Tag Archives: USA Today

The Shutdown was a Symptom


Media Matters for America

“There can be no liberty for a community which lacks the means by which to detect lies.” – journalist Walter Lippmann. As long as the conservative media machine pushes lie after lie upon its viewers, symptoms like the shutdown will keep happening.

John Whitehouse Twitter: @existentialfish

Were They Even Paying Attention?

The Republican government shutdown of 2013 has caused at least $24 billion worth of damage to the American economy. How does Fox News respond to that? By pretending the damage doesn’t exist: http://mm4a.org/1aPendT Related: On Sunday, Megyn Kelly declared that Fox News does not lean right: http://mm4a.org/1gCvLY4 By Wednesday, Kelly was openly advocating the Republican position on the debt: http://mm4a.org/1cvp6wh

It’s Never Them, Is it?

In the wake of the failure of the radical shutdown strategy, conservatives whined that the strategy they advocated for didn’t fail, — they were betrayed. http://mm4a.org/19PJ988 Related: How did we even get here? If you’re looking for one man to blame, blame Rush Limbaugh: http://mm4a.org/17kGL5h

Treating Opinions As Facts

Schoolchildren do not get to claim that their wrong answers on a math test are just their opinions. And yet, that’s the same logic the news media uses when mainstreaming climate lies. The latest outlet to fall for this is USA Today. Shauna Theel explains their error: http://mm4a.org/19LK9u1

FEATURED VIDEO

Appearing on Fox News Sunday, Juan Williams blasted the conservative “media bubble” causing hyper partisanship: http://youtu.be/PtLnrH8zg7s

AFTER IT’S NEWS

The second episode of Media Matters original web series After It’s News is live on Youtube! Check it out: http://youtu.be/XDC8XbZfviU

CHRONICALLY WRONG

Economist Dean Baker excoriates Niall Ferguson for being chronically wrong about the economy, from Ferguson’s inflation fearmongering to his attacks on the stimulus and more: http://huff.to/19TcAGD

IMAGE OF THE WEEK


Guests On The Sunday Shows Are Still White And Conservative

Tell Enterprise Rent-a-Car to stop fighting against a law that would ban renting recalled cars …Jess Kutch, Change.org


Tell Enterprise Rent-a-Car to stop fighting against a law that would ban renting recalled cars.                       
Sign the Petition

Cally Houck’s two daughters, Raechel and Jacquie, rented a PT Cruiser from Enterprise Rent-a-Car in 2004. What they didn’t know about their car was it had been recalled for serious safety problems a month earlier, and that Enterprise didn’t fix the car.

Raechel and Jacquie’s rental car caught on fire because of the very issue that prompted the recall. The young women crashed their fiery car into a tractor-trailer, killing them both.

In just a matter of days, Congress is set to consider a new law that would force rental car companies to fix recalled cars, but Enterprise Rent-a-Car is lobbying against it — and hard. Enterprise’s opposition could block the bill, allowing Enterprise to continue to ignore car recalls like the one that killed Cally Houck’s daughters.

Cally Houck has dedicated herself to making sure that rental car companies fix recalled vehicles so no other parent loses her daughters to rental cars that are known to be unsafe. She says it’s critical to stop Enterprise’s opposition now, before they kill the law. Cally started a petition on Change.org asking Enterprise Rent-a-Car CEO Andrew Taylor to stop opposing the law to force rental car companies to repair recalled vehicles.

Click here to add your name to Cally’s petition.

These two young women weren’t the first to die from rental cars under recall, and they weren’t the last, according to a USA Today report this weekend. Despite knowing the risks, companies like Enterprise choose to keep unsafe cars on the road.

When a vehicle is recalled because of safety or performance issues, the government says all vehicles should be fixed immediately. That why car dealerships aren’t allowed to sell new or used cars under recall that haven’t yet been fixed.

For Cally, it’s hard to imagine why rental car companies would be okay with renting cars that they knew to be unsafe. Before her daughters rented the car that killed them, three other customers had rented it from Enterprise after the safety recall.

There is hope — Hertz, a major rental car company, bucked its competitors and is actually supporting this new law. Cally hopes that by calling attention to Hertz’s willingness to protect its customers — and by showing that Enterprise is willing to let customers drive what she calls “ticking time bombs” like the one that killed her daughters — Enterprise will stop opposing this law.

Click here to add your name to Cally Houck’s petition on Change.org asking Enterprise Rent-a-Car to stop opposing a law to protect drivers from renting recalled cars.

Thanks for being a change-maker,

– Jess and the Change.org team

P.S. Can you please take a minute to sign these other urgent campaigns started on Change.org?