Category Archives: Media

February 7, 2011 · 8:26 pm

10 Things Conservatives Don’t Want You To Know About Ronald Reagan

A little more on the truth about the Reagan Presidency….

How soon people forget and how easily their memories are manipulated by the Corporate Media….

From ThinkProgress.org

ThinkProgress has compiled a list of the top 10 things conservatives rarely mention when talking about President Reagan:

1. Reagan was a serial tax raiser. As governor of California, Reagan “signed into law the largest tax increase in the history of any state up till then.” Meanwhile, state spending nearly doubled. As president, Reagan “raised taxes in seven of his eight years in office,” including four times in just two years. As former GOP Senator Alan Simpson, who called Reagan “a dear friend,” told NPR, “Ronald Reagan raised taxes 11 times in his administration — I was there.” “Reagan was never afraid to raise taxes,” said historian Douglas Brinkley, who edited Reagan’s memoir. Reagan the anti-tax zealot is “false mythology,” Brinkley said.

2. Reagan nearly tripled the federal budget deficit. During the Reagan years, the debt increased to nearly $3 trillion, “roughly three times as much as the first 80 years of the century had done altogether.” Reagan enacted a major tax cut his first year in office and government revenue dropped off precipitously. Despite the conservative myth that tax cuts somehow increase revenue, the government went deeper into debt and Reagan had to raise taxes just a year after he enacted his tax cut. Despite ten more tax hikes on everything from gasoline to corporate income, Reagan was never able to get the deficit under control.

3. Unemployment soared after Reagan’s 1981 tax cuts. Unemployment jumped to 10.8 percent after Reagan enacted his much-touted tax cut, and it took years for the rate to get back down to its previous level. Meanwhile, income inequality exploded. Despite the myth that Reagan presided over an era of unmatched economic boom for all Americans, Reagan disproportionately taxed the poor and middle class, but the economic growth of the 1980′s did little help them. “Since 1980, median household income has risen only 30 percent, adjusted for inflation, while average incomes at the top have tripled or quadrupled,” the New York Times’ David Leonhardt noted.

4. Reagan grew the size of the federal government tremendously.

MORE:   ThinkProgress » Blog Archive » 10 Things Conservatives Don’t Want You To Know About Ronald Reagan.

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February 7, 2011 · 8:43 am

AOL Buys The Huffington Post

Could this be the beginning of the end of one of my favorite sites?

It’s not proven to be a good thing when a corporation buys a Media Outlet.  Especially one as inept as AOL.

I keep thinking of how Time Warner ruined CNN when Ted Turner sold out to them….

Time will tell…

“This is truly a merger of visions and a perfect fit for us,” said Huffington. “The Huffington Post will continue on the same path we have been on for the last six years – though now at light speed – by combining with AOL. Our readers will still be able to come to the Huffington Post at the same URL, and find all the same content they’ve grown to love, plus a lot more – more local, more tech, more entertainment, more finance, and lots more video. We are fusing a legendary and powerful new media brand with a vibrant, innovative news organization, known for its distinctive voice, a highly engaged audience, an expertise in community-building, and a track record for demystifying the news and putting flesh and blood on the data while drawing our audience into the conversation.”

Huffington continued, “By uniting AOL and The Huffington Post, we are creating one of the largest destinations for smart content and community on the Internet. And we intend to keep making it better and better.”

Kenneth Lerer, The Huffington Post’s Co-Founder and Chairman, said, “The Huffington Post team has created a potent brand with the proven track record of knowing how to grow traffic, inform and entertain its readers and build a one-of-a-kind online community. Add that to the powerful scale and resources of AOL and you have the perfect combination for today and the future. Together these two companies will be a premier online content provider. From local citizen reporting through AOL’s Patch, to The Huffington Post’s national reporting on politics, business and culture, consumers will have access to everything they want whenever they want it.”

AOL has agreed to purchase The Huffington Post for $315 million, approximately $300 million of which will be paid in cash funded from cash on hand. The Huffington Post is privately owned by its two cofounders, as well as a group of investors. The proposed transaction is subject to customary closing conditions, including receipt of government approvals. The boards of directors of each company and shareholders of The Huffington Post have approved the transaction. The transaction is expected to close in the late first- or early second-quarter 2011.

The Huffington Post over-indexes on educated, affluent users, reaching the key decision makers in C-suites around the globe. The Huffington Post speaks to this influential audience via a host of prominent voices on its group blog. Among those who have blogged on The Huffington Post are: President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Larry Page, Diane Sawyer, Buzz Aldrin, Nora Ephron, Bill Maher, Madeleine Albright, Robert Redford, Katie Couric, Neil Young, Rahm Emanuel, Mia Farrow, Senator Russ Feingold, Senator Al Franken, Ari Emanuel, Harry Shearer, Senator John Kerry, Representative Nancy Pelosi, Madonna, Lawrence Summers, Jamie Lee Curtis, Ryan Reynolds, Craig Newmark, Alec Baldwin, Aaron Sorkin, Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johansson, Russell Simmons, Sean Penn, Bill Gates, Norman Lear, Charlie Rose, Elizabeth Warren, Tavis Smiley, Sheryl Sandberg, George Clooney, and former President Bill Clinton. And the audience speaks back, generating four million comments a month***.

The Huffington Post’s affluent, influential audience, that is growing at a rate of 22 percent (December 2009 vs. December 2010)****, when combined with AOL’s massive scale, video offerings and local expertise, will represent an incredibly desirable demographic for a broad range of advertising partners across the board.

MORE:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/07/aol-huffington-post_n_819375.html

 

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February 5, 2011 · 11:51 pm

Wallflowers at the Revolution

Another insightful column by Frank Rich in the Sunday New York Times:

Unable to watch Al Jazeera English, and ravenous for comprehensive and sophisticated 24/7 television coverage of the Middle East otherwise unavailable on television, millions of Americans last week tracked down the network’s Internet stream on their computers. Such was the work-around required by the censorship practiced by America’s corporate gatekeepers. You’d almost think these news-starved Americans were Iron Curtain citizens clandestinely trying to pull in the jammed Voice of America signal in the 1950s — or Egyptians desperately seeking Al Jazeera after Mubarak disrupted its signal last week.

The consequence of a decade’s worth of indiscriminate demonization of Arabs in America — and of the low quotient of comprehensive adult news coverage that might have helped counter it — is the steady rise in Islamophobia. The “Ground Zero” mosque melee has given way to battles over mosques as far removed from Lower Manhattan as California. Soon to come is a national witch hunt — Congressional hearings called by Representative Peter King of New York — into the “radicalization of the American Muslim community.” Given the disconnect between America and the Arab world, it’s no wonder that Americans are invested in the fights for freedom in Egypt and its neighboring dictatorships only up to a point. We’ve been inculcated to assume that whoever comes out on top is ipso facto a jihadist.

This week brings the release of Donald Rumsfeld’s memoir. The eighth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq is to follow. As we took in last week’s fiery video from Cairo — mesmerizing and yet populated by mostly anonymous extras we don’t understand and don’t know — it was hard not to flash back to those glory days of “Shock and Awe.” Those bombardments too were spectacular to watch from a safe distance — no Iraqi faces, voices or bodies cluttered up the shots. We lulled ourselves into believing that democracy and other good things were soon to come. It took months, even years, for us to learn the hard way that in truth we really had no idea what was going on.

More: Wallflowers at the Revolution – NYTimes.com.

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January 25, 2011 · 6:44 pm

Fox News’ $55 Million Presidential Donation | Media Matters for America

I’ve always thought this really should be either a Campaign Finance Law violation or they should at least declare it an “in kind” donation.

In addition to the millions of dollars they give in cash to the GOP.

Fair and Balanced?  Yeah, right….

Faux News….

Last year, five potential Republican presidential candidates (Newt Gingrich, Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, John Bolton, and Rick Santorum) who also serve as Fox News contributors or hosts appeared on the network for more than 85 hours. Media Matters for America estimates this time to be worth approximately $54.7 million in free advertising.

Fox News Candidates Appeared On The Network For More Than 85 Hours In 2010. Media Matters calculated the amount of on-screen time each of the five potential 2012 Republican presidential candidates appeared on Fox News as contributors or hosts in 2010. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee appeared for a total of almost 48 hours. Sarah Palin, former governor of Alaska, appeared for close to 14 hours. Fox gave former House Speaker Newt Gingrich almost 12 hours. John Bolton, former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. under George W. Bush, and Rick Santorum, former Republican senator from Pennsylvania, each received around six hours.

More:   UPDATED REPORT: Fox News’ $55 Million Presidential Donation | Media Matters for America.

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January 23, 2011 · 9:06 pm

Soloflex, Jerry Lee Wilson: A pilot, a shirtless spokesmodel, and a transformational home-fitness device.

Interesting article from “Slate” about Soloflex and how it changed TV Marketing.

I had forgotten about this thing, but now I remember the commercials very well.

Not that they ever inspired me to buy one, but anyway…

If late-night television commercials are to be believed, America’s soft-bodied sofa dwellers dream primarily of three things: owning a knife that can cut through a penny; obtaining cash for gold; and building their muscles with a minimum of time, money, and effort. Of these three dreams, the last appears to be the most pressing. Today, gullible endomorphs can choose from dozens of fitness miracles: the Total Gym, which is endorsed by Chuck Norris; the Ab Flyer, an expensive swing that tones your midsection; the Thigh Glider, which turns leg-spreading into an exciting workout; and the Flex Belt, which uses electronic stimulation to shock your abdomen into six-pack shape.

Twenty-five years ago, though, a single home-fitness product ruled the airwaves: Soloflex. The first comprehensive home-exercise device marketed to a mass audience, Soloflex broke ground with its unique design, which promised users a safe way to build their bodies at home; its magazine ads, featuring close-up photographs of chiseled torsos and abdomens; and its infomercials, which brought those torsos and abdomens to life. Although Soloflex no longer paces the home exercise market, it paved the way for all the Ab Flyers and Thigh Gliders to come and changed the way we think about building our bodies.

via Soloflex, Jerry Lee Wilson: A pilot, a shirtless spokesmodel, and a transformational home-fitness device. – By Justin Peters – Slate Magazine.

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January 22, 2011 · 11:39 pm

Did Keith Olbermann Bolt MSNBC to Create Media Empire? | TheWrap.com

Interesting…

There has to be more here than we know so far.  Could this be it?

It was Keith Olbermann’s decision to leave his high-profile perch at MSNBC, TheWrap has learned. The outspoken host abruptly announced his departure on Friday evening, sending shock waves through the cable news world.

But the sudden departure has a history, and the timing does not rule out a preemptive MSNBC move. The gadfly commentator first told the network last April that he wanted to leave and began negotiating his exit then, according to an individual with knowledge of the situation.

Olbermann abandoned the notion of leaving at that time but revived his plans in recent weeks with new representation from the talent agency ICM.

With two years left on his $7 million a year contract, Olbermann was seeking a full exit package but he really has his eye on creating his own media empire in the style of Huffington Post, according to the individual. That way, Olbermann would control his own brand and, in his view, potentially earn far more as an owner.

via Did Keith Olbermann Bolt MSNBC to Create Media Empire? | TheWrap.com.

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January 22, 2011 · 10:30 pm

Trust in Fox News plummets: poll | Raw Story

Could people actually be getting wise to this?

In the space of one year, Fox News has lost its perch as the most trusted TV news network in the US and is now average at best, a new survey has found.

A poll gauging public trust in TV news has found that PBS is the most trusted name in news, while trust in Fox News has dropped significantly.

According to a survey from Public Policy Polling, “a year ago a plurality of Americans said they trusted Fox News. Now a plurality of them don’t.”

In a survey taken a year ago, PPP found that Fox was the most trusted news network, with 49 percent saying they trusted the network, and 37 percent saying they did not. In the new poll, 42 percent said they trusted the network while 46 percent disagreed.

The new reigning champion is PBS, which was not included in last year’s inaugural poll. The public broadcaster was found to be trusted by 50 percent of respondents, and distrusted by 30 percent — the closest any news network has come to gaining the trust of a majority of Americans.

 

Fox News has found itself in roughly the same place, trust-wise, as NBC and CNN, but still above ABC and CBS, who were trusted by 35 and 36 percent, respectively, in the latest poll.

PPP notes that trust in the network declined only marginally among conservatives, from 75 percent to 72 percent. “But moderates and liberals have both had a strong increase in their level of distrust for the network — a 12-point gain from 48 percent to 60 percent for moderates and a 16-point gain from 66 percent to 82 percent for liberals,” the institute reported.

via Trust in Fox News plummets: poll | Raw Story.

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January 14, 2011 · 10:20 pm

Jewish Group Wants Glenn Beck Dropped From Fox News

I keep waiting for Beck to have his Joe McCarthy moment…

Someone needs to finally say, as Welch said to McCarthy:  “You’ve done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?”

In Beck’s case, I think we know the answer…

From AOL News:

Jewish Funds for Justice (JFSJ), a charity that campaigns for social change, delivered a petition with 10,000 signatures to Fox News Thursday demanding that talk show host Glenn Beck get the pink slip.

The petition drive began in November after Fox News aired a three-part Beck special on businessman and philanthropist George Soros called “Puppet Master.” The television show was deemed anti-Semitic by many in the media and Jewish groups.

Beck once said that his election coverage goal was to “make George Soros cry,” which is “hard to do,” as Soros “saw people into gas chambers.”

Beck’s Thursday night show highlighted nine people of the 20th century who contributed to “the era of the big lie.” All nine of these “shadowy figures,” as Beck called them, were Jewish, including psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud and columnist Walter Lippman. Gov. Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania also was cited.

Mik Moore, chief strategy officer for JFSJ, told Politics Daily that the group met with Fox News Channel president Roger Ailes last summer to raise concerns about Beck’s use of Holocaust references. Moore said the group received some commitments from the network that it would watch for anti-Semitic language. But that didn’t happen, according to Moore.

On Thursday, the group unveiled Beck’s 10 worst quotes of 2010, which included “Women are psychos” and “Charles Darwin is the father of the Holocaust.”

via Jewish Group Wants Glenn Beck Dropped From Fox News.

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January 12, 2011 · 5:48 pm

‘All in the Family’: 12 Memorable Moments

This was a great show…

Would ‘All in the Family’ make it today?

Today, Jan. 12, marks the 40th anniversary of the CBS show’s debut, and it’s hard to say if the comedy would’ve been as influential in today’s television landscape.

While there are plenty of shows that feature sex and violence — and even cartoons like ‘South Park’ handle some political/cultural issues — there aren’t many that deal with politics, race and sex the way this show did. It was controversial then, but with today’s 24-hour news, cable pundits, the Internet and political correctness, it would get a lot of heat (if it made it on the air at all).

So in honor of ‘All in the Family’s’ anniversary, here’s our list of 12 great moments from the show. It’s hard to pick just a dozen, but these are all classic.

More:   ‘All in the Family’: 12 Memorable Moments.

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January 10, 2011 · 10:23 pm

Fox Host’s Site Runs Picture of Glenn Beck with Gun while Condemning Violence

Is it possible he could be the reincarnation of all 3 Stooges rolled into one man?

Today wasn’t the best day for Glenn Beck’s website to rely on a random image generator.

While the media goes back and forth about whether or not Fox News or conservative talk radio had an impact on Jared Lee Loughner’s decision to go on a rampage, Beck unknowingly made a convincing case against himself when an image of him holding a gun appeared next to a quote where he condemns violence.

Click link for full article and picture on the Huffington Post

More-including the Picture:   Glenn Beck Photo FAIL: Fox Host’s Site Runs Unfortunate Juxtaposition (PICTURE).

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