“Racists, idiots and lunatics.” These seem to be the preferred (and reckless) insults that those on the Left and its defenders in the mainstream media have been hurling at anyone who dares criticize the political agenda of President Obama. No one is safe from these ad hominen attacks; not congressmen, senators, pundits, reporters, academics and especially regular citizens who have come to the public square seeking answers to reasonable questions about the Obama Administration and what exactly it means by “hope” and “change.”

Whether on serious issues that are intentionally “transformative” of American society like cap-and-trade, health care reform, and the Federal stimulus package, or on issues that may reveal some inconvenient truths about the present Administration, the Left and the mainstream media seem unable to make their case without totally dismissing the criticisms and questions lodged by an increasing number of the American people.

And, when they do deem it necessary to stoop to answer the criticism, they do so by heaping harsh invective on the critics by attributing to them a caustic bigotry or a vast ignorance on the issues that have inspired people to speak out. This, even after they are scooped on the big stories by the very same people they ignore and deride.

The irony was on full display this past week as both the Left and most of the mainstream media missed the story of the resignation of Obama’s controversial “green jobs czar” Van Jones. By any measure, this should have been a big story facilitaing sober analysis from both sides of the political spectrum. Nevertheless, the Left and the mainstream media left it to go largely unreported. Instead, they have obsessively pursued ways to make Congressman Joe Wilson’s now famous, disgraceful and unfortunate “You lie!” outburst during Obama’s speech, a racially inspired incident without a shred of evidence that it was anything more than a response within the ongoing and raging health care reform debate.

Van Jones is an attorney and environmental activist who was appointed by President Obama in March as Special Advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation at the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) in the United States. After it was revealed first by the blogosphere and later picked up by Fox News host Glenn Beck, that Jones had a very radical past- describing himself at various times both as a “Communist” and a “revolutionary,” and had signed a 9/11 Truth.org petition that sought to implicate members of the Bush Administration in the 9/11 attacks- Jones tendered his resignation late Saturday (9/5) with nary a peep from most news outlets. The explanation offered by the mainstream media for missing this story until Jones actually resigned- if they admitted there was a story at all- was irresponsible and was accompanied by desperate attacks on those that first broke the story.

On the NBC News program Meet the Press the day after Jones’ resignation, the assembled panel, which included New York Times Pulitzer-winning International Affairs columnist Tom Friedman, found the only lesson in the whole episode was that the internet could not be trusted as a source of information. He said, “the Internet is an open sewer of untreated, unfiltered information” adding to former NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw’s previous comment that the Internet is filled with “false information” and “it's something that we all have to address and it requires society and political and cultural leaders to stand up and say, ‘this is crazy.’ We just can't function that way.”

Did both these important journalists believe at the time they made these comments that the information that forced the Van Jones resignation was false? Certainly, they did not follow up with any questions about the Obama Administration’s silence on Jones’ resignation, even as there was evidence, as reported in the San Francisco Chronicle, that Obama knew about his background before he became an important appointee in the Administration. Or, did they just want the whole incident to go away? Why didn’t they even acknowledge that the vetting process for Jones’ appointment appeared to be quite flawed, even if one merely acknowledged the comments of Obama supporter and west coast Democratic icon former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown who said, "The only question I have about Van Jones' resignation as the White House green czar is why they didn't they call me before they hired him... I would have said, 'Yeah, I know a lot about him. He's really a pain in the a**. When he ran Bay Area PoliceWatch, he slanted every case to make the cops look as bad as possible. And while he might be talented enough, he's totally and completely unreliable.'"

It seems that Friedman’s employer, The New York Times, did not view the fact that an important advisor to the President of the United States was both a self-described revolutionary and a 9/11 Truther warranted much in the way of further discovery. Their response to the fact they completely missed the story was that they did not have enough reporters on duty that weekend to cover it. And, quite amazingly, there has been absolutely no follow-up inquiry on Jones’ resignation. Why has Obama remained silent on the incident? Why didn’t the White House defend Jones, who is an acknowledged expert on the emerging green economy and is a best-selling author on the issue? Yes, Van Jones is clearly someone who inhabits the far-left of the Democratic Party, his membership in Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement (STORM) and the new-agey Noetic Institute, where he was resident Fellow, prove that. Yet he was still appointed to the White House on the merit of his work, according to
Obama’s closest advisor, Valerie Jarret. Obviously, they initially felt that there was nothing objectionable about his past.

Indeed, Jones was perhaps an important symbolic representation of the new green progressivism in the Administration and was quietly going about his business at that. Allowing him to resign tends to lend credence to the right-wing narrative of concealed radicalism they are trying to foist upon the Administration. Why give them the fuel for their fire if these charges are as delusional, racist, ignorant and overheated as many claim? And why not follow up on the true story of his resignation if they don’t want the likes of Glenn Beck and the sewer of the (conservative) blogosphere to write the popular history of this event?

What I should really do with this blog is to try and be as funny as possible. I have joined other sites dedicated to activism but sometimes, what I really need is just to laugh and mock liberals. I spend a lot of time in my life answering the liberal argument and spend far too little time just making fun of them. I think I'll start doing that here and see if I can get some readers who will inspire me to continue writing. I hope I can entertain, if we're allowed to do that anymore.

However, the first person that I will attempt to skewer here will not be a liberal at all; but erstwhile conservative David Frum.  But is he really a conservative? I spent some time this past weekend at Frum's The New Majority website and it is hard to imagine that Frum's movement is anything but an attempt to supplant conservatism as we know it. While there isn't really much policy on the site, the articles that do discuss what the so-called New Majority's vision is for "a conservatism that can win again" left me wondering. There is a Frum piece on the economy where he suggests conservatve Keynesianism is the answer. There is a short piece by an anonymous author that recommends the administration of public parks be handed over to environmental groups. And there is a short article about how states cause health insurance costs to rise and thus a federal super-regulator for the insurance industry would solve a lot of the problems in health care. There are more of such wistful policy essays to be found on the site along with a number of  "cultural" essays.   Of course, there are many articles that attack talk radio and the so-called lunatic fringe of conservatism.

Oh, what to say about such a character and his assault on conservatism?  Well, David Frum has bad breath. I know. I know. This sounds like a gratuitous insult, but it is not. I mean really, if  he can call Rush Limbaugh a fat idiot and Mark Levin an insecure retard in his columns, then insist he is really the one who wants to have an educated and rational debate on policy, I insist that what I say here is not gratuitous either; though I admit I may enjoy this a little too much.

To be honest  I never smelled David Frums's  breath up close nor do I see him as a the type of unkempt fellow whose yellow teeth and grungy, dry lips  may just emit an unpleasant and  pungent odor. No. See, David Frum  has been emitting an odor that is not coming from his mouth but is really stinking up the beleaguered and worried conservative movement as of late. Frum  wants to initiate some kind of policy reassessment by agreeing with the liberal's media assessment of Limbaugh notably in columns published in Newsweek and an interview with MSNBC's Chris Matthews. I know, at this point in time, most conservatives would rather not have to smell Frum's breath, but after all we must admit he is breathing directly on in its face. And we are going to have to confront him sooner or later. It is agood thing this is being done by one of our most able. http://newsrealblog.com/2009/10/03/coda-frum-v-horowitz/