Category Archives: Media

UPDATED: ‘Knockout,’ Or, More Precisely, ‘Polar Bear Hunting’

Crime, Media, Race, Racism

Thomas Sowell mocks the piety of the likes of Bill O’Reilly in reporting about the “fun” ways black mobs choose to pass the time. “Despite such pious phrases as ‘troubled youths,’ the attackers are often in a merry, festive mood. In a sustained mass attack in Milwaukee, going far beyond the dimensions of a passing ‘knockout game,’ the attackers were laughing and eating chips, as if it were a picnic.”

“New York seem to have been caught by surprise,” quips Sowell, “even though this ‘knockout game’ has been played for years by young black gangs in other cities and other states, against people besides Jews — the victims being either whites in general or people of Asian ancestry.
Attacks of this sort have been rampant in St. Louis. But they have also occurred in Massachusetts, Wisconsin and elsewhere. In Illinois the game has often been called ‘Polar Bear Hunting’ by the young thugs, presumably because the targets are white.”

Nor is this game just a passing prank. People have been beaten unconscious, both in this game and in the wider orchestrated racial attacks. Some of these victims have been permanently disabled and some have died from their injuries.

In one murderous instance, a reporter comments facilely: “A man lost his life because a group of young people decided to play this very dangerous game.” Just like that?

A blogger responds appropriately by railing against the pathetic pattern one finds when a “Murdering Black Mobs Comes to [Town],” and “Local Media and City Officials Run Interference for Them”:

… And I don’t want to hear anyone making excuses for these little scumbags. I don’t want to read leftist hacks from Syracuse University writing guest editorials on how America’s “institutional racism” or “lack of educational opportunities” led these kids to murder this guy. I don’t care how poor or marginalized you are, there is no justification for seeking out someone at random and beating them to death. None.
I especially don’t want to hear [the reporter] blaming these attacks on “boredom.” When I was a kid and I was bored, I went outside to play, played video games, or read a book. Gang-swarming on some poor stranger and putting him in the hospital never crossed my mind, and anyone who would do that for fun is a sociopath with no place in civilized society.
These “teens” beat Michael Daniels to death for one reason and one reason only: they hate white people.
They’ve been told to hate whites since they were old enough to comprehend words. They’ve been told by their mothers, their teachers, their role models that whites are oppressing them, stealing from them, and are responsible for all the misery in their lives. Is it any wonder that blacks across America are beating up and abusing whites like this? You want to talk about “institutional racism?” Let’s talk about the institutions that tell poor blacks that stomping random white people to death is socially acceptable.
Again, … I’m not keeping my mouth shut on a disgusting story like this.

Hear, hear.

UPDATE (11/20): WND:

After scores of reports by WND about the problem of black-mob violence in the U.S. and a lethal practice of attacking random whites and Jews called “the Knockout Game,” Fox News has launched a full-frontal assault on the shocking phenomenon its own analysts say is intentionally suppressed by national news media.

MORE.

CNN White-Noise News Conceals ‘Massive, Fraudulent,’ Indictable, Obama Scheme

Barack Obama, Ethics, Healthcare, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Media

The thing that’s on every American’s mind—breaking news about the consequences of Obama’s devastating (developing) lies to their medical and financial well being—CNN has been concealing with the following white-noise news stories:

* A state senator’s stabbing
* George Zimmerman’s ongoing antics.
* JFK.
* The Jonestown massacre’s 30th anniversary.
* Ted Turner (“who,” you ask) turns 75, and CNN profiles him for hours on end.

National Review and Powerline have filled in the gap in reportage magnificently. In “Obama’s ‘5 Percent’ Con Job,” Andrew C. McCarthy expounds on the developing impeachable offenses of O:

… Unable to deny that millions of Americans have lost the coverage he vowed they could keep, Obama and other Democrats are now peddling what we might call the “5 percent” con job. The president asserts that these victims, whom he feels so terribly about, nevertheless constitute a tiny, insignificant minority in the greater scheme of things (“scheme” is used advisedly). They are limited, he maintains, to consumers in the individual health-insurance market, as opposed to the vastly greater number of Americans who get insurance through their employers. According to Obama, these individual-market consumers whose policies are being canceled make up only 5 percent of all health-insurance consumers.
Even this 5 percent figure is a deception. As Avik Roy points out, the individual market actually accounts for 8 percent of health-insurance consumers. Obama can’t help himself: He even minimizes his minimizations. So, if Obama were telling the truth in rationalizing that his broken promises affect only consumers in the individual-insurance market, we’d still be talking about up to 25 million Americans. While the president shrugs these victims off, 25 million exceeds the number of Americans who do not have health insurance because of poverty or preexisting conditions (as opposed to those who could, but choose not to, purchase insurance). Of course, far from cavalierly shrugging off that smaller number of people, Obama and Democrats used them to justify nationalizing a sixth of the U.S. economy. …

But that’s not the half of it. Obama’s claim that unwelcome cancellations are confined to the individual-insurance market is another brazen lie. In the weekend column, I link to the excellent work of Powerline’s John Hinderaker, who has demonstrated that, for over three years, the Obama administration’s internal estimates have shown that most Americans who are covered by “employer plans” will also lose their coverage under Obamacare. Mind you, 156 million Americans get health coverage through their jobs.
John cites the Federal Register, dated June 17, 2010, beginning at page 34,552 (Vol. 75, No. 116). It includes a chart that outlines the Obama administration’s projections. The chart indicates that somewhere between 39 and 69 percent of employer plans would lose their “grandfather” protection by 2013. In fact, for small-business employers, the high-end estimate is a staggering 80 percent (and even on the low end, it’s just a shade under half — 49 percent).
That is to say: During all these years, while Obama was repeatedly assuring Americans, “If you like your health-insurance plan, you can keep your health-insurance plan,” he actually expected as many as seven out of every ten Americans covered by employer plans to lose their coverage. For small business, he expected at least one out of every two Americans, or as many as four out of every five, to lose their coverage. …

… October 17, the Obama Department of Health and Human Services, represented by the Obama Justice Department, submitted a brief to the federal district court in Washington, opposing Priests for Life’s summary judgment motion. On page 27 of its brief, the Justice Department makes the following remarkable assertion:
The [ACA’s] grandfathering provision’s incremental transition does not undermine the government’s interests in a significant way. [Citing, among other sources, the Federal Register.] Even under the grandfathering provision, it is projected that more group health plans will transition to the requirements under the regulations as time goes on. Defendants have estimated that a majority of group health plans will have lost their grandfather status by the end of 2013.
HHS and the Justice Department cite the same section of the Federal Register referred to by John Hinderaker, as well as an annual survey on “Employer Health Benefits” compiled by the Kaiser Family Foundation in 2012.
So, while the president has been telling us that, under the vaunted grandfathering provision, all Americans who like their health-insurance plans will be able to keep them, “period,” his administration has been representing in federal court that most health plans would lose their “grandfather status” by the end of this year. Not just the “5 percent” of individual-market consumers, but close to all consumers — including well over 100 million American workers who get coverage through their jobs — have been expected by the president swiftly to “transition to the requirements under the [Obamacare] regulations.” That is, their health-insurance plans would be eliminated. They would be forced into Obamacare-compliant plans, with all the prohibitive price hikes and coercive mandates that “transition” portends. …

MSNBC at least broaches the topic of healthcare today, but not to break the aforementioned news.

Fix News Falters, But Flatters

Conservatism, Ethics, Etiquette, Ilana Mercer, Media

When “‘Obama, Love Means Never Having To Say You’re Sorry’” was first published and circulated, Megyn Kelly led her show with the exact reference and column title, even cuing the music from “Love Story.” Did she or her producer have the decency to credit the column? You know the answer to that.

Our editor sent me this comment: “yep, par for the course—still kinda cool though.” He’s right.

Indeed, as documented in “Glenn Beck Awakens To The Color Of Hate Crime (But Fails To Credit Those Who Went Before),” this is not a first for big, conservative media—generally challenged in the originality department. Passing off the often-idiosyncratic ideas or references of others as their own is “par for the course” in these circles.

Personally, I experienced Sean Hannity as a cordial gentleman—disarmingly charming—who was generous on air in his praise for my work and controversial position. (Perhaps the only position I’ve taken that I’ve come to deeply regret, even though it is probably philosophically correct.)

Debbie Schlussel, however, has had a different experience, detailed in “Why is Sean Hannity Deliberately Ripping Me Off?”.

UPDATED: Obama, Love Means Never Having To Say You’re Sorry (Fix News)

Barack Obama, Bush, Ethics, Healthcare, Media

“Obama: Love Means Never having To Say You’re Sorry” is the current column, now on WND. An excerpt:

So where do we stand in the health care chain reaction, cooked-up in the Barack Obama command-and-control centers? Let’s see. Having destroyed the market for health insurance, the president turned to another parlor game, hailed by the daytrippers at CNN and the New York Times as a “health fix” and a “fix for canceled plans.”

Yes, the fix is in. Parsed, the president’s advice to the millions who’ve lost coverage is, essentially, “I’ll let you keep your already canceled policies through 2014. Feel free to take it up with your insurance company.”

In the preceding weeks, and against the backdrop of polls in which 50 percent of voters said, “President Obama knowingly lied when he repeatedly told Americans they could keep their plans under his signature health care law,” the paper of record took a “different” view. Obama, the apple of their eye, “wrongly assured Americans that they could retain their health care plans.”

An “incorrect promise” was another euphemism used by NYT story tellers.

Quite the opposite, opined Patrick J. Buchanan:

WHO’S THE BIGGEST LIAR OF THEM ALL? In the grand scheme of history, Obama’s rank lie “now enters presidential history alongside George H.W. Bush’s ‘Read my lips! No new taxes,’ Bill Clinton’s ‘I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky,’ and George W. Bush’s tales of yellow cake in Niger and hidden arsenals of WMDs.”

As wrecking balls go, Obama and “W” are tied in ignominy. Christopher Conover of Duke University estimates that “129 million, or 68 percent of Americans, may not be able to keep their current health care plans once Obamacare is fully implemented. [Conover’s] study also suggests that 18 to 50 million people will lose their plans altogether.”

The butcher’s bill of human suffering—Bush’s—has been tallied. Obama’s is still to come. …

The complete column is “Obama: Love Means Never having To Say You’re Sorry.” Read it on WND.

If you’d like to feature this column, WND’s longest-standing, exclusive paleolibertarian column, in or on your publication (paper or pixels), contact ilana@ilanamercer.com.

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UPDATE (11/15): FIX NEW. Megyn Kelly of Fox News uses the exact reference and title of my Friday, WND column, even cues the music from “Love Story” referenced. Did she or her producer have the decency to credit the column? You know the answer to that.