For Obama, whose main achievements are getting elected and writing books about himself, life is a wonderland.. Unlike for millions now out of work, the presidency for this man is endless golf, holidaying and party. Hey, who wouldn't like to have a never ending ball at taxpayers' expense?
The Obamas have taken it to a new level - secret partying!
Johnny Depp and Obama at the Alice in Wonderland 2009 White House Halloween party.
The big news over the weekend, that the Obama White House had a secret Alice and Wonderland-themed Halloween party, really didn’t surprise me. The taxpayer-funded event featured Johnny Depp in full Mad Hatter costume prancing on tables in the White House State Dining Room. Someone wore the actual Chewbacca Wookie costume, while guests drank punch from blood vials. (An aside: why is Halloween such a big event for some people, requiring excessive decorations and festivities?) The State Dining Room was turned into a Lewis Carroll-themed house of horrors for the invited guests.
Not surprisingly, the White House deliberately concealed the existence of the grotesque party from the public and the press corp. That pesky 16% real unemployment rate required stealth.
So much for the vaunted transparency. Also note the complicity of the lapdog media in keeping his quiet. Woof, woof - anything else, master?
The Gray Lady gets a new editor who by looks appears to be the tough liberal type with four testicles of steel and poisoned knuckles for her opponents. Barely has the new boss moved in that she gladdens the old faithfuls by convincing them that she intends to carry on the hoary New York Times tradition - that of flushing inconvenient facts down their politically correct dual flush toilet.
In the New York Timesarticle announcing the surprise leaving of Bill Keller(kicking out?) and the anointment of Jill Abramson there slipped in some revealing(but not really, if you know the Times) facts-
Ms. Abramson, 57, said being named executive editor was “the honor of my life” and like “ascending to Valhalla” for someone who read The Times as a young girl growing up in New York.
"In my house growing up, the Times substituted for religion,” she said. “If the Times said it, it was the absolute truth."
Now we know what religion the liberals practice. Thanks for clearing it up.
But somebody at the Times must have realized the enticing free fodder this provides to its hated right wing opponents. An open invitation to snark.You know like Peter Wehner of the Commentary magazine (the Death Star of conservatism) saying-
When Journalism Substitutes For Religion
This is a practically perfect quote from Ms. Abramson, simply in terms of giving voice to what one imagines the people who run the Times are like. She believed the Times wasn’t simply a great newspaper; the stories were written on tablets of stone. (Perhaps she viewed reporters at the Times as secular prophets and the op-ed columnists as secular apostles.) But it goes even deeper than that: the Times was a substitute for religious faith, meaning it must have provided her not simply with the news but with existential meaning and moral guidance.
For a person to have viewed (and presumably to still view, at least to some degree) a newspaper with religious reverence and its stories as sacred text is slightly weird and quite revealing. Devotion to a journalistic enterprise is one thing; cultism is quite another.
Jill Abramson’s mindset is exactly the kind conservatives assume liberals at the Times possess. To see it confirmed by her own words is, in its own way, quite useful.
and with Jay Nordlinger of the National Review (another power center of the dark side) adding his own ridicule of Jill's religious beliefs.
Can't have that, can we?
So up goes a revised version of the article with the following lines missing -
“In my house growing up, The Times substituted for religion. If The Times said it, it was the absolute truth.”
And no mention that it has been edited. They love transparency like their messiah Obama does. So transparent that we wouldn't notice anything. Except for the pesky right wing bloggers who are noticing.
Unfortunately for the Gray Hag(is she a lady?), the original quote has been picked up by other sources like Howard Kurtz and Politico which even gives the vanishing quote as a caption to the image of the quadruple-balled Jill-
So Jill starts where Bill left off - by using the toilet. Looks like it's going to be an overworked loo.
It's not just me that gets the impression that Rajdeep Sardesai, the top honcho of CNN-IBN, is trying to distract us from probing deeper into the ethical woes of his media colleagues. His latest column is like pointing at the sky and saying -look a pink elephant! while the rat of journalism sneaks by. Or, as the neglected TV film reporter Smita Smitten, Showbiz Kitten used to say in the delightful comedy Goodness Gracious Me to divert viewers from her woes- "Look, there goes Art Malik!"
I won't bother to fisk the article-I'm too tired now and tomorrow is another day - but comments below the column have done that to an extent already, some in a cruder way than I would have. Some samples -
Over at the Hindustan TimesSamar Halarnkar ponders over the dodgy ethics of his many allegedly distinguished media colleagues as exposed in the Radia tapes and gives us this eternal wisdom of the heavens-
It is always hardest to look within and acknowledge one's failings.
Ironical.
This blog has at various times analyzed and criticized the highly biased "reporting" in this paper by none other than Halarnkar himself. For example see this and this. It was sheer advocacy of an agenda -hardcore environmentalist agenda in this case - that masqueraded as "news" and such is the media world so hermetically sealed in its perceived intellectual superiority and arrogance that neither Halarnkar nor his editors could make out the difference between belief systems and facts. In the few emails and comments we exchanged he simply laughed off all criticism.
I guess media persons do find it hard to look in the mirror. Either that or their mirror is frosted.
Obama’s Palace Guards: Desperate Maher, Colbert, Jon Stewart Go All In to Save Dems
Remember when American comedians went after the powerful in an effort to bring them down to earth with the sharp satire of accountability? Today, they appear to only protect the powerful. Well, unless the powerful aren't liberal enough. As things stand now you have the likes of David Letterman and Louis C.K. savaging Sarah Palin's family, SNL terrified to rip Obama with any real zeal, cartoonists proclaiming President Teleprompter too cool to mock, and Will Ferrell films flaking for corrupt public unions, all in an effort to protect the corrupted leftist elitists currently holding power.
-----------------
In desperate Hail Mary moves to protect Obama and Democrats from what's looking like a November rout, three of the left's most beloved Palace Guards have just upped their game considerably.
Yes, that sums it up - the joker in the White House is being defended by comedians.
Was it yesterday or the day before when an obviously peeved Asieh Namdar of CNN had Abdel Bari Atwan,the editor-in-chief of al-Quds al-Arabi, on to denounce pastor Terry Jones? The same Bari Atwan who said "that he would dance in Trafalgar Square if Iranian missiles hit Israel".And he meant nuclear missiles.
But killing a few million Jews -why that's nothing.The real outrage is burning one's own property (Pastor Jones planned to burn his own copies of Koran).
The would be dancer on the graves of the Jews is a favorite at the BBC too.
Yes, sir, this is how morally loathsome the media elites have become.
Update 2- PDF of the Portland Police Bureau's file on the Gore sexual assault allegations including the 67-page transcript of the alleged victim's January,2009 interview with the police. Scroll to the last for R rated stuff.
I have no idea what they are saying in this Taiwanese video(one can take a wild guess, though) but it is hilarious. More so if the wacky humor is unintentional -or maybe it isn't.Anybody who speaks the lingo let us know.
The God of Global Warming has been accused of molesting a masseuse.Next Media Animation put's it's creative talents to work out what might have happened-
Some screenshots-
While the video is amusing the allegations are not-
The massage therapist said Gore asked for an abdominal massage, according to a transcript of the interview released by police. The masseuse said Gore began to moan during his appointment, insisted that she go lower, and grabbed her hand and guided it to his pubic area.
She later claimed Gore tried to have sex with her and began to embrace her before she wriggled out of his grasp.
A close friend of a Portland massage therapist who accused former Vice President Al Gore of groping her says the therapist told her soon after the 2006 encounter that she'd been violated and assaulted by "someone in the higher ups."
Donna Burleigh of Keizer said her best friend didn't identify the person, but when Gore returned to Portland years later, her friend "freaked out."
"She freaked and split. She said her predator was back and coming to town. She up and left," Burleigh said.
And he paid 540$ for the services, real or expected.
Wow! A 540$ massage! The fat god has money to burn. It might be his divine disdain of wealth.Isn't it interesting that the haters of Capitalism often live like filthy, rich pigs they accuse others of being-what's a $540 massage here or a $9 million mansion in the hills there- and damn the carbon footprint.
We would say that he is a giant hypocrite -but gods work in mysterious ways.
Or, as a commentator with the sagacious sounding name of 2fly4pdx says,
global warming made him do it
Ann Althouse compares the media treatment of a liberal(i.e. leftist) icon and a conservative one.No surprise there.
Update -TMA do make parodies and tongue-in-cheek videos.Check out this one-
Gore, who she portrayed as a tipsy, handsy predator who forced her to drink Grand Marnier, pinned her to a bed, and forcibly French kissed her. The woman's statement--which could be mistaken for R-rated Vice Presidential fan fiction--describes Gore as a man with a "violent temper as well as extremely dictatorial commanding attitude besides his Mr. Smiley Global Warming concern persona." After fleeing Gore's suite, the woman returned home to discover, a la Lewinsky, "stains on the front of my black slacks." Suspecting that the stains were Gore bodily fluids, the woman made sure not to clean them. "I carefully hung them up and decided to be sure not to launder them until I knew more what to do with what had happened. Just my intuition." While the masseuse hired a civil attorney, "I was not interested in making any money from this case," she told cops. "I did not want to be labeled a gold digger like the women in this situation are often labeled." The woman recently eased off this principled stand when she offered to sell her story to the National Enquirer for $1 million. (15 pages)
Ah, yes- we all know. Obama is super. He’s so honest, so refreshing, so full of hope and optimism. So transparent. And the mainstream journalists are so scrupulous, honest and ethical –just like Obama. At least that is the narrative that hangs like smog and we are forced to breath it in. And like smog it is pernicious. And false-
…..many White House correspondents and other top tier journalists want to write Obama books.
Anything with "Obama" on it is running at a huge premium in the book publication market.
But the kind of books that sell need "inside access" and this is something that the communications team at the White House doles out minimally, and increasingly, only when favors are part of the arrangement.
What I have learned after discussions over the last several days with several journalists who either have regular access to the White House or are part of the White House press corps is that there is a growing sense that access is traded for positive stories -- or perhaps worse, an agreement that things learned will not be reported in the near term.
-----------------
Edward Luce, Washington Bureau Chief of the Financial Times, who has been one of the few to resist the 'you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours' offers from the White House has found himself in a dust-up with the White House for his recent article co-authored with Daniel Dombey, "US Foreign Policy: Waiting on a Sun King".
One of the few ?! So, most so-called reporters now work as Obama’s whores?
White House corrupt. Journalists corrupt.These thieves get on well together.
But all you hear from our media, here in India, is how wonderful Obama is. And the journalists/editors here don’t even have the possible benefit of an Obama book deal. They are just whoring for Obama for free.
Reading John Hinderaker one realizes how easy and enjoyable it is to kick Frank Rich around.Rich will obviously not appreciate the treatment John gives him nor this great advice-
You really shouldn't read the New York Times. It has lower editorial standards than any other newspaper in America, and if you read it enough, it could make you stupid. Like Frank Rich.
Read the whole thing. A thorough take down of an idiot-pundit, the kind that infect the media all over.
Ravi Shankar is one of those cartoonists who just by the dint of being there for a long time become 'eminent'. He has an interesting style of drawing -but even a monkey can draw with practice. The art of cartooning has to with being genuinely funny, witty, sharp, intelligent, perspicacious...and Ravi Shankar is hardly ever that. He is also a moral idiot-
A morally obtuse Ravi Shankar cartoon, the Hindustan Times, 16 Feb,2010
Saddam trial: villagers tell of the day the planes came
Kurdish villagers gave a series of emotional testimonies today in Saddam Hussein's genocide trial as they told of how the Iraqi dictator’s forces bombarded civilian villages with poisonous gas.
On the second day of the trial, after a chaotic opening in which Saddam refused to state his name or enter a plea, witnesses began to detail the savagery of the Anfal campaign which ran from 1987-88.
The prosecution alleges that up to 182,000 civilians were killed in air strikes, poison gas attacks and armed sweeps by Iraqi forces through designated "prohibited zones" in Kurdish regions.
------------------------
"On April 16, 1987 in the evening as the cattle were returning home and the sun was setting in the sky, about eight to 12 jets covered the sky," he began.
"The jets started firing on the villages of Belisand and Sheikwasan. The explosions were not very loud.
"There was greenish smoke from the bombs. It was if there was a rotten apple or garlic smell minutes later. People were vomiting... we were blind and screaming. There was no one to rescue us. Just God," he said.
Prosecutors said that a series of eight campaigns between February and August 1988 were aimed at driving Kurds from their homes into "collective villages" where Iraqi authorities could monitor them. Those who did not die in the military attacks were arrested, displaced, tortured or killed, the court was told.
If IPCC chief R K Pachauri remained under attack for the better part of last month, his reputation was more than resurrected in the last two days, with government heads and leaders from across the world voicing their support for the man and his organisation.
Like the IPCC's creative writings,the Times of India defies science.This paper carries water.
Saw this a few hours ago on the Pachauri-infatuated channel NDTV. It again gives us a lesson in how the NDTV anchors simply cannot get away from their biases.They cannot be objective even if they try.And they don't try too often.
Part 1-
Video(Youtube) part 1- NDTV anchor Sonia Singh stacks the debate against Dr.Richard North
Part 2-
Video(Youtube) part 2- NDTV anchor Sonia Singh stacks the debate against Dr.Richard North
Part 3-
Video(Youtube) part 3- NDTV anchor Sonia Singh stacks the debate against Dr.Richard North
This time the anchor was Sonia Singh.She stacked the debate against Dr.Richard North with the following tried and tested techniques-
1) three participants,Dr.Rajendra Pachauri, Dr.Murari Lal (another IPCC author and now a notorious one), and environmental journalist Bittu Sahgal (editor of the Sanctuary Asia magazine)were on the same side -the alarmist side or if you prefer, the IPCC side-all agreeing with each other of course.Opposed to them were Dr.North and Dr.Raina.However Dr.North got little support from Raina as the gentleman was obviously reluctant to say anything beyond Himalayan glaciers(which were hardly discussed).So this is not just a 3-2 advantage to the alarmist side but more like 3-1.1
2) the alarmist side was given whale of the time
3) Dr.North appeared briefly in a phone-in at the beginning of the debate.After that he was never called upon again.That left the field for the three alarmists to have a field day apart from some neither-here-nor-there meanderings of Raina.
4) Sonia Singh was obviously sympathetic to the alarmist side. In particular she kept agreeing with the environmentalist Sahgal even when he uttered something truly stupid like -"nobody can or is trying to debate or discuss or negotiate with the planet" It perhaps never occurred to her to ask-"how can one do that?"
In all, it was mostly a collective whining from the alarmists with the anchor joining in.Sonia Singh did Prannoy Roy proud.
Update -
changed Bittu Sahgal's words from "who's having a debate with the planet?" to the more accurate "nobody can or is trying to debate or discuss or negotiate with the planet". Sounds even more idiotic now.
In Hindi, a sycophant is called a chamcha. Chamcha is also the Hindi word for spoon. Thus, a common wordplay in India is to call a bootlicker(often in the context of politics) a spoon, say-
X is Minister Y's spoon.
A few days ago I was mildly amused to see perhaps Indian TV's most famous (and perhaps most influential) personality Prannoy Roy of NDTV play a fawning spoon to Rajendra Pachauri.I say 'mildly' because I have come to expect such servility from the MSM- it is their normal mode.Still, it's an amazing example of media's obsequiousness towards Pachauri.No wonder Pachauri gets miffed easily when criticized. He has had it so easy over the years.
Video(Youtube) -Prannoy Roy acts obsequiously towards Rajendra Pachauri NDTV link
Roy wanted to be reassured by Pachauri that the glaciers were melting, whatever the expected date of demise(it is true -certainty of disaster does comfort some people. The thought that catastrophic global warming might not be happening can disconcert them.)
The funniest part is Prannoy Roy's concern about 'Global Attack' on Pachauri.He thinks criticizing Pachauri and other alarmists is like finding "reds under the bed", like "cold war".I don't think Roy is very interested in hearing out the critics.
His 'Global Attack' also reminded me of images from all those sci-fi movies-
Listening to Roy one can almost imagine Richard North and other Pachauri critics to be hovering in the sky like Predator drones zapping IPCC scientists.And looking for Dr. Pachauri in particular.
Roy's fawning at the end has to be heard to be believed. He says-
"Your credibility is impeccable.Let's hope you fight back and win and clear your name in all these...in this widespread attack from one side against you."
Roy also didn't think it fit to disclose that his NDTV has been in bed with Pachauri for quite some time-
Rajendra Pachauri with Prannoy Roy- the guru and the spoon
Thank you, Dr.Prannoy Roy, for a seminal lesson in how not to be an unbiased mediaperson.
I had earlier left a comment at Carbon Footprint, a Hindustan Times blog by the resident alarmist Samar Halarnkar. To which he had replied-
Samar Halarnkar Says:
December 23rd, 2009 at 8:33 pm
Er, I don’t really get your point. This isn’t a newspaper. it’s a blog. It has a point of view because it is meant to have one. The newspaper reports didn’t take any sides, just brought to you the nitty gritties of what happened in Copenhagen. As you suffered me, I suffer you. :-) cheers
My riposte is the following two comments left at the same blog post-
Samar,
I mainly meant your 'reports' in the HT.They are not blog, are they?
"The newspaper reports didn’t take any sides" -nice try at humor.Better luck next time.
I suppose it is the destiny of a newspaper man to suffer his readers -tells us much about the attitude.
Gives a hint to how much the computer models on which the global warming alarmism is based get it wrong.
I hope the new year brings you happiness and wisdom.
Cheers
And-
Oh! forgot to mention -
You have been ignoring Pachaurigate( Pachauri's scandalous conflicts of interest) as if he were the mayor of Timbuktu.
Apart from an initial report -very inadequate and leaning towards Pachauri -where are your investigations? Whatever happened to investigative reporting? The conflicts of interest are glaring to even a blind mouse- what about you and your editors?
Why not suck up a little less and ferret a little more? Won't hurt. Just try.
Why can’t the gentleman stay at home and emit less?The planet is dying, isn’t it?
Isn’t it strange that those who shout the loudest about CO2 emissions have an extra large carbon footprint?
Is it too much to expect them to live up to their own ideals?
I'm positively a bastard!
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Vimal Chander Joshi does a puff piece on Rajendra Pachauri's baby -TERI. Did Joshi used to copywrite product brochures? The piece does read like an amateurish advertisement draft -so much so that Joshi was probably fired and became a journalist.Ads require more honesty, I suppose.
The Pachaurigate rolls along in the media and things are getting hotter(pun intended)-
In a rejoinder(to the accusations in the daily Telegraph), nine Fellows of the TERI.....demanded an unqualified apology from the newspaper for the “libellous” piece of journalism, failing which the institute would take recourse to other measures it would deem appropriate.
To similar threats one-half of the Booker-North team had earlier replied -
The second word of the response I have in mind is "off".
The IPCC must put it's best minds to solve that one.Maybe they can come up with a hockey stick for Pachauri to defend himself.
TimesNOW TV had a small report -
Who is gunning for Pachauri?
That makes it sound as if a shadowy group of international hackers has let loose a hit team after him. I suppose that's the way Pachauri feels nowadays.
The embedded video from that site is not working.Here is the link.
As EUreferendum pointed out, he also appeared on NDTV to put up a totally unconvincing defence-
Video -Pachauri defends himself on NDTV
His basic case remains that -
1) every single penny he received (and some of his remunerations are "generous", he admitted)went to his institute TERI.
2) this is a plot by "skeptics" to demolish climate science(he didn't say "hackers" this time, at least in the portion shown)
3) the "skeptics" are being paid lot of money by "vested interests" who don't want to do anything about climate change.
The interview was incomplete - we were obviously shown a part only. Whether the anchor asked any tough questions or not remains a mystery. Pachauri by the way is deeply enmeshed in the NDTV's green initiatives.
Pachauri was also on TV yesterday saying something like,"I know something about English language" -this was in context of interpretation of the Copenhagen agreement.Now that he has admitted to understanding English, then surely he knows what "conflict of interest" means.Denying it is like denying that the sun rises in the east or that Angela Jolie's lips are God created strawberries.
It is as simple as ABC-
A) He is the head of IPCC which has been promoting climate alarmism and recommending drastic policy measures on a global as well national and local scales.Those policy changes will obviously hurt many and benefit some(as always happens when the state mandates something)- and companies and organisations are jostling to be among the winners.They stand to make a killing in the artificially created carbon "market" that is expected to be in trillions.The taxpayers the world over will be among the losers -but who cares about them? Not Pachauri and his ilk.
B)Pacahuri is advisor etc. to these concerns which are drooling at the thought of making a killing. They of course, fully expect that with Pachauri on board they will succeed and how!
C)This is classic conflict of interest. Pachauri by his enormous influence creates new policy environment.Pachauri as adviser helps organizations take advantage of those policies and make hay while Pachauri shines.
And this is irrespective of whether Pachauri makes a personal fortune out of it or not.
So what's so difficult to understand about this "conflict of interest" thingamijig? It's not as if it's climate science.
As for Pachauri giving all his wealth selflessly away to TERI, his organization -I definitely answered that here.
To repeat myself partially-
The excuse that he did it for TERI, a non-profit, does not wash. Top-notch non-profits are a very far cry from some local outfit of salvation army type misty-eyed stragglers.They have lavish offices all over the world and their budgets run in tens and sometimes hundreds of millions.Their top honchos are wined and dined and awarded in the highest places and palaces.
The big non-profits are the new elites.
And Pachauri is the top of this heap.Playing the saint won't wash. No sir,
IT WON"T WASH!
We need accountability, transparency, an impartial investigation of his affairs and better excuses that won't insult our intelligence.
Remember how anybody who suggested during the presidential campaign that Obama was a Marxist or a radical was vilified as a 'right-wing' hatemonger?( In the MSM 'right-wing' is a pejorative while 'left-wing' means idealistic).Then came all those extreme left-wing nuts that Obama appointed to crucial positions -from eco-nut John Holdren (who is obsessed with "the rates at which people breed")to the communist and9/11 truther Van Jones to the Mao admirer Anita Dunn.
The media, of course made no noise. In fact when some of these nuts were quietly fired, the MSM dutifully played dead.
It has now become very hard to deny that Obama's heart lies to the very,very left of the scale.So I'm not at all surprised by this-
Why let a holiday season come between the White House and making some political statements? The White House pegged controversial designer Simon Doonan to oversee the Christmas decorations for the White House. Mr. Doonan, who is creative director of Barney’s New York has often caused a stir with his design choices. Like his naughty yuletide window display of Margaret Thatcher as a dowdy dominatrix and Dan Quayle as a ventriloquist’s dummy. For this year’s White House, he didn’t disappoint.
So he has, as decorations, images of the legendary transvestite Hedda Lettuce, President Obama onto Mt. Rushmore(wait - I thought these arty-sharties were supposed to speak truth to power, not go all oozy and sycophantic) and an image of - MAO, who "like Stalin, indisputably murdered more people than Hitler"!(Some say 70 million- but what's a few million people here and there when the ideals are noble and the heart pure? e.g. see Mao: The Unknown Story)
But hey, Mao was for hope and change -in his own way. So a left-wing mass murderer's image in Obama White House doesn't seem so out of place.
All the experts say the effects of climate change will be felt most in Alaska, home of the ex-governor who contends climate change is no big deal.
Good thing she wasn't in Valdez this week when the citizenry got buried under a record snowfall.
-------------------
Yes, you read right. Five feet, 8 inches; over the head of your average American woman
Obama, who escaped grim weather in Copenhagen, arrived to a warm welcome in Washington-
Record snowfall totals were reported Saturday afternoon at Washington Dulles and Reagan National airports -- and snow was still falling. Accumulation at Dulles reached 16 inches, breaking the old record of 10.6 inches set December, 12, 1964; 13.3 inches was reported at Reagan. The old record there was 11.5 inches set December 17, 1932.
Powerline has more images of global warming from Europe-
We 'skeptics' understand that the weather is not climate -unfortunately the greenies and their media-poodles don't. But even here they are dishonest in terms of their own premises.Every warmer than usual event means global warming, but record cold events - well, they are just ignored.Silence is a weapon- a heavy artillery- in this war. And the media uses it all the time.
to divert viewers from her woes- "Look, there goes Art Malik!"
)
