I’ll be on Reliable Sources tomorrow morning, 1/21, sometime between 10:30 and 11:00
Published by Mike Stark January 20th, 2007 in UncategorizedCNN with Howie Kurtz from 10-11. I should be on in the second half.
I believe the topic will be KSFO, but I’m really in the dark as to what exactly Howie will want to discuss. At my suggestion, they’ve also invited Dan Riehl, of Riehl World, to debate the topic.
I don’t mean to be a dick, but the truth is by the time the 6-7 minute segment is over, CNN will want to hire me as a sanitation engineer because I will have mopped the floor with Mr. Riehl…
Anyway, other news:
DisneyHatesYou.com has hit a snag. My host had his basement flood and took the week off. As soon as it launches, I’ll let you know.
In the meantime, here’s a tremendous new Youtube to keep you tied over. (Who has the skills for this stuff? It’s friggin amazing!)
Finally, this really treads a fine line, but I don’t know how else to talk about it from my perspective. What this is is an email I sent to a good friend that runs in circles of fundraisers and progressive strategies. I talk about a very real problem that I’d really like to get some feedback on from evryone. I don’t care if your name is George Soros, Richard Mellon Scaife or Bill Gates… Nor does it matter if you don’t have two cents to rub together - if you’ve got a spark of an idea, let me hear it… (I’ve redacted some of the content to protect identities keep promises of secrecy)
*** and I have been getting pretty angry and frustrated and we really don’t know who to talk to. We’ve both demonstrated an incredible devotion to this cause we’re all a part of, but we’re both looking towards the future and realizing that something’s gonna hafta give or we’re gonna be forced to bail out…
We’ve both got families. My second child is due in July. He just had is first three months ago. Neither of us have hit our career strides yet, but we’ve both spent endless hours and a not insignificant amount of money (that by all rights should be spent on our families) on “the cause”.
we both have high-paying alternatives, or at least serious prospects. He can make plenty of bank as a corporate speech writer, I can do the same as a lawyer…
Neither of us want to change paths - we both love the battle we’ve joined. But it’s looking more and more like we’re gonna have to, well, to coin a phrase, move on.
Why? Because we can’t afford to keep spinning our wheels doing good work that we can’t make a living from. Like anyone else, w’re faced with some hard choices. Do we continue spending our own money to further the cause, or do we make sure our kids are going to be able to go to college? Well, that’s a no brainer…
So, I’m throwing this conversation back at you. Why is it that when I look around at the Fellows at Center for American Progress, MediaMatters and other progressive organizations, I see all the same people. And to be honest, that’s the only place I see them. I don’t see them impacting elections or taking on Republicans in a way that excites the base and draws people into the party… ***
I guess my point is that we do shit - we get shit done. The people we see on the boards of all these think-tanks - well, they don’t do shit - at least not that we notice. And the same people are paid by all the same organizations - some people I’ve never heard of are on 4 or 5 diff’t boards…
Ugh.
If *** and I (and god knows how many more) give up on this, then it’ll be two hard-earned brands thrown in the trash. It’ll be people with experience and “institutional knowledge” (such as it is) lost for nothing.
This isn’t an explicit fundraising appeal - instead, I’m asking y’all to start conversations with people that run in your circles about how you can incentivise activism. I know people don’t want to pay for shit that’s already been done, but activism, by it’s very nature, is mostly spur of the moment. I’ve ranted and rambled, but I think it’s time somebody started talking about this.
Best,
Mike
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hate to bother you mike, but the youtube link aint working
Youtube worked fine for me.
The video gave me an alternate idea. Watching the animation and the perfect background music (which I just commented on at the site), made me think about all this right-wing hate speech and gave me an idea for a performance piece.
Instead of Hitler speaking in German, string together as many hate filled quotes about liberals and Democrats from all the wingnut pundits and talkers as possible, into hopefully something resembling a coherent narrative. At a public protest, present the speech with a background screen showing, at each point, the name of the person who originally spoke the sentence being repeated. But when the speaker utters them, he should so with the kind of over-the-top histrionics that Hitler was known for (lots of arm-waving, fist-shaking, and pointing, etc.) Perhaps have the same electronica Ode to Joy playing beneath it, with the speaker dressed in a brown double-breasted suit similar to the Fuehrer uniform (don’t wear an actual swastika or anything - let people get the message themselves). I think it could be a powerful performance piece if done right, and really get the message across of the underlying filth these people spew on a regular basis.
Mike,
I’m a big fan of what I’ve encountered of your work, and I think you’re breaking some important new ground.
Here’s those 2 pennies you mentioned:
My perception is that you won’t be able to sustain the kind of work you’re doing based on grassroots fundraising.
If that’s so, if you want to make it sustainable, you’ll have to make some kind of appeal to existing institutions to support you in some way.
If you haven’t done so already, put some time into make a written pitch for what you do - and maybe several, for different audiences. For instance, if you want to pitch to a media organization, non-breaking stories that don’t result in new news (like the call to Gingrich) might not hold a lot of interest to them, compared to stuff that provokes a newsworthy response (like the hotel encounter with Allen.)
As good as your work is, I suspect nobody’s going to figure out a way to pay you, unless you package it and tell them why they should.
A lot of what you do - like calling Hannity a hypocrite to his face - is really something that lots of individuals should be doing on their own time, not something that anybody will pay you for. If you can demonstrate that you’re leading and guiding people to expand their own notions of civic responsibiility, maybe that’s different.
But you’ve got to make the case, and you’ve got to figure out who to target!
Best of luck.
-Pete
Be nice to Riehl, Miguel, he ees a leetle slow, eh?
Having read some of hees posts, I would say that joo are smarter than heem, so be nice, joo do no want to come off as the bully.
That’s KSFO’s job.
Buena suerte, we weel all be rooting for joo.
Mike Stark - I just heard of you today. Dan Riehl linked to a couple of your juvenile stunts on his web site.
You are on the level of a 12 year old punk kid.
The only people who are impressed by your pranks are other immature nutjobs.
Hey Mike,
Good Job on CNN.
OK now let’s have a Hillary talk, you know a chat.
I’m eating a late breakfast. Sitting across from my 50 inch flat screen HDTV. Soooo….
What the hell is up with that GROWTH on your NECK. OMG I thought something was wrong with my new Flat Screen TV!
Man is that that distracting. It’s worse that a nose hair that wiggles when you take a breath. For God’s sake man get a razor blade and cut that thing off!!!
If it’s not some crazy mole growth thing and it’s only left over egg McMuffin please forgive me.
Chris
PS otherwise you’re a nice looking guy
Deveiled eggs - like anyone gives a crap what you think.
I just saw you on Kurtz’s program - you’re doing a fabulous job (I just realized that my other comment was made to the wrong post- it actually belongs here).
Anyway - I would stay away from institutional dollars if I were you. It tends to blur the mission. Do what you can in your spare time and stick to grass roots support.
Ah yes. The left. Silence critics by screaming, throwing things, having a tantrum but never by a conversation. Stark is no different than any of the left wing brown shirts from history or even Chavez now. His method, since his arguments lack substance, is to out shout or throw things to stop someone from offering an alternative view. Chavez nationalized the media and censored it. He should feel a kindred spirit with a man who has his own secret police to kill and intimidate people he disagrees with. Hitler would understand your thinking, he shared your point of view on alternative view points. Worse still are the videos. Pointless, without merit or fact, “see what i dun” worthless self agrandisement.
Maybe this propaganda will generate a buck or two from the loony left for ya. Maybe it won’t. But it won’t last. Nothing so hollow ever does.
Shane
Be honest. When Howie said to you “It seems to me that you have a problem with the First Amendment,” didn’t you want to slap that toupee of his head?
Keep the faith my new friend. Don’t for a second think your work has gone unrewarded, unnoticed or that its effects didn’t influence the last, very important, election. Personally I feel the election was far more overwhelming then we were told. Who believes that the same scum who affected the computer coup of 2000 didn’t have the machines rigged for 2006? More than likely there were no repugnicons elected and pudgy, pasty Rove had to puke up the half chewed canary he was munching on with such confidence just prior to the elections.
I lost most respect for my fellow, lazy and unconcerned americans after 2000. Not ever a “true believer,” I foolishly, since childhood, thought all those churchgoing (mostly protestant in my community) citizens knew something I didn’t, or worse, had a leg up on me spiritually, a “righteousness” that danced around me and mine because we were Catholics, and not very good ones at that. It was both a sad and glad awakening I had after 2000 when it became so clear that these were haters, hypochristians who could only be dragged out to the polls, and their civic obligations by the phoney, non-issue of “gay marriage,” and, at the last moment, through the whore media suggestions that “Blacks were streaming to the polls in record numbers.” Yes, that was the pitch early on election day.
There truly has been, for decades, a dumbing down of americans. Two weekends ago we watched some of a “Rifleman marathon” on the Western channel. Those 30 minute shows, which ran from 1958-1962, were wonderful vignettes of moral lessons, interrupted by a mere 4 minutes of commercials (OK, Ok, folks got knocked off every week too but badguys were often on the side of unamerican greed and the twisted logic of aggressive bullies, both now hallmarks of repugnicon identity, and they always paid the price). Now, there can be no 30 minute shows due to the 8 to 10 minutes of corporate commercials and overbearing self promotions of other asinine shows. Now, these anti-intellects, not only stretch presentations to an hour (complete with 16-20 minutes of paid nonsense and misrepresentations) but insult what thinking beings remain by repeating, ad naseum, the limited ground covered prior to the commercials (maybe they believe we’d forgotten what we were watching before the break, it being so damn long). Add to this the disgrace that has become our children’s education, the purposeful diversion of those tax dollars to eco-unfriendly, mostly redneck businesses such as Halliburton and a public seemingly content as long as the TV’s on and WalMart’s open and here we are.
I could go on forever here but don’t want to wear out any welcome a newbie might enjoy. I’ll have plenty to say over time and you may not (or what is forcefully pidgeon-holed as a “liberal” may not) agree with all I have to say (such as immigration or the sell-out Climtons or the Israel version of our tiny, loud and controlling neocon minority, the ziocons) but I doubt I’ll suffer the screeds or outright bans I’ve enjoyed when challenging the haters at their funky websites.
One must be patient. Easily said but one of life’s hardest lessons. The fact that you were on national television this morning and have enjoyed a raised profile from your righteuos and honest revelations of one medias hate mongering proves the public is listening and interested. That one of “them” felt compelled to have you on their network proves that voices like yours can no longer be ignored or dissed. 7 or 8 minutes is better than none, the giraffe faced moderator (who didn’t know who Yvonne DeCarlo was but suggested that anyone who didn’t know who Kate Middleton is “has been living in a cave”) didn’t have any influence in the too brief debate and the squinty cow head who debated you was ineffective (trust that the “Hannity sucks ass” was a hoot to anyone listening).
The tide. too slow to turn, is turning. The whores of the “Haves” are blinking and looking for material to make cocoons with. You, and those like you (you aren’t alone) are the foot to fleeing ass needed.
Truth can’t be extinguished with lies as long as truth is allowed to be voiced. What these cynical talibangelists represent can’t stand the light of day. That it’s taking so long is extremely frustrating but we aren’t dealing with a well versed and proudly educated public anymore or an honest media. Those with IQ’s over 100 get it and if they are on the wrong side they either are of the “Haves” or are nasty haters (that unrepentant 20-25% of bottom feeders who continue to support president stupid, the dull tool of fascism, the promoter of pollution, the muddling Midlothian).
Keep up the noble work, particularly now when the spotlight is on you.
Obviously others are impressed, as well — hence your angry tone. Has Stark touched a nerve?
Blast! I didn’t have as much space left as I thought on the videotape I programmed to record this. I hope some other folks caught it and maybe will post the video.
Oh, and “Deveiled” (can you not even spell your nickname right?) - I guess you’ll just have to go back to that elevated conservative discourse in the great war of ideas with such advanced philosophies as “it’ll be really funny when bad things happen to all these damn liberals!”
Mike,
I missed the show this morning. I hope you did well and it gets youtubed at some point.
I’ve been a fan of yours as of late, and I really can understand your frustration when it comes to the “cause” and not wanting to let it go. but needing an income.
I can only suggest that you find a balance, stay in the game as best you can while not going hungry, but also with an eye toward your goal.
As PeteF suggests, you may consider packaging yourself as “Stark’s Reality” or some such thing and pitch to media organizations or pitch a book idea to a publisher and springboard from that.
There’s definiteley a hankereing for a strong liberal voice, with the growing success of Olberman and recent political events, the media may be on the look out for new perspectives- my two cents anyway, good luck.
Sean
They should have video at http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/reliable.sources/
Mike,
You did a pretty good job today, but I do have one piece of advice to throw your way, FWIW…Whenever you get on one of these shows & lose your train of thought for a second (which happened about a quarter of the way into the segment), just remember to stick to your theory. You have a good theory, advertisers do deserve to know exactly what they are putting their money behind, especially when they agree to advertise under the auspice of the station being a nice, family-oriented Disney radio channel.
As much as I wish civility would dominate our national discourse, the reality is that it will not happen. That being said, the “Hannity sucks ass” sign was hilarious!
The only people who are impressed by your pranks are other immature nutjobs.
…except for those immature nutjobs that read Dan, and feel the need to try to throw a wet blanket.
Three cheers, Mike. I don’t have an answer, other than to network more. I think Becoming a Figure is the key to getting funding for activism - look at the FDL folks. Hell, I don’t even agree with many of your positions, but the Allen stuff was priceless, and I hope you keep it up. The fact that so many people try to position your activism as “pranks” demonstrates that they can’t compete in the current frame.
I enjoy your work but today on CNN you left the mop at home.
Thanks FGFM, it looks like there is a “Podcast” link which has a small format video. I overlooked it at first because I was looking for something like a “Download vide” link since I think of podcast as being a primarily audio thing.
Having seen it, doesn’t Riehl look like he needs to take a dump through the whole thing?
I fail to see how he can equate a sign saying “Hannity sucks ass” to calling for “unpleasant things to happen” to one’s political opponents (as quoted in the youtube CGI video linked by Mike in his post above).
Mike, what can I say, you got spanked and looked like a complete hypocrite.
Good job showing us your sanitation skills, I think you will probably be needing them.
Talk about putting the cart before the horse. Not only did you not mop the floor with him, he cleaned your kitchen. He made you look like a silly college kid with your Hannity sign stunt.
I say , keep it up, makes the left truly look looney.
Dude, I have been a warrior since college but…What can I say? You were PATHETIC on that show. That Dan Reihl guy made you look like a sputtering fool and I am sorry, it DOES appear you are anti the 1st Amendment to me.
My brothers, we Progressives have GOT to get back to reality! I am EMBARRASSED by many of us these days…And this jerk is just the latest to make me cringe.
I will NEVER be a “righty” but I am seconds away from bailing on you losers once and for all.
Get it together or shut up. And anyone, ANYONE, who watches that vid and thinks Stark “won” or was even something less than an unmitigated buffoon is LYING to themselves and hurting the cause…
Pathetic.
“Hannity sucks ass” Wow! What an eloquent statesmen you are! I look forward to your next syllable.
Just saw a re-play on YouTube.
What a dork Mike Stark is.
He looked like he was about to cry when Kutz asked him to explain the juvenile stunt, when he held up a sign behind Colmes.
Mike Stark - you came across like a total dweeb, a short, shifty-eyed moron.
Are you about 5 foot 3? You look like a little guy.
Not a bad appearance Mike, but next time you’re doing national TV invest in a real dress shirt. Your appearance had a Nixonesque quality to it, if your opponant “won” in any area it was in this.
Nice to see all the KSFO sockpuppets show up.
Mike Stark sucks ass!
i do so love the alledged liberals that come on here and because mike didnt bring his a game, they are gonna become neo cons…..hilarious
kurtz threw riehl softballs while attacking mike….
and when riehl pulled the “i dont wanna tout my website….” bs, i wanted to scream
the fact that kurtz would follow it up with a question to mike then state emphatically, “you had no right to be there” was theater of the absurd