Cindy Sheehan, Rush Limbaugh, and CBS

August 22, 2005 | conservatism_IS_compassion

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Cindy Sheehan, Rush Limbaugh, and CBS

It isn't Cindy Sheehan - she's no more significant than I am. The problem is the broadcasters who get her to stand on her son's coffin and use it for a soapbox.

And it isn't even the broadcasters, but the sheeple who would take offense at the idea that the broadcasters should lose their priveldge - not their right, but their privilege - to transmit at particular frequencies at particular places.

And the reason they should lose their privileges is that those privileges - denied to you and me but given to the government's pets for free - is that the FCC license proclaim that the FCC licensee is "more equal" than you and me. An FCC license makes the licensee's voice in politics louder than yours and mine, and proclaims that what the licensee says and does not say, and what the licensee shows and does not show, is "in the public interest."

But isn't that true? Aren't the broadcast journalists objective? Aren't they moderate? The burden of proof of that question properly lies with them. How can the licensees - how can the FCC - conceivably prove what is essentially an unprovable negative? It is impossible, and that is why the First Amendment ruled out governmental regulation of newspapers, books, or speakers. Because the objection is not to the fact that the broadcasters transmit radio signals, it is the fact that the government censors all but the few - and certifies the transmissions of the few as being "in the public interest."

But isn't it true? Aren't the broadcast journalists objective and moderate? It's certain that CBS spent 5 years looking for an excuse for proclaiming that President George W. Bush's TANG service had been criticized by his superiors. Mary Mapes looked for such an excuse for 5 years - and when the Burkett "documents" came over the transom they were too good to be true:

• First, since they weren't originals with original signatures, they would never have stood up in court. On that basis alone, proclaiming that the "documents" proved anything was not in the public interest.

• Second, the "documents" were not merely copies, but very poor quality copies - of the sort that are produced when the copy in hand is a copy of a copy of a copy, perhaps ten generations. That is suspicious because
  • the "documents" turned up only in 2004, ten years at least after their publication would have been political dynamite. How strange that people obtained copies and made copies from them, over many generations - yet only in 2004 did they surface at CBS.
  • some of the "documents" purport to have been produced only for file and would have embarrassed their putative author "I'll backdate but I won't rate" if seen by other officers.
  • the family of the deceased putative author, who would have had the decedent's effects, deny having had those "documents" - yet they did not turn up until ten years after they would have been highly valuable to Bush's opposition. But in 2004, the "documents" turn up at CBS - with no chain of custody.
  • poor copy quality - and no original - is routine for forgeries.

• minor anachronisms such as old address for GW Bush when the current address would have been known and its use de rigeur; nonstandard formatting of memos and nonstandard usage within them. And a memo complains of undue influence by an officer who was already retired at the time to which the "memo" was dated.

• The "documents" match perfectly the results of keying the same text into Microsoft Word operating at its default settings. This is amazing because:
  • USAF stationary of that time was not 8.5 inches wide; a memo typed on narrower paper would naturally tend to be laid out differently than the same memo typed on 8.5 inch wide paper.
  • among all four memos there was not a single hyphenated word at the end of a line, as would be common with the use of a typewriter.
  • the memos contain centered text - and Microsoft Word centers perfectly, down to the pixel level whereas typewriters center down to only the character level - an odd number of typed characters is not truly centered in the same way as an even number of typed characters because that would require adding a half of a space in the line.
  • Microsoft Word not only assigns differing character space widths to various letters - "w" being given more space than than "i" - but actually nests adjoining characters together if (for example) the hook of a "j" can fit under the top of a preceding "T". This is impossible on a normal 1970's vintage typewriter.
  • Microsoft Word automatically superscripts "th" if that character couplet follows a numerical character without an intervening space; the "documents" have an example of a superscripted "th" couplet immediately after a numeric character. The "documents" also contain a "th" couplet after a numeric character but with an intervening space - in which case the "th" couplet is not superscripted. Microsoft Word would not superscript the couplet under that circumstance, either.

• The claim is made that "typewriters" capable of closely mimicking Microsoft Word existed in the early 1970s, but no example of a routine TANG document formatted in such sophisticated way has yet been produced. Since the National Guard tends to get hand-me-down equipment from the regular military, since a machine capable of that sophistication would have cost as much as a new car at the time, and since it would have been gratuitously tedious to operate at that level of sophistication for the sort of document which these "documents" purport to be, that is hardly surprising.

Mr. Bush was running, not as a former Lieutenant but as a sitting commander-in-chief, so from the Republican perspective thirty-year-old TANG memos are merely quint. But Senator Kerry wanted scrutiny of that history because he was running as a former Navy Lieutenant. CBS gave Senator Kerry a pass on an amazingly thin record as a politician in the past thirty years but pursued the merest possibility of evidence of mal/nonfeasance by Lt. Bush in the distant past in a way resembling nothing so much as Captain Ahab searching the Pacific for the great white whale. The story of "Lieutenant Bush skipped Guard Duty" collapsed under the weight of the evidence of the fraudulence of the supporting "documents."

At that point CBS reverted to the "modified limited hangout." CBS created an "independent commission" to make a show of investigating the matter - and to conclude that it was not possible to conclude that those patent forgeries were forgeries and to conclude that CBS's fanatical pursuit of the flimsiest "evidence" for the Democrat and against the Republican was not politically motivated.

So much for the good faith of CBS; with malice aforethought they aired a vicious, fraudulent hit piece in an attempt to manipulate the electorate and produce the election result they favored. And when caught, they stonewalled shamelessly. No objective journalist could fail to know that that is what happened. And no journalist who wishes to be considered "objective" by establishment journalism - including but not limited to CBS - dares to state the obvious truth. Only a journalist like Rush Limbaugh - a journalist who is dedicated to the truth rather than to a staying in the good graces of go-along-and-get-along Establishment journalism - would tell the obvious truth of the matter. And the "conservative talk show host" journalists like Rush learned the obvious truth from the Internet. Ultimately, from Free Republic.

The conclusion is that the government was arrogant to create the broadcast bands by means of censorship, in direct contravention of the First Amendment. FCC licenses are actually illegitimate titles of nobility which the Constitution explicitly forbids. And the result of that creation of a commanding political height has been the promotion of socialism - of the importance of government. The Internet produces no such commanding height; it is the realization of a "poor man's soap box" with a nationwide reach. Print journalism and personal speech and assembly are constitutionally protected, and if anyone uses the Internet then everyone who wants to is entitled to. But broadcast journalism - arrogant, partisan "objective" broadcast journalism - is fundamentally illegitimate and should be banished from the airwaves.

Ironically, Air America is more legitimate than CBS News - at least Air America is openly liberal.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

See also, Why Broadcast Journalism is
Unnecessary and Illegitimate

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Bump.

[Shazbot29]

Good but old

Did I miss the Sheehan linkage?

[gusopol3]

To me, the linkage was this:the intent of the media in using Sheehan is the same as the intent of the media in using Burkett. That is what he was saying, and it is very clear, from reading the transcript, although I didn't hear it. The intent in both instances is to undermine Bush's support with the military. Burkett:"Bush cheated to get out of serving." Sheehan: " Bush doesn't care about your families' sacrifices."

[Zrob]

"... poor copy quality - and no original - is routine for forgeries."

These were not even FORGERIES - which are illegal copies of legal documents; this was a case of FRAUD, and government docs at that. This case should have been pursued as if an enemy power was involved in espionage.

[GoBucks2002]

This case should have been pursued as if an enemy power was involved in espionage.

But then the media would cry "first amendment!" "you're stilfing dissent!" "Nixonian!" or whatever, and Republicans in Washington just don't have the guts to deal with that.

[FOXFANVOX]

Please pardon me while I indulge in some repressed anger. I, too, joined the Air National Guard [Wisconin] in 1972 not to avoid the draft [I had just come off five years of active duty that included flying into Viet Nam] but because I loved flying and I loved the military. Several of my squadron mates came to the WisANG after service in Viet Nam.

After I retired, my guard unit was called up for both Iraqi wars. So those who say people in the National Guard are avoiding the war haven't got a clue. I believe that over 40% of the current military forces deployed in Iraq today are Guard and Reserve forces.

And as far as Pres. Bush's physical went, there could have been a dozen different explanations for it. The Guard during that period was extremely accomodating. If you couldn't make a "drill", then you could make it up later or not at all if it was not critical. The hallmark of the Guard was its flexibility. That tradition goes back to when we confronted the British and won!

Sorry. Thank you for indulging me; I do feel much, much better.

[PGalt]

...and proclaims that what the licensee says and does not say, and what the licensee shows and does not show, is "in the public interest."

Outstanding!

[Christian4Bush]

bump

[skinkinthegrass]

bump! :)

[E.G.C.]

Bump in support of Rush.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

These were not even FORGERIES - which are illegal copies of legal documents; this was a case of FRAUD, and government docs at that.

Certainly is WAS fraud - fraudulent government documents. But in order to be fraudulent, they had also to be forgeries since they purport to have been signed by someone who is now too dead to disavow them . . . another common feature of forgeries.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

the intent of the media in using Sheehan is the same as the intent of the media in using Burkett.

Yes, in both cases broadcasters licensed by the government and putatively operating "in the public interest" have operated - are operating - in the interest of people who wish to see the policy of the U.S. government fail.

Essentially they define "the public interest" as being whatever The New York Times and The Washington Post say it is. But the Constitution of the United States says that the voters - not the newspaper editors but the voters determine the compostion of the US government.

It is clearly treason to to act on any other view, but the Republican Party obviously is not ever going to press that point. The only conceivable way to press it would be by a civil suit against the FCC and its licensees demanding the end of arrogant claims of "objectivity" by anyone who is advantaged by the government to speak to the nation as CBS is. And to have any hope of success we would have first to see significant turnover in a SCOTUS which can find McCain-Feingold unexceptionable.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Ping.

[Shazbot29]

1. Thank you for your Service.

2. As you very well know, the National Guard has a very long and very distinguished history of service domestic and abroad. For anyone to even suggest that NG service is somehow "less than" anything is studied ignorance on purpose beyond cure.

[Steve0113]

the FCC license proclaim that the FCC licensee is "more equal" than you and me. An FCC license makes the licensee's voice in politics louder than yours and mine, and proclaims that what the licensee says and does not say, and what the licensee shows and does not show, is "in the public interest."

Up to a point. You're overlooking the most obvious reason for FCC licensing, which is that the airwaves would be unusable without somebody imposing order on who broadcasts on which frequency. Read up on the early days of radio, when it was completely unregulated. It was chaotic, with stations "stepping on" one another. FCC broadcast licensing prevents that chaos today. You don't have to agree with how the FCC awards licenses to see that such licensing is necessary.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

the most obvious reason for FCC licensing, which is that the airwaves would be unusable without somebody imposing order on who broadcasts on which frequency.

Of course. But you have to look at the issue not from the audience's POV but from the performers' POV. It is no accident that the First Amendment doesn't say that you have a right to hear, or to read, what others say. Rather, the First Amendment declares the right to speak and to print, and only by implication do you have the right to hear or read - if you are within sound of the speaker's voice or, or if you have bought or borrowed a copy of the writer's text.

It would be completely outside the spirit of the Constitution for it to say that the government has a right to subsidize a newspaper, and hire editors who will propagandize for higher taxes. But the government does in fact promote - under the rhubric of "objectivity" - a concensus of journalists who do in fact propagandize for exactly that.

And that concensus, pretending to be objective, actually defines the Democratic Party of today. Liberal politicians operate out of the mindset that people don't pay attention, really, to the issues - that all that really lmatters at any given time is that you get good PR right now.

That is exactly the kind of governance we got from Bill Clinton, and it led directly to 9/11. But you gotta admit, it got Bill Clinton in the the oval office and kept him there for eight years . . . that's what counts, right? </sarcasm>

The rule of the FCC is that you have a right to be able to pick up some stations on relatively crude electronic equipment. You pay for that "right" with the influence which those broadcast stations have to promote things which you consider anathema, and with the duty you have to shut up and let them do it. That is what a "right to listen" means.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

I, too, joined the Air National Guard [Wisconin] in 1972 not to avoid the draft [I had just come off five years of active duty that included flying into Viet Nam] but because I loved flying and I loved the military. Several of my squadron mates came to the WisANG after service in Viet Nam.

. . . as far as Pres. Bush's physical went, there could have been a dozen different explanations for it. The Guard during that period was extremely accomodating.

In fact, you have already explained it. You and your squadron mates came back from Vietnam and joined the Air National Guard - and, quite naturally, were alloted flying time. Did the hours the ANG could fly skyrocket along with that influx of pilots? No. What effect did that have on the hours existing ANG pilots could get? They went into the tank.

When your squadron mates came back and joined the Texas ANG, they effectively took the flying billet away from Lt. George W. Bush. He didn't trouble to take his physical for the simple reason that the ANG didn't need him in flying status. Contrary to the fraudulent "order" from the conveniently deceased Col. Killian, TANG had no reason to want Lt. Bush to remain on flying status. He had served the Guard when the pilots were in short supply, but when the Guard received a glut of veteran pilots back from Vietnam his services as a pilot were no longer needed.

Yes, and thank you for your service.

[FOXFANVOX]

Thank you both for the insightful comments. And I very much apppreciated your combined "Thank yous." But, I have to say I really became a patriot only with the passage of time. In my youth, I joined because of my love of flying and then continued because of my affection for the military. My thanks and prayers are forever with those who served and didn't return. And I am confident you share those same sentiments.

Again, thanks for taking the time to comment.

[longtermmemmory]

Rush is on FIRE NOW on this!