Logan Suspended
I am kind of shocked about CBS suspending Lara Logan, simply for presenting a fictional news report as fact. Guess I have become cynical.
Do you remember way back in May, when the mainstream press was full of stories about Obama's "scandals," without quotes? None of them turned out to be scandalous, but those who would like to malign the President keep looking for something. Some kind of shenanigans were alleged around the Benghazi attack, cover-ups and talking points and who knew what when, and it was all sound and fury that most of the world disregarded, but a hard anti-Obama core kept pounding the drums.
So it was strange on October 27th when Sixty Minutes ran a story about the Benghazi incident. The story focused on the reports of a man who claimed he was there, he saw everything. Then the Washington Post turned up his initial report of the incident, which said he had been nowhere near the attack. His publisher -- a rightwing imprint owned by CBS -- recalled his books. The man claimed he was "in danger" and went into hiding.
The reporter who had carried the story, Lara Logan, gave a speech last year about how the President is lying about the Middle East. She is married to an operative who spent much of his career planting propaganda in the Middle East, while hiding the source of the information.
CBS clammed up. They stood by their story. Then a couple of weeks ago Logan said she had made a mistake.
Then yesterday, from CNN:
In my lifetime, the nadir of intellectual debate occurred in the run-up to the attack on Iraq, when you could not criticize GW Bush or the government (remember the Dixie Chicks?) without the most severe repercussions. Last week Andrew Sullivan published his regrets for his support of the American decimation of Iraq, and it is hard reading -- I think a lot of Americans would like to forget just how gullibly wrong we were, how easily the public, even a smart guy like Sullivan, was manipulated by the press. It took a strong will to see clearly, to resist the urge to get even with somebody after 9/11, and there weren't very many strong wills around.
That era set a precedent that has become the baseline for contemporary media. Nothing needs to be accurate, or true. Networks and web sites need to make money, they need content that will attract viewers, there is nothing more to it. The Lara Logan story shows though that the media can be held accountable if people will speak out.
Do you remember way back in May, when the mainstream press was full of stories about Obama's "scandals," without quotes? None of them turned out to be scandalous, but those who would like to malign the President keep looking for something. Some kind of shenanigans were alleged around the Benghazi attack, cover-ups and talking points and who knew what when, and it was all sound and fury that most of the world disregarded, but a hard anti-Obama core kept pounding the drums.
So it was strange on October 27th when Sixty Minutes ran a story about the Benghazi incident. The story focused on the reports of a man who claimed he was there, he saw everything. Then the Washington Post turned up his initial report of the incident, which said he had been nowhere near the attack. His publisher -- a rightwing imprint owned by CBS -- recalled his books. The man claimed he was "in danger" and went into hiding.
The reporter who had carried the story, Lara Logan, gave a speech last year about how the President is lying about the Middle East. She is married to an operative who spent much of his career planting propaganda in the Middle East, while hiding the source of the information.
CBS clammed up. They stood by their story. Then a couple of weeks ago Logan said she had made a mistake.
Then yesterday, from CNN:
Lara Logan, the CBS correspondent at the center of a discredited October 27 report about the attack on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, is taking a leave of absence from work, the network said Tuesday.CBS tried to explain that it had been a "mistake" to rely on Dylan Davies' interview for the story, but Frank Rich got it just right in the New York Magazine: CBS’s Benghazi Report Was a Hoax, Not a Mistake. You don't make that kind of mistake accidentally.
Logan's longtime producer, Max McClellan, is also taking time off. CBS suggested that the leaves of absence were punitive measures for the shortcomings in the Benghazi report, which has stung the reputations of both Logan and the program that televised her report, "60 Minutes."
With the staff announcements on Tuesday and the release of an internal review, CBS tried to demonstrate that it has figured out what went wrong with its Benghazi report and taken steps to stop similar mistakes in the future. "The '60 Minutes' journalistic review is concluded, and we are implementing ongoing changes based on its results," a CBS News spokeswoman said Tuesday. CBS' Lara Logan, producer on leave after discredited Benghazi report
In my lifetime, the nadir of intellectual debate occurred in the run-up to the attack on Iraq, when you could not criticize GW Bush or the government (remember the Dixie Chicks?) without the most severe repercussions. Last week Andrew Sullivan published his regrets for his support of the American decimation of Iraq, and it is hard reading -- I think a lot of Americans would like to forget just how gullibly wrong we were, how easily the public, even a smart guy like Sullivan, was manipulated by the press. It took a strong will to see clearly, to resist the urge to get even with somebody after 9/11, and there weren't very many strong wills around.
That era set a precedent that has become the baseline for contemporary media. Nothing needs to be accurate, or true. Networks and web sites need to make money, they need content that will attract viewers, there is nothing more to it. The Lara Logan story shows though that the media can be held accountable if people will speak out.
posted by JimK at 12:03 PM
47 Comments:
The WMD thing was so believable.
Salon ("Lara Logan’s Benghazi nightmare festers") has a few more pertinent details:
"...As progressive blogger Heather Parton, better known as “Digby,” revealed earlier this month (before discussing it with us on The BradCast) Logan harbors hard-right “war hawk” proclivities, and had called publicly for the U.S. to “exact revenge” for the Benghazi attack just one month after it was carried out. That point was also noted by Ortiz in the summary of his internal report as another one of several errors made by CBS and ”60 Minutes” in their production of their now discredited story …
–In October of 2012, one month before starting work on the Benghazi story, Logan made a speech in which she took a strong public position arguing that the US Government was misrepresenting the threat from Al Qaeda, and urging actions that the US should take in response to the Benghazi attack. From a CBS News Standards perspective, there is a conflict in taking a public position on the government’s handling of Benghazi and Al Qaeda, while continuing to report on the story.
Before it all fell apart, Logan and CBS News had stood by the story for almost two weeks, claiming that they had spent more than a year working on the story, and had interviewed some 100 sources to ensure its accuracy. Almost none of the known problems with the Oct. 27, 2013, report were fully acknowledged by Logan during her tepid 97-second on-air “apology” at the very end of the Nov. 10, 2013, “60 Minutes” broadcast.
Logan and McClellan’s temporary dismissal at CBS is in contrast to the permanent removal of four veteran producers and correspondent Dan Rather, who was also the anchor of CBS Evening News at the time, after a 2004 “60 Minutes II” report on George W. Bush’s absence from service in the Texas Air National Guard caused an uproar among the right-wing blogosphere. Though the authenticity of one of the documents used in that report has never been verified, the substance of the report was not disputed by the Bush administration and has since been confirmed to be true.
Meanwhile, Fox “News” — which relied, in a number of stories, on the very same fraudulent source used by “60 Minutes” — has failed to apologize, correct or retract any of their own bogus reports from that source. Fox has been a hub for fraudulent reporting on the Benghazi incident for more than a year. Should Logan not return to CBS, we suspect there will be a job offer waiting for her at Fox “News,” where her politics will be warmly welcomed along with many other discredited “journalists” now proudly featured on the “news” network."
Happy war on Christmas, everyone.
Fox News not outraged by retailers’ War on Thanksgiving
Before you go shopping, if you think money can't buy happiness, you're spending it wrong
Give me your sandwich - Obamacare simplified
Couples across Hawaii began exchanging vows as the clock struck midnight on Monday, signaling the official start of marriage equality in the state.
“We have lived our lives as first-class citizens who are law-abiding, taxpaying, and contributing members of the community,” said one of the couples, Donna Gedge and Monica Montgomery, in a prepared statement. “Yet we are legally recognized as second-class citizens as we do not have Federal rights. Getting married means that we will have the first-class legal status as well as the rights and benefits that only marriage will afford us.”
Lawmakers passed marriage equality in November, after Gov. Neil Abercrombie called a special session specifically to address the matter.
The move is a boon for equal rights in the state, but it may also be a great move for Hawaii’s economy, according to Sumner Lacroix, an economist at the University of Hawaii.
“Same sex couples will be attracted to Hawaii for the same reasons that opposite sex couples are attracted to Hawaii,” Lacroix told NPR. “It’s the great weather, it’s the warm water, it’s the beautiful scenery. And it’s also the aloha spirit.”
Lacroix estimates that gay marriage will boost tourism in Hawaii by $217 million over the next three years.
"Lacroix estimates that gay marriage will boost tourism in Hawaii by $217 million over the next three years"
fascinating
Hunger Games: Catching Fire made more than that in two weeks
"News from Santa’s Grotto:
Global warming hysterics at the BBC warned us in 2007 that by summer 2013, the Arctic would be ice-free. As with so many other doomsday predictions by warmists, the results turn out to be quite the opposite.
Meanwhile, down the other end at Santa’s summer vacation condo:
Antarctic sea ice has grown to a record large extent for a second straight year, baffling scientists seeking to understand why this ice is expanding rather than shrinking in a warming world.
Antarctic ice is now at a 35-year high. But scientists are “baffled” by the planet’s stubborn refusal to submit to their climate models. Maybe the problem with Nobel fantasist Michael Mann’s increasingly discredited hockey stick is that he’s holding it upside down.
Nonetheless, the famously settled science seems to be re-settling:
Scientists Increasingly Moving To Global Cooling Consensus
Global warming will kill us.
Global cooling will kill us.
And if it’s 54 and partly cloudy, you should probably flee for your life right now. Maybe scientists might usefully consider moving to being less hung up on “consensus” – a most unscientific and, in this context, profoundly corrupting concept."
Critics of those who claim that man-made global warming is a serious threat to the planet and settled science frequently point to the fickleness of scientists on the issue, noting that in the 60s and 70s scientists were warning of just the opposite. It now appears the critic’s claims may have merit as a new consensus is beginning to once again return to the global cooling model.
Adherents of man-made global warming have supported the issue in a way akin to that of religious zealots, even to the point of attempting to cover up evidence that runs contrary to their beliefs or portrays it in a negative light.
Global warming has been blamed for every recent catastrophe including wildfires in America even when they have been started by human activity, Hurricane Sandy, and even for the recent rash of cold spells that have descended upon much of the world.
However, even in the midst of their support for the theory, they appear to have acknowledged there are serious issues with claiming that record cold winters are the result of global warming. In the 1990s, they frequently made calls for governments to take steps to issue regulations to curtail “global warming.” However, they now generally do not use the phrase any longer, instead calling on combating “climate change.”
It is unclear exactly how that is supposed to happen since the very definition itself means that if the weather changes from one day to the next that is climate change.
However, scientists are now beginning to rethink their climate change models and are seriously discussing the possibility the earth is entering into a period of global cooling.
Environmentalist Lawrence Solomon writing in the Financial Post cites the fact that solar activity is currently decreasing at one of the fastest rates as anytime the last 10,000 years. Because of this, he says many scientists are actually reverting from the mantra of global warming and are now subscribing to the possibility of global cooling as occurring.
“Now an increasing number of scientists are swinging back to the thinking of the 1960s and 1970s,” Solomon writes. “The global cooling hypothesis may have been right after all, they say. Earth may be entering a new Little Ice Age.”
He further goes on to note that Columbia University’s George Kukla- who warned the US government about the dangers of global cooling back in 1972 claimed that global warming “always precedes an ice age… The warming we saw in the 1980s and 1990s, in other words, was expected all along, much as the calm before the storm.”
One of the public-relations problems facing man-made global warming adherents is that individuals are able to look around and see the effects of increasingly cold weather that they are able to experience personally. Europe and many parts of America have experienced record snowfalls at even later periods in the year in recent years. This causes people to ask if the alarmists are warning about the planet getting warmer, then how can they explain it getting colder.
Rather than blame man-made activity for weather change on the planet, scientists have recently begun looking at solar activity as a predictor of world climate. Data available has revealed that low solar activity has been connected with cold eras in human history, while the opposite has occurred during higher solar activity such as what happened during the recent period form the 1950s to the 1990s.
Evidence of solar activity affecting climate appeared on Mars, when a probe revealed that the planet’s icepack was also experiencing global warming and receding. This prompted skeptics of man-made global warming to mockingly say that it is amazing how our probes are now causing global warming on Mars.
Singapore-sized chunk of ice breaks away from Antarctica and is now adrift
"A chunk of ice the size of the island nation of Singapore broke off of the continent of Antarctica late last month and is currently adrift at sea.
NASA satellite images taken on Oct. 28 and Nov. 13 show the before and after images of the break.
A crack was first detected in the pine island glacier years ago. Gradually it deepened into a rift and now, a full detachment from the continental mass.
Scientists say the city-sized iceberg measures roughly 35 by 20 km. (22 by 12 mi.) and that it is anybody’s guess whether the iceberg will stay trapped in Pine Island bay or get set adrift in the Southern Ocean.
Watch the video here."
happens all the time
that's how icebergs form
Antarctic sea ice has grown to a record large extent for a second straight year, baffling scientists seeking to understand why this ice is expanding rather than shrinking in a warming world.
Antarctic ice is now at a 35-year high. But scientists are “baffled” by the planet’s stubborn refusal to submit to their climate models.
The increasing Antarctic ice is especially perplexing since the water beneath the ice has warmed, not cooled.
“The overwhelming evidence is that the Southern Ocean is warming,” said Jinlun Zhang, a University of Washington scientist, studying Antarctic ice. “Why would sea ice be increasing? Although the rate of increase is small, it is a puzzle to scientists.”
In a new study in the Journal of Climate, Zhang finds both strengthening and converging winds around the South Pole can explain 80 percent of the increase in ice volume which has been observed.
“The polar vortex that swirls around the South Pole is not just stronger than it was when satellite records began in the 1970s, it has more convergence, meaning it shoves the sea ice together to cause ridging,” the study’s press release explains. “Stronger winds also drive ice faster, which leads to still more deformation and ridging. This creates thicker, longer-lasting ice, while exposing surrounding water and thin ice to the blistering cold winds that cause more ice growth.”
But no one seems to have a conclusive answer as to why winds are behaving this way.
“I haven’t seen a clear explanation yet of why the winds have gotten stronger,” Zhang told Michael Lemonick of Climate Central.
Some point to stratospheric ozone depletion, but a new study published in the Journal of Climate notes that computer models simulate declining – not increasing – Antarctic sea ice in recent decades due to this phenomenon (aka the ozone “hole”).
“This modeled Antarctic sea ice decrease in the last three decades is at odds with observations, which show a small yet statistically significant increase in sea ice extent,” says the study, led by Colorado State University atmospheric scientist Elizabeth Barnes.
A recent study by Lorenzo Polvani and Karen Smith of Columbia University says the model-defying sea ice increase may just reflect natural variability.
If the increase in ice is due to natural variability, Zhang says, warming from manmade greenhouse gases should eventually overcome it and cause the ice to begin retreating.
“If the warming continues, at some point the trend will reverse,” Zhang said.
However, a conclusion of the Barnes study is that the recovery of the stratospheric ozone layer – now underway – may slow/delay Antarctic warming and ice melt.
Ultimately, it’s apparent the relationship between ozone depletion, climate warming from greenhouse gases, natural variability, and how Antarctic ice responds is all very complicated. In sharp contrast, in the Arctic, there seems to be a relatively straight forward relationship between temperature and ice extent.
Thus, in the Antarctic, we shouldn’t necessarily expect to witness the kind of steep decline in ice that has occurred in the Arctic.
“…the seeming paradox of Antarctic ice increasing while Arctic ice is decreasing is really no paradox at all,” explains Climate Central’s Lemonick. “The Arctic is an ocean surrounded by land, while the Antarctic is land surrounded by ocean. In the Arctic, moreover, you’ve got sea ice decreasing in the summer; at the opposite pole, you’ve got sea ice increasing in the winter. It’s not just an apples-and-oranges comparison: it’s more like comparing apple pie with orange juice.”
sounds like the current batch of scientists have failed to carry the ideals of the profession and substituted "consensus" for empirical objectivity
these bunch of "Keystone Cops" scientists will spin in rhetorical circles designed to obscure one inconvenient fact:
their past predictions have not came to past and they have no idea what will happen next
it's obvious no one should rely on their advice to legitimize massive economic redistribution
It’s fine that a president staffing his administration should need 51 votes rather than 60. Doing so for judicial appointments, which are for life, is a bit dicier.
The violence to constitutional norms here consisted in how that change was executed. By brute force — a near party-line vote of 52-48. This was a disgraceful violation of more than two centuries of precedent. If a bare majority can change the fundamental rules that govern an institution, then there are no rules. Senate rules today are whatever the majority decides they are that morning.
What distinguishes an institution from a flash mob is that its rules endure. They can be changed, of course. But only by significant supermajorities. That’s why constitutional changes require two-thirds of both houses plus three-quarters of the states. If we could make constitutional changes by majority vote, there would be no Constitution.
As of last week, the Senate effectively has no rules. Congratulations, Harry Reid. Finally, something you will be remembered for.
Barack Obama may be remembered for something similar. His violation of the proper limits of executive power has become breathtaking. It’s not just making recess appointments when the Senate is in session. It’s not just unilaterally imposing a law Congress had refused to pass — the DREAM Act — by brazenly suspending large sections of the immigration laws.
We’ve now reached a point where a flailing president, desperate to deflect the opprobrium heaped upon him for the false promise that you could keep your health plan if you wanted to, calls a hasty news conference urging both insurers and the states to reinstate millions of such plans.
Except that he is asking them to break the law. His own law. Under Obamacare, no insurer may issue a policy after 2013 that does not meet the law’s minimum coverage requirements. These plans were canceled because they do not.
The law remains unchanged. The regulations governing that law remain unchanged. Nothing is changed except for a president proposing to unilaterally change his own law from the White House pressroom.
That’s banana-republic stuff — except that there, the dictator proclaims from the presidential balcony.
Remember how for months Democrats denounced Republicans for daring to vote to defund or postpone Obamacare? Saboteurs! Terrorists! How dare you alter “the law of the land.”
This was nonsense from the beginning. Every law is subject to revision and abolition if the people think it turned out to be a bad idea. Even constitutional amendments can be repealed — and have been (see Prohibition).
After indignant denunciation of Republicans for trying to amend “the law of the land” constitutionally (i.e., in Congress assembled), Democrats turn utterly silent when the president lawlessly tries to do so by executive fiat.
Nor is this the first time. The president wakes up one day and decides to unilaterally suspend the employer mandate, a naked invasion of Congress’s exclusive legislative prerogative enshrined in Article I. Not a word from the Democrats. Nor now regarding the blatant usurpation of trying to restore canceled policies that violate explicit Obamacare coverage requirements.
And worse. When Congress tried to make Obama’s “fix” legal — i.e., through legislation — he opposed it. He even said he would veto it. Imagine: vetoing the very bill that would legally enact his own illegal fix.
At rallies, Obama routinely says he has important things to do, and he’s not going to wait for Congress. Well, amending a statute after it’s been duly enacted is something a president may not do without Congress. It’s a gross violation of his Article II duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed.
A Senate with no rules. A president without boundaries. One day, when a few bottled-up judicial nominees and a malfunctioning health-care website are barely a memory, we will still be dealing with the toxic residue of this outbreak of authoritative lawlessness.
The Obama administration had promised a vastly improved shopping experience on healthcare.gov by the end of November, and Monday was the first business day since the date passed.
But staffers at an organization in South Florida and a hospital group with locations in Iowa and Illinois said they have seen no major improvements from the federal website, which 36 states are relying on.
Amanda Crowell, director of revenue cycle for UnityPoint Health-Trinity, which has four hospitals in Iowa and Illinois, said the organization's 15 enrollment counselors did not see a marked improvement on the site.
"We had very high hopes for today, but those hopes were very much quashed," said Crowell. She said out of a dozen attempts online only one person was able to get to the point of plan selection, though the person decided to wait.
The site appeared to generally run smoothly early Monday morning before glitches began slowing people down. By 10 a.m., federal health officials deployed a new queue system that stalls new visitors on a waiting page so that those further along in the process can finish their application with fewer problems.
About 750,000 had visited the site by Monday night — about double the traffic for a typical Monday, according to figures from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Roberta Vann, a certified application counselor at the Hamilton Health Center, in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, said the site worked well for her Monday morning but she became frustrated later when the site went down.
"You can get to a point, but it does not allow you to select any plans, you can't get eligibility (information). It stops there," she said. "The thought of it working as well as it was didn't last long."
In South Florida, John Foley and his team of navigators were only able to successfully enroll one of a handful of return applicants who came to their office before glitches started, including wonky estimates for subsidy eligibility. He worried about how they would fare with the roughly 50 other appointments scheduled later in the week.
Despite the Obama administration's team of technicians working around the clock, it's not clear if the site will be able to handle the surge of applicants expected by the Dec. 23 deadline to enroll for coverage starting at the beginning of the year.
With a large chunk of the U.S. having endured one of the coldest Thanksgiving holidays in years and even more brutally cold weather in the forecast over the next few days, 2013 is poised to have daily record lows outnumber daily record highs.
According to statistics from the National Climatic Data Center, the U.S. had 9,023 daily record high temperatures through Dec. 1, compared to 9,932 daily record lows. About 1,000 cold temperature records were set or tied during the last week alone.
So far this year, warm temperature records overall, which includes record warm overnight low temperatures, are running behind cold temperature records, with 24,084 warm temperature records set or tied compared to 24,957 cold temperature records.
That means that December will be a crucial month for determining if lows outpace highs for the year. The Arctic air mass moving south from Canada, which is set to send temperatures plunging from Seattle to Texas by the end of this week, tilts the odds in favor of cold temperature records prevailing.
This contradicts global warming computer models which project how the records ratios will shift in future decades as the amount of greenhouse gases in the air continues to increase. According to global warming models, the ratio of daily record highs to daily record lows in the lower 48 states will soar to 20-to-1 by mid-century, and 50-to-1 by 2100.
During the next two weeks, temperatures are projected to be 15 to 25°F below average throughout the Northwest, West, and Upper Midwest, according to multiple computer models as well as the latest climate outlooks from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
During the early part of this week, the Arctic surge will be accompanied by strong winds and areas of heavy snow for the Cascades, Bitterroot and Teton Mountains, as well as parts of the Rockies, Wasatch, and Sierra Nevada mountain ranges. Some areas are likely to receive 12 to 18 inches of snow.
Eventually, heavy snow is forecast to spread into parts of the Northern Plains and Upper Mississippi Valley, as frigid temperatures take hold of about two-thirds of the lower 48 states.
Some of the coldest air will affect Montana, where low temperatures are expected to dip well below zero by the end of the week, with dangerous wind chills approaching 40°F below zero. The National Weather Service forecast office in Missoula described the coming chill as a “horrendously cold air mass” that will bring the coldest temperatures in at least 2 years.
The cold air will also affect major metro areas along the West Coast, from Seattle southward to San Francisco. In Seattle, snow flurries were possible Monday evening, and high temperatures may not get above freezing for much of the week. In California’s Central Valley, lows may drop to 20°F.
In Denver, which is more accustomed to wintry weather, snow and high winds are expected to accompany the bitter cold. The city is unlikely to set a record for the coldest high temperature for the month, which was minus-8°F, set in 1983, but daily temperature records could be threatened. Denver’s average high for December is 41.8°F.
Residents of Colorado’s Front Range are expecting an extended period in which temperatures do not rise above 15°F, after enduring a potentially damaging windstorm on Monday night into Tuesday morning as the Arctic air moves in. The National Weather Service said wind gusts of up to 75 mph, which qualifies as hurricane force wind gusts, are possible.
The large dip in the jet stream responsible for the cold air outbreak will initially allow milder-than-average conditions to envelop the East Coast, but there too, cold air will eventually win out, starting late in the week, according to the latest forecasts.
Extended forecasts for the rest of December show an increased likelihood of continued below-average temperatures across large portions of the Upper Midwest and Western U.S., which would help to further add to the imbalance between record cold and record warm temperatures. Even if warming occurs after mid-month, temperatures would have to hit record highs across a large swath of the U.S. to have any chance of catching up to cold temperatures’ lead
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) accused President Barack Obama of rewriting the Constitution during a Tuesday appearance on Fox News.
Bachmann's accusation came amid criticism of the Affordable Care Act.
“He has rewritten the Constitution for himself as a part of his effort to fundamentally transform the United States of America,” Bachmann said Tuesday.
Bachmann called the recently announced delay of online enrollment for small businesses "political management."
“What are these delays about, what do they have in common? They all put off the very negative effects of Obamacare until the next election. That’s what this is all about," Bachmann said. "This is all political management. But we believe the constitution has to be respected."
Bachmann has considered taking action against Obamacare before, saying in November that she and several of her GOP colleagues in the House of Representatives were considering suing Obama for allowing plans canceled under the Affordable Care Act to be extended through 2014.
"The WMD thing was so believable."
Robert making an intelligent comment is so inconceivable.
Quoting Michelle Bachmann?
Denying climate change?
Heaving a personal insult against a gay man's remark?
What a display!
Meanwhile, outside the toxic bubble of Anon's mind:
Bachmann has decided not to run for reelection because even she isn't so blind as to miss the voting trend in her own bright red district.
Bachmann's winning margins when facing off against a Democrat have dwindled from a high of 60.1% to 39.9% in 2000 to 50.5% to 49.3% in 2012 and she'd rather avoid the public shame of losing in 2014.
Climate skeptics are a dying breed. Even a solid Majority of red-state Americans believe climate change is real, study shows
"A vast majority of red-state Americans believe climate change is real and at least two-thirds of those want the government to cut greenhouse gas emissions, new research revealed on Wednesday.
The research, by Stanford University social psychologist Jon Krosnick, confounds the conventional wisdom of climate denial as a central pillar of Republican politics, and practically an article of faith for Tea Party conservatives.
Instead, the findings suggest far-reaching acceptance that climate change is indeed occurring and is caused by human activities, even in such reliably red states as Texas and Oklahoma..."
Unlike Anon's inability to accept gays, Gallup has found In U.S., Record-High Say Gay, Lesbian Relations Morally OK
I think anon learned his social skills by listening to WMAL.
Robert, your comment was just moronic cheerleading for a comment by Jim that was so stupid that it didn't merit comment.
"Heaving a personal insult against a gay man's remark?
What a display!"
Notice the implication that insulting gays is a special category of offense unlike insulting anyone else.
It appears that certain idiots who post here think that because you're gay that you are in a specially protected class, like the elderly and preschool children, and can't handle yourself in any conversation that doesn't affirm you.
If I was you I'd find that more insulting than anything.
Or, is it true?
Children and the elderly aren't held in contempt by large segements of the population who seek to demean and abuse them and as such aren't groups of people in need of special protection.
Gays and lesbians are no more able to physically protect themselves when knives and guns are used against them or mobs assault them. On the other hand it is universally held as taboo to assualt children or the elderly so it is gays and lesbians who are in need of special protections, not children and the elderly. The hate crime statistics bear this out, gays and lesbians are a great deal more likely to be physically assaulted then any other minority group. While children and the elderly get assaulted from time to time they are never assaulted because someone hates children or the elderly as a group.
Gays and lesbians are not in a specially protected class but they are in a class specially sought out for abuse and discrimination and as such are in need of special protections where children and the elderly who are held in high esteem are not in need of special protections.
Just as it is considered a special category of offense to insult a person because they are black or Jewish right thinking people see insulting gays as the same thing.
And of course it is innately evil people such as bad anonymous who are responsible for the climate of hate that sees gays and lesbians targeted for abuse, the denial of equal rights, and violence.
Despicable people like bad anonymous feign concern over children and the elderly solely as a means to promote the falehood that gays and lesbians aren't singled out for abuse and aren't in need of protection from the haters like him who've singled out the LGBT as a special class deserving of abuse, imprisonment, and assault:
http://www.teachthefacts.org/2009/12/research-testosterone-does-not-cause.html#comments
I said "Bad anonymous left out one situtation where the Uganda law called for the death penalty - if the person was a repeat "offender".
That meant if you had sex with more than one same sex partner, or more than once with the same partner they proposed putting you to death."
Bad anonymous responded: "yes, Robert said that too I didn't leave it out on purpose, I didn't know about it. Of course, penalties should increase with repeated offenses but the death penalty would be wrong".
Bad anoymous offers unqualified praise for Peter Sprigg who seeks to criminalize gayness and deport gays:
http://vigilance.teachthefacts.org/2011/08/peter-sprigg-we-do-it-out-of-love.html#comments
Bad anonymous later lets it slip that he doesn't really oppose the death penalty for gayness:
"in the U.S., you can be executed for doing nothing in Iran, you have to commit a serious crime, like homosexuality"
http://vigilance.teachthefacts.org/2011/09/on-killing-of-troy-davis.html#comments
This comment has been removed by the author.
There you have it - bad anonymous who often pretends he doesn't support criminalizing gayness let's his guard down from time to time and acknowledges he supports criminal penalties for gayness up to and including execution. You'll never see anyone supporting criminal penalties or execution for being a child or elderly but in service of his pogroms against LGBTs bad anonymous pretends they're in need of special protection but gays and lesbians aren't. What a disgusting piece of immoral trash he is.
Wow!!
In another of a string of rants by lazy Priya, we now see that calling someone, who happens to be gay, "stupid" is the moral equivalent of third world executions.
Good to know.
What a moron Lazy Priya is, that is..
It's always funny when one of lazy Priya's personalities deletes the comments of another of lazy Priya's personalities.
Wonder if the other personality is called Norma Bates.
Nah, that would be Psycho!!
ha!ha!!ha!ha!!!ha!ha!!!!
here's a fun story that shows where the country is headed:
BOSTON, Dec 4 (Reuters) - Young Americans are unhappy with virtually every major thing President Barack Obama has done since he was re-elected, according to the results of a Harvard University survey released on Wednesday.
The national poll by Harvard's Institute of Politics of more than 2,000 people aged 18 through 29 is intended to provide insight into the political views of the youngest U.S. voters, an increasingly influential demographic known as the "millennial generation."
More than 50 percent of respondents in the survey, taken between Oct. 30 and Nov. 11, said they disapproved of how Obama handled key issues in his second term, including Syria, Iran, the economy, healthcare and the federal budget deficit.
Some 55 percent of the survey respondents who reported casting ballots in the 2012 presidential election said they had voted for Obama, compared with 33 percent for Romney.
The results follow a separate CNN/ORC poll released on Nov. 25 that showed a growing number of Americans doubted Obama's ability to manage the nation, amid ongoing problems plaguing the president's signature domestic policy achievement, the healthcare reform law widely known as Obamacare.
Obama's administration has also come under fire from critics at home and abroad who claim it is dealing poorly with the Syrian government over its alleged use of chemical weapons and Iran over its nuclear ambitions. They also say the administration has failed to rein in U.S. public spending or revive the economy.
Some 57 percent of respondents in the Harvard poll said they disapproved of the Obamacare law, with 40 percent expecting the quality of health care to worsen and about half expecting health care costs to rise.
In terms of job performance, 54 percent said they disapproved of the president, and 59 percent disapproved of Democrats in Congress.
I guess getting out of college and not being able to find a job doesn't make you feel all warm and fuzzy about our "do nothing but walk on Hawaiian beaches" President.
"gays and lesbians are a great deal more likely to be physically assaulted then any other"
yeah, they do a lot more dangerous stuff
2 a.m. strolls through SE Washington
prancing around naked in pride parades
going to the girls room
while I wish no one would attack these obviously mentally ill individuals, it's hard to feel sorry for them when they refuse to use common sense
problem is: they ain't folks
Pope Francis has become a such a frequent target for Rush Limbaugh — and some Tea Partiers—in the past few weeks that Bishop James D. Conley felt the need to pen a defense of the pontiff in the right-wing National Review.
If I was you I would use the subjunctive and say "If I were you."
Bad anonymous said "In another of a string of rants by lazy Priya, we now see that calling someone, who happens to be gay, "stupid" is the moral equivalent of third world executions.".
I never said any such thing.
You however made it clear that you consider the execution of gay people a joke:
"in the U.S., you can be executed for doing nothing in Iran, you have to commit a serious crime, like homosexuality"
http://vigilance.teachthefacts.org/2011/09/on-killing-of-troy-davis.html#comments
I said "gays and lesbians are a great deal more likely to be physically assaulted then any other minority group"
Bad anonymous said "yeah, they do a lot more dangerous stuff".
There's no evidence of that and no reason to believe it. That's just a pathetic excuse you use to encourage society to tolerate anti-gay violence.
Bad anonymous said "while I wish no one would attack these obviously mentally ill individuals, it's hard to feel sorry for them when they refuse to use common sense".
You contradicted yourself in that sentence alone. Obviously if you don't feel sorry for victims of anti-gay violence you don't wish no one would attack gays and lesbians. Not only that, but in the situations you alude to you previously admitted gays were victims because the attackers were anti-gay not because they were coincidentally victims of random violence:
Bad anonymous said "areas of town where racial minorities dominate seem to be where these attacks are taking place kind of inconvenient that the groups you so desperately want to identify with are much more opposed to the gay agenda than the general population,".
September 13, 2011 6:46 AM
http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=9797121&postID=8983201243029260450&page=1&token=1315936760426
Your hatred of gays and lesbians causes you to slip up regularly and show that don't oppose violence against gays and lesbians, you cheer it on and joke about it. In moments of honesty you praise those who call for criminal penalties for gayness and call for such penalties yourself and have sanctioned executing gays:
Sometime ago I said "Bad anonymous left out one situtation where the Uganda law called for the death penalty - if the person was a repeat "offender".
That meant if you had sex with more than one same sex partner, or more than once with the same partner they proposed putting you to death."
Bad anonymous responded: "yes, Robert said that too I didn't leave it out on purpose, I didn't know about it. Of course, penalties should increase with repeated offenses but the death penalty would be wrong".
Here you offered unqualified praise for Peter Sprigg who seeks to criminalize gayness and deport gays:
http://vigilance.teachthefacts.org/2011/08/peter-sprigg-we-do-it-out-of-love.html#comments
After calling for criminal penalties for gayness and dishonestly saying you thought the death penalty would be wrong you let it slip that you don't really oppose the death penalty for gayness:
"in the U.S., you can be executed for doing nothing in Iran, you have to commit a serious crime, like homosexuality"
http://vigilance.teachthefacts.org/2011/09/on-killing-of-troy-davis.html#comments
So spare us your disengenous claims couched in demonizing language that you oppose violence against gays and lesbians, your own words make it clear you take delight in gays being assaulted, imprisoned, and executed and that your real goal is to promote such violence and oppression against gays and lesbians and make it consequence free.
It is you who is the demon, not innocent gays and lesbians.
Now bad anonymous, like the nasty child you are, go on and try to deflect from the truth and attempt to change the subject by lying about what I said, whining about the irrelevant fact that I deleted one comment, or misspelled something. You're so obviously wrong and evil that's all you've got.
I won't be comming back because every honest person can see I've utterly destroyed your anti-gay assertions and exposed your true evil motivations. None of the B.S. you post in response can change that.
"Now bad anonymous, like the nasty child you are, go on and try to deflect from the truth and attempt to change the subject"
uh, lazy Priya, let's look back here
we were having a discussion about the fallacies of Obamacare and anthropogenic global warming theory and you start waving your arms around about how I secretly want to execute all gays and then picking apart years-old posts to "prove" your point
I mean who's changing the subject?
you act as if I want the government to just go out and shoot all gays
obviously, that would be foolish
if the government properly interrogated them first, they might be able to catch their partners too
lazy Priya doesn't know a joke when lazy Priya sees one
and the joke is that certain people compare homosexual social problems with the real suffering endured by minorities in the past
as I've pointed before, one of the demented aspects of the gay personality is the chip on the shoulder
"by lying about what I said,"
that's what happens when you play games with words
people tend to misunderstand you
"whining about the irrelevant fact that I deleted one comment,"
whining?
I was having a good laugh at your multiple personalities
"or misspelled something."
well, I think everyone will agree that your carelessness with spelling and grammar is annoying
"You're so obviously wrong and evil that's all you've got."
yeah, that, and the little fact that Obama's only achievement has turned into a grand disaster, that Americans now favor Republicans over Democrats, and that global warming alarmists are false prophets whose predictions have not come true
oh, and your schizophrenic deleting of comments you've already posted
besides that all I can do is change the subject
is that why you changed the subject?
"I won't be comming back because every honest person can see I've utterly destroyed your anti-gay assertions and exposed your true evil motivations."
isn't that convenient?
the Obamacare you've been pushing is a catastrophe for Democrats; Obama's approval rating is in free fall, especially among the young; global warming has pretty much been halted; and Robert has been shown to be stupid
and, suddenly, lazy Priya can't find the door quick enough
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
this one's for all the readers up in Saskatchewan, who keep their opinions to themselves, for good reasons:
President Obama has reached a new low in his presidency -- this much is clear.
But the president's lowest-ever approval ratings don't even tell quite how bad it is for Obama. For that, you need to look at how he is viewed on the issues.
Recent polling from the Pew Research Center and Quinnipiac University has shown Obama's approval rating on almost all major issues plunging into the 30s -- below even his lowest-ever overall approval rating, which has stood around 40 percent in recent polls.
One might expect Obama's issue approval rating to be lagging on the economy, for example. And it is.
But even with an issue on which which the president appears to fall in line with a majority of Americans, he's struggling.
The Pew poll showed Obama's approval rating on immigration, for instance, was at 32 percent, with 60 percent disapproving, and Quinnipiac showed just 35 percent approving of Obama on that issue.
This is despite his push for a comprehensive immigration reform package that, in principle, Americans support. Two recent polls have shown about six in 10 Americans support the idea of a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants currently living in the United States -- the linchpin of comprehensive reform.
Immigration isn't the only issue. The Quinnipiac poll also showed Obama's approval on foreign policy, the federal budget and health-care all below his overall approval rating. On none of these issues did he crack 36 percent approval.
The Pew poll showed basically the same thing, with Obama rising above 37 percent approval only on terrorism.
So why is Obama's approval on the issues lower than his overall approval rating? We've got two theories.
One is that, despite his fall from grace, the president retains some of the likability that once kept his favorable rating -- a personal feeling towards the president -- above his approval rating -- an evaluation of his job performance.
Another is that Obama's leadership ability has taken a hit. Polls have shown a significant decrease in the number of Americans who view Obama as a strong leader -- a decrease that suggests even some supporters don't have faith that Obama can execute on issues like immigration.
Regardless of what it is, the lesson is that Obama is going to be fighting something of an uphill battle on basically anything he does going forward, be it immigration reform, the looming budget negotiations, or even the temporary deal to halt Iran's nuclear program -- which, like immigration, polling suggests he should be strong on.
The Quinnipiac poll showed Republicans in Congress had an edge on Obama on all four issues tested: immigration, health care, the economy and the federal budget.
All of it suggests a difficult road ahead for Obama when it comes to the looming legislative fights in Congress.
Persistent areas of high pressure like the one over Alaska, as well as long-lasting unusual jet stream patterns, have caught the attention of some scientists who think such features may be becoming more common as the Arctic warms and sea ice declines. It’s an area of active research, with little consensus yet emerging from the meteorological community.
The cold snap means that 2013 will likely become the first year in 20 years in which record daily lows exceed record daily highs in the U.S. In a trend that is likely related in part to manmade global warming, there has been an increasing imbalance between record highs and lows during the past several decades, with record highs far outnumbering record lows.
This year is a rare exception to that trend, but it does not indicate a slowdown or reversal of U.S. or global long-term warming trends, since short-term climate variability ensures that there will still be cold snaps and heat waves even in a warming world.
According to statistics from the National Climatic Data Center, the U.S. had 9,035 daily record high temperatures through Dec. 3, compared to 9,951 daily record lows. Last year at this time, that ratio stood at about 5-to-1 in favor of record daily highs, with 32,881 record daily highs through Dec. 3, 2012, compared to just 6,238 record daily lows during that same period. Last year was the warmest on record in the U.S.
Globally, 2013 is expected to be the 7th-warmest year on record, which follows the warmest decade since records began in 1850.
"It’s an area of active research, with little consensus yet emerging from the meteorological community."
Nice to see the "meteorological community" admitting they don't know what they're talking about.
Could you do us all a favor and stop advocating massive economic disruption until you do?
Right now, it looks like human activity is not the cause of the global warming from 1976-1997. It appears to be correlated with solar activity, which is why icecaps on Mars are also shrinking.
"short-term climate variability ensures that there will still be cold snaps and heat waves even in a warming world."
in other words, nothing much will change
meanwhile, in a big surprise, another Obama lie has surfaced:
The White House has acknowledged President Barack Obama lived with his uncle, Onyango "Omar" Obama, after previously denying that the two had met.
“The President first met Omar Obama when he moved to Cambridge for law school,” White House spokesman Eric Schultz said “The President did stay with him for a time until his apartment was ready. After that, they saw each other every few months, but after law school they fell out of touch. The President has not spoken with him in 10 years.”
During a deportation hearing this week, Omar Obama contradicted the earlier White House statement, saying the president came to live with him while attending Harvard Law School.
"live with him" or "don't know him"
it's all a matter of semantics, right?
btw, what is the definition of "is"?
in the bleak midwinter
frosty wind made moan
earth stood hard as iron
water like a stone
snow had fallen
snow on snow
snow on snow on snow
in the bleak midwinter
why? they did not know
"Happy war on Christmas, everyone"
I'm just glad the person who said this can no longer comment on the blog
there is no room in the innternet for that type of nastiness
I see reading comprehension is still a problem for certain commenters here.
"...On Thursday, a White House official said the press office had not fully researched the relationship between the president and his uncle before telling the Globe in 2011 that it had no record of the two meeting. This time, press office staff members asked the president directly, which they said they had not done in 2011.
“The president first met Omar Obama when he moved to Cambridge for law school,” said White House spokesman Eric Schultz. “The president did stay with him for a brief period of time until his apartment was ready. After that, they saw each other once every few months, but after law school they fell out of touch. The president has not seen him in 20 years, has not spoken with him in 10.”
The White House said Onyango Obama’s immigration case was handled “without any interference from the president or the White House.”...
Onyango Obama is the second relative of the president’s father to face deportation toKenya since he took office...."
"The unemployment rate declined from 7.3 percent to 7.0 percent in November, and total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 203,000, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment increased in transportation and warehousing, health care, and manufacturing."
"well, I think everyone will agree that your carelessness with spelling and grammar is annoying"
"there is no room in the innternet for that type of nastiness"
Oh look, the annoying nasty bully can't spell.
"a White House official said the press office had not fully researched the relationship"
funny how often that happens
is there any good reason to ever believe anything said by the White House?
not really
btw, Obama is responsible for what comes out of the White House
if they're lying, he should have detected it and, even if it innocently missed his attention, heads should roll now
that won't happen because he signs off on everything they say
Dick Cheney Didn't Regret His Vote Against Freeing Nelson Mandela, Maintained He Was A 'Terrorist'
"The unemployment rate declined from 7.3 percent to 7.0 percent in November, and total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 203,000, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment increased in transportation and warehousing, health care, and manufacturing."
imagine that
I guess the Dems were wrong about the extension of most Bush tax cuts and the sequester and the multi-week government shutdown
the economy can grow even when Republicans force taxes down and reduce the deficit
coming after the disastrous Obamacare implementation, where it is likely more people will be uninsured in January 2014 than were in January 2013, it would almost make you think that Democrats don't know what the hell they are talking about
"Oh look, the annoying nasty bully can't spell."
did you notice that we were talking about Christmas story?
have you heard the Christmas story?
did you ever hear the phrase "no room in the inn"?
do you think there's any possibility, nay, likelihood that I was making such a reference?
btw, how can I possibly "bully" a lazy someone who has informed they are much more intelligent than me and have completed destroyed my arguments?
hahahaha!!
Bush Reverses Course on Carbon Dioxide
"Backing off a campaign pledge, President Bush told Congress today he will not regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.
The decision, outlined in a letter sent to a Republican senator, came after furious lobbying from the coal industry...."
"the economy can grow even when Republicans force taxes down [except taxes got raised from 35% to 39.6% at the top] and reduce the deficit [and obstruct every bill that comes for a vote except the repeal of Obamacare]
coming after the disastrous Obamacare implementation"
Oh oops! It looks like your talking point about Obamacare killing jobs is shot to hell.
A month after its "disastrous" roll out, the unemployment rate dropped to the lowest point in five years.
"Backing off a campaign pledge, President Bush told Congress today he will not regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.
The decision, outlined in a letter sent to a Republican senator, came after furious lobbying from the coal industry...."
nice to remember that there was a time when Presidents could listen to reason and adjust when their plans are obviously wrong instead of doubling down on idiocy
not to mention, fulfill their oath to uphold the Constitution
and here we are, all these years later, a world where global warming has not advanced significantly for 15 years, the Antarctic ice sheet is growing substantially, this year will record more record lows than highs, and the Third World is climbing out of poverty with a middle class that afford to drive, just like all the liberal a-holes in America do
so why would we think Bush should have enacted those regulations?
"the economy can grow even when Republicans force taxes down [except taxes got raised from 35% to 39.6% at the top]"
well, true, the economy would be doing much better if the top rate hadn't increased but most of the Bush tax rate is now permanent, after Dems whined about it for years
"and reduce the deficit [and obstruct every bill that comes for a vote except the repeal of Obamacare]"
obstructing Obama's agenda is part of why the economy is finally coming back, people see his influence waning and his agenda unlikely to succeed now
the optimism is translating to new jobs and investments
Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's, was asked yesterday how we can keep the momentum going: "The only thing that has to happen is lawmakers need to do nothing"
while Dems try to demagogue about a do-nothing Congress, Republicans have chosen the wisest course
"Oh oops! It looks like your talking point about Obamacare killing jobs is shot to hell.
A month after its "disastrous" roll out, the unemployment rate dropped to the lowest point in five years.
"
you really are an idiot, aren't you?
so far, Obamacare only affects those who buy their own insurance
Obama postponed it a year for businesses, first large and then small
most businesses who cover employees also renewed their current plan on December 1, effectively using a technicality to put off compliance of the plans so most individuals aren't yet affected
and what businesses now see is the likelihood that Obamacare will be repealed or substantially changed before they are subject to it
thus, the new optimism resulting in new hiring and investment
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