Bill O'Reilly: Not-so-pretty hate machine

Do I really have to write yet another article just to prove Bill O'Reilly is nuts?

Obviously, the many people who read this blog know the answer to that question. Okay, except for the seven or so people as of this writing that claimed in the poll here that they'll proudly vote for "some Republican dumbass" in the upcoming election. All of that aside, O'Falafel's show is shining and glowing proof that the right wing is guilty of just making shit up to prop up really moronic talking points. Sadly, there are probably way too many people that actually still fall for it.

Earlier this week, he featured progressive talker Ed Schultz on his show (video here). The topic was how the presidential candidates are handled on talk radio. Of course, Captain Constipated wanted to sidetrack that. The current target of his ire is Air America Radio, which obviously must be keeping him awake nights, because he mentioned them at least four times in the past week. He started at the top of the show:

...The mainstream media — print and TV — is largely liberal, so talk radio gives conservatives a voice, so to speak. Liberal radio networks like Air America have been disasters, with low ratings and even lower presentations.

O'Reilly doesn't mention, of course, that in many markets, his own radio show gets equal or lower ratings than Air America programs. That's even with the backing of big syndicator Westwood One.

Obviously, this so-called 'bankrupt, failed radio network' must be pushing the right buttons, since it's evidently replaced George Soros, Daily Kos, Media Matters for America and MoveOn at the top of O'Reilly's shit list. With the knowledge that Schultz and Air America don't get along very well, Falafel-for-brains saw this as an opportunity to use him to fight his own personal childish grudge, a typical O'Rambling tactic. Of course Schultz is too smart for this, and could care less about doing O'Reilly's bidding against his percieved enemies. O'Reilly wasted no time, it was the second question directed at Schultz, on a show that was supposed to be about the election:

O'REILLY: OK. Air America traffics in the personal attacks. That's what they did 24/7. It did not work. Did you learn from that? Were you appalled by what they did?

SCHULTZ: Well, you know, I've been in this racket since 1978. I've been around TV and radio for a long time. I've never based my career on how well I can attack somebody. I mean, we can be pretty creative when we decide we want to go after somebody. But I can't really say that I've learned anything from any particular network.

Of course I'm independent from them. I've got my own company and my own radio show that's independent, but I'm on a lot of their stations. Bill, I don't pay attention to other talk show hosts. I feel strong in my...

O'REILLY: The reason I asked that question is you said that your progressive listeners are getting fed up with the personal attacks. I hope that's true.

SCHULTZ: It is.

O'REILLY: But I'm hoping that maybe they saw what happened, because Air America did have an opportunity in this country, because as I said, most talk radio is right wing. They came on, in the beginning they were financed, they put on Franken and Garofalo, and all they did was lodge personal attacks after personal attack. It was monotonous. It wasn't funny. It was disgusting. And progressive people, obviously, didn't listen. Because if they did listen, it wouldn't have gone bankrupt, and they fled.

See what I mean?

I guess I should mention that later, in that same segment, Captain Phonesex refuted Edwards' claims that there are far too many veterans that are homeless. Yes, he claims that there is no such thing as homeless veterans. I'll be sure to mention that to the several I see along the streets holding signs that I frequently pass on the way to work. Obviously, he needs to tone down the tint on the back windows of the limousine he takes from Long Island to his workplace everyday. he's not living in the same world as us.

Another recent segment was about the USO, a long-time organization that organizes entertainment tours for the military overseas. It's a great group with a long history. But according to O'Reilly, they're 'under fire' because they allegedly took donations from MoveOn. Oh, the horror! Conventional wisdom in the media would dictate that he would feature a spokesperson from the USO and grill him/her about it. Well, this is Faux News, and there is no conventional wisdom. The featured guest is someone from a 527 group called Vets for Freedom. Uh huh. Some of O'Really's choice comments from the interview:

A few weeks ago, we told USO President Edward Powell that more celebrity visits to the troops were badly needed. Mr. Powell did not disagree. But now some USO board members are furious with Mr. Powell, because he took donations from the radical left organization MoveOn. You'll remember that organization took out this despicable "betray us" ad...But my question is this. If this organization, which we think is despicable, move on. We think that they're bad and nothing good about them.

...Radical left. Trying to undermine the military, no question, irresponsible.

Earlier this week, former FOX Noise goon and Bush-appointed mouthpiece Tony Snow went on "The Factor" to whine about the liberal pile-on while he appeared on "Real Time with Bill Maher" last Friday. Pot, meet kettle. Welcome to our world. Here's an excerpt:

...he was up against far-left loons on the panel and in the audience...

...Now I've seen people outnumbered, but nothing like Tony Snow was on that program (I guess he doesn't watch his own network, where he could easily see the flipside of that)...

...By the way, I will do the Bill Maher program, but only one on one with Maher, not sitting there with Mark Cuban and Catherine Crier and the other nut. Not going to happen. Now this incident just reinforces the bitterness and attack strategy of the far left.

Typical. In other words, O'Liely is afraid of getting into a situation where he doesn't control the guests. Never mind that Crier is a TV pundit just like him and the other guy is a political writer for Rolling Stone magazine. Cuban is a businessman and media executive, just like O'Puhleez's boss. O'Reilly's background is basically as a jerkoff who reads a teleprompter. What makes him more qualified to discuss politics than you or I or anyone else?

But back to the Snow pile-up. Did O'Reilly bring Snow on to talk about it? Of course not. Snow was on Captain Phonesex's radio show earlier. On "The Factor" that night, was yet another conservative pundit nobody's ever heard of:

...With us now to analyze is Mark Smith, author of the book "The Official Handbook of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy..."

...Well, we've been saying that — I don't know if it's against America. It's certainly against the war...

...The issue is off the table now because the elite media won't cover it anymore because things are going better. So now it's the economy. We see The New York Times everyday front page: recession, recession, recession has replaced bombing, bombing, bombing...

...the left now is fighting each other. They're tearing each other apart. Do you think that's getting through to Americans because you are seeing lively debate on the Republican side, but nothing like the vitriol on the Democratic side?

...And the malice, the level of malice on the far left is now rising. I mean, Air America was bad. They went bankrupt. But they took that mantel of malice. And now they're just riding it to the mainstream media. And I'm saying to myself, Americans don't like that...

As most media junkies know, FOX and MSNBC are at verbal war with each other. MSNBC is owned by General Electric, so naturally, GE, one of this country's largest defense contractors, is in cahoots with the terrorists. Of course, GE automatically became the bad guy not for some ridiculous degrees of separation between an American concern and supporters of terrorism and enemy nations. It was likely because of a humorous bit on "Countdown with Keith Olbermann' called 'Bill O’Reilly Puppet Theater,' which parodied the recent incident where O'Reilly tried to muscle through presidential candidate Barack Obama's security detail. O'Falafel evidently was not amused at the puppet show. Nobody from GE came on the program. Instead, one guest was from a right-wing think tank, and the other was from an obscure group called 9/11 Families for a Safe and Strong America:

...Syria also involved, you know, also on the list of the State Department. They do help terrorists in Syria. GE does a lot of business with them as well. So I don't know, man. It's just looking pretty bad here...Do you think GE's actually helping the Syrian government? Or is it just a private thing?

Not much really seems to amuse Mr. Pout. Here, O'Loony gives his take on the war positions of the presidential candidates:

...It's interesting because Ron Paul, a Republican congressman, and John Edwards, a Democrat, both saying basically the same thing, get the hell out of the Gulf. And Paul doesn't want any intrusion in Pakistan at all. And I'm sitting here going, am I crazy? Or would this heighten the danger for Americans like by a 1,000 percent?

...OK. Now you know that the American media per se, The New York Times, The Washington Post, the network news, CNN does not believe what you just said. Their point of view is, we illegally invaded Iraq.

...As you said, John Edwards is a loon. I think he'll be out soon...

One can also detect a pattern O'Reilly uses in his attacks. He often brings on surrogates (hence all the right-wing goons he features as guests) to do much of his bidding. Who better than the oft-nutty Melanie Morgan from KSFO in San Francisco?

MORGAN: Well, I will take it as far as to point out the fact that (Hillary Clinton) is a woman who would not be a good president for all the people. Why do I know that? Because she has personally attacked me through her surrogates and through her Media Matters, which she's claimed credit for starting. She is trying to get you fired. She is trying to get me fired.

O'REILLY: Is that right?

MORGAN: Yes, it's real personal for me.

O'REILLY: Well, everybody knows that Media Matters is a far-left smear machine. So if I were you, I would just ignore them. They've tried to get me fired every hour on the hour for 11-and-a-half years, Melanie.

MORGAN: Absolutely.

O'REILLY: They ain't going to do it unless my ratings go down. Then it won't be them — it'll be FOX that fires me, OK. So they have no — all they can do is dish out the vitriol. But I agree with you. I get angry about the lies and the distortion because there's nothing we can do about it because we're in the public eye.

(snip)

O'REILLY: Well, we know on talk radio in the last, I don't know, five years with the advent of Air America, there's never been a more vicious network. You have right-wing kooks out there as well. You know who they are.

MORGAN: In comparison to the left-wing kooks, they are small in comparison.

O'REILLY: Yes, but there's one that is really out there. I mean, you know, not going to give the guy any publicity, but I mean, you know, it's hard to measure hatred on the level that these people bring to the table.

And all of this was just this week. I could go on and on, like how he compared actor/activist Tim Robbins to a Nazi officer. Or that time he claimed reporter Helen Thomas "is consistently anti-American in her point of view." Oh yeah, and then there was that time that he equated “reading far-left websites with devil-worship”, and that the Daily Kos, a longtime target of his ire, is run by Satan Himself.

Suffice it to say, Bill O'Reilly is full of shit. A far-right rabble rouser who spouts hateful and insulting rhetoric complaining about how the other side spews hateful and insulting rhetoric. My opinion is that FOX Noise, in general, is for people too lazy, too busy or too stupid to comprehend the news in general, and need someone to do the thinking for them.

And perhaps Bill O'Really should concentrate less on building his ego and building his humility and self-esteem and admit that he is indeed a hypocrite. All it takes is a good look in the mirror.

Yeah, that's a start.

Radio Nowhere?

You may or may not know that Bruce Springsteen has a new album out, one in which he reunites with his E Street Band. The new release is called Magic, and it is currently the #1 selling album in the country. Since its release on October 2, it has sold more than 500,000 copies. In this day and age, that's pretty good. In addition, critics are raving about it. Rolling Stone gave it a rare 5-star rating, and even Pitchfork Media kinda sorta liked it, and they hate everything.

Twenty years ago, something of this magnitude from The Boss would have been all over the radio. You wouldn't be able to escape it. But that was twenty years ago.

Welcome to 2007.

Believe it or not, many so-called 'rock' radio stations are not playing the new Springsteen album. At least that's what FOX Noise is trying to tell us. Sure, it wouldn't be surprising. The over-compartmentalized radio industry, for some really stupid reason, does not know what to do with aging rockers. And in shades of 2003, they're also claiming that radio monolith Clear Channel Communications has put the kibbosh on the album, and it's lead-off single "Radio Nowhere," a scathing attack on you-know-what, due to Springsteen's often outspoken views on politics and society. Of course, the alleged memo claims, stations could continue to play the shit out of "Born to Run."

Is it because of Springsteen's left-leaning political stances? Is is because his latest single is about how much radio sucks these days? Or is it because he's older than dirt? Whatever the reason, it certainly hasn't stopped him from selling albums. Or concert tickets.

Some stations are indeed playing it. According to Radio and Records' airplay charts, the song is currently #3 on Adult Alternative-formatted stations, and #22 on rock formats. You'd think that at least a few stations are playing it.

But something doesn't smell right. And something even tells me not to trust anything coming from FOX Nuisance. And I'm not one to jump to conclusions either. I'd rather take my time and be accurate. What I found is that Clear Channel did not send out a memo, or at least that's what they're saying:

MYTH: Clear Channel Radio directed its stations not to play music from Bruce Springsteen’s “Magic” CD.

FACT: Although Clear Channel owns only 8% of the radio stations in the U.S., in the first days after the CD's release, airplay of music from the disc on Clear Channel Radio stations represented a full 21% of the total radio airplay in the U.S., including airplay from satellite radio. That's according to airplay stats from Mediabse (sic). Further, Clear Channel Radio stations played music from the CD more than twice as much as the nearest radio broadcaster, which came in at less than 10% of total U.S. airplay.

Gotta love Clear Channel for having their very own debunking page. They also claim that they did not boycott Madonna and Rage Against The Machine due to their political comments, and that it was Cumulus that banned the Dixie Chicks, not them. They also claim to have not banned Tom Petty's The Last DJ, which was essentially a vicious tirade against the radio and music industries, and John Lennon's Imagine.

Now, claims such as the ones purported by FAUX News deserve to be investigated. Actually, anything reported by them deserves looking into, but I've said that many times before. And if Clear Channel was going to blackball Springsteen for his politics, they're 35 years too late. Everybody knows what Springsteen's about. Or didn't they ever listen to Nebraska?

So, I decided to see if there was any truth to this, and decided to take a look at the radio trade sites and see for myself. Of the 'active rock' and 'mainstream rock' stations that Clear Channel owns, none are reporting any airplay of Springsteen's new album. Then again, these stations are oriented more toward current hard-rock, so you'll be more likely to hear the latest from Korn or Megadeth. The lone exception is WDVE in Pittsburgh, which is actually playing "Radio Nowhere." It is currently #3 on the station's playlist.

To make things even more confusing, there is another rock format designed for the older folks. It's primarily called Adult Album Alternative, or 'Triple A' or just 'AAA.' This is one of the only radio formats still around that are friendly to older musical artists. Clear Channel owns four stations airing this format - KBCO in Denver, KTCZ in Minneapolis, KZPS in Dallas and KPTL in Des Moines. All four are playing the new Springsteen album, and some are even playing a few other cuts in addition to "Radio Nowhere."

So, what about Clear Channel's classic rock stations? Ah hah! One would think that a format that plays the death out of Born in the USA would be ideal for the latest offering from The Boss, right? Wrong. Seems they'd rather remind us how young our favorite rockers used to be, rather than how old they are now. Some of the rumors about the alleged Springsteen memo claim it was directed at these very stations. Maybe they did get the memo, because it looks like those stations aren't touching it, save for maybe WAXQ in New York. Then again, most classic rock stations resemble the movie Children of Men, where they live in a world where nothing has been born for 18 years or so. For many of these stations, the last album ever released was U2's The Joshua Tree in 1987. Heaven forbid they even acknowledge this century! Now you're just asking too damn much.

Just for a comparison, I did search of some of their classic rock stations and and their playlists to see if they were playing any other new offerings from other high-profile classic rock staples, to see if they were indeed singling out Springsteen. In the past few months, John Mellencamp, Paul McCartney, John Fogerty and The Eagles have released notable new product. Of all these releases, only Fogerty's new one is getting airplay on classic rock radio, albeit on only one Clear Channel outlet, WNRQ in Nashville. I should also mention that WNRQ did do perhaps one of the strangest segues in rock radio history this morning, when the went from Van Halen's "You Really Got Me" into Elton John's "Tiny Dancer." Ouch!

So, this little bit o' research showed me that Springsteen doesn't seem to be ostracized by The Monolith due to his stances. It's likely due to his age. In fact, any new product from any artist over the age of 50 is being avoided like leprosy! On friggin' classic rock stations! On radio stations that would rather play the same REO Speedwagon and Foghat hits over and over again! Blasphemy!

Now, it would be a different story if these guys were putting out shit, like Styx currently does. Or were washed-up bands that likely don't even have any original members left. But we're talking about artists who have put out very strong recent product that has gotten a lot of press. McCartney, unhappy at the way his label has been marketing his newer stuff, left EMI after almost 45 years to sign with a label owned by Starbucks, and over the past decade has put out perhaps the strongest, most consistent stuff in his entire solo career. With little airplay, his new album has sold over half a million copies. Yesterday, the Eagles released their first studio album in 28 years. Fogerty made peace with Fantasy Records, got back the rights to his Creedence Clearwater Revival hits after 35 years and has gotten rave reviews for his newest release. He's actually happy now.

Yet you likely won't be hearing any of that stuff on your local classic rock outlet, owned or not owned by Clear Channel. Hey, they didn't play the latest offerings from Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones either. And that's a shame.

It's gotten so dire that these guys, in search of any kind of airplay, have resorted to alternative venues. McCartney licensed a song for a Lexus commercial a couple years ago and is angling for airplay at the local Starbucks. Mellencamp also licensed his latest hit single, in this case to sell Chevys. Dylan is doing a radio show for Sirius Satellite Radio. The Eagles took matters into their own hands and released their new album on their own through Wal-Mart.

Meanwhile, commercial rock stations are torturing us with crap like Nickleback, a band that basically releases the same song over and over again.

And they wonder why we don't listen to radio as much anymore.

So, what about this memo business? I'm guessing that it isn't what it seems. If Clear Channel were to banish every left-leaning musical act from their stations, all that would be left is country (though minus the Chicks, Faith Hill, Tim McGraw and now Merle Haggard(!!!)) and talk radio. So that's a losing proposition there. Sounds to me like yet another FOX Noise gossip trying to stir up shitstorms.

Clear Channel deserves to be raked over fiery hot coals in hell for many things, and they certainly do for not giving The Boss the airplay he so rightfully deserves. And for dumbing down their crappy radio programming for the many listeners who are much smarter than they assume.

The mugging that never happened, and the mugging that did

An open letter to the conservative blogosphere, in regard to the whole Randi Rhodes brewhaha yesterday:

Okay, we screwed the pooch on that one. There appears to be no mugging. No creepy conservative goons lurking in the shadows beating up defenseless women (at least not in this case). We got our information from a credible source, Jon Elliott, who got his own wires crossed and jumped to conclusions on an opinionated talk show. From there, it trickled down to Democratic Underground and Daily Kos, then to Talking Radio and everywhere else. One of your own, Matt Drudge, even linked it.

I put up my initial entry early in the morning. I wasn't so sure about the whole hate crime angle, as there was no suspect, no evidence, and not even a police report. But people were talking about it, so I wrote about it.

Nicole Sandler, morning host at WINZ in Miami, dedicated most of her show to it, as she furiously tried to get confirmation of the incident. The blogosphere exploded with coverage. Hey, many of you guys even believed it, so what does that say?

Once the suits at Air America Radio arrived at work, they quickly issued a press release downplaying the incident, as details were a bit sketchy. Then, reporters at a few New York newspapers made some calls, to the NYPD, Rhodes' lawyer and Air America. There appears to have been no mugging, and things were blown out of proportion. Rhodes was seriously hurt in an accident, but no foul play seems to have taken place.

Later, Elliott himself issued an apology, "I shouldn’t have speculated based on hearsay that Randi Rhodes had been mugged and that it may have been an attack from a right wing hate machine. I apologize for jumping to conclusions based on an emotional reaction. I wish Randi nothing but the best and look forward to a speedy recovery." So basically, Elliott, a rather fiery, passionate guy who unfortunately doesn't get a whole lotta love from many on our side since he's still unfairly viewed as The Guy Who Replaced Mike Malloy, acted out of emotion. Obviously he was wrong, but this stuff happens. And yes, many of us admitted we screwed up as well. Personally, I made it a point to do so immediately when I saw the Daily News account.

But this wasn't enough. Oh no. You guys in the conservative blogosphere were crapping mountains with glee, wagging those self-important fingers with false pride about 'dem librulz is lyers.' What one will see, in browsing your various wingnut screech blogs, is a lot of crowing headlines like these:

Randi Rhodes wasn’t mugged, Air America credibility plunges to NYTimes stock-level depths
Air America Radio Host Mugged, Liberals Blame Conservatives
Randi Rhodes: Still Not Mugged Air America: Still Not Credible
Air America: We Just Make It up As We Go Along
Air America’s Hit-job
Air America Lied! Randi Rhodes Not Mugged

Well, gee whiz! Must be nice to be so infallible, huh? And be able to do your own mugging for the public, screaming from the mountaintops that your shit smells like roses? To be the type that never makes a mistake? To be so damn... perfect? By the way - isn't 'pride' one of the Seven Deadly Sins?

Uhh... not so fast. Sure, we fell for this 'Randi got mugged by right-wing lunatic' thing. It sounded somewhat credible, given the amount of harassment often dished out by their kind upon us. We didn't just pull this out of our asses. A few years ago, I was the lucky recipient of death threats myself from some moronic loser named "AZ Joe." Yes, there are some on your side of the fence that are a bit unhinged.

You see, this really does not vindicate you guys, the 101st Fighting Keyboarders. At least we came clean about this. I followed up immediately, claiming that I was wrong. The fact that hardly any of you guys have ever apologized for any of the bullshit you've spewed in the past does not translate to some sort of superiority thing. After all, there's a reason your false idol has slipped from a high 90% approval rating all the way down to a third of that. And that you guys are really only trusted by the ones who have already sipped the right-wing Flavor-Aid. In short, you guys have been reduced to mere conservoporn. Shall I count the ways?

We never forwarded lies about 'weapons of mass destruction' to get us in a war that has already killed thousands.

We never falsely claimed that Saddam Hussein was in bed with al Qaeda.

We never flasely claimed that Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei died, as Pajamas Media and Michelle Malkin did. He's still among the living, and since there's been no retraction from any of you, I assume you must still think he's dead. Or just hanging out with Elvis, Marilyn Monroe, JFK and Tupac.

We never forwarded phony photos of Sen. John Kerry eating alone in a mess hall. Well, at least some of you guys retracted that.

We never rammed that whole Swift Boat Veterans for Truth bullshit, the purpose of which was to defame decorated American soldiers who aren't Bushbots, down people's throats. Still waiting for an apology there.

We never accused the Associated Press of lying about an Iraqi source, like Michelle Malkin and others did. Malkin said flat out, "I'm not apologizing for anything."

We never claimed former President Clinton sent troops into Somalia, when it was his predecessor that did.

We never forwarded tin-foil hat theories about the Clintons wiretapping Princess Diana.

We never demanded the head of Osama bin Laden, then turned around and forgot who he was.

We never published the names, phone numbers and email addresses of those who disagree with us, then complain about our own invasion of privacy, like Michelle Malkin did. Repeatedly.

We never whined about the New York Times publishing photos of the vacation homes of Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, even after Rumsfeld's office had given them permission to do so.

We never believed that "Mission Accomplished" bullshit, and never swept it under the rug.

We don't normally call people who disagree with us 'traitors.'

We never bullied and slandered young children that disagree with us.

We never made up stuff to smear Dan Rather. Seeing as Rather is currently suing his former bosses at CBS, this little house of cards you guys built will likely collapse in the coming months.

We never saw a conservative apologize for the behavior of their perverts.

We never accused the media of being terrorist sympathizers.

We never secured false White House press credentials for a barely existing news service under a false name, as former gigolo Jeff Gannon did.

We never took pride in lying.

We never tagged disgraced Republicans as Democrats, like FOX News has done.

We never turned our backs on our own.

Hate to break it to you all, but you guys are far from perfect. By a longshot. Then again, we aren't perfect either. We are mere flesh and bone, prone to mistakes. Being infallible does not make you a good person. Being humble does. It's too bad most of you conservative screechers just don't have the confidence or self-esteem necessary to own up to your own shortcomings. And that has done more to cripple your credibility than admitting a simple fuck-up.

We owned up. How about you?

You can't make chicken salad out of chickenhawks and chickenshit

Writing about things like this is a real pain in the ass sometimes.

I like to try to be above the fray, and I have no desire to make a comment every time some moron conservative demagogue opens his or her big mouth and says something stupid. It just happens all too often. I also tire of gossiping about the spats between middle-aged political wonks in suits tossing out insults at each other. Besides, these articles take a long time to write, seemingly almost as much time as it's taken Axl Rose and what's left of Guns n' Roses to finish Chinese Democracy.

Besides, other sources, such as Think Progress and Media Matters for America do a much better job of chronicling the nonsense. I can only offer witty commentary when something really noteworthy comes up. Or if something happens that really makes me scratch my head and wonder, "why?"

Today, I'll share a couple recent interconnected incidents that have made me rather enraged, bored to tears, and wondering in amazement about the overall decline of our society.

Let us begin. This little war of words and ideas started a few weeks ago.

General David H. Petrayus, President Bush's war lackey, testified before Congress and the nation on the state of the Iraq War. And, not surprisingly, he toed the Bush line on the whole ordeal, as our insecure president feels most comfortable around an army of yes-men. I most certainly wasn't surprised by Petrayus' statements. He's a soldier, and soldiers follow the orders of their superiors.

But many were furious, including political activist group MoveOn, which retorted with a scathing ad placed in the New York Times. Since much ado has been made about the wording of the ad, albeit with little actual quoting from it, below is the whole body of text, unedited:

GENERAL PETRAEUS OR
GENERAL BETRAY US?

Cooking the Books for the White House

General Petraeus is a military man constantly at war with the facts. In 2004, just before the election, he said there was “tangible progress” in Iraq and that “Iraqi leaders are stepping forward.” And last week Petraeus, the architect of the escalation of troops in Iraq, said, “We say we have achieved progress, and we are obviously going to do everything we can to build on that progress.”

Every independent report on the ground situation in Iraq shows that the surge strategy has failed. Yet the General claims a reduction in violence. That’s because, according to the New York Times, the Pentagon has adopted a bizarre formula for keeping tabs on violence. For example, deaths by car bombs don’t count. The Washington Post reported that assassinations only count if you’re shot in the back of the head — not the front. According to the Associated Press, there have been more civilian deaths and more American soldier deaths in the past three months than in any other summer we’ve been there. We’ll hear of neighborhoods where violence has decreased. But we won’t hear that those neighborhoods have been ethnically cleansed.

Most importantly, General Petraeus will not admit what everyone knows: Iraq is mired in an unwinnable religious civil war. We may hear of a plan to withdraw a few thousand American troops. But we won’t hear what Americans are desperate to hear: a timetable for withdrawing all our troops. General Petraeus has actually said American troops will need to stay in Iraq for as long as ten years.

Today, before Congress and before the American people, General Petraeus is likely to become General Betray Us.

And boy, did conservatives get pissed! Quite frankly, I didn't see any kind of vile cheap shots directed at General Petrayus in the ad. Sure, there's that "Betrayus" thing, but anyone who gets offended by that needs to grow a thicker skin. But Republicans, unlike their elephant mascots, don't necessarily have thick skins. And because of this, the recent anti-MoveOn movement became a major cause for a conservative movement that desperately needed a rallying cry.

The AM radio meatheads were all over it. Sean Insannity himself spent over a week trying to compare MoveOn to a terrorist organization, and trying to find some kind of connection to their favorite whipping girl Hillary Clinton. MoveOn temporarily moved ahead of Media Matters for America on Bill O'Reilly's shit list. Bush himself called the ad 'disgusting,' while obviously having no problem winning the 2004 election thanks to the smearing of another decorated military officer (a.k.a. John Kerry).

Yes, there's Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), who saw this as such a pressing matter that he moved to stop everything in Congress so that he could introduce a new Republican wedge issue on the floor of the Senate. At least we can expect this kind of childish nonsense out of Republicans. What irritated me the most was that there were far too many Democrats that caved in and supported this incredible waste of time!

The vote was 72-25 in favor of this silly political stunt. That's right, 72 Senators support the condemnation of free speech that they don't like. That includes almost half of the Democrats, who are showing themselves to be spineless on a completely different level than the Republicans! Just disgusting. Think that time could be better spent trying to get our troops out of Iraq? But like many other things that go on in our government, this wasn't about the best interests of Americans. It was yet another childish pissing match between the Republicans and Democrats, a.k.a. the Bloods and the Crips.

MoveOn's response to all of this? "Yesterday, they couldn't even pass a bill to give soldiers adequate leave with their families before redeploying. But they're spending time cracking down on a newspaper ad?"

So now, a week has passed. And now it's time to call the GOP on the carpet. Because it was only inevitable that one of their own would flash some serious conservative hypocrisy. And that man was no other than their main mouthpiece, Rush Limbaugh.

On his radio show, Limbaugh, speaking with a caller, lashed out at dissenters in the military, and called them 'phony soldiers'. Here's an excerpt:

LIMBAUGH: "Save the -- keep the troops safe" or whatever. I -- it's not possible, intellectually, to follow these people.

CALLER 2: No, it's not, and what's really funny is, they never talk to real soldiers. They like to pull these soldiers that come up out of the blue and talk to the media.

LIMBAUGH: The phony soldiers.

CALLER 2: The phony soldiers. If you talk to a real soldier, they are proud to serve. They want to be over in Iraq. They understand their sacrifice, and they're willing to sacrifice for their country.

LIMBAUGH: They joined to be in Iraq. They joined --

CALLER 2: A lot of them -- the new kids, yeah.

It takes a massive set of nuts, or millions of dollars in 'fuck-you money' for a guy who dodged the draft due to a pimple on his ass to call a combat veteran a 'phony soldier.' As the heat started to thicken, he went into damage control mode, Limbaugh claimed that the "phony soldiers' comment was directed at guys like Jesse Macbeth, a con artist who just got nabbed for pretending to be a soldier. But this had nothing to do with Macbeth. In actuality, that "phony soldiers" comment was likely directed at people like Captain John Soltz of VoteVets.org. Smoltz knew this, and in return, slapped him silly at Huffington Post.

Of course, Rush did no wrong in the eyes of his lemmings. They claimed the "phony soldiers" comment was taken out of context. I dunno, I heard the audio clip from his show, and read the unedited transcript, which displayed El Rushbo getting his ass handed to him by anti-war caller 'Mike in Chicago' and the follow-up call with the 'phony soldiers' comment. Sounded pretty plain to me. But the fault of this gaffe lied not with Limbaugh, but with another entity - Media Matters.

This was yet another ploy in the neocon playbook. Never attack the message, attack the messenger. So, this is why Republicans and their minions didn't condemn Limbaugh's lashing. Instead, it was all Media Matters' fault!

So, once again come the attacks on the media watchdog. Limbaugh, who allegedly pulls in upwards of $30 million a year, claims it's a conspiracy and that they're coming to get him. Riiiiight. The guy must really be scared. Then things got even more ridiculous. Brent Bozell's NewsBusters again clutched at all the straws they could, and claimed that ABC News did a story about 'phony soldiers' a few days earlier. But that report was about Jesse Macbeth, the con artist mentioned earlier. Nice try, guys. FOX News goon John Gibson used an edited version of the conversation to prove that MMFA edited the conversation. Aye carumba!

And now, shrill San Francisco radio bimbo Melanie Morgan, who has to say really outrageous stuff because nobody really cares about her otherwise, is now using colorful terms like "fake," "phony," "poser" and the worn-out cliche "anti-America" in reference to people like Soltz. Obviously, all those years of combat - if you call getting shit-faced drunk in casinos while neglecting your kids 'combat' - has prepared Ms. Morgan well for things like this.

Of course, it was inevitable that all of this would reach the government, which as of late seems all too happy to comment on pop culture happenings. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid blasted Limbaugh on the floor of the Senate, calling for an apology and for fellow Democrats to join him in writing a letter to Limbaugh's handlers at Clear Channel Communications, whose Premiere Radio Networks syndicates his show.

Now, this is where I'm torn. I'm glad Reid and co. decided to get tough, and shove the Republicans' hypocrisy back in their faces. But I was furious over the Senate's chiding of MoveOn last week, and I certainly don't think things like this are the best use of the Senate's time and resources. Does the Senate have to comment on everything in the world of current pop culture? What's next? Is the Senate going to give Britney Spears her kids back? Will they pick the next "American Idol"?

The Senate should not speak out against the rights of any American to speak their mind. That includes MoveOn protesting the war, and that also includes Limbaugh yet again making a complete ass of himself. But let's assume that I enjoyed Limbaugh getting raked over the coals. Because in doing so, I could enjoy Drugboy going into spastic meltdown mode on his show yesterday, as he challenged Reid to 'say it to his face.'

Now that's funny! Limbaugh trying to be an alpha male. A real badass. I'll bet his personal boot licker Brian Maloney is in such awe that's he's ready to swallow this time instead of spit!

But really, is Limbaugh really so thin-skinned that he has to issue threats over a microphone, from the security of his home studio in South Florida? After all the insults he's spouted at so many others? Would he ever tell Bill Clinton that his daughter was "the White House dog?" Or repeat all those nasty things he said about John Kerry or Al Gore directly to their faces? Of course not.

Let's face it, Rush Limbaugh is not only a chickenhawk, but he's a chickenshit. A true coward. Anyone listening to the 'phony soldiers' audio bit heard him get his ass handed to him by "Mike in Chicago," an anti-war caller. Limbaugh couldn't argue his way out of a paper bag. And most certainly not with Harry Reid. And most certainly not with Capt. Soltz, who had issued the 'say it to my face' challenge earlier:

My challenge to you, then, is to have me on the show and say all of this again, right to the face of someone who served in Iraq. I'll come on any day, any time. Not only will I once again explain why your comments were so wrong, but I will completely school you on why your refusal to seek a way out of Iraq is only aiding al Qaeda and crippling American security.

Ball's in your court.

In addition, VoteVets.org has released a new television and radio ad, saying that very thing. They were aiming to air the ad on a few of Limbaugh's radio affiliates.

In all actuality, I certainly hope this swinging dick competition ends soon. Not that I don't enjoy seeing wingnut bloviators get their words thrown back at them. I do. But aren't there more important things going on the world? Like the Iraq War? Or Britney Spears' kids?

Priorities, we've got to have our priorities.

'Foxopedia' and the comedy of errors

Fans of the old DC Comics books may be familiar with a character named Bizarro. He's a strange cat, who's persona is that of being the exact reverse of the world around him, most notably arch-nemesis Superman.

Bizarro comes from a planet called Htrae (spell it backward), which is worth mentioning in that it is cube-shaped. It is often referred to as Bizarro World. Everything there is opposite of Earth. Ugly is beautiful, beautiful is ugly. Black is white, white is black. You get the idea. Basically, everything in Bizarro World is the opposite of reality.

The same could almost be said for FOX News Channel. One suspects that they seem to live in their own little Bizarro World, where just a little crafty spin can create a sort of artificial reality for their jaded viewers, who seem to feel out of place in the real world. A Republican does something bad? That's okay, he's branded a Democrat. Things going bad in Conservoworld? No problem, they just turn that frown upside down. Nothing a little creative spin doctoring can't clean up. The people of Bizarro World spoke in simple, nonsensical grunts. Hey, so do the people of FOX News!

I've often given FOX News a little more slack than most. I recognize them for what they are, namely a feel-good fantasy channel for crabby conservatives who feel paranoid that the alleged 'librul' media is out to brainwash them and steal their children. Right-wing fantasy porn. But let's face it, FOX Noise is only as offensive as one makes it. Besides, while they do well in the cable news subculture, they're really only watched by a small percentage of the overall viewing public. Kinda like AM talk radio. Most people could care less about cable news. And many of the people who watch it either take everything with a grain of salt or are already guzzling the proverbial powdered drink mix. This basically makes them further irrelevant. If conservatives want to live in their own little virtual reality, hey, let 'em. It's easier to poke fun at them.

In effect, FOX Noise has tried to carve out its own niche as the last resort for right-wing political wonks. And they usually have a pretty good idea of what they want. And I'll be the first to admit that they are very good at what they do, when one considers what they are in fact really doing.

Lately, they have tried to expand the FOX News brand. Take for instance their recent attempt at comedy. No, I'm not talking about Hannity and Colmes. I'm talking about their own bizarro version of Comedy Central's highly popular news parody The Daily Show, a rather weak effort that was unleashed on the public earlier this year. The Half Hour News Hour was envisioned as a more 'fair and balanced' version of Jon Stewart's show, which I imagine they felt was vulgar, subversive 'librul' fare. Well, they likely thought, what about a cheap knockoff crammed with a bunch of stale Hillary jokes?

So off to the drawing board they went. The producer is the guy who brought us "24," a rather mundane, overrated spy yarn that mostly featured civil servants standing around arguing in control rooms. To spice it up, they shot it with hand-held cameras and had the actors yell and emote a lot. News flash - Alias was better. Much better. So, the producer, Joel Surnow (also well-known as Rush Limbaugh's Dominican Republic wingman) helped craft a direct ripoff of The Daily Show and the 'Weekend Update' feature on Saturday Night Live. Unfortunately, in FOX's version of bizarro world, what's intentionally serious is often funny, and what's intended to be funny is usually far from it. The FAUX News 'comedy' show looked more like a really bad version of SNL in one of their bad years than the hilarious Jon Stewart show. It got horrible reviews. The first sketch was something about Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter being president and vice president, no doubt giving the children of America disturbing nightmares. The hosts of THHNH were bland, amateurish, dorky, plastic-looking and rather unfunny. Then again, so was the rest of the show. Hey, at least SNL's Charles Rocket dropped the F-bomb on live network TV.

The initial ratings were adequate, probably better than any of the leftover fare often found in the Sunday Night News Channel Deathslot (let's face it, the lame-ass hosts with the fake names are definitely not ready for prime time). But the show fizzled over time, and now, it's being dropped. Yesterday, FNC's programming chief Bill Shine announced that no further episodes will be produced following its current 15 episode run. They are, however, considering a revamp of the show for future use.

As I mentioned months ago, THHNH had a serious uphill climb ahead of it. First of all, conservatives are often not that funny. As stated previously here, the best topical comedy often pokes fun at the 'establishment' or 'authority.' And let's face it, you most certainly can't get anymore 'establishment' than the Republican Party, and they were basically off-limits as far as targets go. There are rare exceptions, such as P.J. O'Rourke, who also possesses a rapid-fire wit. But Dennis Miller? Come on! Oh, and did I mention Miller was a commentator on the failed FOX News comedy show? 'Nuff said.

So, the FOX Noise Comedy Half-Hour Hour or whatever it's called has been fed to the worms, though the door has been left open for reanimation sometime in the future, with a great deal of tweaking. How will it change? Probably for the worse (if it can indeed get worse). Might I make a suggestion? Perhaps instead of trying to carbon copy The Daily Show, why not start watching the even more brilliant The Colbert Report? If FAUX Noise is to resurrect their not-so-divine comedy, they need to do something radical. Namely, self-parody. Now, this is a pretty bold suggestion for a news channel as self-righteous and pompous as FNC. They'll lie, scream and cry before they let anyone diss their meal ticket, let alone do it themselves. But if there's a subject ripe for parody, it would be FOX News Channel itself. Besides, they may even gain a little respect for having the ability to poke fun at themselves, particularly from the many, many people that think they're full of shit. Why not self-mockery? Sadly, I highly doubt FNC has the humility required to pull off something so radical. But if they do, drop me an email to discuss intellectual property royalties.

So, the intended attempt at humor was discovered to be rather unfunny, and yesterday, the gang at the FOX Nuisance Channel were caught with their hands in the proverbial cookie jar due to an unintended humorous series of events that turned out to be downright hilarious.

Yesterday morning, the tubes of the internet were all aglow with an article at Wired.com about a new little search tool designed by CalTech grad student Virgil Griffith. This little do-hickey, called the Wikiscanner, was designed for amateur sleuths and Wikipedia addicts to find out just who these so-called 'anonymous' users are that contribute those strange edits and selective deletions.

So far, people at the headquarters of defective voting machine manufacturer Diebold have been outed for providing their own little spin on articles about them and their suspicious practices. Scientology whitewashes their articles, but we already suspected that. We also found out what the CIA is doing on there. Some evil Republican tried to spoil the ending of the new Harry Potter book. And no doubt people are scouring Wikipedia to see what people inside the U.S. Congress are editing, such as the user who added this little difference between Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. On computers owned by the Government. Yes, the skeletons were released from the closet.

Perhaps the funniest thing uncovered so far, besides the CBS staffer who changed Clinton's birthplace to 'Hot Dog, Arkansas' comes from our friends at "The most powerful name in noise." Allegedly, when they're not creating revisionist news fiction, and when their pundits aren't screaming at each other, they're being pretty ferocious online, trying to make the rest of the world look like the false reality so vividly displayed on their television property. Artur Bergman made a fascinating discovery when he uncovered what colors the gang at FOX were using to paint their own candy-coated world. Witness this little short-lived change on Al Franken's article, as the original text up to that point looked like this:

The lawsuit focused a great deal of media attention upon Franken's book and greatly enhanced its sales. Reflecting later on the lawsuit during an interview on the [[National Public Radio]] program ''[[Fresh Air]]'' on [[September 3]], [[2003]], Franken said that Fox's case against him was "literally laughed out of court" and that "wholly (holy) without merit" is a good characterization of Fox News itself.

The FOX Noise 'anonymous' user made a few changes:

The lawsuit focused a great deal of media attention upon Franken's book and greatly enhanced its sales. Reflecting later on the lawsuit during an interview on the [[National Public Radio]] program ''[[Fresh Air]]'' on [[September 3]], [[2003]], Franken said that Fox's case against him was liberal [[National Public Radio]] program ''[[Fresh Air]]'' on [[September 3]], [[2003]], Franken said that Fox's case against him was the best thing to happen to his book sales.

Unfortunately for them, this little masterpiece lasted all of eight minutes before being reverted.

And notice the slapping-on of the term 'liberal' in describing Fresh Air? Hey, at least they spelled it correctly there, as opposed to this edit. Oops!

So, who exactly is this person? Well, there is at least a little anonymity left on the net, as this person (or persons, since anyone in the building could have been making edits) is only known as 12.167.224.228. So it may be a big gun like, say Bill O'Reilly. Or it may just be some underling in a cubicle. Nonetheless, the IP number is indeed assigned to the FOX News HQ.

So, how else has .228 (since there's no first or last name, let's refer to this moniker) been attempting to 'Foxify' Wikipedia? Well, one look at the edit history assigned to the number shows some rather interesting revelations. Editing is very heavy on the articles of their high profile personalities. Witness the article on Shepard Smith, which shows an edit by .228 removing a couple bits - one about an arrest in Florida (even removing the Smoking Gun link with his mugshot) and the other about a hilarious on-air gaffe regarding the phrase 'blow job' in a story about Jennifer Lopez. Unfortunately for .228, video doesn't lie. The edits were reverted by the next day. In addition, references to Greta Van Susteren's facelift were deleted.

In addition, .228 was also trying to scrub articles on 'talents' such as Carl Cameron and Brit Hume (though, to be fair, some of the edits involve his son's alleged suicide, so best not go there). They also removed a paragraph from Chris Wallace's article that used a reference from long-time FAUX nemesis Media Matters for America.

Lots of fluff was added for the various FOX Noise comedy all-stars, but a bit of vitrol was reserved for their 'enemies list'. Keith Olbermann got slammed a bit by .228, ironic in that the network seems to disavow Olbermann's very existence. First, .228 removed a couple sentences about a well-received book Olbermann wrote about baseball coaches, one that was even recognized by the Baseball Hall of Fame. Next, .228 removed a cited source praising Olbermann. And then, .228 added a vague statement chastised a time when Olbermann, in reporting the death of Peter Jennings, told his own personal story about his battle with smoking. They also cleaned up a sentence reading, " Some conservatives feel that Olbermann's reporting carries a liberal bias" to remove the word 'some.' References to O'Reilly's infamous sexual harassment lawsuit were removed from the article. Within an hour, all these additions were reverted.

Remember that on-air gaffe by CNN that resulted in Dick Cheney's face being 'X'ed' out for a split second? That was expanded on by the fine folks at FAUX (they claim it was for 1/7 of a second rather than 1/15, if you're dying to know). Oh, the little things.

So, what is FAUX's deal anyway? Do they really think we're that stupid? Have they spent so long snookering the American public with their own brand of infotainment they really think they are living in Bizarro World, where they can fool all the people all the time on all the internet? Who knows. Will the newly revamped Half Hour News Hour bring this up? Doubtful.

LTR follows the money

"Just when I thought that I was out they pull me back in."

- Michael Corleone, as portrayed by Al Pacino, in The Godfather: Part III

I was hoping what I wrote last week would be the end of it. Every once in a while I just gotta get one of those things out of my system. And I thought I had said all I needed to say about Media Matters for America, George Soros and paranoid right-wing talk show hosts. But sure enough, another reason comes along to write something about it. Here we go again.

Bill O'Reilly of FOX Noise Channel hates Media Matters. I mean, he really hates them. So much that in the past, he's compared them to the likes of Mao, Castro, the Ku Klux Klan, and the Nazis. He called them "cowards" and "people who are afraid to answer any questions," yet will not allow anyone from MMfA to come on his show to spar with him. And now, MMfA must have really pissed O'Liely off, since he has trotted out his own personal doomsday device. His own neutron bomb. Yes, in his strange personal game of "six degrees of separation," he has a chart that links MMfA to George Soros' deep pockets. With this, he grasps at all the straws he possibly can in proving that, while Soros hasn't directly given money to the group, organizations funded by Soros have themselves sent money to MMfA. Oh the horror!

Only thing is, you'll never hear about why Soros is such a bad man on the "All-Spin Zone." Oh sure, you'll hear accusations of insider trading. Or that he's some kind of radical to the left of Abbie Hoffman. Or that he was a teenage Nazi back in World War II. Or that he's some kind of Dr. Evil, set on world domination (no doubt complete with laserbeam-fitted sharks and his mysterious Alan Parsons Project). Suffice it to say, O'Reilly's gone batshit crazy.

Now, here's a guy, Soros, who's a self-made billionaire, and in turn spent a lot of money fighting communism in Eastern Europe. One would assume that would make him a virtual hero to the right-wing of America. He sounds like a Reagan Republican's dream guy. Only one problem, though - he turned on the Bush Administration. A big no-no. Even after being buddy-buddy with the Bushes in Carlyle Group. Even after Harkin Energy, which Soros was part owner of, bailed out Junior's failed oil company, Soros soured on Dubya's economic and foreign policies. The war in Iraq was the final straw. First, he ran full-page ads in major US newspapers challenging the honesty of the Bush administration's rationale for the war. He also wrote a book, The Bubble of American Supremacy, which criticized the president's foreign policy. Then he pledged to spend up to $30 million to help defeat Bush in the 2004 election, donating nearly $24 million to various political action committees and liberal think tanks. The biggest beneficiaries of Soros' generosity were Americans Coming Together ($10 million), MoveOn.org ($2.5 million) and the Center for American Progress ($3 million). It's a rather small list. And no, Media Matters was not on that list. And neither was Air America Radio. Soros basically shot his $30 million load and left. But that $30 million is why the right-wing hates him so much. Or, they're scared shitless of the guy. So much that they're making up myths about this alleged bogeyman.

Michael Savage called Soros "a totally dangerous individual" who "doesn't miss an opportunity to attack this country" and "should be stripped of his citizenship." Right-wing activist David Horowitz, backed by quite a few generous right wing benefactors himself, has made ridiculous claims about Soros' campaign donations. O'Reilly called him "the big left-wing loon who's financing all these smear sites," and added, "They ought to hang this Soros guy." When Soros recently donated $2,100 to Barack Obama's presidential campaign, O'Reilly put on his tinfoil hat, oblivious to the fact that Soros once donated the same sum of money to John McCain. He really lives in fear in his belief that Soros is waging a war against him via MMfA. In short, Bill O'Reilly is one big pussy.

But enough about Soros. As I claimed last week, Soros isn't the only one doing it. On the left, there's Progressive Insurance CEO Peter Lewis and a few others. But that's a drop in the bucket compared to the other side. See, on the right, there's a whole ton of people. Some of the names I mentioned in the past, such as cult leader Sun Myung Moon and Rupert Murdoch are pretty out in the open. They invest in blatant partisan media geared toward right-wing propaganda. Richard DeVos, founder of the Amway pyramid scheme, has long been one of the biggest contributors to the Republican Party, and his kids have followed suit.

Behind the scenes, though, are a wide variety of billionaires, families, corporations and foundations throwing obscene amounts of money at political action committees, think tanks, media watchdog organizations, lobbying groups, and various propaganda outlets. Many of them stay out of the limelight. In this group, you'll find families like the Coors in Colorado, the Bradleys of Milwaukee, the Olin Foundation and others. They're still giving. But the most effective sugardaddy of them all is in Pittsburgh. The man is Richard Mellon Scaife.

Recall last week when I claimed that Moon was the top fatcat for the New Right. In terms of total spent, he likely is. But Scaife is the one who got the biggest bang for his buck. It's very likely that people like O'Reilly will never talk about right-wing moneymen like Scaife who heavily fund ventures designed to attack the left. Of course he wouldn't. Otherwise, he'll sound like a complete hypocrite. Most wingnuts will never acknowledge the efforts of the Coors, the Bradleys and the Scaifes. Even the Radio Tranquilizer has been whining that they don't have their own Soros or Lewis. Evidently, he's either not doing his homework or there are some things he just refuses to tell his readers. They're just pissy because we're now playing the game on their turf. The usual B.S. you hear is that left-leaning donors are squashing the right-wing with their spending. But that's utterly ridiculous. See, I have decided to track where all that right-wing foundation money goes, and after taking a trip down the rabbit hole, was pretty damned shocked to see where it all wound up. In fact, I struggled like crazy in making a similar chart to the simplistic one that O'Reilly's people coughed up, just because it went in so many directions. Here's a partial chart of what I came up with:


It's time to follow the money.

Now, who is Richard Mellon Scaife? He's an insanely rich man living in Pittsburgh, with interests in banking, oil, uranium and newspapers. Unlike Soros, who earned his own way from a poor immigrant, Scaife made his money the old fashioned way - he inherited it. And while Soros kept reinvesting his money to make more money, in that grand ol' American tradition, Scaife used his money to gain influence, spending roughly a third of his fortune on various right wing causes. Scaife is a man that seems to lurk in the shadows. He's a bit reclusive. He doesn't go on FOX Noise and play pundit. He doesn't write op-eds in the paper. In the grand tradition of Hearst, Hughes and others, he stays out of the limelight.

Even for a newspaper publisher, he's not very media-friendly. When former Wall Street Journal reporter Karen Rothmeyer, denied an interview on several occasions, ran into him on the street and asked him about his donations, an enraged Scaife yelled "You f*cking Communist c*nt, get out of here." In the remaining five minutes of the interview, Scaife told her she was ugly and that her teeth were "terrible." He closed by saying, "Don't look behind you." Wow, now THAT'S unhinged!

"If a liberal politician doesn't toe the Soros line, he or she will be denied funding and brutally attacked. Just ask Senator Joseph Lieberman about what MoveOn and Media Matters did to him," claimed O'Reilly. Yeah, just like Scaife did when Brock was canned for not being mean enough to Hillary Clinton and severed ties to American Spectator when they gave a bad review to a book by one of his henchmen. Pot, say hello to kettle.

Scaife is the Kevin Bacon of the New Right, in that just about anything and everything neocon seems to have connection to him, within even fewer degrees. So, how much has he forked over to prop up the right-wing? By 1999, according to the Washington Post, Scaife's foundations have forked over $340 million dollars to conservative causes and groups. Again, this is just Scaife we're talking about here. Granted, Scaife isn't forking it over like he used to, but thanks to his past efforts, the groups that he's given to are the ones now paying it forward.

To start with, Scaife made a shady donation of $990,000 to the 1972 re-election campaign of Richard Nixon. Due to loopholes, he wasn't charged with a crime, but roughly $45,000 of that went to a fund linked to the Watergate scandal. Quite a beginning there, Dick!

What really got Scaife hot though was a semi-obscure Arkansas governor named Bill Clinton. Fearing that this guy actually stood a decent chance of beating Bush I in the 1992 election, Scaife brought out all the guns. He was a major backer of The American Spectator, a right-wing magazine that was planning an all-out smear campaign now commonly referred to as "The Arkansas Project." The purpose was to find out anything about Clinton, and if that wasn't good enough, just make stuff up. This is where stuff like Paula Jones came from. And later Whitewater, the suicide of Vince Foster (which they tried to paint as a murder), and whatever else they could pull out of their asses. The purpose was to force Clinton from office and endlessly dog and harass him and his family. This was with the help of Scaife's own personal attack dog reporter, Christopher Ruddy, who later founded NewsMax.com. In other words, lots of time and effort was spent in trying to topple a presidency, an act that could theoretically be considered treason. Scaife sunk a ton of his own money into these ventures, reportedly almost $2 million dollars (not counting money he gave to then-House Speaker and Clinton antagonist Newt Gingrich's various groups), giving Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr a lot to work with. Ironically (or not), Scaife endowed a new school of public policy at Pepperdine University, and Starr was named its first dean. A controversy brewed, and Starr turned it down, before accepting it again in 2004.

Ironically, Scaife indirectly helped fund MMfA, since founder David Brock was a top writer for American Spectator at the time of the Arkansas Project, and was paid handsomely to lash out at the Clintons with various ridiculous claims. Following an eventual change of heart and his brave decision to publicly declare his sexual orientation, Brock drifted toward the other side and founded MMfA, obviously using some of the money paid to him from the Spectator's coffers. We can thank Scaife in part for that.

Like many other conservative sugardaddies, Scaife sunk money into other ventures. The American Enterprise Institute was another big benefactor, and they in turn helped prop up the epicenter of neo-conservatism, the Project for a New American Century (PNAC), as well as the Federalist Society, which could be seen as the starting point for conservative trash-talker Ann Coulter. Coulter's scating columns have since been published in various Scaife media ventures.

And while O'Reilly and his ilk constantly charge that Soros funds MMfA, several conservative-leaning media watchdogs have stuck their hands in Scaife's cookie jar. Directly. The Center for Media and Public Affairs is one, and the ironically-titled Accuracy in Media is another beneficiary. You remember AIM, right? They were out front in the whole Vince Foster conspiracy. But the most well-known of these watchdogs is the Media Research Center (MRC), headed by Brent Bozell, complete with a $6 million annual budget and 60 staff members. And they've even branched out, starting their very own news organization, the Cybercast (formerly Conservative) News Service (CNS). They were the ones that claimed they had proof of Saddam Hussein's WMD's. In addition, the MRC started up a MMfA-type blog, Newsbusters.org. MRC's affiliate, the Parents Television Council (PTC), is similar in nature. The MRC has also helped encourage the efforts of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, whose purpose was to dog John Kerry with lies and vague accusations during the 2004 presidential campaign. And unlike MMfA, the MRC/PTC has actually taken their fight against liberalism to the government, in the form of various complaints to the FCC.

Scaife has also thrown money at right-wing news organizations. Besides his ownership of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, he presently has an ownership stake in NewsMax.com. He donated to Heritage Society and Moral Majority founder Paul Weyrich's Free Congress Foundation, which in turn started an ill-fated conservative TV network, National Empowerment Television (later America's Voice), a venture that turned out to be a financial sinkhole that nobody watched. He also sent $330,000 directly to the Western Journalism Center, which helped start Joseph Farah's WorldNetDaily.com.

Scaife sent money to the Center for the Study of Popular Culture, a group founded by former Marxist-turned-right wing activist David Horowitz. Horowitz in turn started FrontPageMag.com, Discover the Networks, which tracks funding to and from left-leaning causes, and most curiously, the Matt Drudge Defense Fund, which supported him in a lawsuit a few years back. Needless to say, Drudge knows who his sugardaddy is.

Lately, Scaife has been a buyer of buyer of books, in mass quantities. Ever wonder about those high rankings on the New York Times bestseller lists for conservative books? Or those conservative book clubs offering titles for ridiculously low prices? Thank Scaife for that, since he buys in bulk. Particularly titles from Regnery Press, which publishes the work of Michelle Malkin, David Limbaugh and most famously, "Unfit for Command," which helped jumpstart that "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" thing a few years back. Ah, yes - another connection to the Swift Nuts!

And Scaife also contributed money and resources to the Council for National Policy, a secretive networking group that counts among its members a who's-who of the New Right, including Bozell, Moon, DeVos, Pat Robertson, Donald Wildmon, Jerry Falwell, Grover Norquist, disgraced congressman Tom DeLay, Senator Trent Lott, Tommy Thompson and others. Whew!

Needless to say, Scaife gets around. And it's not just him either. The names of Coors and Bradley also pop up here and there. But for head marionette status, nobody can top Scaife. Sure, he didn't make much financial return on these investments, but for overall influence and power, he most certainly got his money's worth. So when people like O'Reilly piss and moan about the right wing being horribly underfunded, we can all laugh at him. Or when Brian Maloney whines on his fact-lacking blog about the lack of a Soros or Lewis on his side (that is, when he's not writing ridiculous entries about Sheryl Crow and toilet paper - which is a fitting topic for him, since he is kind of an asswipe anyway), then we can point him in the right direction and he can stop begging his readers to send him money. So consider this a helpful tool for the right. That's right, I'm providing a service here. Because, if you get all your news from Rush Limbaugh, the FOX Noise Channel and AM radio, you'll likely never know about the Coors, or the Bradleys, or the John M. Olin Foundation, or Jeremiah Milbank, or ExxonMobil, or Lockheed Martin, or any of the other 'philanthropists', foundations, corporations or other sugardaddies and fatcats.

And certainly not Richard Mellon Scaife.

In an ironic footnote, the Scaife Family Foundation is now under the control of his daughter Jennie, and the focus has changed quite a bit. Much of the money currently goes to nonpolitical projects such as medical programs, drug treatment and animal welfare. They also send money to Planned Parenthood, though against her father's wishes. Hey, at least there's still all those other donors, foundations and think tanks, provided they haven't jumped ship already. But thanks to the infrastructure provided by the likes of Scaife, they can all sail on autopilot for a long time to come.