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The other day political journalist Rich Miller noted that Illinois Review editor Fran Eaton was violating copyright laws by posting subscriber’s only material he had written for Capitol Fax. Today, she does the same by copying + pasting an entire Illinois Times article.

Even more interesting, Ms. Eaton labels the fact-based article about Illinois conservatives’ efforts to demonize Sen. Barack Obama (and, in particular, infopimp crass distortions about his church and his faith) “amazing” and “entertaining” as if it was somehow inaccurate.

In fact, the article has all the stock conserv-o-partisan players — Ms. Eaton, Dave Smith of the Illinois anti-Family Institute, Jill Stanek of “Debby Does…” fame, and a host more. It connects the dots on the history of Obama opposition from these comrades and also points to the many ways they are willing to twist and distort his words and the words of those with whom they like to tar and feather him as they try to advance their conservative agenda while desperately trying tearing him down any way they can.

Did Ms. Eaton forget that she herself wrote a post decrying Sen. Obama’s abiding faith and how she considers his faith dangerous to the conservative agenda? Other times, she has simply called Sen. Obama “dangerous” not because he actually is but because of her partisan-tinged misunderstandings of his church’s tenets. Yet here, in her post copying an article about her repeated partisan attempts at sliming Sen. Obama, she claims to be “humble”.

Humble? Ms. Eaton has been systematically info-pimping her schlock for well over a year.

As we saw with Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004, conserv-o-partisans are avoiding the high negatives of their failed policies by attacking the Democratic candidate’s strongest attributes. In 2000, we got lies from George Bush wherein he falsely claimed Al Gore said he invented the Internet, etc. VP Gore of course never said that, but it didn’t stop then-candidate Bush from info-pimping this and similar lies in an effort to undermine Gore’s credibility and whitewash then-Gov. Bush’s own lacking credibility. Same in 2004 in which veterans who never served with Kerry (and even a few who had, despite the fact they sung a different, completely opposite tune before 2004) bald-faced lying about Sen. Kerry’s time in Vietnam.

Now, circa 2008, we have these myopic, hollow attacks on Sen. Obama’s former pastor, the hard truths to which his pastor has borne witnessed, his fellow church congregants and even Obama’s fundamental Christian faith which guides him each and every day…

But hey, at least we’re not talking about the effect of conservatives’ failed policies on the economy, our international standing, and more.

Update: Ill Review commenter “Marriage Defender” exclaims:

The Illinois Times is a left-wing Christian hating rag!

What a coinky-dink! I’ve repeatedly explained how Fran Eaton and other conserv-o-partisans write their own Christian hating screeds at that “right-wing rag” known as Illinois Review, among others. (Of course, one has to rely on those same partisans’ definition of “anti-Christian” in order to discuss such things….)

Get your rubber duckies.

For some time now I’ve been butting heads with Bruno Behrend and other self-described “global warming deniers” on a variety of issues. (Given that these folks choose to find sand and promptly place their heads in it instead of acknowleding, oh, say… reality… you’d expect they would butt heads when it comes to having facts pointed out to them.)

One of the particular points that always seemed to get Mr. Behrend’s goat was the fact that ice in Antarctica was breaking away and melting off. He (and his denieralist buddies) would always claim ice was growing in Antarctica. (Oddly, he rarely cited actual statistics or studies. In an exception, he did mention some 2005 reports about ice thickening.)

Technically, if you remove all context, we were both right. Ice was melting at a variety of Antarctic sites. Mr. Behrend liked to point out it was melting “at the fringes” (well, the “fringes” of Antarctica would be the warmer edges, lapped by waves from the southern oceans). Simultaneously, additional “energy” in the atmosphere (energy generated by what now?!) was leading to more moisture arriving in Antarctic weather fronts — thus more snow at the bottom of the world.

Turns out the ice melt I keep bringing up (and Mr. Behrend keeps ignoring) is happening faster than expected and is outpacing any additional “ice thickening”. Of course, the more ice that melts from the poles (either top or bottom) the higher the sea levels rise world wide and the more liquid and atmospheric moisture available for generating severe weather systems.

Oops. Too bad for ostriches like Mr. Behrend facts are sticky things.

Yet another attempt to point out that what some on the conserv-o-partisan side of things claim is the “truth” is actually so much hokum when you scratch off the paint job… Today we learn that Bruno Behrend is all excited that Christmas came early for him and his prideful “global warming denier” allies.

You see, in his bizarre, head-in-the-sand rant Mr. Behrend links to a conservative newspaper (Washington Times) which discusses a minority “report” from a single Senator, himself a conservative (Sen. James Inhofe, R-Big Oil), about a quite faulty report from a group of conservative-allied pseudo-scientists…

And Bruno alludes that all this biased information is somehow proof that Al Gore is pure evil and everything he touches turns to crap. (I guess VP Gore’s appearance on Saturday Night Live a few seasons back explains the current writer’s strike, eh?)

Doesn’t Bruno have anything better to do with his time on the weekend before Christmas than copy and paste some propaganda and complain about a former vice president? What’s even more strange is that him and his fellow “deniers” have to now resort to referencing layer after layer of biased propaganda as if piling enough layers onto their malarkey will hide the fact it’s malarkey in the first place. (Such propaganda itself is of course based on often speculative, incorrectly referenced contrarian for contrarian’s sake reports in a journal which does not meet modern scientific review standards.)

It’s as if all they have left is stomping their feet and repeating “global warming isn’t happening … (as long as you ignore all the evidence)”.

Just what is so wrong with the head-in-the-sand position, you ask? For one thing, their tactics are reliant on measures aimed at distracting people rather than actually informing us.

Bruno’s post is a perfect example — carry on about a conservative paper’s article about a conservative Senator’s one-man brief about a group of conservative-influenced researchers and their “findings” (which turn out to actually be faulty). This is the same as the folks who run around crying that government research thermometers are too close to asphalt or concrete (which influences the readings) or that it’s simply a natural, long-term event (which completely ignores just how fast temps are rising globally compared to the prehistoric events deniers cite).

Sure, there’s a kernel of truth in their yelping (ie, yes, some thermometers are near built-up environments and yes the Earth has gone through hot/cold cycles), but it all tends to ignore the reality of what’s actually happening around the world with extreme weather, changing ice patterns at the poles, slowly rising sea levels, etc.

For another, much of their “research” (which usually sounds more like, “Nah, nah — told you so!”) is based on faulty conclusions. The report that Mr. Behrend and Sen. Inhofe rely on for their head-in-the-sand conclusions is chock full of unfounded speculative statements, misreadings and ignorance of available data and misrepresentation of their cited sources.

Even some of these folks’ “So what?” attitude turns out to be based on false premises. For instance, many “deniers” claim that as atmospheric CO2 rises plants will begin working overtime to convert the gas. Turns out they’re wrong on that bit of “conventional wisdom” too. Increasing CO2 levels actually harm plants instead of helping them.

Essentially, if they want to run around looking like fools by touting erroneous information as gospel that is certainly their right in this the Land of the Free… but basing their opinions on falsehoods and faulty info (and, worse, constantly carping against their opponents because of it) is hardly worthy of the Home of the Brave.

Sidenote: Is any group — the Nobel Prize “cabal” as Mr. Behrend calls it — really to be considered “politically extreme” when they award their prizes to people ranging from Yassir Arafat to Milton Friedman? That hand Mr. Behrend is using to point a finger has several more pointing right back at himself.

Mr. Behrend ought to relax and let go of all that pent-up hatred he’s got brewing in his mind, it’s clearly affecting his ability to be rational. (OTOH, it has perhaps been affecting his ability to reason for quite some time now, as his blog of rants demonstrates.)

(h/t Grist and A Seigel, both of whom dive into more detailed info than my bird’s eye view post)

In recent weeks Chicagoland denizens have been treated to story after story about British Petroleum’s plans to dump more ammonia, mercury and other toxic pollutants into Lake Michigan as a result of planned renovations to their Indiana processing facility. And certainly over the past several years (decades even) we’ve also heard plenty about the effect air pollution has on our quality of life in relation to smog, acid rain and global warming.

We all ought to be doing our best to reduce, not increase, the garbage we dump willy-nilly into our public resources. That’s why our local parks ask us to put our refuse in garbage cans instead of leaving it strewn about so others can enjoy a picnic in a clean park. Same principle ought to apply to our water and air.

So it was with disappointment that I read today of two obstructionists who apparently think it’s just jim-dandy to dump more garbage into our shared resources, rather than less.

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Over the last few days, several conservative partisans — including Illinois’ own Backyard Anne and Extreme Bruno — have noted the Democratic Party’s coverage of Fred Thompson’s foibles, usually with the comeback that “They must really be a-skeered of the guy to go after him like that.”

Um, no.

For one thing, that would imply that conservatives and the Republican Party (Karl Rove in particular) were deathly afraid of how well a Howard Dean candidacy would do in 2004 (let alone a Hillary or Barack candidacy in ‘08). To this day, conservative partisans still label Gov. Dean “crazy” because they apparently like beating a dead horse.

For another, the DNC’s “Republican Presidential Candidates” blog is actually covering all the front runners (even Duncan Hunter and Jim Gilmore have gotten mentions in recent days) and pointing out the many areas in which they are hypocritical, wrong, pandering or otherwise acting goofy. Welcome to politics. If cons have a problem with that then they might as well leave because we have this little thing called Freedom of Speech in this here country. The DNC blog isn’t anything the Repubs and their allies haven’t also done; so quit whining.

And despite some of the cons’ tin-foil rants, there’s nothing secret or conspiratorial about it. Heck, I even linked to it. Look, I’ll link it again just so you can see how out in the open and public it is.

Sidenote: Anyone else noticed how many times this “Dems are focused on Thompson” meme made its way into the supposedly “liberal” press lately? (See London Telegraph — repeated in New York Sun, USA Today, AOL News Blog, and The Politico, among others.)

The guy who helped spy for Nixon during Watergate ain’t all that, but the supposedly “biased” media is happy to give the actor the part of pitiable victim.

As stated, the Dems are also going after McCain, Giuliani, Romney and the other plodding elephants… Just as the Repubs are going after Clinton, Obama, Edwards, etc. But the so-called “liberal” mainstream media makes Thompson out to be some sort of martyr… Hmm, must be that “bias” showing.

Conservatives enjoy railing against what they see as a bloated pension system among government employees. Said conservatives also fail to mention that those same government employees would have typically earned much more salary-wise throughout their career had they been employed by the private sector — you pay for what you get.

And while Bruno Behrend does his fair share of such ranting, he also is rather disillusioned by the current state of overcompensation among the corporate CEO set even though they are typically a staunch ally (not to mention funder) of conservative candidates and causes. So while it may raise an eyebrow or two for those who haven’t been reading or listening to Mr. Behrend, it comes as little surprise that today he joins with libertarian-leaning liberals who fight for fairness and have long decried the huge and growing gap between the haves and the rest of us (ie, the CEO-to-employee income gap).

Here’s Mr. Behrend on the recent announcement of AT&T CEO Ed Whitacre, Jr.’s retirement. (He cross-posts at both his blog and Illinois Review which I take to mean Mr. Whitacre’s wheel of fortune winnings really get under Mr. Behrend’s craw):

Speaking of Obscene Pensions…

AT&T CEO Whitacre may end up being the biggest Pension Pig of all. As an aggressive (and accurate) critic of the obscene pensions showered upon “public servants” (quotes indicate sarcasm & irony), I find corporate retirement packages - along with the often unwarranted ‘parachutes’ they get for bankrupting their companies - just as vile, but for different reasons. [emphasis is original to BB's post]

Come now Mr. Behrend, when’s the last time a public school CEO … I mean superintendent … received a retirement package that included $25,000 per year for a country-club membership?

Now Hascat at Illinois Review gives Mr. Whitacre the benefit of the doubt in by commenting some of that jackpot will be spent on charities, goods and services and in the long-run benefit the economy. Pres. Reagan tried trickle-down voodoonomics. It didn’t work back then either. Based on the history of such wealthy individuals it is much more likely the bulk of the money will be divvied up between political contributions, some charitable giving (which could also mean deductible political-philosophy contributions), and any heirs.

Mr. Whitacre, by the looks of his past donations (which, while bipartisan, skew Republican) is Mr. Behrend’s political ally, whether Mr. Behrend likes it or not. Perhaps if he finds Mr. Whitacre’s pension jackpot to be obscene he ought to speak a little louder and a little more often to his fellow conservative friends, many of whom seem to buy into the goofy notion of socio-economic darwinism which would dictate that Mr. Whitacre has earned such an “obscene” retirement package by virtue of being better than all the rest of us (ie, a somehow more ‘evolved’ citizen-worker).

COMPLETE TANGENT: Maybe our state legislators will be reminded of all this when they settle on voting for or against AT&T’s “TV 4 us” malarkey.

“TV 4 us” is the shell political organization set up by AT&T to introduce a false sense of competition to the near-monopolistic cable industry. This group, oddly enough, runs the exact same TV commercials across a great many states, not just Illinois, to chide citizens to call their legislators and “support HB such-and-such” (check out all those yellow, “non-video choice” states on their website’s map). Go figure.

I’ve always wondered who they consider to be the “us” in their group’s name? Is it we the people, or is it AT&T and their jackpot-winning CEO retiree? And I’ve always wondered why they consider more of the same (albeit with a different name, and a cell-phone contract as part of the bundle) to be “choice.”

True choice in cable TV would involve a la carte channel options so that folks with, say, tots could pick Nick, Disney, Noggin, etc. and avoid F/X and the other basic cable channels ill-suited to kids. It would also work for home-improvement fans who could pick every DIY channel under the sun while foregoing the channels they don’t want, etc. Bachelors could get all 19 ESPNs, plus the Golf Channel, Bowling Channel, and Squash Channel — while not having to buy Lifetime, Oh! or the Hallmark Channel (vice versa for the gals).

Then again, who would watch all 500 channels with nothing on them if we weren’t forced to buy them all at once? (Gee, maybe that’s why there’s no a la carte basic cable.)

Illinois Review contributor John Ruskin (not the dead English guy) joins fellow Illinois Review contributor Bruno Behrend (who posted about it at his own blog, Extreme “Wisdom”) in promoting Mark Steyn, jackass.

Why is Steyn a jackass? He feels a need to turn a 32-person massacre into a debate over whose balls have more brass — instead of a soapbox to promote his partisan conservative agenda, he climbs on their dead bodies (some of whose families have yet to bury their loved ones).

The truly funny thing? They’re all grown men whining about what they think is some sort of a “loss of manhood” in this country. To be honest, they sound just like my pre-schooler when she can’t find her dolly. Seriously. (Though, in all fairness, my girl has yet to quote Shakespeare, let alone esoteric pundit Kathy Shaidle, while searching for Cinderella).

Guys, it’s ok. You don’t need to worry about the rest of us — we are fine. But really, this continuing questioning of others’ manhood … well, it’s starting to look like maybe the problem is with the guy staring back at you in the mirror. Steyn, and his parrots Behrend and Ruskin (among others), seem to want to join the league of those like Petey LaBarbera who is so uncomfortable with his own manliness he had to keep his son home from school lest he get ideas about “the gays”.

If you’re not comfortable with the status of your own manhood, fine. Figure out a way to deal with it on your own. Leave us out of it because, as for all us regular guys over here in the real world, we’re jim-dandy with the level of testosterone flowing in our own red-blooded, flag-waving manly man selves.

You want evidence of America’s manliness (ie, bravery)? Don’t look to the partisan conservatives in the 101st Fighting Keyboardists. Look to these guys and gals instead:

• Heroes in uniform
• NY City hero, saved a man’s life by protecting him from oncoming subway train … then dusted himself off and went to work
• And, of course, the hero professor who sacrificed himself to protect his students and the heroes in Room 207 who at first protected themselves and then blockaded the door to prevent the gunner’s return (including the guy who had already been shot)

And there are plenty more right here in these United States, so quit whining like girly-men.

Unwisely, the Extreme Wisdom headine reads: “I Felt Compelled to Simply Reprint This Without Comment…“

Disgustingly, Extreme Wisdom blog writer Bruno Behrend copied wholesale (feeling “compelled” to post it in an apparently approving fashion) a disgusting column by conservative writer Mark Steyn in which the conservative Steyn bemoans what he apparently considers some sort of sissification at VT in particular and America in general.

Hypocritically, Extreme Wisdom blog writer Bruno Behrend claimed just one day earlier (the day after the Virginia Tech massacre) that:

I wasn’t there, so it may sound somewhat fatuous to say that I’d have “done something.” I might have been crapping my pants.

OTOH, I think I would have done something. I believe it is fair for me to say that because I’ve actually thought about such situations, and though never being in THIS TYPE of situation, I am the type of person who has taken action in other stressfull circumstances. (emphasis his)

Nes points out Extreme Wisdom blog writer can’t decide if he would have been crapping his pants or would have done something. Nes points out the Steyn column has an answer for Extreme Wisdom blog writer (in quoting Kathy Shaidle):

When we say “we don’t know what we’d do under the same circumstances”, we make cowardice the default position.

Nes points out that contrary to the fatuous crap conservative-pundit column the Extreme Wisdom blog writer repeated from Mark Steyn, many professors and students at Virginia Tech did not crap their pants and instead literally sacrificed themselves in order to barricade doors and protect others from harm, not just the one professor Steyn decided to include as NY Times notes.

Nes points out that by Steyn’s own logic (vis a vis the Shaidle quote), Behrend is a coward by default.

Nes points out Steyn is a jackass, and Extreme Wisdom blog is not so wise for echoing Steyn’s fatuous crap.

UPDATE: Mr. Behrend tries to defend the whining by calling me a “self-appointed righ[t]er of all Illinois conservative wrongs” (which is funny since he thinks he’s “righting” what he thinks are liberals “wrongs”) and saying I’m “hot and bothered”… My reply:

As for being hot and bothered? Yeah, jumping on 33 dead bodies to debate testosterone ought to bother any rational person (before most of the families have buried their loved ones, no less).

You want to pee on fire hydrants, fine, I’ll debate this with you (as I am). And I’ll point out just how disrespectful and creepy you’re being by promoting your fake-manliness agenda by jumping on the dead instead of a soapbox.

EXTREME WISDOM blog headline: Is Climatology a Science?

Disconcertingly, conservative blogger and talk show host Bruno Behrend denies the scientificalitiness of a field of science. Your Illinois Reason blogger wonders if Behrend realizes Intelligent Design excuse-making is not a science, but Climatology is.

Strangely, Behrend doesn’t even seem to understand that the science of predicting the weather next week is called “Meteorology” (your Illinois Reason blogger wonders if the “meteor-” part throws Behrend off) and that the study of the weather patterns over time is called “Climatology”.

Dictionary.com explains “climate” is “the composite or generally prevailing weather conditions of a region, as temperature, air pressure, humidity, precipitation, sunshine, cloudiness, and winds, throughout the year, averaged over a series of years.”

Your Illinois Reason blogger wonders why anyone would expect the study of weather averages to predict weather on a specific day instead of predicting weather patterns in general. Nes thinks this is because Behrend does not know what he is talking about — though Nes points out that denying reality helps promote Behrend’s agenda on this matter.

Discouragingly, denying reality through use of red herrings such as ignorance of words like “climatology” also leads to dismissal of other issues related to our shared atmosphere such as the increasing rates of asthma among children worldwide, which is ultimately likely a result of air pollution (dumping “garbage” into the air).

Nes points out that no matter what the cause of catastrophic global climate change, reducing pollution will also have positive effects on health (by reducing harmful material dumped into our air and decreasing rates of acid rain and the like) and the economy (by spurring competition and diversification in energy-production industries).

(Again, apologies to Phil Collins.)

I’ve been holding off on commenting on this race because of my own involvement — I’ve endorsed and have been actively volunteering for the incumbents in the High School District 214 race (northwest suburban Cook County). There’s your full disclosure.

Sometime last night (between evening time and the newspaper delivery this morning) we got a middle-of-the-night lit drop from those opposing the District 214 incumbents. The Daily Herald lists 214 as one of its “key races” and based on the number of yard signs for the incumbents and the challengers (almost as much as last year’s Republican vs. Democrats dogfight) it certainly seems to be key.

Indeed, District 214 has been on conservatives’ radar for a few years now. Illinois Family Institute Board of Directors member Bruce Tincknell lives in the district and is frequently opposing this or that move during school board meetings. Sandy Rios’ Culture Campaign has been helping to promote a partisan conservative version of District 214 events for a while (replete with “On the Scene” reporting…). Even radio talk show host and Illinois conservative blogger Bruno Behrend picks up on District 214 by recently repeating something conservative school board member Leslie Pinney brought up during a school board meeting (have these folks ever heard of context — bring up the fact you noticed this large number and then ask for an explanation before pouring acid all over the issue).

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Bruno Behrend has a new post up dissing universal coverage. He relies heavily on an op-ed in the LA Times from Michael Tanner and Michael Cannon, both of the conservative Cato Institute. (A fine example of the conservative echo chamber in action here, with Mr. Behrend essentially pulling a lengthy quote from the Cato conservatives to use for his own writings.) Mr. Behrend goes so far as to claim universal coverage is somehow “immoral”?!?

The Michaels, and subsequently Mr. Behrend in echoing their sentiment, complain “What these politicians and many other Americans fail to understand is that there’s a big difference between universal coverage and actual access to medical care.”

True… but without medical coverage even moderately expensive treatment (to the tune of thousands of dollars) can ruin a family financially, leading many families to not even seek medical care til it’s perhaps too late or ending up in bankruptcy if they do (health costs are the #1 cause of bankruptcy in America).

Read more “Skipping Facts on Healthcare” after the fold…

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