Comments on: News of the [Murdoch] World

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 22:28:27 +0000

Mr. Duff, no one votes for Vice President in US elections, the job is filled by the successful candidate for President.

Pat Paulsen ran for President six times, but he was still considered a comedian. Jerry Springer was elected to the city council, mayor of Cincinnati, Ohio, and considered a run for the Senate in 2003, but he is still a talk show host.

Ms Palin didn’t run for the Alaskan Senate seat in 2010, which would have been a better position if she was actual interested in making a run for President, and has spent all of her time being a celebrity, not a politician. It is her choice, not yours.

By: Badtux

Badtux — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 20:34:14 +0000

Duffer, she resigned being a politician when she resigned the governorship of Alaska to become a professional celebrity. I once spent two years in college delivering pizza too, but when I resigned that job upon graduation I ceased to be a professional pizza deliverer and instead graduated to being professional pizza deliveree (IT professionals do like their pizza 😉 ).

— Badtux the Snarky Penguin

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 16:52:54 +0000

Ms Palin isn’t running for anything currently, she is promoting a movie release, Mr. Duff, and she stopped during that when the job was only half done, which has been her pattern lately.

I don’t write about her, or even mention her unless someone else brings her up, because she is less relevant to political matters than Lady Gaga.

By: Badtux

Badtux — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 15:34:16 +0000

Duffer, in *this* universe (as vs. your fictional universe) Caribou Barbie was elected *ONCE* as governor of Alaska, and served only two years of her four-year term before resigning to be a “professional celebrity”. You’ve never answered my question — what color are the unicorns in this bizarro-world universe you live in?

– Badtux the Snarky Penguin

By: Bryan

Bryan — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 17:13:47 +0000

1. They put the pieces in place to publish ‘The Sun on Sunday’ before they made ‘News of the World’ go away, so the names were changed to protect the guilty.

2. Ms Palin is a celebrity who works for Rupert, not a viable politician. It was her choice.

I just posted on that, Badtux. It is up to Ofcom to make the decision on the News Corp existing ownership of BSkyB.

By: Badtux

Badtux — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 16:26:50 +0000

Duffer, “Screws” competed with other Murdoch publications. You could eliminate all Murdoch publications but one in the UK and it would affect competition not at all, because competition requires there to be diversity of ownership as well as diversity of content. Competing with yourself is not competition!

In any event, welcome news for the UK — Murdoch has apparently abandoned his attempt to purchase Sky TV. I suspect he’s just hoping that he’s going to be allowed to retain his 1/3rd ownership at this point…

By: Bryan

Bryan — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 03:39:49 +0000

Media consolidation has progressed to the level in the US that a half dozen corporations control all of the major news outlets, and they don’t bother investigating anything, because that costs money that reduces the bottom line.

Politicians are investigated by local law enforcement, small local papers, and bloggers. As the major media considers politicians as employees working for their corporate interests, they have no incentive to do any reporting.

The only politicians who are ever pursued are the few who oppose the corporate interests

You still have media competition in the UK, we don’t.

There was a reason I put single quotes around ‘friendly’, i.e. to indicate it shouldn’t be taking literally.

By: Badtux

Badtux — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 20:02:07 +0000

how you would feel if American politicians on all sides agreed to push a certain agenda

Like their current race to gut Social Security and Medicare? Hmm… you have a point there :).