Arkansas Blog

Who believes in polls.......

The masses of the Republican are ignorant.

How else can you be a Republican if you are not part of the benefitting elite?

Just yell Jesus, America, fags, or abortion and you'll instantly court the votes of Republicans (when used in the right context).

Abortion will never be banned under Republican control (like the control now). All talk.

I am ashamed, very ashamed, that the United Sates of America is being led by George W. Bush.
Every person who loves this country must call the White House, e-mail the White House, fax the White House, and insist that the President tell the truth, openly and withour fanfare.
THE WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION DID NOT EXIST.
Additionally, we must call, fax, and e-mail every single person serving in Congress and tell them to get the message out.
Write letters to the editor of every newspaper in the country as well.
Protest in the street. Talk to everyone you know.
A long time legislator once told me something I will never forget: "If you tell people the truth, they will do the right thing."
It is time to unite and make a real difference. Take a hour a day and change some hearts and minds.
Most of all, hold Bush's feet to the fire for his contined lying.

Edit:
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"People tend to become "independent of reality"

I think that is a real nice way of saying a large segment of our population are dumbasses. I spent last weekend in the pine trees of South Arkansas with my wife's dear auntie. I love her dearly, she is not so old, but very strange...life long strange.

After a couple of days of avoiding a political discussion Auntie couldn't hold back any longer and thus we began. Everything she said made me gasp. Everything I said made her gasp. It took me 2 more days to figure out line for line for line, everything out of her mouth came straight from the Fox News channel. I mean every last lick stickin bit was pure Fox News.

No wonder she is so MISINFORMED. It's not an accident, it's a well oiled plan. Fox News is the new TASS. It isn't an information channel, it is a MISINFORMATION channel as sure you're born. And that one channel is responsible for the dumbass 50% who think Sadam had WMD.

If I am making hot dogs and I get caught putting dog meat in them while I say they are 100% beef, the FDA will be on me like a duck on a June bug. Yet Fox News which reaches more people everyday than Oscar Meyer ever dreamed of, can put out mounds of stinking shit to poison the minds of the more dense among us and no one does a damn thing.

Unless we take ball bats to these people, I don't know what can be done. You can't force people to be smarter than they are. Figuring a way to either make Fox tell the truth or shut down is the only way I know to stop this MISINFORMATION campaign being waged by Bush-Fox-Cheney-Rove.

Should the Democrats win back the House and Senate job 1 should be to reinstitute the Fairness Doctrine that Reagan killed after it served America well for 50 years. It forced the media to present both sides of the issues and let the public decide for themselves. If you look back, the end of the Fairness Doctrine was the beginning of the end of fair and balanced news. God....Fox has even tainted that phrase.

We will see WWIII and a world filled with gulags unless the Democrats win this November. We must start regime change now or continue to slide into a world of darkness and chaos. Is the world happier and better off now than it was 6 years ago? It's time to start asking that question.

You know what, DBI? Most of the people I deal with daily don't even know that we invaded Iraq under false pretenses. They think we are at war and that we will win.
They don't know about the stolen elections, either.
They don't understand history or politics.
Shame on them. This country has gone to hell and the American population does not care what's going on. They continue to go on about their lives, shopping at WalMart, who gives 80% of their PAC money to Republicans.
Where the heck is the "liberal" press?
Every newspaper in the land should be telling the truth about BushCo, but as we all know, it is not going to happen.

I hate to be all Bob Somerby, he beats this drum loudly and nearly every day, but most Americans still believe that Al Gore told people he "invented the internet."
And that's just one of the deceptions that outfits like the Post and NYTimes pushed on the American people about Gore.
No correction is forthcoming. No apology either.
The Times has been down this path before. Remember the awful junk they came up with to get around Gerth's elaborate piece o'crap Whitewater "reporting"?

I may have already related this before but my parents, who are both knocking on the door of octagenaria, didn't know Fox News was anything but news until I told them a couple months ago. They didn't realize how the whole enchilada over there at Fox is in this administration's jacket pocket, not to mention on the payroll.

Now they are not exclusive Fox viewers: they change the channels, but the issue for me is that while Fox is tuned in they can even take it seriously.

I guess they bought the whole Fox sales pitch: flashy and dramatic graphic lead-ins to hyped up sensational hot button issue stories. Because it was on the TV dial, so to speak, it must be legitimate.

This was a pretty grim realization for me. If they had MY parents going, Lord, think of all the others.

So I hope any of you out there with older friends or relatives don't make the same mistake I did. If someone you know and love is misinformed on how the bushworld spins, please help them to understand.

Take care of your old parents if you are fortunate enough to be able to.

And make sure they know how critical their votes are.

hugh...that's what makes me so damn mad. When I was growing up the news was the news. ABC, NBC, CBS, that new PBS stuff that no one watched. When Walter Cronkite said something you took it to the bank. No one suspected there was a hidden agenda. And looking back, I don't think there was.

Now, if you go back to the Civil War and come up to about WWI, that period of time was full of newspapers slanted right or left, Republican or Democrat, Socialist, Communist.....you name it. I've dug in the 1890s extensively and the opposing newspapers in Fort Smith called each other everything in the book with every issue. Now and then the editors would be thrashed in the streets. They printed whatever they thought they could get away with. Sorta Fox-like, don't you think?

But in the majority of your parent's time on earth the news was fair and accurate and trustworthy. Like all things Bush touches, the media has gone to shit. And like our Auntie, a lot of older folks never question what they hear on TV. If Walter Cronkite had said there were WMD in Iraq, you can bet I'd have believed it. Looks to me jettisoning the Fairness Doctrine was the start of fake news, Rush Limbaugh and everything down hill from there.

When nothing means nothing any more, chaos sets in and I'd say we're seeing a dose of that now. What a crying shame America has come to this.

You see, this is what happens when the President talks directly to the people and not through the filter of the liberal media. You folks make fun of Sen. Santorum, but doggone it, he worked very hard on this story and it climaxed with the story on Fox News. This will help him and other republicans get over the hump in November.

We're too far past the tipping point to rescue our failed republic. This is North Korea on steroids. We've become a one-party state with a lunatic at the helm.

I believe some of the people who profess to believe all this misinformation are people who simply refuse to admit they were duped by George Bush and his minions. No one wants to appear stupid, so when confronted with the truth, they become defensive and angry. They are people who are filled with hate and negativity. Now that I think about it, that description seems to apply to many who post on this blog, usually anonymously.

Whenever I sit in a waiting room, the TV is always tuned to Fox. Whenever I sit in my dentist's chair, the damned radio is always tuned to Fox or Clear Channel.

I can be the first one into the waiting room on any given day, and it's already hostile territory.

At my age, I'm spending a lot more time in doctor's waiting rooms, and feel like taking another shower AFTER the appointment.

I quit taking my truck in for maintenance, because ... well, that's just one more shower I'd have to take during the day.

Does Fox pay someone in every waiting room to monitor the TV?

--De Die in Diem.

I believe some of the people who profess to believe all this misinformation are people who simply refuse to admit they were duped by George Bush and his minions. -- Posted by: Pavel
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So the Right gets duped by their favorite media outlets and the Left gets duped by their favorite media outlets.

Republicans have no credibility.

Democrats have no credibility.

The print and electronic News is massaged to gain readers and viewers with attention grabbing sound-byte "stories" or photos that are plagiarized or fabricated to suit the editorial persuasion of the outlet.

So, each person picks the talking heads that tickle their ears and blissfully parrot the crap that they hear and we merrily divide and vilify each other as we skip down the road to our impending doom.

According to the news, we just lost our BP Alaska pipeline today. Better fill up quick - oops, too late!

Have a nice Monday.

I know a lot of people like the ones you describe, Pavel. You could call them "faithful" Bush supporters, but "stubborn" is more like it. These are people who are lost without a leader. How frustrating it must be for them.

And DBI, you nailed it. My parents' generation rightly believed Cronkite and those guys. Too bad honest mainstream journalism has gone the way of the buggy whip, with a few exceptions.

I've been spending a lot of time in St Vincent & Baptist procedure prep rooms the past few months. Every one of them had their TVs tuned to FNC. Usually these were small rooms w/ only another unfortunate soul in front of me. When they left I always tuned to CNN.

But, last Friday I was stymied. St Vincent had a TV that would only go up to channel 42 - FNC (I remember old TVs that had an upper limit of 13, but never 42). They probably had gotten complaints about their TVs being tuned away from FNC and had their technicians modify the sets.

It's not as simple as 'both sides slant the news so it all equals out'...in fact that's bull. There are absolute facts about what's occurring and what has occurred. And while it may take some effort to find those facts (reading more than one source and being off kool-aid for starters), they are out there. For example:

1. There were NO WMDs found in Iraq.
2. WMDs were the given reason for invading Iraq.

The Bush administration is not the first nor the only administration to embellish its view of the world. It is has, however, elevated lying and misinformation to heights never seen before. I've witnessed Rumsfeld lie to Tim Russert about something he had previously said; Tim then played the clip that demonstrated Rumsfeld's lie; Rumsfeld then ignored the clip, snorted something smart ass as he attempted to ridicule Russert's question, and then moved on. Cheney has also done this...if fact he still says we were greeted as liberators.

All the crooked/lying politicians who came before this current crew were, in comparison, novices, and usually quit perpetuating the lie once the evidence revealed their crap...but not this gang. If they get caught lying, they lie more. They then try to muddy the water by saying 'well, dems do it to' or flat out ignore the evidence and keep on chanting their lie to their choir of kool-aid drinkers.

The truth is still out there, but now you have to dig for it. First thing, don't rely on news from extremist news organizations from the right or the left. I want the truth, even if it's not always good news for my side. It's a personal thing with me, I hate it when I find out I've fallen for a lie. I feel worse when I fall for a lie and then go spreading it around. No matter your intentions, everyone looks a little stupid when they're incorrect.

I lean very very left, but I rely on news I find coming from the middle. Jon Stewart does very well catching CNN being Fox News far too often, yet most right-wingers consider CNN to be liberal. I think lots of people have no clue what liberal actually means. John Dean clearly points out that the old meaning of conservative didn't really fit 50 years ago and totally doesn't fit now. So maybe people on both sides need to re-examine what they are calling themselves.

I just have a feeling if we could talk to a 95 year old German, they'd tell us the first thing to go in 1930s Germany was non-biased news coverage. Every tin horn dictator in the world controls the media in their country and makes sure it reports the party line. Who would have thought that would ever happen in America? But it has. Out and out payments by the White House for fake news reports shipped to our local stations, fake news printed in Iraqi newspapers...the evidence is everywhere. Fox News should be based in the basement under the West Wing....a total White House organ. And boy, didn't I put that politely?

If the Democrats don't win back some power this November America has had it. By 2008 Bush will have declared himself President for life and we'll see him on TV under giant pictures of him and Cheney looking down at the endless parade of US troops and military weapons just like the good old days back in the USSR.

Wish someone had told me 20 years ago that things would be like they are today. I would have tied my wife tubes with my bare hands rather than bring children into the world to witness the decline and fall of the United States.

JD and 70%

There were WMDs in Iraq,

Iraq used WMD against the Kurds
A Pentagon report states they found ,
an intelligence report in Washington saying 500 chemical munitions had been collected in Iraq since the 2003 invasion.

They might have been old or degregated, but they were there and they have been found. , also WMDs were not the only reason.

Sadam Hussein has twice invaded other countries, he was a brutal dictator who has murdered thousands of his own citizens. The Middle East is better off with him gone.

The middle east was better off with Saddam than with a U.S. occupation. The region is now more unstable, we're creating more new terrorists than Saddam ever dreamed about, and anti-American sentiment is at an all-time high.

Death By Inches, do you not have anything else to do but write a million diatribes on this blog every day?

No nony, I don't. It's too hot and I'm too wealthy to do much work today. How's things going for you?

I listened to that Meridith woman on The View ( yeah, she's a "real" newswoman now) say we should support "our troops who are fighting for our freedom in Iraq." Last tiime I ever saw that show. Anyway, there are more problems than Fox news out there. Sure, we would be much better off as a country if there were a standard of truth for news shows and newspapers. Problem is, everybody thinks the truth is just one simple thing all the time. Sometimes, it is. Sometimes, it takes a lot of work to find the truth. It is much easier and much less expensive to just mix all the simple truth with all the fantasy and spit them both out at the same time. After all, who has time to search for truth in such a busy world. We are usually willing to settle for a new sound bite at the fast news window rather than spend the extra time and cost for a meal of truth. Scientists seek truth; the rest of us just want to believe.

Dump the GOP elite cable companies.

America used to have intelligent, dedicated reporters who went 20 extra miles to get the news and get it right.

Last night I was reading Pierre Salinger* autobiography and when he was a newspaper reporter in California in the early 50s, he got himself arrested on purpose and spent a number of weeks in various county jails to write an expose on the horrid conditions and treatment of anyone unfortunate enough to get locked up in San Francisco.

Now, tell me one reporter who would do such a thing today to get a story and get it right? Yes, not everything is simple, but we used to have a media intelligent enough to go get the facts and regurgitate them back to us accurately, in a fashion even the simple minded could understand.

If America could do it once, we can do it again. But not when most of the media is being paid off by the White House. Not when most of the media is owned by Republicans. We're in a heap of trouble and better find the way out fast.

* Pierre Salinger said he wouldn't live in a country with George W. Bush as President and moved to France after the Supreme Court crowned King George in 2001. He died there in 2004.

There were WMDs in Iraq,

Iraq used WMD against the Kurds
A Pentagon report states they found ,
an intelligence report in Washington saying 500 chemical munitions had been collected in Iraq since the 2003 invasion.

They might have been old or degregated, but they were there and they have been found. , also WMDs were not the only reason.

There ya go...a perfect example of why the Bush Cartel doesn't have to admit they lied their asses of to the American public. Old, degraded and unusable WMD's were not the ones referenced by Bush/Cheney/Condi/Powell when they were making their Iraq War sales pitch to the American public. 'Impending' mushroom clouds and an immediate threat were their tense choices. This is not a theory; their own words are there for the seeking...if it's the truth you're interested in.

And, none of the crap they're spouting today about 'removing a really bad man' or 'an eternal War against bad people' or 'bringing peace to the entire Middle East' or... was mentioned during the pre-war sales pitch.

What's interesting is how Bush et al know better than to publicly tout those old useless weapons as proof of the pre-war WMDs... but yet their followers still put it out there as proof of WMDs.

Yeah zelda, it's a clear as glass that ole frank is getting 100% of his news from those friendly folks at Fox News. He's quoting them verbatim. Sad.....

While DBI and you other wing nuts can try classic Nazi tactics all day long every day. Repeating your Bush lied lies does not work except on your own predisposed, bitter, twisted (election losing) kind. Cite one source who said there were not WMD's in Iraq. Certainly wasn't Clinton or Kerry, or even the frogs in France. Being mistaken is not the same thing as a lie.

The uninformed blogger who calls himself "wing nuts lie" wrote:
"Cite one source who said there were not WMD's in Iraq."

I've done your home work for you. Here's an article by a writer who cites a bunch of sources.

-----------copied paragraphs, beginning of article----------
Half of U.S. still believes Iraq had WMD

By CHARLES J. HANLEY, AP Special Correspondent Sun Aug 6, 7:43 PM ET

Do you believe in Iraqi "WMD"? Did Saddam Hussein's government have weapons of mass destruction in 2003?

Half of America apparently still thinks so, a new poll finds, and experts see a raft of reasons why: a drumbeat of voices from talk radio to die-hard bloggers to the Oval Office, a surprise headline here or there, a rallying around a partisan flag, and a growing need for people, in their own minds, to justify the war in Iraq.

People tend to become "independent of reality" in these circumstances, says opinion analyst Steven Kull.

The reality in this case is that after a 16-month, $900-million-plus investigation, the U.S. weapons hunters known as the Iraq Survey Group declared that Iraq had dismantled its chemical, biological and nuclear arms programs in 1991 under U.N. oversight. That finding in 2004 reaffirmed the work of U.N. inspectors who in 2002-03 found no trace of banned arsenals in Iraq.
---------------------end copied paragraphs-------------------

OK, Wingy, now go back to your Mommy and Daddy and tell them to help you find this article.

Well I don't know any other way around it or any other way to say it...but you WMD spouting Bushies (that'd be you 'wing nuts lie') are idiots who lack any sense of what it is to actually discuss an idea and/or formulate a productive thought...to research a fact.

Most of the stuff you spout would be LOL funny if there weren't so many of you and you didn't have such a vicious streak (I'm reminded of the witch burnings of old). All you seem to know is war, greed and intolerance. Your answer to most situations is 'kill em,' lock em up' or 'give me more money.' And, you're willing to throw away every value this country has stood for in order to achieve your totalitarian theocracy. We're at war so Bush can do anything, break any law---totalitarian. Every political stand the Bushies take is based on their religious views...not on sound public policy, or historical wisdom--theocracy.

Well I feel better...

Sturm and Drang -- Nice of you to cite an article from this weekend, after the $900 million investigation, but I'm still waiting on a source from before the war that show's the President lied as opposed to being mistaken (something none of you Dims ver are). Zelda, wake up honey, we are in wwIII. Ignoring the Islamic facists, like this Country did beginning with Reagan in 1983, or trying to appease them, a la Chamberlin (sp?) will only make the day of reckoning worse.

wing nut lie....as long a Senator Pat Roberts is alive and in the Senate and in charge of the investigation of how we went to war, not a living human being will ever know the truth.

Roberts has stonewalled and stonewalled and stonewalled and we'll know Elvis's last thoughts on the john before we ever confirmation of what we already know....that Bush-Cheney and their neo-con masters wanted Iraq's oil, and to set up permanent bases in Iraq as a first step in taking over the entire Middle East.

If only Pat Roberts would cough up a lung and fly to the ever-loving arms of Jesus the investigation would go forward and the world would know the truth.

DBI, hey I thought you guys think the President is some monkey faced moron, but now you say he was the only one who knew there were no wmds? I think you should get a different sized tin hat and different flavored kool aid. Next I suppose you believe the Wisconsin professor who is advocating the administration really caused the towers to fall, and blew the levees in New Orleans. Oliver Stone couldn't do any better than plot to take over Middle East for oil. Hel,l Venezula is a lot closer and would be an easier takeover candidate.

wing nut, I personally think the President dribbles in front of the toilet because he can't find his own wing-wang. But he along with Cheney, Rummy, Rove, Condi, Wolfie, and the rest of the neo-cons pulled out all the stops to spread lies that caused the US to invade a rotten little oil rich country that had no WMD and nothing to do with 9-11. Can you say WAR CRIMINALS?

Although I don't agree with your politics, Don K, I do appreciate your willingness to use a screen name. I try to skip through all anonymous posts (or to read as little of them as possible), but I do read your posts and the posts of those polite enough to use a screen name. Thanks again for the courtesy.

I do appreciate your willingness to use a screen name. . . Thanks again for the courtesy. - Posted by: Pavel
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I always enjoy perusing the blog for interesting comments from both (or rather, all) sides of the spectrum.

With a few exceptions, most of the useless fluff and name-calling is usually posted by "Anonymous" (I know I will get scorched for that).

Although I can usually anticipate what the "regulars" are going to say, it is still informative to tag along since, every once in a blue moon, I find something that changes my perspective.

Not too old to learn.

Not too stubborn to change.

And, regardless of each blogger's, perspective, we're all in this together.

(Soft music starts here . . . fade to black).

Yeah, Don K, I read your stuff, too. I pretty much just skim the anonymous posts.

Don Keyhotay--

I enjoy your posts also, but I also read and enjoy the genuine Don Quixote. It's a brutal book, and the genuine Don is insane. Squire Sancho is a lot smarter than the Don is, but he hangs around his lunatic boss hoping to cash in when the Don gets rich.

Now, forgive me for asking, but why are you masquerading as a lunatic Don?

--Leer y Saber.

Now, forgive me for asking, but why are you masquerading as a lunatic Don?
--Leer y Saber. - Posted by: Ecce! Spiro et Spero.
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I enjoy most of the exchanges in this forum and recognize that many would consider my thoughts somewhere "out there" on the opposite side of the spectrum. (Therein lies the lunatic?)

But, I will persistently strive to open some impossibly and/or irrationally closed minds on this blog while occasionally finding that my less-than-open mind is sometimes pried slightly apart when I glean a pearl of wisdom from someone in here with whom I would ordinarily healthily disagree.

Those EUREKA moments are great! I get some here. Maybe every once in a while I can provide some.

Savoring those moments, the joust continues. . .

aprenda de otros

Why would anyone at this point demand a "source" from before the war ro prove that Bush lied abour WMD's?
Good Lord, their are many sources - do your own homework.
Bush still says "they wouldn't let inspectors in," when it is well documented that the U.N. inspectors were KICKED OUT OF IRAQ SO THEY WOULDN'T BE KILLED BEFORE THE INVASION BEGAN.
Bush One was humiliated, and Bush Two tried to erase it.
There were no effective WMD's in Iraq. Bush lied. Period.