Showing posts with label warner todd huston. Show all posts
Showing posts with label warner todd huston. Show all posts

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Quote of the Day (November 16, 2011)

Diane Sawyer Again Links Tea Party And Sarah Palin to Rep. Giffords’ Shooting
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Warner Todd Huston, at Big Journalism:
“The enflamed political environment had nothing at all to do with the crime committed that January morning. Democrats aren’t at fault for it. Certainly, neither are tea partiers, conservatives, anti-Obamacare activists, or Governor Sarah Palin.”
- JP

Sunday, June 26, 2011

ICMI: Warner Todd Huston's Stephen Bannon interview

"One of the things I decided to do was drive a stake in the heart of 'Caribou Barbie'"
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Stephen Bannon, director of "The Undefeated," has granted many interviews over the past month or so, but we believe one of the best and most comprehensive of those was this discussion with Warner Todd Huston at the Right Online conference. In case you missed it (ICMI), here's the full interview:

Part 1:

_

Part 2:


h/t: Hot Air

- JP

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Palin gives TIME a few minutes of her time about its false 'reporting'

-By Warner Todd Huston
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[Note: JP covered this briefly the other day, but I’ve added some context to the story so I thought it would be worth adding here]

The media is so sure that only the worst about Palin could possibly be true that false stories, out right lies, and even comedy bits are constantly presented as actual news. TIME Magazine is the latest to fall into that trap by reporting a satirical Internet posting about Sarah Palin as hard news. It all just goes to prove that Sarah Palin lives in the heads of the Old Media and it must be awfully cramped up there.

Last week on TIME Mag's Celebrity Newsfeed, Nick Carbone reported satire as fact only to make a "correction" days later. Carbone had fallen for a "tongue-in-cheek" Internet posting that joked that in an interview with Fox News personality Sean Hannity Palin said she wanted to deport Christina Aguilera for screwing up the National Anthem at the opening of the Superbowl.

TIME's Carbone was outraged by this. He snakily wrote, "And you thought Sarah Palin went overboard by commenting that she wanted to deport the singer?" Aside from the fact that you should never start a paragraph off with the word "and" (I know, I've made that mistake myself and been slapped for it, but he's supposed to be a pro), the report that Carbone linked to was a piece of satire. Yet Carbone never double checked the source because he was so sure that it was true. Sadly for his skills as a reporter, the piece he was so sure was true was clearly marked as residing in the "comedy" section.

After TIME regurgitated satire as fact, Governor Palin took the time to send a friendly note to the struggling magazine to help them with their fact checking.
Subject: Great job, MSM!

Jay - pls tell your bosses there at Time Magazine thank you for the invitations to attend the upcoming functions. I'll sure put a lot of thought into those invitations.

Then, have your editors retract Time's most recent ridiculous lies about me supposedly giving Sean Hannity a radio interview wherein I supposedly talked about Christina Aguilera (that I slammed her for her Nat'l Anthem mistake, and called for her deportation, etc). You guys were fooled into running a fake story that even US Weekly pulled and apologized for their blunder. Total lies - and you guys (once again) even put quotation marks around things I have never uttered. Then, Time needs to run an apology to Christina along with the retraction. (Add Hannity in your apology, too...those good folks don't deserve to be in a caustic, untrue story about me.) Thanks much - keep up the great work, Time Magazine.
Apparently TIME hasn't the time for fact checking.

This fits with so much of the "news" about Palin that has been disgorged by the media over the years. Not but two weeks ago, MSNBC's Rachel Maddow was also taken in by a statical piece about Palin. Early in February, Maddow breathlessly reported that Palin wanted to send the U.S. military to strike Egypt at its time of turmoil. When she finally discovered that the report was a joke and she was fooled by satire did she apologize? Sort of, but even as she apologized she quixotically blamed it all on Glenn Beck.

The Old Media has been presenting lies and calumny about Palin as fact for quite some time, now. We have but to go back to when Palin was chosen as McCain's VP nominee. Remember the false story that Palin banned books when she became the Mayor of Wasilla? During that 2008 campaign the media reported a long list of books that she supposedly banned. Turns out that list was not a list that had any connection at all to Sarah Palin as it was a list of books that had been banned over the last 100 years. This list should have been easy for the Old Media to discount because some of the books on the list had yet to be published when Palin was Mayor of Wasilla. Yet the media falsely reported this as Palin's book banning list regardless.

You'll see at this link a whole lot of stories during the 2008 campaign that the media reported as fact without bothering to check to see if they were true or not.

The sad fact is that the Old Media is so sure that Sarah Palin is the worst evil since Hitler that they'll believe anything negative about her that they see. No need to check the fact. If it's bad it simply must be true.

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, and a number of other websites.

Saturday, January 29, 2011

Quote of the Day (January 29, 2011)

Missoula Children’s Theater does “The Mikado.” What could possibly go wrong?
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Warner Todd Huston at Right Pundits:
"Of course, what a reference to beheading Sarah Palin is doing in a play written in 1885 featuring a story set in medieval Japan is anybody’s guess. But, hey, we have that wonderful new tone and everything going for us still, right?"
- JP

Saturday, January 8, 2011

As AZ Shooting Story Unfolds, Media Already Blames Gov. Palin

-By Warner Todd Huston
*
Even as the early, sketchy details of the shooting incident in Arizona were still emerging some members of the left-leaning media were already trying to tie the killer to Tea Party activism in general and Sarah Palin in particular.

Andrew Sullivan of the Atlantic.com was early to attempt to link lunatic killer Jared Loughner to the Tea Party, but he wasn't the only one. The Washington Post's Sandhya Somashekhar immediately attempted to color the story as an example of the "militant rhetoric" of the Tea Party movement and Sarah Palin.
Liberals on Saturday blamed the tea party movement's sometimes militant rhetoric -- for example, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin's advice to her supporters via Twitter, "Don't Retreat, Instead - RELOAD," or Nevada Senate candidate Sharron Angle (R) advocating "second-amendment remedies" for some of the nation's problems. Palin had also posted a U.S. map depicting crosshairs over the states where she hoped to oust Democratic incumbents. That map no longer appears on the Web site of her political action committee.
Additionally, within minutes of the attack, hard left-winger Paul Krugman of the New York Times asserted that the reason Giffords was shot was because her seat was not turned over to Republicans. Despite that no political motive was at all known, Krugman immediately asserted that it was the fault of the Tea Party and Sarah Palin.

On his DailyDish blog for the Atlantic, Andrew Sullivan posted an unconfirmed and anonymous claim from "a reader" who claimed to have heard people in a store callously saying that they were glad that a Republican could be appointed to replace the wounded Giffords. This "reader" also claimed that one of them said, "Well, that’s to be expected when you’re so liberal."

Sullivan's disgusting attempt to smear conservatives went on even as it was emerging that the killer's ideology seems incoherent and not legitimately anchored in the left or the right.

Sullivan's next idiotic attempt to smear the right was to conjure a connection between a campaign photo for Jesse Kelly -- who is a Marine and was Gifford's opponent recently -- to using "violence" to further his political career because his campaign photo showed Kelly as a Marine holding his M16.
How many political candidates hold an automatic rifle in their open crotch in order to demonstrate their ideological bone fides? The conflation of conservatism with the willingness to use violence depressingly deepens.
Then, when this hack finally noticed that the killer's book list included the Communist Manifesto and Hitler's Mein Kampf, Sullivan tried to back track a bit saying that Loughner was, "Not exactly a Tea Party purist."

Not exactly a Tea Party purist? Not a Tea Partier at all, more like.

But Sullivan wasn't the only left-wing media figure to immediately connect this crime to those on the right and to assign a conservative political motive to the killer's actions.

The extreme website Talking Points Memo also jumped into the blame Palin game by pointing out the Palin PAC target image without mentioning that the DailyKos and the DNC also used the same imagery. As the good folks at Verum Serum noted back in March, Giffords' district was marked with a target on the webpage of the Democratic National Committee during the late midterm elections.

There’s more. CNN's Piers Morgan also immediately tried to equate Sarah Palin to this incident. On his Twitter feed Morgan linked Palin's political action committee work from months ago to this shooting saying, "This now deleted image from Sarah Palin website will be reason this terrible shooting has huge political ramifications." The image was Palin's map of the U.S. that showed states where incumbents were vulnerable for challenge, the image used to identify those states contained a target motif. Morgan was trying to equate a political campaign to an act of murder.

Another left-leaning website agreed with Morgan that the Palin campaign image was somehow relevant to an action taken months later by a man not obviously connected to any political campaign. These leftists are trying with all their might to link Palin to this crime despite the fact that there isn't a shred of evidence at this time that there is any connection whatsoever.

Yet, even as Sullivan, Morgan and their pals tried to smear Sarah Palin with this attack, they correspondingly ignored the DailyKos website that went on a deletion binge trying to wipe away all the foul attacks by its members on Gabrielle Gifford.

One DailyKos post, originally seen at this address, said that Gabrielle Gifford was "dead to me." The headline of the piece read: "My CongressWOMAN voted against Nancy Pelosi! And is now DEAD to me!" The posting went on to complain about Giffords. Tellingly, DailyKos has sent this post down the memory hole.

Not only that, but Kos himself said that Gabrielle Giffords was on a "target list" of politicians he wanted to get rid of. Naturally, the Sullivans and Morgans of the leftward Old Media have ignored this fact.

Then there is Hollyweird. Anti-American, hatemonger and Hollywood Actress Jane Fonda went even farther than those mentioned above. Hanoi Jane took to Twitter and directly blamed the Tea Party movement and Sarah Palin. Fonda, a well-known supporter of America's enemies, wrote: "@SarahPalinUSA holds responsibility. As does the violence-provoking rhetoric of the Tea Party." Fonda also wrote, "Glen Beck guilty too. Shame. It must stop!"

So, what can we make of the killer's politics? Not much at this point, really. A YouTube video that Jared Lee Loughner posted is a rambling mess of a manifesto that is practically incoherent. The video consisted of text only and read as follows:
Hello, my name is Jared Lee Loughner.

This video is my introduction to you! My favorite activity is conscience dreaming: the greatest inspiration for my political business information. Some of you don't dream - sadly.

Firstly, the current government officials are in power for their currency, but I'm informing you for your new currency! Of you're treasurer of a new money system, then you're responsible for the distributing of a new currency. We now know -- the treasurer for a new money system. is the distributor of the new currency. As a result, the people approve a new money system which is promising new information that's accurate, and we truly believe in a new currency. Above all, you have your new currency, listener?

Secondly, my hope s for you to be literate! If you're literate in English grammar, then you comprehend English grammar. The majority of people, who reside on District 8, are illiterate -- hilarious. I don't control your English grammar structure, but you control your English grammar structure.

Thirdly, I know who's listening; Government Officials, and the People. Nearly all the people, who don't know this accurate information of a new currency, aren't aware of mind control and brainwashing methods. If I have my civil rights, then this message wouldn't have happen.

In conclusion, my ambition -- is for informing literate dreamers about a new currency, in a few days, you know I'm conscience dreaming! Thanks you!
Laughner's now removed MySpace page listed some of his schooling.
Schools: I attended school: Thornydale elementary,Tortolita Middle School, Mountain View Highschool, Northwest Aztec Middle College, and Pima Community College.

Interests: My favorite interest was reading, and I studied grammar. Conscience dreams were a great study in college!

Movies: (*My idiom: I could coin the moment!*)

Music: Pass me the strings!
In another video Loughner claims to be a military recruit at MEPS in Phoenix and is upset that mini Bibles are being given to recruits. The Army has since reported that Loughner was rejected in 2008.

The killer goes on to say:
In conclusion, reading the second United States Constitution, I can’t trust the government because of the ratifications: The government is implying mind control and brainwash 0n the people by controlling grammar.

No! I won’t pay debt with a currency that’s not backed by gold and silver!

No! I won’t trust in God!

What’s government if words don’t have meaning?
This man is obviously an anti-Christian, anti-government, conspiracy nut with anti-federal reserve ideas and delusions that he knows all and sees all the "brainwash" going on out there. This man is mentally ill and his ideas are mixed up between left and right with obvious paranoia underlying it all.

Tea Partier? Hardly. Yet the far left Old Media insists on making of him a conservative, Tea Party member despite the facts.

Whatever the final facts are that we find out about this crime, the early assumptions by the Old Media linking this incident to conservatives is irresponsible.

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, and a number of other websites.

Monday, November 22, 2010

How The Old Media Constantly Undermines Sarah Palin

- by Warner Todd Huston
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Most media-watching conservatives have simply been flabbergasted at how the Old Media establishment has so neatly come together to destroy Sarah Palin. The Internet has been abuzz with examples of this attack on Sarah since she was chosen by John McCain to be her number two during the campaign for the 2008 presidential election. Every day there is a new example of it and here is yet another one.

This time it was penned by a "TV critic" for the Washington Post named Lisa de Moraes. De Moraes is well known for constantly injecting left-wing asides into her work and her Nov. 19 attack on the Palins is no exception.

She misled her readers (all 20 of them, I'm sure) right off the bat with her snotty headline, "Sarah Palin tries to lure Bristol's huge 'DWTS' audience to her far less popular TLC reality series."

What is with this "her far less popular" epithet? This claim is not based in logic.

De Moraes went on with her accusatory rhetoric.
Sarah Palin hopes to lure her daughter Bristol's 20 million viewers to her own, far less popular, reality TV series this coming Sunday:

"Ah yes...Bristol-the-diva! Silly critics! See her diva-ish-ness Sunday, 'Sarah Palin's Alaska' 2 learn truth, before assuming. Thanks & enjoy!" Sarah Palin tweeted Thursday afternoon.
Of course her every word is but hatemongering, left-wing spin not based on any real truthful analysis of TV. After all, anyone with a basic grasp of the statistics of TV would understand that her sniping was simply not based in reality.

First of all the 20 million viewers that Dancing With the Stars gets are not “daughter Bristol's 20 million viewers.” They are the viewers of the show that Bristol happens to be appearing on for this one season. So, de Moraes’s first snark is not based in truth.

Secondly, Sarah’s Tweet was but a good-natured poke at her own daughter, the sort of ribbing every healthy family indulges with each other. Sure it was an advertisement for her own TLC show, but critic de Moraes is more interested in imputing a darker meaning to the good-natured Tweet: jealousy.

The simple fact of the matter is that TLC’s cable channel does not attract the sort of viewing numbers that any of the old three TV networks attract. So Palin's TLC show could never achieve the numbers that Dancing With the Stars or practically any other network TV show garners.

According to Nielson, for instance, the number of TV households across the country stood at 114.5 million for the 2008-2009 season and the big three appears on all of them. As it stands now, ABC, CBS and NBC rarely get less than an average of twenty million viewers a night of all shows combined on their network in primetime and Dancing got nearly 20 million last week all by itself.

For its part TLC appears in fewer homes than the big three. According to TLC the cable channel appears in 99 million American homes. For those counting that’s a difference of some 15 million fewer homes than the big three.

Another way to compare: for the week of Nov. 8 the top rated non-sports show was Dancing with the Stars with nearly 20 million viewers. Yet the top rated non-sports cable show was Nick@Nite's Spongebob Squarepants with just a bit over six million viewers. Cable simply doesn't come close to the viewers the big three networks get.

De Moraes tried to pretend she was a real critic by adding this:
While Sarah Palin's new TLC reality series attracted TLC's biggest series-debut audience ever, that amounted to only 5 million viewers -- a tiny crowd compared to the 20-million-ish who have been watching this season of ABC's "Dancing With the Stars" on which her daughter has made it all the way to the finals. Because, no matter what people might say about cable TV taking over the universe, there' s still nothing like a broadcast network for reaching a gigantic number of people.
Notice how de Moraess is trying to have it both ways? In one breath she is saying that Palin’s show is “far less popular” yet on the other saying that a cable show can’t possibly get the same numbers as a network TV show. So, even as she admits that trying to compare a cable audience to a broadcast TV audience is absurd, she still rests her entire snarky point on imagining that Sarah’s show is “far less popular” than Dancing With the Stars.

Still, Sarah Palin's Alaska brought 5 million viewers for its debut episode, a smashing success for TLC. Even wth that success, for de Moraes to try to compare Dancing with Palin's TLC show is idiotic. It's apples to oranges… or apples to grizzlies at least. The fact is Sarah Palin’s show could be the most popular show on cable and still not get the numbers that the big three get. “Popularity” isn’t the proper measuring stick and de Moraes knows it.

So, what do we have here? We have a supposed TV critic misleading readers into thinking that Palin's TLC show is “far less popular” than the show her daughter appears on, we get a TV critic discounting the massive numbers of 5 million viewers Palin did get by presenting that stat as somehow incidental when it is nothing short of amazing, and we get a TV critic trying to paint the momma grizzly as somehow jealous of her cub's success on Dancing.

This "TV column" is not a reporting on TV. It is a ham-handed, cynical attempt to mislead readers into thinking ill of Sarah Palin, painting her in a bad light, and misconstruing the facts in the attempt.

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, and a number of other websites.

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Alaska's Sen. Murkowski a Coke Head?

-By Warner Todd Huston
*
Dan Riehl of Riehl World View has a bit of a bombshell to drop on the arrogant, self-reverential "Senator of the people," Alaska's Lisa Murkowski -- she of the second hand Senate seat bequeathed to her by her father who held that seat himself. Riehl says that it is a commonly known, not-so-secret secret in Alaska that Lisa Murkowski is and/or was a major drug addict even as she served as Alaska's Republican Senator.

Murkowski recently lost her primary, as we all know, and suddenly she is now Mz independent because obviously having her in the Senate is far, far more important than anything as silly as the will of the voters! Perhaps her drug use explains her completely incomprehensible decision to continue running despite being turned out by her own voters?

So what did Riehl find?
"It was back during the primary that I first heard reports that Alaska's independent candidate for Senate, Lisa Murkowski, may have routinely ignored the state's drug laws by regularly abusing cocaine. Given a lack of solid sources and Lisa Murkowski's loss to Joe Miller, I moved on, though some reports suggested the abuse may have been habitual, even while her influential politician father, Frank Murkowski, positioned himself as something of a hardliner on drug enforcement."
After calling Murkowski's office and getting no reply, Riehl sent five questions via email that he wanted answered regarding this rumored drug use.
1) Has Senator Murkowski ever used cocaine recreationally prior to her holding elective office at the state, or federal level? Has she ever shared same in the past, without cost, with friends and or associates, including at a then downtown Anchorage restaurant owned by her husband?

2) It's also been alleged that this was something of an open secret within a relatively small circle of friends and associates in Alaska. If true, is that a correct characterization?

3) Has the Senator ever been confronted with said allegations? If so, how did she respond?

4) Has her husband, Verne Martell, ever been involved with a police matter in California? Did Lisa's father Frank ever use his influence to minimize said matter, if not in essence, make it go away? Has she ever been approached by CA or AK media in this regard?

5) Finally, as it will likely be briefly re-visited in a pending item, the Senator recently spoke well of PMBR, see link below, despite its having been hit with an 11.9 million dollar judgment for copyright violation. Would the campaign care to comment as to how her experience with PMBR relates to the copyright issue? Any comment as to any concerns that the acknowledged assistance from PMBR could be construed as her having gained insight to copyrighted questions for which (bar exam) testing candidates should not have had access?
Still no reply.

Riehl looked up one of Murkowski's former opponents and he said he got many reports of Murkowski's drug use when he ran against her in 1998. "I received many calls back then alleging that Ms. Murkowski used cocaine in substantial amounts for a prolonged period of time," said Richard J. Helms.

Riehl has a lot of other anecdotal evidence concerning Murkowski's drug use at his blog post but it all raises an interesting question. Why has Murkowski not addressed this persistent question, one that has been around in Alaska since at least 1998? One would think that Murkowski would have at least denied the allegations and moved on if they are, indeed, deniable. But Riehl could find no statement from Murkowski shooting down the rumors.

These are pretty strong charges, to be sure. Why no reply?

Now, many of you reading this may dismiss this as all just rumormongering, unsubstantiated blather, nothing to get exercised about. Of course there's that whole media propensity to think the "seriousness of the charge" is enough to talk about this accusation until the cows come home (for you city folks that means "for a long time").

Yet, even as the media would normally give this sort of rumor a full court press, the same media has wholly ignored this long-time rumor. One has to wonder why?

On the other hand, let us contrast the media blowing off this Murkowski rumor to its drummed up reports about another Alaska politician: Sarah Palin. Remember the idiotically absurd rumors that Sarah's baby son Trig was actually her own daughter's baby, one born out of wedlock?

This rumor was really one of the most idiotic rumors of the age, one easily disproven, yet the Old Media played this rumor to the hilt and for months used it as a staple of criticism of Palin during the 2008 presidential elections.

So, in light of the halfwit Trig truther rumor that the Old Media went wild to report I have to ask once again: why is the Old Media ignoring this much more substantive Murkowski drug use rumor?

In any case, it's all a pretty good reason to vote for Joe Miller for Senate in Alaska!

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, and a number of other websites.

Monday, September 20, 2010

Gov. Palin Wins Right Nation 2010 Presidential Straw Poll

- by Warner Todd Huston
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Right Nation 2010, a grassroots gathering starring Glenn Beck, was held Saturday, Sept. 18, in the western suburbs of Chicago, Illinois. A straw poll was conducted and Palin grabbed the top spot for president.

Conservatives, Republicans and Tea Party independents from throughout the Midwest chose former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as their top choice for President in 2012. Palin received 323 of the 1,693 votes cast at Right Nation 2010, the unprecedented event sponsored by the United Republican Fund and held just outside Chicago this past Saturday, September 18th.

Palin beat out New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, who came in second with 274 votes, and Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, who came in third with 227 votes. Herman Cain and Mitt Romney rounded out the top five with 201 and 190 votes, respectively.

Full Results:

1. Sarah Palin – 323 votes (19.1%)
2. Chris Christie – 274 votes (16.2%)
3. Newt Gingrich – 227 votes (13.4%)
4. Herman Cain – 201 votes (11.9%)
5. Mitt Romney – 190 votes (11.2%)
6. Mike Huckabee – 156 votes (9.2%)
7. Ron Paul – 78 votes (4.6%)
8. Mitch Daniels – 76 votes (4.5%)
9. Tim Pawlenty – 68 votes (4.0%)
10. Mike Pence – 45 votes (2.7%)
11. Rudy Giuliani – 33 votes (1.9%)
12. Haley Barbour – 22 votes (1.3%)

The straw poll was conducted via paper ballot and overseen by Right Nation 2010 officials. It was sponsored by Americans for Prosperity.

For more details on Right Nation, visit the website here.

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, and a number of other websites.

Friday, September 3, 2010

Violence Soaked AFL-CIO Prez Calls Palin a McCarthyite?

-By Warner Todd Huston
*
For his Labor Day weekend trick, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka leveled the charge of McCarthyism at former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. This is a bit rich from a guy with blood on his hands -- and I don't say that figuratively, either.

At a September 2 meeting sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor, Trumka claimed that "Palinism" was the "new McCarthyism" and warned that if she kept up her rhetoric she would be guilty of inciting her followers. "She can't use loose language that foments... that anger to hatred, or that action to violence," Trumka said.
The comments were “totally consistent,” Trumka said. “She has taken on a position of leadership, and whether it is rightfully given to her or not, she is there. And so she can’t use loose language that foments … changing that anger to hatred or that action to violence.” He continued, “If she doesn’t change her ways, then Palinism will be equated with other forms of McCarthyism that fomented division among the populace and acts of hatred among the populace.”
This is a bit rich from a guy that has the death of a non-union worker in New York on his head. Michelle Malkin does the good work of reminding us all of the violence that Trumka has supported in the past.
Meet Eddie York. He was a workingman whose story will never scroll across Obama's teleprompter. A nonunion contractor who operated heavy equipment, York was shot to death during a strike called by the United Mine Workers 17 years ago. Workmates who tried to come to his rescue were beaten in an ensuing melee. The head of the UMW spearheading the wave of strikes at that time? Richard Trumka. Responding to concerns about violence, he shrugged to the Virginian-Pilot in September 1993: "I'm saying if you strike a match and you put your finger in it, you're likely to get burned." Incendiary rhetoric, anyone?
And Malkin also chronicles the time when Trumka incited violence in Illinois.
In Illinois, Trumka told UMW members to "kick the s**t out of every last" worker who crossed his picket lines, according to the Nashville (Ill.) News. And as the National Right to Work Foundation, the leading anti-forced unionism organization in the country, pointed out, other UMW coalfield strikes resulted in what one judge determined were "violent activities ... organized, orchestrated and encouraged by the leadership of this union."
And this union thug has the gall to go after Palin?

The Monitor's video of this criminal's remarks is here.

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, and a number of other websites.

Thursday, September 2, 2010

Politico Again Slaps Bad Vanity Fair Palin Attack

-By Warner Todd Huston
*
As we discussed here yesterday, Vanity Fair published a badly sourced attack piece on Governor Palin. But the piece is even worse than first thought.

As Politico's Ben Smith discovered, the Vanity Fair piece contained yet another lie passed off as "journalism."

Smith highlighted the part of the VF piece that led the reader to think that the Palins used son Trig as a political prop at the rally held in Kansas City.

Smith excerpted this section of the VF piece:
Backstage in the arena, a little girl in Mary Janes pushes her brother in a baby carriage, stopping a few yards shy of a heavy, 100-foot-long black curtain. The curtain splits the arena in two, shielding the children from an audience of 4,000 people clapping their hands in time to “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” The music accompanies a video “Salute to Military Heroes” that plays above the stage where, in a few moments, the children’s mother will appear.

When the girl, Piper Palin, turns around, she sees her parents thronged by admirers, and the crowd rolling toward her and the baby, her brother Trig, born with Down syndrome in 2008. Sarah Palin and her husband, Todd, bend down and give a moment to the children; a woman, perhaps a nanny, whisks the boy away; and Todd hands Sarah her speech and walks her to the stage. He pokes the air with one finger. She mimes the gesture, whips around, strides on four-inch heels to stage center, and turns it on.
But he found out that the whole story was bunk.
The problem: Trig wasn't at the event, according to its organizer, Karladine Graves, a 61-year old Kansas City physician and who, in 2009, founded one of the wave of new local conservative groups, this one called Preserving American Liberty. The "woman, perhaps a nanny," was the boy's mother, St. Louis talk radio host Gina Loudon, according to the event's organizer, Graves.
Ah the lies of this VF piece continue to amaze, don't they?

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, and a number of other websites.

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

WTH: Joe Miller Set to Win AK Senate Primary (Updated)

*
Texas for Sarah Palin contributor Warner Todd Huston, at Andrew Breitbart's Big Government:
Sources in Alaska have informed Big Government that the trend in the count of absentee ballots makes it virtually impossible that Sen. Murkowski will overtake Joe Miller in the GOP Senate Primary. A trusted and well-placed operative told BG:
It’s over.
Warner also revealed that the full Murkowski campaign team is meeting by conference call this afternoon (Alaska time) to discuss what they should do next. He advises to stay tuned for updates,because there there is additional information he hopes to be able to publish soon.

Updates...

According to Stacy McCain in Anchorage, sources there are reporting that Lisa Murkowski is expected to concede the GOP nomination to Joe Miller in a matter of hours.

From the CNN Political Ticker:
Sen. Lisa Murkowski could concede the GOP Senate primary as early as Tuesday night after election officials in Alaska finish counting the day's absentee ballots.

In an interview with CNN, Murkowski campaign spokesman Steve Wackowski was emphatic that the vote could still swing their way. "We're being hopeful, we want to make sure that all the votes are counted," he said.

But Wackowski also addressed the harsh reality that Murkowski might fall to the once lesser known, Tea Party Express-endorsed Joe Miller.

"I think we should know ... by our calculus, we should know by tonight," Wackowski said.

Wackowski was asked if Murkowski might concede the race to Miller once Tuesday's ballot counting ends. "Unfortunately we've got all our options are on the table," he lamented.
Back at Big Government, Warner reports that Sen. Murkowski tentatively announced a 9 PM (Texas Time) press conference.

A Murkowski aide via Twitter:
RT @shushwalshe: Murkowski staffer: "She is calling her family now-It looks like she will come out/concede That's what we recommended to her"
- JP

Thursday, August 26, 2010

AFL-CIO Leader Attacks Palin

-By Warner Todd Huston
*
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka spoke before the union's Biennial Convention in Anchorage, Alaska today. In that speech Trumka called Governor Palin a new Joe McCarthy and says she has come "close to calling for violence." He also objected to Palin's use of the phrase "union thugs" in her comments and Internet postings.

Transcript of Trumka's Palin comments:
Sarah Palin?

She used to have a job, your governor…. You knew her…. Or thought you did…. I know I thought I did. She seemed like a decent person, an outdoorswoman. Her husband’s a steelworker. She seemed to take some OK stands for working families.

And then things got weird. After she tied herself to John McCain and they lost, she blew off Alaska. I guess she figured she’d trade up…shoot for a national stage. Alaska was too far from the FOX TV spotlight.

I bet most of you, on a clear day, can see her hypocrisy from your house.

I think Sarah Palin quit so she wouldn’t have to be accountable… so she wouldn’t have a record that could be scrutinized…

Instead, she’s hanging out on cable TV, almost a parody of herself, coming out with conspiracy theories about Obama and his “death panels….” Talking about “the real America.” Talking about building schools in “our neighboring country of Afghanistan.” Writing speech notes to herself on her hands.

Sometimes – about Sarah Palin – you just have to laugh…. But it’s not really funny. In this charged political environment, her kind of talk gets dangerous. “Don’t retreat… reload” may seem clever, the kind of bull you hear all the time, but put it in context. She’s using crosshairs to illustrate targeted legislators. She’s on the wrong side of the line there. She’s getting close to calling for violence. And some of her fans take that stuff seriously. We’ve got legislators in America who have been living with death threats since the health care votes.

And down in Tyler, Texas, she’s talking about—and I quote— “union thugs.” What? Her husband’s a union man. Is she calling him a thug? Sarah Palin ought to know what union men and women are.

Oh, she goes to great pains to talk differently about unions and the working people who belong to them, knowing full well we’re one and the same.

But using the term “union thug.” That’s poisonous. There’s history behind that rhetoric. That’s how bosses and politicians in decades past justified the terrorizing of workers, the murdering of organizers…

To me, it just doesn’t seem OK to go where she’s going…. It sits wrong with me…. The Mama Grizzlies, Sarah Palin says, just sense when something’s not right. Well… I wonder if those Mama Grizzlies can sense something’s just not right with her.

Quite frankly, America works because lots of people contribute lots of ideas—that’s good—even when some of them are just plain wrong. But people need to come to the table in good faith. That’s not Sarah Palin. She’ll go down in history like McCarthy. Palinism will become an ugly word.

Who is this woman, anyway? What happened to her?
It is hilarious, however, to see a union boss act wide-eyed in shock that anyone would call union members "union thugs." Unions have been neck-deep in perpetrating violence since the late 1800s!

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, and a number of other websites.

Updates...

Gov. Palin commented on Trumka's attack via Twitter:
"Think Trumka's frustrations r w/Obama, not me (high unemplymnt, deals w/Obama&his subsequent broken promises)so understandable Rich's ticked"

"Know our hardworking union friends (esp from my days as an IBEW sister, Todd IBEW & USW brother) aren't sheep, they'll ask: Trumka's motive?"
The Examiner's Mark Hemingway via the Beltway Confidential Blog:
"Palin’s quote about thugs clearly differentiates between rank-and-file union members and union leaders. Perhaps the reason why Trumka is so offended is that he’s exactly the kind of thuggish union leader Sarah Palin was talking about."

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Roger Ebert: Calls Sarah Palin Hitler, Says America Is At Fault for GZ Mosque Troubles

- By Warner Todd Huston
*
Roger Ebert is nothing if he isn't a knee-jerk leftist, absolutely without a single original political or cultural thought in his head and his latest meandering post on the Sun-Times hosted Roger Ebert's Journal is a perfect example.

His piece is titled "Ten things I know about the mosque" but it doesn't seem like there really are ten things nor are they all about the mosque. After reading his wandering post one is tempted to believe that the only reason he posted the thing was to find an excuse to attack Sarah Palin, someone that has nothing to do with the Ground Zero Mosque.

Let's deal with Ebert's off topic attack on Palin first. For a piece that is supposed to be about the Ground Zero Mosque (and by the way he never once calls it the Ground Zero Mosque, even as the Imam that was planning the thing has called it that) Palin's appearance at point 6 on his list makes no sense. Not only that but Ebert goes off on a tangent of a tangent by discussing Palin's interaction with Dr. Laura and her "N" word controversy. Hello, Rog… mosque? What does Palin and Dr. Laura have to do with the mosque?

Even more absurdly, Ebert's first few points are filled with his ruminations on the First Amendment. Then he attacks Palin for employing her own freedom of speech? It's a whiplash-inducing tangent, for sure.

Plus, in essence he calls Palin a liar by assuming that some right-wing "anonymous genius" is writing all her Tweets and Facebook posts. Ebert has to reach into the dim corners of his conspiracy-laden mind for that one because there is no hint anywhere in the rest of the world that Palin isn't writing her own stuff. It's just Ebert's hatred of Palin informing his belief that she's too stupid to put two words together.

Worse he seems to be saying that it was Sarah Palin that invented the name "Ground Zero Mosque." This is an untruth. Then he calls Palin Hitler by saying she is using tactics from Mein Kampf.

That's alright Rog, we know that you are using tactics invented by Marx, so you have that going for you, which is nice.

OK, the off topic tangent aside, let's start with Ebert's first point. He says America is the one "missing" an opportunity with the Ground Zero Mosque. We should bend over backwards for Imam Rauf so we can "showcase" our "Constitutional freedoms," Ebert insists. We should allow the mosque because it is these Muslim's right to build it at Ground Zero. Never mind, Roger, that Imam Rauf is deeply involved in a project to push Sharia laws on the U.S. and, if successful, his law would eliminate everyone but him from having freedom of religion in America. I guess Roger thinks it is Rauf's right to take away all our rights.

His second point is about the First Amendment's freedom of speech clause, a point he mars by introducing Dr. Laura's "N" word controversy into the mix. Again, Rog… what does Dr. Laura have to do with the "ten things" you know about the mosque? Nothing. So why clutter up a piece with tangential points? It only makes your post seem more geared toward the left-wing political talking point du jour instead of one discussing timeless American principles. It shows you are a hack, not an elegant writer or deep thinker.

Ebert does have a good point on the mistake of planning a mosque near Ground Zero, though. But once again he mars what could be a good point with his left-wing talking points.
The choice of location shows flawed judgment on the part of its imam, Feisal Abdul Rauf. He undoubtedly knows that now, and I expect his project to be relocated. The imam would be prudent to chose another location, because the far right wing has seized on the issue as an occasion for fanning hatred against Muslims.
First of all, this Sharia-pushing Imam has made no such admissions. What we have here is Ebert giving him the benefit of the doubt, a benefit he doe not extend to conservative Americans. Secondly it is interesting to note the tone Ebert has in his first point and this, his third point. In his first point Ebert scolds Americans for not being sensitive to the Muslims needs for their mosque project. In his third does he scold the Muslims for not being sensitive to Americans who might be angered that a mosque is being built within striking distance of a place that Muslims killed three thousand people? Nope, Ebert instead scolds right-wing Americans for making of this mosque a political issue. The Muslims are innocent as a lamb as far as Ebert is concerned. Quite despite that the very name of the project, Cordoba House, implicitly invokes an historical Muslim victory over westerners in 8th century Spain when Muslims invaded and took over that country.

But, no, Ebert blames Americans as he always does.

Heck, even other Muslims are saying that this GZ Mosque is a bad idea.

Point four is a real gymnast's twist. Ebert thinks that a "buried motive" for attacking the Ground Zero Mosque, a project he graciously calls the "Park51" project, is that evil Americans think Obama is a Muslim. How this mosque became about Obama is anybody's guess. But Ebert knows that evil right-wingers are only attacking the mosque because they want to "get" Obama. Never mind the fact that America had been outraged by the GZ Mosque for at least a week before Obama even opened his mouth -- and inserted his foot -- about the matter. Nope Ebert's left-wing talking points have to make this all about our Imam in Chief.

… and you are a racist if you say otherwise, I guess?

Point five is right on. He finally was able to address a point without all the incoherent left-wing extremism souring it. He says that like being pregnant, you can't be only "a little free."

On to point seven because we dealt with his hate-filled rant against Palin already. Aaannnd… as it happens his point seven is no point at all. He says nothing in it to even consider it a "point." All he does is ramble about how much he hates Fox News.

On to point eight:

In point eight Ebert simply makes things up. "A meme is infecting our society that Muslims are terrorists and hate America; they are the enemy," he says. Really? Who is saying that all Muslims are terrorists and hate America? There is a difference to feeling that almost all terrorists today are Muslim -- which is a true statement -- and all Muslims are terrorists. No one thinks "all Muslims are terrorists." But, what do we have here really? What we have is Roger Ebert promulgating the very meme he pretends to decry. It is called the strawman argument. Set up a false premise and then bat it down with righteous indignation. Way to go Rog.

Aside from point five, point nine is the only other point that is on topic.

Ebert wraps up with the tenth in his rant claiming that Americans are too stupid to know what is really being planned for the Ground Zero Mosque. Ebert puts on the shine to the mosque project claiming that it's really just a "community center" and that a "retail mall" is what is really going on at Ground Zero. But the fact is that debris of one of the planes that hit the Towers also hit the building that the mosque builders want to tear down for their project. So, it really is Ground Zero.

And finally, of the fact that this mosque will be so close to Ground Zero as to encompase the killing grounds of 9/11, Ebert thinks this is great. "What might have been more appropriate?" he asks.

Ebert thinks it could be very "appropriate" that a mosque is close enough to be touching the killing grounds of the victims of Islam. Say, how about building a Nazi headquarters building right next to Auschwitz? Sound good? Or maybe we can build a museum to the greatness of Stalin over the top of one of his Gulags? I know, how about we build a nice, glowing homage to Timothy McVeigh right next to the bombing site he made so famous in Oklahoma City? Would those be "appropriate" Mr. Ebert?

In the end what we have here is Roger Ebert putting on his hate for his fellow Americans, excusing those that would stand against her, and rolling out one left-wing trope after another.

I won't be the first or the last to relate to this left-wing hack that he should stick with the fluff of movies and leave the real thinking to those more equipped for the effort.


-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, and a number of other websites.

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Palin is Nasty Because She 'Rolls Her Eyes' or Something

*
-By Warner Todd Huston

What's the Old Media's latest nit-picking Palin apostasy? They claim she rolled her eyes at a nasty, negative constituent. Mean, rotten, evil Sarah the "eye roller" should be tarred and feathered over this, I guess.

Here's how The New York Times' The Caucus Blog is reporting it:
In a video that has been widely reported, Ms. Palin asks a woman standing next to a large “Worst Governor Ever” banner what she does for a living. The woman — Kathleen Gustafson, according to news media reports – responds that she’s a teacher. That leads to a response that prompted several outlets to comment that Ms. Palin rolled her eyes — or at least looked like she was rolling them.
This supposed "eye rolling" occurs after the woman told the Governor that she was a teacher (about 1:10 into the video). Many of the left-media are claiming that Palin rolls her eyes and gives a "knowing glance" to her supporters as if to say, "oh, a teacher, now we know this constituent is a left-wing, loony."

But if you look at the video closely there is no "eye rolling." The Gov. does look at her supporters and does give a sort of shrug-like look, but one has to assume and read into what that all means because the Gov. does not actually say anything to inform anyone of what she was thinking at that moment. Nor does she make an obvious face to inform. A look and a slight grin does not adequately reveal her thinking. One has to read her mind to really know what she was thinking at that instant.

But then, the Old Media are experts at mind reading, right? They are also experts at creating the news instead of reporting on it. One has only to remember the "fake but accurate" news as reported by Dan Rather of G.W. Bush's AWOL. It never happened, of course, but Rather had all the fake documents to prove it regardless.

For that matter, we have the story of Palin's non existent book-banning in Wasilla and the thousands of Trig-truther stories that continue to be circulated by the Old Media to prove the BS that is treated like fact among these writers of fiction.

But, above all, this shows the pettiness of the Old Media. The fact that the Old Media is attacking Gov. Palin for "eye rolling" is evidence of this.

See JP's post below on Gov. Palin's reply to the Old Media on this issue.

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, Red County and a number of other websites.

Monday, August 9, 2010

About the Left's New Palin-Confronting 'Drama Teacher'

*
-By Warner Todd Huston

Earlier today the left sent up cheers for an Alaska "teacher" that is seen on video attacking Governor Palin as "the worst Governor ever" as the sign she was putting up read.

When Gov. Palin interacted with her, the woman told Palin she was a "teacher."

Looks like the woman, Kathleen Gustafson, is a liar. As we find on GatewayPundit, she isn't a teacher but a theater tech. Even more absurdly, the woman belongs to a band that features drag queens as its attraction!

Another blogger whose blog is named Mac'sMind did some digging and the only Kathleen Gustafson he could find connected to the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District works in the theater dept. as a tech.

So, once again, the left's hero turns out to be a whack-job and a liar. Are we surprised?

Here's that confrontation with Gov. Palin:



**UPDATE**

It is beginning to look like the original researcher of this woman's background misunderstood what the woman's role was in the schools. In my day "theater tech" was just a stage hand and it appears that the original poster also thought the same thing. But apparently the modern name for a drama teacher is now "theater tech." So it looks like this woman is, indeed, a drama teacher.

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, Red County and a number of other websites.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Top Ten most Left-Biased American Journalists - #9: Liz Sidoti, Associated Press

-By Warner Todd Huston
*
As we continue our list of the top ten most left-biased journalists working in America today (See part one here), we have to nominate Liz Sidoti of the Associated Press for spot number nine on the countdown.

The Associated Press has been increasingly disappointing at least since Ron Fournier, one of its former bureau chiefs, decided in 2008 to change the AP's editorial policy and allow more emotive language and opinion to become an official part of its newswire copy. Not every AP reporter has taken Fournier’s challenge, but boy has Liz Sidoti claimed that policy as her own.

Liz isn't the only AP reporter to indulge her inner Olbermann, of course, as there are many AP writers that have been caught using emotive wording, hyperbole, and straight out opinion to damn conservatives and Republicans. But Liz is particularly good at the off-handed sleight and the surreptitious slam.

Let's take Sidoti's explosive fawning over The One after his first four months in office as an example of her wonderfully understated style of "reporting," shall we? Liz was so overawed by her Obamamessiah's ascension to godhood that she couldn't help herself from gushing like a schoolgirl. The following are some of the notable quotes from her April 26, 2009 piece.
  • It didn’t take long for Barack Obama — for all his youth and inexperience — to get acclimated to his new role as the calming leader of a country in crisis.
  • “I feel surprisingly comfortable in the job,” the nation’s 44th president said a mere two weeks after taking the helm.
  • Obama has applied the same “no drama” leadership
  • As a fledgling president, he similarly has mapped out a big-risk agenda that he’s methodically begun to execute, keeping to the discipline that has been a hallmark of his life.
  • Rookie jitters? Far from it.
  • Confident almost to a fault
  • exhibiting few flashes of any off-putting, self-important tone
  • he’s reached the pinnacle
  • Obama has seemed extraordinarily at ease
  • (And here’s that “expect”)“He became presidential almost immediately. Physically as well as rhetorically he transformed himself,” said American University professor James Thurber, an expert on the presidency. He said Obama had little choice but to dive in and start governing, given the full plate of issues. But, Thurber added, “He also did it with real skill and confidence that you wouldn’t necessarily expect from someone who just walked in the door.”
  • Obama has spoken in firm, yet soothing tones
  • Sometimes he has used a just-folks approach
  • He also has steamed with anger
  • He has shown contriteness
  • He also has let it be known he hasn’t forgotten how politics works
  • Stylistically, this is a careful president who uses a teleprompter even during news conferences and presides over a White House that scripts his public appearances
  • a strong, ethical leader
  • Mindful of Obama’s high popularity and, thus, the media’s hunger for any details about him and his family, the White House has gone to great lengths to make sure he’s visible.
  • People don’t seem to mind all that exposure
  • Overall, Obama seems unflappable
  • He made a string of comments that were, to some extent, joking and self deprecating, almost as if he didn’t take the hubbub around his candidacy too seriously
Sickening, isn’t it? And remember that was all in just one piece!

Amusingly, the December before the piece mentioned above, Sidoti penned an AP piece to help lower expectations for Obama in order to better ease his then upcoming term. One wonders how Obama's crushing unemployment numbers, continuously dismal economic news, and major failure with the BP oil spill is affecting her sycophantic outlook for The One, though.

But effusive Obamaluv isn't Liz' only rhetorical vice. She also has a tendency to help pass the left-wing meme as "news."

Only a few months ago, Sidoti helped the left set the tone of scorn for Democrats that wouldn't toe the line on the administration's Obamacare policies. After almost a year of public outrage over Obamacare, it was only in March that Sidoti perceived that Obamacare was in "jeopardy."

"A dozen or so anti-abortion House Democrats are opposing Obama's health care overhaul plan -- and putting its passage in jeopardy -- because it includes a provision they don't like," Sidoti gravely intoned. Nowhere in the article did Sidoti mention the year-long battle that millions of Americans at townhall meetings waged to stop Obama's take over of healthcare. It was but a few recalcitrant Democrats putting Obama’s grand plan into "jeopardy" as far as Liz was concerned.

And Governor Palin is also a favorite Sidoti whipping… er, girl. In February Sidoti insisted that a speech that Palin gave to the National Tea Party convention held in Nashville, Tennessee was "short on ideas."
Sarah Palin, in a speech that was short on ideas but big on enthusiasm, took aim at President Barack Obama and the Democrats, telling a gathering of "tea party" activists that America is ripe for another revolution.
I've been to one of Palin's barnstorming speeches and she is hardly "short on ideas." In fact, her speeches are all about ideas. The big ideas of small government, low taxes, strong national defense, freedom, liberty, adherence to the Constitution, the vision of the founders… in short all the big ideas that this country was founded upon, those ideas that have made us great. I guess those ideas aren't really of interest to our friendly AP writer.

Of course, I could go on and on detailing Liz Sidoti's attempt to color the news a deep Democrat blue, but you get the point. Unfortunately, she isn't the only AP reporter doing it, but she stands as a perfect example of the practice so woefully prevalent there. So, congratulations to Liz Sidoti for ringing in at number nine on our most left-biased list.

Please check back tomorrow for number eight, won't you? (Originally posted at BigJournalism.com)

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a regular contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, Red County and a number of other websites.

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Palin's Newest Crime Against Humanity: An Ugly Fence

- By Warner Todd Huston
*
To pile onto Josh's morning post, it must have been a slow news day for the Washington Post's Adrian Higgins. Either that or someone made him upset that day and he wanted to take some anger out on someone and get paid for it at the same time. Catharsis doesn't come free from a journalist, you know? So, looking for some payback, Higgins decided that a petty attack upon Sarah Palin would be cheaper than a visit to his therapist. Besides, Palin is always the Old Media's favorite target for venomous attack so he obviously didn't have to think too hard in the effort.

But, since Gov. Palin hadn't been in the news over the last several days, Higgins must have had a hard time trying to find a rhetorical hook upon which to hang his venomous pen. Then it hit him. Her fence is ugly. Who cares that the fence story is now months old, eh? Who needs topical when one is going after Sarahcuda?

That's right, the fence is ugly and that makes Mrs. Palin an evil, oil-loving, war-mongering, racist, anti-feminist, monster, right? Man, that must have made Higgins feel better. And it saved him from kicking his dog this time, too. Smiles all around.

Of course, there was more to it than just saying the fence was ugly. Higgins also proclaims the Palins as "bad neighbors" because of it. Never mind that the only reason that the thing was even put up is to keep the hack-next-door from acting the peeping Joe on Palin's young children.

So, that fence is "defiantly ugly," says writer Higgins:
However genuine the motives behind the fence, from a design, horticultural and sheer aesthetic standpoint, it looks like a disaster.
Higgins scolds the Palins for not tearing down the old fence and replacing it with a more costly, professionally made fence.

Seriously? That is his concern here? Let's review why the fence went up in the first place. The goal for the Palins was to immediately stop the journo-voyeur next door from peering into their living quarters. The Palins had no plans to carefully tear down an old fence and build a new, permanent fence that was taller before the intruder arrived. Speed was of the essence, not "horticultural aesthetics"!

In fact, it is doubtful that the Palins intend to leave the thing up once the tabloid screedist next door has run out his lease and slithers back down to the lower 48.

Of course, this is thin gruel for a story. So Higgins goes off on several related tracks. That fence, that ugly, ugly fence, why it wouldn't even be allowed in some communities, Higgins gravely informs us:
A fence of such towering presence would not be allowed in many communities across the land, including the District and the Virginia and Maryland suburbs.
See, here is the thing, Mr. Higgins. The fact that some communities have rules that restrict the freedom of property owners to do whatever they want with their property is not a reason to scold those communities like Palin's that respect their citizen's rights more! In fact, I'd say that those rarefied communities in Maryland are far more un-American by telling people what they should be allowed to do on their own property than Palin's "ugly fence" is. And I'd also suggest, Mr. Higgins, that you, sir, are un-American if you are in such wild support of government taking away its citizen's property rights!

In any case, this was a petty and rather pointless attack piece and it makes me wonder how it got past an editor. In the final assessment, Higgins' op ed was far uglier than Palin's fence, for sure.

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a regular contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, Red County and a number of other websites.

Thursday, June 17, 2010

Gov. Palin likes Warner's Big Journalism article

*
Sarah Palin gave Warner Todd Huston a ReTweet this morning for his "Name that Party" op-ed at Big Journalism:
Warner (aka Publius) is one of our Texas for Sarah Palin contributors. He doesn't write about Gov. Palin often, but when he does, he cross-posts here.

- JP

Saturday, May 29, 2010

Joe McGinniss Like a Wife Beater Blaming the Wife

- By Warner Todd Huston
*
Left-wing, hack writer Joe McGinniss is showing signs of instability. Like a wife beater, he's now blaming Sarah Palin for being alarmed and upset that he -- well known as her literary stalker -- has suddenly appeared as her new next door neighbor.

McGinnis has, wife-beater-like, told Washington Post blogger Dave Weigel that HE is the one "offended" by Palin's portrayal of HIM.

McGinniss told the Post that Palin should have "offered him a plate of cookies" when he moved in to stalk her instead of scoffing about him on her FaceBook account. He says that he was "deeply offended" at what she wrote and told the Post that he was even nice enough to shoo some tourists from Minnesota off Palin's lawn after he set up his surveillance operations next door.

Yeah, that rascally Palin is such a meanie, isn't she?

So, let's take a look at hack McGinniss' has done here:

  • He has written patently untrue screeds about her several times in the past
  • He has threateningly moved in next door to her family in order to write more scurrilous stuff
  • He has wagged his finger in her face saying she's a bad neighbor
  • He has pleaded that he just wants to get along as he pens his latest sack of lies
Yeah, I am beginning to see just how innocent and inoffensive this McGinniss hack is. Aren't you?

Like I said, McGinniss is acting like an inveterate wife beater, here. It's always the wife's fault, you see. Dinner was late… she deserved a beating. Sex was luke-warm… she deserved a beating. She interrupted him as he was writing his next calumny… she deserved a beating. She objected when he moved in next door after she last got a beating… she deserved a beating. She dared to point out his uncivil and threatening behavior… she deserved a beating.

I mean, it's such a natural thing to welcome an enemy as a next door neighbor, isn't it?

Then again… she deserves a beating, right Joe McGinniss, wife beater at large?

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a regular contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin as well as Big Government, Right Wing News, Red County and a number of other websites.

Thursday, May 20, 2010

A Tale of Two Book Banners: Palin Ripped, Kagan Excused

- By Warner Todd Huston
*
Comparisons are always a great way to show how differently the Old Media treats conservative and leftist politicians in America today and Obama's nomination of the Elena Kagan to the U.S. Supreme Court gives us another opportunity to see the Old Media's penchant to excoriate a Republican's actions while soft peddling and excusing away similar actions by a left-winger.

In this case, it is instructive to see how the Old Media treated the claim that Sarah Palin banned books from the Wasilla library when she was mayor and today how it is treating the recently highlighted Supreme Court arguments made by Elena Kagan that the government could ban books under the McCain-Feingold Act.

After McCain picked Governor Sarah Palin for his number two slot during the 2008 campaign for president the Old Media lit upon a story that said Sarah Palin tried to ban books from the Wasilla library when she was mayor there in 1996. A list of the supposedly banned books was even bandied about by the left-wing blogs causing a ruckus in the media but it turned out the list had books on it published years after Palin had left the Mayor's office. The list was a fabrication and was lifted from a website that detailed the books that had been banned at one time or another, in one place or another, over the last 100 years.

As it turned out the whole story came from another former Wasilla mayor. He claimed that Palin had asked a Wasilla librarian "how she could go about banning books." No books were banned, no list was made and Palin said she was asked by a constituent to look into how a book might be removed for its "objectionable material."

In Sept. of 2008, the McCain campaign stated that the book banning claim was "categorically false." Spokesman Brian Rogers said, "The fact is that as Mayor, Palin never asked anyone to ban a book and not one book was ever banned, period."

The story was false. Palin banned no books nor did she ask for any to be banned. But the Old Media went after the story with gusto even though it was a wildly overblown, anti-Palin fantasy. And the headlines tell the tale. The Old Media’s headlines as much as stated Palin was a book banner or asked the question in such a leading way as to make folks think she may have been a book banner.

Here are some of those headlines:
Of course, the left-wing blogosphere went nuts for the Palin story. The Daily Kos, the Democratic Underground, Wonkette and other extremist websites played the false story up for days.

To contrast the media's treatment of the false Palin book-banning story, we can look to the current story about Obama's SCOTUS nominee, , who was involved in a case before the Supreme Court in which she affirmed that books, pamphlets and other printed matter could possibly be open for government banning under the McCain-Feingold Act.

In front of the Supreme Court during questions asked of her by the justices about her stance on behalf of the government on Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, Kagan affirmed that the federal government could ban books, though she felt it was unlikely.

Kagan told the justices that, "the government's view is that although 441b does cover full-length books, that there would be quite good as-applied challenge to any attempt to apply 441b in that context." Here Kagan assumed that while the federal government posits that the rule does apply to books she felt that since the gov't has never tried to ban any book publishers might have a good case to reverse that ban. She followed that saying, "the FCC [Federal Election Commission] has never applied 441b in that context. So for 60 years a book has never been at issue."

In essence her position is that the gov't can ban books under 441b, but that no one should worry over much because the gov't has never used that rule to ban a book. As the New York Daily News says in shock, "it’s hard to recall the First Amendment hanging by a gossamer as flimsy as that offered by General Kagan."

So, how has the media treated this story? Mostly by pinning the "accusation" that Kagan thinks the gov’t can ban books to GOP Senator Mitch McConnell as if McConnell is really the one to blame for all this.

Here are some of the current headlines on Kagan, IF you can even find the story -- and the fact that so few stories are covering this is also telling when noting that there were thousands of stories covering the Palin book-banning subject.
  • "New GOP Argument Against Kagan: She Could Ban Books" - The Hill
  • "GOP To Press Kagan On Book Ban Question" - National Journal
  • "McConnell attacks Kagan over Citizens United" - Politico
  • "McConnell Raises Book-Banning Concerns About Kagan" - Roll Call
  • "Variety is the Spice of Talking Points" - Washington Monthly
Just as naturally as the left-wingers went after the Palin story, the conservative media is hitting the Kagan book ban story, too. The Examiners, NewsMax, Rush Limbaugh and a host of righty blogs are hitting Kagan for her apostasy against free political speech.

Now, take a look at these two collections of headlines. Notice that all the Palin headlines connect Palin directly to the charges of book-banning by discussing her "book banning efforts" even though there were no books banned and no lists made for possible bans. Then look at the Kagan headlines. You'll notice they all link a Republican to a claim that Kagan wanted to ban books (with one saying that the charge of book-banning is just "talking points"). The way the Kagan headlines are written it makes it seem as if the charge of Kagan’s book-banning is just politics as usual, Republican charges made, just average, everyday Republican attacks. Yet the Palin headlines as much as say that Palin was banning books. With their headlines the Old Media convicted Palin in 2008 yet today Kagan is nearly absolved of the charge.

This is the often times subtle bias that the Old Media employs against conservatives and Republicans and the soft favor they bestow upon Democrats and leftists.

(Originally posted at BigJournalism.com)

-WTH

Warner Todd Huston is editor of Publius' Forum and a contributor to Texas for Sarah Palin and Big Government, Right Wing News and Red County, among other websites.