Will There Be Another Live Tea Party Response To The State Of The Union?

After last year’s State of the Union address by President Obama, the Tea Party produced a response delivered by Michele Bachmann, the founder of the Congressional Tea Party Caucus. Astonishingly, this irrelevant and amateurish production was broadcast live by CNN immediately following the Republican response. It was one of the most surreal and embarrassing lapses in judgment by a news network for the whole year.

This year, the Tea Party Express (TPE) has announced that they will produce a similar response featuring failed GOP presidential aspirant and serial sexual harasser, Herman Cain. There is no indication at this time whether CNN intends to carry his response. The choice of Cain leaves little to the imagination about the content of the Tea Party response. Cain has already expressed his opinion that Obama is a liar who engages in rhetorical bullshit:

Herman Cain

Stay classy, Herman. I couldn’t care less what, or who, a disreputable organization like TPE wants to waste their time on. They are best known for funneling the donations from their supporters into the coffers of the GOP PR firm that created the group, and they were thrown out of the Tea Party Federation due to racist remarks by their spokesman. But it would be unconscionable for CNN, or any other network, to broadcast their extremist tripe again on live television.

It is an incontestable fact the Tea Party is the far-right flank of the Republican Party and it is losing even the meager support that it managed to achieved. It does not deserve to be elevated to the status of legitimate political party by media that is only interested in generating fake controversy. Carrying the Tea Party response to the State of the Union amounts to having two Republican rebuttals to a single speech by the President.

If the media is concerned with responsible reporting they will not repeat the absurdity of last year by broadcasting the Tea Party response. However, if they do choose to proceed with such a broadcast, then they should be fair and balanced and also air a response from the other side. The Congressional Progressive Caucus (a much longer established and larger group than the Tea Party) could produce a response suitable for broadcast. Or an independent group (i.e. Common Cause, Rebuild the Dream, AFL-CIO, etc.) could put together a response. They could get Robert Reich or Al Franken or Elizabeth Warren to act as the spokesperson.

Given that the State of the Union is just a couple of days away, it is important to act quickly to ensure that a response is available to the networks. Then, if the press goes ahead with a Tea Party response they will have to provide equal time or explain their obvious bias. Anyone reading this with access to the people or organizations that could put this together is encouraged to pass the idea along ASAP. Let’s not be caught unaware again.

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Fox News Psycho Analyst: Newt Gingrich’s Adultery Means A Stronger America

The Republican Party has long sought to position itself as the party of family values. They fiercely defend what they call “traditional” marriage. They are the epitome of the faithful, sacred, one-man, one-woman, Till Death Do Us Party.

Except when it is politically inconvenient.

With the Republican primary race settling down to a two man contest between Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich, the GOP Defense Squad (aka Fox News) is jumping out in front of a potentially devastating calamity.

By now most voters are aware that Newt Gingrich is an abhorrent slug who has cheated on multiple wives and divorced them when they were ill. He even engaged in a tryst with a young woman on his staff while he was leading the effort to impeach Bill Clinton for having a tryst with a young woman on his staff. The argument made repeatedly was that a public servant who could not be trusted to keep his marital vows, could not be trusted with the responsibility of leadership – that character matters.

Now that a Gingrich primary victory is being perceived as plausible, the martinets of virtue are coming forward with modified tenets of behavior that not only absolve Gingrich of his sins, but cast him as paragon of principle and morality.

This unexpected and unseemly turn of events is exemplified by Rush Limbaugh who related a story to his radio audience that expressed sympathy for Gingrich as the victim in his marital woes, and praised his open infidelity as “a mark of character.” But no one can come close to the Fox News editorial by alleged psychiatrist Keith Ablow titled, “Newt Gingrich’s Three Marriages Mean He Might Make A Strong President – Really!”

Keith Ablow

Ablow is the resident Fox News psychiatrist and a co-author of a book with Glenn Beck. Ablow’s treatise on the merits of infidelity commence with the assertion that the whole affair is just a creation of the media that is “trying to castrate candidates for the prurient pleasure of the public.” It’s a position that appears to defend promiscuity. How dare the media expect pious politicians to live the chaste lives of the little people they govern? Our leaders, Ablow implies, must not be rendered impotent by standards of conduct that need only apply to peasants – and Democrats. Then Ablow condescends to dictate the import of these events to the peons who populate the Fox family:

I will tell you what Mr. Gingrich’s personal history actually means for those of us who want to right the economy, see our neighbors and friends go back to work, promote freedom here and abroad and defeat the growing threat posed by Iran and other evil regimes.”

What a relief. Ablow will tell us the meaning of it all, which saves us the trouble of having to think for ourselves. And the first thing he wants us to know is that the age-old dogma of conservative politics – that character matters – is a myth:

“You can take any moral position you like about men and women who cheat while married, but there simply is no correlation, whatsoever — from a psychological perspective — between whether they can remain true to their wedding vows and whether they can remain true to the Oath of Office.”

Ablow, of course, is directly contradicting Gingrich himself, and the standard Gingrich set while he was trying to impeach Clinton. But Ablow is not deterred. He then lays out a five-point justification for how a serial adulterer is better able to make America stronger:

  • 1) Three women have met Mr. Gingrich and been so moved by his emotional energy and intellect that they decided they wanted to spend the rest of their lives with him.
  • 2) Two of these women felt this way even though Mr. Gingrich was already married.
  • 3) One of them felt this way even though Mr. Gingrich was already married for the second time, was not exactly her equal in the looks department and had a wife (Marianne) who wanted to make his life without her as painful as possible.
  • 4) Two women — Mr. Gingrich’s first two wives — have sat down with him while he delivered to them incredibly painful truths: that he no longer loved them as he did before, that he had fallen in love with other women and that he needed to follow his heart, despite the great price he would pay financially and the risk he would be taking with his reputation.
  • 5) Mr. Gingrich’s daughters from his first marriage are among his most vigorous supporters. They obviously adore him and respect him and feel grateful for the kind of father he was.

Seriously! Those are Ablow’s five points verbatim. I’m not making this up. See for yourself. Now, let’s look at them one at a time:

  • 1) Ablow thinks that it is a measure of a man’s greatness that multiple women have agreed to marry him. By that standard we should elect Larry King or Dog the Bounty Hunter president. Both have been married more times than Gingrich. And Ablow might also look into the multiple marriage proposals received by men in prison, including rapists and murderers. Is Ablow endorsing their candidacies?
  • 2) In Ablow’s professional opinion, as a psychiatrist, if the woman is a home wrecker it further validates the virtue of the adulterous man. I’m sure that’s documented in psychiatric journals and textbooks.
  • 3) If the home wrecker is hot (according to Ablow), and the man is not, then he must truly be a great leader. Obviously Ablow is unfamiliar with the romantic successes of repugnant rich and/or powerful men. I refer Ablow to billionaire oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall (married to Playboy playmate Anna Nicole Smith) and Henry Kissinger (who said that “power is the ultimate aphrodisiac”).
  • 4) Ablow regards the fact that Gingrich told both of his sick ex-wives that he was dumping them as evidence of honesty and moral strength. But Gingrich was hardly honest while he was engaging in his affairs for years before he got around to telling his spouses. And he was hardly moral for abandoning them when they were in need. The best that could be said for Gingrich is that if he were president he might tell us about his crimes and improprieties in office years after his term was over.
  • 5) It’s funny how people like Ablow never mention Gingrich’s gay daughter sister, Candace, when they are making a point about family harmony.

Finally, Ablow offers his psychoanalysis of Gingrich in his closing paragraph:

“So, as far as I can tell, judging from the psychological data, we have only one real risk to America from his marital history if Newt Gingrich were to become president: We would need to worry that another nation, perhaps a little younger than ours, would be so taken by Mr. Gingrich that it would seduce him into marrying it and becoming its president. And I think that is exceedingly unlikely.”

First of all, to what psychological data is Ablow referring? He has never examined Gingrich or his family. This is another in a series of irresponsible and unethical psychiatric appraisals conducted by Ablow. He has previously published his deranged opinions about President Obama and Media Matters founder, David Brock. In both of those cases, as here, Ablow is in violation of the American Psychiatric Association’s Principles of Medical Ethics (Section 7.3), which state:

“On occasion psychiatrists are asked for an opinion about an individual who is in the light of public attention or who has disclosed information about himself/herself through public media. In such circumstances, a psychiatrist may share with the public his or her expertise about psychiatric issues in general. However, it is unethical for a psychiatrist to offer a professional opinion unless he or she has conducted an examination and has been granted proper authorization for such a statement.

Why this hack hasn’t had his license revoked is a mystery. Setting that aside, clearly Ablow intends his closing remarks to be a joke, but there are some very real concerns embedded in it. Gingrich’s loyalty to others is a fragile thing. While he may not leave America for a younger, prettier country, he certainly cannot be depended on to pursue the interests of this nation if they are in conflict with his own personal interests. He was ousted from his Speakership and his House seat due to the pursuit of his personal financial interests. And he has a long history of taking political positions that advance his electoral prospects. Add to that his selfishness with regard to his marital history and you have a picture of man who is morally, if not literally, treasonous.

The conclusions by “Doctor” Ablow are an obvious attempt on the part of Fox News to whitewash Gingrich’s past. If Ablow thinks that three wives and two extramarital affairs (that we know about) enhance Gingrich’s qualifications to be president, then what about a candidate with five or six wives and a membership in the Swingers Club?

The logical extension of Ablow’s theory would put Charlie Sheen atop his list of America’s best presidential aspirants. [Come to think of it, would Sheen be any worse than Perry, Bachmann, Trump, Cain, Gingrich, etc.?] And this is what the Republican Party is passing off as family values in the 21st century. Now if they could just get Sheen to come out against abortion and declare war on Iran, they’d have themselves a real dream candidate.

[Update] The good news is that Ablow is getting pummeled in the press for his idiocy. Even his own network has called his article “asinine” and “pandering slop.” Although it was just on their overnight comedy show Red Eye.


Republicans Are Afraid Of MSNBC

If you think that you have been inundated with Republican candidates yelping at one another on television for the past year, you would be right. So far there have been 17 GOP primary debates aired in a campaign season that has seen only two actual elections take place (Iowa and New Hampshire).

Here’s an interesting statistic that isn’t getting much attention. Of the 16 debates held thus far, the three major cable news networks (Fox, CNN, and MSNBC) carried eleven of them. Of those, the breakdown is five on Fox News, five on CNN, and only one on MSNBC.

Date Network Total Viewers Adults 25-54
Jan. 19 CNN 5,022,000 1,717,000
Jan. 16 Fox News 5,475,000 1,573,000
Dec. 15 Fox News 6,713,000 1,865,000
Nov. 22 CNN 3,599,000 1,041,000
Oct. 18 CNN 5,468,000 1,651,000
Sept. 22 Fox News 6,107,000 1,701,000
Sept. 12 CNN 3,600,000 1,100,000
Sept. 7 MSNBC 5,411,000 1,728,000
Aug. 11 Fox News 5,053,000 1,430,000
June 13 CNN 3,162,000 918,000
May 5 Fox News 3,258,000 854,000

What makes this interesting is that the single MSNBC debate drew more total viewers than four out of the five CNN debates. It beat all of the CNN debates in the key 25-54 year old demographic. In fact, in that demo, MSNBC beat every cable news debate except for one (Fox 12/15), despite its broadcast date back in September, before the campaign had begun in earnest.

With that kind of ratings performance you might think that the Republican Party would be anxious to get their candidates in front of such a large audience of engaged voters. You would be wrong. Republicans are not rushing to put their candidates on MSNBC and there can be only one reason. They are scared.

The GOP knows that they get treated with kid gloves on Fox News. It is their home field, it is staffed by teammates, and the stands are packed with rabid fans. CNN bends over backwards to prove they are not partisan, with the result being that they are partisan to the right. They even co-hosted one of their debates with the Tea Party Express, a disreputable political action committee that raises funds for Republicans, but pays out most of the donations to the PR firm that created it. Plus, the GOP knows that they can bash CNN, to the delight of their fans, and that the network won’t lift a finger in its own defense.

That diffidence was in evidence last night when CNN’s John King opened the debate with a question for Newt Gingrich about his ex-wife’s contention that he had proposed an open marriage. Gingrich was appalled that King would start off on such a sordid subject. Frankly, so was I. It was a boneheaded move that could have only resulted in precisely what happened. Gingrich would assert his outrage, the audience would explode with approval, and King would look like an idiot. What other possible outcome could King and CNN have imagined when they brainstormed that idea? It was, plain and simple, a gift to Gingrich.

During the 2008 presidential election, Democrats deliberately embargoed Fox News due to their blatant bias against them. At that time they were accused of being afraid to face tough questioning from Fox moderators. I’m sure those same critics would now regard the Republican candidates as cowards. And Fox News CEO Roger Ailes, who said that “the candidates that can’t face Fox, can’t face Al Qaeda,” surely feels the same about candidates who can’t face MSNBC.

Last year Republicans were advised to steer clear of the “mainstream” media altogether and restrict their debates to friendly venues. Conservative columnist Hugh Hewitt and Breitbart blogger John Nolte were amongst those who advocated this policy. I wholeheartedly agreed with them. Nothing would be better for Democrats than to have the GOP nominate their presidential banner carrier in a series of love-fests that fail to either vet the candidate nor steel him for battle.

But I also knew that they wouldn’t have the guts to follow through on that. They need the media they pretend to hate. So they will continue to fraternize with those they regard as their enemy, except for one particular foe that they just cannot abide. With the primary season winding down, the GOP may succeed in skirting MSNBC until the general election. But they will not skirt the reputation of cowardice that is evident in their evasion.


Herman Cain Makes His Unconventional Endorsement For President

The world has been on the edge of its seat for the past several weeks in anticipation of who former GOP candidate Herman Cain would endorse for President of the United States of America. He promised that his would be an “unconventional” endorsement.

But the wait is over. At the Southern Republican Leadership Conference, Cain finally delivered on his promise. So who got the nod?

Herman Cain: “Here is my unconventional endorsement. Not a candidate seeking the nomination. Not someone that’s not running. My unconventional endorsement is “The People.” We the people of this nation are still in charge. That’s who I’m endorsing, because we are the ones who are gonna have to lead this revolution. We are the ones who are gonna be able to take our power back. I’m endorsing the people. The people who started this country. We have allowed the politicians to take it away from us. And the message is real simple: This revolution is gonna have to be driven from the bottoms up.”

Herman Cain

That’s right. The People! Let’s examine this unconventional endorsement in more detail.

Cain stated that he is not endorsing a candidate, and “Not someone that’s not running.” So apparently he thinks that The People is running.

Cain stated that he is endorsing “The people who started this country.” So apparently he thinks that George Washington et al are available to accept the nomination.

And finally, he stated that “This revolution is gonna have to be driven from the bottoms up.” So apparently he thinks this is some sort of drinking game (one shot every time he says “The People.”

Since Cain has taken this extraordinary measure to endorse The People, he should be aware that The People overwhelmingly support preserving Social Security and Medicare; they support higher taxes for the rich; they favor addressing the issues of income inequality and jobs over tax cuts and deficits; they are fed up with the notion that money equals speech; and despite the rightist cry that corporations are people, The People do not regard them as such.

If Cain were smart he would have endorsed Stephen Colbert. But as it stands he may have taken on more than he can chew because he may have endorsed The People, but The People have most decidedly not endorsed him.


Fox Nation Review Of Obama Ad Riddled With Falsehoods

The Obama campaign just released its first advertisement of this election season. It focused on his record of ethics and energy independence, specifically addressing the phony allegations from “secretive oil billionaires” (the Koch brothers?).

It did not take long for Fox News to start its attack on the ad by posting two articles this morning on Fox Nation that lamely attempt to refute it. The first article sported the headline: “Obama’s First Ad Riddled With Falsehoods.”

Fox Nation

Here’s the funny part. When you click on the article it takes you to a page that does not cite a single example of a falsehood from the ad. In fact, it even links to a Brookings Institution report that affirms what the ad says about “clean economy” jobs.

The closest the Fox Nationalists get to a falsehood is the claim that PolitiFact rated Obama’s campaign promise to toughen ethics rules a “promised kept.” That’s actually true and the ad cited a January 29 posting as proof. However, PolitiFact revisited the issue two months later and reversed their decision because the administration had granted some waivers to the rules in order to seat a few appointees who did not comply completely with the new rules. But the claim in the ad was still correct as referenced.

The next item Fox raised had something to do with Solyndra. But all they wrote was that it was a company that went bankrupt. They don’t address in any respect what that has to do with anything in the Obama ad being untrue. It seems they just like to keep saying it.

Then came the Brookings Institution piece. Obama’s ad notes that the clean energy industry supports 2.7 million jobs. Brookings confirms that. Fox doesn’t dispute it. So where is the falsehood?

The second Fox Nation article linked to a column in the Washington Post that gave Obama four “Pinocchios” due to the same PolitiFact discrepancy noted above. It also provided a link to the PolitiFact page tracking Obama’s promises. The most striking thing about that is that out of 25 promises listed, only 6 were designated as broken. And even that number is suspect because some concerned matters that were out of the President’s control. For instance, they rated Obama’s promise to repeal the Bush tax cuts as “broken,’ despite the fact that it was the Republicans in congress who feverishly obstructed Obama’s efforts, and continue to do so. I think that a broken promise is when someone goes back on their word to do something. That is not the case here and it could even be said that the President kept the promise because he got the Republicans to agree to let the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of this year.

If Fox is going to accuse Obama’s campaign ad of being “riddled with falsehoods” it would be nice if they tried just a little to back up the claim. But that isn’t how Fox works. Since they are not encumbered with being actual journalists, they can just make stuff up and trust that their dimwitted audience won’t bother to do any research on their own. It’s not an honest way to do business, but it’s easy and it helps to spread the disinformation that is the reason for Fox’s existence.


Rupert Murdoch Calls Blogosphere Terrorists For Opposing SOPA

It’s good to know that the Chairman of the parent company of Fox News isn’t a histrionic panic-monger who wallows in absurd hyperbole.

No, it is perfectly reasonable for Rupert Murdoch to call members of the Internet community terrorists just because he disagrees with their position in opposition to the censorious, power-grabbing legislation speciously known as the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA).

Rupert Murdoch Tweet

Murdoch seems to think that “terrorism” is synonymous with “democracy,” because that’s all that the opponents of SOPA were engaging in when they sought to solicit support from their representatives. Furthermore, Murdoch, who became a U.S. citizen by an act of congress so that he could buy the Fox Television network, still does not understand our Constitution that guarantees the right to redress grievances with our government. Murdoch regards such activity as terrorism.

Ironically, since 2003 Murdoch has spent about $45 million “terrorizing” … I mean lobbying congress to get them to bow to his will. Apparently he thinks it’s alright for a billionaire to shower mountains of cash on congress, but if citizens try to inform their representatives about what they want, they might as well have joined Al Qaeda.

It’s also ironic that the man who is in charge of the global “news” corporation that hacked the phones of thousands of people, including a murdered school girl, has the gall to use such repulsive language against respectable citizens. But it isn’t surprising. Murdoch’s CEO of Fox News, Roger Ailes called everyone at NPR Nazis. And Murdoch’s news empire was the biggest cheerleader for invading Iraq when there was no justification. That resulted in the loss of more than 4,000 American lives and hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians.

So who is the real terrorist?

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Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Case Of The Tea Party Smoke Bomber

If there is still anyone who wonders where Fox News gets the information it publishes, let there be no mistake – They make it up. Take, for instance, this article featured on Fox Nation with the headline, “Occupier (Not a Tea Partier) Throws Smoke Bomb Over White House Fence.”

Fox Nation vs. Reality

The Fox Nationalists linked to an article on their own FoxNews.com about the protest in Washington by Occupy Congress. Nowhere in the article was there any evidence that the smoke bomb was thrown by an Occupy protester. There are no witnesses, no suspects, no statements from the authorities – nothing that implicates a protester.

Nevertheless, Fox makes a declarative statement of fact that the smoke bomb was thrown by an “Occupier.” They also make a similar statement that the smoke bomb was not thrown by a Tea Partier, an assertion for which they also have zero evidence. And we already know that Tea Partiers have conspired to create disruptions at progressive events and blame the progressives. Here are just two verified examples:

Patrick Howley, an assistant editor for the uber-conservative American Spectator magazine, admitted to infiltrating OccupyDC for the purpose of undermining it. He then attempted to lead a group of protesters into storming the National Air and Space Museum in Washington. The protesters, being much smarter than Howley, did not play along. Howley stormed the museum alone and was pepper-sprayed by security.

Mark Williams, former spokesman for Tea Party Express, told his radio listeners that he was planning to sabotage union rallies with the intention of making them look “greedy and goonish.” And he beseeched his listeners to do the same. Williams was the one-time spokesperson for the Tea Party Express, but was dismissed for publishing a virulently racist article on his blog.

Given their history of attempts to implicate Occupiers for crimes they did not commit, it is entirely possible that a Tea Party, or other right-wing activist, was responsible for the smoke bomb. But I’m not leveling any charges because there is no evidence one way or the other. That, however, doesn’t stop Fox from inventing news stories that advance their agenda. Fox News has always been more interested in disseminating propaganda than in upholding ethical standards of journalism.


When Fox News Anchor Megyn Kelly Is Right, She’s Right

You have to give Megyn Kelly some credit. Today she conducted a scintillating debate about the cover of Newsweek magazine that featured President Obama and the headline, “Why Are Obama’s Critics So Dumb?”

Kelly’s razor sharp intellect immediately focused in on the most relevant question that arose from that controversial title. It didn’t have anything to do with the substance of the article. Why would that be of interest to anyone watching Fox News? Kelly quickly dismissed the fact that the author, Andrew Sullivan, was criticizing Obama’s critics from both the left and the right, although only the right seemed to take any offense They apparently know themselves so well that if somebody yells “Hey stupid.” in a crowded Walmart, only the right-wingers will turn and say “What?”

The core point of interest that Kelly recognized had to do with the credentials of Sullivan and his place on the cover of a news magazine. Without hesitation she directed this probing inquiry to her guest news analysts:

“Don’t you think that most people when they go to the store and they see Newsweek there they assume it’s like a real journalist who’s actually going to report the news in an objective way?”

Exactly! And don’t you also think that when most people turn on a television network with the word “news” in its name that they assume a real journalist is actually going to be anchoring the program? If you do then you’ve obviously never watched Fox News.

In addition to Kelly’s rank hypocrisy, the very fact that she was discussing this issue with a couple of pundits that had no inside knowledge of either the Newsweek article or the process by which the cover or headline was selected, illustrated the shallowness of Fox’s reporting standards. Sullivan happened to see the segment and issued a challenge to Fox News: If you want to trash my work, have me on to defend it. Any time, Megyn. Any time. What are you afraid of?

As a final dagger in the heart of ethical journalism, during the segment Fox displayed the Newsweek cover in a graphic. But for some reason they chose to blur out Andrew Sullivan’s name.

Fox News Newsweek Cover

Why they would do this when they were using his name in the discussion is puzzling. But I wouldn’t spend too much time trying to unravel that mystery when we still haven’t figured out why Fox thinks that Megyn Kelly is a journalist who can question the credentials of other journalists.

[Update] Megyn Kelly’s Fox sister, Gretchen Carlson, joined the parade on Fox whining about the Newsweek story. Carlson, in a fit of self-delusion, challenged her guest, Jerry Springer, on the subject of bias in the media. Springer responded that it was disingenuous for Fox to be decrying bias on Newsweek’s part:

“We’re here on Fox News. Every single day, in fairness, you guys, every single day bash President Obama. […] Every single morning you are slamming Obama. You know you are.”

Carlson wasn’t going to take that lying down. She quickly retorted that…

“Jerry, you obviously don’t watch our show because you do not understand that there’s a reason – I’ll speak for myself. I sit in the middle as the independent on the panel – and quite frankly we present both sides of the story and we leave it up to our viewers to decide where they fall.”

If Carlson is sitting in the middle because she is the independent, then who on the Fox & Friends panel is she implying is the liberal? Steve Doocy? Her claim is so absurd it approaches surreal performance art.


Fox News On Mitt Romney’s Tax Returns: Who Cares?

The Fox News morning program, Fox & Friends, has a unique quality that differentiates it from the rest of the Fox News schedule. In addition to the lies, propaganda, and GOP PR that fills the network’s fare, Fox & Friends features a trio of hosts who are called anchors only because of how much they weigh down the network’s IQ.

On today’s episode, the three squawking heads entered into a discussion of Mitt Romney and the question of whether he would, or should, release his tax returns as just about every other candidate has done in modern times. [Video below] It went a little something like this:

Brian Kilmeade: One thing about Mitt Romney: He’s rich! And most people know it. And I guess that’s one of the reasons that he does not want to release his tax returns, because there seems to be a war on success in this country.

Gretchen Carlson: And I want to know from the viewers: Do you care about this topic? Tax returns?

Eric Bolling: Who cares if he made a lot of money. Frankly, we should all be thrilled he made a lot of money. He’s a capitalist. Don’t we want that?

Indeed, Mitt Romney is rich and most people know it. But that is not the reason that he doesn’t want to release his tax returns, and it’s not the reason that voters want him to. The practice of releasing tax returns was begun in order to establish whether the candidate is complying with the law and not receiving special treatment due to his connections in business or politics. It is also done to disclose any impropriety or relationship to special interests that might pose a conflict for a public servant.

Fox News is exploiting the controversy surrounding Romney to invent another so-called war on something they consider sacred (i.e. Christmas, junk food, religion, light bulbs, etc.) In this case it’s success. The segment was chock full of the usual complaints about “villainizing the wealthy,” job creators,” and “class warfare.” But the ultimate goal was to trivialize those who call for accountability on the part of our representatives, and to give people like Romney (or R*Money, as his Highlife Homies call him) cover to suppress any information that they want to hide from voters.

I’ve seen a lot of tactics used by right-wingers to obfuscate and evade true transparency, but this is a new low. People have a right to know whether their leaders are honest and trustworthy. I have to wonder whether Fox’s Tea Party viewers, who purport to be fed up with government deceit, would actually approve of this effort to free candidates from the responsibility of demonstrating their fitness to serve in this simple manner.

Does Romney have something to hide? Is he embarrassed by how little he paid in taxes due to loopholes that the rest of us don’t get? Does he have investments in enterprises that might affect his judgment or independence? These are important questions, but equally important is why is Fox News running interference for Romney and any other politician who might have skeletons he wants to keep in the closet until after the election?


GOP Mocks Rachel Maddow In Support Of The Keystone XL Pipeline

The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) just released a video that they are directing to constituents in 48 congressional districts represented by Democrats. The video is a satire of an MSNBC promo for the Rachel Maddow Show. Here is Maddow’s video:

And here is the NRCC version:

Not surprisingly, the NRCC has chosen to mislead their audience on several points.

First, there is nothing analogous between the construction of the Hoover Dam and the Keystone XL Pipeline. Hoover was a public works project that was built, and is currently run, by the government for the benefit of the American people. Keystone is a project of private, for-profit enterprise, that benefits wealthy individuals and corporations.

Secondly, the point Maddow was making about Hoover is that it was an historic achievement of ingenuity and resolve that exemplified the heights of human accomplishment that can be realized when a nation unites to pursue a noble goal. Keystone, on the other hand, is a garden-variety oil pipeline that exemplifies the greed of corporations that place profit over the safety and well being of people and their environment.

This is another example of the GOP siding with Big Business over average Americans. The NRCC falsely claims that the Keystone project will create 130,000 jobs and produce energy security. The truth is that it will only create a few thousand temporary jobs and much of the refined oil will be exported to other countries.

The press release for the NRCC’s video accuses the targeted representative of siding with “wealthy anti-energy activist donors.” It does not identify who the donors are or how they became wealthy via anti-energy activism, which is not generally considered a particularly profitable vocation. It also does not mention that House Speaker John Boehner has received a million dollars from fossil fuel enterprises and has investments in at least seven companies that stand to profit from Keystone.

However, what’s really funny about this satire is that it fails utterly in its goal. Why would the GOP produce a video satirizing a promo for a program on MSNBC? Their constituents are notoriously glued to Fox News and talk radio. Consequently, hardly any of them will have ever seen the Maddow video that the NRCC is mocking. That diminishes the comedic value pretty much entirely.

While Fox News will likely give it some free air time (it’s already posted on Fox Nation), they will just be preaching to the choir, which won’t help them to persuade the public at large that the pipeline is a good idea. But in the process they have tacitly conceded the point that Maddow was making with regard to the value of ambitious public works projects. They are telling their audience that commitments to large infrastructure ventures are beneficial and deserving of support.

So the result is that the Republicans have produced a satirical video that isn’t funny and affirms the investment philosophy of the Democrats. Thank you, NRCC.