Roger Ailes  that same evening:

Any candidate for high office of either party who believes he can blacklist any news organization is making a terrible mistake,'' Ailes said, adding that the strategy would surely backfire with voters.

I guess Roger forgot that Vice Cheney kept the New York Times reporters off Air Force 2.  You might say he "blacklisted a news organization".  Roger, Roger, Roger.

With no intent to defend Ailes, isn't this joke more a jab at Bush cluelessness than Obama's name rhyming with Osama?   

And it is true that Barack Obama is on the move. I don't know if it's true that President Bush called Musharraf and said: "Why can't we catch this guy?"

Isn't is also helpful of the right to make the name similarity a joke? It helps clarify the difference between Obama and Osama and will make it harder to portray Obama as a threat.

Nice try, Todd. Emma is right, this is a jab at Bush implying confusion about names, confusion about the war, confusion about the culture. It also paints Bush as being confused and flat footed and Obama (I can use that name can't I?) is portrayed as agile, nimble, on the rise and surpassing a slow witted opponent.

If Jay Leno made this joke, no one would think twice. If Katie Couric made it, people might actually pay attention to her. If Joe Biden made this joke, people might think he is becoming more racially sensitive.

I think its funny. It made me laugh. Your attempt to discredit Fox because you want to censor political news coverage that annoys you is obvious and sad.

"Any candidate for high office of either party who believes he can blacklist any news organization is making a terrible mistake," Ailes said, adding that the strategy would surely backfire with voters.

Unfortuantely, Ailes is right. Fox News is on everywhere - in barbar shops, at the health club, in bars and restaurants. It's fine to continue to lay into Fox for its incompetence and biases. But Democrats must continue at the same time to engage the enemy on the unfair battlefields that exist, not the chivalrous playing fields of their wishes and fantasies.

Fox is not fair and balanced. What else is new? Reid's response unfortunately reinforces the view of Democrats as a party disposed to run home to their mommies and complain about the mean boys rather than fight back.

Ailes crack can be read just as much as an insult to Bush's intelligence and difficulty with names as an insinuation about Obama. Rather than running and whining, I would advise Democrats to repeat the remark and play up the Bush stupidity angle in it. Obama himself should be able to have quite a bit of fun here at Ailes's and Bush's expense - just as he used the Howard remark as an opportunity to take a swipe at Australian manhood.

The American popular cultural scene - from You Tube, to late night talk shows to Comedy Central - is dominated by a tendency toward very aggressive and irreverant humor. Standup acts - even by part-time comedians like Ailes - are going to be full of "Bill and Hill" cracks for the duration. I think Democrats are going to need a more pro-active counterpunching approach rather than rely on "booing and hissing". Looking at Ailes, for example, the response from the Clintons should be that, yes, Hillary has been on the road a lot; and rumor has it that Roger Ailes wanted to get out on the road more too, but Fox couldn't afford the freight charges.

By the way, in response to the Hillary crack, Schieffer showed what I would characterize as an "embarrassed smile."

Mr. Gitlin,

I have always associated the First Amendment with protection of unpopular speech.

Whether the KKK rallies, skinheaded Nazis marching in Skokie, or Sean Hannity proclaiming a gay porn stud "a great American" on his show after CPAC honors the gay prostitute, all enjoy the constitutional protections that our troops are fighting for.

I would posit that Roger Ailes and Faux News are the champions of those examples of unpopular speech, and should forever be associated with those in the KKK, the Nazi Party and all their white supremacist brethren.

Alphonse ( Al ) Kada
Iranians are fighting the Americans in Iraq so they don't have to fight them on the streets of Tehran

No news organization should be blacklisted. However, I have met news organizations, some news organizations are friends of mine, and Fox is no news organization.

But they do have a babe doing the weather, and what about all those blondes flashing thigh?

"Unfortuantely, Ailes is right. Fox News is on everywhere - in barbar shops, at the health club, in bars and restaurants. It's fine to continue to lay into Fox for its incompetence and biases. But Democrats must continue at the same time to engage the enemy on the unfair battlefields that exist, not the chivalrous playing fields of their wishes and fantasies."

This logic is flawed. No matter how many upstanding influential debauched male citizens frequent the whorehouse, a lady does not need to get pretty and go to the whorehouse to get a man. Should she choose to be unwise enough to do so, when she leaves she will be called the same name as the occupants of the house.

Notrol,

By the logic you slyly suggest, the Nazis who marched in Skokie not only had a right to march--they did--but the right to be honored by an association of news directors for their preeminent commitment to the First Amendment.

Todd Gitlin

By the way, how many Pulitzers does FOX have? Brit? Sean? Bill?
How about Barnes, he must have a few he was awarded during the Clinton years.

1. I'm sure that there are any number of jokes/statments that would be appropriate for Jay Leno, or any other commedian, to say that would be inappropriate for the president of a news network to make in an event where he is representing that network. I love George Carlin's work, but if George Bush did "The Seven Deadly Words You Can't Say on TV" at the Correspondents Dinner, I think it would be judged in poor taste. (Making light of the mistakes that caused thousands of soldiers to die, not so much).

2. It isn't the jokes per se, it is the slanted news reporting that goes along with them.

By the same token, we could say that no matter how many American voters frequent Fox News, a sensitive and well-bred Democratic candidate need not go to Fox News to win a supporter. And of course if Democrats, like the lady of your story, are more interested in preserving their personal purity and virtue than achieving concrete results for the people they claim to care about, they can follow that advice.

But if they do want to win elections, Democrats need to go where the voters are.

Don't leave out Ms Botox herself, who always reminds us how fair & balanced they are -- just in case you couldn't tell it from the broadcast.

Watch FOX News and hear Roger, Brit, Fred, Sean and the gang preach about morals and values.........then switch to FOX Entertainment.

Washington is a city that is dazzled by status, power and the privileges that attend them. Those are the chief values that animate the members of the imperial court. After all, the allure of status and power is what motivated these courtiers to scrape the provincial shit off their shoes, and drew them to the Emerald City in the first place. The Washington media minions are thus highly disposed to preserve and protect the aura of pharaonic Godliness that surrounds the President, because their own modest tinctures of grandeur and self-worth are derived from nearness to the divine radiance.

Colbert went up before the assembled court and pissed on the Sun King's shoes right in front of everybody. In doing so, he showed that (i) he wasn't afraid of Bush and (ii) Bush couldn't really do anything about it, and his vaunted Chiefly power was in large measure hollow. This sort of effrontery and shock of realism makes the courtiers very uncomfortable. If the President is not a God on Earth, but just a guy - and a dimwitted and undignified one at that - what does that say about the dignity and presumed importance of the coutiers themselves, who have made a career of fawning over the words and actions America's First Man?

"interested in preserving their personal purity and virtue than achieving concrete results for the people they claim to care about, they can follow that advice."

The only concrete "purity and virtue" that results from fraternizing in a whorehouse is everyone being wellphucked.

I had to give you a 5 on this if for no other reason than that you had at least that many literary/cultural/historical references in two paragraphs. Here's another 5 for good writing/agreement :-)

Typical Fox "News" viewer. You can't tell the difference between news and commentary.

Bluebell, if you think every single person who watches Fox News is simply a bigot who can afford to be written off by Democratic candidates, I would say you have you have a very refined and unrealistic view of the nature of the US electorate. Fortunately, I do not think the main Democratic candidates labor under this delusion, and we can expect to see them out there working hard for every last vote, wherever it might be found.

No Democrat would gain a single voter by appearing on a program masquerading as a debate on Faux News.

That's really a silly statement. if it were true, Democratic candidates would have to be the lamest pack of unpersuasive sad sacks the political world has ever known. Fortunately, that is not the case, and most are perfectly capable of presenting an appealing image and message to that portion of Fox viewers that are susceptible to persuasion.

As you yourself note, many people watching Fox News do so only because it's what happens to be on. They are not all True Believers. So candidates should not neglect any opportunity to get themselves on in front of all those viewers. Barack Obama should relish every opportunity he has to mix it up with blustering, pea-brained frauds like Sean Hannity.

Who is talking about letting them "get away" with anything? Fight back! But realize that you have to make your own opportunities, and turn challenges into victories. There is no supervising referee of politics who is going to rush in and call "foul". If you take your ball and run home every time you think somebody is cheating or not playing fair, you just end up home alone, sobbing and cradling your ball.

Do you think that that lowering lardass Roger Ailes is a match for Barack Obama is all his glory? Obama is witty, commanding and has gobs of charisma. Ailes is a fat, sullen hack. Democrats should only wish Fox executives and talent continue to make themselves part of the story, and offer Democrats golden opportunities for smart comebacks, and for media juxtapositions of images of Barack Obama with the likes of Roger Ailes and Bill O'Reilly. In every such juxtaposition, Democrats shave voters away from the ranks of the undecided. Democrats at the Nevada debate could have had a field day with this comment, making fun of Bush, and Ailes and Fox. Now they will be denied this opportunity.

By the way, I don't think it helps Democrats to have kindly Grandpa Harry step in to defend them when the bullies start swinging. Obama and Clinton can fight their own fights. Step back, Senator Reid, and let them handle it. Stop diminishing your candidates by suggesting they need protection.

One question: Why do the publicans get away with the "liberal media" baloney and Dems are out in the cold?

Unless we say, "You suck, and I'm not going to play with you anymore!" we just give them all the ammunition they need.

Jan Knaus

It's great news that the Nevada democratic party had the guts to pull out of this debate. We all know what FOX has done with debates in the past, and how they spin the news to serve their own corporate and political agendas.

However, I would not congratulate Senator Harry Reid so quickly, nor would I laud Governor Bill Richardson either for that matter. I know that Markos of Daily Kos has touted Richardson as having canceled his RSVP for the August debate (he was the only democrat who had given one), though from reports I've heard, Richardson only "canceled" his commitment to the debate a half hour after the Nevada democratic party called off the contract with FOX news.

http://desertbeacon.blogspot.com/2007/02/what-ailes-western-majority.html

"The Western Majority Project (WMP), another cosponsor of the FOX debate, is a federally registered political action committee. WMP was recently founded to build upon the growing political strength of the West by injecting Western issues into the national dialogue and highlight the common sense, forward looking, independent values of Western voters. WMP's advisory council includes co-chairs Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV, as well as Senators Ken Salazar, Colorado; Max Baucus, Montana; Jon Tester, Montana; and Jeff Bingaman, New Mexico and Governors Bill Ritter, Colorado; Brian Schweitzer, Montana; Bill Richardson, New Mexico."

From what is leaking out from the Nevada democratic party, it wasn't their idea to go with FOX in the first place, it was due to pressure brought to bear on the state party by the WMP PAC, (Western Majority Project), the board member of which include Harry Reid and Bill Richardson.. now while it's dead wrong for Reid to have supported this, and I do believe he was being less than honest when he made the rather lame excuse that he sought to widen the audience for the democratic message, it is seriously troubling that Governor Bill Richardson, a candidate for the democratic nomination for the presidency to be involved in pressuring a state democratic party to contract the first democratic presidential debate to a news network known to be hostile to democratic candidates and to the issues the party stands and has fought for.

What's more this is a clear example of a conflict of interest. We do not know why any group of democrats seeking to win the presidency would place control of what will be an extremely important discussion and debate into the hands of a network that would manipulate that opportunity to marginalize and demean the candidates for their own advantage. Nor do we know what if any inducement there was, for what appears to be an attempt to triangulate or collude with a known enemy of the democratic party.

This needs to be discussed, and looked into. At the very least we need to demand better answers than what these individuals might try to get away with.

Tom, I expect better from you. Reread my post. I made it very clear that the joke was intended to make fun of Bush's confusing the names, not the fact that the names are alike. Watch Jon Stewart on any given week make jokes about Osama and Obama sounding similar, which is not what I was proposing was being implied. Re-read it.

Regarding OBL being at large,...what a frickin stretch. If you are implying the President doesn't want him brought to justice, you must have been one of those loopy Kerry-ites that kept on claiming that Karl Rove was going to suddenly showup with the body of OBL 3 days before the election. stretching even further and pretending like your personal Tora-Bora theory of Iraq interfering with OBLs apprehension demonstrates a clear lack of understanding of the military implications and complexities of Pakistans internal politics. There was a time when OBL was handed to us on a silver platter and President Clinton turned it down, because of some bizarre theory that Habeas Corpus extends to all living life forms on earth. Tora-Bora might have made for a fun rhyme for Theresa Heinz, but its ludicrous. Furthermore its a total stretch to squeeze that into your feined outrage over this Joke.

I can't believe your analogy of who tells a joke. I don't make jokes using that offensive racial epithet that you used in any company, let alone mixed. In fact It is offensive and wrong anytime anyone uses that word in mixed company or otherwise which you just did. You should apologize for posting that. I consider that word more offensive than any cuss word and I have told people of "any" race that it is offensive. You seem to be implying that it is OK to make those Jokes in "unmixed" company but would not risk telling it in other situations, or if a person of any particular ethnic group is free to use racial slurs, where white people are not. I don't give a damn, I'm offended either way and I say so. I can't believe some of the self-hating Jews on this board that make bizarre anti-semitic remarks, and when anyone does I will say something about it. The same goes for any ethnic group.

Ailes has in the past been critical of Bush, but he doesn't have to rake Bush over the coals to have the right to tell what was a funny joke. If your ridiculous attempt to uncover some alleged hidden racism from Ailes in order to remove Fox from the air because your belief in freedom of the Press is only meant for one side of the political spectrum, then you apparently have very little faith in the validity of your left wing ideals.

I do know why you say it matters who tells the joke. Its because if Joe Biden makes stupid remarks about Indian Americans in quikie marts or how surprised he is that Obama can actually speak clearly and that he is actually "clean", or any ove the left wing darlings in hollywood, it gets a day of second tier coverage and he is back on the campaign trail when he is not chairing one of the most powerful committees in the Senate.

...if a Republican made a single remark like that, let alone multiple Bidin-isms, there would be 24 coverage until he was run out of town, stripped of his chairmanship and censured by his colleagues.

I am surprised at you Tom. This story has no legs, because in private even the MSM knows it is nothing but a PR campaign to hurt Fox, because the other three networks are losing ratings.

Stop using that word. It's insulting and offensive.

I do not want to censor Fox. It is tedious wall to wall hate-mongering. I don't take anyone who watches it or who is willing to appear on it seriously. It is certainly no place for a Democratic party primary debate. I would be very happy if their audience dried up, but I would never wish to censor them.

global citizen

She makes the point that "the other honorees [both injured in Iraq], Bob Woodruff and Kimberly Dozier, were diminished by being used as a sympathetic backdrop for this guy."

good lord. as if the award itself weren't bad enough. Who's running that organization? They should be utterly ashamed of themselves.

The news media in this country is the instrument of propaganda of the government.

It is not about the truth. Lies are often as disguised as facts and worst, as opinions. In communist countries such as China, it is responsibility of the Chinese government to indoctrinate communist values into the brains of every communist member, and by default, everyone in the country. Their means are the newspaper, TVs and radios and other electronic devices that can be installed on the streets and broadcasted repeatedly daily. This is their form of programming their citizens.

In America, everyone is under the illusion that they have the freedom to express their opinions and it does not matter their opinions are based on facts, hearsay or imagination, they just have a say. They speak under the framework designed by the government and this framework allows each individual to say anything but with a few exceptions such as bomb threat, or a threat to the President. There is so much information and misinformation that nobody knows for sure what is real and what is not.

Over the past 6 years, there has been so much misinformation about Iraq and the Middle East, the people in power at the white house have always found a way to neutralize the truth. Such news keeps on flashing onto the brains of everyone living in this country. Is this programming of human minds? Yes, it is. It is very similar to the approach used by the communist for their propaganda. The difference between here and there is that the news media is the one that foots the bills; this is very much a market economy at work. The news media needs the audience and it has to “sex” it up to make the news more exciting and entertaining. The truth in this country does not help to sell the news, it is the reverse, and news media needs the money to continue their operation. As a result, the news media is doing exactly the same thing as what the communist country does best, and that is, indoctrinate false values and information. Many people may not aware of it but the end result is the same.

Depends what the strategy is. If Dems now say they'll never have anything to do with Fox and appear to run from it in cowardly fashion, you could be right.

On the other hand, this could be seen as taking the offensive. Fox, you've been feeding this shit for years and we're not going to sit still and take it anymore. We have a right to be treated fairly by you, and not made the subject of stupid "jokes" by your supposed newspeople.

And until you clean up your act, we're not going to let you moderate our internal debates. You haven't earned that privilege.

None of that precludes some Democrat like perhaps Obama going on Hannity's show and ripping him a new one. You're right that Dems have to learn how to engage in this type of combat - but I'm not so sure that this isn't a way to get there.

Fox averaged 15.3 million viewers in prime time last week (8.9 rating, 14 share), with second-place CBS averaging 11.8 million (7.5, 12). Among people aged 18 to 34, Fox had more than double the audience of any other network.

I call FOX the tabloid birdcage liner of the television world, I think their reporters/commentators have more in common with Jerry Springer than Harry Reasoner, but bluntly spoken, if you want good, well-written news articles, you don't read the tabloids, you go for something with really small print, like the Wall Street Journal, something like that. Unfortunately, the digital editions of a lot of these things have become pretty homogeneous, kind of pointing to the whole media ownership thing, the monopolists would very much like to tell you the same story 20 times over, in exactly the same way, part of the Information Age is repeating the same thing over and over again, EXACTLY the same thing...well, nobody's perfect, and anytime you didn't see an event with your own two eyes and make notes, you're taking someone else's second-hand information.
But, when some people, like FOX get done with it, your second-hand information has a fresh wax job, and sawdust in the differential...there's no law that says they have to check their facts in order to broadcast, or whatever, and the same goes for your other 'news' people, too.

I think that's where competition comes in, more and more people are able to access more and more news stories these days than ever before, and you can kind of cross-reference, and that helps to cut down on the crap...

Gee Tom, I don't know why you're bashing FOX and Roger Ailes, after all, it was through FOX's hard hitting investigative reporting and week long commentary by Britt, Bill, Sean, and Fred, that we discovered Barack Obama's middle name was Hussein.....and you know what that means!!!!!

And lets not forget that other guy, King Hussein of Jordan, another one!

OK Im going to admit FauxNews ignorance.
Who is Ms Botox?

They just got baited into a sound bite competition, Jan, and they lost. They were challenged, ever so slightly, and instead of fighting back they quit.

Oh, pooh! That makes as much sense as "We've got to fight them over there so we don't have to fight them over here! "They" didn't quit. They just thumbed their noses at Faux News. It's past time for that, and the Dems didn't lose; they actually found one thing they all agree on. Well, it's a start!

Jan Knaus

my first thought was Mary Matalin, but I don't think that's right.

I think its a given that most who watch FOX watch it to get reinforcement of their notions. I'm sure the Rush Limbaugh dittoheads all tune in to FOX, as do the Ann Coulter fans.

That's a huge part of it. But I think another factor is the percentage of time devoted to actual news coverage. For example, on weekends MSNBC seems to run a lot of celebrity bio filler with a skeleton news crew while Fox has substantially more news and politics related coverage. So one is forced to choose between wingnut-slanted politics, or yet another account of some Hollywood bubblehead's battle with divorce, booze and pills.

Your point being that if Democrats go to Fox News and show all of their loyal viewers how brilliant they are they can win people over. Right. No one can be prepared for what will come out of Ann Coulter's or Sean Hannity's mouth, because it requires more than knowledge of facts.

It's time to give up on the base of the GOP and work on the true conservative republicans who simply want good governance and peace. Fox will not allow that message, and there is no reason to respect them enough to play ball with them.

Dan, you and I just will have to agree to disagree on this one. I realize you feel stongly about your view, and I do too.

******************************************
Is anyone else as annoyed as I am by the complete upper page drop-downs that disable your curser when you're typing, and cover what you're reading if you're at the top of the page? I don't like them one bit!

Jan Knaus

Sorry, I can't recall her name, but she is the blond who has the big forehead who does what we used to cal "station identification" in the old days. It's not Lori Duhe (sp?). When she comes on, all you can do is stare at her paralyzed forehead!

Jan Knaus

No one can be prepared for what will come out of Ann Coulter's or Sean Hannity's mouth, because it requires more than knowledge of facts.

I dsagree with this Jan. You prepare for Hannity and Coulter by watching (or assigning someone on your staff to watch) tapes of their many interviews and appearances, noting their general tendencies, their obsessions, their insecurities and their weak spots. They have certain skills, but if they were so brilliant and invulnerable they would be running for office themselves. They can be taken down.

Tom,

I didn't claim there was no effect. In an interconnected world, it would be fair to say almost any major foreign policy issue affects our efforts in Afghanistan. But you implied allegiance to what has become a hyperbolic myth of the left:

"... Given that the arguable reason for the continuing absence of Osama in the dock is Iraq, with its thousands of dead,...."

Using the singular, implies it is the sole reason we have not brought OBL to justice, or at last nearly the sole reason.

It makes it appear as though you have created an argument where you say the war in Iraq is 100% responsible for OBL being at large, (which chronologically can be argued is impossible) and your alleging that I am arguing that Iraq and Afghanistan have absolutly zero interconnection.

I consider your posts thought provoking and well sourced, but I think we would both agree that our respective positions are further from those far edges.

I think there are still plenty of reasons to discuss. Thanks for your response.

If Dems boycott Fox, the Fox response will probably be to ratchet up the lies, swift-boating and sleaze to draw them out. So even if the Dem candidates are not on Fox, Democratic operatives will be forced to appear to rebut reports which would otherwise be allowed to stand and influence Fox's viewers.

I think one of the questionable assumptions in this debate is the notion some have that Fox's viewers are all right-wing dittoheads who are a lost cause for Democrtas anyway, and so there is no need to go on Fox to reach its viewers. But I just don't think that is right. Elections always come down to battle for undecided, often unaffiliated voters, and a lot of them will be watching Fox along with the other cable news stations.

It is true that the Democrats have an attractive group of candidates, and there is a lot of public interest in them. So you make a good point that perhaps Fox would be hurt a little if they are deprived of live appearances by these candidates. But they can cover those candidates and their races anyway. If Fox's viewers can't get enough of Hillary Clinton, they can feed them all the Hillary they can handle - presented of course with some choice Fox framing. So I'm not sure a Dem boycott, even if it could be organized, would have much of an effect.

Additionally, you make the requirement that you be allowed to bring along your own film crew because you don't trust theirs. That's what Michael Moore did with O'Reilly, so there's precedent. Unfortunately, I think that O'Reilly out-performed Moore in their interview, but Moore had the right idea about bringing along his crew. That Moore did not do better is purely his own fault.

I have thought of posting this anecdote in a few different places over the last few days.

When the Libby verdict came down I was at my desk and I turned off the radio and turned on the TV. I wasn’t watching, just halfway listening when it occurred to me to turn to Fox News to see how they were spinning the verdict.. As I returned to my seat the phone rang and it was a friend laughing. He said that he had done the same, turned to Fox to see the spin.

“Did you see the scroll bar?”, he asked. I looked and there it was, “Libby found innocent of lying to the FBI. Sentencing to come in July.”

It seemed to us that there was irony in several places and on several levels, including our viewing habits.

Here is one idea. Every time a Democrat is on Fox News he\she should be prepared to invite every listener to their website for a more complete explanation of the issue at question. Do this EVERY time. A statement like, “ Shaun, as usual you have twisted and spun the story. For a full explanation viewers can come to my site at So and So.com.” There they could both explain themselves, stay on topic, and convincingly attack the credibility of Hannity and the rest. Some would go there, maybe a lot. The Fox gang would likely defend themselves against any perceived attack and drive even more people to the web sites of the Dems. Out of the sub-group of Fox viewers who can read, some would come to see the Fox gang as we do.

In Atlanta, Fox TV (the broadcast one, not cable) does not have a national news program.  National news is included with local coverage.  Same deal for the morning shows -- they are local, not national.   When that fact first registered with me, I thought it a smart business model.

The other national network news programs are a disincentive for local stations to devote a full time reporter to politics so local political coverage suffers.  The morning show promotes local events and happenings and there is a good chance you will see someone you know on the show doing something other than holding up a sign saying where they are from and screaming on cue.

Its too bad Fox is the only one doing this.  Sometimes their news is so transparent in their bias it endangers my TV. 

“Did you see the scroll bar?”, he asked. I looked and there it was, “Libby found innocent of lying to the FBI. Sentencing to come in July.”

The scroll bar message tells you FOX knows their audience. I'd say its not a breeding ground for particle physicists.

So, a person who wants to be President of the United States should either spend his/her valuable time or assign someone on his staff to waste their time watching all the Fox news "gotcha's" so they can be prepared?

Doing that is the same as being pulled around a blog site by a troll; it simply wastes resources. At Fox News they are not interested in information or facts; they are simply a mouthpiece for the GOP. If there were an equivalent Democratically inclined "news" program on, that regularly dissed and lied about republicans (and called them Publicans, like they call us the Democrat Party) do you honestly think they would agree to go on the program? And more to the point: If they did come on, would it do them any good with the audience the program reached?

No, and NO!

Jan Knaus

John, you are right. My comment was unworthy of me! I ask for the millionth time: How is it that the administration that, when warned about such an attack discounted it and its leader actually said "Now you've covered your ass." and went out to play golf...MANAGES TO TAKE CREDIT FOR BEING THE ONES WHO WE CAN TRUST FOR NATIONAL DEFENSE???????????

I just saw some publican talking head referring to the Democrat Party, and how they plan to "take back the house and senate and will win the White House because "Americans know who can keep them safe." Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa?

Why have we not refuted this absurd story? When we hit them with facts they blame Clinton (and get away with it) because he was so wrapped up in his impeachment (a little irony?) that he dropped the ball (a little pun).

So, for me, that irritating "We have to fight them there..." is beyond the good point that you brought up -- yeah, like they don't already have several hundred people here waiting for orders, but they are too busy watching Fox News and Ollie North's War Stories to go out and wreak havoc. So we have to keep fighting them over there, so we can be sure there are many hundreds more ready to die in the next attack against us.

Jan Knaus

they are simply a mouthpiece for the GOP

And Kerry ignored the swift-boaters at his own peril. I don't disagree with the Democrats decision here. However, I also think that - if the Dems are careful - they can defeat the Republicans on their own turf. Right now the Republicans have never been more exposed.

John, thank you for fact checking and then affirming the above statement. I hope you don't get ripped to shreds by these guys for pulling that one out of the blue-looking sky.

I think you are making the assumption they are dittoheads. Fox viewers may well also be CNN, MSNBC and network viewers. Sheesh, they might even be BBC viewers. A number of them know full well that Fox is biased. Dems don't have to boycott Fox altogether but they sure don't have to buy into any stacked decks either. Fox may well be dissing the next President of the United States. Don't let them forget it.

Jan, you are right and benhocking sure knows his math. Like I said, it was just an idea. I certainly agree that a candidate must be able to express and explain his position.

My thought was more about attacking the false memes that are put out so often that they have become the “truth” for many/most Fox viewers and pointing out in a more aggressive way that Fox is anything but fair and balanced and doing so to their core audience. I was also thinking about the talking heads directing viewers to a sight rather than the candidate. Still, it’s just an idea and if it is a bad one I sure hope they don’t use it.

Getting rhetorical, I intended the term "arguable" to mean "one could make a good argument that..."

I was placing it there, and asking it be stipulated while I showed the result of that context. The result is that if one feels that way, the subject of Osama is a hot one. Regardless of the merits of what is certainly not only my "personal theory", many people feel this way, thus the joke is in poor taste.

You're correct that I feel that way, but let's not crowd the thread with a pointless rehashing of our respective postions. I have no more nits to offer.

Not sure I agree with it, but what an interesting theory.

It's not racist - it's stupid and hollow. It has nothing to do with Fox News in particular but with infotainment in general. I'm not one to throw around the racist card willy-nilly and I'm not doing it here. I'm just saying that it's distracting viewers from what's important.

Additionally, the way Fox News handled it was belittling to Obama. Again, not racist - just propagandist.

It does seem, however, that you're a little sensitive to the racist card - seeing it where it's not. Perhaps that's due to your personal experiences, but realize that you're being oversensitive yourself on this one.

OK, you may accuse me of being disingenuous here for saying this, but I am ignorant about some of the racial stereotypes you seem to be intimately familiar with, such as Obama in a bathing suit. Why is Obama in a bathing suit significant?

Racist stereotypes are not necessarily overt, they can be subliminal messages which reinforce blatant stereotypes. For instance, when they put that skicap on OJ it was an attempt to reinforce the idea of  the racist stereotype that blacks are criminals. Despite, his all-american image heretofore, OJ was being portrayed as a 'black criminal'.  The same goes for the nude torso of Barack it reinforces the Mandingo (physical attributes)stereotype of black males. Despite his being a US Senator with Columbia and Harvard degrees he was being portrayed as a black male sex object. Images are powerful messages that convey racist stereotypes without words. That is why the bathing suit was significant.

Would you get it, if they showed Hillary in a bathing suit.? Folks would scream sexism...without a second thought. They would understand that the image reinforces societal stereotypes of females being objects of sexual desire vs. her being a US Senator with a Wellesley and Yale degree.. The same is true of Barack in the swim suit it is a racial vs. a gender stereotype.

CVilleDem says:

"It's time to give up on the base of the GOP and work on the true conservative republicans who simply want good governance and peace."

You may be right. I've often wondered why the Log Cabin Republicans don't switch parties, as they seem to have a lot in common (no, not their gayness) with the DLC wing of the Democratic party

WOW,I knew they were bad but I didn't know they were that blatant! It seems like there are two bits of information, that of those appearing live on the screen, and the propoganda printed comments on the bottom.

I'd like to see some right winger try to come up with a similar indictment for the "liberal media" CNN, MSNBC, CBS, NBC, ABC.

We'll know that FOX is feeling the heat when they start practicing the Russian idea of having ~nude~ babes doing the weather. News Freedom, after all.

I expect it sometime early in 2008.

It is really bad when you consider that many times the visual image is all a person sees, as the volume may not be loud enough in public venues to hear the accompanying story.

"at one level, a knock on Bush; at another, a further, deeper etch-mark"

Now THAT'S funny! In a Mark Crispin Miller kind of way...

Actually-- and it's really funny that no one gets this-- Ailes was making a meta-Bush-stupidity joke. (It's basically in quotes, the way he says it-- not "I heard that Bush..." but "I don't know if it's true [what people are saying]...")

So he was neither poking fun at Bush nor insidiously subliminally associating Obama with Osama, Assad, the Mossad, or Norad. He was making fun of people who think Bush-is-a-moron jokes are hilarious-- and who think they leave a deep etch-mark of insightful analysis on the present situation.

This is ridiculous. This is like the Spanish inquisition or the Salem witch trials where even the lack of evidence is considered proof of guilt.

"...Racist stereotypes are not necessarily overt, they can be subliminal messages which reinforce blatant stereotypes..."

This is just psycho-babble for a mechanism where the left can say overtly racists remarks and people, will say, "he's a good liberal, so, he didn't mean it literally, what he meant was...blank...etc." If a Hollywood lefty or politician says it they apologize and claim lack of sleep or a sloppy attempt at a joke or a need for a trip to the reprogramming monastery at Betty Ford clinic.

If a conservative says the weather is nice, it is codespeak for a hidden agenda that is so devious it is veiled in hypnotic mantras that are further interwoven with a seriptitous plan to place conservative blacks in the highest levels of government to slip in their evil and demonic plan against people of color (is that phrase still on the orthodox list of acceptable phrases).

"...For instance, when they put that skicap on OJ it was an attempt to reinforce the idea of the racist stereotype that blacks are criminals. Despite, his all-american image heretofore, OJ was being portrayed as a 'black criminal'...."

I don't remember putting a skimask on OJ. I remember his racist black attorney wearing it. They made him put gloves on. If they made him wear a mask it must not have been an effective hypnosis, because I don't remember it.

OJ, didn't need a skimask, a pair of skis or anything else to make him out to be a criminal, he is a criminal who happens to be black. He is a double murderer. I personally spoke to someone very close to Nicole a few weeks before the murder that told me he was going to kill her. If there is a stereotype, racist or otherwise that young black males are criminals, OJ himself reinforced that stereotype by taking a knife and killing a woman and a Jew (if those two protected groups matter to you) in cold blood. A higher percentage of young black males are involved in crime and OJ, took his so-called All American image and smashed it too pieces by slaughtering two people.

This story you mention about Barack in a bathing suit having some kind of secret subconscious message that is meant to hurt him, is a joke. How can you be serious. When asked about the picture in People magazine, he giggled and joked about it and both he and his staffers seemed to love the photo, the press, the whole thing. Maybe when you see a Black man in a bathing suit you think of Mandingo warriors, but I spend a lot of time at the beach and don't think twice when I see a black man. It was a picture of him in the ocean in the state he was born, Hawaii, doing what Hawaiins do.

"...The same goes for the nude torso of Barack it reinforces the Mandingo (physical attributes)stereotype of black males. Despite his being a US Senator with Columbia and Harvard degrees he was being portrayed as a black male sex object...."

JFK went to Harvard, I didn't hear his staff complaining about action photos of him playing football and swimming. There is absolutely 100% no doubt that he and his staff wanted this PR. Your remarks are utterly ridiculous.

"...Images are powerful messages that convey racist stereotypes without words. That is why the bathing suit was significant...."

Chicago sun times:

"...Asked what Obama was planning to do yesterday afternoon, the senator's communications director, Robert Gibbs, replied: "Photo shoot on South Beach."..."

As I said, before, I don't get clued in on all the racist stereotypes that apparently Liberals are very knowledgeable of. I am amazed at the new ones that pop up that no one has ever heard of.

In the meantime the left is throwing oreos at Republican senate candidates and putting them in black minstrel face without a mention in the MSM.

"...Would you get it, if they showed Hillary in a bathing suit.? Folks would scream sexism...without a second thought. They would understand that the image reinforces societal stereotypes of females being objects of sexual desire vs. her being a US Senator with a Wellesley and Yale degree...."

They did show Hillary in a bathing suit and just like Obama in this situation it was a staged photo op, by the Clintons. In January of 1998, Bill was in the midst of his testimony for Sexually harrassing Paula Jones and in order to promote his image as a man romantically involved with the First Lady (blaaah! Wrrreeeeetch!!), he setup a situation on a beach where the Press had been allowed to camp out on the otherside of some trees on a carribean island beach and when the video and still photographers raised their lenses from behind the branches Bill hopped up and started waltzing with the flabby elephant ankled woman he is married to. When they were published he feigned anger and complained of a violation of the privacy of a loving family engaged in an intimate and loving marital moment. As he walked away, he said, the picture though...."...I like it quite alot!"

The story of his blowjobs in the oval office hit the internet a week later.

If you're looking for sensitivity to the objectivisation of women, I am afraid you chose a ridiculous example.

OJ is a victim? Obama is a victim? The Clinton's are the icons of protecting vulnerable young girls?

I don't know what they are teaching at Yale, but if this is the new PC prism of racial orthodoxy, It is going to create a backlash against Obama, because no one wants to be stuck in a room without escape with a media that screams racism for a creampuff pic in the surf.

What a joke!

“Chavez may 'hate' Bush, not America”. This kind of talk is very misleading and confusion for the general public.

Prior to the Iraq war, Bush said, “if you are not with me, you are against me” or “if you are not my friend, you are my enemy”. This kind of speech is used to intimidate others into joining an illegal war against Iraq.

When America failed to intimidate France, the white house started to bash everything French, including changing the name “French Fries” to “Freedom Fries”. In other words, “America hates France”. It is not “Bush hates France” because he alone does not have the power, but once he is the President of America, he carries the power of the people in this country and when he hates France, he is in fact saying America hates France collectively.

Fortunately, France was not intimidated to join the coalition forces and commit atrocities in Iraq.

As regard to Chavez, 2 wars in the Middle East is enough, another war is just too much. It is about time to make friends. The money in the piggy bank is getting smaller and smaller and there are many poor and sick Americans needed the money to get by each and everyday. Let’s make peace and not war.

"...You seem to be putting words into my mouth in your excitement to make me look like a fool. That technique backfires...."

I used your words in quotes. In context, because I used every sentence from your post. If it "seems like putting words in your mouth, I am only placing your words back in the mouth that produced them.

I had said regarding your near certainty we would have captured OBL if not for Iraq:

"...It is almost universally agreed that OBL has not been outside of Pakistan since 2001. What if we devoted twice the resources that have been used in Iraq, how would those resources be used against Nuclear bomb toting Pakistan? Do you prefer we drop Nuclear bombs on Karachi, Pakistan first, or drop them on Islamabad first?..."

One, in order to apprehend him you have to be proximate to his location, namely Pakistan. Two, he has been there since over a year before Iraq was invaded. I made these points and you did not address them. Here is your response:

"...Yes, we have special ops that are par excellence, and no, I'm not suggesting a nuclear bomb. To suggest that I am suggesting a nuclear bomb is practically admitting that you realize I'm right and are refusing to debate it on what I've actually said...."

Pakistan is a nuclear power. Whether you have faith in our special ops or not, is your confidence so great that they can enter Pakistan and wander around indefinitely until OBL is found, then apprehend him and bring him back to Afghanistan and do this all without being detected? Or, are you recommending the well received notion of so-called pre-emption and so-called unilateralism and just go in to nuclear power Pakistan and risk war with them. If we enter and they choose to fight us, how long will it take to find OBL while we are fighting Pakistan. The left here always wants to remind us that all wars are quagmires and escalate geometrically until we are not capable of winning. If we start fighting Pakistan, never ending escalation means eventual Nuclear war. Are you prepared for that?

As I made clear in my post, if you are claiming that with some certain level of resources acquired from Iraq or where ever, it is "very unlikely" we could not catch him, then you are responsible for explaining how you intend to do this.

Also, as I said, if your premise is correct, the "very unlikely" statement, which you have now reiterated, why didn't late 2001, all of 2002, and early 2003 produce this near slam dunk capture.

You said: "...Here you're being not just an idiot, but also a jerk. The connections between Al Qaeda and Bush require no conspiracy theory. They are well documented, and not even most Republican apologists will deny them. First of all, when his father was Vice President, we were supplying the Taliban with arms to fight against the Soviets...."

This is such nonsense. Where do I start? When you say a connection between President George W. Bush and Al Qaeda, you are clearly implying that they are now or have been allies. Using your bizarre logic, the fact that his father was a President at one time can make him responsible for anything in the last 83 years. Example: George H. W. Bush worked at the CIA under Nixon. The CIA operated in Iran in 1974. Therefore George W. Bush created the Iranian Hostage crisis in 1979, that caused Carter to ask Saddam to invade Iran. The current President was best friends with Saddam in the 1970s. Your linkage is ridiculous.

Even if GWB was sitting on his dad's knee while Reagan was President, his father was VP and OBL was a newbie to the Mujahadeen and Al Qaeda did not exist. The end result of Ronald Reagan's policies was that the Soviets pulled out of Afghanistan and eventually collapsed completely. I guess I could say George W. Bush destroyed Breshnev, using your logic.

Furthermore the article you link to about $43 million gift for drug enforcement is typical of the bald faced lies that come out of the nation magazine and Robert Scheer's article is one of the more infamous pieces of conspiracy theory journalism.

Liberals">http://www.spinsanity.org/post.html?2003_02_23_archive.html">Liberals continue to pass on the myth in Scheer's article as if it were real:

"... As we have noted many times, President Bush granted $43 million in food aid and food security programs to relieve an impending famine in Afghanistan in May 2001, continuing an aid program initiated by President Clinton. The programs were administered directly by the United Nations and NGOs, bypassing the regime...."

Scheer's June 2001 column, however, claimed that this constituted a "gift of $43 million" to the Taliban while never once mentioning the famine in the country or that the "gift" was food aid that bypassed the regime. Scheer's distortion has set off a series of echoes that shows no signs of fading...."

Your followup link to your credit, shows how false Scheers articles are. The funny thing about his article is he drones on and on about how Bush is best buddies with the Taliban and how wrong that is because the poor women of Afghanistan need our help to protect them from the Taliban, but after 911, the Nation along with the popular antiwar groups immediately flushed their stash and changed sides claiming that Afghanistan is a paradise that US intervention will only destroy.

Bush did not appoint Fitzgerald. Both Ashcroft and Bush were so hands off in the appointment of Fitz, that even liberal news sources have said that some of the contacts from State to DOJ epitomized the type of neutrality a Justice department should show in cases like this. Fitz is the pet of the left, because he bent over backwards to do the bidding of the left as is noted in Robert Scheer's fawning over him in this weeks article.

You asked about links regarding Saddam and AL Qaeda regarding the 911 report, this interview, This week with George Stephanopolous June 20, 2004 makes for a good summary, but if you would like, read the report its public information.

"...[1]10:44:20 LEE HAMILTON (VICE CHAIR, 9/11 COMMISSION)

We make two points in the staff statements. Number one, there were contacts between al Qaeda and Iraq going back clear to the early 1990s when Osama bin Laden was in Sudan, then when he was in Afghanistan. I don't think there's any dispute about that. The second claim we make in the staff statement is that there was no collaborative relationship between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein with regard to the 9/11 attacks. Our whole report, as the governor mentioned a moment ago, is on 9/11. Our mandate does not run to the Iraqi war. So, far as I know, I've looked at these statements quite carefully from the administration. They are not claiming there was a collaborative relationship between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda with regard to the attacks on the United States. Now, all of us understand that when you begin to use words like relationship and ties and connections and contacts, everybody has a little different view of what those words mean. But if you look at the core statements that we made in the staff statement, I don't think there is a difference of opinion with regard to those statements. If they, if they, if there is -it has to be spelled out to me...."

Lee Hamilton has stated several times that regarding 9/11, they have no evidence of command and control by Saddam over the 911 attacks, but that there was an extensive amount of evidence of an ongoing relationship between Saddam and Al-Qaeda.

Your implying that somehow Donald Rumsfeld is the one man wrecking crew that turned Saddam into a armed menace is misleading. Did the Reagan administration play one side against the other regarding Ayatollah Khomeini's war with Iraq, yes he did. And for good reason. It was a bloody war that Reagan inherited from Jimmy Carter's pathetic foreign policy failures in the Region. Carter was flailing about trying to figure out how to get our hostages back and he asked Saddam to invade Iran. When the Iranian insiders were captured and executed, Carter asked that it be put on hold, but Saddam went on without him, knowing that Carter had already given him his blessing. Reagan did the right thing by insuring a stalemate in a botched foreign policy debacle by an incompetent President Carter.

"...Certainly you have to admit that our connections to the Hussein regime our stronger than Hussein's connections to Al Qaeda. Don't you?...."

Whats your point? Having the world's most dangerous terrorist having connections with the only dictator in the latter half of the 20th century to habitually use WMDs in combat and further more a dictator that we are in a simmering state of suspended war and is bribing the UN and our allies to vote against us in the UNSC. I think thats significant. It became more significant when that terrorist blew up thousands of innocent Americans on every continent in the world including on our soil. Our previous connections with Saddam Hussein? insignificant.

Your original assertion about near certainty in capturing OBL without Iraq remains unproven and unsubstantiated until you address some of these points. Your examples and evidence does not hold up and what is left is a campaign catch phrase that never held up under scrutiny, nor does it now.

Let’s make peace and not war.

You sound like Coleman McCarthy, good for you :)

Do you prefer we drop Nuclear bombs on Karachi, Pakistan first, or drop them on Islamabad first? It might be costly to clean up, and you obviously come from the party of "Don't Republicans realize War has unintended consequences". I'm sure two thermonuclear devices on Pakistan would have some kind of consequences, but, no, Ben wants to get OBL, he believes it is VERY unlikely we will not catch him now. We did not invade Iraq for over a year after that.

Don't tell me let me guess, you are about to start telling us about building 7 was a demolition job by George Bush and ex-mossad agents and the Jews didn't show up to work that day at the WTC and a plane never hit the pentagon and Elvis lives in Area 51 with Marilyn Monroe and they hunt bigfoot by night and sleep by day.

If it "seems like putting words in your mouth, I am only placing your words back in the mouth that produced them.

I think this is the point where you should argue that John Kerry's masterful diplomatic skills would cause the other countries of the world to bow to every conceivable request we make of them, if we would just give him the Presidency.

What a knee slapper...that I don't have respect for our special ops, because I am not willing to send them on your ill defined mission, with poorly described goals, and potential to escalate into full blown war for something you can't even comprehend. Your feigned piety is comedy of the most surreal order.

I was hoping you were clever enough to realize that I was using one of your tricks there. Do you now see how stupid it is? Please stop. You actually make a few good points, but then you ruin it by completely misrepresenting what I'm saying with those ludicrous exaggerations I've just now cut-and-pasted.

TJ doesn't give in. Suggest letting it go.

I'll only add that CIA's Jawbreaker team leader, Gary Berntsen, wanted and did not get 800 Rangers at Tora Bora. While Berntsen only says CENTCOM would not approve, there must have been a reason to be so stingy with troop strength.

Only reason I can come up with is saving resources for Iraq. The only substantial reource we committed to Afghanistan was air-delivered ordinance.

One: By your assertion. Many reasonable conservatives disagree with you on that point. However, as it is an "alternative history" it must remain pure speculation. For you to assert that your counter-claim is patently obvious is to be so bull-headed that it hurts.

Two: Bush provided money to Afghanistan. Afghanistan was ruled by the Taliban. That a conservative web-site has pointed out that Powell gave money to help the poor does not change the very real probability that it went to help the Taliban. I am not questioning the motives here - I suspect they were well intentioned. However, the point is that there was a connection. Which is more than the proof of a connection you've provided for Saddam.

Three: See #2.

Four: I never made that claim. You made the claim that I made that claim. I said they could go into Pakistan and find OBL - if that is where he was. Of course, they most likely also could have gotten him in Tora Bora if it had been more of a priority for Bush than trying to find excuses to go into Iraq.

Five: Your "logical conclusions" are not logical at all. They're strawmen. When the same trick is applied to you: "you don't respect our servicemen", you rightly cry foul. However, you are blind to your own misrepresentations.

Six: You're right that Pakistan has grumbled when we've taken unilateral action into their country. (See how easy it is to admit the other side has made a valid point? You ought to try it!)

Seven: I don't seem to remember them nuking us afterwards. Did they? If so, please provide some evidence, because I really think I'd be aware of that.

Are you trying to rationalize Chavez's hatred or defend him?