I've now discovered at least three examples of a curious phenomenon: The Bachmann Effect. When Bachmann is out there talking about the issues in an adversarial setting, her opponents find themselves on a very unsure footing -- mainly because they're shocked and befuddled to hear what she's saying.
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These three individuals don't know each other, and yet on three separate occasions you'll see the exact same facial expression each time.
Jon Stewart hosted CNBC "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer on last night's Daily Show, and the results were not pretty for the financial network star.
Of course, in today's day and age, there really is no such thing as bad publicity, so maybe the fact that he got served by a comedy network host on his own rhetorical turf isn't such a bad thing after all.
Maybe.
(Editor's note: YouTube link no longer available; link here to watch entire episode at ComedyCentral.com)
Have you seen the glossy, friendly-looking ads for "clean" coal? How it's an abundant resource, and can power America to an oil-free future, and is super-duper cleaner than it used to be?
Yeah, not so much. Turns out that when disasters like this happen, entire watersheds can be impacted in a really, really bad way.
Although FactCheck.org's figures on the state of the Senate recount in Minnesota are a couple of days out of date, they still have some important fact- and reality-based smackdowns for other reactionary tactics -- like smears "questions" about President-elect Barack Obama's citizenship.
Via Change.gov, the Obama-Biden transition team is starting a great new initiative called Your Seat at the Table.
It's like this: all meetings the transition team attends with outside organizations, groups, individuals, etc are now recorded and published online so all Americans can see what their soon-to-be Executive Branch is doing, to whom they're talking, etc.
This is an incredibly powerful idea -- how does a future administration back away from this, if the Obama Administration continues with this program once in office? "Sorry, we know the Obama Administration was open with the American people about its actions, but we just don't trust Americans that much..." That does not play. This has the potential to change how Americans watch and gather information about what's going on in the White House on a day-to-day basis.
Have a look -- the clip will stick around in the VotD blox in the sidebar.
In the continual rollout of new features here on MPP, we're introducing the Video of the Day.
Okay, so it may not be every day initially, since we're currently in December of an election year and there aren't likely to be too many political ads hitting the air- and cyber-waves right now. But as often as possible, we'll be posting a great online video clip along with a little commentary, and the video will be available in the VotD slot in the right-most sidebar.
Like this one, in which the Daily Show's John Stewart discusses Fox News being replaced by MSNBC as the President's TV Station Of Choice. Cheeky as always :)
