I guess I should start telling people about this now. I’ve been invited to be on a discussion panel with Star Parker (!) next month. Accuracy in Academia (AIA) is hosting a conference, Conservative University 2004, and the director asked if I’d join Star and others on Saturday, July 17. Although my name isn’t listed in the announcement on AIA’s site, it’s listed on Accuracy in Media’s site.
The director read some of my columns and asked me to speak to students about my experiences. He especially liked this one. It’s quite an honor for a small-time Internet columnist and blogger to be invited to speak at such an event. I don’t know where my writing “career” is going, but I’m sure enjoying the ride.
You want to know the best part about getting exposure? Weaving my relationship with Christ and Christian worldview into a presentation to a large group of people. Sharing the Gospel will always be the most important thing I do.
by La Shawn on June 24, 2004
in Liberals
From the Washington Times:
“He [Clinton] is less forthcoming about, or does not mention, other women who say they were either sexually involved with him, or that they had been sexually harassed or assaulted. These include:
- Dolly Kyle Browning, a real estate lawyer and Clinton high school classmate who said she had an off-and-on-again romance with Mr. Clinton for 30 years.
- Sally Perdue, a former Miss Arkansas who said she had a four-month affair with him in 1983.
- Connie Hamzy, a self-proclaimed rock-and-roll groupie, who said Mr. Clinton propositioned her in 1984 while she was sunbathing by a Little Rock hotel pool.
- Juanita Broaddrick, a gubernatorial campaign volunteer who said Mr. Clinton raped her during a nursing-home-operators convention in Little Rock in April 1978.
- Bobbie Ann Williams, a one-time Little Rock prostitute who said Mr. Clinton fathered a child by her when he was the governor of Arkansas.
- Eileen Wellstone, an English woman who said Mr. Clinton sexually assaulted her after she met him at a pub near Oxford University where Mr. Clinton was a student in 1969.
- Sandra Allen James, a former Washington, D.C., political fund-raiser who said Mr. Clinton invited her to his hotel room during a 1991 campaign trip, pinned her against the wall and put his hand under her dress.
- Christy Zercher, an airline flight attendant on Mr. Clinton’s 1992 campaign plane, who said Mr. Clinton exposed himself and grabbed her breasts.
- Lencola Sullivan, a former Miss Arkansas and fourth runner-up in the Miss America pageant.
- Elizabeth Ward, a former Miss Arkansas and Miss America.
- Susie Whitacre, press aide to Mr. Clinton when he was governor….
Mr. Clinton describes as a ‘liar’ Kathleen Willey…He writes that her ’sad tale’ was part of a conspiracy by conservatives, including Whitewater independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr, to ‘discredit me and impair my ability so serve.’ …Mr. Clinton does not say why he was interviewing an applicant for an assistant’s position in the Office of Social Secretary, a relatively low-level position.”
by La Shawn on June 24, 2004
in Lunacy
Speaking of sexual assault, you may open your front doors to a convicted rapist asking for your telephone number — for a Democratic voter drive.
From the New York Post:
A Democratic group funded by Bush-hating billionaire George Soros is hiring felons — some convicted of sex offenses, assault and burglary — to go door to door registering voters in key states, it was revealed yesterday.
Soros gave $10 million to America Coming Together, which employs convicts to ring doorbells in Missouri, Florida and Ohio and perhaps other states.
They include at least four felons who got sent back to jail, the Associated Press reported.
Are Democrats really this desperate?
I know liberals are so tired of hearing about this subject. They think a liberal media bias is non-existent. For example, check out the way the Washington Post covers it in Bull Market for Media Bias:
We in the news business think we’re impartial seekers of truth, but most Americans think otherwise. They view us as sloppy, biased and self-serving….the latest Pew survey confirms — with lots of numbers — an especially disturbing trend that we’ve all sensed: People are increasingly picking their media on the basis of partisanship. If you’re Republican and conservative, you listen to talk radio and watch the Fox News Channel. If you’re liberal and Democratic, you listen to National Public Radio and watch “The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer.” It’s like picking restaurants: Chinese for some, Italian for others. And everyone can punch up partisan blogs — the fast food of the news business. What’s disturbing is that, like restaurants, the news media may increasingly cater to their customers’ (partisan) tastes. News slowly becomes more selective and slanted.
Can you believe this? Samuelson just doesn’t get it. In his assessment, the media aren’t biased; it is us who are biased toward news sources based on our “partisanship.” At the same time, it’s almost a confession, of sorts, that mainstream media is biased, which is why he believes we seek out partisan sources in the first place.
What Samuelson misses is that mainstream media journalists cater to each other. While they may believe they’re fair and objective, “ordinary” people living outside left-leaning enclaves of large cities on the east coast don’t enter into their thoughts until it’s time to consort with the masses the way Peter Jennings did last month.
I give the liberal Samuelson points for trying to understand why us ordinary folks keep harping on and on about bias, but his column reeks of elitism, just like a John Kerry campaign speech (where is he, anyway?). He just can’t seem to take that necessary step: admission. In fact, I find some white liberals to be quite condescending people. I can see right through their phony “compassion” and “I’m very tolerant, aren’t I?” façade. They hide behind a “progressive” ideology, which they seem to think is something noble or superior.
And why people lump Rush Limbaugh in with network and cable news programming, I’ll never understand. Rush is a biased, conservative pundit. That’s OK. Opinion-makers can advocate whatever they want. But if he were a biased conservative reporter, that would be a problem.
Back to Samuelson. He adds:
I’ve worked in the mainstream press for 35 years. Editors and reporters reflexively deny a liberal bias, even though many ordinary people find it and mainstream newsrooms are politically skewed….Most reporters I know believe fiercely in being fair and objective. Still, the debate over “what’s news and significant?” is warped.
I don’t understand why he sees the debate as “warped” or precisely what he means by warped, but what is fair and objective is reasonably easy to determine. The Media Research Center’s Brent Bozell wrote an informative article (and book) about bias and how to spot it.
Samuelson believes that “sorting of audiences by politics” is why conservatives don’t like CNN, and that poses “dangers.” Liberal journalists don’t trust us to pick our own news sources. They see the decrease in newspaper circulation and the success of FOX as dangerous and partisan. He concludes: “The worthy, if unattainable, ideals of fairness and objectivity will silently erode.”
Someone needs to tell Robert those ideals left the building a long time ago.
by La Shawn on June 23, 2004
in Bloggers
We were supposed to have met the day before, but we didn’t connect. She said she’d be in town a few more days, so we rescheduled.
I was standing by our designated meeting spot, a bookstore, about 15 minutes early (I’m notoriously early for everything). I watched people go by — wide-eyed tourists, excited kids, unchaperoned teenagers whispering and giggling, office workers and Hill staffers (they have a certain “look”) trying to grab a quick lunch.
I knew I’d recognize her from the pictures on her blog, but I wondered if she’d recognize me. “I forgot to tell her I’d be wearing glasses,” I thought. Did I think I was Clark Kent, unrecognizable as Superman as soon as I put on a pair of glasses? Good grief.
I was about to meet someone I’d “known” for a few months, someone whose blog I frequented, reading her commentary on life and catching glimpses of her insights. She approached and we greeted. Observing our instant rapport, you’d have thought we were old friends. We walked to the restaurant, me in my dress-down-casual-Friday chic of khakis and sandals, she in a gorgeous summer dress.
It was a pleasure meeting Juliette (aka “Baldilocks”) last Friday. And as she said, we didn’t have enough time to talk about all the things we wanted to talk about. I hope one day I’ll get to meet more members of my blogging community.
According to Reuters:
An Iraqi group has carried out its threat to behead a South Korean hostage, Al Jazeera television said on Tuesday….Militants kidnapped 33-year-old Kim Sun-il on June 17 and had threatened on Monday to kill him within 24 hours.
The U.S.-led occupation authority in Iraq had vowed to do all it could to rescue Kim, an Arabic speaker and evangelical Christian who had worked in Iraq for a year as a translator for a Korean firm supplying goods to the U.S. army.
“I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony for Jesus and because of the word of God. They had not worshiped the beast or his image and had not received his mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years.” (Revelation 20:4)
Update (6/23): See Kris’s post about knowing ourselves. This is an interesting topic to explore.
by La Shawn on June 22, 2004
in General
Jerry Schwartz, Associated Press:
None of them comes alive, not even the main characters of this badly conceived, flatly written, poorly edited book. Not Hillary Rodham Clinton, who comes off as a cardboard saint who is said to be smart and tough and good. Not special prosecutor Kenneth Starr, the book’s villain, who comes off as pure evil — not really a human being at all, more of an incubus….
Part of the problem is that “My Life” is relentlessly chronological, especially the second half of the book, which is devoted to his presidency. Almost every paragraph describes another meeting with a foreign leader or the signing of another bill or delivery of another speech.
The effect is mind-numbing. It’s like being locked in a small room with a very gregarious man who insists on reading his entire appointment book, day by day, beginning in 1946.
Michiko Kakutani,
New York Times:
Unfortunately for the reader, Clinton’s much-awaited autobiography My Life, is long-winded and tedious.
The book, which weighs in at more than 950 pages, is sloppy, self-indulgent and often eye-crossingly dull.
In many ways, the book is a mirror of Clinton’s presidency: lack of discipline leading to squandered opportunities; high expectations, undermined by self-indulgence and scattered concentration.
And last but definitely not least, the Washington Post says: Memoir Contradicts Testimony on Lewinsky:
In his August 1998 grand jury testimony, Clinton said he began an inappropriate sexual relationship with Monica S. Lewinsky in “early 1996.” His testimony, as was widely noted at the time, was in conflict with Lewinsky’s story: She testified the relationship began on Nov. 15, 1995, in the midst of a government shutdown.
Without explanation, in his memoir Clinton departs from his grand jury testimony and corroborates her version: “During the government shutdown in late 1995, when very few people were allowed to come to work in the White House, and those who were there were working late, I’d had an inappropriate encounter with Monica Lewinsky and would do so again on other occasions between November and April, when she left the White House for the Pentagon.”
So there we have it. According to Clinton’s own words, he lied to a federal grand jury. Random House might want to hire some new fact-checkers.
About the liberal media’s “Bush lied!” chants after the release of the 9-11 Commission’s interim report, he writes:
One of the most reprehensible things about the past year’s campaign against President Bush is that his accusers have repeatedly lied in calling him a liar — and they’ve marshaled nonexistent evidence to support their fraudulent claims.
One of the principal complaints against President Bush’s prosecution of the War on Terror is that he distorted the facts to tie Saddam Hussein to Al Qaeda’s 9/11 attacks against the United States in order to strengthen his case for attacking Iraq….
They, including the New York Times, accused the administration of misrepresenting something it never said. You’ve got to have a representation before you can have a misrepresentation.
But now the Times has belatedly admitted that the Bush administration never claimed there was a specific connection between Saddam and 9/11 attacks, “only that there were ties, however murky, between Iraq and Al Qaeda.”
Don’t just brush over this as if it’s a minor detail. The Times just confessed that neither Bush nor his team ever said Saddam was tied to 9/11. The Times even provided statements from various administration officials claiming there were connections between Saddam and Al Qaeda, but never positing a 9/11 conspiracy. This is a major, painful admission by the Times.
Hatred has a way of blinding people to the truth, resulting in unsubstantiated claims and a rush to judgment. George Bush is detested by liberal journalists so much that they lay in wait like tigers watching prey, ready to pounce. The leader of the free world can’t catch a break.
When the 9-11 Commission issued its interim report, I chose not to blog about the liberal media’s distortion of it because I wanted to wait for the truth to come out. Indeed it has. Now the Old Gray Lady herself has had to admit, in a roundabout way, to adding a little fiction to the facts.
For the five people in America still not convinced that the media is biased toward the left, Bruce Bartlett has written a good column about it, citing several studies that confirm a liberal media bias:
A new poll from the Pew Research Center has raised again the issue of liberal bias in the media. A growing body of academic research at top universities supports it. Unfortunately, those in the major media still don’t get it and are unlikely to change their behavior, resulting in further declines in ratings and circulation….
This is the point of the Pew study. Whatever the media think about themselves, there is simply no denying that a high percentage of Americans perceive a liberal bias. The credibility of every single major media outlet has fallen sharply among conservatives and Republicans, while falling much less among liberals and Democrats….
One consequence is that conservatives are gravitating toward those outlets that are perceived as being less biased toward them. These include Fox News, talk radio and the Internet. Ironically, academic studies view these not as conservative, but as objective. Apparently, the effect of having a rightward tilt only has the effect of moving “conservative” outlets to the middle, owing to the extreme left-wing bias of the dominant media.
It’s unclear which Pew study Bartlett’s referring to, but it’s probably this one. He also cites a study done by Tim Grosedose of UCLA and Jeff Milyo of the University of Chicago (PDF version). Follow this link to an article about it. The Grosedose-Milyo study concludes there is a significant liberal media bias, and that the Drudge Report and “Special Report” on Fox News are “closest to the true center of the political spectrum, despite being widely viewed as conservative.”
Interesting. You don’t need studies; all you need is a pair of eyes to see the bias, but it’s good to have actual research to cite when you’re trying to convince seemingly blind liberal friends of the media’s leftward tilt.
That leads us to this question: Why do liberals flock to the journalism profession in the first place? Bartlett cites yet another study, this one done by Professor David Baron, an economics professor at Stanford University. Bartlett doesn’t name this study, either, but my guess is “Persistent Media Bias” (PDF version). Professor Baron surmises that liberals are willing to accept less pay to exercise their bias.
With all of these studies being paid for by liberal universities, one thing liberals can’t do is claim “conservative bias” in the research methods. But they probably do anyway.
by La Shawn on June 21, 2004
in Lunacy
This is so stupid. And I don’t use the word lightly and try to avoid it, but this is really stupid. The Lesbian Health Research Center claims:
The health care status and needs of lesbians, bisexual women, and transgendered individuals remain largely unstudied by researchers of women’s health and aging.
What — please enlighten me — is unique about the female homosexual’s anatomy? Maybe I’m missing something. The only clue I get from the web site is the inclusion of “transgendered individuals.” That, I understand.
The “transgendered” person is either a man who’s had surgery to remove his genitalia and is now calling himself “she” or a woman who’s had…who’s added…removed…whatever.
I found the site through this article. Check this out:
When a lesbian does make an initial visit to a gynecologist, the doctor often assumes the patient is heterosexual and asks what birth control method she uses.
“That puts you off right to begin with,” said Dr. Marion Kavanaugh-Lynch, vice president of the Lesbian Health Fund. “It shouldn’t be up to a patient to correct an assumption – the assumption shouldn’t be made in the first place.”
Such encounters compel lesbians to decide on the spot whether to disclose their sexual orientation. “Every time you face that situation, you ask yourself, ‘How will this person react?’” Kavanaugh-Lynch said.
This is so stupid. First of all, a gynecologist (excuse me, guys) will not ask what type of birth control you use until it’s determined whether you use birth control.
Attention homosexual women: If your doctor asks if you use birth control, tell him the same thing I tell a new doctor who asks the question: “No. I’m not married.” That’ll blow his mind!
What a retro attitude! Yeah, living this Christian life is really retro, isn’t it?
What is it with America? This pampered country has so much material wealth that we have an overabundance of leisure. Instead of struggling to survive day to day or experiencing any real sense of danger in the world, we have people cashing in on the age-old poor-oppressed-me-look-at-me-give-me-stuff con game, ranging from an outfit like BAMN, who considers America a “sham” because there are poor people (who have cable TV and air conditioners) to a “lesbian health center” catering to men who cut off their private parts. Great Caesar’s ghost!
Wake me up when it’s over.
by La Shawn on June 21, 2004
in Bloggers
The next Christian Carnival will be held at Dawn’s. Email Dawn at dawn@dawnxianamoon.com
Provide the following:
Title of your Blog
URL of your Blog
Title of your post
URL linking to that post
Description of the Post
Cut off date is Tuesday by 9 PM EST
If you are reading this and are not a part of the Christian Carnival mailing list please visit this link and join up:
*If you wish to host the Carnival in coming weeks email Nick at
carnivalhost@patriot-paradox.com
by La Shawn on June 20, 2004
in Bloggers
It was the DailyPundit who coined the term “blogosphere” back in 2002. When I first heard the word “blog” sometime in 2003, the only clue I had to its meaning was that people were doing it online. Now I’m blogging, you’re blogging, we’re all blogging. On June 11, I asked readers with blogs why they do it.
The main reasons we blog is to get our opinion out there from our small corners of the world. Brutally honest Rick says it’s a way of venting and “letting people know that which I deem important.” For Wallace, it was originally a way to let friends around the country know what he was up to. And now? He says to “also make minor statements about the trip we call life.”
A break from media bias, intellectual stimulation, instant gratification and practice were also cited as reasons for blogging. Mike Gallaugher says the “interactive nature” of blogging lends to the phenomenon more credibility than mainstream media, and Lorie writes, “The back and forth dialogue through message boards and comment features provides great fun and instant gratification.”
Brian says he started blogging because he’s going back to law school in August and wants to dust off his writing skills. Mike, aka “Bunker Mulligan”, also writes to work on his skills, but also to vent. For DANEgerus, it was a perception of the media’s appeasement after September 11 that led him to the blogosphere.
Are We Bloggers Vain?
Mamamontezz says, “Sometimes I post for ego and vanity, sometimes as a response to both the good and the bad in this world…I want to feel a part of something so much bigger than one middle aged woman in a little frame house in an inner-city neighborhood in Indianapolis,” she adds. Of course vanity is a small part of it, but reaching so many people online definitely makes you feel important.
Kristin writes, “I crack myself up and want to share it with the world.” And DeoDuce tells it like it is. “I blog because I’m selfish and want people to pay attention to me.” I can relate to that, too. Sissy Willis puts it more subtly: “We blog because of the importance of being noticed.” I won’t argue with that.
Christian Bloggers
Jerry McClellan, who says I inspired him to blog, writes about his faith in Christ. “Miss Barber has inspired me, along with others that I’ve read….I love the truth. God has planted in me a desire to know, and share. It is so strong sometimes it scares me. So I figured having a blog would give me the opportunity, not only to write out my views but to point out error where I see it and to share the truth of God’s word.” No doubt Jerry will inspire other to blog, too.
Faith also led Lee to blog. “I started my blog to share my faith in Christ, vent and express my 2 cents worth.” Eric Jay blogs for similar reasons. “I blog as a way to share my thoughts and beliefs. I enjoy it most when someone has an opinion and returns the favor to me,” he writes.
Aaron believes he was called to join the blogosphere. “I…felt the divine calling to begin to blog about my life and my feelings, especially those centered on Jesus Christ and conservatism. I want the world to know how I experienced/experience the world and how I see it to be….I saw it as a great opportunity to open my heart to readers and share the Lord Jesus Christ with others. It is from my pain and hardships that the Lord has worked dramatically in my life. So there are stories that I need to share.”
Katy offers her perspective on the value of blogging. “I see small and special things in the middle of the mundane, and I love to bring it to the attention of my readers. The Scripture says, in Jeremiah 15, ‘If you will extract the precious from the worthless, you will be my spokesman.’ Extracting the precious from the worthless is a noble reason for blogging. We should all aspire to do so.
Kimberly says, “I started my blog as a way to be a Christian conservative voice at my school, to be a counterpart of sorts to my colleagues’ voices, to be a witness to my faith and to show that intelligent moral conservatism is not a contradiction in terms.” She also enjoys the affirmation she gets from fellow conservatives (preaching to the choir!) and finds blogging rewarding because it helps focus her thoughts, always a good practice.
Stay tuned this week for reader responses to “Why Do You Read Blogs?”
by La Shawn on June 20, 2004
in Bloggers
Connecting
Rikki and I share similar feelings about connecting with people all over the country. She writes, “At first, blogging was merely an offshoot of my desire to learn something about web design, and an outlet for a single mother who had become a little isolated. It soon became a way to connect with different people. There is just something fascinating to me about having friends all over the country. It’s also a great way to learn new information. I like to read different opinions on different issues.”
Jennifer doesn’t have a blog (yet), but she started writing opinion pieces as a way to share her views and connect with the like-minded. “On the internet, I can find people like myself and discuss things with them, which often solidifies the way that I feel about things. I can write things…for people to read, I can read what others write and the great consensus can be met.”
Journaling
Kris opens up about why she blogs. “About six months ago I was struggling with a bit of depression, and I knew that I needed to sort out some things which were all cluttered up in my head. I used to keep a journal where I would go to work things out, but I had stopped writing in it several years ago because as my children have gotten older, I have been afraid that they might stumble upon my journal and read some things that I don’t really want them to read. So I started a private blog, where basically I could sort through all of my thoughts, and it was secure and private. No one would be able to read it unless I wanted them to. And I loved it.” Kris now has a public blog, appropriately called Writing to Understand.
Deb also blogs as a way to sort out thoughts and because she loves to write, although she hadn’t written for years. “Trying to find my lost muse,” she surmises.
You have to admire Ambra’s honesty. “I started blogging because I was too lazy to keep a journal, and I can type faster than I write (ahh the digital generation). Something about having people tune in to what you have to say every day is the type of instant gratification that keeps you writing more.”
I think I’m older than Ambra by more than a decade, so I remember the early Apple computers of the 1980s, and you couldn’t get me near one of those things. How time and technology have changed. As a reluctant member of the “digital generation”, I prefer typing on a keyboard. But I prefer longhand for my personal journal, which I’ve kept for the past 20 years. (Has it been that long?!)
Bloggers also blog to answer e-mail and other queries. “It was like playing 10 games of chess at the same time,” G. van den Bosch says about his busy schedule debating, discussing and responding to e-mails about faith and politics. “So, I began to blog and my first blogs were like emails. After some ‘feedback’ pointing out the funny writing, I began to experiment and to review other blogs.” He also likes to redesign his blog (unlike me!).
Self-described extrovert Rae says, “[W]riting has always been a way to clear my head of thoughts that attempt to deceive; thoughts that encourage and avail; it is a way of thinking aloud.” And Andy says he’s in it only for the money, but here’s the real story.
by La Shawn on June 18, 2004
in Columns
BlackElectorate linked to my latest column, “Liberals and Their Advice” (sixth entry under Culture/Sports). The piece was written partly as a follow-up to “Why Courting the Black Vote Won’t Work”, which was also linked to by BlackElectorate back in January. I’m still getting e-mail from that one. We’ll see what happens with this one!
By the way, I’ll post some of the “Why do you blog/read blogs” comments this weekend. Busy week.
Oh, and I met Baldilocks today! She was on the east coast this week and stopped by to meet a fellow blogger face to face. She’s the greatest. I’ll tell you all about it.
National Public Radio’s Juan Williams writes in the New York Times:
With the presidential election only a few months away, it is time for President Bush to unleash his secret weapon — his relationship with black and Hispanic voters….
But the president has the opportunity to flip the script. With a direct appeal, President Bush could win at least 20 percent of the black vote — and the White House.
How can he attract those votes?
First, the field is open. Compared with previous Democratic campaigns, Mr. Kerry’s has done a poor job of reaching out to black voters. As Donna Brazile, Al Gore’s campaign manager in 2000, said recently, “Don’t expect me to go out and say John Kerry is a great man and a visionary if you’re not running ads on African-American or Hispanic cable networks. Fair is fair. So send my dad a postcard, send my sisters a bumper sticker.” The Kerry campaign has also been notable for its lack of blacks and Hispanics among the candidate’s top advisers. And Mr. Kerry has rarely been identified with issues that compel black voters — notably affirmative action.
Second, it’s increasingly clear that blacks are no longer willing to vote as a bloc, automatically lining up with the Democrats. This is particularly true of younger black voters. A 2002 poll by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a research group based in Washington, found a shift in the political identification of black voters. For example, 34 percent of 18- to 25-year-old black voters identified themselves as independents. Overall, 24 percent of black Americans of all ages see themselves as independents — a four percentage point increase since the 2000 election. And now 10 percent of blacks call themselves Republican, a six percentage point rise since 2000.
Read the article (registration required).
Are you tired of giving out your personal information just to read a news story? Have I got a solution for you. Somebody turned me on to BugMeNot, a free service that generates a working username and password for you so you don’t have to register every time you want to access information. Try BugMeNot today!
Can I have my money now?
