Showing posts with label MSM. Show all posts
Showing posts with label MSM. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Vying for the Krugman award, liberal econ blogger Barry Ritholtz markets the standard progressive fare: Fox-bashing propaganda

What exactly this story has to do with economics is beyond me, but Barry Ritholz's popular econ blog -- The Big Picture -- ran a headline earlier today that read "Fox News: Less Honest than Dictatorships."

Well, the post is nothing but a copy-paste of a CNN rush transcript that boils down to the following dialogue.

WOLF BLITZER, HOST: On another related – unrelated matter – maybe it is related – I want you to explain what you know about this suggestion Fox News reporting that you, a Reuters crew, some other journalists, were effectively used by Gadhafi as a human shield to prevent Allied fighter planes from coming in and attacking a certain position.

Explain what you know about this.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, this allegation is outrageous and it’s absolutely hypocritical. You know, when you come to somewhere like Libya, you expect lies and deceit from the dictatorship here. You don’t expect it from the other journalists...

...So for them to say and call this – to say they didn’t go and for them to call this and say this was government propaganda to hold us there as human shields when they didn’t even leave the hotel, the correspondent didn’t leave the hotel and go and see for himself, is ridiculous.

We were taken there. We went in through the security. We filmed the building. We were given 15, 20 minutes to do that, five minutes in Gadhafi’s tent and then we were taken out... And I was literally physically pushed back on the bus when we left... That’s how quickly the government officials wanted to get us out.

Of course, the real story is simple. Jennifer Griffin simply reported what her sources in the defense community told her. No less a source than the left-leaning MediaBistro reported after CNN's diatribe that "Jennifer Griffin [is] sticking by report on journalists being used as human shields in Libya".

Griffin did not get into the media-on-media fracas touched off by her report earlier today in which British sources told her their mission last night was cut short because of the presence of the Western journalists and several Libyan civilians...

“They felt that the civilians and journalists had effectively been used as human shields and that was frustrating to them,” said Griffin tonight. “It was a very close call. In fact one official told me that there was a Reuters crew literally on a spot where they were going to drop a missile.”

...Griffin is sticking by her original report that “the Libyan government is using journalists as human shields.”

In fact, yesterday The New York Times -- not exactly a mouthpiece for the conservative right -- ran a story headlined "At Qaddafi Compound, a Human Shield."

For that matter, earlier today London's Daily Express ran with a screaming all-caps lede that read "COLONEL GADDAFI’S SUPPORTERS SURROUND HIS HOME AS HUMAN SHIELDS."

Finally, Amnesty International -- a true right-wing conspiracy if there ever was one -- even published a FAQ regarding Gaddafi's use of human shields ("What about reports that Libya is using ‘human shields’?"

It's in CNN's interest -- given that its ratings are trailing the Hallmark Channel and airport radar -- to foment a "controversy". And leftist econ blogger Barry Ritholz is more than happy to oblige, so long as it means his analysis consists of typing an inflammatory headline, followed by [Ctrl]+[C] and [Ctrl]+[V].

Somewhere, Paul Krugman is green with envy.


Monday, March 21, 2011

Hush, little media children... more death threats in Wisconsin

More Republican lawmakers in Wisconsin are receiving death threats for casting votes, though to read state-run media you'd never have an inkling.

For this kind of news, we turn to a local TV outlet, WQOW in Eau Claire, WI.

State lawmakers receive threats after budget repair bill passes


Lawmakers across the state have been under attack following the passage of Governor Walker's budget repair bill.

State senator Dan Kapanke's car was vandalized, and he says he's received several death threats, forcing him to cancel meetings. The Wisconsin Department of Justice has also investigated death threats sent to other state republican lawmakers, identifying a suspect who was responsible for sending several threatening e-mails.

"I know I have received death threats in my office, and that's very disturbing, and we don't need that kind of activity in Wisconsin, and I think most of us are above that, and hopefully those kinds of things will stop," says Senator Terry Moulton (R-23rd Senate District).

Senator Moulton is hoping the state can be healed, and both republicans and democrats can come together to work on the state's upcoming budget. Sunday night, hear more from local lawmakers about how they think both parties can work together once again.

Last week Noel Sheppard at NewsBusters observed that ABC, CBS, MSNBC, NBC and NPR had all censored news of these death threats.

To give credit where credit is due, it appears only CNN has had the temerity to report the outrageous behavior of the Democrat Party, President Obama's community organizers and the public sector union bosses.

Which means there's probably an IRS investigation or three in their future.

Isn't it lovely to see the collapse of a civilization right in front of our eyes?


Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Legacy Media Wakes Up, Notices That President Obama is Far More Energized by Motown and Wisconsin's Unions Than Global Calamities

Politico headlines its latest "President Obama staying in background on deficits."

Which is a polite way of saying that he's busy arranging his next Remembering Motown party. Or jetting to Rio.

But it was Ruth Marcus, the liberal Washington Post columnist, who got the ball rolling with her op-end entitled "Obama's 'Where's Waldo?' presidency" and asked, "Where's Obama? No matter how hard you look, sometimes he's impossible to find."

Except when there's a party or a pick-up golf game.

The left-leaning Ottawa Citizen titled its missive "Obama's foreign policy is in tatters" and observes, "It used to be said by critics that Canada offered all aid short of help in global crises; now regrettably the same might be suggested of the Obama administration as it loses its position and influence in a critical part of the world."

CBS News highlighted the tenuous policy positions of Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV), who called out the president in harsh terms: "Dem Sen. Joe Manchin: Obama has 'failed to lead' on spending."

The New Republic, which once championed Obama's candidacy, now appears to have come to the same conclusion the rest of us did, oh, around 2007: "The clock is ticking on action in Libya—and on the president’s foreign policy legacy" and notes that France and the Arab League are both more hawkish on Gaddafi than the U.S. -- for the first time in history.

As it turns out, the only person yet to notice the president's detachment is the brilliant economist Paul Olberkrugmann.


Monday, March 14, 2011

Legacy media beclowns itself anew: interviews nuclear 'expert' with Texans-are-Nazis sign in plain view

Dave Craft of the NEIS discusses the Japanese nuclear reactor meltdowns on WGN News while showing off his office decor.

The most hilarious aspect is that WGN's crew saw this sign, included it in the shot, and didn't even think twice about it.

Okay, I get it.

All Texans are Nazis. All Republicans, including Republicans of color, are racists. All Constitutional conservatives trying to save the country from economic collapse deserve to be shot.

Do I have that about right?


Update: Although not clearly visible in these screen-caps, a reader indicates that the sign on the right says "Support our Troops, Euthanize Congress."

Civil.


Hat tip: JSaf. Linked by: NewsBusters. Thanks!

Friday, March 11, 2011

Did you know that a bill was introduced this week that would begin to save Social Security from financial collapse? Neither did I.

That's the genius of our legacy media: they don't tell us stuff that we don't need to know.

Consider, if you will, Lummis Bill Tackles Entitlement Reform.

U.S. Representative Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) has introduced H.R. 867, Alex’s Law. Alex’s Law, named after a four-year-old child of a member of Representative Lummis’ staff, helps ensure Social Security remains viable for all generations of Americans by slowly raising the retirement age starting in 2024.

...America’s debt has surpassed an astounding $14 trillion – and [f]or the first time since its reform in 1980, the Congressional Budget Office announced in January that [Social Security] is now permanently in the red. The Social Security trust fund goes broke in 2037, which means Americans will see a 22 percent cut in benefits, and the cuts will get worse if Washington continues to look the other way.

... In 2010, payroll taxes fell $37 billion short of what was required to pay out benefits. The Congressional Budget Office projects permanent Social Security deficits until the Social Security trust fund is exhausted in 2037. At that point, the Social Security Administration trustees estimate that Social Security payroll tax revenues will only be able to support 78 percent of benefits, leading to a 22 percent cut in benefits for all retirees.

Under H.R. 867, the retirement age increase would phase-in slowly over time:

• Today’s 50-year-olds and those older: NO CHANGE FROM CURRENT LAW

• Today’s 49-year-olds – Retirement age increase: 1 month

• Today’s 35-year-olds – Retirement age increase: 1 year

• Today’s 19-year-olds – Retirement age increase: 2 years

• Today’s 4-year-olds – Retirement age increase: 3 years

Let me guess: if the media bothers to cover this, Democrats will demagogue these trivial but important changes.

Because that's what they do.


Thursday, March 10, 2011

Legacy Media: Death Threats Against Political Figures Are Now Perfectly Fine and Unworthy of Notice

...that is, so long as it is conservatives who are receiving the death threats.

...left-wing filmmaker and propagandist Michael Moore appeared yesterday on “The Rachel Maddow Show” and all but incited violence... “Really, this is a war,” Moore told Maddow. “This is a class war that’s been leveled against the working people of this country.”

...Thus, the danger in using such extreme and over-the-top rhetoric is that some people will take Moore’s rhetoric literally and act accordingly. The result, tragically, could be incidents of violence that result in murder and mayhem... Unfortunately, this is no phantom worry. It’s happened before in American history, thanks to violent union thugs, and it could happen again. And of course, it doesn’t help when Democratic members of Congress such as Rep. Michael Capuano (D-Mass.) urge union goons to take to “the streets and get a little bloody…”

So it isn’t surprising that, as Wisconsin talk radio host Charles Sykes reports, there is “growing intimidation and escalating threats of violence” in Madison.

Yesterday, 15 Republican state senators received a chilling, death threat-laden email from a union supporter.

This is how the civil society frays before it unravels altogether.

And legacy media -- which helped an inexperienced crypto-Marxist achieve the nation's highest office by completely failing to vet him -- is once again culpable.

Once so concerned with civility and the attitude of non-violent Tea Party protesters, The New York Times, the Washington Post, ABC, CBS and MSNBC have all fallen silent when confronted with real incivility and real violence on the part of the radical Left.

There is no media left in this country, save a few radio talk show hosts, Fox News, some intrepid bloggers, and a handful of digital gurus like Matt Drudge and Andrew Breitbart.

One gets the feeling that James O'Keefe could have successfully run the NPR sting operation against any of the best-known legacy media outlets.

They're all pathetic and disgraceful.


Image credit: Sad Hill News.

If James O'Keefe continues at this pace, de-funding NPR will be unncessary because it won't have any employees left

Investigative journalist James O'Keefe just released Part II of his NPR Housecleaning Tapes. And he promises more to come.

An NPR fundraising executive said her organization would be willing to shield a would-be donor from a government audit by keeping the donor's name anonymous, according to a series of surreptitiously recorded phone calls released on Thursday... Betsy Liley, NPR's senior director of institutional giving, made the comments to a man posing as a trustee of a fictitious Muslim charity, which the man had said had connections to the Muslim Brotherhood, an Egypt-based group that has suspected ties to terrorists.

...O'Keefe [also] secretly videotaped Liley's boss, Ron Schiller, making demeaning comments about conservatives during a luncheon meeting set up to discuss what the NPR managers believed was a potential $5 million contribution. Liley was also at that meeting and briefly comments on the video.

Ron Schiller resigned from NPR on Tuesday for his role in the video scandal. The video's release also led to the resignation on Wednesday of his boss, NPR chief executive Vivian Schiller.

In a lengthy follow-up phone call with Liley after the lunch, an O'Keefe associate posing as "Ibrahim Kasaam " of the Muslim Education Action Center (a fictitious entity) expressed concerns that NPR, which receives government funding, would be subject to government audits or would have to disclose the source of its donations.

Liley responded, "If you were concerned about that, you might want to be an anonymous donor and we would certainly, if that was your interest, we would want to shield you from that."

At another point, Kasaam asked Liley, "It sounded like you're saying that NPR would be able to shield us from a government audit, is that correct?"

"I think that is the case, especially if you were anonymous, and I can inquire about that," Liley said. She later informed Kasaam via e-mail that NPR's management had cleared an anonymous donation from his group.

NPR had previously said, in the wake of the luncheon video, that it had "repeatedly refused" to accept donations from the organization.

NPR put Liley on administrative leave as a result of the video.

I guess we could call this a "citizen's de-funding".

Well done, Mr. O'Keefe.


Hat tip: Tom. Linked by: Michelle Malkin. Thanks!

Tuesday, March 08, 2011

Top 10 Rejected Scripts From Katie Couric's 'Muslim Cosby Show'

A couple of months ago, CBS news personality Katie Couric had quite the brainstorm.

Couric suggested a Muslim Cosby Show would perhaps help eradicate Islamophobia in America. Couric said, "I know that sounds crazy," she said, "but The Cosby Show did so much to change attitudes about African-Americans in this country, and I think sometimes people are afraid of things they don’t understand."

One of the problems with her idea is that so many script ideas would be off limits for devout Muslims. Biff Spackle lists the following story pitches almost certain to be rejected.

• Teenage daughter brings home a Christian boy

• Rebellious son decides he no longer wants to practice Islam

• Teenage daughter dabbles with homosexuality

• Youngest daughter steals a candy-bar from a convenience store

• Rebellious son is caught drinking vodka with friends

• Teenage daughter wears super-revealing clothing to school

• Rebellious son is caught sassing the Imam

• Teenage daughter brings home a Jewish boy

• Rebellious son is caught desecrating the Koran

• Teenage daughter brings home Charlie Sheen

Spackle asserts that ending a show with a flogging or an amputation wouldn't exactly help the ratings.


Linked by: Weasel Zippers. Thanks!

Excellent News: NPR Willing to Partner With Muslim Brotherhood to Combat Zionist Agenda Using Your Tax Dollars!

Ron Schiller, NPR's senior vice president for fundraising, just got punk'd by conservative activist James O'Keefe. A hidden camera caught Schiller baring his soul regarding Republicans, conservatives and Jews in a meeting with two men claiming to represent the fictional Muslim Action Education Center (MEAC). MEAC claimed that it was willing to donate $5 million to NPR to help its efforts to fight the mainstream media's "Zionist coverage".

Schiller's diatribes included the following gems:

— “The current Republican Party, particularly the Tea Party, is fanatically involved in people's personal lives and very fundamental Christian — and I wouldn't even call it Christian. It's this weird evangelical kind of move ... it's been hijacked by this group that ... "

— "It's not just Islamophobic, but really xenophobic. Basically, they believe in white, middle America, gun-toting — it's pretty scary. They're seriously racist, racist people.”

The operatives in the sting then proceed to disparage what they call Jewish control of the media, prompting Schiller to assure them that Zionist influence doesn't exist at NPR, but "it's there in those who own newspapers obviously."

Schiller laughs when one of the men jokes that NPR's reporting on the Middle East had garnered the nickname "National Palestinian Radio” while his colleague Liley chuckles: “Oh really? That's good. I like that.”

...While discussing media coverage of the political uprising in Egypt, Schiller said what he is “most disappointed by," in the United States, "is that the educated, so-called elite in this country is too small a percentage of the population, so that you have this very large uneducated part of the population that carries these [unworldly] ideas."

Oh, and there's this:

— "I think what we all believe is if we don't have Muslim voices in our schools, on the air ... it's the same thing we faced as a nation when we didn't have female voices." In the heavily edited tape, that comment followed Schiller being told by one of the men that their organization "was originally founded by a few members of the Muslim Brotherhood in America." There's no sign in the edited tape that Schiller reacted in any way after being told of the group's alleged connection to an Islamic group that appeared to be connected with Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood.

— That NPR "would be better off in the long run without federal funding," a position in direct conflict with the organization's official position.

Remember, though, NPR claims to be unbiased. In fact, they're so confident that they're unbiased, they've challenged Republicans to find proof of their political affiliation.

Oops.

Alternate headline: Ignorant, Gun-Toting Racists Decide Not to Fund NPR.


Image: Real Aspen. Hat tip: Memeorandum. Linked by: Michelle Malkin. Thanks!

Monday, March 07, 2011

Could Someone Ask The New York Times to Tone Down Its Violent Rhetoric?

One would think that the self-proclaimed "newspaper of record" could do better than resorting to the hysterical, shrill and uncivil hyperbole laced throughout its op-ed "Holding Firm on the Budget."

After all, weren't these the very same kooks that lectured the Right about "civility" and "tone" after the horrific Tucson attacks?

After letting a highly destructive budget fight fester far too long, the White House finally stepped in late last week to negotiate with the House, which wants to eviscerate nondefense spending. Senate leaders still seem shell-shocked by that breathtaking ruthlessness, and have pleaded with the administration for help in pushing back. The White House needs to do so, and firmly.

Last year the administration acted as referee in a similar situation and got mixed results. It allowed Republicans their cherished goal of keeping taxes low on the richest 2 percent of Americans, and even gave multimillionaires and billionaires new estate tax benefits. President Obama won an extension of jobless benefits and a cut in payroll taxes that could boost the economy.

...But this is not a moment for another difference-splitting deal. The House wants to carve $61 billion out of the government for just the next seven months, which would throw hundreds of thousands of people out of work and kill off scores of vital functions.

The Times' intellectual dishonesty is legendary due, in no small part, to secretions like this one.

And its spendaholic hubris is highlighted by Mary Meeker's recent report that, without a hint of political enmity, paints a picture of impending fiscal calamity for the United States. That, of course, the Times chooses to ignore -- just as it ignored the most important book in a generation, a monumental bestseller focused on American history, law, philosophy, jurisprudence and economics.

This era's editions of The New York Times are useful only as curiosities: museum pieces that serve to warn future generations against journalists joining with the government to promote lawlessness, theft and oppression.


Hat tip: Memeorandum. Linked by: Michelle Malkin. Thanks!

Sunday, March 06, 2011

Thousands of Angry Egyptians Attack Coptic Christians and Burn Church While Screaming 'Democracy Akbar'

While mainstream media is busy promoting the notion that Egypt's revolution is a peaceful and democratic one (e.g., here, here and here), the stubborn facts keep getting in the way. The latest exhibit: this troubling report from the Assyrian International News Agency.

A mob of nearly four thousand Muslims has attacked Coptic homes this evening in the village of Soul, Atfif in Helwan Governorate, 30 kilometers from Cairo, and torched the Church of St. Mina and St. George. There are conflicting reports about the whereabouts of the Church pastor ... and three deacons who were at church; some say they died in the fire and some say they are being held captive by the Muslims inside the church.

Witnesses report the mob prevented the fire brigade from entering the village. The army, which has been stationed for the last two days in the village of Bromil, 7 kilometers from Soul, initially refused to go into Soul, according to the officer in charge. When the army finally sent three tanks to the village, Muslim elders sent them away, saying that everything was "in order now."

A curfew has been imposed on the 12,000 Christians in the village.

This incident was triggered by a relationship between 40-year-old Copt Ashraf Iskander and a Muslim woman. Yesterday a "reconciliation" meeting was arranged between the relevant Coptic and Muslim families and together with the Muslim elders it was decided that Ashraf Iskander would have to leave the village because Muslims torched his house.

The father of the Muslim woman was killed by his cousin because he did not kill his daughter to preserve the family's honor, which led the woman's brother to avenge the death of his father by killing the cousin. The village Muslims blamed the Christians.

The Muslim mob attacked the church, exploding 5-6 gas cylinders inside the church, pulled down the cross and the domes and burnt everything inside... the mob has [reportedly] broken into Coptic homes and has called on Copts to leave the village. "Terrorized Copts have fled and some hid in homes of Muslim neighbors," he added.

Witnesses said the mob chanted "Allahu Akbar" and vowed to conduct their morning prayers on the church plot after razing it.

The observers must be mistaken: I feel quite confident that, based upon reporting by the unerring Washington Post and other legacy media outlets, that the mob must have been chanting Democracy Akbar.


Hat tip: Bones. Linked by: Michelle Malkin. Thanks!

Saturday, March 05, 2011

Chris Christie continues to duck interviews on talk radio while appearing on the likes of Face the Nation, which gets lower ratings than airport radar

Despite his assertion that he won't seek the Republican presidential nomination, Chris Christie's public relations machine is working overtime. Appearing on Face the Nation last Sunday, in front of its traditional twelve viewers, Christie was quick to launch a thinly veiled attack on Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann and Rush Limbaugh. He defended Michelle Obama's bloviating on better nutrition, which she expounds upon while eating short ribs and nachos.

"I think it's a really good goal to encourage kids to eat better," he said. "I've struggled with my weight for 30 years and it's a struggle. If a kid can avoid that in his adult years or her adult years, more power to them."

Christie added that "I don't want the government deciding what you can eat and what you can't eat," but said, "I think Mrs. Obama being out there encouraging people in a positive way to eat well and to exercise and to be healthy - I don't have a problem with that."

...Palin and Bachmann have also accused the First Lady of curtailing individual freedoms by trying to dictate lifestyle choices by government fiat.

No, Governor Christie: that's not all the First Lady is up to. She's putting the arm on restaurateurs using the power of the White House to affect policy change through political intimidation.

A team of advisers to the First Lady has been holding private talks over the past year with the National Restaurant Association, a trade group, in a bid to get restaurants to adopt her goals of smaller portions and children's meals that include offerings healthier than French fries and soda, according to White House and industry officials.

The discussions are preliminary, and participants say they are nowhere near an agreement like the one Obama announced recently with Wal-Mart to lower prices on fruits and vegetables and to reduce the amount of fat, sugar and salt in its foods.

Why is FLOTUS interfering with an industry that is already in difficult straits, treading water through an economic tsunami?

Why? Because the hard-left Democrat Party can't stop meddling with private industry, be it the auto industry, oil companies, insurance companies, banks, credit card companies, and every other industry under the sun.

That shouldn't be too hard for Governor Christie to understand, right?

Problem is, Christie has held a plethora of troubling positions and has avoided discussing any of them on conservative talk radio. Mark Levin has reportedly extended numerous offers to Christie to appear, all for naught.

And I think I know why.

A few months ago, Christie spoke at the Republican Governors Conference [RGC] and reportedly brought down the house. He told the audience that sometimes leaders simply have to ignore their advisers and face the tough issues head on. But the New Jersey Star Ledger's Paul Mulshine has followed the career of Chris Christie for several years. And he doesn't quite recognize the current version.

[The RGC] Chris Christie sounds like a heck of guy — not at all like the Chris Christie I have been following closely for almost two years... [For example, after] a number of legislators held a press conference in the Statehouse to announce they were... protesting the new screening policies of the [TSA, Christie] declined an offer to back the resolution because, his spokesman said, it was a federal issue...

...Just for fun, I put up a post on my blog asking readers to predict how long it would take before Christie came out against the TSA. If you bet on last Monday, you would have won. In response to a question from a kid at one of those town-hall meetings he holds, Christie announced the screenings were "too invasive."

That’s just one instance in a pattern obvious to those of us who’ve been covering Christie since he entered state politics. Name an issue — from judicial activism to the Highlands Act — and you will see Christie tiptoeing up to it and finally committing when the consensus is clear.

On issues such as guns and abortion, Christie’s views have moved rightward over the years, in remarkable harmony with the rightward drift of the GOP primary electorate... His position in favor of New Jersey’s participation in the cap-and-trade program, known as the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, for example, would be a non-starter with Republican primary voters. Sure enough, he recently made an incremental move away from that when he told a participant in another town hall that he is becoming skeptical about man-made global warming.

Some took that as a sign that he’s serious about running for president. If so, he’ll have to start inching away from other positions associated with RINOs, or "Republicans In Name Only," such as his mushy stands on gun rights and immigration amnesty.

Christie's oft-changing positions are the antithesis of the Tea Party's immutable principles.

Global warming.

Gun control.

• Amnesty for illegal aliens.

His bizarre endorsement of the execrable Mike Castle and the pathetic Meg Whitman.

His odd invitation to the White House for a State Dinner -- the only one extended to a Republican

• And his refusal to join 28 other states in the fight against Obamacare, even though it would cost New Jersey exactly $0.00.

And those are but a few of Christie's anomalous activities.

Some great YouTube sound-bites have immortalized Christie's fight against the public sector unions. And there is much to appreciate in his stand.

But it is clear that the Governor also has much to explain. After all, constitutional conservatives rightfully fear the nomination of another "Maverick", the positions of whom are rooted only in political expediency.

Christie is ducking talk radio, presumably because he'd have to answer for his shape-shifting policy positions.

Nominating another mushy centrist -- and I count the governor of New Jersey as one, based upon his track record -- will simply guarantee Barack Obama a victory in the general. And that we cannot accept if we are to save this Republic.


Update: Ace is a tad non-nonplussed by the latest kerfuffle.

Friday, March 04, 2011

New York Times and Ezra Klein celebrate imaginary unemployment rate of 8.9% (shhh... real rate is 16% or more)

The New York Times gleefully trumpeted the Bureau of Labor Statistics' jobs report today

The waiting game still is not over, but it may be soon.

The nation’s employers added 192,000 jobs in February, up from a gain of 63,000 the previous month, the Labor Department reported on Friday.

...Taken together, the job growth for the first two months of 2011 has not been much better than it was last fall...

...The unemployment rate ticked down to 8.9 percent, falling below 9 percent for the first time in nearly two years. This rate, which comes from a separate survey and is based on the total number of Americans who want to work, has remained stubbornly high in the last year despite payroll growth...

...Economists say the unemployment rate may rise temporarily in the next few months, as stronger job growth lures some discouraged workers back into the labor force. Right now the share of working-age population that is actively involved in the work force — that is, either in a job or actively looking for one — is at 64.2 percent. That is the lowest labor force participation rate in 25 years, an indication that many Americans are waiting for hiring to get better before resuming the job hunt.

Or perhaps they've simply decided to ride 99 weeks of unemployment until they need to work for a living.

Earlier today, economist Mike Shedlock explained the true job numbers. Fortunately for Washington Post cub reporter Ezra Klein, he used very small words.

In the last year, the civilian population rose by 1,853,000. Yet the labor force dropped by 312,000. Those not in the labor force rose by 2,165,000.

In January alone, a whopping 319,000 people dropped out of the workforce. In February (this months' report) another 87,000 people dropped out of the labor force.

Were it not for people dropping out of the labor force, the unemployment rate would be over 11%.

Given the total distortions of reality with respect to not counting people who allegedly dropped out of the work force, it is hard to discuss the numbers...

...The official unemployment rate is 8.9%. However, if you start counting all the people that want a job but gave up, all the people with part-time jobs that want a full-time job, all the people who dropped off the unemployment rolls because their unemployment benefits ran out, etc., you get a closer picture of what the unemployment rate is. That number is in the last row labeled U-6.

While the "official" unemployment rate is an unacceptable 8.9%, U-6 is much higher at 15.9%. Moreover, both the official rate and U-6 would be much higher were it not for huge numbers of people dropping out of the workforce.

Things are much worse than the reported numbers would have you believe.

Of course they are, Ezra. When you have a government that restricts access to energy, dumps thousands of pages of regulations on small businesses, attacks and vilifies industry after industry, takes over vast swaths of the free market, and makes an already byzantine tax code even more complex, you better believe things are getting worse, not better.

Don't believe me. Just ask your neighbors. Unless, that is, you live in Washington, DC.


Hat tip: Memeorandum. Linked by: Michelle Malkin. Thanks!

Thursday, March 03, 2011

Figures: PBS, NPR and other state-run media executives make millions on the backs of the taxpayers

When 'the rich' are those bureaucrats employed or subsidized by the government, should they receive the same hatred and vitriol that Democrats direct at the private sector? After all, it's you and I are that are footing the bill.

PBS President Paula Kerger ... recorded a personal television appeal that told viewers exactly how to contact members of Congress in order to "let your representative know how you feel about the elimination of funding for public broadcasting." But if PBS can pay Ms. Kerger $632,233 in annual compensation—as reported on the 990 tax forms all nonprofits are required to file—surely it can operate without tax dollars.

...[Corporation for Public Broadcasting] President and CEO Patricia de Stacy Harrison received $298,884 in reportable compensation and another $70,630[, but that's] practically a pittance compared to Kevin Klose, president emeritus of NPR, who received more than $1.2 million in compensation, according to the tax forms the nonprofit filed in 2009.

Today's media landscape is a thriving one with few barriers to entry and many competitors, unlike when CPB was created in 1967. In 2011, Americans have thousands of news, entertainment and educational programs to choose from that are available on countless television, radio and Web outlets.

Despite how accessible media has become to Americans over the years, funding for CPB has grown considerably. In 2001, the federal government appropriated $340 million for CPB. Last year it got $420 million. As Congress considers ways to close the $14 trillion deficit, cutting funding for the CPB has even been proposed by President Obama's bipartisan deficit reduction commission. Instead, Mr. Obama wants to increase CPB's funding to $451 million in his latest budget.

Meanwhile, highly successful, brand-name public programs like Sesame Street make millions on their own. "Sesame Street," for example, made more than $211 million from toy and consumer product sales from 2003-2006. Sesame Workshop President and CEO Gary Knell received $956,513 in compensation in 2008. With earnings like that, Big Bird doesn't need the taxpayers to help him compete...

Here's a more fundamental question: does the concept of a state-funded media make any sense whatsoever in the United States of America?

I would assert that it does not.

Kill all funding for state-run media. All of it. Now.


Hat tip: @SissyWillis.

Sunday, February 27, 2011

This Week With Christiane Amanpour in 90 Seconds [Biff Spackle]

[Rush transcript by Biff Spackle - further edits may be forthcoming]

AMANPOUR: This morning, we'll take you on a journey into Libya to visit my close personal friend Colonel Gaddafi and interview his two sons. What do they think of my new haircut? My weathered looking L.L. Bean journalist's vest? And my Estee Lauder makeup, guaranteed to hold up for 24 hours, even during an Islamist uprising?

Closer to home, we'll also visit with Governor Scott Walker, whose controversial strategy of making state employees chip in to their pension plans has touched off rallies nationwide, including some by President Obama's elite Praetorian Guard.

Back to Libya: after weeks of silence President Obama finally asked Colonel Gaddafi to step down saying that it was "in the best interest of my poll numbers." Saif Gaddafi, what do you think of that?

SAIF GADDAFI: Yes, I saw it on TV. I think the show was called Welcome Back, Carter. Let me try and describe how little we care what President Training Wheels has to say: put it this way, I watch Celebrity Rehab with a lot more interest. As for the accusations of violence: show me one person who has complained about being killed! Just one!

AMANPOUR: In the past, you've been described as a reformist tyrant, one open to new ideas of mass-murder and killing. What went wrong?

SAIF GADDAFI: We haven't implemented our reforms fast enough! Our free health care system, GaddafiCare, doesn't really start kicking in until 2014. And some people expressed concern about that, may they rest in peace.

SAADI GADDAFI: Christiane, I love what you've done with your hair! And are you wearing that new 24-hour makeup from Estee Lauder?

{Break}

AMANPOUR: Now, in an unusual turn of events, we're going to switch to our sister network -- NBC -- and it's news show Meet the Press, where David Gregory is standing by.

GREGORY: Thanks, Christiane. We're here with Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker who stands at the center of a storm that pits him against the powerful public sector unions. Governor, why aren't you giving in on collective bargaining since they've generously agreed to chip in to their retirement and health care plans?

WALKER: David, is it okay if I call you schmuck? Okay, schmuck, we have a $3.6 billion deficit and I've resolved not to kick the can down the road, got it? Even today, the unions are rushing to school boards trying to jam through contracts that have zero contributions to their health care and pension plans. And at least in one school system, they're pushing through salary increases as well.

GREGORY: But Governor, the unions have agreed to those contributions, why not accept that? Or are you just a right-wing teabagger like our sister networks, ABC, CBS and MSNBC insist?

WALKER: Schmuck, the two statewide union leaders who made the offer don't have anything to do with the 1,000-plus municipalities, 424 school districts and 72 counties. We're trying to protect all of the taxpayers at every level of government -- and a state union leader can't do that. The unions do things like try to force school districts to buy expensive insurance through their own company -- WEA Trust -- which costs $70 million more than if they bought it on the open market.

GREGORY: Dammit, man, what’s wrong with collective bargaining? For the love of God, why are you trying to destroy the working man in this country (sobbing)??

WALKER: Uhm, schmuck, let me guess: you weren't a math major. I spent eight years as a local official trying to get modest changes to pension and health care through. And because of collective bargaining, unions were able to refuse time and time again, daring me to lay off 400 or 500 people. And in this kind of economy, how can any official do that? How can part-time officials in tiny districts negotiate? We have to destroy collective bargaining for these benefits, because the fiscal time-bomb is ticking.

In fact, if Senate Democrats don't return, we're going to be forced to make thousands of layoffs in a terrible economy.

GREGORY: You got punk'd by a prank caller, which was rilly, rilly funny, and you said that you wanted to emulate Ronald Reagan and his dismissal of the striking air traffic controllers. What is up with that, dude?

WALKER: Is it okay if I call you dumbass now? Anyhow, dumbass, we've kicked the can down the road year after year after year. We can't do it any more, Einstein. We're broke. We have to stand up and confront the problem. Got it, genius?

GREGORY: But... but... what about collective bargaining? Why are you trying to emasculate the unions? Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy?

WALKER: Dumbass, didn't I answer that question, like, ten minutes ago? Collective bargaining has a cost, which your tiny pea-brain can't seem to comprehend, and the local governments need help in negotiating. Got it, this time, Sparky?

GREGORY: Are you needlessly dividing your state?

WALKER: Are you marketing Democrat-Union propaganda?

GREGORY: You can't answer a question with a question! What the hell!

WALKER: Okay, dumbass: those 14 state senators need to come back and do what they were elected to do. To do their job.

GREGORY: And if they don’t–if they don’t, Governor, how does this end? What's your prediction for the outcome?

WALKER: My prediction?

GREGORY: Yes, your prediction.

[Walker looks directly into camera]

WALKER: Pain.

[End Transcript]

Saturday, February 26, 2011

State-Run Media: Government Spending Cuts Will Kill the Economy!

Just a glance at the headline of an article by the AP and published by National Public Radio tells you everything you need to know about state-run media's agenda. Please consider State And Local Budget Cuts Are Slowing US Economy.

Deep spending cuts by state and local governments pose a growing threat to an economy that is already grappling with high unemployment, depressed home prices and the surging cost of oil.

Lawmakers at state capitols and city halls are slashing jobs and programs, arguing that some pain now is better than a lot more later. But the cuts are coming at a price — weaker growth at the national level.


...Newly elected Republican governors are leading the charge. They're acting on campaign pledges to shrink government to meet budget gaps. They favor smaller governments with lower taxes and less regulation, which they say will boost private-sector growth and job creation.

Gee, schmucks: did it ever occur to you that public sector jobs aren't real jobs when it comes to GDP and economic growth? Because the private sector has to pay the freight for all public sector jobs?

And the more public sector jobs the private sector has to support, the worse the real economy?

This calculus is so simple to understand that even the nimrods on the coasts are starting to get it. Please consider The Los Angeles Times' Debt takes a huge chunk out of California's beleaguered budget.

Closing California's deficit this year would be immeasurably easier if the state weren't paying for a 10-year borrowing binge.

Without that tab, officials could scrap plans to close state parks, force nearly a million low-income children to go without eye care and take in-home aid away from hundreds of thousands of elderly, blind and disabled residents.

But the state has had an insatiable appetite for debt in recent years. In the last decade, the debt per resident has tripled, to $2,362, according to the credit-rating agency Moody's Investors Service... That means for every household of four, California owes nearly $9,500 — more than the government spends to put a child through a year of school. In the next budget, the amount devoted to debt repayment is expected to exceed the money invested in California's prized public universities.

...[And b]ecause of its rock-bottom credit rating, California pays a premium for its loans. Taxpayers must fork over roughly $2 for every $1 borrowed — about 20% more than top-rated states,

Excessive debt is literally strangling the states and is about to crush the federal government.

But the loons in state-run media think the states and the federal government should keep on borrowing and spending, not because it will support them, of course. But because it'll "help grow the economy".

Yes, this is economic propaganda at its finest, crafted with the help of your tax dollars.


Friday, February 25, 2011

WaPo does its level best to bury reminders that Obamacare was declared null and void by a federal judge

The Washington Post tried its very best to ignore the biggest Obamacare news story of the day. But they couldn't quite mask it entirely. Please consider the effusive reporting of "States argue against implementing health care law".

Florida and 25 other states suing to stop President Barack Obama's health care overhaul say in a new legal filing that they should be allowed to stop following the law immediately.

The states filed a response late Wednesday to an earlier Justice Department request. The states say a federal judge in Florida declared that the law is unconstitutional, meaning they do not need to implement it.

The Justice Department wants the judge to order the states to follow the law pending an appeal to a higher court.

The entire law was voided by the judge. An injunction was not necessary because there is no law to enforce.

The law is dead. Kaput. Bupkis. And any HHS bureaucrat who is in the process of implementing it risks a violation of 18 USC 641, punishable by up to ten years in prison.

Eric Holder won't be a feckless hack AG forever. And By Crom's Anvil we will pursue and prosecute those who have attempted to rip our society apart.

Remember that, losers. We will pursue you. We're elephants. We never forget.


Thursday, February 24, 2011

In the blue corner: public sector unions... bought-and-paid for Democrat hacks... and legacy media. In the red corner: the American taxpayer...

The union beat-downs of innocents continued today, proving that the violence isn't isolated. It's organized. Community organized, if you will. But maybe they can't help themselves. Maybe Sarah Palin made 'em do it.

Slapping an innocent cameraman, calling him an epithet and then threatening to sodomize him? Check.

Shoving around a 5'1" female blogger who dared to videotape a thuggish bully? Checkety-check

An SEIU thug knocking a Congressional candidate to the ground? Check. And. Mate.


Yes, this should really build a lot of sympathy and good will for the public sector union bosses who rake in hundreds of millions of dollars in dues money -- which they promptly spend on themselves and Democrat politicians in order to steal ever greater amounts of your hard-earned money.

Go pound sand.

There's no money, losers. You can raise taxes to 100% and there's still not enough to pay for your Rolls Royce pension and benefits.

Welcome to the real world.

And that goes double for you pathetic legacy media types who decried non-existent "violent rhetoric" by Sarah Palin after Tucson... but can't seem to find a single instance of actual leftist violence. What with all of your layer upon layer of fact-checking and such.

Get stuffed.


Friday, February 18, 2011

Treasury Secretary Geithner to Senate: "Yes, Obama's Budget Will Cause the United States to Collapse. What Are You Gonna Do About It?"

"What this country needs are more unemployed politicians." -- Edward Langley, Artist (1928-1995)

Yesterday's testimony by the Treasury Secretary in the Senate Budget Committee meeting was shocking for two reasons. First: Tim Geithner as much as admitted that his boss's budget sucks. Second, that legacy media didn't report his shocking admission.

That is: Obama's budget sets the United States on a course of complete economic collapse. And, no, I'm not kidding -- though I wish I were.

Sen. Jeff Sessions: "...Under your budget, the interest increases each year. It was $187 billion in 2009, under your proposal it increases to $844 billion."

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner: "Senator, absolutely, it is an excessively high interest burden, it’s unsustainable."

Sessions: "Well it’s your plan. That’s the plan the President submitted."

Geithner: "You’re absolutely right that with the president’s plan, even if Congress were to enact it, and even if Congress were to hold to it and reduce those deficits to three percent of GDP over the next five years, we would still be left with a very large interest burden and unsustainable obligations over time."

The question, though, is -- just to be direct about it -- what's the alternative plan? ... We'll be able to see from the House, to see from this body, whether you people can find the political will here to go deeper. And if you can find --

Sessions: "Well, what your plan is, that plan, the one you're required by law to submit, and ... it's not acceptable..."

Let me repeat: Interest payments by the federal government were $187 billion in 2009.

Under the Chavez administration, our annual interest payments alone -- alone! -- will total $844 billion. That interest payment is double the worst total Bush-era deficit.

Now that's what I call change.


Hat tip: Mark Levin.