Tag: lies

Cokie’s Law in Action

FOXnews VP Bill Sammon was caught on tape making a rather unfortunate admission on a conservative cruise:

At that time, I have to admit, that I went on TV on Fox News and publicly engaged in what I guess was some rather mischievous speculation about whether Barack Obama really advocated socialism, a premise that privately I found rather far-fetched.

Then, later, walking back this statement:

[Obama’s supposed “advocating” of socialism] was a main point of discussion on all the channels, in all the media [and by 2009 I was] astonished by how the needle had moved.

You (or your proxies) go on television, you knowingly lie repeatedly, your entire network repeats said lie knowingly and with malice aforethought, on all programs 24/7, then you proclaim yourself astonished that some number of people have picked up the lie and repeated it themselves (whether knowingly or unknowingly is now immaterial; congratulations, you have successfully propagated the meme).
Now, of course, because of the ironclad rules of Cokie’s Law, you simply continue to repeat and repeat and repeat the lie you know is a lie (because you were complicit in its genesis) now with the “it’s out there, we have to report it” fig leaf. And the rest of the MSM steadfastly defends you as an accurate, respectable news source despite all evidence to the contrary. I guess that concept is “out there” too.

O’Keefe and Journalistic Malpractice

Gee, I’ve never been more surprised by a reveal of misleading editing:

If you watch the entire conversation, it becomes crystal clear that O’Keefe’s provocateurs didn’t get what they were looking for. They were ostensibly offering $5 million to NPR. Their goal is clearly to get Schiller and his colleague Betsy Liley to agree to slant coverage for cash. Again and again, they refuse, saying that NPR just wants to report the facts and be a nonpartisan voice of reason.

And this also falls into the utterly gobsmacking shock of the ages category:

James Poniewozik of TIME’s “Tuned In” blog admits that he reposted O’Keefe’s video without watching the entire two-hour exchange and suggests that many other reporters did the same.

Poniewozik speculates that O’Keefe posted the extended video because he was confident that “by the time anyone took the time to go over the full video, the narrative would be established, the quotes stuck in people’s minds and the ideological battle won.”

No shit. After all, one can’t expect journalists (and especially not millionaire pundits) to spend their time watching the thing they’re going to report on. They can’t even be bothered to force an intern to do it and report back. There’s just no time. People have to be fired. Now. After all, there’s no reason to believe this all might be purely manufactured horseshit. And, of course, one should never forget that we sorry rubes out here in our pajamas just can’t understand what it is to do journalism.
That aside, it’s almost like even serious people should begin to gather that this sort of pattern is their whole operation. They throw out a distorted narrative, claim some scalps, and move on. They haven’t even had to bother to find a new messenger, despite the fact that every one of these things has been utterly disproved as shamefully and willfully misleading. That would be bad enough, but you, the media, still misreport the ACORN business (among many, many other potential examples) as though no newer information ever emerged on that front. To this day and probably right now.

And, it’s worth noting (as the linked article does) exactly who due diligence in this sorry case fell to:

Glenn Beck’s website, “The Blaze,” ran a critique titled, “Does Raw Video of NPR Expose Reveal Questionable Editing & Tactics?” The short answer: Yes.

So it takes Glenn Beck’s folks to do what NPR and any other respectable journalistic outfit should have done immediately and for as long as it took before taking action: study the actual source data because we know this guy has a long, long history of purposefully misleading and creative editing. But do you come out immediately and say that? Eviscerate the messenger? Of course not. You fire people and strengthen their case against you by creating the implicit appearance of guilt.

Truly, truly the Republic is at an end. We have crossed the Rubicon once and for all and there is nothing left worthy of salvage. This is what the intellectual discourse has become. This is the level of intellect running the discourse in our public square…essentially that of a sad rube, caught out playing Three Card Monty. Again and again and again and again. Publicly. But I’m sure the Queen’s in there this time; after all, he keeps showing it to me!

The article concludes:

At this point, any news outlet that runs an uncorroborated James O’Keefe video is committing journalistic malpractice.

At this point?!? Anybody paying any attention to O’Keefe about anything several episodes ago was committing journalistic malpractice. That NPR merrily still fires people over this sort of horseshit is just flat out astonishing. Newsflash, NPR: they want to destroy you. Nothing you do, say, print, broadcast, or color favorably to the Right point of view is ever going to change that. Start acting like it.

Or, better yet, start acting like the responsible news organization you claim to be. As Dear Leader once said, “fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled again.”

O’Keefe and Journalistic Malpractice

Conservative Radio Hosts Called by Scripted Actors

Premiere On Call is our new custom caller service,” read the service’s website, which disappeared as this story was being reported (for a cached version of the site click here). “We supply voice talent to take/make your on-air calls, improvise your scenes or deliver your scripts. Using our simple online booking tool, specify the kind of voice you need, and we’ll get your the right person fast. Unless you request it, you won’t hear that same voice again for at least two months, ensuring the authenticity of your programming for avid listeners.

The report notes that the “service” is part of the overall operation that syndicates Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and Sean Hannity among many others. I keep thinking that one day one of these “shocking revelations about the conservative message machine” will stick, but then we’ve long known that W. Bush and his administration planted editorials, basically employed journalists to run preferred stories, and openly bragged about controlling various “mainstream” media outlets and programs (notably Meet the Press, but also obvious ones like Hannity and etc…). None of those seemed to register with people and the MSM has an obvious vested interest in letting such stories drop. Quickly . This one probably won’t register either, though it does get at their precious, precious two hours hate…and we certainly can’t have that.

Anyway and once again: they are lying to you with malice aforethought. Your entire media construct is bought and paid for with the express intent of fucking you out of what is yours so that the folks at the top can extract an additional fractional percent at your expense this quarter. They call that “shared sacrifice.” There are more of you; one would think the center could not hold. Not forever, anyway. Thanks for consistently proving me wrong on this. It’s really made my day. Over and over and over again. That is all.

(via militantagnostic)

Conservative Radio Hosts Called by Scripted Actors

Next up: American Mexceptionalism

Only one sitting president in the last 82 years has publicly uttered the magical phrase “American exceptionalism” – care to guess who it is? Ronald Reagan, he of the “shining city on a hill?” George W. Bush, who closed his speeches by asking that “God continue to bless” America? Nope. The only president to publicly discuss (and for that matter embrace) “American exceptionalism” is Barack Obama.

I would have been surprised were it otherwise. It’s just how FOXmemes work.

Next up: American Mexceptionalism

The Republican Party is the party of K-N-O-W. We know how to lower the cost of health care. We know how to take care of the uninsurable. We know how to put patients in charge of their health care and have a market-based, patient centered health care system that’s not going to kill jobs like ObamaCare is going to do. And we know how to stimulate the economy. We know how to create jobs in the private sector. We know how to prevent this huge government takeover of health care as well as all of society.

But we are the party of N-O against socialism and that’s what Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and Barack Obama have been proposing is a greater take over of everything in human endeavor in America.

Paul Broun (R, GA) (of “spew venom” fame), has a host of apparently secret plans. Which is fine. But once, just once, the host needs to say: “okay, that’s great. We’ve got plenty of time here, so let’s start with item one. With program specifics, budget figures, and policy detail, let me hear how you plan to reduce the costs of health care? And I’m afraid we’re going to have to ask you to be more specific than simply parroting "market solutions” and other tropes; please, let’s discuss this like adults.“ And then spend an hour or four until he stops digging. Then: item two, economic stimulation. Pretty sure that one will be tax cuts for the rich. Where’s the money coming from. Specific program cuts, specific dollar figures, specific deficit projections.
Honestly, how many times do you get to speak the ”lie of the year“ without any friction whatsoever? A million times? A billion? MSM, I’m asking: when do we not just "leave it there”?
Source: thinkprogress.org

Those Liberals at the AP

The far-left journalists over at the AP make the hard calls and reports that there is trouble at the mill, everyone:

LONDON — Prime Minister David Cameron yesterday waded into waters in which past British governments have foundered, promising fundamental changes to the country’s expensive and over-stressed public health care system.

I see. Crazy expensive socialist medical care. Only Lord Jesus can Know how much that stuff costs. Or, you can throw your lot in with pointy-headed statisticians and find out that it costs about $2317 per capita for the UK to provide universal, essentially free care to everyone (free as in beer, it is obviously paid for through various taxes and etc…). The US? We pay $5711 per capita. More than twice as much.
Now, of course, that would all change if we look at percent GDP, right? The US is such a giant economy and all. Actually, no. The US spends ~15% of GDP on healthcare, UK: ~8%. So it’s roughly half as expensive, whether considered as a function of the overall economy or strictly in terms of what’s spent per individual. And but so they all get access to healthcare. In the US, well, the GOP assures us that the market will take care of that any minute now.

Now we come to “over-stressed,” which must mean that outcomes are terrible in Britain when compared to the US, which (as we’re told repeatedly) has the finest care anywhere. They must be choking the streets with bodies over there if they spend half as much and then funnel that through some socialistic nightmare of a healthcare bureaucracy. Not so much: turns out they live longer, have lower infant mortality, and, of course, have universal access to free-as-in-beer healthcare 24/7, all without having to use the ER as their primary care physician or being told to just go die in the streets already. In fact, we typically rank in the low end of developed nations, not even within spitting distance of dread France, and always well behind the UK.

So, AP wrong on “expensive,” wrong on “over-stressed.” But they did get the current PM’s name right (though notably not his party affiliation; can’t go around limning the word “conservative” with “fundamental changes” and “foundered,” now can we?). So there’s that.

Re: Several of The Big Lies

dont-bs-me-bro:

Sorry, you are free to believe what you like, but this graph proves none of that, because it only goes back to Jan. 2010. It ignores the first 11 months of Obama’s adminstration, and seasonal changes in employment from quarter to quarter, year over year. It simply is not possible to examine just the most recent 11 months of data and draw any kind of big picture conclusions about the economy.

People choose cutoff points in graphs for a reason, to amplify the message they are trying to send. Let’s see some graphs that go back to 2007, or even earlier, for some context, and then we can debate facts about the economy.

So that takes care of (A) and (B). 

Or, not. Does this graph go back far enough for you? Total non-farm jobs under Bush and Obama:

Same conclusion: The United States under Obama is creating jobs. Period. Fewer than desirable, but job creation nonetheless.

You continue:

As for ©, of course government-funded jobs are not real jobs, because we have to fund them. This distinction causes confusion among those who don’t understand the difference between “real” jobs and government, taxpayer-funded jobs.

A real job is created when a private citizen or business dips into its own assets, or takes out a loan, to hire a person.

This is unadulterated horse-shit. A job is a job. A person is hired to perform a task in exchange for money. Period. They are jobs every bit as real as any other. They transfer money, also just as real, directly into the broader economy. That money spurs a larger overall economy. More people are hired. Lather, rinse, repeat: the Federal Government gradually reduces support as the private markets recover and can employ more people. I’m not sure why this is remarkably hard to understand other than the fact that it demonstrably works (see original three-part graph) and yet is incompatible with a worldview that states that no action of government, large or small, can be for the betterment of society. Ever.
All that aside, though, it is indisputably true that federal/state/local government employment has been distinctly reduced under Obama. Perhaps this graph has a sufficient time scale to pass your ever-so-sensitive BS detector?

That’s government employment relative to population. While the government did indeed get a lot bigger under such noted socialists as DD Eisenhower, it has since shown no trend at all relative to population. There at the very end, under Obama, you’ll note both the census spike and a distinct downward slide.

But, feel free to believe whatever nonsense you are being peddled. These are just the rather inconvenient facts.

Recap and Trade

Mike Huckabee, 2007: I also support cap and trade of carbon emissions. And I was disappointed that the Senate rejected a carbon counting system to measure the sources of emissions, because that would have been the first and the most important step toward implementing true cap and trade.
Mike Huckabee, 2010: In a recent internet post, a contributor makes the claim that I supported cap-and-trade in late 2007 while running for President. To put it simply, that’s just not true.
McCain|Palin 2008 platform: …will establish … a cap-and-trade system that would reduce greenhouse gas emissions. A cap-and-trade system harnesses human ingenuity in the pursuit of alternatives to carbon-based fuels.
Palin, in VP debate: [Ifill asks “Do you support capping carbon emissions?”] I do. I do.
Palin, 2010: I am deeply concerned about President Obama’s cap-and-trade energy plan, and I believe it is an enormous threat to our economy. It would undermine our recovery over the short term and would inflict permanent damage.
Lemkin: What’s remarkable is that she didn’t call it “Cap and Tax.” They think you have the memory of a goldfish. And, it seems, they are mostly right. We shall never speak of any of this again.

Spread

Well, it’s only online (MSM read: world wide interweb-log, or “blog”) commentary for the moment, but for the MSM this appearing (and staying) on the NYT site amounts to a clarion call:

In the much-discussed Pew poll reporting the spike in ignorance, those who believe Obama to be Muslim say they got their information from the media. But no reputable news agency — that is, fact-based, one that corrects its errors quickly — has spread such inaccuracies.

So where is this “media?” Two sources, and they are — no surprise here — the usual suspects. The first, of course, is Rush Limbaugh, who claims the largest radio audience in the land among the microphone demagogues, and his word is Biblical among Republicans.

[…]

Once Limbaugh has planted a lie, a prominent politician can pick it up, with little nuance. So, over the weekend, Kim Lehman, one of Iowa’s two Republican National Committee members, went public with doubts on Obama’s Christianity. Of course, she was not condemned by party leaders.

[…]

[Then] there is Fox News, whose parent company has given $1 million to Republican causes this year but still masquerades as a legitimate source of news. Their chat and opinion programs spread innuendo daily. The founder of Politifact, another nonpartisan referee to the daily rumble, said two of the site’s five most popular items on its Truth-o-meter are corrections of Glenn Beck.

Beck tosses off enough half-truths in a month to keep Politifact working overtime. Of late, he has gone after Michelle Obama, whose vacation in Spain was “just for her and approximately 40 of her friends.” Limbaugh had a similar line, saying the First Lady “is taking 40 of her best friends and leasing 60 rooms at a five-star hotel — paid for by you.”

The White House said Michelle Obama and her daughter Sasha were accompanied by just a few friends — and they paid their own costs. But, wink, wink, the damage is done. He’s Muslim and foreign. She’s living the luxe life on your dime. They don’t even have to mention race. The code words do it for them.

I can think of no other instance in which a prominent, national news source has even intimated (much less directly called out) the modern news cycle. Let me be the first to say: Welcome to Earth. We breathe a mix of nitrogen and oxygen here.

I’ve got a little list

From digby:

  • Tea Party’ers are not more likely to have racist tendencies than other conservatives.
    (Except they are.)

  • Democrats are scheming to hit 94 percent of small business owners with tax increases.
    (Except they aren’t.)

  • Bloody violence is out of control along the Mexican border, and illegal immigrants are streaming into America at record levels.
    (Except it’s not and they’re not.)

  • Obamacare will send Medicare spiraling out of control.
    (Except it won’t.)

  • Marriage is a religious union that’s all about procreation.
    (Except it isn’t.)

  • Voters say cutting the deficit is more important than creating jobs.
    (Except they don’t.)

  • Social Security is going broke, it adds to the deficit, and we have to raise the retirement age because people are living longer.
    (Except it’s not, it doesn’t and we don’t.)

  • The earth is getting cooler.
    (Except it’s really really not.)

Small enough to print, laminate, and keep in your pocket, David Gregory (et al.). Go and do likewise.