Fox Lies

Purposely misleading their audience is what it's all about. In this case, they chose to use year-old footage to pretend Ron Paul was booed when he won a straw poll concerning who the Regressive candidate should be. The current year's clip actually shows he received overwhelming cheers. Watch the clip:



Next time one of your rightwing friends/relatives/coworkers needs a little proof of how they are being purposely lied to by a foreign-owned, Saudi-financed organization, send them this link as well as the following links:

• They spliced in footage from a successful Teabag rally to prop up the crowds at a poorly-attended rally:

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2009/11/fox-lies-surprised-to-make-protest-seem.html

• Tape of Anderson Cooper was carefully edited to make it sound like a quote he was reading was actually his own opinion presented as news:

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2011/04/another-day-another-fox-lie.html

• They lie so much a survey shows how many issues are misunderstood:

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2011/02/more-you-watch-less-you-know.html

• Footage of peaceful pro-union protests by 100,000 people in Wisconsin was replaced by hostile, violent crowds at some other event, as you can tell by the palm trees in Wisconsin:

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2011/04/palm-trees-in-wisconsin.html

• They claimed CNN, Reuters and other journalists were "used as human shields" by Ghaddafi in Lybia:

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2011/03/blog-post_22.html

• Edited clip to pretend President Obama wanted to raise taxes on everyone:

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2010/09/another-fox-channel-lie.html

• An internal memo tells staffers which inflammatory words to use to provoke viewers:
  

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2010/12/fox-noise-internal-memo.html

• Graphic incorrectly states that a huge majority believes global warming is a hoax:

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2009/12/fox-comedy-channel-uses-fraudulent.html

• Careful editing makes Shirley Sherrod say the opposite of what she actually said:

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2010/07/fired-because-of-fox-channels-lies.html

• Providing ridiculous, sky-high false figures on a Presidential trip:

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2010/11/president-obamas-zillion-dollar-trip.html

• "Fair and balanced", yet donates $1,000,000 to the republican party:

http://radiovegan.blogspot.com/2010/10/fox-gives-another-million-to.html

Pro-Democracy Protesters Oust Egypt's Mubarak

The whole world watched as peaceful protesters refused to give in, and refused to resort to violence for 18 days. Even after the Egyptian police and military used force and attempted to goad the protesters into violence, millions refused to take the bait. The result: a 30 year dictator was forced to resign.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41526422/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa/

Obama Accomplishments: The First 2 Years

• Children's Health Insurance covering an additional 4 million kids
• Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act
  
• Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act
• Tobacco Regulation
• Credit Card Reform protecting consumers
• Student Loan Reform
• Stimulus (Stopped the worst recession in 80 years from becoming another Depression; gave Americans the largest tax cut in American history)
• Signed nuclear arms deal with Russia that would diminish nukes on both sides by one third
• Signed non-proliferation initiative to keep nuclear materials out of the hands of terrorists
• Health Care Reform
• Wall Street Reform
• New GI Bill
• Food Safety Modernization Act
• Repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell
• Dismantled the scandal-plagued Minerals Management Service (MMS), so the division collecting revenue from oil leases is not the same division that regulates and inspects the industry
• Cancelled the irrelevant, outdated F22 weapons program
• Passed the 9/11 First Responders Bill
  

Regressives Accomplish Nothing in First Month

They were dancing in the streets. The Regressive Republicans, with the help of the Teabaggers, won back a majority in the House of Representatives. "We're gonna balance the budget! We're gonna create jobs! We're gonna eliminate Obamacare!" they proclaimed.

Mission: Not accomplished.

What DID they do? Essentially nothing.

• The reading of the Constitution (or parts of it). Yes, they took turns reading aloud sections of the US Constitution -- except for the sections they didn't like or were embarrassed by, like that whole "blacks are 3/5 of a person" thing, and that Regressive Prohibition amendment.
• The pledge to have "open rules" allowing Democrats to offer amendments. Well, except for that very first bill trying in vain to repeal health care reform. No amendments were allowed. Whoops.
• The swearing in ceremony. The oath was taken by all Regressives except for 2 who failed to show up on the very first day. Pete Sessions(R) and Mike Fitzpatrick(R), pictured above, decided to go to a FUNDRAISER instead of the swearing-in ceremony. But, get this, they claim they watched on C-Span, raised their hands and took the oath in front of a TV set! As if that counts. If that were the case, anybody who watched on C-Span, raised their hands and took the oath could have instantly become a US congressman! Morons. To make matters worse, they actually voted on issues illegally on subsequent days before being given a second-chance swearing in ceremony.
  

Jobless Claims LOWEST Since 2008

The economic news in the fourth quarter of 2010 was relatively good. From msnbc:

The last two indicators of the year showed a slowly improving job market and a housing market whose wounds are healing, although it remains battered and bruised by the worst real estate slump in decades.

The number of people applying for unemployment benefits fell to its lowest point in nearly two and a half years, a sign that the job market is slowly improving. And the number of Americans who signed contracts to buy homes rose in November, the fourth increase since contract signings hit a low in June.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40850565/ns/business-eye_on_the_economy/


Notice the jobless rate's substantial increase through the final year of Bush/Cheney (2008). The high point comes at the transition from Bush to President Obama. The jobless rate decreases slowly and steadily all through the first two years of President Obama's first term. Source: US Dept of Labor.

The More You Watch, The Less You Know

What channel do you think that describes? Hint: It's foreign-owned and Saudi-financed.

A recent study from the University of Maryland shows that people who watch Rupert Murdoch's "Fox News" channel on a daily basis were more misinformed than people who watched any other source of news. Any other source.

The report shows that, regardless of a person's political party, if they watched a significant amount of Fox Noise, they believed the following FALSE statements:

Most economists estimate the stimulus caused job losses (12 points more likely)

Most economists have estimated the health care law will worsen the deficit (31 points)

The economy is getting worse (26 points)

Most scientists do not agree that climate change is occurring (30 points)

The stimulus legislation did not include any tax cuts (14 points)

Their own income taxes have gone up (14 points)

The auto bailout only occurred under Obama (13 points)

When TARP came up for a vote most Republicans opposed it (12 points)

And that it is not clear that Obama was born in the United States (31 points)

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/study-fox-news-viewers-most-misinformed-of-all-news-consumers/

Great Day for America

How do you get angry, hateful, recalcitrant, petulant Republicans to get anything done in Congress? Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D) knows.

You threaten to take away their vacation.

"No Christmas vacation until you get your homework done," is essentially what Harry told them. Oh, they balked and whined and complained (and I think John Boehner cried) all over cable TV.

But this week, the Senate passed three important bills:

• The 9/11 First Responders bill
• The Repeal of Don't Ask / Don't Tell
• The Nuclear Arms Control Treaty (The START Treaty. "START" stands for Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty.)

President Obama signed the second one today (photo above).

This means that:

• Congress will provide up to $4.2 billion in new aid to survivors of the 9/11 terrorism attack on the World Trade Center and responders who became ill working in its ruins
• Patriotic Americans in the US Armed Forces fighting for freedom and liberty will no longer have to deal with institutionalized discrimination against themselves
  
• The US and Russia would restart onsite weapons inspections Republicans should have endorsed all along, since Ronald Reagan's edict of "trust, but verify." (Reagan also spoke of his dream of a world without nuclear weapons at all. He would be a Democrat today.)

Republican Jackass of the Week

Tom Coburn.
Republican Jackass.
From Oklahoma.

This Jackass threatened to be the one to hold up funding for the American firefighters, cops and rescue workers -- the First Responders -- in the days and weeks following 9/11. Yes, the very people who Republicans held up as heroes and exploited in every campaign with flags waving in the background since 9/11, are the ones they refused to help with hospitalization, even though many of these heroes are now dying of cancer, lung diseases, etc, all related to 9/11.

Why would Republican Jackass Tom Coburn object? Because, he claims, the bill was "fast tracked" through Congress and didn't get heard in a committee first. But that's a lie. Fact is the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions held a hearing on the bill in June -- and Tom Coburn, who is actually on that committee, didn't bother to show up for it.

Jackass.

Regressive Senate Republicans

Today the Regressive Republicans in the US Senate blocked two important bills from passing. It was a spiteful move by Senate Regressives, keeping their promise/threat to not allow anything to pass until they get their bonus tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires.

The first bill would have funded the health needs of ailing 9/11 responders and survivors. The second bill would have ended "Don't Ask Don't Tell."

So the Regressives continue to act like spoiled brats, holding their breath and refusing to vote on any issue until their ultra-rich campaign contributors get their additional tax breaks. Meanwhile, Americans who put their own lives on the line -- and are still suffering the consequences -- to help in NYC on 9/11 will not get funding.

And at the same time, "Don't Ask Don't Tell" will not be abolished, even though the Commander in Chief, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Secretary of Defense all have repeatedly said they were in favor of ending it. In addition, polls show that 70% of the American public, and 70% of active service members also want it to end.

How ironic that patriotic American soldiers, fighting for "freedom, liberty," and all that, still have to deal with institutionalized discrimination.

Fox Noise Internal Memo

A memo leaked to Media Matters from an insider at the foreign-owned, Saudi-financed Fox channel shows, once again, that their on air people are instructed on which specific words to use -- and which to avoid -- to shape the news and promote their rightwing agenda.

From Media Matters:

At the height of the health care reform debate last fall, Bill Sammon, Fox News' controversial Washington managing editor, sent a memo directing his network's journalists not to use the phrase "public option."

Instead, Sammon wrote, Fox's reporters should use "government option" and similar phrases -- wording that a top Republican pollster had recommended in order to turn public opinion against the Democrats' reform efforts.

Sources familiar with the situation in Fox's Washington bureau have told Media Matters that Sammon uses his position as managing editor to "slant" Fox's supposedly neutral news coverage to the right. Sammon's "government option" email is the clearest evidence yet that Sammon is aggressively pushing Fox's reporting to the right -- in this case by issuing written orders to his staff.

Two months prior to Sammon's 2009 memo, Republican pollster Frank Luntz appeared on Sean Hannity's August 18 Fox News program. Luntz scolded Hannity for referring to the "public option" and encouraged Hannity to use "government option" instead.

Luntz argued that "if you call it a 'public option,' the American people are split," but that "if you call it the 'government option,' the public is overwhelmingly against it."

And here's the memo:

From: Sammon, Bill
Sent: Tuesday, October 27, 2009 8:23 AM
To: 054 -FNSunday; 169 -SPECIAL REPORT; 069 -Politics; 030 -Root (FoxNews.Com); 036 -FOX.WHU; 050 -Senior Producers; 051 -Producers
Subject: friendly reminder: let's not slip back into calling it the "public option"

1) Please use the term "government-run health insurance" or, when brevity is a concern, "government option," whenever possible.

2) When it is necessary to use the term "public option" (which is, after all, firmly ensconced in the nation's lexicon), use the qualifier "so-called," as in "the so-called public option."

3) Here's another way to phrase it: "The public option, which is the government-run plan."

4) When newsmakers and sources use the term "public option" in our stories, there's not a lot we can do about it, since quotes are of course sacrosanct.

Happy Thanksgiving!

It's not a holiday celebration if there's a slaughtered, tortured bird on the table. Here are some interesting articles from all over the country on celebrating A VEGAN THANKSGIVING!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/15/AR2010111507286.html

http://www.pbpulse.com/dining/holiday-dining/2010/11/17/a-vegan-style-thanksgiving-meal-rich-with-the-flavors-of-autumn/

http://www.nj.com/hunterdon-county-democrat/index.ssf/2010/11/save_a_turkey_eat_vegan_this_t.html

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/11/08/health/20101108_thanksgiving.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/avital-binshtock/how-to-green-your-thanksg_b_785499.html

http://www.inthisweek.com/view.php?id=2428013

http://www.stargazette.com/article/20101119/VIEWPOINTS03/11190306/1121/Spare-the-turkey-this-Thanksgiving

The Quitter's Ratings Plummet

"What's that? Another precipitous drop and I'm cancelled? But what does 'precipitous' mean?"

Sarah Palin, the part time politician who aborted her own governorship halfway through her first term, has lost almost HALF the audience on Sarah Palin's Alaska, the so-called reality show that's really a long form campaign commercial seen on The Learning Channel.

From CBS News:

The show fell 40 percent on Sunday night, to 3 million viewers, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The premiere drew 5 million viewers, setting a ratings record for a TLC show debut.

Only 885,000 of those viewers were in the coveted 18-49 age bracket, dropping 44 percent from last week. The report states that the show's median age is 57 -- fifteen years older than TLC's average.

Corporate Profits Hit Record Highs

According to Commerce Department report, U.S. companies turned in record profits for the third quarter — nearly $1.66 trillion, the highest amount of profit ever!

"American businesses earned profits at an annual rate of $1.659 trillion in the third quarter, according to a Commerce Department report released Tuesday. That is the highest figure recorded since the government began keeping track over 60 years ago."

Much to the chagrin of the rightwing blowhards on Fox and AM radio, this managed to happen with a Democratic House, a Democratic Senate and a Democratic President.

And yet, the Obama-hating Republicans in Congress and in the media continue to push the lie that the President is somehow "anti business" or "against corporations."

And the Regressive Republicans in Congress STILL want to give special tax breaks to these corporations -- the very same ones that outsource American jobs overseas. Apparently making record-breaking profits never seen before is just not enough.

GUILTY of Corruption!

Tom DeLay, former Republican House Majority Leader, was found guilty of illegally funneling corporate money to Texas candidates (money laundering) in a Texas court today. He may find himself in prison for life.

Here's what he did: He conspired with two associates to use his Political Action Committee to send almost a quarter million dollars to the Republican National Committee, which, in turn sent the same amount back to 7 Republicans in Texas. The money helped the Republicans take control of the Texas House, set up new districts allowing even more Republicans to be voted in, making DeLay even more powerful.

Compare this to the story about Charlie Rangel of NY, which fox and the rightwing radio blowhards love to scream about. Rangel, a Democrat, recently was found guilty of ethics violations resulting in a censure (basically a "stern talking to") because -- are you ready for this? -- while raising money for an educational center charity, he used House stationary to solicit donations and filled out certain forms incorrectly, and improperly reported rental income. Heavens to Betsy!

DeLay, on the other hand, engaged in money laundering to corrupt the entire political system in Texas to make himself more powerful.

One filled out forms incorrectly while raising money for a charity; the other laundered a quarter million dollars to corrupt the system for personal gain.

Enjoy your time in prison, Tommy! No more dancing with stars for you.