Because Democracy is Not Free — we all have to work at it
“The media is in love,” cried John McCain’s campaign to supporters in a recent email. The McCain campaign slammed the press for portraying Obama favorably over McCain, citing bias. Is the media in love, is the free market driving content, or could it be both? Having watched both sides of the campaign this week, I think [...]
This morning, the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) and the Office of Inspector General (OIG) issued this report on political hiring at the Office of Attorney General. The audit concluded that Monica Goodling, the White House liaison; Gonzales’s chief of staff, Kyle Sampson; and others committed misconduct by considering political affiliations in the selection [...]
Pajamas Media recently ran an article, Homeland Security Meets the Sopranos, in response to the Transportation Security Administration placing CNN reporter Drew Griffin on the no-fly list just weeks after he ran a newspiece critical of the organization. When asked by Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX) if people were being targeted as a result of criticism of [...]
What would you do if you received a multimillion dollar settlement as part of a qui tam whistleblower lawsuit? Live frugally? Volunteer your time and donate money to worthy causes? How about write a book, or all of the above? That’s what John W. Schilling did. Schilling’s book, Undercover: How I Went from Company Man [...]
This is an update to my previous post about “McCain at German Restaurant while Obama is in Germany.” I was flipping through the channels and I saw a video clip highlighting John McCain’s Presidential photo-op at Schmidt’s Restaurant and Sausage Haus in Ohio. Someone at Rawstory caught the clip and posted it here. Check out the compelling backdrop and sound [...]
Remember my earlier post about how absurd news has become and how I’ve had a hard time telling it apart from the lampoon magazine, The Onion? Well, here’s a real article from Fox News — McCain at German Restaurant while Obama is in Germany. And here’s a real quote from the article thrown in for good [...]
ProPublica summarizes the Department of Labor’s (DOL) attempt to sneak through a new rule that, health and safety experts say, would make it harder to protect workers from exposure to hazardous chemicals and toxins. In response to a recent article from the Washington Post, Congressman George Miller (D-CA) and Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) have sent [...]
For the next few weeks, I’m on the road, alternately writing from my Treo phone and my laptop. Anyhow, this does lead to a story, so stick with me. Because it’s not easy to navigate the web from a mobile phone, I selectively picked my favorite sites, like ProPublica. I read their article on Bush Administration Tries To [...]
In House legislation which passed 392-0 yesterday, federal aviation inspectors would have to wait two years before taking airline jobs where they deal with their old government boss. The measure now moves to the Senate. This measure follows an Associated Press investigation which found numerous industry leaders who were once under the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) authority [...]
Recently, I was introduced to a new aviation security blog written by two very courageous individuals, P. Jeffrey Black of the Federal Air Marshal (FAM) program and U.S. Army Captain Jeff Denning. Prior to being deployed to Iraq, Captain Denning served in the FAM program as well. On many levels, Black and Denning’s new blog [...]