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Fri 2 Sep, 2005 11:34 pm
The other day while listening to NPR's "Morning Edition" (or perhaps it was "All Things Considered"), the host (whose name escapes me) was interviewing a spokesman for the Insurance Industry. Said spokesman, in his initial comments, explained that private insurance (the kind you buy from those loathsome bastards, the Insurance Companies) generally does not cover flood damage. He further explained that for flood insurance, one must go the Federal Government.
Obviously our intrepid NPR hostess was not listening to her guest because towards the end of the interview she delivered what she clearly thought was a piercing question (paraphrased):
Since insurance companies offer flood insurance to homeowners in locations prone to flooding, and therefore enable these people to rebuild after a flood, aren't they culpable in the cycle of destruction and rebuilding that is inevitable in a flood prone area?
Her guest politely explained that, as he initially said, insurance companies do not offer flood insurance to any homeowner, but I doubt she was listening to that answer either.
Perhaps this isn't an example of liberal bias, but merely an example of shoddy journalism, but it seems unlikely that this same reporter will be found guilty of a similar gaffe which shines the harshest light on a classically liberal constituency.
Whether political bias or incompetence, clearly the reporter revealed her shortcomings in this exchange, but let's assume for a moment that private insurance companies did sell flood insurance to homeowners.
Would her question have been truly piercing?
Private insurance companies do not offer flood insurance because it will never be profitable. If your house isn't located in a flood plain, you will not buy flood insurance. If you buy flood insurance it is because you are very likely to sustain flood damage and insurance companies do not make money paying for losses. The cost of insurance, while seemingly onerous, is a mere fraction of the worth of the property protected, and therefore the only way a private company could make money by providing flood insurance would be to charge something like 25% or more of the property's value as a premium. If you own a house worth $200,000, are you likely to pay $50,000 a year for flood insurance?
But let's, for argument's sake, assume that private insurance companies could make money providing flood insurance or were so poorly run as to try. Does this make them responsible for the destruction and tragedy that follows a flood?
And if it does, then isn't the Federal Government which actually provides flood insurance culpable? The Feds providing flood insurance is a classic New Deal deal.
My God, is it possible that the largess of a paternalistic government could actually be causing or exacerbating the problem which it seeks to remedy?
So, you don't know the program, the host's name or the guest's name, but what the heck....
Shoreline flood insurance is most the most odious form of welfare for the rich found under the sun or, in this case, under the water. So is the insistent development of wetlands which, unless it is in a duck hunting area favored by Cheney and Scalia, this administration has pursued at a fabulous rate, but neither lies at the heart of the most recent problems in New Orleans. The problem is what those in charge see as the problem. People of the George W. Bush School of Thought*, think that government is the problem and are stunned when events arise that can only be handled by good governance, a term with which they are not familiar.
George Bush was irritated the other morning. First, everyone hated his 'Iraq is equal to WWII' speech that he gave at the end of his six-week vacation, (it was not month-long unless you can't count days.) then everyone hated his 'list of what we are sending' speech and wanted to know what the hell the Feds were intending on doing, like he was supposed to know. When you have spent your political career cutting government, starving the beast, you expect others to pick up the slack.
What George wanted to know was not where was the National Guard, but where was the Red Cross, the Lions Club and the Boy Scouts.
Oh, and don't look for the end of flood insurance any time soon as long as the folks on Florida's shoreline is populated by retired Republicans.
Joe(Still lurking about)Nation
*(look! the words bush, school and thought in the same sentence.)
Re: Liberal Bias in the Media (At least in Public Radio)
Finn d'Abuzz wrote:Perhaps this isn't an example of liberal bias, but merely an example of shoddy journalism, but it seems unlikely that this same reporter will be found guilty of a similar gaffe which shines the harshest light on a classically liberal constituency.
There are
dumb journalists who ask inane questions ranged across the political spectrum.
And technically, insurance companies
do offer flood insurance. They just don't back it. The government backs the flood insurance, but it relies on the companies to sell the coverage.
Finn d'Abuzz wrote:And if it does, then isn't the Federal Government which actually provides flood insurance culpable? The Feds providing flood insurance is a classic New Deal deal.
The National Flood Insurance Act was passed in 1968. It was not a New Deal piece of legislation.
Re: Liberal Bias in the Media (At least in Public Radio)
Yes, indeed there are.
Re: Liberal Bias in the Media (At least in Public Radio)
joefromchicago wrote:Finn d'Abuzz wrote:Perhaps this isn't an example of liberal bias, but merely an example of shoddy journalism, but it seems unlikely that this same reporter will be found guilty of a similar gaffe which shines the harshest light on a classically liberal constituency.
There are
dumb journalists who ask inane questions ranged across the political spectrum.
True, but from my point of view (and I know this will come as a shock to you), most of them (the dumb journalists) lean to the left. Statistically this must be the case since about 80% of them in total lean to the left.
And technically, insurance companies
do offer flood insurance. They just don't back it. The government backs the flood insurance, but it relies on the companies to sell the coverage.
Technical, smechnical. It is the government taking the risk, not private insurance companies.
Finn d'Abuzz wrote:And if it does, then isn't the Federal Government which actually provides flood insurance culpable? The Feds providing flood insurance is a classic New Deal deal.
The National Flood Insurance Act was passed in 1968. It was not a New Deal piece of legislation.
Of course not, New Deal is used figuratively.
It just cracks me up to see the contention that most of the media are "liberal." Yeah, tell that to Rupert Murdoch and Conrad Black.
Re: Liberal Bias in the Media (At least in Public Radio)
Finn d'Abuzz wrote:The other day while listening to NPR's "Morning Edition" (or perhaps it was "All Things Considered"), the host (whose name escapes me) was interviewing a spokesman for the Insurance Industry.
I didn't get any further than this. Gosh, if you don't even know what program you are listening to, how can we be expected to accept your version of what was said.
Setanta wrote:It just cracks me up to see the contention that most of the media are "liberal." Yeah, tell that to Rupert Murdoch and Conrad Black.
That's Lord Black of Crossharbour to you Set.
Ruprecht Murdoch obviously doesn't care about a peerage because he shot through to the States and got himself naturalised.
Setanta wrote:It just cracks me up to see the contention that most of the media are "liberal." Yeah, tell that to Rupert Murdoch and Conrad Black.
Whether or not the Liberal media allows their personal opinions to affect their professionalism is subject to debate, but that the vast majority of reporters and editors are liberal is not in question.
I am amazed that you have surrendered all of
News Media to Fox and the Chicago Sun Times, but, then again, yours is a rather typical obfuscating argument from the Left
Last Christmas when i was in Kingston, Ontario at Hamburger's house for the holiday, the Toronto Globe and Mail had a very long section on Black. One section looked at his holdings and media ownership, and another reviewed a book which has been written about his forced divestiture in the United States. The third piece was an op-ed which ended with a plea that Black get the hell out of Canadia and follow Murdoch's example. Very entertaining, all of it.
Re: Liberal Bias in the Media (At least in Public Radio)
Chrissee wrote:Finn d'Abuzz wrote:The other day while listening to NPR's "Morning Edition" (or perhaps it was "All Things Considered"), the host (whose name escapes me) was interviewing a spokesman for the Insurance Industry.
I didn't get any further than this. Gosh, if you don't even know what program you are listening to, how can we be expected to accept your version of what was said.
An utterly vacuous retort.
Re: Liberal Bias in the Media (At least in Public Radio)
Finn d'Abuzz wrote:Chrissee wrote:Finn d'Abuzz wrote:The other day while listening to NPR's "Morning Edition" (or perhaps it was "All Things Considered"), the host (whose name escapes me) was interviewing a spokesman for the Insurance Industry.
I didn't get any further than this. Gosh, if you don't even know what program you are listening to, how can we be expected to accept your version of what was said.
An utterly vacuous retort.
First, you need an argument before it is possible to fashion a retort. You utterly failed in your first sentence. Sorry.
Setanta wrote:Last Christmas when i was in Kingston, Ontario at Hamburger's house for the holiday, the Toronto Globe and Mail had a very long section on Black. One section looked at his holdings and media ownership, and another reviewed a book which has been written about his forced divestiture in the United States. The third piece was an op-ed which ended with a plea that Black get the hell out of Canadia and follow Murdoch's example. Very entertaining, all of it.
Murdoch left Australia long ago but only just recently moved his News corporation hq (nominal hq) from where I live to Delaware something about being able to list on the New York Stock Exchange. Unfortunately he still owns his newspapers here and still issues instructions to editors about how to do their job. He most definitely is not a small-l liberal. He runs, among other things, the New York Post. He owns Fox. Murdoch's media interests are as right wing as you can get without falling off the edge into complete nutbardom.
This whole thread is based on a ad hominem logic error.
Public Radio=Liberals
This one Liberal=Bad journalist
Therefore, all public radio is filled with bad journalists.
Try again, Finn.
Setanta wrote:Last Christmas when i was in Kingston, Ontario at Hamburger's house for the holiday, the Toronto Globe and Mail had a very long section on Black. One section looked at his holdings and media ownership, and another reviewed a book which has been written about his forced divestiture in the United States. The third piece was an op-ed which ended with a plea that Black get the hell out of Canadia and follow Murdoch's example. Very entertaining, all of it.
And this is relevant how?
DrewDad wrote:This whole thread is based on a ad hominem logic error.
Public Radio=Liberals
This one Liberal=Bad journalist
Therefore, all public radio is filled with bad journalists.
Try again, Finn.
What the hell is "ad hominem logic;" let alone "ad hominem logic error?"
Public Radio = (largely) Liberals (Yes)
This one Liberal = Bad journalist (Yes)
You, not I, have made the illogical leap that Public Radio = Liberal Bad Journalists.
I have offered this exchange as an example of Liberal bias, while acknowledging that it may have more to do with poor journalism than Liberal bias.
Personally, I don't believe it was merely a case of poor journalism, because I doubt it would have repeated itself in the interview of a Liberal.
If you actually have a position to argue, let's hear/see it.
Goodfielder and i were having an interesting conversation in what is otherwise a witless and puerile thread, embodying yet another moronic conservative rant against the media. So, of course, relevance to your idiocy is irrelevant.
Setanta wrote:Goodfielder and i were having an interesting conversation in what is otherwise a witless and puerile thread, embodying yet another moronic conservative rant against the media. So, of course, relevance to your idiocy is irrelevant.
Proof positive that dog owners eventually resemble their dogs: Yip, yip, yip.
Not my dog. You can't recall the name of the program, you can't remember the name of the host, you refer to an unnamed member of "the insurance industry," you fallaciously state that the Federal government provides flood insurance (it is a guarantor, not an insuror)--and you want that bit of vague blather to stand as an indictment of public radio in particular, and the allegedly liberal (unproven) media.
Yes, you well should yip, yip, yip, because it makes about as much sense as your silly, silly thread.
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