Thursday Open Thread
By Bronwyn on January 13, 2011 at 8:45 PM in Current Affairs
Below the fold, I have news on the edict that Roger Ailes issued to all the employees of Fox News. It’s quite a story and reveals that Ailes is as astute as ever and has an uncanny ability to sense the nation’s shifting moods. His edict was evident in last night’s exceptional and respectful coverage of Obama’s speech by Fox News’s Bret Baier, Brit Hume, Charles Krauthammer, et al. (But do check out my side note on Obama’s speech — it’s at the end of the post.)
But first, I want to share with you the extraordinarily moving photos (via Yahoo News) taken outside St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Catholic Church in Tucson, Ariz., where funeral services were held for Christina Taylor Green, the youngest victim of Jared Lee Loughner. That flag, restitched by loving hands, came from the ruin of the twin towers of 9/11, the same day that little Christina was born into this world.
……………………………………………………
Yahoo Caption: Firefighters fold up the 911 flag outside the entrance at the St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Church after the funeral of 9-year-old Christina Taylor Green Thursday, Jan. 13, 2011, in Tucson, Ariz.
……………………………………………………
MORE PHOTOS at Yahoo News.
……………………………………………………
Did you all hear about Roger Ailes’ message to all Fox News employees? Here’s one account via ABC News that begins by describing the political back-and-forth following the Tucson shootings:
Liberal commentators and bloggers took aim at conservatives — chiefly Sarah Palin — for putting out a map last March that put the districts of 20 House Democrats in cross-hairs, including that of Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. …
Conservatives, meanwhile, blasted the left for turning the tragic shooting into a political issue.
Now, the president of Fox News, Roger Ailes, has called for a cease-fire, vowing to tone down the political rhetoric, even though he dubbed his targeting by liberals “bullshit.”
Joe Scarborough, on today’s Morning Joe, said he thinks that Ailes’ edict to his employees was primarily directed at Glenn Beck. Who knows.
……………………………………………………
SIDE NOTE on Obama’s speech last night: Larry Johnson was correct to give Obama props for a well-done speech.
However.
On today’s “Morning Joe,” the MSNBC White House reporter said that she used all of her WH sources to learn that Obama worked on the speech himself for hours and hours, over several days.
The gaggle at the roundtable at Morning Joe totally missed what the WH reporter revealed. The MJ crew talked about how this proves that Obama is an excellent writer and that the speech reflected his insightful paean to the American people.
Uh. Hang on one f–kin’ second.
Obama spent ALL that time on a speech that his cadre of speech writers would have taken care of, for the most part?
Obama SHOULD have been working on the countless crises this nation faces.
I wonder if he has EVER spent that many hours on the plight of the jobless in this nation?
But Obama knew that this was an event that millions of Americans would be watching, and he wanted to be sure to milk it for all the political capital he could muster.
Call me cynical. But that’s how I see it.
And I wish, so much, that we had a president for whom his only interests weren’t the vanity exercises that come his way.
Now, it is all well and good that the Fox News gang reins it in a bit, but I hope that they will continue to fearlessly point out the politicization of a memorial service when that is what has gone down.
……………………………………………………
YOUR TURN!
(
)