A Liberal's Hit List: Oct 20, 2009

Nobel Winner Slams Bible as ‘Handbook of Bad Morals’

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

By Agence France-Presse

The Raw Story

LISBON — A row broke out in Portugal on Monday after a Nobel Prize-winning author denounced the Bible as a "handbook of bad morals".

Speaking at the launch of his new book "Cain", Jose Saramago, who won the 1998 Nobel Prize for Literature, said society would probably be better off without the Bible.

Roman Catholic Church leaders accused the 86-year-old of a publicity stunt.

The book is an ironic retelling of the Biblical story of Cain, Adam and Eve's son who killed his younger brother Abel.

At the launch event in the northern Portuguese town of Penafiel on Sunday, Saramago said he did not think the book would offend Catholics "because they do not read the Bible".

"The Bible is a manual of bad morals (which) has a powerful influence on our culture and even our way of life. Without the Bible, we would be different, and probably better people," he was quoted as saying by the news agency Lusa.

Saramago attacked "a cruel, jealous and unbearable God (who) exists only in our heads" and said he did not think his book would cause problems for the Catholic Church "because Catholics do not read the Bible....(Remainder.)

Colorado Dems Champion Health Care Public Option, Debate Funding

Polis: 'Worst way to pay for reform is the way that's in the House bill'

By Joseph Boven

The Colorado Independent

AURORA — At a health-reform town hall gathering this weekend that brought together six members of the Colorado delegation to the nation’s capital, Democrats, including Sens. Mark Udall and Michael Bennet, said that health care costs would continue to skyrocket unless insurance companies were subject to anti-trust regulation and to competition from a national non-profit government-insurance option.

At the event, sponsored by 9News and held here Saturday, Rep. Jared Polis of the 2nd Congressional District said he thought opposition to the public insurance option was due in part to misrepresentation. It has been reductively pinned to the term “single payer,” he said.

“The single-payer system is a bit of a false stalking horse,” Polis said. “This isn’t foreign to the United states.” The government is the sole or “single” payer in Medicaid. Under that plan all bills go to the government and the government pays them. But that’s not what the reform legislation is proposing. Here the main purpose is to provide competition and drive down prices, especially if everyone is being asked to participate.

“We’re telling people as part of this proposal, there’s a mandate. It is unfair to say that you have to get insurance and by the way we are throwing you into bed with the sharks.”

Polis said the public option would save $120 million over ten years.

Rep. Diana DeGette of the 1st Congressional District agreed.

“Part of the reason we need reform is to get everybody involved in health care. But it doesn’t do any good to do that if health care premiums continue to go up and [people] can not afford to pay their health insurance premiums.”...(Remainder.)

Palin Insta-Memoir ‘Going Rogue’ Priced to Sell at $9

By John Tomasic

The Colorado Independent

Former governor Sarah Palin completed her memoir in four months. She knew what she wanted to say, apparently, and had Lynn Vincent, a senior writer for the Christian publication World Magazine, bang it out. The book is due November 17 and is originally listed at $28.99 at Amazon, except that it’s already available at a cut-rate discount: Going Rogue is priced-to-sell at a mere $9– that’s for a hardcover due out in three weeks. Which raises the question: How many bestseller lists can the book top before it’s printed?

Safety Nets for the Rich

By Bob Herbert

The New York Times

The headlines that ran side by side on the front page of Saturday’s New York Times summed up, inadvertently, the terrible fix that we’ve allowed our country to fall into.

The lead headline, in the upper right-hand corner, said: “U.S. Deficit Rises to $1.4 Trillion; Biggest Since ’45.”

The headline next to it said: “Bailout Helps Revive Banks, And Bonuses.”

We’ve spent the last few decades shoveling money at the rich like there was no tomorrow. We abandoned the poor, put an economic stranglehold on the middle class and all but bankrupted the federal government — while giving the banks and megacorporations and the rest of the swells at the top of the economic pyramid just about everything they’ve wanted.

And we still don’t seem to have learned the proper lessons. We’ve allowed so many people to fall into the terrible abyss of unemployment that no one — not the Obama administration, not the labor unions and most certainly no one in the Republican Party — has a clue about how to put them back to work.

Meanwhile, Wall Street is living it up. I’m amazed at how passive the population has remained in the face of this sustained outrage....(Remainder.)

Is Obama Trying to ‘Neuter’ the Chamber of Commerce?

By Kathleen Miller

The Raw Story

The White House is distancing itself from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, meeting directly with CEOs of major American companies, more often than with the lobbying group that has long-represented business interests, several media reports said Monday.

President Obama's administration enjoyed the support of the U.S. Chamber early on, when the organization rushed to embrace his economic stimulus plans last winter. Recently, however, there has been a significant chill in relations: Since June, senior White House officials, sometimes including Obama himself, have met with executives from more than 55 companies -- including Eastern Kodak, Kraft and Amazon.com last week -- while criticizing the Chamber for ad buys supporting "free enterprise" after their support of government bailouts of companies.

“We prefer the approach — particularly in this climate — where the actual people who are on the front lines, running businesses, trying to create jobs, come and advise us on policy,” senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett said in an interview for a POLITICO article entitled "White House plan: Neuter the Chamber."

The Huffington Post's Sam Stein notes that the Chamber's $100 million "free enterprise" ad campaign, which chamber leaders say is being used to create jobs, is also aimed at killing regulatory reform....(Remainder.)

I Get My Investment Advise From Glenn Beck and G. Gordon Liddy

Want to make money off of right-wing paranoia? Try buying gold -- I did, and it worked

By Mike Madden

Salon

WASHINGTON -- Forget Warren Buffet, Bill Gates and all those other self-made millionaires. My new financial gurus are Glenn Beck and G. Gordon Liddy -- and I'm a richer man for it.

For the last six weeks, I've been making money off of right-wing paranoia. All it takes is listening to Beck, Fox News' conspiracy king, and Liddy, who stars in an ad touting gold that runs several times during most of Beck's broadcasts. Late this summer, my former employer, the Gannett newspaper chain, wrote me a check for a small pension payout I had earned in seven years working there, which I rolled over into an IRA. Most of the money went straight into the boring, but responsible, funds you're supposed to invest in for the long term. I bought one composite fund designed for people, like me, in their early 30s, with retirement still decades off; I bought another that had been one of Fidelity's top performers even as the economy crashed.

But after following all the financially sound advice, I still had a little bit of cash left over, and I wasn't quite sure what to do with it. Until 5 p.m. rolled around one slow late August news day, and Beck's show came on the air. Advertisers have been fleeing Beck since the middle of the summer, when he called President Obama a racist; by the time Labor Day rolled around, the only ads running on his show represented the fringe. "Join our class-action lawsuit!" the advertisers implore. "Buy our natural 'male enhancement' pills! Subscribe to National Review!" And, over and over again, "Buy gold!" On any given show, three or four different gold merchants run ads. The weirdest, and most frequently aired, of the gold commercials goes a full minute, and it features G. Gordon Liddy. The spy-turned-convict-turned-conservative hero mocks the falling price of the dollar, then exhorts viewers to buy precious metals instead. "That's the sound of security," Liddy says. "That's the sound ... of gold!"...(Remainder.)

The Wall Street Economic Death Squad

By David DeGraw

The Public Record

Recent Headlines: $140 billion! Record Payday for Wall Street

Goldman Sachs 2009 Bonuses Could Buy Insurance for 1.7 Million Families

Paraphrasing a very insightful quote: ‘The amount of poverty and suffering required for the emergence of a Goldman Sachs, and the amount of depravity that the accumulation of a fortune of such a magnitude entails is left out of the mainstream media, and it is not always possible to make the people in general see this.’

The American middle class, once the only effective counter weight to Wall Street greed, has been decimated. Over 25 million people, in what was the US middle class, are now in full-blown crisis mode and urgently need to increase their income.

Over 25 million people in crisis mode! Every seven seconds, another American family is kicked out of their home. We are confronted by a lost generation of young workers who cannot find jobs. Despite all the talk of health care reform, there is no meaningful reform coming for years, if at all, while right now over 45,000 Americans will die preventable deaths this year, and bankruptcies continue to skyrocket due to the cost of medical bills.

Millions upon millions of uninsured, unemployed, underemployed, stressed out and sick people fight through every day and urgently need to get some justice....(Remainder.)

Anything to Be on TV

By Eugene Robinson

Truthdig

Now we know the answer to one of the vexing questions of the modern age: Evidently, there is nothing at all that some people won’t do to get on television.

As proof: balloon boy.

I realize this is, technically, a nonstory. There was no boy in the UFO-shaped helium balloon whose runaway flight across the skies of Colorado last week riveted the nation. The story of the nonstory, however, is emblematic of our times. It almost seems as if the lust for being on television is in a league with our most basic human needs and desires—not just food, shelter and clothing but exposure, too.

It took just a few days for authorities to conclude that the whole balloon escapade was staged by the all-too-ready-for-prime-time Heene family. The aim was not to rescue a child but to win a time slot.

“It has been determined that this is a hoax, that it was a publicity stunt,” Larimer County Sheriff Jim Alderden told reporters Sunday. “We have evidence at this point to indicate that it was a publicity stunt done with the hopes of marketing themselves, or better marketing themselves, for a reality television show at some point in the future.”

Richard and Mayumi Heene and their three sons—including Falcon, the 6-year-old who was believed to be in the balloon—were already familiar with the swamp of embarrassment, humiliation and relentless self-promotion that is reality TV. They have appeared on two episodes of the ABC series “Wife Swap,” whose premise is explained by the title. It will come as no surprise that the Connecticut woman who came to live temporarily with Richard and the kids thought he was awfully casual when it came to parental supervision....(Remainder.)

Dick Gephardt's Spectacular Sellout

By Sebastian Jones

The Nation

In March, months after the government gave an unprecedented $85 billion to AIG, the insurance giant released a list of counterparties, exposing some of the world's top financial institutions as the real recipients of the bailout. First among its peers, Goldman Sachs got a whopping $12.9 billion, despite having claimed in September to be insulated from AIG's troubles. Based on these revelations, Maryland Democratic Congressman Elijah Cummings, who had dogged the financial industry since the crisis began, told his staff to prepare a letter calling for an investigation.

Two Congressional staffers familiar with the matter told The Nation that a draft was circulated to House members on March 23. Within hours, Cummings's office had received a phone call from a lobbying firm hired by Goldman Sachs, making an "insistent but polite" request for a meeting. Cummings, intending to send the letter regardless, granted the audience, and so it was that top Goldman executives like president Gary Cohen and CFO David Viniar arrived the next day. They brought someone else too, a big-name Democratic politician with serious populist credibility: Dick Gephardt....(Remainder.)

U.S. Spies Buy Stake in Firm That Monitors Blogs, Tweets

By Noah Shachtman

Danger Room @ Wired.com

America’s spy agencies want to read your blog posts, keep track of your Twitter updates — even check out your book reviews on Amazon.

In-Q-Tel, the investment arm of the CIA and the wider intelligence community, is putting cash into Visible Technologies, a software firm that specializes in monitoring social media. It’s part of a larger movement within the spy services to get better at using ”open source intelligence” — information that’s publicly available, but often hidden in the flood of TV shows, newspaper articles, blog posts, online videos and radio reports generated every day.

Visible crawls over half a million web 2.0 sites a day, scraping more than a million posts and conversations taking place on blogs, online forums, Flickr, YouTube, Twitter and Amazon. (It doesn’t touch closed social networks, like Facebook, at the moment.) Customers get customized, real-time feeds of what’s being said on these sites, based on a series of keywords.

“That’s kind of the basic step — get in and monitor,” says company senior vice president Blake Cahill.

Then Visible “scores” each post, labeling it as positive or negative, mixed or neutral. It examines how influential a conversation or an author is. (”Trying to determine who really matters,” as Cahill puts it.) Finally, Visible gives users a chance to tag posts, forward them to colleagues and allow them to response through a web interface.

In-Q-Tel says it wants Visible to keep track of foreign social media, and give spooks “early-warning detection on how issues are playing internationally,” spokesperson Donald Tighe tells Danger Room....(Remainder.)

Better Know Your Right-Wing Fringe: The Oath Keepers

By Charles Lemos

MyDD

The Las Vegas Review-Journal introduced me to a new right-wing fringe group, The Oath Keepers. With a motto of "Not on Our Watch", the group bills itself as a "non-partisan association of currently serving military, reserves, National Guard, peace officers, fire-fighters, and veterans who swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic." You can imagine who the domestic enemy is.

Founded in March of this year by Stewart Rhodes, a former staffer to Texas GOP Congressman Ron Paul and a former Army paratrooper with a Yale Law degree, the group is targeting law enforcement and military personnel for membership. The group, whose membership in the thousands, is to hold its first convention in Las Vegas beginning October 24th.

Launched in March by Las Vegan Stewart Rhodes, Oath Keepers bills itself as a nonpartisan group of current and retired law enforcement and military personnel who vow to fulfill their oaths to the Constitution.

More specifically, the group's members, which number in the thousands, pledge to disobey orders they deem unlawful, including directives to disarm the American people and to blockade American cities. By refusing the latter order, the Oath Keepers hope to prevent cities from becoming "giant concentration camps," a scenario the 44-year-old Rhodes says he can envision happening in the coming years.

It's a Cold War-era nightmare vision with a major twist: The occupying forces in this imagined future are American, not Soviet.

"The whole point of Oath Keepers is to stop a dictatorship from ever happening here," Rhodes, a former Army paratrooper and Yale-trained lawyer, said in an interview with the Review-Journal. "My focus is on the guys with the guns, because they can't do it without them.

"We say if the American people decide it's time for a revolution, we'll fight with you."

Meet the Senators in the Creepy Right-Wing Cult Trying to Defeat Health Care Reform

By Adele M. Stan

AlterNet

In the heat of summer, a din of voices arose from the U.S. Senate in opposition to the health care reform legislation that was taking shape in both houses of Congress. Overlooked in media coverage of the health care brouhaha is the membership of many of the senators who most vociferously oppose the legislation in the right-wing religious cult known as The Family.

With the Senate Finance Committee's passage last Tuesday of its version of health care legislation, expect the debate to flare again as the bill moves to the Senate floor. The Family's point men -- "key men" in the cult's theological lexicon -- will likely try once again to defeat reform in the service of their Supply-Side Jesus.

You could chalk it up to nothing more than pure partisanship, this obstructionism on the part of these Republicans. Or you could say that the ideology-cum-theology of The Family, which has spent decades consolidating power within the GOP, has at last come to dominate the party even among those who do not belong to the cult.

While leaders of religious right we've come to know assert their claim to "a place at the table," The Family sets its table for only a select few. They are the nation's powerful: senators, congressmen, business executives and the strong-armed leaders of Third World countries. Together, in secret, they worship a Jesus unrecognizable to most practicing Christians. (In their secret theology, the leadership model of Adolf Hitler is one of which Jesus would approve.)...(Remainder.)

Happy and Gay

By Mr. Fish

LA Weekly

Oh No Jew Di'nt!

By Michael Seitzman

The Huffington Post

Hear about those two South Carolina GOP officials who wrote that op-ed defending Senator Jim DeMint? Oh, man, with friends like these.

If you haven't read it yet, here's the opener by Edwin O. Merwin, Jr. and James S. Ulmer, Jr.:

Recently your newspaper published a letter from state Rep. Bakari Sellers attacking U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint and his opposition to congressional earmarks. There is a saying that the Jews who are wealthy got that way not by watching dollars, but instead by taking care of the pennies and the dollars taking care of themselves.

That can't really be a saying, can it? I mean, with that tortured sentence structure? A cursory search of the internets reveals that it was apparently Ben Franklin who said the actual phrase that Merwin and Ulmer think they're quoting: "Take care of the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves." But, as you can see, no Jews mentioned. Let's keep digging...

Seems Lord Chesterfield used the phrase in a letter to his son in 1747. "Take care of the Pence, for the pounds will take care of themselves." No Jews mentioned here either. Drat. Can never find an anti-Semite when you need one (Ed. Note: this is not actually a true statement)....(Remainder.)

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-seitzman/oh-no-jew-dint_b_326593.html

Is FOX's Chris Wallace the Anonymous "Concerned Parent" They Showed on Glenn Beck?

By John Aravosis

AMERICAblog

FOX News' Glenn Beck, who has previously talked about poisoning House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, has been on a tear lately about all the "communists" he thinks are working in the highest levels of the Obama administration, and in the major media (Beck even found a "communist building" in downtown NYC - seriously, Beck uncovered that Rockefeller Center has secret communist drawings all over it - Keith Olbermann has a great segment on the commie building). One such "communist" who Beck thinks he's uncovered is White House communications director Anita Dunn. (I was on CNN yesterday talking about Beck's queer fixation with Dunn.)

Well, today America's favorite sociopath had a super duper double secret "anonymous" parent on to complain about a graduation speech that Ms. Dunn gave a while back. The thing is, when you look at the alleged parent, who was speaking from FOX's Washington, DC bureau, he sure looks an awful lot like FOX's own Chris Wallace. Check out the screen capture above from the TV. I posted a normal photo of Wallace to the left, and one in which I scrunched his head to the right (since the anonymous parent looks like they scrunched the video of his head, to further disguise him). Is it just me, or are those trademark ears and helmet-head hair just a little too similar to Chris Wallace's?...(Remainder.)

The Insanely Cavalier Anti-Semitism of the GOP

By Larisa Alexandrovna

at-Largely

Senator Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) is a well known glue-sniffer, complete with tea-bagging credentials and backwards views on everything from race to health care. So it is no surprise that two of his fellow glue-sniffers would come to his defense using racism and fear as a way to bolster their otherwise idiotic argument. What is surprising is how casual these two mental-all stars are in their absolutely disgraceful op-ed, in which they use anti-Semitic stereotypes as though everyone is aware of how those 'Jews are.'

"There is a saying that the Jews who are wealthy got that way not by watching dollars, but instead by taking care of the pennies and the dollars taking care of themselves. By not using earmarks to fund projects for South Carolina and instead using actual bills, DeMint is watching our nation’s pennies and trying to preserve our country’s wealth and our economy’s viability to give all an opportunity to succeed."

Really? And just where does this "saying" come from? KKK rallies perhaps? The two authors of this anti-Semitic crap in defense of their fellow glue-sniffer DeMint are the GOPs brightest stars in South Carolina:

"The letter, published by South Carolina newspaper The Times and Democrat, was authored by James S. Ulmer Jr., who chairs the Orangeburg County GOP, and Edwin O. Merwin Jr., who chairs the Bamberg County GOP."

Adding insult to injury, these two racists seem to think that this understanding of how "some Jews got wealthy" is common knowledge. Again, where is this common knowledge? At tea-bagging parties?

As I say to all anti-Semites, happily and on a regular basis, you can kiss my Jew ass boys....(Original.)

Defense Department Opposed Franken's Anti-Rape Amendment

By Ryan Grim

The Huffington Post

When thirty Republicans lined up against an amendment that would have required defense contractors to allow their employees access to U.S. courts in cases of rape or sexual assault, Jon Stewart ripped them to pieces.

"I understand we're a divided country, some disagreements on health care. How is ANYONE against this?" he wondered.

It's a question, it turns out, best addressed to the White House.

The vote against the amendment, sponsored by Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.), has sparked outrage at the all-male, all-white bloc of thirty Republican senators. HuffPost readers have been particularly infuriated by the GOP opposition and have regularly posted the names of the offending thirty in the comment section of even unrelated stories. A mock website - www.republicansforrape.org -- has sprung up.

The men had an ally in opposition that has so far gone unreported: the Department of Defense.

"The DoD opposes the proposed amendment," reads a message sent from the administration to the Senate on October 6, the day the amendment passed by a 68-30 vote.

"The Department of Defense, the prime contractor, and higher tier subcontractors may not be in a position to know about such things. Enforcement would be problematic, especially in cases where privity of contract does not exist between parties within the supply chain that supports a contract," reads the DoD note. "It may be more effective to seek a statutory prohibition of all such arrangements in any business transaction entered into within the jurisdiction of the United States, if these arrangements are deemed to pose an unacceptable method of recourse."...(Remainder.)

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/19/defense-department-oppose_n_326569.html

Ed Schultz: I Will Debate Liz Cheney Anytime! Anywhere!

In the Case of Rush Limbaugh, Activism Once Again Prevails

By Rev. Al Sharpton

The Huffington Post

Last week, when conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh lost his bid for partial ownership of the St. Louis Rams, many adjectives were used to describe his possible state of mind. Several news outlets commented on his anger and frustration, while the right-wing had a field day with the 'injustice' of it all. But perhaps the most precise word to summarize Mr. Limbaugh's reaction to news that his inflammatory commentary of the past excluded him from ownership in the NFL is pure and simple "fear." Fear that activism is alive and well, and fear that activism worked.

Almost as quickly as news broke of Limbaugh's football dreams, I was contacted by members of the NFL Players Association over concern they had regarding ownership from a man who previously equated the NFL to a game between rival gangs the Bloods and the Crips. A man who in 2003 stated that Eagles' quarterback Donovan McNabb was overrated because the media just wanted to see a Black athlete succeed. And a talk show host whose controversial, divisive statements about African Americans and other minorities had no place in a sport that was primarily comprised of Black players and epitomized unity.

Without hesitation, I drafted a public letter to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, voicing the shared apprehension that I and other progressive individuals ready to move beyond antiquated and offensive rhetoric felt about the matter. We took bold and immediate action because that is precisely what this situation demanded; for silence equals acceptance. And as a result of our active engagement, we were able to halt an immense wrong from ever transpiring. Cornered and defeated, Limbaugh has resorted to once again launching personal attacks against me because, simply put, he is virtually powerless to do anything else....(Remainder.)

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rev-al-sharpton/in-the-case-of-rush-limba_b_326549.html

Fox News Gives Undue Weight To Bighollywood.com Conspiracy Theory

By Ellen

News Hounds

In the “Unresolved problem segment” of Friday night’s (10/16/09) O’Reilly Factor, guest host Juan Williams (one of Fox News' liberals) gave unquestioned credibility to an unsubstantiated accusation by a Bighollywood.com writer, that the Obama administration had engaged in “prime time propaganda.” With video.

Williams opened the segment by saying, “The federal government has teamed up with the Entertainment Industry Foundation to promote, ‘service and volunteerism’ on network TV shows. But the website bighollywood.com may have a smoking gun that some say shows evidence of a government propaganda movement.”

Williams went on to play a clip from a recent episode of the CBS show, “The New Adventures of Old Christine” in which the title character, played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus, finds out she’s no longer covered under her old health insurance plan. “What are we supposed to do? People can’t go around without health insurance. This is America!” Christine says. Her friend, played by Wanda Sykes, shocks her friend by saying, “And 45 million people don’t have health insurance.” “Why isn’t anyone talking about this?” Christine asks. “Maybe because you get all your news from Nicole Richie’s blog,” Sykes tells her.

Somehow, that was proof enough for Big Hollywood that the Obama administration was behind this and proof enough for Fox News to suggest Big Hollywood was right. FNC called its video “Prime-Time Propaganda?” and went on to host a debate clearly framed to suggest an answer in the affirmative. “Is the Obama administration using Hollywood to push health care reform?” Williams asked. Never mind that the clip he showed did not push health care reform but only underscored the problem, one which, presumably, is non-partisan.

Williams asked New York Post television critic Linda Stasi, “Explain to me what is going on. What did we see in terms of the administration trying to get big Hollywood types to push their agenda on the prime time shows?”

Williams seemed to have missed the fact that he had shown absolutely no evidence such a thing had actually happened. There was no spokesperson for The New Adventures of Old Christine nor the White House. If anyone from either Fox News or Big Hollywood had tried to contact either of the parties involved to discuss whether or not there had been any actual collaboration, they kept it to themselves...(Remainder.)

Reichsführer Beck Airs Manufactured "Concerned Parent" to Advance His Dunn/Mao Bullshit

Baron of Batshit Is Still Foaming at the Mouth Over Dunn's Media "Control" Comments

Reichsführer Beck & Self-Hating Fag, Drudge, Hype Some Nonsense About "Oath Keepers"

Reichsführer Beck, WND, & Self-Hating Fag, Drudge, Accuse Anita Dunn of Admitting White House Control of Media

By Media Matters

WorldNetDaily, followed by the Drudge Report and Fox Nation, falsely claimed that during a January 12 speech, White House communications director Anita Dunn boasted about the White House's "control" over the media. In fact, Dunn was discussing the Obama campaign's strategy for controlling the campaign's message, not the media; moreover, her comments were made before Obama had taken office and before she became communications director.

UPDATE:

On his October 19 Fox News show, Glenn Beck played the Dunn clip and linked it to his attacks on Dunn's past comments about Mao. Beck said that "Mao did like to control the media."

WND, Drudge, Fox Nation falsely claim Dunn admitted, "We 'control' news media"

WND headline: "White House boasts: We 'control' news media." The WorldNetDaily article was subtitled, "Communications chief offers shocking confession to foreign government," and claimed that "President Obama's presidential campaign focused on 'making' the news media cover certain issues while rarely communicating anything to the press unless it was 'controlled,' White House Communications Director Anita Dunn disclosed to the Dominican government at a videotaped conference." The article quoted Dunn as saying, "Very rarely did we communicate through the press anything that we didn't absolutely control." [WorldNetDaily, 10/18/09]

Drudge headline: "White House admits: We 'control' news media ..." The Drudge Report linked to the WorldNetDaily article with the following headline:

Reichsführer Beck & Propagandaministerium Continue to Advance Lies About Dunn and Mao

Mika Downplays Beck's Nazi Comments

Greta van Susteren Throws Glenn Beck Under the Fox Bus

The Toe-Sucking Troll From Under the Bridge, Morris, Brags that He's a Corporate Whore

Raving Hypocrite & Right-Wing Lunatic, Gingrich, Attacks Dunn for Make-Believe Mao Reference

Former Journailst, Goldberg, Tells Fucktard O'Reilly White House's Fox Message Might Become Part of American Culture

Completely Ignorning the Video, the Baron of Batshit Wonders How Dunn Thinks What She Said About Mao is Funny

Would Someone Kidnap This Moron, Beck, and Take Him to Maoist China So He Can Experience It? Fucking Moron

Mark "Steaming Bucket of Diarrhea" Levin Smears Obama as "Leader of Counter-Revolution"

The Oxy-Moron Thinks Kids Dying from H1N1 is Just Fine

In Yet Another Sexist Screed, the Pedophilic Pig-Man Says CNNs Costello Should "Sit on a Fire Hydrant"

Keith Olbermann & Richard Wolffe Discuss Whether Chris Wallace is Behind Dunn Smear

Dylan Ratigan & Michael Moore Discuss Wall Street Bonuses on NBC's Today Show

Tucker "More Disgusting Than a Floating Outhouse Turd" Carlson Thinks Obama Advisers "Lie for a Living"...You Know, Like Him

The Dittohead Challenge: Please Explain Limbaugh's "Grab the Ankles" Quote

By Eric Boehlert

Media Matters

Over the weekend, Limbaugh continued to express his complete bafflement at the idea that anyone associated with the NFL would think he turbo talker had a problem with race. Limbaugh, with the entire GOP Noise Machine nodding franticly in agreement, has declared his only take on race is that America should strive to be truly colorblind. In fact, National Review's Andy McCarthy* claimed Limbaugh treats people just Martin Luther King did--based on the content of their character! ("Kumbaya, my Lord...")

Limbaugh's not a race-baiter and there's nothing in his archives that would suggest he was. In fact, liberals had to invent nasty quotes from him, the Dittoheads whined, because they can't find any real ones because Limbaugh's record is so clean on this issue. Or so went the claim. (Not quite.)

So here's the challenge, and it's open to anyone within the right-wing; Andrew Breitbart, Michelle Malkin, McCarthy, Glenn Beck, Limbaugh himself. Anyone can take a shot. But could somebody from the right-wing please--please--take a few minutes and explain what Limbaugh was talking about when he made this comment earlier this year:

"We are being told that we have to hope [Obama] succeeds, that we have to bend over, grab the ankles ... because his father was black."

I realize that the GOP Noise Machine has avoided this quote for months and absolutely refuses to acknowledge its existence. Appearing on conservative radio talk shows this year, I've mentioned it a couple times and hosts simply will not discuss it. But in the context of Limbaugh's blanket denial about how he doesn't have a race problem, I think it would be helpful if a Dittohead addressed this quote and help remove any fears readers might have that Limbaugh's comment was patently offensive....(Remainder.)

Fuckin' Balloon Boy, Motherfuckers

By Rude One

The Rude Pundit

Man, all the Rude Pundit wants to hear about is Balloon Boy. He wants Balloon Boy confessing or vomiting on an endless loop, an entire fucking network devoted to every fucked second in Balloon Boy's next few weeks. Nothing but motherfucking Balloon Boy. He wants to see footage from other shows that demonstrate what a little shithead or innocent victim of mean ol' parents Balloon Boy might be now that we know he's not Dead-on-the-Ground Boy. He wants body language analysts, legal experts, balloonists (is that the right fucking word?), all talking about Balloon Boy because what we learned the last few days is that nothing is more important than Balloon Boy.

He wants to know every fucking delicious tidbit about Balloon Boy's Fucked-Up Dad. Yeah, it's all of our business that Balloon Boy's Fucked-Up Dad is so fucked-up, to discover every YouTube video of him saying and doing stupid, fucked-up things in his desperate cry for attention, of his desire for a reality show called something like We Love Heene. Shit, yeah. Let's talk about the charges that might maybe be filed against him, let's get child abuse experts to tell us how putting a Balloon Boy in a box in the attic is so wrong when we all know that Balloon Boys should be soaring far above us all in their mighty silver balloons. (Although even the Rude Pundit's gotta admit: it's just brilliantly hilarious that Balloon Boy's Fucked-Up Dad might end up getting publicity for the greatest loony conspiracy theory out there, that the world is controlled by Reptilians, who are lizard-like aliens from the constellation Draco. No, really, people believe this shit, including, apparently, BBFUD.)

And now that they spent days on the tale of Balloon Boy and his distinct lack of riding in a balloon, the Rude Pundit wants the media to self-analyze whether or not they gave too much coverage to Balloon Boy. It's so worthwhile when they do that. Yes, he loves hearing Howie Kurtz ask mournfully, "[S]houldn't we be embarrassed that we've been sucked into this vortex?" not five minutes after saying, "I certainly don't think it was overplayed." Man, he can't wait for more of CNN patting itself on the back for getting Balloon Boy to confess to Wolf Blitzer. He can't wait for the rest of the media to be outraged at BBFUD for lying to them. How dare he? How dare the cops pretend not to be on to something? Who do they take the great and mighty media for? Ratings whores who go down on spectacle like it's a rich man's cock?...(Remainder.)

Aha! Extremist Crowd Uncovers Another Sinister Government Plot

By Larry Keller

Hatewatch at SPLC

Holy cow! Another sinister plot by our government to enslave citizens has been unearthed by fans of radio talk show conspiracist Alex Jones. This one entails livestock. The Austin, Texas-based Jones posted a short news item on his Infowars.com website on Sunday about plans by officials in Oklahoma and Kansas to stage an emergency response exercise on Thursday to stop livestock movement in the event of a disease outbreak. “The exercise is not surprisingly funded by the Department of Homeland Security,” Infowars noted darkly.

The plan is for the two states to coordinate efforts to stop animal movement across their shared border to prevent the spread of disease to healthy animals. In the exercise, officials will try to prevent animals in their states from contracting hoof-and-mouth disease. The disease was last identified in the United States in 1929. While it poses no real threat to humans, it’s a highly contagious disease of cattle, sheep, swine, goats, deer and other cloven-hooved animals that causes painful blisters that make it difficult for them to eat and walk. An outbreak could be painful to the economies of Kansas and Oklahoma.

Thursday’s exercise will include the screening of traffic at two border locations: Near Sitka, Kan., and near Turpin, Okla. That has Infowars readers as nervous as pigs in a barbecue joint.

“The County Sheriffs in those states should EXERCISE THEIR POWER to ARREST ANY GOV’T THUGS WHO INTEREFERE WITH COMMERCE,” Underdog wrote....(Remainder.)

Leader of Anti-Marriage Campaign Admits Misleading People of Maine

By Joe Sudbay

AMERICAblog

We've known that the anti-gay side has been lying about Maine's new marriage equality law. We've reported on the lies coming from the Catholic church in Maine over and over again, and the local press has even called out the Catholic church for their anti-gay lies. But, the anti-equality campaign, funded by the Bishop of Maine and led by the Bishop's spokeperson, Marc Mutty, has continued to lie about the impact, or lack thereof, of same-sex marriage on our state.

But, in an interview tonight on Maine Public Broadcasting Network, Mutty not only admitted that, contrary to what his campaign has been alleging, there won't be a mandate to teach same-sex marriage in schools, he went further. Mutty admitted that his side has misled the people of Maine:

"We've never said that schools will be mandated- or, actually, perhaps we did in one ad, or certainly led people to believe that, inadvertently," says Yes on 1's Chairman Marc Mutty.

"Inadvertently." Wink, wink.

Mutty and his boss, Bishop Malone, have done a disservice to the people of Maine. In the interview, Mutty had the audacity to blame the lie on "verbal short cuts" in his side's 30-second ads. Those ads and the "verbal short cuts" were created by Mutty's very high-powered consultants, Schubert-Flint, the very same firm that created the disgusting ads for the Yes on Prop. 8 side in California. So, just how inadvertent do you really think the lies were?...(Remainder.)

Palin’s Political Viability Plunges

By Christopher Mangum

Advocate.com

A new survey finds that Sarah Palin’s popularity is waning with likely Republican voters.

When provided with a list of five candidates likely to run for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, Palin ranks third, according to Rasmussen Reports.

Twenty-nine percent of GOP voters claim they would vote for Mike Huckabee, while 24% prefer Mitt Romney and 18% Palin.

In July, Rasmussen Reports found that the candidates were in a near three-way tie: 25% favoring Romney, 24% Palin, and 22% Huckabee.

Not only is Palin’s popularity dipping, but the polarizing former governor is the candidate Republicans would least prefer to see win the nomination.

Twenty-one percent of primary voters claim Palin is the GOP candidate they would least like to see win the party’s presidential nomination. Just 9% say the same of Romney, and 8% feel that way about Huckabee, according to the national telephone survey....(Remainder.)

Baron of Batshit Beck's Mission it to Bring "Take the Administration Down"

By Media Matters

In recent days, Glenn Beck has said that something he is "working on" will "take the administration down" and that White House interim communications director Anita Dunn "will have to go away" after "what we show you tonight." Beck and his fellow Fox News personalities have repeatedly called for Obama administration officials to be fired, asked people to dig up information on administration officials, and fearmongered about President Obama, his advisers, and his policies.

Beck: Working on something that will "take the administration down"

Beck: One of the things I'm working on, if proven, will "take the administration down." From the October 16 edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Glenn Beck Program:

BECK: I think there is going to come a time soon, and when you see what we have in -- that we're working on now, if -- if especially one of these things come to true -- come to fruition, and is actually true. We're working on four different stories right now that if any of them are true, it's big, big trouble. All of them appear to be, but we have to be able to nail everything down. One of which I think will take the administration down. There comes a point to where people have to say, "OK. Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. This was right, this was right, this was right. These people had to go away." Now they won't answer this charge, this charge, or this charge. They won't -- they can't even address them without smears. [10/16/09]

The Glenn Beck Chart

By Media Matters

Glenn Beck's affinity for chalkboard diagrams charting out the frequently illusory "connections" in the growing liberal conspiracy to undermine America is well-documented. In that spirit, Media Matters for America has explored Beck's links to the extremist, unhinged, and sometimes paranoid people and groups that inhabit the world of right-wing political activism and laid them out in a Beck-style chart, but with two key differences: these connections actually exist, and they were spell-checked.

Legend

1. GLENN BECK → W. CLEON SKOUSEN: As documented by Salon's Alexander Zaitchik, W. Cleon Skousen, a right-wing activist and conspiracy theorist, is "Beck's favorite writer and the author of the bible of the 9/12 movement, 'The 5,000 Year Leap.' A once-famous anti-communist 'historian,' Skousen was too extreme even for the conservative activists of the Goldwater era, but Glenn Beck has now rescued him from the remainder pile of history, and introduced him to a receptive new audience." Beck frequently touts Skousen's work on his television and radio programs and wrote a foreword for the 30th anniversary edition of The 5000 Year Leap, which he promotes on his website.

2. GLENN BECK → THE JOHN BIRCH SOCIETY: Beck interviewed Sam Antonio, a national spokesman for the John Birch Society, on the July 25, 2007, edition of his now-defunct CNN Headline News program. Leading off the interview, Beck said to Antonio: "I have to tell you, when I was growing up, the John Birch Society, I thought they were a bunch of nuts, however, you guys are starting to make more and more sense to me." Beck was discussing with Antonio the Security and Prosperity Partnership, an economic and security initiative of the United States, Canada, and Mexico that the John Birch Society believes is a vehicle "to stealthily merge the three North American nations."

3. GLENN BECK → ABC NEWS: In January 2007, ABC News hired Beck to appear as a "regular commentator" on Good Morning America. The announcement was made not long after Beck's interview with Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), the first Muslim elected to Congress, during which Beck said, "I have been nervous about this interview with you, because what I feel like saying is, 'Sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies.' " Beck appeared on Good Morning America several times as a "commentator."...(Remainder.)

Sen. Alexander Repeats Debunked Falsehoods About Clean Energy Jobs Legislation

By Media Matters

On October 16, 2009, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) falsely claimed clean energy jobs legislation would raise prices and send jobs overseas. In reality, legislation increasing our investment in clean energy technologies would create jobs in every state and help America become more energy independent, all for less than a quarter a day.

Sen. Alexander Falsely Claimed Clean Energy Legislation Would Raise Prices & Send Jobs Overseas

Sen. Lamar Alexander:

To cut carbon emissions, the House of Representatives has devised a cap-and-trade plan that also mandates a switch to renewable resources -- wind, sunshine, and "biomass" -- for 20 percent of our energy by 2020. Democrats on the Senate Energy Committee have proposed a similar mandate. Meanwhile, the Obama administration is threatening to cut carbon-dioxide emissions by executive order. The most certain consequence of these proposals is that they will raise prices and send jobs overseas. [Alexander op-ed, National Review, 10/16/09; emphasis added]

Clean Energy Jobs Legislation Would Have Minimal Effect On Energy Prices

Reuters: "Climate Legislation Moving Through Congress Would Have Only A Modest Impact On Consumers." According to Reuters: "A new U.S. government study on Tuesday adds to a growing list of experts concluding that climate legislation moving through Congress would have only a modest impact on consumers, adding around $100 to household costs in 2020. Under the climate legislation passed by the House of Representatives in June, electricity, heating oil and other bills for average families will rise $134 in 2020 and $339 in 2030, according to the Energy Information Administration, the country's top energy forecaster." [Reuters, 8/5/09]...(Remainder.)

Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)

© Blogger template Newspaper by Ourblogtemplates.com 2008

Back to TOP