There’s nothing so dramatic to illustrate the point that neoconservatives think along the same lines as liberal interventionists than this case of arguing about intervening in Libya’s civil war. On the right, we have this joker Paul Wolfowitz, who wants to illustrate that his political ideology of using military force to spread democracy and liberty throughout the Middle East is in fact a good and just one. The answer to the first of these questions can only come after establishing direct contact with the new authorities, but the delivery of supplies should not be such a problem, either through the many ports along the Libyan coast or across the Egyptian border. Nonlethal assistance could be important, including basic supplies such as food and medicine. So could broadcasting assistance to discourage Gadhafi’s forces from fighting. The concern that American weapons might end up in the wrong hands must definitely be considered before supplying shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles, but other weapons pose less of a risk—particularly accurate antitank weapons. In any case, forcing the Libyans to turn to other countries for arms would repeat the mistakes of Afghanistan in the 1980s and Bosnia in the 1990s. It is only in the context of a larger assistance strategy that a no-fly zone should be considered. It would be different from the prolonged and largely futile zones imposed over southern Iraq from 1991-2003 or over Bosnia from 1992-1995. Intended to stop the genocides of the Marsh Arabs in Iraq and of the Muslim population of Bosnia, they did neither. Critics accurately point out that the massacre of 11,000 Muslims in Srebrenica took place under a NATO-imposed no-fly zone. But the situation in Libya would be very different if the Libyan people are properly armed. Yes, the Clinton administration’s policies were certainly ill-considered, look how many people didn’t get killed and how many countries weren’t invaded. But this jackass, this mad joker, doesn’t want to be concerned about the fallout of any US military aid to Libya. I recall seeing mention that the Libyans who came to Iraq and Afghanistan to fight against the American occupation over the past few years came from the eastern side – where the rebels are. What do you think they’re going to do with those anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons after the civil war ends, Mr. Wolfowitz? As MoDo correctly asks , does this guy know when to shut the hell up? Now we have the clowns on the left to deal with. Ann-Marie Slaughter, former Director of Policy Planning in the Obama
Continue reading …There’s nothing so dramatic to illustrate the point that neoconservatives think along the same lines as liberal interventionists than this case of arguing about intervening in Libya’s civil war. On the right, we have this joker Paul Wolfowitz, who wants to illustrate that his political ideology of using military force to spread democracy and liberty throughout the Middle East is in fact a good and just one. The answer to the first of these questions can only come after establishing direct contact with the new authorities, but the delivery of supplies should not be such a problem, either through the many ports along the Libyan coast or across the Egyptian border. Nonlethal assistance could be important, including basic supplies such as food and medicine. So could broadcasting assistance to discourage Gadhafi’s forces from fighting. The concern that American weapons might end up in the wrong hands must definitely be considered before supplying shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles, but other weapons pose less of a risk—particularly accurate antitank weapons. In any case, forcing the Libyans to turn to other countries for arms would repeat the mistakes of Afghanistan in the 1980s and Bosnia in the 1990s. It is only in the context of a larger assistance strategy that a no-fly zone should be considered. It would be different from the prolonged and largely futile zones imposed over southern Iraq from 1991-2003 or over Bosnia from 1992-1995. Intended to stop the genocides of the Marsh Arabs in Iraq and of the Muslim population of Bosnia, they did neither. Critics accurately point out that the massacre of 11,000 Muslims in Srebrenica took place under a NATO-imposed no-fly zone. But the situation in Libya would be very different if the Libyan people are properly armed. Yes, the Clinton administration’s policies were certainly ill-considered, look how many people didn’t get killed and how many countries weren’t invaded. But this jackass, this mad joker, doesn’t want to be concerned about the fallout of any US military aid to Libya. I recall seeing mention that the Libyans who came to Iraq and Afghanistan to fight against the American occupation over the past few years came from the eastern side – where the rebels are. What do you think they’re going to do with those anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons after the civil war ends, Mr. Wolfowitz? As MoDo correctly asks , does this guy know when to shut the hell up? Now we have the clowns on the left to deal with. Ann-Marie Slaughter, former Director of Policy Planning in the Obama
Continue reading …U.S. News: Political Donations of NPR Board, NPR Foundation Officers Dramatically Lean Left to Democrats
March 15, 2011 No Comment
Danielle Kurtzleben at U.S. News & World Report crunched some numbers of federal campaign contributions and discovered that the NPR Board and the board of the NPR Foundation are — surprise, surprise — much more likely to donate to Democrats. A review of campaign finance data found that NPR board members' campaign contributions have sharply favored Democrats . Since 2004, members of the boards of NPR and the NPR Foundation, the public broadcaster's fundraising arm, have contributed nearly $2.2 million to federal candidates, parties, and PACs, of which $1.95 million, or 89 percent, has gone to Democratic candidates and liberal-leaning political action committees. Officers and trustees of the NPR Foundation, which has no control over the organization's programming, have given substantially to national political campaigns in recent years. According to data from the Center for Responsive Politics, this group's members (as listed on NPR's most recent available annual report, from fiscal year 2008) have given almost $2.1 million to political campaigns in the last eight years. Fully 89 percent of this giving was to Democrats and progressive organizations. These figures include all federal contributions since the 2004 election cycle, the first in which “soft money” contributions were banned. “Soft money” refers to money given to a party for non-campaign activities, which until being banned in 2002 were unlimited and largely unregulated. A majority of contributions from members of NPR's Board of Directors have likewise gone to Democrats. This board comprises 10 NPR station managers, the NPR president, the NPR Foundation president, and five prominent members of the public, selected by the board and confirmed by member stations. Political contributions by these station managers have been virtually nonexistent, and there are also no recorded political contributions from either Ron Schiller or Vivian Schiller. Of the five public board members, however, giving has been far more Democratic than Republican , with nearly 95 percent of the group's $106,000 in contributions going to Democrats or progressive committees. Three of these members have given exclusively to Democrats since the start of 2003, though in amounts less than $5,000 each. One member, Carol Cartwright, has given $4,100 to Republicans and $700 to Democrats. But the biggest giver, John A. Herrmann, Jr., has given $82,500 to candidates and committees since 2003, 98 percent of
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The combination of 20 years of reporting conflict, together with scars left by her upbringing prompted Janine di Giovanni to try an intense week-long form of psychoanalysis Many years ago I went to an isolated village in Switzerland to report on a renegade Freudian psychiatrist and analyst called Dr
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The combination of 20 years of reporting conflict, together with scars left by her upbringing prompted Janine di Giovanni to try an intense week-long form of psychoanalysis Many years ago I went to an isolated village in Switzerland to report on a renegade Freudian psychiatrist and analyst called Dr
Continue reading …Maine’s New Teabagging Gov Raises Pension Fund Contribution For Union Members To Pay For Tax Cuts
March 15, 2011 No CommentWhen last I checked in on Maine’s new teabagging governor, he wanted to repeal the state regulation that prevented using toxic chemical bisphenol-A in baby bottles. (Says there was no “science” behind the ban.) Now, under Paul LePage’s proposed budget, teachers and other state employees will be required to increase their contributions to the pension system, from 7.65 percent of their salary to 9.65 percent. Of course, the teabagger governor has exempted himself! And is this to build up the state’s pension system? Nope. It’s to pay for $203 million in tax cuts for Maine residents in the top 10% income and estate brackets. Isn’t “shared sacrifice” great ? While public employees and teachers face this increase, as well as a raise in the retirement age, a freeze on cost-of-living adjustments for current retirees and a 2 percent cap on future cost of living increases, LePage’s personal contribution rate to the retirement system will remain the same , which means he’ll be paying $21,420 over four years. If LePage faced the same increase as state employees, it would cost him $5,880 over his term. Unlike teachers and state employees, however, the size of the governor’s pension doesn’t depend on how long he pays into the system. As soon as he leaves office, he’ll begin receiving a three-eighths of his salary, which works out to $26,600 annually. For comparison, a Maine teacher would have to work for more than 25 years to receive this level of benefits. Confidential employees, those that are not represented under union collective bargaining, also are not seeing their salary contributions increased to the same rate. They’ll continue to pay just 3.65 percent of their salary to the pension fund. At the same time that most employees are to be forced to increase their contributions, the state will reduce the amount it pays into the retirement fund. Maine currently contributes 5.5 percent of an employee’s salary, less than the 6.2 percent it would have to pay if these workers were enrolled in Social Security rather than the more efficient state pension system. It is difficult, then, to take LePage seriously when he says, “I know some teachers and retirees are struggling, but we need honest and shared solutions to solve our pension problem,” as he did last week, or when his spokesperson talked about “shared sacrifices” as they announced the budget.
Continue reading …Maine’s New Teabagging Gov Raises Pension Fund Contribution For Union Members To Pay For Tax Cuts
March 15, 2011 No CommentWhen last I checked in on Maine’s new teabagging governor, he wanted to repeal the state regulation that prevented using toxic chemical bisphenol-A in baby bottles. (Says there was no “science” behind the ban.) Now, under Paul LePage’s proposed budget, teachers and other state employees will be required to increase their contributions to the pension system, from 7.65 percent of their salary to 9.65 percent. Of course, the teabagger governor has exempted himself! And is this to build up the state’s pension system? Nope. It’s to pay for $203 million in tax cuts for Maine residents in the top 10% income and estate brackets. Isn’t “shared sacrifice” great ? While public employees and teachers face this increase, as well as a raise in the retirement age, a freeze on cost-of-living adjustments for current retirees and a 2 percent cap on future cost of living increases, LePage’s personal contribution rate to the retirement system will remain the same , which means he’ll be paying $21,420 over four years. If LePage faced the same increase as state employees, it would cost him $5,880 over his term. Unlike teachers and state employees, however, the size of the governor’s pension doesn’t depend on how long he pays into the system. As soon as he leaves office, he’ll begin receiving a three-eighths of his salary, which works out to $26,600 annually. For comparison, a Maine teacher would have to work for more than 25 years to receive this level of benefits. Confidential employees, those that are not represented under union collective bargaining, also are not seeing their salary contributions increased to the same rate. They’ll continue to pay just 3.65 percent of their salary to the pension fund. At the same time that most employees are to be forced to increase their contributions, the state will reduce the amount it pays into the retirement fund. Maine currently contributes 5.5 percent of an employee’s salary, less than the 6.2 percent it would have to pay if these workers were enrolled in Social Security rather than the more efficient state pension system. It is difficult, then, to take LePage seriously when he says, “I know some teachers and retirees are struggling, but we need honest and shared solutions to solve our pension problem,” as he did last week, or when his spokesperson talked about “shared sacrifices” as they announced the budget.
Continue reading …Actor Harry Shearer Hits ‘Vaguely Liberal’ Journos for Love of ‘Sob Stories’
March 15, 2011 No Comment
Actor and filmmaker Harry Shearer, best known for his voice work in 'The Simpsons', blasted the news media in a speech to the National Press Club on Monday. Specifically, he singled out the media's “myth-making” tendency – its constant desire to fit current events into mostly pre-formed narratives. “What I’m calling a ‘template,’ is based on facts. Some facts. A partial collection. The first dusting,” Shearer claimed. “It then becomes adopted as ‘the narrative.' The mental doors lock shut, and no further facts are allowed in.” The Daily Caller's Chris Moody reported Tuesday: He made the case, using coverage of Hurricane Katrina, the Iraq War and Wikileaks as examples, that once a “template” is set, news practitioners have a hard time diverting from it. On Katrina, he recalled the time NBC News anchor Brian Williams told him that viewers prefer personal feature stories over detailed accounts of why the levies broke during the storm. “A bias toward sob stories is as old as William Randolph Hearst’s first hard on for an actress,” Shearer cracked. He said that the tendency for national news media outlets to “parachute” into an area they know little about for a story, combined with a dash of hubris, makes it difficult for them to rethink whether they even had it right in the first place. “You can’t stay on a story very long, and when you come back, as everybody did to New Orleans for the fifth anniversary last fall, there’s now corporate institutional ego involved in defending the template against the assault of new information. After all, the networks, cable and broadcast bragged big time about the ballsiness of their Katrina coverage,” he said. “Exactly how do you go about retracting a boast?” Veteran journalist W. Joseph Campbell has written at length about media myth-making , including in post-Katrina New Orleans. He discussed much of the media's self-aggrandizing attitude towards its own coverage of Katrina and the aftermath in an interview with NewsBusters . For his part, Shearer stopped short of proclaiming a widespread liberal bias in the news media, Moody reported: On questions of media bias, he said the real slant is not just a liberal vs. conservative issue, but one that bends toward laziness. “Most journalists are vaguely liberal; most media owners are not so vaguely conservative,” he said. “The far more pervasive biases, I suggest, those of logistics of parachuting in and asking cab drivers, ‘what’s the mood here?’” Of course laziness often lends itself to media liberalism, since lazy reporters who (by Shearer's telling) lean left are more likely to incorporate shallow but easily presentable narratives – such as race-centric opposition to Barack Obama or the perpetual “corporation bad, union good” line – into their reporting.
Continue reading …Actor Harry Shearer Hits ‘Vaguely Liberal’ Journos for Love of ‘Sob Stories’
March 15, 2011 No CommentActor and filmmaker Harry Shearer, best known for his voice work in 'The Simpsons', blasted the news media in a speech to the National Press Club on Monday. Specifically, he singled out the media's “myth-making” tendency – its constant desire to fit current events into mostly pre-formed narratives. “What I’m calling a ‘template,’ is based on facts. Some facts. A partial collection. The first dusting,” Shearer claimed. “It then becomes adopted as ‘the narrative.' The mental doors lock shut, and no further facts are allowed in.” The Daily Caller's Chris Moody reported Tuesday: He made the case, using coverage of Hurricane Katrina, the Iraq War and Wikileaks as examples, that once a “template” is set, news practitioners have a hard time diverting from it. On Katrina, he recalled the time NBC News anchor Brian Williams told him that viewers prefer personal feature stories over detailed accounts of why the levies broke during the storm. “A bias toward sob stories is as old as William Randolph Hearst’s first hard on for an actress,” Shearer cracked. He said that the tendency for national news media outlets to “parachute” into an area they know little about for a story, combined with a dash of hubris, makes it difficult for them to rethink whether they even had it right in the first place. “You can’t stay on a story very long, and when you come back, as everybody did to New Orleans for the fifth anniversary last fall, there’s now corporate institutional ego involved in defending the template against the assault of new information. After all, the networks, cable and broadcast bragged big time about the ballsiness of their Katrina coverage,” he said. “Exactly how do you go about retracting a boast?” Veteran journalist W. Joseph Campbell has written at length about media myth-making , including in post-Katrina New Orleans. He discussed much of the media's self-aggrandizing attitude towards its own coverage of Katrina and the aftermath in an interview with NewsBusters . For his part, Shearer stopped short of proclaiming a widespread liberal bias in the news media, Moody reported: On questions of media bias, he said the real slant is not just a liberal vs. conservative issue, but one that bends toward laziness. “Most journalists are vaguely liberal; most media owners are not so vaguely conservative,” he said. “The far more pervasive biases, I suggest, those of logistics of parachuting in and asking cab drivers, ‘what’s the mood here?’” Of course laziness often lends itself to media liberalism, since lazy reporters who (by Shearer's telling) lean left are more likely to incorporate shallow but easily presentable narratives – such as race-centric opposition to Barack Obama or the perpetual “corporation bad, union good” line – into their reporting.
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Veteran actor made plea against cutting arts funding as he revealed details of a mini-scale version of event he created He was here to announce that the Sundance festival is coming to London. But Robert Redford also took the opportunity to make a plea in solidarity with Britain’s actors: don’t cut the arts. Redford revealed details of a small-scale London version of the film festival he created and which has been held in the mountains of Utah since the 1980s. It will be staged at the O2 in April next year, and while there may not be the opportunity to ski down the slopes of Mount Timpanogos, Redford said he was confident the venue was the right one. He also added his voice to the campaign against cuts to arts funding in the UK: “Everbody is experiencing this austerity programme around the world, we’re seeing it in America – cutbacks, cutbacks. “That’s something I wouldn’t attack on all fronts, other than in the arts, and I join my colleagues here – Helen Mirren, who I’ve worked with, Jeremy Irons and others who say you can’t cut the arts because it enriches the culture. “There are also many examples where it enriches the economy. Look at the festival. It puts $70m into the local economy. You can’t, unless it is an ideological argument, classify the arts as a trivial pursuit.” UK arts groups will be glad of his support as they await the next round of funding decisions by the Arts Council, which had its budget cut by 29.6% last year. However, Redford’s real job was to announce details of Sundance London. The 74-year-old actor said he hoped it would become an annual festival: “I’ve wanted to come to London for a long time and it was a question of how and when. It could only happen if there was someone here who wanted us.” Although British films such as Submarine, Tyrannosaur, Project Nim and Knuckle did very well at this year’s Sundance festival, Redford said that Sundance London will be a showcase for independent American films. “We want to bring a slice of our culture to this space,” he said. “There will also be American music, as well as debates and panel discussions.” Redford said that he set up the original Sundance festival in the mountains of Utah “because I thought it would be more weird, more odd and more interesting. I also like to ski”. Clearly, the O2 will be a different prospect. “Time will tell how it works, but we’re coming in very small. We’re here four days, we’re not bringing the full complement of Sundance – we’re bringing film and American music.” The Sundance Institute was founded to promote “independent storytelling to inform, inspire and unite diverse populations around the globe.” Among the projects that it has helped to nurture are An Inconvenient Truth, Spring Awakening and Angels in America. From the work of the institute came the film festival, held in Park City, which has introduced audiences to movies such as Reservoir Dogs, Little Miss Sunshine and American Splendor. London Sundance will run 26-29 April 2012. Register at www.sundance-london.com How the Sundances compare Sundance Park City Largest independent film festival in US Original purpose ‘Advancing the work of risk-taking storytellers worldwide’ Success Impressive Notable films Reservoir Dogs, The Blair Witch Project Sundance London at O2 Arena Largest mast-supported, dome-shaped cable structure in world Original purpose ‘Triumph of boldness over blandness’ – Tony Blair Success Ironic Notable films Disney Channel’s High School Musical 2 premiere. Past attractions The Millennium Dome’s Body Zone, home to a giant Perspex testicle inside which visitors could watch a video simulation of the life of a spermatazoan. Now sadly defunct. Sundance film festival Robert Redford Festivals London Mark Brown guardian.co.uk
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