I come home to this?

Its why Olbermann is beating CNN -- look, people watch Fox to be pandered to, but people watch MSNBC to actually hear someone at least attempt to cover the news.

I realize KO has an ideological bias (justifiable in the context of our times, imho), but his is a good mix -- 30 minutes of serious news with actual serious people talking about it (and not screaming), followed by 30 minutes of silly stuff.

CNN has very little serious news left in their news schedule. Paula Zahn? Anderson "I'm Emoting" Cooper? Lou "The Dirty, Dirty Immigrant Hour" Dobbs? Larry King? To say nothing of the bubbleheads during the day.

Where has Aaron Brown gone?

Hear, hear.

I watch an hour of Situation Room and the CNN International at noon. The morning bubbleheads are a waste of time, the mid morning routine is worse and I simply cant face the afternoon.'I never see Zahn etc. If CNN wants to head into the toilet with GlennBeck so be it. They have lost my vote a year ago.

With Appologies to Atrios,

Haven't we already established the fact that no one is watching Beck's crappy show?

Joe - Bravo!

Not only because you show that you understand how poorly served we feel by the traditional media but you even linked to MediaMatters.org to back up your case.

Seriously - no snark here - bravo.

A bit off-topic: I was wondering if you had any comment about George Will's column in Newsweek about Bloomberg's potential presidential run. He has some scathing comments on 'post-partisanship' that appear aimed in your general direction.

Joe, when you're right, you're right.

Have you checked out Beck's ratings? They're abysmal, by far the worst of anyone on any CNN, MSNBC, HLN, or Fox from 7 to 11.

Got to wonder why he's got a job with CNN at all.

I'd like someone to convince they don't have him there for promote the company's own right-wing agenda.

Yeah, Joe do you have an response for ol' George. Why is he throwing hand grenades your direction?

Excellent post by the way. You linked. You were concise and snarky in fact. A little Mud rubbed off on you, eh. :-) In any event, check out what Will has to say and if you keep this up you begin to win friends.

Joe,

I left a compliment for you on the thread below, but I'll say it here too. You are a really good blogger. Brass me off sometimes, but an excellent blogger. And this is a great group blog. It's good to note that every now and again, between harumphs.

Come on folks, ease off on Mr. Beck. We all know that whoever watches Beck, they are like the folks who watch auto racing because they want to see someone crash and burn.

Beck's job is to attract an audience for his broadcaster (and his sponsor); in our increasingly fragmented media landscape, there will always be a small but devoted lunatic demographic who want to watch some 30+ person act like a 6th grader; and it's easy to do if you are a narcissist who just wants to be on TV.

Let's be honest: there are no standards in the news/entertainment industry anymore. It's only a matter of time until there's a cooking show for copraphiliacs.

Mr. Beck helps to fill a need in the world, and the rest of America (those of us smarter than a box of rocks) can just step around his pile o'crap and go on with our lives.

sean s.

This looks like a trial run to steal some of O'Reilly's audience at 8PM --- the people running CNN look at Fauxnews ratings, and want a piece of that action, which is why they hired Beck in the first place. And they assume that Beck isn't grabbing more of the Fauxnews audience because he's on CNN's sister network, Headline News -- but maybe if they put him on their flagship, more Fauxnews devotees will make the switch.

(and does anyone else find it ironic that Joe Klein is complaining about the lack of "smart" media -- when his first post back from Iraq is based on White House propaganda about "al Qaeda" being the enemy we are fighting in that country?)

There is a certain strain of conservative male that simply refuses to believe that anything of psychological value can develop after the age of, say, fifteen. We have a person similar to Beck (Michael Graham) hosting radio here in Boston.

Giggly fear of women, obsession with playing war, the "you're not the boss of me!" whiny attitude: this pre-adolescent stuff is what informs their politics. Their image of the entire world mirrors their relationship to their parents when they were thirteen.

Listening to them is beyond annoying to anybody who has a life.

So, Joe. Is this person "merely aping" (to use your words) the right wing pundits like Glenn Beck?:

http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=860546376283859020&hl=en

Sounds like you had quite a trip, by the way. Good to hear that you're home safe.

Maybe CNN could feature a smart, sleazy liar like Joe Klein. Has Klein ever issued a retraction for his false statement about Tom Tancredo? When Klein calls those opposed to massive illegal activity "Mexiphobes", whose interests is he serving?

P_Lukasiak,
Come on!! Can't you give Klein credit when he is right? He's seeing the light, even if it is very slowly.

Cable News:

Interview Ann Coulter;

Have on Bill Bennett -- Repeatedly

NEVER invite those damn hippies, like, say Glenn Greenwald or Noam Chomsky on your network.

"P_Lukasiak,
Come on!! Can't you give Klein credit when he is right? He's seeing the light, even if it is very slowly."

I don't think Joke is seeing the light. I think, rather, he knows he has to say something reasonable on occasion, in order to protect his ruse of being a "liberal."

Right on ,Joe. I turned on CNN last night for about 10 seconds of that insipid whiny ranter and clicked right away. Cable news used to be why I got cable TV. Cable news is dead now, replaced by right wing propaganda. So, Dailyshow and Colbert Report are the only things keeping me subscribing.

But it's probably not worth the dough for that.

And, why are liberals banned from the cable news shows? Phil Donahue had better ratings than Beck ad was canned. Fact of life: TV Executives call the shots and they are pocketbook conservatives.

I canceled my Time subscription because they withheld information from voters about the PLame leak, which is simply unconscionable.

TLB: "Maybe CNN could feature a smart, sleazy liar"

They already got Lou Dobbs (if we report it, it must nbe true) and Glenn Beck. And you want more sleazy liars? Maybe get Malkin to join in?

I've never understood why Paula Zahn remains on the air. I still remember the CNN coverage of the 2000 election, when she was trapped between Blitzer, Judy Woodruff and Jeff Greenfield. She had literally NOTHING to add to the coversation most of the time, and I wondered then why she has such a prominent role on CNN. I'm still wondering. On the bright side, though: Beck will probably make viewers miss Paula Zahn.

Oof.

Joe,

You take a lot of (mostly well-deserved) grief, but in this case, credit where credit is due: right on. It's testament to the state of cable TV that I would rather see you do your impersonation of a liberal in that hour than the racist murderous thug Beck do his "Outrage for Dummies" schtick any day.

I write a lot of crap on my crappy little blog, but few people read so I am not that surprised that I don't get a lot of wingnut response to some of the far left vitriol I write. In fact, I've only ever gotten one - on this post about Glenn Beck:
http://dgently.blogspot.com/2007/05/why-is-glenn-beck-on-my-tv.html

Which amazes me. I can't imagine why he is even on TV, let alone how he got a supporter. It wasn't a particulary clever comment, but still ...

>Can't we, like, try a week of smart?

Mr. Klein,
After a week of Mudcat,
After a week of Dick Army,
After a week of Michael Kinsley,
All I can say is draw the dots between glass houses and a refraining from the act of throwing stones.

Perhaps your employer could extend an invitation to Digby for Swampland to try a week of smart.

Like I've said before, there is a larger market for serious, honest news than there is for the dishonest, partisan, ideologically driven crap of Fox "News".
But CNN hasn't figured that out yet and that's why Fox cleans their clocks in the ratings.
The 26 percenters will always hate CNN, whether they try to be Fox Lite or whether they actually become a serious news agency again.
What about the other 74 percent of Americans? What choices do they have to watch for their news?
Not much.
Everyone's trying to be Fox Lite as they cave in to the loud 26 percenters, who are waging a right wing Fatwah against all agencies of reason.

Dear Joe:

Right on.

Love, Padraig

Dear Joe:

Right on.

Love, Padraig

I don't know whether this is the real you, or the straw liberal you sometimes claim to be, but in either case, I'd like to see more of this content. I enjoy your non-tool posts, and it's simply because I've seen so many of the tool ones that my knee-jerk skepticism is activated.

Joe...you forgot that we live in Bizarro World since January 2001.

Joe, remember the Broderville rules. You must have a pox on both houses narrative.

Try to find one liberal pundit who gets invited on all the TV talk shows who wants terrorists to kill a presidential candidate(Coulter) or invites guests on his show who want to bludgeon a presidential candidate with a tire iron(Beck).

After all both sides do it. Right?

But for some reason only right wingers with homicidal fantasies get promoted and celebrated by the corporate media.

I posted this on WaPo today in response to Howie Kurtz's lament about "news"casters promoting Paris Hilton:

I turned off my TV in 1998 and I see no reason to turn it back on.

Joe's post here and everything I see/read online has made me more convinced this is right. I do miss TDS and Colbert. But I get to see snippets here.

Yes. You come home to this.

yeah, and tonite you got paris hilton to spend the entire hour with larry king. cnn only too happy to snarf up the humiliated nbc/abc puke reject.

puh-leez. cnn hasn't been worth watching for years.

Joe,
Thank you for making a needed point. What kind of analysis leads someone to conclude that people want to watch Beck?

Good post Joe. The flip side obviously is why cab't doctrinaire liberals get a shot? I and many others would appreciate knowing. It's always avoided.

It's not ratings. Phil Donahue was fired by MSNBC when he led their ratings. Other than Keith Olberman, who does quite nicely, there seems to be a soft ban.

Why do the Sunday talk shows put on more Republicans than democrats too? Every time this subject is broached, it's studiously ignored... and Glenn Beck is on my tv. This is fine. But let's not pretend that liberals are allowed to have shows other than K.O.

Props to Joe for keeping the focus, not on freaks like Coulter or clowns like Beck, but on the MSM outlets irresponsible enough to give them airtime.

There probably is a market for a right-of-center version of the Daily Show or Countdown. There definitely will be such a market if, come 2009, we have a Democrat as president. Someone like P.J. O'Rourke, but younger and hipper, with 90% bemusement leavened with 10% outrage if the occasion calls for it (i.e. the Olbermann formula). But definitely not Beck, his schtick is Coulter's paranoid malevolence, delivered with the sh**-eating grin of Pat Robertson.

I thought the George Will piece bashing post-partisanship was right on the money. I'm not sure it was aimed at Joe as much as at David Broder.

Let's face it: in the rogues gallery of pundits pimping post-partisanship, Joe isn't exactly America's Most Wanted.

It's surprising to me that George Will -- Reaganite, global-warming denier that he is -- often makes more sense than 90% of "liberal" pundits.

Jill:

"we live in Bizarro World since January 2001."

Oh, it's been longer than that. Just think of all the press shenanigans against Clinton in the 90's and their War Against GoreTM in 1999-2000 (trademarked by Bob Somerby, http://www.dailyhowler.com/ ).

We have to remember that the small audience for day time cable news is stay at home moms and retired older men. They don't really want to know about real news. What they want to know is when Paris Hilton gets out of prison and how to get information on the newest boner pill.

It is time.

I am declaring war on RIGHT-WING AMERICANS. We must do use any means necessary to ensure a return to centrist policies in America.

Mr. President,
Your war is over.

Darth Cheney,
Obey the law or go to pound me in the @$$ federal penitentiary.

Gonzo,
You're a loser.

Glenn Beck,
Sleep with Coultergeist and make some alien babies on Mars.

I am fed up along with many others. Let the Revolution begin. Come hell or highwater, this country shall be taken back.

Uhh excuse me, I have my TV but after going through all 6,227 cable channels, I seemed to have lost the "Hard News Channel" Can anyone tell me where it went?

Bravo Joe. TV news ratings are in trouble because their market researchers are asking the wrong questions and using bad data to drive programming. If someone actually has the fortitude to forsake the flighty nonsense that is standard fare they will stand out and (eventually) make a killing. The News Hour with Jim Leher does this but in a very in-depth manner. This is great if you have time to actually watch the whole show but there is clearly room for someone to take a straight up approach (how about no bias - liberal or conservative?) and combine it with the shorter story format of the cable news channels.

I can't wait for this to happen...Oh and by the way I have a pig that sprouted wings and can fly across my back yard.

Joe,
I'm glad that you found that table to hide under on your first night in Iraq and that you are safe.

Your trip has done wonders for your blogging--three good posts in a row must be your new record.

Keep on keeping on and maybe your voice will finally break through to Mr. Parsons. In my wildest imaginings, I can't for the life of me conceive of anyone thinking that Beck is good for business.

I applaud your recent efforts!

If CNN is trying to pry viewers away from Fox they can forget it. Only the Grim Reaper will accomplish that and he does so on a regular basis (Fox' audience is pretty old). MSNBC should develop some shows around young liberal pundits or give Rachel Maddow a show to lead in Countdown. There's fertile ground that Fox will never try to claim and CNN is ceding. With conservatism becoming more unpopular every day, MSNBC could become the dominant cable new network.

DOn't you know that rich white guys like Beck are getting the shaft day in and day out? I wish there were an entire station devoted to whiny, overweight, privileged, white guys who aren't getting their fair shake in America!

Glenn Beck,
Sleep with Coultergeist and make some alien babies on Mars.
*********
Sweet Jesus, Bryan, that is a horrible, horrible thought!

I was having a fairly good day until you put that ugly thought into my head!

I agree with Joe, why doesn't someone try smart TV?

We already have a network that feeds the right-wing extremists, who prefer propaganda to reality. We also have the networks that cater to the centrist, plague on both their houses crowd, the Broder audience. What we don't have is smart TV, a network dedicated to the truth, even if the truth doesn't balance out evenly.

Joe's corporate zombie masters are desperately trying to salvage something from the Glenn Beck fiasco, probably figuring a little exposure on the CNN mothership might zap a pulse into his crappy little show on HLN. Which will only pull down CNN's rating -- but hey, if these guys could think they wouldn't be among the corporate cable news undead.

How did we come to this, Joe asks.

Well, why don't we all take a moment and remember that the cover story of the April 17, 2005 issue of TIME was devoted to a loving story about Ms. Coulter by John Cloud?

Was there a more telling instance of how lunatics with absolutely nothing important or incisive to say about anything are elevated to celebrated pundit status?
___________________________

Where has Aaron Brown gone?
*******
I was someone who used to watch Brown regularly, and I was really hacked off when they got rid of him. While he may not have had the ratings that AC did then, I liked his laid back style.

Apparently Aaron went the same route as the three journalists who were recently dismissed because they were on MSNBC's list of journalists who had contributed money to politics. I think all three who were dismissed had contributed to Democrats and/or Moveon.org.

Smart TV=PBS!

Thanks, Klein, for putting your view of Beck on the record. Frankly, I don't particularly care whether such sentiments are genuine or not. I only care that Beck gets increasingly marginalized.

I am loathe to criticize after Klein just became the first mainstream journo to call Beck out that I know of, BUT this type of criticism is just insufficient.

Strictly speaking, journalism isn't a profession. There is no official barrier to entry. There are no self-policing industry mechanisms. Media outlets routinely violate their own internal guidelines.

While journalism SHOULDN'T be an ivory tower, like the practice of law or medicine, there is much that the industry could do, through voluntary self-enforcement, to improve the public perception of journalists.

Print journos should not assume that the public reaction to the sloppy reporting practices (and the blurring between reporting and editorializing) that exists -- indeed, is encouraged -- in TV news will not affect them. New is news. If Klein and his colleagues remain silent when TV talking heads routinely report unsubstantiated rumors, if not rank speculation, as fact, why should readers assume that print journalists have different standards for their own reporting?

If Klein truly believes that Beck is that bad, snarky blog posts just don't cut it. How about a serious letter (preferably open and public) from Klein and his colleagues to management?

Glenn Beck, Ann Coulter, and all their cousins--there are tons of these insane, hateful people all over our media.

Yet it's liberals who are called angry and extreme and other names.

More like this, Joe.

Glenn Beck is an untalented, and as the ratings attest, unwatchable hack.

JUST REMEMBER, REAL MEDIA IS WINNING AND LIBTARD MEDIA IS LOSING. GO FOX GO!

JUST REMEMBER, REAL MEDIA IS WINNING AND LIBTARD MEDIA IS LOSING. GO FOX GO!

JUST REMEMBER, REAL MEDIA IS WINNING AND LIBTARD MEDIA IS LOSING. GO FOX GO!

JUST REMEMBER, REAL MEDIA IS WINNING AND LIBTARD MEDIA IS LOSING. GO FOX GO!

JUST REMEMBER, REAL MEDIA IS WINNING AND LIBTARD MEDIA IS LOSING. GO FOX GO!

JUST REMEMBER, REAL MEDIA IS WINNING AND LIBTARD MEDIA IS LOSING. GO FOX GO!

JUST REMEMBER, REAL MEDIA IS WINNING AND LIBTARD MEDIA IS LOSING. GO FOX GO!

JUST REMEMBER, REAL MEDIA IS WINNING AND LIBTARD MEDIA IS LOSING. GO FOX GO!

JUST REMEMBER, REAL MEDIA IS WINNING AND LIBTARD MEDIA IS LOSING. GO FOX GO!

JUST REMEMBER, REAL MEDIA IS WINNING AND LIBTARD MEDIA IS LOSING. GO FOX GO!

"Smart TV=PBS!"

Not really, anymore -- Luntz, Melanie Morgan, Richard Perle rehabilitation efforts, ...

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2007/06/whos-minding-pbs-store-by-digby-there.html

The only really smart one there is Moyers nowadays.

Glenn Beck has gotten face time at all is incomprehensible. I wrote to CNN early on about this guy and from time to time..like when he insulted an AMERICAN congressman...Ellison...by asking him to prove he is a loyal american.

He is pathetic and even typing this gives too much energy in his direction...

SHUT UP LIBTARDS almost had me convinced, there, but not quite.

If only she had hit "paste" a couple more times. Alas.

> How about a serious letter

Or how about giving this issue as much critical attention as you've already given "Nameless Leftist Blog" ?

The above linda about LKL and Paris Hilton was not me.

Just a heads up. LKL did have Paul, Ringo and Olivia on last night. LK was definitely out of his league.

Thurs. is Colin Powell--I really thought that Powell had just faded away. The man who had the real political capital, but failed to use it for the greater good and is now playing a soft Tenet/Bremer.

Fri. is Michael Moore.

Most has already been said. Yes to International News and an occassional blind sow finding an acorn. I was an Aaron Brown fan, too.

I can't even type B***.

The whole crazy equivalency game - the left being just as bad, nutty, and powerful as the right - is a staple of Joe Klein School of Centrism. But the evidence is so sketchy that it borders on obstinate evenhandedness.

60 some million people voted for the most manifestly incompetent man in American presidential history BECAUSE our media tilts so hard to the right. They did so not because they're fundamentally stupid so much as easily hypnotized by sound bites and wedge issues. It's pushed the MSM to the right, as Klein himself shows. And it's made a hash of this country's capacity for self-governance.

Glenn Beck doesn't even sell books!!!!

I agree with you for once, Joe.

More posts like this, please. Maybe together we can overcome the "no liberals on the teevee" law.

Hey, look, today we got a smart blog post from Joe. Good job and more of it (resisting the urge to say "faster, please").

Glenn Beck doesn't even READ books!!!!

The only really smart one there is Moyers nowadays.
**********
Well, that's what makes it better than all the others put together, imho.

Frontline, while uneven in content, is still leagues above the others too, imho.

On an arguably related note, remember when Phil Donahue had the highest rated show on MSNBC and his reward was getting canned?

Glen Beck and Tucker Carlson hardly draw flies but somehow they manage to hold on to their jobs with no apparant pressue to changes their hugely unpopular acts.

If I was a stockholder in either CNN or MSNBC I'd be sorely cheesed off at management's failure to follow classic economic theory.

Good job Joe.

Beck the bigot knows his job- race bait over immigration issues. It's the last card the reps have for doemstic policy and that is why they let it go unresolved when the bipartisan bill was made.

They have the war and immigration as their issues, neither issue is one that the GOP represents a majority of America's interests in.
Trained seals can bark for fish and put on a better show.

Beck knows which side his bread is buttered on.

Bias accomplished.

One day a couple of months ago, my cable company put the CNN International feed on CNN's channel by mistake for a few hours.

Man, what a difference!

Real news from all over the world, much less glitz, and a buttload more information, proving that despite all the evidence to the contrary, Time-Warner is still capable of running a real 24-hour cable news channel that actually covers news.

CNN International is the very model of what Mr. Klein is calling "smart" above.

I need no other reason to support "a la carte" cable than that I might be able to substitute CNN International for the Glenn Beck Channel.

That, and not having to pay for any of the ESPNs or Foxes that I never watch...

Forgive me for wandering into the wrong room; I'm an old guy. Joe, LOVED your column about asking pols hard questions.
I've been talking up the draft, too, but in a different.

1A. The volunteer military we have now stays in place
1. The draft mechanism is sitting in the background ticking. It has names.
2. No exemtions except physical. None.
3. A POTENTIAL war comes along, say post-9/11, the machine is pulled out and names start getting called.
4. Let's say Iraq starts getting tossed around, as well as WMD
5. EVERYONE will feel the pain if the President gives the "go" sign.

Bottom line? "War" becomes a very hard call. This "war" would have been over a LONG time ago, if not started at all if EVERYONE had IMMEDIATLY begun to feel the pain. We would have seen more than cheesy flags in car windows showing "support"

PS Viet Nam vet, two years in country, volunteered to go and am now retired military. Been there and done that.

DRAFT THE NEOCONS!
Teach them that peace is the way!
The draft was integral to our success in Vietnam.

Libtards expresses for me everything I find distasteful...naw, let's be honest, loathesome...about the conservative mindset, and it's this:

In lieu of intelligent arguments and honest debate where listening is valued at least as much as talking (screaming?), we get instead name calling, sophomoric (alright, moronic) hatemongering, and racist/sexist/bigoted ideology masquerading as intelligent thought and expression.

The inmates have taken over the asylum etc. Ann Coulter, you know who you are.

The reason I don't watch CNN much any more is that right when I'm looking for a good wrapup of the days news, there is the pink, plump, Rovian visage of Glenn Beck (who looks so fresh faced and all- American-likable...until you listen to 45 seconds of the nonsensical Limbaughian bullpucky endlessly spewing from his mouth).

I in all sincerity fail to understand what he is contributing to any meaningful dialogue anywhere that isn't being said elsewhere, and much more intelligently.

Is this CNN's answer to "fair and balanced"?

More like "foppish and braindead".

And hear hear to laments over Aaron Brown's dismissal. I made it a point to watch his segment almost every night because he seemed intelligent, willing to consider more than one hysterically shouted point of view, and he had good stories most of the time. What a colossal mistake, CNN.

But then, you got rid of the wrong O'Brien in the morning so what in fact can we expect from you in terms of integrity and balance? Wolf Blitzer remains about the only worthwhile person to watch if news is what we're after. Mostly I avoid tv these days for anything but old western DVDs, and get my news from Time magazine and The Economist.

Yet sometimes at night, as I'm drifting off, I am like The Old Man and The Sea, dreaming of the lions who are no more: Cronkite, Sevareid, Murrow, Huntly and Brinkley. The lions, looking out to sea and wondering where the ship of state has sailed, and why it's left real journalism to die on the beach.

Thats whats called an easy lob over the plate. When you've got Joke Line calling out the press, you know its really, really over. Does that mean you won't be showing up on CNN anymore as a protest? Of course not.

You're part of the problem Joe, and have been for a long, long time. Pointing out the obvious, to those who have been pointing it out to you, doesn't erase your horrendous embrace of administration talking points, constant mis characterization of anyone who disagrees w/ you and habit of out and out lying about what you wrote and when. I would say something, as others here have, along the lines of "hey joe, you suck but this is a good first step", but I know you too well.

Joke, did they find any pizza delivery uniforms among the 'al-qaeda' fighter's belongings?

"One day a couple of months ago, my cable company put the CNN International feed on CNN's channel by mistake for a few hours.

Man, what a difference!

Real news from all over the world, much less glitz, and a buttload more information, proving that despite all the evidence to the contrary, Time-Warner is still capable of running a real 24-hour cable news channel that actually covers news."

Can we start a movement to have the faux news CNN pulled and replaced with the real version? I see this on the road while traveling and agree it's actual news.

Don't forget Bernard Shaw is very unhappy with CNN's descent into the gutter:
http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/cnn/bernard_shaw_very_very_disappointed_by_cnn_management_fox_mannerisms_60348.asp

Glen Beck is weird. He doesn't make any sense. He's poorly educated and speaks without any substance. CNN I thought was serious about the news. Might as well give Rosie O'Donnell a CNN show since their comments are equally nonsensical.

"Joe, when you're right, you're right."

And when you're left, you're left. It really all depends on who is shouting the loudest from what political position this week.

*rimshot*

To Jim Lawrence:

Beautifully said.

As I speak, Chris Matthews is wringing his hands at the existence of Ann Coulter and her brand of politics, it of course, never dawns on Tweety, that it was HE who gave her a platform to spread her disease and and HE who also profited from it.

Glen Beck is almost as big of a devil as Cheney.
Can we impeach him too?

To cite ratings in order to prove a point about someones worth is a cop out. 40% of Americans think that Saddam was involved in 9/11, Hannity, Rush and Fox news are still very popular ( as well as pro wrestling and tele-evangelism ). All this proves is that there are alot of stupid and easily manipulated Americans.

Beck is a preening prick. Coulter gets an hour on MSNBC. CNBC is 24/7 corporatist. Fox is 24/7 right wing.CNN gives about five minuites to Cafferty lest he say something the powers that be don't like. There is still no channel a true progressive can regularly speak on. How about Gore, Edwards, the Kerrys and Soros get together and fund a true progressive 24 hour news channel and let Randi Rhodes, Phil Donohue and Bill Moyers be in charge of programming content. That is the only way we can finally put to bed the myth of the liberal media. By showing the country what liberal media realy looks like.

Paulqx

You are right. There are a lot of stupid and easily manipulated Americans.

They are called liberals and George Soros, Moveon.org and the DU/KOS KLOWNS rely on their stupidity to further their agendas.

Strong comeback Mark A, really insightful...why aren't you on cable TV?

Pumpkinhead Russert is finally having a blogger on Meet the Press--look who it is: Meet The Press Roundtable To Feature Christian Broadcasting Network Blogger -- http://thinkprogress.org/2007/06/27/mtp-brody/

Joe, if you suddenly want to clear out the stupid, you need to look closer to home, and you have a lot of work to do.

Time's Quote of the Day for today:

"Democrats should shut the f**k up and bend over."
- Tony Fratto, White House spokesman

Quote for yesterday: Ann Coulter regarding Elizabeth Edwards
"I use the memory of her dead son to wipe up the bulimia vomit from around my toilet."

Quite the day before that: George Bush
"scotsmen r dour, but dis one iz funny!"

Bravo! Bravo!

just another right wing person who is wrong on everything falling up. i guess cnn wasn't satisfied with their poor ratings and wanted crappy.

Libtard:Do you see a connection between your rants & the rants of "Two legs bad,Four legs good" from Orwell's Animal Farm?

CNN, Fox what's the differance? I will never watch CNN again, and I'm a valued demografic. Bye-bye.

Glenn Beck? Come on and put the cork back in the bottle. Ever try broadcasting someone who is intelligent? Why not Tom Hartman? He is smart, argues a good point and already has a VERY LOYAL following. You have a million and one right wing boobs on TV and except for Keith Obermann no other speakers who I would label progressive. Is CNN the new Fair and Balanced network? Glenn Beck, you've got to be kidding me.

arch

because it is the truth and the mainstream media

a) cannot handle the truth
b) don't want to offend their sheep, I mean their viewers

Beat me to it but said it in a nicer way than I would have.

This is why the libs want the fairness doctrine back because it is the only way that their BS will get any airtime on radio since Air America did so well given its Daily Kos/DU sound. Maybe if the Democrats took their party back from the Kos Kids and the inmates at the DU they might develop a coherent message that people might actually support.

Look, I am a regular poster on the Daily Kos and we are the heart and soul of the Democrat Party. Without us netroots and activists there would have been no glorious victory in Nov 06 and without us there is no way Obama can win the Presidency. Since we are the Democratic Party one cannot take us out of the equation. If you don't like it you can go traitor on us like Joe Lieberman. We don't want, nor do we need people who are not with the program.

"Fluoridation is the most monstrously conceived
and dangerous Communist plot we have ever had
to face." "Mandrake, have you ever seen a Commie
drink a glass of water."

Thanks Joe.

Glenn Beck degrades the common culture, that he's taking up space on what used to be a commendable 'news' channel suggest the TWBCNNMSM Execs have completely lost their moral compass.

That those same Execs keep supporting a ratings loser like Beck suggests that shareholders have lost their collective voices as well.

Life in the Twilight Zone
_Chris Mathews has Armstrong Williams (the payola for NCLB guy) on as the Conservative commentator vs Hillary Rozen (former head of the organization that sued music downloaders) as the Liberal.
Williams pointed out that Mathews gave Coulter credibility by having her on. Coulter is looking out for her own interests. He also noted that young Conservatives love Coulter.
_Kiran Chetry (former FauxNews AM person now CNN AM person) interviews Roland Martin (bright African-American frequent CNN guest who doesn't have a show on CNN because it has been taken by Affirmative Action hire Glenn Beck). Martin makes the point that equating Bill Mahrer to Coulter is a false equivalency since Coulter is a "journalist" and has spoken at Conservative organizations (see John Edwards slur, followed by Conservative audience's applause), while Mahrer is a comedian. Chetry looks down and mutters under her breath that she doesn't see a difference.
_Joe Scarborough is upset that Coulter is being attacked, while Mahrer is not. Coulter is to be a guest on his show later in the day on his AM show.
_Coulter's book sales increase.

My detailed :) review of the situation. MSM equates Coulter with Mahrer. Coulter has no shame. MSM has no shame. With few exceptions (Roland Martin above), MSM commentators include some pretty unsavory characters. MSM news hosts share identical opinions.
I am wasting a lot of time listening to MSM.

CNN, yes, has gone down, down, down. But all networks and print media are on that downward trend. Instead of important public affairs news, they focus on completely irrelevant celebrities they themselves created or promoted or both. Paris Hilton and Ann Coulter and dead ones like Princess Diana and Anna Nicole Smith and, and...
If you are interested,I have written on this at
http://www.reflectivepundit.com/reflectivepundit/2007/06/mainstream-medi.html

Thank you, Joe. Not that CNN will care. . .

JOe - you need to be more respectful of your overlords at CNN.

Once Clinton is President, CNN will have to answer to President HillBill once again and toe the line. So will Time. Better start practicing acceptable journalism.

Your are all a bunch of idiots!Glenn Beck actually tells it like it really is and doesn't just complain about Bush &Fox news. Paula Zahn has terrible ratings and cnn and msnbc are going down hill and into the gutter as we know it.Fox news doesn't focus on irrelevant celebrities 24/7, instead focuses on important politics and isn't on the clinton bandwagon like all the misled liberals are.OH yeah, u think cnn and msnbc are not bias, pleaaaaaaaase. They might as well just come out flat and say Bush is Satan himself. Look Bush is one of the worst presidents we ever had but not the worst. The 2 in front of have to be Jimmy Carter& Bill Clinton. Dear God, kill me now if Hilary's elected. You liberals think we'll be a o.k. if we leave the war. Wrong and right. Let's leave Iraq and got to Afghanistan like we should have done in the first place. Comin home will put us at bigger risk of getting attacked again because we will show a weakness. C'mon guys, it's a reality we have got to face-republicans.... &all u democrats.

Don't forget Bernard Shaw is very unhappy with CNN's descent into the gutter:
****
Alpha, I had read before that Bernie was upset with CNN's decline in quality. I used to enjoy CNN when Bernard Shaw, Judy Woodruff, and Aaron Brown were there.

Since all the departures and changes, I can barely stomach it. The most recent morning switch was the straw that broke the camel's back for me.

Lou Dobbs has been ranting about one topic for years and years now--Broken Borders. I used to enjoy his program until he become obsessive-compulsive and started to sound like Limbaugh on steroids about the immigration problem. Also, it didn't help my feelings much that Dobbs kept having as a frequent guest Jeff Sessions, a supposed voice of reason, who is nothing more than a Bush-azz kisser.

If Mr. Parsons, the person Joe Klein is pleading with above, is the one responsible for all the changes, then it is past time that someone replace Mr. Parsons.
*****
amberglow,
I meant to thank you for the link to Digby re. PBS's recent changes.

ypop,
..........
Glenn Beck actually tells it like it really is and doesn't just complain about Bush &Fox news.
..........
Look Bush is one of the worst presidents we ever had but not the worst. The 2 in front of have to be Jimmy Carter& Bill Clinton. Dear God, kill me now if Hilary's elected.
..........
********
Poor thang!

Honey, I can let ya borrow a few bucks to attend your local community college if they have a course in critical analysis or something akin to it.

Just call me at Greenwood 45709 any old time.

What about Keith Olbermann on MSNBC? His hate has not bounds, the man spews constant hate speech. Where is the outrage ?

Posted by ypop
June 28, 2007
Your are all a bunch of idiots!

Ypop
Not only is your no-caps email style tedious, it's the most mind-numblingly stale bunch of rw talking points, exhibiting NO substance whatsoever. If you can't do more than that, don't do anything.

FOLKS, get used to more right wing slime purporting to be information. The NeoConservative so-called "right" has enough money to fund this beligerant bellicose bull sh-T until the end of time. Which is why their TAXES SHOULD BE RAISED to help pay off the national debt and bring some relief to the myriad social ills harming the afflicted. If they can throw good money after trash such as Beck O'Reilly et al they can pay higher taxes!
Does ANYONE remember when the job of the journalist was to Comfort the Afflicted and Afflict the Comfortable? Now we have the hate mongering flame thrower sycophants berating the powerless and fawning over the oligarchs.

My disillusionment with CNN began with their vapid, video-game graphics coverage and glorification of the Iraq war. I went from having CNN on in the background for a few hours a day while I worked from my home office, to having it on for maybe 30 to 45 min. in the evening, hoping to catch some actual news.

It was Nasty Grace's promotion to her own show on HLN which finished them off with me, for good - both CNN and HLN.

Wonderful, Joe. And daring, I have to think. If you got some nasty e-mails from management, I'd love to see them. You stood up for at least this loyal Time customer.

Except for the Music and Theater sections, I'm proud to say that I've read every word or every issue of Time since I went to college forty-some years ago, leaving a home exemplified by the Reader's Digest. That was particularly difficult for the Person of the Year issue with The Idiot Georgie W., but I managed. (If he should be on the cover, I turn the magazine over on the coffee table to avoid revulsion each time it catches my eye.)

I often say that I've learned more from Time on a wide range of subjects than any other source. And I have always and will always trust Time.

Stuff like Glenn Beck, Lou Dobbs, Nancy Grace, and Larry King on CNN should, I think, be an extreme embarrassment to Time and it's staff. And it embarrasses me because CNN denigrates the standards of Time, my trusted source for news.

So I was delighted to see your post on Swampland. You said to management what I have told myself that I should say to them many, many times.

I look forward to your every post and article. If it has your byline, I go straight to it.

I'm all for putting Rachel Maddow on TV. She's got one of the more interesting news programs on Air America. However, I would settle for a real news program that isn't constantly trying to convince Americans that the country is going to "Hell In A Handbasket". What's annoying about all of these shows is that they masquerade as news while offering a slanted view of the facts. The whole point of news is to offer NEWS!.

Talk shows (right or left) are different. You go to talk shows like Olbermann or O'Reilly primarily because you agree with the show's point of view. However, the 24 news channels have become too reliant upon these types of shows and they do almost no reporting on hard news anymore.

Finally, I really hate calling people names like idiot and stuff like that just because they disagree with me. I leave stuff like that to Coulter and her ilk. But the overall dumbing down of America is a real problem. And while I can point out excellent examples of this on all sides (Dem, Rep, Libertarian), my experience has shown me that the right wing has an almost pathological contempt for hard facts and a near total reliance on venom when talking points fail. Ann Coulter will call John Edwards a fag then claim that you can't have an intelligent discussion with liberals because all they can do is name-call. Right wing pundits will routinely repeat discredited talking point as gospel, and refuse to acknowledge error such as the covert status of Valerie Plame.

As Elizabeth Edwards pointed out - this degrades the political discussion in this country. It serves no purpose except to heighten emotions and create bigger divides in this country's population.

Why don't you liberal whiners go listen to some Air America to calm yourselves? If you can find a station that is!

Aw shucks -- Glenn Beck is just a well meaning down to earth regular American saying what everyone else is afraid to say. Gee wilikers you liberals sure are mean to the poor guy.

There are so many examples of how CNN is trying to imitate Faux News. There are so many examples that demonstrates their loss of credibility.

1. Hiring Paula Zahn & Kiran Chentry from FAUX.
2. Rick Sanchez - all style and no substance
3. No serious investigative journalists
4. AC - inability to ask an intelligent question
5. Soledad O" Brien ( best interviewer on cable) replaced by Faux journalist
6. Nancy Grace - crazy
7. Kyra Phillips - apparently every attack in Iraq is caused by Al Quaeda.
8. Barbara Starr & Suzanne Malveux - stenographers
9. T. J. Holmes - of all the talented, professional and experienced black journalist in America, they hired this dummy?
10. Rob Marciano - they hired this dummy?
11. Glenn Beck - looks and sounds retarded
12 Lou Dobbs - liar and bigot ( 60 minutes interview was priceless)

Unfortunately I have to watch CNN because there is no other news channel to choose from. I wish I could get BBC News or CNN International.

Gotta love Glenn Beck. Anyone that has the Libs whining this much must be doing something right.

Hey anonymous if you nazis weren't trying to suppress free speech and divergent opinion and would just let your beloved free market work, we'd have no trouble getting Air America. Why don't you chickenhawk conservatives go find another country to invade on false premises so innocent Americans can die for no reason whatsoever.

Yeah the nerve of us libs whining over a fake journalist who dissemintes lies while representing them as the truth and makes his living by demagoguery. If that constitutes "doing something right" in your values system, then you must be a conservative.

I'm a Mormon (a Mormon Democrat...if you can believe such a thing exists) and so is this blond blabbermouth Beck. I'm ashamed of the guy. Not just for his dumb rants and Limbaugh-like reasoning, but for his presentation. No one, and i repeat...NO ONE on TV is as smug, self-satisfied or self-amused as this guy. He cracks himself up. And he seems to think that he's so cute. Only Kelly Ripa conducts herself on the tube with such self-ascribed cuteness.

Your are all a bunch of idiots!Glenn Beck actually tells it like it really is and doesn't just complain about Bush &Fox news. Paula Zahn has terrible ratings and cnn and msnbc are going down hill and into the gutter as we know it.Fox news doesn't focus on irrelevant celebrities 24/7, instead focuses on important politics and isn't on the clinton bandwagon like all the misled liberals are.OH yeah, u think cnn and msnbc are not bias, pleaaaaaaaase. They might as well just come out flat and say Bush is Satan himself. Look Bush is one of the worst presidents we ever had but not the worst. The 2 in front of have to be Jimmy Carter& Bill Clinton. Dear God, kill me now if Hilary's elected. You liberals think we'll be a o.k. if we leave the war. Wrong and right. Let's leave Iraq and got to Afghanistan like we should have done in the first place. Comin home will put us at bigger risk of getting attacked again because we will show a weakness. C'mon guys, it's a reality we have got to face-republicans.... &all u democrats.

OK guys Paula Zahn has worse ratings than glenn beck.It's just one conservative on the entire network.Besides, it's only one week so lets all stop complaning. Frankly, they should put that Al Franken nutt on instead of paula. He is more entertaining and far left. You extreme liberals would love that wouldn't u. Stop complaning all the time. you people complain about talk radio &Fox news. Guess what-Fox news is the most watched cable network and Air America sucks so bad i bet ya'll can't name me one person with their own show there. Instead, people listen to Rush Limbaugh, Layra Ingrahm, Michael Savage, Sean Hannity, Bill o'reily, and GLENN BECK. Go ahead argue that i am a far right winger and that i should just keel over right now. Well 2 bad because i'm not gonna let this stupid extreme liberal website let u liberals debate within eachother. Oh yeah, dont worry, the satan woman is right in the lead!!!!!!!!!! So SCARY!!!!!!!

Nobody will be watching Glenn Beck. They will be watching Bill o'reily and keith olberman. Hey Joe klein, tell your network all they got is Anderson Cooper 360. That network really needs help quickly because Fox news is going to blow them completely out of the cable news race completely. Also, MSNBC needs help. Keith OLberman keeps its ratings tolerable. Of course, all Keith Olberman does is complain about Bill OL'reily. Wheres a smart liberal on cable news anymore?

You all except for a few are major kool-aid drinkers. Some of you actaully provide proper statistics, and actaully provide a way out, but i will say this, i like glenn beck alot and bill orielly, and alan colmes, i dont agree with them all the time but i do like there points of views and the way they present themselves and the way there show is carried out, I am a human being with very conservative vaules but i wont mind listening to the other side, it provies for good debate, but whem you people want to try to sensor other people's thoughts and opnions, thats when you are properly titled nazi's, because its the exact same thing hitler did in the 20's and 30's...silence people, and thats what 80% of liberals are trying to do with America. And the majority of americans dont like and wont let it stand, thats why the capitol phone system crashed, cause people are tired of having things shoved down there throat, its time to stand up and take our country back democrats and republicans, because washington is selling out on both side to labor unions and big buisness, and this country will die as we know it, if we do not do something about it.

First time to be on the site. Glenn Beck on cnn, who cares guys. Is this all ya'll do is come to this website where you can smear conservatives. Liberals need 2 stop. Ya'll look really pathetic on this website where all you do is complain about Fox news. That's all ya'll got. iF Ya'll what to control America then you better get some help in the media because nobody watches any of your networks or listens to Air America. Of course New York Times is always there to wipe your butts. Here's the reality for the libs right here-Paula Zhan sucks, Keith OLberman sucks, and Air America sucks. Just look at the ratings and what the majority of the American people want. Oh yeah, this website sucks.

Oh Boo Hoo Hoo. Glenn doesn't read from a certain liberal websites talking points (I know you know who I speak of), he actually has a mind of his own unlike that guy MSNBC employs at 8pm.

So Glenn can't do t.v., Glenn, Hannity, O'reilly and Rush are trying to be kicked off of radio by liberal congressman. Where have I heard of this clear attempt at abolishing the first amendment? Cuba? USSR? Nazi Germany? Ortega's Nicaragua?

All those countries have done great havent they? The closer and closer we move to socialism the sooner our great country becomes just another haven of poverty and crime.

Bush met with former President Jimmy Carter. Jimmy Carter is 76 years old, or as Democrats call him 'their bright new star of the future.'" —David Letterman
Did you see Carter and Castro meeting together — dining together? The last time a president embraced a Cuban like that he got impeached." —Jay Leno
The Democrats said today that if they were in power they could get Israel to pull out of Palestine. Oh shut up. They couldn't even get Bill to pull out of Monica." —Jay Leno
"It seems Monica Lewinsky is on the loose again, teaming up with HBO to do a documentary about her affair with Bill Clinton. It's not really a documentary. It will be more of an oral history." —Jay Leno
"Democratic leader Tom Daschle has been whining all over TV, saying that Rush Limbaugh and other talk show hosts have been inciting violence against Democrats. Which is illegal you know, attacking an endangered species." —Jay Leno

Bush met with former President Jimmy Carter. Jimmy Carter is 76 years old, or as Democrats call him 'their bright new star of the future.'"

Did you see Carter and Castro meeting together — dining together? The last time a president embraced a Cuban like that he got impeached." —

The Democrats said today that if they were in power they could get Israel to pull out of Palestine. Oh shut up. They couldn't even get Bill to pull out of Monica."

"It seems Monica Lewinsky is on the loose again, teaming up with HBO to do a documentary about her affair with Bill Clinton. It's not really a documentary. It will be more of an oral history."

"Democratic leader Tom Daschle has been whining all over TV, saying that Rush Limbaugh and other talk show hosts have been inciting violence against Democrats. Which is illegal you know, attacking an endangered species."

"We urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs." - 10/9/1998. Letter to President Clinton, signed by Senator John Kerry & others.

George Bush sold us on going to war with Iraq based on the threat of weapons of mass destruction. But we still haven't found them. ... We were misled about weapons of mass destruction." - 4/27/2004. John Kerry speech.

"We urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs." - 10/9/1998. Letter to President Clinton, signed by Senator John Kerry & others.

George Bush sold us on going to war with Iraq based on the threat of weapons of mass destruction. But we still haven't found them. ... We were misled about weapons of mass destruction." - 4/27/2004. John Kerry speech.

Wow, Hilary will probably look just as stupid as kerry in the next race. Liberals, please stop trying to take over America. We want to keep our values and keep God important in America. Ted kennedy should move to Mexico 2 since he loves those immigrants.

Wow, so much hate on this website- i thought this place was for liberals. Media Matters Sucks bad. Go to Liberalforum.com if you really want to debate about our real issues.

Wow, so much hate on this website- i thought this place was for liberals. Media Matters Sucks bad. Go to Liberalforum.com if you really want to debate about our real issues.

Wow, so much hate on this website- i thought this place was for liberals. Media Matters Sucks bad. Go to Liberalforum.com if you really want to debate about our real issues.

Is there a conservative commentator X, where:
X = Glen Beck - racism - sexism? I can deal with the rest of it.

"i like glenn beck alot and bill orielly, and alan colmes"

May I ask if you mean Sean Hannity there?

"whem you people want to try to sensor other people's thoughts and opnions, thats when you are properly titled nazi's, because its the exact same thing hitler did in the 20's and 30's...silence people"

Glen Beck and Sean Hannity want to sensor others and silence people, but I don't call them Nazis; not even Bill O'Reilly and his Evil Jewish Conspiracy Theories cause me to to do that.

"washington is selling out on both side to labor unions and big buisness"

May I assume you mean that Republicans are selling out to big business and Democrats are selling out to labor unions? I personally think there are other powerful interests driving the Republican Party, the Democratic Party supports businesses more than they support unions, and many important issues tend to be business vs. business anyway (i.e. Net Neutrality).

Feel free to name names on what unions are powerful enough to get Democrats to sell out to them, because I want to know who is slacking off!

-------------------------------------------------

"Of course New York Times" is there to mindlessly repeat the President's lies about Iraq, but nice try, anyway.

"Just look at the ratings and what the majority of the American people want."

Keith Olbermann gets better ratings than Glen Beck. The American people have spoken.

YOU MIGHT BE A DEMOCRAT IF...
by Steven Plaut

* You feel Fidelity means not cheating on your mistress.

* You think that ########### corrupts women, but find nothing wrong
with a 50 year old president seducing a 21 year old intern.

* You cry every May 4th over the four people killed at Kent State, but
have never been to the Vietnam Memorial.

* Along the same lines, "Four Dead in OHIO" by Neil Young gives you
goosebumps, but "19" by Paul Hardcastle means nothing to you.

* You say shows like "Leave It to Beaver" are out of touch with America
today, while you flip to your soap opera.

* You know of the stockpile of biological weapons in Iraq, but think
that the US is wrong for not signing the land mines treaty.

* You want to know why we don't offer schooling in prisons (hey, isn't
that what public schools are for).

* You think those stupid ribbons actually ac! complish something.

* You tout the NAACP, but criticize anyone referring to a black man as
a "colored person."

* You think a mother has a right to kill an ######## 5 month fetus
because her pregnancy would interfere with her career, but feel we shouldn't put to death the man who raped and murdered 14 women.

* You feel that banning smoking in public indoor places limits your
constitutional rights.

* You feel that being convicted of treason is an infringement on your
first amendment rights.

* You honestly feel that alcoholics deserve social security disability
benefits.

* You outwardly said "I would have voted for Elizabeth Dole" knowing
darn well you wouldn't have because she is a Republican.

* You think it is ok for a President to commit perjury on his sex life,
but criticize Dan Quayle for spelling potato/potatoe wrong.

* You stood on a soapbox demanding that Anita Hill be heard, but want Paula Jones' accusations to be swept under the rug.

* You think the guy who drops out of High School and builds your jeep
deserves more money than the doctor who went to college for 10 years
and saves your kids life.

* You sang along to "Give Peace a Chance" during the Gulf War.

* You've filed for unemployment within two weeks of getting out of high
school.

* You went to Woodstock II and felt that it was a significant
historical event, changing the way our country thinks.

* You own something that says, "Dukakis for President," and still
display
it.

* You've tried to argue in favor of anything based on, "Well, they're
gonna do it anyway so..."

* You've ever said, "We really should call the ACLU about this."

* You believe that a few hundred loggers can find another career, but
the defenseless spotted owl must live in its preferred tree.

* You ever based an argument on the phrase,! "But they can afford a tax
hike because..."

* You've ever argued that with just one more year of welfare that
person will turn it around and get off drugs.

* You think Lennon was a brilliant social commentator.

* You keep count of how many people you know in each racial or ethnic
category.

* You believe our government must do it because everyone in Europe
does.

* After looking at your pay stub you can still say, "America is
undertaxed."

The problem with Democrats

Liberals may be well-meaning, but that is about all they are

I am rabid environmentalist and care passionately about the poor. Yet
I would sooner pull out a constitutionally protected handgun and
shoot myself while chain smoking, eating red meat, and conducting a
painful experiment on a cute bunny rabbit than become a Democrat.
Here is why I am not a liberal:

Liberalism is simplistic. Whenever there is a problem, liberals
define it as a tragedy of the commons or an example of the private
sector under providing public goods, or make it an issue of rights.
The solution, of course, is to make it government's job to provide
the good or protect the newly minted right.

No doubt a President Gore would soon grace us with a right to the
internet or make self-confidence a public good which needs to be
provided by federal education standards.

The Left is short-sighted. It wants to fund a behemoth welfare state
at home while crusading and gallivanting about the globe in defense
of American ideology abroad. The ever-increasing financial demands of
their utopian vision will suck up all the surplus from our miracle
market, increase the yearly interest payments on the debt, and
necessitate more taxes.

In the long term, the liberal vision is only sustainable if they
succeed in raising the already immorally large tax burden. Yes,
immoral. Coercively appropriating the fruits of up to a third or even
a half of someone's labor is alienating and dehumanizes the process
of work and the worker. Especially when done to fund programs that
deliberately benefit someone else. Especially when justified as our
obligation to helping our community; as if the national, rather than
the local community was the locus of our communal obligation.

Liberal rhetoric is too shrill. If liberalism has an answer to
poverty and you have a different one, you are labeled `anti-poor
people'. If liberalism wants to tax pollution but you think the rate
is too high, you are personally responsible for the deaths of 6,484
small children somehow directly attributable to that specific
pollutant. "It's like you pulled the trigger yourself, man."
Liberalism defines every issue around saving lives and enhancing
liberty: it isn't dramatic or activist enough to say that we are
simply reducing risks and preserving stability.

Liberalism is hypersensitive, waging an unwinnable eternal revolution
against the smallest evil. Liberal causes these days are puny: let us
make sure we use `she' for a hypothetical person instead of always
using `he'; let us narrow the income gap between the richest
country's rich people and the richest country's poor people (the
richest poor in the world); let us give everyone a right not to be
subject to a certain level of pollution (lowering my risk of cancer
from one in a million to one in two million).

Liberals will never believe that America is doing okay; they are the
modern day muckrakers who insist on spoiling the party for everyone
because one person doesn't like the music.

The left is naïve. Liberals act indignantly shocked to find
injustice, poverty, hypocrisy, or oppression. There is really nothing
new about those evils at all. "It is the 20th Century, for crying out
loud!" The most barbaric century yet, they seem to forget. "This
isn't the Middle Ages!" As if that was the only or the worst age of
ignorance, vice, and malice.

Instead of heeding the historical truth that humans and their
institutions in every age will always find ways to perpetuate evil,
liberals blindly listen to the music of political scientists,
economists, psychologists, sociologists, and anthropologists who lie
and say they have discovered the laws of human behavior, and that
with the right institutional manipulation we can cancel out our vices
and live in harmony forever.

Which brings us to the worst crime of liberal ideology. The left
behaves as if the human spirit did not exist. Liberals and their
social scientists treat humans like object of the scientific method:
predictable, responding to stimuli like animals, obeying laws.
Liberals believe that hard circumstances like poverty,
discrimination, or oppression cause people to believe and behave in
certain ways, with little or no choice of their own. They do not
expect people to rise above their circumstances or live above their
material reality.

The tragic consequence is that liberal programs treat people like
products of their material reality: and when you treat a person a
certain way, over time they begin to believe that is all they are.
Liberals turn a blind eye to the system of power and domination that
their programs often unintentionally create.

The conservative belief that people should participate in helping
themselves is founded on the belief that they can help themselves. If
you treat people like they have the capacity to change, they will
begin to believe they can do so. Conservatism is fundamentally more
respectful of the dignity of human beings. Liberals do not believe
people have the ability to chose their response to their environment.
Conservatism, not liberalism, is the ideology of choice.

I believe liberals are sincere and earnest (which is more than most
conservatives will concede). Indeed, that earnestness is what gives
them their strength over conservatives: they really are more ready
and willing to attack injustice and oppression. Their problem is that
they act so fast that they cause so many unintended consequences
which could bring down the whole social project and which offend most
everyone else in the meantime.

Their victories are pyrrhic and their zeal is fundamentalist, two
very undesirable traits in an ideology.

Straight from the "donkey's" (remember what their party symbol is?) mouth:

Subject: Weapons of Mass Destruction

"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line." President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998

"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We
want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass
destruction program." President Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998

"Iraq is a long way from [here], but what happens there matters a great deal
here. For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear,
chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest
security
threat we face." Madeline Albright, Feb 18, 1998

"He