Fausta's blog

My latest on the dog that made the news, and the law, at the Star Ledger's NJ Voices.

Labels: dogs, law, media, Princeton, Star Ledger

The Court of Appeals Decision: A Professional Translation into English As you can see from the details, the judge dismissed the case after she ripped Enderlin. Just one paragraph (emphasis added)

Given that, indeed, the testimony by Luc ROSENZWEIG, former chief editor of MONDE, established that after having met, in May 2004, some colleagues who shared with him their doubts about Charles ENDERLIN's commentary, and having thereafter himself shared these doubts with Denis JEAMBAR and Daniel LECONTE, on October 22, 2004, he viewed with them FRANCE 2's rushes and was surprised that, of the 27 minutes of Talal ABU RAHMA's rushes, more than 23 minutes of the scenes on film had nothing to do with the images broadcast by the station, including those of little Mohamed's death, and consisted of young Palestinians faking war scenes. The witness concluded his testimony at the hearing in the lower court by stating his conviction that "the theory that the scene [of the child's death] was faked was more probable than the version presented by FRANCE 2," while admitting that, as a journalist, journalistic "criteria did not allow him to go further than that."

and found,

ON THESE GROUNDS

The court

By judgment rendered after due hearing of the parties and after having deliberated according to the law;

In view of the interlocutory order of October 3, 2007;

Declares no objection to the pleadings submitted by Philippe KARSENTY;

Overturns the deferred judgment and dismisses the charges against Philippe KARSENTY;

Dismisses the demands of the civil parties.

Go read the entire translation. Dr Landes is going to comment on the text of the decision in the future, so I'll be posting updates.

Via Maria,
Jonathan Rosemblum writes, Pallywood: For once, the good guys win. The article summarizes the details of Enderlin's nefarious blood libel (emphasis added), one of the most harmful anti-Israel propaganda videos ever made:

Enderlin distributed the France 2 clip free of charge, and it was subsequently broadcast thousands of times. The image of the terrified boy cowering behind his father quickly assumed iconic status. It featured prominently in mass anti-Israel demonstrations in Europe, where it was juxtaposed to the image of the Jewish boy with his hands raised in the Warsaw ghetto.

To heighten its impact, Palestinian TV cropped into the France 2-clip pictures of an Israeli soldier firing. The image of "Muhammed al-Dura" beckoning other Palestinian children to join him as martyrs in paradise features prominently in the Palestinian death cult. His name was invoked by the Ramallah mob that disemboweled two Israeli reservists, in Osama bin Laden's 9/11 video, and in that of Daniel Pearl's beheading.

France2 has played the footage thousands of times over the years (and the footage is still played by the international media as if it were true) but to the best of my knowledge have not reported on the court decision in their newscasts. I watch the France2 newscasts almost daily.

The whole Enderlin footage was a lie:

From the general to the particular. The sole footage of "Muhammed al-Dura's death" was that of Palestinian cameraman Talul Abu-Rahmeh working for France 2. Abu-Rahmeh is a liar. On October 3, 2000, he testified under oath to the Palestinian Center for Human Rights that there had been 45 minutes of sustained Israeli fire directed at the man and boy. As an experienced war reporter, he could verify that they could have only been hit by Israeli fire. Abu-Rahmeh claimed to have filmed 27 minutes of the fusillade. Later he told German documentary filmmaker Esther Schapira that he had filmed six minutes.

We now know that the boy could have only been hit by Palestinian fire. The story of a 45-minute fusillade was on its face laughable: Had Israeli soldiers wanted to kill Palestinians, they had dozens of rioters immediately in front of the Israeli stockade from which to choose. Moreover, Abu-Rahmeh's entire footage of the man and boy consisted of 58 seconds comprised of six spliced scenes.

The rest of his 27 minutes of footage - only 18 minutes of which France2 produced when ordered to do so by the French appeals court - consists of obviously staged scenes, according to three veteran French journalists who viewed it. The "al-Dura" footage was shot in the same area that Abu-Rahmeh and other Palestinian cameramen spent the day shooting such staged scenes.

Abu-Rahmeh once declared, "I went into journalism to carry on the fight for my people," and was certainly not above employing his camera for a bit of deception. A Reuters clip from the day shows him filming another staged scene involving a Molotov cocktail. That scene was inexplicably omitted from the rushes produced in the French court.

Whether Charles Enderlin knew from the first that his voice-over was false is unclear. That he lies is certain. He drew for gullible journalists a false map of Netzarim Junction, which wrongly placed the Israeli position in a direct line of fire to the man and the boy. Worse yet, he repeatedly claimed that he had edited out the last three seconds of the "al-Dura" footage because the boy's death throes were too painful to watch.

Enderlin was ridiculed in the courtroom:

Enderlin drew twitters of laughter in the French courtroom when he offered that perhaps the crowd was anticipating the boy's death.

There were no such death throes. In those last three seconds, the boy lifts his head, peeks out from under his arm (with which he is shielding his eyes) prior to resuming a prone position -- albeit with his leg still held aloft. A nearby mob chants, "the boy is dead, the boy is dead," before he even lies prone the first time. Enderlin drew twitters of laughter in the French courtroom when he offered that perhaps the crowd was anticipating the boy's death.

What has the French media done? They're circling the wagons and claiming that Enderlin is a victim - along with the Palestinians - of the Jews.

The word perfidy doesn't begin to describe it.

Dr Landes and Yaacov Ben Moshe have been my podcast guests, most recently on May 20, the day before the final verdict. You can listen to the podcast here.



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Labels: AlDura, France2, journalism, media, propaganda

UPDATE
This is the second Venezuelan journalist killed in a week. Scroll down
Asesinado Javier García, ancla de El Observador de RCTV

Javier García, periodista y ancla de El Observador de RCTV, ha sido asesinado, este fin de semana, de varias puñaladas, en el interior de su apartamento de Caracas.

El hallazgo ocurrió en el departamento del comunicador, ubicado en Colinas de Bello Monte, en Caracas. Se desconoce el móvil del crimen.
(my translation:)
Javier Garcia, journalist and anchorman of RCTV's Observer newscast, was stabbed to death this weekend in his Caracas apartment.

He was found in his residence at Colinas de Bello Monte, Caracas. The motive for the crime is unknown.

Noticias 24 says that the building's doorman stopped a man who tried to leave the building with a suitcase. When the doorman asked where was he coming from, the man said the suitcase belonged to Garcia. The doorman didn't allow the man to leave with the suitcase.

Here is a video report in Spanish:


Readers of this blog will remember that Chavez closed RCTV last year, amidst a great deal of outrage. For more information on the RCTV closing please listen to my May 26, 2007 podcast.

UPDATE
Pierre Gerges, vice president of Reporte Diario de la Economia, was driving his brother's car Monday evening a week ago when two unidentified gunmen on a motorcycle shot him at least 12 times: The IHT has the article, Venezuelan newspaper says executive's killing due to reporting



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Labels: censorship, crime, Hugo Chavez, media, TV, Venezuela

A friend sent this link from Solomonia,
Darkness at Noon -- MSM Plays Along with Hamas Photo Staging
The Gazans have to hold their meetings by candlelight... because they had the curtains drawn

The Spanish Marxists aren't wasting any time, and are saying "The Zionist Israeli government treats the Gaza residents as the Nazis treated the Warsaw Ghetto Jews" while the Gazans drive on, and not just with their agenda.
(h/t Gates of Vienna)



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Labels: Israel, media

Via Gateway Pundit, at the New York Times,


NYT Interactive has more.

At the Times of London,
Road From Damascus
Iraqis are voting with their feet by returning home after exile:

The figures are hard to estimate precisely but the process could involve hundreds of thousands of people. The numbers are certainly large enough, as we report today, for a mass convoy to be planned next week as Iraqis who had opted for exile in Syria return to their homeland. It is one of the most striking signs that not only has violence in Baghdad and adjacent provinces decreased dramatically in recent months, but confidence in the economic and political future of Iraq has risen sharply. Nor is this movement the action of men and women who could easily reverse course and turn back again. Tighter visa restrictions imposed by Damascus mean that those who are returning to Iraq cannot assume that they could quickly retreat again to Syria if that suited them. This is, for many, a one-way decision. It represents a vote of confidence in Iraq.

The homecoming is not an isolated development. The security situation in Baghdad, while far from totally peaceful, has improved substantially in the past few months, with civilian fatalities falling by three quarters since the early summer. This has been reflected on the streets with markets, clubs and restaurants that had been closed for months, especially at night, now reopening. This good news has not attracted the attention that it should because critics of the conflict in 2003 and its aftermath have been extremely reluctant to acknowledge progress in the country. Yet even observers from publications long hostile to US policy in Iraq, such as The New York Times, are finally conceding that "the violence has diminished significantly since the United States reinforced troop levels in Iraq and adopted a new counter-insurgency strategy".

The "surge" associated with General David Petraeus is indeed paying extraordinary dividends. The positive effects were seen in Anbar province, which had become a hotbed of Sunni resistance to the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, and are increasingly seen in the Iraqi capital. It has enabled Sunnis to disassociate themselves decisively from al-Qaeda in Iraq, in effect switching sides, while some of the extreme Shias linked to the rebel cleric Moqtada al-Sadr have felt obliged to observe a ceasefire. All these fundamental shifts have allowed Iraqis the chance to rebuild an economy that, particularly with oil at its current price, should be among the strongest in their region. This opportunity has been recognised by exiles such as those who have been located in Syria. Iraq can only benefit from the return of some of its most talented citizens

A.J. Strata:

But there is another statistic which is also important - the number of terrorists killed and captured, and the amount of weapons caches seized and destroyed.

At the BBC:
Iraqis return home 'in thousands'

An estimated 1,000 people a day are returning across Iraq's borders having previously moving abroad to escape the violence, Iraqi authorities say.
...
The UN's refugee agency, the UNHCR, estimates about 45,000 Iraqis returned from Syria in October - the first month of the school year.

One factor in their return is likely to be a sharp and sustained drop in all kinds of violence, particularly in parts of the capital Baghdad, over past months following a US-Iraqi military "surge".

Via TigerHawk, Ralph Peters:

THE situation in Iraq has im proved so rapidly that Democrats now shun the topic as thoroughly as they shun our troops when the cameras aren't around.

Meanwhile, at the box office...


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Labels: BBC, Iraq, media, news, NYT

Betsy's asking, Has the victim card been played out?
It'll never be played out. There's too much riding on the victimology industry.

It takes a village to tip a single mom
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Jihad on panties
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Siggy writes about Media Dances And Other Forms Of Distraction and this week's Useful Media Idiot of the Week
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Bernard Kerik has been indicted. I agree with Macsmind that "But this is good news in a way for Guilliani the story will be three days old by Monday."

Jammie Wearing Fool has the whole roster of Hillary cronies.

Green Mountain Politics has a good Giuliani impersonation.
---------------------------------------------------------------
Via Larwyn, Roy Spencer on Global Warming
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As N.Y. Economy Sours, Aliens Plan To Leave for Home, or at least for Newark.
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The Van Gogh didn't sell
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Via Sex and the South,

Labels: art, Hillary Clinton, illegal immigration, media, Rudolph Giuliani

Socialized Medicine through the back door:
Doug Ross explains SCHIP for Dummies and Self-Employed Woodworkers.

Mark Steyn knocks on the woodworker part of the story.

And here's the punchline:

"And in order to get enough money to pay for this, it would require 22 million new smokers."

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Terrorist memorial through the back door:
At the crescent of death, Why only 38 Memorial Groves?
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One more push towards the Fairness Doctrine, through the back door:
Republicans rule radio but Democrats fight back
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Another U.N. Power Grab through the back door:
What would Reagan do? On the Law of the Sea Treaty, we know the answer

Such developments only serve to reinforce the concerns President Reagan rightly had about the central, and abiding, defect of the Law of the Sea Treaty: its effort to promote global government at the expense of sovereign nation states--and most especially the United States. One of the prime movers behind LOST, the late Elisabeth Mann Borgese of the World Federalist Association (which now calls itself Citizens for Global Solutions), captured what is at stake when she cited an ancient aphorism: "He who rules the sea, rules the land." A U.N. publication lauding her work noted that Borgese saw LOST as a "possible test-bed for ideas she had developed concerning a common global constitution."

------------------------------------------------------
Charlie Gibson might be shown the back door if he keeps it up:

CHARLES GIBSON, ABC ANCHOR: The U.S. military reports the fourth straight month of decline in troop deaths, 66 American troops died in September, each a terrible tragedy for a family, but the number far less than those who died in August. And the Iraqi government says civilian deaths across Iraq fell by half last month.

As War Dragged On, Coverage Tone Weighed Heavily on Anchors:

By training their powerful spotlight on the chaos gripping Iraq, the anchors were arguably contributing to the political downfall of a president who had seemed to be riding high when he won his second term.

But not to worry: Howard Kurtz has been told:

To Kurtz's obvious frustration, his guests - Robin Wright of the Washington Post and Barbara Starr of CNN - both supported the press burying this extremely positive announcement.

Watch:

------------------------------------------------------
Al Jazeera through the YouTube back door:
YouTube Deepens Commercial Relationship With Al Jazeera
------------------------------------------------------
Sharia law through the Med School Back door:
Muslim medical students refuse to learn about alcohol or sexual diseases:

Some Muslim students claim studying sex and alcohol related diseases is 'offensive'.
...
Professor Peter Rubin, chairman of the GMC's education committee, said: 'Examples have included a refusal to see patients who are affected by diseases caused by alcohol or sexual activity, or a refusal to examine patients of a particular gender.'

Spare them their feelings and kick them out of med school, then.
------------------------------------------------------
Special thanks to Larwyn for the links.


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Labels: 9/11. terrorism, al-Jazeera, Iraq, Islam, media, SCHIP, YouTube

Michael Ramirez has it.

More blogging later.

Kobayashi Maru: 'Taking Out' Drudge and Rush--A Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy?

Carl Hulse agrees: Limbaugh Latest Victim in War of Condemnation

A resolution introduced by 20 Democrats urges the House to condemn the "unwarranted slur" made by Mr. Limbaugh, though it does not condemn the broadcaster himself.

Their push, not coincidentally, comes after House and Senate Republicans maneuvered some Democrats into voting to condemn an advertisement by MoveOn.org in The New York Times last month that referred to Gen. David H. Petraeus as "General Betray Us."

"What's good for the goose is good for the gander," Representative Steny H. Hoyer, Democrat of Maryland and the House majority leader, said Tuesday.

I do not like Limbaugh but this particular Dem maneuver is quite telling:
1. a game of tit-for-tat
2. while waffling: condemning the slur "but not the broadcaster himself."

Or as Betsy puts it,

When the Democrats are reduced to editing a Limbaugh quote so that they can pretend to be all outraged they just expose the hollowness of their own support for our troops.

Technorati: Rush Limbaugh
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Labels: Congress, Democrats, media, Senate

Final Bow

I also want to stop focusing so much of my creative energy on negative aspects of daily life. There's still an ideological battle to be fought, not to mention an actual war, and I will stay engaged in some form and medium. But at this point, anything seems more appealing than immersing myself in the sewer of daily politics.

Cox and Forkum have always been a class act, and they will be greatly missed.

Michael Ramirez and Day by Day continue...
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Seven people emailed this,

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US Military Death Toll the Lowest in 16 months
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Mark Levin: Media Matters is a Criminal Enterprise
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Remember The Birds, Alfred Hitchcock's classic movie?

Well, now we know what the birds were after: They weren't after the blonde, they were after the Doritos
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Laurie Kendrick fast-forwards to Hillary's presidency.

Special thanks to Larwyn and Maria for the links.

Labels: Iran, media, movies, politics

Fox: Senate Approves Symbolic Rebuke of Iran

Yahoo: Senate Neocons Provoke Iran

The amendment, which calls on the State Department to designate Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps as "a foreign terrorist organization", passed 76-22.

That's a lot of neocons.

Labels: media

UPDATED
Media Matters for America has come up with a study, Black and White and Re(a)d All Over: The Conservative Advantage in Syndicated Op-Ed Columns that purportedly "reveals the true extent of the dominance of conservatives" in newspapers.

You wouldn't know it by looking. As Jonah Goldberg points out,

With the exceptions of the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post, I'm hard pressed to think of a top 20 newspaper that isn't liberal editorially.

James Joyner takes a look:

One obvious concern in a study like this being conducted by an organization whose very mission is to expose conservative bias in the press is that the coding will be skewed. They looked at 100 columnists, many of whom I’m unfamiliar with, so I can’t provide detailed feedback on that score. Looking at the major columnists, though, raises a couple of red flags:

James quantified the results,

I agree with his assessment. Go read the rest.

More posting later.

Update
Copious Dissent rips to shreds the study:

This coding bias demonstrates emphatically that the people behind this study are deliberately trying to mislead their audience. They simply cannot be trusted. Astonishingly, what I am about to tell you next is even more ridiculous. According to the study, sometimes "editors of papers provided the name of a syndicate or syndi¬cates in addition to or in lieu of specific columnists." When that happened, Media matters "recorded such syndicate data but did not include them in the analysis, except for a few rare exceptions." So according to these dishonest people, we are supposed to believe they did not omit newspapers from their study that would throw off their agenda?

Why am I not suprised?



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Labels: journalism, media, news

Coalition Forces Are Making Progress On The Ground In Iraq With More Tips And Gains Against Al Qaeda, While The Iraqi Government Passed Over 50 Pieces Of Legislation Under Difficult Circumstances.

Security Is Improving In Iraq . U.S. and Iraqi forces have:
· Seen a substantial drop in sectarian murders and attacks in Baghdad since January.
· Seized more weapons caches in the first six months of 2007 than in all of 2006. (Rear Adm. Mark Fox, Press Briefing, 7/30/07)
· Received 23,000 tips in June, four times the monthly average at that time last year. (Rear Adm. Mark Fox, Press Briefing, 7/30/07)
· Seen signs of life normalcy in Iraqi neighborhoods and communities like Haifa Street - vibrant markets, more economic activity and increased security. (Brig. Gen. Kevin Bergner, Press Conference with U.S. Embassy Baghdad, 8/1/07)

Coalition Forces Have Done Enormous Damage To Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda in Iraq has been dislodged from its former stronghold of Ramadi and is finding that its methods and goals are creating a backlash among Iraqis.
· On August 2, Coalition Forces killed senior al Qaeda terrorist leader Haythem Sabah al-Badri east of Samarra . (Rear Adm. Mark Fox, Press Briefing, 8/5/07)
o Badri was al Qaeda’s emir of Greater Samarra and is believed to be the mastermind behind the 2006 Samarra mosque bombing, and to have been involved in the bombings of the Kirkuk courthouse on June 23, 2006, and the attack on a Samarra checkpoint that killed 29 Iraqi soldiers on August 28, 2006.
· In Mosul , Iraqi Army soldiers recently killed the al Qaeda emir of Mosul known as ‘ Safi ’ and two other members of al Qaeda Iraq . (Rear Adm. Mark Fox, Press Briefing, 8/5/07)
· Among the many terrorists Coalition forces captured or killed in May and June were 26 al Qaeda leaders. (Brig. Gen. Kevin Bergner, Press Briefing, 7/11/07)
o 11 of those captured or killed were city or local al Qaeda leaders; 7 were facilitators who smuggled foreigners, weapons, and money into Iraq ; 5 were cell leaders who commanded terrorist units that worked for emirs; 3 were vehicle-borne IED network leaders

In Ramadi, A Former Al Qaeda Stronghold, The 1st Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division Has Worked With Iraqis To Achieve Successes In The Anbar Province . (Col. John Charlton, Press Briefing, 8/3/07)
· Attacks per day have dropped from between 30-35 in February to one or less.
· Approximately 6,000 U.S. forces are partnered with more than 12,000 Iraqi security forces.
· Approximately 7,400 police officers are operating in more than 30 police stations and substations throughout the area compared to less than 200 operating in two police stations a year ago.
· More than 1,200 Iraqi army recruits enlisted over three days in late March.
· The Coalition has provided more than $5.5 million in aid to day labor programs and employed more than 18,000 Iraqis, all in about three or four months.
· The Coalition has joined efforts with organizations like the Iraqi-American Chamber of Commerce & Industry to help revitalize small businesses in Ramadi.
o Company commanders went throughout every neighborhood and collected over 500 assessments of all small businesses in Ramadi, to help jumpstart the small business grant program.

Other Reports From Elsewhere In Iraq Are Positive. For example, the Provincial Reconstruction Team in al Qaim - located northwest of Baghdad near the Syrian border - is highlighting progress such as:
· A “spectacular” drop in insurgent activity over the last two years.
· Local tribes now providing tips to coalition forces, joining police, and staffing municipal offices.

The Iraqi Parliament Recently Finished A Busy Session Under Difficult Circumstances.
· Parliament passed more than 50 pieces of legislation in their most recent session, including laws creating an electoral commission, military courts, a $41 billion budget, and laws allowing formation of larger federal regions and easing rules for investment in production of gasoline and diesel fuel. (Letter from Assistant Secretary of State for Legislative Affairs Jeffrey T. Bergner to Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, 7/26/07)
· Political leaders of all the major blocs in Iraq ’s Parliament are staying in Baghdad throughout August to continue negotiations.

Oil Money Is Being Distributed To The Iraq People Even Though The Proposed Oil Law Is Still Being Negotiated.
· $2.116 billion in oil money has been allocated for FY07.
· $848 million in oil money has been obliged.

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Fair but Unbalanced: How the media promote false pessimism about the economy. (via Larwyn)

After all, the economy is closing in on six straight years of growth and the stock market is up more than 80% since its bottom in October 2002. It is true that the number of shares sold short on the Nasdaq rose to a record of 9.3 billion last week, but this only equals the number of shares that change hands on the Nasdaq (on average) every 4.9 days. There are way more bulls than bears. It's not a 50/50 world.

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Via Memeorandum, CAIR Identified by the FBI as part of the Muslim Brotherhood's Palestine Committee

In testimony Tuesday, FBI Agent Lara Burns reported before the jury in the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) trial that the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) was listed as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee, right alongside HLF, the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP), and the United Association for Studies and Research (UASR). Agent Burns further testified that CAIR received money from HLF - a claim that Nihad Awad blatantly denied in a congressional testimony in September of 2003.

Burns also said that both Omar Ahmed and Nihad Awad, CAIR co-founders who today serve as CAIR’s chairman emeritus and executive director, respectively, were also listed as individual members the Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee in America.

-------------------------------------------------------------
In a lighter vein,
As a Coach stock holder, I'm sorry to hear that The Anchoress doesn't like Coach handbags. (h/t Larwyn)

Labels: CAIR, Iraq, media, The Anchoress

UPDATED
See Iraq briefing
According to the NYT, Iraq - We're winning! As Allison said,

Much of it will sound familiar if you've been reading Michael Totten's dispatches.

Elsewhere, the Telegraph: Paper backs off Maliki-Petraeus row because they made up the story.

UPDATEFrom today's White House Briefing: (emphasis added)

Points From Rear Adm. Fox Briefing, Baghdad , Iraq : July 30, 2007

Our offensive operations continue with increasing evidence that the surge is pressuring terrorists, keeping them off balance, and eliminating safe havens. We have established a degree of tactical momentum that we will continue to build on.

· We continue to pressure former sanctuaries in the Baghdad Belts, around Ramadi and in and around Baqouba.

· We are denying al Qaeda Iraq (AQI) freedom of movement and disrupting extremist secret cells while increasing local citizens' confidence in the Coalition and Iraqi Security Force.

The number of caches found and cleared continues to grow.
· In the last week, Coalition and Iraqi Security Forces seized more than 120 weapons caches.
· We have seized more weapons caches in the first six months of this year than all of last year combined.

Leads and tips received from Iraqi citizens are up and helping us discover these weapons caches. Last month there were some 23,000 tips a month, four times the number at this time last year.

We are seeing more and more Iraqis turning against violence.
· On July 7, 100 Sheikhs and 400 religious and political leaders met in Ramadi for a conference called "Promise of the People."
o They agreed to "The Ramadi Covenant" - a solemn agreement between tribes and most importantly with the Government of Iraq that is a clear sign the people of Iraq are rejecting the hatred, violence, sectarianism and Taliban-like state offered by AQI.
· In Baqoubah, 50 tribal leaders met at the governor’s house on July 14 to discuss security, services, and pledged to work together in the Muqdadiyah Tribal Conference.
· On July 16 in Taji, Sunni and Shia shieks pledged unity to one another to stop the sectarian attacks, each signing a map next to their village.
· On July 23, 16 local shieks and tribal leaders in Khalis pledged on behalf of some 75 shieks to work to end the violence.

-------------------------------------------------------Via Larwyn, the Judiciary Committee Clown Show
Update: Schtackink Da Courts
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The Acorn doesn't fall far from the tree: Whose Ox Is Gored: After Bush's victory, liberals shouted "Voter fraud!" Why have they changed their tune?

now liberals are accusing the Bush Justice Department of cooking up spurious claims of voter fraud in the 2006 elections and creating what the New York Times calls a "fantasy" that voter fraud is a problem.
...
Instead, Sen. Leahy and other liberals are busy dismissing concerns about voter fraud, no doubt in an effort to make certain the Justice Department drops the issue as a priority before the 2008 election. But the blunders and politicization of parts of the Bush Justice Department notwithstanding, voter fraud deserves to be investigated and prosecuted. The Justice Department may be dysfunctional and poorly led, but the Democratic Congress seems more interested in paralyzing its activities than helping to fix the problem.

-------------------------------------------------------
I just finished reading HP7 and LaShawn has a nice article about it, WITH SPOILERS, Harry Potter and the Inevitable End
-------------------------------------------------------
Via Maria, ALLERGIC TO 'NO'
WHY 'REHAB' FAILS LINDSAY LOHAN & OTHER CELEBRITY ADDICTS
-------------------------------------------------------
Via CatHouseChat and Evangelical Outpost, Photosynth.
-------------------------------------------------------
Reminder: Podcast today at noon

Labels: elections, Harry Potter, Iraq, media, NYT

It doesn't take much digging to find example after example of the BBC bias:
From just the last 24 hours:

• Yesterday the BBC suspended a number of editorial leaders.
• Democracy Project posts about the Beeb's use of fake competition winners.
• Melanie Phillips writes about The protocols of the BBC, the latest on a number of incidents where the BBC has lied about or misrepresented Israel.

Then there was the story they made up out of whole cloth about the Queen throwing a snit last week.

And the time the BBC Radio 4 Today program host got his comeuppance, when trying to patronize John Bolton, who the Beeb characterizes as a "strident character".

In other, habitual, ways the Beeb's impartiality is nonexistent, for instance:

• The folks at the Beeb don't bother remove anti-Semitic comments from its Noticeboards.
• The BBC uses "peace be upon him" when referring to the prophet Mohammed in its Islam page of its official Religions and Ethics website - shouldn't they be referring to Jesus, then, as "Our Lord Jesus Christ" in its Christianity page?

All the while, the Beeb is playing with a huge budget of close to $7billion (£3.2bn) which from the most part comes from British taxpayers, who are supposed to take it all in, passively and receptively.

So it is with amusement that I read this article by Simon Jenkins, who believes that

The castigation of the corporation in the royal photo-shoot affair has lost all sense of proportion

It's not just the "royal photo-shoot affair", Simon.

Of course, having the tip of the iceberg finally surface does get people upset and asking them for zero tolerance, doesn't it?

Update
As I was saying...



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Labels: BBC, media, UK

Media Mythbusters Blog has inagurated their Media Mythbusters Wiki Page

This is great news, and I'll be visiting often.

Labels: blogs, media, propaganda

UPDATED
Scroll down for the hologram
Psychologist Licensed professional counselor GM Roper has made it official: Acquired Green Delusional Syndrome

Don't miss the symptoms:

This diagnosis requires any 4 of the following criteria during any six consecutive months since the publication of "Earth In The Balance."
1. A belief when not smoking dope or other mind altering chemicals that all the glaciers are going to melt and cause a world wide rising of the ocean of 20 to 40 feet.
2. A belief that Owlgore is a prophet and has the real skinny on the climate discounting that Owlgore was a politician, a dropped out divinity student and didn't complete law school but does sound earnest in spite of the fact that he has no scientific training what-so-ever.
3. Has come to believe, despite training in science and the scientific method that "consensus" means the same thing as proof.
4. The duration of the disturbance appears to last until "The Next Big Thing" comes along and diverts attention away from Green issues or Global Warming

Go to his blog and read the rest.

And yes, I remember the Good Old Days when people were panicking over Global Cooling...

Update
Green is the new yellow.
The folks at demand Debate were flying banners over the concert in the Meadowlands.
I had posted the links before, but you can watch The Great Global Warming Swindle on You Tube


Update
Any of you trekkers who thought the holodeck would be a great place to be, here's one hologram that creeps me out:

Just a mirage, but just as preachy as the original!
(h/t Ella and M.)

Labels: Al Gore, Global Warming, media, music, TV

Via Huber,
Reason on Line uncovers the scandal: Castles Made of Sand IV: The Revenge -- This Time It's Personal

Is this from The Onion?

Noooo....

The article's in the New England Journal of Medicine: Sudden Death from Collapsing Sand Holes. Where the NJEM goes, can CNN be far behind?

Or, as a commenter in the Reason post says,

Good thing the New England Journal of Medicine is covering this issue...nothing screams Medicine like people falling into holes...

Here, I've invented a cure: WATCH WHERE YOU'RE GOING
You can thank me later. Nominations to the Nobel Prize for Medicine are deeply appreciated.

(Later today I'll go to the beach and photograph one of these lurking dangers as a public service to my readers.)

Update, Saturday June 30:
I did go to the beach that day and photographed, but wasn't able to post the photos because I was too lazy until today. So here you have them:

Holes to China, or craters of death?

This one has a lethal weapon ready to chew your toes:


I post, you decide.

Labels: health, media, news, photos

Every day when I first wake up I pray a Rosary in thanks, for I live a most privileged life filled with blessings.

Some of it may have to do with my name.

In Spanish, the name Fausta is most unusual for a woman. There are many Faustos, but women are usually named Faustina, which carries a softer connotation as the ina ending is also used as a diminutive. There are very few diminutive aspects to my personality, as those who know me well will tell you.

Faust in any language, to anyone familiar with Western opera and literature, connotes being gypped by unsavory characters. Frequently the person inquiring about my name is not fully familiar with the Faustian plot, and I have been asked if I was named after the devil. (I have developed a number of cutting remarks which have come in handy for those inquiries, thanks. Some day I'll post about that.) Classical scholars do know that Fausta was the wife of Constantine the Great, and she was up to no good. Probably becasue of this, many new visitors to this blog think Fausta is a pseudonym, when it actually is my real name.

I'm happy to report that I have not engaged in any Faustian dealings and that I was named after my grandma, a nice little old lady with flawless fair skin and snow-white hair, not after any conniving Roman empresses.

Fausta, on the other hand, is also an adjective in Spanish, meaning fortuitous, and also, happy in a splendid way. So I have been blessed with the life my name invokes.

Granted, mine is a simple mind and I derive great joy from the simplest things. Like stair-climbing, for instance.

Yesterday I went up and down four flights of stairs several times during the day. It was a hot and humid day and I was perspiring heavily (almost as much as that time I went to the aerobic yoga class, but not quite). To me it is a wonder that I can actually do that. It is an outright miracle. Several years ago I was really sick and despaired of ever doing such a simple thing again.

So there I was yesterday, going up the stairs for the umpteenth time (yes, the building has an elevator, but I wanted to go up the stairs because I could) and my heart was singing. No, it wasn’t palpitations. It was sheer delight. As I reached the fifth floor, I nearly said to a lady who was heading down, Look, I can do this!.

I'll never know if I woul feel that way if I hadn't been so ill. All I know is that I do now. I can not go back to find out, since there is no going back.

I derive a great deal of enjoyment from the most common things.

A fresh peach, eaten on the balcony overlooking the ocean.

The smell of the early morning.

The feel of cool clean linens.

The sight of a four year old hosing off the sand from his bellyboard.

The sound of a groom and his best man hugging each other in silence, just before they head to the wedding.

Blogging and podcasting are two other things I truly enjoy. Blogging and podcasting enrich my life in many wonderful and surprising ways. If I weren't blogging I would have never witnessed this wonderful event yesterday, for instance.

Yes, I have a most privileged life filled with blessings.

Since I'm on vacation I have had a chance to ponder these things while I haven't been keeping up on the news as much as usual, but I have heard from friends who do. Several of these friends I have met because of blogging, and they are very well informed.

They are expecting that things are not going to get better; indeed, they are expecting things to get a lot worse for a long time. Several of those friends are preparing for the worst.

They certainly have good reason to.

• A glance at the so-called newspaper of record shows the complicity of the mainstream media with crackpot Communist dictators.
• Academia has debased itself into a morass of dogmatism and moral blindness to the point where 87 faculty members of a major university judge three young men as guilty by "reason" of their race and background.
• Unprincipled secular societies in the West can not ever begin to understand fundamentalist Islamists because they are unable to fill a void with a void.
• We are in an existential struggle and Democrat candidates are running on the premise that there is no war at all. Listen up, democrats, look at what really happened in the Middle East. There have been 8,638 terrorist attacks since September 11, 2001. It's not Methodists doing it.
• The leadership in Washington is faltering in ever-worse ways. Both parties are out to find the most disastrous way in the least time.
• Even when I'm not keeping up with the news I know that the US and Israel will be arming Fatah. Have they lost their minds? We are arming our enemies. The enemy of my enemy will turn against us. They have before and will again.

So while I'm enjoying everyday pleasures and posting about them, I too have the temptation of wanting to go back to the the age of 1990s blindness, where a corrupt president was lauded by the media and where terrorist attack after terrorist attack was ignored and pushed aside because it didn’t fit the script of Clintonian happiness so many want to return to today.

They think that by bringing back the same-old same-old and singing the new campaign song it's all going to be Happy days are here again
The skies above are clear again
So lets sing a song of cheer again
Happy days are here again,as if the words alone would make it so. It didn't happen in the 1930s. Then, as now, appeasement didn't work. But oh, those words would make anyone feel so good.

The problem is, words alone are not cutting it. Being blessed with a name does not alone make for a happy life as of itself. Ignoring an enemy set on destroying our very culture where I can write these words will not win a war.

There are many things I don't know, but there is one thing I know: there is no going back.

Don't close your eyes to reality.

Enjoy every moment you have.

And pray.



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Labels: 9/11. terrorism, Catholic Church, Fatah, Islam, media, news, NYT, Palestinians, terrorism, Venezuela

Captain Ed was just talking about this on his podcast:

Blair attacks "feral" media he once tamed

Blair, who steps down on June 27, said he was not blaming the media for the "damaged" relationship with politicians but pointing the finger at the changing nature of modern news.

"The fear of missing out means that today's media, more than ever before, hunts in a pack. In these modes it is like a feral beast, just tearing people and reputations to bits," he said in a speech at Reuters headquarters in London.

Journalists are "increasingly and to a dangerous degree ... driven by 'impact', and this is driving down standards and doing a disservice to the public, he said.

"The damage saps the country's confidence and self-belief ... it reduces our capacity to take the right decisions," argued Blair.

Which is why so many of us are glad there are blogs.

The BBC has a video

Update, Wednesday 13 June:
Mark Kilmer: Tony Blair calls mainstream media, "feral beast", and they know they've been nailed



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Labels: media, news, politics, Tony Blair, UK

Business Week says that Venezuela's RCTV keeps cameras rolling

Some of the programs are making their way to viewers on the Internet or by satellite to stations abroad. Other shows are not reaching any audience at all, but cameramen, sound engineers and actors are continuing to produce most of RCTV's programs in hopes they may once again reach viewers across Venezuela, if only by cable.

Venezuelan students have gone to the high court. Adam Housely reports that

all the universities in Caracas (there are many) led by professors and students, will walk out in a massive protest planned for Wednesday.

Via Belmont Club, Chavez, Lula and the media: is it a samba or a waltz?

In this battle of renditions, it is important to mention that the Brazilian Congress has veto power over Venezuela's ongoing application process for full membership in the regional trade alliance Mercosur and it could damage Chavez’s continental plans independent of Lula's actual directions. Chavez faces the political constraint of having to "sell" Venezuela's membership to the Brazilian Congress as well as to the President

Read the rest.

Secretary of State Condeleezza Rice spoke up for democracy at the OAS meeting, where the president of the organization calls her "Condi", as if they were in his back yard enjoying cold drinks. The Venezuelan guy demanded that the US allow a Venezuelan commission to visit Gitmo with TV crews.

Predictably, Venezuela held onto its seat on the Organization of American States human rights commission because, while Hugo's busy doing this:

and his Government feels the heat and the impact from student demonstrations, he can always rely on useful idiots from abroad.

Showing further docility, The head of the Organization of American States says he will not press Venezuela to approve a mission to study questions about media freedom in the South American country.

Former president of Peru Alejandro Toledo has an excellent article on the IHT, In Venezuela, Silence = Despotism

This is about more than one TV station. President Chávez has become a destabilizing figure throughout the hemisphere because he feels he can silence anyone with opposing thoughts.

He wishes to hear only his own voice, to see his own face replicated a thousand times on the television channels that he controls. He ignores the fact that the true revolution of our era consists of listening to others rather than silencing them through repression or government decrees.

The rest of Latin America's leaders cannot remain indifferent to the closing of RCTV or to Chávez's threats to close other media outlets that give time to opposing opinions. Those of us who confronted authoritarianism in the past must again stand up for continent-wide solidarity.

This should be a perfect moment: this week the Organization of American States holds its annual general assembly in Panama. Unfortunately, the RCTV issue was not on the official agenda of the plenary session.

And, as we just saw, the OAS dropped the ball altogether.

Thor writes about Hugo and the media kings
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Matt Lauer's back from Cuba with the Today Show. Cuban TV showed the Castro interview, which of course Matt didn't get.

The Beeb has the video. FC's still in a jogging suit. One has to wonder if Addidas is paying him for the endorsement.

As far as I'm concerned, it ain't diverticulitis. And the fool doing the reporting must be dreaming to even think that Fidel would be a late convert to free-market reforms.

Via Babalu, here's the interview in Spanish. Notice the date stamp, June 4, 2007 (day/month/year):

Looks like Castro's wearing loose dentures. Interesting how he makes a point of showing the newspaper, as if he was a hostage.

Breibart News feed says Fidel Castro gives no sign in TV chat of plan to return to power. He's probably waiting for his suits to come back from the cleaners.

Jane's Intelligence has Life after death - scenarios for a post-Castro Cuba

Yesterday Val Prieto and I were Captain Ed's guests in his CQ Radio with Ed Morrissey show.
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If you haven't yet, read Chavenezuela, my latest article, and also listen to last week's Blog Talk Radio podcast with guests Thor Halvorssen, President and CEO of the Human Rights Foundation, award-winning bloggers Daniel Duquenal of Venezuela News and Views and Miguel Octavio of The Devil's Excrement


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Labels: Brazil, Captain's Quarters, Communism, Cuba, Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, Latin America, media, TV, Venezuela

Daniel posts about how Chavez didn't forsee the effect of modern technology in his attempt to silence all media in his quest for "informational hegemony" and insisting on a news blackout.

Take a look at the photos, for instance.

Here's yesterday's demonstration:


Access to information is limited all over the country, as opposition leader is detained in Caracas He was released, while many protesters are still in the clink: Calls to release Venezuelan protesters

A top opponent of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has demanded the release of jailed protesters as university students poured into the streets for a third day to protest the removal of a leading opposition TV station from the air.

Alvaro Vargas Llosa calls Marcel Granier Venezuela's Cool Hero

Leaving aside the obvious argument that the judgment over a broadcast network's journalistic content should be left to the viewers, and that Chavez's track record makes him an unsuitable custodian of any country's morals, there is a deeper reason why the case of RCTV is worthy of universal attention. It has to do with the role that, in the absence of checks and balances in the steady march toward totalitarianism in Venezuela, this network was forced to play.

Forced by circumstances, RCTV had become in recent years something of a surrogate National Assembly, a surrogate Supreme Court, and a surrogate electoral authority. "We are not politicians," Granier told me a few days ago, "but in a situation like this you cannot avoid being perceived as part of the political struggle by those who lack effective representation or democratic safeguards, and by those responsible for doing away with both. Simply by providing information to a society starved for information we were placed in that position."

The Economist has a mediocre article about the RCTV closing. Earlier this week the WaPo had a better article, Chávez Raises Volume Of Government's Voice, with the money quote:

Outlets, particularly television stations, that were once aggressively anti-government have grown docile under threat of sanctions, say press freedom and human rights groups, while the government has used a windfall in oil revenue to start up newspapers and broadcast networks.

Well, cry me a river: After three days of demonstrators being tear-gassed, drenched with water cannons and shot at with rubber bullets, friend of dictators Jimmy Carter has finally deigned to issue a press release Carter Center concerned about possible violence in Venezuela. Jimmy, who gave the blessing to a fraudulent electon, wants dialogue. Words fail me, but only because I strive to maintain a certain level of discourse in this blog.

One thing is clear: The left cannot stand competition in the arena of ideas

Here are my Pajamas Media article, Chavenezuela, and the podcast on Venezuela.

Will update this post later today.

4:30PM Adam Housely reports that

Yesterday, the crowds were at their largest and the clashes were at a minimum. At one point, thousands of protesters marched through the streets headed for a neighborhood loyal to President Chavez. Their aim is to deliver letters to a Chavez official, urging the release of 180 people arrested for opposing the view of the president. As the masses approached, the street was blocked by more than 1,000 police officers and National Guard troops. They are shoulder to shoulder, and four to six deep.

For once, both sides showed incredible restraint.

Iberian Notes:

Venezuela note: The closing down of Radio Caracas Television has finally brought the entire Spanish press out against the Chávez regime. The protests got good coverage. Now he's threatening to close down the country's other major channel, Globovisión, and CNN. It takes a threat to the media's status, power, and influence to really get it pissed off.

Labels: censorship, Communism, Hugo Chavez, Latin America, media, Venezuela

UPDATED
My guests were Thor Halvorssen, President and CEO of the Human Rights Foundation, award-winning bloggers Daniel Duquenal of Venezuela News and Views and Miguel Octavio of The Devil's Excrement, and oil industry expert Gustavo Coronel. You can listen to the archived podcast here. All of their blogs continue covering this story, please visit them for updates.

Thor made an excellent point,

"It's important that we underline that, although we are constantly referring to the president of Venezuela, it's not because he happens to be the cause of all this. It's because he has chosen that the center of the government is him, nothing is above him. The separation of powers does not exist in Venezuela: the judiciary is subservient to the executive power, the National Assembly was elected with less than 15% of the votes cast, meaning that there was a huge abstention rate. So, for the interest of your listeners, Venezuela is about as self-centered in terms of government power as North Korea, or Cuba, is: Everything depends on the leader and what he wants done.

Here are the facts on the closing of the TV station:

• RCTV is the oldest TV station in the country, with the largest share of the audience.
• Globovision is the only other major opposition-aligned channel, and it is not seen in all parts of the country. Two other channels that used to be staunchly anti-Chavez, Venevision and Televen, have recently toned down their coverage.
• Chile, the European Parliament, the US Senate (including senators Kennedy, Lugar, Dodd, Clinton and Obama), and Reporters Without Borders, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Human Rights Watch, The Human Rights Foundation, and Amnesty International have passed resolutions condemming the closing

You can read more about it at Free RCTV

Venezuela is well on the way of becoming a totalitarian state.

I wrote an article for Pajamas Media last February on the Enabling Law. Chavez is legally able to rule by decree, and, as Miguel stated, is pushing for a constitutional reform that would allow him to be re-elected indefinitely.

Additionally, there's the Maisanta database

The government has built a detailed list - the Maisanta database - that documents the political leanings of 1