Now that Frank Lautenberg has died, the race is on to replace him for the New Jersey senate seat. In that reliably Democratic state (Republican Chris Christie’s election as governor notwithstanding) whoever wins the Democratic party nomination in the primary in August will likely become senator at the special election in October. [Read more…]
The story of Samantha Power, president Obama’s nominee to be US Ambassador to the UN, provides a telling example of how the political and media system filters out those who do not conform to the narrow spectrum of views required to rise in either government or the media. [Read more…]
I have my own personal gauge of how well the Obama propaganda system is working. It consists of my social circle, almost all of whom are strong Obama supporters. They read newspapers, watch a lot of CNN and MSNBC, and despise Fox News. They see themselves as well-informed about current events and politics. So whenever there is an occasion when many of them are gathered together, I usually raise a current topic to see what their reaction is. [Read more…]
M. J. Rosenberg says that Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is ramping up the rhetoric on US media and that Iran now plans to actually launch a military attack the US, and the Israel lobby led by AIPAC is joining him in urging that the US take military action against Iran or at the least impose even greater sanctions against that country. [Read more…]
Some may recall that famous Honda ad from about five years ago that showed a Rube Goldberg device made out of Honda car components. What was notable was that they wanted to do it in a single take and had to repeat it 606 times before they got it right on take number 607. For those who missed it, here it is again. [Read more…]
In this interview with Noam Chomsky (which I date from the exchanges as having taken place soon after the Gulf War in 1991), he schools a British journalist on the reality that most journalists for the big media are not the crusading types they think they are but don’t even realize how much they work within a very narrow range of views. [Read more…]
You know what is a major problem with most religions? They are killjoys. The thought that people are engaging in enjoyable acts somehow bothers them, hence the prohibitions against ordinary pleasurable activities like eating, drinking, singing, dancing, films, sex, and contraception (because it allows people to have more sex). Most of the time these prohibitions stay is the realm of the laughable and absurd but sometimes become deadly. [Read more…]