Media Succeeds With 1992 Strategy

“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.” — Joseph Goebbels

When George W. Bush Sr. was running for re-election in 1992, the media harped ad nauseum about the horrible state of the economy. Except that most of it was irresponsible (and intentional) exaggeration.

In 1992, Bush was thrown out of office even though GDP was growing and the unemployment rate falling, leading one political scientist–Marc J. Hetherington of Bowdoin College–to theorize that negative media coverage of the economy had driven Bush from office. Hetherington found that voters who regularly read newspapers and watched TV news were more likely to have a negative view of the economy than those who didn’t. Maybe so, but the problem wasn’t all bad press: Unemployment was high and didn’t fall much in 1992, and new jobs were scarce.

And now, the media dusts off its old 1992 playbook, and it’s working yet again.

And just like it was in 1992, it’s all wrong, meant to mislead, meant to put voters in a negative mood so that they vote with their hearts and impulses (i.e., Democrat) and not with the facts.

Contrary to what the liars with microphones tell us, there is no recession. John Lott recently wrote:

A recession is defined as two consecutive quarters of negative growth. But we haven’t even seen one quarter of negative growth. In fact, the last two quarters have shown nothing short of phenomenal growth. During the third quarter of last year, GDP grew at an annual rate of 4.9 percent, twice the normal growth rate. The second quarter last year saw a growth of 3.8 percent. The new numbers for the very end of last year will be released on Jan. 30, but they are unlikely to show negative growth.

And yet:

CNN: Poll: Three-quarters think U.S. in recession By Paul Steinhauser

Don’t Be Shocked. Spitzer Was Being Spitzer.

‘Non-Judgmental’ Nonsense By Thomas Sowell

What Eliot Spitzer did was not out of character. It was completely in character for someone with the hubris that comes with the ability to misuse his power to make or break innocent people.

[...]

When you start thinking of yourself as a little tin god, able to throw your weight around to bully people into silence, it is a sign of a sense of being exempt from the laws and social rules that apply to other people.

[...]

In this age, when it is considered the height of sophistication to be “non-judgmental,” one of the corollaries is that “personal” failings have no relevance to the performance of official duties.

What that amounts to, ultimately, is that character doesn’t matter. In reality, character matters enormously, more so than most things that can be seen, measured or documented.

What Caused the Subprime Mortgage Collapse?

No surprise about what led to the subprime mortgage collapse: blame government do-gooders for meddling with the free market.

How Government Makes Things Worse By Jeff Jacoby

The subprime mortgage collapse is another tale of unintended consequences.

The crisis has its roots in the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977, a Carter-era law that purported to prevent “redlining” - denying mortgages to black borrowers - by pressuring banks to make home loans in “low- and moderate-income neighborhoods.” Under the act, banks were to be graded on their attentiveness to the “credit needs” of “predominantly minority neighborhoods.” The higher a bank’s rating, the more likely that regulators would say yes when the bank sought to open a new branch or undertake a merger or acquisition.

But to earn high ratings, banks were forced to make increasingly risky loans to borrowers who wouldn’t qualify for a mortgage under normal standards of creditworthiness. The Community Reinvestment Act, made even more stringent during the Clinton administration, trapped lenders in a Catch-22.

“If they comply,” wrote Loyola College economist Thomas DiLorenzo, “they know they will have to suffer from more loan defaults. If they don’t comply, they face financial penalties . . . which can cost a large corporation like Bank of America billions of dollars.”

Banks nationwide thus ended up making more and more subprime loans and agreeing to dangerously lax underwriting standards - no down payment, no verification of income, interest-only payment plans, weak credit history. If they tried to compensate for the higher risks they were taking by charging higher interest rates, they were accused of unfairly steering borrowers into “predatory” loans they couldn’t afford.

Trapped in a no-win situation entirely of the government’s making, lenders could only hope that home prices would continue to rise, staving off the inevitable collapse. But once the housing bubble burst, there was no escape. Mortgage lenders have been bankrupted, thousands of subprime homeowners have been foreclosed on, and countless would-be borrowers can no longer get credit. The financial fallout has hurt investors around the world. And all of it thanks to the government, which was sure it understood the credit industry better than the free market did, and confidently created the conditions that made disaster unavoidable.

“No man’s life, liberty, or property is safe,” warned Mark Twain, “while Congress is in session.” Mark Twain was a humorist, but that was no joke.

7 Engineering Wonders of the Modern World

7 Engineering Wonders of the Modern World: Contemporary World Record-Setting Construction

Planned Parenthood Apologizes, is Pissy for Plunging into Pro-Life Trap

An example of “shoot the messenger.”

Idaho Statesman: Response to caller ‘a serious mistake,’ says Planned Parenthood of Idaho — They also criticized The Advocate for trying to discredit employees with recorded phone calls

WHAT WAS SAID

Autumn Kersey of Planned Parenthood in Boise: Good afternoon, this is Autumn.

Donor: Hello, Autumn, I’m interested in making a donation today.

Kersey: Fantastic!

Donor: What about abortions for the underprivileged minority groups?

Kersey: Oh, absolutely. We have, um, in fact, uh wonderful, fantastic news. We just received a very generous donation to our women in need fund.

Donor: Wonderful. I want to specify that abortion to help a minority group - would that be possible?

Kersey: Absolutely.

Donor: Like the black community for example?

Kersey: Certainly.

Donor: OK, so the abortionI can give money specifically for a black baby, that would be the purpose.

Kersey: Absolutely. If you wanted to designate that you wanted your gift to be used to help (an) African-American woman in need, then we would certainly make sure that that gift was earmarked specifically for that purpose.

Donor: Great. Because I really face trouble with affirmative action, and I don’t want my kids being disadvantaged, you know, against black kids. I just had a baby; I want to put it in his name, you know.

Kersey: Mmhmm, absolutely.

Donor: So that’s definitely possible.

Kersey: Oh, always, always.

Donor: So I just wanna - can I put this in the name of my son?

Kersey: Absolutely.

Donor: Yeah, he’s trying to get into colleges, and he’s going to be applying, you know, he’s justwe’re just really bighe’s really faced troubles with affirmative action.

Kersey: Mmhmm.

Donor: And we don’t, you know, we just think, you know, the less black kids out there the better.

Kersey: (Laughs) Understandable, understandable. … Um David, let me, if I may, just get some sort of specific general information so we can set this up the right way. You said you wanted to put it in your son’s name, and you would like this designated specifically to assist (an) African-American woman who’s looking to terminate a pregnancy.

Donor: Exactly, and yeah, I wanna protect my son, so he can get into college.

Kersey: All right. Excuse my hesitation, um, um, this is the first time I’ve had a donor call and make this kind of request, so I’m excited, and I wanna make sure I don’t leave anything out.

Transcript released by The Advocate BY SANDRA FORESTER

I doubt The Advocate was trying to “discredit” Planned Parenthood’s employees so much as reveal the truth about them.

Autumn Kersey could have easily corrected this “donor.” She could have atleast said something to the effect that babies are not aborted based on their race/ethnicity/gender, etc.; she had multiple opportunities to do so. Instead, her comments either approve of what this “donor” had to say, or they shifted toward the fact that a donation was being made and not the purpose of the donation.

If Kersey does not have racist beliefs, she certainly salivated at the thought of a donation, so much so that even outrageous and racist statements didn’t bother her.

On the other hand, one ought not to expect decency from the #1 abortion provider in America.

Top Jihadist Makes New Home at Guantanamo Resort

CBS13: Top Al Qaeda Figure Who Aided Bin Laden Captured

The First Time I Ever Agreed With Paul Krugman

“I’m sorry to say that a large part of the progressive movement seems to have lost its sanity.” — Paul Krugman, New York Times

With regard to this use of the word “progressive”: a person must be massively arrogant to believe that his or her belief system achieves “progress.”

Encroaching Sharia Law

Some Muslims aim to use the courts to harass those who dare criticize or speak the truth about Islam.

Soft Jihad: the next phase by Roger Kimball

Even as some Westerners are beginning to wake up to the progress of soft jihad and “sharia creep” (and here), it is worth noting that radical Islam continues to make conspicuous strides in coopting Western institutions and legal instruments to undermine the reality of Western liberty. Consider, to take just one example, the summit meeting of the Organization of the Islamic Conference which ended Friday in Dakar, Senegal. An Associated Press report has the details:

The Muslim world has created a battle plan to defend its religion from political cartoonists and bigots.

Concerned about what they see as a rise in the defamation of Islam, leaders of the world’s Muslim nations are considering taking legal action against those that slight their religion or its sacred symbols. It was a key issue during a two-day summit that ended Friday in this western Africa capital.

The Muslim leaders are attempting to demand redress from nations like Denmark, which allowed the publication of cartoons portraying the Prophet Muhammad in 2006 and again last month, to the fury of the Muslim world.

Let’s see, “redress” for publishing cartoons about a 7th-century religious figure? For “slighting” a religion?

Muslims appear to hold grudges for a hell of a long time. Either than, or they love conflict.

A powerful statement of why Sharia is incompatible with Western standards of justice and human rights.