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Published Sep 24, 2009 - Comments? None yet

Justice Alito Makes Crack About 'Hope And Change' Mantra

By Kerry Picket

Justice Samuel Alito was the featured keynote speaker at the American Spectator’s annual Robert L. Bartley dinner at Washington’s Mandarin Oriental hotel last night. Along with taking a crack at the new vice-president elect (h/t Politico), he also joked about the famous 2008 Obama campaign mantra of “Hope and Change.” (Eyeblast.tv has the audio uploaded here:)

On November, 29 1967, Secretary of State Robert McNamara resigned in protest over the war which he had personally presided over for a number of years.

On November 30^th, Eugene McCarthy announced that he would seek the Democratic presidential nomination promising to restore hope and bring about change.

Now I’ve been thinking a lot about that time recently and in particular about how things might have looked in those days to those who saw themselves in the vanguard of the legal profession. The law had changed quite dramatically in the 1960’s, and those in the vanguard at that time, I think, certainly anticipated that in the coming decades there would be quite dramatic movement in new directions.

Justice Alito also jokingly noted that his own submission to the American Spectator, pitched many years ago, was refused by the magazine at the time.

Published Dec 04, 2008 - Comments Off

Planned Cover-Up: Statutory Rape In Indiana

By K. Daniel Glover

Teenage victims of statutory rape who find themselves pregnant in Indiana have a law-breaking friend in the federally funded abortion provider Planned Parenthood.

Live Action Films today released an undercover video investigation that shows a nurse at Indiana Planned Parenthood advising a 13-year-old girl to lie about the 31-year-old “boyfriend” who got her pregnant.

The nurse repeatedly tells the girl, “I don’t want to know how old he is.” But once the girl discloses the man’s age, the nurse says: “OK, I didn’t hear the age. I don’t want to know the age. It could be reported as rape.” She then advises the girl to lie about the father’s age and shows her where to go in neighboring Illinois to get an abortion.

The 5-1/2-minute film is the latest expose by Live Action Films, which bills itself as “a new media movement for life.” It is part of Live Action’s “Mona Lisa Project,” which group president Lila Rose said demonstrates “the routine lawlessness of abortion providers at Planned Parenthood.”

Previous videos exposed Planned Parenthood facilities in Idaho and Ohio taking money specifically to abort black babies. Rose said in a release that the new video “is only a sample from many hours of similarly disturbing footage.”

The footage isn’t welcome at YouTube. This year, the Internet’s largest video-sharing site has repeatedly banned undercover investigations of Planned Parenthood by both Live Action Films and Students for Life of America. Google CEO Eric Schmidt, whose company owns YouTube, dodged questions about the deletion of those videos when asked about them in September.

All of the banned Live Action and SFLA videos, including SFLA’s undercover investigation of Planned Parenthood failing to report a statutory rape in North Carolina, are available on Eyeblast, where conservative views aren’t censored.

Published Dec 03, 2008 - Comments? None yet

YouTube’s Double Standard On Protests

By K. Daniel Glover

YouTube is promoting as its “citizen news report of the day” a video of an alleged attack on Greenpeace activists at a coal plant in Poland. There are two problems with the news judgment behind this video selection.

First, both the initial report on the video and YouTube’s description of it overstate what actually happened. Watch the video for yourself and see. Aside from some unjustifiable shoving, kicking of snow and grabbing of signs, there is no attack.

In one instance, the pushing is to get protesters out of the way of an oncoming bulldozer. Another clip appears to show a coal miner helping up a protester who fell, and the Greenpeace activists eventually are allowed to display their “Quit Coal” banners without interference — presumably on private property where they had no right to be.

But the bigger problem with the news judgment in this case is the blatant double standard at work. Why is YouTube helping to publicize an obscure, pro-environmental protest in Poland while ignoring citizen journalism reports of recent bad behavior by protesters that are far more noteworthy and much closer to home?
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Published Nov 25, 2008 - Comments? None yet

Obama’s New AG: Terrorist Detainees Don’t Fall Under Geneva Conventions

By Kerry Picket

President-Elect Obama’s choice for Attorney General, Eric Holder, had a 2002 interview with CNN’s Paula Zahn, (partial transcripts and stories have appeared on several sites recently including: National Review, Salon, Israpundit, and Democrats.com) where he cited a stance on terrorist detainees and their rights which was very different from not only Vice President-elect Joe Biden but also Obama himself

Obama voted against the tribunal system and has vowed to scrap it. “As president, I will close Guantanamo, reject the Military Commissions Act and adhere to the Geneva Conventions. Our Constitution and our Uniform Code of Military Justice provide a framework for dealing with the terrorists,” Obama said in 2007. An Obama aide says he wants to try the suspects publicly in existing courts.

Holder’s view on terrorist detainees could very well cause some tension in the new Obama White House. Talking with CNN’s Paula Zahn in 2002, Holder had a different take on who fell under the Geneva Conventions:

ZAHN: When you have Secretary of State Powell saying, “Let’s abide by the Geneva Convention,” and then folks on the other side, we are told, saying “Wait a minute. If we hold them to that kind of status, then all they’ll be required to give us is their name, rank and file number.”

HOLDER: Yes, it seems to me this is an argument that is really consequential. One of the things we clearly want to do with these prisoners is to have an ability to interrogate them and find out what their future plans might be, where other cells are located; under the Geneva Convention that you are really limited in the amount of information that you can elicit from people.

It seems to me that given the way in which they have conducted themselves, however, that they are not, in fact, people entitled to the protection of the Geneva Convention. They are not prisoners of war. If, for instance, Mohammed Atta had survived the attack on the World Trade Center, would we now be calling him a prisoner of war? I think not. Should Zacarias Moussaoui be called a prisoner of war? Again, I think not.

And yet, I understand what Secretary Powell is concerned about, and that is we’re going to be fighting this war with people who are special forces, not people who are generally in uniform. And if unfortunately they somehow become detained, we would want them to be treated in an appropriate way consistent with the Geneva Convention.

ZAHN: So is the secretary of state walking a fine line here legally? He is not asking that the United States declare these men as prisoners of war right now. He’s just saying let’s abide by the Geneva Convention in the meantime.

HOLDER: Yes, and I think in a lot of ways that makes sense. I think they clearly do not fit within the prescriptions of the Geneva Convention. You have to remember that after World War II, as these protocols were being developed, there seemed to be widespread agreement that members of the French Resistance would not be considered prisoners of war if they had been captured. That being the case, it’s hard for me to see how members of al Qaeda could be considered prisoners of war.

And yet, I understand Secretary Powell’s concerns. We want to make sure that our forces, if captured in this or some other conflict, are treated in a humane way. And I think ultimately that’s really the decisive factor here. How are people, who are in our custody, going to be treated? And those in Europe and other places who are concerned about the treatment of al Qaeda members should come to Camp X-ray and see how the people are, in fact, being treated.

The video is now uploaded at Eyeblast.tv

Published Nov 25, 2008 - 1 Comment

In Memory Of Ted Stevens

By K. Daniel Glover

Sen. Ted Stevens has been the bane of many a conservative’s existence ever since the Alaska Republican’s name became synonymous with the plan for the infamous “bridge to nowhere” in Ketchikan, Alaska. His reputation tanked even further last month when Stevens was convicted of seven felony counts in a corruption case.

That explains why few conservatives are concerned with yesterday’s news that liberal Mark Begich will replace Stevens in the Senate come next year. Some conservatives are eager to see Stevens go.

But it would be a shame for him to go without a proper video send-off because Stevens is one of the first stars of the online video era in politics. With that in mind, I spent some time searching YouTube today to compile a video collage of sorts in his memory.
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Published Nov 19, 2008 - Comments? None yet

Ayers Calls Sirhan Sirhan Book Dedication ‘Stupid’

By Kerry Picket

William Ayers spoke to a Washington, D.C. audience tonight about his views on the American education system. The Ayers speech included slams towards Fox News and Governor Sarah Palin.

The event was full of mostly supporters given the amount of loud applause he received. A true question and answer session never really occurred, as audience members were required to write their questions on note cards for pre-screening. Knowing organizers would only choose softball questions I confronted Ayers with cameraman Brian Maloney.

I asked Ayers about the dedication to Robert Kennedy’s assassin Sirhan Sirhan in his 1974 book Prairie Fire. The video is uploaded at Eyeblast.tv:

PICKET: Professor Ayers you had an unusual dedication to Sirhan Sirhan in your previous book. Do you regret that?

AYERS: Absolutely, but that wasn’t a dedication…show me. You heard it somewhere. The dedication in Prairie Fire in 1974…It was a manifesto was to all prisoners, and if I were writing a book like that today, I would dedicate it to 2.1 million people in prison. I think it was a stupid thing to single him out, but I also think that we have created a monster in the prison system. We ought to abolish the prison system. That’s what I think.

It is unfortunate the mainstream media refused to ask Ayers any questions about the Weather Underground’s 1974 manifesto, but that would make scrubbing his past even more difficult for them.

Published Nov 18, 2008 - 1 Comment

Obama To Do Weekly Video Addresses

When Barack Obama becomes president Jan. 20, he will move the traditional presidential radio address into the Web 2.0 era by producing online video versions.

In fact, Obama isn’t waiting until he takes office to break tradition. He recorded his first video address today, and it will air tomorrow as the Democratic counterpart to President Bush’s weekly address.

Obama’s team is trumpeting the development as a major change, but Ellen Miller of the Sunlight Foundation thinks otherwise. I agree with her. What extra value do we as citizens get watching Obama deliver a canned speech as opposed to hearing it?

Oh, wait, I get it now. It’s not about using today’s new media to be more transparent and engage the public directly rather than going through the mainstream media. Obama doesn’t need to bypass journalists because they adore him, and there are plenty of great ideas he could implement to become more accessible online.

But that’s not Obama’s goal. He’s just trying to make it easier for his worshipful will.i.am’s of the world to make viral hits of his eloquent but meaningless liberal catchphrases.

– K. Daniel Glover

Published Nov 14, 2008 - Comments? None yet

The Military Gets Its Own Video Site

The Pentagon last year put the kibosh on U.S. troops uploading videos to YouTube and other sites for both security and technological reasons but recently launched its own video site for soldiers and their families.

TroopTube isn’t quite like Eyeblast.tv or YouTube, however. It doesn’t appear to let viewers embed clips on their own sites. But that’s OK because we want more military videos on Eyeblast.

There is another new video outlet for the military called Great Americans. The site also is home to videos about law enforcers, emergency responders, homeland security officials, astronauts and other heroes.

You can bet we’ll be visiting the site regularly for videos to embed on Eyeblast, which serves as a portal to interesting military videos we find across the Web. But check it out for yourself, too. Any military site that merits the attention of Fox News’ Megyn Kelly is worth a looksee.

– K. Daniel Glover

Published Nov 14, 2008 - Comments? None yet

Back To Your Regularly Scheduled Programming

A quick tour of the latest online video hits confirms that campaign season is over.

Election videos, especially those about the presidential race, have ranked among the top clips at Viral Video Chart for weeks, if not months. Check the Top 20 for the past 30 days to get a sense of what the chart looked like until a few days ago. Not all of them are serious news, but most of them soared to the top because of their political nature.

Now look at today’s Top 10. The subjects:

Gmail
A Toshiba advertisement
A creative a cappella tribute to ”Star Wars” composer John Williams
A dance scene from “Twin Peaks”
A clip of Joe Biden in the vice-presidential debate
Two foreign-language music videos and a preview of a third video
A fascinating snapshot of ancient Rome via Google Earth
A Keith Olbermann rant about gay marriage

Out of 10 videos, only two are remotely political and one of those is outdated. Why is a clip of Biden bashing McCain in the vice-presidential debate still floating around the Web?

Ed Morrissey hit the online nail on the head yesterday when he asked, “What will we do without campaign ads?” The answer: Travel electronically back in time to ancient Rome.

Published Nov 13, 2008 - Comments? None yet

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