Between the job I started 17 months ago and family time, it is difficult to do much blogging. But when I saw this amazing work by Duane Lester I had to link it up and make sure as many bloggers as possible saw it. Duane had his work at All American Blogger taken and published in a local paper without permission and with no attribution. Unfortunately, this happens too often with blog posts being used by other blogs, newspapers and even on radio and television, without permission or attribution.
What makes Duane's story different is that he did something about it. Read his blog post about the experience from start to finish, including the legal advice he got and what he did from there, ending in a tense in person showdown that was captured on video. You don't want to miss this and every blogger should bookmark this one for future reference. Read Duane's blog post, then watch the video:
Even though I often disagree with him, I am a huge fan of Juan Williams. I like him so much that I went to see him at a Civitas function in Raleigh a few years ago and invited my good friend, blogger Betsy Newmark to come since I knew she was a fan of Williams' work as well. After listening to him speak at length about his book, Enough, and after talking to him after the event, I went away with enormous affection for him and, as hokey as it sounds, hope for the future. Williams was open to considering different ideas and to changing his opinions when presented with new facts. My hope was that his influence, through his book and television appearances, would reach millions and cause many to question the politically correct narratives they have been fed over the years, just as Williams had.
I have been so consumed by the election that I have not written anything about NPR's firing of Juan Williams and regrettably don't really have time to do the topic justice, but I did not want to go without at least jotting down some words of support for a man I deeply respect, and some words of outrage for NPR. Firing him was bad enough, the ridiculous explanation for it was outrageous (NPR should be embarrassed. The psychitrist comment in the video was completely out of line.)
Betsy Newmark took the necessary time to do the issue justice, so please go read her blog post at Betsy's Page. She looked at the entire transcript. It is difficult to imagine that NPR could have done the same and come to the conclusion they did. Read Juan Williams' piece at Fox News to get his side of the story.
This post looks at 106 reported “Journolistas” to look for connections or common threads.
Of the known “Jounolistas” and organizations listed below, many can be linked back to two interrelated groups Democratic Socialists of America, the U.S.’s largest Marxist-based organization and the D.S.A.’s “brain,” the Washington DC-based, far left “think tank,” the Institute for Policy Studies.
Between them, D.S.A. and the I.P.S. dominate or influence several organizations affiliated to JournoList, including:
*Mother Jones – Includes D.S.A. member Adam Hochschild on its Board of Directors, plus some D.S.A. affiliated staff and contributors. Hochschild was a supporter of Progressives for Obama.
*Economic Policy Institute - Led by D.S.A. member Larry Mishel and I.P.S. affiliate Jeff Faux
and several D.S.A. affiliated board members. This organization has
contributed at least three officials to the Obama Administration,
including Obama economic adviser and ‘Journolista’ Jared Bernstein.
*Center for American Progress
– Several staff and officials are affiliated with D.S.A. and the
I.P.S. Writing of the Center’s relationship to the Obama Administration,
former Weather Underground terrorist leader and Progressives for Obama supporter Mark Rudd said “There’s a whole govt. in waiting that Podesta has at the Center for American Progress. They’re mostly progressives, I’m told…”
This article about how Andrew Breitbart has changed journalism and politics is an interesting read. Money quote, "Breitbart is, in short, expert in making the journalism industry his bitch."
Michelle
Malkin followed up on a story Pulitzer Prize winner Nicholas Kristof
reported in the New York Times as evidence of the urgent need for
universal health care and she found some things the Pulitzer Prize
winner didn't find. It appears he didn't find them because he didn't
bother to look for them.
Today, I did something that Pulitzer Prize-winning
NYTimes columnist Nick Kristof apparently didn't do: I talked to a
spokesman at the Oregon Health Sciences University in Portland, Oregon.
I called them up after OHSU's Dr. Johnny Delashaw left a comment
about Kristof's piece spotlighting the horrible plight of John
Brodniak, an Oregon man with a neurological condition that he says no
one would treat.
Kristof used Brodniak's plight to argue for universal health care,
decry Brodniak's deadly lack of insurance (even though he got Medicaid
coverage in August), and lambaste doctors for refusing to treat
Brodniak due to low reimbursements.
Well, OHSU confirmed for me two things:
1) OHSU is a safety-net hospital not far from where Brodniak lives.
The hospital accepts all Medicaid patients and would not turn Brodniak
away.
Okay, are you ready for Number 2?
2) Brodniak is a patient at OHSU -- and has been a patient there for the past three weeks.
What amazes me (and Michelle makes this point in her piece as well) is
that Kristof reported that Brodniak had gotten Medicaid coverage, but
then cited the situation Mr. Brodniak was in as proof of the need for
universal health care. Huh? So this man who Kristof said could not get
adequate health care was a recipient of a government health care
program. That is typical of liberals though. Any failure by a
government program is not seen as proof that some things are better
handled by the private sector, but that the government program is
simply not big or far reaching enough. Read Michelle's full post. It is a jaw dropper.
There have been many opportunities over the past two years for those in the media to slow or stop the decline of their credibility, ratings and sales. Time and time again though, too many in the media have chosen to remain on a path to obsolescence. Michael Gerson recently wrote about how sad it is that objective journalism, especially traditional news gathering, appears to be going the way of the dinosaur. It is sad. Not just that it is becoming so difficult to find fair and impartial journalism these days, but that those in the profession have so many times this year alone ignored or buried stories that might have given the public renewed confidence in them.
We've seen two recent examples of this with the ACORN stories broken at Andrew Breitbart's Big Government site and with the global warming scandal dubbed ClimateGate. It is easy to understand why those in the mainstream media have found it difficult to cover these stories. In both cases the stories themselves serve as huge embarrassments for Big Media considering how long they either failed to report information relevant to the American taxpayers (in the case of the ACORN stories) or participated in perpetuating a fraud (through their promotion of global warming hysteria). The MSM could go a long way to redeeming themselves though if they simply chose to fairly and impartially investigate and report these two stories now. I don't expect to see that happen though. These are likely to not only be more missed opportunities for redemption, but further evidence for conservatives to point to as proof that most of those in the Mainstream Media deserve all the problems they are currently experiencing.
When those in the MSM interview supporters of conservatives they get
extra special treatment. Just watch as MSNBC's Norah O'Donnell grills,
I mean interviews, a Palin supporter.
O'DONNELL: Well, her name was Jackie Seal and she voted in the last election,
not 13 years old as some have suggested. And it is important to point
out that when I walk and talk to a bunch of people up and down the
line, I say "Who wants to talk on camera?" Some people say, "I don't
want to talk." They're not ready to talk. Some people say, "I want to
talk, So, I walked down and met that man who had the shirt that said
Palin for president on it. And I said, "Is there a woman who will come
and talk about Sarah Palin?" And he grabbed that woman and pulled her
over. So, I did not choose that woman, it just so happens she
had a shirt on and was confused about Palin's position on the issues. I
think that is important to point that out. We do it with both sides of
the aisle, sometimes people are connected to a politician or someone
but know very little about them on the issues. This book
wouldn't tell you about the issues, it requires reading. It requires
examination. And so I think that that was a reflective moment in terms
of finding out just how much people are either confused about the
issues or didn't know about the issues. But, it is important to point out everybody we interviewed volunteered and that case, a previous voter and not 13 years old.
Jackie, the girl O'Donnell grilled has weighed in with the back story of the interview.
She is 17 years old so those who identified her as 13 or 14 were wrong,
but O'Donnell, who twice claimed she had voted in the last election,
was wrong as well. Read her full detailed account. She definitely
learned a valuable lesson.
In one day I met a role
model, and met the liberal media and their crafty schemes. I fell prey
to liberal bias, but I'd like to think I did an okay job. We always
want do-overs, and I can assure you if I had a do-over with Miss
O'Donnell you'd see a much more prepared (well rested) and ready to go
at it side of this 17 year old. But unlike Norah I didnt have my note
cards with me. I was forced to think on the spot and answer a gotcha
question. Her goal was clear, make this teenager look like an
uneducated Palin supporting buffoon. To liberals, and the 5 people who
watch MSNBC she succeeded. To conservatives, she was the only buffoon
during that interview.
I have no problem with a reporter asking the kind of question
O'Donnell asked, as long as it is in context and is done equally on
both sides of the aisle. I challenge O'Donnell to produce an example of
her similarly questioning an Obama supporter. When I said "context" I
was referring to the question fitting the type of interview. This was a
reporter questioning a person in line to get a book signed. O'Donnell
grilled this 17-year-old girl more vigorously than she does most of the
liberal politicians she interviews. She regularly lets Democrats repeat
their talking points on air without challenging or fact checking them.
There are many instances when their talking points are demonstrably
false, yet fail to even elicit a question from the "journalists" on
MSNBC. Here's a bit of advice for those on MSNBC, start treating all
your guests (including the liberal and Democrat ones) like Norah
O'Donnell treated 17-year-old Jackie Seal and maybe the public will
start taking you seriously. Who knows, if you did that maybe your
ratings would even improve.
The
blogosphere is abuzz with news of Andrew Breitbart's next big story set
to break at noon today. For the best rundown, read all of Mike Flynn
and John Nolte's "pre-game" report at BigGovernment.com. This story began at Big Hollywood with Patrick Courrielche's post
about an NEA conference call back in August in which the artists on the
call were encouraged to support many of President Obama's initiatives.
On
Thursday August 6th, I was invited by the National Endowment for the
Arts to attend a conference call scheduled for Monday August 10th
hosted by the NEA, the White House Office of Public Engagement, and
United We Serve. The call would include "a group of artists, producers,
promoters, organizers, influencers, marketers, taste-makers, leaders or
just plain cool people to join together and work together to promote a
more civically engaged America and celebrate how the arts can be used
for a positive change!"...
Backed by the full weight of President Barack Obama's call to
service and the institutional weight of the NEA, the conference call
was billed as an opportunity for those in the art community to inspire
service in four key categories, and at the top of the list were "health
care" and "energy and environment." The service was to be attached to
the President's United We Serve campaign, a nationwide federal
initiative to make service a way of life for all Americans.
It sounded, how should I phrase it...unusual, that the NEA would
invite the art community to a meeting to discuss issues currently under
vehement national debate. I decided to call in, and what I heard
concerned me.
There is much more to the story than just that call though.
But,
there is even a larger issue that hasn't yet received much attention in
the press. Among the Obama Administration officials on the call were
Buffy Wicks, Office of Public Engagement and the lead White House
official on the President's Serve.Gov initiative to promote national
service. Also on the call was Nell Abernathy, Director of Outreach for
Serve.Gov. One of their main goals on the call, it seems, was to
encourage artists to produce works that would reinforce the President's
call for service; specifically through the Serve.Gov web-portal.
As Dana Loesch recently reported at Big Government, the Serve.Gov
portal funnels citizens to volunteer or service projects connected with
ACORN and other leftist groups. The taxpayer-funded website is evolving
into a cyber-recruitment tool for the progressive movement.
So what did happen on that call? Was the NEA coordinating with the
White House to push their agenda on a group of artists eager for and
reliant upon the NEA for grants, or is the NEA telling the truth that
this call "was not a means to promote any legislative agenda"?
Read the two posts linked above and for more background see the NEA entry at Media Mythbusters.
If I were a betting man, I'd be betting big that the upcoming bombshell will relate to the NEA. You read it here first.
But I think Breitbart's overarching target is even bigger than that:
the national media as a whole. Just as the media was caught flatfooted
by the ACORN scandal, so too will they be rocked back on their heels by
the next bombshell.
If you follow all the links above and track the story as it has
evolved, you will see that there was plenty of "there" there and there
has been plenty of time for the national media to pick up on it. Yet
most in the mainstream media ignored it. I don't think they are going
to be able to ignore this one anymore. Tune in at noon.
Geez,
this one wasn't even thinly disguised. I don't know how often Media
Matters does this kind of thing because I almost never read them, but I
found a link to one of their posts at Digg and clicked on it because the title (Will Fox News hold Beck to its Dan Rather standard?) made me curious.
Here is the relevant part of the post by Jamison Foser:
Fox
News' Glenn Beck recently aired a video indicating that an ACORN
employee shot and killed her husband, without first bothering to verify
whether the husband is, in fact, dead. He isn't. The video is, in other
words, a fraud. But that didn't stop Beck from calling it evidence of
"murder" and perhaps even "premeditated murder." Of a person who is
still alive.
Sean Hannity aired it, too.
Here's a bunch of Fox News "reporters" who are outraged about the murder. Which didn't happen. Because the guy is still alive:
Got
that? Beck was being deceptive because he said the guy was dead. And
that the woman committed murder. Possibly premeditated murder! The
problem is, I saw that segment of Beck and I remembered that after
showing the video, Beck questioned whether or not the husband was even
dead. Media Matters posted the video though, so I wondered if I had
misunderstood what Beck had said. So I watched the following video
posted by Foser at Media Matters:
When
I watched the video Media Matters ran I immediately knew what was up
because they chopped Beck's commentary to bits and curiously left out
the part of it that completely contradicts their claim. I looked for
the Beck video at YouTube to make sure I was not misremembering his
commentary and here is a transcript of what I found.
Glenn Beck:
This is twisted, bizarre, macabre. I mean, is this theater? I'm not a lawyer. I'm not a jury. Um, but gosh
even to me it seems like this is a potential admission of murder and
the way she was describing doing some groundwork beforehand, you know
so everyone in town knew exactly what was going on, a case might be
made for premeditated murder. In fairness, I don't understand
people who stay in abusive relationships. I don't. I get it. I get it.
And maybe a jury might conclude that it was justifiable homicide. I
don't know but we haven't been even able to confirm from the state of
California whether Theresa's husband from ten years ago was killed. Or
if he's dead. Or if she even had a husband. Did she make the story up?
I don't know. Nobody is asking questions. See if the mainstream media will follow this one. This is shocking. It raises serious questions about what is going on inside of ACORN.
I
italicized the portion of the commentary Media Matters provided to
their readers in the mishmash video they put together. The parts they
omitted are not italicized. I put in bold the part of Beck's comments
that directly contradict Media Matters post. It is not like the
comments were made in a different Beck show, or even in a different
segment of Beck's show. They were part of the same paragraph if you
look at the commentary in written transcript. And the pieces they chose
to include in their video came from just before and right after the
part where Beck questioned if the husband was dead. There is NO WAY
that Media Matters could have seen Beck's commentary and not known he
questioned whether or not the husband was even dead. No way. I would
have argued that they could not have been any more deceitful in the way
they presented the material, but I would have been wrong. The
ridiculousness of the post continues.
After showing the video that is chopped off before Beck questions
whether or not the husband is still alive (which obviously negates the
basis of their attack on Beck), Foser posted a bunch of commentary from
Fox News people regarding Dan Rather and the fake Bush memos. Then
Foser asks:
Any chance we'll see this level of outrage directed at Glenn Beck for unquestioningly
airing an apparently fraudulent tape in order to portray an ACORN
employee as a murderer? Beck has, after all, been pretty clear that he
is trying to bring ACORN down.
Again, watch the unedited
video of Beck's segment, the one Media Matters didn't cut off in
midstream, or read the transcript provided above. Beck asked plenty of
questions, including whether or not the man was still alive. But Foser
wrote "Any chance we'll see this level of outrage directed at Glenn
Beck for unquestioningly airing an apparently
fraudulent tape in order to portray an ACORN employee as a murderer?"
Does he think his readers are not smart enough to go find the unedited
video.
I know my readers understand the difference between the nature of
the ACORN video and the Rathergate documents, but for those at Media
Matters I'll explain. The ACORN video is real. Whether or not the woman
was telling the truth when she claimed to have shot her husband has
nothing to do with the authenticity of the video itself unless Foser is
claiming James O'Keefe hired the woman to make up some lines and
deliver them on camera. Or maybe if it was butchered the way Media
Matters did Glenn Beck's commentary video. If neither of those things
happened then how is the ACORN video "apparently fraudulent"? The woman
may be a liar, but if she is indeed an employee of ACORN (which I don't
believe has been disputed), she was caught on camera, in an ACORN
office, giving advice to someone claiming to be a pimp trying to open a
brothel of underage illegal immigrant girls about how to hide the true
nature of his business in order and evade taxes and be eligible for
assistance. Glenn Beck was shocked by the statements from the ACORN
employee, in an ACORN office, and asked a series of questions,
including one about her claims about shooting her husband.
Is the argument that everything is cool if the woman was lying about
killing her husband? I have heard that one floating around -- that if
the woman's husband is not dead then the tapes are fake or fraudulent
or irrelevant. I would argue that it is much worse if ACORN hired a
woman who would lie to people coming into their office about killing
her husband, than if they hired a woman who (possibly in self defense)
shot and killed her husband.
Regarding the Dan Rather comparison -- do I really, seriously, have
to explain how that is different from supposedly seasoned professionals
at CBS news and 60 Minutes putting on the air documents that were
supposedly 30 years old, but were obviously produced with a relatively
recent version of a Word processing program (superscript and all)? I
won't get into all the ways CBS failed to do due diligence on the
documents that were so obviously inauthentic, but it is interesting
that those on the left are comparing the ACORN video to the Rathergate
docs in an effort to save ACORN's bacon, or to save their President who
has a history with ACORN. To me it sounds like desperate, grabbing at
straws, how the heck are we gonna spin this one, crazy talk.
For those who would like to see the unedited version of Beck's commentary in full, here is the video:
Recent reports of criminal activity in the Association of Community Organizations for
Reform Now (ACORN) are
serious and should be of interest to every American citizen, their
congressional representatives and the media.The series of undercover videos made in several ACORN offices across the
country by James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles, while certainly the most sensational
evidence of ACORN wrong doing, are far from the first.
Bloggers like Michelle Malkin and Jim Hoft have been
tracking instances of ACORN problems for years, many related to voter
registration fraud.In Florida,
Indiana, Wisconsin and elsewhere tens of thousands of bad voter applications
were submitted by ACORN in the last election – “tying up election officials and
jeopardizing the voting rights of untold victims whose identities may have been
stolen.”
Other
illegal activity has been perpetrated and prosecuted as well.No matter how many instances of submitting
bogus voter registration forms and other improper or illegal activity have been
shown, the mainstream media have been remarkably uninterested.Not only had the organization continued to
receive millions in public funding, but was eligible to receive billions of
stimulus money.
The undercover video investigation by O’Keefe and Giles
finally forced the Congress to reconsider ACORN funding and even appears to
have prompted some official investigations into the operations of the
group.If not for publicity on the
internet, conservative talk radio and Fox News those in the mainstream media
would likely have continued to ignore wrongdoing by ACORN.In fact, some network television and major
national newspapers did not give the story any coverage until the Senate voted
to cut off funding.ABC News lead anchor
Charles Gibson said he didn’t even know anything about the video investigation
story until well after it had been covered by Fox News and was all over talk
radio and the internet.
Citizens should be troubled that the major news
organizations in the country seemed so determined to ignore the story.They should be particularly concerned because
they have a very real interest in what was going on at ACORN.Millions of taxpayer dollars have gone to the
organization and those taxpayers have a right to know how their money is being
spent.Likewise, those in Congress with
the responsibility of over-seeing those funds should be concerned about the
type of activity that was being funded.
The American taxpayer was let down multiple times.They were let down by their representatives
in Congress who ignored and/or made excuses for the group and they were let
down by most in the news media who ignored or minimized some very serious
problems within the group.I can’t help
but wonder if not for the sensational nature of the undercover video operation
if Congress and the media would ever have adequately addressed ACORN’s
problems.They have ignored them for so
long, I don’t know that anything short of ACORN workers on camera helping to
facilitate a child prostitution operation would have raised an eyebrow from
them.
Another reason citizens should be concerned about the ACORN
operation is that they were on track to help conduct the next U.S. Census.Census numbers, of course, affect the way
congressional districts are drawn.Thankfully
another result of O’Keefe and Giles’ investigation is that the Census Bureau
has severed ties with ACORN.
ACORN has played a large role in past elections and when
campaigning, President Obama, who has a long history with the group, promised
them a
seat at the table if elected. As Michelle Malkin described it, “Obama's
political DNA is encoded with the ACORN agenda.”Considering that strong connection there is
no way to know just how involved ACORN might have been in shaping public policy
over the course of the Obama administration if not for the work done by O’Keefe
and Giles.
Those defending the group, like ACORN chief executive Bertha
Lewis, claim the problems found at various offices across the country are
isolated cases of rogue employees.As
Mary Katharine Ham put it, “I love how Bertha Lewis
thinks it's exculpatory that only a handful of ACORN offices blithely help
pimps and child prostitution.” The
same was the case with the many incidents of voter registration fraud found in
ACORN offices around the country.
Congressman Mark Foley was just one out of hundreds of
congressmen, and one out of millions of Republicans, yet in 2006 the exposure
of his inappropriate sexually suggestive instant messages to pages was offered
as proof that Republicans were steeped in a culture of corruption. Those in the
media heavily covered the story and helped build that culture of corruption
storyline which played a large role in the huge losses experienced by the GOP
in that election. Yet in the case of improper and even illegal activity in
multiple offices of ACORN, they saw no reason to connect the dots and consider
the cumulative nature of the evidence.
Citizens should be very concerned and troubled by what went
on at ACORN, but they should be even more so by the way that activity was
enabled by Congress and the media over a period of years.
