Buck Naked Politics

Another Massively Distracting "Issue"

by Deb Cupples | Paying close attention to the news can be downright dispiriting.  For me, time to recharge was a must, so I took some weeks off from blogging.

Easing back into it, my first stop today was Memeorandum, a site reflecting topics folks find important enough to blog about.  At 5:40 pm (EST) the top story (and numerous stories below it) was about the Cordoba House Project (a Muslim community center that people wanted to build  near Ground Zero in New York).

If the placement and number of stories on Memorandum's front page indicate what has attracted people's focus, then it's safe to say that the Cordoba House is utmost on tonnns of people's minds.

This reminds me of a quote from Charlie Wilson's War.  The character Gust Avrakotos (exquisitely played by Philip Seymour Hoffman) says this: 

“As long as the press sees sex and drugs behind the left hand, you can park a battle carrier behind the right hand and no one's gonna … notice.

I edited out the gerund form of the F-word, but the point still remains: some political operatives and media execs are hell-bent on distracting us ordinary folks from serious issues that affect our daily lives and our nation's future.  Several come to mind:

- Children who aren't well fed, cared for, and educated.

- People who can't face a health problem without bankruptcy. 

- Adults who still need decent-paying jobs, despite stimulus packages.

- Corporate players who still routinely rob us taxpayers.

- All the people who will suffer due to BP's oil problem.

- The government players who repeatedly failed to protect us citizen-taxpayers from the fallout of bad corporate decision-making.

Is the Cordoba House yet another issue of mass distraction?  (It's not my phrase, but I forgot who generated it).  If airtime and column inches are being given to this so-called issue, then you can bet that some people are putting serious money into it.  

And this makes me wonder: just how many "battle carriers" are hiding behind the right hand?

White House Says Fox Isn't Really News: Duhhhhh!

by Deb Cupples |  I know, you know, we all know that Rupert Murdoch's Fox is all about editorializing, not reporting news. 

More accurately, the folks tend to selectively report news items so as to support certain people's political (and personal-financial) agendas.  If selective reporting (or omissions) won't work, the folks at Fox tend to spin facts or outright lie in order to promote their financial backers' agendas.

Mr. Murdoch has a constitutional right to editorialize -- and onlookers have a right to point out that Fox is editorializing.

All that said, a White House spokesperson has said it publicly, according to The Politico:

Grayson & Tweety on Hardball: We Can't Run This Country Based on Republican Hissy Fits

by Damozel | I'm just so damn relieved that somebody is finally saying it and that the someone in question is Florida's Alan Grayson.  Watch Tweety call Grayson "a Martin Luther" and the GOP blowhards such as Limbaugh "clowns" and calls Glenn Beck "what's his name, Beck."  Grayson says that bullies always back down. 

More About Right Wing Hate Speech and the Census Taker Lynching

Yesterday, my co-blogger Bartleby did a post about Bill Sparkman, the murdered census worker and substitute teacher whose body was found hanging from a tree in Clay County, Kentucky (Time Magazine).  The word "Fed" was written on Mr. Sparkman's chest.

Naturally, people are wondering whether anti-government hate speech from certain media had whipped some Kentucky residents into a frenzy.  Right Wing Watch posted a video containing examples of such frenzy stirring (below):

It's not just media folks.  As Bartleby points out, even some taxpayer-paid politicians got in on the game:

From Media Matters: Glenn Beck & the New McCarthyism

At Commentary, conservative Peter Wehner talks about how Glenn Beck is harming "the conservative movement."

Frank Rich: Far Right Racism, Rage, and Ranting (& Where Glenn Beck's Demagoguery May be Taking Us); Obama: "It's Not About Racism"

by bartleby the scrivener | From an op-ed by Frank Rich in The New York Times:

"[T]he racist component of Obama-hatred has been undeniable since the summer of 2008, when Sarah Palin rallied all-white mobs to the defense of the “real America.” Joe Wilson may or may not be in that camp, but, either way, that’s not the news. As we watched and rewatched the South Carolina congressman’s star turn, what grabbed us was the act itself.

"What made the lone, piercing cry of “You lie!” shocking was that it breached a previously secure barrier. It was the first time that the violent rage surging in town-hall meetings all summer blasted into the same room as the president. Wilson’s televised shout was tantamount to yelling “Fire!” in a crowded theater. When he later explained that his behavior was “spontaneous” rather than premeditated, that was even more disturbing. It’s not good for the country that a lawmaker can’t control his anger at Barack Obama. It gives permission to crazy people....

"Beck has notoriously defamed Obama as a “racist,” but the race card is just one in his deck. His ideology, if it can be called that, mixes idolatrous Ayn Rand libertarianism with bumper-sticker slogans about “freedom,” self-help homilies and lunatic conspiracy theories....It’s the same crazy-quilt cosmology that could be found in last weekend’s Washington protest, where the marchers variously called Obama a fascist, a communist and a socialist, likening him to Hitler, Stalin, Castro and Pol Pot. They may not know that some of these libels are mutually exclusive. But what they do know is that they need a scapegoat for what ails them....

KosTV: Fox's Cavuto Caught on Tape Fabricating 9-12 Teabagger Count for Benefit of Fox Viewers?

by Bartleby the Scrivener | Via Countdown and KosTV:

It's all right for Fox News, I guess -- it isn't as if they pretend not to be Fox News. Original tape after the jump:

Astroturfin' USA: Widely Circulated "Ginormous Turnout" Photo Showing DC Mall Packed with Teabaggers Was from 1997?

 by Teh Nutroots |  This, to no one's surprise, from Politifact:

"[S]upporters of Saturday’s “tea party” protests...posted a photograph that showed a gargantuan crowd sprawling from Capitol Hill down the National Mall to the Washington Monument....

"Pete Piringer, public affairs officer for the D.C. Fire and Emergency Department, said the local government no longer provides official crowd estimates because they can become politicized. But the day of the rally, Piringer unofficially told one reporter that he thought between 60,000 and 75,000 people had shown up....

"[A]fter marching down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol, the crowd “only filled the Capitol grounds, maybe up to Third Street,” he said.

"Yet the photograph so widely posted showed the crowd sprawling all the way to the Washington Monument, which is bordered by 15th and and 17th Streets.

"There’s another problem with the photograph: It doesn’t include the National Museum of the American Indian, a building located at the corner of Fourth Street and Independence Avenue that opened on Sept. 14, 2004. (Looking at the photograph, the building should be in the upper right hand corner of the National Mall, next to the Air and Space Museum.) That means the picture was taken before the museum opened exactly five years ago. So clearly the photo doesn’t show the “tea party” crowd from the Sept. 12 protest.

"Also worth noting are the cranes in front of the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. According to Randall Kremer, the museum’s director of public affairs, “The last time cranes were in front was in the 1990s when the IMAX theater was being built.”" (emphasis added)

Joe Wilson's Cry Built Upon a Lie: No Undocumented Aliens Would Benefit from Health Care Reform

by bartleby the scrivener | Eric Boehlert of Media Matters calls out the press for failing to address the fact that Joe Wilson's outburst was in sober fact entirely inaccurate, giving credit where due to Times' Michael Scherer for at least taking time to fact-check the President's Speech.  

"The President's seemingly simple statement that "the reforms I am proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally" is not hard to check. In the Senate Finance Committee's working framework for a health plan, which Obama's speech seemed most to mimic, there is the line, "No illegal immigrants will benefit from the health care tax credits." Similarly, the major health-care-reform bill to pass out of committee in the House, H.R. 3200, contains Section 246, which is called "NO FEDERAL PAYMENT FOR UNDOCUMENTED ALIENS." ....

"He was claiming something — benefits for illegal immigrants — that is expressly prohibited in the major legislative efforts in both houses of Congress. He was becoming the sideshow the President wanted to spotlight, and as such Wilson handed a great gift to his political enemies, for whom he clearly has little regard."(Time Magazine)

Afghanistan Photo: Some Big Media Still Failling to Do Their Job

by Deb Cupples |  In June 2004 -- a little more than a year after the Bush Administration invaded Iraq -- I was in a London hotel watching British news as I unpacked.  The story that caught my attention was about the Bush Administration's banning photographs in U.S. media of the flag-draped coffins  containing  the corpses of U.S. soldiers who had died in Iraq.

Obviously, some U.S. government officials had wanted us taxpayers to fund and emotionally support the Iraq war, but they did not want us to actually see some of the upsetting costs of that war.

I am reminded of the 2004 news clip by yesterday's flare up, after Defense Secretary Robert Gates whined about  the Associated Press's having run a photo showing a fatally wounded U.S. Marine in Afghanistan, Lance Cpl. Joshua M. Bernard.  You can see the photo at Editor and Publisher, which Greg Mitchell describes as follows:

"It was not a one-off bit of "sensationalism" but part of a tasteful and remarkable tribute package profiling the dead Marine and the experience of the photographer, Julie Jacobson, who was there to capture his final moments before he was gravely injured. He later died, three weeks ago."

It's bad enough that a publicly paid government official 1) tried to interfere with the First Amendment right to a free press, and 2) tried to persuade news media to shirk its moral duty to accurately inform us citizens.

What's worse is that some big and trusted media outlets did what Mr. Gates asked.

Investigative Filmmakers Barred From China

posted by Bill:  Filmmakers Jon Alpert and Matthew O’Neill were barred from visiting the Bejing Independent Film Festival this week.  The Chinese government denied the pair visas to travel to the festival, where they hoped to speak with audiences of their HBO documentary, “China's Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province.”  Their film follows the struggles of parents whose children were killed during the earthquake in the central Chinese province last May.  These children were among thousands who perished when approximately 7,000 substandard classrooms collapsed during the quake.

The scandal that erupted over the deaths of the children has sparked a controversy that continues to rage.  The term "tofu-dregs schoolhouses" has now become a derisive Chinese name for the shoddy and corruption-ridden construction process behind the structures that suffered mass casualties of schoolchildren during the disaster.  See today’s NY Times article and the film’s site for more information.

(Cross-posted at Bill’s Big Diamond.)

Gah. Megan McArdle, Glibertarian, Live at WaPo

by Teh Nutroots | Gah. Whoever offered her a platform at The Washington Post needs to be forced to read her musings every day for the next year as a penance. 

McArdle: "Facts I Did Not Know"

TBogg:  "We're gonna need a bigger internet."  

Even so.  If you want a break from reality, catch McArdle in the process of demonstrating how much her reach-- as TBogg points out (though he's funnier) -- exceeds her grasp.

Update:  TBogg reviews McArdle (First we get rid of all the sick people.  Then we won’t need insurance. Profit!)  "I think, after this, we can officially designate Megan McArdle as the America's Stupidest Blogger™."

Brad at Fire Megan McArdle:  "Note that every single number she came up with to support her argument was hypothetical, and based on willful ignorance of reality..."

Susan of Texas: "A hypothetical is not a statistic. A statistic is a fact that can be verified, not a guess, and McArdle just admitted she made a guess. That guess was the entire basis for her argument against health care reform."

Jon Stewart: Fox Has Become "Liberal"

posted by Deb Cupples |  As usual, the Daily Show's Jon Stewart speaks for himself (video is about 8 minutes):

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Fox News: The New Liberals
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Healthcare Protests

The Daily Show: Fox News Finds Cloud Behind Silver Lining of Journalists' Release?

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
William Jefferson Airplane
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Spinal Tap Performance

Corporate Media Moguls Protect Commercial Interests by Silencing Valid Criticism

by Deb Cupples |  The New York Times reports that some folks at Fox and MSNBC (owned by General Electric )  held a private "summit," at which they agreed to stop allowing Keith Olbermann and Bill O'Reilly to go after each other -- despite the fact that both networks had seen ratings increases (which usually means bigger ad revenues) since the two TV personalities started openly attacking each other. The Times states:

"The reconciliation — not acknowledged by the parties until now — showcased how a personal and commercial battle between two men could create real consequences for their parent corporations."

Well, sure.  Consistently one of our nation's top-20 federal contractors, General Electric has made billions off the contractor-friendly politicians that Bill O'Reilly and other folks at Fox dupe ordinary, hardworking Americans into voting for. 

Why would GE allow one of it's own talking heads to so effectively discredit the deceptive cheerleaders at Fox?  My guess is that the ad revenues resulting from MSNBC's higher ratings (when Mr. Olbermann exposes Mr. O'Reilly for the unabashed liar that he is) are not quite as large as the revenues from government contracts. check out the table below:

Iran Wants Public Talks with US: What's Really Happening in Iran?

by Deb Cupples |   CNN reports:

"I will go to the United Nations and will invite Obama to negotiations," Ahmadinejad said, adding that such talks would be "in front of the international media, not a sit-down behind closed doors in order to talk about matters."

"The Obama administration has sought dialogue with Iran but also criticized the government for its handling of unrest after disputed presidential elections.

"Last week, Obama said Iran's government must justify itself not in the eyes of the United States, but in the opinion of its own people."

I have no opinion on Iran's recent election, having been thousands of miles away when it occurred.  But given the irregularities during Elections 2000 and 2004, are U.S. officials the best folks to criticize other people's elections?   CNN continues:

Media Should Leave Sarah Palin Alone

by Deb Cupples |  Today, The Politico ran a story entitled "Palin Story Sparks Family Feud," which is about a recent Vanity Fair story that reportedly "has touched off a blistering exchange of insults among high-profile Republicans over last year’s GOP ticket – tearing open fresh wounds about leaks surrounding Palin and revealing for the first time some of the internal wars that paralyzed the campaign in its final days."

What dramatic, attention-grabbing words: "blistering," "insults," "wars."  But is there really a fresh story here? 

A year ago, numerous big Republicans were downright distraught over Candidate McCain's bizarre choice of a running mate.  Whenever Ms. Palin did a televised debate, you could hear the thunderous sound of Republican operatives, nationwide, simultaneously slapping their own foreheads silly when Ms. Palin attempted to address issues of national importance.

The Right Wing Media's Role in Fostering Domestic Terrorism

by Teh Nutroots | Remember the great Furore o' Right Wing Fury a few months back when the DHS published a report stating that right wing extremism and the threat of right wing extremism was on the rise in the US?  No?  If not, please see "Dept of Hollow Laughter: Right Wingers Incensed Over DHS Report on Rise of Right Wing Extremism," published on April 15 at this very blog.  And while you're at it, see also Bill Kav's piece yesterday on the increasingly scary rhetoric coming from right wingers who watch Fox News.

In re: the DHS report that had certain vocal conservatives up in arms last April, Paul Krugman says:

Yet Another Corporate-Backed Group Tries to Dupe the Voting Public

by Deb Cupples |  Yesterday, Raw Story ran an interesting piece about an age-old story: big corporate interests' creation of sham "non-profit" groups that use misleading labels and create false impressions simply to dupe ordinary voters into unwittingly fighting for big corporate interests.

 The Raw Story piece begins:

"Corporate interests posing as a grassroots conservative group are behind attacks on President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, a RAW STORY investigation has found.

The Terroristic Tiller-Murder: More Evidence that the Wall Street Journal is Just a GOP-Propaganda Rag

  by Deb Cupples  |   The folks at the Wall Street Journal certainly do have a First Amendment right to publish articles about whatever topics they choose.  I don't take issue with that.

But I do wonder about the WSJ editors' motives sometimes.  Today, for example, the WSJ published a piece with this title "The Religious Right Didn't Kill George Tiller." 

That may be true, in the sense that not all members of the entire so-called "religious right" conspired and pulled the trigger.

By the same token, the title's message may be somewhat false -- in the sense that some human being who was worked into a frenzy by some elements of the so-called "religious right" did gun down Dr. Tiller in cold blood -- outside a church no less.

But the truth or falsity of the WSJ's assertion is not my point.  My focus is on why the WSJ even bothered devoting costly resources to defending the so-called "religious right."