~~By InsightAnalytical-GRL
Last week we had a story up about the media censorship in Fiji, but this story courtesy Kenosha Marge about the decline of Newsweek is so much more satisfying. OK, it’s by Brent Bozell, but facts are facts and some of them are pretty scary–for Newsweek.
The Decline and Fall of Newsweek
Newsweek greeted the coming of Easter with a black cover, and the headline “The Decline and Fall of Christian America,” spelled out in red in the shape of a cross. Inside, it was more declarative: “The End of Christian America.” Why? Because they found that the percentage of self-identified Christians had fallen 10 points since 1990. OK, then let’s compare. How much has Newsweek’s circulation fallen since 1990? Just since 2007, their announced circulation has dropped by 52 percent. It would be more plausible to state “The End of Newsweek.”
At the end of 2007, Newsweek reduced its “base rate” (or circulation guaranteed to advertisers) from 3.1 million to 2.6 million, a 16 percent drop. At the end of 2008, the Wall Street Journal reported that Newsweek, faced with an estimated 21 percent decline in ad pages, could soon drop that circulation number by another 500,000 to 1 million readers. In February, the magazine confirmed the million-issue drop, saying it would drop to a base of 1.9 million in July and 1.5 million readers by January 2010.
MORE
Where will the Obot writers at Newsweek go if it sinks? They all can’t squeeze into the MSNBC studios, can they?
***
Well, it’s time to brace yourselves…the abortion wars are simmering nicely…Again, courtesy Kenosha Marge:
Obama boosts anti-abortion efforts
The first hint of a stir came just after Election Day, when the computer servers at Americans United for Life crashed. People were swamping the Web site to sign a petition urging President-elect Barack Obama to stand firm against abortion.
“I got a call from one of our guys, ‘We have a problem,’ ” said Charmaine Yoest, the group’s president and chief executive officer. “And I was like, ‘The problem would be what?’”
Obama’s first 84 days in office have been like an extended recruiting drive for the anti-abortion movement, reinvigorating a constituency he sought to neutralize during the campaign. Activists report a noticeable spike in activity as Obama moves to defend and expand a woman’s right to choose an abortion – causing anti-abortion voters to mobilize in ways never needed during the Bush administration.
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Did you know that there was an anti-abortion group called “The Susan B. Anthony List”?
Aren’t you getting tired of all this crap always being used as a wedge issue??
***
By now practically everyone has seen Susan Boyle, the “unlikely” talent that wowed the cynical judges and audience in the UK.
Well, it’s such a wonderful story and the BBC story on contains a few wonderful quotes:
How Susan Boyle won over the world
SNIP
Lisa Schwarzbaum, writer for US celebrity magazine Entertainment Weekly, said the performance was a powerful reality check.
She wrote: “In our pop-minded culture so slavishly obsessed with packaging – the right face, the right clothes, the right attitudes, the right Facebook posts – the unpackaged artistic power of the unstyled, un-hip, un-kissed Ms Boyle let me feel, for the duration of one blazing showstopping ballad, the meaning of human grace.
“She pierced my defences. She reordered the measure of beauty. And I had no idea until tears sprang how desperately I need that corrective.”
Her post has been followed by comments from scores of readers saying they watched the clip repeatedly, with the same emotional response.
“I cried SO hard,” read one. “There’s something so beautiful about reaching your dreams… and knowing that age means nothing.”
Another wrote: “I cry because she reminds us to hope, to never lose track of our dreams, to keep putting one foot in front of the other no matter what others say or think. She gives us hope.”
Hope…of the real kind?
For me, I came away with a sense of the courage and sturdiness that so many “plain” people…especially women…have and which are qualities that are so overlooked.
Link to the You Tube video (full version, complete with the sole woman judge on the panel addressing Simon Cowell’s attitude…catch his rather “deflated” look at the very end)
THE PAST WEEK
*By Grail Guardian
**By American Lassie
***By Kenosha Marge
Saturday Sanity: The Antidote to the Madness (April 18, 2009) Glorious Organ Mountains; Apricots; Quail on the Wall; Sneaky Slick the Min Pin
Welcome to “Fiji on the Potomac”…
*Report From the Rochester, NY Tea Party (With Pics)–April 15, 2009
**Sharia Finance: Rapidly Increasing Inroads Via American Banks…With the Help of Our Treasury Department
***A Nation of Nincompoops
The Past Week: April 5-April 11, 2009 (”President Panytwaist”; A Split Among Progressives over War Spending Plan?; Smear Campaign in Britain; “Sageism”)
Filed under: Current Politics | Tagged: American United for Life, Brent Bozell, Britain's Got Talent, circulation base rates, Entertainment Weekly, kenosha Marge, Lisa Schwarzbaum, Newsweek Magazine, Simon Cowell, Susan Boyle, The Susan B. Anthony List |
InsightAnalytical -- Watching Our World 
Ah! I couldn’t comment on this thread earlier…
And I so wanted to share my joy at the painful demise of Newsweek! Of course, the idea never occurred to those jugheads that it was their own smarmy asses that are becoming extinct!
As far as Obama using abortion as a divisive issue again – we must be smart enough to avoid the bait. There’s a great conversation on an open thread at Uppity Woman today about this. In a nutshell: Uppity feels that the abortion issue is basically resolved in the Obama administration with at least 2 SCOTUS appointments; no way Roe v. Wade will be changed.
http://uppitywoman08.wordpress.com/2009/04/18/my-day-off-your-open-thread-care-to-join-in/
Do you trust who he will appoint? And when his sorry ass is out of office and we’re stuck with Republicans in the White House and owning Congress again…
It’s never over!!
The one thing I do trust is that he’ll appoint someone inappropriate. It will be another tool controlled by the Pilgrim Society, and certainly not an objective jurist.
That’s the whole point of the Tea Party idea, GRL. We need to get riled up enough to shake off the partisan shackles and break out of the party system altogether.
As long as we continue to label ourselves as anything other than Americans, we can be divided and conquered. We cannot think of ourselves as Democrats, Republicans or even Independents. If our primary characteristic is that we’re black, white, or brown we can be made to resent others. If we’re New Yorkers, Texans, or Iowans we can be manipulated to think we deserve a bigger piece of the pie. For a few brief moments after the 9/11/01 attacks, we were all just Americans. We stood as one against the world without a thought to our differences. I am told there was a similar spirit during WWII. So it seems that we are most easily united under duress. Well understand this, brothers and sisters: we are at war right now, and I am not referring to Afghanistan or Iraq. (Although it is odd that 2 concurrent wars do not evoke a sense of patriotism in us, isn’t it?) We are battling for our future, our freedom, and for our Republic. It’s time for all of us to be true Americans; nothing more, nothing less.
Absolutely Grail! And it’s time we realized that anyone that seeks to demonize other Americans simply because they do not agree with them is the enemy. That means the media, and both major parties. I am now and will remain an “Independent”. Which means, at least to me, that I will vote in ways that I believe are best for the country. And I will never again vote based on partisanship.
There are few things with which I ever agreed with Reagan about but his “trust, but verify” line is one I am willing to paraphrase and use. “Verify and then support. Trust? No bloody damn likely. I don’t trust politicians. Any of them.
Grail, we came together on April 15th to show all the politicians that we are disgusted with them. While standing in the rain in Annapolis, Md. that day, I met a lot of people who feel as I do. The Tea Parties are not over, they’ve just begun, and all the nay-saying by the MSM and the dirty cracks made by Olberman, Maddow, Shuster and Gloria Vanderbilt’s little boy won’t change that one Iota. Americans are waking up and they won’t be stopped.
Marge, I also became an Independent this last May 31st and have never been more satisfied with my decision than I was on April 15th. On that day we were not D’s, R’s, or I’s. We were/are Americans.
P.S. I, too, salute the demise of News Week.
And how about that Susan Boyle? There’s “Hope” that you can believe in!
I have to wonder how long it will be before some group comes along and wants to “treat” Susan Boyle to a makeover—therefore she can be “beautiful” inside and out. I hate the thought of it and I hope she stays exactly as she is…lovely, inside and out.
Regarding NewsWeek….the sooner they shut down the better. Not a lot of journalistic integrity over there.
Oh…I left a post on Bad Habit today. Enjoy