David Swindle maintains the David Horowitz cult of personality in an Aug. 8 NewsReal post devoted to "The 10 Most Important David Horowitz Books to Read":
One of the most common queries I’ve gotten from NewsReal Blog readers and bloggers alike is some guidance on which of David Horowitz’s books to read. Which are the most important? Which will help them understand his political approach and analysis of the Left the best? Which will be most useful in their own political fights?
It’s not an easy question as different people have different interests and will be moved by different books. Never the less, I’ve decided to create this guide listing what — in my personal opinion — are the ten most important of David’s books to read — and I’ve ranked them in order.
Thanks for sharing. Not quite the wonk-Tiger-Beat tone of previousposts, but still yet another reminder that it's still all about the increasingly Lenin-like visage of Chairman David.
NewsReal Declares Levin-Palin Re-Engagement 'A Coup for the Left' Topic: Horowitz
In one of the dumbest blog posts we've seen in a while, Ann Kane uses a July 17 NewsReal post to go on a tirade about the re-engagement of Levi Johnston and Bristol Palin, declaring it "A Coup for the Left."
How so? It's all the fault of that homewrecker Kathy Griffin! Kane helpfully explains:
Scenario: Sarah Palin’s seventeen-year-old daughter comes home and tells her she’s pregnant. Sarah takes it hard, and tells her they will handle it. Her daughter plans to marry the father of the child.
Within months of Palin losing the election, Levi dumps her daughter for a forty-nine year-old leftist foul mouth comedienne, Kathy Griffin, who has a highly public relationship with him. Then he poses nude for Playgirl magazine.
At Palin’s convention debut, Levi was obviously caught up in the fanfare. Griffin, aka, hovering vulture looking for her next prey in her crusade to wipe out decency from civilization, swept in on Levi, and took advantage of his fifteen minutes of fame. Griffin saw in Levi a messenger from whom she could launch her vitriol against Sarah Palin.
Just one little problem: There was never a relationship between Johnston and Griffin. The New York Daily News article Kane links to as evidence of the alleged affair clearly states the two "never actually dated" and it was all a "comedic charade."
But forget the facts -- Kane is on a roll:
Celebrities like Griffin hate the wholesome goodness of Palin. She tried to destroy the former Alaska governor by seducing the her star struck future son-in-law. Now that Levi’s going to marry Bristol nonetheless, what’s Griffin going to do, fade into the background? I doubt it. Heaven forbid the Palin clan should let Levi, with his despicable past, into their home again.
Um, yeah. Glad to see the standards for being a NewsReal blogger remain as highasalways.
NewsReal Blogger Likens Obama to Charles Manson Topic: Horowitz
Here's some five-alarm Obama derangement from NewsReal's Kathy Barkulis:
Charles Manson claimed he was trying to start a race war when he killed Sharon Tate and the others in Los Angeles 40 or so years ago but knew nothing about starting one. The people who are doing a good job of trying to start a race war now were barely out of diapers when Manson went on his killing spree. Attorney General Eric Holder, President Barack Obama, and the New Black Panther Party have joined forces to make sure that divisions remain between the races, and it’s all in the name of voter intimidation and getting Democrats elected. Or is there something else brewing too?
[...]
It is stunning that the first African American President and the first African American Attorney General are going to use their historic places in history to stick it to the white man.
Barkulis' entire premise, in addition to being hateful, is entirely baseless: The Bush administration, not the Obama administration, declined to charge the New Black Panthers, and the so-called whistleblower she's relying on is a right-wing activist with no firsthand knowledge of the claims he's making.
We've previously highlighted the cult-of-personality aspect of NewsReal, run by the David Horowitz Freedom Center mainly, it appears, for the glory of David Horowitz.
Another thing on the subject is worth mentioning: The avatar for NewsReal's Twitter account is, yes, the increasingly Lenin-like visage of David Horowitz. Which results in things like this (copied from TweetDeck):
FrontPageMag Repeats Bogus Obama-Soros Conspiracy Theory Topic: Horowitz
A June 22 FrontPageMag article by Tait Trussell repeats the conspiracy theory that President Obama is calling for a moritorium on oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico in order to benefit George Soros:
Could this be merely a happy coincidence for George Soros, the major financial backer of Obama’s presidential campaign who also has $811 million invested in the Brazilian oil company, Petrobras? Wasn’t it enough of a payback to Soros when the Obama Administration loaned up to $10 billion to Petrobras? Soros, with his far left-wing organization, MoveOn, is called the Godfather of world socialism. But most relevant currently is that he has been an enthusiastic proponent of global warming and environmental liberalism. He has urged adoption of a global carbon tax. Could it be more than coincidence that his position is strikingly similar to what Obama called for in his June 14 Oval Office speech on the Gulf oil spill and future energy actions?
In fact, the loan to Petrobras was made by the Export-Import Bank, not Obama. At the time the loan was made, the bank’s Bboard consisted of three Republicans and two Democrats, all of whom were appointed by President Bush.
FrontPageMag Selectively Criticizes Candidates' Falsified Military Records Topic: Horowitz
A June 9 FrontPageMag article by Rich Trzupek denounced Democrats who apparently made false claims about their military service, such as Richard Blumenthal and Phil Hare, as "arrogant." But Trzupek curiously looks over another candidate from Hare's state of Illinois accused of falsifying his military credentials: MarkKirk.
Then again, Kirk is a Republican, so that falsification apparently doesn't count in Trzupek's eyes.
I felt empty when "Avatar" ended. It was as if I had witnessed an angry man's vision of the world, a man who fails to see joy in a child's smile, but who sees conspiracies around every corner. He is a man who sees his fellow neighbor as evil personified.
"Avatar" proved, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Cameron is not much of a man. He is a child on a never-ending temper tantrum. Like all members of his extreme political faith, he lives in a fairy tale world, and so it causes rage when that carefully constructed vision of how things should be doesn't translate into reality. Perhaps this explains why he's known to be a tyrant himself and why he's had four failed marriages.
When all is said and done, "Avatar" is more about a man projecting his own self-hatred and self-loathing onto the screen than anything else. It's all about Cameron, the man who doesn't trust corporations, who claims that Western culture is ugly, racist and greedy. Yet, at the same time, Cameron is the man behind "Avatar's" stunning box office records and its release on DVD and Blu Ray which made him even richer than he already was.
As an aside, there is a reason why the DVD has no special features and why the Blu Ray, while slightly better, only has the bare minimum: they are planning to release a special edition of "Avatar" shortly before Christmas. This edition will have all the features we missed the first time around. And Cameron, corporations' main critic, knows full well that fans of his films will buy this second edition as well, which means he will make double his profit. In other words, if he wants a conspiracy, he should look in the mirror.
NewsReal may appear to be just another forum, but it's really just another tool in the aggrandization of David Horowitz.
First, there's the actual name of the blog in the nameplate: David Horowitz's NewsReal Blog. Since it's run by the David Horowitz Freedom Center, that's perhaps understandable.
Then there's the Litle Red Book-esque "From the Writings of David Horowitz" category at NewsReal, which hands out daily nuggets of Mao-like wisdom from Horowitz, complete with the ever-more-Lenin-like visage of Fearless Leader. These readings from the master are punctuated with actual blog posts from the man himself.
On top of all this, NewsReal's managing editor, David Swindle, says he's writing a book about "the ideas of David Horowitz." Gee, you think that's how he got the job?
It almost seems as if the Horowitz organizaiton is more a cult of personality than a political machine.
NewsReal Calls Obama's Mom A 'Hippy Sleazebag' Topic: Horowitz
An April 13 NewsReal post by some coward hiding behind the pseudonym "Van Helsing" (really? How unoriginal) describes Barack Obama's mother as a "hippy sleazebag."
That post links to a fuller one by the cowardly author at Right Wing News, where the words "hippy sleazebag" link to a website purporting to have nude pictures of her.
The coward is a sleazebag as well. David Horowitz must be so proud.
Last week, we wrote an item for Media Matters about Ralph Peters' nonsensical fearmongering over "voting rights for illegals" at FrontPageMag. In response, FrontPageMag published a column by Rich Trzupek that engaged in a lot of ad hominem attacks to defend Peters.
Ralph Peters Rants Against A Non-Existent Threat Topic: Horowitz
Ralph Peters served up a special brand of crazy in an April 2 FrontPageMag article, ranting against giving "illegals" voting rights -- something nobody has proposed to do -- and illustrated with a picture of heavily tattooed gang members as an apparent illustration of the "illegals" who would purportedly be given those voting rights.
NewsReal: Health Reform Supporters Like An Abusive Spouse Topic: Horowitz
For almost a decade I worked in a domestic violence shelter. I sat with women who were shaking, bruised and ashamed. They were in utter shock and disbelief at the violence that had just occurred. The names of the people in each woman’s story were different; but the story lines were remarkably the same.
Police responding to domestic violence calls can tell a similar story. Often times, the officer responding to a call finds a calm man sitting on the front porch steps, smoking a cigarette, quietly waiting for the police to arrive. He greets the officers, and coolly explains to them that his wife is inside, ranting and raving. “She’s crazy, out of her mind. I don’t know what her problem is.”
Her problem is she has just realized what has happened to her.
In much the same way, as Americans try to grasp what just hit them...
-- Rhonda Robinson, March 24 NewsReal post, who goes on to claim that "The difference between the anger so many Americans feel right now, is quite different than the hatred and rage that has long been a part of the Left’s political arsenal."
NewsReal Promotes Bogus Fishing Ban Claim Topic: Horowitz
A march 15 NewsReal blog post by Rhonda Robinson approvingly quotes a NewsReal commenter, whom she calls "entertaining and informative," making the claim that "the efforts to bring an end to sport fishing are neither rumor nor something that just popped up on the internet."
Actually, they're completely bogus. We'd cite Media Matters to back this up, but since NewsReal hates them, we'll have to go with no less a sporting authority than ESPN Outdoors, in which it essentially retracting a column that had forwarded the bogus claim:
ESPNOutdoors.com inadvertently contributed to a flare-up Tuesday when we posted the latest piece in a series of stories on President Barack Obama's newly created Ocean Policy Task Force, a column written by Robert Montgomery, a conservation writer for BASS since 1985. Regrettably, we made several errors in the editing and presentation of this installment. Though our series has included numerous news stories on the topic, this was not one of those -- it was an opinion piece, and should clearly have been labeled as commentary.
And while our series overall has examined several sides of this topic, this particular column was not properly balanced and failed to represent contrary points of view. We have reached out to people on every side of the issue and reported their points of view -- if they chose to respond -- throughout the series, but failed to do so in this specific column.
Is that good enough for Robinson and her favorite commenter? Probably not -- they probably would much rather promote anti-Obama conspiracies.
