LOU DOBBS is a HUGELY UNINFORMED ASSHAT!

The GOP has 99% of its DC contingent that tow the corporate line. The Dems have about 30% who do. But Lou Dobbs claims there is no difference between 99 and 30. Would he notice the difference if there was a dollar sign in front of the numbers?

He did this throughout 2004 campaign, too. He CLAIMS to be against corporate money to politicians, then would repeatedly say there's no difference between Bush and Kerry.

IF Dobbs was truly an advocate for getting corporate money out of politics he would have KNOWN already that Kerry has advocated for public financing of campaigns since 1985 and was the senator who crafted the only public financing legislation ever submitted to the senate - the Clean Money, Clean Elections bill.

So - how is it that any JOURNALIST who claims sincere interest and expertise in this area DOES NOT KNOW one thing about the state of public financing issue and where DC lawmakers stand on it?

Dobbs can be a HUGELY UNINFORMED ASSHAT or he is being deliberately misleading to effect elections.

:hi:

Are you sure - cuz I read on Free Republic several articles from Newsmax and American Spectator that say the science is still out on that.

This is his niche, blaming both parties. The Lou Dobbs rant, in some ways he gets his ratings like Bill O'Rielly does, I think in fact he was sorta the model for O'Rielly.

centrist corporatism that appeals to the worst aspects of populism. Maybe he dangles issues like election fraud and outsourcing only as carrots to attract the left and draw them in to his campaign.

Just to kill off the Democrats as a party.

If this happens, there will be a third party to siphon votes from the GOP. Maybe then we can let the Greens into the debates, as long as their is a fourth party to split the right in the same debate. More information for everyone.

and its hopelessly romantic to think the rise of the Greens would come from a move like this.

and he wants to sell it to both sides..My take on Dobbs..he talks a lot about corporate lobbyists..But its lobbyists that signs his check..Its double talk to get the viewers and sell a book.You'll notice when he has to lean he always leans right...

They are Catholic school boys who have the "populist" and "traditionalist" labels down pat.

On another front, here's what the Southern Poverty Law Center says about DOBBS:

*******QUOTE*******
http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=589

Broken Record
Lou Dobbs' daily 'Broken Borders' CNN segment has focused on immigration for years.

But there's one issue Dobbs just won't take on.

By Heidi Beirich and Mark Potok

.... For more than two years now, Dobbs has served up a populist approach to immigration on nightly segments of his newscast entitled "Broken Borders." He has relentlessly covered the issue, although hardly from a traditional news perspective -- Dobbs favors clamping down on illegal immigration, and his "reporting" never fails to make that clear. He has covered the same issues, and the same anti-immigration leaders, time after time after time. In recent months, Dobbs has run countless upbeat reports on the "citizen border patrols" that have sprung up around the country since last April's Minuteman Project, a paramilitary effort to seal the Arizona border.

But there's one thing Lou Dobbs won't do. No matter what others report about the movement, Dobbs has failed to present mounting and persistent evidence of anti-Hispanic racism in anti-immigration groups and citizen border patrols. ....

********UNQUOTE*******

on the seamy side of the anti-immigrant movement, e.g. the Minutemen.

While I don't support his anti-immigrant bias, so I can hardly condone his not reporting on the Minutemen, I acknowledge that as a liberal I do not propose that we spend much time talking about the seamy side of issues that we support.

If I support the outing of gay Republican congressmen, I would not want extensive discussions of the tactics of individuals or groups who spent their time digging up evidence, or at least rumors, of gay Republicans. I would much rather talk about hypocrisy, polling data, the fundamentalist base deserting the GOP, etc.

I could never be a Minuteman, because I don't believe in their cause, much less their tactics. But neither would I want to pursue a career in the burgeoning field of gay outing.

You can always see thru the hypocrisy.

Seat of Heat question: If you could, would you pull your head out of your ass long enough to report facts and not inject any personal bias into your "observations"?

*just thinking out loud*

from what I've seen over the years.

He said there was absolutely no difference between the Dems and Reps and went on to list things that are troubling the nation, one being the stagnation of the minimum wage. Jon needed to point out right then that Ted Kennedy has for at least the last 10 years tried to pass a bill raising the minimum wage, but that it keeps getting shot down by the asshats.

Shit like that has to be nipped in the bud.

Nip it...nip it the bud

I won't say both parties are the same. They aren't. The GOP is much worse. I also agree with you that Dobbs should be more aware of those Democrats that have been standing up.

But in a larger sense, I think he is expressing a core truth and perception that most Americans have.

I do believe that there is far too little difference between them when it gets down to the brass tacks of Corporate Power and refuting the economic assumptions of the corporate elite and the GOP.

As bad as he is on some issues, Dobbs has at least evolved in a way that the Democrats have not over the last six years, in terms of rejecting the Corporate Pap of the 1990's and acknowledging what he calls The War on the Middle Class.

It's been going on for the last 30 years, and we are witnessing tne rotten results.

And unfortunately, we're still hearing the same blather and not hearing enough truth, and not seeing any action now. For example, the huge mega mergers in many industries are still going on with nary a peep of protest from our political leaders of either party.

Even if Democrats are not in a position to actually enforce anything, they ought to be leading the charge as a unified Democratic front.

Paul Wellstone should have been a typical mainstream Democrat. Instead, he was considered an anomoly. The entire Democratic Party ought to be as tough talking and honest about the CORE PROBLEMS with the US economy as Bernie Sanders. For example, while the majority of Demnocratic leaders were echoing the GOP's praise of Alan Greenspan, Sanders was the only voice who actually called Greenspan on the carpet for his Ayn Rand-Milton Friedman view of the Glories of Unfettered Free Market Corporatism.

Dobbs isn't the problem. We are.

and if more Democrats WERE in power, the centrists would be comfortable leaning more left, the same way they found it easy to lean right with the GOPs controlling everything.

Characterization... demonization is something I expect to hear from freepers about their critics.

I agree with Dobbs on this issue and won't quibble about the % of corporatists in each party.

It's important to look around you. Look at the factory closings. Look at the IT outsourcing. American land which belongs to us all being sold to highest foreign bidders.

Look at it and remember this: It's more important than ever to get every Democrat we can elected.

Then we let Dr. Dean weed out the corporatists at the local levels. We need more Democratic leaders who are progressive populists.

Parties candidates are obliged to the corpratists! I'm not even sure"oublic financing" would cure the problem! I HATE IT, but it's a fact of life. Of course the Pubs continue to want to give more power to the Corps than the Dems, but there's no clean hands here.

I still like Dobbs. I don't always agree with him, but those of you who say he's against immigration must not listen to him. He's against illegal immigration, and so am I. Kill us both if you must!

100%

Corporate shills like Dobbs and the people who consistently fall for their line of BS is the real problem.

Don

Enron, Abramoff, Foley - you name it. If Dems did it is too outrageous, "both parties are the same applies. ALWAYS.

the party of responsibility. welcome, by the way.

basically OLielly with a better-masked corporatism and twice the intelligence. Plus, Lou actually believes what he's saying. Uninformed? Hardly. Biased? Certainly. Racist? you bet your ass. Classist? Now you're talking.

His rants about immigration never stress the hiring practices of corporate america. It's always the border my god the BORDER!!!!! Racist.

He was not on the show to promote a political philosophy, he was there to promote a book. Anyone who realizes who is in power knows who to blame. If you expected a supposed neutral news anchor to take a stand for either party, then you have been smoking copious amounts of pot.

He may speak against Republicans now, but he is careful to speak against "Republicans and Democrats", so he can make it look like all are bad.

And he is careful to blame liberalism but leave Conservatism blameless, using the tired line that today's Reupublicans aren't really conservative.

Sorry, Lou, but they are conservative.

I'll take him over 75% of the idiot anchors out there. I will not criticize him for not being a liberal. He's said on the air that he is a Republican, I like that Republicans have to listen to him criticizing Republicans day after day. And he should know Republicans as he is one. Although he claims to be an "old school" Republican and appears to be quite tired of these neocons scumbags. I can listen to him even if he doesn't pass the liberal test here on DU.

conservatism is inherently a selfish philosophy, a pursuit to justify undeserved wealth and unrepentant greed.

There is also the beggars can't be choosers principal. He's still better than 75% of them - though I have to admit I rarely watch him any more - Olberman, Stuart AAR & NPR are the 90% sources of information for me.

aside from the apologist BS, unfair attacks on Dems, embracing of conservatism, etc...

As a journalist, here is what I despise about him:

He is a con artist.


You watch promos for his shows, it shows him sitting there, pompous and arrogant, angry, yelling pro-middle class rhetoric. Makes him look like a fighter and a champion of the middle class.



But he never actually does anything or gets to the roots of the problems, never actually addresses real issues or tries to get to the core.

He is all rhetoric.

I honestly think he doesn't even give a fuck about the middle class. He just knows that the middle class makes up a very large percentage of CNN's viewership, and so he panders by posing as a hero of the working stiff...

He was actively adding to the list. He really tried to do something about it and he was mostly ignored.

Back then he was ripping RW retards like Forbes on a daily basis - it was very satisfying and there were few other choices for information back then. I will not forget how he was there when nobody else was. All of our companies' high-tech engineering jobs are in China now. If only idiots weren't so preoccupied back then, now we have to wait for the fallout with China and the head-scratching that will occur when we realize that we can not only not build the products any more, but we cannot even design them!

I will never forget how he owned Forbes and other RW retards who were supporting Bushco's idiotic policies. THere are a LOT worse out there.

I guess this one is at an end.

He's a journalist, their service is typically in exposing and discussing, and ends there.

that's all he ever does.

He never actually talks about the root causes of outsourcing, the unlimited power and status that conservatives want to grant corporations that makes things like outsourcing and crushing the middle class possible...

He just brings up cliches and scapegoats them away, then is careful to remind people that all politicians are equally to blame.

Not once have I ever heard him mention that when Republicans have power, life seems to get harder for the middle class...

corporations. He really dug in deep during his "Outsourcing America" series a few years ago.

He went WAY beyond the call of duty for a news hour type guy. I really appreciated it and NOT ONE other person with his stature was saying much of anything so there is not even another anchor to compare him to.

But, I cannot ever expect you to listen to reason as you clearly hate his guts.

guess you found a way...


BTW, if he was really going beyond the call of duty, he would be pushing for real changes.

He is just whoring for ratings.

Even Olbermann is not pushing for changes per se, that is up to us,"we the people"!

No matter how much I point out his good work, you set the expectation level one step higher, thus my reference to being "obstinate".

:smoke:

then submit the FACTS to his audience. Any opinion maven who gets our airtime should give their audience the facts as to how they came to their conclusion before they made it.

I saw just enough of a chuckle from him to tip me off that he was just trying to "sound" fair to both sides.

All or nothing people are missing the point in attacking this fellow, unless you would prefer Wolf or Hannity or O'Liely or bowtie boy or Scarborough or Tweety or...

Get a grip on reality would you?

were the same. That's a lie - and a lie that brought harm to this country.

he is a real mixed bag ...

It is great that he calls out a good portion of the Bushco/republican nonsense right now, but he NEVER, N E V E R gives the democrats a break ... And, as some have noted, the constant need to throw in the "they all are the same" to mitigate complaints about the current party in power ... He will do a 5 minute pieces calling out Bushco or the reps on some nonsense and you get all pumped up about it being fleshed out, and at the very end he just HAS to spit out the "and the democrats aren't any better" ...

both sides are the same - that's a big difference because what he said is a LIE.

He was trying to be fair by assailing the Dems equally - especially on TDS which may seem already liberal biased - I thought his comments were somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but it doesn't surprise me that the rabid ones just can't grasp this.

It was a lie then and a lie now.

Write:
http://www.cnn.com/feedback/forms/form5.html?9
http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/lou.dobbs.tonight/

Commentary on this subject:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/10/10/Dobbs.Oct11/index.html

that ANY of it is bad. I'm not ready to give up on Lou yet, thogh he is a conservative, he has fought a pretty damn good fight

as much as the repugs - that twists my circley hairs into a burning bush.

I still like Lou, tho. He's onto election fraud and outsourcing and what it's doing to the spine of middle classness -and that's okay with me even if he pisses me off big time onct a while.

He's a former republican that wants to be a republican again. His new book is all about the middle class, but he can't bear the thought that the middle class wouldn't exist without Democrats.

He'll never be a Democratic supporter.

and if he slams repugs, they will dismiss him out of hand, so he has to dance around and say it's nobody's fault. I don't argee wtih that at all, but that's what he's doing I think.

The same people who Nader appealed to.

Don

electoral fraud, so I'm not sure that he always just appeals to ignorant people. (I've seen of a few of those sentiments here on DU;) Maybe that's what he is doing now.

Yet he devotes 75% or more of his show to that one issue.

Why does he does that? Who is he trying to appeal to by doing that?

I say he is trying to appeal to the racist lunatic fringe who hate brown people.

If someone has a better reason I would like to hear it.

Don

here at DU. I haven't been around here long enough to see the DU polls the poster below is referring to, but I see plenty of comments here promoting stopping illegal immigration (usually through employer crackdowns).

This was a response I received from "TheGoldenRule" on 10/10 in the LBN thread entitled "India may gain 10 million jobs from outsourcing."

"Also, illegal immigration has driven wages down in the skilled labor construction field. None of it is a "win win" situation for the U.S. or the workers of America that's for damn sure. I think you would find that most here on DU do NOT support Outsourcing or Illegal Immigration. There have been polls done to prove it too."

"The polls I'm talking about were posted months ago, but feel free to do a search. I'm thinking that the number was in the 80% range." The polls he is citing regarding illegal immigration may not exist, or he may be remembering them inaccurately, but they seem reflective of attitudes I read here.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=2326098

Why does Dobbs devote so much time to the xenophobic immigration fringe?

http://www.pollingreport.com/prioriti.htm




CBS News/New York Times Poll. Sept. 15-19, 2006. N=1,131 adults nationwide. MoE ± 3 (for all adults).

.


"What do you think is the most important problem facing this country today?" Open-ended

.


ALL Adults - Republicans - Democrats - Independents
% % % %
War in Iraq 22 15 32 19
Terrorism (general) 14 26 6 12
Economy/Jobs 11 7 16 10
Immigration 4 8 2 3
Gas/Heating oil crisis 3 3 2 4
Health care 3 2 4 3
Foreign policy 3 1 3 5
Defense/Military 3 4 1 2
Foreign aid 3 1 2 6
President Bush 3 1 7 2
Other 25 24 21 28
Unsure 6 8 4 6

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

but I don't disagree that immigration is hardly issue #1 with anyone. With Iraq and a host of other issues to choose from, that is not surprising.

My impression was that TGR's point was that most DUers were opposed to illegal immigration. Again, I don't know how if those polls existed or are quoted accurately, but I see opinions on both sides of the issue here. Though, as I said previously, those that are against immigration usually propose employer crackdowns rather than border enforcement.

Personally I am in favor of immigration, but I have been accused of being too comfortable and not having MY job threatened by immigrants.

If flawed people like Dobbs and Nader resonate with people, while the Democrats get trounced regularly, perhaps the fault isn't with the "ignorant" people who agree with the core message of Dobbs and Nader.

Nader turned out to be a self-centered spoiler in the long run.

But most of his positions on the issues are exactly correct. His message is what the Mainstream Democrats should have always been espousing, loudly and proudly.

The reason Nader did get support from smart and aware people -- not "ignorant" ones -- is because of their frustration at seeing the Democrats ignoring core issues, enabling Corporate CONservatives and becoming more and more like Republicans over the last 30 years.

Likewise with Dobbs. There is much about him I disagree with. I don't like the fact that he is a libertarian Republican, and I hate his blind spot about progressives and liberals and the good Democrats. And I often can't stand to watch his show when he gets off on his rampages.

But the underlying point that Corporate America is ripping of America, and the Middle Class is getting royally screwed is absolutely correct.

Dobbs is saying things the Establishment Democrats keep tip-toeing around.

That is interesting. I am not sure if someone can be both of those things simultaneously.

I will need to think about that one for a while.

Don

Read his basic positions and proposals regarding then economy, corporate power and participatory democracy. Try to be objective and seperate them from your opinions of Nader as a person and his role in the elections. Also, overlook the Democrat bashing aspects of it from the campaigns of 2000 and 04.

Instead, think of those observations and proposals coming from a liberal Democratic politician you respect.

You might find two things there. 1)He makes a lot of sense on a lot of issues. 2)He addresses both core issues and speciaic problems that too many of the politicians who supposedly represent our interests have either ignored or taken the side of the elite oligarchs on.

If politics were not so skewed these days, Ralph Nader's message would simnply be that of the mainstream democratic Party. They should be considered no more "radical" than any otehr mainstream Democrat on most issues.

The fact that Nader got so frustrated that he felt the need to go so far outside the political system says more about the system than it does about him and his foillowers.

It's one of the more disgusting habits we have around here - and I'm not totally free of guilt in this myself. It's one thing to arrive at an opinion regarding the corruption of a politician or pundit based on their positions and quite another to arrive at an opinion of the stance based upon some demonization of the person. The latter is mindless bigotry.

This, again, is much of why I'm an independent. Blind partisanship is a mental disorder, imho. Perhaps it's humility on my part - since I don't see myself as rationally immune from the seductions of such partisanship. That's because I've not detected such an immunity in others.

While we're not perfect, there's no way in hell we can be compared in any way, shape, or form to Republicans as being just as bad an alternative as they are.

Ben Affleck; Middle-East specialist Danielle Pletka; entrepreneur Richard Branson; former Sen. John Danforth -- could be a good show...

And both are totally anti-middle class.

at all levels in the US.

I can remember running for the Legislature in Florida and doing the interview in front of (let's call them the Business council). Basically the biggest business interests in the State.

Here I was a grassroots politico left-wing populist sitting in front of people that could have been in the cast of the Manchurian Candidate. They sat you at the front of the room at a large boardroom type table amidst extremely bright stage lights and filmed the entire interview process.

It was ALL about the money and access to power for CORPORATIONS. Democrat, Republican... hardly mattered to them... they just wanted the power and influence.

With a few notable exceptions in Congress... Russ Feingold comes to mind first, everyone plays an even bigger version of that game in Washington. Everyone dances to the K-street two-step.

If we want something different, we have to change the game. There is little chance of that happening when the people who benefit from the system remain in power. (That includes both parties).

out of the election process. And has advocated for public financing of campaigns since 1985. There is no way anyone who claims to support that issue could possibly claim that Bush and Kerry are the same. And Lou did that in 2004. And he's still doing it.
It makes it difficult to believe he's earnest about it when he's so badly informed about who in DC is for it and against it.

A minority of Dems voted for Bush's taxcuts and a minority of Dems voted for bankruptcy bill, which are the two leading indicators where the parties loyalties lie.

To say 100% of GOPs is equal to 30% of Dems is plain BULLSHIT.

BTW....Feingold wouldn't give support to the publivc financing bill and instead, teamed with McCain on their so-called reform bill that ended up getting all the media attention over the Kerry-Wellstone bill.

ummmmm YES...

but your point is well taken. There is a world of difference between John Kerry who I think would like to at least TRY and reform the system and someone like Tom Delay who manipulated it to the Nth.

In Lou's defense on last week's Larry King interview, he repeated his same formula. There was little, or no difference between the PARTIES... However, he pointed out that individual politicians within that structure were tying to put forward reform and that those people should be supported.

He led the way on that.

When you see corporate money amounts, it's individual donations grouped under whatever OCCUPATION of the donor or company they worked for.

That's why AOL execs did not give their corporate pac money to Kerry, but their Warner Bros. artists and officeworkers made donations.

But the bottom line is that as president, Kerry would have finally HAD the bully pulpit to make the case for public financing of campaigns, and of course, having an actual longtime ADVOCATE for it as president does make the difference.

If Dobbs had been SINCERE about recognizing Clean Money advocates, he would have KNOWN that Kerry was a leader on the issue, but instead was CLAIMING to his audience that there was no difference between Bush and Kerry on the issue.

That's a LIE - either deliberate or pure IGNORANCE, which makes Dobbs derelict in his duty.