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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Road Walker who wrote (318981)	1/7/2007 4:57:39 AM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1572942

Speaking of nut cases.............. Scarborough blasts O'Reilly for being GOP "suck-up" On the January 4 edition of MSNBC's Scarborough Country, host Joe Scarborough responded to Fox News host Bill O'Reilly's attacks on NBC and MSNBC by asserting that O'Reilly was "way off base on MSNBC, on NBC, and certainly on me. And I challenge you to debate me anytime, anyplace, anywhere." Scarborough further challenged O'Reilly to "find one thing I have said on this program over the past year that is not consistent with the conservative congressman who was against military adventurism when I was in Congress, that was against exploding deficits, that was against reckless spending, and was against turning Congress into the type of swamp that we Republicans have turned it into over the past six years." Concluding, Scarborough stated, "That doesn't make me liberal, that makes me conservative. That may make you, though, a suck-up, if you defend the Republicans that have done that to this country and to our party over the past six years." O'Reilly has recently taken to attacking NBC and MSNBC for what he perceived to be "Bush-hat[ing]" and "irresponsible" reporting of Saddam Hussein's execution. For instance, on the January 3 broadcast of his television show, O'Reilly asserted that "NBC News led the way" among the "Bush-hat[ing]" media because "elements over there" were "calling the execution a PR disaster for the USA." O'Reilly was presumably referring to a January 2 report on Saddam's execution by NBC News Middle East correspondent Richard Engel during NBC's Nightly News, in which Engel reported that the "execution wasn't just a PR disaster for the Iraqi government. The gallows were on a U.S. military base, and many in the region are blaming the U.S. for letting it happen." On the January 3 Scarborough Country, Scarborough first addressed O'Reilly's remarks, stating: "Bill O'Reilly says NBC News hates President Bush and sides with Saddam Hussein or at least feels sorry for Saddam Hussein because some of us questioned how the lynch mob took over the execution scene." Scarborough then went on to say that "today, the United States government appeared to share our concern over the way that disgusting spectacle played out." Scarborough later addressed Saddam's execution, explaining that he was "concerned about the United States of America and our reputation" because "there was a lynch mob, people screaming [Muqtada] al-Sadr's name while Saddam Hussein was being executed." Scarborough also said that the execution "was a debacle" and that "[a] lot of people are embarrassed, and they should be embarrassed, " because this is "a guy, who I've loathed for 20-30 years," and he appeared to be "the most dignified guy there." On the January 4 editions of both his television and radio shows, O'Reilly continued to attack NBC News' coverage of Saddam's execution. On his radio show, O'Reilly asserted that "[t]hey are an activist network now. They hate Bush across the board. They hate him. Their White House correspondent, David Gregory, hates him. The Today show hates him. The Nightly hates him. Everybody hates him, across the board." Further, on Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, O'Reilly stated that he was "disturbed by" NBC's reporting " because I don't believe it's honest. I believe it's a calculated decision to attack people in the hopes of getting viewers, which is sleazy to say the least." O'Reilly then claimed that every member of Today was liberal, including "[t]he weatherman." O'Reilly asserted that it was a "business decision to go to the left" to gain viewers. Additionally, on The O'Reilly Factor, O'Reilly falsely claimed, "There isn't one conservative ... not one conservative commentator that works for NBC News at this time." In fact, at least two MSNBC hosts -- Scarborough and Tucker Carlson -- are known conservatives. Scarborough is a former Republican Florida Congressman and Carlson is a well-known conservative commentator who used to write for the conservative publications Policy Review and the Weekly Standard, in addition to formerly being the conservative co-host of CNN's now-canceled program Crossfire. On January 4, Scarborough devoted a segment of his program to responding to O'Reilly's fresh attacks on NBC, in which he noted O'Reilly's falsehood that "not one conservative commentator ... works for NBC News." Scarborough also took O'Reilly to task for noting that White House press secretary Tony Snow called Gregory a "partisan," without noting that Snow apologized for doing so. Scarborough concluded the segment by issuing a challenge to O'Reilly: SCARBOROUGH: Bill O'Reilly ... You're ... way off base on MSNBC, on NBC and certainly on me. And I challenge you to debate me anytime, anyplace, anywhere, and find one thing I have said on this program over the past year that is not consistent with the conservative congressman who was against military adventurism when I was in Congress, that was against exploding deficits, that was against reckless spending, and was against turning Congress into the type of swamp that we Republicans have turned it into over the past six years. That doesn't make me liberal, that makes me conservative. That may make you, though, a suck-up, if you defend the Republicans that have done that to this country and to our party over the past six years. As Media Matters for America has previously noted, O'Reilly has argued that "if you attack someone publicly ... you have an obligation to face the person you are smearing. If you don't, you are a coward." Yet, despite this pledge, O'Reilly has not hosted a single NBC representative to address his very public attacks. Scarborough and O'Reilly recently clashed after O'Reilly blasted NBC News' decision to refer to the ongoing sectarian violence in Iraq as a "civil war," as Media Matters noted. On the November 28 edition of The O'Reilly Factor, O'Reilly said, "[T]he American media is not helping anyone by oversimplifying the situation and rooting for the USA to lose in Iraq." After airing the clip on the November 29 broadcast of Scarborough Country, Scarborough said O'Reilly is "suggesting that NBC is rooting for America to lose in Iraq" and asked: "What is going on at Fox News? Why is Bill O'Reilly claiming that my network, NBC News, is rooting for terrorists? That's truly insulting to me." mediamatters.org

To: Road Walker who wrote (318981)	1/7/2007 5:03:13 AM
From: tejek	Respond to of 1572942

cbsnews.com

To: Road Walker who wrote (318981)	1/7/2007 3:28:00 PM
From: tejek	Respond to of 1572942

re: Recently, the rightie bloggers made a big thing about the AP not having creditable sources in Iraq... The nut cases are the only ones left supporting the war. Shorty and his lot. Not even worth paying attention to them. And still Bush is increasing the number of troops in Iraq by 20K. The guy is evil.

To: Road Walker who wrote (318981)	1/7/2007 4:19:00 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1572942

Do you know Hinsdale? I have to admit in this case the replacement house is not bad looking at all and is mostly correct architecturally. You should see the replacements for teardowns in LA and Seattle.........UGLLLYYYY! Stemming the tide of old-house teardowns A new home sits on property once occupied by a historic red brick cottage designed in the 1920s by architect R. Harold Zook, sometimes called the Frank Lloyd Wright of Hinsdale, Ill. The cottage was moved, and builders are nearly finished with the $5.5 million three-story, six-bedroom mansion that replaced By Michael Tarm HINSDALE, Ill. — It was a rare occurrence in a community with a national reputation for tearing down old houses: A developer bought the historic cottage at 327 S. Oak St. but didn't bulldoze it into oblivion. The norm in this leafy Chicago suburb and in affluent communities around the country has been to allow builders to demolish older homes to make way for far larger, far flashier houses — dubbed "McMansions" by critics. But a teardown tide that surged for a decade has begun to turn, largely because of a housing-market slump, but also thanks to the growing influence of preservationists. As a five-year real-estate boom fizzled this year, teardowns plummeted by at least 20 percent nationally, roughly corresponding to the drop in housing starts, said Stephen Melman of the National Association of Home Builders. At the same time, though, preservationists across the country have exerted increasing influence in a quest to protect historic neighborhoods. "The whole issue of preservation is more on the radar of all communities," said Genell Scheurell, a Chicago representative for the Washington, D.C.-based National Trust for Historic Preservation. "It absolutely wasn't the case 10 years ago." National Association of Home Builders: www.nahb.org The small, curvy, red-bricked cottage was designed in the 1920s by architect R. Harold Zook, sometimes called the Frank Lloyd Wright of Hinsdale. So when a developer said he intended to demolish the house, preservationists scrambled to save it. "A lot of people said the Zook house was the line in the sand," said Bob Saigh, who took the lead in saving the home. "It was a galvanizing situation." Preservationists arranged to have the 82-year-old house lifted intact and rolled a mile and a half to park land donated by the village. Workers are putting the finishing touches on a three-story, six-bedroom mansion listed at $5.5 million on the lot where the two-bedroom Zook house stood. "The builder admired the house, but it was in his way," Saigh said. "It was move it or lose it." Hinsdale, a 133-year-old village about 20 miles west of Chicago, gained notoriety years ago in preservationist circles. "It's been the poster child for teardowns," said Royce Yeater, who heads the Midwest office of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. About 30 percent of Hinsdale's 4,700 homes replaced ones that were razed, giving the village the dubious distinction of having one of the highest teardown rates in the U.S. "Other places are nervous with 10 percent teardowns," said village Trustee Jean Follett, a committed preservationist. "We say, 'Ha! That's nothing!' " National teardown figures are not compiled and are difficult to assess, but the National Association of Home Builders has estimated that 75,000 houses are razed and replaced with larger homes every year. The National Trust says Chicago's suburbs, California's Bay Area, Palm Springs and neighborhoods around Washington, D.C., are among the hardest-hit areas. "Teardowns spread through a community like a cancer," Richard Moe, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation said in an address in San Francisco last summer. "I believe they represent the biggest threat to America's older neighborhoods since the heyday of urban renewal and interstate highway construction. The pace of teardowns has amounted to an orgy of irrational destruction." Old neighborhoods need to be preserved so "that generations to come can live in them, learn from them, be sheltered and inspired by them," Moe said. To that end, preservation groups are issuing warnings as suburbs sprawl toward older communities. The Chicago suburb of Kenilworth, for example, was named this year as one of the nation's 11 most endangered places by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Thirty-three of the village's 850 homes have been razed since 2001. When a developer took steps to demolish a home designed by the firm of Daniel H. Burnham — a top American architect 100 years ago — placards protesting its destruction appeared in yards throughout the upscale community. Just before its scheduled demolition last year, a good Samaritan neighbor stepped in to buy the home for more than $2 million to save it. That controversy and the National Trust listing helped spur Kenilworth officials to action. The village board recently approved a zoning change that provides incentives for owners and developers to fix up old homes rather than tear them down. "They've had their head in the sand a lot in Kenilworth," said David Bahlman, head of the Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois. "But the good thing is the issue is out there now. Officials know they need to do something." Follett said there's also newfound agreement among Hinsdale trustees. "It's unanimously for preservation, which is a change," she said. Following the national trend, Hinsdale is expected to issue fewer than 80 teardown permits in 2006 — well below last year's record of 118. Moving the Zook house last year might have helped galvanize the preservationist cause, but no one suggests that the project serves as a model for saving other homes. That, Follett said, will come with other initiatives, including granting landmark status to more buildings to make them off limits to developers. So far, 19 have the designation. Some municipalities have established historic districts in which teardowns are banned outright. Hinsdale would like to do something similar, Follett said. Still, few think teardowns are a thing of the past, however delighted preservationists are about the current downward trend. The potential profits of teardowns simply are too attractive to dissuade developers for long, said Daniel McMillen, who heads the Center for Urban Real Estate at the University of Illinois at Chicago. "Some people might argue that the teardown market was a bubble and now that bubble has burst," McMillen said. "But I don't think that is the case. I think the teardown market will bounce back." Copyright © 2006 The Seattle Times Company seattletimes.nwsource.com