The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

‘Streisand Effect’: Scientology Imploding?

Posted on | January 16, 2013 | 26 Comments

One of the principles of the New Media age is that attempts to suppress the truth tend to backfire, generating greater interest in the hidden truth. The so-called “Streisand Effect” may now be invoked in the wake of Monday’s debacle in which The Atlantic published a ludicrously over-the-top “advertorial” for Scientology and was forced to remove it and apologize after reader complaints. (More at MediaGazer.)

It was widely speculated that Scientology’s motive in buying the “sponsored content” at The Atlantic was to hold back a wave of negative coverage. In 2011, Janet Reitman published Inside Scientology: The Story of America’s Most Secretive Religion, and now Lawrence Wright has published Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief. The niece of Scientology’s leader is about to publish Beyond Belief: My Secret Life Inside Scientology and My Harrowing Escape. But the attention created by the “sponsored content” controversy has now provided a hook for journalists to report more about the internal divisions inside the Scientology cult. Alex Klein at BuzzFeed:

The Church of Scientology International (CSI) headquarters in Los Angeles says that it has built 34 of these cathedrals worldwide since 2003, with 60 more underway. . . .
Across the country, donors and high-ranking executives say that the aggressive fundraising and construction scheme is used to enrich the central church at the expense of the rank-and- file, helping to grow the Scientology war chest to over a billion dollars. Two former members, Mike Rinder and Mark Elliott, went so far as to call the project a “real-estate scam.” To some of these defectors, the structures are metaphors for the religion itself: garish on the outside, empty on the inside. The irony is that the very expansion that Scientology lauds as its renaissance is actually a symbol of internal dissent and decline. . . .

Read the whole thing, because Klein makes an important point:

Back in the ’70s, the famously litigious church had time to fight publicly with the novelist William S. Burroughs, himself a Scientology defector — or, in the ’90s, with Time magazine. Today, going after every Cruise-bashing blog post would be impossible.

Exactly. There was a time when the cult could sue a few critics and thereby intimidate everybody else. But the Internet makes it impossible to silence the truth, and the truth is not Scientology’s friend.

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers!

 

 


Category: Journalism, Religion

‘Just Another Elitist Hypocrite’

Posted on | January 16, 2013 | 24 Comments

The National Rifle Association’s new ad:

(Via Memeorandum and Hot Air.) Liberals were on a gun-control rant for the past month. The NRA’s been signing up dues-paying members:

A day before President Barack Obama is scheduled to release Vice President Joe Biden’s recommendations to curb gun violence in the United States, the National Rifle Association told U.S. News and World Report that they have seen membership grow by 250,000 in the month since the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Connecticut.
Politico reported membership had grown by more than 100,000 five days ago. The NRA says that when Politico reported the story, membership was close to 200,000, but the number has drastically grown in just five days. The association now has over 4.25 million members.

I Watch MSNBC So You Don’t Have To™

 

 

RECENTLY:


Category: Barack Obama, Constitution

LIVE AT FIVE: 01.16.13

Posted on | January 16, 2013 | 1 Comment

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
French, Malian Troops Go On The Offensive

French troops arrive at Bamako

French commit 2500 troops to Mali

Obama Gun Proposal To Look Beyond Mass Shootings
“Comprehensive approach” = more laws that already don’t solve the problem

Top Japanese Airlines Ground Boeing Dreamliners After Emergency
Battery problem latest in a string of teething troubles for high-tech airliner



POLITICS
Sweeping Limits On Guns Become Law In New York

NY Assemblyman Joe Lentol answers questions about his gun-control bill

NRA, GOP condemn bill as mere pandering to Cuomo’s presidential aspirations

Maryland’s O’Malley Plays “Me Too”, Readies Tough Package Of Gun Laws For Maryland

Sandy Funding Passes House; Offsetting Spending Cut Amendments Defeated

Senator Inhofe Opposes Hagel Nomination

Supremes Rule Floridian’s Floating House Is Not A Boat

Rep. Zoe Lofgren Introduces “Aaron’s Law” To Amend Computer Fraud And Abuse Act In Memory Of Aaron Swartz

Treasury To Tap Civil Service Retirement Funds In Latest Debt-Ceiling Move

Washington GOP Chair Urges Support For Defecting Democrat Senators; Defectors Will Give GOP Control Of State Senate For First Time In 8 Years



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
Oil Slides On Soft Demand: NYMEX $93.43, Brent $110.52
Japan Stocks Fall As Rising Yen Outweighs Machine Orders
Fitch Warns Of US Downgrade Over Debt Fight
Dell Buyout Could Be Announced Within Two Weeks
Alibaba Founder Jack Ma Stepping Down As CEO
Walmart Pledges To Hire Vets, Buy American
Facebook Unveils New Search Tool
Microsoft To Give Free TV Ad To Top-Voted WinPhone8 App
OkCupid Wants To Send You On A Crazy Blind Date
Apple Shares Tank On Weak iPhone 5 Sales Report
Five Notable New Features In Fedora Linux 18 “Spherical Cow”
Disney’s Biggest Stars Join Forces For Skylanders-Style Gaming Mashup
iPhone Tops Among Potential Buyers, But Samsung Surging
Oracle Patches Java, But Concerns Remain
Phone Tracking Tool Leads Authorities To Wrong Home – Constantly
Blackberry 10: The Underdog Is Coming After Windows Phone



SPORTS
Unranked Badgers Stun #2 Hoosiers, Take Over First Place In Big Ten

Wisconsin’s Traevon Jackson drives to the basket against the Hoosiers

Wisconsin holds off Indiana for 64-59 win

Nyets Win Seventh Straight Against Raptors, 113-106

Mike McCoy Moves From OC Of Broncos To Chargers Coach

Knicks Recording Trash Talk To Protect Own Players

Rockets Can’t Recover From Third Quarter Collapse, Fall To Clippers 117-109

Hornets Come Out Shooting, Beat Sixers 111-99

Livestrong, Sporting KC Divorce Could Get Ugly

Ryder Plans Return To International Cricket, Even As Warnings Sound That NZ Could Be Shunned

Nationals Are All-In For 2013: Closer Rafael Soriano Inked



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Megan Fox Saves Herself

Megan Fox

Interview starts with crappy Aztec analogy and goes downhill from there

Taylor Swift Wants To Hook Up With Bradley Cooper – Who’s Just Not Interested

Jessica Simpson To Star In Semi-Autobiographical NBC Comedy


Lindsay Lohan Pleads Not Guilty – Shawn Holley To The Rescue

Amanda Bynes Gets Pierced

Elton John Welcomes Second Son

Lifetime’s “Drop Dead Diva” Cancelled After Four Seasons

Charlie Sheen’s Going To Be A Grandpa!

Danica Patrick Files For Divorce

Oxygen Cancels Shawty Lo’s “All My Babies’ Mamas” Reality Show



FOREIGNERS
Mali’s Jihadis Dig In And Blend In For A Long War
Pakistani Supreme Court Orders Arrest Of Prime Minister In Bribery Case
Iran: Fatwa Against Nuclear Weapons Is Binding
PM Singh Says “No Business As Usual” With Pakistan
British Airlines Employee Wins Right To Wear Crucifix At Work From European Court Of Human Rights
“Canadian Society Is Our Heaven”: Imam Qadri Touts Islam, Democracy, Tim Hortons
Memories Of Its Own Civil War Damp Lebanon’s Desire To Help Syrian Refugees
US Downplays Report That Syria Used Chemical Weapons



BLOGS & STUFF
Weasel Zippers: NRA Ad Calls Obama An “Elitist Hypocrite”
Rush Limbaugh: GOP Doesn’t Have The Will To Stand Up To Obama On The Debt Limit
Beltway Confidential: The Only Times Obama’s Agreed To Cut Spending Are In Times Of Crisis
Atlas Shrugs: NY Punishes Law-Abiding Citizens – Cuomo Signs Nation’s Most Punitive Gun Legislation Into Law
Neo-Neocon: The Conspiracists Tackle Newtown
Viking Pundit: No More Hope & Change
Jim Treacher: Best Smoothie Bar In The World Charges Liberals $1 Extra
Pejman Yousefzadeh: The Empire Strikes Back
Allahpundit: State Department Investigation Confirms Assad Used Chemical Weapons Last Month
Power Line: Let’s Not Hand The Chinese Our Advanced Battery Technology
Israel Matzav: Obama Patronizes Israel (Again) And Threatens Too
Protein Wisdom: New Yorkers Who Own Three Or More Guns Now Felons

Category: Live at Five

Steubenville ‘Rape Crew’? Non-Facts Smear the Innocent in an Ohio Town

Posted on | January 15, 2013 | 93 Comments

Michael Nodianos in the now-infamous Aug. 12 video

“Michael didn’t know the Jane Doe in this case. . . . He left the party around midnight on Saturday, went to McDonald’s and then to a friend’s house. She was leaving just a few moments after he arrived at the second house. He saw her leave with two guys. . . . There were three witnesses to the alleged rape at a third house and two of them came back to the house where Michael made the 12-minute video at around 2 a.m. or 2:30 a.m. People at the other house came back and talked about what happened. The kid shooting the video of Michael was not a witness to the alleged rape. The video was made at a friend’s house and not at the house where the alleged incident occurred.”
— Dennis McNamara, attorney for Michael Nodianos

“An Ohio State University freshman shown in a video joking about a teenage girl allegedly raped by two high school football players will not be returning to school for the spring semester, his attorney says. . . .
“[S]omeone has hacked into his client’s email and social media accounts and the email accounts of his family members. . . .
“McNamara said people [had] attempted to find Nodianos’ class schedule and even came to his dormitory looking for him.”
— CBS News

How did a sexual assault case involving three 16-year-olds — a girl and her two accused attackers — turn into a digital lynch-mob that has forced Michael Nodianos to drop out of college and defamed the entire town of Steubenville, Ohio? Lee Stranahan has been examining those questions, and a disturbing “story behind the story” is now beginning to emerge, which the national media seem reluctant to address.

Stranahan’s item headlined “Steubenville Rape Case: Everything You Know Is Wrong” identifies misinformation that has circulated about the case, including the unsubstantiated claim that there is (or was) a cover-up which bloggers and Anonymous hackers exposed.

Let’s start with the notorious 12-minute video in which Nodianos, an academic scholarship student who graduated from Steubenville in June, jokes about the alleged victim in the case. As Stranahan has pointed out (“Steubenville Probable Cause Transcript: The Infamous Video“) this video has been both the subject and source of much mythology about the case. Some believe that the video was recorded at the scene of the alleged rape, that Nodianos was a witness to (or participant in) the alleged rape and that nobody knew about the video until it was posted online by Anonymous — all of which is wrong, wrong, wrong:

  • The video was recorded in the basement of a home where, as Nadianos’s attorney explained, the girl had left about two hours before the video was recorded.
  • The alleged sexual assault(s) occurred in a car en route to another party, and also at that party at another home.
  • Detectives were aware of the video, as court transcripts make clear, by Aug. 14 or 15 — just two or three days after the alleged attack.

Keep in mind Stranahan’s caveat about his reporting: “This is not defending the suspects or attacking the accuser.”

Why did Nodianos become such an object of hate? Well, he made cruel jokes on the video about how drunk the girl was. He had seen her briefly — before she left for the third party she attended that night — in a state of extreme intoxication. The New York Times, Dec. 17:

At the parties, the girl had so much to drink that she was unable to recall much from that night, and nothing past midnight, the police said. The girl began drinking early on, according to an account that the police pieced together from witnesses, including two of the three Steubenville High athletes who testified in court in October. By 10 or 10:30 that night, it was clear that the dark-haired teenager was drunk because she was stumbling and slurring her words, witnesses testified.
Some people at the party taunted her, chanted and cheered as a Steubenville High baseball player dared bystanders to urinate on her, one witness testified.
About two hours later, the girl left the party with several Big Red football players, including Mays and Richmond, witnesses said. They stayed only briefly at a second party before leaving for their third party of the night. Two witnesses testified that the girl needed help walking. One testified that she was carried out of the house by Mays and Richmond while she was “sleeping.”

Nodianos joked that the girl was so drunk she was “dead” and, at one point in the video, suggests that anyone who had sex with the girl in that condition was guilty of “necrophilia.” But it must be emphasized that Nodianos was neither a participant in nor a witness to the alleged assault. As cruel and tasteless as his jokes were, he was not guilty of a crime, nor did he have any first-hand knowledge of a crime.

What has happened in the past three weeks — since Anonymous “released what its members called a ‘partial dox,’” as Michelle Dean of the New Yorker reported — is that a witch-hunt mentality of collective guilt has developed around the case. Alexander Abad-Santos of the Atlantic:

The hackers . . . seem to believe that there are more people involved, that there are more victims, that the accused are getting special treatment because they are football players, and that there’s a bigger group of boys involved, which Anonymous has dubbed the “Rape Crew.”

These unsubstantiated claims about a “Rape Crew,” which allegedly involves many more people than the two Steubenville High School students who will face trial next month, are wildly irresponsible. As the Steubenville police chief told the New York Times in December:

“Everybody on those Web sites kept saying stuff that wasn’t true and saying, ‘Why wasn’t this person arrested? Why aren’t the police doing anything about it?’ ” he said. “Everybody wanted to incriminate more of the football players . . .”

John Ziegler appeared Monday on CNN Headline News and said:

“All of this information on social media that has come from this Anonymous Internet hacking group has been bogus, fraudulent, slanderous, libelous. They have committed at least nine felonies, according to one Ohio prosecutor. . . . They are frauds. Almost everything they have said has been false. They have ginned up an enormous amount of false media coverage and a false narrative has been created to destroy a town and there are many innocent victims here.”

Lee Stranahan continues reporting on the story:

It seems that we may be witnessing a typical case of media malpractice, in which a crew of irresponsible bloggers and “hacktivists” are ginning up false accusations without regard for truth, and without concern for the harm done to innocent citizens of Steubenville.

UPDATE: Lee Stranahan has posted excerpts of the testimony at the October hearing, to clarify when, where and by whom the girl was allegedly assaulted. Claims that the victim was “dragged [by the suspects] to three separate parties during the course of the night as their personal rape toy” (The Nation) or “gang raped and dragged from party to party” (Salon) are simply not substantiated by the testimony.

No one “dragged” her to the first party (she attended with girlfriends). She was not “dragged” from that party (she voluntarily left with Trent Mays and others), and there wasn’t really much of a “party” at the second home they visited, where they stayed only about 20 minutes, most of which time the girl was vomiting. The teenagers were asked to leave that home and the girl had to be carried out because she was passed out. According to testimony, it was only then — en route to the third party of the night, and at that party — that the girl was allegedly assaulted. And witnesses said the “gang rape” involved only the two 16-year-old boys who have been charged in the case.

There is a vast difference between (a) the specific crimes alleged in the testimony, and (b) the misleading impression created by certain media reports that the girl was the victim of repeated gang rapes.

PREVIOUSLY:

Category: Crime, Media Bias, Ohio

At Least One Chief Executive Is Doing The Correct Thing

Posted on | January 15, 2013 | 3 Comments

by Smitty

So the guy who already knows he’s not going to meet his budget deadline is going to surround himself with children and infringe upon the 2nd Amendment. Mataconis figures that flinging this much humus is likely to make something stick, in particular, the executive orders. One can hope the fiasco proves a bridge too far for the President. Is there some kind of psychological theory about repeatedly playing the Bad Guy as a means of weakening the opposing resolve?

For some green shoot of intellectual life peeking through the humus, Mike Pence in Indiana is enacting a regulatory moratorium. One is confident that the policy of “If DC can’t take credit, it won’t notice” will remain in effect. Also, Senator Rand Paul will be addressing CPAC 2013, in just two short months. Which, on the current course, will be a desperately needed therapy session. Register, and get your fedora down there.

Category: Uncategorized

Eighteen Severed Human Heads Stopped En Route to Chicago ‘Research Facility’

Posted on | January 15, 2013 | 42 Comments

Somewhere in Illinois, a “research facility” is being operated by zombies, cannibals or, perhaps, a mad scientist from Transylvania:

The 18 human head specimens that arrived at O’Hare International Airport from Rome just before Christmas were on their way to a research facility in the Chicago suburbs — a facility that is “under investigation,” a source told the Chicago Sun-Times Tuesday morning.
Officials initially said a paperwork problem prevented the shipment from being delivered to its final destination, but the Sun-Times has learned that the hold-up is connected to an ongoing investigation at the suburban facility in question. The investigation is “absolutely not” connected to the shipment of the heads, the source said.
The heads were shipped from Rome as cargo on a Lufthansa Airlines flight, arriving at O’Hare about one week before Christmas.
“They were properly preserved and tagged as human specimens,” said Tony Brucci, chief investigator for the medical examiner’s office.
Brucci said U.S. Customs officials at O’Hare initially held up the shipment, when they found the paperwork to be “a little confusing.”
Brian Bell, a spokesman with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, said earlier Tuesday that the specimens appear to be legitimate medical samples.

Why won’t the newspaper name the facility “under investigation”? Why do I suspect the “facility” is a castle with a laboratory in the cellar?

 

(Via Gawker; hat-tip to David Freddoso on Twitter.)

 

Category: Illinois, Science

Why Doesn’t President Obama Support ‘Citizens Against Senseless Violence’?

Posted on | January 15, 2013 | 9 Comments

New York Times headline today:

Obama Poised to Back Comprehensive
Plan to Curb Gun Violence

If he’s against “gun violence,” why would his attorney general call the cops on a peaceful group promoting its own “comprehensive plan”?

Posing as “Citizens Against Senseless Violence,” [James] O’Keefe and company visited the homes of anti-gun journalists employed by The Journal News in New York and the Star-Ledger in New Jersey.
They also swung by Touré’s place and paid a visit to the ol’ Eric Holder homestead. Each household was asked to display a yard sign with the words “This Home is Proudly Gun Free.”
Any guesses how that turned out?

You don’t have to guess:

“FBI Police confronted our reporters within minutes of their knocking on the Attorney General’s home. Eric Holder is safe and sound under armed protection, unlike the nation’s children.”

 

CLICK HERE TO DONATE TO PROJECT VERITAS

 

Category: Barack Obama, Constitution, Eric Holder, James O'Keefe

The Problem With ‘Sponsored Content’: Atlantic Unpublishes Scientology Article

Posted on | January 15, 2013 | 24 Comments

How do you turn pixels into profits? This is an industry-wide issue for journalism in the digital New Media age, and the “sponsored content” approach — selling ads that look like articles — is supposed to be the wave of the future. Well . . .

The Atlantic apparently sold space to the Church Creepy Ripoff Brainwashing Cult of Scientology for an “advertorial” with this headline:

David Miscavige Leads Scientology to Milestone Year

To say the very least, the article attracted unflattering attention:

The Atlantic — the one time publisher of Mark Twain, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edith Wharton — is now publishing blatant Scientology propaganda. The “sponsored content,” which went up Monday around noon, features all sorts of breathless praise for Scientology and its alleged growth last year.
The post is basically one long tribute to David Miscavige, the “ecclesiastical leader of the Scientology religion” . . .

Given the high-toned image and upscale readership of the Atlantic, this invitation to public ridicule was an embarrassment to the staff:

Twitchy collected the ROTFLMAO reaction from Twitter, and MediaGazer aggregated the firestorm of journalistic shame, which predictably ended with the de-publication of the non-article:

The Atlantic has U-turned on its controversial paid-for feature article from the Church of Scientology. The publication had sparked a debate on media ethics and business models after allowing the advertorial from the religious group to appear on its site but — as of 21:00, UTC-8 — the page now redirects to one with the following message: “We have temporarily suspended this advertising campaign pending a review of our policies that govern sponsor content and subsequent comment threads.”

Of course, this is just an occasion to laugh at the snobbish hypocrisy of the Atlantic, another elite-oriented neoliberal institution caught in the economic crunch that has affected so many other Legacy Media outposts. Paying for actual journalism in a post-literate age is an increasing challenge for every outfit not attached to an entertainment conglomerate that can afford to subsidize the written word as a “loss leader.”

For my own Shameless Capitalist self, I say shop our Amazon specials and remember the Five Most Important Words in the English Language:

HIT THE FREAKING TIP JAR!
A Feasible Alternative to Scientology Ads, So Far

 

UPDATE: Ed Driscoll offers a dish best served cold:

As I said, “Old Media Belatedly Discovers That Elections Have Consequences”‘ the moribund Obamaconomy is impacting the Atlantic as well.

The widespread belief among journalists that they can safely ignore market forces is crumbling under the weight of contradictory evidence. Jeff Bercovici of Forbes notes that it took less than 12 hours for the Atlantic to pull the ad, and issue an embarrassed statement:

We screwed up. It shouldn’t have taken a wave of constructive criticism — but it has — to alert us that we’ve made a mistake, possibly several mistakes. We now realize that as we explored new forms of digital advertising, we failed to update the policies that must govern the decisions we make along the way. It’s safe to say that we are thinking a lot more about these policies after running this ad than we did beforehand. In the meantime, we have decided to withdraw the ad until we figure all of this out. We remain committed to and enthusiastic about innovation in digital advertising, but acknowledge — sheepishly — that we got ahead of ourselves. We are sorry, and we’re working very hard to put things right.

Maybe the Atlantic can sell out to the Qatari oil sheikhs . . .

 


Category: Journalism, Shoe Leather Fund
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