salon
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Are the American people "obsolete"? Do the super-rich no longer need Americans? - 08/04/10
Michael Lind of the New America Foundation offers "Are the American people obsolete?" (link) which basically claims that the rich (or what I think would be more accurately called the superrich) no longer really need Americans to obtain money or to defend them.
More proof Justin Elliott isn't credible (Sharron Angle, public health concerns over fluoride) - 06/09/10
[SEE THE UPDATES TOO]
Sharron Angle [1] won the Republican primary against Harry Reid yesterday, and as could be expected Democratic Party proxies are already beginning their attack. One of those is Justin Elliot of TalkingPointsMemo, who offers "FLASHBACK: GOPer Angle Spoke Out Against Fluoride In Water Supply" [2].
It's a low-grade attempt to provoke a conditioned response that most people have: when someone says something against fluoridation, you're supposed to think that person must be nuts. As it turns out, the science of fluoridation isn't anywhere near as settled as some would have...
Census worker found hanged in Kentucky; see who's politicizing it - 09/24/09
[UPDATE: Police say it was a suicide]
Al Franken shows incompetence of Tea Party leaders, how they help Obama - 09/05/09
The attached video shows U.S. Senator Al Franken discussing Obama healthcare with a group of his constituents at the Minnesota State Fair. At least one person is wearing a "Taxed Enough Already" t-shirt, and some or most are presumably from a tea parties group.
I'm proud to have opposed both two major recent U.S. personality cults - 09/02/09
Due to it being played in a classroom in Utah, the creepy, seven month-old pledge video made by a group of B-list celebrities to Barack Obama is making the rounds again. The original video is here, and an answer video I made about it is attached. While the exact circumstances are quite unimportant, Jay Nordlinger and others at National Review are apparently upset about the (original) video. Accordingly Glenn Greenwald of Salon weighs in with a tu quoque response ("Deleting the Bush Personality Cult from history", link).
Alex Koppelman lies in his failed refutation of "Birthers" - 08/05/09
Alex Koppelman of Salon offers "Salon's handy-dandy guide to refuting the Birthers" (link):
1. He says of the Certification of Live Birth ("COLB") pictured on Obama's site:
There are allegations that what Obama released is a forgery, but state officials have repeatedly affirmed its authenticity and said they've checked it against the original record and that Obama was indeed born in Hawaii.
That is completely, absolutely false. Those state officials haven't even once said they've checked the picture on Obama's site against their records. I don't like repeating what I wrote earlier, but aside...
Max Blumenthal/David Neiwert smear Sarah Palin (true guilt-by-association, bad reporting) - 10/09/08
Max Blumenthal - last seen here spinning a fantastic tale - joins with Mr. "white supremacist under every bed" himself, David Neiwert, to offer a smear called "Meet Sarah Palin's radical right-wing pals" (link). Their report was partly funded by the "Nation Institute Investigative Fund", which isn't getting its money's worth.
In this campaign we've heard a lot about guilt-by-association, but most have been using that phrase incorrectly. Thanks to the two authors, we finally have a real example of guilt-by-association. It's also tremendously bad reporting because - besides apparently trying to...
Barack Obama lies about Rush Limbaugh in Spanish-language ads - 09/17/08
The Barack Obama campaign has a new Spanish-language ad that features racial demagoguery and a distortion of Rush Limbaugh quotes. You can see the ad here:
"They want us to forget the insults we've put up with, the intolerance," the television ad's announcer says in Spanish as a picture of Rush Limbaugh appears onscreen with quotes of him saying, "Mexicans are stupid and unqualified" and "Shut your mouth or get out."
"They made us feel marginalized in a country we love so much," the ad continues. "John McCain and his Republican friends have two faces. One that says lies just to get our...
Howard Dean <b>can</b> win! - 06/09/03
Via this post comes this post which says:
After I attended the Howard Dean meetup this week... at The Metro, a gay bar in the Castro. I... signed up to volunteer... to do "outreach" activites, including, apparently, going to gay bars and talking to people about Dean. Well... a genuine excuse to [go] up to strange guys without having to worry about an opening line.
Good luck, but I don't think it's going to work unless someone is either crazy, drugged, or otherwise already fairly pro-Dean.
However, as my own form of outreach, I herewith present something that just might work:
"Hello, I'm...