Online Blogintegrity

Where We Are Going, You Cannot Follow

2007-04-10T16:00:00.000-07:00

Who's the more the foolish: the fool, or the fool who follows him?

Update by egn: Just so joo know, joo actually can follow us.

Just click on the above leenk, or go here: http://www.blogintegrity.net/

¿Ho-kay?

¡Vamanos!

Blog Against Theocracy

2007-04-08T16:49:00.000-07:00

¿Theocracy?

Phfffft.

Pipples should just go back to worsheeping gatos, no?

so.

Update: by ¡egn!

From the above leenk (written by Caroline Seawright)

Herodotus describes the 'Festival of Bast' where thousands of men and women travelled on boats, partying like crazy. They had music, singing, clapping and dancing. When they passed towns, the women would call out dirty jokes to the shore-bound, often flashing the townsfolk by lifting up their skirts over their heads! When they reached Bubastis, they made their sacrificies of various animals, and drank as much wine as they could stomach. No wonder it was such a popular festival!!

When the people are on their way to Bubastis, they go by river, a great number in every boat, men and women together. Some of the women make a noise with rattles, others play flutes all the way, while the rest of the women, and the men, sing and clap their hands. As they travel by river to Bubastis, whenever they come near any other town they bring their boat near the bank; then some of the women do as I have said, while some shout mockery of the women of the town; others dance, and others stand up and lift their skirts. They do this whenever they come alongside any riverside town. But when they have reached Bubastis, they make a festival with great sacrifices, and more wine is drunk at this feast than in the whole year besides.

¿Now, amigos, does thees no sound more fun than sitting een some stuffy box, wearing itchy clothes while some old man harangues joo about the death of some hombre wheech happened 2000 plus years before joo were born?:

Absolutamente.

¡Ah! The Frog-Faced Stranger Who Will Lead Us to The Magic Kingdom!

2007-04-05T01:31:00.000-07:00

Ho-kay, so, sometheeng that Cabrone perezoso borracho posted last week on one of hees other, lesser, blogs reminded me of a certain leetle brou-haha-haha that percolated over during the heady post-election glow of the 2006 elections.

A few members of el sociedad de los frotacíonados profesíonales*, using some derogatory spleet-screen imagery, had been having some fun at the expense of Senadore Obama. As I recall, they were pretty roundly smacked down by pipples from across la blogsfera.

Here at the "Leetle-Blog-on-the-Integrity", we were not long delayed een taking our own tiny, smug, jabs as well:

Primero, I noted that Obama supporters could play the same game, likely to better effect.

Segundo, Thersites played the argumentum ad captandum card, allowing that los frotacíonados had many ridiculous tropes they would most likely use, such as Scary Asians, and Democrats as Girly-Men, not to mention the whole usual poisonous stew of American Media Prejudice against Black pipples.

NTodd chose to abandon the dog-whistle subtext for a more straightforward reductio ad absurdum (the FOX gambit).

And the game ended there, although I remember theenking there was at least one other candidado who was rrripe for the same treatment.

(...y tambien, tomorrow we start on Lumpy-haid McCain peectures.)
so.
# posted by ¡El Gato Negro! : 10:03 PM

So, as I read Thersites post on Kyle Sampson's doppelganger quality (for a fictitious alien), she immediately brought the unmet blogging-opportunity to mind.

¡Immediatamente, I had pounced onto the Google! Hunting the photos of el Cabezazo-trozo weeth fierce abandon and casting about the net for similar images, fictional or metaphoric.

Phffffft...

There are so many that could be employed, I hunted them like slow mice.

Mine for the catching.

Thees has been almost entirely too easy. Senadore Lumpy-haid has many exploitable weaknesses. The most obvious ones involve age, political inconsistency, and a naked lust for power wheech he has a hard time concealing.

¿¡Que divertido, no!?

Si, hilarity indeed, and jet, sometheeng important, she was lacking.

My image searches had led me to a stark realization about poking-the-fun at los Republiculos.

There are no spleet-screen images that one could exploit wheech would cut deeper than the real images of the pipples weeth whom the Republiculos candidates choose to associate.

To put eet another way: There ees no personage that joo could stick John McCain's head next to, wheech would be worse than the pipples whom he actually sticks hees head next to by choice.

...and Senadore Lumpy-haid ees no the only candidado Republiculo to have thees leetle problem, no? The other two hijos de putas enculamientos have also been buddy-buddy weeth the kind of pipples who are no good for the long-term health of any national campaign.

¿Seriously, can one possibly create a spleet-screen image that ees more troublesome for Mitt Romney than the existing shot of hees overlarge, brilliantined cabeza going ~~mano-a-mano~~ tête-à-tête weeth Annathema Coulter?

¿Likewise, ees anyone likely to manufacture an image of Giuliani wheech would have a more malign effect on hees Presidential ambitions than the very real photo of Rudy embracing hees B.F.F., the incompetent, mobbed-up adulterous gomberro, Bernie Kerik?

Eet seemed that I had reached an impasse. The Republiculo frontrunners, by and large, should receive far more ridicule from actual peectures for wheech they have posed than any self-satisfactory leetle mash-up wheech my poor mind could conceive.

Thees ees how matters stood, until thees week, when Las Dias-Felinas de Risa looked down upon their humble servant and smiled.

¿Now, who ees up for Rrround three?

¿eh?

*No leenk, joo can find eet easy enough eef joo are curious.
McCain in Baghdad photo via Jesus Generale

¡Happy Bloggiversary!

2007-04-01T02:40:00.001-07:00

¡Happy Two-Year Bloggiversary to Driftglass!

Eef joo are among los unfortunados who do no read Driftglass on a regular basis, I can only promise that I weel try to express my profound sympathy for joo een a way wheech weel no be too embarrassing, publicly.

Happy Bloggiversary to Driftglass, whose regular readers have the joy of a perpetual drive-in movie, where the concession stand is a library, and up on the screen you can see the work of a human whose love of the English language allows him to use it as a scalpel, a reservoir, and a bulldozer.

¡Simultaneously!

¡Vamanos!

Noticia de Despidida Muy Triste

2007-03-27T16:40:00.000-07:00

Today, la blogsfera says adíos to one of eet's most beloved members.

Teddy was one of the gatas primeras, one of the first cats that I ever encountered by thees curious and marvelous practice of "Cat Blogging",
the regular maintenance of said habit having an unmeasured yet inarguably beneficent effect on the level of discourse throughout la blogsfera.

Por favor, go over to First-Draft and help the wonderful Scout Prime say farewell to Teddy, one of the most vivacious gatas ever to grace la blogsfera weeth her loveliness.

En la paradiso de los Gatos,

the mice are just as slow or as fast as you choose,

the dogs all carry trays brimming with delicious kitty-treats,

and all the people who hated them on earth are put to work,

cleaning the solid-gold, heated and perfumed litter-boxes.

Adíos, Teddy.

Put Jour Money Where Jour Meow Ees.

2007-03-24T18:46:00.000-07:00

Amigos, thees seems to be fundraising week for many across the public media.

Now, our leetle treehouse-of-integritude runs no ads and accepts no donations
(bathe, bathe), so I could no raise money from our two dozen readers
(las bendiciones de la madre de las dias de las gatas de paradiso be upon joo)
even eef such was my weesh.

Amigos, leesten to the gato, verrry, verrry, carefully.

Take all the dinero that joo used to geeve to Nacional Públicos Relacións and put eet to work over at Orcinus.

David Neiwert and Sara Robinson are experienced journalists whose site helps fulfill a necessary role of la blogsfera.
Sr. Neiwert has done valuable work een showing how hard-right extremist thought has tried to spread eetself throughout the public discourse. He has related een a very thorough way where these ideas originated and who has largely been responsible for transmitting them een the traditionally compliant media.

Now Sra. Robinson and Sr. Neiwert have begun to address how to effectively respond and marginalize those extremist ideologues who profit from mixing together hate and nonsense and modern media.

Todays post from Sr. Neiwert, por ejemplo, looks at the hierarchical model of the media, originally promulgated by Walter Lippman (who has geeven the U.S. such wonderful curiosities as "The New Republiculo"), and what happens when that model breaks down, and why the whiny leetle sociedad des frotacionados profesionales stuck on the broken down heap expostulate so intemperately against their newer, faster, more accurate and si, less arrogant counterparts en la blogsfera.

¡Vamanos!

Becky the Calico: Transcript

2007-03-23T13:03:00.000-07:00

Last Monday, ¡El Gato Negro! wrote about how the traditional media can best begin to show respect for la blogsfera.
(Stossel, that litterbox weel no clean eetself, joo know.)

At the end of the post I offered what I felt was an insructive visual metaphor for the relationsheep between the traditional media and la blogsfera.

Thees involved a brief run-in between one Kathleen Cochrane, a reporter for Cleveland FOX affiliate WJW, and Becky, a Calico Cat weeth some strongly held views.
That wheech makes thees piece a perfect example of the media/blog dynamic ees made a leetle more clear when joo take into account not just what was said by Ms. Cochrane, but also the statements Becky made throughout the piece.

I know that thees was promised for earlier een the week, yet due to an extended bout of hairballs, I was unable to provide the full transcript of the encounter until today, but I am certain joo weel find eet an enlightening read for a Friday.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

-Female News Presenter: "Hi, everybody, thank you for joining us tonight. (camera change)
Jail is not enough for the judge who sentenced the pair on animal abuse charges."

-Male News Presenter: "Fox News Reporter Kathleen Cochrane, live in Russell Township-"

(camera shows Kathleen Holding Becky)

-Becky the Calico: "-ust want it on the record that this is under duress."

-Male News Presenter: "-has the details."

-Becky the Calico: "Please, let me go!"

-Kathleen Cochrane: "Hi, Bill and Stacy, well, the couple is accused of throwing two cats like this one here -"
(Kathleen hefts Becky the Calico, and jiggles Becky like the cat was a human child (Cats hate thees-egn))

-Becky the Calico: (looking directly at Ms. Cochrane) "Set me down! Who are you people?"

-Kathleen Cochrane: (overtalking) "-out of their car and killing them."

-Becky the Calico: "They did WHAT!? Oh my god! I have to get away from these lunatics!"

-Kathleen Cochrane: (overtalking again) "Now, as part of their sentence- this little guy (sic) is having fun-"

-Becky the Calico: (looking directly at floor, reaching down towards floor with her paws) "Please let me down, please?"

-Kathleen Cochrane: (still overtalking)- "having fun. But now, as part of their sentence, the couple is going to have to come right-"

-Becky the Calico: (fed up) "I said unhand me foul news creature!" (lunges towards Kathleen Cochrane's face)

-(crosstalk)-

-Kathleen Cochrane: (drops Becky, makes tiny noise) "ooooooerp!" (looks at camera for half a second, then bursts into tears)

-(Brief moment of silence as camera switches to shot of the floor of the shelter entrance, Becky the Calico is trying to claw the door open to get back inside, then camera switches back to Kathleen)-

-Kathleen Cochrane: (arms crossed protectively over chest for rest of piece)
"Well, there are lots of cats here. All of them are nice, y'know? And, honestly it's just my luck that something like that would happen. I'm obviously not a cat person. But the people here do say that they are looking forward to the people coming in and hope that they can leave here withsome type of education. You know, I had been holding that cat, everything had been going well until right when we came on the air, but I'm fine. Maybe just a little... scratches" (sic).

-Male News Presenter: "Uh, you know about reporters and animals, and that will end up on a reel for some reason."

-Kathleen Cochrane: "Oh, no kidding, that was like an out of body experience, how embarrassing."

-Female News Presenter: (suppressing a smile) "No, we're glad you're OK, that's all that matters."

-Male News Presenter: (suppressing smile) "Thanks, Kathleen."

-Kathleen Cochrane: (voice breaking) "I'm just fine." (gives half-hearted "thumbs-up" gesture)

-Female News Presenter: (suppressing smile) "Thanks."

-Kathleen Cochrane: (arms crossed protectively over chest) "Thanks."
____________________________________________________________________________________________

Amigos, I theenk the lesson here ees that eef reporters do no pay attention to what ees going on right een front of them, they may become the story themselves, eh?

**¡Koff! ¡Koff!** ¡Hrnrnrnrnrnrnrrrrnnn! ¡Koff-Koff! ¡Kinsley! **Koff-splat**

(Perdona mi)

Eet should be noted for the record, that een the follow up to the first piece, Kathleen Cochrane denies having broken down in tears. ("I was instantly laughing...") Also Becky ees shown having suffered no ill-effects from her ordeal.

Reached for comment, Becky said "I expressed myself rather forcefully, [and] felt better after I had done it,"

Oh, and as for why Kathleen Cochrane was ignoring the impatient and rapidly-becoming-cross ball of fur that she was holding, she says: "I just got into reporter mode"

(facepaw)

Thees, then, ees emblematic of what ees wrong weeth so much of what passes for journalism these days.

But as to Kathleen, well, eef she can maintain that oblivious "reporter mode", and lie weeth a straight face about what we all saw on camera, I'm sure she has a long, prosperous career ahead of her on FOX.

so.

Teh Eagles Have Crash-Landed/ Sadly, Mirrored

2007-03-20T21:36:00.000-07:00

Note: Eef the weengnutbars want to shut down Sadly, No! for posting the truth, we should spread that truth far and wide. ~ egn

Teh Eagles Have Crash-Landed
Originally Posted 20Mar06 at 23:31 by Gavin M.

So how many people were there, really, at the Gathering of Eagles demonstration? We don’t know, but here’s the final word on that ‘National Park Service’ figure of 30,000 pro-war demonstrators, now ubiquitous on the Web and in the right-leaning media.

Michelle Malkin wrote on Saturday that the figure came directly from the Gathering of Eagles:

***Update: Kit at Gathering of Eagles reports on the National Park Service estimate of the GoE turnout: 30,000 strong. The silent majority no more.***

Then at some point, the attribution changed:

***Update: Heidi at Gathering of Eagles reports on the National Park Service estimate of the GoE turnout: 30,000 strong. The silent majority no more.***

Here’s what the Gathering of Eagles site now says. That text, as well, has been changed since Sunday evening, when it only read, ‘the first unofficial estimate.’ (Emphasis ours):

2) the first unofficial NPS estimate of the Eagle turn-out today…

30,000!

That figure may be adjusted upward as more figure are tallied during the week.

Now here’s what the Park Service has to say about it:

Dear Mr. […]:

I am the spokesperson for the National Park Service in Washington, D.C. I never issued any statement of any kind about anything related to this past weekend’s events, let alone anything about crowd size. In fact, I was never asked that question by anyone.

Anyone who gives any crowd size number or figure for this past weekend is making the figure up and does not have any authorization whatsoever to attribute those figures to the National Park Service. Since I never issued any such statement nor was ever the question raised in the first place, it is impossible to attribute any figures to the National Park Service for this past weekend’s events.

Lastly, Congress prohibits the National Park Service from giving or providing any crowd estimate for any permitted event on the National Mall.

I hope this is of help and clarification for you.

Bill Line
Communications & Tourism Officer
National Park Service
National Capital Region
1100 Ohio Drive, SW
Washington, D.C. 20242

Looks like someone has some ’splaining to do.

One more thing: Below is the attendance petition circulated widely on the Internet by the Gathering of Eagles organizers, in order to gauge the number of demonstrators:

To: All Interested Parties

We, the undersigned, pledge to attend the March 17th Gathering of Eagles in Washington, D.C. We intend to stand guard at our nation’s sacred memorials to honor the memory of our troops who died in service of our great country. We promise to recognize and reflect on the sacrifice of our fallen heroes.

Please sign here only IF you WILL be in attendance at the Vietnam War Memorial on March 17th. We are trying to obtain an accurate total so we know how many to expect. There is another petition at: http://www.petitiononline.com/GOE317/petition.html - please sign there if you will be with us IN SPIRIT.

Our troops, current and prior, are true heroes and we will honor each and every one of them by standing side by side, heads held high, defending the sanctity of our nation’s monuments to veterans. Our sacred pledge is that our actions will honor those heroes and that we will respect their service and their sacrifice.

I WILL be at the Gathering of Eagles on March 17th in Washington, DC.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

1826 Total Signatures

One would have to say that 1,826 doesn’t seem very close at all to the figure the right-wing noisemakers have been cheering about.

Then again, another petition for people who pledged to ‘be there in spirit’ has 4155 signatures, so maybe there was also a big pro-war demonstration in Second Life or something.

Putting the "C" een CPAC

2007-03-20T18:42:00.000-07:00

Earlier this year, just after Ann Coulter's annual bout of verbal dysentery at the CPAC conference, Glenn Greenwald wrote an excellent piece in Salon(watch the ad to see the post) from wheech I would like to quote the first few paragraphs, purely to help others play connect-the-dots:

The right-wing cult of contrived masculinity
(updated below)
In a very vivid way, this Ann Coulter moment is shining a light on the right-wing movement that is so bright that even national journalists would be able to recognize some important truths if they just looked even casually. Kirsten Powers was on Fox last night with Bill O'Reilly and Michelle Malkin and, as shocking as it is, Powers managed to ask the only question that matters with this whole episode, thereby forcing Malkin to make the critical concession, the one which right-wing pundits have been desperate to avoid:

KP: [Coulter] has said a lot of horrible things . . . . she's done all these things. And I don't understand why if this is the pre-eminent conservative movement place to be speaking, why she is chosen as a person to speak . . .

BO: Why do you think they invited her, Michelle?

MM: She's very popular among conservatives. And let me say this. I have been a long-time admirer of much of Ann's work. She has done yeomen's work for conservatism. But I think, lately, over the last couple of years, that there has been this penchant for hurling these kinds of bombs.

And there is a divided opinion among grass-roots conservatives about what she did. I was one of the people who condemned the raghead comment last year . . . . If going into 2008, that is what the Republican Party is trying to do and win back the Congress and take the Congress and win the White House, having her there is not going to be a help.

This is why -- the only reason -- Coulter's remarks are so significant. And the significance lies not just in this specific outburst on Friday but in the whole array of hate-mongering, violence-inciting remarks over all these years. Its significance lies in the critical fact that Malkin expressly acknowledged: "She's very popular among conservatives." The focus of these stories should not be Coulter, but instead, should be the conservative movement in which Ann Coulter -- precisely because of (not "despite") her history of making such comments -- is "very popular." (Note, too, that Malkin urges that Coulter be shunned not because her conduct is so reprehesensible, but because her presence "is not going to be a help" win the 2008 election)

(emphasis Greenwald's except for the first statement een bold)

Greenwald, as usual, heets the nail on the head as to the matter of Coulter's popularity among Movement-Conservatives.

Now, intrepid and perspicacious journalist Sara Robinson, from Orcinus, has a more specific answer to Kirsten Power's question about

"why she is chosen as a person to speak . . . "

My, my, my. It's such a cozy little world… especially if you're a conservative.
We all know Ann Coulter's said some grotesquely hateful things over the years. What you may not realize, though, is how many of the most memorable bombshells got dropped in just one venue. She seems to save up her most horrific stuff for the annual CPAC conference, where she's been a fixture for many years. In fact, looking back on just her CPAC performances alone is a fairly comprehensive summary of Coulter's most gobstopping moments:

Mrs. Robinson lays out a number of Coulter's sheet-headed audible gnashings from past CPAC conferences, and leaves no doubt about one theeng.

Kicking Coulter out of CPAC would be like kicking Cheney from the Republiculo party, and ees just about as likely to happen.

Go, read the whole piece to get the full effect, Coulter and CPAC are intertwined. Greenwald was more right then he knew.

As for Malkin's recent tiff weeth Ann (& her leetle cabana-boy), I would just like to point out that while CPAC security apparently allowed Michelle Malkin to be accosted by a someone more dangerous than a serial killer, they were going above and beyond the call of duty to protect poor, helpless Ann from thees guy:

(Dan) Borchers is the most mild-mannered, humble Christian. He is critical of the way Ann Coulter has "mainstreamed extremism" and has written articles about her. He accused her of plagiarizing her early books, and at the CPAC conference two years ago, he tried to distribute press kits calling for Coulter to stop her hate speak.

...and just for that, when Borchers made an appearance at CPAC thees year, he was grabbed, roughly dragged around the conference area, threatened, publicly embarrassed, and allegedly assaulted.

I guess we know where their priorities are, no?

so.

Anatomy of a Con Job/ Sadly, Mirrored

2007-03-19T22:45:00.000-07:00

Note: Eef the weengnutbars want to shut down Sadly, No! for posting the truth, we should spread that truth far and wide. ~ egn

Anatomy Of A Con Job
First Posted 19Mar06 3:26 by Gavin M.

As we know, opinion against the war in Iraq, and against President Bush, now stands at between 60 and 70 percent in America. If you’re a right-wing authoritarian follower, how do you continue to prop up the necessary belief that you represent a silent majority of downtrodden patriots, and that someday a real rain will come and wash the scum off the streets?

Luckily, there are people out there to do that thinking for you.
_______________________________________________________________________________

Above: Right-wing astroturfer Larry Bailey

Step One: Invent a phony threat — for instance, to the Vietnam War Memorial:

As a Vietnam veteran, and suffering through fox-hole combat, and knowing what the anti-war movement did to America and to my morale of me and the morale other troops during the Vietnam era, the thought of elements of those same vile and vicious people attempting to resurrect their venom and use the Vietnam Memorial Wall as a proxy was intolerable. My view was it must be challenged, and in short it cannot happen.

The current anti-war movement is no different than the Vietnam era group, in fact many current participants are the same people who were involved in the 60s and 70s. They lie, deceive, distort, damage, desecrate, spit on our military, curse, hurl insults, and dishonor not only historical sites but hallowed ground if given the opportunity.

Step Two: Create a fake-nonpartisan campaign to ‘protect’ the memorial from the vile and vicious spitters-on and desecrators-of, who are converging on DC in a mammoth hippie tidal wave:

Our Mission Statement

1. Gathering of Eagles is non-partisan. While each member has his or her own political beliefs, our common love and respect for America and her heroes is what brings us together.

Actually, they’re about as non-partisan as this. Note the Vets For The Truth address through which contributions are funneled:

Please send checks or money orders to:
Vets for the Truth
ATTN: Gathering of Eagles
PO Box 291
Chocowinity, NC 27817

And note, as well, the enthusiastic pre-publicity from commentators such as Michelle Malkin:

SAYING ‘NO!’ TO CINDY
A ‘GATHERING OF EAGLES’ TO MARCH FOR AMERICA

How many times have you sat in front of the TV over the last four years, watching anti-war activists march on Washington, chase the ROTC off your local college campus, vandalize war memorials, insult the troops and wreak havoc under the surrender banner?

How many times have you thought to yourself: What can I do?

As your planning continues, begin referring to all supporters as ‘veterans’ regardless of whether they’ve ever served in the military. This makes it look like it’s a rally of non-partisan veterans — which is altogether much better, and much more likely to be taken seriously by the media, than a rally of Republican zealots frightened that the zeitgeist is escaping them.

Also be sure to stir up the Freeper beehive, because a Freeper will fall for anything if you slap a flag on it — let alone a flag, an eagle, and the word, ‘troops.’

Serious Media Inquiries:
Kristinn Taylor

Above: Taylor, national spokesman of Free Republic

Join forces with other phony-nonpartisan groups:

Above: The inimitable Move America Forward Foundation

At last the day arrives. Have a bunch of people stand around heckling war protesters for a few hours:

Step Three: Declare victory! The Vietnam Memorial was saved!

A pure, grass-roots effort, the Gathering of Eagles’ volunteers matched the massive Soros-funded anti-war machine sign for sign, chant for chant, and marcher for marcher. The contrast was most stark right before the entrance to the Memorial Bridge, where Eagles gathered with a field of American flags–while anti-Bush, 9/11 conspiracy nuts wrapped themselves in a figurative blanket of yellow “Out of Iraq” placards. Several of the vets shouted, “Yellow! How appropriate!” in between spirited chants of “U.S.A! U.S.A!” While the classless Cindy Sheehan ranted profanely, the Eagles raised their voices in polite, but roaring disapproval and raised their American flags in answer to the ANSWER socialists’ Che banners and peace pennants.

America was strengthened:

When history is written, March 17th, 2007 will at long last eclipse March 17, 1967, as the day when soldiers in faraway Iraq and Afghanistan knew for certain, no matter what real time saw them doing, love and respect await their safe return. The day when it was proven to a watching world that Washington war memorials stand for what they always stood for, time immemorial, the day when the graves of fallen American soldiers the world were warmer.

Never again will America’s brave warriors and their cause be abandoned and the people our country has pledged to liberate be left to perish at the hands of tyrants. Those days are most definitely over.

Whilst enjoying the afterglow, make up a jaw-dropping unofficial attendance figure, for instance that 30,000 heroes stood up for America against the dirty-hippie communist menace — of whom there wasn’t really a mammoth tidal wave after all, which also equals a victory.

What an outstanding day! The Eagles soared!

You should be very proud of your fellow veterans, families, and supporters. There’s so much to tell, and we encourage you to post your experiences in the the comments.

In the meantime, two items of business: 1) we have a gallery open for you to upload your digital photos to the website. That way you can share your photos with others. See the tab in the top right corner of the site. 2) the first unofficial estimate of the Eagle turn-out today…

30,000!

That figure may be adjusted upward as more figure are tallied during the week. Fox News reported today that the anti-war protesters had significantly less than they expected. However, they are erroneously reporting that the Eagles were there in “equal numbers”. The truth is that we outnumbered them by at least three to one!

Go farther! Here Michelle Malkin claims without any evidence that it’s an official number (emphasis added):

Blogburst: Gathering of Eagles–30,000 strong
By Michelle Malkin

***Update: Kit at Gathering of Eagles reports on the National Park Service estimate of the GoE turnout: 30,000 strong. The silent majority no more.***

Here’s Brent Bozell’s Newsbusters:

Gathering of Eagles (GoE): An Indicator of Old Media Decline

Gathering of Eagles’ web site reports that they were told by the National Park Service that their GoE estimate is ….. is …..

30,000

GoE’s site is also saying that the protester counts being reported elsewhere were 5,000 to 10,000 (the Times reported “thousands” and WaPo said “several thousand,” but both papers acknowledged that the protester turnout was much lower than at a similar event in January).

Remember not to check the original source: Citing AmericaPundit who cites FreedomWarrior who cites someone else citing three other people who cite what Michelle Malkin says about what the GoE site says, is what they mean by ‘the self-correcting blogosphere.’ If it weren’t true, someone would have said so.

Anyone who is not a dirty hippie should be thrilled by the turnout. I figured a few thousand people would show up, not 30,000. This is an estimate from the National Park Service, not from the GoE organization.It’s a testament of rational people trying to take the country back. The sad part is that most of the press was given to the psychotic, immoral moonbats there protesting the war.

Also, if other published figures contradict the 30,000-heroes one, don’t forget to keep up a constant drone of indignant complaint about the biased liberal MSM, because they super-lie about everything with gigantic crazy lies, just for the sake of dragging America down. Malkin updates:

***Update March 18, 2007 1:30am: The NYTimes lies…***

Pure bullcrap. Yup, the journalistic standard-bearers of the NYTimes relied on “several veterans of the antiwar movement” to give them crowd estimates of the Gathering of Eagles. It’s the domestic equivalent of MSMers relying on dubious Iraqi stringers to provide them with war coverage while they sit in their comfy Green Zone offices in D.C. and Manhattan.

Don’t believe the MSM — either their lying by entirely omitting any mention of the numbers of people attending the Gathering of Eagles, or their deliberate playing down of the numbers who did come. The Parks and Service people counted thirty thousand patriots gathered to protect the Wall.

So what else is new, except in this case their lies are more than usually blatant in favor of their personal agenda. The National Park Service’s first estimate of the turnout of Eagles is, wait for it: 30000.

Say guys, I heard some hippies are threatening to desecrate various locations in and around Baghdad. Why don’t the 30,000 of y’all surge on over?

…Hey wait, where did everybody go?

Update: No such Park Service, Parks Service, or Parks and Service estimate has appeared in any form, and no publicly available photo on the Web — although please correct us if we’re wrong — shows more than a couple of hundred pro-war demonstrators in any place at any time.

Update:

Rrrespect

2007-03-19T16:24:00.000-07:00

¡Sagrado Sagrante Saguaros de Santo Salvador Dali!

The events, how they overtake one, earlier thees week, ¡El Gato Negro! posited that eef los bloggeros weere ever to be respected by the traditional media, one of the theengs they would have to embrace was a scrupulous accuracy.

Of course, een just that few days, some leading lights en la blogsfera begin to get the grudging nod from The New York Times (FDL), and the L.A. Times (TPM).

Now, joo must understand, ¡El Gato Negro! had geeven thees matter less than a Goldbergian amount of thought, so perhaps eet was predictable that he would make hees case een an unwieldly manner. Wheech ees no to mention that the mighty paws of ¡El Gato Negro! are unsuited to the straightlaced regimen of the standard qwerty-type keyboard, wheech may have aided ¡El Gato Negro! een inadvertently mis-stating hees thesis.

He deed no mean to suggest that la blogsfera ees innaccurate, only that the commonly held misperception that we are such should endeavour us to strive for accuracy, as a watchword, and a hallmark of all the bloggers who would be said to have integrity, both een the stories we report, and een the targets we choose.

Nor deed he mean to suggest that all bloggers should stoop to gain the affection of la sociedad de los frotcaionados profesionales de la prenza, apestosa maracon des playas sin cojones qui chingas ses madres that they are, nor las Democratistas Invertebradas and their leek-speetle toadies een the Consultaría politica.

Recently, Media Matter's Eric Boehlert said:

"It's also time for [them] to show influential liberal bloggers a little love."

He was speaking of the WashingComPost een particular, but the same sentiment has been expressed more widely, about the media een general.

As a matter of mere strategy, ¡El Gato Negro! does no hold weeth the otherwise fantastic Boehlert on thees point. ¡El Gato Negro! theenks that the media needs to geeve the la blogsfera more than just "a litte love", he believes that the media needs to show us some respect.

By wheech he does NO mean "treat us like we were just like them".

No, no... joo would need to have a pretty funny definiton of "respect" to theenk that ¡El Gato Negro! would endorse such a theeng.

Allow me to geeve joo half a dozen examples of what ¡El Gato Negro! means when he mentions the traditional media "showing respect" for los bloggerros.

-The Rude Pundit has hees own Broadcast Network Sunday Morning Show

-Katherine Q. "Kit" Seelye is relieved to learn that she can use Norbizness as an anonymous source on background, and refers to heem as "the left".

-CNN pre-empts "The Situation Room" een order to cover the Fafblog Reunion live.

-Chris Matthews develops an embarrassing man-crush on a certain "Sweaty lunk".

-On "Reliable Sources", Kate O' Bierne, Howie Kurtz, and George Will squabble over who gets to present Jane Hamsher weeth the Sacred-Bejeweled-Weenie-Tongs.

-John Stossel ees cleaning ¡El Gato Negro!'s litter-box.

-Sadly, No! ees handling election night coverage.

Thees, then, ees what ¡El Gato Negro! means, when he says the traditonal media should "show respect" to los bloggerros.

The goal ees eminently attainable, the point of my last post was seemply that accuracy ees an essential, an "Integral" part of the engine that weel get us there. Accuracy een the sense that los bloggerros must remain streectly accurate to be trusted as a primary source of information, and een the sense that we must be accurate regarding our choice of targets. Some sources of poisonous discourse are too large to be effectively addressed by la blogsfera alone, some are weetheen range, and can be pressured to reduce or reform their ruinous effect, or pay a price een advertising dolares and loss of influence weetheen their political party.

I regret any confusion that may have been caused, and so, to illustrate my point, I would like to apply an instructive visual metaphor.

The role of los bloggerros ees portrayed herein by "Becky", a tailess calico of the sort that reportedly made Ex Attorney General John Ashcroft "anoint heemself".

The role of the traditional media ees portrayed by FOX/WJW Cleveland's Kathleen Cochrane.

so.

One final note: Een anticipation of an attempt by some to suggest that by presenting the behavior of la gata calica as a metaphor for the relationsheep of los bloggerros to the traditional media, I am advocating violence:

Nothing could be further from the truth, and een support of thees statement,¡El Gato Negro! weel endeavour to next publish the full transcreept.

Melanie Morgan's Response to Walter Reed Scandal

2007-03-18T12:33:00.000-07:00

From MelanieMorgan.com:

Melanie responds at Move America Forward:

When it comes to supporting the troops, you can't beat a Yellow Ribbon Patriot. Right, Mel?

More to come...

Rip -

All the yellow ribbons on all the cars in the world

2007-03-15T22:16:00.000-07:00

If you’ve never read Milo’s accounts of serving in the Middle East, you’re missing out on some heavy, and heady, stuff. You owe it to yourself to check out his blog, The Calm Before the Sand.

His latest

Think about this experience, and multiply it by thousands and thousands of troops and families, thousands of times over the last 4 years.

Melanie Morgan can shriek about supporting the troops, Move America Forward can run their pro-war ads 24/7, George Bush can babble about higher callings and greater causes until he’s hoarse – none of it will dull the pain or fill the void these families are experiencing, over and over again.

Bring them home.

Rip -

Heeeeeee's Ba-aaaaack.

2007-03-13T17:58:00.000-07:00

Mike Stark's most wonderful blog, Calling All Wingnuts ees back online.

Sr. Stark's blog had mysteriously disappeared after he visited the notorious CPAC conference, where he inadvertently showed that the majority of the Cheetoh-sphere ees populated by histrionic bedwetters.

Vamos, go and say "hola" to Mike and tell heem joo are glad to see that he's back and ees once again enraging the weengnuts.

so.

Blog-Integral: Accuracy

2007-03-12T12:29:00.000-07:00

One of the hallmarks of Integrity, especially as eet relates to blogging, ees accuracy.

For the sake of thees discussion I would even posit that accuracy is the load-bearing-wall of Blog-Integrity (eef such a term ees to have any constant meaning beyond a cathartic parody of a similar conceptual portmanteau more broadly defined, and covering a wider range of reprehensible acts as a result).

¿Where was I?

Oh, si, accuracy.

Eef los bloggerros are to hold any longterm hope of being respected, even grudgingly, een the traditional media, they must be scrupulously accurate, for traditional media holds weeth the perceived sloppiness of la blogsfera as a dog stubbornly holds to a drool-encrusted, bedraggled and foul-smelling pet-toy.

No, thees ees not about Ann Coulter.

Let me begin again.

Amigos, accuracy ees the sine qua non of Blog-Integrity. Accuracy een blogging ees an ongoing process, as blogging ees a process. The increasing influence of la blogsfera means that thees process must be geeven a priority, and ees due constant attention.

Weeth thees een mind, eet was pleasantly reassuring to read the recent work of Michael Suskind, of the blog Drawing the Line. Over the course of three exhaustively well-researched posts at DTL (Cross-posted at Naranjo Diablo), Suskind challenges a claim that had been gaining ground across la blogsfera, to weet: That el Chimperador's administration has been scrubbing the Whitehouse web site.

Update 14Mar by egn: Suskind was responding to thees original blog-post, wheech ees also mentioned een the primero dKos diary leested below.

Thees ees a serious accusation, for, as Suskind tells us, El Chimperador's administration has been caught doing thees very theeng once before, and the information that had been removed was placed back on the site.

¿So why wouldn't they do eet again, eh?

¿Ees eet no rrreasonable to assume they would?

Suskind assumes nothing, thoroughly investigates the claim by digging through publicly available sources, and comes to an interesting conclusion. Then, being a thorough sort of journalist, he checks hees findings against a different source, a source weeth wheech joo may be familiar.

I weel no geeve away too much, only that eet makes a good read, so vamos, go and enjoy.

Oh, y tambien, I weel say gracias to Sr. Suskind for having shown heemself able to fulfeel such a necessary role en la blogsfera.

Gracias.

Drawing the line
What I did not find at Whitehouse.gov
Are Any Cheney Files Missing?"
Replies

Update: I wanted to post the original dKos diaries as well, for two reasons:

1. the comment threads are eenstructive, and

2. The original dKos diary from suskind carries thees leetle gem:

I emailed the author with 19 points of inaccuracies in his diary, and missing information, but received no answer. I also emailed two front pagers asking "What should I do?" I heard back from one of them it said "correct him at your own risk."

(emphasees by egn)

...muy divertido.

What I Did NOT Find at Whitehouse.gov by suskind, dKos diary,
Sun Mar 04, 2007

What I Did NOT Find at Whitehouse dot gov by suskind, dKos diary,
Sun Mar 05, 2007

¡Spocko attains internet immortality!

2007-03-08T19:32:00.000-08:00

Savage Weiner & Mann Coulter get "Spocko-ed"

Sara Robinson (of Orcinus) coins a handy phrase for what ees sure to become an even more popular tactic among los bloggerros.

Por favor, read the whole theengy.

Then, go forth and "Spocko".

¡Vamanos!

New Orleans to Bush: We Rebuke You!

2007-03-02T13:08:00.000-08:00

We live in a devastated city and you are a big part of the reason why it still sits in ruins. Your administration has abandoned our children by savaging their public schools. Your administration has tortured our working class people by refusing to reopen the city's public housing developments. And your administration is fully complicit in placing our uninsured in harm's way by ruthlessly pursuing the privitization of public healthcare in the aftermath of Katrina. And, finally your administration is guilty of sending our sons and daughters to war for oil and empire just when we need them most to help us rebuild our community.

Mr. President, we, Katrina Survivors all, do notwelcome you to our city, we rebuke you!

Sponsored by Survivors Village, United Front for Affordable Housing

(504) 587-0080

If you have a blog, please consider posting this today.

(via Spocko's Brain, from the inestimable Scout at First Draft, and via Humid City)

OI, DEAD!

2007-02-23T00:37:00.000-08:00

A few days ago Scott pointed out that Online Integrity is dead. Now, I think there's plenty of actual integrity online, so that's good. But the Online Integrity of the sort sponsored by our good friend Tacitus, aka Josh Trevino -- well, that's gone and buried, done and over. And that's even better.

As any number of people picked up on at the time, last May, the big problem with the "OI" project was that the person who was pushing it, this Trevino fellow, himself lacks integrity, in the same rather spectacular negative fashion that the Sun lacks ice cream. Oh, he talks about "honor" all the time, like he's Worf or something. But when he says "honor" he says it like you'd phonetically pronounce a word in a foreign language that you don't understand.

It was, and is, too rich: here was someone wanting to primarily define "integrity" as "respect for a person's right to anonymity online," who had been notorious for stunts like this. And the incident where he coquettishly let slip Billmon's last name. And other nonsense. The record shows that Tac sees anonymity or pseudonymity solely as an opportunity to whip out a cudgel against someone he doesn't like, because if you can "out" them, oh boy, you've got one over on them! What a mighty little fellow you are! Have a biscuit! Hence his addiction to using real names whenever he can, even when he knows full well that the other person is known online by a pseudonym. And even when it's pointless because the target doesn't really care. (The purpose is to insult, as in the infantile usage, "The Democrat Party." Bonus insulting points in that he doesn't say "fuck" so he's still one "civil" little Fauntleroy!)

So for Tac to start up an "Online Integrity" project where everyone would swear not to out people, well, that was like the Ted Haggard Crusade Against Meth n' Gay Hookers. Just too funny. So my initial response, once I heard it was him behind it all, was to make fun of it. And to complete the joke, this Online Blogintegrity site that began as a parody is still in existence, and indeed about to evolve (more on that soon).

Indeed, from our vantage point right now, it's pretty clear just what exactly Online Integrity always was: the bouquet of flowers the abuser buys in order to prove -- mostly to himself -- that he's... not an abuser. Witness Tac's behavior in this recent Sadly No thread. It's been going on for days now. (Scroll down to the end for the real fun, where Tac reveals the nickname of the sports teams at the CC where I teach, immediately after he has accused Scott Lemieux and HTML/Retardo of being "obsessives" because they read and criticize his blog posts.)

Integrity consists in holding to a principle because it's a principle. If you have respect for the legitimacy of anonymity or pseudonymity online, then you do not under any circumstances violate that principle.

So much for Tac's "principles." He's right now in the process of violating a principle he once launched a public campaign to champion.

I think that's super.

(Crossposted to Whiskey Fire)

Rust in Pieces

2007-02-19T15:48:00.000-08:00

In case you haven't heard yet, Josh Trevino's Online Integrity is no more. (Take that any way you want it.)

I'm sure it's only a matter of time before someone accuses us of pulling their plug. (That should be taken in a technological sense, not the... y'know... other sense.)

More to come, as the inebriation... err... story develops.

Rip -

Update: By ¡EGN!

Well, hees site may be no more, but Treviño remains active online, holding fast to the principles he set forth een hees now defunct leetle pledge. We can see a primo example of thees een the comments section of thees post over at Sadly, No!

Context: ¡Zombis Mentirosos!

2007-02-07T14:15:00.000-08:00

(Context: Lying Zombies)

Practically anyone who has read political blogs for any amount of time has met the seemingly undead weengnut talking points. Eef joo run afoul of these horrorosos, joo can rarely free jourself from their steenky embrace merely through the use of logic, reasoning, or appeals to one's better nature.

Over a year ago, Azul Grande labeled them ¡las Mentiras de las Zombis! or Zombie Lies! and rightfully so. Multiple debunkings appear to have no effect on these tweested leetle fairy tales.

The only sure tactic appears to be massive applications of ridicule, and even then, the strongest Zombie-Lies are only marginalized.

Some can lay dormant for years, awaiting only the barest opportunity to once more raise their lumpy, toothless skulls, break free of their tombs, and terrorize a feckless, fawning Sociedad de las Frotacionados Profesionales into once more repeating their unholy brain-sucking mantras:

"¡¡¡OOOo0ooOOo00oooaaughhhhhh!!!"

"Aaah-braaamofff gaaave mOo0ney to bOo0th parrrtiesss"

"J0oOeee Willllsuhnn 0oOuted hisssss Oo0wnnn wiiiiiife"

"¡¡Blaahhhrrrghglglglllllllrrrrrrrspp!!"

...and so on, and so forth, eh?

Joo would need an army of Bruce Campbells to even make a dent een the sheer numbers of these infernal just-so-stories.

Regarding the ongoing Spocko Saga, the most noticeably unquiet of the current clutch of mouldering ghastly untruths ees the one most easily overlooked. Wheech ees no suprise, as eet appears weetheen the pixelated hyper-spew of vociferously expressed neuroses wheech appears under the unfortunate title "The Cat Call."

(I weel no provide a link) Here ees the URL:

h t t p ://melaniemorgan.com/TheCatCall.html

Let us glance at a sample of the caterwauling that thees "Cat" does, eh?

During his debate on Reliable Sources, Stark used specious arguments to defend his buddy, an anonymous Star Trek-obsessed blogger, Spocko, who used out-of-context quotes from KSFO radio talent in an effort to turn away advertisers and, thus, squelch the 1st Amendment Rights of the radio personalities.

Thees ~~paragraph~~ sentence eetself ees a dozen different kinds of crazy, but I would like to focus on one leetle part:

"...Spocko, who used out-of-context quotes from KSFO radio talent..."

Here eet ees again, back from the dead. Thees particular chunk of ambulatory stupid has been debunked at least once already. However, like the brainless zombi, thees moronic whine about "context" climbs back out of the grave to stalk the overcrowded tubes of outer-wingnuttia.

Well then, merely for the sake of finding a more accurate target for our ridicule, let us look more closely at the "context" of one of the controversial statements from SNUFFRadio560am's "talent". Thees ees from the "talented" Lee Rodgers:

"Now you start with the Sears DieHard, the battery cables connected to his testicles, and you entertain him with that for a while, and then
you blow his bleeping head off."

¿Of whom ees Rodgers Speaking? ¿A terrorist?

¿A serial killer?

¿Maybe a republican pedophile?

No, no. Rodgers ees speaking about one Kevin Holder.

LINCOLN, Neb. Aug 15, 2006 (AP)— Kevin Holder's rap sheet is 43 pages long, dating back to 1980, and he just got another entry his 226th arrest. Police say they caught him Sunday morning after a brief chase and found burglar tools in his possession.
"He's very well-known to Lincoln police officers," Police Chief Tom Casady said.

Oooooooh... thees sounds like a dangerous hombre, no? I wonder what sort or horrrrible deeds he has been up to?

Holder's convictions include criminal mischief, marijuana possession, violation of protection order, assault, resisting arrest, assault on an officer, possession of cocaine.

What? No charges of "Shot a man just for snoring"?

Many were misdemeanors, but he also has been sentenced to at least three prison terms for felonies, including a four-year stretch starting in 1996.

Now, I am no advogato, yet I am fairly sure that assault on an officer ees a felony, and possession of cocaine can be a felony, depending on how much joo are carrying, and for some reason what form the cocaine ees een, and the color of the possessor's skin. (the story does no specify).

Ciertamente, thees man ees an habitual criminal and drug addict. He obviously needs drug rehab, and probably weel do jail time (the article suggests that thees ees likely).

¿¡But wait, that's all!?

¿¿I mean, really, that's eet??

¿¿Breaking and entering, resisting arrest, punched a cop while on cocaine, and for that Rodgers wants to electrically torture the man's genitals, then "blow his 'bleeping' head off"??

Eet seems as eef Lee Rodgers ees no so much interested een justice, as he ees een dispensing violence to pipples that he doesn't like.

To wheech I can only reiterate the thoughts of mi compañerro Thersites, when he handled thees matter briefly.

(Monday, January 22, 2007)

Now, this may come as news ... but when you say (paraphrasing) "let's look at the context in which he said 'let's hook his dick up to the battery cables,'" you have just lost any claim to the moral high ground. No, seriously. Even Michelle Malkin's guest posters get this simple point.

Thersites ees correct, for, over at Malkin's site, we read thees, from one See-Dubya:

Sheppard thinks this proves something:

It’s a bit different when you find out that Rodgers and Morgan were discussing a felon that had been arrested 236 times, and were thereby using the Sears DieHard image to mock the justice and penal systems for his continued presence on the streets. Wouldn’t you agree?

Um, no. No, I most definitely wouldn't. I don't care if the guy had two thousand felonies, I don't want the state shooting people for property crimes. Battery cables on the testicles and summary executions may be cool within the Mahdi army or Chi-Com dungeons, but not here in America. There's nothing conservative about that sadistic, statist fantasy and as a conservative myself I don't like being associated with it.

When joo are so out-of-bounds that a Malkinite backbencher can see eet, buddy, joo got a beeger problem than lack of adequate context, no?

To sum up, we see een thees seengle example how learning the context of these statements can reveal that the statements themselves are more offensive than previously thought.

Thees ees enough to make one wonder about the contexts of other statements by KSFO personnel. So, I theenk that we shall be looking at the contexts of more of "SNUFF Radio's greatest hits" een the days to come, eh?

so.

[Rip adds another layer of context] -

"Now you start with the Sears DieHard, the battery cables connected to his testicles, and you entertain him with that for a while, and then you blow his bleeping head off."

I wonder if this is the standard for employee conversation at ABC/Disney corporate offices. I've done some white collar time and, at least in the multi-national corporations I worked at, that quote would be grounds for a quick trip to the HR office and an asterisk on your merit review.

Perhaps ABC attorney, Enid Karpeh, could enlighten us. Or perhaps Jack Swanson could provide some clarification. We'll wait...

Liars, Thieves and Hypocrites

2007-02-05T20:20:00.000-08:00

Well, it seems that KSFO Drama Queen and PR Patriot, Melanie Morgan, just can’t get enough of playing the victim, and has turned her personal website into a blubbering collection of posts that let her play Damsel in Distress, hounded by dark and mysterious forces. Ooooh, high drama, indeed! So, let’s have some fun with that, shall we?

First, some background I put together before the San Francisco Thousand Watt Circle Jerk© on Jan 12th.

Morgan and Coulter love attention from Liberals
('It makes us a bigger bullseye for the Left - and that's always a good thing')

Morgan and Rodgers love to hear from Liberals
('Please keep the hate mail coming. We enjoy it immensely - We want to offend you')

As you can see and hear, Morgan and Rodgers have no problem with attention from liberals or Teh Left – they enjoy it! So keep it up, kids!

From Melanie's site:

Re: Sussman and the “halfrican” comment:

I want to officially correct the record regarding false allegations made against me by those on the political far Left, who are always quick to distort what I say for their own polical aggrandizement.

During an on-air discussion, I made reference to his using this term, and thereafter I let Mr. Sussman know that I did not approve of it. Terms that needlessly make reference to race or ethnic makeup are in poor taste.

The "halfrican" clip

First of all, what were these false allegations made against you? I’d say the focus was on Brian Sussman, since he made the comment, but enjoy your status as a self-styled victim, Melanie.

Second, you’re clearly laughing in this audio clip, then the topic changes to Hillary Clinton. So, when did you “let Mr. Sussman know that [you] did not approve of it”? As you said, you brought it up, but I don’t hear any protestation or chastisement in this audio clip. If it was so offensive to you, why would you bring it up for public consumption on your radio show? You could very easily have mentioned your disapproval to Brian in private and let the issue be forgotten. In his apology (see below) Brian even mentions that you looked “uncomfortable” as he continued his dialogue – why didn’t you say something then, on the air?

Tell you what – you send me a clip wherein you tell Brian you disapprove of the term “halfrican”, and I’ll issue a retraction. Until then, I can only assume you’re covering your ass.

As for Brian’s apology, this makes for an interesting segue to a related topic. Again, from Melanie’s personal site:

And here are Brian's own words about the subject in this audio link.

I’ll give Brian credit and acknowledge that it was a pretty decent apology. But here’s where the other topic comes up. Remember what actually turned this into a big ordeal? An attorney for ABC (KSFO’s parent company), Enid Karpeh, sent Spocko’s hosting company a C&D letter regarding copyrighted materials on his website, and his site was pulled, Fair Use be damned!

Did you check the URL for Sussman’s apology? Let me post it for you:

http://www.melaniemorgan.com/1_short_sussman_apology.mp3

Yes, Melanie is hosting, not linking, copyrighted material on her personal website. Material that is copyrighted to ABC Radio/Disney. Want more? Sure you do! Again, from Melanie’s personal website:

Hear our three hour special broadcast in which we do the "Ultimate Smack-Down" of pinhead, cheesy cartoon characters with keyboards.

Oh, Melanie, you just don’t get it do you? The fact that KSFO forced you to break format and air a special program to deal with the fallout of your homicidal ranting just proves that you and your colleagues got the “Ultimate Smackdown.” Sorry, babe – in the PR world, it was an unqualified disaster.

But, let’s take a look at what Melanie posted. Here are the links to all 3 hours of the San Francisco Thousand Watt Circle Jerk© audio, in WMP and Real Player formats:

http://www.melaniemorgan.com/audio/ksfo1.asx
http://www.melaniemorgan.com/audio/ksfo2.asx
http://www.melaniemorgan.com/audio/ksfo3.asx
http://www.melaniemorgan.com/audio/ksfo1.ram
http://www.melaniemorgan.com/audio/ksfo2.ram
http://www.melaniemorgan.com/audio/ksfo3.ram

That’s 6 hours of ABC copyrighted material - not links to KSFO, but files stored on Melanie’s personal website. Now, raise your hand if you think that Melanie or her hosting company will receive a C&D letter from ABC attorney, Enid J. H. Karpeh.

So, I have to ask: Can you produce a copy of something giving you written permission to store these copyrighted audio clips on your site, Melanie? Something from ABC legal?

More goodies:

CNN's Unreliable Sources with Howard Kurtz takes on Mike Stark, the stalker who chased Senator George Allen out of politics with dirty tricks...

Where to begin… Calling Mike Stark a “stalker”? First, Mike is a resident of Virginia and was a constituent of former Senator Allen’s – he had every right to attend functions for former Senator Allen and ask questions. Also, “stalker” is a touchy term – you might want to reconsider your choice of words. Lastly, Mike didn’t chase Senator Allen out of politics, thousands of voters did – it’s called Democracy. There are many books on the subject – check one out some time.

Even more goodies:

...it looks like the Internet stalker and his Vulcan pal who launcheda crusade against KSFO and my co-hosts have some interesting buddies -- Al Jazeera.

See for yourself. Click here

Ok, this is just pathetic. Again, you might want to reconsider using the term “internet stalker”. First, I don’t think you understand the meaning of the word. Second, throwing out terms like that could be grounds for a civil suit. Tsk tsk!

And, Al Jazeera? Interesting buddies? Seriously, how old are you? It’s like you’re stuck in Jr. High and for some reason you think you’re really clever.

Here’s the damning post from Al Jazeera that Melanie’s referring to:

In San Francisco, Richard Gizbert investigates a David and Goliath media story, where one blogger took on a radio station owned by ABC. The San Francisco station's hosts made comments the blogger called Spocko's Brain found offensive. He posted them on his site and informed the station's advertisers, who withdrew their business. That's when the lawyers were called in – and the blogosphere rushed to Spocko's rescue.

That’s it, kids. That’s the entire reference to KSFO and Spocko that allows Melanie to conflate liberals with terrorists. Pathetic. But, hey – as long as we’re playing the “guilt by association” game, let’s see what Melanie’s buddies are up to.

Remember this story from newsbusters? Noel Sheppard did his damnedest to bail Melanie out and change the subject. But do you know what else Noel did? I’ll tell ya.

Noel hotlinked 12 of 13 pictures in that post. That’s right – Noel is stealing bandwidth from other websites. Now, you might think that’s not a big deal – it’s just pictures, right? But any blogger or website proprietor knows that of all the Cardinal sins one can commit on the internets, hotlinking is pure evil. It’s unethical, it’s bad form and it’s wrong. Examples? Sure!

Morgan
http://www.moveamericaforward.org/images/uploads/blogimages/Melanie-Fox-HI.jpg

Rodgers
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2007/01/14/business/15radio1.190.jpg

Detainee Torture
http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/thumb/e/ea/250px-Iraqis_tortured_wp-f.jpg

More Morgan
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2007/01/15/business/15radio.190.jpg

Cal Worthington
http://www.calworthington.com/home/caltiger.jpg

Looks bad, doesn’t it? And, just in case anyone thinks I’m cherry picking pics out of context, here are some more recent examples:

Al Franken
http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/msnbc/Components/Photos/040825/040825_franken_hmed.hmedium.jpg

Lara Logan
http://www.iraqslogger.com/images_large/image531425g.jpg

Mike Stark
http://msunderestimated.com/MikeStark;RS.jpg

Path to 9/11
http://a.abc.com/images/20050919/moviesandspecials/pathto911new_big2.jpg

Penn/Fonda
http://www.publiusforum.com/publiusbanners_buttons/penn_fonda_protest.gif

I wonder what ABC will have to say about that. We’ll see, I suppose.

One last item… About 3 weeks ago, I commented at my site about Melanie’s claim, on the San Francisco Thousand Watt Circle Jerk©, of a mysterious Gallup poll. Here’s the gist of the post:

Our new friend FGFM posts this video on the YouTube, with

Fair Use commentary on the San Francisco Thousand Watt Circle Jerk©. If you listen closely, you’ll hear Melanie Morgan cite a recent Gallup poll, which states (paraphrasing – listen to the audio) “over 80% of Americans believe that anyone in the media who exposes state secrets in a time of war - and that's what this is, a time of war - should be tried for treason... and that's a Gallup poll!" Wow! That’s pretty damning, and quite the defense of KSFO’s calls for the execution of NY Times editor, Bill Keller.

Well, it would be if the poll actually existed. I spent some time digging around, going so far as to sit through a commercial at the GallupPoll.com site so I could access some of their info., and I didn’t find any such poll. The only Gallup polls I could find that dealt with treason were from 1953, 1978, 1981, 2001 and 2002 (re: John Lindh Walker). [cite]

I even checked at PollingReport.com, a polling aggregator site, and came up empty when checking other polls (in case it wasn’t Gallup). Nothing on the Google re: “Gallup + treason” or “Gallup + treason + media” that referred to Melanie’s alleged poll, either.

So, one is left to wonder, once again, just what the Hell is going on at KSFO. I suppose it’s possible that there was a poll in Melanie’s head, which stated that “more than 80% of America…”, but how the heck am I supposed to refute that? Or maybe KSFO picked up an inside scoop that nobody else was privy to – hey, it could happen!

I don’t know… But, I can assure you – if someone can point me to a specific, recent Gallup poll that accurately reflects Melanie’s statement, I’ll be more than happy to issue a retraction, and maybe even a real apology. Seriously. There’s no love lost between KSFO and myself, but I’d rather be accurate than ‘right’.

[Update] – I did find this, at FOX News
These are just some of the findings of the new national telephone poll of 900 registered voters conducted from June 27 to June 28 by Opinion Dynamics Corporation for FOX News. The poll has a 3-point error margin. [I couldn’t find a link to the actual poll, though. Can anyone point me to it?]

The Bush administration asked the New York Times not to publish information about the secret program, but the newspaper went ahead because it felt it was in the public interest to do so. By publishing the story, a 60 percent majority thinks the Times did more to help terrorist groups than the public (27 percent).

More Americans blame government employees for leaking the classified info (51 percent) than the media for reporting it (28 percent).

Furthermore, almost all (87 percent) think the employees who leaked should face criminal charges and two-thirds think the news organizations should. Even so, only 43 percent are willing to call what the media did treason, and almost as many think the organizations that published the information were operating for the public good (37 percent).

Note that more Americans blame the Gov’t. employees than the media, and less than 50% were willing to call the media’s actions ‘treason’.

You want to play Media Professional, Melanie? Act like a Media Professional, not an agenda-driven ideologue who ‘every day for four hours… sits behind a radio microphone’.

As I said – if someone can point me to the poll she’s citing, I’ll issue a retraction.

I checked again, the other day, and I still can’t find this phantom Gallup poll that Melanie is citing. Our friend, Suskind, looked but couldn’t find it, either. I’ll happily issue a retraction if someone can provide the Gallup poll that supports Melanie’s claim. Until then, I can only assume she’s a liar.

(Hoist a pint for our new “interesting buddy”, Bob King, whose post at GraphicTruth.com gave us the Newsbusters scandal. Thanks, Bob!)

So, there you have it, kids. Again, if someone can provide honest refutation or sources, I’ll start retracting like the water’s cold. Until then – to the best of our knowledge, they’re liars, thieves and hypocrites, all...

Rip -

Pant-Load in Hot-seat: Spills Beans on Cheese-Eaters

2007-02-01T17:45:00.000-08:00

I thought that thees deserved a leetle more play:

Our fearless compañerro Mike Stark, over at hees wonderful,
and muy divertido blog, www.callingallwingnuts.com, has recounted a brief meeting weeth Jonah Goldberg, wherein Señor Pantload makes a startling admission.

I weel no spoil the surprise, she ees just too good to pass up.

¡Vamanos! Go and read eet for jourself.

so.

YouTube, the Voice of the Pipples

2007-01-29T13:15:00.000-08:00

When Spocko's struggles were just beginning to get attention, one of the more popular narratives that arose weeth the press coverage was "Old Media vs New Media".

Most bloggerros are already familiar weeth thees narrative, and eet has no escaped attention among the many blogs who have already written about Spocko, and hees attempt to inform the advertisers at SnuffRadio560am of the violent rhetoric that they were unwittingly sponsoring.

One very powerful tool that we have online, one wheech has only begun to show eet's true utility, ees YouTube.

There are currently about a dozen videos regarding Spocko's Saga on Youtube. Over half of them represent Pro-Spocko viewpoints. The latest ees from a video-gráficerro who posted under the title KSFO Watch.

Thees was certainly a pleasant surprise, eh?

He or she has some fun weeth the gomberros from SNUFFRadio 560am, and debunks some of the boneheaded claims they made een the run-up to their three hour wank-a-thon from last December wherein they failed to adequately squelch the controversy.

¡Muchas gracias to whoever ees on KSFO-Watch, I can no speak for Spocko personalmente, but I can say weeth pleasure that we here (at the leetle treehouse that integrity built) appreciate jour efforts!

Let us have more YouTube videos, and more Audio-files, let's have more bloggerros calling attention to the kind of ugly language weeth wheech these thugs are polluting the public airwaves, and the public discourse.

These pipples clearly have no idea about los bloggerros.

so.

¡The Wrath of Spocko!

2007-01-27T10:45:00.000-08:00

¡Enjoy!

Feel free to share thees video, and pass eet around to jour amigos, and post eet on jour websites.

Thees video was brought to us by the great and funny Dan McEnroe, to whom we owe muchas gracias.

¡Muchas Gracias, Sr. McEnroe!

Update: by ¡EGN!

Sr. McEnroe tells me that for those who can no view the JouTube, the new Spocko video ees up at Google Video and iFilm as well.

Here ees the Google-video link: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1859340737993512910

We weel post the iFilm link as soon as she arrrives.

so.

Nut Busters

2007-01-25T22:10:00.000-08:00

Our good friend Noel Sheppard is at it again. This time he's mad at USA Today for not realizing that Spocko has been ordered by Nancy Pelosi to destroy the few remaining outposts of conservative expression left on Earth, 'cause she's, like, Sauron, and Spocko's, like ,the Nazgul, or some shit like that.

I've been gazing in wonder at NewsBusters lately. Sheppard n' the NB gang seem to spend most of their time watching The View so as to gasp in delicious horror at Rosie O'Donnell, which is I suppose Noble Work, though one wonders if Elmo were not the Graver Threat to the Union. Or maybe Twinkie the Kid. I suppose, though, that when your whole gig is warning about the evils done by an imaginary beast like The Liberal Media, you have to do something to justify drawing a paycheck while you sit on your ass all day, and you might as well TiVo The View. I just hope Sheppard doesn't have too much trouble laundering the Nacho Cheez stains out of his house dress.

Anyway, his latest is pretty stupid. He wants to claim that it's really the Liberals who are against free speech because they support the Fairness Doctrine, which would censor conservatives by requiring radio stations to present both sides of political issues. Because nothing says censorship like hearing both sides.

But the Fairness Doctrine stuff is irrelevant to the real issue here, anyway. It's meant to distract from the ridiculous crap the KSFO hosts have been spewing -- the delight in testicle torture, the odes to genocide:

Now you start with the Sears DieHard, the battery cables connected to his testicles, and you entertain him with that for a while, and then you blow his bleeping head off.
Indonesia is really just another enemy Muslim nation. ... You keep screwing around with stuff like this we are going to kill a bunch of you. Millions of you.

That and the "call Allah a whore" fun.

Sheppard desperately wants for this to all be an abstract wrangle about Free Speech, and not about the KSFO hosts being held accountable for what they say. Which is understandable: when you set out to defend the indefensible, you have a lot of bullshitting to do:

After all, one of the positions of the liberal bloggers concerning this Spocko issue was that ABC/Disney had no right to try and stop him from using audio clips from KSFO’s broadcasts, a position that I likely agree with. However, at the same time, these folks are trying to stop KSFO from making the statements present in those clips.
As such, these folks are fighting to allow bloggers to copy and air statements made by radio personalities that they themselves object so strongly to that they want said personalities to not be allowed to make. In effect, the bloggers are saying that they should be free to disseminate examples of what they feel is hate speech at the same time that they are trying to invoke a boycott of those committing the act.

Anybody see an extraordinary hypocrisy here?

Yeah, yours, buster. Nobody has ever said KSFO doesn't have the right to have its jocks babble about killing millions of people and hooking dicks up to batteries. Go ahead. All we're saying is, you want to say shit like that, and, say, the California State AAA might not particularly like having the genocide joy up next to their ads. Particularly insofar as what has motivated the organizations who have pulled their ads is not the threat of a boycott, but their sense that what the KSFO idiots said was genuinely obnoxious:

MasterCard and the state-run Michigan Economic Development Corp. say they advertised on KSFO talk shows last year but won't place new ads. "It's hard to listen to those clips and not be offended," says Mike Shore, spokesman for the Michigan agency.

No shit. Anyway, fair use is a wholly different legal (and moral) concept than is hate speech -- a revelation that will not surprise anyone who isn't a wingnut desperately seeking a way to make delighted lubrications on genital electrocution a legitimate source of pleasurable meditation for the multitudes. Or, in other words, stop pretending that people who want to connect gonads to Diehard batteries aren't sick little freaks, and we'll leave you alone, you dishonest little prick.

Oh, and since Sheppard started with the grammar flaming:

As amazing as it might seem, our liberal brethren on the opposite side of the aisle don't understand that the more they look this horse in the mouth, the less freedoms they might find they have in the future.

Not "less" -- "fewer." Dumbass. (The mixed or even miscegenated metaphors aren't a grammatical but a stylistic lapse, so I let them pass, indulgently.)

(Cross posted to Whiskey Fire)

Once more, for the fucking record

2007-01-24T16:38:00.000-08:00

Click Play. This one goes out to the KSFO fans.

How many times do we have to keep saying this? Oy...

Our friend 'blogicalthought', affiliation unknown, proves just as tenacious as the Howling Moonbats of DOOM!!!! in LeftBlogistan when it comes to the KSFO story. And while we, here at OBI, admire his elegant prose and affectatious search for the Truth, I think everybody's grown a wee bit tired of his insinuations and accusations. But, we're also integrimongous, so I thought I'd respond to his comment at Stark's place by rebutting his points in context. Hear that? In context! Qua! Let's begin, shall we?
..........................................................................................................................................................................

Mike,

I am still waiting for a response regarding Nancy Pelosi’s and Ted Kennedy’s role in this debacle, especially since there is an appearance of trying to squelch free speech on public airwaves in the District of her Constituency. This is especially since the issue you claim to be attached to is within her district and would benefit her to “squelch the conservative voice” on public airwaves.

'bt' is referring to a conference call with some Dem leaders. A call that many people participated in. There's been no effort to 'squelch free speech on public airwaves' by anyone involved. (Also, note the airwaves belong to the Public, not KSFO or Morgan/Rodgers.) Stark's website is called Calling All Wingnuts, bt. Are you really that surprised that he might jump into this game?

Btw, Pelosi's district has what to do with this? Stark was calling O'Reilly (NYC), Hannity (NYC), Limbaugh (FL) and how many others?

The sequence of events, as revealed online, is as follows and is quite interesting for a “first year law student” who is living off financial aid and his wife’s income from work:

1. For over a year, a lone poster, who was previously involved in the John Kerry Campaign doing public relations for him [wtf? thousands of people were. what's your point?], began a campaign against a conservative radio station, claiming he was only advising advertisors of the content of the productions. Can you prove he was doing otherwise?

2. Despite the above claims, he continued the process and encouraged others to do it as well, thus not really “advising advertisors” but trying to pressure them to stop advertising on Conservative Radio. How is 'encouraging others to do it' pressuring advertisers?

3. You travel to Iowa for the Iowa primaries, campaigning for the Democrat party. Wtf? Again, so did thousands of other people.

4. You meet with Duncan Black during the summer primary in Connecticut, where you are campaigning for Ted Lamont who is running against Joe Lieberman, though you are not a resident of CT. and are not a Constituent. Again, wtf? And again, thousands of people traveled to CT to campaign for Lamont, so... Are you saying that Stark should avoid any area where Atrios might be present? You don't know the first thing about political campaigns, do you?

5. You actively campaign against Senator Allen for the Democrat party in Virginia [now , suddenly, constituents aren't allowed to campaign for the DemocratIC party in their home state?], go to several campaign functions and disrupt them with acts of violence, pushing people, holding them up against doorways, using force and pushing a female reporter out of the way. [proof?] You do so, claiming you are a reporter for Air America. [again, proof?]

6. Cenk Ugyar of The Young Turks, Air America Radio Show issues a press release stating you have been hired by Air America, AFTER you advised others you were disrupting the Republican rallies on their behalf (allegedly trying to get an interview.) [proof ot timeline?]

5. [sic '7'] Just weeks before the Media Reform Conference in Nashville, Tennessee, you begin to organize liberal bloggers, mainly “Eschatonians” or rather known as “Atriots” who blog for Duncan Black and David Brock of Media Matters, financed by George Soros, to “blogswarm” the issue. First of all, Atriots don't 'blog for Duncan Black'. He has his own blog - you might have heard of it... Eschaton? Secondly, 'weeks before the Media Reform Conference'? It was also weeks before Martin Luther King Day and Easter - so? And, nobody that I know, in this matter, is involved with Media Matters. Also, based on material available online, you'll notice that this 'blogswarm' occured a week after Spocko's website was pulled by his hosting company. Should we have waited until after the Media Reform Conference? Next time, let us know - we'll see what we can do for you.

You'll also notice that Atrios and Media Matters didn't jump on this story when it started. Nor did Kos or Aravosis. Or Pelosi or Kennedy. 700+ practically unknown bloggers did, though - because they cared about the story. Without being paid to care.

6. [sic 8] During the height of this “blogswarm” you post an article on Huffington Post, claiming to be a “Marine” the week of the Conference. Wtf?!? Yeah, and don't forget - his name isn't even 'Mike'. It's Michael. Oh, the lies!!! God, you're pathetic, bt...

7. [sic 9] During this same week, Media Matters does a series of articles regarding the radio station. So... what then... Media Matters should have waited or not responded to this story? Do you not get the name? Media matters...??? They write about the Media and things relating to the Media?

8. [sic 10] On January 10th, you announce you were involved within a Conference Call with Representative Nancy Pelosi and Ted Kennedy on January 9th and announce you went to DC to the Capitol Building on the 10th. You state you would post a transcript of the conference call, yet never did it. Ok... Stark's a lazy blogger who promises posts that he doesn't write. Scandal! And again, many people participated in that conference call, Sherlock Drones.

9. [sic 11] On January 10th, the San Francisco Chronicle writes an article about the “lone blogger” (who appears to have ties with the San Francisco Chronicle.” A board member of Media Matters is a “journalist” with the San Francisco Chronicle and writes with the journalist who wrote the article. Um, what are these 'ties with the SF Chron'? And who's the MMFA board member?

10. [sic 12] On January l0th, the radio station announced on January 12th, the radio station would open the air waves for all to call, with their concerns about content matter of their shows for a three hour period of time. What does this have to do with anything?

11. [sic 13] On January llth, you wrote you spoke to the Station Manager and tried to negotiate terms for your input in calling into the show. On that same date, Media Matters writes an article regarding the situation. Oh my God! Two liberal writers wrote something on the same day! Conspiracy!

12. [sic 14] On January 12th, the “lone anonymous blogger” doesn’t call in, however YOU do and you are able to give your say on the matter. Which means what? Obviously, you're trying to imply that Stark is Spocko. Nice try. Could be that Spocko was working and couldn't call the show. Could be that KSFO refused to air his call. Could be that he just couldn't get thru, what with all the wingnuts trying to call and tell Melanie how they'd kick Spocko's ass for a whiff of her knickers and a spank on the ass.

KSFO asked Stark to call. He and Spocko aren't responsible for each other's phone calls, so pointing the finger at him because Spocko didn't call is rather illogical and juvenile.

13. [sic 15] On that same date, Media Matters does an article about the matter and the Media Reform Conference begins in which Duncan Black, David Brock of Media Matters (funded by Soros) [proof?] participate with Democrat legislators Hinchey and Sanders, representatives of Moveon.org (funded by Soros) [proof?] your boss (or rather client since you claim to be a free lance reporter hired to disrupt Republican campaign functions) Cenk Ugyar of the Young Turks, Air America Radio Program and Geena Davis, Danny Glover and Jane Fonda attend, as well as Jesse Jackson. Oh my God! Jesse Jackson? Conspiracy!! Tell you what, bt, since you're such a smart guy, why don't you contact the folks who set up the Media Reform Conference and ask them when they started planning it.

14. [sic 16] Following the Conference, you focus on media reform and the blogosphere is flooded with blogs about media reform. How very odd that the blogosphere would focus on Media Reform, following a Media Reform Conference. Seriously, it's almost creepy... It's like... the Borg! I just hope it didn't spread to newspapers and the telly. Eek!

Now, perhaps you can tell us what the role was by Nancy Pelosi in this obvious campaign by Democrats to squelch free speech as well as the role of Ted Kennedy. What role did Pelosi play in trying to “shut down” a radio station in her own district? I'm going to guess... none, none and... again, none? Unless you have better proof than you've dropped on us, so far.

What strategy is being used now, besides your new “website” attacking Disney? Get back to us, we're still waiting for Soros' e-mail.

What is your relationship with Nancy Pelosi and is she supporting you, despite your violent actions against Republicans and the assault upon a woman? Love child? Err, American citizen who's glad she's the new Speaker of the House? And, let's have some proof for that 'assault upon a woman', pally.

Does she condone the sexist comments you make about women and your actions toward them and how does Ted Kennedy feel about them? Cite?

How much income do you receive in order to travel through the U.S. campaigning and attending conferences? This past year, you traveled to the KOS Conference, to the Iowa primary, to Connecticut and have made regular trips to DC to meet with top national legislators, despite the fact you are a “poor student” relying upon student loans and your wife’s income to support your family. Let me run this one backward. Stark doesn't live that far from DC - that's info available online, sugarlips. More importantly, how much income do You receive? I'm guessing the source would be Move America Forward or maybe Russo, Marsh & Rogers / King Media Group. Am I right?

Law school ain’t cheap, especially at a Tier I level. Since you claim to be a former waiter and wine steward up until last year, solely funded by student loans (which hardly cover tuition) and your wife’s income is the sole income, as you claim) just how are you financing everything? Are you donations reported to the IRS as taxable income, since this is a hobby and not a business? Well, that's really none of your business. But again, how much are you making and who's paying you?

Just a few questions, which as a public figure who is involved with national political strategies to affect elections….by the way, you have my email address, so you can always respond….why is it you don’t want to answer the questions but prefer to have your “spokesman” address your issues with attacks? Is your spokesman really you? I'm sure that Mike is flattered, but I'm not sure that even I would call him a 'public figure who is involved with national political strategies to affect elections'. Not yet, anyway. As for his 'spokesman', I'm not sure whom you're referring to with that strawman point. Cite?

By your statements, it appears your actions are not only sanctioned by the Democrat Party but also strategized by them, as well. Finally, this is reinforced by your recent interview on CNN, where it appeared you spoke for the Democrat Party. Wtf?!? You need to re-view the CNN bit - it 'appeared' he spoke for the DemocratIC party? Seriously, get some professional help.

So, is this all one propoganda campaign with the roots being with Nancy Pelosi? No, the roots being Thomas Jefferson and God. Sweet Jeebus in a prom dress, you're ridiculous! (Seriously, though - God did organize this and we do speak for Her.)

Lets see if you have the integrity to answer this one….rather than have the Media Matters lackeys answer it with offensive attacks. Lets see if the Democrats let you answer it. Well, considering your questions would put a 9/11 conspiracist to shame, I don't think it's really a matter of 'integrity' if Mike decides you're not worth the pixels. I, on the other hand, think you're a fucking shill for Russo Marsh & Rogers / Move America Forward. Sue me...
..................................................................................................................................

Let me make this perfectly clear to everyone - nobody at OBI is being financed, led, instructed or otherwise moved to write anything about the KSFO fiasco. We do it because we love a good fight, we stand up for the 'little guy' and we demand a little better from other bloggers and the Media. (Plus, KSFO sucks from Hell to breakfast.) And when you fuck with someone we know, we're going to call you on it - no matter who you are.

I'll testify that I've never received any personal correspondence in this matter from Atrios, Media Matters for America, the Democratic Party (other than John Laesch, for unrelated issues), George Soros, Nancy Pelosi, Ted Kennedy, Geena Davis, Danny Glover or Jesse Jackson. (Though, I did see Jesse at a function in Chicago, once - tall man, well dressed, seemed quite pleasant - and Ted Kennedy was a non-political client of mine, a few years back.) I haven't received one cent for any blogging, hosting, pimping, instant messages or broadcasting on this story, nor have I received any other form of compensation. My personal site doesn't have any ads because I don't have the traffic (hint to you advertisers - I'm cheap!) and OBI has never sought any advertising.

I'm not affiliated with Media Matters for America, George Soros, the Democratic Party (I made small contributions to Rowley, Lamont, Spencer, Laesch and McNerney), Atrios, any KSFO competitors, or any blogs but this site and my personal site. (I guest post at Mia Culpa and Sine.Qua.Non's Journal, occasionally, but haven't posted on this issue.)

I can't speak for everyone at OBI, Mike Stark or Spocko - but we've exchanged an enormous number of e-mails in the last few weeks and nobody has even hinted at any involvement by MMFA, the Democratic Party, George Soros or any other quasi-interested corporate or political party. And I'm damned sure that, even if it were off the record, one of them would have said something - just so we could gloat privately.

So, you can take the word of a regular OBI contributor (and if you doubt our veracity for integricipity, read some posts from May or June of 2006), or you can listen to a nozzle who uses the Google to see if anyone's talking about him and may just be an employee at Russo Marsh & Rogers, Move America Forward's PR team. I'm talking about you, 'blogicalthought'... what, you think I don't watch the stats here?

Anyone who thinks there's some well-financed, well-coordinated campaign to 'squelch the free speech' of the KSFO ghouls doesn't understand the nature of the internets. I'm talking to you, this time, Melanie.

Rip -

PS - If you're a free-wheeling, spirited advertiser who digs our groove more than money - e-mail us!

¡¡¡Spocko Saga makes USAToday!!!

2007-01-24T00:55:00.000-08:00

LOS ANGELES — In a dispute between the "new media" of the Internet and the "old media" of broadcasting, liberal bloggers and conservative talk-radio hosts are accusing each other of trampling the First Amendment's guarantees of free speech.

Hundreds of blogs are exhorting national advertisers not to buy commercial time on Disney-owned KSFO-AM in San Francisco because some on-air hosts have made comments that the bloggers allege are racist or encourage violence.

KSFO personalities say the bloggers are trying to muzzle their political views. The bloggers say they're rallying behind the free-speech rights of a colleague whose website was briefly shut down after Disney's ABC network threatened to sue over alleged copyright violations.

Vamanos, go read the whole theeng, I found eet a fair appraisal, overall.

¡...y tambien, they give Mike Stark the last word!

Shhhhhhhh... joo can almost hear the weengnut cabezas go Booooom.

so.

Thers Ads: There's another article up, from UPI.

Via Ellroon.

News Busted

2007-01-22T21:30:00.000-08:00

This NewsBusters article purportedly debunking Spocko's take on KSFO's hateful gibberish has been getting some acclaim in Greater Wingnuttia. Let's play with it.

It's a long article, comprised mostly of whine and straw. Noel Sheppard argues that the sound files Spocko sent to KFSO's advertisers documenting their adolescent shrieks are taken out of context, that Spocko is an illiterate, that liberals are trying to shut down conservative speech, and that the Liberal Mainstream Media are big and mean and Spocko is taking orders from Nancy Pelosi about the Fairness Doctrine.

Bullshit.

1. Sheppard's claims about Spocko's "out of context" clips are stupid.

Sheppard wants to use this as the place where we take evidence. Fine.

In that post, by my kindest count, there are nine audio links. Sheppard challenges the context of two. So he's down by seven. Go ahead, do the math your own self: he's got a shitty case.

First, embarrassingly, Sheppard tries manfully to put a positive spin on a demented call for testicle torture. Now, this may come as news to Sheppard, but when you say (paraphrasing) "let's look at the context in which he said 'let's hook his dick up to the battery cables,'" you have just lost any claim to the moral high ground. No, seriously. Even Michelle Malkin's guest posters get this simple point. (Fun Actual Quote: "Now you start with the Sears DieHard, the battery cables connected to his testicles, and you entertain him with that for a while, and then
you blow his bleeping head off." Classy!)

As for the one about calling "Cheverolet's product shitty," well, maybe Sheppard has a case there, though Chevy perhaps still might not be thrilled by such larking. But... one for nine, hooray.

More seriously, Sheppard simply doesn't address how overjoyed Chevy might be to having their product associated with comments like "just stomp their bleeping guts out," or, even better, this gem:

Indonesia is really just another enemy Muslim nation. ... You keep screwing around with stuff like this we are going to kill a bunch of you. Millions of you.

That's called genocide, you know. Not that many advertisers use genocide-themed commercials, for some reason.

Sheppard is an ass. Where's the exculpatory context for that one, sport? Where's the humor in the "call Allah a whore" remark?

Sheppard invokes "context" when it's convenient and ignores it when it isn't, and in the instance of the testicle torture quote, manages to come across as depraved. Well done!

2. Spocko's letter has typos. Omigod. Sheppard invokes the dreaded spelling flame!

It takes a pretty refined sensibility to get all huffy about a few misspellings right after you've just argued that there is a proper "context" for testicle electrocution. Feh. (You also kind of look like a snotnosed little priss when you put a "sic" after a misplaced apostrophe in a plural possessive.)

Anyway, two can play this game. It's fun! Here's Sheppard:

This is especially true for the proprietor of Daily Kos, Markos Moulitsas, who resides in Berkeley, and most certainly should have been cognizant of the rather obvious satire being purported by the KSFO crew.

Put aside for the moment that Sheppard doesn't understand how Daily Kos the site works, and thus that dragging Kos into this is pretty silly. Instead, enjoy Sheppard's claim about the KSFO crew's "purported" satire while he scurries off to find himself a dictionary, the poor dope.

3. Sheppard pretends that Spocko and the Left don't get the distinction between wee little plucky KSFO and the Big Bad Totally Liberal MSM:

complaining that this station presents right-of-center views is akin to carping and whining about a classical station playing Beethoven.
By contrast, as cable outlets like MSNBC and CNN, as well as the major broadcast networks, don’t advertise or promote themselves as being liberal – in fact, they feign impartiality whenever questioned on the subject – it is significantly more fair and appropriate to point out to viewers across the country when program hosts and guests are allowing their biases to dominate and impact the content of the issues being presented.

Straw man. The substance of Spocko's complaints are to do with crazy crap like raving about killing millions of Indonesians and hooking testicles up to battery cables. Nobody gives a rat's ass if KSFO wants to be "conservative." The problem is the psychotic burbling.

Anyway, there's no such thing as the "Liberal Media." But since this is a central tenet of the Wingnut Faith, there's no point in debating it. What is more to the point is that Sheppard is trying his damnedest to distract from the issues at hand, that is, what the KSFO hosts actually said, the right of advertisers to know what they're paying for -- and the legitimacy and downright creepiness of KSFO and its parent companies slapping Spocko with a bogus legal threat.

It's also funny how Sheppard wants to paint Spocko as "an anonymous coward," a nonentity whose campaign has had no effect... but also as a Terrible Threat. You know, Mike Stark wouldn't have gotten involved in this, and neither probably would have we here at OBI to the extent that we have, if KSFO and ABC and Disney hadn't sent out that threat and gotten Spocko kicked off his ISP. I find it hard to believe that they would have done that if Spocko wasn't having any effect. Unless, of course, they are the real cowards in this affair. Could be!

4. Sheppard has a lot of irrelevant bullshit about how this is all some crazy liberal plot, because Mike Stark has a freelance deal with Air America and how Media Matters doesn't yell at Don Imus. (Imus as a Liberal Media icon is pretty rich -- see, well, Media Matters, here, here, here, or here.)

Spocko isn't being paid for this. Nobody at OBI is being paid for this. Mike Stark isn't being paid for this. Noel Sheppard and the KSFO loons n' goons are being paid for this.

Power to the people. But if that Sheppard tripe is the best these clowns can muster, well, let's hear it for wingnut welfare, I suppose.

Cross posted at Whiskey Fire.

¡¡¡Sunday, Sunday, Sunday!!!

2007-01-20T23:20:00.000-08:00

Thees Sunday, 10:00 am on CNN's Reliable Sources.

The valiant Mike Stark takes on the easily confoos-ed weengnutbar Dan Riehl
een a debate regarding Spocko, KSFO, and the depredations of El Ratón, weeth the asinine Howie "the Ho" Kurtz as referee.

Our compañerro Mike Stark, of www.callingallwingnuts.com has the details:

Published by Mike Stark January 20th, 2007

I’ll be on Reliable Sources tomorrow morning, 1/21, sometime between 10:30 and 11:00
on CNN with Howie Kurtz from 10-11. I should be on in the second half.

I believe the topic will be KSFO, but I’m really in the dark as to what exactly Howie will want to discuss. At my suggestion, they’ve also invited Dan Riehl, of Riehl World, to debate the topic.

Señor Stark expresses confidence een the outcome of thees match-up, and, having read some of the posts* on Riehl-Bizarro-Worldview.com, all I can offer by way of advice ees to say:

Mike, be gentle.

*(more on wheech mañana)

New You-Tube-y goodness for Spocko

2007-01-17T11:55:00.000-08:00

Our amigo, Dan McEnroe, has put together a new YouTube video
summing up the Spocko Saga.

Eet includes clips and pictures of the SNUFFRadio560am
hate-spewers, as well as some of their more colorful rantings.

Eef joo are new to thees story, or know someone who needs to get caught up
on the Spocko vs Disney Saga, thees piece ees an excellent place to start.

McEnroe even put een a leetle beet more about fair-use as well,
and the soundtrack ees just the icing on the cake, eh?

¡Gracias Sr. McEnroe!

[Rip adds] - The NY Times article on Spocko and KSFO is #5 on their Most Blogged articles list. So! (because Gato forgot to say it)

[Rip -]

You say tomato - we say hypocrite

2007-01-16T04:14:00.000-08:00

Just a few thoughts, while I wait for the coffee to kick in.

I'm sure you're all familiar with this scene from KSFO's Whiniest Story Ever Told:

But as numerous blogs have noted in recent days, on December 21, ABC Inc., a subsidiary of the Disney-ABC Television Group, apparently issued a cease-and-desist letter targeting Spocko and his blog for copyright violation. Specifically, ABC alleged that by posting brief audio clips of various talk radio hosts on KSFO, the site was "in clear violation" of the station's copyright. The letter demanded that the owner of the site "remove the content immediately." (Media Matters)

Oh, they cried and cried about copyrighted material, how Fair Use didn't apply and how it made them look bad. Poor little radio hosts just asserting their God given right to protect their Intellectual (snort!) Property.

Well, it seems that Melanie Morgan is just terribly forgetful, laughably disingenuous or downright arrogant - or, more likely, all of the above. Examples, you say? I'd be happy to...

From Melanie's personal site, melaniemorgan.com:

On Melanie's 'About' page

NY Times Columnist Condemns Melanie
July 4, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist

Don't Turn Us Into Poodles
by NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

A pop-up window with what appears to be an entire op-ed column by Nicholas Kristof. According to the NY Times, the original column is 747 words. No commentary from Melanie, btw - just Kristof's column.

On Melanie's From Melanie page

All the News That's Fit to Bully
by Frank Rich

TWO weeks and counting, and the editor of The New York Times still has not been sentenced to the gas chamber. What a bummer for one California radio talk-show host, Melanie Morgan, who pronounced The Times guilty of treason and expressly endorsed that punishment. She and the rest of the get-the-press lynch mob are growing restless, wondering why newspapers haven't been prosecuted under the Espionage Act.

And again...

I was named
WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD
by Keith Olbermann of MSNBC

June 29: Click here to see me being named "Worst" person in the world.

June 30: Click here to listen to me being named "Worser" person in the world.

The June 30 link is an mp3 copy of audio from MSNBC's Countdown program, stored on Melanie's site.

So, it seems that Melanie doesn't have any problems posting other people's copyrighted materials to her website. And, notice that these items are all critical of her and/or her work. Keep that in mind when you read Melanie's wailings of 'we're under attack!'.

A coward who won't even publicly identify himself is trying to destroy my reputation, and has threatened the security of myself and my family, as well as my friends and colleagues at KSFO Radio.

Huh... It appears you enjoy attacks on your reputation. Badge of Honor and all that rot, eh?

And I'd love to see some evidence of anyone threatening your security, Melanie. Or maybe this is another one of those 'existential threats' you're always going on about, yes?

[Update] - Commentor 'stogie' takes a jab at OBI for our dearth of comments. Group sigh... There, we're all better now. Here at OBI, though, we know that it's not always what people say to us, it's what people see - and how many people see it.

Just sayin'...

Rip -

Other News

2007-01-15T20:25:00.000-08:00

In other news of wingnuts with lawyers, Taylor Marsh is threatened with a lawsuit. She doesn't seem too sussed about it, frankly...

The Testicle Electrocution Was Done in the Best Possible Taste

2007-01-15T15:45:00.000-08:00

Shorter NewsBusters: Persons of morality and integrity will always ask "what's the context?" when they hear someone gleefully ranting about genital torture.

I don't really have the time to get into this now, but that's some article over there...

[Rip adds] - Remember our friend 'blogicalthought'? He's still out there.

One has to wonder if the bloggers who continue to perpetuate this propaganda realize the average American has the resources to go back through historically cached internet sites and to research the backgrounds of the individuals who are posting? And one has to wonder if the attitude of the blogger is that the average American is basically dumb and will buy into it?

You may recognize that very comment from some other sites, as well. Apparently, the story has changed to 'Spocko and everyone who was at Eschacon are working for George Soros and Media Matters, and that's why we're all ganging up on KSFO.' I kid you not.

Yo, Soros! Where's my check, baby?
[Rip -]

UPDATE from Thers... Oh dear, the wingnuts are all a-flutter. And -- believe it or not -- along with a hearty helping of the usual paranoid tripe, Michelle Malkin actually is sensible enough to tell KSFO that they're wrong about the lawsuit and that genital torture screeds are counterproductive. There's a bit of irony there, perhaps, but credit where it's due.

FURTHER UPDATE from Thers... Whoopsie, that wasn't Malkin, but a guest poster, one See-Dubya. I am overcome with shame at the error.

Spocko Saga makes the New York Times

2007-01-14T22:57:00.000-08:00

Shorter Monday's New York Times: Spocko to Hate-Radio: Hit the Road

Reporter Noam Cohen does a fair job of recounting not just the hateful theengs said by personalities on SNUFF Radio560am, but also the lies they tell een order to avoid responsibility. (emphasis ees mine)

Among the advertisers Spocko contacted, and who have been reported in The San Francisco Chronicle to have stopped advertising at KSFO were Bank of America, MasterCard and the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. During the Friday show, one of the hosts, Lee Rodgers, read an e-mail message asking if the station had lost any sponsors so the listener could, in turn, boycott the former sponsors. Ms. Morgan said “one advertiser — exactly one” had left the station.

Perdóna mi, Señora Morgan, jour pantalones, they are en fuego.

Thees next part, though, she ees my favorite:

Joo see, thees company "1&1", they are probably going to suffer some backlash from thees, because they acted like leetle cobardes invertebradas:

[Spocko's] lawyer, Matt Zimmerman of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit digital rights group based in San Francisco, says that 1&1 acted too quickly in response to the ABC letter...
(snip)
A spokesman for 1&1, Neil Simpkins, said the company was acting on the advice of its lawyers and noted that the material “is being distributed all over the Internet.”

Señor Simperkins seems to be missing the point. Eet ees precisely because of hees futile attempt to censor Spocko that thees material ees available all over the internet.

Heckuva job, Señor Simperkins.

UPDATE by Thers: See also TRex and Mike S, his own bad self. And yeah, the NYT reporter was fair.

We don't ask for anything else but a fair hearing, "MSM."

UPDATE II :by ¡El Gato Negro!

David Neiwert at Orcinus has a detailed interview weeth the Vulcan-of-the-Year, entertainingly entitled: Picking Spocko's Brain.

In the Other Story...

2007-01-13T23:09:00.000-08:00

In the other story we're monitoring, the saga of Tucker Carlson acting like a complete git hits the WaPo. Tucker defends himself thusly:

In a phone interview Thursday, Carlson acknowledged that he approached Williamson in the store and said he was "very aggressive" because he wanted the post removed: "I don't like to call the police or call his boss. . . . I'm a libertarian. I'm not into that."

The spectacle of a "very aggressive" Tucker Carlson is one I honestly cannot contemplate without laughing. Though if I needed the job, it wouldn't be so funny.

C'mon, Tucker, grow a pair. Anyone who goes through life worried about what video store employees might do on their blogs is not really living life to its fullest.

Why is Tucker employed by anyone, again?

A Crackpot's Perspective on KSFO's Rebuttal

2007-01-13T05:33:00.000-08:00

I was able to listen to about half an hour of KSFO's "town hall meeting," and I have a few comments.

First off, the hardest thing for me to grasp is that these people are actually adults. Granted, Morgan, Sussman, and Rodgers are as trapped in their respective personae as the Three Stooges, which limits their emotional range and their ability to be honest. Plenty of entertainers are one-trick ponies, and expecting Lee Rodgers not to act like Lee Rodgers is like expecting REO Speedwagon not to play "Ridin' the Storm Out" at the Colusa County Fair. Still, I find it amazing that these folks were obliged to defend their credibility today - if not their sanity - and the best they could manage, while I was listening, was a collection of infantile lies and evasions that would make a cat laugh.

For instance, Rodgers played the clip in which he fantasized about attaching electrodes to a criminal's genitals before shooting him in the "bleeping" head. Afterwards, he insisted at length that he was simply taking a principled stand in favor of capital punishment.

I don't know of any state where genital torture is a legal prelude to execution, and I don't know any supporters of capital punishment who get excited at the thought of "entertaining" criminals by electrocuting their balls. I've heard many arguments for the death penalty in my day, from people across the political spectrum. Rodgers is the only person I've ever heard recommend the sexual torture of condemned Americans as a sort of foreplay to execution. It's bad enough that such punishment is unconstitutional, but the fact that Rodgers sounds like he's jerking himself off while he talks about it makes it very uneasy listening indeed.

Now to be fair, Rodgers always sounds like he's jerking himself off. It's very possible that he's so captivated by the timbre and cadence of his own voice that he pays no attention to what he's actually saying. But even so, the fact remains that advertisers are naturally going to question the wisdom of being associated in the public mind with a man who waxes quasi-erotic over testicle torture. Hell, they'd be exceedingly bad businesspeople if they didn't. Which makes it all the more bizarre that Rodgers would call the people who were upset by Spocko's clips - i.e., KSFO's advertisers - "gullible dolts." This is damage control like Iraq is a cakewalk.

Speaking of genital torture, Brian Sussman didn't come across as quite as much of a slack-jawed onanist as Rodgers when he was fantasizing about lopping off Iraqi penises, but he was a lot whinier and siller. He complained that he'd been unfairly characterized as "pro-torture," simply because he read a "scripted bit" based on 24 Hours, in which the torture of an Islamofascist just happens to save a bunch of American lives. Morgan and Rodgers found this a compelling argument, of course. The thing is, see, Sussman wasn't saying torture is good; he was just implying that it works really, really well. Hey, if you'd rather have your buddies murdered by ragheads than lop off a pecker or two, that's your own "bleeping" problem, you...you...clown.

I'm sure we've all heard media figures and politicians argue soberly that torture can be effective. While we may've disagreed with them, we probably didn't write letters to advertisers to complain that they were given airtime. But the problem with Sussman is that like Rodgers, he sounds too goddamn cheerful. Even people who agree with BushCo's policies in theory don't necessarily want to have their noses rubbed in the gory details, especially by people who seem to revel in cruelty, instead of seeing it as a painful duty that must be draped with the Veil of Civility. It's quite possible that some of KSFO's advertisers are worried less about the moral implications of advocating torture than they are about the fact that Sussman and company are too déclassé and...well, too fucking weird, quite frankly.

If KSFO's hosts want to display their dipshit sadism like a badge of courage, that's their right. But expecting advertisers to accept it unquestioningly is a bit delusional, to put it mildly. (Which is odd, because conservatives normally have a much better grasp of "personal responsibility" and "unintended consequences" than you or me or the man in the next street.)

Melanie Morgan was fairly subdued, at least while I was listening. She announced that unlike the "coward" Spocko, she shows her real name and face to the public. True enough, I guess. But as we've recently had occasion to notice, Morgan also has a phalanx of lawyers with which to frighten her critics, and a powerful radio transmitter with which to denounce them. As usual with right-wing bullies, there's no acknowledgment of any difference in power and resources between the wildly successful, world-beloved, truth-empowered, all-American radio hosts and the pathetic Castro-loving faggot-ass crackpots who dare to slap their wrists.

Actually, that's not quite true. In fact, Morgan worried at one point that Spocko might pose a physical threat to her. You can just imagine Melanie and her cronies cowering in the underground bunker they built in anticipation of the Y2K meltdown, while Spocko - his pockets bulging with George Soros's blood money - growls and paws at the hatch like a starving bear trying to break into a beaver lodge.

Dissenters were invited to call, although Rodgers repeatedly cautioned the Hun against pissing his bleeping ass off with their bleeping profanity, lest the station lose its bleeping license already. I'll bet you a bottle of soda pop that these ruff tuff creampuffs are equipped with as lengthy a tape delay as you'll find in the business, but Rodgers clearly believes that what his acolytes don't know won't hurt him.

Anyway, the best call I heard was from a gentleman who was furious that anyone would dream of accusing his heroes of spouting racist and eliminationist hogwash. He went on to say that "Mohammedism" is a cancer, and that "the only cure for cancer is radiation." QE bleeping D, ya goddamn lie-berals!

That's right about where I had to tune out. Overall, I was pretty amazed at how poorly thought out and executed their "rebuttals" were. Obviously, they pleased the station's regular listeners, who'd eat a plate of dogshit and ask for seconds if Lee Rodgers required it of them. But I can't see how this grueling triumphalist circle-jerk is going to reassure advertisers, or bring new ones into the fold. I'm extremely prejudiced, of course, but looks to me like this round goes to Spocko.

We can't say it enough

2007-01-12T23:20:00.000-08:00

[Rebooted because it's important]

As I mentioned in one of the original thoughts below, I spent a lot of time watching the buzz on this story building over the weekend. (And kudos to Mike Stark for dropping it on dKos – not that Thers wasn’t on the ball at OBI, as well.) I don’t have an exact number right now, but yesterday Stark claimed over 500 blogs pushing Spocko’s story. And one of the beautiful things, as I watched this unfold over the weekend, was the sheer number of ‘unknown, 27th-tier’ blogs who picked this up. (their words, in response to Spocko’s ‘self-proclaimed 5th-tier blogger’ comment)

Jeebus…. When I say it was ‘beautiful’, I mean it was truly beautiful. I don’t know how much traffic these folks get – evidently many of them are in the same corner of the Web as I am – but some of these bloggers went above and beyond the Call, in my opinion. Some gave short excerpts with links, some wrote impassioned calls for Justice, some gave brilliant analyses of the situation. And most of you/us have probably never heard of them.

Bloggers who never make the A-, B- or C-list blogrolls. People who never get a lucky link or h/t from Atrios, never make the Recommended List at dKos, never get quoted by anyone that some people think matters… But they took 2, 5, 15, 30 minutes of their time and gave their slice of real estate to stand up for another Z-lister because they believed in what Spocko was saying and doing.

As I rummaged around in Technorati and Google, and drilled down into the links, I came across dozens of bloggers who deserve more attention. I wish I’d copied blog addresses, so I could give all of you great bloggers some real cowbell – I’m sorry, I didn’t think of it at the time. But I did leave comments on quite a few blogs. Nothing fancy or particulary deep – just a quick note to let them know we were paying attention.

So, if there’s a comment on your blog that said ‘Thanks for helping to spread the word! Rip – (Team Blog Integrity)’ – that was me. I know I didn’t catch all of you – again, I apologize.

I wish I could do more to thank all the bloggers who grabbed Spocko’s story and ran with it. Without you, this would have been another unheard rant on a few blogs, that slipped away like a frat boy in the early morning after a one night stand. Every one of you deserves more gratitude than I could possibly express.

I’m sure I speak for Spocko and all the scalliwags from Online Blog Integrity when I say:

Thank you, thank you, thank you!! You have our undying gratitude and appreciation. Keep up the good work!

Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!

Team Blog Integrity

[Update] -It's on HuffPo. Thanks again!

Rundowns of the KSFO Pity Party

2007-01-12T15:23:00.000-08:00

This is meant as a roundup of commentary on the KFSO Pity Party today, where Melanie and her gang sang their woeful lament at how big 'ol mean Spocko made them cry.

Sinfonian gives a running account of the festivities here.

DKos diarist abbaanthony liveblogs his take.

OBI's own Ripley rips into 'em in his DKos incarnation.

Crooks and Liars adds their perspective.

See also Gaelic Starover.

...more as they come in...

Update from Phila: Too Sense makes a good point about the KSFO supporter who called for wiping out "Mohammedism" with nukes (because "the only cure for cancer is radiation"):

At one point, a caller called Islam "Mohammedism" and advocated for using nuclear weapons against Muslims everywhere. Needless to say, the KSFO hosts instead warned liberals to be civil when they call.

Heh indeed, as the cognoscenti say.

Also, if anyone has a clip of Rodgers claiming that people who were offended by Spocko's clips are "gullible dolts," please send it along to one or another of us OBI folks. I really think it deserves wider circulation.

[Rip adds] - Over the weekend, I checked out KSFO's website - just rummaging around, as I'm known to do. There were a good 15 or so advertisers on their KSFO Advertisers page.

Check it now, Bleed!

Just sayin'...

Also - Sinfonian takes a Sears DieHard - the battery cables connected to Lee Rodgers' testemony and blows his bleepin' rumor off! Here...

Dig!

[Rip - ]

Changes (with update)

2007-01-12T14:40:00.000-08:00

Brief blog management note. I've added links to Spocko & Mike Stark over to the left. Any other additions...? Also, I changed the comments settings to disallow anonymous commenting. As amusing as the troll is in the last post, a little of that stuff goes a long way.

ADDED: I've been busy today and missed the KSFO pity party, but this running commentary from abbaanthony at DKos is pretty funny. Especially this bit, given that I just changed our comments preferences:

2:15 PM - We are hypocrites for requiring people to register to post comments and that we might comment out spam or hate-filled comments.

Oh dear. Again the Left wants censorship! I suppose it's true; we simply cannot cope with brilliance like this --

NOT AFRAID like a toddelr is not afriad to craps his diapers

It would be advanced anthtropomorphizing to call you juvie pukes People

The true voice of the Melanie Morgan fan, indeed.

"Now the taste is bitter."

2007-01-12T11:46:00.000-08:00

Suskind over at Drawing the Line has a great post on the long, sad decline and fall of Radio station KSFO, from iconic jazz station to hate-fueled elimination-station.

In the mid seventies I lived in San Francisco, where one of the many splendors was the thriving jazz scene. It was a joy to tune into KSFO and listen to Jazzbeau Collins, coming from The Purple Grotto.

(snip)

The nighttime was really the only time to hear Al Collins. He was soft and gentle and soothing and cool like a thumbnail moon.

He passed away this week after a lifetime in Bay Area and New York City radio. When I knew him best, and I knew him only as a listener, he was the night guy on KSFO.

That's when KSFO was the world's greatest radio station -- so sophisticated, so full of personality that it's hard to believe there really was such a place on the airwaves.

Por favor go read the whole theeng. He draws on the memories of S.F. journalistos Mark Simon and Herb Caen to aid een thees bittersweet remembrance of a once-proud San Francisco icon.

Suskind has offered us a small peek eento what KSFO was like een eet's hayday, before eet became SNUFF RADIO-560AM.

Outright Lies

2007-01-11T17:44:00.000-08:00

A sympathetic SFGate article on Spocko features this droll counterattack from KSFO:

In a statement Wednesday, KSFO program director Ken Berry said, "Many of the remarks attributed to KSFO on the Internet are old, lacking context and, in some cases, outright lies. When our hosts have stepped over the line, they have apologized and have been reprimanded."

Which line is that, Ken? And which of Spocko's audio clips are "outright lies"?

I guess we'll find out at noon tomorrow. KSFO is planning a sort of community outreach program, in which the hosts targeted by Spocko will take calls and e-mails from interested parties, and perhaps even apologize for - or at least explain - some of their more offensive remarks. That's the official story, at least. My assumption is that it'll actually be an unctuous wingnut love-in, with plenty of starstruck listeners begging the hosts to stand firm against political correctness, and a handful of inarticulate lefty dissenters trotted out for cheap laughs. But only time will tell, and I'd be very pleased if I turned out to be mistaken.

They've asked Spocko to participate; needless to say, he wasn't stupid enough to accept. Spocko's strength is that he appeals in good faith to broad community standards and sensible business practices (e.g., questioning the wisdom and morality of funding people who want to exterminate half your prospective customers). He has nothing to gain by singlehandedly taking on these bullies - and their engineers and audience - on their own turf. He understands that they're hothouse flowers, and can thrive only in a heavily controlled environment; the idea that their abuse of power could effectively be addressed by helping them to abuse their power further is a nonstarter, obviously.

Since they've essentially lost the real battle with Spocko, it's not surprising that these folks would want to drag him into their lair for a carefully choreographed rematch. My understanding is that Melanie Morgan has called Spocko a coward for refusing to climb into KSFO's hot seat, but as he points out, there's no reason such a debate couldn't have a more evenly matched lineup, and be held on neutral territory. For that matter, there's no reason Morgan et al couldn't venture out of their bubble, for once, and into "enemy" territory, without their training wheels or safety net. No reason, that is, beyond the obvious fact that they want ratings, and complete control of the discussion. And revenge.

It's not cowardly to decline an invitation to one's own lynching. What's cowardly is being unwilling to debate your opponent unless you and your cronies outnumber him four to one, and can cut him off or shout him down at will, and can choose whether or not to give his supporters a voice (as opposed to regular listeners who agree with you that "the liberal tree needs to be pruned").

KSFO's morning show is a microcosm of modern conservatism, really: thin-skinned, petty bullies remarkable only for their ability to lie fluently, and their inability to take even a fraction of the abuse they dish out.

Having gotten that out of my system, I'd like to draw your attention to the "Make a Donation" button at Spocko's Brain, which allows you to contribute to his legal defense fund. Alternatively, you can contribute to the EFF, which has been giving him free legal help. Or both.

I'll leave the last word to Spocko:

I’ve been called a hero. I’m not a hero, a hero is a journalist in the middle-east working his or her ass off to tell a story that might cost them their life. Consider donating to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

My button for donations is on the right. It’s the button for PayPal right under Spocko's United Reserves Against Killing of Journalists and Liberals (Hey that spells out SURAK, of JAL wow what a coincidence!), and I put it up only at others’ insistence, but if you don’t have money, your kind words are welcomed too.

(Crossposted from Bouphonia.)

Hotel San Francisco

2007-01-11T13:33:00.000-08:00

or Why the Spocko/KSFO Story Matters

Well, it seems as though KSFO Snuff Radio 560-AM is in full Panic mode now, desperately back pedaling and trying to fend off their duly deserved criticism and quite a bit of unwelcome attention. And I’m enjoying that thought immensely, believe me.

But let’s remember why this particular story matters. This isn’t merely a case of ABC/Disney trying to shut down an individual’s right to speak out and criticize. Remember why Spocko started this campaign originally.

Watch this video, then listen to the KSFO audio clips again (if you can stand it) and reflect on the similarities.

(Hoist a pint for jag at Impious Digest. Video produced by the ID gang – shamelessly and gratefully lifted from their site by me. Thanks guys!) (Direct Link)

This kind of thing isn’t supposed to happen in America. Let’s make sure it never does.

Spocko/KSFO story in SF Gate

2007-01-11T10:09:00.000-08:00

Excellent! Great timing, as well. KSFO Snuff Radio 560-AM will be holding a radio townhall tomorrow at 12:00 PST. I don't have the details in front of me but I'll post them in a bit.

SF Gate article

In a statement Wednesday, KSFO program director Ken Berry said, "Many of the remarks attributed to KSFO on the Internet are old, lacking context and, in some cases, outright lies. When our hosts have stepped over the line, they have apologized and have been reprimanded."

Berry declined to specify Wednesday which remarks were old or lies or who was reprimanded. Instead, at noon Friday, KSFO will pre-empt regular programming to allow four KSFO personalities cited in Spocko's e-mails to answer questions on-air about the controversy from the public, bloggers and media. "I don't tell people what to say, but I do think there will be some mea culpas there," Berry said.

Berry said KSFO will invite Spocko to appear on the air, but the blogger has declined such invitations in the past, saying in an e-mail to The Chronicle, "I'd be just another revenue generating 'event' for them to their audience, and they would love that kind of 'controversy' because it would MAKE them money and they still had control."

Spread the word! and Thanks!

Rip -

Meanwhile, Tucker Carson Is a Wanker

2007-01-10T19:38:00.000-08:00

The Spocko saga continues: see Rip below and also Media Matters.

But in other news of Blogs and Integrity, and hence Blogintegrity, we learn with some surprise that Tucker Carlson is an absolute wanker. Well, actually I think we knew the wanker part. What does come as a bit of a surprise is that Tucker! fancies himself a bit of a thug. Read Chuckles' posts for the background, but here is the latest:

Tucker Carlson's lawyer or someone claiming to be in this position has hassled my friend and former coworker around 7:30 to 8:00 pm this evening. This person marched into the video store and demanded information about me and insisted that my friend divulge my full name, place of residence and any other further places of employment I might have. My friend is totally effing rad and rightly told this person that there was no way in hell he/she was giving away any information about me and then demanded that this hassler then produce their name and place of employment. The hassler claimed that this information was confidential. My friend then said, "Well, now you know how I feel." I am rather in awe of the loyalty this friend displayed and I should find some appropriate way to pay him/her back for the aggravation suffered.

If this harassment does not cease by 5 pm Tuesday the 9th, I will be forced to take further legal action.

Oy. Tucker is kind of a jerk.

See also 3 Bulls! and Auguste. For his reference, Tucker may here observe someone who is NOT Tucker Carlson, Worf, the Online Blogintegrity Patron Fictional Character:

Now, see what Worf is doing? Looking down in absolute scorn at Tucker acting like a complete wanker.

Six Degrees of Hypocrisy

2007-01-10T19:10:00.000-08:00

Well, it’s been a fun week, hasn’t it? Yes, it has. But we’re not done yet, kids. Not by a long shot.

Melanie Morgan fights the War on Terror – Sock Puppet style!

I’m sure you’ve seen the YouTube video, which details a few of the nice things that KSFO’s talkshow hosts have been saying lately. But have you checked out the comments? I was wondering, a few days ago, who this Move America Forward character is. He’s doing quite a nice job of trolling the comments for the video, even if he does seem to miss the intent, with the standard boilerplate Wingnut Talking Points.

Well, I just grew curiouser and curiouser, (my friends call me Whiskers) so I started rummaging around again. This fella calls himself ‘Joe’ in his YouTube profile, so I thought I’d start with that.

For those of you who don’t know, Melanie Morgan’s little outfit, Move America Forward, was formed by Sal Russo, who’s now their Chief Strategist. He also runs a little PR firm known as Russo Marsh & Rogers. Wait – Russo Marsh & Rogers?

SourceWatch

In the long run, the headline grabbing “Truth Tour” may prove to be significantly less important than RM&R’s contract with the Kurdistan Regional Government, which aims to promote the interests of the Kurds in Iraq.

“Our job” with the Kurds, said Wierzbicki, “is to do a public relations campaign that will essentially thank the American people for supporting the war in Iraq. We will also encourage Americans to visit and invest in the Kurdish region.”

You remember the Truth Tour, right? Melanie and all her conservative pals flew to Iraq to show us all how super swell it was going over there. Well, they flew to the Kurdistan region of Iraq, anyway. We’ll get to that in a moment.

But first this:

Move America Forward was established in May 2004 by political consultant Sal Russo, former Republican assemblyman Howard Kaloogian and Melanie Morgan, a talk show host at KSFO 560 AM, both of whom now serve as Move America Forward’s co-chairmen.

Wait a minute! Kaloogian? Truth Tour to Iraq? It’s all coming back to me now:

In April 2006 controversy erupted again when Kaloogian’s campaign website posted a picture on his website that he claimed depicted a peaceful Baghdad neighborhood, and the claims that the Iraq conflict was going well. Quickly, however, internet watchdogs correctly identified the picture as coming from Istanbul, Turkey, and the picture was removed. Kaloogian later said using the photo was “a stupid mistake”.

Yeah – so was signing up with that chowderhead Melanie Morgan. I told you we’d get to that Kuridstan trip. Oh, I forgot one thing.

SpinWatch reported on July 6, that the “Truth Tour” was also in part sponsored by “the newly created Office of Media Outreach, a taxpayer-funded publicity arm of the Department of Defense.”

Say wha? Anyhoo – guess who else works for Russo Marsh & Rogers. Go on – guess! Did you guess Joe Wierzbicki? If you did, you win a prize!

Washington Note

In the “comments section” of The Washington Note, Joe Wierzbicki identifies himself as working “with a firm hired by Move America Forward.” The fact is that Joe works for the firm that created ‘Move America Forward’. At least, that is my understanding of it.

Joe’s a Principal at RM&R and, evidently, quite the PR virtuoso. Now, whether Joe is also the YouTube’s ‘Move America Forward’ is difficult to say, at the moment. But it would be irresponsible not to speculate, right?

After all, RM&R has a vested interest in maintaining Melanie’s image. And ‘Move America Forward’ spends a lot of time and text trying to move the conversation away from Melanie and back to ‘liberals hate America and love terror!!’. Plus, they ‘send cookies and Gatorade to the troops’. Hell’s bells! That’s practically taking on a dirty fucking terrorist with your bare hands!

RM&R is also responsible for promoting several ‘pro-troop’ videos, some of which can be seen on the YouTube. I’ll leave it to you to find them. (It turns out that Saddam Hussein was some kind of bad man. Oh, if only the Evil Liberal Media had reported such revelations!)

So, until we find out for certain, all we can do is sit back and wonder if a Principal for MAF’s PR firm is spending his time playing sock puppet on the internets. Not bad work, if you can get it, I suppose.

Now, here’s how this ties into Spocko’s case. I’m sure that Melanie and the rest of the Morning Ghouls at Snuff Radio 560-AM are simply beside themselves that someone would take their copyrighted material and distribute it without consent. I mean, ABC lawyers couldn’t be wrong, could they? Heavens no!

But as I’m rummaging about for things, I came across this. Again, the Washington Note

March 24, 2005
TWN Scoop: ‘Move America Forward’ Allegedly Steals John Bolton Video

‘Move America Forward’ has allegedly stolen property belonging to Citizens For Global Solutions by posting on its website a video clip of John Bolton where in about three minutes, Bolton completely guts the very idea and notion of the United Nations.

The video clip is the sole property of Citizens for Global Solutions and comes from an event called the “Global Structures Convocation,” held on February 3, 1994 in New York. The video was recently found in the organization’s archives.

By March 16th, ‘Move America Forward’ had posted a slightly truncated version of the video on its own website and provided no attribution for the Bolton clip. I have confirmed that ‘Move America Forward’ neither sought permission from Citizens for Global Solutions to use the video clip nor was given such permission.

I guess the key word here is ‘attribution’. See, Spocko was more than happy to attribute all of KSFO’s audio clips to KSFO and the individuals who made the remarks. Evidently, that’s bad… very bad. If Spocko had simply posted the clips and asked for contributions, that would be OK. Wait a minute… whaaa?

Again, the Washington Note

Some argue that Move America Forward is using the Bolton video as a recruitment and fundraising device – and that the “fair use” principles of accessing copyrighted materials for discussion or critique are not being followed in this case.

I guess it’s OK, if you’re a thinly veiled organization of sock puppets for the Republican Party, but not if you’re an individual trying to spotlight offensive and unAmerican broadcasts, via Fair Use doctrine.

You and your lawyers have a lot of nerve, Morgan. Not much for souls, but a lot of nerve.

[Update] – I forgot one item. From Wiki

Observers and the press have noted that some pro-Bush activists in the MAF entourage were aggressively confrontational and verbally abusive, calling the anti-war protesters “communists”, saying they are “aiding and abetting the enemy”.

Huh… I thought Republicans were the Party of Civility. Sure, everyone knows they lie through their teeth, but aren’t they at least supposed to be Rockwellian good neighborly types? Guess not…

Rip -

CBS-5 TV in SF report on Spocko/KSFO

2007-01-10T08:34:00.000-08:00

Hoist a pint for JoeWo !

Spread the word!

Rip -

A preemptive strike

2007-01-09T13:14:00.000-08:00

I’m sure the folks at KSFO/ABC Radio/Disney are aware of the buzz their little story has raised since the weekend, so let me throw something out there for them to think about.

I imagine their first thought is to try to track down all the sites that are hosting audio clips from KSFO and serve C&D letters. Good luck! But in case they’re wondering just how many people might already be aware of the story, here’s some traffic info.

The Zen Cabin has received nearly 450 requests for zipped files in the last 7 days. We could call that an average of almost 225 requests for each zip (wma and mp3), though I’m sure there have been more requests for the mp3 zip. I don’t have the exact breakdown – but let’s call it 400 requests for zipped KSFO mp3s.

Audio clips are hosted on probably a dozen other sites, if not more. Worldwide.

In the last week, Online BlogIntegrity has seen:

5,724 Visits 10,279 Page Views

Not bad, for a pissant little blog on the Blogger network, that most people never heard of before. Guess how many of those visits occurred since Jan. 4th. Go on – guess!

At 2:45pm CST, Technorati shows 691 results for ‘Spocko’.

El Gato Negro just e-mailed me with Google results for ‘spocko disney’: 2:30 this afternoon: 54,200 (Up almost 60% in eight hours)

The Spocko/KSFO YouTube video showed the following stats at 2:30pm CST:

Views: 29,929 Comments: 142 Favorited: 117 times

14 Honors for This Video:

#22 Most Viewed (This Week) News & Blogs (All)

#18 Most Viewed (This Week) – News & Blogs (English)

#24 Top Rated (This Week) (All)

#3 Top Rated (This Week) News & Blogs (All)

#24 Top Rated (This Week) English

#3 Top Rated (This Week) News & Blogs (English)

#19 Top Rated (This Month) News & Blogs (All)

#19 Top Rated (This Month) News & Blogs (English)

#13 Most Discussed (This Week) News & Blogs (All)

#10 Most Discussed (This Week) News & Blogs (English)

#6 Top Favorites (This Week) News & Blogs (All)

#6 Top Favorites (This Week) News & Blogs (English)

#42 Top Favorites (This Month) News & Blogs (All)

#39 Top Favorites (This Month) News & Blogs (English)

I would guess that more people have heard KSFO’s moronic jackassery via the internets in the last four days than heard it live on the air when it was broadcast. But I’ve always been an optimist.

Rip –

Word for the week: Mouse-o-fascism

2007-01-09T13:03:00.000-08:00

"Like Lancaster, Donald felt constrained by the political exigencies of the time to be seen as not undermining the wholesome American message of such companies as Disney, both during the second world-war and in the notoriously partisan "red-scare" of the early cold war years.
Unfortunately, however, Donald had less luck in hiding his prematurely anti-mouse-o-fascist beliefs in his oeuvre, and while Lancaster had success with films like The Crimson Pirate, Donald paid a heavy price at Disney after releasing films such as this thinly-veiled swipe at the Mouse's employment policies.~ (p. 387)

~ Chalmers Wöder Patterson, from The Mouse, the
Dancing Banana, and the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire,
Why do Free Markets Sometimes Kill People? ~
Regnery Publishing, 1998
WAS THIS EXCERPT HELPFUL? -~~$49.95~~,
~~$39.95~~, ~~$29.95~~, ~~$19.95~~, $9.95 - Buy it! More..."

Some thoughts on Spocko and KSFO

2007-01-08T17:35:00.000-08:00

Just some things that were rattling around in my head today.

[Meta-Update] – I want to add one very, very important thought before I let this post slip away.

I’m sure I speak for Spocko and all the scalliwags from Online Blog Integrity when I say:

Thank you, thank you, thank you!! You have our undying gratitude and appreciation. Keep up the good work!

Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!

For those of you who’d like to see just how much this story has grown, and maybe check out some of the blogs I’m talking about, see this:

Technorati search for Spocko
..........................................................................................

* Who's signing Melanie Morgan's paycheck? Rumor has it that she actually works for a third party traffic reporting company, to skirt Disney's anti-nepotism policy. Her husband, Jack Swanson, is KSFO's Operations Manager. Who hired Melanie or agreed to bring her on as a contract employee? Even if she's a contractor, wouldn't hiring the spouse of someone in station management still be considered nepotism? It would in my book.

* The YouTube comments issue: Why was a YouTube user named Move America Forward commenting on this video? Yes, we all know that Melanie Morgan is the head of MAF, but there's nothing in this video about MAF. I wonder if 'Joe' is 'blogicalthought', the curious commentor who was running damage control on so many blogs that featured Spocko's story. The delivery is a little off - but it would be irresponsible not to speculate.

* Where is the WingNet? I spent quite a bit of time observing the buzz as it grew over the weekend, and I don't think I came across one RightWing site that mentioned this story. Did we reach a sympatico - little guy against the MegaCorp? Did the wingnuts not hear about this? I find that hard to believe. Why were they so quiet? Why wasn't there a RightWing rush to defend the Free Speech of the anti-Terra! radio poseurs? I would think the LGF crowd would have been all over this. Interesting...

[Update] – From Disney’s website, on “corporate culture”:

Decency

We honor and respect the trust people place in us.

Our fun is about laughing at our experiences and ourselves.

[Update] – Thanks to SineQuaNon for the heads-up on this, from Fast forward Blog

Once the dispute became public, much of the blogosphere rushed to Spoko’s defense and dozens of web hosts stepped forward to provide access to the disputed KSFO audio files. The Electronic Frontier Foundation volunteered to defend the blog against legal action. Some of the biggest and most widely read political and media blogs–like DailyKos–provided extensive coverage of the controversy and posted the disputed files, daring Disney to sue them. Selections were posted on YouTube.

There are a lot of morals here for enterprises, not least of which is that social media are great tools for collaboration, teamwork and marketing but they are also lethal to those who try to play the new game by the old command and control rules. Marketers are no longer in total control of the message or the agenda and any attempt to censor public discourse about your brand will come back to bite you on the ass. There simply aren’t enough lawyers available to create a “surge” big enough to contain the blogosphere. Learn the new rules and get on with it.

Simply. Fucking. Brilliant. !!

You feelin’ us, Mouse?

[Update] - Just for fun...

I didn't start this, Swanson - you and your wife did. Deal with it.

More thoughts as they come to me.

Rip -

Disclaimer

2007-01-07T20:42:00.000-08:00

The audio files posted at Online Blogintegrity are posted in our sincere belief that such posting constitutes fair use under any reasonable understanding of applicable US law. We have no commercial interest in posting this material (we have no ads) and do so fully in the interests of fair comment for the public interest.

Moreover, in accordance with the Solemn Oath of Online Blogintegrity, which all contributors here have signed in a Dark Blood Oath by the Spectral Light of the Demonic Moon, we are also perfectly willing to blame Ripley for everything.

¡Spocko's Brain Lives!

2007-01-07T04:18:00.000-08:00

¡Viva Spocko's Brain!

¡Vamanos!

Go, and say "hola"...

and "gracias for jour effort",

and "¿How may I help joo geeve the feenger to Mickey, the steenky Raton?"

so.

Video Killed the Audio Star

2007-01-06T23:23:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm sorry to say that my YouTube project is scrapped, for the moment. Evidently, my computer just doesn't like video editing.

However, I did produce a decent audio file - and you're all welcome to use it! Make a YouTube video, post the clip to your site, whatever you can do to push the message.

Direct Link: Spocko KSFO mp3

Right-click to save, then do what you need to do. A couple requests:

1 - Give me credit if you use the audio - because

* I want credit
* Let them come after me, not you

2 - If you make a video with this, please be sure to use 'Spocko' and 'KSFO' in the tags, and let us know you've uploaded a video, so we can spread the word.

Any comments or suggestions are welcome. And if anyone needs audio help, I'm here. Evidently, my computer doesn't like the video work, so you're on your own with that. Do what you can to help, kids - spread the word!

Fuck teh Mouse! Hard! anyone asks about anything, say it was Rip!

Disney Responds!

2007-01-06T15:45:00.000-08:00

A Video

2007-01-06T12:39:00.000-08:00

See this Mike Stark post at Kos, also.

It's A Spocko, After All

2007-01-06T12:16:00.000-08:00

Uncle Smokes composed a theme song for Spocko's Saga:

After all it's a cruel world
After all it's a fool's world
After all it's a crude world
It's a lewd crude fool's cruel world

Mickey the Rat says "SLAPP!"
Cease and Desist
Mickey the Rat says "SLAPP!"
Cease and Desist
The Disney family
Loves those advertiser fees
That hate speech does not come free

ntodd

x-posted at DM

Spocko Prepares for the Next Round

2007-01-06T11:01:00.000-08:00

Amigos,

thees weel probably be the last guest post from Spocko, as hees new server weel be going up pretty soon.

I am grateful to have had the opportunity to host hees guest posts here, and hope hees new blog enrages el Raton even more.

Spocko ees always welcome to guest post at OBI.

!EGN!

Hi everyone. I'm working on

1. updating the advertiser database
2. reloading my blog on a host with balls and
3. Setting up Spocko's United Reserves Against Killing Journalists and Liberals Legal Defence Fund (Thanks to Interrobang's insistence)
4. sending background materials to the SF Chronicle and the SF Weekly.

Oh, and everyone say hi to a few folks: Bob P, Zeno and Jim Madison. All folks who wrote early letters to advertisers.

* Bob P got the Visa response to my Nov 15 series of letters, Operating in the dark in a powerless Oregonian night he still sent letters and they got better and better with each version.
* Zeno is our Sacramento connection to folks in the teaching world (who strangely are not responding to his request to pull their ads. Maybe it is time to point out their reluctance...)
* Athenae you all know, her inspiration lights all our hearts up.
* Eli, who played devils advocate on my letter and kept me company while I was being a boring poster and writng letters. (He is Not shadowy or Mysterious though)
* Kelley B, whose brain works like mine only MUCH smarter and more scientific, you can bask in all my reflected glory, like you asked, just for being one of my 15 regulare regular reader!
* Interrobang. Brilliant, technical, writer, Canandian, what's not to love? Long conversations via emails keep me sane, deserves crazy credit for keeping this going.
* GradeSchoolTech, whom I love like a sister and whose sons I endeavor to provide a good example to so they will visit me in the old Vulcan's home. You were always there. Thank you 50 times over.
* AND Jim Madison (PTcruiser) WHO is the ENGINE that kept chugging at the advertisers when even I was scared shitless. He truly deserves the lions share of the Sussman losing advertisers credit , and if it wasn't for the fact that I have tried to protect him from the thugs at KSFO/ABC/Disney he would be much more prominent in this story. He doesn't even know my real name, yet he kept on this story. If I ever make any money out of this deal (vs. losing all my money!) I'm going to buy him multiple bottles of Romulan Ale.

And Vulcan salutes of course to Mike Stark the finest Wingnut talker fighter in the whole blogosphere who put me up at DKos to the bigs.

Updated post eh? Let's think tactical AND strategic.

What keeps this up or propels it to the next news cycle?

One will be to list successes. Blogger v. Hate Radio. Headline:"Polite bloggers One, Hate Radio Zero" (God I suck at those).
I'll never top my Dixie Chicks headline about them losing red state fans, "Hix Nix Cix. Dix."

Prep for morning show assault:
And the Monday show AM on KSFO? They will be back pedaling like a crazy, apologizing, denying, lying. They always have the stage. They have the volume button and a broadcast license to give their side for 4 hours.

Their defenses need to be prepared for and countered. Mike, chime in please between contract law and tort reform if you have a sec.
It's Time to DEPosition and prep for the counter attack. Based on what they do, Morgan will play victim, dismiss us as dirty bloggers and "that moveon.org crowd." (FYI I emailed with a Moveon person, I'm requesting technical resources if necessary and if Disney/KSFO actually pulls some other legal trick.)

Lee Rogers will go all tough guy: "Nobody tells me what to say and If you Don't like it, Change the Channel! And then he will talk about how Air America was a failure and how We were going this route because AAR was not successful with their talk radio."

Messages and Narrative

My friend Dave and I role played my interview and he thinks that the
"Why this action, why Now" part of the story is interesting.Athenae? (This blogging stuff isn't just entertainment and carping, this can be a tool to battle bullies. ABC and Disney are fine when it is just entertainment and ratings, but when it costs THEM money it's BRINGS OUT THE LAWYERS to keep the cash flowing.)

What I think still sticks in my craw it the way that journalists can't, don't or won't defend themselves. The FRAKKING Wall Street Journal sponsors this show. Not the editorial page, but the rest of the Journal has some fine writers and they never said BOO to my letter! (I spent 15 hours on that sucker! You do a Google search for WSJ and Nancy Abramson and Spocko's Brain is #1. Did they care? No. Call for Reporter Glenn Simpson to be hanged. Great. Free Speech is swell, but you don't have to pay money to Morgan for the privilege of telling your reporters to hang.

And how in KSFO land controversy usually DOESN'T lead to anyone getting into "trouble". The Chronicle reporter said that a controversial story just ends up bouncing back and forth with O'Rielly, or Morgan or Savage, just leads to "Train wreck looky loo" ratings for them. They WIN with controversy up until it reaches a point where someone loses a job, a advertiser or a journalist or Muslim loses his life.

So the end game here is to make the controversy work in OUR favor. People writing the advertisers will work, until, like the Borg they will adapt. So the goal here is to NOT let them apologize their way out of this. The world needs to know that the money they generate via hate speech Is ILL GOTTEN gains. Cash generated by hate speech and violent rhetoric is tainted, just like your product Mr. Advertiser..

ONE PROBLEM,

With asynchronous Talk Radio we are all playing on THEIR turf and in their space. And since we are ALL huge free speech advocates here it's hard for us to effectively say to RADIO bullies, "Hey, that's not cool, cut it out."

They asked me if I wanted to "debate" Sussman. I said no, taking on Jon Stewart's tone to Tucker Carlson I said, "I won't be your monkey." and "You are hurting the country." I'm no Mike Stark, but I also knew that the second I was off the air they would mock me and dismiss my point. It is never about "changing someone's mind" on Hot Talk radio, so I moved the battle to another venue.

Bottom line: Right now It is SAFE for advertisers to be on violent AM hate radio. That needs to change. There are NO consequences to the HOST (The Union protects them from the new FEC fines, good for the Unions!), there are no consequences to the station: This needs to change. The Christian Right has been doing this to radio for years. John A at Americablog used the same tactics FOR the gay community against companies like Ford. His work was also an inspiration. Behavior can change.

Hate Radio does better with "controversial topics" and they get better ratings, which leads to higher ad rates. They hide behind "free speech!" like the bullies they are.
I think that Hannity and Rush are more subtle and frankly more dangerous, and Media Matters, Al Franken and others have been dealing with the dangerous the present, but third and second tier hosts are more apt to slip up and therefore when their hatred, racial bias or violence toward others come out we can shine the light on them to their advertisers who DO care about what they say.

I've learned a lot in this fight and one thing that we can do is help replicate this for our causes. I haven't told many of you about the DEEP PR anti smear work I did against Melanie Morgan to protect Jimmy Carter from her "Censure Carter" campaign in Atlanta, but that is a story for another boring blog post.

LLAP,
Spocko

Update: Go and read Mike Stark's new dKos Diary. Stark ees a dangerously creative and resourceful hombre, and he has many good suggestions on what joo can do to help Spocko, and give el Raton the feenger.

¡Spocko Speaks!

2007-01-05T18:18:00.000-08:00

Compañerros, I just got thees email from Spocko.

The Hotel Rawanda reference ees een response to a request for images/ideas for a possible Youtube video. More on thees later.

EXCELLENT.
Just got off the phone with the (San Francisco-egn) Chronicle. I think I stayed on message, but now it is open to narrative drift. I want to make sure we provide a solid back story on this too. Talk radio has MUCH more reach, we are dirty hippies, so we should keep in mind who they are and what this is about.

They talk serious and jokingly about killing us.

They idenitify where we live (Malkin)

They send us "White powder" in the mail.

They talk about killing our leaders

The people who they talk about killing, don't respond because they think it is a joke and all in good fun. (some journalists)

Radio is powerful. Speech is powerful. Talk about killing millions of Muslims, democrats and liberals is not a sport for entertainment and we are NOT just being politically correct babies. My friends are journalists. I'm not worthy to carry the boots of a Joe Conason, Eric Boehlert, Allison Hantschel, Mark Danner, and all the AP reporters who die in Iraq covering Bush's war, and I'm not pleased that they use it as entertainment fodder.

Use clips from Hotel Rwanda.
You want a back ground Video and audio? Hotel Rwanda Hutu Power radio.
I sent them to the people at Politics TV. I DON'T have the RIGHTS to that clip either, but I'm going to attach it and the clips from Rogers. "Crush the cockroaches, cut off the heads of liberals". Which one was RTLM, Which one was KSFO? You will be shocked at the similiarity.

These talk radio people have divided this country as much as the president, they count on it, they profit from it. Talk Radio IS the MEDIA for millions and you and I don't confuse them, but millions do (like my mom!).
My friends the corp VPs of Marketing will agree with me if they find out. They are the allies. The press and liberals are the groups being attacked.

It's all fun and games until a journalist dies (wait, that already happened, anthrax, Iraq...)
So I guess it ISN"T fun and games. No it's all fine until they lose advertising dollars then it is SLAPP down the dirty hippies and YOU HAVE VIOLATED THE LAWS OF THE UNIVERSE AND YOU WILL ATONE! (Howard Beale in the board room with Ned Beaty)

My lawyer from EFF who is advising me said I should bring the site up at a new place and I have it in process, 23 hours till it is up again hopefully next news cycle.

LLAP,
Spocko

(edited slightly for punctuation and to remove extraneous code kibbles- egn)

That's the San Francisco Chronicle there, pipples.

The Spocko Saga ees about to get legs.

so.

[Rip adds] - Evidently teh Mouse has ears and eyes on this story. I've found the same commentor on three different sites, pushing a gentle concern troll meme.

Who are you, blogicalthought? Are you a sock puppet for Disney? KSFO? Are you Jack Swanson? Melanie Morgan's illicit lover? Lee Rodgers' boyfriend?

blogicalthought at Lost Remote

blogicalthought at MonkeyFister What's with the NTodd reference? Creepy...

blogicalthought at WGG's Walled In Pond

I'm sure we'll see more of our newfound friend in the next few days. If you come across a comment by 'blogicalthought', be sure to let us know.

[Update] - Well, it seems our friend 'blogicalthought' has been quite busy the last couple days.

blogicalthought at What Would Matt Do

blogicalthought at Echidne of the Snakes (Scroll down - is it two people commenting with the same name or did blogicalthought go out of character?)

blogicalthought at Crisis Blogger

blogicalthought at the Biz of Show Biz

And again...

blogicalthought comments at The Supreme Irony of Life What the hell is a 'rural suburban lifestyle', anyway?

Pretty much the same message in all comments: 'Spocko stole copyrighted material - he's a fascist and wants to squelch Free Speech - he's practically a Muslim extremist - blah blah fucking blah...' It appears that 'b-thought' is running through the Technorati results and trying to do some damage control. Good luck, old chum!

I've been watching the buzz on this story grow over the last 36 hours or so, and it's encouraging and surprising to see how many non-political blogs have picked this up. Marketing, technology, media, advertising - a lot of sites you wouldn't expect to care much about a Z-list blogger (no offense to Spocko - I'm on that list, as well) taking on a political talk show.

Monday morning, kids - how much energy and volume can we pump into this story in the next 48 hours? Do what you can - spread the word. Thanks!

KSFO's Eliminationist Tendencies, caught on tape.

2007-01-02T10:29:00.000-08:00

You will be redirected to our new site in

seconds. If not, please click here to see the post in our new locale...

I am Spocko

2007-01-02T09:08:00.000-08:00

Thees following ees a guest-post by Spocko. He ees being harassed by lawyers for ABC/Disney for telling their advertisers the truth about what kind of sheet-headed eliminationist crrrap they were sponsoring.

Por favor take a minute to read eet, then joo weel see how joo can help as well.

We are also posting the eliminationist sound bites that KSFO/Disney's lawyers feel the need to suppress. Hopefully, the more pipples that post them, the sooner ABC/Disney weel get the message and back off of Spocko.

so.

ABC Radio Lawyer tells Spocko to Shut Up

Two days before Christmas I got a Cease and Desist letter from ABC regarding my use of audio clips from KSFO radio hosts Melanie Morgan and Lee Rogers on my blog, Spocko’s Brain (see attached PDF).

KSFO is a Disney affiliate whose radio hosts broadcast violent rhetoric directed toward journalists, liberals, Democrats, Arabs and Muslims all over the SF Bay Area and to the world via the Internet. I commented about the content of these host’s broadcasts on my blog and informed KSFO’s advertisers about what they were supporting by letting them listen to the exact audio quotes from the hosts.

Why the C&L Letter Now?

In mid-December I got confirmation that a major national advertiser, VISA, pulled their ads from the Melanie Morgan and Lee Rogers show, based on listening to audio clips I provided them. I also think that FedEx, AT&T and Kaiser are considering pulling their ads. Visa isn’t the first advertiser who has left KSFO, multiple advertisers have left the station, especially from the Brian Sussman show. In July of this year when KSFO lost MasterCard as an advertiser someone from KSFO “outed” me on a counter-blog (which I won’t link to). This same person has also threatened me with local and federal criminal action for using the audio (which I clearly used under the fair use portion of copyright law). And because they have suggested violence toward me (in addition to talking about suing me "for everything I have”) I have chosen to remain anonymous.

As Thers has said, 95 percent of blog fights don’t mean anything, but I think this one does since KSFO is using the full weight and force of an ABC/Disney lawyer and copyright law against a private citizen blogger. I dared to use the audio content in question for nonprofit educational purposes (I don’t even have ads on my blog!), and thus under the protection of the Fair Use Doctrine set forth in Section 107 of the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C.§107.

It’s about Money not Ideology

Talk Radio is a multi-billion dollar industry. It is also a regulated industry because the public gave the broadcast airwaves to radio stations. There are rules. First there are FCC rules with fines of $315,000 for obscene and indecent speech, thanks to the Christian Right. Interestingly, the radio union, (which KSFO hosts hate so much) worked very hard to stop those fines from being directed to individual radio hosts. So the corporation will bear the burden of any fines. Next, there are guidelines at the local station level, the network level and the parent company level. So even if the inciting of violence and hate speech is ignored by the FCC, the continued violent rhetoric has been, and continues to be, approved at the station level (KSFO) the group level (KGO-KSFO) the company level (ABC Radio) and the parent company level (Disney). They are ALL aware of this speech, and because they have not acted in a meaningful way, they all are giving approval for it to continue.

No Management Action

When Keith Olbermann and Media Matters ran Melanie Morgan’s comments about “putting the bull’s-eye on” Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi, management did nothing. Morgan did a jokey non-apology where she never even mentioned she used the term bull’s-eye.

I’ m guessing Lee Rogers may have gotten a memo telling him to stop talking about burning people alive, torturing them and blowing their brains out, because on November 30th, he defiantly said to management and advertisers, "Nobody is gonna tell me what to talk about or not talk about or in what fashion on this radio program. It ain't gonna happen!"

ABC/Disney acted only when they lost revenue. Then they went after ME with a cease and desist letter.

Why me? I’m not the one saying journalists should be hanged, thieves should be tortured and killed, people should be burned alive, stomped to death or have their testicles cut off. I’m not the one saying that millions of Muslims should be killed on the presumption that they are extremists or just because they live in Indonesia . I’m not the one who says that lying is as natural as breathing to Egyptians and Arabs or demanding that a caller “Say Allah is a Whore” to prove he is not an Islamist. I’m simply documenting this speech and providing it to the people who are paying KSFO hosts on commercially supported broadcast radio.

They have Lawyers, Guns and Money. I’ve got a 5th tier blog and no money

Because I and some other listeners hit right-wing talk radio in the pocket book, they are acting like wounded animals and brought out the big guns, Corporate Lawyers. Am I scared? Hell yes. They can easily squish me like a bug and tie me up in legal battles for the rest of my natural life (and Vulcans live a long time), not to mention that unlike KSFO radio hosts, I’m not getting paid hundreds of thousands of dollars and generating millions of revenue for a multibillion-dollar parent company. If I pursue this further I expect the next step is a “CyberSLAPP" suit.

I don’t want to consider the possibility of Morgan’s good friend Michelle Malkin deciding to publish my address and real name so that her minions can send me death threats or “white powder” in the mail. Chad Castagana, was charged with mailing more than a dozen threatening letters containing white powder to liberals. He got the idea from someone that journalists, liberals and democrats were the enemy and deserved to die.

Brian Sussman proudly poses with his handgun in KSFO publicity shots and says that he thinks that everyone should have the right to have a machine gun. Maybe I’m over reacting, why would they attack me? I’m not famous, I’m not an elected official, I tried very hard to be accurate about what THEY said BY USING THEIR OWN WORDS.

I tried to help companies protect their brands from being tainted with the violent rhetoric and anti-any-religion-but-right-wing-christianism speech. I wanted to help the VPs of marketing avoid being associated with Lee Roger’s “testicle talk” or Sussman talking about cutting off a finger and a penis of an Iraqi in his imaginary torture sessions.

It’s about Brands: All the Blessings, None of the Taint

I have found out that KSFO is sold to advertisers as “a Disney affiliate” with all the associated family-friendly connotations. So KSFO is getting all the benefit of the Disney name as well as the massive infrastructure of ad sales at the national level. Clearly ABC Radio doesn’t want KSFO hosts’ horrific comments to actually reach advertisers. Advertisers are kept in the dark so KSFO can benefit from the Disney brand glow (ABC Radio News creditability glow?).

Advertisers should be able to decide if they want to keep supporting this show based on complete information. We already know that management at ABC and Disney support these hosts, which means that the ABC/Disney Radio brand now apparently includes support for violent hate speech toward Muslims, democrats and liberals.

But instead of directing the hosts to refrain from violent rhetoric and hate speech, they go after the weakest person with the fewest resources. It’s cheaper and easier.

Bottom line: ABC/Disney is supporting and profiting from this violent speech, they should at least also accept any negative connotations or financial impact it might have to their image.

What can you do?

1) As El Gato Negro suggested, let’s distribute the audio clips of violent rhetoric and hate speech to multiple locations on the internet so that the ABC/Disney lawyers will have to find and send cease and desist letters to ISPs with stronger policies than the nice people at 1&1.

2) Crank this up around the blogosphere, if you have a blog link and post about this.

3) Let’s see if anyone in the mainstream media cares. Sadly they have a hard time writing about people who want them dead. I would think that at least the PUBLISHERS and MANAGEMENT at the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and the Associate Press would want to at least defend their own journalists and photojournalists. To date only the LA Times has called Morgan out for accusing them of photojournalist misconduct..

Some members of the press HAVE covered this. When Joe Conason at Salon did a story about Morgan and KSFO he got called a hack by Morgan. When Todd Milbourn of the Sacramento Bee did a story about Move America Forward he got called a liar by Morgan.

4) Donate to groups who would defend bloggers, journalists and others that Morgan, Rogers and Sussman attack. Specifically I’m recommending you donate money to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Committee to Protect Journalists, and Media Matters.

You can also support the journalists who are doing their jobs and are threatened with death from talk radio hosts.

5) Write the advertisers of KSFO. I have a list of SOME of the advertisers who advertise on KSFO. Drop me a line at spockosemail @ gmail.com and I’ll send you a link to an updated list.

As always, be polite, let them know what they are supporting and how it is impacting their brand in your eyes. They often times have their own stated values that they want to maintain, you may want to ask if their corporate values align with what is being said on KSFO (often times the hosts are the VOICE of their brand in the Bay Area, so it’s not just the fact that their ad is run right after some violent hate speech, but that the person who is reading their copy is the person who is spewing the violent rhetoric.)

I’m open to other ideas too.

I’d like to thank everyone who has written letters to advertisers, especially PTcruiser and BP. Thanks to the Blog-Integrity folks for the forum, and special thanks to El Gato Negro.
LLAP,
Spocko

Spocko also provides us weeth documentation of the fair use to wheech he has put these sound-files. I post thees because I find eet to be a fine example of how to write an effective letter to advertisers.

This is a copy of the letter I sent to advertisers on November 15, of course all the audio links are now inactive. But the clips they link to are attached. (The sound files weel be posted up next- E.G.N.)

Wendy Clark,VP-advertising, AT&T

Dear Ms. Clark:

Thanks to radio hosts from KSFO your brand is being associated with torturing and killing people. Would your marketing people be happy to hear your commercial ran after Lee Rogers said this about a black man in Lincoln , Nebraska ?

"Now you start with the Sear's Diehard the battery cables connected to his testi*les and you entertain him with that for awhile and then you blow his bleeping head off."

(Audio link 2:30 total for context. Comment at 2:03 )

You should know the person calling for the execution and torture of the black man in that clip READS THE AT&T commercials on the air. Right now on KSFO Lee Rogers is THE VOICE of AT&T to the SF Bay area. (Audio Link from 11/16/2006 )

Sadly, calling for the death and torture of individuals and groups of people is a regular occurrence on KSFO 560 AM, owned by ABC Radio Disney.

Another example: immediately after the 6 am ABC Radio news on October 27th:

Lee Rogers: I say they catch the person, tie 'em to a post and burn 'em. Set 'em on fire.

"Officer Vic": Yeah.

Lee Rogers: Let 'em know what it feels like.

Melanie Morgan: Hog tie 'em first. That would be good.

Next, Lee Rogers talks about a protester at a Cindy Sheehan event:

"Whoever did that should have been stomped to death right there. Just stomp their bleeping guts out."
(Audio link 4 minutes total).

Within three minutes they called for someone to be burned alive and a protester to be stomped to death. If you dismissed the first clip as a "joke", note that in this clip they were clearly not joking

Melanie Morgan famously called for Bill Keller of the New York Times (and nine editors from other papers) to be hanged. (Audio link)

On Nov. 14th Melanie Morgan said this about Nancy Pelosi:

"We've got a bulls-eye painted on her big laughing eyes." (Audio)
Also note that Morgan reads the Cingular Wireless commercials on KSFO.

Of course political speech is protected, but I believe the FBI and the FCC frown on targeting elected officials for death or inciting violence toward leaders of any political party.

Because of how ads are purchased, your ad placement agency probably didn't know that Tom Brenner (the "comic relief" called Officer Vic) regularly mocks advertiser's products. Listen as he:

* calls Chevrolet's product "shi**y" (link)
* suggests an anti-virus product is part of a protection racket (link)
* pretends a cold pill is really a suppository (link)

The odds are your product will be mocked. If they don't respect a big client like Chevrolet, will they respect your brand?

And it's not simply calls for killing specific people or mocking products, the radio hosts at KSFO proudly talk about their anti-Muslim views. Based on my research, your business has rules about discrimination against people of other religions, so what message are you sending when your employees or customers hear your advertisements right after Brian Sussman demands of a caller:

"Say Allah is a Wh*re!" (audio)

Or when Lee Rogers says,

"Indonesia is really just another enemy Muslim nation. ... You keep screwing around with stuff like this we are going to kill a bunch of you. Millions of you." (audio)

Maybe you haven't heard any complaints. Would KSFO management let you know about complaints? Doubtful. Morgan's husband, Jack Swanson, is KSFO's operations manager. The president of KSFO, Mickey Luckoff, started the station format and has a history of defending hosts like Michael Savage until he was forced to fire him.

I understand you can't listen to all the shows you advertise on, no one can. You rely on the accurate representation of the sales reps and the show description. But you don’t need to take my word, listen to the programs. You probably won't have to listen long to hear something that offends or disgusts you. If you wish to hear the complete context on any clip or the audio during a date your ad ran contact me I have an educational archive of audio clips, I've listed a few below.

I want to emphasize that if you withdrawal your ads you aren't limiting their free speech, just removing your paid support of it. Some other company without the values you describe on the AT&T website can support them. You can choose to advertise elsewhere. This is really about YOU. Do YOU want to be associated with these comments? Do you want your company and brand to be associated with these comments?

I urge you to discontinue advertising on KSFO during the shows hosted by Melanie Morgan, Lee Rogers, Tom Brenner and Brian Sussman.

If you want to contact KSFO here is a link to their website. If you wish to express your displeasure to their parent company contact Zenia Mucha, Senior Vice President, Corporate Communications, The Walt Disney Company PHONE: (818) 560-5300 CA, (212) 456-7255 NY or email Heather Rim, Vice President, Communications, ABC, Inc. heather.rim@abc.com.

Sincerely,

P.S. I would appreciate hearing your final determination in this matter.

Corporate Issues
Michael Coe,

Corporate Citizenship
Eric Hausken

Human Resources

Karen Jennings, senior executive vice president of human resources

A final note, the sound files weel be posted up presently, please save them to jour computer and post them far and wide on the internet.

Muchas gracias.

¡E.G.N!

WHAT THE CHRISTMAS FUCK!

2006-12-24T23:39:00.000-08:00

Wait, what the hell is going on here?

This is the sort of thing we were sworn to, uh, protect!

ONLINE BLOGINTEGRITY TEAM, AWAY!

I read that PDF, and that is transparent bullshit.

Barack Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn Obama

2006-12-16T23:17:00.000-08:00

Following up on Gato's and Thers' posts:

Think about it.

ntodd

In the Interests of Fairness

2006-12-15T18:32:00.000-08:00

We here at Online Blogintegrity are committed to Integrity. Uh, online. With blogs in, er, particular. Ahem.

With that in mind, we feel that "the other side" of El Gato Negro's post below deserves to be heard. For, as we have learned over the last seven years, when it comes to Democratic politicians running for higher office and the media, "balance" means putting something "reasonable" on one side and something "insane and borderline libelous" on the other.

Keeping that in mind, we would like to suggest to CNN some further split screen opportunities for their portrayal of Senator Obama:

Sen Obama and Ming the Merciless

Sen. Obama and RuPaul, for reasons Digby has elucidated

And Sen. Obama and Botulism, because I bet they could find a way to use it.

Let us at OBI never be accused of a lack of Journalistical Balanceitude.

Thees game, she could be fun.

2006-12-14T15:03:00.000-08:00

Amigos, I had hoped to avoid having to write thees post.

However, recent actions from some een las Sociedad des Frotacionados have left me weeth leetle alternative.

Eef eet ees an accepted truism een la prenza these days that the image, she ees everytheeng, and the substance, she ees notheeng, than certainly "jokes" like thees should no be countenanced.

Leetle jabs like that of Greenfield's can help marginalize a candidate or define heem/her een negative ways. Visual attacks such as those using the splitscreen format are so graphically strong, and yet informationally vapid, that I do no see them being abandoned by the media any time soon.

I must therefore note the curious lack of response from the excessively-renumerated democratic strategists/imagineers and even among the more (nominally) moderate ~~pudding-~~talking-heads.

Further, while no necessarily questioning their motives, I must also wonder why no one has made thees sartorial comparison en la prenza or even en linea:

Now, were I a clever leetle overpaid consultant, I would most certainly be working my corpulent, pasty culo off to make eet a certainty that these two hombres have a photo-opportunity how-joo-say "tout de suite".

so.

(Note: Thees ees no to say that ¡El Gato Negro! endorses Senadore Obama or any other 2008 Presidential candidate. I seemply offer thees leetle show & tell een the spirit of civility.)

You Vill Be Givink Your Name Now

2006-08-21T23:24:00.000-07:00

Crossposted at Whiskey Fire.

Via kc, we observe that one Brad Warthen has devised a rather original new comments policy for his blog:

I'm implementing a Double Standard:
The bad news is that one group of people will be free to post pretty much whatever they want. I will maintain the same hands-off policy with them that I've maintained with everyone up to now. With those in the other group, I will delete at will any comments that I deem harmful to good-faith dialogue.
The good news is that you get to choose which group you're in. To be in the first group, you just have to give up your anonymity. This won't require filling out special forms or supplying me with your birth certificate or blood type or anything. Just fill out the existing fields that precede comments with your real, full name; your regular, main e-mail address (the one you use for friends or family or co-workers, not something you set up on Yahoo for the specific purpose of hiding your identity); and if you have a Web site, your URL....
To be in the other group, keep hiding behind anonymity. I'll still let you through most of the time, but I'm going to start deleting comments that fit into one of two categories...

You are also enjoined to keep offa his property, ya dang smoochers.

As kc points out, many of your more delightful right wing bloggers have gotten into a snit lately about online anonymity. Their reasoning seems to follow that first put forward by the well-regarded ethicist Conan the Barbarian: "Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing." Of course, they sound pretty damn fey when they say it, but their basic point seems to be the same. We need real names, dammit, so we can split the skulls of the discourteous, or, I dunno, send them messages from stolen foreign IPs that threaten their kids, or something. I just use that as a wacky example.

If something is genuinely offensive, it's offensive whether it comes from a named or an anonymous source. The only difference is that in one case it's easier to retaliate -- but by doing what, trying to get them fired? Finding out their spouse's name and publishing it? If you want to foster civility by inviting some sort of disproportionate if petty response, go ahead, but please don't pretend that this makes you Lord Captain Commander Civilitypants. First of all, that's Tacitus's pretention, and he guards it jealously. Second, it's just silly.

I'll again invoke Thers's Iron Law of the Internets: 95% of what happens online is not worth getting upset over. And if you find yourself in that last 5% too long, like, for more than 5 minutes, just shut off the damn computer. (Or delete the blog, as the case may be.) Who the hell gives a rat's ass if someone is anonymous or using their real name online? It's just online shit. It's not high school debate club, and thank Christ for that, really.

I've long been a bitter foe of "online civility." I think it's hypocritical shit and a backdoor way of legitimizing truly reprehensible concepts, such as lunatic wars and state-sponsored torture. In support of this hypothesis, let me introduce the following as evidence, from Warthen's comments:

Well, Brad, although I never should have brought it up,I'm gay (or queer,as you prefer), and listing my real name WOULD make me feel vulnerable to attacks by thugs(it's happened before). There's enough antigay sentiment on this blog to make me feel this way. If you think I'm being paranoid,walk a mile through Lexington County in my shoes someday.

And the reply, from Mr. Civility Warthen:

As for being gay -- look at Andrew Sullivan. He's out there with his real name, and he says what he wants. But note -- he expresses himself with respect for other people. He doesn't have to tear people down to build his ideas up. I don't get time to read his site as often as I'd like, but what I've seen is good stuff.

Wow. Putting aside for the moment the differences between Lexington County and Manhattan, as well as the astonishing claim that Sully never "tears people down" (on this, see The Editors, and passim)... look, we're not talking here about anything like promoting rational discourse, we're talking about censorship. You big silly, worrying about getting bashed after you out yourself to a bunch of unhinged strangers! Why can't you be more like that nice Andy Sullivan...

Oy.

2006-08-18T18:36:00.000-07:00

Nice Pants

You probably all know that I have... mmm issues... with Jeff Goldstein. But I was pleasantly surprised, tonite, by one of his posts. Being a real live actual blogger, I'm always willing and happy to point to a good post. And Jeff dropped one that actually made me giggle. Yeah, I know, you're shocked - but it's true.

Another question for my Levi’s

me: “Point of pants etiquette: is it okay to wear a boot cut jean with, say, New Balance cross trainer tennis shoes, or maybe a leather dock shoe without socks?”

Levi’s: “Well, that depends. Do you want a real answer?—or is this gonna be like the time I told you it was most definitely not okay to go free-balling in a loose-fit button-fly, but you went ahead and embarrassed yourself with the inadvertant turtlehead in front of that Safeway checkout girl just the same?

“Because if it is, I’d just as soon save my breath.”

I can see the humor in that and, frankly, it reads like something I'd write. Hey, credit where it's due and all that rot, right?

But...

I've worn Levi's 501 jeans before. Button-fly. Commando. No skivvies. 'I'm out there, Jerry. And I'm lovin' it!!' And I never poked my head out for a breath of fresh air, if you know what I'm saying.

So, I'm curious... how does a fella's fella make its way thru a button-fly? Negligent buttoning? How gauche!

Is this a matter of girth or defective buttonry? We may never know.

But kudos to you, Jeff, for having the ~~balls~~ courage to post it! Nice Pants!

Rip -

Thugs.

2006-08-03T03:48:00.000-07:00

There ees no other word for what we have experienced lately from los bloggerros on the right.

Thees idea, first expressed by El Culo Bloggente Jeff Goldstein, that eef joo disagree weeth what someone writes, joo are absolved of any guilt when revealing their identity to the world:
Online Integrity Pledge? Fuck it. Like the Geneva Convention: You don’t sign it, no protections for you. I don’t give a shit what Ginsburg, Souter, Kennedy, Bryer, Stevens and Greenwald have to say on the matter.

And here:
I’m thinking I’ll maybe pull out of the Online Integrity thing. Integrity doesn’t mean we should be compelled to respect the privacy of those who rely on our restraint to launch the basest personal attacks.
Thees idea, she ees crrrap.
For, as our own Ripley has stated:

Thirdly (and mostly lastly), I flat out disagree with your statement. Maybe your ego is too tender to suffer the slings, arrows and all that rot of base personal attacks, but mine isn't. You can call me whatever you want, say anything about my family, use the foulest of language, drag your internet-enlarged cock across my face... knock yourself (selves?) out... I won't intimidate your offline Life or threaten your privacy. That's just the kind of guy I am. I expect the same from the rest of the blogosphere, whether I'm dealing with right-wing idiots or left-wing idiots.

And she ees no just any crap, but a dangerous and hateful crap.

As our own Thersites has found out, and Armando, and now, TBogg.

Ciertamente, thees thug, Patterico, left heemself an out. He employed a transparent veneer of rationalization that TBogg took thees action (to reveal hees identity) heemself, but I theenk eef joo read the thread een question, joo weel come to the same conclusion as Tbogg (and ¡ElGato Negro!).

Theese thugs, theese gamberros apestosos have made clear that eef they disagree weeth joo, they are more than justified een taking away jour pseudonymity and subjecting joo and jours to threats and intimidation.

Thees ees who they are, thees ees what they do.

The question remains:

¿What ees the proper response to thees thuggery?

¿Can someone tell me?

E.G.N.

THERS ADDS: Well, here is TBogg's response --

'm not going to get into a blogwar with Patterico but here is his fairly transparent "Idintdoit" response. Really, it's not a big deal. My name being out there won't change my life one bit. I won't lose my job. I'm not going to have a panic attack every time some one mentions it or my family, so if you comment on Patterico's blog: be nice.

He knows it was wrong, but he's playing "you were asking for it and besides you know you wanted it" card. As a prosecutor he's probably heard it a million times in rape cases and it obviously resonated with him.

And so: I'm done with it. Kerfuffle over.

Time to move on.

I think this is the right attitude. Once these weasels begin to go there, you leave it. Oh, you could always retailiate, and escalate. I was offered all sorts of "inside" information about pasty, but who cares? Their little games are so retarded, and so exhausting. And so are their endless attempts to pretend they didn't do what they obviously wanted to do from the very beginning.

What's hilarious about this is just how unable these weenies are to take getting teased. Call them names and they throw just the prissiest little tantrums.

Wankers.

Update by ¡El Gato Negro!

Thers has the right idea, although he deed no say eet een so many words.
Thees thug and hees eelk are enraged by a leetle ridicule.
The best response ees more ridicule,
as our compañeros bloggerros have made evident.

Brief Comment from Thers: One thing -- if you post at Patterico's fever swamp, he'll grab your IP. Be careful.

Ripley adds: I couldn't resist. And, I found this in Patt's post:

I had no plan to actually “out” the guy, but — angry over his trashing of Malkin — I wanted to rattle his chain. So I left some obscure comments on the Malkin post, needling him. It was the kind of hints he would understand....

Huh... now, what possible motive could a person have for doing such a thing? The mind wobbles...

Oh, wait - I almost forgot the Troll Chow! Goldstein, Pablo, Pasty, Jeff 'Cock Slappin' Good Time!' Goldstein, Jeff Goldstein has a dick and he's not afraid to abuse it (see Pablo), Pablo McGoldstein, Goldstein Pablo wedding in the Lehi Banquet Room, Jeff Patterico McPablo Dickfor, Bigus Dickus...

2006-07-31T20:02:00.000-07:00

Holding the mirror to our own faces

This morning I read a diary at dKos and had to shake my head. Evidently, we, the bloggers who blog, just aren't receiving the message.

firestorm's dKos diary

As far as diaries go, it wasn't very good to begin with - some graphic pictures of dead children and some quotes from Free Republic commentors, which were the slack-jawed, no eyelid quality we've come to expect. But 'firestorm' intro'd his/her quoted comments with this:

Selective comments from freepers, we need to expose those haters' real identities...

Ah, boy... So, I read through the quoted comments and came to 'firestorm's' finale:

We should definitely track down the true identities of those freepers who advocate violence and glorify the death of innocent children. There is no difference between these beasts and Nazis, Bin Laden etc. We should hold freerepublic accountable for those comments full of hatred and violence... I suggest we should set up a team to monitor and record every freeper hater. Folks, don't underestimate them. I have no doubt if they can get away, they will have no problem killing every liberal.

Wrong, wrong, WRONG!!! I'm not here to defend anything the Freepers say, trust me. Their comments are typically churlish, inhumane, bigoted and light on facts. But they have a right to speak and they have a right to Privacy offline, just as liberal/progressive commentors do.

Based on the comments that firestorm provided, I'd be hard pressed to say that the Freepers are advocating violence but that's probably splitting hairs. And while some of them are glorifying the death of children, we, the rest of us out here, don't have the right to harass them offline or impinge on their privacy. It's that simple and we know it.

The diary received 113 comments (and hasn't been deleted, as of this post) and quite a few expressed the same thought I post here, i.e., bad form on the diarist's part. What I found odd was that more commentors were lamenting the substance of the diary (too short, no analysis, etc.). Having been around there for a while, though, I understand the dynamic - but I was really surprised that there wasn't more reaction to the diarist's calls for outing.

dKos has already felt the sting of overeager sleuths trying to use the exposure of personal information to intimidate members into silence. Frankly, I'm quite disappointed in firestorm's short memory or thoughtless attempt to turn the tables, whichever it may be. I'm sure his/her heart was in the right place and there certainly seems to be some emotion involved. But we know that it takes time and effort to create a post - and that should be enough time to think about what we write.

We hold liberal bloggers to the same standard as our friends across the aisle, here. I think I speak for all of us when I say that firestorm's post was over the line and should be denounced.

(If you decide to read the diary, the pictures are quite graphic.)

Rip -

Junior Detective Wingnut Freaks

2006-07-23T13:30:00.000-07:00

Over at OI the question is raised, "exposing a sock puppet: violation of OI?" The answer, I think rightly, is that it is not:

In general, while there is nothing inherently wrong with using a “sock puppet”, it betrays a lack of confidence in your own arguments to carry the day (by manufacturing a legion of supporters to lend your own arguments weight).

....

Regardless of any specific allegations’ veracity, the distinction must be made between a true pseudonym, used for reasons of privacy, and a sock puppet, which exists solely to buttress an existing persona.

Fair enough. But let's stress this point again: "there is nothing inherently wrong with using a 'sock puppet.'”

What is interesting about this statement is that nobody disagrees. Sock puppetry is, in and of itself, not really much of a problem. What it amounts to is someone doing something a bit odd on the Internet. And nearly everyone who has ever accessed the Internet in some way, shape, or form has at some point done something silly, and probably understands the temptation to do something sillier. So availing oneself of the anonymity afforded online to do something so essentially harmless as to mess around in this way is trivial. As trivial as Googling "tits" or "Nelly Furtado" or "hot colostomy pix,", or similar.

Of course, if someone goes totally bananas with the sock puppetry, then it becomes more serious. Like, if they employed sock puppets to add weight to a shoddy but widely cited statistical study on a matter of serious public import, or something.

But if we're going to sort out the ethics not so much of employing a sock puppet, but of exposing one, it is perhaps not sufficient to simply say that no ethical bar prevents you from doing so. Merely saying that nothing prevents you from doing something is not a good reason for other people to think you aren't insane when you go ahead and do it. You are free to spend all your free time at home dressing up like Blossom, or memorizing batting champeens through 1916, or whatever else reconciles you to the Utter Howling Emptiness that is Human Existence. But you're still some sort of a creepy git if you go around bothering other people over a nice dinner out with your Blossom obsession. Ahem. Moving on.

Let me here propose not so much a Postulate, as a Pustulate:

If you post interminable, unreadable, turgid, whiny screeds trying to prove that someone is using a sock puppet, absent the other kind of other stuff Tim Lambert has documented, you're a complete fucking lunatic.

Can't see why anyone who concedes that using a sock puppet is a "Venial Sin" would object. Especially when we add not so much the Corollary as the Crapollary:

If you're going to post a gazillion word wankfest allegedly proving sockpuppetry, you had best (1) actually prove your case; (2) show some reasonable, non-mental-patient excuse for why you ever cared enough to post about it with enough bandwith to choke a Nazgul.

I'm afraid these simple guidelines are a bit rough on Patterico, who, remarkably, seems to have some sort of an actual job that doesn't involve writing extensive dissertations on Glenn Greenwald's use of the semi-colon. They're also bad news for the charming and winsome Ace, who in this general regard writes charmingly and winsomely of a blogger who dared to look askance at his Hardy-Boying, "He is, in short, and idiot." (Very sic).

Part II is tomorrow.

Spocko

2006-07-16T21:29:00.000-07:00

Here is an interesting case that will amaze and delight all the true devotees of Online Integrity -- the Integriteers, if you will.

Spocko has been pointing out for a while that the fine folks at KSFO Radio are totally bananas, especially their marquee on-air personality, the charmingly, winsomely homicidal Melanie Morgan. Ms. Morgan has attracted attention lately for her adorable Mengele-esque conversations with her BFF, the lithesome A. Coulter.

Spocko has had the audacity to wonder if certain of Ms. Morgan's advertisers are fully comfortable with associating their products with naked calls for lynching journalists. The... fiend...

Joe Conason has the roundup at Salon. (Conason is not a signatory to Blogintegrity, but we do not hold that against him. Probably an oversight. He's busy.)

AND NOW FOR THE BLOGINTEGRITY: Spocko has been given shit from some goon, probably at KSFO, though perhaps it is some stray lunatic. (No direct link. Fuck that shit.)

Spocko, anonymously or not, pseudonymously or not, has been acting completely within his rights as a citizen to complain about the content of a radio station that after all uses the public airwaves.

No farther with this, kids. What they're trying to pull with Spocko is worse than what they did to me and my wife. That was just intrablog bullshit. This is about a media outlet trying to intimidate a citizen.

More later.

Ripley adds: Evidently, Melanie has no problem with people using the internets to intimidate people who may have different viewpoints. Check it, bleed!

Jones and his Bruin Alumni Association figured it was about time that someone documented just how revolting the push for leftist political thought in America's taxpayer-funded universities had gotten.

And the Bruin Alumni Association wisely realized the best way to share their findings with the world was to publish them online.

Britain, I understand, has some pretty stiff libel/slander laws and I wonder if we won't start seeing tighter legislation regarding internet posts here in the US, as well. Until then, I'd guess we'll be seeing more 'outing' and outright intimidation via the nets. Seems the RightWing has run out of real ideas, so they're reduced to finger-pointing and smears. And these are people who claim to be adults. Nice...

2006-07-14T17:36:00.000-07:00

Help, help! He's being repressed!!

Now you just don't remember
All the things you said
And you're not sure that you wanna know
I'll give you one hint, honey
You sure did put on a show

So many victims, so few candles

So, in my travels, I came across this tidbit from Goldstein, at Sadly, No:

I’m thinking I’ll maybe pull out of the Online Integrity thing. Integrity doesn’t mean we should be compelled to respect the privacy of those who rely on our restraint to launch the basest personal attacks.

Firstly, that second sentence was an abomination before the Lord (or a goatfuck, depending on which school of Lit Crit you adhere to). Christ, Goldstein, did you take any English classes at Our Lady of the Eternal Victim that your parents paid so dearly for? (Yes, I know - that's what makes it ironical and stuff...)

Secondly (or nextly), when in the name of Sweet Baby James did you Ever truly subscribe to the tenets of OI? You've knighted yourself Sir Doppleganger of Online Integrity from Day One - I know it, you know it, and the entire blogosphere knows it.

Thirdly (and mostly lastly), I flat out disagree with your statement. Maybe your ego is too tender to suffer the slings, arrows and all that rot of base personal attacks, but mine isn't. You can call me whatever you want, say anything about my family, use the foulest of language, drag your internet-enlarged cock across my face... knock yourself (selves?) out... I won't intimidate your offline Life or threaten your privacy. That's just the kind of guy I am. I expect the same from the rest of the blogosphere, whether I'm dealing with right-wing idiots or left-wing idiots.

[I don't condone Frisch's comments. Then again, I don't quite buy the entire story. Call me cynical...]

But let's step back and try to get some perspective on our tearful victim, shall we? Yes, let's shall !

For those of you interested, I’ll be appearing on KIRO News Talk’s Dori Monson show at 3:05 MST (5:05 EST). [...]

Registration is all marketing/database related, so if you want, just submit Cindy Sheehan’s info.

We’ll be talking about Dr Frisch.

Oh, Satire, thy name is Jeff! What red, white and screwed American couldn't get a chuckle out of that? Not this one, I can tell ya! Hang on, I think I just peed myself.... oh, man... I did! Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha !!! No, go on without me - I can't stop laughing!!! Hooooo Mama!

Where was I? Oh, yes... Goldstein...

update: Evidently, I’m undergoing another DoS attack. So if the site gets wonky, that’s the reason.

Oh... my... fucking... God in Heaven with no beer! Are you fucking kidding me?!?

C'mon, Jeff, we all know you never suffered a Denial of Service attack, you lying crybaby. You're a fucking liar. That's it. You're a fucking liar - we know it, you know it, even your drooling hordes know it. So stop playing the victim in hopes that you'll get a link and catch some sweet wingnut stroking and maybe some ad revenue.

You're not a victim. You're just fucking pathetic.
...............................................................................

I had deleted this post because I messed it up, trying to re-format and edit, this morning. Frankly, I'm not very pleased with it; the tone and content are not what I was aiming for. I should also note that I can't claim certainty that Goldstein is a liar or that he didn't suffer a DOS attack.

That said, he's still fucking pathetic.

The thing that started me on this post was the line about pulling out of Online Integrity. I'd never paid attention to Goldstein before things started heating up between him and Thers. (They were NOT FLIRTING!!) But it seems that as soon as I did start watching what he wrote, Goldstein was going out of his way to violate the basic precepts of online integrity and Online Integrity on a daily basis. That, in itself, should be reason enough to dislike the creep - but I get the feeling he's actually proud of what he does, which seems to be a rather common posture of bloggers on the Right side of the aisle. I can't help but wonder if these clowns are still pulling the wings off flies.

So, for people like Goldstein, it's no big deal to post someone's personal information and mock their reaction to disturbing comments about their children. Good clean fun. Fraternity pranks. Boys will be boys, eh, Jeff? Of course, these are the people who take not-so-secret delight in the idea of torturing detainees in the unholy 'War on Terror', so it's not surprising to see the devolution to fucking with fellow Americans, simply because they're 'liberals'. And while I'm sure you have an impressive dick, Jeff, your comments about slapping people in the face with it shows a level of immaturity that makes me wonder if you have a 15 year old nephew who's borrowing your computer from time to time.

When you wake up in the morning
With your head on fire
And your eyes too bloody to see
Go on and cry in your coffee
But don't come bitchin' to me

But the part that's really amazing, to me anyway, is how shamelessly Goldstein and the other nitwit right-wingers run crying to Mommy at the slightest hint that someone's not buying their bullshit. And even more bewildering, instead of acting like the manly men (and women) they'd have us believe they are, they're suddenly swooning like some dainty maiden in an Anthony Trollope novel. Jesus - man up, people! Frisch's comments were way out of line - I'll join the chorus and condemn her comments. Do I feel for Jeff? Not a fucking bit. Know why? Because Jeff thinks he's special and shouldn't be held to the same standards as the rest of us.

You want to call liberal bloggers and the New York Times 'traitors', knock yourselves out. But stop whining when someone calls you on your bullshit or dares to tell you to Fuck Off! It's bad enough reading your John Wayne-a-be, exaggerated sense of self-worth and entitlement spilling onto the nets each day, but watching you and Malkin indulge in inter-linking orgasms of self-righteous indignation whenever someone offends your delicate sensibilities is, frankly, enough to make me retch. I'll admit, though, your toadies are well trained. (See? I said something nice about you, Jeff. Gold star for Me! Yay!)

So, go ahead, Jeff - pull out of Online Integrity. Join Trevino for a drink on the patio. Your macho Fancy Lad turned tut-tutting Society Lady is a bit of a hard sell to those of us who posses even average intelligence and humanity.

[Update] - No, it appears my first instincts about Goldstein may have been correct. To wit:

I received no email or phone call from anyone at Inside Higher Ed.

A few corrections: 1) I don’t believe I engage in “considerable mocking of liberal academics and ideas.” I taught English for a number of years at a private university in Colorado, in fact, so I’m not unfamiliar with the academy.

I'll pass that mind-fucker on to Thers, Jeff. Ya fucking liar...

But you might be thinking, 'Hey, Rip - which is it, fucking liar or victim?' The mind wobbles, don't it? Yesterday:

Guess Deb isn’t quite done milking her 15 minutes.

This time, however, I’ve contacted the authorities.

Can I get a collective gasp!! from the choir? gasp!! Thank you... now, you're probably wondering what heinous atrocity was commited that would leave Jeff no choice but to contact the authorities... the Authorities!!

Ephu, Count Cockula. Jeff - I really encourage you to have Mrs. Cockula google Satchel so she can see what you do while she’s at work all day. Trust me on this, Jeff. Cunt Cockula really needs to google Satchel.

Umm...yeah... I guess SWAT will be out in full force over that one, eh?

I'm pretty nonplussed by accusations, threats and fiery rhetoric on the internets. Hell, we've all seen (and probably typed) plenty of empty threats, drunken outbursts and strings of profanity that would make our Mothers blush. To paraphrase the old band joke: Instant asshole - just add keyboard. Yep, we've probably all been there, right?

Don't get me wrong - when it comes to children, I'm very rigid in my views of right and wrong behavior. Frankly, I have no sympathy for anyone that abuses women, children, animals or preys on the weak and helpless. (Let me add that the fucking non-human pieces of shit that engage in torture need to be put somewhere uncomfortable. Christ, it's the 21st Century - grow up, you sick fucks.) Call me a bleeding heart Liberal, if it makes you feel better.

But, back to Jeff, where was the hot-house outrage when someone made a comment about Thers' daughter? 'It wasn't one of My commentors!' That's it? Where was the RightWing hue and cry about the sanctity of children? No-fucking-where, that's where. Goldstein's regular commentors were nothing, if not loyal, and the issue became 'Why won't Thers produce the IP? Thers is lying!' Where were the RightWing 'Family Values' bloggers who, you'd think, would have jumped up to align themselves with a Father, take a stand and type, 'Say what you will about me - but children are Off Limits!'? Again, no-fucking-where, that's where. Where was the 'Politics be damned!' condemnation? You know it...

Jeff, I'll admit that I feel for you, a little bit, after all. I'm sure that you love your son and you're probably a decent father. I'm not a father but I'd hope that, if I were, I wouldn't have to read some churlish comments about my children. But let's face it: You're not special, and you're certainly no more special than Thers.

But hey - whatever it takes to keep you in the limelight... right, brother?

Rip -

Do What Thou Wilt

2006-07-11T12:36:00.000-07:00

Here at Online Blogintegrity, we have a tendency to cut marionette capers, act the goat, and generally stumble around like silly-assed fucking fools. However, our dedication to crude, quasi-lobotomized humor in no way prevents us from appreciating more sober forms of drollery. I'm thinking, for instance, of Aziz Poonwalla's re-re-re-re-reclarification of what "online integrity" really, truly, honestly is and is not:

[T]his site is not a watchdog group, checking for compliance to the OI principles amongst the endorsers. In fact, to avoid any illusion of responsibility for how individual blogs behave, the blogroll has been disabled....[I]t will be upon their own conscience alone to adhere to them, and the responsibility of their readers alone to hold them to it.

It's just what the Internets have been waiting for! Finally, we have a firm philosophical framework that allows good people to be good, and bad people to be bad, just as their conscience dictates.

And it gets better:

An OI logo and button will soon be made available to blogs to display as they wish to indicate their endorsement of the Principles....

Soon? Who can wait that long? I've come up with an OI logo here and now, and there's no doubt in my mind that it shrieks "integrity" louder than Josh Trevino on a Yohimbine bender:

Now, in theory, it remains possible that some blogger might put an OI logo on his or her site, and still do something not at all integritudinal, like (for instance) publishing the home address of an insulting commenter. And it's also possible that instead of holding this blogger to the OI Principles, his or her readers might actually harass the commenter themselves...just as the blogger hoped or assumed they would right from the start.

Then, too, BushCo dead-enders seem to agree pretty much across the board that the Left "wants the terrorists to win"; for them, America's survival requires fighting this liberal Selbstschutz by any convenient means. It's no wonder OI has thusfar been a slapstick disaster that would make a cat laugh.

All the same, we have to give this thing a(nother) chance to work. We mustn't underestimate the power of a logo - and the ill-defined, unenforced "principles" it advertises - to keep delusional and emotionally crippled bloggers from overreacting to legitimate criticism, bad language, or unpalatable facts.

And if it doesn't work out that way this time around...well, I guess it serves us right for expecting too much.

Thers Adds

OI has an Open Thread up. I see this as a good thing, actually. I for one have never been against the general concept of a site discussing integrity, just the way it's been implemented. I've already asked over there about what the comments policy might be, and got a fairly reasonable response. So, it's a step. Be perlite please if you head over there, ye lot o' cabogues. Would it kill ya to put on a tie?

The New Faces of Blogintegrity

2006-07-09T15:24:00.000-07:00

We note with wild surmise that Online Integrity is under new management. The beloved and Most Integritudinous founder of this great Vessel of Internetty Rectitude, Lord Captain Commander Tacitus Q. Pompitude Civilitypants, has resigned his commission.

*HONK*... sniff...

It's just so darn sad to see such a Great Hero of the Integrity Wars fade away. G'Bye, ya big lug! You've made the Internet if not more civil, more integriticious, at least more verbose, and for that, we Salute You.

And this site welcomes the new Captain of Online Integrity, standing tall on the Poop-Deck of Propriety, Aziz Poonawalla, of City of Brass. He has already made one great improvement to the site, in our opinion. We have previously noted that the OI comments policy was completely opaque, with comments being deleted by persons unidentified according to undisclosed criteria. Captain Poonawalla has solved the problem elegantly, by not allowing any comments at all. Instead, he boldly states that we can stride boldly into the bold future and "shape the vision of decency and profesionalism to which we aspire" by joining a bold Yahoo email list to which nobody sends anything.

We here at Online Blogintegrity salute this bold descision to not discuss what happens on the blogosphere on the actual blogosphere. Integrity, one notes, is best discussed at a dignified remove from the riff-raff. And criticism, is, of course, always bad.

We here also would like to join in this new spirit of openness and Intergritesquiness by similarly changing management staff. We think you will be pleased with our new direction. Meet the new bosses!

Muttley

Scott Thorson

Manny Mota

Lemmy

Ripley adds: Eat the ~~rich~~ non-integritudinous!!

Phila adds: Here's the part I like:

The OI project was accused of being a partisan tool, and in the ensuing reaction from both sides, that accusation became a self-fulfilling prophecy.

2006-07-07T17:42:00.000-07:00

July 4th Backwash

(Right-click, open in new window for dramatic background music while you read)

And, so, the outcry drags ever on.... Not content to paint the New York Times as an organization run by traitors, for traitors, the right-wing nutjobs are again up in arms. The latest target? Hollywood...

Michelle Malkin:

Harrison Ford and Wolfgang Petersen should be shot on sight! I have never seen such blatant disregard for the safety of the President. Why, they practically showed the entire layout of Air Force One - the number of weapons, the locations of the bathrooms, the fax machine model. I urge all my readers to look for Harrison Ford and harass him! Harass harass harass!!!

Ann Coulter:

Is it any surprise that liberal Hollywood has decided to endanger the President by revealing the most sensitive secrets about Air Force One? No, it's not! Someone should kill Wolfgang Petersen and bring his blood to me.

Pam (Atlas Shrugs):

How dare they?!? How dare they?!? This was top-secret, classified information! They are putting our troops in Iraq in mortal danger! How dare they?!?

Glenn Reynolds:

I'm flabbergasted! I cannot believe that even liberal Hollywood would stoop so low and give Al Qaeda this information. Not only that, George W. Bush would never say, 'Get off my plane!' - he'd tell that terrorist to stay right there and fight. Then he'd kick the terrorist's ass!

Republican Senators were quick to support a bill, authored by Joe Lieberman (D-CT), condemning Hollywood for its release of Air Force One.

What was once a valuable and stealthy mode of transportation for the President, his aides and family, has now become the desktop wallpaper of every computer on the Al Qaeda computer network. By revealing the name (Air Force One) and description (large aircraft with Presidential seal and United States of America logos) to the enemy, liberal Hollywood has put every American at risk, especially those Americans who purchased the commemorative Air Force One bomber jackets. It is the sense of the Senate that Air Force One, Harrison Ford and Wolfgang Petersen should be condemned for their lack of patriotism and their outright treason. In addition, we find Glenn Close a bit sassy in this movie.

The outrage continues as conservatives lash out against the Tom Hanks/Steven Spielberg collaboration:

Jeff Goldstein:

They've effectively given away all of our Special Forces training programs, going back to WWII. I'd like to slap my dick across liberal Hollywood's face, then tell them that I just slapped my dick across their faces and see the look on their faces when I tell them that. Does anyone have Tom Hanks' address? I'll quote you in boldface.

Charles Krauthammer:

I can't imagine living in an America with subversives, like Steven Spielberg, who will give away our tactical tactics just to make a dollar. Why would they tell Al Qaeda that our troops use helmets and rifles? It's shameful. I'm a psychiatrist - you can trust me.

Pam (Atlas Shrugs):

How dare they?!? How dare they?!? This was top-secret, classified information! They are putting Easy Company in mortal danger! How dare they?!?

You'd think they'd be out of outrage. But you'd be wrong...

Michelle Malkin:

First of all, women don't belong in the Army Seals. Second, liberal Hollywood has just told Al Qaeda that the Army Seals use women as diversions. Does anyone have Demi Moore's address? I'll blogroll you.

Wall Street Journal:

While women are certainly an asset to America, they obviously require much more maintenance (read: defense funds) when they serve in the Military. Liberal Hollywood is doing a disservice to America by encouraging women to serve in the military. America would be better served if more women worked in the secret SWIFT monitoring program, which we've detailed on the front page, just below the MBNA ad... no, further down... now left... that's it - read that one...

Pam (Atlas Shrugs):

How dare they?!? How dare they?!? This was top-secret, classified information! They are putting the Air Force Seals in mortal danger! How dare they?!?

Jeff Goldstein:

I'd like to slap my dick across Demi Moore's face!! Does anyone have Ashton Kutcher's address?

Well, that's about all the outrage I can handle for one nite.

Blog of the Week

2006-07-05T08:25:00.000-07:00

This week's Online Integrity Blog of the Week is Jesus's General, run by General JC Christian.

The good general wins for displayingActual Integrity:

I've given a lot of thought over the last few days to the practice of publishing people's personal information on blogs. It's a despicable practice, an act designed to scare those targeted into silence. It is never justifiable.

I did something very similar a few months ago. I published a map of the area in which Michelle Malkin's former residence was situated. Although I did not publisher her address or label the exact location of her house--instead, I added a "Malkinwald Internment Camp" a few blocks away at a football field--I left the red Yahoo pin, unlabeled, at the location of her home....

I did it to retaliate for Malkin's publication of the personal info of two college students who had organized an anti-war demonstration. I was wrong to do that. Her actions spoke for themselves. They exposed her for what she is.

I now wish I had listened to Auguste at Malkin(s) Watch and the others who urged me to delete the post. They were right. I was wrong.

I want to thank reader Elendil for making me think long and hard about this. And I want to apologize to her for reacting defensively at first. She was right to call me on it.

2006-07-03T20:20:00.000-07:00

The Prom Queen's assistants also blog

I don't care what side of the aisle you're on - maintain some Integritility, act like you have a fucking scrap of humanity in you and stop fucking about with the facts! This is just fucking pathetic... (from dKos)

Ethical Blogging At HuffPo ?

I blogged a few weeks ago about the situation in which an invited blogger, Dr. Peter Rost was fired from Huffington Post after he revealed a troll that showed up on almost all of his posts was in fact an employee of Huffington Post. As a result of Dr. Rosts research and subsequent blog outing of this person, he was fired.

It gets even better - go read...

Look, I don't care how liberal, conservative or wicked kewl you think you are - you have an obligation, as a blogger or blog-manager, to keep things Real. If you run a multi-author site, either vet your contributors or let them know that you have a certain 'theme' you're aiming for. And don't send your boot-lickers to refute them while you stay safe in your 'it's not My peanut butter on your chocolate!' tower.

I'll guarantee you, if I posted something that wasn't accurate or Integritastic, Thers or one of the others would call me on it, ask me to correct it and/or they'd delete the post. Same goes with comments: if we disagree with a commentor, we disagree - but we won't fake comments to make someone look bad. We don't fuck around here, kids. And by the by, see any ads on this site? This is homegrown Integrilasticity - we don't answer to anyone but you and our souls.

I don't know - maybe it's just me... I like to think that the internets give us a voice, even if no one's listening to us, but aren't we all just a little beyond the Jr. High games by now?

You'd think....

¿Mess o' pottage?

2006-07-03T18:54:00.000-07:00

Thees story from Businessweek has already been blogged about elsewhere, but I felt eet deserved further attention.

Ted Murphy, an advetising executive *¡koff!* ¡koff!* ¡Hrnrrnrnrnrrrn! *¡koff!* *¡¡Koff!!* *¡SPLAT!* (Yo disculparse, advertising executives geeve me the hairballs) ees launching PayPerPost.com where la blogsfera can sell out eet's shiny new media street cred for Five dolares a pop.

Jon Fine, the columnist (y bloggerro) who wrote about PayPerPost for Businessweek, seem to theenk that thees ees no such a good theeng:

But media today is so cynical that you have to come out and say that shilling without disclosure is a bad idea. (...) Thanks in no small part to bloggers, this is an era of increased media transparency, and many shifty dealings between the business and editorial sides have been exposed. (...)An undisclosed PayPerPost placement on a little-seen blog isn't the most egregious thing out there, but it's far from honest. Media may be more transparent, but the line between authentic editorial and paid placement is still often smeared, and defenders of disclosure can feel, like the proverbial buggy whip company, that they're terribly outmoded.

Lindsay Beyerstein seems to have less concern over the prospect that thees concept weel destroy la Integridad de la blogsfera:

I take comfort in the fact that the PayPerPost business model is so wretched that it will burn everyone involved. Companies who pay five bucks a pop for a couple sentences on a random blog are stupid.

From what I can tell PPP will pay anyone with a blog, irrespective of traffic. So, they're probably already spawning Astroturf Spam blogs--link farms that exist solely to house unread 30-50 word blurbs on spring break meccas that the spammer has never been to.

Kristjan Wager, een the comments at Lindsay's blog, breengs up a point wheech I find muy interesante:

Well, if politicians can do it, why not bloggers?

Finalmente, sometheeng to consider, from the businessweek article:

Those seeking to subvert PayPerPost from within can't: No pornographic or "illicit" content is accepted.

Amigos, that almost sounds like a challenge to me.

so.

2006-06-30T13:15:00.000-07:00

After much thought, and many argumentative exchanges, Blog-Integrity™ has chosen Sadly, No! as thees week's Blog-Integrity™ Blog-Of-The-Week©

Frrrom their award-worthy takedown of Jeff Goldstein, to their courageous forays eento the murky depths of the Online Integrity brouhaha and beyond, los bloggerros at Sadly, No! have shown a true reverence for the Blog-Integrity&trade.

Thees means that Sadly, No! joins the prestigious group of previous winners, let us hope that eet does no go to their heads, eh?

¡Felicitaciónes! Sadly, No! at being chosen as Blog-Integrity™ 's Blog-Of-The-Week©.

so.

¿How do joo practice the Blog-Integrity&trade?

2006-06-29T15:27:00.000-07:00

Recently, we have seen some good guidelines for practicing integrity online een regards to the role of los bloggerros as online-journalists.

However, Blog-Integrity&trade ees more than just practicing good online journalism, no?

Por ejemplo, some bloggerros, like Spocko at Spocko's Brain use their blogs as a way to keep their local media outlets honest.

Some, like MyDD's Chris Bowers, take their Blog-Integrity&trade eento the political realm, getting eenvolved een their state or local party, weeth an eye towards changing theengs from the ground up.

Others, like The Daou Report's Peter Daou, join onto campaigns, weighing een weeth their Blog-Integrity&trade as a way to create connections between los bloggerros and politicians at the highest levels.

Bloggerros wheech are no that ambitious (like jour humble, furry, author) seemply use their blogs as a way to draw attention to candidates worth supporting, weeth the hope that thees may also draw some donations their way.

So, mis compañeros bloggerros, my question to joo, she ees thees:

¿How do joo practice the Blog-Integrity&trade?

¿eh?

El código de los bloggerros

2006-06-27T17:49:00.000-07:00

Suskind, over at the shiny-new blog Drawing the Line, suggests that thees Statement of Principles for the Prenda de integridad en linea, she ees een need of some amending, een order to have sometheeng more how-joo-say "efficacious".

Now, ¡El Gato Negro! need sign no steenking pledges to have Blog-Integrity&trade, but he ees no averse to these concept of a code of conduct for los bloggerros.

So een the rare spirit of trying to add sometheeng positive to thees discussion, he would like to offer for jour perusal A Bloggers' Code of Ethics, from the estimable site www.cyberjournalist.net.

Thees leest, from April of 2003, she refers mostly to the actions of los bloggerros een their role as periodistas ciudadanos, or citizen journalistas.

I weel excerpt only a small part, under the heading "Minimize Harm" we find:

• Show compassion for those who may be affected adversely by Weblog content. Use special sensitivity when dealing with children and inexperienced sources or subjects.
• Be sensitive when seeking or using interviews or photographs of those affected by tragedy or grief.
• Recognize that gathering and reporting information may cause harm or discomfort. Pursuit of information is not a license for arrogance.

Thees seems to make sense, and there ees much more at the leenk to be considered, and many new chances for diversiónes cómicos.

Por ejemplo I leave joo weeth thees leetle gem, under the heading of "Be Accountable":

• Expose unethical practices of other bloggers.

(choplick)

so.

2006-06-27T15:50:00.000-07:00

So Integrilicious you can almost taste it!

One of our Integrilerity Scouts, David (Austin Tx) has once again proven his merit by forwarding this example of Integrimismem to us:

WASHINGTON, DC — Citing a longstanding need to "restore honor and dignity to the American food-service industry," Sens. John McCain (R-AZ) and Russ Feingold (D-WI) announced the public debut of their joint business venture Monday, a chain of integrity-themed restaurants which opened in 12 locations nationwide.

Other menu items at Russ & John's include the "All You Can, In Good Conscience, Eat" buffet; Grandma's Favorite Mashed Potatoes, which comes with gravy, coleslaw, and a signed affidavit from Irene Feingold, the senator's paternal grandmother, confirming that they are, in fact, her favorite mashed potatoes; and John's Hot & Spicy Jalapeño Poppers.

McCain said the staff has been trained to deliver "straight talk" to customers.

"Their heart is in the right place, but I don't ever see myself eating there, especially when there's a McConnell's Pork Barrel right across the street," said Sen. George Allen (R-VA), referring to the barbecue-style eatery owned and operated by Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell, known for its controversial "lawmakers-and-campaign-donors-eat-free" policy.

While we at the award winning Blog Integrity salute the Senators for their outstanding and exemplary efforts to encourage Integritocity in the mainstream, we have to ask, "Is it enough?". To which we quote Sen. Ted Stevens: "NO!!"

Sorry, fellas, it'll take a lot more than some chicken strips and day old guacamole to garner our praise and endorsement. We are, after all, pretty damned close to the zenith of Integrilunction here and have standards which would make a Six Sigma blackbelt weep in the supply room.

But thanks to David (Austin Tx) for bringing it to our attention. He has now earned enough points that we shall award him the Ring of the Mighty InteGriffin.

Huzzah!! Now, you might be thinking, "Hey, that's not a Griffin..." I know - I just told you it's an InteGriffin. Christ, pay attention, people! Fuck's sake...

Anyhoo - there's a secret ceremony that accompanies the awarding of the ring, but I can't describe it here because the secret cabal that Thers, NTodd, Phila, The Black Cat (Espanol) and I operate is so secret that we can only communicate with each other via e-mail and this blog. Suffice to say, if you ever see one of us mentioning 'Chicken-in-a-Bisket', you should avert your eyes and think of something else for several minutes, such as Plato's Republic or Joan Jett. Strange workings are in the works... Also, don't mention anything to Atrios, Kos, Siegel, Zenergerlerle or Judith Miller. Just... don't...

Congratulations again, David!!

Rip -

The Integrilicious Others

2006-06-20T21:25:00.000-07:00

There is apparently another blog like ours, one that comments upon not merely Integrity but Online Integrity. That would be Drawing the Line; they call themselves

a group of (mostly liberal progressive) bloggers who endorse the Online Integrity Statement, and agree to abide by these principles. This group supports the OIS and actively encourages others to do the same. [The] With Online Integrity blog started just today as a result of recent events.

The "recent event" they have in mind would seem to be the Armando affair: "This site was started on June 13, 2006 in response to some changes occuring on the net and within online communities."

OK: all well and good. We here at Online Blogintegrity never really opposed the OI Statement of Principles in and of itself; we had some fun with it, sure, but by and large, you know, we actually abide by it. We've never outed anyone. We've never threatened anyone. We've sung, we've danced, a little seltzer down the pants, and so on... (Armando did at least at one point say that our first post was kinda funny.) But we have no problem with the words or the sentiment. Hell, it never even would have occurred to any of us to "out" anyone even if OI had never existed -- even Ripley would never, ever have done such a thing, and he's a complete bastard.

Our beef all along has been that it is foolish as a purely practical matter to try to cut deals with people you should perfectly well know will try to twist the words into a cloak to disguise as righteous the noxious shit they were always going to pull anyway. I'm not going to rehearse the whole Case Against Tacitus here, though I will if anyone wants. More to the point, recently we've seen a pretty blatant violation of the Sacred Integrity Principles by a certain paste-eating wingnut moron, and the reaction has been, well, jack shit from the signatories of the pledge -- all we've heard is a lot of silly wanking about why they don't need to live up to their own sworn word if it is to their advantage not to do so. So what the hell do the words mean without the will to back them up? What the hell is the point of discussing integrity with people who obviously don't have any, but who are more than willing to use the fact that they signed an online petition to pretend that they do?

So that's the first issue I'd put to the Drawing the Line folks.

The second is that I think Suskind, who seems like a thoughtful, intelligent fellow, reads far too much into OI statement. He says the following "should do a lot of good":

* Violations of these principles should be met with a lack of positive publicity and traffic.

To me this means do not link to what is defamatory, what is not true, what cannot be sourced or backed up, and to what gives support to people and sites who do not respect the dignity and rights of others. Do not link to a person or to material with the intention to aggravate a negative situation and cause more harm. It is a preventative measure to stop the creation of "google bombs" for the far-flung stories that become urban legends, and it stops the personal and baseless attack on persons.

Uh, that's not what it says. If it were what it said, that'd be great, but it isn't.

But if it were: aren't you really just asking the whole right wankosphere to simply pack it in and go home...?

Anyway they seem like nice folks over there, and we should have them over for coffee and lemon squares.

Outing and So on

2006-06-19T22:15:00.000-07:00

Lindsay Beyerstein has a post up about psedonymity, anonymity, and outing. There is a lot to respond to in the post, but let me just isolate one strand, in the part where she talks about the Armando business with some young journalists at Yearly Kos:

I was surprised by how much these journalists seemed to resent bloggers who guarded their identities. They felt that fake-namers enjoyed more freedom of expression (or less accountability) than they did. Money also came into it. Some people remarked that it wasn't fair that they, the full-time journalists, had to take heat for a pittance while other people were using pseuds to command a large audience while holding lucrative corporate jobs.

The journalists also insisted on their absolute right to out anyone they wanted.

Well, I'm kind of in a position to know what "taking heat" in this context means. I actually didn't and don't care about any heat directed at myself, especially considering the, uh, quality of the particular heat source. It was when someone deliberately decided to out my wife in a blogfight to which she was only a very minor party that I got skeeved: someone who would cross that line and justify it with total bullshit is someone who is not particularly concerned with lines of any sort. What next? becomes the reasonable question, and once I asked it of myself, I deleted my old blog.

So I am probably more sympathetic to these journalists than others in the blogosphere might be. When someone contacts you anonymously via a stolen foreign ISP to ask you "How are your children?" you become... alarmed. I think you'd have to be pretty naive to think that journalists have not been contacted personally with shit just like this. And yes, by the left as well as the right. (Only the Right relentlessly plays the stupid incivility card -- "eeek, the other side is impolite, we win!" -- because they are disingenuous morons.) This is not at root a political phenomenon. The internets are the internets. I've belonged to academic listservs, sports message boards, have seen the Mac vs PC flamewars in various forums... and I've witnessed some weird stuff. People just get totally bizarre and a few don't have any clue where to stop. I would not be surprised to learn that someone who publishes a column about, say, gardening, gets the occasional spooky threat. Sure, political debate is more heated, but the dynamic is the same.

As journalists move into the online realm, they are bound to attract this sort of unfortunate but really unavoidable sort of attention. And they don't like it, and they should not, and asking them to just roll with it is unfair. Have your kids be made the subject of a bizarre comment from an untraceable source, and then you can disagree with me.

But then. Journalists have more resources at their disposal to deal with such garbage than all but a few bloggers. Most of us are not affiliated as bloggers with any institution, and that does offer a kind of protection that we don't have. You write something for a paper that someone does not like, and they threaten you -- well, you don't need to try to make the Blogger Support Team pay attention to you. Presumably, your boss can find you a lawyer. We really are more vulnerable: most of us, anyway. (Note -- I have tenure, and so am much less vulnerable than most people, and also I can call on free legal advice through my union; community college professors are often represented by unions like the NEA, to which I belong. That doesn't change the wider point, though, as it had nothing to do with what I wrote or write as a blogger. I stand by everything, by the way.) So in this sense writing pseudonymously is for some the only shield they have under which they can participate in public discussion. And that is a good thing. American public debate is bound to be raucous, it should be, and the more the merrier, I say.

So in short I think journalists have some legitimate complaints -- but they also have more resources than those they complain of. And, please, on the money thing, we are hardly all corporate lawyers. I'm not rich. I do OK, but I'm not rich. And I know some pseudonymous bloggers who make far less than journalists -- and who risk far more than they do to write what they write.

2006-06-15T15:21:00.000-07:00

Blog of the Week? You're soaking in it...

Huzzah !! BI has been chosen as this week's Blog of the Week, by Blog Integrity. What a pleasant surprise to come home to.

After careful consideration and much discussion, Blog Integrity has chosen Blog Integrity as this week's Blog of the Week.

Their careful attention to detail, their wit and their integrimaniacal devotion to online integrity made them the obvious choice.

On behalf of Thers, Phila, NTodd, The Black Cat (Spanish Edition) and myself, congratulations to Thers, Phila, NTodd, The Black Cat (Spanish Edition) and me, for your hard work and dedication to maintaining integrity on the internets. We salute you and thank you.

When this blog started, I knew we had something special happening - but I never dreamed we'd be chosen as Blog of the Week. I wish I had something profound to say here, like at the Oscars, but I'm slightly overwhelmed and, frankly, wondering whom I should call first with the news.

On behalf of Thers, Phila, NTodd, The Black Cat (Spanish Edition) and myself, I'll just say that we're humbled and honored to receive this noteworthy recognition and we'll certainly try to maintain the high level of integrifility that folks have come to expect from us.

Of course, none of this would be possible without you, our intelligent, attractive, witty and very probably well endowed readers. You make us what we are. When Life handed us accos, you helped us make accolades. Um... well, you know...

Anyhoo - Thanks, everyone! I can't even begin to describe how much this means to me, and probably Thers, Phila, NTodd and The Black Cat (Spanish Edition), as well. In fact, I'm s'darned excited about this, I'm placing a temporary moratorium on the NO FLIRTING policy here.

Desi, this is for you, baby. Mwah!!

(And in case Uma Thurman is reading this blog, I'll post this, for good measure.)

Thanks again, everybody!

Rip -

2006-06-15T15:14:00.000-07:00

Blog of the Week

After careful consideration and much discussion, Blog Integrity has chosen Blog Integrity as this week's Blog of the Week.

Their careful attention to detail, their wit and their integrimaniacal devotion to online integrity made them the obvious choice.

On behalf of Thers, Phila, NTodd, The Black Cat (Spanish Edition) and myself, congratulations to Thers, Phila, NTodd, The Black Cat (Spanish Edition) and me, for your hard work and dedication to maintaining integrity on the internets. We salute you and thank you.

What-ever

2006-06-14T20:37:00.000-07:00

Please don safety goggles and hard-hats. We are spelunking for Josh Trevino's ethics.

Tac begins this fascinating post by explaining that he was pseudonymous from Oct 2002 to Aug 2004. He then quite placidly admits that during much of this period he was a hypocritical asshole:

For my first several years of blogging, I believed that the cons outstripped the pros, and I acted accordingly. Anonymity and pseudonymity struck me mostly as a means for base people to do base things. The ranks of those who had sincere and defensible reasons for the practice seemed thin. Of course, I included myself in those ranks: even Peter Singer admits to some justification for personal partiality. In the past year or so, though, my views have slowly changed — particularly as I’ve met more professionals who must engage in pseudonymous blogging by dint of their professions.

What he means is that he was pseudonymous, but thought other people who made that decision were jerks, so in several cases, he outed them. But the irrelvant aside about Singer makes that all OK. Magically.

The guff about whether or not anonymity or pseudonymity is a net benefit to blogging and bloggers in general is stupid. The reason you should not so it is that people get insane and self-righteous about this crap, and at some point somebody is going to go too far and hurt someone or get hurt. Period.

Strength Through OI!

2006-06-10T13:53:00.000-07:00

Usually, liberals are nothing if not flexible. We support Muslim theocracy and gay marriage. We hate America, and overvalue the Constitution. We're moral relativists who refuse to make situational excuses for torture.

But when it comes to online integrity, we've been too rigid, too unyielding. We've taken words like "commitment" to mean "the trait of sincere and steadfast fixity of purpose." And we've taken sentences like "Private persons are entitled to respect for their privacy regardless of their activities online" to mean that you shouldn't reveal people's offline identities even if you don't like them very much.

I suppose this is part of the liberal childishness one hears so much about...that naivete that makes us unable to conceive that there are bad people in the world, or to understand that you can't trust government to have your best interests at heart. Whatever the cause, our inability to grasp the bright, elusive butterfly of Online Integrity seems to be causing us a great deal of grief lately, so I thought I'd see if I could translate the principles into more accessible language.

Private persons are entitled to respect for their privacy regardless of their activities online, unless they've said stuff that bothers you. You should usually respect the non-public nature of personal contact information; that said, if you can dig up someone's name online, and use it to look him or her up in the phone book, it's fair to say that the person is asking for trouble. The safety of people's families is important, but bear in mind that someone who marries a bad person, or is being raised by one, can't really complain when the chickens come home to roost. The separateness of private persons’ professional lives should also be respected, unless you have good reason to believe that violating it will wrench people's attention away from your rhetorical inadequacies.

Public figures are entitled to respect for the non-public nature of their personal, non-professional contact information, and their privacy with regard to their homes and families, unless you're really pissed off, or are feeling keen pangs of existential dread.

Persons seeking anonymity or pseudonymity online should have their wishes in this regard respected as much as is reasonable. Exceptions include cases in which people: 1) can profitably be belittled or mocked for their station in life; 2) prove you wrong; 3) make you angry; 4) attempt to win arguments by posting links to primary documents from authoritative sources; 5) dismiss Hayek; 6) call Ayn Rand's dialogue "wooden"; 7) respond to being called a "fuckwit" by calling you a "fuckhole"; 8) encourage other people to laugh at your sophistry; 9) insult your commenters; 10) have funny-sounding names; 11) hurt your feelings; 12) are corporate lawyers; 13) are not corporate lawyers; 12) cross any line, real or imagined, that you feel justifies encouraging a campaign of harassment against them.

Violations of these principles should be met with a lack of positive publicity and traffic, since there's no other way for signatories to demonstrate that they take their "commitment" seriously. But since OI neither has, nor desires, any formal mechanisms for enforcement - not even so simple and obvious a mechanism as deleting signatories' names from the OI webpage when they gleefully break the pledge with malice aforethought - participants are encouraged to use the OI pledge as a club for their enemies, and a shield for themselves. It's really a pretty nice little racket.

FROM THERS: You know, if the OI people want to be taken seriously:

1. Tell us who the hell is deleting any and all critical posts there. Who is the moderator? What are your posting rules? Don't annoy Tac, is that it? Can't you just say so? And why did you ask for "discussion" and then shut it down completely?

2. Who is writing the posts that say "we at Online Integrity"? Some group of Integrity Initiates? Who? Are we supposed to accept your intentions uncritically? Why do you get upset when the people you speak to as children become irked at your desire to be seen as anonymous Integrity Gods -- are you mad?

3. Tell us why some cases of OI transgressions merit a main page post, weaselly as that is, and others don't? Why do the merits of the Armando case get discussed, but others, well, get banned? It seems the actual debate about online ethics is occurring everywhere else online except OI!

4. Blow me.

¡Mayday! ¡Mayday!

2006-06-09T19:30:00.000-07:00

When last we left the Good Sheep Online Integrity, she had just barely escaped
a series of near-disasters.

First she ran eento a dead calm that left her crew hungry and dehydrated,

then she fired a warning shot across her own bow,

disastrously, her gunner's mate torpedoed her own engine room,

and she was taking on water.

But then, just when eet looked like the whole venture was destined to fade as just another reña desarreglada ala blogsfera, the Good Sheep Online-Integrity suffered a mortal blow just below the waterline.

Si, thees time the target was Armando, late of thees noble experiment een bloggiendo bi-partisano known as ~~Penises Touching~~ Swords Crossed, who bravely had battled the rate-heads at dKos, and nobly defended the rights of bloggerros ala izqueirda to browbeat each other een extended bouts of joyless hectoring.

¿Who could have foreseen that the already tattered pledge would face such an outrageous attack?

Armando had been one of the original signatories of La Prenda de la Integridad en Línea, and eef hees privacy (and therefore hees Online Integrity) could be shattered, any bloggerro might suffer the same fate!

¿How weel the men of The Good Sheep Online Integrity deal weeth thees new threat?

The answer ees "no-very-well", for their erstwhile leader, Captain Tactless, has no even begun to understand the nature of the problem that imperils hees vessel, and the crew has already begun a rousing game of blame the victim.

Amigos, bloggerros compañeros...

let us now refer back to thees statement of the First Principles of Online Integrity.

Thees pledge, she was directed solamente at preventing the abridging of pipple's privacy online. Punto.

According to what we know right now, all the violators of thees pledge have been from the right side of la blogsfera.

Primero, thees leetle trollita, Patrick Bell ¡koff! who laughed at the example set by the signatories at RedState.com, where Bell diaried frequently.
(no, no, I said diaried, not what joo were theenking.)

Then, thees Eater-of-Paste, Jeff Goldstein ¡koff, koff hrnhrnhrnhrrnnn! heemself a righty bloggerro, and a signatory of thees very pledge that he has broken.

Finally, Armando's name was revealed at the Media Blog of the National Review Online ¡¡koff, KOFF *splatt*!! the online version of a more-respected-than-read periódico de politico a la derecha.
(I weel no leenk to the page, email me eef joo weesh to see eet.)

From thees examples, any gato weeth eyes can perceive the pattern of thees attacks. She ees plain to see, like una ratón blanca gorda on a bright moonlit night.

Thees Sheep, the Online Integrity, she ees recieving thees fusillades from her own allies een thees conflict, no?

so.

Update: To eet's credit, an anonymous poster at OI has "noted with regret" the revealing of Armando's personal information online, and asks that thees information be taken off the site "in the spirit of graciousness and respect".

We weel see how far that gets them.

That thees anonymous "Voice of Online Integrity" further notes:
Online Integrity is voluntary, nonideological, and nonpartisan. It has no formal mechanisms for enforcement, and does not compel agreement on individual cases from its signatories. Participants are free to take action, or not, as their judgment and conscience demands.
suggests to me that thees "anonymous voice" ees actually Aziz Poonawalla, one of los bloggerros ala izquierda who founded thees project, who ees almost certainly thanking hees lucky stars that he does no blog pseudonymously.

(I mean, as far as we know.)

tambien, no mention so far of the late unpleasantness eenvolving Thersites and the Paste-Eater.

E.G.N.

If Integrities Were Ostriches

2006-06-04T07:33:00.000-07:00

Then Tacitus would be burying the Pasty Unpleasantness:

(Originally posted at SwordsCrossed, based on a comment posted on OnlineIntegrity and removed)

Sorry for the offtopic post. But I tried to find your (Armando) and Josh Trevino's email addresses here and at online integrity but could not. Nor can I find at either site how to communicate with the blog owners. And I cannot find a way at online integrity to report an abuse.

I tried to post a comment about an abuse an online integrity, but the comment never posted and my username was banned from the site.

A rather serious situation has come up regarding Jeff Goldstein a signer of the online integrity pledge. A commenter of Jeff's outed Thersites and NY Mary's meatspace names and their place of employment. Jeff later went on to publish and republish these names.

More details can be found at

http://blogintegrityblogspotcom.blog...

This appears to be very serious and raises the following questions:

How does someone report an abuse?

What is the onlineintegrity process in determining if an abuse has taken place?

What is the expected time before OI makes an official remark?

Why was "GeneralMichaelHayden" banned at OI when his "crime" apparently was reporting an online abuse and providing details?

How come email addresses or a contact form are not provided at online integrity?

Does online integrity have any integrity?

Indeed.

Like a Hurricane

2006-05-31T20:34:00.000-07:00

CAPTION: RIP AND PHILA ROCK DA HOUSE!

Anyway, here I am, rock me like a hurricane, etc.

Looks like not only is our mission accomplished, fellows, we did it without stuffing sweatsocks down our gym shorts (NTODD! STOP, NOW!)

Here is my pithy comment on the whole thing: FUCK 'EM. El gato negro's is, I believe, "lick 'em," but the shitty sound here at the Nassau Colisseum is making it tough.

Online Integrity is not merely dead, but is pissed on good and proper.

Scumbags lack integrity, you know, and what they spawn is never no good.

Peace. Except Mike Krepansky. You can bite me.

2006-05-30T18:33:00.000-07:00

Goldstein: Just another prick in the hall

First off, Jeff, I'm only posting this here because I don't want to "dirty up" your precious website, and you told me to fuck off. So, here I am, fucking off on a Tuesday evening - wasting my valuable time to give You a lesson in basic humanity and etiquette. The things I won't do for you, eh?

I've been following the barrages of literary reductionisms or whatever you call them with some mild amusement. Personally, I don't care who's correct - it doesn't really change the way I read but it was interesting to watch two people debate something other than politics, for a change. I consider Thers a friend (as much as one can, knowing someone only via the internets) and I respect his intelligence and wit. I'd never heard of you before but I was willing to give you the benefit of the doubt, until now.

Until Drs [Thersites] and [NYMary] of [redacted] College in [redacted] NY prove that one of my commenters made this comment about their kid—or else explain to their own commenters that coming over here and trying to tar my site with this offense is very bad form and will no longer be tolerated—Drs [Thersites] and [NYMary] of [redacted] College in [redacted]NY can kiss my ass. From the annex where they teach comp to GED recipients.

What are you, some kind of tough guy, Jeff? Fucking grow up, man... Or perhaps you can tell me what good reason you have to post this kind of information in comments on your website. We both know, you and I, there are only two reasons to post info like that: 1) You're expecting some reader (whether one of "your commentors" or not) to harass and intimidate Thers and Mary, or 2) You're posting it to intimidate them with the threat that #1 will occur. The idea that you would hold someone's privacy hostage for the sake of your "public reputation" is appalling and shows that you cannot be trusted in the slightest. Your family must be so very, very proud.

But, for the sake of civility and teaching you something, let me throw a few Surely's your way.

Surely, you can agree that a man (or woman) who's not a "public figure" has a right to earn their living in peace, without harassment from persons known or unknown to them. By posting personal information, you've opened the door for random freaks to impinge upon Thers' and Mary's right and ability to work in peace.
Surely, as a husband and father, you can appreciate the fact that the safety of one's family is paramount. Thers and Mary are loving and concerned parents of several children. By posting their personal information, you've opened the door for random freaks to intimidate or cause harm to their family.
Surely, you can agree that a blogger's level of anonymity or personal revelation should be determined by the individual, not by relative strangers who assume that blogging is akin to celebrity and take it upon themselves to act as demented paparazzi.

Assuming that we can agree on these basic points, I have to wonder what was going thru your tiny mind.

As far as the lewd comment about Thers' daughter, I'm not pointing any fingers at you or your commentors. For all I know, it may have been a random internets freak or just someone who doesn't like Thers. But again, your website's "reputation" is far less important than Thers' and Mary's privacy, and your intentional posting of their information, semi-public and researchable as it might be, is beyond the pale. You've proven to be nothing but a spoiled, vindictive child and you don't deserve the slightest hint of respect. But you won't find me posting your personal information here or anywhere else.

Tena—you are, without doubt, one of the stupidest people I have ever encountered in any forum. And you shouldn’t take that lightly, because I’ve spent several weeks now having to do battle on the finer points of interpretive theory with a bunch of adult education instructors posing as big shot university literature professors.

Oh, I would argue that it's You, Jeff, who's one of the stupidest people I've ever encountered in any forum. Throwing a tantrum by posting someone's full name and employer information (multiple times) because you disagree with them is hardly the work of a man who's in full control of his senses or his civility, wouldn't you agree? Also, I was bemused by the phrase "having to do battle" - were you under some form of duress that you felt compelled to engage Thers repeatedly? I'm sure your "public reputation" could easily have withstood the challenges of an "adult education instructor", no? By the by, you and your commentors aren't exactly the Pristine Kids on the Block when it comes to debating other people, either, so don't pretend you're all Sweetness and Light there, pally.

I hope you'll take this castigation in stride, Jeff. Like a lot of people, I'm concerned about the tenor of debate on the internets - some days less than others, of course. But I find it hard to believe that a scholar, such as you are, would stoop to something of this nature. You really need to grow up and act like a Man.

Rip -