It is about time that somebody takes on the embarrassing behavior of an American president supplicating himself to foreign leaders. The United States is a nation of superior values and goals. We must never show subservience to others, even as a measure of humility or respect. Leave it to the conservative media to put this critical issue front and center. We have already wasted too much time on trivialities like health care and war. It’s time to refocus on the issues that matter to America.
Thank you Fox Nation.
However, the Fox Nationalists seem to be having trouble keeping their War on Christmas alerts straight. Today they are featuring a story on this year’s War on Christmas: “Santa = Swastika? War On Christmas Begins In Massachusetts.” But on October 29, they posted this declaration: “War on Christmas Starts in KY.” I guess everyone wants credit for firing the first shot.
Update: The Fox Nationalists must not have thought their first slap at Obama for bowing (Again?) was hard enough. So the next day they took another swing (Our Most Embarrassing President?).
I assume they’ll just keep changing the headline until they find one that is sufficiently insulting. It would probably be a lot easier if they just went with “Obama Hates America” and used that for the headline of all of their biased, dishonest stories.
This will be a quick examination of the appropriate response time for critical public decision making. It is an area of cognitive analysis that the media, and most of the political order, have neglected to explore. For instance…..
When addressing the current debate on health care, Republicans have concluded that the issue is too important to rush:
Mitch McConnell, Senate Majority Leader (R-KY): Americans are telling us that health care is too important to rush. John Boehner, House Majority Leader (R-OH): Health care reform is too important to rush through a flawed proposal that will raise costs John Kline (R-MN): Health care reform is far too important to rush through Congress in a few days or a few weeks. Rick Boucher (R-VA): It’s important that we take the time to consider all of these measures thoroughly. Mike Johanns (R-NE): Health Care Too Important To Rush Mike Crapo (R-ID): Health care is too big, too personal, too important to rush or get it wrong. Paul Broun (R-GA): Whoa, this is an issue that is too important to rush through.
Setting aside for the moment that health care has been debated for several months already in this administration, and for decades if you include prior administrations going back to FDR, the Republican’s judgment to give due consideration to matters of importance is generally commendable. It seems obvious that weighty issues that have the potential for great impact should be more thoroughly considered than trivial issues. Good call, Republicans.
However, the same GOP have similarly concluded that a decision on the conduct of the war in Afghanistan is too important to delay:
Mitch McConnell (R-KY): Any failure to act decisively in response to General McChrystal’s request could serve to undermine the other good decisions the president has made on national security John Boehner (R-OH): I do believe that the quicker he makes this decision, the quicker General McChrystal can get on with the task at hand. Dick Cheney (R-VP): The White House must stop dithering while America’s armed forces are in danger. Jon Kyl (R-AZ): Clearly time is of the essence here. John McCain (R-AZ): Every day we delay will be a delay in this strategy succeeding. Steve Scalise (R-LA): Our commander in chief continues to delay action on Gen. McChrystal’s assessment that calls for more troops in Afghanistan David Vitter (R-LA): We simply cannot afford to let the insurgents gain ground.
So the Republican approach to policy is that health care is so important that we must slow down the process to give it more thought, but war is an insignificant little affair that we can just dash off cavalierly. Either that or that war is so important that we need to hasten an abrupt decision, but health care we can afford to dally with and resolve when we get around to it.
This reminds a bit of Aesop’s fable of the man who blew on his hands to warm them, and blew on his soup to cool it. The satyr who had taken him in then threw him out saying…
I will have nought to do with a man who can blow hot and cold with the same breath.
Sounds like good advice when dealing with Republicans.
On the O’Reilly Factor yesterday, the big news was released that Bill O’Reilly and Glenn Beck will be taking to the road for a major entertainment event: The Bold & Fresh Tour.
It sounds like the launch of a new laundry detergent to me. But no – this is the Tea Bagger equivalent of the Grateful Dead. This national extravaganza will march across this great nation from Westbury, NY, to Tampa, FL, to North Charleston, SC, to Norfolk, VA to … well actually, that’s the whole thing. Four cities in seven days. It’s gonna be WILD! As it says on BoldFreshTour.com…
“It’s an event that makes professional wrestling seem like a night at the opera.”
Now that’s exciting! This will not be just another evening of inspiring music, compelling drama, extraordinary talent, and cultural enrichment. Hell no! It will be a sweaty brawl with two of America’s premiere purveyors of slack-jawed invective, spitting furiously at each other in their phony, choreographed dance of dimwitted arrogance. Either that or a Marx Brothers movie.
The announcement last night revealed the name of the tour as the Bold & Fresh Tour. Then the fireworks started as Beck pretended to be bothered by the fact that the tour was named for O’Reilly’s book instead of his own. I’m inclined to agree with Beck. They definitely should have used Beck’s book for the name of this tour. It is so much more accurate to promote this as the “Arguing With Idiots” tour. But that would have been a bit more honesty than this clod couple could muster.
For much of the past year, Fox News squawking heads have bitterly complained that President Obama and his secret Muslim socialists have been plotting to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine. Never mind that no one in the administration has advocated this, no one in the Congress has drafted legislation or even held hearings on the subject, and the President himself is on record opposing it. Nevertheless, the panic on the part of the right-wing mouth brigades is threatening to cause a Prozac shortage.
The fear expressed by these mongers is that free speech would be obliterated and the Constitution rendered moot. And we all know that the right has been a stalwart proponent of free expression, just ask the Dixie Chicks and Bill Maher – and Jon, the YouTube news junkie who has posted hundreds of Fox News clips under the name of News1news.
While Jon’s clips contained no added commentary, they were often segments in which Fox News personnel looked foolish. This was not Jon’s doing. He just posted the unadulterated video and the FoxPods acted naturally. Fox News has filed numerous complaints against Jon for copyright infringement, and now, YouTube has suspended Jon’s account and removed his videos.
Why would Fox do this? It certainly wasn’t because they were upset that their content was being recorded and distributed without their permission. They have not bothered to remove other Fox-owned content posted by sycophantic fans like TheRightScoop, BuckFarack, GlennBeckDailyClips and ConservativeNewMedia. But the liberally-inclined News1news has been shut down.
Granted, News Corp has been making noises lately about securing their content by charging Internet users and barring Google indexing (although to date it has been all talk and no action). But clearly this is not a case of protecting intellectual property. The selective nature of Fox’s legal actions prove that they are only interested in squelching liberals. Well, that and erasing the record of their dubious broadcasts, replete with lies and embarrassing behavior that reeks of anger, racism and ignorance.
Recently, Glenn Beck lost his bid to shut down a satirical web site with the name: glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com. The argument was that the public might confuse it with an official Beck site because the URL had the name Glenn Beck in it, along with 32 other characters. I wonder why they haven’t come after me. My URL has the name News Corp in it with only two additional letters. If they think the public is so stupid they would mistake the Beck parody site as official, what’s to stop those morons from thinking that I represent Rupert Murdoch?
What Fox is doing here is an unabashed curtailing of speech – THEIR OWN! They are prohibiting the dissemination of information and ideas based solely on political criteria. I wonder if the First Amendment advocates at Fox will now mount a campaign exposing Fox as anti-speech. What is it about their own broadcasts that they are seeking to hide from the public? Will Rush Limbaugh take to the air and lambaste Fox for destroying the American values of open dialogue and expression? If these hyper-alarmists are afraid of a Fairness Doctrine that exists only in their delusional imaginations, then shouldn’t they be doubly ascared of a cable news network that strongarms harmless citizens who are merely passing on the broadcasts of the very same cable news network?
Jon has created a new YouTube account under the name NewsPoliticsAmerica. Let’s see how long this one lasts.
Posted by Mark NC on November 13, 2009 at 11:09 am.
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Heed ye the call and come unto the word of FOX. Herewith are more revelations as revealed by Glenn Beck in the divine Gospel According to Beck*:
2:1) You’re gonna see a black and white world, man, that is nothing but destruction and ugly. 2:2) I don’t know why no one else will tell you the truth about these things. I don’t know and I don’t care. All I I know is they are all there. Embedded in each one of these bills, in plain sight. 2:3) Barack Obama and Congress are selling you a bill of goods. It is only when you take down the mask of sunshine and lollipops that you will see the real thing – the real image. 2:4)Destruction. These bills are creating the path to America’s destruction. How many months ago did I say “Please, please America, don’t debate, don’t compromise on these things.”. 2:5) There are things in these bills that you don’t even know. They’re building a machine and they’re about to turn the darn thing on. You don’t compromise on your destruction.
Once again, Beck is the only one who can see the danger that lies ahead. He is the only one with the courage to warn us that we are on a path to destruction. And you do not compromise on destruction. You do not even debate. It doesn’t matter if you know what you’re talking about. You do not need to know – or care. Just listen to Beck. He sees the things that are hidden in plain sight. He is your light and your guide.
Posted by Mark NC on November 12, 2009 at 5:59 pm.
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I was going to write a piece similar to this one that I found at Media Matters. However, Simon Maloy has so perfectly articulated everything I had to say on this subject that I just copied and pasted his article. I hope he doesn’t sue me.
Consider for a moment the circumstances surrounding Lou Dobbs’ abrupt departure from CNN, announced last night and effective immediately. Dobbs had been going increasingly far afield in
his programming, from spinning North American Union conspiracy theories, to indulging the Birther nonsense, to claiming that his opponents had taken to shooting at his house (the police said it was likely an errant bullet from a hunter’s rifle). Notably, CNN itself debunked each of these stories. According to the New York Timeswrite-up of Dobbs’ exit, Dobbs’ on-air behavior was apparently too much for the network to bear: “Months ago the president of CNN/U.S., Jonathan Klein, offered a choice to Lou Dobbs, the channel’s most outspoken anchor. Mr. Dobbs could vent his opinions on radio and anchor an objective newscast on television, or he could leave CNN.”
Now, contrast CNN’s Dobbs situation to Fox News and its handling of Glenn Beck. In terms of delusional conspiracy-mongering and spittle-flecked invective, Dobbs is a stripling compared to Beck. Fox News’ steady transition from untrustworthy cable news network to conservative political action committee can largely be attributed to Beck, whose 9-12 Project is wrapped up with the Tea Party movement. Except for those that buy into his fevered shtick, Beck is an embarrassment, an embodiment of everything that is wrong with cable news, and there is no greater example of this than when he called the President of the United States a “racist” who has “a deep-seated hatred for white people.” The network lost scores of advertisers over that remark, and, as NBC’s First Read pointed out, “[t]here was a time when outrageous rants like this would actually cost the ranters their jobs.”
But what happened to Beck? He got a pat on the head from NewsCorp president Rupert Murdoch, who said Beck “was right” to call the president a “racist.”
CNN’s movement on Dobbs was long overdue, but they eventually decided that their credibility as a news network outweighed Dobbs’ (rapidly dwindling) ratings. Fox News, on the other hand, shows no such concern with Beck, maybe because they didn’t have a whole lot of credibility to sacrifice in the first place.
Last night Fox News CEO Roger Ailes was honored by the Boy Scouts of America with the 2009 Good Scout Award. If his corpulent visage wasn’t enough to frighten the children, his acceptance speech surely turned the trick. Here is an excerpt that was broadcast by the boot-licking toadies of Fox & Friends:
So Ailes is “heartened to know that what the enemies of America don’t know is that someday they will meet the courage, resilience, dedication of these young Americans.” If you were a ten year old Scout in the audience, would you be heartened to know that powerful adults like Roger Ailes are already conscripting you into armies to face future enemies? And isn’t this the same sort of government indoctrination of innocent children by Ailes, for which his network has so furiously condemned President Obama?
Ailes was introduced by his good friend Rush Limbaugh. In the introduction, Limbaugh candidly revealed something that most observers already know about Fox News, but which Ailes himself has decried in the past as a great danger:
Limbaugh:Roger’s never been on camera. Roger is not actively in the director’s chair every day for all these shows and yet he’s created this culture where everybody there is on the same page and proud, and they’re winning.
Ailes:The greatest danger to journalism is a newsroom or a profession where everyone thinks alike. Because then one wrong turn can cause an entire news division to implode. We must respect and encourage diversity of thought and speech in the newsroom.
I think we can comprise and agree that Fox is both a myopic purveyor of lock-step biases AND a great danger.
CNN’s resident immigrant basher and birther booster, Lou Dobbs, has announced that he is leaving the network effective immediately.
This comes as somewhat of surprise, as Dobbs was considered to be secure in his position despite significant protest from civil rights groups. But it is hardly out of the blue. There has been frequent speculation about Dobbs’ future with CNN. His opponents have mounted well publicized campaigns to persuade CNN to drop the anchor. And many observers have thought that he would be a better fit for a right-wing network like Fox, particularly its struggling business channel. A Fox News spokesman (not a notoriously credible source) said that there have been no discussions with Dobbs. However that would contradict reports a month ago that Dobbs was seen dining with Fox CEO Roger Ailes in September.
However plausible a Fox/Dobbs partnership may appear, Dobbs’ on-air farewell struck a tone that suggested another possibility entirely:
“Over the past six months it’s become increasingly clear that strong winds of change have begun buffeting this country and affecting all of us, and some leaders in media, politics, and business have been urging me to go beyond the role at CNN and to engage in constructive problem solving as well as to contribute positively to the great understanding of the issues of our day.”
Dobbs went on to lament what he called “the lack of true representation in Washington, D.C.” There was an unmistakable ring of political aspiration in his remarks. Does this mean he might seek political office? Dobbs lives in New Jersey where they just elected a new governor. The next available senate seat doesn’t come up until 2012. It seems unlikely that Dobbs would give up a multimillion dollar TV gig for anything lower.
If I had to guess, I would venture that he may want to mount an independent campaign for President in 2012. While there would be no realistic scenario in which he could prevail, it would be just the sort of thing to stroke his immense ego. And there is a vocal and motivated minority that is primed to get behind a third party protest candidate. He would sweep up the Beck/Palin malcontents and, in all likelihood, smooth the way for Obama’s reelection.
Closer to home, CNN now has a hole to fill at 4:00pm. Judging by their past timidity, it is unlikely that CNN will replace Dobbs with a partisan from either side of the aisle. The last opening they had was given to Campbell Brown, who is notable for…um…..
If CNN is serious about establishing itself as a straight up news provider in contrast to the modestly left-leaning MSNBC and the raving histrionics of Fox, they will need to find an anchor with journalistic bona fides. They will need to avoid the trap of personality-driven spokesmodels. It would be wise for them to build an investigative news group as the central point of their programming. Adding more news readers like Blitzer or Cooper simply won’t lift them from their cellar dwelling. They need to demonstrate that there is a place for reporting that is probing and informative. And that passion for journalism is not twisted into rancorous blathering.
That’s a tall order, but getting rid of Dobbs is a step in the right direction. Now they have to show that they can embrace this opportunity and aim for something higher. Yeah, I know…I’m not holding my breath.
Update: CNN has announced that their own John King will replace Lou Dobbs. King is an old-school, straight news reporter. This means that CNN is properly moving away from the Fox model of news screeching, but it also means that they are probably not planning on innovating and advancing the state of media. Oh well.
Posted by Mark NC on November 11, 2009 at 9:21 am.
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On the heels of reports that Rupert Murdoch’s sensationalistic tabloid, the New York Post, is severely wobbling financially and bleeding circulation, comes this report from the Huffington Post’s Sam Stein about a fired NY Post employee’s lawsuit against the paper.
Sandra Guzman was terminated by the Post after she had leveled criticism of an overtly racist cartoon that portrayed President Obama as a chimpanzee. Guzman’s allegations cover a broad sweep of misconduct by the paper and its editor, Col Allan. Stein writes…
“As part of the 38-page complaint, Guzman paints the Post newsroom as a male-dominated frat house and Allan in particular as sexist, offensive and domineering. Guzman alleges that she and others were routinely subjected to misogynistic behavior. She says that hiring practices at the paper — as well as her firing — were driven by racial prejudices rather than merit.
And she recounts the paper’s D.C. bureau chief stating that the publication’s goal was to ‘destroy [President] Barack Obama.’”
The lawsuit alleges that the environment at the Post was a hotbed of salacious innuendo, undisguised racism, and open political partisanship. Read Stein’s article for the juicy details. He has also posted a copy of the full complaint.
This is just another embarrassing episode for the Murdoch family of pseudo-news operations, and should further lock in Murdoch’s legacy as a disreputable purveyor of filth and lies.
Jon Stewart is on fire. About two weeks ago, Stewart put together one of the best presentations illustrating perfectly why Fox News is NOT news. Just last week Stewart gave us an hysterical portrayal of Glenn Beck’s diseased psyche. And last night Stewart proved, once again, that he is a far better journalist than most of those who actually call themselves journalists.
Why does Sean Hannity even still have a job? Anyone else, on any other network, would be fired for this sort of deliberate fabrication. Apparently on Fox it is acceptable to show video footage from a rally two months ago and pretend it is from a rally a few days ago, in order to falsely inflate the size of the attending crowd.
The propagandists at Fox are well aware that the nation overwhelmingly supports heath care reform, so they resort to dishonesty in pursuit of their unpopular agenda. If they can’t get enough Tea Baggers to show up, Fox will just falsify the video record to make whatever point serves their venal interests. It is the same disrespect for the truth that compels Hannity to assert, without any evidence, that 20,000+ people turned out to the protest, although neutral sources say it was no more than 10,000. Hannity’s guest, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN), put the crowd estimate as high as 45,000. She also said that the event was the result of spontaneous word of mouth. What she left out was that Fox News promoted the affair repeatedly and anti-health care lobbyists like Americans for Prosperity funded the organizing efforts, including some forty buses to deliver the AstroTurfers to the Capital.
What’s truly depressing about all of this (besides Hannity keeping his job) is that the rest of the media has failed to report any of it. When Dan Rather aired a true story that was marred by a few poorly vetted documents, it became a media frenzy that eventually cost Rather his job. But when Hannity blatantly manufactures a false story, the media shrugs its shoulders and turns away.
This is why Jon Stewart is such a treasure and a model of journalistic integrity, despite his objections to being cast in that role. We definitely need more like him. It would be great if they were just as funny, but I’d settle for just being responsible reporters.
More to the point, Hannity’s apology doesn’t pass muster. It stretches credulity to assert that he had merely used “some incorrect video” along with some that was correct. The event he was discussing was current news, footage for which would be at hand in the newsroom. In order to buy his excuse you would have to believe that someone accidentally stumbled into the video archives facility, mistakenly retrieved footage from an event that took place two months prior, and unknowingly spliced it onto the correct footage. Then everyone on the staff – editors, directors, producers, and Hannity himself – failed to notice the mishap even after the multiple viewings that these prepackaged segments are subjected to prior to going on the air. Yeah, right.
Update: Hannity has responded to Stewart’s exposé in a typically smug manner, saying that he had “screwed up” but that it was “an inadvertent mistake.” Then he thanked Stewart and his writers for watching. That’s a little like a heroin trafficker thanking a DEA agent for listening in on his phone calls.