On a Mission...

Fox News: “Fair and balanced” or operating in a "Spin Zone"?

2011-08-27T00:00:00.009-10:00

Photo credit: crooksandliars.com

Ted Turner, following the launch of Cable News Network (CNN) became a media pioneer with the first 24-hour programming dedicated to news.

But recently uncovered documents reveal plans for a Fox-type outlet hatched in the early 1970’s by conservatives concerned about what had (and has been) routinely perceived as liberal media bias.

A potentially historic find, the memo suggests that the birth of Fox News Channel - the de-facto cable news challenger with a decidedly conservative bent - may have predated its rival CNN.

In fact, the discovery of the memo hints that it may not have been Turner, but conservatives, who laid the groundwork for what at times appears to be a flagrant media-spin factory.

A Plan is Born
Titled “A Plan for Putting the GOP on TV News”, CNN obtained the document from the Nixon Presidential Library based on tips from the watchdog group, Gawker.com.

Apparently, the memo, whose author is speculated to be Nixon’s embattled (and later convicted) Chief of Staff, H.R. “Bob" Haldeman - provides a blue-print of sorts to accomplish this plan. Handwriting analysis and notes signed by “Roger” suggest that the memo consisted of communications between Haldeman and media consultant Roger Ailes.

While Haldeman would fall from grace in the heat of the Nixon tape scandal, at the behest of the now embattled British tycoon Rupert Murdoch, Ailes would go on to develop Fox News in 1996.

According to CNN reporters, the memo contained specifics regarding production efforts, including plans to conduct daily interviews with republican leaders to broadcast the conservative political perspective to Americans.

News was intended to be packaged and then distributed to select markets in time for the evening news. In their defense, the objective was merely to overcome liberal censorship and provide the other side of the story.

Or so they say.

Photo credit: upgradetravelbetter.com

Ailes’ smoking gun
During a recent interview with CNN, Kerwin Swint, professor of political science at Kennesaw State University and a leading expert on political campaigns provided interesting insight into the matter.

According to Swint, the plan formulated in the “Roger” memo was intended to help shape the viewers perceptions about political candidates and the GOP platform.

Swint reported to a CNN editor that the 1968 Nixon campaign benefitted greatly from a series of Ailes' stylized television campaign promotions, eventually cinching the presidency. Swint speculated that the success of Nixon’s campaign became the seed upon which the contemporary spin-factory germinated.

Calling Ailes' brief tenure at the failed Television News Inc. (TVN) and its association with the conservative think-tank, the Heritage Group, a “smoking gun”, Swint suggested that TVN was a “beta” to Fox News.

Swint points to the famous Rorschach (ink blot) tests as defining the two camps and their followers:

“Republicans look at Fox News and see a principled, straight down the middle newscast,” Swint told CNN reporters, "Democrats look at Fox News and see a phony news organization taking its marching orders from the Republican National Committee.”

“I look at Fox News and see a very successful effort to have a conservative version of the national news, but positioned and marketed as neutral, fair, and balanced,” Swint added, “I just get the sense that he (Ailes) is taking us all for a ride and laughing all the way to the bank.”

Save the USA, Buy 'Made in America’

2011-08-20T00:00:00.034-10:00

Photo credit: static.emedco.com

What would be the best way to put Americans back to work and ease America’s economic woes? Buy American.

Recently released figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics reveal what could portend a second Great Depression - a time when millions of hard working Americans are left without work and forced into soup lines.

But the specter of gloom and doom need not be as fatalistic as it sounds. All it takes is the will power and the courage to put an end to waivers and treaties that have degraded areas of manufacturing that were once the mainstay of American life.

Every month the BLS publishes a summary of employment trends, paying close attention to key private and public sectors, such as healthcare, retail trade, manufacturing, mining and government employment.

As of July 2011, though the BLS was reporting non-farming payroll employment had increased by 117,000 jobs, the overall rate of unemployment remains unchanged at 9.1%.

Jobs reflect socio-economic conditions

With a total of 153.2 million workers in the labor force, the 9.1% rate represents little change to the total unemployment figures.

What is reflected in the statistical breakdown is the way in which unemployment is skewed by age and ethnicity - with African Americans experiencing almost double the rates of unemployment compared with Caucasian workers.

Rates of unemployment are highest for teens, at 25%. However, rates are mostly unaffected by gender, with male unemployment reported at 9%, compared with 7.9% of females reported as unemployed.

What is further reflected is the continuing decline of government employment, down 37,000. Of that total, the shut down of Minnesota’s state government accounted for 23,000 unemployed persons in the month of July.

Photo credit: www.grandforksherald.com

Of the key industries, healthcare experienced the largest gains (31,000), followed by manufacturing (26,000), retail trade (24,000), and mining (9,000). These figures demonstrate what is an aging demographic, as well as an American tendency toward retail therapy. Luckily, it also demonstrates that manufacturing, especially in the automotive sector, is holding its ground.

Rosy picture or rose colored glasses?

Whatever modest gains were achieved in July, mass layoffs in all areas, including the recent reports from Bank of America of anticipated future layoffs, don’t paint a rosy picture for American workers.

One way to tamp the lid on layoffs and start putting Americans back to work, is by re-visiting the value of those things ‘Made in America’. This is where America’s strength lies, in the things that we forge with our own creative spirits and off the sweat of our own brow.

And this is where our collective future exists - in promoting products made in America over those made in China, Vietnam, the UAE or elsewhere.

The security of future generations cannot be assured without a base of manufacturing, a substantial support for improving infrastructures, and an unwillingness to buy on the cheap. We Americans must be willing to forego the imported products sold by retailers such as Wal-Mart and reinvest in local businesses with product made right here in America.

But America won’t get there if there isn’t sufficient governmental support and willpower in place to back American workers.

Depression deja vu?

Following the stock crash of 1929 dubbed ‘Black Tuesday', the push to buy American was first made in response to dizzying unemployment rates which surpassed 20% in the mid-1930’s - the height of the Great Depression.

Like today, housing came to a standstill and crop prices fell as much as 60%. Americans, many of whom were still 1st and 2nd generation immigrants, saw their dreams of a better life dashed by a massive economic downturn.

Photo credit:www.oregonlive.com

Caught off guard by so many unemployed Americans, elected officials crafted legislation to put money back in American’s pockets and bread in their stomachs - the Buy American Act.

Re-engineered several times since its passage in 1933, the Act places a priority on buying American. Back in the early 1940’s, the Act (along with WWII) helped to get Americans back to producing and off the government dole.

Public works put many back to work, with housing and community agencies benefitting greatly. Private enterprise and innovation flourished, and Americans were infused with a renewed sense of patriotism. The American ability to work together through the lean times was the catalyst by which collective fortunes expanded in the 1950’s.

As it was back in 1933, America’s future is looking bleak. The next BLS report is due on September 2 - just as American’s are celebrating our Labor Day weekend.

If we Americans want to save America, perhaps it’s time to revisit the ‘Made in America’ logo and turn words into reality.

Should Americans fear candidate Bachmann?

2011-08-13T00:00:00.008-10:00

Photo: www.thedailybeast.com

Yes, Americans should be afraid…very afraid…if Michele Bachmann is elected President of the United States.

With multiple foreign engagements (that we know of), increasing unemployment rates, seniors having to choose between medication and eating, and, let’s not forget, the DEBT, Americans can not afford the gamble that any Bachmann ticket presents.

Now, I told myself I wasn’t going to get personal…but I am.

And this time it’s very personal to me.

Despite my locale in the middle of the Pacific, as an American, and as someone with close ties to soldiers serving overseas, Bachmann has the ability to impact not only my life, but the lives of people I love.

I’m like that “mama bear” we so often heard about in a recent election - I fight to protect my cubs.

In this case, floundering and unsure of our footing, Americans are all like eager young cubs who have ventured into a snake pit and need some rescuing. Quick.

Bachmann, like a snake in the grass, has slithered her way to the front door of our presidential house and, underneath that shiny veneer, has plenty of venom to inject into our society. There’s much to be said about Bachmann, but for now, let’s stick with the low-hanging fruit.

Say it isn’t so
I know, we all thought Sarah Palin was a trip when she said she could “see Russia” from her house. Little did we know that it could get much worse…even with more “well-schooled” candidates.

Like Bachmann, a Minnesota native, who forgot this little factoid of her life earlier this weekend in Iowa, declaring to the audience,

“Everything I needed to know in life I learned in Iowa” and “As one Iowian to another…”

Okay, I gotta say it. Really, Iowa?
This candidate gets me - on all kinds of levels.

First. And, I hope to most, the obvious credibility problem.
How does Bachmann get off calling herself an “Iowian” when she attended Anoka High School and Winona University, spending much of her time in Minnesota?

Not to mention her long-time residence since her 1986 graduation from Oral Roberts University in Oklahoma; which lost its accreditation for a few years before finally morphing into Regent University in Virginia. Regent, established in 1986, lacked ABA accreditation until 1996, all the while continuing to churn out legal scholars who would later practice in Virginia and, apparently, Minnesota.

Photo: www.enchantedlearning.com

In all my visits to Minnesota I have found the people who live there to be thoughtful and proud of their communities. How do Minnesotans feel today after they got shafted by their hometown hero?

And why two different versions of her “submissive” story - what’s there to hide in how the Bachmann’s “operate” their marriage?

Inquiring minds want to know (and share).

These misstatements appear so flagrant that I can only refer to a potential psychological rationale as to why she might have misspoke on these instances. Since any such condition would be beyond the scope of my own practice, perhaps her husband, who earned an internet PhD in psychology, can enlighten her/Americans as to the reasons.

Second. Bachmann’s very close ties to the tea party.
Isn’t Bachmann the same woman who helped form the tea party? And didn’t the tea party pressure President Obama into tendering a copy of his birth certificate to proof he was born in Hawaii?

I agree with Bachmann that it is important to protect our country from all enemies, those foreign and domestic. Times are unsure and American’s future steps require caution and mediation as we try to navigate an increasingly hostile world. A world that will become a very changed America once the troops all start coming home - for good. That’s another story.

Perhaps it’s time we Americans (including all Iowians and Minnesotans) inspected an original copy of Bachmann’s birth certificate to be sure that she isn’t in fact a secret agent for Cuba or Iran. Anything’s possible.

Photo: media.zenfs.com

Third. Bachmann’s photo complaints.
This one Bachmann will need to get over, pronto. Like many I know, there are pictures of me floating around that I never hope to see published on the cover of a magazine. But if I did, I wouldn’t complain about how bad I look - I’d just hope I wasn’t peeing behind a car as a teenager. Or worse.

Ask any public figure and they will tell you that the media is not there to be your best friend, they are in a business to make money. Besides, how do we know that wasn’t her best picture. Just saying.

Fourth. Bachmann’s staunch anti-diversity position.
Bachmann defends the definition of marriage as “one between a man and a woman”, relying on her religious instruction for guidance.

This untenable position leaves little room for all Americans to pursue the same constitutionally protected rights that Bachmann has sworn (many times) to uphold. Furthermore, this position narrows the playing field of life to a proscribed set of rules that may or may not be interpreted accurately, or even have relevance in the lives of all Americans.

Bachmann also sends a message to those within the gay and lesbian community that they are unwelcome to participate in one of the most sacred (and private) aspects of American life. With so much fervor to have the government get out of the business of business, isn’t it time that government get out of the bedrooms of consenting adults?

Photo: freestockphotos.com

Bachmann’s religious position exposes what is either hypocrisy or ignorance of one of her own guiding source documents.

The Bible.

This subject, while beyond my own pay grade, is one in which I was exposed to during weekly classes, between coloring and cookies.

In addition to churning out a few psalms, I can even belt out the Doxology in English and Hawaiian.

So I take issue with someone who identifies themselves as religiously oriented and yet is not completely familiar with the words of the organization’s founder and spiritual CEO, Jesus Christ. Nowhere in the Bible version that I have (circa 1930, gifted from my grandma, may she rest with her Lord in peace) does Jesus state that love is confined to a man and a woman.

In Matthew 19:1-12, Jesus describes marriage, divorce and “eunuchs”. Jesus suggests that there “are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother’s womb”. While interpretive, Matthew’s contributions to the text suggests that Jesus may have been describing a group of people who are now referred to as the gay and lesbian community.

Bachmann’s failure to appreciate the breadth of this interpretation also suggests an equally limited understanding of the expansive nature of Jesus’ love for mankind. It also underscores what could be Bachmann’s inability to fully love and appreciate diversity in all forms.

Elections are months away with much ground to cover before now and the time voters hit the voting booths. Let’s hope Americans tend to their political gardens and watch out for the snakes.

Tea Party: "Hostage-takers" or "Freedom Fighters"?

2011-08-06T00:00:00.290-10:00

Photo credit: www.wikipedia.org

Just over a week after the media focused attention on the U.S. debt crisis, certain factions of American society can finally breathe a sigh of relief.

That’s right - members of Congress have taken leave of their credit woes and closed shop on the budget.

For now.

On the way out, the gang on the hill have left America with a blemished reputation across the globe. Far worse, their dysfunctional antics have been cited by Standard & Poor’s John Chambers as contributing to America’s reduced credit rating.

The rating, formerly AAA (only the best) was lowered to AA+ (in league with several developing nations) in response to America’s continuing fiscal fiascos and is, by all measures, a truly historical event.

Political posturing
Apparently this reduction was made possible in large part by the active and, at times, vitriolic displays rendered by those declaring themselves the “Tea Party”.

An organization originally created to counter the 2008 Stimulus package, specifically, the tea party has its sites on the Obama administration, in general.

Add to this the “politics as usual” stance taken by elected officials on both sides of the aisle and average Americans were caught in the a political vice-grip - between Democrats, Republicans, and tea party activists.

Or, as Bill Maher has been heard to say, “Tea Baggers”.

Photo credit: www.City-analysis.net

I say “hostage-taker” you say “freedom fighter"
Maher is amongst a growing number of comedians, elected officials and private citizens who, passionate about their politics, rely on colorful descriptive language to communicate their message.

Like using the terms “terrorists”, “hostage-takers”, or “freedom fighters”.

I know, since I’ve used one of them to describe the debt ceiling debacle and I definitely meant it when I said it. And I still do.

Mostly because being a “hostage" was exactly how I felt, and “hostage-taking” was the immediate and closest definition that came to mind for the current situation.

That said, I am equally confident that, when tea party activists have used the phrase “terrorists” against Democrats (since that was not so long ago) or the most recent, “freedom fighters”, to describe their own cause - they really believe it.

Many election cycles ago the United States backed what was then referred to as the “freedom fighters” - an army of Afghani citizen soldiers fighting to deflect a brutal Soviet invasion.

If Hollywood’s portrayal of that time is at all accurate, most of us now know that millions of dollars in military aid and training were funneled to these “freedom fighters” - including one Osama bin Laden.

Fast forward to September 2001 and those same “freedom fighters” whom we supported against the Soviets have been re-classified “terrorists” - haters of democracy whose sole mission is one of destroying America.

So, it appears, last years “freedom fighters” are this years “terrorists” - with a definite thin line between the two.

Photo credit: www.wikipedia.org

Thin line of politics
In that thin line are politics and language. Of which the former is completely engaged in the latter - capitalizing on language and messaging to bedazzle otherwise uninformed citizenry.

In a recent World Net Daily article, tea party members are quoted as decrying the use of certain words to describe their behavior - suggesting that anyone using these descriptors is “offensive, false, and shocking”.

Specifically, tea party activists are taking aim at Vice-President Biden after Biden suggested that tea party protests related to the budget, debt, and credit ceiling amounted to acts of terror on American society.

This doesn’t sit well with the tea party - who, apparently, can dish it out a whole lot better than they can take it. Now comes word that they want a retraction and an apology from the second in command.

Sorry, for what?
But why should Biden apologize for what he believes, if what he believes closely mirrors the reality on the ground?

For Biden (and many others) the actions of the tea party have operated contrary to the best interest of the majority of Americans and Biden is well within his rights to voice that opinion.

Heck, if tea party activists stopped to read the fine print on their own “proposal”, many would find that they themselves will not benefit from the recently approved budget.

But that’s another blog for another day.

Photo credit: www.4bp.blogspot

Just a little thing we call the 1st Amendment
In just the same way that the tea party believes that they are the modern day “freedom fighters”, there are many others who believe just the opposite - that the tea party operates as “terrorists” from within.

Taking it further, there are those who believe that the tea party has operated to hijack our society with unreasoned policies (like trickle-down economics) that have historically only benefitted the top of the American food chain.

In a country which prides itself on freedom of expression based on the 1st Amendment and Constitutional rights, who is right and who is wrong in this debate?

At the end of the day and the debate, it all boils down to political perspective: one man’s “freedom fighter” is another’s “terrorist”.

Playing Chicken with America’s Credit Rating: Default or Revolt?

2011-07-30T00:04:00.003-10:00

Photo Credit: Flickr

News of the day is centered around the ability (or lack thereof) of the United States to reconcile our income with our debt.

Bottom line: we are broke.

Broke, not just in fiscal terms - but broke on a societal level because we fail to collectively comprehend where our individual responsibility lies.

It’s as if our collective conscience is broke. And that’s not good.

Here’s why.

For years Americans have been convinced as to our “exceptional” nature…importing cheap labor while exporting very expensive consumerism. Apparently, we haven’t kept up with our payments and the bill on democracy is now due.

French political writer de Tocqueville was an early observer and prognosticator of America’s love/hate relationship with democracy. In 1835 de Tocqueville wrote with keen insight as to what he perceived were the factors driving democracy, and, ultimately, capitalism.

de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America focuses on Christianity and the American drive for equality as being at the root of our capitalistic evils. According to Tocqueville, this zeal for religious expression carried over into politics and wealth accumulation.

Photo Credit: Flickr/rawprints

The push for religious equality also led Americans to be suspicious of intellectuals and prone to promoting mediocrity under the guise of equality.

Fearing control by educated elites, Americans rejected academics in favor of labor - aka the lowest common denominator.

Essentially, as Americans we have sharpened our religious weapons while dulling down our mental capacities.

At the same time, Americans - many of whom were hopeful European immigrants escaping servitude - have became ruthless in our efforts at resource accumulation.

Americans, unlike de Tocqueville’s French compatriots, saw that upward mobility was possible and we ran with it…all the way to the bank.

We went after the “new world” riches with gusto and made everything - from land to water - a commodity to be bought and sold vs. a common need to be shared and protected.

So it’s no surprise that we might fail to comprehend how years of living on processed foods and media has failed to bring us the fulfillment long promised by our “exceptional” status.

We buy things we don’t need because someone we don’t know convinces us we “need” it AND we pay for it on credit because someone else convinces us that we “need” that, too.

But, do Americans really “need” credit or does credit “need” Americans?

CNN’s Piers Morgan referred to America’s economy as being “too big to fail”. Morgan seemed to be likening the current credit debacle with the financial fiascos ala Wall Street.

But, just like I don’t buy my goods at Wal-Mart, I don’t buy that the credit failure is a new phenomena. That’s just false.

What is true?

We really are broke as a society and we need to fix it.

The Plan

2011-07-29T11:01:00.002-10:00

Recognizing that the definition of insanity is "doing the same thing and expecting different results", I understand that I need a new plan. Hence, "The Plan".

Yes, I know, having a plan in itself doesn't guarantee someone success...but, absent a plan I am simply responding to my circumstances and allowing events to dictate my future.

As of today, this has meant living to please others to such extremes that resentment has taken the place of reason. This has not been healthy, for myself or those in my life.

To start the process of dismantling unproductive habits and improve quality of life, my initial steps include the following:

Step 1: Detoxifying my life

Step 2: Practicing mindful meditation

Step 3: Improve my physical conditioning

The goal here is to move out the negative to make way for the positive.

Here I go!