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December 5, 2003 |
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Sent to NY Times: Re: Thomas Friedman's erroneous column Please request that your columnist, Thomas Friedman, correct his erroneous column of November 30. In his column, he mischaracterized British antiwar protestors as failing to recognize the deaths of British troops in Turkey the same day as the protests. He called the protestors "morally obtuse" and asked if some of them were "crazy." Here is what some of the speakers said about the deaths: "That's going to happen increasingly because of the policies of the Western world. The attacks in Turkey and Bush's visit to Britain were no mere coincidence. People are playing for very high stakes." -- Damon Alburn. "[The violence in Istanbul] shows us our world is anything but more secure today." -- Caroline Lucas And a quote from the 11-21 edition of the New York Times itself: "News of Thursday's bombings in Istanbul -- which killed more than two dozen people, including Britain's consul general, and wounded hundreds of others -- appeared to galvanize the protesters' opposition to the continuing operation in Iraq. ...If anything, many protesters said repeatedly, the war on Iraq created more instability in an already volatile region." Mr. Friedman is entitled to his opinion of liberals and protestors, but as a New York Times columnist, he is enjoined to base his opinions on facts, not idle, baseless speculations and groundless vituperation. If Mr. Friedman has any integrity, he will correct his error. If the Times has any integrity, it will require him to do so. Thank you for your time and attention. Max Black Subj: AARP I’ve just done something that everyone should do I received a mailer from AARP yesterday about their auto insurance program. It included a postage paid envelope. I took the contents of the mailer, ripped them into very small pieces, put them in the prepaid mailer and sent them back to AARP. It’s a small thing, but it helps! Barbara Silverman Subj: Texan's Tic-Tac Testicles Bush exhibited once again that he has nads the size of tic-tacs. How much fakery does it take for the populace to wake up? The natural inclination is to blame it on the media, but this utter complacency reflected in the polls is unfathomable. Unless, of course, the poll numbers are fakes just like the recent “Arthur Anderson”economic reports. After all that’s been said and done, is that possibility all that remote? Is it conceivable that people do not tell the pollsters the truth because of fear of retribution from the government? Well, who knows? The turkey was a prop and the soldiers were served from steam tables! I suppose, just like the “banner,”it was the soldiers’idea for Bush to pick up the platter and pretend to serve them. Forget the dog, wag the kennel. Turk p.s. Is Chris Matthews physically attracted to GWB? Subj: FAKE TURKEY! But we knew that already..... "Bush's Baghdad Bird A Decoration" PJOnes Subj: Thanksgiving Turkey Just wondering if you heard on the news this am that the turkey Bush was holding in Iraq was a prop? Wonder if they took it with them or ordered it from the military. Any doubt that this was strictly another photo-op for our turkey in the white house? Pisces Corporate Insiders forecasting a huge Ka-Boom!
A BuzzFlash Reader Was the thanksgiving trip really made? Please refer to the movie Capricorn One. Len Did anyone do the research to find the cost the government paid to pay for the turkey? What if the contractor billed $4,000 for the turkey? It would be great, just like the $800 toilet seat scandal! -rich Subj: Missed Headline Opportunity I laughed to see from a Buzz link that the bird Bush carried in Baghdad was a fake. "The Bird Was Perfect But Not For Dinner; In Iraq Picture, Bush Is Holding the Centerpiece" But then I wondered how Buzz, usually so great with their headlines, missed this one: Guess Who's the Real Turkey? Sincerely, Claire Plume Subj: I need a cartoonist!! December 4, 2003 I desperately need a cartoonist. Since the Crawford, Texas gift shop is selling magnets with Chirac kissing Laura Bush's hand with the caption, "Laura Bush: America's Secret Weapon" I have an idea for a cartoon or a shirt. It should have a bed, with a huge W on the headboard and a cowboy hat on the bedpost and cowboy boots at the side. There should be a large lump with a hand sticking out from the covers on the side of the bed. Chirac should be bowing to kiss the hand. Caption: "The Lump in Dubya's Bed: America's Secret Weapon". It was a freedom kiss and not a French kiss. Karen Webb, Moore, Ok. Subj: How Many Days? Dear BuzzFlash, I read your website every day and have tried to surf the internet for an answer to my question. I have been unable to find an answer. How many days has Bush spent at the White House since he took office? I t seems to me he is constantly on the road and never staying in Washington to do the sort of job a real president would do. Do you know of any website that has been tracking this "fly by night pres". Thankyou, Karen Borgardt To the NY Times: Subj: Friedman is Morally Obtuse Dear Editor, Your columnist Thomas Friedman should not make up history and then cite it as fact so he can get puppy chow from the Bush Administration. His recitation of the protest in Britain against the Bush visit (Nov. 30) -- that the protesters did not acknowledge the Istanbul bombings -- is so wrong and false that "there is something morally obtuse" about his dedication to his own profession, leaving me to "wonder whether George Bush had made [Friedman] crazy." But it is all part and parcel of the NYT's current swing through the Middle East. Thank god you folks still have the sense to keep Krugman around, but I suspect that will be ending shortly. It is difficult to express the sorrow that our world famous 4th Estate culture has been mortgaged to the highest bidder. A Disappointed Former Subscriber, Chris Hardaker Subj: Thomas Friedman countered In publishing “Is Thomas Friedman Even Listening?”from Fairness and Accuracy in reporting, you render a real service. These journalistic aiders, abetters, fellow-travelers of our rogue regime must ever be exposed, both the shrill and the more restrained ones, or we the people become their propaganda victims. I once thought Friedman a pretty reasonable, balanced conservative (in the better sense of the word, not a Tom DeLay kind of conservative), but now I believe he is merely a stealth neocon posing as an objective and even liberal observer of world affairs. In reality, he is an ideologue who thought our so-called preemptive war against Iraq absolutely A-okay. In fact, he wrote shortly after its beginning, after no weapons of mass destruction had surfaced, that he knew it was not about WMD, it was about bringing democracy to the Middle East. It didn’t, he argued, matter that it was Iraq that was attacked, that any Arab country would do as well in order to bring light unto the nations of that region. And this is what we get today from the sainted NEW YORK TIMES? Well, you can also read therein William Safire and David Brooks and of course Friedman one hell of a lot more than you’ll read Paul Krugman, the only one willing to proclaim that our emperor is bare-assed naked. Norman Weinstein Subj: A fake turkey prop for The Fake Turkey Prop Buzz, Mary Matalin, a former administration official claimed DimSon's fake turkey prop "captured something about the president that people know is true ... capture[d] the Bush we know. ... [DimSon] regularly rejects anything that is not him." Words so true! So, I guess we all agree DimSon is a Turkey - and a hollow fake turkey prop to boot! Matalin also claimed the ResidentTurkey "gets emotional when he sees soldiers." The article's author rightly responded, "He just didn't like being near soldiers back when he was supposed to be one." T Quigly Subj: Eureka Since the lead-up to the War on Iraq, I have been tearing my hair out on a daily basis at the antics of the Bush administration. I was down to the last few strands the day the Senate was to vote on the Medicare Bill. Then, I had a "eureka" moment: let George have his way on everything! Bring him on! Let him run up the tab on Iraq, send more troops or draw down the troops, make more tax cuts for the wealthy, destroy the environment, lift the steel tariffs or fight the WTO, attack social security, award more no bid contracts to Halliburton and Bechtel, change his plans for Iraq on a daily basis, threaten and bully Republicans who vote against him, raise zillions of dollars for his campaign, go to bed with the lobbyists and PACS on every piece of legislation before the Congress, poison the air and the water, thumb his nose at the international community, cover up the war casualties, run the Patriot Act to its extremes, fly to Baghdad to serve turkey...whatever. I am rooting for him to have his way!!!!!! Seems I recall a law of physics, something to the effect that "every action has an equal and opposite reaction." When this turkey has successfully alienated every voter interest group in the country (and, he is getting closer every day), the election will be a piece of cake if the Democrats have no more than a warm body to run against him. Go, George, Go!!! We're waiting for you. Barbara
Minich Subj: Very Funny I thought my fellow BuzzFlash readers would get a kick out of this one. Go to Google (www.google.com) and search on the term "miserable failure". VERY funny result. Sincerely, Craig Schott Subj: cnn poll did you notice the lou dobbs poll on computer voting machines was suddenly changed to a dumb down question about the moon?....last time i caught the original it was 96% in favor of requiring a paper trail with 1016 votes cast. wonder who quashed the poll....Diebold perhaps?.. a buzzflash reader Subj: A dark analysis Your “America Unhinged”by Maureen Farrell I feel is, alas, totally on mark. How well I recall a quite decent acquaintance of mine declaring that I should get over that nauseating banana-republic 2000 election and let it go. No way, not that or, if it were possible to maintain them all in memory, any of the scores of outrageous acts by this unelected oligarchy: acts against the social contract that was slowly evolving (against decency itself), against bipartisanship and simple civility, against the environment, against the economy, against the international community, above all, as Maureen Farrell so cogently states, against truth itself and thus against the very modus operandi of democracy. Without truth we the citizens of this country are done for as a nation that considers itself a democracy. Hate this? You’re goddamn right I do. It’s sick not to, even sicker to accept what is happening here, and it’s not creeping, it’s moving apace. Indeed, can it be reversed, or is it possible we are seeing enacted that old saw: People get the government they deserve? Norman Weinstein Subj: Beware the Con's "Libs just hate Bush" Con game This bogus hyperbole is reaching shrill levels again. Standard CON M.O.... invent "the enemy" to suit their rhetoric. We need to be aware and wary of the fact that the average person does not pay enough attention to day to day politics to spot this con game. That's why it has worked in the past. Does this mean we Liberals need to be nice to Bush? NO, not at all. What we need to do is ad a quick preemptive rebuttal to every one of our arguments. We don't even need to say we don't hate him, we merely need to assert over and over again that this is not personal, it's not about the person, it's about the failed policies, it's about the actions, it's about the lies and misrepresentations, it's about the incoherency, about shallowness, about the bigotry... nothing personal! Roger Subj: Wesley Clark & the 2000 Election Results. I just heard Gen. Clark talking about the gang of people who banged on doors in Florida asking the election officials to stop the vote counting in 2000. I happen to have the Wash. Post article in my files with a picture of ten protestors banging on the door with names of all ten labeled on the photo. (This is from an Al Kamen "In the Loop" column the week of Dec. 4, 2000.) They were young well dressed congressional staffers and political insiders sent from Washington to Florida to get George Bush elected.They were identified as follows: one aide to Tom Delay, one chief counsel to a House Judiciary subcommittee, one staff member of the National Republican Congressional committee, one former house Republican conference analyst, five aides or legislative assistants to Republican senators or Representatives and one former chief of staff to a Republican Representative. Can we believe that the Tom Delay aide was leader of the group? Harold Martin Subj: Anger Over Medicare Bill Has Sparked Seniorstorm Meetup in 33 Cities Already!!! NATIONAL MEDICARE MEETUP DAY! 33 CITIES ALREADY.and COUNTING! HERE'S SOMETHING THAT CAN GROW GEOMETRICALLY, AND HAVE A HUGE IMPACT! IT PROVIDES A WAY FOR US TO PLAN AND ORGANIZE! Send people to http://WWW.MEDICARE.MEETUP.COM to register. While on the website click on TELL FRIENDS. Click on MEMBERS to see if your city is listed! IF YOUR CITY IS NOT LISTED YET, WHY DON'T YOU BE THE FIRST? For your information DEAN2004.MEETUP.COM has the lead so far! They have registered 150,900 MEETUP MEMBERS to date. This is one of the reasons for the early success of the Howard Dean campaign for the Democratic nomination for President. I believe TEAM SENIOR, that's us, CAN OVERTAKE DEAN2004. The reason is that BOTH DEMOCRATS AND REPUBLICANS are OUTRAGED BY THIS LEGISLATION! DEMOCRATS and REPUBLICANS ALIKE WILL BE JOINING OUR TEAM! We have 2 CHOICES! We can SIT AND WATCH while the HMO'S, INSURANCE COMPANIES, and PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANIES DEVASTATE OUR FINANCIAL FUTURE or WE CAN TAKE ACTION TO CHANGE THINGS FOR THE BETTER! WHICH WILL IT BE? IT'S UP TO YOU! START NOW! "The
largest problem that we face in the US of A is that we no longer care
for our own" A BuzzFlash Reader Subj: "How Lies do Fly" Hi Buzz, So the Thanksgiving flight of 'Chicken-a-la-king' has hit a few air pockets has it? Just who saw the plane is now 'in play' as they say. First it was a British pilot, then it was the British tower, who next? Maybe, just maybe it was God himself who boomed out "Did I just see Air Force One?" No! Was the reply we is just a Gulfstream 5. "Oh", said God. And the secrecy of the mission was preserved. Proving that protection of GWB is primary and it is not wise to "In God You Trust" when the mission is on the wing. And who woke up the troops so early in the morning? Could it have been the landing and then the crowing of the First Cock at Baghdad Airport? Pass another fake drumstick, s'il vous plais. Best, Cole... Subj: Investigations . . . Dear BuzzFlash: So, now Ashcroft is being asked to lead an inquiry into the accusation of the bribery of Senator Smith over the Medicare vote..... Yeah...I can see that happening. We are already supposed to see investigations into: 1) The outing of the CIA operative. You can try your best to convince some of the people of this country that the matter is being "looked into". If Bush spent half the time and energy actually trying to find the leaker as he does on fund-raising and grandiose photo-ops...well, something actually might show up.... 2) 9-11. Anybody remember 9-11? I mean, other than hearing it mentioned when it is convenient for Bush's push for what he wants. All that is happening is that this particular investigation is being stonewalled into oblivion. 3) The pre Iraqi war intelligence. Senators Frist and Roberts have brought this business down to a schoolyard stand-off. Not so funny when your own tactics are used on you, is it boys! Besides which, what were your people doing going through someone else's garbage anyway! Perhaps, if we injected a healthy dose of sex into all of this we would see a lot more interest generated in getting these investigations done. Anyone?? Mary in Indiana Subj: Sock Puppet So if sock puppet Joe Lieberman is chosen by the Dems, we should support him? Randy Cecil Subj: Chris Matthews Buzz, In Wednesday's Boston Globe was an article about Chris Matthews interviewing Howard Dean, which was done live from Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government. Matthews spent the hours leading up to the interview by honing and fine tuning his attack plan on Dean. His plan was to provoke Dean into a confrontation and hopefully get him to bad mouth Bush. This he said, would be "important TV." He would also try to get him to go after Clinton saying "I want him to get into a war with Clinton here." At show time Matthews begins to put Dean through his paces. When he tries to get Dean to take a shot at Clinton, Dean parries the question and moves on. Matthews then moves in for the kill. He hammers him relentlessly about his military deferment for a bad back. Matthews finally asks "were you hoping to be deferred?" Dean answers "yes." Inside the production truck there is much excitement. "He got him to say he wanted to be deferred." This they feel is a headline making moment. After the close of Hardball, Matthews hammers this point home with Amy Robach on MSNBC. "A big night here" he says, offering his post-mortem. "I thought he was candid about how he went about getting his deferment...a lot more honest than Clinton ever was." Just what can you say about this kind of shit? This is the lowest most despicable twisting of truth as practiced by the whole right wing, from the administration on down to toadies like Matthews, Limbaugh, Hannity, O'Reilly and the rest of these bottom feeders. Is the right capable of doing anything but lying and twisting? The only way they know is to cheat at everything they do. If this is fair for the Dem. candidates, why not then for Bush, or anyone in his cabal. For that matter that goes for Limbaugh, Hannity , etc. BTW where was Matthews during Nam? These people sure have a different standard for others than they do their own. To Matthews, Dean "went about getting a deferment" funny, I thought he went before the board and took his chances like anyone else did. It was the board who decided on his deferment not Dean, he had no choice one way or the other. That is more fair and honest than boy Bush was. His daddy hop scotched him over a list of young men waiting to get into the Guard only to have Mr. I don't have to live by the rules go AWOL. Of course the honorable VP has stated he "had other interests" None of these creeps served and they all cheated to do it. So Dean plays by the rules but honestly admits he didn't want to go just like every other kid in America at the time, and he get pilloried for that? What kind of bullshit is that? Somebody ask these same "Hardball" questions of Bush and his pack. ATTENTION: "TRUE REPUBLICANS" your party has been overthrown just like the rest of the Country has. This is no longer a partisan matter. These people are a different breed altogether. We all need to see them put out of power regardless of party affiliation. This is about America now and these ain't Americans. Phil Rowland |
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