Health Insurers Consider A Caesarean-Section Pregnancy A Pre-Existing Condition

By Amanda Terkel Earlier this week, the Huffington Post’s Ryan Grim reported on the fact that in seven states plus the District of Columbia, “getting beaten up by your spouse is a pre-existing condition.” The insurance industry figures that if “you are in a marriage with someone who has beaten you in the past, you’re more likely to get beaten again than the average person and are therefore more expensive to insure,” but what it really does is punish these victims for something that wasn’t their fault.

But that isn’t the only policy that health insurers have that primarily discriminate against women. First of all, most individual health insurance markets don’t cover maternity care. In fact, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, only 14 states have a requirement for such coverage, and the number of plans without maternity coverage continues to rise dramatically. Why? Anthem Blue Cross — which has been actively fighting health care reform — considers pregnancy optional and therefore not necessary to insure:

“The point of insurance is to insure against catastrophic care costs. That’s what you’re trying to aggregate and pool for such things as heart attacks and cancer,” said an Anthem Blue Cross spokesman. “Having a child is a matter of choice. Dealing with an adult onset illness, such as diabetes, heart disease breast or prostate cancer, is not a matter of choice.”

Even Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) spoke an unintentional truth when he said of his parents: “When they arrived in Baton Rouge, my mother was already four-and-a-half-months pregnant. I was what folks in the insurance industry now call a pre-existing condition.”

When a woman isn’t currently pregnant, she often still cannot get coverage. Many insurers consider a Caesarean-section pregnancy a pre-existing condition and refuse to cover women who have had the procedure. From a 2008 New York Times story about a Colorado woman who had Golden Rule Insurance:

She was turned down because she had given birth by Caesarean section. Having the operation once increases the odds that it will be performed again, and if she became pregnant and needed another Caesarean, Golden Rule did not want to pay for it. A letter from the company explained that if she had been sterilized after the Caesarean, or if she were over 40 and had given birth two or more years before applying, she might have qualified.

The number of C-sections performed in the United States has been “growing steadily,” with approximately 30 percent of women having the procedure. Other insurance companies that don’t necessarily reject women with C-sections often do charge them higher premiums or “factor in chronic or recurring problems that might have led to the Caesarean.” What’s even worse is that once you’re denied by one company, it’s harder to get coverage somewhere else because you’ve been red-flagged.

Today, Golden Rule CEO Richard Collins is testifying before the House Subcommittee on Domestic Policy about “Bureaucracy of Private Health Insurance.”

Judge tosses birther suit, threatens lawyer with sanctions

By Daniel Tencer A federal judge in Georgia has threatened Orly Taitz, de facto leader of the birther movement, with sanctions if she ever brings another “frivolous” case before him, news reports say.

Judge Clay Land of the US District Court in Columbus, Georgia, threw out a case brought by US Army Captain Connie Rhodes, who earlier this month sued for the right to refuse deployment orders to Iraq, on the argument that the commander-in-chief of the armed forces, President Barack Obama, was not born in the United States and is therefore not the legitimate head of the army.

According to the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer, Judge Clay stated in his ruling that the plaintiff “has presented no credible evidence and has made no reliable factual allegations to support her unsubstantiated, conclusory allegations and conjecture that President Obama is ineligible to serve as president of the United States.”

The ruling continues: “Instead, she uses her complaint as a platform for spouting political rhetoric, such as her claims that the president is ‘an illegal usurper, an unlawful pretender, [and] an unqualified imposter.’”

As WTVM-TV in Columbus reported, the judge also stated that Rhodes’ attorney, birther leader Orly Taitz, “will be subject to counsel sanctions for bringing any future actions in his court which are similarly frivolous.”

The judge’s ruling represents a significant legal defeat for Taitz and the birther movement, which received a great deal of attention from the media this summer. Media watchdog groups specifically targeted CNN’s Lou Dobbs, who gave the discredited theory that Obama was not born in the United States a disproportionate amount of coverage, according to some observers.

Taitz was behind this summer’s release of a purported “Kenyan birth certificate” for President Obama, which was dated two years after the president’s 1961 birth date, and contradicted Hawaiian officials’ long-standing insistence that the president’s Hawaiian birth certificate is legitimate.

Judge Clay ruled that that document, which evidently formed the backbone of the plaintiff’s case, was illegitimate because Taitz’s organization paid money to acquire it, making it tantamount to bribery.

However, the legal actions challenging President Obama’s citizenship have not ended. A US District Court judge in California recently allowed another lawsuit challenging President Obama’s citizenship to go forward. This one, brought by Capt. Pamela Barnett, also involves Taitz. The first hearing is set for October, when the judge will review a motion to dismiss the case.

Limbaugh Cares About Hate Crimes Only When Whites Are Victims — Even If They’re Not Real Hate Crimes

By Amanda Terkel

Yesterday, hate radio host Rush Limbaugh took up a story about a fight between three Missouri schoolchildren — the two attackers were black and the victim was white. The event gained extra attention because it was captured on video. Limbaugh cast it as a hate crime — typical of what whites face in “Obama’s America” where “white kids now get beat up with the black kids cheering”:

LIMBAUGH: It’s Obama’s America, is it not? Obama’s America, white kids getting beat up on school buses now. You put your kids on a school bus, you expect safety but in Obama’s America the white kids now get beat up with the black kids cheering, “Yay, right on, right on, right on, right on,” and, of course, everybody says the white kid deserved it, he was born a racist, he’s white. Newsweek magazine told us this. We know that white students are destroying civility on buses, white students destroying civility in classrooms all over America, white congressmen destroying civility in the House of Representatives.

Listen here:

There’s no evidence that the fight was racially motivated. Although the local police captain initially speculated that it may have been, he later backtracked and said, “The incident appears now to be more about a couple of bullies on a bus dictating where people sit.” D’Vante Lott, a student who witnessed the attack and was suspended for laughing at the incident, said the two attackers were basically just trying to act tough.

Limbaugh never cares about racially motivated attacks perpetrated on people of color and has derided hate crimes legislation. He said that such a bill would “carve out protection for perverts” and worried that it didn’t provide enough protections for whites.

Federal authorities are now probing a possible hate crime that happened outside a Georgia Cracker Barrel restaurant. After Army reservist Tasha Hill, who is African-American, politely asked Troy Dale West, who is white, to be careful because he almost hit her daughter when opening the door, he began spewing racial epithets at her and punching and kicking her in front of her daughter. Will Limbaugh also condemn this incident today? (Unlikely, considering that in the past, he has praised slavery, said that James Earl Ray deserved the Medal of Honor, and claimed that “all composite pictures of wanted criminals resemble Jesse Jackson.”)

Baucus says he ‘worked hard to get that bipartisan support’ for a bill that has no bipartisan support.

By Faiz Shakir

Standing alone at a podium today to unveil his long-awaited health reform proposal, Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) said he has an obligation to work as hard as he can to “try to get the most broad-based bill possible.” Baucus has held up the process for months as he tried to build bipartisan support for a bill. “I worked very hard to try to get that bipartisan support,” he said in his defense. But in the very next breath, Baucus stated, “No Republican has offered his or her support at this moment.” He reiterated his hope that Republicans will vote for his bill by the time a vote comes up:

Matt Latimer Book: Bush Knocked Other Pols While President

The Huffington Post | Rachel Weiner

President Bush mocked other prominent politicians behind their backs while in office, according to a new book by former speechwriter Matt Latimer.

Last month, the Washington Post reported that ex-Bushies were feeling a "growing nervousness" over what might be in their old colleague's tome. The October issue of GQ includes some eye-opening excerpts from the book.

Of Obama, Latimer writes that Bush came in to rehearse a speech fuming. The New York Daily News reported:

This is a dangerous world," he said for no apparent reason, "and this cat isn't remotely qualified to handle it. This guy has no clue, I promise you."

Bush thought Hillary would be the Democratic nominee. "'Wait till her fat keister is sitting at this desk,' he once said (except he didn't say 'keister')," Latimer wrote.

But Bush was perhaps most critical of vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin:

"I'm trying to remember if I've met her before. I'm sure I must have." His eyes twinkled, then he asked, "What is she, the governor of Guam?" [...]

"This woman is being put into a position she is not even remotely prepared for," he said. "She hasn't spent one day on the national level. Neither has her family. Let's wait and see how she looks five days out." It was a rare dose of reality in a White House that liked to believe every decision was great, every Republican was a genius, and McCain was the hope of the world because, well, because he chose to be a member of our party.

A former aide to Palin and Bush disputed the account, saying the two were close.

"There is no air, no space between them," he told CNN. "Sarah Palin is a big fan of George Bush, and she has said publicly she was proud he was Commander-in-Chief when her son Track was in Iraq."

Latimer also writes that at one point, Bush appeared not to understand his own administration's proposal to deal with the economic crisis.

One of the president's staff members anxiously pulled a few of us aside. "The president is misunderstanding this proposal," he warned. "He has the wrong idea in his head. ... It wasn't that the president didn't understand what his administration wanted to do. It was that the treasury secretary didn't seem to know, changed his mind, had misled the president, or some combination of the three.

Is Matt Drudge openly calling for a race war?

by Ron Brynaert

The screaming, all-caps headline on the one-time influential Drudge Report blog isn't calling attention to a Democratic lawmaker caught doing something naughty or announcing that those "missing" WMD that Dick Cheney kept warning us Saddam Hussein had hidden have been found.

Nope.

It's about a school bus fight.

Apparently, Matt Drudge believes that during the Obama administration it's important to showcase stories like "WHITE STUDENT BEATEN ON SCHOOL BUS; CROWD CHEERS," as if they were the biggest stories in the world.

Is Matt Drudge openly calling for a race war?

A recent Columbia Journalism Review article referred to Drudge's site as a "middle-of-the-pack niche product."

CJR's Ethan Porter wrote, "As of this writing, Alexa, Amazon’s Web site counter, lists Drudge as the 704th most popular site on the Internet. (Politico is 2,078 and The Huffington Post is 331.) Compete.com, which tracks Web traffic over time, tells a fuller story: in June of 2008, all three sites had around two million unique visitors. Since then, The Huffington Post’s numbers have soared, reaching 6.7 million in June. Drudge and Politico have both seen their traffic rise slightly, yet remain under the three million mark monthly."

According to Alexa, the leading white supremacist website Stormfront is only ranked 11,777, so turning to straight-out racist hate probably won't help Matt catch up to Arianna.

But perhaps Drudge can attract readers like "Fed Up" who left a comment on the video of the bus attack, stating, "As a White man married to a Black woman for 20 years I am not afraid to say that despite my love for Black people, thanks to Obama and his ilk, it is getting close to lock and load time. The ingratitude of Black people is stunning. Truly sorry."

Update: As a reader noted in the comments, police officials are now saying that the attack probably wasn't racially motivated.

The Associated Press reports, "Police in the southwestern Illinois city of Belleville say the videotaped attack on a 17-year-old student by two other riders on a school bus doesn't appear to have racial overtones after all."

"Police Capt. Don Sax told media outlets Monday the beating of a white Belleville West High School student by two black schoolmates on the bus occupied mostly by black students appeared to be racially motivated," the AP article continues. "But on Tuesday, Sax said the attack appears to have been about where the victim wanted to sit on the bus, with no racial underpinnings."

The article that Drudge has linked to has also been updated to reflect the "police captain backtracking on whether attack was racially motivated" but Drudge's banner remains unchanged as of 'update press time' at half past 2 PM.

"It was premature on my part," Belleville Police Capt. Don Sax told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. "It was my personal and emotional comment after only seeing the video briefly."

2nd Update

Since some commenters loved my use of a comment in this story I figured why not promote two diverse comments from the thread below.

Joe writes,

Are you kidding? Drudge reports this and he's trying to start a war?

Whoever you are who wrote this, quit your job. Find something else to do. You wasted my time.

The next comment, number 70 on the thread, was written by Srowles:

You people defending Drudge Report are fucking morons.

The actual piece is more responsible than the irresponsible Drudge-line. and the Belleville police actually say it may not have been racially motivated.

So, if Drudge Report wasn't trying to stir anything up, why did he qualify the headline with the word "WHITE"? Why was noting the student being white important?

Idiots.

Rockefeller Announces He Will Not Support Baucus’ Health Care Bill

By Igor Volsky This afternoon, on a conference call with reporters, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), a member of the Senate Finance Committee, announced that he would not support Chairman Max Baucus’ (D-MT) health care framework in its current form:

The way it is right now, now we have an amendment process coming up next week. I’ll have many, many, many amendments and we will see what happens on that. But now, there is no way that I can vote for the Senate package. For a lot of reasons. Obviously the lack of a public option is one of them. So that I want to be very clear about.

Listen:

Other Democrats have also expressed concerns about the bill’s affordability standards and financing mechanisms. “The flashpoint is all about affordability,” Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) told reporters. “Additional steps have to be taken to make health care more affordable.” Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) “also said he has concerns with the fees Baucus’ proposal would impose on some sectors of the healthcare industry. He did not specify which industries — pharmaceutical, medical device, health insurance or clinical labs — he was most concerned with.”

Meanwhile, the three Republicans participating in the so-called Gang-Of-Six negotiations are also unlikely to support the measure. Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Mike Enzi (D-WY) have indicated that they favored smaller bill that does not impose fees on health insurance companies, establishes a five-year waiting period for legal immigrants to obtain coverage, and strictly prohibits “the use of federal money to pay for abortion.” Meanwhile, Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) signaled Tuesday “she is unlikely to immediately support” Baucus’ bill, “but emphasized strongly that she is prepared to jump on board in the coming days.” “I’ll issue my statement tomorrow. But that’s not the end of the process, tomorrow. It’s just the beginning. So, I wouldn’t read too much into it,” Snowe told reporters.

On Sunday, during an appearance on ABC’s This Week, Rockefeller criticized the bill’s “network of cooperatives,” telling host George Stephanopoulos that the provision is not an alternative to the public option. A cooperative “really doesn’t work on health care,” Rockefeller explained. “There are fewer than 20 in the country and there are only two that really work. … So it hasn’t had a future, it goes back to the 30s and 40s, and I don’t think you can take the chance. You have to start a national thing all the way up,” he said.

Beck loses 50 percent of his advertising dollars.

By Amanda Terkel Today, Color of Change announced that since it launched a boycott of Glenn Beck’s Fox News show a month ago, the controversial host has lost half of his estimated advertising revenue:

According to the data collected, the amount of money spent by national advertisers on Beck’s program per week was at its highest at approximately $1,060,000, for the week ending August 2, 2009. ColorOfChange.org launched their campaign at the end of that week and since then, 62 advertisers have distanced themselves from Beck. Data collected for the week ending September 6, 2009 shows Beck’s estimated ad revenue at $492,000, equal to a loss of $568,000.

“Fox News Channel has consistently claimed they haven’t lost revenue as advertisers abandon Glenn Beck, but the numbers prove otherwise,” said Color of Change Executive Director James Rucker. “Fox News Channel has a limited amount of ad positions. If 62 companies refuse to run ads on two of their 24 hours of programming, they are losing inventory.”

Michelle Malkin and the anatomy of the 2 million protester lie

It turns out that's what kicked off the right-wing blogosphere's comically inept misinformation campaign last weekend to try to swell the size of Saturday's anti-Obama protest in the nation's capital, to jack the crowd size up to the wildly inflated -- and erroneous -- number of 2 million people.

Nice try.

According to estimates provided by the Washington, D.C., fire department, Malkin and friends were only off by 1,930,000 people. In other words, Malkin, citing fictitious press accounts, led the charge to falsely inflate the size of the crowd by 30 times. Malkin and company, desperate to dress up the tea party event as a mass movement, saw a relatively modest crowd of 70,000 GOP protesters and imagined it was 2 million strong. (She's a dreamer, I suppose.)

Worse, Malkin spent most of Saturday in denial, refusing to update her transparently false report, which meant the rest of the right-wing blogosphere also played dumb on a massive scale and kept excitedly repeating the manufactured claim. The scary part is that within the fact-free conservative blogosphere, lots of people still believe the 2 million nonsense, or are at least repeating it. They believe it despite the fact that nobody can point to any evidence to support it.

For most sane observers, what transpired over the weekend resembled a comical bout of telephone tag -- the game schoolchildren play when they whisper something into a friend's ear and then get a big laugh when, six or seven friends later, they hear how distorted the original message has become via garbled repetition. (Two million protesters!) The sad part is that right-wing bloggers are serious. They think they're engaging in some bold new era of citizen journalism. Instead, they just, you know, make stuff up.

It's just the latest example in a string of unforgettable whoppers from online conservatives who rarely let the facts get in the way of a good story. And, yes, irony abounds in that right-wing bloggers hate the press and that they hate the practice of journalism. They lecture reporters about accountability and fairness all the time, yet whenever amateur conservatives try their hand at reporting, they just produce guffaws for the rest of us. (Did I mention they miscalculated the size of the crowd by 1,930,000 people?)

On Saturday, facts didn't matter because right-wing ringleader Malkin was helping to spread a sprawling (and illogical) lie, and her dutiful followers knew just what to do: spread it hard and fast. Perhaps Malkin's only regret was she didn't aim higher; she could have claimed there were news reports of 12 million people protesting in D.C., and I'm sure every one of her willingly gullible devotees would have linked to her.

The amusing part of the weekend's blind-leading-the-blind charade was that Malkin already has a very long and detailed history of manufacturing phony stories that later leave nasty stains all over the blogosphere when they turn out to be turds. (Paging Jamil Hussein.) And that's what I think was so revealing about the 2 million-people-in-D.C. fiasco: Nobody within the right-wing blogosphere seems to be the slightest bit upset, let alone embarrassed or chastened, for having been part of a farcical, inept attempt to inflate the size of Saturday's rally by 1,930,000 people. Nobody seems to think it reflects poorly on them as a community, or that it will damage their collective reputation.

They really are shameless. And they really do inhabit their own parallel political universe where everyone's allergic to facts.

Why the shamelessness? Sadly, members of the GOP Noise Machine are acutely aware there is no downside to just lying 24/7. Malkin knows that no TV producers are going to deny her an on-air spot because she purposefully spread the patently phony claim that 2 million people gathered in Washington, D.C. (i.e. that the city's population quadrupled overnight). The Beltway press rarely holds the Noise Machine accountable, so of course they're going to just keep lying (what's the downside?), since it's obvious they don't really care about facts to begin with.

The conservative comedy of errors began on Saturday when Matt Kibbe, president of FreedomWorks, took to the rally stage and unfurled a massive lie. He told the crowd ABC News had reported that between 1 million to 1.5 million people had gathered to protest Obama's policies. (Later, a FreedomWorks flack conceded she had no idea know why Kibbe manufactured the claim about ABC News.)

Immediately, conservative activist Tabitha Hale (aka "pinkelephantpun") tweeted Kibbe's lie but added an additional 500,000 people to the tally: "ABC reporting 2 million people."

Seven minutes later, Malkin re-tweeted Hale's claim. Then, one minute after that, Malkin turned that tweet into part of her ongoing protest coverage. Intrepid "reporter" Malkin took an unsupported tweet and reported it as news:

12:34pm Eastern: Police estimate 1.2 million in attendance. ABC News reporting crowd at 2 million -- tweets Tabitha Hale from D.C.

Teeny, tiny fringe, huh?

Note that in her blog post there were no links for Malkin's utterly fantastic claim, no place on the Web where readers could go and confirm that D.C. police had pegged the crowd at 1.2 million or that ABC had made the staggering claim of 2 million. The lack of live links should have been a massive red flag for readers and fellow bloggers, especially when it was associated with such a controversial and news-breaking claim.

But, of course, Malkin had no links or any real facts to go on. All she had was a couple of tweets from Hale, who, in retrospect, appeared to have spent much of Saturday just making shit up.

But again, none of that mattered, because Malkin had spoken (2 million!) and the right-wing bloggers knew what to do. Let's take a stroll through the far-right blogosphere and see which sites did their best to spread Malkin's patently absurd claim about 2 million protesters. [Emphasis added.]

Pajamas Media's Roger Simon:

I can remember telling Glenn Reynolds during CPAC that these Tea Party demonstrations were rinky-dink and going nowhere. Barely more than a half-year later, they're putting two million people on the Washington Mall. Wow!

Jawa Report:

UPDATE:(Newbie): Crowd estimated by ABC NEWS: 2 MILLION!

Looking at the Left:

ABC News reports that two million Americans flooded D.C. in what people in the crowd were calling "a conservative Woodstock" Like the liberal Woodstock of the '60s, thousands were rumored stranded on freeways.

Atlas Shrugs:

The two photos above show a tiny fraction of the two million ABC estimates attended.

NewsBusters, the day after the 2 million people story had been debunked:

You'll note no mention of the D.C. rally yesterday that drew an estimated 1-2 million people.

Wizbang:

Michelle Malkin reported on her site that ABC News estimated the crowd to be 2 million people.

[...]

Rick at Brutally Honest linked to this awesome time lapse video showing progression of the approximately 2 million people who marched in DC today:

Riehl World View:

ABC Reports 2 Million At DC Rally

Right Pundits:

Michelle Malkin is reporting that estimated turnout is now 2 million people.

And then there was the sad, confused work of blogger Stephen Green. Doing his best to spread the word about the supposedly massive crowd size on Saturday, Green first claimed that CNN had reported the crowd was 2 million strong. (CNN never did any such thing.) Then later under a banner that read "correction," Green, following Malkin's phony lead, reported it was ABC News that reported 2 million protesters were on hand. (Green then failed to correct his "correction.")

Of course, the 2 million tally never made sense. Not only couldn't anybody find ABC's alleged reporting, but no other news organization (not even rally co-sponsor Fox News) were going anywhere near the 2 million mark. Instead, most of Saturday's reports used phrases like "tens of thousands" to describe the crowd size.

Just after 4 p.m. Saturday, New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen tweeted the glaring discrepancy:

http://michellemalkin.com/: "ABC News reporting crowd at 2 million." Front page, ABCNews.com: "thousands march on Capitol"

By the end of that 4 o'clock hour, ABC's News' Yunji de Nies also weighed in:

Later that afternoon, ABC News took the unusual step of reporting an article about itself. Headlined "ABC News Was Misquoted on Crowd Size," the dispatch, designed solely to knock down the false rumor that Malkin helped hype, was quite emphatic:

At no time did ABC News, or its affiliates, report a number anywhere near as large. ABCNews.com reported an approximate figure of 60,000 to 70,000 protesters, attributed to the Washington, D.C., fire department. In its reports, ABC News Radio described the crowd as "tens of thousands."

Finally, near day's end, Malkin finally addressed her bogus ABC News claim and pointed the finger of blame at FreedomWorks' Kibbe. (He's the one who first mentioned ABC News.) Malkin then thanked ABC News for "clearing this up," without noting that "this" was launched when Malkin broadcast a completely fictitious claim without the slightest hint of attribution and then waited most of the day to acknowledge her colossal blunder. And note that Malkin blamed Kibbe because Kibbe told the rally that ABC News had estimated the crowd to be between 1 million and 1.5 million. But Malkin told the world ABC News had claimed it was 2 million. So how was that Kibbe's fault?

Post-protest, some conservatives, such as Instapundit, still tried to push the phony 2 million claim by clinging to a typically awful and unsubstantiated article from the British press that originally suggested "up to two million people" marched on Washington. The article, though, lacked any sourcing. It was just another case of the British press regurgitating a right-wing lie. (The article was later changed to include an equally misleading claim: "As many as one million people flooded into Washington for a massive rally.")

By Saturday night, RedState blogger Erick Erickson, conceding the 2 million number was pure fantasy, did his best to clear up the confusion:

I've been talking all night to people who are there and involved. The 2 million number was generated by the media, but truly seems to be a gross inflation of what is there.

And with that we traveled full circle in the unstable world of the right-wing blogosphere. According to press-hating Erickson, it was the media that concocted the wildly inflated 2 million number. (ABC News again?) In the new, sanitized telling, Malkin's dirty hands, of course, had been completely washed and her leading role in the embarrassing charade had been forgotten and forgiven. Because at the end of the day, it was the media's fault all along.

9/12 March 'Tea Party' Photo: False Image Spread By Anti-Reform Activists

From Think Progress

Tea Party protesters trying to tout the size of their march on Washington last weekend have been passing around a photo of a packed National Mall. But the picture is years old. Politifact asked Pete Piringer, public affairs officer for the D.C. Fire and Emergency Department, if the rally was big enough to fill that space. Piringer said no -- and moreover, the picture can't be from 2009.

"It was an impressive crowd," he said. But after marching down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol the crowd "only filled the Capitol grounds, maybe up to Third Street," he said.

Yet the photo showed the crowd sprawling far beyond that to the Washington Monument, which is bordered by 15th and and 17th Streets.

There's another big problem with the photograph: it doesn't include the National Museum of the American Indian, a building located at the corner of Fourth St. and Independence Ave. that opened on Sept. 14, 2004. (Looking at the photograph, the building should be in the upper right hand corner of the National Mall, next to the Air and Space Museum.) That means the picture was taken before the museum opened exactly five years ago. So clearly the photo doesn't show the "tea party" crowd from the Sept. 12 protest.

"I've seen bigger crowds at Montreal Expos games, but I still wouldn't fake a photo just to justify your predictions of millions descending on Washington," said one gleeful Democratic media strategist. "This is grade-A stupid and just plays into the argument that these were astroturf protests to begin with. They've always brought the noise, but the question that was supposed to be answered this weekend was, could they bring the numbers? In that respect this was an unmitigated disaster."

The photo had been circulated on blogs and Twitter. A number of conservative blogs have since taken the photo down. Some have corrected their posts. Others say the circulation of the picture was a left-wing conspiracy to discredit the event. However, many of them are still claiming that at least a million people attended the march. Nate Silver estimates about 70,000 protesters showed up.

It isn't the first failed attempt by the protesters to inflate the size of the event. On Saturday, organizer Matt Kibbe announced on stage that ABC News had estimated a crowd of 1 to 1.5 million. ABC News had reported no such thing.

Pressed On FreedomWorks’ Connections To Tea Parties, Dick Armey Lashes Out At TP As ‘Juvenile Delinquents’

By Lee Fang

On Thursday, Dick Armey’s FreedomWorks partnered with an anti-health reform group pushing to privatize Medicare to host a Republican rally outside the Capitol. Alongside speakers such as Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) and Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA), Armey proclaimed, “Give me liberty or give me death. Well, Barack Obama is trying to make good on that.”

Speaking to reporters and ThinkProgress after the rally, Armey pretended that the upcoming 9/12 anti-Obama march on D.C. was entirely “grassroots,” and that his corporate-backed group only provided “consulting.” In fact, most of the groups paying for the rally are front groups and phony think tanks fully-funded by big business to create an image of public and academic support for their special interest agenda. One of the most visible organizations mobilizing the protest this Saturday is the Tea Party Patriots group. As Talking Points Memo has reported, the Tea Party Patriots’ listserv is managed by FreedomWorks staffer Tom Gaitens. Not only is the list managed by FreedomWorks, but Armey’s staffers have final say on decisions such as the logo for the event this Saturday. Tea Party Patriots does not even hide its close affiliation with corporate front groups, since it lists FreedomWorks as a coalition partner. The Tea Party Patriots listserv was used to distribute the infamous memo from a Tea Party Patriots volunteer detailing how town hall attendees should “rattle” Democrats by interrupting their events with coordinated yelling and shrieks.

When ThinkProgress asked Armey about this close relationship with the Tea Party Patriots, he erupted in rage. He also denied even knowing his own employee:

Q: Mr. Armey you said you have no affiliation with the Tea Party Patriots group that’s organizing this rally, but isn’t it true that your staff members manage the Tea Party Patriots list serv?

ARMEY: Absolutely not.

Q: So Tom Gaitens is not connected to your–

ARMEY: Who? First of all who is Tom Gaitens?

Watch it:

Armey proceeded to call the ThinkProgress reporter a “juvenile delinquent.” Armey has lashed out before at critical questions, attacking Joan Walsh, saying “I am so damn glad you can never be my wife ’cause I surely wouldn’t have to listen to that babble from you every day.”

Gaitens — who helped organize the very first pilot “tea party” protests in February and demanded that “folks … need to intimidate Congress” — is listed multiple times on the FreedomWorks’ website as the Florida Outreach Director for Armey. He has not only won awards from FreedomWorks, but he also helped organize a tea party this year where Armey was the main speaker.

Of course, Armey’s deception is the very basis on which FreedomWorks gins up support for its causes. FreedomWorks maintains several other domain addresses to promote tea party events. Last year, the Wall Street Journal exposed FreedomWorks for building “amateur-looking” websites to promote the lobbying interests of Armey.

Radical, Racist Signs Featured At 9/12 March

This morning(yesterday morning) on ABC’s Good Morning America, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) embraced the protesters at today’s 9/12 March in Washington, DC, saying that he was “glad they’re here to take back their country.” He characterized the attendees as nonpartisan, adding that “it’s not about President Obama. It’s not about the Democrats.” Several other Republican lawmakers, including Reps. Tom Price (GA), Mike Pence (IN), Marsha Blackburn (T), and Phil Gingrey (GA) planned to attend and speak at the event.

Members of ThinkProgress attended today’s march and the signs carried by these protesters were hardly nonpartisan — and were often racist, radical portrayals of Obama, despite DeMint’s claim. Some examples of what we saw:

In an interview with the Washington Independent, DeMint claimed that the attendees at the march were “a cross-section of the population.” When it was pointed out to him that almost everyone there was white, DeMint simply said, “It’s probably just the time and organization and the media that promoted it.”

Mark McKinnon, a former adviser to Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) presidential campaign, has warned conservatives from embracing events like the 9/12 March. “It’s bad for Republicans because in the absence of any real leadership, the freaks fill the void and define the party,” McKinnon said.

Update More signs from the event here, including ones that say, "Thank 'God' 4 Fox" and "Ayn Rand was right." Other signs showed Obama as a "Democratic Socialism" and called him a "bloodsucking...alien." More offensive signs here and here and here.

Update At today's march, DeMint repeated his Waterloo remarks, announcing to the crowd, "Ladies and Gentlemen: Welcome to Waterloo!" He claimed that the health care debate is "a critical battle for the heart and soul of America, and for freedom itself. Freedom fighters are outnumbered in congress, but not in America. If you continue to stand up and speak out, we will save freedom in America."

Update Birthers also showed up today:

Update We saw another protester wearing a t-shirt calling himself a "freedom rider." The real freedom riders were civil rights activists who rode buses into the segregated South in the 1960s:

Update DeMint told Fox News that today's attendees were "informed" and "outraged." "I've never been so proud to be an American," he said. M.C.L comment: For Christ sake tea baggers just say what everybody already know you hate having the N-word as president, because they look like hypocrites they didn't care about personal freedom when Bush was taking white out to the constitution. Another part of their reason for why they don't like President Obama is government spending yet they didn't care when Bush didn't veto one GOP spending bill nor did they care that the Iraqi war on top of tax cuts for the richest two percent were causing the country to slip into the red and why didn't they hold protest rallies when they found out 9 billion in tax payer dollars went missing in Iraq? Lastly they claimed they're being taxed too much, never mind the only people that are looking at tax increases are those lucky few that make over 250,000 a year, but hey somebody gotta have the rich folks back right?

Michael Savage Dropped From "Flagship" Radio Station

By:Jason Linkins and via Think Progress

Via ThinkProgress comes the news that San Francisco radio station 910 KNEW has dropped conservative talk-show host Michael Savage(R-super nut) from its lineup. KNEW, which was Savage's "flagship station" dropped the righty talker in favor of "John and Ken," who the station manager reliably informs listeners are just as good as "Armstrong and Getty," whatever that means.

From KNEW's blog:

I'm going to answer the very first question many of you have.

"Why did you take Michael Savage off the air?"

Here's your no-spin direct answer; we have decided to go in a different philosophical and ideological direction, featuring more contemporary content and more local information. The Savage Nation does not fit into that vision.

You can take a look at KNEW's revised lineup, here. As usual, I'll point out that this has nothing to do with the "Fairness Doctrine."

The San Francisco Chronicle attempted to reach Savage for comment. It went about as well as you might expect:

So we called Michael to ask him what's up. His response: "Why don't you call Mao Zedong? He's your boss."

After we stopped laughing, we called back, noted that Mao is still dead and asked for a call back. Until we get one, we'll be reading our favorite little red book.

Don't worry about Michael -- for those of you who are. Not only are his ratings strong across the country, he's already called at least one San Francisco station Thursday, presumably in search for a new home.

The Savage Nation website alerts listeners in the Bay Area that Michael Savage can still be heard on KSTE 650.

Right-Wing Health Care Group Misled Canadian Interviewees Who Appeared In Anti-Reform Ads

By Zaid Jilani

Earlier this year, Conservatives for Patients Rights (CPR), an anti-health care reform group led by the disgraced former CEO of Columbia/HCA Healthcare Rick Scott, began running a commercial attacking the Canadian health care system. The TV ad runs through “tragic stories” of Canadian citizens who it portrays as being against government-run health plans such as Canada’s Medicare system. Watch it:

Now, CTV British Columbia is reporting that CPR misled several of the interviewees who appeared in their ads. One of them, Charlie Wadge, feels that the ad unfairly portrayed Canada’s system as “barbaric“:

A B.C. man featured in a series of American conservative health care ads says the videos portray the Canadian medicare system as “barbaric” — and that goes too far. [...]

“They just made it sound way worse than it was,” he said. “They made it sound barbaric — like we don’t have a health care system at all.” [...]

The patients were recruited by Rick Baker, a B.C.-based consultant for Timely Medical Services, which matches disillusioned Canadian patients with American hospitals, and Dr. Brian Day, who runs a private hospital at Cambie Surgery Centre in Vancouver. [...]

[Wadge] feels terrible that his words are being used to slow health care reform in the United States. He said if given the choice again, he would decline to appear in any ad.

“I think everyone should have health care,” he said.

This isn’t the first time CPR has misled its interview subjects. Last month, the Daily Mail reported that CPR tricked British women into appearing in its ad series slamming the British single-payer health care system known as the National Health Service.

While CPR’s misleading ads portray the Canadian single-payer health care system as unpopular and unable to provide care for the Canadian public, the reality is completely different. A bi-national poll conducted last year found that 91 percent of Canadians say they have a better health care system than the United States (a plurality of Americans agree). Indeed, the Commonwealth Fund ranks Canada ahead of the United States in terms of “dimensions of access, patient safety, efficiency, and equity.” And as Gov. Brian Schweitzer (D-MT) says, “there’s more likelihood of a person in Canada being struck by lightning than there is a likelihood of a Canadian going to the United States for their health care.”

Michigan Chamber Of Commerce Embraces Glenn Beck, Invites Him To Be A Keynote Speaker

By Brad Johnson

On his Fox News show this past Wednesday, right-wing extremist Glenn Beck claimed, “The uber-left is in business with big business.” But next Tuesday, Beck is keynoting a U.S. Chamber of Commerce forum in Michigan sponsored by several major corporations, including AT&T, Comcast, and Dow Corning.

Although Beck’s race-baiting and McCarthyism have led a massive advertiser boycott of his Fox News program, the largest business lobby in the United States has chosen to embrace him as the “dinner keynote speaker” for the 2009 “Future Forum” at Michigan State University’s Kellog Forum on September 15th:

Beck has called President Obama a “socialist,” a “Marxist,” and a “racist” with a “deep-seated hatred of white people.” It may not come as a surprise that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, with its right-wing agenda of blocking health care reform, clean energy legislation, and workers’ rights, is embracing Glenn Beck’s hate and fearmongering.

Tomorrow, Beck is broadcasting live on Fox News from Washington D.C. to promote the “9/12 Project,” Beck’s tearful mobilization against “socialism.” The 9/12 march is bankrolled by right wing organizations such as the Competitive Enterprise Institute, FreedomWorks, the National Taxpayers Union, and GrassFire.org. These front groups are themselves backed by ExxonMobil, Koch Industries, HealthFirst, and other corporate titans who aim to maintain their windfall profits under the status quo.

The top sponsors of the Michigan event are Comcast, AT&T, and Consumers Energy. AT&T is on the board of the Chamber of Commerce but has pulled its ads from Glenn Beck’s show. Other Chamber members who have stopped advertising on Beck — but are giving him a platform in Michigan — include Aegon, CVS, State Farm Insurance, and UPS.

M.C.L comment:

It seems there's a need to make a couple of calls to Comcast, AT&T and Consumers Energy to let them know letting a racist and all around d-bag to speak isn't a good idea.

Health Care Bill To Cover Undocumented Immigrants? False.

ByJason Linkins

Over at Media Matters, Eric Boehlert calls out the media for covering Rep. Joe Wilson's interjectory fireworks during President Obama's address to a joint session of Congress on Wednesday night without delving into whether Wilson was correct in his assertion -- that Obama was lying when he said that illegal immigrants would not qualify for credits for the proposed health care exchanges:

What's been completely glossed over by the press is the fact that the "You Lie!" was itself built upon a lie. That the rude outburst was yet more GOP misinformation. Instead, too many in the press treat the exchange as a he said/he said. i.e. Obama claimed illegal immigrants won't be covered, and Wilson called him a liar. What are the facts? Which man was telling the truth? The press won't say.

In an update, Boehlert credits Michael Scherer at Time Magazine for digging into Wilson's claim. But he should also dole out a kudo to MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan, who invited Politifact's Bill Adair on the show to provide fact-checking of the speech. Ratigan got right to it, leading off the segment by asking Adair to rate the accuracy of Wilson's outburst, citing it as "the obvious [item] to fact check." Adair, noting that it was the first time he'd ever "fact-checked a heckler," said that he rated Wilson's assertion "false."

ADAIR: Obama is right. When you look at the bill, it does go to some lengths to make sure that illegal immigrants do not get the credits for the health care exchange that would allow them to get free care. They'd have to pay for it, like everybody else. False for Wilson.

Politifact goes into greater detail in its assessment here.

WATCH:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

[Would you like to follow me on Twitter? Because why not? Also, please send tips to tv@huffingtonpost.com -- learn more about our media monitoring project here.]

Limbaugh wishes Rep. Wilson didn't apologize

By.Stephen C. Webster

Pinning someone under a lie can be a tricky thing. It requires nuance, preparation, persuasion and resolve to convince a group that another person is or has been lying. This is especially true in preaching across ideological lines, where many are already inclined to believe the words of another.

Take Rush Limbaugh, for example. In a Thursday radio broadcast, the right-wing leader lamented Rep. Joe Wilson's (R-S.C.) apology for interrupting President Obama's speech with a jeer of, "You lie!"

"One of the things that's really irritated me all morning and last night," began Limbaugh, "was listening to Republicans, after Wilson had apologized -- and I wish he had not -- but he's apologized and, even after he's apologized, members of his own party are all over television denigrating him, 'Mmyeah it was bad decorum.'"

Limbaugh then claimed efforts to broaden access to health care are actually moves "to completely tear down the institutions and traditions that have made this country great."

He added: "He is lying, President Obama is. From the moment he opens his mouth until he ends the speech."

Wilson interrupted Obama's speech after a cascade of boos from Republicans triggered an explicit admonition from the president over alleged coverage for undocumented immigrants in the health insurance reform proposals.

"This too is false," Obama said. "The reforms I am proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally."

"You lie!" jeered Wilson.

A cavalry of condemnation rode through the chamber. Even Republicans joined in.

"That's not true," said Obama.

Limbaugh added that he was shouting "You're lying" at his television through the entire thing.

Shout as he may, on this point the president is truthful.

In the America's Affordable Health Choices Act (PDF link) legislation currently circulating the House, page 243, Sec. 246 reads:

SEC. 246. NO FEDERAL PAYMENT FOR UNDOCUMENTED ALIENS. Nothing in this subtitle shall allow Federal payments for affordability credits on behalf of individuals who are not lawfully present in the United States.

In plain(er) speak, that means no government subsidies will be appropriated to make an illegal immigrant's health coverage cheaper. Citizens and legal residents are the only groups covered.

An interesting passage, considering how many Republicans have loudly called on Congress to "read the bill."

While there are several competing packages of reform legislation at the moment, it would appear as though Mr. Limbaugh and Rep. Wilson did not abide by their own constituents' advice.

M.C.L comment: Rush is so full of dog crap, if any Democratic congressmen got up and called Bush a liar(which Bush was a liar) the Republicans and their storm troopers in the right wing media would declare an war on that Democratic congress person. The right wing used this mythical reason of well the Democrats did it to Bush, as far to the left some members of the Democrats in the congress not one of them interrupted Bush by calling him a liar during one of his speeches.

Which brings up what I've been saying even before President Obama got swore in, the Republicans and their whores in the right wing media will magically remember there's something called freedom of speech and they're going to excise their rights to voice their displeasure with President Obama even though they made sure critics of George W. Bush were kept silent or face retaliation i.e. the Dixie Chicks.

For the right wing to act like people on the left or elected Democratic office holders had the same level of freedom voicing their opinions of George W. Bush is a lie, just watching the documentary "Shut up and Sing" proves it. If you was a high profile Bush critic you probably got enough hate mail that you could make two books out of them or if you're one of the lucky ones you got death threats from probably one of these proud tea baggers that's screaming about their first amendment right.

Right-wing group sponsoring Republican doctors rally supports privatizing Medicare.

By Lee Fang

The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, a right-wing group that filed an amicus brief supporting Rush Limbaugh in his fight to keep his medical records private amid charges of doctor-shopping to obtain pain medication, was present with a booth at the FreedomWorks rally on Capitol Hill today. AAPS is sponsoring another event this afternoon with Republican leaders, including Rep. Tom Price (R-GA) and Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-GA). ThinkProgress caught up with an AAPS staffer, who explained that the group not only opposes health reform, but also supports privatizing Medicare:

Q: So you prefer a privatization of Medicare?

AAPS: Of Medicare? [...] Yes. We don’t think it’s very efficient at all.

Watch it:

The AAPS booth was busy making “homemade” protest signs and passing out invitations to a National Republican Campaign Committee reception at the NRCC’s fundraising offices in DC. View the invitation the AAPS handed out here.

GOP Lawmakers Treat President Obama’s Joint Address To Congress Like A Town Hall Protest

note Think Progress has updated the story at the bottom

Tonight during his joint address to Congress, President Obama attempted to set the record straight on some of the “key controversies” surrounding the health care debate. While it’s normal for members of the opposition party to occasionally not clap at statements with which they disagree, congressional Republicans went further tonight, being outright rude at times.

At one point, President Obama addressed the myth that his health care proposals would insure undocumented immigrants: “This, too, is false – the reforms I’m proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally.”

In response, Republicans not only began booing him, but Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) shouted out, “LIE!” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) shot an angry look in his direction, and Vice President Biden shook his head. The rudeness shocked even veteran political observers such as NBC’s Chuck Todd, who wrote on Twitter, “Wow. What’s next a duel?” MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough also wrote, “Whoever shouted out that the president was lying is a dumbass who should show the President respect.” On MSNBC after the speech, Newsweek reporter Howard Fineman said, “The Republicans were mostly stage props in this speech tonight and they behaved like it.”

Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) could also be seen wearing a homemade sign — similar to the ones seen at town hall protests — around his neck, which read, “What bill?” Watch it:

Various Republican lawmakers were also holding up draft GOP bills during the speech:

Transcript:

Still, given all the misinformation that’s been spread over the past few months, I realize that many Americans have grown nervous about reform. So tonight I’d like to address some of the key controversies that are still out there.

Some of people’s concerns have grown out of bogus claims spread by those whose only agenda is to kill reform at any cost. The best example is the claim, made not just by radio and cable talk show hosts, but prominent politicians, that we plan to set up panels of bureaucrats with the power to kill off senior citizens. Such a charge would be laughable if it weren’t so cynical and irresponsible. It is a lie, plain and simple.

There are also those who claim that our reform effort will insure illegal immigrants. This, too, is false – the reforms I’m proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally. And one more misunderstanding I want to clear up – under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions, and federal conscience laws will remain in place.

My health care proposal has also been attacked by some who oppose reform as a “government takeover” of the entire health care system. As proof, critics point to a provision in our plan that allows the uninsured and small businesses to choose a publicly-sponsored insurance option, administered by the government just like Medicaid or Medicare.

Update Republicans are now coming out and condemning their colleague. On CNN, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) said that Wilson's outburst was "totally disrespectful": "He should apologize immediately." Rep. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) said, "I thought that was unfortunate. [Obama's] the president. He deserves more respect than that."

Update CNN has posted a picture of Wilson's heckling:

Update On Fox Business News, Karl Rove and host Neil Cavuto thought Wilson shouting at the President was hilarious. "Joe Wilson, good guy," said Rove. "Lovely," agreed Cavuto.

Update Wilson apologizes:

“This evening I let my emotions get the best of me when listening to the President’s remarks regarding the coverage of illegal immigrants in the health care bill. While I disagree with the President’s statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable. I extend sincere apologies to the President for this lack of civility.”

Update After Obama's speech, chief of staff Rahm Emanuel reportedly "approached two Republican House leaders, Roy Blunt and Paul Ryan and said, 'No president has ever had that happen,' and urged them to have the lawmaker M.C.L comment: I love right wing hypocrisy just as much I love right wing fake outrage, and I really love the part where Karl Rove praises Joe Wilson(not the Joe Wilson who got his wife outed) for calling President Obama a liar. Now could image Karl Rove's reaction if Barney Frank or Dennis Kucinich screamed "that's a lie"during one of President Bush's speech to congress? The right wing would declared war on them Hannity would talked about about it for weeks, Rush while popping some blue pills and planning another trip to the Dominican Republic would be telling his listeners how calling Bush a liar in time of war is hurting the troops and Karl Rove would be emailing each of Rush and Hannity clones telling them what to say.

Glenn Beck no stranger to conspiracy theories or incendiary rhetoric

From Media Matters

Beck flirts with the idea that FEMA is building detention camps

Beck: "I can't debunk" FEMA camps conspiracy theory. In March, Beck stated: "We are a country that is headed towards socialism, totalitarianism, beyond your wildest imagination. I have to tell you, I'm doing a story tonight that I wanted to debunk these FEMA camps." Beck further stated: "I'm tired of hearing -- I wanted to debunk them. Well, we've now for several days done research on them. I can't debunk them. And we're going to carry the story tonight. ... [I]t is our government. If you trust our government, it's fine. If you have any kind of fear that we might be headed towards a totalitarian state, look out, buckle up. There is something going on in our country that is -- ain't good." [Fox News' Fox & Friends, 3/3/09] (Beck eventually managed to "debunk" this theory.)

Beck fearmongers that Obama is "genius architect" bent on forcing people to work for ACORN, AmeriCorps

Beck says Obama "wants you to work as a bureaucratic slave to government." From the July 24 edition of Fox News' Glenn Beck:

BECK: Well, if the jobs never go away, then why don't you we just raise the minimum wage to $50 an hour? How about $100 an hour? How about $1,000 an hour? That should solve some issues, right? Of course not.

That's why economists are estimating -- wait a minute, the same economists that we're supposed to be listening to about bailing people out? I'm not sure we should listen to them. They're estimating that at least 300,000 jobs will be lost due to the minimum wage hike. That's huge considering that only 2.8 million workers in America earn the minimum wage.

So, why would Obama support a policy that directly hurts young people -- especially nearly half of African-American teenagers, who are already unemployed? Well, it makes sense if you're trying to transform America.

When Obama comes out and says the stimulus is working as planned while the economy is tanking, people assume he's either an idiot or he's lying. I don't think he's either. I think the man is a genius architect, quite frankly, and on this particular case, he's telling the truth.

What happens when kids can't get a job? They become discouraged, disenfranchised. They look for somewhere to land, and guess who's now there to swoop in? President Obama -- tonight, strangely, in these really long jeans -- President Obama and his new government program -- programs and community service organizations, not just AmeriCorps -- not just ACORN, but now AmeriCorps.

Do you remember Michelle Obama's words on the campaign trail?

MICHELLE OBAMA [audio clip]: Barack Obama will require you to work. Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual -- uninvolved, uninformed.

BECK: "Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual." Are we to believe that she's kidding or just haphazardly stringing words together and they came out in a sentence?

These people are steering our youth into community service. Ted Kennedy and his ilk are even pushing the idea of forced mandatory service. They're incentivizing working for the government with promises now of paying off college loans -- we told you this last night.

Of course, the catch is you have to -- you have to federalize your loan before they'll pay it. He wants you to work as a bureaucratic slave to government. You work for them for 10 years, and you don't have to worry about any debt for education.

Maybe I'm crazy for going down this road, but from what we already know about Washington, the truth is always stranger than fiction, and the sooner we realize that, the faster we're going to be able to stop and go down the road paved with a couple of bricks of common sense.[Fox News' Glenn Beck, 7/24/09]

Beck: Maybe Treasury is "selling black-market bonds." Discussing the reports of "two middle aged guys with Japanese passports who were stopped by Italian police after trying to enter Switzerland with $134.5 billion worth of U.S. treasury bonds," Beck said, "And this story has not been in The New York Times yet. That's weird, isn't it? That's why we're left with speculation." Among the possible "scenarios" that Beck explored was the possibility that "[t]he treasury or the Federal Reserve is selling black-market bonds or double-dealing some way or another." Beck explained:

And the fourth one [scenario] is really troubling. The treasury or the Federal Reserve is selling black-market bonds or double-dealing some way or another. Maybe because they know of the possible deflation of the dollar, they just can't -- they just can't sell this many bonds.

OK. The worst is if we're running another set of books. We are already running four sets of books in Washington, D.C., why would that surprise anybody? Hopefully, it's just keystone cops, but we don't know. These are guesses. No one is answering questions.

And if this story just dies, mark my word, America. Two years from now, when our dollar really starts to lose its value and we can't sell our bonds because we have too much debt and none of this stuff happen, it was keystone cops, this conspiracy theory will gain power. [Fox News' Glenn Beck, 6/19/09 (transcript from the Nexis database)]

Beck imitates Obama pouring gasoline on "average American"; says, "President Obama, why don't you just set us on fire?" From the April 9 edition of Fox News' Glenn Beck:

BECK: So what does Obama do, he says, boy, I'm not -- I'm just out of stuff to do. What else could I possibly do to the American people?

President Obama, why don't you just set us on fire? For the love of Pete, what are you doing? Do you not hear -- do you not hear the cries of people who are saying stop? We would like some sanity in our country for a second!

We didn't vote to lose the republic. We didn't vote for any of this stuff. We voted for change.

[...]

BECK: We can disagree with each other on policies, but Good Lord Almighty, man, please. Some of us don't agree with all of the policies. We'd like to have a country left in the end of four years. No need to set us on fire. [Fox News' Glenn Beck, 4/9/09]

Beck sees fascism and communism everywhere

Beck: U.S. government under Bush and Obama moving us "into a system of fascism." Beck said: "I am not saying that Barack Obama is a fascist. I'm not saying the Democrats are a fascist. I'm saying the government under Bush and under Obama and under -- under all of the presidents that we've seen, or at least most of the presidents that we've seen for quite some time, are slowly but surely moving us away from our republic and into a system of fascism." [Fox News' Glenn Beck, 4/1/09]

Beck on health care: "This system is going to come out the other side dictorial -- it's going to come out a fascist state." Beck told a caller: "Let me tell you something, the end game ... for Congress and this president -- and I don't know how many members of Congress even realize the game that they are either being used in or a pawn in. But believe me, they'll take ... the universal health care coverage over what ... skin they do have in it. They're going to come out -- this system is going to come out the other side dictorial [sic] -- it is going to come out a fascist state." [Premiere Radio Network's The Glenn Beck Program, 7/27/09]

Beck: "You have the artwork of Mussolini there, here in New York at Rockefeller Plaza." Beck analyzed the artwork decorating Rockefeller Plaza, and concluded, "So you have the hammer and the sickle. You have the artwork to Mussolini there, here in New York at Rockefeller Plaza." Beck said of a decoration on the Rockefeller building:

So, let's just take it piece by piece, and I'll show you what this means.

First, the sun. The sun represents the bright tomorrow. Right here, underneath the boy, here is the sun. Show me the boy. This is the youth. The next one is the youth here, leading the way. Notice he is ahead of the horses. He's leading the way into the bright future of tomorrow.

Now, this man standing on a chariot, the wheel. The wheel is always representative of industry in any of these progressive pictures or paintings or artwork. So you've got the wheel. Now, let's go to the horses, please. He is standing on a chariot. You've got the industry and the engines of industry, but who's in the back here?

Let's show you his hand. This man's strong hand is holding on to the reins tightly here, holding back the engines of industry being led into the bright future of tomorrow by a young boy. Who is this? Who is this?

This is the strong leader taking that -- using that industry and those machines to lead us into the bright future led by our children. Gee, who's having indoctrination next week? Oh, yeah, that's right. The president. Completely unrelated.

This represents, at the time this was made, Mussolini. This was Mussolini. By the way, the artist that made this -- his son, ironically and tragically died fighting the army of Mussolini years after this was made. This still is up in Rockefeller Plaza.

So you have the hammer and the sickle. You have the artwork to Mussolini there, here in New York at Rockefeller Plaza. [Fox News' Glenn Beck, 9/2/09]

Beck claims Obama's "civilian national security force" is "what Hitler did with the SS," "what Saddam Hussein" did. Discussing Obama's "civilian national security force," Beck said, "I'm finding this -- this is the hardest part to connect to, because this is -- I mean, look, you know, David [Bellavia, former Army staff sergeant], what you just said is, you said, "I'm not comparing" -- but you are. I mean, this is what Hitler did with the SS. He had his own people. He had the brownshirts and then the SS. This is what Saddam Hussein -- so -- but you are comparing that. And I -- I mean, I think America would have a really hard time getting their arms around that." [Fox News' Glenn Beck, 8/27/09]

As Media Matters for America has repeatedly noted, Obama's comments about the necessity of a "civilian national security force" came from a July 2, 2008, speech on service and referred to expanding the foreign service, AmeriCorps, and the Peace Corps.

From Obama's July 2, 2008, speech in Colorado Springs, Colorado:

Today, AmeriCorps -- our nation's network of local, state, and national service programs -- has 75,000 slots. And I know firsthand the quality of these programs. My wife, Michelle, once left her job at a law firm and at City Hall to be a founding director of an AmeriCorps program in Chicago that trains young people for careers in public service. And these programs invest Americans in their communities and their country. They tap America's greatest resource -- our citizens.

And that's why as president, I will expand AmeriCorps to 250,000 slots and make that increased service a vehicle to meet national goals like providing health care and education, saving our planet and restoring our standing in the world, so that citizens see their efforts connected to a common purpose. People of all ages, stations, and skills will be asked to serve. Because when it comes to the challenges we face, the American people are not the problem -- they are the answer.

So we are going to send -- we're going to send more college graduates to teach and mentor our young people. We'll call on Americans to join an Energy Corps to conduct renewable energy and environmental cleanup projects in their neighborhoods all across the country. We will enlist our veterans to find jobs and support for other vets, to be there for our military families. And we're going to grow our Foreign Service, open consulates that have been shuttered, and double the size of the Peace Corps by 2011 to renew our diplomacy.

We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.

Beck suggests health care reform designed as a system of backdoor reparations

Beck says all of Obama's policies rooted in "reparations." Beck said, "Everything that is getting pushed through Congress, including this health care bill, are transforming America. And they are all driven by President Obama's thinking on one idea: reparations." Beck later added that Obama's "goal is creating a new America, a new model, a model that will settle old racial scores through new social justice." [Fox News' Glenn Beck, 7/23/09]

— H.D.

M.C.L comment: Not only Glenn Beck is a liar, Beck uses the tactic of floating conspiracy theories out there to smear people or push across the right wing agenda but there is a parody site that's using Glenn Beck own tactic against him called "Did Glenn Beck murder and rape a young girl in 1990" while Keith Olbermann and others have admit they understand using Glenn Beck tactic against him but the way they using it lower the people that created the site to Beck's level (which is below the million level of hell) I agree the site does goes a little far with the question it ask yet I have to remind the critics of the site the conspiracy theories Beck and his marry band of right wing ass plugs floated out over the years are a million times worst remember Bill and Hillary Clinton had Vince Forster and other political rivals killed?

I wonder if this rumor manged to leak into mainstream press will Beck talk about it or get his flying monkey supporters to handle it on the DL?