June 17, 2005

6/17: Byrd On A Sidebar

The Hotline's Blogometer takes the daily temperature of the blogosphere. For more information on the thinking behind this feature, go to the end of the story.

Today we wrap up a relatively uneventful week in the blogosphere with another day of acrimony over what exactly Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) said about Guantanamo, more discussion of a recent analysis of the blogosphere by a prominent liberal blogger, and another poll with bad news for Pres. Bush.

Meanwhile, today we unveil our latest new feature -- a semi-regular report on what's happening in the world of political blog ads, particularly those through the nearly-ubiquitous BlogAds company. Today we report that Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) has started running fundraising appeals on a handful of top liberal weblogs. The new feature is currently titled "Moneyblog," with all apologies to Michael Lewis; this is subject to change just as soon as we get a better title. Feel free to send us a suggestion.

TRACKBACKS: Digging In On Durbin

Where the blog swarm is headed, who's taking part, and what they're saying:

• AP's Nedra Pickler reports on the latest in the flap over Sen. Dick Durbin's comparison of prisoner treatment in a "repressive regime." Now the WH has weighed in, with spokesperson Scott McClellan saying: "I think the senator's remarks are reprehensible. It's a real disservice to our men and women in uniform who adhere to high standards and uphold our values and our laws."
  
  

  >> Democratic Veteran: "The 1600 Crew, which is wholly morally, legally and in every other way responsible for any torture that occurs is both going for the 'you don't support the troops' card and blaming the military at the same time." Lean Left puts it: "The White House has joined the right wing chorus attempting to minimize torture."
  

  >> Conservative Michelle Malkin: "What America needs is for President Bush himself to directly challenge Durbin on his treachery. What President Bush should do is to call on Durbin to retract his remarks (not just apologize) and ask forgiveness from our troops and the American people." Captain's Quarters compares it to John Kerry's "razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan" testimony to the Fulbright cmte.
  

  >> More: Eschaton; PoliPundit; Daily Kos; The Mahablog; TalkLeft; Hoystory.

BUSH: Could Be Worse

The New York Times and CBS News report on their new poll showing Bush's disapproval rating rising to 51%.

• Conservative James Joyner: "Things are unlikely to get better any time soon. With the likes of Howard Dean and Dick Durbin in the leadership of the Democrats, there is going to be no ratcheting down of the rhetoric. Nor is President Bush likely to back down on his agenda..."
• Centrist Joe Gandelman: "There are two ways this can be argued: (1) This is a problem for Bush because he's not in tune with the American people. (2) This is a minor problem that needs to be worked on because leadership means bringing around the public to your way of thinking. Can you guess which perception is likely to the dominant one in the White House?"
• Liberal Rising Hegemon writes, "the smell is getting bad and harder to miss. No matter how much you hold your nose. ... Wow, maybe we will start holding leaders accountable? All I can say, is go John Conyers... go go go!"

DLC's Marshall Wittmann: "Every day there is more and more evidence that the American people detect that President Bush suffers from Johnsonitis -- a chronic inability to level with the American people. The latest New York Times poll finds that W. is that 42 percent approval. However, there is danger that the Democrats will go off the deep end in their opposition. There was evidence of that yesterday in the [Rep. John] Conyers hearings on the Downing Street Memo."

Liberal Ron Gunzberger highlights a quote from a commenter on the Politics1 blog: "This Administration has an exit strategy from Social Security -- but not from Iraq."

From Editor and Publisher, a transcript of ABC News corr. Terry Moran grilling McClellan on whether the Iraqi terrorist insurgency is "in its last throes" gets linked by a few popular liberal blogs, including Crooks and Liars, The Political Forecast, CathiefromCanada and Daily Kos.

• Liberal journalist Chris Mooney fisks a McClellan-led WH presser; the press corps. asks about ex-admin. aide Philip Cooney, who handled energy issues to the dissatisfaction of environmentalists and now works for ExxonMobil. Mooney quotes the transcript, then adds brief comments, such as: "Here, again, is that magical incantation of McClellan's: 'interagency review process.' It's as if his simple utterance of these three words is supposed to immediately stop all questioning and critical thinking." Another: "Nice job, Scott. You win again. These reporters don't seem to have mastered the issue yet."

GITMO: What's Not To Git?

Daily Kos reports: "The story from right-wing rag Washington Times earlier tonight sported this headline: 'Durbin Calls Gitmo a Death Camp.' Except he didn't call it a death camp. So they changed it to: 'Gitmo called death camp.' Which is interesting, because no one has called it a 'death camp.' Hacks."

Rising Hegemon follows a online dust-up between Andrew Sullivan and Markos "Kos" Moulitsas. Wrote Moulitsas: "The torture that was so bad under Saddam, is equally bad under U.S. command." Sullivan responded, "this kind of morally cretinous hyperbole only discredits the serious case against the administration." Based on e-mails received, Sullivan later allowed that Moulitsas didn't mean what Sullivan thought, writing: "The sentence, when re-read, is indeed unclear and could be read either way, I think. Well: Kos can clear it up. All he need say is that the torture that has occurred under the U.S., while nothing like as extreme or as widespread as under Saddam, is still reprehensible."

• Right-leaning Vodkapundit makes note of the same, and links to My Pet Jawa, who has photos of Saddam-era abuses at Abu Ghraib (Warning: Very, very, very graphic).

Righty radio talker Hugh Hewitt: "Help me find a spokesman for the soldiers at Gitmo. I am looking for the spouse, father, mother, or adult sibling or child of any service man or woman serving at Gitmo. I would like to interview them on today's show about their reaction to Senator Dick Durbin's slander of their husband/son/daughter/parent. I will also be glad to interview any service member who has served alongside of a member of the military presently stationed at Gitmo."

Ace of Spades HQ has a mildly crude (and actually somewhat confusing) message for you to give Durbin.

MONEYBLOG: A Byrd On The Blog Is Worth Quite A Few Bucks To Someone

Friends of Robert C. Byrd Committee has ads through BlogAds -- which handles the majority of advertising on blogs -- running on a number of websites, including DailyKos, Talking Points Memo and Raw Story (not a blog per se, but the distinction is academic). The NRSC has been running an Internet campaign against Byrd (see 5/23 Hotline). Also notable: It's the first Flash blogad; previous ads ran only in JPG or GIF format.

Meanwhile, BlogAds' Advertise Liberally network -- assembled in mid-May so that advertisers can "reach virtually the entire liberal and progressive political blogosphere at once" -- this week recorded its first full buy. I.e., one org. bought spots across the full network of 59 blogs: Friends of the Earth, which sought the spot to run an anti-nuke campaign titled Nuke Retro aimed at the Senate Energy Bill. Partial buys have been the norm. BlogAds founder Henry Copeland tells the Blogometer: "Another piece of trivia: the trigger puller was Dick Bell, former blogmeister for the Kerry campaign." It's also worth noting that there is currently no equivalent conservative blog network organized through BlogAds.

THE NEW MEDIA: Speak And Be Hearinged

RedState's Mike Krempasky: "The Powers That Be at the Federal Election Commission have seen fit to honor my request to testify at the public hearings regarding the proposed rules governing political activity on the InterWeb." The hearings are 6/28-29, and others testifying include Markos Moulitsas from Daily Kos, CDT's John Morris and CP exec dir. Larry Noble."

Reporters Without Borders hands out awards to recognize the "best blogs defending freedom of expression." NYU prof Jay Rosen's media crit blog Press Think is the winner for the "Americas."

BLOGS VS. THE MSM: Refinery Tuning The News

WILLisms reported on 6/10 that ExxonMobil had sent a letter to the New York Times claiming the paper had deliberately misreported facts about the security at an oil refinery. The Times wrote in a 5/22 editorial, "a Times editorial writer had no trouble standing in the nearby park for 15 minutes with a large knapsack..." ExxonMobil responds: "It certainly appears that the Times wanted a report on lax security at the Chalmette refinery to support your editorial, so your paper simply suppressed key facts. The action taken by our security personnel was appropriate and professional." WILLisms adds: "The real motive for the Times is not safety; rather, the true force behind its misleading editorialization is its unhealthy engrossment with all things Europe, Kyoto, and global warming..."

• National Review Online's new media blogger, Stephen Spruiell, asks: "Don't facts count in an editorial?" Spruiell corresponds with the Times' Adam Cohen (the writer with the "knapsack") and Times dep. ed. page editor Andrew Rosenthal, but not to his satisfaction. Spruiell posts the photos of Cohen at Chalmette, commenting: "He wasn't exactly off security's radar."

The rescue of Australian hostage Douglas Wood, mostly unremarked upon in the U.S. media, has gotten some attention for the way it was reported. Conservative American Barbarian: "NPR reported on the 'release' or 'freeing' of an Australian hostage today. Their language is purposefully vague because this man was rescued by Iraqi and American forces. Let's repeat that he was rescued by Iraqi and American forces. Certainly saying that in a report doesn't fit NPR's editorial point of view so they use the word 'released' or 'freed' so they can remain ambiguous. The capper was the statement, 'sources say that no ransom was paid.' Implication being that those sources can't be trusted. So NPR reports what representatives from terrorist or NGOs say without caveat but if you are an American or Australian you can't be trusted." Questions about NPR's coverage was first raised by a commenter at hawkish warblog Belmont Club.

BLOGOSPHERICS: The Way Blogs (Might Possibly) Work

Conservative bloggers continue to discuss MyDD blogger Chris Bowers' ruminations on the right- and left-blogospheres. See 6/14 Blogometer for 1st mention, then 6/16 Blogometer for the early reaction.

• Right-leaning Llama Butchers argues that in the blogosphere, the "conservative/libertarian side has brought about NYTimes-Gate, Memo-Gate, the Swifties and other stories" with impact, while the left's biggest hit "so far is to bring about the rise of Howard Dean. That's a trade I'd take any day, even if it means I have to wear shackles."
• Wizbang responds to Bowers' endorsement of Scoop by calling it a "shitty blogging tool" that "has become, in effect, a bought and paid for tool of the elite liberal bloggers. Scoop development is occurring, funded by Kos and others, and the byproduct of that work isn't available to you, the lowly blogger." Wizbang also criticizes Bowers' methodology for determining blog popularity.
• Arguing With Signposts: "The left and right dichotomy is really growing tiresome for me. I realize that it's exciting for people heavily involved in politics, because you get to put people into 'our camp' and 'the hated enemies of freedom' camp. But the truth of the matter is, the left-right dichotomy is bogus. Breaking the blogosphere down into conservative or liberal is going to become increasingly difficult as issues become more complex and people are focused away from hot-button issues like the war in Iraq."

INTRODUCING: The Line On Corzine

Sen. Jon Corzine's (D) NJ GOV website includes the Corzine Connection Blog, which is primarily written by Blogging of the President co-founder Matt Stoller and allows for comments.

The Los Angeles Times' new Wikitorial feature went online early this a.m., with 1 editorial available for editing. With less than 50 edits gone by, the article has become more extreme and less moderate, contrary to typical assumptions about wikis. The original verstion began: "As the war in Iraq grinds on..." It now leads: "As U.S. aggression and occupation in Iraq continues..." One can see wiki editing in progress here.

The Truth Laid Bear, one of the best-known blog ranking systems, unveiled a re-design late 6/15. Proprietor "N.Z. Bear" writes: "As I hope will be apparent, a great deal of thought and effort has gone into this new release, which essentially amounts to a top-to-bottom redesign of the site, including oodles of new features." What's new: summaries of the "most-linked posts," pages organized by "specific topics," pages for weblog "communities," and a directory of blog "carnivals" (for more on carnivals, see 5/19 Blogometer). What's still there: the TTLB Ecosystem, arranged by inbound links and by daily traffic.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Losing China's Internet, Again

In what is mostly a bipartisan issue, Microsoft's business dealings in China have been widely remarked-upon throughout the blogosphere this week. Here's Mark Leon Goldberg at TAPPED, speaking for many: "I see that Microsoft has agreed to a Chinese government request to ban insidious terms such as 'democracy,' 'human rights,' and 'freedom' from the Chinese versions of its new blogging software, MSN Spaces. I don't quite know what to say about this, except that any transnational corporation is obviously required to adhere to the domestic laws of each country in which it operates. But Microsoft is more than just any old company, and Bill Gates missed an opportunity to take a principled stand here. It didn't take too much pressure to get Microsoft to flip its position on an anti-discrimination bill in Washington state. The same may well happen here if both sides of the American political blogosphere start denouncing its new blogging software, I would think."

LEST WE FORGET: What We Forgot

Cleaning out the Friday folder:

• An amateur video of Norwegian soldiers singing "Kosovo" to the tune of the Beach Boys' "Kokomo."
• At INDC Journal, Bill Ardolino tries his hand at "abstract punditry."
• The Six Figure Challenge: "Is it possible to make $100,000 in 12 months on the Net? Join me as I find out."
• An iPod owner dresses head-to-toe in black like the silhouettes in the iPod commercials and dances around an Apple store during business hours.

Posted by at June 17, 2005 12:00 PM