Fox Nation vs. Reality: On The Debt Ceiling

Posted by on July 12, 2011 at 12:53 pm. 2 Comments :

Fox Nation has posted another item that grossly misrepresents reality. Their featured story this morning concerns an interview that President Obama gave to CBS News.

Fox Nation

Notice the headline from the Reuters article to which the Fox Nationalists linked: Obama: Seniors could be hurt without debt deal. The article quotes Obama saying that…

“I cannot guarantee that those [Social Security] checks go out on August 3rd if we haven’t resolved this issue. Because there may simply not be the money in the coffers to do it.”

However, the Fox Nation headline is: Obama Threatens to Withhold Social Security Checks from Seniors and Vets. That, of course, is a lie. There is nothing in the article or Obama’s remarks that even implies that he would withhold any payments. He simply pointed out a potential consequence of the Republican’s intransigence and unwillingness to compromise.

There is a huge difference between an alert and a threat. If I were to tap you on the shoulder and warn you not to cross the street because of oncoming traffic, Fox would report it as me threatening to shove you off the curb into the path of a speeding truck. In the world of Fox News no distortion is too twisted if it casts Democrats in a bad light.

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Shoes Are Falling: News Corp Scandal Keeps Getting Worse

Posted by on July 11, 2011 at 3:42 pm. 6 Comments :

Anyone waiting for the next shoe to drop in the News Corp hacking affair would be wise to seek cover. It’s about to hail footwear. No matter how hard Rupert Murdoch and his minions struggle to hold back the sea, they are continuing to get battered by higher and more powerful waves of corruption. And the tsunami is reaching across the Atlantic to American shores.

News Corp Shoes Falling

Here are a few of the late breaking stories that threaten to being down many of News Corp’s highest ranking officers:

Reports now emerging that News Corp reporters hacked the phones of 9/11 victims.

“…a former New York cop made the 9/11 hacking claim. He alleged he was contacted by News of the World journalists who said they would pay him to retrieve the private phone records of the dead.”

Congress encouraged to investigate News Corp in the U.S.

“The watchdog group Citizens For Responsibility and Ethics in Washington is calling on Congress to investigate Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. for evidence that the company’s sprawling phone hacking scandal reached the United States.”

[Note: Media Matters has a petition calling on Congress to investigate News Corp. That’s only fair since Fox News has initiated a campaign against Media Matters.]

More News Corp papers engaged in hacking. Plus more high-profile victims.

“British media said Monday that Brown was one of thousands whose personal details — including his bank account and his son’s medical records — were targeted by people working for News International titles including the Sun and the Sunday Times.”

News Corp shareholders are revolting. Company has lost $7 Billion in market cap.

“A group of News Corp. shareholders have sued the company over a phone-hacking scandal at its now-closed News of the World tabloid in London. The lawsuit accuses News Corp. of large-scale governance failures.”

The scandal is reaching into the executive suites of Rupert Murdoch, who may lose his bid for the BSkyB satellite business. Even worse, he may be liable for prosecution under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Murdoch’s man at Dow Jones (parent of the Wall Street Journal), Les Hinton, has been implicated in a cover up. Even conservative British Prime Minister David Cameron called Hinton out saying…

“There is now a large-scale and well-resourced police investigation. Of course, in 2006 we did have a police investigation, but we can now see that it was plainly inadequate. This in itself requires investigation.”

That 2006 investigation was overseen by Hinton who concluded that only one NotW reporter had done anything wrong. Clearly that was untrue. We now know that more than 4,000 people were victims of the hackers. Either Hinton was utterly incompetent or he was deliberately complicit in the cover up. And while Hinton was running Murdoch’s British papers, Rebekah Brooks was the editor of NotW. Brooks was briefly in charge of conducting the most recent inquiry into the scandal, but she has been removed as more speculation arises as to her involvement.

As an illustration of the depraved nature of these weasels, BBC’s Newsnight hosted actor/comedian Steve Coogan who confronted the former deputy features editor of NotW, Paul McMullan. Coogan told McMullan that he was morally bankrupt after McMullan explicitly defended the unlawful practice of hacking into people’s cell phones:

McMullan: I’ve always said that I try to write articles in a truthful way, and what better source of getting the truth is to listen to someone’s messages?

McMullan could also get the truth by breaking into people’s homes and hiding in their closets. He went on to make the ludicrous claim that freedom of the press would be at risk if he were prohibited from invading the privacy of anyone with a phone. And he mocked Coogan for profiting from his celebrity while complaining about having his phone hacked.

Today Rupert Murdoch withdrew his offer to spin off Sky News as a condition to win approval of his acquisition of BSkyB. That condition was key to the bid going forward due to concerns that he would control too much of the British media. By withdrawing the offer he casts the bid back into the Competition Commission for a review that will likely take six months. Murdoch’s purpose is to delay the decision in hopes that the hacking scandal would fade away. But there is now the risk that the Commission will decline approval for the acquisition. This move shows both how cynical and how desperate Murdoch is.

Stay tuned. This thing is getting worse by the hour. And don’t expect to see much about it on Fox News. Roger Ailes must be running scared himself. I wonder why.


Media Matters Has Fox News Scared And Desperate

Posted by on July 11, 2011 at 9:38 am. 7 Comments :

This is a compilation of several previous News Corpse articles that I put together for Alternet.com.

In the untamed jungle that is cable news, there is a ferocious and predatory beast stalking the terrain. Anyone who has encountered Fox News in the wild can attest to the spine-chilling threat imposed by the pseudo-news network. And now Fox News has the scent of new game.

The Fox News pack is on the prowl for the media watchdog group, Media Matters, against whom they have recently initiated a sustained assault. In the past two weeks they have featured over 30 stories with the express purpose of challenging the group’s right to exist. Fox has assigned network stalwarts like Bill O’Reilly, Bret Baier, Charles Krauthammer, James Rosen, Ann Coulter, Dick Morris, and Bernie Goldberg, to the mission. This is an unprecedented, broadly distributed attack by a major media enterprise against a non-profit group they regard as an adversary.

This latest batch of complaints stem from comments made last March by Media Matters founder, David Brock. He was quoted in Politico as saying that the organization was shifting its focus toward Fox News to one of “guerrilla warfare and sabotage.” Giving Fox the benefit of doubt, one might conclude that it’s only fair that Fox defend itself from such an overt declaration of war. The only thing that might refute that perspective is – reality.

If this is war, it is one wherein Fox is the aggressor. Fox News initiated their attacks long ago with aggressive and false assertions that cast Media Matters as hacks, anti-American, violent, and communist. They alleged that George Soros was pulling their strings long before Soros ever made any contributions the group. Fox stalwarts like Bill O’Reilly and Glenn Beck engaged in rhetoric so hostile that it inspired actual physical attacks against Media Matters and their progressive allies. This video (courtesy of Media Matters) was posted two years ago and illustrates the hostility harbored across the Fox platform long before Brock’s recent comments:

The new and highly coordinated offensive by Fox asserts that Media Matters has violated the terms of their tax-exempt status by setting their sights on Fox. They quote from the IRS rules governing non-profits that state that…

“…501(c)(3) organizations are absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office.”

On the basis of that criteria, Fox News argues that Media Matters is in violation and should have their tax-exempt status revoked. However, in order for that to be valid, Fox would have to admit that they are a political operation so that attacks on Fox News would qualify as opposition to political campaigns and/or candidates. Without that stipulation there is no violation on the part of Media Matters. So Fox is, in effect, conceding their role as a Republican mouthpiece. Shocking, I know.

Contine reading →


News Warp: Rupert Murdoch’s Crime Drama Plot Thickens

Posted by on July 9, 2011 at 3:31 pm. 5 Comments :

The corruption and criminality threatening to sink Rupert Murdoch’s media empire is growing into a monstrous story throughout the world. One place you won’t hear of it is on Fox News’ own “News Watch.” This may be the most shocking media story in a century and the only half hour on Fox News dedicated to reporting about the media completely ignored the international scandal even as new revelations have emerged. In just the past 48 hours:

  • James Murdoch, Rupert’s heir-apparent, announced that the News of The World would stop its presses forever (although they may just be moving the operation to the offices of Murdoch’s other British tabloid, The Sun).
  • Andy Coulson, the former NotW editor and former press spokesman for conservative Prime Minister David Cameron, was arrested by British police.
  • The scandal escalated from one of phone hacking to one that alleges paying off police to acquire information for stories.
  • Rupert Murdoch flew to London to personally take charge of the damage control.
  • Investigations are underway to determine if company executives unlawfully deleted millions of emails related to the controversy in an attempt to obstruct Scotland Yard’s inquiry.
  • News Corp stock plummeted 7.6%, losing more than $1.5 billion in market value.

None of these factors were deemed significant enough to warrant a mention on News Watch (which last week devoted half the show to blasting Media Matters). Just as his minions are attempting to subvert justice in the UK, the Murdoch gang is plainly trying to hide the evidence of their guilt by silencing their domestic reporters. They have provided only the most perfunctory coverage of the affair on Fox News, and nothing at all on Fox Nation.

This deliberate effort to cover up the scandal affirms my speculation that the worst is yet to come. Murdoch would not have shuttered a 168 year old newspaper overnight – one of the largest circulation papers in the UK – unless there were some dreadful consequences looming. Remember, Murdoch stuck with Glenn Beck for two years as his audience was cratering and advertisers fleeing in droves. He has stuck with the New York Post despite a decade of losses that total more than half a billion dollars. Why would he suddenly turn to mush and jettison a profitable enterprise like NotW without even putting up a fight? There’s trouble-a-brewin, you can rest assured.


What Fox News And Republicans Fear Most

Posted by on July 9, 2011 at 10:42 am. 4 Comments :

The rabidly partisan Fox News web site, Fox Nation, has revealed what they regard as the most terrifying foe in the political universe. They posted an article that makes it clear what is keeping them up nights: Media Matters Spawn Trailing G.O.P. With Cameras.

The headline references an article in the New York Times about American Bridge, an independent organization that documents public political events and candidates. It was founded by David Brock, founder of Media Matters. However, that brief headline is dripping with references to Fox’s spine-chilling horror.

First, and foremost, is the frightful Media Matters. Fox News is so petrified of this little, non-profit, media watchdog, that they are presently engaged in a weeks-long effort to shut it down by challenging their tax-exempt status. They have committed dozens of stories and personnel to the campaign that includes direct appeals to file complaints with the IRS.

The other cause of their dread is the notion that Republican candidates might be recorded by (cue scary music) CAMERAS! That’s right, the most frightening prospect facing any Republican is that of being captured actually saying things to citizens. It sends them into seizures of anxiety and wails of gotcha-ism. The last thing a Republican wants is to be held accountable for what they actually say.

Recent examples of why they are so apprehensive include, Michele Bachmann’s stated affinity for serial killer John Wayne Gacy; Mitt Romney’s sequence of contradictory assertions that President Obama made the economy worse, which he later denied saying, then later said it again; Herman Cain’s remarks that Obama is not really black; Newt Gingrich slamming Paul Ryan’s GOP budget as “right-wing social engineering.”

Orrin HatchThis week in the senate, Orrin Hatch (R-UT) spoke about the sputtering economy and his opposition to the wealthy sharing in the sacrifice required to get the country back on track. He began by saying that…

“Shared sacrifice is something – sounds good – but I’d prefer the Republican approach to shared prosperity.”

What does that even mean? Have the uber-rich been sharing their prosperity without my noticing (or getting any)? But Hatch wasn’t through embarrassing himself with how pitifully out-of-touch and insensitive he is. He continued his speech to note that…

“The poor need jobs, and they also need to share some of the responsibility.”

Of course. Because the poor have not suffered enough. While the top 1% of earners have seen their fortunes increase and their taxes decline, the poor have been living it up at soup kitchens and unemployment offices. In a nation where the 400 richest individuals have more wealth than the 150 million at the bottom combined (half of the nation’s population), it is the poor who have not taken up enough of the burden. And the rallying cry of the GOP is that cuts must be made; cuts to Social Security; cuts to pensions; cuts to worker’s compensation; and of course, cuts to taxes for the rich – again. There’s your shared sacrifice GOP style:

Shared Sacrifice

It’s that sort of rhetoric that the GOP is afraid will be distributed to voters. And their hypocrisy only compounds the problem. That’s why American Bridge – or any citizen with a cell phone – will always be regarded as a threat by Republicans. They simply can’t handle the truth. That’s why they created Fox News.


News Of The Whirled: What’s Rupert Murdoch Up To Now?

Posted by on July 8, 2011 at 1:20 am. 3 Comments :

The hacking scandal that has embroiled Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp is one of the most stunning ever recorded. The News of the World is not some backwater rag with a handful of readers. It is one of the largest circulation Sunday papers in the UK. Well, it was. As of next Sunday it no longer exists. And arrests are said to be pending as soon as tomorrow.

The despicable actions of its reporters and executives that brought the paper down include hacking into the cell phones of celebrities, politicians, sports stars, and royals. However, the bottom-feeding scum at NotW went even lower when they hacked into the phone of a kidnapped thirteen year old girl who later turned up dead. And as if that weren’t enough, new reports reveal that they also hacked the families of soldiers who were killed in Afghanistan and victims of the terrorist subway bombing in London.

When news of hacking first broke two years ago, Murdoch appeared on his own Fox Business Network where Stuart Varney, who is notorious for aggressively challenging (i.e. interrupting) liberals, attempted to ask him a question:

Varney: The story that is really buzzing all around the country, and certainly right here in New York, is that the News of the World, a News Corporation newspaper in Britain…
Murdoch: No, I’m not talking about that issue at all today.
Varney: OK. No worries, Mr. Chairman. That’s fine with me.

That’s fine with him? What an intrepid reporter. Murdoch’s response today would be starkly different, I’m sure. In fact, in response to this parade of revulsion, James Murdoch, the heir-apparent to daddy Rupert’s empire, announced that, rather than cleaning house and soldiering on, the NotW would shut down entirely, thus avoiding the sort of scrutiny that would come with a corporate cleansing. This dramatic solution will result in hundreds of staffers being terminated who had nothing to do with the scandal, while the guilty executives continue on in new positions at other divisions.

Rebekah Brooks, who edited the NotW during the period the hacking occurred, is presently the chief executive of its parent company, News International. Les Hinton who ran Murdoch’s British newspapers is now running the Wall Street Journal. Hinton also lead the internal investigation that concluded that there was no widespread wrongdoing at the paper. That’s a conclusion that can only be explained as either incompetence or complicity.

Murdoch hopes that shuttering the paper will allow him to evade further questions about its criminality. There are even reports that by closing up shop he will be permitted to dispose of company records that the law would otherwise require be maintained for investigations. And speculation has already emerged that the paper may actually resurface as the Sunday edition of The Sun, another of Murdoch’s British tabloids (that has its own hacking scandal). So the closing may be a subterfuge that masks the rats scurrying off to another garbage dump.

The NotW was not sacrificed for some moral repentance. This radical reaction has a purpose that is not being disclosed. Nothing Rupert Murdoch does can be taken at face value. He has proven himself to be a ruthless, untrustworthy, and dishonest businessman. That ought to be cause for conjecture as to what sort of chicanery might be taking place at his U.S. enterprises. Who is being hacked here at home? And is the demise of NotW a gimmick to prevent the exposure of even more disturbing revelations?

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Fox News Accidentally Reports On News Corp Hacking Scandal

Posted by on July 6, 2011 at 11:37 am. 17 Comments :

Fox News – July 5, 2010, BREAKING NEWS: AN ILLEGAL CAMPAIGN?

Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp has been battling to suppress reports about a scandal threatening to upend the conservative media empire. Their British tabloid, News of the World (NotW), was caught hacking into the cell phones of politicians, celebrities, royals, and others, in order to find or manufacture salacious stories. But now Murdoch’s own Fox News is reporting this about the illegal campaign waged by its sister company:


Fox News has assiduously avoided the embarrassing story. That would be consistent with their history of ignoring stories that reflect poorly on the company, no matter how relevant to the public interest. Are they now relenting and covering this major corporate scandal? Not on your life. The screen shot above is not actually from a story about the hacking scandal at all. It is from another assault in their current crusade against Media Matters. However, Fox inadvertently snapped a screen shot of the Media Matters web site that featured coverage of the hacking scandal. This is pretty much the only way the story will ever make it onto Fox News.

The headline from Media Matters, “Murdoch Tabloid Accused Of Hacking Murdered Schoolgirl’s Phone,” refers to a particularly despicable incident wherein NotW reporters hacked into the phone of a missing thirteen year old girl who was later discovered to have been murdered. They accessed her voicemail and even deleted messages after the mailbox became full to make room for more messages upon which they could eavesdrop. That action gave false hope to the girl’s family who assumed that she had deleted the messages herself and was therefore still alive. It also potentially destroyed evidence of the crime.

The new hacking allegations concerning the murdered girl have elevated the scandal to new and repulsive heights. In addition, new information is surfacing that reveals similar hacking into the phones of victims of London’s terrorist subway bombing. So while it funny that Fox News inadvertently posts this image that implicates them in a scandal, we must take seriously the threat that dishonest propagandists like Fox pose for our nation.


WTF: Fox News Is Now Psychoanalyzing Media Matters Execs

Posted by on July 5, 2011 at 3:58 pm. 6 Comments :

To anyone who thought that Fox News would become a more responsible and sane journalistic enterprise after the departure of Glenn Beck, your expectations have been dashed against the jagged rocks of reality (I told you so).

For the past couple of weeks Fox News has been engaging in a dogged effort to discredit the media watchdog group, Media Matters. They have sicced their most vicious attack poodles on them and openly beseeched their viewers to file complaints with the IRS to challenge Media Matters’ tax-exempt status. Every day they bump this two week old story to the top of their rabidly partisan web site, Fox Nation, above other more recent news. Their Saturday “News Watch” program devoted fully half the show to this one subject. But today they have taken a running leap off a cliff that leads to a Grand Canyon of stupidity, hilarity, and jaw-dropping shame.

Fox & Friends host Steve Doocy, perhaps the stupidest man on TV, brought in Glenn Beck’s co-author and “doctor” Keith Ablow for an interview that careened off into the surreal. Ablow pretended that he could psychoanalyze someone whom he has never examined or even met. That is a sign of certain quackery reminiscent of “doctor” Bill Frist’s pathetic attempt to diagnose the terminally ill and vegetative Terri Schiavo. Here is a portion of the exchange:

Steve Doocy: I understand you’ve done a psychological profile of [Media Matters founder] David Brock. What did you find?

Keith Ablow: Well, look, I looked at him from a distance, but you don’t have to look very hard to see into the man’s mind apparently. This is somebody who seemingly has such low self-esteem, Steve, that he’s lurching from one group to another. Whoever will embrace him and reassure him that he’s a decent guy and be his cheerleader in a dramatic way, that’s who he’s gonna be with. […] You can’t believe this guy because he’s full of self-hatred which he then projects on the world around him in order to get love. So he’s gotta have somebody to hate because he thinks that’s the way, the best way to galvanize the love in his direction. So yes, it’s always about being a hit man, you know, exposing someone. There’s very sexual connotations here too.

That is about as idiotic an appraisal as has ever been articulated aloud. I pity anyone who actually has this fraud as an analyst. Ablow has no basis whatsoever to arrive at his conclusions. He is merely taking obviously hostile swipes at someone he is being paid to disparage. He should have his license revoked. And with all of his brazen, personal animosity he fails to provide a single example of anything that Brock has done that is incorrect or unsubstantiated.

This attack is purely personal. Ablow’s notation of “lurching from one group to another” references the fact that Brock was once a conservative, but is now a liberal. However, Brock was a conservative for many years and, after evolving more to the left, he has remained liberal for the past decade. That behavior is hardly what any rational person would describe as “lurching.” In fact, it’s rather stable. Would Ablow also regard Andrew Breitbart, David Horowitz, Rick Perry, and Michele Bachmann as lurching, self-haters? They are all former Democrats or liberals.

Ablow neglects to explain what the “sexual connotations” are. He probably only raised that issue to remind his audience that Brock is openly gay, a factor that the Fox audience will regard as negative. At one point Ablow tried to inject that Brock’s having been adopted had some part in this absurd analysis, as if adoption is a precursor to the alleged self-hatred Ablow is inventing. And he signed off the segment by telling Doocy, in a declarative tone, that Brock is “A very dangerous man, my friend.”

Ablow is a very disturbed and unprofessional little weasel (I can’t bring myself to call him a man). His medical credibility is identical to the journalistic credibility of Fox News – Zero. No wonder he is their resident psychiatric expert. The prerequisite to becoming an expert on Fox News is to demonstrate that you have little knowledge of your professed field, and that you’re willing to use your ignorance to advance the Republican agenda.

In addition to this psycho-circus, Fox News also called upon faux-liberal Juan Williams to pile on Media Matters. In an interview with Doocy’s co-host, Brian Kilmeade, Williams said that Media Matters is “about ruining people and trying to take a company down – to destroy a company.” There was not even a hint of irony as he said this while he was trying to ruin people and destroy a company. Then Kilmeade closed the interview with this verbal and graphic appeal to viewers:

“If you want to file a complaint about Media Matters I want you to do this. Go to FoxNation.com and click on the “Justice”>/em> tab. We’ll take it from there.”


This is just the latest attempt to drive viewers to a web page where they can file their own complaint to the IRS. As I’ve noted previously, there is no merit to the argument that Media Matters is in violation of their tax-exempt status. To be in violation they would have to be engaging in substantial political (i.e. campaign) or lobbying (i.e. legislative) activities. Media Matters does neither. However, the instructions as presented in the graphic above advise Fox viewers to lie in their complaint. Let me repeat that: Fox is advising their viewers to LIE to the IRS! This is because the instruction to check the boxes for political campaigning and lobbying activities amounts to falsifying the form.

I defy anyone to supply an example of Media Matters either engaging in a political campaign or lobbying any member of any legislative body. Since no such examples have been supplied, the form would be a false representation. The only way that Media Matters can be construed as being in violation of their tax-exempt status by virtue of their attacking Fox, is if Fox is itself a political operation. Of course, Fox denies that. Were they to admit it we might have a different story. In the meantime, if these complaint forms required the complainant to sign under oath, then Fox would be guilty of suborning perjury. As it is they are merely guilty of attempting to flood the IRS with frivolous and phony paperwork. Which for conservatives seeking to reduce the cost and oversight of government is pretty hypocritical.

At the risk of being accused of psychoanalyzing Fox, I must observe that they are obviously scared. They are so afraid of Media Matters that they have become obsessed with destroying it. While most Americans have probably never heard of Media Matters, Fox is elevating them to the top of the news pile, even above Casey Anthony. They know that any organization that shines the light of truth on Fox News is going to make things difficult for an enterprise like Fox whose mission is to disseminate disinformation and keep viewers ignorant.

If you haven’t done so already, this would be a good time to join Media Matters.


Fox News Twitter Account Hacked – Hacker Hired To Replace Glenn Beck

Posted by on July 4, 2011 at 10:23 am. 12 Comments :

Reports are circulating this morning about an apparent hack of the Fox News Twitter account @FoxNewsPolitics. The hacker, falsely identified as Anthony Weiner in early reports, posted several tweets asserting that President Obama had been assassinated. The report of the hacking was confirmed by Fox News who issued a statement of regret for “any distress the false tweets may have created.”

Immediately after posting their regrets, Fox announced that they had hired the hacker to be the host of a new program to be aired weekdays at 5:00pm, Glenn Beck’s old time slot. Praising the hacker’s ingenuity and initiative, Fox VP Bill Sammon said, “He’s at least as accurate as the rest of our Fox News team.”

This acquisition should insure a steady supply of the sort of delusional conspiracy theories that epitomized the Beck brand. To date Fox News has not issued any regrets for the distress caused by the thousands of other false stories they broadcast on a daily basis.


Leave It To Blather: A Holiday Memorial To The Media Madhouse

Posted by on July 4, 2011 at 9:14 am. 1 Comments :

In honor of Independence Day I offer this reprise of a video I produced almost five years ago that embraces the naive wisdom found in the Golden Age of American television. Is this a great country or what?

Who would have thought that after 50 years the Cleaver brothers would be looked back upon as media visionaries? The insight and stark analysis preserved in this video unmistakably marks them as the intellectual peers of Minow, McLuhan, and Colbert.

The video above contains an actual clip from Leave It To Beaver. In the episode’s customary moralistic epilogue, the boys tackle the same defects in television news that Jon Stewart so elegantly skewered in his now famous Crossfire appearance.

Seeing this icon of innocence and family values humorously addressing a media problem that persists 50 years later, illustrates just how entrenched these problems are (and how easy they are to make fun of). But the fact that we’re still laughing at the same jokes is a bit disheartening. It’s not exactly an affirmation of progress.

The parade of prattling pundits that populate the closing credits are only a taste of the Blathering Class that infects our national discourse with deceit, diversion and division. And yet, people watch. Are we gluttons for punishment, addicted to conflict, or just starved for knowledge and hoping some will inadvertently reveal itself?

I don’t know. I guess I watch too much TV. Have a Happy Froth of July.