September 27, 2005
9/27: TimesShare
The MSM is always coming under fire from the blogosphere, but it's been especially pronounced in the last 24 hours. In particular, a couple of newspaper reports debunking the apparently-exaggerated early reports of massive unrest in New Orleans elicit strong criticisms from liberals and conservatives alike.
On the other hand, we notice this a.m. that while the New York Times' much-derided TimesSelect program has prompted some to argue that the Times would soon find that their columnists aren't really that important to people, we noticed something very unusual at Technorati this a.m.: 7 of 10 of the top search terms, including the top 5, were for Times columnists:
1. 'Find The Brownie'
2. 'Paul Krugman: Find The Brownie'
3. 'Paul Krugman'
4. 'Bring Back Warren Harding'
5. Bob Herbert: A Waking Nightmare 6. Ifilm
7. 'Bob Herbert'
8. Krugman
9. 'Don Adams'
10. 'Cindy Sheehan'
Perhaps not surprisingly, the top searches are for the Times' liberal columnists. There aren't that many results (also unusual for top searches) but there are definitely a handful of blogs hosting these columns in knowing violation of the Times' policy. How ugly will this get?
On the SCOTUS front, RedState is once again a hotbed of rumors -- supposedly culled from DC and WH insiders -- about who will get the nod for the open sat. Judge Priscilla Owen and AG Alberto Gonzales get serious mentions, and ex-DC Circuit nominee Miguel Estrada gets some attention.
Other news on bloggers' radar screens: ex-FEMA dir. Michael Brown is still on the gov't payroll brings condemnation from both sides; Cindy Sheehan gets arrested at the WH; Dan Rather considers his critics; Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) appears on TV as a conservative blog swarm hovers; and a 3+ min. clip of the upcoming John Kerry documentary hits the web. Plus, we bring you our latest Blogger Spotlight.
KATRINA COVERAGE: Of Course, The New Reports Also Come From The MSM
Where the blog swarm is headed, who's taking part, and what they're saying:
- 2 newspaper reports from 9/26 focus on the early reports of violence in N.O. during the 1st week after Katrina, in the New Orleans Times-Picayune and a Newhouse report carried in the Seattle Times, got plenty of attention from the right and left yesterday a.m.
>> Conservative Pejman Yousefzadeh: "It now falls to those who either spread or repeated such stories to retract them. Doing so will restore a semblance of honesty in the analysis of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Failing to do so will cause honest observers to believe that those who continue to spread a false meme have an ulterior motive in doing so." Liberal Kevin Drum agrees: "The national press could do everyone a favor by weighing in on this."
Instapundit: "Apparently, the press' performance during Katrina wasn't any better than the governments involved." Power Line: "It's time for some accountability here. The conventional wisdom is that no one performed particularly well in the aftermath of Katrina--not local, state or federal authorities, and not considerable numbers of private citizens. But it now appears clear that the worst performance of all was turned in by the mainstream media. Congress should promptly investigate...">> The Left Coaster, on the racial angle: "So far, [the rumors] turned out to be bullsh*t. But it helped Fox and others in the wingnut galaxy keep the base drinking the Kool Aid that the blacks weren't worthy of any help, right?" Liberal Michael O'Hare snarks: "The murder rate in New Orleans in the week after the storm was not even a single case higher than an average week. Obviously they didn't even try, and with the whole world watching and telling them exactly what was expected. ... If they won't misbehave when it really counts, they shiver the entire just desserts structure of social policy. These people just have no respect for authority and their betters, and no manners, and that's the plain fact."
>> Liberal Seeing the Forest, on the origin of the reports: "Sure -- some of those stories came from Democrats, and some of those Democrats were black. There's enough blame to go around. My guess is that in the end Blanco, Nagin, and Bush will all get together and cover for one another, and the whole episode will be forgotten."
Centrist Roger L. Simon: "Baghdad immediately after the invasion. Remember all those reports of the mass looting of their national museum that turned out to be little more than some minor thefts (most returned), principally by the museum's own directors? ... Of course the major intent of the misdirection and distortion in Baghdad and New Orleans was the same -- to embarrass George Bush." Conservative Scared Monkeys: "The press has spent the last few weeks patting themselves on their backs regarding their coverage of the horrors of New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Well, odds are these are the same reporters who hide out at the pool in Baghdad and report body counts in Iraq, but never get near the real news.">> Protein Wisdom's Jeff Goldstein takes issue with AP TV writer David Bauder's praise of FNC anchor Shepard Smith, writing: "As FOXNews' Major Garrett did the far less glamorous work of learning about FEMA and identifying bottlenecks in the relief effort by reviewing the local and state disaster plans in an effort to understand how states are set to integrate with the federal support efforts, Smith received 'critical praise' ... and 'his first visit to Letterman's couch' for standing on an overpass and wringing his hands, showcasing his concern as his preened before the camera, tossing out implied blame and misinformation with each new utterance, and doing so in a way that really drove the story: 10,000 dead; rapes and murders widespread; people starving and dying of thirst; the federal government nowhere in sight..."
Meanwhile, Dick Meyer at CBS's Public Eye's criticizes BuzzMachine's Jeff Jarvis for a critique of Tim Russert (see 9/26 Blogometer) that included the line "Anybody can get facts. Facts are the commodity." Meyer disagrees: "Why can't anybody get the facts? Because lots of times people -- sources, officials, real people -- lie to you. Sometimes they shoot at you. Getting the facts about what's going on in, say, a 200-square-mile part of southern Louisiana that's flooded is very difficult. Getting the facts in a murder case is difficult. You get the idea. Good reporting of true facts is not something to denigrate."
SCOTUS: So Many Choices, So Few Retirements
RedState's Erick Erickson wrote last a.m.: "RedState's sources tell us to expect a Presidential announcement any day concerning Sandra Day O'Connor's replacement. ... Who the nominee will be is a mystery. What seems sure is that Larry Thompson's star has fallen just as fast as it rose. Back on the horizon is Priscilla Owen, who the White House seems to think will placate conservatives. Across the board, sources outside the White House feel like Judge Owen is the nominee. These same sources almost totally agree that Owen will not get confirmed, but her nomination fight will help re-energize the Republican base. Inside the White House, sources are not so sure." Then a few hours later, he updates with another bit of gossip: "Unfortunately, I have received reliable information late this afternoon that Karl Rove, among others, is making a last minute push for the President to consider Alberto Gonzales..." The Gonzales news elicits a series of "SHUDDER" headlines at The Corner, where Jonathan Adler emphasizes part of Erickson's post that notes, assuming this is even true, that "Rove is pushing Gonzales because (Rove believes) Gonzales is more conservative than his reputation."
Reading this line from a Michael Fletcher/Dan Balz Washington Post report -- "Democratic strategists privately say that [AG Gonzales] could win confirmation without a bloody fight" -- Mickey Kaus is skeptical: "The opposition to Gonzales among conservatives I know is not ideological. It is personal and almost visceral. They think he is a mediocrity and a whiny, gutless careerist! Also a classic overpromoted affirmative action hire. It seems entirely possible that a Gonzales nomination would become the cathartic vehicle for conservatives to vent all their frustrations with Bush (over spending, Katrina, and even Iraq). At some point, Democrats might sense the chance to deal the President a defeat. ... If Bush loses the right, the left, and Arlen Specter, how, exactly, does Gonzales win easy confirmation?"
Early this a.m., a writer at RedState's Confirm Them speculates that the success of John Roberts may have paved the way for Miguel Estrada, who "can provide through his benign but Roberts-esque work experience and charming style a strikingly similar scenario with some added bonuses that were mentioned in this post. Roberts fortuitously cleared away Daschle's excuse to filibuster Estrada about the lack of White House cooperation in releasing sensitive and privileged documents." Then later, Erickson weighs in (at both RedState and Confirm Them) writing, ex-AG Ted Olson "has been a big proponent of Estrada's, but it is unclear that Estrada wants to try that fight again -- especially when the stakes are so much higher."
FEMA: Hash Brownie
CBS News reports that FEMA has hired ex-dir. Brown as a paid consultant.
Lefty Jim MacDonald, at Making Light: "Brown, if there were a shred of decency left in Washington DC, would be talking to a grand jury, not consulting at FEMA. Didn't he already prove that he knows not one solitary thing about emergency management? ... They're mixing up whitewash in industrial-sized drums." Liberal The Green Knight: "Patronage has always been a part of politics; it's done for various reasons, but the Bush administration seems to do patronage for the sheer joy of it. They positively wallow in it." Conservative Michelle Malkin: "The retention of disgraced bureaucrats is, unfortunately, nothing new. ... Bureaucratic insiders at the old INS had a slogan that sums up the management philosophy of the government workforce concisely: 'Screw up, move up.'"
Wizbang's Kevin Aylward: "After a few WTF's, I actually thought about possible rationales. Perhaps the agency is serious about learning from it's mistakes. If that's the case then Brown's knowledge is essential." Unfutz, thinking along the same lines: "Now, in the abstract, this is not a bad idea, making sure you get the value of an employee's experience before they leave to go elsewhere. In this particular instance, though, one has to think What experience?" CA-based Matt Szabo: "What part of 'I take responsibility for federal failures' didn't President Bush understand? Paying Mike Brown to assess the failures of Katrina is like hiring Gray Davis as a budget consultant or Cruz Bustamante as an ethics advisor."
Author/military expert Austin Bay asks in a header: "Should the US military take the lead in responding to natural disaster?" and answers in the entry below: "Not if we want to keep a federal system. Unless we're talking about fighting a war, a 'let the military do it' idea is bad for a democracy. What the military can do is provide extraordinarily fine 'special asset' coordination. ... Coordination doesn't necessarily mean command -- and that's an important distinction." BAGnewsNotes posts newly released original photos of suffering and devastation from the immediate aftermath of Katrina.
BLOGS VS. THE MSM: Select Disobedience
Re: discussion of illicit sharing of New York Times columns mentioned above, conservative John Tabin -- who had been collecting links to New York Times columnists' work as it appeared on other newspapers' websites -- now updates the situation: "I'm aware that bloggers and message-board posters have put up copies of several TimesSelect op-eds that I don't have links to. I started this site to point to newspapers who print syndicated Times columns, not to promote copyright violations .... But I never intended to play Napster to the Times's Metallica; if I did, I wouldn't have signed my name to the site. So here's what I'll do. When I know there's a bootleg copy out there, I still won't link to it, but I will put up a link that says '(Bootleg available)' ... You are free to search for those yourself. Try Technorati and Google Groups."
MRC's News Busters reports on a C-SPAN-broadcast Marvin Kalb interview with Dan Rather, where Rather "stated that his network will not allow him to continue to pursue the story" of Bush's TANG service, "expressed suspicion about bloggers' role in publicizing CBS's mistakes in the whole Memogate affair" and "expressed wonder that professional journalists immediately looked at blogger accusations that CBS had run with phony documents." News Busters provides the audio, video and transcript. Liberal King of Zembla wishes CBS would let him follow up the report." Ace of Spades HQ is of like mind with many conservative bloggers -- and it is nearly all conservatives who are covering Rather this a.m. -- "Pathetic. It is perfect, delicious irony that Dan Rather, scourge of Dick Nixon, is now spending his winter years pacing around muttering to himself about dark conspiracies against him."
ABC News' The Note acknowledges its critics on the left: "How would the bloggers who think The Note is 'a stinking repository of Bush-licking Pre$$titution' ... convince those who think it is devoutly anti-Bush that they are right?" The line refers to a post on the a new liberal blog, Pre$$titutes. FishBowl DC has a brief round-up of lefty blogs' issues with The Note; see 9/20 Blogometer for more.
An occasional feature at Little Green Footballs is the presentation of a MSM photo of a media event that benefits liberal causes, with another photo from a different angle showing a mass of photographers huddling together to get the best shot; the point being to expose the absurdity of a manufactured media event. The latest shows an anti-war protester dressed in the infamous hood-and-wires Abu Ghraib position in front of the WH, with a half-dozen or so photojournalists assembled just a few feet away. Header: "Let's A/B the Media."
WHITE HOUSE '08: Bubble Boy
A clip of "Inside the Bubble," the Steve Rosenbaum documentary, can be viewed here. To our knowledge, this hasn't been widely seen, and we haven't see any commentary on it yet. Center-left Kerry supporter Michael Stickings: "Excited? Me neither. (Although, as a Kerry supporter who is still lamenting the result of last year's election, I wouldn't mind seeing it, if only to acquire a better understanding of what went wrong when all should have gone so well." Conservative Pardon My English, noting Rosenbaum was a Kerry supporter, speculates: "I suspect the underlying purpose of this film is illustrate the failures of the Kerry Campaign to serve as an excuse for their loss. But why do that? The propaganda campaign of this movie -- I suspect -- is to show the American people that it was the ineptitude of the Kerry campaign that lost the election, not that President Bush actually won re-election."
Update: There are 3 more clips available: here, here and here. Hat tip for these to Political Wire.
MIDTERMS '06: The "Gigli" Of Candidacies?
MyDD's Chris Bowers, on Washington Post-reported rumors that actor Ben Affleck (D) is interested in challenging Sen. George Allen (R-VA) in '06: "[W]hy not? ... Actually, I can think of one main reason why not. Someone like Affleck would be a horrible, media sucking distraction from the 2006 campaign. This would be the equivalent media circus of the 2003 California recall election. It would destroy the generic advantage Democrats are poised to hold in 2006, and from which they will reap huge benefits if Bush's approval rating stays low. So, please God, no, don't let Affleck run. The last thing we need in 2006 is for the star of Gigli to be our most recognizable national face."
SHEEHAN: The Endless Summer
As virtually everyone reported last p.m., anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan was arrested while protesting outside the WH on 9/26. The Political Teen hosts video of the arrest. Blogs for Bush, like many right-of-center blogs, notes that she appears "smiling and happy" while being arrested: "Doesn't exactly come across as a 'greiving mother.'" Others, like NYC-based gossip blog Gawker, focus on the spin it received at Drudge Report. Right Wing News guest blogger Mary Katherine Ham: "I'm guessing she won't be using her right to remain silent." Ham also follows the updated AP versions of the story, which changes its lead description of Sheehan's activism from "[Sheehan] has used her son's death" to "driven by her son's death" to "became a leader of the anti-war movement following her son's death."
RANGEL: Hitler References Are So Out This Season
In reference to Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY)'s comments last week that "George Bush is our Bull Connor," California Conservative calls attention to last p.m.'s "Hannity & Colmes," where Rangel "was taken to task by" Sean Hannity. CC: "Basically, Rangel backpedals," although he pointedly avoids a retraction. Previously, conservatives The Anchoress, Orrin Judd, Amy Ridenour, and centrist Joe Gandelman and many others had criticized him for it. The Moderate Voice's Gandelman, on his latest appearance: "It's clear Rangel's comments will be lambasted by Republicans, but it'll be interesting to see how many independents, independent thinkers and Democrats denounce it. As they should. This is the kind of verbal tripe that has poisoned American politics -- a statement that's "red meat" to fire up people in a room up but that serves no purpose except to arouse angry passions." Conservative Michelle Malkin: "Some sufferers of Bush Derangement Syndrome have grown tired of Fourth Reich analogies. ... Fellow Democrats have done nothing to distance themselves from Rangel's insane remarks. Sadly, so-called civil rights leaders abandoned the high road for cheap demagoguery years ago."
ENQUIRER: Too Subtle For Us!
On 9/24, film producer Jane Hamsher passed along a bit of gossip at her personal blog: "[A]ccording to sources within the Enquirer itself, the source for Bush's drinking story is -- an incredibly pissed-off, recently scapegoated head of a federal agency who thinks that BushCo. done him wrong." For more reaction on the National Enquirer story, see the 9/23 Blogometer.
MISCELLANY: A Better Question Might Be, Which Dem Pols Haven't Showed Up On Blogs ...
- Last p.m., Rep. Jane Harman's (D-CA) office sent out a press release announcing she will be a guest contributor at TPM Cafe, "marking her first venture into the growing world of blogs. Harman will share daily dispatches with readers about her experiences during a four-day trip to the Middle East. Harman is quoted as saying: "Writing this blog is an opportunity to share with the audience my experiences in real time with no filters. It's a direct line into what I'm seeing and feeling during my trip." Harman's 1st post went up just after noon on 9/26.
- Hullabaloo's Digby, who last week argued for the word "fascism" as an apt description of the Bush admin., responds to the much-noticed San Francisco Chronicle story on the death of Pat Tillman (see 9/26 Blogometer), which reports for the 1st time that Tillman was outspokenly opposed to the Iraq war, comments: "My first shocking thought after reading it was that a high profile star like him could have been seen by someone as a very dangerous guy. He might have been fragged. ... I no longer trust what any official says about the Iraq war. There seem to be no limits."
- BradBlog highlights the fact that the Cleveland Plain-Dealer has picked up on his Diebold reporting (see 9/21 Blogometer), specifically mentioning the "Dieb Throat" insider Friedman has been quoting about the company's little-noticed security problems and recent financial trouble.
BLOGGER SPOTLIGHT: He Has Seen The Best Minds Of His Generation ...
Today the Blogometer talks to pioneering liberal blogger/ex-Hotline Senior Key Grip Bob Somerby, who writes The Daily Howler.
What is your full name?
Bob Somerby
What is your age?
57 (if we're counting in human years, an accomodation I often make).
Where did you grow up?
Winchester, Mass. thru 7th grade. San Mateo, California thru the end of high school in 1965.
Where do you live now?
Baltimore.
What is your occupation? Have you ever worked on a political campaign or for the mainstream media?
Occupation: Comedian. I have never worked for a campaign, although I've written jokes for some campaigns/candidates. (Did you ever wonder why Governor Jeanne Shaheen was so witty?) I briefly worked as part of a morning radio show at WTEM-AM Washington in 1993. Then they brought in Imus. As a part-time matter, I did a long stint of humorous commentary for WBAL-AM in Baltimore.
When did you start blogging and why?
Early 1998. Couldn't listen to the unchallenged BS from the MSM any more. At the time, there was essentially no one talking back to the trashing of Clinton (and, later, to the trashing of Gore).
What has been your favorite post, or favorite story to write about, in that time?
The story I stumbled into was the press corps' remarkable trashing of Candidate Gore from 3/99 through 11/00. I take it as obvious that this bizarre two-year, press corps campaign put Bush into the White House.
Describe your typical blogging schedule. And what is your average output?
Ugh. All day, every day, although I am now changing that. Average output: Way too much.
Who is your favorite political blogger? Favorite non-political blogger?
Because TDH has always been focused on the MSM, I have never read a huge number of blogs. Can't say I have a fave. I don't read non-political blogs.
Who is your favorite mainstream media columnist?
Krugman
What is your favorite television news program, either network or cable?
I can't say I have a favorite, or one I could much recommend. During the time of TDH, I have found that journalists sometimes speak more freely (less guardedly) about their own attitudes and practices on Imus than in other venus. For a student of the MSM, Imus is a good place to eavesdrop.
What MSM-produced websites (i.e. newspapers, magazines) do you visit on a daily basis?
I'm not sure what you'd call MSM. I review, in non-alphabetical order, Salon, Slate, Josh Marshall, Kevin Drum, TAPPED, Andrew Sullivan, Atrios, Daily Kos, Romenesko, Dan Kennedy, CJR Daily, James Wolcott, Altercation, Media Matters, HuffPo.
What non-MSM websites (i.e. blogs) do you visit on a daily basis?
See above.
How often, or do you ever, read a newspaper in its dead-tree (i.e. print) form?
NYT, WP, each morning, with a bagel amd some dead coffee beans in hot water. During Campaign 2000, I read WP/NYT/WSJ/USAToday/Wash Times every morning, in their dead-tree variants.
How do you see the new media and old media affecting and influencing each other in the next five years?
I think the environment in which I started has changed substantially, and I will probably change TDH to an urban ed web site as a result. When I started, the MSM was essentially out-of-control (on its way to a group nervous breakdown starting in 3/99), and there was no liberal web to complain about this. Now, the MSM is less irrational -- they no longer invent strings of bizarre, inaccurate stories about major Democrats, as they did all through Campaign 2000--and the liberal web is often more irrational than the MSM, I'm afraid. I didn't get into this to yell at libs, so I'm pretty much planning to switch my attention to an older interest -- urban education. (I taught in the Baltimore City schools from 1969 thru 1982.) I hope to finish my work on the press corps' War Against Gore in a different format, as I should have done long ago. It remains an astonishing untold story -- a story that changed our history.
THOUGHT OF THE DAY: DCM? Hey, It Has The Benefit Of Not Also Being A Personals Ad Term
TX-based One-Handed Economist proposes a term for the Beltway magazines such as Weekly Standard, Washington Monthly and The New Republic: the DCM. He explains: "Without the insular world of think-tanks, politicians, and various campaign committees, there wouldn't be a market" for their "agenda-driven journalism." Their "obvious political slant, which is neither hidden nor apologized for, sets these publications a bit apart from what the blogosphere has dubbed the MSM. What's more, many of those publications are direct participants in the blogosphere, and joined long before many MSM outlets decided to give it a try ... the DCM plays a pretty big role in not only blogospheric conversation, but also in conversations between Beltway insiders, and I think it's high time we have an easy way to identify them."
LEST WE FORGET: The Dolphin Menace
The UK Guardian reports, in the aftermath of Katrina: "Armed dolphins, trained by the US military to shoot terrorists and pinpoint spies underwater, may be missing in the Gulf of Mexico. Experts who have studied the US navy's cetacean training exercises claim the 36 mammals could be carrying 'toxic dart' guns. Divers and surfers risk attack, they claim, from a species considered to be among the planet's smartest." Liberal Needlenose's Swopa understands what's really going on: "Do you see what's happened here? What we're looking at is a dolphin sleeper cell that managed to acquire top-secret U.S weaponry and training before going over the wall ... or, ummm, whatever the appropriate seaborne analogy might be. And to think that they were kept near Lake Pontchartrain! Remember how the earliest criticisms of the slow federal response to Hurricane Katrina asked, what if terrorists had blown up the levees surrounding New Orleans? How do we really know that didn't happen?"
Posted by at September 27, 2005 12:27 PM
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