Kevin Koster commented on Trump Claims Facebook And Zuckerberg Stole Election With ‘$500 Million Worth Of Phony Lock Boxes’
2021-06-07 22:55:39 -0400
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Interesting to note that Fox News really didn’t cover Pence’s childish spokesman’s attempted super-spreader this past weekend. They discussed it here and there, but they didn’t stop their programming to air it, the way they would have a year ago. Newsmax of course stopped all programming to fawn over this moment. But not Fox News. Hmmm.
Another sidenote: Even Newsmax won’t give Matt Gaetz a paid position – he already tried to wheedle them into giving him a soft landing after he likely winds up leaving office in disgrace this year. They said NO.
And as of this afternoon, disgraced former Fox News shouter Bill O’Reilly is now saying that he and Pence’s childish spokesman are booking a few public appearance dates together for the end of the year. Not sure on which side the pathetic lives more loudly…
Another sidenote: Even Newsmax won’t give Matt Gaetz a paid position – he already tried to wheedle them into giving him a soft landing after he likely winds up leaving office in disgrace this year. They said NO.
And as of this afternoon, disgraced former Fox News shouter Bill O’Reilly is now saying that he and Pence’s childish spokesman are booking a few public appearance dates together for the end of the year. Not sure on which side the pathetic lives more loudly…
Kevin Koster commented on Fox’s Pavlich Credits Trump For Pandemic Recovery Under Biden
2021-06-06 19:15:32 -0400
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This is typical of the current angry Right Wing approach to the Biden/Harris White House’s successes in combating the pandemic.
In reality, Operation Warp Speed was a publicity announcement, made by the Pence White House in their panic as they realized that they were deeply underwater in their efforts to stay in power in mid 2020. So they frantically told the media that somehow they would be able to provide a vaccine just in time for the November election and then everything would be all better. As it happens, the major companies like Pfizer were already working on that, from well before Pence’s childish spokesman opened his mouth.
And when the vaccines were finally ready to be distributed, it became clear that the Pence White House had no idea how to get them to the public. They had assumed that each state would somehow create their own distribution system, and they hadn’t bothered to do any work of their own. Result – complete disaster in terms of trying to actually get vaccines in people’s arms.
It wasn’t until the Pence White House left office in disgrace that the Biden/Harris team was able to roll out an effective production and distribution plan, one that saw a 200% success rate in Biden’s first 100 days.
I agree with John that it’s pathetic to see angry Right Wingers desperately trying to throw the credit for our current improvements to Pence’s spokesman. But one supposes we should have expected this, given how they played a similar game when President Obama took office. (We went from the Right insisting that there was no recession to suddenly declaring we were practically in a Depression and that it was all President Obama’s fault…)
In reality, Operation Warp Speed was a publicity announcement, made by the Pence White House in their panic as they realized that they were deeply underwater in their efforts to stay in power in mid 2020. So they frantically told the media that somehow they would be able to provide a vaccine just in time for the November election and then everything would be all better. As it happens, the major companies like Pfizer were already working on that, from well before Pence’s childish spokesman opened his mouth.
And when the vaccines were finally ready to be distributed, it became clear that the Pence White House had no idea how to get them to the public. They had assumed that each state would somehow create their own distribution system, and they hadn’t bothered to do any work of their own. Result – complete disaster in terms of trying to actually get vaccines in people’s arms.
It wasn’t until the Pence White House left office in disgrace that the Biden/Harris team was able to roll out an effective production and distribution plan, one that saw a 200% success rate in Biden’s first 100 days.
I agree with John that it’s pathetic to see angry Right Wingers desperately trying to throw the credit for our current improvements to Pence’s spokesman. But one supposes we should have expected this, given how they played a similar game when President Obama took office. (We went from the Right insisting that there was no recession to suddenly declaring we were practically in a Depression and that it was all President Obama’s fault…)
Kevin Koster commented on Hannity Tells ‘Radio Family’ To Work Two Jobs Instead Of Taking Govt. Assistance – While His Real Family Enjoys Unearned Luxury
2021-05-30 16:17:15 -0400
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No surprise that Hannity is spouting the usual angry Right Wing/Libertarian talking points. There’s nothing original in his commentary – he lifted it from other AM Radio hosts like Dave Ramsey.
The basic Libertarian approach is to pretend that there is nothing we can do to help each other and that everyone is living on an island completely apart from everyone else, with no obligation to anything other than ourselves. This is intended to help justify the typical anger that Libertarians feel when it comes to taxation or any kind of community spirit toward lifting the common good. To the committed Libertarian, there is no common good and community spirit is a myth that justifies the individual not being able to just enrich themselves without shame or humility.
I’ll note that I’ve never heard Libertarians cry out against wealthy people and business owners being given various subsidies and tax exemptions at everyone else’s expense. Their only complaint is when they are required to contribute to society.
I’ll also note that this narrative serves two purposes. First, it establishes the false premise that anyone receiving money from a government program is somehow a moocher. If they’re getting Social Security, they’re taking an “entitlement” that they don’t deserve. If they’re getting Unemployment Insurance, they’re lazy idlers who won’t go out to do real work. Never mind that both programs are partly funded by the recipients. (Of course, there’s a big exception to this for angry Right Wingers – if there’s a stimulus check that Donald Trump rushed in to plant his own signature on and thus fool millions of Americans into voting for him in 2020, then that’s a wonderful thing that shows how much Trump cares.)
But the main purpose of talking down any kind of community effort of us to help each other is to continue to sow seeds of distrust in that entire notion. By repeating the canard that “we can’t afford it” and by constantly telling everyone that Social Security is “on the verge of bankruptcy”, angry Right Wingers are trying to close the sale on the idea that “government” can’t get anything done. This was the reason why the Pence White House deliberately understaffed every major cabinet department, refused to even appoint ambassadors to much of the world and gutted every agency they could, including the CDC. They were practicing the self-fulfilling hypothesis of saying that “government” was inept while making sure that this would be the case. Had they not been trounced in the 2018 midterms, they would have gutted Social Security and Medicare for everyone under the age of 62, following the published Heritage Foundation playbook for destroying those programs. At which point, disingenuous propagandists like Hannity would have shrugged and said “We TOLD you that you couldn’t trust the ‘government’!”
The approach is as predictable as it is despicable.
The basic Libertarian approach is to pretend that there is nothing we can do to help each other and that everyone is living on an island completely apart from everyone else, with no obligation to anything other than ourselves. This is intended to help justify the typical anger that Libertarians feel when it comes to taxation or any kind of community spirit toward lifting the common good. To the committed Libertarian, there is no common good and community spirit is a myth that justifies the individual not being able to just enrich themselves without shame or humility.
I’ll note that I’ve never heard Libertarians cry out against wealthy people and business owners being given various subsidies and tax exemptions at everyone else’s expense. Their only complaint is when they are required to contribute to society.
I’ll also note that this narrative serves two purposes. First, it establishes the false premise that anyone receiving money from a government program is somehow a moocher. If they’re getting Social Security, they’re taking an “entitlement” that they don’t deserve. If they’re getting Unemployment Insurance, they’re lazy idlers who won’t go out to do real work. Never mind that both programs are partly funded by the recipients. (Of course, there’s a big exception to this for angry Right Wingers – if there’s a stimulus check that Donald Trump rushed in to plant his own signature on and thus fool millions of Americans into voting for him in 2020, then that’s a wonderful thing that shows how much Trump cares.)
But the main purpose of talking down any kind of community effort of us to help each other is to continue to sow seeds of distrust in that entire notion. By repeating the canard that “we can’t afford it” and by constantly telling everyone that Social Security is “on the verge of bankruptcy”, angry Right Wingers are trying to close the sale on the idea that “government” can’t get anything done. This was the reason why the Pence White House deliberately understaffed every major cabinet department, refused to even appoint ambassadors to much of the world and gutted every agency they could, including the CDC. They were practicing the self-fulfilling hypothesis of saying that “government” was inept while making sure that this would be the case. Had they not been trounced in the 2018 midterms, they would have gutted Social Security and Medicare for everyone under the age of 62, following the published Heritage Foundation playbook for destroying those programs. At which point, disingenuous propagandists like Hannity would have shrugged and said “We TOLD you that you couldn’t trust the ‘government’!”
The approach is as predictable as it is despicable.
Kevin Koster commented on Juan Williams Abruptly Departs The Five – Probably Because Of Gutfeld
2021-05-27 18:02:39 -0400
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Williams unfortunately does not have other options at this point. He tossed those when he took a large paycheck from Fox News after his anti-Muslim comments got him fired by NPR. Ever since then, he’s been paid to be the meek liberal punching bag on various Fox News shows, just like Alan Colmes. His entire purpose of being on the network has been to allow deplorables like Watters and Gutfeld to make extremely nasty comments at his expense.
He’ll of course stay on Fox News as a contributor to various other shows (probably on Perino’s daytime show and on Wallace’s Sunday show, among other things). But I wouldn’t expect to see him trying to join up with any legitimate news organization after this. He simply doesn’t have any journalistic credibility at this point. He knew what it meant to join up with Fox News, and he was happy to accept a lot of money from them to do so. Nobody forced him to do so.
I agree that it’s cringeworthy to see him constantly getting shouted down by attack dogs like Watters, but Williams could have put a stop to that at any point if he really cared about it.
He’ll of course stay on Fox News as a contributor to various other shows (probably on Perino’s daytime show and on Wallace’s Sunday show, among other things). But I wouldn’t expect to see him trying to join up with any legitimate news organization after this. He simply doesn’t have any journalistic credibility at this point. He knew what it meant to join up with Fox News, and he was happy to accept a lot of money from them to do so. Nobody forced him to do so.
I agree that it’s cringeworthy to see him constantly getting shouted down by attack dogs like Watters, but Williams could have put a stop to that at any point if he really cared about it.
Kevin Koster commented on Fox Guest: Biden ‘Already Hurting Our Economy’
2021-05-23 14:50:25 -0400
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Brady has no grounds at all to complain about tax rates. He gleefully participated in the 2017 Tax Transfer, which skyrocketed tax rates on Middle Class Employees, particularly those who live and work in Blue States, while giving a nice break to his donors.
If he’s complaining about the top individual tax rate (for people earning above 420K) going back to 39.6%, that’s a far far cry from when the rate was 71% for people earning over 120K – which was where the rate sat in 1982, when Ronald Reagan was supposedly in charge of what the GOP wants everyone to think was “the greatest economy ever”. And at that time, the book rate for corporations was 46%. Yet Brady would try to scam everyone that significantly lower tax rates will somehow kill the economy.
If he’s complaining about any tax rate increasing, or any loopholes or deductions being reduced, he can explain why he did exactly that to Middle Class Employees, resulting in tens of millions of Americans seeing massive increases in their federal tax bills. But he’s not about to do that.
And this entire act from him and Payne is nothing but further gaslighting to try to talk the economy down and help the GOP win back some seats next year. The act should look familiar – we saw nearly the same playbook during President Obama’s first two years, where Fox News and the GOP went from insisting that nothing was wrong with the economy during W’s massive recession to suddenly deciding the economy had gone off a cliff the second that President Obama was sworn in. It used to be that these guys hoped you would not remember history from 30 years ago. Now they’re hoping you won’t remember things that happened yesterday.
If he’s complaining about the top individual tax rate (for people earning above 420K) going back to 39.6%, that’s a far far cry from when the rate was 71% for people earning over 120K – which was where the rate sat in 1982, when Ronald Reagan was supposedly in charge of what the GOP wants everyone to think was “the greatest economy ever”. And at that time, the book rate for corporations was 46%. Yet Brady would try to scam everyone that significantly lower tax rates will somehow kill the economy.
If he’s complaining about any tax rate increasing, or any loopholes or deductions being reduced, he can explain why he did exactly that to Middle Class Employees, resulting in tens of millions of Americans seeing massive increases in their federal tax bills. But he’s not about to do that.
And this entire act from him and Payne is nothing but further gaslighting to try to talk the economy down and help the GOP win back some seats next year. The act should look familiar – we saw nearly the same playbook during President Obama’s first two years, where Fox News and the GOP went from insisting that nothing was wrong with the economy during W’s massive recession to suddenly deciding the economy had gone off a cliff the second that President Obama was sworn in. It used to be that these guys hoped you would not remember history from 30 years ago. Now they’re hoping you won’t remember things that happened yesterday.
Kevin Koster commented on Eric Trump: People On The Street Hug Me And Cry Because They Miss Donald Trump
2021-05-20 20:06:26 -0400
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The Trumps shouldn’t be too concerned about whether their fans will be able to see them after the New York criminal indictments come through.
Visiting Hours are on Thursdays, aren’t they?
Visiting Hours are on Thursdays, aren’t they?
Kevin Koster commented on Lachlan Murdoch’s Fox News Fantasy: ‘Opinion On Our Channel Is Center-Right’
2021-05-14 13:44:18 -0400
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Murdoch’s comments are consistent with how the Right Wing has attempted to reframe debate over the past four decades. I believe he’s being honest here. From his perspective, Fox News’ blend of biased coverage and more blatant propaganda is indeed “center right”. Because he’s going from the Right Wing position that a “liberal” is a 1970s Republican in the Mitt Romney mode, and a “conservative” is an Extreme Far Right Wing idealogue like Stephen Miller or Sydney Powell. From that thinking, Far Right Wing idealogues like Ted Cruz and Tom Cotton are just “center right”. And from that thinking, an actual centrist politician like Joe Biden suddenly becomes a “Far Left Socialist”.
The Right Wing has desperately tried to convince everyone that the centerline of political discussion has somehow shifted six football fields to the Right over the past decades, when in fact that never happened. The centerline does not shift just because one side decides they’re going to move it. And just because there are piles of angry Right Wing shock jocks on AM radio trying to imitate the unrepentant bigotry of despicable men like Rush Limbaugh does not mean that the centerline suddenly moved. It just means that angry Right Wingers would like to get away with saying as much outrageous material as they can, and they’re hoping nobody will call them out on their behavior.
The entire point of the existence of Fox News has always been to promote a Far Right propaganda tilt of “journalism”, as Roger Ailes designed it. The point was always to normalize angry Right Wing talking points and to put everyone else on the back foot. Fox News has never been in the mainstream, and the Right Wing attempts to redefine CNN as somehow “Far Left” have always been laughable. One has to wonder if these guys have ever heard of Pacifica Radio.
But it is true that there are now even more extreme outlets flanking Fox News on the Right – namely the wingnuts at Newsmax and OAN and Breitbart and the like. In the aftermath of Donald Trump losing the 2020 election, it does seem that a chunk of the angry Right Wing base of Fox News is now turning to these alt propaganda sources that go even farther down the rabbit hole. So it makes sense that Fox News is frantically trying to reclaim its viewers by throwing them more red meat. I’d note that Fox News only covered the election results as they did as a way of trying to pretend to be “fair and balanced”. It’s a similar game to that played by Rasmussen Reports in their polling – keep a heavy Right Wing thumb on the scale until the last possible minute and then report something accurately at the very end and then claim to have always been accurate.
The Right Wing has desperately tried to convince everyone that the centerline of political discussion has somehow shifted six football fields to the Right over the past decades, when in fact that never happened. The centerline does not shift just because one side decides they’re going to move it. And just because there are piles of angry Right Wing shock jocks on AM radio trying to imitate the unrepentant bigotry of despicable men like Rush Limbaugh does not mean that the centerline suddenly moved. It just means that angry Right Wingers would like to get away with saying as much outrageous material as they can, and they’re hoping nobody will call them out on their behavior.
The entire point of the existence of Fox News has always been to promote a Far Right propaganda tilt of “journalism”, as Roger Ailes designed it. The point was always to normalize angry Right Wing talking points and to put everyone else on the back foot. Fox News has never been in the mainstream, and the Right Wing attempts to redefine CNN as somehow “Far Left” have always been laughable. One has to wonder if these guys have ever heard of Pacifica Radio.
But it is true that there are now even more extreme outlets flanking Fox News on the Right – namely the wingnuts at Newsmax and OAN and Breitbart and the like. In the aftermath of Donald Trump losing the 2020 election, it does seem that a chunk of the angry Right Wing base of Fox News is now turning to these alt propaganda sources that go even farther down the rabbit hole. So it makes sense that Fox News is frantically trying to reclaim its viewers by throwing them more red meat. I’d note that Fox News only covered the election results as they did as a way of trying to pretend to be “fair and balanced”. It’s a similar game to that played by Rasmussen Reports in their polling – keep a heavy Right Wing thumb on the scale until the last possible minute and then report something accurately at the very end and then claim to have always been accurate.
Kevin Koster commented on Private Jet Hannity Defends Caitlyn Jenner’s Elitist Homeless Comments
2021-05-12 17:44:04 -0400
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One would think that Hannity would learn his lesson at some point here and stop it with the double downs and the frantic attempts to bully anyone who disagrees with him. But he’s apparently a slow learner.
Kevin Koster commented on Tucker Carlson War On America: Calling For Criminal Investigation Of Dr. Fauci Edition
2021-05-11 18:44:09 -0400
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It really does seem that angry Right Wingers like Carlson have not been getting the message that doubling down will not help them. They’ve been repeatedly preserved on video saying the most vicious and negative things they could. They aren’t going to be able to walk all this stuff back.
Kevin Koster commented on Fox Host And GOP Rep. Just Itching To Cut Jobless Benefits
2021-05-11 18:41:19 -0400
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This has been the refrain from angry Right Wingers over the past year. That people who were left unemployed by the pandemic were just lazy and shiftless and needed to be told to shut up and go back to work. Mitch McConnell completely fed into this with his refusal to extend stimulus as of last May, when he played the game about how everyone should just go back to work because America would be back to normal by summer 2020. His viciousness resulted in millions of Americans struggling through last fall until the new Congress and White House could start to address the problems the GOP ignored.
I’ll also note that the canard about overpaying the unemployed is offensive on a variety of levels. It’s not accurate, since people really do prefer to be able to work and earn a living if possible. And it’s a second barrel from the Right Wing that regularly exhort against raising the minimum wage.
I’ll also note that the canard about overpaying the unemployed is offensive on a variety of levels. It’s not accurate, since people really do prefer to be able to work and earn a living if possible. And it’s a second barrel from the Right Wing that regularly exhort against raising the minimum wage.
Kevin Koster commented on Gingrich: States Biden Narrowly Won ‘Were, In Effect, Stolen’
2021-05-13 21:05:49 -0400
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In late 2001, a full recount of the Florida results from that election was conducted by a group of media agencies, just so that we’d know what the result would have been. The recount was conducted under multiple premises, including just the 4 counties that Gore’s people had specified, including hanging chads, not including hanging chads, etc. As it turned out, Gore would still have lost in the limited recount he’d requested of the 4 counties. He just couldn’t pick up enough votes to get past 520. On the other hand, the premise of recounting the ENTIRE STATE showed that Gore had won by 72 votes overall. Meaning that Gore won the 2000 election.
By the time these results were made public, we were already deep into Fall 2001, after the point where the 9/11 attacks had happened. Gore once again chose not to make a big deal out of this, and most Americans are unaware this recount even occurred.
I note also that when the GOP was concerned that they were going to lose the Florida recount, they were making noises about recounting New Mexico because they felt they should have won that state. There was a bunch of angry Right Wing talk about how the voters of New Mexico had the right to have their voices heard. And then when Gore caved on everything, those same GOP voices became strangely silent about New Mexico… Guess they didn’t care that much about those voices after all.
By the time these results were made public, we were already deep into Fall 2001, after the point where the 9/11 attacks had happened. Gore once again chose not to make a big deal out of this, and most Americans are unaware this recount even occurred.
I note also that when the GOP was concerned that they were going to lose the Florida recount, they were making noises about recounting New Mexico because they felt they should have won that state. There was a bunch of angry Right Wing talk about how the voters of New Mexico had the right to have their voices heard. And then when Gore caved on everything, those same GOP voices became strangely silent about New Mexico… Guess they didn’t care that much about those voices after all.
Kevin Koster commented on Weekend News Anchor Leland Vittert Ousted From Fox
2021-05-02 14:59:31 -0400
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Vittert is by no means a champion of free speech or tough journalism. He’s an angry Right Wing media face who made his bones by harassing Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake 6 years ago, following her group with his microphone and screaming at her to the point that Al Sharpton tried to back him off, at which point Vittert tried to pretend he’d been “assaulted”. (Shades of Stephen Crowder’s attempt to play the same game in Wisconsin a couple of years prior to that.)
His falling out of favor with the Trump crowd just indicates how much farther over the threshold of lunacy the Right Wing has gone in the past 4 years. It doesn’t suddenly mean that Vittert isn’t who he is. Any more than the disastrous Pence White House suddenly transforming W into anything other than the dangerous and incompetent warmonger he was and is.
Fox News is in panic mode as their viewership has dropped off, with many of them transferring over to even more rabid sites like OANN and Newsmax, who are doing their worst to drive discourse completely into the gutter. So Fox News is doing its best to try to throw more red meat to that audience, to try to stop the bleeding. I have a feeling Vittert has also ruffled feathers within the Murdoch organization, given his odd behavior on camera in trying to provoke conflicts and then being shocked, shocked when his antics backfire.
I doubt that Vittert will come out like Carl Cameron did, or like some others have done at different times. It’s more likely that he’ll find another Right Wing outlet, or just slink into obscurity.
His falling out of favor with the Trump crowd just indicates how much farther over the threshold of lunacy the Right Wing has gone in the past 4 years. It doesn’t suddenly mean that Vittert isn’t who he is. Any more than the disastrous Pence White House suddenly transforming W into anything other than the dangerous and incompetent warmonger he was and is.
Fox News is in panic mode as their viewership has dropped off, with many of them transferring over to even more rabid sites like OANN and Newsmax, who are doing their worst to drive discourse completely into the gutter. So Fox News is doing its best to try to throw more red meat to that audience, to try to stop the bleeding. I have a feeling Vittert has also ruffled feathers within the Murdoch organization, given his odd behavior on camera in trying to provoke conflicts and then being shocked, shocked when his antics backfire.
I doubt that Vittert will come out like Carl Cameron did, or like some others have done at different times. It’s more likely that he’ll find another Right Wing outlet, or just slink into obscurity.
Kevin Koster commented on Fox Calls Biden Address 'Biden Admin Propaganda On Cap Hill'
2021-04-29 12:02:26 -0400
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Two things are evident from Fox News and Carlson’s coverage here:
1. They are clearly panicking over the popularity of the Biden/Harris White House. So they’re trying any tack they can to keep repeating the lie that Biden is somehow senile, or that a major jobs proposal is somehow “socialism”. It’s clear that they’re hoping to repeat their vicious success against Hillary Clinton, where years of smears eventually allowed them to pretend that somehow the smears were “facts” rather than endlessly repeated lies. Not sure that this will work in the current context, but it will be crucial for everyone to show up to vote in 2022 and 2024 and not assume that angry Right Wingers are staying home.
2. Carlson and the rest of the angry Right Wing have clearly forgotten about how Pence’s childish spokesman never gave a single address that was not extremely partisan, and extremely negative toward anyone not on the Extreme Right Wing. They’ve forgotten how Pence’s childish spokesman regularly used State of the Union addresses to embolden bigotry and viciousness – including the horrifying spectacle in 2020 when the Presidential Medal of Freedom was thrown away on an unrepentant bigot. The idea that they would then label a simple, heartfelt address as “unbelievably partisan propaganda” is enough to raise the eyebrows, but it’s par for the course for the Right Wing these days.
It’s also clear that Carlson is panicking that he and Fox News are losing their audience to the more hardcore wingnut outlets like OANN and Newsmax. He’s obviously trying to show his audience “See, I’m just as angry as those guys on The First!”
1. They are clearly panicking over the popularity of the Biden/Harris White House. So they’re trying any tack they can to keep repeating the lie that Biden is somehow senile, or that a major jobs proposal is somehow “socialism”. It’s clear that they’re hoping to repeat their vicious success against Hillary Clinton, where years of smears eventually allowed them to pretend that somehow the smears were “facts” rather than endlessly repeated lies. Not sure that this will work in the current context, but it will be crucial for everyone to show up to vote in 2022 and 2024 and not assume that angry Right Wingers are staying home.
2. Carlson and the rest of the angry Right Wing have clearly forgotten about how Pence’s childish spokesman never gave a single address that was not extremely partisan, and extremely negative toward anyone not on the Extreme Right Wing. They’ve forgotten how Pence’s childish spokesman regularly used State of the Union addresses to embolden bigotry and viciousness – including the horrifying spectacle in 2020 when the Presidential Medal of Freedom was thrown away on an unrepentant bigot. The idea that they would then label a simple, heartfelt address as “unbelievably partisan propaganda” is enough to raise the eyebrows, but it’s par for the course for the Right Wing these days.
It’s also clear that Carlson is panicking that he and Fox News are losing their audience to the more hardcore wingnut outlets like OANN and Newsmax. He’s obviously trying to show his audience “See, I’m just as angry as those guys on The First!”
Kevin Koster commented on Biden Address To Joint Session Of Congress – Live Stream And Open Thread
2021-04-29 11:53:02 -0400
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I’ll add that Tim Scott’s rebuttal has already been appropriately criticized for multiple blatant misstatements. The bit about the Georgia law is just one area where he flat-out lied. I’ve read the law. It’s not a “pro-voting” law at all, unless you only want Right Wingers to vote in Georgia. It’s a revenge law, designed to punish the voters who picked Joe Biden and the election officials who didn’t do enough to toss the Biden votes out. I lost count of the number of poison pills in that law, but the intention is to make it so difficult for Black voters to participate in Georgia that they’ll presumably surrender and allow the Right Wing to have their way. Not sure that it will play out in that fashion – but we should keep in mind that we now have a Far Right judiciary and a Far Far Right 6-3 Supreme Court. Meaning that the litigation challenging the Georgia law is likely to be met with 5-6 unfriendly faces when it gets to the high court. (My expectation is that they will assert states’ rights over elections and tell those Georgia voters that if they want to change the election laws they should vote for different legislators.)
Kevin Koster commented on Former Fox Regular Raided In Giuliani/Ukraine Probe
2021-04-29 11:34:29 -0400
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It will be both interesting and ironic to see the people who have most vehemently yelled “Lock Her Up!” finding themselves behind bars for their criminal actions.
Angry Right Wingers’ obsession with smearing the Biden family has led them down some extremely strange pathways over the past few years. It’s obvious that trolls like DiGenova and Toensing thought they could eliminate the threat of a Biden presidential run by throwing a bunch of already debunked dirt from Ukraine. This got the attention of Giuliani, who fell for every bit of the lure and pulled the Pence White House into the scheme. And then Pence’s childish spokesman stupidly tried to muscle the Ukrainian president into continuing the smear or risk losing US aid, and the rest of that is impeachment history.
At the tail end of the 2020 campaign, the same trolls attempted an “October surprise” with the nonsense about the engineered “Hunter Biden laptop” that just happened to pop up in a Trump supporter’s shop with all kinds of salacious material on it shortly before Election Day. Thankfully, nobody outside the angry Right Wing media bubble fell for that one, and it died as quickly as the nonsense from Tara Reade.
It seems that the same angry Right Wingers are refusing to acknowledge their 2020 loss and are now just trying to double down on their hatred. Which says a lot more about their immaturity than it does about the non-existent “scandal” they’ve been pushing for years.
Angry Right Wingers’ obsession with smearing the Biden family has led them down some extremely strange pathways over the past few years. It’s obvious that trolls like DiGenova and Toensing thought they could eliminate the threat of a Biden presidential run by throwing a bunch of already debunked dirt from Ukraine. This got the attention of Giuliani, who fell for every bit of the lure and pulled the Pence White House into the scheme. And then Pence’s childish spokesman stupidly tried to muscle the Ukrainian president into continuing the smear or risk losing US aid, and the rest of that is impeachment history.
At the tail end of the 2020 campaign, the same trolls attempted an “October surprise” with the nonsense about the engineered “Hunter Biden laptop” that just happened to pop up in a Trump supporter’s shop with all kinds of salacious material on it shortly before Election Day. Thankfully, nobody outside the angry Right Wing media bubble fell for that one, and it died as quickly as the nonsense from Tara Reade.
It seems that the same angry Right Wingers are refusing to acknowledge their 2020 loss and are now just trying to double down on their hatred. Which says a lot more about their immaturity than it does about the non-existent “scandal” they’ve been pushing for years.
Kevin Koster commented on Fox News’ Anti-Trans Obsession: ‘Religious Liberty’ Lies Edition
2021-04-29 11:24:16 -0400
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It’s obvious that Fox News is trying to parlay its viewers hatred for gay and Trans people, as yet another distraction from reality. It’s similar to their harping against Planned Parenthood and reproductive rights, where the idea is to assume a faux “moral high ground” while actually justifying bigotry against a community that the Right Wing absolutely hates.
The danger in the current scenario is that angry Right Wingers have packed our judiciary with partisan idealogues who are likely to take actions that could have dire consequences for most Americans. In the past, these kinds of feints were just the usual sops to the angry Right Wing base of voters, and everyone knew that it was unlikely that anything would actually be done. The Right Wing campaigned against reproductive rights for decades, since they could endlessly use the issue to fundraise but knew it was unadvisable to take us back to the days of coat hangers in alleys. Today, unfortunately, angry Right Wingers now accurately believe they have sufficient control over the judiciary that they can toss out the precedents of the Earl Warren Supreme Court and take their revenge against the rest of the country.
With the current Far Far Right Supreme Court, we’re very much looking at a situation that should have the gay and Trans communities extremely worried. Fox News can claim some responsibility for the damage, as they’ve specialized in running propaganda pieces like the one referenced in this article. I’d like to think that something can be done about it, but that will take years, if not decades, and not until the Supreme Court is no longer loaded with a 6-3 majority of extreme partisans.
The danger in the current scenario is that angry Right Wingers have packed our judiciary with partisan idealogues who are likely to take actions that could have dire consequences for most Americans. In the past, these kinds of feints were just the usual sops to the angry Right Wing base of voters, and everyone knew that it was unlikely that anything would actually be done. The Right Wing campaigned against reproductive rights for decades, since they could endlessly use the issue to fundraise but knew it was unadvisable to take us back to the days of coat hangers in alleys. Today, unfortunately, angry Right Wingers now accurately believe they have sufficient control over the judiciary that they can toss out the precedents of the Earl Warren Supreme Court and take their revenge against the rest of the country.
With the current Far Far Right Supreme Court, we’re very much looking at a situation that should have the gay and Trans communities extremely worried. Fox News can claim some responsibility for the damage, as they’ve specialized in running propaganda pieces like the one referenced in this article. I’d like to think that something can be done about it, but that will take years, if not decades, and not until the Supreme Court is no longer loaded with a 6-3 majority of extreme partisans.
Kevin Koster commented on FL AG Calls SCOTUS Expansion ‘Most Dangerous Issue To America’
2021-04-26 18:22:21 -0400
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Moody, like many angry Right Wingers, is hoping that viewers will not remember history, or even RECENT history for that matter.
Republicans have been trying to pack the judiciary and particularly the Supreme Court ever since Nixon took office in 1969. They had long been accustomed to the courts upholding their wishes and had been bitterly disappointed in the Earl Warren SC and rulings like Brown v Board of Education. (Angry Right Wingers have long wanted to overturn that ruling, among many others, as they were fine with a discriminatory public school system. When that was blocked by Warren, the Right Wing began pulling their kids out of public school, with the wealthier ones going to expensive private schools and the working class ones just home schooling.)
In the days of Reagan, the GOP instituted a “litmus test” to make sure their appointees were not just Republican but dependably Right Wing. But even that test was not strict enough for the Far Right, so Republican justices like Sandra Day O’Connor and Anthony Kennedy were deemed to not be conservative enough, particularly after they failed to outlaw reproductive choice in the Casey decision in 1992. In the current era, the selection of judges and justices for the GOP has been farmed out to extreme Right Wing groups like Heritage Action and the Federalist Society. This way, conservatives know that only their true brethren will be getting these seats.
Angry Right Wingers would also like you to forget that in 2016, they deliberately refused to even hold a hearing for Merrick Garland after he was named by President Obama to fill the seat of the deceased Antonin Scalia. Not only that, but senators like Ted Cruz smugly declared on cable news that they would refuse to hold any hearings for ANY judge named by Hillary Clinton regardless of who they were. Cruz went so far as to remind everyone that there was no rule saying that the Supreme Court necessarily had to have 9 justices and could get along just fine with 8 or 7.
These same angry Right Wingers would like everyone to forget how they rammed Neil Gorsuch into Garland’s SC seat and then did an endzone dance on the Senate floor to celebrate. They’d like everyone to forget how prominent Right Wingers pushed Anthony Kennedy into retirement (partly by providing his son with a lucrative position) and then rammed unrepentant rapist and partisan idealogue Brett Kavanaugh into that seat moments before the midterm election day. And they definitely hope everyone forgets how they seized on the death of Justice Ginsburg to ram Amy Coney Barrett into that seat, again within moments of a major election, even though they had previously decried such an action.
Let’s also not forget how angry Right Wingers rammed through literally hundreds of unqualified partisan idealogues into our judiciary between 2017 and 2020, with Mitch McConnell prioritizing the ram-throughs over providing aid to tens of millions of Americans in the COVID pandemic. And let’s not forget that Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett should never have been confirmed to hold any seat in the judiciary, let alone Supreme Court seats. All were extreme partisan picks who were intended to do exactly what they will now do over the next decade – namely, rip up the precedents of the Earl Warren Court and return us to a time when the American Judiciary comforted the powerful and afflicted the afflicted.
Angry Right Wingers have literally spent over five decades trying to game our political system to give themselves the hardline judiciary they wanted. And now that they may have to deal with everyone else pushing back on their behavior, they’re crying foul? This would be laughable if it wasn’t so brazen, and if the consequences weren’t so serious. The Right Wing has no moral or ethical or legal high ground here. If they had the slightest iota of self-awareness, they’d hang their heads in shame.
Republicans have been trying to pack the judiciary and particularly the Supreme Court ever since Nixon took office in 1969. They had long been accustomed to the courts upholding their wishes and had been bitterly disappointed in the Earl Warren SC and rulings like Brown v Board of Education. (Angry Right Wingers have long wanted to overturn that ruling, among many others, as they were fine with a discriminatory public school system. When that was blocked by Warren, the Right Wing began pulling their kids out of public school, with the wealthier ones going to expensive private schools and the working class ones just home schooling.)
In the days of Reagan, the GOP instituted a “litmus test” to make sure their appointees were not just Republican but dependably Right Wing. But even that test was not strict enough for the Far Right, so Republican justices like Sandra Day O’Connor and Anthony Kennedy were deemed to not be conservative enough, particularly after they failed to outlaw reproductive choice in the Casey decision in 1992. In the current era, the selection of judges and justices for the GOP has been farmed out to extreme Right Wing groups like Heritage Action and the Federalist Society. This way, conservatives know that only their true brethren will be getting these seats.
Angry Right Wingers would also like you to forget that in 2016, they deliberately refused to even hold a hearing for Merrick Garland after he was named by President Obama to fill the seat of the deceased Antonin Scalia. Not only that, but senators like Ted Cruz smugly declared on cable news that they would refuse to hold any hearings for ANY judge named by Hillary Clinton regardless of who they were. Cruz went so far as to remind everyone that there was no rule saying that the Supreme Court necessarily had to have 9 justices and could get along just fine with 8 or 7.
These same angry Right Wingers would like everyone to forget how they rammed Neil Gorsuch into Garland’s SC seat and then did an endzone dance on the Senate floor to celebrate. They’d like everyone to forget how prominent Right Wingers pushed Anthony Kennedy into retirement (partly by providing his son with a lucrative position) and then rammed unrepentant rapist and partisan idealogue Brett Kavanaugh into that seat moments before the midterm election day. And they definitely hope everyone forgets how they seized on the death of Justice Ginsburg to ram Amy Coney Barrett into that seat, again within moments of a major election, even though they had previously decried such an action.
Let’s also not forget how angry Right Wingers rammed through literally hundreds of unqualified partisan idealogues into our judiciary between 2017 and 2020, with Mitch McConnell prioritizing the ram-throughs over providing aid to tens of millions of Americans in the COVID pandemic. And let’s not forget that Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett should never have been confirmed to hold any seat in the judiciary, let alone Supreme Court seats. All were extreme partisan picks who were intended to do exactly what they will now do over the next decade – namely, rip up the precedents of the Earl Warren Court and return us to a time when the American Judiciary comforted the powerful and afflicted the afflicted.
Angry Right Wingers have literally spent over five decades trying to game our political system to give themselves the hardline judiciary they wanted. And now that they may have to deal with everyone else pushing back on their behavior, they’re crying foul? This would be laughable if it wasn’t so brazen, and if the consequences weren’t so serious. The Right Wing has no moral or ethical or legal high ground here. If they had the slightest iota of self-awareness, they’d hang their heads in shame.
Kevin Koster commented on Tucker Carlson: ‘Hollywood Leads The Forces Of Darkness And Intellectual Repression’
2021-04-25 23:46:42 -0400
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Part of the reason that Carlson now feels free to just throw bile at Hollywood is that Murdoch sold the movie/TV assets to Disney and just retained Fox Sports and the propaganda division. The former Fox Studios and Fox Television arms are now redubbed Touchstone Television and Searchlight. Disney puts their family-oriented stuff on Disney+ and the Fox stuff on Hulu these days.
But Carlson’s smear of Hollywood is nonsense, like much of the rants he inflicts these days. He appears to be desperate to win back the viewers who abandoned Fox for their temerity in acknowledging reality last November. Not sure that his tactic will work – the ones who left are getting much redder meat from OANN and Newsmax these days. And Glenn Beck and Bill O’Reilly are frantically hoping to peal off a few people to their web shingles. And everyone on the Right is hoping to be the next Rush Limbaugh, as if the world needed another dirigible of drivel.
But Carlson’s smear of Hollywood is nonsense, like much of the rants he inflicts these days. He appears to be desperate to win back the viewers who abandoned Fox for their temerity in acknowledging reality last November. Not sure that his tactic will work – the ones who left are getting much redder meat from OANN and Newsmax these days. And Glenn Beck and Bill O’Reilly are frantically hoping to peal off a few people to their web shingles. And everyone on the Right is hoping to be the next Rush Limbaugh, as if the world needed another dirigible of drivel.
Kevin Koster commented on Greg Gutfeld Wants To ‘Send A Message’ By Flouting Fox's Remote Work Rules
2021-04-24 19:20:04 -0400
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John is correct to note that both Carlson and Gutfeld are frustrated in falling short of their aspirations. I’ll add that they’re only the latest angry Right Wing pundits to go through this syndrome.
Rush Limbaugh wanted to be a funny rock & roll DJ in a major market. But he failed in that career because he wasn’t funny and his bullying nature offended FM radio listeners. One of the radio station managers who fired him pointedly commented that “I’m not as impressed with you as you are”. So he found a home on AM Radio in the lower end field of talk/phone-in shows. And he was able to parlay his style into financial success for himself (and increasingly serious cultural problems for the nation as a whole).
Bill O’Reilly wanted, and still desperately wants, to be an “elder statesman” of politics and culture. He was hoping to outshine Brit Hume at Fox News (not that Hume is any actual statesman) and become a voice of authority for Right Wing viewers. Instead, he was forced to retreat from Fox News in disgrace over his repeated sexual misconduct and his vicious behavior, particularly after the revelation that he’d paid 32 million dollars to Lis Wiehl for truly despicable conduct. Today, he rants from the sidelines at his website, openly rooting for the failure of cable news media (including Fox News) and pretending that his webcast is somehow anything more than what it is. It’s interesting to listen to him kowtowing to both Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity to get radio time on their shows – when he’d previously been in a position to treat Beck like a pet, and when he’d been known to despise Hannity while they were both on Fox News.
If I had to guess, I’d say that both Carlson and Gutfeld are making the most of their situation. Carlson knows he’ll never have a legitimate media gig anywhere, so he’s milking the Fox News purse for whatever he can get out of it. For a guy whose prior career was hooting from the sidelines at Daily Caller, this is actually a big step up for him, and he’s clearly making some coin for himself in the short term. But no, he’ll never be an “elder statesman” either. My expectation is that in a few years, Fox News will replace him with whoever the newer, angrier fad is at that time. Gutfeld similarly knows he’ll never be the huge live comic act he wanted to be, so he’s taking the crumbs that Fox News gives him. When the music stops in a few years, he’ll be the guy doing the opening remarks at CPAC and events like that. But he’s cashing in while he can.
Rush Limbaugh wanted to be a funny rock & roll DJ in a major market. But he failed in that career because he wasn’t funny and his bullying nature offended FM radio listeners. One of the radio station managers who fired him pointedly commented that “I’m not as impressed with you as you are”. So he found a home on AM Radio in the lower end field of talk/phone-in shows. And he was able to parlay his style into financial success for himself (and increasingly serious cultural problems for the nation as a whole).
Bill O’Reilly wanted, and still desperately wants, to be an “elder statesman” of politics and culture. He was hoping to outshine Brit Hume at Fox News (not that Hume is any actual statesman) and become a voice of authority for Right Wing viewers. Instead, he was forced to retreat from Fox News in disgrace over his repeated sexual misconduct and his vicious behavior, particularly after the revelation that he’d paid 32 million dollars to Lis Wiehl for truly despicable conduct. Today, he rants from the sidelines at his website, openly rooting for the failure of cable news media (including Fox News) and pretending that his webcast is somehow anything more than what it is. It’s interesting to listen to him kowtowing to both Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity to get radio time on their shows – when he’d previously been in a position to treat Beck like a pet, and when he’d been known to despise Hannity while they were both on Fox News.
If I had to guess, I’d say that both Carlson and Gutfeld are making the most of their situation. Carlson knows he’ll never have a legitimate media gig anywhere, so he’s milking the Fox News purse for whatever he can get out of it. For a guy whose prior career was hooting from the sidelines at Daily Caller, this is actually a big step up for him, and he’s clearly making some coin for himself in the short term. But no, he’ll never be an “elder statesman” either. My expectation is that in a few years, Fox News will replace him with whoever the newer, angrier fad is at that time. Gutfeld similarly knows he’ll never be the huge live comic act he wanted to be, so he’s taking the crumbs that Fox News gives him. When the music stops in a few years, he’ll be the guy doing the opening remarks at CPAC and events like that. But he’s cashing in while he can.
Kevin Koster commented on Fox Guest Calls Amazon Union Defeat ‘A Win For The Worker’
2021-04-13 01:25:00 -0400
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Just to be accurate, Ellen is correct about the point of the book “Nomadland” as written by Jessica Bruder. It’s not just about Amazon. It’s about middle class people who fell off the grid (and more and more are continuing to join them) and are then left in the gutter. It makes the point that the corporations did just fine – and it also makes the point that the corporations like Amazon then were happy to have these new nomads work for them on an “at will” basis for a month or two a year, with no obligation at all to think about what it means to hire a workforce who parks their vans and mini-RVs in your parking lot for a month and then are booted out. It’s not like the companies don’t know that they’re hiring people on the ragged edge and treating them in an abominable fashion. They absolutely know – and they don’t care. And we let it happen.
I do need to point out that the movie by Chloe Zhao is not a romantic one, and it does not present this life as anything but bleak and depressing. And it presents many of the real nomads interviewed by Jessica Bruder in the film and allows them to tell their own stories. And all of that is a good thing. The problem is that the central narrative of the film is about the depressing life led by Frances McDormand’s character (and it’s bleak beyond bleak) – but that life is shown to be her choice and not a situation she cannot escape. She’s repeatedly shown to have the option to live with family who want to give her a home and a new start. She turns all that down to live in her van. One can argue that she’s fiercely independent or unable to engage with others – and that may be true. But the reality for the very real nomads interviewed by Jessica Bruder is that they don’t have a sister or a son or a daughter who wants to take them in. They don’t have any family. They don’t have anyone from their former lives who would do more than shrug at their situation. So they’re stuck in this existence and there is no escape for them.
I think there’s a larger point that Jessica Bruder was trying to examine – about the fact that we tried to establish a safety net for Americans in programs like Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid, etc. We tried to make sure that nobody wound up completely destitute if we as a society could do something about it. Starting with the rise of Ronald Reagan, that safety net was shredded by angry Right Wingers who felt it should never have existed in the first place. So we’ve arrived at a place, about 30 years post Reagan, where multiple Right Wing objectives have been accomplished. The existence of tens of thousands of nomads living in this situation is a sign of the success of the Right Wing.
I do need to point out that the movie by Chloe Zhao is not a romantic one, and it does not present this life as anything but bleak and depressing. And it presents many of the real nomads interviewed by Jessica Bruder in the film and allows them to tell their own stories. And all of that is a good thing. The problem is that the central narrative of the film is about the depressing life led by Frances McDormand’s character (and it’s bleak beyond bleak) – but that life is shown to be her choice and not a situation she cannot escape. She’s repeatedly shown to have the option to live with family who want to give her a home and a new start. She turns all that down to live in her van. One can argue that she’s fiercely independent or unable to engage with others – and that may be true. But the reality for the very real nomads interviewed by Jessica Bruder is that they don’t have a sister or a son or a daughter who wants to take them in. They don’t have any family. They don’t have anyone from their former lives who would do more than shrug at their situation. So they’re stuck in this existence and there is no escape for them.
I think there’s a larger point that Jessica Bruder was trying to examine – about the fact that we tried to establish a safety net for Americans in programs like Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid, etc. We tried to make sure that nobody wound up completely destitute if we as a society could do something about it. Starting with the rise of Ronald Reagan, that safety net was shredded by angry Right Wingers who felt it should never have existed in the first place. So we’ve arrived at a place, about 30 years post Reagan, where multiple Right Wing objectives have been accomplished. The existence of tens of thousands of nomads living in this situation is a sign of the success of the Right Wing.