They also want to ban the flag, mom and apple pie
As an example of how nasty and paranoid our politics have become, Republicans are sending out mailings claiming that liberals want to ban the Bible. I'm picking on the right with this example, but the left has plenty of blood on its hands as well.
posted by Jonathan Potts at
1:25 PM
14 Comments:
The difference is that on the left, it's usually the wingnuts who run around spouting nonsense ("Bush is Hitler"), like the indymedia groups or moveon.org. In this case, it's the Republican National Committee putting out whack-job crap.
Now, if the Democratic National Committee was sending out flyers that read "Bush is Hitler" and "No Blood for Oil," then I'd agree they were just as bad as the RNC, but they aren't.
"Ban the Bible" indeed. Ed Gillespie and Karl Rove have no shame, and the RNC is way over the line. And not for the first time this year.
Who are supposed to be the grownups here?
--- aka Jelly Doughnut
1:57 PM
Those damned Republicans at the state level, doing irresponsible things! I'm sure no Democrat, at the highest level, would be caught erroneously inflaming voters on something he knows in his heart will never happen.
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A42196-2004Sep22.html?nav=rss_politics
Oh. OK. Well, at least his wife hasn't gone completely batty.
phoenix.bizjournals.com/phoenix/stories/2004/09/20/daily58.html
Oh. OK. Well, at least with a little help from his friends in the Clinton White House, Kerry won't go completely off the edge into insanity. He just needs a steady hand, and next thing you know, he's in the Oval Office...
www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-na-assess24sep24,1,7081693.story?coll=la-home-headlines
Oy. OK, well, at least Kerry is saying smart things about domestic issues that really resonate with the voters! And, best of all, he's Anybody but Bush, right?
www.thehill.com/morris/091504.aspx
www.nytimes.com/2004/09/22/politics/campaign/22women.html?ex=1253505600&en=5375fdd1ed0d73e7&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland
Oh, well. Thank's Iowa!
2:37 PM
Am I going to have to separate you two?
Seriously, when I started to read that story, I didn't expect to find out it was the RNC who was behind it. They really are playing with fire.
9:04 PM
Actually, I checked the posts from anonymous. Pretty funny! I don't know who I'm going to vote for, but I don't like Kerry. Nader is off the ballot, it seems. Screw me, right? I like that, "Thanks, Iowa!"
Larry
11:38 AM
Thank you, Anonymous, for demonstrating the classic debating technique we call "changing the subject" (aka "the Limbaugh Manuever").
The issue here is whether the DNC has sent out anything as inflammatory, obviously wrong, and jingoistic as the RNC's "Democrats want to ban the Bible and legalize gay marriage." As far as I know, they haven't, though some wingnuts on the left have. In response, you threw out some other alleged misdeeds that had nothing to do with the issue at hand.
And besides, your facts are wrong, Anonymous. The flyer was sent out by the Republican National Committee, not the state committee, and the RNC has admitted it.
-- aka Jelly Doughnut
1:24 PM
Hello. This is my second time on this site, and I really like it. But I think "Jelly" person gets it all wrong, and doesn't seem very nuanced. If you go to the posts "Anonymous" listed, you will see a very funny train of thought. He or she posits a good question, What is the most heinous lie? Is it a stupid flyer sent out in West Virginia, or real lies about public policy that could affect the race?
I'm going to vote for Kerry. Let's just say that. But "Anonymous" shows us an obvious, even insane, lie about the draft. This is said not only by Kerry but by his wife and vice president, so the lie becomes serious discussion if repeated often enough. It's not true, and Kerry, himself, knows it's not true. But he says it.
Then "Anonymous" shows what lies lead to. In this case, it's a loss of faith among women voters who actually care about national security, and even Kerry supporters, like me, who really don't like the man.
You can't say Bush "lied" about Iraq, 9/11 or whatever else Dean, then Kerry and now his extended family, want to point out if you are yourselves lying.
Whoever the "Jelly" is, he is not very nuanced, or he's a partisan.
11:31 AM
Am I the "original anonymous?" Can I have that nickname? Whatever. I would rather remain hidden, which my job seems to require. There aren't many of us who do public policy investigations, and I probably give away too much information anyway.
Oh well.
Yes, the intention of my web listings was two-fold: (1) Introduce the nutty notion that perhaps Kerry and his troupe were engaging in a more heinous series of lies than the clumsy, Willie Hortonesque WV flop; and, (2) that this strategy is not only backfiring with ABB (Anybody But Bush) voters, but harming his pursuit of the very few uncommitted voters in important swing states.
If I may borrow from the W, "Mission Accomplished!" That Jelly Blow would snap back, as curtly and effeminately as possible, like he did only illustrates my point. The hardline ABB crowd, including Jelly Blow, doesn't really like Kerry. They just don't like Bush.
I don't much like him either, but if the central question in this campaign is how best to contain or eradicate Islamist (or, "Jihadist," if you will) threats to America and her allies, then Bush is telling the truth more often than Kerry.
Primary example: The blather about the draft. The Pentagon doesn't want it. The Republican leadership that controls both the legislative and executive branches don't want it. Only Charles Rangel seems to want it, and he offered going-nowhere legislation to spook some Baby Boomer (read "draft dodger") reporters.
That he succeeded should suggest that he would make a better candidate for higher office than Kerry. At least his grand lying gesture has been effective, whereas Kerry's seem to fizzle, even with the help from Clinton's friends (note the link) and his increasingly batty wife (ibid).
In an act of futile desperation, I imagine Kerry, his wife and several key Clinton insiders will now start the buzz that Bush wants to use nuclear weapons against Fallujah. Hell, it worked against Goldwater, why not try?
The problem for Kerry is that the Rove/Bush strategy of attacking relentlessly what most campaigns would assume are untouchable strengths (retired Democrats, suburban moms, older farmers, young professional voters) is working, and his efforts to counter them (go on Regis to shore up the ladies! Letterman for the youngins! Get me to a baseball game! County fair! Someone stop Teresa! Help! Help! Help!) aren't.
At no time since Hoover have the Democrats had such a fat, bumbling, unpopular target to hit. Hell, even Nixon tracked better in his second term than W! And at least people liked GHW Bush!
If the election were held today, Bush would win. Actually, I think Gary Coleman could beat Kerry at this point, should the GOP have nominated him.
Lay the blame where it deserves, on the people of Iowa. I will curse them iteratively until 2008. I can't imagine any other Democrat, except Sharpton or Dean, flopping this badly (Sharpton because he says nutty things some times; Dean because he's a nut, although a sincere one).
Who ever would've thought that an Edwards/Gephardt or Clark/Lieberman ticket would look so appealing right now. Thanks, Iowa!
1:23 PM
When Naomi Wolf is dry humping a girly-man candiate, it's time to strike the flag and wait until 2008:
www.newyorkmetro.com/nymetro/news/columns/thesexes/9911/
1:32 PM
To the lifeboats! Vite! Vite!
Even Tom Daschle is deserting Kerry in South Dakota and has been reduced to running an ad showing the former Senate Majority Leader hugging W shortly after 9/11:
www.argusleader.com/news/Mondayarticle1.shtml
You know you're in trouble when Kerry is running ads of him hugging John Edwards, and his own majority leader in the Senate is flooding the Dakota airspace with pictures of him all over Bush.
Thanks, Iowa!
4:39 PM
The Wire writes an epitaph (someone tell the McKeesport savant that the lede is buried at the bottom):
The presidential campaign has left Arizona behind. Democratic Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites) made four visits and spent nearly $4 million on television commercials in an attempt to make the state competitive. But polls this fall show President Bush (news - web sites) with a comfortable lead, and Kerry has tabled plans for advertising in the first week of October.
The Bush campaign responded by pulling down its commercials Friday. Kerry has not ruled out airing Arizona ads in late October, but advisers say privately it would take a significant shift in the race to put the state back in play.
Four years ago, Bush won the state with 51 percent of the vote compared with Democrat Al Gore (news - web sites)'s 44.7 percent.
Kerry's team thought there was a chance to close that gap, partly because of Arizona's fast-growing Hispanic population. The state has been moving slowly to the political center since its days as the conservative stronghold of Barry Goldwater, the longtime senator and the 1964 GOP presidential nominee. Nearly one-fourth of Arizona's voters register as independents.
But the president has courted Hispanics as well as Republican-leaning voters in the state's suburbs and rural areas.
Before Labor Day, Kerry's campaign spent $3.7 million on television advertising while the Democratic National Committee (news - web sites) spent $800,000 in the state. Arizona joins Missouri, North Carolina, Arkansas and Louisiana as GOP-leaning states that Kerry has taken off his target list barring a surge in his national political ratings.
7:09 PM
You're immune from this Potts because you were a decent newsman (before you opted to sell out), but I believe Fester and the Jelly Blow Nut should read NRO (me, a lifelong Nation subscriber, suggesting NRO. Uggh):
www.nationalreview.com/frum/diary092704.asp
7:31 PM
All of these anonymice make my head spin. Which anonymouse is which? And that was a nice dig, too, by Anonymous 3 (or was it 2?): "McKeesport savant." Ha ha!
Savant means "man of learning." Am I supposed to be insulted?
Whatever. None of the anonymice (or the original "anonymous" and his or her sock puppets, it's hard to tell) addressed the original issue. Instead, they chose to argue tangential issues and shovel out statistics and quotes --- and finally resorted to name-calling and trying to bait me.
Chastened, I must yield the floor to their superior debating skills.
Come to think of it, it's like a little preview of Thursday's presidential debates!
-- aka Jelly Doughnut
9:08 AM
You will note that the McKeesport savant himself uses an anonymous title. The bad syntax, shoddy reasoning and general inability to grasp the main point of a story, however, are hallmarks of another blog in a steel valley far, far away, and thus made him easy to identify.
What I like about The Conversation is the editor's ability to grasp the key issue and toss it out for discussion. This is a skill he honed while a professional newsman, and it's good to see he hasn't let it go to waste.
Keep up the good work, Potts.
10:23 AM
I appreciate the vigorous debate. That's why I dubbed this site the conversation. But let's try to stay as civil as possible. And as far as my abilities as a journalist when I practiced that craft, Jelly Doughnut could give me a run for my money any day of the week.
1:57 PM
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home