Is the Jon Stewart-led critique of Jim Cramer really all about rejecting his shtick? Anyone who has ever watched five minutes of Mad Money knew Cramer has long since been due for a major, public comeuppance.
Or is it about pushing back against someone who very publicly seemed to spark widespread openness - ahem - of criticizing the One? Would such a reaction to Cramer be happening if he had kept his obnoxiousness focused on the usual targets, rather than going after Obama, especially via a high profile appearance on the Today show?
Provocation extra: what does it say about the state of the modern media that Jon Stewart - he who is not shy about hiding behind the "I'm just a comedian" defense - is now counted as a journalistic force?
Posted by Eric Earling at March 14, 2009 11:40 AM | Email ThisWhy are they not going after the real villians, Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, and the rest of the liberal creeps who encouraged irresponsible lending?
I agree with #4 and the public would have been much better served by hearing it from PJ O'Rourke.
Posted by: KS on March 14, 2009 12:04 PMIt might be a wonderful way to illustrate how liberal schemes end up helping no one and hurting everyone.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 14, 2009 12:09 PMOh, aren't you a good little Stalinist!
Posted by: Crusader on March 14, 2009 12:47 PMYOU qualify.
Posted by: Hinton on March 14, 2009 01:06 PMOFF TOPIC and better 'Provocation of the Day':
Which states are worst for personal freedom?
1. New Hampshire 0.432 BEST
44. Washington -0.275
50. New York -0.784 WORST
Freedom in the 50 States: Index of Personal and Economic Freedom.
Eric... perhaps you can make that a thread of its own.
OFF TOPIC 2... (and private note of particular interst to SP pro-lifer Michele)
Obama Signs Law Banning Federal Embryo Research Two Days After Signing Executive Order to OK It
Amendment in 465-page omnibus appropriations bill overrides new executive order
Obama giveth and then taketh away
"Does he have a clue about anything he is doing?"
About Barack Obama's EO on Federal Funding of Embryonic Stem Cell Research
Sorry About Your Loss, Mom. Now Can We Use Part of Your Baby for 'Reaseach'?
http://www.nypost.com/seven/09292008/postopinion/opedcolumnists/os_dangerous_pals_131216.htm?page=0
Posted by: dan on March 14, 2009 02:06 PM"Red lining" has been against the law for years. Didn't you leftists have enough lawyers handy to enforce the anti-discrimination laws already in existance?
Qualified buyers? You must be kidding. The whole idea behind this Democrat scam was to use the race card so that banks could no longer apply traditional standards of qualification to "minorities and the poor". You know this, "facts". Banks don't just lend money to people they know can't pay it back unless liberal government loons force them to.
And why did liberal loons force banks to lend money to unqualified buyers. It surely wasn't to buy Democratic votes. How could I be that cynical?
So what happened? The price of housing went up into the stratosphere. How did than end up helping "poor and minorities"? It worked swell as long as people could borrow against the increasing value of their homes. Any fool could have seen that it wouldn't last, (not much different than the dot.com bubble of the '90's which eventually burst...causing a recession which the left immediately blamed on Bush). The Bush Administration and Alan Greenspan's attempt to get Congress to stop this runaway train are well documented. As is the opposition to such reforms championed by Frank and Dodd who stopped the reform legislation cold.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 14, 2009 02:38 PMYou might call the result of this the "FrankandDodd Monster"! Ha! It sure has been scary...
Posted by: Bill H on March 14, 2009 03:18 PMEnough said for this post. My last comment should have read;
I agree with #3 and the public would have been much better served by hearing it from PJ O'Rourke.
Posted by: KS on March 14, 2009 03:58 PMSo Bill is still trying to blame Dodd, and Frank for the problems that The Bush Crime Family caused.
And later:
Dems are partially at fault for letting this mortgage nightmare get this bad, but trying to blame them for everything is like blaming the Jews for WWII.
Can you just SMELL the hypocrisy! Factless, you blame the entire thing on the Bush Administration. Then you say that the Slavers were also responsible, and you shouldn't be so extreme.
Can you BE more hypocritical? Well, I'm sure you can...
HOPE AND CHANGE!
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on March 14, 2009 04:29 PMThese people shamelessly play the race card over and over. The same folks that destroyed the black family with their "War on Poverty" which has served to keep many blacks in government dependency. And not incidentally a permanent brainwashed Democrat voting bloc.
Shame on these dishonest power hungry crooks.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 14, 2009 04:49 PMAnd it's true. Which party was it that was most involved in those 150 years of racism? Hint, it wasn't the Republicans.
True racism is what Democrats have done to blacks since 1964. The nasty truth is Democrats do no want blacks to go to school, learn and succeed in life. The want them to live in crime ridden misery so they can blame Republicans and get black votes. That is real racism, and it is a fact.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 14, 2009 05:53 PMBut they have another agenda.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 14, 2009 06:16 PMThe WSJ had an article with a picture of two black kids that attend the same school (on vouchers) that Obama's two kids attend. But "the One" hasn't said a word in protest of what the Dems in Congress are trying to do. Oh yeah, they CARE (about what the teachers union has to say on vouchers!)...
Posted by: Bill H on March 14, 2009 06:23 PMWhy don't you just for once come clean and say the Republicons f-ed up. Just once. I know there is one or two cells belonging to human beings in your bodies. I know you have it in you. You can do it.
We have. On the other hand, you and your Slaver Party Marxist ilk refuse to lay one ounce of culpability on your fellow Leftists, and refuse to acknowledge the obvious failings of your Obamassiah, Pelosi, and Reid, nor the crippling blows landed by your Socialist/Marxist dream.
You first. You hypocrite and liar.
HOPE AND CHANGE!
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on March 14, 2009 06:26 PMWill Obama Stand Up for These Kids?
All they can manage is sound bites and talking points such as "facts" spews here. If that isn't enough they resort to character assassination such as they continue to do with Sarah Palin.
They are rotten, spoiled, nasty, power hungry people. And liars.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 14, 2009 06:33 PMIt's actually pretty sad that they can be so clueless to not realize they are being completely snowed. But they feel all warm and fuzzy being a part of the liberal street gang.
Posted by: Bill H on March 14, 2009 06:40 PMThe young have been particularly brainwashed. They are told that Republicans have "destroyed the middle class". They believe it because they have no point of reference. They are the most spoiled generation in history, many have cars their destroyed middle class parents buy them the minute they get a license. The have phones they text message on constantly from the time they are 10. They wear expensive "hip" clothes bought by their vanished middle class parents.
If those kids had any clue they'd realize what a marvelous world capitalism, particlarly since Ronald Reagan, has blessed them with. But instead they believe the lies of the left. Those lies don't stand the light of day.
Ok I'm ranting, but I just get so tired of the way the left lies. I feel better now.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 14, 2009 07:35 PMI also noticed Stewart being hailed as some kind of hero in today's Seattle Times, with dual stories by...wait for it...The Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times.
Fair and balanced, as usual.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 14, 2009 09:23 PMIt means that the electorate is filled with a bunch of dingbats who wouldn't know a journalist from a jurist. Which may mean a second term for Obama.
Posted by: pbj on March 14, 2009 11:59 PMAnd I'm getting so tired of the way that the right lies. You're actually quite laughable! I can picture you yelling "Get off my lawn!" to all the neighborhood kids. (That is, if you don't shoot them for trespassing.)
Posted by: demo kid on March 15, 2009 01:24 AMOk demo kid lets hear you recite "the way the right lies". Be specific, and don't just come back and say "Bush lied us into war"...Obama's Secretary of State was right there supporting him. If that's all you can come up with you haven't got much. I can and am very specific about the many lies the left tells. It's pretty easy. The left is made up of liars. If they were honest they would own up to their failures such as public schools,(which the left runs).
It's easy to say "the right lies", but I noticed you didn't provide a single example. A few specifics, please.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 15, 2009 09:53 AMYou must mean the republicans who started criticizing Obama from day one in office, who have no psotive plan of their own for the economy bush ruined and keep trying to blame the banking crisis on Democrats when that is an out and out lie.
Bill is either lying or simply too stupid to read. Howm many times do I have to post the links showing the bills that Phil Gramm wrote (with banking lobbyist help) that allowed the credit default swap and other financial deregulation that cuased thei mess.
There is NO credible evidence that the bill clinton signed outlawing redlining on standard loans (using strict criteria) had anything to do with the banking crisis. Period.
Put up or shut up, Bill. You simply don't have the facts, but you like to repeat what you heard or read on the lying right wingnut sites.
Here is a hint little bill and the other morons on here - they don't have the facts either. You just parrot the same BS but can't back up a dman thing.
If it doesn't fit into you limited world view - well then it must not be true (talk about the kool-aid crew). Liberals are all bad and conservatives are all good.
Porr stupid Ragnut - keep citing the freedom study. Did you look at the criteria for the study? It was biased to start. They sarted with the assumption that places with higher taxes or more regulations (like bigger cities) were less free and they proved their own biased assumptions.
As if that is research? Here is a big clue - places with more people need more regulation. Move to the middle of nowhere - less refgulation. I expect all you fools to move to the middle of nowhere - just don't expect to find any JOBS there.
You are such a poor pathetic tools. Unable to think for yourselves or critically evaluate data or information.
Facts: Give it up. The fools on SP are too dense to understand actual facts and to critically evaluate information. They are sheep who follow Rush and only know how to criticize.
What is the republican plan for the recession? Whree is it? It doesn't exist!
Tax cuts...ahahhaha - more of what has not worked? The stimulus was already way too heavy with tax cuts - 42%.
Posted by: correctnotright on March 15, 2009 11:37 AM@42: Forgive the stream-of-consciousness... but there's a lot of ground to cover, and I only touched the surface of Republican liars:
Anyone that believes Obama to be a Marxist, Socialist, or terrorist. Jindal lying about Katrina and rescue effort. Conservatives lying about the effectiveness of abstinence-only education. Right-wing policy advocates lying about the effect of tax cuts versus stimulus spending. The Republican Party lying about being the "party of fiscal responsibility" and the party of individual rights. Racist "fiscal hawks" arguing that illegal immigration is bleeding the healthcare system dry when the uninsured are burdening hospitals with inflated healthcare costs. That coward Saxby Chambliss arguing that a disabled, triple-amputee war vet didn't have national defense credibility. The right out and out lying about ACORN. Bush's lies about torture, casus belli, etc. Conservatives complete misrepresenting the effects of the New Deal (which conveniently avoid mentioning Bush's grandfather's participation in a failed coup d'etat). Conservatives lying that Democrats are "soft on national defense" when the most significant attack on American soil since Pearl Harbor was during a Republican Administration. Republicans claiming they are a "big tent" when they're about to force out a GOP chair that's made a few tepid pro-choice comments. Anti-union talking heads making up the entire mess about "card check", which is a convenient distraction to eliminate a bill that would give workers more rights in the workplace.
The biggest? That the Republican Party is for "the little guy", when it is really run for the benefit of the rich.
Disagree with any of these all you want, but the fact that you blame all your problems on "libruls" suggests that you need a convenient scapegoat for your own failure. I have rarely, if ever, seen any level of self-reflection about why certain conservative policies are followed, either... suggesting that you're just unable or unwilling to think for yourselves.
Posted by: demo kid on March 15, 2009 11:55 AMLast time I checked Gramm never required banks to lend money to unqualified borrowers. But leftists really don't want to discuss that.
You always know when you are getting under the skin of leftists. Out come the personal insults. One of the many examples of why we need adults back in charge.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 15, 2009 11:57 AMFor example, I can quote John Kerry in 2004 saying that "this is the worst economy since the Great Depression". That's a specific quote. It wasn't an opinion, which you seem to confuse with lies. What Kerry said was a lie. The economy was growing in 2004.
That's what I'm talking about demo kid. You can rant and call names all you want. We expect it.
If you can't do better, admit it.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 15, 2009 12:09 PMYou must mean the republicans who started criticizing Obama from day one in office, who have no psotive plan of their own for the economy bush ruined and keep trying to blame the banking crisis on Democrats when that is an out and out lie.
It's not just conservatives who are starting to complain about Obama's dishonesty.
Twirly twirly spin spin: making his employees LIARS too..
Another Obama Campaign Promise Expires ..."baloney lasts longer"
Hope!
Change!
LIES! ...
Brought to you by the
STUPID!
GULLIBLE IncorrectAndAlwaysWRONG, Factless Dimkids!
Don't look in the mirror little libs, self-deception is mesmerizing.
Posted by: Ragnar Danneskjold on March 15, 2009 12:21 PMHa! Ha! would that be this guy? McGovern on Card Check
Note to those too young to remember the 1972 Presidential Election--George McGovern was the most liberal Democrat running for president until Barack Obama.
Posted by: Bill H on March 15, 2009 01:02 PMNot a big surprise that "demo kid" would oppose secret ballots, a cornerstone of democracy, and call it instead a vehicle to "give workers more rights". These people are simply amazing.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 15, 2009 02:08 PM"Conservatives complete misrepresenting the effects of the New Deal (which conveniently avoid mentioning Bush's grandfather's participation in a failed coup d'etat)."
Please, "demo kid" give us all the juicy details of Bush's grandfathers's (his name was Prescott Bush), participation in a failed coup d'etat"
You credibility is on the line here, bucko.
Back this nutty stuff up with some real, documented facts.
This ought to be good.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 15, 2009 02:15 PM@50: An interesting one, actually. Try the article on good ol' Prescott's dealings with the Nazis:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/sep/25/usa.secondworldwar
and Prescott Bush's involvement with the Business Plot:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/document/document_20070723.shtml
Do I believe all this? Well, I'm a pretty evenhanded sort, and I'd like to think that things are never as bad or as good as they seem. Conspiracy theories are usually more speculation than anything else.
But hey, you're a cranky old man, willing to cherry pick facts, lie to make your points, and draw ridiculous conclusions from circumstantial evidence. In comparison, this seems quite rational.
Get off my lawn!
Posted by: demo kid on March 15, 2009 02:50 PMAs for me being a "cranky old man", I'm in pretty good shape for a guy on the threshold of geezerhood. I can still leap in and out of the bed of my truck when I unload it at the dump, the same as I could when I was 25. In fact, I might be in better shape than you. We're starting a business to teaching people how they can stay in shape long after their youth. You'd be surprised at this "cranky old man". I likely could wear you out, sonny.
And isn't calling someone "old" a form of ageism? I though you leftists were against discrimination. Oh, that's only when it suits your political purposes, otherwise insulting people is just fine.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 15, 2009 03:23 PMReally kid, you should tell us all about Josph Kennedy (Teddy's dear old dad) and his agreeing with the Nazi's that exterminating jews was the thing to do.
From "The Kennedys at War, 1937-1945", published in April 2002 by Doubleday:
Arriving at London in early 1938, newly-appointed U.S. Ambassador Joseph P. Kennedy took up quickly with another transplanted American. Viscountess Nancy Witcher Langhorne Astor assured Kennedy early in their friendship that he should not be put off by her pronounced and proud anti-Catholicism.
"I'm glad you are smart enough not to take my [views] personally," she wrote. Astor pointed out that she had a number of Roman Catholic friends - G.K. Chesterton among them - with whom she shared, if nothing else, a profound hatred for the Jewish race. Joe Kennedy, in turn, had always detested Jews generally, although he claimed several as friends individually. Indeed, Kennedy seems to have tolerated the occasional Jew in the same way Astor tolerated the occasional Catholic.
As fiercely anti-Communist as they were anti-Semitic, Kennedy and Astor looked upon Adolf Hitler as a welcome solution to both of these "world problems" (Nancy's phrase). No member of the so-called "Cliveden Set" (the informal cabal of appeasers who met frequently at Nancy Astor's palatial home) seemed much concerned with the dilemma faced by Jews under the Reich. Astor wrote Kennedy that Hitler would have to do more than just "give a rough time" to "the killers of Christ" before she'd be in favor of launching "Armageddon to save them. The wheel of history swings round as the Lord would have it. Who are we to stand in the way of the future?" Kennedy replied that he expected the "Jew media" in the United States to become a problem, that "Jewish pundits in New York and Los Angeles" were already making noises contrived to "set a match to the fuse of the world."
During May of 1938, Kennedy engaged in extensive discussions with the new German Ambassador to the Court of St. James's, Herbert von Dirksen. In the midst of these conversations (held without approval from the U.S. State Department), Kennedy advised von Dirksen that President Roosevelt was the victim of "Jewish influence" and was poorly informed as to the philosophy, ambitions and ideals of Hitler's regime. (The Nazi ambassador subsequently told his bosses that Kennedy was "Germany's best friend" in London.)
Columnists back in the states condemned Kennedy's fraternizing. Kennedy later claimed that 75% of the attacks made on him during his Ambassadorship emanated from "a number of Jewish publishers and writers. ... Some of them in their zeal did not hesitate to resort to slander and falsehood to achieve their aims." He told his eldest son, Joe Jr., that he disliked having to put up with "Jewish columnists" who criticized him with no good reason.
Like his father, Joe Jr. admired Adolf Hitler. Young Joe had come away impressed by Nazi rhetoric after traveling in Germany as a student in 1934. Writing at the time, Joe applauded Hitler's insight in realizing the German people's "need of a common enemy, someone of whom to make the goat. Someone, by whose riddance the Germans would feel they had cast out the cause of their predicament.
Posted by: pbj on March 15, 2009 03:44 PMOK, you want to fiddle playing the blame game while America collapses. YOU Slavers run the show - Congress and the White House. You have Olympia, too.
What is the Slaver solution to the current economic mess? What do you plan to do? Because 83% of America thinks the Stimulus will hurt - not help. Most economists give the Obamassiah a failing grade for his approach - health care "reform" and "cap-and-trade" won't help now, and will only hurt long term.
So grow up and answer: how do you address the problems today? YOU run the show, it's your turn to lead. Blaming the GOP does nothing - the GOP's not in control.
What's the plan?
HOPE AND CHANGE!... is not a plan...
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on March 15, 2009 03:52 PMAnd the drumbeat grows ever louder...
The Drip, Drip, Drip of Leaking Confidence
In what should be an extremely worrisome sign for the Obama administration, even those who most fervently supported Barack Obama are now beginning to express substantial doubts about his ability to govern.
...Mind you, it's not Broder, Goodwin or Barone expressing their own opinions. Rather, they're quoting Obama loyalists.
Obama opens new era of recklessness
Hapless Joe Biden must be doing a nightly jig in anticipation of the LIAR toddler jig to be up!
Posted by: Ragnar Danneskjold on March 15, 2009 04:09 PMMore hints to remember when you are talking about lying, "demo kid". Calling Obama a "socialist" is not a lie. It is an opinion, and probably a darned good one.
Saying "republicans are the party of the rich" is an opinion, it is not a lie.
When Obama said during the campaign,
"McCain is willing to send our troops to another war of 100 years in Iraq" he was lying, and he knew it.
When Democrats called Bush's plan to give Social Security contributors the option of directing a small portion of their own pay towards investment vehicles of their choice "Bush's plan to privatize Social Security" it was a lie.
Do you understand the difference?
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 15, 2009 04:40 PMFacts are irrelevant to the Marxist Left!
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on March 15, 2009 04:44 PMThe dot.com bubble where companies had inflated stocks despite never having shown a profit collapsed shortly before Clinton left office. Largely, if I remember correctly, as a result of anti-trust action against Microsoft initiated by the Clinton Administration. Clinton of course took all kinds of credit for those heady days before the bust.
Bush took office in 2001 and immediately it was the "Bush recession". How well I remember. I certainly think that could be categorized fairly as a lie. What do you think, "demo kid"?
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 15, 2009 04:56 PMThese creeps destroyed the black community with welfare. Now 70% of black children live in single parent homes. Blacks murder each other on the streets at a rate that would have been unimaginable 50 years ago. Nice work, Democrats. Is that what you call success?
Democrats have run public schools for 50 years. The drop-out rate continues to increase. Do they ever have enough funding? No, not according to Democrats. That's always the excuse they give for their failure, "we are underfunded". I've never seen an education levy rejected here in Seattle.
You'd think people would wise up and figure out these scammers.
Posted by: Bill Cruchon on March 15, 2009 05:14 PM1: the quality or state of being responsible: as a: moral, legal, or mental accountability b: reliability , trustworthiness
Synonyms: blame, fault, liability
Antonyms: Democrat (Slavery Party member)