A serious question: What's up at the Washington Post?

[blondeatlast]

Several stories in recent weeks that smack more of proapganda than actual reporting--the piece on Obama's religion (should that even be news?), apparently burying stories that support the current NIE (Media Matters link here: http://mediamatters.org/items/200609180007 ), possible deliberate obfuscation of the Valerie Plame affaiar (Media Matters: http://www.colorado.mediamatters.org/items/200511280006 ), that' just one story. And to top it all off, the shoddy, severely spun "torture briefing" story from yesterday--so full of holes a truck could drive through it.

I'm sure savvy DUers can come up with dozens more.

My point is this--good editors would not let some of these stories even be published; the Obama religion story and the "torture briefing" story are so full of gaping holes and spin that a decent editor would not risk the embarrassment of letting them go into print without severe re-editing--and in the latter case, some confirmation. there is NO named source as a witness to the story. Anyone who took high school journnalism wouldn't let that kind of thing pass.

I can't find any real dirt on editor Leonard Downie, Jr. but something just doesn't pass the smell test anymore, IMHO. Try to imagine Ben Bradlee letting that Obama story in his newspaper and see if you think like I do.

It seems lately it's more like the Washington Times than the once-great Post...

[spanone]

1. it's called collusion with the current administration and now Murdoch is about to take over WSJ

hang on america

[SpiralHawk]

2. They have mutated to become a homelander propaganda organ

I do not trust them any longer. At all.

[OHdem10]

3. I am surprised at how many people are not and have not been

aware that the WAPO is owned by a historically prominent Republican
Family. As with most newspapers in US, when owned by a Republican
Family, the OP Ed, Editorial Page is slanted or framed to favor
Republicans. They have openly carried water for GWB his entire
time in WH. Expect nothing less.

They pretty much play it straight in the center on other pages of
the newspaper.

Nothing new here. I have been posting the NIE will only be figment
of our memory in a few days.

[OregonBlue]

4. Washington Post and CRC.com - tracking cookies that the Post

places on your computer when you go to their sight. It is Coleman Research Corporation, part of L-3 communications. They are one of the "intelligence" contractors that the U.S. DOD uses. Be sure to block them in your privacy settings. I definately don't trust The Washington Post. I've written more than once to ask about it. No reply of course. One of the cookies is surfaid.ihost.com. That's the usual tracking cookie but it turns out the ihost is CRC. Probably just tinfoil hat on my part but it makes me very uncomfortable to think that when I read the Post, they then allow a cookie that tracks my internet usage back to L-3 Communications!

[CrispyQ]

5. Can you clear your cookies after each internet session?

If so, how?

[havocmom]

8. what browser are you using?

I love Firefox for ease of cleaning.

[OregonBlue]

10. Firefox as well but, if you check your cookies you will see that crc.com

and surfaid.com and ihost.crc.com are there. If you go to the Washington Post site, you will get these cookies unless you block them.

[havocmom]

13. I can set it to not take cookies without asking each time

and there is a swell tool that will clear 'em out when I close up shop

I looked. The cookie isn't there.

Now, about spyware that is more subtle... I need help. We keep getting a popup (ad) advising us to clean out the spyware... Havocdad uses IE and that seems to be the major factor in that popup.

[OregonBlue]

15. Sounds like it's in your registry. Download (for free) free Trash Registry

http://www.download3000.com/download-Registry_Trash_Keys_Finder-count-reg-16983.html

just click the zip file, it unpacks and then you click on the .exe icon. It will find those items that should not be in your registry. Works for most things. When my computer gets a little wonky, that's the first one I use. Also, use Asquared free version. Cleans most of the junk off the computer. Once I run these two, I'm pretty sure most of the spyware, etc. is gone. The only thing to remember about Asquared is that if you are running Firefox, you must have it closed until Asquared has scanned the cookies. Once it is past the cookies portion (first minute or so) you can open your browser and let it run in the background. If you use these two once a week, your registry should be pretty clean.

[havocmom]

20. Thanks for the tip

The darned pop-up scam makes Havocdad nuts.

[OregonBlue]

9. Even easier is to block cookies. I use Firefox. Just go to top of page to

tools, then options, then privacy, then cookies, then exceptions. Type www.surfaid.com then do www. surfaid.ihost.com and then www. crc.com. If you use explorer, let me know, I'll look up the procedure. Even if you are using spyware blaster and spybot, etc. there are valid cookies that are placed on your computer. If you clear them every time, you will also clear the ones you want like DU cookie and will have to log on every time. I frequently look at the list of cookies on my computer and block those that I do not want instead of clearing them all.

[CrispyQ]

17. Thank you.

I figured it out, but I deleted all of them before reading your post. I don't visit that many sites, so it won't be a big issue.

Does every site you vist add a cookie or just ones where you need to logon?

[OregonBlue]

19. Not all do but many of them do. That's why you should have spyware blaster (it's free) at

download.com. It blocks all of the nasty ones. I check my cookies every once in a while and block individual cookies that spyware blaster missed.

Asquared free version and trash registry free are also good for cleaning up your computer. Also, spybot, free version, gets rid of nasty stuff.

These are all really good programs, they are all free and they don't delete needed programs from the computer. About once a week I run them all. You can run them in the background (except for the first minute or so of Asquared if you use Firefox since it has to scan the cookies while your browser is closed), so they can run while you are on DU.

There is so much garbage out there it's good to run them as a matter of course. You will find that your computer is much faster once you get the garbage off of it. If you have dialup, it will take a while to download Asquared. Still, it's worth it. It catches lots of things that others missed.

Run TrashRegistry every morning. It's a little zip file, takes seconds to run, cleans those nasty little registry entries and stops your computer from "hanging".

A squared download is at http://www.emsisoft.com/en/software/download/ page down to the free 3.0 version.

These work for my and have never deleted ANYTHING that I needed but of course I won't guarantee them.

Spyware Blaster is at http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/sbdownload.html

Spybot is here http://www.spybot.info/en/download/index.html

TrashRegistry is here http://databack4u.com/snc/rtkf_eng.html#4

[OregonBlue]

18. Not sure what browser you use but when I clear all my cookies after each

session I clear those I want, like DU, KOS, etc. I just block those I don't want.

[blm]

6. The WaPost has been like this for decades - it's been called "Spook Central"

because it sets up cover for some of the more illegal operations of the BFEE.

[OregonBlue]

11. Exactly, which is why I don't want the CRC tracking cookis on MY computer.

[EFerrari]

7. The was the American lesson from the Weekend of Hugo Chavez.

The Noise Machine will put out the story the Administration wants spun. It's more of a fax machine than a press. News side AND editorial side. And they will keep it up for days if that's what's needed. I'm not even sure they respond any more when you call them on their errors. I emailed three papers that weekend and only one bothered to respond.

[porphyrian]

12. Why is anyone surprised about this now?

The entire corporate media has been cheering for this administration for the better part of a decade now, and people are still surprised by it? Stop giving them your attention already.

[blondeatlast]

14. I'm more surprised that DUers keep falling for it. I like to think we're smarter than that,

but we appear to accept stuff like this without a moment of critical thinking.

The "torture briefing" story is full of gaping holes and oh-so-conveniently timed to coincide with the tape destroying story--guess which story is getting more play here?

It isn't the one that hurts the WH...

[porphyrian]

16. Some people here are rightfully frustrated with and angry at Pelosi.

While that doesn't justify support of a propaganda piece, which isn't what is going on, I believe - I doubt most people even read the article, it just reinforced what they already thought/believed, neither does the piece dismiss peoples' frustrations and concerns with Pelosi's leadership.