Adapted from Rant of the Week from The Stars Hollow Gazette
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Tag: Jon Stewart
May 18 2014
Jon Stewart: Bullets Points Over Benghazi
Apr 27 2014
Jon Stewart: Back to the Torture
Adapted from Rant of the Week at The Stars Hollow Gazette
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Why aren’t these people in jail? One word answer: Obama
Mar 02 2014
Jon Stewart: Romancing the Drone
Adapted from The Rant of the Week at The Stars Hollow Gazette
The Obama administration explores the legal ramifications of aerial citizen reduction programs.
Senator Carl Levin stages an intervention for American drone policy, but the Obama administration refuses to admit it has a problem
Feb 03 2014
Jon Stewart: State of the Union
Adapted from Rant of the Week at The Stars Hollow Gazette
President Obama uses lessons learned from passive-aggressive Jewish mothers in his 2014 State of the Union address.
Joe Biden does his thing, and Republican politicians react to President Obama’s State of the Union talking points.
Republicans uninterested in bipartisanship decry President Obama’s lack of bipartisanship, and one Congressman gives a NY1 reporter the traditional Staten Island goodbye.
Nov 24 2013
New York Pizza v Chicago Pizza
Adapted from Rant of the Week at The Stars Hollow Gazette
Let me explain something, deep-dish pizza is not only not better than New York pizza. It’s not pizza. It’s a f***ing casserole!
Let me add this, if you can’t pick it up in one hand and have to eat it with a fork, it isn’t pizza.
Rahm Emanuel Sends Jon Stewart And ‘Daily Show’ ‘Deep Dish With Dead Fish’ After Pizza Fight
Apparently dead fish are Rahm Emanuel’s version of an olive branch. [..]
In a nod to one of his most infamous political shenanigans, Chicago’s mayor made sure the deep-dish pies were topped with dead fish (y’ know, anchovies). [..]
Yet as much as the feisty mayor wanted the last word, Stewart and company were having none of it. Their response to Emanuel’s “peace” offering? A Vine video showing a pooch turning his nose up at the delicious pie.
Nov 17 2013
Zombie Buzzkill
Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson debunks the science behind zombies and shares a haunting tale of the universe’s eventual heat death.
Oct 18 2013
“Medican’t”
Adapted from Rant of the Week at The Stars Hollow Gazette
Health-challenged states like Texas and Mississippi refuse to take advantage of a federally subsidized Medicaid expansion.
If statehood was health care, moocher states like Mississippi and Missouri would be rejected as having a preexisting condition.
Apr 21 2013
“The Lost Channel of Atlanta”
Adapted from Rant of the Week at The Stars Hollow Gazette
Under the leadership of Jeff Zucker, CNN broadens the definition of news to include more goat holograms and murder dramas.
Media Reassure Themselves They Didn’t Do So Bad in Boston Coverage
By Nicole Belle, Crooks & Liars
April 21, 2013 11:00 AM
Zucker actually sent his underlings a “you’re do(ing) a heckuva job” memo in the midst of them getting so very much wrong.
At the end up one of the busiest news weeks in recent memory-for CNN and every other major media organization-Jeff Zucker delivered his gratitude to his CNN staff in an internal memo obtained by POLITICO’s Dylan Byers. Beginning with the declaration, “What a week,” Zucker goes on to praise his team for their “exceptional work.” He wrote, “It was important to see CNN, CNN.com, HLN and CNNI all shine this week,” and let the full staff know, “you have shown the world what makes us CNN.”
Zucker dismissed the criticism levelled at his organization as so much “jealousy”. Uh huh. Sadly, Rupert Murdoch offered a similar, albeit more abridged defense of his multiple news platforms:
Rupert Murdoch belatedly came to the defense of his newspaper, tweeting: “All NYPost pics were those distributed by FBI. And instantly withdrawn when FBI changed directions.” Murdoch did not go into detail about how exactly a newspaper can “instantly withdraw” a front page already published, although perhaps that would have taken more than 140 characters (and harnessing the power of the space-time continuum) to explain. Among the mistakes the Post made this week: they inaccurately reported 12 people had died in the blast (three did); they claimed a Saudi man was a “suspect” in “custody”, when he wasn’t; and most prominently, they plastered the photos of two “suspects” on the front page with the headline "Bag Men." They didn’t outright say these two people were the bombers, but they did everything they could to insinuate it. Of course, it later turned out that neither men were really suspects, and one was a high school student who went to the police on his own to clear his name.
Apr 18 2013
Empire of the Gun
Adapted from Rant of the Week at The Stars Hollow Gazette
The Senate preserves America’s right to sell weapons to international terrorists and drug lords.
Senate votes 53-46 to stop US from joining UN Arms Trade Treaty
by Ramsey Cox, The Hill
In the last batch of amendment votes to the budget, the Senate voted on several foreign policy proposals.
Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) introduced an amendment that would prevent the United States from entering into the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty in order to uphold the Second Amendment. His amendment passed on a 53-46 vote.
Republicans have been critical of President Obama’s decision to consider the treaty, although Obama has said he would not vote for anything that would violate the Second Amendment.
The U.N. Arms Trade Treaty would regulate international arms sales. Negotiations end on March 28.
Feb 13 2013
The Geithner Doctrine
Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette
The former special inspector-general of the troubled asset relief program (TARP), Neil Barofsky says that it is time for a “post mortem” analysis former Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s doctrine, the preservation of large banks, the largesse of Wall St. and the perversion of of the US criminal justice system. In this article posted at naked capitalism, Mr. Barofsky looks at the effect of the “Geithner Doctrine” and the weak response to the LIBOR scandal:
The recent parade of banking scandals, such as the manipulation of Libor rates by Barclays, Royal Bank of Scotland and other major banks, can be traced back to the lax system of regulation before the financial crisis – and the weak response once disaster struck.
Take the response of the New York Federal Reserve to Barclays’ admission in 2008 that it was submitting false Libor rates and was not alone in doing so. Mr Geithner’s response was to in effect bury the tip. He sent a memo to the Bank of England suggesting some changes to the rate-setting process and then convened a meeting of regulators where he reportedly described only the risk but not the actual manipulation of the rate. He then put the government imprimatur on the rate via bailout programmes. His inaction helped permit a global crime to continue for another year.
When it was UBS’s turn to settle its Libor charges, even though a significant amount of the illegal activity took place at the parent company level, only a Japanese subsidiary was required to take a plea. Eric Holder, US attorney-general, demonstrated his embrace of the Geithner doctrine (a phrase coined by blogger Yves Smith) in explaining the UBS decision. He said that a more aggressive stance against the parent company could have a negative “impact on the stability of the financial markets around the world”.
This week we saw the latest instalment of the saga. In fining RBS £390m, the DoJ only indicted one of the bank’s Asian subsidiaries, avoiding the more damaging result that would have stemmed from charging the parent company.
Instead of seeking deterrence and justice, the US government increasingly appears to have fully absorbed the Geithner doctrine into its charging decisions by seeking a result that has a minimal impact on the target bank but will generate the best-looking press release. Some banks today are still too big to fail – and they are still too big to jail.
There are no meaningful consequences for this criminality. The fines with a promise not to do this again are just a game to allow the banks to continue the fraudulent conduct and find better ways to cover it up. Mr. Barofsky concludes that we must ditch the “Geithner Doctrine” to end “the game of incentives gone wild, and the lack of accountability in the aftermath of the crisis has only reinforced those bad incentives.”
o reclaim our system of justice, the global threat posed by the failure of any of our largest financial institutions must be neutralised once and for all. They must be reduced in size, their safety nets must be dramatically constricted and their capital requirements enhanced far beyond the current standards. Then, and only then, can the same set of rules apply to all.
In an extended interview with “The Daily Show“ host Jon Stewart, Mr. Barofsky discussed the double standards of the TARP program and the alien culture of Washington DC and explains why the banks will never face true justice..
Dec 07 2012
Republicans Hate the Disabled
Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette
Citing everything from home schooling to abortion, 38 Republican senators block the ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities. The negotiations for the convention were completed by the administration of Pres. George W. Bush in 2006 and it was signed by Pres. Barack Obama in 2009. But somehow, according to these right wing conspiracy theorists, the disabilities convention, which is entirely based on the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, would even threaten the “sovereignty of the United States.”
The treaty, already signed by 155 nations and ratified by 126 countries, including Britain, France, Germany, China and Russia, states that nations should strive to assure that the disabled enjoy the same rights and fundamental freedoms as their fellow citizens. Republicans objected to taking up a treaty during the lame-duck session of the Congress and warned that the treaty could pose a threat to U.S. national sovereignty.
“I do not support the cumbersome regulations and potentially overzealous international organizations with anti-American biases that infringe upon American society,” said Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla.
Say what!? Protecting the rights of disabled Americans abroad is now “anti-American?” The irrational hatred of the United Nations by the radical Republicans has twisted their minds. Sen. Inhofe has allies in Tea Party favorites freshman Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA), along with anti-feminist conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly:
At an event with former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) late last month, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) announced that 36 Republicans had signed a letter pledging to vote against the treaty.
Lee told Senators on Tuesday that the treaty “threatens the right of parents to raise their children with the constant looming threat of state interference.” [..]
Writing for World Net Daily on Monday, Santorum said the treaty had “darker and more troubling implications” and suggested that it would have meant the forced abortion his daughter because she has a rare genetic disorder. [..]
Conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly also warned in November that proponents were “using this treaty as an opportunity to promote their abortion agenda.”
Even with the support of former Republican presidential candidates and disable veterans, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) and former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-KS), present and looking frail and in a wheelchair, the convention failed to garner the necessary two third vote.
The Daily Show host Jon Stewart put it quite succinctly, “It’s official. Republicans hate the United Nations more than they like helping people in wheelchairs.” I just wish I could tell him that this is rock bottom for the Republicans:
Aug 06 2012
First Amendment v Type II Diabetes
Adapted from The Stars Hollow Gazette
Thousands turn out to support the First Amendment rights of Chik-fil-A president and gay marriage opponent Dan Cathy by contracting Type II diabetes