Who Is "Public Policy Polling?"

Not every pollster can be believed.

In nearly every poll of the West Virginia race for United States Senator in the past few weeks, John Raese enjoys anywhere from a five to nine point lead.

The only holdout is Public Policy Polling who has Manchin ahead by six points in its most recent evaluation.

Say what? Who is Public Policy Polling?

PPP is an outfit out of North Carolina that Real Clear Politics always denotes with a (D) when publishing its numbers. And D don't mean "Dallas."

PPP has a track record in this election of bucking the numbers of polls that show light to moderate leads for Republicans by indicating ties or Democratic leads. Their effect is to bring down the average reported Republican poll leads every week. If you want any further proof of their bias, they show that John McCain has a moderate 13 point lead over his opponent, while the non partisan Rocky Mountain Poll has McCain up by 34 points.

More proof needed of their bias? Oftentimes their polls are funded by the radical left wing Daily Kos website. No motivation for bias there, right?

Unfortunately for those behind these bizarre results, these polls will have the opposite effect. An energized Republican base will grow even more motivated to bring out the voters if the polls look close. If you only care about the John Raese race, you will be more likely to come out and vote if the numbers look closer. Of course Raese voters will tend to vote Republican on the rest of the ticket, so trying to make the Raese/Manchin contest look closer than it actually is should only help the West Virginia Republican Get Out the Vote efforts.

NBC does not want to hear any critisism of their bias coverage

The Slow Death of Old Journalism

I spent Memorial Day weekend in Atlanta and saw something shocking.

One of the great urban newspapers of the nation, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution had completely transformed itself. The once stately masthead with respectable headline font had now degraded into lowercase Times New Roman. Its size had shrunk into weekend same guide territory. This newspaper, once one of the premier dailies of the South, now looked much less respectable than our local and regional papers. It carried about as much news, too.

There is something to be said about a newspaper's audience and market. The New York Times and Washington Post struggle while the Washington Times and Wall Street Journal have avoided some of the same problems. It seems that conservatives tend to like actually holding a newspaper in their hand, turning the pages to read the news, in larger numbers than liberals. Our nation's capital actually supports two conservative dailies ( the Washington Examiner also seems to be doing well.)

The problems associated with newspapers lie in the fact that they continue to rely heavily upon their reporting of current events. By the time a major city newspaper has published and delivered, most people have either seen the news on television or read about it on the internet. Small town papers have always operated on tight budgets, but will probably survive because who else will report on doings in Cumberland, Moorefield, or Keyser? Who else will publish the picture of the Kelley and Church Award winners so that their parents can buy fifty copies apiece? The Mineral Daily News Tribune has a much more encouraging future than the Boston Globe.

Big city papers need to redefine their niche by focusing more in depth. The internet and TV will never be able to give its audience the kind of information and detail that print journalism offers. In the 1980s many papers moved away from such stories towards flashy colors and more concise writing to mimic the success of USA Today. Papers following this model give precisely the same quality journalism as the internet, but much more slowly. Also the hysterical liberalism adopted by many editorial boards seems to only sell in Charleston, West Virginia. Try moderating to the level of the market.

It's time for print journalism to remember that they are capitalists and act accordingly. It would be a real shame to see some of these old publications die off.

Facebook eliminating those with conservative ideology?

Many conservatives around the country have found the social networking sites like Facebook, Myspace, Twitter are useful tools to network with other conservatives. After all these sites are specifically designed to assist people in networking, but it appears that at least one may not wish conservatives to be able to network with each other. Stories of conservatives being deleted from Facebook have been floating around the internet for months, but until it happened to a few friends on Facebook and then myself I though they were only rumors.

For me problems began shortly after appearing on the Fox News Channel, which is owned by News Corp which also owns Myspace, Facebook’s larger rival in the social networking internet realm. An influx of new friend requests and new friend suggestions began to roll in from people of like minded conservative ideology. Shortly after accepting the new friend requests and suggestions that Facebook was suggesting I began to get warnings about possible abusive behavior. After reading the “Terms of Use” I could not find anywhere where I was being abusive for responding to friend request and suggestions, so I requested clarification by contacting Facebook.

Inquiries to Facebook only resulted in automated responses, “The Facebook Team has received your inquiry. We should get back to you soon.” Nothing beyond this response was ever received. My experience is not unique among conservatives across the nation. One Conservative Facebooker, of Ames, IA, kept having her accounts deleted, but could get no where when trying to find out why, “I never got my original account back. I got my 2nd account back after a month after 30 emails someone finally bit and told me I was banned. I asked for specifics, [they] couldn't answer me.” Many conservatives are reporting that Facebook is unresponsive to request for information as to why their accounts are being deleted.

The deletions do not just affect the individual Facebook account of the user; sometimes they have far reaching effects. A Facebook event listing for a dinner with RNC Chairman Michael Steele, himself a Facebook member, was deleted along with the conservative user that posted the event. For many this was their only point of contact for the event which included times and directions. Friends and political connections also are also lost when Facebook is the only point of contact. The Iowa Conservative said, “I am very involved in politics. This is NUTS. I am losing friends like crazy to accounts being disabled.”

It has been reported in the media that Facebook has had problems with people registering under fake names and they are disabling those account, but so far most of the conservatives having their accounts disabled have had fairly normal names. The Iowa Conservative believes “We need a conservative Facebook NOW!”

Janeane Garofalo needs to make up her mind

Obama to Traditional Liberal Media Elite: Drop Dead

Obama and his public relations crew just initiated the next great gaffe of the administration. They announced that they will increasingly bypass the White House Press Corps to speak directly with bloggers and other alternative forms of media. Of course they plan to only speak to liberal and leftist sources so as to avoid the "filter" and speak directly to the base.

I just spoke to friend about this latest Obamfoolery. He responded with "Sounds like what the Republicans have been doing for years." My response to him? "Exactly."

It's called preaching to the choir. Republicans have followed this strategy and it does not work. Sure it feels better to only speak with people that believe in what you are doing and will not challenge you. The GOP set up its own news agency for awhile for this purpose. This strategy got the Republicans nowhere.

Imagine how bad it will turn out for the leftist Obamacrats. The liberal news media helped to create Obama and now, when times for them are toughest, they propose to ignore their benefactor. It looks like revenge against a press corps that has shed much of the partisanship of the past several years and has returned to some semblance of real reporting. The fawning stopped, real journalism began, and the Obamacrats are shocked. How dare any reporter challenge The One!

Why the challenges? Part of the coverage is the sudden absence of Bush, who inspired a bizarre hatred among the journalistic community. Part of it is because of Bush. The coverage of him was so slanted, they now have to demonstrate journalistic fairness by questioning their own choice as president. Most of it is because Obama has bumbled and fumbled in his first two months. With his poll numbers down to around 50%, he blames not his own incompetence and lack of even effort, but the press corps for doing at least part of its its job.

How will the press react? Reporters have already turned away from the Won in many instances. Now you will see the editors and producers go after him. He is shunning them at a time when they are most vulnerable. They will not go down without a fight.

Should be fun!

CNN and the Left

Former CNN reporter, Mauricio Funes, was just elected President of El Salvador. Now many main stream news outlets are leaving out the fact that Funes was a former CNN reporter. The Washington Post reported, "Mauricio Funes, a former TV newsman who was recruited to run for president," and Reuters "Funes -- a former TV journalist and candidate of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front," both mention that he was a TV news journalist, but they fail to mention the the CNN element. Why?

CNN has been accused of left wing bias it their reporting over the years, a fact that they deny. The reality is most of the main stream press has been accused of left leaning bias, so leaving out the fact that Mauricio Funes was CNN Reporter might be done on purpose. The political party, Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMNL) which was named for Farabundo Marti the founder of El Salvadors Communist Party. El Salvadors Communist led years of civil war leading to allegations of war crimes.

The facts are a former CNN reporter is a communsit and not just any communist, but now the leader of El Salvador. Why was this fact left out or glossed over in reporting? It is the reporters job to report the facts and not leave anything out. More media bias?

Winds of Change, Words of Deceit

Monday night I had the opportunity to attend one of the monthly Windmill meetings that are open to the public and designed to keep the community informed and give the opportunity for the public to ask questions. The format is quiet simple, a presentation is made, questions are ask of the permanent panel of local leaders, then the public in attendance is allowed to ask questions. If it is something that can’t be answered immediately, then it is put on the agenda for the next meeting or a reference for that information is given. It works quite well.

Last night there were some anti-jobs people there disrupting the meeting, I’m all for exercising freedom of speech, but you don’t purposely disrupt a meeting and make accusations you can’t back up. Several times during the meeting the anti-jobs people had to be ask to be respectful to the other speakers. It was mainly a tactic to get the attention of the media present and judging by Tuesday’s paper they succeeded, as the article doesn’t accurately reflect the events of the meeting.

I especially like the quote by Greg Trainor in the newspaper, “This is more of monologue.” While it was true that Mr. Trainor said that, it fails to point out it was during Dave Friend’s presentation. The presentation was supposed to be a monologue, the question and answer session came after is presentation, not in the middle of it. Mr. Trainor didn’t want to play by the rules like the rest of the people in attendance were willing to do, and when the question and answer session came Mr. Trainor didn’t really ask questions as much as he made accusations. Mr. Trainor needs to understand you learn by listening and not shouting over the people that are trying to answer your questions.

Trainor did ask a question that is impossible to answer. “I want to know how many houses will be powered, what you really think?” But it was his point to ask a question that couldn’t be answered correctly. You can take average estimated output of the windfarm and average home electrical usage, but beyond that the question can’t be answered. Mr. Trainor knew that. He wanted an exact number that doesn’t exist, because then he could use that number to say look under these conditions that it is wrong.

Well most people are quick to understand that in the middle of the night in the fall when there is a strong wind and people are asleep using very little electric the project may meet the needs of 100,000 homes. The average person is also smart enough to understand that on a 100 degree summer day a noon and no wind is blowing that the project can’t supply work to a single electric fan. The people are smarter than Mr. Trainor believes.

In 30-days the project is filing its papers with the Public Service Commission. 99% of the questions asked by the anti-jobs group will be answered in that public filing. The Windmill project is operating releasing its information as prescribed by the laws of the state of West Virginia, but the anti-jobs group is demanding information be released in a matter not in accordance with the law. US Windforce is complying with the law as they should and when the follow the law the anti-jobs group accuses them of trying to hide something. The anti-jobs group is using deceit to stop the positive change coming to our community.

Last Word on the W Movie

No, I haven't seen it yet and I don't plan on doing so.

However I read a review in Fox News's website that was almost gushing about how even handed it was. Oliver Stone expressed sympathy towards President Bush in a manner that astounded the writer of the review. It was sympathy with a cruel edge though.

Oliver Stone is a master propagandist. His film about the president undermines George W. Bush's legacy in a manner much more effective than the juvenile Michael Moore could ever comprehend. Stone states that he felt sorry for President Bush, citing the effects of a domineering father and a supporting cast of evil geniuses such as Condoleeza Rice. Here is the final liberal position on George W. Bush, a good but weak man manipulated by evil conservatives. Such "sympathy" could destroy the historical legacy of this administration, at least in the short term.

Stone asserts that every statement made by the president in the movie is true and backed by at least two sources. Such is the basis for arguing against inaccuracy. However words can be given context or have context taken away. Words can be delivered by an actor in such a way as to change the original intent of the speaker.

George W. Bush's legacy will remain as controversial as that of Harry Truman. Both men will have their presidencies interpreted very differently for the foreseeable future. Take two of the many looks at Truman made in the past fifteen years. David McCullough's biography, Truman and Arnold Offner's Another Such Victory.

Offner condemns Truman as a backwards provincial whose narrow vision led to disastrous results. Those results included the dropping of the atomic bomb on Japan and America's early moves in the Cold War. Using the same statements and facts, McCullough celebrates Truman's middle American common sense as a strong factor in a successful foreign policy. Both men look at the same man's words and deeds to produce wildly different conclusions. Those who disapprove of America's leadership role in world affairs will side with Offner, while those who see the US as a positive force shaping the world will agree with McCullough.

Typically, Offner brushes aside critics of his denunciation of Truman by claiming they are blinded by "Fourth of July" triumphalism. Any idea that someone could legitimately and intelligently believe that Truman made good decisions about US foreign policy is laughed off. One sees the same response to arguments that Reagan played some role in ending the Cold War or that George W. Bush made the nation safe from terror in his presidency.

Hopefully academics will look at Bush's presidency with eyes not blinded by hatred to see the accomplishments made. It took a long time for FDR to get any credit from Republicans. Only recently has Truman earned grudging respect. Reagan is only now being described in positive terms by such unlikely people as Obama. Bush's day should come, but it will be a very long time.

Fear and Loathing in Charleston, West Virginia

It must already be desperation time for the Charleston Gazette's drive to oust Representative Shelley Moore Capito from office.

Columnist Jim Haught last week produced a long and rambling column, more like a list, of alleged Moore misdeeds. Some of these came to light as a result of the paper's undying obsession with the popular Republican governor. The column raises interesting questions about journalism in West Virginia.

The obvious pride shown by Haught and his employer in taking down Arch Moore should raise a question in anyone's mind (anyone who does not live in a cave or who is not a non thinking left wing liberal) about the other side. Journalists pay lip service to objectivity, but when has the Gazette ever written an expose of a Democratic politician? If you read the pages of the Charleston morning paper, GOP misdeeds happen every day, but Democrats are merely victims of Republican vendettas.

What about the Gazette's undying love affair with John F. Kennedy? Interestingly, as a side note, Kennedy's policies look much more like Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush than Obama or Kerry, but the Gazette does not often deal in inconvenient facts. Put a (D) after Reagan or Bush and they'd be heroes worthy of beatification in the Gazette's partisan eyes. While Kennedy's foreign and economic policies often made sense, his West Virginia record was fairly mixed. He brought in the Appalachian corridor system, but to become president had to lie, cheat, and corrup[t his way into office. If you read Dr. Allen Loughry's account of the 1960 presidential primary, you'd probably figure that at the very least, Ted Kennedy (who led the campaign in Southern West Virginia) should have spent some time in a federal prison instead of the US Senate. Loughry, by the way, was a Caperton administration official, not a GOP hatchet man.

If you do not believe him, read Raymond Chafin's Just Good Politics. This autobiography of a Democratic boss in Logan County was written with the help of liberal writer Topper Sherwood. A subsequent and more detailed account written later by Keith Davis was forwarded by Earl Ray Tomblin. They discuss shenanigans that make Moore's alleged offenses look fairly petty, but presented them in a nostalgic, back home sort of manner. Of course Sherwood recently wrote a fawning commentary for the Gazette about Obama. The gist of the book is that Chafin was just helping the folks who helped him like good politicians always do. In reality, Chafin accepted thousands of dollars to buy precincts for John F. Kennedy in his primary campaign. He also used the State Road Commission as a place to reward the politically faithful. Loughry blames this campaign for introducing a whole new scale of corruption to the state political system.

As for Governor Moore, the Gazette never balanced the equation of his political career with his achievements as they certainly have with Democratic politicians who ended up in jail. Moore fought for and got an expanded interstate highway system, for example. During the Flood of 1985 he acted aggressively to secure federal funds, to help the afflicted, and got people's lives back to normal as quickly as possible. Instead of wringing his hands waiting for the president to act (like the Democratic governor of Louisiana during Katrina) Moore did everything the law allowed and then some.

It is time for state GOP press outlets to start shining the lights a little more closely on Democratic politicians and their past. It would only be fair. Questions and rumors about unfair elections have surrounded a few Democrats for years. The people are probably kind of curious to see what would come up.

We won't see this from the Gazette. They are too busy trying to use the problems of twenty and thirty years ago to unseat a popular and effective congresswoman guilty of nothing. It is typical of the Charleston paper to apply this kind of guilt by association tactic, especially since it looks like Capito will cruise to yet another strong victory in November.

Rockefeller Insults Veterans

A big thank you to Vic Sprouse for bringing this to our attention.

Our United States Senator, Jay Rockefeller, in an attempt to defend his backing of Barrack Obama, lashed out at John McCain's service. He belittled McCain's role as a combat pilot. Rockefeller criticized McCain's role as simply being a guy that dropped laser guided bombs on people, then he flew away never for a moment considering the fate of the people he bombed.

You know that the state media will never publicize these comments. That is why it is so important to supplement the traditional news by reading these conservative blogs. Rockefeller gave us a clue as to his entire elitist mindset about the military and those who serve. He thinks nothing of the danger those pilots faced. He thinks nothing of the fact that McCain was eliminating threats to soldiers on the ground fighting for their lives. No, Rockefeller is an elitist guy from an elitist school who will never understand the sense of duty and honor that John McCain represents.

I am going to cut and paste Vic Sprouse's blog entry in its entirety and send it to my friends and relatives who served. Here is a link.

http://www.changewv.com/2008/should-jrock-continue-as-head-of-intelligence

Spread the word and donate to Jay's Republican opponent. We need to get this information over the television and radio airwaves next fall.

CNN Admits they didn't do their pre-debate homework