Hannity’s situational war ethics: ‘If you were president,’ he tells McCain, ‘I would be behind you, but you are not president.’
March 25, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media Oh, now there’s a big surprise: The guy who searched through the rubble heap of the Japanese earthquake for any excuse to bash President Obama is, of course, unhappy with the airstrikes in Libya — but only because it’s Obama doing it. Last night Sean Hannity invited onto his Fox show Obama’s erstwhile opponent, John McCain, aka Grampa McCranky, to bash Obama some more: HANNITY: Senator, I was with you. Early on, you called and you were asking that we expand the mission, that we have a surge. You were right. I give you 100 percent credit. Here is the problem. This president dithered for six months on Afghanistan. Wouldn’t support the students in Iran in 2009. He supported Mubarak, then he was neutral and then he shifted away from Mubarak. Here’s the problem, I mean, Hillary disagrees with Mullen and Gates disagrees with Hillary. And Obama shifted his opinion. Gadhafi has got to go, not got to go. I don’t have confidence in him. This policy is incoherent. He seems to be too little, too late, ill advised and doesn’t have the political or moral courage to do this right. Tell me where I’m wrong! MCCAIN: I understand your concern and I share those concerns. And it is incoherent when you say Gadhafi must go and then say that the mission is only there for humanitarian purposes. But we are attacking his forces on the ground. We are keeping two major cities from being overrun and the people are already being subjected to terrible atrocities as we speak. And I believe that with continued ground attacks we can succeed. By the way, this latest announcements I just read that somehow NATO would take over the air, the no-fly zone and the United States would continue the other activities or something frankly I don’t understand. I haven’t had time to absorb it. But I’ve never seen any decision quite like that. But the fact remains, it is in our interests and America’s interests and the world’s interests to not have another — to not have another Rwanda. Every time we say never again. And so, I want to see us continue to use our airpower, not ground troops, but airpower which I think would have a significant effect still on the battlefield. That along with equipment and other assistance. HANNITY: With NATO split. And literally NATO allies abandoning the effort, the president not acknowledging this is war, it is some kinetic military action. And if the humanitarian rational that they are offering, you are right it should have existed for Rwanda and the whole series of other countries. But, you know, does that mean these human rights violations, humanitarian concerns in China, in Russia, in Iran, in Bahrain, in Yemen, in Saudi Arabia, you know, Lebanon. Where do we go, I mean, from here? It seems to me that he was forced into doing something instinctively that he doesn’t want to do. MCCAIN: I’m sure that instinctively he doesn’t want to do it. HANNITY: But the fact is, but he’s pulling out. MCCAIN: The people of Libya were being massacred. And by the way, you haven’t seen a single anti-U.S. demonstration in the Arab world. The Arab League has not reversed their position. The UAE is sending 12 aircraft, Qatar is already sending some airplanes. So, if we allow the people of Libya to be massacred, I’m going to be on this program six months from now saying never again. And I believe that American military power in the air and with other kinds of assistance, they can still prevail. HANNITY: Senator, if they. MCCAIN: Despite, they dithering back and forth that has been going on. Go ahead. HANNITY: Senator, if he doesn’t say that we’ve got to remove Gadhafi which they flipped and flopped on. And if they never talk about victory or define victory or define success or talk about an exit strategy or telegraph no boots on the ground, he’s not committed to it. And I think it is unfair for our military. But, yes, there are all these other countries that a lot of slaughters are going on as well. MCCAIN: Right now, there are air attacks on Gadhafi’s forces on the ground. If those can continue, maybe we can save those people. I’ll tell you what, if you bail out right now, Sean, and I heard the criticism, we bail out right now we will see massacres of enormous proportions. HANNITY: I agree. MCCAIN: We can still win this thing. HANNITY: You know what? If you were president, I would be behind you, but you are not president. MCCAIN: I can still urge the president to use our airpower and our other assets to help these people survive. Thousands of lives are at stake right now my friend. HANNITY: Senator, if you were president, it would be done right. He is timid and he’s inconsistent. This is incoherent and frankly, it’s unforgivable because he’s the commander in chief. Of course, Hannity really is just like so many other of his fellow Republicans that way. They’d support this action if it were a Republican leading it! I’m shocked by this development, I tell you. Especially because these are the same people — Hannity especially — who attacked Democrats as not only insufficiently patriotic , but as actively harming American soldiers if they questioned the wisdom of George W. Bush’s war policies. [H/t Media Matters .]
Continue reading …Michele Bachmann Forming Presidential Exploratory Committee, But Even Former Chief of Staff Won’t Vote for Her
March 25, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media How sad is it when even your former chief of staff says they won’t vote for you if you decide to run for president? Apparently that’s the case with Minnesota wingnut Rep. Michele Bachmann who just announced that she’s forming a presidential exploratory committee by this summer. Let the dragging of the field of Republican primary candidates even further to the right (if that’s even humanly possible) begin! Bachmann’s Former Chief Of Staff: I’m Voting For Tim Pawlenty : Thrilling tea partiers and liberals alike, CNN reported today that right-wing Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) will form a presidential exploratory committee by July. Boasting a pseudo-firm grasp on U.S. history , policy priorities , and reality , Bachmann hopes to secure America’s vote of confidence come 2012. Unfortunately, she’s already lost one vote : her most recent chief of staff’s. Serving as her fifth Chief of Staff before resigning last summer, Ron Carey said he intends to vote for Tim Pawlenty in the GOP race for President because “electability is a very, very high attribute you have to have”. Go read the rest of their post and Ed Schultz did a mash-up of some of Bachmann’s greatest hits in the video above.
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Fleetwood Mac’s frontwoman is one of the last old-school rock stars left – and she’s still walking the walk, finds Craig McLean Stevie Nicks , legendary singer-songwriter and hard-living Fleetwood Mac frontwoman, is considering her greatest regret. It is not her “huge cocaine period”, the 10 years that elapsed between the making of Fleetwood Mac’s 40m-selling 1977 album Rumours and the moment, in 1986, when she finally entered the Betty Ford Center . Nor is it
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Muammar Gaddafi must be stopped from looking for revenge, claims lord chancellor Kenneth Clarke has ratcheted up government pressure to depose Colonel Gaddafi by warning that the Libyan leader could stage a Lockerbie-style attack in revenge for Britain’s role in the enforcement of the UN resolution if he is left in power. The lord chancellor told the Guardian: “We do have one particular interest in the Maghreb [the western region of North Africa], which is Lockerbie. “The British people have reason to remember the curse of Gaddafi – Gaddafi back in power, the old Gaddafi looking for revenge, we have a real interest in preventing that.” Clarke says in the interview that the UN resolution does not support regime change, adding that he would regard occupation as madness. But his remarks suggest British ministers recognise they now have a direct security interest in Gaddafi’s removal in light of Libya’s involvement in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing which killed 259 people on Pan Am flight 103 and 11 on the ground in the Scottish town. The justice secretary is also extremely frank in admitting the UK government has little idea how long the conflict will take or how it will be resolved. He says: “I am not in the Foreign Office, fortunately, so I am not too worried by my remarks. But I am still not totally convinced anyone knows where we are going now”. His remarks came as a Guardian ICM poll shows a majority of the public oppose British involvement in the military action in Libya: 42% oppose it, compared with 36% who support it. Asked about the purpose of British involvement, 80% support protecting civilians from attack by Gaddafi and 42% said the intervention should help Libyan rebels depose Gaddafi. Clarke himself contends that “the British people will support us for as long as it takes, so long they think we are protecting innocent civilians, many of whom seem to share our values against an evil dictator”. Clarke, who was an opponent of the Iraq war and a critic of “havering” over Bosnia, said the UN resolution on Libya “represented a significant event in the evolution of the world order”. Speaking as the cabinet’s senior lawyer, he said: “What we seem to have almost established in the international law is the humanitarian basis which can, in exceptional cases, justify intervention by the international community.” He admitted victory would be hard to define: “ou cannot answer what is the destination, what it is going to be the moment when you can see the mission is accomplished. It is a little uncertain, but that would have been a dreadful reason for doing nothing.” He added that no expert or pundit had foreseen the democratic uprising in Libya: “I don’t think any of them saw it coming. I don’t think any of them knew why it started or what started it. He said: “We have already achieved a great deal by stopping the imminent invasion of Benghazi in the nick of time. We would have seen a lot of innocent people, some of them inspired by the best motives, being killed and a quite lunatic regime back in power, acting as an inspiration to others who want to imitate him. So we have already achieved something.” He admitted there was a risk that Libya could divide: “There has never been any love lost between Tripoli and Benghazi. I don’t think at the moment, even on the ground in Libya, the average person who is shooting at the other side is quite clear where this is going to wind up.”
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Click here to view this media ( Meeting with Robert F. Kennedy, 1968 – Chavez on day 25 of Hunger Strike ) Note: This is a re-post from 2009 in case you missed it the first time around. G.S We often think the situation with Migrant workers is something that’s happen in the past few years. It’s been going on for decades. One of the great voices in the labor movement and champion of migrant workers rights was Cesar Chavez. His endless campaign of organizing for better working conditions and a fair wage for long hours was a lifelong struggle for him, which was often met by overwhelming resistance. But in the end, progress had been made – not perfect, but a solid foundation. His is certainly a legacy that has lived on, long past his death in 1993. Here is an interview, part of the Educational Television Networks nightly news program Newsfront, hosted by Mitchell Kraus on May 17, 1968. Chavez is joined by Junior Senator Harrison A.Williams (D-New Jersey) and Chairman of the Senate Sub-committee on Migratory Labor.
Continue reading …ABC Fawns Over ‘Hilarious’ Sex Columnist Dan Savage Who Railed Against ‘C–ksucker’ Antonin Scalia
March 25, 2011 No CommentNightline's Yunji de Nies on Thursday offered a laudatory segment on the sex columnist Dan Savage. She has previouisly fawned on Twitter that the writer/activist was “hilarious.” De Nies offered almost no mention of the outrageous statements Savage has made, including referring to Antonin Scalia as a “c–ksucker” and once asserting, “F–k John McCain.” The only hint about the radical nature of Savage came when de Nies explained, “Savage doesn't hide his politics. He famously went after Republican Rick Santorum after the former senator compared homosexuality to bestiality. Savage responded by calling on his fan base to redefine the word Santorum online.” Instead of pressing the syndicated gay columnist about his remarks, she blandly wondered, “Have you had a chance to talk to [Santorum] personally?…Do you have any interest in engaging with him on this?” Amazingly, de Nies didn't even ask Savage about his now infamous 2000 Salon column where he recounted an attempt to “give [then-presidential candidate] Gary Bauer the flu”: Naked, feverish and higher than a kite on codeine aspirin, I called the Bauer campaign and volunteered. My plan? Get close enough to Bauer to give him the flu, which, if I am successful, will lay him flat just before the New Hampshire primary. … I went from doorknob to doorknob. They were filthy, no doubt, but there wasn’t time to find a rag to spit on. My immune system wasn’t all it should be — I was in the grip of the worst flu I had ever had — but I was on a mission. If for some reason I didn’t manage to get a pen from my mouth to Gary’s hands, I wanted to seed his office with germs, get as many of his people sick as I could, and hopefully one of them would infect the candidate.
Continue reading …Michigan Drastically Cutting Unemployment Insurance And FOX’ Stuart Varney Simply Giddy Over Real ‘Austerity’
March 25, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media Michigan voted to extend unemployment initially, but has now become the first state to cut the number of weeks a person can have unemployment benefits from twenty six weeks to twenty starting in 2012. Michigan Lawmakers Pass Controversial Compromise On Unemployment Extension State lawmakers in Michigan passed last-minute legislation to preserve 20 weeks of federal unemployment insurance for the long-term jobless on Wednesday, averting an abrupt cutoff for 35,000 Michiganders in April. But in a deal preserving the benefits, lawmakers sharply reduced aid for future layoff victims. Democrats in MI are calling for Gov. Rick Snyder to veto the new bill: Democrats say the move will simply hurt workers. “This bill does nothing to create jobs or move Michigan forward,” said Whitmer, who along with Hammel and other state Democrats are asking Snyder to veto the legislation and send it back to lawmakers to pass a bill that includes only the needed technical change. “Thirty states have already passed the technical change to their state’s unemployment program without attaching reforms,” Levin said, adding that Michigan would be the first state to shrink unemployment benefits. “This is leading Michigan backwards,” he added. If Snyder signs the bill, Michigan workers would be eligible for only 20 weeks of benefits as opposed to 26, affecting thousands of workers. In 2010, more than 171,000 people in Michigan exhausted 20 weeks of benefits, according to Levin. Levin added that if the bill is signed into law, not only will Michigan workers lose eligibility for six weeks of state-paid benefits, but they would also lose eligibility for 16 weeks of federal benefits if the program is extended into 2012. “Let’s discuss this in a more reasonable way,” Hammel said. “We all want to help business, but let’s not take resources away from workers.” So that’s where we are. Gov. Snyder has already said he’s going to sign the bill, so a veto is out. Then we cut to FOX News’ Stuart Varney, the newest FNC republican, free market shill to get his own show on FOX Business. He’s very happy over these cuts because now as he sees it, austerity is here and it will hurt . (rough transcript) Q: Since the 50′s you could get twenty six weeks, now in Michigan… Varney: That was the standard for fifty years, five full decades, the standard has been you will get six months, twenty six weeks of state funded unemployment benefits and now that standard has been cracked. Michigan is going to twenty weeks and I gotta tell you, Florida is considering moving it down to twelve weeks. That would be a big crack in the established standard. It’s all a response to the fact that you can’t afford it. These state funded .. in that state, all of them have run out of money. — Q: What happens, will it force people to take jobs perhaps that they wouldn’t have taken otherwise? Varney: Well, there’s always that consideration, but let’s look at the big picture. This is austerity. This is in cuts and services and benefits across the board. It’s happening in state after state after state. Austerity is beginning to hit home now. The real story is how will the voters respond to this? We don’t know this, but austerity is here. It bites, it hurts and it’s happening now. Notice how jacked up Varney is about the idea that “AUSTERITY IS HERE!”? There’s not a word in the world that can turn on a conservative economy hack like the word austerity can because that means cuts to the working class. And not just minor ones. Notice that Stuart highlighted that austerity will bite and hurt . There’s a good little Fox News zombie when they need one. Workers supply the carcass that business vultures pick clean to line their pockets with cash and when an opportunity presents itself, they strike. Varney is one of the head scavengers on TV for FOX. Vultures like Varney share this distinctive character trait: Vultures seldom attack healthy animals, but may kill the wounded or sick. Workers are suffering right now because of free market thinkers like Varney, but the masters of business should never have to share the sacrifice. Only the sick and wounded. enlarge Credit: Michigan Labor Market Michigan Unemployment Rate Michigan has over a 10 percent unemployment rate so where are the lowly jobs that they might be forced to take?
Continue reading …No Lock-Out Coverage for Obama in NY Times, But Bush’s Door Flub Was Front-Page News
March 25, 2011 No CommentPresident Obama arrived home to the White House on Wednesday from his five-day trip to Latin America and found himself locked out of the French doors to the Oval Office, as captured by several news organizations. My Media Research Center colleague Tim Graham reminded me that back on Nov. 21, 2005, the New York Times published on its front page a photo of President George W. Bush making a face after trying to leave a press conference in Beijing through a locked door, accompanied by an article that mentioned the gaffe. Former CBS reporter Bernard Goldberg wrote a letter to the editor at the time to complain: The Times published a four-panel picture on Page 1 that extended over two columns and ran some 12 inches from the masthead more than halfway down the page showing President Bush trying to exit a meeting with reporters in Beijing — through a locked door….Did it occur to anyone in charge — and for that matter, does it occur to anyone at The Times even now — that this is precisely what gives your critics ammunition?….on Page 1, whatever your editors' intentions, it sure looks like an editorial posing as news. Yet not only has the Times not put an image of Obama’s flub on the front page, a nytimes.com search indicates that as of Friday afternoon Obama’s lock-out has neither been shown or even mentioned by the Times, either in print or online.
Continue reading …UAW Members Temporarily Shut Down Detroit Branch of Bank of America Yesterday
March 25, 2011 No CommentYou would think at some point that the banksters would notice that we all have a pretty good idea that they conned the Congress and brought down the country’s economy — while they sat back and collected the cash. And you’d think that they’d understand that business as usual isn’t acceptable anymore . If the corporate boy wonders had thought to pull back the reins on their greed, or pushed to get the government to help all the people they forced out of work, they wouldn’t have to be quite so nervous right now: At the end of the UAW’s three-day bargaining convention in Detroit, union president Bob King led more than 100 members into the Bank of America branch in downtown Detroit today and temporarily shut down its operations for about 30 minutes. Afterwards, the group joined hundreds more UAW members at the corner of Griswold and Congress streets in downtown Detroit and continued the protest. King criticized the bank for not paying taxes in 2009, overpaying its executives and opposing legislation such as credit card reform and the Foreclosure Prevention Act. “Anything that would help the middle class, Bank of America opposed,” King said. “When workers are struggling to pay child care and feed their families, Bank of America in 2010 made about $17.5 billion from credit card and ATM fees.” Bank of America spokeswoman Diane Wagner said Bank of America paid more than $40 billion in taxes from 2000 to 2009. However, she was unable to say how much the bank paid in taxes in 2009. Generally, companies don’t pay taxes unless they earn a profit. Wagner also said Bank of America repaid the $45 billion it received in federal stimulus dollars as well as an additional $2.5 billion in dividends. And, in 2009, Bank of America’s outgoing CEO received no pay under an agreement with the government. King said the protest against Bank of America and corporate tax breaks is connected to the battle for collective bargaining rights and the need to broaden the union’s organizing efforts. “Banks get bailed out, people get sold out,” King chanted as the crowd joined in.
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Director to curate four night season at Cornish festival with Brunel viaduct providing backdrop to outdoor screenings Even legendary Hollywood director Martin Scorsese has never had a set like this to play with – a giant screen by a river under the stars, with a backdrop of trains rumbling across a towering viaduct designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel. Scorsese, who is curating The Director’s Cut, a unique four-night film season at the Port Eliot Festival in Cornwall this June, clearly agonised over an opening film that would live up to the grandeur of the setting in 4,000 acres of Humphry Repton -designed parkland. Trains and clouds of steam were obviously essential ingredients, and he considered both Shanghai Express (1932), with the luminous Marlene Dietrich and Anna May Wong, or Hitchcock’s thriller The Lady Vanishes (1938). His final choice may surprise devotees of Raging Bull or Gangs of New York: his opener is Murder on the Orient Express (1974), the version directed by one of his heroes, Sidney Lumet, starring Albert Finney as Agatha Christie’s cranky Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot, which he regards as a classic. He has paired it with Hitchcock’s North by Northwest (1959), which ends with one of the deathless cinema metaphors when Cary Grant, having battled the baddies on the face of Mount Rushmore, pulls his new wife to him on a train, and the scene cuts to the train itself speeding into a tunnel. It was a considerable coup for one of the summer’s most eclectic festivals to persuade Scorsese to take a break from editing his first 3D film, The Invention of Hugo Cabret, filmed at Shepperton and starring Jude Law and Sir Ben Kingsley, to programme four themed double bills. Port Eliot, at St Germans, began as a small books event in 2003 and now includes music, food, fashion, art, a flower show and comedy. This year will also include John Cooper Clarke presenting a masterclass on writing limericks. All Scorsese’s film choices are vintage. He is a passionate film historian and has worked with the British Film Institute (BFI) to secure the prints for his season. Heather Stewart, creative director of the BFI, said his season matches its mission of getting archive film out to new and broad audiences. She said: “The interaction of these forms and the mix in such an inspiring setting will be a great experience for the festivalgoers and artists alike.” On successive nights Scorsese has chosen films which appear on many lists of the greatest of all time, including Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard (1963), matched with Jean Renoir’s The River (1951) for his literary adaptations night. Michael Powell’s ravishing ballet movie, The Red Shoes (1948), starring the glorious Moira Shearer, which is apparently his favourite film, is matched with All About Eve (1950) for his musical theme. He has not chosen any of his own films, but that gap will be filled by discussions of his work chaired by the film writer Tom Shone. “Getting Scorsese to do something for this tiny corner of Cornwall is truly fantastic,” Cathy St Germans, co-founder of the festival, said. “We did it the way we got Sarah Waters to come here and many others – we wrote him a nice proper letter, and he said yes.” Scorsese has yet to visit the beautiful estate and the house which claims to be the oldest continuously inhabited in the country, the home for centuries of the St Germans family, but will be pleased to discover he can come by train. When a 19th century earl allowed the railway to cross his lands, the payback was one of the prettiest railway stations in the country, right at his gate, and unlike many quaint vintage stations, still in daily use. “He hasn’t said he’s not coming, so we very much hope he will – if he does we know he will just fall in love with the place as everyone does.” The contact with Scorsese came through his long-term colleague, the British costume designer Sandy Powell, who was nominated for an Oscar for her astounding costumes for Gangs of New York, and won one for The Aviator. She came first to the festival as a visitor, and returned last year as a performer, presenting a show-and-tell session which included her Oscar statuette – at the special request of Lord St Germans. The festival organisers are working hard to create an environment which lives up to Scorsese’s vision: the Paradiso will have a cocktail bar in an Airstream campervan, some seats in cardboard Cadillacs designed by the Ballet Rambert designer Michael Howells, and will also be serving hot chocolate and providing blankets and umbrellas just in case. “The idea of a cinema by the river came last year when I was lying on the grass one night at last year’s festival. It felt like the first time I’d lain down in days – and I thought what I’d really like now is to watch a lovely movie, right here, without having to move,” Cathy St Germans said. The Director’s Cut: Michael Scorsese’s Open Air Film Festival Trains Murder on the Orient Express/North by Northwest Books The Leopard/The River Noir The Narrow Margin/Human Desire Musicals The Red Shoes/All About Eve Martin Scorsese Film industry Sidney Lumet Festivals Maev Kennedy guardian.co.uk
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