Drudge… Scarborough: ‘Total Crap’ CNN Didn’t Know Gay Questioner Is Clinton Campaigner

Tease from Matt Drudge:

MSNBC HOST: ‘Total crap to suggest that nobody in CNN knew’…

Even MSNBC can grasp the obvious.  So it would seem.  Have not been able to link to the story.

Addendum: (Bit) Newsbusters has VID 

But why is nobody mentioning the rest of the people pointed up here? 

This is far greater than just one offense.  And this is the second time that they’ve been caught at it as the Newsbusters video on their homepage this morning, points out.

So, the Democrats managed to ‘slip one by’ CNN’s screening process? It appears so.

Adam Yoshida notes it, this morning:

So, the fellow who just asked the Republican candidates about Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, retired Brigader General Keith Kerr, is a member of Hillary Clinton’s campaign for the Presidency.

Gee… Democrats flying under false colors, eh? Who’d have thought THAT would ever happen? Says Adam:

It’s probably also worth asking who put a seventy-four year-old guy up to asking a question on YouTube.

Overall, I thought it a pretty typical affair, given CNN, it’s usual leanings, and its total lack of competency. All were in display last night.

More at Memeorandum.

Addendum I:(Bit)

Apparently, the plant from the Hillary Clinton camp, wasn’t the only one that by the process… Michelle Malkin notes one of the supposedly undecided voters was wearing a John Edwards T-Shirt. Digging deeper, she has a site where she declares herself a John Edwards supporter. The most basic of fact checking checking would have revealed this… fact checking which CNN didn’t do, or ignored the results of, so as to have a desired political end….why was CNN so easy to slip past on this stuff?

Six Meat Buffet notes that David Cerone, the guy who asked about the Log Cabin Republicans, is a declared Obama suporter.

Yet another, from The Autopsy..(OK, yeah weird blog name) (BBCT: MIchelle) The one question about the lead in Chinese toys… one LeeAnn Anderson? Turns out, she’s a union activist from Pitt, and another John Edwards supporter.

Mind you, those are only the ones we’ve caught, so far. One wonders if this isn’t part of the new, “Net-savvy attitude” of the Democrats they announced last night, showing through. One also wonders if there were any questions from people who were NOT Democrat party plants. Apparently, they have Glenn Greenwald consulting for them, thereby, having discovered the utility of having sock puppets.

Addendum II: (David L)

Over at the Weekly Standard, Richelieu, comments:

What a depressing debate. CNN’s long slide into mediocrity accelerates.

It is long past mediocity.  Any network which would employ a Peter Arnett, Wolf Blizter or Christine Amanpour is not even good enough to be called mediocre, The Clinton News Network is descending into whoredom.  They are shrill stooges for the Clintons.

More here, here, and Memeorandum

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said on Wednesday CNN may have been instigating his murder when the U.S. TV network showed a photograph of him with a label underneath that read “Who killed him?”The caption appeared to be a production mistake — confusing a Chavez news item with one on the death of a football star. The anchor said “take the image down” when he realized.

But Chavez called for a probe in an interview on state television, where he repeatedly reviewed a tape of the broadcast, questioning why the unconnected photograph and wording were left on screen for several seconds.

“I want the state prosecutor to look into bringing a suit against CNN for instigating murder in Venezuela” he said. “… undoubtedly it is part of the psychological warfare.”

There’s more to the story, of course and Reuters did a good job with it. Go read the whole thing.

Any doubts we may have had about Hugo Chavez and his insanity have now been erased. Clearly, the man doesn’t know his own friends.

Memo to Crazy Uncle Hugo…

Trust me; CNN would be the LAST network to instigate your murder.  And that’s an insult to CNN.

/Bit 

What is about freedom that so darn hard for the ‘rats to understand?  According to ABC News, Barack Obama does not understand the Constitution of the United States.

The issue of mandates for health care has driven the debate between Clinton and Obama for the past few weeks. Obama says he would enforce his mandate for health care for all children by fining parents if they refused to allow health care coverage for their children.

The federal government has no such authority.   If Obama had the brains of a piss ant, he’d darn well know it.   The ‘rats have utterly no concept of freedom.  The Constitution was designed to protect citizens from wanna be tyrants like Obama and not as a device to empower Obama’s craven lust for power.

The only mandate authorized by the Constitution is the income tax and that was the result of the Sixteenth Amendment.    There is no other provision in the Constitution giving the federal any authority to require any citizen to do anything. 

Hat Tip:  Bryan, Hot Air.

Gateway Pundit:

Reportedly, on Sunday 11 close family members of Jordanian-based Baathist reporter Dia al-Kawwaz, who runs the online anti-Iraq newspaper Shabeqat Akhbar al-Iraq, were slaughtered in Baghdad. The attack occurred in the Al-Shaab neighborhood shortly after 7 a.m. Shia militia men shot dead two of Kawwaz’s sisters, their husbands and their seven children, aged 5 to 10. They then exploded the house on their way out.

This story was carried by dozens of media outlets around the world.

However… there is one small problem….

It isn’t true.  They even faked the funeral.

Yet another situation where the entire American left Leach said anything that might possibly make America, (under George W. Bush) look bad… looking so desperately they fall for obviously faked stories.

Gee, someone might even think there’s something of a pattern, here.

More at Memeorandum.

Hehehe… Democrats.Org  has come up with one of the more stupid moves I’ve seen in a long time:

For months now, Democrats have been tracking the Republican presidential frontrunners in the field, compiling a video library of candid moments as they campaign across the country. Found at FlipperTV, Americans can now watch and download this video and use the footage as they wish, putting raw material into the hands of the American people to hold these candidates accountable for their comments and actions.

Oh, come ON, gang… didn’t we just in the last 12 hours see Bubba flip flop on his support for our actions in Iraq, in answer to questions about his wife trying to play both sides of that same question? I suspect that this is going to be a project that’ll go over about as big as Walter Mondale, or another really big project in history:

This is going to be soooooo eeeaaassssyyyy…

Michelle Malkin, noting the very same link says:

Wasn’t there anyone at the DNC who thought, “Hey, maybe this might come back to bite us in the rear?”

Using the words “DNC” and “THOUGHT” in the same sentence, Michelle? You know better.

Today’s WSJ:

Fred Thompson’s Presidential campaign has been struggling, in part because of a sense that he lacks passion and an agenda. But late last week he unveiled a tax reform that is more ambitious than anything we’ve seen so far from the rest of the GOP field.

Hmmm.

I’d noticed the proposal of course, (usually offered within the context of a comparison to the “Fair Tax” proposal from Neal Boortz and company) but I had not previously seen it mentioned within the context of the remainder of the Republican field of hopefuls.

It strikes me, that this comment puts Mr. Thompson directly on line with what I had mentioned previously about him not wanting to keep too early in the campaign.  the one it comes to campaigns, Fred Thompson is a come from behind a sort of fellow, and so he feels comfortable there, I think.

Also, it would seem that Fred has chosen himself a winner of a flight to wave:

Mr. Thompson is getting aboard what has become a global bandwagon, with more than 20 nations having adopted some form of flat tax. Most–especially in Eastern Europe–have seen their economies grow and revenues increase as they’ve adopted low tax rates of between 13% and 25% with few exemptions.

The main political obstacle to such a reform in the U.S. has come from liberals, who favor punitive taxes for “class” reasons, and K Street corporate lobbyists who want to retain their tax-loophole empires. The housing and insurance industries, states and localities, charities, bond traders and tax preparers are all foes of low tax rates.

That’s why the idea of a voluntary flat tax–introduced on these pages a dozen years ago–makes political sense. The Thompson plan would allow taxpayers to keep their mortgage and charitable deductions if they prefer, by adhering to the current tax code and rates. But it would also allow the option to abandon those credits and deductions except for a single allowance based on family size ($39,000 for a family of four). Most taxpayers would pay a 10% rate on income above that allowance, with a 25% rate kicking in at $100,000 for a couple. There would only be five lines on the tax form and most taxpayers could fill it out in minutes.

Liberals are already objecting that the plan is not “paid for,” by which they mean it doesn’t raise taxes the way they hope the next President will. But Mr. Thompson is right in refusing to play by the “static revenue” scoring game that demands that one dollar in estimated tax cuts be offset by one dollar in estimated tax increases somewhere else. “The experts always overrate the revenue losses from tax cuts,” Mr. Thompson says, and history supports him going back to the Mellon reductions of the 1920s, the Kennedy tax cuts of the 1960s, the Gipper’s in the 1980s, and this decade’s success with President Bush’s reductions.

It seems to me, that that is precisely the company that Fred Thompson wants to keep, just now.

Certainly, we can expect powerful objections to come from the bodies that the article mentions the lobbyists, the housing and insurance industries, lawyers, indeed, all of the usual suspects on the financial backers of left wing causes, but I would be most interested in seeing the reactions of the proponents of Boortz’ “Fair Tax” to this proposal from Thompson.

Backers of proposals like that would do well to fall in line behind Fred Thompson on this one.

Wouldn’t it be interesting for somebody in Fred Thompson’s campaign, to run up a comparison between the tax proposal Fred is talking about, just now, and the one that Charlie Rangel ran up the flagpole for Hillary Clinton a few weeks ago?  I mean, if I’m Fred, I’m not letting the Democrats off the hook, for that one.  This proposal of his is a perfect opportunity to draw a rather stark line between the goals and objectives of each party’s policies.  You know was well as I do, that a tax hike isn’t selling most years, including this one, particularly a tax increase of the size proposed by the Democrats.  Very loudly drawing the comparison between the two, would be the relative equivalent of taking a sledge hammer to the presidential hopes of the whole of the list of Democrat presidential hopefuls.

It also wouldn’t hurt in the congressional races.

More, Memeorandum

McQ, this morning, looks at the Citibank investment yesterday:

Soren Dayton says this may be the “Defining news story of the cycle”…

Citigroup Inc., the biggest U.S. bank by assets, will receive a $7.5 billion cash infusion from Abu Dhabi to replenish capital after record mortgage losses wiped out almost half its market value. … the state-owned Abu Dhabi Investment Authority

I’m skeptical that it will be. The Dubai/Ports issue was a big PR problem…the Dubai/NASDAQ issue wasn’t. Do people really care that much about preventing or discouraging foreign investment in US companies? Should they?

I respond, over there:

One of the things that has been noticed in the past by the left in the past about the buying habits of wealthy Arab leaders is that so very little of that money ends up showing up being invested in the region. This, it is said, is how ideologies such as that of Usma BinLaden take hold, among the poorer classes.

Indeed, if we are to believe the hype, all of the excess that the American left likes to attribute to the top 1% earners here in America, are far more easily attributable to the type of people who bought up a large chunk of Citibank yesterday. The whole thing tends to make Saddam Hussein look like an average Joe.

Instead of that money being used to refocus the energies of the working classes within their own country so as to prevent extremism, it gets used instead to buy a part of a bank, or a few Rolls Royces, or another flying palace.

I’m happy that they’ve chosen to invest here as opposed to somewhere else. I wonder, however, if the purposes of the world would be better served by redirecting some of those profits for the betterment of the people within their own regions, as opposed to snapping up American financial infrastructure.

I propose no solution for the problem, because frankly, I can’t think of one that doesn’t involve use of the power of government, which is something I’m rather not see happen. (There’s that principle thing, sticking up again.) But I won’t deny that I’d be a lot more comfortable, seeing those dollars invested in their domestic improvement, because frankly, there is the greater need than a moment in terms of the needs of the world.

To extend my comments there…

When I raise these objections, I am speaking within the framework of the kind of Pan Arabism that is voiced by some in the region.  (It is quite true, that Abu Dhabi is apparently quite different in this regard from some of the more extremist states such as Iran, or Syria.)

Certainly, there is the underlying concern about how much power over world affairs (And, specifically, our affairs) radical Arab states have, anymore, by means of those petrodollars.  (Yes, arguably, Abu Dhabi isn’t one of these, but let’s not make the mistake of thinking that all who live and operate there are of some kind of monolithic mind about their goals here in the west. Smiling faces, sometime….)

However that may be… Unfortunately, we signed on for that, when we allowed domestic environmentalists to shut off our access to our own energy supplies, which as we pointed out recently, we have more of than anyone else in the world.  At the moment, because of the environmentalist movement, we have restricted access to something like 85% of our available stocks.  So, not only are such people causing us concern from an energy and financial standpoint, there also causing us to buckle under to pressures from Arab extremists.

I see that as a domestic issue, (And most certainly a security issue) …not as one to be dealt handled with the Arabs directly.  But I wonder if government policy here in terms of what we allow into the country as investments from this country or that would not positively affect countries in the Arab sphere of influence.  I suppose that could be best answered by asking the question “if we didn’t allow them to invest here, where would the money go?”

Over at The Glittering Eye, Dave Schuler extends the argument he’s made in the commentstongue-in-cheek post on the fact that the media continues to ignore the ethnic-religious component of the rioting in France.He argues that the problem goes beyond religion and is ultimately about assimilation and “giving the descendants of immigrants a stake in the country that’s the only one they’ve ever known.”He’s right. Indeed, I allude to that even in my glib observation that, “Clearly, not much has been done over the past two years, since the last set of youth riots, to integrate the youths into French society.”How to go about that, though, is the question. The politics of race and ethnicity is especially difficult in an era where we’re supposed to simultaneously pretend that cultural differences are immaterial and yet revel in the wonderful diversity that different cultures add.

So says James Joyner.

The idea that we should deal with the “root causes” is all well and good but it’s not clear exactly how one goes about doing that. Nor should the fact that there are legitimate grievances be considered justification for mayhem.

(Sigh)

James, let me point you to a post I put up yesterday as regards Ron Paul, where one of the reasons I reject Mr. Paul is on the basis of his being willing to take the blame for criminal actions taken against us. He tells us:

There are long-term consequences or blowback from our militant policy of intervention around the world. They are unpredictable as to time and place. 9/11 was a consequence of our military presence on Muslim holy lands; the Ayatollah Khomeini’s success in taking over the Iranian government in 1979 was a consequence of our CIA overthrowing Mossadegh in 1953. These connections are rarely recognized by the American people and never acknowledged by our government. We never seem to learn how dangerous interventionism is to us and to our security.
– April 6, 2006

In both cases… what Ron Paul is talking about, and what France is going through, the answer is the same.

First, we need to recognize that the people responsible for the rioting, are the rioters, and none other.

That said, you are correct that there’s a religious/ethnic issue at stake here. More correctly, I think, we have a cultural issue at stake.

So, here it is: If you insist on taking the blame for something incidental to those riots, the issue is not that we haven’t given them enough chance in the society, we’ve given repeated chances… that they’ve for the most part never taken us up on.  It’s not that we haven’t given them a stake in society, it’s that we have not made clear that we expected them to live up to their responsibilities to society. Including, their behavior. Every time we’ve gievn then additioal chances, we’ve sent the signal that acting out of line is OK because they’re part of a particular sub-group that the left has decided needs ‘help’ and “understanding”.

We in the west have allowed our minority populations to remain isolated in the cultures they’ve chosen to remain in, all in the name of “diversity”, of course…  and as a result, they’re not members of the culture. They’re not expected to act like an American (or, French) citizen culturally, so why in the world should be be shocked when they meet our expectations and behave like something other than citizens, and try to take us over, culturally speaking?

Addendum: (Bit)  Rusty Shakleford at the Jawa report, brings up a good point from Evan Coyne Maloney:

If we convince ourselves that all of the blame for the current state of the world should be placed at the feet of Western civilisation, then why would any Westerner think that our civilization is worth fighting for? Or even worth saving? The rules of Multicultural Hierarchy require us to pre-emptively surrender, because any crime committed against us by a more worthy Victim is somehow deserved. And if we deserve it, then fighting against what we deserve amounts to fighting the administration of justice…”

You have good liars and you have chronic liars.  Nobody seems to be believing B.J. Clinton’s  latest.  The New York Times is reporting that B.J. now clains to have opposed the war, “from the beginning”

Sadly for B.J. his old quotes are no more that a few keystrokes away.   Steve Gilbert, Sweetness & Light, quotes B.J.’s justification for attacking Iraq in 1998:

Earlier today, I ordered America’s armed forces to strike military and security targets in Iraq. They are joined by British forces. Their mission is to attack Iraq’s nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and its military capacity to threaten its neighbors.

With the Clintons you get two liars for the price of one.    I say the voters should never give the Clintons another chance to use the presidentcy to tell yet another lie.  

More, Memeorandum.

Addendum:

Allah Pundit, Hot Air,  offers an utterly devasting collection of reactions.

Are the days of a Clinton lying with impunity over?

I tend to use a lot of older equipment around here.  The fastest server at Casa de Bit is a PII/400 that I’ve cracked up to around 700 or so with some added cooling. The other two are PII/400’s.

I’ve got a “toaster” called “Gopher” that’s a Pentium/166… an old IBM model 300XL. Yes, a slug for most things, and most people wouldn’t bother with something so slow. For me, it watches the firewall, and all the network resources and the website, and pages me on my phone if there’s trouble with any of them. Well within the old boy’s ability, and yet cost me next to nothing to build up. It’s been running for years, that way.

My usual trick with these things is to ‘full house’ the system with RAM, give it a nice vid card off Ebay, a sizeable drive (I’m working off a stack of referub’ed 20gb Maxtors I got for $40 summer before last, just now), and put it in service.

Parts are cheap, and when they’re set up that way, the performance for what these things do is more than acceptable. Besides, I get a kick out of it. I pay for the parts, but I’ve not bought a PC except for my main desktop, in years. (Being in PC support has it’s advantages) Cheap, that way, and it keeps my repair skills sharp, too.

Most of the time I work on IBM stuff, because I know it best. But for a change, my current project is working on restoring a Dell L700CX to service. (PIII/700)

It’s no speed demon, but it’ll make an OK automation machine. FTP and so on.
It’s actually working OK now, but I’m curious… It looks like it’ll handle a Coppermine proc, which would give me another 250MHz of bandwidth. A worthwhile project. Anyone tried this one? Is anyone aware of what the last BIOS upgrade is for this box? Any mods available for more than the stock max of 512mb?

Send me some feedback if you can help. Thanks.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – Forget politics, the concern of Chris Dodd’s 6-year-old daughter is that Santa Claus won’t find her in Iowa.

Hmmm. That’s OK, kid… the voters out there can’t find your dad, either.

It evens out.
Just as well, too. Can you imagine explaining How Santa’s going to make it past the Secret Service in the White House to the kid?

Writing in the Christian Science Monitor, one Mansoor Ijaz, attempts to skewer Mitt Romney for his answer to a question that Ijaz provides no evidence was ever asked:

I asked Mr. Romney whether he would consider including qualified Americans of the Islamic faith in his cabinet as advisers on national security matters, given his position that “jihadism” is the principal foreign policy threat facing America today. He answered, “…based on the numbers of American Muslims [as a percentage] in our population, I cannot see that a cabinet position would be justified. But of course, I would imagine that Muslims could serve at lower levels of my administration.”

A responsible journalist can not cite himself as as a sole source.   The only evidence Ijaz presents to show that he asked this particular question of Governor Romney is his unsubtaniated, and unverifiable.

Even an old fart like Bob Novak practices the two source rule   Evidently the CSM does adhere to journalist standards.   Shocking isn’t it?

Further Edward Morrissey, Captain Quarters, identified Ijaz is a democrat fund raiser, a fact that Ijar did not see fit to disclose.

Yet the fact Ijaz attritubuted question is unsourced and his role as political operative undiclosed, by myself, did not stop leftards sites like Stink Progress and Chuckie from accusing Romney of bigotry.

Romney’s bigotry, or lack thereof, isn’t the question.   The stupidity of the leftosphere for falling for an unsourced story is.

More, Memeorandum.

Confederate Yankee reminds us that Franklin Foer and the staff at TNR still has yet to pay the price….

It All Comes Down to This.

Does The New Republic have the solid factual evidence to support these stories?

Did the editors of The New Republic act unethically by burying collected testimony, deceiving their readers, misleading and hiding expert witnesses, and falsely attacking the military as it conducted a formal investigation?

Franklin Foer’s next article on the “Shock Troops” scandal needs to contain names, places, dates, and unimpeachable justifications for unethical behavior that have been sorely lacking in the nearly five months up until this point. If he cannot provide these details, this next article in The New Republic should be his last.
I’m sure TNR’s few remaining advertisers will be watching.

As will we here at BitsBlog. and doubtless, CY will be as well.

Those fins you’re seeing ain’t dolphins, Frank.

IRAQI SECURITY FORCES, U.S. SPECIAL FORCES DETAIN 3, UNCOVER 18 IEDS IN SEPARATE OPERATIONS

Posted: 26 Nov 2007 06:28 AM CST

IRAQI SECURITY FORCES, U.S. SPECIAL FORCES DETAIN 3, UNCOVER 18 IEDS IN SEPARATE OPERATIONS

COALITION FORCES CAPTURE CRIMINAL ELEMENT LEADER, TWO OTHERS DETAINED

Posted: 25 Nov 2007 10:25 AM CST

COALITION FORCES CAPTURE CRIMINAL ELEMENT LEADER, TWO OTHERS DETAINED