Can’t watch Fox these days: the level of hypocrisy is dropping to record depths.

PS: Seems that Fox News couldn’t get a big enough audience in the UK so they’re closing down the station. Yet another piece of evidence that Europeans may not have entirely forgotten what fascism looks like. I’m pretty worried about that news that a lot of generals have been put in charge … As suggested by Margaret Atwoods “The Handmaid’s Tale”, a military mindset (the evangelicals in the book) can open the door to dictatorship by evil forces.

Spot on, Ben Newmark!

If anybody sees Shep Smith, please tell him to inform these two idiots about what actually happened. I watched the reporting and the guy on the ground for FoxNews was NOT Cavuto and Brown was MIA until President Bush came a-visiting with a large press corps.

The pardon granted to Joe Arpaio sends a clear message to the goons: the boss man has our back.

Great comment, Marge.

The only quibble I have has to do with the reasons often given for the decision to import blacks from Africa. Although people have advanced a lot of theories, my idea is that landowners were interested in securing their access to lots of labour. Native Americans knew how to disappear into the woods and did so with dismaying speed. White escapees could blend into a predominantly white society. Malaria was not endemic to the Americas and most of the early settlers in North America were from Northern Europe (little to no contact with the disease). It’s the mass importation of Africans that probably created the critical mass needed for the disease to spread in the USA. Some people still talk about a supposed greater resistance of Africans to the disease: truth is that the ones they’re talking about are the survivors of several bouts of malaria during early childhood.

By contrast, African runaways stood out like sore thumbs in a society where any black could not be anything other than a slave on the run; their survival skills were useless in the unfamiliar environment; and key plantation owners had contacts with a well-established slave trade. Slavery was totally accepted during Roman times (prisoners of war, debtors, political opponents) and the Ottoman empire thrived on large exports of slaves throughout Europe, all the way to Russia and beyond. Slaves were the best way to make sure they had the labour they needed and slaves were equated with the horses, oxen and mules. A truly black practice in the history of humanity.

BTW. For a spoof-ridden account of slavery in Roman times, it’s hard to do better than “How to manage your slaves”, by Marcus Sidonius Falx, with Jerry Toner. The humourless need not even try to read it.

@Marge: spot on, as usual.

@Richard: I was thinking about the risks of having the President take an interest during the event. I’m hoping that the dems in congress won’t ape the GOP’s deplorable behaviour.

I’m a bit less pessimistic than scooter, but that’s because FEMA was substantially improved during the Obama years and the professionals seem to be in charge. People on the ground should be crossing their fingers against the President showing any interest in their fate.

EOF: I believe that’s called “cut off one’s nose to spite one’s face”. Do you have a link to that study? I want to give it to a friend who says he regrets having either not voted at all or voted for Trump. He refuses to say what he did but his reluctance to fess up makes me suspect that it was the latter.

Every time President Trump and by extension, fellow travellers like Hannity and other foxies anxious to earn their monthly paycheck, launch this call for unity it’s abundantly clear that they have no intention of doing anything at all towards that end.

What they want is total submission to the whims of the Dear Leader. Weird hairdoes aren’t the only thing that President Trump shares with Kim Jong Un.

Very likely, Ben Newmark, very likely.

Something that intrigues me: the Boston event was largely peaceful yet almost 40 people were arrested. The Arizona protests were marked by a massive use of tear gas and confrontations, yet only 3 arrested. Those numbers don’t track.

I remain in total awe at the capacity of the RW commenters like this lady to twist themselves into pretzel-like art-forms, both to defend the indefensible (à la Jeffrey Lord, who would try to defend the President’s “taking a dump on the desk”) and to accuse others (Obama).

Why should the media NOT take their lead from the President? He simply can’t let the subject go. And, as Kevin wrote, the media would have to a lot of digging in order to find any accomplishments of note. Even the foxies can’t put together a list of their own.

This idea that slavery could be judged a “good” chapter in any country’s history is so colonial, also fascist (master-race sort of stuff).

This idea of slaves being civilised by a superior race is one that I heard a lot during the late ’50s, early ’60s when poor white trash had only one thing to claim superiority of a genius like George Washington Carver: they were white (under the dirt)

Am pleased to take back what I’d posted on CNN. The President shot himself in the foot again by tweeting an old myth about General Pershing having quelled a Muslim uprising by rounding up 50 men and having them killed using bullets dipped in pork fat.

Eight historians who were called in to examine that claim during the 2016 campaign agreed that there was no evidence of anything of the sort having actually happened.

Although the events in Spain are monopolising air time on CNN “à la FNC”, I’m happy to note that they’re not allowing this to be a total distraction.

I’m not good at identifying faces, but isn’t Eboni the host who had a (fully justified, IMO) bash-fest on the President’s attempt to equate white supremacists with the counter-protesters?

I’d not realised that she had a long history of toeing the Foxy line for her pay check. Her stance during that session on the other thread (must see, IMO) must be the real Eboni. Just like the President’s addresses on Saturday and Monday revealed his “real” self.

I, too, remember separate drinking fountains and separate bathrooms, separate restaurants, separate motels and even separate neighbourhoods. An early form of apartheid without the passes imposed on non-whites.

I find it interesting to learn that the monuments to the confederacy (statues, flag and that catchy tune, “Dixie”) were actually put in place by the descendants of traitors. I’d never thought about it that way until President Trump created the false equivalence between the founding fathers who forged the country and the secessionists who wanted to break it up.

Oops. Shep let slip a little fact that I’ve always suspected, i.e. that Republicans are usually eager to appear on Fox. Their reluctance to come forth and defend the President is extremely enheartening as it provides proxy evidence of a very hostile public opinion. IOW, all those republicans may be getting a lot of flack from their constituencies.

Dontchya just gotta love them fine Xtian values?

As for the likelihood that violence in response to violence will result in a positive outcome, history tells us exactly the opposite: since forever, conflict leads to calm only after a lot of blood has been shed. I prefer the more difficult but more effective (and in the end less bloody) non-violent approach. In Europe, communities are blocking the thugs simply by creating chains of people in the streets. That will work so long as the sane and civilised decide to turn out in large numbers.

Gosh, how I wish I were able to trust that I’ll be seeing the ladies (host and guests) on Fox again, and often.

Methinks there’s little chance of that happening.

so true, mj, so true.

Good heavens.

Deepest thanks to Think Progress for capturing this gem for posterity.