Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

Back To Iraq

I have heard stories about Iraq’s child prisoners and we all know that there is a story out there of some horrible video footage of child rapes, but this story in the Sunday Herald is the first I’ve seen that puts all the details of what is publicly known together, from UNICEF, the ICRC, Amnesty International and others. It’s very disturbing.

I had not, for instance, heard about this:

The [UNICEF]report also states: “A detention centre for children was established in Baghdad, where according to ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross) a significant number of children were detained. Unicef was informed that the coalition forces were planning to transfer all children in adult facilities to this ‘specialised’ child detention centre. In July 2003, Unicef requested a visit to the centre but access was denied. Poor security in the area of the detention centre has prevented visits by independent observers like the ICRC since last December.

Another jail — for kids? The article goes on to note an obvious problem with this strategy. Young muslim males are not exactly the smartest group to send to a prison to be radicalized:

“The perceived unjust detention of Iraqi males, including youths, for suspected activities against the occupying forces has become one of the leading causes for the mounting frustration among Iraqi youths and the potential for radicalisation of this population group.”

The article points out that we have no jurisdiction anymore to be holding anyone, really, but it seems that we are and juveniles are among them. The credibility of the military on these matters being what it is, the following must be taken with a grain of salt. And surely, by now, we should have learned that these processes must be transparent. Apparently not.

High-placed officials in the Pentagon and Centcom told the Sunday Herald that children as young as 14 were being held by US forces. “We do have juveniles detained,” a source said. “They have been detained as they are deemed to be a threat or because they have acted against the coalition or Iraqis.”

Officially, the Pentagon says it is holding “around 60 juvenile detainees primarily aged 16 and 17”, although when it was pointed out that the Red Cross estimate is substantially higher, a source admitted “numbers may have gone up, we might have detained more kids”.

Officials would not comment about children under the age of 16 being held prisoner. Sources said: ‘‘It’s a real challenge ascertaining their ages. Unlike the UK or the US, they don’t have IDs or birth certificates.” The Sunday Herald has been told, however, that at least five children aged under 16 are being kept at Abu Ghraib and Camp Bucca.

A highly placed source in the Pentagon said: “We have done investigations into accusations of juveniles being abused and raped and can’t find anything that resembles that.”

The Pentagon’s official policy is to segregate juvenile prisoners from the rest of the prison population, and allow young inmates to join family members also being detained. “Our main concern is that they are not abused or harassed by older detainees. We know they need special treatment,” an official said.

With the political season upon us, it’s easy for me to forget the horror of what we did in these Iraqi prisons and how utterly stupid it was in terms of the threat of islamic fundamentalism. But, as Yglesias pointed out today, this story is so over just as Karl and Dick knew it would be once we passed the magic meaningless date they set forth as the crucible. The media are pulling their people out. It is now like Afghanistan — one of those foreign hotspots that boring ugly people on PBS are always yammering about.

But, GI’s are still getting picked off daily, ever bigger car bombs are exploding and kids are mouldering in jails and nobody knows or cares about it. It’s as if the Iraq war was one of those summer shark stories.

Bouncing and Spinning

Following up my post below, here’s an interesting analysis from the LA Times:

Kerry Campaign Isn’t Banking on a ‘Bounce’

Observers on both sides predict a tight contest that will not be decided until late in the game.

Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry can expect at least a modest bounce in popularity following his star-studded convention, where the most serious hitch was a balky balloon drop. But now he faces an important question: Can he keep his momentum going until November?

The initial signs Friday were favorable for the Massachusetts senator: strong Nielsen ratings for his acceptance speech; a wave of generally positive news coverage; a record-breaking day of fundraising that pulled in more than $5 million on the Internet; and a poll that suggested support for President Bush may be slipping.

But Kerry’s strategists warn that the contest is tight, focused on a dozen or so of “battleground” states and a relatively small number of undecided voters who are unlikely to settle on a choice until the fall.

“We never expected great movement in the horse race” to result from the convention, Kerry strategist Tad Devine said. “We just expected to build here, not to end the race.”

Neutral analysts said that Kerry largely succeeded at the tasks he set for himself at the convention: introducing himself to millions of voters who had not tuned into the presidential race before and conveying a message that a Kerry administration would be strong on defense in the struggle against terrorism.

“I think Kerry comes out [of the convention] having unified his Democratic base,” said Stuart Rothenberg, editor of a nonpartisan political newsletter. “Maybe he didn’t close the deal, but he moved the ball down the field. I still expect a close race,” he said. “Kerry should get a two- to four-point bounce [in the poll numbers] and then, unless the Republicans mess up, they’ll get a two- to four-point bounce from their convention” in early September.

The actual increase in support Kerry reaps from the convention — especially from having his message showcased in news coverage — won’t be known until next week. But every presidential candidate in recent history has benefited from at least a modest bounce, with the exception of George S. McGovern, the 1972 Democratic nominee, whose acceptance speech was delayed by convention chaos until after 2 a.m. and was seen live by few voters.

Kerry’s speech Thursday evening was seen by an estimated 24.4 million viewers, according to Nielsen — compared with the 21.1 million who watched Democratic nominee Al Gore in 2000.

In another rough index of the convention’s potential effect, the Kerry campaign said it had raised $5.2 million on the Internet on Thursday, breaking its own record of $3 million set the day before.

Equally important, news coverage amplified the convention’s core messages: that Kerry volunteered for military service in Vietnam, that he will not shrink from military action now and that he believes the Bush administration has needlessly divided the nation.

[…]

A Zogby poll released early Friday — based on surveys performed before Kerry gave his acceptance speech at the convention — found that the percentage of voters who said they planned to vote for the Democrat was unchanged at 48%. But that the percentage of respondents who said they planned to vote for Bush had slipped from 46% to 43% when compared to a similar poll taken two weeks earlier.

That confirmed the most basic finding of other recent “horse race” polls: The contest is tight, but discontent with Bush has given Kerry a slowly growing chance to win.

“It’s a competitive race with a narrow advantage to Kerry,” Rothenberg said. “Most of the dynamics appear to favor the challenger … [but] it’s still a question of what events will move late-breaking voters. There are a lot of scenarios that are possible,” he added. “I’ve kind of thrown out the book. Historical analogies don’t work in an election like this.”

“We’re in uncharted territory,” Republican pollster Bill McInturff agreed. “We’re looking at a list of things we haven’t seen before in this generation of American politics, so we should be modest about making predictions.” Among the new factors, he said, was the stubbornness of voters on both sides of the partisan divide, which has kept Bush’s job approval rating — and his likely vote in November — hovering near the 50% mark.

In the six most recent elections that included an incumbent president as one of the candidates, the three who lost their jobs — Gerald R. Ford in 1976, Jimmy Carter in 1980 and George H.W. Bush in 1992 — all had slipped well below the halfway point.

“By historic standards, Bush does not look like the three winners, but he doesn’t look like the three losers either,” McInturff said. “He’s in between, in a new category. And a campaign with these numbers is not like any of the last six campaigns.” The number of undecided voters in the electorate is unusually small this year, he added, meaning the contest is unlikely to shift dramatically in either direction.

“You’re talking about 88% to 90% who say they’re locked in,” he said. As a result, both sides will campaign furiously throughout August, traditionally a lull before the Labor Day kickoff.

And both are focusing intently on the battleground states that probably will decide the contest in the electoral college — most notably Ohio, where Kerry and Bush will be campaigning today.

During his current coast-to-coast tour, which will end in Seattle, Kerry plans to fill out a policy agenda that he only hinted at during the convention, focusing on four issues: economic and tax policy, healthcare, energy independence and national security.

[…]

The question, Rothenberg said, is whether the GOP convention will have “a single, appealing message that can both mobilize the [traditional] base and reach out to swing voters.”

“The Democrats managed to do that,” he said. “They often talked in platitudes, they didn’t put a lot of meat on the bones, but they avoided the danger of sounding angry and bitter.”

[…]

“The biggest problem for Democrats is that some sort of event could happen that allows the president to present himself as a strong, decisive leader,” Rothenberg said. “We’re all prisoners of events, and that includes the campaigns.”

So, the lack of a significant bounce is predictable in this current climate. However, after building up the expectations, the GOP has the much better hand and will spin it, as David Brock notes, as a sign that the American people reject the Democrats for being “out of the mainstream” as Bush launches his new (gack) “Heart and Soul of America” Tour. (Picture Judy Woodruff and Bill Schneider tomorrow…)

Since this election has no historical analogies, perhaps the old saw about “new voters” really will come to pass this time. As I wrote below, we should all make it our business to get at least one of our apolitical friends to vote this time. It’s not asking too much of anyone.

No Resting On Laurels For Us

No boost for Kerry after convention:

The Democratic National Convention boosted voters’ perceptions of John Kerry’s leadership on critical issues, a USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll finds. But it failed to give him the expected bump in the head-to-head race against President Bush.

In the survey, taken Friday and Saturday, the Democratic ticket of Kerry and John Edwards trailed the Republican ticket of Bush and Dick Cheney 50% to 46% among likely voters, with independent candidate Ralph Nader at 2%.

Before the convention, the two were essentially tied, with Kerry at 47%, Bush at 46%.

The change in support was within the poll’s margin of error of +/- 4 percentage points in the sample of 763 likely voters. But it was nonetheless a stunning result, the first time in the Gallup Poll since the 1972 Democratic convention that a candidate seemed to lose ground at his convention.

USA TODAY extended its survey Sunday night and tonight to get a fuller picture of what’s happening with the electorate.

A Newsweek survey taken Thursday and Friday showed the Democrats with a lead of 49% to 42%, a four-point bounce compared with a poll taken three weeks earlier the smallest in the history of the Newsweek poll.

Analysts say the lack of a boost for Kerry may reflect the intensely polarized contest. Nearly nine of 10 voters say in the survey that they are confident they won’t change their mind between now and the Nov. 2 election. That leaves little room for a candidate to gain support even when major events occur.

This isn’t actually bad news, but it will be spun like a whirling dervish. The networks barely covered the convention and it wasn’t watched by very many people, so in a close contest, this shouldn’t be unexpected. But, we have our work cut out for us guys and gals. There is no landslide. We are going to have to fight for every single swing vote out there and there aren’t very many of them.

The New York Times reports today that:

Mr. Bush’s advisers plan to cap the month at the Republican convention in New York, which they said would feature Mr. Kerry as an object of humor and calculated derision.

The Tucker Carlson convention. This is one of their patented tactics and it is very powerful and very difficult to counter. Just ask Al Gore. And it is guaranteed to get the media howling and laughing right along with them. That is one of the main reasons they do it.

Bush is also going to have his convention coming off of the flag waving pageant of the Olympics and right up on the 9/11 anniversary. People will also be beginning to pay attention more as they always do after labor day. Be prepared for him to get a better bounce.

If this article is true is should serve as a galvanizing cry for the grassroots to get out there. If all of us persuaded just one person who doesn’t normally vote to vote this time we’d win. I have a relative in a swing state who is apolitical but will vote the way I advise because she knows me and respects the fact that I follow these issues. I am taking the time to get her to register to vote and will hound her into following through. I think everyone can do that. Just one vote per Democratic political junkie could make the difference in this close election. Yes, it’s going to be that close.

Update:

Here’s an interview with David Brock by Liberal Oasis which sheds some light on the strategy:

LO: How successful has the right-wing been in counterspinning the convention?

DB: I think we don’t fully know the answer yet. I think the main thing is really going to be after we get the first polls…

…[the GOP] has attempted to set it up for Kerry to have a huge bounce…

…the fact of the matter is that with the race so tight, and Kerry’s base having [already] gelled…that it’s not really realistic for there to be a 15-point bounce or 10-point bounce, which is what the Bush pollsters have been saying they think will happen.

So what I anticipate is a bounce that is less than what Bush said will happen.

And then the entire spin will be about how America had met the ticket this week and decided they were too liberal.

That can’t happen yet until they get the polls. That’s number 1.

This is probably where the derisive humor begins it’s arc.

The Cry Wolf Conundrum

So, they are raising the threat level for DC and NYC. Perhaps they are really hearing something different this time. But, once you lose your credibility it’s very difficult to get it back. Half the country thinks they’re lying for political purposes. In fact, the only way that many people will ever believe this administration again on the subject is if there is another catastrophic terrorist attack. That’s not a position I’d want to be in.

On the other hand, catastrophic terrorist attacks have been the lifeblood of Bush’s poll ratings, so wtf. It’s not like NY or DC are planning to vote for him anyway.

Nukular Meltdown

This seems to me to be the worst possible politics in the world — not to mention that it is purely insane:

Administration now opposes inspections as part of nuclear treaty:

In a shift of U.S. policy, the Bush administration announced this week that it will oppose provisions for inspections and verification as part of an international treaty that would ban production of nuclear-weapons materials.

For several years the United States and other nations have been pursuing the treaty, which would ban new production by any state of highly enriched uranium and plutonium for weapons. At U.N.-sponsored Conference on Disarmament in Geneva this week, the Bush administration told other nations it still supported a treaty, but not verification.

The planned treaty wouldn’t affect existing stockpiles or production for non-weapons purposes, such as energy or medical research. Mainly, it was designed to impose restraints on India, Pakistan and Israel, whose nuclear programs operate outside the reach of Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty inspectors.

Administration officials said they made the decision after concluding such a system would cost too much, require overly intrusive inspections and wouldn’t guarantee compliance with the treaty.

Nuclear proliferation is a potent issue politically and an extremely important issue on the merits. That Bush and his team think it’s smart on either level to do this right now is simply inexplicable to me. I’m starting to wonder if those Capital Hill Blue reports of a White House on drugs aren’t true.

There can be no peace, no winning the GWOT, no safety for the people of the United States and the world without new measures and controls on the development of nuclear weapons. The idea that they are not doing absolutely everything possible to get formal and informal information about those weapons, whatever the cost, is shocking. That they aren’t concerned particularly about Pakistan and India, one of which is the prime breeding ground of islamic fundamentalism ferchristssake, is completely and totally bizarre.

Are these the kind of deals is this government making with the Musharef government these days to get bin Laden at the right moment? Or have the neocons finally decided that their loyalties really are to Israel rather than the US — although I find it very difficult to believe that Israel is safer with loose nukes in the hands of terrorists? I swear, my tin foil hat is buzzing and honking as I write.

Update: In the post above, the final paragraph mentions neocon loyalties to Israel which seems to set off alarms that I’m an anti-semite or a believer in the Protocols. I doubt that you can find much evidence of that in any of my writing on the subject here on this blog or anywhere else, but suffice to say that it is disturbing enough to me that I feel the need to explain further.

I think that the neocon worldview is as distorted by its view of Israel’s strategic and moral importance as the apocapyptic Christians’ are — indeed that’s partially why they have such a bizarre alliance. There are many reasons for it, some of them no doubt are religious or ethnic identification, but mostly they are the result of an intellectual movement that has fetishized “democracy” and become obsessed with the idea of muscularity and strength as the only way to spread that gospel. Israel, with its historical and religious significance AND as the only democracy in the middle of various quasi Stalinist and theocratic totalitarian regimes has become a symbol of something much bigger than its religious identity. Indeed, I would argue that for the neocon movement the fact that Israel is a Jewish state is far down the list of significant factors explaining their obsession.

The neocons have never, to my knowledge, been consciously working against American interests. Indeed, they believe that Israel and the United States’ interests are the same, which in many cases they are. But, in my view, many of the policies set forth by the Likud party, to which the neocons actively serve as advisors (see “Clean Break”) are counterproductive to real American interests in the region and serve the neocons fevered troskyite wet dream of a democratic world revolution under the Pax Americana.

But, this last year has been something of a disaster for the neocon vision of American hegemony. We have demonstrated to the entire world in as vivid a way as possible that we are something of a paper tiger. It is perhaps impolitic of me to suggest that this might have induced a nutcase like Josh Bolton (who isn’t Jewish, btw) to try to use Israel to undermine America’s now very practical necessity to play fair in that part of the world as regards nuclear proliferation. But, I would not put it past him. His loyalties to the US can surely be questioned when in light of failure after failure on this most serious of issues (let’s not even discuss North Korea) he continues to press on. If that’s anti-semitic, so be it.

One of my commenters raised the question of needing Israel’s complicity regarding the new nuclear threat in Iran. Actually, the fact that Iran is actively pursuing nuclear weapons proves that continuing the fiction that Israel isn’t a nuclear power is useless and renders the laughable UN “mid-east nuclear free zone” finally moribund. Israel and the rest of the region are safer overall allowing inspections under a nuclear proliferation treaty. And, if somebody decides that the nuclear facilities in Iran need to be bombed, there is absolutely no reason that anyone would believe today that Israel acted alone as they did in 1981. If it happens it will be seen as done by the US no matter who takes on the physical task.

As for deterrence, we have thousands and thousand of ICBM’s and submarine precision guided nuclear missiles. There is nobody on this earth who thinks that the United States cannot launch a nuclear strike against any place on the planet if we choose to do so. We don’t need Israel for that.

Nuclear proliferation must be dealt with on many levels, but the first thing we must do is set out clear, understandable international guidelines and procedures for controlling it. That alone will not solve the problem, but it is an absolutely necessary part of the process. Parochial arguments at this point about Israeli exceptionalism are counterproductive to that particular task and I would argue are counterproductive to Israel’s security as well.

Poll Fucked

Damn it. Reuters is using that incorrect Newsweek poll and I’m sure others are too, just in time for the Sabbath gasbags to inscribe “baby bounce” in granite:

“A Newsweek poll released on Saturday showed Kerry gained a four-point bounce from last week’s Boston convention where he was formally nominated. “

Donkey Rising explains the problem with the poll:

…as their story sheepishly admits, half of their poll was conducted on Thursday night, before Kerry had delivered his acceptance speech! Moreover, their results differ on the two nights, with Kerry leading by 2 points in the pre-acceptance speech data and by 10 points in the post-acceptance speech data.

What possible excuse can there be for presenting these data as measuring Kerry’s bounce from the convention, when the effect of the most important event of the convention isn’t included in half the data? Perhaps there is one, but I can’t think of it.

And that’s not all that’s wrong with their bounce measure. To make their sin even more egregious, the previous poll they use as a point of comparison is way too long ago (July 8-9) to be a real before/after comparison. What if the race was closer before the convention than it was on July 8-9? Then using July 8-9 as a point of comparison would further contribute to understating Kerry’s bounce from the convention.

And in fact that appears to be the case. In the Gallup poll, Kerry was leading 51-44 on July 8-11 but only 49-45 on July 19-21. So using July 8-9 as the comparison period probably knocks several more points off Kerry’s bounce.

I’m assuming that the Kerry campaign is blastfaxing the whores like crazy with the problems in this poll. if they’re not, they’re stupid. Once these things gel in the minds of the kewl kid chatterers it’s almost impossible to get them to revise it.

Product Liability

One of the secrets of conservative America is how often it has welcomed Republican defeats.

That’s no surprise. You have to be either a fool or a patriot to feel the duty to govern after a Republican has been in power. They come in to office, reward themselves and their rich friends, totally fuck up the country and then leave the mess for the Democrats to clean up. Then they use their time out of office assassinating the characters of the Democrats for fun and profit preparing the way for them to get back into office and fuck it all up again. These people are not interested in governing in a democratic system, which takes negotiation, compromise and patience. They are about power which requires far less complexity.

This merry-go-round reflects an aspect of the American character that works to its own disadvantage in more ways than one. We have no sense of the past except that which has been created by mythmakers and screenwriters. We simply do not remember what really happened even a few short years ago. Unlike the Europeans and the Chinese, for instance, who behave as if slights from the 14th century happened five minutes ago, we are oblivious to our own political past.

Think about this. The American people decisively repudiated George Bush Sr in 1992. He got only 37% of the vote. Seven years later the Republican party is actively courting his namesake for president without any sense whatsoever that his association with a man widely regarded as a failure just a few short years before could be a problem. It was actually seen as a strength. The marketing mavens of the GOP understood very well that the brand name was all that mattered. The product failure of a few short years before had long been forgotten.

I suppose that this would be expected in a country that prides itself on offering people the chance to reinvent themselves, but I think it might just be helpful to re-frame this as a matter of corporate liability. The GOP gets away with murder over and over again, leaving chaos in its wake and forcing the taxpayers to clean up mess after toxic mess — savings and loan bailouts, record deficits, crumbling infrastructure, foreign wars and international threats. Their product is defective. They need to be held accountable.

Sensible Cowards

Atrios (who it’s good to have back blogging in force) points out something that can’t be repeated enough. With regard to the new faux moderate pundits on the right he says:

…pretending to support Kerry while doing little but bashing him, or supporting Kerry with the caveat that “we may all die if he’s elected!!!” is mostly a way of preserving your street cred on both sides…

We know this because we’ve lived it. It’s not nearly as prevalent this year as it has been before, but for years there was a veritable cottage industry out there of “liberal” writers who made an excellent living disparaging Democrats and often voting (with crocodile tears in their eyes) for Bush Sr., Dole and Junior. And there were many more who found it very convenient to jump on the conservative bandwagon whenever the DC zeitgeist went in that direction.This, as much as anything else, is what legitimized the modern GOP’s scorched earth tactics. And, more than anything else it legitimized the presidency of George W. Bush. For instance, the liberal Richard Cohen, who saw where the wind was blowing back in November 2000 and wrote:

Given the present bitterness, given the angry irresponsible charges being hurled by both camps, the nation will be in dire need of a conciliator, a likable guy who will make things better and not worse. That man is not Al Gore. That man is George W. Bush.”

I believe that it is that type of “sensible” punditry on the left that has validated for many the Republican propaganda that Democrats are weak and easily led. Here you have one of the leading voices of the left who consistently gets rolled by Republicans and then comes up rubbing his head months or years later asking “whuh happened?”

One of the perverse advantages of tagging the media in general as liberal, when they are actually easily duped by right wing spin, is that people consequently lose more respect for liberals than conservatives when that right wing spin is exposed. People expect politicians to be slimy. Journalism is supposed to expose it and when it doesn’t people feel betrayed by the institution that let them down — the media. Which they subconsciously associate with the word “liberal.”

As Atrios pointed out in an earlier post, when Richard Cohen laments the lack of “leadership” that led him to agitate for the Iraq war, he seems to have no idea that he is one of the leaders. Indeed, to much of the country, with no single political voice to turn to, these writers became the most important voices of the left. It is another reason why it’s so frustrating to see people discounting the real courage that it takes to throw yourself into the right wing meat grinder as a Democratic politician when it’s the liberal pundits who ostensibly speak for them who are the cowards. They never had to face any angry, misinformed voters, they never had to have their lives laid open and picked over by the likes of David Bossie and Barbara Comstock. They didn’t have to deal with Tom DeLay and James Inhofe or smile for 14 hours a day trying to raise enough money to compete with some multi-million dollar corporation in a suit. The worst thing that happens to them is that somebody calls them “shrill.” And yet from their cushy perches atop the political hierarchy, they crumble like little old ladies at the first sign of GOP intimidation and eagerly adopt the “sensible” path that says these bullies should be given what they want.

Jon Stewart said it well in his show last night in which he admonished people not to listen to the pundits and the spinners (or even himself) but to make up their own minds. It’s difficult to do. And, in a better world we’d be able to employ these well-connected writers to demystify the process and help us get to the truth. But, the reality is that many of them are actually participants, either knowingly or as useful idiots, and there are many more who are simply performers in the Political Show.

It is good politics for Democrats to separate the media in the minds of average voters from the political process, because as long as people hear the words “liberal media” (and the GOP will never stop saying it) they will associate liberalism with an institution that can no longer be respected. We have enough to do without having to carry the burden of the media’s credibility problems on top of everything else.

Cognitive Dissidents

Buzzflash has a copy of the flyer urging Florida Republicans to cast an absentee ballot because:

The liberal Democrats have already begun their attacks and the new electronic voting machines do not have a paper ballot to verify your vote in case of a recount. Make sure your vote counts order your ansentee ballot today. Just sign the request form below and drop it in the mail. Don’t be fooled by imitations. This is the official Republican Party absentee ballot request form.

This is post modern politics at its best. Up is down, black is white. We will tell you what is real. This is an example of the Republicans using the Democrats’ own repetitive rallying cries against them. (“Political hate speech” is another good example.) It’s brilliant because many people are apparently so goddamned stupid that they don’t even have a second of cognitive dissonence when they see something like this. You can’t really blame the GOP. It works.

I’m very glad that the Democrats have begun to fight back using some of these same techniques. Kerry and Edwards did it using the “Hope/Help is on the way” riff which was stolen directly from Cheney’s convention speech in 2000. I thought it was weird. But, I’ve since realized that most people in the audience just felt a soothing sense of familiarily, kind of like when they hear old advertising jingles from their childhood. The jingle remains long after everybody’s forgotten what it was selling in the first place.

Damn, I’m starting to pray that somebody out there is keeping track of reality because this is getting mighty difficult to follow.

Oppo Nerds

Michael Crowley in TNR has an interesting look at the GOP spin operation in Boston:

Example A was the headquarters Republicans installed a few blocks from the FleetCenter to coordinate their response to the Democrats. At center was a so-called war room–a dozen or so computer terminals arranged around a pair of TV sets, at which a team of young GOP staffers pulled up research on Democrats and skimmed the Drudge Report as they watched the convention. For maximum partisan effect, the office’s walls had been festooned with blown-up quotes of Kerry saying various foolish or purportedly revealing things (“I’m a liberal and proud of it”), images of a recent Boston Herald front-page headline declaring John Kerry and John Edwards “left of ted,” and, by Tuesday morning, multiple images of Kerry in that absurd blue nasa space suit. (Republicans seemed to consider this a defining moment in the campaign. Several staffers promptly made this photo their computer desktop image, and the office distributed a flyer juxtaposing the Kerry photo with the infamously goofy image of a tank-riding Michael Dukakis.)

The decor made the office feel more like a movie set than a place where actual politics was practiced. Indeed, the war room’s main function seemed to be to attract reporters. During my two visits there, at least a half-dozen news organizations passed through, including a CNN team and a New York Times photographer. “Campbell Brown was over to shoot a package,” bragged Galen, who takes credit for setting up the first opposition party office at a convention, back in 1984.

[…]

In the end, though, it’s not clear just how much damage these GOP commandos managed to inflict. Yes, the GOP’s surrogates blanketed television and radio nationwide–Iverson bragged to me that they intended to reach every “targeted” swing-state media market in the country by the end of the convention–but Republicans can always get themselves on television and radio to provide a GOP response to the speeches. Few mainstream journalists, however, bought the premise that Democrats were conducting an “extreme makeover” in the FleetCenter or that John Kerry is a hateful divider in league with Michael Moore. Ultimately, the GOP “war room” amounted to a cheap gimmick. But, for some, that seemed like enough. After a standing-room-only press briefing at GOP headquarters Wednesday morning, I ran into an excited Galen, still wearing his old gray sneakers. “Downstairs, we’ve got a guy with a sign that says, kerry response this way,” he said gleefully. “So we’ve got them responding to our response!” He dashed back to his office to grab a camera. “I’ve got to get a picture of it,” he said. I suggested that this back-and-forth was starting to feel like a game. He smiled and said, “It is!”

It’s fascinating how they’ve put themselves on exhibit. I guess everybody’s a star these days. But, it makes me wonder if there isn’t another war room somewhere doing the actual oppo smear work.

Either way, this article somewhat misses the point about how this stuff works. Somethimes they can get lucky and get something into the media bloodstream right away that is irresistable and everybody can’t stop talking about. But, mostly this crap is done through mindless repetition and filtration through the right wing media until it becomes a sort of soothing conventional wisdom. Easy on the ears. “That’s what people think.” They didn’t need to make anything in particular “stick.” All they are trying to do is keep the drumbeat.

They don’t necessarily plan to take Kerry out with a one-two punch. It’s a long drawn out series of accumulated jabs. If they can get a mediawhore like Jeff Greenfield to parrot their talking points verbatim that’s just icing on the cake. Their real mission is to implant doubt.