Bernie Sanders For Gadfly

bernie-sandersWonkette said it best today, “Bernie Sanders has approximately zero percent chance of being elected president.” And yet I’m excited about him entering the race for the Democratic nomination for president, probably tomorrow.

Bernie will fractionally do to Hillary what the right wing of the Republican Party did to Mitt Romney… in the opposite direction.

Even though Sanders isn’t particularly well known outside Vermont (where he won his last Senatorial election with 71% of the vote, even against candidates from the Republicans, Marijuana Party and a guy named named Pete Moss!) his ideas are. He speaks to labor and the forgotten middle class. He rails against the moneyed and powerful (actually the powerfully moneyed).

Without Sanders in the race, Hillary Clinton could stake out her territory by being a centrist or even right-of-centrist candidate.

Mitt Romney was a reasonably middle-of-the-road governor in Massachusetts. He was for a lot of things there that he was forced to run against as the Republican candidate for president.

“What we have seen is that while the average person is working longer hours for lower wages, we have seen a huge increase in income and wealth inequality, which is now reaching obscene levels,” Sanders told the AP.

“This is a rigged economy, which works for the rich and the powerful, and is not working for ordinary Americans. … You know, this country just does not belong to a handful of billionaires.” – AP

Now things get interesting.

Matt Drudge Is A Slimy Weasel

drudge-screengrab-8-14-14-805p-pdt

Matt Drudge is a slimy weasel and the poster child for why America’s so damned angry. The screengrab above is from Drudgereport.com, Thursday evening, 8:08 PM PDT. His headline, “‘HOPE AND CHANGE’ TURNS TO RAGE”

As is normally the case, Drudge isn’t promoting his own story, but one published elsewhere. His link is to Britain’s Mail Online and describes what happened yesterday, not tonight.

Heavily armed SWAT police trained their guns on the public and fired tear gas in Ferguson, Missouri, last night as racial unrest over the fatal shooting of an unarmed black teen rocked the St. Louis suburb for the fourth night running. (emphasis mine)

An inflammatory photo of Michael Brown, the unarmed young man shot by a Ferguson, MO policeman sits above the headline, his middle finger unfurled. The headline itself is a dig at President Obama. It’s a Drudge twofer!

But, hold on. Brown was a high school graduate getting set to attend trade school for HVAC repair. He had no criminal record. In other words, he was training for a job. He was no thug.

cjmusickAttorney C.J. Musick came up with “#IfTheyGunnedMeDown,” a hashtag which quickly went viral on Twitter. Black men (and a few women) posted two shots of themselves–one which could be interpreted as threatening and another more mainstream and docile.

The attached photos on the left shows Musick with President Clinton and with a bottle of cognac. Which would be used #IfTheyGunnedMeDown, he asked?

Drudge can’t be bothered with tonight’s turnabout to peaceful protests under the supervision of the Missouri Highway Patrol and with a less militarized police presence. That doesn’t fit his narrative.

The press should be free. Drudge is entitled to slant the news as he wishes. It’s our right. It’s his right. But, someone’s got to call him out on it.

I can’t guarantee tonight will stay trouble free. But I won’t purposely blind myself to the truth as Drudge has.

The Roger Ailes Bio Is Brutal!

loudest ovice in the room-w1400-h1400I’m reading an excerpt from Gabriel Sherman’s new book, “The Loudest Voice in the Room.” It’s an unauthorized biography of Roger Ailes. What I’ve read so far is brutal.

He said he would never send Zachary to the public school because it was overrun with liberalism. At his window, he pointed at an outdoor sculpture exhibit at Boscobel House and Gardens, a half-mile in the distance. “Do you think they have the right to block my view?” Roger asked. “Isn’t it their property?” Foley asked. “It’s not their property! It’s a nonprofit! They get tax breaks!” Roger replied. He spoke of his security more than once. “He worried about his kid and his wife and said he wouldn’t want anything to happen to them because of what he was,”

If Sherman’s account is to be believed, Ailes is a paranoid, controlling, dickish son-of-a-bitch who gets his way by taking no prisoners! The excerpt doesn’t say Ailes is unhappy, but how can he not be? He is described as one troubled man.

What Ailes built at Fox News is astounding. He’s left both CNN and MSNBC in his dust. It’s not an accident. This is Ailes doing. Fox News consistently provides a broadcast easily digestible by its target audience. It is remarkably effective.

Recent reports say Ailes made disparaging remarks about his ‘stars,’ like Bill O’Reilly, but he mostly appears to be strongly supportive of his talent. Fox News pioneered talent-centric broadcasts in cable news. Outwardly, he seems the boss I always wanted.

If Ailes’ reported temper and vindictiveness can be believed, maybe Sherman should be looking over his shoulder as he reports Ailes already does on a regular basis.