links for 2010-07-19

Before the infamous tweet, she used the same word on Fox news in reference to the NAACP. Evidence is, the deleted tweet was actually hers.

A customer complaint dialogue is structured around a two-position toggle: a) it’s terrible, b) it’s nothing. The first one to grab a position forces the other person to assume the only one left. When Dear Customer calls, “Canon Law” dictates the first words out of my mouth: ‘This is terrible, how could we have let this happen to you!’. This forces the caller to concede: ‘Well, it’s not the end of the world, I just would like to…’ A cooperative conversation ensues. However, if I argue that it isn’t the end of civilization, civility goes out the window. ... Steve Jobs’ cavalier dismissal worked as per the theorem: Dear Customer got mad. The media saw red meat, planted its teeth, and won’t let go.

The problem is that conservative leaders and Republican politicians, in their blind rage against Obama these last 18 months, invited the epithets of the fringe into the mainstream. ... Consider these tallies from Glenn Beck's show on Fox News since Obama's inauguration: 202 mentions of Nazis or Nazism, according to transcripts, 147 mentions of Hitler, 193 mentions of fascism or fascist, and another 24 bonus mentions of Joseph Goebbels. Most of these were directed in some form at Obama -- as were the majority of the 802 mentions of socialist or socialism on Beck's nightly "report."