Helen Thomas, Whitehouse press corp veteran died today

[awepittance]

Probably one of the, if not the only journalist who worked at the Whitehouse who would continuously ask real and difficult questions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwBBYLr_1bU

edit: she got fired years ago for making some comments about Israel and she describes being fired as a result of 'touching the 3rd rail of american politics' meaning being critical of israel.
edit2: watches eugene reading thread, waits anxiously for him to fuck up thread out of the gates

[Guest zaphod]

the israel thing was so fucking ridiculous. i felt so bad for her when that happened. legendary career and you get fired for expressing an opinion, in an honest manner, when asked spontaneously by someone who is basically ambushing you. of course no one condemned israel's actions on the mediterranean that same week, and no one fires right wing talk radio guys for saying incendiary shit about muslims on a regular basis. you ask for someone's opinion in a country that supposedly champions free speech, then rake them over the coals when they give it to you.

[eugene]

if you're so interested in my opinion..

she got fired because of a blatantly anti-semitic remark that is somewhat related to israel, not just because she criticizes israel. she had been criticizing it her whole career, from what i understand, and it didn't stop her from becoming so celebrated.

[goDel]

RIP Helen.

 

Lets just we say completely agree for a change, awe.

 

(last vid was painful to watch..)

[delet...]

yes i thought that must've been why fox had her photo up, i was waiting for some nasty eulogy, but then they had a story about traygeorge martyrman.

 

Shame about her passing.

[joshuatxuk]

Probably one of the, if not the only journalist who worked at the Whitehouse who would continuously ask real and difficult questions.

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwBBYLr_1bU

 

 

 

edit: she got fired years ago for making some comments about Israel and she describes being fired as a result of 'touching the 3rd rail of american politics' meaning being critical of israel.

edit2: watches eugene reading thread, waits anxiously for him to fuck up thread out of the gates

 

 

if you're so interested in my opinion..

she got fired because of a blatantly anti-semitic remark that is somewhat related to israel, not just because she criticizes israel. she had been criticizing it her whole career, from what i understand, and it didn't stop her from becoming so celebrated.

 

I'm going to try to bridge the gap here, I think we can prevent this from being derailed. The comments that got her fired were made in May 2010: "Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine." and "Remember, these people are occupied and it's their land. It's not German, it's not Poland..." When asked where Israeli Jews should go, she replied they could "go home" to Poland or Germany or "America and everywhere else. Why push people out of there who have lived there for centuries?"

 

They're quite out there but not anti-Semitic, but anti-Israeli and mostly a sloppy, ill-conceived statement that generalized Israelis. The ones arguably more anti-Semitic were made later in December 2010 at speech.

 

"I paid a price, but it's worth it to speak the truth."^[71][72][73] During the speech, Thomas said: "Congress, the White House and Hollywood, Wall Street are owned by Zionists. No question, in my opinion."^[71] Thomas defended her comments on December 7, telling Scott Spears of Marion, Ohio AM radio station WMRN, "I just think that people should be enlightened as to who is in charge of the opinion in this country."^[74]

 

Personally, I don't think these are anti-Semitic either, but they are anti-Zionist and anti-Israeli. One could argue, and I would (but please, let's not, we've been over it so many times) that current Israeli government policy is beyond extremist Zionism and the original concept of Israel. She herself mentioned as a daughter of Lebanese immigrants, she was a Semite. Arabs and Jews (the vast majority of anyhow) are Semitic people. "Antisemitism" can to only apply to Jews in the 20th century and more recently that has become a trump card for anyone who is fiercely pro-Israel to demonize critics. It's everywhere, even the nominee of someone as moderately conservative as Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense.

 

I think it was an overblown response and was disturbed that it derailed her career. It completely think it's a double-standard as mentioned by Ralph Nader and others.

 

alph Nader noted the "double standard" where one off-hand "ill-conceived remark" ended Helen Thomas’ career while "ultra-right wing radio and cable ranters" engaged in "bigotry, stereotypes and falsehoods directed wholesale against Muslims, including a blatant anti-semitism against Arabs."^[67] Gary Leupp in CounterPunch called the interview an "ambush" because it was a spontaneous one and wrote the "they" referred to did not specify whether it was all Jews or Jews in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. He also criticized the White House for being more outraged by Thomas’ comments than by Israel’s May 31, 2010 Gaza flotilla raid which killed nine Turkish activists.^[68] Paul Jay on Huffington Post wrote Thomas "clearly" was referring to Jews from Germany, Poland and America who had to go to Israel after World War II, mostly because "the American, Canadian and British governments would not drop their anti-Jewish quotas" and that most refugees would have preferred to go to those nations.^[69]

 

 

 

Her fierce questioning might of verged on the unprofessional, but it was clearly from her decades of gradual frustration and ire over the various deceitful and superficial administrations she watched come in and out. You know what sums it up? In 2012 Newt Gingrich, presidential hopeful and former legislator, said that Palestinians were "an invented people." There was controversy but it was discussed as if it was an arguable statement (by other "invented" nationalities like "Americans" and "Canadians" and "Israelis" I would note). Why wasn't his career damaged? For one, anti-Israeli discussion makes you a pariah in US politics. Secondly, and more importantly, Gingrich is the establishment, and Helen Thomas never was. She was too fucking stubborn, too pioneering, and inquisitive. That was just the one comment that the establishment could end her job with. It's a shame it's overshadowed her career that began with the Kennedy Administration.

 

We need more journalists like her in places like the Whitehouse Press Corp. She will, and absolutely should be, a missed personality. RIP Helen.

[joshuatxuk]

On a lighter note, I loved that Simpsons episode when Helen Thomas appeared in the "future" when Lisa Simpson became president:

 

[awepittance]

for a while Jake Tapper seemed to be filling her shoes, but now that he has his on CNN show he's no longer part of the Whitehouse press corp.

i love when she asks Obama 'Why are we still in Afghanistan? and don't give me any of those Bushisms' just balls to the wall, and of course his response sounds exactly like a fucking Bushism

[Guest chunky]

she knew she was old and going to die so thought nothing of blurting out the truth that everybody in america's ruling class knows anyway

 

also i cant get excited that she's so special just because she has a pussy instead of a dick. liberal media is gross and shitty.

 

it's mostly young people who are blind to what's happening, because of media censorship along with religious and historical ignorance like being unfamiliar with the stories and prophecies in the bible and torah and being unable to tell the difference between the legitimate second reich and the criminal third reich

 

atlantic and huffingtonpost are pure trash, mainly because they are there to hide truth and influence the young to belief false ideas. it's disgusting that some rich bastard tells you what to think and so many people are willing slaves to this lying garbage.

 

pat buchanan's magazine www.amconmag.com tells the truth every month. you see what happens when you say the plain truth is that you get sacked or silenced or ignored. smelly little orthodoxies you see. wayyyyyycism wayyscism.

[SR4]

she knew she was old and going to die so thought nothing of blurting out the truth that everybody in america's ruling class knows anyway

 

also i cant get excited that she's so special just because she has a pussy instead of a dick. liberal media is gross and shitty.

 

it's mostly young people who are blind to what's happening, because of media censorship along with religious and historical ignorance like being unfamiliar with the stories and prophecies in the bible and torah and being unable to tell the difference between the legitimate second reich and the criminal third reich

 

atlantic and huffingtonpost are pure trash, mainly because they are there to hide truth and influence the young to belief false ideas. it's disgusting that some rich bastard tells you what to think and so many people are willing slaves to this lying garbage.

 

pat buchanan's magazine www.amconmag.com tells the truth every month. you see what happens when you say the plain truth is that you get sacked or silenced or ignored. smelly little orthodoxies you see. wayyyyyycism wayyscism.

 

 

holy fucking LOL Pat Buchanan?

[awepittance]

broken clock is right twice a day, I was surprised (since I haven't been to his website or seen his magazine in years) to see an article about how the surveillance state psychologically effects US society, pretty good an interesting article. I actually still have a cutout cover of an old issue of his mag on my fridge showing Rudy giuliani in a quasi SS nazi uniform with an arm band that says '9/11' . I mostly don't agree with him but sometimes I'm shocked by how close some of articles are to my own perspective

[Guest chunky]

Alison Weir

 

http://www.ifamericansknew.org/media/distortion.html

 

I discovered a system of reporting from the region in which a violent conflict between an officially "Jewish state" and the Muslims and Christians it had dispossessed (and was in the process of dispossessing further) was being covered most of the time by journalists with legal, familial or emotional ties to Israel. A great many are Israeli citizens (though this is almost never disclosed) or married to Israelis, their children also being Israeli.

I discovered that the Associated Press control bureau for the region, from which virtually all news reports that appear in US newspapers were transmitted, was located in Israel and was staffed almost entirely by Israeli and Jewish journalists (many of whom had served in the Israeli military).

I learned that the son of the New York Times bureau chief was serving in the Israeli military while his father was reporting on the conflict. In fact, I discovered that it was common for journalists in the region reporting for American media to have close personal ties to the Israeli military; that at least one staff member had been serving in the Israeli military even as he was reporting for the NY Times; that US News & World Report's senior foreign correspondent, who had covered and written about the Middle East for more than 40 years, had a son serving in the Israeli army during the time he was reporting there; that Middle East "pundit" Jeffrey Goldberg, whose commentary pervades both the print and broadcast media, is an Israeli citizen who served in the Israeli military.

I learned that CNN anchorman Wolf Blitzer lived in Israel for many years, at one point travelled around the US as the "voice of Israel" and had worked for an Israel lobby publication.

I learned that Time magazine's bureau chief was an Israeli citizen, and that NPR's long-time correspondent from the region had an Israeli husband who had served in the military and may be an Israeli citizen herself.

I also discovered that this pattern of Israel-centrism went beyond the regional reporting. In fact, the regional filtering of the news may not even be the most significant factor in the broken media reporting on this issue that Americans receive.

Within US-based journalism per se I discovered patterns of Israel-centrism that were deeply troubling. In some cases I personally experienced the intentional suppression of information on Palestine. Following are a few examples.

[Guest chunky]

Helen Thomas tells Playboy: Jews 'control' White House Ex-dean of Washington press corp: 'Everybody is in pocket of Israeli lobbies' Published: 03/18/2011 at 9:20 PM

Drew Zahn About | Email | Archive

Drew Zahn is a WND news editor who cut his journalist teeth as a member of the award-winning staff of Leadership, Christianity Today's professional journal for church leaders. A former pastor, he is the editor of seven books, including Movie-Based Illustrations for Preaching & Teaching, which sparked his ongoing love affair with film and his weekly WND column, "Popcorn and a (world)view."

Helen Thomas

Helen Thomas, the former “dean” of the White House Press Corps who lost her position over a string of anti-Semitic comments, is interviewed in the April issue of Playboy, renewing her criticism of Israel and Jews in “control” of America.

“[The Jews are] using their power, and they have power in every direction … power over the White House, power over Congress,” Thomas told Playboy Contributing Editor David Hochman. “Everybody is in the pocket of the Israeli lobbies, which are funded by wealthy supporters, including those from Hollywood. Same thing with the financial markets. There’s total control.

“It’s real power when you own the White House, when you own these other places in terms of your political persuasion. Of course they have power,” Thomas continued, then addressed Hochman: “You don’t deny that. You’re Jewish, aren’t you?”

The 90-year-old journalist was a correspondent with United Press International for 57 years, an opinion columnist with Hearst Newspapers for 10 years and the senior White House reporter, covering every president since Eisenhower, until damaging comments last year pushed her to retirement.

Thomas resigned in June after telling a rabbi on camera that Israelis should “get the h— out of Palestine” and “go home” to “Poland, Germany and America and everywhere else.”

Though Thomas published an apology for her statements last year, writing, “I deeply regret my comments,” Thomas expressed a different sentiment in her interview with Playboy:

“I knew exactly what I was doing – I was going for broke. I had reached the point of no return. You finally get fed up,” she told the magazine. “I finally wanted to speak the truth.”

Part of that “truth,” Thomas told Playboy, is her claim that Israel is perpetuating its people’s victim-of-the-Holocaust status to escape criticism over wrongdoing against the Palestinians.

“The slaughter of Jews stopped with World War II. … They were liberated since then. And yet they carry on the victimization,” Thomas told the magazine. “American people do not know that the Israeli lobbyists have intimidated them into believing every Jew is a persecuted victim forever – while they are victimizing Palestinians.”

She continued, “Sure, the Israelis have a right to exist – but where they were born, not to come and take someone else’s home. I’ve had it up to here with the violations against the Palestinians. … [The Palestinians] are incarcerated and living in an open prison. I say to the Israelis, ‘Get out of people’s homes!’ … I mean, they’re living there and these people want to come and take their homes and land and water and kill their children and kill them.”

Still, Thomas insists, she doesn’t hold any hatred for the Jewish people.

“Oh, I know what they’re going to say: ‘anti-Semite.’… The truth is, I don’t hate anybody. I care deeply about people. I care for the poor, the sick, the lame, the harmed, those who’ve been treated unjustly,” she told Playboy. “I think [the Jews] are wonderful people. They had to have the most depth. They were leaders in civil rights. They’ve always had the heart for others but not for Arabs, for some reason.

“I’m not anti-Jewish,” she explained, “I’m anti-Zionist.”

Thomas, therefore, explains why she blames Israelis for Palestinian terror attacks:

“Of course I don’t condone any violence against anyone. But who wouldn’t fight for their country? What would any American do if their land was being taken? Remember Pearl Harbor,” Thomas told Playboy. “The Palestinian violence is to protect what little remains of Palestine. The suicide bombers act out of despair and desperation. Three generations of Palestinians have been forced out of their homes – by Israelis – and into refugee camps.”

Following her comments last year, made on the White House lawn during American Jewish Heritage month, President Obama criticized Thomas’ statement, supporting her departure from the White House press corps.

“Her comments were offensive,” Obama said. “It’s a shame because Helen’s someone who has been a correspondent through I don’t know how many presidents, was a real institution in Washington, D.C. But I think she made the right decision. I think those comments are out of line, and hopefully she recognizes that.”

Earlier this week, however, Editor & Publisher reports, Thomas told a national conference of campus journalists from College Media Advisers, “I want an apology from the president.”

“I also heard from Jimmy Carter,” Thomas revealed. “He called a few weeks later. Basically he was sympathetic. He talked about the Israelis in the Middle East, the violations. It was very nice of him to call, but I don’t want to get him into trouble.”

She also reiterated her statements that Israelis should leave homes occupied by Palestinians prior to 1948, only this time suggesting they come to the U.S., rather than “go home” to “Poland, Germany and America and everywhere else.”

[goDel]

for a while Jake Tapper seemed to be filling her shoes, but now that he has his on CNN show he's no longer part of the Whitehouse press corp.

i love when she asks Obama 'Why are we still in Afghanistan? and don't give me any of those Bushisms' just balls to the wall, and of course his response sounds exactly like a fucking Bushism

Yeah. As a poster boy of Obama apologism, I get that as well. Imo, you can see him really struggling here with how to behave presidential. The initial hesitations really show that he just didn't have a good answer or perhaps was even tied to a story which he himself didn't personally support. And because this is pretty early on in his presidency (he still openly supports mcchrystal here!?), his work is to pretty much be responsible for decisions taken before he came into office. I think the situation involving Libya kind of proves this. He wouldn't start a war like Bush did. But if he must "finish the job" however, you can expect things like that Osama assassination and the countless drone attacks. It's as if he's saying he's willing to turn his cheek early on, but whenever he's done with turning cheeks, his inner hawk flies out of his chest like a superman costume out of Clark Kents suit.

[awepittance]

i think that even the most pacifist person in the world, when they are seated as president the power they have becomes intoxicating. It's like any person thrust into a position of great power, except in this case it happens to be a position in control of the most advanced military and surveillance force ever created in the history of man kind. the 'civilized' world and the people running it know better than to go out and act like Caligula (at least in public) but that same feeling of having immense power and essentially not having to answer to anyone is still thriving.

[goDel]

Although it's pretty obvious people can be intoxicated by having power, I'm not sure to what extent you see this in Obama. You can see it to some extent in all kinds of hierarchical social structures through any society. But Obama?

 

His struggle with congress? With the economy? Gun laws? New healthcare laws? Banking regulations? Syria? National dept? Some disasters in the country? Greener policies? Dealing with a huge growth of poverty? Immigration laws?

 

Sure there's quite a number of sour spots. Guantanomo. Drone strikes. NSA. Dealing with leakers and whistleblowers. War on drugs perhaps as well.

 

If I put these in a balance I don't see a modern day Caligula. Could be me though. At least, I hope you're not saying he was disingenuous when he made comments about his own experiences of racial profiling in the context of the events surrounding Martin. To me, that didn't feel like coming from some power hungry individual. Even if it's impossible (imo) for someone becoming president of the US without having a considerable stain of the stereotypical power hunger. (So, in conclusion: yeah he's stained, but ok, in my book)

[awepittance]

i'm just not of the belief that his external behavior and personality publicly reflects how he really feels about having such immense power.  I don't have faith that he is a 'good person' or a 'thoughtful man' (as michael moore calls him). I have as much faith in him as any other president of the united states. And in my strong opinion simply to be president you have to have a pretty significant amount of ice water running through your veins. He's not ok in my book because he has irreparably damaged the state of civil liberties and privacy rights in the united states not to mention continued Bush's war on terror which is based on the false premise that you can win a war against a tactic. The worst thing Obama could have done, he's already done, which is to lull all the liberals and democrats who voted for him into a catatonic state of accepting all of the 'Bushism's' that people rightfully knew were terrible and unconstitutional but due to their respect for the man, allowed him to codify it all.

 

and re: his Martin comments, every once in a while Obama feels the need to re-connect with the African community that he essentially abandoned when he got into office. This was one of those times. I don't know if he was genuine or not, he's a great actor so I honestly can't say.

[goDel]

He might be a good actor, but he's no Kevin Spacey from "House of Cards". The only catatonic state I see is Congress/house of reps and the (seemingly intentional) inability to get things through. And this has nothing to do with people being lulled into believing the lies of said president. Nothing. If people actually were in a catatonic state of utter love of anything Obama has to say, there would have been a whole lot of legislation done by now. Instead....

 

IMO, you put way too much burden/responsibility on one man. Although the president is important, he's not nearly as important I believe you make him out to be. He's for a large part responsible for selecting the people who work directly for him (even though congress have part in that as well...). But the entirety of washington is responsible for what comes out of washington. Especially when you start with the idea that the us is still a democracy. If you start from the idea that it isn't a democracy (which is arguable), you should place the responsibility to those into actual power. That maybe the people having political powers in the various states. Or, one could imagine that would be the CEO's of the international corporations (mostly those financial institutions at W$ll-street).

[awepittance]

I think it depends on who sits in the office. You can't really argue that the Bush or Nixon white house wasn't extremely powerful acting independently or even able to intimidate large swaths of the other branches of government. Nixon got his in the end but Bush did not. I don't think we know enough about the inner-workings of the Obama administration on exactly how much power he actually has or wields compard to Bush or Nixon. His presidency has been masterful in the sense that instead of making the government more transparent, he's done a very good job of deflecting responsibility away from the whitehouse when it comes to certain issues, like GITMO or investigation and prosecution of Bush era crimes like torture. I would argue part of his 'job' when he got into office was to reverse the growing sense among Americans that America was no longer a democracy, caused in part by the escalation of soft fascism by George W Bush. He's succeeded in that respect at least in a PR sense. He's effectively convinced people that other branches of government wield immense power as well (like the republican controlled congress). I think only time will prove if he really believed that to be true or wanted to re-align perceptions again so that America will feel like the executive branch can't steam roll over every other branch of government and the constitution as well.
The fundamental flaws that appear so far though are things like his continuation of Bush's NSA power increase. His executive 'kill list' where he alone can wield the power of deciding whether certain suspected militants or 'terrorists' will live or die (including now American citizens). You could say 'well congress authorized it', and now the president has that power. IT's not just a matter of the executive branch breaking the law or creating new 'law' behind closed doors (which W did on many ocassions, the Jay Bybee torture memos being a good example). It's that Obama, following Bush now holds most of that executive power that Bush had whether it was voted on by congress and passed or steamrolled in by Bush. So in the end all I'm trying to argue is that you would be mistaken to underestimate the power that the executive branch, by itself now has in the United States. Maybe I place too much of my focus on Obama as a person, but I'm not exaggerating in any way the power he holds

[goDel]

He's effectively convinced people that other branches of government wield immense power as well? As in Obama and nothing but Obama ( and his administration) pulled off this ploy to convince people he doesn't have all the power? Does that make the Tea Party a government run thing? What makes you think of the inaction of Congress? Is Boehner working for Obama as well? The investigations into the killed diplomats in Libya? How about those diplomats being killed? Or that video that was released at the time about Mohammed the prophet? All a large ploy coming out of the minds of Obama and his henchmen?

You name some specific powers of the executive branch and seem to implicitly extrapolate those to every subject the administration is working on. There's a huge difference between the executive power when it comes to issues across the us border and the executive powers on all other issues within the us border. Those executive powers, imo, are specifically about maintaining safety within the borders by taking actions across the borders.

Looking at it from the other side of those borders, all I can say is that most of the US simply doesn't seem to give a shit of what is happening outside of their borders. The exception perhaps being israel. The executive power across the us borders that is granted, is very specific. Even though that stuff that leaked from the NSA might indicate there's a gray area where these powers work inside the US borders as well. But that kind of proves my point.

The only outrage happened after "we the people" got the feeling "we the people" are being spied upon and are being threatened in their own freedom. The people outside the borders being spied on? Well, whatever keeps the people inside those borders safe and free, seems to be the mindset. This isn't new, nor only characteristic for the US, I believe.

Nor is this cultivated by the administration, or any government across the world, I believe ( i do see lots of room to argue at this point however). At least, not to the extent that you seem to make it out to be. If the government didn't cultivate it whatsoever, there would still be a large part of the population effectively acting like a bunch of Hobbits uninterested in the outside world. Don't mistake that behavior for complacency to the powers/ploys of government. This is happening everywhere across the globe. Especially in a time of economic downfall.

Just out of curiosity though, why do you put so much emphasis on international policies? Even if the us was governing the human rights across the borders, which they don't, what has that got to do with everything what is happening inside the us borders?

[awepittance]

I feel like you asked a lot of questions in your post, not sure which ones you want me to answer. Most of what I believe is in my above post pretty clearly laid out. You want to talk about domestic issues, I'm not really focused on that right now. I place a significant amount of blame on Obama for continuing policies I despise, for for somehow reinventing the image of the US world-wide while it continues to do most of the shit I hated under Bush. It's pretty simple, and obviously we have different ideas on how a president should be judged. You also dodged everything I said about the immense power the executive branch now holds. I'm never going to cut Obama any slack deciding to keep all that power, and maybe you'll realize I was right when a Republican perhaps as bad as Romney or Bush 2 gets in after Obama and wants to wield the same or greater power passed down to Obama from Bush.