Ted Kennedy

Rupert Murdoch Says 9/11 Is Bullshit And Should Be Forgotten

Posted by on August 28, 2009 at 11:58 am. 1 Comments :

The faux patriots at Fox Nation are making a habit of exploiting the image of 9/11 and contriving false and negative associations with Democrats. Last week the Fox Nationalists published an article accusing President Obama of desecrating the memory of 9/11 because he supported a National Day of Service to be held in conjunction with other memorials. The view at Fox is that Americans coming together to make a better country is a horrible insult to the anniversary of the terrorist act. So Fox Nation posted this image juxtaposing the burning World Trade Center towers with the President:

Their undisguised intent was to visually associate Obama with a horrific event that he had nothing to do with. Well, today Fox is at it again with an even more repulsive and dishonest defamation:

Just three days after the death of Sen. Kennedy, Fox Nation found a way to denigrate his memory in the same fashion as they did with Obama. In this case, however, they really had to test their capacity for lying because the headline attached to the image is 100% false. The Fox Nationalist’s editors title the item “Huffington Post Compares Kennedy Death to 9/11.” But the Huffington Post did no such thing. There was no article about Kennedy and 9/11 at all, much less one comparing them. The headline is a blatant, brazen, bald-faced lie.

The article that Fox Nation links to is from Newsbusters, the uber-conservative media watch/lap dog of Brent Bozell’s propaganda tank, the Media Research Center. Newsbusters reported that Matt Cooper, editor of Conde Nast Portfolio, tweeted:

“It feels a bit like 9/11 on Martha’s Vineyard. End-of-summer weather is achingly beautiful but the mood is melancholy because of Teddy.”

For the record: After receiving some replies on Twitter that questioned whether the simile was appropriate, Cooper tweeted that he had clumsily stated his observation and only meant that both were otherwise pleasant summer days that were marred by sadness, and that is was not a comparison of Kennedy’s death to the 3,000 murders on 9/11.

So, what does Cooper’s tweet have to do with the Huffington Post? Absolutely nothing. There was no article on HuffPo that was remotely associated with this. However, Cooper has written articles in the past that appeared on HuffPo. The last one was in December 2008. So according to Fox Nation, if you are the editor of Portfolio, but you wrote something for HuffPo nine months ago, and then you tweet something on your personal Twitter account not affiliated with either publication, then obviously you are speaking for the Huffington Post and even your misstatements are attributable to them.

And best of all, for the Fox Nationalists, is that you get to post a disgusting image that conflates the recently deceased senator with a national catastrophe, and place it all above a headline that is a lie.

So did Rupert Murdoch actually say that 9/11 is bullshit? Well he is certainly exploiting it for crass political purposes which could be construed as regarding it as excrement that is not worthy of respect. So by that measure, my headline is just as accurate as the one on Fox Nation.

Cable News Remembers Sen. Edward M. Kennedy

Posted by on August 26, 2009 at 12:58 am. 4 Comments :

Statement from the Kennedy family:

“We’ve lost the irreplaceable center of our family and joyous light in our lives, but the inspiration of his faith, optimism, and perseverance will live on in our hearts forever,” the Kennedy family said in a statement. “He loved this country and devoted his life to serving it.”

At a time like this, our thoughts are with the Kennedy family and we wish them peace and the consolation of having known and loved one of the great statesmen of our time.

However, as a site that observes and documents the media, I cannot let it go unnoticed that both CNN and MSNBC broke into their regular programming with news of Sen. Kennedy’s passing, and continued broadcasting commentary and condolences uninterrupted. When Fox News eventually reported the news, they quickly returned to the reruns of Greta Van Susteren and Glenn Beck. Thereafter they would intersperse brief updates, always resuming their scheduled programs.

It is no secret that I am an ardent critic of Fox News, but even I would not have predicted this demonstration of disrespect and journalistic lack of judgment. Fox News gave more consideration to the passing of Michael Jackson than they are now giving to Sen. Kennedy. That is a sad way to live up to a reputation of political prejudice.

R.I.P. Edward M. Kennedy.

Hillary & The Dead Kennedys

Posted by on May 23, 2008 at 9:56 pm. 4 Comments :

This past week has seen a perverse conspiracy of events that strains the capacity for people of good will to avoid giving up on civilization all together.

It began with the sad news that Sen. Ted Kennedy was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. As the shock and trauma of that news was settling in, James Rosen of Fox News declared on air that this could not be considered a tragedy because he had lived (past tense) a full life. Soon after, radio Neanderthal Michael Savage decided it would be appropriate to play snippets of the 1980’s punk band The Dead Kennedys, which Savage said was “in respect” for the Senator. Finally, Hillary Clinton weighed in on why she persists in pursuit of a nomination she can’t possibly win:

“My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right? We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California.”

So while Sen. Kennedy is awaiting a treatment plan for an often fatal affliction, Sen. Clinton is using brother Bobby’s demise to remind voters that Sen. Obama might be felled before this is all over. If she has any conscience at all, she would be regretting tonight that she didn’t drop out of the race yesterday.

Dragging The Dead Kennedys into this has produced an unexpected benefit in the form of wisdom from their singer, and inspirational hurricane, Jello Biafra. For those not familiar with the band, they were an anarchic, brood of rebellious provocateurs. They chafed at anything hinting of authority. And they would have stuffed a slug like Savage down a garbage disposal if he looked at them funny back in the day. Biafra responded to Savage’s prank in an interview with The Phoenix:

“Obviously he took my song way the hell out of context and did it deliberately. But the bigger issue is Savage himself and how the hell he gets away with stuff like saying this…”

But Biafra went further to assail the broader problem of a media environment that has devolved into a nearly useless heap of bio-waste:

“It scares the shit out of me that the most popular radio talk-show hosts are all foaming-at-the-mouth, ultra-bigoted blabbermongers whom only North Korea or the Nazis could love.

But like it or not, Savage is the third-most popular radio-talk show host in this country behind Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. Nobody from the other side is represented or promoted well enough by the big right-wing-owned radio networks to compete. That’s one of the ways they mindfuck the country into being so dumb they vote for people like George Bush, Mitt Romney and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The real issue here is why aren’t the big candidates calling for media reform?”

~~~

“The damage was further compounded when your friend and mine Bill Clinton rammed through the Telecommunications Act of 1996, further deregulating how many radio stations and media outlets one corporation can own and what they can do with them and they greenlighted their long-held agenda to throw public interest out the window.”

Jello totally nails it. This problem is bigger than a radio crap dispenser; it’s bigger than a Fox News buffoon; it’s even bigger than a pathetic presidential candidate who is the only one that doesn’t know she’s lost. The problem is the media and, were it fixed, these other travesties would be mere annoyances.