5/5: The Outsiders
Populist sentiment runs strong on both sides of the blogosphere today. Lefties celebrate the impolite questioning of Def/Sec Donald Rumsfeld while righties point to alleged special treatment for Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI) 5/4 in his early a.m. car crash near the Capitol. Lefty bloggers also train their fire on the MSM while asking if it's time for a cease-fire on Dems. Righties are equally unhappy with their party's spending habits of late and commend one Sen. for his leadership on the issue.
Also, be sure to check out the Blogometer's web edition later today for the first installation of TWIB (This Week In Blogs) Notes featuring the first ever BloggersChoice Poll.
RUMSFELD: The Atlanta Brave?
Video of ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern's questioning of Rumsfeld in Atlanta, GA flew around the lefty blogosphere 5/4. Crooks and Liars also provided transcripts of past Rumsfeld media appearances supporting McGovern's claims.
In a case of deja vu for anyone over 30, a man named McGovern became the lefty/antiwar hero of the hour:
- Marty Kaplan at Huffington Post: "Add former CIA analyst Ray McGovern to the list of patriots not only willing to speak truth to power, but also able on the spot to cite chapter and verse to back up their accusations with facts. ... McGovern is doing what, shockingly, national Democrats haven't been doing.
- firedoglake: "I don't want to draw conclusions that are too broad ... but there does seem to be a day of reckoning on the horizon. Between Harry Taylor's questions put to George Bush, Stephen Colbert's appearance before the White House Press Corps and now Ray McGovern's public accusations against Donald Rumsfeld. ... The simmering public feelings of frustration do seem to be bubbling up."
- Informed Comment: "Back in the Sixties it would be some activist college student who confronted the Secretary of Defense on an illegal, ill-conceived and unwinnable war. It is an index of the changed times that now it is retired CIA analyst Ray McGovern! Rumsfeld was asked about the failure already 9 days into the war to find any WMD. His answer was "we know where they are." It is unambiguous, unqualified. And now he is lying about that!
- Booman Tribune: "Today Ray McGovern, the man who used to give George Bush senior his daily intel update, spoke truth to power. Rumsfeld, to his credit, permitted Ray to speak rather than be carried out of the auditorium. In retrospect, Rummy probably regrets that decision."
- TruthDig: "Ray McGovern, a 27-year veteran of the CIA, literally leaves Donald Rumsfeld speechless as he pulls apart the Secretary of Defense's flawed rationale for the Iraq war--on live television. Rumsfeld is only saved from abject rhetorical defeat by the guards who try to physically remove McGovern from the public microphone."
News Hounds complained about Fox personality Bill O'Reilly's coverage of the event: "O'Reilly gave a very incomplete and distorted take on the incident during his Ridiculous Item segment claiming that Rumsfeld was heckled, he showed a brief clip of a woman in the audience creating a disturbance who was also there in protest of the war." While State of the Day produced a broader MSM round up.
Also with lefty thoughts: Pacific Views, The Democratic Daily, In Search of Utopia, Shakespeare's Sister, Road To Surfdom, Loaded Mouth, and Georgia10 at DailyKos.
Righties by no means avoided the story. Self-described former U.S. intelligence community memberIn From The Cold: "But Rumsfeld's critics ignore a salient fact in this game of 'gotcha.' What was Rumsfeld's 2003 statement based on? Intelligence reporting -- much of it from McGovern's old employer, the CIA. In the late 1990s, there was a sizeable body of reporting about Iraq's WMD programs and locations of potential stockpiles, based on the reporting of multiple agencies, including the CIA. If Rumsfeld got it wrong (the final verdict on Saddam's WMD programs has not been rendered), it was because the spooks got it wrong, with the CIA leading the charge."
RightyBlue Crab Boulevard is tired of the speaking-truth-to-power theme: "Yeah, I know the folks who like to talk about how they are being oppressed (or repressed) are already all just aglow about the heckling of Rumsfeld. Yeah, speaking truth to power and all that. Except, consider this, Rumsfeld let him speak. Rumsfeld waved off security personnel ready to take him away."
Righties also attacked McGovern directly. Under a header "Rumsfeld heckled by wacko conspiracy theorist Ray McGovern"AllahPundit at HotAir writes: "If McGovern's name sounds familiar, it should: he's been popping up on TV and in newspaper articles lately as one of the media's go-to guys for quotes defending accused CIA leaker Mary McCarthy." Macsmind also goes the McGovern-route: "Funny thing is how all three major evening newscast reported McGovern as simply an "ex-CIA analysts, without explaining that he is also the leader of the leftist group Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS), that was formed conveniently in 2003 after being funded by George Soros, simply to perform a bloodless coup on the present Administration."
Righty NewsBusters has a lengthy and thorough critique of MSM coverage while Olbermann Watch dissects only guess who's coverage.
BLOGGERS VS. DEMS: With Friends Like These ...
Asking "with the congressional elections 6 months away, is it time for us to stop criticizing Democrats?" AMERICAblog got the lefty blogosphere chattering. From the post:
I ask this as a serious question. Some friends on the Hill recently asked me if the liberal blogs could lay off their attacks on Democratic members of Congress until after the election. The idea being that we need to keep promoting a public image of Dems good/Republicans bad, and that any criticism of Dems hurts our image and only helps detract attention from the Republicans' increasing number of failings. ...I think at some point we can hurt ourselves by helping create a public perception that our party has no message and is spineless. ... It's very difficult to take a six-month hiatus in offering criticism that is intended to change the party for the better, lest the party get worse or at least stagnate at mediocre.
An extremely unscientific survey of AMERICAblogs comment section revealed his readers were not willing to give Dems any relief. Lefty Pandagon agreed: "I'm not on some kind of "team" here. Whether it be the Democratic "team" or some blogospheric "team." Or any other team. I'm not interested in caucusing on what my role or the blogosphere's role is in getting Democrats elected. This whole thing reminds me of a discussion I had with a friend the other day. As it turns out, I simply don't care what happens to the Democratic Party anymore. I no longer consider them a vehicle, long-term or otherwise, for my political goals."
Democracy guy had a list of specific reasons he wasn't going to simmer down: "Perhaps we should give a free pass to candidates to make complete asses of themselves in public...maybe just wink and nod when they threaten people anonymously...how about when they steal from bloggers for ammunition in their direct mail attack pieces...or perhaps we should applaud transparent pandering flip flops...or maybe we should just ignore it when they distribute gay-baiting literature which spouts GOP hate speech. I'm sure I'm missing something here, but you get the drift."
Many lefties had more nuanced answers:
unfutz:"The answer is clearly: It depends. What's the general political situation? Who's the Democrat? How loyal to the party and progressive has that Democrat been? What's the strength of that Democrat, against what kind of Republican opposition? How important to us is the office that Democrat holds? What's the issue involved, and how important is it to us?"
Upper Left:"Should the liberal blogs, and the Democrats grassroots more generally, cut back on their criticism of the party until after the November elections? Or is there a role for criticism in making the party better and helping the election at the same time? To which my reply is yes. And yes. ...When a Democratic official or candidate says something that weakens our case and our cause, he or she should properly be called to task. When Democratic organizations act imprudently, someone has to say so. ...But is it time, as the ticket for November comes together and public awareness of the impending elections grows, to limit our criticism? Absolutely. For starters, we can drop the snarky, gratuitous generalizations that only feed the stereotypes put forward by our political adversaries."
The Agonist:"In order to be effective the Democrats need to get the three tier attack going -- first layer includes screamers. Screamers are people who simple repeat the one or two talking points of the day, rubbing opponents noses in the problem. The next step are spammers. A conversational spammer cycles through the last several years of talking points. Effectively ending any real discussion. Then there must be Suits, who come in and explain the party's view and ideology. The screamers and the spammers need to learn to sit respectfully when the suit starts in.
Not responding directly to AMERICAblog's question, but definitely underscoring its importance, under a header "CT-Sen: Lamont within striking distance" kos highlights a new Rasmussen poll showing businessman Ned Lamont just 20 points behind Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-CT):
And as of this poll, 38 percent of Connecticut voters still don't know enough about Lamont to have an opinion about him, yet Lieberman is just barely over 51 percent. It's clear running as an independent will be Lieberman's clearest path to reelection. And it's also clear that if Lieberman pulls that trigger, that 1) Reid will have to strip Lieberman of all committee assignments and replace him with real Democrats; and 2) it's also clear that the DSCC will be forced to support Lamont's efforts (at least rhetorically, if not financially).
I'll call it the Democrats' "Lieberman problem", because they so clearly won't want to do either of those things and will do whatever they can to shirk those responsibilities.
BLOGGERS VS. GOP: Why Is The Blogometer Suddenly So Hungry ...
Righty bloggers had nothing but love for Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) after his personal battle with Sen. pork this week. And they had nothing but scorn for those Sens. who fought him. Tapscott's Copy Desk got the ball rolling with this glowing item:
"It's been an historic week in the U.S. Senate as Sen. Tom Coburn, R-OK, used an obscure parliamentary move dubbed the "clay pigeon" amendment to force votes on nearly two dozen earmarks slipped into the emergency appropriations bill. ... By standing up by himself in the beginning and then persevering through the insults, counter-attacks and tirades of the old bulls of the Senate, Coburn has given the country a vivid demonstration of genuine political courage."
Tapscott continued with the story through conference and was not happy with the GOP's performance: "Of the 23 votes cast by conferees against earmarks, 11 were by GOP senators, the other dozen by Democrats. That apparent balance is a bit deceiving, however, as there were 8 GOP senators who voted for earmarks every time, compared to five among the Democrats." Instapundit linked to the story and noted: "I'd like to see a lot of incumbents voted out."
Captain's Quarters highlights pro-pork Senators from both sides: "SENATORS COCHRAN, STEVENS, SPECTER, DOMENICI, BOND, McCONNELL, BURNS, SHELBY, GREGG, BENNETT, CRAIG, HUTCHISON, DeWINE, BROWNBACK, ALLARD, BYRD, INOUYE, LEAHY, HARKIN, MIKULSKI, REID, KOHL, MURRAY, DORGAN, FEINSTEIN, DURBIN, JOHNSON, AND LANDRIEU. Mark(Tapscott) calls this a Porkers Hall of Fame, and then provides the data to back it up. It turns out that this group has individually voted to retain pork almost three times as often as they have voted for its elimination."
Riehl World View wants to blame all politicians for the pork problem: "People need to wake up and start to get it in this country. If we don't, we are going to continue to get it from our politicians. ...Somehow we are going to have to find a way to take this country back from the professional politicians, or we are going to completely lose the from the bottom up dynamic of democratic governance which has always made America great." While The Influence Peddler thinks the GOP specifically has lost its way: "When the Republicans gained control of the House of Representatives in 1994, there were plenty of reformers who had been itching to get the chance to revamp Congressional procedures, committee structures, and House rules. ...I worked with one of the very bright staffers who had labored at this plan for years. ...Just a few months later, he told me that he had finally come around to supporting term limits. ...Now he said, he supported term limits, because he had seen that to a large degree, people's positions on the issues followed from their positions of power."
RedState is just full of love for Coburn: "But you RedStaters ought to be proud of getting behind Tom Coburn in 2004 - he was one of the very first candidates we got together and supported financially. We called him "Senator Trainwreck" before he came to Washington because we knew that his committment to the principles of limited government was far, far more important to the good Doctor than being popular on the Georgetown cocktail circuit - not to mention being liked by the leaders of his own party in Congress. Our hats off to you, Doctor Coburn. If we weren't so opposed to cloning, we could sure use about 50 more of you. ...And RedState....two words: elections matter."
BLOGGERS VS. MSM: A Monkey Could Do Your Job
Predominantly lefty bloggers are drawing together the Stephen Colbert and Mike McCurry episodes, along with recent dismissive comments from Joe Klein to paint a picture of an MSM slowing losing their power and whining about it every step of the way. Greg Sargent at The American Prospect:
"In recent weeks, one member after another of the D.C. media establishment has gone out of his way to depict bloggers as hysterical, angry and destructive. To hear them tell it, bloggers sitting at their computers are akin to squalling brats in high-chairs chucking baby food at their sober, serious elders -- i.e., major figures at the established news organizations. ...This fight doesn't really have anything to do with the "tone" of the blogosphere at all. Rather, it's actually about the efforts of bloggers to establish the legitimacy of their medium, and about the reluctance of major news organizations and their employees to recognize that legitimacy. ...Bloggers are also a threat because they're in the process of making the opinion-generating profession a purely meritocratic one. And that's the real reason, as I hope to show, that commentators like Joe Klein and self-appointed custodians of journalistic standards like Deborah Howell constantly carp about "tone." ...Readers are turning to bloggers to do what a handful of exalted columnists and their editors once did exclusively -- that is, interpret the world for them. And that, not the tone or the supposedly destructive streak of bloggers, is the thing that's really intimidating to the "MSM" about the blogosphere."
Amens came pouring in. Interesting Times: "I don't much abide with blog triumphalism. ...Like the silent film stars of old whose careers were destroyed by the advent of movies with sound, today's establishment pundits and journalists are seriously worried that blogging represents an existential threat to their livelihood." Hullabaloo takes Klein to task specifically for enabling the Lewinsky fiasco. While firedoglake notes that Klein's blogosphere efforts have not gone well: "As I've noted before, Klein's efforts to toss off a few poorly written paragraphs and post them at the Huffington Post (where no doubt we should all be grateful he graced us with his presence, I suppose) were no doubt an attempt to stick his toe in the waters of the blogosphere. He got his ass resoundingly kicked.
...There is absolutely nothing he does that hundreds of people in the blogosphere don't do better every single day of the week."Middle Earth Journal also has thoughts.
Atrios believes the MSM should stop hiding behind anonymous attacks: "When people in the media wish to criticize bloggers they should start naming names and start being specific. If we aren't important enough to be engaged specifically than ignore us. It's fair to talk about the blogosphere as a collective at times as it's fair to talk about the mainstream media as a collective at times, but complaining about the nasty tone of the whole party is just cheap and sloppy journalism."
KENNEDY: About Last Night ...
The Blogometer lost count of the righty blog references to Mary Jo Kopechne somewhere around 25 this morning. If you were a righty and blogging on 5/4, you mentioned Rep. Patrick Kennedy's (D-RI) traffic incident. A very incomplete list includes: Michelle Malkin, California Conservative, GOP and the City, Leaning Straight Up, Texas Rainmaker, Church and State, Iowa Voice, Confederate Yankee, Wizbang, and A Blog For All.
Rightwinged looked at Kennedy's later drug explanation and wasn't buying: "I was just thinking about the combination of drugs Kennedy said he was on. He named Phenergan and Ambien. Phenergan is an antihistamine used for allergies, as well as a sleep aid. Ambien is simply a sleep aid. Why would a person take sleep aids before heading to vote in Congress (again, at 2:45 am)? Is taking sleep aids normal protocol for making house votes? So now all they have to do is convince us that he took the sleep aids, intending to go to bed, but somehow they made him go crazy and think that he had a 2:45 am vote. And you know the rest."
Many righties took the opportunity to bemoan politicians' entitlement:
Captain's Quarters:"Just a few weeks ago, we hailed the Capitol Police when it pursued assault charges against Cynthia McKinney. Now it appears that McKinney may have had a point when she presumed that DC police would give her special treatment due to her position. They certainly appear to have done so with Kennedy, at least above the patrol level. ...It may not reflect on Rep. Kennedy at all, if he did nothing to initiate the favorable treatment, but may have more to do with an entrenched culture in DC which treats politicians significantly better than they treat the public in general."
The Sandbox:Blue Crab Boulevard: "Anyone who has read this blog for any length of time knows I don't have a high opinion of Ted Kennedy. It's not his politics, although I agree with almost none of his positions. It's not his nasty partisanship. It's not his personal life, in general."I wonder if I'd have been treated this nicely on what seems to be an obvious DUI stop? Actually, since I've blown in a breathalyzer three times already at the age of 25 (completely sober each time), I don't like my odds in that situation! It must be nice to have friends in high places."
It's the way he skated on something that would have gotten any other person in this country lacking his money and family connections in serious trouble. Likely jail time. Then to preach about the rights of the downtrodden. Kind of sticks in my craw."
Wonkette looks at a police report from another Kennedy accident three weeks ago and isn't impressed has some questions about his writing: "He was pulling into a CVS into oncoming traffic and was broadsided, but we didn't get that from the statement, which seems to maybe be about pixies? Trowels? We can't actually read it. How does this guy co-sponsor bills?...As we learned today, if you're a drunk-drivin' Congressman and you smash into something down here in DC, and not in lame ol' Rhode Island, the cops will drive you home and not, like, test you or anything. Which is, really, above and beyond the call of duty, guys. That kind of treatment? He must've been wearing his members' pin."
Lefty reactions were light but not non-existant. TalkLeft was ready to stand by his man: "Ambien has been known to cause both sleep driving and sleep eating. ...Patrick Kennedy did undergo drug rehab before college, but that was a long time ago. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. ...He says he is cooperating with the police and denies he received special treatment."
Atrios wants to wait for more info before mounting a defense: "Well, if he drove drunk he's an irresponsible idiot and if he got special treatment from the cops shame on them. If not, shame on the people making the accusation. I'll never understand why people who live in an area with good taxi service drive drunk (not excusing those who do it absent good taxi service)."
NewsHounds wasn't happy with FOX News coverage of the incident: "FOX News is so obsessed with crimes by Democrats and African-Americans (and so oblivious to crimes by Republicans) that you could almost see the glee on the faces of FOX News execs when they heard the news last night (5/4/06) that Rep. Patrick Kennedy had been involved in a car accident and, as Sean Hannity reported, "when Kennedy stepped out of the car, he was said to be staggering" and appeared to be intoxicated."
THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Herbert like Sherbert
Sticking with todays anti-MSM theme Evan Coyne Maloney has written a computer program to replace New York Times columnist Bob Herbert: " According to Nancy Kruh of The Dallas Morning News, veteran New York Times columnist Bob Herbert has been stuck in a rut for years. ...What Kruh discovered is that many of Herbert's columns during the Bush presidency contain similar, interchangeable passages. ...I thought I'd help the Times find ways to put out the same product for less money. So I spent about fifteen minutes writing software that can generate Bob Herbert columns while using a minimal amount of our Earth's precious resources."
LEST WE FORGET: One Brick At A Time
Frustrated by congressional inaction some neo-nativist with a funny bone has set up a Send a Brick site encouraging Americans to Send-A-Brick to their Sen. and Rep. The site offers to send a brick on your behalf but also provides a handy guide on how you can send a brick all by yourself: "STEP 1: Get a Brick!"
