Nobody would ever hope or pray for a hurricane to strike at the expense of their political opponent. Or would they? Well, maybe Michael Moore would. In fact, he did, as has already been discussed on this site.
Financial Times
By Ken Shepherd | August 26, 2008 | 6:12 PM EDT
Partly because this story doesn't fit preconceived liberal storylines and partly because the Democratic Convention is taking up all the oxygen in the mainstream media, you can expect this story to remain buried in your newspaper and be given little if any attention on cable news networks.
From page 17 of today's Financial Times, "US drillers to get $1bn court award" comes news of how federal government red tape often holds up oil companies for drilling on leases they've already sunk billions of dollars into (emphasis mine):
A US federal appeals court ruled yesterday that 11 oil and gas companies should receive more than $1bn awarded to them in 2006 after the government effectively changed the terms of leases to drill off the California coast.
The US Court of Appeals was upholding a 2006 ruling that the government had breached the leases when changes in federal law materially interfered with the companies' efforts to develop the oil and gas reserves off California.
The case points to the difficulties US oil and gas companies have developing oil and gas resources in the US.
By Ken Shepherd | August 13, 2008 | 11:58 AM EDT
"Three prominent Republicans declare their support for Obama" insisted the August 13 Financial Times front page headline. But who are these "prominent" GOPers that have gone Obamacan? Staffer Edward Luce pointed to two left-of-center Republicans ousted in the 2006 mid-terms and one Rita Hauser, who is no stranger to supporting Democrats for president:
Barack Obama won the endorsement yesterday of three prominent Republicans, including Jim Leach and Lincoln Chafee, both of whom lost their congressional seats to Democratic opponents in the 2006 mid-term elections.
[...]
The three, who include Rita Hauser, a former White House intelligence adviser, stressed foreign policy as their principal motivation and alarm at what Ms Hauser described as the Republican nominee's "bellicose" stance on Russia's conflict with Georgia.
By Ken Shepherd | August 12, 2008 | 5:00 PM EDT
Note to the Financial Times: When one nation sends tanks and troops across the border into another sovereign nation, that's an invasion, not an "invasion," even when you're quoting President Bush. An acute case of Bush Derangement Syndrome needn't cloud editorial judgment.
Yet that's precisely what the FT did in the August 12 paper as headline writers chose to dismissively place the word "invasion" in quote marks for the front page story, "Bush slams Russia 'invasion'" (emphasis mine):
President George W. Bush last night accused Russia of invading Georgia and said Moscow appeared to be mounting an effort to overthrow the "duly elected government" in Tbilisi.
The sharply tougher tone from Washington came after Russia defied mounting international pressure and opened a new front in its five-day-old war with Georgia yesterday, sending tanks and troops deeper into the territory of its southern neighbour.
By Ken Shepherd | August 1, 2008 | 5:36 PM EDT
In his July 31 blog entry, "Postcard from the gun show," Financial Times correspondent and loyal subject of Queen Elizabeth II Clive Crook admits that he "may get thrown out of Georgetown for this," but he applauds the rugged individualism of the American gun owner.:
Aside from other motivations-sport, self-defence-the gun-show universe is about pride, self-reliance, and resentment at being bossed around. Distinctively American traits, wouldn't you say? Best in moderation, no doubt-but still, where would the country be without those attitudes? I may get thrown out of Georgetown for this, but I say, good for them.
In the midst of describing his first-ever visit to a gun show in the Colonies, the British expat expressed agreement with the rationale for laws permitting concealed carry for law-abiding citizens:
By Ken Shepherd | July 28, 2008 | 2:53 PM EDT
If the MRC had an annual Charlie Gibson Award for Praise of Nancy Pelosi, I'd have to think Financial Times reporter Stephanie Kirchgaessner would be in the running for the 2008 prize.
In a news analysis piece in the July 28 paper -- "Energy crisis sees Pelosi run a tight ship for Democrats" -- Kirchgaessner praised Pelosi's parliamentary prowess:
Steering the Democrats' response to the energy crisis without alienating environmentalists or the struggling middle class could prove to be one of the biggest tests Ms Pelosi will face this year. Her record suggests that the speaker will respond to the challenge with astute political manoeuvring, showing once again that, though she is labelled a "San Francisco liberal", the roots of her political education lie in the rough and tumble world of Baltimore, where her father was mayor.
Yes, congressional approval ratings are in the cellar, Kirchgaessner admitted later in her article, but you've got to admire how Pelosi can crack the whip and keep her caucus in line:
By Ken Shepherd | July 5, 2008 | 6:26 PM EDT
London-based broadsheet the Financial Times spilled vials of poisonous ink in a July 5 obituary marking the death of former North Carolina senator Jesse Helms, going strong out the gate by charging that Helms was "little less than a monster" to "many around the world."Writer Jurek Martin boiled down the political career of Helms, "The reviled Republican courted by his adversaries," as nothing more than that of "a man who never bothered to disguise his dislike for his enemies and his determination to frustrate them."Martin listed the former Soviet Union, Fidel Castro's regime, and China among Helms's enemies, while failing to acknowledge the systemic human rights abuses from these regimes that a broad swath of liberals and conservatives alike shared (and share) a strong aversion for. As for the United Nations, another target of the late senator's criticism, Martin glossed over Helms's bipartisan cooperation with the very liberal Democratic Sen. Joe Biden (Del.). Helms and Biden co-sponsored legislation in 1999 that held up U.S. dues to the international body in order to spur it to enact reforms. Martin chalked up the success of the dues-withholding policy to Clinton administration officials:
By Ken Shepherd | January 18, 2008 | 2:39 PM EST
One of the American mainstream media's favorite John McCain memes is that South Carolina voters rejected the Arizona Republican in 2000 because of a baseless smear campaign about McCain's personal life. That bias is so infectious it's now a global pandemic, just witness this item from the January 18 edition of the London-based Financial Times:
McCain hopes to avoid repeat of 2000For John McCain, victory in tomorrow's Republican primary in South Carolina would exorcise the ghosts of the bitterest moment in his political career.It was in South Carolina in 2000 that his first presidential campaign crumbled after a vicious smear campaign by supporters of his opponent, George W. Bush.A barrage of misinformation was spread through phone calls and leaflets, including claims the Arizona senator had fathered an illegitimate black child and that his wife was a drug addict.The smears reinforced doubts about Mr McCain among social conservatives and helped deliver Mr Bush a victory that set him on course for the Republican nomination.
The problem, of course is that the smear tactics were not only never proven to be linked to the Bush campaign, they are taken on face value as THE driving factor rather than conservative distaste for the more liberal stances of John McCain when set in contrast to then-Gov. Bush.For example, McCain ran, to be charitable, gun-shy on income tax cuts compared to then-Gov. Bush's tax cut plans. What's more, McCain actually pushed some tax hikes and demagogic rhetoric about a major industry in South Carolina centered on the state's most profitable cash crop, tobacco.Take this Nexis transcript excerpt from Linda Douglass's report on the Feb. 3, 2000 edition of ABC's "World News Tonight" (emphasis mine):
By Ken Shepherd | January 16, 2008 | 2:55 PM EST
Writing in the January 16 Financial Times, reporter Marc Frank takes a look at Cuban politics as though it were an actual liberal democracy, not a Marxist dictatorship. Frank finds no irony or contradiction-in-terms in the way he qualifies the election as a public ratification of a pre-determined outcome. And in what amounts to a laughable print edition subheading, Frank's editor wrote this in the subhead to "Castro keeps world guessing on retirement":
Even if the head of state stands down, he may still be able to exert power from the sidelines, writes Marc Frank.
Gee, ya think?!Here are the first few paragraphs of Frank's page 3 report, with my emphasis added:
By Mark Finkelstein | December 17, 2007 | 9:57 PM EST
Despite his war wounds, can Bob Kerrey still kick Chris Matthews' butt? We might soon find out, because on this evening's Hardball Matthews lumped Kerrey into a group of Clinton sycophants he derided as "castratos" and a "eunuch chorus."
Chris was kvetching about the way a variety of Hillary Clinton supporters including Kerrey have lined up to take shots at Barack Obama. In endorsing Hillary yesterday, the former Nebraska senator went out of his way to draw attention to Obama's Muslim background.
View video here.
By Ken Shepherd | December 6, 2007 | 11:12 AM EST
Here's a substantive critique of Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.), from the international stage no less, that I've seen unreported in American media thus far.The Democratic presidential candidate is under fire from a European trade official who suggests that her hinted support for more trade protectionism would prove harmful to the global economy. The December 6 Financial Times reported the comments by European Union trade commissioner Peter Mandelson above-the-fold on its front page (emphasis mine):
By Ken Shepherd | December 5, 2007 | 3:31 PM EST
The Financial Times (FT) is reporting that an Iran-bound ship seized by the United Arab Emirates last month "contained materials banned by UN Security Council resolutions 1737 and 1747, while the purchaser of the materials has been barred by the same resolutions."Those resolutions were put in place, FT writers Simeon Kerr and Najmeh Bozorgmehr noted in their December 5 article, "to curtail its [Iran's] nuclear development programme."Although Kerr and Bozorgmehr's Emirati government source "declined to identify the contents of the cargo or the Iranian company" that ordered them, the development is newsworthy, particularly in light of the shift in the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), that now concludes that Iran stopped its nuclear program in 2003.A search of the December 5 Washington Post found no articles similar to Kerr and Bozorgmehr's, although it's unclear if the FT reporters have an exclusive scoop. On December 4, the Post ran two above-the-fold front page stories about the 2007 NIE, including a news analysis piece by Peter Baker and Robin Wright entitled "A Blow to Bush's Tehran Policy."