HONOLULU (AP) — Lou Conter, the last living survivor of the USS Arizona battleship that exploded and sank during the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, has died. He was 102.
Lou Conter, the last living survivor of the USS Arizona battleship that exploded and sank during the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor.
Conter passed away on Monday at his home in Grass Valley, California, following congestive heart failure, his daughter, Louann Daley said, adding she was beside him along with two of her brothers, James and Jeff.
The Arizona lost 1,177 sailors and Marines in the 1941 attack that launched the United States into World War II. The battleship’s dead account for nearly half of those killed in the attack.
Conter was a quartermaster, standing on the main deck of the Arizona as Japanese planes flew overhead at 7:55 a.m. on Dec. 7 that year. Sailors were just beginning to hoist colors or raise the flag when the assault began.
Conter recalled how one bomb penetrated steel decks 13 minutes into the battle and set off more than 1 million pounds (450,000 kilograms) of gunpowder stored below.
The explosion lifted the battleship 30 to 40 feet (9 to 12 metes) out of the water, he said during a 2008 oral history interview stored at the Library of Congress. Everything was on fire from the mainmast forward, he said.
What strikes me is the amount of blogs that wrote about this. Sure, the major papers covered it, they had to, it is news. But, no left wing blogs at all and an smattering of right wing blogs covered it. It is sickening. The left wing blogs are too busy painting Trump is some sort of crazy person, who is going to declare martial law and imprison all Democrats and liberals if elected. The right, well they are too busy mocking Joe Biden and “owning” the liberals on the left…..whatever that means.
The crazy thing is, that war, the only constitutionally declared war, was fought to protect the rights of these boneheads who printing the tripe that they are printing today. If it were not for the MEN, and yes, they were MEN, fighting MEN that put their butts on line to protect this Nation of ours and to punish Japan and Germany from reaching their evil goals and the World is much better off for it too.
It is a terrible state what our media — Broadcast, cable, and online media have become in 2024.
New York CNN — Chris Licht, the embattled chief executive and chairman of CNN, whose brief one-year tenure at the network was stained by a series of severe missteps, departed the company on Wednesday.“I met with Chris and he will be leaving CNN,” David Zaslav, the chief executive of parent company Warner Bros. Discovery, told CNN employees at the start of the network’s daily editorial meeting.
Licht’s departure capped a tumultuous year for CNN, marked by layoffs, shrinking profits, historically low ratings, the firing of two anchors, and rock-bottom employee morale. The chaos that defined the last year also followed several other gut punches to the organization, including the ouster of previous leader, Jeff Zucker, and shuttering of nascent streaming service CNN+.
Licht, who became network chief last May after most recently leading “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” to much success, saw his tenure dogged by fierce criticism in the press, often the result of leaks from employees around him who never fully trusted his leadership skills or editorial vision.
The final death knell was a devastating 15,000-word profile in The Atlantic that published on Friday. The blistering piece, in which author Tim Alberta spoke to more than 100 CNN employees, called into serious question Licht’s ability to lead the organization into the future.
In the wake of The Atlantic article, Licht attempted to regain his footing. He apologized to staffers and vowed to “fight like hell” to win over the trust of employees.
But it became increasingly clear that Licht’s tenure as the chief executive was not tenable and quickly coming to an end. High-profile anchors and correspondents, in addition the the rank-and-file staff, had hit the wall with Licht. The CNN chief had, in effect, lost the room.
The picture quickly became clear to Zaslav, who installed his top lieutenant, David Leavy, as CNN’s chief operating officer last week. On Wednesday morning, Licht was informed that he was being relieved of his duties as CNN’s top executive, a person familiar with the matter said. The top two leaders of CNN’s communications department, Kris Coratti Kelly and Matt Dornic, as well as Licht’s chief of staff, Devan Cayea, will also depart the company, the person said.
I read the article in the Atlantic and it was clear that Licht was trying to, perhaps a bit too hard; to being CNN back to, at least, the center and also appeal to Conservatives and Republicans. This did not go over well with the employees at CNN. Licht forgot an important rule in Media and that is, know your audience.
MCHENRY, N.D. (Valley News Live) – A community is mourning the loss of an 18-year-old man from Grace City, North Dakota, as investigators look into what led up to a deadly crash. Foster County Deputies were called to a hit-and-run that happened in an alleyway near Johnston Street and Jones Avenue in McHenry, ND.
Court documents say at 2:35 Sunday morning, 41-year-old Shannon Brandt called 911 to report that he had hit a pedestrian because he was threatening him. Brandt told State Radio that the pedestrian was part of a Republican extremist group and that he was afraid they were “coming to get him.” The pedestrian has been identified in a GoFundMe page as 18-year-old Cayler Ellingson.
After visiting the scene where the incident happened, deputies went to Brandt’s house in Glenfield, ND, which is about 12 minutes from the crash scene. Brandt admitted to consuming alcohol before the incident, and stated he hit Ellingson with his car because he had a political argument with him. Brandt also admitted to deputies that he initially left the crash scene, then returned to call 911, but left again before deputies could arrive.
Court documents say just before the crash, Ellingson called his mom and asked if they knew who Brandt was. She said yes, and told her son she was on her way to pick him up. A short time later, court documents say Ellingson called his mom again to say that “he” or “they” were chasing him. It was after the second call that Ellingson could not be reached again.
Ellingson was pronounced dead at a Carrington Hospital. Brandt has been charged with criminal vehicular homicide and DUI. Court records show a judge set bail at $50,000.
Here are the media outlets covering this, according to Memeorandum:
Fox News is reporting as well. But, others? Crickets. 🙄 Normally, when the right cries “media bias!” I roll my eyes. Not this time, it’s obvious that the progressive media is not touching this, at all.
He is leaving the site for the same reasons, that I really have not been writing very much on this blog.
Quote:
Partisan media serves two masters, the truth and the cause. When they align, all is well. When they conflict, you choose. If you prioritize the truth, you’re a traitor; if you prioritize the cause, you’re a propagandist. One recent example of the latter is the left mocking Republicans who accepted PPP loans during the pandemic for opposing Biden’s student debt bailout. The differences between those two programs would be evident to a reasonably intelligent fourth-grader but the imperative to serve the cause by rationalizing Biden’s giveaway forced liberals to treat it as a smart own. I think some even talked themselves into believing it. Propagandists lie to others, then lie to themselves to justify propagating the original lie. Propaganda rots the brain, then the soul.
That’s one reason why, when I’ve been forced to choose, I preferred to be a traitor than a propagandist. Here’s another: What is the right’s “cause” at this point? What cause does the Republican Party presently serve? It has no meaningful policy agenda. It literally has no platform. The closest thing it has to a cause is justifying abuses of state power to own the libs and defending whatever Trump’s latest boorish or corrupt thought-fart happens to be. Imagine being a propagandist for a cause as impoverished as that. Many don’t need to imagine.
The GOP does have a cause. The cause is consolidating power. Overturn the rigged elections, purge the disloyal bureaucrats, smash the corrupt institutions that stand in the way. Give the leader a free hand. It’s plain as day to those who are willing to see where this is going, what the highest ambitions of this personality cult are. Those who support it without insisting on reform should at least stop pretending that they’re voting for anything else.
I agree with others who say that, fundamentally, the last six years have been a character test. Some conservatives became earnest converts to Trumpism, whatever that is. But too many who ditched their civic convictions did so for the most banal reasons, because there was something in it for them — profit, influence, proximity to power, the brainless tribalism required by audience capture. “Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket,” Eric Hoffer wrote. We’ve all gotten to see who the racketeers are.
I would rather fail as a writer than succeed if success means being some demagogue’s footstool. To the extent my work at Hot Air has made that clear, I’m happy with it.
Never forget, it’s not the 30 percent of Trump worshipers within the party who brought the GOP to what it is. It’s the next 50 percent, the look-what-the-libs-made-me-do zombie partisans, who could have said no but didn’t. I said no. Put it on my tombstone.
As much as I hate to admit it; he is absolutely correct. The Republican Party has become a shadow and bad parody of itself.
Gone are the days of the statesmen, like Ronald Reagan. Gone are the intellectual Conservatives, like William F. Buckley. Gone are the moderates like Jack Kemp. Gone are the real Conservatives like Patrick J. Buchanan, who actually loves America, and wants to keep American jobs. Unlike the two-bit phony like trump, who only cares about his supposed “Brand.”
On another aspect, it is truly the end of a blogging era. AllahPundit was a pen name, that was created in response to the 9/11 attacks in NYC. It was basically a parody of Islamic Fascism. Starting with “Allah’s in the House” blog and continuing with his writing over at HotAir.com.
It also represents a change in the landscape of the blogosphere. Where people like Michelle Malkin were the superstars of the Conservative Blogging world and the movement itself.’ Malkin has been relegated to the corner of the extremists. with her friendship with the “proud boys.” Strange case, that one was.
This is what happened after President Bush’s term ended, the right united against Obama. Then Trump ran and won. The cult of personality around trump was divided into two camps, Pro Trump and Anti-Trump. Alliances were destroyed, friendships ruined and the Conservative movement fractured badly. Now, the conservatives are slinging it out between anti and pro Trump camps and slinging mud at President Biden; who is by the way, the worst President since Jimmy Carter. In fact, Biden is much, much, worse.
Even I have changed in my political beliefs since starting blogging in 2006. I, in fact, started out as a Populist, but nothing like the Conservative Populism that Trump represents. More of this kind here. However, in the years since then, mainly because I have gotten older, (I turned 50 this year.) I have honestly come to realize that left wing politics is a dead end. Leftism is nothing more a religion of hate; black against white, Jews verses Gentiles, Poor against Rich, Haves against Have-nots.
It is all rather exhausting honestly and I got quite tired of being on the side of hate. Equally tiring is the battle of conservatives against each other. For goodness sake, are not we supposed to be fighting against the far left and their lunacy? Instead we are fighting against each other, over a man, who could give a wit about the Republican Party, Conservatism, and America in General. He has his money, and he really does not care about anyone or anything else. The White House was an ego thing for him, and that was it.
We should be fighting against the loony far left. We should be fighting back against Joe Biden and his idiotic policies, we should be fighting against assault against our freedoms, by the left. Instead conservatives are fighting each other, and media is obsessed, left and right; about a President that lost an election 2 years ago! Enough! The media, the conservative movement, and everyone else needs to move the hell on!
That is my opinion and I would like to know yours.
Today I sent my intention to resign from The Intercept, the news outlet I co-founded in 2013 with Jeremy Scahill and Laura Poitras, as well as from its parent company First Look Media.
The final, precipitating cause is that The Intercept’s editors, in violation of my contractual right of editorial freedom, censored an article I wrote this week, refusing to publish it unless I remove all sections critical of Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, the candidate vehemently supported by all New-York-based Intercept editors involved in this effort at suppression. — Source: My Resignation From The Intercept – Greenwald
Man, when Glen Greenwald decides that a publication that he co founded, has gone off the rails; something is very wrong. Go read this article, it is amazing. Kudos to Greenwald for telling it like it truly is.
“I’m retiring,” Matthews said. “This is the last ‘Hardball’ on MSNBC.”
Matthews was due to retire in the near future with the events of the past week playing a factor in the timing of the move, an MSNBC spokesperson said.
After MSNBC aired a commercial following the announcement, Matthews did not return to the program. Steve Kornacki, a political reporter for the network, took over the rest of the hour, and seemed shocked by the news. “That was a lot to take in,” he said, saying it had been an honor to work with Matthews, and then beginning a discussion about the coronavirus response.
A day after he was accused of sexual harassment by a journalist, MSNBC decided to keep host Chris Matthews off its airwaves during coverage of the South Carolina primary results.
Matthews is normally a fixture of election night coverage, which made his absence on Saturday all the more notable. His disappearing act came as MSNBC faced calls from a feminist organization to fire him because of sexism and sexual misconduct allegations—after raised eyebrows over other on-air remarks.
<….>
MSNBC did not immediately return a request for comment.
It’s starting.
—-Original Story Below—-
Honestly, I do not see Chris Matthews surviving this report.
MSNBC host Chris Matthews, whose long history of sexist comments and behavior have somehow not yet gotten him fired, tested the boundaries of his own misogyny again on Wednesday night. After the tenth Democratic presidential debate, the Hardball anchor grilled Elizabeth Warren about one of her lines of attack against Mike Bloomberg during the debate: that a pregnant female employee accused Bloomberg of telling her to “kill it.”
“You believe he’s lying?” Matthews asked Warren of Bloomberg’s denial.
“I believe the woman, which means he’s not telling the truth,” said Warren, who recently had to defend her own credible story of pregnancy discrimination.
“And why would he lie?” Matthews said. “Just to protect himself?”
“Yeah, and why would she lie?” Warren responded pointedly.
“I just wanna make sure you’re clear about this,” Matthews said. Right there on America’s purportedly liberal network, the anchor spoke to a 70-year-old United States senator who is running for president—and a renowned Harvard Law professor, no less—like she couldn’t possibly understand her own words, as if she were a child choosing between a snack now or dessert later.
The allegation that Matthews, a veteran journalist, was trying so hard to undermine was actually corroborated by a third party to The Washington Post earlier this month. There was no reason for him to harp on its veracity, except, perhaps, that he himself has made so many sexist comments over the years that he has a vested interest in Bloomberg being let off the hook.
Some of Matthews’s behavior has already been well-documented. Like Bloomberg, who frequently remarked “nice tits” and “I’d do her” at the office, Matthews has a pattern of making comments about women’s appearances in demeaning ways. The number of on-air incidents is long, exhausting, and creepy, including commenting to Erin Burnett, for example, “You’re a knockout…it’s all right getting bad news from you,” while telling her to move closer to the camera. Behind the scenes, one of Matthews’s former producers told The Daily Caller in 2017 that he allegedly rated his female guests on a numerical scale and would name a “hottest of the week,” like a “teenage boy.” In 1999, an assistant producer accused Matthews of sexual harassment, which CNBC, the show’s network at the time, investigated. They concluded that the comments were “inappropriate,” and Matthews received a “stern reprimand,” according to an MSNBC spokesperson.
This tendency to objectify women in his orbit has bled into his treatment of female politicians and candidates. He has repeatedly lusted over women in politics on air, including remarking in 2011 that there’s “something electric” and “very attractive” about the way former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin walks and moves, and noting in 2017 that acting attorney general Sally Yates is “attractive, obviously.” But he has reserved a particular contempt for the woman who made it closest to ascending the heights of American political power, Hillary Clinton, calling her “witchy,” “anti-male,” and “She-Devil.” The Cut obtained footage of him joking in early 2016, just before a live interview with then candidate Clinton, “where’s that Bill Cosby pill,” referring to the date-rape drug. In 2005, he openly wondered whether the troops would “take the orders” from a female president; after another interview, he pinched Clinton’s cheek; and in another, he suggested that she had only had so much political success because her husband had “messed around.” This evening anchor, in addition to everything else, has repeatedly challenged whether women are legitimate politicians or could be president at all. “I was thinking how hard it is for a woman to take on a job that’s always been held by men,” he said of Clinton in 2006. – Source: Like Warren, I Had My Own Sexist Run-In with Chris Matthews | GQ
There is much more, click the link to read this story. You should look for Matthews to retire very soon.
I happened to go over to that site and noticed that Ed has announced that HotAir.com is going to a “VIP Program“, meaning, you need a membership to read some of the stories. This is, basically, what the New York Times has, a partial paywall.
This is a horrible, terrible, decision on the part of Salem Media. Here is why: The New York Times is a well-funded Newspaper, with a huge readership, while HotAir.com is nothing more than an partisan blog that is center-right and I tend to believe that HotAir.com gets nowhere near the viewership of the NYT.
Furthermore, No one is going to start paying for, what they have read for free, for all of these years, since the site’s existence. I believe that Salem is most likely betting on a huge readership spike during the 2020 elections. But, judging from the comments, we will be hear that this site went dark, after Salem got tired of supporting a money losing blog.
A sad ending to blog, which I read, even when I was still voting for and blogging for the left, because it seemed a bit more reasonable than some of the right, at the time.
Things have changed since the days of Clinton/Bush and blogging’s early days. 😔
Splinter is shutting down. In an internal memo sent Tuesday to staff, Paul Maidment, the editorial director of Splinter’s parent company, G/O Media, praised the site’s journalism but said the publication struggled to gain large numbers of readers.
“Despite the hard work of everyone on that staff, which has produced much outstanding journalism and great scoops, establishing a steady and sustainable audience for a relatively young site proved challenging in a fiercely competitive sector,” Maidment said.
“Given that reality, the leadership team made the difficult decision to cease operation of Splinter and redistribute the headcount to the other sites to increase the impact the editorial department can have overall.” Maidment claimed there would be “no reduction of G/O Media’s editorial workforce as a result of this decision,” and Splinter’s headcount would be “reallocated” across other sites at G/O, the network of former Gizmodo Media Group sites including Deadspin, Jezebel, Gizmodo, and Jalopnik, among others. “Our goal, wherever possible, will be to retain current Splinter staff members in open positions at other G/O Media sites.”
Some Splinter staffers, however, said they’ve been laid off. Deputy editor Jack Mirkinson tweeted, “Splinter is shutting down and we’re all being laid off,” and staff writer Sam Grasso wrote: “I’m getting laid off.”
Splinter was launched in 2017 after Univision acquired most of the old Gawker Media assets following Gawker’s high-profile legal dispute with wrestler Hulk Hogan and conservative tech billionaire Peter Thiel. – Source: The Daily Beast
Now, I am not going to sit here, and say, “ha ha! liberals lost another one!” because is that is stupid, immature, and elitist. I will say truthfully that “New Media” has become a very tight market. Since the crash of 2008, quite a bit of the crazy money floating around, simply dried up. Also too, many people have their favorite news and opinion sites that they frequent and it is tough to break into that market and get eyeballs on a site.
Another problem is that media has become so polarized since the election of President Obama and President Trump. Many people spend their time in their own echo chambers, being feed propaganda; whether it be right wing or left wing. Another thing killing print media is Youtube. Many people would rather watch a video, than take the time to read a webpage.
Personally, in 10 years from now, I think that blogs will become a thing of the past and video will be “the thing”. Personally, I don’t write as much as I used to; It takes a bit of effort to craft a thoughtful blog posting; only to have no one read it. Plus, I have become involved with gaming and that’s taken my attention away from political blogging some. Plus, the political scene is much different than it was, when I first started blogging in 2006. Silly season? More like silly, drama daily anymore. I kinda just got old of it. Why I just game and watch documentaries on Youtube.
Bottom Line: New Media is a tight, fickle, and sometimes even biased market. If one owns a site, one has to figure out, do I want to be an echo chamber or do I want to be real? Decide wisely.
MSNBC host Chris Matthews, whose long history of sexist comments and behavior have somehow not yet gotten him fired, tested the boundaries of his own misogyny again on Wednesday night. After the tenth Democratic presidential debate, the Hardball anchor grilled Elizabeth Warren about one of her lines of attack against Mike Bloomberg during the debate: that a pregnant female employee accused Bloomberg of telling her to “kill it.”