So I decided to partake in my weekly dose of Wingnutistan flagellation from "the right" and came across the following Gem on the website of the Cincinnati 9/12 Project during my dumpster dive:
http://www.cincinnati912project.com/...
It delves into a criticism of tightening of government screws in the tax laws in an attempt to eliminate what many consider to be one of the bigger fraud/abuse/waste contributors in our antiquated system: Non-qualifying, tax-exempted "expenses" -- For instance, when an SBE owner buys a new laptop for his college-bound daughter and writes it off as a "business expense".
You'd think that, in the climate of horrible private sector disasters like the BP oil spill, maybe the Cincinnati 9/12 Project, which laments upon the failure of government to eliminate its own waste, would welcome an attempt by legislators to scrutinize this practice more, and hopefully get more non-paying entities to pay taxes that are due.
That's not the worst offense though... The Cincinnati 9/12 Project bills this as an article written by "a CPA, whose profession is to keep up on all tax laws and keep his clients (small businesses) in compliance" supposedly named "Wayne". About half-way through the article I got the tingly feeling of Deja Vu. I had already read this.
In fact, I had. The "article" was almost a verbatim regurgitation of another one, published roughly a month earlier on CNN's website, and written by one Neil deMause. Here is the CNN link: http://money.cnn.com/... , and here's one from Neil's own website: http://demause.net/...
Notice how, save for some superficial changes to wording, they are almost identical? Even the idea flow and paragraph breaks match up! In fact, the major changes to the article were solely to remove the citations from other sources, which include opposition to and support of the new law changes, as well as comments by a legislative aide involved in the legislation.
What's more -- Neil's a writer for CNN and many other publications, including NYC publications such as The Village Voice and City Limits. So the Cincinnati 9/12 Project plagiarizes an east-coast Ivy League writer to make their point (badly).
I wish that I could say that this is an isolated occurrence. I'd be mistaken if I did make such a claim. Unfortunately, as was shown by Andrew Breitbart's protege James O'Keefe, as well as the recent textbook changes in Texas, and any patron of the Glenn Beck Show on Fox can attest: the movement that includes Beck, the Cincinnati Tea Party, COAST, and this Cincinnati 9/12 Project is being marked more and more by revisionist history and selectively edited reporting that conspire to create the story that the writer wants, rather than report the story that the writer sees.
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Coleman Kane
Secretary, Hamilton County Young Democrats