This blog is mainly about the spectacular train wreck at The Sacramento Bee and its parent company, the McClatchy Company. But I also post about current events, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, politics, anything else that grabs my attention. Take a look around this blog, hope you enjoy it.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Friday November 20 -- Got news or an update?
If you have news or an update, leave it in comments. . . .
29 comments:
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Senate Dems Will Only Deliberate 10Hours Before Vote to Nationalize Health Care (GatewayPundit)
Senate Democrats will only deliberate 10 hours on SATURDAY before they vote to nationalize one-sixth of the US economy.
Via Drudge
The bill will nationalize the nation’s health care industry, increase costs, ration care, tax cosmetic surgery, cut Medicare, charge a monthly abortion fee, and take away your freedom.
Support for this disastrous bill is down to 40% with 52% opposing.
Dems Buy Off Sen Landrieu’s Vote For $100 Million of YOUR Money (GatewayPundit)
Senator Harry Reid and the Democrats bought off Senator Landrieu’s vote for their nationalized health care plan for $100 million of your money. How does that feel?
ABC’s The Note reported: What does it take to get a wavering senator to vote for health care reform?
Here’s a case study. On page 432 of the Reid bill, there is a section increasing federal Medicaid subsidies for “certain states recovering from a major disaster.”
The section spends two pages defining which “states” would qualify, saying, among other things, that it would be states that “during the preceding 7 fiscal years” have been declared a “major disaster area.”
I am told the section applies to exactly one state: Louisiana, the home of moderate Democrat Mary Landrieu, who has been playing hard to get on the health care bill.
In other words, the bill spends two pages describing would could be written with a single world: Louisiana. (This may also help explain why the bill is long.)
Senator Harry Reid, who drafted the bill, cannot pass it without the support of Louisiana’s Mary Landrieu.
How much does it cost? According to the Congressional Budget Office: $100 million.
Mayo Clinic's CEO Steps Down(says Congress should Reform Medicare First)KTTC.com
snip
We're letting politics interfere with intelligent decision-making on how to take care of patients." Cortese says Congress should look to reforming medicare first, because he says almost anything else won't make as big of an impact in the system.
The problem, however, he say lawmakers have turned health care into a political issue instead of a scientific one.
FDA openly allows criminally-convicted doctors, researchers to keep working on clinical trials (NaturalNews)
The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently released a report indicting the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for allowing health professionals convicted of crimes to perform research for the agency and to supervise patients' safety during clinical trials.
The FDA is required by law to disqualify from positions within its organization doctors that have been convicted of fraud or other crimes.
Yet the GAO is publicizing that it takes an average of four years for criminals to be disbarred from their positions.
In one case, a doctor who was convicted of 53 counts of criminal offense was allowed to remain at the FDA for 11 years before action was taken.
The doctor's offenses included bribing an employee to cover up a patient suicide that occurred during a clinical trial and prescribing drugs without a license.
Patients in Uproar over Gov’t Mammogram Policy (CBN)
Cancer hotlines and doctors offices have been flooded with calls following the release of new government guidelines on mammograms that contradict previous medical advice.
The recommendation surprised many this week, stating women should start getting mammograms in their 50s, rather than in their 40s as the American Cancer Society has advised for years.
Nicole Kurokawa, with the Independent Women’s Forum in Washington, joined CBN News with a reaction to the new government guidelines.
Is this the beginning of rationed health care? Click play for Kurokawa’s answer.
Now, patients are confused and many doctors are questioning the new policy.
“Whoever is coming up with this ridiculous recommendation,” said breast cancer survivor Linda Benitez. “I think they need to think twice.”
Breast cancer patient Gabrielle Ringquist said she is disturbed by the policy. “I find it shocking,” she said.
White House backs off cancer test guidelines (Washington Post)
Downplaying a panel assembled by her own dept. Let's not unveil our death panels until after health-care reform is passed.
A top federal health official said Wednesday that the controversial new guidelines for breast cancer screening do not represent government policy, as the Obama administration sought to keep the debate over mammograms from undermining the prospects for health-care reform.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, in a written statement, said the new guidelines had "caused a great deal of confusion and worry among women and their families across this country," and she stressed that they were issued by "an outside independent panel of doctors and scientists who . . . do not set federal policy and . . . don't determine what services are covered by the federal government."
Sebelius's statement challenged the recommendations of that influential panel, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, made up of independent experts assembled by her department to address one of the most explosive issues in women's health.
Doublespeak at its’ finest. The panel is independent, but it was hired by the government to do the study, but the government sponsored study doesn’t represent the government.
Whaaaat? Maybe someone in my Congressional District 00, or 99, or 69 office can clarify her answers
Jesse Jackson: ‘You can’t vote against healthcare and call yourself a black man’ (The Hill)
The Rev. Jesse Jackson on Wednesday night criticized Rep. Artur Davis (D-Ala.) for voting against the Democrats’ signature healthcare bill.
“We even have blacks voting against the healthcare bill,” Jackson said at a reception Wednesday night. “You can’t vote against healthcare and call yourself a black man.”
The remark stirred a murmur at the reception, held by the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) Foundation as part of a series of events revolving around the 25th anniversary of Jackson’s run for president. Several CBC members were in attendance, including Chairwoman Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), who’d introduced Jackson. Davis, who is running for governor, is the only black member of Congress from Alabama.
The LA Story, Part IV: Program for Torture Victims (New O'Keefe ACORN VID) (BigGovernment)
Lavelle Stewart, of ACORN in South Central Los Angeles, tells us she thinks we have to hook up with “someone who’s on that international sex business level,” that “14 and 15 year olds been traveling overseas for years,” that she can do independent research for us, and that she has had meetings with Porn magnate Larry Flynt.
As for laundering the sex money into my faux political campaign, Lavelle says, “there are ways, people do it all the time. Yeah there are ways, especially out here in California.”
(Roger) Mudd questions the need for a network evening newscast (Poyneter Online)
"Most Americans probably already know pretty much what's happened by the time they get home at night, with radio and the Internet and iPods," says retired TV newsman Roger Mudd.
"So at 6:30 p.m., they don't want to sit in front of television for a half hour and have someone tell them what they already know."
How about the next morning when teh DNC talking points arrive in the driveway?
MORE EXITS: The layoffs have begun at BusinessWeek as staffers learn this week whether they will continue with the magazine once its sale to Bloomberg is complete.
According to sources, about 20 staffers were let go in the online and multimedia departments on Wednesday, just a day after Bloomberg named time.com managing editor Josh Tyrangiel its new editor in chief.
BusinessWeek employees have had to reapply for their positions and outline their duties to Bloomberg’s top brass and advisers during the transition of ownership from McGraw-Hill to Bloomberg, and are being notified if they will remain at the magazine.
Earlier this week, several staffers on the business side were let go. Layoffs are expected to continue through the rest of the week and, according to reports, some estimate about 100 staffers could be let go as a result. Some of those staffers could be placed elsewhere within Bloomberg.
NYT Wants to Make Reading NYT a Requirement for College Students (NewsBusters)
Further your indoctrin...I mean education -- with the New York Times!
Professor Scott Stein recently received an email offer from the Times: Require his students to read the Times, and get a free subscription.
Excerpt from the email (hat tip American Spectator):
All faculty at [Name of university] are entitled to a complimentary subscription of the New York Times delivered to their home when the New York Times is listed in their syllabus as required reading.
If 15 or more students subscribe, you will also receive a handsome portfolio as a free gift.
Help your students make discoveries every day in topics ranging from social trends and new technology to politics and the economy inside the nation’s most honored newspaper....
To begin, please email me with a copy of your syllabus listing the New York Times as required reading.
Stein commented in part: Does anyone think marketing stunts are going to save newspapers?
That forcing students to purchase them will create loyal long-term readers? That they won’t go back to reading the news on their phones or laptops (or go back to ignoring the news entirely) the moment they are no longer required to buy the paper for class?
....If a physical paper is preferred for some reason, why a subscription to just one paper?
Why not have the students read a different paper or magazine each week, with different editorial slants?
....Using one paper -- particularly if politics or economics or some other controversial subject is being covered -- is an invitation to accusations of bias and indoctrination.
Professors should not be trying to get their students to think like the Times.
AOL: We Need to Fire 2,500 “Volunteers”(mediaMemo)
AOL, which has already told investors that it will spend up to $200 million firing a good chunk of its staff, has now told its employees.
It is looking for “up to 2,500 volunteers,” CEO Tim Armstrong told his staff today. That’s a third of the company’s payroll.
The voluntary layoff program begins on December 4, a few days before the company spins off from Time Warner (TWX). If the company doesn’t get enough volunteers, it will axe people on its own.
This is lousy news for employees, who are faced with a “jump now or wait to be pushed” decision, but it is designed to cheer investors:
AOL says the cuts will drop its annual operating expenses by $300 million. Through the first nine months of this year, AOL’s operating expenses ran around $1.8 billion.
Four Hawaii Phantom Districts Receive $45,639,408 Million in Stimulus Funds for 3.4 Jobs (watchdog.org)
Hawaii received $2,284,000 million of federal stimulus funds for the 11the Congressional district, $40,903,941 million for the 15th Congressional district, $1,651,811 for the “00” Congressional district, and $799,656 in the 99th congressional district creating a combined “3.4” jobs or $13,423,355 per job, according to the federal government’s transparency web site for stimulus funds
http://www.Recovery.gov/.However, Hawaii has just two congressional districts, 1 and 2. Those districts received $592,211,484 million and $174,075,308 respectively, according to the federal web site, creating combined total of 1,541.5 jobs. See the full report on Hawaii here: http://www.recovery.gov/Transparency/StateSummaries/Pages/statesummary.aspx?StateCode=HI
First, Obama gets a Nobel Peace Prize for nothing; Now, a tae kwan do black belt after 0 kicks (LA Times) Since when did the Times care about real news?
Even President Obama himself during his just-concluded trip to Asia admitted that he was surprised to receive the Nobel Peace Prize earlier this year without actually producing any peace.
In fact, the rookie American president ordered his own troop surge, boosting U.S. troops fighting in Afghanistan to 68,000.
Now, the Democrat may be preparing to send more again. And a Gallup Poll showed 61% of Americans didn't think he deserved it either.
Anyway, there he was in Seoul, South Korea on the last stop of his journey.
And out of the Seoul sky, President Lee Myung-bak hands over to the American leader a tae kwan do outfit. And then Lee, who practices tae kwan do himself, presents Obama with a coveted black belt.
After 0 long years of study. What would Chuck Norris do?
Probably bow. But never as low as Obama bowed for Japan's Emperor last weekend in Tokyo.
Daily Presidential Tracking Poll (November 20, 2009 Dear Reader is at -14 AGAIN!)
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Thursday shows that 27% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Forty-one percent (41%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -14. That matches the lowest Approval Index rating yet recorded for this President
Obama Tells Troops: "You guys make a pretty good photo op"
Yes, that's what the commander-in-chief said to his troops today in South Korea. Well, give the bas**** credit for being honest for once.
Buried at the end of a Washington Post report on his decision to not decide on Afghanistan until after Thanksgiving is this George Washington moment for Barack obama:
Obama arrived on the base 3:19 p.m. local time (1 a.m. Eastern Standard Time), and received a rousing welcome from 1,500 troops in camouflage uniforms, many holding cameras or pointing cell phones to snap pictures.
"You guys make a pretty good photo op," the president said.
Standing on a riser wearing a blue suit and red tie, with a cluster of troops and a large American flag behind him, Obama expressed "the gratitude of the American public" and said his meetings in four countries over eight days in Asia will help deliver a "safer more prosperous world for all of us."
He got a huge cheer when he told them he was increasing military pay. "That's what you call an applause line," he said, before boarding his jet and taking off at 4:11 p.m.
John Conyers: “I’m getting tired of saving Obama’s can” (GatewayPundit)
Far left Democrat John Conyers, husband of convicted felon Monica Conyers, told reporters today that, “I’m getting tired of saving Obama’s can.”
The Hill reported: President Barack Obama is “bowing down” to Republicans and corporate interests on health reform, Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) said Thursday.
Conyers, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and a longtime advocate of single-payer healthcare, blasted the president for a perceived weakness in leadership on health reform.
“I’m getting tired of saving Obama’s can in the White House,” Conyers said on the liberal Bill Press radio show. “He only won by five votes in the House, and this bill wasn’t even anything to write home about.”
“The only way he could have got it through was that progressives held their nose,” Conyers added.
Networks Ignore SEIU's Alliances, Thuggery and Presidential Lobbying (NewsBusters)
Members of the self-proclaimed fastest-growing union in North America have started fights at town hall meetings, share office space with ACORN and spent over $60million to elect President Barack Obama.
The left-wing, 2.1 million-member Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and its president, Andy Stern, spent much of 2009 campaigning for health care reform that would include a government-run insurance plan, and for the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), which would make it easier to unionize.
Critics of EFCA say it would result in worker intimidation (not something that would bother SEIU, if its recent history is any guide).
Well-connected, Stern was the most frequent White House visitor in the first six months of Obama's presidency.
But ABC, NBC and CBS haven't reported any of those things.
In fact, a search of Nexis transcripts for all of 2009 only turned up one story mentioning either SEIU or Andy Stern. That was an Aug. 20 story from Jake Tapper of ABC which identified Stern as "a close ally of the President's and the leader of a major union."
Sen. John Kerry's daughter arrested in Hollywood (She was not in Vietnam) Imagine if it had been Sarah Palin’s daughter and how the press would have run with it...
Senator John Kerry's elder daughter, Alexandra, who made a red-carpet splash at the Cannes film festival five years ago in a see-through dress, was arrested in Hollywood on Thursday on suspicion of drunken driving.
The 36-year-old aspiring filmmaker was stopped by police shortly before 1 a.m., jailed briefly on a misdemeanor charge of driving under the influence and later released on $5,000 bail, a Los Angeles police spokeswoman said.
She said no further details were immediately available.
Celebrity news website TMZ.com reported that Kerry was stopped for a traffic violation and was placed under arrest after failing a field sobriety test.
Not finding any, Gore airbrushes in hurricanes for his new book (Erases arctic ice-photos And his hero Fidel’s Cuba)
Al Gore’s new book had a problem – no big hurricanes since Katrina to put in the book to look “threatening” to the USA.
Any imagined link between hurricanes and global warming has evaporated.
Solution: the artists airbrush.
The cover opens and closes half and half — so you only see one hurricane…as in the press release photo or the one on Amazon.
But this is the real picture sequence from the book which I looked at Borders today and took cell-phone pictures, original (before the retouching by some “artist”)
Note all of the Arctic ice and the size of the Florida Peninsula
AARP Received $18 Million In Stimulus Money (American spectator)
AARP, which has given its full-throated support to Democratic health care legislation even though seniors remain largely opposed, received an $18 million grant in the economic stimulus package for a job training program that has not created any jobs, according to the Obama administration's Recovery.gov website.
The Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP), according to the website, is "a work training program for unemployed mature workers who are 55+ and are at or below 125% of the poverty guidelines." So far, $6.5 million has been spent on the program, and it has not reported creating any jobs.
In February, the Politico reported that AARP was putting pressure on Republican members of Congress to support the stimulus package.
Since then, AARP has moved on to lobbying for passage of health care legislation, even though Democratic proposals have called for several hundred billion dollars in cuts to Medicare, a program that the group typically defends tooth and nail when Republicans propose cutting it. A recent Pew survey found that just 31 percent of those over 65 supported health care legislation being touted by AARP.
As it turns out, AARP is also in a position to benefit financially if the health care legislation passes, because seniors losing benefits as a result of cuts to Medicare Advantage will be forced to buy Medigap policies, which is the main source of AARP revenue.
Barry Rand, the chief executive of AARP, was a big donor to the Obama campaign and has retained a cozy relationship with the administration.
The stimulus grant to AARP was reported by WatchDog.org, a site run by the Franklin Center for Government and Public Integrity, which also found that stimulus funds were funneled into another liberal interest group, the National Council of La Raza.
ACORN Still Owes $2.3 Million In Overdue Taxes (biggovernment.com)
ACORN and its affiliates are content to impose crippling big-government laws, regulations, and taxes on Americans, but when called upon to obey those same rules, ACORN’s network of scofflaws and deadbeats simply refuses to comply.
ACORN and its affiliates currently owe more than $2.3 million in long overdue back taxes to all levels of government.
As of Nov. 11 the exact figure was $2,328,596.95.
ACORN owes money to the IRS, Arkansas, California, Delaware, District of Columbia, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico, New York, New Jersey, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Washington, Wisconsin, and to the cities of New York and Philadelphia.
AARP has embarrassed itself licking Obama's feet. If you are still a member, you should be ashamed. As for the cable news race, there is no race. Fox News is the only real competitor these days. The rest are fighting for scraps.
Hey McClatchy work force...is it just my little, tiny paper that resembles a slasher film or does anyone else find themselves standing alongside the gore and dismemberment?
7:16...Having been a "Worker Bee" and getting booted from the hive, all I can tell you is there is a MUCH BETTER life away from McClatchy. Best thing they did for me was lay me off. It's been over a year and things are looking up! Gary "the Slasher" Pruitt is not done cutting. The cuts are not as deep 'cause there is not much left to cut, but cut he will...and it will show.
29 comments:
Senate Dems Will Only Deliberate 10Hours Before Vote to Nationalize Health Care (GatewayPundit)
Senate Democrats will only deliberate 10 hours on SATURDAY before they vote to nationalize one-sixth of the US economy.
Via Drudge
The bill will nationalize the nation’s health care industry, increase costs, ration care, tax cosmetic surgery, cut Medicare, charge a monthly abortion fee, and take away your freedom.
Support for this disastrous bill is down to 40% with 52% opposing.
Dems Buy Off Sen Landrieu’s Vote For $100 Million of YOUR Money (GatewayPundit)
Senator Harry Reid and the Democrats bought off Senator Landrieu’s vote for their nationalized health care plan for $100 million of your money.
How does that feel?
ABC’s The Note reported:
What does it take to get a wavering senator to vote for health care reform?
Here’s a case study.
On page 432 of the Reid bill, there is a section increasing federal Medicaid subsidies for “certain states recovering from a major disaster.”
The section spends two pages defining which “states” would qualify, saying, among other things, that it would be states that “during the preceding 7 fiscal years” have been declared a “major disaster area.”
I am told the section applies to exactly one state: Louisiana, the home of moderate Democrat Mary Landrieu, who has been playing hard to get on the health care bill.
In other words, the bill spends two pages describing would could be written with a single world:
Louisiana. (This may also help explain why the bill is long.)
Senator Harry Reid, who drafted the bill, cannot pass it without the support of Louisiana’s Mary Landrieu.
How much does it cost? According to the Congressional Budget Office: $100 million.
Mayo Clinic's CEO Steps Down(says Congress should Reform Medicare First)KTTC.com
snip
We're letting politics interfere with intelligent decision-making on how to take care of patients."
Cortese says Congress should look to reforming medicare first, because he says almost anything else won't make as big of an impact in the system.
The problem, however, he say lawmakers have turned health care into a political issue instead of a scientific one.
FDA openly allows criminally-convicted doctors, researchers to keep working on clinical trials
(NaturalNews)
The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently released a report indicting the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for allowing health professionals convicted of crimes to perform research for the agency and to supervise patients' safety during clinical trials.
The FDA is required by law to disqualify from positions within its organization doctors that have been convicted of fraud or other crimes.
Yet the GAO is publicizing that it takes an average of four years for criminals to be disbarred from their positions.
In one case, a doctor who was convicted of 53 counts of criminal offense was allowed to remain at the FDA for 11 years before action was taken.
The doctor's offenses included bribing an employee to cover up a patient suicide that occurred during a clinical trial and prescribing drugs without a license.
Patients in Uproar over Gov’t Mammogram Policy (CBN)
Cancer hotlines and doctors offices have been flooded with calls following the release of new government guidelines on mammograms that contradict previous medical advice.
The recommendation surprised many this week, stating women should start getting mammograms in their 50s, rather than in their 40s as the American Cancer Society has advised for years.
Nicole Kurokawa, with the Independent Women’s Forum in Washington, joined CBN News with a reaction to the new government guidelines.
Is this the beginning of rationed health care? Click play for Kurokawa’s answer.
Now, patients are confused and many doctors are questioning the new policy.
“Whoever is coming up with this ridiculous recommendation,” said breast cancer survivor Linda Benitez. “I think they need to think twice.”
Breast cancer patient Gabrielle Ringquist said she is disturbed by the policy. “I find it shocking,” she said.
White House backs off cancer test guidelines (Washington Post)
Downplaying a panel assembled by her own dept. Let's not unveil our death panels until after health-care reform is passed.
A top federal health official said Wednesday that the controversial new guidelines for breast cancer screening do not represent government policy, as the Obama administration sought to keep the debate over mammograms from undermining the prospects for health-care reform.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, in a written statement, said the new guidelines had "caused a great deal of confusion and worry among women and their families across this country," and she stressed that they were issued by "an outside independent panel of doctors and scientists who . . .
do not set federal policy and . . . don't determine what services are covered by the federal government."
Sebelius's statement challenged the recommendations of that influential panel, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, made up of independent experts assembled by her department to address one of the most explosive issues in women's health.
Doublespeak at its’ finest. The panel is independent, but it was hired by the government to do the study, but the government sponsored study doesn’t represent the government.
Whaaaat? Maybe someone in my Congressional District 00, or 99, or 69 office can clarify her answers
Jesse Jackson: ‘You can’t vote against healthcare and call yourself a black man’ (The Hill)
The Rev. Jesse Jackson on Wednesday night criticized Rep. Artur Davis (D-Ala.) for voting against the Democrats’ signature healthcare bill.
“We even have blacks voting against the healthcare bill,” Jackson said at a reception Wednesday night. “You can’t vote against healthcare and call yourself a black man.”
The remark stirred a murmur at the reception, held by the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) Foundation as part of a series of events revolving around the 25th anniversary of Jackson’s run for president. Several CBC members were in attendance, including Chairwoman Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), who’d introduced Jackson.
Davis, who is running for governor, is the only black member of Congress from Alabama.
The LA Story, Part IV: Program for Torture Victims (New O'Keefe ACORN VID) (BigGovernment)
Lavelle Stewart, of ACORN in South Central Los Angeles, tells us she thinks we have to hook up with “someone who’s on that international sex business level,” that “14 and 15 year olds been traveling overseas for years,” that she can do independent research for us, and that she has had meetings with Porn magnate Larry Flynt.
As for laundering the sex money into my faux political campaign, Lavelle says, “there are ways, people do it all the time. Yeah there are ways, especially out here in California.”
(Roger) Mudd questions the need for a network evening newscast (Poyneter Online)
"Most Americans probably already know pretty much what's happened by the time they get home at night, with radio and the Internet and iPods," says retired TV newsman Roger Mudd.
"So at 6:30 p.m., they don't want to sit in front of television for a half hour and have someone tell them what they already know."
How about the next morning when teh DNC talking points arrive in the driveway?
Layoffs at BusinessWeek...(WWD.com)
MORE EXITS: The layoffs have begun at BusinessWeek as staffers learn this week whether they will continue with the magazine once its sale to Bloomberg is complete.
According to sources, about 20 staffers were let go in the online and multimedia departments on Wednesday, just a day after Bloomberg named time.com managing editor Josh Tyrangiel its new editor in chief.
BusinessWeek employees have had to reapply for their positions and outline their duties to Bloomberg’s top brass and advisers during the transition of ownership from McGraw-Hill to Bloomberg, and are being notified if they will remain at the magazine.
Earlier this week, several staffers on the business side were let go. Layoffs are expected to continue through the rest of the week and, according to reports, some estimate about 100 staffers could be let go as a result. Some of those staffers could be placed elsewhere within Bloomberg.
NYT Wants to Make Reading NYT a Requirement for College Students (NewsBusters)
Further your indoctrin...I mean education -- with the New York Times!
Professor Scott Stein recently received an email offer from the Times: Require his students to read the Times, and get a free subscription.
Excerpt from the email (hat tip American Spectator):
All faculty at [Name of university] are entitled to a complimentary subscription of the New York Times delivered to their home when the New York Times is listed in their syllabus as required reading.
If 15 or more students subscribe, you will also receive a handsome portfolio as a free gift.
Help your students make discoveries every day in topics ranging from social trends and new technology to politics and the economy inside the nation’s most honored newspaper....
To begin, please email me with a copy of your syllabus listing the New York Times as required reading.
Stein commented in part: Does anyone think marketing stunts are going to save newspapers?
That forcing students to purchase them will create loyal long-term readers? That they won’t go back to reading the news on their phones or laptops (or go back to ignoring the news entirely) the moment they are no longer required to buy the paper for class?
....If a physical paper is preferred for some reason, why a subscription to just one paper?
Why not have the students read a different paper or magazine each week, with different editorial slants?
....Using one paper -- particularly if politics or economics or some other controversial subject is being covered -- is an invitation to accusations of bias and indoctrination.
Professors should not be trying to get their students to think like the Times.
AOL: We Need to Fire 2,500 “Volunteers”(mediaMemo)
AOL, which has already told investors that it will spend up to $200 million firing a good chunk of its staff, has now told its employees.
It is looking for “up to 2,500 volunteers,” CEO Tim Armstrong told his staff today. That’s a third of the company’s payroll.
The voluntary layoff program begins on December 4, a few days before the company spins off from Time Warner (TWX). If the company doesn’t get enough volunteers, it will axe people on its own.
This is lousy news for employees, who are faced with a “jump now or wait to be pushed” decision, but it is designed to cheer investors:
AOL says the cuts will drop its annual operating expenses by $300 million. Through the first nine months of this year, AOL’s operating expenses ran around $1.8 billion.
Four Hawaii Phantom Districts Receive $45,639,408 Million in Stimulus Funds for 3.4 Jobs (watchdog.org)
Hawaii received $2,284,000 million of federal stimulus funds for the 11the Congressional district, $40,903,941 million for the 15th Congressional district, $1,651,811 for the “00” Congressional district, and $799,656 in the 99th congressional district creating a combined “3.4” jobs or $13,423,355 per job, according to the federal government’s transparency web site for stimulus funds
http://www.Recovery.gov/.However, Hawaii has just two congressional districts, 1 and 2.
Those districts received $592,211,484 million and $174,075,308 respectively, according to the federal web site, creating combined total of 1,541.5 jobs.
See the full report on Hawaii here: http://www.recovery.gov/Transparency/StateSummaries/Pages/statesummary.aspx?StateCode=HI
First, Obama gets a Nobel Peace Prize for nothing; Now, a tae kwan do black belt after 0 kicks
(LA Times) Since when did the Times care about real news?
Even President Obama himself during his just-concluded trip to Asia admitted that he was surprised to receive the Nobel Peace Prize earlier this year without actually producing any peace.
In fact, the rookie American president ordered his own troop surge, boosting U.S. troops fighting in Afghanistan to 68,000.
Now, the Democrat may be preparing to send more again. And a Gallup Poll showed 61% of Americans didn't think he deserved it either.
Anyway, there he was in Seoul, South Korea on the last stop of his journey.
And out of the Seoul sky, President Lee Myung-bak hands over to the American leader a tae kwan do outfit. And then Lee, who practices tae kwan do himself, presents Obama with a coveted black belt.
After 0 long years of study.
What would Chuck Norris do?
Probably bow. But never as low as Obama bowed for Japan's Emperor last weekend in Tokyo.
Daily Presidential Tracking Poll (November 20, 2009 Dear Reader is at -14 AGAIN!)
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Thursday shows that 27% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Forty-one percent (41%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -14. That matches the lowest Approval Index rating yet recorded for this President
Obama Tells Troops: "You guys make a pretty good photo op"
Yes, that's what the commander-in-chief said to his troops today in South Korea. Well, give the bas**** credit for being honest for once.
Buried at the end of a Washington Post report on his decision to not decide on Afghanistan until after Thanksgiving is this George Washington moment for Barack obama:
Obama arrived on the base 3:19 p.m. local time (1 a.m. Eastern Standard Time), and received a rousing welcome from 1,500 troops in camouflage uniforms, many holding cameras or pointing cell phones to snap pictures.
"You guys make a pretty good photo op," the president said.
Standing on a riser wearing a blue suit and red tie, with a cluster of troops and a large American flag behind him, Obama expressed "the gratitude of the American public" and said his meetings in four countries over eight days in Asia will help deliver a "safer more prosperous world for all of us."
He got a huge cheer when he told them he was increasing military pay. "That's what you call an applause line," he said, before boarding his jet and taking off at 4:11 p.m.
John Conyers: “I’m getting tired of saving Obama’s can” (GatewayPundit)
Far left Democrat John Conyers, husband of convicted felon Monica Conyers, told reporters today that, “I’m getting tired of saving Obama’s can.”
The Hill reported: President Barack Obama is “bowing down” to Republicans and corporate interests on health reform, Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) said Thursday.
Conyers, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and a longtime advocate of single-payer healthcare, blasted the president for a perceived weakness in leadership on health reform.
“I’m getting tired of saving Obama’s can in the White House,” Conyers said on the liberal Bill Press radio show. “He only won by five votes in the House, and this bill wasn’t even anything to write home about.”
“The only way he could have got it through was that progressives held their nose,” Conyers added.
Networks Ignore SEIU's Alliances, Thuggery and Presidential Lobbying (NewsBusters)
Members of the self-proclaimed fastest-growing union in North America have started fights at town hall meetings, share office space with ACORN and spent over $60million to elect President Barack Obama.
The left-wing, 2.1 million-member Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and its president, Andy Stern, spent much of 2009 campaigning for health care reform that would include a government-run insurance plan, and for the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), which would make it easier to unionize.
Critics of EFCA say it would result in worker intimidation (not something that would bother SEIU, if its recent history is any guide).
Well-connected, Stern was the most frequent White House visitor in the first six months of Obama's presidency.
But ABC, NBC and CBS haven't reported any of those things.
In fact, a search of Nexis transcripts for all of 2009 only turned up one story mentioning either SEIU or Andy Stern. That was an Aug. 20 story from Jake Tapper of ABC which identified Stern as "a close ally of the President's and the leader of a major union."
Sen. John Kerry's daughter arrested in Hollywood (She was not in Vietnam) Imagine if it had been Sarah Palin’s daughter and how the press would have run with it...
Senator John Kerry's elder daughter, Alexandra, who made a red-carpet splash at the Cannes film festival five years ago in a see-through dress, was arrested in Hollywood on Thursday on suspicion of drunken driving.
The 36-year-old aspiring filmmaker was stopped by police shortly before 1 a.m., jailed briefly on a misdemeanor charge of driving under the influence and later released on $5,000 bail, a Los Angeles police spokeswoman said.
She said no further details were immediately available.
Celebrity news website TMZ.com reported that Kerry was stopped for a traffic violation and was placed under arrest after failing a field sobriety test.
Not finding any, Gore airbrushes in hurricanes for his new book (Erases arctic ice-photos And his hero Fidel’s Cuba)
Al Gore’s new book had a problem – no big hurricanes since Katrina to put in the book to look “threatening” to the USA.
Any imagined link between hurricanes and global warming has evaporated.
Solution: the artists airbrush.
The cover opens and closes half and half — so you only see one hurricane…as in the press release photo or the one on Amazon.
But this is the real picture sequence from the book which I looked at Borders today and took cell-phone pictures, original (before the retouching by some “artist”)
Note all of the Arctic ice and the size of the Florida Peninsula
AARP Received $18 Million In Stimulus Money (American spectator)
AARP, which has given its full-throated support to Democratic health care legislation even though seniors remain largely opposed, received an $18 million grant in the economic stimulus package for a job training program that has not created any jobs, according to the Obama administration's Recovery.gov website.
The Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP), according to the website, is "a work training program for unemployed mature workers who are 55+ and are at or below 125% of the poverty guidelines." So far, $6.5 million has been spent on the program, and it has not reported creating any jobs.
In February, the Politico reported that AARP was putting pressure on Republican members of Congress to support the stimulus package.
Since then, AARP has moved on to lobbying for passage of health care legislation, even though Democratic proposals have called for several hundred billion dollars in cuts to Medicare, a program that the group typically defends tooth and nail when Republicans propose cutting it. A recent Pew survey found that just 31 percent of those over 65 supported health care legislation being touted by AARP.
As it turns out, AARP is also in a position to benefit financially if the health care legislation passes, because seniors losing benefits as a result of cuts to Medicare Advantage will be forced to buy Medigap policies, which is the main source of AARP revenue.
Barry Rand, the chief executive of AARP, was a big donor to the Obama campaign and has retained a cozy relationship with the administration.
The stimulus grant to AARP was reported by WatchDog.org, a site run by the Franklin Center for Government and Public Integrity, which also found that stimulus funds were funneled into another liberal interest group, the National Council of La Raza.
ACORN Still Owes $2.3 Million In Overdue Taxes (biggovernment.com)
ACORN and its affiliates are content to impose crippling big-government laws, regulations, and taxes on Americans, but when called upon to obey those same rules, ACORN’s network of scofflaws and deadbeats simply refuses to comply.
ACORN and its affiliates currently owe more than $2.3 million in long overdue back taxes to all levels of government.
As of Nov. 11 the exact figure was $2,328,596.95.
ACORN owes money to the IRS, Arkansas, California, Delaware, District of Columbia, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico, New York, New Jersey, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Washington, Wisconsin, and to the cities of New York and Philadelphia.
CABLE NEWS RACE NOV. 18, 2009 Drudge
FOXNEWS HANNITY/PALIN 4,200,000
FOXNEWS O'REILLY 3,868,000
FOXNEWS BECK 2,512,000
FOXNEWS GRETA 2,383,000
FOXNEWS BAIER 2,235,000
FOXNEWS SHEP 1,980,000
MSNBC OLBERMANN 1,041,000
CNNHN GRACE 1,036,000
MSNBC MADDOW 957,000
CNN KING 835,000
MSNBC HARDBALL 625,000
CNN POOPER 611,000
Mentioned earlier: this might explain why the AARP backs Obama Care: AARP received $18 million in stimulus money
AARP has embarrassed itself licking Obama's feet. If you are still a member, you should be ashamed.
As for the cable news race, there is no race. Fox News is the only real competitor these days. The rest are fighting for scraps.
Nancy Grace beating Rachel Maddow in the ratings made my day!
thanks for the cable news ratings list. i think it should be cooper of CNN, not pooper. although pooper is the better description of his crappy show.
Hey McClatchy work force...is it just my little, tiny paper that resembles a slasher film or does anyone else find themselves standing alongside the gore and dismemberment?
7:16...Having been a "Worker Bee" and getting booted from the hive, all I can tell you is there is a MUCH BETTER life away from McClatchy. Best thing they did for me was lay me off. It's been over a year and things are looking up!
Gary "the Slasher" Pruitt is not done cutting. The cuts are not as deep 'cause there is not much left to cut, but cut he will...and it will show.
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