What have we been tweeting

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A free society requires a free press. While true, saying fails to mention anything abt corrupt press.

We can’t buy the “bias” angle anymore as it goes far beyond the simple statist cheerleading of this country’s 4th estate.

What inspired that tweet was MSNBC deliberately editing a legislative hearing this week in Hartford, CT to make it look as if Neil Heslin, the father of a Sandy Hook victim who was testifying, was being heckled by members of the audience. In fact, he was not being heckled.

This is shameless journalistic malpractice to alter footage of an event in order to stack the deck against those with whom’s politics you disagree.

We felt a similar manner of disgust in the tone of coverage regarding Abu Ghraib and now Benghazi. We have forgotten the exact figure but the NY Times ran a front page story on the tasteless and disgusting photos taken of Iraqi prisoners by our troops minding the prison for 33 straight days. Howls of indignation echoed from the media-political class calling for Rumsfeld’s and, at times, Bush’s head. We may remind everybody that though, humiliating, none of the prisoners died.

Fast forward some 8-9 years and the absolute fiasco that was Benghazi generates barely a shrug from our nation’s press. We ignored constant pleas for beefing up security there and as a result four Americans are dead from a well-coordinated assault on the Benghazi consulate on 9-11. There is probably a handful of embassies/consulates we would want to pay particular attention to on the anniversary of the worst terrorist attack on this country in its history and Benghazi, a hub of anti-Qaddafi Islamist activity, would certainly be one of them.

And when it all went up in smoke, the administration immediately, and against all logic and reason, blamed some totally obscure alleged anti-Islam Youtube movie trailer. They maintained this lie for weeks and no one had the balls to call them out on it.

And when Hilary Clinton, before stepping down as Secretary of State, beclowned herself in congressional testimony (“What difference does it make?”) she was labeled by the press a tough-minded statesmen who, incredibly enough, may have possibly been using these hearings to launch her 2016 presidential campaign.

As far as we can tell, the only person that has been punished for this travesty is the poor sap who made the crappy Youtube movie trailer.


Again, mere bias doesn’t adequately explain what is going on here. The press has effectively abdicated their responsibility to have an inherently adversarial relationship with a presidential administration. Indeed, it appears quite the opposiste They are all, with few exceptions, corrupt to the core.

Maybe that fact alone is the single best reason for a Republican president.

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Not so random thought of the day

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But first, from BuzzFeed:

On Saturday night, State Department spokesperson Philipe Reines slammed CNN for its “disgusting” handling of Ambassador Christopher Stevens’ diary. The diary helped confirm, as the network reported, that Stevens had been worried about the threat of an Al Qaeda attack, and even feared his own name was included on a hit list.

The blockbuster news contradicted the line the State Department and the administration had been pushing since the horrible tragedy took place almost two weeks ago: that there was no intelligence of a coming attack. In fact, the Ambassador himself was aware of a persistent high level threat against him.

“Perhaps the real question here,” CNN responded to the State Department criticism, “Is why is the State Department now attacking the messenger.”
That is the real question, and State Department’s bizarre criticism of CNN gives clues to the answer. Foggy Bottom is now in full-on damage control mode, with the primary goal of keeping Hillary Clinton’s legacy in Libya — and in Washington — intact.

So, let’s get this straight: For nearly a week, the administration lied its ass off with respect to what went down in Benghazi where a well-coordinated terrorist assault overran our consulate their resulting in the deaths of the Libyan ambassador, Christopher Stevens, and three others, instead choosing to blame it on an unruly mob whose rage was stoked by a the maker of a crappy Youtube video alleged to have dissed Mohammed.

No biggie, right? All administrations lie. And certainly any administration that reserves the right for itself to whack any of its country’s citizens without due process can certainly be forgiven throwing one of those citizens, like aforementioned crappy Youtube video-maker, under the bus in order to save its news-cycle hide. It’s still all good, right?

Here’s where were lost, though Where’s the press? Where have they gone? They’ve been played for fools in all this. Absolute fools and they are nowhere to be found… except sitting in their news trucks outside of the filmmakers home in Cerritos, California all but signing his death warrant.

They’ve been used by this administration and they simply don’t care. They’ve given up and the lack of outrage they have expressed with respect to how they’ve been played while the administration’s Arab Spring strategy has blown up in its face is stunning.
Congrats to the administration.

When Obama promised us a transformational change, he wasn’t lying: In just over 3-1/2 years he and his administration have managed to transform an entire media structure from what should be a naturally skeptical, if not confrontational, 4th estate into one that has decided to just lay down if not be entirely complicit in promoting the deception and hypocrisy of this administration.

Again, congratulations to the administration on a job well done and for inviting perilous damage to the republic.

Remember when gas was $1.82 a gallon...?

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... these guys don't.

Rising gas prices used to be big news, but not so these days. Although the national average climbed to $3.56 on Feb. 20, setting a February record after going up nearly a month straight, there was far less coverage than in 2008. Broadcast networks repeatedly covered the rise under the Bush presidency. Gas prices bounced around eventually reaching $3.56-a-gallon on April 24, 2008.

The Business and Media Institute analyzed broadcast network news references to gas or fuel prices between Jan. 20 and Feb. 20, 2012 and from March 24 and April 24, 2008. BMI found that in the 2008 period there were more than 4 times as many gas prices stories, news briefs or news headlines on ABC, CBS and NBC as there were in 2012 (97 to 21).

Coverage during the time periods differed not only in quantity, but in tone as well. During Bush’s tenure, gas prices were a huge economic threat and cause of suffering. The networks also used the high gas prices to attack the administration. In 2012, the networks aired mostly matter-of-fact stories on the rising gas prices, and worried primarily that they would hinder the economic recovery, not that they are making people suffer.

Dismal broadcast network reports about “skyrocketing” gas prices filled the newscasts in 2008. There were reports about businesses closing, airlines struggling and truckers protesting -- all because of the high prices. One ABC report said families were facing the “tough choice” between food or fuel. Others said that “wallets were running on empty” and consumers were told over and over that there was no relief in sight. But by the end of November 2008, prices had collapsed to $1.82.

Related: Anecdotaly, we recall quarterly GDP figures quite often being revised upwards after the fact while Bush was in office and conversely, those same figures being routinely revised (unexpectedly!) downward under Obama.


We suppose that when you are in the tank for a man who has been nothing but passive-agressively hostile to oil production and who has on his team an energy secretary who actually said “Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe,” , higher gas prices at the pump are really no big deal and, in fact, are something to be celebrated. If it weren't for these damn elections every four years, though.





We'll let Victor Davis Hanson wrap things up:

Obviously putting American oil off-limits and blocking the Keystone pipeline hardly encourage Middle East producers to make up the slack by doing things that we will not. Nor can we blame the “oil men” in the White House. Under the old calumny, the Bush-Cheney oil connections led to supposed profiteering that got gas up to an average of $1.85 when Bush left office in January 2009; apparently that slur is now inoperative given that gas has roughly doubled under the wind-and-solar team.

CNN loves them some parades...

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... especially as a backdrop for coverage of a brutal communist dictatorship.







It's just so much easier than having to address the more usavory aspects of North Korea.


And towards the end of this 3 minute clip, cue the obligatory useful (Western) idiot.


H/T: Ed Driscoll

The sadly obligatory NBC omits "under God" from the Pledge post

Here's the full advert that was run during the U.S. Open yesterday.




And here's NBC's explanation for what happened:

NBC issued an on-air apology Sunday for omitting the words "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance during its coverage of golf's U.S. Open.

The words were edited out of a clip of children reciting the oath -- a move immediately noted by viewers, who took to Twitter and various blogs to voice their anger, the Huffington Post reported.

In a statement during the broadcast, NBC commentator Dan Hicks said, "We began our coverage of this final round just about three hours ago and when we did it was our intent to begin the coverage of this U.S. Open Championship with a feature that captured the patriotism of our national championship being held in our nation's capital for the third time.

"Regrettably, a portion of the Pledge of Allegiance that was in that feature was edited out. It was not done to upset anyone and we'd like to apologize to those of you who were offended by it."

Ah yes, the old "we're sorry if our 'editing' cheezed off anyone" defense.


How out of touch are these people that they thought this would be a good idea? For a modest fee, we would sit in on production meetings and earn more than our keep by warning off the suits from idiotic ideas like this.

The (il)logic that was employed seems to be along the lines of not wanting to offend the sensibilities of a few cranks in exchange for offending the sensibilities of a far, far greater number of people plus insulting the intelligence of everybody by thinking we all wouldn't notice and we wouldn't care. That's apparently what passed for a reasonable approach on how to handle that politically-explosive and divisive hot potato, The Pledge of Allegiance.

Memo to the brain surgeons at NBC: Next time you are considering how to finesse your way around what you believe to be culturally and politically-sensitive matters like, you know, the Pledge of Allegiance, either recite the thing in its entirety, or don't recite it at all.

Developing now! (UPDATED)

(please scroll to bottom of post for update)



Palin derangement syndrome on display...

--The state of Alaska on Friday released more than 13,000 e-mails that shed light on Sarah Palin's tenure as governor — before she became a vice-presidential candidate, a reality-TV star, and an undeclared heavyweight in the 2012 race for the White House.

Many of the e-mails dealt with the mundane matters of running an office and a state: speech preparations, gubernatorial appointments, even office softball games. Others, however, provide a look at Palin’s political persona, before she was catapulted into the national spotlight.

Check out this exchange between Andrea Mitchell and Michael Isikoff, MSNBC's senior D.C. correspondent, whom they saw fit to pack off to Juneau for this 3-ring circus.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The mere fact that we have so many reporters, news organizations who have flocked up here to Juneau to start poring over this material is a sign that Sarah Palin... remains the superstar in this (G.O.P.) field.

Mitchell looks downright bummed that this near-foreign over-land adventure might actually benefit Palin. Then again, Mitchell always looks like she's coming off a two-day bender.


Does Isikoff or anyone else up there of his ilk ever ask themselves, "What in God's name am I doing up here in Alaska on this glorified dumpster- diving gig?"


We're being crushed under a mountain of debt, we're now officially pursuing regime change in Libya, unemployment is up again and all economic indicators show us slipping back into a double-dip and this is the big news of the day.

Gripping

Dig this:

One embarrassing aspect of this episode, among several, is that major newspapers like the Times and the Post don't seem to have the resources to review a few boxes of emails to determine whether there is anything there of interest. Otherwise, why would they solicit help from hundreds of readers? In my business, litigation, it is not unusual for parties to produce tens of millions of documents. A production of 13,000 emails would be considered minuscule. That our major newspapers evidently don't have staff to do this minimal amount of work speaks volumes about their decline.

And this: LA Times Won’t Release Obama-Khalidi Tape But Posts 24,000 Sarah Palin Emails



Perhaps Isikoff has a point regarding Palin's celebrity but it's far more accurate to reason that Palin being who she is must be destroyed and must be destroyed at any cost as the breathless manner in which this is all being handled by the legacy media is proving.


We cannot see ourselves voting for Palin in the Republican primaries but count on our vote for her in the general should it come to that as for no other reason than the sight of heads exploding all across the fruited plain due to the mere possibility of Palin becoming President would bring us an unbridled joy that cannot be described in mere words.




(UPDATE #1: via the Los Angeles Times, explosive bombshell drops in the Governor Palin email hog root:

The email account of Aug. 29, 2008, the day John McCain announced Palin as his running mate, tells a tale of jubilant shock and amazement from Palin devotees.

Palin's staff fired off emails praising her speech – and got lots of love back from the new vice presidential nominee.

"Wow governor! Just watched you on TV!" wrote budget director Karen Rehfeld. "You knocked their socks off!"

"Can you believe it!" Palin replied. "He told me yesterday -- it moved fast! Pray! I love you."

Vice President Dick Cheney called the governor's office requesting a call back.

There you have it, folks. The smoking gun. Does it really get any worse than potential contact with Dick Cheney?

As time and space permit, we will be updating with more explosive Palin email revelations.

Encouraging journalism development of the day

The AP now working lefty narrative into their lede on the results of an ObamaCare poll.

As lawmakers shaken by the shooting of a colleague return to the health care debate, an Associated Press-GfK poll finds raw feelings over President Barack Obama's overhaul have subsided.

Ahead of a vote on repeal in the GOP-led House this week, strong opposition to the law stands at 30 percent, close to the lowest level registered in AP-GfK surveys dating to September 2009.

"shooting", "raw feelings" and "President Barack Obama's overhaul", all worked into the first paragraph. About as subtle as a two by four upside the head, no?

In the horribly slanted article, the authors Jennifer Agiesta and Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, wait until the 10th paragraph to re-address the issue of the supposed link between the Tucson shooter and the current political climate.

There's no evidence the gunman who targeted Giffords was motivated by politics, but the aftermath left many people concerned about the venom in public life. A conservative Democrat, Giffords had been harshly criticized for voting in favor of the health overhaul, and won re-election by a narrow margin.

There's always that "but"
that leaves the door open for conjecture on the motives and intent of those opposed to the current statist legislative agenda.

It would appear that the Associated Press learned nothing last week with respect to unfounded accusations and shameless speculation. Such is the current state of journalism, we suppose.

Quickies (the crosshairs edition)

A round-up of articles, columns, news items and blog posts that caught our eye this past week.


Alternate paranthetical: The week that the professional liberal-Left media industrial complex augered-in in a fiery ball of hypocrisy, wild and baseless speculation and abject unprofessionalism.


The President made a fine speech at the memorial service/pep rally in Tucson this past Wednesday, striking the appropriate tone by backhanding the liberal-Left for their unhinged and appalling accusations against conservatives, Sarah Palin and the tea party.

And even now when everybody... everybody knows this guy had no political affiliations to speak of, we have not yet heard any apologies, corrections or walking back of the truly divisive and politically incendiary language from any of the same people making them though we feel no need to attempt a more civil tone as that is something we have possessed all along. So forgive us for thinking then that many of the President's supporters and cheerleaders have quite a bit to answer for and have willfully destroyed any credibility they may have thought they had by their words and actions this past week.


And with respect to the Tucson rally, Tammy Bruce tweeted:

"I went to a Massacre Rally and all I got was a lousy t-shirt."

James Taranto points out that not all massacres are created equally:

After the horrific shooting spree, the editorial board of New York Times offered a voice of reasoned circumspection: "In the aftermath of this unforgivable attack, it will be important to avoid drawing prejudicial conclusions . . .," the paper counseled.

Here's how the sentence continued: ". . . from the fact that Major Hasan is an American Muslim whose parents came from the Middle East."

The Tucson Safeway massacre prompted exactly the opposite reaction. What was once known as the paper of record egged on its readers to draw invidious conclusions that are not only prejudicial but contrary to fact. In doing so, the Times has crossed a moral line.

Allahpundit breaks down the media's predictable disdain for Palin's video/speech as compared to that of the President's.

Seriously, how dare she inject herself into this national tragedy by attempting to defend herself against all the crap we were making up about her out of the thin blue air. The nerve.





You know, since Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated JFK and since he was also a Marine, maybe the Marines should dial it back a notch.




Charles Krauthammer on the obvious Loughner/tea party/Sarah Palin links:

Furthermore, the available evidence dates Loughner’s fixation on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords back to at least 2007, when he attended a townhall of hers and felt slighted by her response. In 2007, no one had heard of Sarah Palin. Glenn Beck was still toiling on Headline News. There was no Tea Party or health-care reform. The only climate of hate was the pervasive post-Iraq campaign of vilification of George W. Bush, nicely captured by a New Republic editor who began an article thus: “I hate President George W. Bush. There, I said it.”

The always civil and thoughtful David Harsanyi of the Denver Post sees right through the non-sense and calls B.S.

We can argue about those things, I know. We can cobble together stupid remarks by radio talk show hosts or union activists or congresspeople and smear half the country. We can play tit-for-tat with Tea Party banners and anti-war bumper stickers and dig up some figurative rhetoric that sounds over the top retroactively and blow it out of proportion.

But this impending conversation about civility and our climate of hate is not only a useless one, it also is meant to discourage dissent. It is a rigged talk, because not only do we — by any standard and context available — reside in a highly civil and peaceful political system, violence is almost non-existent. The Tea Party didn't pick up pitchforks and storm the White House; they knocked off Republicans in primaries.

Now, we may want to have a conversation about our policies regarding the mentally ill or the need for more gun control (though I may disagree with the outcome) because, after all, they are relevant to the horrible events of the past week. But conservatives should be wary of any national dialogue about civility or any beer summit about the specter of political violence.

It is nothing more than a setup.

Yep. Roughly translated we believe Harsanyi is telling liberals they can take their "civility" and "conversation" and shove it in their ear.




B-Daddy is worried about a potential double-dip recession brought on, in part, by a housing market that has never been allowed to properly deflate and state economies that are an absolute mess.



Uh-oh. Tucson shooting victim not sticking with the liberal-Left's media narrative. W.C. Varones has the details, here.



The Scratching Post: Meat: good. Fur: bad. Why?

What is it?

Hint: It would've made the perfect gift for the Journolist-er on your Christmas shopping list.




Why, it's a "Klein bottle", that's what. Iowahawk explains here.

Big Media breathing a sigh of relief?

Via Gateway Pundit:

You think the President has had a rough go of it this year? Think of what the media has been going through. They abased their profession with shameless adoration for the guy in order to get him elected President and what does he do in return but give them a 45% disapproval rating.

Alas, even with unemployment still hovering around 10%, a struggling economy and mountains of debt, signing a treaty and 2 or 3 bills into law during a lame-duck session of Congress can do wonders for your image with some people.

For Caren Bohan from Reuters, at least, it looks like she can hold her head high at cocktail parties as happy days are here again!




Pathetic.

It simply cannot be

The sometimes infuriating Joe Scarborough on a specific trend he notices in the media:

“This is curious and it was our staff that did it this time. I’m always curious when there is a controversial issue … that mainstream media doesn’t like, they’ll always will say a George W. Bush appointee or a Reagan appointee … when a Democrat does something unpopular they never say Clinton appointee. Never. Never.”

Love the body language and words of co-host Mika Brzezinski. She simply refuses to accept the possibility that there may be some media bias out there. It was her Pauline Kael moment.

We need new economists

Employers added 39,000 jobs in November, far fewer than expected, as budget-strapped local governments continued to lay off workers, and retailers and manufacturers cut payrolls despite recent signals that both sectors have been growing.

The nation's unemployment rate, which is calculated from a different survey, rose to a seven-month high 9.8% from 9.6% in October as the labor pool grew by 103,000, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported Friday. Among their ranks were many discouraged Americans who re-entered the workforce after giving up their job searches in the recession.

The report disappointed economists, many of whom believed the 172,000 increase in jobs last month signaled that the job market would finally shift into a higher gear. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expected payrolls to grow by 150,000 in November.

It has been noted both here and other places how consistently economists and the media at large are caught off guard by "unexpected" bad economic news. It's getting to be that you can set your first Friday of the month (when the jobs reports come out) clock by any and all bad economic news to be "unexpected".

But why is that? Precisely what actions has the government taken that would be of benefit to the economy and where economists would not express shock, shock, of "unepected" bad news?

Did economists actually think gimmickry like Cash for Clunkers was going to going to provide any sort of long-term growth for the economy instead of merely the illusion of stable growth? And it's been obvious to anyone with a pulse that Porkulus has come nowhere close to delivering on its promise to keep unemployment under 8 percent.

People and businesses don't know what they are going to be paying in taxes next year and a looming regulatory regime which includes ObamaCare have contributed to a chilling of the business environment where these businesses are unwilling to hire new employees.

We'd hate to think that the economists are in the tank for statist government actions but given the fact that this administration has consistently pursued actions that have done harm to this nation's economy with the full knowledge of economists who are supposed to know these things, what else are we to believe?

Enough with the "unexpected". We need new economists.

The New York - D.C. axis media's one last push.

The talking points have gone out and in hopes of stemming the ass-kicking that will be administered next Tuesday, the last bullet remaining in the ruling classes clip is: you ungrateful slobs, can't you see what this wonderful man and Congress have done for you?

First up, David Ignatius of the WaPo:

Constant repetition of anti-government rhetoric in our political echo chamber has dulled Americans into overlooking an important and perhaps surprising fact: We have just lived through one of the more notable successes of government intervention in modern times -- the auto and bank rescues that almost surely saved the country from another Great Depression.

Ignatius admits he's friends with Steve Rattner, the Obama hack that recently stepped down as head of the Administration's auto task force. Ignatius conveniently whistles pass the graveyard in the column not wanting to address the more unseemly points of order in the bankruptcy cramdown and the fact that GM lied about how they were paying back their TARP loan.

But enough about Ignatius, how about our favorite NYT columnist, Frank Rich:

PRESIDENT Obama, the Rodney Dangerfield of 2010, gets no respect for averting another Great Depression, for saving 3.3 million jobs with stimulus spending, or for salvaging GM and Chrysler from the junkyard. And none of these good deeds, no matter how substantial, will go unpunished if the projected Democratic bloodbath materializes on Election Day. Some are even going unremembered. For Obama, the ultimate indignity is the Times/CBS News poll in September showing that only 8 percent of Americans know that he gave 95 percent of American taxpayers a tax cut.

Admit it, you're sensing a trend here, aren't you?

And here's Yahoo! News' Jane Sasseen:

Indeed, despite their professed desire for compromise, voters hardly have rewarded President Obama for attempting to achieve it.

Most likely, because the President didn't even try, Jane. Remember: "I won"?



And from MSNBC's "Morning Joe" panel, we have: Where's the love? (via NewsBusters)

"Where is the celebration over what has been done and accomplished in the face of all this anger and vitriol in Washington?" complained co-host Mika Brzezinski. "No credit. No credit at all for what he's accomplished," lamented "60 Minutes" correspondent Lesley Stahl.

Is there an original thought that is formulated in any of these peoples' heads anymore?



Even the foreigners get in on the lament of why we don't appreciate such a swell guy. From Der Spiegel:

Barack Obama is not a bad president. He is eloquent, sharp-witted, and has certainly not lost any of his talent since moving into the Oval Office. Members of his staff say he still listens to what people say. A senator who once lost an election to Obama says the president demands dissenting opinions and that he's reliable, funny and works best under pressure.

Nor is he a weak president. He has begun withdrawing American troops from Iraq. He has been able to strengthen his alliances. And he has tackled the global economic crisis with an $800 billion stimulus package and a reform of the financial markets. His education policies target performance and aim to improve the disastrously under-resourced public school system. Millions of Americans have been dreaming of healthcare reform for decades. Bill Clinton failed to get it passed. Barack Obama succeeded.

It is entirely beyond our understanding how these people cannot grasp the concept that the reason why the President's party is going to turn over control of the House and, in a less-likely scenario, possibly the Senate is that his policies stink and the manner in which they were put into effect, even more so.

Even so, we commend the New York - D.C. media axis on one of the most incredible displays of group-think we have ever witnessed. Well done, gang!

Sub-headline of the day

Disaster On Primary Day As Machine Glitches Cause Chaos



Given the number and degree of tea-fueled upsets that went down around the country on Tuesday, that sub-headline made us think of something other than malfunctioning vote counters.

Photo image of the day

Have we mentioned we detest the new slimmed-down format of the local rag here in San Diego?

We were assured by the editors that getting less bang for our buck was merely an effort to generate more "focused" news content.

This reminded us of Spinal Tap and their manager assuring Rob Reiner's character that the band's shrinking concert audiences were merely becoming "more selective".

It's Official...

... The People Magazine (Sorry, People) of current affairs and politics has jumped the shark in their all-out un-humorous snark offensive-as-distraction as they implicitly acknowledge the disastrous nature of this administration thus far.



In case you can't read the asterisk footnote:

*Who isn’t actually any of those things

Did you hear that, you kooks! Any of them! Any. Of. Them!

The desperation is palpable.



Here's our own alternative Newsweek cover.

It ain't the way I wanted it. I can handle things! I'm competent! Not like everybody says... like incompetent. I'm competent and I want respect!

H/T: Instaglen

No Big Media love for mighty Mo?

We noted last week Newsweek's mocking and chiding of the American public for allowing the possibility to think that the President might be Muslim and we are beginning to wonder just what is Big Media's problem with Islam for we have never seen a more vigorous defense of Christianity at the expense of another widely practiced and perfectly legitimate Abrahamic faith.

Check out the WaPo who caught up with the President's former pastor, the quote machine, Jeremiah Wright, who was blasting those who think that Obama is a Muslim:

Wright's only reference to Obama came when he compared Griffen's opponents to those who incorrectly think Obama is Muslim. The president, whose full name is Barack Hussein Obama, is Christian.

And later:

A poll released this month found that nearly one in five people, or 18 percent, said they thought Obama was Muslim, up from the 11 percent in March 2009. The proportion who correctly said he was Christian was 34 percent, down from 48 percent in March of last year. The poll, conducted by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center and its affiliated Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, surveyed 3,003 people.

(italics, ours)

If it's an opinion poll, then why do we need to be told what the Washington Post is insisting is the right answer... that would only be their opinion, no?



And check out the perky one, Katie Couric from last week:

Embed is currently disabled. Please go here

Couric:

"He is not (a Muslim)"

"For the record: He is a Christian"

Are you all noticing a pattern here?

Newsweek, the Washington Post and CBS Evening News all saw fit to instruct, nay, admonish us for thinking that the President was anything but a follower of Christ and most certainly not, pffft, a Muslim.

It certainly looks from our vantage point that Big Media would have a problem if it indeed turned out that the President is a closet Muslim. Given the context of the comments and the narrative, how could it not?

How wacky are things these days when a small neighborhood right-wing blog like ours is coming to the defense of the religion of peace?

That would be one way of looking at it

Last week, we blogged with considerable glee concerning the Democrats' apparent decision to campaign on President Obama's legislative record... you know, a record that includes overwhelmingly popular stuff like ObamaCare.

If that indeed is going to be the case, then the President's allies in the media are falling in line with a meme of yeah, the Prez is having a rough go of it of late but look at all the wonderful things he has accomplished!

Here's E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post:

Democrats should feel a lot better than they do. They enacted a health-care bill that had been their dream for more than 60 years. They pulled the country out of a terrifying economic spiral. They are on the verge of passing the biggest reform of Wall Street since the New Deal. The public has identified enemies that are typically seen as Republican allies: oil companies and big bankers. And given the Republicans' past policies, the Gulf of Mexico oil spill is at least as much their problem as Obama's.

That the Democrats should take heart that they passed legislation that the majority of Americans don't want is an odd way to look at things. If that's all you've got to go on, however, a suspension of reality doesn't seem so far-fetched.

(We'd like to note that Dionne in the same article can't resist taking a shot at the G.O.P. and what he perceives as a hard swerve to the right as it's being held hostage by the tea party. That a near-record 49% of Americans think the Democratic Party is too liberal vs. 41% thinking the Republican Party is too conservative is not a Dionne talking point.)



And here's Gail Collins writing in the New York Times:

As a political leader, Barack Obama seems to know what he’s doing. His unsatisfying call for a new energy policy sounded very much like the rhetoric on health care reform that used to drive Democrats nuts: open to all ideas, can’t afford inaction, if we can put a man on the moon. ... But at the end of that health care slog, he wound up with the groundbreaking law that had eluded his predecessors for decades. The process of wringing it out of Congress was so slow and oblique that even when it was over it was hard to appreciate what he’d won. But win he did.

(italics, ours)

Here's Merriam-Webster's definition of oblique:

1 a : neither perpendicular nor parallel : inclined b : having the axis not perpendicular to the base c : having no right angle

2 a : not straightforward : indirect; also : obscure b : devious, underhanded

(emphasis, ours)

By Collins' own definition, the crafting of ObamaCare was a shameful ordeal but when you are crafting the new paradigm by defending the indefensible, oblique takes on a curiously positive hue.

For taste-makers like Collins and Dionne, who, if they are being completely honest with themselves, realize Obama has only contributed to the hyper-partisan nature of Washington D.C. and whose HopenChange has meant only more business as usual, the circling of the wagons will strain credulity and their own credibility.

At long last...

... an establishment liberal columnist who's starting to get it.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, perhaps the most powerful Republican in Washington and certainly the party's kingpin in Kentucky, put his considerable clout behind Grayson. But Paul's candidacy became a cause celebre for the national tea party movement, and he whipped Grayson in Tuesday's primary by 24 points.

The stunning result should telegraph two warnings to Republicans. The first is a reminder that while voters' ardor toward the Democratic Party might have cooled, this has not led to a passionate embrace of the GOP. There's a splash-back effect from unceasing attacks against the evil empire known as Washington: Voters notice that Republicans live there, too.

The second warning is that the tea party movement does not intend to become a wholly owned subsidiary of the Republican Party. Strategists who hoped to use the movement's energy and passion as weapons against the Democrats in the fall should realize that many tea party types see the GOP as fundamentally no different.

After nearly a year and a half of 2x4 upside-the-head obviousness of what the tea party movement stands for, the memo arrived at WaPo's Eugene Robinson's desk this week. Congrats, Gene!

Also note the lack of crocodile tears and faux hand-wringing with respect to any "purges" of moderate elements of the Republican Party if it now means electoral gains for the Democratic Party.

Life is easier with pasty white Michiganders

Earlier today, we gave MSNBC host Contessa Brewer some deserved grief for having to live with the distinct possibility that there are one or two Islamic extremists out there wishing to put another crater in a major U.S. city.

"...there are a lot of people who want to use this terrorist intent to justify writing off people who believe in a certain way or come from certain countries or whose skin color is a certain way. I mean they use it as justification for really outdated bigotry."

And speaking of believing in a certain way and having different skin color here's how she relates the alleged Times Square bomber with the Hutaree militia that were rounded up in March.

But that being said, I mean, we know even in recent history you have the Hutaree militia from Michigan who have plans to, let’s face it, create terror. That’s what they were planning to do and they were doing so from far different backgrounds than what this guy is coming from. So, the threat is not just coming from people who decide that America is the place to be and you know come here and want to become citizens.

Appears that Contessa didn't get the memo.

Nine members of a Michigan militia will be released from jail pending trial after a federal judge on Monday harshly criticized the government's claim they had conspired to overthrow the U.S. government.

The decision is a significant defeat for federal authorities, who spoke in tough and triumphant terms after arresting members of a southern Michigan group called the Hutaree in March and charging them with conspiracy to commit sedition and attempted use of weapons of mass destruction.

The government "need not wait until people are killed before it arrests conspirators," U.S. District Judge Victoria Roberts said. "But the defendants are also correct: Their right to engage in hate-filled, venomous speech is a right that deserves First Amendment protection."

If the feds want to head off any criticism that the arrest of these militia men coincided quite curiously with the tea party protests at the Capitol on the weekend of the ObamaCare vote, this is not going to help.

Poor Contessa. We wonder what her thoughts were regarding these militia members and any feelings of "isolation" they experienced and any "failed family ties" they may have been forced to cope with.

Look, we don't like trailer-dwelling, gun-toting, "Christian" meth-heads with bad teeth and bad hygiene any more than the next person. They drive down property values and yes, they may indeed by dangerous.

However, all we're asking for here is a little adulthood. A little maturity where the President doesn't ask for "civility" as he did a few days ago and then turnaround and debase the people who oppose his policies.

And maybe a little professionalism as well. Professionalism in the form of taking a couple days off, in the case of Contessa Brewer, in lieu of making a complete ass of herself as she did regarding the Times Square bomber because god knows, she really, really, really wanted that guy to be some white dude in his forties sporting a "Don't Tread On Me" t-shirt. Things would've gone so much smoother, now wouldn't it have?