Times analysis implies Clinton beat Sanders, but he won more delegates

By Dan Brooks in Contemporary Media 0 Comment

Hillary Rodham Clinton Signs Copies Of Her Book 'Hard Choices' In New York

As regular readers of this blog know, I really like the New York Times. I think it’s by far the best newspaper in the country, and I am thrilled to write for them whenever they hire me. But that doesn’t mean the Times is perfect. Last week, news editors came under fire for substantially altering a story about Sanders’s legislative record after it was published online—changing its headline, in the process, from “Bernie Sanders Scored Victories for Years via Legislative Side Doors” to “Via Legislative Side Doors, Bernie Sanders Won Modest Victories.” Today, the Times seems to have reframed another Sanders victory in its analysis of last night’s Democratic primaries. Hillary Clinton won in Arizona, while Sanders won in Idaho and Utah, giving him 67 delegates to her 51. But Jonathan Martin’s analysis does not report delegate totals and strongly implies that Clinton won.

Continue reading

Campaign finance is dead. Long live campaign finance

By Dan Brooks in Politics versus Government 0 Comment

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrdTX8m5G98

The Mitch McConnell campaign—which refers to itself by the parody-proof name “Team Mitch”—posted this video on YouTube last week. As you may have noticed, it contains no diegetic sound. There’s a weirdly contemporary electropop soundtrack, but at no point to do events in the video sync up with a particular element of the soundtrack or even narrative. It’s just footage of McConnell signing papers, turning alarmingly to the camera, shaking hands with a man in a tam and goatee whose vote cancels out yours, et cetera. You can dub whatever sound you want over this video, which, as The Daily Show has pointed out, makes it hilarious. It also makes it a free source of McConnell footage for whatever 501(c)4 organizations might want to produce ads to support him—but not coordinate with his campaign, since that is forbidden by law.

Continue reading

Utah legalizes gold, silver currency

By Dan Brooks in Class Warfare 2 Comments

The official Utah state human being

The Utah legislature moved a step closer to complete insanity fiscal independence this month by declaring gold and silver coins legal tender in the state. Sort of: no laws have been passed requiring merchants or banks to accept an ounce of 24-karat gold with Rush Limbaugh stamped on the front, but as of a week ago, it’s still totally money. It’s just that legally, parties to a contract cannot be required to accept it as tender for debts public or private. This raises the question of exactly how those pieces of precious metal constitute currency, but that’s not important. What’s important now is that, thanks to Republican state representative Brad Galvez, Utah doesn’t use federal bills. Don’t worry, by the way—he isn’t crazy. “We’re too far down the road to go back to the gold standard,” Galvez acknowledged to the Associated Press. “This will move us toward an alternative currency.”

Continue reading