No More “Fake News” – Repeal ObamaCare Now!

Posted on January 2, 2017 by Tom Balek Standard 3

coverbatboy This just in: the mainstream news industry has confirmed the existence of “fake news”.

It’s not yet clear exactly what qualifies as “fake news”. Some online political trouble-makers have learned that there is nothing to prevent them from writing stories that are flat-out untrue. Worse, they have learned that lazy mainstream journalists and pundits will often repeat their fabrications without an ounce of verification.

The label “fake news” can apparently be used by a reporter to discount any news that doesn’t support his ideology. It is also acceptable for one to use fake news to plant his own ideology in the minds of the low-information masses.

And there has been, especially in the recent election silly season, a serious epidemic of Facebook and Twitter users (of all political persuasions) sharing and re-posting titillating but bogus information without testing its veracity – or even reading anything more than the title.

Now, I can cut Average Joe and Jane some slack for not knowing journalistic “best practices”. But it’s pretty hard to excuse paid media professionals who engage in fake news. Facebook and Google claim they are going to crack down on fake news. Who can take them seriously after they were caught manipulating search results and “trending” lists to drive viewers toward their left-wing point-of-view?

After all the hand-wringing and accusations about fake news, it is astonishing how left-wing media pundits still have no shame about making their own false or misleading public statements. On last weekend’s Sunday news shows, the “media professionals” strapped on their Pinocchio noses and went to work.

Karine Jean-Pierre dropped this little stool on ABC’s This Week : “Donald Trump does have a vote in Congress to repeal, to take away, health care from many Americans.”

There was no mention of how many people lost their private coverage due to the ACA. In fact, she didn’t mention ObamaCare at all. No elaboration on how Congress’ proposed replacement plans are designed to cover more people rather than fewer. Certainly no reporting on the need to beat back the crushing cost increases taxpayers currently bear (my forced ObamaCare premium is 400% higher than my private insurance was, and is now mostly subsidized by the taxpayers.)

Jean-Pierre just laid out her fake news “fact” that President Trump wants to take your health insurance away. Job done, let’s go get a Starbucks.

During that same show, there was an advertisement paid for by the taxpayers, encouraging viewers to sign up for ObamaCare. The ad’s appeal is that “most people who are enrolled receive ‘financial help’ with their premiums” – specifically, your individual premium might be as high as $650 per month, but you might only pay $50 per month. Fake advertising news alert: it’s not “financial help,”, it’s a taxpayer-funded subsidy.

If ObamaCare is such a good deal for everyone, why do we have to pay for TV advertisements to drum up business?

The left-wing media has become so adept at “fake news” that half of the Democrat party’s sobbing supporters believe Vladimir Putin actually hacked into the voting machines and threw the election for his buddy Donald Trump.

Here’s hoping the incoming administration will discard the corrupt mainstream media like a Hillary Clinton disk drive and take its messages straight to the people by whatever alternative means are available. Because chances are, if it came from the mainstream media, it’s fake!

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

You’re a fake, baby
You can’t conceal it
Know how I know?
‘Cause I can feel it!
You’re a fake, baby
No rhyme or reason
‘Cause in your mind it’s lyin’ season.

FAKE – Alexander O’Neal

Now here’s a funky one! O’Neal on Soul Train, mid 80s.

Denver Post Freezes Out African-American Candidates. Raaaaacists!

Posted on August 29, 2016 by Tom Balek Standard 1

Racist! Raaaaaacist!

It’s the oldest play in the Democrat handbook. Any time they feel threatened by an opponent, they fall back on the old reliable “you are a racist” routine. They never have evidence; every time they level the charge it is a flat-out lie. They can’t prove racism, but they know they don’t even have to try. Just the accusation is enough to turn low-information dumb-bots against their Republican opponents.

Isn’t it odd, then, that one of the left’s very own “totally-in-the-tank” newspapers, the Denver Post, has no shame for their public naked discrimination against African-American candidates for office in Colorado?

Derrick Wilburn is vice chair of the Colorado Republican Party, and an African-American. He won his post in March of 2015, and after a year and a half of being “the invisible man” to the Denver Post, he finally popped a vessel.

In an op-ed in the Colorado Springs Gazette, Wilburn wrote:

The Denver Post is the largest newspaper in our state. I was elected to my current position as state GOP vice chairman in March 2015. A black American elected in a landslide by a 98 percent white constituency. Not once in the year and a half I’ve held this office has the Post contacted me for a story, sought me for a quote, placed my picture in their pages or so much as bothered to ask a question. I’m the sitting party vice chair, and as far as the Post is concerned, I don’t exist.

And Wilburn is not the only freeze-out victim.

Darryl Glenn is as solid a candidate for US Senate as you will find anywhere. 21 years of military service. Budget and management guru. Attorney. PTA president. Church leader. Champion weight-lifter. Proud parent. African-American. So how is it the Denver Post completely ignores his stellar candidacy, save for occasionally trashing his integrity because he doesn’t believe in murdering babies?

Colorado should also be extremely proud of Casper Stockham, candidate for US House District 1. 14 years of military service. Business management expert. Author, speaker and radio host. Devout Christian. Common sensible and down-to-earth. African American. Nothing from the Denver Post about Stockham except crickets chirping.

Whenever somebody on the right side of the political fence criticizes Barack Obama’s abject policy failures, they are vilified as racists. Obama’s followers believe their man is so perfect that only a racist could utter a discouraging word. But the same standard doesn’t apply to Colorado’s own Wilburn, Glenn, or Stockham. Because they are conservatives, and the left has no tolerance for African-Americans who stray off the Democrat plantation.

And the Post apparently has no tolerance for readers who object to their duplicity, either. When blogger Pete Boddie from Littleton questioned Denver Post lead writer Joey Bunch about his paper’s treatment of African-American candidates, he got this terse reply: “drop dead”. Doesn’t look like you are ready for that Pulitzer this year, Joey.

Meanwhile the Post’s circulation tumbles like an April avalanche in Aspen, and all the hard-left editors at the few papers still clinging to life around our once-great nation slap each other on the back, never wondering why the public doesn’t trust them any more.

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

When the change was made uptown and the Big Man joined the band
From the coastline to the city, all the little pretties raise their hands
I’m gonna sit back right easy and laugh
When Scooter and the Big Man bust this city in half
With the Tenth Avenue freeze-out
Tenth Avenue freeze-out

Tenth Avenue Freeze Out – Bruce Springsteen

Hilarious! Stephanopolous Lets Ellison Claim George Wallace Ran As Republican!

Posted on July 24, 2016 by Tom Balek Standard 3

Congressman Keith Ellison (D-MN)

You can’t write better comedy than this. George Stephanopolous and ABC News may have just put the Comedy Channel out of business.

On ABC Sunday Morning This Week, anchor George Stephanopolous – former Clinton employee, big contributor to the Clinton Foundation, and chief Clinton apologist – sat by and did not even blink when his panelist, Democrat Congressman Keith Ellison, laid this giant, stinking egg:

“Donald Trump is the worst Republican candidate since George Wallace.”

Congressman Tom Cole (R-OK), sitting next to Ellison on the panel, could barely keep from laughing out loud.

“I have to correct my friend, Congressman Ellison,” Cole told Stephanopolous. “George Wallace was a lifelong DEMOCRAT. He ran on the Democrat ticket, and we can’t let history be rewritten.”

The embarrassment on Ellison’s face was absolutely priceless. As a Democrat, and an African-American, Ellison has been brainwashed to believe that all Republicans are racists, and all racists are Republicans. He has bought into the Democrat re-write of history, which hides the fact that the KKK was a Democrat organization, and the Democrats fought integration tooth and nail. Learning that the bogey-man under his bed was actually a Democrat was a total shock. He literally saw his television career pass before his eyes.

But the really funny part was watching Stephanopolous throughout this Sunday morning news misadventure. Stephanopolous knew that Wallace was a Democrat and never batted an eye, hoping that nobody else would pick up on Ellison’s devastating gaffe. Even better, Ellison had just finished excoriating Donald Trump for being mean and unfair to the press.

At the other end of the panel, Donna Brazile, another lifetime Clinton lackey and DNC vice-chair, was nearly in tears as she apologized profusely for her Democrat National Committee’s abuse of Bernie Sanders, revealed by WikiLeaks after it was learned that Russians hacked the DNC email accounts and had the goods on chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

Ever the good little Clinton puppy, Stephanopolous gamely tried to accuse Donald Trump of conspiring with Russian president Vladimir Putin to cause trouble for the poor Democrats.

Cole, having the time of his life, got in one more little shot. “The Clinton campaign might be worried that the Russians will report what they found on an email server in somebody’s basement,” he giggled.

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

Don’t think I’m bein’ funny when I say
you got just what you deserve
I can’t help feeling you found out today
You thought you were too good you had a lot of nerve
Laugh, laugh – I thought I’d die!
It seemed so funny to me
Laugh, laugh, you met a guy
Who taught you how it feels to be – lonely

Laugh, Laugh – the Beau Brummels

Here’s Today’s News You Didn’t Get

Posted on July 28, 2015 by Tom Balek Standard Reply

Republican Fears in 1936 Same As Today

Posted on July 20, 2015 by Tom Balek Standard 3

image by rarenewspapers.com

My wife bought me a book of selected front pages from the New York Times, from 1920 to 1976, at a garage sale and it is a treasure. It imparts some amazing insights into the news and the history of our nation. I was astonished as I read this article from 1936.

THE TEXT OF THE PLATFORM – Cleveland, June 11

Following is the text of the party platform as adopted by the
Republican National Convention tonight:

America is in peril. The welfare of American men and women and the future of our youth are at stake. We dedicate ourselves to the preservation of their political liberty, their individual opportunity and their character as free citizens, which today for the first time are threatened by government itself.

For three long years the administration has dishonored American traditions and flagrantly betrayed the pledge upon which the Democratic party sought and received public support.

The powers of Congress have been usurped by the President.

The integrity and authority of the Supreme Court have been flaunted.

The rights and liberties of American citizens have been violated.

Regulated monopoly has displaced free enterprise.

The administration constantly seeks to usurp the rights reserved to the States and to the people.

It has insisted on passage of laws contrary to the Constitution.

It has intimidated witnesses and interfered with the right of petition.

It has dishonored our country by repudiating its most sacred obligations.

It has been guilty of frightful waste and extravagance, using public funds for partisan political purposes.

It has promoted investigations to harass and intimidate American citizens, at the same time denying investigations into its own improper expenditures.

It has created a vast multitude of new offices, filled them with its favorites, set up a centralized bureaucracy and sent out swarms of inspectors to harass our people.

It has bred fear and hesitation in commerce and industry, thus discouraging new enterprises, preventing employment, and prolonging the depression.

It secretly has made tariff agreements with outr foreign competitors, flooding our markets with foreign commodities.

It has coerced and intimidated voters by withholding relief to those opposing its tyrannical policies.

It has destroyed the morale of many of our people and made them dependent upon government.

Appeals to passion and class prejudice have replaced reason and tolerance.

To a free people, these actions are insufferable. This campaign cannot be waged on the traditional differences between the Republican and Democratic parties.

The responsibility of this election transcends all previous political divisions. We invite all Americans, irrespective of party, to join us in defense of American Institutions.

Alf Landon was unanimously accepted by the GOP as its candidate for president. He asked that two more planks be added to the platform before his nomination was final: first, that sweatshops and unrestricted child labor be abolished and that laws be passed to regulate maximum hours, minimum wages, and working conditions for women and children; and second, that the US currency should be backed by a gold standard.

I find these old newspapers fascinating in so many ways. The articles are written in clear but advanced language and style on the assumption that its readers were intelligent, informed, and educated – unlike today’s news which is written to a fifth-grade reading and comprehension level.

It’s very hard, if not impossible, to find a bias in these pages. Even during the war years, events were described impartially. The standard for journalists was: facts only, double- and triple-verified. Political coverage was painstakingly even-handed and dispassionate.

All of the news on the Times front pages was real news – coverage of real events, with no fluff or pop culture. A box in the top left corner promises “All the News That’s Fit to Print”.

In the 79 years since this front page of the Times was published, much has changed in the relationship between the media and the public. Is news reporting dumbed-down because of us, or we because of it? Do we tolerate biased reporting because we have no choice, or because we are able to choose news that fits our personal bias? Either way, the loss of accurate, salient, unbiased news harms Americans and our progress as a nation.

The stories themselves remind me that ours is not the only time in history with grave challenges, conflict and tragedy. Our parents and grandparents lived through a period of historic human suffering and heroism. What must they think of our squabbles today over gender identity and political correctness?

And the story above, contrasting Republicans and Democrats, reminds me that some things haven’t changed much.

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

And you may ask yourself
Am I right? Am I wrong?
And you may say to yourself
My God, what have I done?
Same as it ever was . . . same as it ever was . . .
Same as it ever was . . . same as it ever was . . .

Once In A Lifetime – Talking Heads

Gay Wedding Cakes – What Difference Does It Make?

Posted on April 2, 2015 by Tom Balek Standard 1

photo courtesy of The Blaze

I hate to admit it, but just this once I agree with Hillary Clinton when she says, “What difference does it make?”

I’m not talking about Benghazi, I hope she goes to jail for that one. But most of the hoo-hah in the press is about stuff that is totally inconsequential. What difference does it make?

Once again, the news media has sacrificed a week of our waking, thinking lives on stuff that has absolutely no significance to the vast majority of Americans. The big item this week: Indiana’s “religious freedom law”. What a nothing-burger.

Indiana’s law just says if you own a business, and you are sued for discrimination by a customer for refusing to participate in what you consider to be a sacreligious act, you may use your religious commitment and beliefs as a defense. Doesn’t mean you will win.

Ann Coulter said in her brilliantly sarcastic column, “Evidently, the sole function of the media these days is to subject the public to a steady stream of manufactured events . . . [such as claiming] a law protecting religious freedom will lead to separate water fountains for gays in Indiana.”

Manufactured is right, and anyone with a modest sense of proportion can see that the stuff they are manufacturing doesn’t amount to a rat’s derriere. Do the math. How many people are gay? Maybe 3%? How many of them get married? Maybe 5%? How many of them are likely to run into a bakery that will turn down a $200 profit by refusing to bake their wedding cake? Maybe 1%? I’m not a statistician, but according to my non-Common-Core math I think we are talking about .0015% of the adult American population. All this fuss over maybe a hundred people? And that’s a stretch.

With all the publicity you would think there is NOTHING IN THE WORLD more important than wedding cakes for a couple of cranky gay couples. Starving kids in Guatemala? Doesn’t matter. Radiation in Japan? Yesterday’s news. Violent civil unrest in Myanmar? Forget it, Rachel Maddow doesn’t know Myanmar from a Mars Bar.

We are being played for idiots. You and me. The media / liberal Democrats (same thing) are so condescending to us, the American people, that they think they can convince the masses that we all are losing sleep over the ten or twenty gay people who go out of their way to cause problems for a few families trying to earn a living and live by their religious principles. And they think this chicanery can swing elections. God help us if they are right.

I’m not worried about the working families. They will be fine if we all just let them do their thing. The couple of gay activists making trouble? Not even a mosquito on an elephant’s ass.

Can we talk about something important now?

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

Doesn’t matter what the pain we go through
Doesn’t matter if the money’s gone too
Just as long as I’m with you
Nobody but you, baby, baby

Doesn’t Matter – Janet Jackson

It’s the OTHER Jackson, and she’s hot. Check it out.

The Newseum Tilts to the Left

Posted on March 19, 2015 by Tom Balek Standard 2

newseum I was in Washington, DC yesterday and after I finished my business there I had a few hours of free time before my flight home. I had been wanting to visit the Newseum, and here was my chance.

At this point I should come clean. I must admit that I have an addiction. My name is Tom Balek, and I am a newsaholic.

There, I said it. Ever since high school journalism class I have had a fascination with news – the process of investigation and reporting, the incredible importance and power of freedom of the press, the technology, the ethics, the relentless pace, the pathos of a great story well written. I spent many hours working on my high school paper, and after college I taught journalism for a couple of years in small-town Montana.

Back then journalism students learned that impartial honesty and accuracy were sacrosanct to a reporter or editor. A journalist was duty-bound to report the facts and nothing else. Facts must be verified and double-verified. Opinion was not allowed outside the confines of the editorial section. That was that.

It was the “Edward R. Murrow” school of journalism. Murrow has been credited with creating radio and television news as we know it. Or, I should say, knew it. Modern news reporting came of age during World War II, and pioneers like Murrow set the bar high.

Then, as we all know, journalism changed. Some years ago I had an animated discussion with a top news producer for ABC about what I felt was a growing liberal bias in news reporting. He very candidly told me that as far as he knew, at least in his own news division, there was (at that time) no left vs. right bias. The mission of his department was to produce news stories that would increase ratings and thereby maximize ad revenue. Period.

That caused me to ponder whether the news is a reflection of real life, or real life is a product of the news. I concluded that the question is really not that deep: the news media merely pander to the latest whims of pop culture in search of ratings.

This was just before the first Obama election, and we all know what happened to the news media since then. Chris Mathews’ “thrill up my leg.” The defense of blatant lies by the State Department about the Benghazi embassy attack. The blind eye to the attorney general’s Fast and Furious scandal. The refusal to report the IRS targeting of opponents of the administration. While talk radio and Fox News built a thriving industry on the popularity of conservative opinion and news analysis, the liberal media bias in hard news reporting became almost universal. Ratings were no longer the primary objective. Networks like MSNBC and CNN persisted in their liberal propaganda campaigns despite plummeting viewership.

Nowhere is this liberal bias more evident than at the shrine of the news industry, the Newseum. It would be naive to expect anything else. Study after study has determined that modern journalists are predominantly liberals and any pretense of adherence to the Edward R. Murrow rules of journalistic propriety is routinely sacrificed to the mission, as defined by Peter Jennings: “Those of us who went into journalism in the ’50s or ’60s, it was sort of a liberal thing to do: Save the world.”

While the Newseum does point out some ‘errors in fact’ produced by the news media over the years (Dewey Defeats Truman), it has no criticism of MSNBC’s Al Sharpton, who remains immune from a history of outrageous lies, including his totally fabricated story of the rape of Tawana Brawley by a group of Boston police officers and an attorney. Only fleeting mention is made of the pioneers of conservative media, such as Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and Andrew Breitbart, who had a profound effect on national politics and culture. And that fleeting mention is pointedly disparaging.

At least half the displays in the Newseum were dedicated to the civil rights movement, featuring compelling stories, photos, and video of Ku Klux Klan rallies and violent abuse of southern blacks. But there was not a single mention of the ties between the Democrat party and the Klan, or the Republican leadership against segregation.

Thomas Jefferson said, “Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them.” Unfortunately, the average citizen today is not very discerning – only 36% of adults know the three branches of government – and the news industry does not hesitate to take advantage of our ignorance.

The Newseum aspires to be a “champion of the first amendment” and promotes the value of freedom of the press. It admits, in one display, that bias can exist in news reporting, and then points to Fox News as an example. If only it could see this failing within its own left-tilting walls.

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

I make my living off the Evening News
Just give me somethin’, somethin’ I can use
People love it when you lose, they love dirty laundry

Dirty Laundry – the Eagles

Even idiot rock stars can’t resist taking a shot at Fox News:

Big-Government Fails – What Did You Expect?

Posted on November 21, 2013 by Tom Balek Standard 3

Duh Is anybody surprised?

We now know, irrefutably, that ObamaCare really IS a train wreck. The Affordable Care Act has instantly made health care unaffordable for millions of previously happily-insured Americans. Many have lost coverage altogether – experts now predict that another 50 to 100 million cancellations are on the way. It has ballooned the Medicaid rolls to the point where states don’t know how they will be able to manage the cost. Using CBO data, the total cost of ObamaCare has been calculated at up to $3 Trillion over ten years. And after three and a half years and $1 billion of IT work, the still-dysfunctional ObamaCare website is 40% short of completion (including the part which is supposed to deliver our subsidy payments to the insurance companies) and the personal data collected by it is not secure.

Well, what did you expect? You glassy-eyed Obama zombies, you liberal/progressive elitists, you arrogant academics, you shameless, thrill-up-the-leg media hucksters, you blind-ambition Democrat politicians, you weak-kneed RINOs who value re-election over the will and well-being of your constituents, you crocodile-tear bleeding hearts who never contribute your own money to anything – what do you say now? Did you really believe the bungling bloated bureaucracy you created and enabled, and Obama’s corrupt campaign-contributing cronies could actually pull off an undertaking of this scope?

Really? The same big-government people who gave away $4 billion dollars in tax refunds to identity thieves, including 655 refunds to one address in Lithuania? The same big-government people who left an ambassador and three brave defenders to die at the hands of radical Muslim thugs and then blamed it on a Hollywood video? The same big-government people who waste billions of dollars humiliating grandmothers in airports, but fail to follow up on Russian warnings about known terrorists?

There was a time when the U.S. government could get things done. World War II comes to mind. The Hoover Dam. The Interstate Highway System. Astronauts on the moon. Those days are gone. We have allowed our government to become corrupt, fat, lazy, and mired in irrelevant politically correct nonsense. Rudderless. Incompetent. Pathetic.

While they did little to address the impending health care problem for decades, I give credit to the 100% of DC Republicans (and a smattering of responsible Democrats) who at least voted against ObamaCare. Ted Cruz and a few brave conservatives went to the wall to try to stop it. The Tea Party took the point on patrol, battling every assault on personal freedoms, free-market capitalism, and the values that built our nation’s success. But they couldn’t stop this latest, potentially fatal attack on Lady Liberty.

If the liberal progressives do not finally admit and capitulate to the total failure of big-government socialism now, in the face of irrefutable evidence, their motives are clear.

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

You’ve been talking in circles
Since I’ve been able to cry
There’s never been any reason
for ever telling me why
Save my life, I’m going down for the last time!

Never Been Any Reason – Head East

One Step Forward, Two Steps Back – the Obama Tango

Posted on June 8, 2013 by Tom Balek Standard 1

DC Celebrates Inauguration With Gala Balls The relationship between government and citizens is a delicate dance. In recent years, our federal government has insisted on taking the lead role, forcing citizens to step consistently backward, giving up their personal freedoms and national dignity. But recently the music has changed, and our president takes us by the hand to do the “Obama Tango” – an intricate, passionate dance with steps forward and backward and all over the place.

The Obama Tango:

One step back: Congressional hearings reveal the utter and apparently willful failure of the administration to defend the Libya embassy compound and personnel, and attempt a disgraceful coverup by sending U.N. ambassador Susan Rice to lie about it on all the major TV networks.

One step forward: Benghazi-gate finally gets some mainstream media coverage as a result of the hearings.

One step back and a slap in the face: President Obama selects Rice as his next National Security Advisor. What a slap in the face to the families of those who died representing the USA and defending our embassy and personnel, and to the American people who have always believed the word security implies honesty.

Another step back: The federal government is caught abusing the privacy of reporters and news agencies including the Associated Press.

One step forward and a turn: The mainstream media, whose fawning and “thrill-up-the-leg -ing” over the “Unvetted One” was the single biggest factor in Obama’s election and re-election, turn against their former lover. While defense of the Constitution has not been a priority with the fourth estate for a long time, they are reminded that “freedom of the press” is in there somewhere. Mainstream America has a good laugh at Mainstream Media’s expense – serves them right.

One step back and a pelvic thrust: The IRS systematically targets conservative groups and contributors for harsh treatment over the last several years, while throwing lavish parties on the taxpayer’s dime. The administration pretends it knew nothing about their political adversaries getting screwed.

One step forward, then grab and double-slap: The media, already upset at Obama and his crew (see above), grabs the momentum and gives him a slap, followed by a back-slap when they learn that the EPA has been setting up hidden “man rooms” in warehouses where its employees relax with couches, TVs, microwaves, etc. instead of laboring at their desks.

Stand still: It turns out the NSA has been gathering phone, e-mail, credit, web traffic and other information about every US citizen without our knowledge or consent. Citizens ask why data is collected from everyone instead of just the bad guys. Obama says, “I believe in the right to privacy, but there are some tradeoffs involved in our need for security.”

One step forward, deep dip, and kiss: The Obama administration, in a surprising concession to hunters and stockmen, announces that the feds will lift the ridiculous protections for the gray wolf that was “reintroduced” to the lower 48 states, resulting in untold damage to livestock and the decimation of elk herds and moose in Montana and other western states.

After all these years of only stepping back, it’s refreshing to get in a few forward steps.

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

I take 2 steps forward, 2 steps back
We come together cuz opposites attract
It ain’t fiction, just a natural fact
We come together cuz opposites attract

Paula Abdul – Opposites Attract

Paula Abdul live in Japan, 1991 – kinda cheesey stage show, but the music is solid with a smokin’ band and backup vocalists.

Yesterday’s News

Posted on March 24, 2013 by Tom Balek Standard 2

news One year ago the news media fixated on a single story for several weeks. It was so terribly important that it superceded everything else that was going on in the world. It was as if nothing else mattered – this story was so critical to the life and welfare of every American that there was no room for any other news. Even President Obama had to take time from his schedule to express his concern and thoughts about the topic.

Don’t remember? Does the name Trayvon Martin ring a bell?

What have you heard about him lately? Do you know how the case turned out? Has anything changed in our lives because of the Florida incident in which Martin, a neighborhood watch volunteer, followed a young man he thought was suspicious, and ended up shooting him in a scuffle?

My point is this: our news industry has devolved to the point where they now pick a salacious and often irrelevant or marginal news story and elevate it to crisis pitch, while ignoring everything else that happens worldwide. If the Trayvon Martin case was so earth-shakingly important, why have you not heard anything about it for a year?

Whatever happened to the Occupy Wall Street crowd? Our media elites climbed all over each other to recount every syllable uttered by a tiny group of incoherent losers, affording them status on par with world leaders and history-makers. Where are they now? What happened? Is it possible that MAYBE THEY WEREN’T NEWSWORTHY IN THE FIRST PLACE?

The media was quick to report that the Tea Party is dead. It isn’t. But the Occupy Movement sure as hell is. Who is reporting on that?

Remember all the hoo-hah about ObamaCare? We would all die if it was implemented. Or we would all die if it was NOT implemented. Either way, we were all going to die. Three years later, not much has happened.

Michael Jackson. Lady Diana. Stories about pop culture icons deserve a headline, not an entire page of the calendar.

It’s a sad fact that the news business has become so much more business than news. Rather than reporting actual news and letting the informed public determine what is important to them, the media now chooses the story it feels has the most commercial potential and milks it to the bloody end.

So when you see today’s front-page bold-type stop-the-presses big story, don’t get your underwear in a knot. There’s a good chance it will be completely forgotten a year from now.

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

Who wants yesterday’s papers?
Who wants yesterday’s girl?
Who wants yesterday’s papers?
Nobody in the world!

Yesterday’s Papers – the Rolling Stones

Rockin' On The Right Side

Conservative common sense with the volume set at 9!

Tag Archives: media bias

No More “Fake News” – Repeal ObamaCare Now!

Denver Post Freezes Out African-American Candidates. Raaaaacists!

Hilarious! Stephanopolous Lets Ellison Claim George Wallace Ran As Republican!

Here’s Today’s News You Didn’t Get

Republican Fears in 1936 Same As Today

Following is the text of the party platform as adopted by the
Republican National Convention tonight:

Gay Wedding Cakes – What Difference Does It Make?

The Newseum Tilts to the Left

Big-Government Fails – What Did You Expect?

One Step Forward, Two Steps Back – the Obama Tango

Yesterday’s News

Following is the text of the party platform as adopted by the Republican National Convention tonight:

Following is the text of the party platform as adopted by the
Republican National Convention tonight: