A slew of TV critics are urging Americans to watch NBC correspondent Richard Engel’s documentary of his experiences covering the war in Iraq for three years. It’s supposed to be harrowing and contains some of the most gruesome images yet broadcast in Western news media, but is being hailed as an important window into what life in Baghdad is like for journalists covering the war. Airs at 10 p.m. tonight on MSNBC.
Go John! Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards turned down a debate opportunity in Nevada if it meant having to deal with Fox “News.”
The state’s Democratic Party — led in part by Sen. Harry Reid, a Mormon — forged a “partnership” with the biased broadcaster, supposedly in order to reach a more diverse group of voters. That would be the “Minds Locked Down Tighter Than Guantanamo” block, I guess. Even they now admit it’s not working.
…in a letter posted Wednesday on the party’s Web site, Democratic Party Chairman Tom Collins said Reid now shares activists’ concerns and “has asked us to take another look.”
PBS is working on a two-part special on Mormons, set to air April 30 and May 1. The Boston Globe’s Alex Beam says it could hurt Republican presidential candidate Gov. Mitt Romney, since the less Joe Sixpack knows about the tenets of the cult (oops, I said the C-word), the better.
The Salt Lake City-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as the Mormons call themselves, cooperated with “The American Experience ” and “Frontline, ” the show’s co-producers. [Filmmaker Helen] Whitney in turn pays the church the compliment of taking its faith very seriously indeed. The positives are there for all to see: the Mormons’ triumph over persecution in mid-century America; the dramatic “exodus” from Illinois to Utah, the “country no one else wanted,” according to Wallace Stegner, a great admirer of the Mormon pioneers; the devotion to family and community.
But also on view are doctrines and practices that most Americans would view as strange…
“The Mormons” even tackles the ultimate red herring, “celestial marriage,” Joseph Smith’s term for polygamy…”The Mormons” estimates that 30,000 to 60,000 fundamentalist believers practice polygamy. Whitney has footage of 11 happy children passing plates around the dinner table, with three mothers and a father in attendance. Heather has three Mommies! Sorry, I couldn’t resist.
Michael Sullivan, “Frontline” executive producer for special projects, calls the project “respectful but frank. We’re not out to get the Mormons.” He says “there is a small section on Romney” in the portion of the documentary that is still being edited. Romney declined to be interviewed for the show.
What does it all mean? PBS claims it has 75 million viewers a week. Let’s say one-tenth — no, one-twentieth — of that audience watches “The Mormons.” That’s almost 4 million men and women who will know more about the Mormon faith than Romney might wish them to know. It’s bad math for the Mittster.
Cold shoulder: Remember last week when Fox News “reported” a story from the Moonie fishwrapper Washington Times about how Illinois Sen. Barak Obama was brainwashed in an Indonesian Muslim madrassah when he was 7? And remember how all the talking tools on wingnut TV and radio shows picked up the unattributed, unresearched and, as it turned out, untrue story?
Well, Obama has retaliated by cutting Fox reporters off. No comments, no interviews, no thanks, you’re not welcome on my really kool campaign for president.
The Fox reporters, typically, are whining:
“I’m still in the freezer,” one Fox journalist said, noting that the people at Fox “suffering the most did nothing wrong.”
My favorite, though, is the unnamed “source” who made the following addle-pated statement:
One source familiar with the dynamic between Fox and Obama, who asked not to be named, said Obama and his staff are in for a rude awakening if they think they can write off Fox News. If a candidate is serious about running for president, he or she is going to need a network like Fox to reach out to all those voters in the red and purple states, the source said.
One, red-staters who watch Fox News are not going to vote for a guy who’s even just half black. Second, Obama is going to get tons of coverage because — he’s Obama! Even voters who only watch Fox News and listen to Rush Limbaugh will still hear about him and his message.
So don’t let Fox off the hook too soon, Barak. Enjoy watching them twist in the breeze for a while.
Senseless censorship: In the wake of Saddam Hussein’s execution, the Western media have been collectively wringing their hands over how to handle coverage of the ex-tyrant and U.S. political toy’s execution, funeral and burial. “Do broadcast the grainy cell phone video of Hussein’s last living moments?” “Do we show his dead body?” “Do we cover the sparsely attended funeral?”
But the execs at privately owned TV station al-Charkiya in Baghdad don’t have to worry about such questions because the Iraqi puppet government shut them down for inciting sectarian violence by broadcasting scenes of Hussein’s funeral:
Reporters Without Borders has condemned the closure of the Baghdad studios of privately owned satellite TV al-Charkiya, which was accused of “inciting sectarian violence” for showing footage of Iraqis mourning the death of former president Saddam Hussein.
The announcement of his execution and the broadcast of footage of his hanging produced sharply different reactions in the Iraqi media. Some, particularly state-owned publications, celebrated the death of the “tyrant”, while others lamented his death.
“We are very concerned by the attitude of the Nuri al-Maliki government which is imposing more and more restrictions on the press,” the worldwide press freedom organisation said. “The authorities should show more restraint so that pluralism of news and information remains a reality in Iraq.”
The interior ministry decided on 1st January 2007 to shut down the offices of the al-Charkiya, in the capital’s Yarmuq neighbourhood for “incitement to sectarian violence” and “to hatred”. The same day the channel had showed film of several demonstrations opposed to the execution of Saddam Hussein, in Bagdad, Tikrit (province in which the president was born) and in the Jordanian capital, Amman, where his daughter, Raghad Hussein, lives. Elsewhere, presenters on public al-Iraqiya condemned “Iraqi and Arab TV channels showing sympathy for the tyrant Saddam Hussein”. Al-Charkiya is still broadcasting from its studios in Dubai and Amman.
The Iraqi authorities already ordered the closure, on 5 November 2006, of TV stations al-Zaura and Salah-Eddin for showing footage of demonstrators brandishing pictures of the former president and protesting at his death sentence. Both stations were accused of inciting sectarian violence and have still not been allowed to resume broadcasting.
Seems you can impose democracy on a reluctant Muslim populace, but you can’t teach them a thing about freedom.
This title was shown at 4:30 PM PST, January 1, 2007.
The black soul of Republican authoritarianism was in full voice on Bill Hemmer’s show on Fox News this week. Rightwing radio talk show host Mike Gallagher made his case for rounding up liberals like Joy Behar, Matt Damon and Keith Olbermann and sending them to concentration camps:
Bill Hemmer: They talk about Godwins Law, internet junkies, as discussions grow longer someone makes a comparison to Hitler and that person loses the argument. The view, Joy Behar weighing in on the Times Person of the Year.
Video Clip of Joy Behar: “I don’t think anyone cares anymore about Time Magazines Person of the Year. You have to put like a Hitler type, like you put Donald Rumsfeld there or something.”
Onscreen is a picture of Hitler and Donald Rumsfeld side by side and the words ‘The View from the Left?’
Bill Hemmer: Rob, can you defend that?
Rob Thompson: Who can? Godwins Law stands true in all instances. Nobody believes he’s like Hitler, c’mon.
BH: I like Joy Behar. I think she’s smart. I think she’s funny but this is a bit unexcusable, Mike?
RT: Now, if she’d have said something like Rumsfeld alone or Rumsfeld is a lot like Bob MacNamera, we’ll put him on the cover of Time Magazine.
Mike Gallagher: You know it’s a little bit ridiculous that we continue to watch these TV stars and movie stars who smear our leaders. I just wonder, Rob, if you’ll think for a moment what our enemies think … of seeing TV personalities comparing the outgoing Defense Secretary to Adolph Hitler.
The Bush era has changed Lou Dobbs. Early in the administration, the host of “Lou Dobbs Tonight,” CNN’s daily financial news show, once described himself on the air as a conservative and a supporter of the president.
Now he’s using the bully pulpit of his anchor desk to crusade against Bush policies, especially on illegal immigration and the unbridling of corporatism by the government, and has become the de facto spokesman for a rising centrist populist movement.
His fans are generally moderates from both parties, who call themselves “Lou Dobbs Democrats” or “Lou Dobbs Republicans,” respectively. Like Dobbs, they are upset with Republicans’ incompetence and corruption but are less than sanguine about the odds that Democrats will fix the hard problems.
These voters in the agitated middle helped throw the bums out in 2006, and they could play a significant role in the 2008 elections, especially if a third-party candidate emerges who campaigns on their issues.
The shape of the movement so far is secular and libertarian on social issues, which could bode well for liberal causes like choice and gay rights. But Dobbs’ populism sees illegal immigration as a dangerous threat to our security and financial stability. It also puts a low priority on the social welfare of the immigrants, which is a position liberals don’t generally share.
If you want to know more Dobbs and his views, there are three new articles up:
• “Mad As Hell: Lou Dobbs’s populist crusade” –The New Yorker
• “The Lou Dobbs Factor” —New York
• “Lou Dobbs Turns on the CEOs” —Mother Jones
• “The Secret Life of Lou Dobbs” —The American
(Via Jossip)
In the diplomatic ranks, trained professionals toil,
To keep the peace and tamp down foreign turmoil.
But for Greek ambassador,
Trump picked an artful dodger —
The grifting, drunken blackmailer Kimberly Guilfoyle.
