Also from The Washington Post, this profile of Paulo Coehlo:
"MONTPELLIER, France -- 'I'm a very famous author all over the world, totally unknown in America,' says Paulo Coelho. True. He's one of the most successful writers on the planet, yet virtually unrecognized in the United States. According to the industry newsletter Publishing Trends, Coelho's latest novel, Eleven Minutes, appeared at the top of more best-selling fiction lists around the world last year than any other novel, including the Harry Potter volumes and John Grisham's King of Torts.
"In the United States it's another story. Published in the spring by HarperCollins, 'Eleven Minutes' has not landed on the top-selling fiction lists of either The Washington Post or the New York Times."
Interestingly, when I lived in Uzbekistan, Coehlo's The Alchemist seemed to be everyone's favorite novel. It had been translated into Uzbek by a literary journal, and was taken very seriously.
Tuesday, September 28, 2004
How Washington Works
A fascinating profile of Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff in The Washington Post:
"The foundation's brief history -- now the subject of a federal investigation -- charts how Abramoff attached himself to House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) and, in so doing, became a magnet for large sums of money from business interests. It also demonstrates how easily large amounts of such cash flowed through a nonprofit advocacy group to support the interests of a director. "
"The foundation's brief history -- now the subject of a federal investigation -- charts how Abramoff attached himself to House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) and, in so doing, became a magnet for large sums of money from business interests. It also demonstrates how easily large amounts of such cash flowed through a nonprofit advocacy group to support the interests of a director. "
Monday, September 27, 2004
Dan Rather on Dan Rather
From the Media Research Center [link from Little Green Footballs]:
"A serious journalist can't run with a story without confirmation. Two sources at the absolute minimum....This is how your narrator made it through Watergate. If I'd gone off half-cocked, if I'd gotten my facts scrambled, if I'd run with unconfirmed leads, I'd be selling insurance right now.-- Dan Rather in his 1994 memoir, The Camera Never Blinks Twice, page 97."
"A serious journalist can't run with a story without confirmation. Two sources at the absolute minimum....This is how your narrator made it through Watergate. If I'd gone off half-cocked, if I'd gotten my facts scrambled, if I'd run with unconfirmed leads, I'd be selling insurance right now.-- Dan Rather in his 1994 memoir, The Camera Never Blinks Twice, page 97."
Sunday, September 26, 2004
Will White House Debates Fumble Help CBS?
From INDC Journal: A Very Brief Interview with Bob Schieffer:
"INDC: 'Has this scandal affected you personally, with your impending moderation of one of the (Presidential) debates?'
SCHIEFFER: 'Well, there's been some e-mail that says that I should excuse myself, uh, but both the White House and the Kerry campaign have said that they think that I can do a fair and honest job. [emphasisis added] So as long as it's ok with them, I think it's ok.'"
"INDC: 'Has this scandal affected you personally, with your impending moderation of one of the (Presidential) debates?'
SCHIEFFER: 'Well, there's been some e-mail that says that I should excuse myself, uh, but both the White House and the Kerry campaign have said that they think that I can do a fair and honest job. [emphasisis added] So as long as it's ok with them, I think it's ok.'"
The Diplomad v. Europe (continued)
From The Diplomad:
"We drew fire from those who took offense from our claim that educated Americans -- such as we humble Diplomads -- know more about Europe, than educated Europeans -- notably Euro diplomats -- know about the USA. We don't know why some got upset about that. It happens to be true. Various emailers challenged us to recite all the kings of Lower Saxony or some such thing to prove we know European history. That's a very European approach to history: dry recitation of relatively insignificant facts that can be looked up in a reference book (or now on the internet) without any context or analysis of why a particular fact is important to the way the world is today. You would think that the USA being the world's most important country, the richest and most powerful country that has ever existed, would be an object of serious study, at least by the European foreign policy elite. Not so. They seem to get what knowledge they have (and it's not much) from BBC, CNN, Hollywood, and the shoddy and demented news media organizations that dominate the EU. America, 'the land of McDonalds' as one email charmingly put it, has more bookstores, libraries, museums, theaters, orchestras, music and art schools, and high quality technical and educational institutions (private and public) than any other country in the world, including any European country. The New York City public school system probably has produced more Nobel prize-winners than any other educational institution in the world.
Let us also not forget that the USA is actually older as a nation than many European countries (Germany and Italy, to name just two.) We are also the world's oldest democracy. You would think that Europeans would be dying to read up on the American Revolution and the principles that founded such a successful Republic. But, no. They blather on about the French Revolution, a ludicrous and horrific event that produced empty slogans, mass murder, chaos, dictatorship, years of warfare, defeats galore for France, the installation of one of the world's most absurd monarchies, and decades upon decades of political instability."
"We drew fire from those who took offense from our claim that educated Americans -- such as we humble Diplomads -- know more about Europe, than educated Europeans -- notably Euro diplomats -- know about the USA. We don't know why some got upset about that. It happens to be true. Various emailers challenged us to recite all the kings of Lower Saxony or some such thing to prove we know European history. That's a very European approach to history: dry recitation of relatively insignificant facts that can be looked up in a reference book (or now on the internet) without any context or analysis of why a particular fact is important to the way the world is today. You would think that the USA being the world's most important country, the richest and most powerful country that has ever existed, would be an object of serious study, at least by the European foreign policy elite. Not so. They seem to get what knowledge they have (and it's not much) from BBC, CNN, Hollywood, and the shoddy and demented news media organizations that dominate the EU. America, 'the land of McDonalds' as one email charmingly put it, has more bookstores, libraries, museums, theaters, orchestras, music and art schools, and high quality technical and educational institutions (private and public) than any other country in the world, including any European country. The New York City public school system probably has produced more Nobel prize-winners than any other educational institution in the world.
Let us also not forget that the USA is actually older as a nation than many European countries (Germany and Italy, to name just two.) We are also the world's oldest democracy. You would think that Europeans would be dying to read up on the American Revolution and the principles that founded such a successful Republic. But, no. They blather on about the French Revolution, a ludicrous and horrific event that produced empty slogans, mass murder, chaos, dictatorship, years of warfare, defeats galore for France, the installation of one of the world's most absurd monarchies, and decades upon decades of political instability."
Chris Hitchens on Dan Rather
From INDC Journal:
"But for journalism and its standards do matter, not just to me. I don't think of myself now as in the same profession of Dan Rather. And Dan Rather showed himself, it seems to me, to be--not for the first time actually--a very poor specimen of a showbiz type. He's not in journalism at all anymore. It's an absolute scandal that this stuff ever got on the air.
And it's wrong for us to call it forgery, even. A forgery is an attempt to fake something that's worth having. If I could get my printer to give me a $100 bill and I handed it to you and you took it, the handshake between us would be of that kind. But if I printed a $99 bill and handed it to you, you would be a fool and I would be a crook twice. This is not a forgery. This is fabrication.
And we help Rather out, it seems to me, every time we say forgery. Forgery is the cover story now. That's what they're back to. They're saying, well, it's essentially true. All the documents are fake, but the story is true. This is unpardonable.
...
I don't think it could fall any lower than this, in other words. And whether there is collusion with the DNC or not, I don't know. But there really had better not be, because I can't think'having said it couldn't go any lower, that's as low as it could then go. "
"But for journalism and its standards do matter, not just to me. I don't think of myself now as in the same profession of Dan Rather. And Dan Rather showed himself, it seems to me, to be--not for the first time actually--a very poor specimen of a showbiz type. He's not in journalism at all anymore. It's an absolute scandal that this stuff ever got on the air.
And it's wrong for us to call it forgery, even. A forgery is an attempt to fake something that's worth having. If I could get my printer to give me a $100 bill and I handed it to you and you took it, the handshake between us would be of that kind. But if I printed a $99 bill and handed it to you, you would be a fool and I would be a crook twice. This is not a forgery. This is fabrication.
And we help Rather out, it seems to me, every time we say forgery. Forgery is the cover story now. That's what they're back to. They're saying, well, it's essentially true. All the documents are fake, but the story is true. This is unpardonable.
...
I don't think it could fall any lower than this, in other words. And whether there is collusion with the DNC or not, I don't know. But there really had better not be, because I can't think'having said it couldn't go any lower, that's as low as it could then go. "
Charles Johnson on The New York Times
From Little Green Footballs :
"Matthew Klam, with whom I spoke on the phone for 43 minutes of my life that I'll never get back, writes a story for the New York Times Magazine about political blogs. And in a 10-page article, covers only the left wing blogs, including the worst, most virulent centers of lunacy. In glowing terms. Featuring a photo of Markos Zuniga, the owner of Daily Kos.
"There is not one word about the anti-idiotarian blogosphere. No LGF. No Roger L. Simon. No Michael Totten. No Allah. No Belmont Club. No Power Line. No INDC Journal. No Command Post. No Michele. No Cox & Forkum. No Rantburg.
"Nobody but Atrios, Josh Marshall, Daily Kos, Wonkette, and the other New York Times-approved left-wing drones. Not one word. Ten pages.
"The New York Times, with help from Matthew Klam, is trying to make us all disappear.
"I don't trust myself to write what I really feel about Klam's outrageously slanted piece. Read it for yourself: Fear and Laptops on the Campaign Trail. The mainstream media's shameful, arrogant bias, up there for all to see.
"UPDATE at 9/25/04 8:00:33 pm:
Matthew Klam will be on C-Span's Washington Journal tomorrow, talking about his article and taking calls."
"Matthew Klam, with whom I spoke on the phone for 43 minutes of my life that I'll never get back, writes a story for the New York Times Magazine about political blogs. And in a 10-page article, covers only the left wing blogs, including the worst, most virulent centers of lunacy. In glowing terms. Featuring a photo of Markos Zuniga, the owner of Daily Kos.
"There is not one word about the anti-idiotarian blogosphere. No LGF. No Roger L. Simon. No Michael Totten. No Allah. No Belmont Club. No Power Line. No INDC Journal. No Command Post. No Michele. No Cox & Forkum. No Rantburg.
"Nobody but Atrios, Josh Marshall, Daily Kos, Wonkette, and the other New York Times-approved left-wing drones. Not one word. Ten pages.
"The New York Times, with help from Matthew Klam, is trying to make us all disappear.
"I don't trust myself to write what I really feel about Klam's outrageously slanted piece. Read it for yourself: Fear and Laptops on the Campaign Trail. The mainstream media's shameful, arrogant bias, up there for all to see.
"UPDATE at 9/25/04 8:00:33 pm:
Matthew Klam will be on C-Span's Washington Journal tomorrow, talking about his article and taking calls."
Saturday, September 25, 2004
Agustin Blazquez and the 'Bad Word' by Belkis Cuza Male
(Published by El Nuevo Herald, Friday, Sept. 24, 2004)
When I saw him at the door of my house I thought he was a resurrection of Fujita, because he was the living likeness of the Japanese painter living in Paris in the 1920s. His hair was evenly falling over his forehead making his eyes look oriental--everything about him reminded me of the painter. Well, these are the first impressions that later on vanish, deconstructing that person the next time our eyes focus on them.
In the case of Agustin Blazquez it is easy to realize that he was not Fujita, but a different being, emanating from himself, who knows if he is a relative of the famous Spaniard writer, nonagenarian Blasco Ibañez, but I could more accurately present him as a tenor, because that very special voice of his presides as a visiting card.
I am not far off; Agustin Blazquez was an actor and a singer in Cuba, he mentioned to me, and many years ago worked in theatrical companies in Havana. For sure, everybody knows him now for what he is, a film director with three fantastic documentaries, the most recent, Covering Cuba 3, about the case of the boy Elian Gonzalez, which was a success at the American Film Renaissance Film Festival in Dallas, Texas.
Agustin traveled from the Washington, DC area to participate with his film as a guest of the festival and while in Texas, on Sunday, September 12 he came to La Casa Azul in Fort Worth and presented Covering Cuba 3: Elian. He was accompanied by Jaums Sutton, his assistant and interviewer in his various films and co-editor of his articles and books.
The impression you receive when you see Covering Cuba 3: Elian is totally new and surprising, although the Elian theme by itself is too well known and could result in a hard to do piece when you want to create art. But Agustin has done it. He achieved the emotion and made us shed tears with his true-cinema and his denunciations.
But it is here, in this word – denunciation – where I want to pause and call your attention. Because I want you to understand that it seems there are “denunciations” and “denunciations.”
When Communists use propaganda to denounce something, immediately there are receptive ears, there are mouths multiplying, cameras that work, newspapers giving all types of coverage and front page exposure. But when someone that is categorized a “conservative” makes a denunciation about a situation, makes art with this denunciation, the result is an immense void, a profound silence, an unhealthy indifference.
If you could talk with Agustin Blazquez, he could tell you better than myself of the frustrations of his experiences. First as a painter and sculptor - for years he tried to make it as such – and later his uncountable efforts to show his films in this country. To date all would have been negatives. For example, recently the American Film Institute (AFI) and a film festival associated with the AFI in Maryland as well as the Maryland State Arts Council rejected Covering Cuba 3: Elian. It did not fit the political taste of the sponsors.
So when he was invited by the Dallas film festival, which intended to show the other side of the coin, the filmmaker and painter (former actor and singer) packed his bags and drove all the way to far away Texas, where his presence and his art were being requested. Indeed Covering Cuba 3 received all the deserving applause.
However, these days have been a non-stop roller coaster of emotions for Agustin Blazquez, who – thanks to the rudeness in Maryland – received a reaction from some in the media. A wonderful editorial in the Wall Street Journal about him and his work set him in orbit followed by a live interview at the Fox News Channel. And while in Dallas, the local CBS did the same in relation to his Elian film.
But for example, when we sent a press release to the Star Telegram in Fort Worth announcing Covering Cuba 3 and his presence at La Casa Azul (Heberto Padilla Cultural Center), what we got was a four-line ad among the ethnic activities on the calendar celebrating Hispanic Month. That in spite of the photos of the film and the director they requested which were promptly sent.
Everybody knows that conservative is a “bad word” and the Dallas film festival seemed to be such, so the newspapers appear to use that classification to treat as junk all of the participants. So, that’s why Agustin Blazquez and La Casa Azul didn’t deserve anything better from the Star Telegram nor La Estrella, their Spanish counterpart (that totally ignored the press release).
Could it be in fashion someday--the word “conservative”? A friend asked me, What’s wrong with being a conservative? I mean, to believe in God, in the family, in some moral values, to believe that abortion is a crime and of course don’t play with the Communists?
There are dictatorships of the right and the left? Of course, but the first type you can almost always can get rid of, but the Communist ones, as we say in Cuba, fall only by “holding the tin cup to the fire til the bottom melts.”
The real “conservative” is the one that of course is loyal to the traditional values of justice and rejects outright any dictatorship.
Truly, for me, the word conservative equally defines anyone from the right or the left who grasps at his ideas (sometimes with the extreme stubbornness of the liberals and the anti-imperialists). The ultraconservatives and fundamentalists are Fidel Castro himself and his Latin American associates, as well as all these characters of the horrible left and that Hollywood “star” fauna giving their stupid opinions and those that don’t want to see any other documentaries than the one of the pathetic Michael Moore.
Agustin Blazquez is a complete artist, a renaissance man, a character that breaks the parameters of the definitions, so it’s better that we don’t classify him but in the place where he belongs, in the landscape of the great creators and Covering Cuba 3 is a good sample of what I mean. If you haven’t seen it, run and do it and tell me about it.
I am sure you are going to agree with Bill, a humble American and a neighbor of La Casa Azul, who thinks that all the youngsters in this country must see Agustin Blazquez’s film.
(The film is available on DVD at http://www.cubacollectibles.com)
When I saw him at the door of my house I thought he was a resurrection of Fujita, because he was the living likeness of the Japanese painter living in Paris in the 1920s. His hair was evenly falling over his forehead making his eyes look oriental--everything about him reminded me of the painter. Well, these are the first impressions that later on vanish, deconstructing that person the next time our eyes focus on them.
In the case of Agustin Blazquez it is easy to realize that he was not Fujita, but a different being, emanating from himself, who knows if he is a relative of the famous Spaniard writer, nonagenarian Blasco Ibañez, but I could more accurately present him as a tenor, because that very special voice of his presides as a visiting card.
I am not far off; Agustin Blazquez was an actor and a singer in Cuba, he mentioned to me, and many years ago worked in theatrical companies in Havana. For sure, everybody knows him now for what he is, a film director with three fantastic documentaries, the most recent, Covering Cuba 3, about the case of the boy Elian Gonzalez, which was a success at the American Film Renaissance Film Festival in Dallas, Texas.
Agustin traveled from the Washington, DC area to participate with his film as a guest of the festival and while in Texas, on Sunday, September 12 he came to La Casa Azul in Fort Worth and presented Covering Cuba 3: Elian. He was accompanied by Jaums Sutton, his assistant and interviewer in his various films and co-editor of his articles and books.
The impression you receive when you see Covering Cuba 3: Elian is totally new and surprising, although the Elian theme by itself is too well known and could result in a hard to do piece when you want to create art. But Agustin has done it. He achieved the emotion and made us shed tears with his true-cinema and his denunciations.
But it is here, in this word – denunciation – where I want to pause and call your attention. Because I want you to understand that it seems there are “denunciations” and “denunciations.”
When Communists use propaganda to denounce something, immediately there are receptive ears, there are mouths multiplying, cameras that work, newspapers giving all types of coverage and front page exposure. But when someone that is categorized a “conservative” makes a denunciation about a situation, makes art with this denunciation, the result is an immense void, a profound silence, an unhealthy indifference.
If you could talk with Agustin Blazquez, he could tell you better than myself of the frustrations of his experiences. First as a painter and sculptor - for years he tried to make it as such – and later his uncountable efforts to show his films in this country. To date all would have been negatives. For example, recently the American Film Institute (AFI) and a film festival associated with the AFI in Maryland as well as the Maryland State Arts Council rejected Covering Cuba 3: Elian. It did not fit the political taste of the sponsors.
So when he was invited by the Dallas film festival, which intended to show the other side of the coin, the filmmaker and painter (former actor and singer) packed his bags and drove all the way to far away Texas, where his presence and his art were being requested. Indeed Covering Cuba 3 received all the deserving applause.
However, these days have been a non-stop roller coaster of emotions for Agustin Blazquez, who – thanks to the rudeness in Maryland – received a reaction from some in the media. A wonderful editorial in the Wall Street Journal about him and his work set him in orbit followed by a live interview at the Fox News Channel. And while in Dallas, the local CBS did the same in relation to his Elian film.
But for example, when we sent a press release to the Star Telegram in Fort Worth announcing Covering Cuba 3 and his presence at La Casa Azul (Heberto Padilla Cultural Center), what we got was a four-line ad among the ethnic activities on the calendar celebrating Hispanic Month. That in spite of the photos of the film and the director they requested which were promptly sent.
Everybody knows that conservative is a “bad word” and the Dallas film festival seemed to be such, so the newspapers appear to use that classification to treat as junk all of the participants. So, that’s why Agustin Blazquez and La Casa Azul didn’t deserve anything better from the Star Telegram nor La Estrella, their Spanish counterpart (that totally ignored the press release).
Could it be in fashion someday--the word “conservative”? A friend asked me, What’s wrong with being a conservative? I mean, to believe in God, in the family, in some moral values, to believe that abortion is a crime and of course don’t play with the Communists?
There are dictatorships of the right and the left? Of course, but the first type you can almost always can get rid of, but the Communist ones, as we say in Cuba, fall only by “holding the tin cup to the fire til the bottom melts.”
The real “conservative” is the one that of course is loyal to the traditional values of justice and rejects outright any dictatorship.
Truly, for me, the word conservative equally defines anyone from the right or the left who grasps at his ideas (sometimes with the extreme stubbornness of the liberals and the anti-imperialists). The ultraconservatives and fundamentalists are Fidel Castro himself and his Latin American associates, as well as all these characters of the horrible left and that Hollywood “star” fauna giving their stupid opinions and those that don’t want to see any other documentaries than the one of the pathetic Michael Moore.
Agustin Blazquez is a complete artist, a renaissance man, a character that breaks the parameters of the definitions, so it’s better that we don’t classify him but in the place where he belongs, in the landscape of the great creators and Covering Cuba 3 is a good sample of what I mean. If you haven’t seen it, run and do it and tell me about it.
I am sure you are going to agree with Bill, a humble American and a neighbor of La Casa Azul, who thinks that all the youngsters in this country must see Agustin Blazquez’s film.
(The film is available on DVD at http://www.cubacollectibles.com)
Dan Rather, the Blogosphere, and Me...
All this fuss about the role of blogs in the Dan Rather Forgery Scandal reminded me of an article about blogs from couple of years ago, which discussed the significance of the Blogosphere:
"It was rewarding to google 'bloggers accounts of The Idler's June 28th panel at the National Press Club: 'Inside the Blogosphere: The Weblog Phenomenon.' While it was naturally disappointing that Glenn Reynolds and James Lileks cancelled due to thunderstorms, airlines, and scratched flights, it was gratifying that they wrote about their experience in their blogs, because that is the Blogosphere in action -- self-referential, self-reflexive, self-analytical, self-correcting, universal, instaneous, decentralized, emotional, rational, and available for continuous updating, response, and review. It shows the strength of the Blogosphere as a network of responses.
In the words of William Quick's January, 2002 posting on DailyPundit:
'I PROPOSE A NAME for the intellectual cyberspace we bloggers occupy: the Blogosphere. Simple enough; the root word is logos, from the Greek meaning, variously: In pre-Socratic philosophy, the principle governing the cosmos, the source of this principle, or human reasoning about the cosmos; Among the Sophists, the topics of rational argument or the arguments themselves. ..' "
"It was rewarding to google 'bloggers accounts of The Idler's June 28th panel at the National Press Club: 'Inside the Blogosphere: The Weblog Phenomenon.' While it was naturally disappointing that Glenn Reynolds and James Lileks cancelled due to thunderstorms, airlines, and scratched flights, it was gratifying that they wrote about their experience in their blogs, because that is the Blogosphere in action -- self-referential, self-reflexive, self-analytical, self-correcting, universal, instaneous, decentralized, emotional, rational, and available for continuous updating, response, and review. It shows the strength of the Blogosphere as a network of responses.
In the words of William Quick's January, 2002 posting on DailyPundit:
'I PROPOSE A NAME for the intellectual cyberspace we bloggers occupy: the Blogosphere. Simple enough; the root word is logos, from the Greek meaning, variously: In pre-Socratic philosophy, the principle governing the cosmos, the source of this principle, or human reasoning about the cosmos; Among the Sophists, the topics of rational argument or the arguments themselves. ..' "
Nonie Darwish on the Jewish New Year
From Kesher Talk [link from WindsofChange.net]:
"At a time when most religions struggle to explain evil in the world, radical Islam found the answer. Without hesitation, they say it is the Jews. Just listen to most Friday sermons in mosques all around the Muslim world. In these sermons week after week, there is one theme that keeps repeating itself: The Jews are responsible for all that is wrong in Arab society, and Arabs are not responsible for their failures. Blame the Jews, is what ends every mosque sermon. For that I personally want to apologize to Jews around the world on their holiest time of the year.
"Jews do not wish each other a “Happy New Year” on Rosh Hashana, the way we are all used to on every January 1. The traditional Hebrew greeting is “Shanah Tovah”, which means a “good year” or “a year of goodness.” The greeting stresses the yearning for goodness and the desire of living a good life; a life committed to improving the world and relationships. I am in awe when I hear my Jewish friends speak and explain the teachings of their faith.
"During these “10 days of Repentance” I want to repent and personally apologize to Jews around the world on their High Holidays. I also want to thank them and their culture for their many contributions to humanity. I am grateful for their teaching me this great tradition that so many of us non-Jews need to reflect upon. We all need to examine ourselves from inside, bring out the good and see what we have accomplished as members of the human race. We all learn from each other on this small planet of ours, and that is good. Much of the early Islamic thought and practices were based on what the Prophet Mohammed observed from the Jewish tribes of Mecca and Medina, who were a significant part of the life and culture of the Arabian Peninsula in the 7th century. Let us revive a gracious cultural exchange, a time of appreciation and understanding. May the New Year bring to our reality some of our expectations and may it bring us more together."
"At a time when most religions struggle to explain evil in the world, radical Islam found the answer. Without hesitation, they say it is the Jews. Just listen to most Friday sermons in mosques all around the Muslim world. In these sermons week after week, there is one theme that keeps repeating itself: The Jews are responsible for all that is wrong in Arab society, and Arabs are not responsible for their failures. Blame the Jews, is what ends every mosque sermon. For that I personally want to apologize to Jews around the world on their holiest time of the year.
"Jews do not wish each other a “Happy New Year” on Rosh Hashana, the way we are all used to on every January 1. The traditional Hebrew greeting is “Shanah Tovah”, which means a “good year” or “a year of goodness.” The greeting stresses the yearning for goodness and the desire of living a good life; a life committed to improving the world and relationships. I am in awe when I hear my Jewish friends speak and explain the teachings of their faith.
"During these “10 days of Repentance” I want to repent and personally apologize to Jews around the world on their High Holidays. I also want to thank them and their culture for their many contributions to humanity. I am grateful for their teaching me this great tradition that so many of us non-Jews need to reflect upon. We all need to examine ourselves from inside, bring out the good and see what we have accomplished as members of the human race. We all learn from each other on this small planet of ours, and that is good. Much of the early Islamic thought and practices were based on what the Prophet Mohammed observed from the Jewish tribes of Mecca and Medina, who were a significant part of the life and culture of the Arabian Peninsula in the 7th century. Let us revive a gracious cultural exchange, a time of appreciation and understanding. May the New Year bring to our reality some of our expectations and may it bring us more together."
Madonna's Israeli Pilgrimmage
From Haaretz :
"After midnight prayers at the grave of a rabbinical sage, songstress Madonna on Sunday called for world peace at a conference on Jewish mysticism, a highlight of her five-day pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Israel hopes the star - the biggest pop celebrity to visit in years - will revive tourism battered by four years of violence, and government officials were on hand at a Tel Aviv hotel to share the spotlight, the glory and the photographs.
"Madonna, wearing a low-cut dress with a black and white leopard pattern, said she was hesitant to come to Israel 'after seeing so many news reports about terror attacks' and reading State Department travel warnings. 'I realize now that it is no more dangerous to be here than it is to be in New York,' she told the gathering of more than 1,000 people.
"Speaking without notes, Madonna said the people she met during her five-day Holy Land trip 'have one thing in common - we want to create peace in the world.' "
"After midnight prayers at the grave of a rabbinical sage, songstress Madonna on Sunday called for world peace at a conference on Jewish mysticism, a highlight of her five-day pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Israel hopes the star - the biggest pop celebrity to visit in years - will revive tourism battered by four years of violence, and government officials were on hand at a Tel Aviv hotel to share the spotlight, the glory and the photographs.
"Madonna, wearing a low-cut dress with a black and white leopard pattern, said she was hesitant to come to Israel 'after seeing so many news reports about terror attacks' and reading State Department travel warnings. 'I realize now that it is no more dangerous to be here than it is to be in New York,' she told the gathering of more than 1,000 people.
"Speaking without notes, Madonna said the people she met during her five-day Holy Land trip 'have one thing in common - we want to create peace in the world.' "
Ann Coulter on Dan Rather's Forgeries
From AnnCoulter.com:
"CBS was forced to run a fake story so early in the campaign that it was exposed as a fraud – only because of the Swift Boat vets. These brave men, many of them decorated war heroes, have now not only won the election for Bush, they have ended Dan Rather's career.
"It's often said that we never lost a battle in Vietnam, but that the war was lost at home by a seditious media demoralizing the American people. Ironically, the leader of that effort was Rather's predecessor at CBS News, Walter Cronkite, president of the Ho Chi Minh Admiration Society.
"It was Cronkite who went on air and lied about the Tet offensive, claiming it was a defeat for the Americans. He told the American people the war was over and we had lost. Ronald Reagan said CBS News officials should have been tried for treason for those broadcasts.
"CBS has already lost one war for America. The Swift Boat Vets weren't going to let CBS lose another one."
"CBS was forced to run a fake story so early in the campaign that it was exposed as a fraud – only because of the Swift Boat vets. These brave men, many of them decorated war heroes, have now not only won the election for Bush, they have ended Dan Rather's career.
"It's often said that we never lost a battle in Vietnam, but that the war was lost at home by a seditious media demoralizing the American people. Ironically, the leader of that effort was Rather's predecessor at CBS News, Walter Cronkite, president of the Ho Chi Minh Admiration Society.
"It was Cronkite who went on air and lied about the Tet offensive, claiming it was a defeat for the Americans. He told the American people the war was over and we had lost. Ronald Reagan said CBS News officials should have been tried for treason for those broadcasts.
"CBS has already lost one war for America. The Swift Boat Vets weren't going to let CBS lose another one."
Colbert King on Kerry's Latest Critics
From The Washington Post:
"Two weeks later, another e-mail arrived on the same topic. It was from a Howard University classmate, a friend of 47 years, former assistant secretary of the Air Force Rodney Coleman. A Democrat, Coleman has local roots, having worked for the D.C. Council and later the Pennsylvania Avenue Development Corp. Bill Clinton appointed Coleman to the Pentagon post, in which he served from 1994 to 1998. Somehow, despite our running into each other over the years at various social occasions, Vietnam was never a serious topic of conversation between us. Until now. Coleman, who served in Vietnam for 13 months in 1971-72, wrote that he found disheartening the protracted mudslinging between Bush and Kerry and their respective camps about military records. But the favorable conclusion I drew about Kerry's service was, he stated, 'with all due respect, not mine!'
'Some of those 58,000 who died [in Vietnam] were at DaNang with me, and some were under my command, in the 366th Air Force engineering squadron,' Coleman wrote. Then he got to the heart of the matter.
'I vividly recall Kerry's antiwar testimony in April 1971. I was a White House fellow at the time, on a leave of absence from active duty, as were five of the 17 fellows selected. Two of them had Vietnam experience with Silver and Bronze Stars and Purple Hearts awarded for their heroism. In early April 1971, I volunteered to go to Vietnam after my year as a White House fellow. I could have very easily taken steps to forgo a tour in 'Nam, but as an Air Force captain committed to the ideals of the oath of office I took, Vietnam was the only game in town.' The oath of office was a serious matter for products of Howard's ROTC programs. I know. I was commissioned in the Army; Coleman joined the Air Force. Unlike some college campuses, Howard's ROTC programs were a source of pride, having produced, according to the school, more African American general officers than any other university in the country.
"When Kerry made those critical statements of the war," Coleman wrote, "my parents, God bless them, went ballistic about their son going in harm's way. My military colleagues in the fellows program who had been there and were shot up were incensed that a so-called military man would engage in such insubordinate actions. At the time Kerry made those unfortunate remarks, America had POWs and MIAs, among them my friend, Colonel Fred Cherry, the longest-held black POW of the Vietnam War. How could a true American fighting man throw away his medals, while thousands he fought alongside of were in the midst of another example of man's inhumanity to man?"
"Two weeks later, another e-mail arrived on the same topic. It was from a Howard University classmate, a friend of 47 years, former assistant secretary of the Air Force Rodney Coleman. A Democrat, Coleman has local roots, having worked for the D.C. Council and later the Pennsylvania Avenue Development Corp. Bill Clinton appointed Coleman to the Pentagon post, in which he served from 1994 to 1998. Somehow, despite our running into each other over the years at various social occasions, Vietnam was never a serious topic of conversation between us. Until now. Coleman, who served in Vietnam for 13 months in 1971-72, wrote that he found disheartening the protracted mudslinging between Bush and Kerry and their respective camps about military records. But the favorable conclusion I drew about Kerry's service was, he stated, 'with all due respect, not mine!'
'Some of those 58,000 who died [in Vietnam] were at DaNang with me, and some were under my command, in the 366th Air Force engineering squadron,' Coleman wrote. Then he got to the heart of the matter.
'I vividly recall Kerry's antiwar testimony in April 1971. I was a White House fellow at the time, on a leave of absence from active duty, as were five of the 17 fellows selected. Two of them had Vietnam experience with Silver and Bronze Stars and Purple Hearts awarded for their heroism. In early April 1971, I volunteered to go to Vietnam after my year as a White House fellow. I could have very easily taken steps to forgo a tour in 'Nam, but as an Air Force captain committed to the ideals of the oath of office I took, Vietnam was the only game in town.' The oath of office was a serious matter for products of Howard's ROTC programs. I know. I was commissioned in the Army; Coleman joined the Air Force. Unlike some college campuses, Howard's ROTC programs were a source of pride, having produced, according to the school, more African American general officers than any other university in the country.
"When Kerry made those critical statements of the war," Coleman wrote, "my parents, God bless them, went ballistic about their son going in harm's way. My military colleagues in the fellows program who had been there and were shot up were incensed that a so-called military man would engage in such insubordinate actions. At the time Kerry made those unfortunate remarks, America had POWs and MIAs, among them my friend, Colonel Fred Cherry, the longest-held black POW of the Vietnam War. How could a true American fighting man throw away his medals, while thousands he fought alongside of were in the midst of another example of man's inhumanity to man?"
Friday, September 24, 2004
Ballerina on the Boat
Last night we watched a DVD called Masters Of Russian Animation, featuring Brezhnev-era cartoons. It was a mixed bag, generally the films for children based on fairy-tales were more appealing than the propagandistic adult-oriented Soviet animation. Can't recommend the DVD overall, but a few short films really were excellent.
Ideya Granina's "Crane Feathers" is striking, Japanese dolls tell a sad story of trapped lives. Yuri Norstein's three shorts were also super: "Fox and Rabbit," about courage, "Heron and Crane," about marriage, and "Hedgehog in the Fog", about life. These are charming Aesop's-fable like morality tales, sweet for children, while bittersweet for adults.
My favorite was Lev Atamanov's "Ballerina on the Boat." A beautiful ballerina comes onto a boat, transforming everyone she meets, rescuing the vessel from a dangerous storm, literally floating away. It reminded me of "Steamroller and Violin," how much art and culture meant to people as an escape from the grim realities of the "Worker's State."
Ideya Granina's "Crane Feathers" is striking, Japanese dolls tell a sad story of trapped lives. Yuri Norstein's three shorts were also super: "Fox and Rabbit," about courage, "Heron and Crane," about marriage, and "Hedgehog in the Fog", about life. These are charming Aesop's-fable like morality tales, sweet for children, while bittersweet for adults.
My favorite was Lev Atamanov's "Ballerina on the Boat." A beautiful ballerina comes onto a boat, transforming everyone she meets, rescuing the vessel from a dangerous storm, literally floating away. It reminded me of "Steamroller and Violin," how much art and culture meant to people as an escape from the grim realities of the "Worker's State."
France Promises Israel Support
FromHaaretz :
"NEW YORK - French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier promised U.S. Jewish leaders Thursday that his country would wage an intransigent battle against anti-Semitic violence and improve its relations with Israel. Barnier met a group of U.S. Jewish community leaders to explain government measures to counter a surge of attacks on Jewish targets in the Paris region and the provinces. 'I told them of the total determination of the president [Jacques Chirac] and the government to fight all forms of anti-Semitism, racism and xenophobia,' Barnier told reporters."
"NEW YORK - French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier promised U.S. Jewish leaders Thursday that his country would wage an intransigent battle against anti-Semitic violence and improve its relations with Israel. Barnier met a group of U.S. Jewish community leaders to explain government measures to counter a surge of attacks on Jewish targets in the Paris region and the provinces. 'I told them of the total determination of the president [Jacques Chirac] and the government to fight all forms of anti-Semitism, racism and xenophobia,' Barnier told reporters."
Russia Atones for Stalin's Anti-Jewish Purge
From MosNews.com:
"One of the skeletons rattling in the former Soviet Union's closet was finally put to rest with honors on September 21--it even happened at a cemetery. A newly unveiled memorial at Moscow's Donskoye Cemetery commemorates the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee. The committee had been created to further Jewish culture in the USSR, but in the 1950s its members, including renowned artists and writers, were eliminated during Stalin's anti-Semitic purge. The story of the committee's end has been unraveled by historians as a stark, chilling testimony of Stalin-era horrors. The committee had been formed in 1942 to create support for the Soviet Union among Jewish communities in the West. Solomon Mykhoels, a well-known Jewish actor, was chosen to head the committee. Many other famous Jewish cultural icons of the time were also active in the committee, including actors, poets, writers, scientists, and others. The committee published a newspaper in Yiddish. It was the first Soviet organization of this kind. Obviously, in the Soviet Union, an atheist state, the uniting factor was Jewish culture, since religion was discouraged. After the war, the committee revived Jewish culture in the Soviet Union, helping preserve Soviet Jews as an ethnicity. The ties it established with Western Jews helped assemble and spread information about the persecution of Jews and the Holocaust. After WWII, when the Soviet Union was becoming the center of one of two warring camps in a bipolar world, these ties to the West, which were the very reason the Committee was established, became a threat to the secretive, policing Soviet government."
"One of the skeletons rattling in the former Soviet Union's closet was finally put to rest with honors on September 21--it even happened at a cemetery. A newly unveiled memorial at Moscow's Donskoye Cemetery commemorates the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee. The committee had been created to further Jewish culture in the USSR, but in the 1950s its members, including renowned artists and writers, were eliminated during Stalin's anti-Semitic purge. The story of the committee's end has been unraveled by historians as a stark, chilling testimony of Stalin-era horrors. The committee had been formed in 1942 to create support for the Soviet Union among Jewish communities in the West. Solomon Mykhoels, a well-known Jewish actor, was chosen to head the committee. Many other famous Jewish cultural icons of the time were also active in the committee, including actors, poets, writers, scientists, and others. The committee published a newspaper in Yiddish. It was the first Soviet organization of this kind. Obviously, in the Soviet Union, an atheist state, the uniting factor was Jewish culture, since religion was discouraged. After the war, the committee revived Jewish culture in the Soviet Union, helping preserve Soviet Jews as an ethnicity. The ties it established with Western Jews helped assemble and spread information about the persecution of Jews and the Holocaust. After WWII, when the Soviet Union was becoming the center of one of two warring camps in a bipolar world, these ties to the West, which were the very reason the Committee was established, became a threat to the secretive, policing Soviet government."
Thursday, September 23, 2004
Belmont Club on Terror Networks
Thanks to Instapundit again, here's an interesting link at Belmont Club:
"Vladis Krebs has a case study page examining how mapping social networks and understanding their properties can be used to take down of terrorist networks. Network analysis was used to take down Saddam Hussein. The Washington Post has some of the details."
"Vladis Krebs has a case study page examining how mapping social networks and understanding their properties can be used to take down of terrorist networks. Network analysis was used to take down Saddam Hussein. The Washington Post has some of the details."
Iranian Bloggers v.the Mullahs
From the BBC [tip from Instapundit.com]:
"Hundreds of Iranian online journals have been protesting against media censorship by renaming their websites after pro-reformist newspapers and websites that have been banned or shut down by the authorities. Many of the websites, known as blogs or weblogs, have also posted news items from the banned publications on their websites. The protest was started by blogger Hossein Derakhshan, a student at Toronto university in Canada. He told the BBC that although he felt the action was symbolic, he wanted to show Iranian authorities 'that they would not be able to censor the internet in the same way as they have managed to control other media.'"
"Hundreds of Iranian online journals have been protesting against media censorship by renaming their websites after pro-reformist newspapers and websites that have been banned or shut down by the authorities. Many of the websites, known as blogs or weblogs, have also posted news items from the banned publications on their websites. The protest was started by blogger Hossein Derakhshan, a student at Toronto university in Canada. He told the BBC that although he felt the action was symbolic, he wanted to show Iranian authorities 'that they would not be able to censor the internet in the same way as they have managed to control other media.'"
Samuel Marshak
In our Russian class yesterday, we read a short poem by Samuel Marshak, a renowned poet of the Soviet era, best known as author of a number of children's books. His collaboration with Vladimir Lebedev was legendary, resulting in some 50 works for young readers. Marshak translated Shakespeare, Keats, Blake, Wordsworth, and Kipling for Russian readers, as well.
From Marshak and Lebedev's 1928 About a Foolish Mouse.
From Marshak and Lebedev's 1928 About a Foolish Mouse.
Wednesday, September 22, 2004
Mark Steyn on John Kerry
From SteynOnLine:
"If it weren't for the small matter of the war for civilization, I'd find it hard to resist a Kerry Presidency. Groucho Marx once observed that an audience will laugh at an actress playing an old lady pretending to fall downstairs, but, for a professional comic to laugh, it has to be a real old lady. That's how I feel about the Kerry campaign. For the professional political analyst, watching Mondale or Dukakis or Howard Dean stuck in the part of the guy who falls downstairs is never very satisfying: they're average, unexceptional fellows whom circumstances have conspired to transform into walking disasters. But Senator Kerry was made for the role, a vain thin-skinned droning blueblood with an indestructible sense of his own status but none at all of his own ridiculousness. If Karl Rove had labored for a decade to produce a walking parody of the contemporary Democratic Party's remoteness, condescension, sense of entitlement, public evasiveness and tortured relationship with military matters, he couldn't have improved on John F Kerry."
"If it weren't for the small matter of the war for civilization, I'd find it hard to resist a Kerry Presidency. Groucho Marx once observed that an audience will laugh at an actress playing an old lady pretending to fall downstairs, but, for a professional comic to laugh, it has to be a real old lady. That's how I feel about the Kerry campaign. For the professional political analyst, watching Mondale or Dukakis or Howard Dean stuck in the part of the guy who falls downstairs is never very satisfying: they're average, unexceptional fellows whom circumstances have conspired to transform into walking disasters. But Senator Kerry was made for the role, a vain thin-skinned droning blueblood with an indestructible sense of his own status but none at all of his own ridiculousness. If Karl Rove had labored for a decade to produce a walking parody of the contemporary Democratic Party's remoteness, condescension, sense of entitlement, public evasiveness and tortured relationship with military matters, he couldn't have improved on John F Kerry."
DiploMad on the USA v. Europe
From The Diplomad:
"Among the features of EU anti-Americanism is lecturing the US about how superior Europe is because of its doles and pensions and, of course, because it's, well, not the USA. We poor American Diplomads have to sit through endless bloviating from Euro colleagues about how Europe has high taxes but excellent public services, unlike in the USA. Of course, that the reality is far different doesn't bother them. OK, yes, we'll gladly grant them that Europe has taxes that are higher than in the US, but, sorry, they don't get much for them: European public services are much, much worse than ours. This statement comes as a shock not only to Europeans, but also to many Americans of the NY Times variety who see high taxes as the answer to every question. Don't believe it? Go to Europe, get sick or hurt, call an ambulance. Then, wait and wait and wait. If that's not the week the ambulance drivers are on strike, when (if) the ambulance comes, you quickly will learn that an American hearse has more life support equipment, and that European paramedics couldn't teach a Boy Scout first aid course. The ambulance, however, will look good compared to the public hospital where you'll be delivered, and, if still alive, you will wish that you were in the hands of American Boy Scouts.
"Our 'friends' the French get upset when we say this, and immediately retort that their medical system is considered (by whom?) the best in the world. Yes, that's the very same system that when the temperature went up a few degrees in the summer let 15,000 people die. Imagine the scandal in the USA if 15,000 people died because the temperature 'shot up' to 95 degrees Fahrenheit! Imagine if we couldn't handle 95 degrees: LA would be a ghost town; Vegas never would have happened; Texas would be a howling wilderness.
"Don't want to get sick? OK, then get robbed on the street, and if you stay in Europe for more than a couple of weeks, there is a very good chance that will happen as crime is skyrocketing -- and the EU solution is to lie about the stats. Then deal with the cops. See where that gets you. See if you don't have the experience one Diplomad's mother-in-law had when her purse was ripped out of her hands in a Madrid street. At the police station bored, listless, unionized cops grumpily took her statement; one then asked, 'So what do you want us to do? Poor people have to live, too.'"
"Among the features of EU anti-Americanism is lecturing the US about how superior Europe is because of its doles and pensions and, of course, because it's, well, not the USA. We poor American Diplomads have to sit through endless bloviating from Euro colleagues about how Europe has high taxes but excellent public services, unlike in the USA. Of course, that the reality is far different doesn't bother them. OK, yes, we'll gladly grant them that Europe has taxes that are higher than in the US, but, sorry, they don't get much for them: European public services are much, much worse than ours. This statement comes as a shock not only to Europeans, but also to many Americans of the NY Times variety who see high taxes as the answer to every question. Don't believe it? Go to Europe, get sick or hurt, call an ambulance. Then, wait and wait and wait. If that's not the week the ambulance drivers are on strike, when (if) the ambulance comes, you quickly will learn that an American hearse has more life support equipment, and that European paramedics couldn't teach a Boy Scout first aid course. The ambulance, however, will look good compared to the public hospital where you'll be delivered, and, if still alive, you will wish that you were in the hands of American Boy Scouts.
"Our 'friends' the French get upset when we say this, and immediately retort that their medical system is considered (by whom?) the best in the world. Yes, that's the very same system that when the temperature went up a few degrees in the summer let 15,000 people die. Imagine the scandal in the USA if 15,000 people died because the temperature 'shot up' to 95 degrees Fahrenheit! Imagine if we couldn't handle 95 degrees: LA would be a ghost town; Vegas never would have happened; Texas would be a howling wilderness.
"Don't want to get sick? OK, then get robbed on the street, and if you stay in Europe for more than a couple of weeks, there is a very good chance that will happen as crime is skyrocketing -- and the EU solution is to lie about the stats. Then deal with the cops. See where that gets you. See if you don't have the experience one Diplomad's mother-in-law had when her purse was ripped out of her hands in a Madrid street. At the police station bored, listless, unionized cops grumpily took her statement; one then asked, 'So what do you want us to do? Poor people have to live, too.'"
Sayings of V.S. Naipaul
From his profile and interview in The Observer, last Sunday:
"On becoming a writer: 'It is mysterious that the ambition should have come first - the wish to be a writer, to have that distinction, that fame - and that this ambition should have come long before I could think of anything to write about.'
On multiculturalism: 'A man can't say, 'I want the country, I want the laws and protection, but I want to live in my own way.' It's become a kind of racket, this multiculturalism.'
On Hindu nationalism in India: 'Dangerous or not, it's a necessary corrective to history and will continue to remain so.'
On the fatwa against Salman Rushdie: 'An extreme form of literary criticism.'"
"On becoming a writer: 'It is mysterious that the ambition should have come first - the wish to be a writer, to have that distinction, that fame - and that this ambition should have come long before I could think of anything to write about.'
On multiculturalism: 'A man can't say, 'I want the country, I want the laws and protection, but I want to live in my own way.' It's become a kind of racket, this multiculturalism.'
On Hindu nationalism in India: 'Dangerous or not, it's a necessary corrective to history and will continue to remain so.'
On the fatwa against Salman Rushdie: 'An extreme form of literary criticism.'"
V.S. Naipaul: Destroy Saudi Arabia and Iran
From The Hindu thanks to Prashant Kothari's blog, this little reported statement from Nobel-prize winning author V.S. Naipaul:
"London, Sept 12. (PTI): Raking up a controversy, Nobel prize winning author Sir Vidia Naipaul has said countries like Saudi Arabia and Iran which foment religious war must be destroyed. The 72-year-old India-born author, in an interview published in 'The Observer' today, however had a word of advise to the people: 'hate oppression, but fear the oppressed.' Naipaul said the thing he saw in the current terrorism was the exulting in other people's death."
"London, Sept 12. (PTI): Raking up a controversy, Nobel prize winning author Sir Vidia Naipaul has said countries like Saudi Arabia and Iran which foment religious war must be destroyed. The 72-year-old India-born author, in an interview published in 'The Observer' today, however had a word of advise to the people: 'hate oppression, but fear the oppressed.' Naipaul said the thing he saw in the current terrorism was the exulting in other people's death."
PrashantKothari.com
I met Prashant Kothari a couple of years ago at the National Press Club. He had a successful business publishing corporate newsletters online. Now he has his own blog, and it is interesting. His company is String Technologies, which has an ad on the site, in case you need some work done...
Nikolai Getman Remembered
An obituary of the Soviet painter and former Gulag prisoner, by Robert Conquest, in The Wall Street Journal:
"Mr. Getman's death comes soon after that of Czeslaw Milosz, with whom I had warm, though not close, relations. He too, though stressing that his own experiences in Communist Poland were not at the Kolyma level, was very concerned that the Westerners he encountered should understand, should really understand, the extreme negativity of the Communist phenomenon. The implication was that the Western vision was still blurred. Mr. Getman has added what one would hope to be a final touch to our understanding."
"Mr. Getman's death comes soon after that of Czeslaw Milosz, with whom I had warm, though not close, relations. He too, though stressing that his own experiences in Communist Poland were not at the Kolyma level, was very concerned that the Westerners he encountered should understand, should really understand, the extreme negativity of the Communist phenomenon. The implication was that the Western vision was still blurred. Mr. Getman has added what one would hope to be a final touch to our understanding."
Our First Tip
We just processed our first donation via the Amazon.com tip jar (down below the links in the left-hand column), and would like to say our "Thank You!" to our contributor.
Daniel Wiener on CBS and the Presidential Debates
From Wienerlog:
"The Drudge Report claims that Bush officials want CBS News correspondent Bob Schieffer removed as the moderator for the final (Oct. 13th) Presidential debate. If true, this would appear to be a clever move to keep the story about the CBS forged document scandal in the public eye, while simultaneously punishing CBS for it's biased and shoddy journalism. But characterizing it as merely a 'clever move' misses the underlying genius. It would be a BRILLIANT political move, simultaneously skewering CBS and the Kerry campaign..."
[link from RogerLSimon.com]
"The Drudge Report claims that Bush officials want CBS News correspondent Bob Schieffer removed as the moderator for the final (Oct. 13th) Presidential debate. If true, this would appear to be a clever move to keep the story about the CBS forged document scandal in the public eye, while simultaneously punishing CBS for it's biased and shoddy journalism. But characterizing it as merely a 'clever move' misses the underlying genius. It would be a BRILLIANT political move, simultaneously skewering CBS and the Kerry campaign..."
[link from RogerLSimon.com]
Bruce Feirstein on Dan Rather's Forgeries
From The New York Observer:
"Yes sir, Dan-O: The "essential truth" is that your credibility is now lower than a piece of armadillo road kill, flattened by a blogger driving an 18-wheeler out on I-20 somewhere west of Abilene.
"Or, to use one of your more colorful Dan-isms from the last Presidential election: The chances of CBS and Dan Rather coming out of this with their reputations intact are somewhere between slim and none--and Slim just left the state.
"And with all due respect here, sir: All this--for what? To prove that a Congressman's kid got special treatment in the National Guard? Hell, that's not criminal. It's practically the American Way. Look at the news business, publishing, movies, union jobs in Detroit--even most of our recent Presidential candidates."
[link via Romanesko]
"Yes sir, Dan-O: The "essential truth" is that your credibility is now lower than a piece of armadillo road kill, flattened by a blogger driving an 18-wheeler out on I-20 somewhere west of Abilene.
"Or, to use one of your more colorful Dan-isms from the last Presidential election: The chances of CBS and Dan Rather coming out of this with their reputations intact are somewhere between slim and none--and Slim just left the state.
"And with all due respect here, sir: All this--for what? To prove that a Congressman's kid got special treatment in the National Guard? Hell, that's not criminal. It's practically the American Way. Look at the news business, publishing, movies, union jobs in Detroit--even most of our recent Presidential candidates."
[link via Romanesko]
Dan Rather's Forgeries = Journalism's Watergate
Says Eric Fettmann:
"LAST week, as the furor over Dan Rather's National Guard memos grew more and more intense, media critic Ken Auletta, appearing on PBS, criticized Fox News Channel for having 'treated this story as if it were Watergate. It's not Watergate.' Actually, in many respects, it is indeed broadcast journalism's Watergate."
[tip from powerlineblog.com]
"LAST week, as the furor over Dan Rather's National Guard memos grew more and more intense, media critic Ken Auletta, appearing on PBS, criticized Fox News Channel for having 'treated this story as if it were Watergate. It's not Watergate.' Actually, in many respects, it is indeed broadcast journalism's Watergate."
[tip from powerlineblog.com]
Tuesday, September 21, 2004
Ernest Miller on CBS's Fraudulent Response
From Corante > The Importance of... > Incompetent or Unethical? The Story of CBS News' Response to Criticism Over the Killian Memos:
"I should also note that this isn't about Dan Rather. I couldn't care less about Dan Rather. This is about CBS News as an organization. Although Dan Rather has been the focus for attention for many, the majority of my criticisms are directed at CBS News as a whole.
"Whether you agree that the documents are forged, clearly credible and legitimate questions about their authenticity have been raised. CBS News has not responded to criticisms with transparency and responsibility we should expect from any news organization, let alone such a large and important one.
"The following is an analysis and timeline of CBS's response to their critics. It is abundantly clear that CBS's actions when questioned about the validity of their reporting are a breach of what should be fundamental journalistic practice. Either that, or CBS News is hopelessly incompetent.
If I've missed something or erred, please let me know."
"I should also note that this isn't about Dan Rather. I couldn't care less about Dan Rather. This is about CBS News as an organization. Although Dan Rather has been the focus for attention for many, the majority of my criticisms are directed at CBS News as a whole.
"Whether you agree that the documents are forged, clearly credible and legitimate questions about their authenticity have been raised. CBS News has not responded to criticisms with transparency and responsibility we should expect from any news organization, let alone such a large and important one.
"The following is an analysis and timeline of CBS's response to their critics. It is abundantly clear that CBS's actions when questioned about the validity of their reporting are a breach of what should be fundamental journalistic practice. Either that, or CBS News is hopelessly incompetent.
If I've missed something or erred, please let me know."
Roger L. Simon Calls Dan Rather A Liar
There, someone's finally said it, Roger L. Simon:
"But the question remains, had the anchorman done so, would he have had the intellectual capacity to have understood what he read. Maybe that's the secret to being a good liar. You can't comprehend what your critics are saying."
"But the question remains, had the anchorman done so, would he have had the intellectual capacity to have understood what he read. Maybe that's the secret to being a good liar. You can't comprehend what your critics are saying."
Memo to the RNC: Replace Bob Schieffer with Brit Hume as Presidential Debate Moderator
Hugh Hewitt says it best:
"Why would anyone believe anything from CBS or Team Kerry, including denials and committee reports? . . . At the j-schools there will be a brisk business in seminars for years to come: How Did It Happen! Save a lot of time: It happened because the fever swamp lives in the newsroom. Drain the swamp and people will begin to believe the big 3 again. In the meantime, they are watching Fox. You can believe Hume."
Which leads to the suggestion that the RNC demand Fox's Brit Hume moderate the Presidential Debates instead of disgraced CBS's Bob Schieffer. Fox right now is the most ethical news operation: CNN had "Tailwind," NBC had "Dateline", ABC had "Red Lion," and CBS has "Dan Rather". That leaves Fox as the lowest-scandal news network.
"Why would anyone believe anything from CBS or Team Kerry, including denials and committee reports? . . . At the j-schools there will be a brisk business in seminars for years to come: How Did It Happen! Save a lot of time: It happened because the fever swamp lives in the newsroom. Drain the swamp and people will begin to believe the big 3 again. In the meantime, they are watching Fox. You can believe Hume."
Which leads to the suggestion that the RNC demand Fox's Brit Hume moderate the Presidential Debates instead of disgraced CBS's Bob Schieffer. Fox right now is the most ethical news operation: CNN had "Tailwind," NBC had "Dateline", ABC had "Red Lion," and CBS has "Dan Rather". That leaves Fox as the lowest-scandal news network.
Allahpundit on Dan Rather
Allahpundit has an excellent analysis of the latest nonsensical story in the Dan Rather affair, which appeared in USA Today.
Power Line Questions CBS's Fraudulent "Apology"
From Power Line, in an item also called "Modified Limited Hangout" (file under Great Minds Think Alike):
"Yesterday you stated that CBS originally approached Burkett for the story, that Burkett did not seek you out. Who directed you to Burkett? Was it a member of the Kerry campaign? Why have you not identified the name of the person who directed you to Burkett?
"Did any member of the Kerry campaign have a hand in the story? Did the campaign direct you to any of the 'unimpeachable sources' you used for the story? What members of the Kerry campaign did CBS speak with about the story before it aired? Is it a sheer coincidence that the Kerry campaign unrolled its 'Operation Fortunate Son' attacking President Bush's Air National Guard service the same week that you broadcast the 60 Minutes story?
"The answers to these basic questions are within your knowledge. Will you please answer them publicly now? Why not?"
"Yesterday you stated that CBS originally approached Burkett for the story, that Burkett did not seek you out. Who directed you to Burkett? Was it a member of the Kerry campaign? Why have you not identified the name of the person who directed you to Burkett?
"Did any member of the Kerry campaign have a hand in the story? Did the campaign direct you to any of the 'unimpeachable sources' you used for the story? What members of the Kerry campaign did CBS speak with about the story before it aired? Is it a sheer coincidence that the Kerry campaign unrolled its 'Operation Fortunate Son' attacking President Bush's Air National Guard service the same week that you broadcast the 60 Minutes story?
"The answers to these basic questions are within your knowledge. Will you please answer them publicly now? Why not?"
From Our Great Minds Think Alike Department (continued)
Today's editorial in The Wall Street Journal also sees Rather-Nixon parallels, calling CBS's latest statement a "Modified Limited Hangout":
"All of this raises the question of whether CBS was a vessel for, if not a willing participant in, a partisan dirty trick two months before a closely contested Presidential election. Last week Mr. Rather told the Washington Post that "if the documents are not what we were led to believe, I'd like to break that story." It was too late for that; Web writers and other news organizations had beaten him to it. But if CBS wants to restore the credibility it enjoyed back in the era of Edward R. Murrow, it will now get to the bottom of the story behind Mr. Rather's discredited story."
"All of this raises the question of whether CBS was a vessel for, if not a willing participant in, a partisan dirty trick two months before a closely contested Presidential election. Last week Mr. Rather told the Washington Post that "if the documents are not what we were led to believe, I'd like to break that story." It was too late for that; Web writers and other news organizations had beaten him to it. But if CBS wants to restore the credibility it enjoyed back in the era of Edward R. Murrow, it will now get to the bottom of the story behind Mr. Rather's discredited story."
Monday, September 20, 2004
HughHewitt on Rather's Continuing Watergate Parallels
At HughHewitt.com:
"Gee, I may be old fashioned, but it seems to me that a third rate burglary is less threatening to the outcome of an election than fraud broadcast into millions of homes."
"Gee, I may be old fashioned, but it seems to me that a third rate burglary is less threatening to the outcome of an election than fraud broadcast into millions of homes."
Dan Rather Owes Viewers a Confession
Not an investigation, as Dan Rather fraudulently promised, because Rather and CBS News already know exactly what happened. An "investigation" by CBS is likely to continue the cover-up, providing an excuse for CBS News to gag employees until after Election Day, "due to the investigation." This would have the effect of silencing sources, rather than providing full disclosure.
To put this matter to rest, all Rather and his accomplices really need to do is tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth--in a venue not controlled by CBS video editors.
For example, lets start with a live press conference, where Dan Rather answers questions, instead of asking them. It could be televised on PBS or C-Span, if CBS doesn't want to carry it.
To put this matter to rest, all Rather and his accomplices really need to do is tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth--in a venue not controlled by CBS video editors.
For example, lets start with a live press conference, where Dan Rather answers questions, instead of asking them. It could be televised on PBS or C-Span, if CBS doesn't want to carry it.
Is CBS Part of the Kerry Campaign?
From Power Line, on links between Joe Lockhart, Burkett, and CBS:
"Okay, Joe, did Burkett tell you what they said? Okay, Mary, is CBS an adjunct of the Kerry campaign?"
"Okay, Joe, did Burkett tell you what they said? Okay, Mary, is CBS an adjunct of the Kerry campaign?"
Sorry He Got Caught...
Here's the transcript of Dan Rather's non-apology from tonight's CBS News, which followed a red-herring "interview" that seems scripted and fake, itself, from the Mudville Gazette:
But even this "apology" is a fraud, because CBS knowingly presented forged documents as the basis of a false story. Remember, while they were standing by their story last week--a delaying action designed to buy time to get all the principals on the same page for a cover story--they publicly declared that CBS had a system of "checks and balances" and "careful vetting." That was what separated their network news operation from "bloggers in pajamas." Remember also, CBS admitted that the producers asked experts to vouch for the authenticity of the documents.
The charade continues. Rather has not admitted his documents are forgeries and is still treating them as authentic, although not "authenticated." He did not report that they have been exposed as crude forgeries, easily detected when compared to original documents of the period. Rather didn't ask any tough questions of Burkett, either. He didn't ask for the original documents, or explain why CBS doesn't have them, or didn't seem to want them at any point. He didn't ask Burkett to reveal his sources. He didn't seem interested in pursuing the story at all, with good reason. He doesn't have to do any further investigation, for Rather knows exactly what happened, because he was at the center of the fraud.
The interview's supposed news content, that CBS came to Burkett rather than the other way around, makes no material difference. It is a red herring, designed to distract people from the real story: Dan Rather is perpetrator of a fraud, a peddler of forged documents, and is now orchestrating a cover-up. Like Watergate, there is probably "hush-money" involved. No "independent investigation" answering to Andrew Heyward--so far, one of the unindicted co-conspirators, to continue the Watergate analogy--is going to get at the truth.
This isn't an apology, it is an insult to the CBS audience. Especially all the viewers who believed that CBS News was an honest outfit, at least once upon a time.
From this interview, as Richard Nixon might say, Dan Rather has made one thing perfectly clear: The only thing Dan Rather is sorry about is getting caught.
RATHER: The failure of CBS News to do just that, to properly, fully, scrutinize the documents and their source, led to our airing the documents when we should not have done so. It was a mistake. CBS News deeply regrets it. Also I want to say personally and directly, I'm sorry.
But even this "apology" is a fraud, because CBS knowingly presented forged documents as the basis of a false story. Remember, while they were standing by their story last week--a delaying action designed to buy time to get all the principals on the same page for a cover story--they publicly declared that CBS had a system of "checks and balances" and "careful vetting." That was what separated their network news operation from "bloggers in pajamas." Remember also, CBS admitted that the producers asked experts to vouch for the authenticity of the documents.
The charade continues. Rather has not admitted his documents are forgeries and is still treating them as authentic, although not "authenticated." He did not report that they have been exposed as crude forgeries, easily detected when compared to original documents of the period. Rather didn't ask any tough questions of Burkett, either. He didn't ask for the original documents, or explain why CBS doesn't have them, or didn't seem to want them at any point. He didn't ask Burkett to reveal his sources. He didn't seem interested in pursuing the story at all, with good reason. He doesn't have to do any further investigation, for Rather knows exactly what happened, because he was at the center of the fraud.
The interview's supposed news content, that CBS came to Burkett rather than the other way around, makes no material difference. It is a red herring, designed to distract people from the real story: Dan Rather is perpetrator of a fraud, a peddler of forged documents, and is now orchestrating a cover-up. Like Watergate, there is probably "hush-money" involved. No "independent investigation" answering to Andrew Heyward--so far, one of the unindicted co-conspirators, to continue the Watergate analogy--is going to get at the truth.
This isn't an apology, it is an insult to the CBS audience. Especially all the viewers who believed that CBS News was an honest outfit, at least once upon a time.
From this interview, as Richard Nixon might say, Dan Rather has made one thing perfectly clear: The only thing Dan Rather is sorry about is getting caught.
Why Americans Hate Foreign Policy
P.J. O'Rourke says it is because Americans are all foreigners themselves. [hat tip, DiploMad]
Memo to the RNC: CBS Didn't Apologize...
From RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie Statement on CBS:
"We accept CBS's apology for a breach of the journalistic standards that provide the American people confidence in news organizations, but some disturbing questions remain unanswered."
Actually, Rather is sticking to his guns, and has not apologized for peddling forgeries, or misleading the public, so there isn't a real apology for the Republican National Committee to accept.
This kind of weak and bureaucratic response by the RNC is pretty good evidence that the bloggers who discovered Rather's forgeries were not working for the RNC, which would do much better to stay quiet than give Rather an "exit strategy" with his "limited modified hangout."
"We accept CBS's apology for a breach of the journalistic standards that provide the American people confidence in news organizations, but some disturbing questions remain unanswered."
Actually, Rather is sticking to his guns, and has not apologized for peddling forgeries, or misleading the public, so there isn't a real apology for the Republican National Committee to accept.
This kind of weak and bureaucratic response by the RNC is pretty good evidence that the bloggers who discovered Rather's forgeries were not working for the RNC, which would do much better to stay quiet than give Rather an "exit strategy" with his "limited modified hangout."
From Our Great Minds Think Alike Department...
HughHewitt has also just called Rather's statement a "limited, modified hangout."
Rather's "Modified Limited Hangout"
Under stress, Dan Rather appears to be morphing into Richard Nixon. For evidence, just take a look at Dan Rather's Statement on Ernest Miller's website:
The tone is pure Nixon. "Mistakes were made." Sanctimonious self-righteousness combined with self-pity and the portrayal of himself as a victim, ending with an outrageous howler that the CBS fraud was perpetrated "in good faith" based on "our commitment to report fairly and truthfully." And Rather's mother was a saint, too, no doubt.
Tactically, it looks like Rather is using Nixonian damage control strategies taken directly from the Watergate playbook, as well. This means the above statement may be classified as a "Modified Limited Hangout." This was Nixon's next step after "Stonewall" during Watergate. Rather even seems to have his own "Palace Guard" (aka Haldeman & Ehrlichmann) in CBS News executives Andrew Heyward and Josh Howard, who will say or do anything to protect him, no matter how absurd or dishonest it may seem. The next step, if Rather follows Nixon's footsteps a little longer, will be to release a partial set of documents while claiming it is full disclosure.
Last week, amid increasing questions about the authenticity of documents used in support of a 60 MINUTES WEDNESDAY story about President Bush's time in the Texas Air National Guard, CBS News vowed to re-examine the documents in question--and their source--vigorously. And we promised that we would let the American public know what this examination turned up, whatever the outcome.
Now, after extensive additional interviews, I no longer have the confidence in these documents that would allow us to continue vouching for them journalistically. I find we have been misled on the key question of how our source for the documents came into possession of these papers. That, combined with some of the questions that have been raised in public and in the press, leads me to a point where--if I knew then what I know now--I would not have gone ahead with the story as it was aired, and I certainly would not have used the documents in question.
But we did use the documents. We made a mistake in judgment, and for that I am sorry. It was an error that was made, however, in good faith and in the spirit of trying to carry on a CBS News tradition of investigative reporting without fear or favoritism.
Please know that nothing is more important to us than people's trust in our ability and our commitment to report fairly and truthfully.
The tone is pure Nixon. "Mistakes were made." Sanctimonious self-righteousness combined with self-pity and the portrayal of himself as a victim, ending with an outrageous howler that the CBS fraud was perpetrated "in good faith" based on "our commitment to report fairly and truthfully." And Rather's mother was a saint, too, no doubt.
Tactically, it looks like Rather is using Nixonian damage control strategies taken directly from the Watergate playbook, as well. This means the above statement may be classified as a "Modified Limited Hangout." This was Nixon's next step after "Stonewall" during Watergate. Rather even seems to have his own "Palace Guard" (aka Haldeman & Ehrlichmann) in CBS News executives Andrew Heyward and Josh Howard, who will say or do anything to protect him, no matter how absurd or dishonest it may seem. The next step, if Rather follows Nixon's footsteps a little longer, will be to release a partial set of documents while claiming it is full disclosure.
CBS's "Smoking Gun"?
It is a truism from detective novels that every criminal leaves a piece of self-incriminating evidence. Reading Ernest Miller's summary, one comes across this quote from CBS spokesperson Kelli Edwards on September 8th:
Note the phrases: "individuals who had seen the documents," "at the time they were written," and "reflect his opinions at the time the documents were written." These are evidence of the "accurate but fake" line taken by CBS and its apologists, that the documents were concocted at a later date to illustrate opinions that Killian supposedly held. CBS does not state the documents came from the author, does not give a date certain (say 1972) for the creation of the documents, and has the peculiar weasel-words about "reflecting opinions."
The attitude towards the White House reaction to the forged documents, expressed by producer Josh Howard in the New York Times today, is a proper response only to a premeditated a confidence trick. Why, if CBS did not have an ulterior motive, would executives point to the White House's acceptance of the documents as evidence of anything at all? Had the White House denounced the documents as the forgeries they are, CBS would not have accepted that statement. They admit to pre-recording an interview with a so-called "expert" to rebut such a claim. So, it would have proved nothing.
Likewise, that the White House responded to the forgeries faxed to them, proved nothing--other than that the press secretary doesn't have a licensed document examiner on staff. There is no way the President could know what a private individual had in his personal files. It is not up to the victim of a hoax to prove fraud.
Accounts of CBS's broadcast have referred to a "rush" to put the program on the air. But why the "rush"? One reason would be to put fraudulent documents on the air before the trick could be discovered. This is why CBS never really confirmed the authenticity of its own documents from an examination of the originals, since it never had any originals--as there were no originals. The documents could not be confirmed as genuine by any credible examiner, and CBS knew it, before, during and after the broadcast.
A "fake but accurate" defense fits into this scheme, as it treats the forgeries as a "reconstruction" or later documentation of a prior state of mind, so their authenticity is not relevant. And that only makes sense if they were concocted in the first place, to smear the White House. It also indicates that CBS News as a corporate entity was deeply involved, and that executives of the network approved the fraud prior to air.
The scheme might have worked, had CBS News not posted the fake documents on the internet, for no one might have checked them. That the crude forgeries didn't work, was due to the efforts of bloggers, who pointed out the fraud.
These forged memos, utilized by CBS as a "smoking gun" against President Bush, turned out to be a "smoking gun" all right--proving that CBS perpetrated deliberate fraud.
'CBS verified the authenticity of the documents by talking to individuals who had seen the documents at the time they were written. These individuals were close associates of [Bush commander] Colonel Jerry Killian and confirm that the documents reflect his opinions at the time the documents were written.'
Note the phrases: "individuals who had seen the documents," "at the time they were written," and "reflect his opinions at the time the documents were written." These are evidence of the "accurate but fake" line taken by CBS and its apologists, that the documents were concocted at a later date to illustrate opinions that Killian supposedly held. CBS does not state the documents came from the author, does not give a date certain (say 1972) for the creation of the documents, and has the peculiar weasel-words about "reflecting opinions."
The attitude towards the White House reaction to the forged documents, expressed by producer Josh Howard in the New York Times today, is a proper response only to a premeditated a confidence trick. Why, if CBS did not have an ulterior motive, would executives point to the White House's acceptance of the documents as evidence of anything at all? Had the White House denounced the documents as the forgeries they are, CBS would not have accepted that statement. They admit to pre-recording an interview with a so-called "expert" to rebut such a claim. So, it would have proved nothing.
Likewise, that the White House responded to the forgeries faxed to them, proved nothing--other than that the press secretary doesn't have a licensed document examiner on staff. There is no way the President could know what a private individual had in his personal files. It is not up to the victim of a hoax to prove fraud.
Accounts of CBS's broadcast have referred to a "rush" to put the program on the air. But why the "rush"? One reason would be to put fraudulent documents on the air before the trick could be discovered. This is why CBS never really confirmed the authenticity of its own documents from an examination of the originals, since it never had any originals--as there were no originals. The documents could not be confirmed as genuine by any credible examiner, and CBS knew it, before, during and after the broadcast.
A "fake but accurate" defense fits into this scheme, as it treats the forgeries as a "reconstruction" or later documentation of a prior state of mind, so their authenticity is not relevant. And that only makes sense if they were concocted in the first place, to smear the White House. It also indicates that CBS News as a corporate entity was deeply involved, and that executives of the network approved the fraud prior to air.
The scheme might have worked, had CBS News not posted the fake documents on the internet, for no one might have checked them. That the crude forgeries didn't work, was due to the efforts of bloggers, who pointed out the fraud.
These forged memos, utilized by CBS as a "smoking gun" against President Bush, turned out to be a "smoking gun" all right--proving that CBS perpetrated deliberate fraud.
Mark Steyn on Dan Rather's Forgeries
From the Chicago Sun-Times:
"By now just about everybody on the planet also thinks they're junk, except for that dwindling number of misguided people who watch the ''CBS Evening News'' under the misapprehension that it's a news broadcast rather than a new unreality show in which a cocooned anchor, his floundering news division and some feeble executives are trapped on their own isle of delusion and can't figure out a way to vote themselves off it."
"By now just about everybody on the planet also thinks they're junk, except for that dwindling number of misguided people who watch the ''CBS Evening News'' under the misapprehension that it's a news broadcast rather than a new unreality show in which a cocooned anchor, his floundering news division and some feeble executives are trapped on their own isle of delusion and can't figure out a way to vote themselves off it."
Sunday, September 19, 2004
EDITORIAL: Until Dan Rather Apologizes, Bush Should Not Cooperate With CBS News
Simply as a matter of human decency, the White House might refuse to do business with CBS News until Dan Rather apologizes on the air for peddling his crude forgeries.
There is no reason to do business with con men or fraudsters. It would set a good example for the rest of the country, indeed the rest of the world, if the White House declares CBS News off-limits until this matter is resolved.
Once apologies are made, and measures taken to guarantee this sort of thing never happens again, normal relations could resume, with lessons learned on all sides.
There is no reason to do business with con men or fraudsters. It would set a good example for the rest of the country, indeed the rest of the world, if the White House declares CBS News off-limits until this matter is resolved.
Once apologies are made, and measures taken to guarantee this sort of thing never happens again, normal relations could resume, with lessons learned on all sides.
Ernest Miller on Dan Rather's Forgeries
A fascinating, detailed recap of the major events, by a US Naval Academy and Yale Law School graduate, Ernest Miller, on his Corante blog The Importance of...:
"By this past Monday evening, however, the story had clearly become one involving serious questions about the future of news reporting and I decided to join the conversation on this blog. This story is important because the blatant flouting of basic and fundamental journalistic practices by one of the largest and prominent news organizations in the country is undermining the credibility of journalism as a whole. Jay Rosen has asked how the press can 'win' during this election season (Campaign Puzzler: How the Press Comes Out with a Win). Well, I think that right now, the press is falling farther and farther behind in points. If major news organizations think that their credibility is not tarnished by a rogue CBS, they are sadly mistaken.
"It is disappointing to me that the major media has been mostly silent in their condemnation of CBS's response to this scandal. Even granting, against reason, that there remains a serious debate about the authenticity of the documents, and that CBS's 'checks and balances' for vetting this story were sufficient, the response of CBS to its critics has been outrageous. Where are the outraged calls for more transparency on the part of CBS News from the editorial boards of the New York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune or Wall Street Journal? Why haven't anchors of the other networks called for CBS to establish an internal, or better yet, an external investigation into the issue? Any profession that won't police its own when members egregiously violate the fundamental tenets of that profession will very quickly lose all credibility.
"More importantly, the press plays a vital and critical role in forcing transparency on government. How effectively will the press be able to play that role if it adopts the stonewalling tactics of the government when it is subject to criticism? If our watchdogs cannot even watch themselves, the Fourth Estate will become ever more ineffective.
"Many of my most important criticisms aren't about content, but about process. Many stories will lead to valid disagreements over nuance, omissions, and etc. However, there are fundamental aspects of process that virtually all can agree upon. CBS News has violated many of these. And, even where I criticize CBS News content, it is generally with the belief that a news organizations should be especially fair and even-handed in responding to criticism.
"I should also note that this isn't about Dan Rather. I couldn't care less about Dan Rather. This is about CBS News as an organization. Although Dan Rather has been the focus for attention for many, the majority of my criticisms are directed at CBS News as a whole.
"Whether you agree that the documents are forged, clearly credible and legitimate questions about their authenticity have been raised. CBS News has not responded to criticisms with transparency and responsibility we should expect from any news organization, let alone such a large and important one.
"The following is an analysis and timeline of CBS's response to their critics. It is abundantly clear that CBS's actions when questioned about the validity of their reporting are a breach of what should be fundamental journalistic practice. Either that, or CBS News is hopelessly incompetent."
"By this past Monday evening, however, the story had clearly become one involving serious questions about the future of news reporting and I decided to join the conversation on this blog. This story is important because the blatant flouting of basic and fundamental journalistic practices by one of the largest and prominent news organizations in the country is undermining the credibility of journalism as a whole. Jay Rosen has asked how the press can 'win' during this election season (Campaign Puzzler: How the Press Comes Out with a Win). Well, I think that right now, the press is falling farther and farther behind in points. If major news organizations think that their credibility is not tarnished by a rogue CBS, they are sadly mistaken.
"It is disappointing to me that the major media has been mostly silent in their condemnation of CBS's response to this scandal. Even granting, against reason, that there remains a serious debate about the authenticity of the documents, and that CBS's 'checks and balances' for vetting this story were sufficient, the response of CBS to its critics has been outrageous. Where are the outraged calls for more transparency on the part of CBS News from the editorial boards of the New York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune or Wall Street Journal? Why haven't anchors of the other networks called for CBS to establish an internal, or better yet, an external investigation into the issue? Any profession that won't police its own when members egregiously violate the fundamental tenets of that profession will very quickly lose all credibility.
"More importantly, the press plays a vital and critical role in forcing transparency on government. How effectively will the press be able to play that role if it adopts the stonewalling tactics of the government when it is subject to criticism? If our watchdogs cannot even watch themselves, the Fourth Estate will become ever more ineffective.
"Many of my most important criticisms aren't about content, but about process. Many stories will lead to valid disagreements over nuance, omissions, and etc. However, there are fundamental aspects of process that virtually all can agree upon. CBS News has violated many of these. And, even where I criticize CBS News content, it is generally with the belief that a news organizations should be especially fair and even-handed in responding to criticism.
"I should also note that this isn't about Dan Rather. I couldn't care less about Dan Rather. This is about CBS News as an organization. Although Dan Rather has been the focus for attention for many, the majority of my criticisms are directed at CBS News as a whole.
"Whether you agree that the documents are forged, clearly credible and legitimate questions about their authenticity have been raised. CBS News has not responded to criticisms with transparency and responsibility we should expect from any news organization, let alone such a large and important one.
"The following is an analysis and timeline of CBS's response to their critics. It is abundantly clear that CBS's actions when questioned about the validity of their reporting are a breach of what should be fundamental journalistic practice. Either that, or CBS News is hopelessly incompetent."
Power Line on the Washington Post on Dan Rather's Forgeries
Power Line:
"What jumps out at me is that Dan Rather, Mary Mapes and the 60 Minutes staff behaved not as objective journalists, but as opposition researchers for the Kerry campaign. They had been trying for years to dig up dirt on President Bush so as to prevent his re-election, and were beside themselves with glee when Bill Burkett, or whoever it turns out to be, gave them the opportunity to use forged documents as a pretense to air their anti-Bush story."
"What jumps out at me is that Dan Rather, Mary Mapes and the 60 Minutes staff behaved not as objective journalists, but as opposition researchers for the Kerry campaign. They had been trying for years to dig up dirt on President Bush so as to prevent his re-election, and were beside themselves with glee when Bill Burkett, or whoever it turns out to be, gave them the opportunity to use forged documents as a pretense to air their anti-Bush story."
Saturday, September 18, 2004
Friday, September 17, 2004
Scott Johnson on Dan Rather on Fox News
From Johnny Dollar's Place:
A transcript of a Fox News program with Powerlineblog's Scott Johnson, who says: "And CBS now has gone from being perhaps the willing dupe of a hoaxer to a participant in a fraud."
A transcript of a Fox News program with Powerlineblog's Scott Johnson, who says: "And CBS now has gone from being perhaps the willing dupe of a hoaxer to a participant in a fraud."
Meet Alexander Fainberg, People's Poet of Uzbekistan
From Ferghana.ru [thanks to Registan.net for the link]:
"Alexander Fainberg, author of 12 books of poems, 4 scripts for full-length movies and 18 cartoons, translations of Uzbek poets into Russian, publications in Uzbek, Russian, American, and Israeli media became a People's Poet of Uzbekistan. This correspondent met with Fainberg, the patriarch of Tashkent poetry extremely popular with the Russian-reading general public in Uzbekistan for the last 25 years or so, on Saiilgokh Street, the so called Tashkent Broadway, in company of his friends - local journalists."
"Alexander Fainberg, author of 12 books of poems, 4 scripts for full-length movies and 18 cartoons, translations of Uzbek poets into Russian, publications in Uzbek, Russian, American, and Israeli media became a People's Poet of Uzbekistan. This correspondent met with Fainberg, the patriarch of Tashkent poetry extremely popular with the Russian-reading general public in Uzbekistan for the last 25 years or so, on Saiilgokh Street, the so called Tashkent Broadway, in company of his friends - local journalists."
PBS Covers for Dan Rather
In a ridiculous segment, The Newshour last night featured Terence Smith, a former CBS employee, discussing Dan Rather's forgeries with Susan Tifft, a press aide for the 1980 Democratic National Convention and speechwriter for the Carter-Mondale campaign and Ken Auletta, a liberal writer for The New Yorker who claims that PBS is right-wing. The introductory taped "package" actually altered the typography and format of CBS's forged memos, displaying computer-generated documents different from the ones on the CBS website. So misleading, so transparently dishonest, one had to laugh--the producers perhaps realized that showing the actual documents, as they appeared on sites like Powerlineblog.com or LittleGreenFootballs would illustrate that they are obvious fakes.
The discussion was as ludicrous as the backgrounder. In response to Smith's softball questions, Auletta and Tifft soft-peddled the CBS fraud, clinging to a "Fake but Accurate" line. For example, Auletta's explanation: "Sometimes you race too fast. You don't pin your facts down."
But according to The Wall Street Journal, CBS was working on this story for several years, and had contacted multiple document experts.
Thus, Auletta's explantation is false. Yet, Smith didn't question it, even though as a CBS News veteran, he ought to know better. All he did was go to Tifft, the former paid Democratic party operative, who supported Auletta's line: "I think it's important to think about the atmosphere in which this occurred, which is obviously very partisan atmosphere, but as Ken said, there really has been a race and rush on this story."
So, instead of a balanced debate between two sides, The Newshour offered rationalizations and excuses from partisans on the side of Dan Rather and CBS. It was simply laughable, and can't be taken seriously. A fraud,itself--transparently not balanced, not objective, and not true.
To save his own reputation, and that of his program, maybe Jim Lehrer might invite one of the pajama-clad bloggers on the show to talk about how he discovered the fakes, instead of CBS apologists and political operatives? Or if that is a bridge too far, an articulate commentator who knows something about the internet side of the story, like Andrew Sullivan or Glenn Reynolds?
Until something like that happens, PBS's Newshour reputation is damaged goods, victim of self-inflicted wounds.
The discussion was as ludicrous as the backgrounder. In response to Smith's softball questions, Auletta and Tifft soft-peddled the CBS fraud, clinging to a "Fake but Accurate" line. For example, Auletta's explanation: "Sometimes you race too fast. You don't pin your facts down."
But according to The Wall Street Journal, CBS was working on this story for several years, and had contacted multiple document experts.
Thus, Auletta's explantation is false. Yet, Smith didn't question it, even though as a CBS News veteran, he ought to know better. All he did was go to Tifft, the former paid Democratic party operative, who supported Auletta's line: "I think it's important to think about the atmosphere in which this occurred, which is obviously very partisan atmosphere, but as Ken said, there really has been a race and rush on this story."
So, instead of a balanced debate between two sides, The Newshour offered rationalizations and excuses from partisans on the side of Dan Rather and CBS. It was simply laughable, and can't be taken seriously. A fraud,itself--transparently not balanced, not objective, and not true.
To save his own reputation, and that of his program, maybe Jim Lehrer might invite one of the pajama-clad bloggers on the show to talk about how he discovered the fakes, instead of CBS apologists and political operatives? Or if that is a bridge too far, an articulate commentator who knows something about the internet side of the story, like Andrew Sullivan or Glenn Reynolds?
Until something like that happens, PBS's Newshour reputation is damaged goods, victim of self-inflicted wounds.
Thursday, September 16, 2004
Dan Rather and "Credo Quia Absurdam"
How can people believe things that are clearly false?
The Dan Rather story led us to this article by Robert D. Sider on Tertullian. Although renowned for the phrase, apparently Tertullian didn't really say "credo quia absurdam" (I believe because it is absurd), rather "certum quia impossibile" (I am certain because it is impossible).
Either phrase is about the power of religious faith to overcome logic, as in the case of miracles.
That is what the CBS forgeries represent in the faithful mind of Dan Rather--the documents are miracles from on high to destroy the "Evil Bush." They have provided the 'smoking gun' of Bush's guilt in shirking National Guard duty. Like a relic of the Holy Grail, to doubt them is to challenge an entire faith. Thus, to preserve their own faith they must ignore the facts of this case. This religious impulse to believe the absurd is what lies at the heart of Rather-gate. Rather is a true believer. And in a form of religious fanaticism he places his faith in things which are clearly impossible. The greater the absurdity, the greater the faith. Thus, Dan Rather is demonstrating his fideism by sticking to his absurd story.
However, unlike Rather, Tertullian actually accepted the authority of reason--Logos:
"In the second and third centuries Christians of both East and West generally accepted a common mythos about God and the world. They believed that the world was rationally ordered, because it was created by God through his reason, his Logos. The same Logos spoke to man through rational terms in the Revelation embodied in the Bible and in Jesus. Even apart from Christ, men have caught glimpses of the truth, whether borrowed from the Bible or gathered from the order of nature. Unfortunately, the demonic, in one form or another, has entered to distort the vision of man, so that pagan philosophy never attained the wholeness and integrity of truth. Such integrity can be found only in Christ, the Logos; but because he is the Logos the integrity of truth implies the necessity of rational perception. Differences in apologetic aims, in individual style, and in personal temperament led to formulations of the relationships between faith and reason, and Christianity and philosophy which undoubtedly varied in tone and emphasis, but the common commitment on the part of all the major Christian thinkers of the second and third centuries, including Tertullian, to a belief in Christ, the Logos, eliminated fideism as a possible mode of Christian self-understanding."
Dan Rather's actions in this case reveal that he doesn't recognize the authority of Logos, only Mythos.
The Dan Rather story led us to this article by Robert D. Sider on Tertullian. Although renowned for the phrase, apparently Tertullian didn't really say "credo quia absurdam" (I believe because it is absurd), rather "certum quia impossibile" (I am certain because it is impossible).
Either phrase is about the power of religious faith to overcome logic, as in the case of miracles.
That is what the CBS forgeries represent in the faithful mind of Dan Rather--the documents are miracles from on high to destroy the "Evil Bush." They have provided the 'smoking gun' of Bush's guilt in shirking National Guard duty. Like a relic of the Holy Grail, to doubt them is to challenge an entire faith. Thus, to preserve their own faith they must ignore the facts of this case. This religious impulse to believe the absurd is what lies at the heart of Rather-gate. Rather is a true believer. And in a form of religious fanaticism he places his faith in things which are clearly impossible. The greater the absurdity, the greater the faith. Thus, Dan Rather is demonstrating his fideism by sticking to his absurd story.
However, unlike Rather, Tertullian actually accepted the authority of reason--Logos:
"In the second and third centuries Christians of both East and West generally accepted a common mythos about God and the world. They believed that the world was rationally ordered, because it was created by God through his reason, his Logos. The same Logos spoke to man through rational terms in the Revelation embodied in the Bible and in Jesus. Even apart from Christ, men have caught glimpses of the truth, whether borrowed from the Bible or gathered from the order of nature. Unfortunately, the demonic, in one form or another, has entered to distort the vision of man, so that pagan philosophy never attained the wholeness and integrity of truth. Such integrity can be found only in Christ, the Logos; but because he is the Logos the integrity of truth implies the necessity of rational perception. Differences in apologetic aims, in individual style, and in personal temperament led to formulations of the relationships between faith and reason, and Christianity and philosophy which undoubtedly varied in tone and emphasis, but the common commitment on the part of all the major Christian thinkers of the second and third centuries, including Tertullian, to a belief in Christ, the Logos, eliminated fideism as a possible mode of Christian self-understanding."
Dan Rather's actions in this case reveal that he doesn't recognize the authority of Logos, only Mythos.
Rush Limbaugh: Rathergate is Media's Gettysburg
From RushLimbaugh.com:
"All right, now something interesting is happening with this CBS story, the Forgery Story, beyond what CBS is going to do today. Nobody really has any idea what they're going to say, but the Wall Street Journal, as I say, says that CBS is going to offer further evidence here of what they believe to be true. Uh, you just... There's a part of me hates to see this and another part of me that loves to see this. I mean, it's just an amazing thing to watch these giant institutions tumble. You might be able to say, ladies and gentlemen, that we are in the midst of re-fighting the Civil War again here in terms of the left versus the right and the media and this CBS may represent Gettysburg for the mainstream press. "
"All right, now something interesting is happening with this CBS story, the Forgery Story, beyond what CBS is going to do today. Nobody really has any idea what they're going to say, but the Wall Street Journal, as I say, says that CBS is going to offer further evidence here of what they believe to be true. Uh, you just... There's a part of me hates to see this and another part of me that loves to see this. I mean, it's just an amazing thing to watch these giant institutions tumble. You might be able to say, ladies and gentlemen, that we are in the midst of re-fighting the Civil War again here in terms of the left versus the right and the media and this CBS may represent Gettysburg for the mainstream press. "
Hugh Hewitt Calls for Congressional Hearings on the CBS-Dan Rather Forgery Scandal
In theWeekly Standard:
"...all we need are some timely Congressional hearings, best conducted by the Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, chaired by Michigan Rep. Fred Upton, or the Subcommittee on Communications of the Senate's Commerce Committee, chaired by Senator Conrad Burns of Montana. CBS president Les Moonves would be a wonderful witness, as would Rather, and while the subject of 'sources' would be a touchy one, either subcommittee could provide some information on the workings of a major broadcast network confronted with a juicy story that has been discovered to have been cooked.
"Hearings such as these would benefit the Bush campaign, just as the forgery scandal has, because it brings into sharp focus the ethics of the Bush opponents and the anti-Bush bias of the mainstream media. If a Deep Throat or two were to develop from within CBS, the revelations could be explosive, and the ratings for the cable shows wouldn't be bad either. The sacrifice of a few execs, producers, and, of course, Rather might be good for the industry all told. Certainly very, very few people have rushed to Rather's defense, and those few are just now finding convenient excuses to leave the front lines.
"The hearings would serve one additional important role beyond immediate accountability, a role far more crucial than any played by the Howard Stern-Janet Jackson hearings, or even those hearings which conducted the post-mortem on the election night network fiasco of calling Florida for Gore in 2000. Hearings now, immediately, would signal broadcasters and news executives everywhere that partisan maneuverings under the guise of news gathering--especially those that occur late in an election season--would be subject to close Congressional scrutiny..."
"...all we need are some timely Congressional hearings, best conducted by the Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, chaired by Michigan Rep. Fred Upton, or the Subcommittee on Communications of the Senate's Commerce Committee, chaired by Senator Conrad Burns of Montana. CBS president Les Moonves would be a wonderful witness, as would Rather, and while the subject of 'sources' would be a touchy one, either subcommittee could provide some information on the workings of a major broadcast network confronted with a juicy story that has been discovered to have been cooked.
"Hearings such as these would benefit the Bush campaign, just as the forgery scandal has, because it brings into sharp focus the ethics of the Bush opponents and the anti-Bush bias of the mainstream media. If a Deep Throat or two were to develop from within CBS, the revelations could be explosive, and the ratings for the cable shows wouldn't be bad either. The sacrifice of a few execs, producers, and, of course, Rather might be good for the industry all told. Certainly very, very few people have rushed to Rather's defense, and those few are just now finding convenient excuses to leave the front lines.
"The hearings would serve one additional important role beyond immediate accountability, a role far more crucial than any played by the Howard Stern-Janet Jackson hearings, or even those hearings which conducted the post-mortem on the election night network fiasco of calling Florida for Gore in 2000. Hearings now, immediately, would signal broadcasters and news executives everywhere that partisan maneuverings under the guise of news gathering--especially those that occur late in an election season--would be subject to close Congressional scrutiny..."
AndrewSullivan Says "Off With Their Heads!"
From www.AndrewSullivan.com:
"RATHER AND HEYWARD MUST GO: I have to say that the risible statement given by CBS News last night finally did it for me. Who do these people think they are? They have failed to find a single expert who will back the authenticity of the memos; their own experts say they warned CBS not to go with the story; Killian's secretary thinks they're fakes ... and yet Rather and Heyward say they stand by their story and will continue to investigate the provenance and dubiousness of the forgeries! This beggars belief. How do I put this to Rather: it doesn't matter if the underlying story is true. All that matters is that CBS's evidence is fake. Get it? End of story. For what it's worth: I believe Bush got into the Guard because of his dad's connections. I believe he probably didn't perform his duties adequately in his final two years. When I first read the CBS story, I thought the docs were 'devastating.' I'm not backing this president for re-election. But all that is completely beside the frigging point. Journalists are supposed to provide accurate evidence for their claims. CBS didn't. And its response to the critics is to stonewall and try and change the subject. The correct response - the one they'd teach you in kindergarten journalism class - is immediately to check the authenticity of the documents as best you can, and if the doubts persist, to apologize immediately and yank the story. Can you imagine what CBS News would do if a government official found to be peddling fake documents refused to acknowledge it? And kept repeating his story nonetheless? They'd be all over it. But, you see, they are above politicians. They are above criticism. And they are stratospheres above bloggers who caught them red-handed.
THE COUP DE GRACE: And then this astonishing statement from Rather to Howie Kurtz:
'If the documents are not what we were led to believe, I'd like to break that story. Any time I'm wrong, I want to be right out front and say, 'Folks, this is what went wrong and how it went wrong.''
Memo to Rather: you can't break that story, because someone else in pajamas already did. Check the frequency, Kenneth. You are so far from being out front on this, you are leagues behind in the dust. Have you heard of the Internet? You can find it on that weird machine in your office they call a computer. All this proves is the fathomless cocooning of Rather and Heyward. They still think this is the 1980s. They have no idea what media world they are living in. Like Howell Raines, they are so out of it, they don't even know they're finished. Above all, they are not acting as journalists. They are acting as political operators, determined to win a news cycle, to inflict as much damage on their opponents as possible, while stonewalling on their own glaring, obvious errors. So this is a test of the blogosphere. We have to keep at these guys day and night to force them to live up to the most basic ethical requirements of their profession. After all this stonewalling and arrogance, an apology and retraction will no longer suffice. These guys have to resign or be fired. "
"RATHER AND HEYWARD MUST GO: I have to say that the risible statement given by CBS News last night finally did it for me. Who do these people think they are? They have failed to find a single expert who will back the authenticity of the memos; their own experts say they warned CBS not to go with the story; Killian's secretary thinks they're fakes ... and yet Rather and Heyward say they stand by their story and will continue to investigate the provenance and dubiousness of the forgeries! This beggars belief. How do I put this to Rather: it doesn't matter if the underlying story is true. All that matters is that CBS's evidence is fake. Get it? End of story. For what it's worth: I believe Bush got into the Guard because of his dad's connections. I believe he probably didn't perform his duties adequately in his final two years. When I first read the CBS story, I thought the docs were 'devastating.' I'm not backing this president for re-election. But all that is completely beside the frigging point. Journalists are supposed to provide accurate evidence for their claims. CBS didn't. And its response to the critics is to stonewall and try and change the subject. The correct response - the one they'd teach you in kindergarten journalism class - is immediately to check the authenticity of the documents as best you can, and if the doubts persist, to apologize immediately and yank the story. Can you imagine what CBS News would do if a government official found to be peddling fake documents refused to acknowledge it? And kept repeating his story nonetheless? They'd be all over it. But, you see, they are above politicians. They are above criticism. And they are stratospheres above bloggers who caught them red-handed.
THE COUP DE GRACE: And then this astonishing statement from Rather to Howie Kurtz:
'If the documents are not what we were led to believe, I'd like to break that story. Any time I'm wrong, I want to be right out front and say, 'Folks, this is what went wrong and how it went wrong.''
Memo to Rather: you can't break that story, because someone else in pajamas already did. Check the frequency, Kenneth. You are so far from being out front on this, you are leagues behind in the dust. Have you heard of the Internet? You can find it on that weird machine in your office they call a computer. All this proves is the fathomless cocooning of Rather and Heyward. They still think this is the 1980s. They have no idea what media world they are living in. Like Howell Raines, they are so out of it, they don't even know they're finished. Above all, they are not acting as journalists. They are acting as political operators, determined to win a news cycle, to inflict as much damage on their opponents as possible, while stonewalling on their own glaring, obvious errors. So this is a test of the blogosphere. We have to keep at these guys day and night to force them to live up to the most basic ethical requirements of their profession. After all this stonewalling and arrogance, an apology and retraction will no longer suffice. These guys have to resign or be fired. "
Protein-Wisdom's Humorous Take on Dan Rather's Forgeries and CBS's Cover-Up
A friendly reminder to the folks at CBS and their apologists...:
"If they were done in Word, your defense is absurd...
"If the reporter is Rather,
then the news is pure blather....
"Rather lied...
CBS died ."
"If they were done in Word, your defense is absurd...
"If the reporter is Rather,
then the news is pure blather....
"Rather lied...
CBS died ."
Power Line's Class Act
They've shown a lot of class in their responses to Dan Rather and CBS. Here's a sample fromPower Line:
"Every morning another batch of op-eds credits us, along with other bloggers like Charles Johnson and the Freepers, with bringing down the CBS News empire. I'm told that tonight they were showing screen shots of Power Line on the NBC Nightly News. That's fun and gratifying, of course, but we don't want you to think that it's going to our heads. I was on the Hugh Hewitt show tonight, and Hugh asked whether I was surprised at the hate we were getting from the establishment media. I said not at all; on the other hand, I was surprised at how much credit we were getting from so many sources. Too much credit: as I told Hugh, the real credit belongs to our readers, not us. We knew nothing about military protocol, type fonts of the '70s, when General Staudt retired, and so on. The power of the blogosphere (more properly, the internet) does not lie in a handful of bloggers with well-read sites. It resides in the hundreds of thousands, or millions, of smart, well-informed, engaged readers who, collectively, have amazing knowledge and expertise in just about any area you can think of. What is new is the ability to bring together these disparate sources of knowledge, analyze them, and disseminate them in real time. We help to do this, but on a big, fast-breaking story like this one, the real impetus comes from our readers--a point we make in every interview we give.
Along with the thanks, an apology. Over the last week, we have been absolutely inundated with emails. This was great, and we were able to use some of them to push the CBS story forward. But they overflowed our inbox, and at times stopped coming in until we could clear out more space. We tried to read them all, but I'm sure we missed some, and we couldn't begin to respond to more than a handful. Our site was actually down, briefly, yesterday because of the bottleneck in our email account. So please don't be offended if you've emailed us and we haven't responded; it just hasn't been humanly possible. At the same time, don't stop sending us your thoughts and information, as emails from our readers are where we get lots of our best stuff.
So, thanks again to the people who make the blogosphere the powerful force it has become: our readers."
"Every morning another batch of op-eds credits us, along with other bloggers like Charles Johnson and the Freepers, with bringing down the CBS News empire. I'm told that tonight they were showing screen shots of Power Line on the NBC Nightly News. That's fun and gratifying, of course, but we don't want you to think that it's going to our heads. I was on the Hugh Hewitt show tonight, and Hugh asked whether I was surprised at the hate we were getting from the establishment media. I said not at all; on the other hand, I was surprised at how much credit we were getting from so many sources. Too much credit: as I told Hugh, the real credit belongs to our readers, not us. We knew nothing about military protocol, type fonts of the '70s, when General Staudt retired, and so on. The power of the blogosphere (more properly, the internet) does not lie in a handful of bloggers with well-read sites. It resides in the hundreds of thousands, or millions, of smart, well-informed, engaged readers who, collectively, have amazing knowledge and expertise in just about any area you can think of. What is new is the ability to bring together these disparate sources of knowledge, analyze them, and disseminate them in real time. We help to do this, but on a big, fast-breaking story like this one, the real impetus comes from our readers--a point we make in every interview we give.
Along with the thanks, an apology. Over the last week, we have been absolutely inundated with emails. This was great, and we were able to use some of them to push the CBS story forward. But they overflowed our inbox, and at times stopped coming in until we could clear out more space. We tried to read them all, but I'm sure we missed some, and we couldn't begin to respond to more than a handful. Our site was actually down, briefly, yesterday because of the bottleneck in our email account. So please don't be offended if you've emailed us and we haven't responded; it just hasn't been humanly possible. At the same time, don't stop sending us your thoughts and information, as emails from our readers are where we get lots of our best stuff.
So, thanks again to the people who make the blogosphere the powerful force it has become: our readers."
Wednesday, September 15, 2004
Wall Street Journal v. The New York Times
From OpinionJournal - Best of the Web Today:
"All the News That's Fake but Accurate: Today's New York Times has an update on the scandal over Dan Rather's use of fraudulent documents in last week's hit piece on President Bush. Oddly, the Times piece lacks a byline, but it has what may be the greatest headline ever: 'Memos on Bush Are Fake but Accurate, Typist Says.' Fake but accurate! If this is the New York Times' new standard of journalism, does it apply to all stories, or only the ones that seek to make President Bush look bad?"
"All the News That's Fake but Accurate: Today's New York Times has an update on the scandal over Dan Rather's use of fraudulent documents in last week's hit piece on President Bush. Oddly, the Times piece lacks a byline, but it has what may be the greatest headline ever: 'Memos on Bush Are Fake but Accurate, Typist Says.' Fake but accurate! If this is the New York Times' new standard of journalism, does it apply to all stories, or only the ones that seek to make President Bush look bad?"
Andrew Sullivan on Dan Rather's Forgeries (cont'd)
From www.AndrewSullivan.com - Daily Dish:
"RATHER IS GOING DOWN: This new story seems to me to show reckless indifference to the truth in the pursuit of political pay-dirt. Honestly, you can't make this stuff up. If a couple of years back, someone had predicted that a) Howell Raines would be brought down by a fabricating affirmative action hire; b) the BBC would lose its director-general because of shoddy anti-war propaganda tarted up as journalism; and c) that Dan Rather would flame out over forged documents designed to wreak revenge on the Bush family; then I would think it was Brent Bozell having a wet dream. But it's all true. Bernie Goldberg, pour yourself a drink. Eric Alterman, just go home and cry. "
"RATHER IS GOING DOWN: This new story seems to me to show reckless indifference to the truth in the pursuit of political pay-dirt. Honestly, you can't make this stuff up. If a couple of years back, someone had predicted that a) Howell Raines would be brought down by a fabricating affirmative action hire; b) the BBC would lose its director-general because of shoddy anti-war propaganda tarted up as journalism; and c) that Dan Rather would flame out over forged documents designed to wreak revenge on the Bush family; then I would think it was Brent Bozell having a wet dream. But it's all true. Bernie Goldberg, pour yourself a drink. Eric Alterman, just go home and cry. "
Jim Lehrer and the Weakness of the Blogosphere
Jim Lehrer just reported the CBS forgery scandal--apparently taking the side of CBS. After quoting Laura Bush saying the documents are probably forgeries, he concluded by saying "the memos" did something or other. But they are NOT memos if they are forgeries. By calling them "memos" rather than "alleged memos", Lehrer sided with Rather--even though they are obvious forgeries; yet Lehrer did not report any evidence that showed that they were forgeries. Plus, he reported the fraudulent claims of the forged memos as fact. Shame, Shame Shame. Jim Lehrer should know better.
This is the type of story that Terence Smith the "media correspondent" would normally cover. He's a former CBS News producer, and should know where the bodies are buried. Let's see how long it takes for him to host a segment...
Frankly, this all shows not the strength, but the weakness of the blogosphere. Keith Olbermann's MSNBC performance, documented by the Media Research Center (scroll down for link), showed that it is possible to ignore the facts and repeat ad hominem insults directed at bloggers, as host of a major news program on a cable network--owned in part by Microsoft, which should in principle be on the side of bloggers, simply because bloggers are more likely to make the purchasing decisions about computer software than CBS anchormen--rather than deal with the facts, that Dan Rather has been defending a crude and unconvincing forgery. Here's the Olbermann quote, from the MRC website: "So the Killian documents come out and are almost immediately questioned by a lawyer with Republican ties and are distributed to other news organizations without comment by the White House and they suddenly have one of their principal endorsers retract his endorsement. How many rats do you smell?"
Well, the only rat I smell is Keith Olbermann. But don't look for any negative consequences to his career for joining in a smear job against the blogosphere. He can see which way the wind is blowing in media land. It was Dan Rather, on CBS, who called characterized bloggers and their supporters as "partisan political operatives," on Monday's CBS Evening News, according to the MRC. And after five days, CBS has still not corrected the record. Of course, PBS has not done any independent reporting on this controversy, either.
So, when Jim Lehrer sides with Dan Rather--and nowadays Lehrer is perhaps the most trusted anchor in America, filling the shoes of Walter Cronkite--what does this mean? Even PBS, which by law must be fair, balanced, and objective in all matters of public controversy, in the most balanced program on PBS, cannot report the truth; namely that Dan Rather peddled forged documents on the evening news to smear President Bush. The major media are able to ignore the facts, and hunker down till it all blows over. That doesn't show the strength of the blogosphere, rather that the major media, including PBS, plan to marginalize "guys in pajamas" as right-wingers who can be ignored.
Will CBS and its supporters in the maintream media succeed? So far,they have. Even the Washington Post today, which basically admitted the facts of the case prove forgery, didn't criticize CBS. The next move will have to take place outside the blogosphere or the media, the issue taken to a higher level...
UPDATE: Here' the transcript, which I just made from the RealPlayer file on the Newshour Website:
On Monday, First Lady Laura Bush dismissed National Guard memos reported last week by CBS News. She said they probably are altered, and they probably are forgeries, as some experts maintain. The memos said Mr. Bush ignored orders to take a physical exam and keep his pilot statuts.
Note it is only Laura Bush's word and some unnamed experts against CBS News. Lehrer is clearly siding with Rather, coming back to the fraudulent contents of the forged documents, treating them as legitimate.
Pathetic.
This is the type of story that Terence Smith the "media correspondent" would normally cover. He's a former CBS News producer, and should know where the bodies are buried. Let's see how long it takes for him to host a segment...
Frankly, this all shows not the strength, but the weakness of the blogosphere. Keith Olbermann's MSNBC performance, documented by the Media Research Center (scroll down for link), showed that it is possible to ignore the facts and repeat ad hominem insults directed at bloggers, as host of a major news program on a cable network--owned in part by Microsoft, which should in principle be on the side of bloggers, simply because bloggers are more likely to make the purchasing decisions about computer software than CBS anchormen--rather than deal with the facts, that Dan Rather has been defending a crude and unconvincing forgery. Here's the Olbermann quote, from the MRC website: "So the Killian documents come out and are almost immediately questioned by a lawyer with Republican ties and are distributed to other news organizations without comment by the White House and they suddenly have one of their principal endorsers retract his endorsement. How many rats do you smell?"
Well, the only rat I smell is Keith Olbermann. But don't look for any negative consequences to his career for joining in a smear job against the blogosphere. He can see which way the wind is blowing in media land. It was Dan Rather, on CBS, who called characterized bloggers and their supporters as "partisan political operatives," on Monday's CBS Evening News, according to the MRC. And after five days, CBS has still not corrected the record. Of course, PBS has not done any independent reporting on this controversy, either.
So, when Jim Lehrer sides with Dan Rather--and nowadays Lehrer is perhaps the most trusted anchor in America, filling the shoes of Walter Cronkite--what does this mean? Even PBS, which by law must be fair, balanced, and objective in all matters of public controversy, in the most balanced program on PBS, cannot report the truth; namely that Dan Rather peddled forged documents on the evening news to smear President Bush. The major media are able to ignore the facts, and hunker down till it all blows over. That doesn't show the strength of the blogosphere, rather that the major media, including PBS, plan to marginalize "guys in pajamas" as right-wingers who can be ignored.
Will CBS and its supporters in the maintream media succeed? So far,they have. Even the Washington Post today, which basically admitted the facts of the case prove forgery, didn't criticize CBS. The next move will have to take place outside the blogosphere or the media, the issue taken to a higher level...
John Kerry Reaches Out to Business
By John Kerry, from The Wall Street Journal:
"As I travel across this country, I meet store owners, stock traders, factory foremen and optimistic entrepreneurs. Their experiences may be different, but they all agree that America can do better under an administration that is better for business. Business leaders like Warren Buffett, Lee Iacocca and Robert Rubin are joining my campaign because they believe that American businesses will do better if we change our CEO."
"As I travel across this country, I meet store owners, stock traders, factory foremen and optimistic entrepreneurs. Their experiences may be different, but they all agree that America can do better under an administration that is better for business. Business leaders like Warren Buffett, Lee Iacocca and Robert Rubin are joining my campaign because they believe that American businesses will do better if we change our CEO."
German Report Charges Syrians Provide Poison Gas to Sudan
It's in German, somehow appropriate for a story about mass killings with poison gas, this time in the Sudan. Syrien testet chemische Waffen an Sudanern. If the report is true, one might ask: Where did Syria get these Weapons of Mass Destruction? Iraq, perhaps?
Bloggers on TV Talking about Dan Rather's Forgeries
You can read transcripts of Powerline with Brit Hume and Instapundit with Paula Zahn ondoubletoothpicks.com. A very interesting explanation of what blogging is about, from two very big bloggers...
Tuesday, September 14, 2004
CBS Was Told Documents Were Fake Before Broadcast
From Jim Geraghty:
"Just when you think the story couldn't get any more devastating for CBS, it gets worse. A round of applause to ABC's Brian Ross, who ate his Wheaties today and got the most stunning story of this entire scandal, the revelation that CBS ignored experts who said the documents were fake before the initial broadcast."
"Just when you think the story couldn't get any more devastating for CBS, it gets worse. A round of applause to ABC's Brian Ross, who ate his Wheaties today and got the most stunning story of this entire scandal, the revelation that CBS ignored experts who said the documents were fake before the initial broadcast."
John Kerry's Vietnam After-Action Report
Via Matt Drudge, from NewsCentral.tv. Note the reference to "spider holes".
Andrew Sullivan on Dan Rather
From The New Republic:
"What's riveting has been the reaction of CBS. Like Howell Raines and the directors of the BBC before him, Dan Rather seems to believe that journalism is some kind of caste profession, a calling that no amateur blogger can aspire to."
"What's riveting has been the reaction of CBS. Like Howell Raines and the directors of the BBC before him, Dan Rather seems to believe that journalism is some kind of caste profession, a calling that no amateur blogger can aspire to."
Canada Declares War on US (sort of)
From The Diplomad:
"One of our Diplomads attended a Canadian National Day reception, July 1, at a major hotel in a large city in the Far Abroad. It was a standard evening dip reception, to wit, carved ice swan, gummy canapes, warm drinks, and lots of inane banter among several hundred milling guests. Canadians are generally gracious hosts and traditionally hard to distinguish from their southern neighbors -- until they say "out" or "house," that is. But of late, and certainly at this event, they seem determined to ensure that there is no confusion, that the definition of Canada is "We're not the USA." At this reception, our Diplomad got cornered by a slightly tipsy Canadian aid worker (CIDA) who proceeded to give a weird version of US-Canadian relations which involved an apparently widely held Canadian view that Canada has defeated the United States in war, "We are the only the country to have defeated the United States in two declared (sic) wars." Our Diplomad, being a diplomat, held his tongue and didn't get into the details of these wars, such as noting that, yes, the Americans and British on several occasions fought battles in what is now Canada, and, yes, Americans lost some but won others, and in the end the Americans gained their independence (The Revolutionary War) and then successfully kept it (War of 1812.) Our noble Diplomad didn't launch into a description of Perry's victory on the Great Lakes over a "Canadian" invasion fleet or Old Hickory's victory over the "Canadian" army at New Orleans. Our Diplomad -- gracious, as are all our Diplomads -- limited his riposte to the ever polite, "Any time you want a rematch, let us know.""
"One of our Diplomads attended a Canadian National Day reception, July 1, at a major hotel in a large city in the Far Abroad. It was a standard evening dip reception, to wit, carved ice swan, gummy canapes, warm drinks, and lots of inane banter among several hundred milling guests. Canadians are generally gracious hosts and traditionally hard to distinguish from their southern neighbors -- until they say "out" or "house," that is. But of late, and certainly at this event, they seem determined to ensure that there is no confusion, that the definition of Canada is "We're not the USA." At this reception, our Diplomad got cornered by a slightly tipsy Canadian aid worker (CIDA) who proceeded to give a weird version of US-Canadian relations which involved an apparently widely held Canadian view that Canada has defeated the United States in war, "We are the only the country to have defeated the United States in two declared (sic) wars." Our Diplomad, being a diplomat, held his tongue and didn't get into the details of these wars, such as noting that, yes, the Americans and British on several occasions fought battles in what is now Canada, and, yes, Americans lost some but won others, and in the end the Americans gained their independence (The Revolutionary War) and then successfully kept it (War of 1812.) Our noble Diplomad didn't launch into a description of Perry's victory on the Great Lakes over a "Canadian" invasion fleet or Old Hickory's victory over the "Canadian" army at New Orleans. Our Diplomad -- gracious, as are all our Diplomads -- limited his riposte to the ever polite, "Any time you want a rematch, let us know.""
New York Will Rise Again
Says Vartan Gregorian:
"NEW YORK--When I first arrived in New York City in 1956 (by way of Tabriz, Iran, where I was born, and via Beirut, Lebanon, on my way to Stanford University), the New York I encountered was awesome as well as mind-blowing--even if that term hadn't been invented yet. I wrote to my sister in Tabriz that this city was a gigantic magnet attracting everything and everyone, every idea, every bit of energy, every scrap of power. It still is.
"The past several days have seen many commemorations of the terror attacks of three years ago. These events focused on the grief, the calamity and the slaughter of innocents. This was entirely appropriate, for we should never forget what happened that day.
"But we shouldn't lose sight of the other side of 9/11, either: the tremendous strength, dynamism and resiliency of New York. This is a proud, self-confident, busy, determined and impatient place that simply cannot be cowed or bowed. Within hours of the attacks, there was little question in anyone's mind that soon the city would be back about its business."
"NEW YORK--When I first arrived in New York City in 1956 (by way of Tabriz, Iran, where I was born, and via Beirut, Lebanon, on my way to Stanford University), the New York I encountered was awesome as well as mind-blowing--even if that term hadn't been invented yet. I wrote to my sister in Tabriz that this city was a gigantic magnet attracting everything and everyone, every idea, every bit of energy, every scrap of power. It still is.
"The past several days have seen many commemorations of the terror attacks of three years ago. These events focused on the grief, the calamity and the slaughter of innocents. This was entirely appropriate, for we should never forget what happened that day.
"But we shouldn't lose sight of the other side of 9/11, either: the tremendous strength, dynamism and resiliency of New York. This is a proud, self-confident, busy, determined and impatient place that simply cannot be cowed or bowed. Within hours of the attacks, there was little question in anyone's mind that soon the city would be back about its business."
Islam Has No Answers for Modern Iraq
From Zeyad, in Healing Iraq:
"Waiting for clerics and leaders of Islam to condemn violence might take forever. The reason is that there is no ONE Islam that all Muslims today adhere to. There is a multitude of sects, cults and groups that constitute what we call Islam, the followers of which can range from tens of millions to a few thousands. Even within the same sect there can be fundamental differences in interpretation of the Quran and the Hadith. Rival clerics from the same sect can hold highly contradicting opinions on a matter as simple as washing yourself before prayers.
"Muslim jurists over the last 14 centuries have gone into every small detail of life that one could imagine without ever attempting to address the fundamental or controversial differences. Hundreds of thick volumes have been written about what is najis (filthy) and what is not, which hand you should use to wipe yourself with after defecating and which one to use when eating, whether it is acceptable or not to kiss a woman when she is menstruating, whether to wash one's hands again after touching the robe of a non-muslim before prayers (there are actually two answers to that depending on whether your hand was wet or not), and so on. Muslims to this day ask these questions, seek answers for them, and fear the consequences of not following them properly. Such a sad waste of time and resources.
"In fact, one can lead a completely normal life without ever learning these irrelevant minor details, probably because they were originally intended for a society that existed centuries ago. One would certainly be regarded with scorn today if he took a few stones and some sand with him to the toilet. So, Islam is NOT a universal religion for all times no matter what Muslims say, neither is Christianity or Judaism by the way. Islam does not have the answers for many things which is why Muslim clerics over the last century were speechless about modern technology and scientific discoveries. Eighty years ago in Iraq it was considered blasphemy to say that rain was originally steam and some people were actually killed for doing so. Mullahs struggled hard to prevent people from sending their children to primary schools or to teach women to read and write. Every new and strange device was considered 'evil' and a work of the devil. Telegraphy, telephones, radios, cameras, televisions. In Saudi Arabia people went to the local telegraph office to ask them where they are hiding the Jinn that brings them news from the other side of the kingdom. They were incredulous to the fact that a message would travel in seconds a distance that took many days or months on camel back."
"Waiting for clerics and leaders of Islam to condemn violence might take forever. The reason is that there is no ONE Islam that all Muslims today adhere to. There is a multitude of sects, cults and groups that constitute what we call Islam, the followers of which can range from tens of millions to a few thousands. Even within the same sect there can be fundamental differences in interpretation of the Quran and the Hadith. Rival clerics from the same sect can hold highly contradicting opinions on a matter as simple as washing yourself before prayers.
"Muslim jurists over the last 14 centuries have gone into every small detail of life that one could imagine without ever attempting to address the fundamental or controversial differences. Hundreds of thick volumes have been written about what is najis (filthy) and what is not, which hand you should use to wipe yourself with after defecating and which one to use when eating, whether it is acceptable or not to kiss a woman when she is menstruating, whether to wash one's hands again after touching the robe of a non-muslim before prayers (there are actually two answers to that depending on whether your hand was wet or not), and so on. Muslims to this day ask these questions, seek answers for them, and fear the consequences of not following them properly. Such a sad waste of time and resources.
"In fact, one can lead a completely normal life without ever learning these irrelevant minor details, probably because they were originally intended for a society that existed centuries ago. One would certainly be regarded with scorn today if he took a few stones and some sand with him to the toilet. So, Islam is NOT a universal religion for all times no matter what Muslims say, neither is Christianity or Judaism by the way. Islam does not have the answers for many things which is why Muslim clerics over the last century were speechless about modern technology and scientific discoveries. Eighty years ago in Iraq it was considered blasphemy to say that rain was originally steam and some people were actually killed for doing so. Mullahs struggled hard to prevent people from sending their children to primary schools or to teach women to read and write. Every new and strange device was considered 'evil' and a work of the devil. Telegraphy, telephones, radios, cameras, televisions. In Saudi Arabia people went to the local telegraph office to ask them where they are hiding the Jinn that brings them news from the other side of the kingdom. They were incredulous to the fact that a message would travel in seconds a distance that took many days or months on camel back."
Dan Rather: Destroying CBS News to Save John Kerry
That's the thrust of this article by Stanley Kurtz in National Review:
"Why were we so wrong? Why did Dan Rather and CBS News, against all expectations, impeach their own credibility to defend the authenticity of memos that are almost certainly forgeries? The obvious answer is that they did it to save the faltering Kerry campaign from a final and decisive blow. If CBS were to admit that the documents were forgeries, it would have no grounds for protecting its sources. In fact, CBS would have a positive obligation to do everything in its power to expose the malefactors behind the forgeries. If the trail led back to the Kerry campaign, president Bush's reelection would be assured. Dan Rather has been at pains to derogate those who are interested in where the documents came from. This sounds suspiciously like Rather is concerned about what a revelation of his sources might mean. Certainly, if Rather personally received the forgeries from a Kerry operative, it would be a disaster for Rather. That alone might seem to be sufficient to explain CBS's refusal to admit its error. (It now appears that CBS News may well have received the documents from a partisan and highly questionable source.)
"And even if the trail leading back to the forgers does not pass through the Kerry camp, an admission by CBS that the documents are bogus would be a huge embarrassment for the senator's campaign, which has so aggressively seized upon the story to attack the president. It would also be a fiasco for Dan Rather and CBS, whose credulity on a story harmful to the president would be exposed, and pointedly contrasted to their treatment of the Swift-boat veterans.
"But surely it would have been better for Rather and CBS to cut their losses and admit their error. Yes, they would have taken a hit, but they would also have won kudos for honesty and professionalism. Americans are forgiving of those who admit error. By standing behind a story that is so obviously flawed, Rather and CBS News are setting themselves up to become laughing stocks. That is why the reasonable assumption I -- and many other folks -- made was that CBS would attempt to salvage its reputation by repudiating the memos. And that is why many now assume Dan Rather and CBS News have sacrificed their reputations in order to protect the Kerry campaign."
"Why were we so wrong? Why did Dan Rather and CBS News, against all expectations, impeach their own credibility to defend the authenticity of memos that are almost certainly forgeries? The obvious answer is that they did it to save the faltering Kerry campaign from a final and decisive blow. If CBS were to admit that the documents were forgeries, it would have no grounds for protecting its sources. In fact, CBS would have a positive obligation to do everything in its power to expose the malefactors behind the forgeries. If the trail led back to the Kerry campaign, president Bush's reelection would be assured. Dan Rather has been at pains to derogate those who are interested in where the documents came from. This sounds suspiciously like Rather is concerned about what a revelation of his sources might mean. Certainly, if Rather personally received the forgeries from a Kerry operative, it would be a disaster for Rather. That alone might seem to be sufficient to explain CBS's refusal to admit its error. (It now appears that CBS News may well have received the documents from a partisan and highly questionable source.)
"And even if the trail leading back to the forgers does not pass through the Kerry camp, an admission by CBS that the documents are bogus would be a huge embarrassment for the senator's campaign, which has so aggressively seized upon the story to attack the president. It would also be a fiasco for Dan Rather and CBS, whose credulity on a story harmful to the president would be exposed, and pointedly contrasted to their treatment of the Swift-boat veterans.
"But surely it would have been better for Rather and CBS to cut their losses and admit their error. Yes, they would have taken a hit, but they would also have won kudos for honesty and professionalism. Americans are forgiving of those who admit error. By standing behind a story that is so obviously flawed, Rather and CBS News are setting themselves up to become laughing stocks. That is why the reasonable assumption I -- and many other folks -- made was that CBS would attempt to salvage its reputation by repudiating the memos. And that is why many now assume Dan Rather and CBS News have sacrificed their reputations in order to protect the Kerry campaign."
John LeBoutillier on the Presidential Debates
They are Kerry's last chance, according to John LeBoutillier:
"Kerry has to tread a fine line: respectful of the office of the Presidency but hard on the Bush record. And he has to attack that record concisely, coherently and quickly; if he drags it out in his normal boring manner, viewers are going to head to other shows and games. Kerry’s biggest problem? He is 'un-likeable.' He is Lurch who flip-flops, dissembles and connives. That image has to be changed by his debate performances. He has to have voters walk away from these debates saying something like this: 'Boy, Bush made some big mistakes and that Kerry...well, he is not as bad as I had heard he was.' If Kerry can do that - then this race is going to tighten up right away. And then the Passion Differential (the anti-Bush sentiment outweighs the pro-Bush feeling in intensity that will manifest itself in dispropportionate turnout on Election Day)."
"Kerry has to tread a fine line: respectful of the office of the Presidency but hard on the Bush record. And he has to attack that record concisely, coherently and quickly; if he drags it out in his normal boring manner, viewers are going to head to other shows and games. Kerry’s biggest problem? He is 'un-likeable.' He is Lurch who flip-flops, dissembles and connives. That image has to be changed by his debate performances. He has to have voters walk away from these debates saying something like this: 'Boy, Bush made some big mistakes and that Kerry...well, he is not as bad as I had heard he was.' If Kerry can do that - then this race is going to tighten up right away. And then the Passion Differential (the anti-Bush sentiment outweighs the pro-Bush feeling in intensity that will manifest itself in dispropportionate turnout on Election Day)."
Sunday, September 12, 2004
Roger Simon on Pajamas and Bloggers
From RogerLSimon.com:
"Full Pajama Disclosure: I have noticed that some are casting aspersion on bloggers for working in their pajamas. I cannot tell a lie. I often do it. I also wrote screenplays for Warner Brothers, Universal and Twentieth Century Fox in my pajamas (do I have to give the money back?) and books for Simon & Schuster and Random House. I could go on... but I think you get the point. All together now:
'The pajama game
That's the game we're in
And we'll always be
In the pajama game
We love it!'"
ETYMOLOGICAL NOTE: According to the American Heritage online dictionary, the word "pajama" comes from the Hindi "pijma," for baggy pants, which in turn is based on the Middle Persian words "p" for leg plus "jmah" for garment.
"Full Pajama Disclosure: I have noticed that some are casting aspersion on bloggers for working in their pajamas. I cannot tell a lie. I often do it. I also wrote screenplays for Warner Brothers, Universal and Twentieth Century Fox in my pajamas (do I have to give the money back?) and books for Simon & Schuster and Random House. I could go on... but I think you get the point. All together now:
'The pajama game
That's the game we're in
And we'll always be
In the pajama game
We love it!'"
ETYMOLOGICAL NOTE: According to the American Heritage online dictionary, the word "pajama" comes from the Hindi "pijma," for baggy pants, which in turn is based on the Middle Persian words "p" for leg plus "jmah" for garment.
Mark Steyn on the Anniversary of 9/11
From The Spectator:
"Three years after September 11, the Islamist death cult is the love whose name no one dare speak. And, if you can't even bring yourself to identify your enemy, are you likely to defeat him? Can you even know him? He seems to know us pretty well. He understands the pressures he can bring to bear on Spain, and the Philippines, and France, too. He's come to appreciate the self-imposed constraints under which his enemy fights-- the legalisms, the political correctness, the deference to ineffectual multilateralism. He's revolted by the infidels' decadence but he has to admit it's enormously helpful: the useful idiots of the pro-gay, pro-feminist Left are far more idiotic and far more useful to him than they ever were to Stalin. He's figured out that while pluralistic open democracy might be a debased system of government next to Sharia, it has its moments: he had no idea that quite so many Westerners so loathed their own governments and, if not their own, then certainly America's. And he never thought that, even in America, while one party is at war, the other party is at war with the very idea that there is a war. And even the party committed to war presides over a lethargic unreformed bureaucracy, large chunks of which are determined to obstruct it. So, despite the loss of the Afghan training camps and Saddam and the Taleban and three quarters of al-Qaeda's leadership, it hasn't been a bad three years: the enemy has learnt the limits of the West's resolve, and all he has to do is put a bit of thought into exploiting it in the years ahead. A nuclear Iran will certainly help. "
"Three years after September 11, the Islamist death cult is the love whose name no one dare speak. And, if you can't even bring yourself to identify your enemy, are you likely to defeat him? Can you even know him? He seems to know us pretty well. He understands the pressures he can bring to bear on Spain, and the Philippines, and France, too. He's come to appreciate the self-imposed constraints under which his enemy fights-- the legalisms, the political correctness, the deference to ineffectual multilateralism. He's revolted by the infidels' decadence but he has to admit it's enormously helpful: the useful idiots of the pro-gay, pro-feminist Left are far more idiotic and far more useful to him than they ever were to Stalin. He's figured out that while pluralistic open democracy might be a debased system of government next to Sharia, it has its moments: he had no idea that quite so many Westerners so loathed their own governments and, if not their own, then certainly America's. And he never thought that, even in America, while one party is at war, the other party is at war with the very idea that there is a war. And even the party committed to war presides over a lethargic unreformed bureaucracy, large chunks of which are determined to obstruct it. So, despite the loss of the Afghan training camps and Saddam and the Taleban and three quarters of al-Qaeda's leadership, it hasn't been a bad three years: the enemy has learnt the limits of the West's resolve, and all he has to do is put a bit of thought into exploiting it in the years ahead. A nuclear Iran will certainly help. "
Steamroller and Violin
The other night we viewed a DVD of this, Andrei Tarkovsky's first film, completed as his student thesis project at Moscow's famous VGIK film school, shot at the Mosfilm Studios. Tarkovsky went on to become one of the great lights of the Russian art film, making Andrei Rublev, Solaris, The Mirror, and Stalker, among other pictures. This first effort is easier to understand than some of the later works, and a good introduction to his personal style. It is a 46-minute children's fable, about the friendship between a beleagured and insecure child musician and a heavy machinery operator paving the square in front of his apartment house, sort of like the French classic The Red Balloon. But it is also very different.
The themes of art and labor are Soviet, but the human drama, of personal fulfilment, bullying, testing, studying suffering, frustration, friendship, and the power of love, are universal. For anyone interested in the art of Tarkovsky, this early work is a real gem. It is full of symbolism, artistic cinematography--a raindrop falling into a puddle is almost like a human tear--and human moments. In a way, it presages his later themes, of a sensitive person caught in an insensitive world. We got our copy from Netflix. You can buy a copy at Amazon.com. And there is an excellent critical analysis online at Nostalghia.com. If you are interested in Russian films, especially Tarkovsky, you won't want to miss Steamroller and Violin.
The themes of art and labor are Soviet, but the human drama, of personal fulfilment, bullying, testing, studying suffering, frustration, friendship, and the power of love, are universal. For anyone interested in the art of Tarkovsky, this early work is a real gem. It is full of symbolism, artistic cinematography--a raindrop falling into a puddle is almost like a human tear--and human moments. In a way, it presages his later themes, of a sensitive person caught in an insensitive world. We got our copy from Netflix. You can buy a copy at Amazon.com. And there is an excellent critical analysis online at Nostalghia.com. If you are interested in Russian films, especially Tarkovsky, you won't want to miss Steamroller and Violin.
Saturday, September 11, 2004
Is Bush Soft on Terror?
The Guardian's Craig Unger says despite the hype, in fact, he is:
"A poll just after the Republican convention showed that 27% of the voters preferred Bush to Kerry when it came to national security. Increasingly, it is becoming clear that if Bush wins in November it will be because of the fear factor. Yet the truth is that Bush is actually soft on terror. When it comes to going after the men who were behind 9/11 and who continue to wage a jihad against the US, Bush has repeatedly turned a blind eye to the forces behind terrorism, shielded the people who funded al-Qaida, obstructed investigations and diverted resources from the battle against it."
"A poll just after the Republican convention showed that 27% of the voters preferred Bush to Kerry when it came to national security. Increasingly, it is becoming clear that if Bush wins in November it will be because of the fear factor. Yet the truth is that Bush is actually soft on terror. When it comes to going after the men who were behind 9/11 and who continue to wage a jihad against the US, Bush has repeatedly turned a blind eye to the forces behind terrorism, shielded the people who funded al-Qaida, obstructed investigations and diverted resources from the battle against it."
Kamal Nawash on 9/11
Via Matt Drudge Kamal Nawah's interesting essay:
"This September 11 marks the third unforgettable anniversary of the worst mass murder in American history. After September 11, many in the Muslim world chose denial and hallucination rather than face up to the sad fact that Muslims perpetrated the 9-11 terrorist acts and that we have an enormous problem with extremism and support for terrorism. Many Muslims, including religious leaders, and �intellectuals� blamed 9-11 on a Jewish conspiracy and went as far as fabricating a tale that 4000 Jews did not show up for work in the World Trade Center on 9-11. Yet others blamed 9-11 on an American right wing conspiracy or the U.S. Government which allegedly wanted an excuse to invade Iraq and 'steal' Iraqi oil."
"This September 11 marks the third unforgettable anniversary of the worst mass murder in American history. After September 11, many in the Muslim world chose denial and hallucination rather than face up to the sad fact that Muslims perpetrated the 9-11 terrorist acts and that we have an enormous problem with extremism and support for terrorism. Many Muslims, including religious leaders, and �intellectuals� blamed 9-11 on a Jewish conspiracy and went as far as fabricating a tale that 4000 Jews did not show up for work in the World Trade Center on 9-11. Yet others blamed 9-11 on an American right wing conspiracy or the U.S. Government which allegedly wanted an excuse to invade Iraq and 'steal' Iraqi oil."
Glenn Reynolds Remembers 9/11
On GlennReynolds.com:
"September 11, 2001 wasn't the beginning of this war. In fact, fundamentalist Islamists had been making war on the United States for years, with the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole, the attacks on our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993 (which was intended to topple both towers, but failed), all the way back, in some sense, to the seizure of the U.S. embassy in Tehran back when Jimmy Carter was president. For all those years, they were at war with us, but we largely ignored it. But September 11, 2001 was when we woke up, and realized what was going on. When people talk about the 1,000th casualty in Iraq, it's worth remembering that we had 3,000 casualties in a single day, in America, and that terrorists want to do much, much worse."
"September 11, 2001 wasn't the beginning of this war. In fact, fundamentalist Islamists had been making war on the United States for years, with the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole, the attacks on our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993 (which was intended to topple both towers, but failed), all the way back, in some sense, to the seizure of the U.S. embassy in Tehran back when Jimmy Carter was president. For all those years, they were at war with us, but we largely ignored it. But September 11, 2001 was when we woke up, and realized what was going on. When people talk about the 1,000th casualty in Iraq, it's worth remembering that we had 3,000 casualties in a single day, in America, and that terrorists want to do much, much worse."
Mira Nair's Unknown 9/11 Film
Viewer's of Vanity Fair might be interested to track down a copy of Mira Nair's short docudrama about 9/11, one episode in an anthology film, which according to Tom Plate in the Straits Times, is not being shown in the US:
"Grieving Americans, shocked to discover that not everyone reacted to the World Trade Center massacre the same way, might want to see 11'09'01 September 11. It's an anthology, of sorts, from directors in 11 countries. The Egyptian contribution, by director Youssef Chahine, contains dialogue making the case for terrorist attacks against the US and Israel. India's Mira Nair tells the story of a Pakistani-American who died helping firefighters at the World Trade Center and who, posthumously, became the target of an anti-terrorist probe simply because, as his mother puts it, 'his name wasn't Jesus'- or David or Cary. Curtains go up on the controversial film in France on Sept 11. Americans who want to see it, at this point, will have to go there. It has yet to find a US distributor. Might this be a foretaste of US cultural protectionism? What an unwanted surprise ending that would prove. "
Here are some more details on the film, from ApunKaChoice.Com:
"Mira Nair's vignette dramatises the real life story of Salman Hamdani, an American Muslim medical student who went missing in New York City after the attack and later became a terrorist suspect. The all-American upbringing of the boy came to naught as his family saw neighbours and friends turn against them. Finally, it turned out that Salman had died helping people out of the World Trade Center tower that day. The members of the youth's family took part in the film.
"Nair was later quoted as saying that she wanted to make a film about the reality of life for South Asians in New York City after September 11. 'Life has changed irrevocably, and I think forever. From New York to Jenin to Gujarat, the Islamophobia that has taken over the world disturbs me immensely. As a filmmaker, I thought it was about time we spoke up,' the director of such popularly acclaimed films as 'Salaam Bombay' and 'Monsoon Wedding', told an ethnic Indian newspaper in the US."
Shahid Nahim reported that Nair's 9/11 docudrama was banned in the USA, in Pakistan's Daily Times:
"In the discussion that followed, Mira Nair revealed that the American film distribution association refused to distribute the film. According to them, the film is controversial and political. Hence the Columbia screening might be the only screening in the US. This effective banning of the film has come from Hollywood, which is notorious for making films about disasters and tragedies that have taken place all over the world. The film has been shown in Europe and other parts of the world and has been well received. It is a shame that the US public is unable to see the film � they need to see films of this kind more than any other nation. It is the US public that needs to learn how the rest of the world looks at them and their government. It is they who need to find out that there are other perspectives, other prisms through which events like 9/11 look very different indeed. 9/11, the film, does not present things as black and white or good and evil, unlike the US version of 9/11, where all good lies on one side and all evil on the other. "
"Grieving Americans, shocked to discover that not everyone reacted to the World Trade Center massacre the same way, might want to see 11'09'01 September 11. It's an anthology, of sorts, from directors in 11 countries. The Egyptian contribution, by director Youssef Chahine, contains dialogue making the case for terrorist attacks against the US and Israel. India's Mira Nair tells the story of a Pakistani-American who died helping firefighters at the World Trade Center and who, posthumously, became the target of an anti-terrorist probe simply because, as his mother puts it, 'his name wasn't Jesus'- or David or Cary. Curtains go up on the controversial film in France on Sept 11. Americans who want to see it, at this point, will have to go there. It has yet to find a US distributor. Might this be a foretaste of US cultural protectionism? What an unwanted surprise ending that would prove. "
Here are some more details on the film, from ApunKaChoice.Com:
"Mira Nair's vignette dramatises the real life story of Salman Hamdani, an American Muslim medical student who went missing in New York City after the attack and later became a terrorist suspect. The all-American upbringing of the boy came to naught as his family saw neighbours and friends turn against them. Finally, it turned out that Salman had died helping people out of the World Trade Center tower that day. The members of the youth's family took part in the film.
"Nair was later quoted as saying that she wanted to make a film about the reality of life for South Asians in New York City after September 11. 'Life has changed irrevocably, and I think forever. From New York to Jenin to Gujarat, the Islamophobia that has taken over the world disturbs me immensely. As a filmmaker, I thought it was about time we spoke up,' the director of such popularly acclaimed films as 'Salaam Bombay' and 'Monsoon Wedding', told an ethnic Indian newspaper in the US."
Shahid Nahim reported that Nair's 9/11 docudrama was banned in the USA, in Pakistan's Daily Times:
"In the discussion that followed, Mira Nair revealed that the American film distribution association refused to distribute the film. According to them, the film is controversial and political. Hence the Columbia screening might be the only screening in the US. This effective banning of the film has come from Hollywood, which is notorious for making films about disasters and tragedies that have taken place all over the world. The film has been shown in Europe and other parts of the world and has been well received. It is a shame that the US public is unable to see the film � they need to see films of this kind more than any other nation. It is the US public that needs to learn how the rest of the world looks at them and their government. It is they who need to find out that there are other perspectives, other prisms through which events like 9/11 look very different indeed. 9/11, the film, does not present things as black and white or good and evil, unlike the US version of 9/11, where all good lies on one side and all evil on the other. "
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