Category Archives: Journalism

CNN Bimbo Holds Out Hope For Socialism

EU, Europe, Journalism, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Media, Political Economy, Political Philosophy, Socialism

This week, CNN’s ERIN BURNETT, HOST of OUTFRONT, and “a valued member of the OUTFRONT Strike Team,” whatever gimmick that stands for, entertained the possibility that President Francois Hollande’s Socialist Party might just “save Europe’s economy and ours.”

Burnett’s babbling was boosted by “striker” Bill Gross, CO-CHIEF INVESTMENT OFFICER of PIMCO, who positively spun the political platform of Francois Hollande by describing France’s manifestly socialist agenda as “pro-growth,” and as “a different way forward.”

I listened to the Gross man live on TV. CNN’s transcriber failed to transcribe Gross’s salutary reference to France’s founding principles of “liberté, égalité, fraternité, writing in their place: “(INAUDIBLE)”

But here is Mr. Gross(out)’s verbatim nod to the blood-drenched, illiberal French Revolution and its legacy:

I think what [Hollande] is trying to do is favor labor as opposed to capital. Remember the (INAUDIBLE) [Gross actually said “liberté, égalité, fraternité”] and you know he’s moving in that direction. To the extent that he moves only gradually, I think that’s a positive. What France needs, what Euro land needs is growth. And to the extent that they can prevent a continuing recession, then the growth is going to be positive.

An “anti-austerity vote in France” Erin’s strike-man has conflated with a “pro-growth” agenda.

The Law is a pamphlet published in June, 1850, by Frédéric Bastiat, a great classical liberal “economist, statesman, and author.” Bastiat castigated his countrymen for becoming “the most governed, the most regulated, the most imposed upon, the most harnessed, and the most exploited people in Europe.”

In 1860, Bastiat saw France as a society that “receives its momentum from power”; a passive people who “consider themselves incapable of bettering their prosperity and happiness by their own intelligence and their own energy.”

“So long as they expect everything from the law,” he warned, “their relationship to the state [would be] the same as that of the sheep to the shepherd.”

Moreover, Bastiat, who had a mind like no other, did not share Mr. Gross’s fondness for French “fraternity.” “Enforced Fraternity Destroys Liberty,” he proclaimed.

“In fact, it is impossible for me,” wrote the great man, “to separate the word fraternity from the word voluntary. I cannot possibly understand how fraternity can be legally enforced without liberty being legally destroyed, and thus justice being legally trampled underfoot.”

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ILANA













UPDATE II: Just Another Mouth In The Republican Fellatio Machine (Ad Hominem)

Celebrity, Critique, Feminism, Individual Rights, Intellectualism, Journalism, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Media, Politics, Pop-Culture, Republicans

The column “Just Another Mouth In the Republican Fellatio Machine,” debuts on Taki’s Magazine today. Here is an excerpt:

“The symbolic thrust of Hustler’s crude, much protested, photo-shopped depiction of Rockefeller Republican S.E. Cupp is commendable: silence this siren of stupidity.

The Hustler make-believe image of Cupp was captioned incorrectly, describing the ‘conservative’ commentator as ‘someone who had read too much Ayn Rand in high school and ended up joining the dark side.’

Sacrilege. If S. E. Cupp has read Rand’s works, she has internalized none of it.

The problem with the product (or production) called Cupp is not that it is conservative and is being victimized for heralding conservative truths. This was the tired tack adopted by almost all the rightists who’ve rushed to Cupp’s rescue.

On the contrary. Cupp is no conservative. Like a lot of loud idiots, Cupp lacks a coherent ideology.

Dumb distaff abound on America’s news channels. Cupp is a leader of the pack, a luminary in the Age of the Idiot, rivaled only by Grand Old Party leading lights such as Margaret Hoover and Gretchen Carlson (Bill O’Reilly’s circus clowns, aka the “Culture Warriors”), Elisabeth Hasselbeck, Carrie Prejean, Noelle Nikpour, and Dana Perino (the Heidi Klum of the commentariat).

Like these low-watt women, Lolita’s forte is to gesture wildly and grimace, while parroting talking points disgorged by every other Bush bootlicker before her. …”

… To find out why (in this column’s opinion) “‘Big Media,’ Left and Right, came together unequivocally to defend the dishonored S.E. Cupp (who has been honored for her vomitous prose on C-SPAN’s Book TV, and was called on to speak at CPUKE 2012),” read “Just Another Mouth In the Republican Fellatio Machine,” now on Taki’s Magazine.

It goes without saying that you should click to “Recommend,” “Tweet” and “Share” the Taki’s column. Or register your discontent at the Comments Section after the column.

UPDATE I: A reader at Taki’s writes this, which is completely true. I was thinking of exactly how O’Reilly avoids Coulter like the plague, because she can’t help but make him look unintelligent (I don’t think O’Reilly is stupid, and he can certainly be very funny, but he has nothing on Coulter’s intelligence, whatever else you think of her.)

“A completely TRUE article. I actually agree with every bit of it. CUPPCAKE goes on O’Reilly and I get the impression his avuncular patronizing of her means …he’s boning her. Coulter goes on, and Billo nitpicks at her like a grandma. He’s jealous of Coulter.”

UPDATE II: The one ad hominem leveled at me at Taki’s Comments Section is that I’m jealous of the Cupp creature (as if that constitutes an argument). That doesn’t square. Why would I be jealous of the half wit, but not of Coutler and Malkin (who are attractive and smart too, surely)? It shows you how far the ad hominem argument will take you. No where at all.

UPDATED: A Toilet Flushed; Kim Kardashian Flashed a Smile

Barack Obama, Celebrity, Hollywood, Journalism, Media, The Zeitgeist

In a spoof on the president’s hot-mic malfunctions, BHO engages in weak banter with an aide in the next room. A toilet flushes, and it becomes clear that Barack Obama was supposed to have been relieving himself during the “witty” repartee, which was overheard by the rapt crowd attending the 2012 annual White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner.

A repulsive sequence, befitting a revolting crowd: Jimmy Kimmel was seated with the First Couple; porn star Kardashian crowed in the crowd. The press itself is minimizing the cringe factor. After all, practically every anchor person on the networks began his broadcast by brandishing a personalized gold-embossed invitation. “See what a top dog I am?”

During the sickening specter, some of the most pretentious, worthless people in the country—in politics, journalism and entertainment—get together to revel in their ability to petition and curry favor with one another, usually to the detriment of the rest of us. The annual pimping of the office is nothing new. This low culture has been cultivated by successive administrations

Those gathered at the annual White House correspondents’ dinner are not the country’s natural aristocracy. Rather, this is a bunch of people who make their living pretending to be something they are not. Poseurs and parasites all.

Granted, actors do not coerce the citizenry to patronize their (mostly) lousy flicks. However, when they use their celebrity to push unconstitutional, naturally unlawful policies—then they are acting as enemies of the people. (Every time I turn around a “celebrity” is preaching and propagandizing for the leftist cause du jour.)

Like nothing else, the annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner is a mark of corrupt politics. The un-watchful dogs of the media have no business frolicking with the president and his minions. This is co-optation. And when did the phonies of Hollywood become a fixture in this event?

The toxic “tradition” began in 1920, and, as far as I know, is sponsored by THE WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENTS’ ASSOCIATION, which was formed in 1914 as a liaison between the press and the president.”

The event and the invited tell a great deal about the Association, its ethics and code of conduct.

UPDATE: Some of Kimmel’s jokes were really good. He was not as offensive as Wanda Sykes, who, in 2009, began her routine with some good material and then descended into vulgarity and sheer spite.

Hispanic Hero

Crime, Criminal Injustice, GUNS, Journalism, Justice, Law, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Racism

Big media’s poster boy for a bad-ass white boy appeared in court yesterday. The tards of TV had nothing but bad things to say about the placid, polite, Hispanic young man called George Zimmerman. Unburdened by brains, CNN’s Erin Burnett entertained a body-language expert to decipher Zimmerman’s demeanor. This Western equivalent of an African shaman threw her ancestor’s bones and concluded that the manifestly demure Zimmerman was seething with rage.

Alan Dershowitz, the famed civil libertarian from Harvard Law School, never ceases to impress in the apolitical stands he takes. Dershowitz denounced the prosecution’s case, which I had found suspect when, a week ago, Special prosecutor Corey opted to dismiss the Grand-Jury option.

“Dershowitz Blasts Zimmerman Prosecution: ‘Not Only Immoral, But Stupid,'” reported Breitbart.com (which continues to do good reporting):

With ABC News’ release of the George Zimmerman photo showing blood flowing freely from his head, the question becomes whether Angela Corey, the prosecutor in the case, had access to the photo before charging Zimmerman with second-degree murder.
The arrest affidavit did not mention the photograph, or the bleeding, gashes, and bruises on Zimmermans’ head. Professor Alan Dershowitz of Harvard Law School stated upon release of the arrest affidavit that it was “so thin that it won’t make it past a judge on a second degree murder charge … everything in the affidavit is completely consistent with a defense of self-defense.”

Bimbo Burnett’s choice of experts countered facts with feelings—and in favor of the cause of Trayvon Martin. One was a black woman with orange hair and peacock-blue eye shadow. She turned out to be a former Florida Judge. The other was the weeping, stammering Judge who presided over the investigation into the death of Anna Nicole Smith.

On March 30, I wrote that “The facts of the case should be reviewed impartially, and the identity of the aggressor in the altercation that left Martin dead determined. The issue, of course, hinges not on who was armed, but on who was first to aggress.”

The image of “Zimmerman’s head bloody, bruised, battered” the media had delayed publishing despite threats to Zimmerman’s life. It is convincing. The neighborhood watchman had been a victim of an assault by Martin, whose memory and innocence the corporate media had cultivated by airing only pictures of an angelic-looking Trayvon, aged 12.