Why Conservative "Media" Deserves To Be Ignored

This is the perfect illustration of why FoxNews along with most other conservative "media" outlets should be ignored by real media outlets.

And I just have to say, PEFECT timing too.

Joe Klein Needs To Read This

Now that Joke Line has beclowned himself over the White House vs FoxNews story perhaps he should read this post from Dan Froomkin. Well actually I am pretty sure that as a Villager in good standing Joke Line won't change his stance because the script says all journos should say the White House is stupid for "picking this fight". But at least he will have some material to site once public sentiment turns and the decision to push back on FoxNews is seen as a smart one in hindsight and as usual he does his usual flip flop with the shift in the journalistic winds.

Are there any good journalists left in the mainstream media?

Joe Klein, Blogger For Swampland, Hates Bloggers

Or I should say left wing bloggers.

You have to check out this ancedote about Joe Klein from Aimai over at No More Mister Nice Blog. Its the way you would imagine a discussion about liberal and progressive bloggers would go with Joke Line but never really thought you would hear about.

Last week I went to a cookout on the beach here with some old friends (Sausages and seafood, but no cocktail weenies!) Every year they do a cookout, and then a birthday party, and for years I've known that one of their guests was Joe Klein. I never mixed it up with him because, after all, well...the opportunity never presented itself and while I'm pretty aggressive in print no one really goes up to someone and picks a quarrel with them, do they? Or maybe they do. Yes, I guess they do. I was standing at the cookout minding my own business when Klein started pontificating for the rubes on how “surprising” and “shocking” it was that Grassley, of all people, should have come out and endorsed the “death panels” lie. I walked up and said “why are you surprised?” [edited to remove typo] to which he, in best pundit debater fashion (never allow yourself to admit you were just posing!), shot back “who says I'm surprised?” I said “well, you did. You just started your lecture saying “Its surprising.”” Its not surprising, the republicans have nothing left to lose and nothing left to gain at this point outside of pleasing the crazy base and attacking Obama and the dems.”

We were off and running. He then said that its true the fringe republicans were “crazy” but perhaps no crazier than the “crazy left” under Bush. I thought he meant the “truthers” so I said “name me one person in congress or the Senate who was as crazy on any topic as these Republican senators and Congressmen who sign on to the birther and deather stuff are now?” Evading this question he said “well, Glenn Greenwald is crazy—he's a civil liberties absolutist.” Now, me, I come from a long line of civil liberties absolutists so I said “I admire Glenn Greenwald's work immensley but it must be very embarrassing for you, of course, because he's been eating your lunch for years.” (!) I think this must be something of a sore point for him. He began shrieking “Glenn Greenwald is EVIL! EVILl!..do you know what he did? He “sicced” his blog readers on my EDITOR and she was going through a DIVORCE at the time.” Really? I said, politely, that was very wrong, if it happened.

“We kept it very quiet” he said, backing off the claim of any real harm and, as a twofer, managing to imply that only those "in the know" had been kept informed.

People around us were clamoring to know what the debate was about so I laid it out, chapter and verse: I explained the Klein was upset because he had been caught out shilling for the Republicans on National Security Matters and on the FISA court legislation in particular and that he was still upset because he'd been held up for ridicule for his absurd statement that there was no problem with the secret Bush programs although he didn't know anything about them. And that this extended to the actual retroactive FISA legislation, which he also said was fine but didn't know anything about. This seemed to inflame things somewhat. Can't see why. He began shrieking at me that he hadn't been wrong, he'd been misled by a “democratic staffer” but really, I just began laughing at that point because “I didn't read the legislation” like “the dog ate my homework” is rather a lame explanation for a grown man, let alone a self described journalist.

I re-iterated that I was a big admirer of Glenn's work and that he had just received the I.F. Stone award for his excellence. That really got Klein's goat and he started screaming that he had been one of Izzy's readers for years and that Glenn was no Izzy, that he was crazily anti-national security which Izzy wouldn't have been, and at any rate I shouldn't talk about things I don't understand and I should realize that Klein has been on the right side of every argument since the Vietnam war.

Yes! I should read his stuff on the Vietnam war!” I said that I was, in fact, one of his readers—that I read his column and his blog and that it was precisely because I did know his history, in detail, that I accepted Glenn's critique of him, which of course has always been extensively documented and linked. And then, in what might be the piece de resistance of this little interaction, he screamed “you don't read me! You read WIKIPEDIA! AND THAT'S LEFTIST.” He then added that he had always been anti war and that I should “read his [Klein's] stuff from 1993." Hmm....1993, were we at war with Iraq then? I rather thought that was a different time, and even a different president. I take it that the rationale behind that bizarre interjection is that, as far as Klein is concerned, most of this is really old history at this point and what he really wants to be talking about is health care reform.

After this the e discussion, such as it was, devolved into the usual journalistic posturing and ranting against “those bloggers” who “don't do research” and who “don't have editors.” (There were many other well respected journalists at this dinner but they don't deserve to be dragged in here) to which I responded “jeezus christ on toast points you can say that to me after it came out today that John Solomon, then of the Washington Post, was writing fawning letters to the White House explaining to them how he could spin the US attorney scandal anyway they wanted? And hellooooo? Judy Miller?” Klein actually backed down on this topic and we agreed that McClatchey had done very good reporting but the main thing I took away from the discussion is that for journalists like Klein the world is divided into practitioners/insiders and totally ignorant outsiders. He was surprised that I brought up the Solomon story, or that I took seriously the Judy Miller issue, because in his world that's really inside baseball. In fact when I pointed out how abysmal the Washington Post's editorial page had been, under Fred Hiatt's tenure, he and another Journalist standing nearby assured me that Fred is an “editorialist” so the ordinary rules don't apply and I don't need to tar the whole paper with his sins. Its as thought they imagine that each story is a stand alone piece and that there's a hard and fast line between opinion and “fact” when every day, and every way, we've seen any pretense to that distinction run right into the ground. Has any adult person thought that since Media Whores Online (of sainted memory?).

Well you at least have to give the man points for consistency. Joke Line has actually come a long way since he first stated blogging at Swampland. He is at least willing to admit every blue moon when he gets something wrong now. But at heart he has this elitist attitude about the mainstream media of which he is a member in good standing in contrast to his readers and liberal and progressive bloggers. He holds himself and his profession up as some kind of gold standard while trying to pooh pooh any instances where he and his industry get the story completely wrong. To this day he won't concede that he screwed up his FISA article, choosing instead to blame everyone but himself. But really that is just the going mindset of Villagers anyway its just kind of amusing to see him verbalize it in an real life in person exchange with one of his readers.

Stick A Fork In Him

I would love to excerpt this whole short post from Joe Klein PWNING that war mongering sonofabitch John Bolton and his weaksauce enablers in the Mainstream Media but that wouldn't apply under fair use, so I will just link to it and strongly encourage you to go check it out.

Almost Admirable: Game Over

You already know where I stand on the Mark Sanford sex scandal and you already know where I stand on those who would so easily try to forgive him because he appeared to "come clean" of his own accord. It was already apparent before now that such a notion was pure fantasy, but now this comprehensive story in The State put the final nail in his political coffin.

Shortly after 5 a.m. Wednesday, Smith went to the airport. Shortly after 6 a.m., she met a surprised Sanford. Smith was the only media member there.

Sanford said he had just arrived from Argentina. He also said he had not been on the Appalachian Trail.

When asked who he had been with in Argentina, the governor cut off the interview.

By 7:30 a.m., thestate.com had broken the news that Sanford had not been on the Appalachian Trail, but in Argentina.

In their morning meeting, State editors decided to immediately inform the governor and his inner circle about the e-mails. .

A reporter called a Sanford staffer, saying the paper had e-mails that outlined an affair between the governor and Maria. Unless Sanford would address the issue privately, The State would have no choice but to ask him — with TV crews filming — if he knew Maria at his press conference that afternoon.

The names of two other women tumbled into the newsroom.

Fearful Sanford’s staffers did not get it — that the paper would ask publicly what Sanford’s relationship was with Maria — a State editor called Davis, Sanford’s former chief of staff.

Davis, a Beaufort lawyer, recently had been elected to the state Senate. When called, he quickly said he no longer worked for Sanford.

The editor said he knew that but wanted to talk with Davis. Sanford had landed from Argentina, and the paper had e-mails about an affair with a woman in Argentina.

The editor told Davis why he thought the e-mails were genuine. They mentioned Coosaw, the Sanford plantation, and Sanford’s love of digging holes; they quoted Bible verses and contained details about Sanford’s known schedule.

And more names of women were coming in over the transom. The total was at three and counting.

“Women?!” Davis responded, sounding incredulous. “Women?!”

The editor repeated that the paper would ask Sanford publicly about Maria with TV cameras running. Jenny Sanford and the couple’s four sons should be spared that image, and it was up to Davis to ensure Sanford’s staffers “got it.”

Davis, who said he was in Beaufort, promised to call Sanford’s staff and call back.

When he called back, Davis said he was driving to Columbia.

Now actually there are some ethical questions you have to ask about "The State" too here. Why were they so intent on giving the Governor a heads up? Why did they go out of their way to make sure Sanford's staff "got it". And even if you buy that they were trying to protect his wife and kids, once the cat was out of the bag, why didn't they ask any questions about the other 3 names that had come into the news room?

Regardless I think its apparent now that Sanford was doing anything noble. He was just taking advantage of the opportunity to come clean that The State granted him when they gave him his "heads up".

"Almost Admirable" Revisited

I know a lot of Villagers, not surprisingly most of them men, are trying their best to excuse South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford for sleeping around on his wife simply because he admitted to it in a press conference. A press conference he HAD to have after he went AWOL for almost a week and an enterprising journalist on a haunch caught him flying back into town from Argentina. You know from my earlier post that I am not buying that particular line of bullshit at all. And now I want all of those "forgiving" MSM types to read this tidbit from a New York Times article on Sanford's wife, Jenny.

Through a spokeswoman, Mrs. Sanford declined requests to be interviewed for this article, but told The Associated Press she learned of her husband’s affair early this year when she found a letter he had written. She told him to end the relationship, but he repeatedly asked permission to visit the woman in Argentina in the months that followed.

“I said absolutely not,” Mrs. Sanford told The A.P. “It’s one thing to forgive adultery. It’s another to condone it.”

Then, last week, when the governor told her he needed time alone to write, she had specifically warned him not to see his mistress. She said she was devastated when he went to meet her in Argentina.

In my earlier blog post I asked these journalists to imagine if it was their wife who did the cheating. But now I would ask them to imagine it was their daughter who was married to Mark Sanford. And after she specifically asked him not to see his mistress while he "needed time alone" he not only went, but planned to be there for 10 days initially and couldn't even find 2 minutes to call his sons for Father's Day.

What he did was disgusting and the people trying to pooh pooh it are just as disgusting in my opinion.

Update: I personally don't think that anybody who watches "Morning Joe" for more than five minutes takes anything Mike Brzezinski says seriously. However on the off chance that a few people do MediaMatters absolutely ANNIHILATES her false equivalency and erroneous contrast between how Republicans and Democrats are treated when they engage in sex scandals.

I swear, she must have been adopted.

Almost Admirable?!

Really Joe Klein?

The Mark Sanford case is a bit different from the others, and almost admirable. Not for him the usual "I made a mistake" dodge, not for him the exploitation of a staffer or a child. This is a guy who clearly fell in love, and seems unable to hide it very well.

Riddle me this Joe. If YOUR wife was carrying on a sexual relationship for over a year and you found out about it and then SHE flew to Argentina so she could get it in with "Rico" one last time on Mother's Day weekend and didn't tell you nor anybody else. And if she ended up having to stand in front of cameras and tell the world that she cheated on you for over a year.....would you find THAT "almost admirable"?

What a load of bullshit is being shoved down our throats. The same Village idiots who wanted President Clinton strung up and beaten because he got head a couple of times are now oh so forgiving and understanding of Governor Sanford because he was "in love".

Yeah well tell that shit to the wife he committed himself to for life.

Tell that to the kids he couldn't even find the time to call on Father's Day while he was with his mistress.

We are talking about a guy who was most recently seen trying to deny his state badly needed stimulus funds. We are talking about a guy who was as holier than thou as you can get when he was voting for President Clinton to be impeached. We are talking about a guy who has spoken out against empathy in recent weeks.

The victims in this story are Jenny Sanford and her kids, not the bastard who ruined their lives.

I won't even get into the Bill Clinton analogies but its absolutely fucking AMAZING that Republicans can totally fuck over their wives and kids and the Villagers NEVER hold it against them. From Newt to Rush to Ensign to Vitter to now Sanford, you damn near have to pull teeth to get MSM types to mention their past transgressions. Hell every single time, and I mean EVERY SINGLE TIME, Joe Klein mentions Newt Gingrich he makes it a point to say he is smart/briliant/very intelligent. But does he ever mention he is a sorry son of a bitch who cheated on every wife he has ever had and brought divorce papers to his first wife while she was in the hospital battling cancer?!

HELL NO.

Give me a break. Mark Sanford is a dick who doesn't believe in empathy, so I am sure as shit not going to spare any of mine for him.

Props When They Are Due

I give Joe Klein tons of grief over at Swampland when he gets it wrong, but this morning on CNN he made up for quite a bit of it. In a stick up the ass discussion about the WhiteHouse Correspondence Dinner last night and Wanda Sykes' performance Klein smacked down wingnut stepford wife reject Amanda Carpenter when she tried to rag on Wanda's jokes about Rush Limbaugh.




Compared to some of the outrageous shit that Rush Limbaugh has said recently on his radio show and on FoxNews, Carpenter's station of choice, Wanda Sykes' jokes were tame. Fuck that fat drug addled bastard. And good on Joe Klein for pointing out the hypocrisy involved in the criticism of Wanda Sykes. If you don't want to hear someone tell jokes then don't invite a comedienne to do a set. The GOP is full of humorless jackasses and Amanda Carpenter represented for all of them this morning on CNN.

Joe Klein Slaughters K Hamm

All I can say is go read the whole thing or just enjoy the excerpt.

Charles Krauthammer, the ultimate bleating-heart neoconservative, is all atwitter over Barack Obama's foreign trip. Where most rational observers saw a significant U.S. triumph, the beginning of our reconciliation with the rest of the world after eight years of stupid bellicosity, destructive threats and empty bluster, Krauthammer sees decline and weakness. Obama admitted past U.S. misbehavior! That is surely a sign of weakness...or maybe, perhaps, a sign of renewed strength? Or maybe, it's just being honest, a quality the Bush Administration eschewed. The Euros chose not to play on Afghanistan? Perhaps that had something to do with the Bush Administration's myopic avoidance of that theater of battle for the past seven years--the Euros, not the heartiest of allies when it comes to warmaking, were left to fend for themselves without any U.S. leadership or much U.S. support and they are aching to leave now. Over the next year, we'll see what effect a renewed US good-faith effort in Afghanistan has when it comes to stiffening the spines of our allies.

snip

And there was--oh. my. God.--the failed North Korean rocket launch. The Gates Defense budget is cutting anti-missile defense systems in Alaska. More Obama wimposity! Except that Gates has decided not to spend tens of billions on an anti-missile system (that doesn't work) to counter a North Korean rockets (that don't work) carrying North Korean atomic bombs (that have, so far, fizzled when tested). The real North Korean threat, created by George W. Bush's first-term ineptness, is the nuclear fuel that was produced in the past six years--fuel that the wildly impoverished North Koreans could sell to terrorists or rogue states (as they sold their nuclear plant design to the Syrians).

snip

The point is that Krauthammer's nonsense--the whole neoconservative project--proved an utter failure during the Bush years and now exists well outside a vast, stable, liberal-moderate consensus on foreign policy that includes most Democrats, the Bush 41 realists and the leading strategists of the U.S. military.

Joe Klein's Moving Tribute To His Friend Ron Silver

You should really go and check it out.

Lies And The Lying Liars That Tell Them

This is an exercise in judgment. Yours. First I want you to read the accounts of Susan Rice's press conference yesterday from a couple different sources. Then I want you to watch the video of the press conference and see if they match up.

From Joe Klein at Time Magazine:

Yesterday, in her first appearance as United Nations Ambassador SusanRice said that the Iranians would have to stop the enrichment of uranium before we began talks with them.

From The AP:

Not since before the 1979 Iranian revolution are U.S. officials believed to have conducted wide-ranging direct diplomacy with Iranian officials. But U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice warned that Iran must meet U.N. Security Council demands to suspend uranium enrichment before any talks on its nuclear program.

Cue the video.

The Enemy of My Enemy

Now that we have the SOFA agreement in Iraq, virtually assuring a pull out of all combat troops, it is time to turn our attention to Afghanistan. In the words of Congressman Elijah Cummings, "This is a mess." When the average citizen views the elected officials as being worse than the Taliban, you know there will not be any quick or easy fixes. Of course everybody can point out the problems in Afghanistan because at this point they are staring us in the face. What is quite troubling to me personally is that I haven't heard a lot of viable solutions. The problem with "Spreading Democracy" is that sometimes you get a result that you don't like. And because the U.S. has basically legitimized any and all democratically elected regimes it makes it a LOT harder to oppose them just based on the fact that we aren't happy that the people of a soverign nation elected them. But in this case when we are already there and there is already chaos (largely from our doing) do we have a moral obligation to continue a fight that truly might be unwinnable just because we picked it in the first place? And what about our obligation to ensure that there is stability in a region where you have two rival countries who both have nuclear weapons stockpiles? With an economic crisis in this country that is unrivaled in the last 40 or 50 years I think its time we started asking some tough questions and perhaps start making some even tougher decisions.

What say you?