish judges for decisions with which the president disagrees is fundamentally unconstitutional and anti-American. Such power would mean that judges would have to live in fear of losing their job if they displeased the White House. It would mean that they could not decide cases on the merits, but would have to decide based on the political repercussions of their ruling. That would, in effect, make the judiciary an irrelevant appendage of the White House, rather than an independent and impartial administrator of the law.

It will be interesting to see how Gingrich’s Tea Party supporters respond to this repulsive stance. The Tea Party has always tried to portray itself as opposed to big government and the encroachment of power by government institutions. There is nothing more representative of a power grab than one branch of government asserting that it has the authority to eliminate another branch. And that’s exactly what Gingrich is proposing.

But I wonder if Gingrich has thought this through. If President Obama were to adopt Gingrich’s view today, he could have Justices Thomas and Scalia arrested and thrown off the bench. Then he could appoint two new judges to take their place. Somehow I don’t think that’s what Gingrich had in mind? In fact, were Obama to try that he would be swooped on by outraged Republicans and Tea Partiers and castigated as a traitor.

And if it wasn’t disgusting enough that Gingrich would propose something so contrary to American values, Fox Nation characterizes this as Gingrich criticizing “Anti-American Judges.” That’s a loaded term that implies that any judge that makes a ruling that a president doesn’t like is anti-American and, therefore, subject to impeachment. Of course, it’s the policy advanced by Gingrich, as well as the spin given to it by Fox, that is anti-American, not the judges that Gingrich yearns to impeach.

[Update] Fox Nation doubles down with a second column on Gingrich’s dictatorial aspirations. This one sports a curious headline that lamely tries to tar Bob Schieffer of Face the Nation as having been “jacked up” by Gingrich and calls the program “Slay the Nation.”

Fox Nation

Also note that on the morning following the death of Kim Jong Il, the Fox Nationalists place this rehashed story at the top of their web site above a much smaller link to a story on the deceased leader of North Korea.

Republicans Reveal Their Top Priority For America In Iowa Debate

Posted by on December 17, 2011 at 12:38 pm. 5 Comments :

At a time when the nation faces some formidable challenges on critical matters of economics, employment, national defense, health care, etc., the Republican candidates for president met in Iowa to debate the issues that they regard as most important to voters and the country.

Leading off the Fox News sponsored debate, Fox anchor Bret Baier summarized just what issues the GOP held as their highest priority, and it wasn’t any of those enumerated in the paragraph above.

Bret Baier: We have received thousands of tweets, Facebook messages and emails with suggested questions. And the overall majority of them had one theme: Electability. People want to know which one of you on this stage is able to be in the best position to beat President Obama in the general election. And that’s the number one goal for Republican voters, obviously.

So there you have it. The number one goal is not restoring the nation’s economic health. It is not creating jobs or strengthening the middle-class. It is not Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Al Qaeda, or any other source of international hostility. It isn’t even Republican pet causes of guns, gays, God, or repealing ObamaCare. The number on issue is electability. Republicans are focused squarely on the singular issue of evicting the Kenyan socialist from the White House, to the exclusion of all other principles or positions. Just like Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said shortly after Obama was inaugurated.

Taking this theme to heart, the debate continued with a series of question that addressed nothing substantive other than the candidate’s prospects for beating President Obama next November. Here are the first seven questions asked at Thursday’s debate:

Bret Baier: Speaker Gingrich, since our last debate your position in this race has changed dramatically. You are now physically in the center of the stage, which means that you are at the top of the polls, yet many Republicans seem conflicted about you, They say that you’re smart, that you’re a big thinker. At the same time many of those same Republicans worry deeply about your electability in a general election saying perhaps Gov. Romney is a safer bet. Can you put to rest, once and for all, the persistent doubts that you are indeed the right candidate on this stage to go up and beat President Obama?

Megyn Kelly: Cong. Paul, you have some bold ideas, some very fervent supporters, and probably the most organized ground campaign here in Iowa, but there are many Republicans, inside and outside of this state, who openly doubt whether you can be elected president. How can you convince them otherwise, and if you don’t wind up winning this nomination, will you pledge here tonight that you will support the ultimate nominee?

Megyn Kelly: Sen. Santorum, no one has spent more time in Iowa than you. You have visited every county in the state. And yet, while we have seen no fewer than four Republican candidates surge in the polls, sometimes in extraordinary ways, so far you and your campaign have failed to catch fire with the voters. Why?

Chris Wallace: Gov. Romney, I want to follow up on Bret’s line of questioning to the Speaker because many of our viewers tell us that they are supporting Newt Gingrich because they think that he will be tougher than you in taking the fight to Barack Obama in next fall’s debates. Why would you be able to make the Republican’s case against the President more effectively than the Speaker?

Chris Wallace: Cong. Bachmann, no one questions your conservative credentials, but what about your appeal to Independents who are so crucial in a general election? If you are fortunate enough to become the Republican nominee, how would you counter the efforts by the Barack Obama campaign to paint you as too conservative to moderate voters?

Neil Cavuto: Gov. Perry, by your own admission you are not a great debater. You have said as much and downplayed debating skills in general. But if you were to become your party’s nominee you would be going up against an accomplished debater in Barack Obama. There are many in this audience tonight, sir, who fear that possibility and don’t think you’re up for the fight. Allay them of their concerns.

Neil Cavuto: Gov. Huntsman, your campaign has been praised by moderates, but many question your ability to galvanize the Republicans, energize the conservative base of the party. They’re especially leery of your refusal to sign on to a “no tax hike” pledge. How can you reassure them tonight.

Nothing is more revealing of a party’s intentions than what they themselves place at the forefront of their campaigns. And nothing could be more clear than the fact that Republicans simply do not care about issues or the welfare of the American people as much as they do about their own selfish quest for power.

What’s more, the debate sponsor, Fox News, and other right-wing spokesmodels concur with the GOP’s directive on beating Obama above all else. That’s why the questions were littered with words like “worry,” “doubt,” “fear,” and “leery,” to describe the electorate’s mood toward the GOP frontrunners. And the debate amongst Republican elites is raging at an unprecedented pace. Rush Limbaugh thinks Romney is a milquetoast candidate. Glenn Beck called Gingrich a progressive (a pejorative for Beck) and the one candidate he would not vote for. Even Fox’s Chris Wallace slammed Ron Paul saying that a win by Paul in Iowa would discredit the state’s caucuses.

So what we have here is both the candidates and the media fixated on electability. All they talk about is the horse race and not the underlying issues. And of course, the reason for that is that they don’t care about the issues, only the power that comes from political control. And now they have confessed this obsession unabashedly.

Unfortunately for these polito-Narcissists, they aren’t quite smart enough to craft accurate predictions of who is or isn’t electable. They will undoubtedly make the wrong choice and their anointed candidate will suffer an embarrassing defeat. But to be honest, that’s an easy call for me to make because any of the current GOP candidates would be the wrong choice. They are all presently losing to Obama in national polls, and that’s quite a feat considering Obama’s low favorability ratings. The best thing that’s happened for Obama’s reelection prospects is that he’s running against this batch of pathetic Republicans.

Fox Nation vs. Reality: On Watergate

Posted by on December 16, 2011 at 3:35 pm. 1 Comments :

Today Fox Nation ran an article by Jeffrey Kuhner, a devout birther and columnist for the “Moonie” Washington Times. The article sought to draw a correlation between President Obama and Richard Nixon’s Watergate scandal.

Fox Nation - Watergate

Kuhner’s outrageous theory was that the failed Department of Justice’s “Fast and Furious” initiative, intended to track weapons sold in the U.S. to Mexican drug cartels, was somehow akin to Watergate. But the only thing that this piece illuminates is the profound ignorance that Fox Nation, the Washington Times, and Kuhner have of what happened at the Watergate, and the subsequent cover-up.

The scandal began when Nixon’s henchmen unlawfully broke into the Democratic Party’s campaign offices one night. They were caught and arrested. The White House, recognizing the political fallout if they were implicated, decided to try to payoff the perpetrators and sweep the whole thing under the rug. That effort failed as well, and the administration came crashing down amidst charges of felony burglary, bribery, corruption, and abuse of power.

Kuhner alleges that the Fast and Furious project was “part of an illegal Obama administration operation.” First of all, the operation was initiated during the Bush administration. Secondly, while it may have been ill-advised, it was not illegal. What’s more, although it failed to achieve its intended goals, it was not rooted in corruption or personal gain by any participant. So Kuhner is stretching mightily to associate Fast & Furious with the obvious law-breaking engaged in by Nixon’s “plumbers” and the bribes that later emerged.

Fox News has been peddling this story for weeks. They have been attempting to fabricate an emotional appeal built around allegations that guns sold in the program wound up in the hands of Mexican criminals and resulted in the death of an American Border Patrol Agent. There is, however, no definitive evidence that the agent was shot with one of the guns from the DoJ operation. But even if there were such evidence, do these simple-minded fable spinners at Fox News really believe that if the errant guns from that project had not been lost, that the wealthy kingpins of the drug cartels would not have found other ways to arm themselves? They were well armed before Fast and Furious and they are certainly finding sources for new weapons today. The risks faced by Border Patrol Agents, and all law enforcement officers, have always been, and will always be, a disturbing reality. But they are in no more danger as result of Fast and Furious than they would have been had it been called off by the Bush DoJ that started it.

Unfortunately, in addition to dealing with the failure of the project, and the loss of life, we also have to endure Fox News exploiting the affair for their partisan political ends. That’s a shameful way to undertake their role as a so-called news enterprise, but it is no less than what we expect from Fox.

Fox Nation Features The Nazi Neurosis Of Rep. Allen West

Posted by on December 16, 2011 at 1:12 pm. 5 Comments :

Fox Nation, the web site of Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News, may have lost Glenn Beck and his Nazi Tourette’s Syndrome, but they needn’t worry as long as GOP representative Allen West is around:

Fox Nation - Allen West

West’s apparent Nazi Neurosis has been in effect for quite some time. Here is a sampling of his references to the regime that he can’t stop dreaming about (including the one from yesterday):

“If Joseph Goebbels was around, he’d be very proud of the Democrat Party, because they have an incredible propaganda machine.”

“In 1930 there was a gentleman in Germany who took away private gun ownership. And you know what happened to that population. You must be well-informed and well-armed because this government that we have now is a tyrannical government.”

“If we allow those Gestapo-type intimidation tactics to prevail in the United States of America, what happens to our liberties?”

“In reviewing history, I would say Sir Neville Chamberlain was naive in his negotiations with German Chancellor Adolph Hitler. However […] I cannot attribute this incompetent statement [by Obama] to naivete, but rather to conscious, nefarious, and malicious intent.”

“Mainstream media’s is no longer reporting the news, they are propagandizing and I think that is another dangerous situation that we find developing in the United States of America […] Goebbels is doing somersaults and back flips in his grave.”

West has been admonished in the past for his insensitive exploitation of the horrific atrocities of Hitler and his Nazi Party. He has been condemned by Jewish and civil rights groups. And his usual response is to stiffen his resolve and defend his unconscionable rhetoric.

By repeatedly assaulting his political opponents with talk of Nazis, he trivializes the very real pain and loss of millions of victims and soils their memory. And Fox News is equally accountable for promoting West’s offensive behavior.