Conservative Blogger Faces Criticism Over Protege, by DAVID FOLKENFLIK

The conservative online news entrepreneur Andrew Breitbart is, for the moment, doing little to dispel stereotypes about bloggers. During a recent visit to his home on the west side of Los Angeles, Breitbart, 41, is working from his own basement. Barefoot. At the beck and call of his own kids.

But that basement is light and airy, with a decent view of the city. A young assistant works there with Breitbart to help funnel wire service stories to Breitbart.com, his main news aggregation site. And his reach, thanks to a brawling rhetorical style and a protege who taped the undercover ACORN videos last year, is only expanding.

Over the past year, Breitbart has hired editors to run a new network of conservative blogs called BigGovernment.com, BigHollywood.com and BigJournalism.com. No matter the focus, the media are a prime target throughout.

“They want to control the narrative,” Breitbart says. “I’m saying, ‘No more!’ The new media has freed it up. I’m sorry, mainstream media. It’s over. Your ability to control the narrative is over.”

New Fodder

He can talk that way for hours — and finds fresh grist all over. The media have devoted intense coverage to the late-January arrest of James O’Keefe, the 25-year-old videographer and conservative provocateur. He was charged with trying to get into Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu’s federal office in New Orleans under false pretenses to commit a felony. And O’Keefe is also under contract to write for BigGovernment.com.

Read the full transcript at NPR.com.

Some editors told me they were not immediately aware of the Acorn videos on Fox, YouTube and a new conservative Web site called BigGovernment.com.  When the Senate voted to cut off all federal funds to Acorn, there was not a word in the newspaper, although a report in the Caucus blog that day covered the action. When the New York City Council froze all its funding for Acorn and the Brooklyn district attorney opened a criminal investigation, there was still nothing.

Well Mr. Hoyt, welcome to the world of the “undernews” – Mickey Kaus’s apt word for the news that everyone in the blogosphere knows about but, apparently, no one who gets his news strictly from the Times, other major newspapers, the newsweeklies, and most of the networks has the slightest inkling of.

10. “Fistgate”

Why it’s important: Because Obama’s “Safe Schools Czar,” Kevin Jennings, appears to be the kind of guy parents used to warn their kids about, and his elevation by Obama to a position of national prominence shows how far and how fast the culture has changed.  Jennings’s views – alien to most of America, but perfectly normal in his Harvard-educated social circle – are only now beginning to sink in, as his at least tacit approval of teaching various gay sexual practices to children has come to light.

Why the MSM ignored the story: Are you kidding?  And get branded as “homophobic?”  Far better to simply mainstream homosexuality in a non-judgmental way,  which has been one of the goals of the The New York Times for years now.   For a time after his appointment, Jennings appeared to be on the ropes over his 1988 counseling of a teenage boy regarding a sexual relationship with an older man.  But the boy turned out to be 16 at the time, not 15, so that’s okay then. (For a defense of Jennings, such as it is, go here:

9. Van Jones

Why it’s important: Because a self-identified communist, “Free Mumia” radical and 9/11 “Truther” nut became, however briefly, Obama’s “Green Jobs Czar,” a bogus position addressing an imaginary issue that turned out to be just another way to get Hussein’s camel’s nose under the tent in the president’s continuing end-run around the Constitution.

Why the MSM ignored the story: Are you kidding?  Jones is exactly the kind of target the MSM isn’t going to go near: black, articulate, persuasive – and absolutely hostile to the kind of country America used to be.  Fundamental change!  What’s not to like?  Which is why the Huffington Post readers were stunned when Glenn Beck finally got Jones’ scalp.  Oh well…

8. Anti-Americanism as official State Department policy

Why it’s important: Because  Foggy Bottom – long regarded by sensible policy-makers as “Indian country” – has now fully embraced its inner Kim Philby and has gone completely over to the other side.  Yes, an institution so penetrated by enemy operatives that it makes porn star Jenna Jameson look like Bernadette of Lourdes, came down squarely on the side of the mullahs as protesters battled the evil Iranian regime during the recent “elections” and, via its lapdogs at CNN, barked at the Hondurans about an illegal “coup,” as they, perfectly constitutionally, removed a Chavez-wannabe from office and, in an orderly transition, replaced him and then held free elections.

Why the MSM ignored/distorted the story: Are you kidding? The CNN en Español correspondent on the case was named Krupskaia Alis, “Krupskaya” being the famously randy wife of you-know-who; they don’t call it the “Chavez News Network” south of the border for nothing!  (Remind me to tell you my favorite Soviet-era joke about “Lenin in Warsaw” some day.) In lockstep, the rest of the media parroted the White House party line that what occurred in Honduras was a “coup” — apparently the only word they could think of to describe a “constitutional regime change.”   Bravo to the Hondurans for telling the State Department to go pound sand.

7.  The National Endowment for the Propagation of Obama

Why it’s important: The White House and the National Endowment for the Arts were recorded during a conference call encouraging pro-Obama arts types to create “art” on the theme of health care (among other issues) at a time when health care reform legislation was heading toward hot-button status. This shameless attempt at propaganda was abruptly halted after the appearance of the story on Big Hollywood, and the revelations led to the resignation of the NEA Communications Director, Yosi Sargent, and the issuance of conduct guidelines by the White House to deal with the “appearance” issues of the call.

Why the MSM ignored the story: Are you kidding? There was a direct connection to Valerie Jarrett, one of Obama’s top aides, since Sergant’s boss, Buffy Wicks, reports to Jarrett, the jewel of Shiraz, Iran, who’s a major player in Obama’s Chicago mafia.  And you know how disinclined the MSM is to harm a Democratic administration, especially while their legs are still tingling.  Luckily, Sergant’s forced resignation gave the media a perfect excuse to roll over, go back to sleep, and not cover the story.  La Buffy, meanwhile, could not believe her good fortune:  “I’m actually in the White House and working towards furthering this agenda, this very aggressive agenda.” Smile, Buffy — you’re a model public servant!

6. Andy Stern and the SEIU

Why it’s important: Return with us now to those glorious days of yesteryear, when the labor movement ruled the roost and “collective bargaining” was often negotiated at the point of a gun, one way or the other.  It was a time when labor and capital were at each other’s throats, and every right-thinking, soon-to-be-the-parent-of a red diaper baby knew whose side the Engels were on.  Because, if your cause is just, it’s OK to beat the crap out of Kenneth Gladney, a conservative African-American selling patriotic gear, and call him a “nigger.”  After all, in the ongoing struggle between labor and capital, the ends justify the means, and if a black guy gets in the way of Hope and Change, tough.

Why the MSM ignored the story: Are you kidding?  Under Andy Stern – the most frequent visitor to the Obama White House – the Service Employees International Union has gone from “who?” to the most powerful muscle operation in the country.  Recruiting heavily from the minority community – which he uses as human shields, testifying by their presence to his good motives – Stern has cleverly positioned his collection of labor gangsters as the champions of the Little Guy, the better to fly under the radar of the MSM, which is more concerned the with the “narrative” than, you know, the facts.   Following in the footsteps of such great “labor leaders” as Louis “Lepke” Buchalter and Jacob “Gurrah” Shapiro, the new Stern Gang bids fair to surpass their achievements.  But he might want to avoid their fate:

This Afternoon: Part Two

In response to the tumult over what appears to be a small feature of the effort, more than one critic has wondered aloud why Democrats don’t just give up on the public option – which is opposed by every Republican – in order to reach a more bipartisan outcome. What exactly is so important about the public option anyway? And why do Democrats in particular seem so wedded to the idea?

There is a simple answer to these questions, but it’s an answer you’ve likely not heard from any institution in the mainstream media. The truth is that the public plan is a carefully devised scheme, a sneaky strategy, to deceive American voters. It’s a political marketing ploy designed to move the nation to a single-payer system – like the one in Canada – over the next decade. The public option is the Trojan horse. On the outside it’s all about “choice and competition”, but once it has been dragged within the walls of American medicine it’s true nature will become evident. By that time, it’ll be too late.

You want proof? We’ve got plenty.

Starting in April on our blog at VerumSerum.com, we have uncovered many prominent advocates of health reform revealing the hidden agenda behind the public option. Most prominently Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) and Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), but also Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI), and HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. Even Rahm Emanuel got into the act.

More damning still, we uncovered video of the original architect of the public option, Yale professor Jacob Hacker, describing how it was designed to not “frighten people into thinking they are going to lose their private insurance” even though that is the inevitable result. In another clip he denies the plan is a Trojan horse saying, on the contrary, “it’s right there”. In other words, it’s not even a secret. Most relevant of all, Hacker admits in another clip that the real advantage of his plan is that “at least you can make the claim that there is competition between the public and private sectors”. In other words, this is all a marketing strategy designed to get around public resistance to government-run health care.

For his part, President Obama has been an extremely disciplined salesman. The mantra of “choice and competition” has been repeated to the point that it is little more than political background noise. To this day, neither the President nor any of his spokespeople have been challenged by the media about these claims, despite the fact that there is video evidence which directly contradicts what he is saying. So confident is the President that the media will toe his line that, in a speech in front of the American Medical Association, the President explicitly denied that the public option was a “Trojan horse” for a single payer system. On this, and numerous other occasions, he has said that opponents of reform who claim this are not telling the truth. Outside talk radio, the conservative blogosphere, and a couple editorials in the Wall Street Journal, no one has been willing to suggest that the opposite is the case.

With so many proponents of reform caught on tape directly contradicting the President, it almost seems as if the mainstream media has intentionally avoided covering this story. And as anyone who has been paying attention knows, that’s something they’ve been guilty of more than once since Obama took office. NY Times public editor Clark Hoyt admitted in a bombshell statement that the paper had risked appearing biased for its failure to cover the Van Jones and ACORN stories as they broke. The Washington Post was similarly chastened.

And as it turns out, both papers may have an additional reason to avoid touching this story. Because politicians are not the only ones we have exposed admitting the truth about the public option. Back in June, we posted a video of Ezra Klein from the Washington Post revealing how the public option was designed as a “sneaky strategy” to move towards single payer. And we have posted videos of Paul Krugman from the NY Times admitting much the same.

But nothing we have uncovered previously is as comprehensive and breathtakingly direct as a new audio clip of Paul Krugman we discovered this week. Krugman is speaking on health care reform at Hunter College on July 16, 2008. It’s a long clip at ~5:00 (unedited), but if you want to know why liberals are continuing to fight tooth and nail for the public option, here it is in astonishing detail (click below to listen):

Paul Krugman – Single Payer and the Public Option

TRANSCRIPT HERE.

FULL AUDIO PODCAST HERE.

Just a couple of quick points on this. Since I already knew about this hidden agenda, what I found most striking was Krugman’s admission that even without a public option the system would largely look like a single payer system. Based on the subsidies for lower wage earners, and the fact that everyone else is paying for these with taxes on top of their insurance premiums. (And with the bills being discussed in Congress, subsidies are provided up to 300-400% of the federal poverty level).

Also, I should point out that a “Rube Goldberg device”, which Krugman used as a metaphor, is a term for an over-engineered solution to a simple problem. In this case, designed to obscure the solution they are actually looking for, i.e. single payer.

However, the critical point in all of this is the sheer scope of this deception on the part of the Administration – and the media. Paul Krugman and Ezra Klein have been two of the most prominent media advocates for healthcare reform throughout the debate this year. With numerous appearances on television and their blogs at the New York Times and the Washington Post, respectively. And while they are both unabashedly partisan, this should not excuse them from direct and honest reporting. But of course they have not been fully candid, as they were last year, because in doing so they would reveal the dishonesty on the part of the President and his Administration. (Klein has recently added a whole new layer of deceit.)

It’s long past time for an honest broker in the news media to report on the Administration’s ongoing and deceptive strategy with regards to the public option. The President has made claims which directly contradict statements made by numerous of his supporters – people intimately involved with the health reform process. How can we trust our government to reform one-sixth of our economy when a central element of their plan is based on a deception? And how we can trust the accuracy of information reported by the media when by and large they have been complicit in covering this up? It’s time for these questions to be answered. It’s time to let America know they’ve been getting a hard sell, not an honest diagnosis.

ON Sept. 12, an Associated Press article inside The Times reported that the Census Bureau had severed its ties to Acorn, the community organizing group. Robert Groves, the census director, was quoted as saying that Acorn, one of thousands of unpaid organizations promoting the 2010 census, had become “a distraction.”

Clark Hoyt

What the article didn’t say — but what followers of Fox News and conservative commentators already knew — was that a video sting had caught Acorn workers counseling a bogus prostitute and pimp on how to set up a brothel staffed by under-age girls, avoid detection and cheat on taxes. The young woman in streetwalker’s clothes and her companion were actually undercover conservative activists with a hidden camera.

It was an intriguing story: employees of a controversial outfit, long criticized by Republicans as corrupt, appearing to engage in outrageous, if not illegal, behavior. An Acorn worker in Baltimore was shown telling the “prostitute” that she could describe herself to tax authorities as an “independent artist” and claim 15-year-old prostitutes, supposedly illegal immigrants, as dependents.

But for days, as more videos were posted and government authorities rushed to distance themselves from Acorn, The Times stood still. Its slow reflexes — closely following its slow response to a controversy that forced the resignation of Van Jones, a White House adviser — suggested that it has trouble dealing with stories arising from the polemical world of talk radio, cable television and partisan blogs. Some stories, lacking facts, never catch fire. But others do, and a newspaper like The Times needs to be alert to them or wind up looking clueless or, worse, partisan itself.

Read the full article here.