ED DRISCOLL ON THE DAILY NEWS’ OBAMA DISAPPOINTMENT: If only the New York Daily News had taken its own advice in 2008. “The 2008 covers above, just a small example of the daily hagiography pumped out by the MSM back then, reflect a very different, but similarly self-destructive contagion that rapidly enveloped the MSM starting in early 2007. The virus began to subside around mid-2009, when it slowly became obvious that the MSM had sacrificed their credibility to elect a false messiah. But as a dangerous aftereffect to Obama fever, the MSM quickly turned viciously on its readers, in the form of their unceasing racialist attacks on the Tea Party and anyone who dared oppose The One. . . . After November, it will be fascinating to watch the MSM similarly go all-in to aid Hillary, and act as if 2008 never happened, and pretend that they had no role to play whatsoever in electing a president about to go as deep into the memory hole as Woodrow Wilson, and for similar reasons. It isn’t just that the MSM got things so wrong, it’s that they permanently shattered their credibility to make it happen. Don’t let them forget what they’d like the world to forget.”
Archive for 2014
October 16, 2014
MICHAEL TOTTEN: Turkey Bombs The Kurds. The Turks are not our friends.
THE EBOLA CRISIS AS A CRISIS OF PUBLIC TRUST:
Underscoring the difficulties faced by CDC and other state and local agencies to contain the threat of Ebola is the largely reactive, rather than anticipatory, nature of the public health measures taken, such as screenings at a small number of ports of entry. The case of Thomas Duncan, the disease’s first victim in the United States, has undermined confidence in self-reporting by travelers as an effective measure. Further, it appears that the government is having a difficult time persuading citizens to follow the public health protocols most likely to save lives. Contacts of Thomas Duncan are reported to have resisted public health officials’ recommendations to self-quarantine. The nurse who treated Duncan also contracted the disease because of a breach in protocol. Asking people to avoid contact with others for as long as three weeks, the disease’s incubation period, is a tall order, especially since relatively few of the people asked to quarantine will actually have the disease. The public may also be confused by the seemingly contradictory nature of the simplest caricatures of public health messages: On the one hand, Ebola is difficult to contract, so don’t worry; On the other hand, if you are suspected to have been exposed to the virus, you could be placed under house arrest for three weeks. . . .
The United States faces a crisis of trust in government less severe than in Liberia, but it is still important to address this problem if we are to be prepared for pandemics. A Pew Research Center survey shows that trust in government is near its all time low. Other major institutions, from schools to unions to business and religion, do not fare much better. Specific federal agencies, however, such as the CDC and even the Department of Homeland Security, show much more favorable views among the public. Just as Americans hate Congress but love their congressmen and women, Americans distrust government to do the right thing most of the time, but they have more faith in some specific agencies to get the job done.
Well, I doubt the CDC will poll as well next time.
The photos are disturbing.
A LIBERTARIAN SOLUTION TO THE CAMPUS RAPE “CRISIS:” Lower the drinking age. “What does the drinking age have to do with campus rape? Much. Most college undergraduates are under 21 and therefore unable to legally drink. And yet heavy alcohol consumption on the part of one or both students is a significant factor in nearly all sexual assault allegations. That’s because the current drinking age doesn’t actually stop teens from drinking. It merely changes where, and how much, they drink.”
A CIVIL WAR among California Democrats?
SO FAR, SO GOOD: Family that lived with Texas Ebola victim showing no symptoms. If they remain uninfected — which at this point seems likely — then perhaps Ebola is mostly a danger for health workers. That’s still troubling, but probably makes the risk of a wider outbreak lower.
TRANSPARENCY: Obama administration has secured 526 months of jail time for leakers. “Up until Obama’s ‘most transparent administration’, and throughout the entire history of the USA, national security leakers had received a total of 24 months of jail time. There are many more cases pending.”
UPDATE: Sharyl Attkisson: 19 Times the Government Withheld Documents It Didn’t Want You to See.
RAND PAUL ON BUDGET COMPLAINTS: “Have You Seen What The NIH Spends Money On?”
ROLL CALL: As Ebola Crisis Escalates, Lawmakers on Both Sides Turn Up Heat. “Ebola is quickly becoming the dominant issue in Congress, even as the United States conducts airstrikes in Syria and Iraq, and as Congress isn’t even in town.”
ACCOUNTABILITY: GOP Lawmakers Call For CDC Director To Resign.
Related: White House: ‘Shortcomings’ In Ebola Response. Ya think?
TIM CARNEY: Party Of The Rich.
President Obama is sometimes beyond parody — especially when he plays the populist.
Last week, Obama headlined a $32,000-a-plate fundraiser at the $26 million Greenwich, Conn., estate of a real estate mogul. During that dinner I noticed an email from Obama in my inbox warning me that “If Republicans win, we know who they’ll be fighting for. Once again, the interests of billionaires will come before the needs of the middle class.”
Obama has played this populist game unceasingly since he began his presidential run in 2007. He spoke as if he were being outspent while demolishing John McCain in fundraising. He declared war on lobbyists before hiring more than 100 of them and recruiting many as his top fundraisers. His top adviser at the White House — millionaire Valerie Jarrett — proclaimed that their administration was busy “speaking truth to power.” . . .
The richest county in America, according to IRS data on mean household income, is Teton County, Wyo., home of Jackson Hole. It’s the only Wyoming county Obama won in 2012. And Obama won it big — by 12 points, while losing the rest of the state by more than 40 points.
Seven of the 10 richest counties in America voted for Obama, from Manhattan to Marin. Three sparsely populated counties in Texas made the top 10, and all three voted for Mitt Romney. . . .
Here’s another measure: Ten members of Congress have a net worth more than $40 million — and seven of them are Democrats.
While the people of Northern Virginia get rich off of stimulus, and the people of Greenwich bank their bailouts and government loan guarantees, they can sleep well at night knowing they contributed to Obama. They may still be rich, but they’re different rich.
This thought can comfort Obama, too.
So who can comfort me?
JONATHAN CHAIT: Liberals Get Illiberal on Campus Rape [Updated].
Read that passage again. He is not merely arguing that, to make an omelette, one must break some eggs. He is arguing for false convictions as a conscious strategy in order to strike fear into the innocent. This is a conception of justice totally removed from the liberal tradition.
Ezra Klein is not a nut; he is the polar opposite of one, which is what makes it so important that he is arguing in such expressly illiberal terms. Of course, campus justice need not contain all the safeguards of a criminal proceeding. But since they are a quasi-judicial procedure, and often held explicitly in lieu of formal police charges, we might expect them to at least broadly reflect our expectations of justice.
Plus, an appropriately dismissive response to bogus charges of sexism from Salon.
JOSEPH CURL: Obama’s spectacular incompetence turns deadly.
#WARONWOMEN: Breast Cancer Survivor Responds To Bossy Lacto-Moms About Why She Doesn’t Breastfeed.
On Jan. 29, I gave birth to a 7 1/ 2-pound baby boy who had a head full of light brown hair and whose ravenous appetite and old-man snore we instantly found mesmerizing, maybe in a way only parents could.
“You never gave up,” my husband said, laughing as he watched Lincoln gulp down his first 2-ounce serving of formula, which my husband fed to him.
As the two of them cuddled afterward, I was in a mood that I can describe only as postpartum elation.
That is, until those I jokingly call the “breast-feeding Nazis” came marching in to my room.
“You really should breast-feed,” the hospital’s lactation consultants, aka “lactivists,” said.
When I simply said, “I’m going to do formula,” they didn’t want to leave it at that.
So holding my day-old newborn on what was one of the most blissful days of my life, I had to tell the aggressive band of well-intentioned strangers my whole cancer saga.
Maybe their aggressiveness belies a lack of truly good intentions. Remember: Most woman-shaming has always been at the hands of other women.
POLITICO: Who Lost Yemen? Obama calls it a “model” for fighting terror. So why didn’t anyone notice last month’s coup? Smart diplomacy.
IT’S COME TO THIS.
October 15, 2014
HILLARY HYPOCRISY: Clinton Talks Student Debt While Being Paid $225K By UNLV Charity. “Hillary Clinton spoke at University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) last night about how millions of young people are burdened by student debt. She would know – her contract demanded she be paid $225,000 by the UNLV Foundation to speak there.”
BEN AFFLECK & BILL MAHER: We Own Guns to Protect Our Homes and Families.
UPDATE: Brad Pitt Owned a Gun Since Age Six, Doesn’t Feel Safe Without One in Home.
L.A. TIMES EDITORIALIZES: In U.S., an Ebola crisis of confidence. “Even as U.S. health authorities continue to tell Americans not to worry about the Ebola virus, their assurances are being undercut by the increasingly obvious deficiencies in domestic planning. . . . The United States does not remotely have an Ebola crisis, but it is beginning to have a crisis of confidence in the Obama administration’s handling of the matter.”