"This just in. After blaiming Pres. Bush for the weather,
Dan Rather got on his knees and begged America to make Castro the US President
claiming that Castro is "the best frequency for everyone".
Posted on 08/15/2003 3:39:24 AM PDT by kattracks
(CNSNews.com) - CBS News anchor Dan Rather, covering Thursday's multi-state blackout from New York, wondered if President Bush would cancel his fund-raising dinner in California because of the power outage back East, a media watchdog group reported.
According to a transcript provided by the Media Research Center (CNSNews.com's parent organization), Rather asked CBS reporter Bill Plante, "Any serious thought given to the president canceling his appearance at that big fundraising, campaign fundraising dinner tonight, given the fact that so many millions of people are going through this in the Northeast?"
Plante responded, "Dan, not that we have heard. We're attuned to the possibility of that, but there's absolutely no indication so far that he intends to cancel. He does intend, so far as we know, to go ahead with that fundraiser."
Rather also noted that White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card -- "who's a White House official, but not an elected official" -- would be the administration's "point man" for the power outage.
"Where is Vice President Cheney and why wouldn't he be in charge since the President is not in Washington?" Rather wondered.
The Media Research Center noted that if CBS were so concerned about the blackout, maybe it could have cancelled some of its prime time line-up.
According to MRC, While the other TV networks were airing President Bush's remarks about 8:54 p.m. EDT, "CBS continued with the program Amazing Race 4. Then at 9 p.m. EDT, Rather cut in with a one-minute update that included a Bush soundbite. Afterward, it was on to CSI and Without a Trace," MRC said.
See the 1,562nd Media Research Center CyberAlert, which has been tracking liberal media bias since 1996.
In charge of what, Dan--seeing that the power gets turned back on? The President assured the nation that this was not an act of terrorism. The utility companies are working around the clock to restore power. Had Bush been helicoptered into New York, Rather and the rest of the libs would have called it a shameless photo-op, like they did when he landed on the aircraft carrier. Rather's ratings tell the story, and they ain't very good.
"This just in. After blaiming Pres. Bush for the weather,
Dan Rather got on his knees and begged America to make Castro the US President
claiming that Castro is "the best frequency for everyone".
Its that simple.
Interesting thing was that he was interviewing their (CBS's) WH correspondent on the issue and she defended the President's decision. Said it would have alarmed the nation is the President reacted any other way than "business as usual."
sw
Too bad Dan Rather's close personal friend Fidel Castro didn't push Rather off this ridge when he had the chance.
The Devil made me say that...
You knw what Dan? You are are wOrthless POS, hypocritical liar. You fit in well with the rest of your leftist friends. And, you're not aging well...GET OFF MY TELEVISION!.
Al Gore invented powerlines.
I thought that was Brokaw. So many of them, so little time...
No, now that I think about it, when I shout at the screen, I qualify it for Brokaw, as "YOU LITTLE --cksuc--r !"
Can I buy an "O"?
Dittos to that. If he wants to leave his job, he can got to NM and get with the runaway senators. We DO NOT need him back in Texas. The IQ of Texas goes up, every time he or any other lib leave the state.
I think all of these communist loving idiot's should retire in their favorite communist country. Cuba, China, North Korea....
Last night confirmed it for me when Richardson, once again, ambulance chased himself into the spotlight. Except for Bill Clinton, there has never been a politician so intent on inserting himself into every headline, with unembarrassed, self-glorifying boasts of how wise and wonderful he is.
Get a load of his CNN appearance last night:
"GOV. BILL RICHARDSON (D), NEW MEXICO: You know, Larry, when I was secretary of energy, I went around the country warning that this could happen. We held what we called reliability summits around the country saying, one, we and America were a superpower, but we have a third world grid that needs to be modernized, that is antiquated. We've got an overload on our transmission lines. We've got to build more transmission lines in the country because we've got more technology. We've got more computer demand. We've got more heat waves. We've got more people. And unless we take those steps, we're going to have massive blackouts.
We had some in California several years ago, and what has happened in the Northeast is that this Niagara Mohawk grid has always been overloaded. And what seems to have happened is some kind of a trip in the transmission line in an overloaded system has caused a cascading effect that affects generators, transmission lines and what you have now is this massive blackout and the country can be very vulnerable.
Just think of a terrorist did this. This was almost a natural cause.
KING: So you're saying this could happen in Chicago, San Francisco, New Orleans?
RICHARDSON: Yes, it can, Larry, and the reason is that our transmission lines, our electricity grid is all interconnected. And since we have not built enough transmission lines, the existing lines have an enormous amount of electricity pent-up. In other words, overload. And what we need is basically the federal government and the states working together to allow utilities to invest in new technologies, to bring in wind power and solar and biomass, not just get electricity from the traditional coal and nuclear sources. Diversify, invest in new modern plants.
But also, Larry, this is -- you know, this is very technical. But the Congress has been, for years, not passing an energy bill which contains what are called reliability standards, mandatory reliability standards on utilities, many that are monopolies, that don't want this kind of control, that says to them, look, you cannot have more power than you can absorb. And what they had here in New York - well, in the Niagara power grid is too much power, an overload of power.
KING: But it's still only mid-August, and there has been an awful lot of heat in that area. So that's going to continue. So you start it up, it could happen again tomorrow?
RICHARDSON: Yes. What we have is we're very vulnerable to this kind of overload. Now, Larry, I don't think it's a terrorist situation. By the way, I think the president was wise to come in and calm the country, but at the same time, I don't think it was a computer glitch. You know, in the year 2000, we had that gigantic Y2K effort testing everyone's computers, all entities. The utilities have good computer systems. So then that leaves the next cause and that is an overload in our transmission lines. And we should not permit those overloads. And what happens is the utilities, to make more bucks, to deal with the demand, and then the public, which doesn't like new transmission lines because it's in your backyard and it's not nice to see, and so you have this situation where the greatest superpower in the world has not modernized its power grid. And that's the problem.
KING: So that is very pessimistic. Do you expect the government, Congress, do you expect the utilities, state governments, local governments to act?
RICHARDSON: Well, I believe that this terrible incident has now going to wake up the Congress to pass an energy bill that - an energy policy for this country, an electricity modernization act, Larry, that does three things. One, that allows intrastate building of transmission lines. Number two, we need to build more transmission - number two, mandatory reliability standards. What does that mean? That means that these utilities cannot have too much power overloaded in their systems. And that's what they're doing. They have overloaded power, and when it causes a glitch or there's a trip wire is what happened, it affects all of other systems that are overloaded too in the Northeast. That's the second thing. The third thing that has to happen is discussions between the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, because this is generally a federal issue, and the states that allow more cooperation among states on common electricity grids. And then lastly, mandate more alternative sources of energy, not just rely on coal and nuclear, but say, wind power is working, solar, biomass, green technologies, so many new fuel technologies that are existing that are out there that we're not using.
KING: Are you optimistic or pessimistic?
RICHARDSON: Well, I'm optimistic in that this is a wake-up call that the Congress needs to listen to to pass mandatory reliability standards. But we've also got a lot of utilities that have been enjoyed this monopoly power in the country that don't want change, that are going to resist this. Now hopefully the Congress will now get a will to move. Now, again, in the Clinton administration, everybody yawned about this, oh, we don't need to do this. Oh, we don't have a crisis. And then California, blackouts happened and we went around the country saying, we have got to have an electricity modernization bill at the federal level to keep the states from basically fighting each other. So I am now optimistic because this is a massive blackout that is going to wake a lot of people up, and that now we will act. But just think if this had been a terrorist. "
"Bill, Governor Richardson, people are extraordinary in extraordinary times, aren't they?
RICHARDSON: Yes, they are. And I think it shows that local officials knew what they were doing. They responded. Obviously Governor Pataki is in control. But you know, a lot of states, Larry, a lot of the problem is generated by our failure to enact comprehensive energy legislation, comprehensive electricity, modernization legislation. You know, our generating facilities, our transmission lines are antiquated. They're old. And we have so much more demand and capacity and more overload of power because of increased needs that the country has, population, technology, people, more computer and cells, that unless we upgrade and modernize our facilities, our transmission lines, build more, and look at distributive generation, which is generating the power where some of these facilities are, those are new technologies, invest in new technologies, we're going to have these blackouts all around. We had them in California four years ago. We had them in the '60s in the West. I think the East Coast is most vulnerable. We're also vulnerable in the West. For instance, I believe that California has some vulnerabilities, Phoenix, the southeast part of the country, New Orleans. We warned that unless there is more investments in new technologies and in new transmission facilities, those areas are vulnerable."
BLITZER: Sometimes you need a wake-up call to get the job done. And let me just ask Governor Richardson a question. Governor, they were told in Westchester County, parts of Westchester County just outside of New York, Con Ed, the power - the electrical power company here in the greater New York area, says that parts of Westchester now have power. We're also hearing parts of the Bronx. The Bronx abutting Westchester they're getting power. What do we expect? How will this work? Will areas adjacent to each other slowly but surely start getting power?
RICHARDSON: Yes, I think you will see the same way that the tripwire caused massive power throughout the Northeast, I think they are going to be spotty areas that will bring the power back. I think one of the first steps that has to happen is an investigation by the secretary of energy or by the reliability organization under the secretary of energy to see why this happened. How we can avoid it, but we need to know how it happened. I agree with Governor Pataki. The lightning excuse doesn't sound valid to me. I don't think it's a computer glitch. We don't believe it's terrorism. So, therefore, it's one of lines the major transmission lines overloaded.
KING: Right.
RICHARDSON: And we can't allow this to happen again."""""" RICHARDSON: But I think it'll number the next day or two. But that's not acceptable. This shouldn't happen in the most modern superpower in the world. I bet you countries, third world countries are saying, look at Iraq. They've had a lot of blackouts. I'm not comparing ourselves to Iraq, and I know when I say we have a third world grid it's partly to motivate our electricity and transmission systems to invest in new technologies, to modernize, to build new transmission plants. You know, we've been warning this for years and no one has listened and it takes a crisis for a wake-up call it all of us."
I betcha right now, Bill Richardson will be the Democrats' Vice President candidate, a shoo in, no matter who gets the top slot.
Blithering Idiot... Doesn't he know the President can be on the darkside of the moon and STILL be in communications with anyone he so desires??????
Sure he does, he's DEM hack mouthpiece
"Yes, I believe that Bill Clinton is an honest man." - Dan to Bill O'Reilly, Fox News Channel.
"Where is environmentalism strongest?", ask Sabato. The northeast. "Where was the blackout?" The northeast, Sabato says. This argument will be a great help to President Bush when the environmentalist whackos attack his energy plan and his re-election campaign.
Sabato began his interview by saying the blame game after something like this is to be expected, but Senate Democrats are going to be under lots of presssure to vote for Bush's Energy plan.
I know you got gripes with FOXNews, and I watch more carefully now because of that...but no other network gives half decent background from both sides, like FOXNews.
And on with Sabato was a hunk of a republican strategist (an't remember his name), who gave it right back to the democrats who were on television last night blaming the blackout on Bush.
Now I know some might interpret that as giving Gebhardt way too much airtime, but I think it's important voters understand that the Democrat spin machine is running full tilt to blame the blackout on Bush. People are still without electricity and water, still suffering, but already democrats in concert, are casting blame, taking political advantage of the situation. Voters need to know just how organized Democrats are in their vile, self-serving attempt to regain their power. (pun intended)
(I emailed Lynn Samuels to make sure she was ok...and she is, had her electricity back after 12 hours, but she told me television isn't mentioning that people who in high-rises don't have water.)
I hope all of us remember the universal polls that showed overwhelmingly the American people were sick and tired of mean spirited politics, they wanted a change. So showing the democrats spewing hateful garbage, is a good thing!
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