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Vanity Fair writer Michael Joseph Gross has already admitted to one error in his profile of Sarah Palin, but the contradictions and controversies surrounding his hit piece continue to stack up.

In a Sept. 7 post on The Corner, Katrina Trinko "refudiated" Gross's characterization of Palin as vicious, vengeful, and fake. Unlike Gross's sources, almost all of which were anonymous, Trinko provided citations.

Gross had cited "people who know" suggesting Palin's relationship with close friends Kristan Cole and Kris Perry had "deteriorated." But Cole reportedly told Trinko the charge was "absolutely not true. I don't know where they get this stuff from, honestly."

A former Palin aide, Ivy Frye, also contradicted Gross's characterization that she parted ways with Palin "on bad terms." "I didn't leave on ‘bad terms,'" she said in a statement. "Gross' 8 page hit piece is a complete work of fiction from beginning to end."

Gross recently admitted to misreporting the profile's opening story - in which he had originally suggested Palin was using her son, Trig, who has Down syndrome, to gain political sympathy. The child he'd seen was the son of Palin's friend Gina Loudon. "This was a mistake, and I regret the error," Gross wrote in a statement.

But the story posted on Vanity Fair's website makes no note of the retraction. The original storyappears unedited.

Gross had previously defended his work by telling MSNBC "Morning Joe" hosts that, "I have a lot in common with this woman." Elsewhere in his "Morning Joe" interview, Gross also called Palin "a person for whom there is no topic too small to lie about" and said, "She lies  about everything." Maybe they're not so different after all.

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To many, it's hardly a revelation to most, but when someone keeps taking the same action over and over again, even to his detriment, it can reveal a lot about that individual's belief system.

This was an observation CNBC "Squawk Box" host Joe Kernen made about the Obama administration's willingness to embrace a populist "soak the rich" tactic against the wealthy in the United States, even though it isn't winning him favor with the American people, according to opinion polling. A new ABC News/Washington Post poll shows more people now think President Barack Obama's policies have hurt the economy than have helped. And Kernen called the unwillingness to change course evidence of the president's ideology - proof he does believe in the redistribution of wealth.

"When push comes to shove, the left wins out with this guy," Kernen said on the Sept. 8 broadcast of "Squawk Box." "Axelrod calls the shots when push comes to shove. And this will make the case for a populist argument that these rich people - soak the rich - they do not need this and we're going to cut for the middle class and we're going to pay for it by soaking the rich. And it's right down - but it also - he said it all along, but to his critics, those critics, it's more evidence of a redistribution that when it all comes down to it, the overriding mandate of this administration - it's a redistribution of wealth." 

And even Kernen's "Squawk Box" co-host Carl Quintanilla said it was obvious this wasn't working.

"If that strategy had worked since he came into office - talking down Wall Street, scolding businesses, fat cats - his poll numbers would be higher," Quintanilla added. "So the question is, why isn't he adjusting?"

But Kernen says it's deeper than just a soak-the-rich philosophy for the sake of short-term political expediency, but that this is a belief Obama has held for decades.

"Because I think he really believes that wealth needs to be redistributed after the income disparity over the past 30 years," Kernen said. "I really think he believes and he'll forego some near-term job gains and every thing else."

In his first column for The New York Times on Sept. 7, Peter Orszag, Obama's former director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, suggested that Obama should reconsider his administration's stance on allowing the Bush tax cuts expire. Moody's economist Mark Zandi, an expert the Obama administration had relied on heavily in 2009 to get the stimulus passed, also has questioned the administration's wisdom. And even a Times Sept. 8 story, which are traditionally sympathetic to Obama's causes, was also doubtful he could prevail, as Kernen pointed out.

"It's so obvious - even Orszag can figure that out," Kernen continued. "Even Zandi - just about everyone can figure out that you don't try to stimulate at the same time you're sucking money out of the economy. It makes no sense. But even The New York Times - ‘It's not clear that Mr. Obama can prevail given his,' and this is The New York Times, ‘given his own diminishing popularity the tepid economic recovery and the divisions within his own party.' It says a lot of nervous Democrats wish that he would give them some cover and say, all right, maybe we'll ..."

UK Telegraph columnist Janet Daley blasted the BBC on Tuesday for treating the tea party movement "as if it were a cross between the Klu [sic] Klux Klan and the German neo-fascist brigade."

While Daley's piece is a stirring and hard-hitting indictment of the BBC's coverage, she seems to believe that its disdainful approach to the tea party movement stems from a failure to understand the American political tradition. But by that logic, American reporters, who presumably do understand that tradition, would refrain from such coverage.

Let's see: Nazi comparisons? Check. KKK comparisons? Check. The fact is the American media elite are more akin to their British counterparts than to the tea party protesters they all cover. Liberal elitism knows no borders.

After making the KKK and Nazi comparison allegations, Daley wrote on the Telegraph's website Tuesday:

The British generally and the BBC in particular have a real problem understanding the obsessive suspicion in which the power of central government is held in the US. This is not some funny redneck eccentricity: it is fundamental to the Constitution which gives individual states much greater sovereignty than the countries of the European Union enjoy. The states have independent judicial systems (some states have capital punishment, others do not) and separate taxation systems (some have sales taxes, others do not). Only a Supreme Court ruling can over-turn state law by, for example, declaring something (such as abortion) to be a legal right which a state legislature may not deny.

Traditionally there is only one nationally imposed tax - federal income tax - which is designed to pay for those functions that must be carried out by national government. Resistance to the Obama healthcare reforms is as passionate as it is precisely because it imposes a federal requirement to purchase health insurance which seems to contravene the basic economic freedom guaranteed by the Constitution. The BBC obviously finds it impossible to believe that ordinary people could actually take issues like this seriously. (They can only be racists or hillibilly know-nothings.) The Corporation really ought to encourage its correspondents to get out more and talk to some of the articulate Americans who don't spend their lives in liberal salons.

Who knows if Ed Scultz and Keith Olbermann spend their time in "liberal salons," but like their journalistic brethren across the pond, they have no compunction about painting the tea party movement as vicious racists or Third Reich-esque fascists (see links above).

Are they utterly ignorant of the American values Daley eloquently summarizes? They both have college degrees (please Keith, don't bring out the diploma again), and presumably learned a thing or two about American history.

No, they despise the tea party movement not because they don't understand it, but simply because it challenges their political agenda and hence must be debased and delegitimized with the most overwrought of historical epithets. Godwin would be proud.

In short, Daley is mischaracterizing the BBC's opposition to the movement. It has nothing to do with historical or political ignorance, and everything to do with an agenda. How do we know this? Well, the BBC's attitude mirrors that of our press.

There's nothing particularly novel about calling tea party activists Nazis. Olbermann and his ilk have been doing it for months.

Remember the Seinfeld episode where George Costanza pretended to be an architect? Seinfeld thought it was a bad idea, suggesting Constanza would do better as a fake marine biologist, leading Constanza to complain, "You know I've always wanted to pretend that I was an architect."

Ed Schultz, liberal radio host and MSNBC flamethrower, is done pretending to be an architect.

Schultz garnered plenty of attention last week with his huff-and-puff claim he could outdraw the estimated 300,000 people who attended Glenn Beck's Restoring Honor rally in Washington on Aug. 28.

What made Schultz's boast so insipid was his insistence that he not actually organize or take part in a rally to exceed Beck's draw, if only in spirit. Schultz's suggestion alone would suffice. No need to actually draft a blueprint or break a sweat.

Perhaps the Labor Day weekend knocked some reality into Schultz. According to Brian Maloney at The Radio Equalizer, Schultz has decided to appear at the "One Nation Working Together" rally on the mall in Washington on Oct. 2, exactly one month before the midterms.

Here's Schultz talking about this on his radio show yesterday (audio available at Radio Equalizer) --

The march is on, Oct. 2. Will you march with me?  And thousands upon thousands. Oh, we'll get three hundred grand. We'll get 300,000, absolutely. We'll show you conservatives out there when big Eddie starts cranking on something we don't back down until it gets done. It's happening on Oct. 2. I appreciate all of you going to our website at wegoted.com, there's a consortium of groups that are coming together. You see, the Republicans, they want you to quit. They want you to think that there's a tsunami coming. What tsunami? Ain't no tsunamis coming! Nothing's lost until you give up! If you give up, then they have a chance. I don't buy the polls, I don't believe it, I believe America is smarter than this, and I think Americans don't want to go back. ...

Many of you are out of work. Many of you can't make it to the rally but a lot of you will. We have been inundated with all kinds of communication from wonderful listeners and viewers and I will be a featured speaker. There will be other speakers and there will be some groups that are going to be obviously helping out with all of this, just like FreedomWorks and the billionaires and the six months of promotion helped out the Beckster. And I want to get something very clear right now. If Beck had not done his rally, this would have happened, OK? This is about the country. This is about making sure that information is where it has to be, with the American people. And now it's about passion, now it's about emotion. And by the way, there will be some old and there will be some white people at the Oct. 2 rally on the mall in Washington, D.C. They just won't be angry. And they won't be motivated by hate and they won't be race-baited.

Schultz asserts that "if Beck had not done his rally, this would have happened" anyway. Maybe so, and I'll temporarily set aside my well-deserved skepticism of anything claimed by Schultz.

But the whiff of desperation wafting from Schultz's reversal makes me wonder if Beck hasn't put the fear of God in him.

Craigslist.com has finally nixed its controversial Adult Services section, but it looks like the popular website may still be giving the green light to hundreds of prostitution ads - with dozens more popping up on the site each day.

The go-to portal for online classified ads and local discussion boards, Craigslist has been criticized for years for selling ad space to sex-peddlers and prostitution rings. Law enforcement officials and watchdog groups say that the site is frequently used by human sex traffickers and pimps to find clients for women and children who have been coerced into the sex industry.

On Sept. 4, Craigslist removed its Adult Services section in response to a letter from attorneys general in 17 states urging the website to crack down on prostitution ads.

But it doesn't look like the sex traffickers had to move far. Other sections of the Craigslist site are still overrun with ads for "sensual massage parlors" - many of which have been identified as brothels by law enforcement officials or sex industry websites.

In the Therapeutic Services section of the Washington, D.C. site, hundreds of ads boasting titles like "Sweet Beautiful Asian masseuses" and featuring photos of attractive, scantily-attired women have been posted since Sept. 4.

Some of these businesses are being monitored by law enforcement officials for engaging in prostitution, such as the Rt. 1 Therapy massage parlor in Woodbridge, Va. The massage business was raided by police on Aug. 13 in regards to an ongoing prostitution investigation and the owners were charged with "keeping a bawdy place." Less than a month later, and just two days after Craigslist removed the Adult Services section, Rt. 1 Therapy was still posting ads in the site's Therapeutic Services section, touting its "Talented and Delightful Asian Staff."

Jade Tree Therapy, another Woodbridge, Va.-based massage parlor that has been investigated for prostitution, posted a Craigslist ad on Sept. 7 offering a military discount for service members. And Jasmine Therapy, located in Washington, D.C., has also been pinpointed by police as a brothel and continues to post ads in the Therapeutic Services section.

Dozens of other massage parlors advertising on Craigslist, like Papaya Therapy in Falls Church, Va., Pine Tree Spa in Fairfax, Va., and Peach Therapy in Annandale, Va., have placed other ads on or been reviewed on sex escort websites like "LocalEscortPages.com" and "USASexGuide.com."

According to the Polaris Project, an organization that aids victims of forced prostitution, U.S. massage parlors are common fronts for the foreign sex trafficking industry.

"Sex trafficking cases of foreign national women and children brought into the U.S. are known to occur in a wide variety of locations in the commercial sex industry, such as massage parlors," the Polaris Project reported.

And the organization noted that Craigslist ads have long been linked to sex trafficking. "Polaris Project has directly witnessed a rampant misuse of [C]raigslist by pimps and traffickers," said the group. "Many of the victims that we have served can point to the [C]raigslist posting that a trafficker once used to market their bodies against their will."

In an open letter to Craigslist owner Craig Newmark that was printed as an advertisement in the Washington Post in August, two anonymous women who said they were coerced into the prostitution industry at a young age, pleaded with the website to crack down on the sex ads.

"All day, me and other girls sat with our laptops, pasting pictures and answering ads on Craigslist, he made $1,500 a night selling my body, dragging me to Los Angeles, Houston, Little Rock - and on one trip to Las Vegas in the trunk of a car," wrote a woman named MC, who said she was forced into prostitution at 11 years old.

The second woman, identified as AK, wrote that her pimp "put my picture on Craigslist, and I was sold for sex by the hour at truck stops and cheap motels, 10 hours with 10 different men every night. This became my life...Men answered the Craigslist advertisements and paid to rape me. The $30,000 he pocketed each month was facilitated by Craigslist 300 times."

Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster has shrugged off criticism of the sex industry ads on his site for years, saying they were protected under "freedom of speech." The Adult Services section was reportedly a major money-maker for the website, bringing in tens of millions of dollars a year.

However, the pressure on Craigslist to remove the prostitution ads reached a fever-pitch in mid-August, after a medical student accused of murdering a woman he met on the erotic services section of Craigslist committed suicide in prison.

The open letter from the former forced-prostitutes in the Washington Post also prompted a public outcry against the website. Craigslist finally responded by taking down the Adult Services section and putting a "Censored" bar in its place. Some have said the word "Censored" was used by Craigslist to make a political statement about the alleged infringement on its free speech rights.

And while politicians have praised Craigslist for removing the problematic section, some acknowledge that there is still more work to be done before the site is prostitution-free. Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal said on Aug. 7 that the termination of the Adult Services section is an "important step" in combating online sex trafficking, but it is "not the end game."

Craigslist isn't the only mainstream website that has been used to advertise prostitution. YouTube has also been criticized for allowing video ads for escort services on its site, according to "BlueTube," a 2009 Special Report by the Culture and Media Institute.

In an interview with controversial Florida Pastor Terry Jones on Wednesday's CBS Early Show, co-host Harry Smith doubted whether or not Muslim extremism was really a threat: "Would you regard radical Islam, then, as the enemy?"

While Jones' plan to burn copies of the Koran on the anniversary of 9/11 has been rightfully condemned as offensive and an unnecessary provocation, Smith's response of questioning the danger of  Islamic radicalism altogether denies the ideological motivation of America's enemies. After Jones described receiving threats over his planned event, Smith responded by quoting scripture: "...you're a student of the New testament, I'm sure. Did not Jesus say you're to love your enemy?"

After Jones continued to defend the burning of the Muslim religious text, Smith again cited the Bible: "But there are at least two different times in Matthew and Luke where Jesus is quite, quite clear about loving – about loving your enemy." Concluding the interview, Smith commented: "Well, I know you say you've been praying about it. And I hope that you find the wisdom in order to do the right thing, as the next couple of days unfold."

In the past, Smith has not been so quick to tout Christian theology. On the September 6, 2005 Early Show, Smith fretted over Christian charities forcing religion on victims of Hurricane Katrina in an interview with Saddleback Church Pastor Rick Warren: "...if I'm a family, am, do I need to be concerned that I'm going to go live with a church family, are they going to proselytize me, are they going to say, 'you better come to church with me or else, I'm, you know, you're not going to get your breakfast this morning'?"

On Tuesday, Smith lumped opposition of the Ground Zero mosque in with Jones: "...you've heard about...the controversy near Ground Zero...the proposed building of an Islamic cultural center there. And there have been all kinds of people protesting this and one of them is a preacher from down in Florida, who has really been on the march on this. And he has promised to burn a Koran on the anniversary – on the 9/11 anniversary." During the Wednesday interview, footage rolled of people protesting the mosque in New York City while Jones discussed burning the Koran.   

Here is a full transcript of Smith's September 8 interview with Jones:
7:00AM ET TEASE:

HARRY SMITH: Koran controversy. A Florida minister's plans to burn the holy book condemned by the U.S. government and others. But Pastor Terry Jones insists he will set fire to the Koran on September 11th. We'll talk to the man at the center of the controversy.     

7:07AM ET SEGMENT:

HARRY SMITH: This morning a Florida minister refuses to back down in the face of worldwide outrage. The Reverend Terry Jones insists he will burn a Koran this Saturday, the ninth anniversary of 9/11. We're going to talk to him in a moment. But first, CBS News correspondent Kelly Cobiella has the latest.

KELLY COBIELLA: From his small office in Gainesville, Florida, Pastor Terry Jones hears the worldwide protests building against him. Muslims in Kabul, Afghanistan, are burning him in effigy. Fellow evangelical Christians are denouncing him.

RICHARD CIZIK [REVEREND, NEW EVANGELICAL PARTNERSHIP FOR THE COMMON GOOD]: You bring dishonor to the name of Jesus Christ.

[ON-SCREEN HEADLINE: Koran Controversy; Pastor's Burning Plan Comes Under Attack]

COBIELLA: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton singled out Jones and his plan to burn 100 copies of the Koran on the anniversary of 9/11 at a Washington dinner to observe Ramadan.

HILLARY CLINTON: I am heartened by the clear, unequivocal condemnation of this disrespectful, disgraceful act.

COBIELLA: Yet despite mounting pressure, this small town pastor will not budge. Jones, who keeps a gun at his side because of death threats, insists he is answering a religious calling.

TERRY JONES [PASTOR, DOVE WORLD OUTREACH CENTER]: We are speaking to radical Islam, saying we don't want them, their influence, and their Sharia law.

COBIELLA: Jones says the only thing that will change his plans is a message from God. Kelly Cobiella, CBS News, Gainesville, Florida.

SMITH: And joining us now from his church in Gainesville, Florida, is Pastor Terry Jones. Pastor Jones, good morning.

JONES: Yeah, good morning.

SMITH: So, we've got the White House, you have the Secretary of State, you have General Petraeus, you've got the VFW, among many others, saying, 'please don't do this.' Are you still determined to do it?

JONES: As of right now, we feel that this message is that important. We are still determined to do it, yes.

SMITH: Yeah. And the message being what, exactly?

JONES: Well, the message to Islam is actually the message geared towards radical Islam. We see its influence around the world. We are sending a message to them that we don't want them to do as they appear to be doing in Europe. They appear to begin as they grow in numbers, to push their agenda, to push Sharia law. What we are saying to them is that if they're in America they need to respect, honor, and obey our Constitution and not slowly try to push their agenda upon us.

[FOOTAGE OF GROUND ZERO MOSQUE PROTEST]

SMITH: Right. Would you regard, then, as radical Islam as – as your enemy?

JONES: I didn't quite understand you. Sorry.

SMITH: Would you regard radical Islam, then, as the enemy?
                        
JONES: Oh, I think definitely. Definitely radical Islam is an enemy. I think there's also the question of how – I think sometimes we don't realize that this radical element of Islam goes deeper into the Muslim community than what we actually want to admit. To give you a small example, we had yesterday a Muslim lady came onto our property. I mean, we're here in America. We're in Gainesville, Florida. We're in a little subdivision. And a Muslim lady comes on to our property and threatens us. She says, 'if you do not stop this, there is a wrath, there is a judgment, there is a judgment coming upon you that you cannot handle.'

SMITH: Let me ask you-

JONES: That is in Gainesville, Florida.

SMITH: I understand.

JONES: And we asked the lady, is this a threat? And she says yes.

SMITH: Let me ask you this – you're a student of the New testament, I'm sure. Did not Jesus say you're to love your enemy?

JONES: Yes, definitely.

SMITH: Right.

JONES: And I believe that this approach is not the normal approach, but I believe this approach is at this particular time in history very necessary. We also see times in the Bible where Jesus also got very upset.

SMITH: We understand.

JONES: Jesus went into the temple and threw all the money changers out. We feel this is definitely an exception.

SMITH: But there are at least two different times in Matthew and Luke where Jesus is quite, quite clear about loving – about loving your enemy.

JONES: Right. And that's exactly what we do. With this action here, this action here itself is not – is not supposed to be an act of love. We agree that generally that's what we do. We would reach out to Muslims in other ways.

SMITH: Right.

JONES: This particular act is actually an act of warning radical Islam. It's a different type of a thing.

SMITH: Well, I know you say you've been praying about it. And I hope that you find the wisdom in order to do the right thing, as the next couple of days unfold. Pastor Terry Jones, thank you very much for taking the time to speak with us.

JONES: Uh-huh. Thank you.

Here's a delightful little story from the Sept./Oct. issue of Mother Jones, the far-left political magazine. It's called "Rick Santorum's Anal Sex Problem," and, with its helpful creative artwork, it's not something you want to read over lunch.

Thanks to the efforts of a vindictive liberal writer, anyone Googling conservative former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum is fairly likely to get an unpleasant surprise. Among the top three results will probably be a nauseatingly offensive website based on making "Santorum" a "sexual neologism," according to Mother Jones' Stephanie Mencimer.

Back in 2003, Santorum expressed a traditional Catholic view on the issue of homosexuality and same-sex marriage. Then talking in general about "orientations" always excluded from understandings of marriage, he included pedophilia and bestiality along with homosexuality.

"The ensuing controversy," wrote Mencimer, "prompted syndicated sex columnist Dan Savage, who's gay, to start a contest, soliciting reader suggestions for slang terms to "memorialize the scandal." Having selected the nastiest entry, "Savage launched a website, and a meme was born."

Once launched, the smear site "eventually it eclipsed Santorum's own campaign site in search results; some observers even suggested it may have contributed to Santorum's crushing 18-point defeat in his 2006 campaign against Bob Casey," Mencimer wrote.

Whether that's the case or not, the damaging site remains, and remains a problem for Santorum's future political aspirations.

The site "hasn't been updated for years," but it still comes up high in the Google results. It's been linked to over 13,000 times "compared with only 5,000 for Santorum's own, real site, America's Foundation," according to the article.

Mencimer talked to Internet PR and search engine experts who called the site "devastating" and said Santorum should "consider buying paid search results for his name.'

The article claims that Santorum "would very much like to be president." If so, Savage, not content to let his website do its passive work, threatens to "‘sic my flying monkeys on him' - in other words, mobilize bloggers to start posting and linking to his site again."

Mencimer explained that "Savage has not forgiven Santorum for his seven-year-old comments: ‘Rick would have prevented me and my partner from being able to adopt my son,' he points out."

And that would be a shame, not to raise a child in an environment where differing opinions are met with vitriolic and gross scatological personal attacks. Why, he might not grow up to be a tolerant liberal.

Good Morning America's George Stephanopoulos on Wednesday quizzed House Minority Leader John Boehner about his tan, dismissing, "...I have to note that if you do win and you do become Speaker, you will probably have the deepest tan of any Speaker in American history." He also wondered if this was something the Republican would have to "overcome."

The former Democratic operative turned journalist cited PPP, a Democratic polling firm, that queried voters about Boehner's tan: "And there's actually been a poll out in your state of Ohio, saying 30 percent of the voters think you spend too much time on your tan. And 27 percent don't like it. Is this something you have to overcome?" [MP3 audio here.]

However, when World News' Claire Shipman interviewed Nancy Pelosi on October 26, 2006, just prior to the Democratic take over of the House, the reporter mused, "Do you let yourself think, for example, maybe before you go to sleep at night, 'Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi?"

Stephanopoulos on Wednesday asked the same question, but minus the flowery language: "Mr. Leader, how confident are you that you're going to be Speaker of the House next year?"

The host also pressed Boehner to condemn Terry Jones, a pastor in Florida who will be burning Korans on 9/11: "What is your message to Pastor Jones?"

Boehner responded by asserting that just because someone can do something, doesn't mean they should. That, apparently, wasn't enough for Stephanopoulos. He challenged, "So, you're telling him not to do it? Sir? Are you telling him not to do it?"

Yet, on the August 4 GMA, Stephanopoulos declared to conservative Laura Ingraham, "This is a country founded on the notion of religious freedom. What better way to say they [the terrorists] haven't won?"

A transcript of the September 8 segment, which aired at 7:11am EDT, follows:

7:11

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: As we said, the President will deliver what he hopes will be a tide-turning speech on the economy in Cleveland. And he is taking direct aim again at our next guest, top House Republican John Boehner.

BARACK OBAMA: And the Republican who thinks he's going to take over as Speaker- [Audience boos.] I'm just saying, that's his opinion. He's entitled to his opinion. But, but when he was asked about this, he dismissed those jobs, as government jobs that weren't worth saving.

STEPHANOPOULOS: And House Republican leader John Boehner, joins us now. Thank you, sir, for coming in this morning. You seem to be the President's new punching bag.

HOUSE MINORITY LEADER JOHN BOEHNER: Well, George, I think it just shows how out of touch the White House is. You know, the American people are asking the question, where are the jobs? And yet, here's the White House worrying about what I've got to say instead of working together to get our economy going again and to get jobs back in America.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Well, the President is outlining proposals that Republicans have supported in the past. This permanent extension of the Research and Development Tax Credit. This expensing proposal, the small business tax cut of about $100 billion. Those are proposals Republicans have supported in the past. Will you support them now?

BOEHNER: George, I'm open to the President's ideas. But I think the President's missing the bigger point here. And that is, with all of the spending in Washington, and all the uncertainty facing small businesses, including the coming tax hikes on January the first, until this uncertainty and spending is under control, I don't think these are going to have much impact. And, so, today, what I'd like to do is work on a bipartisan basis to do two things: First, instead of waiting until after the election to put together some big omnibus spending bill, with a bunch of wasteful spending, why wouldn't we do this? Why don't we pass a bill this month at 2008 spending levels. You know, before the TARP, before the bailout, before the stimulus. And let's put some certainty in the economy. That in and of itself would save about $100 billion this year alone. And then, secondly, why wouldn't we work together to make it clear that all current tax rates will be extended for the next two years? What that will do-

STEPHANOPOULOS: So, you're open-

BOEHNER: What that will do is help small businesses who have no clue what the coming tax rates are going to be, gives them some certainty. And if we're able to do this together, I think we'll show the American people that we understand what's going on in the country. And we'll be able to get our economy moving again and get jobs growing in America.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So, you're open to the President's ideas. You're also making these two proposals of your own for the President. You talked about the two year extension of the Bush tax cuts. As you know, the President is against, right now, the extension for the wealthy. But his former budget director, Peter Orszag, made a similar proposal about the two year extension. But he said, but they have to expire in two years so we can reduce the deficit. Are you open to that part of it as well?

BOEHNER: George, we can't deal with the deficit until we're willing to get our arms around spending and have a strong economy. And you can't have a strong economy if you're raising taxes on the very people you expect to invest in our economy to begin hiring people again.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Mr. Leader, how confident are you that you're going to be Speaker of the House next year?

BOEHNER: Well, certainly, George, it's possible. We've got a steep hill to climb. We have got a lot of work to do. But when I travel the country and I travel my district, I've never seen the American people more engaged in this election and any election in my lifetime. And, so, we've got a lot of work to do. That's our goal, though. To earn back the majority so we can renew our efforts to drive for a smaller, lest-costly and more accountable government in Washington, D.C.

STEPHANOPOULOS: If you win, you will be third in line for the White House. Obviously, the eyes of the world will be on you. I wanted you to weigh in on an issue of national security implications, as well. We've seen this Pastor Terry Jones down in Florida, threatening to burn the Koran this weekend. This weekend, General Petraeus has spoken out against it. Secretary of State Clinton has spoken out against it. What is your message to Pastor Jones?

BOEHNER: To Pastor Jones and those who want to build a mosque, just because you have a right to do something in America, does not mean it is the right thing to do. We're a nation of religious freedom. We're also a nation of tolerance. And I think, in the name of tolerance, people ought to really think about the kind of actions they're taking.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So, you're telling him not to do it? Sir? Are you telling him not to do it?

BOEHNER: Well, listen. I just think that it's not wise to do this in the face of what our country really represents. And over some, you know, 234 years.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Okay. Before you go, I have to note that if you do win and you do become Speaker, you will probably have the deepest tan of any Speaker in American history. And there's actually been a poll out in your state of Ohio, saying 30 percent of the voters think you spend too much time on your tan. And 27 percent don't like it. Is this something you have to overcome?

BOEHNER: Well, hey probably weren't there yesterday, when I was out cutting my grass or when I was out riding my mountain bike. All right?

STEPHANOPOULOS: So, no worries there?

BOEHNER: Thanks, George.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Okay. Thank you, Mr. Leader. No comment at all.

Time executive editor Nancy Gibbs, the writer of many ridiculously gooey leg-thrill sentences about Democratic politicians, is now begging President Obama to avoid going to church -- it's "The Piety Trap." Her headline continues: "Sure, we want to know what a president believes in...but that doesn't always mean he should tell us." Obama is much more likely to end up in a sand trap than a piety trap on Sundays, but Gibbs doesn't want him to go to church anyway: Many a pundit has predicted that we are sure to see the Obamas attending some nice, safe church one day soon, the girls in their Sunday best, Obama with a big Bill Clinton Bible under his arm or explaining what Glenn Beck calls Obama's "version of Christianity." I devoutly hope the President resists this advice or, if  he feels the call to worship, that he finds a way to do it that meets his private needs rather than his political ones.

This is a funny passage coming from Gibbs, who found some poetic equivalence two years ago between the birth of Jesus Christ and the birth of hopes for Obama after the election: "Some princes are born in palaces. Some are born in mangers. But a few are born in the imagination, out of scraps of history and hope." It won our "Obamagasm Award" as the gushiest pro-Obama quote of the election year.   Sentences like this should be kept in mind when Time's top editor Rick Stengel declares "No one personifies TIME more than Nancy Gibbs...As a journalist, Nancy is timely and timeless."   Gibbs also won our "Carve Clinton Into Mount Rushmore Award" in 1998 for her infamous "naked in a sharp dark suit" tribute to Bill Clinton: 

He invited his exhausted audience to take a holiday from Lewinsky and spend a refreshing hour and 12 minutes feeling like a country again. For once the talk on the screen was not of oral sex, but of our lives and fortunes and sacred happiness. He had become all human nature, the best and the worst, standing there naked in a sharp, dark suit, behind the TelePrompTer. That which does not kill him only makes him stronger, and his poll numbers went through the roof....That may have been a miracle, but it was no accident: Americans are less puritanical and more forgiving than the cartoon version suggests, and this President is never better than in his worst moments." — Time magazine Senior Editor Nancy Gibbs, February 9, 1998 issue.

Gibbs clearly doesn't like her presidents to be overtly religious. She declared "We've seen what happens when it serves a president's interest to flaunt his faith -- which is almost inevitably does, since every poll affirms that Americans want their leader to submit to some higher power." So what happens? She never elaborated. She lamented "Religious tests, a constitutional taboo, are a political tradition." 

Her liberal hero, naturally, is John F. Kennedy, who declared in 1960 that he came to Protestant pastors to talk about "now what kind of church I believe in , for that should be important only to me -- but what kind of America I believe in." She insisted "That was an America where church and state were absolutely separate and priests and preachers did not tell parishioners how to vote."

Clearly, Gibbs doesn't really mean that progressive Reverends like Jesse Jackson (or even Reverend Wright) can't tell their parishioners how to vote. She simply doesn't like it when priests and preachers tell parishioners not to vote straight-ticket Democrat, like most well-coached Time magazine staffers.  

The Imam in the middle of the Ground Zero mosque controversy finally spoke about the issue Wednesday by publishing a New York Times op-ed without once mentioning the overwhelming public opposition to the location of this Islamic center.

Somewhat curiously, he didn't even refer to last week's poll by the Times finding two-thirds of New York city residents against the building of such a facility two blocks from where radical Islamists killed thousands of innocent people almost exactly nine years ago.

But that didn't stop Feisal Abdul Rauf from putting a happy face on an issue that has deeply saddened much of the nation he is also a citizen of:

We are proceeding with the community center, Cordoba House. More important, we are doing so with the support of the downtown community, government at all levels and leaders from across the religious spectrum, who will be our partners. I am convinced that it is the right thing to do for many reasons.

Yes, but not with the support of the very community this mosque would serve. Let me remind the Imam of what the very paper he wrote in Wednesday reported just five days prior:

The poll, however, reveals a more complicated portrait of the opposition in New York: 67 percent said that while Muslims had a right to construct the center near ground zero, they should find a different site.

Most strikingly, 38 percent of those who expressed support for the plan to build it in Lower Manhattan said later in a follow-up question that they would prefer it be moved farther away, suggesting that even those who defend the plan question the wisdom of the location.

Weeks prior, a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll found similar opposition nationwide.

How could a man claiming his "life's work has been focused on building bridges between religious groups" not recognize in his call for unity the overwhelming opposition to this mosque from the very people he says he wants to build bridges between?

Shouldn't the beginning of such a process be to validate the existence of powerful resistance and concern?

By ignorning the volume and intensity of these sentiments, the Imam was actually offending those that possess them. Instead, he continued to make his pitch like a salesman ignoring negative feedback from his prospects:

Our broader mission - to strengthen relations between the Western and Muslim worlds and to help counter radical ideology - lies not in skirting the margins of issues that have polarized relations within the Muslim world and between non-Muslims and Muslims. It lies in confronting them as a joint multifaith, multinational effort.

From the political conflicts between Israelis and Palestinians to the building of a community center in Lower Manhattan, Muslims and members of all faiths must work together if we are ever going to succeed in fostering understanding and peace.

Great thoughts indeed, but you can only convert your opponents by recognizing their existence. By ignoring them, you run the risk of further alienating those you claim to be reaching out to.

With this in mind, if Times editorial page editor Andrew Rosenthal had any input to what Rauf wrote before it was published, one has to wonder if he suggested to the Imam that it might be a good idea to mention last Friday's poll. He may have balanced this by referring to the Times own editorial the same day wherein the Gray Lady spoke in favor of the mosque despite the poll's findings.

After all, the absence of both suggests regardless of the optimistic title "Building on Faith," either Rauf had little faith his readers could handle the truth or he is refusing to face it himself.

Whichever the reality, it didn't paint a picture of a religious figure trying to build bridges. 

As a result, this op-ed might act to further the divide concerning this mosque rather than unify a nation with many remaining questions about its possible construction.

What a concept. The New Jersey Governor offered that and other bits of advice to the President over the weekend:

In other news, Christie is busy lining up an endorsement tour. Thoughts on his more moderated approach here (take note that he stopped short of condemning Obama's policies as vehemently as some high-profile Republicans)?

Do the math. Instead of someone with the last name Rodriguez telling the tale of noble, sympathetic Hispanics victimized by white American southern rednecks  - all of whom are portrayed as murderous racists, what if we had a white filmmaker telling the tale of noble and sympathetic Texas border ranchers victimized by marauding, racist, gold-toothed unwashed Mexicans out to steal their land? Oh, and we would close our story with a stand-up-and-cheer race war where Texas ranchers unite to violently mow down evil Mexicans.

The same Left whose standards are so low that opposition to ObamaCare, same-sex marriage, and the Ground Zero Mosque can only be driven by a "phobia" or "ist" - the same PC Left that hides "silly" old Bugs Bunny cartoons and can't broadcast a season of "24″ without including a patronizing Don't Be Racist to Muslims PSA - sees the vicious portrayal of white Texans in "Machete" as nothing more than a silly goof. I guess it's easy to convince yourself of that when your principles are based on an agenda as opposed to any sense of consistency or intellectual honesty.

The bottom line, however, is that whether Rodriguez likes it or not, this is still the United States of America, which means he has the right to make whatever film he wants and 20th Century-Fox has the same right to distribute it. But does that mean Texas taxpayers should foot part of the bill for a cinematic slandering of both their state and identity? [emphasis mine]

A tax incentives bill passed by the Texas Legislature in 2007 and strengthened in 2009 offers grants of five per cent to 17.5 per cent, based on the type of project and the amount of money spent in the state, the Austin Statesman reported.

But the law requires that productions meet certain standards. It also rules out incentives for movies that cast Texas in a negative light. ....

The film was released this weekend, meaning Rodriguez now has about two months to submit it to the Texas Film Commission.

The Commission's head Bob Hudgins, has to decide whether to approve funds for the film, which was filmed in and around the Texan city of Austin.

He recently told Texan media that he was nervous about turning down the state's most prolific film director.

However, he added: ‘I have to make my determination on the final version of the film. I have to be Switzerland about it.'

If Commissioner Hudgins is going to be "Switzerland about it"  then Commissioner Hudgins should always be "Switzerland about it." Meaning, the awarding of "Machete" with taxpayer dollars is also the setting of a precedent that might come back to haunt both him and the state somewhere down the line:

Alamo Dawn:  Set in 2030, this affectionate nod to low-budget, paranoid, political actioner-thrillers like Red Dawn, finds Texas overrun and under the thumb of lazy, shiftless Mexicans who may not need no steenkin' badges but do need their tequila and white women. Tired of being racially oppressed, a group of good ole' boys militia up to yee-haw and gun down all those who brought the failed and corrupt policies of Mexico to America.

"This time they f*cked with the wrong Southerner."

If Commissioner Hudgins is going to force Texas taxpayers to foot the bill for "Machete" he had better ask himself what he would do if a bunch of rich, white "rednecks" got $30 million together to produce, market and self-distribute a "Bizarro-Machete."

Could happen, right?

After all, we are a bunch of racists.

Crossposted at Big Hollywood

Public broadcasting is often a sacred cow in the media. Reporters don't often dig skeptically to find self-dealing inside the walls of PBS or NPR stations. But kudos should go to Paul Farhi and The Washington Post for offering such a story on Tuesday.

NPR listeners in the Washington metropolitan area get their news programs on WAMU-FM, based at American University. One of its regular features is called Capitol News Connection, which offers little newscasts within WAMU's regular NPR news shows. Farhi found a conflict-of-interest case, and notice how the adjective “public” can fall away from public radio:

As it happens, the founder and chief executive of CNC's parent company is also the wife of the WAMU executive charged with determining which programs the station airs.

WAMU officials say they see no problem with the admittedly unusual arrangement, which isn't mentioned in any of WAMU's public filings or press material about the program. The station executive, Mark McDonald, has recused himself from any dealings about Capitol News Connection, according to WAMU.

But the ties between the station and CNC suggest at least the appearance of a conflict. WAMU, after all, buys such CNC programs as the congressional news show "Power Breakfast" and "This Week in Congress" with funds raised through listener donations and other contributions. In this case, the station is purchasing programs from a company operated by McDonald's wife, Melinda Wittstock, thus benefiting McDonald in the process.

CNC, in turn, benefits from its presence on WAMU's schedule. As one of the most popular stations in the Washington area and one of the largest public radio stations in the country, WAMU's contract represents a powerful calling card for CNC, as the service markets its programs to other public stations around the country. CNC's Web site even includes a promotional quote from Jim Asendio, WAMU's news director and McDonald's underling, calling it "irreplaceable and unmatched."

These machinations for private gain are exactly what WAMU listeners will not hear about during pledge drives, and they won't hear about them in the membership newsletter:

WAMU spokeswoman Kay Summers said the station has been aware of the potential for "the appearance of impropriety" from the time it started purchasing CNC programming in 2007 and thus set up a "firewall" between McDonald and CNC. Although the station hasn't publicly disclosed the McDonald-Wittstock relationship, Summers said, "we always disclose it, if asked. It's not a secret."

Would an NPR reporter buy that line from a target of their reporting? We don't volunteer certain information, but it's not a secret, because we disclose it when anyone snoops around long enough to ask?

Farhi also found that McDonald has a second conflict of interest, a moonlighting business as a media coach, called Pundit Media Consulting. Once again, Farhi found McDonald blurring that business and WAMU business, which other station executives weren't informed about:

Among the online testimonials is one from Brooks Rainwater, the director of local relations for the American Institute of Architects, a Washington-based organization. "Mark worked with me as a media coach, and as a result of his instruction, my confidence has increased when I speak to the media and give presentations to groups," Rainwater says on the site. "Mark's media background offered a unique insight and understanding."

Rainwater apparently has appeared twice on WAMU, offering commentaries that promote AIA initiatives. On Aug. 27, for example, he offered a two-minute piece advocating environmentally friendly schools. "We can design schools that prepare students for a more successful future," he said. "At the American Institute of Architects, we believe in the power of design and are approaching sustainability with a solution-based approach." Rainwater didn't mention that such retrofitting would probably be a boon to members of his organization.

He was described on the air as "a commentator." His status as a former client of the station's program director was not disclosed.

Wouldn't it be interesting for an NPR station to offer fairness and balance by letting critics come on for five minutes during a pledge drive and tell listeners why they should NOT contribute to the station? A critic could read the Farhi story on the air, and tell WAMU members they should stop donating until this kind of self-dealing is stopped in the nation's capital.

Well fancy that: The New York Times has learned what Times Watch has been pointing out for weeks: Not even New Yorkers want a large mosque built two blocks from the site of the 9-11 terrorist attacks.

New York City residents were previously praised by Times reporters like Sheryl Gay Stolberg as better informed and thus more tolerant of the idea of a mosque at Ground Zero than ignorant outsiders.

But a New York Times poll conducted last week showed that New Yorkers don't like the idea of building a mosque near the site of the 9-11 terrorist attacks anymore than the rest of the country. In fact, New York City residents (that includes Manhattan and the outer boroughs) oppose it by a 50%-35% margin. Yes, the nationwide opposition to the construction, twice declaimed as a "nativist impulse" by the paper's main political writer Matt Bai, has infected even the tolerant, sophisticated liberals of Manhattan.

Building its story around the poll, reporters Michael Barbaro and Marjorie Connelly reported on last Friday's front page: "New Yorkers Divided Over Islamic Center, Poll Finds." (Actually New Yorkers are more than merely divided but are mostly opposed to the mosque being built near Ground Zero.)

Two-thirds of New York City residents want a planned Muslim community center and mosque to be relocated to a less controversial site farther away from ground zero in Lower Manhattan, including many who describe themselves as supporters of the project, according to a New York Times poll.

The poll indicates that support for the 13-story complex, which organizers said would promote moderate Islam and interfaith dialogue, is tepid in its hometown.

....

Over all, 50 percent of those surveyed oppose building the project two blocks north of the World Trade Center site, even though a majority believe that the developers have the right to do so. Thirty-five percent favor it.

Opposition is more intense in the boroughs outside Manhattan -- for example, 54 percent in the Bronx -- but it is even strong in Manhattan, considered a bastion of religious tolerance, where 41 percent are against it.

The poll was conducted Aug. 27 to 31 with 892 adults. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

It suggested that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, the center's most ardent and public defender, has not unified public opinion around the issue. Asked if they approved or disapproved of how he had handled the subject, city residents were evenly split.

Indeed, Times reporters took to Twitter to gush over NYC Mayor Bloomberg's weepy speech in defense of building the mosque near the site of terrorist attacks committed in the name of Islam. The Times worked in its standard jab against Newt and Palin as outsiders (albeit outsiders who are on the side of the majority of New Yorkers on this issue):

While a majority said politicians in New York should take a stand on the issue, most disapprove of those outside the city weighing in: Newt Gingrich and Sarah Palin, among others, have tried to rally opposition to the center.

The article was accompanied on the editorial page by a righteously concerned editorial, "Mistrust and the Mosque," moaning over how New Yorkers have failed to teach a moral lesson to the ignorant masses.

The furor over the proposed Islamic cultural center and mosque near ground zero keeps giving us new reasons for dismay. As politicians and commentators work themselves and viewers into a rage, others who should be standing up for freedom and tolerance tiptoe away.

To the growing pile of discouragement, add this: A New York Times poll of New York City residents that found that even this city, the country's most diverse and cosmopolitan, is not immune to suspicion and to a sadly wary misunderstanding of Muslim-Americans.

....

Tolerance, however, isn't the same as understanding, so it is appalling to see New Yorkers who could lead us all away from mosque madness, who should know better, playing to people's worst instincts.

Well fancy that: The New York Times has learned what Times Watch has been pointing out for weeks: Not even New Yorkers want a large mosque built two blocks from the site of the 9-11 terrorist attacks.

New York City residents were previously praised by Times reporters like Sheryl Gay Stolberg as better informed and thus more tolerant of the idea of a mosque at Ground Zero than ignorant outsiders.

But a New York Times poll conducted last week showed that New Yorkers don't like the idea of building a mosque near the site of the 9-11 terrorist attacks anymore than the rest of the country. In fact, New York City residents (that includes Manhattan and the outer boroughs) oppose it by a 50%-35% margin. Yes, the nationwide opposition to the construction, twice declaimed as a "nativist impulse" by the paper's main political writer Matt Bai, has infected even the tolerant, sophisticated liberals of Manhattan.

Building its story around the poll, reporters Michael Barbaro and Marjorie Connelly reported on last Friday's front page: "New Yorkers Divided Over Islamic Center, Poll Finds." (Actually New Yorkers are more than merely divided but are mostly opposed to the mosque being built near Ground Zero.)

Two-thirds of New York City residents want a planned Muslim community center and mosque to be relocated to a less controversial site farther away from ground zero in Lower Manhattan, including many who describe themselves as supporters of the project, according to a New York Times poll.

The poll indicates that support for the 13-story complex, which organizers said would promote moderate Islam and interfaith dialogue, is tepid in its hometown.

....

Over all, 50 percent of those surveyed oppose building the project two blocks north of the World Trade Center site, even though a majority believe that the developers have the right to do so. Thirty-five percent favor it.

Opposition is more intense in the boroughs outside Manhattan -- for example, 54 percent in the Bronx -- but it is even strong in Manhattan, considered a bastion of religious tolerance, where 41 percent are against it.

The poll was conducted Aug. 27 to 31 with 892 adults. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

It suggested that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, the center's most ardent and public defender, has not unified public opinion around the issue. Asked if they approved or disapproved of how he had handled the subject, city residents were evenly split.

Indeed, Times reporters took to Twitter to gush over NYC Mayor Bloomberg's weepy speech in defense of building the mosque near the site of terrorist attacks committed in the name of Islam. The Times worked in its standard jab against Newt and Palin as outsiders (albeit outsiders who are on the side of the majority of New Yorkers on this issue):

While a majority said politicians in New York should take a stand on the issue, most disapprove of those outside the city weighing in: Newt Gingrich and Sarah Palin, among others, have tried to rally opposition to the center.

The article was accompanied on the editorial page by a righteously concerned editorial, "Mistrust and the Mosque," moaning over how New Yorkers have failed to teach a moral lesson to the ignorant masses.

The furor over the proposed Islamic cultural center and mosque near ground zero keeps giving us new reasons for dismay. As politicians and commentators work themselves and viewers into a rage, others who should be standing up for freedom and tolerance tiptoe away.

To the growing pile of discouragement, add this: A New York Times poll of New York City residents that found that even this city, the country's most diverse and cosmopolitan, is not immune to suspicion and to a sadly wary misunderstanding of Muslim-Americans.

....

Tolerance, however, isn't the same as understanding, so it is appalling to see New Yorkers who could lead us all away from mosque madness, who should know better, playing to people's worst instincts.

ABC’s Diane Sawyer gave Arianna Huffington a rare gift on Tuesday night: An entire World News segment devoted to promoting the left-winger’s new book, Third World America: How Our Politicians Are Abandoning the Middle Class and Betraying the American Dream, and her Huffington Post site. Though a matching ABCNews.com posting described Huffington as a “liberal commentator,” no iteration of liberal passed Sawyer’s lips.

As if Huffington’s book does any such thing, Sawyer wondered: “What if we pulled together in one place all the innovative ideas for creating jobs?” The generous on-screen heading beneath Huffington’s picture: “Change Agent.” After highlighting Huffington’s wish to absolve troubled mortgage-holders of much of their responsibility, Sawyer trumpeted:
Arianna Huffington's new book is called Third World America, and on her Web site, she's been gathering innovative solutions to keep that Third World from happening.

The articles posted on the Huffington Post page with “innovative solutions,” a page the ABC segment displayed, sound more like the usual liberal carping: “Work Until You're Dead? That May Be the Only Option for Many Americans,” “Thousands Crowd Atlanta Area Housing Authority for Section 8 WAITING LIST, Fights Break Out,” “The 10 Highest-Paid CEOs Who Laid Off the Most Workers: Institute for Policy Studies” and “Income Inequality: ‘The Most Profound Change In American Society In Your Lifetime.’”

Huffington hailed: “It's one person's idea, like, that's what I love. It's like, somebody imagined that, and is making it happen.” Sawyer then showcased an idea that’s failed: “One solution we heard about, Gene Epstein, a self-made millionaire who's going door to door in Philadelphia, asking every small business to hire one more employee, just for six months. He says if ten percent of businesses do that, one half million people will be employed.” She had to acknowledge, however, he’s “got only one signature.”

Not raised by Sawyer in her friendly session with Huffington – the title's racial overtones. Imagine if a conservative had written a book warning President Obaam’s policies could turn the U.S. into a “Third World” nation?

From the Tuesday, September 7 ABC World News:
DIANE SAWYER: And finally tonight, what if we pulled together in one place all the innovative ideas for creating jobs? Arianna Huffington has just written a book which begins with some tough statistics about Americans faltering in this economy.

SAWYER TO HUFFINGTON, IN MOCK DISBELIEF: Every 30 seconds, someone goes bankrupt in America. Every 30 seconds?

ARIANNA HUFFINGTON: Every 30 seconds. And almost three million homes were lost in the last year and about three million or more are expected to be foreclosed in 2010.

SAWYER: Foreclosures on mortgages. You think it should be required that every one be negotiated?

HUFFINGTON: We need to help people in the middle class who are losing their homes.

SAWYER: You don't think there will be a wave of people shouting, “it's just not fair, I scraped and saved to make my mortgage payment”?

HUFFINGTON: There's an awful lot that's happening that's not fair. But I feel that's something that, in the end, is going to have a positive impact on every community in the whole country.

SAWYER: Arianna Huffington's new book is called Third World America, and on her Web site, she's been gathering innovative solutions to keep that Third World from happening.

HUFFINGTON: It's one person's idea, like, that's what I love. It's like, somebody imagined that, and is making it happen.

SAWYER: One solution we heard about, Gene Epstein, a self-made millionaire who's going door to door in Philadelphia, asking every small business to hire one more employee, just for six months. He says if ten percent of businesses do that, one half million people will be employed.

GENE EPSTEIN, BUSINESSMAN: People will be buying, stocks will be moving, people will start spending the cash that they've had in hand, waiting to spend.

SAWYER: So far, he's undaunted, though he's got only one signature, a carpet company.

EPSTEIN: Businesses have created what we are in the United States. Why can't they be the salvation for what we are in the United States?

SAWYER: Just one person, six months. You think you can pay it forward that way?

HUFFINGTON: Yes, I totally believe you can pay it forward. Truth is that democracy's not a spectator sport. When people take action, it's the greatest antidote to despair.

SAWYER: The rest of the interview's on ABCNews.com, and give us your innovative ideas.

Just what you've all been waiting for - the pathetic promo for CNN's pathetic "Parker Spitzer" program premiering October 4 (video follows with commentary):

Our dear friend Ace of Spades comically wrote Tuesday this reminded him of the sexual tension between Sam and Diane on the hit '80s sitcom "Cheers."

Hot Air's Allahpundit noted: 

This feels exactly like a trailer for a Nora Ephron comedy about two TV journalists bantering their way through life. Even the whimsical jazzy soundtrack is Ephron-esque. Is that what they're going for? The coveted "When Harry Met Sally" demographic? I could be down with that, but if they're going to try it, I want other conceits from the movie too. Like, they could have Kyra Phillips and John King on occasionally in the Carrie Fisher/Bruno Kirby quirky best-friend roles.

Even worse, I see more of a "Sleepless in Seattle" or "You've Got Mail" dynamic. After all, despite oozing with saccharin, "When Harry Met Sally" was a darned good film.

As for the silly giggling noises Parker was making during this promo, I don't want to have what she's having.

Exit question: Do you care what either of these people has to say about anything?

In a Tuesday evening report, Associated Press Writer Jesse L. Holland engaged in a great deal of word massage which appears to have been designed to mislead relative newcomers to discussions about stem cell research.

The news concerned Federal Judge Royce Lamberth's refusal of the federal government's request that he lift his August 23 order blocking federal funding for embryonic stem cell research during the appeals process.

Less-informed readers could be excused for believing, at least through first nine of the eleven tortured paragraphs in Holland's report, that stem cells can only be obtained from human embryos. In Paragraph 10, Holland finally acknowledged the existence of adult stem cells, but then dubiously implied that the litigation was brought solely because the plaintiffs don't want competition from embryonic research. The AP writer also ignored a fine piece written in early August by wire service colleague Malcolm Ritter (covered at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog), who accurately reported that "Adult stem cell research (is) far ahead of embryonic."

What follows are several paragraphs from Holland's horror, including a ridiculous title falsely implying that no federal funds are going into any kind of stem cell research (bolds are mine throughout this post):

Judge won't let stem cell money keep flowing

A federal judge on Tuesday refused to lift his order blocking federal funding for some stem cell research, saying that a "parade of horribles" predicted by federal officials would not happen.

Medical researchers value stem cells because they are master cells that can turn into any tissue of the body. Research eventually could lead to cures for spinal cord injuries, Parkinson's disease and other ailments.

The Justice Department argued in court papers last week that stopping the research could cause "irrevocable harm to the millions of extremely sick or injured people who stand to benefit ... as well as to the defendants, the scientific community and the taxpayers who have already spent hundreds of millions of dollars on such research through public funding of projects which will now be forced to shut down and, in many cases, scrapped altogether."

U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth rejected that argument in refusing to lift the restraining order he signed after ruling that the argument in a pending lawsuit - that the research violates the intent of a 1996 law prohibiting use of taxpayer dollars in work that destroys a human embryo - was likely to succeed.

... The scientists suing to stop the research "agree that this court's order does not even address the Bush administration guidelines, or whether NIH could return to those guidelines," Lamberth wrote in his latest order. "The prior guidelines, of course, allowed research only on existing stem cell lines, foreclosing additional destruction of embryos. Plaintiffs also agree that projects previously awarded and funded are not affected by this court's order."

(Paragraph 10 -- Ed.)

... The lawsuit was filed by two scientists who argued that Obama's expansion jeopardized their ability to win government funding for research using adult stem cells - ones that have already matured to create specific types of tissues - because it will mean extra competition.

Here are a few paragraphs from the report by Malcolm Ritter that Holland ignored:

For all the emotional debate that began about a decade ago on allowing the use of embryonic stem cells, it’s adult stem cells that are in human testing today. An extensive review of stem cell projects and interviews with two dozen experts reveal a wide range of potential treatments.

… Adult stem cells are being studied in people who suffer from multiple sclerosis, heart attacks and diabetes. Some early results suggest stem cells can help some patients avoid leg amputation. Recently, researchers reported that they restored vision to patients whose eyes were damaged by chemicals.

Apart from these efforts, transplants of adult stem cells have become a standard lifesaving therapy for perhaps hundreds of thousands of people with leukemia, lymphoma and other blood diseases.

... in the near term, embryonic stem cells are more likely to pay off as lab tools, for learning about the roots of disease and screening potential drugs.

The fact that so much is being accomplished with adult stem cells further buttresses the correctness of Lamberth's ruling. It's reasonable to contend that anything embryonic cells may someday in theory be able to do, adult cells are doing now, with the rest to follow in fairly short order. So why do researchthat involves killing embryos at all?

Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.

The midterm elections this fall will feature young people born in 1992 – in other words, four years after Ronald Reagan left office. What do they know about this man?

It’s quite likely that many of them have been told of Reagan’s firm resolve to win the Cold War. But it’s also likely they haven’t learned about the Reagan budget policies that led to a historic economic recovery. Instead, liberal revisionists are working overtime to assign to the Gipper’s tax cut policies the blame for deficits on his watch. Given the disastrous performance of Barack Obama, it’s time to give this man a serious look once again.

Young Hollywood director and producer Ray Griggs has made a breezy and yet substantive documentary titled “I Want Your Money” that can educate young voters on the differences between Reaganomics and Obamanomics. Some might say that Griggs is trying to become the conservative Michael Moore, but that would be unfair, since Moore’s documentaries often depart from the classification of “nonfiction.” When Moore claims health care is better in Cuba than America, or that Iraq before the Iraq war was a placid kite-flying paradise under Saddam Hussein, serious filmmakers run from him.

Griggs is talking about a real, gripping American disaster: our trillion-dollar deficits under Obama and the ever-increasing weight of the national debt. Conservatives in this film are appalled by the loose spending of George W. Bush and Congress over the last decade, and correctly so. But they know Obama is making those deficit years look like a nursery-school exercise in overspending. What’s emerging now is Tea Party anger, of conservatives who’ve been pushed too hard for too long.

“I Want Your Money” is stuffed with weighty conservative experts – Steve Moore, Steve Forbes, Newt Gingrich, Ed Meese, Ken Blackwell, and more. But perhaps the most affecting visuals are the old clips of Ronald Reagan, speaking so clearly about the perils of liberal profligacy. There is Reagan at the convention in Dallas in 1984 joking “We could say they spend money like drunken sailors, but that would be unfair to drunken sailors...because the sailors are spending their own money.”

It also has a “BS meter” which goes berserk when Speaker Nancy Pelosi claims that the Democrats will pass the Obama agenda, including ObamaCare, with “no new deficit spending.”

The film not only discusses green-eyeshade budgeting, but the larger philosophical debate between capitalism and socialism. In an animated segment, the Reagan character lectures “Obama” about what kind of productivity you would get in a classroom if everyone was awarded the same grade, no matter how serious the effort: a dramatically reduced work effort from the productive people, while the lazy students would forever be lazy.

It exposes a real contrast between presidents. As experts point out in the film, Ronald Reagan used clarity to teach you about the real world. Barack Obama uses eloquence to hide what he’s doing, because if his real agenda became clear, as it did with ObamaCare, it would be opposed by the majority.

Griggs found a very nice film clip of the late Nobel Prize-winning capitalist economist Milton Friedman speaking to a dark-haired Phil Donahue in 1979. Donahue proclaimed that capitalism was all about greed. Why, Friedman wondered, was it that political self-interest was so much nobler than economic self-interest? A voter born in 1992 has probably never witnessed Milton Friedman’s television work, especially his “Free to Choose” documentary series (also in those paper-stuffed things called books). This kind of exposure could cause a rediscovery, just like this year’s new interest in Friedrich Hayek’s book “Road to Serfdom.”

So how will this film get into theaters, since it’s not one of those left-wing documentaries? A national effort is being organized by Motive Entertainment, the company that promoted the grassroots campaigns for “The Passion of the Christ” and the first “Chronicles of Narnia” movie. In mid-September, they’ll begin organizing private screenings to celebrate Constitution Day on September 17. From there, organizers will prepare for an October 15 theatrical launch in more than 500 theaters from coast to coast.

But this campaign to show box-office appeal won’t be successful without the same grass-roots energy that mobilized the Tea Party protests. The movie trailer on YouTube has more than two million page views. If everyone who watched the trailer would turn out for the whole movie, then theater owners would have no choice but to take notice.

Perhaps, then, Americans will laugh when news anchors (like CNN’s Rick Sanchez) try to describe Obama’s campaign speeches as “Reaganesque.” We can’t even find a Republican who has fully earned that grand adjective, and it certainly doesn’t fit the socialist blather of the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Howard Dean on Tuesday accused Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and Laura Ingraham of being part of a "significant hate wing of the Republican Party."

Chatting with Keith Olbermann on MSNBC's "Countdown" about the Florida pastor that wants to burn Korans on the upcoming ninth anniversary of 9/11, Dean said, "I think the Republican Party has become the party, this really started back with Richard Nixon's Southern strategy, that appeals to hatred."

He continued, "I don't think the majority of Republicans are haters, but there is a significant hate wing of the Republican Party, including the talk show hosts like Glenn Beck and Laura Ingraham and Rush Limbaugh and people like that and they don't dare cross them" (video follows with transcript and commentary): 

KEITH OLBERMANN, HOST: Governor, good evening.

HOWARD DEAN: And the guy with the longest introduction on television.

OLBERMANN: General Petraeus wants this Pastor Jones to cancel the Koran burning. Why aren't people like Sarah Palin and John Boehner and McConnell and company helping to cut to the nut of this, General Petraeus protect our men and women in uniform?

DEAN: Unfortunately, I think the Republican Party has become the party, this really started back with Richard Nixon's Southern strategy, that appeals to hatred. And I don't think the majority of Republicans are haters, but there is a significant hate wing of the Republican Party, including the talk show hosts like Glenn Beck and Laura Ingraham and Rush Limbaugh and people like that and they don't dare cross them. For a long time we've thought that Fox worked for the Republican Party. Now we know that Fox really runs the Republican Party.

Exit question: when people like Dean, Olbermann, and their ilk spew hate, do they have the slightest understanding of how hypocritical it is to accuse others of being haters, or does their seemingly limitless antipathy for their opponents make this impossible?