Conservative – praag.org

Daily Show: Brainwashing a generation with lies

Brian Williams lied about his personal exploits many times, but Jon Stewart was unabashedly and habitually dishonest. Any standard liberal publication was as likely to contain an unflattering thought about Stewart as L’Osservatore Romano is to run a hit piece on the pope.

Though Stewart has often claimed he does a “fake news show,” “The Daily Show” isn’t that. It’s a real news show punctuated with puns, jokes, asides and the occasional moment of staged sanctimony.

It contains real, unstaged sound bites about the days’ events and interviews about important policy matters.

Stewart is a journalist: an irresponsible and unprofessional one.

Stewart uses his funnyman status as a license to dispense with even the most minimal journalistic standards. Get both sides of the story?

Hey, I’m just a comedian, man. Try to be responsible about what the real issues are? Dude, that’s too heavy, we just want to set up the next d- -k joke.

Stewart is often derided by the right as having minimal impact and low ratings. That’s not true. He and Stephen Colbert ruled the late-night ratings among 18-to 34-year-olds for most of the last five years, though Jimmy Fallon has lately surpassed both.

About 522,000 Americans in that age range watch “The Daily Show” on an average night, but that means many millions of occasional viewers, with millions more watching clips online.

To a key audience, he was a strong influence. Longtime Cooper Union history professor Fred Siegel says his students constantly came to him repeating Stewart’s talking points.

College students, of course, are both little acquainted with realities of adult existence and walled off from conservative views, so they’re the perfect audience for Stewart’s shtick, which depends on assumptions that are as unquestioned as they are false.

Jon Stewart’s defense of Brian Williams was “The Daily Show” in a nutshell – laugh off a scandal and change the subject.

Brian Williams has become a joke for telling lies, but Jon Stewart is a liar for the way he told jokes.

Source: NYP

Whites and conservatives have no rights in SA

A senior researcher at the Institute for Security Studies, confirmed in Johannesburg on Monday that farm attacks were motivated by racial hatred.

“There are allegations of race and politics being the motivation but these cannot be substantiated,” Johan Burger claimed initially, but had to concede that farm murders exploded when when former president Thabo Mbeki phased out the commando’s for purely racist reasons.

Burger, who was speaking at an SA Human Rights Commission hearing on safety and security in farming communities, said farmers became vulnerable when former president Thabo Mbeki ditched the idea of safety for white farmers.

While trying to defend the black attackers, Burger actually made a strong case for the white victims.

“There was a feeling that the commandos were an extension of right-wing groups and that blacks were under-represented in them. There was also a perception that the commandos were concerned only about the safety of white people,” he said, confirming that neither whites nor conservative groups have the right to safety.

Burger said farm attacks were always vicious.

But he also claimed that the intention of the assailants was usually simply to steal cash and goods, when black attackers almost never steal anything except cellphones which make it difficult for surviving victims to call for help.

In instances in which attackers used racist language, Burger said, it could be just “tough talk”.

“They are motivated by greed and not politics or race,” he insisted, trying to minimize the clear evidence of racial hatred that mark the attacks.

ANC police commissioner Riah Phiyega declared that “poor adherence to labour laws” and “unsatisfactory labour relations” were a “contributory factor” in farm attacks, while conveniently ignoring ANC leaders who chant “kill a boer” at mass meetings.

The commissioner thus reiterated popular threats by the ANC to confiscate white property justified by a set of baseless claims.

“Some of the workers are not registered and are illegal immigrants and it becomes difficult to track some of the people during police investigations,” she said, also forgetting that the country has an open-border policy thanks to her party’s policies.

Police were no longer classifying crimes taking place on farms separately, in trying to hide the racist scourge that white farmers have to suffer.

Howard Mbana, a Food and Allied Workers’ Union representative, said farmworkers were still subjected to abuse by their bosses.

“There is widespread violation of farmworkers’ rights by farm owners. Workers still suffer from beatings and insults on a regular basis. Farmworkers live in conditions of indignity and slavery; animals live better,” said Mbana.

He could, as per usual, give no examples of the alleged abuse.

Study: Conservatives and liberals smell different

A new study from the American Journal of Political Science indicates that different political affiliations may actually correspond with different body odors.

The researchers, led by Brown University political scientist Rose McDermott, found that conservatives and liberals smell dissimilar. While the difference is small, it is apparently significant enough that we subconsciously prefer the scent of those who vote like we do. “It appears nature stacks the deck to make politically similar partners more attractive to each other in unconscious ways,” the researchers wrote.

Previous research has found a number of other political view correlations with unknown degrees of biological and cultural influences. From eating preferences (the left likes strawberry jelly, while the right favors grape) to alcohol choices (Republicans like brown liquors; Democrats drink the clear stuff), conservatives and liberals live as distinctly as they vote.

Other differences are more psychological: Conservatives will look at an unpleasant image 15 percent longer than liberals, and they’re also more likely to keep an organized dorm room in college. In fact, one study showed that conservatives are more generally conscientious and liberals are more open to new experiences. Libertarians display some psychological aspects of both groups, albeit with a far lighter helping of respect for authority.

Source: The Week

South Africans are very conservative Pew finds

South Africans are very conservative according to findings by an independent American fact tank Pew Research Centre.

Speaking on the poll, former Constitutional Court Justice Zak Yacoob said there was a “huge disconnect” between societal values and the constitution.

Pew released its Global Views on Morality survey earlier this month.

South Africa fared the most tolerant of the African countries polled – including Ghana, Nigeria and Kenya – but less so than its international counterparts.

The study, which covered 40 countries, focused on eight moral issues ranging from premarital sex to contraceptive use and divorce.

The following percentage of South Africans found these practices morally unacceptable:

Extramarital affairs: 65%
Homosexuality: 62%
Abortion: 61%
Premarital sex: 48%
Gambling: 40%
Divorce: 40%
Alcohol use: 36%
Contraception use: 15%

Ninety eight percent of Ghanaians believe same-sex relationships are immoral. At 93%, the figure is slightly lower in Uganda. This is in stark contrast to European countries like Spain, Germany, Britain and Italy, where less than 20% rate homosexuality as unacceptable.

For South Africa, the findings could explain why violent attacks on members of the lesbian and gay community are common.

Justice Yacoob suspected that the true picture of South Africans’ views on moral issues was in fact “much worse”.

South Africans are not interested in most of the “liberating” issues foisted upon them by a small and too vocal minority, often isolated voices from a foreign and too powewrful transnational media hoping to thus gain influence in the country.

Experts questioned the items polled, and said South Africans should be concerned with “real moral issues”.