In 1988, he was TIME’s man of the year and in 1990—for his role in the dissolution of the Soviet Union– the Man of the Decade. In 1990, he won the Nobel Peace Prize. He’s weighing in on the current crisis. I was curious to see what he had to say.
Before doing so, I thought it would be interesting to start with a ride on the Wayback Pony. It’s instructive to recall how the elder statesmen who emerge to school us in a current crisis were viewed in their glory days. Some younger readers might not remember. Furthermore, the past is not always quite the way we remember it. It was interesting to see how the mainstream media—and is any more mainstream than TIME?—viewed him in the day. (To give further context to what follows, I recommend reading William Kern’s post here.)
I must admit to only being a modest fan of the Olympics but I do enjoy seeing some of the more exciting events like swimming and gymnastics. What has bothered me in trying to watch this is the seemingly idiotic coverage by NBC where these important events don’t start until 10 or 11 at night while ‘prime time’ is filled with things like beach volleyball.
Now of course time zones play a role in Olympic coverage and with the games in China it means that the events are 12-15 hours ahead of us (depending on where you live in the US). This mean that in order to air events live here they have to occur sometime in the morning in China.
I understand that NBC heavily pressured the Olympic authorities to move the swimming events to the morning rather than running them in the afternoon or evening. This was pretty controversial because Europe is 5-8 hours ahead of New York, so starting the big events at 10pm in New York means running them between 3am and 6am in most of Europe.
I assume that the fact that the prime events are run at 10pm in New York has something to do with the fact that there was some reason they could not take place earlier (perhaps the athletes require a certain amount of time to prepare and such). Obviously moving things back to 8pm EST would not change the problem in Europe, so there is no logic there.
Nor does it seem to make sense that they put the prime events on later assuming people would already watch between 8pm and 10pm since they put they most boring stuff on then.
So for those on the East Coast having to watch the prime events between 10pm and midnight it would seem to be pretty much a matter of time zones and logistics (either than or the networks are simply choosing to shaft the entire country). But what I do not understand is why we have to do so on the West Coast.
Now having lived in California most of my life I understand that the East Coast is the only thing that matters when it comes to televison and that we in the West are the untouchables. But if you are already making the decision to air them at 10pm-midnight on the East, why cant you air them between 7pm and 9pm in California ?
I don’t think the networks would show the Presidential Debates live in New York and taped in California. They recognize that people want to see the events live. The same holds true for the big events at the Olympics.
August 14th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
This Guest Voice post is by CBS veteran newsman and anchor Bob Schieffer. In this excerpt from his new book, Bob Schieffer’s America, he looks at the issue of campaign reform and the realities facing those who seek it.
From Bob Schieffer’s America
by Bob Schieffer:
Campaign 2004 cost nearly a billion dollars. In 2008, spending in just the presidential race alone will surpass that figure. Bill Clinton had amassed a campaign war chest of $3 million when he ran in the New Hampshire primary in 1996. His wife had collected a staggering $90 million before New Hampshire rolled around in 2008.
Money was always a part of politics, but it has become the overriding factor in modern campaigns.
No candidate, no matter how brilliant or charismatic, can get elected without the money to buy campaign commercials. Only those who are willing to spend a major part of every day asking others for money can even hope to be elected. Since a vast majority of the American people wouldn’t even think of spending their days that way, we have come to see a different kind of person run for office, people who are willing to do just that. They are not bad people to be sure, some of them are very good people, but they are more akin to development officers and professional fund-raisers than those who sought office in the past, and with the new breed has come new values and new goals.
In 2004, the average winning Senate campaign cost $7 million, which meant the candidate had to raise $3,196.35 every day including Saturday and Sunday of his or her six year term. Ask a retired politician why he or she decided to get out of politics, and most of them will tell you they just couldn’t take another day of relentless fund-raising. Others may tell you they just got offers to make more money. The influx of money into the system has made public office a stepping-stone to wealth. Candidates find they can make more money and exercise more influence lobbying than they ever did as congressional representatives or senators.
August 13th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Will former Secretary of State Colin Powell endorse Democratic presumptive nominee Senator Barack Obama? Yes…wait…he might not. Will Powell go to the Democratic convention to endorse Obama? Yes…wait…he might not.
Once again Colin Powell, the charismatic military former military commander with the great bio, is in the spotlight and continuing his role as one of the most respected and also discounted political rock stars in the nation. Republicans love him when he is toeing the party line. Democrats love him when he seems to be bucking the party and administration line. Republicans discount his importance when he doesn’t hold the party line. Democrats say he was a lousy Secretary of State when he isn’t breaking with the party line.
Today, political pundits and reporters were having a field day after Weekly Standard bigwig Bill Kristol suggested that Powell would not only endorse Obama but go to the Demmie convention to do it to boot.
Kristol is a contributor at Fox News and he told this network:”“He may well give a speech at the Democratic convention explaining his endorsement of Obama.” Kristol said his tip came from inside sources:
“This is not an absolute done deal, but these people are very confident that Powell will endorse Obama,” Kristol said, adding that he thinks Powell, a Republican, still has “a high respect” for John McCain, Obama’s Republican rival.
Powell immediately denied the report to Fox and later told ABC News that he has no plans to go to the convention. And he had icy comments in particular for Bill Kristol — who sometimes is to solid political reporting what Fox News contributor Dick Morris is to accurate political crystal ball gazing:
“I do not have time to waste on Bill Kristol’s musings,” Powell told ABC News. “I am not going to the convention. I have made this clear.”
He ended the conversation before he could get the big follow-up question — on whether he’ll endorse Obama.
He also emailed the Washington Post:
“I am not attending either political convention,” Powell wrote in an e-mail. “As I have said for some time, I know both candidates and I am studying their positions and statements. I have not decided who I will vote for.”
Meanwhile, Powell’s spokesman stressed that Powell won’t be going to either convention — but left the door for an endorsement (of someone) open.
And Former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski told the Huffington Post that he “expects” Gen. Colin Powell to endorse Obama.
August 5th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
The popularity of online news sites and weblogs (such as this one) is part of an Internet news explosion. But it’s also symptomatic of a truth, NPR’s Dick Meyer points out: there now “more news, but less news” because a lot of what passes for news now consists of people talking about the news.
Meyer, the former CBS staffer who has a new book coming out today, takes a look at the realities of early 21st century news and the organizations that have traditionally provided it in an NPR column that deserves to be read in its entirety by TMV readers and anyone interested in the news biz. Let’s take a look at some key highlights.
One of Meyer’s key points is this:
It is important to differentiate between “news gathering” and “news product.” Investors like news product; they dislike news gathering. The sheer quantity of news gathering done by American journalists is shrinking. The amount of news product is growing.
The news business is shrinking, and shrinking fast. The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune are just three of the many metropolitan dailies that are cutting newsroom staffs dramatically. The news divisions of the television networks have been in steady decline for years. Commercial news radio is getting scarce. Cable networks hire more hosts than reporters.
Meanwhile, it was recently announced that my alma mater the San Diego Union-Tribune is up for sale. This followed the closure of the evening Tribune in the early 90s, spurts of buyouts and layoffs over the years and constant rumors that the paper would never be sold.
Publisher Helen Copley died and left the paper to her son David. When news reports surfaced recently that David Copley was donating millions of dollars to a university for a chair in theatrical make up design, eyebrows went up more than ever. Some present and former staffers got bad vibes – which proved to be true.
How bad is the situation with America’s newspapers? I’m on an 8 week journey doing 8 events in three states in my other incarnation and newspapers are often Missing In Action at local convenience stores, restaurants and hotels where you USED to see them. And now when you see them they’re often so thin and bland in content you wonder how anyone can buy most of them.
Which an increasingly large number of people aren’t.
Yet, as Meyer points out, there is more NEWS around than ever “depending on how you define news…”:
Thirty years ago, there was no cable. Now, there are three all-news cable channels, three business news channels and scads of entertainment, religious and sports channels. That’s more news, right?
Fifteen years ago, there were no online news sites like this one. Now they are uncountable, available on demand 24-7, with instant, easy-to-produce news from every corner of the planet. That’s more news, right?
August 4th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
This is a Guest Voice original-report post is by journalism professor and author Walter Brasch who is also an award-winning syndicated newspaper columnist and radio commentator, and president of the Pennsylvania Press Club.
Mining Racism and Murder in a Northeastern Pennsylvania Town
by Walter Brasch
On a street in Shenandoah, Pa., deep in the heart of the anthracite coal region, six White teens took their racial hatred to a higher level. They confronted 25-year-old Luis Ramirez, an undocumented worker, and beat him to death.
At first the police chief, the mayor, and borough manager refused to believe racism was involved. Although there was already racial and ethnic tension in the 5,000 population town, the town’s political leaders were united in one belief—it was just another street fight gone bad. “I have reason to know the kids who were involved, the families who were involved, and I’ve never known them to harbor this type of feeling,” said the borough manager.
It took police almost two weeks, even with several witnesses, to finally arrest four of the teens. The district attorney charged two of the teens with homicide, aggravated assault, and ethnic intimidation, and two others with aggravated assault and ethnic intimidation.
Unindicted co-conspirators are millions of Americans and the far-right mass media.
It’s common for people in a nation that is in a Recession to complain. They’re frustrated with their lives, with bad working conditions, dead end jobs, and low incomes. They’re frustrated by skyrocketing prices, obscene corporate profits, and do-nothing legislators. The problem isn’t “us,” they believe, but “them.” Others. Outsiders who “invaded” America
A century ago in the coal region, good ole boy Americans complained about the Irish and Poles who took “our” jobs in the mines. For decades, Whites kept Blacks out of almost all but the most menial jobs, and then lynched those who they found to be too “uppity.” During the 1920s and 1930s, the masses of Germans, trying to rationalize their own economic distress, decided the problem was the Jews—and Americans went along with that ethnic racism. We blame Asians. Africans. Muslims. Anyone who’s different.
In today’s America, it’s the “Illegals,” the code-name for undocumented Mexicans. Of course, undocumented Swedes or Canadians or anyone with White skin pass under the radar. Anyone with dark skin doesn’t. Read the rest of this entry »
In one of his blogs this week, Jack Cafferty of CNN asked the ominous question, “What happened to the Clintons?” Well, I for one can’t wait for the fireworks to start at the Democratic National Convention. For those of you who think Hillary and Bill Clinton are going to peacefully surrender to Obama, I’ve got some Eskimos who are looking to buy some ice.
For the first time in over three decades, I will be glued in front of the television for the first three days of the convention. The first ballot is sure to be a made-for-television moment. I talked to a Clinton delegate here in Maryland and he told me that they have been instructed to vote for Hillary on the first ballot. To make things more interesting, there is a movement to swing 160 delegates from Obama to Clinton. If that occurs, Clinton could re-establish her campaign and face John McCain in the fall.
The group, P.U.M.A (Party Unity My A**) claims that 15 delegates have switched from Obama to Clinton in July. There is still the possibility of a floor convention vote to fully-seat the delegates of Michigan and Florida which would benefit Senator Clinton. Finally, the Obama flip-flop on the FISA bill has not been well received by the more liberal segments of the Democratic faithful.
The Democratic Convention may be shaping up as the O.K. Corral, Part Two. The weapons will be delegate votes instead of Colt Peacemakers. Where are the Clintons? They are patiently waiting for Denver. The only question is: will it be an easy nomination for Obama or one of the grandest political ambushes ever pulled off…on the voting floor of the Convention.
After the open display of affection and support Barack Obama received from French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris on Saturday - John McCain cannot be pleased. On the other hand, such a display could serve to hurt Obama, which is something that will perhaps become clear in the coming days. The French are not oblivious to this.
“Drawing too close to Paris could cost him precious from the center of the electorate in November. But on Friday standing behind his lectern, Obama had only sweet words for the Hexagone [France is often referred to as a six-sided Hexagon due to the geometric shape of its territory].”
“One is interested in a candidate who’s looking toward the future rather than the past” - in reference to the way he campaigned last year. ‘Good luck to Barack Obama. If he is chosen, then France will be delighted. And if it is somebody else, then France will be the friend of the United States of America,’ he finally concluded; with a formulation which again - says a lot about his preference” …
This just in from the Department of Credit Where Credit Is Due, it’s nice to see the presidential candidates maintain a sense of humor during hard times, and John McCain seems to be keeping hold of his. The image to the left is a fake press pass that the McCain team was handing out to reporters who were “left behind to report in America” and referring to them as the junior varsity squad of reporters. The treatment Obama has received during his trip has, of course, been non-stop and mostly flattering, but the candidate’s own actions have been even more shocking in some cases.
You can argue either way about how appropriate it is for a candidate not yet in the seat of power to be getting one on one engagements with all of these world leaders, but it does seem like Obama is acting as if he already has the job. As Ben Smith reported, there have been White House type protocols instituted on Air Obama for the press pool. As the recipient of such an avalanche of good fortune, (with reports that the initial press estimates of Iraq’s support for his withdrawl timetable may have been less than accurate going largely unnoticed) one would think that Senator Obama might make humility his watchword. Overstepping is a definite possibility if Obama continues to treat this tour as if it were the preamble to his coronation.
Although I sometimes see a story that makes me wonder, I have not generally been one to obsess over media biases against Republicans or the political right.
I recognize that the news media today is a business and that the basic rule is to go after any juicy scandal. My basic view has been that perhaps personal biases sometimes cause the reporter to lean to a Republican scandal versus a Democratic one but that if its a juicy story they will go after anyone.
However in the past couple of weeks I have seen some things that make me want to reexamine this position. The news media has taken some steps that seem to really step beyond just some minor slipups to some fairly serious bias against Senator McCain and the Republicans in general.
One of the biggest examples of this has been the reaction to Senator Obama’s trip to Iraq. All three network anchors (NBC/CBS/ABC) are along for the trip along with over 200 other reporters. They are covering every step of the trip as if it were a major Presidential summit.
Now I certainly understand that you need to cover this story, he is likely to be the next President and this is a major foreign policy trip. But do you really need to send all of the anchors ? The only times I’ve seen all of the anchors travel together in the past has been during events like 9/11, Katrina and the like. It doesn’t seem like this quite rises to that level.
In addition, we can look at what the media did when Senator McCain took a trip to Iraq (in fact he has taken several trips recently). The media reaction there was considerably understated. No anchors went with him, the stories didn’t even lead the news that night. In fact there was less coverage on all three networks combined than there has been on one network for Obama.
As I said above, I certainly understand the desire to cover Obama since he is the presumptive Democratic nominee. I even understand that perhaps he is a newer story. But the level of difference between the McCain coverage and the Obama coverage is well beyond what would seem reasonable.
For example, the New York Times recently carried an editorial on Iraq written by Senator Obama. Senator McCain wrote one in response and the Times refused to publish it. They contend it is because they don’t like the content of the article.
Now as far as I know they did not impose similar requirements on Obama and do we really believe that if the situation was reversed that they would reject Obama’s response editorial ?
Outside the election campaign there has also been some interesting content to the reporting on oil prices and the stock market.
Needless to say both issues are very important and I certainly understand that when oil prices surge or stock prices sag that it is very significant to the viewers. Perhaps all of the special reports and breaking news were a bit of overkill but I chalk that up to media hype rather than bias.
But when the trend was in the favor of the public (IE Oil prices dropping or Stock prices surging) then the media did not simply tone things down they reversed them drastically.
Oil price increases were reported by CNN as ‘Oil prices spike drastically’ while equal drops in prices were reported as ‘Slight reductions in price’ or by MSNBC as ‘Drops that are probably temporary’.
The same thing happened when the stock market prices improved. When the stocks slumped we had special reports about the plunging markets and the horrible effects it would have on retirement plans.
When they improved the reports focused on the fact that in the long term the market was ‘bound to’ slump (CNN) or on ABC we were told that the ’slight gains’ did not erase the losses.
What ABC didn’t tell you is they were comparing one day worth of gains to one month worth of losses (unless you read the fine print at the bottom of the screen).
Now I can accept that some of this is simply the result of the media liking to report bad news because they think it is better for ratings. But when you combine all of the reports on all of the networks it becomes a question mark.
Although I am still not sold on a vast media conspiracy (either left or right), when you look specifically to the Obama/McCain race I think it is pretty hard at this point to deny that Saturday Night Live got it right. The media is ‘in the tank’ for Obama. I would like to see them prove me wrong but I doubt that they will.
July 20th, 2008 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
This question was raised by a reader in India who takes an avid interest in the American blogs/media. She marvels at the manner the media/blog pundits cling on to the statements issued by Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. Who is this chap? Do the pundits need to be reminded that Mr Maliki is the creation of the present Bush administration?
The reader then reminds that Mr Maliki would become as irrelevant in a few months time as his mentor and master George W. Bush. Does it really matter whether Mr Maliki agrees with the proposed Barack Obama plan for withdrawal from Iraq or not? The reader wonders whether this approach of media/blogs is because of myopia, or ennui, or sheer laziness, or let-the-world-go-to-hell attitude. “Where are the fresh insights into complex issues?”
It also occurred to me that the pundits had already made up their minds that the White House “leaked” this news. No one is asking whether this could be an intentional leak. In any case aren’t there other issues to talk about? Do Mr Maliki’s routine flip-flops on this issue to be taken with such seriousness, and analysed so minutely, as if this was a new development or “Breaking News”? (See here..)
The reader adds: “So one is not sure whether the US presidential candidates’ views on important issues are being properly reported/reflected in the media/blogs. This hysterical approach has become typical of media/blogs trivializing important issues and then forgetting about them. The atmosphere thus created resembles that of a fish/vegetable market in an Asian or an African country.”
But then someone could say that at least those fish and vegetable-sellers are earning their bread by putting in hard work, and in an honest fashion!!! (The NYT opinion here…)
When Barack Obama pointed out recently that Americans should - in their own interest - teach their children Spanish or some other second language, many were quick to pounce.
But, not surprisingly, people in South America wholeheartedly agree with him.
“The percentage of people in the United States who master a foreign-language is pathetic compared to other wealthy countries. … Obama is right, although it would’ve been nice if he himself spoke Spanish or some other language. … a recent survey taken in 27 countries of the European Union revealed that 56 percent of Europeans speak at least one language apart from their native tongue, which is an increase of 53 percent over five years ago.”
When I was a kid back in the Seventies, a favorite sarcastic phrase used to peers who were getting a bit too full of themselves and getting all entitled and snippy about playing fair was: ‘What do you think you are — some kind of P.C.?’ ‘P.C.’ stood for ‘Privileged Character.’
Dick Cheney is now officially our nation’s most privileged character.
It seems that Cheney Branch has thought up another innovative new privilege to protect itself from Congressional Oversight. As Isikoff and Hosenball remark at Newsweek, (and as my colleague has likewise noted),
The decision by the White House to refuse to honor the subpoena from Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman’s House Oversight and Government Reform Committee for Cheney’s interview was hardly unexpected, given the administration’s history of fiercely protecting presidential prerogatives. (Newsweek)
But as the article remarks with wonderful restraint,
What was surprising to some legal scholars was the basis for shielding the FBI interview report. It was covered, Mukasey said, by what he called "the law-enforcement component of executive privilege." (Newsweek)
Let me see if I can interpret this. Reading between the lines, I would interpret it to mean that any legal scholars who know anything about executive privilege and who still believe in ‘rule of law’ are gobsmacked that Mukasey would have the gall to make this absolutely specious argument. (Newsweek)
But of course, any legal scholar who hasn’t spent the last seven+ years locked in an ivory tower with no internet access doubtless isn’t all that surprised that he did. Mukasey quickly learned the Bush administration’s foolproof strategy: if you’re the executive and refuse to account for yourself, who is really going to make you if you come up with some kind of color-of-law excuse to refuse? Even if the judiciary calls you out, you can always make up another one.
Or as Benen more succinctly puts it, ‘The Bush gang plays by its own rules — the ones they make up as they go along.’
Surely two of the great things about being George Will are the facts that he’s not running for office and that he has about the same level of job security as a Supreme Court Justice or the Pope. This allows him the luxury of saying some really unpopular things, particularly when they are true. During the roundtable section of George Stephanopoulos’ show, Phil Gramm’s remarks on “a nation of whiners” were brought up, prompting George Will to jump into the breach.
Of course, Phil Gramm is absolutely right… We are the crybabies of the Western world. We have an extraordinarily low level of pain tolerance.
While some are complaining about it mightily, that phrase really stopped me in my tracks and I’ve been pondering it all day. An “extraordinarily low level of pain tolerance” indeed. While I have never been a cheerleader for the war in Iraq, on at least one point I think I can understand some of the thinking of the administration. Why have Americans not been asked to make sacrifices to run this war, as we have during conflicts in our more distant past? Probably, I imagine, because whatever popular support the war enjoyed during the early years would have evaporated like mist in the morning valley.
Were those who came before us - that Greatest Generation - really that much tougher and, well… greater? During World War Two, our citizens on the home front were asked to make tremendous sacrifices - at least to our modern way of thinking. But it bears remembering that these were people who had lived through the great depression. Grow a victory garden? Recycle your tin foil? Donate the odd pot or pan to be melted down for the war machine? Baby food! They had seen much worse. I wonder what they would make of our complaining about the perceived shortcomings of our current health care system? Many of these were the same folks who survived the great influenza pandemic of 1918 when there was no social support network, healthcare (such as was available) was oh so crude by comparison, and they had literally been watching people dying in the streets.
My grandparents’ generation also had clear memories and family stories of the people who came before them who had it even worse. They had to live through the Great War of Northern Aggression. Famines were commonplace, medical procedures involved barbaric and largely pointless torture procedures which were far more likely to kill than cure, and they did it all by the light of whale oil lamps. Diseases which are now either virtually unknown or - at most - require the annoyance of a quick trip to the clinic, routinely ripped through towns and cities wiping out as much as two thirds of the population at times.
We just bred ‘em tougher in those days, not from any ingrained sense of, “We are Americans and we must be tough!” but rather out of simple necessity and the immutable laws of Darwin. Those who were tough, survived, and those were were not, well… did not.
Today we take all of these benefits for granted and our idea of “sacrifice” would be curious indeed to our forebears. The vast majority of us not technically homeless sit comfortably protected from the weather. The loss of a job is painful, but there is unemployment insurance and, if you must, welfare. Most any medical challenge can be met, and even facing the unthinkable we can be kept mostly pain-free in hospice to await our end in peace. We expect our government to take only a bare minimum of our paychecks in taxes, but demand that it keeps the price of everything low, the supply plentiful, and that we be discomfited to no significant degree while we engage in our own, individual pursuits of happiness.
There are plenty of things going on with our government and society where clear room for improvement exists. And, of course, we’re free to comment on it. But let us not pretend that we’re not a bunch of whiners. Our threshold for personal pain and sacrifice would likely send those who cleared the way for us into howls of laughter.
After a long, candid and public battle with colon cancer, former White House press secretary and radio talk-show host Tony Snow died early this morning.
Immediate details were sketchy. But the news bulletin moved shortly after 7 a.m. Eastern time. Snow was 53.
He previously served as chief speechwriter for President George H.W. Bush and as a frequent host on the Fox News Channel on Fox News Sunday, Weekend Live and The O’Reilly Factor.
He also guest-hosted for Rush Limbaugh and had his own radio talk-show.
Last September after 17 months in the White House job Snow retired as President George W. Bush’s third press secretary, saying with his cancer he needed to earn more for his family than the job’s $168,000 salary. He was succeeded by Dana Perino.
Tributes are likely going to pour in about Snow, but not just from Republicans.
Snow was a public figure who truly seemed to have fun at his job and did it well. He was the quintessential broadcasting pro who put a professional TV face on the White House point of view. Not all people who leave the job as press secretary do so with their integrity intact — particularly not those who’ve left administrations suffering Grand Canyon-like credibility gaps. But if Snow didn’t leave with his reputation as pure as snow, he left it unbattered unbruised and unbowed.
He took over the job and immediately got rave reviews from both the press and Republican partisans and begrudging comments from many Democrats. The reason: he took over from the hapless Scott McClellan who often looked like he was undergoing a root canal while answering press questions. Snow seemed to be either having fun or setting the record straight (even when it was spin).
He is refusing to testify before Congress about Bush crimes but he just won’t shut up in the Wall Street Journal about how Barack Obama is using his political genius for the ‘08 election.
Citing a letter from the Bush Justice Department, Karl Rove’s lawyer claims he is “constitutionally immune from compelled congressional testimony” but is willing to grant an “informal interview” or answer written questions about the prosecution of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman, whose ouster Bush’s Brain is accused of arranging.
But Rove is showing no such reticence in the Journal claiming that “the Obama for President effort has cribbed an awful lot from the Bush-Cheney playbooks of 2000 and 2004.”
On closer inspection, the “awful lot” turns out to be the nuts and bolts of modern electioneering, although Rove insists that “by setting a world indoor record for jettisoning past positions, Mr. Obama may be risking his reputation for truthfulness. A candidate’s credibility, once lost, is very hard to restore, regardless of how fine an organization he has built.”
Lost credibility is a subject Rove knows inside out and, if the Judiciary Committee can make its subpoenas hold up in court, he will get ample opportunity to expatiate on it under oath, not for pay by Fox News and the Journal, but under penalty for perjury.
Meanwhile, Obama and the rest of us may be excused for not wanting to hear the brilliant insights of the man who made the White House a cesspool of lies and deception.
Was Hillary badly treated by America’s male dominated media elite? That debate is not only an American one. In fact, it’s apparently a debate that has been sanctioned by China’s Communist Party.
“Looking at how newspapers and TV networks commented on Hillary’s looks, her voice and her emotional life, we can see the kind of criticism and humiliation she has suffered. ‘Hating Hillary’ has even become a kind of national sport or entertainment. … The path of her struggle in seeking to make a breakthrough may not have met with the approval of all women. But in her own words, the 18 million voters who supported her have made “18 million cracks in the glass ceiling.”
Here’s an interesting question: What do North Koreans, who risk Kim Jong-il’s wrath by watching South Korean TV, think about the mass protests against American beef that have been taking place in the South for the past two months?
According to this article from the Daily North Korea, a publication staffed in part by North Korean defectors, a letter recently received from someone who works in North Korea doing missionary work writes that the protests are triggering ’sorrow.’
“”When we see the South Korean people protesting the resumption of U.S. beef imports rather than showing a sense of pride as citizens of a powerful and rich nation, we felt sorrow. The North Korean people are eating grass porridge to survive. … We don’t understand what the South Korean people are protesting. Why make such a fuss? …”
In this Guest Voice post, National Examiner columnist Tony Campbell wonders whether art (TV) imitates life (politics) or life (politics) imitates art (TV) when it comes to Michelle Obama. Guest Voice posts do not necessarily reflect the opinion of TMV or its writers.
The Sherry Palmerization of Michelle Obama
by Tony Campbell
Several weeks ago, I wrote a column comparing the presidential campaign of Senator Obama with the 1st season of “24”. Dennis Haysbert, the actor that played President David Palmer on the hit series, said the following Tuesday:
“If anything, my portrayal of David Palmer, I think, may have helped open the eyes of the American people.”
While there may be some truth to Haysbert’s comment, my May 25th column mentioned a more interesting political subplot (worthy of a “24” episode) – Rupert Murdoch and the vast right wing conspiracy against a third Clinton administration in the Oval Office.
“Rupert Murdoch and the Clintons have not been friendly since the mid-1990s. The FOX News Channel was at the forefront of the attack on President Clinton during his impeachment and trial in 1998. Is it possible that Rupert Murdoch and the Newscorp/FOX folks planted the seed of Obama’s candidacy through a TV show to put the final nail in the Clinton political coffin? In this business of politics, stranger things have happened…this is one of those things that make you go hmmm…”
Oh yes, I should get back to today’s point of my column. If Barack Obama is David Palmer, then that makes Michelle Obama – you guessed it, Sherry Palmer. Sherry Palmer, played by actress Penny Johnson Jerald, is one of the main characters in the first three seasons of “24”. By the end of season three, Sherry had lied, extorted, blackmailed, and even killed to protect the political career of her husband. Read the rest of this entry »
he looks at the issue of campaign reform and the realities facing those who seek it.
This just in from the Department of Credit Where Credit Is Due, it’s nice to see the presidential candidates maintain a sense of humor during hard times, and John McCain seems to be keeping hold of his. The image to the left is a fake press pass that the McCain team 
