MikeR on Sep 14 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web, MikeR's Page
Stop the ACLU“Dontcha ya hate it when Old Media outlets beat up on other Old Media outlets?”
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Lee on Sep 13 2008 | Filed under: Culture, Foreign affairs
Photos of Russian kids mounting a street protest against the banning of South Park by the state. This is no small or meaningless act.
As daily experience, one of the worst aspects of living under a repressive fascist regime is how utterly boring it is. It is a horrible experience to be a teenager in a [...]
Lee on Sep 12 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Media
Boy, this was an awfully interesting exchange. Democratic strategist Mark Penn, absurdly invited by Brian Goldsmith to argue the press has been soft on Sarah Palin, instead slams the media for counterproductively biased and vindictive coverage:
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Lee on Sep 10 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
I would agree that the ‘lipstick on a pig’ controversy is a manufactured bit of political silliness, expressly designed to fill a news cycle. But that’s pretty much all it is in my view. Jason Linkins on the other hand is taking it way too seriously. How seriously? He writes that if he owned a [...]
Lee on Sep 08 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
Andrew Cochran reports that some media organizations he’s familiar with have reassigned terrorism specialists to investigate Sarah Palin. Andrew sees this as part of a long-term decline of media interest in the threat of transnational terrorism and US counterterrorism policy, in favor of more marketable domestic political squabbling. Atlas on the other hand, takes it [...]
Lee on Sep 07 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
Tom in Paine has a blistering take on the MSNBC commentariat’s demands for the intervention of Hillary Clinton against Palin, as a kind of childhood psychodrama: “The more you listen to them the more you realize that instead of supporting Obama, a package of Pampers will do.”
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Lee on Sep 07 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
Warner Todd Huston compiles some of the more egregious untruths being promoted in mass media about Sarah Palin.
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Lee on Sep 04 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
According to a new Rasmussen poll, 51% of the public believes the media is intentionally trying to injure Sarah Palin. Only 35% feels the coverage of her has been unbiased.
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Lee on Sep 04 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, History, Media
John Podhoretz thinks the Palin speech might be among the most dazzling debuts in American political history. I don’t know about that, but I do know it was the most powerful, important, and effective speech by a vice presidential candidate since Nixon’s “Checkers.” John later notes that McCain looked relieved by it all. Again, I [...]
Lee on Sep 02 2008 | Filed under: Foreign affairs, Lee's Page, Media
The IMF has come through for Georgia in an enormous way, approving a $750 million credit line for the beleaguered republic. Beyond the much needed aid, it’s a powerful political reminder for Russia of the gargantuan economic advantage the West maintains.
But in that article notice the black banner in the feature photograph. It’s a promotional [...]
Lee on Sep 01 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
It would seem the innuendo campaign alleging the illegitimacy of Sarah Palin’s son Trig, inadvertantly uncovered a real family tragedy to media attention. As Jay Tea points out, the circumstances of that situation make it physically impossible for the campaign of whispers to have been true. Don’t wait for any apologies from the whisperers however.
[...]
Lee on Aug 31 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Lee's Page, Media
photo: Michael Levesque
It seems the international media is crawling all over the tiny town Sarah Palin began her political career in. Being fond of leaders for whom membership in the general public is a recent memory, I think it’s great to see.
Although, how strange it must be for the residents of Wasilla to suddenly have [...]
Lance on Aug 23 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
Norm Geras, as he often does, cuts away the extraneous aspects of how and why terrorism exists, as well as how the media distorts out thinking about it, and our response.
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Joshua Foust on Aug 19 2008 | Filed under: Blogs, Foreign affairs, Josh's Page, Media
Columbia Journalism Review asked me to write an essay criticizing blogger coverage of the War in Georgia. As I’m sure you can imagine, I was scathing.
While this wasn’t necessarily surprising—after all, these blogs all talk in a big circle, and tend to reference each other—it was disappointing. As Reason’s Michael C. Moynihan trenchantly observed, much [...]
Peg on Aug 18 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Media, Peg's Page
Every day, Professor Keith Burgess-Jackson reprints a Letter to the Editor from the New York Times. This offering left me gape-jawed.
The Professor’s first point is well-taken.
Where is the evidence that Barack Obama is more intelligent than John McCain? Have they taken intelligence tests?
One might argue that because Obama performed better in college than McCain, he [...]
MikeR on Aug 17 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
Say AnythingHow clueless can these folks get?
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Peg on Aug 17 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Media, Peg's Page
When you’re Speaker of the House, I guess that, in addition to all your other powers, you can make language mean whatever you wish it to mean.
PELOSI: I’m never certain of anything. Today, I would be certain. I just think that it is the opportunity for our country to move away from Washington. You know, [...]
Peg on Aug 17 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Media, Peg's Page
And now? The end of the mainstream media as we know it.
Edwards, 55, now admits that he had an affair with Hunter, now 44,in 2006, but denies that he is the father of the child she had in February. Andrew Young, another former Edwards aide, has said he is the baby’s father. In a statement [...]
Lance on Aug 15 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
I would call this ignorance, but it is worse than that. The Times reporters just believe corporations are such a honey pot they didn’t even stop to think. They just wrote.
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Lee on Aug 14 2008 | Filed under: Foreign affairs, Lee's Page, Media
Georgian television reporter Tamara Urushadze gets shot by a Russian sniper as she delivered a live report near Gori. Tough girl, she finishes the report without a tear.
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Lee on Aug 13 2008 | Filed under: Foreign affairs, Lee's Page
Russian units are on the move again in Georgian territory, apparently in violation of the truce agreement. One Russian soldier in a large convoy shouted an ominous flirtation to a press photographer outside Gori, hopefully in jest or lust:
“Come with us, beauty, we’re going to Tbilisi.”
(AP)
A week in a Caucasian foxhole will make any soldier [...]
Lee on Aug 10 2008 | Filed under: Foreign affairs, Lee's Page
When it seemed like escalation was the modal reality, outcomes looked bleak for Georgia. Dynamics change. Thus Georgia’s ceasefire in South Ossetia cannot be a bad thing under the circumstances. By putting up an initial fight, they drew the attention of the world and now in can come the international community, which is as firmly [...]
Lee on Aug 09 2008 | Filed under: Firearms, Lee's Page, Media
Cernig at Larisa Alexandrovna’s site had me persuaded for two whole paragraphs.
Now, having little taste for the fine art of distractions-from-distractions, I tend to roll my eyes at the transparently partisan diversionary tactics one sees all over the web from Democrats in defense of John Edwards (eg “who cares about a politician’s adultery when [...]
Lee on Aug 06 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
While I’d generally agree that Maureen Dowd’s style is a kind of cut-rate Dorothy Parker, there’s something to her characterization of McCain as socialite dah-ling scorned. It was inevitable that the press would consider any effort by McCain to actually win the election to be bad form (hasn’t Obama already won?). But McCain isn’t free [...]
Lee on Aug 05 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
Jon Stewart hilariously ridicules the notion that McCain’s advertising contains hidden racist and sexist messages.
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Lance on Aug 03 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Foreign affairs, Glenn Greenwald's Carnival of Fisking, History, Lance's Page, Media, Notes on the war
After 9/11 itself, the anthrax attacks were probably the most consequential event of the Bush presidency. One could make a persuasive case that they were actually more consequential.
You could?
The 9/11 attacks were obviously traumatic for the country, but in the absence of the anthrax attacks, 9/11 could easily have been perceived as a single, isolated [...]
Lee on Aug 01 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Lee's Page
Perhaps Mr. Riley’s allegation in Newsday that the McCain “Celeb” ad exposed some sort of crypto-racist subterfuge, is more widely shared among Obama’s media advocates than one might have assumed. For the queen of that kingdom evidently shares the sentiment:
The ad gave us an uneasy feeling that the McCain campaign was starting up the same [...]
Lee on Jul 31 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Lee's Page
(photo: photosan0)
Yesterday I suggested that it was unwise for Obama to have titled and predicated a video on a line from a rather slanted New York Times editorial, given the growing public perception of media bias in his favor. But he has now built an entire microsite and subcampaign on the title of that editorial, [...]
Lance on Jul 28 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Lance's Page, Media
For those of you who love New York Times bashing, I am in rant mode at Risk and Return. What a bunch of balderdash.
Also, if you want a good idea of where housing prices may go, I also have this. Charts, I have lots of charts!
Finally, I really hate the housing bill.
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Lance on Jul 27 2008 | Filed under: Foreign affairs, Lance's Page, Media, Military Matters, Notes on the war
We see this kind of thing in the press all the time:
U.S. and Afghan troops have abandoned a remote outpost in eastern Afghanistan where militants killed nine American soldiers earlier this week, officials said Wednesday.
Compounding the military setback, insurgents quickly seized the village of Wanat in Nuristan province after driving out the handful of police [...]
Lance on Jul 26 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Humor, Lance's Page
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Joshua Foust on Jun 21 2008 | Filed under: Blogs, Foreign affairs, Josh's Page, Travel
But not forevs. Tomorrow I hope on a plane and fly to Budapest, Hungary, for a well-deserved break from the grunt and grind of every day. At the tail end of the week, I shall be attending the Global Voices Citizen Media 2008 Summit. Despite some closed sessions, I’ll try to report back here what [...]
Lee on Jun 21 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
Chris Weigant demands an immediate end to the “pervasive” pro-McCain and anti-Obama bias of the media. Yeah. No word yet on when Chris will take up the equally necessary cause of converting the Pope to Catholicism.
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MichaelW on Jun 13 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Media, MichaelW's Page
R.I.P. Tim Russert:
Tim Russert, NBC News’ Washington bureau chief and the moderator of “Meet the Press,” died Friday after being stricken at the bureau, NBC News said Friday. He was 58.
Russert was recording voiceovers for Sunday’s “Meet the Press” broadcast when he collapsed, the network said.
He had recently returned from Italy, where his family was [...]
MichaelW on Jun 09 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Media, MichaelW's Page, energy, regulation
When the most recent unemployment numbers were released, the media bleated about the highest percentage increase in the jobless rate since 1986. For example, The New York Times lamented:
The unemployment rate surged to 5.5 percent in May from 5 percent, the largest monthly spike in more than two decades, as the economy shed [...]
Lee on May 31 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Lee's Page
(photo: Department of Defense)
The Obama campaign has categorically rejected John McCain’s proposal for a joint trip to Iraq, calling it a “publicity stunt.” Publicity stunt it most certainly is, but why is it automatically assumed that the publicity would only benefit McCain? Because he proposed it? Or because the facts on the ground are thought [...]
Lance on May 13 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
The New York Times thinks housing was in a bubble and prices are too high. Their solution? Try to keep housing prices too high.
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MichaelW on May 09 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Foreign affairs, Media, MichaelW's Page
It should be clear by now to anyone who frequently reads blogs that the MSM is not terribly accurate in its reporting, nor does it seem to have any intention of getting better at it. Whether you think the media leans left (as I think it demonstrably does) or right, there is no denying [...]
Joshua Foust on May 03 2008 | Filed under: Foreign affairs, Media, Military Matters, Notes on the war
This is the latest post in a running commentary on a new meme to emerge from the PR folks in Afghanistan: the security benefits of building roads. The argument, advanced by a few American reporters and one David Kilcullen, is that building paved roads reduces the IED threat and contributes to the security necessary for [...]
Joshua Foust on Apr 28 2008 | Filed under: Foreign affairs, Media
Question the timing! That old mantra from the halcyon days of 2002-4, when the Left would be mocked by the Right for wondering about the suspicious timing of terror alerts, is universally applicable to the Presidency. In the case of the Syrian nuclear facility—the underlying story of which isn’t significant—what the intelligence community is choosing [...]
Joshua Foust on Apr 14 2008 | Filed under: Media
Gawker Media has decided to sell Wonkette to managing editor Ken Layne. Missing in the “internal emails” published on both Wonkette and Politico is the key fact that after Layne fired associate editor Megan Carpentier (full Disclosure: she’s a good friend), about 2/3 of the site’s regular visitors staged a months-long boycott, tanking the site’s [...]
Synova on Apr 08 2008 | Filed under: Firearms, Media, Synova's Page
h/t Instapundit
I’m not convinced that the two incidents contrasted in this video from Ed Driscoll are similar enough to be compared to each other but he does say something that I said about the Aguilar report at the time. Someone edited, prepared, and made the decision to air the segment of her badgering the [...]
MichaelW on Mar 07 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Glenn Greenwald's Carnival of Fisking, Media, MichaelW's Page
The inscrutable and vainglorious Boi from Brazil weighs in to explain why Republicans find Obama’s candidacy “scary”:
Conservatives love to claim that Obama supporters have excess reverence for their candidate and see him as some sort of transcendent messiah figure. There is a small minority of Obama supporters — as is true for most candidates and [...]
Peg on Feb 28 2008 | Filed under: Media, Peg's Page
Many of my liberal friends believe that the line “Fox News; Fair and Balanced” is a joke. I happen to think it’s pretty accurate, but - who knows? Perhaps it is indeed my bias that lends me to that opinion.
I defy my friends on the left, however, to read this post by Ed [...]
MichaelW on Feb 28 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008, Law, Media, MichaelW's Page
THE LATEST non-issue hyped by (who else?) the New York Times is that “some” people are questioning whether or not John McCain is eligible to be a sitting President:
The question has nagged at the parents of Americans born outside the continental United States for generations: Dare their children aspire to grow up [...]
Lee on Feb 10 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
Michael Kraft takes a look back at candidate Hugo Chavez in 1998, being interviewed by Jorge Ramos for Univision. Jorge asks a series of what turned out to be extraordinarily prescient questions. In sequence Chavez denies he will shut down media companies, nationalize private industries, or criticize foreign leaders. He even pledges to facilitate and [...]
Lee on Feb 09 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
Andy Burnham, the UK’s Labour Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, was caught in thick mascara at Prime Minister’s Questions on Thursday (glamor shot here). It might seem a light affair, but the peril for the British public is substantial. As Taxtrust points out, the gentleman from Leigh with an otherwise meaningless departmental [...]
Lee on Feb 08 2008 | Filed under: Culture, Firearms, Lee's Page, Society
There’s a moment in Mark Steyn’s book America Alone, where he relates the truism that we’ve all experienced conversations with a mild-mannered, educated and seemingly rational person from the Arab world, where quite unexpectedly they say something nutty in the most casual way. “Of course the Jews planned 9-11″ for instance. As Steyn notes, when [...]
Lee on Feb 04 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
75% of Germans believe that their society is hostile to children. That’s a toxic attitude to combine with an appalling 1.3 children-per-woman fertility rate. Well below the replacement rate, the country is literally dying out over time. To attack the problem, a consortium of German advertising agencies and media firms have launched a €30 million [...]
Lee on Jan 31 2008 | Filed under: Around the Web
Arnold has to govern liberal California, Rudy had to govern liberal NYC and McCain…McCain is from Arizona. So what exactly is his excuse for his dramatic shift to the Left over time? Lest you think he has one, here’s a very good interview from Kudlow & Company with Arizona Senator Jon Kyl, who is championing [...]
Risk and Return Multinational Force-Iraq QandO