Television news has taken criticism from every direction imaginable. It is accused of being too far left, or too far right, or too shallow, or too consumed with profit, etc.
Now the Federal Communications Commission has settled the argument. Television news is too newsy. The FCC's latest satire-defying ruling has declared that the gossip-mongers at TMZ, and the God-casters at Pat Robertson's 700 Club, are "bona fide" news providers. In arriving at that ruling, the Commissioners had to conclude that there would be no overt political partisanship in the news content from these parties.
MSM, the GOP and the rival Democat campaign's divisive political tactics to seperate Obama from the rest of the electorate appears to be working to some degree.
Somehow the media has become responsible for Sen. Obama’s ‘problems’ with Rev. Wright. Let’s ‘get real’ here. Now only is the media NOT responsible, but Sen. Obama didn’t do enough to put this problem behind him early on. How, in good conscience, can anyone blame the media? Let’s face it, the ugly truth we’re not talking about is the fact that African-Americans (and I am African-American) are all alike. We talk alike, we think alike, we behave the same way. Sen. Obama’s problem is that he tried to deny that fact early on and presented himself as a ‘new negro’. Why didn’t it work? Because there’s no such thing.
The fact that Obama even mentions Daily Kos in an interview with Chris Wallace is an amazing thing. I've been following this website from its modest, humble beginnings. To think that you're now doing the talk show circuit, writing for Newsweek and being referenced on Fox News is something to be proud of. In a nutshell, Kos, in this universe of post-modern cybernews cycles, you're f---ing brilliant. In less than 6 years, the blogshpere has turned the MSM world upside down and the blogsphere is only going to grow (see Facebook, My Space, and the 100s of other blogs doing what we do out there).
Obama needs to interview with the likes of Wallace even Limbaugh because if he can get through that without looking completely stupid, he can get through nearly anything. Do you forget that Bill Clinton went on Chris Wallace not too long ago. Clinton attacked Wallace mid-interview and looked like a bulldog to folks like us, but didn't win over any new friends on the Right. Obama looked pretty good. His answers were frank and straightforward. No attacks. Very little back-peddling. He did well.
As a steward of the Earth growing dismay is the inevitable response to yet another American election cycle where the environment is felled to utter obscurity on the public agenda, trees and fish can’t vote or make demands as they provide revenue for the almighty American capitalism engine, so the salmon and polar bear fade to oblivion on our watch. Clinton and Obama have robustly demonstrated they could give a damn, both of their ludicrous emission plans have end goals of 2050.
Given the enormous scope of change required for a real emissions plan of 80% reduction by 2020—combined with the many extremely powerful market players that would oppose that change with everything they had—is that harsh condemnation of the Democratic candidates really warranted?
After today, between GWB's "All is Well in Iraq!" mantra, listening to Doug Feith on the Diane Rehm show, and being exposed to "Team Torture"'s play book, I am convinced that NONE OF US will be "judged kindly by history." The constitutional and moral travesties committed by this administration will, of course, be well-documented. But, those in the future will look back on us, the American people, and wonder how we let them get away with it. We should be ashamed of ourselves. Sorry I'm such a downer tonight. OK...on with tonight's Countdown musings.
With all of the attention being placed on Reverend Wrights comments, which were taken out of context in the first place and do have some meaning if one is to listen to them in full (though I do have a problem with churches that mix religion and politics) have we forgotten the insane comments made by Republican Loyalists Pat Robertson and Jerry Fallwell, you know, the "Agents of Intolerance."
Why, oh why are people so concerned about Rev. Wright's comments and their effect on Obama's campaign but very little attention is brought to the public and private comments made by just these two religious whack jobs?
I'm still fairly new to the Daily Kos, but I'm sure that I'm in the right place because I know that this is "Obama Country". However, he's been taking a beating in the polls ever since the right-wingers got a hold of these remarks made by his pastor.
If Obama is going to rebound, we've got to get the media's focus off of Obama and Pastor Wright. We've got to go on the offensive and back the right-wing off with damaging information about the Republican Party that reveals the utter hypocrisy of their attacks on Obama and his pastor, so that the media switches its focus onto them.
What is that damaging information? I'm certain that it's in the article below, which I've copied from a website that permits you to copy whatever you want. This article has the ammunition to shutup Hannity, Limbaugh and the rest of their right-wing buddies. It proves that all of the Republican presidential candidates were far more guilty than Obama of every single charge that they've made against him because of his association with Pastor Wright. It exposes and nails them! They will want to drop this Pastor Wright thing like a "hot potato". The media will switch its focus upon them. We've got to spread this message far and wide.
Barack Obama's speech today in Philadelphia was simply amazing.
If there was ever an opportunity to turn adversity into opportunity, Obama did just that, and a lot more. To use some sports vernacular, it was like Michael Jordan making the jumper that gave the Chicago Bulls an NBA title in Utah or Reggie Jackson smacking four home runs to close out a New York Yankees world championship in the 1970's (one of the things I thought, to use the Reggie Jackson analogy, was "It was like October coming early!").
So compelling was Obama's speech that even the senior correspondent for Pat Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network came through with some ringing praises of Obama's remarks.
More below.
I am very upset with the hypocrisy that has been promulgated by the talking heads of the mainstream media with respect to Obama's relationship with his minister Rev. Wright....
As we all know, Obama himself is not responsible for the statements for which he is being held accountable.
Still, Republicans have fed into this notion that Obama "sat there in a pew for 20 years" listening to the racist and unpatriotic statements, and so he is guilty by association and/or osmosis.
They claim that Obama should have abandoned the Reverand and the Church, and found a new one somewhere.... They argue that by staying with the Church and continuing to seek counsel from the man responsible for the bile that Obama was condoning it....
Were these same Republicans up in arms when Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson BOTH claimed that God was punishing America through the 9/11 attacks for accepting gays?
No.
Were these same Republicans up in arms when Falwell claimed that America was "rotting from within", and that God did not answer "the prayer of any unredeemed Gentile or Jew"?
In the past few days, people have died in Iraq, the economy has taken some pretty heavy blows, and --- HOLY SHIT, STOP THE PRESSES. This just in! We have received reports that Barack Obama's pastor said the words "God damn America", while referring to injustices faced by the black community in the United States.
We will now go to a split screen for the next 72 hours, where we will put the video of this black man jumping around and getting emotional in front of a black congregation on a continuous loop. As you can see from the video, the pastor is black and so is his congregation.
This black pastor's tone of voice and level of emotion is fairly typical of many, many churches across America, but coming from a black pastor in a black church it is quite troubling. Also note that black Democratic candidate Barack Obama attends this black church and often hears this black pastor preaching. This is a significant blow to the Obama campaign.
OK, so everyone is up in arms over the words of Obama's "pastor, mentor, and friend" to quote America's favorite bigot, Pat Buchanan from MSNBC this a.m.
I've seen replay after replay on the news the last 24 hours of Wright condemning America. It seems to me that the response to this is rather simple and I show it after the jump.
In 1981, The Council for National Policy was established by Richard Viguery, Paul Weyrich, Richard DeVos and others on the hard right. Eventually, members of the Council for National Policy would include members like Hunt Oil heirs, the Coors Beer folks, Amway, Richard Cheney, Reverend Sun Myung Moon, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson.
Here is what a membership list of the Council for National Policy looks like
McCain's so-called Christian supporter Rod Parsley claims the country was founded as a "Christian Nation", founded to destroy Islam... Great. Thankfully, Keith Olbermann used my favorite quote that disputes the Christian Right's allegations that the United States was founded as a Christian Nation. I featured it in my graphic novel, "Holy S#!t: Or... Pat Robertson Is The Anti-Christ", using it to dispute the Christian Right's claims.
The quote is from a treaty with Tripoli negotiated by George Washington and signed by John Adams (saw somewhere he's on TV soon...), goes something like this:"As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion, --as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Musselmen (Moslem), - and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan (Mohammedan) nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries." Continued...
Okay, I’m not going to say that Tim Russert’s questions to Barack Obama about Louis Farrakhan are racist.
Not directly, anyway.
Instead I’m simply going to ask you about a white religious leader who has been accused of anti-Semitism, and tell you whether primary candidates have been asked to denounce him.
You tell me in the comments whether you think there is a double standard.
Here comes the calvary. Even though this was, up until now, a dead story, leave it to right wings mouthpieces to re-hash, and exhibit unrivaled hypocrisy.
Television news has taken criticism from every direction imaginable. It is accused of being too far left, or too far right, or too shallow, or too consumed with profit, etc.
