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

Monday, December 30, 2013

HILARIOUSLY APPROPOS: Videotape of Burning Log Beats CBS Morning Show in Nielsen Ratings

If this doesn't prove that vintage media is dying, I don't know what will.

But how’d it do in the demo?

Dallas-Fort Worth local CBS affiliate TXA 21 played a loop of burning yule log on Christmas Eve into the morning of the 25th, accompanied by a holiday selection from a local radio station, and it was a (comparative) ratings hit.

According to Nielsen breakdowns, the “roaring fire” beat a Friends rerun and tied an episode of The Office.

Most surprisingly, however, from 8:45 to 9:00 a.m., as the log was “burning out,” it averaged almost 30,000 viewers, enough to tie that morning’s edition of CBS This Morning on Dallas’ CBS 11 in ratings.

No word on how badly MSNBC got pasted in the ratings, although I believe the all-night laundromat on 34th Street may have doubled 'em.


Hat tip: BadBlue News

Saturday, December 28, 2013

NSA Data Collection Program Called "Orwellian" by Federal Judge Stopped a Total of... Zero Terror Attacks

Last week Federal Judge Richard Leon had some harsh words for the NSA's massive data collection programs, including the one that collects all telephone calls in America:

I cannot imagine a more ‘indiscriminate’ and ‘arbitrary invasion’ than this systematic and high-tech collection and retention of personal data on virtually every single citizen for purposes of querying and analyzing it without prior judicial approval. Surely such a program infringes on ‘that degree of privacy’ that the founders enshrined in the Fourth Amendment...

[It uses] almost-Orwellian technology.

The irony is rich. As Roger Aranoff observes, "...had [this] happened on George Bush’s watch, they could have been calling our government fascist, expressing hyper-outrage, and demanding impeachment."

An investigation by Michael Isikoff of NBC News found that the NSA's unconstitutional domestic data collection programs helped to stop the following number of terror attacks: none.

A member of the White House review panel on NSA surveillance said he was “absolutely” surprised when he discovered the agency’s lack of evidence that the bulk collection of telephone call records had thwarted any terrorist attacks.

...Under the NSA program, first revealed by ex-contractor Edward Snowden, the agency collects in bulk the records of the time and duration of phone calls made by persons inside the United States.

...The conclusions of the panel’s reports were at direct odds with public statements by President Barack Obama and U.S. intelligence officials. “Lives have been saved,” Obama told reporters last June, referring to the bulk collection program and another program that intercepts communications overseas. “We know of at least 50 threats that have been averted because of this information.”

...But in one little-noticed footnote in its report, ... Section 215, based on the provision of the U.S. Patriot Act that provided the legal basis for it – had made “only a modest contribution to the nation’s security.” The report said that “there has been no instance in which NSA could say with confidence that the outcome [of a terror investigation] would have been any different” without the program.

The panel’s findings echoed that of U.S. Judge Richard Leon, who in a ruling this week found the bulk collection program to be unconstitutional. Leon said that government officials were unable to cite “a single instance in which analysis of the NSA’s bulk collection metadata collection actually stopped an imminent attack, or otherwise aided the Government in achieving any objective that was time-sensitive in nature.”

...The comparison between [the] 702 overseas interceptions and 215 bulk metadata collection was “night and day,” said Stone. “With 702, the record is very impressive. It’s no doubt the nation is safer and spared potential attacks because of 702. There was nothing like that for 215. We asked the question and they [the NSA] gave us the data. They were very straight about it.”

In other words, the Obama administration (yawn) lied to the American people yet again.


Hat tip: BadBlue News

Please Congratulate Thomas Friedman of the New York Times for His Dumbest Quote o' the Year Award

The Media Research Center calls the award "The Audacity of Dopes" for the year's most misguided, inane and intellectually bankrupt "analysis".


MRC recognized Melissa ("Tampon Earrings") Harris-Perry as the winner, but it's clear in our view that Friedman was the true winner.


Hat tip: JTT

Thursday, December 26, 2013

Where is Your Spine, America? 6 Truths to Remember

Guest post by Professor Laura Hollis

The unveiling of the dictatorial debacle that is Obamacare absolutely flabbergasts me. It is stunning on so many levels, but the most shocking aspect of it for me is watching millions of free Americans stand idly by while this man, his minions in Congress and his cheerleaders in the press systematically dismantle our Constitution, steal our money, and crush our freedoms.

The President, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid (with no small help from Justice John Roberts) take away our health care, and we allow it. They take away our insurance, and we allow it. They take away our doctors, and we allow it. They charge us thousands of dollars more a year, and we allow it. They make legal products illegal, and we allow it. They cripple our businesses, and we allow it. They announce by fiat that we must ignore our most deeply held beliefs – and we allow it.

Where is your spine, America?

Yes, I know people are complaining. I read the news on the internet. I read blogs. I have a Twitter feed. So what? People in the Soviet Union complained. People in Cuba complain. People in China complain (quietly). Complaining isn’t the same thing as doing anything about it. In fact, much of the complaining that we hear sounds like resignation: Wow. This sucks. Oh well, this is the way things are. Too bad.

Perhaps you need reminding of a few important facts. Here goes:

1. The President is not a king

Barack Obama does not behave like a President, an elected official, someone who realizes that he works for us. He behaves like a king, a dictator – someone who believes that his own pronouncements have the force of law, and who thinks he can dispense with the law’s enforcement when he deigns to do so. And those of us who object? How dare we? Racists!

And while he moves steadily “forward” with his plans to “fundamentally transform” the greatest country in human history, he distracts people with cheap, meaningless trivialities, like “free birth control pills”! (In fact, let’s face it: this administration’s odd obsession with sex in general - Birth control! Abortion! Sterilization! Gay guys who play basketball! -- is just plain weird. Since when did the leader of the free world care so much about how people have sex, who they have it with, and what meds they use when they have it? Does he have nothing more important to concern himself with?)

2. It isn’t just a failed software program; it is a failed philosophy

People are marveling that Healthcare.gov was such a spectacular failure. Well, if one is only interested in it as a product launch, I’ve explained some of the reasons for that here. But the larger point is that it isn’t a software failure, or even a product failure; it is a philosophy failure.

Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Congratulations to Ruth Marcus and David Gergen, 2013 Winners of MRC's Most Hilarious Commentary Awards

The Media Research Center has awarded its annual prizes for the year's worst reporting. Congratulations are due to Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus and CNN's David Gergen, who were named co-winners for the funniest commentary of 2013.


You can see the complete slate of winners here. Congratulations to all of the award recipients: you're truly among the world's worst reporters!


NEW COMIC BOOK: The Adventures of Krugtron the Invincible

Based upon "WHY PAUL KRUGMAN DOESN’T LIKE US. AND VICE VERSA"


For more epic mockery of Krugman's inane and error-prone "analyses", see Krugtron the Invincible, Part I, Part II, and Part III by historian Niall Ferguson.


Monday, December 23, 2013

Politifact Has Now Officially Completed its Transition From Embarrassment to Laughingstock

Guest post by Jon Cassidy

When the White House press secretary can mock you for your evasive, evolving explanations, it’s time to get out of the fact-checking game.

PolitiFact’s 2013 Lie of the Year may be the most dishonest thing it has ever done. It takes the tatters of the organization’s reputation and rips them into smaller tatters — call ’em tatteritos.

The newspapers around the country that signed on with PolitiFact when it seemed like such a good idea ought to pull their support now. They can fact check the right way on their own if they want.

If they care about their own credibility, they need to part ways with PolitiFact, which refuses to abide by a basic principle of journalism: acknowledging and correcting one’s errors.

Saturday, December 21, 2013

THE ADVENTURES OF PAJAMABOY: Duck Dynasty Edition

With a tip o' the beret to iOwnTheWorld:


Biff Spackle says he's never gonna get tired of "peein' on Pajamaboy".


THE ADVENTURES OF PAJAMABOY: PJ-Boy Considers Joining the Military Edition

Biff Spackle:


As an aside, have you seen Rep. Steve Stockman's awesome poster?


Stockman's the real deal. You can support him over the RINO Cornyn by clicking here.


LAPDOG MEDIA COMIX: CNN's Brianna Keilar, Laughingstock Edition

"Hump that leg," Brianna:


Feel free to retweet my thanks (below) to Brianna for this tough question, coming as it does on the heels of the collapse of Obamacare's Individual Mandate, a federal court smacking down the NSA's data collection on American citizens, another federal judge hammering the administration for helping Mexican drug cartels traffic in human beings, and revelations the president systematically delayed controversial regulations until after the 2012 election. All of these scandals have come in the last four days alone, but there are dozens more to choose from, "Bri" (or is it "Brie", like the cheese?).


I would call the media a joke, but I don't want to unfairly lump them in with real comedians.

Friday, December 20, 2013

The Adventures of Pajamaboy

Because MSNBC says that "Santa could be transgender", Biff Spackle presents the following:


It would seem that our leftist pals have made quoting the bible a crime.

Which doesn't bode well for a society based on Judeo-Christian values.


Wednesday, December 18, 2013

When Memes Collide

When some ask "why?", I ask "why not?"


Twitchy calls it "Twitter Gold" -- and they're right!


Tuesday, December 17, 2013

A Quiet Rage Building Across the Nation

Guest post by Richard Larsen

Earlier this week I posted a graphic on my FaceBook wall that stated, “All across America a quiet rage is building against the assault upon American values. More so than ever in the history of America, the concerns and patience of its people are being tested, tried, and attacked by a group of elitists that are hell-bent on the destruction of this country.” It then ended with the phrase, “Refuse to remain silent!”

The post elicited responses by some who concurred with the sentiment, and some who didn’t. The posting afforded a teaching moment about what the right of the political spectrum feels about the “fundamental transformation of America” that has been occurring for several years, but accelerated dramatically over the past five.

Some were upset that the term “rage” was used, and thought it improper to be enraged toward those who’re dismantling our republic. But in a politico-cultural context, emotions like anger and rage can be a powerful motivator, especially in regard to values, convictions, and ideals that are violated and impinged upon.

Likewise, those of us who treasure America as the land of the free and the home of the brave, see contemporary statists, those who are actively engaged in expanding centralized governmental authority at the expense of personal liberty, as adulterators and enemies of freedom.

They are “fundamentally transforming America” into a fiercely potent centralized government that was never intended for this republic; a fascist police state that, regulates, coerces, bullies, and spies on its citizens. And they have done it surreptitiously, clandestinely, and dishonestly. How any thinking person, who professes love for America, can accede to the destruction of American idealism perpetrated by those who have a stated objective of “fundamentally transforming” the nation is beyond my comprehension!

A Dramatic Poetry Reading By Mr. B. H. Soetero

See if you recognize any of these.


And, no, I'm not a birther, but it would seem that Mr. Obama is.


Saturday, December 14, 2013

OH, THE HUMANITY: Warmal Colding Strikes Syria

I wonder how the climate grifters like Michael "Piltdown" Mann will explain Earth's slow, inevitable slide into global cooling? You know, caused by the one factor the Climategate kooks forgot to countenance? You may know it as the "Sun":


Quick! Someone find fat-boy some tree rings -- I hear they taste like onion rings!


Democrat Logic Comics, Episode #18

Yes, this really appears to be their argument.


More here.


Media Matters: "The war on Fox is over and... we won"

It's true. Media Matters, the Soros-funded, anti-veracity, left-wing goon squad has defeated Fox News on the field of open and public debate.

Bryan Preston has all of the gory details and I pulled the Alexa traffic rankings to prove it.


I really don't know what else to say except for: so long, Fox. It's been great knowing you.

Hashtag #delusional.


Hat tip: BadBlue Uncensored News.

Thursday, December 12, 2013

Check out the final front page of The Onion's print version

As reported by Crain's Chicago Business, the final print version of The Onion was published today. Onion Vice Chairman Douglas Siegfried Zweibel wrote the following open letter to other media outlets:

A Message From The Onion's, Vice Chairman, Douglas Siegfried Zweibel

Wed, Dec 11, 2013 19:13 EST

To Whom It May Concern,

Please enjoy the latest print edition of the The Onion, America's Finest News Source, on newsstands now in every city on the planet. As but a mere speck of a crumb in the shadow of The Onion, you are no doubt aware that our newspaper's print revenues accounted for nearly 45% of the national GDP in 2013, making The Onion by far the most successful print-based media corporation in the world, and the vanguard of the burgeoning Print Media Revolution. May this most recent hard-copy issue serve as a subtle reminder of our disgusting wealth and prestige.

Cower before us, pathetic peon, and know that no matter what breed of calamity shall soon befall this doomed hellscape we call Earth, The Onion's print edition shall never die, shall never be rendered obsolete, shall never fall prey to a sudden and irreversible shift in the global media marketplace, and shall always be there, every week, until humanity itself has, God willing, passed from the cosmos.

Tu Stultus Es ,

Douglas Siegfried Zweibel

Vice Chairman

The Onion , America's Finest News Source

The Onion

730 N. Franklin, Floor 7

Chicago, IL 60654

Hat tip: the finest news aggregator in the local super-cluster, BadBlue News.

FIRST AMENDMENT? WHAT FIRST AMENDMENT? FCC to interrogate local news media to ensure appropriate content

The hard left Democrat Party despises free speech and every sunrise seems to bring new proof.

The Obama administration, like some sort of tinpot dictatorship, has created its own propaganda broadcasts, restricted press access to the president, seized phone records of 100 Associated Press reporters, wiretapped others, and publicly excoriated or banned media outlets that offered unfavorable coverage of the White House.

Now the next phase of the Obama administration's totalitarian scheme has begun, as Tim Cavanaugh describes.

It is, among other things, a thinly disguised attack on conservative talk radio.

The Federal Communications Commission is planning a broad probe of political speech across media platforms, an unprecedented move that raises serious First Amendment concerns.

The FCC’s proposed “Multi-Market Study of Critical Information Needs,” which is set to begin a field test in a single market with an eye toward a comprehensive study in 2014, would collect a remarkably wide range of information on demographics, point of view, news topic selection, management style and other factors in news organizations both in and out of the FCC’s traditional purview.

The airwaves regulator would also subject news producers in all media to invasive questioning about their work and content.

A methodology (PDF) worked up by Silver Spring, Maryland-based Social Solutions International (SSI) says that in addition to its general evaluation of news content, the survey will include a “qualitative component” featuring interrogations of news organization owners, management and employees.

Among the questions federal contractors will be asking of private media companies... [f]or media owners:

“What is the news philosophy of the station?”

For editors, producers and managers:

...“Who decides which stories are covered?”

For reporters:

“Have you ever suggested coverage of what you consider a story with critical information for your customers (viewers, listeners, readers) that was rejected by management?” (Followup questions ask the reporter to speculate on why a particular story was spiked.)

According to a May article in Communications Daily, Social Solutions International will be paid $917,823 for the study, which also questions news consumers about their habits and numerically codes news content according to how well, in the FCC’s view, it meets the “critical information needs” (CIN) of particular “communities.”

FCC Chairwoman "Mignon Clyburn" (yes, that's her name and she is related -- I'm sure -- to the far left, perma-politician James Clyburn) claims that "...the FCC has a duty to make sure that the industries it regulates serve the needs of the American public no matter where they live or what financial resources they have..."

Wrong, Filet. The FCC is to abide, first and foremost, by the Constitution. You have no -- zero -- right to interfere with media companies.

“In this study, the FCC will delve into the editorial discretion of newspapers, web sites and radio and TV stations,” Hudson Institute Fellow Robert McDowell, who served as an FCC commissioner from 2009 to 2013, told The Daily Caller. “This starts sticking the government’s nose into what has traditionally been privileged and protected ground. Regardless of one’s political stripes, one should be concerned.”

I urge all media outlets to refuse to cooperate with the FCC.

Our free speech rights aren't subject to the whims of these Marxist hacks.

Every single media outlet should reject the FCC's intrusive interrogatories on constitutional grounds.


Hat tip: Mark Levin.

Wednesday, December 11, 2013

MARK LEVIN ON OBAMA'S HANDSHAKE WITH CASTRO: "The bigger the gulags that they have, the more deference he gives them"

Yesterday Mark Levin returned to the microphone, offering some choice words for Barack Obama and his bizarre deference for mass-murdering dictators.

All this talk about the memorial for Nelson Mandela in South Africa. And Obama conducting himself in a reckless manner because that's what he does for which he's cheered on by the lib media. Honestly, I was surprised that Obama and Raul Castro didn't exchange spit. Really.

We all know Obama has an affinity toward these totalitarian regimes. I'm not surprised in the least. And he's bowing to them and shaking their hands -- almost the bigger the gulags that they have, the more deference he gives them.

And I was thinking about this, and I'm not going to waste a lot of time on it because folks, here's the truth, no one will remember what Obama said in South Africa. We don't even remember what he said today and he said it today. No one will remember much about that memorial other than it was for Mandela. So, take that to heart.

But, I was thinking. When Obama leaves office, there won't be tens of millions of people newly freed from behind the Iron Curtain, or under the thumb of some third world dictator, and so forth as they were under Reagan and Thatcher. Margaret Thatcher was responsible for -- along with John Paul II and Ronald Reagan -- the freedom of over a hundred million people behind the Iron Curtain, and with Reagan, also in our own hemisphere in toto.

Obama won't be in any such movements. In fact, I dare say more people will be imprisoned and enslaved when he leaves office then before he came to office. And it's a disgrace -- as I said maybe two weeks ago, but certainly last week -- how our government, the Obama administration, treated the passing of Margaret Thatcher, who is responsible for the freedom of more people than any of Obama's favorite leaders or what have you. Absolute disgrace.

And there they are clowning it up, acting goofy, in the stands, in the cheap seats. Just ridiculous. I listened to Obama for Obama for about fourteen seconds and there he was again, what effect Mandela had on him. He started with the I, I, I. I said that's enough, I don't need to hear this crap. And I didn't and I'm not playing any the clips either because I don't care what he said. It doesn't matter to me. It doesn't affect my life nor yours.

One thing that did happen there that should draw our attention, at least to a point, as pointed out in the White House Dossier website. When Former President Bush, George W. Bush, when his face appeared on the video monitor at the memorial, in Johannesburg, he was booed. He was booed according to the White House poll report, which cited local press outlets.

Now, when the images of Obama and his wife popped up there was a thirty-second deafening roar, the pool writer wrote.

George W. Bush did more for South Africa and Africa period than Barack Obama has ever done. Obama is better at crafting his public image and saying the right things.

Bush personally saved the lives of millions of South Africans with his President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, ensuring AIDS drugs are available to South Africa’s impoverished masses.

And he's booed. He's booed. The Washington Compost talked about the success of this program. It said:

In South Africa, the success ( of PEPFAR) was extraordinary. AIDS killed roughly 2.3 million in South Africa -- once one of the worst-affected countries in the world -- and orphaned about a million children there, according to the United Nations. Today, rates of infection have fallen to 30 percent, and nearly 2 million people are on antiretroviral drugs.

Meanwhile, Obama has cut this program and generally has been customarily inattentive to it, as The Washington Post essentially reported. He's cheered, Bush is booed, the media is slobbering all over Obama.

Larry Elder also posed an excellent question that is sure to be ignored by the left and vintage media (but I repeat myself).



Hat tip: BadBlue News.