Dennis Kneale

I Spy Hypocrisy

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Senator Dianne Feinstein of California must be suffering from whiplash.  For months she has defended the NSA’s mass surveillance of billions of phone calls, e-mails, video chats and more, saying it safeguards the nation. “What keeps me up at night, candidly, is another attack against the United States.  And I see enough of the threat […]

How to be Jobless

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Hello guys. Today starts Week 5 of my first-ever stint in the ranks of The Unemployed. So this pretty much makes me an expert, right? Journos are like that. A month of furious outreach has yielded a passel of no’s and a foreboding sense that this could take longer than expected.

GS & @BS

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You see the headlines this morning?  Publishing titan Simon & Schuster kills six-figure book deal with @GSElevator, the Twitter feed that bashes Goldman Sachs and all of Wall Street. The Twitter account professed to report the real overheard exchanges of rapacious GS plunderers.  It was said to be the puckish work of an anonymous writer […]

Passivity Begs Aggression

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That rascally Russian Vladimir Putin–Pooty, as George W. had nicknamed him–is at it again.  He isn’t stopping in Crimea, it now is clear, as he sends masked thugs into police stations across eastern Ukraine.  Passivity by the U.S.–the only superpower left–invites aggression by a diminutive despot with a chip on his shoulder and something to […]

SEC: The Ultimate Insider

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Oh now isn’t this rich: The SEC, stung by its failures in the biggest scam of all time (the Bernard Madoff Ponzi scheme), is hellbent on a search-and-destroy mission to mete out and vanquish all insider trading. Now a new report shows SEC staffers themselves are extremely effective insider traders. Researchers looked at 56 enforcement […]

Wages and Lies

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In these Days of Obama — hand-wringing, feckless and ineffectual — even the wonkiest economic issue is infected with moralizing, business-bashing and political correctness. If you question the fear-mongering of climate-change alarmists, you are a “denier.” If you oppose extended payments for jobless benefits, you are heartless (despite clear evidence that it makes unemployment worse […]

CMCSA-NETFLIX: WHAT NO FCC?

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The Net-neutrality nannies are shocked and outraged by the Comcast-Netflix deal—and by new reports that AT&T is in similar talks with the streamer that gave us the binge-worthy “House of Cards.” They are appalled that Netflix, their poor oppressed corporate hero, would stoop to signing a deal to pay a traffic-bounty to its tormentor, Comcast, […]

Comcast Bid: Ego, Cash & Golf with Obama

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A lot more is at stake than mere money in Comcast’s bold $45 billion bear hug of Time Warner Cable. It is a bid to amass the largest collection of cable systems in the world; a battle for clout against the broadcast networks and other content-makers; and a test of efforts to restrict cable with […]

Netflix: The Real House of Cards

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First of two articles Happy Valentine’s Day, honey. Instead of going out to an overpriced dinner in a restaurant crowded with a few dozen other tired, tense couples, how about we stay in and binge? On “House of Cards,” season 2. Netflix today posted all 13 episodes of the much-anticipated second season of the Kevin […]

Comcast’s Bold Bid: Brilliant or Betrayal?

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Let’s admit it: No one reads “all” of anything anymore, nor wants to do so. It isn’t that we don’t have the time, it’s that we don’t make the time. So here are a few fast, quick thoughts on Comcast’s $45B bid for Time Warner Cable, one of the biggest media deals in years. In fewer than 600 words.