June 26, 2006

6/26: Diversity Training

It's the nature of journalism to take broad and complicated facts and force them into a coherent narrative. Often in this pursuit of comprehensibility, complexity is sacrificed for simplicity. So is the major sin running through the Blogometer today. At the heart of almost every fight between bloggers and bloggers, and bloggers and the MSM, is an unwillingness to acknowledge differences while demanding full understanding of one's own diversity of opinion (i.e. Vast Left Wing Conspiracy vs. Vast Right Wing Conspiracy vs. monolithic MSM). So this weekend we have Newsweek, David Brooks, and the entire staff of The New Republic condemning the entire diverse lefty blogosphere by attacking just two (though admittedly prominent) members of its community. On the right, Hugh Hewitt is stepping up to a big challenge, trying to meld the boisterous Townhall righty hangout with the more moderate wing of the righty-talk radio world. All would be better served by taking the time to study the real divisions in their opponents' positions.

The pre-blogger activist life of ex-VA Gov. Mark Warner (D) advisor Jerome Armstrong continued to produce blogosphere fodder this weekend when Riehl World View uncovered Armstrong's past penchant for astrology based forecasting. RWV explains that at its inception "MyDD didn't have anything to do with democracy, direct, personal, or otherwise when it started out as an astrological tabloid, forecasting the ups and downs of the stock market based upon the stars." RWV provides links to past Armstrong posts relating the rise of Osama Bin Laden to the "exploration of the Kuiper Belt in 1992," and Pres. Bush's "natal chart" to his post-9/11 "special calling."

Unlike the pay-for-play and SEC accusations, Armstrong owns up to his astrological past but then both minimizes and and embraces his former hobby at MyDD: "Oh yea, on the astrological stuff. ... Down that line, I dabbled with planets and predictions in the most abstract manner, as one of several different predictive mathematical disciplines ... It has nothing to do with what I consult with in online political strategy. But hey, like JP Morgan once said, "millionaires don't use astrology, billionaires do!"

Righty bloggers thought it was Christmas in June.

• Pejman at RedState: "I'm just gobsmacked. How precisely is it possible that the "Blogfather" of the "Netroots" movement, the guy responsible for being Gov. Mark Warner's Ambassador to the Technoworld ... how is it that that guy was trusted to call shots and give advice based on whether the moon was Waxing Gibbous, or whether Orion was in a reclining chair."
• Wizbang: "The Warner and Brown campaigns are in a bind. Dropping Armstrong is the logical course of action, but it they do they risk losing the support of Kos, whose support seems to correlate pretty strongly to Armstrong's employment.
• DonkeyCons: "A visionary Democratic political consultant who sees world-historical significance in the movements of Ixion, Quaoar and the Kuiper Belt? It's a target-rich environment."
• Stromata Blog: "Liberals sneered at Nancy Reagan's consultations with astrologers and insinuated that they influenced her husband's political agenda. If that had been true, it would have been the strongest argument ever in favor of astrology. Jerome Armstrong appears to be a much more zealous follower of the Zodiac than Mrs. Reagan ever was. I'm not sure whether astrology or leftism suffers more by the association.
• Just One Minute: "So one of the leaders of the "reality-based community" is an astrologer - who knew?"

Fellow righty Wizbang claims to have caught MyDD in flagrant cover up of the burgeoning Stargate: "In the hours since the story broke it looks like a search and replace has been done at MyDD for the term 'astrologer ' See this post (Original / Sanitized) for and example of the purge - look for the second comment by 'Hugh' in the original post. Suddenly it's not there anymore in the latest version of the 2004 post, which Google cached in February 2005."

The fight between The Plank's Jason Zengerle and the DailyKos/MyDD axis spun off into side scandals over the weekend. As the Blogometer already reported Zengerle first accused DailyKos' Markos Moulitsas and MyDD's Jerome Armstrong of connecting support for Dem candidates with employment for Armstrong, and then trying to put a wet blanket on lefty blogger comment on the story. Beltway Blogroll (go team!) has a great full rundown of the story. Zengrle's original post turned on three emails puportedly sent to a private lefty-blogger only email list called "Townhouse" one of which Zengerle claimed to be written by The News Blog'sSteve Gilliard . While the other two emails turned out to be authentic, Zengerle admitted 6/25 that the third "wasn't." In the same post Zengrle refused to bow to lefty blogger calls for him to out his Townhouse sources.

For Gilliard, Zengerle still had not fully paid for his mistake: "What I would have liked to see is an admission that his refusal to actually consult with anyone he quoted was a fundamental mistake. ... I don't think Zengerle has handled this well, and this grudging article tries to minimize the gross error he has committed. ... Again, and I will be e-mailing Foer with the same request: I fully expect TNR to reveal the source of the e-mail I was quoted from and in a timely manner."

The whole episode drew in TNR's biggest names. Martin Peretz at The Plank was in a name calling mood: "Forgive me. But I never read Daily Kos until today. Well, now that I've read it, the first thought that came to me is how illiterate Kos is, just plain illiterate. ...And his rant against us, well, borders on a nut case's." Fellow TNRer Lee Siegeldropped an f-word : "It's a bizarre phenomenon, the blogosphere. It radiates democracy's dream of full participation but practices democracy's nightmare of populist crudity, character-assassination, and emotional stupefaction. It's hard fascism with a Microsoft face."

Markos left DailyKos' response up to Hunter who found little meat in Peretz attack: "Martin Peretz responded to the hailstorm of criticism unleashed on TNR as a result of the stories by TNR writer Jason Zengerle. By "responded," I mean responded, not addressed, or defended, or explained on the merits. I mean, simply, responded. Among his more surgical and biting criticisms is that Kos is "illiterate", and that "his rant against [TNR], well, borders on a nut case's." ...The New Republic is not a right-wing rag. But nor is it a progressive one, and nor is it a relevant one."

Fellow lefty Booman Tribune thought the left of center in fighting did not bode well for Dems in Nov: "The left, never known for its ability to act in lockstep, is predictably tearing itself apart at the exact moment (the upcoming 2006 midterms elections) when it can least afford to do so." Still BT had little sympathy for TNR: "If there is one issue around which the left-wing blogosphere coalesces, it is opposition to the invasion of Iraq. Lieberman going independent would be a sure sign that these hawks no longer feel welcome in the Democratic Party. That is what is really going on. TNR is fighting for influence, and is trying to marginalize the blogosphere (to Michael Moore us) in order to retain their influence. They don't care about butter half as much as they care about guns, and therefore our political differences are unbridgeable."

Kevin Drum at The Washington Monthly thought the feud was a black-eye for the larger blogger community: "I don't know. Maybe it's just a perfect storm of YearlyKos, Ned Lamont, and the TNR-Kos feud. But whatever the cause, it's not doing us any good. Mainstream reporters, despite their generally liberal temperaments, have an odd sort of contempt for actual liberal politicians, who they widely view as being wimpy, pandering, fence-sitting, poll-driven wonks who are hesitant to really speak their minds and insist on giving lots of boring policy-oriented speeches that don't make good copy. Well, the blogosphere is anything but that, but it turns out the mainstream press doesn't like that much either. I'm not sure how that's going to play out in the long term, but in the short term I have a feeling it's nothing but bad news. "Spittle-flecked loons" seems likely to become the new media CW. Karl Rove must be pleased."

Following up on the original payola story, righty Riehl World View noticed that Markos turned administration of BlogPAC over to MyDD and that from 1/05 - 3/05: "their only disbursements were to another blogger / consultant - Bob Bingham - from the Swing State Blog. According to slate, he was a one time employee of Armstrong, as well as a leading force behind BlogPAC. Interesting. They've been collecting money on line and paying it to ... themselves for consulting?? I don't know. But those filings could prove interesting, either now, or in the future."

The MSM spotlight on DailyKos' Markos Moulitsas grew brighter with the publication of a 6/25 Newsweek profile of the Berkeley, CA denizen. So far lefty reaction to the piece has been mixed. TalkLeft calls it "venom...with a right-wing agenda" while John in DC at AMERICAblog calls it "a good story" that "accurately captured Markos and the blogosphere."

Reviews from the right were much more unified. Right of center Ann Althouse: "Newsweek has a big article on Kos that starts off looking like a puff piece. He's listening to hummingbirds and finally getting that flat-screen TV. ...Kos's writing style -- which has obviously served him well as a blogger up to this point -- sounds angry and crazed to the outsider. It's easy to get him to react with "belligerence and paranoia," and the more successful he is, the more Democrats are motivated to marginalize and disqualify him."

Righty Blue Crab Boulevard worried that a Kos meltdown under the MSM spotlight could harm all bloggers: "It's not just TNR coming down on Kos, Newsweek is now taking the offensive with an article that is not at all flattering. ...So the more they react, the harder the media scrutinizes. The more rage they respond with, the more coverage they will get. Not positive coverage, either. This will not get prettier or easier for Kos. The real danger here is that if the media drags him down, they will be trying really hard to bring down all bloggers at the same time." Matt Margolis at GOP Bloggers sees only good news for his party: "What Kos fails to understand is that the greater influence he does have in the Democratic Party, the more Republicans are going to win. And if he wants to ignore that fact, by all means, he should continue what he's doing. Kos not only suffers from delusions of grandeur, but he also harbors delusions that he is in the mainstream, and that Republicans and moderate Democrats are not."

If lefty bloggers ever wanted an Exhibit A to rebut charges of MSM liberal bias, the juxtaposition of Kos' Newsweek profile with the following glowing Hugh Hewittprofile could serve as a good starting point.

Fellow righty Captain's Quarters cops to a role small role in Hewitt's efforts to merge Salem Radio with the righty web portal Townhall and then explains the logic behind the deal: "Originally, Salem wanted to start its own portal from scratch, which would have taken more effort to attract new readers, even with its high-powered talk-show lineup. Now it will leverage the existing readership of Townhall and the listeners of Salem, combine it with blogging heavyweights, and create a powerful force for conservative activism. And make no mistake, Hugh and Salem intend on creating a site that will produce activists and not just passive readers."

CQ goes on to speculate that the venture could moderate righty web presence: "What does that mean for conservatives? Looking at the Salem line-up, it portends a strengthening of the center-right rather than conservative extremism. The hosts on Salem tend towards that direction, especially Hugh himself. Dennis Prager and Michael Medved also offer shows that rely on dialogue with opposing views and focus on finding common values to reach larger consensus on political issues. Bill Bennett has a more socially conservative slant, and Laura Ingraham tends towards hard-line conservatism, but the thrust should enable the center-right and put a positive face on the Right."

Fellow conservative Professor Bainbridge wonders if Hewitt is a little too much of a team player to keep up with the whims of the GOP base: "Newsweek correctly points out the Hugh has been "a valuable White House ally," in large part because he has consistently sided with the DC elite rather than the base. Remember his unswerving fealty to the excreable Harriet Miers or the way he tore into Mark Tapscott and yours truly for suggesting that the base might sit out 2006? Conservative leaders like Hugh are soon going to face the need to choose between the base and the corrupt/out-of-touch K Street Gang. Noonan and Tapscott get it; does Hugh?"

It seems Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-CT) feels the best way to address the Iraq war online is to pretend it doesn't exist. Connecticut Bob stopped by Friends of Joe Lieberman and could not find any mention of Iraq: "When I clicked on the "Get Involved" button, the sign-up sheet appeared. After the personal info fields, I captured this image. The lower portion of the window has a section for you to choose "What issues are important to you". Well, the problem is, there's only a few issues listed; and none of them are the war in Iraq. Yeah, the...WAR IN IRAQ doesn't ever rate!

Rumpole at TPM Cafe and the unofficial LamontBlog both take Lieberman to task for falsely claiming cable co. exec Ned Lamont (D) said he was against Sen. John Kerry's (D-MA) Iraq amendment.

Meanwhile, Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) scores major lefty blogger points by pledging to support the winner of the 8/8 Dem primary.

• Jonathan Singer at MyDD: "Appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press" this morning, Russ Feingold was thrown an important question on the issue of the Connecticut Democratic Senatorial primary. ...Simply put, Russ Feingold hit the ball out of the park with his answer to this question. ...Democrats should, just like Russ Feingold, pledge to support the Democratic nominee.
• SirotaBlog: "Here's the deal: what's going on in Connecticut is good for the Democratic Party and good for democracy. No politician - not Joe Lieberman, not Chuck Schumer - owns a congressional seat. We the people do, and thankfully, at least some courageous Democrats like Sen. Russ Feingold (D) understand that and are willing to use their position to give voice to that truism."
• Atrios: "Kudos to Russ Feingold for understanding that as a Democrat the right thing to do is to support the wishes of the Democratic voters of Connecticut."

Atrios was also bullish on Lamont's chances in a 3-way general race: "I hope he jumps. As soon as he does I bet he'll be surprised at how quickly his Republican pals will forget his name. Anything can happen in a 3-way race, and unless Joe jumps all the way to their camp, they'll be quite interested in the possibility of taking that seat."

Lawyers Guns and Money is not happy over Pandagon twitterings of abandoning support for Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) over Iraq in favor of a Green Party candidate: "People wonder why LGM regularly devotes a post a month to excoriating Ralph Nader and those who voted for him in 2000. Well, this is it; the same narcissism that prevailed among some progressives then threatens to prevail among others now. Political elections are about real world effects, and there is almost no situation, in America today, in which a victory by a Republican will lead to a more progressive outcome than a victory by a Democrat. This includes Maria Cantwell and it includes, God help me, Joe Lieberman."

Michael Crowley at The Plank notes that while most polls show Cantwell up a solid 10 points on challenger and former insurance executive Mike McGavick (R), a new poll shows the lead down to four. Crowley worries: "It would be very bad news for Democratic prospects of winning back the Senate if Maria "Hellcat" Cantwell is truly in this much trouble in her Washington state re-election race. ... one reason to watch this race is Cantwell's uncomfortable position on Iraq: She supported the war and has generally counseled patience with the occupation (and voted against John Kerry's quick-withdrawal amendment yesterday). Largely as a result, she has drawn three primary challengers, including an anti-war Green Party candidate."

Under the header "Tester Crushes Burns in first Debate" progressive Ed in Montana at DailyKos live blogged the 6/25 Sen. Conrad Burns (R-MT)/state Senate Pres. Jon Tester (D) event. Highlights include:

• Iraq: "Tester says that Burns and the U.S. Senate allowed President Bush to invade Iraq under false pretenses. Burns responds that weapons of mass destruction, such as mustard gas in artillery shells have been found in Iraq (this week's sound bite direct from Rick Santorum!) and that Saddam Hussein was a bad man that used poison gas on his own people. Tester quickly hits back with "Senator you know that a few 15 year old shells of mustard gas weren't the reason we were told to invade Iraq. The imminent threat of Saddam's nuclear weapons program was the reason we went into Iraq. No sign of nuclear weapons have been found."
• Burns: "Repeated a lot of standard repub talking points. Now in his late 70s, he is a lot slower on his feet than even in 2000 when he barely beat back Brian Schweitzer to retain his senate seat."
• Tester: "Jon Tester is very quick on his feet and almost never let a charge from Burns go un-answered. In my view he comes across as very smart and likable to the general Montana public. Tester won this debate hands down on the likability factor alone."
• Ethics: "It was surprising that there were no questions about ethics or Jack Abramoff."

Conservative Michael "A.J. Sparxx" IllionsPoliPundit took in the 6/25 Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ)/State Sen. Tom Kean (R) debate and did not like what he saw from either side: "What can I say, both candidates are left of center, our views are not represented by either candidate. The one representing our Party, Tom Kean, Jr., announced the following positions; Would have voted for the minimum wage increase that was just defeated this past week, is against any off-shore drilling, specifically in New Jersey and in ANWR, admitted to driving a hybrid and was proud to announce when asked that John McCain was his favorite current Senator. What are Conservatives in New Jersey to do ??"

Conservative ParaPundit asks his brethren to support businessman John Jacob (R) over Rep. Chris Cannon's (R) immigrations sins: "Congressional representatives rarely lose in reelection attempts and even more rarely lose in primaries. But that might happen in Utah and if it does the public demand for tougher immigration policies will be the cause. ...A defeat of Cannon would be a huge victory against George W. Bush's immigration amnesty plans and and stiffen the spines of the House opponents of the Senate's plan to drastically increase immigration."

Enjoy it while it lasts cause progressive Matt Stoller at MyDD is rooting for the same guy: "Republicans may get a major wake-up call on Tuesday because of immigration. The issue is immigration, which is what the GOP is going to run on in 2006. The Republican base wants to criminalize immigration, as usual, but it's particularly intense this year. It seems as if conservative voters are voting against Bush, because they see him as soft and untrustworthy. They aren't going to vote for Democrats, but it is possible to keep them from the polls since a vote for an R this year is effectively a vote to continue Bush's policies.

Lisa Vorderbrueggen at ContraCostaTimes Politics Blog notes that wind energy engineer Jerry McNerney (D) bid for first place in Democracy for America's "Grassroots All-Star" contest drew support from DailyKos diarist ripzaw who "begged folks on his blog to vote for McNerney, apparently under the premise that if the guy wins, he'll have salary money." Vorderbrueggen goes on to quote McNerney's campaign manager: ""I might give him a job. Who knows?" says Carrillo. "You have to give the guy points for creativity."

Vorderbrueggen reports that McNerney is also competing for a similar $5,000 prize from ex-VA Gov. Mark Warner's (D) Forward Together PAC. Vorderbrueggen concludes: "On-line voting contests are a sign of the times as campaigns go high-tech in the wake of success stories such as the liberal Moveon.org, which collects millions of dollars in contributions for its causes through the Internet. It's also a way for national political organizations or candidates to collect new e-mail addresses for their databases, which serve as a path to solicit more contributions and build momentum for their causes. Several national environmental groups conducted similar on-line voting schemes in the primary when they asked readers to pick their favorite anti-Pombo ads. If this method of raising money stars mooing like a cash cow, watch it take off like grass in spring. No one's email box is safe."

Words For My Enjoyment patience with the musical stylings of James Blunt has reached its end and pens the following plea to TV producers everywhere:

Dear TV Producers: I know that James Blunt's latest album "Back to Bedlam" is probably one of the best-selling CDs to come out in a long time. ... I know that you sat watching that sequence with your female lead contemplating her life and the problems she's faced and the tough road she's traversed to get to this point in the episode you're currently in post production on. ... And I know that when you watched that sequence you thought to yourself how beautiful that character looked and how if you could just find a song that could communicate just how beautiful she was in that moment that it would further hit home the point to the audience... But do you really need to use James Blunt's song "You're Beautiful" to do it? Are we really that stupid that we will hear that song, listen to the words, and think to ourselves how beautiful said character is even though she's faced such tough problems throughout her life? Maybe.

But if it's the fifteenth time we've heard that song this week, it may lessen the impact a little bit. ...So, here's a tip, TV Producers. James Blunt's entire album has already been used on more than 10 different TV shows as background music. Everyone has heard his music on the radio over and over and over again. Every time someone hears James Blunt on your show, now all they can think is how behind the times you really are. So instead of carting out "No Bravery" when your main character runs away from a huge hit and run accident, or throwing down "Out of My Mind" for your new "beautiful actors in a mental facility meets 90210 show "...Think again. Because James Blunt is so played out...it's not even funny.

Posted by Conn Carroll at June 26, 2006 12:35 PM