Saturday, May 30, 2009

Another Saturday With Tim Krekel

Photo: May Newman playing a cigar box banjo she made: Palatka Florida 192?



IT'S A BEAUTIIFUL, SUNNY 73 DEGREES HERE IN LOUISVILLE, KY TODAY!

Time to Party


With an Encore Performance by Tim Krekel



From his My Space page:

Kentucky-bred Singer-Songwriter-Guitarist Tim Krekel has stunned listeners with his soulful grooves and knockout passionate performances for years.Yet, he remains a welcome, new discovery for many outside of the Southeast US. Befriended and endorsed as a personal favorite early in his career by John Belushi, the modest Krekel has a massive recording and touring history with icons such as Jimmy Buffet, The Eagles, Bo Diddley, Tracy Nelson, Delbert McClinton and others. He has enjoyed several Billboard chart-toppers and 1 Hits; and is ranked as the 150th Greatest Artist of All Time on WFPK/Louisville's "Fortunate 500" and had FOUR songs listed in WFPK's "2001 Greatest Songs of All Time".


I'd encourage everyone to check out his My Space page because he has some audio recordings of some more of his songs that you just gotta hear! And for politico's like me, you will especially appreciate his new song - Bailout blues.

And now ladies and gentleman, the music of TIM KREKEL









Unfortunately this final video doesn't have the video and soundtrack in sync so you don't want to watch the video but you will want to listen to the song because it's one of the most beautiful love songs I've ever heard. When we see Tim sing this live we get chills up and down our body. It's truly a beautiful song. I hope you enjoy it as much as we do. Incidently Tim has quite a few cd's out there that you can purchase if you like his music, like we do.



Friday, May 29, 2009

Obama and Cheney Speeches Not the End of Torture Discussion

When President Obama and former Vice-president Cheney gave what the press called "dueling speeches" about Bush era war crimes I posted a comment where I said that I'd talk about my reaction to the speeches at a later date. Since that post there have been a lot of people who have commented about the speech so I'm not going to rehash what was said and not said other than to say my overall impression of both speeches and the media coverage was one of disappointment.  The Cheney speech was so full of distortions and lies that it doesn't even merit a response except to say that in my view former V.P. Cheney is a thoroughly dishonorable man. The media coverage was typical establishment media coverage. They stuck to their narrative and ignored any facts that didn't fit the narrative. The one response about Obama's speech that was closest to my own response was this one from Rachel Maddow


Because of the importance of this issue I know the two speeches given by Obama and Cheney will not be the last word on what happened in the Bush era. In fact, we already have descriptions leaking out about what appeared in the photos that the Obama administration failed to release. The administration is of course denying the reporting.




We also continue to have Cheney's daughter, Liz Cheney, appearing on one political talk show after another claiming waterboarding and other "enhanced interrogation" techniques were not torture. We also have President Bush  publicly defending torture again and we have Alberto Gonzales trying to deny his involvement in torture. 

The American people deserve answers, not spin and until that happens this subject will not go away and should not go away. Contrary to what President Obama and others believe, we can't move forward as a country while we still have people who think what was done in the past is appropriate for use in the future. We can't afford to have people like Liz Cheney encouraged to run for office when she is out there actively promoting the use of torture. 

Until we drive a stake through the heart of the idea that torture is a viable option to be used by the U.S. we can't move forward or we risk having the use of torture come back like some vampire in a horror movie comes back to feed on it's victims again and again. 

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Sibel Edmonds Starts a New and Exciting Blog - Project Expose MSM




The battle to reclaim our free press has a new warrior. Sibel Edmonds,
a former language specialist for the FBI has started a new blog devoted to holding the establishment media accountable. 

Ms. Edmonds worked as a language specialist for the FBI’s Washington Field Office. During her work with the bureau, she discovered and reported serious acts of security breaches, cover-ups, and intentional blocking of intelligence that had national security implications. After she reported these acts to FBI management, she was retaliated against and ultimately fired in March 2002. Since that time, court proceedings on her issues have been blocked by the assertion of “State Secrets Privilege” by Attorney General Ashcroft, and the Congress of the United States has been gagged and prevented from any discussion of her case through retroactive re-classification issued by the Department of Justice.

Here is a link to the rest of her bio at her blog.

Her new project is called Project Expose MSM. Here is a snippet from her blog that describes her project:

We all have been tirelessly screaming about issues related to Congressional leaders abdicating their main responsibility of 'oversight.' We have been outraged for way too long at seeing 'no' accountability whatsoever in many known cases of extreme wrongdoing. I, and many of you, believe that the biggest reason for this was, and still is, the lack of true journalism and media coverage -- which acts as the necessary pressure and catalyst for those spineless politicians on the Hill and in the Executive branch. Or, at least it's supposed to. So, in our book, the MSM has been the main culprit.

Well, here is a chance to turn the tables.

At my new blog, 123 Real Change, I'm happy to present an experimental project, Project Expose MSM, created to provide readers with specific mainstream media blackout and/or misinformation cases based on the documented and credible first-hand experiences of legitimate sources and whistleblowers.123 Real Change is inviting all members of the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition (NSWBC), other active (covert or overt) government whistleblowers, and even reporters themselves, to publish their experiences in regard to their own first-hand dealings with the media, where their legit disclosures were either intentionally censored, blacked out or tainted.
Yes, we will be naming names -- myself included.

This is very exciting news. While people like me can expose specific lies  or distortions in the media we don't have access to the behind the scenes story about how those lies and distortions make their way into our newspapers or onto our television screens. Hopefully, Sibel will be able to ;penetrate behind enemy lines to find out why this is happening over and over and over again.

Good luck, Sibel. We will all be watching, waiting and helping you whenever we can to help expose the shoddy work of our establishment media and to force them to explain why they have been acting more like the propaganda mouthpiece for our government and various corporations instead of being the watchdogs for the American people. We have your back and  hopefully you will have ours.


Unlikely Partners - David Boies and Ted Olsen File Prop 8 Challenge


Clarence Darrow & Wm. Jennings Bryan - Scopes Trial - July 20, 1925

The Los Angeles Times is reporting that an unlikely partnership has formed between David Boies and former U.S. Solicitor General Ted Olsen. David Boies, who represented Al Gore in the 2000 election contest, and Ted Olsen, who represented George Bush, are now joining forces to challenge California's Proposition 8 in Federal Court.

In a project of the American Foundation for Equal Rights, Olson and Boies have united to represent two same-sex couples filing suit after being denied marriage licenses because of Proposition 8. Their suit, to be filed in U.S. District Court in California, calls for an injunction against the propostion, allowing immediate reinstatement of marriage rights for same-sex couples.

Here is a pdf file of the press conference announcing the challenge and a pdf file of the complaint filed May 22, 2009.

And here are the plaintiff bios and the bios of Ted Olsen and David Boies.


In the AM LAW Litigation Daily they point out that the LA Times talks about the uphill battle that awaits this challenge:

The Times adds that Boies, of Boies, Schiller & Flexner, and Olson, of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, could have a tough battle ahead, given the many conservative judges George W. Bush appointed during his presidency. Even the reliably liberal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has "experienced a curtailing of its liberal orientation with Bush's seven appointments," notes the Times. 

In an article by Byron York at the Washington Examiner, Ted Olsen tells York why he is involved in the case and what he would tell conservatives who object to his challenge:

"I personally think it is time that we as a nation get past distinguishing people on the basis of sexual orientation, and that a grave injustice is being done to people by making these distinctions," Olson told me Tuesday night.  "I thought their cause was just." 

I asked Olson about the objections of conservatives who will argue that he is asking a court to overturn the legitimately-expressed will of the people of California.  "It is our position in this case that Proposition 8, as upheld by the California Supreme Court, denies federal constitutional rights under the equal protection and due process clauses of the constitution," Olson said. "The constitution protects individuals' basic rights that cannot be taken away by a vote.  If the people of California had voted to ban interracial marriage, it would have been the responsibility of the courts to say that they cannot do that under the constitution.  We believe that denying individuals in this category the right to lasting, loving relationships through marriage is a denial to them, on an impermissible basis, of the rights that the rest of us enjoy…I also personally believe that it is wrong for us to continue to deny rights to individuals on the basis of their sexual orientation."

Politico always eager to placate the right is already snidely referring to Olsen as "the left's favorite conservative lawyer." I'm sure that this characterization of Olsen by Politico will be mild in comparison to what other conservative outlets and their friends in the establishment media will be saying. It might get real ugly.

Because this case will probably end up at the Supreme Court it raises a number of questions. Will the Court take the case or will they punt? If they do take the case and rule in favor of Boies and Olsen will this finally put an end to Republicans using gay marriage as a wedge issue in Republican politics or will they just combine their attack of gay marriage with their usual attack against "activist judges"?  Will the current make-up of the Supreme Court doom this case before it even gets there? Will Ken Starr go after Ted Olsen? How will the right wing echo chamber handle having one of their own turning on them? Lots of interesting questions. This is certainly one case that should get a lot of attention.

For further updates on this case you can follow it at the American Foundation for Equal Rights FACEBOOK page.

Update: Internationaljock has a diary up at Daily Kos on this same topic. Check it out.



ATT Up to it's Old Tricks Again


Photo: Mobile phone and thief


Looks like AT&T is up to it's old tricks again. This time instead of illegally helping the Bush administration wiretap it's customers, AT&T was accused in January of this year of spamming their customers with American Idol messages and more recently of helping to rig the text voting for American Idol.

LOS ANGELES — AT&T, one of the biggest corporate sponsors of “American Idol,” might have influenced the outcome of this year’s competition by providing phones for free text-messaging services and lessons in casting blocks of votes at parties organized by fans of Kris Allen, the Arkansas singer who was the winner of the show last week.
AT&T spammed a "'significant number' of its 75 million customers" yesterday with text messages advertising the premiere of American Idol. AT&T also pissed off a significant number of its 75 million customers in the process, and the company's justification for the blitz isn't exactly making AT&T sound smart when it comes to understanding what qualifies as spam.
I guess after Congress granted them immunity for helping the Bush administration with their illegal wiretapping AT&T felt that they could do anything they wanted to do without suffering any consequences. 

Indeed, back in 2008 Boing Boing documented that AT&T was so unrepentent for helping the Bush administration spy on Americans and so confident that nothing would happen to them that they even ran a parody about spying on people on their billing website. I guess AT&T thought the parody was a perfect way to advertise their online billing program and at the same time thumb their nose at those who had the nerve to criticize their lawless participation in the Bush spying program. 

Our establishment media never got real excited about covering AT&T's lawless behavior in helping the government spy on Americans.

Unfortunately, there has been scant coverage by MSM of the AT&T/NSA spying program and the pending court cases against it, despite the imminent threat this program and its legalization poses to communication privacy in America, and indeed to democracy itself. So why haven't the MSM given due attention to this serious threat to national security? 

The answer probably lies in the ever-increasing trend toward corporate media consolidation in America. First, the MSM corporations including News Corp (FOX), General Electric (NBC), Time Warner (CNN), Viacom (CBS), and Disney (ABC) have all enjoyed joint ventures with AT&T. Since these few giant media corporations that control network news in America are driven largely by their bottom lines, they are not likely to persist in exposing a serious business partner to bad press. Consequently, such stories are played down or not covered at all. 

Second, the behemoth media and telecom companies have strong monetary incentives to cooperate with the government -- such as the receipt of lucrative military defense contracts, tax breaks, and relaxed ownership and antitrust rules. For example, the recent merger of Bell South with AT&T was possible only because the Federal Communication Commission (FCC), presently chaired by Kevin Martin, a Bush appointee with close ties to the White House, approved the merger. 

Maybe the allegations that they participated in a vote rigging scheme for American idol and that they spammed their customers will prove to be just too juicy for our tabloid loving establishment media to resist. Maybe this time AT&T may actually get the unwanted negative publicity that they so richly deserved for spying on their customers. 

Sadly, in the upside down world that we live in today, where a man who authorized torture is given the same respect by our establishment media as that given to our president, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if AT&T suffers more negative consequences for rigging  American Idol votes than they ever did for illegally spying on Americans. 

Update: Looks like the establishment media is going to give AT&T another pass. They are now reporting that the vote rigging scandal is "overblown." Here is the evidence they cite to support their view that this vote rigging is overblown:

1. it was just a few "overeager" AT&T employees who brought the phones to the Kris Allen viewing parties. (it was not AT&T policy is was just a "few bad apples")
2. AT&T employees giving texting lessons at these Allen parties is no different than citizens who band together as a voting bloc. (yeah, right)
3. It was the Allen fans who went to the trouble to get AT&T at their party (they were smart enough to cheat)
4. Fox has a system to discard "power votes" (oh a system. Did the "system" work?)
5. conspiracy theorists should note that Allen's rendition of the "awful" final song outranks Lambert's fantastic rendition of Mad World on Itunes according to rankings of single downloads for May 25. (conspiracy theorists? how about AT&T employees frantically downloading to "prove" voting was not rigged?).
6. Imperfect science but Fox keeps voting as fair as possible (yeah, how?)
7. Let's put this in the rear view mirror. (let's look forward, not backward)

Wow. This sounds like a lot of the same type of comments we've heard about other "scandals."

We have a few bad apples, people accused of being conspiracy theorists, let's look foward not backward, etc. What we don't have is any evidence that AT&T didn't rig the voting.

Monday, May 25, 2009

A Memorial Day Tribute to All of Our Fallen Heroes


Sailor and Girl at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Washington, D.C. - May - 1943

A salute to all the brave men and women in our military who fought and died in the service of our country.

May you all rest in peace. We will never forget the sacrifices you made for the rest of us. 


Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, love leaves a memory no one can steal." - Anonymous

Here are two different videos where taps are played.  The first video is from an old movie From Here to Eternity. While this is a fictionalized account of what happened at Pearl Harbor during WWII I always thought this scene, where Montgomery Clift's character played taps, was one of the most beautiful renditions of Taps that I've ever heard. It's a very emotional scene and I actually tear up every time I watch it.





The second video is a current video that is more of a tribute to honor all of our fallen heroes rather than just an individual salute to a specific soldier that the first video represents. I think watching both of them gives one a better sense of the full range of emotions that are present on this day.







TAPS

Day is done,
gone the sun,
From the hills,
from the lake,
From the skies.
All is well,
safely rest,
God is nigh.

Go to sleep,
peaceful sleep,
May the soldier
or sailor,
God keep.
On the land
or the deep,
Safe in sleep.

Love, good night,
Must thou go,
When the day,
And the night
Need thee so?
All is well.
Speedeth all
To their rest.

Fades the light;
And afar
Goeth day,
And the stars
Shineth bright,
Fare thee well;
Day has gone,
Night is on.

Thanks and praise,
For our days,
'Neath the sun,
Neath the stars,
'Neath the sky,
As we go,
This we know,
God is nigh.

Sunday, May 24, 2009

Wash. Post Lied to Readers About Max Baucus & His Health Care Reform

The Super massive Black Hole at the Center of our Galaxy


Back on May 18, 2009, Perry Bacon Jr. participated as the Washington Post's representative in their Post Politics Hour discussion. At one point during that discussion Mr. Bacon was asked about single-payer health coverage and this was his response:

Perry Bacon Jr.: The Post is not covering single-payer (like the rest of the media) because the President of the United States has repeatedly ruled it out as an option. I wrote recently about a meeting he had with some House Democrats who were pushing the issue and he again said no

So there you have it - our media corporations are censoring information crucial to the public discussion about health care reform simply because the government doesn't support it. 

Whether this censorship is self-censorship by our corporate controlled media or whether it's due to government pressure is unknown. But the results are clear - rather than reporting all of the facts to the public, our establishment media is instead tailoring it's reporting to support the president's view on health care just like they've been tailoring their reporting to fit the president's view that there should be no criminal prosecutions for torture.

Today the Washington Post continues their policy of not reporting about single-payer health care. Not only didn't they mention single-payer health care in the Shailagh Murray/Ceci Connolly piece about Senator Max Baucus but because they didn't, they out and out lied to their readers about what they call "the Baucus approach to health care reform." 

 

For Baucus, Health Care is the Issue of a Lifetime
Legislation Could Define His Career, His Party.  

The Washington Post says in the above headline that health care is the issue of a lifetime for Senator Baucus. That may be, but for average Americans, the health care reform debate is not about selfishly polishing our legacy or defining our career, it's about getting quality, affordable health care where we are not at the mercy of the greedy health insurance industry. And unlike Mr. Baucus, for some Americans this truly is an issue of a lifetime - their lifetime- a lifetime that frequently gets cut short because of the greed of others. In view of the seriousness of this issue for so many average Americans it is especially galling to see the Post deliberately lie about and hide key facts in this article.

The majority of the Murray/Connolly article attempts to rehabilitate the well deserved, bad reputation that Democratic Senator, Max Baucus has earned for not supporting Democratic principles on high profile issues. Murray and Connolly actually go out of their way in their piece to give readers the impression that Senator Baucus is a western maverick who gets in trouble with his party only because he sticks up for principle and because of his strong belief in bi-partisanship. They of course fail to tell the readers that Senator Baucus is a darling of the health care insurance and pharmaceutical industries and that he has received enormous amounts of campaign donations from these players because of his strong support for their agenda - you know something that readers might want to know about when deciding whether they should believe what he says about health care reform issues.  

But this omission of relevant facts about Senator Baucus' background is a small lie compared with the blatant lie told by the Post about "the Baucus approach to health care reform." That lie is truly a whopper.

For more than a year, Baucus has schooled himself -- and many on the committee -- on the daunting complexities of the U.S. health-care system, a sector that represents one-sixth of the economy. His approach has been to pull together stakeholders and hold them as long as possible; no idea is ruled outno policy change dismissed.   

This statement by Murray and Connolly that was approved for publication by the Post is just factually false.  In fact, it’s a bald-faced lie. Max Baucus ruled out the idea that there should be a policy change to a single-payer system for health care before the discussion even began. Not only did he rule out the idea but he and the rest of the Committee made sure that not one representative who supported the idea of single-payer, that incidentally the majority of the public supports, would even be allowed to sit on the panel of so called  “stakeholders” who testified before the Committee. 

 But these groups had a seat at the table:

  1. The insurance industry was at the table.
  2.  The Business Roundtable was at the table.
  3. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce of Commerce was at the table.
  4. Blue Cross Blue Shield was at the table.
  5. The Hertiage Foundation was at the table
  6. Corporate liberals like Andy Stern, Ron Pollack, and AARP were at the table.

Baucus and his Committee, like the Washington Post, were determined that the pubic would not even so much as hear about the idea of single-payer much less that the idea would be given fair consideration in the debate to reform health care.

When  nurses and doctors protested this undemocratic exclusion of  not having a spokesperson, who supported the single-payer view, represented on the Baucus health care reform panel the Washington Post didn’t even bother to run their own story about it. Instead they ran a small AP piece that was hostile to single-payer (they characterized it as “government run” health care) that gave very few details about what actually happened and why. And now today the Post is once again failing to inform their readers about relevant facts because of their policy not to report on single-payer.

Max Baucus excludes single-payer representatives from having a seat at the table for discussion on health care reform and instead of being challenged by the Washington Post, as he should have been, he is awarded with a puff piece by them designed to enhance his reputation because the Post sees itself not as a watchdog for the public but as a propaganda mouthpiece for the president’s “protect the insurance industry” agenda. And sadly, the Post is not alone. The majority of our establishment media are doing the exact same thing, as this study by FAIR documents.

The establishment media censorship of single-payer is more in line with the kind of propaganda we'd expect from Pravda then it is with what we'd expect from a FREE PRESS that historically prided itself on serving the democratic principle of the public's right to know. In this Washington Post piece today the readers are delibertately lied to about Max Baucus in order to continue with the Post's policy of not reporting about single-payer. For a country like the United States that fancies itself as the world's leading democracy, fully capable of spreading democracy around the world,  this is an absolute disgrace.

Cross Posted at Oxdown Gazette

Update: I also found this hilarious yet depressing chat answer in another Washington Post discussion where Garance Fanke-Ruta refers a questioner from Princeton (who's asking about single-payer) to Ceci's Connolly's blog. Yeah, the very same Ceci Connolly who helped write today's Max Baucus piece where she and Murray lied about "the Baucus approach to health care reform."

Princeton, N.J.: You may think single-payer health care has no chance. But this will be a self-fulfilling prophecy if the facts are not available to the people.

We see article after article on process, but never any discussion of content. Since the wealthy health insurance industry has the power to suppress the facts, we only have the media, you, to get the truth out.

Garance Franke-Ruta: Thanks for your faith in the power of the fourth estate! One good place to get more of the substance of the debate is our new Health Reform 2009 aggregating page and Ceci Connolly's Daily Dose blog:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/health-care-reform/


Friday, May 22, 2009

When Will the Cheneys Finally Admit That Waterboarding is Torture?

Liz Cheney tells Norah O'Donnell that Waterboarding is Not Torture




Dick Cheney claimed in his speech yesterday that Waterboarding is Not Torture

President Obama has banned the harshest tactics that the CIA employed in the interrogation of suspected terrorists captured after 9/11, with his Justice Department labeling waterboarding, a simulated-drowning tactic used in many interrogations, as "torture."

"Torture was never permitted,"


Here's what conservative radio host Erich "Mancow" Muller  says about waterboarding:





If the Cheneys can't even tell the truth about what waterboarding is, why would anyone believe them when they tell us that waterboarding and other methods of torture are essential for our protection?

Swopa has an excellent piece up at Firedoglake about waterboarding and hypocrisy that's a MUST read.

Is Mark Halperin Really The Best "Public Face" for Time Magazine?


Carnival barker at the Vermont State Fair - 1941



On May 20, Time magazine's Swampland ran a piece about Nancy Pelosi called Pelosi Probably Right. In that piece the reporter, Jay Newton-Small, put to shame the establishment media's more "experienced" reporters by actually reading the statements of Porter Goss, Richard Shelby, Nancy Pelosi, Leon Panetta and Bob Graham and comparing them. You know, something anyone who knows anything about reporting would do before jumping to conclusions in order to create a narrative that agreed with their own political bias.

When Ms. Newton-Small read those statements she reported that even Porter Goss was parsing his language in his op-ed piece and was not directly contradicting Pelosi. Her conclusion after reading all of the statements was that Pelosi was probably telling the truth. Now for those of us who no longer trust our establishment media, the story in Swampland was nothing new to us. We've known about how carefully Goss chose his words in his Washington Post op-ed and we've known about how all of the statements and other evidence did not support the establishment media's narrative that assumed that  Pelosi was not telling the truth. We knew it because of the wonderful reporting done by Marcy Wheeler and others that have focused on reporting facts.

What's also notable about this piece in Swampland is that Time's Mark Halperin evidently didn't bother to read the Pelosi, Graham, Goss or Shelby statements like Ms. Newton-Small did because he's been reporting this story incorrectly since it started. He also evidently doesn't read his own magazine because he appeared on the Morning Joe show the day after the piece in Swampland was reported yet he never bothered to set the record straight during the two segments on Morning Joe where Pelosi was trashed. He never mentioned the Newton-Small story that Time includes in the MUST READS section on the front page of it's website. 

The day after Pelosi's initial press conference, Halperin wrote this piece in Time. Two of his three things "to watch for" were about Pelosi:

Mark Halperin's three things to watch for in politics for Friday, May 15.

1. Watch to see how House Speaker Nancy Pelosi handles herself today. The press conference she had yesterday on what she knew about the government's enhanced interrogation techniques got her into more trouble, so watch to see if she's willing to answer more questions today to clear up some of the contradictions and allegations swirling around her.  

2. Watch to see how people around Pelosi treat her. See what liberal bloggers, her constituents, the White House, Republicans and Democrats say about her today and whether there seems to be a strong sense that she's really in trouble. In particular, watch to see whether any prominent Democrats raise questions about her credibility on the briefings and in general. (Halperin reported on plenty of Republican comments, a few comments by a select group of Democrats, the WH, no liberal bloggers, no constituents).

Mr. Halperin never revised his "things to watch for" on Pelosi (like whether maybe Pelosi was truthful) and he obviously never reported what liberal bloggers were saying or he would have reported what Newton-Small reported even earlier than she did.  Halperin started out with the premise that Nancy Pelosi was in trouble on this issue because he assumed she did not tell the truth and that's how he's covered it, both on Morning Joe and at Time. It's clear from his "reporting" that he never changed his initial narrative and when facts were reported that supported Pelosi's comments he just didn't report them because they didn't fit his narrative. He was evidently more concerned with selling entertainment and a political view than he was in reporting all the facts so that readers and viewers could make an informed decision about the story. Here are the pieces he did for Time since he laid out his narrative, beginning with the most recent one that he reported on today that shows that even two days after the Newton-Small piece in Time he's still ignoring the facts she laid out and is still working off his "narrative."

Stonewall

House Dems Shut Calls for Pelosi Probe

Potus Praises Pelosi

Speakers Brawl

Penn to Pelosi: "Close the Door" on CIA Controversy

Boehner: Pelosi Needs to Come Clean

Pelosi Wants to Move Forward

Panetta: CIA Didn't Lie

Pelosi Newted

What Now?

Pelosi on Waterboarding: CIA Misled Me

Thank goodness Ms. Newton-Small doesn't use the Mark Halperin method of reporting. Rather than creating a narrative about Pelosi and then reporting on what fits the narrative, she reported on the facts in her story (substance)  even if they led in a direction that contradicted the widely used faux narrative of people like Halperin

Maybe Time magazine needs to question the wisdom of lending Mr. Halperin to Morning Joe in light of the fact that he's not a very good emissary for the magazine. His bias and sloppy work is being noticed by average Americans and that certainly won't help Time's image.  Maybe Time needs to place Mr. Halperin on a shorter leash so that instead of making TV appearances where he can yuck it up with his buddies he can have more time to sharpen his basic reporting skills. Maybe they can have him sit with his colleague, Jay Newton-Small, and let her educate him about basic reporting that he's either evidently forgotten or never learned in the first place. Or better yet, why don't they hire Marcy Wheeler to replace Mark Halperin. She's obviously a much better reporter on her worst day than Halperin is on his best. 

Here are two videos from Thursday's Morning Joe show where Nancy Pelosi was repeatedly trashed yet Halperin never mentioned the facts laid out in the Newton-Small piece. 






I'll continue to watch for Halperin's appearances on Morning Joe to see if he ever sets the record straight on the Pelosi story or if he sticks to his "narrative," come hell or high water.