Thursday, April 30, 2009
Nets: Specter 'Driven Out' of GOP by 'Right Wing' and 'Fringe of Party'
The evening newscasts on Tuesday night attributed Senator Arlen Specter's motivation for changing parties to how he realized he wouldn't win the Republican primary in Pennsylvania, but they also, just as they did with Senator Jim Jeffords in 2001, eagerly relayed -- without any challenge -- Specter's spin that, in the words of the TV journalists, he
“had been driven out by the right-wing of the Republican Party,” the GOP's “increasingly conservative tilt” and “the fringe of the party.”
[Typical. When Bret Bair relayed that point while interviewing Brit Hume on the subject Hume replied that the GOP is essentially unchanged from the days of Reagan and that it was Specter who'd become increasingly liberal over the years to the point where he simply couldn't be renominated in a Republican primary.]
READ MORE
REPORT: "The Media and Obama: 100 Days and Still Madly in Love"
Yesterday Media Research Center President Brent Bozell sat down for a chat via Skype with Breitbart.tv "B-cast" anchors Scott Baker and Liz Stephans. You can watch the video here.
The topic: preliminary findings in an MRC study on the media's treatment of President Obama's first 100 days:
President Barack Obama has put forward policies representing the most radical government intervention in the free market in American history, with more proposals for even greater government interference on the way. But according to the Media Research Center (MRC), DURING Obama’s first 100 days in office the media have steadfastly refused to report this. In fact, rather than challenging the President’s radical policies, network news reporters have often celebrated Obama’s radical agenda.
MRC analysts examined all 852 stories on the Obama administration from January 20 through April 15 on ABC’s World News, the CBS Evening News and the NBC Nightly News. We will publish a detailed report on coverage of Obama’s first 100 days (ending April 29) in May. The trends, however, are evident.
Among the key findings thus far:
- Sanitizing Obama’s Socialist Agenda. None of the three broadcast network aired a single story focused on whether President Obama’s economic policies were driving the U.S. towards European-style socialism. Not a single network news reporter used the term “socialist” to describe how Obama’s policies are shifting economic authority to the federal government, away from the free market. On only four occasions was the word “socialist” used on-camera at all – all by outside sources, once by a random man-on-the-street.
- Obama is not a “Liberal,” Either. Amazingly, network reporters never called Obama or his agenda even “liberal.” NBC and CBS never used the word, and ABC only aired the term twice, citing Republicans using the word “liberal” to describe Obama’s policies.
- No Conservatives Allowed. On three of Obama’s major economic policies and plans - his banking bailout, his auto bailout and his plans for universal health care - the networks never had a single sound bite from a conservative or a free market expert.
- One out of four bank bailout stories (17 of 74) discussed the concept of outright government bank nationalization. In only two was a free market person allowed to rebut.
Media Research Center President Brent Bozell:
“For the pro-Obama liberal media, the Obama honeymoon is nowhere near over. His is the most radical agenda ever presented to the American people. It is a socialist agenda. Why won’t the media – accurately – label him a socialist? Why do they refuse even to label him a “liberal”?
“The liberal media’s dedicated defense of Obama knows no bounds. Reporting his bank bailout, his auto bailout and his socialist health care plan without including ANY conservative or free market voices is not the work of real journalists, but it certainly is a labor of love.“The liberal media deserve the Tammy Wynette Award for their coverage of Obama’s radical agenda, as they continue to devotedly stand by their man.”
READ MORE
At 100 Days, ABC Mangled Poll on Bush: 'Nice Guy, But We Don't Like Your Policies'
As the networks wind up to praise President Obama, there are easy comparisons to make with President Bush eight years ago. They were looking for any excuse to deny or destroy Bush’s popularity at that time. Brent Bozell gave an example of poll-denial and poll-mangling:
In his 100-days interview with the President, ABC's Charlie Gibson cut to the chase: our pollsters' finding of your 63 percent approval rating is nice, "yet less than half the people in the poll say that they approve of policies or feel that you understand their needs, which could be interpreted as saying, ‘nice guy but we don't like his politics or his policies.’"
The data, in fact, contradict Gibson’s interpretation.
When they asked if Bush was too liberal, too conservative, or just about right ideologically, 31 percent said too conservative, but a whopping 62 percent said about right. Well, what a shock. Moderates and conservatives like his policies; liberals don’t. When Gibson says 'Americans' don’t like his politics or his policies – guess which camp he’s representing?
You can also consult Brent Baker's Cyber Alert for more details on that time.
READ MORE
'Ethicist' for NY Times: 'Great to Have President Who's Competent and Not Insane'
Appearing on Friday's Real Time with Bill Maher on HBO, Randy Cohen, the “The Ethicist” columnist for the New York Times Magazine, blurted:
“I'm a huge Obama fan. I think it's such an unbelievably great thing to have a President who's competent and not insane.”
[Guess that makes him a professional ethicist.]
READ MORE
THE OBAMA DOCTRINE
HUGGING FOES, HURTING FRIENDS
The combination of dizzying naivete, dislike of our allies, disdain for our military, distrust of our intelligence services and distaste for our own country promises the worst foreign policy of our lifetimes... [snip]
We're to blame. If there are problems anywhere, they're America's fault.
This central conviction of leftist ideology appears to have soaked so thoroughly into our president's consciousness during his lengthy friendships with extremists that it's now second nature to him.
Problems can be negotiated away.
From Somali pirates to Moscow's belligerency, Obama and his Cabinet see a good chat as the best response to a challenge. Our president got to the Oval Office by talking, not doing, and his faith in his powers of persuasion is unlimited.
"We have to get over our Cold War thinking."
Great -- except that it's the Russians who've revived Cold War hostility.
Problems that can't be talked out can be bought off.
In Pakistan, send billions of dollars that will disappear and weapons that may soon be used against our troops. The solution to piracy? A generous program to rebuild Somalia. Hamas? Hand them a billion bucks.
Israel's the obstacle to Middle East peace.
Palestinians are all victims. Hamas consists of struggling community activists. The terrorists are in the Israeli military.
Islamist terrorism doesn't exist.
The term's even been banned from government departments. As Muslim extremists slaughter innocent victims by the thousands, we're assured Islam's a "religion of peace".
Our nukes threaten world peace and we need to get rid of them.
Other states only maintain or seek nuclear arsenals because we worry them. If we can get down to zero nukes, peace will reign on earth... [snip]
We now have a president who doesn't know that Pakistan was founded as a democracy, a secretary of state who thinks we created the Taliban, a head of the Department of Homeland Security who doesn't believe Islamist terrorists exist and a vice president who claims FDR gave televised speeches during the Depression.
If Bush had made such gaffes, the media would've mocked him. But Obama and his entourage excite orgasmic forgiveness among journalists. Which brings us to the Obama Doctrine's final tenet:
Our media sluts will portray defeat as victory.
READ MORE
Muslims: 'We do that on first dates'
Without any pretense of an argument, which liberals are neurologically incapable of, the mainstream media are now asserting that our wussy interrogation techniques at Guantanamo constituted "torture" and have irreparably harmed America's image abroad.
Only the second of those alleged facts is true: The president's release of the Department of Justice interrogation memos undoubtedly hurt America's image abroad, as we are snickered at in capitals around the world, where they know what real torture is...
READ MORE
Spanish judge opens Guantanamo investigation
MADRID -- A Spanish judge opened a probe into the Bush administration over alleged torture of terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, pressing ahead Wednesday with a drive that Spain's own attorney general has said should be waged in the United States, if at all.
Judge Baltasar Garzon, Spain's most prominent investigative magistrate, said he is acting under this country's observance of the principle of universal justice, which allows crimes allegedly committed in other countries to be prosecuted in Spain.
He said documents declassified by the new U.S. government suggest the practice was systematic and ordered at high levels of the US government... [snip]
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, speaking with reporters in Berlin before the investigation was announced, did not rule out cooperating with such an investigation...
READ MORE
North Korea threatens nuclear tests over U.N. move
Seoul - North Korea on Wednesday threatened a new nuclear test unless the U.N. Security Council apologized for tightening sanctions, confirming some analysts' fears that Pyongyang is determined to build an atomic arsenal.
The United States said such threats were counterproductive and urged Pyongyang to return to stalled six-nation denuclearization talks...
READ MORE
GM, Chrysler to follow failed British model
.
There was a time in the decades following World War II that the British auto industry was vibrant, technologically sophisticated, and growing. It was no surprise when, for example, Jaguar won the grueling 24 Hours of LeMans sports car race three years running in the 1950s because the firm was the first automaker to adapt disc brakes successfully from aircraft to automobiles.
But, enervated by complacent management and recalcitrant unions, the British auto industry lost its edge. Partial nationalization came in 1968 followed by the complete government takeover in 1975. Within a decade, what had been a thriving economic powerhouse was reduced to a shambles. Once-proud British marques like Jaguar, Aston Martin, and the Mini were sold to foreigners, while scattered, isolated remnants survived a few years longer as cottage industries.
Skip forward to this week as General Motors embarks on an assuredly similar path of nationalization and inevitable demise. Under the terms of agreements now taking final form, what was only a few years ago America’s biggest company will soon cease to exist, and GM will become “Government Motors.” This is happening because of two presidents: Barack Obama, who controls GM’s decisionmakers via Washington’s Toxic Assets Recovery Program (TARP), and Ron Gettelfinger of the United Auto Workers.
Obama said nothing as Gettelfinger refused to make pay and benefits concessions that GM had to have to continue as a private entity.
The GM news release Monday made the new order clear:
"As a result of its ownership of GM common stock, the U.S. Treasury will be able to elect all of our directors and to control the vote on substantially all matters brought for a stockholder vote."
In case anybody missed the point, the statement then added:
“In addition, through its stockholder voting rights and election of directors, and its role as a significant lender to us, the U.S. Treasury will be able to exercise significant influence and control over our business if it elects to do so."
Washington now dictates who manages GM and what the automaker will try to sell, as well as the working conditions of all its employees. It’s much the same at Chrysler, except for one wrinkle involving Italy’s Fiat, which gets a minority position in the new firm.
The majority position at Chrysler will be explicitly owned by the UAW, whereas the U.S. Treasury will effectively be a UAW proxy at GM.
Not long ago, GM was so big that Washington regularly threatened anti-trust action. Well, at least Obama and Gettelfinger have taken care of that problem.
READ MORE
UAW: Not Just Wages—Work Rules
To the extent the MSM has been willing to report on the disadvantage under which the Big Three automakers operate compared to their non-union competitors, the focus has been on the huge wage differential.
On this evening's Fox News Watch columnist Jim Pinkerton highlighted another issue which has gone largely unreported in the liberal media: the onerous union work rules that add literally thousands of positions to the job rolls compared to those of the foreign transplants.
View video here.
READ MORE
[The cartoon's wrong: the unions ended up with the companies
they ruined because they invested in a political party...]
image toon - bdd mny auto uaw - Stakeholders skewered by union refusal for wage changeThe Anti-Success Presidency
Sit in on a corporate boardroom struggling to come to grips with the new economic climate Barack Obama has created. Do we expand? Create more jobs?
But, wait a minute. The bigger our company gets, the closer we come to being ''too big to fail,'' a ''systemic risk.'' The nearer we are to intrusive government oversight, limits on executive pay and regulators breathing down our necks...
READ MORE
Why Your Next Credit Card Could Be Backed by Obama
Since apparently everything in America is going into the toilet except the public's faith in Barack Obama, it seems that the way to fix everything in America is to entrust it to Barack Obama.
The issues on the table for greater government involvement include: student lending, the car companies, car warranties, pensions, health care, banks, etc -- the list goes on... [snip]
I mean, really, what's the White House going to back next, your credit card? Maybe, says Slate's Chris Beam...
[It's not about helping, it's about gaining control.]
READ MORE
ESA satellite images show ice shelf breaking away
Massive ice chunks are crumbling away from a shelf in the western Antarctic Peninsula, researchers said Wednesday, warning that 1,300 square miles of ice - an area larger than Rhode Island - was in danger of breaking off in coming weeks.
[2 points: 1) The 'Antarctic Peninsula' is the jutting little finger part of Antarctica, and the only place ice is melting: the rest of the (huge) continent is accumulating ice.
2) What's the mechanism for 'ice shelf' (i.e., ice extending/floating beyond the shoreline) break-aways?
A: They keep growing as long as it's cold enough and the shoreline 'hinge' is thick enough to withstand the 'bobbing' of the floating ice mass. Eventually, this bobbing causes the shelf to break off at the hinge, and the larger a chunk is means the longer/colder its been developing.
I.e., 'record setting' break-aways are indications of prior record setting accumulations - that's to say, intra-cycle cold.
As always, 'context is key' {and absent}.]
READ MORE
Ministers split over Antarctic ice shelf claims
A split over global warming has emerged in Kevin Rudd's cabinet after it was revealed that a 13-month-old photograph was published this month to support the view that a catastrophic melting of Antarctic ice was imminent.
A study released last week by the British Antarctic Survey concluded that sea ice around Antarctica had been increasing at a rate of 100,000sqkm a decade since the 1970s...
READ MORE
NBC’s 'Today' Warns of Doom-and-Gloom Icecap Melt Catastrophes
.
At a time when Americans increasingly aren't buying into the theory of anthropogenic global warming according to a recent Rasmussen poll, NBC and its cable news network MSNBC are bringing out the big guns to slow the rise of that mentality down.
On NBC's April 26 "Today," anchor Lester Holt previewed his special "Future Earth: Journey to the End of the World," slated to appear on MSNBC on the night of April 26. According to the preview shown by Holt, the TV special is remarkably similar to Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth," forecasting several doom-and-gloom scenarios.
Some have questioned NBC Universal's willingness to promote environmental alarmism, as it is doing with this special program and the segment previewing it. According a Washington Examiner article and a follow-up segment on Fox News Channel's "The O'Reilly Factor" on April 23, General Electric stands to profit off of a cap-and-trade policy if enacted.
READ MORE
Energy Secretary Offers Dire Global Warming Prediction
Caribbean nations face "very, very scary" rises in sea level and intensifying hurricanes, and Florida, Louisiana and even northern California could be overrun with rising water levels due to global warming triggered by carbon-based greenhouse gases, Energy Secretary Steven Chu said Saturday.
Chu's comments followed meetings with environmental ministers attending the fifth Summit of the Americas.
[How in the world did a devouted Green zealot become our Energy Secretary?
"Appointments are policy." - What does this say about the one appointing them?]
READ MORE
FLASHBACK > FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 2009
Energy Secretary Steven Chu recently told the Los Angeles Times that global warming might melt 90 percent of California's snowpack. This, Chu said, would mean "no more agriculture in California," the nation's leading food producer. Chu added: "I don't actually see how they can keep their cities going."
Invidious Statistics
How focusing on race can make a solution look like a problem
Eight years after Congress passed the No Child Left Behind Act, American 9- and 13-year-olds are doing measurably better on standardized tests. Good news? Not necessarily. The New York Times report on NCLB carries the headline " 'No Child' Law Is Not Closing a Racial Gap."
Fair enough. If the law is helping white kids but doing nothing for blacks, that doesn't seem right. Only that isn't what's happening, as you learn from reading the actual report:
"Between 2004 and last year, scores for young minority students increased, but so did those of white students, leaving the achievement gap stubbornly wide..."
So minority kids are doing better than before. But because white kids are also doing better, and therefore the "gap" remains, the Times suggests the law is a failure. By this measure, it would have been better to pass a law that only benefits minorities than one that benefits everyone...
[Or better to have done nothing than to equally benefit everyone? These are the divide and conquer tactics of all race/sex/economic divisions exploited by the Left: 'other's success has been at your expense'... ]
READ MORE
Montana Fires a Warning Shot over States' Rights
- Montana is trying to trigger a battle over gun control - and perhaps make a larger point about what many folks in this ruggedly independent state regard as a meddlesome federal government.
In a bill passed by the Legislature earlier this month, the state is asserting that guns manufactured in Montana and sold in Montana to people who intend to keep their weapons in Montana are exempt from federal gun registration, background check and dealer-licensing rules because no state lines are crossed.
That notion is all but certain to be tested in court.
The immediate effect of the law could be limited, since Montana is home to just a few specialty gun makers, known for high-end hunting rifles and replicas of Old West weapons, and because their out-of-state sales would automatically trigger federal control.
Still, much bigger prey lies in Montana's sights: a legal showdown over how far the federal government's regulatory authority extends."It's a gun bill, but it's another way of demonstrating the sovereignty of the state of Montana,"
said Democratic Gov. Brian Schweitzer, who signed the bill.
[10th Amendment baby.]
READ MORE
State seeks more federal aid for cost of keeping illegal immigrant inmates
CALIFORNIA
Fifteen years after Congress promised that Washington would help states pick up the tab for imprisoning illegal immigrants convicted of crimes, California is receiving but a fraction -- less than 12 cents on the dollar -- of its nearly $1-billion annual cost.
The unfulfilled promise is perhaps the most glaring example of the federal government shortchanging California...
READ MORE
Firms bidding for Government contracts face equality quotas
Companies could be required to meet quotas on number of women or ethnic minority workers they employ in order to be win Government contracts, under new rules.
New laws planned by Harriet Harman, the equalities minister, mean that firms tendering for taxpayer-funded work could be judged on new criteria including the gender and race of their staff...
READ MORE
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
