And they will always win, over and over again, as long as the lazy Traditional media keeps covering their events. It's a combination of institutional bias as well as lazy, repetitious reporting. No wonder Colbert had Al-Jazeera English on his show. It's about the only source online right now that I can find that isn't breathlessly repeating the Lie: that there was a "rally" by anybody at all today in D.C. One hundred to three hundred people? I scanned the online news articles published today about budget talks, and they all parrot the fake concept of a 'rally' by teabaggers.
Dailykos's frontpage today seemed to be the only place prominently pointing out: the rally in DC today is a figment of Boehner's imagination.
Try five thousand people today in New Hampshire. Or another five thousand people rallying against the Class War in New York City last week, which I only saw because of Al-jazeera.. But unlike the Tea Party fake rally in D.C. today, when I go to Google News to see coverage of the "Day of Rage" in NYC last week, it's nothing but crickets. And TV coverage is generally worse than online, so there you go.
I'm not a member of the 'professional left', and I don't need to be to see something very troubling in the cacophony of statements being released today by Reid and Boehner.
I have yet to see much coverage at all of the New Hampshire rallies. See diary on rec list right now...http://www.dailykos.com/...
Here's what Reid is saying. Don't be surprised if you see a repeat of historical patterns here.
Asked at Thursday’s news conference whether he was willing to leave conservative members behind in order to forge a budget agreement with moderate Democrats, Boehner responded: “Not very interested.”
Boehner’s remarks stood in contrast to comments made by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on the Senate floor less than an hour earlier.
“As Vice President Biden announced last night, Democrats and Republicans have agreed upon a number on which to base our budget cuts – $73 billion below the president’s budget proposal,” Reid said. “Now we have to figure out how to get there.”
Is Reid being punked?
“We’ll continue talking and continue working to find a middle ground,” Reid said.
The Teabaggers are losing popularity, and it's well known that the GOP and tea party leadership collude. Matt Taibbi wrotegreat pieces on how the GOP took over the Rand Paul campaign after its primary victory. The Koch Bros and Americans for Prosperity are in bed with other teabagger groups. John Boehner and the GOP are astro-turfing half the teabaggers activity, and exploiting the other half of it to pretend that they have no choice but to make their cuts.
Harry Reid: you aren't buying this bullshit, are you? Wait, YOU ARE??????
He acknowledged the difficulty Boehner faced. "I'm sure it's not easy trying to negotiate with the tea party screaming in his right ear."
It's not easy to negotiate in good faith when you have no intent to, that's the problem. There's no point in playing nice, or pretending to. No point mincing words with the wingers. The people screaming in Boehner's ear are his own people, and he doesn't dive a f*** about the Joe Schmoe teabaggers in rural America who might actually want to primary some Republicans. The teabaggers were used and tossed aside by the GOP for the 2010 elections, and if they can continue preventing economic recovery as much as possible, then they'll still have a fighting chance for 2012.
I get it. Reid, how the f*ck don't you?
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The Tea Party rallies were a wash, with 300 as the highest estimate out there, and "dozens" as a more realistic number. GOP pictures of event were kept very low to the ground to minimize the smallness of the crowd. Yet the daily coverage of this teabagger "event" is as thorough, or more extensive, than an average daily coverage of progressives in Wisconsin.
I scanned through a dozen or so different media reports on today's budget negotiations, using Google News and also going over various publications off the top of my head.
Every freakin' single one of them made mention of the teabagger non-rally, as if it was relevant in the least. Which could be excusable, if it weren't for the fact that ALMOST NONE of these reporters bother to mention any estimates of the crowd.
USATODAY's reporter did make mention of a 300 estimate, and was the only one to do so that I found. But she lazilystuck it at the bottom of the article, which gives readers the false image of an active teabagger rally.
LA Times idiotically titled its piece as "tea party protests budget compromise".
The American media must be waiting for us to go to the store and pick up condoms so it can continue its teabagging, winger lovefest.
One of the best on the left, in my opinion, is Cliff Schecter. Many of you remember him, check out his very, very excellent tea party piece....
http://english.aljazeera.net/...