As The Carpetbagger Report has grown, so too has the amount of correspondence I receive. A surprisingly large number of them are creative, witty, and astute.
With this in mind, I thought I would blatantly steal, I mean, pay homage to Eric Alterman’s fine work at Altercation by unveiling my own version of Slacker Friday. The feature, which I’d like to make a regular part of my Friday posts, will highlight some of the best emails I’ve received in the last week in a little something we’ll call “Correspondents’ Corner.” (See the key distinction in the spelling? Alterman calls his “Correspondence Corner,” which makes mine completely different.)
First up is an email from a Carpetbagger regular, Jim B. In response to yesterday’s post about Fox News Channel twisting Richard Clarke’s comments out of context, Jim had a very creative suggestion.
Maybe the Dept of Labor should add Fox News to the manufacturing sector. They really do fabricate the news. Or is it a re-assembly plant? Think of all the T shirts that could be sold on this one.
Excellent point, Jim, but don’t give the White House any ideas.
Next up is an email from a reader whom I affectionately call Dr. Who. Responding to my call for suggestions for a name to describe the Medicare cost cover-up scandal, Dr. Who noticed an interesting parallel.
Let’s see if this sounds familiar. A large organization, whose leader hails from Texas, “cooks” the books and plays accounting games to hide costs and make the bottom line look better. As a result, many people (tens of thousands? hundreds of thousands? millions?) are fooled into believing in the organization and they put their money on the line in support of it. In the end, the lies are discovered and all those innocent trusting people who believed in the organization — and in the ability of our laws to keep such organizations honest — are the very people who lose. While it looks, at first, like those at the head of the organization might get away with a slap on the wrist and millions of dollars in their pockets, an investigation ensues and …
Can you name the scandal I’m talking about? If you said Enron, you’re absolutely, well, um, hmm. I guess it could be them. I was thinking of the White House and the Medicare scandal, but I guess the details kind of apply to both don’t they?
OK, let’s split the difference and call the scandal MedRON, or maybe ENdicare?
I kinda like Endicare…sounds a bit like “end of care.”
Just to take this analogy even further, those in Enron who knew the truth were threatened with dismissal if they shared accurate information with anyone, pressure that Richard Foster can certainly relate to.
Enter your submissions for next week’s Correspondents’ Corner at any time.