On Fox News snippets were distributed throughout the mainstream media of Bill O'Reilly snarling with impending dyspepsia to Hillary Clinton over the sheer audacity of her statement that his federal income tax might be raised to 39 percent under a plan she would offer as president.

This is so prevalent under the crybaby yuppie mentality of the Bush-Cheney Administration, fostered by the neoconservatives at the top carrying the spears for the likes of the company Cheney continues to, in all reality, lead, Halliburton, along with Bechtel.  

Then there are the revered telephone communication giants, and how Bush wants you to believe that U.S. intelligence sources will dry up post haste if we do not grant these giants immunity from prosecution.

Amid this jockeying that is occurring not only in America but worldwide over the New World's Order to keep things running in a neoconservative fashion by having the "super haves" hold on to all they have while expanding to own even more, there are efforts afoot to provide economic justice by giving those groups whose rights have been lying dormant all too long in the wake of expanding costs an opportunity to achieve needed economic benefits.  

The Progressive Democrat Newsletter grew out of the frustration of the 2004 election. I have try mixing my own rants and ideas, with national issues, news items, and some very local groups and events in an attempt to both help shape debate and to help people find their own ways of getting involved.

This week I highlight Bill O'Reilly's latest insult: denying the existence of some 200,000 homeless Veterans. For my NYC readers I highlight a very important attempt in the City Council to require permits for citizens to use devices that detect harmful materials in the air, water and soil. For my North Carolina readers I highlight a Democratic candidate for Congress, Marshall Adame, who is pissing off the mercenary firm Blackwater. I am urging people to support Marshall Adame for his willingness to challenge Blackwater. And I continue to highlight local events in all the states where I have had a good number of readers. Interestingly, Florida and Texas are joining New York and California as states where I have lots of readers. Don't forget to visit an advertiser or two and if you want more, please visit Culture Kitchen.

Roy Pearson, a judge in Washington, D.C., had his "15 minutes of fame" when he filed a lawsuit against a cleaning establishment for $54 million after the cleaners lost a pair of pants that accompanied his suit.

The owners of the Korean cleaning establishment claimed to have spent $100,000 in court costs fighting this irrational lawsuit.  They were ready to return to South Korea, but finally managed to settle this frivolous nonsense.

What is a judge with such poor judgment doing in the U.S. legal system?  This is the question that demands an immediate answer.  He is obviously exploiting freedom that citizens have fought and died to deliver and preserve.

Equality before the law is the boasted hallmark of the American justice system.  

In the current college football fever to determine which two teams should meet for the national championship this season, the term "style points" has caught on big with sports commentator and writers in conjunction with how teams might fare in the continuing Bowl College Series computer sweepstakes.

Fox Television is a tough act to beat when it comes to finishing dead last in any style points media sweepstakes.  

Just when you think the network has hit rock bottom with another session of Ann Coulter shrieking that the Democratic Party exists "to kill babies" or Bill O'Reilly delivering another hand wringing declaration that to criticize Cheney and Bush on Iraq is at least coming perilously close to treason Fox delivers a fresh surprise.

Fox's latest effort at informing the public is a two part series arranged by book publisher Judith Regan.  Regan has scored a two-tiered "triumph" by announcing a book and two part interview on Fox starring O.J. Simpson.

Amy Richards is at work on Opting-In: The Case for Motherhood and Feminism, which will be published in 2007. She is also the co-author of Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism and the Future and Grassroots: A Field Guide to Feminist Activism. In 1992 she co-founded the Third Wave Foundation and since 1995 she has been the voice behind Ask Amy, an online advice column.  This is her first time writing on www.RHRealityCheck.org.

Bill O'Reilly doesn't scare me. I have been on his show a few times and know that his bark is a lot louder than his bite. He's a bully, in that classic playground sense - he's not nice, unless you play his game. That said, however, when his producer invited me to contribute to a segment about the then impending Supreme Court cases dealing with later-term abortions, and the medical records from two abortion providers in Kansas being turned over to that state's Attorney General after a two year escapade, I was apprehensive.

Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline finally obtained private medical records from Kansas abortion clinics last week, though months ago the Kansas Supreme Court made efforts to protect people's medical privacy by limiting the scope of information.  Someone else had been seeking them too, Fox News' own Bill O'Reilly, who said on his program Friday that he had been seeking these records for months and months, and finally got them, from an "inside source."

Just think of what we read in high school civics books.  We were told that good citizenship was inextricably tied to voting.  This was our contribution toward making our voices heard.

When Dwight D. Eisenhower, the forgotten Republican president, was seeking reelection in 1956 he delivered a brief announcement to the nation shortly before Election Day urging all Americans to exercise their right to vote.  He urged every eligible American citizen to vote, even if that meant voting against him.

We have come a long way.  Sean Hannity, who drips with syrupy self-proclamations on patriotism, has a different view.  Voters should only turn out if they favor the candidates he and his "fair and balanced" Fox News colleagues such as Bill O'Reilly and Neil Cavuto sanction, meaning Republicans slavishly supporting the Cheney-Bush agenda.

Recently Hannity encouraged Democratic voters to "stay home on Election Day," adding that, "your vote doesn't matter anyway."  His rationale was that Democrats should stay away from the polls "for the sake of the nation" since their votes "won't change who occupies the White House" and Democratic "candidates have absolutely no idea how to win the war on terrorism."

Next week, CBS plans to air a documentary about some of the events on 9/11/2001.  The documentary is controversial, even though it was shown before.  What makes it controversial is not revisiting the raw horror of that day,  it's that people -- some of them recorded live in the midst of these events -- curse.  After all, you have to remember 2/1/2004 changed everything.  Daring to let a four letter word through the nation's television speakers could cost CBS more than half a million dollars per offending syllable.

The Republicans, who so often poke the left as pushing a "nanny state," have made radical increases in fines for "indecency" part of their pretense at family values.  But as usual with the current crew in Washington, they've missed the target.  Not only have they failed to stop the real obscenity that threatens our country, the radical right has become the largest source for filth and indecency.  They've turned the Republican Party into the biggest pornographer in the world.

We often talk about the Republican Culture of Corruption, the excessive cronyism that exists between current Halliburton Republicans and the military-industrial complex. In today's Republican party, there is the ultimate fulfillment of what President Eisenhower warned the nation against. But bad though the widespread Republican Culture of Corruption is, there is an even worse side to the modern right wing: the Culture of Intolerance and Violence.

One of the worst examples of this was the Delaware Pogrom.

Hate Crimes have been on the rise in America since 9/11, and, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, hate groups in America have increased by 33% in the past five years. A peak in attacks on Muslims after 9/11 was rapidly followed by an increase in anti-Semitism in the US and worldwide. There was a slight decline in anti-Semetic incidents in 2005, but incidents are still at disturbingly high levels.

As Senator Joseph Lieberman seeks to secure the Democratic Party's nomination in Connecticut a question must be asked, one that becomes more increasingly relevant with each passing day.  With Lieberman expressing concern that so many members of his party on the important issue of values, he has made a prominent new ally.  

This new alliance not only begs an important question, it presages a more involved discussion of the direction where Senator Lieberman is taking America.  It lies at the heart of where the Democratic Party stands and the ideological ground it should encompass in the future.  

It must also be asked whether Lieberman and others like him are part of a unilateral disarmament movement to enable the Cheney-Bush style of radical Republicanism to reign unchallenged.

As has been noted, Lieberman has made a recent ally of Fox News right wing Republican commentator Sean Hannity.  On one of his recent appearances Lieberman expressed concern that so many in his party do not understand traditional American values.  The Fox commentator was only too happy to agree.

Professors should beware.  That is any professors to the left of Fox News, since anyone failing to heed and speak the devout word is in the sights of David Horowitz, the self-anointed head of the Thought Police maintaining watchdog status over academia.

According to Horowitz there are 50,000 college and university professors currently endangering students with exposure to anti-American propaganda.  Since this is a tall order for even as devoted a right wing zealot as Horowitz to handle at one time, he has concentrated his efforts on those he deems to be the 101 leading malefactors.

The Horowitz crusade takes the form of a propaganda-laden book entitled The Professors:  The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America.  Assuming equal interest to the author's background and agenda is the identity of the publisher, Alfred Regnery, also known, and with good reason, as "the right wing publishing ghetto."  

One work that emerged as a gigantic bestseller released by Regnery was Unlimited Access, written by former CIA operative Gary Aldrich.  

Professors should beware.  That is any professors to the left of Fox News, since anyone failing to heed and speak the devout word is in the sights of David Horowitz, the self-anointed head of the Thought Police maintaining watchdog status over academia.

According to Horowitz there are 50,000 college and university professors currently endangering students with exposure to anti-American propaganda.  Since this is a tall order for even as devoted a right wing zealot as Horowitz to handle at one time, he has concentrated his efforts on those he deems to be the 101 leading malefactors.

One work that emerged as a gigantic bestseller released by Regnery was Unlimited Access, written by former CIA operative Gary Aldrich.  

The author disclosed that while in the White House Hillary Clinton decorated the national Christmas tree with pornographic ornaments while Bill snuck away from his Secret Service detail in the wee hours of the morning and walked by himself to the Marriott Hotel a few blocks away on Pennsylvania Avenue to engage in secret trysts with young women.  

Former right wing author-propagandist David Brock, who ultimately broke away from the Fox-Scaife-Limbaugh-Reveren d Moon axis, revealed that he was the "source" that Aldrich thought reliable enough to use for the Bill Clinton "disclosure."  

Brock explained that he disclosed to Aldrich that such a rumor was making the rounds, which was good enough for both the author and his publisher, even though Brock stressed that it was unconfirmed.  

When employees at the Marriott were interviewed in connection with the Aldrich charge by the media, raucous laughter was the response.  As one employee stated, "How could President Clinton come and go in the early hours when our lobby is virtually empty without being discovered?"

Despite no evidence being forthcoming to substantiate either absurd charge, Alfred Regnery stuck by both revelations and the work became a bestseller icon to the hate Clinton crowd.  Regnery also was noted for providing that historian of probity and incisive accuracy, Ann Coulter, with an early showcase to try out some of her earliest "traitor" lines in print.

Horowitz fits comfortably into the aforementioned tradition, a former Marxist firebrand who merely traded brands of extremist thought.  

It is significant how many times this occurs, only to find the right douse their newly devoted converts with an appropriate holy water welcome.  The right's leading voices assert that a watershed conversion has occurred when in reality a troubled fanatic has no more than begun reading from a different script.

Two of the accused professors have responded recently to Horowitz's charges while, in recent Amazon.com reviews, students have come to the defense of others, relying on a firsthand experience unknown to Horowitz.  

One of the professors Horowitz singled out was Professor David Barash of the University of Washington.  Considering the topic Barash chose for his latest book, Horowitz's suspicions are understandable.  

The psychology professor, who teaches a course in Ideas of Human Nature, dared to co-author a book on Peace and Conflict Studies, crossing paths with the neoconservative agenda embraced by Horowitz natural allies such as Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle.  

"Some of the assertions in Horowitz's book are flat-out lies," Barash wrote in an e-mail, the contents of which were published in The Daily, Washington University's campus newspaper.  "He evidently didn't bother to read my Peace and Conflict Studies book, but simply took it as an occasion to agitate."

Barash tackled the crux of the issue in stating, "I've never made any bones about my personal politics, but I also think it's very important that I don't expect my students to agree with me."  Barash noted that, while it might be true that in social work and the humanities there might be a "left bias," he conjectures that "the exact opposite is true in engineering schools or business."

Taking up a related point was another individual singled out for rebuke by Horowitz, Professor Robert W. McChesney of the University of Illinois.  

Considering that McChesney has been an articulate critic of the current monopoly of the mainstream media by the likes of Fox and Clear Channel, and co-authored with John Nichols the incisive work Tragedy:  How The American Media Sells Wars, Spin Elections, and Destroy Democracy, he would thereby loom as a conspicuous Horowitz target.

After all, don't O'Reilly, Hannity and their Fox colleagues insist that the network is objective and is criticized only because they refuse to sell out to the left?  This is the message that the propaganda machine, of which Horowitz plays an ardent part, has attempted to inculcate into the minds of Americans.

McChesney, in responding to Horowitz's attack on the website CommonDreams.org, cited the prevalence of staunchly conservative thought in an area where Horowitz has never treaded, that of the U.S. military.  

"Generals and military officers are far more important (than professors) to the functioning of a government," McChesney wrote, "and, as history shows in depressingly frequent detail, a much greater threat to democratic governance than anthropology professors.  In the United States the military is enormous, it is entirely funded by taxpayers, and the officer corps is significantly right-wing Republican.  There is hardly a liberal Democrat in the bunch, and I dare say probably not a single soul to the left of the Clinton-Kerry center of the Democratic Party."

McChesney, a shrewd media critic who knows undiluted propaganda when he observes it, finds it "revealing that Horowitz uses the term `dangerous' as a pejorative in his book's subtitle.  Dangerous professors are those with ideas with which Horowitz disagrees.  This is a ludicrously opportunistic and undemocratic framing.  The entire premise of a viable democratic public sphere is that what some perceive as `dangerous' ideas be protected, even encouraged, and permitted to be thrown into debate.  Especially, above all else, in universities."

If there is one thing that Horowitz and his ideological allies do not want it is a free marketplace of ideas.  What troubles Horowitz is that there are those that dare to think rather than fall into the tidy pattern of Fox zombies, docilely accepting the communicative Big Brother's message of the moment, whether it be disseminated by Horowitz, Limbaugh, Coulter or Hannity.  

The phrase "dare to think" is a toxic to the likes of Horowitz.  If you dare to stand up for the First Amendment and freedom to worship or not to do so without government interference, if you believe that the government has no right to intrude into an individual's thoughts or bedroom, known traditionally as a right of privacy, or if you believe that searches should be preceded by warrants from magistrates, or that the Nuremberg and UN charters along with the Geneva Code should all be followed under both U.S. and international law, then Horowitz and his thought police have news for you.

The foregoing used to be regarded as bedrock constitutional principles by both traditional John Stuart Mill liberals as well as Edmund Burke conservatives.  To adhere to these principles currently is to invite at least suspicion, perhaps investigation, and maybe prosecution under the dire Orwellian warning, "We are at war!  You are making the world safer for terrorists!"    

There are more and more efforts out there to lobby the companies that advertise on right-wing talk shows to get them to pull their ads. This is an approach that I have advocated for some time based on the fact that this is how groups like the NRA and moral majority have been so successful in dictating the national dialogue. Their constant lobbying not just of politicians but of businesses and advertisers mean that they get listened to and we don't. I am urging you to join me and dozens of others in the blogsphere to fight back and use your consumer and investor muscle to pressure companies to avoid right wing talk shows when they are considering where to spend their advertising dollars. This particular push is about a week old and already we are seeing some signs that we are being noticed. But we need more numbers!

This is absolutely unbelievable.  Bill O'Reilly is accusing people who call his public on-air radio show of harassment.  And these callers did not say anything obscene or threatening, they just mentioned two magic words -- "Keith Olbermann." (O'Reilly has been "feuding" with MSNBC's Olbermann, who has been successful at getting under O'Reilly's skin).

Not only that, O'Reilly has persuaded Fox's Security department to contact these callers and intimidate them.

Two people have described the ordeal on Daily Kos:

Charlie Reina, a former producer at Fox News wrote an open letter to Bill O'Reilly on the media site, Romenesko.

He asks for an invitation to appear on O'Reilly's show. He better make it quick. At the rate O'Reilly's ratings are dropping, no one will see his appearance.

Dear Bill:

I just watched a clip from Monday's "Factor" featuring Eric Burns, the host of your network's media criticism show, News Watch. During the segment, you implored Eric to fire one of his panelists, Neal Gabler, whom you called a "rabid dog" and described as "cowardly" for declining an invitation to appear on your show. Since not a word was said in Neal's defense, I would appreciate an opportunity to do so as a guest on the "Factor."

As you know, I was the producer of "News Watch" from its inception in 1997 until I left FNC six years later. (By the way, thank you for complimenting "News Watch." I'm sure I speak for all of us responsible for making it exactly what it is today, the best show in FNC's weekend lineup.) Neal joined us in 2002, replacing Jeff Cohen in the panel's "liberal" chair. Like Jeff, he took seriously management's implicit "hands-off" pledge to News Watch, and he clearly has felt free to criticize Fox during debates on the show. For the most part, Fox has made good on its pledge, and I would hate to think that Neal's job is in jeopardy now just because he offended the network's highest-rated personality.

Bill, I know that you don't engage in personal attacks, so I'm sure the "rabid dog" thing was merely a bit of hyperbole - nothing more serious than, say, calling a harmless blowhard a "demagogue." But it was disappointing to see your characterization of Neal as a coward go unchallenged. As you know, people of all stripes often refuse to appear on programs for reasons other than cowardice - for instance, when they consider the show or its host or other guests beneath their dignity. A case in point: Brent Bozell of the Media Research Center won't appear on any show alongside Jeff Cohen. At least, that's what Bozell told us when we invited him to fill the "News Watch" panel's "conservative" seat one week and he turned us down flat.

There are many other examples we can discuss. And I'm not even including cases in which hosts declare topics taboo after they've had their say on them. If you invite me, I promise not to raise any subject you may have vowed never to speak of again. I would, though, like to discuss - in general terms, of course -- other acts that happen in and around television newsrooms which might be considered cowardly. For instance, a physically-imposing on-air personality publicly humiliating a staffer so cruelly that she can no longer return to work. Or a network public relations department so depraved that it sets out, behind the scenes, on a campaign to destroy the career of another channel's rising on-air star. Or a network executive who feels free to embarrass a vulnerable young anchorwoman by ogling her legs on a public escalator as others watch.

Anyway, Bill, I think we could have a really eye-opening discussion. Properly promoted, it could raise your already-astronomical numbers a notch. And it might even do me some good. Remember when I agreed to have you on "News Watch" so you could promote one of your novels? If you return the favor, the book I'm writing could wind up a best-seller.

All the best.

Charlie Reina

Wonder if Reina will get an invite to appear on O'Reilly's show? Nah. O'Reilly's too cowardly. UPDATE: O'Reilly is even more cowardly than I thought. People who call his show and mention MSNBC's Keith Obelman is getting a follow up call from Fox News Security. Link to adigal's account and Mike Stark's.