Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Case Of The Half-Naked ObamaCare Promotion

Posted by on October 3, 2013 at 3:06 pm. 3 Comments :

Now that the Affordable Care Act (aka ObamaCare) health insurance exchanges are open, Fox News has been shifting into overdrive to sabotage it and frighten away Americans for whom it will be valuable service. And not to be left out, Fox Nation is joining the assault with its customary disrespect for truth and ethics.

Toward that end, the Fox Nationalists posted an item criticizing what they regarded as a weak first day showing by ObamaCare because “Less Than 1% of Visitors Are Signing Up For ObamaCare on State Health Exchange Websites.” Who knows what Fox would consider a strong showing, but a 1% conversion rate is considered pretty good in the direct marketing business. It also rep[resents 65,000 sign-ups on day one. Is that supposed to be bad? At that rate, by the end of the year, that would add up to nearly seven million.

Factor into this the fact that, due to enormous interest, the heavy volume produced some technical glitches that prevented many people from completing their applications. Also factor in the fact that buying insurance online is not like buying socks or light bulbs. Consumers are going to want to compile information, compare options, and consult doctors and family members. Consequently, they may not make a purchasing decision as a result of the first visit. Finally, it’s likely the sign up rate will increase over time as people learn more about the benefits and get positive word-of-mouth feedback from satisfied customers.

Nevertheless, Fox is ramping up their typical disinformation campaign in order to cast a negative light on the new law’s implementation. But it doesn’t even come close to the ludicrous dishonesty displayed in another story posted this morning with the provocative headline “Obama Hires Half-Naked People To Promote ObamaCare.”

Fox Nation
Click here for more documented examples of Fox Nation’s battle against reality.

Oh lawdy, pass the smellin’ salts. Young folks wearing beach attire are on the mall distributing literature. What has become of this country? Thank goodness that Fox is around to expose our President for engaging in these sinful acts. It would be even more of a blessing if any of it were actually true.

Reading down the page a bit reveals that these morally loose boys and girls were not hired by Obama at all. Right there, just below the sensationalist headline, it says that “Colorado HealthOP, a consumer-run cooperative selling insurance plans on the exchange, sent models in skimpy clothing — and sporting signs with information — to greet Denver’s 16th Street Mall lunch crowds.” So contrary to Fox’s sweaty panicking, it was a privately run insurance coop that hired the semi-nudists to advertise their insurance products available on Colorado’s state exchange. It had nothing whatsoever to do with Obama or the federal administration of the Affordable Care Act.

The headline on this Fox Nation article is 100% false. And Fox’s attempt at deceit was so inept that it was contradicted a few lines down on its own propaganda tract. Clearly, they aren’t even trying anymore to disguise their lies.

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Journalistic Malpractice: A Forensic Analysis Of A Fox News Lie About ObamaCare

Posted by on October 3, 2013 at 11:03 am. 4 Comments :

As the country is mired in an unnecessary financial crisis courtesy of the Republican Tea Party establishment, Fox News is continuing to do its part in disseminating false information and right-wing propaganda.

Fox News Jim Angle

Yesterday’s Special Report with Bret Baier featured reporting by Fox News Chief National Correspondent, Jim Angle, on the harried first day of access to the health insurance exchanges created by the Affordable Care Act (aka ObamaCare). Angle presented an error-ridden account of the new law’s benefits and grossly misrepresented the facts. The core conclusion that he built up to was embarrassingly inept, untrue, and biased.

Angle: Without subsidies, many will be paying more than they would now. Not only that, we’re now learning what the wide range of deductibles will be, in addition to widespread reports of large increases in premiums, especially for the young. Those buying even the least expensive plan under ObamaCare will have a large deductible to pay before getting any insurance coverage.

Let’s dissect Angle’s remarks in detail to see the depth of his dishonesty:

“Without subsidies, many will be paying more than they would now.” Of course they will. That’s why ObamaCare included the subsidies in the first place. It is absurd to report the cost of the unsubsidized premiums that few if any Americans will pay. It’s sort of like advertising the sticker price of a new $30,000 car when every dealer in the country is selling it for $23,000 due to manufacturer incentives.

“…in addition to widespread reports of large increases in premiums…” Angle never documents the alleged reports of premium increases, nor what he regards as “widespread.” In all likelihood, he is referring to his own false reporting that omits the subsidies.

“Those buying even the least expensive plan under ObamaCare will have a large deductible to pay before getting any insurance coverage.” No kidding! This is the most ignorant part of Angle’s report. The least expensive plans are always the ones with the highest deductibles. Angle is spinning this as a flaw in the system when, in fact, it’s precisely how the insurance actuaries devised it from the earliest days of insurance. It’s a trade off between cost and risk. The more risk you’re willing to assume, the less you have to pay. The more you pay, the less your exposure to risk. Do you think Angle doesn’t know this?

The blatantly biased misrepresentations in Angle’s report are certainly nothing new for Fox News. At the same time that they are broadcasting Angle’s mutilation of the truth, they are spinning the government shutdown as a “slimdown,” as if it were diet program that will make us all deliciously svelte. And this isn’t the first time that Angle has lied openly in his reporting either.

Angle did a story last month about a man and his family in Kentucky that he said would suffer a tripling of their insurance premium. But Angle left out a couple of pertinent facts: 1) That subsidies available under ObamaCare could reduce the premium to an amount lower than the family currently pays. And 2) That the man in the report is the vice-president of the Association of Mature American Citizens, a conservative alternative to the AARP and an adamant opponent of ObamaCare.

That second fact is a wholly unethical failure of journalistic standards of disclosure. Surely an executive working for an anti-ObamaCare organization is going to have a built-in prejudice and an incentive to negatively portray the law. His occupation is a salient fact that any reputable reporter would mention. Angle certainly knew the man’s identity and his professional affiliation, but he deceitfully withheld that information from the audience.

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All of this adds up to journalistic malpractice on an Olympian scale. No news enterprise with an ounce of credibility would permit this sort of obfuscation and deception. Which is, of course, why Fox News not only permits it, they encourage it. And it is why Fox News viewers are so often proven to be more ill-informed than even people who watch no news at all. This is not an accident. It is the mission of Fox News to create as many idiots as possible, who will vote against their own interests and enhance the power and wealth of the upper-crusty corporatists who exploit them.


Fox News Renames Government Shutdown A “Slimdown” – And Hurricane Katrina Was A Gentle Breeze

Posted by on October 2, 2013 at 11:05 am. 28 Comments :

Yesterday Republicans forced the nation into shutting down hundreds of government services and putting nearly 800,000 Americans out of work. The impetus for this tantrum was the GOP’s tiny Tea Party faction’s obsession with crippling ObamaCare, a goal they cannot conceivably accomplish.

The effect of this shutdown will be devastating to many citizens, particularly those who are seeking home loans, attempting to pay taxes, traveling abroad, operating businesses in or around national parks, relying on food safety inspections, and victims of natural disasters and workplace discrimination. The shutdown is estimated to cost taxpayers $300 million per day.

Nevertheless, Fox News is editorializing their reporting with a distinctly unfair and unbalanced misrepresentation of the crisis. They have taken to calling the shutdown a “slimdown,” as if it were part of a beneficial dietary program, rather than an expensive, destructive, and painful disruption of the people’s government.

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Fox News Government Slimdown

This is like calling a hurricane a gentle breeze. And this is not merely the product of an off-hand op-ed, it is a policy that has spread across multiple stories. For instance:

  • Why the Government ‘Shutdown’ Is More Like a ‘Slimdown’
  • The government slimdown’s effect on Hollywood
  • Obama shortens Asia trip due to government slimdown
  • Government slimdown leaves travelers in a state of flux
  • D-Day cemetery among the victims of government slimdown
  • Government slimdown blocks some seeking NIH research treatment
  • What are next steps in resolving government slimdown?
  • Americans turn to social media to air feelings on slimdown
  • Obama just as responsible for government ‘slimdown’ as Republicans
  • House to try again to pass 3 emergency funding bills amid government slimdown
  • Lawmakers, World War II vets rise up against government slimdown at war memorial
  • ObamaCare takes center stage in gov’t slimdown
  • Heated rhetoric in blame game over government slimdown
  • Hume: WH eager to see people ‘feel’ the gov’t slimdown
  • Welcome to ObamaCare activation and government slimdown week
  • Rep. Rigell calls for clean bill to end gov’t slimdown
  • Congressional stalemate rings in government slimdown
  • Government slimdown will weaken ability to track disease, flu outbreaks
  • Slimdown Showdown: Are Dems, Obama seeking political coverage by making it hurt?

That’s twenty instances of this erroneous affectation in just one day that cut across the Fox empire including the news network, the business network, the web site, and the lie-riddled Fox Nation. This is a blatant attempt to deceitfully manipulate public opinion by inserting prejudicial language into what should be straight-forward reporting. Fox News is deploying the term they coined in stories where the actual content uses the correct term, shutdown. They even plaster their invented term, via headlines, over stories from other news sources (e.g. Associated Press) who never use the term themselves.

This is not really anything new for Fox News who have engaged in this propaganda tactic before. They call undocumented residents “illegals” even if they never broke any laws, including immigration laws for those who were brought into the country as children. Fox invented the term “homicide bomber” to use in place of the more accurate phrase “suicide bomber.” All terrorist bombings with fatalities involve homicide, but they were not all conducted by perpetrators who killed themselves. Fox adopted the phrase “government-run health care” to replace the “public option” after focus groups expressed a more positive response to the latter. In keeping with their opposition to reform, Fox chose to use the phrase that would generate the most unfavorable reaction. And Fox repeatedly made references to “job creators,” which they used to avoid talking about the ultra-rich, corporate exploiters of America’s workforce.

Clearly Fox has abandoned any pretense of objectivity with regard to the budget debate. They have ceased to apply ethical journalistic standards to their reporting, instead assuming an activist role on behalf of the Tea-publican extremists in congress. And their insensitive adoption of the artificially weakened “slimdown” rhetoric to describe something that is having such a harsh impact on the lives of citizens who are not responsible for this crisis, illustrates the depth of the callousness to which Fox will sink in order to advance an agenda that benefits the wealthy and corporations at the expense of ordinary Americans.


Sorry Tea-Publicans: America Made Its Choice And ObamaCare Won In A Landslide

Posted by on October 1, 2013 at 9:06 pm. 7 Comments :

House Republicans have succeeded in shutting down the government, a goal they have had for decades stretching back to Grover Norquist’s famous and heartless yearning to shrink it until it’s small enough to drown in a bathtub.

In the course of the debate there has been some dispute about whether the last election was a sufficient referendum on the Affordable Care Act (aka ObamaCare). Republicans persistently assert that the American people oppose the law and that it should be repealed to conform with their wishes. Conveniently left out of this argument is the fact that the law was passed with a super-majority in both houses of congress and signed by a popularly elected president. It later passed constitutional muster according to a conservative leaning Supreme Court. Finally, President Obama was reelected by a significant margin. And while polls about ObamaCare seem mixed, they rarely take into account that a fair percentage of unfavorable sentiment is actually people who think the law did not go far enough and would prefer a single-payer plan.

Nevertheless, that hasn’t stopped the GOP from pretending that the election had nothing to do with ObamaCare and was not an affirmation of the people’s support. These Tea Party history revisionists might want to sign up for ObamaCare so they can get medical attention for their severely short-term memories.

Mitt Romney
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Mitt Romney had made repealing ObamaCare a key factor in his vain pursuit of the White House. He spoke about it on almost every campaign stop. And he did not mince words. Here are just a few examples of his pointed rhetoric:

  • If elected, I will repeal Obamacare on day one.
  • What the court did not do on its last day in session, I will do on my first day if elected president of the United States. And that is, I will act to repeal Obamacare.
  • I’ve said that on the campaign trail, I think, every single day. Obamacare must be repealed –- in its entirety.
  • Our mission is clear: if we want to get rid of Obamacare, we are going to have to replace President Obama. That is my mission. That is our work. And I’m asking the American people to join me.

Apparently the American people declined to join Romney on his mission to repeal ObamaCare. Obama won by more than five million votes. And what is abundantly clear is that Romney had thrust the health care law into the forefront of the campaign. Anyone who attempts to dismiss the prominence of it as an issue is deliberately lying (I’m looking at you, Fox Nation). And if these comments by Romney are not convincing enough, he also produced an ad in the thick of the campaign blasting ObamaCare and making this promise: “Day One. Job One. Repeal ObamaCare.”

Just to reiterate – “Day One. Job One. Repeal ObamaCare.” That hardly seems like an issue that was an afterthought in the Romney Campaign. So America was presented with a choice that was focused on this very subject. They made their choice and now they are just beginning to discover the rewards of having made the right one.

That is what is so terrifying to the Republican Party. If they really believed that ObamaCare would be a disaster, they would allow it to proceed and fail, and then they would ride a wave of support into a senate majority next year and the White House in 2016. Instead they are putting up roadblocks, disseminating disinformation, and trying to persuade people not to enroll. Because they know that once people see what the program actually provides, they will not only be excited and grateful, they will lobby their representatives to expand it.

So remember that the more you hear Republicans slamming ObamaCare and trying to prevent its implementation, the more you know they are running in fear of a law that they themselves believe will be popular and will help millions of people. And if there is one thing Republicans hate, it’s helping people, because – you know – socialism.


Faux Miracle From Fox News: Christian Brain Defect Saves Muslim Man?

Posted by on October 1, 2013 at 9:16 am. 2 Comments :

Over the years Fox News has been properly criticized for its brazen political partisanship, rabid anti-Obama crusading, and support for a far-right, corporate-friendly, Tea Party agenda, but less has been mentioned about their religious bias for Christianity and open proselytizing.

Fox NewsSure, we all remember the annual “War on Christmas” campaigns and the efforts to discriminate against Muslims who have the effrontery to want to build mosques so that they can practice their religion as the Constitution guarantees. But little notice has been paid to the increasingly televangelical tone of Fox’s programming. More and more, Fox broadcasts stories whose only purpose is to shore up faith in Christianity.

While Fox rarely reports on religious discrimination against other faiths, they have a hyper sensitivity to what they regard as slights to Christians. Host Todd Starnes seems to produce daily pieces about some imaginary suppression of the rights of Christian soldiers, which is usually just an example of them being required to be tolerant of non-Christians and gay Americans. Gretchen Carlson launched her new program by noting that she will feature stories that favor her faith. And Christian leaders like the Pope are a staple of Fox’s schedule, except when he advocates for the poor.

But an article on the Fox News web site takes real leaps of faith in promoting what they characterize as a miraculous conversion from a pagan Islamic belief to glorious Christianity. The headline preaches “Muslim man becomes Christian after recovering from brain aneurysm.” The story is one of hope for the salvation of infidels who suffer from not knowing Jesus. Of course, Fox never considers the possibility that having a serious brain defect might lead to delusional thoughts and behavior.

However, a more egregious deceit in the story is revealed as it unfolds. Rather than being a tale of a man who is transformed instantly into a beacon of faith due to a life-threatening illness, the conversion actually took more than twenty years to take effect. It began with questions about why he survived after waking from a month-long coma induced by the aneurysm.

“That question started Shamsi-Basha on a 20-year journey that he says led him to Jesus Christ. He began reading the Bible and was baptized in 1996, but he says it took another 10 years of challenges — including a divorce, his father’s death and becoming homeless — before he fully accepted becoming a Christian.”

So contrary to Fox’s portrayal of this incident as a miracle enacted by the waving of a magic wand over some poor soul, it is actually a story that has almost nothing to do with the illness from two decades prior, and more the result of relentless and prolonged hardship that is often the inspiration for people to grasp onto the notion of a higher power in their desperation for relief and peace of mind.

Regardless of what one chooses to believe about this man’s experience and spiritual conversion, it is pathetic (though typical) that Fox decided to exploit the story and present it in such a deliberately misleading fashion. It is further evidence that Fox is more interested in acting as missionaries than as journalists. And since the subject of this article has also written a book about his journey, Fox also gets an opportunity to practice its other religion: the holy sacrament of commerce.


House GOP’s New ObamaCare-Busting Bill Contains Provision To End Imaginary Exemptions

Posted by on September 30, 2013 at 7:11 pm. 1 Comments :

With the deadline for a government shutdown rapidly approaching, the functionally impotent Speaker John Boehner, and his minority clique of Tea Party diehards, are proposing a third version of the Continuing Resolution in an attempt to blackmail President Obama and the Democrats into undoing the benefits of ObamaCare that millions are already receiving, and that millions more will receive after the insurance exchanges go online tomorrow.

A feature of the new Republican proposal is a version of the Vitter Amendment that would strip health care subsidies for members of Congress, their staff, the President, and other federal employees. The argument proffered for this measure is that government officials have unfairly exempted themselves from ObamaCare and that they should have to live under the same laws as the people they represent. The problem with this tactic is that they already do, at least so far as ObamaCare is concerned. So the GOP is attempting to pass into a law a provision that addresses an imaginary exemption.

The gist of the deception put forth by the House Republicans is that if someone is not enrolled in one of the insurance exchange plans, then they are not participating in ObamaCare. But that is plainly false. The new health insurance reforms include both the exchanges and private insurance. Every American has the option to choose either type of plan. If the President or any member of Congress has the resources to purchase the pricier private plans, they are entitled to do so. And as employees of the federal government, they are eligible for health care benefits from their employer.

What the GOP want to do is pretend that only the exchanges constitute ObamaCare. However, the exchanges are just one part of the program, and they were designed specifically to make access to health care more affordable for people with limited resources. So in reality, forcing the President, or any other federal worker, into the exchanges is what is treating them differently than the people they represent who are free to choose the exchange plans or private plans. What’s more, the GOP amendment proposes to force federal employees into the exchange as well as denying them the benefits they are entitled to as employees. No other American is subjected to these discriminatory policies that were only devised to embarrass Democrats by falsely making it look like they were giving themselves special privileges.

Republicans have been spewing this dishonesty for months, but now they have committed it to paper in the form of a bill that, if not passed by the Senate (which it will not be), will lead to a shutdown of the government. Republicans, therefore, are so obsessed with shutting down the government that they will hinge the whole thing on their insistence that a nonexistent benefit be repealed. They have officially gone past their previous designation as the stupid party. Now they are the delusional party.

Feel free to share this graphic lesson by a character with more smarts than the average Teabagger:

Cletus on ObamaCare

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Gretchen Carlson Not Naked In Fox News Debut

Posted by on September 30, 2013 at 5:43 pm. 14 Comments :

BREAKING (7/6/2016): Gretchen Carlson Sues Fox News CEO Over Pervasive Sexual Harassment

Moving up from her previous assignment on the Fox & Friends couch, Gretchen Carlson’s new afternoon program on Fox News premiered today with something of a disappointment for the old, white, male, Christian, Tea Partiers who dominate the Fox audience.

Earlier this month Carlson teased the launch of her new show, “The Real Story” during a an interview with her former co-host Brian Kilmeade on his radio show. The discussion took a lascivious turn when Carlson announced that “pants were not allowed on Fox & Friends.” She later chided Kilmeade saying that “You always liked to be shirtless. Sometimes you actually suggested that for me.”

If that saucy exchange didn’t get blood pumping in the Viagra-stuffed Fox watchers, what came next would surely guarantee a anxious tune-in bonanza for Carlson’s debut.

Carlson: You never know what I’m going to show up in. I’m busy putting it all together and so, you know, I might forget my clothes the first day.

Unfortunately for all the Fox pervs who made a point of flipping over to Fox for Carlson’s virgin outing, she showed up fully clothed and sitting behind a desk that obstructed much of the view that fans had become accustomed to on the Fox & Friends furniture. Sometimes the temptation even proved too much for her co-workers.

Gretchen Carlson
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As for the program itself, Carlson managed to book both Donald Trump and Sarah Palin to spice up the first day. Needless to say, her guests insured that the program would have the same low standards for substance, depth, and newsworthiness that she demonstrated on her old show. Trump pretended that he would be able to negotiate a solution to the shutdown crisis, but offered no specifics on how. Palin unleashed her patented word-salad jumble of incoherence that was peppered with insults to the President and anyone else with whom she disagrees.

Carlson herself proved that she does not have the intellectual foundation to host an alleged “news” broadcast. In a discussion about the Justice Department’s announcement that they are suing the state of North Carolina for voter suppression, Carlson was stunned to learn that the state had a voter fraud rate of about .00174 percent. She further dismissed the notion that any other state’s rate would be so low. Of course the truth is that North Carolina’s rate is not the least bit extraordinary, as documented by Media Matters. Voter fraud is extremely rare in the United States, despite the right’s attempt to artificially inflate the issue as some sort of epidemic.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Fox News has had a great deal of success parading a bevy of blonde hosts and contributors who have no journalism credentials whatsoever. She is replacing Megyn Kelly who got a bump up to primetime. Carlson, therefore, may do well in her new role as the network’s newest daytime eye candy. But she will also continue the network’s right-wing agenda and devotion to lies and disinformation. If Fox News is anything, it’s consistent.


Fox News Carries Articles From Koch Bros-Funded “News” Service

Posted by on September 30, 2013 at 1:34 pm. 2 Comments :

An odd item appeared this morning on the Fox News web site attacking the progressive organization MoveOn.org. It was the sort of substanceless filler that generally appears on rabid anti-Obama fringe sites. Beneath a headline reading “MoveOn.org tries to sideline Tea Party over shutdown fears,” the article revealed the shocking news that MoveOn.org is a liberal outfit that is seeking donations. You don’t say?

In the few paragraphs posted, Fox included a defamatory reference to a passage in MoveOn’s email that said “If we play our cards right, 2013 could become known as the year the tea party relegated itself to the dustbin of history.” In an effort to manufacture a negative association, the article asserted that the phrase “dustbin of history” was “borrowed” from Leon Trotsky. In fact, the phrase and its variations had been in use long before Trotsky uttered it, and it has even been used by Republican candidate for sainthood, Ronald Reagan, who said in June of 1982 “The march of freedom and democracy will leave Marxism and Leninism on the ash heap of history.”

The reason that this article was loaded with such blatant conservative rhetoric quickly became apparent. The item was sourced to a web site called Watchdog.org that presents itself as sort of a wire service. However, Watchdog.org is actually a right-wing, propaganda-spewing project that is funded by the Koch brothers through their Franklin Center for Government and Public Integrity. It is an unabashedly partisan source of slanted opinions and attack pieces. But now Fox is utilizing it as an affiliated reporting service. In effect, the Koch brothers have co-opted Fox to get their Tea Party agenda disseminated to Fox’s national audience in the guise of journalism.

Koch News
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As an example of the deceit employed by Watchdog.org, they castigated MoveOn for its early support from George Soros and for “putting a bulls-eye on the conservative Koch Brothers.” However, while defending the Koch brothers, nowhere in the article did the authors disclose that they actually work for the Koch brothers. That’s a pretty egregious omission. Furthermore, as a measure of their journalistic neutrality, the Watchdog reporter sought out quotes from four people for the article: the chair of the Tea Party Express, the chair and vice-chair of the Virginia Tea Party Patriots Federation, and the chair of Tea Party Fort Lauderdale. Fair and balanced, my ass.

A quick Google search on Fox News, and their related Fib Factory Fox Nation, turned up dozens of previous Watchdog-sourced articles that were published by Fox. Many of these articles are hit pieces on unions and environmental science, two issues that deeply interest the Koch brothers whose businesses have fought workers rights and have contributed to dirtying the air and water of every place they have a presence. In none of the articles did Fox provide disclosure of the Koch affiliation to the reporting.

It is clear that the infiltration by the Koch activists is complete. Fox News has long been associated with the conservative politics of the GOP, the Tea Party, and right-wing enterprises like Breitbart News, the Drudge Report, and even WorldNetDaily. But now they have turned a corner and embraced the brazen biases of an activist corporation with vested interests in the stories they pretend to cover. So now, in the warped universe of Fox News, corporations are not only people, they are also journalists. And if, like the Koch brothers, you can afford to create your own fake wire service, you can get fake news networks like Fox to distribute your PR.


Tea Party Shakedown vs. Shutdown: The Shame Of Being Boehner

Posted by on September 28, 2013 at 4:06 pm. 13 Comments :

The Speaker of the House of Representatives is one of the most powerful positions in American politics. The person in that post is second in the line of succession to the presidency, and has the power to appoint every committee chair and to determine what legislation will be considered. However, the current occupant of that post, John Boehner, hardly exerts the influence that comes with it.

To the contrary, Boehner has presided over an embarrassing reign of failure and capitulation. The tiny Tea Party cell of extremists in the House has utterly dominated Boehner and reduced him to a dysfunctional figurehead who cannot complete even the simplest tasks of governing.

John Boehner
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Boehner has a historic opportunity to shepherd several initiatives through the House that would advance the welfare of the nation economically, socially, and diplomatically. Congress has an immigration reform bill before it with broad bipartisan support. There is also legislation that would prevent felons and mentally ill people from having access to guns. Both of these proposals could pass now with a coalition of votes from both Republicans and Democrats.

The Continuing Resolution currently being debated would fund the government at levels that the Tea Party had previously supported. But now they are acting to obstruct it because of their obsession to defund ObamaCare. The insertion of language to cripple or delay the Affordable Care Act is a deliberate attempt to shakedown Democrats in order to get rid of it under the threat of shutting down the government and creating economic distress for the whole country. That’s how desperate zealots who don’t care about anything but their own narrow self-interests operate.

Of course, Boehner has a choice to succumb to this extortion by fanatics or to represent the American people. What Boehner seems to fail to understand is that he is the Speaker of the whole House, not just the Republican caucus – and certainly not the Tea Party. Yet he feels compelled to obey an unwritten rule that only legislation that receives a majority of Republican votes will be brought to the floor. That is a perversion of democracy. The House is the people’s branch of government and ought to reflect their will.

What Boehner is afraid of is the possibility that he will offend the two dozen or so Tea-hadists and put his speakership in peril. So he chooses to acquiesce to their demands while ignoring the other 200-odd members of his caucus. If he were a real statesman, he would craft a legislative agenda that appeals to both Republicans and Democrats and actually pass bills that become law. That is, after all, his job. Instead, he presides over the most unproductive congress in history.

Boehner needs to ask himself what he sees as his role and what he hopes for as his legacy. The way he’s going he will be remembered as a weak hand who surrendered to a noisy faction of outliers while pursuing his own selfish interests. He will have empowered an otherwise small and unpopular group of ignorant malcontents by granting them more attention than they deserve. And he will lose his post whether or not the Republican Party retains a majority after the 2014 elections.

It is really rather pathetic that The Tea Party, which is languishing at near all-time lows of favorability, has such a stranglehold on this congress simply because the guy running it is such a quivering wimp.


SuperZero: Fox News “Psycho” Analyst Says Obama Is The Enemy Of Heroism

Posted by on September 27, 2013 at 12:30 pm. 4 Comments :

It doesn’t take much to get “psycho” analyst Keith Ablow, a member of the Fox News Medical “A” Team, to embark on a demented journey into Obama Derangement Territory. Ablow is well known for his schizoid rants attacking the President and finding common ground with fellow nutcases like domestic terrorist Ted Kazcynski (I’m not kidding. See Romancing The Unabomber).

Keith Ablow
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In his most recent outing on Fox, Ablow was supposedly brought on to discuss an inspiring story in which a subway passenger fell onto the tracks and nearby witnesses bravely jumped down to help him back onto the platform and safety. It didn’t take long for Ablow to dive into his own personal obsession and divert the segment into an Obama bashing circus of stupid. This is the exchange with host Martha MacCallum that dominated the segment that was supposed to be about a heroic rescue by ordinary citizens:

MacCallum: You say [heroism] can be taught. How?

Ablow: It can be taught by example and by people talking about it. […] Now I know it’s not gonna be popular with all viewers, but I gotta tell you, the culture of dependency that’s being created by this administration, which is a favorite psychological topic of mine, that is the enemy of these moments of autonomy and heroism.

There you have it. The culture of dependency, by which right-wing crackpots like Ablow mean Social Security, Medicare, Food Stamps, etc., is the enemy of heroism. So according to Ablow, people who receive such benefits are cowardly no-accounts who cannot be relied upon in a crisis. Of course, Ablow made no attempt to find out whether any of the heroes in the subway were the sort of government moochers he is insulting. The exchange continued…

MacCallum: Why? How so?

Ablow: Because you gotta be a person. You have to have a self. You have to feel confident about you and your capacity to change the world for yourself and for others in order to hop down past that third rail and rescue someone. Otherwise, if you can’t have intention, if you can’t believe in your own power, you can’t do those things. And to the extent we create a culture of dependency, we are not going to have people that have the wherewithal to act heroically.

Remember, Ablow is a psychiatrist (although he is no longer a member of the American Psychiatric Association over a dispute wherein he was violating their standards), and he is asserting that Social Security recipients, who worked their whole lives to earn their benefits, are not “persons.” He says they lack the confidence, intention, and belief in themselves to be heroes. And the same is true, in his view, for low-income parents working two or more jobs to provide for their families if they accept any type of temporary aid for food or housing. Perhaps they would be more heroic if they were homeless and their children starved. He goes on…

MacCallum: So you’re suggesting that if we rely on government, rely on programs all the time, that we’re just sort of part of a mass and we lose that kind of independent spirit and confidence and self-esteem? Is that the suggestion?

Ablow: That is the risk. It’s the risk in towns, it’s the risk in families, it’s the risk on the world stage as to the American character and the character of Americans. We have to choose whether we want people to be autonomous, and do we want people to emulate these people who rescued someone, or do we want people who are always looking to some amorphous entity called the government to say “Well the government can be heroic, but I can’t because I’ve never had that experience in my life.”

Ablow is now elevating this absence of heroism from the individual to the world. He thinks the entire nation is made up of drones who have no autonomy or self-direction. They cannot think for themselves or act independently once they have been tainted by the group-think of what he calls an “amorphous entity” that usurps their free will. Actually, he may have something there. It sounds very much like the elitist, Koch-sponsored, Tea Party movement that thrives on ignorance and fear mongering. Ironically, it was Ablow who once presented a recipe for building a terrorist that also seemed more like a recipe for building a Tea Party. There is an odd and disturbing consistency in his dementia.

Keith Ablow's Terrorist Tea Party

There are few people on Fox News who are more repulsive than Keith Ablow. He repeatedly violates the standards of his alleged profession and of decency. And this abhorrent episode is further evidence of his disdain for ordinary people who valiantly struggle to get by in the face of adversity. Contrary to Ablow’s derogatory point of view, it is these people who are the true heroes, and they have to prove it every day as they strive to improve the lives of their families, their communities and their country.