Prairie Recommends: Frank Rich

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As Frank Rich reminds us, Cronkite was a helluva lot more than pulling off his glasses that dark November day.

And the "journalists" of today are too often a helluva lot less.
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From A to W — A Short Herstory of Rightwing Screeders

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From Ann Coulter to Wendy Long, with a sidetrip via Liz Chee-knee and Laura Ingraham and all the other blondoids [yes, Monica Crowley, you are merely one of the other blondoids....] the right has inflicted on us in recent years, the prime unifying thread is their fast talking, overtalking screedarageousness against anything Democratic or liberal or progressive, or...may I finish??????...or American.

The rightwing has honed its blonde verbal bombthrowers to a fine edge over the years, using the tools of sexual subtext...flip that mane, sweetie pie...run those talons fingers through those oxidized locks...but just maybe the tide is turning.

I do believe I did actually hear Chris Matthews abruptly cut into Wendy Long's filibuster of nonanswerousness on Hardball. Could it be the era of drooling idiot male anchorishism [with a strong emphasis on "ish"] has run its course?

Maybe there are Mrs. Matthewses and Mrs. Stephanopouli and company out there who have finally stamped their feet and said ferchrissake you look like a damn pussy-whipped pimply faced kid fool out there. Snap out of it!

Time will tell. Maybe these anchors feel they have to act the part of the yes, I'm gonna say it, hornier demographic of their audience.

But this red-headed gramma for one is going to say: enough already, guys. Shape up or get left behind. And wipe your chin.
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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette

Wheels Coming Off the Imus Wagon?

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This morning, RFD-TV censored comedy bits by two of Imus' sidekicks. Admittedly Rob Bartlett's routine as Dice Clay yesterday was beyond raunchy for RFD's audience. But then that's what remote buttons are made for.

In a possibly inadvertent admission, another sidekick, Bernie, bantering with Imus about Neil Cavuto's too busy to appear syndrome, let slip that their touting Fox Business News is a "billboard" that is paid for.

I'm shocked, shocked I tell you, that there's gamblin' in that there casino.

What does this all prove? For one thing, that the media should be as forthcoming about their "special interests" as we want the politicians to be. And that the change and clean-up that this country so desperately needs covers a lot more than Pennsylvania Avenue.

On the bright side, better to be confirmed a whore than thought a fool
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Roxana's Two Minutes

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Roxana Saberi, currently imprisoned in Iran, finally had a scant two minutes to talk to her parents in Fargo Monday. She is, she told them, unharmed.

The family's attorney met with her Sunday and his recounting of that meeting to her father was also limited to two minutes.

Roxana is a student in Iran and has reported from there for the BBC, for NPR and others. Initial reports said she was arrested for buying a bottle of wine. Later, that was changed to say that she was arrested for reporting after her press credential stopped in 2006.

There have been big events hereabouts this week—in sports, in weather—but this is news that needs recounting.

There have been big events in the world this week—spree shootings, preening pundits pontificating on politics, Bristol's breakup. And the big media maw scoops 'em up and moves quickly on to the next.

We'd all do well to remember that real events keep on keeping on. They happen to real people. And one of those people is Roxana Saberi.
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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette

Howie the K's Moral Outrage

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Oh, my, Howie Kurtz is on a tear this morning. Ripping into Carville and Begala for tainting his precious CNN with their presence as guest pundits because they may have been too cozy with their ol' buddy Rahm about the matter of Drug-Rush Limbaugh.

And minutes later, reading with sarcasm dripping from his tongue, clips from newspapers that may imply that the media themselves are too cozy with the new O-crowd in DC.

I admit I was in and out a bit, so I may have missed his takedown of Roger Ailes, the head of an entire network that a whole lot of people actually think is a news channel, for saying they were going to battle against Obama until the last shot is fired.... Anybody see that? Did it happen?

That takes what one Kurtz guest called "narrowcasting"--instead of broadcasting--to a whole new level...of muck. And probably also explains the recent metamorphosis of CNBC from an obscure business network into the Santellized conservative network of GE-NBC.

Maybe Kurtz should look to his own political biases and cozy relationships and make them transparent. As Joan Walsh constructively noted at one point in the Begala Carville blather, she has no problem with them being on

Why Roxana Saberi Matters

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Roxana Saberi has some pretty high-powered voices speaking out for her release these days. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urges her prompt freedom while expressing frustration at the difficulty of the current lack of direct diplomatic contacts. The Swiss are acting as intermediaries.

As well they should, given their collusion in robbing American citizens of tax resources by their complicity in the UBS secrecy scandal. But that's a subject for another time.

Hopefully the heavy hitters will produce speedy results and Roxana will be able to return to North Dakota and her waiting parents.

There's a teacher waiting for her, too, one of many. And her words about Roxana, her caring, are told within the context of the larger truth about what she teaches in her journalism classes, summed up in these words she cites of Pete Hamill:

Journalists are

“chosen by the tribe to carry the torch to the back of the cave and tell others what is there in the darkness.”

That journalism, the noble kind worth practicing, is not based on how combative you can be in the White House press room, or how well you steno partisan spin to maintain your access, or any of the other warts that have befallen too much of the top o'the heap of the journalism profession.

Roxana may have been reporting beyond her legal authorization as Iranian representatives allege...once they stopped schlepping the "she bought a bottle of wine" story. Or she may have been completing her master's degree studies and compiling material for her book-in-progress.

But for those of us who have heard and seen her reporting, here in Fargo and from Tehran, we know she has stood head and shoulders above the precious prima donnas that pose and pontificate on too much of punditized media these days.

Hers is a voice of quiet reason that spoke with clarity about the people of Iran amid all the saber-rattling that the Military Industrial Media Class has been doing during the Bushie Era.

We look forward to when that voice is restored, that child of Fargo, that woman comes home.

Please follow this link and read Cathy McMullen's column from Fargo's Forum Thursday. Cathy is a professor at Concordia College where Roxana was her student.
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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette

Where Is Roxana Saberi?

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Roxana Saberi was arrested a month ago in Iran where she had been attending graduate school and freelance reporting for NPR and the BBC, among others.

But here in Fargo, she is better known as a former news reporter at a local television station, a former Miss North Dakota, a graduate of North High and Concordia College across the river in Moorhead, slated to be the commencement keynote speaker in May at Concordia.

We don't know many details, except that her parents here in Fargo (her father is Iranian) were instructed not to report her arrest and subsequent disappearance, and they held their silence until now.

We talk in the blogosphere about the risks our military face if captured because of our conduct at Abu Ghraib and Gitmo. Roxana is not a soldier. She is a student. And until recently she was permitted to file her freelance radio reports.

Now, her voice is silent. And the context is alarming.

We raise our voice asking the State Department, the Iranian government, the voices of all those who strive for a better world to do everything you can to bring Roxana home safe.

Her parents are waiting, and we, her hometown neighbors, are waiting, too.
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UPDATE: Over at FDL, commenter cinnamonape provided this link:

Here’s the link to the heart-rending NPR Interview with her father.

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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette

NY Post and its Cartoon Cross Racist, Incendiary Lines

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First reaction, WTF was the New York Post cartoonist thinking, drawing the cartoon in the first place?

Second reaction, WTF was the New York Post doing publishing it?

Rush Limbaugh's recent "I hope he fails." campaign has reached down to small town American talk show hosts like Fargo's Scott Hennen's "I hope Pres. Obama's socialist policies fail miserably." [Yes, he is the guy who chortled with Chee-knee about waterboarding. Figures.]

The rightwing Wurlitzer is ramping up the hate.

Now this disgusting cartoon published in a supposedly sophisticated marketplace like New York City. By the global empire of Rupert Murdoch.

Well, there's a tradition Murdoch's probably run across in his world travels — seppuku.

For the New York Post, and all of Murdoch's global propaganda machine for that matter, I hope they commit media seppuku. Ritual disembowelment of the Murdoch presses and the Murdoch websites and the Murdoch networks.

No entity deserves it more than the Partners in Propaganda brainwashing machine that is Murdoch Media.

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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette

A Radical Idea

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The ratings are in and CNN's Campbell Brown aka Mrs. Dan Senor is not doing so well in her time slot. Hardly justified dumping Paula Zaun, now did it....

Here's a radical thought for the original cable news network:

How about giving us some news for an hour? No pundits. No "opinions." No "experts" at the desk. No glammed-up anchor babes or buffed boys in suits. No gizmos. No three-Dee. And absolutely no politicians spewing spin.

Just news.

Fact-checked.

Who knows, we could get to know the rest of the planet better.

And it might catch on.
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Partners in Proganda

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Case in point on Partners in Propaganda, an update to the One Is the Loneliest Number post, take a moment to watch Bill Moyers discussion, via HuffPo. [Is Bill Moyers the best thing to come from Texas? Or the last best thing to come from Texas? Just asking.]

Witting, unwitting, or witless...it's time the media hold themselves to account.

The Elites Are Different than You and I

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Last week the Rev. Peter J. Gomes noted to Imus that his appearances on the show are a source of astonishment to his friends. I suspect there's a...lurker or two hereabouts that thinks the same about my viewing the show.

But I find the Imus Show is frequently instructive, in a way that transcends Hardball or any of the Sunday morning shows or the other programming of the sputtering media.

Like this morning, when Senator Joe Lieberman graced the show with his bon mots. We learned during the cozy schmoozefest that Imus and his wife dined night before last with the Assistant Secretary of the Senate, Sheila Dwyer, who grew up across the street from Deidre.

We learned that Lieberman still pauses to see what Imus is going to proffer before jumping on the bandwagon—kinda like back in the day when he never believed a black guy could win the White House, so he jumped ship for McCain in true opportunistic Lieberman fashion.

We learned that Lieberman is still a good ol' warmonger and Repubican at heart.

We learned that Lieberman thinks ol' Harry's a good guy. 'nuff said.

And we learned "let me be the first to offer" young Wyatt Imus an internship...'cause it's still not what you know in Lieberman/Old Washington's world, it's who you know.

Just as long as he doesn't have that Mark Foley thing going.

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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette

Are "We" Up to the Challenge?

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For the last four days we've watched the methodical and sweeping changes President Obama has delivered. We've made much of executive orders on closing Gitmo and restoring funding for family planning global programs and....

We've buzzed over the giant step upward from cowboyness to manhood that defines the arc from Bush to Obama.

We've kibitzed about all manner of changes, from blogs to op-eds. As Frank Rich opines for Sunday, Obama calls on us in austere terms to put aside the shallow and childish for the responsible. Rich concludes, in "No Time for Poetry": While it’s become a Beltway cliché that America’s new young president has yet to be tested, it is past time for us to realize that our own test is also about to begin.

While he may be talking about every American, every citizen, there's one group that needs singling out for special confrontation: Rich's own cohorts in the "mainstream media."

Sunday morning launches as officially as there is the new media age for the Obama years. Sure there were the preliminaries, the predictable rants of folks like O'Reilly, the riffs of Stewart and Colbert, the jockeying for questioning in the WH press room, the nightly news reporters reciting as fact the debunked "61" Gitmo detainees fighting against us.

But it's on Sunday morning that conventional wisdom takes root, that arguments are put forward, that truths are revealed...or hidden or omitted.

How will the Sunday morning gang—John King, Bob Schieffer, George Stephanopoulus, David Gregory—acquit themselves? Will they enable false framing...or confront it? Will they blithely let blatant and debunked numbers slip-slide on by...or will they clearly clarify?

Sunday morning Senators and Congresspeople and the Vice President will sit across from these hosts. Experts on finance and the challenges of the current economy.

Will we hear facts? Or spin? And will the Sunday morning gang be up to the challenge of sorting it out? We'll be watching.

No matter what Chris Matthews or others in the old media may want to tell themselves, being "journalists" is not earned by dint of having a teevee show or a newspaper column.

And the era of infotainment, like the rest of the childish things, must be put aside. Because we're all in this together. And we all are being put to the test.

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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette

Scientific Inquiry Is Back!

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Breakthrough! News this morning that the FDA has approved the first embryonic stem cell study. CNN's reporting turned to stumbling back and forth between their anchor and their medical not-Sanjay on which works better, embryonic or adult.

That immediate rush to framing is concerning.

For too long, scientific inquiry, like everything else the Bush Administration touched, was couched in false framing. Or flat-out lies.

I hope that the increasingly self-immolating mainstream media (and see yesterday's link to Hunter) will not be manipulated by dogma from a screeching few ideologues instead of listening, yes, to facts and reason-based opinion on both scientific/medical and ethical considerations .

The media have, for too long, pitted screeching against reality as some sort of "fair and balanced." Now, they are on the brink of "Foxifying" and "Crossfiring" themselves right out of existence.

Because when President Obama [God, I love to say that!) called on all of us to put aside childish things, to grow up, shape up, pull up our britches, by golly, he was talking to the Whine Club of the anachronistic media, too.

Obama's pace of unraveling what BushCo probably "heh, heh, heh-ed" would be tightly bound Gordian policy knots is breathtaking...from issues of security and torture to family planning and medical research. Something reassuring to see that the previous administration has been as incompetent at locking-in their radicalism as they were at everything else they touched.

Now excuse me while I go whip up some scrambled poultry embryos and contemplate the potential this one restoration of science opens for all.
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Basking in the Nod

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We confess, we're proud to be the morning feature up at Crooks and Liars.

First question...Helen Thomas.
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Hey, we all need our warm fuzzies when it's 27 frackin' below.
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UPDATE: Helen Thomas column "History Cannot Save Him"
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"Stunningly Superficial"

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When Zbigniew Brezinski delivered that scathing riposte to some Morning blather from Joe this a.m., he transcended the usual fodder of cable news talking before engaging brain, he delivered the punchline of the entire Bush era of selfishness, greed, blame-gaming, politicizing, warmongering, war profiteering, rightwing pandering, Rushian propaganda whoring, media enabling.... .

"Stunningly superficial."

21 days to go.
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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette

What's Afoot Among USA's?

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UPDATED FROM ORIGINAL PUBLICATION FRIDAY, 12/5.
One's an occurrence, two's a coincidence, are there more?

Ever since the election, I've been watching something brewing in my home state, North Dakota. A letter to the editor here, another coming from there, all pushing the argument that the North Dakota USA, Drew Wrigley, should be kept on by the incoming Obama Justice Dept.

Most recently, an article in the local paper, front page, above the fold, touted the, what, P.R. campaign to keep Wrigley on? And noted his insistence that he stay on until the Dru Sjodin case was finished. Well, her killer has already been convicted.

But reading that Dru's mother is part of this budding crusade complete with Facebook page, to keep on Wrigley really raised my political radar antennae.

And the skeptical side of me started to think, how disgusting. To be so self-aggrandizing and cynical and conniving and self-serving that you'd manipulate the emotions of a distraught mother of a crime victim to perpetuate your own agenda.

Yeah, I know, describes the Bush DOJ modus operandi to a T.

And young Mr. Wrigley is considered one of the up-and-comers in ND Republican circles. How better to fluff his vitae than a continuation into the Obama administration for a Red State USA where all our national congressional delegation are Blue.

And then I ran across ThinkProgress' blogpost about the USA in Pennsylvania. She, too, according to her, is indispensable....

And couldn't help but notice her connection to this woman that digby reminds us of, too.

And now I'm wondering. Any other USAs around the country firing up their PR campaigns to stay on? Kinda amusing if you think about the USAs the Bushies' minions were so quick to dispense with—from their own team.

And then you think about the activities of the Bush administration, in and out of DOJ, and maybe it's not so funny after all. Maybe it's a cancer trying to stay within the body politic that needs radical and thorough and complete excision come January 20. No exceptions.

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UPDATE: Today, the hometown Forum editorializes that the Rethug USA must stay...that it's a test of Obama's postpartisanship. Blithely blows off Wrigley's close ties to Alberto Gonzalez, while tugging the emotional blackmail some more on the Dru Sjodin case. Add the Forum editorial board and its heavy-handed collaboration in the pr drumbeat to preserve Wrigley as USA to the list of the craven. I restate my conclusion of Friday: thorough and complete excision come January 20. No exceptions.

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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette and North Decoder.

Backstabber Joe's First Test...

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Will it be Disingenuous Joe? Self-Righteous Joe? Self-Pitying Joe? Or soon-to-revert-to-old-tactics Joe? "Democrat" Joe? Or, a Joe-to-be-named-later?

Lie-berman's set to be interviewed by Katie Couric. One hopes he gets the full Sarah Palin treatment.

Joe's first test of the Obama Era begins now.

And meanwhile, the House shows the Senate how it's done....

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(crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette)

Rather on the Story

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Dan Rather's decision to sue CBS may have been dismissed as Quixotic, but he's getting results. As this update story in the New York Times recounts, Rather is putting his money where his heart is, pursuing the story.

In this case, the story is his own. And as discovery proceeds, yet another tawdry example of the BushCo Republican style of iron-fisted and self-serving rule...with the knowing complicity of top media executives...begins to emerge.

It's simple enough...report a story that shows George W. Bush in a less than favorable light and you will be destroyed. And what message does that send? One that makes other reporters hesitate to follow controversial stories? Or how about, give a wink and a nod and dance backup, eh, Dave?

There will be many legacies of the Bush era. The meta-legacy for George Bush and Karl Rove and their political minions is a litany of examples of coercion and intimidation. That is their thuggish hallmark, one seen in the common threads of the imprisonment of Alabama Governor Siegelman and the end of Dan Rather's career at CBS.

And a cozy crony of the meta-legacy of Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfeld and their ilk.

Damn them all.

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(crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette)

Strib De-frocked

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Once there was a truly great newspaper in Minnesota.

Then it got bought out.

And purged its best talent and kept the execrable.

Now, it's just another right-leaning, truth-suppressing, slanted rag of yellow journalism.

Media Matters has part of the tale.
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If Coleman and Bachmann and McCain or any of 'em win on November 4, it'll be due in sizeable part to the abysmal failure of what was once iconic journalism in the Land of Sky Blue Waters.
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(h/t Atrios for the signpost; crossposted at Firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette)
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"No bias, no bull."

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Wow, imagine if this catches on. Campbell Brown proposes a no-idiots zone:

“As journalists, and certainly for me over the last few years, we’ve gotten overly obsessed with parity, especially when we’re covering politics,” Ms. Brown said. “We kept making sure each candidate got equal time — to the point that it got ridiculous in a way.”

“So when you have Candidate A saying the sky is blue, and Candidate B saying it’s a cloudy day, I look outside and I see, well, it’s a cloudy day,” she said. “I should be able to tell my viewers, ‘Candidate A is wrong, Candidate B is right.’ And not have to say, ‘Well, you decide.’ Then it would be like I’m an idiot. And I’d be treating the audience like idiots.”