Posted 11:21 AM by Scoobie Davis

Posting Later Today
Sorry about the dearth of recent posting

UPDATE: I don't have time to finish the post I was working on today but I have new posts on the Moon blog and the Amway Global blog.

Posted 12:49 PM by Scoobie Davis

Media news
Sean Hannity wins the 2008 Media Matters for America Misinformer of the Year award.

UPDATE: Media Matters has a very long post about how the Fox News crew helped Hannity.

Posted 8:24 PM by Scoobie Davis

I had to laugh
Last night on Conan, Amy Adams appeared. The audience laughed when she told Conan that she learned how to "bone a duck."

Posted 9:41 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Robert Parry "We Need New Media in Age of Obama."

Posted 2:01 PM by Scoobie Davis

How Do People Get to this Site? Results from my Statcounter Stats
Whenever I check my Statcounter stats and I notice that someone got to this site from a search engine via some weird-ass keywords, I make a note of it and occasionally post the results (Here and here are some recent posts on the matter. Here is my most recent list of search engine keyword terms that people used to get to this site:

That Fuckin' Moonie Newspaper
faith hill legs spread pics
greta van susteren what is wrong with her face
nude gingrich drawing
hannity is an ass
dexter yager sex
i hate fox news is evil
miami of ohio nudes
why do people say fox news shows both sides?
Is Brit Hume catholic
dexter yeager is a fraud
jack tapper down and dirty Katharine harris
caesar salad tijuana lap dance

Posted 8:34 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Joe Conason on the return of "the Clinton rules."

Posted 10:37 AM by Scoobie Davis

New Post on the Moonie Blog
Click here

Posted 12:02 AM by Scoobie Davis

Sour Grapes: Former Talk Radio Jock Uses Flawed Methodology to Claim That Obama Voters are Ignorant
John Ziegler is a former LA talk radio jock. I didn't find his show remotely interesting but to be fair, there were times in which he showed that he wasn't a complete Rush clone (I noted on this blog how, to his credit, Ziegler strayed from the right's dogma on Terry Schiavo).

To his discredit, Ziegler is part of the right's attempt to delegitimize Obama's victory by claiming that Obama's supporters are uninformed and stupid. Ziegler commissioned a poll by Zogby International that asked Obama and McCain supporters twelve questions. Ziegler has a web site and a YouTube video to support the contention that based on the results of the survey, McCain supporters were more informed than Obama supporters. I looked at the twelve questions and found that several of them have serious problems in wording and/or reliability and validity. The survey is so fatally flawed that had a first year graduate student in sociology or political science used similar methodology in a class project, the student would have deserved a failing grade (disclosure: I have taken two graduate-level research methodology courses). In short, the survey is a joke. Here are the questions from the original Zogby survey Ziegler commissioned:

1. Before this past election, which political party controlled both houses of congress?
2. Which candidate could not say how many houses they own?
3. Which candidate said they could see Russia from their house?
4. Which candidate had to quit a previous political campaign because they were found to have plagiarized a speech?
5. Which candidate won their first election by getting all of their opponents kicked off the ballot?
6. Which candidate wore clothes that their political party reportedly spent $150,000 on?
7. Which candidate currently has a pregnant teenage daughter?
8. Which candidate said that Obama would be tested in his first six months as president by a generated international crisis?
9. Which candidate claimed to have campaigned in 57 states?
10. Which candidate said their policies would likely bankrupt the coal industry and make energy rates skyrocket?
11. Which candidate said that the government should redistribute the wealth?
12. Which candidate started their political career at the home of two former members of the Weather Underground?

ANALYSIS:

Question 1 is problematic because of misleading wording. The awkward wording might have led one to believe that the question is referring to prior to the 2006 elections. It's not the worst question in the world but the wording could have been better.

Questions 5, 10, 11, and 12 are fatally flawed. 1) they are examples of questions with invalid premises (the Do-you-still-beat-your-wife? fallacy). 2) Answering them "correctly" doesn't measure anything other than a person's likelihood of being exposed to right-wing media outlets that devoted a lot of time harping on the disinformation in the premises of the questions.

Question 5: Which candidate won their first election by getting all of their opponents kicked off the ballot? Problem: the premise is a right wing talking point. It wasn't a matter of Obama kicking his opponents off the ballot, there was evidence that the opponents signatures were forged or were by made by ineligible voters. Despite the falsity of the claim that Obama kicked these candidates off the ballot, this tendentious talking point was a staple of right-wing talk radio and the Fox News Channel during the election campaign. Answering it "correctly" is only a measure of how much you listen to wing-nut media outlets.

Question 10: Which candidate said their policies would likely bankrupt the coal industry and make energy rates skyrocket? This is a meaningless tendentious question. Here is what Obama said:

So, if somebody wants to build a coal power plant, they can. It's just that, it will bankrupt them because they're going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that's being emitted. That will also generate billions of dollars that we can invest in solar, wind, biodiesel, and other alternative energy approaches. The only thing that I've said, with a respect to coal -- I haven't been some coal booster -- what I have said is, that, for us to take coal off the table as a ideological matter, as opposed to saying, if technology allows us to use coal in a clean way, we should pursue it. You know, that I think is the right approach.

The American right took that nuanced statement to claim that Obama said he wanted to bankrupt the coal industry. Also, there is nothing to suggest that Obama will cause energy rates to skyrocket--unless, of course, you believe right-wing media outlets who were spinning Obama's words.

Question 11; Which candidate said that the government should redistribute the wealth? Same principle as the previous two questions. It's meaningless. If you believe in a progressive income tax (both Obama and McCain support this), you believe in redistributing the wealth. The Bush administration's no-bid contracts to their corporate friends like Haliburton as well as their anti-union policies were wealth redistribution policies, regressive ones. This is a biased question that has no place in a meaningful survey.

Question 12: Which candidate started their political career at the home of two former members of the Weather Underground? Pure right-wing propaganda. Obama started his political career "when he got the backing of then state Sen. Alice Palmer (D-Chicago), who wanted him to replace her as she was planning a run for Congress. Palmer's backing gave him entrée into local influential political circles." Again, answering this question "correctly" only measures how much one listens to Hannity and/or watch Fox News. These questions don't demonstrate political knowledge but one's exposure to right-wing talking points and spin.

Questions 4, 8, and 9 are technically correct but they are not good indicators of how well a citizen is informed. True, Obama said he campaigned in 57 states--the guy misspoke. One can't reasonably think that Obama didn't know that there are 50 U.S. states; it's a non-story. It's a trivial matter that was relentlessly hyped on talk radio and on the fair-and-balanced channel. Like question 9, questions 4 and 8 pertain to negative but relatively trivial information given a lot of play on right-wing media outlets.

I could go on with several of the other questions but I think my point has been made: this survey was fatally flawed and worse than worthless. It would be like shooting fish in a barrel to use survey research to suggest that McCain voters are dumbasses. All it would take would be a survey comparing McCain and Obama voters on the following questions: 1) Do you believe that the earth is less than 10,000 years old? 2) Do you believe that human beings coexisted with dinosaurs? 3) Do you believe that Bill and Hillary Clinton were responsible for the murder of Vince Foster?

This is nothing more than part of the social science component of the radical right's war on science. Ziegler has joined other hacks (such as John Lott/Mary Roush, Gabriel Nahas, Charles Murray, and Paul Cameron) who have used phony social science findings to support reactionary public policies.

Addendum: Several critics of Ziegler's work referred to the survey as a "push poll." Was Ziegler's survey a push poll? Technically no. A push poll is a political dirty trick in which operatives falsely claiming to work for a polling firm call potential voters and falsely claim to be collecting data for a survey and ask the person jaundiced questions about a political opponent in order to reduce support for the opponent; there is no attempt to find a representative sample or collect data. On the other hand, Ziegler used a polling firm to collect (flawed) data to support his argument. Ziegler used misleading and meaningless questions as well as questions with false premises. Ziegler's poll is similar to the survey questions that Fox News chief Roger Ailes included in a Fox New/Opinion Dynamics poll in March after MoveOn.org and other grassroots groups put pressure on the Democratic Party presidential candidates to cancel the debate sponsored by Fox News. Here is one of the leading questions in the poll:

36. After the 2004 presidential election, the president of the left-wing Moveon.org political action committee made the following comment about the Democratic Party, "In the last year, grassroots contributors like us gave more than $300 million to the Kerry campaign and the DNC, and proved that the Party doesn't need corporate cash to be competitive. Now it's our Party: we bought it, we own it and we're going to take it back." Do you think the Democratic Party should allow a grassroots organization like Moveon.org to take it over or should it resist this type of takeover?

16% Yes, allow a grassroots organization to run the party
61% No, don't allow a grassroots organization to run the party
24% Don't know

What Ziegler's phony survey and push polling have in common is that they both are an affront to legitimate survey research.

Labels: How Obama Got Elected, pseudoscience

Posted 5:18 PM by Scoobie Davis

People Who Deserve One Another
John Tesh is now Part of the Amway family

Posted 5:16 PM by Scoobie Davis

Summing Up The Palin Phenomenon in One Paragraph
Bob Cesca:

For instance, apart from her unserious pageant walking and clueless turkey geeking, it's practically impossible for Sarah Palin, with her far-right ideology and divisive politics, to expand a Republican electorate that's already suffering from, well, shrinkage. Her appeal is so laser-focused on a rabidly fanboy-ish chunk of the GOP base that many more Americans who would otherwise vote Republican will surely continue to snap to other options. Meanwhile, the Palin base -- the fanboys who are "exploding" over Sarah Palin -- are a mélange of Bush dead-enders, disgruntled former Bush loyalists who haven't yet realized that the only difference between Palin and Bush is, well, lipstick, and, of course, way too many disturbingly pervy older men. Outside of this narrow demographic, everyone else thinks she's more or less an earnest yet embarrassing joke.

Posted 12:56 PM by Scoobie Davis

New Post on the Anti-Amway Global Blog
Click here

Posted 11:54 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Neal Gabler on the cultural and political roots of the contemporary Republican Party.

Posted 10:56 PM by Scoobie Davis

New Post on the Sun Myung Moon blog
Click here.

Posted 8:53 PM by Scoobie Davis

New Jack Chick Tract
This is one of Chick's best in a long time: In "Somebody Angry?" Chick tells us that Hurricane Katrina was due to God's wrath for the the situation in the Gaza Strip.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Posted 2:29 PM by Scoobie Davis

New Post on the Moon Blog
click here

Posted 3:28 PM by Scoobie Davis

Alas, It Won't Be Hannity and Miller
In APJ, Steve Young suggests to Fox News chief Roger Ailes to replace departing co-host Alan Colmes of Hannity & Colmes with syndicated talk show host Stephanie Miller.

I don't think this is going to happen. The main reason is that Miller knows the score and a member of the left who knows the score is not what Roger Ailes is looking for. Salon's David Talbot pointed this out a few years ago:

Ailes was the king of cable and he was clearly reveling in his power. Alas, he couldn't squeeze us into the Fox News schedule, Ailes told us -- every show in his lineup was "kicking the competition's ass" and he was not about to mess with success by opening a hole for Salon. Though he didn't say it, there was also a clear implication that a regular dose of Salon might be too much for his audience, which Ailes described as age "55 to dead, like me" (he left out white and intolerant). Years earlier, when hunting for a liberal punching bag to pair with Sean Hannity, Ailes had tried out a tough Salon writer. He apparently punched back so effectively in his audition that Fox picked bespectacled milquetoast Alan Colmes instead. Fox likes its liberals soft and chewy, the better to eat them, my dear.

My guess: Kirsten Powers. She's (kinda) liberal; she's hot (something Ailes looks for); and she doesn't have a clue--the perfect Fox News Democrat. She's currently a Fox News Analyst and writes for Murdoch's crapsheet The New York Post (read her column denouncing the Obama campaign for throwing the Post reporter as well as the Moonie Times operative off the campaign plane).

Posted 11:08 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Robert Parry on the media's asymmetry:

Despite Barack Obama’s election victory, this media asymmetry will not go away. Indeed, it is almost certain to limit his ability to bring about significant change and could tilt the country back in the direction of the Republicans in the not-too-distant future.

It is a pattern I have seen often since 1977 when I arrived in Washington as a reporter for the Associated Press.

During that time, while the American Left has been largely absent from the national media landscape, wealthy right-wingers (from foundations like Olin and Scaife to media moguls like Sun Myung Moon and Rupert Murdoch) have poured tens of billions of dollars into media.

Over those years, the Right built a towering – and vertically integrated – media structure reaching from newspapers, magazines and books to talk radio, cable TV and the Internet, an apparatus concentrated in the power centers of New York and Washington.

The Right also invested money in attack groups to go after mainstream journalists who dared dig up information that put right-wing policies or politicians in a negative light. Offending journalists were accused of “liberal bias” and often found themselves hounded from the national press corps.

Over time, this imbalance had a spillover effect. Many right-wing and neoconservative pundits landed prime spots on mainstream TV news shows and the Op-Ed pages of leading newspapers, such as the New York Times and the Washington Post.

Even the most dangerous of right-wing ideas – such as free-market absolutism at home and neoconservative imperialism abroad – got respectful if not reverential treatment across the mainstream-to-right-wing media spectrum, the news outlets that most Americans read, heard and watched.

Posted 1:21 PM by Scoobie Davis

In Denial
El Rushbo uses U.S. county maps to argue that the U.S. is still conservative. It's too bad, that people, not gravel, vote.

For further reading: Mark Monmonier, How to Lie with Maps.

Posted 1:05 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Brad Friedman on Wussy Dems:

The Democrats, as usual, have only themselves to blame. But we're still happy to help both them and the Republicans if it means the voters might see their votes counted and counted accurately, no matter who will ultimately be declared the winner of any election. You're welcome, Republicans (and Democrats).

After years of Democrats refusing to use the f-word (fraud) or discussing concerns about the s-word (stolen) for elections, for fear of being declared conspiracy theorists and sore-losers by the Republicans, we'll note that Republicans have no such fears. They never did. And they are happy to don enormous and shiny tin-foil hats any time to claim any conspiracy they need to, regardless of the actual evidence (or lack thereof) to support their theory.

They will claim --- even at the highest official levels of their party --- that "Democrats are stealing the election," "stuff[ing] new ballots into the ballot box" and all other manner of unsubstantiated allegations, if they believe it might help their candidate "win." The voters be damned.

Read the whole article.

Posted 11:42 AM by Scoobie Davis

The Inimitable Robert Greenwald on Joe Lieberman

Posted 7:06 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Robert Parry give Barack Obama some valuable advice and hopes that Obama will learn the lessons of 1993:

Barack Obama seeks a new era of bipartisanship, but he should take heed of what happened to the last Democrat in the White House – Bill Clinton – in 1993 when he sought to appease Republicans by shelving pending investigations into Reagan-Bush-I-era wrongdoing and hoped for some reciprocity.

Instead the Republicans pocketed the Democratic concessions and pressed ahead with possibly the most partisan assault ever directed against a sitting President. The war on Clinton included attacks on his past life in Arkansas, on his wife Hillary, on personnel decisions at the White House, and on key members of his administration.

The Republicans also took the offensive against Clinton’s reformist agenda, denying him even one GOP vote for his first budget and then sabotaging Hillary Clinton’s plan for universal health insurance.

The desperately-seeking-bipartisanship Clinton allowed Republican loyalists to stay burrowed inside the government, and he bowed to the appointment of right-wing special prosecutors (appointed by a Republican-dominated judicial panel) to investigate him and his administration.

In the first two years of the Clinton presidency, radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh emerged as a national phenomenon, regaling his huge audience with three hours a day of mocking attacks on Bill and Hillary Clinton.

At one downtown Washington restaurant, Blackie’s House of Beef, a special area was set aside so Clinton haters could listen to Rush Limbaugh’s show while eating lunch. Limbaugh’s success inspired a new generation of radio talk show hosts who got rich dishing anti-Clinton dirt.

In February 1994, when I covered the annual Conservative Political Action Conference – a kind of trade show for the Right – I was stunned by the volume and variety of hate-Clinton paraphernalia. Never had I seen anything like this well-organized, well-funded determination to destroy a political figure.

In November 1994, a resurgent Republican Party – energized by its hatred of the Clintons – wrested control of Congress from the Democrats. But rather than sating the Right’s anti-Clinton obsession, the success only fed a desire for more.

Read the rest.

Posted 10:17 PM by Scoobie Davis

WTF!?
I was checking my Statcounter stats and found out that someone from Vancouver, Washington came to my Sun Myung Moon blog from a Google search of "sun myung moon nude photos"

Posted 6:38 PM by Scoobie Davis

You Gotta Read This
Michael Lind "Obama and the Dawn of the Fourth Republic" in Salon.

Blast from the Past: The first post on this blog referenced Lind's book Up From Conservatism: Why The Right Is Wrong For America.

Posted 12:38 PM by Scoobie Davis

A National Party No More
One of the best things about Tuesday's elections was that it was a repudiation of Zell Miller. Remember four years ago when Miller, a washed-up has-been who had been appointed to the Senate after Paul Coverdell died, became the darling of the right when he endorsed George W. Bush. Miler, a Democrat, proclaimed that the GOP was the wave of the future and that the Democrats were no longer a national party (I sure on the remainder tables of your local bookstore you can find a copy of Millers's 2003 manifesto A National Party No More: The Conscience of a Conservative Democrat).

On Tuesday, Obama not only did well in the South, carrying Florida, Virgina, and North Carolina, but the last GOP member of the U.S. House, Christopher Shays, was defeated. What a difference four years makes.

Posted 11:38 AM by Scoobie Davis

Was That Great or What?
I just got back from the Crooks and Liars election night party. I'm exhausted.

I heard a little of Rush. To no surprise, Limbaugh spoke about stolen votes and socialism.

Posted 11:30 AM by Scoobie Davis

The Black Panthers in Philadelphia:The Right's Media is on it
There are initial reports that individuals claiming to be Black Panthers are standing outside Philadelphia polling places (some of whom were brandishing weapons). I heard about this on Rush Limbaugh's radio program and when I checked the Internet, the Fair and Balanced Channel and Drudge had it as its main story.

Are these real Black Panthers? That's for someone else to determine. A couple things I do know:
1) It is being used by the right's media as a GOTV tactic for the McCain campaign.
2) The alleged Black Panthers are helping the right's media with their preemptive narrative that an Obama victory will be illegitimate. That's at least how Rush is playing it--he's telling his listeners that it's an attempt to steal the election in Pennsylvania.

NOTE: I'm heading to Los Angeles for the Crooks and Liars Election Party and my laptop is dead so there will be light posting today.

Posted 11:29 AM by Scoobie Davis

I Voted Today
Yeah, I voted for Obama

Posted 9:56 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Paul Krugman "The Republican Rump"

Posted 2:22 PM by Scoobie Davis

My Election Predictions
Electoral votes: Obama 341; John McCain 197
Popular vote: Obama 53%, McCain 46% Everyone else (Ralph Nader, Bob Barr, Cynthia McKinney, et al.) 1%
U.S. House 256 Democrats; 179 Republicans
U.S. Senate 58 Democrats, 40 Republicans, 2 Independents (Sanders and Lieberman)

Here are the predictions from the ABC News gang.

Posted 2:43 PM by Scoobie Davis

Post on the Expulsion of the Washington Times Operative from the Obama Press Plane
On the Sun Myung Moon blog.

Posted 12:55 PM by Scoobie Davis

Happy Halloween!
I'm gonna party!

Posted 10:54 AM by Scoobie Davis

Busy!
I'm working and putting together a Halloween costume.

Posted 11:40 AM by Scoobie Davis

More Evidence of The Wingnut Implosion
Former(?) Scaife operative Joseph Farah of WorldNetDaily: "Obama: Never a Christian"

Posted 8:32 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Glenn Greenwald on the changing rhetorical landscape.

Posted 10:32 AM by Scoobie Davis

Best Summary of the ACORN Pseudo-Scandal
Christopher Hayes in The Nation:

the ACORN-Truthers persist in believing something that on its face is manifestly and obviously absurd. But this isn't some fringe movement. This is being cynically fomented by everyone in the entire right-wing noise machine, from talk radio, to Fox News, all the way up to the actual members of the ticket, Sarah Palin and John McCain. My suspicion is that the people who are fomenting this garbage, the RNC, Sarah Palin, Fox News and others know that it's bullshit.

But for frank political reasons they are heavily invested in reducing the number of poor people and black people who vote. Black people are going to vote for Barack Obama in overwhelming, historic numbers. Poor people vote for Democrats by massive margins as well. Ergo, the Republicans want to keep them home. Simple as that. Increasing the likelihood that these voters are struck from the [rolls], or intimidated into staying home redounds to their benefit.

Posted 10:20 AM by Scoobie Davis

New Post on the Sun Myung Moon blog
click here

Posted 12:16 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Josh Marshall on ACORN, the Bush Department of Justice, and voter suppression.

Posted 11:59 AM by Scoobie Davis

Go Figure--Lesbian Fox News Democrat Praises Gaybashing Movie
I had previously noted that An American Carol writer/director David Zucker made the transformation from liberal Democrat to Bush-supporting Republican because, after 9/11, he believed that the GOP would do a better job fighting terrorism. Fair enough, but I wondered why Zucker would put an unfunny lesbian-baiting gag in his new film An American Carol (go to 0:30 of the Carol trailer).

Fox News Democrat and lesbian Tammy Bruce loves Zucker's film. I had previously wrote about the homophobic images on Bruce's web site. Whatever.

UPDATE I: An American Carol continues to tank. I and others noted that the opening weekend of Carol and the Bill Maher film Religulous, they both had about the same box office despite Carol being on about three times as many screens. On Monday the 13th, Religulous had box office receipts that were more than double those of Carol ($316,711 versus $145,000).


UPDATE II: An American Carol cast member and lifelong Republican Dennis Hopper came out for Obama.

Posted 2:02 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must View
Palin and the Chipmunks:

Posted 10:53 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Josh Marshall "The Gist of the ACORN Story":

The Republican party is grasping on to the ACORN story as a way to delegitimize what now looks like the probable outcome of the November election. It is also a way to stoke the paranoia of their base, lay the groundwork for legal challenges of close outcomes in various states and promote new legal restrictions on legitimate voting by lower income voters and minorities. . .

Read the whole article.

UPDATE I: I also agree with The Atlantic's Marc Ambinder that the GOP, Drudge, Fox News are trying "to pre-emptively delegitimize Obama's victory."

UPDATE II: Andrew Burmon "Behind the GOP's voter fraud hysteria"

Posted 1:31 AM by Scoobie Davis

Religulous/An American Carol Postscript
Last week, I wrote about the relatively strong showing of the Bill Maher film Religulous at the box Office compared to the heavily-promoted right-wing film An American Carol.

Last weekend's box office confirm previous trends, Religulous had a higher box office with $2,200,000 than Carol with an anemic $1,505,000--despite the fact that Religulous is showing on roughly one-third of the screens (note: Religuous added an additional 66 screens).

What is more revealing is the box office dropoff from weekend one to the second weekend. A rule of thumb is that if the dropoff is less than 40 percent, the film is doing fine. Religulous had a 35 percent dropoff while Carol reduced its traffic by 58.8 percent.

Posted 9:22 AM by Scoobie Davis

The Media Landscape and An Obama Administration
Today on This Week with George Stephanopoulos, Paul Krugman echoed some concerns he recently addressed on his blog about the right's media apparatus and what it did during the Clinton administration and what is will certainly do during an Obama administration:

Something very ugly is taking shape on the political scene: as McCain’s chances fade, the crowds at his rallies are, by all accounts, increasingly gripped by insane rage. It’s not just a mob phenomenon — it’s visible in the right-wing media, and to some extent in the speeches of McCain and Palin.

We’ve seen this before. One thing that has been sort of written out of the mainstream history of politics is the sheer insanity of the attacks on the Clintons — they were drug smugglers, they murdered Vince Foster (and lots of other people), they were in league with foreign powers. And this stuff didn’t just show up in fringe publications — it was discussed in Congress, given props by the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal, and so on.

What it came down to was that a significant fraction of the American population, backed by a lot of money and political influence, simply does not consider government by liberals (even very moderate liberals) legitimate.

I have addressed these matters on this blog. During the Clinton administration, there was an massive ratfucking campaign by deranged billionaires (namely Scaife, Moon, and Murdoch) who promoted paranoid conspiracy theories about the Clintons that paralleled those put forth by Lyndon LaRouche--namely that the Clintons were operating a drug smuggling operation and other criminal enterprises and the "Clinton Body Count," the view that Bill and Hillary eliminated dozens of political enemies as well as friends (such as Vince Foster) who "knew too much."

Those who promoted these hateful conspiracies included the Wall Street Journal's editorial page, Rush Limbaugh, now-head of the Fox News Channel Roger Ailes, the Reverend Jerry Falwell, and Joseph Farah of WorldNetDaily (who at the headed a Scaife-subsidized front group The Western Journalism Center whose existence centered around legitimizing various Vince Foster conspiracy theories put forth by other Scaife-paid operatives).

One important consideration is that those who put forth these hate-filled and loony theories have not paid a price for their insane rantings. That won't be the case under an Obama administration; I'm more optimistic than Krugman. Expect the usual suspects to go by the playbook they did during the Clinton years. However, expect them to fail and pay a price. I'm not suggesting that there is parity between the right and left's media--the right still retains a huge advantage in promoting memes (e.g., the right's media successfully got the mainstream media to take the bait about the largely bogus ACORN voter fraud allegations). However, now we have sites like Media Matters for America, the Huffington Post (which serves as a sane counter to the Drudge Report), and there is the left's blogosphere. The right's media apparatus can't run roughshod over the truth as they had done in during the Clinton administration. It's not 1993 anymore and I suspect the right will learn this the hard way in 2009.

Posted 10:06 AM by Scoobie Davis

Fox News, ACORN, Bill Sammon, and William Ayers
I watched Fox & Friends this morning and when they weren't spreading the voter fraud meme over the ACORN voter registration flap (in an attempt to provide cover for GOP disenfranchisement strategies), they were discussing William Ayers. During the discussion of voter fraud, they interviewed Fox News analyst and former Washington Times reporter Bill Sammon (I've written about Sammon before--also here).

Posted 2:49 PM by Scoobie Davis

The Mainstream Media, The US Council for World Freedom, and John McCain
Will the mainstream news media pick up the story of John McCain's ties to the terror group, misnamed The US Council for World Freedom? I noticed on my Statcounter stats that someone from CBS News in New York got to my recent post on McCain's ties to the group via a Google search of "The US Council for World Freedom." Let's wait and see.

UPDATE: I just noticed a query by the Washington Post too.

UPDATE II: The Washington Post has a story:

McCain and the U.S. Council for World Freedom

By Glenn Kessler
When John McCain severed his ties with a group linked to ultra-rightwing death squads in Central America may make a difference considering some of the literature associated with the U.S. Council for World Freedom.

McCain has said he resigned from the Council's board in 1984 because he was uncomfortable with the group's activities, but his name was still on the group's letterhead in 1986. He also attended the group's "Freedom Fighter of the Year" award ceremony on Oct. 3, 1985.

On July 15, 1985, the group's newsletter featured an article by Robert H. Goldsborough that appears to belittle concerns about then-President Reagan's decision to visit a cemetery with 49 graves of Waffen-SS officers.

"Those misguided souls who accused President Reagan of insensitivity for visiting the German cemetery at Bitburg are wallowing in ears of pity over the past crimes of the Nazi regime which collapsed over 40 years ago," the article begins. "They want to keep the memory of the holocaust alive so that it can never happen again. Crocodile tears! It is happening again ... and again, and again, right now, in the modern world; only the crimes of today are not being perpetrated by the Nazis but by their philosophical and demonical soul mates, the communists."

The article goes on to argue that Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and the Sandinistas in Nicaragua are engaged in "Holocaust now."

Goldsborough, identified on the web as a former staff investigator for the House Committee on Un-American Activities, is author of a book called "The Network of Power" which purports to reveal the "the handful of powerful unelected men who secretly rule America." In an interview conducted in 1998 that appears on the web, Goldsborough identified who he felt were the "top four world elite who he thought controlled the world" -- Edward Bronfman of Seagrams and the World Jewish Congress; then-Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin; then-Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan; and financier George Soros.

Goldsborough, now associated with a group called Americans for Immigration Control in Monterey, Va., did not return a call left on the group's answering machine.

Posted 3:28 AM by Scoobie Davis

At the Movies: Religulous is Strong and An American Carol Tanks
Last week, I was flipping the channels and noticed that The View was on. I don't think I have ever seen a full episode of the show but it mentioned that two of the guests would be Bill Maher and Kevin Farley. Both are in films that were released last weekend--Maher film is a slam of religious folly, Religulous and Farley is in David Zucker's lampooning of Michael Moore and the American left, An American Carol.

I wanted to write a post about both films but was discouraged because I figured that because An American Carol was heavily advertised on Rush Limbaugh's show (Limbaugh gave the film a big plug on his show) and heavily promoted on right-wing talk radio and the fair-and-balanced channel that it would kick ass at the box office and that Maher's film would tank because we live in a highly religious nation.

I was wrong. An American Carol and Religulous did roughly the same at the box office this weekend ($3,810,000 and $3,500,000 respectively). However, Religulous was on fewer than one-third of the screens as An American Carol. The per-screen average revenue for Religulous was $6,972 while An American Carol had an anemic $2,325 average.

I don't know why Religulous did so well. I have an idea why An American Carol tanked. I had seen the trailer for the film and it looks like it was made for the kind of people who enjoyed The 1/2 Hour News Hour (remember that?).

UPDATE I: They didn't screen An American Carol to critics, a sure sign that the producers didn't want negative reviews to hurt the opening weekend box office. Well, the reviewers paid to see the film this weekend and the reviews are not good.

UPDATE II: One thought I have about writer Director David Zucker. He is a former liberal Democrat who embraced the right's foreign policy views after 9/11 because he believed that Republicans were more capable of dealing with terrorism. What events caused Zucker to embrace the hard right's homophobia? (e.g., 45 seconds into the trailer).

UPDATE III: Religulous did more business than An American Carol on Sunday 10/5 and Monday 10/6

Posted 12:08 PM by Scoobie Davis

John McCain, The U.S. Council for World Freedom, the World Anti-Communist League, and Sun Myung Moon
(Updated below)
This morning on Meet the Press, when the topic of the discussion was the attempts by the McCain campaign and the right's media to link Barack Obama to former Weather Underground member William Ayers, Democratic strategist Paul Begala noted that McCain has his own problem with consorting with extremists considering his membership of the board of the U.S. Council for World Freedom, an affiliate of the World Anti-Communist League (WACL), headed by former general John Singlaub. Begala noted that the Anti-Defamation League has documented how the WACL (now known as the World League for Freedom and Democracy) “has increasingly become a gathering place, a forum, a point of contact for extremists, racists and anti-Semites.”

That's putting it lightly. I have done some research on the WACL for my Sun Myung Moon blog when I heard that Moon had been a major financial supporter of the League in the 1970's and 1980's. The definitive book on the League is Scott and Jon Lee Anderson's Inside the League: The Shocking Expose of How Terrorists, Nazis, and Latin American Death Squads Have Infiltrated the World Anti-Communist League. I used information culled from the book for my YouTube video "The World's Most Powerful Cult." What the book documents is shocking. The League has served as a resource for neo-Nazis (Roger Pearson,former chairman of the WACL, was expelled when media stories emerged that he been in various neo-Nazi organizations including Willis Carto's notorious Liberty Lobby). The League did what it could to prop up undemocratic regimes and aided Salvadorian terrorist death squad leader Roberto D'Aubuisson whose nickname "Blowtorch Bob" was coined because of his favorite instrument of torture (quick aside: D'Aubuisson had also received support from figures beloved by "values voters": Jesse Helms and Jerry Falwell).

The big difference between Obama and McCain: Obama did some educational reform projects with William Ayers decades after his Weather Underground activities. McCain was affiliated with the WACL at the time in which it was a nest of neo-Nazis and was openly supporting terrorist like D'Aubuisson. How come I didn't know about McCain's affiliation with the group until today?

UPDATE I: The Center for Media and Democracy's SourceWatch has more on The U.S. Council for World Freedom.

UPDATE II: Welcome Crooks and Liars readers. Check out the front page of this site for other informative posts. Also, check out the sidebar for transcripts of on-air conversations I've had with Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly and others--they're priceless. Also, check out my blog devoted to exposing Sun Myung Moon's rise as a Washington power player.

Posted 3:26 PM by Scoobie Davis

I discuss Sun Myung Moon with NPR's Juan Williams
On the Moon blog

Posted 2:15 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman on Election 2008 in Ohio

Posted 12:05 PM by Scoobie Davis

Funny
One of the featured posts on Democratic Underground is one encouraging people to contact the Washington University debate hosts to make sure that Sarah Palin doesn't have an earpiece transmitter during her debate with Joe Biden tomorrow.

Posted 10:36 AM by Scoobie Davis

Instant Classic
Bill Maher on race

Posted 9:08 AM by Scoobie Davis

New Post on the Moon Blog
Click here

Posted 8:56 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Mean Girl

Sorry for the dearth of posting. I'm busy.

Posted 2:15 PM by Scoobie Davis

Jet Setters Against Obama
Somebody apparently didn't send Sean Hannity the memo that the endorsement of John McCain by former Hilary supporter and socialite Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild (as well as her characterization of has led to snickering by people in the know. Today Hannity interviewed her on his radio show. She sounds like the type of person who has been on a fox hunt.

Posted 7:28 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
(Updated Below)
Yesterday's Frank Rich column in the New York Times. It's kind of fitting that Sarah Palin, the darling of Limbaugh, Hannity, and the hard right, would quote the late Westbrook Pegler, the right-wing journalist/operative. I am familiar with Pegler. Though Pegler rightfully is an obscure figure in American politics, his influence continues to this day. I will write a future post about this.

UPDATE: I am familiar with Pegler but I didn't know this tidbit of information about Pegler's thoughts about Bobby Kennedy.

Posted 11:45 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must View
This is the best campaign spot I've seen all year--"Judement" by TruthAndHope.org:

Posted 4:54 AM by Scoobie Davis

The Moonie Media, Sean Hannity, Fox News, and the "Obama is a Muslim" Meme
On the Sun Myung Moon blog.

Posted 4:39 AM by Scoobie Davis

B.F. Skinner & American Politics
Cathleen Decker of the LA Times asks why the McCain campaign lies. Her answer: "he answer is simple: because it works."

When I think about people like McCain adviser Karl Rove and the various Rove-clones who are running McCain's campaign, I think of B.F. Skinner behaviorist theories. These people are motivated by whether they receive a reward or punishment for a act. If they tell a lie like the "lipstick on a pig" accusation and they don't pay a price (or the price they pay is less than the rewards they receive in return) then they will stay on the same course. It's that simple.

Posted 9:52 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must View
The segment on Bill Moyer's Journal last night on how right-wing talk radio has poisoned American discourse. It is disturbing but very insightful. On the show was Rory O'Connor, the author of Shock Jocks: Hate Speech and Talk Radio: America's Ten Worst Hate Talkers and the Progressive Alternative (here's a blog post on the book). O'Connor was the journalist who had uncovered that author Carlton Sherwood's manuscript for a book defending Sun Myung Moon was reviewed by Unification Church operatives despite Sherwood's claim that he was an independent journalist (click here for more about Unification-related books).

Posted 4:13 PM by Scoobie Davis

College Stuff
Playboy had its latest college pictorial The girls of the Big Ten (I'm still waiting for the girls of the Mid-American Conference pictorial that I personally spoke to Hef about).

I have a graduate degree from Ohio State but my top pick is Missy Tarrington of Minnesota. First runner-up is a buckeye, Jamie Graham of Ohio State. Second runner-up is Shavon Presely of Purdue. Third runner-up is Kimberlee Ann of Penn State. fourth runner-up: Mallory Adams of Iowa, Fifth runner-up: Nicole Marie of Penn State.

Honorable mention: KELLY Kae, Lauren Brooks, Adelaide Miller, Taylor Loftlyn, Hayley and Kelly Fox of Indiana; Maxine Christine, Maria Vargas of Northwestern; Chelsie Rae, Abby Leigh, Austin Thompson, Lisa Marie, Chloe Allen of Minnesota; Kelsey Evans, Marie Morgan of Ohio State; Sophie Adams, Brianna Leigh, Crystal Elise, Kimberlee Ann, Shannon elizabeth of Penn State; Mariela Henderson, Michelle Reid, Vanessa Carrera of Purdue; Nina Reyes of Illinois; Lindsey Elizabeth, Julianna Reed, Kimberly Mueller, Kelly anne of Iowa; Andrea Bach, Katie Marie of Wisconsin; Lynn Wisper, Ryan Lovette, Monica Walker, Ann Morgan, Alyse Sutton, Nicole Kennedy of Michigan State; Renee allison, Bobbie Korina, Caitlyn Shannon of Michigan, Nikkki christine of Purdue, Julia francis of Illinois

Posted 1:32 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Joe Conason

Posted 1:00 PM by Scoobie Davis

Busy
Sorry no posting but I have been busy. Saturday I'm going to the USC/Ohio State game. I might post on Sunday.

Posted 7:48 AM by Scoobie Davis

Busy Busy Busy
I will post today or tomorrow on the Unification media

Posted 11:34 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Paul Krugman, brilliant as usual, on the GOP's politics of resentment:

By selecting Barack Obama as their nominee, the Democrats may have given Republicans an opening: the very qualities that inspire many fervent Obama supporters — the candidate’s high-flown eloquence, his coolness factor — have also laid him open to a Nixonian backlash. Unlike many observers, I wasn’t surprised at the effectiveness of the McCain “celebrity” ad. It didn’t make much sense intellectually, but it skillfully exploited the resentment some voters feel toward Mr. Obama’s star quality.

That said, the experience of the years since 2000 — the memory of what happened to working Americans when faux-populist Republicans controlled the government — is still fairly fresh in voters’ minds. Furthermore, while Democrats’ supposed contempt for ordinary people is mainly a figment of Republican imagination, the G.O.P. really is the Gramm Old Party — it really does believe that the economy is just fine, and the fact that most Americans disagree just shows that we’re a nation of whiners.

UPDATE: Another must-read: Robert Parry, "McCain-Palin: 'Phonies Squared'"

Posted 1:29 AM by Scoobie Davis

Rush
From the guy who characterized then 13-year-old Chelsea Clinton as "a White House dog," it a headline on RushLimbaugh.com for a commentary about Sarah Palin's daughter: "Liberals and The Children: Liberals are content to destroy a 17-year-old girl."

Posted 11:30 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Oliver Willis on the right's "Bubble."

Posted 10:53 AM by Scoobie Davis

New Post on the Moon Blog
Moon's Univeristy of Bridgeport recieves a dubious award.

Posted 1:56 AM by Scoobie Davis

Pepsi Retro
I was in Mexico yesterday and had Pepesi Retro. It was pretty good. Here's a commercial:

Posted 3:44 PM by Scoobie Davis

What a Joke
Abigail Thernstrom´s opinion piece in the LA Times claiming that the days of elctoral ´´disfranchisement is a closed chapter in American history.´´

The LA Times should allow a rebuttal by Greg Palast, Mark Crispin Miller, or Bob Fitrakis.

UPDATE My bad. I forgot to mention Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Read his latest article on election fraud. I´ve just added Kennedy site that he has with Greg Palast, Steal Back Your Vote, on my list of links.

Posted 9:40 AM by Scoobie Davis

Omissions
Today the LA Times did a list of the top 25 LA movies of the last 25 years. It's a good list but they listed mediocre films like Less than Zero and Fletch but left out Go. Also, they didn't list Pulp Fiction or Reservoir Dogs but gave an explanation when they picked Jackie Brown (number 3). I agree: Jackie Brown is my favorite Tarantino film.

Posted 9:22 AM by Scoobie Davis

Soundalike?
When I heard Sarah Palin give her VP speech with John McCain in Dayton, I thought, "That voice sounds familiar." Then it struck me: Palin has the same voice that Joan Cusask used as the uptight principal in School of Rock.

Posted 4:08 PM by Scoobie Davis

Short Post on the Sun Myung Moon Blog
Click here

Posted 9:04 PM by Scoobie Davis

You Won't Read This on Other Blogs
I've been too busy to deal with the convention. Here's something you won't find on other blogs: Jack Chick has a new tract "First Bite." It's a trip.

UPDATE: Chick Publications announced that you can now embed "First Bite" and some other Chick tracts. Here's "First Bite":

Posted 5:54 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Joe Conason asks "Pumas" some tough questions.

Posted 6:11 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Media Matters on Swiftboating 2.0

Posted 9:29 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Paul Krugman:

But in the world we actually live in, pro-corporate, inequality-increasing Republicans argue that you should vote for them because they’re regular guys you’d like to have a beer with, while Democrats who want to raise taxes on top earners, expand health care and raise the minimum wage are snooty elitists.

And in that world, stripping away the regular-guy facade — pointing out that everything Rush Limbaugh said about Mr. Kerry applies equally to Mr. McCain, that Mr. McCain lives in a material world few Americans can imagine — is only fair. Yes, Mr. Obama vacations in Hawaii — and Cindy McCain says that “In Arizona, the only way to get around the state is by small private plane.”

The squealing from the usual suspects demonstrates how much the Obama counterattack has the G.O.P. worried. Back in 2004 Fox News described John Kerry as “one of the haves” with a “billionaire wife”; now it asks whether raising the issue of Mr. McCain’s houses is “bashing the American dream.”

Posted 7:23 PM by Scoobie Davis

Radio Interview
Today I was interviewed by Nat & Drew for Vancouver BC's 95 Crave morning show about how to crash a party. I don't know when the interview will air but you can listen live on the Internet. In case you missed it, Wired magazine interviewed me for the August issue.

Posted 2:01 PM by Scoobie Davis

Kicking Ass And Taking Names
Click here

Posted 7:03 AM by Scoobie Davis

Hey, Wait a Minute. What about Mary Matalin's Racism?
There has been a lot of talk in the news about author Jerome Corsi's bigoted statements about various groups (largely thanks to the tireless work of Media Matters for America).

Nobody has mentioned the racism of Mary Matalin, the chief editor of Corsi's publisher, Threshold Editions. During the aftermath in Florida following election day 2000, Republicans sent operatives to riot in order to stop the recount. At the same time, Jesse Jackson held entirely peaceful demonstrations of mostly African Americans, some of whom had been disenfranchised due to being falsely accused of being felons. Matalin referred to these people as "rent-a-rioters."

UPDATE: Not This Time. Eric Boehlert on why the Fox News/Swift-boating attempts are not working this time around:

But there were also key marketplace changes within the cable news industry that affected the Corsi coverage, I think. Because remember that in 2004, Fox News drove the Swift Boat saga; it was practically a co-sponsor of the anti-Kerry crusade, devoting endless hours to promoting the Vietnam-era allegations. By sheer force of repetition, Fox News, then the dominant player in cable news, forced its competitors to not only acknowledge the Swift Boat story, but to go all in as well. And soon all the cable news outlets were treating the Swift Boat saga with Fox News-like breathlessness. (CNN aired nearly 300 segments referencing the topic.)

And just like Fox, they weren't asking the tough questions. Instead, they gave the Swift Boat accusers the same free ride that Fox News did. They became media enablers, too.

Not this time around. With Fox News no longer the dominant cable news king -- and with Fox News no longer driving the campaign narratives -- its competitors opted for a much different approach to covering Corsi. And I think the coverage from the competitors sent a subtle, yet simple, message: We no longer take our cues from Fox News' lead, because they no longer dictate campaign coverage. Instead, we're going to exult in our role as a counterbalance, as a fact-checker, to the Fox News-produced Corsi attack campaign. In fact, we're gonna help pull the curtain back on Corsi.

Posted 6:13 AM by Scoobie Davis

Sean Hannity and Newt Gingrich
You've probably seen this clip of Newt Gingrich telling Sean Hannity that Obama in in the pocket of Big Oil for telling Americans to have thir tires properly inflated (e did it on Fox News, of course). Click here for the hilarious transcript of me taking Hannity to school about Gingrich.

Bonus: the transcript of me telling Slanthead about his buddy Jerry Falwell.

Posted 5:30 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must View
McCain's Mansions:

Posted 12:50 PM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Talk to Action on the Texas roots of the modern sectarian right. Note: I have discussed Billy James Hargis here.

Posted 4:41 PM by Scoobie Davis

Gotta Love This Parody

Posted 6:30 AM by Scoobie Davis

The U.S. Justice Department Apparently Likes My Blogs
I have noticed that someone from the U.S. Justice Department has been lurking on my main blog and my anti-Amway blog for the past several months (see the addendum for info from my Statcounter page on the Amway blog).

Quick note to Justice Department lurker(s): if you really want to do your job, do something about illegal activity, do something about the illegal "tools" pyramid created by some top Amway distributors which have netted them hundreds of millions of dollars--if not billions of dollars. Also, you could refer to the INS the charges made by Nansook Hong about how the Reverend Sun Myung Moon engaged in immigration fraud to bring an underage girl to the United States to become the unlawful bride of his adult son.

Initially I was amused that the Justice Department reads my blog; however, this morning I listened to Sam Seder's interview of journalist Scott Horton.

Addendum: Info from my Statcounter page for my anti-Amway blog:
Host Name wdcsun27.usdoj.gov
IP Address 149.101.1.127 [Label IP Address]
Country United States
Region District Of Columbia
City Washington
ISP Us Dept Of Justice
Returning Visits 10
Visit Length 54 seconds
VISITOR SYSTEM SPECS
Browser MSIE 6.0
Operating System Windows XP
Resolution 1280x1024
Javascript Enabled

Posted 2:48 PM by Scoobie Davis

That's Mighty White of You, Mr. Corsi
Jerome Corsi to appear on "pro-white" radio show.

Posted 7:48 AM by Scoobie Davis

Appealing to the Reptilian Brain: A Mellon Family Tradition
Recently I got the DVD for the Showtime film Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical (see the addendum for more about it) and made an interesting discovery: two of the most influential paranoid fear-mongers of the twentieth century were related to each other. In the special features portion of the DVD, a mini-documentary gave some background on the criminalization of marijuana in the 1930's. It mentioned Harry Anslinger, the notorious bureaucrat who helped to spread nationwide fears of cannabis through lurid propaganda linking the use of weed to savage violence, criminality, and insanity; in essence, Anslinger utilized what scholar Alfred Lindesmith called "the dope fiend mythology."

When I watched the documentary, I learned that Anslinger was the son-in-law of banking magnate Andrew Mellon. That made me think: Anslinger was spreading irrational anti-pot fears throughout the early and mid-twentieth century and another member of the Mellon family, Richard Mellon Scaife, was spreading paranoia during the last part of the twentieth century (Scaife’s mother was Andrew Mellon’s niece). That’s a lot of fear-mongering for one family.

When Bill Clinton became president, Scaife became a proponent of the “Clinton Body Count”—a paranoid urban legend that argued that Bill and Hillary Clinton were responsible for bumping off dozens of political opponents as well as friends who knew too much. This absurd propaganda was spread by Scaife’s paid agents--notably Joseph Farah and Christopher Ruddy--as well as by Roger Ailes who is now the head of Fox News (even though the Clinton Body Count is dismissed now even by the most fervent American wing-nuts, to this day, it is a staple of Rush Limbaugh’s radio program).

Propaganda is the bane of democracy. It does not strive to encourage dialog; it seeks to dominate by appealing to base fears. There’s nothing wrong with appealing to the reptilian brain if a legitimate danger exists. If an out-of-control car is careening toward you, someone who yells, “Get out of the way!” is appealing to your survival instinct but doing it in a rational and humanitarian manner.

The problem is that Anslinger and Scaife used rhetoric that appealed to the fight-or-flight reflex for problems that were either nonexistent (e.g., the Clintons as murderers) or problems that could have been addressed in a thoughtful manner (e.g., while Anslinger was scaring American parents half to death about “the assassin of youth,” New York mayor Fiorello La Guardia commissioned a study that looked at marijuana from a responsible perspective). The Anslingers and the Scaifes of the world want to seal off meaningful discussion before it begins. Their goal is a frightened and acquiescent populace that does not weigh and measure issues in a meaningful way.

Jerry Falwell, who was part of the Clinton Body Count hoax, was a master of appealing to the reptilian brain in his sermons that were broadcast on his The Old Time Gospel Hour television program. The typical Falwell sermon was devoted to a topic such as gays, feminists, secular humanist, or Bill and Hillary Clinton. In the first half of the sermon, Falwell would tell his congregation what a terrible threat to decency, Christianity and the American way of life the given phenomenon posed to them. Falwell then spent the second half of the sermon telling them that he and the GOP were fighting the good fight but they needed help--primary financial help (when Bill Clinton became president, Falwell sold a videotape (for $35) claiming that Clinton was murdering people. Falwell even tacked on infomercial to the end of his Old Time Gospel Hour broadcast in which Falwell interviewed a silhouetted figure claiming to be an "investigative journalist" who claimed to be in fear of his life (Salon reporter Murray Waas found the silhouetted man was the producer of the video who did not fear for his life--quick note: I confronted Sean Hannity about this). Falwell’s goal was a docile, obedient flock. Referring to his congregation, Falwell once quipped, "Christians, like slaves and soldiers, ask no questions." True to form, Falwell knew how to squeeze every last penny out of his scared followers. Falwell is dead but his spirit lives on in the Obama-is-a-Muslim spam e-mail campaigns.

Addendum: Reefer Madness and the two types of Camp. Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical is a musical remake of the camp classic Reefer Madness made in 1936 (watch it here). Susan Sontag, in her essay “Notes on Camp,” distinguished between naïve or unintentional camp and self-conscious, intentional camp. The original Reefer Madness is amusing because of the over-the-top depiction of marijuana use while the remake is pure intentional camp. Sontag believed that "[c]amp which knows itself to be Camp ("camping") is usually less satisfying." I don’t know if this is true for me in this case because I like both films equally.

Posted 10:49 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Greg Palast interview

Posted 9:29 AM by Scoobie Davis

Post I'm Working On
The Mellon family tradition of promoting paranoia.

Posted 4:09 AM by Scoobie Davis

A Thought
It's great to be back in Ohio for the summer but I would have loved crashing the premiere after-party for The Pineapple Express.

Posted 7:59 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Eric Boehlert on just one more symptom of the decline of Fox News and why the lion's share of the credit should go to bloggers and the online community.

Posted 7:47 AM by Scoobie Davis

Regnery Publishing And Me
After I posted the article on Regnery Publishing's cozy relationship with cult leader Sun Myung Moon, I e-mailed them to let them know about the post. They e-mailed me back informing me of the following information: "The Regnery logo is copyrighted material, which we do not give permission to reproduce, and we ask that you remove it from your blogs immediately, as well as that you refrain from using it in the future."

In other Moon news, I ask "why?" on the Moon blog.

Posted 10:27 AM by Scoobie Davis

I'm Wired!
I'm featured in the August 2008 print edition of Wired magazine. I tell readers how to crash a party. Check it out on page 123 or online here.

Posted 9:40 AM by Scoobie Davis

Regnery Publishing's War on American Democracy
Regnery Publishing just released The Case Against Barack Obama: The Unlikely Rise and Unexamined Agenda of the Media's Favorite Candidate by David Freddoso. I have not read the book so I can’t comment on the specifics of the book. However, I can cite some reports about that raise serious questions: 1) There has been some pre-release information about the book that show that there are some serious problems with the truthfulness of the book. The media watchdog Media Matters for America uncovered some falsehoods in the introduction and the first few pages which were released by Regnery prior to publication. Media Matters has been doing an excellent job of documenting misinformation in the anti-Obama book by Jerome Corsi (who co-authored the wildly inaccurate Regnery 2004 hit book on John Kerry, Unfit for Command).

However, what is particularly revealing is that the publisher of the book, Regnery Publishing has a pattern of publishing books that denigrate true American heroes, such as John Kerry, as well as books that elevate sociopaths--namely the Reverend Sun Myung Moon.

Regnery's History of Elevating Sun Myung Moon and Unification Thought

Regnery has been the publisher of five books that have served the purposes of Sun Myung Moon, who is 1) a sexual predator who committed immigration fraud in order to bring an underage girl to the United States to be the illegal bride for his violent and drug-addicted son; 2) a thief who has stolen hundreds of millions, possibly billions, from vulnerable Japanese widows in what is known as the spiritual sales scam; 3) A megalomaniac who believes that he is the Messiah and the world’s savior; 4) A would-be tyrant who believes that American democracy—-which he views as “Satan’s harvest”—-should be overthrown and replaced with a theocratic rule. In a word, the guy is a nutjob (my YouTube video "The World's Most Powerful Cult" gives a succinct overview of Moon and a more comprehensive look at Moon can be found in John Gorenfeld's recent book Bad Moon Rising as well as my blog devoted to Moon).

Regnery has published not one but five books promoting Moon’s pathological philosophy. Two of those books specifically defend Moon’s criminality and anti-democratic worldview and attribute criticism of Moon’s predation to racism and bigotry. I will discuss each of these Regnery books, starting with the two books that specifically defend Moon's indefensible behavior and outlook.

1) To Bigotry, No Sanction: Reverend Sun Myung Moon and the Unification Church by Mose Durst. Then-president of the Unification Church Mose Durst wrote this apologia of Moon and the Unification movement and blamed Moon's unpopularity with Americans to racism and bigotry. These charges of racism and xenophobia are not only an example of blaming America first but they are particularly ironic since Moon's Washington Times has been a repository for white supremist and neo-Confederate thought.

Quick aside: It's revealing that Regnery's anti-Obama author David Freddroso is a contributor to William F. Buckley's National Review. The back of the dust jacket of Durst's book has an endorsement by William Rusher, then-publisher of National Review (as I noted, the popular narrative about Buckley and NR marginalizing crackpots and extremists from the American conservative movement is a crock).

2) Inquisition: The Persecution and Prosecution of the Reverend Sun Myung Moon by Carlton Sherwood. When Moon was sent to prison for tax fraud and conspiracy, Sherwood served as Moon's primary literary apologist. The main premise of Sherwood's book was that Moon was railroaded because of racial and religious bigotry. Sherwood claimed that he wrote the book independent of Moon or the Unification Church but a PBS Frontline documentary found that unification Church officials reviewed and edited Sherwood's manuscript (Quick note: I confronted Fox News Democrat Tammy Bruce about Sherwood's dishonesty on her radio show--friends have told me that the transcript is priceless).

It should be no surprise that during the 2004 election, Sherwood produced the anti-Kerry film Stolen Honor--a film that contained many misrepresentations and libels.

3) At Any Cost: How Al Gore Tried to Steal the Election by Bill Sammon.
Sammon, an operative for Moon's Washington Times, wrote this apologia for the Bush campaign. This is hardly surprising since the Bush and Moon families are very close and there has been a history of Moon's Times doing dirty work for the Bush family. Bob Somerby of the Daily Howler uncovered blatant examples of journalistic misconduct by Sammon (I addressed this in an article for American Politics Journal).

4) Icons of Evolution and 5) The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design both by Jonathan Wells.
Wells, a well-known proponent of the form of creationism known as intelligent design, is one of Moon's most fanatical member of Moon's shock troops. Wells' motivation for his embrace of creationist pseudo-science is his devotion to his "father," the Reverend Moon (note the warlike language):

Father’s words, my studies, and my prayers convinced me that I should devote my life to destroying Darwinism, just as many of my fellow Unificationists had already devoted their lives to destroying Marxism. When Father chose me (along with about a dozen other seminary graduates) to enter a Ph.D. program in 1978, I welcomed the opportunity to prepare myself for battle.

Regnery Publishing's Bizarro World
In Regnery Publishing's bizarro world, true patriots like Kerry and Obama are deserving of denigration while a deranged megalomaniac like Moon is praised. This should be a news story but isn't.

Posted 6:38 PM by Scoobie Davis

D'oh
I almist finished the Regnery post and I accidently los about two hours worth of data. My friends want to party so I will start again first thing tomorrow morning. Lo Siento

Posted 7:55 AM by Scoobie Davis

The Ohio State Fair
I am working on the Regnery Publishing post right now. I was at the Ohio State Fair yesterday. I always have a great time there. The highlight of the day was the dairy exhibit in which they had a Mount Rushmore-like sculpture of the faces of Ohio's U.S. presidents carved in two-and-a half ton "mountain" of butter (Ohio's eight presidents were William Henry Harrison, Ulysses S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, William McKinley, William H. Taft and Warren G. Harding). It's kind of sad that all of these men were mediocre or worse as president (though, in fairness, William Henry Harrison and James Garfield didn't serve long enough to be judged by history as presidents).

Posted 10:02 AM by Scoobie Davis

Later Today I Promise
A post on Regnery Publishing's war on America. Today is the publication date of Regnery's book The Case Against Barack Obama: The Unlikely Rise and Unexamined Agenda of the Media's Favorite Candidate by David Freddoso.

UPDATE: I have to break my promise. I've been working on the post for quite some times and I still have a lot of writing to do. I will work on it tomorrow morning but I might not finish it tomorow because I'm going to the Ohio State Fair.

Posted 10:15 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Read
Newshounds on Howard Wolfson. I researched Wolfson for my fothcoming post on why the vanquishing of the Clintons is a good thing.

UPDATE: Andrew Sullivan has more

Posted 7:17 PM by Scoobie Davis

"Our Man" (Roger Ailes)
I listened to Limbaugh's radio show today and heard part of the telephone conversation Limbaugh had with George W. Bush, George H. W. Bush, and Jeb Bush. I missed the part in which Bush the Elder referred to Fox News CEO Roger Ailes as "our man Ailes." Watch the Countdown video.

Think Progress has the important part of the conversation in which the truth came out from Bush the Elder who didn't realize they were on the radio and then corrected himself:

H. W. BUSH: Do you see our man Ailes at all?

LIMBAUGH: Oh, yeah. I saw Roger at Tony Snow’s funeral…And a couple of times earlier this summer.

H. W. BUSH: Are we on the radio, are we? […] I didn’t know that. I’ll clean up my act here. I’m glad they told me.

I thought their man was Sun Myung Moon.

UPDATE: I address Roger Ailes, Fox News, and Limbaugh in this post that examines the chapter on Fox News in Bernard Goldberg's book Crazies to the Left of Me, Wimps to the Right: How One Side Lost Its Mind and the Other Lost Its Nerve. Also, go to the talk radio transcripts on the left sidebar to read the transcripts of my conversations with Limbaugh.

UPDATE II: The full transcript of the conversation is on Limbaugh's web site. I thought Limbaugh would have edited the Ailes comment out of the transcript the same way he did with his transcript of his "phony soldiers" comment.

UPDATE III: I've gotten a lot of hits from keyword searches. If you really want to stick it to Ailes and Fox News, one easy and painless way is to participate in the anti-Fox News Google bomb I started. Also, here is my post on how to reach out to Fox News viewers.

Posted 4:39 PM by Scoobie Davis

Smokin'
Media Matters has been smokin' lately. They just obtained the introduction to the forthcoming Regnery Publishing hit book on Obama by David Freddoso titled The Case Against Barack Obama. Media Matters found that Freddoso's book is playing fast and loose with the facts.

I should have a post on Regnery Publishing in the next few days.

Posted 8:26 AM by Scoobie Davis

Must Reads
Bob Somerby, Robert Parry and Joe Conason on the campaign .

Posted 7:56 AM by Scoobie Davis

New Post on the Sun Myung Moon Blog
Check it out.

Posted 1:36 AM by Scoobie Davis

Who is Reading this Blog?
I check on my Statcounter stats and found that someone from Creative Response Concepts was reading the blog.

Posted 10:49 PM by Scoobie Davis

Heads Up
I updated yesterday's post on Jerome Corsi

Posted 9:48 PM by Scoobie Davis

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Posted 6:13 PM by Scoobie Davis

Media Matters
(updated below)
Today I listened to Sean Hannity's radio show. His guest was Jerome Corsi, the author of the forthcoming book The Obama Nation. In 2004, Corsi co-authored the book Unfit for Command with Swift Boat Liar John O'Neill (I have written about Corsi here and here).

On Hannity's show, Corsi bragged about the number of footnotes in the book (which means little in terms of accuracy--note Ann Coulter's thoroughly endnoted but dishonest book Slander). As luck would have it, around the time that Corsi was crowing to Hannity about how well-researched the book was, Media Matters posted on their web site how the first reported allegation from the book is false based on an article promoting the book on WorldNetDaily, a far-right web site that Corsi writes for.

UPDATE: Media Matters has a post on Steve Sailer, noted racist and contributor to the Washington Times, I wrote about Sailer on the Moon blog last year.

UPDATE II: Department of I'm-Not-Making-This-Shit-Up. WorldNetDaily, the site that carries Corsi's column, has a column by apocalyptic author and theologian Hal Lindsey titled "How Obama prepped world for the Antichrist." I mentioned Lindsey in my article about the satanic scare.

UPDATE III: Media Matters uncovered another falsehood that Corsi made on Hannity & Colmes.

UPDATE IV: Media Matters has more on Corsi's falsehoods.

UPDATE V: Media Matters' comprehensive post debunking Corsi's book.