Turnabout is fair play: Secretary Clinton critiques the American media

Official Secretary of State photo

You do, of course, remember when the Left wing of the American media dug up every right wing talking point it could find from the 90s to join forces with Fox News in its all out effort to destroy Hillary and Bill Clinton during the 2008 Democratic primary.

Well, turnaround is fair play, is it not?  Read the transcript below and then follow the link to watch the ABC video showing Secretary of State Clinton critiquing the American media as substandard while lifting up the success of Al Jazeera.

Ironically, the Huffington Post (one of the worst anti- Clinton offenders in 08) provides the transcript of Clinton’s comments and the video.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Wednesday that Al Jazeera is gaining more prominence in the U.S. because it offers "real news"--something she said American media were falling far short of doing.

Clinton was speaking before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and she said the U.S. is losing the "information war" in the world. One of the reasons she cited for this was the quality of channels like Al Jazeera.

"Viewership of Al Jazeera is going up in the United States because it's real news," she said. "You may not agree with it, but you feel like you're getting real news around the clock instead of a million commercials and, you know, arguments between talking heads and the kind of stuff that we do on our news which, you know, is not particularly informative to us, let alone foreigners."

Watch the video here:

Live rifle ammunition found outside capitol in Madison, Wisc.

The capitol building in Madison surrounded by protesters.

The AP reported from Madison, Wisc. minutes ago:

Dozens of rounds of live rifle ammunition were found Thursday scattered around the grounds of the Wisconsin Capitol, where large crowds of people have been protesting Gov. Scott Walker's proposal to rescind nearly all collective bargaining rights for most public employee unions.

For more on this story, go to USA Today.

It’s morning at the NY Times: the budget crisis “is all obfuscating nonsense”

Morning in NYC, photo public domain

A surprising editorial in the NY Times appears this morning titled “The Hollow Cry of Broke,” which suggests that John Boehner, Scott Walker, and company are exaggerating the nation’s so-called financial crisis in order “to break unions and kill programs they never liked in the first place.”

Keep in mind that in recent weeks, NY Times op-ed writers have railed time and again at those “entitlements” as the source of the nation’s scary budget deficit and more specifically, said pundits have blamed Social Security, a self-funding program, and Medicare for our current economic woes.

I’ve yet to see David Brooks or any of his colleagues at the Times mention that the government has violated federal law in raiding the Social Security Trust fund to pay for its two wars of choice and avoid taxing the wealthy or closing tax loopholes for major corporations. And they’ve certainly not mentioned that the nation’s seniors paid into the Social Security Trust Fund throughout their working lives with high payroll taxes.

So what’s with this Times editorial that begins:

“We’re broke! We’re broke!” Speaker John Boehner said on Sunday. “We’re broke in this state,” Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin said a few days ago. “New Jersey’s broke,” Gov. Chris Christie has said repeatedly. The United States faces a “looming bankruptcy,” Charles Koch, the billionaire industrialist, wrote in The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday.

It’s all obfuscating nonsense, of course, a scare tactic employed for political ends. A country with a deficit is not necessarily any more “broke” than a family with a mortgage or a college loan. And states have to balance their budgets. Though it may disappoint many conservatives, there will be no federal or state bankruptcies. 

The federal deficit is too large for comfort, and most states are struggling to balance their books. Some of that is because of excessive spending, and much is because the recession has driven down tax revenues. But a substantial part was caused by deliberate decisions by state and federal lawmakers to drain government of resources by handing out huge tax cuts, mostly to the rich. As governments begin to stagger from the self-induced hemorrhaging, Republican politicians like Mr. Boehner and Mr. Walker cry poverty and use it as an excuse to break unions and kill programs they never liked in flush years.

Those programs "they never liked in flush years" included Social Security and Medicare. Anyway, it’s good to see the Times editorial board is waking up. I’m resisting the temptation to say, “Good morning, fellas.”

Read the rest of this on target editorial here.

 

Has Margie J. Phelps or the members of Westboro Baptist church ever studied the life and teachings of Jesus?

It’s hard to know what’s more shocking, the Supreme Court’s decision today supporting the Westboro Baptist Church’s right to harass a grieving family trying to bury their son, a fallen Marine, with love and dignity, or the appalling distortion of biblical teachings and grotesque characterizations of God emerging from the mouth of Westoboro Baptist’s spokesperson, Margie J. Phelps, daughter of church leader and counsel for the group, Fred Phelps.

Follow the logic offered by Ms. Phelps if you can: An all loving God created some human beings as homosexuals - psychologists now agree that gays were born that way. This very same God then condemns gays and chooses to destroy them and their families and any person or nation, for that matter, who supports them.

Now read these words uttered by her holiness, Ms. Phelps, following the court’s decision today as reported by the Huffington Post:

"Let me tell you what this church does: Shut up all that talk about infliction of emotional distress," Phelps said, in response to the claim by Albert Snyder, father of slain marine Matthew Snyder, which had provided the impetus for the lawsuit. "When you're standing there with your young child's body bits and pieces in a coffin, you've been dealt some emotional distress by the Lord your God."

The Huffington Post article continues:

The Westboro Baptist Church has repeatedly drawn controversy with its inflammatory picketing efforts, which often include bright signs displaying slogans such as "God Hates Fags" and "Thank God For Dead Soldiers." The congregation most recently drew fire in January for announcing that it would demonstrate at the funerals of those killed in the Arizona shootings, though it eventually backed down on plans to protest at the service of the youngest victim, 9-year-old Christina Taylor Green.

According to the above article, Phelps went on to say:

"I very much appreciate the fact that I get to be the mouth of God in this matter," she told reporters.

As a graduate of an accredited theological seminary with a master’s in divinity,  I must say that Phelps is not the mouth of any understanding of God that I’ve glimpsed in my studies of the Bible and the works of leading theologians, or that I’ve experienced in my personal devotional life.

On the contrary, the God that I worship is a God of compassion, love, and grace who leads by persuasion, never by coercion, as vividly demonstrated in the life of Jesus who lived and preached non-violence. Apparently, Ms. Phelps, her father, and the members of Westboro Baptist Church, all of whom call themselves Christians, have never studied the life and teachings of Jesus.

Go Wisconsin Dems - recall those GOP senators!

Wisc. Gov. Scott Walker (R)

The Huffpost’s Sam Stein reports:

WASHINGTON -- The Wisconsin Democratic Party has launched a fundraising campaign to recall state Senate Republicans who have supported the budget bill by Gov. Scott Walker (R) that would strip collective bargaining rights from the state's public employee unions.

Stein’s report includes excerpts from the email the Dems sent out Wednesday afternoon.

In 60 days you can take Wisconsin back. It's that simple.
 
 

This morning citizens from around the state took the first steps by filing recall papers against key Republican Senators who have stood with Scott Walker and pushed his partisan power grab that will strip thousands of middle class teachers, nurses, librarians and other workers of their right to collective bargaining. And we learned just last night that their disastrous budget that will cut millions from our schools and universities.

In 60 days you can take Wisconsin back by recalling the Republican Senators who have decided to push Scott Walker's divisive attack on the rights of workers and his assault on schools, universities and local communities. Can you contribute $60 today to support the Democratic Party's recall efforts?

Read more:

Are you listening, Washington? Minn. political leaders on managing the state’s deficit, partnering with business, and educational reform (video)

For thoughtful insights on resolving tough issues that Minnesotans are facing that might well be of benefit to the nation as a whole, listen to Audrey Britton on Real Progress TV interview Minn.  House Minority leader Rep. Paul Thissen and Deputy Minority leader Rep. Debra Hilstrom.

Selling sex online: “fresh and innocent” means underage

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi.

Thanks to DFL’er Grace Kelly for calling my attention to this issue.

The Twin Cities metro area is taking the lead in Minn. to stop the exploitation of youth by pimps and other varieties of sexual predators, online or otherwise. And our officials are making clear the difference between criminals and victims of sex crimes. In an article titled Teen prostitutes get new status, the Minneapolis StarTribune’s Pat Pfieffer and Jim Anderson report:

County prosecutors from across the metro said Friday they are overhauling their policies to ensure that juvenile prostitutes are treated as crime victims instead of criminals, even as some regions of the state see an uptick in teen prostitution cases.

The article continues:

"These kids are 14 going on 43 sometimes," said Pete Orput, Washington County attorney. "It's important to send them the message that they're going to be treated as crime victims."

Dakota County Attorney James Backstrom, a national leader in the field of juvenile justice issues, said protecting children is one of the most important tasks for prosecutors.

"In many ways, it's reached epidemic levels," aided by the Internet and social network websites, he said. Victim advocates say when online ads selling sex tout "fresh" and "innocent," what they mean is underage.

And get this:

Joy Friedman, a case worker for Breaking Free, a St. Paul-based outreach and recovery group for prostituted women and girls, said the average age that a girl enters prostitution is 13. More and more, she said, she is seeing girls recruited by other juveniles. "We had an 11-year-old who was recruited by a 12-year-old," she said.

 Strange, isn't it, how we Americans continue to preach to other nations about human rights while situations like the above continue to exist in our own society, even out here in the Midwest.