Month: April 2008

New Rules, Same As The Old Rules

by digby

Joe Conason:

The sorry performance of ABC anchors Charles Gibson and George Stephanopoulos in this week’s final Democratic primary debate should serve as a signal of the coverage to come. Playing gotcha with Democrats and patty-cake with Republicans will remain basic operating procedure for the mainstream media this year, no different from the past half-dozen presidential campaigns — except that the additional bias in favor of John McCain may make a bad situation worse.

And as Barack Obama should have learned during the debate’s first 45 minutes, if not before, the same fuzzy but obsessive focus on “character” that plagues Bill and Hillary Clinton will be turned on him with equal or greater ferocity by those who once claimed to admire him. He is now subject to the “Clinton rules,” which have long permitted pundits, editorialists and reporters to indict the former president and first lady for sins that other politicians, mostly Republican, may commit with impunity (see Gingrich, Newt, first, second and especially third marriage).

[…]

Why otherwise would the campaign press corps have demanded the Clinton tax returns while nobody insists that McCain release the returns filed by him and his beer heiress wife, Cindy? When the Arizona Republican releases his 2007 return, as he has done today, will anyone urge him to cough up returns from previous years, as the Clintons did? It is an act of transparency that he has neglected to fulfill for the past quarter-century of his public service, without a peep from his press fans (despite the precedent of his wife’s highly questionable shopping-mall investment with savings and loan crook Charles Keating).

And having raked Bill Clinton’s charitable foundation for evidence of conflicts of interest, when will the press corps take another look at McCain’s “Reform Institute,” the nonprofit think tank that has served as a soft-money conduit and cushy sinecure for his political advisors?

Will anyone ask McCain why he doesn’t wear an American flag pin, the burning question that the ABC anchors pressed on Obama? Perhaps the former POW deserves a pass on that issue, but it is interesting to note that photos of McCain with a flag pin are very scarce — which may simply prove that not every patriot must constantly sport Old Glory on his lapel.

It would be refreshing to place the likes of Gibson and Stephanopoulos and their peers on the witness stand for a change to explain their choices and prejudices. Why did they require Democrats to make tax-cutting pledges that are based on bad economics and worse journalism? Why should they focus on Obama’s tenuous connection with a reprehensible but inconsequential figure like former Weatherman Bill Ayers, when they have never mentioned the White House coddling of Cuban exile terrorists? Why do they obsess over the “bitter” gaffe by Obama while passing so lightly over the confusion of Sunni and Shia groups by McCain, supposed master of foreign policy?

Details may be different but the double standard remains the same. If the coverage of this election already induces a nauseating sense of déjà vu, be warned. It will only get worse.

Word. As Atrios said at Eschacon,“This campaign is not going to be between the Democrats and the Republicans. It’s between the Democrats and the media.”

It just doesn’t get any more obvious than this, vis Media Matters:

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We Came, We Saw, We Handed Out Flag Pins

by dday

OK, so I should mention the results of our protest yesterday at the ABC/Disney headquarters. It went really well. Note that I had this idea sitting on my couch at 12:00pm Thursday, and by 4:00pm Friday we had 60 or 70 people out there in Burbank. Considering that in the current age there’s almost an allergy to protesting, that’s not bad (especially in gridlocked L.A.), and we were able to get the word out without making one phone call.

I’ll give you the AP’s impression:

About 50 people rallied at Disney Studios Friday to protest the questions that ABC News journalists asked the Democratic presidential candidates during a debate earlier this week.

Protestors waved signs that read “Restore the Fourth Estate” and “ABC is TMZ,” referring to the online celebrity site.

Organizer Rick Jacobs criticized ABC for focusing on the past gaffes of Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, instead of issues like the war in Iraq and the American economy.

Jacobs said he was offended that Obama was asked why he hasn’t worn an American flag pin on his lapel.

“Patriotism isn’t defined by a flag pin made in China,” he said.

They didn’t note the most important part of the protest: our distribution of flag pins to employees as they left the ABC gates. Letting them know that they were getting “free patriotism on a stick” and telling them that “Charlie Gibson won’t approve of you unless you wear one,” we handed out about 300 pins. Most took them graciously and approvingly.

I’ll direct you to where there are a bunch of pictures and then highlight a few.

That’s me.

My personal favorite sign.

There goes a flag pin.

Breaking news.

Panama Jack Rick Jacobs.

Yes, the pins were made in China.

Thanks to everyone who came out…

Here’s video coverage from KTLA News:

We also shot some video, but I won’t have that together until probably tomorrow.

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Al-Qaeda As Catch-All Term

by tristero

Glenn Greenwald rightly takes Kenneth Pollack to task for this idiocy from the NY Times:

Some other analysts do not object to Mr. McCain’s portraying the insurgency (or multiple insurgencies) in Iraq as that of Al Qaeda. They say he is using a “perfectly reasonable catchall phrase” that, although it may be out of place in an academic setting, is acceptable on the campaign trail, a place that “does not lend itself to long-winded explanations of what we really are facing,” said Kenneth M. Pollack, research director at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution.

What Glenn doesn’t realize is something that Pollack surely knows, which is that Philip Bobbitt is trying to make the catch-all “al Qaeda” academically acceptable as well. From a review of Bobbitt’s latest:

Bobbitt’s central premise is that today’s Islamic terrorist network, which he calls Al Qaeda for short…

The 3 Trillion Dollar Shopping Spree

by tristero

Have fun people!

The Big Change

by digby

Whenever I get down about the Democrats’ prospects in the fall, which is rare, I try to remember that the Republicans are more unpopular than they’ve been in a generation and that the seismic forces that are driving this election are of such a magnitude that it’s hard to see how we can really lose it. But still, there’s that little voice whispering in my ear that Democrats have got a knack for screwing themselves even when there is major social and economic upheaval that should favor them. Are they going to do it again?

And then I read something like this piece that Matt Stoller wrotefor The Nation a few weeks back explaining how the Democrats are using the new technology to change the face of politics. And today, Ron Brownstein writes a similar article for the National Journal that makes me feel — truly — that it’s almost impossible for us lose this thing next fall:

In scope and sweep, tactics and scale, the marathon struggle between Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton has triggered such a vast evolutionary leap in the way candidates pursue the presidency that it is likely to be remembered as the first true 21st-century campaign.

On virtually every front, the two candidates’ efforts dwarf those of all previous primary contenders—not to mention presumptive GOP nominee John McCain. It’s easy to miss the magnitude of the change amid the ferocity of the Democratic competition. But largely because of their success at organizing supporters through the Internet, Clinton and, especially, Obama are reaching new heights in raising money, recruiting volunteers, hiring staff, buying television ads, contacting voters, and generating turnout. They are producing changes in degree from prior primary campaigns so large that they amount to changes in kind.

It’s a perfect storm. The GOP is imploding and while their candidate is formidable, the zeitgeist has passed him by. After eight years of Republican rule, massive numbers of Americans believe the country is on the wrong track, the economy is in recession and we have an extremely unpopular Republican war. And the Democrats are using new technologies to raise massive sums of money and bring voters and activists into the system in huge numbers, efficiently dispatching them to campaign and get out the vote. Meanwhile, completely on their own, citizens are participating through blogs, youtubes and social networking sites completely outside the system. The right has nothing like this.

This election will not be a cakewalk — the Republicans have 25 years of internalized philosophy and some primitive prejudices to work with. But in 2008, after Bush, that just not going to be enough. The forces of change in this election run far deeper than the presidential campaigns.

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Modo And Mr X

by digby

This is the best Maureen Dowd story evah.

“Suffice it to say, it was a long night.

And to make the horror complete — Chris Matthews was also at this dinner.”

Tiddly Winks

by digby

I’m hearing a lot of complaining from people who are upset that bloggers and others are taking action against ABC when “nobody cared” about MSNBC’s outrageous behavior throughout the campaign, particularly towards Clinton. That’s actually not true. There was plenty of outrage among some bloggers, including yours truly, about MSNBC’s campaign coverage, particularly Chris Matthews’ disgusting sexist behavior. It’s true that it may not have been as loud and vociferous as it is toward ABC in the wake of their reprehensible debate, but it did happen. And it had an effect. Matthews was forced to apologize and he’s had to stop compulsively blurting out his obnoxious sexism masquerading as nursery school social psychology on the air. It’s not much, but it’s not nothing.

Eric Boehlert points out in his column this week that there is a perverse effect though, which I hadn’t realized and about which I will have to give some thought. Matthews star has actually risen as a result of his being the poster boy for sexist commentary. His buddies at the network and in the rest of the media have rallied around him since he was perceived to be under siege by a bunch of shrill, shrieking harpies:

This election season, we’ve seen a cavalcade of white, middle-age men express their deep, personal contempt for the first serious female contender for the White House. Contempt, of course, that has nothing to do with Sen. Hillary Clinton’s policies or her beliefs. Instead, it’s been an oddly personal disdain dressed up as political analysis.

The way Mike Barnicle on MSNBC said Clinton “look[ed] like everyone’s first wife standing outside a probate court.” The way Bill Kristol on Fox News said that among the only people supporting Hillary Clinton were white women, and “[w]hite women are a problem, that’s, you know — we all live with that.” The way CNN’s Jack Cafferty likened Clinton to “a scolding mother, talking down to a child.” The way Fox News’ Neil Cavuto suggested Clinton was “trying to run away from this tough, kind of bitchy image.” The way MSNBC’s Tucker Carlson announced that “when [Clinton] comes on television, I involuntarily cross my legs.” The way Christopher Hitchens on CNBC described Clinton as being “sort of alternately soppy and bitchy.'”

That’s all taken place in open view. And while a blog swarm did engulf Matthews in January, followed by a forced, pseudo-apology by the host — and his attacks did prompt some women activists to carry picket signs outside the MSNBC studios — the openly sexist comments have produced very few condemnations from within the industry and even less soul-searching from the (mostly male) press corps. In fact, in Matthews’ case, the sexist outbursts have helped propel his career. That’s how he landed on the cover of the Times magazine.

Why? Because misogyny pays.

Depressing, but true. Matthews is more of a celebrity now than he was before, with his grinning face on the front of the NY Times Magazine and probably getting his contract renewed since he’s suddenly a “hot” commodity, even if he’s widely known as a freak show. (That’s long been a staple of successful cable TV. Look at O’Reilly.) So, as satisfying as it was that he was forced to curb his more obscene sexist observations, it may have actually helped him among his peers in the Village media. They stick together.

The outcry against Gibson and Stephanopoulos may have more traction, however. They are being taken to task by members of their own profession and the reviews of the debate were brutal. There may be some social pressure from within the village itself that could at least mitigate some of the silliness.

Unfortunately, it’s not going to happen over night. Judging from this little interchange today between Wolf Blitzer, Peter Fenn (Democratic strategist) and Kevin Madden (Republican strategist) it looks to me as if the villagers are reacting to the outcry by retreating to a very familiar storyline: Democrats are soft.

Blitzer: So what do you think. Is Obama tough enough to handle this kind of tough questioning?

Fenn: Uh, I certainly think they’re both tough enough. In fact, I think we’re talking about alligator skin here with both of these folks. But it’s funny. One complains about always getting the first question — that was Hillary’s a couple months ago. He says, “hey wait a minute, 45 minutes, no issues are discussed,” you know there’s a lot of back and forth, but this has been tiddly winks so far in this Democratic primary. It’s going to get real tough.

Blitzer: It’s small potatoes. Whoever gets the nomination can expect a whole lot worse in a general election campaign.

Madden: Oh absolutely. We were joking around before saying “there’s no crying in baseball” and this is one of those instances. When you run for president you are actually asking for the right to be humiliated. That is an odd thing but very often times in debates like these, that get very tough, where you get tough questions, you’re constantly probed and being hammered by the media, you can actually come out above, looking very presidential if you stand by those attacks and you come out ahead of them.

Blitzer: If you want to be president, Kevin is absolutely right, you have to expect that everything is fair game, almost every part of your life, and certainly your finances or anything like that.

Isn’t that great? Presidential candidates sign on for the right to be humiliated — by the press.(Has anyone told John “Sprinkles” McCain about this, because I don’t think he knows?) Apparently, Blitzer and these “strategists” believe the press has been holding back during the primaries (tiddly winks, small potatoes) and are planning to go nuclear during the general. At least that’s what it sounds like they are saying. After all, this question was about the debate and specifically the complaints about Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos. I don’t know if these people know they are conflating what the Republicans will do in the general election with what the press is going to do, but it’s telling that they all agreed to the premise without batting an eye. If you ever wanted to know if the political media are an arm of the Republican Party, you don’t have to look any further than this conversation. Believe me, nobody’s warning John McCain about how hard the Democrats are going to go after him in the fall — or the press, for that matter. Everybody knows exactly what going to happen.

As I mentioned last night in my post about Greenwald’s new book, the idea that parrying stupid questions about a flag pin or sanctuary cities or a trivial anecdote shows how tough you will be as president is standard among the press corps.(At least in their treatment of Democrats — Republicans are assumed to be rough ‘n ready.) They let a halfwit dauphin coast to victory in 2000 and 2004 while killing the presidential aspirations of two decent, intelligent and politically battle hardened Democratic candidates with this death of a thousand small character smears. It’s what they will try to do again. We can see it coming clear as day.

I don’t know if it will work this time. But I do know that it causes them some confusion and unhappiness when we rise up and get in their faces about it. We may have helped Matthews become a hot commodity for this election season, but at least our TVs will be less polluted with his sexist remarks for a while. And perhaps the media will rally around Gibson and Stephanopoulos, but they are on notice that there will be a firestorm if they pull this crap again. It will make them think twice.

This is classic working the refs and it can be very effective. It’s how we got here in the first place: the conservatives made it job one to harass the media and call them on what they perceived to be a liberal bias. It worked. It can work for us too, maybe not at once, but over time, first in small ways then in large.

Update: Doesn’t everyone remember that the whole blogosphere went apeshit over Disney/ABCs The Path To 9/11? That was about a despicable wingnut movie that accused the Clinton administration of letting 9/11 happen. We’ve been harrassing them for a long time. This isn’t new and it isn’t partisan.

Remember this?

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D-Day didn’t post this here, so I will — digby

We’re marching on ABC/Disney in Burbank today – armed with flag pins!

by dday

OK, so everyone’s frustrated with the content-free, brainless ABC News debate the other night. Chuck Todd actually gets it wrong – it’s not about rabid Obama partisans rising up to hammer ABC, it’s about thinking people rising up and deciding not to accept the thin gruel the media tries to feed us anymore.

The moderators are unrepentant and congenitally wired to not get it. So we’re going to have to take to the streets – the mean streets of Burbank, California. We want to know if ABC/Disney executives can pass the Gibson/Stephanopoulos flag pin litmus test – it’s obviously the most important issue facing the nation, so are they sufficiently patriotic? If not, we’re willing to help them out.

I called up my friends at the Courage Campaign and told them we were uniquely positioned not just to throw things at our TV screen but to do something about this. The ABC/Disney headquarters is right there in Burbank, and prior to the Path to 9/11 airing, we actually protested out in front of there.

They obviously didn’t get the message, and I figured out the reason why – our flag pin deficit! Nobody takes you seriously unless you bring 350 symbols of patriotism along with you.

Well, we got ’em. And now we need your help.

Today at 4:00, we’re going to meet at ABC/Disney’s headquarters in Burbank to protest and pass out flag pins to employees leaving their Disney corporate office.

Your mission: Ask ABC/Disney employees whether they can pass their own flag-pin litmus test: “Are you patriotic enough to wear a flag-pin?” Obviously they don’t want to be considered as a bunch of America-hating terrorists by their own network news anchors, so of course they require the pin, the shield of immunity from all questions of patriotism. And maybe we’ll give them a couple extras to give to George and Charlie.

If you’re in the area and available, at 4 p.m. please join me and the Courage Campaign and your fellow activists at ABC’s Disney Studios in Burbank in front of the West Alameda Gate, between S. Buena Vista and Keystone Streets (CLICK HERE FOR A MAP). We’re going to be there until about 7 p.m.

I’ll just leave you with this because it’s fun.

(ultimately these things don’t change a lot of minds; I don’t expect ABC to issue an on-air apology or anything. But they provide an outlet for frustrations, and create a moment of accountability. If you or someone you know is in the press, please send them by, too.)

Hey, Los Angelenos. It’s Friday. Wouldn’t you like to leave work early and head over to Burbank and help d-day and the gang embarrass Disney in their own back yard? It might even make the local news here. Entertainment executives no likee being socially embarrassed among their liberal peers. — digby

“A Major Debacle,” Yes, But It’s Also A “Must Win”

by tristero

Joseph J. Collins who was, until 2004, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Stability Operations, writes in a study published by the National Defense University (pdf)

Measured in blood and treasure, the war in Iraq has achieved the status of a major war and a major debacle.

Given the standards set by The Man Called Petraeus, that is refreshingly candid. So has America’s establishment started to come back to reality? Well, it’s not that simple:

For many analysts (including this one), Iraq remains a “must win…”

If you read more, he makes a point of calling the effects of the surge “impressive.” Oh well.

But a quick skim of the report reveals nothing in the way of a serious description of what a “win” would look like, let alone a concrete plan for how to turn the debacle into such a “win.” It deals mostly with very vague efforts to strengthen interagency planning in the US. Needless to say, this is something of a cop-out. It is always the case that interagency planning should be strengthened. We should also eliminate all waste from government programs and love our mother and father.

So the report has two meta-meanings. First, the military is prepared, at a pretty high level to acknowledge publicly that the Bush/Iraq war is “a major debacle.” That is most certainly important news (not that the war is a debacle, but that the military will admit it so baldly). Secondly, even now, no one in in the upper echelons of the establishment (with an occasional exception who is immediately derided as out of the mainstream) is brave enough to speak the full truth that most Americans realized a long time ago: The Bush/Iraq war, by any standard you care to mention, not only is unwinnable, but should never have been fought.

And again that question: What to do now? Well yes, we can strengthen interagency planning and remember to call our Moms, but neither will turn a debacle into a success.

For years I have said that any serious plan to confront the catastrophe created by Bush’s utterly immoral invasion, conquest, and occupation of Iraq must acknowledge the unavoidable step one: Bush must leave office and a sensible president of the United States must be elected. In short there is nothing anyone can do but wait.

I realize that is a horrible plan, not much better than strengthening interagency planning. But it has the virtue of being honest and of not pretending anything can be done now that has a hope of mitigating the disaster.

Once a competent, reality-based president is installed, hopefully in January, 2009, then we can discuss the next step, namely US withdrawal. Until then, let’s applaud the fact that people like Collins are prepared to call Bush/Iraq a major debacle, but let’s not try to hide the fact that the establishment discourse is still overwhelmed with pie-in-the-sky, hope-trumps-experience magical thinking. And let’s not hide the fact that nothing whatsoever we can propose has a chance of improving the situation in Iraq until Bush is out of the White House and there’s a president with a connection to consensual reality.

Sleazy

by tristero

Sometimes The New York Times is right:

One of the sleaziest documentaries to arrive in a very long time, “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed” is a conspiracy-theory rant masquerading as investigative inquiry…

…the film relies extensively on the post hoc, ergo propter hoc fallacy — after this, therefore because of this…

Blithely ignoring the vital distinction between social and scientific Darwinism…

This is not argument, it’s circus, a distraction from the film’s contempt for precision and intellectual rigor. This goes further than a willful misunderstanding of the scientific method…

“Expelled” is an unprincipled propaganda piece that insults believers and nonbelievers alike. In its fudging, eliding and refusal to define terms, the movie proves that the only expulsion here is of reason itself.

“Expelled” is rated PG (Parental guidance suggested). It has smoking guns and drunken logic.