Archive for the 'media' Category

We all know John McCain, Rebel Republican, the man who don't take no gruff from his party and isn't afraid to go it on his own.  Why McCain has been widely known as an independent Republican since... since... well, since the 2000 campaign.  Sure, McCain's voting record shows that he consistently votes right in line with the rest of the Republicans.  What could be more rebellious than his perfect 100% record with the right wing American Security Council or his somewhat less than perfect 20% rating from Disabled American Veterans?  But the news tells us that McCain is a rebel, darn it.  It must be so.

The truth is, far from being a damn-the-political-torpedoes-full-speed-ahead rebel, John McCain may be the most malleable politician in D. C.  The "independent" reputation never originated from his (non-existent) stand against the party bosses, but emerged by necessity from the PR of his 2000 campaign.

Then, much of the GOP establishment lined up behind Bush early on so McCain had no choice but to run as an anti-establishment candidate — and he did so with fervor, said Kenneth Sherrill, a political science professor at Hunter College in New York.

What do you do when someone else is already running as the insider candidate, with all the money and power of the party at his back?  Reinvent yourself as the outside candidate, slap a "Straight Talk" sticker on your bus, and sell the press on the idea that you're the antidote for politics as usual.

In getting the press on his side, McCain's done a good job.  His acting has always been better than his politics.  But his heart was never really in his rebel façade.  Attacks on his family and his own reputation didn't keep him from going on his knees before Washington's power brokers.  He tossed a bit of token resistance into the arena, just to keep a little spark in that "rebel" story -- as when he offered some initial bluster about Bush's pro-torture stand before folding like a sheet of wet Kleenex -- but mostly McCain has concentrated on writing his 2008 script.  That script calls for McCain the Prodigal Republican, the Man Who Has Seen the Light and come home to GOP positions.  

Regardless, 10 months before the first primary votes, McCain's work to woo the GOP base — and become the party's standard-bearer — is just beginning... "This time, McCain has worked very hard to identify himself as the heir apparent and to be as closely aligned as possible to the forces that vanquished him in 2000, but he does face a couple of problems," Sherrill said.

Those problems chiefly being that a huge majority of Americans hate the positions that McCain has adopted.  He's been given this script for the 2008 election, but it might as well be titled "Electric Boogaloo III," because it's as out of date as Disco (and a whole lot less fun).
So what's McCain to do?  Well, he's open to suggestions.  Should he polish off that James Dean jacket?

In what is being perceived as another slight, McCain decided to skip a major annual gathering of conservatives in Washington this weekend even though most in the crowded GOP field were attending.

Or maybe he needs to get James Dobson.

On abortion, McCain said once in 1999 that he didn't think Roe v. Wade, the landmark decision legalizing abortion, should be overturned but now he advocates its repeal.

McCain's actions show he's neither a rebel nor a true believer.  His script for this cycle could be called The Man without a Conviction.  

Even McCain seems to realize that his wanderings have led him nowhere.  In his last public appearances -- including his announcement on Letterman -- he's displayed less energy than a firefly in February.  Peter O'Toole may still be able to put on a convincing show at 75, but McCain never had O'Toole's acting chops in he first place.  These days, his performance is looking a little sad.

In yet another fine example of Howie Kurtz's "fair and balanced" commentary on the media and blogging, this week he's trying to manufacture an outrage allegedly conducted by liberal blogs--the Cheney death wish. Greenwald chronicles this latest Kurtzian atrocity here. Suffice it to say, Kurtz has teamed up with his long-time favorite Michelle Malkin to cherry-pick and preserve comments at Huffington post--which were deleted by HuffPo site adminstrators--expressing dismay that the suicide bomber didn't take Cheney along with him. Of course, Kurtz does provide this disclaimer, buried at the end of his column:

I would agree that it's absurd to view these assassination fantasies as anything other than the rantings of the fringe, and that they shouldn't be used to tar an entire ideology.

So why bring it up at all, Howie? It couldn't be to try to tar an entire ideology to which you've proven yourself hostile, now, could it? Let's take a little trip down memory lane with Howie.

Here's a pretty recent one, Howie's glowing tribute to Michelle Malkin, in which he details how the nasty liberal bloggers say mean things about her, and "some" even posted her private contact information in retaliation for her crusade against a handful of UC Santa Cruz students last year. Unsurprisingly, Howie glosses over the death threats against the targets of that particular diatribe of Malkin's. Doesn't fit his narrative, doncha know.

Malkin isn't the only favorite of Kurtz. He's also pretty fond of Powerline's John Hinderaker. One real highlight is the "fake" Schiavo talking points story:

Of course, Mr. Kurtz's stenographer work for the Powerline blog came crashing down on April 7 when the Washington Post reported that the memo was produced by the office of Senator Mel Martinez. What is most ironic in this comedy of gross negligence by Mr. Kurtz is his decision to accept the speculations of the extreme Right Wing partisan blog Powerline over the reporting done by his own Washington Post colleague. Is this journalism? Surely not.

Or there's this gem of a transcript from his CNN show, Reliable Sources, in which he pits John Aravosis against Hinderaker to talk about Jeff Gannon. Here's just a sampling of his questions for the two bloggers:

KURTZ: John Aravosis, you posted some X-rated pictures of Jeff Gannon from what were obviously gay escort sites. He'd already quit his job reporting for these two conservative Web sites, Talon News and GOPUSA. Why put up the pictures after the fact?...

KURTZ: Gannon, or James Guckert, which is his real name, is now defending himself. He says yes, he's made mistakes in the past, but why should that disqualify him from being a journalist? Why shouldn't he be able to move on, change his life and pursue a journalistic route, just like bloggers practice journalism, as well, without any license?...

KURTZ: John Hinderaker, do you think that Jeff Gannon has been treated fairly by the blogging community? And what about this question of should he have had access to the White House? Yes, he's a self-described conservative reporter, but there's some liberal reporters at the White House as well....

KURTZ: All right. Well, now, after several of these high- profile media controversies in which bloggers have played a key role, Steve Lovelady of "Columbia Journalism Review" had this to say: "The salivating morons who make up the lynch mob prevail."... John Aravosis, do you plead guilty of being at least a member of the mob?

KURTZ: So John Hinderaker, is it now bloggers like yourself and your online brethren who are taking on this kind of self-appointed role of holding news organizations accountable? And do you feel that there's a lot of resistance to this in the old dinosaur, mainstream media?

Aravosis, online mobster destroying a young conservative's life vs. Hinderaker, holding news organizations accountable. Uh-huh. Of course, you also have his very strange defense of Jimmy/Jeff on yet another edition of Reliable Sources:

KURTZ: Gannon quit after liberal bloggers revealed his real name and his registration of several sexually provocative online Web addresses that he never turned into Web sites. Gannon, who said he and his family were being harassed, defended his work on CNN's "WOLF BLITZER REPORTS."...

KURTZ: But there are lots of people that change their names. Woody Allen isn't his real name. What's the big deal about that?...

KURTZ: On the other hand, David Gergen, there are a lot of colorful characters in the White House briefing room. You've worked there. Lester Kinsolving comes to mind. And some people there are just out-and-out liberals. Liberal columnists and others. So why shouldn't Jeff Gannon or James Guckert be able to ask his question as well?...

KURTZ: But Jeff Jarvis, liberal bloggers like DailyKos and Atrios, among others, went after Gannon on some personal stuff. Some of them say he's anti-gay; he denies that. Did they go too far in using these kinds of online tactics against somebody whose politics they clearly didn't like?

Yeah, personal stuff. Like the fact that he's a hooker! A hooker in the White House briefing room! Using a fake name! Yeesh.

No, conservative bloggers certainly wouldn't use online tactics against somebody whose politics they clearly didn't like. No more than would a conservative media commentator for the Washington Post. It's long past time Kurtz and the WaPo give up the charade that he is an unbiased, objective media observer.

Politico editor-in-chief John Harris:

With a mixture of pride and remorse, I have a confession: I am the author of the Democratic Party's "slow-bleed strategy" for ending the war in Iraq.

I had nothing to do with the details of the plan that Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.) floated two weeks ago. His plan was crafted to use the appropriations process to limit President Bush's options for mobilizing more forces in Iraq, while trying to protect Democrats from the accusation that they were abandoning troops in the field. As it happens, Murtha's idea is itself bleeding support, hit by a barrage of denunciations from people who say it does indeed amount to abandoning the troops.

In retrospect, it probably has already occurred to Murtha and his supporters that from a public relations perspective, "slow-bleed" was not the most winning description. How could they have been so stupid?

That's where I come in. "Slow bleed" is my phrase. Murtha had nothing to do with it. Neither did John Bresnahan, the reporter whose name was on the Politico story in which the "slow-bleed strategy" made its debut.

The Politico needs to decide whether it wants to be a serious news operation or be just another political opinion mag. These guys think they're being cute with their language, but in reality they're handing Republicans talking points. Who needs Frank Luntz when DC's newest political rag is a treasure-trove of bullshit negative Democratic framing?

And all of it coming from its "serious" news reporting because editors wanted to make the prose "snappier".

Bresnahan, who has unparalleled sources and understanding of how Congress works, wrote an article that was the first to detail the emerging Democratic strategy of challenging Bush on Iraq. Here was the lead paragraph of the draft he submitted:

"Even as the House begins debate on a resolution opposing President Bush's plan to send 21,500 more U.S. combat troops to Iraq, leading anti-war groups are preparing a multi-million dollar TV ad campaign and grassroots lobbying blitz designed to pressure vulnerable incumbent lawmakers to end their support for the war."

VandeHei and I read the article and were impressed by the detail of Bresnahan's reporting. But, as editors always do, we had our quibbles. Like the lead paragraph: Too bulky, and too bland. The story was a good bit better than the introduction.

We rushed the patient to the operating table for emergency surgery. With VandeHei hovering over my shoulder, this is what I came up with:

"Top House Democrats, working in concert with anti-war groups, have decided against using congressional power to force a quick end to U.S. involvement in Iraq, and instead will pursue a slow-bleed strategy designed to gradually limit the administration's options."

That is not exactly prize-winning prose, but it seemed a little snappier to us -- and more on point. Please note the context: What is slowly bleeding away is the administration's political support to keep fighting the war. Republicans pounced on the phrase because of the ease with which that context could be shorn away, to give the impression that what Democrats were slow-bleeding were the bodies of troops in Iraq.

And thus a negative GOP talking point was born.

At least Harris admits his mistake, which is more that can be said about the arrogant jokers at the NY Times and Washington Post who led the war cheerleading (read Marcy's book if you want more on that). So in that regards, this is encouraging. I want to like the Politico, even if they are off to a rocky start (don't ask me about how they tried to link bait me with that lame Dan Gerstein anti-blogger post. It was so pathetic I'd rather spare them the embarrassment).

Now if Democrats were better at fighting off these bullshit attacks instead of folding like a house of cards, then we'd have an even better reason to feel optimistic.

Update: BarbinMD nailed the Politico for this on the first day of the smear.

Apparently in response to reader comments and e-mails, Barney Calame takes Michael Gordon and the NYT editors to task for his decidedly pro-adminstration reporting on Iran.

Editing vigilance on intelligence and national security coverage means dealing with the anonymous sourcing that many deem essential to bringing vital issues to light in that murky area. So editors need to ensure that unnamed sources are in a position to know and that any biases are clear to the reporter. The Times’s most important requirement for anonymous sources — that an editor must know their identity — was followed for Mr. Gordon’s Feb. 10 story. Douglas Jehl, a deputy chief of the Washington bureau and his editor, told me he knew the name of each anonymous source in the article. The story also attempted a generalized explanation of why the officials were willing to talk. I do wish, however, that the article had found a way to comply with the paper’s policy of explaining why sources are allowed to remain unnamed.

On the whole, Calame's piece doesn't come down too hard on Gordon, but does call into question some of the choices his editors allowed.

Failing to reach out for dissenting views was a pre-war shortcoming, The Times has previously acknowledged. So even after Mr. Gordon had "nailed" key parts of the Feb. 10 article, according to Mr. Keller, editors specifically asked him "to talk to places in government that had been skeptical of W.M.D.," such as the State Department. Still, editors didn’t make sure all conflicting views were always clearly reported. For example, the article on Mr. Bush’s news conference pointed out that the position of the president — and the similar position taken earlier in the week by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff — differed from the suggestion at the Sunday Baghdad briefing that the weapons effort involved top levels of the Iranian government. That story also should have noted, however, that the president’s view on this point differed from the intelligence assessment given readers of the Feb. 10 article.

The column is significant in that Calame and the NYT are listening to readers (and possibly, as Greenwald posits, the blogs) in reviewing national security reporting. There is ample evidence in this column that Calame and editors at the NYT did learn a lesson from the Judy Miller/Michael Gordon reporting fiascos of 2002 and 2003.

I'm not sure that Gordon has indeed learned the lesson of skepticism, or that he lets skepticism outweigh his own political biases. As Greenwald points out, Gordon has already faced very public criticism for advancing his political views in his role as a reporter/commentator:

In fact, this is the second time in less than a month that Gordon has been expressly criticized in the pages of the NYT, having been chided in late January by his own editor when he "stepped over the line" and "went too far" by going on The Charlie Rose Show and expressly advocating President Bush's "surge" plan. Gordon clearly has a pro-war, pro-neoconservative agenda which engenders serial journalistic sins (and that is the case despite his having authored a book which, as many neoconservatives have done, criticizes the administration's handling of the war). There is a reason why Iran-obsessed warmonger Michael Ledeen -- Michael Ledeen -- recently called Gordon "one of our best journalists."

That Michael Gordon continues in the national security beat given his involvement in the Iraq WMD reporting is problematic, but as Big Tent Dem points out, he has the sources and the background knowledge to effectively cover the beat. But as BTD stresses, his editors need to keep him on a short leash, a much shorter leash than his editors have allowed. That the public editor of the NYT is stressing this is indeed good news. Even better, he's responding to readers' concerns. So keep those e-mails flowing, folks.

Those defending the Democratic debate on Fox News are getting sillier by the minute.

D. Taylor, Secretary–Treasurer of the 60,000-member Culinary Union called on those who have focused on Fox to look at the larger political picture. “Nevada was chosen as an early caucus state because of its diversity.

Nevada has lots of blacks, Asians, and Latinos. Hence, Democrats should go on the alll-white Fox News Channel instead of media venues frequented by that diverse population. It's that kind of brilliant thinking that has made the Nevada Republican Party so dominant in a state which should be far more competitive.

It's increasingly clear that Nevada didn't deserve to be moved up in the calendar. They apparently don't understand that Democratic caucuses have nothing to do with the Republicans watching Fox News.

They think that being on Fox News will win over converts, apparently unaware that the pundit heroes of those watching Fox News (Hannity, O'Reilly, Hume, Bennett, etc) will mine the debate for hours and days for ways to bash those Democrats. Who will viewers believe? Evil Democrats, or their favorite Fox talking heads?

This is on Dean and Reid, who are happily legitimizing the right-wing's favorite propaganda outlet. And it will be on any Democratic candidate that decides to appear at the debate.

The so-called "liberal" New Republic is now cutting back publication to every other week, yet another sign of its inevitable death.

I mean, how can the editor of the magazine that supposedly covers politics get this simple observation so wrong:

Mr. Moulitsas, [Franklin Foer] said, “is waging a war for ideological purity.”

I'm waging a war against out-of-touch DC-centric "punditry" that gets the biggest issues of the day wrong. Anyone who follows this site or politics with any modicum of attention will know that Jon Tester, Jim Webb, Patrick Murphy, Jerry McNerney, Gary Trauner, Jay Fawcett, Joe Sestak, Ned Lamont, Ben Chandler, Stephanie Herseth, and all the other Democrats we've supported with money and moral support are all over the ideological map.

If I'm waging a "war for ideological purity", I'm doing about as good job of it as the New Republic is of running its magazine.

Luckily, I'm not. And TNR has still lost half its circulation in the past six years.

How can we forget TNR's rabid support for the Iraq War? Or such foresight as its hilarious endorsement of Joe Lieberman in the 2004 presidential primaries as the party's future?

The deep irony of Lieberman's campaign is that many Democrats view him as timid. But how much courage does it take for Dean to throw red meat to the party faithful? The Democratic Party is racing back to the '80s, with interest groups enforcing litmus tests on everything from partial-birth abortion to steel tariffs, and party activists dangerously out of touch with a country that feels threatened by terrorism, not Donald Rumsfeld. Dean has helped create this mood of self-righteous delusion, and his competitors have, to varying degrees, accommodated themselves to it. Only Lieberman--the supposed candidate of appeasement--is challenging his party, enduring boos at event after event, to articulate a different, better vision of what it means to be a Democrat. Three years ago, that vision seemed ascendant. Today, it is once again at the margins. It may take years, or even decades, for Democrats to relearn the lessons we thought, naïvely, they had learned for good under Clinton. But one day, Joe Lieberman's warnings in this campaign will look prophetic. And the principles he has espoused will once again guide the Democratic Party. It will be the work of this magazine, to whatever small degree possible, to hasten that day.

What's that about "ideological purity"?