Beautiful Horizons

Something I Meant to Comment On

The New York Times made a very bad omission in this article on broadcasters reaction to the possibility of having to surrender some of their spectrum for cell phone and wireless internet use. Here is the omission: broadcasters did not pay a dime for the 40 to 70 billion dollars worth of digital spectrum that they received. Not one cent.

Accordingly, this makes the comment seem disingenuous at best:

Other owners are more blunt. “I’ve never heard so much nonsense in my life,“ said Charles Glover, chairman and chief executive of Telos Digital Television Networks, which owns the Fox station in Portland, Me.

“This is an actual cash grab from all of these people who have dedicated our lives to build these systems.” By taking spectrum, Mr. Glover said, “you are about to start a train wreck that we will not be able to come back from.”

It's only a cash grab if you actually paid for it. You didn't. No less a conservative than Herbert Hoover stated that the airwaves belong to the public. Broadcasters received public property for free. It's time to pay for it. Now.

The NPR Threat to America...

Via TPM

Tunisia

"All I know is what I read in the papers" - but this New York Times article on the fall of the Tunisian government in the face of popular unrest is remarkable for the apparently significant conjunction of information gleaned from Wikileaks revelations, communication on Twitter and related social media, and the broadcasts of Middle Eastern cable news channel Al Jazeera in the destabilization.

Worst David Broder column ever?

I don't know. There is a pretty "high" bar, but I'm submitting this as a likely candidate.

Money quote:

Can Obama harness the forces that might spur new growth? This is the key question for the next two years.

What are those forces? Essentially, there are two. One is the power of the business cycle, the tidal force that throughout history has dictated when the economy expands and when it contracts...

What else might affect the economy? The answer is obvious, but its implications are frightening. War and peace influence the economy.

Look back at FDR and the Great Depression. What finally resolved that economic crisis? World War II.

Here is where Obama is likely to prevail. With strong Republican support in Congress for challenging Iran's ambition to become a nuclear power, he can spend much of 2011 and 2012 orchestrating a showdown with the mullahs. This will help him politically because the opposition party will be urging him on. And as tensions rise and we accelerate preparations for war, the economy will improve.

Via Washington Monthly's Steve Benen, whose comments on this are HERE.  

PS:  Atrios calls Broder a "sociopathic monster."  "Shrill" but definitely arguable.  This loonytoons suggestion that WWII-style spending - just so long as it's actually on a war - is just what the doctor ordered for a deeply depressed economy comes from the same Beltway Denizen who wrote last year that the big challenge to Congress and Obama is, quote, "don't pass along unfunded programs to our children and grandchildren."  I'm not sure I'd go as far as "sociopathic monster", but "incoherent, irresponsible, blathering idiot" seems about right.

More of This, Please

The truth will set you free:

Hat tip to John Cole.

It's ON !!! C-Span, Motherf...ers !!!

Posted today by Ezra Klein and Andrew Sullivan, but I'm putting it up here 'cuz it's very funny.

Shoot Me Now

So when I'm at the gym this afternoon,  note that the "Breaking News" on CNN is that Tiger Woods was in a minor car accident, was treated and released from the hospital. All this merits a press conference, two reporters and an analyst.

God help us.

Bertrand Tavernier and D.G Compton - Ahead of Their Time

The New York Times published this article last Thursday about the planned reality show concerning the last days of Jade Goody, a reality show star from the UK who is dying of cancer. In the article, the following comment is made:

This is reality television carried out to its most extreme, grotesque conclusion, one not even envisioned in the film “The Truman Show” all those years ago. The question of why, exactly, the story is so compelling — how to negotiate the line between poignant and voyeuristic, whether newspapers are exploiting Ms. Goody or she is exploiting them — has twisted the media into knots, even as they provide daily updates on Ms. Goody’s deteriorating condition and state of mind.

Oh please. First of all, this exact scenario was envisioned by the writer D.G. Compton in his book The Continous Katherine Mortenhoe (aka The Unsleeping Eye), which was also adapted by one of my favorite directors, Bertrand Tavernier, into the grim, but brilliant film, Deathwatch, which starred the late Romy Schneider as a woman dying of a terminal illness, befriended by Harvey Keitel as a man with a camera secretly implanted in his eye under the direction of Harry Dean Stanton as the producer of a documentary that will trace her final days, unbeknownst to her.

It's a very affecting study of media manipulation and exploitation, and, although it's not been released on DVD, it should be. The idea was also created some twenty five years before the tragic case of Jade Goody. It's just as tragic to see that Compton's idea has come to fruition; life imitating art in the most depressing fashion.

Quote of the Day and Sloppy Editing of the Day

In this article in Monday's New York Times on training the French Foreign Legion in French Guiana lies what is  probably the understatement of the year:

We don’t accept the hardened criminals anymore, the murderers or rapists, so this makes our job easier,” said Capt. Samir Benykrelef, the commander of Camp Szuts.

No kidding.

As for the sloppy editing -  and inane comment - from the same article:

“This is where we come to forget why we’re stationed here,” said Andrey Korivitsky, 28, a legionnaire from Belarus who resembles Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber.

No doubt if Korivitsky ever reads the article, he'll be certain to be thrilled to see himself likened physically to our nation's biggest mass murderer ever.

Your Liberal Media - At It Again

I've been swamped with work, but I did want to call this your attention. In Saturday's New York Times, in an article about the Krongard brothers, one of whom is the Inspector General for the Department of State and the other of whom is on an advisory panel for Blackwater, Scott Shane makes the following comment regarding Congressman Henry Waxman:

Hence Representative Henry A. Waxman’s disclosure at a hearing Wednesday, the latest in a string of revelations the California Democrat has used to torment the Bush administration.

“We have now learned that Mr. Krongard’s brother, Buzzy Krongard, serves on Blackwater’s advisory board,” Mr. Waxman declared, saying the inspector general had “concealed this apparent conflict of interest.”

Howard Krongard grew indignant, saying his brother had no ties to Blackwater.

“When these ugly rumors started recently, I specifically asked him,” he said. “I do not believe it is true that he is a member of the advisory board.”

Then came a break, and Howard phoned his older brother. Buzzy told Howard he had just returned from his first Blackwater advisory board meeting in Williamsburg, Va.

A chagrined Howard Krongard returned to the witness stand. “I want to state on the record right now that I hereby recuse myself from any matters having to do with Blackwater,” he said. [my emphasis]

"Torment" the Bush administration? Waxman is chair of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. He's doing his job. This is not journalism; it's editorializing and it's irresponsible. Just as irresponsible if I were to say, accuse Scott Shane of being a stenographer for the Republican National Committee. I don't believe he is. I do believe that this is sloppy reporting and even sloppier editing.