Archive for the ‘Agenda Media’ Category
A number of years back, I heard a joke, part of which I can’t remember. Still, I can remember enough of it to make a point. Historic military figures were looking at the Soviet Union’s military hardware. When the tanks rolled through Red Square, Alexander the Great replied, “If I had had these chariots, I would’ve ruled the entire world.” On his left stood Napoleon Bonaparte. After Napoleon read the current copy of Pravda, he replied “If I had this as the official newspaper, nobody would’ve heard of Waterloo.”
The point of the joke isn’t to get people laughing. It’s to make the point that there’s a more insidious type of Pravda operating inside the United States. For the last 5+ years, I’ve called that operation the Agenda Media. The Agenda Media doesn’t think it’s their responsibility to get people important facts. In their minds, their responsibility is to push their politicial agenda. If that means omitting important facts, that’s what they’re willing to do. This video is a perfect illustration of the Agenda Media’s selective editing:
Thankfully, citizen journalists with cell phones are recording things as they happened. Thankfully, citizen journalists with video cameras are informing people by filming protests like this, then posting the video to Youtube, then reposting the videos to their Facebook page, then posting the links to their videos to Twitter.
There’s a more important point to this. OFA isn’t just about protesting against constitutional conservatives. They’re identifying people in communities who might vote for progressives. Conservatives will show up to counterprotest against OFA. The big question is whether they’ll get into the neighborhoods and identify people that might appreciate the conservative/capitalist message.
Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, Tom Coburn, Ron Johnson, Paul Ryan and Rand Paul should be the blueprint for Republicans for 2014. They’re picking fights with President Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, which is essential to winning elections. They’re framing debates. For instance, Sen. Coburn is highlighting tens of billions of dollars of duplicative spending that should be eliminated in this budget. Sen. Johnson is highlighting how government is used as a weapon against the citizenry. Paul Ryan is fighting for a pro-growth budget that will eventually balance within a decade.
It’s despicable that the Agenda Media would distort what happened at a protest. As despicable as that is, that’s only part of this story. OFA is already identifying potential Democrat voters. Republicans need to start this week at identifying potential conservative voters.
Tags: Organizing for Action, Gun Control, Protests, Agenda Media, Censorship, Voter ID, Democrats, Tom Coburn, Sequester This, Ron Johnson, Victims of Government Project, Mike Lee, Cut This, Not That, Ted Cruz, Second Amendment, Paul Ryan, Balanced Budget, Rand Paul, TEA Party Conservatives, Election 2014
What’s frightening about Chris Matthews’ latest declaration is the stunning stupidity displayed in it:
Chris Matthews: “It’s a down and dirty world when you decide chopping down the government and hurting the economy is the smart move. But bring it all down is now the hard right battle cry. Slash spending, short the pentagon, screw up traffic control, whatever raises the noise level, bashes Democrats and lowers hope. Is this the tea party dream? Is this John Boehner’s version of feeding time at the zoo, giving the crazies what they want so they will sit in their seats and behave? Is this final payment to insanity the last vestige of what calm Republicanism is ready to cough up? But how else can you explain the readiness of the GOP leadership to let this Frankenstein’s monster, this doomsday machine, this sequestration go all out berserk? How else can we understand the party of Lincoln doing such economic damage to the Republic, such damage and moral to the people?”
This is utter stupidity. Since when did lightly trimming $85,000,000,000 from a $3,600,000,000,000 budget constitute “chopping down government”? Since when did that constitute slashing spending?
There’s a reason why MSNBC is a laughingstock. Chris Matthews is a significant contributor to that reputation. Incoherent diatribes like this make Matthews and MSNBC look infantile.
As for Matthews’ question about sequestration being a “doomsday machine”, that’s the hysteria featured at MSNBC on a seemingly daily basis. People didn’t hear Matthews complain when spending jumped from $3,000,000,000,000 to $3,500,000,000,000 in a single year. That’s before factoring in the $850,000,000,000 stimulus bill.
Matthews can’t justify trillion dollar deficit after trillion dollar deficit. Perhaps MSNBC sent out the directive that, rather than defending President Obama’s history of trillion dollar deficits, which are indefensible, they’d mindlessly attack Republicans instead. By doing that, MSNBC and Matthews are cementing their reputation as buffoons.
Just like MSNBC isn’t a news organization, Chris Matthews isn’t a pundit. MSNBC is a media outlet, not a news organization. Chris Matthews is a court jester, not a serious news analyst.
Tags: Chris Matthews, Court Jester, Agenda Media, MSNBC, Barack Obama, Stimulus, Deficits, Sequestration, Democrats, Demagogues
During his interview with KSTP political director Tom Hauser, Gov. Dayton made an interesting statement that offers insight into how the DFL thinks of the tax system. Here’s what Gov. Dayton said that caught my attention:
GOV. DAYTON: Well, I campaigned on making our tax system fairer, raising taxes on the wealthiest who aren’t paying their fair share and the Republican-led legislature rejected that so we’re still back at square zero.
Hauser had questioned Gov. Dayton about his changing opinion on raising the cigarette tax, considering the fact that he’d criticized Tom Horner for proposing a change in the sales tax. Here’s what Candidate Dayton said about Horner’s proposed tax increases:
…you’re in favor of raising taxes on alcohol and cigarettes, another regressive tax. So the difference between us is I want to raise taxes on the rich, and you want to raise taxes on sportsmen and women and and middle income working families.
That’s an accurate appraisal of what Horner’s tax would do. Whether it’s a sales tax or it’s a sin tax, it’s regressive, hitting “middle income working families.”
Apparently, Gov. Dayton thinks it’s ok to raise regressive taxes that hit “middle income working families” when he proposes it. He’s only critical of others raising regressive taxes.
That isn’t logic. That’s anti-logical, which fits with Gov. Dayton’s type of thinking.
Later, Gov. Dayton had this exchange with Tom Hauser:
HAUSER: The new income tax increase is for singles making more than $150,000 a year and couples making more than $250,000. Do you consider that rich?
GOV. DAYTON: Well, it would put those individuals and couples into the top 2% of wage earners in Minnesota. Whether that’s wealthy or not, it’s up to their individual circumstances. A family with 4 children and elderly parents to take care of, those dollars are real. Everyone’s money is real.
HIGHLIGHT: It’s interesting that Gov. Dayton immediately repeated the DFL/ABM/media praetorian guard’s (pardon the repetition) chanting point of the rich not paying their fair share.
Later, when Hauser questioned him if some families making $250,000 a year weren’t rich, Gov. Dayton admitted that “a family with 4 kids and elderly parents to take care of” might fit into the DFL’s definition of middle class.
The explanation for that is simple. DFL-think is conditioned on the notion that people doing well must’ve stiffed “working families.” Only when caught in these types of situations does the DFL admit that people who make 6-figure salaries are part of the middle class. That’s the only time they’ll admit that these aren’t greedy people who won’t “pay their fair share.” That’s just their reflexive spin.
Tags: Mark Dayton, Chanting Points, ABM, Agenda Media, Tax The Rich, Tax Increases, Middle Class, Working Families, Middle Class Squeeze, Deficits, DFL
It isn’t that there isn’t a fair amount of truth in this SC Times article. It’s that it didn’t talk about a truly disturbing pattern, namely ABM’s lies in their anti-GOP smear campaigns.
Jerry McCarter tried portraying himself as having tried to run a clean campaign on the issues. I wrote here why that’s BS. First, let’s look at what he said in the Times article:
“Part of what I was trying to do was show people you can do this without negative ads; you can do this without all the special-interest money,” he said. “I guess I showed them that you can’t.”
Now let’s look at something McCarter ran on:
McCarter, who’s running against Sen. John Pederson, R-St. Cloud, says the shutdown was part of what spurred him to run for Senate. “Like a lot of people, I found [it] unnecessary, politically motivated, and I think it damaged the state’s image long-term,” he said.
I’ve written repeatedly that Gov. Dayton shut the government down. It’s a matter of record that several GOP legislators submitted lights-on funding bills to prevent a state government shutdown. The one attracting most attention would’ve funded state government at its 2011-2012 levels through July 11. During that time, the goal was to negotiate a final settlement on the budget.
At 10:00 pm of June 30, 2011, Mark Dayton stepped to a microphone and announced that negotiations had failed and that state government was shutting down. Rather than calling a special session to pass a lights-on bill, Gov. Dayton put 23,000 state government employees on furlough.
For all of his I’m-running-a-clean-campaign rhetoric, the truth is that Mr. McCarter built much of his campaign on a verifiable lie.
That isn’t the only lie ABM peddled during the campaign. With their willing accomplices in the Twin Cities media, they put together this lie-filled ad:
One announcer said that “It was another day of deep budget cuts at the Capital.” Pat Kessler said “Cuts are so deep, it threatens public safety.” Dayton said “There are real consequences to every dollar cut.” It’s time to highlight the truth with the DFL’s own words:
SEN. COHEN: We’re going to be passing a budget that it billions and billions and billions and billions of dollars and at a level that we’ve never done before in the history of the state. The 12-13 budget will be $34.33 billions of dollars in general fund dollars taxed to the citizens of Minnesota. The 10-11 budget two years ago was $30.171 billion, I believe.
So the difference is over $4 billion, I believe. The largest state general fund budget ever, ever, ever, in the history of the state of Minnesota.
What this means is that Gov. Dayton’s words, Pat Kessler’s words and other biased media’s words didn’t have a hint of truth to them. It’s worth noting that ABM didn’t hesitate in using them in their statewide smear campaign against GOP candidates.
It’s time for Mr. Sommerhauser and other reporters to blister Alida Messinger, Gov. Dayton and the Twin Cities media for telling the whoppers that they told. If he won’t, citizen journalists like Mitch Berg and myself will expose the DFL for the corrupt political party it is.
Tags: ABM, Smear Campaigns, Alida Messinger, Mark Dayton, Jerry McCarter, DFL, Pat Kessler, Mark Sommerhauser, Agenda Media
Jeff Anderson, a DFL candidate against Chip Cravaack, submitted a resolution calling for a constitutional amendment to essentially overturn the Citizens United v. FEC Supreme Court ruling.
In so doing, Anderson proved, as did the Duluth City Council, that they a) don’t understand the U.S. Constitution and b) are pro-censorship.
First, progressives argue that the First Amendment only applies to individuals. That’s incredibly naive. The Fourth Amendment doesn’t just protect individuals from unreasonable searches and seizures. The Sixth Amendment guarantees that corporations and individuals alike “shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial” and that said trial shall be by a jury of their peers.
Why would the First Amendment protect the free speech rights of individuals but not the free speech rights of corporations? Don’t corporations have a right to speak out on behalf of their interests? How is it different that PACs can speak on behalf of their clients’ interests but corporations can’t?
The progressives’ past response has been that they don’t want corporations having undue influence in elections. That’s a flimsy argument. I don’t recall progressives criticizing the Alliance for a Better Minnesota, aka ABM, when they spent millions of dollars on the biggest smear campaign in Minnesota gubernatorial history.
I vividly recall DFL activists and DFL media organizations like the UpTake working together to intimidate Target and other corporations from contributing to pro-capitalist independent expenditure organizations.
Might that be because they’re defenders of the First Amendment until it’s their ox that’s getting gored? Selective defending of the First Amendment isn’t truly defending the First Amendment.
It isn’t difficult to make the argument that progressives aren’t true defenders of the First Amendment. It isn’t difficult to make the argument that progressives are pro-censorship if that fits their political agenda.
The bigger question that needs to be asked is why progressives need to silence differing opinions. They’ve done that on college campuses for years. They’ve tried silencing critics by employing mean-spirited blowhards like Paul Begala.
In Minnesota, they’ve tried drowning out the Republicans’ pro-growth, pro-reform agenda through ABM’s smear campaigns and attempting to intimidate corporations that don’t conform to their agenda.
Rondy Raiton’s staged protest (what else explains UpTake’s cameras being at the exact Target store where she protested against Target at exactly the right time to capture the ‘event’?) fueled an astroturfed protest because Target contributed to a pro-capitalist organization run by Brian McClung.
Whether it’s Jeff Anderson and the Duluth City Council pro-censorship resolution, Rondy Reitan’s astroturfed protest or ABM’s smear campaigns, one thing’s clear: the DFL doesn’t like confrontation. The DFL doesn’t like policy-based arguments because they consistently lose those fights.
That’s why they specialize in censorship, smear campaigns and intimidation.
Tags: Duluth City Council, Paul Anderson, Censorship, Rondy Reitan, GLBT, Alida Messinger, Smear Campaign, Intimidation, Unions, Astroturf, ABM, Progressives, DFL, First Amendment, Elections, MNGOP
Thanks to the Right Scoop’s tape of last night’s Levin show, Ann Coulter got put in her place. Thanks to their tape, America got a history lesson and a lesson in constitutional law. If there was any doubt about whether Mark Levin was a patriot before last night, and there wasn’t for me, this 10:30 long tape of Levin settles that discussion.
Of all the things that Levin brought up, his mentioning that the district courts and the appellate courts were created by acts of Congress, not by the Constitution, was the most informative and important of his anti-Coulter diatribe.
Mr. Levin challenged his listeners, and by extension those watching the tape, to pull out their copies of the Constitution and find where the creation of the lower courts is discussed. Then he saved them the trouble, saying that they were created through acts of Congress.
Another direct hit on the Sinking Ship Coulter was Levin’s criticizing her for saying that Newt’s too bombastic. Levin’s first shot at the Sinking Ship Coulter was that she supported the cool-as-a-cucumber governor of New Jersey. Levin’s next shot at Coulter was calling her bombastic, something that I suspect she’d accept as a compliment.
Here’s yet another hit on Coulter:
She won’t even give the man credit for what he has achieved! Taking back the House from 44 years of Democrat monopoly was never thought possible and in doing so he had to defeat the Republican establishment! You can’t even give him that? No they can’t, because they have a hate-on. They have a hate-on.
I wrote here that Newt has a lengthy list of conservative accomplishments. I said that Mitt doesn’t have a list of conservative accomplishments because he isn’t a conservative:
Newt’s list of conservative accomplishments is lengthy, too. Newt helped push the Reagan tax cuts through Tip O’Neill’s House. He pushed through the reforms that ended welfare as we know it in 1996. His policies, John Kasich’s negotiations and Bill Clinton’s signature produced 4 straight surpluses, including the biggest surplus in U.S. history.
Yes, Newt’s said some stupid things but he’s enacted tons of conservative-friendly legislation. At the end of the day, I’m infinitely more worried what’s signed into law than what people say.
By comparison, Mitt hired John Holdren to be his environment czar. Holdren is the far left radical that advised Paul Ehrlich when Ehrlich wrote the Population Bomb, which was an early missive in the global warming/global cooling hoax. Then Mitt took Holdren’s advice and proudly implemented the most stringent CO2 emission standards in the northeast. Mitt raised taxes and he signed Romneycare into law.
Despite these facts, Ms. Coulter insists that Mitt is the most conservative candidate in the race.
Apparently, the bombastic Ms. Coulter will say anything to keep the headlines coming.
I’ll take the words of real conservatives like Thomas Sowell over the bombastic diatribes of Ms. Coulter. I wrote that Sowell got it right:
Romney is a smooth talker, but what did he actually accomplish as governor of Massachusetts, compared to what Gingrich accomplished as Speaker of the House? When you don’t accomplish much, you don’t ruffle many feathers. But is that what we want?
Can you name one important positive thing that Romney accomplished as governor of Massachusetts? Can anyone? Does a candidate who represents the bland leading the bland increase the chances of victory in November 2012? A lot of candidates like that have lost, from Thomas E. Dewey to John McCain.
Sowell later said this in Newt’s favor:
Many Americans are already saying that they can hardly recognize the country they grew up in. We have already started down the path that has led Western European nations to the brink of financial disaster.
Internationally, it is worse. A president who has pulled the rug out from under our allies, whether in Eastern Europe or the Middle East, tried to cozy up to our enemies, and has bowed low from the waist to foreign leaders certainly has not represented either the values or the interests of America. If he continues to do nothing that is likely to stop terrorist-sponsoring Iran from getting nuclear weapons, the consequences can be beyond our worst imagining.
Against this background, how much does Newt Gingrich’s personal life matter, whether we accept his claim that he has now matured or his critics’ claim that he has not? Nor should we sell the public short by saying that they are going to vote on the basis of tabloid stuff or media talking points, when the fate of this nation hangs in the balance.
If we want to put this nation on the right path, we’ll need a fighter and a visionary. Ann Coulter is peddling the nonsense that Mitt’s that guy.
Mark Levin and Thomas Sowell, 2 real conservatives, disagree. I’ll side with Mssrs. Sowell and Levin over Ms. Coulter every time. In fact, that isn’t a difficult decision.
Technorati: Constitution, History Lesson, Mark Levin, Thomas Sowell, Conservatism, Ann Coulter, Mitt Romney, Chris Christie, Convenient Conservatives, Newt Gingrich, Welfare Reform, Reagan Tax Cuts, GOP, Election 2012
When it comes to tax cuts, Democrats look like idiots explaining themselves. They look worse when they play their political spin when conservatives call them on their machinations and do the right thing.
Yesterday, Democrats gave Republicans a Christmas gift. Actually, Democrats gave Republicans 2 gifts. First, Nancy Pelosi tried spinning things. Charles Hurt highlights in this article that she failed badly:
And then when it comes to explaining themselves, Democrats walk out with straight faces and blame – who else? – the tea party.
Yes, that would be that pernicious group of fed-up voters who banded together around the single premise that taxes were too high. Not too low, but too high. And so now, according to Democrats, they want to raise your taxes.
“Here we are, just a few days before Christmas, and the Republicans are just coming up with another excuse,” House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi told her liberal cohorts in the press. “It’s just the ridiculous tea party Republicans who are holding up this tax cut for the American people and jeopardizing economic growth.”
The three ways you know Nancy Pelosi is lying here are that she pays homage to “economic growth,” a “tax cut” and “Christmas”, all three of which her political career has been dedicated to destroying.
Ms. Pelosi is a despicable human being. When it comes to public policy, she doesn’t have an honest bone in her body. Mr. Hurt rightly highlights the fact that TEA Party activists joined together to cut taxes because people had been taxed enough already.
Then he did something diabolical: he introduced truth into the conversation by highlighting the fact that Republicans did what President Obama initally told them to do. They passed a one year extension of the payroll tax holiday.
Only in Ms. Pelosi’s world can TEA Party terrorists (terrorists in her mind) kill a tax cut by passing legislation that President Obama asked them to pass.
In Ms. Pelosi’s mind, it can’t be Senate Democrats’ fault. Just because they passed, to use Charles Krauthammer’s words, “a payroll tax long weekend” doesn’t mean they didn’t do the right thing. After all, they got a bunch of Republicans to vote foolishly, too.
The reality is that Republicans, especially the TEA Party terrorist-supporting wing of the GOP, got it right by rejecting the Senate’s patchwork legislation.
Lost on the Democrats and their Agenda Media allies is the fact that the 2-month extension isn’t workable. In other words, the legislation passed by the Senate isn’t a viable policy option. Instead, it’s a laughingstock with serious policy people.
In the end, the Senate will have to return and vote to approve the House Republicans’ extension legislation. If they don’t, House Republicans and the RNC should run a massive ad campaign against President Obama, Sen. Reid, Ms. Pelosi and Senate Democrats.
Those ads should highlight the fact that House Republicans voted to extend the payroll tax holiday for a full year but that President Obama, Sen. Reid, Ms. Pelosi and congressional Democrats opposed the GOP’s middle class tax cut.
It’s time to take the gloves off. The demagogic Democrats need to be, proverbially speaking, punched in the nose on this. They’re doing their best to lie their way through this. The Democrats’ deceit and the Democrats’ shafting of Main Street should be hung around their collectivist necks like a millstone.
Technorati: Payroll Tax Holiday, President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Taxes, Tax Increase, Spin, Agenda Media, Democrats, John Boehner, Tax Cuts, House GOP
This afternoon, I wrote this post stating that the Senate will return to work so that the payroll tax holiday could be properly implemented. I stand by that prediction.
Imagine my disgust, then, when I watched Special Report’s opening All Star Panel discussion. I didn’t expect much from Juan because, in his mind, any news benefits President Obama and the Democrats. I wasn’t surprised that David Drucker said that Republicans had given Democrats a new opportunity to demagogue them. (That’s my phrasing, not Druckers’s.)
When the discussion finally got to Charles, a voice of sanity was finally heard, albeit temporarily. Mr. Krauthammer rightly stated that the bill couldn’t be properly implemented, that House Republicans were doing the right thing, then unfortunately saying that House Republicans would take a beating politically for doing the right thing.
I was with Charles until that last sentence. That’s when he lost me.
Republicans won’t lose this fight politically. That’ll only happen if they assume the fetal position on this issue. That’ll only happen if they don’t constantly pound home the truth about the House Republicans’ plan. If Republicans consistently tell the American people the truth, Democrats will cave because Republicans will win overwhelming support for their plan.
If Senate Democrats won’t give in on the Keystone XL Pipeline project, fine. I’d double dog dare them to stand in the way of maintaining great international relations with our Canadian allies. I’d double dog dare them to listen to their militant environmentalist base instead of doing what’s right for securing energy independence.
In fact, I’ll triple dog dare them to insist on sticking with a 2 month extension of the payroll tax “long weekend” (that’s Charles’s spot on description of the bill passed by the Senate) instead of passing a year-long extension of the payroll tax holiday.
With video all over the internet of President Obama saying it’d be unconscienable not to extend the payroll tax holiday for the full year, the advertising that could be run against stubborn Democrats wouldn’t take a full morning to put together.
My recommendation to Republicans is simple: let’s have this fight. Let’s crank up the decibels. Let’s have GOP presidential candidates weigh in on the fight.
Then, in the end, let’s watch the Democrats assemble their circular firing squad and point fingers on why they didn’t win…again.
Finally, I’d love having the opportunity to criticize the media for not reporting the truth about this issue. While we’re hammering the Democrats, let’s file the indictment against the Beltway’s Agenda Media for not giving the American people the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
The more I think about it, the more I can’t wait to start the battle.
Technorati: Payroll Tax Holiday, President Obama, Militant Environmentalists, Democrats, John Boehner, Canada, Foreign Policy, National Security, Keystone XL Pipeline, Energy Independence, Agenda Media, GOP
Last week, conservative bombthrower Ann Coulter endorsed Mitt Romney. People are still trying to figure out what, if any, thinking went into Ms. Coulter’s declaration. Just when you though it was safe to listen to pundits again, though, up pops Meghan McCain to criticize Newt again:
MSNBC contributor Meghan McCain sat down with Jay Leno on Friday’s Tonight Show and spoke candidly on the Republican candidates, comparing the process of picking a nominee to speed dating. McCain slammed Newt Gingrich‘s campaign as a “vanity project” and slighted him as “this week’s fling” for Republicans, lamenting how the process has turned into an “anybody but Romney” affair. “He seems to be rising; hot air balloons do that,” Leno snarked.
McCain dished on how she got into a feud with the former Speaker of the House. “I said that he was running for president purely for vanity purposes, to sell books, to sell DVDs, which I still believe. Someone told him that, and he was like ‘What would she know?’ and his implication was, like, ‘dumb blond chick, get off TV, what do you know?’ And he just was so, I’m so sick of being talked to like that.”
Ms. McCain should get used to getting to like that. Reality hasn’t sunk it with Ms. McCain that she’s a gossip on a disreputable ‘news’ organization. She isn’t taken seriously because her chief contribution to a nothing news network is that she’s got name recognition.
She’s the famous, albeit ill-informed, daughter of a true American hero. That doesn’t entitle Ms. McCain to any respect. Respect is earned, not given.
It isn’t like she’s a serious news correspondent like Shannon Bream or Jennifer Griffin. It isn’t like she’s a serious pundit like Nina Easton or Dorothy Rabinowitz.
Ms. Rabinowitz and her fellow WSJ pundits think that Newt isn’t the latest flavor of the month:
Gigot: Let’s ask Wall Street Journal editorial board members Dorothy Rabinowitz and Joe Rago and senior economics writer Steve Moore.
So Dorothy, what’s behind this Gingrich surge?
Rabinowitz: Realization. It’s really the perception of a mass of people at what they’re looking at. And I think it was pretty pat of all of the commentators to say, “Well, this is the latest flavor of the month.” I doubt that this is the latest flavor of the month.
Gigot: Well, what–what is his appeal, though, at this moment?
Rabinowitz: His appeal is simply; it’s not simple, it’s the genuine concentration on issues that has been absent, his capacity to engage people on issues. By issues we mean foreign as well as domestic, the depth of his reporting on the meaning of issues, and there is the X factor, the feeling that people have that they’re listening to something different and substantial, some kind of very hearty meal, as opposed to a kind of mind-numbing repetition of “Government is broke, Washington is broke.” How many times can you hear that and–
Gigot: So he can think on his feet and is doing well in the debates.
Rabinowitz: And expansively.
Gigot: Steve, in the summer, as you know, the Gingrich campaign was really given up for dead. His staff had quit. He had all kinds of troubles, couldn’t raise any money, still not raising a lot of money, although that has improved. What’s your reading on the revival of Gingrich?
Moore: Well, I think Dorothy has it right, that what, the reason you’re seeing this revival of Newt Gingrich is that he has looked presidential, Paul, in these debates. He can play the part, and that’s something the Republicans really want. You and I have known Newt Gingrich for over 20 years. We know that, you know, you walk around with Newt Gingrich, and he always has a live hand grenade in his pocket. So you never know when it’s going explode. But you know, for the last–
Gigot: You want that in a president, Steve? Do you want a president with a live hand grenade in his pocket?
Moore: I’m not so sure, but you know, for the last couple of months, it has not detonated. He’s looked very good. And I, one last thing, Paul. I’ve really gone through his economic program, and I think it’s excellent. He sounds very much like a modern-day Jack Kemp, and it’s a very appealing message.
Gigot: You mean it’s a pro-growth message with substantial tax cutting as part of it.
Moore: That’s right.
These are substantive analyses as opposed to Ms. McCain’s analysis, which amounts more to things that you’d read on Page 6 than hear on a substantive news show.
It’s easy to understand why a liberal like Meghan McCain would attack Newt. That’s what liberals do. It’s disturbing to think that a consistently conservative pundit like Ann Coulter would endorse a liberal like Mitt Romney.
Perhaps it’s because she hasn’t gotten enough attention lately. She’s been known to say stupid things to get attention. I take Ms. Coulter more seriously than I take Ms. McCain.
That isn’t a particularly difficult hurdle to clear, though.
Technorati: Meghan McCain, Ann Coulter, MSNBC, Pundits, Shannon Bream, Jennifer Griffin, News Correspondents, Dorothy Rabinowitz, Stephen Moore, Nina Easton, WSJ, Fortune Magazine, Newt, GOP, Election 2012
This article is the picture perfect portrait of what world-class media bias is. This paragraph highlights Lawrence Lessig’s total bias against Newt:
For as far too few remember, more than any other living American, it is Newt Gingrich who gave us the current version of our hopelessly dysfunctional Congress, an institution which, according to a New York Times/CBS poll, now has the confidence of 9% of the American people. That monster is his baby, and no one should deny him his parental bragging rights.
This is astonishingly biased. Mr. Lessig apparently didn’t bother thinking that Harry Reid, Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi might’ve screwed Congress up more than any trio of Americans to ever serve in Congress.
The Framers of our Constitution meant Congress to be a great deliberative body. It has become an embarrassment. Congress doesn’t deliberate to resolve important national issues. Congress fundraises, and postures to fundraise, to support the next fight for control.
I haven’t seen a Democrat in Congress since 2000 who could string 2 coherent sentences together. That’s when the last great Democratic lawmaker served in the Senate. His name was Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Nancy Pelosi’s idea of great deliberations is cobbling a bill together in her office with only Democrats involved. Harry Reid did the same thing with the health care bill on the Senate side.
Together, they crammed the bill down Americans’ throats. Pelosi had the gall to say that we’d “have to pass the bill to find out what’s in it.” Had it gone through the committee process, been worked out in a conference committee, then debated, that would’ve qualified as debating the issue. The Democrats didn’t do that. Instead, they had their sights set on stuffing the bill down America’s throat.
It’s important to remember that they did the same thing with the stimulus.
Apparently, Mr. Lessig thinks that cramming controversial legislation down Americans’ throats over their loud, repeated protestations is what great deliberative bodies do. He’s entitled to his warped opinion but that isn’t what I picture as great deliberative work.
Cramming controversial legislation down people’s throat can’t be blamed on anyone except President Obama, then-Chief of staff, then-Speaker Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Likewise, Harry Reid’s stalling 15 House bills that would get jobs created isn’t anyone’s fault except Harry Reid’s, Chuck Schumer’s and President Obama’s.
Gingrich concentrated the “work” of Congress into a three-day “work” week. He sent his caucus home for the rest of the week, in part so that they had time necessary to launch cross-country fundraising missions.
It’s amazing the amount of impact the Gingrich GOP majority had with those short work weeks. Another thing that Mr. Lessig didn’t grasp is that spending time home in their districts was a positive. Actually listening to constituents matters.
The reality is that the Gingrich House was one of the most positively impactful congresses in modern history. For the record, Pelosi’s House was impactful, too. It just didn’t have a positive impact.
Blaming Newt for the disfunction of the House from 2007-201 or the Senate from 2007-present is intellectually corrupt. It has nothing to do with reality. The current House is functioning quite well, in fact. The argument that Mr. Lessig makes is mostly fiction.
That’s why he’s earned this criticism.
Technorati: President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Rahm Emanuel, Corruption, Op-eds, Media Bias, Democrats, Newt Gingrich, Reforms, GOP, Election 2012