23 Oct 08 Orson Scott Card lightly admonishes the venerable media
From The Rhinoceros Times,
An open letter to the local daily paper — almost every local daily paper in America:
I remember reading All the President’s Men and thinking: That’s journalism. You do what it takes to get the truth and you lay it before the public, because the public has a right to know.
This housing crisis didn’t come out of nowhere. It was not a vague emanation of the evil Bush administration.
It was a direct result of the political decision, back in the late 1990s, to loosen the rules of lending so that home loans would be more accessible to poor people. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were authorized to approve risky loans.
What is a risky loan? It’s a loan that the recipient is likely not to be able to repay.
The goal of this rule change was to help the poor — which especially would help members of minority groups. But how does it help these people to give them a loan that they can’t repay? They get into a house, yes, but when they can’t make the payments, they lose the house — along with their credit rating.
They end up worse off than before.
This was completely foreseeable and in fact many people did foresee it. One political party, in Congress and in the executive branch, tried repeatedly to tighten up the rules. The other party blocked every such attempt and tried to loosen them.
Furthermore, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were making political contributions to the very members of Congress who were allowing them to make irresponsible loans. (Though why quasi-federal agencies were allowed to do so baffles me. It’s as if the Pentagon were allowed to contribute to the political campaigns of congressmen who support increasing their budget.)
Isn’t there a story here? Doesn’t journalism require that you who produce our daily paper tell the truth about who brought us to a position where the only way to keep confidence in our economy was a $700 billion bailout? Aren’t you supposed to follow the money and see which politicians were benefiting personally from the deregulation of mortgage lending?
I have no doubt that if these facts had pointed to the Republican Party or to John McCain as the guilty parties, you would be treating it as a vast scandal. “Housing-gate,” no doubt. Or “Fannie-gate.”
Instead, it was Sen. Christopher Dodd and Congressman Barney Frank, both Democrats, who denied that there were any problems, who refused Bush administration requests to set up a regulatory agency to watch over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and who were still pushing for these agencies to go even further in promoting subprime mortgage loans almost up to the minute they failed.
As Thomas Sowell points out in a TownHall.com essay entitled “Do Facts Matter?” (http://snipurl.com/457to): “Alan Greenspan warned them four years ago. So did the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers to the President. So did Bush’s Secretary of the Treasury.”
These are facts. This financial crisis was completely preventable. The party that blocked any attempt to prevent it was … the Democratic Party. The party that tried to prevent it was … the Republican Party.
Yet when Nancy Pelosi accused the Bush administration and Republican deregulation of causing the crisis, you in the press did not hold her to account for her lie. Instead, you criticized Republicans who took offense at this lie and refused to vote for the bailout!
What? It’s not the liar, but the victims of the lie who are to blame?
Now let’s follow the money … right to the presidential candidate who is the number two recipient of campaign contributions from Fannie Mae.
And after Fred Raines, the CEO of Fannie Mae who made $90 million while running it into the ground, was fired for his incompetence, one presidential candidate’s campaign actually consulted him for advice on housing.
If that presidential candidate had been John McCain, you would have called it a major scandal and we would be getting stories in your paper every day about how incompetent and corrupt he was.
But instead, that candidate was Barack Obama, and so you have buried this story, and when the McCain campaign dared to call Raines an “adviser” to the Obama campaign — because that campaign had sought his advice — you actually let Obama’s people get away with accusing McCain of lying, merely because Raines wasn’t listed as an official adviser to the Obama campaign.
You would never tolerate such weasely nit-picking from a Republican.
If you who produce our local daily paper actually had any principles, you would be pounding this story, because the prosperity of all Americans was put at risk by the foolish, short-sighted, politically selfish and possibly corrupt actions of leading Democrats, including Obama.
If you who produce our local daily paper had any personal honor, you would find it unbearable to let the American people believe that somehow Republicans were to blame for this crisis.
There are precedents. Even though President Bush and his administration never said that Iraq sponsored or was linked to 9/11, you could not stand the fact that Americans had that misapprehension — so you pounded us with the fact that there was no such link. (Along the way, you created the false impression that Bush had lied to them and said that there was a connection.)
If you had any principles, then surely right now, when the American people are set to blame President Bush and John McCain for a crisis they tried to prevent, and are actually shifting to approve of Barack Obama because of a crisis he helped cause, you would be laboring at least as hard to correct that false impression.
Your job, as journalists, is to tell the truth. That’s what you claim you do, when you accept people’s money to buy or subscribe to your paper.
But right now, you are consenting to or actively promoting a big fat lie — that the housing crisis should somehow be blamed on Bush, McCain and the Republicans. You have trained the American people to blame everything bad — even bad weather — on Bush, and they are responding as you have taught them to.
If you had any personal honor, each reporter and editor would be insisting on telling the truth — even if it hurts the election chances of your favorite candidate.
Because that’s what honorable people do. Honest people tell the truth even when they don’t like the probable consequences. That’s what honesty means. That’s how trust is earned.
Barack Obama is just another politician, and not a very wise one. He has revealed his ignorance and naivete time after time — and you have swept it under the rug, treated it as nothing.
Meanwhile, you have participated in the borking of Sarah Palin, reporting savage attacks on her for the pregnancy of her unmarried daughter — while you ignored the story of John Edwards’ own adultery for many months.
So I ask you now: Do you have any standards at all? Do you even know what honesty means?
Is getting people to vote for Barack Obama so important that you will throw away everything that journalism is supposed to stand for?
You might want to remember the way the National Organization of Women (NOW) threw away their integrity by supporting Bill Clinton despite his well-known pattern of sexual exploitation of powerless women. Who listens to NOW anymore? We know they stand for nothing; they have no principles.
That’s where you are right now.
It’s not too late. You know that if the situation were reversed, and the truth would damage McCain and help Obama, you would be moving heaven and earth to get the true story out there.
If you want to redeem your honor, you will swallow hard and make a list of all the stories you would print if it were McCain who had been getting money from Fannie Mae, McCain whose campaign had consulted with its discredited former CEO, McCain who had voted against tightening its lending practices.
Then you will print them, even though every one of those true stories will point the finger of blame at the reckless Democratic Party, which put our nation’s prosperity at risk so they could feel good about helping the poor, and lay a fair share of the blame at Obama’s door.
You will also tell the truth about John McCain: that he tried, as a senator, to do what it took to prevent this crisis. You will tell the truth about President Bush: that his administration tried more than once to get Congress to regulate lending in a responsible way.
This was a Congress-caused crisis, beginning during the Clinton administration, with Democrats leading the way into the crisis and blocking every effort to get out of it in a timely fashion.
If you at our local daily newspaper continue to let Americans believe — and vote as if — President Bush and the Republicans caused the crisis, then you are joining in that lie.
If you do not tell the truth about the Democrats — including Barack Obama — and do so with the same energy you would use if the miscreants were Republicans — then you are not journalists by any standard.
You’re just the public relations machine of the Democratic Party, and it’s time you were all fired and real journalists brought in, so that we can actually have a daily newspaper in our city.
Amen. I disagree with Card on one point, it is too late.
Tags: barack obama, barney frank, dishonest media, orson scott card, rhinoceros times, sarah palin
18 Oct 08 The ACLU has your back(if you’re a sex offender)
ST. LOUIS (AP) - Four sex offenders in Missouri are suing over a new state law that places Halloween night restrictions on them.
The law requires that sex offenders avoid all Halloween-related contact with children, remain inside their homes and post a sign saying they have no candy to keep trick-or-treaters away.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported yesterday that the ACLU of Eastern Missouri filed suit on the offenders’ behalf in federal court on Friday. The suit claims the provisions are too vague to enforce and improperly add punishment to sentences already served. The plaintiffs’ names are not used in the suit. -source
Problem:
Another concern is that when sex offenders post signs about not having candy, they could become targets themselves. “There’s already pranks on Halloween,” Rothert said. “If someone wants to harass you and cause you problems that night, you can’t even turn your lights on.”
Solution: DON’T MOLEST CHILDREN!!!
More…
Tags: aclu, child molesters, halloween, sex offender
16 Oct 08 Media seeks to discredit Joe the Plumber
From Bloomberg,
“Joe the plumber,” the Toledo, Ohio, man whose complaints about Barack Obama’s tax plan were highlighted by John McCain in the final presidential debate, owes the state of Ohio almost $1,200 in back income taxes.
Joe the Plumber became famous earlier this week when he asked Obama a simple question about taxes and the Senator replied by trying to convert him to socialism. The media’s reaction? Why, destroy Joe the Plumber of course. Silly plebe.
Tags: joe the plumber, Joe Wurzelbacher, media bias
16 Oct 08 Obama declared winner in debate by default
This from Reuters today,
Republican presidential nominee John McCain, his back against the wall, turned in his best debate performance on Tuesday in Hempstead, New York…
“I didn’t think Obama was as comfortable this time as he was in the other two debates, but I didn’t really hear any gaffe, any major mistake,” said Larry Sabato, a political science professor at the University of Virginia.
As a consequence, Sabato said, “He might even be judged the winner.”
We keep hearing all this talk about Obama being such an amazing orator, so why is the bar set so low for him on these debates? As long as he doesn’t commit any major screw ups, he wins. Could it be the media is afraid he’ll slip up, yet again, and reveal more of his socialist ideology?
“Your new tax plan is going to tax me more, isn’t it?” the plumber asked, complaining that he was being taxed “more and more for fulfilling the American dream.”
“It’s not that I want to punish your success. I just want to make sure that everybody who is behind you, that they’ve got a chance for success too,” Obama responded. “My attitude is that if the economy’s good for folks from the bottom up, it’s gonna be good for everybody … I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.” -Fox
Spread the wealth comrades.
More…
Michelle Malkin Mcnorman’s Weblog The Daily Conservative
Tags: debate, fox, mccain, obama, plumber, reuters, sabato
13 Oct 08 Wool over our eyes
I had a disturbing political conversation with a good friend last night. It started when I walked into his home and saw the latest issue of Time on the table. The cover reads; “Why the Economy is Trumping Race.” As if up to this point race was the determining factor for voters. Not too surprising coming from Time I guess. Anyway, it sparked a conversation on Obama. To my surprise, my conservative friend liked Obama, and would pick him over McCain. To my incredulous “WHY?” he responded that any change would be good, and Obama seemed like a good guy. He did admit to having only a surface impression of him and that he hadn’t really been paying attention. Being the good friend I am, I suggested we go a little deeper. After telling him about Obama’s association with Rev. Wright and just a little bit about his voting record on abortion, my f riend agreed, Obama would not be a good idea. I felt good about the exchange, but it left me feeling depressed about the overall election. How many voters out there have only paid scant attention to the election thus far? How many of them will be casting their votes based on “feelings” about candidates they get from brief sound bytes courtesy of the left-leaning mainstream media? My guess, way too many. Enough to win an election. Plenty of voters out there do know who Obama is and what he stands for. Don’t waste your time on them. It is our responsibility, the ones who have been paying attention, to get the word out to our friends and neighbors that don’t read blogs. To the people who don’t spend any serious time fact-checking what they hear on the election because they are still under the illusion that our media is just there to report the news. Do it gently, with patience and respect. Coming right out and decrying Obama as a Socialist, true though it is, will turn many away as they’ll assume it’s hyperbole. Here are just a few points you can use to illustrate the true character of Senator Barack Obama.
1) Obama has campaigned, even making a trip to Vermont, for self-described Socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders.
2) Obama is 100% pro-choice. He voted against: a) Requiring medical care for aborted babies who survive. b) The Born Alive Infant Protection Act (3 times). The Act explained in Obama’s words; ”As I understand it, this puts the burden on the attending physician who has determined, since they were performing this procedure that [the abortion], in fact, this is a nonviable fetus; that if this fetus, or child — however way you want to describe it — is now outside the mother’s womb and the doctor continues to think that it’s nonviable but there’s, let’s say, movement or some indication that, in fact, they’re not just coming out limp and dead, that, in fact, they would then have to call a second physician to monitor and check off and make sure that this is not a live child that could be saved.” c) Banning or restricting late-term partial birth abortion. He has even strongly criticized the Supreme Court for upholding the partial-birth ban.
3) Obama attended the Trinity United Church of Christ, home of radical Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr., for twenty years. He has described him as a “spiritual mentor”. He named his book, The Audacity of Hope, in honor of a sermon by Wright and asked Wright to author the forward. Wright was a member of Obama’s campaign until political pressure forced Obama to cut him loose. Rev. Wright believes the H.I.V. virus was created by the “white man”. He preaches the radical views of Black Liberation Theology. He has been quoted as repeatedly saying “God damn America”, in a sermon about 9/11 in which he claims America received what it deserved. ”America’s chickens are coming home to roost.”
4) Obama claims to be for the middle class and to be concerned for the poor. But his record shows differently. ”According to Obama’s tax returns from 2000-2006, the Obamas have given far less to charity than John McCain has. In all but the two most recent years reported, the Obamas gave around 1% or less of their income to charity. Their contributions increased in 2005 and 2006 to 4.7% and 6.1% respectively, but still are far short of those of McCain who gave 28.6% in 2006 and 27.3% in 2007.” -Real Clear Politics
More to follow…
Sources
IBD Editorials CBS News Washington Post MSNBC Real Clear Politics
More…
What we’re up against…
IS BARACK OBAMA THE MESSIAH? Angry African
Tags: abortion, barack obama, partial-birth, socialism, wright
09 Oct 08 Obama kicks off debate with a doozie
Last night the debate started off with a general question from the hall about the downturn in the economy. Here is Obama’s answer:
“I believe this is a final verdict, on the failed economic policies of the last eight years. Strongly promoted by uh, President Bush uh, and supported by Senator McCain. That essentially said that we should strip away regulations, consumer protections, let the market run wild and prosperity would rain down on all of us. Uh, it hasn’t worked out that way. And so now we gotta take some decisive action.”
A little bit later he adds this:
The biggest problem in this whole process was the de-regulation of the financial system.
Wrong Senator. There are two main ingredients in this current economic disaster. One is subprime loans, the other is fraudulent credit default swaps(which is explained well here.) The subprime lending crisis is a direct result of the policies of Bill Clinton and Democrats under the guise of affordable housing. Janet Reno threatened lending institutions with legal action if they didn’t make these loans to people who couldn’t pay them back. Greenspan warned of the impending disaster in 2005!!! But the bill that would have given the regulator actual power to enforce regulations(what’s the point of a regulator that can’t regulate?) was blocked by Democrats. This is obvious! How does Obama and all the other Democrats get away with this kind of garbage? The answer: a complicit media and wimpy Republicans that won’t stand up and nail them to the wall on this issue(or any other). Also, prosperity certainly rained down on Obama during the Bush years.
More…
Bloomberg IBD Editorials Michelle Malkin
Tags: fannie mae, freddie mac, greenspan, janet reno, obama, presidential debate
08 Oct 08 Newsweek openly attacks Palin
Newsweek sheds any pretense of journalistic integrity, assuming it had any left, in an obvious partisan attack on Vice Presidential Candidate Sarah Palin. Just what’s written on the cover will offend some. ”She’s one of the Folks(And that’s the problem).” The author immediately comes off as elitist and arrogant. The article doesn’t start off much better.
Yes, she won the debate by not imploding. But governing requires knowledge, and mindless populism is just that—mindless.
A key argument for Palin, in essence, is this: Washington and Wall Street are serving their own interests rather than those of the broad whole of the country, and the moment requires a vice president who will, Cincinnatus-like, help a new president come to the rescue. The problem with the argument is that Cincinnatus knew things. Palin sometimes seems an odd combination of Chauncey Gardiner from “Being There” and Marge from “Fargo.” -Newsweek
This is how esteemed members of the media say “she’s stupid.”
Is this an elitist point of view? Perhaps, though it seems only reasonable and patriotic to hold candidates for high office to high standards. Elitism in this sense is not about educational or class credentials, not about where you went to school or whether you use “summer” as a verb. It is, rather, about the pursuit of excellence no matter where you started out in life. Jackson, Lincoln, Truman, Eisenhower, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan and Clinton were born to ordinary families, but they spent their lives doing extraordinary things, demonstrating an interest in, and a curiosity about, the world around them. This is much less evident in Palin’s case. - Newsweek
Yes, Mr. Meacham, it is most definitely an elitist point of view. Sarah Palin was also born to an “ordinary” family and has spent her life pursuing excellence. You simply stating that it is less evident does not make it true, you fraud. Looking at Palin’s rise, where exactly was the pursuit of excellence less evident? Was it when she showed early leadership qualities in high school by becoming the head of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes? Or during her time on the Wasilla city council? Or being elected as Mayor of Wasilla where she did some serious house cleaning and tax cuts? Maybe it was when she was re-elected with 74% of the vote and elected president of the Alaska Conference of Mayors? Or was it when she resigned from the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission due to the lack of ethics of her fellow members(who she owned btw after resigning)? It must have been when she became Alaska’s youngest and first ever female governor. Anyone who takes a serious look at Palin’s bio will see one incredible woman. Not, as the elitist liberal media espouses, a mindless populist.
More…
Townhall.com The Ward Report Rove’s Response
Tags: elitist, jon meacham, media, newsweek, sarah palin
07 Oct 08 Barney Frank throws in race, again
Rep. Barney Frank said Monday that Republican criticism of Democrats over the nation’s housing crisis is a veiled attack on the poor that’s racially motivated.
The Massachusetts Democrat, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said the GOP is appealing to its base by blaming the country’s mortgage foreclosure problem on efforts to expand affordable housing through the Community Reinvestment Act.
He said that blame is misplaced, because those loans are issued by regulated institutions, while far more foreclosures were triggered by high-cost loans made by unregulated entities.
“They get to take things out on poor people,” Frank said at a mortgage foreclosure symposium in Boston. “Let’s be honest: The fact that some of the poor people are black doesn’t hurt them either, from their standpoint. This is an effort, I believe, to appeal to a kind of anger in people.” -Breitbart
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are abysmal failures. Franklin Raines made out like a bandit leaving with millions despite the fact that he was forced out because of scandal. In September of 2004 at a Congressional Hearing on Fannie Mae Democrats persecuted OFHEO regulator Mr. Falcon for trying to warn them of the serious problems at Fannie Mae while simultaneously heaping praise on Franklin Raines. But ignore all that, the real problem is that Republicans hate poor people, especially blacks!
But I have seen nothing in here that suggests that the safety and soundness are at issue, and I think it serves us badly to raise safety and soundness as kind of a general shibboleth when it does not seem to me to be an issue. -Barney Frank September 2004 at Congressional Hearing on Fannie Mae.
This is a clear example of poor judgement on Barney Frank’s part. The proper thing to do for Mr. Frank at this point would be to admit his mistake in ignoring the problem years ago. Instead he chooses to accuse Republicans of racism in an attempt to further divide the country and shore up the black vote for his next election. Shameless.
More…
Politico Real Clear Politics Sister Toldjah Right Wing Champ Red Tide
Tags: barney frank, falcon, fannie mae, franklin raines, freddie mac, racism, republican
06 Oct 08 Left outraged at McCain camp for tying Obama to Ayers
“We see America as the greatest force for good in this world,” Palin said at a fund-raising event in Colorado, adding, “Our opponent though, is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect that he’s palling around with terrorists who would target their own country.” -CNN
This comment, and other similar ones made by the McCain campaign, has some on the left fit to be tied. Here’s an excerpt from a post titled “McCain is unethical, unpatriotic and unAmerican - and without honor“.
McCain… You are an unethical, fearmongering, unpatriotic, unAmerican weasel without any honor and who doesn’t care about his country or the safety of its people.
Sarah… You are the pig and not the lipstick.
Saying that Obama is “palling around with terrorists” is not only a lie, but unAmerican, unpatriotic and just damn reckless with the safety of this country and the people who live here. -angryafrican.net
If you bother to scroll down and read some of the comments(not recommended) you’ll witness fans heaping praise on the author for his eloquence. He goes on to explain that Ayers barely qualifies as a casual acquaintance citing the NY Times, Washington Post, and other sources claiming they all debunked the notion of a “relationship” between Obama and Ayers. It is true that the mainstream media has put much effort into minimizing any association between Obama and Ayers, but debunked it they have not.
I just want to make a couple points, as this has been covered fairly exhaustively elsewhere.
1) Ayers refuses any media interaction concerning his ties to Obama. If Obama is telling the truth about their relationship, or lack thereof, it seems like a no-brainer for Ayers to step up and confirm this. It’s indisputable that Ayers wishes Obama no harm, quite the contrary, so why not come forward with the “truth” and help the Obama campaign refute this “despicable smear”?
2) The party at Ayers’ home. Some call it a coffee klatch, some brunch, and some a campaign launch party. Obama has said this was their first meeting. Personally I find it hard to believe Ayers and Dohrn would host a party endorsing a candidate they’d never met, but whatever. This is a relevant event as it shows the type of people Obama has made a habit of associating with. Best case scenario here for Obama is an example of extremely poor judgement. Senator Obama, I’d suggest the next time an unrepentant terrorist invites you over for coffee that you respectfully decline. Also, if you happen to find yourself in a church that preaches America gets what it deserves when terrorists attack, or that the HIV virus is a product of the white man invented to decimate blacks, leave. Just leave.
More…
Tags: angryafrican, barack, mccain, obama, Palin, pig lipstick, unamerican, unethical, unpatriotic, weatherman, william ayers
