Hate Crime Media Cover Up?
May 23, 2007
I’m not sure what to think about this, I’ll just leave it up to you to decide.
The Ron Paul Effect
May 8, 2007
Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, who barely registers in public opinion polls of the Republican presidential field, won last Thursday night’s debate.
That was the unmistakable conclusion of the online poll posted by debate sponsor MSNBC, which registered Paul with higher positive ratings and lower negative numbers than any of the other nine candidates on the stage.
ABC’s post-debate Internet survey showed an even clearer victory for Paul, with the congressman taking more than 9,400 of 11,000 votes as of 12:30 p.m. Monday. (Rudy Giuliani is the next ranked candidate, with barely 150 votes.)
So are the polls missing a Paul boomlet? Is the famously contrarian ob-gyn — a libertarian nicknamed “Dr. No” because of his propensity to vote against anything he believes contradicts the Constitution’s original intent — poised to surge into contention in the GOP field?
Not likely. What’s more likely, based on Web traffic over the past week, is that Paul supporters have mastered the art of “viral marketing,” using Internet savvy and blog postings to create at least the perception of momentum for his long-shot presidential bid.
The Ron Paul Effect
Since online polls aren’t scientific — people choose to take them, and many people vote multiple times — doing well in them doesn’t necessarily mean a campaign is on the move.
But Internet buzz can have a carry-over effect, said Peter Greenberger, an online strategist at New Media Strategies and a former Democratic political operative.
“It’s evidence of something — either passionate supporters, active supporters, or just one very savvy supporter who’s able to vote several thousand times,” Greenberger said. “If it leads to one or two stories in the mainstream media, that could lead to a bounce online, and could lead to some fundraising successes.”
With strong support among libertarians who are unhappy with the top-tier Republican contenders, Paul has a robust online presence.
His MySpace profile boasts nearly 12,000 “friends.” Today, his name ranks in the Top 10 among blog search terms at Technorati.com, behind Paris Hilton but ahead of Mario Lopez.
After Thursday night’s debate, the comment sections of several major news organizations — including ABC’s — were inundated with pro-Paul messages.
Viewers raved about Paul’s commitment to abolishing the IRS, his steadfast opposition to a national ID card, and a forthright tone that bloggers said set him apart from the other candidates onstage.
The Paul campaign did not immediately respond to a phone call and e-mail message seeking comment.
ABC and other major news sources are downplaying the effect that congressmen Ron Paul’s victory might have. They constantly say “He can’t win”, and that the polls are a fluke.
Is the news media that far into someones pocket that they need to toss in their opinions on politics in order to prevent Ron Paul from even having a chance? This is a sick and disgusting practice that needs to be turned around because it crushes the spirit of democracy.
I don’t know what’s going to happen in the next few weeks, but something is going to have the change in the way the news media presents these candidates…. declaring “HE CAN’T WIN” this early because he hasn’t been in the national spot light yet isn’t conjecture…. it’s just ignorance.
Source: ABCNews
A former White House official accused of improperly editing reports on global warming defended his editorial changes Monday as reflecting views expressed in a 2001 report by the National Academy of Sciences.House Democrats said the 181 changes made in three climate reports reflected a consistent attempt to emphasize uncertainties surrounding the science of climate change and undercut the broad conclusions that manmade emissions are warming the earth.Philip Cooney, former chief of staff at the White House Council on Environmental Quality, acknowledged at a House hearing that some of the changes he made were “to align these communications with the administration’s stated policy” on climate change.
The extent of Cooney’s editing of government climate reports first surfaced in 2005. Shortly thereafter, Cooney, a former oil industry lobbyist, left the White House to work at Exxon Mobil Corp.
So the government is so deeply into the pockets of big business that they will go to any length to silence scientists trying to warn us about Global Warming.
Doesn’t surprise me one bit.
Waxman’s committee also heard from James Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies and one of the country’s leading climate scientists, who said the White House repeatedly tried to control what government scientists say to the public and media about climate change.
“Interference with communications of science to the public has been greater during the current administration than at any time in my career,” said Hansen, who was one of the first to raise the problem of climate change in the 1980s.
Hansen’s battles with NASA and White House public affairs officials are not new and resulted in an easing of NASA’s policies toward scientists talking to the media about their work.
But that was not always the case.
Hansen said that in 2005 he was told by a 24-year-old NASA public affairs official he could take no part in an interview with National Public Radio on orders from senior NASA public affairs officials. Instead, three other NASA officials were offered for the interview.
The young press officer, George Deutsch, now 26, sat next to Hansen at the witness table Monday and told the committee he had simply been “relaying” the views of higher-ups at NASA that Hansen was not to participate in the interview.
Republican Rep. Darrell Issa suggested that Hansen was not being muzzled at all, and there is nothing wrong with government scientists being subject to some limits in what they say.
A Republican Representative says that censoring scientists is ok because they work for the government? How do you put limits on a person who’s job is to uncover facts?
Source: Huffington Post
The entire idea of government controlled research has seen much better days, this event will hopefully be a huge step toward taking the scientists away from the government.
Republican: Scripts need reviewing Raleigh | Cit…
February 4, 2007
Raleigh | Citing the controversy surrounding the Dakota Fanning film Hounddog, the leader of the state Senate Republicans says he wants the government to review scripts before cameras start rolling in North Carolina.
That system, said state Sen. Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, would apply only to films seeking the state’s lucrative filmmaker incentive, which refunds as much as 15 percent of what productions spend in North Carolina from the state treasury.
“Why should North Carolina taxpayers pay for something they find objectionable?” said Berger, who is having proposed legislation drafted.
It is not known whether Hounddog’s producers have or will apply for the incentive. A call Thursday to the N.C. Department of Revenue, which oversees incentive payments, was not returned.
Sen. Julia Boseman, D-New Hanover, one of the backers of the new law that created the current incentive system, said she couldn’t say much until she saw Berger’s proposal in writing.
“There’s no bill yet to take a look at,” she said. “But I am always willing to consider reasonable ways to improve the program.”
She did say she thought looking at scripts before shooting starts might be meaningless because a script could be changed during production.
“We should consider the end product,” she said, “which is what our current system is designed to do.”
State law denies the incentive to films that are obscene. In state law, obscenity is defined as depicting sexual conduct presented in an offensive way that appeals to prurient interest, lacks any “serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value” and is not free speech protected by the state or federal constitutions.
Berger said the film-incentive ban should be broadened to include material considered objectionable. He said there should be no First Amendment concerns because the producer would be seeking money from the state government. But he did say that if constitutional questions confused the matter, it would be better not to have a film incentive at all.
This is insane, any form of censorship is wrong, although on that same matter why should the people’s tax dollars have to do to pay for a film anyway? It seems that it’s more of a bribe to attempt to get money into the states local economy than anything else. Which plays for public interest on one side, but on the other takes money out of their pockets.
Private investors for private films. Simple as that.
Source: Wilmington Star
