The Common Ills

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Iraqi security forces, after more than of 40 days of intense fighting, on Thursday told residents to evacuate their homes in the northeast Shiite slum of Sadr City and to move to temporary shelters on two soccer fields.
The military's call indicated the possibility of stepped-up military operations and came as Iraqi security forces raided a radio station run by backers of Shiite cleric Muqtada al Sadr. In the southern port city of Basra, militants launched rockets that struck a coalition base, killing two contractors and injuring four civilians and four coalition soldiers.
Sadr City has been a battleground since late March, enduring U.S. airstrikes, militia snipers and gunbattles between U.S. and Iraqi forces and the Mahdi Army, the militia loyal to Sadr.
Already some 8,500 people have been displaced from the sprawling slum of some 2.5 million people, according to the Iraqi Red Crescent. For weeks, food, water and medical shortages have affected about 150,000 people, aid agencies said.
Two soccer fields in east and northeast Baghdad are expected to receive some 16,000 evacuees from the southeast portion of the city where the fighting has been most intense.

The above is from Leila Fadel's "Iraqi military orders Sadr City residents to evacuate" (McClatchy Newspapers)and probably the big question with the continued assault on Sadr City is does Panhandle Media intend to cover it, intend to editorialize on it? Or did they tire themselves out in November 2004 with their pathetic Falluja 'coverage'? Such 'strong' coverage, that they couldn't even Dexy Filkins out for the story that took how long to clear with the military brass before appearing in the paper? Couldn't call him out, wouldn't call him out. Then they started citing him in their bad -- VERY, VERY BAD -- books. In love with the ultimate embed, the sob-sister, while trying to call out Judith Miller. Repeating, if Miller (and her crowd) got the US into the illegal war, it is the people like Dexter Filkins with his rah-rah 'reporting' that kept the illegal war going. But adding to that, so has a Panhandle Media that can't focus on the illegal war in their ADD drunken stupor.


Anna Badkhen is doing dispatches for Salon from Iraq. This is from her "Guns and water coolers in Iraq:"

Guns at the ready (well, mostly, anyway), soldiers of the Iraqi army Muthana Brigade knocked on the door of a two-story house. "Iraqi army!" they shouted, in Arabic. A few moments later, a woman in a full-length dress and a tan scarf on her head opened the door, and the soldiers, on a routine patrol of the southwestern Baghdad neighborhood of Saidiyah, poured in and began searching the house.
Two of the soldiers walked up the tiled stairs to the second floor. Another asked the woman if she kept any weapons in the house. Another asked if he could have a drink of water. One soldier walked into the empty living room where the TV was on, slumped down on the couch, and stared at the screen, his mouth slightly open.
"They're clueless," spits out U.S. Army 1st Sgt. James Braet, who trained Iraqi troops in Baghdad during his previous deployment, in 2005, and who interacts with them during joint patrols here now almost daily. "They are worse than the ones we trained. They don't hold their weapons right, they don't have the discipline."
For three years, the White House has been repeating like a mantra that the ability of the American troops to cut their presence in Iraq depends on the readiness of the Iraqi forces to handle the Sunni and Shiite militias. As the Iraqi army stands up, American commanders and officials like to say, American forces will be able to stand down.

She'll be added to the links on the left if she's not up already when this goes up. (I've done links in the entries and saved to draft, everything else is dictated around the links.) And, yes, we are thinning the links. That will continue. We'll probably end up with about 20 to 30 links. War resisters and feminists will remain. Others? Call them The Big Question Mark. (Mainstream links will remain. Good or bad, they're in Iraq and covering it to some degree -- putting them far, far ahead of Panhandle Media.)

What's Panhandle Media up to today? On the phone, I'm told husband of Katrina decries the candidates for not focusing on . . . Moscow. Let it rip, Steve, let it rip! While Pig Spawn Of Feminist grabs the chance to attack Hillary again. Pig Spawn is one of those males feminists wrongly praised (due to his mother) and the failure of the feminist movement to call him out over his now lengthy record of sexism allows him to continue to get away with it. (He should have been called out loudly for the little smear/hit job he did on Janeane Garofalo.) Katrina is making a big fool of herself with "Young Voters Hold The Key." The key was the money, Katrina, and you dispatched it nefariously but wisely. Someday the story of you and Facebook, the Roosevelt Institute and so much more will be told. It won't be pretty. But for a laugh, check out The Nation's current postings. They are hilarious. Sadly, they aren't intended to and that includes a trying to be 'hip' writer referring to Paris Hilton's constant presence. What world is she living in? Oh, that's right, an out of touch one. Poor thing.


Isaiah notes Salman Abed cartoons in a post at Inside Iraq (McClatchy Newspapers).

Here's Howard Wolfson's "HUBdate: Strongest at the Top of the Ticket" (HillaryClinton.com):
The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

leila fadel
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anna badkhen
salon
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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi yesterday postponed consideration of a bill that would continue funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as a bloc of conservative Democrats balked at the high cost of including several of Pelosi's favored domestic spending programs.
Pelosi (D-Calif.), who also faces Republican stalling tactics in protest of unusual parliamentary procedures, predicted that the complaints of "Blue Dog" Democrats would be addressed and that the bill eventually would receive unanimous support from Democrats.
[. . .]
The Blue Dogs have objected to the creation of a program that would guarantee veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan a year of in-state college tuition for each year served in the war zones. The Blue Dogs said the House had not found any additional money, through spending cuts or tax increases, to pay for the program, a violation of pay-as-you-go rules imposed by House Democrats in early 2007.

The above, noted by Brady, is from Paul Kane's "'Blue Dog' Democrats Join GOP in Opposing War Bill" (Washington Post). Wait, wait! What education proposal for veterans! You'd have to have a fully functioning media to know about that. And where were our 'lovelies' of 'independent' media? Did they cover the bill? No. They gas bagged and they gas bagged again. They lied a little and then they lied some more. They don't care about Iraq -- not the Iraqis there or the foreign fighters serving there. They need 'fun' topics. They've applied the same 'standards' that they do to those 'fun' topics. Remember when Katrina vanden Heuvel -- editor and publisher of The Nation, an alleged political journal -- had that proud week where she was blogging about both American Idol and her daughter's impending sweet sixteen birthday? Poor dear was so tired from the effort she had to take several days off -- as she announced in a blog post. Never forget Panhandle Media always think they are the story. Or maybe Amy Goodman can book some more friends to come on and discuss their entertainment film "FOR THE HOUR!" If you're late to the party, cake's almost gone, but I'm not insulting Kane or the Post. I'm commenting on the fact that Panhandle Media -- always begging for 'donations' (vagrants don't use "donate," why is Panhandle Media allowed to?) -- doesn't educate, doesn't enlighten and doesn't inform. I'm saying that media critics in Panhandle Media ought to have been calling out their own a long, long time ago. I'm saying that their gas baggery serves no one and doesn't serve the country or the world. They dumb down the country as much as any other outlet but, then, they need their audience to be dumb. Otherwise they might rise up and rebel during the next 'pledge drive.'


This is an excerpt from Julian E. Barnes' "U.S. Army's 'stop-loss' orders up dramatically over last year" (Los Angeles Times) -- read the excerpt or read the article in full, catch what's missing:

The number of soldiers forced to remain in the Army involuntarily under the military's controversial "stop-loss" program has risen sharply since the Pentagon extended combat tours last year, officials said Thursday.
Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates was briefed about the program by Army officials who said that thousands of new stop-loss orders were issued to keep soldiers from leaving the service after Gates ordered combat tours extended from 12 to 15 months last spring.
The Army has resorted to involuntary extensions of soldiers' enlistment terms to prevent them from leaving immediately before a combat tour or in the middle of a deployment.

Did you catch what was missing? If not, note this by Barnes: "That number steadily declined through May 2007, when it hit 8,540. But since then, the number of soldiers subjected to stop-loss orders began to increase again, reaching 12,235 in March 2008." Now did you catch it?

If you didn't and you don't work for a paper, give yourself a break. If you work for a paper or other news outlet, maybe someone needs to work at connecting dots.


The stop-loss number is on the rise and it was 12,235 in the last revealed month -- March. March? Drop back a month. As noted in the February 26th "Iraq snapshot," the Senate's Senate Armed Services Committee held a hearing on the Defense Authorization Request for Fiscal Year 2009 and the Future Years Defense Program. Anybody in the press remember that?

Anyone remember who offered side-by-side testimony? Pete Geren, Secretary of the Army, and Gen. George W. Casey, Chief of Staff Army. And what did they tell the committee? From that snapshot:

In regards to the issue of the months involved in a tour, the committee chair, Carl Levin, had to be rather specific repeatedly finally asking "shorthand, you have to drawdown to what level?" Levin also had to pin Casey and Geren down regarding stop-loss. Beaming, Geren declared that the Army will get the number of stop-lossed soldiers down to "a little less than 8,000 today" and insisted -- at length -- that the Army wanted to "move away from" using stop-loss. Stop-loss is the backdoor draft. It's when you're service contract is ending and you're told, "Forget what your contract says, you're staying." Pressed by Levin about the decrease in the number of soldiers stop-lossed that Geren was so optimistic about, the Secretary of the Army swallowed and stated, "It might get to 7,000." Wow. It might drop to 7,000. To hear him spin and spin before Levin pinned him down you would have thought the figure was going to be significantly below 5,000. Geren insisted, "We're growing this Army faster than we planned."

The numbers released today conflict with the testimony Geren gave -- with Casey at his side. They lie and then they lie some more. If they're ever in need of employment, they'd should check out Panhandle Media which they are clearly qualified for.

In the New York Times this morning, Alissa J. Rubin covers a topic we're not going to. We're not interested because it would require using statements that most likely were obtained through torture. If the torture at Guantanamo turned someone into a blood thirsty criminal, that's really not surprising. "If" is the key word to all the factors of the story including "if" the US military brass is telling the truth, "if" the statements released are factual, etc. Rubin does a very strong job navigating the "ifs" and avoids the sweeping generalities and judgements too many others began making yesterday. For that reason it gets a link and a mention. It will not be noted in the snapshot. I'm not interested in the release of selective bits (by the US government) which may or may not be correct. At some point (probably years from now), the file on the deceased's time in Guantanamo may be available and it may be analyzed in full. That's not happening and we're not noting that story here. Rubin took a lot of care with the writing of the story not to jump conclusions and to note the 'if' factor of it so it's gets noted. She should also get noted -- same article -- for not falling into the "al Qaeda leader arrest!" trap that too many of her peers did and have egg on their faces this morning. (The story imploded -- by the US military's own admission.)

Keelan notes Deirdre Murphy has a photo essay up at HillaryClinton.com of Hillary and Chelsea in West Virginia.

On Hillary, a few visitors e-mailing saw last night's "I Hate The War" as "nice race run, Hillary, thanks" and in a farewell manner. Nothing of the sort was intended on my part. This community is firmly and overwhelmingly for Hillary. Those not for her are for Nader and still wish her the best in the primary. As noted in today's gina & krista round-robin, should Hillary not get the Democratic nomination, 97% of the community votes for Ralph Nader ("barring Cynthia McKinney declaring that she will run a real race") with three percent undecided.

If there was a farewell tone, you may have been sensing my long kiss-off to Panhandle Media. But, on my part, Hillary was not being bid farewell. The race isn't over and as long she's in, the community's behind her. The community would never be behind Barack and Elaine (reading the round-robin) phoned to joke, "Blame me." She didn't know the liar would run for president. He swore, after getting elected to the Senate, he would serve his full term. Elaine wrote for the round-robin long before she started her own site. She wrote about peace. And Barack is not about peace. She wrote about the fundraiser (and where it took place -- how pissed off do Elaine or I have to get to out that and post photos? Probably just a little more pissed, keep it up Panhandle Media and we''ll take your Christ-child all the way down) at length and how we walked when Barack told us the US had to stay in Iraq. She wrote about the townhall after he was senator which she attended and how he was booed and hissed for showing his War Hawk bonifides. She wrote about friends of ours and what they thought and said about him. Barack's not new to the community. The community would never support him. Again, Elaine didn't think he'd run for president (nor did I, as I've noted) in 2008. He swore he wouldn't -- just another lie from Mr. Pretty Words. So to those Panhandle Media writers who continue to LIE in e-mails and try to get their pro-Barack pieces linked to here, peddle it somewhere else. We know the candidate, we know the people around him. We knows he is not now or ever about ending the illegal war and we know the garbage that would come out in a general election that would expose the Christ-child as just another imposter.

Again, the community wants Hillary as the Democratic nominee. We're not walking away from her. And the battle's not over. What you saw yesterday was Bully Boy assembling his cabinet. Remember that? In 2000? While the recounts were going on Bully Boy had his 'cabinet' come to Crawford. To give the appearance that it was all wrapped up, to make people join in calls for Al Gore to give up. Barack plays from the same handbook and that's only surprising if your first encounter with him was at the 2004 DNC convention or after.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

paul kane
the washington post
julian e. barnes
the los angeles times
the new york times
alissa j. rubin
like maria said paz
 

Let's faceit, Obama's biggest problem is he has a problem connecting to stupid people and poor people. Sorry but "uneducated voter" is just a nice way of saying moron who cant think critically and has to work at a steelmill because he's too stupid to get a real job and blames all his problems on affirmative action and immigrants.

That's Josh N. posting his offensive, but telling comments, in a Los Angeles Times thread that should have been moderated for language but apparently the same paper that went wack-job online not all that long ago still has no controls. That would explain the swearing, the b-words and so much more. There is no decency at the LA Times online. It's just a sewer and that's not pleasing out of state ownership.

Anonymous White Man supports Bambi with this 'unifying' statement:

Yes, white Americans are supporting Hillary but if you dig deeper into this statistic you find that it is low educated whites that support Hillary while Obama is getting the support of younger and more educated whites - like myself and all my friends - many of whom voted republican in the last election. My take is that many of the lower educated whites have some racial biases or are unable to see through the BS of Hillary - or perhaps a little of both.

The 'delightful' zadamaja shares:

Obama cant get midwestern white votes he will never get them they are racist pr**k down there.

I edited "pr**k" because, unlike the Los Angeles Times, we do have standards here.

The 'sophisticate" jrldev expresses:

Now Hillary brings back memories of Adolf Hitler.


Martin tries stand up and fails with:

It's unfair to say that Hillary is trying somehow to cast herself as the White candidate when it's clear that her strategy has been to focus on the Uneducated Moron vote and she is glad to find any Uneducated Moron who will vote for her. So give her credit where it's due, she's not seeking only white votes she's seeking to find people dumb enough not to see through her continual lying.

Silly Sylvia refuses to partake of the B-word, she goes for something different:

She has become the C word, and I don't mean Clinton.

Of course the post they're commenting on was written by Hillary Hater (and non-journalist, please, he's been the laugh of the paper for years) Donny Frederick. Little Donny. Little, tiny, small Donny.

Let's do some truth telling. Not about the soap opera that is the Los Angeles Times -- please, we can't work blue, we have a work safe policy.

Let's tell the uncomfortable truths. First of all, the above comments from the thread are brought to you by Panhandle Media. Bob Somerby's wasted this election cycle.


He's wasted eight years recounting Al Gore, Al Gore, Al Gore and rarely seemed to grasp what fueled the Gore hatred. It was Panhandle Media, Bob. That's where it feeds, that's where it breeds. It's where Hillary hatred bubbled.

He's so keen to go after Maureen Dowd and he can't even do that right. He's finally stopped using the hula hoop "framing" and gone with the journalistic term "narrative." Does Maureen Dowd drop facts to shape a narrative?

He dealt with a column of her's recently and she was dropping facts left and right to fit her narrative. She made a glaring mistake (especially for the one-time Premiere writer) and it sailed right over Bobby.

Maureen wanted to play 'cute' and her narrative was "screwball." Hillary was in Philadelphia speaking. Maureen wanted to include that. So she grafted on The Philadelphia Story and LIED and said it was a "screwball comedy." It is not a screwball comedy but Bobby didn't catch that, did he?

Maureen Dowd damn well knows The Philadelphia Story isn't a screwball comedy. Hepburn and Grant did make a screwball comedy: Bringing Up Baby. They made one that some try to include but it's not (Holiday).

There it was, the howler, the proof that she was shaping her narratives (again, Dowd does know that the film is not a screwball comedy, it may have sailed over her editor's head but she knew she was 'fudging'). And Somerby couldn't even find it despite devoting considerable attention to her column. Dowd knows films. You may or may not think she knows anything else, but she does know movies.

The Philadelphia Story not only is too late for the screwball film genre, it was also a successful Broadway play (with Hepburn in the lead) and, no, it wasn't considered screwball on stage either. It wasn't "a satirical comedy" (that season, 1938-1939, it would have been Clare Booth Luce's Kiss the Boys Good-bye). It wasn't an English school comedy (that would be Bachelor Born). It wasn't the unintentional joke (that would be the right-wing One for the Money). It was just a comedy. No "romance" or "screwball" prior to "comedy." ("Delightful" sometimes preceeded "comedy.")

But Dowd had built her column around the narrative that the Democratic presidential primary was a screwball affair and Hillary was speaking in Philadelphia so she attempted to graft The Philadelpia Story onto her column. It stuck out. It was glaring. And Somerby missed the best proof that Dowd chose her narrative and then assembled her 'facts.'

He writes from his strengths (and plays and movies aren't among them) as most writers do; however, he's unable to see too far beyond his own world. Dowd knows the film is not a screwball comedy. She knew it when she wrote the column, she knows it now. She had a column to turn out and she had a narrative she thought was priceless, so facts be damned.

Now the hatred on the thread at the Los Angeles Times didn't just appear. It was fueled and fed by months and months of Panhandle Media. If you wanted to pick just one person fueling it in various outlets, go with Lie Face Melissa Harris-Lacewell. She's done it all. She's threatened a brown-out (as far back as March on PBS). She's attacked Tavis Smiley online and then referenced the attacks on Smiley a month later on PBS without including, "Oh, I attacked him to. In fact, I got the ball rolling with 'Who Died and Made Tavis King?'" Her friend Amy Goodman first brought her on as an 'objective' professor -- months after she had began actively campaigning for (not just supporting) Barack Obama. So naturally, she and Goody thought it was 'fun' to pull one over on the audience and not disclose that fact -- even after the no-endorsement-of-a-candidate Melissa mentioned (at length) being 'wowed' by a speech of Barack's she happened to catch. Then there was LIAR Betsy Reed using her as a 'respected' source last week. Who played the race card? Mellissa said Bill Clinton. But of course, Melissa had already repeatedly played the race card long before -- most infamously in the set-up she and Goody staged on Gloria Steinem.

Bob Somerby deals with things in the mainstream and never tells you where they bubbled up or how they got started. The Nation can take credit for every hateful statement on the LA Times thread. It's no different than what Robert Scheer was saying on The Nation Cruise. It's no different than the race card Scheer and Robert Parry have repeatedly played.

USA Today printed an interview and the days when journalists were able to capture speech are long gone. These days, they're 'trained' and dialogue isn't one of the things they are trained in. Anyone familiar with a film script or the text of a play will grasp what Hillary said.

". . . Senator Obama's support among working" pause "hard-working Americans" grasp that someone in the Obama campaign is going to play the race card (probably Melissa or Mister I'm So Vain I Had Surgery To Lose 50 Pounds Jesse Jackson Jr.) "white Americans . . ."

But the writers portray it with commas when it's double dashes. There was no insult intended and Little Donny knows that but hates Hillary so he turns it into a question. (He's not always so reluctant to peer into her soul -- "peer into her soul" is probably a Somerby trademark to give credit where it's due.)

The Roberts repeatedly sneered at a 'victim competition' while creating one.

Without the race card (played by surrogates and Obama himself), he wouldn't have been able to challenge Hillary. The new tactic is to attack her White women supporters and make them fear they'll be labeled racists.

It only goes to the fact that sexism is so widespread. Betsy Reed thinks it is perfectly understandable for an African-American to support bi-racial Barack but that feminists shouldn't support a strong woman. So does the ridiculous Mark Karlin. Neither are feminists and both write with an appendage, Betsy's is a strap-on.

What they would be smart to do is live in fear. Bob Somerby's failed to document what really has gone done in this campaign season but someone will and it won't be pretty.

Mark Karlin is the man above racist remarks today but think back to how Rev. Jesse Jackson was repeatedly smeared throughout the Terry Schiavo incident. (Jesse Jackson firmly believed in his position. He did not sell out, he was not bought off or any other lie BuzzFlash offered in their non-stop attacks on him.) He's the man who felt the need, when Hillary won New Hampshire, to have a 'talk' with the 'little ladies' via an editorial. As if any woman needed a lecture from the Pig.

As if we were never supposed to notice that it was all glad handing and back slaps at Buzz for man after man but a woman had to break news or write 100 times better than a man to get a link from Lotta Links. As if we were never supposed to notice how women who did get links got them for every other column as opposed to every column. As if we're supposed to forget that women were regularly excluded. As if we're supposed to forget his insulting remarks that killed his chances to be an early Air America Radio star when he went down in flames on The Majority Report and had the blog chewing him out and calling him names.

Bob Somerby says he's a truth teller but he really hasn't told the truth this election. He's told it sometimes and if that hurts his feelings, I really didn't need his friend sending me one threatening e-mail after another every time I criticized Hillary. (For the record, they didn't bother me but I'm not the only working the public account. They bothered everyone but Ava and myself who laughed at them until it became a problem for everyone else working the e-mails.)

To his friend's credit, he saw many things early on that I honestly didn't see. And maybe if Bob had explored those topics, he could have salvaged the Democratic primary. I've often considered writing his friend and saying, "You were right about ___ and you were right about ___ and you were right about ___." However, after those e-mails and the way they upset so many reading the public account, I didn't want the hassle if he popped back up. But I'll state it here. Though rude and vile, he was right about a great deal and I was dead wrong.

If he could have found a way to make his points without threatening me, it wouldn't have been any different because I wasn't ready to hear some of the points he was making. However, he was correct on a number of things. And I'll gladly note it here because I make a million mistakes and am never afraid to own up to them.

The biggest mistake I made was taking people at their word. This thing, as Elaine has pointed out many times, did play out in Panhandle Media before. I was a sucker then as well. But I truly did buy into the lie that they had ethics. They didn't.

An e-mail came in (they do at least once a day) wanting to say, "Hillary's not perfect." I've never claimed she was. No one at any community site has. We were more than willing to explore her imperfections. As we were any Democratic candidate. But that's when we were under the illusion that a standard applied to Hillary would be applied to all. That never happened.

Panhandle Media revealed itself to be without ethics. It did so by stacking the deck against Hillary in roundtables where you wouldn't find a Hillary supporter but you'd find a whole crew of Barack supporters. Of course, you wouldn't be informed that they were Barack supporters or that they had publicly endorsed him. You'd just be lied to. Over and over.

Amy Goodman will hop on her high horse again as sure as the sun will rise. But her act's a little tired and her tricks are exposed now. She is no different than Judith Miller. She criticized Miller for being one-sided, for only getting one side of the story, for offering propaganda as news. Goody did all the same things this campaign season. She has no ethics and that's why she can't work in Real Media. Why she will never be able to work in Real Media.

I loathe Michael Gordon but even he has earned the right to laugh at Goody.

Bringing on a man who pens pieces like "Hillary's hearing voices" and presenting him as just a journalist and objective to comment on Nevada? That's as one-sided as Miller using only White House spin.

Amy Goodman's a pathetic liar. That's all she'll ever be. She trashed her own reputation. The press doesn't create (the real press), they go with what they're fed. Panhandle Media fed the attacks on Hillary non-stop, they continue to do so. They discarded John Edwards long before Real Media did. They got on board with Bambi because they just know he's a radical (he's a craven politician) and they sold and sold him. Over and over.

Patricia J. Williams had a snit-fit on KPFA when a caller had the nerve to correct Williams and point out to listeners that, no, Barack did not vote against the Iraq War resolution.

I guess it beats inventing eleven-year-old boys in a Paris suburb who know all about John Kerry for her ludicrous 2004 column.

If the Democrats go with Barack Obama as the nominee they lose. They lose in November or they lose when impeachment efforts are launched (Rezko would be the chief target) by Republicans or when he has one term and becomes another Jimmy Carter that the Dems have to work hard to shake free from.

These are comments that Bob's friends could have (but didn't) make in his e-mail. He also wrongly confused this election cycle with 1968. It's 1972. We passed the 1968 mark long ago. Panhandle Media wasn't able to motivate people to get into the streets but they were able to poison the well. They consider Barack their crowning achievement. As Winona says in Reality Bites, "That's not real much."

You've got the "anti-war" Barack who was against withdrawal when running for the Senate, when elected to the Senate, when giving his first town hall after being in the Senate, all the way through last summer. He's the one who's backed by the people who put together the Army's counter-insurgency manual. The ones who want war with Africa (sh, don't say AfricCom too loudly, it will shock the groupies).

They lie. They lie and then they take a breath and lie some more.

Bob's friend was correct that they would destroy the Democratic Party (they being the radical types -- 'in Panhandle Media' added by me). He was wrong about the year and how they'd do it. To have one standard for Hillary and none for Barack.

They repeat their lies about how feminists would be for Barack as if feminism suddenly decided homophobia was okay and that Barack's use of it in South Carolina was no big deal. That's a story The Nation and Goody never told you about. They couldn't, they were too busy selling.
But isn't it cute how they trot out homophobia against McCain. (I detest McCain and will never vote for McCain. But calling the man who attended Mark Bingham's funeral a homophobe is stretching the truth unless they have proof and, of course, Panhandle Media never offers proof, they just repeat charges.)

If he was writing me today, I think Bob's friend would probably point out those things and many more. And, being Bob's friend, it's hard to imagine that he wouldn't also point them out to him. A few times in writing about Al Gore over the years, Bob would start to tell the story of The Nation but then back off. He should have told that story. The Nation is nothing but Hillary Hatred. And today they hide behind "Women run it!" Uh, no. Queen Bees ruin it. That's how you get 491 men published in 2007 and only 149 women. And, if we're being honest, call out the feminists who stayed silent while that happened.

It was very well known but they wouldn't tackle The Nation. It was a 'friend.' They loved that we tackled it community wide, called out the systamtic sexism. But they wouldn't. Maybe, like I do now, they can admit they were wrong?

Hillary's a Democrat and in an exchange with a Green (non-community member) today, it became obvious that ___ just doesn't get it. By a Green standard, neither Barack or Hillary will live up to the ideal. That's fine. That's a good reason for someone to be Green. I started a reply tonight but ended up saving up because I don't have the time and also because pointing out basics seemed like it would be read as "You should vote for Hillary!" No one should vote for Hillary that doesn't believe in her.

But no one should hold a Democrat to a radical standard while refusing to do the same with another Democrat.

Yesterday, I-Need-Attention Benjamin showed up at a Hillary function to scream her pointy head off. It's as tired as her organization (one Bob's friend rightly called out, to give him credit). You'll note that she never called out Barack. You may also wonder what political party she's supposed to be a part of. It's all so confusing. Privately, she's one thing. For public consumption, she's a Green and she belongs to a political action group whose stated purpose is to get Greens to vote for Democrats. Who is she really?

Someone bound and determined to lie. I guess it beats whining -- while Iraqis and US service members die in Iraq -- that someone threw a pie at your pouty face. Yes, that was the great tragedy of our times: a pie-ing.

I have no problem with a radical critique, as long as it's applied to all. I have no problem with people being whatever political persuasion they desire, as long as they don't publicly pretend to be what they're not.

Panhandle Media lies because if it told the truth not only would the grants dry up but so would it's ability to influence. It's pathetic. During Vietnam, they could get people in the streets. Today they settle for creating the apperance of a 'movement.' They're such liars.

I was a dupe, I was an idiot. It's happened before and it will happen many, many times again. In this instance, I really thought they wanted to end the illegal war. But you'll notice The Nation moved on by 2005 (we called them out at Third), CODESTINK headed off to Lebanon the first chance they got and never returned Iraq to the forefront, Amy Goodman stopped interviewing war resisters around the time The Nation awarded the $500,000 grant, go down the list.

Today, Marla sent Bob's latest column. He's right and he's wrong. He's arguing that there's no money to be made, no place to go, for mainstream left and 'left' pundits that tell the truth so they play the game. Actually, there is money to be made. But you have to play the game, the one that landed Rachel Maddow her MSNBC contract (which Bob has called out though he's missed how in keeping that game has been with Maddow from the start). He's also ridiculously offering a defense (reposting it) of Arianna. Arianna as truth teller?

Maybe he was trying to make us all laugh?

Better laughs can be found in Tracy Ullman's parody of Arianna.

The original plan was to provide links to everything above but why bother? Panhandle Media's gotten away with it so far. Because they've not been challenged. Goody has to deal with NPR and that's why she's suddenly rushing to now say, "We contacted the Clinton campaign" and to put on Hillary supporters for her dissection along with Obama supporters. NPR doesn't look kindly on the stunts she pulled and, were she an NPR employee, she would have been fired. She's violated nearly every rule in their guidelines for broadcasters.

She set out to poison the well and she has done that. She doesn't care about the Iraq War as anything except a way to maybe get some mainstream attention. She loves to talk about things on MSNBC that she never covers on her show -- and loves to do those mass e-mailings to her groupies telling them to write MSNBC so she'll be invited back on. Makes you wonder about the pressure put on Sally Jesse which, in her first book, she plays off as spontaneous but probably was orchestrated by her.

Hers is the show that has brought you such 'logic' as Barack doesn't have to take big money from corporate donors but he does because he fears they'd come after him if he didn't. That's the sort of 'logic' never offered for Hillary. But she's the one who couldn't stop gushing -- during WBAI's pledge drive -- about Samantha Power being the next Secretary of State.

She doesn't like the Clintons and it goes to the fact that she almost got put into real journalism. The Pacifica fight. All the lies of Save Pacifica. Reality is Pacifica's done such an unbalanced job in the last two years that few will rush to save it now. And it will be under attack in the near future.

They've exposed themselves in Panhandle Media and they're just waiting for the vice squad to make an arrest. When it happens, it won't be pretty but consider the cast.

They couldn't end the war (and can't) because that's not their goal. They make that very clear with each passing day. They're settling old scores. And, just as we stopped trying to play it fair when they did, we may settle some old scores as well. None of the bodies are buried that deeply and, for a crowd that loves to regularly trot out what the New York Times did decades ago, they're all strangely silent on their own pasts. They're silent for a reason.

They've created an environement that allows the commentators on the Los Angeles Times thread to fill informed. All they've done is fuel hatred in the country. That's really all they're capable of. Ending the illegal war was never the goal. Poising the well was and they've certainly 'accomplished' that. Betsy Reed attacks 'mainstream feminists' and repeats baseless charges about racism. It's not about a political dialogue or political change, it's about enraging an electorate. It's not about logic, it's about distortions.

If you haven't noticed, we've gotten very selective about what we highlight and what we don't. Some aren't 'banned' but we're not highlighting their nonsense. Nonsense like leaving out details while 'reporting' on a crime.

One thing Bob Somerby has always been right about is that the charge of racism is used to quickly in this society and that it's very damaging. If you ever doubt it, read the thread at the Los Angeles Times -- but not at work where you may get written up. Barack is bi-racial and there were serious questions about his committment to helping African-Americans (resulting from his own speeches as well as his avoidance of the African-American community). Best way to shore up that was to scream racism over and over. The campaign did that.

Now radical Betsy is leading the charge on White women. How dare White women support Hillary. The next line of 'logic' if Barack gets the nomination is to lie to women and tell them that if they don't fall in line behind Barack, Roe v. Wade will be no more.

That threat's been used once too often. Barack has not supported abortion rights. He voted present and despite the LIAR trying to provide cover for him, it was not the local chapter of Planned Parenthood's recommendation or request. The LIAR was not a part of Planned Parenthood while he was voting "present." Barack is not a friend for abortion rights.

But, honestly, I think we're all tired of hearing that threat. They didn't block Alito or Roberts (they being the Senate). They do what they want and then cry, "Keep voting for our nominee or you'll lose abortion rights!" Abortions are not going away -- legal or not. And you can only threaten women so long before they get tired of it. They better think up a new strategy because that one's not going to work.

Donna Brazile told the base to get lost today. It's going to be really hard to recover from that for Barack should he be the nominee. It's going to be really hard to recover from the non-stop attacks quoted above which take place every day. Panhandle Media's latest attacks on women only further marginalize Panhandle Media. When it comes time for them to trot out the abortion card, women are going to remember that they trot it out every election cycle, that they failed to call out sexism, that they contributed to the sexism and they're really not going to give a damn that Katha Pollitt's writing her every-four-year column again on how the Supreme Court hangs in the balance. I actually think The Nation over-reached in 2004 when they dubbed it the torture election in one overheated cover story. They've amped it up and amped it up. They're so far from reality at this point that they really can't rally anyone come November. (They is Panhandle Media.) They should all be ashamed of themselves. Their hatred of the Clintons is no excuse for their non-stop lies that the Clintons have played the race card. Or for the attacks on Chelsea. Or for repeating right-wing spin long since disproven at The Nation's too-many blogs. None of which is on Iraq, but no one's supposed to notice. They can't cover what Congress is doing but watch them suddenly pretend to be interested in Iraq when the spending bill comes up.

We covered two hearings this week in the snapshots and that's probably all we'll do. But that's two more than The Nation did, isn't it? They'll want you to turn out for the spending, to be outraged. But a really effective media would be informing you of what Congress was doing before they gear up to vote. The Nation lost interest in covering what Congress did around the time Victor Navasky took over. That's when The Nation became The International. Today they have how many blogs covering elections? And not a one following the hearings. Many of which are broadcast on CSpan. They wouldn't even have to go to DC. But it would be work and it's so much easier to churn out their non-stop crap on the Clintons. Recycle from Moon's Washington Times. Or to play 'informed' by telling you what the papers are reporting. Katrina loves to do that. She's a reviewer wishing she were a reporter.

By the time the election cycle is over -- regardless of whom the nominees are as well as the eventual winner -- it's going to be obvious that Panhandle Media does not do journalism anymore than they try to end the illegal war. Veterans suicides were addressed this week. Who bothered to cover it? When 'independent' media can't even claim they did, there's your failure. There's your fraud.

But they 'care' about ending the illegal war.

It's over, I'm done writing songs about love
There's a war going on
So I'm holding my gun with a strap and a glove
And I'm writing a song about war
And it goesNa na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Oh oh oh oh
-- "I Hate The War" (written by Greg Goldberg, on The Ballet's Mattachine!)

Last Thursday, ICCC's number of US troops killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war was 4065. Tonight? 4073. Just Foreign Policy lists 1,206,950 up from 1,205,025 as the number of Iraqis killed since the start of the Iraq War.

And realizing that some Late to the Party will show up tomorrow with e-mails demaning proof, you can refer to the following for documentation (I'm just doing Third links because I can easily copy and paste those -- and the links in it without any extra work):

Radio: Panhandle Media
Dear Betsy Reed
TV: Democracy Sometimes?
TV: Charlie Rose by any other name would still be as bad
"Stop the madness!" cry the Goodmans, "You first," reply Ava and C.I.

And to be clear, they're not damaging feminism. Their actions are only fueling the next wave of feminism. (Real feminism, not the push-up bra set propping up Betsy Reed for letting them blog this year.) They're backlash practioners and the response to that nonsense is always a stronger feminist movement.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.


iraq
i hate the war
the ballet