What liberal media?

Hugh Hewitt notes that, “Not one editorial word from the big newspapers” on Dick Durbin’s comments. He is wondering,

Has the elite MSM grown so craven and so protective of the Democratic Party that it will refuse to comment on the Durbin slander?

I think the answer is YES.

From the Media Research Center,

But while the networks kept their spotlight on the U.S. military’s conduct, none of last night’s broadcasts bothered to note a Tuesday speech by Minority Whip Dick Durbin â?? the second highest ranking Democrat in the Senate. Describing the treatment of al-Qaeda terrorists at the Guantanamo prison â?? including allegations that inmates are kept too hot or too cold, or forced to stay awake â?? Durbin wildly charged that “you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime, Pol Pot or others, that had no concern for human beings.”

The comparison could not be more absurd. As reporter Rowan Scarborough noted in Thursday’s Washington Times, “About 9 million persons, including 6 million Jews, died in Hitler’s death camps, 2.7 million persons died in Stalin’s gulags and 1.7 million Cambodians died in Pol Pot’s scourge of his country. No prisoners have died at Guantanamo….”

Democrat senator Dick Durbin’s outrageous remarks about US troops behaving like Nazi’s, the KGB and PolPot will unite the left and right, just as folks on both sides were outraged by Edward Klein’s reckless charge that Bill raped Hillary and conceived Chelsea, right? Uh, maybe not. It seems that the left is entirely comfortable with the comparison. Some in fact, think Durbin didn’t go far enough.

The largest most widely read blog on the Internet is The Daily Kos. Here is his take,

To the pea brains on the Right, incapable of reading the English language in its most basic, unuanced form, they claim Durbin is calling our troops Nazis. The Wingnutosphere is making that claim. Rush is making that claim. Hannity is making that claim. Drudge is making that claim. Look to Fox News to jump on the bandwagon tomorrow. Of course, what Durbin is saying is that such torture — undisputed, by the way, and read from an FBI report — is more at home in a place like Soviet Russia or Nazi Germany than in a modern Democracy. And that’s the truth. Plain and simple.

The torture that was so bad under Saddam, is equally bad under U.S.
command. And Dick Durbin had the balls to say it so on the Senate floor.

Well, that’s just one guy. That can’t be representative of all lefty bloggers, can it?

Steve Gillard,

But the larger point is this: America is supposed to have higher standards than the Nazis or Stalin, not embrace them or use them as a defense. There is no reason that we should have a gulag in the sun or be accused of torture. We should have jailed and tried these people legally. Not acted like the people we’re supposed to be fighting.

John Aravosis

Apparently, the Republicans who dominate the party today, on the radio, online, and in the halls of Congress, think that the only good American is a Stalinist, a Nazi, a fascist, or any other brand of totalitarian thug who beats the crap out of innocents because he can, because we’re Amurrikans, God damn it, and if we want to throw you in jail for an eternity, with no lawyer and no charges, and torture you until your head explodes and you go absolutely insane, that’s our right because, well, because FUCK YOU.

Steve Soto

If you consider torture legal and acceptable (even if innocent people are tortured), then Dear Leader’s main post-hoc justification of the Iraq invasion it itself illegal, because Saddam Hussein would have been doing something that was legal (in your eyes – for he was only torturing “his enemies”). So, if you have a problem with torture being highlighted and publicized, then maybe it’s time for you to become Saddam Hussein’s lawyer. That is a more appropriate role for those who seek to condone, ignore, minimize or support torture.

Is there a single lefty blogger out there repudiating Dick Durbin’s remarks?? If you find one, let me know please.

UPDATE: We’ve found one. Dan Kennedy of the Boston Phoenix and the MediaLog blog. Ironically, Dan is our guest this weekend on Pundit Rveiew Radio on WRKO. Dan will be on at 9:20pm EST and you can stream the show live here or give us a call toll free at 877-469-4322.

The impact of across the board tax cuts are clear to everyone…well, almost everyone.

Tony Crescenzi is the chief bond market strategist at Miller Tabak + Co., LLC, and advises many of the nation’s top institutional investors on issues related to the bond market, the economy and other macro-related issues. Here is his take on the budget deficit, from RealMoney.com,

The outlook for the U.S. budget deficit has brightened considerably, with the deficit for the current fiscal year likely to be substantially lower than what was expected at the start of the year. The improvement is the result of a surge in tax receipts, a development that in many eyes reinforces the notion that tax cuts eventually broaden the tax base, thus boosting tax revenue.

Driving the improvement in the U.S. budget situation is the surge in income tax receipts. In May, individual income tax receipts were $57.61 billion, an 87.8% increase over the same month a year earlier. In the fiscal year to date, individual income tax receipts are up $103 billion, or 20.5% vs. the same period a year ago. Corporate income tax receipts were up 37.1% in May compared to a year earlier, and for the fiscal year, receipts are up $45 billion, or 47.2% compared to a year ago.

A continuation of the recent trend would put the deficit for next year at $250
billion to $275 billion, which would represent a near-halving of the deficit as a percentage of the gross domestic product. Reaching such a target would give a
lift to President Bush, who has pledged to cut the deficit in half by 2009.

The budget news provides new fodder for those who say that tax cuts can
actually lead to higher tax revenue. Such has been the case for 25 years, one
can reasonably argue. Nevertheless, given the large deficits of the past few
years, the debate over the impact of tax cuts on the U.S. budget deficit goes
on. Whatever the case, the data sure give President Bush and Treasury Secretary
Snow reasons to cheer.

Let’s remember who said what…

Jeff Jacoby writing in the Boston Globe, March 5, 2001

“”Voodoo redux,” sniffs Bob Herbert in The New York Times. “There will be pain,” intones Terry Moran of ABC mournfully. At Time.com, Jessica Reaves finds the Democrats’ dire predictions “more realistic than the goofily optimistic tone Bush likes to set.” Al Hunt, The Wall Street Journal’s house lefty, labels the president’s tax pitch “a sham.” On CBS, Dan Rather assures viewers that Democrats are backed by “independent economists” in pronouncing the tax cuts
“risky business” – but makes no mention of CBS’s own poll showing that a
whopping 67 percent of the public likes Bush’s plan.”

And a few select quotes from the champions of the working man,

‘Many of you are well enough off that … the tax cuts may have helped you,’ Sen. Hillary Clinton said. ‘We’re saying that for America to get back on track, we’re probably going to cut that short and not give it to you. We’re going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good.’

In a Jan. 16 speech at the National Press Club in Washington, Sen. Kennedy joined Sen. Clinton in calling for a “postponement” of $350 billion in scheduled tax cuts already approved, arguing of course that the cuts will benefit primarily “the rich,” since Democrats define “the rich” as virtually anyone who pays taxes, rather than a net recipient of government handouts.

“The disturbing thing about the Bush forecast is that we are not just looking at the cyclical downturn — a return to budget deficits because the economy is down,” Rep. John Spratt, D-South Carolina, said on “Fox News Sunday.”

Democrat Harry Reid of Nevada, said elements like the dividend tax cut largely ignore the poor and middle class. “We should do something to take care of people who work for corporations, not help the corporations necessarily,” he told NBC’s Meet the Press.

â??Iâ??m running for president to roll back George Bushâ??s tax cuts for the wealthy so that we can invest in education and health care,â? proclaims John Kerry in his typical stump speech.

Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., a 2004 presidential hopeful, said on ABC’s This Week that “if this is what (Mr. Bush) thinks is going to help regular people in times of an economic downturn, it just shows how out of touch he is.”

Rep. Rob Andrews, a New Jersey Democrat, criticized the president’s call to accelerate implementation of the tax cuts passed in 2001 to spur the economy now. “This is trickle-down, the sequel,” Andrews said. “It didn’t work the first time, and it’s not going to work this time.”

Former Democrat representative Dick Gephardt, “knee-jerk tax cuts that do nothing but pay off George Bush’s wealthy campaign contributors while killing economic growth.”

Democrat Senator Dick Durbin, who compared US troops to Nazi’s, PolPot and the KGB on the Senate floor yesterday, refuses to apologize. How much of this are we going to take?

CHICAGO Illinois- Senator Dick Durbin says he won’t apologize for comments
comparing American interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to Nazis and
Soviet gulags.News of the Democrat’s comparison created a buzz around the
Internet today, fueled by sound bites of yesterday’s Senate floor speech on
radio talk shows. By this afternoon, Illinois Republican Party Chairman Andy
McKenna asked Durbin to apologize.

Durbin says the Bush administration should apologize for abandoning the Geneva Conventions.

Dick and his fellow Democrats are woefully unprepared to deal with the war on terror if they are still hoping to give Geneva protections to those who clearly don’t deserve them. This has gone from dissent to disgrace. Democrats wonder why people don’t trust them on national security? Please.

And who is this guy who we so brutally tortured, according to Durbin? He was the 20th hijacker from the September 11 plot. Our crimes, according to Dick, we turned down the AC and made him shiver. I wish I was kidding. Here is the account of prisoner abuse that has a Democrat Senator comparing our troops to Nazi’s,

On one occasion, the air conditioning had been turned down so far and the temperature was so cold in the room, that the barefooted detainee was shaking
with cold. ….. On another occasion, the [air conditioner] had been turned off, making the temperature in the unventilated room well over 100 degrees. The detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been literally pulling his hair out throughout the night. On another occasion, not only was the temperature unbearably hot, but extremely loud rap music was being played in the room, and had been since the day before, with the detainee chained hand and foot in the fetal position on the tile floor.

That’s it folks, your US Nazi’s at work, fiddling with the AC.

As Indiana Republican Congressman Steve Buyer, a decorated Gulf War veteran, said on WRKO this morning, Dick Durbin, Nancy Pelosi and Ted Kennedy represent the “hug a thug” crowd. I wish more people in positions of power would call Dick’s like Durbin on the reckless use of language. Hell, I wish EVERYONE would call him on it. I know I will by dialing his office at (202) 224-2152.

Recent guest on Pundit Review Radio, James Taranto of OpinionJournal’s Best of the Web, had this to say about Dick Durbin,

We are fighting an enemy that murdered 3,000 innocent people on American
soil 3 1/2 years ago and would murder millions more if given the
chance–and according to Dick Durbin, our soldiers are the Nazis.

The Al Qaeda training manual is the terrorist bible, not the Koran. Rule #18

Lesson 18 of that manual, whose authenticity has not been questioned,
emphatically states, under the heading “Prison and Detention Centres”, that,
when arrested, members of al-Qa’eda “must insist on proving that torture was
inflicted on them by state security investigators. [They must] complain to the
court of mistreatment while in prison”.

It is truly sad that so many US Democrat politicians, and a few weak Republicans, are accepting at face value the claims of terrorists at GITMO over the words, and evidence, of our own military. It is pathetic and infuriating at the same time. One should expect this from alleged “human rights” groups like Amnesty and Human Rights Watch, but for US political leaders to so quickly, easily and thoughlessly join the chorus, it is disheartening. These people wonder why the US has a bad reputation overseas. Look in the mirror.

As John Hinderaker said on Powerline,

The mildness with which terrorist detainees have been treated stands as an
imperishable monument to the greatness of the American spirit and the moderation
of the Bush administration.

US politicans calling for the closing of GITMO are useful idiots, they are useful to AlQaeda in that they are buying into their planned, deliberate cries of torture and they are idots because they defame the US military unnecessarily, make their job more difficult and bring legitimacy to an obvious red herring.

Powerline has more on this today,

The Senate hearing on Gitmo that C-SPAN has been re-broadcasting tonight stands as a monument to the wisdom of al Qaeda, which advises its terrorists to complain, if captured, about torture and mistreatment in order, presumably, to take advantage of folks like many members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The Democratic members, and several Republicans as well, can’t seem to accept the notion that detainees captured while fighting Americans during our campaign against al Qaeda and the Taliban deserve anything less than the full blown due process we accord our citizens, including access to federal court. Never mind that ordinary prisoners of war captured by us on the battle field during, say, World War II, never received such “due process.” Why should we be more solicitous of unlawful combatants than we were of legitimate soldiers who abided by the rules of war?

Perhaps the argument is not that our treatment of detainees hurts us with potential terrorists, but rather that it hurts our image with friends and potential friends. It is true that if no one ever criticized the way we treat detainees, our image would be better. But I’m aware of no evidence that our image short-fall is causing us any difficulties in fighting terrorism. Governments still cooperate with us, or not, for the usual reason — self interest. Moreover, granting prisoners access to federal court won’t mitigate our the image problems resulting from detaining prisioners at Gitmo and elsewhere. Most foreigners likely find it as absurd as al Qaeda does that we would consider providing gold-plated legal process to captured terrorists. The image problem stems from claims of torture. Those claims, and the eagerness of elements of the MSM and the American left to advance them, won’t end regardless of what we do. Al Qaeda’s playbook, and the history of the past few months, tell us so.

Is idiot too strong? Ah, no it isn’t.

From Little Green Footballs,

Last night on the Senate floor during a debate on the Energy Bill, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill) suddenly launched into a bizarre rant comparing the American military to Nazis, the Soviet KGB, and Pol Potâ??s Khmer Rouge. (Hat tip: Right Wing Conspirator.)

“If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing
what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly
believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad
regimeâ??Pol Pot or othersâ??that had no concern for human beings. Sadly, that is
not the case. This was the action of Americans in the treatment of their
prisoners.”

What actions exactly? What could we have done to have a Democrat US Senator comparing our military to Nazi’s, the KGB and PolPot?

On one occasion, the air conditioning had been turned down so far and the
temperature was so cold in the room, that the barefooted detainee was shaking
with cold. ….. On another occasion, the [air conditioner] had been turned off,
making the temperature in the unventilated room well over 100 degrees. The
detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him.
He had apparently been literally pulling his hair out throughout the night. On
another occasion, not only was the temperature unbearably hot, but extremely
loud rap music was being played in the room, and had been since the day before,
with the detainee chained hand and foot in the fetal position on the tile floor.

Dick Durbin, Democrat Senator, disgracing himself, our military and the Senate all at once. An idiot indeed.

It looks like Kofi Annan’s is going to join the list of high profile people brought down thanks to an email. Am I missing anyone?

Kofi Annan, UN

AP — The committee probing the U.N. oil-for-food program announced Tuesday it will again investigate Secretary-General Kofi Annan after two e-mails suggested he may have known more than he claimed about a multimillion-dollar U.N. contract awarded to the company that employed his son.

One e-mail described an encounter between Annan and officials from Cotecna Inspections S.A. in late 1998 during which the Swiss company’s bid for the contract was raised. The second from the same Cotecna executive expressed his confidence that the company would get the bid because of “effective but quiet lobbying” in New York diplomatic circles.

Hank Greenberg, Former CEO of insurance giant AIG

In a statement, New York Attorney General Spitzer said AIG, led by its former chief executive and financial chief, “resorted to deception and fraud in an apparent effort to improve the company’s financial results.”

The complaint quoted from emails and interviews with current AIG employees that suggested both AIG CEO Greenberg and former CFO Smith were aware of, and had approved, the transactions at issue.

Jim Kilts, Gillette CEO

BOSTON (MarketWatch) — Gillette Co. (G) was ordered Thursday to provide Massachusetts Secretary of State William Galvin with copies of its email communications with its investment bankers sent during the run-up to the company’s proposed merger with Procter & Gamble Co. (PG).

Massachusetts Superior Court Judge Allan van Gestel ruled that Gillette’s two investment bankers, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) and UBS AG (UBS), must turn over emails sent to seven Gillette executives, including Chief Executive James Kilts, relative to their “fairness opinion” on Procter & Gamble’s offer for Gillette, according to court documents.

Henry Blodget, Merrill Lynch telecom analyst

(PugetSound Biz Journal) While Blodget was privately badmouthing InfoSpace’s chief executive (Arun Sarin, at that point) and deriding the company as “a piece of junk,” he was publicly recommending the stock to unsuspecting customers. InfoSpace enjoyed Merrill’s highest stock rating and held a spot on the firm’s “Favored 15” list at a time when Blodget’s insider e-mails fretted that “this stock is a powder keg, given how aggressive we were on it earlier this year and given the ‘bad smell’ comments that so many institutions are bringing up.”

Other stocks got equally brutal private assessments while officially blessed with Merrill’s top ratings of buy or accumulate. Excite@Home was “such a piece of crap.” Internet Capital Group provided “nothing positive to say.” Two others were each assessed as “a piece of s–t.”

Jack Grubman, Salomon Smith Barney

DOW JONES, NEW YORK — Former Salomon Smith Barney telecom analyst Jack Grubman said email messages written by him in 2001 alleging he received outside pressure related to his rating on AT&T Corp. (T) were fabrications.

The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that in Jan. 2001, Grubman sent emails to an analyst at a money-management firm indicating that Citigroup Inc. (C) Chief Executive Sanford Weill pushed him to review his rating of AT&T. The emails say that Weill’s alleged pressuring of Grubman was done to gain the support of AT&T Chief Executive C. Michael Armstrong, a key Citigroup board member, in a power struggle between Weill and Citigroup’s former co-chairman, John Reed, in early 2000.

Here’s a list from the ePolicyInstitute,

1. Using email to send sensitive personal information and comments. The Enron Corporation used its email system to send sensitive employee information, such as Social Security numbers, wage packages, performance evaluations and other personnel information. Employees also sent revealing messages about office romances, affairs and other personal comment. When the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission seized Enron’s email records in an investigation, it posted them online, creating embarrassment or dangerous security breaches.
2. Deleting email messages during a legal investigation. Investment banker Frank Quattrone’s email urging members of his technology-sector banking group at Credit Suisse First Boston (CSFB) to “clean up” their files during a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation led to his being charged with obstructing federal grand-jury and SEC investigations.
3. Issuing potentially negative confidential internal memos. Two Merrill Lynch senior executives faced a barrage of negative publicity after someone leaked their confidential internal memo warning 50,000 employees to be careful with email content to the business media.
4. Not monitoring employee email use, and using company email to receive illegal or embarrassing messages. An American Family Insurance employee the FBI suspected was receiving child-pornography emails at work was prevented from suppressing that evidence because his company repeatedly reminded users that it could monitor or search their computers. However, the employee’s activity didn’t surface until the FBI’s investigation into the email source, a Yahoo! discussion group.
5. Not controlling instant-messaging use. More than half of the regional stock brokerage firm Stifel Nicolas had downloaded free IM software and were using it without management knowledge or approval and without oversight from its compliance division, which makes sure all messages meet strict SEC and stock-exchange regulations. “Instant Messaging is a form of turbocharged email that creates a written business record that can be subpoenaed and used as evidence in litigation or regulatory investigations,” Clearswift and the ePolicy Institute said.

From Hugh Hewitt,

I was on PunditReview Radio last night, which has moved over to Boston’s WRKO –a great, great radio station. If there’s a smart radio entrepreneur in Boston, he or she will start putting a syndication deal for these guys on Sunday nights across the
country, as bloggers would love to listen to a program devoted to new media.

Thank you Hugh for your generous comments and for coming back on Pundit Review Radio! Hugh’s first appearence was last fall when he was promoting his book If It’s Not Close, They Can’t Cheat. You can listen to that interview here.

This weekend we discussed his new book Blog, and the impact of the new media on journalism, politics, pop culture and even American business.

We hope that you will be able to check our show out each Sunday evening at 9pm EST on Boston’s talk station, WRKO. You can stream the show live online here. If you want to call in, you can reach us at 877-469-4322.

This Sunday evening our guest will be liberal media writer Dan Kennedy of the Boston Phoenix.