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MEDIA TRANSPARENCYNewsletterSign-up for our newsletter RegisterOnly registered visitors are allowed to email content or post comments Support Media TransparencyYour help is essential to this website |
AROUND THE WEB | pages 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21Ezra Klein A Charles Murray ReaderCharles Murray has another execrable article in the Wall Street Journal arguing that most children aren't genetically capable of reading well (it's possible these inferiors can, with great persistence and dedication, learn to sound words out), and so we should stop trying to teach them. Indeed, Murray argues that, "It would be nice if we knew how [to raise intelligence], but we do not. It has been shown that some intensive interventions temporarily raise IQ scores by amounts ranging up to seven or eight points...There is no reason to believe that raising intelligence significantly and permanently is a current policy option, no matter how much money we are willing to spend." Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Countdown on MSNBC ‘World's Worst Person’: Dinesh D’SouzaBut our winner, another guy lost here in the complexities of 21st century America, Dinesh D'Souza, author of a new book blaming 9/11 on the cultural values of American liberals, which offended Osama bin Laden, causing him to kill everybody. No, I’m not kidding. So, D'Souza goes on the Colbert Report and specifically blames, of course, Bill Clinton. And Colbert mocks him by asking, 'doesn’t some of it lay at FDR’s doorstep?' And D'Souza doesn’t realize Colbert’s joking. Indirectly yes, he answers. FDR gave away Eastern Europe through Yalta and then the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Also see: Katha Pollitt in The Nation: Ayatollah D'Souza Dave Johnson: Marketing Conservatism and Corporatism Alan Wolfe: Like D'Souza's hero Joe McCarthy, he has no sense of shame. The Progressive: Dinesh D’Souza’s Bizarre New Book Timothy Noah: Dinesh D'Souza's Mullah Envy [ link ] Read the story >
ThinkProgress.org Ward Connerly: Affirmative Action Is ‘Baloney,’ People Should Just ‘Frequent The Racetrack’Ward Connerly has led the right wing’s fight against diversity in schools, pushing ballot initiatives to ban affirmative action around the nation. Earlier in the week on PRI’s To The Point radio show, Connerly said that schools don’t need to be integrated because people can find other places to “get along with others.” He then offered the racetrack as an alternate venue, noting, “I love horseracing, and I– whenever I can find the time I will frequent the racetrack, and I find myself thrown in with people from all around the globe.” Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Talk to Action When False Equivalency Distorts the NewsTraditional Media reports seldom correctly characterize the IRDYou wouldn't know it to read the mainstream media, (or to listen to those who wring their hands over the alleged efforts by as yet unnamed secularists to drive also unnamed people of faith from public life) that the rightist Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD), the inside the beltway, neoconservative agency has waged a war of attrition against the historic mainline protestant churches in the U.S. You wouldn't know about the ways the agency and its satellite groups have spent millions of dollars to destablize and even dismember these churches like they were a third world country whose government was disliked by the United States. You wouldn't know that the group has been bankrolled by the leading strategic funders of the conservative movement and the religious right such as Richard Mellon Scaife and Howard Ahmanson, and cheer-led by The Washington Times newspaper, which is owned, controlled and bankrolled by the Unification Church of Rev. Sun Myung Moon. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
LA Times Gates Foundation to review investmentsThe Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced today that it will review its investments to determine whether its holdings are socially responsible. [ link ] Read the story >
LA Times The dark cloud over Bill Gates' FoundationInvestments hurt many of the people grants aim to help.Using the most recent data available, a Times tally showed that hundreds of Gates Foundation investments — totaling at least $8.7 billion, or 41% of its assets, not including U.S. and foreign government securities — have been in companies that countered the foundation's charitable goals or socially concerned philosophy. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Talking Points Memo McCain and Lieberman to roll out "surge" proposal Friday at American Enterprise InstituteYes to the Surge? Or No? Or, okay, escalation. Have an opinion on this one? As we mentioned a while back, Sens. McCain and Lieberman are heading across town to the American Enterprise Institute on Friday to roll out their 'surge' plan to send a few tens of thousands more troops to Baghdad to crush the Mahdi Army. Make no mistake: this event is the official 'surge' roll-out. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Union of Concerned Scientists Scientists' Report Documents ExxonMobil’s Tobacco-like Disinformation Campaign on Global Warming ScienceOil Company Spent Nearly $16 Million to Fund Skeptic Groups, Create ConfusionExxonMobil-funded organizations consist of an overlapping collection of individuals serving as staff, board members, and scientific advisors that publish and re-publish the works of a small group of climate change contrarians. The George C. Marshall Institute, for instance, which has received $630,000 from ExxonMobil, recently touted a book edited by Patrick Michaels, a long-time climate change contrarian who is affiliated with at least 11 organizations funded by ExxonMobil. Similarly, ExxonMobil funds a number of lesser-known groups such as the Annapolis Center for Science-Based Public Policy and Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow. Both groups promote the work of several climate change contrarians, including Sallie Baliunas, an astrophysicist who is affiliated with at least nine ExxonMobil-funded groups. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Washington Post - On Faith Not Yet The Majority But No Longer SilentThere are many more atheists and agnostics in the country than is generally recognized. For instance, we atheists and agnostics are as numerous as Southern Baptists, and we are also the fastest growing category–-faster even than the Mormons and the evangelicals. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
ThinkProgress.org Only Social Conservatives Featured On Meet the Press Special ‘Faith In America’This weekend, NBC will air a special edition of Meet the Press addressing “Faith in America.” The only two guests scheduled are evangelist Rick Warren, author of “Purpose Driven Life,” and Newsweek editor Jon Meacham, author of “American Gospel.” NBC says the two will discuss the questions, “Can religion unite the country for the greater good and what role will God and values play in the 2008 presidential election?” [ link ] Read the story >
American Journalism Review TiltTwo University of Chicago economists’ findings about the political slant of American newspapers are based on a linguistic version of "fuzzy math."Interested in joining the liberal media elite? Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Thinkprogress.org AEI, Advocating Two-Year U.S. Troop Surge In Iraq, ‘Has The President’s Ear’Last night on CNN, reporter Suzanne Malveaux noted that the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), a right-wing think tank in Washington, DC, “has the president’s ear and is influencing his thinking” on Iraq. Last week Bush was briefed on a report by AEI scholar Frederick W. Kagan that calls for a troop surge in Iraq that “would probably last for anywhere from 18 to 24 months.” Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Edwize.org New York Charter School Association, Completely Bought and Paid ForThe story here, like that in all too much of American public life, is one of the corrupting power of money and the undue influence of those with large amounts of it. Three significant, rather flush entities of the anti-union, far right wing — the Walton Family Foundation of Wal-Mart fame, a network of foundations and corporations connected to the corporate raider and junk bond dealer Carl Icahn, and a network of foundations and corporations connected to ultra-conservative Richard Gilder — give massive amounts of money to NYCSA, to allied organizations and to their political campaigns. [Closely connected to Gilder in his charter school advocacy and political work is the Hickory Foundation of Virginia Manheimer, Gilder’s former wife.] Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
McClatchy Washington Bureau Domino's Pizza founder tosses money, influence to Sen. BrownbackThe passion of Tom Monaghan: Pizza. God. Sam Brownback. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Talk to Action Why We Must Refute Dobson's Crackpot Claim of Liberal Moral Relativism.Many of us do not understand how important it is to refute the Religious Right's charge that Liberals are moral relativists. This is no collateral matter. In fact, it goes to the heart of their whole war against progressive religious thought and beyond that, Liberalism. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
NY Times Religion for a Captive Audience, Paid For by TaxesA growing number of programs use tax dollars to pay for religious activities aimed at prisoners, recovering addicts, job seekers and others. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Washington Post / PostGlobal Hugo Chavez is on a Roll...Not even the most radical free market advocates in Latin America would openly defend now Mr. Pinochet's development formula [in Chile] of Chicago school economics and death-squads. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
The Guardian The neocons have finished what the Vietcong startedVietnam traumatised the US but left its power intact; Iraq, however, will be far more serious for the superpower...The neoconservatives suddenly find themselves isolated and embattled: Rumsfeld has been sacked, Cheney has gone quiet, the likes of Richard Perle are confined to the sidelines. The president is on his own and it is difficult to see how Bush can avoid moving towards the ISG position. The political map is being redrawn with extraordinary alacrity. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
People for the American Way FRC Ally's Partisan Credentials Still SecureLike Gary Bauer, Family Research Council President Tony Perkins criticizes Sojourners chief and fellow evangelical Rev. Jim Wallis for giving the Democrats’ weekly radio program. Writes Perkins: Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Boston Globe Democrats inspect faith-based initiative2 call for probe to determine use of taxesTwo leading Democrats on the House International Relations Committee said they want to investigate President Bush's faith-based initiative to determine whether taxpayer funds are being used to reward Bush's Christian conservative supporters and whether the faith-based groups are using the funds to help gain converts. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
MediaMatters.org Olbermann named Bozell "Worst Person" for claiming "100 generals ... would disagree" with NBC's characterization of Iraq as "a civil war"Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Boston Globe Faith groups urge cuts to AIDS fund[Editor's note: Christians against AIDS victims - how Jesus-like!]Some leading Christian conservatives, angry over the Global Fund to Fight AIDS's promotion of condoms and its perceived lack of support for faith-based programs, are pushing Congress to cut US support for the AIDS initiative, which was initiated by President Bush in a Rose Garden ceremony five years ago with a $200 million commitment. [ link ] Read the story >
AP Ark. begins faith-based inmate programArkansas correction officials are dedicating a Bible-based program for female prisoners, but a national group said it's a risky move while a similar system is being challenged in federal court. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
VOANews.com New Report Paints Bleak Picture of War in IraqA new report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based research and analysis organization, paints a bleak picture of the war in Iraq, and says Americans will have to accept what it calls a high-risk, high-cost strategy in order to reverse the country's slide into civil war. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Thinkprogress.org Hoover Institution Attack On Pelosi Over ‘Union Hypocrisy’ Systematically DebunkedRight-wing media outlets are engaged in an effort to tar House Speaker-designate Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), who won the Cesar Chavez award from the Cesar E. Chavez Foundation in 2003, as anti-worker. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
MediaMatters.org Brent Bozell, unhingedGuess we should've seen this one coming. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
AP Supreme Court upholds Maine law that prevents vouchers for religious schoolsBig blow for voucher supportersThe Supreme Court on Monday refused to take up the issue of school choice in Maine, where a state law bars the use of public funds to send students to private religious schools... Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Talk to Action A Question for Neoconservatives of the Catholic Right...But for all the neoconservatives' bluster about the need for a religious orthodoxy to hold society together, [Leo] Strauss was an atheist and taught that "philosopher-kings" had to maintain their special standing by keeping silent about their personal atheism, playing along with the illusion of there being a God and an afterlife. Believing that reason and revelation cannot be reconciled. Strauss believed that religion can only have currency if it stifles dissent, imposes clannishness and gives citizens a reason to die for one's homeland. As Professor Holmes observes, Strauss also believed that only philosophers can handle the truth that there is no Creator and that we are only left with nature which is indifferent to human values and needs. In other words, organized religion is nothing more than exoteric myths for the rubes, designed to sedate them by fear of eternal damnation. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
Consortium news Chertoff's 'Chilling Vision'Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff describes his "chilling vision" of a future in which the actions of the U.S. government are constrained by international law. To avert this danger, Chertoff urges right-wing legal activists at the Federalist Society to go on the offensive against the European Union and other governments trying to pressure the United States into operating within the Geneva Conventions and other human rights standards. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
NY Times A Free-for-All on Science and ReligionScholar accuses Templeton Foundation of funding "garbage research"Maybe the pivotal moment came when Steven Weinberg, a Nobel laureate in physics, warned that “the world needs to wake up from its long nightmare of religious belief,” or when a Nobelist in chemistry, Sir Harold Kroto, called for the John Templeton Foundation to give its next $1.5 million prize for “progress in spiritual discoveries” to an atheist — Richard Dawkins, the Oxford evolutionary biologist whose book “The God Delusion” is a national best-seller. Also see: [ link ] Read the story >
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