By now almost everyone has seen the viral video of Bill Moyers destroying O'Reilly Factor producer, Porter Barry, after being ambushed at the The National Conference for Media Reform. If not, it follows below. But first check out Bill O'Reilly's lame attempt to get back at Moyers via the ridiculous "Body Language" segment.
Supreme Court expert Jeffrey Toobin explained to Bill Moyers last night that the real intent behind GOP sponsored Voter ID laws which the Supreme Court recently ruled were Constitutional was "to stop Democrats from voting":
Jeffrey Toobin: "I thought it was a bad decision but a predictable one. Because it was a very clear attempt by Republicans to stop Democrats from voting. I don't think there is any doubt about what the motivation was of that law. It didn't say that in the text of the law and the aim of stopping fraud was one that we all can embrace. But the fact is electoral fraud scarcely exists in this country. The real agenda was to help Republicans."
In fact, the man who led the Bush administration's efforts on the Photo ID front, John Tanner, even admitted that the laws disenfranchise elderly voters. Tanner, who eventually was forced to resign for making insane comments (see below) that I caught on video and blogged about at Brad Blog, called it a "shame" that the elderly would be disenfranchised by Voter ID laws:
"And I think that it is probably true that among those who don't [have Photo IDs] is primarily elderly persons. And that's a shame. You know, creating problems for elderly persons is not good under any circumstance.
Of course, that also ties in to the racial aspect because our society is such that minorities don't become elderly the way white people do. They die first. There are inequities in health care. There are a variety of inequities in this country. And so anything that disproportionately impacts the elderly has the opposite impact on minorities. Just the math is such as that."
Thus, we are left with a situation where the Supreme Court ruled a law Constitutional that the government admits will disenfranchise untold Americans in an effort to prevent voter fraud which the government and the Supreme Court admit is virtually non-existent.
Thus the Supreme Court, the Bush administration and Republican operatives across the country have set back our democracy decades. And this will only be the beginning if John McCain, who wants to appoint more Supreme Court judges in the Bush mold, is elected and gets to replace the 88 year-old Stevens, 75 year-old Ginsburg, 69 year-old Breyer or 68 year-old Souter.
Bill Moyers eloquent and thoughtful essay (6:26) about the Jeremiah Wright controversy. Note that Moyers references the double standard in the media between black preachers like Jeremiah Wright and white ones like John Hagee with whom I recently spoke to and asked about the controversy surrounding his endorsement of John McCain. When speaking to me at a lunch attended by mostly Jews Hagee blamed everything on his support for Israel. You can read a transcript of our conversation and listen to the audio here.
It appears that Hot Potato Mash has more Iraq war coverage than the mainstream media. From today's New York Times:
The three broadcast networks’ nightly newscasts devoted more than 4,100 minutes to Iraq in 2003 and 3,000 in 2004, before leveling off at about 2,000 a year, according to Andrew Tyndall, who monitors the broadcasts and posts detailed breakdowns at tyndallreport.com. And by the last months of 2007, he said, the broadcasts were spending half as much time on Iraq as earlier in the year.
Since the start of last year, the Project for Excellence in Journalism, a part of the nonprofit Pew Research Center, has tracked reporting by several dozen major newspapers, cable stations, broadcast television networks, Web sites and radio programs. Iraq accounted for 18 percent of their prominent news coverage in the first nine months of 2007, but only 9 percent in the following three months, and 3 percent so far this year. (emphasis is mine)
The policy debate in Washington that dominated last year’s Iraq coverage has almost disappeared from the news. And reporting on events in Iraq has fallen by more than two-thirds from a year ago.
Clearly the MSM just doesn't care about our soldiers fighting and dying in Iraq. Soldiers like Tomas Young seen in the two videos below and the soon to be released documentary “Body of War”. For more on Young see my post at Brad Blog.
I had a dear friend who had a nervous breakdown because he could not stand being black here. He could not stand the bullshit, no matter how his friends of all races loved him. He kept yelling about not being able to leave his skin. He moved to Africa. Born and raised and 38 years old all American boy had to move to Africa to find a life where his skin was not alienating him from his very life.
Heard someone griping about how there is no provision for race on the internet. They thought it was wrong, a bad omission. I think that is wrong. I love that I don't know anyone's color. I love that I don't have to watch people putting things in the context of their race. I love that I could be giving people in pain like my friend's a rest from that awful alienation. I love that people can love or hate or have any honest feeling toward each other on the internet without race ever being a factor. All it ever is out there is people hating your color or people jumping out of their own assholes not to hate your color... the choices my friend said drove him mad. “It's all being racist or anti-racist, which are both the same thing. We never get to just be together.”
Part 1 - Do yourself a favor and at least watch the first part. Of course, don't count on being able to stop when you're done with Part 1. Republican Constitutional scholar Bruce Fein (he wrote the first article of impeachment against President Bill Clinton) and The Nation's John Nichols (“The Genius of Impeachment: The Founders' Cure for Royalism” (John Nichols)) interviewed by Moyers...
Part 2 - Okay, you absolutely have to watch Part 2.
Part 3 - Sorry, gotta watch this one too.
Part 4 - Yeah, um, I wouldn't skip this one either.
Part 5 - Well, if you made it this far I need not say much more. Please proceed to the final part.
The idea of Rupert Murdoch taking over the Wall Street Journal is obscene and insane. His media empire plays a pivotal role in the right wing propaganda machine that has helped Republicans steal the White House twice and basically killed Democracy in this country. If anything, Congress should be looking to limit the power of Murdoch's empire. Yet, should Murdoch reach an agreement to buy the Journal which appears likely, Congress and the government bureaucracy wouldn't dare block the transaction because they are already in Murdoch's pocket or out of fear of being swiftboated by the entire News Corp media empire.
Of course, to provide cover the government will likely require Murdoch to shed some random property - like a radio station in Des Moines or a billboard in Tacoma - to give the appearance of government oversight and legitimacy. Then the think tank punditry will flood the airwaves - think American Enterprise Institute (AEI) - wondering if Murdoch will proceed with the deal now that the government is extracting such a heavy price from him on top of the money he will layout for the Journal. After pondering the government's outrageous demands for a few days, Murdoch will miraculously find a buyer overnight for said random whatever and proceed with the deal.
And there will only be 300 million losers from this deal.
Bill Moyers Journal returns to PBS tonight with “Buying the War”, a 90-minute exploration of the role that the press played in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq. If the repeated attacks on Moyers over the last two days by Fox News is any indication, it figures to be an excellent documentary. Per PBS, check your local listings.
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