September 8th, 2006
I haven’t seen it. I can only comment on what I’ve read. There seems to be a lot of posting flurry going on. Plus, it’s been covered by the MSM.
So, I can’t really comment on the actual movie because as I said I haven’t seen it. I wasn’t one of the ones chosen to preview it. I’m apparently not right-leaning enough if what the rumors say is true. I do find it odd that ABC didn’t honor President Clinton’s office’s request for an advanced copy but handed it out to all of those right-wing bloggers. That just smacks of rudeness. I mean, he was the President and the movie is about him.
I have no problem with a movie attacking a former President, even a former living President, as long as it tells the truth and is factual. Even ABC admits that this 9/11 “docu-drama” stretches the truth and isn’t factual; however, they have packaged it as an educational tool for children as if it is in fact a truthful telling of the events as they happened.
Right-winger blogs seem to be interpreting the public outrage against the ABC 9/11 Docu-drama as a political thing, as if it’s all about Clinton, as if Democrats and liberals are all about circling the wagon because Clinton is being solely blamed in the movie for 9/11. Once again they don’t seem to be paying attention. They’re own unhealthy preoccupation with Clintion has kept them from seeing the true problem is the fact that this movie is about lying to the public, an Orwellian refabricating the facts. But then maybe they don’t care. After all, maybe the facts and the truth aren’t important to the right so much as having a President in power and being in control of the facts and the fact-telling.
Tags: ABC 9/11 Docu-Drama, lie, truth, Bill Clinton, rightwinger
August 8th, 2006
- Preparing for Martial Law - Jill @ Brilliant at Breakfast reports that President Bush is trying to secretly federalize the National Guard, a move that the National Governors Association is trying to put a stop to. This is the kind of thing a dictator would do, by the way.
- Might as well face it, they’re addicted to porn… - SpinDentist @ The All Spin Zone reports on a poll revelling what I’ve suspected all along — that there are quite a large number of self-identified Christians involving themselves with porn. This may be why so many rightwingers are so interested in what everyone else is doing in their bedrooms.
- ABC’s Good Morning America covers story of gay Arabic speaker kicked out of military - John in DC @ AmericaBlog has a link to ABC’s Good Morning America video coverage of the story. I’ve seen the story reported on several liberal blogs, including Pandagon, but this is the first main stream media coverage I’ve seen. I have to agree with John that it does appear that the military does seem more interested in it’s witch hunt for homosexuals than in helping itself and in stopping the terrorists.
- Senate ratifies Europe cybercrime convention - Michael Hampton @ Homeland Stupidity reports that as of last Thursday night, “the U.S. can now spy on your Internet activity at the request of a foreign government — even if you are only doing things completely legal.” It’s called the Council of Europe Convention on Cybercrime. What does that mean? It’s a treaty which requires its signatories to pass laws against breaking into computer systems, child pornography, Internet fraud, computer viruses, denial of service attacks and related crimes.
The treaty requires the U.S. to turn over data stored by Internet Service Providers, and provide real-time interception of your Internet traffic, at the request of a foreign government, whether the offense the foreign government is investigating is a crime in the U.S. or not.
“That means that countries that have laws limiting free speech on the Net could oblige the F.B.I. to uncover the identities of anonymous U.S. critics, or monitor their communications on behalf of foreign governments,” wrote Electronic Frontier Foundation activist coordinator Danny O’Brien. “American ISPs would be obliged to obey other jurisdictions’ requests to log their users’ behavior without due process, or compensation.”
“And it applies not just to ‘cyber’ crimes but to digital evidence of any crime, so foreign governments now may begin using U.S. law enforcement to help them gather evidence in all kinds of cases,” wrote Cato Institute Director of Information Policy Studies Jim Harper.
- Gunning for PBS - Steve Aqui @ Donklephant writes about the GOP’s targeting of funding for NPR and PBS and how the GOP would prefer both would just disappear. Steve points out how hypocritical the GOP is with it’s big tax cuts and it’s attempts to eliminate the estate tax and yet it claims there’s no money to help handicap children or pay for public radio and television or reduce the deficit.
Tags: PBS, NPR, GOP, Council of Europe Convention on Cybercrime, ABC, Good Morning America, Christians, George W. Bush, National Guard, National Governors Association, EFF
July 31st, 2006
Today is Day 20 of the “Crisis in the Middle East”.
Do you know how many days it’s been since the U.S. invaded Iraq?
According to Frank Rich in yesterday’s New York Times, yesterday was Day 1,229, making today a nice even 1,230.
According to CNN, “there have been 2,802 coalition deaths, 2,576 Americans, two Australians, 114 Britons, 13 Bulgarians, three Danes, two Dutch, two Estonians, one Fijian, one Hungarian, 31 Italians, one Kazakh, one Latvian, 17 Poles, two Romanians, two Salvadoran, three Slovaks, 11 Spaniards, two Thai and 18 Ukrainians in the war in Iraq as of July 31, 2006.” 1,000 plus Iraqis per month have lost their lives in Baghdad alone the last few months.
However, according to Frank Rich:
On the Big Three networks’ evening newscasts, the time devoted to Iraq has fallen 60 percent between 2003 and this spring, as clocked by the television monitor, the Tyndall Report. On Thursday, Brian Williams of NBC read aloud a “shame on you” e-mail complaint from the parents of two military sons anguished that his broadcast had so little news about the war.
This is happening even as the casualties in Iraq, averaging more than 100 a day, easily surpass those in Israel and Lebanon combined. When Nouri al-Maliki, the latest Iraqi prime minister, visited Washington last week to address Congress, he too got short TV shrift — a mere five sentences about the speech on ABC’s “World News.” The networks know a rerun when they see it. Only 22 months earlier, one of Mr. Maliki’s short-lived predecessors, Ayad Allawi, had come to town during the 2004 campaign to give a similarly empty Congressional address laced with White House-scripted talking points about the war’s progress. Propaganda stunts, unlike “Law & Order” episodes, don’t hold up on a second viewing.
The steady falloff in Iraq coverage isn’t happenstance. It’s a barometer of the scope of the tragedy. For reporters, the already apocalyptic security situation in Baghdad keeps getting worse, simply making the war more difficult to cover than ever. The audience has its own phobia: Iraq is a bummer. “It is depressing to pay attention to this war on terror,” said Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly on July 18. “I mean, it’s summertime.” Americans don’t like to lose, whatever the season. They know defeat when they see it, no matter how many new plans for victory are trotted out to obscure that reality.
So much for supporting our troops, eh? What happened to reporting all of that good news that was supposed to be happening in Iraq?
I’m upset about Israel and Lebanon too. Heck, I’m outraged; however, remember, Iraq and Afghanistan are our wars and our messes and our soldiers are dying over there. Shame on our media for a lack of patriotic priority.
Hat tip AmericaBlog.
Tags: Iraq, Israel, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Baghdad, American soldiers, New York Times, ABC, Fox News, NBC, Nouri al-Maliki, Frank Rich
August 8th, 2005
ABC anchor Peter Jennings passed away at his home last night. He’d announcef 4 months ago that he had lung cancer but had felt hopeful he would return to the air.
NPR had a wonderful tribute to him this morning, making me feel that Jennings was probably the last of a special kind of newsman.
Since he began anchoring the program in 1983, Jennings won numerous awards, including a National Headline Award and a George Foster Peabody award. He also won some 16 Emmys, according to the ABC News Web site.
Asked how it felt after anchoring ABC’s evening news program for 20 years, Jennings told CNN’s Larry King on Sept. 8, 2003: “Seems like yesterday; seems like forever — all at the same time.”
I was surprised to learn that he did not approve of the OJ coverage and that he spent 60 hours on air following 9-11 — his bosses could not convince him to go home. He most certainly understood what the world’s priorities should have been. He will be missed.
Tags: ABC News, Peter Jennings, NPR
