It is a tough job defending the media, when some can’t help themselves and just keep stepping in it:
“Journalists, by the way, are not just being targeted verbally or
by John Cole| 37 Comments
This post is in: Media
It is a tough job defending the media, when some can’t help themselves and just keep stepping in it:
“Journalists, by the way, are not just being targeted verbally or
by John Cole| 72 Comments
This post is in: Republican Stupidity
Let’s run through the checklist:
Federalism- nope, don’t need it.
Limited Government- nah- useless.
Fiscal Responsibility- forget it- outdated.
Tradition?- Whatever, loserboy.
Fair play?- For credit card companies, not for you.
State’s rights- a quaint idea.
Separation of Church and State- Fuhgeddaboutit!
Limiting entitlement programs- nonsense!
Compassionate conservatism- meaningless buzzwords.
I guess we should have seen the notion of free trade being thrown over the side of the sinking ship, what with the steel tariffs and and the shrimp fiasco:
China on Thursday criticized new U.S. quotas imposed to control surging imports of Chinese textiles and said it might respond by taking action through the World Trade Organization.
China faces pressure from the United States, the European Union and other producers to restrain its textile exports, which have soared since a global quota system ended on Jan. 1.
The Commerce Ministry expressed “firm opposition and strong displeasure” to two sets of U.S. quotas, imposed in the past week following complaints that Chinese imports were hurting American companies.
“The Chinese government reserves the right to take further actions within the framework of the World Trade Organization,” said ministry spokesman Chong Quan, quoted by the official Xinhua News Agency. The report didn’t say what steps Beijing might take.
But the Chinese Foreign Ministry appealed to Washington to settle the dispute through dialogue instead of unilateral action.
I expect that pretty soon the shills for the administration will be reading Dick Gephardt’s old ‘fair trade’ speeches for justification for this. Exactly what does this party of mine believe in, really? I guess it can be summed up as this:
Money talks, and our bullshit walks.
by John Cole| 21 Comments
This post is in: Media
David Brooks has a decent piece up on the over-reaction of EVERYONE regarding Newsweek:
Maybe it won’t be so bad being cut off from the blogosphere. I look around the Web these days and find that Newsweek’s retracted atrocity story has sent everybody into cloud-cuckoo-land. Every faction up and down the political spectrum has used the magazine’s blunder as a chance to open fire on its favorite targets, turning this into a fevered hunting season for the straw men.
Many of my friends on the right have decided that the Newsweek episode exposes the rotten core of the liberal media. Dennis Prager, who is intelligent 99 percent of the time, writes, “Newsweek is directly responsible for the deaths of innocents and for damaging America.” Countless conservatives say the folks at Newsweek were quick to believe the atrocity tales because they share the left-wing, post-Vietnam mentality. On his influential blog, Austin Bay writes that the coastal media “presume the worst about the U.S. military – always make that presumption.”
Excuse me, guys, but this is craziness. I used to write for Newsweek. I know Mike Isikoff and the editors. And I know about liberals in the media. The people who run Newsweek are not a bunch of Noam Chomskys with laptops. Not even close. Whatever might have been the cause of their mistakes, liberalism had nothing to do with it.
It reeally is too good for me to excerpt, something I am not used to saying about David Brooks. At any rate, he is right. The people to blame for the riots are the rioters and the cynical mullahs who whipped them into a frenzy- not Newsweek. Threats to control the press, or limit their freedoms, or to prosecute them, are misguided and dangerous.
The insanity of the overreach by both left and right is something that became really clear to me just by reading the comments to to the posts I made earlier this week in which I refused to condemn Newsweek to the fiery pits of hell. Sometimes I wonder if this snarky piece from Matt Yglesias is what many really want…
And, as an example of hysteria, I offer you Ann Coulter.
*** Update ***
The Instapundit adds:
BLAME THE CRAZY MUSLIMS: This seems to be the rapidly-gelling defense of Newsweek.
I respectfully disagree. This is not about absolving Newsweek of any sins. What they did in this case was horribly irresponsible, and you can’t excuse a news outfit putting out an inflammatory story with thinly sourced bullshit. Newsweek should be scorned for their laziness, and they, in my opinion should out the damned liar who fed them the nonsense.
However, this is a defense in some sense, in that those who want to put a stake through the heart of all media are using this Newsweek story as a club with which to beat all media around the head and neck, and that is misguided. Newsweek put out a shoddy story, but they are not responsible for the actions of a bunch of lunatics overseas. Should they be more careful so as to not provide them ammunition they don’t need? Sure. But they didn’t supply the gun, let alone brandish it, aim it, and pull the trigger.
by John Cole| 9 Comments
This post is in: General Stupidity
Everyone stop politicizing this damned movie. Now. Stop it. First, most of you who are trying to make something out of nothing don’t know what you are talking about- as an example, I give you Prof. Bainbridge’s lame-brained assessment of Lucas betraying his storyline that we discussed here.
Star Wars is neither Republican or Democrat. It is not left or right. It is neither. If it is anything, the core of the movie, the Jedi and their code, is eastern in origin, resembling Shaolin monks or some sort of pious warrior-monk.
But Reagan used the phrase ‘evil empire’ to describe the Soviets, you say.
True. But it was a metaphor, an apt one, and the Soviet Union, by chance, was both evil and an empire.
But no domestic political analogy is useful. So just cut it out.
by John Cole| 13 Comments
This post is in: General Stupidity
Clearly, these people are going to hell:
Calvin College may be predominantly Republican, but a visit from President George W. Bush on Saturday is stirring up some discontent among students, faculty and alumni…
And about 100 students are expected to adorn their graduation gowns with armbands and buttons bearing the slogan: “God is not a Republican or Democrat.”
“I’m definitely worried about a Christian school being affiliated with the Christian right,” said Elise Elzinga, a 22-year-old Lambertville resident who will graduate Saturday with a degree in political science and international relations.
Four years of college, and she doesn’t know anything. If you don’t vote for everything the GOP believes in at the moment- you can’t believe in God.
BTW- I should add I do think these guys are jerks for protesting at all- I would have been thrilled to have Bush or Clinton or anyone like that at my graduation, but I do find it somehow amusing the religious wars the nuts in my party have started is getting thrown back in their faces.
*** Update ***
Now, I don’t know about you, but when the President does anything, it’s political. It’s pretty damn impossible for the highest-ranking elected politician in the land to make any series of public statements and not bring all of his political baggage with him. And to answer John’s accusation that they’re jerks for protesting – one of the big things about being the President is that you’re the President wherever you go. Particularly when you’re invited somewhere by virtue of being President and are most likely coming to aid your stature as President. Now, I believe he has the right to speak, but our Constitution doesn’t have a “be quiet and be honored clause” for political speech. They’re not jerks. They’re Americans.
True enough- maybe jerks is too harsh. But then again, being a jerk and being an American are not mutually exclusive. I am, after all, exhibit A.
At any rate, I think it is in bad taste, and love ’em or hate ’em, Bush speaking will be memorable and they should consider themselves lucky to have such an A-list speaker. We had Mr. Rogers at a recent commencement at WVU. I don’t even remember who spoke at my graduation. although I do remember being out until 5 am, so there is a good chance I wouldn’t have remembered anyway. That and I found out a week before graduation I was missing a cluster and had to go to school for 6 more weeks in the summer to take “The History of American Women,” so I was in a generally surly mood anyway.
This post is in: Movies
Today, all over the country, we will see a final chapter, of sorts, in one branch of nerd history.
The final Star Wars is here, and geeks all over the country are converging on theatres with a sort of weepy glee.
Be kind to your resident nerf-herder- the finality of it all will soon settle in with them…
This post is in: Movies
I watched Tasagore Seibei, the Twilight Samurai, tonight (IMDB here), and it may be one of the best films I have seen in years.
It may be too slow for a lot of people, but I found it to be worthwhile.
BTW- I just love movies. A good story is hard to beat.