Actual lunchtime conversation, overheard last month at an adjacent table in a little greasy-spoon diner in a small central Indiana town, population approx 400, which will mercifully remain nameless because my wife is the postmaster:

Toothless Old Fart (TOF) #1: "Hey, did yew know that Obama feller wuz a Moozlum?"

TOF #2: "Naw. Whird yew hear that?"

TOF #1: "On Fox!"

TOF #2: "Well, shee-it. I reckon the Democrats just cain't sank no lower."

This goes a long way toward explaining how much of a pickle we are in, and how we came to be pickled in the first place.

News media makes mistakes. Newsweek reporting that Quran's were desecrated at Guantanamo is an example. WATE reporting on election day that City Councilman Steve Hall withdrew from the County Mayor's race is a local example. It happens.

Those weren't mistakes, CBT. That was incompetent reporting.

Then we have the intentional feeding of bad info to the press as in the heroic rescue of Jessica Lynch case, the Missing "W's" on the White House keyboards, the fake listening device on Karl Rove's wall he accused Democrats of planting, the black love child of John McCain, the weapons of mass destruction in the hands of Saddam, the...sorry, I could go on but it gets tiresome.

We get some good accurate reporting and we have a permanent Democratic Majority for decades. The battles will be between the Clintons and Fords at the DLC, and Gore and Dean at the DNC.

It'll be fun and America will be a great Nation once again.

There are endless examples of Fox Noise warping the news to fit the GOP party line (or Rove/Cheney/Bush's). Like this one. I'd be interesting in hearing a theory as to how this one could be a mistake.

In "Buying the War," Bill Moyers covered in depth the extent to which Fox News, in the run up to the President's War on Iraq, went on the attack against any news organization that didn't give Bush a blank check. In the name of patriotism and fighting terror because of 9/11, of course.

No wonder studies show that Faux News viewers are so poorly informed.

I was going to go with one of the dozens of screen caps claiming/"asking" that/whether Mark Foley was a Democrat, Iraq's WMD was shipped to Hezbollah or Dems are wrecking world peace. And don't get me started about "Pope is dead. Helloooooo. Pope is dead!

But I think this is my favorite:

Sven, that one would be--er, uh...hard to beat. Ba-dump!

But seriously, ladies and germs, remember the one that was captioned "Have Democrats forgotten the lessons of 9/11?"? I think it looked a little like this.

And if I wind up in a restaurant or bar with that crap playing on the TV's I leave...they don't need my money bad enough for me to have to see or hear that swill while I'm dining. I would rather be able to digest my food.
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"You can't fix stupid..." ~ Ron White"

"I never said I wasn't a brat..." ~ Talidapali

Living in a red state as I do, when I go to the local Mickey D's Fox is all that is on. You can't even chage it without them getting upset. But, if you are sly, you can throw Mac sauce at the screen.

Now, now. No need to resort to that.