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...
Media Matters was just bursting with pride yesterday. The liberal watchdog group had caught Fox News using “GOP talking points” as their own research.
I scanned the piece from top to bottom, looking for a report about inaccuracy in these GOP talking points. Failing to find that, I looked for an insinuation that any of the facts/figures were subject to discredit, controversy, challenge, contention, dispute…anything. Couldn’t find any of that, either.
Nevertheless, that is a little bit on the slimy side. I’m inclined to give MM the point. Although it would be a much better point, more in keeping with the grandstanding headline, if Fox News recycled Republican talking points as fact in the middle of some kind of argument between the two parties. That would be a clear-cut case of deciding-instead-of-reporting. Not the case here.
But what does that then say about the Sacramento Bee’s headlines tonight. The story underneath carries the byline of “Bee News Services” although it matches word-for-word the first paragraph of a Washington Post story, here. But look how this Sacramento Bee editor chose to present it to the world:
Two logjams broken
Leaders in House, Senate OK blueprint for recovery
MEASURE IS UNPRECEDENTED AND ITS IMPACT UNCERTAIN
Yup, they’re talking about the stimulus plan. The trillion-dollars-worth-of-condoms plan.
Okay, I exaggerate, it isn’t $1 trillion worth of condoms. It’s actually a little less than a trillion, and some of the money goes to things with more of a “stimulative” effect than condoms. There’s lots of good stuff…like…the National Endowment for the Arts…TV conversion…global warming…the Department of Education…
Let’s bottom-line it. You gotta be more than just a little bit left-leaning to think of this as a real “blueprint for recovery.” You gotta be out of yer gourd.
I anxiously await the power, profile and gravitas of Media Matters, showing up to join me in my call for the Sacramento Bee to reverse their cranial-rectal inversion process on this one. This is the front page to the major newspaper of a thriving industrial valley, capital city of one of the nation’s largest and most prosperous states. It’s not a children’s fairy-tale book.
And if it’s wrong to put Republican talking points on the airwaves even when they are not subject to dispute, it’s wrong to put democrat talking points on the front page of such a high-profile newspaper — that are.
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If Media Matters wasn’t a partisan organization — or at least a Leftist one, they might look for the zillions of times editorials in newspapers are just reprinted from activist groups like PeTA and it’s front groups like PCRM and the like, or that they cite these organizations without citing sources with opposing points of view — and I suspect NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, NYT, and WaPO have all basically re-produced Democrat talking points memos (I’d especially look back to the 2004 election for examples of that – but Media Matters won’t. Matters like that don’t Matter to Media Matters.)
My question is as was yours… are they true, or aren’t they? Truth Matters. Not who tells it or if someone repeats it and the wrong people told it.
The only argument I saw in the comments “challenging” the veracity of the statements was — in a word, lame.
It pretty much amounted to “but back then it wasn’t the ‘same’ stimulus package”!
The rest of it was childish sputterings of “Faux” news, and should it even be allowed on the air, Republican mouthpiece, blah, blah, blah….
- philmon | 02/13/2009 @ 23:59