A Powerful Message on the Broader Context of Birther Racism

Quote of Note and a Talk Back on NPR

From an article by Bill Moyers and Michael Winship, What the right means when it calls NPR "liberal" - War Room - Salon.com: 

"So what do conservatives really mean when they accuse NPR of being 'liberal'? They mean it's not accountable to their worldview as conservatives and partisans. They mean it reflects too great a regard for evidence and is too open to reporting different points of views of the same event or idea or issue. Reporting that by its very fact-driven nature often fails to confirm their ideological underpinnings, their way of seeing things (which is why some liberals and Democrats also become irate with NPR)."

There is much to agree with here and I think Moyers and Winship point concisely to what the Right means when it calls NPR liberal.  Now I am not so sure what they mean by the last clause in parenthesis, not being a Democrat, and not being "some liberals".  However, as a "Leftist" to the left of the mainstream of the Democratic party, and critical listener to NPR, I find many examples of what I call an "establishment bias".  I find NPR reporters and programs often don't question deeply what can be considered the mainstream establishment consensus of American society.  Furthermore, NPR often does its best to appease and accommodate the Right.

To Hell With the New Civility!

To hell with this new civility bullshit!  Lets face it, this is just another ploy of the mainstream corporate press and the Obama Democrats to smooth out the real conflicts of American society that should have erupted into full view yesterday.  Politics is about the life and death struggle for power and resources, and its about time people start standing up, not laying down.  Doug Henwood says it nicely (January 15th 2011 entry):

Perhaps most annoying has been the call for a return to civility. Well, no, I don’t feel like being civil. I like being rude. The problem with the rudeness in American political discourse is that it’s often so stupid, not that it’s so rude. The idea that politics can be civil is a fantasy for elite technocrats and the well-heeled. I’m reminded of something that Adolph Reed once said to me, characterizing a mutual acquaintance as the kind of person who thinks that if you could just get all the smart people together on Martha’s Vineyard, they could solve all our social problems. Obviously they couldn’t.

Margaret Atwood once wrote that politics is about “power: who’s got it, who wants it, how it operates; in a word, who’s allowed to do what to whom, who gets what from whom, who gets away with it and how.” There’s no way that could be rendered civil. The field of politics is constituted by vast differences in interests and preferences. Much of the time, we don’t talk about those things directly or explicitly. We talk about them in caricature or euphemism, or take it out on scapegoats.

Smart Things Some People Say on the Internet 1

From a comment by GRMCE on the article:

Caller: Dr. Laura Is Lying About Me | Media Matters for America:

"This is what I mean about confusing 'freedom of speech' with using a privileged position in the mass media to spout lies and falsehoods about those who do not have equal access to defend themselves.


Not the same."

And of course Dr. Laura has vastly disproportionate power and a platform to rewrite history.  Much, much, more so than one of here average callers like Nita "Jade" Hanson.

"She's just a bully," Hanson said

Yes she is!