Media

Budget - Business - Canada - Capitalism - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Ethics - Germany - Government - Jobs - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Progressives - Taxes - Time Magazine - Warner Todd Huston

TIME’s Best Places to Live Does Not Include Any in the USA

December 12, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

TIME has one of those lists that we always start to see as the year comes to a close. This one is the top ten best and worst places in the world to live. Sadly, there isn’t a single place in the U.S.A. on that list.

The worst place to live on this list is, unsurprisingly, the disaster-prone (both man-made and natural-made) country of Haiti. Neither Yemen nor Iraq fare much better than Haiti. The rest of the top ten worst list is filled out with African nations — again, unsurprisingly.

But it’s the best-places list that disappoints the red, white and blue as not one of the best places in the world in which to live are in the good ol’ U. S. of A.

The “Best Quality of Living” list is:

  1. Vienna, Austria
  2. Zurich, Switzerland
  3. Auckland, New Zealand
  4. Munich, Germany
  5. Vancouver, Canada
  6. Dusseldorf, Germany
  7. Frankfurt, Germany
  8. Geneva, Switzerland
  9. Copenhagen, Denmark
  10. Bern, Switzerland

What is the deal? Why does this list diss the United States? In fact, the USA doesn’t even appear in the top 25 best places.
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TIME’s Best Places to Live Does Not Include Any in the USA”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Democrats/Leftists - Elections - Ethics - Government - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - President - Progressives - Warner Todd Huston

Old Media Fear Obama Excluding Them for 2nd Inauguration

December 12, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Old Media establishment is worried that Barack Obama is going to cut them out from his second swearing-in ceremony. As Politico reports, rumors abound that this time ’round Obama is going to hold a private ceremony, one not open to the media.

On Sunday, January 20, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts will perform the President’s swearing-in ceremony then Monday Obama will hold his public inauguration where he will be sworn in a second time in a symbolic gesture.

But Politico reports that some members of the inaugural committee have privately signaled to the press that Obama intends to exclude them from the Sunday ceremony — the one that really counts.

The White House Correspondents Association has already formally urged the Obama administration not to hold such a secretive swearing-in ceremony through a statement by issued Ed Henry, Fox News correspondent and the president of the White House Correspondents Association.
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Old Media Fear Obama Excluding Them for 2nd Inauguration”

Budget - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Ethics - GOP - Government - Jobs - Journalism - Media - Media Bias - New York City - Newspapers - President - Ronald Reagan - Taxes - The New York Times - Warner Todd Huston

Celebration: The NYTimes Finally Admitted Reaganomics Worked

December 10, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Will wonders never cease? American Enterprise Institute columnist James Pethokoukis saw something he never thought he’d see. After 30 years, The New York Times admitted that Reaganomics worked!

Pethokoukis was astounded by a Times article chronicling the steadily falling tax burden Americans have experienced since the 1980s.

The AEI money writer notes that the heart of The Times’ article is that in 2010 Americans “paid far less in total taxes — federal, state and local — than they would have paid 30 years ago.”

Pethokoukis points out that some tax hike advocates think this means that America’s tax burden is too low and time has come for a hike. But Pethokoukis disagrees.
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Celebration: The NYTimes Finally Admitted Reaganomics Worked”

Chicago - Chicago Sun-Times - Democrats/Leftists - GOP - Government - House of Representatives - Illinois - Jesse Jackson - Journalism - Liberals - Mark Kirk - Media - Media Bias - Newspapers - Progressives - Republicans - Senate - Warner Todd Huston

Sun Times Demands Sen. Kirk’s Med Records, Ignores Jesse Jackson. Jr.’s

December 10, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Withchunt: The Chicago Sun-Times once again revels in its partisanship by demanding the public release of the medical records of Senator Mark Kirk while ignoring the records of Representative Jesse Jackson, Jr.

For the Times, Phil Kadner is all upset that the U.S. government should be expected to pay for the medical bills and recovery costs for Illinois Senator Mark Kirk, a Republican who suffered a stroke last year and has since been making a steady recovery.

But the same left-wing Old Media hack isn’t calling for the records of Democrat Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr., who claims he has “bi-polar” disorder and was out of the public eye for most of the year before finally resigning in disgrace just ahead of a federal investigation into his theft of campaign funds.
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Sun Times Demands Sen. Kirk’s Med Records, Ignores Jesse Jackson. Jr.’s”

Democrats/Leftists - Government - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - President - Progressives - Warner Todd Huston

Obama Secretly Meets With His Old Media Propagandists

December 9, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

There was a secret, off-record meeting between President Obama and a passel full of extreme-left, so-called media folks last week. No, this isn’t black helicopters stuff. It really happened as the Washington Post admits.

None of these Old Media leftists are reporting what happened at the meeting, but none that have been outed, so-to-speak, for having been at the meeting are denying that they were there. They are just giving a “no comment” about what went on.

In attendance was the entirety of the MSNBC line-up. Matthews, Schultz, Maddow, the whole crew. Now, granted, these MSNBC people aren’t in any way journalists. They are pure propagandists that entertain with left-wing spin, not facts and truth. Ditto for Ariana Huffington and extremist activist Markos Moulitsas, both have admitted to being at the meeting. But many of the other participants are supposed to be real journalists.

Two of the so-called “real” journalists were Greg Sargent and Jonathan Capehart of the Washington Post. There were others but Whemple doesn’t list them by name in his Washington Post piece.

So, that raises many questions: What was said in that meeting? What was done? What assignments did the President hand out to his propagandists?
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Obama Secretly Meets With His Old Media Propagandists”

Business - Capitalism - Democrats/Leftists - Ethics - Jobs - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Newspapers - Progressives - Warner Todd Huston

WaPost: Next Struggling Paper Planning Paywall

December 9, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Washington Post is poised to initiate a paywall in 2013. The Post is one of the last major American papers to look into putting some parts of its publication behind a subscriber only Internet screen.

The Wall Street Journal reports that The Washington Post is preparing a “metered paywall” for its Internet site. A metered paywall allows readers to see a few articles per month before blocking any more access and informing the visitor that he must pay to read further.

But ahead of this new attempt to improve revenue, ThePost has been seeing a steep decrease in earnings.

The Post is dealing with a steep decline in its core business of print advertising. Its newspaper division reported an operating loss of $56.3 million for the first nine months of the year, reflecting a 14% decline in revenue to $160.7 million. The company lost its chief revenue officer in the spring, and the search for a replacement continues.

The Post has seen quite a lot of trouble recently with a shake up in leadership as publisher Katherine Weymouth canned executive editor Marcus Brauchi and replaced him with the former editor of the Boston Globe, Marty Baron.
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WaPost: Next Struggling Paper Planning Paywall”

Barack Obama - Budget - Congress - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Entitlements - Ethics - GOP - House of Representatives - John Boehner - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Nanny State - Newspapers - President - Progressives - Stimulus - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

The Hill: No GOP Opposition to Speaker Boehner’s Turnabout on Tax Hikes

December 8, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

In a myopic report on the GOP’s half of the Fiscal Cliff debate, The Hill claimed there was no opposition to Republican House Speaker John Boehner’s sudden caving in to President Obama’s demand that tax hikes accompany any solutions to the budget mess.

The Hill reported on December 4 that the GOP was “moving reluctantly toward a debt deal that would increase revenues” and that Speaker Boehner had offered some $800 billion in new taxes in his most recent fiscal cliff proposal.

How could Boehner achieve this flip flopping away from the Party’s until-now stated principles? The Hill says it’s because there aren’t any Republicans opposing the tax hikes.

The lack of immediate backlash within the conference is a key early sign for Boehner, who has made intraparty unity a priority as he seeks the strongest possible hand in negotiations over the “fiscal cliff” with President Obama.

Of course, there could be a reason for this that The Hill doesn’t mention. Boehner is purging all conservatives from his power structure.
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The Hill: No GOP Opposition to Speaker Boehner’s Turnabout on Tax Hikes”

Business - Capitalism - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Ethics - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Newspapers - Ohio - Progressives - Warner Todd Huston

Big Ohio Newspaper Cutting One-Third of Newsroom

December 8, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Cleveland Plain Dealer is one of Ohio’s biggest papers but neither size nor influence is likely to save the jobs of one third of the paper’s newsroom employees who are preparing for big cuts to hit as the new year begins.

Workers at the paper found out on Wednesday that 58 employees would likely be losing their jobs starting in 2013. That is one-third of the workforce Harlan Spector of the Northeast Ohio Newspaper Guild reported.
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Big Ohio Newspaper Cutting One-Third of Newsroom”

Anti-Americanism - Democrats/Leftists - Ethics - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Newspapers - Progressives - Warner Todd Huston

VIDEO: Famed Reporters Admit That They are Reporters First, not Americans

December 7, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

In this video, you’ll see two famous members of the Old Media, Peter Jennings and Mike Wallace, admit that if they were covering a story and were in a position to save the lives of American soldiers, they would not help the soldiers but would instead continue to “cover” the story. They both admitted that they feel they are journalists before they are Americans and that they have a duty first and only to “journalism.”

After that, Marine Colonel George M. Connell expressed his disgust with this concept. He said he had “utter contempt” for these journalists who would turn their backs on American soldiers all the while expecting American soldiers to put their lives in danger to protect the journalists.

Here is a full account of the program from which the above clip was culled as penned by James Fallows in Breaking the News, How the Media Undermine American Democracy (New York, 1997)
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VIDEO: Famed Reporters Admit That They are Reporters First, not Americans”

Crime - Journalism - Media - Media Bias - New York City - Newspapers - Warner Todd Huston

New York Post Criticized for Cover Photo of Man Seconds Before Death by Train

December 7, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

The New York Post came under heavy criticism on Tuesday for publishing a full page photo of a man on its December 4 front page taken only seconds before he was killed by a Midtown Manhattan subway train. The photo’s headline luridly read, “Doomed” and a subhead screamed, “Pushed on the subway track, this man is about to die.”

The photo showed Queens, New York resident Ki Suk Han, 58, after he was pushed onto subway tracks just as a train was pulling into the station. Mr. Han was clearly trying to climb out of the deep-set tracks, but the paper informs readers that he wasn’t able to do so and was killed by the oncoming train.

Naeem Davis, 30, confessed to the murder and is in police custody.

The paper was criticized for its “if it bleeds, it leads” style of news reporting, with one Twitter user accusing the paper of dealing in “snuff.”
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New York Post Criticized for Cover Photo of Man Seconds Before Death by Train”

ABC - Anti-Americanism - Democrats/Leftists - Ethics - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - NBC - President - Progressives - The Atlantic - The New York Times - Warner Todd Huston - Washington Post

Twitter Suggests White House is Just Like Left-Wing Commentators Sullivan, Krugman, Cuomo

December 7, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Daniel Halper recently discovered that Twitter wanted to help him out. After he chose to follow the Twitter feed of the White House, Twitter sent him a list of other accounts he might enjoy, accounts that the social media giant felt were “similar” to Barak Obama’s White House. Amusingly that list was filled with left-wing media types.

When Mr. Halper decided to follow the Twitter feed of the White House, Twitter quickly sent him an automatically generated email with some loverly suggestions. Now that he was following the White House, Twitter thought he might be interested in the following “similar” Twitter feeds:

  • Left-wing newspaper The Washington Post
  • Leftist Atlantic blogger Andrew Sullivan
  • Far left “economist” Paul Krugman
  • NBC News “First Read” blog
  • ABC News Chief Legal Correspondent Chris Cuomo

Quipped Halper, “Looks like Twitter’s algorithm, which appears to have automatically generated this email, is working perfectly.”

Just so.
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Twitter Suggests White House is Just Like Left-Wing Commentators Sullivan, Krugman, Cuomo”

Business - Capitalism - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Ethics - Jobs - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - New York City - Progressives - The New York Times - Unemployment - Warner Todd Huston

NY Times Cutting Staff Again

December 7, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Workers at The New York Times are facing more lost jobs as the paper of record initiates a new round of staff cuts in a cost savings move.

In a pair of leaked memos written by The Times’ executive editor, Jill Abramson, management informs employees of the goal of eliminating thirty more newsroom staffers.

“The economic environment has grown more difficult in the second half of the year and I must reduce costs in the newsroom,” Abramson told employees.
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NY Times Cutting Staff Again”

Children - Democrats/Leftists - Education - Ethics - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Pakistan - Progressives - Warner Todd Huston

‘Three Cups of Tea’ Author Commits Suicide

December 7, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Not long after the book Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace … One School at a Time came out in 2006 it became a best-selling sensation, but now the co-author of the book, beset by questions over whether or not the stories in the book are true, has committed suicide.

On November 14, Three Cups co-author David Oliver Relin, 49, was found dead outside Portland along some railroad tracks and under a roadway overpass. According to Multnomah County medical examiner Peter Bellant, the writer died from a “blunt force head injury.”

Relin co-authored the famed book with adventurer Greg Mortenson who was said to have made a vow to help build schools for girls in remote Pakistani villages because one small village took him in and nursed him back to health after he got lost trying to climb the world’s second highest mountain in the Karakoram range of the Kashmir-administered area of northern Pakistan.

By the early 2000s, Mortenson had joined the lecture circuit to promote his adventures and to raise funds for the Pakistani schools project. Journalist David Relin was assigned the task of writing a book on Mortenson’s cause and met the adventurer on the lecture trail in 2005 to interview him for the book project.

Their relationship was said to have been tense. Regardless, Three Cups of Tea became a huge success selling over four million copies.
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‘Three Cups of Tea’ Author Commits Suicide”

2nd Amendment - Anti-Americanism - CNN - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Ethics - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Progressives - Warner Todd Huston

CNN’s Piers Morgan Tweets Attack on Second Amendment

December 6, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

British citizen and low-rated TV host Piers Morgan of CNN sided with sportscaster Bob Costas in an attack on the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution by coming to Costas’ support in a Tweet on Monday.

“Quite incredible that Bob Costas makes an impassioned plea for less handguns,” Morgan Tweeted, “and Americans go crazy with indignation. He’s 100% right.”

The Brit compounded his lack of knowledge by Tweeting, “The 2nd amendment was devised with muskets in mind, not high-powered handguns & assault rifles. Fact.”

Sorry, Piers. Not “fact.”
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CNN’s Piers Morgan Tweets Attack on Second Amendment”

Anti-Americanism - Iran - Islam - Islamofascism - Journalism - Media Bias - Religion - Terrorism - Warner Todd Huston

Iran Caught Photoshopping Claimed Drone Invention

December 6, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Iranian military recently announced that its “scientists” had created a drone program that successfully built the first Iranian drone capable of vertical takeoff and landings. The Mullahs also released a photo to prove to the world that they had done so. But the photo of the “Iranian drone” came as a surprise to the folks at the Japanese university where the photo and the drone really came from.

For whatever reason newswire service Reuters reported the Iranian’s claims on November 4. “Iran has built an advanced drone that can take off vertically and without a runway,” the wire service reported.

The Mullahs called their drone the Koker-1.

To accompany reports of their wondrous new drone program, the Iranians included a photo of their drone showing the craft floating just above the latticework at the top of some nondescript building.

It turns out, though, that this photo was stolen from a Japanese university. Aircraft enthusiast and blogger Gary Mortimer noticed that the photo the Iranians sent out as proof of the Koker-1 bore a suspicions similarity to a photo of a tilt-rotor UAV built by Japan’s Chiba University in 2008.

The only difference between the photo the Iranians tried to palm off on the world as the Koker-1 and the photo of the UAV from Chiba University is that the Iranians photoshopped out the wind blade devices that sat on top of the building in the Chiba U. shot.

So, it’s more like the Kroaker-1.
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Iran Caught Photoshopping Claimed Drone Invention”

Democrats/Leftists - Ethics - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Mitt Romney - Progressives - Warner Todd Huston - Washington Post

Old Media Still Attacking Mitt Romney

December 6, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Remember weeks and weeks of reports on how down-in-the-mouth the defeated John Kerry was when he lost the presidency to George Bush? Remember how the Old Media establishment obsessed about how badly Al Gore felt after he lost in 2000? Me either. But we sure keep getting stories about how downtrodden Mitt Romney feels after his epic loss.

This time it is The Washington Post in a lengthy December 2 piece that portrayed the Romney’s as sad sacks that have nothing left in life but to mope around the house and feel sorry for themselves.

In this empty report, The Post tells us the Romney’s “wake up each morning now without a plan.” We find out that Romney has become “secluded” and is “marked by repressed emotions.” He’s just a mess if you believe The Washington Post.

Well, the Post must have gotten quite a lot of access to have so thoroughly assessed the Romneys mental state, right?

Maybe not:
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Old Media Still Attacking Mitt Romney”

Business - Cable - Capitalism - Economy/Finances - Fox Business Network - Journalism - Media - Media Bias - TV - Warner Todd Huston

Fox Business Network’s Dobbs Wins Demo For 11 of Last 12 Weeks

December 6, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Lou Dobbs has been enjoying an awful lot of success these days over at Fox Business Network. I’ve reported about the solid performance that Lou Dobbs Tonight has earned and this week we get yet another great ratings success for the program.

Dobbs 7PM program has scored multiple ratings wins over rival Larry Kudlow on CNBC and according to Neilsen numbers, Lou Dobbs Tonight beat Kudlow by 65 percent in last week in the demo.

Lou Dobbs has taken top marks for 11 of the last 12 weeks. He has also come out on top in 20 of the last 48 total weeks.

This is pretty good considering that Dobbs and FBN is the veritable newcomer on the block compared to the long standing CNBC programming.

With all the success that Lou Dobbs has built in 2012, next year ought to be quite interesting.
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Fox Business Network’s Dobbs Wins Demo For 11 of Last 12 Weeks”

Journalism - Media - Media Bias - Race - Slate - The Wall Street Journal - Warner Todd Huston

James Taranto Mentions Warner Todd Huston in Wall Street Journal

December 6, 2012 by

Neato. I got mentioned by James Taranto in The Wall Street Journal’s Best of the Web.

Yes, I am getting all fanboy-like. Sue me.

++++

Meanwhile, blogger Warner Todd Huston notes a two-year-old Slate piece by Ron Rosenbaum, in which Rosenbaum argues that it’s racist to prefer white meat. No, Rosenbaum isn’t speaking figuratively; he actually detects a racial subtext to one’s preference in cuts of turkey:

White meat turkey has no taste. Its slabs of dry, fibrous material are more like cardboard conveyances, useful only for transporting flavorsome food like stuffing and gravy from plate to mouth. . . .

Why have we broken the chains of the whiteness that bound us to fatally tasteless white bread while still remaining imprisoned in the white-meat turkey ghetto? . . .
Do [people] still associate white meat with refinement? It was enough to make me wonder whether there could be a racial, if not racist, subtext here. Perhaps there is a clue in the shifting fate of the “other white meat”–pork. I’ll never forget the moment when I learned the antebellum racial origin of the phrase “living high on the hog.” . . .
It hails from the plantation days, when the white slave owners dined on choice pork chops cut from “high on the hog” while the slaves made do with the lower parts of the pig–the ham hocks, the pigs feet, the pork bellies, and the innards. White meat was high on the hog, but not higher on flavor than other (often darker) cuts. Indeed the “other white meat” now available most frequently in lean and tasteless pork chops and cutlets has little more taste than white meat turkey.

On the avian gustatory question, we’re with Rosenbaum. Not only do we vastly prefer dark meat to white, we had duck for Thanksgiving. But he’s wrong about pork. All pork contains myoglobin, the substance that distinguishes white meat from dark. Try cooking a pork tenderloin medium rare, as we do, and you’ll see it’s quite mouth-wateringly pink.

But wait. One thing that white meats–chicken and turkey breasts and wings, and many types of fish–have in common is that they’re all lean meats. “Lean” is a synonym for “skinny,” which, as we know from reading Slate, is a code word for “black.”

That suggests that Obama’s choice of “white turkey chili” was not a joke at Romney’s expense but an expression of his own identity–and that Ron Rosenbaum is the real racist.

++++

Alas it is a mere mention but it is a mention nonetheless.

Americans for Tax Reform - Barack Obama - Budget - Democracy - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Elections - Entitlements - Ethics - GOP - Grover Norquist - House of Representatives - John Boehner - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Policy - President - Progressives - Regulation - Republicans - Senate - Stimulus - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Norquist: Obama’s Failed Fiscal Cliff Ideas Like a ‘Seinfeld Episode Where No Learning Takes Place’

December 5, 2012 by 2 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

Grover Norquist worries that Obama is like a bad episode of Seinfeld and might prove unable to learn from his past mistakes pushing us over the fiscal cliff whether we like it or not.

This is what Norquist, chief of Americans for Tax Reform — evangelist for the no-tax pledge that so many Republicans have signed — said in an intimate conversation today during which he laid out some ideas on how to push this debate back in our direction.

In a call with only a few conservative bloggers, Norquist laid out the problems we are facing and then went into some of the specifics, the ins and outs of negotiations, and laid out one idea that could help better inform Americans on just what the heck is going on in this debate.

The first thing of interest the ATR chief said was that we should avoid a grand budget bargain that settles everything at once. Instead, Norquist argued to continue the process of having repeated continuing resolutions. Over the last several years, instead of having a full budget passed by Congress, the House has been making do with short-term budgets called continuing resolutions (CR). These CRs fund the government for months or even weeks instead of a full fiscal year.

For his part, Norquist felt that we’ve gotten far better deals and advanced the spending cut/tax cut ball much further with the CRs than we ever could with a single, year-long budget. He also noted that the GOP had a huge amount of power by having control over the debt ceiling and would be stupid to allow the president to take that from them as he’s proposed doing.
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Norquist: Obama’s Failed Fiscal Cliff Ideas Like a ‘Seinfeld Episode Where No Learning Takes Place’”

2nd Amendment - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Guns - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - NBC - Progressives - Sports - TV - Warner Todd Huston

Sportscaster Costas Says Anti-Gun Comments Were a ‘Mistake’

December 5, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

After a player for the Kansas City Chiefs killed his girlfriend and then himself, NBC Sportscaster Bob Costas took time out of his Sunday Night Football broadcast to commit what many thought was an attack on the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Now, Costas says his remarks were a “mistake.”

During his Sunday broadcast, Costas seemed to favorably quote a left-wing commentator who decried America’s fascination with firearms.

Instantly fans and members of the media alike began to criticize Costas’ insertion of political matters into his football broadcast.

Fox News’ Brit Hume, for instance, quickly Tweeted, “Bob Costas quotes KC sportswriter to make gun control case re: Jovan Belcher murder/suicide. Cites all known gun control cliches.”
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Sportscaster Costas Says Anti-Gun Comments Were a ‘Mistake’”

Barack Obama - Budget - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Elections - Ethics - Government - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Politico - President - Progressives - Republicans - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Politico Just Realized Progressives Have Gripes About Obama

December 5, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Now that Barack Obama has been successfully re-elected, The Politico has miraculously discovered that some progressives are not exactly thrilled with the most left-wing president in American history. The lefties want more, says Politico. But, is this turn about really that sudden?

In a lengthy December 2 piece, Politico lays out the left-wing voices in the “progressive media” that have lately taken to criticizing the president for not leaning far enough to the left. If not criticizing, exactly, perhaps a more fitting word is they are “encouraging” Obama to take up the left-wing policies he’s given lip service to but not pushed too hard to implement.

The absurd aspect to Politico’s piece is that the Internet newser seems to think this criticism is all new. One has to wonder why Politico has paid no attention to the far left’s criticism until now? Perhaps Politico wanted to make it seem as if the left was united and had no qualms over Obama but now that he’s safely re-elected, it is Politico, rather than the far left, that finds it is safe to criticize the president?
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Politico Just Realized Progressives Have Gripes About Obama”

Associated Press - Barack Obama - Budget - Business - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Entitlements - Ethics - Government - Jobs - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - President - Progressives - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

AP’s False Claim That ‘Some’ Democrats Open to Entitlement Cuts

December 4, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

In a November 28 article, the Associated Press tried to give cover to Democrats by insisting that they are somehow divided over cuts in entitlements to help solve the “fiscal cliff” problem. But the truth is, Democrats are united against these cuts, not divided.

In its piece headlined, “It’s Not Just Taxes: Benefit Cuts Divide Democrats,” the AP attempted to demonstrate a “division” that doesn’t exist by citing two Democrats that meekly offered to consider cuts to entitlements.

It’s not just about taxes. There’s another big obstacle to overcome as Congress and President Barack Obama work to skirt the fiscal cliff: deep divisions among Senate Democrats over whether to consider cuts to popular benefit programs like Medicare and Medicaid.

This is flat out absurd. There are no deep divisions among Democrats over cuts to these programs. In fact, just the opposite.

This tall tale goes on to present the weak claims of “considering” cuts to these programs uttered by Senator Max Baucus (D, Montana) and Kent Conrad (D, N.D.). But one, Conrad, is retiring and the other has no support from his fellows — especially Democrat leadership — for the idea.
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AP’s False Claim That ‘Some’ Democrats Open to Entitlement Cuts”

BBC - Britain - Crime - Democrats/Leftists - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Progressives - Sex Offenders/Rape - The New York Times - Warner Todd Huston

Did NY Times New CEO Thompson Lie About When He Knew of BBC Sex Scandal?

December 4, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

A new timeline focused on the developing Jimmy Savile child molestation scandal that hit the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) this year raises further questions about what the new CEO of The New York Times knew about the crimes when he ran the network.

Mark Thompson stepped down as director-general of the BBC in September to cross the pond and take his place as the new CEO of America’s most famous newspaper, but before he did so he swore to The Times in pre-employment interviews that he never knew anything about what has become another black eye for the troubled British TV and radio network, one that was developing right under his nose when he was the BBC’s chief.

The tale began with Jimmy Savile, who died last year at 84. Savile was one of the Beeb’s most famous and flamboyant TV stars, a staple entertainer since the 1960s. But upon his death several hundred allegations have been made that he sexually abused teen girls, sometimes doing so in facilities owned by the BBC. Allegations have also been made that for decades the BBC knew all about its star’s behavior and entered into a massive coverup of the crimes to avoid public embarrassment.
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Did NY Times New CEO Thompson Lie About When He Knew of BBC Sex Scandal?”

Barack Obama - Budget - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Ethics - Government - Jobs - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Nanny State - Regulation - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Media Ignores Obama Admin’s Effort to Define ‘Poverty’ Upward

December 3, 2012 by 4 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

Mickey Kaus has alerted readers to a change in the way the federal government figures the poverty line and that new way so alters the formula that we will never be able to show any improvement in rates of poverty going foward. Worse, the new formula stops measuring strict want and instead measures a more vague “inequality” of income.

The Obama administration has reinvented the poverty formula and is now calling it the “supplemental” poverty line.

“‘New’ is not necessarily ‘improved,'” Kaus dourly notes.

As Kaus explains, the old formula was based on, “the level that bought a minimal market basket of food in 1963-4, adjusted for subsequent inflation and multiplied by three.” The goal was to measure what level of income could afford basic survivability in the current economy, giving a base line of income that could meet basic human needs.

But the new formula is more complicated and “deceptive” to boot.
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Media Ignores Obama Admin’s Effort to Define ‘Poverty’ Upward”

Barack Obama - Budget - Business - Capitalism - Congress - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Entitlements - Ethics - GOP - Government - House of Representatives - Jobs - John Boehner - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Nanny State - President - Progressives - Republicans - Stimulus - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Obama’s Insulting Fiscal Cliff Proposal Lauded as ‘Strategic Move’

December 3, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

“Insulting.” That is what conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer termed Obama’s “plan” to prevent the federal government from falling over the fiscal cliff. But to the Old Media establishment, Obama’s insulting plan lacking in specifics was a brilliant “strategic move” that will force Republicans to “offer a counter proposal,” despite the fact that, going back to Paul Ryan’s Road Map, the GOP is the only side offering many specifics in this debate thus far.

Before Election Day, President Obama made vague comments about implementing 2.5 dollars in cuts for every dollar of spending increases, but he never really clarified what that meant in real terms, never saying exactly what he would cut. But at least before the election he gave lip service to cuts. This week, though, now that he is safely re-elected, he sent Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner to the GOP leadership to offer a plan that had no specifics, no cuts, and huge spending hikes.

Even more idiotic, Obama wants another stimulus of $50 billion!
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Obama’s Insulting Fiscal Cliff Proposal Lauded as ‘Strategic Move’”

Anti-Semitism - Democrats/Leftists - Ethics - Hamas - Islam - Islamofascism - Israel - Jews - Journalism - Judaism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Newspapers - Palestinians - Progressives - Religion - Terrorism - The New York Times - Warner Todd Huston

Why Does Western Media Ignore Terrorists Using Journalists as Human Shields?

December 2, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Last week a handful of jihadi terrorists that worked with Hamas were killed in Gaza by the Israeli Defense Force (IDF). These terrorists were hiding among western journalists and pretending to be one of them. Sadly a few actual journalists were also killed in these pinpoint strikes, but the bigger outrage is that western journalists don’t seem to mind at all that these terrorists are using them for human shields. One has to wonder why that is?

On November 18, The New York Times went apoplectic over those “attacks on journalists” when the IDF struck several buildings that housed the studios and offices of several western and mid eastern media outlets, offices that also housed the terrorist’s operations.

The Times article gave room for terror group Hamas to claim that the Israelis were “targeting journalists” and scolded the IDF for its actions. But what The Times didn’t bother to note is that the IDF wasn’t attacking “journalists,” it was targeting and eliminating known Hamas commanders who had been hiding their base of operations among the journalists.
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Why Does Western Media Ignore Terrorists Using Journalists as Human Shields?”

Budget - CNN - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Government - Journalism - Liberals - Media Bias - Policy - Progressives - Regulation - Taxes - Uncategorized - Warner Todd Huston

CNN: Now Pushing for a Gas Tax Hike

December 2, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Talks between the White House and GOP leaders in the House of Representatives are on everyone’s mind and solutions and ideas are coming fast and thick from many corners of Washington. But CNN thinks it has the way to fix it all: raise the gas tax.

Dishonestly portraying “some experts” as offering a new fix to the fiscal cliff, CNN explored the idea of hiking the federal gas tax because, CNN says, the current 18.4 cents per gallon is “not enough.”

“As lawmakers race to negotiate a deal to avoid the fiscal cliff,” CNN urgently reports, “some experts say one tax increase should be on the table: a gas tax hike.”
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CNN: Now Pushing for a Gas Tax Hike”

Associated Press - Budget - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Entitlements - Government - Journalism - Media - Nanny State - Progressives - Regulation - Stimulus - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Stupidity: Govt. Says Unemployment Compensation CREATES Jobs!

December 1, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

This is why no one in government lives in the real world. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) said this week that extending unemployment creates jobs Good lord, if these idiots truly believe this garbage, we need to nuke Washington D.C.!

The AP is reporting that the CBO is saying that extending unemployment for another year will “add 300,000 jobs to the economy.”

Naturally, the left-wing idiots we call Democrats think this is all great.
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Stupidity: Govt. Says Unemployment Compensation CREATES Jobs!”

Associated Press - Gay Marriage - Gays - Islam - Islamofascism - Journalism - Media - PCism - Race - Society/Culture - Terrorism - Warner Todd Huston

AP Quits Use of Islamophobia/Homophobia in Reporting

December 1, 2012 by 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

We often take after the fine folks at the Associated Press for biased “reporting.” But as we criticize when warranted so should we praise when warranted and the AP has done something praiseworthy by telling its correspondents to stop using “Islamophobia” and “homophobia” in their reporting.

On November 26, Politico reported that the AP made some changes to its online style guide, that set of grammatical and language usage rules it requires writers to abide by when writing the news. Out, AP decided, was the phrase “ethnic cleansing” as well as the words “Islamophobia” and “homophobia,” all because they are emotionally tinged words that really have no precise meaning — all are essentially euphemisms, not logical, properly descriptive words.

Said AP,
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AP Quits Use of Islamophobia/Homophobia in Reporting”

Barack Obama - Budget - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Entitlements - Ethics - GOP - Government - House of Representatives - John Boehner - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Nanny State - Newspapers - Policy - President - Progressives - Republicans - Stimulus - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

The Hill: It’s The Spending, Stupid

December 1, 2012 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

In a very business-like manner The Hill published a report that ought to warm the hearts of all fiscally responsible Republicans and, perhaps, give hope that GOP Speaker John Boehner will hold to his pledges on taxes during theses fiscal cliff talks with the White House.

On November 28 The Hill reported that Speaker Boehner (R, OH) quickly shot down the tax balloon floated by Representative Tom Cole (R, OK) who recently proposed that the House go with Obama’s idea of passing an immediate extension of the current tax rates for the middle class.

As The Hill further notes, Boehner and the rest of the GOP House leadership are sticking with their own pledge to make sure any fiscal cliff solutions are tied to spending cuts.
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The Hill: It’s The Spending, Stupid”