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POPSA media orgy of rumors, speculation and falsehoods
It's worth focusing on what the major media did last night, and one can use the Hot Air compilation to examine that. I understand that in the early stages of significant and complex news stories, it's to be expected that journalists will have incomplete and even inaccurate information. It's unreasonable to expect them to avoid errors entirely. The inherently confusing nature of a mass shooting like this, combined with the need to rely on second-hand or otherwise unreliable sources (including, sometimes, official ones), will mean that even conscientious reporters end up with inaccurate information in cases like this. That's all understandable and inevitable. But shouldn't there be some standards governing what gets reported and what is held back? Particularly in a case like this -- which, for obvious reasons, has the potential to be quite inflammatory on a number of levels -- having the major media "report" completely false assertions as fact can be quite harmful. It's often th
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POPSMedicare and Gag Orders "Meanwhile, we have the case of the Association for the Advancement of Retired Persons (AARP), and its fanciful Medicare claims. The self-styled seniors lobby is using all its money and influence to cheer on ObamaCare, even though polls show that most retired persons oppose it. AARP has spent millions of dollars on its TV ad campaign and bulletins and newsletters to its members, including eight million direct-mail letters over Labor Day. The AARP Web site claims that it is a "myth" that "health care reform will hurt Medicare," while it is a "fact" that "none of the health care reform proposals being considered by Congress will cut Medicare benefits or increase your out-of-pocket costs."
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POPSCorrect, ignore the lies ‘News judgment’ is what has been sorely missing. There used to be a wider gap between media publications that are derisively referred to as ‘supermarket rags’ and legitimate media. The danger in the “he said, she said” formula of reporting is that lies get undeserved media attention. When a lie gets printed it takes on a sort of legitimacy that manipulators have learned to use to their advantage. Journalists have a hefty responsibility to the general public to not allow lies to gain legitimacy and also to their profession to maintain a high ethical standard in presenting honest, truthful news. Readers must share equally the responsibility of debunking lies. Critical, informed thinking is the only way this nation is going to move forward in debating issues that matter most to us. Reality can sometimes be ugly and distasteful, but we need to see it with clarity if we are to turn it into something positive.
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POPSLyndon LaRouche has NEVER been recognized by the Democratic Party It's time to drop this idea that LaRouche and his followers are Democrats. Remember, anyone can claim anything about themselves, but that doesn't make it the case. I could claim to be Catholic, but since the Catholic Church would disagree (based on minor, trivial issues like I've never been baptized nor confirmed), I would be making a false statement. Just like the people claiming that LaRouche is a Democrat.
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POPSSurgical Strike: Surgeons' Group Blasts Obama
(Applause.) Nothing against surgeons. I want surgeons -- I don't want to be getting a bunch of letters from surgeons now. I'm not dissing surgeons here. (Laughter.) He probably wasn't going to get many letters at that point, but in his next statement, he guaranteed a groundswell of well-deserved outrage: All I'm saying is let's take the example of something like diabetes, one of --- a disease that's skyrocketing, partly because of obesity, partly because it's not treated as effectively as it could be. Right now if we paid a family -- if a family care physician works with his or her patient to help them lose weight, modify diet, monitors whether they're taking their medications in a timely fashion, they might get reimbursed a pittance. But if that same diabetic ends up getting their foot amputated, that's $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 -- immediately the surgeon is reimbursed. Well, why not make sure that we're also reimbursing the care that prevents
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POPSAARP busts myths about Healthcare
“Some Floridians 50+ are concerned, or even frightened, about health reform. The trouble is, their fears are largely based on falsehoods – wild, scary myths about things that aren’t even in the legislation now before Congress,” said Lori Parham, AARP Florida’s state director. “A big part of AARP’s job is to provide facts to older Floridians. We will be a source of accurate information on health reform, as we have been for 50 years on a wide range of issues important to Floridians 50+. If you want the truth on health reform, we’ll provide it.” “Here’s one truth we all agree on: Our health system costs too much, delivers too little and is unsustainable,” Parham said. “Today’s health system absolutely must be fixed if we’re to ensure that Americans can get what they’re already paying for – the ability to choose their doctor and their treatment and get high-quality care when they need it.” One of AARP’s new print ads reads: “Special interest groups are trying to block progres
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POPSThe Corporate "Death Panels" are already here, Sarah Corporate bean-counters are already deciding if it's profitable to treat people, or just cut off their insurance & let them die. What's so great about for-profit insurance if this is already the result? More: That kind of utilitarian rationing, of course, is exactly what Palin and other opponents of the healthcare reform proposals pending before Congress say they want to protect the country from... the idea that the reform plans would encourage government-sponsored euthanasia is one of a handful of deliberate falsehoods being peddled by opponents of the legislation. But the idea that only if reform passes would the government start setting up rationing and interfering with care goes beyond just the bogus euthanasia claim. Click through to the article for examples of how corporate greed, right this very minute, is leading to sick people BEING DENIED CARE HERE IN AMERICA. PUBLIC-OPTION NOW!
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POPS"'Junk science' as front-page fact" more (full at source): In a lecture entitled The Three Wise Monkeys and the Marketplace of Ideas: Censorship in a Free Society , Lord Justice Sedley pointed to a story published this summer that reported as a fact that kidney stones affected one adult male in four – “a level of risk which might well send you to your doctor for preventive treatment, but which, it turns out, was made up by the PR firm which represents a pharmaceutical company with an interest in such treatment”.
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POPSInsidious Form of Thought Control a la 1984 In Near Future . . . lines when critics of Barack Obama appeared on radio call in shows. The "authoritarian tactics being employed by the Obama campaign to stifle and intimidate its critics" were on full display. Of course, the specter of the Fairness Doctrine being passed by Congress is also another card in the deck meant to chill criticism of Barack Obama and his fellow travelers. Now comes a more insidious form of thought control a la 1984 Cass Sunstein, a Harvard Law professor who has been appointed to a shadowy post that will grant him powers that are merely mind-boggling, explicitly supports using the courts to impose a "chilling effect" on speech that might hurt someone's feelings. He thinks that the bloggers have been rampaging out of control and that new laws need to be written to corral them. Advance copies of Sunstein's new book, "On Rumors: How Falsehoods Spread, Why We Believe Them, What Can Be Done," have gone out to reviewers ahead of its September . . .
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POPSDonohue's Knickers Knotted Anew Bill Donohue riles up the wing nuts again. It makes one wonder if he is capable of rational thought at all? Can he discern fact from fiction? Looks like no to all. It's sad that so many sheeple defend this person. IMO, this is parallel to the "war on Christmas" non-event that has become a yearly laughing point. If I was religious, I think I'd be very embarrassed by having this person in such an influential position. Later in the clip Donohue says: "It's not a secret, OK? And I'm not afraid to say it. That's why they hate this movie. It's about Jesus Christ, and it's about truth. It's about the Messiah." He later apologised for his remarks, saying he regretted the use of the word "controlled". :-(
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POPSA Hate Crimes Thought Experiment "I already addressed this sort of nonsensical claim last week, pointing out that things like pedophilia and bestiality are still crimes and passage of hate crimes legislation will have no impact on that because the two issues are utterly unrelated, despite the Right's insulting attempts to conflate the two. The current law merely adds "sexual orientation" to the list of protections, along with things like religion, race, and color, which are currently protected. And, as the re-written paragraph above makes clear, nobody has being turned into a felon under current existing law for rebuffing the Right or speaking out against their agenda ... just as the Right won't be turned into felons if the new hate crimes legislation becomes law."
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POPSSpot the falsehoods in conservative healthcare ad FactCheck: TV ad by Conservatives for Patients' Rights is long on distortion, short on honesty. Truth is not one of the patient rights the CPR defends, apparently. How long has it been since I heard a conservative political ad that actually told the truth?
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POPSEqual Rights: Weathering the Storm A Response To NOM's Gathering Storm (National Organization for Marriage) Love Not Laws is a coalition of people of various ages, races, and beliefs, who came together to show solidarity and support for same-sex marriage. In response to videos that are circulating the internet that use fear and falsehoods to promote an offensive agenda of "separate and unequal", Love Not Laws created a video that was grounded in compassion, emotion, and heart.
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POPSIs Snopes.com Democratic? Hardly. But the email gossip circuit insists they are, and that they favor Obama. The email - as always - is packed with falsehoods, and utterly untrue.
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POPSFox News Creates Even More Fiction These journalistic wonders (cough) at Fox should be embarrassed to go out in public. They make up this garbage and call it news. I'm sick of their propaganda. Our country's well being is at stake here.
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