Archive for March, 2009
Cocking gun…aiming at foot…fire!
Republicans Disinvite Palin to Major Fundraiser
Sarah Palin is out and Newt Gingrich is in.
Congressional Republicans decided Tuesday to ditch the former GOP vice presidential nominee in favor of the former House speaker for the critical House-Senate fundraising dinner in June 8 in Washington. It’s the marquee Republican event to raise money for GOP House and Senate candidates.
Just weeks ago, the House and Senate Republican campaign committees were giddy at securing the telegenic Palin for the dinner. But then things grew murky. At the time, the Alaska governor’s office told FOX News that Palin was still considering the invitation and had not yet made a decision. Meantime, spokespersons for the committees insisted that Palin was scheduled and it was just a misunderstanding between the Alaska governor’s office and Palin’s political action committee, SarahPAC, that accepted the invite.
Sources familiar with the Palin snub fumed about how the governor handled this.
“She was a disaster,” one Republican source told FOX News. “We had confirmation.”
~snip~
Sarcasm on/* Yeah, lets disenfranchise a popular and photogenic conservative from the party, that will really make it better. */sarcasm off
No matter how anybody feels about Sarah Palin the fact is that she connects with the base of the party, she espouses the views of many conservatives and she has the ability to rally the base.
Snubbing her is a snub to everyone who supported her during the election….and is a huge mistake.
Tags: Bloopers, goofy leaders, GOP, Sarah Palin
More Dead Tree Dailies enter Bankruptcy
And another one goes into Chapter 11.
Seems like we’re seeing a lot more of these.
Sun-Times Group Files for Bankruptcy
NEW YORK — The Sun-Times Media Group, owner of the Chicago Sun-Times and dozens of suburban newspapers, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy Tuesday, making it the fifth newspaper publisher to seek protection from creditors in recent months.
The step, brought on by a precipitous decline in advertising revenue, means both of Chicago’s major daily newspapers are operating under bankruptcy protection. Tribune Co., the parent company of the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times and other newspapers, filed for Chapter 11 in December.
The Sun-Times Media Group, which filed in a Delaware court, said it will continue to operate its print and online properties. The company listed $479 million in assets and $801 million in debt. The largest unsecured creditors are newsprint vendors. Three are owed more than $1 million each.
The company has retained Rothschild Inc. to help with a possible sale of assets.
~snip~
It’s just a matter of time before the major publishers go hat in hand to Barry, Nancy and Barney for a bail out.
Advertising is down because circulation is down, people are rejecting the traditional news media for other venues. They can either get a clue or they can just die out.
Tags: bail out, bankruptcy, old media
About the ‘Bush Millstone’
The leader of the Senate Republicans, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, believes that the party is poised for a come back now that the “millstone” of George Bush is out of the White House.
Without Bush ‘millstone,’ GOP can mount comeback, leader says
Let’s look at a little truth here, there were a lot of things I disagreed with Bush about, but there were some things I did agree with.
Face it, the Republican party had 6 years in congress to act conservative on a lot of things and take the country in another direction, and they blew it.
It’s a little disingenuous on their part to blame Bush for their own failures and everybody with any sense knows it. They didn’t have to tie their fortunes to one man, they could have led and they didn’t.
Allowing a conservative in name only (CINO McCain) to hijack the party didn’t exactly instill confidence in party leadership either….that’s the real millstone around their necks.
Tags: conservative, george bush, millstone, republican
Ain’t Nothing Sacred?
Sean Penn as “Larry”….?
Yuck
‘Three Stooges’ coming together at MGM
Nyuk-nyuk-nyuk.
MGM and the Farrelly brothers are finally slapping together their high-profile cast for “The Three Stooges,” a comedy project the filmmakers have been developing for years. Sean Penn is set to play Larry, and Jim Carrey is in negotiations to play Curly. Benicio del Toro is a rumored possibility for their taciturn leader, Moe.
The studio is looking to start production in the fall for a 2010 release slot.
The project was originally set up at Columbia, which produced the 1930s Stooges shorts. C3 Entertainment Inc., which holds the licensing rights to the Stooges brand, then sold the feature rights to Warner Bros. in 2001 for the Farrellys to write and produce the movie. Eventually, Warner Bros. let the rights lapse and MGM’s Mary Parent scooped them up along with the Farrellys’ continuing participation.
I won’t be running to see this one.
Tags: Add new tag, Sean Penn, stooges, Yuck
Lame Stream Media Wants Google Preference, Update:Bill proposed to rescue newspapers
It’s no mystery why the dead tree dailies and the liberal media are dying in the internet/cable news age. More and more people are finding alternative ways to keep informed and the “traditional” sources are just not keeping pace with changing ideas.
Media Giants Want to Top Google Results
Argue That Professional Sources Should Be More Recognized Than Blogs
NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Major media companies are increasingly lobbying Google to elevate their expensive professional content within the search engine’s undifferentiated slush of results.Many publishers resent the criteria Google uses to pick top results, starting with the original PageRank formula that depended on how many links a page got. But crumbling ad revenue is lending their push more urgency; this is no time to show up on the third page of Google search results. And as publishers renew efforts to sell some content online, moreover, they’re newly upset that Google’s algorithm penalizes paid content.
“You should not have a system,” one content executive said, “where those who are essentially parasites off the true producers of content benefit disproportionately.”
~snip~
There’s just something wrong about any business model that, when it can’t compete in the market place, looks to regulation (like the “Fairness Doctrine“).
Unless local media are covering school board or city council meetings, then opinion creeps in intentional or not, and that’s what drives blogs and bloggers.
A venue that permits interpretation of the events and happenings from their perspective. This is the epitome of free speech in America and one that the established liberal media cannot tolerate.
Update:
U.S. bill seeks to rescue faltering newspapers
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – With many U.S. newspapers struggling to survive, a Democratic senator on Tuesday introduced a bill to help them by allowing newspaper companies to restructure as nonprofits with a variety of tax breaks.
“This may not be the optimal choice for some major newspapers or corporate media chains but it should be an option for many newspapers that are struggling to stay afloat,” said Senator Benjamin Cardin.
A Cardin spokesman said the bill had yet to attract any co-sponsors, but had sparked plenty of interest within the media, which has seen plunging revenues and many journalist layoffs.
Cardin’s Newspaper Revitalization Act would allow newspapers to operate as nonprofits for educational purposes under the U.S. tax code, giving them a similar status to public broadcasting companies.
Under this arrangement, newspapers would still be free to report on all issues, including political campaigns. But they would be prohibited from making political endorsements.
Advertising and subscription revenue would be tax exempt, and contributions to support news coverage or operations could be tax deductible.
Because newspaper profits have been falling in recent years, “no substantial loss of federal revenue” was expected under the legislation, Cardin’s office said in a statement.~snip~
So if they can’t make it in the free market then we are supposed to subsidize them?
It just gets better and better don’t it?
Tags: bloggers, blogs, Google, media, opinion
Lifetile Art
This is just to cool.
Moveable art without any power at all.
Tags: movable art
Miller on Harry Reid
I doubt if Dingy Harry will be able to understand all of this.
Tags: Dennis Miller, Dingy Harry
Who’d a Thunk This?
From Camille Paglia at Salon.com:
President Obama’s clumsy, smirky staff is sinking him — and resurrecting a deflated GOP!
Heads should be rolling at the White House for the embarrassing series of flubs that have overshadowed President Obama’s first seven weeks in office and given the scattered, demoralized Republicans a huge boost toward regrouping and resurrection. (Michelle, please use those fabulous toned arms to butt some heads!)
First it was that chaotic pig rut of a stimulus package, which let House Democrats throw a thousand crazy kitchen sinks into what should have been a focused blueprint for economic recovery. Then it was the stunt of unnerving Wall Street by sending out a shrill duo of slick geeks (Timothy Geithner and Peter Orszag) as the administration’s weirdly adolescent spokesmen on economics. Who could ever have confidence in that sorry pair?
And then there was the fiasco of the ham-handed White House reception for British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, which was evidently lacking the most basic elements of ceremony and protocol. Don’t they read the “Iliad” anymore in the Ivy League? Check that out for the all-important ritual of gift giving, which has cemented alliances around the world for 5,000 years.
Think some on the left are starting to notice that the Obamessiah ain’t all that yet?
Tags: Camille Paglia, Obama, regrets
It’ll Never be Enough
For this congress.
Pelosi: Congress Needs to ‘Keep the Door Open’ to Second Stimulus Package
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Tuesday that Congress needs to “keep the door open” to a second stimulus package — raising the question of how much the government could eventually spend on top of the $787 billion already allocated to rescue the country from dire economic straits.
“The word of the day is confidence. Confidence in our markets, confidence in lending, confidence in our financial institutions,” Pelosi said before suggesting the need for a second rescue package during a press conference Tuesday following a meeting with top economists.
Mark Zandi, chief economist and founder of Moody’s Economy, took a more definitive stance than Pelosi, telling reporters a second stimulus bill is necessary.
“We are going to need more taxpayer money … I think another stimulus package is a reasonable assumption because of the way things are going,” Zandi said.
How much of our childrens and grandchildrens money are they going to throw at this before they realize it won’t work?
Tags: Add new tag, Congress, hogs, stimulus
