Watch Out Fox News: FTC Seeks To Halt Fake News Sites

Posted by on April 19, 2011 at 2:19 pm. 5 Comments :

Fox NewsFrom the Federal Trade Commission,
April 19, 2011:

“The Federal Trade Commission is requesting federal courts to temporarily halt the allegedly deceptive tactics of 10 operations using fake news websites […] According to the FTC, the defendants operate websites that are meant to appear as if they belong to legitimate news-gathering
organizations, but in reality the sites are simply advertisements aimed at deceptively enticing consumers…”

Fox News is not one of the ten operations cited in this action, but given the description of the violations, could they be far behind? The FTC is taking aggressive steps toward reigning in deceptive practices that “attempt to portray an objective, journalistic endeavor,” says David Vladeck, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. “Almost everything about these sites is fake.”

If that is the basis for this action, then Fox News ought to be the next target of the FTC’s investigative unit. They blatantly endeavor to portray themselves as a legitimate news-gathering organization while deliberately deceiving viewers. They employ anchors who openly advocate for political issues and candidates despite claiming to be “fair and balanced,” a slogan that in itself violates the FTC’s truth-in-advertising statutes. In fact, some of their paid contributors are actually candidates themselves.

The Fox network is notorious for making false claims that misinform viewers and produce tangible harm. For instance, they spent weeks promoting heavily edited videos that defamed the community service organization, ACORN. They served as the PR agency for Tea Party interests and events. They disparaged health care reform as socialistic. During that debate a memo from Fox’s Washington managing editor instructed his staff to refrain from using the term “public option” because focus group testing had proven that “government-run” would produce a more negative response.

Even with routine reporting that is objectively factual, Fox purposely manipulated their broadcasts. They reported falsely that President Obama spent $2 billion on an overseas trade mission. They invented stories about the Department of Justice declining to prosecute civil rights cases if the plaintiff was white (and then failed to report that those allegations were proven false by an independent Congressional study). And on more than one occasion their anchor scripts and on-screen charts reversed the numbers for polling to show that the President, or the Democratic position, was disfavored by respondents when the actual poll result was the opposite.

To be clear, the FTC actions in the announcement above were taken in response to complaints levied about companies marketing acai berries for weight loss. But are the allegations really that different? If there is an institutional objection to fake news operations selling dubious nutritional products, wouldn’t it be even more critical to police fake news operations selling lies that could influence legislation and elections that impact millions of lives?

I don’t expect to see the FTC halting fake news operations like Fox any time soon. But it would be nice if they could prohibit the word “news” from being used in conjunction with such an operation. And if phony programs that misrepresent weight loss can be regulated to protect consumers, then why not phony programs that misrepresent news?

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Glenn Beck’s Youth Bashing Crushed By Van Jones’ Optimism

Posted by on April 18, 2011 at 8:30 pm. NO Comments :

Glenn Beck has spent much of the past two years dismissing young people as ignorant, brainwashed, and/or “useful idiots.” He regards them as societal appendages whose obligation is to be obedient and silent. Most recently he blamed the uprisings in the Middle East on unruly kids led by Google executives and intent on forming alliances with western leftists and Al Qaeda to invoke Shariah law from Tripoli to Topeka.

Today Beck replayed old clips of Al Gore motivating young environmentalists by telling them that “There are some things about our world that you know that older people don’t know.” That is objectively true for every new generation. If it were not it would mean that civilization is standing still. We are supposed to get smarter as time goes by. Aren’t we?

Not according to Beck. In Beck’s world Gore’s remarks are an appalling affront to parental authority. As is the speech that Van Jones gave at the Power Shift Conference for young leaders this past weekend. Beck played a short video of Jones encouraging members of the audience to be forthright in their advocacy for a clean environment. As usual, Beck cut the video so as to mislead his viewers. What he left was this snippet:

“When you go home, shift the power at the Thanksgiving table. When your Uncle Joe, who loves Fox News, starts talking to you and starts dominating the discussion.”

That’s where Beck cuts it off to insert his response:

“I will tell you this, in a side note. That is why I’m leaving this network. This network has this audience cornered. You are here because it is telling you the truth. We have got to get to the youth.”

First of all, that is not why Beck is leaving the network. He is leaving because he was fired for alienating over 300 advertisers and losing half of the audience. Secondly, Beck doesn’t explain what audience he alleges to have cornered, but presumably it is not the youth audience. In fact, Beck’s viewers, like Fox in general, skew older than any program on cable news. That aside, it is important to hear the rest of Jones’ thoughts to understand the depths of Beck’s intention to deceive. Just following the point where Beck cut the tape:

“When you go home, shift the power at the Thanksgiving table. When your Uncle Joe, who loves Fox News, starts talking to you and starts dominating the discussion, and starts making you feel small, and that your ideas don’t count, and that you’re some kind of bizarre freak, shift the power. Because this movement is not just for Democrats, and it’s not just for lefties. This movement is for everybody. And you have the opportunity to say to your Uncle Joe, ‘Excuse me sir. Don’t you believe in liberty? And if you do, how can you live in a country where every American is forced to be an energy consumer for the rest of our lives?

“Shouldn’t we have the right as Americans to be energy producers?’ Shouldn’t we be able to put up solar panels on our own houses? Shouldn’t we be able to put up wind turbines in our backyards? Shouldn’t we be able, as Americans, to power our own community? Shouldn’t we have the right and the liberty to be energy producers and not be dictated to twelve times a years by energy companies that dictate how much we’re gonna pay for energy, when we’re gonna pay it, how many asthma inhalers we’re gonna have as a consequence? Shouldn’t we have the liberty, as Americans, to power this country in a new way?”

Beck surely knows that the rest of that segment was entirely respectful toward Uncle Joe. He knows that there was no attempt to dishonor the role of parents or elders. He knows this yet he purposefully manipulates the message to cast young people in a negative light. And he has the gall to do this while declaring that he wants to “get to the youth.” That’s a goal he also spoke of in Albany on Saturday, where he said that he planned to build a way to deliver news directly to the youth of America. Does he plan to do that by frightening them as he does his radio and television audiences? Because that won’t work with this demographic. They are far more independent and self-directed. And for all the disrespect that Beck hurls at them, he cannot win them over with lies and fear mongering.

And just for the heck of it, here is Jones’ inspiring conclusion to the speech (which you can watch in full here):

“I love liberty. Given what’s happened with my ancestors, nobody loves liberty more than I do. But the pledge of allegiance doesn’t stop there. The pledge of allegiance says ‘liberty and justice for all.’ ‘Liberty and justice for all.’ And that’s what your movement is about. Liberty, yes, and justice. Justice for the immigrant. Justice for the lesbians and the gays. Justice for the African-Americans. Justice for women. Justice for the rural poor. Justice for the Native Americans. Liberty and justice for all. Shift the power!”


Bitches Brawl: Glenn Beck vs. Tucker Carlson

Posted by on April 18, 2011 at 12:33 pm. 3 Comments :

Glenn BeckA few weeks ago Tucker Carlson’s web site, The Daily Caller, ran the latest phony videos from scam artist James O’Keefe’s dishonest NPR sting. Shortly thereafter, Glenn Beck’s web site, The Blaze, took apart the videos revealing how deceptively they had been edited. This created a small schism in the right-wing media family.

Today that split has been wedged a little wider. TheDC published a lengthy article that accuses Beck of being a serial thief. He is shown to have appropriated the work of other conservative authors on multiple occasions so that it appears that he came up with the material himself. In some cases he went so far as to erase video logos from the originals in order to hide the source. Some of those whom Beck ripped off were vocally upset:

Andrew Breitbart, Big Journalism: “…sometimes he also uses other peoples’ work without crediting them, making it appear as though it were his own.”

Rebel Pundit: “You’ve got pretty much the biggest guy in the movement take your stuff and actually have his editors spend the time to scrub my name off of it.”

John Sexton, VerumSerum: “He’s used our stuff without any hat tip at all. I don’t understand that.”

Pamela Geller, AtlasShrugs: “I don’t know how to describe such outrageous and proud thievery. I like his work, but he’s a thief.”

Cliff Kincaid, Accuracy in Media: “[Beck’s producers] told me Glenn wanted to handle the issue himself, which means he wanted to appear to be the expert.”

On his radio program this morning Beck and his crew escalated the conflict. They responded to the column in TheDC with a sarcastic reference to the article being an act of vengeance for the Blaze’s takedown on the NPR story:

Sidekick Stu: “Clearly there is no attempt at revenge to come up with a pathetic, horrible story about how Glenn steals from his own employees.”

Then Beck defends himself by saying that there are no original ideas – a justification that implies it’s OK to steal anything. He then proceeds to describe an item on The Blaze that has links to YouTube or some other source material. However, the complaints about Beck’s misappropriation were addressed to his television show, not his web site. And the TV show had no links or other attributions.

Previously Beck has been been called a plagiarist by the popular radio conspiracy guru, Alex Jones. Jones, who has called Beck a whore and a punk, has repeatedly lambasted Beck for stealing his research and twisting it to fit a rightist/GOP agenda.

It’s rather amusing that anyone would want to take credit for the garbage Beck spews, but pride of authorship extends even to nutcases who peddle insane conspiracy theories. If Beck rips them off they are entitled to their indignation. And the skirmishes that ensue ought to be entertaining for those of us in the reality-based world as right-wingers bark at each other. So have at it and may the craziest man win.

Update: Add Mike Huckabee to the list of those with whom Beck is feuding.


It’s Official! Donald Trump Is Dumber Than A Tree Stump

Posted by on April 17, 2011 at 2:59 pm. 8 Comments :

As he pursues his egomaniacal quest for attention and comb-over-exposure, Donald Trump is conclusively demonstrating that you can be a billionaire and an idiot at the same time. Like Henry Ford, who revolutionized manufacturing while supporting Hitler, Trump might be able to get an office building erected, but he can’t think past a third grade level on politics or social affairs.


It was recently revealed that Trump’s Birther obsession has been fueled by the wackiest wingnut publisher on the Internet, WorldNetDaily. WND’s editor-in-chief, Joseph Farah, says that he talks with The Donald “quite a bit.” That’s painfully obvious in that Trump has now adopted one of the most ludicrous, and easily debunked, schizoid rumors that WND has been promoting for years.

WND’s conspiracy nutjob, Jack Cashill, has been asserting for almost three years that Barack Obama’s book, “Dreams From My Father,” was ghostwritten by Bill Ayers. He concluded this by conducting a hare-brained study on the style of language used in the book. Unfortunately, even researchers he contacted would not endorse this nonsense.

Nevertheless, Trump paid a visit to the Hannity program on Fox News and announced that he believes the Cashill ghostwriting fable:

Trump: I heard he [Obama] had terrible marks, and he ends up in Harvard. He wrote a book that was better than Ernest Hemingway, but the second book was written by an average person.
Hannity: You suspect Bill Ayers?
Trump: I said, Bill Ayers wrote the book. […] He was best friends with Bill Ayers. Bill Ayers was a super-genius. And a lot of people have said he wrote the book. Well recently, as you know last week, Bill Ayers came out and said he did write the book.

Where to begin? There is so much about this that is just plain moronic. Let’s begin with the fact that Trump has no idea what Obama’s grades were, and he even admits it by saying it was something he “heard” (voices in his head?). The truth is that Obama earned an academic scholarship to Harvard and, while there, proved his worthiness by becoming the editor of the Harvard Law Review and graduating with honors.

Next, Trump’s assertion that Obama and Ayers were “best friends” is contrary to every factual account of their relationship which has always been at most an acquaintanceship.

Then Trump says that Ayers admitted to writing the book. Can Trump really be this monumentally stupid? He is referring to a speech Ayers gave wherein he was obviously mocking claims in the conservative press that he was the author. Ayers joked that it was true and therefore he wanted his share of the royalties. The audience got it and laughed appropriately. Trump is just regurgitating the take that WND had at the time.

So with no evidence whatsoever, Trump jumped aboard another runaway conspiracy train engineered by WorldNetDaily. He is embracing delusions that some of the most insane stalwarts of the right have rejected. For a supposedly serious GOP candidate to align himself with the crackpottery of WND says a lot about how seriously we can take today’s Republican Party.

Even Glenn Beck has gotten sick of the Birther craze saying “Stop With The Damn Birth Certificate!” [Note: As is typical with Beck’s proclivity for hypocrisy, last night he told an audience in Albany that “I don’t know where [Obama is from] I don’t think he’s from where they issue birth certificates – I think he’s from Hell.” So Beck has gone even further by asserting that Obama is from a place even worse than Kenya].

Perhaps the mind-numbingly idiotic moment of the Hannity interview was when Trump said this:

“Look, he was born ‘Barry Soetero.’ Somewhere along the line, he changed his name.”

Not exactly, Donald. Obama was the son of, and namesake to, Barack Obama Sr. His step-father Lolo Soetoro married Obama’s mother when Obama was four years old. Is Trump’s derangement so severe that he has completely lost his grasp of reality?

Some recent polls have shown Trump rising in popularity. It should be noted that these are polls of Republican primary voters, not the general public. This shows how frighteningly extremist the GOP base has become. They just adore paranoid conspiracies and mutilated facts. And they are oblivious to coherent arguments and objective truths. They happily ignore the fact that Trump once supported universal health care and was an advocate of gay rights. And imagine the rash of head explosions if the Tea Party crowd ever got wind of this quote from Trump’s book:

“I would impose a one-time, 14.25% tax on individuals and trusts with a net worth over $10 million. For individuals, net worth would be calculated minus the value of their principal residence. That would raise $5.7 trillion in new revenue, which we would use to pay off the entire national debt. […] Some will say that my plan is unfair to the extremely wealthy. I say it is only reasonable to shift the burden to those most able to pay. The wealthy actually would not suffer severe repercussions.”

Needless to say, Trump disavows these positions today in favor of Tea Party propaganda. He now believes that we should appropriate billions of dollars from other countries to pay down our debt (he doesn’t say how). He believes we should just take the oil from Libya and Iraq. And he favors military action against Iran and North Korea. And the Tea Party Republicans just love this guy.

Me too. I am now completely behind the Trump candidacy for the GOP nomination. I don’t think there could be any better nominee – for the Democrats. While Palin, Huckabee, or Gingrich, would lose to Obama by historic margins, Trump would not only lose, but he would so embarrass anyone from admitting an affinity for the Republican Party that it would ensure a Democratic majority for a couple of generations. So…..

Go Trump/Bachmann 2012!


Donald Trump Gets His Birther Material From WorldNetDaily

Posted by on April 16, 2011 at 10:10 am. 10 Comments :

The next time you hear Donald Trump spouting off nonsense about President Obama’s citizenship you should know from where he is acquiring his information.

Kendra Marr of Politico reports that Joseph Farah has been “on the phone with Donald Trump every day this week.” Farah is the publisher of WorldNetDaily, a fantastical compendium of demented disinformation and conspiracy theories. They are major sponsors of the Birther movement. They believe that Obama’s biography was ghostwritten by Bill Ayers. If there is a crazy story that reflects poorly on the President you can bet that WND is behind it. And if you question their journalistic credentials Farah will forthrightly declare that…

“Admittedly, we publish some misinformation by columnists, as does your publication and every other journal that contains opinion.”

Nice of him to be so honest. He is actually right about the fact that many news organizations publish opinions that are not factually vetted. However, most publications do not regard misinformation as an acceptable part of the news business, and the reputable ones will endeavor to make necessary corrections.

Farah seems to think it’s just business as usual. In his defense, if he had to correct every mistake or lie that appears on his site he wouldn’t have time to invent any new ones.

Trump is rapidly rising in my GOP presidential hopes primary. I have been rooting for a Palin/Steele ticket for quite a while, but now I think that Trump deserves some serious consideration.


10 Reasons Why Fox News After Glenn Beck Will Still Suck

Posted by on April 13, 2011 at 10:38 am. 10 Comments :

“If I were lying I’d be off the air.”
  ~ Glenn Beck, Jan 4, 2010.
“I’m going to be leaving this program later this year.”
  ~ Glenn Beck, Apr 6, 2011.

There has already been a barrage of media analysis and discussion of Glenn Beck’s not-so-surprising separation from Fox News. For the most part that discussion has been focused on speculation as to the cause of the break up and on what will become of Beck. But any suggestion that Beck’s departure polishes Fox’s reputation is pure folly. The worst of Beck’s haunted imagination is securely woven into the Fox News dis-comforter. The trademark Fox invective, sophistry, and bias predate Beck and will outlive him.


Many in the press, however, are more interested in prattling on about the alleged animosity for Beck amongst “serious” conservatives and his colleagues at Fox who think that his doomsday rhetoric and conspiracy theories give the “news” network a bad name. The purveyors of conventional wisdom are very concerned about Fox’s teetering credibility and are scrambling to defend it:

Howard Kurtz, CNN, The Daily Beast: …many senior Fox executives are relieved to be rid of Beck. [and] …some journalists and executives at the network privately expressed concern that Beck was becoming the face of the network.

George Will, ABC News Washington Post: I think that Glenn Beck and his drift into more bizarre and extreme positions was threatening the Fox brand. So I wish Glenn Beck health and happiness but I think the health and happiness of Fox is served by his departure.

Michael Harrison, editor of Talkers Magazine: You can’t be a rodeo clown and maintain credibility,

Matt Lewis, The Daily Caller: My take is that while Beck’s show was individually a ratings hit, he also risked tarnishing the overall Fox News “brand”.

Jeffrey McCall, professor of media studies, DePauw University: Beck was no longer just a personality with a show on FNC. He became an easy target for Fox News critics to characterize him as representative of the entire channel.

These august observers have frightfully short memories. The truth is that Fox earned its nefarious reputation long before Beck arrived and there is every indication that they will preserve it after he’s gone. In fact, it’s that reputation that made Beck such a good fit to begin with and lured him to the network despite his admitted reluctance when first approached. The pundits who are advancing the premise that by losing Beck, Fox can be redeemed are, to put it kindly, mistaken. Here is why Fox News without Glenn Beck will be just as bad as Fox News with Glenn Beck:

1) Bill O’Reilly: Before Beck called President Obama a racist, Bill O’Reilly ventured to Sylvia’s in Harlem and expressed his surprise that the mostly African-American patrons weren’t acting like primitives. And when the First Lady was criticized for expressing her pride that America had evolved to the point where they would elect an African-American president O’Reilly considerately declared that “I don’t want to go on a lynching party against Michelle Obama unless there’s evidence.” Nice choice of words.

2) Sean Hannity: While Beck may suffer from an acute case of Nazi-Tourettes Syndrome (Louis Black™), Sean Hannity is a personal friend of the notorious neo-Nazi schlock-jock, Hal Turner, and graciously hosted him on his program. Turner won’t be be revisiting Hannity for a while because he is presently in prison serving 33 months for threatening judges.

3) Megyn Kelly: No one can spin a conspiracy theory quite like Beck, but Megyn Kelly comes pretty close. For months she’s been peddling a pseudo-scandal that alleges that the Department of Justice deliberately dismisses all charges of civil rights violations when the plaintiff is white. This has been debunked by the House Judiciary Committee’s Office of Professional Responsibility. Kelly also fronted phony investigations into the alleged terrorist ties of funders of the Park51 mosque in Manhattan. Somehow she left out the fact that one of those funders was Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, the second largest shareholder of News Corp outside of the Murdoch family. Kelly has a permanently affixed expression of indignation and a vocal delivery that makes every story appear to be shocking. She is the human manifestation of Fox’s ever-present “FOX ALERT!”

4) Judge Andrew Napolitano: There are conspiratorial paths where even Beck fears to tread. Judge Andrew Napolitano has no such fears. He is a frequent guest of proto-conspiratorialist and Beck inspiration, Alex Jones. He is an avowed 9/11 Truther who says that the World Trade Center attack was an inside job. He believes that the health care bill contains provisions for a civilian military force to suppress domestic insurrection. And he also happens to be Beck’s most frequent fill-in host and a leading candidate to replace him.

5) Bill Sammon: Fox News’ Washington managing editor, Bill Sammon, has espoused a hard-core conservatism that predates Beck and emanates from the executive suites far above him. He came to Fox from the “Moonie” Washington Times and authored several books lionizing George W. Bush and lambasting Democrats. He was also caught authoring memos that directed his reporters to dispense a brazenly partisan point of view. For instance, he told them to refrain from using the term “public option” during the health care debate because focus group testing proved that the term “government-run” produced a more negative response. Even more disturbing, he was recorded admitting to a friendly audience on a conservative cruise that he “mischievously” cast Obama as a socialist even though he didn’t believe it himself. In other words, he lied to defame the President and rile up his gullible viewers. Beck must be so proud to have worked for him.

6) Neil Cavuto: The glorification of ignorance is a staple of Beck’s brand, but Neil Cavuto has been contributing to the collapse of America’s collective IQ far longer than Beck. He proudly hosts such respected policy analysts as Ted Nugent, Joe the Plumber, and any random Tea Bagger to help him unravel our nation’s dilemmas. One of his favorite idiocies is his insistence that Climate Change is a hoax because it gets cold in the winter. But Cavuto really shines when he brings in guests whose only connection to the segment is a juvenile pun. For instance, in a discussion about whether Tea Party support was grassroots or AstroTurf, Cavuto interviewed the CEO of AstroTurf Technologies, whose expertise with synthetic fiber products contributed nothing to the debate on campaign organization. Cavuto is the prop comic of pundits who delights in interrupting and shouting down Democrats who are naive enough to accept his invitations to appear.

7) Fox & Friends: While there will always be only one rodeo clown in the vast right-wing conspira-circus, there is no shortage of stooges, and three of them are featured on Fox & Friends. First we have Steve Doocy, who wondered “Why didn’t anybody ever mention that [Obama] spent the first decade of his life, raised by his Muslim father.” Perhaps because Obama actually never knew his father who left the family when he was two years old. Then there’s Brian Kilmeade who fans the racist flames by saying things like “all terrorists are Muslims.” And don’t forget Gretchen Carlson, who called the late Sen. Ted Kennedy a “hostile enemy” of the United States. All of these vile inanities were delivered without any help from Beck. However, it should be noted that when Beck made his infamous remarks about Obama being a racist he did it on Fox & Friends.

8) Fox Nation: Any good 21st century propaganda outfit has to have an Internet component, and for Fox News it is the Fox Nation. This web site’s sole purpose is to disseminate the most despicably dishonest disinformation it can invent. There are way too many examples to itemize, but here are a couple that represent the ridiculous and the repulsive. Last July Fox Nation featured a story that claimed that the Taliban was recruiting monkey mercenaries. This absurdity was sourced to the People’s Daily in China. Fox Nation also ran an item that speculated about Obama’s death. This article brought out the hate in the site’s readers who posted numerous comments indicating how welcome that would be. Many of the stories on Fox Nation percolate up to Fox News for broadcast and they they are no less deranged than the nonsense Beck comes up with.

9) Roger Ailes: The president and CEO of Fox News sets the tone for the network as a whole. Roger Ailes was a long-time media advisor to Republican candidates prior to launching Fox News. He is the network’s spiritual leader. If you ever wondered how Beck could get away with aligning President Obama (and anyone else with whom he disagrees) with Hitler, your curiosity was satisfied when Ailes lashed out at NPR saying that “They are, of course, Nazis. They have a kind of Nazi attitude. They are the left wing of Nazism.” Ailes’ remarks prove that the hate speech at Fox goes from the top down. It’s not now, and never has been, unique to Beck.

10) Rupert Murdoch: Speaking of the top – Rupert Murdoch, the Chairman and CEO of News Corp, is as high as you can get. He is the company’s captain and conscience. Every material decision requires his concurrence, including his employment of Glenn Beck. While Beck may be leaving, Murdoch is not (yet). It is, therefore, important to note that when Beck called the President a racist, Murdoch responded by saying that “it was something that, perhaps, shouldn’t have been said about the President, but if you actually assess what he [Beck] was talking about, he was right.”

Murdoch has consistently stood behind Beck for more than two years, defending him at every turn for every scandalous affair and affront. Even as advertisers fled in disgust, Murdoch never conceded an inch. In the television marketplace it is advertisers, not viewers, who are the broadcaster’s clients. Murdoch snubbed his clients in order to allow Beck’s Acute Paranoia Revue and Disinfotainment Revival Hour to continue poisoning minds and influencing elections.

More importantly, Murdoch and Ailes together have fashioned a network whose persona is infested with the same conservative extremist ideology popularized by Beck. The examples above illustrate how ingrained that ideology is into the Fox News schedule in all dayparts. And those programs are augmented by an army of propagandists that include Sarah Palin, Stuart Varney, Eric Bolling, Monica Crowley, Dick Morris, Frank Luntz, and many more.

With this dedicated team of activist anchors and contributors in place, Beck’s departure, though gossip-worthy, will change nothing at Fox News. Beck was not cast off because his message was objectionable, but because he was an ineffective messenger who was alienating the audience. His replacement will surely continue the sordid tradition of which Beck was just a small, irritating part. The Fox mission remains intact and any talk of redemption due merely to having thrown off this defective cog is naive and oblivious to the dark reality that is Fox News.

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Glenn Beck Endorses 60% Tax Rate And Slavery

Posted by on April 13, 2011 at 9:01 am. 4 Comments :

On his radio program this morning, Glenn Beck laid out the argument for raising taxes on wealthy people like himself. Of course, he didn’t mean to, but the result is the same.

Beck: My total tax burden I bet is about 60% of what I make. And then somebody else pays zero and that’s fair? And that’s still not our fair share, that’s still not the wealthy fair share.

They would say that people like me don’t need it. Well I employ fifty people. How many people have created this many jobs? Since the recession hit – what did we have, ten? I’ve hired an additional forty people. I could easily hire – we’re planning on hiring another fifty people by the end of the year.

Wow! That’s quite a testimonial. Apparently 60% tax rates have not inhibited Beck’s incentive to create jobs and grow his business. Although through most of this rant that is exactly what he’s complaining about. That is, when he isn’t complaining about poor people paying nothing or government workers being slaves.

Beck: What do you think these federal jobs are all about? These federal jobs are not about helping anything. They are about getting people enslaved to the state.

Exactly! Because slaves, you recall, all had good salaries, comprehensive health care, and generous retirement plans. They had vacation and sick days. They were protected from discrimination and hazardous working conditions. They were given opportunities to advance into management (i.e. master) positions. It was exactly the same as having a federal job.

Just think how much better America would be if we raised everybody’s tax rate to 60% and fired all the federal workers so that they could be enslaved by corporations instead of the government. Thank God we have Beck’s dementia to figure this all out for us.


Fox Nation Loves Corporations, Hates Mother Earth

Posted by on April 12, 2011 at 1:02 pm. 2 Comments :

The Fox Nation is featuring a story about an initiative at the United Nations to protect the environment and it is, not surprisingly, creating a flurry of outrage.

Fox Nation - Mother Earth

The item, which links to an article on Canada.com, is titled “U.N. Proposal Would Give ‘Mother Earth’ Same Rights as Humans,” and describes the draft document that seeks to create parity in the environmental debate.

“The bid aims to have the UN recognize the Earth as a living entity that humans have sought to ‘dominate and exploit’ – to the point that the ‘well-being and existence of many beings’ is now threatened.”

The article quotes supporters noting that there are plenty of advocates for commercial and state interests that seek to exploit natural resources and that this initiative seeks only to provide balance by creating an advocate for the welfare of the planet.

The outrage expressed by the Fox Nationalists is typically hypocritical of those who defend corporate power over individuals. They have no problem with Supreme Court decisions that define corporations as persons, but to do the same for the Earth is something they regard as unthinkable. Never mind that corporations are notoriously insensitive to the harm they cause to the planet and its inhabitants. And forget that the Earth and its ecosystem is something we all rely for our existence.

The only voices the right believes should be heard are those who oppose the environment. And the real shame is that these rightist eco-terrorists are actually successful in persuading some Republicans and Tea Baggers that Climate Change and other risks to the environment are hoaxes and nothing to be concerned about.


Bill O’Reilly Already Climbing Glenn Beck’s Crazy Tree

Posted by on April 12, 2011 at 11:59 am. 2 Comments :

Glenn Beck hasn’t even left the building and already Bill O’Reilly is angling to take his place as Senior Scare Monger. In his Talking Points Memo segment last night he advanced the idiotic theory that the left is purposefully trying to destroy America.

O’Reilly: The far left wants the government to control the economy, not private industry. That is what is behind The New York Times, Soros and the other uber-left operations.

Very simply, they want a recast of the American economic system, and the only way that can possibly happen is if the system crashes like it did in 1929. In theory, an economic collapse could allow a new system to rise, a quasi-socialistic system whereby Washington would dole out the jobs and money.

Beck: Find the exit closest to you and prepare for a crash landing, because this plane is coming down, because the pilot is intentionally steering it into the trees.

O’Reilly is appropriating Beck’s favorite fear factors including economic catastrophe, socialism and {gasp} Soros. With Beck being shoved out the door, O’Reilly is pouncing on the “Obama wants America to fail” theme before some poser like Hannity latches onto it.

If recreating 1929 is the only way to invoke a “recast of the American economic system,” then the left is three years too late because George W. Bush already did it in 2008. Where was O’Reilly?

It’s clear that the paranoid dementia and deranged conspiracy theories that formed the basis of Beck’s program will be safely redistributed amongst his successors at Fox. Rest easy Beckoids and FoxPods, the message will endure and nothing will change at your favorite indoctrination station.

[Update:] Beck noticed that O’Reilly has come over to the dark side. On his radio show this morning Beck said…

“For two years I have been talking to Bill O’Reilly and trying to get – I mean how many times have we been on planes with Bill O’Reilly and the whole time ‘Bill, Bill…no, no Bill, you don’t understand. They want to collapse the system. They’re not just misguided.’ And he’s never been down that road. ‘No, no Glenn, they’re just misguided. You’re being too pessimistic.’

“This is a huge, huge turning point for Bill O’Reilly. Huge. And, I think, for the country. Cause now it’s no longer – it’s no longer crazy. Now you’ve got it into the mainstream of Bill O’Reilly. That’s incredible.”

If you think it’s funny that Beck thinks O’Reilly’s concurrence means it’s no longer crazy, you aint heard nothin’ yet. This exchange continued with some banter between Beck and his sidekick Stu wherein Stu admits that Beck has a low standard of proof for his ravings.

Sideshow Stu: [O’Reilly] is not into the whole theorizing thing. He’s not necessarily into trying to call the future, he wants to take a – see the evidence that he sees right now and call it as he sees it. And what this means is that there’s a higher – he has to some degree a higher level of – standard of proof.
Beck: No he doesn’t. No he doesn’t.
Stu: I think he does.
Beck: No he doesn’t!

When your own sidekick argues with you that your standard of proof is weak, or at least weaker than your peers, you may want to reexamine who is the monkey and who is the second banana.


Donald Trump Is Too Modest

Posted by on April 11, 2011 at 3:47 pm. 7 Comments :

On Fox & Friends this morning, Donald Trump displayed the vastness of his elephantine ego. The man who is so stupid that he has to keep telling people that he thinks he’s smart; so incompetent that he has to keep asserting that he would be the bestest president ever; that man is now convinced that he is the sole target of the President’s wrath.

Donald Trump: Obviously I hit a nerve because they’re fighting me. I don’t hear them talking about Mr. Pawlenty or anybody else. They’re talking only about Trump. I can tell you, I’m their worst nightmare.

The “Donald” is far too modest. He is the whole nation’s worst nightmare. Trump was reacting to comments made by Obama advisor David Plouffe regarding Trump’s polling and his obsession with Obama’s birth certificate. Of course the Fox & Friends folks clipped off the question that Plouffe was asked:

Christianne Amanpour: What do you make of Donald Trump raising this [birth certificate] issue? Do you think it’s going to be a big issue in the campaign?
David Plouffe: I don’t. I saw Donald Trump sort of rising in the polls, and given his behavior and spectacle I hope he keeps on rising. Because there’s zero chance that Donald Trump would ever be hired by the American people to do this job.

So Trump had not hit any nerve, Plouffe was merely answering a question. He wasn’t the one who brought it up and his answer made it clear that he couldn’t care less about Trump, except insofar as the pleasure he would get from running against the bumbling billionaire.

For the record, the only polls in which Trump is rising are with Republican primary voters. His numbers amongst the whole electorate are near the bottom along with Sarah Palin. And if he thinks he’s going to get anywhere by designating himself Obama’s worst nightmare, take a look at some other candidates who have laid claim to that role:


If Trump is intent on joining this fraternity of losers, he has my wholehearted support.