Submitted by meg on Mon, 02/01/2010 - 2:28pm.
Will the decision by The Huffington Post, The New York Times and others to use Twitter as an advertising platform change the way we tweet the world? BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS
by Meg White Like most writers, I was suspicious of Twitter at first. Always wary of mandated brevity, expression in 140 characters or less struck me as an exercise in ridiculousness. I soon found that Twitter had very little to do with the 140-character news peg the media trumpeted about it in the early days. It was a community of "tweeple" who -- instead of e-mailing, messaging or posting -- were having online conversions by "tweeting." Honestly, though, I probably wouldn't have even started if it weren't for my role at BuzzFlash. Turns out that Twitter is the perfect vehicle for BuzzFlash's snark. Tweeple seem to really thrive on the same sarcasm and irreverence that BuzzFlash had been cultivating for ten years with our headlines and blog. BuzzFlash's Twitter persona has changed a little since it inception. We're still the snarkiest kid on the news block, but now we have begun to do give-aways from the store as well as just plain begging for our very existence. However, these developments are a result of our sorry financial situation, and do not arise out of any desire to use Twitter as a revenue-generating machine. If you were broke and having a conversation with (several thousand of) your closest friends, you'd probably mention it too. What you wouldn't do is take money from a store in exchange for telling your closest friends to go shop there. That's where the community breaks down, and friendship becomes a financial transaction. And that's why tweeple are in an uproar over the latest attempts to monetize Twitter relationships.
Submitted by whynowwhyme on Mon, 02/01/2010 - 2:19pm.
BUZZFLASH NEWS ALERT
by Jeffrey Joseph Sunday news programs tend to evaluate the news of the week and also to bring in "respected" members of the media to do a meta-analysis of the news, although all too often in painfully predictable fashion. Hence, bringing in Paul Krugman, Arianna Huffington, and George Will to discuss the news with Barbara Walters on ABC's This Week made sense, but Roger Ailes, president and CEO of FOX News, made an appearance as well and did exactly what one would expect from a FOX representative -- evade the facts and rely on ratings as validation. Ailes began even-keeled enough, mostly contributing only that he would do the infamous Cosmopolitan spread for far less than Scott Brown did and that he did not believe the Brown election necessarily predicted widespread change as certain outlets portrayed it. He would not last long before Huffington aimed to take Ailes to task for "the language that Glenn Beck is using, which is, after all, inciting the American people." Ailes attempted to deflect responsibility by claiming Beck spoke innocuously of Hitler and Stalin, and therefore uttered truths. Huffington noted Ailes's departure from facts, to which Ailes only retorted, "I think he speaks English. I don't know, but I mean, I don't misinterpret any of his words," then going on to decry any attempt to be the "word police." Beck's English, then, along with his wielding of a bat on the air while talking about how "you, too, could be the next victim of the killing spree," must work on a level beyond what Ailes chooses to comprehend.
Submitted by meg on Mon, 02/01/2010 - 10:18am.
MS. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON Conservatism
He learns how stocks will fall or rise
Holds poverty the greatest vice;
Thinks wit the bane of conversation,
And, says that learning spoils a nation.
-- Matthew Prior, The Chameleon. BuzzFlash, Sadly, things haven't change much since that verse was put into print. I watched the two hours of the GOP retreat on MSNBC with Olbermann, Maddow, and Mathews. This is the first time as a citizen and as a Democrat that I saw President Obama stand up to the Bush GOP. He was very impressive. To start with, we saw no TelePrompTer, no notes, no microphone in the ear, and no bulge on his backside. He knew facts and figures and he knew what he was talking about. Those members of the GOP who were proposing questions, had more dialogue than questions before they would get to their questions, almost as if they were politicking. President Obama would remind these Republicans when they tried to talk about the job loss and the debt, that this did not happen on his watch. These mishaps happened on the Bush administration's watch in DC, and he explained to them exactly why and how it all happened. When I first heard of the GOP retreat and of the invitation for President Obama to join them, it was so Rovian in my mind. Because this is how they (GOP) would get away with the use of subterfuge and the usual Republican spin. However, Obama insisted on it being televised.
Submitted by pmcarpenter on Mon, 02/01/2010 - 4:46am.
THE FIFTH COLUMNIST by P.M. Carpenter
President Obama is a supremely rational leader in a supremely irrational age. That is, perhaps, an oversimplified construct, but to me it neatly explains the Greek tragedy -- or Shakespearean comi-tragedy -- of his reign, and at no time was this on more vivid display than in his appearance last week at the House Republicans' deeper retreat into madness.
There the emperor stood, staring into a sea of uncomprehending visages and taking all comers, much to the latter's chagrin. As the farce proceeded, the frauds believed they had him on the run, only to realize later that he had systematically disrobed them.
Read More
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Sun, 01/31/2010 - 6:26pm.
BUZZFLASH GUEST COMMENTARY
By Dave Lindorff
You had to love the headline the Philadelphia Inquirer put on the jump page of columnist Trudy Rubin’s Sunday commentary about word that the Obama administration is hoping to talk with at least some mid-level Taliban leaders about giving up the fight and “coming over” to the “government” side.
&n
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Sun, 01/31/2010 - 10:33am.
BUZZFLASH GUEST COMMENTARY
By Robert C. Koehler
“If the First Amendment has any force, it prohibits Congress from fining or jailing citizens, or associations of citizens, for simply engaging in political speech.”
The words are those of Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, writing for the majority in last week’s landmark Supreme Court decision marking some sort of culmination in the long corporate trek to personhood.
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Sat, 01/30/2010 - 2:00pm.
BUZZFLASH NEWS ALERT
Barney Frank said at the World Economic Forum: "I think the biggest problem in the U.S. is...far too large a percentage of our resources go into the relatively unproductive segment of Defense. If we had not started the war in Iraq, and spent a trillion dollars there...we would have far more freedom now to respond to this short-term crisis."
Submitted by mark karlin on Sat, 01/30/2010 - 12:30pm.
BUZZFLASH EDITOR'S BLOG By Mark Karlin As Harry Truman said just tell the Republicans the truth, and they'll just think it's Hell. That's what President Barack Obama did in a bravura appearance before a GOP House member retreat in Baltimore on Friday. It was a jaw-dropping trip to the woodshed for the Republicans, who must have thought Obama would rely on the usual political pablum to respond to their inane, inaccurate Frank Luntz talking point questions (which were often long campaign style statements).
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Sat, 01/30/2010 - 10:44am.
BUZZFLASH GUEST COMMENTARY
By Winslow Myers
There is big money in polarization, as Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and
other media kingpins understand all too well. But one of the many
tragic by-products of our polarized political culture is the
demonization of conservatives by progressives.
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Fri, 01/29/2010 - 9:49pm.
BUZZFLASH GUEST COMMENTARY
Her memoir, ‘Why I Stayed: The Choices I Made In My Darkest Hour,’ takes readers on a three-year odyssey from the depths of despair, to the former mega-pastor’s being ‘cured’ of his homosexual ‘compulsions.’
By Bill Berkowitz
The mega-takeaways from Gayle Haggard’s new memoir about the trials and tribulations she went through after her husband Ted’s involvement with a gay prostitute and his solicitation of drugs came to light in November 2006, a
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