Alarming News: I like Morgan Freeberg. A lot.
American Digest: And I like this from "The Blog That Nobody Reads", because it is -- mostly -- about me. What can I say? I'm on an ego trip today. It won't last.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: We were following a trackback and thinking "hmmm... this is a bloody excellent post!", and then we realized that it was just part III of, well, three...Damn. I wish I'd written those.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: ...I just remembered that I found a new blog a short while ago, House of Eratosthenes, that I really like. I like his common sense approach and his curiosity when it comes to why people believe what they believe rather than just what they believe.
Brutally Honest: Morgan Freeberg is brilliant.
Dr. Melissa Clouthier: Morgan Freeberg at House of Eratosthenes (pftthats a mouthful) honors big boned women in skimpy clothing. The picture there is priceless--keep scrolling down.
Exile in Portales: Via Gerard: Morgan Freeberg, a guy with a lot to say. And he speaks The Truth...and it's fascinating stuff. Worth a read, or three. Or six.
Just Muttering: Two nice pieces at House of Eratosthenes, one about a perhaps unintended effect of the Enron mess, and one on the Gore-y environ-movie.
Mein Blogovault: Make "the Blog that No One Reads" one of your daily reads.
The Virginian: I know this post will offend some people, but the author makes some good points.
Poetic Justice: Cletus! Ah gots a laiv one fer yew...
What’s Gathering Dust
The Plame scandal is reaching a fevered pitch, because the White House keeps telling lies, or because the Democrats are getting desperate, depending on your point of view. The White House Press Corps is showing a great deal of diligence (link to video) trying to get Press Secretary Scott McClellan to comment about things that he specifically said he would not comment about.
I think we can all agree that a reporter can do some real, old-fashioned, hard-lined questioning, perhaps make his interview subject start crying, and still fall far short of the stick-to-it-iveness that was shown by these reporters. One wonders what is going on in the press: Do these reporters have to report back to Perry-White type editors, who will lay into ’em if they don’t ask the right follow-up questions? One of the reporters, I noticed, was asking for the date that the White House was asked, by investigators, not to comment on the ongoing criminal investigation. The date. Wow, I guess I really don’t have what it takes to be a journalist — I never would have thought of asking this. And there I’d be in my editor’s office. “Uh, sir, well, the reason I didn’t ask about the date, was…I guess, golly, it simply hadn’t occured to me.” My illustrious career would end there.
Well here is what we know about what happens in the press.
The reporters have to answer to editors, publishers, producers, etc. who don’t do the actual work, but ultimately answer to shareholders. Those executives, in turn, have the job of making sure the television program or the newspaper, puts out a product that people want. If the product is something people want, the share price of the corporation that owns the enterprise, will go up. If it isn’t, the price will decline.
Supposedly, this provides “news” with an incentive to run what is really “news.” That’s the theory. This should, we expect, be guiding reporters as they decide “Scott McClellan gave us all the information on this we need and it’s time to move on,” or, “Scott McClellan is fudging and we should dig into this a little bit further.” Thus, when the reporters are going to such extraordinary lengths to get McClellan to say what he already said he wouldn’t say, they are acting in our interests.
Okay then. But other things are gathering dust while they’re trying to figure out if a crime has been committed — knowing that there are people who know if a crime has been committed or not, and that those people would be behaving differently if a crime had, indeed, been commited.
In an interview with Time Magazine, CIA Chief Porter Goss, in an interview for the June 27 issue, commented that he had an “excellent idea” where Osama bin Laden is hiding, but that our respect for sovereign nations makes it more difficult to stage a capture. Perhaps someone somewhere knows what became of this. I would think it would lead to some hard questioning of the White House, along the lines of what you see in the video linked above. I would like to see that. Make McClellan squirm over that. Why not?
I think it goes without saying that most of us have learned interesting things about the way intelligence and diplomacy works over the last three-and-a-half years. A lot of what we have learned, just leads to more questions. Perhaps if we learned about this kind of thing, it would start to make more sense — at any rate, isn’t this the kind of thing we’re all supposed to be worried about? A lot of liberals were reminding me the White House was losing track the primary objective, when we went into Iraq. Well then why not go after this like a pit bull on a pant leg? That would be in everybody’s best interest, wouldn’t it? Assuming everyone’s on the up-and-up.
Something is screwy. The reporters, editors, publishers and producers have decided that that is not as important as Karl Rove. Do they know something I don’t?
Another item gathering dust: In May, I congratulated the Senate for passing a bill that, among other things, provided funds for a fence spanning the California-Mexican border. One of the things we look to our press to do, is to follow-up on things. This cries out for follow-up. How’s it going? Do we really have to wait for Halliburton to be awarded a contract to pour the foundation, before the press smells some kind of “scandal” and re-discovers the story? Maybe it’s being talked about somewhere, but it’s too subtle for a dimbulb like me because I remain ignorant. How we doin’? Are we accepting bids? Are we pulling weeds, removing rattlesnake nests, hauling rocks away so the site can be prepped for a foundation? Is the fence already up? I’d rather tune in to Entertainment Tonight to see Martha Stewart complaining about the lack of decoration on the fence, than to get no news at all. This is among our biggest vulnerabilities, if not the biggest one. What’s happenin’?
But again, it’s not my job to make those decisions. Those who have the job to make those decisions, have decided the Karl Rove thing is much more important.
Again…do they know something I don’t? These are the people who specifically informed me, seven years ago, that a government official telling a lie was, in & of itself, not a cause for any concern.
Why then are we ignoring this vaporware fence, while getting the hard facts on what date the criminal investigators asked the White House not to comment on something?
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