"It is too bad that few if any of the members of my party ever mention the firefighters and others who died on 9/11. All that Pelosi, Reed, Murphy, Biden and the others seemed to be concerned about are the civil liberties of the terrorists."Sure FDR... Funny - because it is the republican side of the aisle that tries to turn any remembrance of 9/11 into a military parade. Why, in New Milford, do they even bother to have Veterans show up in uniform to talk at the 9/11 remembrance ceremonies every year that I have seen it? The right has tried to do this to all of the September 11th memorial ceremonies everywhere across the country and it is pure frickin' propaganda.
It is the GOP trying to inject the military and politics into a ceremony where they have no reason to be. If you don't recognize this then I truly pity your ignorance on what has happened in America, and particularly to the the far right GOP. The party of endless failed wars.
McCain has so little respect for soldiers that he lies about his own service.
And meanwhile you had the left fighting to get real medical issues recognized and treated for everyone that survived working on the scene of ground zero. Ya know... Fighting for the firemen, the police and their families to be treated in a manner respectful of their heroism on that day. Sadly we have to fight tooth and nail against the same warmongering GOP roadblocks every single day to get them to treat Veterans coming home from Afghanistan and Iraq with the health care that they deserve for their service.
Over the years neocon warmongering, lies and utter and complete failure to be fiscally and morally competent , responsible or even, simply, humane has resulted in boatloads of traditional and sane conservatives like Susan Eisenhower walking away from the GOP and their insane policies. They know for certain that they can no longer beat the idiot neocons in their own party.
The disgruntled republican voter? Shock! Awe! They are real. They are better off becoming indies, like Eisenhower did, and supporting more sane candidates that they can pick and chose from any party but the GOP.I have decided I can no longer be a registered Republican. For the first time in my life I announced my support for a Democratic candidate for the presidency, in February of this year. This was not an endorsement of the Democratic platform, nor was it a slap in the face to the Republican Party. It was an expression of support specifically for Senator Barack Obama.
I had always intended to go back to party ranks after the election and work with my many dedicated friends and colleagues to help reshape the GOP, especially in the foreign-policy arena. But I now know I will be more effective focusing on our national and international problems than I will be in trying to reinvigorate a political organization that has already consumed nearly all of its moderate "seed corn."
And now, as the party threatens to trivialize what promised to be a serious debate on our future direction, it will alienate many young people who might have come into party ranks.
And still, to this day, the far right wing in control of the GOP continues to be stupid and the media refuses to call them on it.
We told you that Joe Lieberman was a neocon and a supporter of bush's failed policies to his core. We told you that long before it became politically popular to tell the truth about Joe. McCain is no different in his support of endless wars and fiscal insanity.
This from the NewsTimes article:
In 2006, Greenwich Democrat Ned Lamont -- backed by a youthful group of Internet-savvy anti-war Democrats -- took on Lieberman for his support of Bush's Iraq war. Lieberman lost the Democratic primary but got a reprieve through a loophole in Connecticut election law that allowed him to form his own party and petition his way onto the November ballot.Those of you who talk about the internet savvy of Ned Lamont supporters would do well to realize that we are also politically savvy, as well as being well informed in our policy opinions. We are always well ahead of the media in recognizing the failures of policies and politicians.
And, more often than the media or the right wing echo chamber ever is, we are proven correct.
Relegating us to a notion of only being "internet savvy" and simply "anti-war" (a bold faced lie) is a pitiful attempt to diminish that which we do so much better than 99% of you failures in the media these days.
Tell your readers the truth: Sure... some of us are anti-war. A reasonable position if you are really pro-life. BUT we are, for the most part, anti-ILLEGAL INVASION AND OCCUPATION. We are anti-ILLEGAL SPYING ON AMERICANS. We are anti-NEOCON-REPUBLICAN... Yep. Even the conservative and libertarian republicans that walk among us now.
But that doesn't fit your media agenda, does it? That would be the truth. And that would not belittle our position. I know it pains you to actually have to admit we exist, but do you have to be so oblivious as to why dead tree media is dying and Blogging is on the rise? It is your fucking job on the line you hack journalists.
While I was at the NewsTimes I decided to go take a look at Eugene's Driscoll's movie Blog because I was drawn to a post title on the front page:
"OBAMA BIDEN MILEY CYRUS SCANDAL"Yep... The media pushing the "Black man coming after your white women!" meme straight out Rove and Luntz's playbook. Absolutely nothing in there that has anything to do with the title.
Just a Blaring title to catch people's roving eyes.
Being somewhat more responsible, timely and ethical in my writings, here, I take the time to point out the obvious in his first part of the story over there as well as question his misleading choice of title.
Anyone with half a brain didn't have to wait for the text message to find out Biden was the VP choice since the Secret Service were dispatched to protect Biden the night before.
And if you really wanted to get the internet's attention, Eugene, you would simply start posting the truth about gigolo McCain's (the guy with the sugar mama Cindy...) warmongering campaign to continue corrupt bush administration failures instead of misleading titles to insinuate scandals on the left side when there aren't any and raising the bigot factor up a notch.
While the rest of America is busy trying to figure out how many homes McCain can't remember he owns OR if he paid his taxes on all of them... Feel free to continue to be well behind the curve. It only continues to make real Bloggers look more competent and you, well, not so much.
Here is Eugene's underwhelming response to my comment:
Uh, this is blog about movies . . . but thanks for the wacky rant!Wow! He sure told me... He writes something that is linked prominently on the front page of a news paper site that is a blatant fabrication and my rant is wacky.
Nice try Eugene but:
"OBAMA BIDEN MILEY CYRUS SCANDAL"This post is a pitiful attempt to plant misleading BS in the media in the hopes of tainting Obama with innuendo in the public mind. And even if this was done unintentionally, then you have still failed the public.
"Fox 61’s Rick Hancock says he received the Obama text at 3:28 a.m. He posted the news on his blog at 3:33 a.m., according to CTWeblogs.
Just before his head hit the pillow (I assume) Rick raised an interesting point:
“Media coverage of all of these people getting the text would have been a great PR move. Essentially, Obama made a 3:30 a.m. booty call to his supporters.”"
He even took the time to add the "booty call" comment for extra effect in the "black man coming for the white women" BS. Pure Willie Horton there. Not the fake stuff the media distracts with, but real McCain campaign Willie Horton material.
What he really told me, yet again, was why the media is failing. He may not know it, but we do. This is right up there with Fox or CNN tactics:
"Is Obama the Antichrist?"If someone in the media has to even ask this or uses it as the blaring title of their piece... Fire them. They are pumping pure propaganda as every part of any investigated story on this would show the real truth:
"Insane McCain Tries to Paint Obama as the Antichrist!"That is a factual and supportable storyline. McCain and his surrogates played that ad to the lunatic fringe. The CNN fox like title was the one that ran. Fuckin' pitiful. They deserve to be scorned.
A disgrace to journalism.
The other day I wrote a quick note on the NY Times idiocy. Really, it was a question that readers everywhere deserve an honest answer to:
Journalists are so far out of the mainstream that we really want to know. A couple of comments that underscore the perception of readers out there. First a comment from BeachBum (another Vet that Blogs about his life in South Carolina) on it:When will the NY Times arrive?
Because Bloggers weren't around at previous conventions, weren't there in the trenches for countless elections, primaries and issues. No, Bloggers haven't been doing what we have been doing and coalescing into one of the largest activist and information sharing networks, shaping the narrative of the news cycles in an effort to counterbalance failures in the older and compromised traditional media long before any of the more recent credentialed things started to happen...The Year of the Political Blogger Has Arrived - NYTimes.com
Nope. According to the NY Times Bloggers have only arrived now. My question for the NY Times:
When do they plan on catching up to us?
Because we are still far ahead of the NY Times and other proven corporate and government media propaganda outlets in speaking truth to power, integrity and honesty in our coverage of the news. At least, the left side of the Blogosphere is.
I don't think they can catch up. Some of their mistakes lately seems to suggest they do worse than some of dedicated bloggers.I think he is right... They seem to willfully remain mired in their dead tree ways while most people have long since moved on to better reading. They have moved on to Blogs. Another comment from someone that has fully embraced the reality of the new and obviously better media:
I have a degree in Communications and I am amazed at how slow the MSM has been in catching onto the incredible power of the internet. I wonder sometimes if they are in denial.Part of the dead tree media problem is that they are so invested in the business model they created for ad revenue they have a hard time trying to keep up with those of us that have absolutely no budget beyond Google type ads and relatively no overhead beyond buying a digital camera or video cam and, if even, some bandwidth and domain name if we want to bother.
They are in denial.
They have a failed business model and refuse to give it up. Eventually smart advertisers will give up the dead tree media model as well. Most of them just haven't quite figured out they should. And the advertisers sure as hell don't want to support the Blogosphere (not the left side of it) because we have integrity and hold them accountable.
And the media tries to mock us as they fall further and further behind. Perhaps they are just acting out because they are ashamed of their own failings... More likely, they are hoping they won't lose that next fed up reader to the Blogs that are writing about the truth.
Then they make matters worse for themselves when they cut local content down to nil and wonder "why do more and more people turn to the internet?" And then you have the media take preposterous positions (like the Hartford Courant did) and ask Bloggers to provide them with free content after laying off many of their local staff.
Aside from Letters to the Editor, the Courant pays for every other word of editorial copy it prints. Shouldn't the paper at least pay a nominal fee to bloggers whose words they excerpt? The blogger who wants to remain pure can give permission to print without a fee, but the very idea that the Courant hasn't made the offer is exploitative.Is the Courant frigin' nuts?
They've been in the business for a long time, and they must surely understand that while the web is extraordinarily freewheeling when it comes to sharing and borrowing information, if you are a major media outlet, who makes money for your newspaper/website, then "borrowing" without pay is impolite, if not immoral.
They will be the first to push the "FREE MARKET RULES AND ALL HAIL DEREGULATION!" talking points for the GOP corporate interests, like all of the ones that led to the housing crash, but they want Bloggers to dig them out of the hole they made for free?
I don't begrudge the few Bloggers that took them up on it and wanting to get at least some sane views in their news papers. In fact, I believe the few that are in there from the reality based community are ones that were there before the layoffs happened. If they don't continue those pages will be left to only the right wing nuts that we have already had to suffer from for years.
If we had a thriving and healthy local media they would still be making money. They are the cause of their own downfall through failed business decisions and failed editorial decisions.
Any media manager that would hire the likes of Judy propaganda Miller, Billy “I’m not right about anything, but I still get my regular TV gig to screw over the national discourse” Kristol, Karl Rove, or pay the AP services for Ron Fournier's GOP talking points, or present a dunderhead like Fred Lucas as a non-partisan contributor without any real opposing views is begging for failure.
I would like nothing more than to see the media succeed.
But they need to provide real hard news and investigative reporting that is fact checked and reality based, and they have do this both locally and nationally in order to succeed. At this point in time, more then ever before, they need to stand up for the little guys.
They don't and the citizens that used to rely on them for the truth suffer. And even more of them head to our Blogs. But Bloggers suffer too. Because now we have to not only fact check the media and political failures but we have to create content for ourselves in their absence.
What did you think? That I was doing this for my own pleasure? Fuck that!
I used to enjoy reading the news paper to keep up on everything. They used to provide a valuable service to their customers. Now they are just a marketing tool for corporations and partisan politics. Very few exceptions to that rule.
Frankly, I would like nothing more than to have more time to Blog about and do things that actually interest me - like hockey, gardening or sex... Anything but politics - So I am begging the intellectually lazy and incompetent media to do their job, to fire the liars, to cut the stenography and to start fact check again, to start doing your job the way you are supposed to so I don't have to anymore.
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