Matt Yglesias

The Dobbs Factor

Lou Dobbs loves it

The New York Times manages to produce an article about the controversy over Lou Dobbs that doesn’t really offer any specific examples of what Dobbs’ critics are talking about. But to get a flavor, the man’s strain of nativism runs so deep that he’s denounced St Patrick’s Day. His show is so unhinged that he promotes “birther” conspiracy theories. From time to time CNN has to scrub official transcripts of his show to eliminate casual racism. Dobbs thought the racist “Obama waffles” box was hilarious.

That just sets the backdrop for the kind of racial stereotyping, cavalier attitude toward the truth, and downright weirdness that characterizes his obsessive coverage of Hispanic immigration into the United States:

Dobbs has a long history of spreading hate and paranoia. He has routinely discussed the North American Union conspiracy theory, incorrectly claimed that undocumented immigrants drain social services and don’t pay taxes, and repeatedly amplified the falsehood that undocumented immigrants are disproportionately violent. He has been an unrepentant purveyor of hateful attacks, fraudulently claiming, for example, that immigrants are spreading leprosy and seek to reconquer the southwestern United States.

For all that, if CNN wants to stand by Dobbs then, fine, they should stand by Dobbs. But if they want to stand by Dobbs then they should stand by Dobbs and feature him prominently in their four-hour “Latino in America” documentary. After all, from what you can see watching the network day-to-day the executives at CNN think Dobbs has a credible and important perspective on this issue. Instead, they just kind of want to sweep the crazy uncle under the rug for the purposes of a big special, and then trot him back out again when everything’s back to normal.

Krugman on Gupta

Paul Krugman reminds us of Sanjay Gupta’s unfair and inaccurate attacks on Michael Moore and Sicko. It’s a fair point, but if this is the worst thing you can say about Gupta it’s honestly not so bad. The plus side is that it means you’ll have as Surgeon General a guy who’s genuinely excellent at going on television and talking about medical issues. That’s potentially a very useful asset in a debate over health care reform, and even leaving that aside just means a guy who can do the Surgeon General’s basic public health and health education functions with an unusual degree of effectiveness.

But the Sicko thing really should remind us that we do exist in a pretty demented political culture, and one that reaches its peak of derangement on cable television broadcasts.

Don’t Know Much About The Weather

Chad Myers is an idiot:

CNN Meteorologist Chad Myers had never bought into the notion that man can alter the climate and the Vegas snowstorm didn’t impact his opinion. Myers, an American Meteorological Society certified meteorologist, explained on CNN’s Dec. 18 “Lou Dobbs Tonight” that the whole idea is arrogant and mankind was in danger of dying from other natural events more so than global warming.

“You know, to think that we could affect weather all that much is pretty arrogant,” Myers said. “Mother Nature is so big, the world is so big, the oceans are so big – I think we’re going to die from a lack of fresh water or we’re going to die from ocean acidification before we die from global warming, for sure.”

Now of course it’s true that we’re more likely to die from a lack of fresh water or from ocean acidification than we are to die from the temperature becoming so high that human life can’t exist. But global warming causes lack of fresh water and ocean acidification is, like global warming, caused by human carbon dioxide emissions. If you’re concerned about water supplies and ocean acidification, you need to hop on the climate catastrophe avoidance bandwagon.

Silly Benen

Steven Benen asks: “If six media figures joining Democratic campaigns is proof that reporters are liberal, are seven loyal Bushies joining news outlets proof that major media outlets are conservative?”

Of course not! The loyal Bushies joining major media outlets is proof that the media is liberal — so liberal, in fact, that even the hard-core liberals who control the media feel so guilty about it that they need to hire hack propagandists from the Bush administration to try to counteract their own liberal liberalishness. Similarly, CNN hiring Steve Hayes also proves that the media is liberal.

CNN Versus Labor Law

I read the news today:

Judge Arthur Amchan found that CNN violated the rights of more than 250 employees at the network’s bureaus in Washington, D.C., and New York City when it ended its subcontract with Team Video Services (TVS) [in 2003-2004], whose employees were represented by NABET-CWA. He also ruled that CNN discriminated against TVS employees who wanted to continue working at CNN’s bureaus to avoid having to recognize and bargain with the union.

A couple of points. One is just to observe that labor law and its enforcement in this country are a joke. You want to engage in some illegal union busting in 2003-2004 and, at worst, you’ll get mild punishment for having done so years in the future. Two, this is what makes about 98 percent of the protestations I’ve read about the evils of the Employee Free Choice Act such a joke. People’s fussy concern about the integrity of union-management relations somehow doesn’t seem to manifest itself amidst these constant violations of existing law by employers. Related, this is what I actually like about Mickey Kaus’ take on labor issues — he just believes, without any evidence whatsoever, that unions and unionization are bad and they should be crushed by any means necessary and he firmly grounds his EFCA opposition in that principled point of view. Fourth, I don’t think we should expect to see anything remotely resembling fair coverage of the EFCA issue when it comes before congress. Fifth, there’s a lot the new congress and new administration could do in terms of stiffer penalties and more expedient justice to improve the state of labor law short of a card check bill.

Ware: “Tehran Was in the Room”

CNN’s Michael Ware talks to Matt Duss about Iran’s deep influence in Iraq and the key role Iran played in constructing the US-Iraq security agreement:

WARE: Iran has a whip hand, or a key hand at least, within the political framework there. So during these negotiations between Baghdad and Washington, Tehran — whether we like it or not — was in the room. Tehran, in some ways, in some fashion, is a party to this agreement. And you’ll see that some of the sticking points and some of the nuances within the negotiations were issues that were very close to the heart of Tehran.

The incredibly operational successes of the counterinsurgency tactics David Petraeus brought to Iraq in 2007 shouldn’t distract us from the extent to which the invasion of Iraq has been a costly strategic debacle. And nothing that’s happened in Iraq since 2007 has changed that. But because the whole thing unfolded in a strategic vacuum absent any ability of the highest levels of the American government to define America’s interests in the region or come up with a way to advance them.

Grant Hill

Why is it that Grant Hill was just on CNN’s Late Edition being interviewed by John King? At first I thought maybe King had just realized that post-election politics is boring and he wanted to focus more on the NBA. And if so, fair enough. How does Hill feel about the Shaq trade? Doesn’t he think it would have made more sense to just tell Shawn Marion and Amare Stoudemire that they had to suck it up and learn to play alongside each other? With the Wizards off to an 0-5 start, wasn’t Matt Yglesias really smart to decline to renew his half-season Wizards ticket package? Yes we can.

But instead he was fielding questions about politics along with a BET reporter and a former member of the US Commission on Civil Rights. Did CNN not know how to find any African-American journalists or public officials? Feel that the black experience is most authentically lived by multi-millionaire professional athletes? I only caught the tail end of the segment so maybe it made more sense than what I saw. Anyone else out there catch it.

CNN Wants Its Viewers to Be Misinformed

Steve Hayes is not what you would call a reliable source of information. His first book, The Connection: How al Qaeda’s Collaboration with Saddam Hussein Has Endangered America was a deliberate attempt to mislead the public about the subject at hand. Based on his willingness to lie on behalf of the conservative movement, he secured the position of court biographer to Dick Cheney, and duly produced the required hagiography. To the best of my knowledge, Hayes has never made a single good analytic point on any subject, or introduced any useful new information into the public debate. Nobody outside the deepest recesses of the conservative cocoon has ever been impressed by a Stephen F. Hayes article.

Naturally enough, CNN, which obviously has contempt for its audience and for the concept of journalism, sent out this press release yesterday: “Stephen F. Hayes Joins CNN’s Best Political Team on Television”:

“Steve is a well-respected and knowledgeable journalist who already has become a natural part of CNN’s political coverage,” said Sam Feist, CNN’s political director. “As part of the ‘Best Political Team on Television,’ Steve will help CNN in its commitment to go beyond political spin and present viewers with the most in-depth and bipartisan insights.”

I would be fascinated to hear Feist explain by what standard Hayes is well-respected. Perhaps he could identify some people who respect Hayes?