Permanent link to MTA daily media news

Iraqi Journalist Throws His Shoes At Bush During Press Conference In Baghdad (Think Progress)

President Bush is in Baghdad today on a surprise farewell visit highlighting the security deal recently reached between the U.S. and Iraq. CNN Baghdad correspondent Michael Ware reports this afternoon that during a press conference with Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, an Iraqi man threw a shoe at Bush, but “it just sailed past his head”… McClatchy identified the man as Iraqi television journalist Muthathar al Zaidi and reports he threw both of his shoes at Bush just after he finished prepared remarks… Apparently, Bush was unfazed by the incident. “I didn’t feel the least bit threatened by it,” he said.
I’m not an expert on the Muslim religion and culture, but I believe that using anything to do with your feet to attack another person is one of the worst insults you can pay.

An Obama Gift for K Street (by Robert Samuelson—NOT one of my favorite economists)
WASHINGTON — We here in Washington are anticipating a stampede of lobbyists, influence peddlers, media consultants, paid “experts” and self-styled crusaders. Who brought us this onslaught of special pleaders? Why, it’s Barack Obama, the man who vowed to “change” how Washington works and banish from the political arena all those “special interests” that were depicted as a form of low-life devoid of all respectability. This is one Obama promise doomed to fail.

The only way to eliminate lobbying and special interests is to eliminate government. [Emphasis added.] The more powerful government becomes, the more lobbying there will be. So, paradoxically, Obama’s ambitions for more expansive government will promote special pleading. You need only watch the response to the expected “economic stimulus” plan — totaling perhaps $700 billion — to verify this eternal truth. “A Lobbying Frenzy for Federal Funds,” headlined a Washington Post story.
Nonsense.  We don’t even WANT to do away with ALL lobbying.  Many progressive groups have special interests, and they lobby members of Congress to make them aware of their issues.  But we can take a lot of corruption out of the process by instituting public financing of political campaigns, and eliminating private donations.  I believe we are the only industrialized nation (except maybe Russia) to allow private donations to political campaigns.  As a consequence that we can certainly not be proud of, we may be the most corrupt industrialized nation (except maybe for Russia).

Go Ahead, Appoint a Prosecutor – For All the Crimes (by Deacon Blues at The Left Coaster)
As certain as the sunrise tomorrow, conservatives will make sure that Barack Obama is sidetracked at the start of his term. They need another “gays in the military” or Whitewater to derail a Democratic administration. And they’ll have a convenient memory loss over the last eight years while doing it. We know that Rahm Emanuel had contact with the governor’s office about acceptable successors for the president-elect. We also know that Emanuel isn’t a target of Patrick Fitzgerald’s inquiry. Yet that hasn’t stopped Patrick Buchanan from already calling for a independent counsel to look into what role Barack Obama played in this matter…

[I]f Buchanan and other conservatives really want to open that door now with this president-elect even before he takes office, out of some newfound concern for the rule of law and avoiding any taint of scandal, then perhaps the incoming administration should oblige – and then use this as the pretext to launch a series of inquiries into everything the Bush Administration got away with. After all, we should all be concerned about the rule of law and finding all lawbreakers, regardless of what party they belong to. Isn’t that right Pat?
That would be right if Buchanan and friends were interested in equal treatment for similar deeds.  But they’re not.  They’re interested in damnation for Democrats and treating Republicans like saints.  Democrats refuse fight back in the same way.  And, apparently, plan to keep on not fighting.

Open Letter to President-Elect Obama (by John Dean, White House Counsel to Richard Nixon, writing at Talking Points Memo)
[I]f you truly want to change the scandal paradigm, you should operate in a fish-bowl to show you have absolutely nothing to hide. Accordingly, I offer this suggestion for your consideration: Email all your past and present staff, all designated appointees, and any others with whom you have an informal relationship if they could have had contact with Blagojevich about your senate seat, and request they all report to you any and all such information that in any manner relates to the appointment to fill your senate seat. Instruct everyone to err on the side of too much information. In addition, tell everyone than when responding to you that they should also post their responses at your website to make them public… Such action by you would forever change the standards of presidents in dealing with potential presidential scandals and nip this one before it can cause any more problems for your new administration. This would be a change everyone could believe in.

Senate scandal snares Obama’s chief aide (The Times, U.K.)
THE bullish, foul-mouthed but effective Chicago arm-twister Rahm Emanuel has come under pressure to resign as Barack Obama’s chief of staff after it was revealed that he had been captured on court-approved wire-taps discussing the names of candidates for Obama’s Senate seat. Emanuel’s presence at the heart of the scandal threatens to roil the president-elect’s administration as a Chicago prosecutor builds his corruption case against Rod Blagojevich, the Illinois governor.
Who are the people putting the pressure on Emanuel to resign?  I haven’t seen that claim anywhere else, and The Times doesn’t say. In case you don’t know, the Times is owned by Rupert Murdoch, who also owns the Fox News Channel.  Emanuel’s “presence” at the heart of the scandal doesn’t necessarily mean any wrongdoing.  The only reason to get ahead of the evidence is to use the Blagojevich scandal as a way to smear Obama.  Which is what right wingers do to Democrats.  It’s in their DNA.  But it wasn’t supposed to happen to Obama, remember?  That’s why Hillary couldn’t be the Democratic nominee.

Slate concocts new standards for “scandal” coverage (by County Fair, Media Matters for America)
Chris Beam unfurled a beloved Beltway CW as way to prop up the breathless Blago story in terms of it being an “Obama scandal.”… [T]he key point was that presidents always have to release all embarrassing information. Immediately. It’s the only way to make a story go away. It’s the only way to get the press to back off. And if presidents (or president-elects) don’t immediately disclose every morsel of information, the tenacious Beltway press is never going to be satisfied. To that I have a two word response: Harken Energy.

Think back to when that embarrassing presidential scandal broke in 2002. Did Bush instantly reveal every Harken-related fact, figure, time and date? Did the White House do everything it could to make sure journalists had as much relevant information as possible and do it in a timely fashion? Please… Actually, the rules being applied to the Democrat today are exactly like the ones that applied to Clinton the Democrat in the 1990’s. Yet for some miraculous reason the same rules did not apply to Bush the Republican, and people like Beam play dumb about it.

Parse till you drop: (by Bob Somerby at the Daily Howler)
Gene Robinson … says the Blagojevich matter “involves Obama in only the most tangential way.” Indeed, the matter “actually seems to cast him in a favorable light.” He says Obama has been “careful not to get ahead of the facts or make declarations that might later have to be retracted.” And then, of course, there’s what happened yesterday: Obama said, once again, that he himself had no discussions about this matter with Blagojevich—and he said he’d release the record of staff discussions “over the next few days.” And yet, this just isn’t good enough, Robinson weirdly decrees in this piece. It would be good enough for other pols. But it’s not good enough for Obama.

Good enough for others—but not for Big Dems! We’ve seen that standard applied before! Soon, Robinson is playing the familiar games of parse-till-you-drop and say-how-it-seems, the familiar games which have been on display in “press corps” venues this week.

Union Is Caught Up in Illinois Bribe Case (New York Times)
The Service Employees International Union has long boasted that it is on the cutting edge of the labor movement. But the union found itself badly embarrassed this week when it was named in the federal criminal complaint charging Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich of Illinois with maneuvering to secure financial gain from the appointment of the state’s next senator.

The complaint said Mr. Blagojevich’s chief of staff, John Harris, had suggested to a service employees official that the union should help make the governor the president of Change to Win, a federation of seven unions that broke away from the A.F.L.-C.I.O. The complaint said Mr. Blagojevich, a Democrat, was seeking a position that paid $250,000 to $300,000 a year. In exchange, the complaint suggested, Mr. Blagojevich had expected the service employees union and Change to Win to seek to persuade him to name President-elect Barack Obama’s first choice, Valerie Jarrett, to succeed Mr. Obama in the Senate. The union would also receive help from the Obama administration, presumably for its legislative agenda.

Blagojevich and Union Go Way Back (Wall Street Journal)
Allegations that Blagojevich sought help from the nation’s largest union in a pay-for-play scheme are the latest episode in his long relationship with the SEIU.

Obama names NY housing commissioner to head HUD (AP)
CHICAGO – President-elect Barack Obama on Saturday named New York City housing commissioner Shaun Donovan to lead the Department of Housing and Urban Development, turning to a former Clinton administration aide with a national reputation for developing affordable housing.

Senate Republicans seek to delay hearings on Holder as attorney general (Los Angeles Times)
Reporting from Washington — President-elect Barack Obama’s nominee for attorney general, Eric H. Holder Jr., is now coming under fire from Senate Republicans, who have asked to delay what was expected to be a swift and easy confirmation over concerns about his role in some controversial Clinton-era pardons and other matters.

Karl Rove’s pundit problem, cont’d (County Fair, Media Matters for America)
We noted earlier this year the problem with Rove’s transformation from White House player to pundit if his new Murdoch paid outlets, such as the Wall Street Journal and Fox News, refuse to acknowledge that Rove remains active in GOP politics. That he’s not just commenting on current events, he’s trying to shape them. Like being an adviser to McCain’s campaign in 2008. The latest wrinkle revolves around the fact that news orgs are suggesting that Rove is taking the behind-the-scenes lead for the GOP in trying to torpedo Eric Holder’s nomination to be the next AG. If the Journal and FNC are even going to pretend to hold Rove to any kind of journalism standards (that is, after all, what they’re paying him to produce), they ought to come clean immediately about his role in the unfolding Holder story.

DOJ blocking Obama transition team from reviewing documents on wiretapping and torture. (Think Progress)
According to the Blog of Legal Times, the Justice Department is blocking President-elect Obama’s agency review team’s request “to review classified legal opinions related to secret CIA and National Security Agency programs.” Included in these documents are the “legal rationale of the NSA’s warrantless spying program and the CIA’s detention and interrogation policies, among other intelligence initiatives.” According to a senior Justice Department official, they are “reluctant to provide the opinions to Obama’s team without permission from the two intelligence agencies whose activities they address.”
Whole lotta shreddin’ goin’ on, I’ll bet.

Obama Discloses Inauguration Donors (Political Wire)
President-elect Obama’s inauguration committee made its donor list available online, with many of the donors maxing out their contributions at $50,000 per person.

Franken Wins Decision on Absentee Ballots (Political Wire)
Minnesota elections officials unanimously voted to require local election boards to count approximately 1,600 absentee ballots that were disqualified by clerical error, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports. The move could significantly boost Al Franken’s (D) prospects of catching Sen. Norm Coleman (R-MN) in the recount of their U.S. Senate race.

The Kiss of Death – Rendell Endorses Tweety (by campskunk at Alegre’s Corner)
Words fail me, even though they never fail Ed Rendell, who’s currently recovering from his “Napolitano has no life” gaffe, but still won’t keep his mouth shut. Here it is from Politico… “Rendell: Matthews is the ’strongest Democratic candidate’…” Now, if only Rod Blagojevich would endorse Tweety, too…

Evan Bayh Wants Blue Dogs in the Senate (by tnjen at Corrente)
Sen. Evan Bayh is working to create a Blue Dog coalition in the Senate and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid –quelle surprise!– is “upbeat” about the idea.

Palin’s Church Severely Damaged by Arson (AP)
ANCHORAGE, Dec. 13 — Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s home church was badly damaged by arson, leading the governor to apologize Saturday if the fire was connected to “undeserved negative attention” from her campaign as the Republican vice presidential nominee. Damage to the Wasilla Bible Church was estimated at $1 million, authorities said. No one was injured in the fire, which was set Friday night while a handful of people, including two children, were inside, according to James Steele, the Central Mat-Su fire chief.

With election in past, McCain declines to back Palin for 2012 (McClatchy)
WASHINGTON — John McCain pointedly refused to say Sunday that he would back former running mate Sarah Palin if she runs for president in 2012, saying there are plenty of other good people in the Republican Party to consider.

Estonia to vote by mobile phone in 2011
TALLINN, Estonia (AP) – Parliament has approved a law making Estonia the first country to allow voting by mobile phone. Lawmakers approved a measure Thursday allowing citizens to vote by mobile phone in the next parliamentary elections in 2011.

David Shuster to Host MSNBC Political Program (New York Times)
MSNBC is replacing one David with another on its 6 p.m. program, “1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.”

Al Gore’s ultimate revenge (by DCblogger at Corrente)
“Could the stars be aligning for a Google-N.Y. Times merger?”… Al Gore sits in Google’s Board of Directors. I hope Google makes him publisher of the NYT.

Glenzilla (by Susie at Suburban Guerrilla)
On Bill Moyers, talking about the rule of law and how it was perverted by the Bush administration: “…Let’s just quickly describe in the most dispassionate terms, as few of euphemisms, as possible, where we are and what has happened over the last eight years. We have a law in place that says it is a felony offense punishable by five years in prison or a $10,000 fine to eavesdrop on American citizens without warrants. We have laws in place that say that it is a felony punishable by decades in prison to subject detainees in our custody to treatment that violates the Geneva Conventions or that is inhumane or coercive. We know that the president and his top aides have violated these laws. The facts are indisputable that they’ve done so. And yet as a country, as a political class, we’re deciding basically in unison that the president and our highest political officials are free to break the most serious laws that we have, that our citizens have enacted, with complete impunity, without consequences, without being held accountable under the law.

“And when you juxtapose that with the fact that we are a country that has probably the most merciless criminal justice system on the planet when it comes to ordinary Americans. We imprison more of our population than any country in the world… What you have is a two-tiered system of justice.”

Oliver Stone slams Bush at Mideast gala for ‘W.’ (AP)
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – Filmmaker Oliver Stone slammed President George W. Bush at the Mideast premiere of his movie “W.” in Dubai, saying the outgoing U.S. president is a man with “a giant ego” and “boneheaded arrogance.”

Drug Maker Said to Pay Ghostwriters for Journal Articles (New York Times)
Wyeth, the pharmaceutical company, paid ghostwriters to produce medical journal articles favorable to its female hormone replacement therapy Prempro, according to Congressional letters seeking more information about the company’s involvement in medical ghostwriting. At least one article was published even after a federal study found the drug raised the risk of breast cancer.

Coal Front Group Forced To Take Down ‘Coal Carolers’ Campaign In The Face Of Widespread Scorn (Think Progress)

[Last] Wednesday, ThinkProgress reported on a holiday campaign by the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE), a coal industry front group, featuring illustrated lumps of coal singing Christmas carols whose altered lyrics praised coal power. The campaign, which also featured a Facebook page, received widespread ridicule around the blogosphere and the press… Now ACCCE has scrubbed the “Coal Carolers” from its website; the link to the old carolers page redirects viewers to a blog post posting that “it’s time for them to go home for the holidays“… The group’s Facebook page has also been taken down.

When Will You Silly Women Get a Sense of Humor?: Just Another Woman Who Enjoys Symbolic Sexual Assault (by Stateofdisbelief at The Confluence)
Washington Post’s Kathleen Parker is busy lamenting the blogosphere’s rage over the Jon Favreau “gropergate” controversy.  Gee…can’t a guy just have fun anymore?… Well Katherine, let me share some “fun” with you.  I hope you enjoy your own personal ‘gropergate’ moment.  It’s just a little “harmless” fun!  As for me…I don’t intend to get a sense of humor about these types of demeaning and mysogynistic attacks on women anytime soon. 

Pray the Devil Back to Hell – Women Unite for Peace in Liberia (by Alegre)
A friend just sent me a link to a video clip of a CNN interview with the producer of a new documentary about the women behind the peace effort in Liberia.  They stood up to the men (and boys) with guns and said ENOUGH!, and they won the day.  We could all take a lesson from these courageous women – if only we united to end war, wipe out poverty, stop global warming… [the] list of the work yet to be done is endless but none of it is as daunting as the struggles of the women portrayed in Pray the Devil Back to Hell.

Shift in Cuba policy anticipated under Obama (McClatchy)
WASHINGTON — Throughout his campaign, President-elect Barack Obama said that he’d loosen some restrictions on travel and remittances to Cuba and rebuild the already slight ties to the communist nation cut by the Bush administration.

Seismic Effects of the Bankruptcy Reform (by Donald P. Morgan, Benjamin Iverson, and Matthew Botsch, Federal Reserve Bank of New York Staff Reports, thanks to Economist’s View)
Is it just coincidence that the surge in subprime foreclosures that has rocked financial markets came right after the bankruptcy reform in 2005 (Chart 1)? Is that surge just about falling home prices, bad mortgage decisions, and weak economic conditions? No and no. Indeed, we would be surprised if the answers were otherwise. Bankruptcy is about protection, after all, and foreclosure is what mortgagors most want to protect against. The Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005, the first overhaul of U.S. personal bankruptcy law in over a quarter century, made filing bankruptcy much less protective and much more expensive. How could that not matter?

If a Wall Street Honcho Had Warned of the Bubble Would Anyone Have Cared? (by Dean Baker)
Steven Pearlstein raised this question in his column last week. He argued that if one of the top executives of a major bank had warned that things were getting crazy in financial markets back in 2004-2006 then it could have brought the madness to an early end. This is certainly possible. I have long argued that if Greenspan had been doing his job, he would followed the course suggested by Pearlstein, using the even bigger pulpit offered by the Federal Reserve Board… [But the] oped pages of publications like the Washington Post were not open to these arguments and the editorial boards of these papers did not want to discuss the possibility that we had a huge housing bubble…. One of the key lessons of this economic crisis should be that there is a remarkable lack of capacity for independent thinking in our most important institutions.
Vastleft has a good recap of the symptoms of groupthink.  You’d think we’d be trying to avoid this malady in all of our dealings.  Sadly, groupthink is rife in the so-called progressive blogosphere, and has been since February, at least.

NYT Informs Readers of Forecaster’s Track Record (by Dean Baker)
Yes, it can be done. The NYT headline read, “Goldman, Once Warning Of $200 Oil, Sees $45 In 2009.” This is exactly what the media should be doing when they present forecasts from various experts. For example, when they share the views of people like Alan Greenspan on the economy, they can preface them with a comment like, “Alan Greenspan, who insisted there was no housing bubble.” In fact, the media should preface the predictions of almost all their economic experts with this comment… Reporters should be familiar with the track record of the experts they rely upon and they should share this information with the public.

It’s Called The Economist, Not The Futurist (New York Times)
For 23 years, The Economist has issued bold predictions for the coming year. Last year, its crystal ball, in the issue called “The World in 2008,” was a little foggy.

Obama, Democrats agree to $500 billion stimulus package (McClatchy)
WASHINGTON — While an auto bailout is on life support, President-elect Barack Obama and Democratic congressional leaders have agreed to a $500 billion economic-stimulus package that they want to move next month even before Obama takes office.

The Public Supports Stimulus and Infrastructure Spending (by Ruy Teixeira, Center for American Progress)
The public is ready for large-scale action on an economic stimulus, whatever the consequences for the deficit.

Stimulus Package To First Pay for Routine Repairs (Washington Post)
President-elect  Barack Obama calls it “the largest new investment in our national infrastructure since the creation of the federal highway system in the 1950s.”… Most of the infrastructure spending being proposed for the massive stimulus package that Obama and congressional Democrats are readying, however, is not exactly the stuff of history, but destined for routine projects that have been on the to-do lists of state highway departments for years.
Those are the projects that are most likely ready to go.  Why NOT start with them?

How Does the Post Know What Congress “Wanted?” (by Dean Baker)
Post readers may ask that question given that the Post told them that: “Congress wanted to guarantee that the $700 billion financial bailout would limit the eye-popping pay of Wall Street executives.” The rest of the article explains how the bailout legislation, as approved by Congress, is not likely to impose any serious limits on executive pay. So, Congress was apparently unable to do what it wanted. This is striking because most members of Congress are not morons. Congress is usually capable of passing legislation that does what it wants…

Of course, giving taxpayer dollars to the richest people in the country is not very popular with ordinary taxpayers. So, it might be in the interest of members of Congress to appear to be trying to rein in executive compensation on Wall Street, even if this is not their real intention. In other words, the restrictions of executive compensation put in the bailout bill were just a charade for the kids.
A Kabuki dance.

NYT Piece on Schumer/Democrats Ties to Wall Street (by Dean Baker)
Anyone was wondering why the bank bailouts seem more designed to help Wall Street than the economy should read this piece.

NYT Hides Tax Break for Rich People (by Dean Baker)
Yet again the NYT repeated misinformation about an effort by Congress to hand more money to rich people. Under current law, people must withdraw money from retirement accounts at a set rate after they reach the age of 70. The idea is that this money will be taxed before they die. Wealthy people, who don’t need this money to maintain their living standard, would rather leave the money in their account, and never have it taxed before it is passed on to their heirs… In short, this is just a lobbyist’s invention to reduce the tax burden on the wealthy even further. The media should be exposing this misrepresentation not repeating it.

Fed Could Remake Credit Card Regulations (Washington Post)
The Federal Reserve on Thursday will vote on sweeping reform of the credit card industry that would ban practices such as retroactively increasing interest rates at will and charging late fees when consumers are not given a reasonable amount of time to make payments… If the new credit card regulations are approved largely as proposed, they would represent the most significant overhaul of the industry in decades, banking officials and consumer advocates said. The Fed has not yet indicated a timeline for implementation.

Auto bailout’s defeat shows McConnell still has leverage (McClatchy)
WASHINGTON — Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s firm opposition to a bailout for the Big Three automakers in the face of mounting White House pressure might serve as an indication of how the de facto head of a significantly weakened caucus might deal with President-elect Barack Obama’s administration.

Senators Supporting Auto Bailout Had Union Money on Their Side (Capital Eye)
Although the senators who voted in favor of the auto bailout didn’t receive more money on average from automakers and dealers than those who opposed it, money from the United Auto Workers correlated significantly with votes to help out Detroit… Senators who supported the UAW-backed legislation received nearly 14 times more money, on average, from the union in the last 20 years than those who voted against it–$21,671.29 compared to $1,600.
It’s natural that legislators will vote in favor of the issues supported by their contributors.  That’s the whole point of contributing to politicians.  We just need to make sure that influence doesn’t go too far.

GM to cut production by 250,000 autos in early ‘09 (Detroit Free Press)
General Motors Corp., which is involved in a last-ditch effort to garner federal funds to help it survive through January, confirmed [Friday] that it is slashing approximately 250,000 units of production in the first quarter by shutting down most North American assembly plants for about 30% of the first quarter.
Is that a threat?

Econo Fraud 101 (by eriposte at The Left Coaster)
I suppose the burgeoning Bernard Madoff fraud scandal is a sign of the times, but just how much of this was preventable is illustrated in a couple of articles that were published in 2001 – yes 2001, not 2008. This incident also suggests that it would more than desirable for President-Elect Obama’s SEC Chair to modernize the SEC to proactively detect and combat various old and new mechanisms of investment fraud.

Dilbert

Media Matters for America headlines

• Media play meteorologists, baselessly forecast “clouds” for Obama because of Blagojevich scandal

• Media Matters: Media pick up where they left off 8 years ago

• AP reported only GOP side of “back-and-forth over when to hold a confirmation hearing for Eric Holder”

• CNN’s Griffin falsely suggested Obama denies assertions in Blagojevich complaint — but there’s no allegation for him to deny

• MSNBC, Wash. Times echo GOP accusation that UAW killed bailout

• Belling: “You wonder why racism occurs … when a minority person moves in. The answer is because sometimes it does mean an increase in crime”

Australia to Test Internet Filter to Block Banned Content
The government plans to test a nationwide Web filter that would require Internet service providers to block access to thousands of sites containing illegal content, officials say.

Free broadband plan stirs debate on filtering
M2Z Networks’ proposal to build a free wireless broadband network is not the only controversial part of its business plan. Just as contentious is its intention to filter the content delivered over that network to block any material deemed inappropriate for children.

Google wants “fast track” for its content
PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) – Google Inc has approached Internet carriers with a proposal to create a “fast lane” for its own content, countering its previously stance of equal network access for all content providers, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday.

Sony BMG Fined $1 Million for Child Privacy Violations
Sony BMG Music Entertainment has agreed to pay $1 million to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that it violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and the commission’s implementing rule.

FCC cancels meeting at U.S. lawmakers’ request
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Federal Communications Commission said on Saturday it was canceling a December 18 meeting in response to a request by Democratic lawmakers that it pay more attention to a smooth transition to digital television early next year.

Va. seeks reinstatement of anti-spam law
RICHMOND, Va. – Virginia’s attorney general asked the nation’s highest court Thursday to revive a state anti-spam law struck down by a lower court as unconstitutionally overbroad.

NEWS YOU CAN LOSE (by James Surowiecki, the New Yorker)
The real problem for newspapers … isn’t the Internet; it’s us. We want access to everything, we want it now, and we want it for free. That’s a consumer’s dream, but eventually it’s going to collide with reality: if newspapers’ profits vanish, so will their product… For a while now, readers have had the best of both worlds: all the benefits of the old, high-profit regime—intensive reporting, experienced editors, and so on—and the low costs of the new one. But that situation can’t last. Soon enough, we’re going to start getting what we pay for, and we may find out just how little that is.

A Scandal in Chicago That Justifies Investigative Journalism (by David Carr, New York Times)
Newspapers, smacked around for lacking relevance the last few years, have found a compelling spokesman: Rod R. Blagojevich, the governor of Illinois.

Entrepreneurial journalism is not an oxymoron (by Jeff Jarvis)
This week, we held the second annual jurying in the entrepreneurial journalism class I teach at CUNY. Damn, it’s fun. And it’s inspiring to see journalists act as entrepreneurs and to see journalistic innovation.

The students propose a new, sustainable, journalistic enterprise. We define journalism broadly. The winners were a platform for educators and students to share lessons in a complex field; a service for a large diaspora; and a company serving news radio over phone calls. (I’m being vague on purpose since these ideas are the students’ own.) Others included coverage of graffiti, one New York neighborhood, one street in a New York neighborhood with a strong social scene (call it nanolocal), Copenhagen, the web itself, and charities. There were also platforms for social bargain hunting and sharing, a new kind of political party, and explaining complex stories. They each emphasized using many media to do the job.

The winners received seed money to actually start their businesses thanks to a grant from the McCormick Foundation.

News About News, in 140 Characters
A Twitter feed for public relations workers documents media hirings and firings in one-sentence bursts of text.

Media Guy’s Worst Media Feuds Of 2008
1. MICROSOFT VS. YAHOO… 2. SARAH PALIN VS. THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE… 3. SAM ZELL VS. HIS EMPLOYEES… 4. REVEREND WRIGHT VS. HIS OWN EGO.
Click through for more.

Politico Network and Reuters Announce Content Deal 
“They get a piece of revenue and a wider audience for their content,” Politico Executive Editor Jim Vandehei said of Reuters. “They get greater exposure.” Reuters, meanwhile, will use some Politico content on its news wires for its clients under an additional charge.

Real estate developer, sugar magnate show interest in Miami Herald
Miami real estate developer Jorge Perez says he and Florida sugar magnate Alfonso Fanjul held talks with McClatchy and Miami Herald executives about a possible sale of the Herald. ”Nothing has materialized,” says Perez.

‘Rocky’ Staffers Set Up Site to Rally Readers — and Slow Chance of Shutting Down
DENVER Rocky Mountain News staffers have created a Web site to rally readers who want to show their support for the newspaper, which is being sold.

Report: Del Toro won’t make another film in Mexico
MEXICO CITY – “Hellboy” director Guillermo del Toro says he is unlikely to make another film in Mexico because his father’s kidnapping 10 years ago left him fearing for his safety, a newspaper reported Thursday.

Radio stations untangle more direct Web connections
NASHVILLE (Billboard) – Radio companies took a giant step forward in 2008 by embracing online and mobile applications like never before.

More [radio stations] decide to go dark, not broke.
Facing lower revenues, more stations are opting to turn off the transmitter. In recent weeks there’s been an up tick in the number of requests landing at the FCC seeking permission to remain silent due to the bad economy. One operator who shutdown three FMs admits it’s “unable to operate profitably.”

Time to Bid Adieu to the 10 p.m. Drama?
Rash Report: Top 10 Shows Don’t Include the Last Hour of Prime Time

CBS Relaunching TV.com; Hoping Finally To Become A Video Player; Aiming Beyond Hulu, Not At It (Paid Content)
CBS Interactive is relaunching TV.com, hoping to transform the well-named site known for its TV-related community and user-generated content into a serious video destination, paidContent has learned… Launched in 2005, TV.com has been a “digital water cooler” about anything and everything having to do with TV, drawing more than 16 million unique monthly visitors and boasting info about nearly 19,000 shows.  As planned, the new version would blend the two by making TV.com into a real video destination, not a place where you happen to watch video, while continuing to build on its community strengths and its depth of content about TV. CBS doesn’t want TV.com to be Hulu—it wants to move beyond Hulu.

With Campaign Season Over, Politicker Scales Back Local Sites (Paid Content)
Observer Media’s local online news network Politicker is scaling back its stable of sites to six from 17, rival Politico reports. Founded about eight years ago as a Trenton, NJ-focused political news blog, Politicker started generating sites for its network at the start of 2008. Its New York blog was born as a channel within the company’s New York Observer site. It had previously planned to have sites in all 50 states and 75- to 100 reporters. After building out several state-specific online outposts earlier this year in Maryland, Nevada, Colorado and Oregon, Politicker will pull back and maintain a northeast focus.

Learning to Talk
Will automatic translation expand the Middle East social network — or just spread some serious misunderstandings?

Need help with class? YouTube videos await
MIAMI (AP) – When University of Central Florida junior Nicole Nissim got stumped in trigonometry, she checked out what was showing on YouTube. Nissim typically scours the video-sharing Web site for clips of bands and comedy skits. But this time she wasn’t there to procrastinate on her homework. It turned out YouTube was also full of math videos. After watching a couple, the psychology major says, she finally understood trig equations and how to make graphs.

WRITER’S TOOLBOX: 35 Best Tools for Writing Online (Mashable)
Whether you’re new to the world of authorship or a veteran trying to make the most of Web services and applications, there are a number of online tools for writers of all types. From blogging platforms to networking hotbeds, and job boards to real-world gatherings, and more, the supply of utilities is comprehensive, to say the least. But finding them all can be hard-going, so we’ve taken the liberty to make the discovery process easier by arranging our top finds here for your perusal. Here are 35 of the best social media tools for writers.

A Software Secretary That Takes Charge
A new generation of Internet technologies is making meaningful progress in anticipating your needs without you pressing a key.

Advertisers Face Hurdles on Social Networking Sites
Web advertising experts see a myriad of difficulties in making brand advertising work on social networking sites.

Banks Use Free Pizzas and Humor to Calm Fears
Banks and financial institutions are buying ads and holding promotions to bolster consumer confidence.

Pepsi Blocks Coke From First Half of Super Bowl
But Soft-Drink Rival Hopes to Lock in Exclusivity for Third Quarter

New Device Prevents Driving While Using Cell Phone
A new automobile ignition key can prevent teenagers from talking on cell phones or sending text messages while driving.

Despite cell phone ban, North Korea gets wired
An Egyptian company said it will launch 3G mobile telephone service in North Korea on Monday, after winning the contract to build the advanced network in the country where private cell phones and Internet access are banned.

Study Reveals Most Internet-Accessible Cities In United States
(Sep. 23, 1999) — Washington, D.C. is the most Internet-accessible city in the United States, according to a new study by Ohio State University researchers. The other top five cities, in order, are Chicago, Dallas, New York and Atlanta.

Improving Internet Access On The Move
ScienceDaily (Dec. 14, 2008) — The on-board entertainment and internet access enjoyed by train passengers could soon be transformed by new technology… Researchers … have overcome two of the major technological challenges which severely limit the services currently provided on trains. “Our research should make it far easier for train operators to offer a broader range of internet and live media services in many more locations and at a lower cost”… In order to offer internet services in any location, trains need to be equipped with a dish, or ‘reflector’, that both transmits to and receives signals from an orbiting satellite. At the moment this is only possible on a relatively small number of routes where there is sufficient headroom between the carriages and tunnels or overhead cables. Using alternative technology to satellites results in reduced bandwidth and patchy geographical coverage.