Some Wacko’s Are Armed With Guns, Other Wacko’s Are Armed With Lies

U You know, I was reading an online report yesterday documenting the services at the Colorado “Mega-Church” on Sunday, one week after the shooting by an anti-Christian nut who was later shot by an armed guard, And I was surprised that it had only been one week since the shooting. It was news for a couple of days, and then it went away.

Usually after a Church/Mall/School shooting, we have weeks of debate and attempts at legislation that will make us all safer, and yet after this shooting the news has been oddly silent. Apparently the debate has been settled, an armed and trained public is the solution that seems to work.

U SMEAR CHANNEL RADIO: You know, I’m a big fan of the left’s ability to get to a story first. Maybe because that’s because they don’t let things like facts stand in the way.

For nearly a week, a baffling series of posts by so- called "progressive" bloggers have claimed GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney is set to purchase Clear Channel Communications and install his own "neo-con" regime inside its talk radio and television stations.In fact, it is Romney's former firm, Bain Capital LLC, that is leading a leveraged buyout of Clear Channel, teamed with Thomas H Lee Partners LP. The deal has been delayed for a number of reasons, including the need to obtain regulatory approval.

At first, the headline seemed so silly, it was easy to mistake it for a spoof or prank. Days later, however, this 'Net myth has spread so far and wide across the left side of the blogosphere that it seems clear many liberals have been duped.

Worse, some may intentionally be spreading misinformation: even when commenters point out that Mitt Romney left Bain Capital before taking over the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, most "progressive" blogs have failed to retract the bogus story. Even if he remains a retired shareholder, Romney is most certainly not calling the shots at Bain.

From the beginning, it has been set in stone that Clear Channel's current management team would remain in place after the deal is finalized. Because that has never been in dispute, there is simply no way Mitt Romney could take over the company's programming, even if he did remain in an active role with Bain Capital.

So far, only the Huffington Post has run a clarification, but it merely added to the inaccuracies.

Below are links to some of the bigger liberal blogs. See how they are reporting this story:

Blatherwatch: http://blatherwatch.blogs.com/talk_radio/2007/12/romney-buys-cle.html#comments
My DD (Direct Democracy): http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/11/16/134450/66
Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/12/14/romneys-bain-capital-buy_n_76801.html
Firedoglake: http://firedoglake.com/2007/12/13/bain-capital-founded-by-romney-buys-clear-channel/
Randi Rhodes Show: http://forums.therandirhodesshow.com/lofiversion/index.php/t107831.html
DailyKos: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/5/21/141627/161

So how did the blogosphere's left side cook up this smear campaign? It has been difficult to determine who started it, but appears to have been triggered by the AP story about the deal's extension into 2008 as a result of regulatory delays. That gave somebody on the left the idea to insert Romney into the story and from there it spread like wildfire.

Don't hold your breath expecting a series of retractions: the tin foil hat crowd has never met a conspiracy theory it didn't lovingly embrace.