Steve Breen by Steve Breen

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  1. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, 2 months ago

    It was a fake picture promoted by the usual right-wing suspects:

    http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2009/sep/14/tea-party-photo-shows-large-crowd-different-event/

  2. rick_e_bear

    rick_e_bearGenius_badge said, 2 months ago

    That doesn’t look the the 70K of rapid republicans on 9.12. It looks like the anti-war protesters from the bush years with the signs photoshopped.

    Keep trying Mr. Breen.

  3. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, 2 months ago

    ^ yes, it was a fake picture, proved later by the link I provided, and Breen bought the scam. Amazing what falsehoods this element is willing to perpetuate on the public. They can’t even be honest about the size of the crowd and have to go and find an old picture of previous demonstrations. According to the link, the pix was taken during the Million Man March on D.C.

  4. churchillwasright

    churchillwasright said, 2 months ago

    BCS: I don’t know what that picture was. It wasn’t shown on any of the sources I usually look at.

    MSNBC put their unofficial crowd size at hundreds of thousands:
    http://tinyurl.com/kwkul4

    I think they were re-thinking their earlier report of “tens of thousands”
    http://tinyurl.com/ktmldm

    Notice how even they say that while mostly repubs, there were democrats there, too. THROW THEM ALL OUT!

    Same shot as this time lapse:

    http://tinyurl.com/lzajsv

    Does that look like 60,000 to you?

    And look at this time lapse:
    http://tinyurl.com/mu27oa

    If you want to say that there were only 60,000 people, or the photos were photoshopped, that’s your perogative.

    As far as your link, I don’t know who “politifact” is, but they don’t sound non-partisan. Here’s what Michelle Malkin actually wrote in her blog:
    http://tinyurl.com/mzm4f6

    You ignore us at your own peril.

    BTW, your comments lately sound as if you’re becoming more and more unhinged. Or maybe I just misjudged you.

  5. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, 2 months ago

    churchhill if sticking to facts and providing sources for fact checking is your definition of “becoming more and more unhinged,” as it seems to be, then you are indeed so tightly hinged you won’t let the facts get in the way of your story.

    (1) First, my post was about a photo that the right-wing blog sites posted online so they could scream about the left-leaning MSM not giving them enough credit for the size of the crowd on 9/12. One site after another picked it up and posted it and round and round the disinformation goes.

    Problem is the photo was of a rally more 10 years prior, as proved by the reasons cited in the politifact.com link.

    Are we clear on that one point before I move on? The righties posted photos of a Promise Keepers March in D.C. by Christian men in 1997 and claimed it was the Tea Party demonstration on 9/12/09. When it was proved it was false, the more honest ones removed the false photo. Some left it up and added a note that the photo was the “wrong rally.”

    (2) Does it really matter that you didn’t see the photo? My post was about the photo posted all over the Internet. You didn’t see it, uh, OK, so what?

    (3) Politifact.com is not a partisan site at all (do you just automatically assume a site is partisan if it proves an error by the Rep right wing?) Politifact is one of the best, if not the best, site for a non-partisan, independent fact checking site. You don’t have to believe me, or any of the other posters on this site who have said the same thing, go look at it yourself. The fact checking has found Obama has made false, or partially true/partially false claims too. Politifact is an equal opportunity debunker. Why on earth do you dismiss it because you weren’t aware of it?

    (4) I have to wonder if you even read the politifact link or you would have known it was NOT about various claims of the demonstration’s size, it was about a fake photo used to buttress claims of the size of the demonstration. I’m going to assume you do understand the difference, but just in case:
    my post: false photo used by righties
    your post: size of crowd

    (5) Now, I’ll move on to the points you attempt to make in your post.

    Michelle Maulkin falsely reported that ABC reported the crowds at 1.5 to 2 million people. She picked it up from another right wing site, Freedom Works, the right wing group which organized the demonstration, and apparently invented the false ABC claim. ABC issued a denial and since it’s all on tape, there’s no dispute the FreedomWorks/Michelle Maulkin claim was false.

    Maulkin updated her site to say the 1.5 to 2 million number was inaccurate and faulted Freedom Works, the source, but, curiously, kept the “Turnout estimated at 2 million” in her headline over the post. (Classy lady, huh, admit the number was wrong, but keep the inaccurate number in the prominent headline. Sheesh)

    (6) About the size of crowd: The grand old man of Fox News, Bill O’Reilly, said, after his research and review of data, he believed the crowd was 70,000.

    (7) Interestingly enough, the clips you provided provided proof that Fox News big ad in WashPo claiming ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC and CNN did not cover rally on 9/12 is FALSE.

    All of them covered it ; you provided clips from MSNBC and NBC. CNN has run numerous clips from its coverage (including one reporter who traveled with the Tea Party Express), and clips from the other networks are easily findable on YouTube. I don’t expect you to recognize this false claim by Fox because you’ll just say you didn’t see it.

    (8) church wrote: ”You ignore us at your own peril.”

    Well, church, I think you ignore facts and accuracy at your peril. It diminishes your contributions when you diss media coverage that is not right-wing and when your response to verifiable facts is just: well, I didn’t see it.

  6. churchillwasright

    churchillwasright said, 2 months ago

    BCS: First, YOU start out the thread by saying that Breen must have based his toon by looking at the ‘fake” photo. You don’t know that he even saw that photo. I didn’t . He couldn have based his toon on any of the millions of other photos of the rally. How is that “buying into the scam”. Or were they all photoshopped and lies?

    By the way, where did you see the “fake” photo? I’m sure you weren’t trolling around right wing sites.

    If you want to believe there were only 60-70,000 people, please be my guest. I provided photos and quotes that show otherwise. The parks dept. said there were 1.2 million, but then said they don’t give official counts. A reporter on MSNBC said it looked to him to he in the hundreds of thousands. And please don’t use Bill O’Reilly as a source. I know you don’t believe anything he says, and neither do I. As a matter of fact, I disagree with him often. You only used it because he said something you wanted to hear. So in this one instance you decided to agree with him and not the reporter on scene from MSNBC.

    Your final point about the Fox ad has nothing to do with this thread. But you do like to hear your own voice. If it makes you feel any better, I agree that the ad was innaccurate and shouldn’t have run.

    One final point. Comments like “[[this toon is] the latest attempt to scam the public from the rabid right” does make you sound unhinged.

    Legitimate commentary on this toon should have been about the number of people (no matter what the actual count), that turned turned up to express frustration with a govt whose spending is out of control and the members of both parties who no longer care what their constituents say. There were plenty of Democrats and Obama voters there. It was a greater success than even the organizers had anticipated. If you want to argue about the legitamacy of these three sentences, go at it.

    This toon wasn’t about a “fake photo”. YOU made it so.

    And Michelle Malkin has more class in her pinky than you have in your entire body.

  7. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, 2 months ago

    this is to churchill, and long, others can skip it

    You are very frustrating to have an online conversation with, because you often misrepresent what I say … you misrepresented here again.

    (1) church: By the way, where did you see the “fake” photo?

    I told you where I saw it, on politifact.com and if you bothered to read it, you’d know politifact named some of the other sites that posted it.

    (2) I didn’t say Breen’s toon was based on the fake photo, but I will concede your point based upon the lead sentence in my 1st post, and because, in my second post, I did not make clear that I thought Breen bought the scam of the inflated numbers, not the phony photo. He may never have seen the photo at all, I agree.

    (3) church: [[this toon is] “the latest attempt to scam the public from the rabid right” does make you sound unhinged.

    interesting isn’t it, that the quote you attributed to me is not even on this thread. Did you take it from somewhere else and you think that’s clever? Nope, it’s dishonest.

    What I did say was this: “Amazing what falsehoods this element is willing to perpetuate on the public. They can’t even be honest about the size of the crowd and have to go and find an old picture of previous demonstrations.” (“Element” refers to the right wing shouters and prevaricators, not Breen.)

    (4) church: So in this one instance you decided to agree with him (O”Reilly)

    Actually, I’ve written before on this site that I do not lump O’Reilly into the same category of commentators as Hannity, Beck and Limbaugh, though I frequently disagree with his views. One of the reasons I do find him more watchable (and I watch him often) is that he doesn’t drink the Kool-Aid and doesn’t always mime the talking points handed out by Karl Rove and Roger Ailes.

    So you’ve assumed incorrectly, once again. I’ve cited him before when he attempts to be more accurate and departs from the Fox line. Perhaps because he came from a journalism background, thus more aware of importance of fact-checking.

    (5) I’m not that concerned about crowd numbers. I think it’s big brouhaha over spin and nothing more. My initial post was about using a 10-year old photo to represent the 9/12 demonstration. But I will address your points

    (6) church: If you want to believe there were only 60-70,000 people, please be my guest. I provided photos and quotes that show otherwise.

    Well, no, actually you didn’t. Here’s what your links said or showed:

    lst link is actually NBC Nightly News, not MSNBC as you wrote. The anchor and one reporter said “tens of thousands”, a second reporter says he thinks it’s “hundreds of thousands.”

    2nd link is from MSNBC and tens of thousands is reported

    3rd link is a blurry time lapse 30 sec. jerky clip of marchers moving down the street. Uh, OK, no one denied they marched. Are you suggesting you can count the people from that?

    4th link is from a blogger/commentator at the event who put together a blurry compendium of still photos that don’t represent anything other than blurry still photos. What was far more informative was at the end of the clip where she attempted a 360 degree shot of crowd, and from that shot, it is apparent that the crowd does not stretch into the Mall as so many previous marches have done in the past.

    Now here’s a clip for you. It’s Fox News anchor Megyn Kelley mentioning the ‘controversy’ over numbers. She says that some media reported thousands, most media reported tens of thousands, a D.C. official estimated 75,000 and the organizers claim 1.5 to 2 million.

    Oh, I am so shocked that the organizers inflated the numbers. All organizers inflate numbers, it’s expected. What’s unique here is that initially the organizers (FreedomWorks) tried to claim ABC reported it.

    The guest Washington Times reporter (conservative paper) covering the event said the estimates she had were between 50,000 to 75,000, and she believed it was closer to the 75,000. the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGacITjExZs&feature=related

    Pete Piringer, public affairs officer for the D.C. Fire and Emergency Department, said the local government no longer provides official crowd estimates because they can become politicized. Smart man, they do become political, a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing.

    If you read the politifact article that contains the quote above, Piringer went on to describe where the crowd was on the grounds, and how far it stretched toward the Washington Monument, substantiating the estimate of tens of thousands is more accurate. (That’s how crowd estimates are measured, by how far up the Mall the crowd reaches.)

    Enough with the crowd size. I don’t give a hoot. However many there were, they were protesting peacefully and voicing concerns. But I noticed that you had no comment on the deceptive use of the 10-year-old photo, which was the point of my post.

    You struck me as one of the more reasonable conservatives to have a civil discourse with. That’s changed in recent days. Though you acknowledged some errors of fact you made, it was accompanied by a sharper tone. I responded in a sharper tone. There are at least two posts where you asked me a specific question, including a work-related question. I responded, posted a couple of notes to tell you I responded and still nothing from you. It’s rude.

    Now you add the classy line: And Michelle Malkin has more class in her pinky than you have in your entire body.

    Worship Michelle Malkin all you want, but now you’re attacking me personally, rather than attacking a statement, or a fact, or a quote, or whatever. I have no tolerance for that and no desire to continue a discourse with personal attacks, from you or others who know no other form of communication.

    If you want to continue dialogues in the future, suggest you consider your tone and respond to the poster’s point, something I see another poster on this site also suggested to you tonight.

  8. churchillwasright

    churchillwasright said, 2 months ago

    BCS: Point 1: Question asked, you answered. Was that too tough?

    Point 2: You concede, then agree.

    Point 3: A direct quote from you, on the next days toon.
    “Did anyone here look at yesterdays toon. Latest attempt to scam the public by the rabid right…”
    Therefore acurate, not dishonest.

    Point 4: So you like O’Reilly. I’m happy for you.

    Points 5 and 6: You don’t care about crowd size, and then I say I don’t care what you think the crowd size is. You then spend 10 paragraphs describing crowd size. But:

    The first link was from MSNBC, not NBC. Watch it again.

    The second link I said was an earlier report. That’s why she asked the reporter in the next segment (the first link) to give his opinion of the crowd size, because it seemed larger than she had been reporting.

    If the 3rd and 4th link are too blurry for you, there’s nothing I can do about that.

    But I will mention that there were over 100,000 people at a football game tonight, and if you think the crowd at the rally was less than that, you’re crazy.

    And of course you had no comment on what I said I thought the commentary should have been about. You know, at the end when I said if you have any comment about these three sentences, I’d like to hear it? Because, according to you, all comments here should be about some lame, fake photo.

    You don’t like my sarcastic tone? Sorry if it offends you. I don’t think its over the top, especially if you compare it to some of the other sniping on this blog. I bet you have no problem with SrBull’s tone, though. I’ll try to “tone it down” for you, but I won’t make any promises.

    For what it’s worth, thanks for the tip on the job. I didn’t know I have to respond to everything you post. And I’ve never seen you ask for a reply about it anywhere.

    And you never responded to my post about the first pitch at the All Star Game, which I put alot of time and research into, even after you said that you would, twice., I don’t think I’ll do that again.

  9. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, 2 months ago

    church,

    1) why ask when I told you straight out? thought you get me saying media matters? never go to the site

    2) I conceded you a point because of the language I used then explained what I meant, no argument, and no retraction of the point.

    3) to throw in a post on a different toon, without saying you’re doing it is dishonest and bad way to communicate, leads to confusion and you and I already have enough of that.

    4) The O’Reilly comment from me was only in response to your erroneous, sarcastic and patronizing statement of my reasons for mentioning his opinion of size of crowd in your earlier post. You assumed incorrectly that I disliked O’Reilly and you didn’t want to admit it, so you chose being snide instead.

    5, 6) what a piece of cr@p this comment is. Now you’re criticizing me for addressing your point?
    I told you I was giving you the courtesy of addressing your point! That;s why I addressed crowd size.
    BCS: “Now, I’ll move on to the points you attempt to make in your post.”
    (Do you bother to even read posts before you attack them?)

    7) You said your links “provided photos and quotes that showed otherwise” (about crowd size). Nope, not a durn one of them did. I accurately described the numbers reported in the first two links — don’t believe me? watch them again and pay attention this time.

    The blurry 30-sec time lapse shows an unknown number of people moving down the street. OK, yes they did move down the street. The last link from a blogger shows nothing but a montage of still photos. Doesn’t matter whether they’re blurry or crystal clear; it’s a montage of still photos. And I accurately said her 360 degree shot shows how the crowd does NOT extend into the Mall.

    Malkin’s blog isn’t worth commenting on, she’s not a journalist, is openly biased, and most importantly already acknowledged she posted false numbers and blamed organizer Freedom Works.

    8) You also said in earlier post: “The parks dept. said there were 1.2 million, but then said they don’t give official counts.” Yeah? where’s that source, some right wing blog site? Guess you didn’t read politifact article because they go into much greater detail into what officials said and it does not say what you reported. So where did you get your info?

    9) church: “And of course you had no comment on what I said I thought the commentary should have been about. You know, at the end when I said if you have any comment about these three sentences, I’d like to hear it?”

    first, you don’t get to determine what commentaries “should have been about.”

    I DID comment on your three sentences. That was the “Now, I’ll move on to the points you attempt to make in your post.” Unbelievably your response was to criticize me for commenting on your posts. church: “You then spend 10 paragraphs describing crowd size.” Then in your last post you once again criticize me for NOT commenting on your post. Which is it? Do you have trouble with reading comprehension?

    10) In earlier post to you, I commented directly on the demonstrators: “However many there were, they were protesting peacefully and voicing concerns.” Gee, sounds like a response to me!

    11) church: “It was a greater success than even the organizers had anticipated.”

    Bull. if it was more than organizers anticipated, there would have been no need to invent grossly overstated numbers and pretend ABC reported them. If it was more than they anticipated, there would have been no need for rightwing bloggers to knowingly post a 10-year old photo of another demonstration with more people.

    You have yet to discuss or respond to either of those points: the false photo and the made up numbers from ABC. Wonder why?

    12) the fact remains that no one other than the right wing bloggers and organizers said the crowd was anywhere near 1.5 to 2 million people. Freedom Works probably made it up and lied about ABC reporting it just to get it out there in the right wing blogasphere where it will never die and stir up more phony charges against MSM bias.

    13) church: ” And I’ve never seen you ask for a reply about it anywhere.” I accept you didn’t see the two posts from me, it’s easy for any of us to miss things like that. Or were you implicitly suggesting I actually didn’t ask on two other toons since you didn’t see them?

    I don’t like the personal digs from you that come out of nowhere — and there are quite a few — that are snide, patronizing, erroneously presumptuous. I was giving you the benefit of the doubt, but that’s worn thin. I don’t like your game lately.

    re the Gorrell Faux News/baseball pitch response, as you correctly point out, it takes time to respond to a long thread between GNW and I that went in circles. If you still want it, I’ll attempt to do it by 10/4 before it disappears.

    One thing I find frustrating with you is that one topic is never completed, or resolved, even if the resolution is to agree to disagree, before topics 2, 3, 4 are brought into the mix. It’s not a question of deciding that only one topic can be discussed. As a communications major, I can assure you that the best way to communicate is to resolve one issue before moving to the next. Even GNW wrote that, though he doesn’t practice it.

  10. churchillwasright

    churchillwasright said, 2 months ago

    BCS: Nothing personal (well, actually it is), but you are way too sensitive and have much too thin a skin to continue having discussions with. It’s simply not worth it.

    (I would have simply not responded, but that gets you upset, too!)

  11. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, 2 months ago

    church it’s amazing to me that you dismiss facts, links, provable evidence by calling it thin skin and continue to never address the points presented to you by obfuscating with sheer noise.

    I do agree it is no longer worth it. But I will tell you flat out that when you post inaccurate information, I will continue to point it out for other readers.

  12. churchillwasright

    churchillwasright said, 2 months ago

    ^ You know where I said earlier that I thought you might be going unhinged? Well I’ve gone back and looked at your past posts, and I was wrong– you always been unhinged! You only fluctuate with different levels of anger. You should have your doctors monitor your meds so you’re a little more…”even”. I hate to think what will happen to you after the next elections.

  13. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, 2 months ago

    ^ how very juvenile of you. You still haven’t developed the skill of employing logic to move a discussion forward. you remind me of some people I know who will NEVER NEVER NEVER admit a mistake. and frankly, the fact you felt the need to post this little gem says a great deal about you.

  14. churchillwasright

    churchillwasright said, 2 months ago

    “Ain’t I a stinker?” - Bugs Bunny

  15. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, 2 months ago

    church: “I’m nothing if not consistent.”

    Since you are not consistent, that must make you the former.

  16. churchillwasright

    churchillwasright said, 2 months ago

    Hey, I’d like to see things from your point of view, but I can’t seem to get my head that far up my @ss!

  17. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, 2 months ago

    equally juvenile … you can’t get the last word on this thread, it will go away for you soon

  18. churchillwasright

    churchillwasright said, about 1 month ago

    ^ You’ve evidently confused me with someone who gives a s_t about your opinion.

  19. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, about 1 month ago

    your normal maturity level sinks again … you’re a misogynist who half-heartedly tries to hide it

  20. churchillwasright

    churchillwasright said, about 1 month ago

    I would have the same low opinion of you no matter what your sex.

  21. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, about 1 month ago

    doesn’t mean you’re not a misogynist just because you say you’re not

  22. churchillwasright

    churchillwasright said, about 1 month ago

    Doesn’t mean I am just ‘cause you say I am

  23. believecommonsense

    believecommonsenseGenius_badge said, about 1 month ago

    There once was a fellow named church
    Whose discussion points often would lurch
    From a factoid here
    To a distraction there
    Before writing, his logic skills he should search.