A man who lived a few doors down from Bill and Hillary Clinton was sentenced Tuesday to 25 years to life in prison for shooting and killing his wife.
In related news, my Dad was invited to a Clinton inaugural ball and now he's dead. Of course those last 2 facts have no more to do with each other than the linking of the Clintons to an ex-neighbor who committed murder, but such is the power of The Clenis to still derange our MSM scribblers.
I'm really surprised to see that there have been no members of this list leaping to the defense of John Edwards this last week.
Right, Bucko.
There has been plenty of criticism of Edwards on the lefty lists I'm on. While under any other circumstances an affair is between the couple themselves, in this case it goes beyond that, because of political aspirations:
1. Both John & Elizabeth Edwards moved forward with his campaign knowing that this time-bomb could drop at any time.
2. The campaign gave donated money to Rielle Hunter's video company while the affair was ongoing.
On policy points, both Edwards' get plenty of support. But for a foolish notion to run for office while this could be used by the idiot traditional media and the wingnut Right as negative ads and ammunition, no support.
And while we're on the topic of the traditional lazy-ass media, has there been any mention of McCain's shoddy treatment of his first wife, including an affair with current wife Cindy?
"Is this another skeleton in the Democratic closet that Barack Obama must struggle to overcome?"David Gregory on the revelation of John Edwards' extramarital affair.
OK, so now we know the new ground rules. The private life of John Edwards, who currently neither seeks nor holds public office, is a legitimate story for mainstream media because he was a hypocrite and because he lied.
He mentions several Republican hypocrites, and that doesn't even include the prize: McCain, who as the Repub standard-bearer, should be held to at least the same standard as a guy who isn't running for anything anymore:
McCain, who is about to become the GOP nominee, has made several statements about how he divorced Carol and married Hensley that conflict with the public record.
In his 2002 memoir, "Worth the Fighting For," McCain wrote that he had separated from Carol before he began dating Hensley.
"I spent as much time with Cindy in Washington and Arizona as our jobs would allow," McCain wrote. "I was separated from Carol, but our divorce would not become final until February of 1980."
An examination of court documents tells a different story. McCain did not sue his wife for divorce until Feb. 19, 1980, and he wrote in his court petition that he and his wife had "cohabited" until Jan. 7 of that year -- or for the first nine months of his relationship with Hensley.
Although McCain suggested in his autobiography that months passed between his divorce and remarriage, the divorce was granted April 2, 1980, and he wed Hensley in a private ceremony five weeks later. McCain obtained an Arizona marriage license on March 6, 1980, while still legally married to his first wife.
Until McCain filed for divorce, the Reagans and their inner circle assumed he was happily married, and they were stunned to learn otherwise, according to several close aides.
"Everybody was upset with him," recalled Nancy Reynolds, a top aide to the former president who introduced him to McCain.
A female lobbyist had been turning up with him at fund-raisers, visiting his offices and accompanying him on a client’s corporate jet. Convinced the relationship had become romantic, some of his top advisers intervened to protect the candidate from himself — instructing staff members to block the woman’s access, privately warning her away and repeatedly confronting him, several people involved in the campaign said on the condition of anonymity.
When news organizations reported that Mr. McCain had written letters to government regulators on behalf of the lobbyist’s client, the former campaign associates said, some aides feared for a time that attention would fall on her involvement.
In his new memoir, “What Happened,” Scott McClellan, the former White House press secretary, said the national news media neglected their watchdog role in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, calling reporters “complicit enablers” of the Bush administration’s push for war. Surprisingly, some prominent journalists have agreed.
Katie Couric, the anchor of “CBS Evening News,” said on Wednesday that she had felt pressure from government officials and corporate executives to cast the war in a positive light. [...] At the time, Ms. Couric was a host of “Today” on NBC.
Another broadcast journalist also weighed in. Jessica Yellin, who worked for MSNBC in 2003 and now reports for CNN, said on Wednesday that journalists had been “under enormous pressure from corporate executives, frankly, to make sure that this was a war presented in a way that was consistent with the patriotic fever in the nation.”
Well that's clear enough, and us DFHs have been saying it for years. But what really shocked me was the flat out lie GE, (the owner of NBC), responded with later in the article:
A spokeswoman for General Electric, which owns NBC and MSNBC through its division NBC Universal, declined to speak about the specifics of the comments but said, “General Electric has never, and will never, interfere in the editorial process at NBC News.”
That statement goes against all evidence:
Shortly after George W. Bush declared his candidacy for president in June of 1999, General Electric Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Jack Welch was contacted by Bush political advisor Karl Rove. Welch later informed associates that Rove told him a Bush administration would initiate comprehensive deregulation of the broadcast industry. Rove guaranteed that deregulation would be implemented in a way that would create phenomenal profits for conglomerates with significant media holdings, like GE. [...] In 1988, NBC News president Lawrence Grossman insisted to Welch that news was a public trust and should not be subjected to the same pressure to make profits that was applied to other GE units. Welch fired him.
In 1999, the GE chairman decided that it was no longer good enough for NBC News to just be profitable. Seven years of a frequently uncooperative Democratic Administration, combined with the Rove-inspired vision of spectacular profits through deregulation, now motivated Welch to take action.
He began to aggressively, but very discreetly, evangelize the gospel of corporate media as corporate lobbying tool. It was not a new concept; in the opinion of many, it was already the status quo. But from Welch’s point of view, the corporate news organizations were not living up to their potential.
The mainstream media could make George W. Bush president. [...] Welch viewed Al Gore as the candidate of the parasites. Gore voters were not the generators of wealth; they were the consumers of taxes. Welch privately described the typical Gore voter as “someone who needs all these goddamned social programs because she’s too goddamned dumb to keep her legs crossed and too goddamned lazy to get an abortion.”
One of the most amazing aspects of this week has been watching network media stars feign shock over the fact that anyone could suggest that they were "deferential, complicit enablers" of the Bush march to war. It's as though they never heard anyone ever suggest such a thing until George Bush's own Press Secretary mocked them for being meek, uncritical disseminators of government propaganda, and now -- they seem to want to convey -- they're just so confused and astonished that anyone could possibly think that about them.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm having a hard time getting worked up about the David Shuster faux pas:
Tasteless, to be sure. But like many words, pimp has morphed over the years into something different:
In the first years of the 21st century, however, a new meaning of the word has emerged in the form of a transitive verb which means "to decorate" or "to gussy." The instigation for this new definition stems from Pimp My Ride, an MTV television show. Although this new definition paid homage to hip-hop culture and its connection to street culture, it has now entered common, even mainstream commercial, use.
The biggest problem I have with MSNBC's coverage of politics is not Shuster, who has been somewhat reliable as a critic of Right-wing hackery. It's the general tone of the big guys over there, especially Matthews, who, while not using such a charged word as pimp, still says things that are far worse in their between-the-lines meaning.
My suspicion is that the bigger questions about all this have been lost on the MSNBC crew as they circle their wagons and get more and more defensive. They've sublimated their own discomfort(shame?)with this discussion by making it into a political/journalistic turf battle, when in fact, it's something much more psychological/sociological.
Matthews is somewhat deranged on this subject, because he sees the entire political system through some sort of gender prism, so he's a special case, but the other offenders could be caught up in this out of a sort of collegian loyalty which has morphed into outright hostility toward people who are "making" them feel uncomfortable with their own behavior. It snowballs to the point where nobody knows what's true anymore.
Shuster asked the right question of Rep. Blackburn and predictably the attacks followed. (Newsbusters) Whenever someone leaks info to right wing blogs—red flags should go up. Via Blue Texan:
Shuster’s apology [re: Marsha Blackburn] may have been premature. The tiny hamlet of Bon Aqua, Tenn., is where Bohannon lived in the months immediately prior to entering the Army. The Census Bureau places his home in Blackburn’s 7th Congressional District.
Why did MSNBC rush Shuster to apologize? And, more importantly, who made him do so? Or did Shuster and MSNBC just not have the info (or didn’t do the research) that Scripps dug up?
We know that Scooter Libby isn’t around anymore to call NBC and complain to the Russert’s of the world—so who is the new contact from the WH that’s putting the heat on?
FishbowlDC hears that MSNBC General Manager Dan Abrams asked David Shuster to apologize for Wednesday’s Rep. Marsha Blackburn incident and even wrote the bulk of Shuster’s on-air apology…read on
Shuster's choice of words was bad, but the overall tone of MSNBC's coverage of politics, especially the Clinton family, is pretty rotten. Matthews has his man-crush on virtually every Right-wing blowhard, and admitted on Michael Jackson's L.A. radio show that he voted against Clinton (sorry, no link, but I heard the interview). And his overall creepiness toward women is legend. But he still has a job.
Meanwhile, Shuster, who has been doing a pretty good job lately, is out on his ass.
Makes no sense. He issued a lame apology, then a real one, now let's move on. After all, when Limbaugh infamously called Chelsea a dog, did he lose his gig?
Hey Bill-O, why don't you tell us some of the good things that Von Ribbentrop did for Nazi Germany, when he wasn't occupied making 'valid points' and such?
Here's a guy of whom Joseph Goebbels was reputed to opine: "Von Ribbentrop bought his name, he married his money, and he swindled his way into office". Probably just a jealous punk.
I can see from that invidious remark alone why you might have an affinity for the vonster, but if you're going to make such vile insinuations about Herr von R., using that naughty leftie libertine Tim Robbins for an unflattering contrast...Why, that's just mean.
But let us accept for an argument the sub rosa conservative premise that liberal thought does indeed infest the news divisions and reporter's pools, and is stealthily manipulating an easily gulled public into substantial revision of their personally held beliefs.
What does this say about conservative attitudes toward that same public? Does it imply, 'Fortunately, an enlightened populace seeking a balanced viewpoint rejects this sort of claptrap out of hand'?
Or, 'Luckily, sweet impartial reason, filled to bursting with informed oversight nips this communistic drivel in the bud'?
No, it does not.
It says...'You, the public, are too stupid and consumerly to analyze and filter anything past horoscopes and The Family Circus. Thus, we must drive our talking point home before our opponents do, over and over, again and again, until you accept our filter on your subjective perception and adopt our viewpoint as your own - Because you are sheep in need of a shepherd, and we are shepherds in need of fleece and lambchops.'
That, folks, is the most poetic home run I've heard in a long time. Hit the ball right into the rockpile in center field (Angels fans know what I'm talking about).
I mean, that tired meme, expressed for eyars no matter who's in charge of the government, that the insidious and disloyal 'liberal media' are out to (insert outrageous complaint here). If that were the case, why have so many Right-wing idiots come to power in the last 27 years.
Jeebus, I'm tired of that refrain from "The Mighty Wurlitzer" of the Right. But far more importantly, so is the clear majority of America.
That's a beautiful thing. For as darkblack finishes:
Over 50% of the registered voters in the United States, 62 million people, voted for George Bush in 2004 not because a 'liberal media's web of lies' were so easily seen through and reacted against.
All the facts as we know them today were on the table then...The corruption, the cronyism, the incompetence, the lies that led to war...It was all there, and it wasn't being reported on.
Who benefited from that lack of reportage... exactly?
Indeed.
And to hear them sing baa, baa, baa, I present The Whiffenpoofs:
Long-time CBS reporter Bob Schieffer asks Presidential wannabee Mike Huckabee (no transcription, my memory):
Schieffer: Can you give me a double-dog dare pinkie swear assurance that you aren't interested in becoming someone else's Vice-Presidential running mate?
Huckabee: Well, I would consider talking with Giuliani about his becoming my running mate.
Bob, how hard is it? You've been doing this for a long time. You know damn good and well that no candidate, especially before any primaries, will give any honest answer to this question. They could be polling in negative numbers and still spin that they only have eyes for the top spot.
Don't waste my time. Waste yours, I don't care. But not mine.
(one of he most lovely bits of plagiarism ever known)
The MSM (MainStream Media) have been late to the dance in recognizing or even considering the effect of blogs on the, well, media. Often derided, and depicted as amateurish and ineffectual, the acceptance of bloggers has been slow in coming.
But our friend skippy tells us we may have a case of a Professional Writer™ who just may have, ahem, 'borrowed' from a blogger. Without attribution or credit.
Just how easy is it for Coulter to offend someone? Would any words from her mouth do the trick? To test this theory, I developed the Ann Coulter Mad Libs.™
It’s a good thing he used that ™ mark. He wouldn’t want anyone to steal his concept.
In honor of Ann Coulter’s influence on American media and politics, the Penguin Group (USA), in a joint venture with Ms. Coulter’s Random House publisher, the Crown Publishing Group, is releasing a special edition of Mad Libs titled Ann Libs.
There's more at the Patterico post. And if you follow the links to both Media Bloodhound and Stein's posts, the similarities are indeed similar!
As skippy points out in an email to me:
granted, there are no copied jokes other than the premise, but the premise, prima facie, is identical to the point approaching zero percent of difference.
New York Times reporter Jayson Blair plagiarized articles and manufactured quotations in stories, including stories regarding Jessica Lynch and the Beltway sniper attacks. He and several editors from the Times resigned in June 2003.[34]
Conservative blogger Ben Domenech, soon after he was hired to write a blog for the Washington Post in 2006, was found to have plagiarized a number of columns and articles he'd written for his college newspaper and National Review Online, lifting passages from a variety of sources ranging from well-known pundits to amateur film critics. Domenech ultimately apologized and resigned.[37]
In 1999, writer and television commentator Monica Crowley allegedly plagiarized part of an article she wrote for the Wall Street Journal (August 9, 1999), called "The Day Nixon Said Goodbye." The Journal ran an apology the same week. Timothy Noah of Slate Magazine later wrote of the striking similarities in her article to phrases Paul Johnson used in his 1988 article for Commentary called "In Praise of Richard Nixon".[33]
still, the coincidence is startlingly coincidental. As skippy suggests:
