WHY I WATCH GLENN BECK
It's patently obvious why Democrats and people on the left don't like Glenn Beck. But I know plenty of people on the right who don't like him either. Usually they point out that he's a crybaby.
I'd like to point out why I do like Glenn Beck, and why his show, along with the Special Report All-Star Panel, is the only political/news programming I watch on TV. And why I watch it every day.
Because Glenn Beck comes at us Ross Perot style, with charts and graphs and numbers. He lays out theories about what he thinks the future of our country will look like, and he always says they're just theories and he hopes he's wrong. He doesn't just do opinion schtick, though there's plenty of that. He doesn't just interview guests and argue about the day's news, which is what every other news/opinion program on TV does. And he doesn't just cry, though there are times when his love for his country and his anguish over what it's becoming do overwhelm him.
He also takes complicated economic problems and explains them to average Americans. (This clip is crucial to watch if you want to see the difference between The Glenn Beck Program and every other news show out there.)
The Glenn Beck model includes a chalkboard, for heaven's sake. He spent twenty-one minutes lecturing on inflation. And gets mega-ratings for it. I think Americans are starving for this kind of programming.
Beck is the only TV personality I know of who consistently examines the long-term problems the US faces and points out that the "fixes" we're implementing now might end up doing us more harm than good. Sadly, he also has a pretty good track record of being right.
Is anyone else pointing out long-term problems to average Americans? Or are they too busy talking about balloon boy and hyping swine flu...
I have only seen clips of his show on YouTube via your links. I think I've only actually seen him on TV once or twice being interviewed during another show. So I never understood his appeal until now.
I don't watch political TV shows, so I didn't realize how unique his use of a chalkboard is. His ability to use one tells me that he isn't just reading off a teleprompter or mouthing off opinions. What he writes on a chalkboard has to be somewhat coherent, because the audience can literally see errors, and he'd look like a fool if he constantly erased to cover them up.
Posted by: Amritas at October 29, 2009 01:13 PM (+nV09)
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Yeah, you're right, Sarah. I guess I shouldn't be so hard on him for being so melodramatic. It's true that he breaks it down nicely.
Posted by: CaliValleyGirl at October 29, 2009 01:33 PM (irIko)
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I don't understand all of the Glenn Beck hatred. He was on Headline News for years and his radio show, yet nobody thought to complain or slander him then. Now that he's on Fox (aka liberal's own Big Satan) people are up in arms and too quick to label him crazy (which he is the furthest thing from). I'm just waiting for the same treatment of fellow libertarian John Stossel who is going to Fox. Good journalists and columnists like Beck and Stossel are degraded for no reason except jealousy because they do their jobs; while village idiots of the media like Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric (shudders) are given awards. Shameful.
Posted by: BigD78 at October 29, 2009 03:11 PM (W3XUk)
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I love Fox's all star panel. I actually time my trips to the gym to be on the treadclimber during that segment. It is riveting TV. There is NO ONE like Krauthammer. I have a secret crush on him. I actually thought about sending him a fan/thank-you letter but couldn't figure out a way to do so that wouldn't be totally weird and creepy. But he is so amazing. I used to listen to Glenn Beck in the car but I work from home now so he lost me when I stopped commuting.
Posted by: Amy at October 29, 2009 03:54 PM (9fDOS)
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Amy -- I am right there with you. I always say to Guard Wife, "Are there any better words on the planet than 'Let's bring in our panel: Who Cares #1, Who Cares #2, and syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer.'"
Posted by: Sarah at October 29, 2009 04:39 PM (gWUle)
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That last comment made me burst out laughing. (And my Philadelphia Phillies just lost, so that is saying something.) I will probably remember that next time and start laughing on the treadmill! Thanks.
ps. I am thrilled to watch you progress so beautifully through your pregnancy one step at a time.
Posted by: Amy at October 29, 2009 10:46 PM (9fDOS)
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It's not like the 70's where the Fed printed money to finance government spending. The Fed increased the money supply to keep the banks from failing, by loaning them money. It can dry up the money supply by recalling the loans, and that's what it's going to do.
Posted by: David Boxenhorn at October 30, 2009 01:43 AM (uYknG)
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My kids like him for the same reason. We watched him one day when he was talking about oil being traded in other currency besides the US dollar and why it was important. He had set up a demonstration with flags and baskets and dollar bills. He made sense to them. They understood why it was important. So, it is one news program they like. Well, that and Dr. Rosenthal.
Posted by: Tressa at November 01, 2009 05:01 PM (yY6P+)
John Podhoretz once remarked that all conservatives are bilingual: We
speak both conservative and liberal. Liberals are monolingual, because
they can afford to be. To the Obama crowd, Fox News is a foreign
tongue. The “mainstream†tongue? Well, we all grew up with it, were
taught in it.
When conservatives hear liberal bias, they say,
“Yeah, so? The sun rises in the east.†When liberals hear conservative
bias, or even a point or bit of news uncongenial to liberals, they’re
apt to say, “Eek, a mouse!â€
This is the same thing that makes liberals say that Rush is probably a racist even though there's no proof. They think they understand how we think, when they're generally pretty far off the mark.
I read the EJ Dionne opinion piece in my parents' fishwrap and thought blah blah blah and then forgot about it.
There is an overwhelming case that the electronic media went out of their way to cover the noise and ignored the calmer (and from television's point of view boring) encounters between elected representatives and their constituents.
But later I remembered it and connected it to a graph I saw at The Corner:
EJ Dionne's core beef is probably the same as mine: that whatever the media reports is whatever becomes important. Ignore Iraq and Afghanistan altogether and the public quickly forgets it and thinks things are going fine or winding down. Ramp up talks on health care and that skyrockets.
The number of news stories people read or hear on an issue shapes how important they think it is. The media has so much power in this realm. They frame most debates and set the order of importance for national issues.
Oh, but wait, that's not the generic conclusion EJ Dionne came to...
But the only citizens who commanded widespread media coverage last month were the right-wingers. And I bet you thought the media were “liberal.â€
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Sarah, you might be interested in this piece by Political Philosopher Patrick Deneen at Georgetown University.
http://patrickdeneen.blogspot.com/2009/08/news-from-nowhere.html
He talks of the death of the local, full-time, professional journalist and what impact that has. . . . I won't do the article justice in a sentence or two, but it also relevant to your point today that what is focused on in the news, translates as 'important' in the public mind. When there are fewer and fewer actual reporters keeping an eye on things, that gives greater scope for nefarious manipulation. . . .
Posted by: queenie at September 05, 2009 01:14 PM (p4Pp0)
Via Amritas, I just learned that Cindy Sheehan is still protesting the war and will camp out at Obama's vacation spot for another vigil. And apparently, the media who thought her protest was oh-so-important four years ago is now finding her lack of moral relativism inconvenient.
Good for her for being anti-war no matter who the president is. Good for her for sticking with her convictions. I disagree with her, but I respect her consistency.
And boo to folks like Charles Gibson, who covered Sheehan's old protests like they were earthshattering news and now can't be bothered to care about her anymore. Shame on him for now saying:
Anybody who has given a son to this country has made an enormous sacrifice, and you have to be sympathetic. But enough already.
When Bush is president, she's "standing her ground." When Obama is president, it's "enough already."
Yeah, he's a tower of integrity and courage, Gibson is.
But while I'm anti-Gibson in this case, I'm still not pro-Cindy-Sheehan. I don't think it's admirable consistency that keeps her protesting; I think she's still trying to stretch her 15 minutes of fame to 20. I don't see it as "sticking with her convictions" so much as "fame-whoring then, fame-whoring now."
To lose a son is a great tragedy. My sympathies to a grieving mother -- but I've always felt that Casey Sheehan deserves a better spokesperson.
Posted by: Lissa at August 21, 2009 09:59 AM (eSfKC)
* Sixty-nine percent believe Obamacare will hurt the quality of their own health care.
* Seventy-three percent believe they will have less access to tests and treatment.
* Sixty-two percent believe Democrats' proposals would force them to change doctors.
* Seventy-six percent believe Obama's changes will mean higher taxes for them.
* Seventy-seven percent expect their health care costs to rise ...
With stubborn wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and an economy still bleeding, you'd think a new President would have challenges enough.Yet Obama has plunged into the health care mess as though it is abattle of absolute necessity.
Get with the prOgram, Cindy!
Posted by: kevin at August 21, 2009 02:48 PM (+nV09)
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seems to sum of the attitude of a lot of the country, don't you think??
THIS ONE'S FOR GUARD WIFE
A friend of ours has been on a few dates with a girl. I asked what she was like, and he answered with adjectives like "sweet" and "nice." I said that was all beside the point. I needed to get to the heart of the matter: What is her stance on Charles Krauthammer? Because really, that's all I need to know to make new friends...
Show me your feelings on Krauthammer and I'll show you your future.
What Fox did is not just create a venue for alternative opinion. It created an alternate reality.
A few years ago, I was on a radio show with a well-known political
reporter who lamented the loss of a pristine past in which the whole
country could agree on what the facts were, even if they disagreed on
how to interpret and act upon them. All that was gone now. The country
had become so fractured we couldn't even agree on what reality was.
What she meant was that the day in which the front page of The New York
Times was given scriptural authority everywhere was gone, shattered by
the rise of Fox News.
What left me slack-jawed was the fact that she, like the cohort of
mainstream journalists she represented so perfectly, was so
ideologically blinkered that she could not fathom the plain fact that
the liberal media were presenting the news and the world through a
particular lens. The idea that it was particular, and that there might
be competing ones, perhaps even superior ones, was beyond her ken.
That's why Fox News is so resented. It altered the intellectual and
ideological landscape of America. It gave not only voice but also
legitimacy to a worldview that had been utterly excluded from the
mainstream media.
I'm pretty sure most people I know would ask, "Charles who?" So for me the question is: What is your stance on Obama?
It's not all I need to know to make friends, but it's a start.
The quality of the answer matters too. Disliking Obama is not enough. Why is he 'bad'? I don't want to befriend conspiracy theorists. I want people who can recognize his badness on the basis of publicly available evidence, not speculation. What Obama thinks, what he does behind closed doors is unknown. What I see and hear is awful enough for me.
I have mixed feelings about the idea of Fox "creat[ing] an alternate reality." The media should reflect reality, not create an alternate reality - a fantasy to reinforce the delusions of the audience. Which media reflect reality? Fox? The rest of the MSM? Neither? (I vote for TTG.)
I think Krauthammer meant to say that Fox created an alternate window on reality - another way of seeing things - another "lens".
I don't think Fox "gave ...
legitimacy to a worldview that had been utterly excluded from the
mainstream media." The worldview's legitimacy - correctness - should be independent of Fox. But I do realize that for many people, legitimacy is based on What Other People Think, and if a worldview is on a national network, that means Other People Think Like That, so it's now 'legitimate'. I heard it on Fox / CNN / wherever, so it must be true! Too many confuse the messenger with the message. Messengers like Fox are important, but the message is still more important.
Then again, it doesn't matter if people don't understand the message. It's not fun to be Not Sure.
Posted by: Amritas at June 11, 2009 11:30 AM (+nV09)
WHO WILL POLICE THE PRESS?
I know there are people out there who think that the media is in Republican pockets because it's all owned by big corporations. Really, I have always found that position untenable. I truly can't understand how anyone who listens to the news for ten minutes would possibly think it is right-wing. But those people exist, a constant reminder to me that people can hear the exact same thing and come to completely different conclusions.
But can anyone really defend the media for how they give Democrats a pass on everything? Is it possible to ignore they way Bush was treated vs Obama? I don't think it is.
When President Bush and Vice President Cheney claimed that reversing their tax cuts would hurt many small businesses, the fact-checkers of the press zinged them for exaggerating the impact. Most small businesses, they pointed out, would not be affected. Good for the media: Journalists ought to inform the public when their leaders are making false or misleading statements.
But they ought to do so whether the politicians in question are Republicans or Democrats, and whether the claims help liberal or conservative causes. Last night, President Obama said that his liberalized policy on funding for embryonic stem-cell research would aid the search for cures for AlzheimerÂ’s disease. ShouldnÂ’t news outlets have reported that even scientists on ObamaÂ’s side of the issue say thatÂ’s a pipe dream?
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Celebrity columns always bother me because I doubt they're actually written by the person whose name attracts readers. Celebrity autobiographies bother me less because they often co-credit the actual writer. This is not to say ghostwriting is bad; if people are comfortable working anonymously and are getting paid, good for them. But I want to know I'm reading the real deal. I read this blog because I know you wrote every word of it, apart from quotations, comments, and credited guestentries. And although blogs have taught me that skilled writers aren't as rare as I thought, musical - or plumbing - ability does not necessarily entail writing ability. Writing is hard, and branding someone else's work with a big name cheapens it: the name overshadows the content below it.
In the MSNBC article, Bono
joked that he's "never been great with the full stops or commas."
I wonder what a raw Bono article would read like. I assume his podcast would be more genuine (i.e., spontaneous rather than scripted) and hence wouldn't sound like his column.
And I wonder what Bono would think of ghostsinging, of some nonsinging celebrity taking credit in a field he passionately cares about. Would that hit too close to home?
Posted by: Amritas at January 10, 2009 08:22 AM (RBQmf)
2And I wonder what Bono would think of ghostsinging,
You mean like Milli Vanilli?
Posted by: airforcewife at January 10, 2009 02:09 PM (Fb2PC)
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AFW,
Girl, you know it's true!
Seriously, no, I wasn't thinking of MV. That is a kind of ghostsinging - possibly the most famous instance - but I was thinking of a nonsinger famous for something else being marketed as a singer. MV were unknowns before they became a Frank Farian project.
I was going to cite Paris Hilton as a hypothetical example, but it turns out she really does have an album out!
Posted by: Amritas at January 10, 2009 02:43 PM (RBQmf)
Posted by: Sarah at January 11, 2009 05:44 AM (TWet1)
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Ha, ha! Yeah, that's pretty much what I had in mind, though apparently Shaq really was rapping (badly, judging from the reviews - I never heard of the album until you mentioned it).
Posted by: Amritas at January 11, 2009 10:03 AM (y3aIN)
YES WE CAN TURN AWAY YOUR AD
Heh, this is rich. Apparently The Washington Post is selling classified ads to welcome the Obamas to the White House and has specified that they will only accept positive, glowing ads.
My favorite comment on this blog post:
It is only fair that WaPo post only positive comments for the winner of the election, after all, they did the same for Mr. Bush right? If John McCain had won, everyone knows they would have done the same for him too. I am also certain no liberals would have had a problem with that either and would have defended their decision. I am also certain McCain would have been Times 'Man of the Year' had he won, as well. That is why he was on the cover just as much as Obama was. Therefore, they are completely objective. People need to realize the myth of media bias is just silly.
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The WaPo is not a government paper. It doesn't have to be "fair." This is not "censorship," contrary to one of the commenters. The WaPo can print whatever it wants, including prOpaganda. So I agree with the first comment:
About time WAPO concedes that they abandoned objectivity!
I don't expect any, because no media source can possibly be "fair" to all of us, or represent a consensus whenever none exists.
The "congratulatory" requirement may also imply that the WaPo is aware of a very vocal opposition. If anti-Obama sentiment were not as strong, they wouldn't need to include the requirement, as they'd only get a few negative ad submissions and even fewer people complaining that their ads weren't included. But such sentiments are intense, and excluding the requirement would result in a flood of negative ad submissions and protests. The potential additional revenue would not make up for the bad publicity.
Posted by: Amritas at December 18, 2008 07:20 AM (+nV09)
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I agree with Artitas that this is not "censorship"; however, the WP is owned by a public corporation which has fiduciary responsibilities to its shareholders, and to the degree that the paper's commercial decisions are motivated by the personal political opinions of its officers and employees, I think legitimate questions can be reaised about whether it is fulfilling those responsibilities.
Posted by: david foster at December 18, 2008 10:17 AM (ke+yX)
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Good points, David. But how many conservatives own shares of The Washington Post Company? If the shareholders are predominantly liberal, isn't the WP "fulfilling [its] responsibilities"?
I'm not that upset by the WP's decision because I doubt that ads for Obama will make many new cOnverts. I'd be more concerned about front page reality distortion posing as "news."
Posted by: Amritas at December 18, 2008 11:00 AM (+nV09)
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Amritas...remember, the company is chartered "for purposes of pecuniary gain and profit" or similar language. Thought experiment: suppose that a public corporation decided to give 50% of its net income to the CEO's favorite charity...and suppose the majority of shareholders agreed. I suspect that the minority shareholders would still have a case for violation of fiduciary responsibility.
I don't think this WP action rises to that level; indeed, it's probably reasonable, given that the ad section is for "congratulations," to ensure that the ads placed are really congratulatory. But I think much media-company behavior in recent years does raise the question of whether it is motivated by proper concern for shareholder financial interests.
Any securities lawyers out there who would like to comment on this?
Posted by: david foster at December 18, 2008 12:09 PM (ke+yX)
IT MAKES ME LIKE HIM EVEN MORE
Last night I was thinking about how everyone loves positive reinforcement. How even us hardened jerks like to hear that we're not all bad.
So I sent Neal Boortz an email.
I briefly said that I enjoy his show, that I took some heat for agreeing with him on voting, and that I was simply emailing to give him some positive feedback, which I'm sure he gets little of. I just wanted him to know that not everyone hates him.
His contact page says, "I probably won't answer your email. I rarely answer any emails. We get over 2000 a day ... do the math. Web Guy and Cristina will forward intelligent messages to me. If you're writing in to tell me you hate me, that's fine."
But he wrote me back. How awesome is that?
Even Neal Boortz has a soft spot for a compliment.
MY KIND OF PAPER
I used to rave about the Stars and Stripes coverage when we lived in Germany, but I don't read it often now that we're home. The Girl clued me back in on it today. Read this article, which is what I think all reporting should be: good points, bad points, positive tone, actual information that's not just regurgitated from Reuters, and the 5 W's right at the beginning. I had forgotten how much I miss that newspaper.
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IGNORANCE IS BLISSThis article on the truth behind the Jena Six is just so depressing. But the part that stands out to me is this:
Bean's narrative, though, contained an interesting factual error: It stated that there had been three nooses, not two, hung from the tree at Jena High School. The error was not material, and the truth did not exonerate the perpetrators (one noose would have been too many), but to an observer examining the numerous stories about the Jena Six that flooded newspapers, radio, television, and blogs, the three nooses, which appear again and again, are a kind of journalistic dye-marker signaling a tendency on the part of the reporters to rely on Bean's narrative, his handpicked sources, and the reporting of Witt--whose frequent stories appeared nationwide in Tribune Co.-owned papers like the Los Angeles Times--instead of doing their own legwork by consulting court records and other documents, or even the Alexandria Town Talk, which accurately reported the number of nooses from the very beginning.
Some guy makes a bunch of "facts" up, and the news sources copy and disseminate it. Good heavens, are they even trustworthy at all?
And remember this the next time you read a report out of Iraq. If journalists don't even bother to interview someone in Jena to get the real story, how much of what we hear from Iraq is verified?
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Have you heard of the HBO show 'The Wire'? If you haven't you might want to check into watching it from the beginning because it totally builds on itself and I don't know how easy or entertaining it would be to just start now.... The series is set in Baltimore. The first season was focused on the streets and drug dealers. The second season was how the drugs get in through the Baltimore port and all about another heirarchy of drug business. The third season was mainly police work and trying to control the drugs on the streets. The fourth season was the school systems, and finally the fifth that just started, is about the media. It's the most incredible, intelligent show that I have ever seen, and accurate. If you wonder how the media draws their conclusions? They just make the shit up!
Posted by: Only $19.95 at January 26, 2008 10:48 AM (f2kPQ)
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Here's a counter recommendation: Have you read the Michael Crichton book Airframe? I never looked at the media the same after that book...
Posted by: Sarah at January 26, 2008 10:51 AM (TWet1)
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No, I haven't -- but I'll put it on my library list. I love Michael Crichton. My perspective has also changed since I switched jobs (temporarily it seems).... I'm working in Public Affairs now. Interesting to see how things get spun 'accidently' when trying to fit an article in a layout or make a deadline.
Posted by: Only $19.95 at January 26, 2008 12:46 PM (f2kPQ)
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Kind of similar to what the Bushies did with Curveball in the run-up to war. Except of course that WAS material.
Posted by: Fred O at January 31, 2008 08:18 AM (X8iAz)
OLD MEDIA
In October, I got interviewed for a Military Spouse Magazine article on how deployments mess with family planning. We had just found out that I was finally pregnant, so I had a triumphant story to tell: we had wasted most of our safe year, but it had worked out in the end.
The article just got published. So much for happy endings.
It's pretty surreal to see your happiness immortalized in a magazine after everything has gone to crap.
I've had a couple of people suggest that I try to get paid to write for a publication, but this is a prime example of why I don't have much interest in such endeavors. Talk about old media; so much has happened in the three months it took for the article to go to print that the story isn't even remotely accurate anymore.
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Sarah....
sending hugs your way. I totally understand, about the amount of time it takes, for an interview, until it becomes print, in a publication. A certain Military Publication took almost one year, before printing an interview, from me.........
and then, there's Erin.....where would we be?, without her??Love you, both!(and your hubby's, too!)
Posted by: debey at January 22, 2008 07:13 AM (83TNL)
CRAPPY NEWS NETWORK
Woah. McQ from Q and O busts out CNN bigtime. He was watching a program on John Cena and steroid use and thought Cena's answer was evasive. Then he saw the entire tape. He asks, "If CNN can so cavalierly edit an answer in a relatively peripheral story about professional wresting, what are they doing with really important stories."
You have to go watch these two videos. It's unreal how sneaky CNN was. And, yes, Cena definitely deserves an apology.
Every time I see something like this, it makes me distrust the news even more. What else are they clipping and cutting?
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CNN Chicken noodle news..
But I have seen people calling it Clinton News Network.
I have to agree
Posted by: awtm at November 20, 2007 07:32 AM (XEBSz)
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Personnally, I do know how "wonderful" the media can be with their edits. from local tv news , to Army Times....the media, all of them, can twist words, and they think NOTHING about doing it.
Posted by: debey at November 20, 2007 08:00 AM (kocrl)
YOU MUST BE KIDDING
John Hawkins found the perfect example of how the media will come up with anything they can to make Iraq look bad. Deaths in Iraq are way down? How can we play this story? Oh, I know, an article on how Iraqi grave diggers are out of a job. Seriously. That's the story they chose to report. The death toll is down, so let's report that cemetery workers are feeling the sting in their wallets.
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Pretty much. Sometimes I really wonder if they took off their negativity blinders, if they would be able to see what we see. Somehow I doubt it. Sad, very sad.
Posted by: Butterfly Wife at October 17, 2007 09:58 AM (G9siZ)
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Yep, it's really pathetic. I really have to stay away from it all sometimes, lest I lose what little bit of sanity I have left!
(I found you via BFW's blog. Nice place you have, and I will add a link to you if you don't mind.)
Posted by: Claire at October 17, 2007 11:59 AM (5eVw9)
WOMEN DRIVE ME NUTSJohn Hawkins posts that Katie Couric is still blaming her failure on the fact that the world can't handle her being a woman. Puh-lease.
Look, you can't have it both ways. You can't say that the country is progressive enough to hire you for the biggest news job ever but not progressive enough to watch you do it. CBS is in it to make money, and Hawkins is right: they wouldn't have hired you if they thought you couldn't pull in ratings. They were wrong. But it's not because they're sexist.
God, that's what I hate about women. They want to be thought of as completely equal, able to do any job that men can and bristling when anyone even suggests they can't. And then when they fail, they say it's because they're a woman and it's different. Either it's different or it's not. It can't be that you are just as good as a man when you're successful and then held back by your gender when you fail.
Male anchormen have come and gone, and none of them get to whine that they failed because they were men. Stop blaming your problems on the viewing audience. And stop viewing everything in the entire world through the lens of your gender. No one cares that you have a vagina; they only care that they don't like to watch you reading the news.
Posted by: Tammi at September 27, 2007 08:47 AM (xYhVQ)
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Gotta agree here...I don't see anything great about her...in fact the only thing I really felt about her, was sorry for her when she lost her husband....and that is human nature.
Posted by: A Soldier's Wife at September 27, 2007 09:54 AM (Yo28E)
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ok now that you have said vagina and Katie Couric in the same sentence...
I need to puke...
I think Ms. Couric has had inordinate amount of success based on her being female.
My Pastor called her Godless in church the other day. He brought her name up because of her being deemed "Americas Sweetheart". He thought it was a shameful thing to say about America, and what Amercia thinks is valuable and honorable. Frankly I gave a hefty amen, but wanted to stand and cheer.
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Katie Couric is a b*tch. And I say that with no due respect. There is a great deal about her in the book Spin Sisters, which just confirms things I've been told by people who have worked under her in one respect or another. She's not a sweetheart, she's not sweet, and she has no depth of feeling for anyone but herself.
Watching her try to give the news is worse than anticipating a dental visit. It has nothing to do with her vagina, and everything to do with the fact that she's talentless in that regard and has risen to her level of incompetance. Wolf Blitzer has a penis, and I can't stand to watch him anchor a news desk, either.
Feminazis. Ick.
Posted by: airforcewife at September 27, 2007 12:36 PM (emgKQ)
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That's funny that you should write about this because just yesterday I was thinking that Katie's rank would be the subject of HILLARY's rant when she loses to Rudy. "The country wasn't progressive enough to elect me, what can I say?" Ugh.
Posted by: Nicole at September 27, 2007 01:35 PM (Mus7L)
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Maybe her problem has something to do with this.
Posted by: david foster at September 27, 2007 04:33 PM (gguM0)
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IT has nothing to do with her gender. She isn't, in any respect, a journalist. She hasn't paid her dues, hasn't been a real reporter. All she has done is the Today Show. Even Charlie Gibson has done real reporting, before he became a morning show geek. I'm sorry, those morning shows are NOT news. Therefore, I am surprised anyone thought she could do this. I felt sorry for her when her husband died, but this is NOT a reason to hire someone.
LAW
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A lot of guys, especially younger guys, are concluding that COMPLAINING is the essence of femininity. It's not fair, because there are a lot of women who aren't whiners, but the complainers are so visible especially in colleges that it's natural for guys to draw this conclusion.
Age, education, and social class have a big effect. Take a woman who is upper middle class, with an advanced degree, and in her 40s or 50s, and odds are you have one of the most unhappy creatures on the earth.
Posted by: anon at September 28, 2007 08:43 AM (tC0Tu)
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Yeah,sorry,Katie...but it's not us,it's you. I
tried watching the woman and she is simply not
meant to do hard news. Painful to watch in a way
that has nothing to do with gender.
Posted by: MaryIndiana at October 03, 2007 04:55 PM (82AdA)
WHAT?
Today's I-can't-believe-they-actually-wrote-that line comes from (who else) Agence France-Presse in an article about Michael Moore's new anti-Bush movie:
Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder, Steve Earl, Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello and Joan Baez break up the film with musical interludes.
Pop singer Cat Stevens, "who couldn't be here tonight" because he found himself on a US no-fly list after changing his name to Yusuf Islam, got a nod.
The egregious statement is bolded so it can sink in for a minute. Do they really think we're stupid enough to swallow that cause and effect chain? Cat Stevens was flying all over the place and then changed his name and accidentally got mistaken for a terrorist and now can't fly? Balderdash! Cat Stevens changed his name back in 19freaking78. He hasn't been Cat Stevens for nearly 30 years. And he's on the no-fly list because he's suspected of contributing money to Hamas, not because his name has the word "Islam" in it. And nice use of the phrase "found himself," as if the action were agent-less. He "found himself" on the list, instead of performed actions and made statements that had the authorities looking in his direction. It's all just a big snafu, right? Poor Cat Stevens just accidentally can't fly anywhere now. Mean old Bush.
If that isn't the biggest whitewashing of why Yusef Islam couldn't be in Michael Moore's movie...
1
I wonder if MM tries to pass of Yusuf Islam's money contribution as an "Oops! I didn't realize!" kind of thing like the Body Shop woman (Anita something or other) does.
She contributed to Hezbollah, if I'm not mistaken. Or perhaps hers was Hamas, also.
I haven't shopped there in about 4 years now, and let me tell you I am very resentful. I used to live on that lotion (with peach, of course).
Posted by: airforcewife at September 09, 2007 08:41 AM (emgKQ)
THEY TAKE IT SO LITERALLY
The people of Seattle are on the edge of their seats:
Construction delays will force journalism history buffs to wait a few more months to visit the Newseum, a museum dedicated to news reporting and the First Amendment being built near the Capitol.
Lenin's Tomb quips, "I hope it includes a special clinic for journalists whose arms dislocate from the spontaneous back-patting."
A museum dedicated to the First Amendment. Incidentally, we caught some crap on the news last week in the motel, where a talking head made a remark about "Second Amendment literalists." Nice. I'd love to hear someone sneer about First Amendment literalists and see how that goes over.
1
I love the First Amendment Literalist analysis Sarah. You can apply the same argument to any of the other amendments. How about the 4th or the 13th?
Good job. I will be borrowing this in the near future.
Posted by: Badger 6 at August 09, 2007 06:20 AM (rlynI)
2
As far as “a museum dedicated to news reporting” they couldn’t be more accurate. Museums are places where one can visit to see things that are old and/or no longer exist. Well, I would say news reporting, that being actually reporting the news – facts, another words, not injecting opinion or uncorroborated, agenda driven falsehoods is indeed extinct. So, I say good for them for acknowledging that.
Also, building a ‘museum dedicated to … the First Amendment being built near the Capitol” is unnecessary. The Capital, and the rest of the DC for that matter, already represents, very nicely I might add, our First Amendment right along with the rest of our rights and freedoms. So that’s just redundant in my book.
Posted by: tim at August 09, 2007 08:07 AM (nno0f)
3
Badger 6 -- You literally took the words out of my mouth. I had added the line "Or the Fourth or Thirteenth" to the end of it and then erased it because I figured I'd already made the point. Those were the exact two others I thought of as well.
Posted by: Sarah at August 09, 2007 08:18 AM (5mt/4)
4
I work in Rosslyn, Virginia, right across the Potomac from DC, and right next door to the original location of the Newseum. One of their best displays was about seven sections of the Berlin wall, complete with East German guard tower and huge background mural of the fireworks on the night the wall came down.
The new Newseum took three or four sections to the new location, but I believe the ones remaining will be reinstalled at the original place.
If you're into that sort of thing, check out Freedom Park in Rosslyn (very near the Iwo Jima Memorial). Statues and memorials to all things free, including a beautiful tribute to journalists who lost their lives covering the news.
Posted by: Ted at August 11, 2007 01:54 AM (7lxqj)
Critics called for the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, a change in command in Iraq and at Centcom, new strategies, and more troops. But now that we have a new secretary, a new command in Iraq and at Centcom, new strategies, and more troops, suddenly we have a renewed demand for withdrawal before the agreed-upon September accounting—suggesting that the only constant in such harping was the assumption that Iraq was either hopeless or not worth the effort.
Amen to that. I had a discussion back in 2003 with a German friend who said we were wrong to go to Iraq without support from countries like France. I pointed out that the problem is that there was actually no possibility of getting France's support, that Chirac said they would not vote for war no matter what. They had already made their decision, no matter what we said or did. Same with the anti-OIF types at The Times: there's absolutely nothing we could do to ever get them to admit that Iraq is not a lost cause. So what's the point?
When Time magazine interviewed a bombmaker claiming to be responsible for “rising American casualties,” they forgot to ask the “sophisticated and tenacious enemy” the tough questions like, “What’s your exit strategy?” or “How broken is the insurgency?” “Could you define victory?” or even the most basic, “Why are you doing this?” The fact that the press demands accountability from one side and offers servility to the other is a very cunning strategy to win an asymmetrical war.
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There is neither happiness nor misery in the world; there is only the comparison of one state with another, nothing more. He who has felt the deepest grief is best able to experience supreme happiness. We must have felt what it is to die, Morrel, that we may appreciate the enjoyments of living. --The Count of Monte Cristo--
While our troops go out to defend our country, it is incumbent upon us to make the country worth defending. --Deskmerc--
Contrary to what you've just seen, war is neither glamorous nor fun. There are no winners, only losers. There are no good wars, with the following exceptions: The American Revolution, WWII, and the Star Wars Trilogy. --Bart Simpson--
If you want to be a peacemaker, you've gotta learn to kick ass. --Sheriff of East Houston, Superman II--
Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without an accordion. You just leave a lot of useless noisy baggage behind. --Jed Babbin--
Dante once said that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality. --President John F. Kennedy--
War is a bloody, killing business. You've got to spill their blood, or they will spill yours. --General Patton--
We've gotta keep our heads until this peace craze blows over. --Full Metal Jacket--
Those who threaten us and kill innocents around the world do not need to be treated more sensitively. They need to be destroyed. --Dick Cheney--
The Flag has to come first if freedom is to survive. --Col Steven Arrington--
The purpose of diplomacy isn't to make us feel good about Eurocentric diplomatic skills, and having countries from the axis of chocolate tie our shoelaces together does nothing to advance our infantry. --Sir George--
I just don't care about the criticism I receive every day, because I know the cause I defend is right. --Oriol--
It's days like this when we're reminded that freedom isn't free. --Chaplain Jacob--
Bumper stickers aren't going to accomplish some of the missions this country is going to face. --David Smith--
The success of multilateralism is measured not merely by following a process, but by achieving results. --President Bush--
Live and act within the limit of your knowledge and keep expanding it to the limit of your life.
--John Galt--
First, go buy a six pack and swig it all down. Then, watch Ace Ventura. And after that, buy a Hard Rock Cafe shirt and come talk to me. You really need to lighten up, man.
--Sminklemeyer--
You've got to kill people, and when you've killed enough they stop fighting --General Curtis Lemay--
If we wish to be free, if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending, if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained -- we must fight! --Patrick Henry--
America has never been united by blood or birth or soil. We are bound by ideals that move us beyond our backgrounds, lift us above our interests and teach us what it means to be citizens. Every child must be taught these principles. Every citizen must uphold them. And every immigrant, by embracing these ideals, makes our country more, not less, American. --President George W. Bush--
are usually just cheerleading sessions, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing but a soothing reduction in blood pressure brought about by the narcotic high of being agreed with. --Bill Whittle
War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.
--John Stuart Mill--
We are determined that before the sun sets on this terrible struggle, our flag will be recognized throughout the world as a symbol of freedom on the one hand and of overwhelming force on the other. --General George Marshall--
We can continue to try and clean up the gutters all over the world and spend all of our resources looking at just the dirty spots and trying to make them clean. Or we can lift our eyes up and look into the skies and move forward in an evolutionary way.
--Buzz Aldrin--
America is the greatest, freest and most decent society in existence. It is an oasis of goodness in a desert of cynicism and barbarism. This country, once an experiment unique in the world, is now the last best hope for the world.
--Dinesh D'Souza--
Recent anti-Israel protests remind us again of our era's peculiar alliance: the most violent, intolerant, militantly religious movement in modern times has the peace movement on its side. --James Lileks--
As a wise man once said: we will pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
Unless the price is too high, the burden too great, the hardship too hard, the friend acts disproportionately, and the foe fights back. In which case, we need a timetable.
--James Lileks--
I am not willing to kill a man so that he will agree with my faith, but I am prepared to kill a man so that he cannot force my compatriots to submit to his.
--Froggy--
You can say what you want about President Bush; but the truth is that he can take a punch. The man has taken a swift kick in the crotch for breakfast every day for 6 years and he keeps getting up with a smile in his heart and a sense of swift determination to see the job through to the best of his abilties.
--Varifrank--
In a perfect world, We'd live in peace and love and harmony with each oither and the world, but then, in a perfect world, Yoko would have taken the bullet.
--SarahBellum--
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free. --Ronald Reagan--
America is rather like life. You can usually find in it what you look for. It will probably be interesting, and it is sure to be large. --E.M. Forster--
Do not fear the enemy, for your enemy can only take your life. It is far better that you fear the media, for they will steal your HONOR. That awful power, the public opinion of a nation, is created in America by a horde of ignorant, self-complacent simpletons who failed at ditching and shoemaking and fetched up in journalism on their way to the poorhouse. --Mark Twain--
The Enlightenment was followed by the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars, which touched every European state, sparked vicious guerrilla conflicts across the Continent and killed millions. Then, things really turned ugly after the invention of soccer. --Iowahawk--
Every time I meet an Iraqi Army Soldier or Policeman that I haven't met before, I shake his hand and thank him for his service. Many times I am thanked for being here and helping his country. I always tell them that free people help each other and that those that truly value freedom help those seeking it no matter the cost. --Jack Army--
Right, left - the terms are useless nowadays anyway. There are statists, and there are individualists. There are pessimists, and optimists. There are people who look backwards and trust in the West, and those who look forward and trust in The World. Those are the continuums that seem to matter the most right now. --Lileks--
The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
--Winston Churchill--
A man or a nation is not placed upon this earth to do merely what is pleasant and what is profitable. It is often called upon to carry out what is both unpleasant and unprofitable, but if it is obviously right it is mere shirking not to undertake it. --Arthur Conan Doyle--
A man who has nothing which he cares about more than he does about his personal safety is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the existing of better men than himself. --John Stuart Mill--
After the attacks on September 11, 2001, most of the sheep, that is, most citizens in America said, "Thank God I wasn't on one of those planes." The sheepdogs, the warriors, said, "Dear God, I wish I could have been on one of those planes. Maybe I could have made a difference." --Dave Grossman--
At heart I’m a cowboy; my attitude is if they’re not going to stand up and fight for what they believe in then they can go pound sand. --Bill Whittle--
A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship. --Alexander Tyler--
By that time a village half-wit could see what generations of professors had pretended not to notice. --Atlas Shrugged--
I kept asking Clarence why our world seemed to be collapsing and everything seemed so shitty. And he'd say, "That's the way it goes, but don't forget, it goes the other way too." --Alabama Worley--
So Bush is history, and we have a new president who promises to heal the planet, and yet the jihadists don’t seem to have got the Obama message that there are no enemies, just friends we haven’t yet held talks without preconditions with.
--Mark Steyn--
"I had started alone in this journey called life, people started
gathering up on the way, and the caravan got bigger everyday." --Urdu couplet
The book and the sword are the two things that control the world. We either gonna control them through knowledge and influence their minds, or we gonna bring the sword and take their heads off. --RZA--
It's a daily game of public Frogger, hopping frantically to avoid being crushed under the weight of your own narcissism, banality, and plain old stupidity. --Mary Katharine Ham--
There are more instances of the abridgment of freedoms
of the people by gradual and silent encroachment of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations. --James Madison--
It is in the heat of emotion that good people must remember to stand on principle. --Larry Elder--
Please show this to the president and ask him to remember the wishes of the forgotten man, that is, the one who dared to vote against him. We expect to be tramped on but we do wish the stepping would be a little less hard. --from a letter to Eleanor Roosevelt--
The world economy depends every day on some engineer, farmer, architect, radiator shop owner, truck driver or plumber getting up at 5AM, going to work, toiling hard, and producing real wealth so that an array of bureaucrats, regulators, and redistributors can manage the proper allotment of much of the natural largess produced. --VDH--
Parents are often so busy with the physical rearing of children that they miss the glory of parenthood, just as the grandeur of the trees is lost when raking leaves. --Marcelene Cox--
Also, building a ‘museum dedicated to … the First Amendment being built near the Capitol” is unnecessary. The Capital, and the rest of the DC for that matter, already represents, very nicely I might add, our First Amendment right along with the rest of our rights and freedoms. So that’s just redundant in my book.
