Ken Berwitz

Poor Alan Grayson.  The freshman congressperson from Florida is having a major-league snit because Republicans are controlling Barack Obama and the political agenda.

No, I am not on drugs.  I didn't say this.  Grayson did.

Before you call the men in the white coats to take me to a detox/rehab center, read this, from Liz Blaine of www.newsrealblog.com and see for yourself:

Democrat Grayson Leaps From Reality on MSNBC, Says Obama Suffering From Stockholm Syndrome

2010 January 30

by Liz Blaine

Appearing on the Ed Schultz Show last night, Rep. Alan Grayson (D) displayed the turmoil and progressive dysfunction associated with failure to pass the leftist agenda. Erupting in cognitive confusion Grayson lept over the edge of reality as he reacted to President Obama’s appearance before the House Republican Conference, declaring Obama and Democrats ”have been held hostage” by Republicans this past year!

“The White House has been so accepting of the Republicans, for so long, and the fact that they just won’t vote for anything, that I was beginning to think the White House was suffering from the Stockholm syndrome. Their agenda’s been held hostage for a year now“

Wow! A Republican stealth super minority, and the President bonding with his legislative captors? You can’t make this stuff up.

It was the People, not Republicans, who voiced outrage at the willful reckless behavior conducted by Congress and the Obama administration. And the opposition to Obama’s policies has been far more bipartisan than its support.

Until Scott Brown’s win in Massachusetts this month, the Democrats held a filibuster-proof majority in the U.S. Senate and a 79 vote majority in the House of Representatives.  And they still do! Democrats are illegally permitting Paul Kirk to vote so they can pass their agenda. Acts such as this, late night backroom deals, pay-for-vote schemes, lack of transparency, and the use of Alinsky tactics to push their radical agenda have led voters to reject the Democrat’s rule in Virginia, New Jersey, and Massachusetts.

I don’t know what virtual reality Grayson’s been living, but it’s obviously not the same as the rest of America.  Perhaps it’s not Obama who’s suffering from psychological phenomena, but the Democrat Congress who need the reality check. Check out the video below to catch progressive dysfunction in action.

Hooboy.

As you can see, Mr. Grayson is of the impression that Republicans - with 40 seats out of 100 in the senate, 178 seats out of 435 in the house, and a Democratic President - are running the show.

So you can still call those guys in the white coats if you want.  But now I think you have a better idea of who may actually need their services.

Ken Berwitz

Here's an interesting tidbit that was released late yesterday (keeping in mind that Saturday is when the fewest people will read it):

From Clarice Feldman at www.americanthinker.com:

January 30, 2010

 

Friday night news dump; Bybee, Yoo cleared by Justice Department

Clarice Feldman

 

Pilloried by the left for the "torture" memos they wrote while at the Department of Justice , it appears that the remaining grownup ( career lawyer David Margolis) at DoJ has cleared Bush appointee Judge Jay Bybee and Professor John Yoo of wrongdoing, per Michael Isikoff wiritng for Newsweek

An upcoming Justice Department report from its ethics-watchdog unit, the Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR), clears the Bush administration lawyers who authored the "torture" memos of professional-misconduct allegations.

While the probe is sharply critical of the legal reasoning used to justify waterboarding and other "enhanced" interrogation techniques, NEWSWEEK has learned that a senior Justice official who did the final review of the report softened an earlier OPR finding. Previously, the report concluded that two key authors-Jay Bybee, now a federal appellate court judge, and John Yoo, now a law professor-violated their professional obligations as lawyers when they crafted a crucial 2002 memo approving the use of harsh tactics, say two Justice sources who asked for anonymity discussing an internal matter. But the reviewer, career veteran David Margolis, downgraded that assessment to say they showed "poor judgment," say the sources. (Under department rules, poor judgment does not constitute professional misconduct.) The shift is significant: the original finding would have triggered a referral to state bar associations for potential disciplinary action-which, in Bybee's case, could have led to an impeachment inquiry.

For all the outraged press Mr. Bybee and Mr. Yoo got when our wonderful "neutral" media were hot to prove what terrible waterboarding torture the Bush administration perpetrated on those poor sweet terrorists (who, after all, only wanted our culture decimated and replaced with shari'a law), it seems a shame that this information was released when relatively few people will read it.

What a (ahem) coincidence.....

Ken Berwitz

Just how dishonest, and partisan is Nancy Pelosi?  How far will she go to further her political aims?

Based on this article by Marc Thiessen, writing for the Washington Post, and Time Magazine, via Streiff of www.redstate.com, the answer is:  to about the nth degree.

Read it and see for yourself:

Did Nancy Pelosi try to sabotage US efforts in Iraq?

Posted by streiff (Profile)

Saturday, January 30th at 1:25PM EST

Today’s Washington Post carries an op-ed by Marc Thiessen, author of Courting Disaster, concerning Nancy Pelosi’s ever morphing story over what she knew about waterboarding. Before we go farther, in order to keep Media Matters or some other lefty from having an aneurysm let me stop and advise everyone that Courting Disaster is published by Regnery Publishing, a division of Eagle Publishing which is the [::ominous music] parent company of RedState. As a matter of full disclosure I have not read the book but would gratefully do so if they would send be a free copy]

Thiessen points to an incident in 2004 when Nancy Pelosi was House minority leader and intervened in a CIA operation she objected to. He rightfully points out that if she was able to stop one operation then her whole defense on the issue of not speaking up on the issue of waterboarding becomes viable only to the lobotomy-based community. I think, however, there is a bigger story here.

From the October 4, 2004 issue of TIME

PRESIDENT BUSH and interim Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi insisted last week that Iraq would go ahead with elections scheduled for January, despite continuing violence. But U.S. officials tell TIME that the Bush team ran into trouble with another plan involving those elections–a secret “finding” written several months ago proposing a covert CIA operation to aid candidates favored by Washington. A source says the idea was to help such candidates–whose opponents might be receiving covert backing from other countries, like Iran–but not necessarily to go so far as to rig the elections. But lawmakers from both parties raised questions about the idea when it was sent to Capitol Hill. In particular, House minority leader Nancy Pelosi “came unglued” [emphasis added] when she learned about what a source described as a plan for “the CIA to put an operation in place to affect the outcome of the elections.” Pelosi had strong words with National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice in a phone call about the issue.

To fully understand the context one has to consider the time. We invaded Iraq in March 2003 and the plan was predicated on the idea that we would topple Saddam and then swiftly replace him with another government. The CIA finding dates from the spring of 2004. At the same time, however, the Democrats were engaged in probably one of the most disgraceful presidential campaigns in modern US history, a campaign fittingly headed by one of the most disgraceful presidential candidates in modern US history. It was as clear then to the Democrats as it was in 2006 that an unstable Iraq and a constant drumbeat of American casualties was a quick road to electoral success. Funding Iraqi political parties who were friendly to the United States would ruin one of the memes developed by the Democrat which was that there were no viable US partners in Iraq. The presence of those parties would also have worked against the “cancel the elections because Iraq is too violent” talking point used by the Dems at this time.

The article goes on to point out that the spin from the Pelosi confidant, that the funds would have changed the outcome of the election, was not true. The CIA was only helping friendly parties achieve funding parity with parties funded by other regional actors. Even so, it is more than a little unclear to me why having a friendly party win the elections, which had not been held with this article was written, is a bad thing. I might be concerned that the CIA was simply not competent to ensure the funding remained secret but the thought of having our guys win shouldn’t make any member of congress come “unglued.”

The other insight here is that the Bush Administration obviously consulted regularly with the Dem House leadership and actually responded to their objections. I don’t know why they did this and it didn’t work out well for them or the country.

I am a lot less concerned about Pelosi’s lack of candor and integrity on what she knew about waterboarding than I am with her intervening in a fairly mundane CIA operation for no other purpose than seemingly to ensure that Iraq was a political difficulty for Bush in 2004

I strongly urge you to click on the link to Marc Thiessen's op-ed piece.  Unless you already think the worst of Ms. Pelosi (as you should), it will open your eyes and drop your jaw, I promise. 

The two key questions here:  Did Nancy Pelosi lie to us?  Did she intentionally damage our efforts in Iraq for the purpose of retaining political talking points for her party in the 2004 elections?

Based on what I have read in these pieces, the answer to both is an emphatic yes. 

Now, grow old waiting for the rest of our wonderful "neutral" media to say or do a thing about it.

The IRS decides to audit Grandpa, and summons him to the IRS office.

The IRS auditor was not surprised when Grandpa showed up with his attorney.

The auditor said, 'Well, sir, you have an extravagant lifestyle and no full-time employment, Which you explain by saying that you win money gambling. I'm not sure the IRS finds that believable.'

I'm a great gambler, and I can prove it,' says Grandpa. 'How about a demonstration?'

The auditor thinks for a moment and said, 'Okay. Go ahead.'

Grandpa says, 'I'll bet you a thousand dollars that I can bite my own eye.'

The auditor thinks a moment and says, 'It's a bet.'

Grandpa removes his glass eye and bites it. The auditor's jaw drops.

Grandpa says, 'Now, I'll bet you two thousand dollars that I can bite my other eye.'

Now the auditor can tell Grandpa isn't blind, so he takes the bet.

Grandpa removes his dentures and bites his good eye.

The stunned auditor now realizes he has wagered and lost three grand, with Grandpa's attorney as a witness. He starts to get nervous.

'Want to go double or nothing?' Grandpa asks 'I'll bet you six thousand dollars that I can stand on one side of your desk, and pee into that wastebasket on the other side, and never get a drop anywhere in between.'

The auditor, twice burned, is cautious now, but he looks carefully and decides there's no way this old guy could possibly manage that stunt, so he agrees again.

Grandpa stands beside the desk and unzips his pants, but although he strains mightily, he can't make the stream reach the wastebasket on the other side, so he pretty much urinates all over the auditor's desk.

The auditor leaps with joy, realizing that he has just turned a major loss into a huge win.

But Grandpa's own attorney moans and puts his head in his hands.

'Are you okay?' the auditor asks.

'Not really,' says the attorney. 'This morning, when Grandpa told me he'd been summoned for an audit, he bet me twenty-five thousand dollars that he could come in here and piss all over your desk and that you'd be happy about it!'

I keep telling you! Don't Mess with Old People!!

Ken Berwitz

Who is a racist?  Often times, it is the person/persons who complain the loudest about racism. 

Here is an excellent example, via Michael Calderone of www.politico.com:

Matthews: 'I forgot he was black tonight for an hour'

Chris Matthews has put his foot in his mouth before on live television, and after the State of the Union, he did it again.

"I forgot he was black tonight for an hour," Matthews said of President Barack Obama's speech before a joint session of Congress and to millions of Americans.

Matthews's line about Obama's skin color was part of a longer comment about the presidency and race that's below. [UPDATE: Matthews also clarified later on.]

I was trying to think about who he was tonight. It's interesting: he is post-racial, by all appearances. I forgot he was black tonight for an hour. You know, he's gone a long way to become a leader of this country, and passed so much history, in just a year or two. I mean, it's something we don't even think about. I was watching, I said, wait a minute, he's an African-American guy in front of a bunch of other white people. And here he is president of the United States and we've completely forgotten that tonight — completely forgotten it. I think it was in the scope of his discussion. It was so broad-ranging, so in tune with so many problems, of aspects, and aspects of American life that you don't think in terms of the old tribalism, the old ethnicity. It was astounding in that regard. A very subtle fact. It's so hard to talk about. Maybe I shouldn't talk about it, but I am. I thought it was profound that way.

Still, that single line quickly bounced around Twitter and the blogosphere, along with widespread criticism of Matthews on the left, on the right and in between.

"The tingle appears to be back for Chris Matthews," wrote Noel Sheppard on NewsBusters. The headline on Wonkette read: "Chris Matthews Has an Apology on the Way." And on ThinkProgress: "Matthews’ comment seems to imply that a man who is too 'black' still can’t become 'a leader of this country.'”

The Matthews comment was met immediately on Twitter with both confusion and contempt, and later "Chris Matthews" became a top trending topic.

The New Republic's Michael Crowley wrote: "Huh?" with The Huffington Post's Jason Linkins asking, "W to the F?"

Meanwhile, The American Prospect's Adam Serwer offered a terse response to the Matthews line: "F--- You." The Washington Independent's Spencer Ackerman wrote that the MSNBC host should "get off the air." And from the The Joshua Blog: "He needs to be gone from @MSNBC for good. Enough already."

Wasn't it Walt Kelly's classic comic strip Pogo, where we read the comment "we have met the enemy and he is us"? 

This is not the first time that Chris Matthews has opened that big, mouth of his and made a stupid racial comment.  And he is hardly alone at MSNBC:  his cohort, keith olbermann, regularly uses racism to attack pretty much everyone to his right (which is to say pretty much everyone who exists).

That's worth remembering, the next time you hear either of these two whining about someone else's racism. 

Think of them as MSNBC's twin glass houses.

Ken Berwitz

You may have noticed that I've barely blogged about President Obama's State of the Union speech.  That is because, for reasons apparently unrelated to my server (or me or hackers) the blog has been down all day.

And, without going into specifics, I won't have much of an opportunity to blog again until this evening.

But my overall reaction to the speech is that it was political, partisan, contentious, combative and dishonest. 

Other than that, it was pretty good.

I'll elaborate later on.

Ken Berwitz

This is the topper - I'm calling on congress to continue down the road of earmark reform????????

Wasn't this the same President who vowed not to sign bills with any earmarks, and then allowed countless thousands  of them into legislation?  Were there not something like 6 thousand earmarks (that is NOT a typo) in the so-called "stimulus package" alone?

Sorry to say it, but Mr. Obama's speech is farcical.

And I think he just said "I" for the 2,482nd time.  So far.

Ken Berwitz

President Obama (approximate wording):  There are people in my party that say we can't freeze spending because too many people are hurting.  I agree.  That is why the freeze won't take effect until next year.

Derisive laughter.

President Obama:  That's how budgeting works.

Louder derisive laughter.

Ken Berwitz

President Obama's speech is not over yet.  But there has been a seminal moment.

Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, build nuclear plants and drill offshore.

Where did that come from?  Is he serious?  If so, where was he for the past year?

And what will his hard-left followers say about it tomorrow?

Ken Berwitz

How many congresspeople are pro-Hamas?  And how many of them are Democrats?

Here's some insight for you, from Daniel Greenfield, a New York-based writer, who writes for Canada Free Press (where did you think this would come from?  The New York Times?):

Amerabia isn't as far away as we have thought

Hamas’ 54 Democratic Congressmen

 By Daniel Greenfield  Wednesday, January 27, 2010

 

Keith Ellison, widely hailed as America’s first Muslim congressman, could more accurately be described as CAIR and Hamas’ man in Congress. Congressman Ellison has been a regular presence at CAIR fundraisers

and at pro-Hamas rallies in the United States. As a former member of Farrakhan’s Nation of Islam, Ellison has enough anti-semitic and Islamist credentials to satisfy anyone, and had expressed openly anti-semitic beliefs in the past.

 

Since Ellison got his start with CAIR , his attempt to provide support for Hamas is completely unsurprising. Both Hamas and CAIR are projects of the Muslim Brotherhood, which also helped birth Al Queda. Organizations like CAIR do the same work in America that Hamas does in Israel. The difference is that CAIR does its work on a political level, while Hamas functions on both a political and a military level. Like CAIR, Ellison is careful to cloak his pro-Hamas agenda, which he does by mentioning that all violence is wrong and that Israelis probably shouldn’t be shelled—but the thrust of his agenda is to force Israel to open its border with Hamas.

 

The entire “Free Gaza” movement is a Hamas propaganda project that allows it to demand that Israel open its borders, without actually using the P word, for peace, since Hamas doesn’t even believe in phony peace negotiations. So Pro-Hamas activists, whether it’s former Saddam supporter, George Galloway’s Viva Palestina or their American flavors talk only about “The People of Gaza”, deemphasize Hamas and emphasize the supposed “suffering” within Gaza.

 

But the call for Israel to open its borders is nothing more than a way of making it easier for terrorists to strike. Ellison’s letter buries its real agenda in paragraphs of prose about how everyone will be better off, except somehow Hamas, if Israel complies with their demand… that Israel ease the movement of people in and out of Gaza. This of course is a fancy way of saying, “Let my Suicide Bombers go”.

 

None of this is up till now is shocking. But what Congressman Keith Ellison accomplished was to convince 53 other Democratic congressmen to join him in this venture. It is not particularly surprising to find the House’s most radical anti-Israel voices signing their names onto Ellison’s letter. It would be inconceivable if a letter aiding Hamas did not carry the signatures of Barbara Lee, Jim Moran or Jim McDermott, who helped Ellison spearhead the whole campaign. It is essentially inconceivable that any letter circulated in congress opposing Israel would not get their signature.

 

Jim Moran had managed to blame even the Iraq War on the Jews and McDermott was actually named CAIR’s Public Official of the Year. Neither is West Virginia Arab Congressman, Nick Rahall, who is the Democratic party’s version of Darrel Issa, who is tied to CAIR as well, and previously voted against Israel’s right to defend itself. Rahall is also the top recipient of CAIR donations. The likes of Diane Watson or Pete Stark aren’t complete surprises either. Pete Stark has a history of being both anti-Israel and unstable. Neither is Carolyn Kilpatrick, who voted against Israel’s right to defend itself, and against condemning terrorist attacks on Israel. Kilpatrick, like virtually every Democrat on the list, is also tied to CAIR.

 

Then there’s William Delahunt, who all but openly expressed the hope that a former Cheney aide would be targeted by Al Queda. John Conyers signing on to this while awaiting prison is no real shocker either. The man has all but endorsed Sharia law in America. Or John Dingell who like many Detroit politicians has gone whole hog with the Islamist Follow Traveler thing.

 

Congresswoman Betty McCollum has been waging her own private war on Israel, right down to issuing an imperial demand that Israeli Ambassador Oren attend the national conference of the far left anti-Israel group, J Street. McCollum famously belittled Hamas’ shelling of Israel as nothing more than a drug gang’s drive by shooting and repeated the discredited white phosphorous smear. Again, no more surprising than Chaka Fattah’s presence on the list.

 

Then there’s Eric Massa, a former Republican turned turncoat Democrat, Massa has been consistently loudly anti-war and to the left. Like virtually every congressman on this list, he’s pushed for a phony ceasefire, that would naturally be one sided. Considering his increasingly unhinged radicalism, and that he has an election coming up soon, Massa must be pretty confident that the nutroots can get him reelected.

 

It is of course no surprise that this list weighs heavily toward Minnesota and Michigan, where CAIR is strong. But it also includes twelve congressmen from California, 3 from New Jersey, 4 from New York and 6 from Massachusetts. These numbers are not mere statistics, they define the rising influence of the Muslim Brotherhood on American politics, state by state.

 

And it is instructive to note how many of the congressmen and congresswomen on the list are funded by CAIR money. Keith Ellison, John Conyers, Loretta Sanchez, Betty McCollum, Lois Capps, Bill Pascrell, Elijah Cummings, Bob Filner, Mike Honda, Barbara Lee, John Dingell, James Moran, Nick Rahall, Andre Carson, Mary Jo Kilroy, Carolyn Kilpatrick and Jim McDermott are among the top receivers of CAIR money in congress.

 

Of the top 11 CAIR moneygetters in congress, Nick Rahall, James Moran, Darrel Issa, John Conyers, Dennis Kucinich, Jesse Jackson, Jr, John Dingell, Barbara Lee, Carolyn Kilpatrick, Shelia Jackson Lee and Jim McDerrmott—7 out of 11 signed on to Ellison’s letter. That makes the Gaza letter a CAIR project. 5 on that list voted against condemning attacks on Israel.

 

And the letter is simply an opening shot as part of a broader campaign by the Muslim Brotherhood and its American proxies to attack Israel and promote its own Hamas wing. Its proxies can’t openly come out for Hamas, not in the United States anyway. Not from members of congress. But they can work toward a common goal. With this letter, Hamas’s masters in the Muslim Brotherhood demonstrated that they can use CAIR to gather 54 congressmen together to push its agenda. That is quite a leap for an organization that is the unindicted co-conspirator in funding Hamas terror  It also demonstrates that Amerabia isn’t as far away as we have thought.

Take a good look at the names.  Other than Darrell Issa, every one of them is a Democrat.  Dozens and dozens of them.

I'm surprised Republican Ron Paul isn't mentioned, and assume he is right up there too.  That makes two Republicans.  Two

The rest?  Democrats.

That just might be something for Jews to remember on election day.  Speaking as one of them, I assure you it is for me.

Ken Berwitz

I don't always agree with the Washington Post's editorial position.  But on this one we are 100% in agreement.  Please pay special attention to the paragraph I've put in bold print:

Hugo Chavez's presidential strikeout

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

 

VENEZUELAN STRONGMAN Hugo Chávez is having a bad month. He's been forced to devalue the currency and impose nationwide power cuts, steps that will worsen a serious recession and Latin America's highest inflation.

The U.S.-led humanitarian intervention in Haiti has undercut his propaganda about an evil American "empire." As his baseball-crazy country watches its annual championship series, a new slogan has gone viral: "Chávez -- You Struck Out."

 

So it should surprise no one that Mr. Chávez has taken new steps to tighten his authoritarian grip. On Sunday, without so much as a hint of due process, his government ordered cable systems to drop six television channels -- including RCTV, the country's oldest and long its most popular station. The alleged offense was failing to broadcast Mr. Chávez's live speeches -- of which there have been more than 140 in the past year alone, lasting up to seven hours each.

 

This is not the first attack on RCTV, which produces Venezuela's most popular entertainment programming as well as news programs with an opposition bent. In 2007, Mr. Chávez ordered the channel off the public airwaves, also without the due process nominally required by law. That action prompted the birth of a student movement that under the slogans of free speech and democracy helped defeat the caudillo's attempt to rewrite the constitution, and propelled opposition candidates to victory in Caracas and other major cities and states last year.

 

The students have returned to the streets of Caracas and at least four other cities this week, with violent results -- two were killed and dozens injured in the town of Merida in clashes with security forces and pro-regime thugs.

On Tuesday, Mr. Chávez's vice president and defense minister resigned, along with the environment minister. International criticism is raining down on his government, most of it considerably stronger than the milquetoast reaction of the State Department, which observed that "any time the government shuts down an independent network, that is an area of concern."

 

Mr. Chávez may calculate that all the turmoil is worth it. Later this year, an election for the National Assembly is due, and what is now a rubber-stamp body could fall into the hands of the opposition if the vote is free and fair. The currency devaluation will, at least, allow Mr. Chávez to spend far more in the domestic market in the coming months; the attack on RCTV will eliminate a major opposition platform. The student protests may provide a pretext to arrest key organizers, or even to declare an emergency and put off the elections.

 

If Mr. Chávez were a right-wing leader or an ally of the United States, Latin American governments and many Democrats in Congress would be mobilizing to stop his latest abuse of power, and to encourage peaceful and democratic opposition. But he is not, and they are mostly silent. The Obama administration, too, has done next to nothing to defend democracy or encourage the opposition in Venezuela. Now -- when Chávez's regime threatens to disintegrate into chaos and violence -- would be a good time to start.

 It is not often that I feel I could have written a Washington Post editorial.  But I could have written this one.  When it comes to hugo chavez, they understand perfectly.

The sooner Venezuela is rid of this thug, the better off it will be.  Let's hope that day is soon in coming.  Very soon.

Ken Berwitz

First there was the speech in Copenhagen to get the 2016 Olympics for Chicago. Then was the campaigning for the Governor's race in Virginia.  And the campaigning for the Governor's race in New Jersey.  And the campaigning for the Senate race in Massachusetts. 

Now there is this. 

From www.wlwt.com, in Kentucky:

President Barack Obama called Kentucky coach John Calipari to praise the program – and to caution the top-ranked Wildcats.

The country's No. 1 college basketball fan thanked Calipari and his players Tuesday for helping to raise more than $1 million as part of the "Hoops for Haiti" telethon. Then Obama counseled them to keep their focus and not let their new position atop the polls go to their heads.

When President Obama offered his counsel yesterday, Kentucky had a perfect 19-0 record.

Last night Kentucky played South Carolina, a decent but not great team with an 11-8 record. 

Kentucky lost.

When you're hot, you're hot.  And when you're not, you're not.

Ken Berwitz

How narcissistic is President Obama?

Watch this video from a speech he made on January 22, and decide for yourself. 

Personally, it reminds me of Bette Midler's self-absorbed character from the movie "Beaches", when she says "But enough of me talking about myself.  What do YOU think of me?"

Ken Berwitz

Could this have been more boneheaded?

James O'Keefe, to whom we owe a great deal of gratitude for exposing what a corrupt, fraudulent organization ACORN is, was arrested with three other men for trying to do something to or with U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu's office telephones - apparently to tap them and listen to the calls coming in and out of that office.

Here are the particulars, via excerpts from an article in the New Orlean's Times-Picayune:

ACORN 'gotcha' man arrested in attempt to tamper with Mary Landrieu's office phones

By David Hammer, The Times-Picayune

January 26, 2010, 6:23PM

 

Alleging a plot to tamper with phones in Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu's office in the Hale Boggs Federal Building in downtown New Orleans, the FBI arrested four people Monday, including James O'Keefe, 25, a conservative filmmaker whose undercover videos at ACORN field offices severely damaged the advocacy group's credibility.

Also arrested were Joseph Basel, Stan Dai and Robert Flanagan, all 24. Flanagan is the son of William Flanagan, who is the acting U.S. attorney for the Western District of Louisiana. All four men were charged with entering federal property under false pretenses with the intent of committing a felony.

An official close to the investigation said one of the four was arrested with a listening device in a car blocks from the senator's offices. He spoke on condition of anonymity because that information was not included in official arresting documents.

According to the FBI affidavit, Flanagan and Basel entered the federal building at 500 Poydras Street on Monday about 11 a.m., dressed as telephone company employees, wearing jeans, fluorescent green vests, tool belts and hard hats. When they arrived at Landrieu's 10th-floor office, O'Keefe was already in the office and had told a staffer he was waiting for someone to arrive.

When Flanagan and Basel entered the office, they told the staffer they were there to fix phone problems. At that time, the staffer, referred to only as Witness 1 in the affidavit, observed O'Keefe positioning his cell phone in his hand to videotape the operation. O'Keefe later admitted to agents that he recorded the event.

After being asked, the staffer gave Basel access to the main phone at the reception desk. The staffer told investigators that Basel manipulated the handset. He also tried to call the main office phone using his cell phone, and said the main line wasn't working. Flanagan did the same.

They then told the staffer they needed to perform repair work on the main phone system and asked where the telephone closet was located. The staffer showed the men to the main General Services Administration office on the 10th floor, and Flanagan and Basel went in. There, a GSA employee asked for the men's credentials. They said they left them in their vehicle.

The U.S. Marshal's Service apprehended all four men shortly thereafter.

Landrieu said: "This is a very unusual situation and somewhat unsettling for me and my staff. The individuals responsible have been charged with entering federal property under false pretenses for the purposes of committing a felony. I am as interested as everyone else about their motives and purpose, which I hope will become clear as the investigation moves forward."

On Tuesday at 4:40 p.m., O'Keefe, Dai and Basel were released from the jail and were waiting for a cab. Asked to comment, O'Keefe said only, "Veritas," which is Latin for "truth." O'Keefe's biography on the blog site www.BigGovernment.com says he works at VeritasVisuals.com, although that site does not appear to be functioning.

O'Keefe spent most of the time in the men's room off the jail's lobby, then hustled to the cab when it arrived. As he ran into the back seat, he called out, "The truth shall set me free." 

Robert Flanagan's attorney, J. Garrison Jordan, said he believes his client works for the Pelican Institute. Asked the motivation for the alleged wiretap plot, he said: "I think it was poor judgment. I don't think there was any intent or motive to commit a crime."

What was O'Keefe thinking?  Was he thinking?

At best this is a boneheaded stunt that backfired, made him look like an ass, and blew away a great deal of his personal credibility.

At worst, it is a felony that makes him a criminal and ends his credibility altogether - not to mention probably putting him in jail.

I will wait to hear what explanation, if any, he has for this inexcusable idiocy.  Maybe there is one..  But it better be a double doozy, because no matter how I think about this, I can't come up with a thing.

One other point:  No matter what happens here, ACORN is just as corrupt and fraudulent as he found them out to be.  One thing has nothing to do with the other.

Ken Berwitz

I heard keith olbermann's "quick comment" last night, in which he angrily (what other emotion does he show?) lectured us (how else does he talk?) that a majority of the people in Masschusetts are in favor of ObamaCare.  His exact words?  "...as polling there shows, they are upset because health care reform didn't go far enough" olbermann also tossed in his standard corporate hatred and racial innuendo - nothing new there.

I found his "analysis" (if you can call it that) fascinating, given that Brown ran explicitly against ObamaCare and even signed his name "Scott "41" Brown, to denote that he would be the 41st vote against cloture and would therefore sink it.

I don't know what poll olbermann was basing his contention on, (maybe he just lied to us - that would hardly be a first), but I suspect it might have been a generic poll that Massachusetts people want universal health care of some kind.  Well, they have it already, via state legislation, and either are unhappy with it, don't want to pay twice for what they already have or some combination thereof.  Any way you slice it, however, they did not want ObamaCare.

In stark contrast to olbermann's screed, I just read a very good analysis of why Scott Brown won - something that makes far too much sense to ever find its way onto olbermann's "countdown" show, let alone be part of a "special comment" - from Pehman Yousefzadeh, writing for www.newledger.com. I thought you might like to see it:

Why Did Martha Coakley Lose? And Why Did Scott Brown Win?

by Pejman Yousefzadeh

As I type this, Keith Olbermann is sputtering in fury, trying ever-so-desperately to spin Martha Coakley’s loss to Scott Brown in Massachusetts, while issuing any insult he can possibly think of in the direction of Scott Brown, and the Republicans. But despite Olbermann’s efforts to complicate the analysis–and despite his inability to understand what he is trying to analyze–the explanation for the Scott Brown win and the Martha Coakley loss is quite simple.

For one thing, candidates matter. Scott Brown was a great one, and Martha Coakley was a terrible one. Brown smartly channeled discontent with the Obama/Democratic agenda, and used it to propel his campaign at Coakley’s expense. He successfully got independents on his bandwagon, thus helping him overcome the Democratic registration advantage. His “it’s the people’s seat” comment in the debate with Martha Coakley was instrumental in helping him consolidate populist support, and he ran a campaign that was significantly more vigorous than the one run by Martha Coakley and the Democrats.

Speaking of Coakley, her decision to take a vacation from the campaign trail, while Brown got to define himself and her for the benefit of the voters, has to rank as one of the most disastrous ideas ever hatched in the midst of a campaign. Equally disastrous, of course, was her decision to take potshots at Scott Brown’s efforts to campaign at outdoor hockey games, her stated belief that there are no terrorists in Afghanistan, and her revelation that she thought Red Sox legend Curt Schilling was a Yankees player. It takes a startling amount of incompetence for a Massachusetts Democrat to lose a Senate seat held by Ted Kennedy, and by JFK himself, but Martha Coakley exhibited that incompetence in spades.

But it cannot be forgotten that ideology played a role in Scott Brown’s win as well. There was no disguising the fact that validation of the Obama/Democratic agenda was on the line in the Senate race–especially the portion of the agenda dealing with health care reform. No one doubted that Martha Coakley would go to Washington and vote in favor of health care reform, if she were elected. And no one doubted that Scott Brown would go to Washington and sink health care reform as Massachusetts’s next Senator. In bluer-than-blue Massachusetts, Brown’s approach was validated over Coakley’s. Whatever the amount of incompetence and bumbling Coakley exhibited, Massachusetts’s rejection of her–and Barack Obama’s–domestic policy vision constitutes an ideological, philosophical defeat for the Democratic party that transcends campaign competence, or the lack thereof.

Could the Democrats have won if they had run a competent campaign? Possibly. But it likely would have been a close victory, and Democrats still would have been startled by what would have been a significant protest against the Obama/Democratic agenda. Whatever one might say about the quality of the Coakley and Brown campaigns, the conclusion that the voters delivered a negative judgment on the Democratic platform is inescapable.

And now, Republicans have a roadmap to further electoral wins, one provided to them by Brown and by Bob McDonnell, the newly elected Governor of Virginia: Focus on economic issues, run positive and appealing candidates with positive and appealing campaigns, and don’t be afraid to directly take on the White House and the Democratic establishment.

If this approach can pay dividends in Massachusetts, it can pay dividends elsewhere as well-including conservative House districts represented by Blue Dog Democrats.

Now that makes sense.  It is thoughtful, analytical and (unlike olbermann's rumpelstiltskinesque screed) reasoned. 

I don't agree 100% with Mr. Yousefzadeh (for example, I think he missed the impact of Coakley's statement that Catholics should probably stay away from emergency rooms).  But, taken as a whole, I think he has done a really good job.

I'll be making a point of reading this site, and this particular writer, in the future.

Ken Berwitz

For weeks I have blogged about how Attorney General eric holder's past - he was a senior partner with Covington & Buling, a law firm which specialized in defending terrorists - is apparently bearing on his insane decision to put terrorists in civil courts, rather than treating them as the enemy combatants they are and putting them before military tribunals.

But I didn't realize that he is also stacking the Department of Justice with others who have taken the terrorists' side. 

Read this editorial from the New York Post and see for yourself:

Come clean, Mr. Holder

Last Updated: 2:16 AM, January 27, 2010

Posted: January 27, 2010

 

Whose side is the Justice Department on: America's -- or the terrorists'?

 

It's just insane that a lawyer who defended Osama bin Laden's driver and bodyguard -- and who sought constitutional rights for terrorists -- could be one of the Obama administration's top legal officials.

 

But there's Neal Katyal, occupying a top perch at the Justice Department as the principal deputy solicitor general.

 

Then there's Jennifer Daskal -- who just months ago was an anti-Guantanamo activist. Now she's in Justice's National Security Division -- working on detainee issues.

 

Talk about conflicts of interest.

 

All kinds of rules prohibit government employees from influencing policy to the benefit of their previous employers. If Katyal, Daskal and other conflicted Justice lawyers had worked for corporations, they'd almost certainly be subject to these regulations.

 

Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are hopping mad about the situation -- and rightly so. Months ago, Senate Judiciary Committee member Charles Grassley asked Attorney General Eric Holder to disclose who in the administration had previously represented or agitated for alleged terrorists.

 

The AG's reply?

 

"I will consider that request."

 

Holder must be thinking long and hard -- because committee members have yet to receive a response.

 

Meanwhile, they've started asking other questions of Justice -- like who came up with the brilliant idea to Mirandize undie-bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, limiting the amount of intelligence he might provide about al Qaeda and future attacks.

 

With high-profile terror cases coming up -- like Abdulmutallab's, and the outrageous Khalid Sheik Mohammed trial in New York -- Americans need to know: Is our government putting in a good-faith effort when it comes to punishing the men who want to blow up our people?

 

The call to treat terrorists like civilians in court has been all Team Obama.

 

Which means the president and his administration also owe the American people an answer: Is the government's prosecutorial deck stacked in favor of the terrorists?

 

A Justice Department spokesman, Dean Boyd, tells The Post that the department will be responding to Sen. Grassley's request "very soon."

 

Will it be soon enough?

 

It's time for Holder and Justice to come clean.

 

Now.

How many are there?  How many more Katyals and Daskals have been planted in the DOJ?  How many more will be in the future?

Is it just that this administration is not serious about fighting terrorism?  Or is it that the administration is siding with the terrorists?  When a President appoints an Attorney General who, without explanation, gives terrorists civil trials with Miranda rights of silence, and puts people who defend and advocate for terrorists in positions of senior authority, that is a valid question.

Every day President Obama keeps eric holder in this position, is a day we are less safe.  holder is a national disgrace who endangers us all.

Fire him today.

Ken Berwitz

The great jazz drummer, Ed Thigpen, died in Copenhagen, Denmark on January 13th (though I first read of it today).  The cause of death was not disclosed,

Mr. Thigpen was simply amazing.  He knew how to create an atmosphere with his drums.  His subtlety (a word rarely used with jazz percussion) was remarkable.  Maybe that is why the greats - like Oscar Peterson (7 years) and Ella Fitzgerald (5 years) loved working with him.

Ed Thigpen was an expatriate.  He moved to Copenhagen in 1972 and lived there for the rest of his life, only occasionally coming back to the United States.  That was Europe's gain and our loss.

Thank you, Mr. Thigpen, for the greatness.  May you rest in peace.

Ken Berwitz

From Agence France Presse we have this story.  Please pay special attention to the part I've put in bold print:

Indonesia mulls tearing down Obama statue

(AFP)

 

JAKARTA — Indonesian authorities said Monday they are considering a petition to tear down a statue of US President Barack Obama as a boy, only a month after the bronze was unveiled in Jakarta.

 

The statue of "Little Barry" -- as Obama was known when he lived in the capital in the late 1960s -- stands in central Jakarta's Menteng Park, a short walk from the US president's former elementary school.

 

Critics say the site should have been used to honour an Indonesian and 55,000 people have joined a page on social networking website Facebook calling for the statue to be removed.

 

"We've been discussing for the past two weeks what to do with the statue... whether to take it down, move it elsewhere or retain it. We're finding the best solution," Jakarta parks agency official Dwi Bintarto said.

 

Obama, who was born in Hawaii, lived for four years as a child in Jakarta from 1967 after his divorced mother married an Indonesian.

 

The bronze was designed by Indonesian artists and depicts the boy Obama dressed in shorts and a T-shirt with a butterfly perched on his hand.

 

"The statue is of Obama as a child, not as the US president. His relatives and friends who erected it said it's meant to motivate children to study hard and dream big," Bintarto said.

 

Members of the "Take Down the Barack Obama Statue in Menteng Park" group on Facebook say Obama has done nothing for Indonesia.

 

"Barack Obama has yet to make a significant contribution to the Indonesian nation. We could say Obama only ate and s (expletive) in Menteng. He spent his subsequent days living as an American," the web page says.

 

"For the dignity of a sovereign nation, Barack Obama's monument in Menteng Park must be removed immediately."

The childhood connection and his knowledge of a few words of Indonesian made Obama popular in the mainly Muslim country of 234 million people.

 

Obama said in November he would visit Indonesia this year along with First Lady Michelle Obama and daughters Malia and Sasha.

 In fairness, 55,000 people is not a lot when you're talking about Indonesia.  But I'm suspecting that it is a pretty good-sized chunk of the people who have internet access and facebook accounts.

Maybe they can remove the Obama part and just keep the butterfly that is in his hand. 

Hey, I have an idea.  How about replacing the butterfly with his passport or long-form birth certificate. 

Ken Berwitz

Why do we fight radical islam?  Every now and again it's good to remind ourselves of the answer. 

This story comes to us from London's Daily Telegraph:

Rape victim receives 101 lashes for becoming pregnant

A 16-year-old girl who was raped in Bangladesh has been given 101 lashes for conceiving during the assault.

 

By Dean Nelson, South Asia Editor
Published: 4:30PM GMT 25 Jan 2010

The girl's father was also fined and warned the family would be branded outcasts from their village if he did not pay.

According to human rights activists, the girl, who was quickly married after the attack, was divorced weeks later after medical tests revealed she was pregnant.

The girl was raped by a 20-year-old villager in Brahmanbaria district in April last year.

Bangladesh's Daily Star newspaper reported that she was so ashamed following the attack that she did not lodge a complaint.

Her rape emerged after her pregnancy test and Muslim elders in the village issued a fatwa insisting that the girl be kept in isolation until her family agreed to corporal punishment.

Her rapist was pardoned by the elders. She told the newspaper the rapist had "spoiled" her life.

"I want justice," she said.

She was raped.  But within their culture, the shame was hers, not the rapist's. 

He raped her.  But within their culture, he was "pardoned by the elders".  What the hell, it was only rape.

The punishment?  101 lashes - to the VICTIM - and a fine to be paid by the victim's father or he and his family would be outcasts.

If we fight radical Islam we may win and we may lose.  But if we don't fight, we will most assuredly lose, because radical Islam will fight regardless.

And if we lose, our culture will be ended.  To be replaced by what?  A world in which rape victims are the villains and rapists are the protected species?

That is why we fight radical Islam.

And that is why we play political games - like sending terrorists through the civil court system - at our own peril.

Ken Berwitz

Want a taste of what the civil-court trial of khalid sheikh mohammed and his pals will be like?

Well, here’s one for you, excerpted from an Associated Press article:

NEW YORK – A U.S.-trained Pakistani scientist linked to al-Qaida got into trouble again Monday in federal court after twice interrupting the sometimes tearful testimony of an American solider who claimed he shot her in self defense in Afghanistan in 2008.

"I feel sorry for you," Aafit Saddiqui blurted out at one point at her attempted murder trial in Manhattan. After a judge had deputy U.S. marshals remove her, she pointed at the witness and muttered something else before disappearing behind a side door.

U.S. District Judge Richard Berman allowed Saddiqui to return later, but kicked her out again amid another rambling tirade about injustice. At the end of the day, the defense argued that the removals made her look bad in front of the jury and asked for a mistrial, which the judge denied.

Authorities allege that Siddiqui, 37, is an al-Qaida supporter who was detained at an Afghan police station on July 18, 2008, after being caught carrying handwritten notes referencing a "mass casualty attack" and listing the Brooklyn Bridge, Statue of Liberty and other New York City landmarks.

Before she could be interrogated in an Afghan police office, prosecutors say she managed to grab a military assault rifle set down by a U.S. Army soldier and open fire at American personnel, but missed. The soldier, a chief warrant officer, shot her with his pistol during a struggle.

On Monday, the officer appeared in uniform and used a cane as he limped into court to testify on condition that he not be identified. He began weeping as he recounted how a roadside bomb had left him severely injured and killed three fellow soldiers in the fall of 2008.

"Sometimes it's a little hard to talk about this," he said.

He testified Afghan authorities had told him Siddiqui had been restrained, and was shocked when she sudden appeared from behind a curtain wielding his M4 rifle and yelling, "Allah akbar," Arabic for "God is great."

"It was pretty amazing she got that thing up and squared off," he said. "She was looking at me and aiming dead at me."

Hearing the rifle go off, the officer said he followed his military training and pulled his pistol. Siddiqui was wrestling with an interpreter when he shot her in the stomach.

"I operated within the rules of engagement to eliminate the threat," he said.

Siddiqui's outbursts weren't the only disruptions of the day: The judge removed two jurors who told him in private that they couldn't be impartial because a spectator had pointed at them and mouthed an obscenity. They were replaced and the man was barred from the courtroom.

But Attorney General eric holder, former senior partner at Covington and Burling, a law firm renowned for its defense of terrorist suspects, won’t reconsider.  

Better to have an enemy combatant who was captured outside the country be given US citizen’s rights in a civil court than a trial by military tribunal.  This makes sense to holder – and to his boss, Barack Obama.

The 2010 elections cannot come fast enough.  And that goes double for 2012.

Ken Berwitz

How can a man this small make himself so much smaller?  It’s a question for the ages.

In case you are unaware (and a lot of you may be, since his ratings are so low), keith olbermann hosts a show called “Countdown” on MSNBC – an NBC-owned network which seems to have become a repository for the hard-left among us.

One of olbermann’s daily features is “the worst people in the world” – a very clever concept (credit where credit is due).  In it, he names three people he has a problem with and insults them (that’s where it falls apart because he is so vile and obnoxious that the cleverness – and humor and impact – is pretty much overwhelmed by his bile-spurting diatribes).

Yesterday – his “worst person in the world” was Bill O’Reilly, the Fox News Channel personality whom he competes against in his time slot, and who regularly makes mincemeat of him in the ratings.  This infuriates olbermann, who has made O’Reilly one of his “worst people in the world” so regularly that it has become something of a yawner.

In any event, olbermann again designated O’Reilly worst person in the world last night.  And I thought it would be instructive for you to see the quality of his commentary.  So here it is, verbatim:

But our winner, Bill-O the clown. About 60 networks carried the Haitian Earthquake telethon Thursday night. CNN did, we did. CNBC didn’t. CNN Headline didn’t. Fixed News didn’t. At least, most of them did not, in lieu of the telethon, instead run a pathetic program whose lead story was about how great the program was and how great its coverage of Haiti had been.

Bill-O did. "Fox News had almost six times as many viewers as MSNBC primetime, five times the audience of CNN. That’s not a victory. Now, most of the liberal media ignore that story, and will not tell you how dominant Fox News has become. That’s why many newspapers are failing. They simply don’t tell you the truth. But writing in "The Miami Herald," TV critic Glenn Garvin did tell the truth."

He then proceeded to read a quote from Glenn Garvin, for years the hands down winner in any poll of newspaper TV writers or of TV people as the TV critic the most in Fox’s pocket, the farthest down the lunatic fringe rabbit hole. Here we read Glenn Garvin in hopes of seeing something shrill and reactionary to reaffirm that we’re on the money.

Instead of two hours to help Haiti, Fox gives us Bill-O. Instead of here is the phone number to help Haiti, Bill-O gives himself == patting himself on the back and this comic relief Garvin smooching his hiney. Then the coup de grace, "to be fair, CNN has covered the Haiti story very well. There’s no question about it. And I applaud the CNN correspondents who have done such a good job. But our Fox News correspondents are just as good."

Then why don’t you put them on, instead of stroking yourself in front of the American public? Just once. Just an hour off from your desperate attempt to bring validation and meaning into your purposeless little life, by reading out the ratings again. Bill, this is a new emotion for me. I don’t know how else to say this: I am now embarrassed for you. Bill "I Have Big Ratings; That Makes My Whole Life Worthwhile" O`Reilly, today’s worst person in the world.

Is it any wonder that, apart from the sorosian left, most people avoid watching this guy?

Please note that all O’Reilly did was say that Fox News was doing a good job covering Haiti and that it was generating high viewership for it.  Look at how that was spun, and try counting up the personal insults (go slowly:  there are so many you might miss one or two).

Oh, by the way, during the 2008 campaign olbermann had a burst of better ratings for a relatively short period of time.  When that happened, he made sure to brag about his higher ratings and compare them to O’Reilly’s.

So apart from being vile, vicious, bitter and insulting….he is a hypocrite too.

Behold the incredible shrinking olbermann.

Ken Berwitz

Arkansas congressperson Marion Barry is retiring rather than to try running for re-election as a Democrat this year.

Before doing so he had a discussion with President Obama about Democratic prospects, and here, according to The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, via Glenn Thrush at www.politico.com, is how it went:

January 25, 2010

Berry: Obama said "big difference" between '10 and '94 is "me"

Rep. Marion Berry's parting shot, published in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette [no link, subscription only] offers a warning to moderate Democrats and border state moderates — warning of a midterm bloodbath comparable to the 54-seat D-to-R swing in 1994.

But the jaw-dropper is Berry's claim that President Obama personally dismissed any comparison between Democrats now and under Bill Clinton 16 years ago — by saying his personal popularity would bail everybody out.

The retiring Berry, who doesn't say when the remarks were made, now scoffs at Obama's 50-or-below approval rating:

Writes ADG reporter Jane Fullerton:

Berry recounted meetings with White House officials, reminiscent of some during the Clinton days, where he and others urged them not to force Blue Dogs “off into that swamp” of supporting bills that would be unpopular with voters back home.

“I’ve been doing that with this White House, and they just don’t seem to give it any credibility at all,” Berry said. “They just kept telling us how good it was going to be. The president himself, when that was brought up in one group, said, ‘Well, the big difference here and in ’94 was you’ve got me.’ We’re going to see how much difference that makes now.” [snip]

 

“I began to preach last January that we had already seen this movie and we didn’t want to see it again because we know how it comes out,” said Arkansas’ 1st District congressman, who worked in the Clinton administration before being elected to the House in 1996... "I just began to have flashbacks to 1993 and ’94. No one that was here in ’94, or at the day after the election felt like. It certainly wasn’t a good feeling.”

Remember:  those comments were made after President Obama campaigned for Democrats in the Virginia and New Jersey Governor races and then the Massachusetts senate race. 

Three losses out of three - including the seat Ted Kennedy held for 47 years - and he has the cajones to make it sound as though things will turn around because he is in the White House?

I wonder if it has occurred to Mr. Obama that Congressperson Berry is retiring because of the fact that "you've got me".  

What hubris.  What amazing hubris.

Ken Berwitz

It happens every year at this time.

There is an anti-abortion "March For Life", tens and tens of thousands mass in Washington DC, there are speeches, often by high profile politicians.........

.........and our wonderful "neutral" media do not cover it, so you probably don't even know it happened.

Here is an excerpt from www.newsbusters.org writer Tim Graham's piece on this year's march:

As usual, ABC, CBS, and NBC ignored Friday’s March for Life protest. (Even the Associated Press skipped over the tens of thousands marching.) But the PBS NewsHour at least offered a brief from news anchor Hari Sreenivasan:

Thousands rallied in Washington in the annual March For Life. It was the 37th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision of Roe v. Wade that legalized abortion. The anti-abortion crowd rallied at the White House, and then moved on to the Supreme Court. A handful of abortion rights supporters were also present.

NPR covered the trial on the murder of late-term abortionist George Tiller on Friday night (as well as Friday morning), but had no March for Life mention.

More from Mr. Graham:.

As the new year began, The New York Times offered a 780-word article to a protest for illegal immigrants – with four marchers walking from Miami to Washington. But on Saturday, tens of thousands of Americans gathering in Washington for Friday's annual March for Life received – part of a sentence.

 

In the Saturday paper on January 23, an article on the trial facing the killer of late-term abortionist George Tiller on page A-11 featured this note in paragraph 9 of a 12-paragraph dispatch by Monica Davey:

 

Testimony began the same day that abortion rights groups celebrated, and abortion opponents protested, the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that made abortion legal.

 

Times defenders could note that The Caucus blog on the Times website offered a two-sentence preview on Friday:

37 Years: Just one day after the Supreme Court announced its latest landmark decision, abortion opponents will gather in Washington to mark the 37th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision, which legalized abortion. Among the events: a National March for Life rally.

The Washington Post carried a calm story by William Wan on the March for Life with color photos of each side of the abortion divide. (An online video on the Post website gave substantial time to both sides, even though the pro-abortion contingent was vastly outnumbered, as usual.)

 

The Los Angeles Times covered the Tiller trial in Wichita, but reporter Robin Abcarian made no mention of the March for Life. Neither did anyone else at that paper.

Readers of this blog know that I support the use of all contraceptives, including the "day after" pill, and that I support a woman's right to abort until there is a beating heart and brain activity - which is when I define what she is carrying as a live child.  I also support later-term abortions, if there is clear evidence that the woman's life is at risk.

Obviously I'm no champion of the "March For Life" people.  But, dammit, they did march, there were a great many of them, and it is news. 

When mainstream media shut out coverage of this march, year after year after year, they are engaging in blatant censorship, by declining to cover a news story because they don't agree with the people they would be covering.

But listen to them squeal like stuck pigs if you call them biased.

Ken Berwitz

First, we have the following excerpt from this morning's column by New York Times columnist (and enthusiastic Obama supporter) Bob Herbert:

Mr. Obama may be personally very appealing, but he has positioned himself all over the political map: the anti-Iraq war candidate who escalated the war in Afghanistan; the opponent of health insurance mandates who made a mandate to buy insurance the centerpiece of his plan; the president who stocked his administration with Wall Street insiders and went to the mat for the banks and big corporations, but who is now trying to present himself as a born-again populist.

Mr. Obama is in danger of being perceived as someone whose rhetoric, however skillful, cannot always be trusted. He is creating a credibility gap for himself, and if it widens much more he won’t be able to close it.

Then, we have President Obama, from yesterday, claiming that the so-called "stimulus package" has been successful in "saving or creating" jobs: 

"These steps have saved or created about 2 million jobs so far.  But over 7 million jobs have been lost as a consequence of this recession."

Reality check:  What you just read it classic Obama BS.  So much so that, if Mr. Herbert had been aware of Mr. Obama's claim in time, I'm pretty sure he would have worked it into this morning's column.

-First Mr. Obama tells us that the "stimulus package" has "saved or created" 2 million jobs.  The data to corroborate this claim is non-existent:  it can't exist because a) it is impossible to gauge how many jobs - if any - are "saved" (we don't even have a specific definition of the term to go by) and b) just about every news venue that looked at the figures presented by Mr. Obama's administration quickly concluded they were obviously false/ridiculously inflated.  Even usually loyal Obama media couldn't escape this conclusion;

-Then Mr. Obama tells us that, during the same period of time, over 7 million jobs have been lost.  By appending "as a consequence of this recession" to those grim data he tries to accomplish two things:  1) separate job creation from job losses, as if they were two completely different statistics - which no one in his/her right mind would believe - and 2) blaming all job losses on the previous administration (which, a year after President Bush left office,  fewer and fewer people are buying anymore).

How many times do we have to recount what President Obama said about the "stimulus package"?    He said it would cap unemployment at 8%.  He said that if it were not passed unemployment could rise to 8.5% - 9%.  He said that it would create 3,500,000 - 4,000,000 million jobs by the end of 2010 (a few days later, it became "created or saved").

Based on these promises, the legislation passed about one year ago -- with virtually no Republican support (understandable, since Republicans were completely shut out of writing the "stimulus package", thus making it a 100% partisan Democratic bill).  And instead of either stopping at 8% or dropping lower, unemployment zoomed to 10%, with well over 3,000,000 jobs lost. 

If Barack Obama did not mean to include those job losses in his estimate of the "stimulus package" success, because they were "a consequence of this recession", then why did he say unemployment would cap at 8%?  The only way unemployment would have risen is by loss of these jobs.  In other words, Mr. Obama is just plain lying to our faces.

And the 2 million jobs that were "saved or created"?  Other than the Soros-loving left, can you find any legitimate news venue that backs the Obama administration up on this absurd claim?  Look until your eyes fall out and you'll find a very precious few.  As noted above, even Obama supporters had to hold their nose for this BS.  So when Mr. Obama says it he, again, is just plain lying to our faces.

Based on the above, I conclude that when Bob Herbert says Mr. Obama is creating a credibility gap, he is being remarkably kind.  Mr. Obama is not creating one, he has created one. And it already is so wide that a large percentage of the electorate no longer believes him - which is why his approval numbers have gone from the stratosphere to Davey Jones' locker in a matter of months.

And if President Obama thinks he can retrieve his credibility with comments like the one referenced above, he is going to find out that it still has plenty further to fall.

Ken Berwitz

Sometimes a cartoon says a great deal.  Like this one, which I picked up from a commenter at www.freerepublic.com:

Ken Berwitz

Does this administration have the capacity to admit an impossibly damaging error and change the status of a terrorist so that he is interrogated like one?

From Jennifer Rubin at Commentary Magazine:

It’s Not Too Late to Fix a Grievous Error

Jennifer Rubin - 01.25.2010 - 3:13 PM

Sens. Joe Lieberman and Susan Collins have written a letter today to Attorney General Eric Holder and counterterrorism adviser John Brennan urging them to designate Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Christmas Day bomber, as an “unprivileged enemy belligerent” so he can be “questioned and charged accordingly.” The senators note that Obama himself has declared that “we are at war with al-Qaeda.” However, Abdulmutallab was read his Miranda rights and, as others have reported, provided only 50 minutes of conversation to FBI agents who lacked the needed detail to elicit all the helpful material he might possess. The senators note that last week, Dennis Blair and other officials conceded in congressional testimony that the Justice Department “did not consult with leadership in the intelligence community and the Department of Defense for their input on whether or not to treat Abdulmutallab as a criminal and read him his Miranda rights.” Senators also learned that the “High Value Detainee Interrogation Group, which the Department of Justice announced last August — more than four months ago — is not yet operational.”

The senators conclude that the president’s repeated admonitions that we are at war do not appear to “be reflected in the actions of some in the Executive branch.” But they note that the president can “reverse this error” and transfer the Christmas Day bomber to the Department of Defense.

This is a superb suggestion, which many conservative commentators have urged. There really isn’t reason not to do so — unless of course the criminalization of our national intelligence system and the self-imposed limits on our anti-terrorism efforts are in keeping with what the president wants. In that case, the actions of the executive branch have been in tune with Obama’s wishes, and we are all in a great deal of trouble. Let’s hope not.

The fundamental issue here is whether we are, or we are not, serious about protecting ourselves against international terrorism, which has a stated goal of ending western civilization and replacing it with shari'a law.

The reaction of President Obama and Attorney General holder to Ms. Collins and Mr. Lieberman's letter will give us some pretty clear insight.

Let's stay on top of this. 

Ken Berwitz

This post is for anyone who still believes that hugo chavez is the head of a democratic state.  It comes to us from the Associated Press:

CARACAS, Venezuela - Police and National Guard troops have fired tear gas and plastic bullets to disperse thousands of Venezuelans protesting after President Hugo Chavez's government forced a critical TV channel off cable television.

Protests broke out after cable companies dropped the anti-Chavez channel Radio Caracas Television Internacional, or RCTV, over the weekend.

The channel was forced off cable after defying new rules requiring cable channels to carry mandatory programming including some of Chavez's speeches.

Authorities sought to prevent a march by university students Monday from reaching the state telecommunications agency. Chavez supporters held a counter-demonstration, and some were seen throwing rocks and bottles at anti-Chavez protesters.

This is the real hugo chavez -- hero of the OAS and the man who lectures Honduras and other countries on how to govern.

It is why this obnoxious, socialistic barroom loudmouth is an international laughingstock -- except for the people he is subjugating, that is.

The sooner hugo chavez is ousted from power, the better off Venezuela and other central and south American states will be. 

Ken Berwitz

Well, Barack Obama promised you "transparency".  And you're getting it.

From Fox News:

White House directed a $25 million no-bid contract to Checchi & Company Consulting, Inc.

By FOX News  01/25/10 at 9:55 am

 

Despite President Obama’s long history of criticizing the Bush administration for “sweetheart deals” with favored contractors, the Obama administration this month awarded a $25 million federal contract for work in Afghanistan to a company owned by a Democratic campaign contributor without entertaining competitive bids, Fox News has learned.

The contract, awarded on Jan. 4 to Checchi & Company Consulting, Inc., a Washington-based firm owned by economist and Democratic donor Vincent V. Checchi, will pay the firm $24,673,427 to provide “rule of law stabilization services” in war-torn Afghanistan.

Is that transparent enough for you?

It's transparent enough for Fox to report it.  Let's see how much of the rest of our wonderful "neutral" media do.

The 2010 elections cannot come fast enough.  And that goes double for 2012..

Ken Berwitz

This piece, by Tom Blumer at www.newsbusters.org, speaks for itself.  No need for addtional commentary by me:

Blatant vs. Balanced: CNN, MSNBC Played Faves With Mass. Election Night Speeches; Fox Carried All of Both

By Tom Blumer (Bio | Archive)
Mon, 01/25/2010 - 14:37 ET

Building on Brad Wilmouth's critique at NewsBusters of Keith Olbermann's disgraceful treatment of Scott Brown's U.S. Senate victory in Massachusetts, Johnny Dollar (HT Taxman Blog) measured the coverage of the victory/concession speeches of Brown and his opponent Martha (or is it Marcia?) Coakley.

Imagine my non-surprise when I saw the results (graph follows the jump):

During Tuesday night's coverage of the Massachusetts special election, CNN and MSNBC aired only a fraction of the Republican candidate's speech. Fox News Channel aired both candidates' speeches in their entirety.

.... CNN only ran 26% of Brown's speech, while MSNBC aired 37%. Fox News Channel carried 100% of both speeches:

Ken Berwitz

It's belly laugh time.

This howler comes from Andy Barr at www.politico.com:

MSNBC host Ed Schultz is tearing into Robert Gibbs and the rest of President Barack Obama’s team, telling the White House press secretary that he is “full of sh—.”

Speaking at the progressive Blue State Bash event at the Minneapolis Convention Center on Saturday, Schultz relayed a combative exchange he had off the air with Gibbs, who last appeared on his program “The Ed Show” on Thursday.

“I know it’s being recorded, but I wasn’t told it was off the record,” Schultz said in a video posted on theuptake.org. “Mr. Gibbs and I had quite the conversation off the air the other night. I’m gonna tell ya, I told him he was full of sh—.”

“I did,” Schultz continued. “And then he gave me the Dick Cheney f-bomb the same way Sen. Leahy got it on the Senate floor. I told Robert Gibbs, I said: ‘And I’m sorry you’re swearing at me, but I’m just trying to help you out. I’m telling you you’re losing your base. Do you understand you’re losing your base?’”

Schultz set a fiery tone in the nearly 20-minute speech that eviscerated the Democratic Party for not listening to its progressive wing.

“We have to get these people who have infiltrated the Democratic progressive movement and get them the hell out,” Schultz boomed. “We are still in an ideological fight for this country.”

The liberal talk show host — who was asked by North Dakota Democrats to run for the Senate seat vacated by Sen. Byron Dorgan’s retirement — implored the audience to hold the Obama administration’s feet to the fire.

“We have to make sure President Obama gets the message: We’re with you, but you have to be with us,” he said. “If we don’t speak up and tell the White House they’re wrong right now, who will do it?”

Schultz also said that despite turning down an opportunity to run for the Senate, he would have used the same aggressive tone on the campaign trail.

“I want all of you to know that I am not running for the United States Senate,” he said. “But I also want you to know that if I did, I’d kick their ass.”

The White House didn’t respond to a request for comment.

You have to laugh.  Baghdad Bob Gibbs being given advice on how to gain votes by Ed Schultz.

Gibbs, a man who lies for a living (and, based on his performance, should get a big raise), being given advice for building up a base by Schultz, who has been on MSNBC for a year and has ratings so anemic that Dracula might give him a pity transfusion.

The latest data (from Thursday of last week):  Schultz has about 600,000 viewers, compared to over 3,000,000 for Brett Baier's straight news show on Fox, and about 700,000 for CNN's news show hosted by Wolf Blitzer.  Now there's a basis for giving advice....

But the best line of all is when Schultz says that IF he ran for the senate he'd "kick their ass".  Spoken by someone who is not running, and therefore can barf out as much bravado as he can muster.

Schultz's comment reminds me of the joke about a woman who goes to the butcher and asks for a pound of chopmeat.  The butcher says "That will be $3.95".  She says "$3.95?  The store two blocks over charges $2.95".  The butcher says "Then why don't you go there?"  The woman says "Because he's out of chopmeat".  The butcher says "Lady, if I was out of chopmeat I'd charge you $1.95".

Evidently Ed Schultz must have a little butcher in him.  Come to think of it, that stands to reason, since his ratings are butchering MSNBC every evening.

Ken Berwitz

Massachusetts?  Gone.  North Dakota?  Almost certainly gone.  Arkansas?  Probably gone.  Nevada?  Probably gone (good riddance!)  And plenty of others either ripe for the picking or realistically competitive.

And now there's Delaware.

Beau Biden, Joe's son, who is the Attorney General of Delaware and Joe's heir-apparent - or so we thought - has read the tea leaves, smelled the coffee and decided not to run for his father's seat.  I don't know that he could have won, but I'm pretty sure he had at least a realistic chance.  That is now irrelevant.

This means Mike Castle, current 9-term congressperson (which is a statewide office since Delaware has just one congressional seat), former two-time Governor and far and away the most popular Republican in the state, is running against......no one.

Nor does there appear to be any competition on the horizon who could beat him.

Another Democratic senate seat lost?  Take that bet.

Ken Berwitz

Remember when the Obama people and their scurrying little squirrels from the left were accusing the Tea Party movement (teabagggers, as they called them) of "Astroturfing" - i.e. presenting themselves as everyday citizens, when they were really an organized movement?

Well, does the name Ellie Light mean anything to you?  I'm betting it doesn't - and if I'm right, it means that the same media which couldn't put out enough stories about the tea party "Astroturfers" their leftward masters invented and then told them about, have buried a real "Astroturf" strategy on behalf of the Obama left.

Want specifics?  Sure.  Here they are, courtesy of Michelle Malkin:

The Astroturf Presidency

By Michelle Malkin  •  January 25, 2010 03:18 AM

Who is Ellie Light?

 

I predict you’ll start seeing the question as a popular bumper sticker soon (a la “Who is John Galt?”…and voila, someone has already made a t-shirt!).

 

It’s a handy rhetorical rejoinder the next time the White House or your nutroots neighbors and co-workers try to tar the Tea Party or any other grass-roots revolts against President Obama as phony, top-down operations.

When Obama’s Soros-funded, Big Labor-directed, K Street-organized goons engage in classic projection and you need a glib way to call out the pot calling the kettle black, just snap back:

 

Who is Ellie Light?

 

A Cleveland Plain Dealer blog first broke the story over the weekend of a “suspicious” letter-writer named “Ellie Light” who submitted more than a dozen pro-Obama letters to the editors in recent weeks using addresses from Philadelphia to California and all points in between. Open-source-optimizing blogger Patterico has added much more information on both “Donald Trump Astroturfing” (”a letter published in multiple places from one person claiming to live in multiple cities”) and “David Axelrod Astroturfing” (”identical letters published in multiple places claiming to be from different people”).

 

Kudos to the Plain Dealer for smoking out the initial ringer and Patterico and his readers/tipsters for delving deeper. But so much for the rest of the vaunted gate-keepers of the Fourth Estate, eh?

 

The bogus letters are just the latest example of Obama theater — doctors in costumes, town hall stage props, trumped-up Obamacare anecdotes, kiddie proxies, etc., etc., etc.

 

Underscoring this administration’s dependence on centrally planned, teleprompter-dependent perpetual campaigns of manufactured support, the other half of Obama’s Astroturf Twin Power — David Plouffe — will soon rejoin Chicago cronies David Axelrod, Valerie Jarrett, and the rest to rescue the Democrats in a new expanded role as outside White House adviser.

 

A reminder from my August 21, 2009 column on Corporate Shills for Hope and Change:

 

Money from pharmaceutical firms and health care companies is dirty, evil, and corrupting – except when key members of Team Obama are pocketing it. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs derides grass-roots opponents of socialized health care as industry-funded lackeys with questionable motives and conflicts of interest. But what about the corporate shills at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?

 

Two weeks ago, the White House embraced $150 million in drug industry ads supporting Obamacare. This week, Bloomberg News reported that White House senior adviser and chief campaign strategist David Axelrod’s former public relations firm, AKPD Message and Media, has raked in some $24 million in ad contracts supporting Obamacare – along with another p.r. firm, GMMB, run by other Obama strategists.

 

The ads are funded by Big Pharma, the AARP, AMA, and the powerhouse Services Employees International Union (whose Purple Shirts dumped $80 million in independent expenditures to get Obama and the Democrat majority elected). In trademark Axelrod-ian style, the special interest coalition adopted faux grass-roots names – first under the banner of “Healthy Economy Now” and more recently as “Americans for Stable Quality Care.”

 

Because, well, “Corporate Shills for Hope and Change” doesn’t have quite the same ring of authenticity.

 

Astroturf master Axelrod was president and sole shareholder of AKPD from 1985 until last December, when he resigned to take his White House position. His son, Michael, works there. So does former Obama campaign manager David Plouffe. Axelrod is prominently featured on AKPD’s website, from a founder’s quote on the front page (“CHANGE IS SOMETHING YOU HAVE TO FIGHT FOR”) to the glamorous election night photos of Plouffe and Axelrod with the Obamas. AKPD still consults with Axelrod on “strategy and research” for the Democratic National Committee. The firm owes Axelrod $2 million, due in annual installments of $350,000, $650,000, $400,000 and $600,000.

 

That Axelrod and his old firm benefit mutually from their respective roles selling Obamacare should be gobsmackingly obvious. Axelrod pushes the White House plan on TV news shows. AKPD derives mega-income from ad contracts selling the White House-endorsed plan. The windfall allows AKPD to settle its debts with Axelrod, whose name, face, and high-powered ties are critical to future wheel-greasing for AKPD — and future salary-earning for Axelrod’s son and close associates.

 

Plouffe authored an op-ed for the Washington Post over the weekend crusading to save the Demcare government takeover. His Washington Post byline does not mention his position at AKPD and does not disclose his financial conflicts of interests in promoting Demcare while serving as senior adviser to AKPD, which raked in an estimated $24 million in drug industry ads supporting Demcare along with Obama-tied p.r. firm GMMB.

 

Another MSM failure to keep readers fully informed:

 

David Plouffe, campaign manager of Obama for America and Obama-Biden 2008, is the author of “Audacity to Win.”

 

Who is Ellie Light?

The article is a good deal longer than what I've posted, and you can read it all by clicking here.  But I think you get the pictures.

Another example of our wonderful "neutral" media in action.

But listen to them squeal like stuck pigs if you call them biased..

Ken Berwitz

Here is another of the seemingly countless instances in which the self-hating Jews who own the New York Times find a way to crap on Israel - even as they are forced to grudgingly acknowledge the country's disproportionate contribution to Haiti relief.

From Leo Rennert at www.americanthinker.com:

January 23, 2010

NYT can't run anything positive about Israel

Leo Rennert

Since Israel responded quickly to the Haiti earthquake with a major relief effort, including a field hospital that trumps all other medical services in the devastated country, it has received widespread, unalloyed recognition and praise from mainstream media in the U.S. and abroad.  ABC News, NBC news, CNN, Fox News, just to mention a few, along with many foreign media, have given extensive, favorable coverage to the life-saving efforts of Israeli doctors and nurses operating with cutting-edge skills and resources.

But NOT in the New York Times.

 

In its Jan. 22 edition, the Times carries an article by Jerusalem bureau chief Ethan Bronner that manages to rain on Israel's parade of rare media salutes for its display of genuine humanitarian caring half way around the world ("For Israelis, Mixed Feelings on Aid Effort -- Questions arise about image and the national character" page A11.)  As far as Bronner is concerned, Israel's life-saving marvels in Haiti are just a mixed bag -- with at least as many minuses as pluses.

 

Bronner starts by acknowledging that Israel has demonstrated that it is "one of the mst nimble countries in disaster relief" -- recognized as such by Western television news correspondents.

 

But he immediately balances this with a hefty dose of negativism -- quoting several Israeli leftists who fault the Haiti relief effort by asking why Israel can't be as generous to Palestinians in Gaza -- "the left has complained that there is no reason to travel thousands of miles to help those in need -- Gaza is an hour away."

 

And Bronner continues with his pejorative coverage by writing that Israel's government is trying to figure out "how to make the most of the relatively rare positive news coverage, especially after the severe criticism it has faced over its Gaza offensive a year ago."

 

Bronner, with his pluses-minuses balancing act, cites a Jerusalem Post commentator's assessment that the Haiti relief project shows that "the Jewish people demonstrated that their extended hand can bridge any gap and traverse any chasm when it comes to saving lives."

 

But just as quickly, Bronner neuters this kudo with a quote from another commentator, Larry Derfner, who wrote that "it's the Haiti side of Israel that makes the Gaza side so inexpressibly tragic.  And more and more, the Haiti part of the national character has been dwarfed by the Gaza part."

 

Well, you get the picture, as sketched by Bronner -- anythng good done by Israel in Haiti is neutered, erased by what it's doing to the people in Gaza.

 

Except, the Haiti-Gaza contrast fails on two counts:

 

1.  The devastation and suffering in Haiti are due to a natural disaster; while the plight of Gazans is due entirely to human factors -- i.e. the terror war waged by Hamas and Islamic Jihad against Israel with a decade-long barrage of thousands of rocket and mortar rounds against Israeli civilian populations.   Bronner doesn't bring himself to point out this obvious and telling difference between these two calamities.  Likening Haiti to Gaza is a totally irrelevant apples-and-oranges ploy.

 

2.  Even with the Israeli-Palestinian economic blockade of Gaza, Israel sends about 100 truckloads daily into Gaza, carrying food, medicines and other basic necessities.  Plus it provides sufficient diesel fuel to meet Gaza's needs.  Plus it has admitted hundreds of injured and sick Gazans into Israel where they receive the same dedicated, advanced medical care that Haitians receive in Israel's field hospital at Port-au-Prince.  Again, while Bronner gleefully quotes slanderous allegations about Israel's lack of humanitarian zeal, he omits any mention of the vast extent of humanitarian aid that is pouring into Gaza from Israel every day.

 

While Bronner relies on a few Israelis spouting a leftist-chic line against their country, he doesn't have the grace to quote the simple, short comment of Prime Minister Netanyahu that Israel, with its Haiti operation, shows "it's a small country with a big heart."

 

And the same can be said of Israel in regard to Gaza, when taking into account the unremitting terror war waged against it from Hamas-ruled Gaza.

 

Both Haiti AND Gaza demonstrate that Israel indeed has a "big heart."  No other country in the world, given the same provocations and rocket barrages, would treat its enemy as kindly as Israel has in responding to Hamas's war making from Gaza.

 

Bronner's Haiti-Gaza contrast doesn't hold water.

And yet, the Times remains a revered news venue among "enlightened" Jews - most of whom, presumably support Israel

How do I explain it?  The same way I explain the fact that 78% of Jews voted for Barack Obama in 2008, even knowing his long, close association with the virulently anti-Israel, anti-Jewish, anti-White jeremiah wright.

At this point, I could repost what I've written before on this blog.  But if you want a really good answer, read Norman Podhoretz' new book, "Why Are Jews Liberals?".  He's better at explaining it than I am (though just as exasperated).

Ken Berwitz

A lot of Monday-morning quarterbacking is being done today about yesterday's NFL championship games.  Countless "why didn't he pass instead of hand off" and "why do that on fourth down" comments will be made before noontime.

But the term "Monday-morning quarterbacking" has another, more general meaning.  It is used to describe people who sit back, watch someone else handle a difficult situation, and then tell them what they're doing wrong - from a distant, safe vantage point.

And I have heard about as much Monday-morning quarterbacking about the US role in Haiti as I can take.

The US, under the directive of President Obama, has been nothing short of stellar since the Haitian earthquake.  We have turned chaos into at least some level of order, we are rescuing the trapped, providing food and water to the hungry and seeing to the physical needs of the injured to a degree that virtually no other country on earth is coming close to (with the exception of Israel which, despite its tiny size and its location half a world away, is both involved in rescue efforts, and is #2, behind only the US, in its medical services for Haitian people).

And this was put together from scratch in just a matter of days. (Yes I know that there are parallels between this and Hurricane Katrina, but this is not the place for them;  I will save that for another blog.)

Yet, even as we bring order to anarchy and save countless lives, we have been attacked mercilessly for our efforts. 

-We have the pathetic scumbag, hugo chavez of oil-rich Venezuela - whose contribution to my knowledge has been one ship's worth of supplies (whoopee doo) calling us "occupiers" and other worse names, and telling us we should send vaccines, not troops.  What he doesn't tell us is who will protect those vaccines - otherwise known as salable goods?  And who will negotiate the non-existent roads and the impossible amount of debris to get them to the field hospitals.  And who will protect the field hospitals, so they aren't robbed of the vaccine out of either greed or personal desperation?  I suggest that chavez should go back to turning his country into a socialist cesspool while regularly making an international laughingstock of himself, and leave the humanitarianism to people who care about humanity.

-Then we have the Alain Joyandet, the French  "minister in charge of humanitarian relief".  From London's Daily Telegraph:

The French minister in charge of humanitarian relief called on the UN to "clarify" the American role amid claims the military build up was hampering aid efforts.

 

Alain Joyandet admitted he had been involved in a scuffle with a US commander in the airport's control tower over the flight plan for a French evacuation flight.

 

"This is about helping Haiti, not about occupying Haiti," Mr Joyandet said.

Ooooh, poor baby.  You had a pwobwum with a US Commander (otherwise known as the guy who facilitates your ability to get anything done at all) and your wiwoo sensibiwities are bwoozed?  I have a great idea, Alain:  why don't you stop whining and complaining for a couple of minutes, and favor us with a quick narrative of France's glorious history with Haiti.  Tell us of the high road France took when it expropriated the country and turned it into one big slave plantation.  Explain to us how much better your country was than we "occupiers".  After that, you can go eff yourself.

-And now we have Guido Bertolaso of Italy.  Here is a man who had humanitarian success under circumstances that Haitians and US soldiers would be thrilled out of their minds with.  And he thinks that makes him an expert on what is happening in Haiti.  From Reuters:

ROME (Reuters) - Italy's top disaster expert has slammed the U.S. response to the Haiti earthquake, criticizing its lack of organization and the reliance on soldiers with no training in humanitarian operations. Guido Bertolaso, head of Italy's civil protection service who received international acclaim for his handling of an Italian earthquake last April, described "a pathetic situation which could have been much better organized."

Bertolaso, who arrived in Haiti on Friday, told RAI state television that Washington had made "a show of force," but military officers coordinating the emergency had no links with the humanitarian groups in the Caribbean island state.

"We are missing a leader, a coordination capacity that goes beyond military discipline," Bertolaso, who holds the rank of minister, said late on Sunday.

"The Americans are extraordinary, but when you are facing a situation in chaos, they tend to confuse military intervention with emergency aid, which cannot be entrusted to the armed forces."

A contingent of 13,000 U.S. troops is helping relief efforts after the January 12, magnitude 7 quake in Haiti, which killed up to 200,000 people and left up to 3 million hurt and homeless.

Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's center-right government, which has tried to foster close ties with Washington, was quick to distance itself from the remarks.

"Bertolaso ... has attacked American and international organizations head on. The Italian government does not share these statements," Foreign Minister Franco Frattini told reporters on a visit to Washington.

Bertolaso won plaudits for his handling of last year's quake in the Abruzzo region of central Italy which killed 294 people and left 40,000 homeless.

However, the loss of life and scale of destruction was far smaller than in Haiti, and Italy as a wealthy nation is much better equipped to cope with disasters than impoverished Haiti.

Read those numbers again.  Bertolaso oversaw humanitarian efforts after an earthquake of 5.8 magnitude, about 300 dead, and some collapsed buildings along with a lot of damaged ones.  Can this world-class imbecile actually think that qualifies him to critique Haiti, where the aftershocks are stronger than the Italian earthquake, the buildings are almost all completely decimated, 3 million are homeless and the the death toll is something like 200,000 - and counting?  Evidently he does.  That's the equivalent of the guy you work with bowling one 200 game and telling you he is ready for the PBA tour.

I would like to think that much of the world is thanking us for what we are accomplishing in Haiti. I would also like to think that much of the world is giving credit - as well it should - to President Obama for his immediate commitment and, most of all, to our magnificent troops, for being there, with the goods, in just a matter of days. 

But then you get the three stooges I mentioned above, along with plenty more just like them, I assure you.  These are the Monday-morning quarterbacks, whose greatest contribution is to flap their lips and whine out criticisms and insults.

Why don't they just shut up and let the United States do what it has done so well in so many places -- help human beings in need.  Then they can go to bed where, along with dreaming up new complaints about how we're accomplishing it, they can fantasize that their countries ever came close to our record of humanitarianism. 

That would be some hell of a fantasy.

Ken Berwitz

From www.politico.com, via The Daily Caller (www.dailycaller.com):

White House can’t keep job numbers straight

By The Daily Caller   01/24/10 at 4:53 pm

 

Three different White House advisers appearing on three different Sunday talk shows gave three different estimates as to just how many jobs were created as a result of President Obama’s three-trillion dollar Recovery Act.

Politico reports:

 

The discrepancy was pointed out by a Republican official in an email to reporters noting that “Three presidential advisers on three different programs [gave] three different descriptions of the trillion-dollar stimulus bill.”

 

Valerie Jarrett had the most conservative count, saying “the Recovery Act saved thousands and thousands of jobs,” while David Axelrod gave the bill the most credit, saying it has “created more than – or saved more than 2 million jobs.” Press Secretary Robert Gibbs came in between them, saying the plan had “saved or created 1.5 million jobs.”

I guess the operative philosophy is, "What the hey:  if you're making it up as you go along, any amount will do.'

Reality check:  The "stimulus package" was passed on February 17th, 2009; almost a full year ago.  At that time unemployment was at 8.1%.  President Obama told us that it would cap unemployment there.  He also told us that, without it, unemployment would go to 8.5% - 9%

Well, with it unemployment has gone to 10%, and about 3,500,000 million jobs have been lost. 

So when the Jarretts, Axelrods and Gibbs' tell us that any number of jobs has been "created or saved", whether "thousands and thousands" or "1.5 million" or "more than 2 million", they are lying right to our faces.

What disgraces they are.  And what a mistake this country made when it elected the man who put them in positions of power and who lies right along with them.

Ken Berwitz

Here is the first paragraph of a much larger story from David Rogers of www.politico.com.  It tells you all you need to know about the Obama administration:

Trying to win the votes of fiscal moderates, President Barack Obama formally endorsed legislation Saturday creating an independent commission with the power to force Congress to vote on major deficit reduction steps this year, after the November elections.

After the November elections, eh?  Why not ASAP? 

I'll tell you why - and it is the same reason that so much $$$ from the so-called "stimulus package" has gone unspent so far.

You are watching a ruthless, unprincipled, win-at-all-costs Chicago machine politician hold the money in reserve, so that he and his equally ruthless, unprincipled congress can use it to artificially pump up the economy during the election campaign and maybe win some house and senate seats which might otherwise have been lost.

It's not like Obama & Co. are new to using our tax dollars for political gain:   Think $300 million to Louisiana.  Think medicaid*** payments being exempted for Nebraska.  Think $60 billion dollars in exemptions for Union insurance plans.

Get the picture?

Other than using our treasury to make fools of voters, why would this supposed move toward fiscal responsibility require almost a year before implementation?  (And, given the naked politics of Mr. Obama's strategy, why would you believe it will ever be implemented at all)?

The 2010 elections cannot come fast enough.  And that goes double for 2012.

======================================================================

NOTE:  I originally, and erroneously, wrote this as "medicare".  My sister emailed to correct me, so I've changed it.  Trust me, she is not the last female today who will tell me I did something wrong.

Ken Berwitz

You can't make this stuff up.  You just can't.

From Noel Sheppard at www.newsbusters.org:

NBC Prez on Olbermann-Scarborough Tiff: Don't Publicly Criticize Colleagues

By Noel Sheppard (Bio | Archive)
Sun, 01/24/2010 - 10:39 ET

 

The president of NBC has officially responded to Joe Scarborough criticizing Keith Olbermann for his attacks on Scott Brown.

In a memo obtained by the Huffington Post, Phil Griffin told his on air staff: "We do not publicly criticize our colleagues. This kind of behavior is unprofessional and will not be tolerated."

Griffin was addressing comments made by MSNBC's Scarborough about Olbermann. As NewsBusters reported Monday, the "Morning Joe" host first tweeted his disapproval of the "Countdown" host's comments about Brown -- "How reckless and how sad" -- reiterating on his program Tuesday morning, "Sad and pathetic.

As a result, Griffin sent out the following memo Friday (h/t TVNewser):

From: Griffin, Phil (NBC Universal)
Sent: Friday, January 22, 2010 3:02 PM

MSNBC is THE place for viewers to get the best political analysis and opinion in today's vast marketplace of ideas. We don't tell our hosts what to say. We don't have talking points. We encourage our talent to voice their opinions strongly and smartly, always rooted in fact. All of this has brought us great success, culminating in last year's victory over CNN.

Hosts strongly voicing their OWN opinions can no-doubt lead to spirited, substantive disagreements. This debate is encouraged. What we're doing at MSNBC is something our competition is not. And it is difficult. We have many strong personalities with differing, passionate opinions, but it is important to remember that we are all on the same team. I want to reiterate my long-standing policy: We do not publicly criticize our colleagues. This kind of behavior is unprofessional and will not be tolerated.

Let me be clear: I encourage you to keep doing what you do best. Give the viewers your perspective and a vigorous debate on the issues they care about. But do not turn substantive differences into personal ones.

Phil

Griffin also sent the following to TVNewser:

"An important rule was broken. I spoke to Keith and he said in the spirit of teamwork and the free flow of ideas, he didn't think it warranted punishment or suspension. I also talked to Joe and he apologized to me," said the MSNBC president, adding, "That's why I made the decision that this didn't rise to the level of punishment, but I felt it was necessary to reiterate my long-standing policy."

For his part, Scarborough tweeted the liberal website Mediaite Saturday, "There is no 'tiff.' I offered a brief commentary as did others."

Readers should recall Olbermann dissing Scarborough during a live discussion in the middle of 2008's Democratic National Convention saying, "Jesus, Joe, why don't you get a shovel?"

So, is this the end of it?

Stay tuned.

Let me get this straight:  Phil Griffin thinks that keith olbermann, who is likely the single most viciously insulting, offensive TV personality ever let loose anywhere near a supposed news station, has been treated "unprofessionally" because Joe Scarborough called his hate-filled, eminently dishonest attack on Scott Brown "reckless and sad"?   

Un effing believable.

This is the same Phil Griffin who proudly sics olbermann on the public to inflict an hour's worth of rumpelstiltskinesque outrage.  To call names and toss out accusations with gleeless abandon.  Yet he feels that if anyone else at the network doesn't like this embarrassment on legs, it is that person who is behaving unprofessionally. 

Has Griffen ever watched keith olbermann's show?  If he did, he might realize that it would need intense remedial help to rise to the level of unprofessional and intolerable.

With myopia like this, it is no wonder that MSNBC remains a perpetual loser in the ratings, or that olbermann struggles to achieve one-third the viewing audience of the man he hates, Bill O'Reilly.

And since olbermann has called O'Reilly just about everything other than bin laden's twin brother (at least I haven't heard him say it - who knows?), should the President of Fox News be writing letters about unprofessional, intolerable behavior too?

Ken Berwitz

From Steve Gilbert, at www.sweetness-light.com (the bold print is his too):

Biden: US To Appeal Blackwater Case

January 23rd, 2010

 

From a cheering Associated Press:

Biden: US to appeal dismissal of Blackwater case

By Matt Apuzzo, Associated Press Writer

January 22, 2010

BAGHDAD – The U.S. will appeal a court decision dismissing manslaughter charges against five Blackwater Worldwide security contractors involved in a deadly 2007 Baghdad shooting, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said Saturday.

Biden’s announcement after a meeting with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani shows just how diplomatically sensitive the incident remains nearly three years later.

Blackwater security contractors were guarding U.S. diplomats when the guards opened fire in a crowded Baghdad intersection. Seventeen people were killed, including women and children, in a shooting that inflamed anti-American sentiment in Iraqi.

According to Blackwater and several witnesses, the guards only opened fire after being fired upon.

But somehow the Associated Press neglects to mention that detail – at least in the part of the article that people are likely to actually read.

Biden expressed his "personal regret" for the shooting and said the Obama administration was disappointed by the dismissal. "A dismissal is not an acquittal," he said… 

How can American citizens get a fair trial when the President and Vice President have stated that they are guilty?

The U.S. rebuffed Iraqi demands that the U.S. contractors face trial in Iraqi courts. After a lengthy investigation, U.S. prosecutors charged five of the contractors with manslaughter and took a guilty plea from a sixth.

But the case fell apart in December after a judge found that the Justice Department mishandled evidence and violated the guards’ constitutional rights. Prosecutors now face difficult odds getting an appeals court to reinstate the case.

Luckily, under Mr. Obama’s regime, constitutional rights are only for foreign terrorists. Not American citizens who are risking their lives for our national security.

And, lo and behold, we find buried at the bottom of this AP story:

Court documents paint a murky picture of a case rife with conflicting evidence. Some witnesses say the Blackwater convoy was under fire; others say it wasn’t. Some said the entire convoy fired into the intersection; others said only a few men opened fire.

Even the government’s key witnesses, three members of the Blackwater convoy, at times seemed to undercut the government’s case…

It’s painfully clear that Mr. Obama and his Justice Department will do anything within their powers to prosecute the people on our side who are fighting the War On Terror.

Just as it equally clear that they will do whatever they can, exploit every technicality, to let the terrorists go free. And, failing that, they will give them a megaphone for them to air their grievances.

Has a war ever been fought where the leadership is doing everything at every turn to betray its own soldiers?

Who does this administration think is the bad guys?

Who does this administration think is making war on us?

Whose side is this administration on?

The 2010 elections cannot come fast enough.  And that goes double for 2012.

Ken Berwitz

How deep is New York Times columnist Frank Rich into his ivory tower?

Well, here is the first paragraph of today's column, which discusses the Massachusetts election.  You tell me:

It was not a referendum on Barack Obama, who in every poll remains one of the most popular politicians in America. It was not a rejection of universal health care, which Massachusetts mandated (with Scott Brown’s State Senate vote) in 2006. It was not a harbinger of a resurgent G.O.P., whose numbers remain in the toilet. Brown had the good sense not to identify himself as a Republican in either his campaign advertising or his victory speech.

Let's take these points one by one:

-Barack Obama, who is tanking in virtually every poll - including the New York Times' own poll - remains one of the most popular politicians in America? 

The www.realclearpolitics.com average of major polls currently shows us the following:

President Obama Job Approval

RCP Average

Approve         49.4

Disapprove   44.9

Does that look like one of the most popular politicians in America?  An average approval rating below 50%?

-The election had nothing to do with health care?  Scott Brown won in dark-blue Massachusetts, by running specifically on the basis that, if elected, he would vote against ObamaCare - even to the point of signing his name with a "41" to denote that he would be the 41st Republican vote.

-And a Republican winning the seat formerly occupied by Ted Kennedy doesn't mean anything good for the Republican party (presumably the wins in Virginia and New Jersey didn't either)?

Would you hire a columnist who wrote this kind of sh...er, stuff?  Would you pay one?  I wouldn't give him/her a penny.  Why bother when I could get unresearched misinformation for free at the nearest barroom.

But he is FRANK RICH of the NEW YORK TIMES.  So it must all be true and he must be worth every penny they pay him. Right.

Heck, this column could get him a Pulitzer prize....

Ken Berwitz

Yesterday's Washington Post did something you almost never come across.  It retracted an editorial position - and just weeks after it was published.

See for yourself below.  The bold print is mine:

Did the Obama administration blow an opportunity in the Flight 253 case?

 

 Saturday, January 23, 2010

 

UMAR FAROUK Abdulmutallab was nabbed in Detroit on board Northwest Flight 253 after trying unsuccessfully to ignite explosives sewn into his underwear. The Obama administration had three options: It could charge him in federal court. It could detain him as an enemy belligerent. Or it could hold him for prolonged questioning and later indict him, ensuring that nothing Mr. Abdulmutallab said during questioning was used against him in court.

It is now clear that the administration did not give serious thought to anything but Door No. 1. This was myopic, irresponsible and potentially dangerous.

 

Whether to charge terrorism suspects or hold and interrogate them is a judgment call. We originally supported the administration's decision in the Abdulmutallab case, assuming that it had been made after due consideration. But the decision to try Mr. Abdulmutallab turns out to have resulted not from a deliberative process but as a knee-jerk default to a crime-and-punishment model.

 

In testimony Wednesday before the Senate Homeland Security Committee, Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair, Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, and Michael Leiter, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, all said they were not asked to weigh in on how best to deal with Mr. Abdulmutallab.

 

Some intelligence officials, including personnel from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, were included in briefings by the Justice Department before Mr. Abdulmutallab was charged. These sessions did provide an opportunity for those attending to debate the merits of detention vs. prosecution. According to sources with knowledge of the discussions, no one questioned the approach or raised the possibility of taking more time to question the suspect. This makes the administration's approach even more worrisome than it would have been had intelligence personnel been cut out of the process altogether.

 

The fight against an unconventional enemy such as al-Qaeda cannot be waged exclusively or effectively through any single approach. Just as it would be a mistake to view all terrorist acts as law enforcement challenges, so would it be unwise to deal with all such incidents as acts of war. All paths must be seriously considered before a determination is made.

 

The administration claims Mr. Abdulmutallab provided valuable information -- and probably exhausted his knowledge of al-Qaeda operations -- before he clammed up. This was immediately after he was read his Miranda rights and provided with a court-appointed lawyer. The truth is, we may never know whether the administration made the right call or whether it squandered a valuable opportunity.

 

Incredible.  Even in its retraction, the Post can't bring itself to admit being wrong.

"We may never know whether the administration made the right call or whether it squandered a valuable opportunity???

Sorry, Post, but YOU may never know.  But most of US do. 

We know that any interrogation of a terrorist that is stopped before we are certain that all the information was extracted was not only the wrong call, but a free pass to terrorism.  Even if you don't.

And more and more of us know that any administration that "fights" terrorism this way is begging for another attack. 

The 2010 elections cannot come fast enough.  And that goes double for 2012.

Ken Berwitz

Here is columnist Jeff Jacoby's excellent column on the so-called "Freedom of Speech" case which the Supreme Court ruled on this week:

'The freedom to think for ourselves'

by Jeff Jacoby
The Boston Globe

 

THE SUPREME COURT'S RULING last week in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission was a triumph for the First Amendment. In clear and cogent language, five justices swept away the caste system under which some groups of citizens have been free to engage in vigorous and unfettered political speech while other groups face criminal penalties for doing the same thing. Overturning two of its precedents and much of the 2002 McCain-Feingold act, the court called their sweeping restrictions on corporate spending during election campaigns by the name they merit: censorship. When the government dictates "where a person may get his or her information or what distrusted source he or she may not hear," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the majority, "it uses censorship to control thought. This is unlawful. The First Amendment confirms the freedom to think for ourselves."

Not surprisingly, some of the formerly privileged groups are reacting angrily to the court's blow for free speech. The New York Times, for example, promptly excoriated what it termed a "disastrous" decision, declaring that it that will "thrust politics back to the robber-baron era of the 19th century" by freeing corporations to deploy "their vast treasuries to overwhelm elections and intimidate elected officials into doing their bidding."

In truth, the decision simply extends to all corporations the same First Amendment freedoms that media corporations -- such as The New York Times Co. -- take for granted. For-profit corporations that happen to be in the business of publishing or broadcasting are free to spend money supporting or opposing political candidates. Why shouldn't corporations in every other industry be equally free?

On the front page of Friday's Times, an article analyzing the impact of the court's decision was headlined, "Lobbies' New Power: Cross Us, And Our Cash Will Bury You." Sounds menacing. Yet newspapers, magazines, and TV networks deploy that power all the time, "burying" public officials (and countless other subjects) with hard-hitting journalism and commentary of every kind -- news stories, photographs, documentaries, exposés, endorsements. They may not always use their power wisely or fairly, but on the whole the marketplace of ideas is richer for their participation. If media corporations have a robust First Amendment right to be heard during political campaigns, every other kind of corporation does too.

Some of the attacks on the high court's ruling have been hysterical -- in both senses of the word. "SUPREME COURT UNDOES DEMOCRACY," wailed Public Citizen in bright-red, Armageddon-sized capital letters on its web site. Florida congressman Alan Grayson denounced Citizens United as "the worst Supreme Court decision since the Dred Scott case."

Such unhinged reactions to a ruling that extends free speech rights to all is a sad reminder of how far the left has moved from the First Amendment tradition of the 20^th century's great liberals. Kennedy's opinion quotes from a 1957 dissent by three of those liberals -- Justices William O. Douglas and Hugo Black, and Chief Justice Earl Warren:

"Under our Constitution it is We The People who are sovereign," they avowed. "The people determine through their votes the destiny of the nation. It is therefore important -- vitally important -- that all channels of communication be open to them during every election, that no point of view be restrained or barred, and that the people have access to the views of every group in the community."

McCain-Feingold was an egregious affront to that principle of open communication. It made it a crime for any corporation -- big or little, for-profit or nonprofit -- to broadcast "electioneering communications" in the weeks leading up to an election, or to advocate the election or defeat of any candidate for federal office at any time. That meant, as the court pointed out, that under McCain-Feingold it would have constituted a felony for the Sierra Club to run an ad a month before Election Day exhorting viewers to disapprove of a congressman who favors logging in national forests. Or for the National Rifle Association to publish a book urging citizens to vote against an incumbent US senator because he endorsed a handgun ban. Or for the American Civil Liberties Union to put up a website telling the public to vote for a presidential candidate because he is a champion of civil liberties.

"These prohibitions are classic examples of censorship," wrote Justice Kennedy. Of course they are. Why did it take the court so long to say so? And why wasn't the opinion unanimous?

Exactly right.  The meaning of this decision is that freedom of speech will no longer be extended to some corporations and disallowed for others.

Not surprisingly, members of the angry left are wailing and banging their fists over this evening of the playing field.  When go from a position of advantage and privilege to one of equality, you're probably not going to like it very well.

And special congratulations to Jeff for his singling out of the New York Times - owner of The Boston Globe, which publishes his columns.

That took a lot of courage.  I hope you still have a job.

Ken Berwitz

From the Associated Press:

Al-Qaida leader Osama Bin Laden has issued a new audio message claiming responsibility for the Christmas day bombing attempt and vowed further attacks. In a message carried by the Al-Jazeera Arabic news channel Sunday, Bin Laden addressed President Barak Obama saying there would be no peace for America unless there was security for Palestinians. He described the attempt by Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to detonate a bomb on plane on Christmas day as a "confirmation" of previous attacks, including Sept. 11.

Why would osama bin laden do this? 

The "suspect" umar farouk abdulmutallab (aka the guy with the mutilated genital area from the bomb he had planted there) is in custody.  He is young, he is inexperienced, he is almost certainly ripe for interrogation.  Why would bin laden brag that he was part of the al qaeda organization?

The reason is that, due to the insane policy of our justice department under Attorney General eric holder, abdulmutallab is being treated not as an enemy combatant but as a common criminal.  He has been placed into the civil court system, handed a lawyer at taxpayer expense, and now has the right to remain silent and not tell anyone anything.

bin laden doesn't often do us favors.  But he did us two of them by issuing this audio message.

-he proved that al qaeda doesn't think it has a thing to fear from Obama and holder;

-he showed that he is still alive and functional, a year after Obama was elected on the promise that, unlike President Bush, he would be the man to capture bin laden and bring him to justice.

I'll tell you what, though:  while holder is our AG, bin laden might as well just give up and surrender.  He'll have better accommodations in our criminal justice system, better food and better communications opportunities.

Every day that eric holder is in that office, and every day that he is supported by Barack Obama, is a day that the US is in grave danger.  Are we out of our minds?

Ken Berwitz

Here are the ratings for each cable news show during the Massachusetts election count:

CABLE NEWS RACE
TUES. JAN. 19, 2010
ELECTION NIGHT

FOXNEWS HANNITY             6,809,000
FOXNEWS GRETA                6,399,000
FOXNEWS O’REILLY             5,228,000
FOXNEWS BECK                  3,446,000
FOXNEWS BAIER                 3,338,000
FOXNEWS SHEP                  3,241,000
CNN KING                          1,681,000
CNN COOPER                      1,508,000
CNN BROWN                       1,308,000
MSNBC OLBERMANN             1,274,000
MSNBC MADDOW                1,236,000
CNN BLITZER                     1,135,000
CNNHN BEHAR                       845,000
MSNBC HARDBALL                  798,000

Did Fox dominate?  That's like asking if Michael Jackson danced.

But the most interesting number to me is Chris Matthews'.  Has there ever been a poilitical commentator with a bigger mouth who is watched by fewer people?  Not that Olbermann and Maddow did well either, but their numbers were spectacular compared to Matthews'.  What exactly does NBC think they have with this guy? 

It makes you think that Jeff Zucker (NBC/Universal President) lives in a bubble.  A thick, impenetrable bubble.

Ken Berwitz

Here are this week's Presidential approval data from the Rasmussen Report.

Keep in mind that the Massachusetts vote was on Tuesday, and Rasmussen uses a three day rolling average (every day's report reflects the previous three days).

On Wednesday, January 20, therefore, everyone who was interviewed could have known about Scott Brown's win/the inability of President Obama to push Martha Coakley over the finish line.  That day's interviewing would be in the January 21 report and - because it is a three day average, this means one-third of the sample could have known.  On January 22, two-thirds of the sample could have known, and on January 23, (the latest Rasmussen data) the entire sample could have known. 

With that in mind, here are the data.  You decide what they mean.

Date	Presidential Approval Index	Strongly Approve	Strongly Disapprove	Total Approve	Total Disapprove
01/23/2010	-19	24%	43%	44%	55%
01/22/2010	-18	25%	43%	45%	54%
01/21/2010	-15	27%	42%