Check out this masterpiece of evasion by Howard Dean on the Drudge Report. Observe how he expects the media companies to offer themselves as willing sacrifices for the sake of “democracy,” and that he defines “censorship” not as the absence of governmental control of the press, but as the active use of government coercion to provide “information from all portions of the political spectrum, not just one.” Note also the New Deal justification of “saving capitalism from itself.”
Dean is right about one thing -- "The essence of capitalism, which the right-wing never understands -- it always baffles me -- is, you got to have some rules." What socialists like Dean will never understand however, is that the basic rule of capitalism is not the adoption of socialism, but the removal of force from men’s relationships.
The Dem hopeful made the comments on GENERAL ELECTRIC-owned MSNBC during HARDBALL WITH CHRIS MATTHEWS.
"The essence of capitalism, which the right-wing never understands -- it always baffles me -- is, you got to have some rules," Dean explained to Matthews and students at Harvard.
MATTHEWS: Well, would you break up GE?
(APPLAUSE)
DEAN: I can`t -- you...
MATTHEWS: GE just buys Universal. Would you do something there about that? Would you stop that from happening?
DEAN: You can`t say -- you can`t ask me right now and get an answer, would I break up X corp...
MATTHEWS: We`ve got to do it now, because now is the only chance we can ask you, because, once you are in, we have got to live with you.
(LAUGHTER)
DEAN: No.
MATTHEWS: So, if you are going to do it, you have got to tell us now.
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: Are you going to break up the giant media enterprises in this country?
DEAN: Yes, we`re going to break up giant media enterprises. That doesn`t mean we`re going to break up all of GE.
What we`re going to do is say that media enterprises can`t be as big as they are today. I don`t think we actually have to break them up, which Teddy Roosevelt had to do with the leftovers from the McKinley administration.
Dean explained how "11 companies in this country control 90 percent of what ordinary people are able to read and watch on their television. That`s wrong. We need to have a wide variety of opinions in every community. We don`t have that because of Michael Powell and what George Bush has tried to do to the FCC."
Matthews continued:
"Would you break up Fox?"
(LAUGHTER)
MATTHEWS: I`m serious.
DEAN: I`m keeping a...
MATTHEWS: Would you break it up? Rupert Murdoch has "The Weekly Standard." It has got a lot of other interests. It has got "The New York Post." Would you break it up?
DEAN: On ideological grounds, absolutely yes, but...
(LAUGHTER)
MATTHEWS: No, seriously. As a public policy, would you bring industrial policy to bear and break up these conglomerations of power?
DEAN: I don`t want to answer whether I would break up Fox or not, because, obviously
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: Well, how about large media enterprises?
DEAN: Let me -- yes, let me get...
(LAUGHTER)
DEAN: The answer to that is yes.
I would say that there is too much penetration by single corporations in media markets all over this country. We need locally-owned radio stations. There are only two or three radio stations left in the state of Vermont where you can get local news anymore. The rest of it is read and ripped from the AP.
MATTHEWS: So what are you going to do about it? You`re going to be president of the United States, what are you going to do?
DEAN: What I`m going to do is appoint people to the FCC that believe democracy depends on getting information from all portions of the political spectrum, not just one.
"The Democrats Have Made Lying Their Norm"
Posted by Gordon Bloyer
A Democrat claims that the economy is the worst since Herbert Hoover. No reporter says to that Democrat, ''That's not true.'' Why?
Reporters today have no background in history and they do no research. They seem to think when a Democrat says something it is an opinion, or just a point of view. It never crosses their mind that the Democrat is lying.
The Democrats running for president get away with saying that the president lied about the war, that we are in a recession, that unemployment is out of control, that we have the largest budget deficit in history, that budgets for safety-net programs have been cut, and that the election in 2000 was stolen. None of these statements are true--not even close--but reporters just let them slide.
Senator Joe Biden (D), Senator Joe Lieberman (D) and Senator Evan Bayh (D) have all said on national television that the president did NOT lie about the war. Why don’t reporters confront the other Democrats with their statements?
The fact is that the economy has been growing for months. A recession is when the economy is negative for three months in a row.
Bill Clinton was president from 1993 thru 2000. Unemployment was higher than the current rate in five out of the eight Clinton years. It was over 6% in three of those years. If the Democrats told the truth, they would say that we have the worst economy since Clinton. The fact is in the last six months of the Clinton years, the economy was headed down and continued that way for several months into the Bush Administration.
The deficit in dollars is the largest in history. That is meaningless. My debt is higher than ever, but it is smaller in relation to my income. It is the same for the deficit. The deficit in relation to the budget is not close to being the largest in history.
No programs have been cut. All programs have increases in their budget, just not as big as the Democrats want or dream about. Life is hard.
All recounts in Florida, including the newspaper statewide recounts, had Bush winning the election. In the Al Gore lawsuit, he never asked for a statewide recount. In the places where Gore asked for a recount the newspaper recount proved that Bush won. How did Bush steal the election?
Let me add these facts for the reporters. In 1980, the last year of Jimmy Carter, inflation was 13.5%, interest rates were over 18%, and unemployment was 5.8% and headed up. How is that for the worst economy since Herbert Hoover? The unemployment rate under Franklin Roosevelt was 24.9% in 1933, 21.7% in 1934, 20.1% in 1935, 16.9% in 1936, 14.3% in 1937, 19% in 1938 and 17.2% in 1939. All of these rates were higher than three out of four of the Hoover years. World War II came along and everyone went to work.
One more thing: President Bush was NEVER AWOL. Get over it.
The truth about all of the above is available by doing research. Why don’t reporters do it? They have allowed the Democratic lies to become the norm.
Gordon Bloyer