Month: May 2006

The Sequel

by digby

Straight Talk McCain unveils his secret plan to end the war:

“One of the things I would do if I were President would be to sit the Shiites and the Sunnis down and say, ‘Stop the bullshit,'” said Mr. McCain, according to Shirley Cloyes DioGuardi, an invitee, and two other guests.

You’ve got to love the Republicans. Their solution to everything is to say they will knock some heads together and “stop the bullshit.” Just trust them.

This one’s my favorite, from Junior in 2000:

Bush said today that he would bring down gasoline prices by creating enough political good will with oil-producing nations that they would increase their supply of crude:

“I would work with our friends in OPEC to convince them to open up the spigot, to increase the supply. Use the capital that my administration will earn, with the Kuwaitis or the Saudis, and convince them to open up the spigot.”

How’s that working out for everybody?

It’s nice that these tough guys like to pretend that they can rule the world with their impressive codpieces, but I think we’ve had enough of this impotent GOP posturing. McCain was a very tough guy years ago, but now he’s prostituting himself to the rightwing and believing his own hype.

As Ezra says:

Woo! That’s bracing stuff! And then, after the hasty consultations with translators to make sure he actually said that, the participants would stare at him quizzically, wondering what the straight-talk solution to oil sharing, political representation, entrenched hatreds, and varying conceptions of secularism will be. So what is it? McCain demands that they “stop the bullshit.” What are his next ten words?

Exactly. It’s funny, but it’s just possible that George Bush’s failure using a faux McCain image has ruined it for John McCain. That ballsy fighter jock thing just doesn’t have the same resonance it used to have. McCain’s playing the lead in a cheap sequel of his own story.

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Silverback Males

by digby

The New York Times got scooped today on another hot sexy story about a presidential candidate. This time it’s about Bill Frist, whose wife needs to keep her hubby on a leash when he’s hanging around female Wapo reporters:

At 9:30 a.m., Frist opened the Senate, gripping the corners of the lectern, as he had the operating table. Across the city, rolling in a bed of hay, Kuja opened his eyes and grunted. The gorilla kept touching his tongue to his tooth. Something had changed inside of the beast while he slept. Frist smiled and spoke unremarkably from the lectern, reeking of silverback testosterone.

Granted, this article is about Frist operating on gorillas for National Zoo, which is nice considering his history of cat killing. But the term “silverback” is not only applied to gorillas. It’s also a slang term for sexy middle aged human males. How this applies to Bill Frist, I’m not sure, but then who can account for people’s taste in members of the opposite sex? Henry Hyde and Newt Gingrich are prime examples of this conundrum.

But I’m sure this reporter knew nothing about that silverback thing, Mrs Frist. All that hot imagery about the beast within and silverback testosterone is completely innocent. Still, it might be a good idea to have Patrick Healy look into the Frist marriage for the Times. This doesn’t look good.

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Charlie Brown Politics

by digby

Glenn Greenwald has a depressing post up about the Democratic retreat on Michael Hayden:

But by and large, what happened yesterday with Gen. Hayden’s nomination is exactly what would have happened in 2002 and 2003. Democrats are afraid to challenge the President due to their fear — always due to their fear — that they will be depicted as mean, obstructionist and weak on national security. And so, even with an unbelievable weakened President, and even with regard to the most consequential issues — and can one doubt that installing Gen. Hayden as CIA Director is consequential? — Democrats back away from fights, take no clear position, divide against each other, and stand up for exactly nothing.
cimply
It is quite possible that Democrats would not have been able to stop Gen. Hayden’s nomination. It is true that they are still in the minority and thus are limited in what they can achieve legislatively. But that’s really irrelevant. Gen. Hayden is a symbol and one of the chief instruments and advocates of the administration’s lawlessness. He refused to say in his testimony even whether he would even comply with the law. Opposing his nomination is both compelled by a principled belief in the rule of law as well as justified by the important political opportunity to highlight this administration’s lawbreaking. Sen. Feingold, as usual, shows how this works:

The Democrats who voted against the nomination were Russell D. Feingold of Wisconsin, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Evan Bayh of Indiana. Each cited concerns about General Hayden’s role in a controversial domestic surveillance program he ran while head of the National Security Agency.

“I am not convinced that the nominee respects the rule of law and Congress’s oversight responsibilities,” Mr. Feingold said.

In other words, there are serious questions about whether Gen. Hayden will comply with the law and whether he believes in the rule of law, so perhaps it’s not a good idea to install him as CIA Director. Is there some reason Democrats were afraid to make that clear, straightforward, critically important point?

Glenn answered that question in his first paragraph. National security has the Democrats so spooked they are paralyzed and for some reason they don’t seem to understand that every time they retreat they look like they are frightened of their shadows — and thus appear to the American people to be incapable of protecting the country. And what’s depressing is that their primary political concern can be rather easily alleviated by doing the right thing and standing up for their principles. George Bush has no credibility. Perhaps some people don’t grasp the significance of the illegal wiretapping per se, but they are certainly open to argument if someone would care to make one. It’s not as if they trust this president to make good decisions.

More importantly, for electoral purposes, the Democrats simply have to show that they are willing to fight this weakened unpopular president or people will see no point in kicking the bums out — and certainly will not believe that the Dems are capable of taking on someone of real strength. As bad as it was in 2002 and 2003, how pathetic is it that the the Democrats rubber stamping Bush when he’s at 29%? How unpopular do his policies have to get before Democrats take the side of the majority?

Glenn goes on to speculate about the future and sees that there is not likely to be a whole lot of action on these matters going forward, even if we win. And that is my great fear, too. The Democrats have the GOP snake by the neck but I’m pretty sure they don’t have the nerve to kill it. And that is a huge mistake as has been demonstrated over and over again for the last 30 years.

Here’s Robert Parry discussing the last time we had a chance to follow up and knock off the criminal element:

My book, Secrecy & Privilege, opens with a scene in spring 1994 when a guest at a White House social event asks Bill Clinton why his administration didn’t pursue unresolved scandals from the Reagan-Bush era, such as the Iraqgate secret support for Saddam Hussein’s government and clandestine arms shipments to Iran.

Clinton responds to the questions from the guest, documentary filmmaker Stuart Sender, by saying, in effect, that those historical questions had to take a back seat to Clinton’s domestic agenda and his desire for greater bipartisanship with the Republicans.

Clinton “didn’t feel that it was a good idea to pursue these investigations because he was going to have to work with these people,” Sender told me in an interview. “He was going to try to work with these guys, compromise, build working relationships.”

Clinton’s relatively low regard for the value of truth and accountability is relevant again today because other centrist Democrats are urging their party to give George W. Bush’s administration a similar pass if the Democrats win one or both houses of Congress.

Reporting about a booklet issued by the Progressive Policy Institute, a think tank of the Democratic Leadership Council, the Washington Post wrote, “these centrist Democrats … warned against calls to launch investigations into past administration decisions if Democrats gain control of the House or Senate in the November elections.”

These Democrats also called on the party to reject its “non-interventionist left” wing, which opposed the Iraq War and which wants Bush held accountable for the deceptions that surrounded it.

“Many of us are disturbed by the calls for investigations or even impeachment as the defining vision for our party for what we would do if we get back into office,” said pollster Jeremy Rosner, calling such an approach backward-looking. [Washington Post, May 10, 2006]

I urge you to read the whole article. It shows just what a massive failure it was on the part of Democrats and Clinton not to follow through. Unsurprisingly, the Republicans didn’t see this “let bygones be bygones” attitude as anything but weakness. Clinton was rewarded with a partisan impeachment for his trouble.

This issue perfectly defines the real argument between the netroots and the establishment. We want to engage the opposition head on and they simply refuse. It is not about policy, although there is plenty to discuss on that count. It is about enabling criminal, radical, undemocratic politics to go unchecked in the name of some sort of bipartisan comity that only Joe Lieberman and his friends at the Democratic Leadership Council believe still exists. It’s about not letting Lucy pull the football away again.

It’s true that we are a vanguard at the moment, but this new media technology makes it far easier for a vanguard to become a movement than it used to and we have the momentum. What is happening in Connecticut is the canary in the coal mine if these establishment types care to actually see it instead of flailing about incoherently that leftists are ruining their party like it’s 1968 and we’re all on acid.

Glenn thinks that here in our blogospheric bubble it appears that things are changing when they aren’t. I have to disagree a bit with that. It’s true that the blogospheric bubble often gives the false impression that there is more momentum on our side than there actually is. I suspect that true inside any movement or campaign where you spend most of your time with fellow travellers. But that doesn’t mean things aren’t changing. We are now a factor. They may hate us, fear us and dismiss us, but we’re here and we aren’t going anywhere. (Say it loud, I’m blog and I’m proud!)

Rick Perlstein noted in the discussion of “Before The Storm” and the conservative movement last week-end at Firedoglake that history is complicated, it moves like a battleship. Things aren’t going to turn around overnight. But we are beginning to affect the way the media sees itself and we are putting political pressure on the party. This is how change is made. We’ll ride all their asses like Zorro until they get the message. We’re in for the long haul.

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Bravo

by digby

A Hullabaloo reader’s letter was published in the New York Times today:

To the Editor:

Re “For Clintons, Delicate Dance of Married and Public Lives” (front page, May 23):

I’m not quite sure what to make of your report about Bill and Hillary Clinton’s marriage as provided by anonymous experts.

What I do know is that I’ll be looking forward to the same thorough reporting into the marriages of other presidential hopefuls, like John McCain and Rudolph W. Giuliani, including “interviews with some 50 people and a review of their respective activities.”

I assume that those critical investigations will be prominently placed in The Times as well; I’d really hate to miss them.

V.L.
New York, May 23, 2006

Thank you!

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It Was Just A Matter of Time

by digby

… before Lou Dobbs went full-on racist on the immigration question. Liberal Oasis has the story:

Today on “Lou Dobbs Tonight,” CNN ran a graphic sourced to the Council of Conservative Citizens, a group deemed to have a “white supremacy” ideology according to the Anti-Defamation League.

During a piece about illegal immigrants in Utah, reporter Casey Wian said, “Utah is also part of the territory some militant Latino activists refer to as Aztlan, the portion of the southwest United States they claim rightfully belongs to Mexico.”

The CCC is a well known neo-confederate group that is the direct heir to the White Citizens Councils of the Jim Crow south. Trent Lott probably would have kept his leadership post had it not been for a previous scandal featuring him and the CCC which caused quite a furor in 1999:

By Charles Pope, CQ staff writer
February 2, 1999, 11:52AM. EST

The last thing Trent Lott needs is another controversy with staying power.

But floating around the Senate majority leader is a storm that has been rumbling for weeks, fueled by race, partisan politics and, most of all, the weather-makers at the Council of Conservative Citizens and its leader, Gordon Lee Baum.

The council claims 15,000 members nationally and has an active chapter in Republican Lott’s home state of Mississippi, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, which studies hate groups. The law center and other critics characterize the council’s agenda as racist and white supremacist; at least one member of the Republican National Committee has called the group “unsavory.”

It is, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, “the reincarnation of the racist white Citizens Councils” that became a potent political force in the 1950s in the South to fight integration. Moreover, the law center concludes the council is “shot through with white supremacist views, members and political positions.”

Baum and other leaders vigorously dispute those labels, but writings in council publications have likened interracial marriage to white genocide and suggested that Abraham Lincoln was elected by communists.

It is not the type of group to which a national politician like Lott wants to be linked. But linked he is, despite repeated efforts to distance himself from the group and claims he was not aware of their views.

When these things happen nobody, it seems, are aware of the CCC’s views. I am sure that Lou Dobbs will say the same. He’s only a credentialed journalist, after all. You can’t expect him to have nose for racist propaganda.

This certainly does bring up an interesting question for me, however. I never thought of the CCC as being a white supremecist organization in the mode of say “Stormfront” or something like that. It’s a neo-confederate group which is certainly racist but organized explicitly around hatred of African-Americans. The fact that they are touting the ridiculous Aztlan “threat” puts the lie to any claims that this immigration debate isn’t being fueled by racism. (Not that that’s a big surprise.)

When you go back to those articles I linked above to the CCC scandal back in 1999, there is a clear desire on the part of the institutional GOP to back away from any association with these people. The party was very, very anxious to shed its racist image. Some of these articles even applaud the end of the southern strategy. Yet here it comes again. This time it’s the “aliens” rather than the blacks, but it’s the same old drill.

It is a sign of Republican weakness this time. They should not have to be shoring up their base with this tired old stuff. But their racist base is restive, looking for a fight, wanting to kick someone’s ass to account for their own feelings of impotence in a complicated world. (Same old shit.) The leadership knows it is a losing long term strategy but they’re left with nothing else.

Lou Dobbs pops an aneurysm any time somebody says that this debate might just be a teensy bit racist. I would suggest that any time someone goes on his show they mention that only a racist would use information from the CCC, the progeny of the White Citizen’s Councils, and not recognize it for what it is.

Here’s the contact info for CNN.

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The Discreet, Measured Tone Of The Right

by tristero

Occasionally, I get taken to the carpet for my angry tone. Occasionally, the person complaining is right, but most of the time they’re not. And here’s why.

The unprincipled fuck in the video at the link gets paid to compare a Vice President of the United States to a Nazi propagandist (and notice: no one tells him he’s gone “too far,” no one tries to interrupt what he’s saying; this is considered reasonable discourse on Fox News). And why does this shithead get paid to do such a thing? It’s not because he believes it. He knows he’s spouting bullshit. No, this asshole gets paid to say things like that because he knows Gore’s argument is good and he can’t attack it on his merits.

Now, you may respond that calling this unprincipled fuck an “unprincipled fuck” simply perpetuates his sin or worse, that I don’t have any way to attack his position on its merits.

You’re 100% right about your first objection. It does perpetuate a pithecanthropic level of discourse for a very good reason: there is no possible way to avoid doing so without being a total fool. You think you can “politely engage” someone who compares an American vice-president who served his country honorably for 8 years – not to mention his previous services to America in government – to a Nazi? You can’t, or rather, you shouldn’t. Nor can you ignore it (although the vice-president should). The terms of engagement have been set by this slimeball – the rhetorical battle-field must always be level. There is no higher ground and attempts to claim it will lead to your destruction (see Daschle, Tom for details).

As for that second objection you could make, well I gotta admit it: you are right once again. I do have no way to attack his position on his merits, again for a very good reason. What he is discussing is not Gore’s ideas or global climate change. No, what he’s talking about, the only subject is, “how exactly comparable is Al Gore to Josef Goebbels” and I will not dignify this scumbag’s comparison by explaining in measured, avuncular tones why such a comparison is, and I hesitate timidly before saying it, “unfortunate?” There is no way to attack his position on the merits because there is no merit to his position. And he knows it.

If this is how the right wants to discuss Gore’s movie, I’m ready. And I’m not gonna deplore the low level they’ve set. I’ll simply meet them, tit for tat. Oh, yes, I can give people the facts, too. But this isn’t about facts, but something else. And those who come to Gore’s defense in the media over the next few weeks have to be prepared truly to engage that “something else” and do a good job of it before facts can have a chance of being heard. And yes, if Sterling Burnett’s appearance is any indication, it will be ugly, and not in a good way.*

Hat tip to Atrios for the link.

*And no, I’m not simply referring to Burnett’s Hot Or Not? prospects: that would be cruel. I’m referring only to what he said. On that basis alone, he would score a 0; his rugged manly (if you’re a chickenhawk) looks could only raise his hotness quotient.

[Edited slightly after original posting. Spelling error in Burnett’s last name corrected (thank you HC in comments). Spelling of “pithecanthropic” corrected (thak you “u…” in comments. )]

Winning

by digby

Matt Yglesias subbing for Marshall at TPM makes the point that despite the fact that Democrat William Jefferson is obviously a crook, he’s just a run of the mill free lance criminal rather than being part of a criminal syndicate like Tom DeLay and Duke Cunningham. This is true and Democrats have a right to make this distinction and should.

But I think the most important thing about all this culture of corruption stuff isn’t who benefits from it as a rhetorical device in upcoming political campaigns. What’s important is that the GOP machine be broken up into little pieces.

I like the “culture of corruption” as a rhetorical frame, and frankly I think it’s probably working quite well. I wrote about this some time back: images are far easier to stick on political opponents if they fit in with preconceived notions of how their side tends to work. Democrats tend to be concerned with issues that affect the weaker members of society and are therefore more easily tarred as “soft.” It’s why the Republicans have always found it easy to win in times of perceived danger — and if we aren’t in times of perceived danger, they’ll create danger out of whole cloth. (Sex is a threat to civilization!)

Republicans tend to look after those with wealth and power and are therefore more easily tarred as greedy and crooked. I’m glad the Republicans gave us such an easy frame for our congressional elections. But I’m even happier that they were so transparently corrupt that even a Republican justice department couldn’t ignore it.

That K Street Project was going to kill us. If the Republicans had played it cool they could have fashioned an impermeable national political machine that could have locked us out for decades. Fortunately, they are greedy and stupid and couldn’t keep themselves from stealing while still in office.

The long term health of our democracy and the long term health of our party required that this machine be shut down. Whether they can effectively frame this as a bipartisan problem or not the truth is, regardless of their hype, this was the GOP’s baby all the way and it has been irreparably damaged. No matter what happens in the fall, in a larger respect we have already won.

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Uncivil Liberties

by digby

Here’s a great post by Glenn Greenwald in which he proves that the pollution of our political discourse can be simply defined as anyone publicly disagreeing with Republicans:

So, that’s the behavioral standard that Bush followers are advocating. The greatest sin against civility is to boo someone while they give a political speech, and those who do that show that they are deranged and “angry” and are therefore acting at their own peril.

[…]

According to Instapundit — who cited the Gateway Pundit post and said that “a Hateful anti-war speech by Rep. Lacy Clay (D-MO) . . . provokes a near riot” — this episode “[s]eems to illustrate the point made in this WSJ editorial about the Democrats’ penchant for self-marginalization and self-destruction.” The WSJ Editorial to which Instapundit cited condemned the heckling and booing by the New School students of McCain’s speech. But to Instapundit, that same Editorial also shows that Democrats are acting stupidly and angrily when they give commencement speeches and are heckled by Republican students to the point where they need security to be escorted out.

Can’t win for losing. But you must admit that it’s heartwarming for the concern trolls to be so worried about the Democratic penchant for self-marginalization. But when your president is at 29%, you’ve probably got some people closer to home who need some of your good advice about how to avoid self-destruction.

The right has been thuggish and uncivil for decades. And they are very good at smirking faux outrage at the other side doing anything comparable. They call for the smelling salts with such over-the-top fluttering of delicate little hands and eyelashes that you have to laugh. Elephants in a tutu. It’s a parody.

This is one case where I think we just have to play the game they’ve set out. I’ll match my outrage to their outrage any day. It’s not particularly pleasant, but blogs are an appropriate place to do this sort of thing in a way that nobody else can.

So bring it. You want examples of incivility? I’ll give you examples. How about this:

Is the Democratic Party the “Party of Death”?

If you look at their agenda they are.

IT’S NOT JUST abortion-on-demand. It’s euthanasia, embryo destruction, even infanticide—and a potentially deadly concern with “the quality of life” of disabled people. If you think these issues don’t concern you—guess again. The Party of Death could be roaring into the White House, as National Review senior editor Ramesh Ponnuru shows, in the person of Hillary Rodham Clinton.

In The Party of Death, Ponnuru details how left-wing radicals, using abortion as their lever, took over the Democratic Party—and how they have used their power to corrupt our law and politics, abolish our fundamental right to life, and push the envelope in ever more dangerous directions.

[…]

Ponnuru’s shocking exposé shows just how extreme the Party of Death has become as they seek to destroy every inconvenient life, demand fealty to their radical agenda, and punish anyone who defies them. But he also shows how the tide is turning, how the Party of Death can be defeated, and why its last victim might be the Democratic Party itself.*

This from a highly regarded conservative intellectual who supported the violent killing of thousands of actual living Iraqi children for no good reason. I call that uncivil in the extreme.

*Ponnuru claims that this book jacket doesn’t reflect the actual theme of the book which is that the Party of Death isn’t really the Democratic party, but rather some other non-partisan death party, which doesn’t actually exist. Right.

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Desperate Lightweights

by digby

Did you know that the Democrats have to “root, root, root” for material to beat the Republicans? Via Peter Daou, The Note Says so:

“As is always the case with the out-of-power party, Democrats have to root root root for bad news. And no bad news source is better for the Democrats’ election prospects than the bad news from Iraq.”

It doesn’t seem to me as if the Dems have to do anything but sit on their asses and eat freedom fries; the bad news is falling from sky like rain. It’s everywhere you look. So why does the voice of DC conventional wisdom portray the political situation as the Democrats feverishly trying to dig up dirt?

Well, that would be the first step in framing the upcoming election as the Democrats unfairly smearing Republicans. It’s quite predictable, really. The derisive coverage of Democratic infighting, the constant refrain that the people will have to hold their noses to vote for Democrats, and now the cranking up of the trivia and tabloid machine, I think it’s quite clear that we are not going to have any easier ride with the mainstream media than we ever had.

No matter how much the GOP destroys the country, the media, for whatever reason, continues its assault on Democrats. We are going to have our hands full for the next two years — and if we win, for the forseeable future. Nothing has changed except for adding the “angry left” meme to the established narrative of Democratic triviality, mental instability and immorality.

Imagine how well this narrative will serve Republicans in the upcoming elections this fall and in 2008: Yes, the country has problems. Yes, they need fixing. But the Democrats are frivolous lightweights who will mire the nation in tabloid scandals and silly personality issues and aren’t we all sick of that? Do we need yet more of this tiring partisanship? (Pssst. By the way, did you hear about Russ Feingold’s divorce? Biden’s personality defects? No? Well, pull up a chair, Ken Mehlman faxed over this hilarious …)

By contrast John Mccain/Rudy Giuliani/George Allen/whomever are maverick GOP tough guy outsiders who will knock some heads together on both sides and get things done. The looney, scandalous Democrats simply aren’t serious enough to run things.

Reader Kay, in the comments below, puts it this way:

Whatever my problems with President Clinton pale in comparison with the insanity that stalked his presidency from the right using an apparently lobotomized national media and the malignant incompentence that has follwed it.

While the GOP masters of this slight-of-hand game never quite succeeded in stealing Clinton’s presidency and bringing him down personally, they did manage to make off with the 2000 election, the Congress, and any serious debate about issues that actually matter. You can make a pretty good case that the Ken Starr driven tabloidization of the Clinton presidency drowned out the discussion of terrorism that we ought to have had in the late 90’s.

But I agree completely that this is not about the Clintons. HillBill is their easiest target, sure. Because of the familiar “storyline,” Hillary can be attacked for all of Bill’s shortcomings while being simultaneously measured unfavorably against his talents and virtues. It’s a triple play when used against Hillary, distraction, personal attack and professional minimalization.

So it’s easier and it’s deadlier for her but this type of “concerned” investigation is part and parcel of a GOP meme that the media adores for its “entertainment” value.

It might be worse if Hillary really runs for president but even if she decides to stay home and bake cookies, this crap will not go away — we will just get some other form of tabloid political analysis shoved down our throats. Did John marry Theresa for love or money? Did you hear he shot himself to win one of those purple hearts? Did Murtha too? How embarassed was Tipper by that too mushy to be real kiss at the convention? (Remember? I know they do.) Did Al start embellishing the truth (you know… inventing the internet and all) to impress his remote, unloving dad? Did Elizabeth Edwards really beg John to stay home with their family in her trying time? (You know he ran off to politics just after another family crisis. Nudge, wink.)

If everything goes according to plan, some fledgling Joe Klein will write a “hip insider” novel explaining the psychological shortcomings of whomever (oops… entirely fictional person who just happens to resemble the nominee) the Democrats eventually nominate.

So just forget Hillary and pretend that the same article was written Feingold’s unmarried status or why Mrs. Dean stays in Vermont. This is really all an entirely different overly familiar storyline from the GOP called alternately “family values” or “character matters.” It is now, just as it once was, GOP-wingnut strategy writ large by a lazy and complicit media.

Democrats, you see, don’t really have families, marriages, true friends, career accomplishments or character. If they appear to have any of those things, there must be, say the wingnutters, a devious ruse that requires endless investigation and liberal doses of unsubstantiated “fun” gossip. If the press is slow on the uptake, they fill the air with innuendo and “everybody knows…” whispers until the press catches on.

All that “fun” stuff can distract us from tedious discussions about war, torture, health care, privacy rights, global warming, competent national security, and staggering budget deficits. God forbid that the right be held in an honest debate about any of that stuff — Joe six pack might get bored or (worse) learn something.

I suspect that if this is not challenged vociferously right now, the press will guide the public to listen to the serious political discussion that the serious Republicans will wage among themselves over the next two years. The Democrats, however, will be relegated to celebrity gossip and cheap armchair psychoanalysis — even if we win in the fall. The political debate will, once more, be between the right and the far right.

Update: This is sort of funny. I interpreted “root, root, root” to mean “dig” which is bad enough. But upon reflection, I see they clearly meant that Democrats are rooting for death and destruction in Iraq which is just outrageous.

I guess we can add incomprehensibly sadistic to our tabloid reputations. Good to know.

Update II: Check out Greg Sargent’s The Horse’s Mouth’s take on the Clinton NY Times Story. This blog is devoted to analyzing the press and Sargent is unsparing; it will be worth keeping an eye on.

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Right Wing Hack Mark Steyn Lifts In Part From Linguist Geoff Pullum’s Post

by tristero

Thanks, PZ, for turning me on to this most amusing post.* To add to the amusement, Steyn had to resort to plagiariz…sorry, “borrowing,” merely to diss the style of author Dan Brown. Talk about being lazy! Pundit Steyn even paraphrased – and poorly – the famous title of the original source, “Renowned author Dan Brown staggered through his formulaic opening sentence.”

(Special note to less-than-quick-on-the-draw-but-who-think-they’re-really-geniuses- rightwing readers: No kidding? You noticed my own careless deployment of anarthrous occupational nominal premodifiers? Whoa, are you sharp!)

* And PZ, I loved reading about the evolution of whale morphology, too, and think I got the basic points, even if many of the details were beyond my immediate knowledge. But as it happens, I wrote the music for the whale evolution section of the PBS Evolution series, so some of the issues were familiar. Fascinating stuff.