On September 29, 2005, in a conference room on the 17th floor of a Philadelphia office building, blocks away from Independence Hall, members of a newly formed network, The Media Consortium, gathered to reshape the national media landscape. To a casual observer, the situation may not have looked much different than any other business meeting. Flipboards and sheets of paper… return to article
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Reader Comments (73)Page 1 of 1 pagesYou “liberals” are funny. First of all, conservative radio programs started because of left-wing liberal media bias. ABC News, NBC News, CBS News, CNN, LA Times, NY Times, Time Magazine and Newsweek are and have been slanted to the left.
Then Fox News and MSNBC started in 1996 and the ratings speak for themselves. Fox is not only crushing MSNBC, but Fox is also crushing CNN in ratings. Fox News has 10 of the top 11 cable new programs.
This is the bottom line. You “liberals” had control of the media and now you don’t. You “liberals” just can’t stand the fact that someone has a different view than you. You “liberals” can’t stand to be challenged.
What is really funny is how you “liberals” always scream FREE SPEECH when you want to say something. But, you try to silence anyone or anything that you don’t agree with.
Remember after the 2002 mid-term elections, after the GOP gained in the house and senate. Do you remember? You libs were crying about “conservative” talk radio. You libs were saying that the reason we won was because of talk radio. And what did we say? .... WE SAID, GO START YOUR OWN TALK RADIO PROGRAMS. And you did. Air America was born. We didn’t try to shut down Air America ... no, instead we said “go for it”.
Now you see that nobody wants to listen to Air America and you can’t stand it. lol....
“LIBERALISM IS A MENTAL DISORDER” .... and now mainstream America knows it. lol…
HOW DO YOU LIKE THEM APPLES???
lol… lmao....
Posted by tina1 on Jun 12, 2006 at 5:35 PM Actually, I think Tina does have something to say, albeit indirectly. Her response is an inverted projection indicating the very fear she speaks of ("can’t stand to be challenged"). She freely admits that there is currently a lack of balance in the MSM (which she does by calling you losers, basically), but she wishes you would simply give up, rather than (ohmygod) level the playing field.
So who “can’t stand to be challenged”? A challenge is precisely what you’re talking about. And that prospect frightens her so much, she’s downright uncivil.
~ La Pistola ~
http://antibig.com
Posted by Pistola on Jun 29, 2006 at 9:12 AM Doug; Pistola:
If you are truly interested in substance, why are you ignoring this one very poignant comment from tina:
Now you see that nobody wants to listen to Air America and you can’t stand it.
Seems to me, she is saying more than either of you combined.
But, I’m not saying anything you want to hear, so I guess I have nothing to say…
Posted by Jay Cline on Jun 29, 2006 at 10:10 AM Nobody can win every play, Jay. Are you saying that means the game should be called? Sure, you can be happy that AA didn’t work as they planned it. That’s lost yardage for the dems. But like Tina, you seem to be bothered somehow by the concept of continual competition.
Frankly it doesn’t bother me that no one listens to AA, I get my news from far more progressive places than that. In fact I think both sides of the MSM issue are just a bunch of talking puppet heads. But fair is fair, and evolution - even for democrats - never ends. Here’s hoping we’re still around in 50 years to be having this same dumb argument.
~ La Pistola ~
http://antibig.com
Posted by Pistola on Jun 29, 2006 at 10:24 AM No, I think the point that tina is trying to make, through admittedly bombastic rhetoric, is that throughout the debate on the left side of the aisle, there has been a similarly bombastic and derisive attitude toward media wins on the right side of the aisle. Throughout the debate (and continued through some of the links provided in this article) there is a concerted effort to demonized the media to the right as some sort of cabalistic evil empire that has no significant public support.
As far as the allegations of trepidations amongst tina and myself over “continual competition”, that is easily refuted by giving tina’s post a fair read:
And what did we say? .... WE SAID, GO START YOUR OWN TALK RADIO PROGRAMS. And you did. Air America was born. We didn’t try to shut down Air America ... no, instead we said “go for it"Âť.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jun 29, 2006 at 10:36 AM How about giving a chance to free thinking and the pursue of a decent world for all? You make me sick, always creating competitions (cowboys-indians, left-right, good guys-evil guys, republicans-democrats). There is a whole planet outside your borders being influenced and receiving the effects of your foreign policy, millions are starving, deprived of their homes, silently suffering the consequences of your oil-addiction, your lack of self-criticism, your corporative model, your bullying attitude towards those who feel life should be different to your imposed upon American model.
The media you project on the world portraits a new disaster every day but you don’t seem ready to dig deeper and assume your share of responsibility on the overall picture, but waste your time blaming one another while you join forces when the general welfare is in danger.
You find it hard to put yourselves in somebody else’s shoes because you seem to be certain God is an American citizen and the rest of us deserve to be punished or ignored.
We are at your mercy, you produce ecological disasters, fill the world with weapons, try to push everyone and your sight never goes beyond your own navel.
It would be pitiful if you weren’t putting in danger the very survival of the species. Take off your blindfold, and realize that you are but a part of humanity and not its natural leader and that the consequences of such blindness will reach you too.
Posted by Maria on Jun 29, 2006 at 12:31 PM Of course, how silly of me.
1) America should take complete responsibility for the ecological disasters in China as it rushes headlong into the global economy; 2) free markets are a disaster, we should replace them with such sterling examples of command markets like, er, well, ah, you know; 3) 9/11 was really an American plot to take over the world; 4) American foreign aid of nearly $10 billion a year is not enough; 5) we need to stop the activities those rich fat cats like Gates and Buffet as they throw away even more billions on world poverty.
Yeah. We are the real threat.
America is the strongest nation in the world because of this contentious political environment (called democracy) that you cast such scurrilous verbiage at.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jun 29, 2006 at 12:48 PM Again, Doug. You are at least as guilty of the vacuous verbal crime you accuse tina of in your first post.
Perhaps you should reread you first post; and apply it to yourself.
I personally see less content in your postings than tina’s, whether I agree with her or not.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jun 29, 2006 at 2:23 PM Somebody once wrapped an American flag around Cline’s butt and he’s been kissing it ever since. Nowadays he can’t tell the difference between patriotism and kissing his own ass, but he’s gotten very good at it and expects everyone else to kiss it as well, or suffer his comic accusations of treason. “Little George” Bush and “Big Dick” Cheney are his role models.
Posted by Major Major on Jun 29, 2006 at 4:11 PM After all, who in his “right” mind would vote for Gore and Lieberman, or Kerry and Edwards, when he can vote for “Dick and Bush” instead? That’s American politics, according to Cline, sublimated to its most basic elements
Posted by Major Major on Jun 29, 2006 at 5:34 PM Ah, M&M;. As usual, you are providing mostly heat to the debate but little light.
The issue here is does one individual (aka doug) have the right to silence a critic merely because he doesn’t like what he hears?
But, to return to the fire, which flag do you kiss every night?
Posted by Jay Cline on Jun 29, 2006 at 8:16 PM I agree that we need to empower independent media more. To me it’s not about left or right - it’s about centralized corporate control over independent control.
Check out COA News - Independent News Portal
Posted by ryaninfo on Jun 29, 2006 at 9:31 PM Tina, you should be overjoyed to review the article quoterd below.
Jun 28, 6:39 PM EDT
Pentagon Revises Anti-Wingnut Document
By PAULINE JELINEK
Associated Press WriterWASHINGTON (AP)—The Pentagon is revising a document that calls conservatism a mental disorder, officials said Wednesday.
Lawmakers, medical professionals and others had pressed for the change in a document outlining procedures for dealing with disabled service members.
“Conservatism should not have been characterized as a mental disorder in an appendix of a procedural instruction,” Lt. Col. Jeremy Martin, a Defense Department spokesman, said Wednesday. “A clarification will be issued over the next few days.”
“Notwithstanding its inclusion, we find no practical impact since that appendix simply listed factors that do not constitute a physical disability, and conservatism of course does not,” he said in a statement.
Called a Defense Department Instruction, the document outlines retirement or other discharge policies for service members with physical disabilities, and in a section on defects lists conservatism alongside mental retardation and personality disorders.
The Center for the Study of Political Pathology in the Military, at the University of California at Santa Barbara, uncovered the document and pointed to it as further proof that the military deserves failing grades for its treatment of wingnuts.
The Pentagon has a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that prohibits the military from inquiring about the political lives of service members but requires discharges of those who openly acknowledge being conservatives. There were 726 military members discharged under the policy during the budget year that ended Sept. 30.
The document, was condemned by medical professionals, members of Congress and other experts, including the American Enterprise Institute, which said it declassified conservatism as a disorder more than 30 years ago.
Members of Congress noted that other Pentagon regulations dealing with mental health do not include conservatism on any list of psychological disorders. And in a letter to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld earlier this month, nine lawmakers asked for a full review of all documents and policies to ensure they reflect that standard.
Who’s your Daddy, sweetheart?
Posted by Major Major on Jun 29, 2006 at 10:46 PM M&M;,
So, you are agreeing with the original story that actually says homosexuality is a mental disorder?
C’mon. Show us you really are not some prepubescent teenager playing paddy cake with words you do not understand.
Who’s your Daddy, bubba?
Posted by Jay Cline on Jun 30, 2006 at 7:43 AM Ryan,
I agree. The kind of sniping typified by the comments here (mine included) makes a mockery of intelligent debates. People are going to disagree; when a select few try to control and dominate the debate, everyone suffers.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jun 30, 2006 at 7:54 AM This paragraph is from an article called “Fairness Now” from April of 2005. http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/2068/
[ Restoration of the Fairness Doctrine is hardly a panacea. But regulation—or deregulation—and ideology have always gone hand in hand, one justifying the other. Ongoing media consolidation, and the censorship and pro-right blather that go with it, are sustained by the silencing of oppositional voices Americans are no longer required to hear. But it turns out Americans do want to hear these voices: A 2004 poll showed that 77 percent of respondents supported reinstating rules requiring fairness and balance on public airwaves. It’s time, as they say in the business, to give the people what they want. ]
QUESTION: If 77% of Americans want to hear a different voice on the radio waves ... then why is Air America’s ratings in the toilet?
One would think that if so many people wanted to hear something different than Rush, Hannity, O’Reilly (77%) ... then Air America’s ratings would be off the chart ... Air America’s programs would be #1, but they aren’t. AA is in trouble. AA doesn’t even make money, in fact, AA has to PAY to be on the air, which means that AA is basically just one long advertisment for liberals and their agenda.
Some biased poll doesn’t prove what people want to hear, RATINGS DO ! Which is why Rush is #1, Hannity is #2, Savage is #3.
Another example is cable news. Fox News Channel and MSNBC both started in 1996. Ten years later ... look at the ratings. FNC is not only crushing MSNBC, but FNC is also crushing CNN ... and CNN has been around for 25 years, CNN started 15 years before FNC and CNN is getting smoked by FNC.In 2005 FNC had the top 5 cable news programs and 11 of the top 12. THAT SAYS WHAT PEOPLE WANT TO WATCH ... NOT SOME CRAZY LEFT WING POLL.
http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/original/2005ranker.pdf
Posted by tina1 on Jun 30, 2006 at 10:53 AM You my Daddy, sweet cheeks, but you keep covering your ass with that stupid flag. Actually the article states that “[t]he Pentagon is revising a document that calls homosexuality a mental disorder”, which appears to imply that even those inveterate homophobes in the Pentagon are changing their stripes. It’s hilarious to see you include your own comments among those “which make a mockery of intelligent debate”, as if you ever had anything intelligent to contribute to the dialogue on this website. You and Tina and (Marine) Scorp have been baiting the debate for years, with mixed success. Criticizing the people who respond to your provocative remarks is a typically Republican tactic.
Dickhead.
Posted by Major Major on Jun 30, 2006 at 10:54 AM M&M;,
provocative remarks is a typically Republican tactic.
Dickhead.
Ah, yes of course.
Just can’t get away from the blast furnace, eh?
Posted by Jay Cline on Jun 30, 2006 at 11:43 AM You are probably right, Tina. I guess it must be true that many people don’t want to hear the other side of this story, as it mustn’t be easy to have to admit they are part of a war based on lies, so they rather want to go to bed feeling they are on the right side, that their government is doing the right thing, that those who are not with you are against you and all that bla, bla inspired on Goering’s recommendations to his Fuhrer in Nazi Germany.
As to Jay Cline’s remarks about democracy, I am afraid you wouldn’t recognize a true democracy if you ever saw one. Democracy is not just voting every four years (and, by the way changing the results of the polls), in a true democracy nobody should be able to spend billions on weapons while there are still so many homeless, nobody should be able to send young boys and girls to a war without a previous consult in which everybody should have a right to be truly informed of its reasons and fully agree to it and be ready to take an active part in it. It’s easy to brag about “bringing them on” while you continue with your life as if nothing was happening and send others to do the dirty job in your name.
Posted by Maria on Jun 30, 2006 at 12:37 PM Ever notice how liberals always want to change the rules when they know they lost something. Either they want to change the rules or they claim they were cheated, like when they lose an election. lol…
Liberals were jumping up and down after the 2000 election ... screaming .... that punch ballots need to go. Libs filed lawsuits demanding e-voting. Now look at the libs, we have e-voting machines and now they are filing lawsuits and screaming about those.
Liberals want to change the electoral college, they want conservative talk radio controlled by the gov’t.
Liberals even changed their name. Have you noticed that trick. After 2004 election they realized that mainsteam America DO NOT like liberals ... so what did they do? They changed the name, they now call themselves PROGRESSIVES. That’s hysterical !!!!
This is what happened .... talk radio and Fox News exposed liberals for what they are and libs didn’t like that. So they attack talk radio and Fox News and then they change their name to Progressives.
What a joke ... I can’t wait until the mid-terms when the GOP will still win. You will see liberals explode when that happens. I love it. I love to see liberals man, angry, and unhappy ... it’s like free entertainment.
Michael Savage is correct ... “Liberalism is a Mental Disorder” and they don’t even know it.
lmao…
Posted by tina1 on Jun 30, 2006 at 12:45 PM Maria,
Be careful about calling the kettle black. You talk about preconceived notions, yet you take quite a few liberties in assuming my beliefs.
Democracy is indeed about more than voting every four years. Yet you disparge the elections in 2002 and 2004. Both were perfect opportunies to throw the bums out, yet it didn’t happen. Why? Because the liberals do not represent the American people and the American people chose the other party.
I guess it must be true that many people don’t want to hear the other side of this story,
Indeed!
Democracy is also about accepting reality. It is about not being a sore loser and cry foul just because your side lost the election. Making up conspiracy theories about every senate and house and gubernatorial election in the past two election cycles isn’t democracy.
Well, at least not here. I don’t know what the fundamental democratic beliefs and values are from your neck of the woods.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jun 30, 2006 at 1:00 PM Tinal, sorry to disappoint you, I don’t call myself a “progressive”, I am simply a human being, I don’t live in your country , my remark about the elections is based on everything I heard and read at the time. As for your feelings towards anybody who thinks different, specially towards those who want a fairer world, with wars forever banned, enjoy while you can, have all the free entertainment you need to make you feel complete, including looking at yourself in the mirror.
Posted by Maria on Jun 30, 2006 at 1:09 PM Another of Maria’s preconceived notions:
It’s easy to brag about “bringing them on” while you continue with your life as if nothing was happening and send others to do the dirty job in your name.
How about us whose life is very much involved with the war and are doing, and have already done, our part?
Someone needs to check her assumptions and stop thinking “my way or the highway”.
That philosophy doesn’t go far in a democracy.
And I believe tina was referring to the larger tendency of liberals to eschew the liberal label. Given the proclivity of America to reject liberalism, I think that is the first thing they’ve gotten right, of late. That you believe you are a fully-actualized individual is belayed by the desultory attitude you take towards those you disagree with.
But, isn’t that your whole argument against myself and tina and the rest of those who “stole” the election?
Posted by Jay Cline on Jun 30, 2006 at 1:16 PM Will somebody please give Bush a blowjob so that the Republicans in Congress can get around to impeaching him? Tina, your unconditional admiration for the man would make you the perfect logical choice. Just grit your teeth and do your patriotic duty.
Uh, thanks, Jay.
Same to you.
Posted by Major Major on Jun 30, 2006 at 4:17 PM For a good example of how trolls like Tina are rendered absolutely useless, click here.
Posted by Major Major on Jun 30, 2006 at 8:26 PM Frankly, the network looks like another attempt to revive the Democratic Party from the left. Or, worse, like a way for moderate Democrats to capture media to the left of them before those media get (any further) out of hand. I’m reminded of the constant efforts of moderate Democrats to “professionalize” Pacifica Foundation and its radio stations.
I noticed that the media network has no mention of journalists (except for bloggers). Sure, supporting organizations that publish journalists is a good idea, but how much of the network will be devoted to actually supporting journalists and investigators? How much of the network organizations’ budgets will stay inside the organizations and how much will filter out? And where does the network stand on journalists’ owning their own intellectual property so they can make a living off it? The issue of ownership of intellectual property is central to independent journalists’ ability to raise families, buy homes, devote months to an article or book.
I don’t see awareness of these issues in the network. To revive progressive news and analysis, to blast the right-wing crap off the airwaves and web, we have to rely on independent journalists and other investigators, not on professionalized message shapers, newsmakers and liaisons.
The right-wing can achieve its goals using well-oiled organizations because organizations get along very well with money and autocracy. There’s little conflict in the relationship. Not so on the left. The left cannot use the same model as the right. Organizations in the capitialist model will overwhelm the anti-capitalist politics of the participants, who will tend to become the career bureaucrats so many of our friends, so many of us, have become, our good intentions notwithstanding. The left wing is inherently alienated by and from capitalism’s tools; attempting to bend the tools to our needs leads, at best, to reform; at worst, to bitter disillusionment and even dictatorship.
We cannot escape the need to build creatively from the grassroots up. The grassroots are the least alienated, the least capitlist. The web is an excellent model for us because so much of it is outside any organization and yet it is enormously influential. Web media didn’t become that way by establishing well-funded media networks.
This is an old story, I know. Bottom up or top down. The money’s at the top; the action’s at the bottom. Take your pick.
Posted by zootsuit on Jul 1, 2006 at 12:38 AM http://www.zeenews.com/znnew/articles.asp?aid=302012&sid=WOR
neo-cons don’t worry about poll ratings, only when it comes to fox news against air america. If you show the poll ratings on congress, bush, senate, iraq war, social security,national debt, trade debt,gitmo even the supreme court went against bush, then the poll numbers don’t count. Jerry spinger has higher polls than fox news, and the number 1 news paper is the inquirer, a rag mag. That’s the level of mentallity in our nation. That’s why fox news, rush drug addict limboob, orielly sex offender are saying their number 1, they are at the same level as the rag mags and jerry springer. It doesn’t make them good just intertaining. People love dirty laundry and people fighting on tv and fox news gives you alot of that.
That’s why they have to keep telling you it is fair and balanced because people are to stupid to figure that out.
Posted by brian28 on Jul 1, 2006 at 10:07 AM Right-wing pundits in Internet ratings freefall
RAW STORY
Published: Friday June 30, 2006Print This | Email This
Many well-known right-wing media figures—including Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter and Bill O’Reilly—are losing their Internet audiences, according to an analysis of Web site ratings by IPD Group and U.S. Politics Today.
On the other hand, traffic for Moveon.org has risen.
On Thursday, Shakespeare’s Sister checked other sites from the right and left at the same tracking service, Alexa.com, used in the analysis.
According to the blogger, Free Republic, Hugh Hewitt, World Net Daily, and Pajamas Media have all suffered at least a 19 percent decline, while the traffic at Raw Story, Crooks and Liars, and Think Progress has risen.
A release issued by IPD Group reads:
#
An odd thing seems to have happened to mighty right-wing talking head media juggernaut. They are still talking, but fewer people seem to be listening—at least on the Internet.Alexa.com—http://alexa.com—which is owned and operated by Amazon.com, tracks online usage for all Web sites, large and small. At Alexa.com, you can check a site’s activity up to the minute, or follow its trail back for many years.
At U.S. Politics Today, we thought it might be interesting to see how the right-wing media machine was doing. Not well, it turns out.
During the past three months, for instance, http://rushlimbaugh.com traffic ranking has declined 18 percent. He still huffs and puffs away daily on radio, but advertisers might want to double check the size of his audience. If the bottom has dropped out on him online, it likely has had a similar trend line with his radio show.
Even Fox News, that gold standard of right-wing media, is down 13 percent. Here are the numbers: http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=www.foxnews.com
Ann Coulter is coining money by attacking widows and orphans—a new game for her since she’s run out of Democrats, living and dead, to defame and verbally pillage. You would think with all of the attention the promotion of her new book has given her would raise visitor numbers at her Web site, http://anncoulter.com. Nope. Traffic there is down 10 percent.
The audience chart reversal seems to be common across the entire right-wing side of the Internet viewing board. Billoreilly.com—http://billoreilly.com—has dropped 40 percent in the past three months. Townhall.com—http://townhall.com—that once popular center for right-wing news and commentary, has fallen by 24 percent. The Washington Times Web site is down by 27 percent. And Matt Drudge, once the hottest right-wing name in Internet sites? Alexa.com says http://drudgereport.com is down 21 percent.
Could it be that Internet users are getting tired of political sites in general? Maybe so. But http://moveon.org is up 13 percent in the same period.
President Bush’s fall from grace has been well documented by poll-after-poll. The unpopularity of Congress may not be at historic lows, but those 20-something level of support numbers can’t be comforting to those who manage things on Capitol Hill.
It seems logical that with enthusiasm draining from the right- wing movement that put the president and the current Congress in place, the media chorus that has lavished praise on them all these many years would be affected by the change in fortune.
And so it seems, looking at the Alexa.com numbers—if they are to be believed. Those graph lines may not directly parallel the decline in GOP poll numbers, but they are all heading in the same direction—down.
Posted by brian28 on Jul 1, 2006 at 6:48 PM A reputed historian, representing a profession that is usually very circumspect about making sweeping judgments, recently speculated that President George W Bush could go down as the worst president in U.S. history.
Sean Wilentz, a professor of history at Princeton University, wrote that great presidents, “Presented with arduous, at times seemingly impossible circumstances, they rallied the nation, governed brilliantly and left the republic more secure than when they entered office.”
By contrast, “Calamitous presidents, faced with enormous difficulties—James Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, Herbert Hoover and now Bush—have divided the nation, governed erratically and left the nation worse off.”Current public opinion, which is notoriously fickle, seems to reflect Wilentz’s view. Bush’s favorability ratings have been hovering around 30 percent. According to Gallup Poll, which has measured presidential job approval ratings since the 1940s, only four presidents, Richard Nixon, Harry Truman, Jimmy Carter and the first George Bush, have ranked lower and none recovered.
During his 1980 presidential bid, Ronald Reagan posed a dramatic question that resonated with the electorate and crucified then Pres. Carter. “Are you better off than you were four years ago?” A recent poll found that a resounding two-thirds of the American public believes the country is worse off than when Bush assumed office. Some 70 percent think it is on the wrong track; more than half consider Bush dishonest and untrustworthy.
Gross ineptitude, reckless politicking even with national security, nepotism, cronyism and sleazy corruption are at the root of Bush’s failed presidency. The administration politicized national security after 9/11 by stoking fear for the sole objective of mobilizing public opinion. Shallow and incompetent political cronies, hucksters, personal friends and business associates were rewarded with plush appointments and contracts by the Bush administration.
Disastrous as Bush’s incompetence and nepotism have been and the terrible price the country has paid as a result in precious resources and lives in the politicized war on terror and the misadventure in Iraq, Bush’s most dangerous legacy is the erosion of America’s vaunted traditions of civil rights and liberties, which served as a beacon around the world.
The first decade of the 21st century will go down in ignominy with the Red Scare of the McCarthy era, the Alien & Sedition Acts of 1798 and the persecution of dissenters in World War I and World War II. The Bush administration has used terrorism in this decade, much as McCarthy used communism.
In the name of the war against terrorism, the Bush administration has engaged in unconstitutional and criminal abuses, including kidnapping people, torturing suspects or rendering them to other countries for torture, holding prisoners without trial and sometimes without even access to attorneys and family in Guantanamo Bay and other secret gulags, and warrantless tapping of emails and telephones of U.S. citizens.
These egregious abuses have been made possible because the Republican majority in the Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives failed in its constitutional oversight responsibilities. With two-and-a-half years still remaining of the Bush term, the prospect that we are living under an incompetent and unchecked president in such perilous times ought to be sobering.
Fortunately, the American public will get an opportunity later this year for some damage control during the midterm Congressional elections. We hope that they will restore some semblance of checks and balances on a reckless, inept and constitutionally unrestrained chief executive by electing Democratic majorities in both houses so that proper investigations can be undertaken and constitutional speed breakers installed until the long Bush nightmare comes to a welcome end in 2008.
Posted by brian28 on Jul 1, 2006 at 6:54 PM The mainstream media’s incessant, excited chatter about a looming Bush Bounce represented just the latest embarrassment in an endless parade of journalism missteps during the Bush years. The depressing puppet show--senior White House aides announce things are great, conservative ‘news’ outlets echo the spin and then MSM journalists gamely play along--has become annoying, tiresome and transparent. Yet the MSM won’t stop embarrassing themselves.
Two problems with the contagious Bush Bounce story: a) the Bounce was all but non-existent, with three of the last four national polls (USA Today, WSJ-NBC, CNN) showing no statistical movement whatsoever for Bush following last week’s wildly hyped “wave of good news” (AP).
And even more importantly, b) when it was eagerly misleading news consumers about how Bush was about to enjoy a big bump in the public opinion surveys, the press provided virtually no context regarding exactly where Bush stood in the polls. Yes, some journalists noted in passing that Bush’s job approval ratings had vaguely fallen during his second term. But notice what is not reported and discussed in polite Beltway company--that Bush is an historically unpopular president. Period. (Fact: If Bush doesn’t post an approval rating gain soon, he’ll trail only Richard Nixon in establishing the longest sub-40 job approval rating streak in modern American history.) Journalists routinely refuse to put Bush’s sorry standings in any sort of perspective. Instead, they go to extraordinary lengths, as they have throughout the last two years, to avoid spelling out the obvious--it would take an hydraulic lift to get Bush’s approval numbers back into the realm of respectability, let alone popularity. i.e. Bush would need a 25-point spike to equal the lofy heights President Clinton reached during his second term.
But the press’ see-no-evil approach is nothing new. They played the same game at the time of Bush’s second inauguration when there was clear evidence of immediate and widespread buyer’s remorse among voters. From my book, “Lapdogs: How the Press Rolled Over for Bush”:
It was not surprising that awed reporters and pundits, carrying on about Bush’s mandate and his lofty stature were so slow to acknowledge that Bush at the time of his second swearing-in stood as an historically unpopular president. On Jan. 20, a New York Times/CBS poll revealed Bush’s job approval rating was just 49 percent, marking the worst Inauguration Day approval rating for any president since modern day polling began nearly 80 years earlier. On the day of Bush’s swearing-in, even as they searched for topics to discuss during the all-day coverage, television pundits politely avoided mentions of Bush’s poor standing. Over the course of four hours of continuous inauguration coverage from 8 am to noon (collectively, that’s 24 hours among the three networks and three all-news cable channels), the topic of president’s (historically poor) approval ratings came up exactly four times.
If, in the coming days, the next batch of presidential surveys match the findings of USA Today, WSJ-NBC and CNN--that Bush received no “turnaround” in the wake of widely trumpeted good news--then it will be obvious the American people have closed the book on Bush. That their minds are made up, they’re not going to give him another serious look, and that barring a truly seismic event, Bush will be relegated to serving out his term as a political has-been. That’ll be the verdict of the American people. The MSM of course, will come to a much more comforting conclusion.
Posted by brian28 on Jul 1, 2006 at 7:03 PM The national debt is $8.3 trillion and climbing. Let me write out the entire number so you can get a sense of how much money that is. The U.S. debt is estimated at $8,382,069,710,723. If you divide the debt among every man, woman and child living in the United States, each of us owes $28,035.
The national debt is just one of many unsolved problems plaguing this country.
More than 45 million Americans don’t have health insurance.
Millions of Americans live below the poverty level. The national minimum wage is $5.15 and Congress has repeatedly rejected calls to raise it for an estimated 7.3 million Americans.
More than 12 million illegal aliens are living among us, as thousands of immigrants sneak into our country daily.
The war in Iraq and Afghanistan is more than three years old and has drained $400 billion from our treasury, with no end in sight for either conflict.
Gas prices have eaten away at the incomes of most working Americans and Congress hasn’t lifted a finger to curtail the runaway profits of multinational oil companies.
Cable companies have increased their rates more than 50 percent higher than the rate of inflation in the past decade.
Our infrastructure (roads, bridges, highways, sewer plants) is crumbling around us.
So what has Congress been doing to fix all these problems? Not much.
Your congressman has been busy collecting lots of money from lobbyists and corporate interests so he or she can return to Washington, D.C., for another two years (or six years in the case of the U.S. Senate).
But Congress did find time from its busy schedule to give itself a pay raise.
Despite record low approval ratings (which are much deserved), lawmakers accepted a $3,300 pay raise on June 13 that will increase their annual salaries to $168,500.
The 2 percent cost-of-living (COLA) raise was the seventh straight pay raise for members of the House and the Senate.
There was a time when lawmakers routinely turned down the annual COLA, but the Republicans who have controlled Congress for the past decade decided they wouldn’t mind more money in their pockets.
Since 1989, Congress voted to make annual cost-of-living pay increases automatic unless the lawmakers voted otherwise. And guess what? They’ve forgotten to turn down the money ever since.
The pay raise didn’t get much coverage in the media. I don’t recall a press release from my congressman saying what a wonderful job he’s doing and how he deserves more money.
The pay raise was hidden inside the annual Transportation and Treasury Department spending bill. Members of Congress may be greedy, but they’re not stupid. They’ll take your money, but they won’t be up front about it.
The bill gave government civil servants get raises of 2.7 percent, the same as military personnel will receive, according to the Associated Press. Under a complicated formula, the increase translates to 2 percent for members of Congress, the AP reported.
Who’s going to notice a measly $3,300 more for members of Congress when these public servants have run up an $8.3 trillion debt?
Posted by brian28 on Jul 1, 2006 at 7:13 PM What about Brian.... Is he ready to snap or what?
How would you like to be that guy? lol....
Can anyone say POSTAL !!!!
lmao....
PS - Brian, you want to seek some professional help.
Posted by tina1 on Jul 2, 2006 at 11:25 PM How goes it, Tina?
You say “fellaytio” and George says “fellahtio”?
The future of the nation rests upon your slender shoulders.
Posted by Major Major on Jul 3, 2006 at 9:04 AM I know truth hurts, keep your blinders on tina1.ann coulter is the michael moore for the neo-cons. Eagerly waiting for her next melt down. lol!!!
Posted by brian28 on Jul 3, 2006 at 12:33 PM That’s why her book is #1. She plays you libs like a drum.
Posted by tina1 on Jul 3, 2006 at 3:14 PM July 2, 2006 – Conservative scribe Ann Coulter cribbed liberally in her latest book, “Godless,” according to a plagiarism expert.
John Barrie, the creator of a leading plagiarism-recognition system, claimed he found at least three instances of what he calls “textbook plagiarism” in the leggy blond pundit’s “Godless: the Church of Liberalism” after he ran the book’s text through the company’s digital iThenticate program
Barrie says he also ran Coulter’s Universal Press columns from the past 12 months through iThenticate and found similar patterns of cribbing.Her Aug. 3, 2005, column, “Read My Lips: No New Liberals,” about U.S. Supreme Court Justice David Souter, includes six passages, ranging from 10 to 48 words each, that appeared 15 years earlier in the same order in an L.A. Times article, headlined “Liberals Leery as New Clues Surface on Souter’s Views.”
But nowhere in that column does she mention the L.A. Times or the story’s writer, David G. Savage.
Her June 29, 2005, column, “Thou Shalt Not Commit Religion,” incorporates 10 facts on National Endowment for the Arts-funded work that originally appeared in the same order in a 1991 Heritage Foundation report, “The National Endowment for the Arts: Misusing Taxpayers’ Money.” But again, the Heritage Foundation isn’t credited.
bill and hilary clinton’s books were number#1 also.They did not have to plagiarize their books and make money off of other people’s misery.
Posted by brian28 on Jul 6, 2006 at 5:20 AM Brian,
Let’s do the math. The book is 281 pages. iParadigm sites three instances for a total of 82 words.
http://www.nypost.com/news/nationalnews/copycatty_coulter_pilfers_prose__pro_nat tionalnews_philip_recchia.htm
I wonder if your posts would pass that muster.
Speaking of your claims of factual integrity,
bill and hilary clinton’s books were number#1 also.They did not have to plagiarize their books and make money off of other people’s misery.
Care to provide the citation for that claim?
Posted by Jay Cline on Jul 6, 2006 at 1:55 PM J.C.,
You’re right - I do think Tina’s saying something. She’s saying “I’m a complete nutcase!”
Posted by drphonic on Jul 7, 2006 at 5:44 AM Well , it seems Redhorse got to the dance a little late.....The nation called Amerika , has always been in an information ditch.....Progressive news media will take time to digest , because most US citizens are living in a time warp....Understand...if Bush can get elected twice....regardless of whatever happens at the polls, proves that most voters have no idea of what is going on in the world , or the impact of their collective conditioning to dumb down the effects....
The self-centered ignorance that is basically the amerikan way of doing things...child-like in it’s inability to take responsibility for the wrongs that it has prepetuated...will have to mature slowly…
As this maturation process takes place....a more progressive outlook will follow....the old conservatives of the past...will most likely take back the republican party...get rid of that whole neo-con right-wing religious crowd...and hold the line on so-called traditional values....
Progressives and free thinkers will branch out....a new pedagogy of collective thought and action will manifest itself...and progress will continue.....This must take effect...if humans are to survive....
The fact of this debate....proves the point.....
This is why extremely repressive regimes...imprison writers , artist , journalist....etc...because , the thought in and of itself,,,is damaging to the agenda of the less progressive members of that society…
Repressive agendas do not grow...they stagnate...they do not look for a better way to do things unless it’s for self-serving reasons, because that upsets their egg cart ....that’s the basic nature of conservatism....
Posted by Redhorse on Jul 18, 2006 at 7:29 PM Major Majors post on the pentagon and conservatives mental disorders...is interesting because...To expect change...by doing the same thing over and over again...is the definition of insanity....
Neo-Conservatives expect the world to change into their vision of a just reality...but they employ the same old tactics....with the same old results...good for them...bad for everybody else....They’re like Peter Pan , the boy that never grows up...that would drive anyone insane....
A more progressive news media is a sign of maturity in amerikan culture...growth....
Air Amerika is not my source for information....reading books...publicly funded radio....juxtapositioned against main stream news media is OK…Now as far as Tina and JC...ANYTHING...that is not tailored to the nero concerns of their immature world or local community viewpoint is label “liberal “....but these people are open to dialog.....? ok right…
I see two scared little people...dreaming of the prince...asking them to the big dance...but the reality is....they are nobodies in a political structure that doesn’t include them...unless both of these folks are filthy rich none of this stuff the neo-cons do is for them....they’re suckers...plan as the wart with the single strand of hair on Tina big nose.....
Posted by Redhorse on Jul 18, 2006 at 8:03 PM Repressive agendas do not grow...they stagnate...they do not look for a better way to do things unless it’s for self-serving reasons, because that upsets their egg cart .... To expect change...by doing the same thing over and over again...is the definition of insanity....
Sounds like the perfect epitaph for the welfare state. Mind if I use it sometime?
Posted by Jay Cline on Jul 19, 2006 at 4:53 AM Yea....right....welfare for who....the rich....Socialism for the rich....Capitalism for everybody else....So my questions to you is...one , do you work. ?...Two , if you DO work , to support yourself and your family...why do you guys , kiss up to a regime that only cares about the “rich”....?
Posted by Redhorse on Jul 19, 2006 at 5:21 AM yes and yes
Wonderful stereotypes you have there.
Pity they reflect your own imagination more than reality.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jul 19, 2006 at 9:08 AM During the 80s, the Soviet Union, desperate to show the superiority of command economies over free market economies, created a film showing the depravity of America and how it treats its poor. Unfortunately, the film backfired as the only thing the Russian audience noticed was that in America, even the poor could afford televisions. You think they would have learned their lesson with Krushchev’s kitchen!
What is your definition of an economically progressive society? One that ensures that equality of outcome reigns supreme? or one that despite gross inequalities of outcome, even the poorest of that society is generally richer by orders of magnitude than the rest of the world?
Even that den of vipers, that cauldron of inequities, that cabal of authoritarian thugs, the United Nations, acknowledges that free democratic capitalistic societies offer their people better fare than the rest of the world.
(all yearly statistics were taken for the most recent year that the UN has the most complete data)
In 1996, of the poorest 98 countries in the world, 14% of the population made less than $1 a day, 39% were below that nation’s poverty line and of the 122 poorest, 24% of the population is undernourished. One wonders why the UN does not provide this statistic in their table for all countries? Certainly if these statistics were that high in a democratic society, as all Western capitalistic countries are, there would be riots in the streets.
In 2000, of 196 countries, the mortality rate of children under 5 was 64 for every 1,000. In just the industrialized, capitalistic West, it was 0.5 - 128 times smaller; infant mortality rates were 44 and 0.5 respectively (88 times smaller); maternal mortality rates were 3.0 and 0.1 for every 1,000 live births respectively (30 times smaller).
In 2001, of 165 countries, the percentage of population with access to improved sanitation was 65%. In just the industrialized, capitalistic West, it was 100% (although only 8 were actually listed - again, why?). Of 220 countries, the slum population as a percentage of households with access to secure tenure was 30%. Again, in capitalistic countries it was 7.9%. Access to improved drinking water, out of 177 countries in 2002, again: 81% versus 100%
Note: in the last two paragraphs, the statistics for the industrialized, capitalistic countries was included in the global figures as well.
Dude! If that is your definition of successful progressive societies, count me out!
Posted by Jay Cline on Jul 19, 2006 at 11:24 AM Jay Jay.....Dude...the article is about , establishing a progressive media to offset the current trend of corporate media consolidation by neo-conservatives.....What does a treaties on free market economics vs socialist market economics have to do with the progressive press movement in the US....The Redhorse did not ask for your opinion on the Soviet economy...much less care , about that opinion.....But....sense you are in a sharing mood...ok....the soviet economy collapsed because the west , who were basically the main financiers to the Soviet block...pulled there money....Now if you are poor...it don’t matter whether you got a TV or not.....I’m sure economically challenged folks are not seating around comparing their life to folks in Russia....all that stuff is just Jay Jay massaging his own ego.....
Now sense you do work...and I assume you are not wealthy....economically speaking....you still did not answer for those kissy kiss pucker up sounds you keep making in the neo-con direction....
Further do you believe that the US at 5% of the world population, can continue to eat up 80% of the world resourses....You seem rather proud of the fact that FREE market economies...expropriate these resourses...for there own use,seldom if ever compensating the provider nation FAIRLY....
Finally....Jay Jay....your ethnic heritage is of very little concern to this Horse....black , white , yellow , red or a combination there of....if you get on this Horses back...talk’in that neo-con friendly crap...you will get bucked............seen
Posted by Redhorse on Jul 19, 2006 at 3:22 PM Major Major....checked the link you gave on June 30....interesting....I have to agree with some of the responses....too little , too late....
Ran into Tinhead Tina over there......same ol’ nasty _itch.....that girl is like a rash....someone give that _itch some anti-_itch cream............
Tina and JC will never admit it....but there is considerable detachment from the party line...among rank and file republicans.....
Posted by Redhorse on Jul 19, 2006 at 3:44 PM Dude, I was not responding to the article. I was responding to your assertions about socialism and capitalism.
I see you have no answer.
As far as the 5:80 ratio, I believe I already answered that. Let me help you (as I obviously have in the past) by dumbing it up for you and ask you how much of the world’s GDP that measly 5% produces.
You do know the definition of efficiencies, no?
Jay Jay.. haven’t been called that in a while.
Welcome back, oh vacuous one.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jul 19, 2006 at 4:15 PM This is typical republican nonsense...attack the strength of your adversary.....not interested....`if you have something to say about the article....Redhorse is all ears...ready to run......
Posted by Redhorse on Jul 19, 2006 at 4:31 PM Assertion it is not.....The rich use socialism to get richer...taxpayer dollars for new baseball staduims as an example.....then they sell shmuks like you on the concept of capitalism and free market economics...what they mean is “ FREE “money for them...you pay dummy....you are being “PIMPED “....Johnny
Classist , egregious and ostentatiously crippled......
Posted by Redhorse on Jul 19, 2006 at 4:58 PM Still unwilling to address reality?
If the bottom quintile of America is orders of magnitude better off than half the world’s population, then we are doing something wrong??
Given the mortality figures from the UN, I guess only rich people are having babies?
Stop rabbiting from the argument. If capitalism is non-progressive, even regressive, explain the reality of those stats.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jul 19, 2006 at 7:49 PM First.....The only reason capitalism worked ,was because of 300 hundred years of force FREE labor....read Capitalism and Slavery by former Trinidad Prime Minister Eric Williams....no such wealth could be amassed without that crime......so there are more crumbs too chase....Why is it that these other nations are struggling....history points to a theft of resourses , IMF / World Bank PREDATORY LOANS , US backed corrupt leadership....sanctions , like those that killed 500,000 children in Iraq , because medical supplies needed could not get in the country , nonpayment of reparational funds.....Redhorse has not checked for factual integrity of your so-called facts...but one doesn’t have to see the stench , to know that something stinks....Informational facts on the .net are like a cartoon...we all know a coyote walks on all 4 feet...but the wily coyote runs around on two feet....right off of the cliff...or dropping a boulder on his own head....don’t be a girlie-manish wily coyote...don’t be true to the ‘ toon....
But again...the discussion is about the article....the progressive media , and stratigies for a more comprehensive destribution of information…
Why do all right-wing neo-cons, love to imitate Carl Rove...Jay Jay Cline stick to the topic.....
Posted by Redhorse on Jul 20, 2006 at 5:01 AM CNN.com.....US mortality rate for newborns second worst worldwide....2 million newborns die within 24 hours after birth on a yearly worldwide basis...US SECOND ON THE LIST OF DEVELOPED NATIONS...Second to Latvia in yearly infant mortality....Jay Cline...why do you lie....the truth is daunting....why don’t you just pull the covers over your head and stay in bed today.....
Oooops....that dumb....wily one...just ran off another cliff.....Need some ACME pain killers…
The interesting point is that Redhorse galluped down your trail....google UN mortality....now how did you miss this link....looks like the Horse can read...and the Cline has on blinders.....
Oooops....here comes that boulder.........
shhwweeeeooooooooooo...............BAM............that look like it hurt....ACME medical kit JC............
Posted by Redhorse on Jul 20, 2006 at 5:14 AM LOL!
US SECOND ON THE LIST OF DEVELOPED NATIONS...Second to Latvia in yearly infant mortality
Ah rabbit. The master of deception!
I will accept your quote at face value and destroy your argument… The argument was that capitalist countries (ie DEVELOPED NATIONS) have a significantly lower mortality rate (by almost a 100 times) than the rest of the world, which is mostly authoritarian or socialist countries and most decidely NOT capitalistic.
Come now, don’t be afraid to challenge facts that you feel are suspicious.
I’m not.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jul 20, 2006 at 7:54 AM Trick question:
Why is it safe to asssume that DEVELOPED NATIONS refers mostly to countries with an effective free market?
Posted by Jay Cline on Jul 20, 2006 at 8:31 AM rabbit is down under in Aussieland....The discussion was about the progressive media...which you have not addressed in at least 8 posts…
jc.....Redhorse is qiute bored with your child-like games....if you care to discuss the article....cool...otherwise I hear the playground is open , maybe they will let you play in the sandbox.....
The so-called argument is your feeble attempt to change the subject....
Posted by Redhorse on Jul 20, 2006 at 2:07 PM Dude.
You are being as disingenuous and scatter-brained as our hapless hare.
The discussion you started was about the relative merits between socialism and capitalism.
Glad to see you capitulate to reality as poorly as your furry alter ego.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jul 20, 2006 at 2:33 PM C’mon wabbit. I know facts are hard to deal with in the realm of prisonplanet.com, but you really should make the effort.
Posted by Jay Cline on Jul 20, 2006 at 3:04 PM This is typical liberal nonsense...kettle calling black…
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