Category Archives: Media

2016 Annual White House Sycophants’ Supper

Affirmative Action, Barack Obama, Ethics, Government, Journalism, Media

The annual White House Sycophants’ Dinner is where the most pretentious people in the country—in politics, journalism and entertainment—convene to revel in their ability to petition and curry favor with one another, usually to the detriment of the rest of us in Rome’s provinces. Those gathered at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, or its Christmas party, are not the country’s natural aristocracy, but its authentic Idiocracy.

The events and the invited say a great deal about the press, its ethics and code of conduct. Like nothing else, the Sycophant’s Supper is a mark of a corrupt politics and press, as the un-watchful dogs of the media have no business frolicking with the president and his minions. This co-optation, however, is the hallmark of the celebrity press, in general. The days following these glitzy events, the Gilded Ones will spend genuflecting to … themselves.

The 2015 gig was given to an affirmative action stand-up comic, talent-less Cecily Weak. Expect a repeat with this year’s anti-white prize fighter, Comedy Central’s Larry Wilmore. Wilmore is neither talented nor funny. He’s going to be gunning for The Great White, Donald Trump, who should, frankly, give the event a miss.

Warned Omarosa Manigault: “I think there’s going to be a lot of jokes about Trump. But I think the biggest joke is on them because he’s going to be the President of the United States.”

President Barack Obama, however, is capable of being very funny, although his political exploits have marred his ability to make thinking people laugh at any of his jokes, no matter how self-deprecating.

Funny Obama past jokes:

* “And I’m feeling sorry — believe it or not — for the Speaker of the House, as well. These days, the House Republicans actually give John Boehner a harder time than they give me, which means orange really is the new black.”

* “Let’s face it Fox, you’ll miss me when I’m gone. It’ll be harder to convince the American people that Hillary was born in Kenya.”

* Obama on CNN’s wall-to-wall coverage of missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 – a frequent target of the night’s jokes: He noted that he had just returned from a trip to Malaysia. “The lengths we have to go to to get CNN coverage these days,” Obama said, adding, “I think they’re still searching for their table” at the Hilton ballroom.

* “MSNBC is here, they’re a little overwhelmed. They’ve never seen an audience this big before.”

Jay Leno’s routine at the SS 2010 was the best, because he was way smarter and certainly more politically astute.

The One Right-Wing Conspiracy Theory The Left Will Accept

Conservatism, Donald Trump, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Media, Republicans

Banana Republicans are so corrupt, so used to having their way; have been swimming in polluted waters for so long—that they imagine their Republican Rules are true and good and that any upheaval in their insider’s game is a source of corruption, rather than a source of cleansing.

John Ziegler, a fast-talking radio mouth, has accused some conservative media, notably Sean Hannity, of “selling [their] soul to build up Donald Trump.”

Ziegler, apparently, blames Hannity and Rush Limbaugh and other “’conservative’ media for willingly enabling this hostile takeover of the Republican Party.”

Where in Ziegler’s equation is the Republican Party base? The voters? To me it looks as though the base is trying to purge the corrupt establishment, and has chosen Donald Trump to do so on their behalf. When you’re mired in the muck as Ziegler has been for so long, it’s hard to see clearly.

If the likes of Ziegler are upset, it’s because Trump is breaking stuff that needs breaking.

MORE.

‘Shahs of Sunset’ Christiane Amanpoor Mocks ‘Poor Me’ America

Celebrity, Donald Trump, Foreign Policy, Iran, Journalism, Media, Race

In ways intellectual, Christiane Amanpoor is impoverished. The famous CNN anchor, however, is not poor. Amanpoor’s net worth is $12.5 Million. She’s lived, loved and worked among the upper echelons her entire life, in her birth place of Iran, too. Amanpoor is more authentically “Shahs of Sunset” than ordinary America.

Read how Amapoor conflates America (“rich”) with Americans (many of whom are awfully poor).

Via Media Matters comes Christian Amanpoor’s take on Trump’s America. She apparently is unfamiliar with white, working-class demographics:

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: [Donald Trump] always comes back to the dollars and cents. So, America’s broke, therefore, America’s weak. These are not true, right, so everybody else has to pony up. This is a businessman’s view of the world, presumably. But it doesn’t make sense when he talks about, for instance, NATO. NATO is not obsolete. Yes, NATO was created 60-plus years ago in response to the Soviet threat. But still, NATO is the organizing principle by which American and the Western democracies’ security is taken care of. And NATO is not just about the United States putting money in. It’s about all the other countries putting in their two percent of GDP as well. Now, they don’t all, that’s true, and America wants them to put more than they do right now. But a good number, nearly half of the NATO countries, put their two percent of GDP in. And the other countries do certain things that America doesn’t do. Now, America, because it is the most powerful military in the world, does a lot of the heavy lifting. You know, you have a military operation and America will do the troop lifting, for instance. Or it will do, you know, many of those kinds of things. But many of the other countries, whether it’s in Afghanistan or elsewhere, pick up a huge lot of the burden as well.

BROOKE BALDWIN (HOST): What about his point on nukes, how he said specifically he would be open to allowing Japan and South Korea to build their own nuclear arsenals so they can protect themselves from North Korea and China?

AMANPOUR: Well again, that puts on its head decades of the United States and its Pacific allies’ security relationship, and this is one of the first times we’ve heard a serious candidate, if not the first time, who will probably be the nominee for the Republican Party, put that forward, and it’s not a Republican sort of point of view that I’ve ever heard in previous elections. This poor me, America’s weak kind of thing is not the way Republicans generally see their view, and Americans’ view in the world. So one of the reasons why Japan does not have a nuclear arsenal is because of the horror that Japan committed during the Second World War. So Japan has been kind of forced to be a pacifist, pretty much, state. It has a military but it’s not an offensive military capability. And so there was a tradeoff. OK, you trade that off. And if there’s a problem, we’ll come to your rescue. But in the meantime, you’ll help us keep the peace in many other ways in that region. So that’s one of the reasons why Japan doesn’t have nukes. And then of course, well, when it comes to ISIS and all the other things, you need allies to be able to go and help you. [CNN, CNN Newsroom with Brooke Baldwin, 3/28/16]

Trump Creates New Political Bedfellows (Or Bedbugs)

Barack Obama, Law, Media, The Courts

The “dreaded” Donald Trump has forced some unlikely partners to slip between the sheets together. After a seven-year, petulant boycott, President Barack Obama has rewarded the Fox News Channel’s sustained anti-Trump campaign by granting Chris Wallace an interview. Megyn Kelly’s efforts in the same department have earned her high praise from Hillary Clinton, who called Kelly “a superb journalist.” Just the other day, HuffPost and MSNBC, left-liberal outfits, converged in proposing a … Clinton-Kasich ticket:

Hillary Clinton should ask John Kasich, the Republican governor of Ohio, to join her in creating a “unity ticket.” It’s time for a national ticket that reflects our national desire for a new type of politics for our modern America.

Sounds like an ideal gathering for Terminix pest control.

In any case, here’s Wallace’s ‘Fox News Sunday’ interview with President Barack Obama. In it, “constitutional scholar” Obama continues to insist, apparently in error, on the Republicans’ constitutional obligation to go through the confirmation process with Justice Merrick Garland.

One suspects Obama might be gearing up for the equivalent of an executive order to fill the SCOTUS vacancy. It’s called a recess appointment, and we know enough about President Barack Obama to know he’ll use it to fill the Supreme Court vacancy left by Antonin Scalia’s death, in the teeth of Republican opposition.