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Balladeer
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0 posted 2008-10-30 08:59 AM



Well, it appears that there are SOME honest reporters out there. It' a long article but well worth the read.

Blue Ridge Observer
Would the Last Honest Reporter Please Turn On the Lights?
By Orson Scott Card
Editor's note: Orson Scott Card is a Democrat and a newspaper columnist, and in this opinion piece he takes on both while lamenting the current state of journalism.
http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/honestreporter.asp


© Copyright 2008 Michael Mack - All Rights Reserved
rwood
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since 2000-02-29
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1 posted 2008-10-30 09:28 AM


Hey, I liked his article. Denise posted a link in your "Presidential Race," comment #64, I think.

but yeah, he deserves a read.

Balladeer
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2 posted 2008-10-30 09:47 AM


Thank you, Regina. I don't expect many will read it but I'm glad you did...appreciate it!
threadbear
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since 2008-07-10
Posts 817
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3 posted 2008-10-30 10:41 AM


Hey Mike,

Good post, although I thought the author did 'reach' a bit when blaming all the Dem's for the debacle.  There were plenty of Repub congressmen who sat quiet on the sidelines and could have pushed for the regulation on Freddie and Fannie Mae, backing Bush.  But they didn't, for various political reasons of expediancy.

Something did dawn on me while reading this:

It hit me, like a bolt of lightning WHY Palin was torn to shred by ALL the media:

They are prejudiced against a woman becoming President!  Just as they might accuse American of not being mature enough to elect a Black President, they themselves aren't mature enough to accept a Conservative Woman as President.

An argument can also be made that they when they saw that Hill Clinton on her way to the Presidency, the media got cold feet, too.  They turned on her like a pack of wolves, and lapped up the Obama salt lick until just a few grains remained on the ground.

Prejudice is still prejudice, and its wrong.  But the hypocrisy of the media playing the anti-race card FOR Obama at times, then playing the Anti-Woman card for Palin, especially on the wardrobe and her tom-boy ways (geez, she lives in Alaska! what duyaexpect?)...well....it is the worst brand of blantant hypocrisy I've seen the media play since the Anita Hill and Bork hearings.   Can someone point to any media outlets (not FOX) that actually DEFENDED Palin on a misleading allegation (of which there were PLENTY of opportunities to balance the new)?  Pretty damned hard, huh?

The other epithany I had is this:  If and when Obama wins the Presidency, there will be one reason that he won:

The media elected him prior to the election.

JenniferMaxwell
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4 posted 2008-10-30 10:46 AM


“The Democratic Party ought to be standing as the bulwark of the little guy against big money and rapacious free-market capitalism, here and abroad. After all, the Republicans seem to be dominated by their own group of insane utopians—when they're not making huggy-huggy with all those leftover racists from the segregationist past.” - Orson Scott Card



Denise
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5 posted 2008-10-30 10:56 AM


Some Republicans pushed for reform along with Bush, Jeff, including McCain.
threadbear
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since 2008-07-10
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6 posted 2008-10-30 11:11 AM


Let's be fair here, Denise:

the debacle wasn't caused by EITHER party on their own.  The attempt by BOTH to paint the other as the sole reason the Economy tanked is just not truthful.  

The lenders are equally as responsible.
The speculators are equally as responsible.
All the congressmen who took earmarks from the lobbyists to overlook possible regulation are responsible.
Even the foreign investors looking for a quick buck driving the market into a corner, are responsible.

McCain may have pushed for legislation, but his whole premise that retirement Soc.Security should be put into 401K, well...that argument just went to heck in a handbasket.  That obviously is not the sole answer to retirement savings.  

I will say this, though:  The Dem's were the last people in the room, and they should have turned the light off.

------------------------------------
On a different note, I want to note there have been
THREE attempts on Obama's life that has been thwarted in the past two months.  

Make of that as you will.  Obama may need a version of the Pope-Mobile to travel in, a bullet-proof bubble to speak in.   If he is martyred, we will fall into into a national mental depression that will rival JFK's assasination.  

God help us all to see the light toward understanding and compassion toward all men (and women.)

WTBAKELAR
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7 posted 2008-10-30 12:18 PM


Pope mobile,  how fitting.  I can see him now, with his head up waving to all his adoring masses as he drives through the streets of Chicago and Philly-delphia, bullets bouncing off the plexiglass as he smiles..  

Oh, by the way,  the presidents limo is already bullit proof.  It will need to have the plastic dome installed as soon as the election is over.  They can do it while they are measuring the drapes.

As for blame,  WHO CARES!!!   I want to know how they (whoever or what ever party) is going to fix the stinking mess we are in?
I am so tired of empty promises from every elected pansy and pansyette.  Just once in my life, I would like to see a congress and senate do something beside play the phoney political blame game, and do something for the American people.

Is that asking to much?  after all, aren't they hired by us and shouldn't we expect that from our employees?

[This message has been edited by Ron (10-30-2008 02:28 PM).]

Denise
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8 posted 2008-10-30 04:13 PM


I have no problem being fair, Jeff, none at all. And I'm not blaming only one side of the aisle for the mess we are in. I just made a statement that McCain did try to get reform legislation passed regarding Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which was blocked by Barney Frank and Christopher Dodd and others, even Republicans too. I just think McCain gets a bum rap on the issue of the economy when he was the one who tried to do something about it over two years ago.

I thought the Social Security/401K thing was a going to be set up as voluntary program where you could contribute as much or as little of your Social Security taxes into it, whereby you could still collect from both systems depending on how you chose to set it up. I don't remember that it was supposed to be mandatory or an either or type program, Social Security or 401K.

Balladeer
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9 posted 2008-10-30 06:18 PM


...not to mention that the three who worked to block it - Obama, Dodd, and Frank were the three top names that Acorn gave campaign funds to. Coincidence? Not likely....
Mistletoe Angel
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10 posted 2008-10-30 08:13 PM


quote:
There are precedents. Even though President Bush and his administration never said that Iraq sponsored or was linked to 9/11, you could not stand the fact that Americans had that misapprehension -- so you pounded us with the fact that there was no such link. (Along the way, you created the false impression that Bush had lied to them and said that there was a connection.)


Ummmmmm.......except they DID suggest there was an established connection time and time again, as has well been documented before here!  

quote:
If you had any principles, then surely right now, when the American people are set to blame President Bush and John McCain for a crisis they tried to prevent, and are actually shifting to approve of Barack Obama because of a crisis he helped cause, you would be laboring at least as hard to correct that false impression.


An urgent lesson I indeed wholeheartedly agree with, which unfortunately some Bush Administration apologists here realized a little too late!  

quote:
Your job, as journalists, is to tell the truth. That's what you claim you do, when you accept people's money to buy or subscribe to your paper.

But right now, you are consenting to or actively promoting a big fat lie -- that the housing crisis should somehow be blamed on Bush, McCain, and the Republicans. You have trained the American people to blame everything bad -- even bad weather -- on Bush, and they are responding as you have taught them to.


The key word here is "somehow". And yes, I believe BOTH parties are to blame for this mess.

How the Democrats are to blame has already been established well here. The GOP are also to blame heavily for this mess. One congressman, Scott Garrett, alone is a very revealing story, who has went so far as to hire as his chief of staff a lobbyist for Countrywide Financial and Washington Mutual, two of the firms that most "benefitted" from Garrett's anti-regulatory positionings, and also the whole collapse in the banking and rela estate sectors. All while sitting in the House Financial Services Committee.

Garrett is far from alone in this among his caucus. McCain himself refuses to explain his role, along with other party faithful, in dismantling the federal regulatory agencies that were designed to protect ordinary Americans from unrestrained predatory capitalism in the first place. Also, in May of this year, in fact, when Congress passed the Waters' Neighborhood Stabilization Act of 2008, and the majority of Congress joined in this assisting of families affected by the deregulation mess, the minority 94 who voted against it were all typical rubber-stamp Bush policy Republicans, including Garrett.

That's not even the worst part of this though. Putting all the blame on one party's doorstep is irresponsible enough, but when some are actually shifting the blame to the poor and minorities for this mess, like Jon Kyl has done, that's just despicable to me. And Congress collectively should be ashamed of itself.

quote:
If you had any personal honor, each reporter and editor would be insisting on telling the truth -- even if it hurts the election chances of your favorite candidate.

Because that's what honorable people do. Honest people tell the truth even when they don't like the probable consequences. That's what honesty means. That's how trust is earned.


Indubitably. So why won't McCain come clean and explain himself too?  

Of course, when during the vast majority of his campaign his economic agenda didn't even hint the housing crisis as an issue, it comes to no surprise to me why he tries distancing himself as far from the matter as he can.

quote:
If you do not tell the truth about the Democrats -- including Barack Obama -- and do so with the same energy you would use if the miscreants were Republicans -- then you are not journalists by any standard.


Ditto, and the reciprocality of that as well!  

Sincerely,
Noah Eaton


"If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other"

Mother Teresa

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