Bias Bash: The stunning secret the media missed

Cuba-EEUU: The NYT's Elitist Bias Against Menendez

capitolhillcubans

The New York Times'editorial board claims it wants U.S. Senator Bob Menendez (D-NJ) to relinquish his post as Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee due to the unsubstantiated ethics allegations being launched against him.

However, The New York Times' problem with Senator Menendez has nothing to do with unsubstantiated ethics allegations, it has to do with its elitist opposition to Menendez's foreign policy views.

Case and point -- the first sentence of the editorial:

"Senator Robert Menendez was never a distinguished choice for chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the position he ascended to this month by virtue of seniority."

For The New York Times, Senator Menendez has never been "distinguished" enough because he doesn't stem from Manhattan's elitist foreign policy community.

You know, from the cocktail party circuit that has endlessly feted the Castros, Arafats and Assads of this world.

Instead, Senator Menendez -- the son of a carpenter and a seamstress that valued their freedom in the U.S. -- has historically challenged the world's most brutal dictators, whether from the left or the right.

He's a tireless champion of human rights defenders and courageous pro-democracy activists -- from Iran to Cuba.

Moreover, he doesn't believe in unilateral concessions to America's foes.

This is a man who has guided three major foreign policy bills on Iran in the last 13 months.

This stands in stark contrast to The New York Times, whose editorial board staunchly advocates for engagement with Iran's mullahs and normalized relations with Cuba's Castro brothers.

Thus, it clearly wants Senator Menendez out of its way.

House Conservative Leader Gives Al Jazeera Deal a Pass

NewZeal
By: Cliff Kincaid

Accuracy in Media

Rep. Steve Scalise, a Republican from Louisiana who is the new chairman of the Republican Study Committee (RSC), believes Al Jazeera has a First Amendment right to expand its broadcasts in the United States and that a congressional investigation of Al Gore’s deal with the channel is not warranted.

Scalise, a self-described “staunch conservative,” is the new chairman of the RSC, which is the “caucus of House conservatives.” His action makes it increasingly unlikely that the House will exercise any oversight of Al Gore’s controversial sale of his Current TV channel to the mouthpiece of the Muslim Brotherhood.

The buyer is the Middle Eastern regime of Qatar, which owns Al Jazeera. The Qatar regime advertises itself as “America’s Strongest Partner in the Gulf” but has supported terrorist groups such as al Qaeda, Hezbollah, and Hamas. Osama bin Laden aide and 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who is currently in U.S. custody in Guantanamo Bay for acts of terrorism, lived and worked in Qatar but was allowed to leave for Pakistan as U.S. authorities were trying to apprehend him, according to the report of the 9/11 commission.

In Pakistan, Mohammed planned 9/11 and decapitated Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, who was kidnapped while investigating the al-Qaeda networks in the Middle East.

Sarah E. Makin, Director of Conservative Coalitions and State Outreach at the House Republican Study Committee, told this journalist on Tuesday afternoon that she received an explanation of Scalise’s position on the Al Jazeera deal after consulting with aides to the congressman.

Conservatives had been asking Scalise to support an investigation on the grounds that a foreign-funded channel based in the Middle East, with a reputation for airing terrorist propaganda, should be examined for its ties to terrorist groups.

Foreigners are entitled to First Amendment protections in the United States, except when they run afoul of existing laws and engage in criminal or terrorist activities.

By offering the First Amendment excuse in favor of the deal, Scalise is ignoring the evidence that Al Jazeera is not a legitimate news operation but rather a conduit for propaganda from terrorist groups, with whom it has intimate and ongoing relations.

In the United States, it is against the law to provide material support to terrorists, with “material support” defined as including expert advice or assistance and communications equipment.

In World War II, Tokyo Rose and Axis Sally broadcast their anti-American diatribes from overseas and were apprehended by U.S. authorities after the war and sent to prison for treason. In the more shocking Al Jazeera case, the U.S. is officially still at war with global terrorism, but Al Gore is giving the channel a base of operations on American soil with access to 40-50 million homes.

Although it will be called “Al Jazeera America,” the channel will still be totally controlled and funded by the government of Qatar, which doesn’t permit freedom of the press in its own country.

Existing federal law requires that foreign propaganda broadcasts in the U.S. be labeled as such, a provision of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) that the Obama Administration has decided to ignore.

Independent television producer Jerry Kenney has filed complaints over the non-enforcement of the FARA law, as well as violations of Federal Communications Commission rules that have given Al Jazeera access to taxpayer-funded public television stations.

Despite these outstanding legal questions, Scalise, the top conservative leader in the House, doesn’t even want an investigation of the deal. “Who got to him?” is the question being asked by conservatives.

It is a known fact that Big Oil interests in the U.S.-Qatar Business Council are very powerful on Capitol Hill, and that the regime and/or Al Jazeera have used expensive public relations firms to lobby Congress and the federal government, and manipulate the press. These firms include Barbour Griffith Rogers, Fenton Communications, and Qorvis Communications.

Another law being ignored in the Al Jazeera case is CFIUS, named for the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. When the Chinese bought AMC movie theaters last year, they went through CFIUS. Al Jazeera has decided, apparently with the acquiescence of the Obama Administration, that it can ignore the law.

In 2006, members of Congress from both political parties, including then-Senator Barack Obama, objected to a company based in the Arab state of Dubai operating U.S. ports. Public criticism forced the company to drop the deal.

Al Jazeera’s ties to al Qaeda are highlighted in the new film, “Zero Dark Thirty,” where the plot involves the CIA locating Osama bin Laden in Pakistan in part by examining his courier’s proximity to an Al Jazeera office, where terrorist tapes were dropped off for worldwide distribution.

After 9/11, the terrorist attacks on America that claimed almost 3,000 American lives, Al Jazeera correspondent Tayseer Alouni conducted an interview with bin Laden in which he denied being involved in terrorism. Alouni was later convicted of being a courier for bin Laden and al Qaeda.

In his book, Terror and Consent: The Wars for the Twenty-first Century, Philip Bobbitt described how, in the 2004 case of the kidnapping and murder of Margaret Hassan, a humanitarian aid worker in Iraq whose captivity was taped by an Islamist group, Al Jazeera “appears to have carefully screened and edited the tapes to protect the deteriorating image of the Iraqi insurgency.” He wrote that Al Jazeera “moved from being passive collaborators in achieving the political objectives of torture to acting as editorial advisors for the terrorists.”

More recently, Al Jazeera ran a story about the “gentle” al Qaeda terrorists in Mali who kidnapped and killed three Americans.

Another major concern about Al Jazeera’s presence in the U.S. is the danger of inciting home grown terrorism.

Dr. Judea Pearl, father of the slain journalist Daniel Pearl, has been committed to increasing understanding with the Arab/Muslim world, but he recognizes that Al Jazeera does not contribute to real dialogue. He supports an investigation of Al Gore’s deal with Al Jazeera.

His statement supporting an investigation was included in a letter to Rep. Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, and reads as follows:

“A decade of watching over its programs has left me no doubt: Al Jazeera is the main propaganda machine of the Muslim Brotherhood. Posing as a benign alternative communication medium, Al Jazeera choreographs a world stage in which the West is a perennial villain, Hamas is the ultimate role model, and entire societies are dehumanized to a lower form of life, stripped of any mark of dignity or empathy. While refraining from explicit incitement to violence, Al Jazeera weaves the ideological structure and combustible angers from which Jihadi recruits eventually emerge.”

McCaul received this letter, signed by media critics, journalists, academics, and national security and Middle East experts, on January 9. He has yet to respond.

The Scalise response to calls for an investigation may shed light on McCaul’s striking failure to act against the Al Jazeera deal. It appears to some observers that Republican leaders in the House have made a conscious decision to let the deal go through without a peep of protest.

Another House member who has decided to do nothing is Rep. Paul Broun, a member of the House Homeland Security Committee preparing to run for the U.S. Senate from Georgia as a strong conservative.

Friends of Broun have asked him to take a stand against Al Jazeera but he has told them that his staff doesn’t want him to.

Critics of the deal say that if Congress won’t do its job and prevent the emergence of this homeland security threat, the American people will pressure the cable and satellite providers and the advertisers.

The cable and satellite providers of Current TV/Al Jazeera America currently include Comcast, DirecTV, Dish Network, Verizon FiOS and AT&T U-verse.

• If you wish to protest his wrong-headed position in favor of a “hands off” approach to the Al Gore deal with Al Jazeera, Scalise and the House Republican Study Committee can be contacted at (202) 226-9717.

Al Jazeera and the Global Jihad in America

New Zeal

By: Cliff Kincaid
Accuracy in Media

By refusing to investigate the Al Gore/Al Jazeera deal, it would appear that Capitol Hill “conservatives” like Republican Reps. Michael McCaul, Steve Scalise, and Paul Broun are adopting the view that we have nothing to fear from the global jihad and its instruments of propaganda being positioned on U.S. soil.

This view finds support from Scott McConnell, writing in Patrick J. Buchanan’s magazine, The American Conservative, who says there should be no “national loyalty oath” for a new cable channel in America and that the transaction is “welcome news.”

Al Jazeera is the voice of the Muslim Brotherhood and the various terrorist groups it has spawned, including al Qaeda and Hamas.

In all seriousness, McConnell calls the sale of Al Gore’s Current TV to the Al Jazeera channel a “public service.”

In an endorsement of the deal, McConnell writes that the channel, which he admits is “Qatar government-funded,” can be “quite good.” However, he admits, “I don’t watch it often.”

He fails to point out the elementary fact that there is no freedom of the press or speech in Qatar.

Unfortunately, this is the kind of uninformed commentary that we have seen all too often in regard to the Al Jazeera deal. It is significant that a self-described “conservative” would adopt this view and that a magazine called “The American Conservative” would publish such nonsense.

During the Cold War, Patrick Buchanan, who served as President Reagan’s White House communications director, was an anti-communist who combatted and helped expose Soviet disinformation and propaganda activities. But in the face of the global jihad, such defenses are apparently being dropped. Indeed, Buchanan has himself been featured in a sympathetic light on Al Jazeera, discussing why he opposes U.S. military intervention in the Middle East.

This is, of course, a legitimate conservative point of view, even if going on Al Jazeera is not the proper place to make such an argument. But McConnell’s idea that Al Jazeera somehow has a right to enter the U.S. media market without scrutiny is not supported by the evidence.

There is no “national loyalty oath” for a cable channel. But there are various laws that are supposed to apply to this transaction which are being ignored. These include the Foreign Agents Registration Act, Federal Communications Commission rules, and the review process of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S.

But the basic hurdle that the channel cannot overcome, based on the evidence of its collaboration with al Qaeda, is that it provides material support to terrorism and, therefore, cannot legally operate on American soil. The Hezbollah TV station Al Manar was outlawed in the U.S. on this basis.

If there is some doubt as to Al Jazeera’s relationship with al Qaeda, then Congressional hearings can set the record straight.

Even if the deal was legitimate and had received the necessary approval, there is every reason in the world for true conservatives to oppose the channel’s entry into the U.S. on the grounds that it spews propaganda which can misinform, mislead, and inspire violence.

There is nothing much we can do about foreign propaganda that is based overseas. But allowing our enemies to operate on the U.S. mainland is a prescription for The Suicide of the West, which is the name of a book by James Burnham I read growing up and which I know is familiar to Pat Buchanan.

For some reason, however, there are some conservatives today who don’t regard the global jihad to be as menacing as Soviet communism.

For those in denial, take some time to look at the case of Lars Hedegaard, the Danish journalist, who was almost killed on Tuesday by a jihadist. I met him at Pamela Geller’s 9/11 conference in New York City last year. He had been prosecuted in Denmark for thought crimes against Islam, in a court battle that went on for two years and eventually saw an acquittal on charges of racism and “hate speech.”

As I pointed out in an article about the event, what is happening in Europe is coming to the United States, as the Obama Administration openly sides with global Islam against our God-given First Amendment right of free speech.

That First Amendment does not give Al Jazeera the “right” to operate on U.S. soil, especially when the evidence implicates the channel in violence and terrorism against Americans.

We cannot lose our rights on the pretext that our sworn enemies deserve them more than we do.

McConnell writes enthusiastically about how, “two years ago, when much of the world was riveted by Al Jazeera’s coverage of the Egyptian revolution,” without noting the purpose of the coverage and what has transpired since then.

In her article, “Al Jazeera: Non-Arabs Should Not Be Fooled,” Najat Fawzy AlSaied writes that, “The Emir of Qatar, an absolute ruler, and Al Jazeera, have not covered the ‘Arab Spring’ to advance democracy, but to support the Muslim Brotherhood, which is aligned with the Qatari regime. Al Jazeera has as its chief goal Muslim Brotherhood domination.”

She adds, “Early in the ‘Arab Spring,’ in Egypt and other countries, Al Jazeera promoted the Muslim fundamentalists. Regarding Syria, Al Jazeera publicizes the demands for power by jihadists.”

However, McConnell seems blind to what is happening right before his eyes in Egypt and the rest of the Middle East and the role that Al Jazeera is playing in it.

Those being fooled today include people like Scott McConnell. During the Cold War they were called dupes.

Anderson Cooper Confronted at CNN on Sandy Hook: ‘You Were in Front of a Green Screen and You Are a Liar’

theinnoplex

By Shepard Ambellas
theintelhub.com
February 3, 2013

After it was reported by two credible alternative news websites such as theintelhub.com and infowars.com Anderson cooper was caught staging an interview at a Sandy Hook funeral by way of green screen technology.

Now in a turning point Anderson Cooper was confronted by a US Citizen in response to the green screen reports.

Please watch the following video:

Sarah Palin and Fox: When Reform Takes Precedence over Reputation

thespeechatime

By Whitney Pitcher

"Cautious, careful people, always casting about to preserve their reputation and social standing, never can bring about a reform. Those who are really in earnest must be willing to be anything or nothing in the world's estimation, and publicly and privately, in season and out, avow their sympathy with despised and persecuted ideas and their advocates, and bear the consequences." - Susan B. Anthony

Governor Palin's decision not to renew her contract at Fox News has received a lot of discussion from the punditry  as expected. Some have pretentiously referred to her as a fad. Others wrote her political obituary (just as they did when she stepped aside from the governorship), casting everything in past tense as if she just plans ride off into the aurora bourealis on a snow machine. Of course, Governor Palin isn't the political equivalent of pogs or Shirley MaClaine, who has had more lives than most cats. Rumors of her political death are greatly exaggerated, which is just how she wants it. As Governor Palin said to Breitbart News on Saturday, " we delight in those who underestimate us".

Throughout her career, Governor Palin, just like Susan B. Anthony, has cared far more about reform than reputation. When she was on the city council, she took a stand by voting against a regulation for garbage pickup because it would have unethically steered business to the garbage company owned by other council member. Who was that council member? Nick Carney--the very person who encouraged Palin to run for city council. Reform was more important to her than social standing.

As an oil and gas regulator in the Murkowski administration, she stood up to Randy Ruedrich, a fellow member of the Alaska  Oil and Gas Commission and the head of the Alaska Republican Party, when he did party business on state time and was engaged in other unethical behavior. Palin did all she could do with in her power to expose the corruption, but Governor Murkowski did not act. The only thing Palin felt she could do in good conscience was resign. She gave up a six figure job and risked her political future.Again, reform was more important to her than social standing.

Later, as Governor and following her time as the GOP vice presidential candidate, she was hit with a barrage of frivolous ethics complaints. Defending these complaints cost her family hundreds of thousands of dollars, her state upwards of two million dollars, and her staff eighty percent of their time. Governor Palin thought that remaining governor stood in the way of reform for Alaska, as the money and time suck of ethics complaints stymied progress. Governor Palin resigned, with the full understanding that it may negatively affect her political future.

Following her resignation, she spread her message of reform using multiple methods. She became a commentator at FoxNews, endorsed and campaigned for reform minded candidates,spoke at Tea Party rallies and used social media outlets to voice her ideas and thoughts on issues ranging from energy independence to foreign policy to government ethics. She used somewhat unconventional outlets, like TLC's Sarah Palin's Alaska and appearances Conan O'Brien, to reach new groups and affect the culture beyond the traditional media used  in politics. For much of this, she was mocked. Governor Palin takes to the her Facebook page far more often than the pages of the Wall Street Journal, although she does that on occasion too. However, using such a platform was poo pooed as unserious. In reality, it was a revolutionary way for politics to enter the social media, as people were exposed to energy policy right along side new pictures of their grand children and news of their favorite music artist's tours. Her travelogue show exposed new people to Alaska's vast resources and the application of a strong work ethic. Again, reforming the method of marketing conservatism in culture and new media was more important to her than her social standing within a party holding steadfast to a world where white papers are seen as the means to influencing the populace.

Governor Palin spoke unabashedly as a commentator at FoxNews. However, as an outlet primarily seen as the "Republican" channel, commenting at Fox became "preaching to the choir". Governor Palin's message of reform is taking on the "big government enablers" on our side and using opportunities to broaden "the message of the beauty of freedom and the imperative of defending our republic and restoring this most exceptional nation." Interestingly and possibly purposefully, news of Governor Palin's departure from Fox and her next steps came as the same time as the National Review held a summit to discuss the future of conservatism--i.e. the very preaching to the choir that she indicated that conservatives need to move away from. For all this, the mainstream media, many of whom try to cast FoxNews as inconsequential, are now trying to portray Governor Palin as irrelevant without Fox. Yet, if one is truly irrelevant, they usually do not require hundreds of news stories deeming them so. She is so "irrelevant" that a publicly funded university did a study to determine how much money she was paid per word at Fox. There still hasn't been a study to determine how much money the federal government spends/borrows per word that President Obama reads off of a teleprompter.

Governor Palin's next step of reform is to too expand her previous steps of taking on the party establishment and continuing to broaden the message of conservatism. Reform is in her nature--whether is policy reform inside elected office or conservative messaging reform and supporting reform minded candidates outside of office. As she said in channeling Revolutionary war hero John Paul Jones, she has not yet begun to fight.

'60 Minutes' Obama, Clinton interview heavy on laughs, light on substance

foxnews

AP/CBS

By Dan Gainor 

If CBS ever needs a softball team, they should sign Steve Kroft. The veteran newsman filled nearly three fourths of his big interview with President Obama and outgoing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton with easy questions (11 out of 15). So much so that laughter was more commonplace that any challenging questions.

For media watchers, the much-ballyhooed half-hour was a waste of good interviewing time. Kroft only threw four mildly tough questions at the power duo and two of those were still fairly easy health questions aimed at Clinton. Only the last two questions tackled Libya, Syria and conservative criticisms that there has been “an abdication of the United States on the world stage.”

Kroft then let Obama dodge questions of his failure in Syria and let stand Obama’s bizarre assertion that the revolution in Egypt has turned out well. “When it comes to Egypt, had it not been for the leadership we showed, you might have seen a different outcome there,” said Obama. 

For media watchers, the much-ballyhooed half-hour was a waste of good interviewing time. Kroft only threw four mildly tough questions at the power duo and two of those were still fairly easy health questions aimed at Clinton.

Had Kroft not wasted the entire first two thirds of his interview on slow pitch, he might have thrown a fastball about the ongoing violence there now, the Muslim Brotherhood’s power grab, threats to Israel and bigoted comments from Obama’s buddy Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi. (Just hours before the pre-recorded broadcast, Morsi declared a state of emergency in three provinces as 50 people had been killed in rioting.)

It was the questions that weren’t asked that left viewers wondering if Kroft reads international news. What about tensions between China and its neighbors and U.S. allies Japan, Taiwan and South Korea? Or the increased tensions over the Falklands? Or that pesky little would-be nuclear state of Iran? Or how about U.S. involvement in Mali or terrorism in Algieria? Maybe even our relations with our nearest neighbors Canada, which is waiting on word about pipeline approval, and Mexico which is wondering about fast and furious?

CBS had certainly built up to the event with pre-show promotion that included the network’s Bob Schieffer remarking how unusual it was for president’s to share the stage with anyone. In that vein, Kroft began by reminding viewers that of the Obama-Clinton “rivalry that is one of the richest in American history.” Someone needs to get Kroft a better history book. Even Obama admitted that the pair agreed on policy.

Kroft’s questions weren’t just softballs. More than half resulted in laughter from Obama or Clinton and sometimes both. A couple were so bad that even Kroft laughed as well. 

The most embarrassing one was a public relations person’s dream as Kroft reflected how he had been with both candidates back in 2008. “That was a very tough, bitter race and I’m going to spare you really some of the things that you said about each other during the campaign,” to which even he laughed.

He laughed again when he asked about Obama’s support for Clinton. “What’s the, I have to ask you, what’s the date of expiration on this endorsement?” Both Clinton and Obama’s responses were equally sickening. Clinton threw out an “Oh, Steve…” and Obama commented, “You guys in the press are incorrigible.”

This wasn’t the first embarrassing Kroft interview of Obama. Back before the election, “60 Minutes” ran another interview but left out key elements where Kroft asked Obama if the Libya attack had been by terrorists. Obama dodged and CBS dodged even more, releasing that full interview with less than 24 hours before Election Day.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/01/28/60-minutes-obama-clinton-interview-heavy-on-laughs-light-on-substance/#ixzz2JHy9fdvC

O'Reilly: Is Hillary Clinton the new Obama in the eyes of the media?

President Obama attacks Fox News

El País relata el error sobre Chávez que le costó críticas y 225 mil euros

nota: la 'foto' fue tomada de un video de un procedimiento medico posteado por deqcomMX que data del 2008: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB4bIH0GsYU

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animalpolitico

Foto: @jacobogg

El diario español El País relata hoy las horas previas y la toma de decisiones en torno  a la publicación en primera plana de una fotografía falsa del presidente venezolano Hugo Chávez que le costó miles de críticas alrededor del mundo.

El diario español publica que el director del periódico, Javier Moreno, es el primero en asumir que fue una equivocación y ofreció disculpas por el error que además les costó 225 mil euros por la nueva reimpresión.

Aquí les dejamos la versión íntegra de la explicación y el relato de El País:

EL PAÍS cometió el pasado jueves uno de los mayores errores de su historia. Ese día, el periódico difundió una fotografía falsa aportada por la agencia Gtres Online en la que supuestamente aparecía intubado el presidente venezolano, Hugo Chávez. Pese a las dudas que les surgieron sobre las circunstancias que rodeaban esa imagen, los responsables del diario decidieron difundirla. Esas dudas no resueltas quedaron reflejadas incluso en el breve texto que acompañaba la fotografía, en el que se indicaba que “EL PAÍS no ha podido verificar de forma independiente las circunstancias en que fue tomada la imagen, ni el momento preciso ni el lugar. Las particularidades políticas de Cuba y las restricciones informativas que impone el régimen lo han hecho imposible”. El director de la publicación, Javier Moreno, es el primero en asumir que fue una equivocación: “Ese es el error central de la historia. Creíamos tener verificada una fotografía que no habíamos verificado”. Como Moreno, toda la cadena en la toma de decisiones asume la gravedad de lo ocurrido y pide disculpas. En cuanto tuvo conocimiento del error, la dirección del periódico ordenó recoger todos los ejemplares distribuidos hasta ese momento y, a la vez, retirar de la web la falsa fotografía. El coste de la reimpresión del diario y la nueva reimpresión supuso un coste adicional de unos 225.000 euros. El error tuvo una gran repercusión en las redes sociales y originó también la protesta del Gobierno venezolano. Nada más regresar de Davos, donde se encontraba, Javier Moreno analizó los hechos con el Comité de Dirección y el Comité Profesional, anunció cambios para mejorar el método en la toma de decisiones y encargó un relato a dos reconocidos periodistas del diario. Este es el resultado de ese trabajo periodístico.

“¿Puedes hablar? Es urgente”. A las dos de la tarde del miércoles 23 de enero, Javier Moreno, director de EL PAÍS, observa en la pantalla del teléfono que tiene dos llamadas perdidas del director adjunto, Vicente Jiménez. Moreno está en Davos (Suiza) asistiendo al Foro Económico Mundial en el que se reúnen las élites sociales y económicas del planeta. Le extraña que desde la redacción en Madrid se comuniquen con él mediante Facetime, aplicación para hablar por videoconferencia.

Estamos seguros de que es Chávez, ¿no? ¿No será un montaje?”
Javier Moreno, director de EL PAÍS

-Javier tenemos una foto de una persona que parece Hugo Chávez en una sala de operaciones. La ofrece una agencia y estamos haciendo gestiones para conseguirla porque primero se la han ofrecido a El Mundo.

-¿Qué sabemos de la fotografía?

-La agencia dice que la ha sacado una enfermera en Cuba y que se la ha enviado a su hermana a España. Esta la ha ofrecido a una colaboradora de la agencia.

-¿No podemos tener más información?

-Luis Magán [jefe de fotografía] va a comer con el comercial de la agencia y lo va a intentar.

La foto está haciendo su entrada en el periódico. Es la instantánea que protagoniza uno de los mayores errores de la historia del diario EL PAÍS. Esta es la narración de cómo una imagen falsa acabó en la portada, reconstruida a través de conversaciones con los que intervinieron en el proceso.

Las llamadas perdidas de Jiménez son para enseñarle la imagen al director. Pregunta si se la puede enviar a Davos, pero el comercial de la agencia, Manuel Montero, rechaza su difusión. Facetime es la solución más rápida para mostrarla a distancia.

El director adjunto se comunica de nuevo con Moreno y le enseña la instantánea. “Me mostraron la fotografía montada sobre una cartulina blanca. Pedían 30.000 euros y respondí que no. Me parecía la típica subasta entre periódicos”, recuerda Moreno, que sugiere ofrecer 10.000.

Cuando el director ve la fotografía le asaltan dudas de que sea un montaje y pide que se verifique. Minutos más tarde envía un SMS a Jiménez: “Estamos seguros de que es Chávez, ¿no? ¿no será alguien que se le parece en un montaje hecho en Lima, por ejemplo?”. Jiménez responde: “Creo que no, pero, claro, es una foto que llega por un cauce irregular”.

Me la han podido colar”
El director de la agencia de fotos

La foto falsa llega a EL PAÍS a través de la agencia Gtres Online. El miércoles 23 de enero, a las 11.00, Luis Magán queda en una cafetería con el director comercial de esta agencia que provee a EL PAÍS desde 2009 con material gráfico, sobre todo, para las secciones de Gente y Cultura. Montero anuncia que tiene una foto de Hugo Chávez hospitalizado. Y que se la han ofrecido antes al diario El Mundo, pero la operación aún no está cerrada.

Sobre las 13.30, Montero se acerca a un bar próximo a Miguel Yuste, 40, la sede del diario EL PAÍS, con una carpeta blanca con el logo de la agencia. En su interior, dos reproducciones en papel de la misma imagen. Magán las ve por primera vez: “La veo y creo que es Chávez. Lo único que pongo en duda es la fecha en que se haya hecho la foto”, recuerda.

El jefe de fotografía pide explicaciones y Montero ofrece su relato. Cuenta que la foto ha sido realizada hace siete días. Que ha llegado a la agencia a través de una colaboradora de plena confianza.

Magán sube con la foto al despacho del director adjunto, Vicente Jiménez.

-¿Esta agencia será de fiar, no?, le pregunta Jiménez.

-A mí me parece que es Chávez, le responde Magán.

A lo largo de la tarde del miércoles 23, por el despacho de Vicente Jiménez, pasan, entre otros, Luis Magán y tres subdirectores: Jan Martínez Ahrens, Goyo Rodríguez y José Manuel Romero. “En esos momentos estamos manejando la sensación de tener una exclusiva mundial”, relata Magán. Hay dudas sobre la fecha y la autenticidad de la foto. “Pero nadie pone en duda que sea Chávez”, relata el jefe de fotografía.

Es fundamental despejar incógnitas. El subdirector Jan Martínez Ahrens es el encargado de hacerlo. Se reúne en su despacho, después de la hora del almuerzo, con el comercial de Gtres Online y le interroga sobre la procedencia de la foto. “El relato es francamente flojo, vago y difuso”, cuenta Martínez Ahrens. Sobre las 17.30 pide hablar con el director de la agencia, Carlos Van Eyck, y le somete a un tercer grado telefónico. Van Eyck asegura que creen que la foto es verdadera y dice que confían en la persona que la ha traído a la agencia. No da la identidad del contacto en España, ni la de quién ha tomado la foto con el argumento de proteger a quien se arriesgó para tomar la imagen.

El periódico no informó al colaborador que tiene en Caracas

-¿Te la han podido colar?, pregunta Martínez Ahrens.

-Me la han podido colar, responde Van Eyck, quien en otros momentos, en cambio, insiste en la fiabilidad de su fuente.

Martínez Ahrens traslada esta información a Vicente Jiménez.

La agencia y su representante insisten una y otra vez en que la fuente de la que han recibido la fotografía es fiable y que confían en su colaboradora. En paralelo continúa la negociación económica. El representante de Gtres Online pide tiempo para hablar con la intermediaria.

Hacia las ocho de la tarde, Jiménez recibe la información de que la negociación ha prosperado y que la fotografía va a ser adquirida. “Cuando pactamos el precio [15.000 euros] decidimos publicarla”, recuerda el director adjunto. “Nos dicen que no quieren que se firme la fotografía porque podría poner en peligro a la persona que la hizo. Nos pareció razonable y creímos que era una salvaguarda de protección y no debilidad de la fuente. Era una enfermera que se estaba jugando la vida. Está claro que nos equivocamos”.

¿Por qué se tomó la decisión de publicar la foto si la agencia Gtres Online no había respondido a todas las dudas que se le plantearon esa tarde? “Consideramos que la fotografía era buena y seguimos de forma natural”, explica el director adjunto. “No se votó ni nadie planteó su oposición. Nadie me transmitió dudas serias sobre la conveniencia de no publicarla o sobre su autenticidad, salvo un subdirector, que dudaba si debíamos publicar la imagen de un enfermo, pero estábamos de acuerdo en que era una noticia relevante porque el Gobierno venezolano no informa sobre la salud de su presidente. Hicimos una cesión de confianza a la agencia a pesar de que había puntos que no se podían comprobar”, reconoce Jiménez. “Hicimos mal nuestro trabajo”.

Magán, que recibió la oferta y negoció la compra, lo recuerda así: “Fue una decisión colectiva. Llega un momento en que tenemos que arriesgarnos o no”. Hugo Chávez no aparece en público desde el pasado mes de diciembre ni acudió a su toma de posesión en Caracas al permanecer convaleciente en La Habana. Su dolencia está rodeada de secretismo.

Las redes sociales advirtieron del fallo cuando llegó el diario a América

En Davos, el director de EL PAÍS se ha encontrado con Moisés Naím, analista venezolano y columnista del periódico al que le cuenta que se está trabajando en la historia. “En un momento dado me trasladan la convicción de que la agencia lo ha verificado, que la historia es buena, que vamos adelante. No me dijeron que había muchas dudas porque si hubiera sido así lo habría parado, pero como había incógnitas sin resolver le pedí a Vicente que en el texto se añadieran, como información adicional, las preguntas a las que no habíamos podido responder. No como cautela sino como información complementaria. Creí que lo más honesto era reconocerlo”.

Moreno asume que fue un error publicar la foto y acompañarla de un texto que dice que no se confía en la instantánea. “Ese es el error central de la historia. Creíamos tener verificada una fotografía que no habíamos verificado”.

La apostilla dictada por Moreno y que se incluye en el pie de la imagen falsa dice: “EL PAÍS no ha podido verificar de forma independiente las circunstancias en que fue tomada la imagen, ni el momento preciso ni el lugar. Las particularidades políticas de Cuba y las restricciones informativas que impone el régimen lo han hecho imposible”.

El director asume que dejar en manos de una agencia las verificaciones que debería haber hecho el periódico es un error grave. La precipitación fue el otro. Y reconoce que el hecho de que la información fuera compartida por un número reducido de mandos multiplicó el riesgo.

A partir de las 21 horas se comienza a editar la imagen para la edición impresa. La fotografía falsa pasa por más manos: diseño, fotografía, internacional y se vuelca en el sistema de edición Hermes por lo que numerosos redactores ya la pueden observar en pantalla. Media hora antes, el director adjunto y los subdirectores muestran la imagen a Guillermo Altares, redactor jefe de Internacional. “¿Esto es lo que creo que es? ¿Estáis seguros al cien por cien?”, pregunta el periodista a sus jefes. “Estaban muy seguros de lo que tenían”, recuerda. Altares propone hablar con el colaborador en Caracas, Ewald Scharfenberg, pero se decide no comunicarle la noticia por temor a que a través de la conversación telefónica se filtre la exclusiva. “Tengo plena confianza en Ewald pero no en las comunicaciones venezolanas”, apostilla el redactor jefe.

De madrugada el director ordenó paralizar la distribución

Martínez Ahrens, subdirector, telefonea al colaborador en Caracas y le advierte de que el periódico va a publicar una información sensible para prevenirle. “Me dijo que era un asunto delicado y que estuviera atento a la reacción del Gobierno”, señala Scharfenberg. El periódico no le informó de que iba a publicar una supuesta foto de Hugo Chávez.

A esa misma hora, Mokhtar Atitar, editor gráfico de la web, ve la fotografía y le asaltan las dudas. Deja su asiento en la mesa digital en forma de media luna situada en el centro de la redacción y se dirige a la de Magán. Le expresa sus reticencias, no tiene claro que la imagen sea buena. Después regresa a su puesto y se pone a buscar en Google para ver si hay en la red alguna imagen parecida. “No encontré nada pese a que hice varias búsquedas de imágenes. Lo hice por iniciativa propia”, explica. Atitar busca fotos, pero la imagen, en realidad, procede de un vídeo.

En Davos, sobre las 23 horas, Naím coincide de nuevo con Moreno.

-Javier, ¿cómo va la historia?

-Vamos a dar la foto.

-¿Puedo tuitear la noticia?

-Pero no digas que es Chávez.

Naím tuitea: “Prepárense para una extraordinaria foto exclusiva en la web de El PAÍS en breve”. Poco después, Moreno lo retuitea.

Ewald Scharfenberg, el colaborador en Caracas, ve el tuit de Naím y escribe a Altares para preguntarle si sabe de qué va la cosa. “Me responde: no te puedo decir nada sorry [lo siento]“. La supuesta exclusiva se ha manejado con la máxima discreción para evitar fugas. Más tarde, Scharfenberg le envía otro mensaje en el que le advierte sobre una fotografía vieja que ese mismo día circula, una instantánea de Chávez con su padre y hermano.

Son las tres de la madrugada en Madrid, las ocho de la tarde en México DF y Bernardo Marín llega a la redacción digital que EL PAÍS tiene en la capital mexicana. Los ejemplares de la edición impresa con la foto falsa en portada ya están llegando a esas horas a distintos puntos de Latinoamérica, sobre todo a Argentina. Y ya hay gente tuiteando que EL PAÍS lleva a Chávez intubado en portada. Marín llama a Jiménez y le dice que considera que hay que adelantar la publicación, dado que en las redes ya se empieza a hablar de ello.

Las cuatro personas que están en ese momento en la redacción de México, donde se elabora la web del periódico durante la noche, empiezan a preparar la pieza informativa digital. Por centrarse en la preparación del despliegue, pierden de vista durante cinco minutos la conversación de Twitter, donde algunos empiezan a hablar de que la foto puede ser falsa.

A las 3.52, Bernardo Marín aprieta el botón de publicar. La supuesta gran exclusiva mundial se empieza a difundir en las redes sociales, Twitter y Facebook. A las 3.54 mira su cuenta de Twitter para ver qué repercusión está teniendo la noticia. Ve que hay tuits que ponen en cuestión la autenticidad de la foto. “Cuando es la dirección del periódico la que ha dado por buena una información, ni se te ocurre pensar que puede ser un error”, explica por teléfono desde México. Inés Santaeulalia, una de las redactoras en ese país, llama por teléfono y alerta de que hay mucha gente tuiteando que esa foto es falsa. La cuenta de Twitter de Moisés Naím recibe insultos: “Hubo una explosión de agresiones por parte de seguidores de Chávez. Algunos incluso dicen que yo tuve un rol en todo esto”, explica el escritor.

Marín comprueba que la foto ha sido extraída de un vídeo que está circulando por la red. Se trata de una captura. Aparece un paciente acromegálico en una mesa de operaciones. La imagen data de 2008. La noche anterior, de hecho, la televisión pública venezolana ha denunciado que ese vídeo está circulando, que es falso, y que no es Chávez.

Marín llama a Vicente Jiménez y le manda una captura de pantalla del vídeo. Son las cuatro de la madrugada.

A las 4.08 Javier Moreno recibe la llamada del director adjunto. Se encuentra descansando en la habitación de su hotel a las afueras de Davos. La conversación dura cuatro minutos y Moreno ordena que los responsables de la web retiren la fotografía de la portada y que se paralice la distribución de la edición de papel para evitar que llegue a los quioscos. “Tomé la decisión al instante, sin pensar lo que iba a costar y sin consultar a nadie”, recuerda el director. Desde ese instante, y hasta las 8.12, Moreno hace 26 llamadas y decide reimprimir EL PAÍS para volver a colocarlo en los puntos de venta.

Se logró detener el 93% de la tirada en Europa y América

A las 4.12, Jiménez llama al responsable de distribución e impresión de Pressprint, Juan Manuel Albelda. Le dice que es preciso retirar toda la tirada. Albelda le informa de que hay rutas que están distribuidas y entregadas. No se consigue frenar la distribución de ejemplares destinados a las líneas aéreas, ferrocarriles, hoteles y suscriptores. En España, 4.100 ejemplares llegan a los lectores con la foto falsa. “De llegar la orden media hora más tarde, hubiera sido dramático”, confiesa Albelda.

Se consigue paralizar el 93% de la tirada. Pero en Argentina solo se recupera un 30% y 8.050 ejemplares llegan a los quioscos. En la República Dominicana se recupera un 10%: 5.670 ejemplares con el error llegan a destino.

En total son 22.635 los ejemplares con la foto falsa que se distribuyen. Se vuelve a imprimir una nueva edición. El coste de la reimpresión del diario ronda los 125.000 euros. La nueva distribución que hay que poner en marcha supone otros 100.000 euros.

“Me pareció increíble que, algo que para cualquier venezolano era un timo, fuera en la portada de EL PAÍS”, remata Scharfenberg, colaborador en Caracas.

La reacción del Gobierno venezolano es inmediata. El chavismo acusa a EL PAÍS de participar en un complot contra la oposición. “Nadie cree que la foto es algo casual, los lacayos internos tienen su réplica en el extranjero”, escribe en su cuenta de Twitter el presidente de la Asamblea Nacional, Diosdado Cabello. “Cada vez que alguien en el mundo, llámese EL PAÍS, Bosé, Juanes, Willie Colón, Cochez o Uribe, ataca a la patria, la oposición lo hace su héroe”, dice en otro mensaje reproducido por medios oficiales.

El Gobierno de Hugo Chávez anuncia que emprenderá acciones legales y su embajada en Madrid acusa al diario de “despreciar” a los venezolanos. “La publicación de esta fotografía grotesca no es más que la confirmación de la campaña sistemática que ese periódico y otros más mantienen aprovechándose de manera atroz de la situación de salud por la que pasa el comandante Chávez”, espeta Ernesto Villegas, ministro de Información. Desde Argentina, la presidenta Cristina Fernández de Kirchner escribe en su cuenta de Twitter: “En la portada de EL PAÍS vi una foto. Me corrijo, eso no es una foto, es una canallada”.

Al día siguiente de la publicación, descubierta ya la estafa, una reunión en Miguel Yuste con los responsables de Gtres Online permite comprobar que la primera versión que dieron no es correcta.

Carlos Van Eyck, director de la agencia, explica que en la misma mañana en que se descubrió la falsedad, su colaboradora llamó a la persona que le facilitó la fotografía y que esta cambió su versión.

El nuevo relato hace que la pista de la foto se difumine aún más. La supuesta intermediaria en España es una venezolana que ha recibido una foto enviada por su hermana, vía Whatsapp, desde Venezuela. Esta última, a su vez, es la que habría recibido la imagen supuestamente procedente de Cuba. Poco importa. La foto era falsa.

"The Optimizer": Secret of the Obama Victory

Daniel Borris for The New York Times

Larry Grisolano helped develop a system that permitted the Obama campaign to target advertising to supporters based on the shows they liked to watch. The campaign placed ads in surprising places, like the TV Land network, that might once have been overlooked.

By JIM RUTENBERG

It was called “the Optimizer,” and, strategists for President Obama say it is how he beat a better-financed Republican opposition in the advertising war.

Culling never-before-used data about viewing habits, and combining it with more personal information about the voters the campaign was trying to reach and persuade than was ever before available, the system allowed Mr. Obama’s team to direct advertising with a previously unheard-of level of efficiency, strategists from both sides agree.

“Future campaigns ignore the targeting strategy of the Obama campaign of 2012 at their peril,” said Ken Goldstein, the president of Kantar Media/CMAG, a media monitoring firm that tracked and analyzed political advertising for both campaigns. “This was an unprecedented marrying of detailed information on viewing habits and political predispositions.”

One of the biggest emerging stories about the campaign that has ended is how Mr. Obama’s team used information and technology to outmatch and outwit a galvanized and incredibly well-financed opposition.

And in the days since the election new details are emerging about just how outmatched the Republicans were on the technology side, prompting a partywide re-examination of how to avoid a repeat and regain the once-fearsome tactical advantages they held in the era of President George W. Bush. They acknowledge they have their work cut out for themselves.

Romney campaign officials have said the computer-driven operation they built to monitor turnout, and to push supporters to polls in areas that were falling below vote levels needed for victory, crashed and became inoperative for a prolonged period as voting was under way.

The system was meant to combat the far more sophisticated version that Mr. Obama’s team had built over years. But Mr. Romney was distracted and financially depleted by his long primary season, and even with perfect execution, both sides agree, he never would have had the time or finances to catch up.

With so much more time to prepare, Mr. Obama’s polling and “analytics” department collected so much information about the electorate that it knew far more about which sorts of voters were going to turn out — and where — than the Romney campaign and most public pollsters.

But in between identifying likely supporters and successfully delivering them to the polls there was an intensive effort to send them a constant stream of messages devised to keep wavering 2008 Obama supporters from succumbing to Mr. Romney’s effort to win them over, and to get unwavering supporters excited about voting.

That was where “the Optimizer” came in.

In essence, said Larry Grisolano, who helped lead the development of the system, it created a new set of ratings based on the political leanings of categories of people the Obama campaign was interested in reaching, allowing the campaign to buy its advertising on political terms as opposed to traditional television industry terms.

“We were able to create a set of ratings based on a model of our target voters, as opposed to the broader categories that are kind of defined by traditional advertising ratings,” he said.

Erik Smith, another senior strategist, said a decision by “super PACS” supporting Mr. Romney to hold off on their first major anti-Obama advertising push until well after the primaries had given the team extra time to develop its system.

Through its vast array of information collected via its e-mail list, Facebook and millions of door-to-door discussions conducted by volunteers in swing states — and fed into the campaign database — the campaign devised a ranking scale for voters ranging from likeliest to support Mr. Obama to least likely.

Then the advertising team worked backward to figure out what sorts of programs likely and undecided voters were liable to watch, and when. It did so using not only traditional Nielsen Media Research data but also newly available information from set-top cable boxes that gave a far more detailed sense of how the groups watched television, and, more important, commercials.

The answers led to advertising purchases that the campaign might not have made, especially as it pursued undecided voters who did not regularly go to traditional sources for news.
Keep reading on New York Times >> 

The 2nd Coming of Obama

TheAlexJonesChannel 

During Barry's first run in 2008, the establishment media went out of its way to portray him in messiah-like fashion. Women swooned and fainted at his campaign events. Bedazzled followers were so mesmerized by Brand Obama's scripted message and performance they came away thinking the onetime foundation-supported community organizer was going to pay their rent and save them from evil Republicans.

Now that the people -- with the help of jimmy-rigged voting machines -- have "re-elected" Obama for a second term as the establishment's official teleprompter reader, the corporate media is once again attempting to convince us Barry Obama is the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

ALERT: CBS' Dickerson to Obama: 'Go for the Throat' of GOP

foxnews

John Dickerson

A column published on Slate.com over the weekend urged President Obama to "pulverize" and destroy his Republican opponents -- even "go for the throat" -- in order to "cement his legacy."
The words of advice, though, didn't come from a Democratic strategist or a former member of the president's inner circle.
The nearly 2,000-word playbook came from CBS News' political director John Dickerson.
Dickerson, who also works as chief political correspondent for Slate, had some unusually harsh words for the minority party as Obama takes the oath and launches into his second term.
To hear Dickerson tell it, Republicans have proved so intransigent that Obama's only option is to obliterate them. The subhead on the article said, "Obama must declare war on the Republican Party" if he wants to transform American politics.
"There's no indication that the president's clashes with House Republicans will end soon," Dickerson wrote. "The president who came into office speaking in lofty terms about bipartisanship and cooperation can only cement his legacy if he destroys the GOP. If he wants to transform American politics, he must go for the throat."
Dickerson went on to describe the strategy of picking off and cultivating a few Republican allies as "the old way."
"Obama's only remaining option is to pulverize," Dickerson said. He wrote that Obama's attempt to build a "post-partisan" Washington didn't work, and in his second term Obama has the chance to "hasten the demise of the old order" of the GOP by "increasing the political cost of having the GOP coalition defined by Second Amendment absolutists, climate science deniers, supporters of 'self-deportation' and the pure no-tax wing."
The advice comes despite the eventual willingness of the Republican Party to allow tax increases on top earners, as part of the recent fiscal crisis deal.
Republicans have also eased off their opposition to raising the debt ceiling, proposing a three-month extension while a budget is debated.
Dickerson was named CBS' political director in November 2011.
Representatives from CBS News have not yet responded to requests for comment.

Debunking the Sandy Hook Debunkers

americanthinker

game-tuts.com

By Jack Cashill

During the age of Obama, the major media have gone fully AWOL. If they fear that their reporting will lead to inconvenient discoveries, they simply stop their advance, lay down their notebooks, and disappear. This trend began in the Clinton years and picked up momentum after the 1994 electoral debacle, but the Clintons at least worried that the media might turn on them.
If Barack Obama ever had any such anxiety, the nonreporting on Fast and Furious, Benghazi and now Sandy Hook has had to reassure him. Sandy Hook is particularly disturbing because the truth is, or at least should have been, so accessible. This tragedy should never have spawned anything like a conspiracy theory, but it obviously has.
Protecting the major media's flank during retreat are many and sundry well-funded leftist blogs -- Huffington Post, The Daily Kos, Media Matters, and TPM among others. While the major media withdraw, the blogs attack those who might challenge the "narrative" the majors have left behind.
A case in point is a recent multi-media Huffington Post piece titled "Sandy Hook Conspiracy Theory Video Debunked By Experts." In the video intro, HuffPo editor Meredith Bennett-Smith laughingly dismisses the various alternate theories of what transpired at Sandy Hook. Says Bennett-Smith, "That is what conspiracy theorists love to do. They put out a lot of questions, but they don't necessarily provide a lot of answers." When there is a Democrat in the White House, alas, anyone who asks a question becomes a conspiracy theorist.
Like too many alleged fact checkers, Bennett-Smith addresses only the least significant of the challenges to the Sandy Hook narrative: the alleged use of crisis actors, the memorials that predated the shooting, the confusion about what weapon was in Adam Lanza's trunk. The "experts" she promises in the headline turn out to be other Obama-friendly fact checkers like David Mikkelson, founder of Snopes, and Robert Blaskiewicz, editor of a comparable blog called Skeptical Humanities. Absent in the piece is anyone who knows anything about guns or police work.
Predictably, what the HuffPo piece does not address are the two most troubling inconsistencies in the Sandy Hook reporting: the nature of the guns used and the presence or absence of a second shooter. Both questions have gained importance because of the White House's obvious political exploitation of a ginned up "assault weapon" hysteria.
As to the guns, on December 15, one day after the shooting, NBC's chief justice correspondent Pete Williams spoke with Today Show host Matt Lauer. Williams shared "new information" from a "couple of federal officials and state officials." Said Williams, "They say now that there were actually four handguns recovered inside the school, not just two as we were initially told; four handguns and apparently only handguns that were taken into the school." (Italics mine)
Williams said that Lanza also brought an "assault style, AR-15 style rifle" with him to school, but, he added, "We have been told by several officials that he left that in the car." In the days that followed, the story would shift to the AR-15, not as the exclusive weapon -- two handguns remained in the story -- but as "the primary weapon used in the attack." On December 19, CNN reported, "Police say Lanza's rifle used numerous 30-round magazines." By January 6, the Hartford Courant was reporting that Lanza used the handguns only to shoot himself.
This shift in reporting may be justified, and Williams' sources may have been wrong, but why has no one at NBC addressed the discrepancy? The police had plenty of time to establish the nature of the weapons used that first day. Williams cited multiple police sources. He is a seasoned reporter on a show that takes itself seriously. In retrospect, it is easy to see why authorities would want to bend the narrative to an AR-15, but why would anyone have chosen to mislead Williams on day two?
Equally under-reported is the disposition of the second suspect. On day one, the media were reporting that the police had apprehended a likely second shooter. As CBS News reporter John Miller said definitively, "They have a second person in custody." He pointed out that this was not at all unprecedented given that there were two shooters at Columbine. Fox News described this person as wearing a black jacket and camouflage pants. According to Fox, a SWAT team escorted him out of the woods.
The Alex Jones Channel, although not always reliable, put together a nonconspiratorial video using network news clips of the chase in the woods, the capture, and interviews with witnesses. ABC News interviewed both a well-spoken child and an adult who confirmed seeing the man in custody. "They did walk a guy out of the woods with handcuffs," said the man. The fellow then pointed the reporter to a police car where the alleged second shooter was still sitting.
Admittedly, the media got much wrong on day one: the name of the shooter, the mother's relationship to the school, the supposed murder of the father, but the media quickly walked this information back. If they retracted the stories about the four handguns or the second shooter -- or even explained the discrepancies -- I have been unable to find any clarification, and the Huffington Post piece provided none either.
Until I see firm evidence, I remain agnostic about the official Sandy Hook narrative. My investigations into TWA Flight 800 and the Oklahoma City bombing have taught me to be wary of an "evolving" story line. In those two tragedies, as is often the case, the early reporting was the most reliable.
With TWA Flight 800, for instance, all initial reporting pointed to a missile strike as the cause of the highly visible explosion that killed 230 people off the coast of Long Island in July 1996. In the weeks that followed, without any new evidence, the Clinton Justice Department ignored the 270 FBI eyewitnesses to a missile strike and shifted the storyline from a missile to a bomb.
The FBI talked exclusively to the New York Times, and the Times returned the favor by interviewing none of the eyewitnesses. The cherry-picked evidence led to the following above-the-fold headline four weeks after the disaster -- "Prime Evidence Found That Device Exploded in Cabin of Flight 800."
Although not as unnerving as a missile strike, the bomb scenario threatened the peace and prosperity message to be promoted at the Democratic National Convention just days away. Whether coordinated with the White House or not, the Times simply ceased reporting on the bomb. A month later, the official narrative shifted from a bomb to a center fuel tank explosion, a possibility that had been ruled out a month earlier. Like the networks at Sandy Hook, the Times never bothered to explain what happened to the evidence that led to the earlier conclusions.
In a similar spirit, days after the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, the Washington Post reported specific FBI testimony describing "eyewitness accounts of a yellow Mercury with McVeigh and another man inside speeding away from a parking lot near the federal building." (Italics mine)
The media, however, quickly lost interest in the swarthy John Doe No. 2. The likely reason is that If he proved to be an Islamic radical, it would be harder to blame the "Republican Revolution" for the bombing. At McVeigh's trial, the Justice Department did not put a single one of the many reliable eyewitnesses on the stand because every one of them saw McVeigh with his foreign-looking accomplice. Again, the media chose not to notice the discrepancy. As Clinton himself acknowledged, Oklahoma City-i.e. the reporting on Oklahoma City -- saved his presidency.
Bottom line: if the Democrat-media complex can turn an obvious missile strike into a mechanical failure and lose John Doe #2 to history, turning four handguns into an assault weapon and making a second shooter disappear is small beer.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2013/01/debunking_the_sandy_hook_debunkers.html#ixzz2IcCWYL3c

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No one Protecting American masses against ‘The Revenge of Obama’

canadafreepress

Judi McLeod 

In an increasingly upside-down world, we’re now being Mainstream media-warned that Obama is getting more aggressive.

And just to think we’re getting that message as if a President of the United States of America getting more aggressive is normal.

“The wide-ranging proposals on gun control that Barack Obama is expected to announce tomorrow (Jan. 16) symbolize the change in attitude accompanying his second presidential term.

Rapidly accelerating a process that began during his campaign, Obama since November has confidently picked fights with Republicans—and challenged the most conservative members of his own party—on a broad range of foreign-policy and domestic social issues. Besides gun control these include immigration, the pace of withdrawal from Afghanistan and the nomination of Republican senator Chuck Hagel as Defense secretary, a red flag for the GOP’s neo-conservative wing.” (National Journal, Jan. 16, 2013)

“Picking fights with Republicans”, “challenging the most conservative members of his own party” is not Barack Hussein Obama at his worst.

It’s how his unchecked policies are dismantling the USA that is the real problem.

As politicians, the GOP’s neo-conservative wing can, or should be, able to look after themselves.

It’s the innocent masses which need protection from a “getting more aggressive” president.

With all the marbles ( the money supply, the mainstream media, the social media, unending executive orders, at your disposal)  and absolutely loathing the country you were elected to serve, you are no longer a president like all those who came before you, but a bully.

Radio Talk Show Host Rush Limbaugh did a superb job yesterday of describing the “Revenge of Obama”, but why is it that not a single elected official is not demanding to know where Obama gets off seeking revenge.

Is this behavior in a president adult, normal or even acceptable?

The lion’s share of Obama’s time in office has been dishing on the US.  No US enemy at home or abroad has done a better job.  Obama is systematically tearing apart everything that brought America to its noble place in the world,  scattering those parts into the four winds—and even showing he enjoys it.

Why is no one in office demanding to know why?

More importantly, why is no one trying to stop him?

It’s everybody’s nightmare that a full-of-hate community organizer from out of nowhere took over the White House in 2008 and was re-installed for a second term in 2012.

Everybody’s because most countries in the outside world depend on a healthy America to survive.

It’s as if Obama is in a self-devised contest to win 1st Place as the president who most hates his country.

People who hate their own country without reasonable rationale are not only dangerous but sick.

Why are so many sitting idly by allowing a revenge-seeking president to utterly destroy their country rather than removing him?

Media coverage of the Al Gore-Al Jazeera story

Congress Must hold Hearings into the Al Jazeera Deal

ijreview.com

NewZeal

By: Cliff Kincaid
Accuracy in Media

If Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) lets the Al Jazeera-Al Gore deal go through without scrutiny, then every broadcast entity or communications facility in America is ripe for the plucking by any of our nation’s enemies and adversaries.

For those who haven’t been paying attention lately, the government of Qatar has announced a deal through Al Jazeera with former Democratic Vice President Al Gore for his Current TV cable channel, in order to transform it into an arm of its Jihadist or “Terror TV” network, once known as a mouthpiece for mass murderer Osama bin Laden. They are planning to call it “Al Jazeera America,” when the oil money for the transaction is coming from abroad. This is part and parcel of the deception, which is designed to make it appear as though Al Jazeera is as American as apple pie and simply has a foreign-sounding name.

To be sure, the deal was not technically announced by Qatar, a Middle Eastern dictatorship where freedom of the press is not permitted. Instead, Al Jazeera made the announcement. But that is part of the deception. Al Jazeera is an arm of the Qatar regime and is not in any sense of the term an “independent” news organization. It is government-funded with “advertising” from such entities as Qatar Airways, the national airline partly owned by the regime. Qatar and Al Jazeera are one and the same.

The purpose of this transaction is to soften the American people up for more Middle East revolution, including within the borders of the U.S. Dr. Judea Pearl, the father of slain journalist Daniel Pearl, supports an investigation of the deal and says, “Al Jazeera weaves the ideological structure and combustible angers from which Jihadi recruits eventually emerge.”

Qatar postures as a friend of the United States and hosts a U.S military base. But Qatar also served as the base for anti-American and anti-Semitic “cleric” Yusef al-Qaradawi before he returned to Egypt to help consolidate the Muslim Brotherhood revolution there. Al-Qaradawi is a leading television personality on Al Jazeera.

You may have missed the news that Qatar just extended another $2.5 billion in economic aid for Egypt, following a gift of $400 million that the emir of Qatar made to the terrorist group Hamas.

Al Gore and his partners, including Joel Hyatt, got more than that—$500 million, according to reports. Whether or not that is an accurate figure, any amount is a drop in the bucket to the emir, who is worth billions of dollars and lives in opulence.

By the way, Muslim Brotherhood leader and president of Egypt, Mohamed Morsi, just told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer that he wants the release of the Blind Sheikh, sentenced to life in prison for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing in New York City. This first terrorist attack on the World Trade Center killed six people and injured over 1,000 others.

Dr. Pearl calls Al Jazeera “the main propaganda machine” of the pro-terrorist Muslim Brotherhood. It is no surprise, therefore, that Qatar would underwrite the Egyptian regime and Hamas, and that the Obama Administration would voice no public objection to the sale of Current TV to Al Jazeera.

However, there is no reason to believe this sale is legal. The circumstances surrounding the sale clearly require Congressional hearings and this is where the Republican House of Representatives and its new chairman of Homeland Security, Rep. Michael McCaul, come in.

If ever there was a time for Congress to take action, this is it. This is not a time to let the Obama Administration take the lead, since it has already approved the questionable deal, which fattens the coffers of two prominent Democrats.

There are many things about this deal that stink and which require an investigation by McCaul’s committee.

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First, there are unresolved complaints to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) about Al Jazeera’s operations in the U.S. Jerry Kenney of Kenney Broadcasting has asked that the DOJ enforce the law by requiring that foreign propaganda pumped into American homes by Al Jazeera be labeled as such. He says, “Why is it that if I buy a pair of tennis shoes made in China, it has to be labeled made in China? But foreign propaganda which is being aired in the U.S. is not being labeled as foreign propaganda, with its country of origin, in violation of the law? I want to know what I am getting. If you know who has produced something, you look at it differently.”

Secondly, it appears that Al Jazeera has evaded the law requiring federal approval for foreign investments in America that have national security implications.

Al Jazeera has issued a 26-page document in which it claims that the deal “does not involve any federal communications licenses or other assets subject to FCC approval.” Again, this is deceptive, since broadcaster Jerry Kenney has filed an FCC complaint about Al Jazeera programming being illegally aired on taxpayer-supported public TV stations. Al Jazeera also claims that “None of the statutory factors that trigger a CFIUS review—e.g., production of important technology, production of military goods, operation of critical infrastructure—are implicated in this transaction.”

CFIUS is the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States and is under the jurisdiction of the Treasury Department. It is described as “an inter-agency committee authorized to review transactions that could result in control of a U.S. business by a foreign person (‘covered transactions’), in order to determine the effect of such transactions on the national security of the United States.”

What “covered transactions” come under the review of CFIUS? We have learned through press reports that CFIUS approved China-based Dalian Wanda Group Corporation’s purchase of AMC Entertainment, one of the nation’s largest movie theater chains.

The CFIUS process is secretive but we learned about this approval from the Chinese entity, which announced it in a press release in July of 2012.

The writer Zach Coleman notes, “News broadcasting is more politically sensitive than cinema operation and Al Jazeera is a much more controversial acquirer than Dalian Wanda, which was previously unknown in the US.”

This is precisely the case. Yet, Al Jazeera claims it had no obligation to obey the law in this case.

I asked the Treasury Department whether Al Jazeera was required to apply for approval of the purchase and all I got was a run-around. A spokesman said, “I will decline to comment. By law, information filed with CFIUS may not be disclosed by CFIUS to the public. Accordingly, the Department does not comment on information relating to specific CFIUS cases, including whether or not certain parties have filed notices for review.”

How’s that for transparent government? Mark Jaskowiak, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Investment Security at Treasury, should be called before Congress to explain the double standard.

If the Chinese buying a movie theater chain comes under the auspices of CFIUS, then a takeover of a cable channel reaching 40-50 million homes has to qualify as well.

Jerry Kenney, president of Kenney Broadcasting, says, “It’s even more insidious in the case of Al Jazeera because cable companies bundle these packages of channels and deliver them to your home, whether you watch them or not. You end up subsidizing the channels you don’t want. Current TV was actually getting a fee from the cable operators to run the channel. So subscribers who pay for that package will end up paying money to Al Jazeera for its new channel.”

In the case of a movie theater, Kenney points out, “you have to make an effort to get out of your home to drive to a theater to watch a movie. With Al Jazeera, you will be forced to pay for it coming into your own home, whether you want it or not.”

It is time for Rep. McCaul to do his duty and announce hearings into this curious transaction. The Committee on Homeland Security can be reached at 202-226-8417.