Tag: Democrat Party

Al Jazeera America Downsizing. Let Freedom Ring!

On By kingsjesterIn Politics2 Comments

aljazeeraAmericaWhat happens when a Cable “News Network” is launched by our country’s enemies, for the purpose of propaganda, and nobody watches it?

The Hollywood Reporter has the story…

Al Jazeera America, which launched last August with nearly 850 employees and 12 news bureaus in the United States, has laid off dozens of employees as part of restructuring. The channel is disbanding its sports unit and scaling back its social-media-driven show The Stream from a daily show to a once-a-week program.

“The majority of people affected were freelancers and many of the staff either came from the sports group or from The Stream,” Dawn Bridges, executive vp corporate communications, tells The Hollywood Reporter. 

In a note to employees on Friday, the cable news channel’s president, Kate O’Brian, stated that staff reductions were part of a process of restructuring after initial hires were made for the launch. 

“In the seven months since launch we have built a channel that it took other networks years to do,” O’Brian wrote. “As you all know, that required extensive effort, planning and resources. We always understood that we would need considerable resources to meet our goals.”

“This will have an immediate impact on some staff, freelancers, independent contractors, and other project-oriented individuals who have been with us for several months,” O’Brian noted. 

…While there was no dedicated sports program, sports content was circulated through daily news shows. A sports show was in development at one point, but plans for a dedicated show have been scrapped. 

The cable news channel, backed by the royal family of Qatar, replaced Current TV on the channel guide when it launched on Aug. 20 of last year. A significant investment, up to $600 million, was made in Al Jazeera America, sources told THR at the time.

In the months leading up to the channel’s launch, AJA boasted numerous high-profile journalist hires — including Soledad O’Brien, Ali Velshi, John Seigenthaler, Joie Chen and Antonio Mora — and pledged to deliver substantive news to differentiate itself from cable news competitors. The channel recently won two Peabody Awards, for documentaries on Haiti and Bangladesh. 

As of December 2013, when the channel struck a carriage agreement with Time Warner Cable, Al Jazeera America was available in almost 55 million homes in the United States. 

“We have more than 800 staff around the country and I hope you are seeing that we’re continuing to build a strong distribution network. Our relationships with distributors, advertisers, and the media industry as a whole are strong,” O’Brian wrote in the Friday memo.

I remember when I first heard the name “Al Jazeera. It was following the worst ever Muslim Terrorist Attack on American Soil on September 11, 2001. Right after the carnage, the “news service” began repeatedly broadcasting a videotape that showed 9/11 terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden praising and taking credit for those attacks by members of his al Qaeda organization. Al Jazeera (AJ) would not reveal where or how it had obtained this videotape, or to provide any information that might have helped to track down the Muslim Mass Murderer Osama bin Laden. These Muslim Terrorist Sympathizers also refused to stop airing the Anti-American video, despite our government’s concerns that the footage might contain coded messages to other al Qaeda agents around the world. Over the next 10 years, AJ would become known as bin Laden’s media outlet of choice for airing his various messages to the world.. These al Qaeda operatives aired at least 10 separate, “exclusive” bin Laden videos.

The New York Times Magazine published a cover story after the horrific mass murder of 9/11 titled “What the Muslim World Is Watching,” In the article, Fouad Ajami noted:

Jazeera’s reporters see themselves as ‘anti-imperialists.’ Convinced that the rulers of the Arab world have given in to American might, these are broadcasters who play to an Arab gallery whose political bitterness they share—and feed.

In April 2003, our nation’s military leaders noticed that one particular AJ reporter who was stationed in Baghdad consistently arrived, with his camera in hand, at the site of Iraqi-perpetrated terror attacks right after they had taken place. Suspecting that Al Jazeera and al Qaeda were working together, the U.S. bombed AJ’s offices in Bagdad, just like we had previously bombed the station’s headquarters in Kabul, Afghanistan in late 2001.

By the time the 2004 presidential campaign season had started, the Democratic Party was well aware of the fact that AJ’s denigration of the Bush administration’s war efforts in Aghanistan and Iraq were helping to detroy support for the Bush Administration at home and abroad. In March 2004, AJ lavished praises on the Democratic presidential nominee-apparent, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry. Later in 2004, AJ was invited to cover the Democratic National Convention, and it did so with unexpectedly positive reporting.

AJ America was born on January 2, 2013, when Al Jazeera spent an estimated $500 million to purchase Al Gore’s left-wing Current TV. (Gore owned a 20% share of Current TV, leading to a payout from the deal of approximately $100 million.) The transaction increased AJ’s potential reach in the U.S. to approximately 40 million homes, a nearly ninefold increase. In a statement concerning the sale, Gore proudly said that Al Jazeera shared Current TV’s commitment “to give voice to those who are not typically heard; to speak truth to power; to provide independent and diverse points of view; and to tell the stories that no one else is telling.” News reports at the time of the sale claimed that AJ was planning to gradually transform Current TV into a network called Al Jazeera America (AJA), which would be editorially separate from the Qatar-based broadcast center that also houses Al Jazeera English.

Uh huh.

At the time of the launch, the New York Times reported that the station would “start in about 48 million of the country’s roughly 100 million homes that subscribe to television.”

Okay. If this blatant proprietor of propaganda, these “nattering nabobs of negativity”, if you will, are so enlightened and successful, why are they downsizing?

Simple. Americans aren’t buying the b.s.

Back on November 18, 2013, theblaze.com reported

Al Jazeera America has been on the air for just about two months and despite being carried in roughly 44 million homes, Americans are apparently not interested in what the Qatar-owned network is offering.

At only about 13,000 viewers a day since its Aug. 20 launch, Al Jazeera America’s daily viewership is reportedly less than half what it was under Al Gore’s unsuccessful Current TV. The news network was only able to draw in about 5,000 viewers in the coveted 25-to-54-year-old demographic.

To put the awful ratings into perspective, consider that 13,000 daily viewers is about .00029 percent of the total number of households who have access to Al Jazeera America.

Just as the propaganda attempts of previous enemies of American Freedom, Nazi Germany and Japan, in World War II, failed miserably, so will this attempt by the true believers of Radical Islam to convince America that they are just a bunch of cuddly teddy bears, fail miserably, as well.

One of America’s greatest allies of all time, the legendary British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, (whose bust  in our White House, President Obama sent back to England) once wrote about Islam that,

Indeed it is evident that Christianity, however degraded and distorted by cruelty and intolerance, must always exert a modifying influence on men’s passions, and protect them from the more violent forms of fanatical fever, as we are protected from smallpox by vaccination. But the Mahommedan religion increases, instead of lessening, the fury of intolerance. It was originally propagated by the sword, and ever since, its votaries have been subject, above the people of all other creeds, to this form of madness.

“Intolerance.” No wonder these enemies of America have forged an alliance with America’s Liberal Democrats, headed by the Obama Administration.

They have a lot in common. They don’t care much for American Freedom, either.

Until He Comes,

KJ

 

Vichy Republicans Vote to Raise Debt Ceiling… and Shaft Conservative Base

On By kingsjesterIn Politics2 Comments

Cartoon-Cruz-Vs-Establishment-600In the Mid-Term Elections of 2010, Conservative American Voters put our trust in the Republican Party, who like the snake who appeared to Eve, promised TEA Party members nationwide, that if Conservatives sent them to Washington, they would represent us, and vote to limit Obama and the Democrats’ dreams of Unlimited Governmental Control of our everyday lives and uphold the Constitutional, Conservative vision of limited Government championed by the Grassroots Movement.

They lied.

The first thing that Republicans did, was to elect sniveling, spineless Vichy Republican John Boehner, the Speaker of the House.

From that moment on, the Grand Old Party en masse, except for a few notable exceptions, have continued their slide toward becoming a perfect replica of the political party whom they are supposed to be opposing.

The insistence by the Northeast Republicans Club, or Vichy Republicans, toward Moderate Mediocrity, has cost them the last two Presidential Elections, and could cause them the upcoming 2014 Mid -Term Elections, as well.

On Tuesday, this hardly august group continued their alienation of their Conservative Base.

Fox News relates the whole, sorry story…

The House voted Tuesday to raise the government’s borrowing limit, as GOP leaders backed down from a potential confrontation with Democrats by declining to seek any concessions in exchange for the increase.

The debt-ceiling bill passed on a 221-201 vote, and now goes to the Senate for final approval.

The vote comes after Republican leaders backed off their strategy of trying to use the debt limit to force spending cuts or other concessions. In 2011, President Obama yielded to similar demands but has since said he would not negotiate with Republicans over the matter.

House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, swiftly teed up the vote Tuesday after failing to get enough conservative support for a plan that would have tied the debt ceiling measure to one reversing cuts to military pensions. Another failed proposal had tied the debt cap hike to the Keystone pipeline.

The House, as part of a separate bill, nevertheless voted Tuesday to restore full cost of living increases to pension benefits for younger military retirees. The final vote was 326-90.

But Boehner’s decision to move ahead on the debt-ceiling legislation without any concessions signals a potentially new approach on these so-called must-pass bills. His party was bruised last year after Republicans tried to extract changes to ObamaCare as part of a budget bill, resulting in a partial government shutdown that lasted until Boehner finally called a relatively clean budget bill to the floor — which passed on mostly Democratic votes.

The vote Tuesday followed the same pattern. Boehner relied on mostly Democrats to bring the bill over the finish line 193 Democrats voted for the bill, while just 28 Republicans did the same. Boehner and other GOP leaders were among those who voted yes.

Boehner announced before the vote that that was the strategy. “We’ll let the Democrats put the votes up. We’ll put a minimum number of (GOP) votes up to get it passed,” Boehner said. “We’ll let his party give him the debt ceiling increase that he wants.”

But the vote caused consternation among conservative groups that have pushed Congress — and particularly Tea Party-aligned lawmakers they helped elect — to rein in deficit spending, in part by extracting spending cuts wherever possible.

“A clean debt ceiling is a complete capitulation on the Speaker’s part and demonstrates that he has lost the ability to lead the House of Representatives, let alone his own party,” Jenny Beth Martin, co-founder of Tea Party Patriots, said in a statement.

The measure approved by the House does not raise the debt limit by a set amount but does suspend it through March 15, 2015.

One of those notable exceptions whom I alluded to earlier, is Texas Senator Ted Cruz, a Reagan Conservative and an American Patriot. After the traitorous vote on Tuesday, Cruz issued the following statement:

Today’s vote is yet another example that establishment politicians from both parties are simply not listening to the American people. Outside the beltway, Americans of all political stripes understand that we cannot keep spending money we don’t have.

Some members of Congress care so much about being praised by the Washington media that they’re willing to mortgage our children’s future. They pretend we don’t have a problem and can just kick the can down the road.

Let’s be clear about the motive behind this vote — there are too many members of Congress who think they can fool people and they will forget about it the next week. But sometimes, come November, the people remember.

Being an American by Birth, and Southern by the Grace of God, my favorite play of all time is “Lil’ Abner”. One of my favorite scenes in the movie they made of it, which starred Petter Palmer as Abner, Stubby Kaye as Marryin’ Sam, and the great Billie Hayes as Mammy Yoakum, was when Senator Fogbound (what a great name) holds a meeting with the townsfolk of Dogpatch, to tell them that they had to evacuate, due to an upcoming “A-tomic” Bomb Test.

Sen. Fogbound: I know y’all have been wondering what I have been doing up there in Washington on your behalf.

Mammy Yoakum: We didn’t care…as long as you wuz up there…and we wuz down here!

That was 1959…before the Cuban Missile Crisis, before Vietnam…before Ithe Munich Olympics…before the Iranian Hostage Crisis…AND, before President Barack Hussein Obama.

It was a more innocent time, when, even as horribly self-serving as the worst of our Senators and Congressmen were, we knew that they still were answerable to their respective constituencies. Unfortunately, in 2014, we cannot afford that naivete anymore. Our “so-called” Congressional  Representatives, the before-mentioned Vichy Republicans, do not care what we think, because they, like their fellow Progressives on the other side of the aisle, believe that they know what is best for us…and what will save their phony baloney jobs.

However, they are wrong…and Senator Cruz is right: 

COME NOVEMBER…AMERICANS WILL REMEMBER.

Until He Comes,

KJ

This Ain’t Yo’ Folks’ Democratic Party

On By kingsjesterIn Christianity, Politics6 Comments

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m 53 years old.  My Mother and Daddy were 40 years older than me. I think that they were going to name me “Oops”. But, I digress…

My folks were Southern Democrats…Conservative Southern Democrats. They passed away in ’95 and ’97, respectively.

Back in the day, the Democrat Party was a far different political party than they are today.

On July 11, 1960, the Democratic Party Platform began with the following:

In 1796, in America’s first contested national election, our Party, under the leadership of Thomas Jefferson, campaigned on the principles of “The Rights of Man.”

Ever since, these four words have underscored our identity with the plain people of America and the world.

In periods of national crisis, we Democrats have returned to these words for renewed strength. We return to them today.

In 1960, “The Rights of Man” are still the issue. It is our continuing responsibility to provide an effective instrument of political action for every American who seeks to strengthen these rights-everywhere here in America, and everywhere in our 20th Century world.

The common danger of mankind is war and the threat of war. Today, three billion human beings live in fear that some rash act or blunder may plunge us all into a nuclear holocaust which will leave only ruined cities, blasted homes, and a poisoned earth and sky.

Our objective, however, is not the right to coexist in armed camps on the same planet with totalitarian ideologies; it is the creation of an enduring peace in which the universal values of human dignity, truth, and justice under law are finally secured for all men everywhere on earth.

If America is to work effectively for such a peace, we must first restore our national strength-military, political, economic, and moral.

That’s a far cry from “You didn’t build that”, huh?

In fact, it sounds like the Modern Republican Party.

Well, hold on to something. You ain’t seen nothin’, yet…as The New York Times reports:

Democrats appear ready to embrace same-sex marriage as part of their party platform, a policy shift that reflects an expanded acceptance of gay rights in mainstream politics.

The move would place the party in line with the beliefs of President Obama, who in May became the first sitting president to declare that gay men and lesbians should be able to marry.

Democratic Party officials had squabbled over the issue in the past. But at a platform-drafting meeting over the weekend in Minneapolis, they approved the first step to amend their platform, placing the amendment on track for adoption. In two weeks, the entire platform committee will vote at a meeting scheduled in Detroit. Then, if approved as expected, it would go before convention delegates in Charlotte, N.C., for final passage in early September.

According to Democrats who were briefed on the vote in Minneapolis, there was no objection when the issue came up. Though the language that was voted on could still be revised, party officials do not anticipate any major obstacles going forward.

The platform language approved over the weekend also reiterated the party’s disapproval of the Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibits the federal government from recognizing legal same-sex marriages. The 2008 platform had a similar section.

The Democratic Party’s move comes more than two months after President Obama personally backed the rights of same-sex couples to wed. The president’s reversal — he had said previously that while he could not support same-sex marriage, his views on the issue were “evolving” — was a significant move, though it carried no legal weight.

The Democrats would become the first major party to embrace same-sex marriage. But as historic as the platform would be, the president’s position makes it decidedly less controversial.

News of the platform amendment was first reported by The Washington Blade.

Gay rights supporters praised the Democratic Party’s vote. “Like Americans from all walks of life, the Democratic Party has recognized that committed and loving gay and lesbian couples deserve the right to have their relationships respected as equal under the law,” said Chad Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign. “I believe that one day very soon the platforms of both major parties will include similar language on this issue.”

The Democratic Party platform that was drafted four years ago, when Mr. Obama was first running for president, called for “full inclusion of all families, including same-sex couples, in the life of our nation, and support equal responsibility, benefits and protections.”

But the platform stopped short of endorsing same-sex marriages, in part because Mr. Obama had said he remained opposed.

Well, all bets are off now, because as we have all found out, all of Obama’s promises come with expiration dates.

Oh…and that whirring sound you hear? It’s the sound of Democrats like Scoop Jackson, Tip O’Neill, Hubert Humphrey, John F. Kennedy…and my parents…spinning in their graves.