It’s amazing to watch how phrases – like that – suddenly flash up on Memeorandum and my RSS reader, in an almost-balletic display of coordinated rhetoric.
It pisses me off, because it’s a transparent substitute for real thought and criticism, and turns the people who should be talking about the campaign – folks like Kevin Drum, Josh Marshall and Ezra Klein – into copyboys for the political talking point of the day.
It’s almost like they coordinated what they were doing…
(a quote from Mickey K, in a 2007 post of mine):
Another party I’m not invited to. And you aren’t either: Vlogging fogey lashes out at ur-whippersnapper Ezra Klein, upon learning that Klein has created a private Townhouse-like email group where liberal bloggers and editors hash out issues before they let the public in on the discussion. … P.S.: Yes, I have private email discussions too, and there are probably some advantages in having these talks in front of a group instead of one-on-one. (If, say, Sidney Blumenthal emails five leftish bloggers privately, all five might think they have an exclusive. If they compare notes, they won’t.). But the innovative virtue of Web journalism, I’ve always thought, is that it makes the back and forth process of argument and investigation relatively transparent to everyone. If the Klein Klub succeeds, isn’t there a threat that it will a) compromise independence, in part because participants will always worry if they are using something that should be kept private and will feel they owe the other members; b) will encourage groupthink, as everyone works out the tacit party line before presenting it to their sheeple-like readers; c) encourage propgandism (see (b)); and d) become the place where the real conversation happens, a conversation the non-elite public isn’t privy to. … P.P.S.: Who’s in the Klein Klub? Have they published a list of names? The sheeple demand to know at least that! … P.P.P.S.: Chait, I know you’re in it. Who else? …
Why, you may ask, am I upset that my ideological colleagues are so deeply in the tank? I talked about that a while ago as well…(back in 2005):
For much of my life as a teen and an adult, I’ve been involved in risky things.
I walked steel while my father built highrises; I’ve sailed offshore, climbed rock and mountains, raced cars and bicycles (the most dangerous!) and motorcycles. I like doing those things and the people who do those things, in no small part because they have very little bullshit in them.
If you lie to yourself about where you are and what you’re doing while sailing a small boat from San Francisco to Los Angeles, you are in a world of trouble. If you lie to yourself while setting protection on a rock face a thousand feet above the ground, you’re going to die.
I don’t like a lot of what the Republican party has to offer; that’s OK, I think we need a national dialog to make good policies. It takes two.
But given that, it may be puzzling to some (hey, JC, how’ re you?) why it is that I bash the media for their blind partisanship toward establishment liberalism, instead of cheering them as an ally.
It’s because I find myself in a risky place surrounded by people who have lost the ability to tell bullshit from reality. Our party is wounded, leaking ideologically and demographically, and we sit here drinking quack nostrums made from apricot pits and listening to fake spirit mediums tell us everything will be OK because our dead ancestors FDR, JFK, and LBJ are looking over us.
They’re not.
Nope, they are not. So if you want to help Obama win, stop the bullshit and start facing reality.
Marc,
I just dropped Mickey K from my blogger list.
His hatred of little brown people from south of San diego who keep, not only CA’s but the Nation’s economy from falling into recession or worse has finally become more than I can bear!
Kevin Drum, Josh Marshal & Klein? They’ve drunk so deeply of the Unicorn’s kool-aid that they’ve failed to rationally make a case for the “progressive” East Coast millionaire left’s agenda! Ooops! Of course that’s impossible!
James Taranto, in today’s “BofTWT” lead “Putting the Lie in Library” pretty much destroys any claim to facts and objectivity the Left may make.
BTW, no link as, if you’re not reading this every day, the kool-aid has infected you beyond cure!
I’m a bit confused why you’re angrier at some people agreeing about something online than a vice presidential candidate lying.
Talboito: Maybe you are too busy driving by to actually read this blog, so I’ll offer you one clue from the recent activity on the Eagleton thread. “(link)”:http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/eagleton.php#c67
There, AL says
bq. Very little of the stuff I’ve seen from the campaigns (as opposed to the blogs, news media, etc.) falls outside the normal salesmanship I expect in politics.
bq. I think that “we tell the truth! they lie!” thing is tiresome not just to me but to the average voter.
I’m sure AL can speak for himself if your comment merits further response in his eyes.
I can hear the assumed conclusions gathering in the periphery.
I guess I’m drawn on this issue. I would prefer bloggers kept a safe distance from campaigns and really focused on individual thought. At the same time, many are upset with the advanced right wing “echo chamber”. By leaking RNC talking points to multiple sources (blogs, Fox, newspaper editorials)simultaneously, it has the power of creating a ‘sensational’ news story out of minor points… even stories that are no more than rumor, innuendo or bald-faced lies.
Strategically, many liberal bloggers believe themselves to be at a disadvantage to this system. Therefore, pooling their ideas allows them to not only spread information faster, but also to ‘echo’ ideas simultaneously. In this way, they hope to compete with the already operating RNC machine.
AL: I empathize with your ideas that blogs should remain separate, transparent veins of thought outside of general politics. I tend to visit blogs that have similar ideals. However, as technology becomes more common, and the mainstream crowds overrun fringe enthusiasts, you’re also going to see the current political paradigm overrun the blogs; and not the other way around.
I think we’re already seeing that in the partisan nature of blogs, and the general attitudes of left/right bloggers/posters.
Alchemist – I think there’s history that goes back beyond that; right-wing talk radio grew big because right-wing people felt shut out of mainstream media discourse. There was an untapped mass market, and the talk shows captured it.
Because mainstream media is so ‘establishment progressive’, there’s less room for the progblogs to create a mass market, so they have become a niche. they’re great at mobilizing that niche, and they’ve become a sounding drum in that space for candidates. And – because they are more closely aligned with the values of the media, they are a great memestarter, and the campaigns from dean onward were smart enough to use them for that.
They made a critical mistake, though, in assuming they were a mass phenomenon like talk radio (vide Air America’s problems in that market).
A.L.
This is a significant story.
While I do think that Palin is lying regarding “saying ‘No’ to the Bridge to Nowhere” (since she knew that funding was already cut for it and therefore cannot credibly claim that she opposed it…since when funding was coming she was a strong supporter…it’s kinda like saying “I quit” a moment after you’re fired), the real credibility problem for the campaign is that it’s being held out as evidence of her opposition to pork, one of McCain’s signature issues.
Since that is not the case (the money came to Alaska and was used for other pork projects) then this is a highly misleading and dishonest position.
I do not think there is anything wrong with pointing this out.
Be careful there – earmarks went down under her administration, I believe (interesting thing to check once I’m done playing with bundler data).
And that’s part of the point of my post. There are real policy issues that ought to be being discussed and which I think would highlight Obama favoribly, and any discussion of them gets washed away in the b.s. “liar, liar” screaming – which is arguably not itself true.
A.L.
AL- I agree with you on your post to Tahune. I think these Palin “controversies” have largely backfired because they focused on rather inappropriate personal problems while avoiding larger, more appropriate problems (like the 2nd billion dollar bridge to nowhere, knik arm).
I wasn’t sure if you were trying to highlight the Palin controversy, or the conglomeration of blogs, so I answered to the latter.
Would you rather that they talk about the End of Times, Jews for Jesus, the Book of Revelations, the Power of Prophecy and the rest of the stuff they talk about in Wasilla?
bq. At the same time, many are upset with the advanced right wing “echo chamber”.
So the VRWC is actual fact instead of pedestrian Clintonian fantasy?
bq. By leaking RNC talking points to multiple sources (blogs, Fox, newspaper editorials)simultaneously, it has the power of creating a ‘sensational’ news story out of minor points… even stories that are no more than rumor, innuendo or bald-faced lies.
With a little bit of substitution in the first half of your sentence, you get the _exact_ situation that we’ve been seeing with all these “scandals” and non-gaffes that keep cropping up around Palin. Which, I think, was AL’s original point.
bq. Strategically, many liberal bloggers believe themselves to be at a disadvantage to this system.
Surely you remember “the Obama campaign’s direct dissemination of talking points to the anti-speech callers”:http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/wgn_on_the_air.php at WGN, who literally recited them in an attempt to shut down the radio program. Heck, the gang over at NRO make an effort to be on all the official campaign and DNC mailing lists _specifically_ to keep track of the latest talking points distributed as fast (or quicker) as their GOP counterparts.
When one side complains about an echo chamber, it’s something to consider. When they have to shout their complaints over the noise of constructing their _own_ echo chambers, it’s worthy of ridicule.
It is called Talking Points Memo for a reason.
While there is no proof of collusion per say, it is funny to see blogs on both sides of the political spectrum run with a meme in a fashion that seems collusive, but is more likely a spontaneous eruption of groupthink.
Where the lefty bloggers are trying to make a scandal out of anything and in some cases pushing outright lies (Trig is Palin’s daughters kid), the righty bloggers are trying to foment outrage over minor or perceived slights (the pig reference). I tend to view this as politics as usual during an election cycle. Of course what makes it so different is the power that blogs have in public opinion now over even 4 years ago.
The left in its desperation to smear Palin has galvanized many right leaning voters who were probably going to sit this one out. Overplaying their hand is something that the left in America does quite often, and I think it comes from the superiority complex that many on the left appear to have.
But in the end, much of what I call blogger-based-analysis is petty and trite. Very little real investigation into Palin is being done, since everyone is looking for that “gotcha” item that they hope will bring her down. Instead of looking for dirt, maybe someone should just draw a broad history of her public life that focuses on her actions, and statements, instead of tabloid trash. It would do the public good far more than spending 3 days and countless front page articles on Bristol Palin being pregnant.
The press shows that its a business more than anything when they focus on trivial and unserious matters like this, and instead focus on the trashy gossip that one finds on Defamer or Perez Hilton.
#8, I’d certainly be interested in a link to this. She has a long history of lobbying for and being successful at procuring many earmarks as mayor of Wasillia and also as governor. If any reductions were driven by her purposeful opposition to such earmarks and/or a reduced number of requests, rather than just being unlucky or the victim of the huge budget deficit, then I’d be all ears.
I can’t agree that _”LIAR! LIAR!!”_ games are dysfunctional for the Left.
It seems Left blogs use about 14 times as much obscenity as conservative blogs. That almost has to be a reflection of both personal habits and a culture of profanity, hatred and viciousness.
They say, rightly: don’t get into a mud-wresting contest with a pig: you both get dirty, but the pig likes it. They don’t add alas that there’s a great incentive for the pigs to force such contests constantly.
When one side is relentlessly filthy, uncivil, and in bad faith, and the other has strong taboos on acting like that, the false drive out the good. Corrupted arguments drive out honest debaters as counterfeit money drives out the real thing.
Driving opponents from the debating ground, shutting people up and making examples of those who do speak up plainly and in good faith works. It brings about vast social changes. Broadly speaking, Christendom put paid to the Ancient world by making the opposition shut up, thus winning the argument. This is historically normal.
Because this is destructive of the community as a whole, it’s rational to ban it, or penalize it enough that “nice players” gain more than they lose on average.
But there has been a great relaxation of manners even in my lifetime, first on the left and then to a lesser but still often deplorable extent on the right; and part of what has fueled that is a model widely accepted on the Left that society, especially our capitalist society, is not an organism with parts that ought to be in a reasonable degree of harmony, but a battlefield of constant unfair and unfree fights for domination between oppressors and Left-defined victims. In this model words are weapons of domination more than they are acts of communication, and the common good that would warrant support for sanctioning overly destructive habits of debate does not exist.
While the model prevail on the Left where words are weapons in fights for domination that are seen as automatically unfair and unfree, thus no holds barred and with hatred fueled by automatically, a priori outraged senses of fair play, and while the Left owns the megaphone and sets the rules for its use, there is no healing to be had. This will go on and on.
I’d certainly be interested in a link to this. She has a long history of lobbying for and being successful at procuring many earmarks as mayor of Wasillia and also as governor. If any reductions were driven by her purposeful opposition to such earmarks and/or a reduced number of requests, rather than just being unlucky or the victim of the huge budget deficit, then I’d be all ears.
Here’s some quotes from a story in the Anchorage Daily News Published: March 12th, 2008 10:18 PM)
I suggest reading the whole article. It seems fairly balanced, and it was written before she became such a celebrity and it became harder to separate fact from legend.
They say, rightly: don’t get into a mud-wresting contest with a pig: you both get dirty, but the pig likes it.
But what if the pig is wearing lipstick?
If what you want is a political monoculture, then words serve the same purpose as car keys dragged along the paintwork of any car with a Republican bumper sticker; and honesty, fairness and politeness are irrelevant, or the vices of wimps, or indications of taboos that reveal the enemy.
Your position is one of the things that is killing Democrats. You want the Democrats to keep playing college debating society while the Republicans do anything they want. You would rather have their message unanswered than to be sometimes wrong. The Republicans keep their message forward like a Roman Legion shields together swords out relentless stabbing and pushing forward. It has to stop.
Stop whining about bloggers getting to promote singular ideas. It isn’t the purity of spirit that blogging started out as. The realities are now that many are outlets for propaganda of all stripes. If people get together your issue should be that they agree but what they agree on be factual.
Being factual is even harder because the messages are pushed to like minded people whom often do not check facts. That is what you should demand; that facts be checked.
You don’t suppose Palin asking for fewer (not zero) earmarks has something to do with the Alaska Congressional delegation finding itself in the minority after the 2006 elections? Had to shovel the money through a smaller diameter hose.
The record makes clear that until the strange brand-new GOP theme of earmarks as some sort of Satanic display (I thought that was earpoints?!), Palin’s treatment of them was based on practicality, not morality. And when it looked practical to get Uncle Sam to build that Bridge to Nowhere, she was for it.
From the link in #15:
bq. Palin said the Alaska delegation, along with President Bush and the front-runners in this year’s presidential election, have made it clear earmark reform is coming.
bq. “You can either be proactive and be a part of the positive changes that are coming, or you can try to fight this new system that’s coming in,” Palin said.
bq. But there’s been a backlash against earmarks with critics, particularly conservative Republicans, saying they are often a tool for powerful lawmakers to channel money to pet projects outside the normal budget process.
bq. A proposal to ban earmarks for a year could come up for a Senate vote as soon as today; Stevens said he doesn’t think it will pass but “it shows the sentiment of a lot of people. I think it will come awfully close to passing.”
bq. A common target for earmark snipers is the so-called “bridge to nowhere” plugged by Alaska Rep. Don Young into the five-year transportation bill in 2005. Congress stripped the earmarks directing the spending but let the state keep the money to use on the bridge if it wanted.
bq. Palin, upheld by national conservative commentators as one of the leaders of a new generation of Republicans, said she’s not trying to do anything to hurt the all-Republican congressional delegation’s ability to bring money to Alaska. It’s just a reality that changes in federal funding are coming whether anyone in Alaska likes it or not, she said.
To me, this story paints the picture of a political opportunist who was quick to reverse her position on the BtoNW as soon as 1) it became politically costly to support it, and 2) after it was already clear that earmarks money in general and bridge funding in particular was going to decrease.
I see nothing to support the idea that she is a champion or even principled supporter of the idea of pork reduction. However, this shift does I think show that she and McCain are kindred spirits in casting aside any pretense of principle for the sake of political expediency.
The strategic error here is that Obama is spending too much of his time on the opposing VP. The prog blog reaction to Palin’s convention speech was “let’s get her.” I thought Obama would play it cool and ignore her. McCain is supposed to be the emotional one. Instead, he seems to be sensitive to the criticism from the prog blogs that Kerry was weak in the face of opposition. Obama’s supporters are undermining Obama with that charge of weakness.
The candidates and the parties have different strengths and weaknesses. Obama needs to spend the final couple of months, above the fray, acting Presidential. He may not look like those guys on the dollar bill, but if he doesn’t act like one, doubts are going to fester.
#16 from SG:
bq. _But what if the pig is wearing lipstick?_
Put it in context. Play the whole piece of rhetoric it was part of, or let it go. Don’t snatch one phrase out of context.
#19, #20. I generally agree, but I wouldn’t phrase it as pejoratively as you do. But you’re free to place the worst possible spin on it, just as Reps are trying to place the best possible spin on it.
I frankly read it as a fairly pragmatic approach to governing. The general mood had changed, and she didn’t fight it. There are some things that government needs to fund, prioritize them and only try to fund the most important. I find it a more appealing (and practical) message than either “government needs to do more” or “government needs to be drowned in the bathtub”.
Your opinion may differ, of course.
#22 – I was trying to make a joke. I find this particular tempest in a teapot amusing.
By the way: yes it’s reasonable for Sarah Palin to say she stopped that bridge. (link)
If someone had the right to criticize Sarah Palin for being _eventually_ right it could only be John McCain, who was _always_ right, not Barak Obama and Joe Biden who were _never_ right.
Robert, you might have had a better argument if then Dems first reaction hadnt been to spend a week obsessed with Palins children and their sex lives.
Its rather telling that instead of fact checking Palins speech (which could have been done overnight), a spontaneous feeding frenzy of invective against Palins private life was chosen. Inaccurately to boot.
Not only are LBJ, JFK, and FDR not looking over their shoulder, only FDR would even have a chance of being nominated by today’s Donks, and not a particularly good chance at that.
Truman? Forget it. The only 20th century presidents who could be nominated by today’s Democrats are Bill Clinton (probably), Jimmy Carter, and that beakish old Princeton prof, Woodrow Wilson.
None of the great (or even merely good) 20th century Dem presidents would have a chance worth betting on. That is the ultimate tragedy of modern Democrats.
The GOP party apparatus could also read AL’s criticism and profit from it. Most of their blogger-centric efforts are one-way push, designed to create blogger coverage for their meme of the day.
This is the same model used with the press, and it isn’t 100% flawed, but it does reveal a basic misunderstanding. Two main problems:
1. Because it isn’t a project of the bloggers themselves, it doesn’t work nearly as well. There is no Republican counterpart to the Klein Cabal, for which I’m thankful.
2. It also forfeits the kind of conversation and reality-facing that the medium is good for. Large parts of their own party don’t like the RNC very much. This approach to bloggers is both a missed opportunity, and an illustration of why that situation exists.
It seems most of the Obama supporters on this thread defend “message coordination” because the Evil Republicans do it, so the Progressives/Democrats should do it too.
While that argument itself might do with some further scrutiny, I would like to point out the (I should think by now obvious) danger of an army of drummers banging the same model drum in unison if that drum should prove defective; all that gets heard is a seriously funny “thud thud thud” instead of “boom boom boom”.
In other words, how are all you Obama supporters feeling about the polling trends right now?
My guess is Palin is more-or-less immune from the gotcha politics that sank Kerry. I base that on the assumption that most Americans have accepted a narrative about Palin in which such attacks just don’t get traction; Her story is about a hyper-competent woman who takes on the establishment and wins. Old-school snipe is just going to throw that story into sharp relief. Palin fights the establishment, therefore the establishment hates Palin, therefore anyone who hates Palin must be part of the establishment.
If McCain saw all this playing out this way, I’d be tempted to vote against him because I’m not sure I want anyone that smart actually running the country. OTOH, I’m pretty sure he just got lucky….
Actually, the general average of “polls”:http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/us/general_election_mccain_vs_obama-225.html only show McCain with a one to two point lead. The RNC bounce is still coming to an end.
And yes, I agree with the sentiment that beating a well-organized slander machine with a better-organized slander machine doesn’t make anyone better off. Yet, it seems to be so much easier for campaigns than honesty…
The ironic thing is- all this nonsense doesnt really matter. My philosophy is that ‘swift boating’ only works when it reinforces something about a candidate that voters are already coming around to.
The debates are going to be a major turning point. Either one side cements their positive image and the other cements their negatives and the polls moves into a comfortable lead, or its going to be a dogfight down to the wire and anybodys ballgame.
bq. In other words, how are all you Obama supporters feeling about the polling trends right now?
My guess is “this post”:http://www.reuters.com/article/blogBurst/politics?type=politicsNews&w1=B7ovpm21IaDoL40ZFnNfGe&w2=B7tmRCRJt2YFzDsa7MJ1CblL&src=blogBurst_politicsNews&bbPostId=Cz1VeFnrO5fmhCz7sNEgkr6eaqCz5odWpbSEERJBEpoBINF1nln&bbParentWidgetId=B7tmRCRJt2YFzDsa7MJ1CblL is indicative of the response narrative. In a nutshell: McCain is getting a bounce only in red states where he already had the electoral votes locked up.
And if “this post”:http://www.reuters.com/article/blogBurst/politics?type=politicsNews&w1=B7ovpm21IaDoL40ZFnNfGe&w2=B7tmRCRJt2YFzDsa7MJ1CblL&src=blogBurst_politicsNews&bbPostId=Cz4LaGYSO8cAmCz8ig70FWHdXJB3NbJCdncCIoB2w6kgMfk5lb&bbParentWidgetId=B7tmRCRJt2YFzDsa7MJ1CblL is accurate, McCain may not be able to transform poll numbers into election day votes due to Obama’s apparently superior GOTV machine.
(Partisan gripe: Reuter’s use of blatantly liberal blogs to feed the “politics section”:http://www.reuters.com/news/politics on their site seems, well, too easy a target…)
Well, I must say, nothing is quite as effective at countering the Republican message that Obama-Biden are a pair of out of touch, condescending, snobbish liberal elites as a horde of liberal bloggers spreading such lovely sentiments about middle America as we see in #10.
It would be really funny if it weren’t so serious. All the Republicans seem to need to do to win a presidential election is poke the Dems in the culture war funny bone and watch the progs whip themselves up into a lather and run right off the cliff.
I was going to say that this’ll be the third election in a row this tactic tipped things over, except as I think about it, Clinton made excellent use of this as well. Anyone else remember the story of elder George and the supermarket scanner?
Unbeliever:
That’s one way to pretty up the pig, but it’s just wrong. He got a nice bounce in Ohio, for example, that doesn’t suck.
Everything is still in post-convention flux, but what surprises me is that McCain is not stronger in Indiana at this point, and he should have Virginia in the bag. Obama, on the other hand, ought to be stronger in Pennsylvania and Michigan.
Obama is the underdog for the nonce, and the problem is that his campaign has no Underdog Mode. (Here is where ol’ Hillary would sure come in handy.) The Obama campaign has only one mode: “Why is it taking so long to make me president?”
You see this in his intemperate reaction to the pig controversy, where he lashes out with “the news media decided that would be the lead story yesterday. This happens every election cycle. Every four years, this is what we do.”
In other words, the fix is in – “What does a man with a funny name who’s not the same color as Thomas Jefferson have to do to get elected in this country?” This is the same kind of stuff his wife was spreading around (“They keep raising the bar!”) before they yanked her off the campaign trial.
Listening to Obama whine about the media is far too rich for me to stomach. I’ve never seen a candidate treated so easily, and with such adoration as Team Obama. The biggest problem I see with Obama is that when he’s challenged, even in the slightest, he takes it personally and gets flustered.
The debates should be an eye opener, but to really see Obama out of his element would be to see him in an unscripted town hall style, the ones McCain has been doing for months. In this area, Obama would be exposed and easily pummeled. His handlers know this, and this is why he has never agreed to debate McCain when he didn’t know the questions before hand.
SG, your comment #16 _”But what if the pig is wearing lipstick?”_ was funny.
I just didn’t have a humorous reaction to it because my mood at that moment was spoiled by seeing the whiny, word-snatching instant-feminist Republican complaint ad.
Your reaction was so much better than theirs.
You know, of course, that the attendees at these events were vetted in advance, right? People who looked like Obama supporters not admitted.
Suuuure they’re unscripted. And Scottie MacClellan had no idea Jeff Gannon/Guckert was a ringer. Time to list a bridge on Craigslist again.
David Blue:
There is something to what you say about instant feminism.
On the other hand, it’s nice – if not noble – to see some people get a good stiff dose of their own patented identity politics. “Found your petard in the dumpster, mind if I hoist you with it?”
It’s also nice, and entirely just, to see the ridiculous notion that women are owned by the feminists (who are in turn a subsidiary of liberal Democratic politics) slapped right across it’s ugly mascara-streaked face.
This argument by Matt Welsh at Hit and Run (link) implies that Armed Liberal is right about the bottom line for Democrats: in this election, the _”Liar!” “Liar!!”_ games won’t help them, because McCain is better off with the debate focusing on anything other than the policy differences he has with the fragile conservative coalition he needs to elect him.
Joe Katzman
The talking points are sent and then bot’s appear on left leaning blogs. They rotate on an irregular basis and respond only to an opening for the talking point. they never follow through to defend their points.
Mark B
You are not thinking this thru. I know left bloggers got bagged because they didn’t know a thing about her and didn’t stop to think about what they came up w/. Given that the McCain campaign provided only the most basic of bio’s on her it was red meat for too many of them. But left bloggers are not part of the the Democrat party apparatus so to blame the Democrats is disingenuous.
As to fact checking the speech that was obvious w/ the bridge to nowhere. The noise overrode the real message.
The one thing we all have to get use to is the MSM story and controversy driven lines, for all of us, is that MSM has to sell a story to retain advertisers dollars. Without something to draw traffic they are shut down. It is clear this is moving to blogs as well. Many of the original authors like Katzman are gone from here because the demands on their time and the lack of income it produces. One hopes to always have a reasonable conversation but inevitably something goes down hill to the point you quit. If your blog reaches a point where you can obtain advertisers you can keep going but you are likely to fall prey to a story driven by the search for eyes.
Suggestion to Obama et al – leave the woman alone … Why not go back to demonstrating to the people that you have novel solutions to problems that have yet remained unsolved during the past 8 yrs – Healthcare, social security, immigration reform, energy, earmark reform, etc. Begin to get in front of the issues instead of getting suckered into the gutter. That, my friends, is a winning strategy.
It pisses me off, because it’s a transparent substitute for real thought and criticism, and turns the people who should be talking about the campaign – folks like Kevin Drum, Josh Marshall and Ezra Klein – into copyboys for the political talking point of the day.
It’s almost like they coordinated what they were doing…
Les Nessman: I really don’t know how to describe it. It was like the turkeys mounted a counterattack! It was almost as if they were … organized!
The left is volume at eleven screaming insane.
Heh. I swear to God, I thought turkeys could fly …
For one example of leftie bloggers all following the WaPo’s lead and failing to even spend a second thinking about whether they were linking to a smear or not, see “this”:http://24ahead.com/blog/archives/007980.html Even NPR has printed a correction to their pile-on of the WaPo’s smear, but DailyKos, MattY, AmericaBlog, RawStory, and blogs.tnr.com have not (somewhat surprisingly, ThinkProgress has).
[Drive-by, no substance to speak of, suggestions with no indication of who was being spoken to, plus namecalling from a new poster. Care to try your luck again? –NM]
I’ve noticed a fair number of commentators here who profess to be from the left, so I have a few questions.
1) Do you believe that you are truly smarter than those who don’t agree with you?
2) Do you believe that if someone whom you recognize to be on your side makes a claim, then that claim is a priori something you are inclined to trust?
3) Do you believe that your advanced views on politics make you expert on subjects with no connection to politics, e.g the ozone layer?
4) Do you believe that those who disagree with you should not be allowed to participate in the political process?
I could go on, but I’ll stop there, to give you a shot at it.
Now all this thread needs is the WPIG mascot wearing a hockey uniform.
My reference is to #41 and #43 in case there is any confusion.
Amazingly dense discussion to me–44 comments, many about a bridge, and none about a pro-life woman having a Down Syndrome baby because she’s, like, pro-life. My friends, this is character–one acts in accordance with what one has professed. I’m for that. So are millions of other Americans.
It’s amazing to watch how phrases – like that – suddenly flash up on Memeorandum and my RSS reader, in an almost-balletic display of coordinated rhetoric.
I agree that echo chambers are lame, but the thing I think you’re missing here, AL, is actually right there in what’s written above: ‘Memeorandum’. Bloggers, like mainstream media outlets, increasingly dance to the aggregators’ tune. I should know, because I work for a tech site and roughly 70% of what we do every day is put up stories that have already been written by others*, in hopes of gaining prominent position in top aggregator clusters, and thus more page views, and thus more ad revenue.
Google News and Memeorandum and a few others are destroying enterprise journalism, in my opinion, though nobody has yet put together an intelligent, researched critque for how and why this is happening.
But it is happening, and it’s happening not just in political coverage but also in tech, business, sports, entertainment, etc. etc.
*Or about to be written by others, to be less cynical
RE: *#18 from Robert M*
As far as I know, nothing that is occurring on these pages is causing or likely to cause anyone (democrats or republicans) to be killed.
That said, I can’t deny the feelings of despair / exhilaration that often arise (at least in me) in the course of these verbal “jousts” [there it is again – use of a term from a physical contest context to describe a verbal interaction]
The Palin stuff about the mother giving birth to her daughter’s baby seemed about as plausible as the now infamous “Clinton Hit on Vincent Foster”; both fables were told with just a touch of too much glee; both had no, what we call in Brooklyn, “stand up” witnesses to attest to the ultimate truth, as opposed to the innumerable factoids, that were involved.
Who were the *initial* *meme-makers* for these lies? I can’t find the citation. At this point no one seems to be seeking credit.
Where I’ve come to at least for today is that the Truth does not need a “clever” campaign as much a it needs a clearly stated exposition as to what it is; and all sides need to be attentive for that.
My apologies for *BeClowning Myself* at this late hour.
Back to you, Roger.
Interesting thread, from the leftist-philosophical-rationalization standpoint. I only say that because you guys remind me of myself, oh, say, about twenty years ago. Like an ex-smoker is the most virulent form of non-smoker, an ex-leftist is the most virulent form of non-leftist. I’ve spent the last two decades beating my head against the leftist wall to learn this (I only have a 135 IQ, so show some mercy).
So, I won’t bother venting my spleen and emptying the full measure of my vitriol upon you – been there/done that/had the black eyes to prove it – because I’ve been where you are, and I know my efforts would be wasted: You simply won’t listen, because you think you’re too smart to listen. Basically, you are incapable of listening, just as I was when I was a leftist so cocksure of everything.
Ironically enough, once you get to the point where you can peer behind your societal indoctrination – I don’t think one-in-a-million men can do this – you discover that you were, in fact, stupid, ignorant and pre-programmed; just as your libertarian-conservative critics said you were. It’s a humbling experience in one way, a liberating experience in another, and then it’s a trap: You’ll feel the need to reform your old friends. Don’t bother. They aren’t your friends anymore, and they’ll tell you that. You either evolve and get there (here, to an informed libertarianism) on your own, or you can’t evolve because you are genetically incapable of said, and you end up stuck in the alternate-universe, pseudo-reality that all leftists share in their self-deluded pseudo-intellectualism.
Hey, it only cost me a university professorship to figure this out. I figure I not only got off cheap, I got the better half of the deal. University music departments are cesspools of leftist rationalization and BS. Sort of like this thread, actually.
Cheers and good luck. You’ll need it: I may have been more lucky than smart, but I’d rather be lucky than smart anyway.
1) Do you believe that you are truly smarter than those who don’t agree with you?
Generally no. I say ‘generally’ because I think I’ve got a better grasp on logical processes than people who believe, say, that the US gov’t was behind 9/11. I don’t think I’m smarter than someone who disagrees with me on, say, raising the capital gains tax, though.
2) Do you believe that if someone whom you recognize to be on your side makes a claim, then that claim is a priori something you are inclined to trust?
Yes. I would be more inclined to trust a claim made by a liberal over a conservative, all else being equal.
3) Do you believe that your advanced views on politics make you expert on subjects with no connection to politics, e.g the ozone layer?
No, and I’d also object to the notion that I have advanced views on politics.
4) Do you believe that those who disagree with you should not be allowed to participate in the political process?
No! Unhindered political participation by people who disagree is what makes this stuff fun … and moral.
There are two different questions here:
1) Is Gov. Palin in fact a liar?
2) Is it healthy for bloggers to coordinate their writing toward a political goal, and if so what rules should govern this action?
I’m a libertarian who will probably vote for McCain this fall, so you know where I’m coming from.
1) Most of the various skeletons allegedly found in Palin’s closet have all the spectral terror of plastic Halloween decorations with the bar code still on them. However, on pork, she’s left out relevant facts. I’m willing to cut her some slack on the issue, given that Alaska needs a lot of infrastructure, and the federal government takes large chunks of money (per capita) from them in taxes while restricting the use of their resources. It is reasonable to think the federal government owes Alaskans something. Palin should explain this directly without pretending to be some crusader against pork, and liberals should admit that while she’s not above politics, nothing uncovered so far really shows a pattern of deception worthy of the label “liar.”
2) When bloggers come up with something genuinely important, coordinating their posts isn’t necessary to alter the political landscape. Nobody has to establish an email list or send out talking points to spread the message when CBS creates fake documents, or Reuters publishes false stories. With the kind of stories that really make blogs worth reading, the message doesn’t have to be managed for maximal impact, because it is of interest in its own right. What’s worrisome to me about the coordination AL criticizes here is that it may herald an age of propaganda blogging rather than information blogging. That’s the kind of thing many readers fled the MSM to escape. If you have to kickstart a message by coordinating it, first ask, is this message worth sending? “Palin’s lies!” is a stupid, sensationalist meme that the world would be better off without.
Why does Hucbald’s comment remind me of the shaggy dog joke that ends “Well, back when I wrote the Encyclopedia Brittanica article, I believed that…”
And welcome, D. Aristophanes because when you say “Unhindered political participation by people who disagree is what makes this stuff fun … and moral.“, my only frustration is that I didn’t say that first.
A.L.
#52, Huckbald
“Informed libertarianism” is right up my alley, and welcome to the team. However, it seems like you’re dismissing those who disagree with us as some kind of lesser beings. You accuse a whole swath of people, maybe a third of all politically aware Americans, of being “stupid,” “ignorant,” “pre-programmed,” “incapable of listening,” and “cocksure of everything” folks with whom one cannot be friends. This is incredible hubris. There are plenty of smart, engaging liberals in the world. While they often start from rather amusing first principles–they think practicing charity with money lifted from other people’s pockets makes them virtuous!–I have no problem working, debating, living, and playing with them. You rejected the monolithic liberal groupthink of universities–good for you! It is insidious swill indeed. But be careful not to start your own brand.
#50, D. Aristophanes
I share your gut feeling that aggregators are “destroying enterprise journalism.” Any ideas on how this problem might be addressed? Would the creation and widespread use of a search engine that only searched pages with no-or-limited advertising help? I think a lot of people would welcome such an engine if it existed.
Nathan – yeah, I think that’d be a good thing to have … but the problem is how do those bloggers/journos get paid for their writing (and also, what’s ‘limited’ advertising)?
Stopping the money flowing to people who are producing drivel doesn’t make them start producing good work. And that’s not the whole story, either (why not stop all drivel, after all?). The reality, though, is that I know a lot of reporters who produce some aggregator-targeted drivel and some good stuff. Stop paying them and the drivel disappears (b/c they go get different jobs), but so does the good stuff.
We’ve got to figure out a way to beat the aggregator racket that doesn’t just disincentivize producing any content at all, which means figuring out a way to replace the ad revenue.
Now that said, there are some really good ‘hobbyist’ type investigative journos. That should continue to be encouraged and rewarded with non-monetary feedback (or monetary if the person asks for it, but more on that later). I just don’t know that there will ever be nearly enough hobbyist types to sustain the scope of information we want and need about politics, business, crime, science etc. So we’re back to figuring out a way to transer money to writers for their work.
A tip jar solution has a lot going for it, and I don’t think we’ve even begun to tap into ways to develop a tip jar ecosystem. For example, there could be tip jar-affiliated blogs (kind of online writing guilds) that share a general kitty that readers donate to.
Forgetting about financing this thing for a minute, one ad-killing technology that already exists is the ad blocking application. I think those have real promise, but they’re client-side so you’ve got to hit some kind of tipping point where enough people are actively deciding to filter out ads that the current advertising-driven model becomes untenable.
If you would face reality, you would NOT want Obama to win. A guy who wanted desperately to lose the Iraq war? Oh yeah, that’s right. That was ALL of you. the consequence of not facing reality.
PS all this stuff is like the Gordean Knot of online content monetization and has been for years, except there’s no Alexander anybody knows about, let alone a sharp sword laying about.
_”But left bloggers are not part of the the Democrat party apparatus so to blame the Democrats is disingenuous.”_
Ahem. Sure they arent.
_”As to fact checking the speech that was obvious w/ the bridge to nowhere. The noise overrode the real message.”_
Great. Sources? Im sure the morning after the speech there are tons of articles that just never got picked up (welcome to what conservatives go through daily). Please provide.
_”The one thing we all have to get use to is the MSM story and controversy driven lines, for all of us, is that MSM has to sell a story to retain advertisers dollars.”_
You know, thats what the MSM always fall back on, yet so many of them are bleeding money like its going out of style (papers especially). Its hard to make the popularity arguement when you are ever increasingly unpopular.
In #18, Robert M complained, “Your (AL’s) position is one of the things that is killing Democrats. You want the Democrats to keep playing college debating society while the Republicans do anything they want.”
Democrats playing “college debating society?” As if!
Lessee, on campus after campus it’s been Democrats and their allies shouting down invited speakers or shutting down the events hosted by college Republicans.
Perhaps Robert M should start a college debating society; Democrats like Robert M could use the experience.
“Copyboys.”
That right there … that’s gonna leave a mark.
This late 50’s still-registered-Democrat is going to vote R this year for the second presidential election in a row and is probably lost to the Democratic party for good.
I grew up in a blue collar town in a solid blue state. We didn’t thump Bibles – wrong tradition and in any case religious fervor took a back seat to making a living, raising a family and enjoying friends. But we did own guns and hunt. Came in handy for food every year when the well-paid UAW bosses called a national strike right before Thanksgiving that usually lasted into the new year.
Seeing that pattern, confirmed by an uncle who sat on a national negotiating committee several times, was my first hint that the party my family belonged to did not in fact belong to them. They were vote fodder.
Add in the treatment of soldiers during/after Vietnam by the left. I still spit when I say John Kerry’s name because, folks, I *watched* the Winter Soldier lies affect the politics of this country in venemous ways. Kerry deserved every hit he took from his boatmates when he had the gall to try to play the veteran card in 2004. If EVER there was a man who did not deserve public credit for time in uniform it was that scum. By the way, did I mention that my blue collar family have served in the military for generations?
I don’t live in that town any more. Nor am I blue collar – my career was in high tech and my PhD is in computer science. I teach at the university level now after a career in industry. But I know exactly where the support for Gov. Palin comes from and it’s obvious to me from most of the comments above that the left hasn’t got a clue. If Obama wins in November it will be due to the political machine in places like Chicago and to the voter fraud perpetrated by ACORN and similar groups funded, in good part, by billionaires who have no roots or deep loyalty to the US (Soros, Teresa Heinz Kerry …).
To paraphrase the Cluetrain Manifesto: The cluetrain has stopped at the DNC several times a week for the last 30 years, but they never took delivery. Centrists aren’t impressed by debate-society attempts to find small contradictions (which seldom hold up under scrutiny anyway). They are flocking to McCain/Palin because they see character and commitment on that ticket and they know it will take both of those qualities to make a dent in the intellectual and financial corruption and self- reinforcing echo chamber that constitutes the current political apparatus in our parties and in DC. Obama just doesn’t bring either of those qualities. He’s transparently the product of a corrupt machine who got his early start (and continued support) from the likes of Acorn and Ayers.
But I have to hand it to the nutroots on the left and the Obama groupies in the media: the lurid, hiddeously sexist and ill-informed politics of personal destruction you all unleashed on Palin and her family is what has really sealed the deal for many voters. Watching her and her family at the RNC proudly and warmly supporting one another after the slime that was thrown at them the previous week made it clear that they were what they appeared at first glance to be: decent people who understand what life is like for Americans outside the wretchedly dysfunctional world of the inner cities that evolved since the 1970s and outside of the smug, condescending and not all that impressed by America coastal crowd. Without those attacks Palin might have had to wait another 4 years or so to move to the national scene. That at least is what GOP observers had been expecting.
I deeply wish we had two functional parties who could debate policy from a position of good will towards each other and this nation. Since we don’t, what is needed is to clean house. I think McCain/Palin look like our best bet to do that and I’m not alone in that assessment.
Robert: Stop whining about bloggers getting to promote singular ideas
You’re not gettting it. Townhouse reflects the weakness the Left has for echo chambers. I know its hard to see b/c you’re used to the MSM carrying your talking points anyway. But go to a blog like TalkLeft and see how insular its become – not allowed to criticize Obama, not allowed to use Barack as his name, regular loyalists banned for speaking outside the accepted meme. It weakens you when your sparring partner is a sycophant. You want to sweat in training so you don’t bleed in war. And right now, your party is hemorrhaging.
And nice post molon. This jumped out at me:
“decent people who understand what life is like for Americans outside the wretchedly dysfunctional world of the inner cities that evolved since the 1970s and outside of the smug, condescending and not all that impressed by America coastal crowd.”
We’re excited about Palin because we recognize she’s Grey Tribe
Continuing with your rock climbing metaphor and facing reality.
Your party’s choice of carabiner for this climb is an empty suit.
This crap about ‘they do it so we must do it too!’ has been responsible for so much Evil with a capital ‘E’ in human history. I would have hoped that some of that evil would taint it so that people who really should know better didn’t keep parroting it.
Originally I planned to talk about “Politics as the continuation of civil war”, Gramsci, the Rwandan genocide (“They plan on genociding us! We got to do it to them first to survive!”) and on other specific evils great and small that spring from the ‘they do it so we must do it too!’ idea…
But I’m too disgusted to continue.
_Kerry deserved every hit he took from his boatmates when he had the gall to try to play the veteran card in 2004._
Agree completely. I hate the term “Swiftboating” that has resulted from the defense of Kerry. The vets who lashed out at him 4 years ago had every right. That other piled on was expected, especially since Kerry was so obviously a phony.
[Drive-by from a new poster. Want to contribute substance? Great. Want to toss another throw-away post at us? Please establish yourself as a contributor first. –NM]
An interesting note on the Palin hysteria: the knee-breakers of the feminist movement are coming out of the woodwork. The new theme is that Palin isnt a ‘real’ woman. I have seen precisely ONE rationale for why this is true- Palin is against abortion. Apparently abortion is the one and only litmus test for being a feminist, or any sort of progressive woman.
Palin is a threat to uber-feminism in the same way that Obama is a threat to race-baiters like Jessie Jackson. Success raises questions about the need for the cause. Palin is everything old school feminism supposedly championed… the only thing they got is the abortion stance.
Whatever is claimed about the Democratic big tent, the one remaining sacred cow is abortion. Even school choice seems to be on the table now(and i give Obama credit for being open on that topic). But you can be the second coming of FDR and if you are pro-life, find another party.
From #64: “They are flocking to McCain/Palin because they see character and commitment on that ticket and they know it will take both of those qualities to make a dent in the intellectual and financial corruption and self- reinforcing echo chamber that constitutes the current political apparatus in our parties and in DC. Obama just doesn’t bring either of those qualities. He’s transparently the product of a corrupt machine who got his early start (and continued support) from the likes of Acorn and Ayers.”
I find it very telling that Obama claims to be the agent of change but then selects Biden as his running mate. WTF???!!!???
So much to answer so little time to whomever said MSM is bleeding money you are right that is why there is so much noise and so little fact checking. They do not have the time and money to do the work.
From Tapped agreeing w/ you:
http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/tapped_archive?month=09&year=2008&base_name=the_facts_are_a_feature_story
As to college debating societies. If you can’t tell the difference between the college Democratic committee, the college Republican committee and the college’s debating club I suggest a visit to the ophthalmologist and otologist.
As to blogs Echo chambers that phenomena is left, center or right. To believe it is only to one side is foolish.
Lastly Mark B you provide your own answer about noise, look what we(conservatives) go through.
Robert, if you’re responding to my comment, read it again. I’m quite clear that there are multiple echo chambers in the parties and in DC.
As to the differences among college debate societies/committees, yeah there are differences. One of them is that on campuses across the country left wing students and faculty shout down anyone they dislike while republican students try to debate even with people they don’t.
Has it always been that way? I have an opinion and some thoughts on that, but whatever you think the history might be, that’s certainly how it has been for the last decade.
_”They do not have the time and money to do the work.”_
Ohh that is such a copout. How come bloggers with _no_ budget routinely crack stories the MSM cant be bothered with? The MSM seems to have the resources to send an army of reporters up to Alaska to dig up dirt on Palin.
#36 from Andrew J. Lazarus at 1:28 am on Sep 11, 2008
“You know, of course, that the attendees at these events were vetted in advance, right? People who looked like Obama supporters not admitted.”
Progs have a problem with free speech and tend to try to shout McCain down…..
Didn’t work real well at the convention.
After the vicious attacks on Gov. Palin by you and your ilk..
I think it would be appropriate to flood the web with photos of a recent street fair / public gay orgy by Nancy Pelosi’s supporters (and by inference Obama’s) on the Public streets of San Fran.
Sort of show the world that these are some Energized Democratic Voters.
I mean if you low rent guys want to take it to the gutter… OKAY… we can go there.
Karl Rove is behind all of this, as he always is.
#77 from 3dc:
bq. _”I mean if you low rent guys want to take it to the gutter… OKAY… we can go there.”_
Not OK. One side belongs in the gutter, the other side doesn’t.
In the Robert Bork confirmation hearings, one side, featuring Joe Biden and Edward Kennedy among others, showed it belongs in the trash. The way Sarah Palin has been treated is consistent with that.
Sarah Palin is a politician not a saint, but she is fundamentally better than that.
Barak Obama is a shocking liar. He doesn’t just spin things. He piles outright lie on outright lie. He lied about the born-alive infants protection act, which in a bad life is the worst thing he’s ever done, and then when he was called on it he slandered those who told the truth for lying about his record. He lies like a burglar blathering away confidently with the stolen goods visible in his hand. He claims he never wrote on that survey supporting a gun ban, when he did. Nobody else put his handwriting there.
Yet I would not advocate a campaign of ranting about “Barak Obama’s lies” even though they are real lies and Sarah Palin’s aren’t.
What I advocate is that the Republican Party keep hammering the positive message of the “Original Mavericks” advertisement. That’s perfect. Let the voters know why voting for this team is positively the right thing to do. That’s honorable and the way to win.
Here’s another thing I don’t want to see (link):
bq. _”The public face for this pushback, though, will be woman Republican politicians, a “truth squad†team designed to highlight attacks on Palin and draw sympathy to her side.”_
In other words, a _GOP full-time all-whine femme squad_.
It’s pathetic. And because it’s pathetic it is out of keeping with the rugged, resilient Sarah Palin her supporters love.
There’s no need for this. Sarah Palin is better qualified for the Presidency than Barak Obama is, and as a natural politician she seems to be out of Joe Biden’s class. Those confident statements should be put to the test. Just let her get to it!
bq. It’s pathetic. And because it’s pathetic it is out of keeping with the rugged, resilient Sarah Palin her supporters love.
You see, I _told_ you McCain wasn’t shrewd enough to choose Palin on his own!
It’s informative to note that all the stupid GOP responses are being pushed by the McCain/Palin _campaign_, not Palin herself, who really should bet out in front of this laughing it off. I understand why the campaign felt it needed to respond initially, to get the story out of the blogs and into the regular press, but after the initial statement they should have just _shut the hell up_ and let Obama stumble through his responses. Even the guys at “NRO”:http://corner.nationalreview.com were a bit more critical of the GOP response than of Obama’s initial gaffe (though now they’re more laughing at his campaign’s incompetent response).
Unbeliever, I agree.
As Ronald Reagan might have said: _Let Palin be Palin._