February 22, 3011
Yet Another Reason Why I Don’t Listen to People Like Glenn Beck
By Ralph Gauthier
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few days you’ve probably heard about the brutal sexual assault of CBS News correspondent, Lara Logan, by an Egyptian mob. You’ve probably also heard about the inappropriate tweets made by Nir Rosen, a fellow at the New York University Center for Law and Security, cruelly mocking the victim, Ms. Logan, and suggesting that is would have been funny if CNN correspondent, Anderson Cooper, had suffered the same fate.
Mr. Rosen was interviewed by Anderson Cooper on Anderson Cooper 360 at which time Mr. Rosen profusely apologized for his comments and attempted to claim that he was unaware of the seriousness of the attack on Lara Logan despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. You can watch the interview here:
http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2011/02/16/video-i-was-a-jerk-journalist-says-of-tweets-about-assault/
I watched the entire interview on AC 360. Afterwards I continued channel surfing and came across Glenn Beck’s nightly broadcast. Coincidentally he was covering the same story which brings me to my point and that is that not once during the story about Nir Rosen nor interview by Anderson Cooper was the subject of Mr. Rosen’s political persuasion ever brought up. In my opinion it’s completely irrelevant. Glenn Beck however took the opportunity to put a whole different spin on the story and launched into a tirade about how this incident underscored the problem with our colleges and universities being overrun by liberals.
If you asked me, I’d have to point to Glenn Beck’s coverage of the Nir Rosen incident and tell you that it underscores the problem of devout conservatives in America who apparently see EVERYTHING in black and white, in terms of conservatism versus non-conservatism. Many of these individuals are inflexible and uncompromising. Their solution to any problem, in their opinion, is the only correct solution. They want things their way or not at all and resist any attempts by non-conservatives to reach an equitable compromise.
Yet Another Reason Why I Don’t Listen to People Like Glenn Beck
By Ralph Gauthier
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few days you’ve probably heard about the brutal sexual assault of CBS News correspondent, Lara Logan, by an Egyptian mob. You’ve probably also heard about the inappropriate tweets made by Nir Rosen, a fellow at the New York University Center for Law and Security, cruelly mocking the victim, Ms. Logan, and suggesting that is would have been funny if CNN correspondent, Anderson Cooper, had suffered the same fate.
Mr. Rosen was interviewed by Anderson Cooper on Anderson Cooper 360 at which time Mr. Rosen profusely apologized for his comments and attempted to claim that he was unaware of the seriousness of the attack on Lara Logan despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. You can watch the interview here:
http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2011/02/16/video-i-was-a-jerk-journalist-says-of-tweets-about-assault/
I watched the entire interview on AC 360. Afterwards I continued channel surfing and came across Glenn Beck’s nightly broadcast. Coincidentally he was covering the same story which brings me to my point and that is that not once during the story about Nir Rosen nor interview by Anderson Cooper was the subject of Mr. Rosen’s political persuasion ever brought up. In my opinion it’s completely irrelevant. Glenn Beck however took the opportunity to put a whole different spin on the story and launched into a tirade about how this incident underscored the problem with our colleges and universities being overrun by liberals.
If you asked me, I’d have to point to Glenn Beck’s coverage of the Nir Rosen incident and tell you that it underscores the problem of devout conservatives in America who apparently see EVERYTHING in black and white, in terms of conservatism versus non-conservatism. Many of these individuals are inflexible and uncompromising. Their solution to any problem, in their opinion, is the only correct solution. They want things their way or not at all and resist any attempts by non-conservatives to reach an equitable compromise.
January 17, 2011
Blinded and Deafened by Prejudice
By Ralph Gauthier
I am not generally in the habit of following every presidential speech or public address. This holds true regardless of the president’s party. President Obama’s speech on January 12, 2011, at the Arizona Memorial Service was no exception but a statement in a recent e-mail thread about that speech prompted me to view the video. The comment in the e-mail thread criticized President Obama for using the event as an opportunity to “campaign.” I listened to the entire speech, looking for anything that might have given someone the impression that President Obama was “campaigning”. Honestly, there was nothing that I could put my finger on. I asked the person who made the “campaigning” comment for specific examples. As I write this column, I am still waiting for a response.
“OK.”, I thought. “Maybe it’s just me.” So I did what I normally do in this situation. I did some online research with the help of Google. I encourage you to do your own research but, for your convenience I have provided a link to an article which illustrates my point.
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/01/obama-tucson-speech-video-and-reactions
From everything that I have found so far, the reactions to President Obama’s speech have been mostly positive. The only references that I have been able to find to campaigning so far have been that the audience applauded and cheered during the speech and that T-shirts reading "Together We Thrive: Tucson & America" were handed out at the event. Neither of these, in my opinion, constitutes campaigning on the part of President Obama. As justification I offer the following personal experiences.
It is difficult and often impossible to control the behavior of an audience. In the last ten years, I have attended at least three high school graduation ceremonies. Prior to the calling of the names of the graduates, the audience is asked to please hold their applause to the end so that everyone can hear the name of their child, relative or friend when it is called. Invariably, this request is largely ignored as most of the graduates seem to have their own private cheering section, complete with air horns and other obnoxious noisemakers.
I didn’t take issue with the T-shirts. There was nothing political in the slogan, "Together We Thrive: Tucson & America" nor is it uncommon to print T-shirts commemorating tragic events. I have a T-shirt hanging in my closet right now commemorating the scouts who lost their lives when a tornado struck the Little Sioux Boy Scout Ranch in Iowa on June 12, 2008.
To those who choose to take issue with President Obama’s speech and to accuse him of campaigning, I can only suggest the possibility that your contempt for the messenger is preventing you from hearing the message. America is a big country with a very diverse population. We cannot solve the problems facing this nation by vilifying and stifling the voices of those whose opinions differ from our own.
Blinded and Deafened by Prejudice
By Ralph Gauthier
I am not generally in the habit of following every presidential speech or public address. This holds true regardless of the president’s party. President Obama’s speech on January 12, 2011, at the Arizona Memorial Service was no exception but a statement in a recent e-mail thread about that speech prompted me to view the video. The comment in the e-mail thread criticized President Obama for using the event as an opportunity to “campaign.” I listened to the entire speech, looking for anything that might have given someone the impression that President Obama was “campaigning”. Honestly, there was nothing that I could put my finger on. I asked the person who made the “campaigning” comment for specific examples. As I write this column, I am still waiting for a response.
“OK.”, I thought. “Maybe it’s just me.” So I did what I normally do in this situation. I did some online research with the help of Google. I encourage you to do your own research but, for your convenience I have provided a link to an article which illustrates my point.
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/01/obama-tucson-speech-video-and-reactions
From everything that I have found so far, the reactions to President Obama’s speech have been mostly positive. The only references that I have been able to find to campaigning so far have been that the audience applauded and cheered during the speech and that T-shirts reading "Together We Thrive: Tucson & America" were handed out at the event. Neither of these, in my opinion, constitutes campaigning on the part of President Obama. As justification I offer the following personal experiences.
It is difficult and often impossible to control the behavior of an audience. In the last ten years, I have attended at least three high school graduation ceremonies. Prior to the calling of the names of the graduates, the audience is asked to please hold their applause to the end so that everyone can hear the name of their child, relative or friend when it is called. Invariably, this request is largely ignored as most of the graduates seem to have their own private cheering section, complete with air horns and other obnoxious noisemakers.
I didn’t take issue with the T-shirts. There was nothing political in the slogan, "Together We Thrive: Tucson & America" nor is it uncommon to print T-shirts commemorating tragic events. I have a T-shirt hanging in my closet right now commemorating the scouts who lost their lives when a tornado struck the Little Sioux Boy Scout Ranch in Iowa on June 12, 2008.
To those who choose to take issue with President Obama’s speech and to accuse him of campaigning, I can only suggest the possibility that your contempt for the messenger is preventing you from hearing the message. America is a big country with a very diverse population. We cannot solve the problems facing this nation by vilifying and stifling the voices of those whose opinions differ from our own.
__________________________________________________________________________
December 31, 2010
Defending a Position of Ignorance
By Ralph Gauthier
According to a recent survey of American voters, Fox News viewers are significantly more misinformed than consumers of news from other sources. I’m not going to reprint any of those articles here. If you would like to read more about the survey simply google: “Fox news makes you stupid.” (I did not make that up.)
In this day and age when anyone who watches Fox News could easily, with a little effort, verify the accuracy of the reports presented by the network (Google is your friend); I am amazed that Fox News continues to maintain an audience and that said audience vehemently defends the claim that they are “fair and balanced.” The simple explanation might be that the network is merely propagating the message that it’s market wants to hear.
What happens when that message can be proven incorrect? What happens when talking heads such as Glenn Beck get caught red-handed deliberately disseminating misinformation?
I recently spoke with a friend of mine about this and he claimed that other news organizations like CBS were just as bad, pointing to the story which originally aired on 60 Minutes about George W. Bush's Texas Air National Guard service record. The authenticity of the documents on which that story was based was later called into question. The difference between CBS and Fox is that CBS fired a producer and asked three other people to resign over the incident, whereas Fox routinely disseminates misinformation and nobody gets fired because it’s in keeping with company policy.
That brings me back to the question of Fox’s loyal following. I can understand people listening to Fox because they express the viewpoint that the audience wants to hear -- but once it can be demonstrated that they deliberately misinform, why would anyone rely on that information when trying to make an informed decision?
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________
December 31, 2010
Defending a Position of Ignorance
By Ralph Gauthier
According to a recent survey of American voters, Fox News viewers are significantly more misinformed than consumers of news from other sources. I’m not going to reprint any of those articles here. If you would like to read more about the survey simply google: “Fox news makes you stupid.” (I did not make that up.)
In this day and age when anyone who watches Fox News could easily, with a little effort, verify the accuracy of the reports presented by the network (Google is your friend); I am amazed that Fox News continues to maintain an audience and that said audience vehemently defends the claim that they are “fair and balanced.” The simple explanation might be that the network is merely propagating the message that it’s market wants to hear.
What happens when that message can be proven incorrect? What happens when talking heads such as Glenn Beck get caught red-handed deliberately disseminating misinformation?
I recently spoke with a friend of mine about this and he claimed that other news organizations like CBS were just as bad, pointing to the story which originally aired on 60 Minutes about George W. Bush's Texas Air National Guard service record. The authenticity of the documents on which that story was based was later called into question. The difference between CBS and Fox is that CBS fired a producer and asked three other people to resign over the incident, whereas Fox routinely disseminates misinformation and nobody gets fired because it’s in keeping with company policy.
That brings me back to the question of Fox’s loyal following. I can understand people listening to Fox because they express the viewpoint that the audience wants to hear -- but once it can be demonstrated that they deliberately misinform, why would anyone rely on that information when trying to make an informed decision?
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________
December 23, 2010
Liar Liar Pants on Fire
By Ralph Gauthier
When is it acceptable for the organizations and people in which the public has placed its trust, to lie? When is it acceptable for political leaders and representatives of political parties, to lie?
The motivation for this article came to me when I saw a video that a friend had posted on Facebook. It was a segment from an episode of the Glenn Beck program in which Mr. Beck referenced approximately 150 new federal agencies that had been created by the Health Care Reform Bill. You can watch it here:
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2sb1H68fAg)
Mr. Beck never mentions the number, 150, as he leafs through the 15 oversized pages of new federal agencies; but that number can be found on numerous web pages across the internet. As an example, I give you a webpage from the site belonging to the Republican Party of Oneida County, WI titled, List of New Boards & Commissions created by the healthcare bill. They don’t go so far as to call them all agencies, as Mr. Beck did but the article does, at the very least, imply that over 150 new bureaucratic entities were created by the health care bill. The complete list can be viewed here:
(http://oneida.wisgop.info/2010/05/18/list-of-new-boards-commissions-created-by-the-healthcare-bill/)
I went through the entire list, all 159 items. There are only two agencies named specifically, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Office of Women’s Health (line 52) and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Office of Minority Health (line 131). The word, “interagency”, is referenced on lines 30, 67, and 141. There are 52 grant-programs named but according to an article titled, Fact or fiction? Bill creates 150 new agencies, which I found on the MSNBC website, those programs will be managed by the Department of Health and Human Services. It’s a short article. You can read it here:
(http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35272540/ns/health-health_care/)
The article does say that the Health Care Reform Bill created “32 new agencies, task forces, advisory committees, and other bureaucratic creations.” That’s a far cry from 150. So how do you reconcile the claims of Glenn Beck and the Republican Party with this reality? Whatever I may think of Mr. Beck’s political views, I have no doubt that he is an intelligent person. Because of that, I cannot imagine his claims as being the result of a simple error on his part. In my mind, there is no doubt that Mr. Beck is deliberately lying to his audience about the number of agencies that were created by the Health Care Reform Bill. If you have a logical explanation to the contrary, I would love to hear it. If you agree with my conclusion that Mr. Beck is lying, what are you going to do about it?
Liar Liar Pants on Fire
By Ralph Gauthier
When is it acceptable for the organizations and people in which the public has placed its trust, to lie? When is it acceptable for political leaders and representatives of political parties, to lie?
The motivation for this article came to me when I saw a video that a friend had posted on Facebook. It was a segment from an episode of the Glenn Beck program in which Mr. Beck referenced approximately 150 new federal agencies that had been created by the Health Care Reform Bill. You can watch it here:
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2sb1H68fAg)
Mr. Beck never mentions the number, 150, as he leafs through the 15 oversized pages of new federal agencies; but that number can be found on numerous web pages across the internet. As an example, I give you a webpage from the site belonging to the Republican Party of Oneida County, WI titled, List of New Boards & Commissions created by the healthcare bill. They don’t go so far as to call them all agencies, as Mr. Beck did but the article does, at the very least, imply that over 150 new bureaucratic entities were created by the health care bill. The complete list can be viewed here:
(http://oneida.wisgop.info/2010/05/18/list-of-new-boards-commissions-created-by-the-healthcare-bill/)
I went through the entire list, all 159 items. There are only two agencies named specifically, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Office of Women’s Health (line 52) and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Office of Minority Health (line 131). The word, “interagency”, is referenced on lines 30, 67, and 141. There are 52 grant-programs named but according to an article titled, Fact or fiction? Bill creates 150 new agencies, which I found on the MSNBC website, those programs will be managed by the Department of Health and Human Services. It’s a short article. You can read it here:
(http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35272540/ns/health-health_care/)
The article does say that the Health Care Reform Bill created “32 new agencies, task forces, advisory committees, and other bureaucratic creations.” That’s a far cry from 150. So how do you reconcile the claims of Glenn Beck and the Republican Party with this reality? Whatever I may think of Mr. Beck’s political views, I have no doubt that he is an intelligent person. Because of that, I cannot imagine his claims as being the result of a simple error on his part. In my mind, there is no doubt that Mr. Beck is deliberately lying to his audience about the number of agencies that were created by the Health Care Reform Bill. If you have a logical explanation to the contrary, I would love to hear it. If you agree with my conclusion that Mr. Beck is lying, what are you going to do about it?
Previous Comment
I thought that was a very good point - really, what has happened to supporting claims with factual evidence!? Please pass along a nicely done to Ralph! -- Martha
I thought that was a very good point - really, what has happened to supporting claims with factual evidence!? Please pass along a nicely done to Ralph! -- Martha
