Journo shot If you're wondering why the "insurgency" continues to grow in Iraq, this would probably make a good case study.

Blocks away from a roving checkpoint, this correspondent was shot by a sniper simply because, it appears, he was a lone male driving a car.

Our men need to be safe but a better tactical response is needed.  ¶ 6/30/2005 12:40:00 PM 0 comments

  Millionth Monkey Syndrome- I often feel like the last one throwin' crap in the blog line.

This post is a year old but I can identify with what he says. Really cool, also check out his sex in politics (there should be more) thing.  ¶ 6/29/2005 09:33:00 PM 0 comments

  Not a Good Day Not necessarily a bad thing that karma came to bite Miller in the ass but all things considered today is just not what I imagined it would be. You see, I always thought that when the Fed's came to get journalists for doing their job, there should be a great upheaval.

Not necessarily a bad thing that karma came to bite the profession in the ass. We shouldn't have been beholden to following the whims of politics and so now there are few at any point of the political spectrum we can count as being in the foxhole with us. It just seems as if we ain't got a friend to be found. Kinda can't blame 'em; we failed everybody, all around. There were bells, whistles and claxons going off that should have woke us to the sham comin' down. {Check the last three lines!} And the "crusaders" think the glory of their Message has been denied to all the world because of our slovenly state (Or we failed to effectively convey the important and far reaching needs for our country's course). Journalism, as a whole, failed to consistently deliver the news; good or bad, left or right. We, as journalists, must now begin the fight to gain the respect and support we need to keep our society free.

The truth will be a mighty armor in this fight. As I've said, the search for truth is never neutral. You gotta really want it: You gotta have that fire to find the truth. You have to want it bad enough to have the courage to make the tough choices the right way. And as we know, the truth doesn't usually come from the utterance of one voice. The right thing to do now is to make this issue front page on every newspaper, web space and broadcast news in the nation. We need the clarity and courage($$) to show that this isn't just an "inside baseball" story. It isn't over yet, but this could be The Big News. This could be the thing that effects every man, woman and child in this country long after the war in Iraq is over. There's more than one way to come at this story, that has been developing right under our noses for the last century or so. The story is big enough for everybody to get a piece of it.

All the blips along the way aside; you can reasonably state that steadily increasing information flow, that was not controlled by the government, has now put the civil, private side on a more equal footing with the government. There is now a greater parity than ever. This prosecution of Cooper and Miller is designed to remove one advantage of the press and gain a greater supremacy for the government. This would be a simple case of prosecutorial abuse were the grand political nature of it not so evident. The administration wants to plug all the holes in their control of the message.

The whole affair stinks to the high heavens. The leak was a White House driven bit; so the Dem's get them to agree to a special prosecutor who then goes after the NYTimes while the only chump (initially -ed.) to bite on the obviously tainted story gets a walk. No one really knows what kind of bargain Novak was able to cut but you can be reasonably sure that it is one of two things. He either rolled or he took such a principled stand, so righteously, that Fitzgerald was awe struck and decided to prosecute others. I've heard Novak went over to the dark side of the force; that must be it. This pursuit is unnecessary and we all know why it is driven. To attempt to deny it bespeaks the dumbest of gullibility.

It's time to get down to the fight. We are fighting for our social, civic and professional lives. We're gonna have to really want this one.  ¶ 6/29/2005 12:41:00 PM 0 comments

  Google Tips Hand on China Policy This post put Google Ads for web filtering on my blog. The irony is rich.

http://services.google.com/feedback/abg?url=http://penheaded.blogspot.com/&hl=en&client=ca-pub-5141657438110402&adU=www.minitrax.com&adT=
Better+Than+Filters&adU=www.surfcontrol.com&adT=
Internet+Filters&adU=www.WebBalanced.com&adT=The+%231+Internet+Fi  ¶ 6/29/2005 07:24:00 AM 0 comments

  Buffalo (Nickel) Bull If Ashcroft had been at Treasury it never would have made it out the door.

Once the dirt and tarnish starts collecting on these nickels as it did on the old style nickels, we'll have another off-color issue.  ¶ 6/29/2005 07:14:00 AM 0 comments

  Citizen Journalism in China From this reading it would seem that most Americans have little or no idea of what is going on in China. It would seem that citizen journalism ( while it stays up on the web before the "nannies" get it) is serving a real and much needed purpose.  ¶ 6/28/2005 09:57:00 PM 0 comments

  Journal-World aka Urinal-World This is what it is all about. My skepticism, I mean. I know about the Urinal-World, as it is affectionately known in Jayhawk land. I don't think the Simons have had a religious experience or anything. This will most likely be the model upon which the new-fangled thing becomes the same ol' thing.  ¶ 6/27/2005 02:46:00 PM 0 comments

  Huh? This is the best the right can come up with when they want to muddy the waters about a Republican party official in charge of the CPB?  ¶ 6/27/2005 12:57:00 PM 0 comments

  "Six Bongs Over Brattleboro"- citizen journalism via iBrattleboro.com Alright, this was posted in the rumor section of this citizen journalism site. But as the post describes, the local culture is fertile ground for the Hippie theme park. And a wily subterfuge.

Meanwhile, down the valley a ways, the rumor is spreading that you'll be able to hunt them over the internet after a large enough contribution to the RNC.

Update: A day later this seems a little like a snarky cheap shot at efforts I admire. Besides the joke posts (I'd do it), not editing posts (this dates from 12/04) is an editorial prerogative and expression of philosophy. They've caught a little bit of color.  ¶ 6/25/2005 09:48:00 PM 1 comments

  Looks good Watched the trailers, read about getting the music rights. Really kinda cute movie.  ¶ 6/25/2005 08:37:00 AM 0 comments

  Forget the buzz, look at the dissenting opinion O'Connor and Scalia teaming up on a dissent isn't all that rare but it points to something the left and right have in common. Some of the underlying philosophy and methods might be different though both sides feel the little guy should have protections from big influence and big money.  ¶ 6/23/2005 09:12:00 PM 0 comments

  White House Cover-up Read the story, the WH knows which one of their political operatives committed the crime of impersonating a Secret Service agent and will not tell. Hot Dog!  ¶ 6/23/2005 05:55:00 PM 0 comments

  Trust in Government? Shouldn't, said they wouldn't and did anyway.  ¶ 6/20/2005 10:57:00 PM 0 comments

  Saddam Misses Reagan I guess there was no one the Great Communicator couldn't reach. He and Ollie North understood how armaments can make friends.  ¶ 6/20/2005 10:20:00 PM 0 comments

  Philosophical Growth Previously, I have stated that the search for truth is not objective nor removed. Here stated, it is passionate.  ¶ 6/20/2005 10:14:00 PM 0 comments

  Dear Abby-Thanks to Sperm Donors on Fathers' Day Her quote- "The most meaningful gift is the gift of self".  ¶ 6/19/2005 08:20:00 AM 0 comments

  Recent reading@rconversation I had seen the blog before and recently rediscovered it through Poynter. It just seems she tends to hit the things that spark my interest.  ¶ 6/18/2005 09:24:00 PM 0 comments

  Scam SPAM I just tell 'em, "Thanks, send the money to General Delivery". I've yet to hear back on anything.  ¶ 6/18/2005 08:44:00 PM 0 comments

  Dean Comes Back From the Edge Was there a perceived coincidence of interests for the U.S. and Israel? Yes. But the thinking that went into our adventure in Iraq was flawed in so many ways and the reasoned discussion of this aspect of that flawed thinking is not in the cards at this time.

The current flap over Durbin's Nazi remarks is another one that needs careful slicing before it can be served up. No question, at any time there are significant differences between our soldiers, deployed anywhere, and the Nazi's. But we need to come to terms with the political decision to sanction torture. The facts would indicate that nothing has been gained to make the moral cost worthwhile.  ¶ 6/18/2005 08:00:00 PM 0 comments

  Schiavo Kept Alive After Autopsy Ghoulish is the only way to describe this. The seeming contradictions have been part of the record for some time and it is only because the medical examiner's report was such a kick to their absurd positions that they feel compelled to strike out. This is morbid beyond belief.  ¶ 6/18/2005 06:21:00 PM 0 comments

  Google right behind? It is in the very nature of economic freedom that it can build political freedom and the reverse is true also. Some would say you can't build economic freedom with out the political kind.

But on the other hand, American business has rarely shown an interest in the issues of freedom when profit is on the line. Microsoft has caved in to the tastes of political censors in China. Google is right behind MS in the line for Chinese business. I'm not optimistic about this.

You gotta give credit when due- I scraped this off the MSN site.  ¶ 6/12/2005 04:56:00 PM 0 comments

  Hacked < week, I bet CVS will now offer a single-use video camera: about $50 to get twenty minutes of video on a DVD seems rather steep.  ¶ 6/07/2005 10:40:00 PM 0 comments

  WaPo via Romenesko Media's reputation has sunk like a stone since Watergate
Washington PostOne reason, according to Howard Kurtz, is that some in the next generation of reporters pumped up many modest flaps into scandals ending in "gate," sometimes using less than reliable anonymous sources. "Journalism became a more confrontational, even prosecutorial business, with some of its practitioners automatically assuming that politicians in the post-Nixon era must be lying, dissembling or covering up," he writes.


He left out "or disseminating self-serving crap".  ¶ 6/06/2005 04:31:00 PM 0 comments