Sticks and stones

I was sitting down at my computer, having coffee this weekend,when Bill Weir from ABC’s GMA Weekend interrupted my nice quiet morning. After a report about the shooter at the pentagon being angry with the government, he brought on an "expert" Brad Garrett and they both proceeded to label people who disagrees with Democratic administrations as right-wing and mentally ill. I cursed at the television, so I guess I am guilty as charged.





This was just too much to take.

As soon as the story came in, the main stream media jumped on it, labeling the shooting as another example of anti-government, right-wing extremism. John Patrick Bedell, the right-wing extremist, was about as right-wing as Joe Biden. Even with a day to get the real facts behind Bedell's history, did the MSM tell you he was a registered Democrat? That he hated President Bush, and was a 9/11 conspiracy nut? Nope. It doesn't fit the media's agenda. It seems if you are a medical marijuana smoking, registered Democrat who spends him time trying to figure how Dick Cheney blew up the World Trade Center, you get lumped into the angry, anti-government, tea party movement. Great job people.

I hear a lot of talk about why the MSM is losing readership and viewers by the bushel basket full. Here is my take on the subject. You suck at your job.

Anyone who disagrees with your politics is not only wrong, but their views are extreme. I grow tired of hearing you are politically neutral journalists. That ship has sailed my friends, you have been riding the Obama Hope and Change express, with first class accommodations, for a few years now. It's no wonder Fox News is absolutely killing CNN, MSNBC and the rest in the ratings. It's not that they are straight down the line, objective journalists, I don't think such a thing exists, the reason Fox News is beating its competitors, three to one in some time slots, is they give you both sides of the issue.

The same can be said of the print outlets. When I see an Associated Press byline, I know I will have to research the story myself to know what really happened. The AP generates much of the content in local newspapers all over the nation, and that's a shame. I am sure the AP reporters can type 95 words per minute, and know every rule in the Chicago Manual of Style for writing properly formatted stories, the problem is their ideology. They bring it with them to every story they write.

If you attend a tea party, you are part of the angry right-wing extremist movement. If you oppose President Obama's health care take over, you are an angry right-wing extremist, and probably racist to boot. Many liberals have told me the reason I don't like the President is because he is black. That gets my blood up. That makes me angry.

Barack Obama's skin color and ethnicity makes zero difference to me, absolutely zero. I look at the man's track record, his policies, and the people he surrounds himself with. The President gets a failing grade on all three from me. The people who make these claims regarding race are usually the ones who know very little about his proposals or facts surrounding the issues. It's just easier to rebut your argument by calling you a racists. You hear the same thing on MSNBC. Here is some free advice to all the progressives out there; don't put your values on me.


I'm sure that in a nation of 300 million, you will find every sort of crackpot imaginable, on both sides of the political spectrum. When progressives commit atrocities, the media will try to gloss over their liberal backgrounds. The mentally ill professor who shot her colleagues at the University of Alabama loved President Obama, she was obsessed with him. Does that make every professor with an Obama/Biden bumper sticker a threat to our nation? No, it doesn't. It just means one crazy person committed a crime.

During the Obama Presidency, there will be a right-wing wacko who commits some horrific crime against the government. In a nation our size, it is bound to happen. However, instead of generic portraits of extremists, the MSM will do one-hour, prime time shows detailing the background of this person, along with every group they associated with. If there is a photo of this person at a tea party, the media will make him or her the poster child of the tea party movement. But I will bet you haven't heard about the man in a wheel chair attacked by a SEIU union members at a health care rally this past August. The media's double standard at its finest.

As the President and Democrats in Congress make their final push for the government takeover of our health care system, I am sure tempers will flair. People on both sides of the issue are passionate about it, and there is a tremendous amount at stake with this vote. I wonder if how many times will hear or read "angry mob, or anti-government extremists" in the next few weeks? Remember when all the anti-war activists were marching in the streets? I guess dissent being the most sincere form of patriotism only counts when you are protesting President Bush.