From WaPo: Administration Rejects Ruling On PR Videos GAO Called Tapes Illegal Propaganda By Christopher Lee Washington Post Staff WriterTuesday, March 15, 2005; Page A21 The Bush administration, rejecting an opinion from the Government Accountability Office, said last week that it is legal for federal agencies to feed TV stations prepackaged news stories that do not disclose the government’s role … Read More
How To Write Like Conservatives
From the Tufts Daily (which I used write for): How to write like conservatives by Steven Ward In honor of Ann Coulter’s visit to Tufts last night, here are some helpful hints for all of you aspiring right-wing pundits out there. Follow these carefully, and soon you too could be a syndicated columnist dumbing down political discourse in the pages … Read More
Fake News
From the NYT: "Under the Bush administration, the federal government has aggressively used a well-established tool of public relations: the prepackaged, ready-to-serve news report that major corporations have long distributed to TV stations to pitch everything from headache remedies to auto insurance. In all, at least 20 federal agencies, including the Defense Department and the Census Bureau, have made and … Read More
The Bankruptcy Bill
Let’s start with a story ripped from today’s headlines: In Cleveland, for example, a municipal court judge tossed out a case that Discover Bank brought against one of its cardholders after closely examining the woman’s credit card bill. According to court papers, Ruth M. Owens, a 53-year-old disabled woman, paid the company $3,492 over six years on a $1,963 debt … Read More
Gods and Democrats
Reprinted from The American Street (PZ Myers): Amy Sullivan has a pet peeve: “the seemingly reckless way in which terms like ‘values’ and ‘religion’ and ‘morals’ are being tossed about in the press.” She’s an outspoken liberal Christian, and I’m an outspoken liberal atheist, and I have to say that I agree completely. I also somewhat agree with this comment, … Read More
Top Twenty Worst Americans
Several blogs were surveyed and asked to list, in order, the twenty worst figures in American history. Here are the results for right-winger bloggers, as tallied here: Honorable Mentions: Ted Bundy (5), Jane Fonda (5), John Wayne Gacy (5), John Walker Lindh (5), Joe McCarthy (5), Michael Moore (5), Boss Tweed (5) 17) Franklin Delano Roosevelt (6)17) John Walker (6)17) … Read More
Should Democrats Embrace Intolerance?
Hell, no, says Digby. He quotes from an interview of David "Mudcat" Saunders which says: Saunders, who has worked on the campaigns of Mark Warner, John Edwards, and Bob Graham, thinks that if Democrats ease up on the culture stuff they can win in the South: "We’ve got an affection for big guns and fast cars. It’s a macho thing. … Read More
Uncle Bucky Cashes In
From the LA Times: The Iraq war helped bring record earnings to St. Louis-based defense contractor Engineered Support Systems Inc., and new financial data show that the firm’s war-related profits have trickled down to a familiar family name — Bush. William H.T. "Bucky" Bush, uncle of the president and youngest brother of former President George H.W. Bush, cashed in ESSI … Read More
More on the F-word
A little over a week ago, I wrote a post about the F-word ("fascism") being used to describe the Bush Administration by a prominent conservative magazine. Was it just mudflinging . . . or is there something to the notion that we are heading into a fascist era? This flash animation makes a compelling argument that we are indeed seeing … Read More
From the Producers of “The Swift Boat Veterans for *cough* Truth *cough*”…
… comes the latest in surreal conservative propaganda. And it is a doosy. AARP: Anti-military. Pro Gay. Therefore, we should privatize social security. This is a copy of the the ad being run by USANext, the conservative alternative to AARP (when you click the actual ad, you are taken to USANext‘s home page). There’s no article or argument as to … Read More
Bush’s “Schtick”
Gotta love it. From the NY Times article on the newly-discovered Bush tapes: He refused to answer reporters’ questions about his past behavior, he said, even though it might cost him the election. Defending his approach, Mr. Bush said: "I wouldn’t answer the marijuana questions. You know why? Because I don’t want some little kid doing what I tried." Isn’t … Read More
Hypocrisy of the Right – Part III
From the comments at Body and Soul via Sisyphus Shrugged: See, me, I’m fine with his being gay. Hell, I’m fine with him being a prostitute, if that’s what he needs to do to live. What I want to see, and what thankfully I am seeing, is all of the right-wing pundits roaring anathema on left-wing blogs because by not … Read More
Hypocrisy of the Right – Part II
Eason Jordon believed that U.S. soldiers were targetting journalists. Ann "It’s Time for the New McCarthyism" Coulter wants U.S. soldiers to target journalists. Eason Jordon’s statement is made in a closed-door symposium with relatively few listeners. He retracts it almost immediately. Ann Coulter’s statement was made on national television to untold millions of listeners. She never retracts it. Eason Jordon … Read More
Camilla Banned From White House
CAMILLA BANNED FROM WHITE HOUSE George Bush has banned Camilla Parker Bowles from the White House – because she is a divorcee. The unprecedented snub has effectively sabotaged Charles’s plan to take his bride on a Royal tour of America later this year. (Source) A divorcee? Never! A gay hooker, on the other hand . . .
Democracy in Action
You know things are bad when election disputes have to be resolved by — literally — a coin toss. And you know things are really bad when they apparently can’t even do a coin toss correctly.