Web Commonerprogressive politics, social commentary, and ramblings on pop culture

One day after FOX News released their latest findings inferring that “Americans” do not want Barack Obama’s healthcare plan, FOX News figureheads, Bill O’Reilly and Chris Wallace, jumped on the air to do some usual fact-twisting, spin-laden analysis, asking why the White House might be snubbing their network in its latest press junket to promote the president’s proposals …

According to O’Reilly, FOX News is the only network today that really matters, thanks mostly to a mysterious migration of so-called “independent” voters recently to Fox’s viewership. In the interview, O’Reilly and Wallace do their best to pretend that the network’s coverage is fair, yet Wallace appears surprisingly unrestrained while making statements like the Obama administration is the “biggest bunch of crybabies” that he ever saw, or blatantly circumventing fact by stating that the number of participants in the recent 9/12 tea-party protests in Washington DC added up to a “million, or hundred thousand, thousands, or tens of thousands.”

Almost in the same breath, O’Reilly attempts to drive home the point that the so-called “power shift” in the media is now with FOX News and talk radio, all because so-called “independents who make the calls” are, apparently, in bed with a news organisation that consistently distorts factual data, intentionally manipulates its audience, and injects subjective opinion into every story that it reports. Of course, what O’Reilly neglected to point out is that the Republican party is in shambles, desperately seeking to separate itself from the party’s pathetic reputation garnished within the last ten or so years, and undergoing an elusive transformation that gives way to a new, so-called “independent” mindset.

By redefining themselves as Independents, disoriented Republican dissidents see an opportunity to save face after enduring eight solid years of embarrassing let-downs under a leader who originally gave them great hope and inspiration. In reality, these so-called “independents” continue to think very much like old school Republicans, which means that they still need to rely heavily on their beloved news network to act as an official microphone for their new and developing political branch. Fortunately for them, specific, strategically placed personalities at FOX are available to serve as official spokespeople for the new, smoke and mirrors faction, despite the reality of their audiences being little more than recycled Republican viewers.

Traditionally, professional journalists steered clear of announcing party affiliation in a more objectively driven industry, holding to an unwritten rule that a journalist might project bias into coverage by revealing their personal views concerning specific policy issues. This is precisely why Bill O’Reilly makes it a point to highlight Chris Wallace’s past credentials, siting 11 years with ABC News, and subsequently mentioning Wallace’s biological father, 60 Minutes staple, Mike Wallace, all to link the FOX News Sunday host’s connections and experience to his assumed ability to host a “fair and balanced” television news show in 2009. Of course, the game is not what it used to be, and broadcast news has come a long way since the days of Mike Wallace and the halfway-objective journalist. Today, personal opinion-driven talking heads rule the 24-hour news circuit and, of course, FOX played a tremendous role in creating that environment.

One of the most prominent and popular characters to embrace so-called “independent” voters at FOX News is Glenn Beck, who took up full time residence there after moving his freakish road show to the network following a two-year stint with CNN. Launching one of the most strange and all-together scary live broadcasts in American television news history, Beck regularly uses the medium as an outlet to spew outlandish conspiracy theories that target the Obama administration and their so-called socialist agenda. He often touts his audience as one that represents all political persuasions, encouraging them to set aside petty political differences, and calling them to arms in a fight to take back a corrupt government. Of course, behind the scenes, Beck is well aware of the fact that his core following primarily consists of bitter, paranoid, and virile Republicans and Republican outcasts frustrated with corruption and bureaucracy, which actually came to a head at the hight of the previous administration. Of course, there is also another sliver of his audience who likely represent nomadic passerby’s, popping in and out on occasion, hoping to witness that predictable moment of self-sacrifice when Beck finally goes off the deep end.

Meanwhile, those who isolate themselves as independents on their voter registration cards are moving away from traditional broadcast news outlets, along with progressives, and taking residence online instead, mostly out of frustration for a devolving medium in television. Unfortunately, the people left behind are those who demonstrate a stubborn unwillingness to embrace new technologies, and subsequently have little choice but to follow FOX’s coverage as competing network ratings fall and content suffers as a consequence. Their pockets ere empty, and they see a government spending unprecedented amounts of money in a sweeping quest to restore the country’s economy. They turn to so-called independent voices like Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, or Chris Wallace, and what they hear in those voices, no matter how fantastical or irresponsibly manipulative, stirs emotions into patriotic action and renewed political vibrancy.

Spending a good portion of my day tracking an erroneous article about a new Fox News poll is not my idea of a good time, but sometimes a person has to bite the bullet and endure a little self-induced torture, simply to get the necessary results that they’re so desperately seeking. Yesterday, I found myself halted half-way through a daily ritual of scanning the latest headlines on Google News after coming across a new poll indicating, “Americans Prefer Current System to Obama’s Health Care Plan.” This should be interesting, I thought, and rashly clicked the link.

As expected, the site brought me deep into the heart of FoxNews.com’s political section and their so-called “fair and balanced” coverage of today’s news. I read the article, by Dana Blanton, which concludes that a poll released by FOX News on Thursday, September 17, found that, “Most Americans see no upside for their family in the health care reforms being considered in Washington and don’t believe President Obama when he says his plan won’t add “one dime” to the federal deficit.” Given the detailed wording of these and other claims, I decided to let the raw data speak for itself.

Of course, the raw data was not available, and neither was the full poll results. In fact, clicking these links on the page got the following disparaging result:

Page Cannot Be Found

Okay, maybe Safari simply had a brain freeze, so I clicked the ‘back’ button and tried the links again. Still nothing, and at this point, the blood started boiling inside my head. Isn’t it irresponsible for a major news network to publish fact-based claims based on polling data that is not available to the reader? This point of contention was enough to propel me into registering at the news conglomerate’s website for the first time and expressing my reservations concerning the report:

by webcommoner[Sep 17, 2009 5:01:02 PM]
Surprise, surprise … links to view the “full poll results” and “raw data” explaining who, exactly, was polled are dead. Page Cannot Be Found How convenient, and how incredibly irresponsible. 5:00 PM EST

I checked back regularly throughout the day to monitor changes, even reinstating my search on Google News several times, but to no avail. Each time that I returned to the site, the raw data and poll results links remained broken, and more and more commenters saw it fit to note this obvious indiscretion. In fact, one of the last comments on the thread posted by edrivcol2112 at 3:47 AM on September 18, still demonstrated Fox’s indifference to these complaints, despite its grammatic fault:

“Fix the link showing the poll numbers are admit this is a fabrication, Fox News.”

The following morning, a subsequent Google News search yielded even more FOX News Poll stories, all based on the same raw data that was inconveniently absent the day before. Of course, this time, the “Americans Prefer Current System to Obama’s Health Care Plan” story linked to a new and separate page, finally making the poll data available to readers, but apparently ditching the comments that previously accompanied the story. Buried somewhere within the depths of FOX News obscurity, I thought, is a page with accompanying comments that question the story’s validity based on data missing from their website, and only a handful of people know.

Having a quick look at the results, which are now available, I scanned through the raw data and found information that is likely typical of a “fair and balanced” FOX News poll, including nothing that indicates whether or not their sample is random or where the telephone numbers that they used to perform the poll actually came from. Then, of course, there is a significantly high percentage of Independents interviewed, which seemed strange given the size of that party’s constituency, and a proportionately skewed ratio of blacks to whites questioned, which is concerning given the fact that the poll addresses issues of race. Finally, it seems convenient, at the very least, that blacks and whites appear to be the only ethnic groups available when the poll was conducted, which reflects data dating back to January, 2009.

A scan of the questions asked indicate a gross manipulation of verbiage, likely used to evoke emotion and provoke specific answers, like when interviewers ask, “how much attention do you feel Congress pays to what regular Americans think when it decides what to do.” Shouldn’t pollers excuse themselves from injecting subjective classifications concerning who is and who is not a “regular” American? Or, how about when FOX asks its subjects if, “you are more likely to: Vote for the Democrat to help Barack Obama pass his policies and programs,” in the next congressional election. Project much? The question that takes the cake, though, is the one that asks, “what do you think the president should be spending more time on right now – fixing the economy or reforming heath care,” as if he is unable to do both at the same time or, better yet, that both are not linked. I could go on, but you get the point.

Then, of course, there is that explosive cherry bomb that most pollers always seem to neglect when it comes to reporting coverage based on poll results, which is the fact that those questioned are only among “likely voters.” FOX then deems it appropriate to relabel these individuals, “Americans,” in their reporting and headlines, rather than call them what they really represent, a small cross-section of a much larger population. So, does FOX’s label for this group inherently imply that unlikely voters are un-American? Of course, scrutiny of the numbers themselves likely requires an infinite amount of patience, time, and due diligence that I am unwilling to yield at this point, and my guess is that FOX News viewers share the same sentiment, if they even care at all to check under the hood and see what’s driving the engine. Undoubtedly, Fox’s, “We report, you decide,” cabal not only depends on that notion, but lives and dies by it.

That’s right, folks. It would appear that our president is human after all … not a superman, not a robot, and not a deity. Just a complex, interdependent, and structured mass of flesh and bone. In a moment of bold and sincere honesty, he let his guard down and revealed himself in a manner that might seem shocking to some Americans:

“I don’t know, not having been there and not seeing all the facts, what role race played in that. But I think it’s fair to say, No. 1, any of us would be pretty angry; No. 2, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home; and, No. 3, what I think we know separate and apart from this incident is that there’s a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately. That’s just a fact.”

This response came from Barack Obama after a reporter asked, in a nationally televised press conference focusing on the president’s healthcare proposals, about the recent arrest of Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. at his home in Cambridge and what it says about race relations in America. Gates is a literary critic, educator, scholar, writer, and editor with a number of notable achievements under his belt, including honorary degrees and awards. He sits on the boards of various arts, cultural, and research institutions, serves as the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor at Harvard University, directs the W. E. B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research and, finally, he is a personal friend to the Obama family.

It took only seconds after hearing that word, “stupidly,” before I realized the political firestorm it would muster. I could hear the media blitzkrieg that would follow as radio blowhards like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity took to the airwaves the next day. They would tear the president to shreds on their syndicated “talk” shows, fulfilling assumed roles as civilian officers and arresting Obama for his criticism of the nation’s good men and women of law enforcement. They would brand him a crony for favoring an esteemed intellectual who they likely consider, at least under their breath, to be just another “affirmative action baby” and, as loudly and surely as they accused Sonia Sotomayor, they would label the president a racist. It would come swift, it would come hard and, most importantly for them and their party, it would stir their base into a feeding frenzy, serving up the perfect storm of criticism that would toss a looming cloud over the president’s entire agenda.

Regardless of what the pundits might say, the harshest criticism actually came in the form of a rebuttal from Gates’ arresting officer. In multiple radio and TV interviews, Sgt. James Crowley told the local press that he supports the president “110 percent,” but believed that the president should not have waded into a local issue without knowing the facts. Those “facts,” available on the filed police report, which quickly surfaced on the Internet, indicate that the officer arrested Gates outside his home after he exhibited “loud and tumultuous” behavior. The report states that Gates, seemingly understanding his rights, refused to step outside his home when first prompted by Crowley, who identified himself and indicated that he was investigating a reported break-in. What followed was a back and forth exchange between the two men inside the home, with Gates accusing Crowley of being a racist before finally approaching the officer outside and subsequently being arrested for disorderly conduct.

Admittedly, not knowing the facts of the case and, apparently, not having personally read the police report, Obama would have been smart to steer clear of dispatching judgment so quickly concerning the arrest, but he is our first African American president. I don’t blame him for doing it. More than any presidential candidate or president in recent history, Barack Obama has addressed the subject of race, racism, and the racial divide head-on in speeches to any number of varied populations, from massive, diverse crowds of constituents to middle easterners, Europeans, and Africans to African Americans. Where other presidents, since the years following the civil rights movement, fell short of addressing racial tensions in proper historical context, this president confronts and acknowledges it with the same attention afforded an actual elephant in the room. Hypotheticals flooded the mind as I pondered his and Gates’ current situation. Would circumstances be different if Gates was a white man? What if Obama was white? Would the reporter still ask him about the incident?

The reality of this matter is that, in the eyes of many Americans, Barack Obama is an African American first and a president second. Since race remains a divisive issue in the United States, Obama is forced to address it in manners that other presidents could easily avoid. Still, some pretend to ignore this reality, expecting the president to act as if wearing some sort of impenetrable force field that serves to repel discussions of race and inequality. It’s not fair and, as long as racial discrimination flourishes, we should not expect Barack Obama to ignore it. Minorities are too often driven to the brink of paranoia by their daily experiences in America, constantly being surveyed and seen as different. Evidence of undue racism rears its ugly head on a personal level constantly, and the country experiences it in bulk all too often. It may be watching the American judicial system acquit four LAPD officers after brutally beating a man in broad daylight, or television coverage of thousands neglected in New Orleans after Katrina makes landfall. It might be watching white mothers who kidnap or kill their children only to pass the buck on to the usual scapegoat and stereotypical violent, black male, or seeing nooses strung over tree branches in the wake of racial injustice in Jena. Finally, it might be listening to Republican party supporters fulfilling their personal want or need to holler racial epithets aimed at a presidential candidate in political campaign rallies across the country.

Racism against minorities thrives in America, even in 2009. It’s still here, still real, and still dangerous. The same is true with racial profiling and, for these reasons, I am not surprised to hear our first minority president impulsively jump to conclusions and express relative concern for a friend and fellow African American, whose experiences in this country are uniquely bound and shared to the point of understanding an all-too-often ignored oppressive force that comes at them from every angle. Nobody knows for sure how much race actually played a role in Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s arrest last week but, I’m personally sure about one thing … what Gates said to Mr. Crowley and his Cambridge neighbors as officers led him away in handcuffs is correct. This is what happens to black men in America and, if I walked in his shoes, I might think twice about an officer’s motives as he passed through that threshold between his world and mine. Until the country reaches a point where all Americans can walk its streets without being stopped by an officer or gawked at with little more reason than the color of their skin, I will continue to sympathize with Gates’ and Obama’s concern or, more appropriately, their frustration.

What exactly is “judicial activism” anyway? Contextually speaking, it’s a rhetorical catch phrase used by the political right to counter years of judicial precedence. The phrase picked up great momentum during the Bush and Cheney years and, today, Republicans use it when referencing high court nominees who, they claim, may or may not “legislate from the bench.” Behind closed doors, though, operatives within the party use it as a tool to foster change for their base, which sets in motion a concept that conservative court appointees will ignore traditional objectivism and actively seek to reverse ill-favored decisions made in the past. These cases, which set precedence spanning the history of the United States, embody a slew of rulings that touch on issues of civil rights, church and state, gun control, corporate litigation, states rights, right-to-privacy, and abortion.

Washington insiders confined within the rarely seen, but often heard, chambers of political think tanks conjure ways to package complex political concepts into compact, succinct, and portable rhetorical gems like “judicial activism,” which trickles down from the higher ranks of the party, in talking-point fashion, to its outer regions via the mainstream media. Anyone who played the game “telephone” as a child knows that messages usually encounter static as they travel from one person to the next, finally losing their luster and becoming freakish giants of little meaning or substance by the time they reach their intended target. Still, base underlings propagate these loaded words into social settings and family gatherings throughout the country, often inverting their meaning by denying or reinterpreting historical fact, as they relay personal problems in the context of government intervention.

While discussing the Supreme Court confirmation hearings of Sonia Sotomayor, I recently had an encounter with a person who withheld support for the judge, fearing that Sotomayor might uphold abortion “law” if confirmed. Of course, the government never passed a law making abortion legal, and it actually passed laws to ban the practice instead. However, Roe v. Wade’s significance is that the case interpreted those laws barring abortion to be unconstitutional. Still, regardless of the case’s historical context, most conservative Republicans seem to agree that the case allowed women a private right to choose if they wanted to have an abortion. In this context, the term “judicial activism” simply implies that judges have been wrongly upholding that decision since 1973. It could be more accurately argued, though, that judges have actually been rightly using Roe v. Wade as precedence to guide future decisions.

In Sotomayor’s confirmation hearings, the judge explained that the federal court system is constitutionally bound to follow the policy of “stare decisis,” which determines that court decisions must stand by precedent, or acts, decisions, and cases that serve as guides for subsequent situations. Landmark cases like Roe v. Wade serve as precedent for future cases that come before the Supreme Court, and logic dictates that the longer each precedent stands, the more difficult the burden will be on the court to find just cause for reversing it. In fact, this is extremely difficult to do since lawsuits that seek to reverse decisions, which previously set precedence, need to challenge the illegality or unconstitutional merit of laws already determined to be unconstitutional. Ultimately, precedence sets a very high standard that federal judges must use and, contrary to political rhetoric coming from the right, acts that covertly seek to reverse it should be more regarded as attempts to “legislate from the bench” than acts seeking to uphold it.

I was only four years old when Walter Cronkite relinquished his post as anchor of the “CBS Evening News,” and it would be many years into his retirement before I would understand and appreciate the true value of his character, or the full weight of his worth in terms of contributions that he made to the world of journalism and the respect he received from a nation of millions. My memories of Cronkite’s most popular moments are not unique, just recorded glimpses of the man’s stern yet warm delivery of the news as captured in time for the history books to later relay. Many in the baby boomer generation held him in such high regard that he earned the nickname, “Uncle Walter,” a testament to his ability to invade their living rooms each night with the sense of a beloved family member. They welcomed him with open arms, sometimes to receive some of the most disheartening news to hit the nation in the last half-century.

In Cronkite’s time, television was different. People peered into CRT monitors spilling duotone images of black and white into their living rooms. Sound came from a single channel, and “rabbit ear” antennas topped TV sets to receive the only signals available to viewers at the time, broadcasts from three major networks captured over the air. Of course, three networks meant three channels, which broadcast news programming for little more than 30 minutes each night. There was no means for recording what you missed, which meant that information-savvy citizens always knew exactly where they would be and what they would be doing once Walter hit the airwaves to deliver the daily news. At the evening’s end, the sound of a single tone and a screen-saver-like image indicated the end of a network’s daily programming, as if acting as an alarm to alert sleepy Americans that they overstayed their visit to TV land.

This nightly ritual between Cronkite, his network, and his constituency continued for nearly twenty years, through the civil rights and women’s liberation movements, the first lunar landing, Vietnam, Watergate, the Nixon impeachment, and the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy Jr., Senator Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. He endured sweeping change within the business of broadcast news, including the introduction of new competing networks, finally relieving himself of his duty not long before federal action brought cable technology to people’s homes in droves, along with a multitude of new channels. Cronkite seemed to disappear from public life temporarily, but a new generation of news hounds were fortunate enough to rediscover the man after he broke silence to deliver opinion-oriented editorial pieces in publications and on the radio throughout the last decade, which focused on everything from politics to the media.

It was in these moments, on the quiet drive home from work, that I welcomed Walter Cronkite, now a seasoned veteran, into my world. I listened intently as his signature voice, confident and adept, brought me into those old living rooms to relive crucial turning points in our country’s sorted history. His radio essays drew heavily on decades of professional experience, reflecting the challenges that he and his colleagues faced as reporters tasked to cover emotionally charged and politically sensitive events with objective eyes and ears. As I look back at Mr. Cronkite’s career, it would appear to me that his legacy is not really about how he delivered the news to millions each night. Instead, it’s about how he delivered information to people that was pure and unfiltered. Walter leaves this world at a point in our history when an evolving news landscape seeks to, once again, change how we organize and deliver new information. His legacy will serve as a sort of signpost, steering us clear from selfishly seeking out information that we want to know and instead pointing us in a direction towards getting the information that we need to know.

Thanks Uncle Walter. We will remember you always.

New evidence of Michael Jackson’s influence is popping up throughout the Internet in the form of tributes to the deceased entertainer. Friends and fans alike are passing along links to websites like Eternal Moonwalk, where a continuous loop of home videos shows people performing Jackson’s signature move. Other homages highlight his artistic genius, and one particular YouTube user is publishing video mash-ups that combine Jackson’s music with old footage of song-and-dance icons perceived to be his artistic inspirations from entertainment’s past. Check out the following series of clips that chronicle evidence of a historical evolution behind what eventually came to be Michael Jackson’s “Moonwalk.”

Other videos on the page carefully combine edited clips of “West Side Story” with Jackson’s “Beat It” and “Bad,” or clips of Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse dancing to Jackson’s “Smooth Criminal,” all skillfully crafted to demonstrate the entertainer’s obvious affinity towards show tunes, and their influence on his music, dance and videos. The significant difference between those historical gems and Jackson’s own art are the media that presented them, the silver screen versus MTV and the boob tube, which invariably led me to ponder how artistic influence gets recycled over time and through different mediums. As technology evolves and cultures change, valued art from the past gets passed on to succeeding generations, and shared influence continues to turn the wheels of inspiration, progress, and innovation.

Recently, Coldplay’s smash hit, “Viva La Vida,” sparked controversy over whether or not the British band lifted their song’s signature tune from an earlier recording of Joe Satriani’s “If I Could Fly.” The Internet and, more specifically, YouTube, became a sort of advanced interactive medium for fans to compare the music, discuss its transference, and indirectly share its inspiration and influence. To make matters more interesting, convincing compositions by other musicians including Enanitos Verdes and Cat Stevens got thrown into the mix, spanning almost twenty years of artistic works that seemingly influenced other works. Much of the matter’s discussion seems reminiscent of conversations that took place at the turn of the century when advances in production technologies brought Hip-Hop culture from block parties to the recording studio as artists began sampling old recordings to create entirely new music compositions.

In a society that sets high standards on the use of copy-written material, technology is once again testing the limits of artistic progress, and rekindling conversations that take place over the influence of past works. In the United States, arguments over copyright material are historically settled within the confines of America’s courtrooms, but new ideas fostering the free sharing of information via the Internet threatens to blow the hinges off the system’s doors. In the not-so-distant past, peer-to-peer sharing showed signs of destroying the business of record companies, which held a monopoly on music distribution, and lawsuits only gained them enough time to restructure their business models. Today, social networking sites like YouTube are excellent examples of mediums that allow for gross sharing of artistic property and ideas. Meanwhile, a new generation of entrepreneurs is setting aside outdated practices of intellectual protectionism by embracing a culture of sharing, most notably in open-source software development.

Regardless of which way the wind blows on future copyright law, shared influence among artistic works remains a powerful force that inspires human progress and innovation through time, a sort of transference of such subtle references to the past that they can quickly and easily be forgotten. Throughout human history, the past is what shapes our future and, since the day we learned to stand upright and speak, that yearning to share what we know and how we came to know it lingers within, like the blood flowing through our veins. It’s generally accepted that you cannot get something from nothing, especially within the spectacular realm of the shared human experience. So, without Copernicus, there would be no Galileo. Without Greek philosophy, no Roman democracy. Without Chuck Berry, no Beatles and, of course, without Fred Astaire, no Michael Jackson.

Side-stepping the urge to fulfill my role as a member of the “chattering class,” I thought it might be more constructive to provide Sarah Palin with an annotated analysis of her writing, which specifically focuses on the op-ed piece she wrote for the The Washington Post yesterday.

Edits, notes, and suggestions to Mrs. Palin are visible in red or bold typeface …

The ‘Cap And Tax’ Dead End
By Sarah Palin
Tuesday, July 14, 2009

There is no shortage of threats to our economy [Now would be a good opportunity to provide examples]. America’s unemployment rate recently hit its highest mark in more than over 25 years, and it is expected to continue climbing [Who expects this ... economists, you, your accountant?]. Worries are widespread [Again ... Tell us exactly who's worried ... Americans, Alaskans, garbage workers?] that the recovery won’t bring create jobs, even when the economy finally rebounds. Our nation’s The national debt is unsustainable, and the federal government’s reach into the private sector is unprecedented.

Unfortunately, many in the national media would rather prefer to focus on the personality-driven political gossip of the day than on the gravity of these challenges [What challenges?]. So, at risk of disappointing the chattering class, let me make clear what is foremost on my mind, and where my focus will be remains:

I am deeply concerned about President Obama’s cap-and-trade energy plan, and I believe it is an enormous threat to our economy [Now would be a good opportunity to dedicate a sentence or two explaining the president's cap-and-trade energy plan in further detail to your readers]. It The plan would undermine our the economy’s recovery over the short term and would inflict permanent damage.

American prosperity has always been driven by the steady supply of abundant, affordable energy [Historical examples would be a good addition here]. Particularly in In Alaska, we understand the inherent links between energy and prosperity, energy and opportunity, and energy and security. Consequently, many of us in this huge large, energy-rich state recognize that the president’s cap-and-trade energy tax [Is it a plan or a tax? You should be more clear about what it is and why] would adversely affect every aspect of the U.S. economy [Now would be a good opportunity to explain how].

There is no denying that, as the world becomes more industrialized, we need to reform our energy policy and become less dependent on foreign energy sources [According to who, and why?]. But the answer doesn’t lie in making energy scarcer and more expensive [Please elaborate. My understanding is that renewable energy sources are just that ... sources]! Those who understand the issue [It would probably be a good idea to provide further insight into who 'those' people are ... Republicans, conservatives, fifth graders?] know we can meet our energy needs and environmental challenges without destroying America’s economy [I'm hoping that you will soon explain how the president's cap-and-trade energy plan will destroy the economy].

Job losses are so certain under this new cap-and-tax [I'm getting confused ... now it's a "cap-and-tax" plan?] plan that it includes a provision accommodating newly unemployed workers from the resulting dried-up energy sector, to the tune of $4.2 billion over eight years [This sentence is wordy. Try saying this instead ... "The president's cap-and-trade plan ensures job losses by including provisions that accommodate newly unemployed workers from its dried-up energy sector, costing $4.2 billion over eight years." Even after re-wording your sentence, I still don't know what it means]. So much for creating jobs.

In addition to immediately increasing unemployment in the energy sector, even more American jobs will be threatened by the rising increased cost of doing business under the cap-and-tax president’s plan. For example, it will increase the cost of farming will certainly increase, by driving down farm incomes down while and driving up grocery prices up [Now would be a good opportunity to provide an example that explains how]. The costs of manufacturing, warehousing and transportation will also increase [Again ... explain how].

What is tThe ironic beauty inherent in this the president’s plan? Soon, even the most ardent liberal will understand supply-side economics [You may want to consider explaining "supply-side economics" to your readers (liberal and conservative) and insert relevance to your primary point here].

The Americans hit hardest will be those already struggling to make ends meet. As the president eloquently puts it, their electricity bills will “necessarily skyrocket. [Insert quote source and context here]” So much for not raising taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year [Please explain your point further in the context of cap-and-trade ... using statistics or numbers would probably make sense].

Even Warren Buffett, an ardent [Redundant ... try another word. Consult thesaurus if necessary] Obama supporter, admitted that, under the cap-and-tax scheme, “poor people are going to pay a lot more for electricity. [Insert quote source and context here]”

We must move in a new direction. We are ripe for economic growth and energy independence if we responsibly tap the resources that God created right underfoot on American soil [Is your inserting God into this sentence relevant to the argument?]. Just as Equally important, we Americans have more desire and ability to protect the environment than any foreign nation that currently imports our from which we purchase energy today.

In Alaska, we are progressing on the largest private-sector energy project in history. Our 3,000-mile natural gas pipeline will transport hundreds of trillions of cubic feet of our clean natural gas to hungry markets across America the United States. We Alaskans can could also safely drill for U.S. oil offshore and in a tiny, 2,000-acre corner of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge if ever given the go-ahead by Washington bureaucrats.

Of course, Alaska is not the sole source of American energy. Many states have abundant coal resources, whose and new technology is continuously making transforming it into a cleaner energy source. Westerners literally [I think you mean figuratively] sit on mountains of oil and gas, and every state can consider the possibility of nuclear energy.

We have an important choice to make. Do we want to control our energy supply and its environmental impact? Or, do we want to outsource it to China, Russia and Saudi Arabia? Make no mistake: President Obama’s plan will result in the latter [Now would be a good opportunity to explain how the president's cap-and-trade energy plan would outsource energy to other countries].

For so many reasons, we can’t afford to kill responsible domestic energy production or clobber every American consumer with higher prices.

Can America produce more of its own energy through strategic investments that protect the environment [Now would be a good opportunity to explain how drilling for oil, building new gas pipelines and nuclear power plants, and burning more coal protects the environment], therefore revive reviving our economy and secure securing our nation?

Yes, we can. Just not with Barack Obama’s energy cap-and-tax plan.

The writer, Sarah Palin, is a Republican, is and governor of Alaska.

South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford’s news of adultery sent shock waves throughout the political establishment and, more specifically, the Republican party. In a recent interview on MSNBC’s Meet The Press, David Gregory asked South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham if his party remains one of values. Graham responded with a hesitant “yes” and added that the group is also a “party of sinners,” connecting the dots between the Republican party and the religious right, and acknowledging its strong ties to the Christian faith.

The party’s relationship with Christianity is no secret, and most of its members take great pride in identifying themselves as Christians. Still, Graham’s declaration of his party as one of sinners opened a Pandora’s box filled with implication, suggesting that all of the party’s members fall under a Christian umbrella and, as sinners, they know God’s will but often choose to ignore it. In an attempt to stress the will of Christians to forgive, Graham’s statement indirectly demonstrated the tendency of Republicans to invoke faith when addressing unethical behavior committed by its political figureheads.

Mitt Romney, also interviewed by Gregory, said that the “heartbreak” of Sanford’s situation is where people should focus their attention, and herein lies the party’s problem. The Republican mantra of moral superiority through faith often leads to undeniable hypocrisy. Newt Gingrich, a prominent Republican figurehead, married and divorced twice before marrying a third time with a women whom he conducted an extra-marital affair. This moral indignity took place at approximately the same time that Gingrich led a Congressional investigation against Bill Clinton concerning his extra-marital affair with Monica Lewinsky.

Alaska governor and born-again Christian, Sarah Palin, whose hardline stance on pre-marital sex led her to support abstinence only education in her state’s public schools, was forced to announce her daughter’s pregnancy out of wedlock shortly after accepting the nomination for Vice President during last year’s presidential campaign. Pastor Ted Haggard, a former evangelical preacher, founder of the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, and influential political figurehead among evangelical Christians, admitted in 2006 to soliciting a male prostitute for sex and methamphetamine. Mark Foley, a Roman Catholic and former Florida representative, resigned from Congress that same year after allegations surfaced that he sent sexually explicit emails and instant messages to former teenaged male Congressional pages.

Add to this mix the moral improprieties of other well known figureheads within the Republican party including Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Tom Delay, or David Vitter, and what we get is a group of proud hypocrites who regularly preach high standards of ethical conduct, yet habitually practice so-called sinful behavior, and rely on their religion’s basic tenet of forgiveness to ride them through whatever storm may surface as a result of their discretion. The other side of the isle is just as guilty when it comes to the hypocrisy that surrounds it, but the glaring difference between it and those who identify with the religious right is the Democratic Party’s constituency and their tendency to refrain from using the Christian Bible as a means to prejudge others.