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Google has ‘interfered' with elections 41 times over the last 16 years, Media Research Center says

2024-03-19

[FoxNews] ‘No organization has more control over information than Google,’ Brent Bozell told Fox News Digital

Google has "interfered" with major elections in the United States 41 times over the last 16 years, according to a new study from the Media Research Center.

"MRC researchers have found 41 times where Google interfered in elections over the last 16 years, and its impact has surged dramatically, making it evermore harmful to democracy. In every case, Google harmed the candidates – regardless of party – who threatened its left-wing candidate of choice," MRC Free Speech America vice president Dan Schneider and editor Gabriela Pariseau wrote in a summary of their findings.

"From the mouths of Google executives, the tech giant let slip what was never meant to be made public: That Google uses its "great strength and resources and reach" to advance its leftist values," they continued. "Google’s outsized influence on information technology, the body politic and American elections became evident in 2008. After failing to prevent then-candidate for president Donald Trump from being inaugurated following the 2016 election, Google has since made clear to any discerning observer that it has been — and will continue — interfering in America’s elections."

Google pushed back, insisting it has a "clear business incentive" to keep both sides happy and that safeguards ensure non-biased and accurate search results.

MRC Free Speech America, a division of the conservative Media Research Center, believes the most recent example was recorded after Google artificial intelligence Gemini "refused to answer questions damaging" to President Biden.

The group’s research found that from 2008 through February 2024, "Google has utilized its power to help push to electoral victory the most liberal candidates, regardless of party, while targeting their opponents for censorship."

Examples include appearing to favor Barack Obama over John McCain in 2008, favoring Obama over Mitt Romney in 2012, refusing to correct a "Google bomb" that "smeared" then-leading GOP primary candidate for president Rick Santorum, using its algorithm to exclude autofill results that were potentially damaging to Hilly Clinton in 2016, "not doing the same for then-candidates Donald Trump or Bernie Sanders," and working with partners to help likely pro-Clinton Latino voters go to the polls that same year, according to MRC Free Speech America.

Other examples cited by the MRC include disabling Tulsi Gabbard’s Ads account just as she became the most searched candidate following the first Democratic Party primary debate in 2020, suppressing news critical of Biden, concealing most Republican campaign websites for the 12 competitive Senate races in 2022, and aiding Biden in 2024 by "burying in its search results the campaign websites of every one of his significant opponents."

The study cites several other examples.

"Utilizing the many tools in its arsenal, Google aided those who most closely aligned with its leftist values from election cycle to election cycle since as far back as the 2008 presidential election. Meanwhile, it targeted for censorship those candidates who posed the most serious threat," Schneider and Pariseau wrote.

"While its interference was first evident in 2008, its meddling has turned into an organizational mission to ensure that its candidates win on election day," they continued. "Many studies reveal the results of the tech giant’s commitment."

Schneider and Pariseau cited AllSides and Dr. Robert Epstein, who performed additional research and found that "Google’s search algorithm likely shifted at least 2.6 million votes to Hillary Clinton" in 2016 and that "Google’s results and get-out-the-vote reminders favored Democrats and shifted the 2020 election results by at least 6 million votes."

Google strongly denied any wrongdoing.

"There is absolutely nothing new here - just a recycled list of baseless, inaccurate complaints that have been debunked by third parties and many that failed in the courts. Politicians on the left have a long history of making similar claims too. We have a clear business incentive to keep everyone using our products, so we have no desire to make them biased or inaccurate and have safeguards in place to ensure this. Numerous conservatives have been particularly successful in using our platforms to spread their message to a wide audience," a Google spokesperson told Fox News Digital.

Google has said it is restricting the types of election-related queries on Gemini out of an abundance of caution, directing users to Google Search instead. As for Gabbard’s ads, Google points to a federal judge dismissing a lawsuit she filed against the company on the matter.

Link

Home Front: Politix

Bill Kristol: Mitt Romney Has Helped Reassure Pelosi There Is Republican Support For Impeachment in Senate

2019-09-26

[REALCLEARPOLITICS] Bill Kristol excitedly reports the prospect that Sen. Willard Mitt Romney
...former governor of Massachussetts, the Publican nominee for president in 2012, now Senator from Utah. He is the son of the former governor of Michigan, George Romney, who himself ran for president after saving American Motors from failure, though not permanently. Romney has a record as a successful businessman, heading Bain Capital, and he rescued the 2002 Winter Olympics from the midst of bribery and mismanagement scandals. He is currently a member of the Never Trump Party and is attempting to assume the mantle of the late John McCain...
's criticism of President Trump's call with the Ukrainian president may result in House and Senate Republicans supporting impeachment.

"I think this statement by DeLauro is very important," Kristol said of a key Pelosi ally calling for the impeachment of Trump. "That signals to me I think where Nancy San Fran Nan Pelosi
Nancy <q>San Fran Nan</q> Pelosi

Congresswoman-for-Life from the San Francisco Bay Area, born into a family of professional politicians. On-again-off-again Speaker of the House. It's not her fault when they lose, but it's her accomplishment when they win. Noted for her heavily botoxed grimace and occasional senior... uhhh... moments...
is going."

"I think Romney has helped reassure maybe Speaker Pelosi that there is the possibility of Republican support. Maybe in the House. Incidentally, maybe in the Senate. If you take Romney's statement seriously, he is not just saying maybe the House should impeach. He is sort of saying maybe as a Senate Republican he would vote to convict. And suddenly if you have a couple more Republicans even sound somewhat like that, the notion that this is a purely partisan maneuver, there will be no Republican in the Senate who will even take it seriously that goes away."

Kristol also lamented that Trump's call with the Ukrainian president didn't take place a year ago while former special counsel Robert Mueller was probing the president's relationship with Russia.

"One reason this is so important is Trump as president is doing this directly from the Oval Office to the president of another nation," Kristol said Monday night on MSNBC. "Pretty different from his son meeting in a shady meeting in the Trump Tower in the middle of a chaotic campaign in 2016."

"Ironically another difference now is there is no Mueller investigation," he said. "I mean if this had happened a year ago someone would have said, House Democrats looking to avoid having to bite the bullet, would have said let's let Robert Mueller look into it. He's looking into everything else. Then we'll look at the report and make a decision."

Link

China-Japan-Koreas

N. Korea to hold parliamentary meeting amid speculation over resumption of nuclear talks

2019-08-29

[EN.YNA.CO.KR] North Korea
...hereditary Communist monarchy distinguished by its truculence and periodic acts of violence. Distinguishing features include Songun (Army First) policy, which involves feeding the army before anyone but the Dear Leadership, and Juche, which is Kim Jong Il's personal interpretation of Marxism-Leninism, which he told everybody was brilliant. In 1950 the industrialized North invaded agrarian South Korea. Twenty-one countries of the United Nations eventually contributed to the UN force opposing the invasion, with the United States providing around 90% of the military personnel. Seventy years later the economic results are in and it doesn't look good for Juche...
's rubber-stamp legislature was set to hold a rare second meeting of the year on Thursday, spawning speculation about what message Pyongyang will send to the outside world amid stalled denuclearization talks with the United States.

The Supreme People's Assembly (SPA), the highest organ of state power under the constitution, usually meets once a year to rubber-stamp decisions by the ruling Workers' Party. The North has also used SPA sessions as a major platform to unveil key policy changes or messages.

During this year's first session in April, North Korean leader Kim Pudge Jong-un
...the overweight, pouty-looking hereditary potentate of North Korea. Pudge appears to believe in his own divinity, but has yet to produce any loaves and fishes, so his subjects remain malnourished...
was reelected as Chairman of the State Affairs Commission, the communist state's highest seat of power and its constitution was revised to make him official head of state.

Kim also delivered a rare policy speech during the meeting, expressing a willingness to hold a third summit with U.S. President Donald Trump

...dictatorial for repealing some (but not all) of the diktats of his predecessor, misogynistic because he likes pretty girls, homophobic because he doesn't think gender bending should be mandatory, truly a man for all seasons......
after their no-deal summit in February and saying that he will wait until year's end for Washington's "courageous" decision.

Link

China-Japan-Koreas

Three European nations condemn North Korea’s missile launches

2019-08-28

[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Three important US allies on Tuesday condemned the "repeated provocative launches" of ballistic missiles by North Korea
...hereditary Communist monarchy distinguished by its truculence and periodic acts of violence. Distinguishing features include Songun (Army First) policy, which involves feeding the army before anyone but the Dear Leadership, and Juche, which is Kim Jong Il's personal interpretation of Marxism-Leninism, which he told everybody was brilliant. In 1950 the industrialized North invaded agrarian South Korea. Twenty-one countries of the United Nations eventually contributed to the UN force opposing the invasion, with the United States providing around 90% of the military personnel. Seventy years later the economic results are in and it doesn't look good for Juche...
, saying they violate UN Security Council resolutions banning any such activity.

The United Kingdom, La Belle France, and Germany issued a joint statement after a closed council briefing by UN political chief Rosemary DiCarlo that they requested because of serious concerns at the series of missile launches in recent weeks by North Korea.

The three Europe
Europe

...the land mass occupying the space between the English Channel and the Urals, also known as Moslem Lebensraum...
an council members urged North Korea "to engage in meaningful negotiations with the US," as President Donald Trump
...Perhaps no man has ever had as much fun being president of the US...
and its leader Kim Pudge Jong-un
...the overweight, pouty-looking hereditary potentate of North Korea. Pudge appears to believe in his own divinity, but has yet to produce any loaves and fishes, so his subjects remain malnourished...
agreed to on June 30 at their meeting in the Demilitarized Zone between the two Koreas.

"Serious efforts by North Korea to re-engage diplomatically and make progress on denuclearization are the only way to guarantee security and stability on the Korean peninsula and in the region," their statement said.

The three countries stressed that "international sanctions must remain in place and be fully and strictly enforced until North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs are dismantled."

Many diplomats and analysts credit 11 rounds of increasingly tougher UN sanctions, which have sharply cut North Korea’s exports and imports, with helping promote the thaw in relations between North Korea and South Korea, and the two summits between Trump and Kim.

Link

Home Front: Politix

Bill Kristol Wants Rick Santorum To Challenge Trump: ‘He’s A Much Better Version Of President Trump’

2019-08-26

[DAILYCALLER] Bill Kristol took a backhand to President Donald Trump
...His ancestors didn't own any slaves...
, suggesting that former Republican Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum

...unsuccessful candidate for president and former U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania. He was a lawyer before becoming the Representative for suburban Pittsburgh in 1991. He lost his Senate seat in 2006 to Bob Casey, a Democrat machine politician and political dynast. Santorum is a social conservative who thinks the rest of the country is, too...
should primary him and calling the senator "a much better version of President Trump."

Kristol made the comments during a panel discussion on Sunday morning’s "State of the Union" on CNN with guest host Brianna Keilar.

Responding to the president’s claims that he would like to see Russia return to the G7 Summit ‐ making it once again the G8 ‐ members of the panel argued that the Kremlin had done little to reassure other nations that it would act in good faith.

Santorum, who has defended the president on occasion, was not a fan of his comments with regard to including Russia.

"It’s a bad call on the president’s part. Russia does not deserve to be in the G8," Santorum explained. "I like a lot of things the president is doing. I don’t like the way he deals with some of these dictators whether it’s North Korea
...hereditary Communist monarchy distinguished by its truculence and periodic acts of violence. Distinguishing features include Songun (Army First) policy, which involves feeding the army before anyone but the Dear Leadership, and Juche, which is Kim Jong Il's personal interpretation of Marxism-Leninism, which he told everybody was brilliant. In 1950 the industrialized North invaded agrarian South Korea. Twenty-one countries of the United Nations eventually contributed to the UN force opposing the invasion, with the United States providing around 90% of the military personnel. Seventy years later the economic results are in and it doesn't look good for Juche...
or Russia. I’m disappointed he’s making the call. I hope it’s revisited and he’s not included."

"Rick should challenge President Trump," Kristol suggested then. "He almost won in 2012. He’s a much better version of President Trump."

Santorum laughed it off, adding, "Bill’s trying to destroy my credibility right here."

Link

Home Front: Politix

It's a Much Smaller GOP Race than Debate Stage Suggests

2015-12-16

[WEEKLYSTANDARD] Tuesday's Republican presidential debate in Las Vegas is the final GOP primary debate of 2015. With about a month and a half before the first primary contest--the Iowa caucuses on February 1--it's become clear the field of plausible contenders is much smaller than the 13 Republicans who will debate in two separate events Tuesday night. It's possible December 15 will be the last time Republican voters see most of the whole band together before the forthcoming breakup. So which candidates should be cut loose after tonight?

Let's begin with the first event, the "undercard" debate: future debate organizers should make a New Year's resolution to scrap it in the months ahead. The undercard debates have had some utility in 2015. Two main-stage debaters Tuesday night, Carly Fiorina and Chris Christie, have spent one debate each on the kids' stage, giving both candidates a much-needed sense of urgency to perform well.

But the undercard has outlived its usefulness, and Tuesday's participants--Lindsey Graham
... the endangered South Carolina RINO...
, Mike Huckabee, George Pataki, and Rick Santorum

...unsuccessful candidate for president and former U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania. He was a lawyer before becoming the Representative for suburban Pittsburgh in 1991. He lost his Senate seat in 2006 to Bob Casey, a Democrat machine politician and political dynast. Santorum is a social conservative who thinks the rest of the country is, too...
--are polling so poorly they barely register as blips in the Real Clear Politics averages of national and early state polls. Onetime undercarders Rick Perry and Bobby Jindal recognized they were going nowhere in the presidential race and got out. It's up to each candidate himself--and their donor(s)--whether he should quit the campaigns, but the TV networks ought to do their part to encourage our hapless undercarders by dropping the increasingly useless JV debates.

Meanwhile,
...back at the buffalo wallow, Yellow Wolf clutched at his chest and fell from his horse...
there are a couple of candidates performing way below their status as main-stage debaters--chiefly Kentucky senator Rand Paul, whose hide was saved from the undercard by the generous folks at CNN. Paul is leading a libertarian movement in the Republican party that's atrophied away in the same way his poll numbers have. His best position is in Iowa, where he's been stalled out since August at below four percent support. Paul is simultaneously running for reelection to his Senate seat. In the unlikely event he delivers an all-star performance Tuesday night and prompts a stampede of supporters to bolt from Ted Cruz, he's likely to spend the next 10 months campaigning in his old Kentucky home.

The same might be said for Carly Fiorina, who burst onto the main stage in September after the only breakout performance on the undercard stage in August. Fiorina's spurt of support has sputtered out, however, and she's in Rand-Paul territory in most of the poll averages. Like Paul, she doesn't have an early state to hold out for. Fiorina's polling best in New Hampshire, at an average of 4.7 percent, but that puts her behind 7 other candidates. Without a compelling message beyond her ability to skewer Hillary Clinton
... sometimes described as For a good time at 3 a.m. call Hillary and at other times as Mrs. Bill, never as Another Elihu Root ...
as perhaps none of the male Republican candidates could, it's hard to see a reason for her candidacy, or her appearance on the debate stage, after December.

Link

Home Front: Politix

Hillary Clinton under fire in South Carolina for being 'old, white and rich'

2015-05-10

[DAILYMAIL.CO.UK]

'Freedom Summit' speakers bring heavy anti-Clinton artillery to Greenville, South Carolina
"We come to bury Hillary, not to praise her!"
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal wondered aloud if Hillary Clinton
... sometimes described as America's Blond Eminence and at other times as Mrs. Bill, never as Another Henry L. Stimson ...
would use 're-education camps' to force Christians to change their views on abortion
I'm against abortion--but by about 51 percent. There are arguments in its favor, some of which are valid. But unrestricted use of coat hangers through term is evil. I suspect most people feel about it approximately the way I do, lots of people being in favor of abortion by about 51 percent. We can argue over at what point a fetus becomes a baby; I suspect it's when Mom feels that first little kick, but that's just my personal opinion. But for God's sake, push the subject down the list of priorities in our political discourse! Compared to Islamism abortion approaches the point of "I don't much care" with me. Compared to the damage our economy's suffered under the B.O. regime it's a mere problem, not a way of life. Lots of times I think the systematic murder of unborn children gives the murderers what they deserve: an eventual guilty conscience and no one to love them when they're old.

As for the "re-education camps," under a Hillary Clinton presidency I guess I would look for a spike in compulsory enrollments at Oberlin College and similar institutions of Higher Reeducation.
Female GOP pollster: 'The question isn't whether you want "a" woman to be president. It's whether you want "that" woman to be president'
I think even hard-core Dems must be swinging around to "anyone but her" by now.
Rick Santorum
...unsuccessful candidate for president and former U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania. He was a lawyer before becoming the Representative for suburban Pittsburgh in 1991. He lost his Senate seat in 2006 to Bob Casey, a Democrat machine politician and political dynast. Santorum is a social conservative who thinks the rest of the country is, too...
, a former senator, could only think of one nice thing to say to Hillary: 'Happy Mothers Day!'
Santorum's a one-issue has-been. He should have the grace to sit out all further political campaigns. He'll be president one or two terms after I am.
Donald Trump spent 15 seconds trying to think of something nice to say about her, but couldn't
The Donald is also approaching the point of being comic relief. Were there any real candidates there?

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Home Front: Politix

Boy Wonder Building Conservative MoveOn.org in Illinois Garage

2015-05-10

A taste:

[Bloomberg] Charlie Kirk was just about to leave the 2012 Republican National Convention in Tampa when he spotted the multimillionaire investor Foster Friess in a stairwell. Kirk, who was 18 and fresh out of high school, had spent weeks memorizing the names and faces of the top 25 Republican political donors in case he found himself in just such a situation. He grabbed Friess into a handshake, took a nervous breath, and began his elevator pitch. Instead of going to college, he wanted to start a grass-roots organization to rival liberal groups such as MoveOn.org, which offer Democratic candidates a standing army of volunteer activists. All he needed, Kirk told Friess, was cash. Friess, who’d just blown $2.1 million on a failed quest to help Rick Santorum win the GOP presidential nomination, handed over his business card. Three weeks later, Kirk had a five-figure check. “He impressed me with his capacity to lead, intelligence, and love for America,” Friess says. “I instantly knew I wanted to support him.”

In the three years since, Kirk—who still sleeps in his childhood bedroom in Wheeling, Ill.—has built his organization, Turning Point USA, into the go-to group for reaching young conservatives. It has a presence on 800 college campuses, where fieldworkers hand out posters and collect e-mail addresses. At the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in February, the group hosted an event featuring Senators Ted Cruz and Rand Paul, who have each since announced they’re running for president. On May 8, Paul was scheduled to speak at a Turning Point rally at Arizona State University, and Carly Fiorina is on deck to speak in June at a Turning Point conference for women in Chicago. Kirk says he’s met candidate Marco Rubio and Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, who is considering a presidential run.

Link

Iraq

New Player in the ISIS War: Christian Gazillionaire Foster Friess

2015-03-08

[Daily Beast] He's best known for bankrolling Republicans Rick Santorum and Scott Walker afloat, but Foster Friess has a new cause a long way from D.C.
Walker was asked recently how he planned to raise the necessary funding for the upcoming race. He responded by saying "funding was not an issue."
Republican megadonor Foster Friess is shifting his sights from political campaigns to a military campaign: to fight ISIS and save Kurdish lives.

Behind the scenes, the conservative Christian has been traveling to the Middle East to support the vulnerable Kurdish minority in Iraq, and then coming back to the U.S. to lobby for arming and training their militias, known as the Peshmerga. These forces are on the front lines of the war with ISIS.

"They are fighting our fight and we have treated them disgracefully in terms of the armaments we have provided. Not only am I embarrassed to be an American, I'm actually ashamed," Friess told The Daily Beast. Arming the Kurds, he added, would help "defeat a ghastly evil that is running amok."

Some pro-Kurdish advocates have interpreted Friess's interest to mean that he wants to raise a volunteer military force to aid the Kurds, or arm them through private funds. But Friess told The Daily Beast that is not on the table, at least not for now.

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Home Front: Culture Wars

Steyn: In Flaunters' Fields, the Dollars Blow

2014-03-26

I blow hot and cold on this stuff, and at a small private dinner at Buckingham Palace a while back I rather enjoyed being the only mister at a tableful of princes, dukes, earls, viscounts, barons, and knights. But on balance I think I prefer a straightforward upfront knighthood to the American practice of turning temporary office into lifelong title. It creeps me out a little when you've got, say, a Republican primary debate between Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich and it's all "Governor Romney", "Senator Santorum" and "Mr Speaker", even though none of 'em has been a governor, senator, speaker or anything else since the turn of the century. Furthermore, titles such as "Governor" and "Senator" are in the gift of the people, who confer them only for a limited time. It's an unseemly act of usurpation to appropriate them as personal prenominals. There's no point forbidding, as the US Constitution does, titles of nobility if you turn a two-year congressional term from the mid-Seventies into a lifelong aristocratic rank.

Link

Home Front: WoT

Conservatives have a Mandela problem

2013-12-08

Not anymore.

Subheading: Republicans were wrong about South Africa's great liberator. Now they have to say something nice about him

I'll bite: He's dead Jim.

Nice enough? No? Read on.

Article by a leftist named Alex Halperin.

For right-wing pundits, talking about Nelson Mandela is a minefield.
Nice. Mandela could tell you something about minefields. He didn't? You mean you didn't do your homework? Or did the right wing fever swamp eat it?
Throughout the Reagan administration, American conservatives regarded South Africa's apartheid government as a bulwark against communism, especially compared to the rest of sub-Saharan Africa. A generation of conservative operatives, including the disgraced Jack Abramoff and the very influential Grover Norquist writes in National Review, "Like many other anti-Communists and Cold Warriors, I feared that releasing Nelson Mandela from jail, especially amid the collapse of South Africa's apartheid government, would create a Cuba on the Cape of Good Hope at best and an African Cambodia at worst."
And it turned out worse than Cuba.
Indeed, the right was hardly vocal in opposition to Apartheid. On Twitter, The Nation's Lee Fang pointed to an 1986 column by William F. Buckley arguing that the U.S. should "Continue our moral pressure by all means. But stop trying to fine-tune South African policy from the White House; pull back on the one-man, one-vote business; and c) forget blanket sanctions." This is like Paul Ryan's plan to fight poverty through "spiritual redemption."
He was wrong then and he is wrong now. I was on the anti apartheid side at the time. It was the right thing to do. But the result sucked and it will get even worse. You can lay that at Mandela's feet.
In the eyes of many conservatives, Nelson Mandela was a terrorist--
He was a terrorist, and now he is an ex-terrorist.
indeed some are still saying so today--so they might be understandably tongue-tied when he ascended to the pantheon of great men. Yesterday pundits compared him to, among others, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington (from Charles Krauthammer!), Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. A rough comparison, might be if history in the Middle East had turned out differently and conservatives had to say something nice about Yasser Arafat. I am certain Brezhnev would say something nice about the good head Arafat gave him.
When was the last time you talked to a conservative,let alone many of them, Alex? Those "conservatives" are like the "house negro" label you hanged on Herman Cain. I no more subscribe to the notion that Mandela was a human rights hero, than I would Bull Conner was a police hero in Alabama.
Some of the more gracious commentary acknowledges being wrong about Mandela. Murdock goes on to write:

Far, far, far from any of that, Nelson Mandela turned out to be one of the 20th Century's great moral leaders... He also was a statesman of considerable weight. If not as significant on the global stage as FDR, Winston Churchill, and Ronald Reagan, he approaches Margaret Thatcher as a national leader with major international reach.
Holy Sh*t! What a gross lie!
But even well after Mandela had been freed and elected president, he was hardly universally beloved among American conservatives. As my colleague Joan Walsh points out, he infuriated the right in 2003 when he criticized the Iraq war. The exact quote, The Other McCain points out, was "All Bush wants is Iraqi oil. There is no doubt that the U.S. is behaving badly. Why are they not seeking to confiscate weapons of mass destruction from their ally Israel? This is just an excuse to get Iraq's oil." So, Mandela being correct on the Iraq war remains a sore spot. Some conservatives felt the need to point this out upon his death.
Mandela was wrong. You failed to address any of the things the US did do in Iraq that had everything to do with the mission and nothing to do with your narrow perceptions.
If we had just wanted the oil we would have made a deal with Saddam, it would have been easier. Then we would have invaded Alberta...
On Fox News, Bill O'Reilly's head almost exploded since Mandela's story doesn't conform exactly to politics as he usually understands them:

He was a communist, this man. He was a communist, all right? But he was a great man! What he did for his people was stunning!... He was a great man! But he was a communist!
O'Reilly is half right. Replace "great man" with "murdering basdard", and he'll be exactly right.
O'Reilly's guest Rick Santorum pulled us back down to the expected level of discourse when he said Mandela stood up to a "great injustice," and then compared the legally sanctioned and brutally enforced segregation of millions of people to the "ever-increasing size of government that is taking over and controlling people's lives, and Obamacare is at the front and center of that."

Venturing further into the fever-swamp, it's possible to find the worst kind of garbage. On his Facebook page, Ted Cruz posted a strongly worded memorial to the great man and some took issue.

Mmmm... I found something I disagree with Cruz on.

Sad to see you feel this way Ted. He was a terrorist. I guess you have only seen the Hollywood movies

Let's not forget that Mandela called Castro's Communist revolution "a source of inspiration to all freedom-loving people."
A lot of individuals who said they were conservatives said nice things about Mandela. I was stunned too.
Meanwhile Michelle Malkin's site Twitchy, brought it all back to groundlessly mocking President Obama, firmer ground for most of her comrades.

Link

-Short Attention Span Theater-

Richard Cohen column smearing the GOP

2013-11-14

The left has chosen to have a collective conniption over Cohen's remarks on interracial marriage. The column that caused so much controversy is a standard liberal poking of fun a conservatives. Gotta expect that from liberals.
The day after Chris Christie, the cuddly moderate conservative, won a landslide reelection as the Republican governor of Democratic New Jersey, I took the Internet Express out to Iowa, surveying its various newspapers, blogs and such to see how he might do in the GOP caucuses, won last time by Rick Santorum, neither cuddly nor moderate. Superstorm Sandy put Christie on the map. The winter snows of Iowa could bury him.

From a Web site called the Iowa Republican, I learned that part of the problem with John McCain and Mitt Romney, seriatim losers to Barack Obama, is they were deemed too moderate by many Iowa conservatives. The sort of candidates Iowa Republicans prefer have already been in the state. The blog cited Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, Sen. Mike Lee of Utah (considered to the right of Cruz, if such a thing is possible), Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, the partys recent vice presidential candidate and its resident abacus, and the inevitable Sarah Palin, the Alaska quitter who, I think, actually now lives in Arizona. If this is the future of the GOP, then its in the past.

None of these candidates bears the slightest resemblance to Christie. And the more literate of them thats not you, Palin must have chortled over post-election newspaper columns extolling Christie as precisely the sort of candidate the GOP ought to run in 2016. This is the dream of moderate Republicans, but not many of them vote in the Iowa caucuses or the South Carolina primary, two of the early nominating contests.
Just amazing. A woman capable of speaking contemporaneously for 30 minutes with a 20 word note written on her hand is illiterate? The 'illiterate' smear is an old one from the 1970s, not quite the truth, but since it is a negative not provable either. In this context it speaks of Cohen utter ignorance, which liberals will follow.
At the moment, it is Cruz, not Christie, who has seized the imagination of Iowa Republicans. Cruz has not only been to the state, but he also was accompanied by his evangelist father, Rafael, a colorful preacher who opposes almost anything, including, of course, same-sex marriage. (It was Adam and Eve, it was not Adam and Steve, he recently said.)
A cogent argument that speaks to the benefit of traditional marriage as a benefit to society. But not to Cohen.
Cruz the younger is not merely tea party to the nth degree, he is a Christian conservative as well and for 22 percent of Iowas likely 2016 caucusgoers, polled by the Des Moines Register, thats who they think stands the best chance of winning the presidency. The No. 1 choice (44 percent) was a candidate focused on civil liberties and a small government rooted in the U.S. Constitution. Christie can passably argue that he is that, but no one is going to call him a Christian conservative. After all, he opposed same-sex marriage in New Jersey, but he acquiesced. Cruz would not to do that. Hed still be talking and Steve would still be single.
Kewt. You should try standup comedy in your new career.
Iowa not only is a serious obstacle for Christie and other Republican moderates, it also suggests something more ominous: the Dixiecrats of old. Officially the States Rights Democratic Party, they were breakaway Democrats whose primary issue was racial segregation. In its cause, they ran their own presidential candidate, Strom Thurmond, and almost cost Harry Truman the 1948 election. They didnt care. Their objective was not to win although that would have been nice but to retain institutional, legal racism. They saw a way of life under attack and they feared its loss.

Todays GOP is not racist, as Harry Belafonte alleged about the tea party, but it is deeply troubled about the expansion of government, about immigration, about secularism, about the mainstreaming of what used to be the avant-garde. People with conventional views must repress a gag reflex when considering the mayor-elect of New York a white man married to a black woman and with two biracial children. (Should I mention that Bill de Blasios wife, Chirlane McCray, used to be a lesbian?) This family represents the cultural changes that have enveloped parts but not all of America. To cultural conservatives, this doesnt look like their country at all.
de Blasio is a self confessed Sandanista, an ally of a Nicaragua political movement responsible for their share of socialist mayhem in central American, coming soon to New York. His wife is supposed to be irrelevant in politics, unless she decides to be relevant. Her race is not s'posed to matter. I have yet to see anything from the TEA Party that extols or even encourages racial segregation. The only time such a thing is even an issue is when liberals like Cohen make the charge as a political smear.
As with the Dixiecrats, the fight is not over a particular program although Obamacare comes close but about a tectonic shift of attitudes. I thank Dennis J. Goldford, professor of politics and international relations at Drake University in Des Moines, for leading me to a live performance on YouTube of Merle Haggard singing Are the Good Times Really Over. This chestnut, a lament for a lost America, has been viewed well more than 2 million times. It could be the tea partys anthem.
That song was written and performed by Merle haggard back in the 1970s. In only my opinion is does speak to unhelpful changes, so its sentiment will be relevant in generations to come. In the song Haggard laments feminism, lying and other American societal changes.
For all his positions and religious beliefs, Christie is too Joisey for the tea party too brash, as well. He would be wise to steer clear of Iowa lest he lose or, worse, follow Romney and take on the deeply conservative coloration of the states GOP. That might make him (barely) acceptable to Republican Iowans but anathema to the rest of us.

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