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Sean Hannity calling President Obama on Fox News Channel a "socialist" every night in prime time on the Fox News Chanel is only the visible tip of the conservative propaganda iceberg. The Right's real power lies in its ability to shape the narrative and define what is fair and out of bounds for the rest of the media.
Last week MSNBC reported the following:
"So you may not hear Mitt Romney say 'Keep America American' anymore, because it was a rallying cry for the KKK group, intimidation against blacks, gays and Jews, and the progressive AMERICAblog was the first to catch on to that."
Within hours, so-called liberals at MSNBC like Chris Matthews and Al Sharpton were falling over themselves to see who could offer the most debasing, abject apology to Mitt Romney.
Predictably, the rest of the so-called mainstream media and more of the "Liberal Media Establishment" weighed in on the issue, all to denounce MSNBC and to portray Romney as an innocent victim.
As recent as last night, Bill O'Reilly and fellow right-wing media ideologist Bernard Goldberg hashed over the affair in Prime Time. The focus of their debate was whether NBC did enough in their apologizing or whether they were still evil because of their so-called liberal bias.
The otherwise normally sensible Mediaite.com describes the story this way:
"It turns out, the (MSNBC's) story was not exactly true. ..."
There is only one little problem with all of this hysteria. MSNBC's story that Romney said "keep America American" and that this was a phrase used by the Klan appears to be 100% factual and truthful!
The Romney campaign initially refused to respond to this story for two days. Finally, they claimed that Romney never said "Keep America, American." They claim he said "Keep America, America." The central point of evidence is a video you can see here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?f...
When I play the video to various people, most claim they hear Romney saying "Keep America American" (I definitely do). But to be fair, a few do hear Romney saying "Keep America America." But here's what isn't a close call. The Los Angeles Times reporter on December 9, 2011 reported that Romney said this: "We have on one side a president who wants to transform America into a European-style nation, and you have on the other hand someone like myself that wants to turn around America and keep America American with the principals that made us the greatest nation on Earth. And I will do that with your help."
Was the reporter ever contacted by the Romney campaign demanding a retraction? Are there comments on the LATimes website at the time of the story (this was before the controversy broke out)?
No and no.
So now we are supposed to believe that The Los Angeles Times reporter just makes up stuff and that most people who hear Romney on this video with their own ears saying "Keep America American" should disbelieve their own ears and instead put their trust in the Romney campaign's press release.
This stretches credulity.
Another school of thought in most of the media reporters is that MSNBC was horribly irresponsible for not providing more context to the story, presumably to cast Romney in a more favorable light.
Fair enough; let's parse the phrase "Keep America American." After all, it truly would be unfair to pick a random phrase like "I love America" or "I am a vegetarian" and show that the Klan or a Nazi had once used the phrase. But "Keep America American" is not that general. It's not a phrase that easily floats from everyone's mouth. The phrase had a specific meaning in the 1920s and it has one today. The similarity is that in both cases, what it means is this "My ideas and principles are good and the ideals and values of people who oppose us are bad. And these ideas are bad because they got their ideas from other countries and other parts of the world. We should reject their ideas and values not just because they are bad but specifically because their ideas originated from other parts of the world."
It doesn't matter how you slice or dice it, the phrase "Keep America American" is a rhetorical cheap shot used by demagogues in the act of committing demagoguery. No, it doesn't mean Romney is a closet Klansman, but it does mean he uses rhetorical cheap shots that have a long tradition and it's fair game to point out their tradition.
So are we being unfair to Romney for looking at the phrase he used and inferring one set of ideas when he was really implying something else? NO. Just look at the full quote above. Romney is rejecting Obama and his ideas, specifically because Obama's ideas are European. That's what makes them bad, they aren't from America-get it?
What O'Reilly and all of the right wing echo chamber have been doing for the last week is tending to the media landscape. And what they have done, to a remarkable degree of success, is to say that any suggestion of racism among prominent republicans is out of bounds. In the conservative media establishment's worldview, there is no such thing as racism among conservatives. Only liberals can be racist. Therefore any story that hints at or suggests that a conservative is racist is inherently wrong and demands an immediate denunciation and retraction.
This bit of zeitgeist shaping was done with such efficiency and collaboration that it left the other side helpless.
In the conservative world view, it is quite Ok to brand Obama a "socialist" or even a "communist" if he does something so radical as suggesting Richard Nixon's healthcare plan. Never mind that socialism and communism are hated ideologies by most Americans and is represented by regimes such as Cambodia's where 7 million people were slaughtered by a genocidal communist. No, that's considered completely fair, and normal because, well, because that's what every conservative gets away with in the media every day.
But no one is ever allowed to compare any extreme Republican rhetoric with, say, fascists or racists. That's considered automatically beyond the pale. There is an un-written rule imposed by the conservative media establishment and accepted by even liberal mainstream media:
"Thou shalt not accuse any Republican of doing anything even mildly racist or even racist-friendly unless you can capture video tape of the republican saying 'I hate all black people and want to string them all up and kill them!'"
The result is a media climate where any ambitious, smart reporter pulls his/her punches when reporting on Republicans. Don't report anything that can tie a Republican to an extremist cause or organization, even if the facts bear it out. Instead, use that time to report that Obama isn't a citizen or that Bill Clinton made a fortune on Whitewater or that House Democrats want to wage "class warfare" because they want to raises taxes to the same rates they were in 1994.
The strongest form of power is away the subtlest and Conservatives have both overt and subtle power to get the media, all the media, to sell their propaganda.
Tish Chafin has announced in an email that she plans to file for the West Virginia Supreme Court in January. She is currently ranked 4th in the Democratic Primary, but is expected to gain polling points after the first of the year.
How do you feel about Tish Chafin and her candidacy for the Supreme Court?
Below is the complete email sent from Chafin.
Dear Supporter,
On January 9, 2012, I plan to officially file my candidacy papers for the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia with the Secretary of State's Office. This same evening, there will be an official filing fundraising reception in Charleston at the Marriott.
Your support is greatly appreciated, and it would be an honor if you would lend your name to the invitation as a host for this event. As a candidate on the Democratic ticket, May 8, 2012, I plan to run a well-organized and successful campaign. Supporters and friends like you are what will make this possible.
The Honorable W. Kent Carper has agreed to chair my campaign committee. Oshel Craigo serves as the chair of my fundraising committee. In addition, Anthony Majestro volunteered to serve as the campaign attorney, and Chuck Smith serves as the campaign treasurer.
Rainmaker, Inc. is heading up the campaign operation, and Cartney McCracken is coordinating the January 9th reception. Please email her at Cartney@chafin2012.com regarding how you would like your name to appear on the invitation if you agree to serve as a host.
I am extremely honored by the support I have received as a pre-candidate for this office, and I would be humbled to receive your support for my candidacy as well.
Republican darling South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley has some explaining to do about her forming a nonpartisan committee to study creation of a state health exchange to help the uninsured:
Meanwhile, back in May, the Charleston Post & Courier filed a Freedom of Information request with the governor's office for information on the committee. For its efforts, the paper received some press releases and nothing of great interest. Then in November the newspaper filed an almost identical public records request with the Department of Health and Human Services.
This time, the answer included a number of emails to and from the governor, which had either conveniently not been saved by Haley's office or just not included in the May response.
Among them was a message from Haley to her top aides and the person who wrote the committee's report seven months later - DHHS Director Tony Keck - telling everybody up front that despite the wording of her own order, the point of the panel was not to consider the idea of a state health exchange but "to figure out how to opt out and how to avoid a federal takeover, NOT create a state exchange."
Given that bombshell, revealed by the newspaper last week, those committee members unaware of the plan, who spent hours debating, researching and investigating in the faith that they were actually doing something, were understandably upset. One person involved called the whole thing "kabuki theater - all for show." The story so far - dictating the outcome of a supposedly independent, nonpartisan committee beforehand, and then omitting public records from a response to a FOI request - was bad enough. But then came the stonewalling, backtracking, obfuscation and deflection as the office bristled at being called out.
For my generation, the end of a war is something of a foreign concept. I was 22 years old when we went into Iraq, and for most of my adult life, our country has been at war in Iraq.
Our military has fought valiantly throughout those nine years, fulfilling every mission it was given, even though it seemed at times as if our occupation would be indefinite.
But on Thursday at a ceremony in Baghdad, our military leaders cased its colors and left the country. By the holidays, our troops will be home with their families.
For those of us who supported Barack Obama in 2008 in part because of our shared opposition to the Iraq War, this is a significant day. The leader we helped elect has kept his word and brought this war to a responsible end.
We are also proud that our President has restored our image around the world and relationships with allies, both of which had been tested by our involvement in Iraq. The President rightly refocused our attention on Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the 9/11 terror plot was hatched, and has eliminated more than half of al Qaeda's leadership - including, of course, Osama bin Laden.
While the end of a war may be new to young Americans, the return of our veterans is something we know well. My generation takes great pride in our military and what it has accomplished, including this new era of democracy for the Iraqi people who, starting today, will determine the future of their nation.
The President takes seriously his responsibility to ensure that everyone whose service made this day possible can get the care and benefits they earned. And we support the President's fulfillment of another promise: to make sure our Iraq veterans can go to college at no cost, get quality healthcare and get the training they need to find a job in the civilian workforce. He's also encouraging companies to hire our veterans and put them back to work - a plan that will help not only those companies and veterans, but also our economy as a whole.
As we celebrate the end of a war, we keep close to our hearts the memories of 4,500 brave Americans - many of them young Americans like us - who gave everything for our country. They are my generation's truest heroes.
Washington, D.C. - U.S. Representative Nick J. Rahall (D-WV) Friday joined the call of Members of the House Education and Workforce Committee, led by Ranking Member George Miller (D-CA), for the U.S. Department of Justice to vigorously investigate and pursue prosecution of individuals whose actions led to the April 2010 deaths of 29 miners at the Upper Big Branch (UBB) mine in Montcoal, Raleigh County.
"From the very day of the disaster at UBB, I have stood with the families of the 29 miners who perished and called for answers and accountability. We now know, beyond any doubt, what caused that explosion, but we have yet to see the justice that those men and their families deserve," said Rahall. "I appreciate the leadership shown by Congressman Miller and other Members of the Education and Workforce Committee who are, again, standing up for those families and pressing for prosecution of those who so callously risked the lives of the UBB miners."
I am not going to post her entire diary here. Go to DK to read it: I'm Sue Thorn and I'm Running for Congress. If you have time tonight, drop by and chat with her and her supporters.
This has been a magical week for her campaign. Sue spent Tuesday and Wednesday in Washington and came back with promises of help from major national organizations. Teacherken at Dailykos offered to provide advice and assistance, which has resulted in her first diary making it on to the rec list at DK.
Sue had her diary ready to go this afternoon when Mike Oliverio made his announcement that he was not going to run. I don't think that he was trying to help us, but the timing could not have been better. Thanks, Mike, and best wishes in your future endeavors!
Right-wing lunacy has won again! MSNBC yesterday forced itself to apologize for telling the truth about Mitt Romney's rhetorical ties to the Ku Klux Klan.
Here's the background: The good folks at Americablog.com reported that Mitt Romney has again used the phrase "keep America American" in a recent speech. The journalists at the site then factually noted that this was a phrase widely used by Ku Klux Klansman in the 1920 and was even used in their recruitment literature. Further, it was noted that Romney has a nasty habit of smearing Obama on any policy disagreement by claiming Obama "wants to transform America into a European style nation." Get it, Obama is un-American if he wants, say, basic health care common to, say, Austria. Yet conservatives who routinely cite their belief in a field of economics founded in, say, Austria, are claimed by Romney and other conservatives to be good, right-thinking Americans.
Next, here is what MSNBC reported yesterday:
So you may not hear Mitt Romney say "Keep America American" anymore, because it was a rallying cry for the KKK group, and intimidation against blacks, gays and Jews, and the progressive AMERICAblog was the first to catch on to that.
As Americablog has since pointed out, MSNBC merely reported two indisputable facts: 1. The phrase Keep America American" was a phrase widely used by the Klan. 2. Romney has used this phrase and is unlikely to use it again.
I will give a free dinner on me to any reader who can point out the factual errors in that report. Typically, when news organizations make obsequious apologies, it is for getting facts wrong, not getting facts 100% right, as in this case.
So how did the ostensibly pro-Democratic Chris Matthews react to this news report? Here's what Matthews said:
It was irresponsible and incendiary of us to do this and it showed an appalling lack of judgment. We apologize; we really do, to the Romney Campaign.
So in the Chris Matthews/MSNBC worldview, it's not irresponsible or incendiary for a presidential candidate of the conservative party to pander to conservative white voters by using the rhetoric of the Klan. It is irresponsible and incendiary of a news organization to report well-documented facts that might make a Republican candidate look bad.
Nor does Matthews think it is incendiary for Romney to say things like this: "he (Obama) takes his political inspiration from Europe, and from the socialist-democrats in Europe."
This is insanity!
Of course I can understand MSNBC's position. After all, why spend valuable time reporting actual facts about Republican Presidential candidates when it's so much more fun to report "debates" on utter nonsense on how Obama was born in Kenya, how Obama is a Muslim, and how Obama wages class warfare and numerous other right-wing memes.
Romney, to his credit, is basically the only Republican candidate who hasn't called Obama a socialist or communist. So we are supposed to grade him as the enlightened one and so it's supposed to be unfair to make him look bad on these sorts of things. After all, nobody, myself included, really things that Romney is a bigot or endorses Klan philosophies. But the problem is that a lot of dangerous demagogues of the past didn't really believe their own demagoguery. They used it because it worked.
It's important to note that people who knew George Wallace didn't think he was really a racist. It's just that in his first gubernatorial Wallace ran as a liberal, integrationist on race relations and lost. So he simply switched positions for pragmatic reasons and vowed that he would "never be out-nigg*!d again." Hmm...a pragmatic politician who first ran as a liberal and then moved right out of pragmatic concerns...sound familiar?
We are supposed to give Romney a pass because compared to the Rush Limbaugh/Glenn Beck/Mark Levin/Sean Hannity/Herman Cain/Newt Gingrich demagogues on the right who routinely traffic in socialistic/communistic/un-American slurs, Romney looks like a flaming liberal. But that is a low bar indeed.
This whole sordid episode is a perfect example of how the right-wing establishment has completely taken over the media in the US. Fox News is merely the clubhouse. But make no mistake about it, the ten gazillion right wing "think tanks," media criticism institutes, talk show hosts, bloggers and pundits, have been "working the refs" (as right-winger William Kristol once conceded) for so long that all mainstream reporters and hosts and even supposed Democratic host and pundits have been cowed.
We now live in world where the only valid criticism of politicians is when it is directed at Democrats. Criticism of Republicans is, ipso facto, illegitimate and therefore must be retracted immediately, as happened yesterday.
I'm half-way tempted to produce a 30-second anti-Romney attack TV ad using footage of his "keep America American" sound bites and then juxtaposing it with quotes and a voiceover from KKK literature, but given, shall we say, the "proclivities" of the Tea Party, that might actually help Romney win the nomination.
In a very quick and dirty move to subvert the will of the select committee on Marcellus drilling regs, ERT substituted his own industry favored bill at the last minute before calling a special session and rammed it through before Christmas holiday with few amendments and little opposition. Last time ERT was in Martinsburg he spoke about the need for democrats to stick together and support each other which was well received by the partisan crowd of supporters at his victory party. Weeks later he shoves an industry sponsored bill with his signature on it down the throats of an interim special call just before Christmas knowing it would pass....unbelievable, Merry Christmas ERT!
My office just got off the phone with Erin Kelly, head of political ad sales at the Fox News Channel. She told us our ad "French Romney" was rejected because everything Fox airs "has to be truthful."
No, I'm not making this up. 60 seconds after the call ended, Erin called back to clarify. She says our ad was rejected because it was "misleading."
Really.
Because if it's one thing we can all agree with, there would never be anything on the airwaves at Fox that a fair-minded person could construe as misleading.<!--more-->
To borrow a phrase from Fox, "We report, you decide" Here is the ad in question below.
Jessica Lynch became a soldier so she could go to college. She graduates on Friday:
MORGANTOWN, W.Va.-- Jessica Lynch was just 19 when the world first saw her - a broken, blond soldier caught on combat video in Iraq, her face wearing something between a grimace and a grin.
The Army supply clerk was being carried on a stretcher after nine days as a prisoner of war. She had been captured along with five others after the 507th Maintenance Company took a wrong turn and came under attack in Nasiriyah on March 23, 2003. Eleven of her fellow soldiers died.
Lynch had joined the Army at 18 to earn money for college and become a school teacher. This Friday, at 28, she completes that mission.
She'll spend Thursday finishing her training as a student teacher at the same elementary school she attended in sparsely populated Wirt County. Then, on badly damaged legs and a right foot that still pains her, she'll walk across a stage Friday evening and get her education degree from West Virginia University at Parkersburg.
Don Blankenship is filing papers to get back in the mining business. (h/t Crook and Liars.) Read the post here.
Don Blankenship, the former CEO of Massey Energy, who was cited as having the worst fatality rate in the mining industry prior to the 29 deaths at the Upper Big Branch explosion in April 2010, has filed paperwork to open new mines. Blankenship lost his job as CEO but faced no other penalties and paid no real price for the lives that were lost under his watch. He filed the paperwork on behalf of McCoy Coal Group Inc. of Belfry, Ky., in January, although the company has not sought a new mining permit.
Massey under Blankenship had a legacy that should prohibit him from ever working in the field of mining again.
Making it easier to export energy from North America, and that is what the Keystone project really would do, would not benefit West Virginia's coal or natural gas industries.
So when false claims are made about the number of jobs created, keep in mind that's not taking into account the number of jobs that would be lost here.
The Alliance for American Manufacturing (AAM) came out today in support of legislation introduced by Congressman Nick J. Rahall, II (D-WV), the Ranking Member on the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, that would strengthen Buy America laws and would require Federal agencies to be more transparent in reporting where taxpayer dollars are being spent.
I for one was appalled to find out the steel for the replacement of earthquake damaged bridges in the San Francisco area was foreign. Nicky Ray and a lot of other people know it doesn't make any sense.
Booman makes a good point that Mitt Romney's upcoming loss in Iowa is going to hurt his viability. A loss to a credible opponent is one thing. Losing to the fellow clowns riding in the GOP clown car is another.
Wednesday evening Sue Thorn held her first campaign rally, at which she formally announced her candidacy for the 1st Congressional seat. On a frigid weekday night, a year before the election, 175 people showed up from all over the district to hear Sue's message. There were elected officials, political activists, political novices, union members, business owners, young and old. Twelve counties in the district were represented- many people drove more than an hour to attend the event in Morgantown. Sue gave a rousing speech. Judging from the cheers, comments, and donations people liked what they heard.
This capped an amazing week for the Sue Thorn campaign.
Last Friday I posted my first diary about Sue's campaign to take back the WV-01 congressional seat and it immediately made the rec list. West Virginia Blue asked me to cross-post it there.
Over 175 people showed up yesterday evening in Morgantown to hear Sue Thorn formally announce that she is running for Congress. There were people from eleven different counties in the 1st Congressional District, including those who made the long drives from Ohio, Marshall, and Wood Counties. There were elected officials, the press, county Democratic Executive Committee members, business owners, union workers, students, and just plain folks.
Please call the governor's office TODAY, thursday Dec 1st and ask him to call for a special session on Marcellus Gas drilling regulations. Ask that the regs be improved not watered down. The number is 888-438-2731. You will be asked to give your name. I called minutes ago and felt the lady in the governor's office was very nice.
The Labor Department announced earlier today that its Mine Safety and Health Administration would be releasing the report of its investigation into the Upper Big Branch Mine Disaster on Dec. 6.
MSHA has scheduled a media briefing for 3 p.m. at the National Mine Health and Safety Academy outside of Beckley, W.Va.
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