Warner Todd Huston's blog

After the last three years of President Obama's graphics and poster art that evokes the style of graphics used in communist propaganda someone in the Old Media has finally discovered the similarity between today's political graphics and communist styled propaganda art. And on top of that another we see another member of the Media calling us all "tea baggers" So which of Obama's posters is the L.A. Times saying is like commie art? Is it the "Hope" poster where Obama stares off into the distance like a communist leader attempting to inspire confidence in the viewer? Is it one of the other many posters that position Obama in similar poses to umpteen communist posters of ages past? Nope, it's Glenn Beck's Taxpayer March logo that caused the Times to finally see a similarity with communist art.

A recent CBS report by Scott Conroy and director of political coverage Steve Chaggaris is typical of the hyperbole to which the Old Media is prone when "reporting" (by that you can read dramatizing) Sarah Palin's political doings.

This report is not as chock full of it as some others that have utilized over-the-top phrases and rhetoric to beat down Palin, but there are a few here that ring typical of the sort of backdoor slams that the Old Media constantly over use in its Palin coverage.

A recent New York Post story brought up a point about the arrest of Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. that few in the Old Media have paid much attention to. Apparently, Gates has since the arrest announced he is in the early stages of involvement in a PBS TV series on civil rights in America. It is odd that this single fact has not been a focus of much discussion.

After all, if Gates is about to start a TV show about civil rights, what better way to punch up that participation than to "suddenly" get mixed up in a national civil rights "abuse" case? What better way to highlight America's civil rights problem than to become a nationally known victim of so-called racism?

Why is no one asking how long Gates has been in the planning stages of this TV show? Was he planning it since before the arrest? It all leads one to wonder if Gates saw an opportunity to gin up interest in his TV appearance by becoming a victim? Instead of experiencing any actual racial tension, did Gates invent his own ready-made, sensational incident to turn his scholarly civil rights discussion into the quintessential TV reality show extravaganza? Was all this just a TV stunt in Gates' mind? Was it mere opportunism?

In an "analysis" on how President Obama is dealing with the race issue, AP writer Charles Babington seems to have based his take on what happened to Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. on the assumption that Gates was arrested for being black in his home, not that he was arrested for disorderly conduct and for his outrageous disrespect for a police officer -- something to which other police officers involved attest, officers that are themselves minorities.

Babington so soft-pedals Obama's gaffe against the police officers, leaving out so many details that, after reading the story, one finds it difficult to understand why Obama's words were so controversial. And it's all in a seeming effort to cover for the president and try to help him reclaim the high ground on race in America. The whole Babington piece appears to be far more of an effort to smooth the waters for Obama instead of provide any actual analysis of the incident.

Calling Obama's reaction to the Gates arrest "understated" and "perhaps obvious," Babington goes on to say that Gates was arrested in his home -- without giving any context at all -- and assumes that even with Obama in the White House race is still a major problem in America.

Over at Media Bistro, we find an odd story that has it all: foul language, boorish behavior, sexual harassment, a male U.S. Navy officer, and a female journalist. Only the story isn’t what you might think it would be considering the ingredients. In this case it is the naval officer filing a complaint against the female reporter for sexual harassment.

Media Bistro has learned that US Navy Commander Jeffrey D. Gordon has filed a sexual harassment complaint against the Miami Herald's Carol Rosenberg with Gordon claiming that Rosenberg made comments about Gordon’s “sexual orientation,” repeatedly showered foul language upon him, and made comments of a sexual nature to him in the presence of others.

Once again Barack Obama waded into territory of which he has no knowledge: American history. Not only did he say during a TV interview that he doesn’t want “victory” in Afghanistan -- because victory is apparently too harsh for the losers -- but he used an example from WWII that never even happened to justify his touchy feely ideas on warfare. So will anyone in the Old Media even realize that the president’s historical example was a muff-up of real history? Will the Old Media make fun of him for his obvious lack of knowledge of our own history?

Let’s try a thought experiment, shall we? When I say “victory,” what do you think of? Do you think of winning the World Series? Do you picture that famous photo of the U.S. Sailor kissing the pretty girl in Time Square as WWII ended? Do you just imagine “winning” at whatever contest is at hand?

In the L.A. Times on July 22, writer Catherine Lyons again revealed a bit of her Bush Derangement Syndrome by calling the war on terror a “so-called war on terror.” What is with these people that simply cannot accept terms of reality? It’s like this every time they use the word terrorism, or “terrorism” as the Old Media so often terms it, and the war on terror. The Old Media simply refuses to understand that terrorism exists, that it is a problem, and that we are at war with terrorists.

This usage of the “so-called” remark was doubly amusing because Lyons threw in her “so-called war on terror” comment into a story about U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder’s visit to a closed meeting of Muslims held in Los Angeles on July 18. Her scoffing at the war on terror seemed geared to let Muslim readers in on the fact that she didn’t believe there was terrorism or that Bush was really fighting a war on terror… wink, wink.

On July 15, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton appeared before the Council on Foreign Relations, the much maligned organization often at the center of many global conspiracy theories.

We won’t talk about the merits of the CFR itself, here, but what made me curious is the treatment that MSNBC gave the Clinton speech. It appears that MSNBC edited out Clinton’s opening statement thanking the CFR for having her. When reading what she said at the outset of the speech one might become suspicious that MSNBC was trying to provide cover for the Secretary of State whose comments opened her up to the tongue wagging of conspiracy buffs.

**Video Below The Fold**

On an interview show called “Give and Take,” hosted by sometime TV pundit Julie Menin, CNN’s Campbell Brown patted herself and her network on the back for being “the only one that is still doing journalism” in cable land.

Menin asked Brown if she felt odd being a “political independent” in this world of cable pundits and lamented that journalism seems to be scant these days. Menin told Brown that at one time, “obviously journalists were independent.” Brown replied by assuming the truth of that “independence” and stated that she and CNN are the only ones “doing journalism” any more.

Menin’s odd assumption, though, that journalists are “political independents” is interesting because of the pervasive left-wing bias that is seen throughout the business. Does Menin think “independent” just means free of conservative ideology but otherwise free to be a liberal?

In How The Huffington Post Can Pay Its Bloggers, HuffPo blogger Michelle Haimoff seems to have gotten a tad miffed at how Arianna Huffington is making millions on the backs of her bloggers without “paying it forward,” as it were. Consequently, Haimoff has developed a prototype scheme on how Arianna can pay her long toiling bloggers to help fulfill her “responsibility” to journalism.

I think that Haimoff, however, misses the point of the Huffington Post. It isn’t now and never was about “journalism.” It’s about left-wing advocacy and advertising sales. Journalists need not apply. As we discussed early in July, journalism isn’t what HuffPo does.

I think this is an example of the distraction that the Internet and the New Media have driven the Old Media to, but it seems that the Ledger-Enquirer of Columbus, Georgia was so amazed that someone finally paid attention to its work that it had to write a whole story about itself to brag about how many webpage hits it got on a recent story by staffer Lily Gordon.

The L-E was all excited that it got "more than 1,000 comments" and received "712,251 page views" after Gordon's July 14 story headlined, "Soldier balks at deploying; says Obama isn’t president."

It looks like Time Magazine’s Karen Tumulty is getting scared that we could be losing the healthcare battle so she is urging Obama to “step in” and fix it all for us. Why, only the dulcet tones of The One could save us all from… wait, isn’t this whole thing his deal in the first place?

What is curious with this piece is the fact that Tumulty seems oblivious to the possibility that if healthcare is failing to win the day, that failure could be squarely laid at the president’s feet. After all, it is his campaign promise and his “highest priority” that we tackle healthcare. Yet Tumulty, while mildly scolding Obama for not being hands on enough, is all too willing to blame everyone but Obama for the floundering of the debate.

Here’s another one of those wonderful examples of how the Old Media will use a headline that makes a stark claim about how rotten Republicans are for opposing a Democratic plan while at the same time conveniently ignoring the opposition to the same idea among Democrats.

This time it is the “partisan divide” in the healthcare debate. The Times tsks Republicans for solidly lining up to oppose Obama’s wild grab for nearly 20 percent of the nation’s economy through his healthcare plans. Yet not once does the Times mention the many areas in which Democrats are disagreeing with Democrats on Obamacare. The Times makes it seem as if there is no dissent among Democrats and it is only those meanie Republicans holding up the wonderfulness of Obamacare.

You know when a liberal has lost any capability to understand the common American when they completely miss the pain that liberal tax hikers cause the average citizen in this country. Charlie Cook recently showed this elitist attitude in a National Journal column on the outrageous costs of the Cap and Trade bill – better called the Cap and Tax bill. Of course, to him, the tax hike on the average American is not a big deal and he doesn’t understand how anyone could be upset over it all.

Cook is perplexed why Washington pols were “getting an earful” from constituents over the energy tax hikes that the Cap and Trade bill will force on the nation. He just couldn’t figure why adding “only” an additional $175 a year to the average citizen’s electric bill was such a big deal.

**Video Below the Fold**

If you want to see how liberals in the media “do” their thing, nothing has been a better example than the analysis by CNN’s Jeffery Toobin. We’ve highlighted some on-air work of his Sotomayor coverage, but he also has a written piece on CNN.com that is a perfect example of how the left spins rhetoric to legitimize leftist precepts.

In his July 13 piece, for instance, Toobin calls Sotomayor a “cautious and careful liberal” like Ginsburg and Breyer. So, it makes one wonder, has Toobin ever called anyone on the right a “cautious and careful conservative”?

Over the last few weeks dozens of Iranians yearning for a more democratic government, striving to beat back the oppressive Mullahs, desperate to live free, have been killed in the streets of Iran during democratic protests. In China Uighurs and members of the religious sect Falun Gong are constantly attacked, imprisoned, tortured and killed for their ethnicity or beliefs by Chinese officials. Not long ago Buddhist Monks were killed by police for their protests in the streets of Myanmar. And on a nearly daily basis, members of the Taliban are killing villagers for not observing their oppressive rule in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

We live in times of violent protests tearing at some of the most oppressive governments in the world. And so, Australia's ABC fielded a report about one "violent" protest experienced by one of its own reporters. Was it murderous Islamists attacking villagers? How about Chinese thugs killing ethnics? Perhaps it was an Iranian Mullah ordered massacre of citizens wanting democracy that frightened her so much?

Uh, no. It was Orthodox Jews that spit on her.

Hey, grandma, hurry up and die so that Obamacare can pay for healthcare for more worthy, younger folks. That seems to be the message that The New York Times is selling in order to smooth the waters for the nationalized healthcare system that president Obama is trying to peddle to us all.

The Times is running a series titled "Months to Live" in order to help spread the sort of end of life issues that are helpful to Obama's healthcare agenda, one of which seems to be the idea that elderly should forgo any sort of heroic measures to keep them alive so as not to waste those resources that might be able to go to younger, more vital patients.

Have you ever met someone that just can't stop talking about a particular topic or person regardless of the subject of conversation? Folks like that slip their obsession into every conversation until people just don't even want to start up a conversation with them any more. And when an unsuspecting person starts talking with such a person, everyone in the know around them just roll their eyes and avoid eye contact. It is beginning to get like this when reading anything in the Old Media these days because it seems that regardless of the topic under discussion, start struck love for Obama is slipped into the piece somehow.

Detroit News columnist Marney Rich Keenan gives us a perfect example of this in hers headlined, "Whatever happened to simple phone etiquette?" It's supposed to be a piece lamenting the loss of the formal way of answering a telephone and really has nothing to do with politics. Keenan waxes nostalgic for that formal way of talking to folks and seems to say this loss is a cultural coarsening that is something to mourn... except when Obama does it, of course. Yes, when The One does it, why it's cool and hip and makes her "go weak in the knees."

In this report we get a nice one-two punch. Not only are we seeing Democrats once again refusing even a tiny compromise with Republicans on Obama's takeover of nearly 20% of our economy with his healthcare plans, but we also get to see another example of why Huffington Post is not journalism. I like a nice one-two punch for a Wednesday.

For one thing, the HuffPo article hilariously calls Democrat pitbull Rahm Emanuel a “conservative Democrat.” But let's start with the more important political point and deal with the HuffPo chicanery second.

Orlando Sentinel movie reviewer Roger Moore was excited to report on the efforts of some Harry Potter fans that want to "change the world" based on their interpretation of Potter character Dumbledore's philosophy of life. He was happy, you see, because the group is all about "global transformation" and spreading global warming fears, gay marriage and the Employee Free Choice Act.

Moore writes abut a group called the Harry Potter Alliance whose website is a sort of Potter fan message board where fans write about what they are doing with their ideas on Potter philosophy. But, it goes "beyond the personal," Moore approvingly says.

It seems that on July fourth, The New York Times saw fit to smirk at both American patriotism and Christianity. A recent Times article about the erection of a giant, though strategically altered, replica of the Statue of Liberty by a showman of a Memphis pastor presented a perfect example of the ridicule and disdain with which the Times views Christianity and American patriotism, both. In Memphis, Tennessee, writer Shalia Dewan could barely hide her sarcasm and distaste for the patriotism and the muscular Christianity espoused by Pastor Alton R. Williams in her coverage of the unveiling of the 72-foot-tall statue.

Tellingly, the entire top third of Dewan's piece is filled with mockery, mischacterization, inapt comparison and quote after quote from Pastor Williams' detractors. It isn't until the initial ridicule is over that writer Dewan finally gives the pastor room to explain what his purpose and principle is in creating the odd pean to Lady Liberty.

For the Associated Press, Tim Klass shows that taking liberties with facts by enveloping them in wild hyperbole can sex up a boring story into something much more alarming. Unfortunately, what one ends up with is not a presentation of news, but a promulgation of a narrative that befits a particular political agenda. And this time writer Klass uses his hyperbolic style to advance the guns-are-evil story line.

The headline startles the reader by screaming out "Powerful weapons found in Northwest drug raids." One immediately imagines an image of dozens of high powered and dangerous guns, those above and beyond the norm, in the hands of these felonious drug dealers. One imagines enough guns to arm an army with the police sorely out numbered. But, when the story is read in its entirety, it becomes obvious that "powerful weapons" turns into one high powered pistol, the rest being your average, everyday firearms seen all over the place.

Meghan Daum of the L.A. Times has had an epiphany. The story of adulterous South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford is still in the news, she's decided, because America's men see themselves reflected in him. Yes, Daum apparently feels that all men are adulterers, so they sympathize with him causing the story to keep bumping along.

Daum spies some "gasp--empathy" for the governor in various corners of the Old Media and this, she has decided, must mean that there is a "tiny bit of Mark Sanford" in men across the country. One wonders if Daum spied this same lecherous "sympathy" abounding among Democrats when a certain president was wagging his finger in our faces and saying he "did not have sexual relations with that woman, Monica"?

Betcha she didn't. As a matter of fact, I'll bet no such thing crossed her mind as the Clinton's Monica-gate raged on and on.

If you listen to the blabbers and gossipers, the Huffington Post is the talk of the town. It is claimed that Arianna Huffington's "success" is the "new journalism," the future of the news. TechNewsWorld proclaimed it "appropriate" that Huffington appeared in the YouTube series on journalism apparently because she personifies it. The New York Times celebrated HuffPo as "hybrid journalism" for its Iran coverage. Jeff Jarvis of The Guardian claims that Arianna is "saving journalism." She was even just awarded the Fred Dressler Lifetime Achievement Award in journalism from Syracuse University. She even testified before a Congressional committee on journalism. And the list of accolades goes on.

But, what sort of "journalism" does Huffington Post represent? Is it the well researched sort with multiple links, named sources, or other such common journalistic practices? Most often no. In fact, those that write for Huffington Post rarely even bother with the normal journalistic practices of research, attribution, or the habit of having more than one source. Sadly, the largest bulk of what Huffington writers do is merely opine whether they have sourced information or not. And more often than not they do so from the extreme left-wing perspective.

Huffington Post is not "journalism." It's really just that simple.

Over at TVBytheNumbers.com, we see that CNN has come in third to FoxNews and MSNBC respectively for weekday primetime ratings during the second quarter of this year. This is the first time that MSNBC has come out ahead of CNN ever.

Unfortunately for those of us wishing for a well informed public, it is the Keith Olbermann show that is driving MSNBC's ratings gain over CNN. Apparently Americans are desperately in need of comedy since last January.

The San Francisco Chronicle is proving the old bromide true. That's the one that goes: "a lie can be half way 'round the world before the truth can pull its boots on" (often incorrectly attributed to Mark Twain). Then there is another one Twain didn't originate but aptly fits here, "there are three kinds of lies: Lies, damned lies and statistics." The subject of this scoffing is that factoid the Old Media has been promulgating like gospel where "90% of Mexico's confiscated guns are from the U.S."

The problem with this "90%" refrain is that it just isn't true. There is no truth in the claim that 90% of the guns Mexican officials confiscate from drug dealers in Mexico are from the U.S.A. But, true or not, the Old Media use this line as if it were received truth. Suspicions are easily raised that they do so because it fits their ideological matrix perfectly and the truth of the matter does not fit the approved story line.

Apparently, YouTube doesn't think that a conservative journalist has anything to say to help all you budding citizen journalists out there. A glance at the denizens of the Old Media offered up as journalism experts on the Internet video giant will show a long list of well known lefties with not a single center or center right professional in the mix.

On April 30, YouTube set up a channel dedicated to a sort of how-to instruction manual or an online media 101 class that folks interested in becoming citizen journalists can watch to help them learn some of the tricks of the Media trade. Ostensibly, this will help the average, every day blogger present his work in a more professional way. This is a great idea, by the way. Many blogs could use some tips on better writing and presentation, interview skills, and video presentation if not an occasional editor -- and I should know on that last one!

For Time Magazine, Kevin O'Leary has decided that he's figured out why California is in such a budget mess. Is it because the state indulges over generous social programs, or always has some of the highest taxes in the nation, or because the denizens of its capitol in Sacramento are paragons of waste, fraud and theft? Nope. It's because California has Proposition 13, a measure that prevents state government from too easily raising taxes. Yep, O'Leary thinks California is in a mess because it doesn't have high enough taxes. And it's all Reagan's fault.

With some of the highest taxes in America, California is a hard place to make a living. According to the Tax Foundation, on average it takes a citizen 110 working days to earn enough money to pay his yearly tax bill. That is the fourth worst in the country. California consistently ranks in or near the top 10 worst states for its tax burdens from property taxes, to corporate taxes, to individual taxes and fees of all sorts. So, how can O'Leary imagine that taxes aren't high enough in California?

Sorry I didn't get to this until two days later, but I figured someone else would have written about this by now. Since no one did, for those of you that are curious, Obama's super special, ultra spectacular healthcare infomercial was a dud in the ratings last Wednesday night.

ABC's Barackspactacular Healthcare Extravaganza (I think that was the official name of the show, wasn't it?) went up against the NBC premiere of "The Philanthropist," widely panned as disappointing, and a repeat of "CSI: NY" on CBS, widely seen as already once widely seen. Unfortunately for ABC, its prop"O"ganda special got a dismal 1.2 rating to the 2.0 and 1.8 ratings respectively for the entertainment competition.

Apparently the TV show where he's president but plays a doctor on TV didn't go over well. The "Super-dooper, Obamalicious, Doctor Spock medicine woman show" was only able to cajole 4.703 million viewers into watching while NBC picked up 7.414 and CBS got 7.393 in the ten O'Clock hour. Remembering that we have 300 million citizens and healthcare is supposed to be the biggest emergency in history, well, that is a paltry number of viewers that Doc Barack got.