Campaign Updates and Media Headlines 8/23/08

and there's a recommended diary calling for Fournier's firing! What a hoot! There must not be any mirrors over there.

Good thing Cheetopia is still the bastion of meaningful media criticism, eh?

No.

[ ] Very tepidly voting for Obama [ ] ?????. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.

1. If you paid attention to the PB2.0 discussion, you would know that it does not really exist yet AND that it is conceived as a whole bunch of blogs / sites... so condemning the whole endeavor based on one freaking post is dishonest

2. You read Corrente, obviously, so, you can dig up all the posts and comments condemning Larry Johnson on the infamous and nonexistent "Michelle / whitey" video.

3. Your comment is just another variation of "get over it and send Obama (now Obama/Biden) more money.

Last time I checked, people could direct their energy wherever the fuck they want. Personally, I think directing tremendous amounts of energy with Obama in the primary was politically naive and that we're all gonna pay for it now.

Back to my main point: don't misrepresent the PB.20 project.

Go Global!

If you don't remember, I'll remind you that the post that got us threatened with a lawsuit was, in part, a takedown of Larry Johnson (though that wasn't the part that got us sued). Personally, if I ever linked to or cited Johnson, it was a long time ago; I don't have time to sort out the truth from the truthiness.

And I'll wait for your retraction on PUMA as well. As you can see from this comment and the accompanying thread, I've expressed some views on the matter that your comment does not address.

[ ] Very tepidly voting for Obama [ ] ?????. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.

No sooner did this pixel-stained wretch codify the new law than you painted a masterpiece of the genre.

This one's got it all:

I simply cannot, and do not want to understand it... antics... will the PUMAs finally accept reality as it is... foolish... before reality is accepted... I’ve tried hard to not engage the Cult of Clinton folks... lined up and pushing the “HYPE” movie... Coff... What has happened that brought this type of crazy on?... This is helping no-one, and hurting everything... Getting a Democratic President into the White House is THE most important thing right now... like it or not...STFU... the only candidate we’ve got... They are all we’ve got.... Let’s GO!... undermining anger... simply irrational and baseless and destructive... totally mis-directed... it’s time to just herd-up.

For my money, the money quote is "do not want to understand," a willful incuriosity that preempts any exploration of your apparently rhetorical question, "What has happened that brought this type of crazy on?"

Here's a thought not to bother understanding: maybe this is Obama's problem to solve, not ours to eat.

Obama is in countless ways a terrible candidate at a critical time. The way he is conducting his campaign is not just repellent to many lifetime Democrats, it's quite risky (both to the Democrats' chance of winning the White House and to using that bully home office in productive ways). Some of us think you have the message precisely backwards. We are the ones that Obama should be waiting for, and he isn't. We're part of the only base he has. Instead of treating us like unruly cats, he should consider asking for our votes in some kind of earnest manner, something he has blatantly failed to do as he keeps whoring himself to some Beltway-approved mirage, these swing voters who are supposed to be (but aren't) impressed by his attempts to play Gideon to the wall between church and state, the wall between the Fourth Amendment and a surveillance state, and so on.

The good news is that this will be an extremely tough year for the Democrats to lose. But he's giving it the college try by playing the disastrous Republican-Lite card that has continually failed us and which is wholly unnecessary and distressingly disempowering at this time.

And it's labeled as such at AP. It makes no claim to being non-partisan or "objective" in that old-style journalistic sense.

I'm sure you see Keith Olbermann's opining (and daring to pretend to be Murrow) and pretending to be a journalist disturbing as well. Afterall, they're both doing the same thing, only from different perspectives. Except I don't know if MSNBC presents Olbermann's show as pure editorializing, while this piece is clearly opinion.

I do. I'm not happy that journalism has returned to what it was before Ida B. Walls, Ida Tarbell, the other muckrakers, and culminating in Murrow and his noble effort. The failure to remain non-partisan in reporting, and the failure to investgate and report real news, are a major failure of the media. A Constitution-threatening failure, IMO.

But when somebody starts lying and propagandizing, we should call them on their shit, right? Fournier or Olbermann or anyone else? Regardless of their political opinions or value to my issues or candidate or whatever? Doesn't truthfulness have value regardless of where it comes from? I mean, even a blind squirrel finds a nut sometimes.

Isn't the great opportunity here one of shining a light, doing what Wells and Tarbell did, on what has value regardless of the personalities?

Again:

ext is Media Matters’ Eric Boehlert. He refers us to McCainFreeRide.com for the excellent book produced by Media Matters, Free Ride. MM doesn’t use the word “bias,” but there’s a new phenomenon … it goes back to Gore’s press in 1999 which was “really unfair and really weird.” What’s happening online now is potentially dangerous: HRC has gotten dreadful press, not fair, “gotcha,” and so on — there’s a portion of the blogosphere that has ignored that and there’s a portion that has encouraged that.

It’s dangerous because the media criticism has to be consistent and relentless, and we can’t very well say, “You can’t go after our candidates … except this one.” I get nervous about pushback regarding disingenuous coverage - our response needs to be, “You can’t treat Democrats this way.” When people in the left blogosphere are quoting an anonymous Matt Drudge source, it makes me nervous.

Or as I put it in the vernacular:

They’re only upset because Fournier hurt their guy. It’s nothing to do with a media critique, although it may present in that guise. Because where were they in the primaries when worse was done to Hillary? Nowhere.

I don't see what's hard to understand about that argument.

[ ] Very tepidly voting for Obama [ ] ?????. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.

To be honest, every word that you wrote is what I failed to say, but implied, and should have written.

Perhaps our posts dovetail, but, while my approach is really pretty damned limbic. Yours is beauty.

namaste.

--mf

I am exceedingly well aware of the difference between blog commenters and journalists, but thanks for the patronizing effort to educate me. I value intellectual honesty more than almost anything else.

I find the Kos community howling with rage because a conservative journalist spouted conservative talking points to be fall-down funny in a really pathetic way. DKos embodied all that was wrong with PB 1.0 and collectively cheered with undisguised bloodlust every "news" story proffered by "journalists" (often "journalists" with very well-documented histories of CDS) as long as it bashed Hillary and praised Obama. Content and perspective were irrelevant.

Double standards suck no matter who is flashing them around. To me, the DKos community in general pissed away any shred of credibility long ago. They have earned the mockery of others. Hypocrisy is unappealing in anyone even though we all are subject to it (yep, myself included).

No one here is in the slightest bit concerned about McCain's feelings. The real problem is a political culture so driven by marketing and identity that anything other than fawning praise is construed as withering criticism.

Unless you think that things have to be linear, and can't proceed in parallel.

Or if you imagine that another Big Fail, no matter which administration, isn't a very bad thing.

If we don't do this work now, we won't be ready when we're needed. Set up time, eh?

And if your hair is on fire.... Who's stopping you from putting out the fire? Have at it, and post, if you think there's some Tier Two aspect of the campaign that's not being handled by Kos, TPM, et al.

You know what I've had a bellyful of? People saying they don't like stuff, and then not investing their own time to change it. If I want others to allocate my time, then I can return to the cube and get managed.

And now, let me return to the exciting task of handling account approvals.

I have exactly zero interest in telling people how they should vote. You guys can make up you mind on that. At this point, I have to confess to no longer caring (and for someone as politically left and active as I am, it takes A LOT of bullshit to get me to that point of exhaustion)... so, my energy will go elsewhere.

PB2.0, on the other hand, is a collective project regarding how we move forward in terms of progressive blogging, considering that DK was not the only culprit in the poo-swinging hatefest that was the primary (which never ended... the poo-swinging, that is).

Also, there is such a thing as multitasking and I don't see how one automatically excludes the other.

To each his own, I guess.

Go Global!

What you said, Sarah:

We still need to move beyond the keyboard into the handshake phase of the drive to upset the Village and its sycophants in both parties, though.

And I think that has to be local. And we need to work out a way to support each other in our various localities. From an editorial perspective, I see the local action as stories (narratives, content). But one must get out from behind the keyboard to create the story. I hope that PB 2.0 can work out a way for all of us to support each of us in that way.

And:

And like all plans, the PB 2.0 plan, once it smacks head-on into reality, isn’t apt to come away undamaged.

Of course. Just like a business plan. Doesn't mean we shouldn't plan, though.

NOTE Sorry if I was touchy, but you hit a nerve; people allocating my time is a sore spot with me. You put in the hours, though ;-)

[ ] Very tepidly voting for Obama [ ] ?????. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.

I've said that I'll concentrate on the business side of PB2.0. Not just because that's where my interests lie, but because a business has to be flexible to survive and take advantage of its opportunities, and it has to perform or it goes tits up.

By this model, _you must act_ or you face the aforementioned tits-upedness.

I want to build a progressive effort that goes beyond a single event or effort. I want us to create something that moves toward long-term goals using progressive tactics.

I don't think I'm being unreasonable to say, "Hey, honest media critique is a value of a liberal," and calling people on their shit regardless of their political views. A lie is a lie. Spin is spin. A free and responsible press is a goal of mine and since the mainstream media appears to be sniffing glue regularly, someone has to pick up the slack. Someone needs to be an honest broker. That could be us.

So, we can provide solid information, action items, community, resources, and equally important: goals.

Now, I can get my green oven mitt. Would you like me to put that fire out, my friend? I have experience in these matters.

... since now that my bathroom is finished, I have a large and well ventilated place to put the box.

[ ] Very tepidly voting for Obama [ ] ?????. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.