I get it!!! I finally understand this thread!!!

I am ashamed for not realizing it. It was too simple to not realize it. How could I have missed it?

All of you here, I am touched. Deeply deeply touched by your willingness to help. I mean here I sit trying to think of some way to help out the hurricane victims and I missed the solution that was right in front of my eyes. I owe all of you a deep and sincere apology.

I see how you are trying to help. I see how you are trying to get rid of the water. You are creating a flamewar in the hopes that the heat will evaporate the water. It is brilliant! Absolutely brilliant. I commend all of you for your hard work.

FLAME ON!!!

CNN on 9/11: "We can't show the bodies. It might inflame the country!"

CNN on Hurricane Katrina: "We have to show the bodies. It will inflame the country!"

Vertigo20:
As a Libertarian

I always find it amusing that most "libertarians" seem to live in densely populated areas where the luxury of being so is only possible because of the massive public infrastructure made possible precisely because of government at its various levels. So, they start clamoring around that this or that is a waste of money, that government is useless etc. etc. So, they lobby to cut taxes and social programs and public works projects while simultaneously lobbying to spend-down surpluses because, hey, that's MY money, give it back. Then, when a disaster strikes after they've successfully hobbled the ability of government to do anything, they scream that government isn't doing enough...

Sigh.

The Bush White House has tried so hard to control the media and the flow of information, and until recently, it has mostly succeeded. Now we know that these people attempt cover-ups because in reality they are know-nothing, do-nothing, say-nothing type people who are incompetent and unable to lead and have no business being where they are.

Boojum2k: From what I understand, the press has access. What they are not being given is government-funded rides on emergency crew vehicles.

You're not too sharp are you? How else are the news outlets supposed to get into a DISASTER AREA THAT IS SEALED TO THE PUBLIC? W all but jacked off all over the WTC corpses, yet he has failed to go to even a SINGLE servicemember's death as a result of Operation Iraqi Quagmire, and he refuses al allow the bodies of dead blacks to hammer his approval ratings any further.

Wow, censorship of the media? Damn, whoever saw that one coming? I guess the Gub'ment doesn't want its mistakes shown all over the evening news.

So the press cannot show the coffins of the heroes coming back from Iraq because that would be disrespectful to the families. Does this mean the hurricane victims are all heroes, too?

Where did these Libertarians come from? I am with

Cuchulane

This is an odd thread for people to be declaring their new love of the Libertarian Party. The Libertarian approach to this disaster would have been- "You're on your own. Good luck..."

rather than

Tatsuma

That's why I vote libertarian. Kill evil by striking at it's roots

Striking at its roots? So far Libertarians have not even managed to pry one leaf off the tree.

or

moltov

I recently dropped my republicrap status and changed my party assn. to Libertarian. Too bad I have to wait til '08 to use it.


Actually, you can print it on toilet paper and get use of it right now -- as much use as it will ever be to anyone.


I also completely respect st_gulik, as I registered Democrap in Flori-duh for identical reasons. Trouble is, there are so many douche bags...

CNN is the closest thing we have to a Praetorian Guard for democracy.

Unsurprisingly Godwin's second law comes up again: any time there is a political discussion on the Internet, it always devolves into gleeful claims about Libertarianism.

If anything, the dismally low approval rating of the government's effort shows one thing: big government is the problem until a real problem comes, then it's your best friend. Sadly, the anti-government incompetants of the GOP have neutered the critical roles that a governing body needs to have.

Free market without government intervention? It's called looting. Support the second amendment? Wonder why I don't hear NRA heads asploding about how the evil gubment is taking guns away from the people of New Orleans. Apparently it's okay for G. Gordon Liddy to take "head shots" at IRS and BATF agents but not to take headshots at FEMA, which is ironic given that the agency was on the loonie libertarian watch list for ages.

And another thing. In a completely free market in which no taxation existed, companies like Wal-Mart and Carnival would have no reason to help out the people of New Orleans. Free markets encourage greed and self-interest and disparage charity or altruism as evil. The cynics who hate morality rise to the top of the totem pole in a libertarian society while everyone else lives in squalor. Look no further than Baghdad, where the mercenary "security forces" just shut down the airport in order to try and extort money.

So feel free to bash both parties, but seriously. Enough of this "waaaah waaah I hate gubment" business.

Anagrammer:

CNN on 9/11: "We can't show the bodies. It might inflame the country!"

Yes, exactly. Up until about a week ago, the entire US media has balls the size of peanuts.

CNN on Hurricane Katrina: "We have to show the bodies. It will inflame the country!"

6 years too late, but at least *maybe* we're starting to have a functional press again.

/it's too bad we had to sink into world-record deficits, unnessessary wars, and thousands of body bags to get it.

I'm torn on this one - I'm all for freedom of the press, but some modicum of respect should also come into play. I had an aunt die in a helicopter crash - that evening's news story included footage of her body being taken out of the wreckage. While she was covered with a sheet, her foot was hanging out. It's been 15 years and that's still the first image that comes to mind when I think of her.

It's so heartbreaking when you see people who have just suffered a loss getting a mic stuck in their face, or being videotaped while in mourning. Too often the press is utterly crass and disrespectful, butting in where they aren't needed under to get the ratings the guise of freedom of the press and recording history. They have the right to do it, but I think they are often very much ethically and morally in the wrong.

I'm not saying that the government stepping in and messing with first amendment rights is a good idea. But I can see why some human being somewhere along the chain is trying to enforce some respect that the press just won't offer to the grieving. I just wish they would police themselves with just a bit of common courtesy.

Hey, when the media shows dead bodies from Hurricane Katrina, it only emboldens the hurricanists.

Freedom of speech should be censored until the War on Terror is over. And the War on Terror should be over any year now...

Remember how our brave media wanted to show the people jumping out of of the towers on 9/11?

Oh wait....

WHOLLY shiat.

The media grew a pair.

quix: I'm torn on this one - I'm all for freedom of the press, but some modicum of respect should also come into play.

Agreed.

Who do you want to decide what a "modicum of respect" is.

The TV network?

Or the Government?

MrBelvedere: Remember how our brave media wanted to show the people jumping out of of the towers on 9/11? Oh wait....

Remember how the media tried to film the towers, and the police leveled guns at their head and drove them away?

Oh wait...

MrBelvedereRemember how our brave media wanted to show the people jumping out of of the towers on 9/11.

The difference between deciding to not show certain footage and being TOLD that you can't shoot any footage is, well, huge. Take your Rush Limbaugh pseudo-logic and stick it up your ass please.

Ditto: Actually, I've been hearing that the 10k number is turning out to be greatly exaggerated.

Thank gawd.

smallberries -

Sorry if I wasn't clear enough in the orginal post, I said it shouldn't be the government doing it and I wished they (the media) would police themselves. The overall value of a free press outweighs the fact that they often overstep the bounds of good taste. Doesn't mean I have to like it when they do so, or that I can't understand why someone somewhere might try to (incorrectly) force the issue in favor of the grieving.

Good. FEMA needs to get severely owned over this. Good for CNN.

I haven't been around a computer much...tell me, has the asshat head of FEMA been canned yet? From what I heard on NPR a few days ago, he's not fit to run a frigging hot dog stand.

isamudyson: This is one person who deserves one of those $2000 debit cards W is always talking about just to help make up for what he put out (time, money and the cost to his body) to do the right thing. I just hope a lot more people like him pop up the next time a disaster happens somewhere here in the US.

I think they killed that idea. I could be wrong.

The fact that CNN filed a lawsuit tells me that they are being prevented from covering the story (or have good reason to believe that they will be). When the government prevents the media from telling the story, that's censorship, plain and simple (censorship is a much misused term). Given that all levels of government are being criticized for their actions surrounding the storm, they have good reason to want to prevent the media from covering the story. They didn't have a whole lot of respect and compassion for the living affected by the hurricane, do you really believe they have it for those killed by the hurricane? It's like the Bush administration claiming that respect for the dead prohibts coverage of bodies arriving at Dover AFB while simultaneously sending soldiers to war without proper armour and attempting to cut veteran's benefits. As Gwendolyn said, hearing about 10,000 people dead is a lot easier for the masses to ignore than seeing 10,000 bodies.

Like it or not, the people affected by the hurricane have become what is known as "involuntary public figures." It's a term usually used in the context of libel/defamation, but essentially they are public figures in the context of hurricane coverage and they are going to be the subject of media attention.

You simply cannot have a truly free society and a democracy without a free press. The thought of the government having the power to determine what stories the press can cover and how they cover them is terrifying. "Limited free press", like "limited free speech" is an oxymoron (or since this is Fark, an oxymoran).

moltov:

tatsuma

I recently dropped my republicrap status and changed my party assn. to Libertarian. Too bad I have to wait til '08 to use it.



No you don't. In fact, you only have to wait about a month and a half to use it. There is usually an election every year. Be sure to vote in every one of them. The more local elections will be this November, midterm elections in November 2006, and another election in 2007, before the next presidential election in 2008.

The crook politicians in charge rely on the public voting as little as possible. By voting every year, you can stick it to them all the better. Pass it on.

Yeah we can't have media coverage because it would be in poor taste.

I don't recall FEMA prohibiting broadcast of the Jerry Springer show, why is that?

newmoonpuppyhead: DIA

Why, what are you arguing for? Can you tell me why you have become so rightwing? Do you have a new group of friends or something?

They cut back on his medication.

ok, I stopped reading comments about the middle of the Kinbg Lago, Mediaho, and leperboy rants. Basically,

I think the whole thing is making sure the human element fully documented. Ya anyone can show damage and assign a pricetag for the damage, But when the deal goes down and someone is asked to take responsibility for this debacle, lets make sure that faces of the dead in the minds of the American People, before some govt appointed lackey tries to write a check to get out of it.

Appearently the govt machine have already set about trying to scapegoat a govt agency rather than the real culprit which its admin's overall policies. Dont beleive it?

""""Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job." President Bush, to FEMA director Michael Brown, while touring Hurricane-ravaged Mississippi, Sept. 2, 2005""""

"If that is indeed the case, why do they refuse to show WTC attack footage?"

A more interesting question is: why don't they release the CCTV footage that was confiscated by FBI personnel from the CITGO and the Sheraton just minutes after "flight 77" plunged into the Pentagon?

People trying to get them released have only met with bullshiat and stonewalling. What's to hide?

Whorehopper

If CNN wants to buy the boats, they can propagandize the dead bodies to their hearts content. But why should FEMA have to babysit a bunch of self-righteous reporters trying to be the next Geraldo?

After the Galveston, Texas flood in 1900:

"Looters found despoiling the dead were summarily executed by the militia - stood against the nearest wall or pile of debris and shot without the hindrance of a trial. The same brutal justice was delivered to amateur photographers. 'Word received from Galveston today indicates that Kodak fiends are being shot down like thieves. Two, it is stated, were killed yesterday while taking pictures of nude female bodies.'"
Dallas News, September 14, 1900

You goda love when the CNN anchors YELL at government officials, now that's entertaining.

Fox News II is fighting for freedom of speech? Their ratings must be in a slump.

"Looters found despoiling the dead were summarily executed by the militia - stood against the nearest wall or pile of debris and shot without the hindrance of a trial. The same brutal justice was delivered to amateur photographers. 'Word received from Galveston today indicates that Kodak fiends are being shot down like thieves. Two, it is stated, were killed yesterday while taking pictures of nude female bodies.'"
Dallas News, September 14, 1900

Texass hasn't changed a bit, has it?

It is high time someone bigger than a blogger stood up for freedom of the press, instead of competing to be Bush's official propaganda agency.

Smallberries: I think they killed that idea. I could be wrong.

I'm pretty sure they did. Remember kids, unless you fight your way to the front of that line like a rabid weasel, you get farked.

Can anyone say "FREEDOM OF THE PRESS"?

Or does anyone care about that anymore? Have we grown out of it or something?

Lose it, and we get that much closer to being China.

A more interesting question is: why don't they release the CCTV footage that was confiscated by FBI personnel from the CITGO and the Sheraton just minutes after "flight 77" plunged into the Pentagon?

People trying to get them released have only met with bullshiat and stonewalling. What's to hide?

Offhand, I'd say they're keeping them from being put on an "Al Queda's Greatest Hits" DVD, the way the twin towers has been.

"Rather than fight a lawsuit by CNN, the federal government abandoned its effort Saturday to prevent the media from reporting on the recovery of the dead in New Orleans."

U.S. won't ban media from New Orleans searches

MrBelvedere: But why should FEMA have to babysit a bunch of self-righteous reporters trying to be the next Geraldo?

Dude, there are plenty of countries with governments that share your opinion of the press. Why don't you move?

FEMA is afraid that the American people will freak out at the numbers of people murdered by bureaucracy. Even though CNN won in court on the right to cover the body count, it is going to be hard to really get a handle on just what is going on, when and why. A big diversionary tool is the outsourcing of the body recovery effort. Even so, we know the govt. is keeping track of how many deaths were due to homicidal violence. That is the one statistic they are likely to release with a big to-do--as they will then use it to fan the fears of the people and divert the rest of us from holding them accountable.

Q: Why does CNN need to take pictures of the dead Hurricane Katrina victims?

A: For photo IDs, so these people can be registered to vote as Democrats before the next election.



/Where am I going?
//Why am I in this handbasket?

jjorsett: Offhand, I'd say they're keeping them from being put on an "Al Queda's Greatest Hits" DVD, the way the twin towers has been.

That's a pretty weak reason. That's the best they got?

oldebayer-

You are so right, there is no hope, the Libertarians will never amount to anything. Personal responabltiy will never happen, our servants will screw us blind, we will all grind to death in the system. Sleep, sleep, be happy in slavery. It will all be OK.

A guy told a friend of mine saw a confedential FEMA memo a week ago, and they were already confirming 5,000 dead.

MrBelvedere: But why should FEMA have to babysit a bunch of self-righteous reporters trying to be the next Geraldo?

Because FEMA works for me, and since I can't be there to watch FEMA doing it's job, or not doing it's job, I have to rely on a proxy. In this case, an independent media.

Get it yet?

MrBelvedere:

Whorehopper

If CNN wants to buy the boats, they can propagandize the dead bodies to their hearts content. But why should FEMA have to babysit a bunch of self-righteous reporters trying to be the next Geraldo?


I feel completely ripped off now, no baysitter of mine ever bought me a boat.

Why does one thing always become some other thing in your mind? Is there something wreong with you? Quit stealing Limbaugh's bit, you're not very good at it.