Fox News Must Hate Rupert Murdoch

Posted by on June 25, 2010 at 11:41 am. 7 Comments :

As a network that has worked tirelessly to promote extreme right-wing views, Fox News has always relied on the fact that they had right-wing executives and owners signing off on their propaganda. Bill, Sammon, their Washington bureau chief, is a conservative author and alumni of the Moonie Washington Times. Roger Ailes, the network’s CEO, is a veteran of Republican politics and PR. And, of course, Rupert Murdoch, Grand Wizard of the News Corp empire, has been publishing and broadcasting rightist rhetoric and disinformation for decades.

But lately, Murdoch seems to be straying from his own pack. There are numerous issues on which he appears to have have sharp disagreements with the people he pays to set the conservative agenda. The most recent ideological departure occurred yesterday when he appeared on Fox and Friends with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. In this interview he came out in favor of providing undocumented immigrants a path to citizenship. Or as Fox News usually describes it: Amnesty for illegals. He even advocate for using the media to achieve this goal.

Murdoch: Well you just gotta keep the pressure on the congressmen. You gotta do it on the press and on the television. It’s a political thing. […] I think we can show to the public the benefit of having migrants and the jobs that go with them.

Add this to Murdoch’s vocal support for reducing the harmful effects of Climate Change. Or as Fox News usually calls it: An environmental hoax. And on this occasion he also recognized the value of utilizing the media to advance this cause.

Murdoch: We want to help solve the climate problem. We’ll squeeze our own energy use down as much as we can. We’ll become carbon neutral for our own emissions within three years […] But that’s just a start. Our audience’s carbon footprint is 10,000 times bigger than ours, so clearly that’s where we can have the most influence.

And remember how Murdoch was dumbfounded when asked about Fox News’ promotion of the Tea Party? Or as Fox News usually calls it: True Americans fighting for God and honor.

Murdoch: No. I don’t think we should be supporting the Tea Party or any other party. But I’d like to investigate what you are saying before condemning anyone.

Rupert MurdochMurdoch’s position on these issues is so starkly divergent from the Fox News talking points that you have to wonder when the dam will burst. Can Murdoch continue to tolerate the distortions that his network is passing off as news when he seems to know that it isn’t? This cannot be dismissed as him keeping a distance from his editorial staff. He has previously asserted himself in the political process, and there is no reason to believe he is now disinclined to do so. Is he just in it for the money and the public interest be damned? Or is he afraid of the monster that he created?

If we were to believe the rantings of Fox News presenters like Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Neil Cavuto, Bill O’Reilly, etc., then the only conclusion we could draw is that Murdoch is an evil secular-progressive, radical liberal, bent on destroying America, poisoning political discourse, and enriching himself through a phony global warming conspiracy.

Those are precisely the views articulated every day on Fox News. At what point will Murdoch realize that they are talking about him? And will he take offense or slither back into his villa and count his money? Has he been silenced by the fear of a backlash from the rabid congregation that his mouthpieces have assembled?

Take a look at the situation surrounding Glenn Beck. He has lost over 100 advertisers (he has zero advertisers in the UK). His audience has been cut in half since the beginning of this year. His conspiracy theories have gotten ever more absurd. He has insulted some of his remaining advertisers on the air. He even accused the largest shareholder of News Corp, outside of the Murdoch family, of being a terrorist.

Yet Murdoch keeps Beck on the air. Any other businessman would cancel a program that was bleeding viewers and fell short on revenue. Not to mention a program that spews seriously demented conspiracy theories. But imagine what would happen if Murdoch sent Beck packing. Beck’s disciples would descend on News Corp with a fierce vengeance. The Tea Baggers and the 9/12ers would make Fox News the target of their wrath and create a black hole in the network’s audience base. And they would come after Murdoch himself.

So when you hear reports of Murdoch saying relatively rational things with regard to the climate or immigration, remember that he still has the final say about what is broadcast and published by his properties. He is still the face of News Corp and Fox News. He can’t have it both ways. He can’t pretend to be concerned about the environment while he permits his network to trash the overwhelming scientific evidence for global warming. He can’t pretend to support immigration reform while paying people to demonize immigrants. And he can’t claim to be fair and balanced while providing a platform for right-wingers, Republicans, and Tea Baggers.

In short, he can’t claim to be sane while he is peddling insanity. And sooner or later it is going to be abundantly clear that these departures of opinion define Murdoch as just another enemy of America as perceived by the nutcases on Fox News. If they hate Nancy Pelosi and Al Gore and Barack Obama, then must hate Rupert Murdoch just as much. Can Murdoch live with that sort of sentiment flowing from his own network? I suppose it depends on how rich it makes him – or how frightened.

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The Many Faces Of The Tea Party

Posted by on June 23, 2010 at 2:58 pm. 5 Comments :

Malice in Wonderland - Tea PartyOn the cover of the new Weekly Standard is a caricature of two people that the magazine’s cover story regards as the banner carriers of the Tea Party movement. They are Rick Santelli, a correspondent for the cable business network CNBC, and Glenn Beck, a delusional Fox News host with a Messiah complex. The title of the cover story is The Two Faces Of The Tea Party.

The article by Matthew Continetti is an overly verbose examination of the Tea Party founding and philosophy. It employs a comparative clash between conflicting visions of the movement represented by Santelli as a sober, businesslike advocate for economic rationality, and Beck as a feverish, paranoiac warning of impending economic and social doom. The problem is that, even as Continetti defines the battle in terms of this duality, he entirely misses the real source of the Tea-volution. He insists on distilling it down to these two charactors, despite recognizing in his opening paragraph the multiple personalities residing in the body of the Tea Party:

“Is the anti-Obama, anti-big government movement simply AstroTurf fabricated by Dick Armey’s FreedomWorks? Is it a bunch of Birthers, Birchers, conspiracists, and white power misfits? Is it a strictly economic phenomenon […] Or are the Tea Partiers nothing more than indulgent Boomers […] Reagan Democrats and Perotistas?”

Continetti correctly answers his own question saying, “All of the above.” However, he then immediately retreats to present the argument as one between Santelli and Beck for the remainder of his interminably long essay. And Continetti takes sides. He characterizes Santelli and Beck in starkly different terms. Santelli is the “former businessman” who “you’d expect to find at the Rotary Club,” while Beck is the “former Top 40 DJ” who “was addicted to alcohol and drugs.”

On Santelli: They are the words of a man who is worried about America’s future, but who thinks the right mix of policy and leadership can cure the nation’s ills. They are the words of a forward-looking, optimistic, free-market populist.

On Beck: For Beck, conspiracy theories are not aberrations. They are central to his worldview. They are the natural consequence of assuming that the world hangs by a thread, and that everyone is out to get you.

As if to confirm Continetti’s portrayal of Beck as perennially victimized, Beck’s producer, Stu, posted a response that blasts the article and the magazine with both barrels. He condemned the author for his laziness and accused him of deliberately lying. But worst of all, says Stu, is that these attacks appeared in the Weekly Standard, an organ he must have presumed would always be friendly.

But Stu wasn’t finished. He helpfully published the Standard’s phone number so that readers could boycott the magazine by canceling their subscriptions. And then, in a fit of hysterical hypocrisy, Stu adds a postscript asserting that he doesn’t believe in boycotts.

The Weekly Standard (until recently owned by Rupert Murdoch) is one of the few remaining advertisers on Beck’s program. They may not take kindly to spending scarce advertising dollars on a program whose producer is encouraging people to cancel their subscriptions. Is this a trend on the part of Beck and company to insult their advertisers? Just a few weeks ago the Vermont Teddy Bear Company was blindsided by Beck bashing Mother’s Day in an intro to the company’s ad for Mother’s Day gifts.

I have to give Continetti some credit for drawing sensible distinctions between Santelli and Beck. Not that Santelli was right. He basically rallied a bunch of commodities traders to whine about financial aid for working people while supporting bailouts for their employers. But there is still a difference between his greed-infused ranting and Beck’s fear mongering.

There are many faces of the Tea Party that Continetti didn’t even mention. Nowhere in his eight page opus did he recognize Tea Party Queen, Sarah Palin, even though he is the author of a book called “The Persecution of Sarah Palin.” I think he is desperately trying to shift attention to folks he feels are reasonable and away from the Becks of the world. But Continetti’s most egregious failing was something that ought to have been pretty obvious. As the Tea Party was forming, neither Santelli nor Beck were representatives of the people. They weren’t activists or politicians or academics or citizen advocates. They were, and are, media personalities. They represent a class of elite, well-to-do broadcasters working for giant, multinational corporations.

Look back at the opening paragraph of Continetti’s article where he identified lobbyists, birthers, racists, etc., as the components of the aborning Tea Party. Notice that he left out what is arguably the most influential component of all – the media. Fox News acted as the public relations arm of the Tea Party. They hosted the early organizers and candidates. They produced lavish rallies that aired live with custom graphics and music. They dispatched their top anchors across the country to perform the duties of masters of ceremonies. They literally branded Tea Party events as Fox News productions.

The question as to what the face of the Tea Party is can be debated for hours on end. But there is one thing that is indisputable: Without the media, there would not have been any Tea Party.


Finally! Black Leaders Unite To Challenge Glenn Beck

Posted by on June 21, 2010 at 2:56 pm. 54 Comments :

For several months Glenn Beck has been promoting an event in Washington, D.C., that he pretends has something to do with Restoring Honor for American soldiers. In fact, the event was originally announced as a launch party for his next book, “The Plan,” a 100 year blueprint for taking the country back a hundred years, to a time when civil rights were only meant for wealthy, white, male citizens. Beck later transformed the affair into a phony military charity that won’t pass on any benefits until the costs of the rally are covered. This way he gets to have his book launch paid for by dupes who think they are supporting the troops.

Glenn beck Restoring HonorBeck scheduled his Tea Bag rally for the same date (August 28), and location (the Lincoln Memorial) as Martin Luther King’s historic “I Have A Dream” speech. By exploiting this profound anniversary, Beck is desecrating a cherished memory of an inspiring American leader. Last March I wrote about this project and wondered, where is the opposition?

“This is the man [Beck] who recently called King a ‘radical socialist’ and questioned whether there should be a holiday in his name. This is the man who called President Obama a ‘racist with a deep-seated hatred for white people.’ This is the man who calls progressives (like King) “the cancer in America.’ The thought of Beck usurping this cherished occasion to further the goals of his Tea Bagging 9/12ers is insulting and unacceptable.

So where is the outrage? Where are the guardians of Dr. King’s legacy? Who will organize an event in our nation’s capital on that day to honor the real meaning that it represents? Will Beck be permitted to tarnish this anniversary with his exclusionary fear mongering and conspiracy brigades?”

Apparently not. At a meeting of the National Newspaper Publishers Association, several prominent African America leaders have taken up the cause to preserve the memory of Dr. King and the meaning of this anniversary. Here are some of the comments from the meeting:

Marc Morial, President, National Urban League: “We’re going to get together because we are not going to let Glenn Beck own the symbolism of Aug. 28th, 2010. Someone said to me, ‘Maybe we shouldn’t challenge him. Maybe we should just let him have it.’ I was like, ‘Brother, where have you been? Where is your courage? Where is your sense of outrage?’ We need to collaborate and bring together all people of good will, not just Black people, on Aug. 28 to send a message that Glenn Beck’s vision of America is not our vision of America.”

Ben Jealous, President, NAACP: “A group of White males wealthier than their peers called the Tea Party has risen up in the land. They say that they want to take the country back. And take it back they surely will. They will take it back to 1963 if we let them.” […] “We will be fighting Glenn Beck on Aug. 28th and we will be using that to leverage the second march [on October 2nd, for jobs and justice].”

Rev. Al Sharpton, President, National Action Network: “…there is no way in the world that I am going to allow [Beck] to have more people there than us. I hope every Black person in the country will help us to challenge this. Everybody’s got to be in Washington. We can’t let them hijack Dr. King’s dream.”

This is precisely the kind of push-back that is needed. It’s great to hear that these leaders are committed to challenging Beck. I haven’t yet seen any manifestation of their efforts outside of these remarks at the newspaper publisher’s event, but if they follow through with this level of intensity, they could turn this August 28th from a farce populated by Beck, Sarah Palin, and a throng of paranoid conspiratorialists, into a remarkable and inspirational day.

Feel free to contact these organizations and let them know that you support their efforts to challenge Beck. Then work to help produce a large turnout in Washington of people who want a true restoration of honor and justice, and the principles advocated by Dr. King.

National Urban League
NAACP
National Action Network


Fox Nation Says Obama Is Toxic

Posted by on June 19, 2010 at 11:13 am. 6 Comments :

Fox Nation has portrayed President Obama in so many unflattering poses that it’s hard to keep up with which demonic entity they are associating him with at any given point in time. He has been juxtaposed with terrorists, tyrants, mobsters, and that old standby, Hitler. Today the Fox Nationalists, in an attempt to disparage the President, have tread on new territory.

In the wake of a massive oil spill, courtesy of British Petroleum and the regulatory apparatus of the Bush Administration, Fox is apparently trying to cast Obama as a horrifying freak, a monster, an alien. That will surely be well received by the FoxPods who frequent their web site. But it is just another example of the childish and disrespectful level of discourse that is routine for Fox News. To the Fox Nationalists the enemy isn’t BP, it’s the President, the victims on the Gulf coast, and the people in the public and private sectors struggling to repair the damage.

The funny thing about this is that the idiots at Fox have utterly mistaken the imagery they are attempting to exploit. The picture they have inserted to represent Obama is actually the comic superhero, Toxic Avenger. He is a fighter for justice and the bane of evildoers, particularly evil politicians and others in positions of power. Note the American flag that is part of the Toxic Avenger’s logo.

What’s more, the Foxies have once again demonstrated that they have tin ear when it comes to political messaging. The Toxic Avenger became what he is by having been shoved into a vat of chemical waste. He is the victim of noxious pollutants that represent a lethal danger to society. Gee, is that reminiscent of any current event that is presently dominating the news and the public’s attention?

So while the President is currently battling the worst environmental catastrophe in our nation’s history, Fox attempts to cast him as a monster, but instead portrays him as a champion of justice who has been grossly deformed by environmental contaminants. And the image even shows him with a mop, ready to clean up the mess caused by the greedy and evil corporatists, and the politicians and regulators of the previous administration, who permitted this disaster to occur.

Nice work, Fox. I’ll take the Toxic Avenger any day over the Bush defilers of the planet, the criminals at BP, and the Republican apologists for the oil barons.


Joe The Plumber: Living In The Past

Posted by on June 17, 2010 at 7:11 pm. 6 Comments :

It would take something uncommonly funny to resurrect any interest in the sublimely irrelevant Joe “The Plumber” Wurzelbacher. And wouldn’t you know it, Joe obliges:

“I don’t listen to Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck or Sean Hannity because I never want to be accused to stealing their material.”

What does he think he is, a stand-up comic? Is he really worried that he might hear one of his ideological allies pop out an anti-liberal gem and then he’d absentmindedly pass it off as one of his own (as if he’s ever had an original thought)? Someone needs to explain to him how the vast [fill-in-the-blank]-wing conspiracy works. You’re supposed to promote shared ideas and commonly held views.

It’s probably for the best that he isn’t listening to Limbaugh, Beck, and Hannity. That would be a healthy prescription for anyone, even a delusional moron who has far exceeded his allotted fifteen minutes. But you have to admire Joey the P’s persistence in grasping for a shred of limelight. Especially his work ethic. He doesn’t just show up at a Tea Party and start shouting at imaginary socialists.

“I come up with my own facts. Usually, they’re from 40-year-old encyclopedias. I don’t look at the new stuff because the new stuff’s been rewritten. But you take an encyclopedia written 40 years ago and you take a new one today, and you’ll find a world of difference.”

Exactly! That’s why old Joe still thinks we have to defend ourselves against the Soviet Union. It’s why he refuses to fall for that nonsense about a moon landing. And he can’t wait to buy the next ABBA 8-track. Although he remains confused about why so many people are talking about the B-movie actor who became governor of California.

I would go Joe one better and refuse to read any encyclopedia printed after Gutenberg. Everyone knows that by turning the press into a mass medium it fundamentally transformed it into a progressive propaganda machine. News and information should only be available to the wealthy and powerful, as God intended.


FreedomWorks Boycotts MSNBC Over New Right Doc

Posted by on June 17, 2010 at 3:45 pm. 12 Comments :

Tea BaggerYesterday Chris Matthews hosted a documentary look at the Tea Party, right-wing militias, Republican extremists, and other components of what he calls “The Rise of the New Right.” It was a generally adequate compilation of the genesis and evolution of the year-old “movement” to take our country back – to the Dark Ages.

While Matthews touched on many of the most troubling aspects of the New Crusaders, there was a noticeable absence of fervor when discussing the very real threats posed by a small but zealous group of reactionaries bent on terminating their ideological rivals. The documentary efficiently checked off the major flash points, but did so in a rather detached manner that diminishes the dangers posed by giving serious consideration to a phony party that was created by corporatists, fed by media, and dependent on the willful ignorance that is the byproduct of greed and fear.

Nevertheless, the subjects of this program have gotten their panties in a bunch by what they regard as slander and a “left-wing propaganda hit piece”. In response, FreedomWorks has joined with Tea Partiers to boycott an MSNBC advertiser. For some reason they singled out Dawn Dishwashing Liquid. From the FreedomWorks web site:

“Tea Party leaders from coast to coast are fighting back against the smears by boycotting one of the network’s sponsors, Dawn dish soap, until they cut off funding to MSNBC. FreedomWorks believes it is important to join this effort, and show unity with other Tea Party groups in the face of these attacks by writing, calling and faxing the offices of Dawn (and parent company, Procter and Gamble) to ask them to stop subsidizing these vicious attacks by MSNBC and Chris Matthews.”

There is a certain measure of irony in this boycott initiative. FreedomWorks just became a sponsor of Glenn Beck’s radio program. Beck told his listeners that accepting FreedomWorks as a sponsor was a “hard decision” because he did not “want to send the message to you that the way to restore our republic is through the political process only.” Despite his reluctance, Beck gave a full-throated endorsement to FreedomWorks and urged his audience to “link arms” with them and to “get on every bandwagon” they can.

First of all, Beck’s pretension that he has some sort of aversion to politics is perhaps one of the best examples yet of his severance from reality. He rants about politics and Washington every single day. But more to the point, he has been the target of a surprisingly successful boycott that has cost him more than a hundred advertisers. Beck has taken to the air to denounce these activists as commies and thugs who are out to deprive him of his Constitutional rights. But now he is embracing a new sponsor (one of the few not ashamed to be associated with him) that is engaging in the same tactics that he fiercely condemns.

I have no problem with any group engaging in a boycott. It’s a time-honored part of democracy. If FreedomWorks wants dirty dishes they are free to boycott Dawn or Ivory or Joy or any dishwashing liquid they like. I am curious though as to why they singled out Dawn. Perhaps it has something to do with this:

“For 32 years, the International Bird Rescue Research Center has had a surprise weapon in the battle against the oil: Dawn dishwashing detergent.

After a 1971 oil spill, the California-based nonprofit group began experimenting with products including paint thinner and nail polish remover to find the least traumatizing method for cleaning oiled animals. In 1978, the researchers settled on the blue liquid soap.”

Dawn’s website claims they have rescued thousands of animals over 35 years. They have donated 7,000 bottles of detergent to the current oil spill crisis in the Gulf. Maybe a crony corporate enterprise like FreedomWorks doesn’t like the fact that Dawn eliminates oil or that they help wildlife (for the record, Dawn is an oil-based detergent and may not be the best overall choice for the environment). Maybe an organization so wrapped in hypocrisy should be boycotting Palmolive, because when it comes to hypocrisy, “they’re soaking in it” (h/t Madge).

It’s unlikely that the FreedomWorks boycott will amount to much. Targeting a single product wouldn’t cause much of a dent even if they were successful in getting P&G to stop running ads for Dawn. And FreedomWorks isn’t even focusing their effort on Chris Matthews’ show but at the MSNBC network. Their announcement of the boycott leads off with this bit of bravado:

“If MSNBC‘s ratings could go down any further, they would after this show.”

FreedomWorks may be disheartened to learn that the Matthews documentary posted the second highest rating for the network during primetime as well as being the #2 program in its time period. The documentary performed more than 60% better than Matthews’ average rating for May 2010.

If Tea Baggers don’t like seeing themselves portrayed as militant nutcases, then they should stop acting like them and associating with them. They should stop embracing leaders like Beck, Sarah Palin, and Newt Gingrich, who frequently use hostile rhetoric. Gingrich even called the Tea Party the “militant wing of the GOP.”

Lashing out at relatively mild documentaries and boycotting their advertisers isn’t going to gain them much respect. To the contrary, it will reveal just how small and impotent a minority they really are. And as for losing viewers, it’s not like FreedomWorks members were ever in MSNBC’s audience in the first place.

This Just In: As usual, Stephen Colbert has uncovered the REAL conspiracy…

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Rick Barber Spills The Beans, Glenn Beck Froths At The Mouth

Posted by on June 15, 2010 at 7:16 pm. 4 Comments :

Rick Barber Founders

The new campaign ad for Alabama congressional hopeful, Rick Barber, is going to anger some very prominent people. The unintentionally hilarious ad features Barber playing the role of a modern revolutionary recruiting Sam Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and George Washington, into a conspiracy against the IRS, health care, and President Obama. The high school quality playlet concludes with Barber asking the founders if they are with him. To which Washington replies, “Gather your armies.”

First of all, historians will be shocked by the numerous inaccuracies crammed into the sixty second commercial. Then there are the veterans who would be offended by the suggestion that armed insurrection against the U.S. is an acceptable form of political dissent. And other patriots will object to these pretend revolutionaries using the American flag as a table cloth. And, of course, Stephen Colbert will likely want to sue Barber for appropriating his persona (but not nearly as funny).

But who could have anticipated that Glenn Beck would emerge as the harshest critic of Barber? Beck called Barber “a dope” and said that he is “one of dumbest people I have seen.” You have to wonder what would set Beck off to this degree. After all, Barber’s ad was as close to a tribute to Beck as could be imagined. He featured Beck’s three favorite Founders. He mirrored Beck’s disingenuous devotion to the Constitution. He covered the conspiratorial territory that Beck plods incessantly. He did everything but genuflect and chant Beck’s name. Beck even prefaced his criticism by saying that he agreed with Barber’s description of the IRS.

So why is Beck so outraged and offended? Perhaps the answer lies in these remarks by Beck on his radio program today:

“How many times did they stand up peacefully? How many times did they stand up and get onto a ship and vomit off the side of it so they could go deliver a letter to the king? Well, I know it’s been a tough couple of years, it may not be time yet to gather your armies.”

Setting aside the vomiting Founders, Beck tells us here precisely why he’s mad: Barber jumped the gun, and in the process, spilled the beans. Beck isn’t upset at Barber for overtly advocating violent rebellion. He’s upset that Barber spoke too soon. Beck isn’t ready yet. And Barber committed the cardinal sin of upstaging Beck and usurping his role as the Messianic leader of the revolt.

This conclusion is painfully obvious. Why else would Beck get so worked up over a call to “gather your armies?” The last sentence of his new novel (released today by coincidence(?)) menacingly declares…

“We’re everywhere. Stay with us. I’ll see you soon. The fight starts tomorrow.”

How exactly is that different than Barber’s call to arms? OK, Beck’s book is fiction, or as he calls it, “faction.” Beck says that the events in the book are made up, but he also says that the ideas are rooted in the truth. But Barber’s ad is not exactly non-fiction, given that he is seen conversing with long-dead historical figures.

So there really is no difference between them other than Barber’s audacity for getting out in front of Beck’s parade. Beck has an event coming up in August that is scheduled to be the launch party for his next book, “The Plan,” a 100 year blueprint for the restoration of America. I can understand why Beck would be angry at Barber for stealing the thunder he hopes to rain down on his disciples. He has been planning for the release of The Plan for months. How dare Barber spoil it all by promoting his own crackpot schemes to get elected to Congress? That’s what Beck is so infuriated by. Beck will lead his troops into battle when the time is right and not before. And woe be to anyone who imperils his plot or gets in his way.

Bonus Hypocrisy: Keith Olbermann also criticized Barber’s ad, but Beck found no common quarter with him. In fact, Beck bashed Olbermann as a…

“…two-faced, no talent, soon to be washed up, alcoholic, throw yourself off the ledge of a building cause you such a loser, kind of guy.”

So when Beck calls Barber out it’s righteous indignation. When Olbermann does it, it makes him a loser. More importantly, I’ve never heard any suggestion that Olbermann was an alcoholic. But Beck’s litany of insults paint an accurate picture of Beck himself. Beck is a former abuser of alcohol and drugs. He admits to being suicidal on multiple occasions. He has lost about half his audience since the beginning of the year. And neither of his faces have any talent.


Christian Broadcasting Network v. News Corpse

Posted by on June 15, 2010 at 1:48 pm. 15 Comments :

The Christian Broadcasting Network, home of The 700 Club, has notified News Corpse of a defamatory posting on this web site. I received an email from their legal team that included an attached letter (pdf) from Louis Isakoff, Vice President and General Counsel of Pat Robertson’s Regent University. Isakoff is representing Pat Robertson’s son (and CBN’s CEO), Gordon. The letter said in part:

“It has recently been brought to our attention that your internet site, newscorpse.com, has posted comments from Cheryl Spencer which are false, misleading, and defamatory. A copy of that post is included with this letter. The posting accused Mr. Robertson of adultery. Obviously this accusation is inaccurate.”

The letter goes on to demand that I “remove the posting immediately” to “avoid legal action” against me. The posting in question is over two years old and it did not address Robertson in any way. It was about the hiring of the late Tony Snow, former Fox News host and Bush press secretary, by CNN. The offending material was contained in a comment made by a reader. Cheryl Spencer, whom I do not know, made a comment, that I did not endorse, concerning Robertson’s marital fidelity. News Corpse, as an advocate for higher standards in the media, respects free speech and provides an open forum for opinion from all ideological perspectives.

CBN and Robertson are demonstrating a rare measure of sensitivity by bringing down the hammer on a small Internet publisher of opinion over an old article that didn’t even mention their client. Isakoff may be a Yale lawyer and the head of the legal division of a big university and media enterprise, but he is woefully uninformed on matters of new media publishing and free expression. Had he taken the time to research the matter, he would have quickly discovered that US Code Title 47, Chapter 5, Sub-Chapter II, Part I, § 230(c) provides immunity from any cause of action related to comments posted on blogs:

(1) Treatment of publisher or speaker
No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.

There is an abundance of case law affirming the protection for bloggers from lawsuits stemming from comments made by readers. The Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Citizen Media Law Project have extensive documentation of this. And that protection even applies when a blogger is notified of an allegedly defamatory comment and declines to remove it.

I can’t say whether this misunderstanding of the law is typical of Regent University lawyers, but there are certainly curious circumstances associated with that crowd. The Bush administration hired some 150 of them, including White House counsel Monica Goodling, who took the fifth before a congressional committee investigating the potentially illegal firing of U.S. Attorneys by the Bushies for partisan political reasons. And the presence of 150 lawyers in the Bush Department of Justice from a single Christian law school that was less than thirty years old is startling and unprecedented.

I have no intention of removing the comment posted on my site. I believe that the demand by CBN is without merit and is deliberately intended to harass me and to stifle free expression. This sort of bullying tactic has a chilling effect on individuals and organizations who seek only to exercise their Constitutional rights and provide forums for others to do so as well. It’s disappointing to see a religious institution, who’s rights are protected by the very same Constitutional amendment, exploit their power by threatening innocent authors and publishers.


Glenn Beck Admits He’s A Fraud – Again

Posted by on June 14, 2010 at 1:09 pm. 13 Comments :

In the past Glenn Beck has revealed that he takes seriously his self-appraisal as a “rodeo clown.” He often describes himself as an entertainer. He tells his audience that “if you take what I say as gospel, you’re an idiot.” He has been exposed for shedding less than sincere tears on camera. He even admitted that there is a legitimate case for global warming despite his frequent mockery of it.

It’s hard to find anything that Beck actually stands for. His hypocrisy is legendary. And in today’s USA Today Beck adds to the list of his adventures in artifice. In the interview he was asked about the writing of his upcoming novel The Overton Window. This is what he said:

“There’s clearly no way that I’m sitting behind a typewriter or word program and pounding this out. … I have my vision and need someone to make sure that vision stays there.”

On the title page of the book, Beck cites three “contributors” with whom he shares credit. It’s rather surprising that anyone would consent to being saddled with credit for writing what appears to be an unintentionally hilariously piece of literary garbage. But it is not surprising that Beck couldn’t have written this book by himself.

Beck’s schedule already includes a daily three hour radio show, another hour on his TV program, numerous guest spots on other Fox News shows, and live personal appearances around the country. Where would he find time to write this, or any other book, and still be the devoted family man and father of four that he claims to be?

Beck’s admission that he doesn’t sit behind the typewriter makes no distinction between his new novel or his many other published works. This means that all of his frenzied fans who gobble up his nonsense in printed form are being ripped off because Beck is clearly not the author of the tomes he peddles with his name on it.

It’s unlikely, however, that his fans will hold it against him. They obviously are not the most discerning consumers to begin with. And as long as the final product affirms their previously held misperceptions of this fragile, tyranny-destined world, they’ll be happy – if you can call that kind of paranoid, doom-laden mindset happiness.


WSJ: The Alien In The White House

Posted by on June 9, 2010 at 12:37 pm. 6 Comments :

The right-wing media long ago cemented its status as a shrill, extremist platform for failed conservative positions, pundits, and politicians. Often it melded all three into its version of super-troopers, peddling partisan rhetoric and propaganda. Fox News, not surprisingly, is the best example of this with their employment of media-politico crossovers like Sarah Palin and Karl Rove.

However, to the extent that some of the more sober purveyors of news sought to maintain an image of seriousness and thoughtful analysis, even that boundary has been breached.

When Rupert Murdoch purchased the Wall Street Journal it was a respected news organization that, at least outwardly, aspired to adhere to established journalistic principles. Murdoch insisted that he was committed to preserving that heritage and that he would not impose his views on the paper’s editorial process. But this morning any aspiration toward ethical journalism was abandoned and replaced with an embrace of the most deranged lunacy straight off of the supermarket tabloid rack.

Dorothy Rabinowitz composed a screed for the Journal that is so devoid of rationality it makes an argument for her family to invoke conservatorship and have her confined to an institution for her own protection. It begins with the title The Alien In The White House. Despite a disclaimer at the end of the fourth paragraph that it has “nothing to do with delusions about his birthplace cherished by the demented fringe,” Rabinowitz has to know that the imagery in her words plants the very message she claims not to be espousing. The demented fringe will devour it with relish. She wants her readers to conjure up thoughts of a foreign, illegitimate, usurper to power.

Fox Nation Obama AlienIn support of this promotion of birtherism, Murdoch’s web site, Fox Nation, republished Rabinowitz’s column with a graphic exclamation point. The visual cues employed here escalate the routine insanity of those who believe that Obama was born in Kenya, to an even more absurd insinuation that he is not even from this planet. At this rate the Weekly World News may sue Murdoch for infringing on their fringiness.

But even the message to which Rabinowitz is laying claim distastefully casts President Obama as something other than a patriotic public servant. In fact, she paints him as borderline treasonous. In her view the President aligns himself with foreigners and pursues their interests and not those of Americans.

“A great part of America now understands that this president’s sense of identification lies elsewhere, and is in profound ways unlike theirs. He is hard put to sound convincingly like the leader of the nation, because he is, at heart and by instinct, the voice mainly of his ideological class.”

Never mind the fact that it was a majority of Americans, not foreigners, who elected him. Rabinowitz imagines that the country has a perception of the President as having a “distant relation to the country.” However, the truth is that she is the one who feels a distance from the mainstream citizens who rejected the policies of her ideological class; the policies that drove the nation into a financial ditch and embroiled it in two costly wars.

Ironically, the first example Rabinowitz offers of Obama’s other-worldliness is that, upon moving into the White House, he failed to find a place for a bust of Winston Churchill. She is literally arguing that by removing the bust of a foreigner Obama is aligning himself with foreigners. That is the level of cognitive disconnect the right suffers from in general. And, of course, had he placed Churchill’s bust on the mantle in the East Room, he would have been criticized for glorifying a foreigner and harassed about why an American didn’t get that spot of honor on the mantle.

It is to be expected that broadsheets like the Weekly World News publish stories about presidents meeting with Venutians, but it represents a devastating collapse of integrity to see the Wall Street Journal treading that territory. And the fact that this nonsense is plastered across multiple Murdoch properties proves that it is his initiative. He cannot pretend to be removed from the hysterical madness that has permeated his enterprise. He is responsible for Rabinowitz’s incoherent daftness, just as he is responsible for Glenn Beck’s fascist evangelism, and Bill O’Reilly’s arrogant racism, and the rest of the crackpot conspiratorialists at Fox.

If Rupert Murdoch ever hoped that by acquiring the Journal he would rehabilitate his reputation, he has fouled that up entirely. Rather than having the Journal’s respected history rub off on him and polish his legacy, he has rubbed off on the Journal and stained it forever. Nice work, Rupe.

ADDENDUM: With regard to the bust of Churchill, Rabinowitz was even more off base than I thought. First of all, Churchill’s bust was on loan from the British embassy and was returned before Obama was inaugurated, so he had nothing to do with it not being displayed. What’s more, Obama put a bust of Martin Luther King in the place where Churchill’s had been. And this is what Rabinowitz is asserting is somehow un-American?