As NewsBusters reported on several occasions this month, CNN’s Jack Cafferty has been blasting House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) for refusing to address the profligate spending by members of Congress at December’s climate change summit in Copenhagen.

On January 12 he called her a "horrible woman," and followed this up two weeks later by referring to her arrogance as "breathtaking."

With this in mind, Cafferty should take a look at a report published Thursday by Judicial Watch claiming the Speaker has spent over $2 million flying on the taxpayer aboard military planes (h/t Hot Air):

Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that it has obtained documents from the Air Force detailing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s use of United States Air Force aircraft for Congressional Delegations (CODELs). According to the documents, obtained by Judicial Watch through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), the Speaker’s military travel cost the United States Air Force $2,100,744.59 over a two-year period — $101,429.14 of which was for in-flight expenses, including food and alcohol.

Here are some examples:

• Speaker Pelosi used Air Force aircraft to travel back to her district at an average cost of $28,210.51 per flight. The average cost of an international CODEL is $228,563.33. Of the 103 Pelosi-led congressional delegations (CODEL), 31 trips included members of the House Speaker’s family.
• One CODEL traveling from Washington, DC, through Tel Aviv, Israel to Baghdad, Iraq May 15-20, 2008, “to discuss matters of mutual concern with government leaders” included members of Congress and their spouses and cost $17,931 per hour in aircraft alone. Purchases for the CODEL included: Johnny Walker Red scotch, Grey Goose vodka, E&J brandy, Bailey’s Irish Crème, Maker’s Mark whiskey, Courvoisier cognac, Bacardi Light rum, Jim Beam whiskey, Beefeater gin, Dewars scotch, Bombay Sapphire gin, Jack Daniels whiskey, Corona beer and several bottles of wine.

Are you paying attention, Jack?

"In 1984, Ronald Reagan won every Northeastern state. Since then, the leadership of the G.O.P. has systematically shed its idealists in favor of ideologues, reducing itself to the current Cheney-Limbaugh illusionati whose strategy is to exploit faith and ignorance by fanning fear and hatred. But, Northeasterners are not so easily duped. Voters there tend to be wealthier, better educated, less religious and more progressive than those in other regions." — New York Times columnist Charles Blow, writing on May 23, 2009.

"Welcome to the mob: an angry, wounded electorate, riled by recession, careening across the political spectrum, still craving change, nursing a bloodlust." — Charles Blow in his January 23, 2010 column, after Republican Scott Brown’s victory in a special Senate election in Massachusetts.

(Hat Tip: James Taranto at Opinion Journal’s Best of the Web)

[Update, 3:00 pm Eastern: Video added.]

On HLN’s Joy Behar Show on Thursday, Joy Behar and Whoopi Goldberg gave a racial explanation for Chris Matthews’ recent “I forgot he was black” remark about President Obama. Goldberg cracked that “this has been quite a year for the white man.” Behar replied, “Traumatic,” and Goldberg continued it was “traumatic in many ways because…you have to think before you speak” [audio clip from the segment are available here].

The HLN host brought up Matthews post-State of the Union comment during her interview of her colleague from The View. After playing the clip of the MSNBC host, Behar asked Goldberg, “What do you think he was driving at there? Because he’s a lefty- you know, he’s liberal, and he likes Obama. And yet, he says something stupid like that- you know, I forgot he was black. He would never say I forgot he was white if he was looking at Bush.”

Goldberg responded half-jokingly, “Well, white people- you know, this is- this has been quite a year for the white man.” After laughs both on and off-camera, Behar interjected, “Traumatic.” Her guest agreed and continued with her point:

GOLDBERG: Traumatic in many ways because the things that people say now, you have to think before you speak. It sounded great in his head, I’m sure, because I know Chris and I know what he was trying to say was- you know, I wasn’t concentrating on that. I appreciate that with him. But, you know, people have begun to say things which they think are PC- and okay- and people go- whoa, maybe you shouldn’t say that. Now, the truth of the matter is- you know, maybe people are starting to see Obama as Obama. You know, as a president, and not a black president. I think that’s what Chris was trying to get at.

Despite her reference to political correctness, Goldberg did depart from this mindset on race later in the interview. As the two continued to discuss Matthews, the black comedian brought up how people don’t realize it when they’re making a racially-insensitive remark. Behar replied by throwing out a politically-correct line: “White people say stupid things about black people.” Goldberg disagreed: “Black people say- a lot of people say stupid things. Everybody says stupid stuff.” The HLN host tried to respond to insist her point, but was cut off by her colleague: “Well, you know what? We are now hearing it and looking at it and examining it in a way that we never had to before, because people are hearing themselves and going- okay, what did I actually mean by that?”

The transcript of the relevant portion of Joy Behar’s interview of Whoopi Goldberg, starting at the 36 minutes into the 9 pm Eastern hour mark:

JOY BEHAR: What about Chris Matthews? Let’s talk about Chris Matthews. I mean we didn’t discuss this today-

WHOOPI GOLDBERG: No.

BEHAR: But I was interested in this because he’s taking a lot of heat for something he said on MSNBC last night. Watch.

CHRIS MATTHEWS: He is post-racial by all appearances. You know, I forgot he was black tonight for an hour. You know, he’s gone a long way to become a leader of this country and past so much history in just a year or two. I mean it’s something we don’t even think about. I was watching and I said, wait a minute, he’s an African-American guy in front of a bunch of white people, and here he is President of the United States and we’ve completely forgotten that tonight.

BEHAR: Maybe he needs a new TV. (Behar and Goldberg laugh) What do you think he was driving at there? Because he’s a lefty- you know, he’s liberal.

GOLDBERG: Yeah.

BEHAR: And he likes Obama.

GOLDBERG: Yeah.

BEHAR: And yet, he says something stupid like that- you know, I forgot he was black. He would never say I forgot he was white if he was looking at Bush.

GOLDBERG: No. Well, white people (laughs)- you know, this is- this has been quite a year for the white man. (off-camera laughs from unidentified person/people)

BEHAR: (laughs) Traumatic.

GOLDBERG: Traumatic in many ways because the things that people say now, you have to think before you speak. It sounded great in his head, I’m sure, because I know Chris and-

BEHAR: Yeah.

GOLDBERG: I know what he was trying to say was- you know, I wasn’t concentrating on that. I appreciate that with him.

BEHAR: Yeah.

GOLDBERG: But, you know, people have begun to say things which they think are PC- and okay- and people go- whoa, maybe you shouldn’t say that. Now, the truth of the matter is- you know, maybe people are starting to see Obama as Obama.

BEHAR: Uh huh.

GOLDBERG: You know, as a president, and not a black president. I think that’s what Chris was trying to get at-

BEHAR: I think so.

GOLDBERG: But sometimes it’s hard- you know, it’s like if you’re black, oftentimes, people say to you, you’re so articulate, not realizing how offensive that actually is.

BEHAR: It is offensive.

GOLDBERG: You know, because you would never say to somebody who is white, gee, you can dance.

BEHAR: Uh huh.

GOLDBERG: And not think it was going to be a slightly offensive comment.

BEHAR: Right.

GOLDBERG: You know, so we’re all having to learn how to-

BEHAR: White people say stupid things about black people.

GOLDBERG: Black people say- a lot of people say stupid things. Everybody says stupid stuff.

BEHAR: Yeah, but-

GOLDBERG: Well, you know what? We are now hearing it and looking at it and examining it in a way that we never had to before.

BEHAR: Yeah.

GOLDBERG: Because people are hearing themselves and going- okay, what did I actually mean by that?

Maybe it’s just happy coincidence. Maybe Hollywood really is taking White House suggestions for its scripts. Or maybe liberal group think has evolved to the point where they don’t just think the same things, they think them at the same time.

Whatever the case, just a day after President Obama’s “surprise announcement” in his State of the Union speech that he intends to overturn the military’s “Don’t Ask-Don’t Tell” policy, the issue surfaced again in prime time. And the inclusion of propaganda in a TV drama was even more incongruous and gratuitous than Obama’s sop to his left wing.

The Jan. 28 episode of Fox’s forensics-based crime drama, “Bones,” centered on the murder of a gay man, and the writers took the opportunity to inject some standard talking points about the inequity of gays being unable to marry and the threat of physical violence from straight men.

But in their zeal to cover the gay rights bases, they shoe-horned in an out-of-place shot at “Don’t Ask-Don’t Tell.” A discussion of a suspect’s possible motives included this extraordinarily weird exchange:

BRENNAN (Emily Deschanel): Native Americans believed homosexuals were of two spirits, held them in high esteem. So what’s the problem?

BOOTH (David Boreanaz): There’s no problem. Why are you looking at me like that? I was a soldier. I mean gay guys, they saved my life in battle more than once. 

Right. He probably once shared a foxhole with a transgendered sergeant, too. And the Native Americans probably had some profound wisdom about cross-dressing machine gunners.

If Hollywood writers feel compelled to lard their offerings with liberal propaganda, they should at least try to do it a little more artfully. Dropping labored references like that into the dialogue is as jarring as, well, making a statement about “Don’t Ask-Don’t Tell” in the middle of a speech on the economy.

The leftist U.K. Guardian newspaper is celebrating an economics lecture from mockumentary filmmaker Michael Moore. The headline:

"Capitalism is evil…you have to eliminate it"

Moore told the Guardian’s Chris McGreal for their Saturday editions that America needs a radical new economic order: 

But what does it mean, to replace capitalism with democracy? He sighs and tries to explain. In the old Soviet bloc, he says, communism was the political system and socialism the economic. But with capitalism, he complains, you get political and economic rolled in to one. Big business buys votes in Congress. Lobbyists write laws. The result is that the US political system is awash in capitalist money that has stripped the system of much of its democratic accountability.

This is bizarre. In the Soviet Union, political tyranny and economic tyranny didn’t go hand in hand? That’s why it was called a totalitarian system.

As he prepares for the British release of his film Capitalism: A Love Story, Michael Moore is a raging example of the comparative openness of capitalist society: that it’s free enough to allow someone to freely advocate its demise. And Moore admits he’s not really qualified to establish his new order:

"What I’m asking for is a new economic order," he says. "I don’t know how to construct that. I’m not an economist. All I ask is that it have two organising principles. Number one, that the economy is run democratically. In other words, the people have a say in how its run, not just the 1%. And number two, that it has an ethical and moral core to it. That nothing is done without considering the ethical nature, no business decision is made without first asking the question, is this for the common good?"

This argument sounds a little tinny when the socialists are currently insisting on passing the health bills in Congress, despite the latest CNN poll showing 58 percent generally oppose them, while 38 percent would vote aye. It’s also tinny considering Moore ends the article by telling McGreal that Obama told people he wanted to get a left-wing agenda accomplished, even if he’s not re-elected (meaning he was not exactly acting in concert with "the people.")

McGreal’s article isn’t entirely positive. In fact, its opening is harsh:

Michael Moore has been accused of many things. Mendacity. Manipulation. Rampant egotism. Bullying a frail old man with Alzheimer’s. And that is by people who generally agree with his views.

Nevertheless, McGreal argues "there’s no denying some very powerful truths in Capitalism, one of which is that it didn’t need to be this way in America." He even worked in how PBS omnipresence Bill Moyers interviewing former Cigna executive Wendell Potter inspired his work:

Last summer something happened that renewed Moore’s conviction that his film-making was politically worthwhile. "I’m in the edit room and there’s Bill Moyers on the TV interviewing the vice-president of Sigma [sic] health insurance. Massive, billion-dollar company. He’s sitting there, telling the country that he’s quit his job and he wants to come clean. That he and the other health insurance companies got together and pooled their resources to smear me and the film Sicko to try and stop people from going to see it because, as he said, everything Michael Moore said in Sicko was true, and we were afraid this film would be a tipping point.

"I came away from that, with ‘Wow, they’re afraid of this movie, they believe it can actually create a revolution.’ The idea that cinema can be dangerous is a great idea."

Moore’s critics would argue this is his ego speaking. The idea that his film about the failings of the US healthcare system was on the brink of prompting a revolution of any kind looks all the more far-fetched given how the political fight over the issue has panned out.

Perhaps no one looks less influential in the present political wave than Michael Moore.

Based on the two pictures seen at the right, it doesn’t exactly take Sherlock Holmes to figure out that the people at the Associated Press who decide on what pictures to use to tease the wire service’s assorted video clips are not all favorably inclined towards Tony Blair.

Rather than show a picture of the former UK Prime Minister, the AP chose pics of a demonstrator outside where the inquiry was held.

As of about 8 PM ET, the "Raw Video" feed was still in the rotation and easily accessible at many hosted.ap.org pages carrying an international story. An accessible link to that vid is here at YouTube.

The "Blair Unrepentant" story is no longer in the rotation, but can be found here.

Here is a transcript of that "Unrepentant" video:

AP Reporter Martin Benedict: This was billed as "Judgment Day" for Tony Blair, and protestors outside the hearing offered their judgment that Blair was a war criminal for invading Iraq on the false premise that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.

But inside, the former Prime Minister was unrepentant, telling the inquiry panel he’d do it all again if he had to.

Blair: It’s really really important I think to understand this as far as understanding the decision I took, and frankly would take again. If there was any possibility that he could develop weapons of mass destruction we should stop him, that was my view. That was my view then that’s my view now.

Benedict: Outside the mood turned somber, as protestors including actor Samuel West held a naming of the dead ceremony.

Samuel West (speaking to AP): I find it extraordinary that a man who saw 1-1/2 million people march past his office go to war with no more justification than that he, he thought he was doing the right thing. Every war criminal in history has said the same thing.

Benedict: Blair’s successor Gordon Brown is due to give his evidence before the election which will be held by May. Martin Benedict, the Associated Press.

Blair appears in all of 23 seconds of the 1:22 video. It’s enough to make one almost relieved that the AP has little direct presence (so far) in broadcast television.

As to Benedict’s breezy assertion about Saddam’s possession of weapons of mass destruction being a "false premise," here the short version of the required routine debunking of the tired leftist claim, historically accurately phrased as "There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq” (with no qualification of any kind) any time yours truly sees it made:

• April 2, 2007 — "Munitions Found (in Iraq) Last Year Were Officially WMDs."
• In a mid-August 2006 post called "The ‘No WMD’ Lie (With Linked Proof) — The Sequel," I identified six establishment media press reports describing items found in Iraq after the invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein. The conclusions concerning these items were that 3 of them were "undisputable definites" as WMDs, that one related to raw materials definitely usable for creating WMDs, that one was inconclusive, and that a final item was not a WMD, but a clue to to the existence of hundreds of WMDs that were subsequently found.
• And of course, there were the 550 tons of yellowcake uranium taken out of Iraq in the summer of 2008. Investors Business Daily deadpanned noted that its "the stuff that can be refined into nuclear weapons or nuclear fuel, at a facility in Tuwaitha outside of Baghdad," and that "it was bought by a Canadian company for further processing into nuclear fuel — thus keeping it from potential use by terrorists or unsavory regimes in the region."

Thus, the claim that there were no WMDs in Iraq is demonstrably and indisputably false. Martin Benedict or anyone else at the Associated Press are welcome to come by BizzyBlog or NewsBusters any time to show why my work based primarily on reports by others in their profession is wrong.

They won’t be able to. Thus, they must resort to showing immature caricatures and providing excessive face time and air time to the same people who have been wrong all along, both about the existence of WMDs and who was on the noble side in the military victory known as the Iraq War.

Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.

Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!