Celine Dion Is Stalking You

Turn on the radio and what do you hear? The same music, over and over and over again. Unimaginative crap-ola. Why? Why has radio come to this? How come you never hear local music? You are not the only one who wonders:

Ever get the feeling that a terrible Celine Dion song is stalking you via the radio? Every time you scan the dial there it is taunting your heart to "go on and on... forever."

You're not being paranoid.

Commercial radio stations everywhere have been swallowed up by a handful of giant corporations, playlists have shrunk, and local and independent acts have been drowned out, as Big Radio soaks listeners in a mind-numbing concoction of saccharine and aspartame.

The good news is that your rescue is at hand. On Tuesday, Reps. Mike Doyle (D-Pa.) and Lee Terry (R-Neb.) introduced a bipartisan bill that would pry open our radio airwaves for thousands of new stations, bringing independent acts like Animal Collective, Rebel Diaz and Bunny's a Swine -- or your favorite local band -- to the audiences they deserve.

If you want to do something locally to change things, then send us an email. Get some more information here and here.

Librul Media: Part 6,587

It's pretty amusing to listen to the shock jocks carried on 1450 WATA AM and 1200 WXIT AM as they characterize the mainstream media in this country as somehow being "liberal". After all, if that were the case, wouldn't an economist get invited to appear every once in a blue moon on some of these liberal mainstream media shows?

Because those liberal, pointy-headed economists all support the stimulus, right? That is why the liberal mainstream media always has them on, right? Well, not so much:

...
A Media Matters for America review of the Sunday talk shows and 12 cable news programs from January 25 through February 15 found that during 203 hours of programming on Sunday mornings and weekday afternoons and evenings, of 722 total guest appearances in discussions about the economic recovery legislation and debate in Congress, only 41 were made by economists -- a mere 6 percent.
...

That's OK. We don't need no stinking liberal egghead experts. We've got our own expert, thanks to 1200 WXIT AM:

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Rush Limbaugh falsely claimed that taxes would increase on "most small businesses" if the Bush tax cuts on Americans making more than $250,000 expire in 2011. In fact, the Tax Policy Center stated that in 2007, about 2 percent of tax returns that reported small-business income are in the top two income tax brackets, which include all filers with taxable incomes of more than $250,000.
...

Yup. We got us a real expert here. Thanks, WXIT. Helpful.

Mississippi Minor

Political prosecutions. The stuff of Banana Republics? It seems that right along with our country's tiny, privileged, untouchable economic elite (see Sunday's post below), we might just have a justice system that would be the envy of every third rate petty dictator wanna-be in the world.

Yes, right down in Mississippi. From Larisa Alexandrovna:

If you do not know who Paul Minor is, see here. Or read through my PRM series, links are at end. In short, he is another Don Siegelman. Both men allege that they were politically prosecuted and the evidence thus far supports their version of events. Karl Rove may be playing games with the House Judiciary Committee and wasting time for all involved, but the people who were most affected by abuses of the DOJ do not have the time for these games.

I have been in contact with Mr. Minor's family and friends over the course of the last 48 hours. Here is what is going on. As most of you who have followed this know, Mr. Minor's wife Sylvia is dying of cancer and is in hospice. He has been denied appeal bond because he is "a danger to society." Remember, he was convicted of bribing 2 judges, so unless he is going to bribe the public to death, this argument is idiotic.

But, the judge who ruled on the bond issue is a long time friend and former client of Karl Rove's, and it was due to his pressure to get her seated (despite a bipartisan opposition) that Judge Priscilla Owen got on the bench.

...

And yet all are silent. The mainstream press is entirely silent on Paul Minor's case. The bloggers on the left and right are entirely silent about this as well. Why? Why does no one care about the number of people who have been politically targeted by the DOJ and prosecuted for political reasons, in some cases on cooked evidence? Perhaps because it has not happened to you. But should it ever, I wonder who will speak for you and ask for justice on your behalf.

Full article here.

Weekend Video Salon: Chile, USA

The economic elites who run the banking sector in our country are largely responsible for getting us in to the mess that we are in. Yet, they remain in power--entrenched. They are quite powerful still. So powerful, in fact, that they remind Simon Johnson of the same economic elites who control entire economies of third world countries. Mr. Johnson knows a thing or two about these things (he used to work for the IMF).

Johnson draws some very interesting parallels between his experiences attempting to resolve various economic crises in the third world--and our country's seeming inability to do what is necessary to fix things. Hint: some pretty powerful economic interests would really rather not have those problems fixed. That would not be in their financial interest.

You, a Brainworker?

Here's an unusual perspective on the makings of our current economic crisis, by someone who is a poet--and former hedge fund "brainworker". Her name is Katy Lederer:

Me, a brainworker toiling in pristine white hallways.

Abnormal, aboriginal, endemic to this site.

Some people sell their wares outside.

In the pulsating light of Times Square they are singing.

In their noses and nipples, the glinting of rings.

Let us call them unoriginal.

Let us call them all these awful things.

The busy unoriginals are throwing out their trash,

But on this lovely parchment they are writing priceless poems.

They suppose that by such rendering they'll be remembered after death.

They suppose that by such influence their souls will sing eternally.

In the hallways, we are killing time,

Its blood now thick and lurid on the freshly painted walls.

In poems that are both heartfelt and ruthlessly critical of our current financial milieu, in which the fates of individuals are packaged, priced out, and then bundled for sale on the open market, Lederer proves Robert Graves’s famous observation wrong: though there may be no money in poetry, there is indeed poetry in money.

Listen to an interview Katy gave recently on Sea Change Radio. Here is her book. Good stuff.

UPDATED-25 Year High In Wilkes: The D-Word

Corporate media-type utters odd statement:



Meantime, some polling results from Gallup:

The American public gives President Barack Obama a strong 67% approval rating for the way in which he is handling the government's efforts to pass an economic stimulus bill...

And word from the NC Employment Security Commission via the Wilkes Journal-Patriot that unemployment in Wilkes County in December 2008 was the at the highest levels for a single month in 25 YEARS. The article even mentioned the D-word. We'll get the text up as soon as we can, the WJP has a very limited website.

From the Wilkes Journal-Patriot, by Jule Hubbard:

Wilkes County's unemployment rate in December was the county's highest for a single month in 25 years.
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The jobless rate in Wilkes averaged 9.6 percent in 1982, during a recession described then as the nation's worst since the Great Depression of the 1930's.
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...we never fully recovered from the recession of 2001 and 2002. We just got back into it deeper [Ann Bowlin, Manager of the North Wilkesboro office of the North Carolina Employment Security Commission].
...

What are Wilkes County's representatives in Congress doing about this? Who was president in 1982? Oh, yeah--this guy. And who was president in 2001 and 2002? Do you see a pattern here?

Tragically Hip

As one of our DNHC'ers huffed and puffed her way through her morning workout today, she noticed that CNN was airing (around 10:15 am High Country time) a story touting the Republican National Committee's "hip new direction" being charted by Michael Steele, the new RNC Chairman. Since most conservatives would gladly tell you that a person's past is the best way to predict their future behavior, let's take a look Mr. Steele's past--shall we?:

In 2006, Limbaugh said he had a high level of "respect" for Steele. Robert Novak has also written that Steele could be a "black Rush Limbaugh."
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In 2001, the Maryland Gazette reported that Michael Steele said, "Unless you're gay, you could care less about gay rights. Unless you're a homosexual or a lesbian, it's not going to rise up on your radar screen." [8/8/01]
...
Steele compared stem cell research to Nazi experiments during the Holocaust.
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Steele defended former Gov. Bob Ehrlich’s decision to hold a $100,000 fundraiser at a country club that did not allow non-white members, saying that the club’s membership’s policies were “not an issue” because “I don’t play golf.”

Well, then. Now that's some hipness. Our intrepid DNHC'er did not hear any of these items mentioned during the CNN report. How strange...

Links here and here.

Weekend Video Salon: It's OK To Be Smart Now

It's neat to see a Nobel Prize winning economist lay bare the falsehoods being spread by those in opposition to the stimulus bill...especially when so many of those falsehoods are brought to you by none other than the stable of hatetalkers aired locally on WXIT 1200 AM and WATA 1450 AM.

Go, Paul:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cb5bXr7Vc2U

Chilling

No true democracy has ever been threatened by the free flow of ideas and opinions. Why then, this?:

A newly introduced Internet Libel Act in the N.C. Senate — SB 46 — would make it a potential civil and criminal (Class 2 misdemeanor) offense for libelous or slanderous material to originate in the state or be received or viewed in the state via the Internet. The bill, which has been referred to the Judiciary Committee, was filed by WNC’s Sen. Steve Goss, an ordained Baptist minister from Boone who is serving his second term in the General Assembly.

The bill was immediately and “strongly” opposed by the North Carolina Press Association, according to Executive Director Beth Grace, who told Xpress by e-mail: “This flies in the face of 200 years of free speech tradition in this state. We cannot and should not penalize citizens just for blogging or e-mailing something the government doesn’t like.

Chilling. What is the motive behind this Act? Full article here.

Red Radio-Blue County

The Great Depression was all FDR's fault. Yes, he started it--and once it started, he made it last longer with his failed policies. This is what the purveyors of hate/hoped-for-failure, brought to you on WXIT 1200 AM and WHKY 1290 AM--would have you believe.

Limbaugh has repeatedly advanced the myth that the New Deal prolonged the Great Depression. For example, during his November 20 broadcast, Limbaugh stated: "the New Deal did not fix the Great Depression; it made it worse. The New Deal prolonged it." As Media Matters has repeatedly noted, prominent economists have disputed this claim.
...

Kids, ask your grandparents what they think about FDR and the New Deal. We can practically guarantee you that their take is 180 degrees different than the one given to us by the above quoted mental giant. Have your grandparents passed away? Then consider buying these books, or checking them out from your local library.

FDR's policies were successful. Things like a decent pension? That was the New Deal. Social Security? Again, the New Deal. Highways, bridges, airports? Yup.

What was life like before these programs? Just ask Herbert Hoover. That's the kind of success that Rush wants us all to hurry right on back to.

Leave My Enablers Alone

Updated at bottom: When Cheney starts jumping up and down--suddenly emerging from his secure undisclosed castle (with moat)--and tells you to start looking this way or else we're all gonna die--we recommend that you look exactly in the opposite direction.

Because while he may spend a lot of time trying to scare people (so that folks will miss the real story), what Cheney fears most is that you'll start caring about stuff like this. Happy digging.

Oh, and just for kicks, here's a little article on Cheney's and Rumsfeld's neighborhood of neocon fun.

Cheney setting up Obama in the event of another attack?:

LMIA

Looky here. It's the dreaded "liberal media" in action. The graph shows the number of times a member of congress has appeared on a cable news program to discuss the proposed economic stimulus plan (sorted by party affiliation). At some point, folks will begin to understand that these media outlets are owned by big corporations. This being the case, coverage skews conservative--as would befit the wealthy owners of each media outlet's parent corporation. No need to make the big boss angry, now is there? Gosh, we'd say that maybe General Electric (owners of NBC, MSNBC, etc.) doesn't seem to want the stimulus plan to become reality. Perhaps GE prefers to continue their stimulus programs in Iraq and Afghanistan?

Mountains of Irony

Irony. We may never tire of it.

You know, it's pretty hard to get more conservative than Avery and Mitchell Counties here in the mountains. They each went for McCain in 2008 by margins of 72%-28% and 71%-29%, respectively.

Yet, when we noticed this article in the Mitchell News-Journal, we had to wonder:

Mitchell County and the towns of Bakersville and Spruce Pine have submitted their proposed projects for President Barack Obama's stimulus package.

The county and its two towns have submitted five projects to the North Carolina state government.
...

The unemployment situation in Mitchell County is tough. Very tough. According to the North Carolina Employment Security Commission, unemployment there was 9.4% in December 2008. And yet, folks there may never be willing to admit that the unfettered free-market could ever be anything other than the ONLY WAY. This, despite years of evidence that Mitchell County residents have wound up on the short end of the stick in terms of economic opportunity.

You'd have to look pretty hard in Mitchell County to find someone there who wouldn't agree with the oft-stated conservative mantra that all government is evil. But here we are. How bad do things have to get until people start to question the ideology that has been passed down from generation to generation?