And the Beat Goes On.

Both from the LewRockwell.com blog:

"Ron Paul teen Cody Hauer of Owatonna, Minn., is fighting the government tickets, totaling $500, he has gotten for DWP--driving while Paulian."

The guy put up a 13 by 40 inch sign that must block the majority of his view out the back. But the fact that's against the law is not the reason he's being ticketed -- oh, no -- he's being ticketed because he supports Ron Paul!

As part of the "total Paul blackout," Newsmax features him on their cover and credits him with changing the face of the GOP. But is that enough for the paulanoid? No way:

"UPDATE from Jack Mayer: 'Could they have picked a worse picture of Dr. Paul for the cover? Of the thousands of smiling, confident photos from which to choose, they chose that one. No bias there, for sure.'"

Comments

  1. Wait, Gene, are you saying that the "Paulanoids" are imagining any mainstream media bias against Ron Paul, or that they are exaggerating it?

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  2. I'm saying Paul has certainly faced no more, and probably less, MSM bias than a typical "fringe" candidate does.

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  3. Anonymous2:14 AM

    Ok, so why do you think they used that picture, if not to be unflattering?

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  4. The picture is not even unflattering, in my view. He looks serious -- it's the kind of picture they use to show someone is a "fighter," changing the face of the GOP.

    Why in the world, if they wanted to be unflattering, would they put a complimentary story on the cover?!

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  5. http://i.l.cnn.net/cnn/2008/POLITICS/02/14/superdelegates/t1home.super.delegates.ap.jpg

    Hillary and Obama with their mouths hanging open! Mainstream bias against the Dems! (Blogger doesn't allow images directly in a comment.)

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  6. http://i.l.cnn.net/cnn/2008/
    POLITICS/02/14/superdelegates/
    t1home.super.delegates.ap.jpg

    Oops, it cut-off the URL -- you'll have to paste it back together.

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  7. No, after looking at that pic again, let me correct myself -- that image is only unflattering to someone suffering from Paulanoia. They chose an image that made him look like he has just come through a tough fight, battered but undaunted.

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  8. I think the Blogger picture of Gene makes him look like a geek.

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  9. Anonymous8:03 PM

    I don't know, I kind of think the picture makes him look like an angry possessed demon. Granted, his tone in the debates is usually an agitated on and an angry one. However, positive political pieces from mainstream magazines usually show the person dreamily staring into the distance. It would be nice to see one like that of Paul just once.

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  10. For the life of me I can't figure out the animosity. "Fringe". Would you like being labeled the ex-fringe of the fringe? Do Paul supporters have to also defend every other anti-war "fringe" candidate to get your stamp of approval? Gravel has been treated even worse than Paul. Does one have to say that before one may talk about the fix? Anti-state advocates should ALL hate the corporate media, not spend time defending them!?!

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  11. I'm certainly not defending the MSM, just noting that Paul fared no worse than, and sometimes better than, other "fringe" candidates. Therefore, it's silly to posit some unique, anti-Paul bias.

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  12. Perhaps we are having a semantic problem here.

    "Bias"...conscious or unconscious? To be born in this blatantly socialist country (founded, c.1933), get through University, then climb all the rungs towards becoming an upstanding member of the MSM...all that & NOT be a died in the wool statist! Would you agree that this would be exceedingly rare? Not to sound like a nutter (I think I'm amongst libertarians), we live under a permanent war economy corporatocracy. ALL the anti-war candidates are dismissed by statists out of hand. But how's this for a UNIQUE case (it pains me to have to repeat for the umpteenth time known facts, but your focus seems so narrow). Someone unaffiliated to the campaign raised more money for it in a single day than has EVER been raised. What stories in the history of the world were like that? (of course the money was the cause of 90% of the coverage)

    There's NEVER been ANYTHING remotely like this campaign on all kinds of levels, I never dreamed such a thing could happen! It's truly the ONLY really interesting phenomenon I've EVER seen in politics. Talk about attention, the main war channel was obviously grooming the mayor of 9/11. Paul kicked the living crap out of him. THAT'S a story!

    Many of the brand new Paul people until recently thought that "the news" was THE NEWS. They are SHOCKED & crushed at discovering reality all at once. Do you enjoy making fun of them? Is this helpful in some way?

    You of course, can say what ever you want. Perhaps I'm naive, I don't understand all the pettiness, carping & in-fighting. Sad.

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  13. "Someone unaffiliated to the campaign raised more money for it in a single day than has EVER been raised. What stories in the history of the world were like that? (of course the money was the cause of 90% of the coverage)"

    Yeah, that story got lots of coverage? Are you trying to make my point for me.

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  14. Never mind, go back to sleep. One last thing though, did you write this in Nov., or do you just hold the other guy's pen for him?

    "Many leading lights of our media had hoped to avoid grappling with the ideas of Ron Paul, which represent such a challenge to the status quo, largely by pretending he didn’t exist. If they refused to take his candidacy seriously, maybe no one else would either."

    The rest of the article is similar. I know I don't know anything, please tell me if you care to (and I won't go into any REALLY insulting theories), are there two Gene Callahans? Did you receive a blow to the head recently? Am I in the "Invasion of the Body Snatchers"?

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  15. "Never mind, go back to sleep."

    Oooh, the thrusts of your cutting, rapier-like wit pierce my to my core!

    "One last thing though, did you write this in Nov., or do you just hold the other guy's pen for him?"

    I believe Bob wrote that bit. But, in any case, there's no conflict between noting that:
    1) The MSM tends to ignore Paul, as they do all "fringe" candidates; and
    2) Some people are paranoid about this and start to see everything as a plot.

    You see, it's sort of like the difference between, "You can catch colds from people," and "all contact with people is deadly."

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  16. I can't let that go. Saying, "go back to sleep" was not a cut, I was giving you the benefit of the doubt, because you're either deliberately cherrypicking my statements & facts or you are so contemptuous, or bored or sleepy that you can't be bothered to come up with anything very convincing (I'm bored too & would love to wrap this up).

    That WHOLE article was about how the MSM MUST ignore Paul, but can't ignore the money so they have to paint his supporters as loons. You say, "I believe Bob wrote that bit", all right you win.

    When I say that nearly all the attention was from the money, you say I'm making your point for you that he had plenty of coverage. That wasn't the only thing they should have covered. And it's convenient for you to boil down my entire arguments to the weakest couple phrases isn't it? (and I DID have a nice little cut in there, so you redirect to something innocuous) So anyway, WHATEVER! ha ha, that's what I should have said last post. Peace, I'm out.

    ReplyDelete
  17. "WHATEVER!"

    Ah, I get it, now you're really letting me have the full force of your scathing bon mots!

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  18. You win, sensei. I don't know exactly how one presents on-line.

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  19. Gene, I think you're wrong on this. Yes, there are paranoids among the Paul supporters, but there's also a justification for anger. No other candidate in recent memory has been treated with such disrespect as Paul has (or do you know differently).

    Let me list some examples:

    1. Snickering during debates. Not only did other candidates snicker at Paul, but so did commentators and even moderators -- during the debate. The disrespectful questions asked of him, especially at the Fox debates, were not asked of any other candidates in any of the other debates.

    2. The rude interviews. Do you recall the stephanopoulos interview? Now seriously, Gene, have you ever seen a mainstream host on a mainstream program like that treat a candidate with such utter disdain? And it wasn't just George. How about every single interviewer asking him if he was going to run as a 3rd party candidate? Has anyone asked that of Edwards? Or McCain? Of course not.

    I think what you're reacting to is the nonsense at LRC declaring victories where there weren't any and looking for boogeymen where there weren't any; but, come on. Paul was definitely treated much much worse than any other "fringe" candidate, when he was acknowledged at all. So I think you've overstated your case as a reaction to overstatement on the other side.

    Paul was definitely treated in a very biased manner.

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