Tag Archives: politics

Scarborough: ‘I Blame Sarah Palin’ For O’Donnell Win

Posted on September 15, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Joe Scarborough believes Christine O’Donnell’s win has cost Republicans the Delaware Senate seat and their best shot at a Senate majority.  And the Morning Joe host made no bones about singling out the person he considers responsible: “I blame Sarah Palin,” said Scarborough bluntly on today’s show. Scarborough’s comment came not long after Morning Joe aired a clip of Karl Rove’s scalding comments about O’Donnell, which I noted here last night, in which among other things the former Bush adviser declared that O’Donnell “doesn’t evince the characteristics of rectitude and truthfulness and sincerity and character that voters are looking for.” Said Scarborough: “I agree with Karl Rove.” JOE SCARBOROUGH: I remember learning that Mike Castle was going to run for Senator. I was very excited about it because I understood that if the Republican party were to be a national party, the Republican party would need to win states like Delaware.  And Mike Castle would give Republicans the best chance to win that Senate seat in a long, long–in decades.  That opportunity’s gone now, and I just wonder: does the Republican party have what it takes to be a national party again? A bit later came the airing of Rove’s scalding comments to Sean Hannity last night about O’Donnell, which notably came after the race had been called in her favor. SCARBOROUGH: I haven’t said this in awhile: I agree with Karl Rove . I mean, I agree with him. And, finally came this from Scarborough, speaking to Pat Buchanan [who by the way mentioned he sat up in bed and let out a whoop last night when he heard O’Donnell won] . . . SCARBOROUGH: I blame—and I’ll just say it: I blame Sarah Palin for last night.  I blame Sarah Palin. If Republicans do not win this Senate seat, it’s Sarah Palin, it falls on Sarah Palin’s shoulders. You were talking about how this helps Sarah Palin and other people do. Guess what?  If we’re one, if we as a Republican party are one vote short of a majority in 2012, I will come on the next morning—in 2010— I’ll come on the next morning and say it’s all Sarah Palin’s fault. She decided to do the reckless political thing and select somebody she knew couldn’t win in Delaware.

Read more:
Scarborough: ‘I Blame Sarah Palin’ For O’Donnell Win

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Washington Post’s Ruth Marcus ‘Despondent’ Over Castle’s Defeat and O’Donnell’s ‘Scary’ Win

Posted on September 14, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus raced to her keyboard on Tuesday night to express her upset with the result of the Republican Senate primary in Delaware. In “ Why Christine O’Donnell’s victory is scary ,” posted at 10:15 PM EDT on the paper’s “ PostPartisan” blog for its opinion writers, she seemed more scared by Mike Castle’s defeat than by Christine O’Donnell’s win. While Democrats may be “delighted” by the prospect of facing O’Donnell, Marcus declared: “I’m despondent.” But not, of course, because it means the Democratic candidate will beat O’Donnell. No, the Post’s deputy national editor from 1999 to 2002 ( bio ) is “despondent” because it ends her dream of “a more robust cadre of moderate Republicans” in the Senate and the “ripple effect” means incumbent Republicans “will be that much more watchful of protecting their right flank,” which will cause them to “be that much less likely to take a political risk in the direction of bipartisanship.” Horrors. Indeed, Marcus feared “a bolstered Jim DeMint caucus, following the disturbingly powerful junior senator from South Carolina : Sharron Angle (Nev.), Rand Paul (Ky.), Ken Buck (Colo.) — plus the two other incumbent-slayers of the primary season, Mike Lee in Utah and in Joe Miller in Alaska. Scary. ” An excerpt from her post: Partisan Democrats are delighted about Christine O’Donnell’s Republican primary victory over Rep. Mike Castle in the race for the open Delaware Senate seat. I’m despondent. From the Democratic point of view, the defeat of the moderate, well-known Castle turns what had looked to be a lost cause into a likely win….So the folks who focus on electing Democrats and keeping a Democratic majority can’t be blamed for breaking out the champagne over O’Donnell’s win. Not me, for two reasons. First, I had thought the silver lining of this election year might be to produce a Senate with a more robust cadre of moderate Republicans. That caucus has pretty much dwindled to the two senators from Maine, with very occasional company from colleagues such as Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown and departing Ohio Sen. George Voinovich. It’s awfully hard for a caucus of two to break with the party…. There is strength in numbers, and you could imagine a bolstered group of (at least relative) moderates made up of the likes of Castle, Carly Fiorina (Calif.), Mark Kirk (Ill.) or Dino Rossi (Wash.) Now, it’s as plausible to envision a bolstered Jim DeMint caucus, following the disturbingly powerful junior senator from South Carolina: Sharron Angle (Nev.), Rand Paul (Ky.), Ken Buck (Colo.) — plus the two other incumbent-slayers of the primary season, Mike Lee in Utah and in Joe Miller in Alaska. Scary. But not as scary as reason number two: the ripple effect of victories such as O’Donnell’s on other Republican lawmakers. Republican members of Congress look at races such as those in Utah, Alaska and now Delaware and think: There but for the grace of the Tea Party go I. They will be that much more watchful of protecting their right flank against a primary challenge. They will be that much less likely to take a political risk in the direction of bipartisanship….

Read more here:
Washington Post’s Ruth Marcus ‘Despondent’ Over Castle’s Defeat and O’Donnell’s ‘Scary’ Win

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , ,

AP, Crutsinger Publish Three Clear Falsehoods in August Report on Deficit

Posted on September 14, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

I tried to find a nicer way to put it in the headline. But I can’t. At the Associated Press, Economics Writer Martin Crutsinger’s apparent plug-and-play report less than an hour after the issuance of Uncle Sam’s August Monthly Treasury Statement on Monday (his item is time-stamped at 2:56 p.m., which follows the Treasury Department’s 2:00 p.m. release by less than an hour) contains three obviously false statements that a news organization which really subscribes to its own ” Statement of News Values and Principles ” would retract and/or correct. The specific AP standard in question is whether it has violated its promise not to “knowingly introduce false information into material intended for publication or broadcast.” The only conceivable excuse at this point is that Crutsinger and his employer don’t realize what they have done. The three falsehoods involved are not arcane or open to interpretation. Rather, they are significant obvious, irrefutable, and in need of correction. What follows are the three statements, the first of which contradicts itself in the report’s own subsequent sentence: 1. ” Deficits of $1 trillion in a single year had never happened until two years ago. The $1.4 trillion deficit in 2009 was more than three times the size of the previous record-holder, a $454.8 billion deficit recorded in 2008.” The fiscal year that ended on September 30, 2008 was “two years ago.” The reported deficit that year was $454.8 billion, as reported. $454.8 billion is less than $1 trillion. There was not a $1 trillion deficit “two years ago.” 2009 was one year ago. That’s the year the deficit first topped $1 trillion for the first time. There is no way to twist the meaning of the bolded statement above to make it true, because it’s false. Is this breathtaking carelessness, or an indicator that AP is bent on assigning any and all economic blame to the previous administration? 2. “Through August, government revenues totaled $1.92 trillion, 1.6 percent higher than a year ago, reflecting small increases in government tax collections compared to 2009. ” Tax collections have not increased, as shown in the following graphics: The first graphic comes from Page 2 of the Monthly Treasury Statement, and identifies the major sources of federal receipts. The second contains the August 2010 detail of “Miscellaneous Receipts” obtained from “Page 5(2)” of this year’s Statement, and compares it to the related year-to-date detail found in the August 2009 Monthly Treasury Statement (there is a $235 million difference between the two reported “Miscellaneous Receipts” amounts that is not relevant to this post). The third boils things down, and proves that tax collections have declined. Even if one dubiously considers every line except “Deposits of Earning by Federal Reserve” to be “taxes,” those Federal Reserve Deposits are not. Don’t take my word for it. Here is how the Congressional Budget Office described these deposits in its Monthly Budget Review last week: In case the AP and Martin Crutsinger need to be reminded: “Profits” are not “taxes.” Thus, as seen in the final graphic above, deposits from the Fed must be excluded when comparing year-over-year tax collections. When one does that, the result is that tax collections are down from a year ago by over $9.5 billion, or about 0.5%. Crutsinger’s statement that the overall increase in federal receipts “reflect(s) small increases in government tax collections compared to 2009″ is false. 3. ” Spending has totaled $3.18 trillion, down 2.5 percent from the same period a year ago.” Yes, reported “outlays” — a contrived term the government uses as a proxy for “spending” (but is not the same thing) — are down. But Crutsinger wrote that “spending” is down. The definition of “spending,” taken from the word ” spend ,” involves “pay(ing) out, disburs(ing), or expend(ing) funds.” As described back in April (at NewsBusters ; at BizzyBlog ) after it occurred in March, Uncle Sam’s reported “outlays” were reduced by means of a $115 billion non-cash entry to reflect the government’s revised estimate that it will ultimately lose less on its Troubled Asset Relief Program “investments” than originally thought. This entry did not involve “spending,” nor did the extra identical amount incorrectly added to “outlays” last year. As I wrote in April: In essence what happened is that the administration pushed as much “bad news” (asset writedowns) as it could into last year’s (i.e., fiscal 2009’s) financial reporting, since last year was going to be a disaster no matter what. But since they overdid it with the writedowns last year (”Gosh, how did that happen?”), they can make this year (fiscal 2010) look better than it really has been. Good old Martin played along by calling it “dramatic.” As noted, Crutsinger and AP should know about this $115 billion item. After all, the AP reporter discussed it in his April report on the March Monthly Treasury Statement. After appropriately adjusting for the non-cash item, “spending” (the word Crutsinger chose to use) has not totaled $3.18 trillion; it has really been $3.29 trillion. Last year’s “spending” wasn’t the $3.26 trillion shown in Table 3 of August 2010’s Monthly Treasury Statement; it was $3.15 trillion. “Spending” is not “down 2.5 percent from the same period a year ago,” as the AP reporter claimed. “Spending” is up by $.14 trillion ($3.29 tril – $3.15 tril). That’s a 4.4% increase ($.14 tril divided by $3.15 tril). Since “spending” means what the dictionary says it means, Crutsinger’s statement about federal “spending” is false. As seen in the graphic at this link , which shows Monthly Treasury Statement data comparing 2010 and 2009 spending in all major functional areas, spending is up in the large majority of them. The following is supposed to represent what the Associated Press does when it commits errors of fact in its reporting: CORRECTIONS/CORRECTIVES: Staffers must notify supervisory editors as soon as possible of errors or potential errors, whether in their work or that of a colleague. Every effort should be made to contact the staffer and his or her supervisor before a correction is moved. When we’re wrong, we must say so as soon as possible. When we make a correction in the current cycle, we point out the error and its fix in the editor’s note. A correction must always be labeled a correction in the editor’s note. We do not use euphemisms such as “recasts,” “fixes,” “clarifies” or “changes” when correcting a factual error. A corrective corrects a mistake from a previous cycle. The AP asks papers or broadcasters that used the erroneous information to use the corrective, too. For corrections on live, online stories, we overwrite the previous version. We send separate corrective stories online as warranted. The three demonstrably false statements described here have misled and will continue to mislead readers and other news consumers into erroneously believing that trillion-dollar deficits go back to 2008; that fiscal year-to-date tax collections are greater than last year; and that federal “spending” in 2010 is down from 2009. AP has “introduced false information into material intended for publication or broadcast” — something it says it won’t “knowingly” do. Your move, guys and gals. You know what you should do. Will you do it? If you choose to do nothing, could you guys at least spare us the sanctimony and remove your “Statement of News Values and Principles” web page? Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com .

More:
AP, Crutsinger Publish Three Clear Falsehoods in August Report on Deficit

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

CBS Analyst Marks 9/11 By Hoping For ‘Backlash’ Against Ground Zero Mosque Opponents

Posted on September 14, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

On the September 11th Saturday Early Show, CBS News Middle East analyst Reza Aslan slammed opponents of the Ground Zero mosque as having “unapologetically politicized” 9/11 and being part of a “whole wave of anti-Muslim sentiment.” While he denounced others for trying to “take advantage of this symbol for their own political purposes,” Aslan made his comments only seconds after live coverage of the first moment of silence for victims of the 2001 terrorist attacks. Co-host Chris Wragge accepted Aslan’s characterization of the controversy and responded: “…this is not an opportunity to add controversy into the mix. If there’s one day, you know what, to keep our mouths quiet and let’s just reflect on the lives lost, today is it, you don’t mess with that.” Aslan followed up by admitting: “I’ll be honest with you, I hope that there is kind of a backlash against what’s going on right now. As you know, at 1pm today there’ll be a rally in support of the so-called Park 51 project, at 3pm there’ll be this international rally against it. So, I’m hoping that Americans all over the country see these images and think we’ve gone too far.” He later specifically condemned mosque opponents: “…particularly in the case of this sort of international anti-Islam rally that’s being brought by this group called Stop Islamization of America. And they’re inviting all these European anti-Muslim politicians in to speak. I mean, that’s really now taking this to a whole other level.”    Wragge also brought up Florida Pastor Terry Jones’s initial plans to burn the Koran on Saturday which were later cancelled: “It just seems as though we’re kind of, I don’t know, exacerbating some negative stereotypes that exist out there. I mean, can Muslims look at what’s going on here and say we can take – we can maybe hopefully take a positive away from this at some point?” Aslan replied: “I think Muslims in the United States can….Now, if you’re in Egypt or Syria, you don’t see that part. As far as you’re concerned, this isn’t about a crazy pastor, this is about America and anti-Islam fervor in the United States.” At the top of the broadcast, Wragge interviewed Dr. Zuhdi Jassar, a Muslim scholar opposed to the Ground Zero mosque. Jasser proposed a very different course of action from Aslan: “…it’s time for Muslims to look less about promoting ourselves, less about victimology, and more about feeling the pain of the families of 9/11 and understanding what we have to do to repair the house of Islam.” Wragge still attempted to mischaracterize mosque opposition: “Do you feel that – that since 9/11 America has become Islamophobic, so to speak?” Jasser replied: “I have to tell you absolutely not. I do think that we’re becoming – we’re getting a crash course on Islam and I we think we Muslims have to do more work to separate spiritual Islam of the faith that we love from political Islam that creates the Nidal Hasans, the Faisal Shahzads and has a continuum from moderate to radical…. It’s a fight within the house of Islam that we need to focus in and not just focus on victimology.” Here is a full transcript of Aslan’s rant: 8:46AM SEGMENT: CHRIS WRAGGE: You’re looking at live pictures of Ground Zero. Nine years ago today, American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center right there. Every year on September 11th at this time we pause to reflect those who lost their lives at Ground Zero, this is the first of four moments of silence. The next will be at 9:03, when the second tower was struck and then again, the two later moments of silence will correspond with the times that the towers fell. Reza Aslan is with us right now, our Middle East expert here at CBS, to talk a bit about the way the world has changed here the last nine years with what’s been going on, especially here the last few weeks, with this controversy of the Islamic center downtown. And let’s begin with that. Your thoughts on what’s transpired and how now, you know, with this Pastor Jones, how it’s really kind of taken on a life of its own here. REZA ASLAN: Well, I think the thing that’s most surprising to a lot of Americans is the way in which 9/11, and particularly Ground Zero, has become so unapologetically politicized in a way that, I think, is surprising to a lot of Americans. That would have been surprising even a year ago. Now, what is the cause for that? Some might say that the Islamic community center, you know, sparked this whole wave of anti-Muslim sentiment but I think maybe we’re far enough away, nine years now, where people do feel like they can take advantage of this symbol for their own political purposes. WRAGGE: You think, though, that’s a big chance to take? Because the one thing that I’m hearing, especially talking from a lot of people not only down in the area, living here in the city, but also family members that say, you know, this is a day of remembrance, reflection, this is a day that changed the world as we know it now, this is not an opportunity to add controversy into the mix. If there’s one day, you know what, to keep our mouths quiet and let’s just reflect on the lives lost, today is it, you don’t mess with that.   ASLAN: And you know I’ll be honest with you, I hope that there is kind of a backlash against what’s going on right now. As you know, at 1pm today there’ll be a rally in support of the so-called Park 51 project, at 3pm there’ll be this international rally against it. So, I’m hoping that Americans all over the country see these images and think we’ve gone too far. This is just too far now. No matter where you fit on this controversy. REBECCA JARVIS: And what’s the end game, then? ASLAN: Well, I think, you know, people are just going to continue to use this to fuel their own political or economic, you know, ideologies, as it is. And I do believe that Mayor Bloomberg said something very interesting. He said that by this time next year, we’ll have the memorial finished. And I do think that once that’s done, then there will no longer be this void, this vacuum, this space that can be filled up with other people’s notions and other people’s ideas. Let’s hope so, anyway. WRAGGE: Today, with these protests that will be going on, those in support, those that are not in favor of this Islamic center downtown at 51 Park, do you think it takes away from what we’re really supposed to be focusing our attention on here? ASLAN: Most definitely. And, you know, particularly in the case of this sort of international anti-Islam rally that’s being brought by this group called Stop Islamization of America. And they’re inviting all these European anti-Muslim politicians in to speak. I mean, that’s really now taking this to a whole other level. The point of this is remembrance, mourning, if anything, we should be coming together as different religions and different ethnicities. JARVIS: I- WRAGGE: I’m sorry. It just seems as though we’re kind of, I don’t know, exacerbating some negative stereotypes that exist out there. I mean, can Muslims look at what’s going on here and say we can take – we can maybe hopefully take a positive away from this at some point? ASLAN: I think Muslims in the United States can. In fact, one of the things that’s most remarkable about this stunt with the Koran burning in Florida, is the enormous response of Muslim, Jewish, and Christian leaders that have come together and really wanted to use this as a way of promoting interfaith cooperation. Now, if you’re in Egypt or Syria, you don’t see that part. As far as you’re concerned, this isn’t about a crazy pastor, this is about America and anti-Islam fervor in the United States. That’s a real problem, we’re engaged in two wars. JARVIS: Reza, thank you. We appreciate you being with us and we will be right back. Here is a full transcript of Wragge’s interview with Jasser: 7:06AM ET SEGMENT: CHRIS WRAGGE: One Muslim scholar is sharply critical of the planned Islamic Community Center and prayer room near Ground Zero. Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser is president of the Islamic Forum for Democracy in Phoenix. Dr. Jasser, thank you for joining us this morning. We appreciate it. ZUHDI JASSER [PRESIDENT, AMERICAN ISLAMIC FORUM FOR DEMOCRACY]: Thanks for having me. It’s a pleasure. WRAGGE: Let me ask you if you heard a second ago, in Elaine Quijano’s piece, there are two competing rallies at Ground Zero today adding controversy to this – this sacred day. How do you feel that this situation can be calmed, if at all? [ON-SCREEN HEADLINE: Ground Zero Divided; Rallies Planned For And Against Islamic Center] JASSER: Yeah, I think today is – especially a day as we remember and reflect upon 9/11 and –  and looking over that pit of devastation there and feeling that – and today, we look through that lens as Americans, not as a Muslim, not as of any faith. I – I don’t look through this lens of trying to repair my – trying to promote Islam. It’s about fighting the forces that caused this. And I think if we’re able to unite under that. That’s why 71% of Americans are against this. It’s not because they don’t want mosques there, there’s even other mosques closer. Many of us have built over 2,000 mosques in the United States with very little problem. And – but I think what unites us is the freedoms and liberties that our Constitution gives us and it’s time for Muslims to look less about promoting ourselves, less about victimology, and more about feeling the pain of the families of 9/11 and understanding what we have to do to repair the house of Islam. WRAGGE: You’re a Muslim. You’ve seen this controversy. Do you feel that – that since 9/11 America has become Islamophobic, so to speak? JASSER: I have to tell you absolutely not. I do think that we’re becoming – we’re getting a crash course on Islam and I we think we Muslims have to do more work to separate spiritual Islam of the faith that we love from political Islam that creates the Nidal Hasans, the Faisal Shahzads and has a continuum from moderate to radical. That’s what we have to do to separate them. And there’s some confusion there, understandably, because it’s not a binary equation of good Muslim non-violent, bad Muslim violent. There’s a continuum that’s confusing. But that is some part of the educational process, part of the war of ideas that we have to fight within. This isn’t a fight between Islam and Christianity or Islam and the West. It’s a fight within the house of Islam that we need to focus in and not just focus on victimology. WRAGGE: Can I ask you your – your thoughts on why there was such a visceral reaction to – to Pastor Jones? JASSER: Well, because, book burning has never been anything that’s been followed by anything good in history. Book burning is something that is clearly against the Constitution and the First Amendment and shows a complete disrespect and he’s a speck of humanity of just thirty congregants and doesn’t represent America. But yet, he feeds into the Islamist narrative overseas, across the world, that America is against Islam, America is against Muslims. So he used it to have his fifteen minutes of fame- WRAGGE: Yeah. JASSER: -and it fed into that narrative. WRAGGE: Alright. Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, thank you very much for taking the time. We appreciate it. JASSER: Thank you for having me. WRAGGE: Alright.

See the original post here:
CBS Analyst Marks 9/11 By Hoping For ‘Backlash’ Against Ground Zero Mosque Opponents

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Open Thread: Krauthammer: Palin, DeMint Endorsements ‘Disruptive and Capricious’

Posted on September 14, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Both conservative stalwarts have endorsed Christine O’Donnell in her Senate primary battle against centrist Republican Mike Castle. The primary is tonight. Where do you come down on this issue? Is Krauthammer right about the Buckley strategy in general? Does it apply to this scenario? Also, make sure you weigh in at the NB poll on the topic.

View original post here:
Open Thread: Krauthammer: Palin, DeMint Endorsements ‘Disruptive and Capricious’

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , ,

The NY Times Splashes in the Shallow End with Meghan McCain, Brave Republican Rebel, Ugg Boot Wearer

Posted on September 14, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Meghan McCain got star treatment on the front of the Sunday Styles section hyping “Dirty Sexy Politics,” her thin little account of her father’s 2008 presidential campaign. Frequent Times contributor Liesl Schillinger’s 2,600-word profile (” The Rebel “) of the 25-year-old daughter of Sen. John McCain  reads like a parody at times, so over-the-top is the praise for what sounds like an incredibly shallow read. Of course, McCain is the Times’s favorite kind of Republican, a surprisingly uninformed “progressive” whose arguments won’t convince anyone except shilling Schillingers. On a sweltering 109-degree August day, driving past election signs (John McCain, J. D. Hayworth, Ben Quayle) and cacti (saguaro), I pulled into a roadside mini-mall, hoping it was the right one. Entering a barnlike Mexican restaurant called Blanco, I scanned the bright blue banquettes for Meghan McCain. Ms. McCain, the 25-year-old politics and pop-culture columnist for The Daily Beast and daughter of Senator John McCain, is also the author of the just-published “Dirty Sexy Politics,” a frank, dishy and often scathing chronicle of her experiences during the 2008 presidential campaign. Her book is not only a front-row view of one of the most historic elections in recent American history, it is, as she told George Stephanopoulos on “Good Morning America,” a “coming-of-age story.” It’s hard to see the point of this paragraph: …in a corner booth, I at last spotted a fresh-faced woman with straight unfoofy hair and next to no makeup. Dressed in a black T-shirt with an eagle on it, cutoffs and black flip-flops with crystal peace-sign charms (from a friend’s boutique), she resembled the sunny girls I used to drive to lunch with in high school in Oklahoma (where we, too, had wide-open spaces and abundant Mexican restaurant options at our disposal). Some of the puffery come off as ridiculous: But I figured that, after three years as a highly visible blogger, writer, Twitter user (she has 86,000 followers) and speaker on college campuses, Ms. McCain had learned to control how she comes across. …. Her own book would make as gripping a read for vacationers on South Padre Island as it would for students at midterms or for politicos on the eve of midterm elections. But “Dirty Sexy Politics” is no young-adult memoir; it’s a strongly-worded political platform from which Ms. McCain attacks today’s moribund, inflexible Republican Party (“all the old dudes,” is one way she puts it) and clamors for change. We eventually get a hint why the Times is promoting McCain and her book so avidly: Throughout the book, she lays out her vision of a moderate, inclusive Republican Party that could win over young people like herself who have come of age with interactive social media and care about small government, defense, the environment and gay rights . It infuriates her when rigid Republicans accuse her of being a Republican In Name Only, a RINO. “I cannot stand the word RINO, because I think it’s an easy way to belittle someone who’s flexible with the kind of world we live in,” she said. “I’m pro-life, but I’m pro birth control. I am also pro being realistic about the kind of world we live in.” She supports marriage equality for gay Americans, she added, because, “I have friends who are gay, and I’d like to go to their weddings.” …. ….her progressive views have angered traditionalists within the Republican Party. In March 2009, she wrote a column in The Daily Beast that accused Ann Coulter, the conservative American political commentator and writer, of perpetuating “negative stereotypes about Republicans,” and called her “offensive, radical, insulting and confusing.” “I object to people who use politics as entertainment,” she told me. The column provoked Laura Ingraham, the conservative commentator and radio show host, to deride Ms. McCain on her show as “plus-sized.” Apparently it’s perfectly fine to insult Ann Coulter as “offensive and radical,” but commenting on McCain’s weight is an offense good for several overwrought paragraphs. Schillinger went on and on about it. But in Arizona, Ms. McCain admitted that she finds attacks on her looks hard to take. “It’s very harsh,” she said. “I’m of the belief that you should never say anything bad about a woman’s appearance, ever. It’s nothing I would ever do.” McCain seemed desperate to sound transgressive: “I’m a 25-year-old woman with tattoos,” Ms. McCain said, waving her left hand to show the black cross on her wrist, “I just live my life very openly. I don’t think in this climate that I could get elected, either. I like to go to Vegas and I like to play blackjack with my friends. Can you do that if you’re a candidate? No. I rest my case.” She still resents Ms. Ingraham’s remark but added, “I should send her a fruit basket. It’s one of the best things that’s ever happened to my career. I don’t care if she disagrees with me.” Schillinger and McCain squeezed several more dramatic paragraphs over enchilada-gate, an evident “snub” by Laura Bush which was literarily enriched with deep observations about who was wearing what: It was in March 2008, two days after Mr. McCain had won four presidential primaries, clinching the Republican nomination. Mrs. Bush had invited Meghan and her mother to the White House for lunch. Meghan dressed to the hilt, in an elegant black Diane von Furstenberg dress, a capelet and Tory Burch peep-toe heels, her hair swept up in plaits. …. But when Mrs. Bush, in a sweater and slacks, greeted her and her mother, she told them there’d been a misunderstanding. The invitation only applied to Mrs. McCain. Meghan was sent to the White House mess. “I was given a doggie bag of enchiladas,” Ms. McCain writes. “Want to talk about feeling stupid and unwanted? Try carrying a take-out bag as you leave the White House in sparkly glitter heels and your hair braided in three huge cornrows.” “I hope Laura and Jenna Bush won’t be angry with me for dishing like this,” she writes. “But I use Taylor Swift as a model: If you don’t want her to write a song about you, don’t give her a reason.” Zing! But at Blanco, Ms. McCain excused the Bush diss: “I think that it was a long eight years for them,” she said. “They’re not ill-intentioned.” After two fawning quotes saying that she could (totally!) pull off a “Meghan McCain Show” on politics, Schillinger gushed about “the book’s other juicy secrets,” such as (gasp) campaign sex: There was the crazy sex among overworked “drones and journalists” blinded by “campaign goggles;” thefts of Mitt Romney signs by misbehaving McCainBlogettes ; and even a Xanax mishap that left Ms. McCain “knocked out like a corpse” on a campaign plane (she gives a “special shout-out” to Cynthia McFadden of ABC, “for not putting it on ‘Nightline’ “). Schillinger doesn’t spell out that it was McCain herself that stole the Romney campaign signs. For Ms. McCain, the political is inextricable from the personal. And whether she would like to see it this way or not, her father’s presidential loss also marked a new beginning for her. Since her book’s release last week, she has appeared on “The View,” “The Rachel Maddow Show,” “Fox & Friends” and “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno.” “It was liberating to be able to tell my side of the story,” she told me in Scottsdale. But the new story she’s narrating is her own; she’s the front-runner in a race whose goal is still unknown, but whose progress is visible. Red State blogger Leon Wolf had some harsh but hilarious criticism of McCain and her book. Here’s some of the milder stuff. When I finished reading Dirty, Sexy Politics, I flipped to the acknowledgements section to find the name of the person who edited this travesty, so as to warn incompetent authors of the future away from utilizing this person’s services, but no such person was identified therein. Either this book had no editor, or the editor assigned to the original manuscript threw up his or her hands three pages in and decided to let the original stand as some sort of bizarre performance art, like Joaquin Phoenix’s appearance on Late Night with David Letterman. …. Meghan’s primary goal in writing Dirty, Sexy Politics appears to have been to show off her encyclopedic knowledge of who was wearing what clothes on what occasion. From all appearances, it is physically impossible for Meghan McCain to describe a given scene or occurrence without describing in detail what everyone in the room was wearing (and how their hair was done), most especially including herself. I stopped counting the number of times she informed me that she was wearing UGG boots on a given occasion at five. Dirty, Sexy Politics is 194 pages long; if you removed the descriptions of outfits and hairstyles so-and-so wore when such-and-such was going on, I doubt it would have scraped 120 pages.

View original post here:
The NY Times Splashes in the Shallow End with Meghan McCain, Brave Republican Rebel, Ugg Boot Wearer

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

NYT’s Deadpan Howler: ‘Lawmakers Were Apparently Unaware’ of New ObamaCare 1099 Requirements

Posted on September 13, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

New York Times reporter Robert Pear ought to consider moonlighting as a stand-up comic in the tradition of Steven Wright . Wright’s deadpan delivery is legendary. Pear’s deadpan lines in his article about the immense paperwork burden heading the economy’s way in the form of requiring IRS 1099 forms to be issued to each and every person paid $600 or more during the course of a calendar year for any and all goods provided or services rendered are remarkable. Of course, if Pear chooses to get on stage with his act he’ll have to come up with a more humorous topic. The nightmare that could be visited upon American business and really the American economy is pretty stunning — and don’t for a minute think that individuals with hobbies that break even or possibly lose money every year and don’t ordinarily bother to file tax returns for their activities (because they aren’t required to) aren’t going to be affected. What follows are a few of the choice one-liners found in Pear’s September 11 article (“Many Push for Repeal of Tax Provision in Health Law”) that appeared in the paper’s Sunday print edition on Page A25: The reporting requirement is expected to lead to a significant amount of revenue — $17 billion over 10 years — to help pay for the expansion of coverage and other health initiatives. I told you this guy Pear is a laugh riot. He actually expects readers to believe that businesses will spent untold millions on forms, postage, and handling of literally hundreds of millions and possibly billions of 1099 forms but will, even though these costs are fully deductible, still have to fork over $1.7 billion more every year in personal and corporate income taxes. In reality, where Pear, the Times, and Washington’s lawmakers clearly don’t live, the amount collected after considering the effect of the extra costs imposed will necessarily be much less, and could conceivably be a big fat zero. (the 1099 reporting provision) drew little attention at the time — it was one of more than 15 revenue-raising measures in the bill — and many lawmakers were apparently unaware of it when they voted for final passage of the legislation. Wow, is this guy a master of understatement or what? Surely a reporter of Mr. Pear’s pedigree will recall that Nancy Pelosi infamously said just weeks before the bill’s final passage that “… we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it.” Robert Pear, New York Times reporter extraordinaire, know that “many lawmakers were apparently unaware of it when they voted for final passage” because they were directly unaware of anything in the bill. Why? Because they never read it, period. Pear had help with the final howler I’ll cite from Nina Olson, national taxpayer advocate at the IRS, whom the New York Times reporter should consider taking on as a standup sidekick: “The I.R.S. will face challenges making productive use of this new volume of information reports,” Ms. Olson said. “Challenges?” Shoot, they’ll have to rent hundreds of thousands of square feet of office space just to accommodate the tidal wave of incoming paper, find a server farm to store the data that comes in electronically, and employ and army of people to enter the data and sift through it. Seriously, the fact that Congress even has to engage in the exercise of repeal shows how derelict those who voted for ObamaCare sight unseen really were. That’s not funny, and that the topic deserved a more informative treatment by the Times should be, well ap-Pear-ent. A related post is at BizzyBlog.com .

Link:
NYT’s Deadpan Howler: ‘Lawmakers Were Apparently Unaware’ of New ObamaCare 1099 Requirements

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Matthews Admits: Maybe I Was Smart Not to Run For Office This Year

Posted on September 13, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Well you have to give Chris Matthews credit for admitting the obvious. On Monday’s Hardball, as he overlooked the bad environment for Democrats this midterm season, Matthews appeared grateful he didn’t make his much rumored run for Pennsylvania’s Senate seat, as he asked one of his guests: “Do you think it could be the year where guys…like me were smart not to make the run?” [ audio available here ] The admission came during a segment in which Matthews, the Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza and local radio talk show host, Dan Gaffney of WGMD, were breaking down the prospects for Christine O’Donnell to upset Republican Mike Castle and go on to win the general election for the Deleware Senate seat with Gaffney explaining that it was a distinct possibility since there is “a lot of anti-establishment, anti-incumbent sentiment” in that state, calling that race “a crap-shoot.” This caused Matthews to wonder, if in fact, that attitude extended to Pennsylvania as he asked Gaffney the following question: Let me go to Gaffney, a fellow Irishman, while I’ve got you on the show, I’ve got to ask you this. Do you think it could be the year where guys like Beau Biden and guys like me were smart not to make the run? I’m looking at this situation. You cannot predict this year! It is a crap-shoot! And they’re so anti-establishment out there, that they recognize your name and they say, “I knew that name three months ago.” They don’t like you. Isn’t that true? The following exchanges were aired on the September 13 edition of Hardball: CHRIS MATTHEWS: Welcome back to Hardball. The Republican primary in Delaware, the little state of Delaware, tomorrow could have big implications for the Republicans nationwide and their ability to take over the U.S. Senate, which is possible. Republican Mike Castle is fending off a tough challenge from Tea Party candidate Christine O’Donnell and polls show she’s in the race of his life, actually that’s a close, too close to call. … MATTHEWS: Joining me is Delaware radio talk show host Dan Gaffney and WashingtonPost.com managing editor Chris Cillizza. Dan, give me a sense do the voters of Delaware know how important this vote is tomorrow. That this could affect the, I guess you could call it the outside chance of the Republicans grabbing the Senate as well as the House, come November. DAN GAFFNEY: Yeah, I think many of them do, but some of my talk radio callers don’t care. They are more interested in winning the actual battle than the war and there’s such a wind of anti-Castle, you know there’s a wind of anti-Castle wind in the air and even when presented the fact that Castle has a better chance of beating the Democrats, many people don’t care. They want to vote him out any way. MATTHEWS: Boy that sounds like the Democratic left sometimes. That sounds like November Doesn’t Count. I grew up with it, it’s called NDC. Cillizza, you’re, you’re shaking your head positively. The one thing about a polarized electorate is it doesn’t care about practical electoral consequences. CHRIS CILLIZZA, WASHINGTON POST: Yep. MATTHEWS: By the way, I want to give a salute, if not a positive salute, a reality check to the far right. Bob Bennett was knocked off, the guy that beat him, Lee is going to win the general. Crist, Crist has been bumped out of his party but Rubio could well win that. He’s ahead in the polls down there. Specter was knocked out of his party, but Toomey is well ahead by about seven points in PA. And who am I missing? Murkowski. Well I gotta bet, what’s his name up there, Joe Miller is gonna win that, or if he gets in that thing clean, one on one. So you could argue that the Tea Parties have had a pretty good record of positioning themselves to win generals. Maybe not in Nevada, but other places. CILLIZZA: Chris, first of all, isn’t it amazing that we’re talking about Delaware? You’ve got the New Hampshire Senate race, you’ve got New York, you’ve got Wisconsin, we’re talking about Delaware. This is a state we never thought we would be talking about. Number two, that states you just listed: Alaska, Utah, those kind of states. The one thing that’s different, this is Delaware. This is a Democratic state. Mike Castle’s been elected for more than 40 years. He’s been the governor of the state. He’s been the at-large representative. This is not a state where whoever winds up being the Republican nominee, Utah, Alaska, has a big leg up in winning. Not sure if they’re gonna win, but that’s a big leg up. MATTHEWS: Okay let me give you, let me give you, let me give you some history, young fellow. Joe Biden, back in 1972, bumped out a guy who had won the House seat, and let’s go in here Dan, you’re the expert, had been a House member, a Senate member, for x many terms, and a governor, just like this guy Mike Castle. Joe Biden, at the age of 29, knocked him out of the seat and held it for what? 40 years. So isn’t it possible that Christine O’Donnell could be a senator for life. We don’t know. GAFFNEY: Well let me tell you, what my original opinion was that if she wins the primary tomorrow, we would say “Hello, Senator Coons.” That was my original opinion. MATTHEWS: Right. GAFFNEY: But now I’m starting to think that if she pulls it off tomorrow, if, that’s a big “if”, she could do anything. If she can beat Mike Castle in this state, she can do anything. MATTHEWS: What’s your state like these days? Is it as unhappy as the rest of the country and could it say, you know what if she isn’t quite prepared or maybe this other fellow Coons has more executive experience, the usual logic way we make decisions may not be in play this year, there’s so much anger. GAFFNEY: No it’s very emotional Chris. MATTHEWS: Yeah. GAFFNEY: It’s very emotional. There’s a lot of anti-establishment, anti-incumbent sentiment. The Tea Party movement is strong. There is a strong sentiment, especially in the southern part of the state. There are only three counties, the two lower counties, much more conservative, much more likely to go to Christine O’Donnell. The upper county, Newscastle, is urban, it’s the city of Wilmington. Much more likely to go toward Mike Castle. However, will he win enough in Newcastle to take the whole state? It’s a crap-shoot. All of my political pundit friends are saying the same thing to me, “I don’t know.” MATTHEWS: Well Let’s talk about the country. Chris go back, let’s pull back and look at the whole country. CILLIZZA: Sure. MATTHEWS: People watching now from California want to know this. It’s possible with Boxer in play, with Patty Murray in play, with Harry Reid in play, with Russ Feingold in play- CILLIZZA: Yep. MATTHEWS: That the Democrats could lose the Senate. It’s very possible, on a bad night, a what do you call it, a wave night, well you’re the expert, right? Delaware matters. CILLIZZA: Look I would say Delaware, you used the word in the intro Chris – shoe-in. And I thought to myself, that’s exactly right. We considered this like, I met Chris Coons, I like Chris Coons, I didn’t think Chris Coons was gonna beat Mike Castle. I agree that Christine O’Donnell, you never know what’s going to happen if she wins, but she’s not as strong a candidate as Mike Castle in the general election. Doesn’t mean she can’t win, but she’s not as strong a candidate. So if you take Delaware and move it into the “We don’t know” category. Now you’re looking at rather than winning two out of the three of Wisconsin, Washington and California, now you’re talking about winning all three. Is it possible? Yes it’s absolutely possible. MATTHEWS: Ha! I love it! CILLIZZA: Polling, polling in all three suggests it could happen, but it seems odd to me. I think Wisconsin, in order, I think Wisconsin, California, Washington, even the most sort of optimistic Republican strategists I talk to say, “Look we’d love to win two out of three of them that would make a great night.” But two out of three and losing Delaware that means they’re probably not in the majority. MATTHEWS: Okay there’s others than. I think you’re so smart. Let me go to Gaffney, a fellow Irishman, while I’ve got you on the show, I’ve got to ask you this. Do you think it could be the year where guys like Beau Biden and guys like me were smart not to make the run? I’m looking at this situation. You cannot predict this year! It is a crap-shoot! And they’re so anti-establishment out there, that they recognize your name and they say, “I knew that name three months ago.” They don’t like you. Isn’t that true? GAFFNEY: Well I think Beau Biden, yeah it is true. Beau Biden should have gotten in this year. I mean he, he probably is… MATTHEWS: Could he have beaten either of these candidates? Could have beaten Castle or beaten O’Donnell? GAFFNEY: Yes, I think he could have. Not that I would’ve supported him but I think he could. Yes. MATTHEWS: Really? GAFFNEY: Beau Biden? Absolutely.

Read more here:
Matthews Admits: Maybe I Was Smart Not to Run For Office This Year

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Delaware Senate: Castle or O’Donnell?

Posted on September 13, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Follow this link:
Delaware Senate: Castle or O’Donnell?

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , ,

Obama Gets Highest Ratings from Followers of Olbermann, Maddow and NYT

Posted on September 13, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

A new study by the Pew Research Center found that Barack Obama gets his highest approval ratings from people that watch MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow, as well as from readers of the New York Times. The numbers are rather staggering, as 84 percent of regular viewers of MSNBC’s “Countdown” give the President high marks for his job performance. This compares to 80 percent for regular viewers of “The Rachel Maddow Show” and 79 percent for regular readers of the Times. But that’s just one of the interesting findings in the Pew survey released Sunday: Americans are spending more time with the news than was the case a decade ago. As was the case in 2000, people now say they spend 57 minutes on average getting the news from TV, radio or newspapers on a given day. But today, they also spend an additional 13 minutes getting news online, increasing the total time spent with the news to 70 minutes. This is one of the highest totals on this measure since the mid-1990s and it does not take into account time spent getting news on cell phones or other digital devices . Only about one-in-four (26%) Americans say they read a newspaper in print yesterday, down from 30% two years ago and 38% in 2006. Meanwhile, online newspaper readership continues to grow and is offsetting some of the overall decline in readership. This year, 17% of Americans say they read something on a newspaper’s website yesterday, up from 13% in 2008 and 9% in 2006. Overall, cable news continues to play a significant role in peoples’ news habits – 39% say they regularly get news from a cable channel. But the proportions saying they regularly watch CNN, MSNBC and CNBC have slipped substantially from two years ago, during the presidential election. The partisan divide in cable news is stunning if not shocking: Only Fox News has maintained its audience size, and this is because of the increasing number of Republicans who regularly get news there. Four-in-ten Republicans (40%) now say they regularly watch Fox News, up from 36% two years ago and just 18% a decade ago. Just 12% of Republicans regularly watch CNN, and just 6% regularly watch MSNBC. As recently as 2002, Republicans were as likely to watch CNN (28%) as Fox News (25%). The share of Democrats who regularly watch CNN or Fox News has fallen from 2008. Interesting. So both Democrats and Republicans are reducing their viewership of CNN. Doesn’t say much for the supposedly must trusted name in news, does it? Eight-in-ten Americans (80%) who regularly listen to Rush Limbaugh or watch Sean Hannity are conservative – roughly twice the national average of 36%. And at the other end of the spectrum, the New York Times, Keith Olbermann, the Daily Show, the Colbert Report and Rachel Maddow have regular audiences that include nearly twice the proportion of liberals than in the public. News audiences also vary widely when it comes to opinions about current issues and topics. For instance, those who describe themselves as supporters of the Tea Party movement make up disproportionately large proportions of the audiences for Limbaugh’s radio show and Fox News opinion programs. This also is the case for supporters of the NRA (National Rifle Association). By contrast, supporters of gay rights make up large shares of regular New York Times readers, viewers of the Colbert Report and NPR listeners. Several ideologically divergent news audiences – including Wall Street Journal readers and viewers of the Colbert Report and Glenn Beck show – include larger-than-average percentages of self-described libertarians. Here’s where things really got interesting: Overall, the share of Americans who say keeping up with the news is something they enjoy a lot has dipped, from a consistent 52% in recent biennial news consumption surveys, including 2008, to 45% in 2010. The decline is linked to partisanship and ideology: in 2008 67% of liberal Democrats said they enjoyed the news a lot, compared with just 45% today. By contrast, about as many conservative Republicans say they enjoy keeping up with the news today as did so two years ago (57% now, 56% then). This has resulted in a switch in news enjoyment. Today, conservative Republicans enjoy keeping up with the news more than any other ideological and partisan group; just two years ago it was the liberal Democrats who held that distinction. How much of this is economic? After all, the news was far better when Pew last did this study in 2008. There certainly is less to “enjoy” today. On the other hand, that doesn’t explain the ideological divide. Maybe liberals liked things better when Bush and the Republicans were being blamed for all the problems in the world, and just can’t stand watching their politicians take any heat at all. By contrast, it seems conservatives enjoy keeping up with the news regardless of which Party is getting scrutinized. That says something, doesn’t it? Search engines are playing a substantially larger role in people’s news gathering habits – 33% regularly use search engines to get news on topics of interest, up from 19% in 2008. This is a predictable but yet concerning finding, for it makes it essential that search engines don’t have their own biases. As conservatives have pointed fingers at Google’s algorithms for years, the more people rely on search engines to guide them to news sources, the more impartial such engines better be, especially for the following reason: About eight-in-ten (82%) say they see at least some bias in news coverage; by a 43% to 23% margin, more say it is a liberal than a conservative bias. This makes search engine neutrality essential or conservatives are really going to have a hard time leveling the playing field. That said, we’ve saved the best for last: Among news audiences, Obama gets his highest approval ratings among regular viewers of Keith Olbermann (84% approve) and Rachel Maddow (80%); his rating is nearly as high among regular readers of the New York Times (79%). Obama gets his lowest ratings among regular Sean Hannity viewers (7%) and Rush Limbaugh listeners (9%). So Obama gets his highest approval ratings from folks that watch Olbermann, Maddow, and read the New York Times. What does this say about the journalistic standards at MSNBC and the Gray Lady? After all, depending on which poll you look at, half or less of the nation currently approve of the job Obama is doing.  If Olbermann and Maddow watchers, along with Times readers, have such a drastically different view of the President than the rest of the nation, these entities must be doing a horrible job of reporting the news to their patrons.  Is there any greater example of the dangers of liberal media bias and the need to aggressively combat it? 

Read this article:
Obama Gets Highest Ratings from Followers of Olbermann, Maddow and NYT

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , , ,