In March, CNN made stunning announcement that Erick Erickson, editor of the ultra-right Tea Party screed Redstate.com (owned by Eagle Publishing, owner of malodorous HumanEvents.com) would be a regular panelist on the new "John King's USA" program.  We get the media we deserve, and I was loath to roll over for one more indignity. I got a little worked up about it.

So We Made A Video About CNN's Latest Farce

My video partner, Oilwellian and I felt this reckless erosion of CNN's responsibility was so egregious that it needed a simple polemical response that called attention to it. 

Enough is Enough — How You Can Help

 

Educate Time-Warner Stockholders

Show them just how fast and loose CNN executives, Jon Klein and Sam Feist are being, You can be sure their stockholders have no idea what kind of unhinged propaganda they are presenting to the American people in their pursuit of a few of Fox New's ratings points.

PLEASE RETWEET this post (see below), so a viral pressure might goose @CNN to stop this Fox-chasing nonsense and try being a real news network again.  It took them two years to admit the Lou Dobbs mistake, so I don't have a lot of hope that they'll can this stupid Erickson idea too soon. But at least this exposure can make it painful for them. We have only 24 hours left to make video go viral (and get special notices on YouTube). Your RTs and emails would help a lot.

IT'S IMPORTANT:  Even though John King USA's show is pretty boring (King was never mister magnetic), and the nepotism shown by using his wife Dana Bash as the show's (Republican friendly) Congressional reporter makes the show a laughing stock,  that doesn't mean this farce should stand, unassailed until the inevitable cancellation. The experience may make CNN just a bit more sensitive to the fact that the Tea Party ain't the only Americans fired up, lately.

Some of us are just disgusted with the corporate wrecking ball that American capitalism—and our media—have become. It's time we just said no, and meant it.

JOIN OUR FACEBOOK SITE:

DumpCNN

FOLLOW THESE PEOPLE TWITTER: 

@DumpCNN ~ @shoq ~ @stopbeck ~ @Oilwellian

Backstory

I have already invested a fair amount of time being the partisan crasher on Twitter on this issue, but it's just not something we can afford to shrug off after a few days of whining.  The right assumes, as CNN's Jon Klein did, that "progressives never get too worked up about anything".

In Retrospect, Our Video Was Too Kind

The right has screwed up this nation too thoroughly for us to just acquiesce to CNN giving a platform to the latest overrated stooge of concorporate hegemons.  As the past few years have proved, they own or control most of this nation where it counts, and even when progressives score gains (as we just did with Health Care Reform), there is still a huge question mark hovering over the future of the United States. A recovering economy will not mask the near-kleptocratic nature of what our modern predatory-capitalist-system-run- amok has become.

Through one of many proxies like Redstate, the corporate and conservative elites use massive private funding networks to distribute professionally crafted propaganda masking as "grass roots" efforts.

Their work is designed to prey on the emotions and fears of an almost fundamentalist fervor amongst the ignorant Teahadist soldiers they are whipping up across the nation. The primary goal is to convince these gullible—or just rich, mean, racist, or stupid—people, that the administration that inherited the burden of fixing the economic malaise they created, are actually the people who caused them in the first place.   And when you have a 24 hour news channel (Fox News) devoted to such efforts, it's really not all that hard to sell such foolishness to the proles.

This professionally-crafted and marketed lying has gone on far too long—and it's wrecking this nation. And yet, as I type this, the US Chamber of Commerce is gearing up to spend more millions of dollars in local elections. Precisely the kind of spending secured with the kind of right-wing propaganda that HumanEvents, Redstate, and Erick Erickson represent (often literally).

Below, I have created one of my "capsules" to provide some background on CNN's latest gift to the nation, and to the right wing groups and strategies that have crippled it: Erick Erickson.

Responses

Overview of Erick Erickson

There is not much about this creep to like. Let's just say he's a man of average means, who now has way above average influence in a Republican party that respects only results, regardless of outcomes. A full picture of him will emerge from the materials, herein.

   Backgrounders

   Redstate.com

Redstate is a property of one of the most loathsome right wing publishing enterprises in the world.

  Parent & Related Organizations

Related

   Previous Lessons CNN Didn't Learn From

   The Growing Threat Of The US Chamber of Commerce

   More From Shoq

Thursday, April 1st is Rachel #Maddow's Birthday

Update 1:  Today is the day. Add #maddow to your tweets.

Update 2:  SIGN HER BIRTHDAY CARD. By adding a comment to @sluggahjells's diary on @dailyKos.

Background

Without going into all the reasons why we worship her for proving that the entire Fourth Estate is not yet merely a lawn sale, let's just say it would be fun to make this day an event for her—and all of us.  After all, it's been one of the better damn weeks this nation has had in a mighty long while, and Rachel Maddow was a core asset throughout this miserable bloody Health Care Reform battle.  That it's also April Fool's day makes the possibilities all the more delicious to contemplate.

As I was just informed of this 10 minutes ago, I am not sure of what #gametags might be fun to play yet, but I'll get with @lizzWinstead and others and plot something out.  If you have some ideas to bring on game day, please do tweet them. Naturally, we will have to run all plans through General Soros.  Please check this page frequently for updates. Please use the Tweet button below—and then favorite it for reference.

The Event Video

This is the fabulous video that @rayk58 made to kick off the event. I was under the impression that the idea came from the @Maddow program itself, and the video evolved from that. Apparently, it was all Ray, all the time. Congrats to Ray for a great idea. Sorry I didn't know enough to credit him in the first edition of this post. FYI: I never had suggested anywhere in this post that this was in any way my idea. I'm just the resident good ideas pimp :)

 

What Are We Doing?

::Shrug:: At minimum, we're going to include the "#maddow" #gametags in our tweets.  When enough of them appear, Twitter staff will greenlight it (we hope) and it "trends," and thus, immediately shows up on Twitter's search apps as a so-called "trending topic."

Beyond that, we don't know what the day will bring.  At the very least, ensuring that "#Maddow" is in our tweets. How often is up to you. You can be sure the ideas will be flowing.

Be sure to follow @maddowTag  for more info — Don't panic, it's just @shoq behind the curtain. 

Also follow idea founder @rayk58 and his @madbdaytweets

Probably best you follow @shoq too, or he whines. We don't know just how @maddowTag will work yet, if at all.

How Do We Communicate About This?

Uh.. with the #Maddow Tag?

The Only Rules

  • Don't Be Annoying. — Don't tweet:  "#maddow #maddow #maddow #maddow #maddow."
    You'll just piss off your followers, and the repetition has no impact on the trending process.
    (Each Tweet's tag counts only once. Seriously. That's it. No mas. Don't do it. Clear? Fine.)

  • Don't tweet to @maddow or @maddowblog. —Because that would suck, and the karma from that is just not something you want to contemplate, nor do I want on my conscience.

  • Try and be cute, funny, or AA (appropriately adoring).

  • Boring is ok (we're used to that)

  • Don't be insipid. Seriously. Don't

Is General Soros Ok With This?

We never really know. Ever since 2006, when he got out of active political spending, the right wing sees him behind every hothouse, whorehouse and outhouse. 

But I can tell you from first hand knowledge, that Dear Leader simply adores Rachel, and would probably give $1 matching dollar for every #maddow tweet we make to the "Send Rush To Costa Rica." fund.

On the other hand, maybe he wouldn't.  He's a funny kinda guy, like that.  (But not anything like all those other left wing billionaires we work for.) 

How You Can Help

   Follow These Names

  • Follow @maddowTag  for more info — Don't panic, it's just @shoq behind the curtain

   Tweet This Page ­

  • Using the ugly green "Tweet This" button at bottom of post

   Tweet These Too

  • RT @shoq: Come Play #Maddow Tag On Rachel @Maddow's Birthday ~Thurs April 1st ~ #p2  Detail: http://bit.ly/maddowtag #p2
  • RT @shoq: Please FOLLOW: @maddowtag for @Maddow's Birthday Tag Day info.  Details: http://shoqvalue.com/maddow #p2

Please copy exactly, including RT.  affects search rank

About Rachel Maddow

Show And Contact Information

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I have to wonder how the Founders would have regarded power like Roger Ailes now has.

He has a security detail (not just a body guard). Now, why would a simple journalist, just telling the truth, need a small army to protect him. Got RPG?

Face it, folks. The first amendment was not meant to protect organized sedition of our nation. We need some serious rethink. Especially now that the Robert's court is doing its best to give these gangsters even more power than they've ever had.

Rupert Murdoch: the king of media paradoxes

Of course, Murdoch, through Ailes, a former Nixon aide, has effectively polarized the political dialogue in this country, and Ailes knows the firestorms he systematically sets off. He has become so paranoid about his personal safety that his daily trek to work from Westchester County is fortified by a security force sizable enough for an Arab potentate (Murdoch, by contrast, often walks to work by himself).

Related

The Twilight of the Elites — Chris L Hayes (for Time)

An Ethically-Challenged Capital City?