December 20, 2024
"Quick story about govt. shutdowns and the theatrics behind them. One year when I was reporting at CBS News during a govt. shutdown..."
"... we were sincerely searching for real life impact. When we couldn't find any, *that* should have been part of the story. Instead, we kept trying to create the appearance of an impact. It wasn't really trying to be dishonest. It was, in my retrospective view, because the general editorial idea for the story was to show how bad the 'Republican' shutdown was for ordinary Americans, and the answer simply couldn't be that it wasn't.... [W]e were calling Ds and the Obama administration for ideas to report what was the real impact. Taking our cue, these officials fabricated impact that we could report. For example, they cordoned off outdoor public monuments in Washington DC. We knew and even discussed in the newsroom that this made no sense. These monuments weren't 'manned' to begin with. The only reason to cordon them off from the public was so that visiting tourists would see the 'impact' of the shutdowns and the news media would have something to take pictures of and interview people about...."
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56 comments:
Can't hate - or disbelieve or ignore - the MSM enough.
If you didn’t recognize this back when it was happening and you needed Sharyl to explain this to you need to smarten up…
Obama went out of his way to shutdown the park services, bringing in extra people to do so, to the point that roads which have overlooks in the parks were coned off, and stuffed to prevent people from stopping. Anything to make it difficult for the people.
Government spite has no limit.
Most of the lamestream media should be to dropped into a war zone via parachute and told to self-report on their slaughter.
The overwhelming reaction on X is, okay, shut it down, and show us, once again, just how useless you are.
The big problem the Democrats have with the pardons is they don’t protect the scummier Democrats who coordinated J6 and all the other unsavories under oath. Stuffing protections in a CR bill is a good strategy under the old rules of media but now there’s X…
The beauty of this is if you were a Rush Limbaugh listener you knew these things contemporaneously . Rush may have been a polemicist but he also informed and he was able to skewer the motivations of the left with precision. I don't know of anyone who was better on the fly at analyzing the objects and motives of the opposition.
The problem with shutdowns is that they always make up back pay to nonworking workers. If they just lost the pay, there'd be a lot of left wing pressure to avoid shutdowns.
Elon and Vivek want to cut agency number from 400 to 99. A good start. For most of us, government and its workers exist to hassle us, create problems, and burn money.
Tony Evers needlessly closed the Wisconsin state parks during covid for "reasons", same with Gavin closing the beaches. Probably the one thing that would be the best thing for people to do, exercise and get some fresh air. All in the name of control.
While Republican leadership deserves all the scorn for the porky pork CR some credit for actually bringing something to a vote. The whole we-took-a-vote-in-the-cloakroom-so-we-aren’t-accountable-for-a-vote-on-the-floor crap needs to stop…
That's the real fear isn't it. That people might actually realize how little they're needed? And then very very shortly after, how much has been taken from them for things they never wanted and never asked for...
Bastilles have been stormed for less.
It wasn't really trying to be dishonest...the general editorial idea for the story was to show how bad the 'Republican' shutdown was for ordinary Americans, and the answer simply couldn't be that it wasn't
But it wasn't dishonest. Gotta love the media.
Too much of "governing" is like a high school musical comedy. I am rather fond of the idea of the melodramatic "shutdown" in which the bureaucracy self-identifies the non-essential parts of our government. That will give the conversation about what we cut and what we don't a bit of clarity.
Clarity is far more important than agreement.
And at what point do you think she finally "got it?" This episode, the suppression of her stories on Hunter's laptop or when she knew for certain that the Obama administration had hacked her computer and had been spying on her all along?
There’s the old salt that all media stories come with a point of view but so long as they’re fair…well, this is the example of the unfair. Same as all the others…
The irony was that it cost more to shut down these public facilities than it did to just keep them open - and it was obvious, which I feel sure that Obama would have found delicious.
…yah, good question. I wanted to like her freelance reporting but feel that after all that was done to her the reporting looked like she still had interest in garnering favor with DC insiders.
IIRC Obama made a point of choosing shut down targets with high public profile/inconvenience. (I was forced to detour from a public highway simply because it ran through a National Park.)
One suspects Trump would do the opposite. He should issue clear orders to minimize impact with repercussions to the workers that can't get the message.
Done correctly I suspect the left would be mighty disappointed in the lack of impact to the public.
The MSM will do its usual job of blaming the Republicans when in fact its the D's who wont give a Goddamn inch - as usual. Johnson tried to pass a "Clean" CR with money for disaster aid and 98 percent of the D's voted against it. To the D's its their 1500 page CR mononstrocity or else.
This was unneccesary - as usual. And as usual, almost none of the Reps or Senators have actually READ the Goddamn 1500 page CR. They just show up and vote whichever their big donors tell them.
I hope they shut it down till Jan 21st. And why didn't they pass disaster relief months ago? They'll pass a bill to help Israel or Ukraine every week, but helping US Citizens seems to be a big effort.
I noticed the state and local governments will always close the parks and libraries first when they have a budgetary crisis. What fakes.
Shutting down the federal government at Christmas is like throwing Brer Rabbit into the briar patch.
I remember the farce of the 2013 federal government shutdown:
“This helpful Tea Party patriot informed me that as I was on the other side of the chain, I was trespassing. It did seem a trifle unfair that I had just twice ridden across the bridge that he had spent the last 5 hours clamoring to be reopened.”
Shutdowns are wasteful of our federal tax dollars. How ironic for the DOGE to kick off with a massive display of inefficiency.
It wasn't really trying to be dishonest.
Just about everything that follows this sentence proves it is a lie...
If you were awake...you would have seen it happening as it happened. We spoke out about it. Obama was the wannabe dictator they claim Trump will be.
Democrazi.
Blame Elon. He certainly is not a very smart businessman! :)
It wasn't really trying to be dishonest.
Dishonesty wasn't the goal; making Democrats look good and Republicans look bad was the goal. They even had a very mild preference for honesty, which is why they started out looking for real examples instead of fabricating them from the start. It's just that they'd never allow any level of dishonesty to interfere with their goal.
"It wasn't really trying to be dishonest" she said about her refusing to accept and report the facts on the ground and instead unquestioningly and eagerly publishing the lies put forth by the Obama administration which she/the press knew at the time they published them to be lies.
Clearly, this is yet another knowing lie being published.
To continue on a theme, I look forward to the government shutting down so they can self identify (that is the correct terminology, right?) which government programs and departments are nonessential. That will provide DOGE with a list of where to start.
I remember one government shutdown a couple of years ago where the Republicans had the audacity to only want to increase the budget by 3.5% and not the 7% that the Democrats wanted. The media was all about the cruel austerity and how the penguins were starving at the DC zoo and other nonsense like that. What a joke.
hold up FEMA for example of unnecessary
do DRJill get her pocket money if govt shut down?
If the shutdown lasts long enough that workers start missing paychecks, I can have sympathy for the workers, yes, some of whom I know. Most of them recognize the shutdown for what it is, however: Theatrics.
A comment about that 1,500-page CR dropped the day before vote...it will no longer be any big deal or clever strategy. In fact, the Democrats could drop it an hour before the vote if they want to make it a little more sporting.
The new reality is that any of the latest AI models could give a very revealing synopsis in minutes with the proper system prompt provided. Nobody needs to pass it to find out what's in it anymore.
If there is a shutdown they will be “made whole”. Everyone will be paid once the government reopens.
My memory of the 2013 shutdown was being able to camp in a loved campground all by myself. The feds had barricaded the entrance road, but I knew a back way in.
They always get their back pay when its over.
Keep in mind the Obama officials Attkisson is talking about are still in the White House.
"How ironic for the DOGE to kick off with a massive display of inefficiency."
What's your objection to the slim bill?
A shutdown might actually be good for the GOP in that it would slash the remaining amount of time the Biden administration has to create problems the new administration will have to deal with, Trump-proof the government, reward allies, etc.
Many government agencies and jobs are:
1. Created as patronage and for pork-barrel gifts, not to serve a function
2. Mainly provide election year marketing talking points
3. Tied to laws enacted by Congress and outside of Executive Branch control
4. Obscure, technical, complex, wasteful, and redundant but REQUIRED per congressional committee decisions about "necessary oversight"
Federal jobs largely address the most unglamorous stuff you can imagine: Collect money (IRS and fees); pay out money for social security, medicare, veteran's salaries, contracts, and grants. To end this you need most of the elected officials to agree to cut benefits/gifts for their friends and voters.
While I wish Elon and Vivek the best, I fear they are replicating Trump's 2016 to 2017 Dunning-Kruger naïveté. A third way, and a painfully long grinding approach, is likely required.
From USA today
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/12/19/government-shutdowns-timeline/77087756007/
How long have U.S. government shutdowns lasted?
Over the last five decades, there have been 21 federal shutdowns:
1976: Under President Gerald Ford. Lasted for 11 days.
1977: Under President Jimmy Carter. Lasted 12 days.
1977: Under Carter. Lasted eight days.
1977: Under Carter. Lasted eight days.
1978: Under Carter. Lasted 17 days.
1979: Under Carter. Lasted 11 days.
1981: Under President Ronald Reagan. Lasted two days.
1982: Under Reagan. Lasted one day.
1982: Under Reagan. Lasted three days.
1983: Under Reagan. Lasted three days.
1984: Under Reagan. Lasted two days.
1984: Under Reagan. Lasted one day.
1986: Under Reagan. Lasted one day.
1987: Under Reagan. Lasted one day.
1990: Under George H.W. Bush. Lasted four days.
1995: Under President Bill Clinton. Lasted five days.
1996: Under Clinton. Lasted 21 days.
2013: Under President Barack Obama. Lasted 17 days.
2018: Under President Donald Trump. Lasted three days.
2018: Under Trump. Lasted several hours.
2019: Under Trump. Lasted 35 days and cost the economy about $3 billion, equal to 0.02% of GDP, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
I was in the military during most of these. Somehow the nation survived.
Okay- say the government does "shut down". What are all those government employees who are already not coming in to the office going to do? They're already at home. Will they just take more naps? Or what?
"It wasn't really trying to be dishonest. It was, in my retrospective view, because the general editorial idea for the story was to show how bad the 'Republican' shutdown was for ordinary Americans, and the answer simply couldn't be that it wasn't."
Sounds like THE DEFINITION of trying to be dishonest
All Civics classes should include training in Media Dishonesty and in Government Media Manipulation.
"It wasn't really trying to be dishonest. It was, in my retrospective view, because the general editorial idea for the story was to show how bad the 'Republican' shutdown was for ordinary Americans, and the answer simply couldn't be that it wasn't...."
Assuming a conclusion and then looking for evidence to support it while rejecting any that doesn't fit the disaster narrative is exactly how the Global Cooling/Warming/Climate Change Green New Deal works.
Yes it cost the federal economy 3 billion, but how much did it save the taxpayers. Keep in mind that every day congress is not in session is a win for the taxpayers.
If your company told you, that you'd get 30 days paid time off.. But you wouldn't get the pay until you came back.. Would you?
Remember!
a) you will suffer NO ill effects from taking the paid time off.
b) your seniority will Continue to acquire.
c) projects, etc, will have their deadlines automatically extended.
d) you are a GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEE, and thus.. HATE WORK
I’m sure that the sous chef at the White House didn’t get any time off.
Trump, Musk, and everyone who supports them needs to go on jihad against the lazy, corrupt Congress that won't do their jobs without stuffing monster omnibus bills with raises and immunity deals for themselves and lobbyist-written goodies for their cronies.
This didn't work so well for Republicans in the days of the media monopoly. I think it can work now, with amplification by X.
Let's attack these lazy, corrupt scum with everything we've got. Call them out individually by name and rain a torrent of hate and anger on their worthless heads. Let's put some real fear in their cowardly hearts.
The dem's CR monstrosity s 1547 pages long. Eight pages are the actual CR. EIGHT pages.
The leftmediaswine cannot be distinguished from the Democrats who cannot be distinguished from the Gramscian Marxists. They are all of a kind even if they are too stupid or evil to notice.
Not necessarily "fake" news, but manufactured news. Like that late Iowa poll that had Harris up by 3. Gave the monkeys something to chatter about which made it appear as valid. Manufactured "news".
Was just listening to Molly Hemmingway and David Harsanyi discussing it on their podcast. Harsanyi was all up in arms about the lawsuit Trump filed. Couldn't see that like the poll being manufactured news, the lawsuit also brought the poll back into the chatter, only this time with discussion of how bad it was and why it might have been so off. But it makes people start to see the tool marks beneath the polish that reveal it was just a quick knock off of the machine rather than a quality good.
I root for a shutdown every year. And every year we watch what has become this Christmas play, where the Democrats and Republicans put together a massive Omnibus Bill and call it a CR. Then one or two of the Republicans would balk at it and cause the threat of a shutdown, the media would jump in to create horror stories that were nothing of the kind. Yet...they worked. They did have an impact on people. And our massive boondoggle spending and corrupt funding would go on.
This year is different. For one, there are a vastly greater number of Republicans who aer done playing this game. They are serious about cutting our debt, or at least taking a stab a cutting back. Secondly, while the media has obediently jumped in to do their job protecting Democratic spending, people don't take their word for anything anymore, and millions more are aware of the dangerous debt we have accrued.
So while this round may yet go to the Democrats spending, the battlefield is changing, and over the next couple of years, it will be different.
In the meantime, I still root for the shutdown. And why not? When they're away they cannot be making any new ridiculous laws or regulations. And spending will be less. It's a win-win-win.
To err is human. To lie constantly, habitually, unthinkingly, is Democrat.
I made a mention of this at Instapundit this morning: the lengths the Obamatrons went to, in order to fabricate some inconveniences.
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