September 30, 2015

The Fix: How the media fails to cover Bernie Sanders in two headlines.

Before I paste some of the story, let me say that the headline for this story is a bit of an oxymoron. If Sanders is getting headlines, the problem is not lack of coverage. The truth is that the media often ignores Sanders entirely (less so as time passes) or covers him unfairly. That said, I will get to pasting from the source.

The Fix: How the media fails to cover Bernie Sanders in two headlines.

By David Weigel September 29 at 9:53 AM

On May 10, the weekend after he announced his presidential bid, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) appeared on CBS's "Face the Nation" to reemphasize some of his campaign themes. Among them was that anyone he would appoint to the Supreme Court would have to be on record against the "disastrous" 2010 Supreme Court decision known as Citizens United. CNN's Eric Bradner reported this under the headline, "Bernie Sanders has a Supreme Court litmus test."

..........

On Monday, Sanders spoke at an event held by the University of Chicago's Institute of Politics in Washington. Much had changed since May; for example, in Real Clear Politics's national average of polls, Sanders had jumped from 5.6 percent to 27.6 percent, a boom predicted by no one in the media. CNN reported from the new speech, and delivered an article with this headline: "Bernie Sanders' Supreme Court litmus test: Overturn Citizens United." The reporter? Not to pick on the guy, but it was Eric Bradner.

It's unusual for candidates to get national coverage this consistent when they repeat their core messaging. Local coverage is one thing; the media in Oskaloosa might be hearing a speech that was already played out in Greenville or Derry or Pahrump. But Sanders, who has refused to go negative against his main Democratic opponent*, has received relatively skimpy coverage, and he knows it. He likes to say that if he "slipped on a banana peel" at an event, the assembled reporters would make that the story.

No one seriously disputes this. In an analysis last week, media watcher Andrew Tyndall discovered that network newscasts had devoted only eight minutes to the Sanders campaign, despite it being arguably the most surprising political story of 2016. That was as much as they had devoted to Mitt Romney's brief flirtation with a third presidential bid.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/09/29/how-the-media-fails-to-cover-bernie-sanders-in-2-headlines/

Good analysis of media coverage follows the portions of the article that I've quoted above.

As far as the language I bolded above, it shows that the author is unfamiliar with DU. While one member of the media and professor after another comments on how Sanders is either being ignored or covered unfairly, a certain group of DUers deny that, while claiming another candidate is a victim of the media.

Then again, perhaps the author is familiar with DU. Perhaps the key word in the language I bolded is "seriously." While I admit I don't read as much outside this group as I once did, I have not seen any serious analysis of media coverage of Bernie at DU, only snark.

See http://www.democraticunderground.com/128054135 (Comic Relief Fundraiser: Sanders Perennial Snark Desperation Syndrome, or SPSDS).

September 30, 2015

25% off sale at the Bernie Store until midnight Wed. night! At checkout, enter code DEADLINE

https://go.berniesanders.com/store-sale

On getting the best deals at the Bernie Store always: http://www.democraticunderground.com/12779936

I will admit that others may sell slicker looking Bernie stuff than does the Bernie store. However, sales at the Bernie store benefit the campaign and all items are union made in the USA. So, shop your conscience.

September 28, 2015

Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders among 2016ers to address 'No Labels' convention

Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders among 2016ers to address 'No Labels' convention

By Cassie Spodak
Updated 9:23 AM ET, Mon September 28, 2015

Manchester, New Hampshire (CNN)In a first for the 2016 presidential cycle, businessman Donald Trump and Sen. Bernie Sanders will address the same crowd in New Hampshire, along with six other presidential candidates from both sides of the aisle.

Trump and Sanders, who have been drawing five times the crowds as other candidates in the first-in-the-nation primary state, will make remarks at the "No Labels Problem Solver Convention" on Oct. 12 with Republicans Gov. Chris Christie, Sen. Lindsey Graham, Gov. John Kasich, former Gov. George Pataki and Democrats former Gov. Martin O'Malley and former Sen. Jim Webb.

According to organizers, Sanders will address the audience via satellite from Las Vegas where he will be for the first Democratic presidential primary hosted by CNN on Oct. 13. Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton is not expected to speak at the convention.

"No Labels" is a national bipartisan organization headed up by former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman and former Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman focused on practical solutions to issues like job creation, balancing the federal budget, securing Social Security and Medicare, and energy security.


[/blockquote

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/28/politics/donald-trump-bernie-sanders-no-labels-meeting/index.html

Federal, state and local officials will also be present.


FWIW, IMO, No Labels is to the right of Third Way. No Labels was started by a fan of Dimson and is full of graduates of the Bubba and Dimson administrations. Lieberman is the head Democrat. Need I say more?

The consider liberals to be the left's version of teabaggers, not even of less than moderate Republicans, but of the most extreme group within the GOP. And they dub the alleged extremes toxic.

Fuck 'em, says I.

Twice.


I hope Bernie wears appropriate protective gear under his suit.

September 28, 2015

10 Reasons Bernie Sanders will overtake Hillary in National Polls Before the Iowa Caucus (Huffpo)

H. A. Goodman Become a fan

Columnist published in The Cleveland Plain Dealer, The Baltimore Sun, The Hill, Salon, The Jerusalem Post www.hagoodman.com

10 Reasons Bernie Sanders Will Overtake Hillary Clinton in National Polls Before the Iowa Caucus




http://www.huffingtonpost.com/h-a-goodman/10-reasons-bernie-sanders-will-overtake-hillary-clinton_b_8205712.html

some of the reasons cited in the article seem duplicative. IOW, I don't see ten distinct reasons. Still, I'd settle for five.

September 28, 2015

Supporters of Bernie are being trolled with pms. Blocking private messages from someone is easy.

The unwelcome message is in your inbox. Under "author," will appear the name of the trolling sender. Clicking on the name of the author of the unwelcome message will get you to the profile of the trolling sender. At the top of the profile, you will find an "ignore" tab. Click on it.

You will then be offered (1) the option of ignoring both (a) all posts of that sender and (b) private messages from that sender or (2) the option of ignoring that sender only for the purpose of keeping his or her private messages out of your inbox.

Any questions, feel free to pm me, as long as it's not for the purpose of trolling me about the primary. That's just weird.

September 28, 2015

"Conspiracy theory" is a way overused term.

Calling something--anything--a "conspiracy theory" has become a one-second method of discrediting that thing. If you believe everything is exactly as government and politicians and their surrogates describe it, I think you are either lying or far too naive to be taken seriously.

No matter how cynical you become, it's never enough to keep up.

Lily Tomli

Can distrust be taken to a ridiciulous extreme? Yes. Duh. Almost anything can be taken to a ridiculous extreme (good gelato being one of very few exceptions). When it gets to the point at which people find it necessary to prove they exist, cynicism and doubt just may have gone too far. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cogito_ergo_sum

This post does not attempt to draw a line between healthy cynicism and paralyzing doubt, but to attempt a definition of a conspiracy because I have recently been seeing the term misused here over and over.

First, let's get this straight: a conspiracy requires more than one person or entity. If I believe that a single corporation has covered up or denied some danger created by its products, I may have a theory. That theory may be correct or off the wall. Either way, it simply cannot be a conspiracy theory. I simply suspect a single corporation of wrongdoing.

It's also not a "conspiracy theory" if the theory does not include conspiring. Sometimes, several people or companies simply decide to do something quite independently of each other.

We don't usually accuse people of conspiring to do good deeds, but people absolutely do conspire to do good deeds all the time. Is the last part of that sentence a conspiracy theory on my part? No, it's fact, not theory.


After that, the definition of a conspiracy gets murky (for me, anyway).

conspiracy
Also found in: Medical, Legal, Idioms, Encyclopedia, Wikipedia.
con·spir·a·cy (kən-spîr?ə-sē )
n. pl. con·spir·a·cies

1. An agreement to perform together an illegal, wrongful, or subversive act.

2. A group of conspirators.

3. Law An agreement between two or more persons to commit a crime or accomplish a legal purpose through illegal action.

4. A joining or acting together, as if by sinister design: a conspiracy of wind and tide that devastated coastal areas

.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/conspiracy


The third definition is clear enough, but the first is not. Our society seeks to outlaw most things that are significantly wrongful and/or subversive. So, why isn't "illegal" enough?

So many things can be deemed "wrongful." For example, if I happen to know something signifcant, negative or positive, about a politician and I decide to keep that information to myself, I have a hard time believing a criminal case would exist against me, even if the information is likely to swing an election. Does it become more "wrongful" because two people know the information and agree with each other to keep silent? And, if I suspect those two people of having information they agreed not to disclose, is that a conspiracy theory? If so, why?

How about insignificant things, like conspiring to throw someone a surprise party? How about if the conspirators know the guest of honor hates surprise parties?

I don't know the answers to all the questions, but I do know that conspiracies do exist. Maybe not as many as some people think, but they exist. And maybe we should not be so quick to dismiss the idea that conspiracies exist or, for that matter, to whip out Occam's Razor. But, let's save the term conspiracy for something more significant and malevolent than, say, a surprise party.

Oh, and labeling something a "conspiracy theory" does not disprove it, even if you are using the term correctly.

September 28, 2015

Fear of Sanders Presidency: How the silly elite media creates phony stories to dodge real issues

Saturday, Sep 26, 2015 09:30 AM EST
Fear of a Bernie Sanders presidency: How the silly elite media creates phony stories to dodge real issues

Stop pretending Jerry Brown is going to run. Dumb horserace journalism is an attempt to not cover real issues
Paul Rosenberg


(Omitted intro to the effect that Michael Kinsley of Vanity Fair and Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post are "covering" the possibility that Jerry Brown might enter the race, which according to the author of this Salon article, Paul Rosenberg, is bull puckies.)

So, it’s clear that this is not about Jerry Brown actually contemplating a presidential run. It’s about the idea of him doing so, and how that idea functions in the establishment media world.

The most obvious way it functions I’ve already mentioned: as a distraction from covering Bernie Sanders, who actually is running for president, and raising issues the establishment media would rather ignore, with a degree of specificity they’re particularly uncomfortable with. The fact that he’s proving wildly popular only makes their antipathy even worse. That’s why they’re grasping at straws like the totally unrelated comments Brown made above.

.............

The first point Kinsley makes is a good one—his best, actually: “He’s had more gubernatorial experience than anyone else in the country, and he’s had it in the largest state.” Senators rarely move directly to the White House, governors do it much more often. So this is a solid argument to be making—if only Brown’s age weren’t a concern. But we should also look at the content of that record. After all, the GOP has all kinds of governors (and ex-governors) competing, and their records have been anything but stellar. Bush did manage high GDP growth—but as I’ve noted before, it’s less impressive on a per capita basis: “Florida’s per-capita GDP grew 19.8 percent over Bush’s two terms (2.5 percent per year), compared to 16.4 percent nationwide (2.1 percent annually), and was due to a housing bubble, which later went bust.” His record is mediocre at best. Without his family money, connections and name, he’d be unremarkable. So, in contrast, how did Brown do in the way of a governing record?

Much more at http://www.salon.com/2015/09/26/fear_of_a_bernie_sanders_presidency_how_the_silly_elite_media_creates_phony_stories_to_dodge_real_issues/


The irony here--which I assume is wholly unintentional--is that Rosenberg's articles basically assesses Brown's record, as though Brown were indeed contemplating entering the race. Seemed to me more as though Rosenberg was grinding an axe about Brown, rather than grinding an axe about how media invents fake stories to avoid covering Sanders. So, Rosenberg sort of does the same thing of which he accuses Kinsley and Cillizza. Still, the admission from a member of the Democratic media that the Democratic media does this kind of thing is significant, IMO.

I don't know a lot about Kinsley, but am disappointed in Vanity Far. No disappointment about WAPO: we all have known WAPO's deal since it was bought out. And Cillizza is, IMO, a hack.

September 28, 2015

Hillary leads, but Bernie's numbers increase. So, his trend is good.

small sample; margin of error 6.1%; both Democrats and Republicans polled (for some bizarre reason)

Bernie Sanders Pulls Closer To Hillary Clinton In New Presidential Poll
He's gained ground since July.

Sam Levine
Associate Politics Editor, The Huffington Post

Posted: 09/27/2015 09:01 AM EDT

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) narrowed the gap with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll.

In the poll, conducted among Democratic primary voters Sept. 20-24, Clinton led Sanders 42 percent to 35 percent. While the new poll isn't necessarily an indicator of who will win the contest, the 7-point difference shows a big change from just two months ago. In July, Clinton led Sanders by 34 percentage points, with 59 percent to his 25 percent.

Vice President Joe Biden, who is still considering whether or not to run, also earned the support of 17 percent of those surveyed. When those conducting the survey removed Biden from the field, Clinton's lead over Sanders increased -- she led him 53 percent to 38 percent.

The poll surveyed 256 Democratic voters with a margin of error of +/- 6.1 percentage points and 230 Republican primary voters with a margin of error of +/- 6.5 percentage points.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bernie-sanders-hillary-clinton_5606ff75e4b0af3706dc86aa

I have no clue what this poll means. What would actually mean something: A poll of Democrats who claim to be very likely to vote in the Democratic primary, state by state.

September 27, 2015

Someone definitely went to jail for contempt

for refusing to answer questions about Bubba.

Someone definitely got caught trying to steal one of a kind documents.

Someone definitely got a lawsuit settlement of more than she originally sued for once the law on sexual harassment in the workplace changed.

Someone claimed indignantly on national TV that a vast right wing conspiracy was lying about her husband's involvement with Monica Lewinsky, and, under penalties of perjury, he lied about it, too.

To me those things say something; to others, those things say only that the Clintons are trustworthy and honest, but simply perennial victims.

Different stroke for different folks, I guess.

September 26, 2015

Another plug from me for you all to like NH Rep. Timothy Smith on Facebook.

For a change, I am not asking you to donate. But I am asking you to like his endorsement of Bernie and his other posts on his facebook page.

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10152974957721548&id=235121411547&comment_id=10152977878081548&offset=0&total_comments=569


Smither endorsed Sanders despite heavy pressure to endorse another candidate. (Hint: That other candidate was not Chafee.)

As a result, he got likes and responses from many Berners asking to donate to him, campaign for him, etc. Originally, he said he does not do any of that in off years, but catch up with next year. Berners persisted anyway. So, he put up his Act Blue.

He is planning to campaign for Bernie in NH. He thinks liking his page will show other politicians that it is safe -- perhaps safer -- to endorse Bernie than to succumb to pressure.

Come on, Berners. Please do this for a good guy and a good reason.