I know we're supposed to hate him, but I just can't. He's smarter than people give him credit for and he appears to be appreciative of and kind to fans (or spies). So many diva/assholes are running around Hollywood, it now seems like something special when a "star" is nice.
@Mediahohoho: I tend to agree with you, but you might not be giving enough credit to people who actually attended. Not ever Angry White American received a memo from Dick Armey to attend a rally.
What confuses me is that Obama is lowering taxes and even the top tax rate is being raised to a level that was lower than under Reagan.
What's happening here is a lot of people are in debt, and they can't protest against Citibank or refuse to make their credit card payments, so it's easier to complain about taxes. They've lived beyond their means for years, and now they have to choose either reel in their personal expenses, pay Citibank or pay Uncle Sam.
Out of those three choices they will: reel in personal expenses, pay Citibank, and pay Uncle Sam. To feel better about it: they go to the Tea Party to complain about the money they have to pay Uncle Sam.
What's ironic is most of these folks voted for Bush. Bush's Vice was Cheney. Cheney said "Deficits don't matter."
So where were these folks while their beloved leaders were doing the amazingly idiotic thing of reducing gov't revenue (by cutting taxes on the rich) while over-spending (not even counting Iraq and TARP, which was a Republican plan!). That's like if I quit my job and then bought a plasma television set! You an spend when your reducing revenue. This is why the GOP has been bad for America. And it's also why Fox News has suddenly become the network of libertarian crazies rather than just a solidly pro-Republican network.
It's funny how much more you're hearing "this isn't a partisan issue" now that the social conservatives had their asses served to them in the past TWO election cycles.
@gawkimo: I agree. There's much to be angry about. That's why I think these people are basically all talk. You're mad? Strike. That'll show 'em. Too timid to strike? Stop paying your credit cards--Tarp should have taken care of that shit anyway, and who the fuck wants to pay banks 20+% interest when they won't even lend your kid money to go to college? But if that's too much of a commitment, why don't you just cut that plastic up and send it to the banks. Those fuckers--who have effectively taken over the Federal government don't care about your little protest anyway, having effectively directed all your rage at the President. My sense is that these people wouldn't give up their credit cards for a day--this shit cost them absolutely nothing.
This would just be an amusing circus of profoundly uninformed people, who are being led around by the nose by professional prevaricators like Roger Aisles, Dick Armey and Ralph Reed's lobbying partner--to say nothing of their mindless stooge news anchors--suddenly defending free speech and dissent.
The hah-hah factor, however, is obliterated by the fact that I recently watched Shut Up and Sing the documentary that records the tar and feathering and ginned up bullshit outrage these same clowns--and their insipid, ignoramus followers--dredged out to blackmail, bully and even threaten the lives of some chick musicians who made the mistake of using their freedom of speech to express, um, dissent. Assholes.
How, with the unbelievable putrescent filth that FoxNews churns out like an hippo with diarrhea, can any of those people there look themselves in the mirror, let alone sleep at night. The sheer incredulity of it all is staggering.
@Airport_Whiskey: I was surprised to hear Olbermann once laud the cred of one of the Faux Noise Boise, I forget which. Grading on the curve. And they say some of the nazi guards showed real courtesy when the Allies took over the camps. As the Cockamamie Pope says of the nazis he's welcomed back into the fold, you gotta take the bad with the bad. Not a direct quote.
@Airport_Whiskey: Other than being very cleverly worded your blanket indictment of the entire Fox News network is ill placed and the same could be said about CNN, MSNBC, CBS and the NY Times.
How does Keith Olbermann look himself in the mirror when Janeane Garofalo claims that the tea-baggers and their cause is about racism and doesn't ask her a qualifying question? Like maybe, "What makes you say that, Janeane?"
How does Susan Roesgen actually attend a Tea Party in Chicago under the guise of covering it, find a single enraged protester, cuts him off and doesn't talk to any of the relatively sane (by protester standards) people in attendance?
How does Dan Rather look himself in the mirror when he decides to go forward with a story despite the fact that the it is backed by fraudulent documents and then asks the New York Times to sit on an unrelated story for a week so that he could spring it on the American people two nights before the 2004 election? Incidentally, how does this hack keep finding employment?
I agree that the ambushes have gone way to far. It was one thing when O'Reilly was ambushing judges who were letting child rapists off with three month sentences, but to stalk people because you don't agree with what they are saying is thuggery.
I try to watch all three cable news networks, because not a single one of them does their job properly. If we didn't have Fox News, I would have never heard about the Oil for Food Scandal. In fact, I wouldn't even know what the Tea Parties were about without Fox News. I would have been treated to a delightful variety of tea-bagging jokes (I'm not being facetious in my use of the word "delightful." It was kind of funny). The jokes were fine, but also cover the story. I have a group of idiotic friends that will sit around with me and make hysterical double entendre jokes. I need content in my news.
@Airport_Whiskey: The mere fact that it pisses you off so much. That you needed to spew self-righteous indignation about a company you don't work for or probably don't watch on tv - makes me laugh so fucking hard.
@ChillbearLatrigue: And where were all these Angry Tea Party people when Dick Cheney was talking about how Ronald Reagan proved that "DEFICITS DON'T MATTER" (direct quote).
Who did you vote for? Because I'm pretty sure I didn't vote for people who believe the Ronald Reagan proved that "deficits don't matter".
Also: Where are all these Angry White Conservatives when Bush was creating the largest deficits in history (including the largest expansion of "entitlements", the Medicare Drug Bill) and saying there are "jobs Americans won't do?" and then promoted and expanded legal foreign temporary workers?
After eight years of the shite leadership, suddenly Fox News is libertarian and talking about how this is a non-partisan issue?
BULL-SHIT. BULLSHIT! I call BULLSHIT. Nyah nyah nyah.
You, Mr. Social Conservative, OWN THIS PROBLEM. It's yours. You created it.
@ChillbearLatrigue: I don't watch the TV news programs, but my sense is that there is a qualitative difference between how Fox and all the others are managed.
If I had to describe the difference, I'd say that the other networks continually realize what they say on the air must be bounded by a world of fact, and that crossing that boundary will injure their reputations. Again, I say this not from watching the shows, but from working with professional journalists, who I tend to believe still make key decisions at those networks.
While my suspicion is that Fox lacks any such constraint or oversight, and that in fact their reputation depends on their coverage issuing from outside the world of fact. And my further suspicion is that this occurs because Fox News is run by people who did not succeed in other areas of journalism, or who declined ever to try it in the first place.
My opinion, once more, is all speculation based on nonprimary sources. But I do know something about how a professional journalistic enterprise is run, and what the final product looks like. That's what I'm going on.
@gawkimo: As I recall, that story was broken by Fox News. Smug bastard.
@skahammer: You realize it's kind of hard for me to argue your opinions that you've based on here say, but for now I will try. If the other networks have such a superior set of journalistic standards, how do you account for my examples?
Let's put reputations aside and talk about the lives of human beings. Do you recall when Newsweek reported on the Koran abuse at Guantanamo in 2005? They retracted their story a week later, but not until 11 people had died in riots. I consider Newsweek to be a fairly mainstream magazine although not a very good one. This is the kind of things that happen all of the time with non-Fox News outlets, but I only see the criticism pointed at that channel.
In the past week, I watched a bunch of news network shows ridicule the tea-baggers (sorry, I can't stop saying it either). They would follow it up with a discussion with some talking head who would generally say that the group doesn't stand for anything. Well, that is not journalism. It's entertainment. It would take someone asking a few intelligent questions to get to the meaning behind the Tea Party movement. When you cover a war protest it's pretty apparent on the surface why the protestors are there. The same applies to a Pro Life rally or a Gay Rights march.
The Tea Party movement (which I am not part of), wants to stem the expansion of government that is occurring through debt or proposed taxation. I pretty much summed it up in one sentence, but that is more than what I received in a week from the other cable networks.
Seriously, though, how can you form an opinion on something that you're not watching? You should at least glance over a few of the shows if for no other reason than to be informed. You can skip Beck.
@ChillbearLatrigue: "As I recall, that story was broken by Fox News. Smug bastard."
Actually, it was an Iraqi newspaper that first published a list of corrupt beneficiaries to the program. Then the Christian Science Monitor published a report that led to a libel suit from Britain's Galloway.
This happened before Fox news took the story and turned into a anti-Clinton tirade.
And this isn't just something "I recall" -- it's something that comes from the fact-based community of smug bastards who read instead of sit in front of the teevee being spoon-fed opinions and bullshit.
@ChillbearLatrigue: Ah, I knew all about the Oil for Food scandal, if you mean Iraq and not Texas. And I didn't learn of it from Faux Noise, for certain. Are you saying they, and only they, broke the story?
Other than mudslinging and character assassination, what other great news have they produced for you?
@Tremonius: Well, I'm watching Chris Matthews interview Michael Hayden about the enhanced interrogation memoes as we speak and I'm finding it quite illuminating.
What I am saying is that they were the first large news organization in this country to actually cover Oil for Food.
07/05/09
07/05/09
07/05/09
07/05/09
07/06/09
07/06/09
07/06/09
05/20/09
05/20/09
05/20/09
05/20/09
05/20/09
05/20/09
04/23/09
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04/19/09
[thinkprogress.org]
04/20/09
What confuses me is that Obama is lowering taxes and even the top tax rate is being raised to a level that was lower than under Reagan.
What's happening here is a lot of people are in debt, and they can't protest against Citibank or refuse to make their credit card payments, so it's easier to complain about taxes. They've lived beyond their means for years, and now they have to choose either reel in their personal expenses, pay Citibank or pay Uncle Sam.
Out of those three choices they will: reel in personal expenses, pay Citibank, and pay Uncle Sam. To feel better about it: they go to the Tea Party to complain about the money they have to pay Uncle Sam.
What's ironic is most of these folks voted for Bush. Bush's Vice was Cheney. Cheney said "Deficits don't matter."
So where were these folks while their beloved leaders were doing the amazingly idiotic thing of reducing gov't revenue (by cutting taxes on the rich) while over-spending (not even counting Iraq and TARP, which was a Republican plan!). That's like if I quit my job and then bought a plasma television set! You an spend when your reducing revenue. This is why the GOP has been bad for America. And it's also why Fox News has suddenly become the network of libertarian crazies rather than just a solidly pro-Republican network.
It's funny how much more you're hearing "this isn't a partisan issue" now that the social conservatives had their asses served to them in the past TWO election cycles.
04/20/09
04/19/09
The hah-hah factor, however, is obliterated by the fact that I recently watched Shut Up and Sing the documentary that records the tar and feathering and ginned up bullshit outrage these same clowns--and their insipid, ignoramus followers--dredged out to blackmail, bully and even threaten the lives of some chick musicians who made the mistake of using their freedom of speech to express, um, dissent. Assholes.
04/19/09
04/19/09
04/19/09
04/19/09
04/19/09
04/19/09
How does Keith Olbermann look himself in the mirror when Janeane Garofalo claims that the tea-baggers and their cause is about racism and doesn't ask her a qualifying question? Like maybe, "What makes you say that, Janeane?"
How does Susan Roesgen actually attend a Tea Party in Chicago under the guise of covering it, find a single enraged protester, cuts him off and doesn't talk to any of the relatively sane (by protester standards) people in attendance?
How does Dan Rather look himself in the mirror when he decides to go forward with a story despite the fact that the it is backed by fraudulent documents and then asks the New York Times to sit on an unrelated story for a week so that he could spring it on the American people two nights before the 2004 election? Incidentally, how does this hack keep finding employment?
I agree that the ambushes have gone way to far. It was one thing when O'Reilly was ambushing judges who were letting child rapists off with three month sentences, but to stalk people because you don't agree with what they are saying is thuggery.
I try to watch all three cable news networks, because not a single one of them does their job properly. If we didn't have Fox News, I would have never heard about the Oil for Food Scandal. In fact, I wouldn't even know what the Tea Parties were about without Fox News. I would have been treated to a delightful variety of tea-bagging jokes (I'm not being facetious in my use of the word "delightful." It was kind of funny). The jokes were fine, but also cover the story. I have a group of idiotic friends that will sit around with me and make hysterical double entendre jokes. I need content in my news.
04/19/09
04/19/09
04/19/09
@ChillbearLatrigue: Why watch any cable news when print journalism does it all much better?
04/19/09
04/19/09
Is that because you don't READ? Because I read about it! But I guess pointing that out makes me "smug".
04/19/09
Who did you vote for? Because I'm pretty sure I didn't vote for people who believe the Ronald Reagan proved that "deficits don't matter".
Also: Where are all these Angry White Conservatives when Bush was creating the largest deficits in history (including the largest expansion of "entitlements", the Medicare Drug Bill) and saying there are "jobs Americans won't do?" and then promoted and expanded legal foreign temporary workers?
After eight years of the shite leadership, suddenly Fox News is libertarian and talking about how this is a non-partisan issue?
BULL-SHIT. BULLSHIT! I call BULLSHIT. Nyah nyah nyah.
You, Mr. Social Conservative, OWN THIS PROBLEM. It's yours. You created it.
04/19/09
If I had to describe the difference, I'd say that the other networks continually realize what they say on the air must be bounded by a world of fact, and that crossing that boundary will injure their reputations. Again, I say this not from watching the shows, but from working with professional journalists, who I tend to believe still make key decisions at those networks.
While my suspicion is that Fox lacks any such constraint or oversight, and that in fact their reputation depends on their coverage issuing from outside the world of fact. And my further suspicion is that this occurs because Fox News is run by people who did not succeed in other areas of journalism, or who declined ever to try it in the first place.
My opinion, once more, is all speculation based on nonprimary sources. But I do know something about how a professional journalistic enterprise is run, and what the final product looks like. That's what I'm going on.
04/19/09
@gawkimo: As I recall, that story was broken by Fox News. Smug bastard.
@skahammer: You realize it's kind of hard for me to argue your opinions that you've based on here say, but for now I will try. If the other networks have such a superior set of journalistic standards, how do you account for my examples?
Let's put reputations aside and talk about the lives of human beings. Do you recall when Newsweek reported on the Koran abuse at Guantanamo in 2005? They retracted their story a week later, but not until 11 people had died in riots. I consider Newsweek to be a fairly mainstream magazine although not a very good one. This is the kind of things that happen all of the time with non-Fox News outlets, but I only see the criticism pointed at that channel.
In the past week, I watched a bunch of news network shows ridicule the tea-baggers (sorry, I can't stop saying it either). They would follow it up with a discussion with some talking head who would generally say that the group doesn't stand for anything. Well, that is not journalism. It's entertainment. It would take someone asking a few intelligent questions to get to the meaning behind the Tea Party movement. When you cover a war protest it's pretty apparent on the surface why the protestors are there. The same applies to a Pro Life rally or a Gay Rights march.
The Tea Party movement (which I am not part of), wants to stem the expansion of government that is occurring through debt or proposed taxation. I pretty much summed it up in one sentence, but that is more than what I received in a week from the other cable networks.
Seriously, though, how can you form an opinion on something that you're not watching? You should at least glance over a few of the shows if for no other reason than to be informed. You can skip Beck.
04/19/09
Actually, it was an Iraqi newspaper that first published a list of corrupt beneficiaries to the program. Then the Christian Science Monitor published a report that led to a libel suit from Britain's Galloway.
This happened before Fox news took the story and turned into a anti-Clinton tirade.
And this isn't just something "I recall" -- it's something that comes from the fact-based community of smug bastards who read instead of sit in front of the teevee being spoon-fed opinions and bullshit.
04/19/09
Other than mudslinging and character assassination, what other great news have they produced for you?
04/19/09
I like the logic, though. It's fun. Nothing is real. It only exists because we imagine it does. So it's real. And lots happened back before time was.
I'm still working on how them Thetans kept appointments before time was ...
04/19/09
What I am saying is that they were the first large news organization in this country to actually cover Oil for Food.
04/20/09