More Cherry Picking polls

I was out of town for Christmas break. Yesterday, I returned and caught up on some of the editorials. Once again, I found Michael Ryan cherry picking polls--this time to the point of absurdity.

He was trying to establish how unpopular the new health care plan is. So he mentioned the Rasmussen poll which shows President Obama with a negative approval rating.

But what he doesn't mention is that the Rasmussen poll is the only one that gives President Obama a negative approval rating--44%-56%. All 7 of the other major polls give President Obama a positive approval rating including CNN (54%-44%), Fox (50%-44%), AP (56%-42%), and Pew (49%-40%). CNN's approval rating jumped 6 points just after the Senate resolution passed. Source: www.realclearpolitics.com

Polls showing the public's disapproval of the the health care plan don't break down the opposition. Much of it is from progressives upset that it doesn't include a public option. In any case, it's never a good idea to administer a government based on polls. Mr. Ryan's point in this editorial was simply irrelevant. He's still unaware of who won the 2008 election.

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Re: "Unleash power of the people," from the December 23rd edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

I did agree with one point made in this editorial. I think a crash Manhattan style program to establish green energy is a good idea.

However, this editorial contained some twisted hyperbole that was particularly outrageous.

Here is the offending quote: "Scientists promoting the man-made theory are now being investigated for massive fraud and junk science."

There are so many things wrong with this statement it's difficult to know where to begin. First, he's referring to the anthropogenic influence on greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming. Sheesh! He can't even write it correctly, demonstrating that he just doesn't know what he's talking about. Second, there are only a few scientists being investigated--out of the thousands of climate scientists worldwide who are convinced man's activities are influencing the climate. Third, these scientists are not being investigated for massive fraud and junk science. They're being investigated to see if they did anything academically unsavory. According to www.factcheck.org , it doesn't look like they did. Fourth, scientists are not promoting this theory. Using the word, promote, makes it sound like they're making money from it. They are no more promoting this theory than a mathmatician promotes the fact that 2 + 2 = 4.

Further on in the editorial, Mr. Ryan advocates nuclear energy writing, "...It releases none of the greenhouse gases the left-wing alarmists are worried about."

True. Instead it releases radiation that can poison the environment for tens of thousands of years.

What an idiot shmuck, Mr. Ryan is.


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I wish the Augusta Chronicle would run Paul Krugman's column. I read the Chattanooga paper while I was out of town and they print it. Paul Krugman is an intelligent progressive, like Eugene Robinson. The Chronicle prints Mr. Robinson, why not Krugman.

Michael Ryan's Imaginary Additions to the Bill of Rights

My phone line was out of order for over a week, but I'm back.

Re: "Rights worth fighting for," from the December 13th edition of the Augusta Chronicle.

Michael Ryan thinks the Bill of Rights has some amendments that don't exist. There's nothing in the Bill of Rights that says we can't have government run health care. I'd like to ask Mr. Ryan which part of the Bill of Rights declares that the "Government can not run health care."

This column also contains some other misconceptions he has about the Bill of Rights. He writes "Liberals have long wanted to squelch freedom of speech by clamping down on talk radio." This is such an obvious lie. Liberals have never wanted to clamp down on talk radio. Forcing radio stations to give equal time to opposing viewpoints doesn't squelch free speech. In reality, it's commercial radio that squelches free speech because liberal points of view are usually not commercially successful and therefore not heard.

He's wrong about the Second amendment too. The Second amendment is poorly written and ambigous so that it's impossible to tell whether the founding fathers meant the people had the right to bear firearms as individuals or as a group. Thus the continuing argument.

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Re: "Get healthy attitude toward reform," from the December 19th edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

Mr. Ryan is still not clear on who won the election. The democrats did. When the republicans won office, they didn't exactly reach across the aisle for bipartisan agreement.

We know what the republicans goal is in this health care debate. Their leader, Rush Limbaugh, said he wants Obama to fail. If this health care legislation passes, it will be a political victory for Obama. That's what Mr. Ryan and all of the conservative jerks out there are afraid of.

Oh and btw, the Congressional Budget Office determined that the republican plan put forth would not reduce the deficit but it would leave even more people without insurance. The republican plan was a worthless, heartless piece of garbage.

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Re: "It's a health care disgrace," from the December 22nd edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

This column was a typical, hysterical knee jerk reaction. Mr. Ryan criticizes Senators for voting for a bill they haven't read. Yet, Mr. Ryan hasn't read it either. How can he be so against it, if he doesn't know what's in it either.

He begins the column off by crying about the debt. Just a month ago he wrote a column suggesting we should have a moratorium on all income taxes. His credibility on this point, therefore, is nil.

Then he whines about how Bill Nelson got a special deal. Well, if Georgia's stupid republican senators would have thought of it, they could have sat on the fence too, and gotten a special deal for Georgia. But no, they had to stick with the republican party line--they want to see Obama fail.

Mr. Ryan tells an outright lie when he states cap and trade will lead to "job killing." Likely, there will be little loss of jobs because old, industrial positions will be almost equally replaced with green jobs according to www.factcheck.org.

Mr. Ryan states, "The federal government is now being run by people with alarmingly scant private sector experience..."

Under Bush, we had the government being run by people with lots of private sector experience. How did that work out?

For his final lie he states, "Remarkably, polls show most Americans doen't even want this reform."On the front page of his own paper in this same addition it says, "Overall, 82% (of Americans) say an overhaul of the nation's health care system is important for recharging the economy,according to an averageof monthly polls conducted since April by the nonpartisan Robert Woods Foundation."

Once again, Mr. Ryan fails to read his own newspaper.

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More evidence that conservatives have a serious problem with math and science comes from Kathleen Parker's column that appeared in the December 20th edition of the Augusta Chronicle. The article was entitled "Merely mortal: Health-care fight teaching Obama a powerful lesson."

In this editorial Ms. Parker states, "that (according to a Rasmussen poll) only 28 % of the nation's voters strongly approve of Obama's performance, while 42% strongly disapprove. Overall, 44% 'somewhat approve' of the president's performance."

28 + 42 + 44 = 114

Ms. Parker doesn't understand percentages. That's greater than 100.

What a dumb-dumb.

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There've been too many stupid letters published on Mr. Ryan's editorial page over the last week for me to comment on them all but I can't resist this one. John Gasko of Martinez wrote an ugly bigoted letter critical of Islam. Mr. Ryan shouldn't run stuff like this, but he's bigoted too so he probably agrees with it. Mr. Gasko doesn't say what religion he is, but I assume he's Christian. He wrote, "My religion does not advocate killing people as I do. Does his (referring to a muslim)?

I found this quote from the Christian new testament. Luke 19: 27 says, "But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me."

So Mr. Gasko's wrong. His religion does say anyone who doesn't believe as he does should be killed.

Michael Ryan's Mindless Opposition to New EPA Regulations

Here are some images that show the extent of global warming. The top picture is of Barrow, Alaska. The one on the left is from July 2006; the one on the right is from July 2007. The Bush administration classified this picture because it gave such obvious evidence of global warming. The Obama administration declassified it, and it's now part of the public domain. The bottom images are from NASA's earth observatory. Note that during the summer of 2008, the arctic ice cap almost completely melted and is much smaller than it was in the summer of 1999.

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Re: "Scary, suffocating regulation," from the December 10th edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

Mr. Ryan mindlessly claims that the constitution forbids the government from regulating pollution, yet he cites no part of this document nor any court case that supports his argument. To put it bluntly, he is full of shit once more. If he was correct, there would be no Clean Air Act, no Clean Water Act, and no Environmental Protection Agency. For good measure, Mr. Ryan throws in the Declaration of Independence as another document that somehow outlaws government regulation of pollution. How ridiculous. The Declaration of Independence merely states the U.S. declaration of independence from England and has nothing to do with the rule of law.

Mr. Ryan is mindlessly closing his eyes, shutting down his brain, and pronouncing loyalty to the constitution and the Declaration of Independence. This is an incredibly weak rhetorical method of avoiding debate about a subject he's completely ignorant of.

He calls the EPA's move to regulate greenhouse gases as a "weapon to be used to advance what amounts to a socialist agenda..." There's that word again. Socialist. This is a clear example of more mindless namecalling.

He quotes an anonymous Obama administration source who stated that the move would be used to as a "gun against the head of Congress to exact global warming legislation favorable to the administration's left wing point of view." This is nonsense. There is no political point of view in science. Scientists urge that steps be taken to reduce global warming. This isn't based on political philosophy...it's based on what the science says.

And as usual, Mr. Ryan naively thinks that industry can solve the problem of global warming with "ingenuity, innovation, and entrepreneurship..." As if industry would ever voluntarily reduce pollution. What hogwash. If it wasn't for government regulations strictly enforced, our planet would be uninhabitable from pollution created by unchecked greedy businessmen.

More Lies and Ugly Bigotry from Michael Ryan

Re: "Godspeed, Mr. President," from the December 3rd edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

Here's the bigoted quote. "Radical Islam is a global cancer caused not by any policy or actions of the West, but by the insane hatred for infidels and the utter disdain for God-given life that makes radical Muslims one of history's most insidious maladies."

What about radical Christians in America? Isn't it mostly Christians in the U.S. military who have actually participated in an invasion and occupation of two muslim countries--actions that have led to the deaths of tens of thousands of innocent civilians? Christians in the U.S. army went all the way around the world, invaded, and occupied two countries that were no threat to us. The U.S. did have a reason to temporarily raid Afghanistan, but that reason has vanished, since the terrorists escaped to Pakistan. Nevertheless, American Christians are still occupying that country. He refers to radical muslim terrorists as a sickness. It's no more sick than American mainstream support for U.S. government ventures whose sole purpose is to enrich the military-industrial complex.

Everytime Mr. Ryan ties a religion to terrorism, he is revealing his ugly bigotry. Moreover, the next day, he featured yet another ugly bigoted letter, this one by J.F. Rodgers of Clearwater, S.C. who stated, "Patriotic Americans should no longer be the silent majority concerning those who want such so-called 'religious practices' to be acceptable in America."

He's referring to some reprehensible practices among a minority of muslims. But his point is ridiculous. No one is saying abuse and murder should be tolerated. The rest of his letter is just totally incoherent. For example he writes we have "plenty of oil and natural gas under our soil. We are idiots to buy from those who like our dollars but hate us. Al Gore's manmade global warming is a big lie." What do these sentences have to do with each other? If we did have plenty of gas and oil, we wouldn't be importing these fossil fuels. Then he writes, "I resent everything I buy having 'Made in China' stamped on it. If he resents it, why does he buy it? Mr. Ryan won't print my letters but features this one. Go figure.

Below this letter there was another redneck gem. Lee Herron, a sons of the confederate, condemned the defacing of a confederate monument downtown. He compares this to what if someone defaced a statue of MLK and asked why there was no outrage, why the double standard? I'll tell him why. Confederate soldiers were defending the existence of slavery and were traitors to the U.S. MLK was a hero, a real man of peace.

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Re: "Global warming, or hot air?" from the December 7th edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

Are conservatives just stupid and ignorant about every single subject under the sun?

The only scandal worth focusing on here is this: the scientists' emails were illegally hacked and stolen. Mr. Ryan doesn't even mention or point out that these emails were made available publicly by someone who BROKE THE LAW. And the scientists' privacy was violated. Just a day earlier Mr. Ryan was defending Tiger Woods's right to privacy. But he must think that scientists, whose findings he doesn't like, have no right to privacy.

Political hacks who know nothing about climate science have misinterpeted and taken out of context some things the scientists wrote in the emails to make it sound like they were fudging the data. Yet, Mr. Ryan has the chutzpah to call the scientists "disengenous." Most people would logically agree that anyone who stole private emails and misinterpeted them should be considered the disengenous ones.

Mr. Ryan called the scientists' explanation for the word trick as disengenous, but when Mr. Ryan wrote this, he clearly showed that he didn't take the time to understand what the scientists meant. In other words, Mr. Ryan is being an ignoramous. An explanation for the word trick can be found in an article from today's Augusta Chronicle on page 8C--"Penn State scientist at center of storm over hacked emails."

Here's the explanation which makes perfect sense, but is obviously too nuanced for the conservative-clogged brains of right wing media pundits.

"By trick Mr. Mann (the scientist in question) said he meant only a technique for highlighting data on a graph. ...It's just a way of showing two kinds of data together. Mr. Mann said his method of combining proxy data has withstood numerous statistical tests--lining up neatly with thermometer readings during the 150 years where they overlap."

Here's the explanation for what scientists meant by "hiding the decline." Note, they were not hiding decline in temperatures. They were referring to "a decline reflected in a certain kind of tree-ring measurement on wood density. For reasons researchers can't explain, those wood measurements track neatly with temperatures from the late 1800's to the 1960's. After that, they show temperatures going down as thermometers show the opposite."

Mr. Ryan also falsely claims the mainstream media is ignoring this story. NBC recently ran an unfair criticism of scientists based on these illegally obtained emails, and CNN plans a prominently advertised documentary (that also sounds unfair from the previews) within the next few days.

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Cal Thomas is a conservative media pundit who is always a day late and a dollar short in my opinion, if you'll excuse the tired cliche`.

In today's Augusta Chronicle editorial page he also wrote a column about Global Warming entitled "The flathead society? The debate is far from over on global warming."

His sole source is Leonard Weinstein, an engineer, not a climate scientist. Mr. Thomas quotes liberally from a blog posting by Dr. Weinstein. Dr. Weinstein, of course, debunks anthropogenic global warming with misleading arguments and blatant lies. He claims the short term trend in temperatures is down, defying scientists predictions. This is bullshit. According to an AP article, also on page 8C of today's Augusta Chronicle, 5 of the past 10 years, have been the hottest in recorded history. Dr. Weinstein makes many false claims but the easiest to debunk is his claim that the arctic ice cap is cooling rather than warming.

NASA takes pictures of the arctic all the time. They clearly show that the ice is melting. I'll upload these images on this blog tomorrow.

Michael Ryan should Stick with Plagiarism

Re: "Right Idea, wrong deadline," from the December 1st edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

I forgot to bring this up yesterday.

Mr. Ryan finally came up with a fresh idea, I think, unless he stole it from Austin Rhodes who I haven't been monitoring lately. He thinks the Olin Corporation should be allowed to continue poisoning our water indefinitely.

Mr. Ryan wrote, "It occurs to us--why not concentrate on when the plant operators commit to a conversion, rather than when they complete it."

This statement clearly shows that Mr. Ryan is a naive idiot. Olin corporation could commit to a conversion, then never complete it. Without a definite date, an order to clean up their act would have no teeth at all.

So Mr. Ryan finally came up with an original idea, but he should've stuck with plagiarizing other people's lies, because this one reveals his incredible naivete`.

In my opinion the plant should be shut down immediately and the company executives imprisoned for poisoning Georgia's water with mercury. If these were foreign Arabs adding poison to our water, Mr. Ryan would be all for hunting them down and jailing them. But apparently, it's ok, for American businessmen to terrorize us as long as they're making a buck.

Michael Ryan parrots America's Mentally Ill Attitude Toward Sex

Re: "Society in the Sewer," from the November 27th editorial page of the Augusta Chronicle.

The U.S. leads the industrial world in teenage and out of wedlock pregnancies. Yet, Mr. Ryan laments the inability of some prudes in Iowa to keep a sex education magazine for teenagers from being displayed prominently in the local library. The parents wanted the magazine hidden from sight. How absurd? The whole point of subscribing to a sex education magazine for teenagers is for teenagers to read it and learn, not for it to be hidden away, where it would serve no purpose.

Americans have always had a mentally ill attitude toward sex. Too many Americans think sex is something dirty that shouldn't be discussed in public. The reason we have high rates of teenage pregnancies is because of the conservative philosophy that opposes sex education.

Oh and btw, Mr. Ryan must be too lazy to get the remote and change the television channel. He described Adam Lambert's raunchy performance at the American Music Awards in more graphic detail than I wanted to read about. Hey, Mr. Ryan, there are 500 channels on tv now days. Nobody is forcing you to watch this stuff.

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On November 25th Mr. Ryan featured a disgusting bigoted letter written by Lawrence Smith who equated the Muslim religion with terrorism. No Mr. Smith, the U.S. is not at war with a religion. Mr. Ryan should be ashamed for printing this bigoted garbage, let alone featuring it.

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Re: "A disaster--of out own making," from the November 28th edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

Once again, Mr. Ryan writes of his concerns with the expanding federal deficit. He's running out of subject matter because this has been the topic of one of his editorials at least once a week since Obama's taken office. I don't remember him ever writing one about this topic when Bush was president.

His editorial is laughable and has no credibility because of a column he wrote the week before suggesting there should be a moratorium on income taxes which would lead to an even bigger deficit.

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Re; "Afghan push: Is it in time?" from the November 30th edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

Here's more unfounded criticism of the president. He writes, "it's hard to argue that the Afghan war effort and the goal of destroying the terrorist platform from which to launch attacks on America hasn't been dealt a severe blow by the indecision of the White House."

First of all, the U.S. has already destroyed the terrorist platform in Afghanistan. According to news reports, there are fewer than 100 Al Qaida left in that country. Second, it's no longer a war, it's an occupation--and an unnecessary one in my opinion. Third, Mr. Ryan provides no evidence for his belief that the delay in Obama's decision has hurt American efforts there.

Mr. Ryan writes that it's hard to argue the delay hasn't hurt, yet he provides not a single fact to support his argument. His criticism is just baseless political bashing completely without ties to reality.

Michael Ryan Caught Writing Many Lies...Again

Re: "Healthy Debate," from the November 24th edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

In this editorial Mr. Ryan does more than just mislead the reader when he ties the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force report to the Senate Health Care bill. He writes "Democratic health care "reforms" include giving the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommendations essentially the weight of law. Remember, that's the task force that last week decided--apparently as a cost-saving measure--that women don't need to get routine mammograms until age 50, rather than 40."

False! The task force's recommendations about mammograms are not even mentioned in the bill. Mr. Ryan should be ashamed of himself for making this entirely false claim. He should also be ashamed for plagiarizing this falsehood from other conservative pundits.

Mr. Ryan also complained about a 60 minutes episode segment about wasteful spending on the elderly. He fears that this will lead to government rationing of health care. But insurance companies already ration health care. I trust the government more than businessmen motivated by profit, and so should Mr. Ryan.

One more lie from this editorial: Mr. Ryan falsely claims the bill will lead to a massive shift in resources from senior citizens to young people. This is a completely baseless charge and he supports it with no facts whatsoever.

Mr. Ryan lives in a fantasy world where he just makes stuff up, or copies stuff the Glenn Becks of the world just make up.

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Re: "Dogpiling on Palin," from the November 23rd edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

Mr. Ryan is full of dogshit. Here, he whines about the Newsweek cover that shows Palin dressed for running. I don't understand what the big deal is about this. Palin complained that the photo was undignified. She is an uptight, constipated, celebrity. That's how I dress everyday.

Mr. Ryan repeats (for about the millionth time) how he thinks the media treats Obama with kid gloves, yet was brutal to Palin.

This is so untrue. The media unfairly hyped Obama's connection to Ayers and the hot-headed reverend. As if he can help what other people say or do. But Palin endorsed a radical Alaskan group that wanted to secede from the nation, and the mainstream media virtually ignored it.

It's not the mainstream media's fault that Palin comes across as a babbling buffoon.

Mr. Ryan complains that the media focused on Palin's family because her teenaged daughter became pregnant. Of course they did because she actually did something scandalous. Getting pregnant out of wedlock, and getting drunk on the town (as Bush's daughters did) is worthy of tabloid scrutiny. Obama's daughters stay in school and get good grades. If one of them ever steps out of line, the media will jump all over it. Until that happens, Mr. Ryan has no case to make on this point.

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Re: "We're building off the foundation," from the November 22nd edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

Mr. Ryan brings up the tired old argument about how the federal government is abusing the 10th amendment.

This is an argument that can be settled politically rather than judicially. If these right wing nuts, think states should have more power than the federal government, they can try to elect crazy conservatives who want to outlaw federal programs like social security, medicare, the national park system, food stamps, welfare, corporate welfare, etc.

Good Luck!

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Re: "Close your eyes, pray and hold on," from the November 21st edition of the Augusta Chronicle.

In this editorial Mr. Ryan notes that some business leaders think health care reform will be bad for the economy. Who cares? All businessmen care about is profit, not what's best for the country.

Mr. Ryan also tells a couple of lies in this column too. He writes, "In an effort to provide health insurance to less than 5 percent of the population..."

He doesn't cite a source for this number. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that he either just pulled that number out of his ass or he's being purposefully murky. The health care reform bill will make sure that 95% of people will have insurance, according to news sources I've read.

Another lie is this: Mr. Ryan says the left got its way. If the left had its way, we would have gotten a single payer, socialized system. This was not even on the table for discussion.

Mr. Liean, I mean Ryan also uses statistics to lie. Without citing a source, he states that Americans feel strongly about this issue oppose the plans by a nearly 40%-25% margin.

I googled this number and can't find it anywhere. Most of the polls I've seen show the public is evenly split on this issue. And who is to say how strongly a person feels about it. That would be totally subjective.

Are Michael Ryan and Conservatives Capable of Rational Thought?

Re: "Obama's Dangerous Show Trial," from the November 17th edition of the Augusta Chronicle.

The decision to try criminal terrorists in New York has caused the latest conservative outrage and, of course, Michael Ryan jumped on the bandwagon this week. Their arguments prove they are incapable of rational thought.

It's a lie for conservatives to say that trying the case will give terrorists "as of yet undetermined access to valuable and sensitive national security intelligence." First of all, if the information is yet to be determined, how do conservatives know that terrorists will get access to it? Second of all, the U.S. government's not going to give terrorists information they can use to hurt us. That's just a ridiculous naive assumption.

It's a lie for conservatives to say the trial will give "terrorists a pedestal to spew anti-American propaganda." Nonsense. No judge is going to let that happen in a trial they precide upon.

And there's no way, these guys are going to be acquitted, as Mr. Ryan fears. The federal government has lots of evidence against these criminals. The feds are not like local prosecutors, such as in the OJ case Mr. Ryan uses as an example. When the feds get an indictment, they get a conviction 90% of the time, and in this case I'm confident they will nail these guys. They wouldn't put them on trial unless they had lots of convincing evidence.

The case will not become a circus. The U.S. government already convicted a 9-11 terrorist in a trial in New York and it never became a circus. Why should this one?

Mr. Ryan claims that the decision to put these terrorists on trial is "an abomination...and a most dangerous and regrettable precedent." It's not a precendent--the Bush administration put a 9-11 terrorist on trial already. And to say that it's dangerous is completely unfounded.

Here's the real reason conservatives don't want these trials: It will look good for the Obama administration when these terrorists are finally brought to justice, and it's likely the convictions will come just in time for the 2012 elections.

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The Augusta Chronicle runs Star Parker's column . This is the woman who supports the legal loan shark industry. She's absolutely opposed to abortion and government welfare, yet she's had 4 abortions and survived poverty, thanks to the grace of welfare and foodstamps. Can anyone say, hypocrite?

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RE: "The White House numbers racket," from the November 19th edition of the Augusta Chronicle.

Here, Mr. Ryan is making far too much of a real Obama administration gaffe. In fact, his column is a hysterical overreaction to it.

Mr. Ryan accuses the Obama administration of being guilty of deliberate fraud or outright stupidity when reporting the number of jobs created by the stimulus package.

I'm sure the Obama administration didn't deliberately inflate numbers because they're aware the media can easily keep track and debunk them. The whole problem is due to a data collecting glitch. The Obama administration made a big mistake because they decided to rely on outside reporting sources.

However, there is no doubt the stimulus package did save jobs--just not as many jobs as the Obama administration is claiming.

Mr. Ryan is just outright lying when he claims the stimulus package is a massive failure. It has helped a little, but was never meant to completely turn the economy around. The natural business cycle will right the economy no matter what the government does. The stimulus package was more of a band-aid and was about all the government could do in the short term.

Here's the real reason Mr. Ryan want to label the stimulus package a massive failure: He wants Obama to fail.

What Kind of Fantasy World does Michael Ryan Live in?

Re; "Is government-centric approach hurting economy?" from the November 15th editorial page of the Augusta Chronicle.

In this editorial Michael Ryan proposes a "moratorium on the collection of income taxes," as a way to stimulate the economy. It's hard to believe he's serious, and it's kind of scary that such a stupid idea would actually be published in a newspaper of any circulation.

Mr. Ryan has been preaching constantly for the past few months about the conservative movement's fear of the increasing national debt. So what does he think will happen to that debt, if the government stops collecting revenue? The debt will increase astronomically. Moreover, the government will be forced to shut down because it needs money to run it. That's why we have taxes: to run the government. But, of course, Mr. Ryan has stated that he doesn't believe in government, so naturally, stopping collection of income taxes would be the easiest way to end government as we know it.

Where does he think the government gets the money to fight the war on those "Islamic Terrorists" he's so frightened of?

It's been proven many times over that lowering taxes doesn't stimulate the economy. It's a tired, ineffective gimmick. But to suggest a moratorium on collecting taxes is extreme and absurd and shows a complete lack of a sense of reality.

Earlier in this editorial, Mr. Ryan denied hating the president, and referred to charges that he hates the president as "cockamamie." If he doesn't hate the president, why did he call him a cold fish last week? Why does he still accuse him of being unpatriotic (see the flag pin label post on this blog)? Why does he cherry pick polls to show that his policies are unpopular? Why does he consistently bear false witness against President Obama as I've noted on many blog entries here?

Last year, Mr. Ryan blamed Obama for the falling stock market. Now that the stock market's up, he gives Obama no credit for its rise. Instead, in this editorial, he's blaming Obama for next year's unemployment rate which according to one study will be 13%. I predict the unemployment rate will decline next year, and Mr. Ryan won't give Obama credit for that good news.

Mr. Ryan points out that the current unemployment rate is higher than the Obama administration predicted. Supposedly, this means the government stimulus package didn't work, but this is not true at all. Without the stimulus package the unemployment rate would've been even higher. According to the November 15th edition of the Augusta Chronicle on page 1 of the Metro section in an article entitled "Stimulus saves teachers for now," the stimulus saved 400 jobs for two years in Augusta, and 16,000 jobs statewide.

Once again, Mr. Ryan fails to read his own paper.

It's likely we'll need an even more government centric approach to help right the economy.

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RE; "Will they try to fine us for this too?" also from this same editorial page.

I agree with Mr. Ryan on this one. The SEC shouldn't have the power to fine coaches for telling the truth when the referees stink up the field and make bad calls. There's no way, no matter what the Urban's Meyer's contract says, that this fine would hold up in a court of law.

More Hysteria from Michael Ryan

Re: "If anyone's ill, it's apologists," from the November 12th edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

The whole premise of Mr. Ryan's opinion piece is false. Nobody is apologizing for Nidal Hasan, the man who allegedly shot 30 people at Fort Hood, killing 13. Mr. Ryan uses the tragic shooting as an excuse to hysterically attack what he thinks is political correctness. Mr. Ryan flatly denies the possiblity that Hasan was mentally ill and tells us with absolute certainty that it was a "pre-meditated, cold, calculated, and carefully executed act of Islamic terrorism on American soil."

There are a couple of points I find disgusting with his statement. First of all, Mr. Ryan knows nothing about mental illness. He's not a doctor and he's not an academic who has studied mental illness. Some of Hasan's colleagues did express their concerns that Hasan may have been mentally ill. Second of all, there is no such thing as Islamic terrorism. To stick the adjective of Islamic on the noun, terrorism, is simply bigoted rhetoric and has no place in a public newspaper. When a Christian man beats his wife to death, we don't call it an act of Christian terrorism. Why should a person's religion be attached to his behavior? There have been other mass shootings in the military committed by Christians. Nobody referred to these acts as "Christian terrorism."

Mr. Ryan also shows once again that he needs to read his own newspaper because he wrote that "Reports say Hasan had 10 to 20 contacts with a top al-Qaida recruiter..." No, he didn't. AP reports published by the Augusta Chronicle say there's no evidence the radical cleric Hasan sent emails to was a member of al-Qaida. To make that claim is slanderous. According to the FBI, the emails did not give any indication that Hasan was going to go on a shooting spree.

There's no way anyone could've predicted that an army psychiatrist would go psycho. For conservatives to claim that failure to prevent this was due to political correctness is a ridiculous stretch.

Mr. Ryan wrote that Hasan gave a lecture in which he said, "if you don't believe (in Islam) you're condemned to hell..."

I'm agnostic but take my wife to a Christian church because she's disabled and can't attend without my help. More than one person who goes to that church has told me I'm going to hell because I don't believe in Christianity. Does that make them a terrorist threat?

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Today, Mr. Ryan ran a column by Charles Krauthammer, a regular Fox News contributor whose ideas Mr. Ryan frequently rips off. Recently, conservatives have been claiming a big victory in the off year elections because they won two governorships. But they fell further behind in the House of Representatives. I wouldn't call falling further behind in the House a victory.

In "They myth of 2008--demolished," Mr. Krauthammer claims the election was an aberration, not a big FDR re-alignment. It's too early to know for sure, but I wouldn't rush to judgement over one off year election when nobody votes. If we had high voter turn out, republicans would lose big time in every election everywhere. The only reason they won two governorships this time, was because nobody shows up for off year elections.

He also repeats the oft-cited poll that shows conservatives outnumber liberals by 2-1. This poll is B.S. When push comes to shove, the U.S. is a liberal socialist country. Even when republicans had control of all three branches of government, they didn't dare take away Social Security, Medicare, unemployment insurance, and food stamps--all liberal socialist programs.

Michael Ryan Repeats Debunked Flag Pin Lie

Re: "Giving Freedom a Miss" from the November 10th edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

Michael Ryan repeated the debunked lie that Obama resisted wearing a pin of the American flag on his suit. This is a lie originating with Fox News, and during the presidential campaign conservatives made a big deal about whether or not Obama was wearing a flag pin, even though most of them never wear a flag pin. I bet Mr. Ryan's never worn one. Gee, how un-American. Maybe Billy Morris should fire him for being so unpatriotic.

Nevertheless, the above picture proves that Obama doesn't resist wearing a flag pin.

Obama has also never made a speech in a foreign land, or in America, bashing America as Mr. Ryan falsely claims.

It's quite obvious that Mr. Ryan is an unabashed liar.

Mr. Ryan criticizes President Obama for not traveling to Europe and making a speech at the ceremonies commemorating the fall of the Berlin Wall. He did send a videotaped message which, I think is good enough.

Yesterday, on NPR, a historian was reading from President H.W. Bush's diary. The diary entry from 1989 shows that Bush was trying to find a way to slow down events leading to the end of the Cold War. Republicans were against ending the Cold War because they knew it would decrease defense profits. Mostly, Bush didn't like the fall of the Berlin Wall because Gorbachev was making him look bad. Gorbachev did more to end the Cold War than any American.

As usual, Mr. Ryan is simply full of shit.

It's not personal? Bologna!

Re: "Surprise Attack," from the November 7th editorial page of the Augusta Chronicle.

Michael Ryan consistently makes the claim that he criticizes the president based on disagreements with policy, not personal attacks. This editorial is evidence that his claim is false.

Mr. Ryan calls President Obama a "cold fish," because in Mr. Ryan's opinion, the president's words about the mass shooting at Fort Hood were not "heartfelt, respectful, and reassuring."

I don't get it. What was the president supposed to do? Have a nervous breakdown and cry? Would that have satisifed Mr. Ryan?

He claims it's not personal. Bologna!

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Re: "Get Serious? Seriously?" from the November 9th editorial page of the Augusta Chronicle.

Mr. Ryan writes a bunch of falsehoods based on conservative, economic, philosophical fantasies in this commentary.

First off, he writes the oft-repeated conservative nonsense that government doesn't produce wealth. This is not true at all. Governments are founded by funding wars that take natural resources from other countries or governments. Governments then create a monetary system, regulate it, and print money. Without the government there would be no money, and therefore no wealth. The fastest rates of economic growth in U.S. history occurred at times when the U.S. government has had the most control over the economy. See World War II, the greatest public works project of all time.

Mr. Ryan criticizes the Obama administration for a massive budget deficit that began to occur under George W. Bush and the republicans when they funded two unnecessary wars of occupation. Mr. Ryan never wrote one column criticizing this wasteful spedning.

A second conservative fantasy Mr. Ryan regurgitates in this editorial is that "reducing taxes and cutting government spending" stimulates the economy. There is no evidence whatsoever that this works. It failed under Reagan and George W. Bush. Both presidents cut taxes, and under both presidents we went into immediate recessions, followed by cyclical recessions ten years later. George W. Bush cut taxes like crazy, yet the economy still plunged into a recession. This is proof beyond a doubt that supply side economics is just a fantasy.

Finally, Mr. Ryan makes the false claim that cap and trade limits on greenhouse gases will weaken the recovery. There is no evidence for this so once again he's making an unsupported claim. The long term effects of doing nothing about greenhouse gases will likely be even worse for the economy.

Michael Ryan is a hysterical ignoramus

Re: "The Worst Bill Ever," from the November 6th editorial page of the Augusta Chronicle.

Michael Ryan calls the new health care reform plan the worst bill ever. I can guarantee he's never read one word of it. So how would he know? Rejecting something without studying means he's rejecting it out of ignorance, making him an ignoramus.

Of course, he bases his opinion on what other conservative pundits are saying. For example he cites the Wall Street Journal which called it the "worst bill ever." It's a good bet nobody on the Wall Street Journal editorial board has read one bit of it either. That paper is a right wing, pro-business publication, and their opposition to any democratic bill is knee-jerk and not to be unexpected.

Basing an opinion on what Michele Bachman, a nutty ditz from Minnesota, says doesn't strengthen Mr. Ryan's case either. Ms. Bachman led a demonstration in front of capitol hill yesterday, opposing the bill. Mr. Ryan writes "thousands of tea party activists converged upon the hill." This is a little misleading--it was only 4,000 people (the ugliest group of fat white people a person will ever see)--less than the average attendance of a Richmond County high school football game. They carried ridiculous, racist signs targetting President Obama. The lead, most prominent sign, equated the health care plan with the holocaust. The sign had the words National Socialist Health Care Plan over a picture of dead bodies piled up at Dachau concentration camp. Anybody who thinks improving health care reform is in any way comparable to mass murder is a stupid ass.

Ms. Bachman falsely referred to the health care reform bill as socialized medicine. It's not socialized medicine, not even close, because private insurance companies will still exist and remain the predominate source of funding for health care.

Mr. Ryan writes that eventually "all medicine will be rationed by politics." Logically, most people would rather have government rationing health care than profit-minded, greedy business executives.

I have one other criticism of this editorial. Mr. Ryan noted that "One economist has estimated the federal government is now in control of 30 percent of the U.S. economy. Adding health care would increase its control to about 48 percent." He doesn't cite his source. What economist says this? An anonymous economist can just make up numbers. I would like to know what economist based on what study came up with these numbers.

Michael Ryan's misleading commentary about Obama mopping up Bush's mess

Re: "Now it's his responsibility," from the November 2nd editorial page of the Augusta Chronicle.

Today, Michael Ryan was misleading readers again. After rehashing Dick Cheney's use of the word "dither" (See a previous entry on this blog for my commentary on this ridiculous point), Mr. Ryan wrote, "Obama and his minions continue to laugh off the lingering economic crisis as somebody else's mess--even pretending to mop it up last week."

Nobody in the Obama administration is laughing off the economic mess, and President Obama never said it wasn't his responsibility. Here's the actual quote--the video is on www.youtube.com

"Another way of putting it is when I'm busy and Nancy (Pelosi) is busy with our mop cleaning up somebody else's mess--we don't want somebody saying you're not holding that mop right. Why don't you grab a mop? Why don't you help clean up?"

This is more of an accurate analogy than a joke. President Obama IS taking responsibility, he's grabbing the mop to clean up the mess.

I doubt Mr. Ryan actually saw the video or he might've actually understood what President Obama was saying. Instead, Mr. Ryan most likely heard about it second hand from Charles Krauthammer or read something at www.newsbusters.com

In the middle of this editorial Mr. Ryan continues to repeat the lie that President Obama's continuing to slide in the polls. As I noted in a previous blog entry, he cherry-picked one poll out of eight to show this.

Mr. Ryan then wrote, "...President Bush stood on the rubble of a disaster (9-11) he didn't cause and took ownership fixing it..."

Obviously, by using the analogy of the mop, President Obama is taking ownership also, but Mr. Ryan is too dumb or uninformed to understand this.

Moreover, President Bush is at least partially to blame for 9-11, but that's an item to discuss on another entry.

Michael Ryan has no sense of humor

Re: "What Now-Curb Your Outrage," from the October 29th Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

As I showed on a previous blog entry, Michael Ryan allows Rick Mckee's anti-semitic caricatures on his editorial page. Yet in this editorial, he whines about a recent episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm in which the lead character, Larry David, accidentally urinates on a painting of Jesus. Clearly, Mr. Ryan is a hypocrite.

Larry David was not inciting hatred of a religion or group of people, like Rick McKee's political cartoons do on a regular basis. Mr. David was taking a satirical look at those nutty people who sometimes see Jesus in such mundane items as a French fry. I find this kind of humor quite clever.

Leave it to Mr. Ryan, and a few Catholics to be offended. Mr. Ryan complains that to "cynically mock an entire religious faith's belief in miracles is an insult overlaying an insult."

Any people who believe in religious miracles or any other superstitious nonsense deserve all the mockery they get.

Mr. Ryan further complains that comedy writers would never think of mocking the Muslim faith. Evidentally, Mr. Ryan hasn't seen many episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Mr. David devoted one entire episode to making fun of a Muslim woman wearing a burkha, and he's made fun of his own religion (Judiasm) more often than any other.

Mr. Ryan's whine that Christianity is the only religion to be mocked by comics is just not true, and the occasional theme in his unsigned columns of the persecution of Christianity is based on his own imagination rather than facts.

Larry David is a genius; Michael Ryan is a mentally-retarded plagiarizer. The latter has no business criticizing the former.

BTW, the funniest part of this Curb Your Enthusiasm episode is the sight gag in the final scene.

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RE: "Obama Stews, We Lose" from the October 30th edition of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

Once more, Mr. Ryan claims he's not being personal when he attacks President Obama. Don't believe it. He's trying to stick our president with the labels of weak and indecisive, but he has no basis for this criticism. In this editorial Mr. Ryan thinks President Obama is taking too long to decide upon a strategy for Afghanistan.

To support his argument, he quotes ex-VP, Dick Cheney who recently said President Obama was dithering. Dick Cheney has no credibility at all with the American people. This is the man who lied to us about WMD's, torture, and Saddam's role in 9-11. The American people wished the administration he was in would have taken the time to make better decisions about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, wars that have cost billions in dollars, tens of thousands of innocent civilian lives, and thousands of U.S. soldiers lives.

Perhaps conservatives are hoping to rush President Obama into making a bad decision that they can later use against him.

There's no reason to rush. Actually, the best strategy would be to withdraw completely. The terrorists who attacked us are in Pakistan. There are very few left in Afghanistan. Our presence there, no matter how many troops we put in, is little better than a "whack the mole" strategy. The U.S. should withdraw, and if terrorists try to re-establish camps, destroy them with missiles and raids.

Mr. Ryan wrote, "Bloggers and internet posters across the nation are demanding a decision..."

So what? The U.S. government is not based on mob rule?

Whatever decision Obama makes will most likely be far superior to any made by the Bush administration because he will actually be using something unknown to conservatives--brain power.

Michael Ryan Knows Nothing about Climate Science

Re: "Skepticism is Warming Up," from the October 26th editorial page of the Augusta Chronicle.

Once again, Mr. Ryan is cherry picking polls, finding one that shows that only 36% of people think anthropogenic activities are causing global warming. I'm sure there are many polls out there that differ, but public opinion polls about this subject are completely irrelevant. The vast majority of people are scientifically ignorant.

What really matters is what climate scientists think. 97% of climate scientists who have published peer reviewed studies do believe that anthropogenic activities are causing the earth's climate to warm. These are people who actually study the science and know what they're talking about.

So the first part of the underheading of Mr. Ryan's title, "Like the science itself, public views on global warming are unsettled," is a total lie. The science is not unsettled, at least among scientists who actually study climate.

Source: http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf

Mr. Ryan stated, "Thus, if global warming is indeed influenced by humans, we've then taken the necessary steps to reverse it..."

This is a strange comment. The U.S. government or the "we" he's referring to have done very little about climate change.

Furthermore, Mr. Ryan falsely claims that cap and trade will cripple the economy. There's no evidence that cap and trade will cripple the economy. Again, Mr. Ryan is making an unsupported allegation.


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On today's editorial page, Mr. Ryan published yet another column, this one by E. Thomas McClanahan that cherry picked polls. The title of this editorial is "More Voters are Souring on Health Reform."

Mr. McClanahan used a recent Rasmussen poll, but ignored an AP poll that shows support for health care reform is on the rise.

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One more thing worth noting from today's editorial page, Re: "They're making opting out looking good."

Mr. Ryan writes, "The truth is, this country was founded on the notion that a central government would be convened to do the states' collective bidding--not the other way around."

This is not true at all. The debate between whether the U.S. should have a strong centralized government or one based on a weak form of federalism was the biggest controversy the framers of the constitution had. The constitution is full of plenty of examples that show federal supremacy over the states, including minting money and making treaties. The tenth amendment was merely a bone to be tossed to states righters when the constitution was being written. There's nothing in any of the health care reform plans that conflicts with the tenth amendment because judicial precedent has clearly allowed the federal government to take precedence over the states when it comes to issues like these.

Michael Ryan Cherry Picks Poll Results to Mislead About President Obama's Approval Rating

Re: "Nothing Personal," from the October 24th edition of the Augusta Chronicle.

Here's a classic case of cherry picking poll results. Of the 8 major polls, only 1 (The Rasmussen, the only one Mr. Ryan mentioned) shows President Obama having a negative job approval rating. Even the Fox News Poll has President Obama with a positive job approval rating (49%-45%). The average of the 8 polls shows President Obama's job approval rating is 52.1%-43.6%.

The Gallup Poll, which Mr. Ryan cites incomprehensively as "More sobering for Obama, Gallup reports that Obama's latest quarterly average ranks 144th, or in the 44th percentile, for all post-war presidents during any quarter," has Obama with a 55%-39% job approval rating. So it's evident Mr. Ryan is aware of the other polls.

Considering that the economy is likely to improve as the recession ends, President Obama's job approval ratings are in good shape.

Source: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/

Moreover, Mr. Ryan must not read his own newspaper. Recently, the Augusta Chronicle ran an article about how President Obama's stimulus saved thousands of local teacher's jobs. Yet, Mr. Ryan writes, "...others point to the huge economic stimulus package the president insisted would help earlier this year--but which appears has not."

Mr. Ryan needs to spend more time reading his own paper, instead of plagiarizing other conservative pundits.

This editorial is another example of how Mr. Ryan is attempting to smear President Obama with the labels of weak and unpopular--both of which are unfounded. Of course, he also condescends to write that it's nothing personal, that Obama's a nice guy.

If Mr. Ryan genuinely think Obama's a nice guy, than why is he continually smearing him with lies?

Rick McKee uses anti-semitic caricatures

I'm posting Rick McKee's political cartoon to illustrate three points.

First, he's using an anti-semitic caricature. The bad guy looks like an Arab (or Jew) with the exaggerated semitic nose and a long beard required by some muslim fundamentalists. Rick Mckee is equating semitic Arabs with terrorism. I attached the photos of actual alleged terrorists recently foiled and arrested by law enforcement. Note, they look nothing like McKee's anti-semitic caricature. One is even blonde and blue-eyed and looks Anglo-Saxon.

Second, Mr. McKee makes the terrorist look so menacing, yet the actual terrorists look like the guys next door. It's misleading to make terroists look like menacing monsters. The most reprehensible crimes in history have been committed by rather ordinary-looking people. Nazis in charge of the holocaust, and those guilty of the Rwandan genocide looked just like normal people.

Third, the captioned dialogue is a complete lie. The Obama administration hasn't "outlawed the use of the phrase--war on terror." They simply chose not to use the propaganda-laden words.

The Augusta Chronicle editorial page Consists of Just a Pack of Lies

Re: "Obama's Flawed Fox Hunt," from the October 22nd edition of the Augusta Chronicle.

Michael Ryan wrote that the Obama administration..."wants to silence dissent and destroy dissenters at home. Ground zero is Fox News."

This statement is a ridiculous lie. The Obama administration is rightfully pointing out that Fox news is little more than a propaganda arm of the republican party. They aren't out to crush dissent.

In this editorial Mr. Ryan once again brings out the tired old whine about how the rest of the mainstream media is liberal. This is mostly untrue as well. The mainstream media is owned by big corporations with pro-conservative agendas. Therefore, journalists are constrained to report in a way that's limited to stay within conservative and centrist ideologies. The mainstream media cites conservative think tanks much more often than liberal think tanks. And although journalists tend to be liberal on social issues, when it comes to economic issues most of them are conservative.

Later in this editorial, Mr. Ryan redundantly repeats the charge he makes in his first paragraph when he writes, "it is highly unusual for a U.S. administration to launch an authoritarian vendetta against an individual news station." This is utter nonsense. The Obama administration has not outlawed Fox news, they've not arrested Fox News employees, they've not even sent the IRS to audit them.

It's apparent that Mr. Ryan just likes making things up. Moreover his claim that the mainstream news has a "left of center oligopoly that has not reflected public opinion" is completely unsupported. He gives no examples of liberal media bias and ignores a recent Washington Post poll that shows that only 20% of Americans identify themselves as republicans. When push comes to shove on such issues as health care, social security, and the environment, the public is overwhelmingly liberal.

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Mr. Ryan's lies are not the only ones appearing on his editorial page. Today, Robert Smock (a regular, contributing, conservative shmuck) adds his lies to those of the editorial page editor. He wrote that Obama took a fairly mild recession and worsened it with taxing the rich. That's just a stupid lie. Obama reduced most people's taxes. The recession was already severe when Obama took office, and the vast majority of Americans understand this. Mr. Smock claims that voters have buyers remorse, but this is just not true either. Obama currently has a 55% approval rating. It's republicans who are sinking in the polls right now, probably due to their irrational and corrupt opposition to health care reform.

On yesterday's editorial page two columnists that regularly run on this page, Cal Thomas and Walter Williams, began both of their columns with ridiculous lies.

Mr. Thomas wrote that "the greatest generation lived within their means." Actually, the biggest national debt in U.S. history occurred during the "greatest generation," due to World War II. To begin a column with such a lie destroys his credibility, but it's been evident to me for a long time that Mr. Thomas is not a very smart man and has little credibility to begin with. He believes fairy tales should be taught in science class.

Mr. Williams is a free market fanatic. In his column yesterday he listed "anti-government" as a good quality for an American to have. Conservatives claim to hate government so much that they don't seem to believe in it at all. Maybe they should stay out of trying to run it then. Mr. Ryan once wrote when criticizing the democrats, "most alarmingly, they believe in government." So if conservatives don't believe in government, what do they belive in? Anarchy?

Mr. Williams falsely claimed that the U.S. is the "most prosperous nation in mankind's entire history." There are about ten nations on earth that have higher standards of living than the U.S. I pointed this out to Mr. Williams once, and he admitted I was right, and he was wrong, yet he's still telling this lie.

Michael Ryan Plagiarizes Glen Beck, The Drudge Report Yet Again

Re: "A Rotten Role Model," from the October 20th edition of The Augusta Chronicle.

Once again, Michael Ryan plagiarized the latest paranoid invention of Glen Beck and The Drudge Report, that Obama Communications Director, Anita Dunn, admires the late Chairman Mao.

What Anita Dunn said in front of a high school class was that she liked one particular philosophical point shared by both Mother Theresa and Chairman Mao. She didn't say she supported the atrocities or ideology of Mao.

Mr. Ryan also copied Glen Beck's mischaracterization of a statement Ms. Dunn made about controlling the media. She didn't say the Obama administration was controlling the media. She was telling how during the campaign for the office of president they tried to control the message which makes perfect sense--all politicians running for office certainly want a consistent message.

This consistent plagiarization of the most insane conservative pundits in the media is more evidence that Mr. Ryan is an idiotic, lazy editorial page editor.

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Re: "Adored and Ignored," from the October 19th editorial page of The Augusta Chronicle.

This was a particularly weak editorial. Here, Mr. Ryan is trying to give the impression that President Obama is a weak leader. But he gives not a single concrete example. Instead, he cherry picks quotes from other pundits.

Talk about lazy.

Michael Ryan Whines again about Leftist Pundits Giving Tit for Tat

Re: "Attacking with Acid," from the Augusta Chronicle editorial page of October 16th.

Just 12 days ago, in an unsigned column I commented on here, Mr. Ryan was complaining that the left was guilty of name-calling. The left is only guilty of giving the right some of its own medicine, and apparently, this causes Mr. Ryan to whine regularly about it, because here again is another column crying about how vicious left wing pundits are. Mr. Ryan must be running out of ideas, if he so frequently returns to this subject.

Today, Mr. Ryan took issue with Keith Olbermann when he made Michelle Malkin one of his "Worst Persons in the World." He called Ms. Malkin a "mindless, morally bankrupt, knee-jerk, fascisitic, without which Michelle Malkin would just be a big mashed up bag of meat with lip-stick on it."

Of course, Mr. Ryan completely leaves out the reason why Mr. Olbermann attacked her. Ms. Malkin falsely accused Ms. Carney-Nunez of writing and directing the "Obama Song," that elementary school children sang in New Jersey. You know, the one that's got conservatives so hot under the collar about indoctrination, that they're sending protestors to the school to frighten the children. It turns out Ms. Carney-Nunez had nothing to do with the song, but as a result of Ms. Malkin's false accusation, she's received death threats and hundreds of pieces of hate mail.

Taken in context, Mr. Olbermann's criticism of Ms. Malkin is justifiable. Mr. Ryan's a Christian who has attended his fair share of Sunday school classes. I'm sure he's aware of the evils of bearing false witness.

Mr. Ryan then blames liberals for derailing Rush Limbaugh's bid to become part owner of the Rams. This is entirely false. It's the conservative owners of the other NFL teams who didn't want to have such a polarizing individual causing controversy for their milk-toast product.

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Oh and Mr. Ryan just happened to run Ms. Malkin's column today--"Who's Behind the White House War on Fox News? Corruptocrats."

Once again, her column is full of outright falsehoods. She claims Fox is the one news outlet not in President Obama's pocket. To support this ridiculous, unfounded argument, she cites the example of CNN fact-checking a Saturday Night Live skit that was critical of the President. She obviously didn't watch the segment--her source must have been some other conservative pundit. I did watch that segment. CNN sided with the Saturday Night Live skit, not President Obama.

Furthermore, she claims the "press gurus" keep Obama from looking thuggish. Thuggish? There's nothing thuggish at all about the Obama administration, except for maybe in her own paranoid dreams that she shares with the Glenn Becks of the world.

Her case that the Obama administration is full of corruptocrats because a few worked on a failed re-election bid for ex-Senator Daschle is also weak and generally unfounded.

She finishes off with another false claim--that "conservatives are reveling in the left's hysteria over Fox News Channel's dominance." Fox News hardly dominates the media. Compared to the combined ratings of ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, and MSNBC, its ratings are minuscule. And its demographic is pretty much limited to old, white conservatives.

Michael Ryan thinks "Washington should start over" on health care

Re: "Ship of state appears rudderless," from the October 13th editorial of the Augusta Chronicle editorial page.

It's taken democrats nearly a year to get a health care reform plan passed in just one Senate committee. And Mr. Ryan thinks "Washington should start over." I've got news for him-- Washington already started over, when the democrats won the election in 2008. So basically, Mr. Ryan thinks "Washington should start over," because he doesn't like the health care reform plan.

I wonder what his response would've been, if when President George W. Bush rammed his initial tax cuts through Congress, a liberal pundit suggested that Washington should start over.

He probably would've considered it laughable.

The excuse Mr. Ryan uses to suggest we need to start from scratch on the health care reform plan is the completely faux propaganda concocted by the PricewaterhouseCoopers report--an insurance company misinformation group. Mr. Ryan admits that "an insurance industry report must be taken with a grain of salt." But he thinks it may have merit anyway. Why? Because he's obviously on the side of businesses profiting, while millions suffer in sickness and bankruptcy. In other words he's in favor of sick people dying quickly, as are all business-crook, conservatives.

His editorial includes the fantasy that government should get out of the way and let the free market solve our health care problems. "Let folks buy insurance across state lines," is their idiotic solution. But it's the free market that has caused the current health care mess. Letting people buy insurance across state lines would reduce competition, not increase it, because big insurance company monopolies would dominate the market, collude, and wipe out smaller insurance companies.

It's obvious, Mr. Ryan thinks we should start over, because he wants no insurance reform. If there's no insurance reform, it will make President Obama look like a failure, and Mr. Ryan, along with all other conservatives, want the president to fail.

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That Mr. Ryan would allow Star Parker's column on his editorial page proves he has no integrity.

In her column "Consumers need protection all right--but from their government," she espouses support for the legalized loan shark industry, the payday loan companies which are criminal business enterprises.

I address her column in my article at www.useless-knowledge.com/1234/09oct/news014.html

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I found the original source for Mr. Ryan's plagarized idea that Obama should "politely decline," the Nobel Prize. It's Doug Heye, a blogger for USA Today who on October 9th, a day before Mr. Ryan's column came out, wrote that President Obama should "politely decline," the award. Of course, all the conservative pundits, including Glen Beck and Michelle Malkin jumped on this silly idea.

In today's Chronicle editorial page Cal Thomas too expresses his jealousy that Obama won the award, while his hero, Ronald Reagan didn't. Mr. Thomas subscribes to the myth that it was Reagan who liberated Europe from the "totalitarian hand of Soviet communism."

I think Gorbachev had a lot more to do with that than Reagan. He's the one who actually tore down that wall.

Michael Ryan Encourages our President to have Bad Manners

Re: "And the Nobel for Good Intentions goes to..." from the October 10th editorial page of the Augusta Chronicle.

Conservatives sure demonstrate their jealousy of President Obama's influence. Admittedly, he's done nothing to deserve the Nobel peace prize, which is basically an irrelevant award, ever since they gave one to the likes of Yasser Arafat.

Nevertheless, it is an honor for a sitting U.S. president. Incredibly, Mr. Ryan suggests that the president should decline the award. Just within the last few weeks, Mr. Ryan wrote a column lamenting the lack of civility in this modern world, and here he is encouraging bad manners. What a diplomatic faux pas that would be, if the President declined the Nobel Prize.

Mr. Ryan thinks awarding the Nobel peace prize will encourage the president to be an appeaser, and he cites the example of how fighting World War II promoted peace. It is true that sometimes war is the answer, but more often than not, war creates more problems than it solves.

In any case, suggesting President Obama decline the award is another example of the ridiculous jealousy that right wing pundits have for him. This point is not Mr. Ryan's original idea. It's yet another example of a plagiarized conservative talking point that he put very little thought into.

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Re: "Danger: Radioactive," from the October 12th editorial of the Augusta Chronicle.

Mr. Ryan rightly condemns Nathan Deal's reference to "ghetto grandmothers."

I guess the racism wasn't subtle enough for him. Mr. Ryan demonstrated a subtle form of racism in yesterday's editorial, "Free Markets, Free People," when he falsely blamed last year's economic collapse on "government presssure to load Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac with bad loans in order to puff up home ownership statistics."

He didn't use the word, minority, but every reader knows what he meant was the government was giving out too many loans to poor black people who couldn't afford to pay the mortgages. This is completely false. Minority loan programs have a higher rate of successfully paid mortgages than average. The collapse of the real estate market was caused by rich people (mostly white) who used real estate as an investment, rather than as a place to live. The speculation caused the value of the properties to skyrocket far past their value, and when the values declined to realistic numbers, lots of people lost their shirts. It had nothing to do with what Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac were doing.

So in one column, Mr. Ryan was scapegoating black people, and the very next day he criticized a conservative politician who was not subtle enough about his scapegoating. However, they are on the same side of the fence.

There is also one laughable line from this column. Mr. Ryan's all for the free market and against salary caps, even though it is the unequal distribution of wealth that causes all recessions and depressions. He wrote "And think of what kind of world we'd have...if all compensation were capped at $500,000. Where would human ambition and striving go to breathe?"

I think 99.99% of the population would be motivated, if they knew it was possible to make $500,000. I don't think capping salaries at $500,000 would discourage very many people.

Another example of Michael Ryan's poor research

Re: "Give us Substance, not Stagecraft," from the October 9th editorial page of the Augusta Chronicle.

Mr. Ryan writes, "Do you even know, after all these months, where the president stands on the so-called "public option"? Or what 4 or 5 principles he wants represented in a final bill?"

This quote makes Mr. Ryan seem uninformed, and in fact his entire column seems rushed. He must have been too busy to put much thought or research into it.

President Obama's made it quite clear that he's in favor of a public option but would be willing to sign a health care reform bill without it.

He's also clearly listed more than 5 principles he want represented in a final bill.

See www.barackobama.com/issues/healthcare/

It's all pretty clear and simple. He wants 1) an end to discrimination on pre-existing conditions, age, and gender, 2) the prevention of insurance companies' policies of dropping sick people, 3) caps on out of pocket expenses, 4) an elimination of limits to preventive care, and 5) tax credits for people buying insurance. These principles among many others are listed on his website.

Once again, here's evidence that Mr. Ryan does little research, other than the plagarization of conservative talking points from the likes of Glen Beck.

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I do think, however, the contrived press event, where some Obama administration official handed out white coats for all the doctors to wear was an insult to the American people's intelligence.

Rick McKee's Cartoon about Letterman is Libelous

There is no evidence that David Letterman threatened to fire or promote any women based on sexual favors. There is no evidence that this is a case of classic work place sexual harrassment.
Mr. Letterman is a celebrity. It's more likely that these women were like groupies attempting to seduce him all the time, so they could get a part in his show or become his wife--a lucrative situation. Rick Mckee's cartoon is just libelous.

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Mr. Ryan felt it necessary to weigh in on the bad excessive celebration call against the Georgia Bulldogs in last week's game. He doesn't mention, however, that the rule itself is racist.

The rule was Vince Dooley's idea. The rule was put in place exactly the same time that African-American athletes began to dominate college football. Southern white men just could not stand to see African-Americans enjoying their excellence on the field.

The rule is also completely subjective and should be eliminated.

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Gil Ward is a regular contributor to the Augusta Chronicle editorial page. Today, he wrote this preposterous line--"There is a no reason for a normal healthy person to be poor in America unless they want to be--or unless their leaders and the government want them to be."

What world does this guy live in? First of all, most unemployed people are not lazy or crazy. At times, especially now during a recession, it can be tough to find a job. Moreover, many jobs pay meager salaries. So even if a person works two jobs, they can still be poor. To suggest that the government wants people to be poor is absurd, though conservatives do push policies that keep wages low.

I'm sure Mr. Ward meant to blame democrats and the "cycle of welfare" myth. He doesn't realize that, if any group keeps people poor, it's conservative republicans who are always against minimum wage increases.

The existence of poor people proves the free market doesn't work. I think that's why conservatives hate poor people. Their existence proves they're wrong.

Michael Ryan's Unfounded Accusation that Liberals Weaken America

Re: "Does the Left Want a Weakened America," from the October 6th Editorial Page of the Augusta Chronicle.

The very first sentence of Mr. Ryan's unsigned editorial is a rather obvious lie I've debunked on a previous entry on this blog. The claim that President Obama was indoctrinating children received the full ridicule of Jon Stewart and deservedly so. The Obama administration was not behind this spontaneous gesture of support. School children sang the praises of President Bush too, and conservatives didn't cry "indoctrination." Conservatives look silly telling this lie, and as we all know, telling the same lie over and over again doesn't convert it to truth.

A second lie in this editorial is Mr. Ryan's claim that President Obama's health care proposal is more unpopular the more he talks about it. It's not Obama's proposal--the bills and resolutions considered originated in the halls of Congress. Perhaps Mr. Ryan needs a refresher course in constitutional law.

Then, Mr. Ryan quotes some unfair criticism coming from George Will who ticks off a list of foreign policy goals that President Obama has failed to accomplish. But these are the same issues that previous presidents, republican and democrat, have failed to solve or in the case of Bush even address.

Finally, Mr. Ryan writes that Obama "springs from a wing of the democratic party that's ashamed of America and its power." What unfounded nonsense. Mr. Ryan doesn't cite a single fact to support this blanket statement.

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On today's editorial page Lee Benedict regales us with another incoherent, rambling letter. This one was about an argument he had with a protestor at Joe Wilson's rally. It's apparent from his version of the debate that Mr. Benedict doesn't understand historical change. Yes, at one time there was a wing of the democratic party that opposed civil rights. They were conservative democrats who have since evolved into conservative republicans. All the racists who used to vote for this wing of the democratic party (the southerners), now vote republican.

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Star Parker's column was another example of her hypocrisy. She's against planned parenthood, yet in other columns she's demonstrated her opposition to welfare. In her world women should be forced to bear unwanted children, but after they're born the children can all starve as far as she's concerned because she's against the government programs that would feed them. She only cares about children when they're microscopic specks of goo in the uterus. After they're born, well, they can "die quickly," so to speak.

Michael Ryan should drop Michelle Malkin

Michelle Malkin's column today was mean-spirited, pointless, and unfounded.

When Ms. Obama commented about how hard people have been working to bring the olympics to Chicago, the little voices in Ms. Malkin's head translated that into a case of self-absorption. Her statement's was completely unfounded.

Ms. Malkin's been accusing the Obama's of a big scandal of cronyism because they know some people who might've made money, if the olympics had been given to the city of Chicago.

So the Obamas know somebody who might've made money on a sports deal. Big deal. I'd hardly call that cronyism, expecially compared to when George W. Bush put coal mining and oil drilling executives into the Interior department and the office of the Vice-president. Moreover, the accusation is just unfounded.

Ms. Malkin's criticisms of the first lady are petty and pointless and not worth printing in any newspaper.

How this Asian-American woman (who thinks the Japanese internment during World War II was justified) can have a nationally syndicated column is a wonder.

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I didn't disagree with Mr. Ryan's editorial today about second hand smoke, but I did find a couple of the letters appearing on his editorial page kind of amusing. Brian Martin was rebutting a pro-abortion letter. He believed he was falsifying the pro-abortion letter writer's statement that the government can't tell a woman what to do with her body by citing anti-prostitution laws. That's not a real strong point. Sure, the government can make prostitution illegal, but they can't even come close to enforcing the laws. It's the same with abortion.

Catherine Minor's letter was even funnier. She too was writing to rebut the pro-abortion letter. She wrote that Ms. Waller (the pro-abortion rights letter writer) should google opinions that falsify her position.

Maybe the Chronicle would publish one of my letters again, if I wrote "do a google search to see how wrong conservatives are."

Michael Ryan Accuses Left of Name-calling, having no ideas. What?

Re: "Stop Name-Calling and Come Up with some Ideas" from the October 4th editorial page of The Augusta Chronicle.

I hate to use such a tired cliche' but isn't the pot calling the kettle black here when it comes to name-calling. For years the likes of Rush Limbaugh have called liberals such dehumanizing names as femi-Nazis, welfare queens, environmentalist wackos, etc. The Chronicle used to run a column by Mona Charen who wrote a book calling liberals "useful idiots." They also used to run Ann Coulter's column. Ms. Coulter calls liberals "traitors. In recent years it's gotten even worse with Glen Beck referring to President Obama as a Nazi, marxist, and racist. Tea bag protestors carry signs depicting President Obama as batman's nemesis, the Joker, and others showing him with a Hitler mustache, or as a monkey, or as a jungle bunny.

For Mr. Ryan to claim that the left is using name-calling to a greater degree than the right is outrageous and completely untrue.

To say they're out of ideas is even more ridiculous. It's liberals who, like it or not, are pushing for real health care reform, stimulus plans that do help the economy, and the cap and trade solution to global warming.

These problems that democrats are trying to address festered under conservative rule for decades, and conservatives offered no solutions whatsoever. Now, Mr. Ryan is accusing liberals of having no ideas? Who is he kidding?

Mr. Ryan defends conservatives from being called "wingnuts" by citing the number of advance copies of Sarah Palin's new book that have been sold. He wrote that, "there must be a lot of them (nuts) around." It wasn't his intent, but he admitted it--there are a lot of nutty people around. There is a market for conservative zombies who like to read books that support their pre-conceived notion of how things should be. Once again he also accuses the media of assassinating Ms. Palin's character. The media didn't assasinate her charactre--it's not their fault that she was clearly unqualified and unprepared.

In the tenth paragraph we finally see what has Mr. Ryan so riled up. Bill Maher called republicans lunatics, religious fanatics, flat-earthers, Civil War re-enactors, and bimbos."

Much of what Mr. Maher (a political satirist) said is true. A good chunk of republican support today comes from religious fundamentalists who want to teach fairy tales in science class. Republicans deny the possiblity of anthropogenic global warming, despite the near unanimity of opinion among climate scientists. And there's been more than one republican politician who has made statements in favor of secession from the United States.

And I can see from paragraph 14 why Mr. Ryan is so upset with Mr. Maher. Mr. Maher made fun of Glen Beck, saying he would some day be caught in a dress and playing with feces or something. As I demonstrated on previous entries in this blog, Mr. Beck is the source of the conservative talking points that Mr. Ryan plagiarizes. Mr. Maher dared to make fun of the republicans current, favorite sacred cow.

As I predicted in an earlier blog entry, Mr. Ryan weighs in on congressman Alan Grayson's recent comments on the house floor. Mr. Ryan wrote that it was much worse than what Joe Wilson said.

What Alan Grayson said was so true and not at all comparable to what Joe Wilson said. Here's the difference: Grayson had the floor and was telling the truth; Wilson did not have the floor and was not telling the truth. Grayson did not violate protocol, but Wilson did.

Republicans (and conservative democrats) are opposed to health care reform because they take bribes to protect insurance company profits. Insurance companies do profit when sick people die quickly. What Alan Grayson said was a refreshing (though calculated) burst of fresh air.

Michael Ryan is Right About Roman Polanski

I almost never agree with Michael Ryan about anything, but he is right about Roman Polanski. The list of Hollywood artists supporting this child rapist should be ashamed of themselves.

Mr. Polanski drugged a 13 year old girl and forced her to have sex with him.

He ended up serving only a little more than a month in jail, then he left the country after a judge was about to renege on a plea bargain deal.

Hollywood stars claim that he's served his time and all should be forgiven.

No, he hasn't served his time, and the constitution forbids the punishment he does deserve--castration.

Whoopi Goldberg made the outrageous claim that it wasn't rape-rape, as if the thirteen year old girl in question was a willing participant which she was not. Let me repeat:

Mr. Polanski drugged and forced a 13 year old girl to have sex with him. That without a doubt is rape-rape.

One of the people signing a petition supporting Polanski is Woody Allen. Woody Allen married his own daughter. No one really knows for sure but it's probable he's brainwashed her and took advantage of her before she came of age. Technically, what he did to his daughter isn't incest because she was adopted, but he was supposed to be a father figure, not a husband.

Woody Allen is a freak, just like Roman Polanski. They are great film-makers, but that will never excuse their actions. I would never let freakos like this inside my household.

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Because this isn't a negative entry, I might as well praise Mr. Ryan for running Eugene Robinson's column. I know many arch-conservative readers of the Chronicle are irate over this, but at least one liberal pundit occasionally gets published on his editorial page.

Michael Ryan Mischaracterizes the Summer of Conservative Temper Tantrums

Within the last few weeks Michael Ryan wrote an editorial that completely mischaracterized this past summer's rowdy town hall meetings. He actually wrote that "liberals went ballistic when older citizens peacefully expressed their concerns about health care reform plans." Everybody that follows the news knows that's not what happened. Mr. Ryan's comment is not even revisionist history--it's revisionist current events.

People were disrupting congressmen who were trying to explain the various health care reforms being considered. They were hardly peaceful protests, and the admitted goal of the insurance company lobbyists financing and organizing these protests was to "shout down intelligent debate."

In a separate editorial Mr. Ryan suggested using these noisy, brainless tactics to protest House Resolution 2190, which would force chemical companies to reduce mercury contamination of our waters, because it might make Olin Corporation (a local factory that poisons the Savannah River) to lay off a few workers, if they can't comply in time. So in one column Mr. Ryan was egging on ballistic behavior among conservatives that in another column he falsely claimed liberals were engaging in.

Demonstrating this kind of chutzpah shows that Mr. Ryan is just, to put it bluntly, a stupid jerk.

Glen Beck's indoctrination fear/ACORN

Re: The September 27th unsigned editorial on the Augusta Chronicle editorial page entitled "Hooray Mr. President, you are No.1"

The crazy conspiracy theory that President Obama is somehow planning on indoctrinating children originates with Glen Beck. Mr. Beck is mean-spirited, foolish, and ignorant. Yet, apparently he is now the source of conservative republican talking points.

Both in Michael Ryan's column and in Michelle Malkin's column, which Mr. Ryan redundantly placed next to his, they plaigiarize Mr. Beck's idea that the Obama administration is bent on indoctrinating children with propaganda. The facts easily dispute these ridiculous allegations.

In Mr. Ryan's column he falsely claims that the National Endowment for the Arts held a conference where the director of communications, Yosi Sergeant, asked artists to consider creating works of art to further President Obama's agenda. Actually, he asked them to work with Michelle Obama to create works that would assist groups sponsoring public service projects--something that obviously has nothing to do with the President's legislative agenda.

Mr. Ryan also repeats some senators' false claim that this might be a violation of the Hatch Act. If Mr. Ryan would have done the slightest bit of research, he would've known the list of government agencies falling under Hatch Act jurisdiction doesn't even include the NEA. (See www.osc.gov for the list of government agencies that do fall under this law's jurisdiction.)

Mr. Ryan also implies that Mr. Sergeant was forced to resign as communications director. This isn't exactly true either, but the controversy, generated by the Glen Beck Show, did lead him to take another position within the NEA.

But perhaps the most ridiculous point of Mr. Ryan's editorial was his claim that a song some students sang in an elementary school in New Jersey was some kind of nefarious indoctrination. The Obama administration had nothing to do with this. I think conservatives are just jealous because democrats have a charismatic leader capable of inspiring spontaneous gestures of support. They know they looked silly when they had a temper tantrum last month about President Obama's address to schoolchildren, and they're just looking for some reason to justify their silly opposition. Jon Stewart puts the whole controversy in context in this clip-- http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/200909290003

Note: The clip also shows schoolchildren singing the praises of George W. Bush's handling of Katrina.

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Re: The September 28th unsigned editorial on the Augusta Chronicle Opinion page entitled "ACORN who?"

ACORN is a worthwhile organization that helps poor and working class people find jobs, finance housing, and register to vote. Conservatives hate poor people, and they've been out to get this organization for a long time. The recent dishonest documentary produced by James O'Keefe and funded by business lobbyists does do a great deal of damage to ACORN. The documentary is dishonest because Mr. O'Keefe claims that no ACORN offices turned him down when he was baiting illicit counseling. In fact police records prove that some ACORN employees did reject and report him. It's a shame ACORN, which does so much good, now has an unfairly tarnished reputation.

In his editorial Mr. Ryan quotes a Wall Street Pundit, John Fund, in an attempt to tie President Obama with ACORN, as if that would be a bad thing. Here is the misleading quote:

"He (Obama) became a top trainer for ACORN's Chicago conference. In 1995, he became ACORN's attorney, participating in a landmark case to force the state of Illinois to implement the federal Motor Voter Law. That law's loose voter registration requirements would later be exploited by ACORN employees in an effort to flood voter rolls with fake names."

President Obama was never a paid employee of ACORN, though it is true he worked alongside U.S. Justice Department lawyers on one case--that's not much of a connection. ACORN reported irregularities with voter applications they paid for. Lazy workers defrauded ACORN--that's the truth of this matter. There is no evidence whatsoever that any of these phony names ever made it on to voter rolls or were counted as votes.

Shame on the pathetic cowards in the democratic party, and the crooked pro-business republicans for defunding ACORN, a violation of the constitution's Bill of Attainder provision, as pointed out by Rachel Maddow.

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I predict Mr. Ryan will weigh in on Alan Grayson's comments on the house floor, and he will, as usual, copy conservative talking points. Just wait and see.

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Local radio talk show host, Austin Rhodes, has suggested my blog is slanderous. There's nothing slanderous about it, and I challenge anyone to find slander on any blog I've written.

This blog is a critical review of the Augusta Chronicle Editorial Page

The Augusta Chronicle newspaper in Augusta, Georgia has banned me from their message boards and will not publish my letters critical of their editorial page. Michael Ryan is the editorial page editor of the Augusta Chronicle, thus this blog is named after him because he's ultimately responsible for all of the ridiculous lies and plagiarized conservative talking points that appear on the unsigned commentary of his editorial page.

I begin this blog with the subject of a letter I sent that the Augusta Chronicle refused to publish. The subject was an Augusta 16th unsigned editorial on the Augusta Chronicle editorial page that repeated a lie about an ABC news interview Charlie Gibson conducted with President Obama at a public forum. According to Mr. Ryan, Mr. Gibson asked the president whether he would give up his health insurance plan for one of the plans being considered by Congress, and the president ignored the question. Mr. Ryan never attributed the source of this lie--a chain e-mail, probably being spread by insurance company lobbyists. Brooks Jackson of www.factcheck.org examined this lie.

A physician asked a similar question and President Obama did give a long and thoughtful answer. The transcript is available on the above mentioned website. The title of the article is "A Question not left unanswered." Mr. Ryan needs to find better sources of information than chain e-mails.

Moreover, Mr. Jackson wrote that the notion Congressmen will be exempt from any plan they put forth is entirely false.

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I started The Michael Ryan Watch on townhall blogs, but they took my blog down and won't recognize my e-mail address, so they've blocked me. Townhall is for conservative blogs; mine was a liberal slant. I was curious how long my liberal blog would last there. It lasted only for three days. Evidentally, since President Obama's been elected, it seems to me that conservatives are less and less tolerant of other viewpoints. In any case, the subjects of the other two blogs entires I wrote on the townhall version The Michael Ryan Watch (ACORN, Mr. Ryan's plagiarism of Glen Beck) will be discussed here tomorrow.