Ah NPR, before 2016 I was happy to support them, sure they had some wacky stuff on air, but they had some amazing programming. But since 2016 they have lost their mind. NPR was left, but in last several years, they went crazy woke, literary every episode became focused on some woke topic, be it DEI, obesity acceptance, how xyz topic is racist, how burning down your local businesses is great, but when those same businesses don't reopen, owners are racists. Not to forget that they became literal propaganda arm of DNC, when on multiple occasions refused to air relevant news about corruption in Democratic Party, best example infamous Laptop of Hunter Biden and NPR calling it Russian Hoax and not relevant.
Today I am almost ashamed to admit that I supported them for years.
I literally jumped out of the shower a few years ago to call my local public radio station to cancel my sustaining membership after one too many stories blaming me, a white female, for the ills of America. And ironically, the day I read The Free Press’ story I got yet another call from them begging for money. Such sweet delight to tell them that my opinion of them had not changed and to please remove me from their calling list (as I’ve asked them to do multiple times!).
I wish I'd set up a spam email address but it's too late now. Unfortunately, the "other' side thinks I'm Michael, so I get all their emails too. How many synonyms are there for "desperate," "begging," "pleading" can there be?
I made the grave error of once writing to Bernie that I disagreed with his nuclear policy. I now get 2-4 emails per day railing against the evil genocide state of Israel. Sometimes I write back telling them to go f--- themselves. It's automated spam with no opt-out. And, that fits perfectly with the Marxists who run Bernie's show these days. He doesn't personally agree with Marxism, but he said, "They're damn good organizers."
Yes but it's important to be clear that all this did not somehow magically come out of nowhere in 2016. The other great public funded media leviathan - the BBC - has also done some great stuff down the years but that does not alter the fact that its smug 'impartiality' pitch has always been a lie and a cover for 50 years of soft-left partisanship. As I said in the original TFP post you just need to look at the people who work in these 'impartial' media empires....how many are left-wing (virtually all of them) and how many are right-wing (virtually none of them).
Conquest's Law -- there's a reason why we call it a Law. The integrity thingee and self-respect kept things in check for a while. And there's that God-shaped hole...
And, it isn't just the news, Graham. I used to really enjoy entertainment on PBS. Now, I cannot stand any UK or US programming made since something like 2016. I watch reruns of good shows and older movies. When I venture away from that I again am shocked to find how terrible it is: all propaganda all the time. And, ideologues do not know how to lecture and still make it fun. They even destroy long running shows that were once zippy & fun, like "Dr. Who". Let's throw in "trans" characters! It's so "normal" and great! And, perhaps they could make an interesting new drama taking place in Africa in the 1700s instead of making Jane Austin characters black? Or, show us a real story regarding black people in the UK in the 1700s? "Amazing Grace" was good but it was made in 2006.
Here's a snippet: "Tv schedules across the Western world are awash with drama serials conforming to a formulaic scriptwriter’s tick-box: Non white person traduced but eventually revealed to be a surprisingly decent sort – Tick....Middle class white person eventually revealed to have a sinister dark side – Tick...Gay Couple included – Tick.... (Post 2017 update: transgender characters urgently needed). More recently it has become an integral part of the story that ‘lgbt’ people are abundant and everywhere. They are bound to be nice as well...."
(Although now I come think of it, didn't we have a conversation along these lines a week or so back?)
Marie Antoinette and All Creatures Great and Small are examples of recent PBS series that weren't preachy and woke. But they are both set in the distant past, and the latter is based on the Herriot novels. You have to watch a "period" program I guess in order not to get that.
I like to point out from time to time that George Orwell, when known as Eric Blair, worked for the BBC, and they apparently had some more or less literal version of "memory holes", in which certain stories were literally burned. So I remember the story, in any event.
We know this happened because impassioned leftists hired their own and froze out everyone else. But this minority is everywhere it needs to be, all bases covered, including taxpayer run institutions, lording it over an entire nation, from what movies we see -- and how they are made-- to the news we read to how our courts are run to, alarmingly, what our law and medical schools teach. Or did management simply cede control to diversity activists?
Liberalism was the only acceptable point of the view, then illiberalism and outright lunacy. I'd love to see an incisive treatment of how we got here. Clearly, the number of us who dropped NPR, which I did years ago, leaves a trail. I remember thinking, ''wait a minute, this is propaganda--who's doing their programming? Who is feeding them these viewpoints?" Is it the DEI admins? Why such power? Political correctness? Are the newer hires steeped in the monomania, and forcing it? Maher seems a nearly perfect example. I wonder the same thing about the White House-- who's pulling the strings? Names, affiliations. If this were any other movement or party there would be 24/7 coverage of who's behind the president, or curtain. Andrew Sullivan makes vague references to 'Brooklyn.' What's the Source?
I think I posted this before but I can't remember. I post so much to this BBS but I think this needs to be said. I believe this is not right or left. It is just commonsense something our politicians don't have:
WHO AM I VOTING FOR - AND WHY?????
That moment when someone says, "I can't believe you would vote for
Trump.”
I simply reply, “I'm not voting for Trump.”
I'm voting for the First Amendment and freedom of speech.
I'm voting for the Second Amendment and my right to defend my life and
my family.
I'm voting for the next Supreme Court Justice(s) to protect the
Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
I’m voting for the continued growth of my retirement 401K and the
stock market.
I’m voting for a return of our troops from foreign countries and the
end to America’s involvement in foreign conflicts.
I'm voting for the Electoral College and for the Republic in which we
live.
I'm voting for the Police to be respected once again and to ensure Law
& Order.
I’m voting for the continued appointment of Federal Judges who
respect the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
I’m voting for our jobs to remain in America and not be outsourced
all over again to China, Mexico and other foreign countries.
I’m voting for secure borders and legal immigration.
I'm voting for the Military & the Veterans who fought for this Country
to give the American people their freedoms.
I'm voting for the unborn babies that have a right to live.
I’m voting for continued peace progress in the Middle East.
I’m voting to fight against human/child trafficking.
I'm voting for Freedom of Religion.
I'm voting for the right to speak my opinion and not be censored.
I'm not just voting for one person, I'm voting for the future of my
Country.
I'm voting for my children and my grandchildren to ensure their
My previous comment was not helpful. But your list of characteristics is not exclusive to conservatives. This is a bifurcation of implementation, caused by fear-mongering by media.
Thank you. But I do disagree with you. Not all of it is on the media but most of it is. The left is cracking down on the first amendment with the PC/Woke BS. PC/Woke is tyranny. If I don't use the approved words I will be castigated and in some cases lose my job, canceled. It is a vicious, cruel practice done exclusively by the left. If I use the wrong pronouns, the same thing can happen to me.
I find these practices reprehensible. How many conservatives do you think yell "Death to America"? I don't believe in men playing in women's sports.
The ever senile Joe saying he is going to appoint a black woman to the Supreme Court is both racist and sexist. Imagine if a white president said he would only appoint only white men to office and the court. The left and the press would be all over it.
I thought the Jan 6 riot was disgusting but I also thought the burning and looting of our cities after a black thug, George Floyd, was killed was reprehensible. I didn't see one leftist or Dem Congress persons condemn the burnings, murder and lootings but they sure as Hell raised Hell about Jan 6 as they should have. Why didn't they condemn and investigate both?
You are right about the press. The MSM is hardcore leftwing. Watch this video to the end and then tell me I'm wrong:
Hmmm... I can't find what I wrote yesterday. But it was brilliant :)
Let's just say that we agree over issues, but differ in our interpretations. I did watch the video, and saw a terminally stupid kid performing suicide by cop. Truth comes out.
As you said, the large number of supporters lost leads a trail. When we lose a customer, I ask myself why. There is no ability at NPR to consider themselves responsible. Cluster B personality disorders are rampant in media.
I think groupthink can do a lot of things. In its extreme form it can dull sensibilities toward cruelty and barbarity, let alone the possibility that someone else may have a legitimate point of view. In today's broader society one needs a strong core to resist the messages bombarding us from every direction.
Perhaps a toxic farrago of groupthink, Freud's urge to destroy----the thrill of it - and hysteria, the mass kind, is brewing. Watch Greta Thunberg's facial expression the next time she's arrested, or waves the Palestinian flag: stimulation and delight. She loves it. At warp speed, she went from an earnest kid with problems obsessed with climate to a full-fledged anti-capitalist, pro- Hamas, anti-western machine. At the heart of all this is Marxism. No matter which intersectional group it is, they're always anti-capitalist. A video in the UK depicted two teenage girls viciously pushing over and kicking a strange woman ,and laughing. We've seen what groupthink can do in the French Revolution- j'accuse -- the Russian Revolution, Mao's Revolution -- all for " the people," and the horror of Nazism, targeting a race for murder. In each case, millions went along.
Political operatives hiding inside social service organizations funded by American tax dollars has got to stop. Billionaire political fascism in which creatures of the Davosphere dictate policy to a corrupt American elected political leadership, which then passes laws and implements and funds immoral assaults on the free citizens of the Republic, is criminal. And, should be treated as such. The theft of citizen labor and treasure by poseur ideologues and criminal financiers has become so day to day commonplace that accountability no longer exists. Hundreds of trillions in treasure and lost and unaccounted for tax dollars. Isn't that what Wall Street thugs call "moral hazard". The "trick/magic" at play in this dark canard is there to convince "we the people" that we can't " bell the cat." We all need to look at that!! (Again: James Lindsay/NEW DISCOURSES on "I see myself as a God." George Soros might help.)
At this point, if we believe our eyes, the entire political/financial enterprise is a grift with the the sole intent of covering up the theft of American life and treasure. The greatest economy in the world brought to its knees and the perps walk again and again. But, the destruction of the peoples lives and the theft of their treasure isn't enough is it? I'm reminded of the actor Laurence Olivier as the Nazi criminal in MARATHON MAN repeating over and over: "Is it safe?..Is it safe?" For those creatures of opportunity flying free inside the malignant vampire pathology of megalomaniac avarice it never is. Hence, the ascent of the surveillance state, the assault on free speech and their hoped for reduction of all free peoples to slavery.They are a kind of spiritual/emotional/psychic poison and their political operatives are "typhoid Mary" inhabitants of the walking dead. Each of us understands clearly that that is exactly what happened to NPR.
Make the line of demarcation personal and clear. Believe in American freedom? THEN BE FREE!! Free of the LIE and the LIAR'S. Free of the doubt and chaos. Take back your power and agency. Remember who you are. And remember that you are not alone.
NPR and their multiple FM transmitters in the 88.1MHz to low 90MHz were awesome connections to the broader world for a lot of rural Americans. The exposure to a different culture was stimulating. Now NPR’s remaining rural listeners are using the broadcast as a “there but for the grace of God go I” lesson.
Very interesting about the 88.1 to low 90s transmitters. As a poet and underground musician I’ve appeared dozens of times in those frequencies on college, publication and Pacifica radio stations but never thought about WHY all those stations were in those frequencies
Same. I was forced by NPR’s demented pro-Palestine bias to stop my regular, decade-long monthly support of my local public radio station, on principle. It’s sad because it’s not really the local station’s fault. But they carry NPR and the BBC most of the day, and I have no inclination or obligation to financially support media outlets that aid and abet the attempted and declared annihilation of Israelis.
If the whole situation weren't so tragic and horrifying, it would almost be funny how overt NPR's bias in favor of Palestine is. I listen almost every day. In the last six months I've heard them mention the hostages taken, tortured and murdered by the Palestinians twice. Not once in that time have I heard any remotely substantive discussion of the details, including the horrific sexual violence, of the pogrom committed by Hamas and their Gazan accomplices October 7; nor of the overt support their atrocities have attracted from the progressive left.
In contrast, I've heard endless NPR puff pieces like a contest for artists who design images of Palestinian resistance fighters; Palestinian families who sell "keffiyehs" all over the world to pro-Hamas leftist/progressives; Palestinian poets and writers who delusionally declare themselves "erased"; the so-called struggles of Arab students on campus, etc. The progressive takeover of NPR is so complete it should understood as an Islamist mouthpiece now.
We have supported WBJC in Baltimore for many years (our grandchildren came with me starting age 12 or so to answer the phone on their 3-times a year short fundraisers. It is not affiliated with NPR, but is devoted to classical music, with experienced and distinctive announcers. You can listen to them anywhere at https://www.wbjc.com/.
Nothing to be ashamed of. Times change, NPR changed, and because you have a brain, you changed. Your story mirrors mine. And we're just two out of thousands (millions?) of people who noticed the rot in NPR and decided to walk away. Perfectly reasonable.
And where else would we get such fine reporting on the deadly contribution to climate change hospitals are guilty of or the crisis of ‘deadnaming’ transgender murder victims by police and investigators assigned to the cases.
Somewhere in the offices of NPR an ambiguously pronouned journalist is pitching a story about the worrisome dangers of paper cuts that, if left untreated, could lead to deadly infection caused by the use of improperly sanitized recycled pulp. Another thing for us to worry about.
I like National Propaganda Radio. I have also heard National Predator Radio on PITT but I think National Propaganda Radio is more comprehensive. For sure "Public" needs to be removed as NPR does not serve the public at large. So, the tax payer funding needs to be removed. NPR will continue as more of the money comes from other sources, like Hyatt. So, National Pritzer Radio would also work.
See: "Today on National Predator Radio (10/31/2022)"
That's a very interesting observation. I'm applying it to myself and wondering if it's accurate. I'm certainly not the same person I was in 2016, that's for sure.
What jump-started my transformation was what I viewed as a shift to the RIGHT by the New York Times. They fired their opinion editor, James Bennet, for publishing an opinion. Then Bari Weiss resigned because she was being harassed by her co-workers for being a Zionist and her editor refused to intervene. The lunatics were now in charge of the asylum.
To me, freedom of the press and free speech had always been left-wing values. Who defended the right of nazis to march in Skokie, Illinois? It was the progressive ACLU. I supported that decision and still do.
But it's impossible to ignore the fact that a shift has occurred, and the Democrats now endorse censorship as a necessary corrective against so-called misinformation. It's disgraceful, cancelling professors and doctors for speaking the truth about covid, or demanding that journalists reveal their sources. What is this country without free speech?
For sure, I see the world differently now. The Democrat policy regarding open borders is folly, and I say this as the grandchild of immigrants. I don't know what to make of these terms anymore: "left," "right." I don't think I've changed my views. Maybe I was too idealistic the entire time.
"To me, freedom of the press and free speech had always been left-wing values."
Freedom of speech has always been and always will be definitionally a right-wing value. The Left is the side that has only ever claimed it when it happened to serve their interests.
While labels ("left" and "right") have changed over time, freedom of speech belongs in the same basket as "individual rights" and "limited government", and opposite all of the collectivisms, including socialism, communism, and welfare states. "Positive rights", aka "entitlements" are always on the side opposite free speech.
But take note: While "progressivism's" initial cause was "democracy is the worst thing ever" because democracy is directly opposite the "progressive" preference (technocracy), today's "progressives" shamelessly describe their "trust the experts" technocratic bent as "democracy". Does that mean they actually value democracy? Of course not. They are very clear in their belief that "voting the wrong way" is "undemocratic". No, their concern for "democracy" is fake, in the same way that their concern for free speech has been fake.
“When I am Weaker Than You, I ask you for Freedom because that is according to your principles; when I am Stronger than you, I take away your Freedom Because that is according to my principles.” - Frank Herbert.
Freedom is a virtue from the side that is opposite collectivism. Nowadays, we describe the former as "right-wing" and the latter as "left-wing".
don't forget their lock step blabber about COVID - not one shred of curiousity about tke skeptics' viewpoint or reasoning. Total propaganda in gushing tones worshipping Fauci and parroting the Biden BS on the subject.
"Right-wing media is in trouble, too. Traffic to top conservative sites is down 40 percent. (The Atlantic)"
Could it be that conservatives value "We report, you decide" - and will seek it out?
I don't read The Free Press because it always agrees with me, or because it makes me comfortable. I read it because I never learned anything from people who agree with me. (Although, admittedly, I am a slow learner.)
Anymore, it's not so much the stories, it's the comments. The front page of the WSJ is a better edited version of HuffPo, with no opportunity for a comments section that will add context. The OpEd section is an excellent place for civil, and robust of exchanges of ideas. It's the only Newspaper' I'll read anymore. My Substack subscriptions (Taibbi, Sasha Stone, FP, Holland) and Greenwald's Rumble are followed by amazing debate filled comments section, where people provide context.
I think that the rise of Substack, and podcasts, has been at the expense of all the old sources. I prefer articles that deal with facts and use logic to reach their conclusions. As soon as I read an author who is relying on terms that are subjective, I'm turned off.
But be careful of what you say on the WSJ comments boards or you'll be banned as I was. They have legions of leftie moderators to police speech. Even speech that mirrors that which its Opinions espouse.
I once peeked into a NYT comments section and was so quickly overcome by the bizarre leftist fanatacism that I thought I'd need an exorcist and a hot shower...
Sad (but not surprised) that the WSJ is into banning speech
I often wonder what people who think like that do for a living, how they contribute productively to society, and how they divest themselves of their privilege.
Yup. Just had a comment canceled on WSJ because I likened the plight of the Rohingya to the Gazans and the Uyghurs…mostly self-imposed (don’t mess with the CCP…look it up…China won’t stand for an inkling of terrorism).
Yep. I had the temerity to use the phrase “mutilating children” and the WSJ comments algorithm immediately deleted my comment. I cancelled my subscription.
I re-subscribed because they have to practically give it away. I think it's $4 per month. A bargain given the content that still hasn't been degraded by these leftist fools.
I just did the same. I canceled last week, but then accepted a $50/year deal/ I'll pay that for the OpEd. The comments lately have been torching the EdBd for their positions on FISA and Iran.
Just be sure you mark your calendar for when the trial subscription rate ends, Bruce. Their normal monthly subscription rate will buy an annual subscription on some Substacks.
These are interesting comments about WSJ moderating its online comments section. Thanks. I usually read in “look-like-a-paper-mode” and don’t see comments. There can be a lot of them like here.
You are correct, the comments are a goldmine. The original author is constrained by time and space, but the comments are not.
The real issue with comments is the noise level and the insane Like Button. Consider the original NPR article - 3,097 Likes and 2,067 comments. All on one page.
It would be a game changer the comments could be distilled into a "wisdom-of-the-crowd" output. Maybe some bright programmer will apply AI to that problem.
"What’s going on? The obvious culprit is Facebook. For years, Facebook’s mysterious algorithms served up links to news and commentary articles, sending droves of traffic to their publishers. But those days are gone. Amid criticism from elected officials and academics who said the social-media giant was spreading hate speech and harmful misinformation, including Russian propaganda, before the 2016 election, Facebook apparently came to question the value of featuring news on its platform. In early 2018, it began deemphasizing news content, giving greater priority to content posted by friends and family members. In 2021, it tightened the tap a little further. This past February, it announced that it would do the same on Instagram and Threads. All of this monkeying with the internet’s plumbing drastically reduced the referral traffic flowing to news and commentary sites. The changes have affected everyone involved in digital media, including some liberal-leaning sites—such as Slate (which saw a 42 percent traffic drop), the Daily Beast (41 percent), and Vox (62 percent, after losing its two most prominent writers)—but the impact appears to have been the worst, on average, for conservative media. (Referral traffic from Google has also declined over the past few years, but far less sharply.)"
To quote my friend Jill "Knock Knock Puddin Head!"
BTW and speaking as an Official hate filled racist homophobic science denier neo-Nazi ulta maga Right Winger Drudge Report stopped being Right Wing Many years ago.
Also I missed the part where Paul Farhi cites his sources. I mean we are talking about The Atlantic.
How many of the people who are so quick to dismiss Fox News do you think have ever actually read any of their reporting? I read Fox News digital several times a week and I find their reporting to be far more fair and balanced and free from bias than any other major news source. Of course they choose to write about issues that the more conservative minded readers are interested in, but the content of their reporting is for the most part free from bias and editorializing. They report the story in a simple and factual manner without an agenda designed to influence the reader. Very few people that are quick with a knee jerk disparaging attitude towards Fox News digital have ever taken the time to read their reporting with an open mind. They criticize out ignorance and groupthink rather than any personal experience. I cannot speak to the broadcast version as I never view it, but the way all l liberals dismiss “Fox News” as a source that only ignorant and uneducated Americans would read, listen to, or trust, only shows their narrow mindedness, arrogance, and ignorance.
I’ve never read RealClearPolitics but thanks I’ll give it a look. Not sure what you are saying about Fetterman - from what I have read recently on Fox digital re Fetterman I felt they were fair and accurately reporting that he is standing with Israel and critical of Biden (although also reporting that he still supports Biden’s reelection). They choose to publish this story because it is critical of Biden no question, but Biden earned the criticism and he will not be criticized anywhere else.
I glanced at the linked article and it pointed to a lot of RINO missing-link media like Druge Report and Federalist. Yeah... "conservative" media that's not populist has fallen, because a lot of the religious right or old-school neocon Reganites have either joined the left or switched to more populist views.
Meanwhile, Timcast is the highest-grossing livestream and is only gaining audience.
True....and without Tucker Carlson.....Fox is almost nothing but boring, yet agreeable.....rhetoric. I can write all their shows. Exceptions - Gutfeld. Maybe Laura Ingraham [used to like her on the radio...so I'm going with her as well].
I did not read the entire Atlantic piece ("Right-Wing Media Are in Trouble The flow of traffic to Donald Trump’s most loyal digital-media boosters isn’t just slowing; it’s utterly collapsing." By Paul Farhi) but I found this funny:
"Some of the bigger names in the field have been pummeled the hardest: The Daily Caller lost 57 percent of its audience; Drudge Report, the granddaddy of conservative aggregation, was down 81 percent; and The Federalist, founded just over a decade ago, lost a staggering 91 percent. (The site’s CEO and co-founder, Sean Davis, called that figure “laughably inaccurate” in an email but offered no further explanation.) FoxNews.com, by far the most popular conservative-news site, has fared better, losing “only” 22 percent of traffic, which translates to 23 million fewer monthly site visitors compared with four years ago."
Reality check:
Matt Drudge sold Drudge Report and it is not at all conservative now. Quite the opposite. I think the readers all left for Instapundit.com run by Glenn Reynolds.
FoxNews now has stories about how it is great to trans your 9 year old child. And they use "preferred pronouns". I think it has gone the way of the WSJ news side - socially progressive - and lost viewership. Also, Fox fired Tucker Carlson who had a lot of viewers.
Rupert Murdock's Newscorp owns WSJ and Fox Corp.
The Federalist has not gone Woke but based on the rest of the paragraph I question the accuracy of the Atlantic reporting about it and would give what Sean Davis says more weight. Beats me about the Daily Caller. But, dream on Paul Farhi. The left tries to create "their reality"/"my truth" by declaring it so with words.
In 2005, Maher received a bachelor's degree from New York University in Middle Eastern and Islamic studies. After internships at the Council on Foreign Relations and Eurasia Group, in 2004 & 2005, respectively, Maher began working at HSBC in London, Germany, and Canada as part of their international manager development program. In 2007, Maher returned to New York City, where from 2007 to 2010, she worked at UNICEF as an innovation and communication officer.
From 2010 to 2011, Maher worked at the National Democratic Institute as an ICT Program Officer. From 2011 to 2013, Maher worked at the World Bank as an ICT innovation specialist and consulted on technology for international development and democratization, working on ICT for accountability and governance with a focus on the role of mobile phones and other technologies in facilitating civil society and institutional reform.
From 2013 to 2014, Maher was advocacy director at the Washington, D.C.-based Access Now. Maher was chief communications officer of the Wikimedia Foundation from April 2014 to March 2016.[Maher became interim executive director of the Wikimedia Foundation in March 2016 following the resignation of executive director Lila Tretikov and was appointed executive director on June 23, 2016. In 2019, Maher became CEO of Wikimedia. From 2022 to 2023, Maher was a member of the US State Department's Foreign Affairs Policy Board, an expert panel established in 2011 by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to advise US officials.
Sucking up to the usual leftie organizations and working at NGOs and leftie thinktanks. An "executive" in name only. But a child of privilege who learned well how to toady. And slurp up its rewards.
Am I wrong to be suspicious of anyone who has never worked in an organization that relies on private citizens voluntarily forking over their hard-earned money? What is it about people whose livelihoods have always depended on taxes or not-for-profit donations?
Yet I have many family members, all very conscientious types, who have spent most all of their careers in the public sector. It has something to do with all organizations, public or private, and their tendency to grow their own budget and self-justify. In the private sector, absent monopolies and oligopolies, at least you have competition and creative destruction. I wonder how many of our educated elites have even heard of Joseph Schumpeter.
Unfortunately, keeping a job for a couple years then moving on is the new model for getting promoted in corporate culture. Companies think someone who stays in a job for even five years is embedded, lazy, risk-averse, or "not up to the challenge." It's a sad change in how we run our companies, but she has to compete in that world if she wants to succeed--and she did.
After high school, Maher graduated from the Arabic Language Institute's Arabic Language Intensive Program of The American University in Cairo in 2003, which she recalled as a formative experience that developed her interest in the Middle East.[10] Maher subsequently studied at the Institut français d'études arabes de Damas in Syria and spent time in Lebanon and Tunisia.[2][11][12]
Don't quote me on this but I recall NPR denied they rely on public funding and said only 5% of their funding comes from the govt. (I swear I heard their former head say this not too long ago but can't remember the source where I heard this now). The rest of their funding comes from charitable foundations. I don't know which ones but given what they've become, most likely they are leftist foundations like the Tide Foundation, Bill & Melinda Gates, the Waltons, etc. ie the same overlords running everything else after making millions off our back.
They said 1%, but they get 30% from their affiliate stations, which are heavily public funded through state requirements or somesuch. There was a good response here yesterday with a detailed breakdown. Anyway, it’s wordsmithing to placate the - well, it’s not masses, anymore, but, you know uh, the people who still give a crap about where NPR gets their money
It’s the donor class. The rich people who green wash their white guilt by buying politicians. Run-of-the-mill voters like me are of no interest to our politicians anymore.
I read in PITT comments today that NPR gets money from Hyatt - which could make them NATIONAL PRITZKER RADIO if we take away whatever public funding they get. Or, even if we do not. I also like National Propaganda Radio.
Somehow I don't think NPR will report on the Cass Review.
“The Billionaire Family Pushing Synthetic Sex Identities (SSI)
The wealthy, powerful, and sometimes very weird Pritzker cousins have set their sights on a new God-like goal: using gender ideology to remake human biology
charitable foundations, what a joke. How much money flows into these organizations which are tax deductible (which means the taxpayer is supporting them) to the person funding them and who knows what their administrative expenses are. They are like a bunch of shell companies hiding their sources
The list of cities with impressive declines in homicides is most revealing for the locations not covered; Chicago, NYC, L.A. , D.C. et.al. Once again, lies, damn lies and statistics.
Before believing the decline numbers it would be useful to examine the reporting of killings in those cities vs attempted killings, manslaughter or other crimes against people. Homicides can be adjusted by bureaucratic procedures.
Thats a great point as well. It does seem like we have had quite a few suicides lately that involves dying in a way someone couldn't likely do alone ;)
And this is also a DROP in deaths. If, say, the year before was the highest murder rare, a drop is good but not amazing, since you were starting so high. Like the Boston numbers. 80% drop. But if they had 100000 murders the year before, an 80% drop is still a HUGE number of murders.
Exactly. I read an article that reported the crime stats in the US are meaningless because there was a change in the system used to report data by the cities a few years ago(2021?), and many cities have not or will not be using this new system which means we’ll never get data from them. These cities include some of the most crime ridden places in the US, as you’ve listed.
Great article. Looks like 2022 wasn’t much better than 2021 for reporting. Notice NY and Missouri, states with high crime numbers were quite low on the reporting map percentage. Thanks for sharing it.
Do you think he chose to throw in that (cherry picked?) crime data in an attempt to include some positive news that could be interpreted as some indication that the left’s insane beliefs on urban crime is not that extreme? The inclusion of it seems a bit incongruous. It’s as if they feel that they need to do this sort of thing less they be viewed as being reliably critical of the left. I get the feeling at times that TFP worries about being viewed as being too consistently critical of the left.
I have to slap myself. I’m in a new world where I actually agree with Senator John Fetterman, a Democrat I assumed would be just another liberal fool, but who has turned out to have an actual moral compass.
He’s right; why DOESN’T the United States stand strong with Israel? Iran for the first time directly attacked them with a barrage of 350 drones and cruise missiles. If this is not a casus belli then nothing is.
What if Iran had fired those weapons at America… would we just shrug, and say “welp, we don’t want a dangerous escalation so we’ll just pretend we didn’t see that, and hope it doesn’t happen again!”
Well, yes, that is exactly what we ARE doing. Our forces throughout the region are being continually attacked and we are responding with 'deterrent' strikes against empty buildings.
Mad dash to finish up a short novel I've been writing, so I've been off the air for the last month or so. Wheeeee, but it's done and off to my editor for the next round!
Its not just the, There are dummies all over the country that don't really understand the history of all of this. Heck, I believe John Stewart just had an episode where he was giving Israel crap for not being less violent in their war. These are the idiots Biden is trying to placate (and likely agrees with anyway).
Yes .....and that is what America is currently doing....Muslims have invaded Amer by invading college campuses the B DS movement is a Muslim invasion of America
True of the old time let me get to DC and enrich myself at the public trough politicians. But the Squad and their like minded compatriots running the White House and worse, staffing the intelligence agencies are not like that. They have an agenda and seek only to impose it on the US and Istael specifically, but also the west in general. I do not think they can be bought. Nor reasoned with.
He also comes out strong against Biden's border policy. HE'S a 'facts' guy' I really misjudged him.
this is a perfect example of how right wing media is as bad as the left when it comes to canceling. I'd like to see if a single prominent right wing journalist got Fetterman right prior to the election. He was smeared at the Kavenaugh/CThomas level.
~3% of Pennsylvania population is Jewish, and many more elderly sympathizers w/ Jews/Israel. That is related to Fetterman break w/ Biden. Biden is looking at Arab votes across the country, especially those in Michigan (Dearborn for example now majority Arab). All that said, I do like Sen. John Fetterman statements in support of Israel.
~3% of Pennsylvania population is Jewish, and many more elderly sympathizers w/ Jews/Israel. That is related to Fetterman break w/ Biden. Biden is looking at Arab votes, especially those in Michigan. All that said, I do like Sen. John Fetterman statements in support of Israel.
It IS coming to the US and soon! Only Fox and ABC actually reported this morning's pro-Palestinian protest that shut down the freeway to O'Hare this morning! They're getting bolder. It won't be long ....
"How Did the War Begin? With Iran’s Appeasers in Washington". Thanks for making is so binary and simple for us Ollie. For a minute, I thought you might actually dig into the complexities of the violence and abuses by both Muslims & Jews over the past decades and that there doesn't seem to be any resolution that doesn't end up costing thousands more lives and tens of billions more from the US taxpayers. But now we know it was just appeasers in DC. Thank goodness it's not something else.
Uri Berliner's interview was outstanding, but the only surprise to the majority us, that NPR has been coopted by progressive liberals for decades, was that he was actually saying it out loud. If I'm a betting man, he's polishing up his resume as we speak. As for Katherine Maher......well it takes about half a second on Google to see that she's a progressive left wing lunatic. So basically now that she's at the helm, NPR will will continue to operate as a psychopathic cult.....until it goes tits up because they're last 3 listeners committed hari kari when Trump or Kennedy get elected.
"there doesn't seem to be any resolution that doesn't end up costing thousands more lives and tens of billions more from the US taxpayers. "
The point was/is that America and the West did not learn anything from the Hitler/Chamberlain era. If Hitler had been stopped in 1935, or Iran in 2008 (or earlier, even 1979) how much in blood and treasure would have been saved up to date? How much more will we have to spend when the spit actually hits the fan, (as it inevitably will) and we are FORCED to defend ourselves, (with absolutely no guarantee of victory)?
And we are both giving the benefit of the doubt to those who keep getting it wrong. Instead of giving it the more nefarious interpretation that our leaders knew exactly what sh** storm they were unleashing.
So you're point isn't lost on me, and I've heard the 1935 Hitler analogy many times......and it seems like comparing apples to grapefruits IMO. I'm not a supporter of Trump, but what seemed to be the magic during his administration that kept most of this type of sh*t tamped down? Hell.....he even relocated of the American diplomatic mission to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv, which if memory served me well the Democrats, main stream media and 2/3's of the globe predicted it would cause nuclear war.
My point was all of this stuff seems extremely complicated and our friend Ollie just seems to be able to tie it up with a nice little bow.
Of course it is complicated. But at the base is the proven failure of attempts to appease despots. Appeasement in 1935 is no different than appeasement in 2008, or thereafter. And the end result will inevitably be the same - more blood, more $ forced later, without any guarantee of final success or even survival.
Yes. But. If we were ruled by angels, we wouldn't need that pesky Constitution thingee, right? So who is the world-grade angel who identifies and takes out the evils a priori the evil?
We are not ruled by angels. We are not even universally, widely ruled by laws or that "pesky Constitution". Most often, we are ruled by the Law of the Jungle, where might makes right. What we strive for is that those who hold the might are also "the good guys".
Dunno to what place you wandered. "Angels" referred to the mythical being who, at the country-leader level, identifies which despot wannabe warrants removal. If the Law of the Jungle applied, any who stuck their head above their bunker would be promptly squashed. Never happened in what was formerly known as the Western practice.
I honestly think Trump was so unusual and predictable back in 2016-2020, foreign leaders were afraid of him--like he might actually push the button and blow the world up. Pelosi et al even warned he would. He so broke the mold and didn't play by the same rule book, they didn't know what to do with him. He was completely unpredictable. China was at a loss how to deal with him. As a result, every other country chose to exercise restraint.
If he wins in 2024, they won't be as reserved. Trump is more predictable now. He's been around longer. Plus his base has made it very clear they want our policy to be isolationist.
I really don't know how people can say lear from the lessons of Hitler on the one hand, then say no more US involvement in foreign wars. I don't even know what Trump means when he said this is Biden's fault for making US weak. I agree he makes US weak and look weak. But how would US be strong by retreating from all foreign conflicts?
If Trump wins, he won't necessarily have to please his base, or anybody. He'll have 4 years, and that will be that. We'll have to trust him. I think it's 60/40 it will work.
The best way to avoid war is to be prepared and ready for war. We (the U.S. and Europe) are not ready.
The question of avoiding foreign wars, in words which have now become ever present, "depends on the circumstances". Should the democracies get involved in the war in Sudan, the war in the DRC, Uganda, Myanmar, etc.? Not in our, or (in our world view) in the world's interest. Assuring the survival of a strong Taiwan, Israel, Greece, Ukraine? Much more important, (to us.)
The US has not fought a war since WWII. Everything since were executive branch forays. Of course the US should engage in necessary foreign WAR. But this using the US military as beat cops has got to stop. For instance, it is pretty clear that Ukraine does not have the manpower (notice that none of the #metoo crowd objects to being excluded in that instance) to defend herself. How long before no US boots on the ground is changed to well just a few?
So that if we had only stopped Hitler mantra is wearing thin. It only has meaning via hindsight. We moved heaven and earth, maybe literally, post WWII to make sure such a thing could never happen again. That the world would be unified because everyone had a stake in peace and would never tolerate it. Yet here we are. In part I think not because of appeasement but rather an unwillingness to acknowledge that decades of investment in that strategy has failed.
It’s possible that the long, Pax Americana of the postwar years lulled generations of people in the West into the false belief that peace is the natural order of things for human beings.
Excellent point. It also explains why so many cannot see, aye refuse to see, the ill intent of others, both at home and abroad. I suppose that kind of belief system defies the Hoffer theory that movements are based on hate.
There has always been, and there will always be a caesar, an Atilla, a Bismark, a Hitler, a Putin who believes he/she was destined to rule the world. There will (or should) always be those prepared to stand up to those despots to preserve their own freedom.
I had heard that part of why we took so long to do anything about Hitler was because during WWI the government and media lied to the American public to get us into THAT war. So when Hitler rolled around, the citizens were gunshy about trusting our institutions again. It took an act that we couldn't ignore or assume was a lie for us to get motivated.
Based on the our track record, I find it VERY easy to understand why our citizens at the time didn't want to get involved
That is interesting. I had not heard that explanation before. When I was a student 20th century history did not interest me much. My mistake. Events of the last few years and trying to inform myself thereon have brought home to me in a big way that a lot of the manipulation of the public did not begin recently.
Its always hard to know how much of what I hear about this stuff is true. But yes, I too have found more and more things that simply show this is normal human behavior. Its just at a much bigger scale than ever before.
We weren't ready to rumble. More to the point, Paris wasn't ready to rumble: there was a very serious worry that the likes of Action Française would provoke civil war. We forget just how divided we were in the years leading up to and during the Munich Crisis.
Then there was Prague. They bottled. Who fights for a country that won't fight for itself? Similar behaviour in Brussels seriously hamstrung the Anglo-French military response right up to the Fall Gelb axe falling.
The least said about the Roosevelt Administration.
Uh, using money taken from taxpayers to fund the MIC under the guise of helping Ukraine. The money tree is no longer bearing fruit. $34,000,000,000,000 in debt. Service on that debt estimated at $865,000,000,000 in 2024. It has to be estimated
because tax revenue is dropping while interest is increasing; at any rate it is very close to surpassing military spending.
In your opinion, is it in America’s national interests to stand by its commitments to the security and territorial integrity of Taiwan, Ukraine, and Israel?
Evan, don't conflate all mid east conflicts. Israel/Palestinians: very complex and requires lots of nuance. Israel/Iran? Seems extremely straightforward. Iran wants to wipe Israel off the map and has a long term plan to achieve it. Not seeing much nuance there...
Perhaps the war began way back to Bush II for eliminating Saddam's Iraq. Iran/iraq were a regional balance of power that served global stability. Our taking out Iraq caused a power vacuum we have no will or commitment to fulfill. We gave Iran the opening to step in and dominate.
Our invasion of Iraq was a mistake. Saddam wasn't even involved with 9/11. We should've focused on Afghanistan and Al Queada. The naive, idealistic NeoCon dream of nation building by Cheney et al is a gift that keeps on giving. We're now dealing with yet another consequence of it.
I suspect that she and everyone at NPR are praying Trump is elected in the fall because that is the surest way to keep their hardcore leftist listeners tuned in! The same can be said for MSNBC and The NY Times.
Wow, crime is dropping rapidly, just in time for an election. You heard it here first! Now brace yourself for NYTCNNWSJWaPo stories explaining how people don’t feel safer despite the good statistics about reduced crime.
A lot of the "drop" in crime is a result of crimes no longer being reported, because people know that the culprits will not be charged, or will be let out immediately on bail, or will receive very short sentences. The risk of retribution for the reporting of crime is getting higher and higher all the time.
That is a puzzler. I guess it depends on how the statistic is created. Is it based on the number of bodies resulting from homicide? Or is it based on the number of murder charges filed?
It is just a headline based on misrepresented data. Those specific cities may be experiencing a drop but Chicago and Philly are through the roof. Not sure about Baltimore.
No. They don't. Death brings a homicide charge even among leftists prosecutors, because they can't get around the dead body issue. But they will reduce the degree of homicide charge drastically to get what they want. What they really do is change attempted murder charges to simple assaults with no bail, which maddens me.
Second degree murder is reduced to simple manslaughter in many of these cases, allowing the homicidally violent criminal to be back on the streets in less than 5 years.
I’m sure the defund the police movement ran out of gas 1-2 years ago and cops are back to doing at least some of the things that discourage or prevent murder. In my area, murder seems to be higher.
I would imagine (and intend to look up) that violent crime excluding murder is up significantly versus 2019 and before.
Number of dead bodies, with "homicide" or "natural causes" determined by the coroner or medical examiner. Homicide stats are very reliable--IF they're all reported to the FBI database. Some cities are withholding right now; why, I don't know.
I've been in Texas, actually! We went down to San Antonio to see my best friend and also to watch the eclipse (although it was somewhat of a bust, thanks to the clouds).
We went to the Alamo. Shopped at Buck-ees. Visited my husband's aunt and uncle in Dallas. Hit Hot Springs, Arkansas on the way home, because I love soaking in hot springs and that's a resource the Midwest has too little of. Too many people there, though!
I tried to look in on TFP occasionally, but part of the joy of the (all too rare) vacation is disconnecting.
Because of the anonymity on this board (and that is a good thing) I wish I knew you were coming. I live just north of SA. I know a great Greek Restaurant in SA, easy to get to, in a shopping mall on I-35. We could have met for lunch.
I, too, had missed seeing you here in the comments section. Glad you're A-okay and that your fam is doing well. I don't respond much in the comments section, but I always scroll down looking for your comments, in particular. Thanks for being here, Celia. You're a wise woman. : )
It wasn't a very long visit, and we didn't pay for the expensive tour. We walked around in the chapel (which is larger than I would have imagined) and read informational placards and perused the gift shop.
I'm immediately skeptical of any of these statistics because it is so easy to manipulate them to obfuscate the real data. Especially in an election year.
Maybe they ask the murder victims if they identify as murder victims. If the dead person doesn’t reply, they mark down “no murder” and hand him a democrat voter registration card.
That Golden Bachelor thing is priceless. No, it doesn’t say anything other than people who go on reality shows are fame whores and gee ya think it was all scripted?
Oliie Wiseman should consider changing his last name, or at least have his "editor card" revoked. Look closely at that murder rate chart. The heading reads "Year to date murder declines" now Look at the footnote - it cites data from March 31st to April 12th, a THIRTEEN DAY PERIOD that certainly is not "year to date" or even close.
And don't forget that the vast majority of murders that occur in ANY city happens during the summer months (omitted)
and to make this lie by omission even worse, where is New York, LA, Chicago, St Louis ? (you know, the murder capitals of the US).
And they don't even care. Witness the justification from the news readers that the state of affairs is so poor, that of course they shouldn't have to be impartial....
Next debate: should America be colorblind ( Coleman Hughes) or anti racist ( X Kendi)? Other debaters could include Wilfred Reilly and Coates or diangelo. Bring it on Bari.
All the more reason to invite them to their intellectual humiliation, and point out to everyone when they decline.
You won't ever see Robin DiAngelo in an environment where she is not universally supported and being paid outrageous amounts of money for her racist hate speech.
No, that would not be fair. Like playing a football game featuring the KC Chiefs and your local high school team. Sowell being the chief of that debate.
I was really hoping for more substantial coverage of Iran's attack. We're already well aware of the Democrats' coddling of Iran. We know what happened in the past. We need to know what is happening--and what is likely to happen--at this point.
Check out the linked Commentary article for a good summary of the defense to the attack. The Abraham Accords are a major step in the right direction. Well done Jared Kushner.
Having spent some time studying international relations as well as Iran, I think this attack makes them look incredibly weak. It was done purely so Iranian citizens or maybe just the hardline clerics can see the regime “did something” in response to Israel, smoking over a dozen of their QF terrorist planners in the Damascus consulate on April 1. Within Iran, they can control the messaging and pretend this was a strong response, maybe even inflate Israeli casualties, but everywhere outside Iran, it just looks like Israel can do whatever it wants to Iran, while Iran is not strong enough to do anything but fund terrorists and militia proxies to conduct terrorism against innocent Israelis.
Figuring next event probabilities is not certain. But I'll put that hat on from my past and take a shot.
1. Iran has learned that their great barrage was useless. So, Iran will hunker down and work to improve.
2. Iran knew that it's barrage wouldn't get through, and Iran fired that as a ruse, in order to lull Israeli's and the USA military into thinking that Iran is a toothless tiger. Iran may be in the process of smuggling an atom bomb (Hiroshima size) into Tel-Aviv, or nearby. There is plenty of food shipments going into Israel now. There is a lot of pressure on Netanyahu to let them through.
There are "respectable" voices published in Western media saying use of a nuke on Tel Aviv is justified. Those voices are the first I have ever seen in the Western press. The Islamists (both Shia and Sunni) are very sophisticated at the public relations war. So, one would expect such PR efforts to appear to prepare the ground for blowing up Tel-Aviv.
In fact, it is possible, (although not necessary to postulate for this latter scenario) that the whole thing, from Oct 7, 2023, was intended to create the PR position to allow Iran to detonate an atom bomb in Israel, and to make Israel's borders more porous, with less careful inspections. My strong leaning is that Oct 7th was not triggered for that reason though. My leaning would be that a long-held idea has had enough time since Oct 7th, to generate a follow-up plan.
My guess is that Iran is probably trying to smuggle a nuke into Tel Aviv, or at least into Israel. If it were detonated where the Israeli army is located, that would allow Hezbollah to overrun Israel potentially. And all the martyrs of Gaza would be, well, martyrs. So there are multiple targets that are worthwhile.
I agree that Iran is set upon unleashing a nuclear weapon against Israel. I hadn't considered an unconventional delivery, although that does seem more likely than a missile attack, after what we saw on Sunday.
It does not surprise me that Leftists are supporting Iran. It's not even very surprising that they favor the use of a nuclear weapon, as long as the user is non-Western.
War ..war ..and more war....start simple America has been invaded and is at war . .but NPR and NYT have not declared..America at war.....so guess maybe we are not at war. ..
Although whistle-blower Uri Berliner doesn't believe that defunding NPR is the way to change its biased reporting, there is a public and private movement underway to do just that. Defunding begins the house-cleaning that needs to be done. After that, there can be some debate to do away with NPR altogether. Personally, I think it might be missed, but not long.
There are those who argue that NPR funding is just a drop in the bucket, so why bother. This is exactly the type of funding we should be cutting to send a message. If we don't start somewhere, even if a minuscule percentage of the total budget, we'll never cut anything.
They should be defunded. Even before the left went insane pre-2010, tax money funding a station clearly left leaning felt wrong to me. And i was firmly a Democrat back then.
That said, they won't be hurting for funding. They're a propaganda mouthpiece for the woke charitable foundations that actually support them. Another reason why they shouldn't get public funding anymore. They don't need it. The question is why leftist woke overlords get tax exempted to fund their pet radio propaganda station. What a scam.
I sent the NPR interview to 3 people I know who are regular listeners - when you get into their cars that’s the station that comes on. One recipient replied that his take was 70% left and 30% center. The other 2 didn’t respond which I took to mean they were happy with that organization being so left wing. And that may be why it is that way - the people who listen want to hear only left wing views.
Definitely but what I think it comes down to is that these left types think they know better than anyone else - they have all the superior answers so really don’t need to hear any other views.
That would be the reaction of all the liberals I know too, which is why I don't even bother. Everything wrong is ok as long as it's their side that does it.
Sadly I think you are right. I persist in thinking that someone from”their side” might influence them - seems to be a useless tactic b/c that person is discredited in their minds and no longer “their side”. One of these individuals actually told my husband to stop sending her articles from the Wall Street Journal- this person worked in corporate America for decades too.
People do not complain about institutions being to THE left. They complain about institutions being to THEIR left. That is why so many people decide that it "only moved left" in some recent year - they themselves are flaming lefties, and they were happy with the bias until recently.
Homicides in U.S. cities: Maybe since last year, but according to John R Lott Jr. ( Crime Prevention Research Center, www.crimeresearch.org ), " the murder rate is still 7.4% above the rate in 2019, before the defund the police efforts started. Yes, the murder rate has declined, but it is still significantly worse than before the policing reforms started."
Ah but they key is: Get the rates really high (gas as an example) and then get some decline and bingo, you have taken serious action and are doing a great job. Or you can just throw the Bull shit flag and actual know failure when you see it. Which the woke crowd can not.
Now, there is a place for journalism that's coming from a particular perspective. Not all media has to be neutral and do its best to be unbiased. That's what you get from Vox (which I enjoyed reading before Matthew Yglesias and Ezra Klein left before it went cuckoo bananas). That's what you get from reason.com. And frankly that's what you get from the Free Press (it definitely comes from a particular perspective and is also not being reported from a purely neutral perspective, nor would I want it to be). There's a place from journalistic commentary coming from a particular perspective, so long as the reader understands what that perspective is.
However, I think a publicly funded news outlet should be held to a different standard. NPR shouldn't be fulfilling the same role as Vox or Slate or reason.com.
The names of the people in power that made the decision to hire Katherine Maher should be made public and held accountable. They unquestionably sought out a person to lead NPR with the beliefs they knew she held. They got exactly what they were seeking.
That she says those things doesn’t mean she actually believes them, which is worse. She grew up in a posh suburb in Connecticut, the daughter of a Goldman Sachs banker father and State representative mother, and went to NYU. She spouts that toxic nonsense both because it’s fashionable and necessary to get ahead in many professions.
Great points. I listened to Batya Ungar-Sargon a while back as she spoke to the idea of class being the issue that creates the woke attitude. How upper class and middle upper class white people adopt a radical progressive ideology as a way to deflect and mask their privilege. As you point out Maher is a classic example of this.
Accountable to whom? Even if you get the names of whoever hired her, those people owe no one anything. They can do whatever they want.
I'm sure they have a board and those board members are the ones who hired her. Most likely they're with all the charitable foundations that fund the bug chunk of their operations. If Jim Jordan's looking for another project, he can inquire into why these woke foundations get tax exempted to fund their own political propaganda station. More than the minimal percentage public funding, I think the tax exemption 501C3 scam is the bigger corruption.
I get it. And you’re most likely correct in that no one will be held accountable, that nothing will change. However, everyone is accountable to someone, directly or indirectly. I don’t know anything about how NPR is structured, but I agree it most likely Maher’s hiring was a done by a board of directors. But they are not above criticism or being replaced - as remote as possibility as I agree that would be. One beauty of capitalism is accountability, and NPR sadly is a great example of state run organization that lacks that accountability
Ah NPR, before 2016 I was happy to support them, sure they had some wacky stuff on air, but they had some amazing programming. But since 2016 they have lost their mind. NPR was left, but in last several years, they went crazy woke, literary every episode became focused on some woke topic, be it DEI, obesity acceptance, how xyz topic is racist, how burning down your local businesses is great, but when those same businesses don't reopen, owners are racists. Not to forget that they became literal propaganda arm of DNC, when on multiple occasions refused to air relevant news about corruption in Democratic Party, best example infamous Laptop of Hunter Biden and NPR calling it Russian Hoax and not relevant.
Today I am almost ashamed to admit that I supported them for years.
I literally jumped out of the shower a few years ago to call my local public radio station to cancel my sustaining membership after one too many stories blaming me, a white female, for the ills of America. And ironically, the day I read The Free Press’ story I got yet another call from them begging for money. Such sweet delight to tell them that my opinion of them had not changed and to please remove me from their calling list (as I’ve asked them to do multiple times!).
Non-profits are incredibly annoying that way (not removing you from their calling/email lists when you request it).
They're annoying to a fault even when you support them. (Hillsdale, I'm looking at you.)
Try donating to a political candidate!!
I wish I'd set up a spam email address but it's too late now. Unfortunately, the "other' side thinks I'm Michael, so I get all their emails too. How many synonyms are there for "desperate," "begging," "pleading" can there be?
I have a separate email just for political donations and can control the spam as nothing else comes there.
Not only that, but they sell or give your name and contact info to every OTHER charity/cause on the planet, who also start soliciting you.
I made the grave error of once writing to Bernie that I disagreed with his nuclear policy. I now get 2-4 emails per day railing against the evil genocide state of Israel. Sometimes I write back telling them to go f--- themselves. It's automated spam with no opt-out. And, that fits perfectly with the Marxists who run Bernie's show these days. He doesn't personally agree with Marxism, but he said, "They're damn good organizers."
Yes but it's important to be clear that all this did not somehow magically come out of nowhere in 2016. The other great public funded media leviathan - the BBC - has also done some great stuff down the years but that does not alter the fact that its smug 'impartiality' pitch has always been a lie and a cover for 50 years of soft-left partisanship. As I said in the original TFP post you just need to look at the people who work in these 'impartial' media empires....how many are left-wing (virtually all of them) and how many are right-wing (virtually none of them).
To your point, 87 Democrats in the NPR newsroom, zero Republicans or Independents. It sounds like the Ivy Leagues.
Conquest's Law -- there's a reason why we call it a Law. The integrity thingee and self-respect kept things in check for a while. And there's that God-shaped hole...
And, it isn't just the news, Graham. I used to really enjoy entertainment on PBS. Now, I cannot stand any UK or US programming made since something like 2016. I watch reruns of good shows and older movies. When I venture away from that I again am shocked to find how terrible it is: all propaganda all the time. And, ideologues do not know how to lecture and still make it fun. They even destroy long running shows that were once zippy & fun, like "Dr. Who". Let's throw in "trans" characters! It's so "normal" and great! And, perhaps they could make an interesting new drama taking place in Africa in the 1700s instead of making Jane Austin characters black? Or, show us a real story regarding black people in the UK in the 1700s? "Amazing Grace" was good but it was made in 2006.
Hi again, On the subject of "isn't just the news" you might find this piece of interest: "https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/non-binary-sibling-is-entertaining
Here's a snippet: "Tv schedules across the Western world are awash with drama serials conforming to a formulaic scriptwriter’s tick-box: Non white person traduced but eventually revealed to be a surprisingly decent sort – Tick....Middle class white person eventually revealed to have a sinister dark side – Tick...Gay Couple included – Tick.... (Post 2017 update: transgender characters urgently needed). More recently it has become an integral part of the story that ‘lgbt’ people are abundant and everywhere. They are bound to be nice as well...."
(Although now I come think of it, didn't we have a conversation along these lines a week or so back?)
Thanks for sending. Will look.
Probably. I've been saying the same things for years now. Good to talk to you. LM
Marie Antoinette and All Creatures Great and Small are examples of recent PBS series that weren't preachy and woke. But they are both set in the distant past, and the latter is based on the Herriot novels. You have to watch a "period" program I guess in order not to get that.
I like to point out from time to time that George Orwell, when known as Eric Blair, worked for the BBC, and they apparently had some more or less literal version of "memory holes", in which certain stories were literally burned. So I remember the story, in any event.
No shame for Car Talk, Wait Wait Don't Tell Me, Prairie Home Companion, This American Life.....
Man, so much fantastic programming before the radical left ruined everything.
God I miss Car Talk
Me too.
Those were the good old days of NPR. Unrecognizable today.
We know this happened because impassioned leftists hired their own and froze out everyone else. But this minority is everywhere it needs to be, all bases covered, including taxpayer run institutions, lording it over an entire nation, from what movies we see -- and how they are made-- to the news we read to how our courts are run to, alarmingly, what our law and medical schools teach. Or did management simply cede control to diversity activists?
Liberalism was the only acceptable point of the view, then illiberalism and outright lunacy. I'd love to see an incisive treatment of how we got here. Clearly, the number of us who dropped NPR, which I did years ago, leaves a trail. I remember thinking, ''wait a minute, this is propaganda--who's doing their programming? Who is feeding them these viewpoints?" Is it the DEI admins? Why such power? Political correctness? Are the newer hires steeped in the monomania, and forcing it? Maher seems a nearly perfect example. I wonder the same thing about the White House-- who's pulling the strings? Names, affiliations. If this were any other movement or party there would be 24/7 coverage of who's behind the president, or curtain. Andrew Sullivan makes vague references to 'Brooklyn.' What's the Source?
I think I posted this before but I can't remember. I post so much to this BBS but I think this needs to be said. I believe this is not right or left. It is just commonsense something our politicians don't have:
WHO AM I VOTING FOR - AND WHY?????
That moment when someone says, "I can't believe you would vote for
Trump.”
I simply reply, “I'm not voting for Trump.”
I'm voting for the First Amendment and freedom of speech.
I'm voting for the Second Amendment and my right to defend my life and
my family.
I'm voting for the next Supreme Court Justice(s) to protect the
Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
I’m voting for the continued growth of my retirement 401K and the
stock market.
I’m voting for a return of our troops from foreign countries and the
end to America’s involvement in foreign conflicts.
I'm voting for the Electoral College and for the Republic in which we
live.
I'm voting for the Police to be respected once again and to ensure Law
& Order.
I’m voting for the continued appointment of Federal Judges who
respect the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
I’m voting for our jobs to remain in America and not be outsourced
all over again to China, Mexico and other foreign countries.
I’m voting for secure borders and legal immigration.
I'm voting for the Military & the Veterans who fought for this Country
to give the American people their freedoms.
I'm voting for the unborn babies that have a right to live.
I’m voting for continued peace progress in the Middle East.
I’m voting to fight against human/child trafficking.
I'm voting for Freedom of Religion.
I'm voting for the right to speak my opinion and not be censored.
I'm not just voting for one person, I'm voting for the future of my
Country.
I'm voting for my children and my grandchildren to ensure their
freedoms and their future.
What are you voting for?
This, all day long, seven days a week, 365 days a year, forever and ever.
Thank you for breaking it down to the most basic explanation.
May I copy your comment and send to some friends. Or would you post this on FaceBook or X for the world to see?
My previous comment was not helpful. But your list of characteristics is not exclusive to conservatives. This is a bifurcation of implementation, caused by fear-mongering by media.
Thank you. But I do disagree with you. Not all of it is on the media but most of it is. The left is cracking down on the first amendment with the PC/Woke BS. PC/Woke is tyranny. If I don't use the approved words I will be castigated and in some cases lose my job, canceled. It is a vicious, cruel practice done exclusively by the left. If I use the wrong pronouns, the same thing can happen to me.
I find these practices reprehensible. How many conservatives do you think yell "Death to America"? I don't believe in men playing in women's sports.
The ever senile Joe saying he is going to appoint a black woman to the Supreme Court is both racist and sexist. Imagine if a white president said he would only appoint only white men to office and the court. The left and the press would be all over it.
I thought the Jan 6 riot was disgusting but I also thought the burning and looting of our cities after a black thug, George Floyd, was killed was reprehensible. I didn't see one leftist or Dem Congress persons condemn the burnings, murder and lootings but they sure as Hell raised Hell about Jan 6 as they should have. Why didn't they condemn and investigate both?
You are right about the press. The MSM is hardcore leftwing. Watch this video to the end and then tell me I'm wrong:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/uproar-ensues-after-chicago-man-killed-in-armed-encounter-with-police/vi-BB1lu2r3?cvid=6b57adbf39fb45f4bb1f405a92f345e6&ei=26#details
Hmmm... I can't find what I wrote yesterday. But it was brilliant :)
Let's just say that we agree over issues, but differ in our interpretations. I did watch the video, and saw a terminally stupid kid performing suicide by cop. Truth comes out.
It was an example of how low the left wing news organizations have sunk.
As you said, the large number of supporters lost leads a trail. When we lose a customer, I ask myself why. There is no ability at NPR to consider themselves responsible. Cluster B personality disorders are rampant in media.
I think groupthink can do a lot of things. In its extreme form it can dull sensibilities toward cruelty and barbarity, let alone the possibility that someone else may have a legitimate point of view. In today's broader society one needs a strong core to resist the messages bombarding us from every direction.
Perhaps a toxic farrago of groupthink, Freud's urge to destroy----the thrill of it - and hysteria, the mass kind, is brewing. Watch Greta Thunberg's facial expression the next time she's arrested, or waves the Palestinian flag: stimulation and delight. She loves it. At warp speed, she went from an earnest kid with problems obsessed with climate to a full-fledged anti-capitalist, pro- Hamas, anti-western machine. At the heart of all this is Marxism. No matter which intersectional group it is, they're always anti-capitalist. A video in the UK depicted two teenage girls viciously pushing over and kicking a strange woman ,and laughing. We've seen what groupthink can do in the French Revolution- j'accuse -- the Russian Revolution, Mao's Revolution -- all for " the people," and the horror of Nazism, targeting a race for murder. In each case, millions went along.
A very insightful comment Susan
Well obviously anyone who doesn't support them is a "bad person" and is good riddance.
Political operatives hiding inside social service organizations funded by American tax dollars has got to stop. Billionaire political fascism in which creatures of the Davosphere dictate policy to a corrupt American elected political leadership, which then passes laws and implements and funds immoral assaults on the free citizens of the Republic, is criminal. And, should be treated as such. The theft of citizen labor and treasure by poseur ideologues and criminal financiers has become so day to day commonplace that accountability no longer exists. Hundreds of trillions in treasure and lost and unaccounted for tax dollars. Isn't that what Wall Street thugs call "moral hazard". The "trick/magic" at play in this dark canard is there to convince "we the people" that we can't " bell the cat." We all need to look at that!! (Again: James Lindsay/NEW DISCOURSES on "I see myself as a God." George Soros might help.)
At this point, if we believe our eyes, the entire political/financial enterprise is a grift with the the sole intent of covering up the theft of American life and treasure. The greatest economy in the world brought to its knees and the perps walk again and again. But, the destruction of the peoples lives and the theft of their treasure isn't enough is it? I'm reminded of the actor Laurence Olivier as the Nazi criminal in MARATHON MAN repeating over and over: "Is it safe?..Is it safe?" For those creatures of opportunity flying free inside the malignant vampire pathology of megalomaniac avarice it never is. Hence, the ascent of the surveillance state, the assault on free speech and their hoped for reduction of all free peoples to slavery.They are a kind of spiritual/emotional/psychic poison and their political operatives are "typhoid Mary" inhabitants of the walking dead. Each of us understands clearly that that is exactly what happened to NPR.
Make the line of demarcation personal and clear. Believe in American freedom? THEN BE FREE!! Free of the LIE and the LIAR'S. Free of the doubt and chaos. Take back your power and agency. Remember who you are. And remember that you are not alone.
NPR and their multiple FM transmitters in the 88.1MHz to low 90MHz were awesome connections to the broader world for a lot of rural Americans. The exposure to a different culture was stimulating. Now NPR’s remaining rural listeners are using the broadcast as a “there but for the grace of God go I” lesson.
The once did Classical Music, too. Only source thereof, many places.
Jazz too.
Quite so -- and the Real Thing, at that.
I propose the FCC reallocate those frequencies.
Very interesting about the 88.1 to low 90s transmitters. As a poet and underground musician I’ve appeared dozens of times in those frequencies on college, publication and Pacifica radio stations but never thought about WHY all those stations were in those frequencies
Same. I was forced by NPR’s demented pro-Palestine bias to stop my regular, decade-long monthly support of my local public radio station, on principle. It’s sad because it’s not really the local station’s fault. But they carry NPR and the BBC most of the day, and I have no inclination or obligation to financially support media outlets that aid and abet the attempted and declared annihilation of Israelis.
They've been horrifying on that front. There's a reason some call it national palestinian radio. Because it pretty much is.
If the whole situation weren't so tragic and horrifying, it would almost be funny how overt NPR's bias in favor of Palestine is. I listen almost every day. In the last six months I've heard them mention the hostages taken, tortured and murdered by the Palestinians twice. Not once in that time have I heard any remotely substantive discussion of the details, including the horrific sexual violence, of the pogrom committed by Hamas and their Gazan accomplices October 7; nor of the overt support their atrocities have attracted from the progressive left.
In contrast, I've heard endless NPR puff pieces like a contest for artists who design images of Palestinian resistance fighters; Palestinian families who sell "keffiyehs" all over the world to pro-Hamas leftist/progressives; Palestinian poets and writers who delusionally declare themselves "erased"; the so-called struggles of Arab students on campus, etc. The progressive takeover of NPR is so complete it should understood as an Islamist mouthpiece now.
We have supported WBJC in Baltimore for many years (our grandchildren came with me starting age 12 or so to answer the phone on their 3-times a year short fundraisers. It is not affiliated with NPR, but is devoted to classical music, with experienced and distinctive announcers. You can listen to them anywhere at https://www.wbjc.com/.
Nothing to be ashamed of. Times change, NPR changed, and because you have a brain, you changed. Your story mirrors mine. And we're just two out of thousands (millions?) of people who noticed the rot in NPR and decided to walk away. Perfectly reasonable.
I heard their viewership is down, so it is not just us. Listen to Walter Kirn and Matt Tabbi on this topic.
Yes, thanks. I love those guys. Matt really did his homework on that one.
Make it 3, Beeswax :)
When I did listen to NPR it was usually the Click and Clack Brothers. They were apolitical and really entertaining.
And where else would we get such fine reporting on the deadly contribution to climate change hospitals are guilty of or the crisis of ‘deadnaming’ transgender murder victims by police and investigators assigned to the cases.
Somewhere in the offices of NPR an ambiguously pronouned journalist is pitching a story about the worrisome dangers of paper cuts that, if left untreated, could lead to deadly infection caused by the use of improperly sanitized recycled pulp. Another thing for us to worry about.
National Propaganda Radio. Hmm it fits. Maybe somebody can come up with something better.
I used to call it Nearly Pravda Radio before I had to quit listening to it after Trump got elected. That's when it truly went off the rails.
I like National Propaganda Radio. I have also heard National Predator Radio on PITT but I think National Propaganda Radio is more comprehensive. For sure "Public" needs to be removed as NPR does not serve the public at large. So, the tax payer funding needs to be removed. NPR will continue as more of the money comes from other sources, like Hyatt. So, National Pritzer Radio would also work.
See: "Today on National Predator Radio (10/31/2022)"
https://pitt.substack.com/p/today-on-national-predator-radio
People do not notice when institutions move to THE left. They notice when institutions move to THEIR left.
Anyone who thinks that NPR only started to go bad at some point in the 21st century has no idea how far left he is.
That's a very interesting observation. I'm applying it to myself and wondering if it's accurate. I'm certainly not the same person I was in 2016, that's for sure.
What jump-started my transformation was what I viewed as a shift to the RIGHT by the New York Times. They fired their opinion editor, James Bennet, for publishing an opinion. Then Bari Weiss resigned because she was being harassed by her co-workers for being a Zionist and her editor refused to intervene. The lunatics were now in charge of the asylum.
To me, freedom of the press and free speech had always been left-wing values. Who defended the right of nazis to march in Skokie, Illinois? It was the progressive ACLU. I supported that decision and still do.
But it's impossible to ignore the fact that a shift has occurred, and the Democrats now endorse censorship as a necessary corrective against so-called misinformation. It's disgraceful, cancelling professors and doctors for speaking the truth about covid, or demanding that journalists reveal their sources. What is this country without free speech?
For sure, I see the world differently now. The Democrat policy regarding open borders is folly, and I say this as the grandchild of immigrants. I don't know what to make of these terms anymore: "left," "right." I don't think I've changed my views. Maybe I was too idealistic the entire time.
"To me, freedom of the press and free speech had always been left-wing values."
Freedom of speech has always been and always will be definitionally a right-wing value. The Left is the side that has only ever claimed it when it happened to serve their interests.
While labels ("left" and "right") have changed over time, freedom of speech belongs in the same basket as "individual rights" and "limited government", and opposite all of the collectivisms, including socialism, communism, and welfare states. "Positive rights", aka "entitlements" are always on the side opposite free speech.
But take note: While "progressivism's" initial cause was "democracy is the worst thing ever" because democracy is directly opposite the "progressive" preference (technocracy), today's "progressives" shamelessly describe their "trust the experts" technocratic bent as "democracy". Does that mean they actually value democracy? Of course not. They are very clear in their belief that "voting the wrong way" is "undemocratic". No, their concern for "democracy" is fake, in the same way that their concern for free speech has been fake.
“When I am Weaker Than You, I ask you for Freedom because that is according to your principles; when I am Stronger than you, I take away your Freedom Because that is according to my principles.” - Frank Herbert.
Freedom is a virtue from the side that is opposite collectivism. Nowadays, we describe the former as "right-wing" and the latter as "left-wing".
Count me among those who stopped writing those checks. Maybe a decade ago or so.
It isn't worth supporting.
don't forget their lock step blabber about COVID - not one shred of curiousity about tke skeptics' viewpoint or reasoning. Total propaganda in gushing tones worshipping Fauci and parroting the Biden BS on the subject.
"Right-wing media is in trouble, too. Traffic to top conservative sites is down 40 percent. (The Atlantic)"
Could it be that conservatives value "We report, you decide" - and will seek it out?
I don't read The Free Press because it always agrees with me, or because it makes me comfortable. I read it because I never learned anything from people who agree with me. (Although, admittedly, I am a slow learner.)
Anymore, it's not so much the stories, it's the comments. The front page of the WSJ is a better edited version of HuffPo, with no opportunity for a comments section that will add context. The OpEd section is an excellent place for civil, and robust of exchanges of ideas. It's the only Newspaper' I'll read anymore. My Substack subscriptions (Taibbi, Sasha Stone, FP, Holland) and Greenwald's Rumble are followed by amazing debate filled comments section, where people provide context.
I think that the rise of Substack, and podcasts, has been at the expense of all the old sources. I prefer articles that deal with facts and use logic to reach their conclusions. As soon as I read an author who is relying on terms that are subjective, I'm turned off.
But be careful of what you say on the WSJ comments boards or you'll be banned as I was. They have legions of leftie moderators to police speech. Even speech that mirrors that which its Opinions espouse.
I once peeked into a NYT comments section and was so quickly overcome by the bizarre leftist fanatacism that I thought I'd need an exorcist and a hot shower...
Sad (but not surprised) that the WSJ is into banning speech
I often wonder what people who think like that do for a living, how they contribute productively to society, and how they divest themselves of their privilege.
(1) Nothing/beg for handouts
(2) They don't
(3) See (2)
Yup. Just had a comment canceled on WSJ because I likened the plight of the Rohingya to the Gazans and the Uyghurs…mostly self-imposed (don’t mess with the CCP…look it up…China won’t stand for an inkling of terrorism).
Yep. I had the temerity to use the phrase “mutilating children” and the WSJ comments algorithm immediately deleted my comment. I cancelled my subscription.
I re-subscribed because they have to practically give it away. I think it's $4 per month. A bargain given the content that still hasn't been degraded by these leftist fools.
I just did the same. I canceled last week, but then accepted a $50/year deal/ I'll pay that for the OpEd. The comments lately have been torching the EdBd for their positions on FISA and Iran.
Just be sure you mark your calendar for when the trial subscription rate ends, Bruce. Their normal monthly subscription rate will buy an annual subscription on some Substacks.
These are interesting comments about WSJ moderating its online comments section. Thanks. I usually read in “look-like-a-paper-mode” and don’t see comments. There can be a lot of them like here.
News organizations of the future must allow democratic feedback with no censorship.
It has become the critical balance to unchecked propaganda.
You are correct, the comments are a goldmine. The original author is constrained by time and space, but the comments are not.
The real issue with comments is the noise level and the insane Like Button. Consider the original NPR article - 3,097 Likes and 2,067 comments. All on one page.
It would be a game changer the comments could be distilled into a "wisdom-of-the-crowd" output. Maybe some bright programmer will apply AI to that problem.
"What’s going on? The obvious culprit is Facebook. For years, Facebook’s mysterious algorithms served up links to news and commentary articles, sending droves of traffic to their publishers. But those days are gone. Amid criticism from elected officials and academics who said the social-media giant was spreading hate speech and harmful misinformation, including Russian propaganda, before the 2016 election, Facebook apparently came to question the value of featuring news on its platform. In early 2018, it began deemphasizing news content, giving greater priority to content posted by friends and family members. In 2021, it tightened the tap a little further. This past February, it announced that it would do the same on Instagram and Threads. All of this monkeying with the internet’s plumbing drastically reduced the referral traffic flowing to news and commentary sites. The changes have affected everyone involved in digital media, including some liberal-leaning sites—such as Slate (which saw a 42 percent traffic drop), the Daily Beast (41 percent), and Vox (62 percent, after losing its two most prominent writers)—but the impact appears to have been the worst, on average, for conservative media. (Referral traffic from Google has also declined over the past few years, but far less sharply.)"
To quote my friend Jill "Knock Knock Puddin Head!"
BTW and speaking as an Official hate filled racist homophobic science denier neo-Nazi ulta maga Right Winger Drudge Report stopped being Right Wing Many years ago.
Also I missed the part where Paul Farhi cites his sources. I mean we are talking about The Atlantic.
Somebody tell the Lefties, who still reply to everything they disagree with by attributing it to Fox News.
How many of the people who are so quick to dismiss Fox News do you think have ever actually read any of their reporting? I read Fox News digital several times a week and I find their reporting to be far more fair and balanced and free from bias than any other major news source. Of course they choose to write about issues that the more conservative minded readers are interested in, but the content of their reporting is for the most part free from bias and editorializing. They report the story in a simple and factual manner without an agenda designed to influence the reader. Very few people that are quick with a knee jerk disparaging attitude towards Fox News digital have ever taken the time to read their reporting with an open mind. They criticize out ignorance and groupthink rather than any personal experience. I cannot speak to the broadcast version as I never view it, but the way all l liberals dismiss “Fox News” as a source that only ignorant and uneducated Americans would read, listen to, or trust, only shows their narrow mindedness, arrogance, and ignorance.
They did to Fetterman what the left did to Kavanaugh.
I would agree that they are better than MSNBC/CNN/ABC/CBS/NBC, but since the kids took over, they're being pushed to the center.
I start with RealClearPolitics, and then fact check from there.
I’ve never read RealClearPolitics but thanks I’ll give it a look. Not sure what you are saying about Fetterman - from what I have read recently on Fox digital re Fetterman I felt they were fair and accurately reporting that he is standing with Israel and critical of Biden (although also reporting that he still supports Biden’s reelection). They choose to publish this story because it is critical of Biden no question, but Biden earned the criticism and he will not be criticized anywhere else.
I glanced at the linked article and it pointed to a lot of RINO missing-link media like Druge Report and Federalist. Yeah... "conservative" media that's not populist has fallen, because a lot of the religious right or old-school neocon Reganites have either joined the left or switched to more populist views.
Meanwhile, Timcast is the highest-grossing livestream and is only gaining audience.
True....and without Tucker Carlson.....Fox is almost nothing but boring, yet agreeable.....rhetoric. I can write all their shows. Exceptions - Gutfeld. Maybe Laura Ingraham [used to like her on the radio...so I'm going with her as well].
I did not read the entire Atlantic piece ("Right-Wing Media Are in Trouble The flow of traffic to Donald Trump’s most loyal digital-media boosters isn’t just slowing; it’s utterly collapsing." By Paul Farhi) but I found this funny:
"Some of the bigger names in the field have been pummeled the hardest: The Daily Caller lost 57 percent of its audience; Drudge Report, the granddaddy of conservative aggregation, was down 81 percent; and The Federalist, founded just over a decade ago, lost a staggering 91 percent. (The site’s CEO and co-founder, Sean Davis, called that figure “laughably inaccurate” in an email but offered no further explanation.) FoxNews.com, by far the most popular conservative-news site, has fared better, losing “only” 22 percent of traffic, which translates to 23 million fewer monthly site visitors compared with four years ago."
Reality check:
Matt Drudge sold Drudge Report and it is not at all conservative now. Quite the opposite. I think the readers all left for Instapundit.com run by Glenn Reynolds.
FoxNews now has stories about how it is great to trans your 9 year old child. And they use "preferred pronouns". I think it has gone the way of the WSJ news side - socially progressive - and lost viewership. Also, Fox fired Tucker Carlson who had a lot of viewers.
Rupert Murdock's Newscorp owns WSJ and Fox Corp.
The Federalist has not gone Woke but based on the rest of the paragraph I question the accuracy of the Atlantic reporting about it and would give what Sean Davis says more weight. Beats me about the Daily Caller. But, dream on Paul Farhi. The left tries to create "their reality"/"my truth" by declaring it so with words.
I want to know who were the people or person who installed Katherine Maher as CEO of NPR?
In 2005, Maher received a bachelor's degree from New York University in Middle Eastern and Islamic studies. After internships at the Council on Foreign Relations and Eurasia Group, in 2004 & 2005, respectively, Maher began working at HSBC in London, Germany, and Canada as part of their international manager development program. In 2007, Maher returned to New York City, where from 2007 to 2010, she worked at UNICEF as an innovation and communication officer.
From 2010 to 2011, Maher worked at the National Democratic Institute as an ICT Program Officer. From 2011 to 2013, Maher worked at the World Bank as an ICT innovation specialist and consulted on technology for international development and democratization, working on ICT for accountability and governance with a focus on the role of mobile phones and other technologies in facilitating civil society and institutional reform.
From 2013 to 2014, Maher was advocacy director at the Washington, D.C.-based Access Now. Maher was chief communications officer of the Wikimedia Foundation from April 2014 to March 2016.[Maher became interim executive director of the Wikimedia Foundation in March 2016 following the resignation of executive director Lila Tretikov and was appointed executive director on June 23, 2016. In 2019, Maher became CEO of Wikimedia. From 2022 to 2023, Maher was a member of the US State Department's Foreign Affairs Policy Board, an expert panel established in 2011 by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to advise US officials.
Sucking up to the usual leftie organizations and working at NGOs and leftie thinktanks. An "executive" in name only. But a child of privilege who learned well how to toady. And slurp up its rewards.
Damn. Hard to imagine a more partisan profile than that.
Her memo to staffers reads like a textbook apparatchik who does not yet feel compromised in her power.
Yes. Her memo used more than a thousand words to say exactly nothing.
Am I wrong to be suspicious of anyone who has never worked in an organization that relies on private citizens voluntarily forking over their hard-earned money? What is it about people whose livelihoods have always depended on taxes or not-for-profit donations?
Ya mean like career politicians? (aka life support for the former Popular Kids?)
Think about every kid who ran for student government. Assholes all.
Election was one of the best sociopolitical commentaries of our time. Tracy Flick is every one of them.
Yet I have many family members, all very conscientious types, who have spent most all of their careers in the public sector. It has something to do with all organizations, public or private, and their tendency to grow their own budget and self-justify. In the private sector, absent monopolies and oligopolies, at least you have competition and creative destruction. I wonder how many of our educated elites have even heard of Joseph Schumpeter.
AND...Wikipeidia, which is totally lost in terms of reliability.
I am thinking Wikimedia might be worse.
Woman can’t hold a job!
Unfortunately, keeping a job for a couple years then moving on is the new model for getting promoted in corporate culture. Companies think someone who stays in a job for even five years is embedded, lazy, risk-averse, or "not up to the challenge." It's a sad change in how we run our companies, but she has to compete in that world if she wants to succeed--and she did.
She sure is holding the NPR gig.
Perfect for NPR National Palestine Radio;
After high school, Maher graduated from the Arabic Language Institute's Arabic Language Intensive Program of The American University in Cairo in 2003, which she recalled as a formative experience that developed her interest in the Middle East.[10] Maher subsequently studied at the Institut français d'études arabes de Damas in Syria and spent time in Lebanon and Tunisia.[2][11][12]
I wonder if she is a full blown communists. I wouldn't doubt it.
Or she could be just a crass opportunist who knows which way the wind is blowing.
She’s a spook.
Don't quote me on this but I recall NPR denied they rely on public funding and said only 5% of their funding comes from the govt. (I swear I heard their former head say this not too long ago but can't remember the source where I heard this now). The rest of their funding comes from charitable foundations. I don't know which ones but given what they've become, most likely they are leftist foundations like the Tide Foundation, Bill & Melinda Gates, the Waltons, etc. ie the same overlords running everything else after making millions off our back.
They said 1%, but they get 30% from their affiliate stations, which are heavily public funded through state requirements or somesuch. There was a good response here yesterday with a detailed breakdown. Anyway, it’s wordsmithing to placate the - well, it’s not masses, anymore, but, you know uh, the people who still give a crap about where NPR gets their money
It’s the donor class. The rich people who green wash their white guilt by buying politicians. Run-of-the-mill voters like me are of no interest to our politicians anymore.
Yup. God knows how they let their guilt get in the way of their Viking cruises or summers on Nantucket or Jackson Hole…
I read in PITT comments today that NPR gets money from Hyatt - which could make them NATIONAL PRITZKER RADIO if we take away whatever public funding they get. Or, even if we do not. I also like National Propaganda Radio.
Somehow I don't think NPR will report on the Cass Review.
“The Billionaire Family Pushing Synthetic Sex Identities (SSI)
The wealthy, powerful, and sometimes very weird Pritzker cousins have set their sights on a new God-like goal: using gender ideology to remake human biology
BY JENNIFER BILEK”
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/billionaire-family-pushing-synthetic-sex-identities-ssi-pritzkers
charitable foundations, what a joke. How much money flows into these organizations which are tax deductible (which means the taxpayer is supporting them) to the person funding them and who knows what their administrative expenses are. They are like a bunch of shell companies hiding their sources
Probably the 3 letter agencies. Gory details of her cringe commissar resume and wedding here: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/commissar-npr-ceo-katherine-maher-she-her
Wow - it's even worse than I thought it would be!
great writing YB
I think it was Jane Fonda 😉
The list of cities with impressive declines in homicides is most revealing for the locations not covered; Chicago, NYC, L.A. , D.C. et.al. Once again, lies, damn lies and statistics.
Thought the same thing. Did Chicago, L.A., D.C. all show increases? Probably.
And Boston, leading the way with an 82% decline had only about 35 murders last year. Even a small downtick will create a large percentage change.
Before believing the decline numbers it would be useful to examine the reporting of killings in those cities vs attempted killings, manslaughter or other crimes against people. Homicides can be adjusted by bureaucratic procedures.
Also important. Murders could be down,...but what about ATTEMPTED murders? A single statistic is meaningless. Oliver should know that
And don't forget uncharged/unsolved mystery crimes that don't end up as chargeable offenses or are assumed "suicide"
Thats a great point as well. It does seem like we have had quite a few suicides lately that involves dying in a way someone couldn't likely do alone ;)
And this is also a DROP in deaths. If, say, the year before was the highest murder rare, a drop is good but not amazing, since you were starting so high. Like the Boston numbers. 80% drop. But if they had 100000 murders the year before, an 80% drop is still a HUGE number of murders.
Great observation. If your murder rate is low, it doesn't take much of a drop to show a high percentage drop.
Exactly. I read an article that reported the crime stats in the US are meaningless because there was a change in the system used to report data by the cities a few years ago(2021?), and many cities have not or will not be using this new system which means we’ll never get data from them. These cities include some of the most crime ridden places in the US, as you’ve listed.
It's complicated. 2021 was absolutely jacked up. Maybe 2023 is back on track. Details here.
https://kansasreflector.com/2023/10/29/politicians-love-to-cite-crime-data-its-often-wrong/#:~:text=Meanwhile%2C%20even%20as%20more%20law,property%20crimes%20are%20never%20reported.
Great article. Looks like 2022 wasn’t much better than 2021 for reporting. Notice NY and Missouri, states with high crime numbers were quite low on the reporting map percentage. Thanks for sharing it.
Do you think he chose to throw in that (cherry picked?) crime data in an attempt to include some positive news that could be interpreted as some indication that the left’s insane beliefs on urban crime is not that extreme? The inclusion of it seems a bit incongruous. It’s as if they feel that they need to do this sort of thing less they be viewed as being reliably critical of the left. I get the feeling at times that TFP worries about being viewed as being too consistently critical of the left.
Yes, TFP carefully tiptoes around any issue that may offend the left. They don't want to chase away the NYT crowd they are chasing.
What it reveals to me is blacks are getting smarter, in those city's cited in declines.
I have to slap myself. I’m in a new world where I actually agree with Senator John Fetterman, a Democrat I assumed would be just another liberal fool, but who has turned out to have an actual moral compass.
He’s right; why DOESN’T the United States stand strong with Israel? Iran for the first time directly attacked them with a barrage of 350 drones and cruise missiles. If this is not a casus belli then nothing is.
What if Iran had fired those weapons at America… would we just shrug, and say “welp, we don’t want a dangerous escalation so we’ll just pretend we didn’t see that, and hope it doesn’t happen again!”
Well, yes, that is exactly what we ARE doing. Our forces throughout the region are being continually attacked and we are responding with 'deterrent' strikes against empty buildings.
YES! That moron we have as President told these murderous clowns when and where we were going to attack.
When you intentionally spill classified information to the enemy isn't that treason?
Biden won't go all out to support Israel because he'a being held hostage by a deranged mob of emotionally stunted pro-Palestine "anti-colonialists".
But why should he be worried about a few thousand votes from Dearborn when he has the millions of illegals?
For Christ sake! Quit calling them illegals. Call them what they really are. They are undocumented Democrats. Geez!
Undocs!
Where have you been? I haven't seen you in a while.
Mad dash to finish up a short novel I've been writing, so I've been off the air for the last month or so. Wheeeee, but it's done and off to my editor for the next round!
😉😏😂
Its not just the, There are dummies all over the country that don't really understand the history of all of this. Heck, I believe John Stewart just had an episode where he was giving Israel crap for not being less violent in their war. These are the idiots Biden is trying to placate (and likely agrees with anyway).
Biden doesn't know where his own behind is half the time. Can't tell the difference between his wife and sister.
Yes .....and that is what America is currently doing....Muslims have invaded Amer by invading college campuses the B DS movement is a Muslim invasion of America
Please. They have invaded the hallowed halls of Congress. And the White House. Can that be reconciled with separation of church and state?
No just weak people who can be bought
True of the old time let me get to DC and enrich myself at the public trough politicians. But the Squad and their like minded compatriots running the White House and worse, staffing the intelligence agencies are not like that. They have an agenda and seek only to impose it on the US and Istael specifically, but also the west in general. I do not think they can be bought. Nor reasoned with.
But he still supports Biden and thinks he’s doing great. Not a joke man.
He also comes out strong against Biden's border policy. HE'S a 'facts' guy' I really misjudged him.
this is a perfect example of how right wing media is as bad as the left when it comes to canceling. I'd like to see if a single prominent right wing journalist got Fetterman right prior to the election. He was smeared at the Kavenaugh/CThomas level.
Fetterman is just a tool to keep the D rank and file convinced their party supports Israel. It doesn’t.
However, I just saw a clip where he said Joe was doing a great job and sharp as a tack.
It doesn't cost him anything to say that.
~3% of Pennsylvania population is Jewish, and many more elderly sympathizers w/ Jews/Israel. That is related to Fetterman break w/ Biden. Biden is looking at Arab votes across the country, especially those in Michigan (Dearborn for example now majority Arab). All that said, I do like Sen. John Fetterman statements in support of Israel.
~3% of Pennsylvania population is Jewish, and many more elderly sympathizers w/ Jews/Israel. That is related to Fetterman break w/ Biden. Biden is looking at Arab votes, especially those in Michigan. All that said, I do like Sen. John Fetterman statements in support of Israel.
It IS coming to the US and soon! Only Fox and ABC actually reported this morning's pro-Palestinian protest that shut down the freeway to O'Hare this morning! They're getting bolder. It won't be long ....
Because his handlers have left him.
When he was incapacitated, his policy positions were that of the Blob speaking for him.
"How Did the War Begin? With Iran’s Appeasers in Washington". Thanks for making is so binary and simple for us Ollie. For a minute, I thought you might actually dig into the complexities of the violence and abuses by both Muslims & Jews over the past decades and that there doesn't seem to be any resolution that doesn't end up costing thousands more lives and tens of billions more from the US taxpayers. But now we know it was just appeasers in DC. Thank goodness it's not something else.
Uri Berliner's interview was outstanding, but the only surprise to the majority us, that NPR has been coopted by progressive liberals for decades, was that he was actually saying it out loud. If I'm a betting man, he's polishing up his resume as we speak. As for Katherine Maher......well it takes about half a second on Google to see that she's a progressive left wing lunatic. So basically now that she's at the helm, NPR will will continue to operate as a psychopathic cult.....until it goes tits up because they're last 3 listeners committed hari kari when Trump or Kennedy get elected.
"there doesn't seem to be any resolution that doesn't end up costing thousands more lives and tens of billions more from the US taxpayers. "
The point was/is that America and the West did not learn anything from the Hitler/Chamberlain era. If Hitler had been stopped in 1935, or Iran in 2008 (or earlier, even 1979) how much in blood and treasure would have been saved up to date? How much more will we have to spend when the spit actually hits the fan, (as it inevitably will) and we are FORCED to defend ourselves, (with absolutely no guarantee of victory)?
What is the quote by Maya Angelou? “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.” We always try to change them.
Actually, "we" insist that They can't possibly mean That.
And we are both giving the benefit of the doubt to those who keep getting it wrong. Instead of giving it the more nefarious interpretation that our leaders knew exactly what sh** storm they were unleashing.
Exactly. Within my lifetime, the idea would have been unthinkable. But in retrospect, almost certainly the reality, at least occasionally.
So you're point isn't lost on me, and I've heard the 1935 Hitler analogy many times......and it seems like comparing apples to grapefruits IMO. I'm not a supporter of Trump, but what seemed to be the magic during his administration that kept most of this type of sh*t tamped down? Hell.....he even relocated of the American diplomatic mission to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv, which if memory served me well the Democrats, main stream media and 2/3's of the globe predicted it would cause nuclear war.
My point was all of this stuff seems extremely complicated and our friend Ollie just seems to be able to tie it up with a nice little bow.
Of course it is complicated. But at the base is the proven failure of attempts to appease despots. Appeasement in 1935 is no different than appeasement in 2008, or thereafter. And the end result will inevitably be the same - more blood, more $ forced later, without any guarantee of final success or even survival.
Yes. But. If we were ruled by angels, we wouldn't need that pesky Constitution thingee, right? So who is the world-grade angel who identifies and takes out the evils a priori the evil?
We are not ruled by angels. We are not even universally, widely ruled by laws or that "pesky Constitution". Most often, we are ruled by the Law of the Jungle, where might makes right. What we strive for is that those who hold the might are also "the good guys".
Dunno to what place you wandered. "Angels" referred to the mythical being who, at the country-leader level, identifies which despot wannabe warrants removal. If the Law of the Jungle applied, any who stuck their head above their bunker would be promptly squashed. Never happened in what was formerly known as the Western practice.
It is different. You ignore decades of effort to assure it is in fact different.
I honestly think Trump was so unusual and predictable back in 2016-2020, foreign leaders were afraid of him--like he might actually push the button and blow the world up. Pelosi et al even warned he would. He so broke the mold and didn't play by the same rule book, they didn't know what to do with him. He was completely unpredictable. China was at a loss how to deal with him. As a result, every other country chose to exercise restraint.
If he wins in 2024, they won't be as reserved. Trump is more predictable now. He's been around longer. Plus his base has made it very clear they want our policy to be isolationist.
I really don't know how people can say lear from the lessons of Hitler on the one hand, then say no more US involvement in foreign wars. I don't even know what Trump means when he said this is Biden's fault for making US weak. I agree he makes US weak and look weak. But how would US be strong by retreating from all foreign conflicts?
If Trump wins, he won't necessarily have to please his base, or anybody. He'll have 4 years, and that will be that. We'll have to trust him. I think it's 60/40 it will work.
The best way to avoid war is to be prepared and ready for war. We (the U.S. and Europe) are not ready.
The question of avoiding foreign wars, in words which have now become ever present, "depends on the circumstances". Should the democracies get involved in the war in Sudan, the war in the DRC, Uganda, Myanmar, etc.? Not in our, or (in our world view) in the world's interest. Assuring the survival of a strong Taiwan, Israel, Greece, Ukraine? Much more important, (to us.)
The US has not fought a war since WWII. Everything since were executive branch forays. Of course the US should engage in necessary foreign WAR. But this using the US military as beat cops has got to stop. For instance, it is pretty clear that Ukraine does not have the manpower (notice that none of the #metoo crowd objects to being excluded in that instance) to defend herself. How long before no US boots on the ground is changed to well just a few?
"The US has not fought a war since WWII"
You mean has not won a war. It has fought in the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Afghanistan War, and we did vanquish Grenada.
" it is pretty clear that Ukraine does not have the manpower "
It has the will, and the manpower. It does not have the weapons it needs, either for defense or especially, offense.
Lynne's point was they were not officially wars; but fighting by executive fiat.
He did?
It's Michael Oren who wrote the appeaser piece, not Oliver Wiseman.
So that if we had only stopped Hitler mantra is wearing thin. It only has meaning via hindsight. We moved heaven and earth, maybe literally, post WWII to make sure such a thing could never happen again. That the world would be unified because everyone had a stake in peace and would never tolerate it. Yet here we are. In part I think not because of appeasement but rather an unwillingness to acknowledge that decades of investment in that strategy has failed.
It’s possible that the long, Pax Americana of the postwar years lulled generations of people in the West into the false belief that peace is the natural order of things for human beings.
Excellent point. It also explains why so many cannot see, aye refuse to see, the ill intent of others, both at home and abroad. I suppose that kind of belief system defies the Hoffer theory that movements are based on hate.
There has always been, and there will always be a caesar, an Atilla, a Bismark, a Hitler, a Putin who believes he/she was destined to rule the world. There will (or should) always be those prepared to stand up to those despots to preserve their own freedom.
I had heard that part of why we took so long to do anything about Hitler was because during WWI the government and media lied to the American public to get us into THAT war. So when Hitler rolled around, the citizens were gunshy about trusting our institutions again. It took an act that we couldn't ignore or assume was a lie for us to get motivated.
Based on the our track record, I find it VERY easy to understand why our citizens at the time didn't want to get involved
That is interesting. I had not heard that explanation before. When I was a student 20th century history did not interest me much. My mistake. Events of the last few years and trying to inform myself thereon have brought home to me in a big way that a lot of the manipulation of the public did not begin recently.
Its always hard to know how much of what I hear about this stuff is true. But yes, I too have found more and more things that simply show this is normal human behavior. Its just at a much bigger scale than ever before.
I cannot excuse manipulation of the citizenry.
The Lusitania WAS carrying weapons; the Zimmerman Telegram was almost certainly a British Intelligence wheeze. We played you like a fiddle.
So disappointing. On both scores.
We weren't ready to rumble. More to the point, Paris wasn't ready to rumble: there was a very serious worry that the likes of Action Française would provoke civil war. We forget just how divided we were in the years leading up to and during the Munich Crisis.
Then there was Prague. They bottled. Who fights for a country that won't fight for itself? Similar behaviour in Brussels seriously hamstrung the Anglo-French military response right up to the Fall Gelb axe falling.
The least said about the Roosevelt Administration.
And how much of that spent money comes right back to the Industrial Military Complex in this country?
All of it in Israel's case. U.S. law requires Israel to buy only U.S.-made weapons with its U.S. defense aid.
Do you think that makes the expenditure okay?
What in the world would make it NOT "okay"?
Uh, using money taken from taxpayers to fund the MIC under the guise of helping Ukraine. The money tree is no longer bearing fruit. $34,000,000,000,000 in debt. Service on that debt estimated at $865,000,000,000 in 2024. It has to be estimated
because tax revenue is dropping while interest is increasing; at any rate it is very close to surpassing military spending.
In your opinion, is it in America’s national interests to stand by its commitments to the security and territorial integrity of Taiwan, Ukraine, and Israel?
Evan, don't conflate all mid east conflicts. Israel/Palestinians: very complex and requires lots of nuance. Israel/Iran? Seems extremely straightforward. Iran wants to wipe Israel off the map and has a long term plan to achieve it. Not seeing much nuance there...
Where's the "nuance" in any Muslim world?
Perhaps the war began way back to Bush II for eliminating Saddam's Iraq. Iran/iraq were a regional balance of power that served global stability. Our taking out Iraq caused a power vacuum we have no will or commitment to fulfill. We gave Iran the opening to step in and dominate.
Our invasion of Iraq was a mistake. Saddam wasn't even involved with 9/11. We should've focused on Afghanistan and Al Queada. The naive, idealistic NeoCon dream of nation building by Cheney et al is a gift that keeps on giving. We're now dealing with yet another consequence of it.
The Certainty of WMDs was persuasive. Oh, wait....
I agree. But it benefitted the MIC so for some here that is reason enough to justify the foray.
I suspect that she and everyone at NPR are praying Trump is elected in the fall because that is the surest way to keep their hardcore leftist listeners tuned in! The same can be said for MSNBC and The NY Times.
Who is Ollie?
Oliver Wiseman
Thanks
Wow, crime is dropping rapidly, just in time for an election. You heard it here first! Now brace yourself for NYTCNNWSJWaPo stories explaining how people don’t feel safer despite the good statistics about reduced crime.
A lot of the "drop" in crime is a result of crimes no longer being reported, because people know that the culprits will not be charged, or will be let out immediately on bail, or will receive very short sentences. The risk of retribution for the reporting of crime is getting higher and higher all the time.
That would be true for most crimes, but I think murder is probably not one of them.
That is a puzzler. I guess it depends on how the statistic is created. Is it based on the number of bodies resulting from homicide? Or is it based on the number of murder charges filed?
It is just a headline based on misrepresented data. Those specific cities may be experiencing a drop but Chicago and Philly are through the roof. Not sure about Baltimore.
The Democrat district attorneys reduce the charges so that what was a homicide now is assault.
No. They don't. Death brings a homicide charge even among leftists prosecutors, because they can't get around the dead body issue. But they will reduce the degree of homicide charge drastically to get what they want. What they really do is change attempted murder charges to simple assaults with no bail, which maddens me.
Second degree murder is reduced to simple manslaughter in many of these cases, allowing the homicidally violent criminal to be back on the streets in less than 5 years.
One of the poster above said in cities with low murder rates , a small change makes a large statistical change. in murders
Yeah, always have to watch when they use % instead of actual numbers. For a % drop to mean anything, you have to know what it dropped FROM.
Spot on!
One would hope it’s based on actual bodies.
One would hope, but I'm no longer sure about information assembled by people who are Leftists.
I’m sure the defund the police movement ran out of gas 1-2 years ago and cops are back to doing at least some of the things that discourage or prevent murder. In my area, murder seems to be higher.
I would imagine (and intend to look up) that violent crime excluding murder is up significantly versus 2019 and before.
Number of dead bodies, with "homicide" or "natural causes" determined by the coroner or medical examiner. Homicide stats are very reliable--IF they're all reported to the FBI database. Some cities are withholding right now; why, I don't know.
Gee, why would they withhold those numbers.....
I am as shocked, shocked, as you are!
Read my "blacks are getting smarter" comment.
Agreed. Murders are almost all reported, which is why murder stats are among the few gold standards of crime numbers.
Celia, where have you been darlin'. We have missed you.
Darlin' is a Texas term.
I've been in Texas, actually! We went down to San Antonio to see my best friend and also to watch the eclipse (although it was somewhat of a bust, thanks to the clouds).
We went to the Alamo. Shopped at Buck-ees. Visited my husband's aunt and uncle in Dallas. Hit Hot Springs, Arkansas on the way home, because I love soaking in hot springs and that's a resource the Midwest has too little of. Too many people there, though!
I tried to look in on TFP occasionally, but part of the joy of the (all too rare) vacation is disconnecting.
Because of the anonymity on this board (and that is a good thing) I wish I knew you were coming. I live just north of SA. I know a great Greek Restaurant in SA, easy to get to, in a shopping mall on I-35. We could have met for lunch.
Ah well, it was a very rapid trip, since we only had a week to drive there and back. Maybe I'll get down that way for a longer visit sometime.
I, too, had missed seeing you here in the comments section. Glad you're A-okay and that your fam is doing well. I don't respond much in the comments section, but I always scroll down looking for your comments, in particular. Thanks for being here, Celia. You're a wise woman. : )
Thank you. *blushes*
Whew! I half-feared you’d been kidnapped by some black-ops org in reaction to your comments here. :)
While you were at the Alamo, did you visit the basement?
RIP Jan Hooks AND Paul Reubens! And Phil Hartman :(
You just took my fun little comment and made me super sad.
It wasn't a very long visit, and we didn't pay for the expensive tour. We walked around in the chapel (which is larger than I would have imagined) and read informational placards and perused the gift shop.
Exactly! Especially here in Hellinois!
I'm immediately skeptical of any of these statistics because it is so easy to manipulate them to obfuscate the real data. Especially in an election year.
Same people who keep telling us how great the economy is under the Biden administration.
Exactly
In truth, crime is skyrocketing.
I’m sure that damn near every crime besides murder is still rising, which is why the news is specifically about murder.
And in proportion to the increasing numbers of "undocumented Dems"! Imagine!
The FBI changed how they receive crime statistics and now it is all voluntary. Several cities like LA and Chicago don't send any so they "estimate". https://www.foxnews.com/politics/fbis-data-is-faulty-as-crime-proliferates-in-big-cities-report
Maybe they ask the murder victims if they identify as murder victims. If the dead person doesn’t reply, they mark down “no murder” and hand him a democrat voter registration card.
No mention of Chicago, D.C., Philadelphia, L.A.
I thought the same thing.
That Golden Bachelor thing is priceless. No, it doesn’t say anything other than people who go on reality shows are fame whores and gee ya think it was all scripted?
No more "scripted" than this past weekend's "surprise attack" on Israel from the Iranian homeland.
Unwoke, it amazes me that people would watch that trash. I mean, it's FAAAKE!
Oliie Wiseman should consider changing his last name, or at least have his "editor card" revoked. Look closely at that murder rate chart. The heading reads "Year to date murder declines" now Look at the footnote - it cites data from March 31st to April 12th, a THIRTEEN DAY PERIOD that certainly is not "year to date" or even close.
And don't forget that the vast majority of murders that occur in ANY city happens during the summer months (omitted)
and to make this lie by omission even worse, where is New York, LA, Chicago, St Louis ? (you know, the murder capitals of the US).
Omission is the high standard of journalism these days.
And they don't even care. Witness the justification from the news readers that the state of affairs is so poor, that of course they shouldn't have to be impartial....
They have absolutely no shame. There is no lie too insane or gross that these people will happily debase themselves on behalf of.
Excellent points, your sharp eye is appreciated.
How To Lie With Statisitics
I read it as March 31 2022- April 12 2023 compared to March 31 2023- April 12 2024. Which is still a weird time period to choose.
Maybe but it still doesn't fit with "year to date".
Next debate: should America be colorblind ( Coleman Hughes) or anti racist ( X Kendi)? Other debaters could include Wilfred Reilly and Coates or diangelo. Bring it on Bari.
People like DiAngelo and Kendi do not debate! That speak loudly about their intellectual capacity.
All the more reason to invite them to their intellectual humiliation, and point out to everyone when they decline.
You won't ever see Robin DiAngelo in an environment where she is not universally supported and being paid outrageous amounts of money for her racist hate speech.
CNN: "News organizations post open letter urging Biden and Trump to debate ahead of 2024 election"
Biden is the candidate that refuses to debate. I'm sure the 'news organizations' know this....
They do not debate, but preach … at $40k a crack.
Thomas Sowell
No, that would not be fair. Like playing a football game featuring the KC Chiefs and your local high school team. Sowell being the chief of that debate.
Kendi and diAngelo won't show up. These assholes will claim they won't deign to talk to us bigots,
Debates are racist. Didn’t you get the memo?
I read Wilfred Reilly and Coates as Wiley Coyote. Probably would be better.
Holding up written signs to debate would take a LONG time.
But likely more fun to watch. Beep beep
You will not hear Coleman Hughes arguing for “color blindness”. His new book ‘The End of Race Politics’ is pretty excellent as far as I’ve gotten…
I was really hoping for more substantial coverage of Iran's attack. We're already well aware of the Democrats' coddling of Iran. We know what happened in the past. We need to know what is happening--and what is likely to happen--at this point.
Check out the linked Commentary article for a good summary of the defense to the attack. The Abraham Accords are a major step in the right direction. Well done Jared Kushner.
Amazing how the legacy of Trump's foreign policy continues to show its historic value in this critical moment.
What a pity he's not in charge. None of this had to happen.
At the moment there is a lot being digested.
The Institute for the Study of War have a good paper -- linking the attack with what is happening in Russia/Ukraine because these are the sorts of attacks Ukraine suffers from, but cannot repel as effectively as the Israeli coalition did. https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/iran%E2%80%99s-attempt-hit-israel-russian-style-strike-package-failedfor-now
The other point is that the US (and the UK) need to urgently look at the soft power Iran attempts to use and how to counter it. The Policy Exchange paper is interesting. https://policyexchange.org.uk/publication/tehran-calling/
Having spent some time studying international relations as well as Iran, I think this attack makes them look incredibly weak. It was done purely so Iranian citizens or maybe just the hardline clerics can see the regime “did something” in response to Israel, smoking over a dozen of their QF terrorist planners in the Damascus consulate on April 1. Within Iran, they can control the messaging and pretend this was a strong response, maybe even inflate Israeli casualties, but everywhere outside Iran, it just looks like Israel can do whatever it wants to Iran, while Iran is not strong enough to do anything but fund terrorists and militia proxies to conduct terrorism against innocent Israelis.
Figuring next event probabilities is not certain. But I'll put that hat on from my past and take a shot.
1. Iran has learned that their great barrage was useless. So, Iran will hunker down and work to improve.
2. Iran knew that it's barrage wouldn't get through, and Iran fired that as a ruse, in order to lull Israeli's and the USA military into thinking that Iran is a toothless tiger. Iran may be in the process of smuggling an atom bomb (Hiroshima size) into Tel-Aviv, or nearby. There is plenty of food shipments going into Israel now. There is a lot of pressure on Netanyahu to let them through.
There are "respectable" voices published in Western media saying use of a nuke on Tel Aviv is justified. Those voices are the first I have ever seen in the Western press. The Islamists (both Shia and Sunni) are very sophisticated at the public relations war. So, one would expect such PR efforts to appear to prepare the ground for blowing up Tel-Aviv.
In fact, it is possible, (although not necessary to postulate for this latter scenario) that the whole thing, from Oct 7, 2023, was intended to create the PR position to allow Iran to detonate an atom bomb in Israel, and to make Israel's borders more porous, with less careful inspections. My strong leaning is that Oct 7th was not triggered for that reason though. My leaning would be that a long-held idea has had enough time since Oct 7th, to generate a follow-up plan.
My guess is that Iran is probably trying to smuggle a nuke into Tel Aviv, or at least into Israel. If it were detonated where the Israeli army is located, that would allow Hezbollah to overrun Israel potentially. And all the martyrs of Gaza would be, well, martyrs. So there are multiple targets that are worthwhile.
I agree that Iran is set upon unleashing a nuclear weapon against Israel. I hadn't considered an unconventional delivery, although that does seem more likely than a missile attack, after what we saw on Sunday.
It does not surprise me that Leftists are supporting Iran. It's not even very surprising that they favor the use of a nuclear weapon, as long as the user is non-Western.
The time to attack is when the enemy least expects it. The US has gotten so used to being so powerful militarily that that concept has gotten lost.
War ..war ..and more war....start simple America has been invaded and is at war . .but NPR and NYT have not declared..America at war.....so guess maybe we are not at war. ..
Although whistle-blower Uri Berliner doesn't believe that defunding NPR is the way to change its biased reporting, there is a public and private movement underway to do just that. Defunding begins the house-cleaning that needs to be done. After that, there can be some debate to do away with NPR altogether. Personally, I think it might be missed, but not long.
There are those who argue that NPR funding is just a drop in the bucket, so why bother. This is exactly the type of funding we should be cutting to send a message. If we don't start somewhere, even if a minuscule percentage of the total budget, we'll never cut anything.
And then remove not for profit status which would see a dropping of support from leftist NGO’s.
And yet each pledge drive starts with ‘the threat of loss of public funding threatens our ability to continue our mission’, or similar.
They should be defunded. Even before the left went insane pre-2010, tax money funding a station clearly left leaning felt wrong to me. And i was firmly a Democrat back then.
That said, they won't be hurting for funding. They're a propaganda mouthpiece for the woke charitable foundations that actually support them. Another reason why they shouldn't get public funding anymore. They don't need it. The question is why leftist woke overlords get tax exempted to fund their pet radio propaganda station. What a scam.
Defund Katherine's salary, along with all the other anti-democratic totalitarians.
Anybody who thinks there's nothing wrong with a politically unified newsroom does not belong in the news industry.
Just throw the baby out with the bath water ...get it over with quickly
A right to abortion argument I can get behind.
Yeah, I needed that.
I sent the NPR interview to 3 people I know who are regular listeners - when you get into their cars that’s the station that comes on. One recipient replied that his take was 70% left and 30% center. The other 2 didn’t respond which I took to mean they were happy with that organization being so left wing. And that may be why it is that way - the people who listen want to hear only left wing views.
This makes me question someone's judgment when they think NPR propaganda is just fine.
Definitely but what I think it comes down to is that these left types think they know better than anyone else - they have all the superior answers so really don’t need to hear any other views.
Toddlerism backed up by nothing but 'I feel'.
That would be the reaction of all the liberals I know too, which is why I don't even bother. Everything wrong is ok as long as it's their side that does it.
Exactly. Now they literally support Iran.
Sadly I think you are right. I persist in thinking that someone from”their side” might influence them - seems to be a useless tactic b/c that person is discredited in their minds and no longer “their side”. One of these individuals actually told my husband to stop sending her articles from the Wall Street Journal- this person worked in corporate America for decades too.
I almost did the same thing (send the essays to my Friends who listen to NPR), but then remembered that is the narrative they want to hear. Eh.
People do not complain about institutions being to THE left. They complain about institutions being to THEIR left. That is why so many people decide that it "only moved left" in some recent year - they themselves are flaming lefties, and they were happy with the bias until recently.
Now re-contact them and ask how much money they donate to NPR.
Homicides in U.S. cities: Maybe since last year, but according to John R Lott Jr. ( Crime Prevention Research Center, www.crimeresearch.org ), " the murder rate is still 7.4% above the rate in 2019, before the defund the police efforts started. Yes, the murder rate has declined, but it is still significantly worse than before the policing reforms started."
Ah but they key is: Get the rates really high (gas as an example) and then get some decline and bingo, you have taken serious action and are doing a great job. Or you can just throw the Bull shit flag and actual know failure when you see it. Which the woke crowd can not.
It's like stores raising prices then telling you there's a 50% off sale.
Now, there is a place for journalism that's coming from a particular perspective. Not all media has to be neutral and do its best to be unbiased. That's what you get from Vox (which I enjoyed reading before Matthew Yglesias and Ezra Klein left before it went cuckoo bananas). That's what you get from reason.com. And frankly that's what you get from the Free Press (it definitely comes from a particular perspective and is also not being reported from a purely neutral perspective, nor would I want it to be). There's a place from journalistic commentary coming from a particular perspective, so long as the reader understands what that perspective is.
However, I think a publicly funded news outlet should be held to a different standard. NPR shouldn't be fulfilling the same role as Vox or Slate or reason.com.
The names of the people in power that made the decision to hire Katherine Maher should be made public and held accountable. They unquestionably sought out a person to lead NPR with the beliefs they knew she held. They got exactly what they were seeking.
That she says those things doesn’t mean she actually believes them, which is worse. She grew up in a posh suburb in Connecticut, the daughter of a Goldman Sachs banker father and State representative mother, and went to NYU. She spouts that toxic nonsense both because it’s fashionable and necessary to get ahead in many professions.
Great points. I listened to Batya Ungar-Sargon a while back as she spoke to the idea of class being the issue that creates the woke attitude. How upper class and middle upper class white people adopt a radical progressive ideology as a way to deflect and mask their privilege. As you point out Maher is a classic example of this.
And lectures the working class on white privilege. Gotta love these folks.
Accountable to whom? Even if you get the names of whoever hired her, those people owe no one anything. They can do whatever they want.
I'm sure they have a board and those board members are the ones who hired her. Most likely they're with all the charitable foundations that fund the bug chunk of their operations. If Jim Jordan's looking for another project, he can inquire into why these woke foundations get tax exempted to fund their own political propaganda station. More than the minimal percentage public funding, I think the tax exemption 501C3 scam is the bigger corruption.
I get it. And you’re most likely correct in that no one will be held accountable, that nothing will change. However, everyone is accountable to someone, directly or indirectly. I don’t know anything about how NPR is structured, but I agree it most likely Maher’s hiring was a done by a board of directors. But they are not above criticism or being replaced - as remote as possibility as I agree that would be. One beauty of capitalism is accountability, and NPR sadly is a great example of state run organization that lacks that accountability