As was brought up in another post, Barney cleared the air with a few health care warrgarlblers, as seen here. A much more detailed, and lengthy, sample is seen from NECN which maybe gives more of the true feel of the meeting. Thanks to Surgoshan for finding that first clip, btw. The key phrase is asking the protester "On what planet do you spend most of your time?"

Limbaugh, the next day, quips that " We all know that Barney spends most of his time prowling around Uranus" referring to Frank's sexual orientation. The day after that refers to that comment as "a great and funny line" - I dunno bout the great although it was a bit clever if you removed the context of the comment. If you want to listen to the comments check out mediamatters.org and do a Limbaugh search. They've got loads of juicy clips there.

Fox News comes up with this in their coverage of the incident on Fox and Friends. Note the missing pieces when you compare the first or second clip with this one.

I always knew there was some bias to any media outlet's handling of "news", but this seems like a bit too bloody far. Personally, I thought Barney was being a bit too nice about it and by not telling this woman to... well, you know. He got his point across without doing it, though.

It leaves me with a question to pose:

How much media coverage did you Americans see on this one, and how was it spun? Did the right wing loonies jump on it but everyone else leave it alone cause it makes them look bad?

It really depends on the spin one saw how one would look at this particular incident, and it was interesting enough IMHO to deserve a thread of its own.

This weekend, I heard Barack Obama at a town hall with his supporters from the campaign, and a question asked "where are these lies (about Health Care) coming from." Obama got a chuckle out of me when his first response was "Well, we all know where they come from. You flip around the channels and you stop on a certain channel and, well, you know what I'm talking about."

Well, apparently this subject must be covered well enough in another topic to not need a new one. My bad.

Don't worry about it. It's not a bad choice for a topic, it just didn't take off.

I wonder if that woman refers to herself as a table now...

You know? She's cute.

Crazy and stupid (and crazystupid), but cute.

You can change her, Surge. All it takes is enough love...

I really, really doubt that.

Although, if I squirt her enough with a water pistol I'm certain I could convince her not to claw a the sofa.

Just make sure never to break up with her otherwise she'll follow you around with a picture of you with a Hitler mustache.

Oh, I finally figured out what she was referring to. Ezekiel Emmanuel, brother of Rahm Emmanuel, is a bio-ethicist who is currently advising the Obama administration. He has written reams and reams about how health resources ought to be allocated in the event that there isn't enough to give everybody what they need. Because that is what bioethicists do. And out of all those millions of words, one or two sentences have been picked out and twisted out of context to make it sound like he advocates mandatory euthanasia and withholding health care from the disabled. When in reality, he was describing other people's views, as one is apt to do in the middle of a huge dense academic paper. And he is extensively on the record as being against euthanasia.

You know the discussion on health care is completely ******** when the Columbia Journalism Review is commending Wikipedia as "one information source that has shone during this otherwise dark hour for the media".

Now I'm an editor and in fact admin on Wikipedia, and I'm proud of what we do, but if we are the best there is for the healthcare debate then the wharrgarbllers have already won.




Everyone knows crazy sex is great sex....

Here's the thing about Wiki that to me is what they're really commending is the NPV (neutral point of view) that Wiki tries to keep going in their articles. No mainstream media outlet puts as much effort as Wiki does into trying to ensure that NPV prevails, even though they are supposed to.

Is it the most accurate source? Probably not. But at least it tries to be neutral, unlike most others.

Neutrality of itself isn't enough. Wikipedia also has a clause in its neutrality policy which states that fringe theories are not to be given undue weight.

The problem with much of the media is that they treat whatever drivel falls out of Sarah Palin's mouth with equal validity to a well reasoned opponent of health care reform. More so, since they tend to focus more on the lunatics.

I have to admit that I was interested in Palin as a politician because she seemed to be so far out of the usual mold of slimy politician - an Alaskan, rifle shootin', beauty queen, Christian hockey mom. What a Maverick (tm) concept. And initially she came off quite well in the public eye.

I eventually came to the conclusion that she's just not the brightest bulb in the string, and definitely not a good speaker without a tele-prompter. Worse yet, she doesn't seem to comprehend that she comes off as completely uninformed and half-baked every time she opens her mouth to insert her Gucci heels. Reminds me of Dan Quayle, actually, without the political resume.

Maybe it's the Jessica Simpson factor - we like looking at her and thinking what a ditz she is? I really don't have much of an explanation for the fascination with a minor, clueless politician who was an afterthought on a doomed presidential ticket. She is on many levels a liability to the GOP, not an asset, but the right wing media loves her apparently.

The right wing media loves her because she speaks to a significant chunk of their audience: people who are inclined to forgive her failures because she is so very, very ideologically correct.

Another amusing snippet from the health care debate - and interview with Michael Steele on NPR. best bit?