Rocket scientist Duncan Black points with thoughtless glee to the fact that the Iraqis are – a month after their election – trying to work out a government.
Start Wearing Purple
Um, just asking, but it’s been almost a month since the Iraq election and we still don’t know what the final outcome is?
Not that he’s forgotten it – I mean how many national elections cause people to rend their garments for years on end – but what exactly were the headlines in the New York Times like on December 5, 2000?
The politics (and society and economics) of Iraq are far messier than I wish they were. Reality is kind of like that.
And there’s debate about what’s going on and what to do that’s worth having. But because everything in BlackWorld is filtered through one lens – “How can it help my bosses at Media Matters kick the Republicans out” – we get a characteristic cheap shot instead, and a reminder of why it is that Duncan – and to and extent the masters who pay him to blog – aren’t useful participants in that debate.
I genuinely wish they were. Bummer, I guess.
The fact is democracy is inherently messy; that’s what happens when everyone gets his say. Dictatorships are nice and tidy–there’s only one voice that counts.
“…thoughtless glee…”?
Nothing in Atrios’ short post suggests any indication of this.
But on this short comment you then try to build a case that he is simply an operative of Media Matters, who’s goal is to bring down the Republicans???
“Media Matters”:http://mediamatters.org/ is, as the name suggests, concerned with bias and inaccuracy in the traditional media outlets that is Right Wing oriented. As such, I believe they serve a valuable function. They are but a gram of counterweight to the massive loads represented on the other side of the scale by the likes of Fox, O’Reill, Limbaugh, Hannity (etc. and so forth).
This seems like nothing more than displaced anger on your part, and I hope you realize it as just that. Because it is very far from anything that I would consider substantive, interesting, or productive. It does nothing at all to improve or advance the debate on either the topic you accuse Atrios of sneering at, nor the broader issue of partisan bias in the media.
But you’re too busy to get into all that now, I suppose….
While we are on the topic of democracy, election and government, can anybody guess how many more elections will be cancelled in Haiti? Um, just asking. They were cancelled for the fourth time and this in a country without problems as acute as those in Iraq.
Andy, please. Media Matters annoys me (particularly) because it hides behind a cloak of nonpartisanship, and because, much more than any right-wing effort by BushCo it has poisoned the well in the political blogs by hiring outspoken D’s (Black, Willis) and allowing them to detract from the tone of the debate by acting as simple partisan Rottweilers.
And if you didn’t see the snark in Duncan’s post, you’re not reading him much.
A.L.
Could somebody point out to this loon that it takes the USA two years to run an election and nearly 3 months to change govts. In most countries this can be done, all of it, in 3 months.
“snark” is not “thoughtless glee”.
Glee implies that Atrios is perhaps glad or happy that tabulating the election results in Iraq are taking so long. Like I said, nothing in his comments implies this, and as a daily reader of his site, I have never gotten the sense that he in any way wishes ill or bad fortune on the Iraqi people in order to score a “political point”. Just the opposite.
Furthermore, I do not think Media Matters is trying to “hide behind a cloak of nonpartisanship”. They are unabashedly leaning against the current government and “BuschCo” (your term) propoganda behemoth.
You must be joking, furthermore, about “poisoning the well” and “detracting from the tone of the debate” simply because they hired lefty Anti-Bush bloggers. There are 39 people mentioned on their list of “staff/ advisors”:http://mediamatters.org/about_us/staff_advisors so you’ve decided to ignore all of their work because you’re “annoyed” with 2? Wow…I’m gonna need a minute to digest what that tells me about you’re view of things.
Look, facts are facts, you can agree or disagree with them, and I see MM as a site that tries to lay them out, in a necessary effort to counterbalance the much more influential and vast Right Wing effort to do exactly the opposite for “their side”. It just so happens that their focus is on the Right Wing propoganda that routinely and frequently creeps into the MSM (suffuses it, I would say)…and it is (sadly) too easy to come up with lots of examples of mendacity & the propogation thereof.
At any rate, you’re welcome to your opinion…just don’t think you’re making any kind of substantive contribution to the blogosphere with your own snarky posts.
We had our own delayed election results in 2000, didn’t we? To me, that indicates Iraq is skyrocketing to stability; to the ‘loyal’ opposition it probably means we’re a quagmire.
All the commentators I can recall indicated that it would take about a month to form a government. (Kissinger is one commentator I can recall) The election commission is supposed to announce the final election tally on Saturday. The major parties appear to have agreed on the broad parameters of the new government, so if there are no significant shifts in support, a new government will probably be announced within the predicted time frame.
PD;
Thanks for pointing that out.
In light of this omission, I agree that Atrios’ post does appear to be guilty of either simple ignorance borne of predetermined guilt (anti-Bush prejudice), or willfull ignorance with intent to propogate false impressions. Neither is admirable.
But my comments about the implications of interpreting this as “glee” and on Media Matters for America stand.
Still it would be nice to hear an update… Even when it took our 2000 election months to figure out, it was covered preety clearly. Of course, wether WE see movement is not as important as the iraqi’s seeing movement.
Then the question is: Does the Iraqi population know what’s going on? Are they ok with it (or are they worried too)?
I believe Kissinger’s point was that Americans are not familiar with parliamentary systems and how long it sometimes takes to organize a new government. I admit to sharing in that ignorance. Absent a majority (in this case a two-thirds majority), elections are merely preliminary to negotiations.
alchemist: News on the Iraqi elections is in kind of a Catch-22. The preliminary results indicated that the major Shiite and Kurdish parties have enough seats to form a government, but its close. UN observers have indicated that there was some fraud, but probably not enough to swing the outcome. Every time the “winners” make pronouncements, minority parties accuse them of taking the elections (and thus the voters) for granted (deft political play). So plans are being made behind closed doors.
The silver lining is that there is enough uncertainty in the outcome that there is incentive for the “winners” to reach out to Sunni Arabs and vice versa.
If I were conspiracy-minded, I might suggest that international observers have an incentive to slow-down the final vote tally in order to encourage such a grand coalition.
If it ain’t messy, it ain’t politics.
Note for future reference.
Don’t ask a perfectly legitimate question that Armed Liberal may read.
Geez, talk about reading Buffalo Shit into cow dung!
Slow news day?
And one more note. Black is not asking how long it will take to form a government. Just how long it will take to see the results of the election.
And given all of the coverage of the election as it happened and in the days afterwards, is it unusual for an American to wonder what the outcome was? Especially considering the fact that the American public and American military has paid mighty dearly to give them an opportunity to have this election.
Forget US 2000, how long did it take for the FRG to select their last government? Elections took place 9/18/2005 and the government was voted into power on 11/22/2005 according to Wikipedia. Two months plus from start to finish and that’s with a half century of uninterrupted democratic practice behind them.
1. Does anyone posting on this site speak Arabic?
2. Can anyone posting on this site name five or ten of the largest tribes in Iraq?
3. Does anyone posting on this site know if the people they read for information speak Arabic?
4. Can anyone posting on this site vouch for the fact that the people they read for information can name five or ten of the largest tribes in Iraq?
Translation:
What if the United states was occupied by Iraqis who knew very little about our culture and formed opinions about it, decided what was best for us even though they did not even speak english?
Listen to yourselves?
TM Lutas,
Really really bad analogy. We knew the results of that election within 48 hours.
I think you fall into the same trap as others here have. IE the difference between getting the results of the election and determining the makeup of the new government.
Unless of course you really believe that the CDU/CSU indicated that negotiations between the two had concluded successfully and they had decided that the election results were “X”.
Americans, myself included, really need more exposure to a parlimentary system of government.
We know who won the election in Iraq fairly quickly. The UN has said there was some fraud that is not likely to change the outcome significantly. They said it will take two to three weeks of review. This does not strike me as extreme given how long it takes to do *formal* counts and recounts in this country.
What we don’t know is the exact number of seats won by each party so that the winning party can negotiate the formation of a government. They’ve already been begun the negotations. It took three months for Iraq to negotiate a government last year; it looks like it will take less this time.
#6 from Andy on January 12, 2006 03:54 PM
“snark” is not “thoughtless glee”.
“Furthermore, I do not think Media Matters is trying to “hide behind a cloak of nonpartisanship”. They are unabashedly leaning against the current government and “BuschCo” (your term) propoganda behemoth.”
With more mindless partisanship. This doesn’t help combat spin, it just adds to it from the other side… helping to drive people to throw up their hands and give up trying to figure out the facts.
The spinsanity guys were the model for ‘leaning against propaganda’… by deconstructing it while not adding to it…
Thomas,
I disagree. It is possible to be both partisan and honest with the facts.
“Here’s an example”:http://mediamatters.org/items/200601120006 of a MMfA counterpoint relating to media spin on Alito’s wife’s tearful breakdown during his confirmation hearings yesterday.
MM is arguing against the (incorrect and biased, in my view) conclusion that many in the media drew from this (potentially staged) event.
(BTW, this is a great example of how the traditional media outlets help serve Right Wing causes.)
If you have an example of what you’re contending MM is guilty of, I’d like to see it. I’m not challenging you because I don’t think you’re right, but rather because I’m interested in how different people can view the same information in different ways.
“…helping to drive people to throw up their hands and give up trying to figure out the facts.”
Speak for yourself. I regard it as rather important that two sides of an issue are presented. I’m not expecting to be told what to think. And a little skepticism goes a long way.
“It is possible to be both partisan and honest with the facts.”
Which mostly works out in practice to drawing attention to the facts which help your side, and ignoring the ones which do not. If you consider that an “honest” approach, well, we differ there.
For every MM post you can come up with to demonstrate the assumed Right-Wing domination of the media, one can find an article by Accuracy In Media (AIM) which makes the opposite claim (sometimes on the same news source).
In the end, I don’t think the blinders of partisanship are a particularly useful prism through which to try and discern truth.
STAGED EVENT!?!
Has the Left becoming completely disengaged from reality?
I am not familiar with MM, but if that’s is an example of the services provide, I have no use for them.
Re “staged event”, yes, if you read the comments from Daily Kos and lefty sites like that, one of the hypotheses being thrown out is that Mrs. Baumgartner-Alito faked her tears in order to make Kennedy/Schumer, et al, look bad. I think the Democrats are adopting the Arab tactic of, whenever possible, portray yourself as a put-upon victim.
So that when over 300 people get trampled to death in Saudi Arabia, Arab newspapers tell us solemnly that it was their own damned fault for not being calm pilgrims.
And when the country gags in revulsion over the antics of Democrats on the Judiciary Committee, we are told it was all the fault of the wife of the candidate who (they say) was obviously faking distress just to make Senators behaving like obnoxious bullying boors look like obnoxious bullying boors.
It’s no more of a disconnect from reality being shown by the Democrats and Daily Kos than any normal disconnect from reality we see from Saudi’s on a daily basis, or anyone else who expects us to accept that Islam is a Religion of Peace.
You may have noticed I said “potentially staged” event.
Is it so hard to believe? Please. PD, I suggest you do “become familiar” with MM before pronouncing judgement.
Nahncee, you make my case for me:
“…whenever possible, portray yourself as a put-upon victim.”
As for the rest, divest yourself of the idea that your reactionary, angry, and senseless responses to this contention are anything but just that. I’d rather have my molars extracted than get into an unwinnable (for both sides) argument with folks who frequent this Right leaning site.
I do find it hard (nearly impossible) to believe that the GOP would stage an event when confirmation was his to lose. It was the Democrat’s burden to find a way to dramatize their opposition.
Andy, the MM piece you link appears to solely serve as corrective to people who get their news from Katie Couric. I wasn’t offended or outraged or anything. I just didn’t find it personally useful.
PD;
If you read down in that same article you will have noticed a list of “non-Katie Couric” news sources where the same biased view was promulgated:
“Fox News’ Your World with Neil Cavuto…
Similarly, during CNN’s special January 11 coverage of the nomination hearing, CNN congressional correspondent Ed Henry…
On the January 11 broadcast of CBS’ Evening News, CBS News contributor Gloria Borger…”
In addition, I’m missing your point about the “people who get their news from Katie Couric”…she has a large audience, and I’m sure a lot of your fellow voting citizens do form opinions on the basis of her “reporting”. Same is true for the above.
So, who exactly should MMfA be targeting, if not the most widely viewed sources of public information?
As I said above, they’re a meager counterweight to the Right Wing media machine…and I find them more than useful…in fact it gives me great comfort and hope in our future to know that not everyone thinks like BushCo wants them to.
To clarify, I listened to two days of the Alito questioning (I guess my local NPR station found the third day too boring to continue). I personally find the information on that particular MM piece to be of the most superficial content. You might say that it is in response to superficial coverage, and I wouldn’t disagree.
What I find harmful about the MM piece is that by joining with Republican triumphalism on the exaggerated significance of the crying, Democrats are led down the rosy path of believing that their efforts have been foiled by a dirty trick by the bigots across the aisle. (its always 1972)
They lost because they don’t have the votes. They also lost because the Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee don’t know how to seriously question a candidate. Too few questions. Too little follow-through. Too much show-boating. Too much discussion from a policy standpoint, not enough questions from a legal standpoint. I would loved to have seen Sen. Obama ask questions since he’s practiced and taught Constitutional law in the last ten years. I’m sure there are other, younger Democrats who could have done better too.
This type of critical self-examination could help (hey, maybe we should rotate committees more frequently!), but its not going to be as “feel good” as complaining about media coverage.
PD;
Sure. But as long as one avoids viewing the content on MM in the wrong context or perspective (one example of which you nicely illustrate), it cannot be judged as anything but a positive contribution to the discourse, as a counterbalance to poor and/or biased reporting in the popular press.
It’s easier to navigate to an better understanding of many issues if one has at least two points of reference to sound off from that are not spaced too close to each other.
I cannot imagine a more disqualifying criterion for a service that purports to cut through media bias and provide the real story than “you must be aware of the service’s bias before you read them, or else they don’t make any sense.”
25
Just one last note.
“Democrats are led down the rosy path of believing that their efforts have been foiled by a dirty trick by the bigots across the aisle.”
I do hope you realize that precisely the same caveats apply to Republicans who think that any failures in the war in Iraq or the fight against terrorism can or should be blamed on the “unserious about national security” Democrats across the aisle.
Just ’cause that kind of thing pops up in comments around here pretty frequently, you know, and, well, for that matter, from the Presidents mouth on a regular basis.
#18 from Andy on January 13, 2006 02:07 AM
Thomas,
“I disagree. It is possible to be both partisan and honest with the facts.”
Partisan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partisan
“An adherent to a political party or political faction; especially, having the character of blind, passionate, or unreasonable adherence to a party; as, blinded by partisan zeal.”
Fact
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fact
“Something actual as opposed to invented.
Something concrete used as a basis for further interpretation.
Information about a particular subject.
Something known to be the case.
Something in the world that makes a true statement true.”
You can be a partisan and use / twist facts towards an ideological goal, but you cannot be honest about them.
A partisan is a tool of a movement or idea, not someone interested in exposing facts or truth.
Andy: “Nothing in Atrios’ short post suggests any indication of this.”
But all of his posts are very short. If you take out the obscenities and the “wingnuts”, they average like 4-5 words.
That means you would never be able to infer anything from an Atrios post, ever, since they are all too brief to suggest anything. Reading them would be a complete waste of …. okay, now I see what you’re trying to say.