The media pundit's pundit. Written by NYC insider Jeff Jarvis, BuzzMachine covers news, media, journalism, and politics.
Wankers of the day
: I wouldn’t use such an infantile headline except to demonstrate that what goes around comes around.
Atrios joins the Washington Post going after Dick Cheney for what he wore at Auschwitz. Hey, there’s plenty of things to go after Dick Cheney for. But the man is a heart patient. What’s so wrong with keeping warm? And are we on the left really reduced to the Mr. Blackwell party? I’ve got it: If we can’t decide who should head the DNC, let’s elect Joan Rivers.
do you really think that was cheney’s only clothing option for keeping warm. I feel like Cheney, who is the vice president in case you hadn’t heard jeff, has a wide variety of more appropriate attire to choose from. and also please don’t say “we on the left”. you are so in bed with the crazies (with the one exception being the FCC and I give you credit for that) you might as well be called the Zell Miller of the internet.”we on the left”, yeah ok Jeff.
He couldn’t find a more appropriate hat than one that said “Staff 2001”? He had to wear a parka with his name embroidered on it?
Did you see the age of the people attending the event? do you think he’s the only one with a serious illness there?
Look, I don’t think this is a huge issue, I don’t want to hear about it anymore from Monday on, but it’s just one more show of how this administration can create absurdity in the most unexpected of places. It’s the absence of class we’ve come to expect from these buffoons.
Congrats to the washington post for writing the piece, showing a rare energy and conviction (I’m surprised they didn’t turn it in to some scandal du jour interviewing some hack democrat then a hack republican for their views).
Surely there is more suitable warm clothing in the world.
You describe the use of “wanker of the day” as infantile. But, to be fair, how would you characterize some of the headlines you’ve used?
Take that, Prof. Pondscum
The Adventures of Prof. Pondscum: The sequel
King Prig
etc, etc.
Gregg, you don’t understand. It’s only “infantile” when someone else does it.
Kind of like musing about about the backgrounds of Iraqi bloggers is “blood libel” worthy of lengthy, bile-filled screeds when someone else does it to Iraq the Model … but just fine when Jeff does it to Salam Pax.
You see, having double standards like this is essential to the preachy narcissism that Jeff peddles here.
Gregg… I’ll put an irony tag in the headline….
(of how this current crop of democrats can create absurdity in the most unexpected of places. It’s the absence of class we’ve come to expect from these buffoons.) You are right, Franky, those Democrats have become so looney that they will stoop to this. They have become a classless group of whiners who offer up no idea or a direction of their own. They just oppose whatever the Republicans do and if all they can find to bitch about is what Cheney wore, that’s good enough for them. Barbara Boxer has now joined the Screw Em Zuningas blog. Sad bunch.
I just hope the majority are like Jeff and not like Scew em. Otherwise the future for Democrats is bleak.
Being Canadian, and having worn parkas when it is cold, I have no idea why people think Cheney’s attire is inappropriate. And I really don’t like Cheney.
Not even voting for Kerry will satisfy those on the left that you are a democrat.
Why do you try to please those people? Some you just can’t please unless you’re to the left of them on everything.
Come to the Republicans. We’ve got a big tent, we can understand why someone might be pro-choice or pro-gay marriage or even pro-union. We don’t have to agree on everything and you’re a lot more likely to find that we agree on stuff you hadn’t thought that we would.
Won’t it be nice to be able to argue with people on your side and not be called a Whatever-In-Name-Only for disagreeing?
Plus the food is a lot better over here.
If you still need to think about it, I’ll let the people who came over here from Atrios give you their side of the story and you can percolate on what they have to say.
I have been reading a on line journal called ” A Soldiers View” the quote below is from it… read the whole thing… it will take you awhile.. notice the dates and the things that happen on those dates… and remembeer it was written as it happened…
http://asoldiersview.com/
Andersen is right; when I get home I need something to remember how well I have it back home.
If you can sleep in a shelter that has temperature regulation you have it better than me.
If the water you drink is at room temperature or colder you have it better than me.
If you can travel in one mile in any direction without an armed escort you have it better than me.
If you don
Thanks for that contribution to the “mountains vs. molehills” ad hoc news judgement monitoring project. It’s sort of a miniature version of Rathergate: maybe Bush went AWOL, but let’s focus on the business at hand, shall we? Yeesh.
This just shows that nothing’s changed. The Democrat battle plan for the last four years has been to boldly sneer at everything. It’s cost them “big time” (as Dick would say), losing disasterously in 2002 and 2004. The lesson learned in 2002 was to sneer even louder, and the lesson learned in 2004 is apparently to sneer louder still.
The “democrat battle plan”? It’s an article in the Washington Post.
But I can’t wait to see Geroge Bush turn up in a Bermuda shirt to a ceremony of Pearl Harbor (maybe one of those baseball caps with “Bikini Inspector” stitched on the front, and a can of beer stuck to the side with a straw leading to his mouth – when you have such class, the possibilities are truly endless)
Jeff:
Didn’t you read Glenn Reynolds? You just said “we on the left.” That means you’re an America-hating traitor, according to the Wingnutty Professor.
http://instapundit.com/archives/020810.php
I can’t wait to hear your reason for not criticizing his Coulterite lies.
Let me guess–because Howard Dean is an asshole?
Not since the faux “fake turkey” scandal has there been such obvious proof that the Bush administration are scum… good work lefties, for exposing this!
I agree with HH. This is a turkey of a controversy. Of more concern is that actions America takes (and is taking under the administration to which Cheney belongs) to prevent another Auschwitz seem also to be out of fashion with most of those appropriately-suited European leaders…and the Cheney parka wankers.
I’m going to start describing myself as “on the right”. Because I’ve got as much to do with the right as Jeff does with the left nowadays.
Oliver:
And what the hell does Cheney’s attire have to do with right or left? What does his coat have to do with human rights or gun control or abortion or social security or education or welfare or health care or…
This is not a matter of right or left. This is a matter of the anticult of personality, politics through the snarky lense of gossip.
If that’s how you define left — and you constantly set yourself up as the definer (or did I miss that election?) — then I’d say left needs a new definition and new definer.
But it has nothing to do with left or right.
What I’m saying here is that concentrating on this bit of trivia on the most serious of days doesn’t make Cheney look bad, it makes us — liberals — look bad.
And, yes, Oliver, I’m a liberal… whether you like it or not. I’m not your kind of liberal. But I take that as a very good sign.
Jeff, you’re the one who talked about what this says about being a liberal. It has nothing to do with the issues you spoke about, but then again neither does John Kerry’s mythical botox or tan, does it?
Jeff, you saying you’re a liberal of any sort at this point is like Bush saying he’s a good leader. The rhetoric doesn’t match the actions. I can only see what you write here, and its endless liberal bashing that only someone on the far right could match.
I don’t set myself up as the arbiter of liberalism. Truth told, many Democrats are to the left of me. But not even Joe Lieberman slams the left as much as you do.
That said, any reaction to your flip flop on exposing the underpinnings of Iraqi bloggers?
I’m glad you removed banned.elke’s comments.
Once again she was incredibly outrageous in her postings. Asking you to actually answer Oliver’s and Atrios’ charges on why it was okay for you to question Salam Pax’s ties to the Baathists and not okay for Eric Alterman to question possible CIA involvement in Iraqi bloggers.
She’s really annoying.
Oh, Jeff… you will never be accepted by the Democrats. Voting isn’t enough. Agreeing on the big things isn’t enough. You have to *HATE*.
That takes up so much energy and it’s all energy wasted at the end of the day.
Come over to us. Yes, we disagree on a lot of things but we agree on the most important of the most important things.
Most importantly: We can take criticism. We can take criticism without believing that you must not be “one of us” for disagreeing.
And the change would be so very small. So many people will never consider you part of who they are and so many people have open arms and are just waiting for you to say “I’d like to sign up”.
Wouldn’t you rather see Oliver as “one of them” than “one of us”?
According to google news, 215 different news sources (not bloggers) representing several foreign countries (at my brief inspection) thought that Cheney and Parka were newsworthy enough to put on their sites.
Why shouldn’t folks discuss on their blogs what 215 different news sources thought were newsworthy? How does that make them wankers?
Also, I note the original news article mentioned that for the Inauguration, also a very cold event, Cheney wore no hat and a black overcoat. Isn’t the contrast worth mentioning and wondering about? This isn’t you or me not having the proper wear. This is our Vice President wearing a ski clothes to what amounts to a funeral service.
Oliver:
I responded yesterday her e because that’s where it was brought up first — in the comments, and because I once tried to register for comments on your site but hit a snag and haven’t bothered since (or maybe I didn’t pass your litmus test).
Yes, the botox story was silly, even moreso. But the difference is that it didn’t become the focus of attention of a story that should have been about the remembrance of the deaths of 6 million innocent souls in the Holocaust. Hmmmm. Genocide or fashion, which should I write about today?
And Oliver, the most loyal liberal will try the hardest to push for improvement of liberalism rather than just swallowing the doctrine of those in charge. You go after Glenn Reynolds for not criticizing what you say is his side, the right, yet you also go after me for criticizing my side, the left. Can’t have your snarcake and eat it, too, Oliver. And, yes, you have set yourself up as the arbiter of liberalism, only I don’t accept your jurisdiction, your honor.
And by the way, what I’m really criticizing here is the Washington Post and, no, that’s not criticizing the left; that’s criticizing my profession and, yes, that means I’m criticizing “my kind” and, yes, I do that often. Does critizing a jouranlist not make me a journalist? That’s your logic, Oliver. I prefer to think that criticizing a journalist and engaging in discussion of that is what helps make journalism stronger.
Gee, any numbskull knows the answer. No one was going to capture Salam Pax for being a Saddam floozy and behead him as they screamed Praise allah.
But to be a CIA operative could get you mutiliated, burned, beheaded, hung from a bridge, or dragged down a main street in Mosul as they praise allah.
Jay:
What was your GoogleNews search? For Cheney and parka I get seven entries, not all critical.
You miss the point… It’s not about Cheney’s attire, it’s about the Holocaust. I don’t care what he wears in either event. This is how certain in the press chose to cover the 60th anniversary of the freeing of Auschwitz. I say that’s trivilialization and bad judgment — especially when you read the snarky tone of the report; it’s not a mention, it’s an obsession. If you want to critize America on such a day, perhaps you’d want to quote Elie Wiesel on how America should have bombed the rail lines leading to Auschwitz. That would be productive criticism. The Cheney fashion report is not.
Jeff, you don’t honestly criticize the left. You parrot the attacks of Reynolds & Co. I deride and decry people like Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Dennis Kucinch, and Ralph Nader. You go after Howard Dean because he was right about the war and you weren’t.
I want improvement on my side, but not simply in response to feckless criticism from the right with no basis in reality. I can’t decide who is and isn’t a liberal, but I sure can call ’em as I see ’em. I think Joe Lieberman is nominally liberal, and your rhetoric makes him appear to be a flaming hippie in contrast.
Re: comments, no I don’t make it easy because otherwise I got too much spam and right wingers who call me racist names. I’ve made an account for you should you want to comment, and emailed you the info.
Click on the link at the bottom about removing omitted results. A lot of these are reprints of the wapo article, but it does indicate (I would think) that some person at that other news organization thought it newsworthy enough to reprint.
Um, the wapo article was in the fashion section, where snark is the rule. (Similar to how I think it is the rule at places like TV Guide, EW, and buzzmachine.com)
Um, with all due respect, I fail to see how commenting on how America should have bombed the lines to Auschwitz 63 years ago is more productive than discussing how our Vice President, who represents us TODAY, should think about how he represents us.
With 214 newspapers agreeing with the wapo, I’d have to say others agree the wapo fashion article’s criticism was relevant to today.
Also getting back to Eric Alterman and your criticism where you agree that you were naive then, I would say I think you are still naive if you think that an organization, the CIA, that made up the slogan, “The Mighty Wurlitzer” to describe how they manipulate the press and national and world opinion and so manipulated actual events on the ground would not consider using blogs to do so.
And in fact with the DHS etc worrying about terrorists and spies communicating with each otehr via email, and by hiding information in the background images of pictures posted on the internet, than it would be bizarre to think that the CIA has overlooked the possibility of using blogs to plug into their mighty wurlitzer.
(btw, google for mighty wurlitzer and cia, it’s interesting stuff.)
So on that point, Eric Alterman is exactly on point. And you were not just calling out for Salam Pax to identify himself, you were linking to an article speculating that Salam Pax was a Baathist and possibly a torturer himself, and this at a time when their were random revenge killings against former baathists.
In the past you’ve railed against pseudonymity saying you could hardly imagine when it was needed, and here was a clear case of how pseudonymity helped a budding journalist practice his craft and inform the world.
And you decried him.
Naive is the most pleasant word for that.
Jeff, you’re wrong to now say you were criticizing the Washington Post because they focused on Cheney’s dress, implicitly suggesting that was it their only coverage. This shows you a list of other stories they did on the topic:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/Search?keywords=auschwitz
And regarding you being a liberal, some liberals are telling you aren’t one, and republicans are telling you that you’re one of them. Now, I would be the last to urge you to have your politics dictated by others, but shouldn’t it at least give you pause for thought?
And it was a first-rate article by a journalist unashamedly expressing an opinion that it was a stupid thing to have done – we need more journalists out there to call this shit as it is.
Uh, Oliver, I wouldn’t talk about parrotting a partyline considering your place of employment and stands: Polly wannna policy? ;-)
Thanks for the login. But did you have to give me the username “former liberal”?
[That’s just a joke, folks, he didn’t really. Don’t want an attack of sarcasmosis.]
here’s the difference about party lines. i’ve never said i’m not a partisan democrat. since day one. i’ve only voted for one republican in my life, and that’s about all the republicans i think i’ll ever vote for.
Jeff…
You aren’t a liberal. Maybe you can call yourself a libertarian.
You are also intellectually dishonest. You have yet to address the hypocrisy you have exhibited with regard to speculating about Salam Pax, nor have you admitted that you lied about the Post’s coverage of Cheney’s completely inappropriate ski bunny outfit at Auschwitz.
Jeff,
How DO you manage to find all these commenters who insist on proving your point?
Oliver writes: “You go after Howard Dean because he was right about the war and you weren’t.”
Really?
“Bush has not made the case for war.
He has made the case that Saddam is a bad guy; we clearly know that. But do we have license to attack any bad guys? No, we don’t have that power and should not want it. It puts us in the position of stage-managing the world; just because we’ve been accused of doing that in the past doesn’t mean we should start doing it now. It puts us in the difficult position of not being able to work with other bad guys (see Pakistan) or of being called out when we do not topple bad guys (see Saudi Arabia or North Korea or China…).
He has not made the case that Saddam is tied to the terror attack on us. If that case could be made, then war would be defined as self-defense, as justice. But the case has not been made, so it’s aggression of one definition or another.
He has not made clear the risk this war will put us under — and it will.
I honestly cannot calculate Bush’s motive: How much of it is about avenging his father’s partial victory and resulting election loss? How much of it is wagging the dog amidst our terrible economy, about which Bush has been ineffective? How much of it is distraction from the failure to arrest the real terrorists who attacked us? How much of it is something we just don’t know? I don’t know.
I support the war against terrorism. I know Saddam is evil. But the two are not yet linked.
Bush has not made the case for war.”
— Jeff Jarvis
Which part does Oliver think was wrong?
Oliver later writes: “Re: comments, no I don’t make it easy because otherwise I got too much spam and right wingers who call me racist names.”
This from the guy who refers to Michelle Malkin as Michelle Magalang in the course of calling her a “buckraker.” Of course, that little smear job is his and his alone, but it does reveal Oliver to have constructed the largest glass blog possible from which to throw his little stinkbombs.
Nevertheless, I implore him to stay focused on the crucial issues of the day, like Cheney’s coat. Maybe that’s the re-branding he’s looking for: “The Democratic Party: Because We Dress Better!”
To be fair, Oliver has one point: “I don’t set myself up as the arbiter of liberalism.”
Damn straight! That’s paul_lukasiak’s job. Don’t you forget it.
It’s pretty darn easy to register at Oliver’s blog. It’s pretty darn easy to post on Oliver’s blog.
It’s just hard to read it without laughing.
gee, Jeff, why did you use a post from October 2002 to imply that you were against the war, when on March 30, 2003, you wrote
It’s not easy being pro-war: a vlog
I’ve just done another video post (vlog), this one about being pro-war…..
just another example of your intellectual dishonesty at work.
As I commented on another blog: When the US Army, dressed in drab green, laced upped combat boots and knit caps under their helmets, that the surviors were concerned with their dress as they were liberated? I doubt it. many of your commentors need to get a grip on life.
When the US Army, dressed in drab green, laced upped combat boots and knit caps under their helmets, that the surviors were concerned with their dress as they were liberated? I doubt it.
here is a ticket for the cluetrain….
there is no comparison.
(and btw, moron, the Russians liberated Auschwitz)
paul,
If you could read, you would have noted that I posted that quote of Jeff’s, not Jeff. And there are many people who may have been less than thrilled with invading Iraq who nevertheless support the war on terror generally and would hope for the best possible outcome once it was launched.
Here’s the text of that videolog:
“It’s not easy being pro-war.
Don’t think for a second that I’m enjoying my membership in the Donald Rumsfeld fan club.
In fact, I think that George Bush did a terrible job making the case for this war — to us and to the world.
Bush screwed up the diplomatic alternative — and the only thing that saves him is that Jacques Chirac screwed it up worse.
And I’m hardly a hawk. I spent most of my life as a Vietnam-induced pacifist. Thanks to a lucky lottery number — the only lottery I’ve ever played — I never had to choose between Canada and jail. Instead, I went on Moratorium marches. I wore peace signs.
But now I’m wearing the American flag — and waving an M-16.
And that is because, on September 11th, men fueled by hate tried to kill me and did kill thousands around me just because of who we are — American — and who we are not — Muslim.
I faced evil that day. I met my generation’s Hitler. And I soon realized that I had no choice but to support force against such a force.
I’m not saying that Saddam Hussein was responsible for that attack. I’m saying that I lost my pacifism that day and so, I now have to make an honest choice about supporting force or not, supporting the President or not, defeating Saddam or not.
And I’ve decided that as with Idi Amin, Pol Pot, Slobodan Milosevic, and Adolf Hitler, we bear a responsibility to defeat tyranny and to free its prisoners.
But do not think that I come to this decision with glee. I am torn apart about resorting to sin to fight sin. I miss the apparent moral clarity of my former anti-war confreres. I dislike the moral smugness of my new pro-war confederates. I was appalled the other day when a newspaper called me “conservative” just because I am not anti-war in my weblog.
Do not paint me with your Dr. Strangelove brush. Do not think that by choosing to support this war in Iraq, I am conservative, or bloodthirsty, or happy about it. This was a hard decision.
It’s not easy being pro-war.”
Of course, paul didn’t want to quote what Jeff actually said, because it makes him look like a petty ideologue. Nice try, troll.
Paul: I supported the war from the first. And I supported it not for Bush’s reasons — which, yes, turned out to be mistaken — but for what I firmly believe are humanitarian — once known as liberal — reasons: defending people’s human rights. We used to be for that, we liberals.
Ever Karl: Thank you so much for that transcription (sorry I talk so fast!).
I have to take issue with this from Oliver’s post about Jeff.
” but what about when Jeff does it? We all remember Iraqi blogger Salam Pax, who was the darling of the right in the march towards the war, but became persona non grata as he had the nerve to criticize Rumsfeld’s botched occupation.”
He was never a “darling” of the right, and got his first Insta-lanche when he called the invasion a colonialist plot.
As for speculation about his background, Tom Drury of the St. Petersburg Times wrote this 2 months before the dates you cite Jarvis on.
“Who is Salam Pax? By his own account, a gay architectural engineer in his late 20s with steady work but an unsteady paycheck. A speaker of Arabic, English and German who has spent half his life outside Iraq and is conflicted about his Muslim roots, more interested in the Tao Te Ching than the Koran. A fan of Bjork and Coldplay and William Burroughs; not a fan of Saddam Hussein or George W. Bush:”
It wasn’t mindless speculation that is as bad as calling the brothers CIA plants with no evidence.
The entire premise of your post is wrong.
links
St Pete Times
Guardian profile
Paul: Don’t go calling people “moron.” It’s infantile and stupid. It’s uncivil. It’s not welcome here. I warned you that I would not tolerate your trolling here. Second warning. What happens on the third? Ask someone named Anne.
Actually, that’s Jeff’s transcription. It was right there on the page paul visited. he could have copied it in a second, just as I did. But trolls don’t care too much for how they misrepressent those they attack.
“And are we on the left really reduced to the Mr. Blackwell party?” No, that will be in 2006. But this is symptomatic of the Democratic party’s obsession with image over substance, as is also represented by its conviction that Michael Moore and John Kerry’s image cost them the election, rather than the party’s positions on the issues.
Sure, the European leaders were impeccably dressed. But Jewish children are being assaulted on their streets, synagogues burned and documentary filmmakers butchered. I’d be happy to see them trade a parka for a committed policy of fighting anti-semitism and muslim violence against their citizens generally.
Yes Paul,
Jeff reserves to himself and his coterie the right to call others pondscum, to use the f word, and to snark. To everyone else, you MUST BE NICE!
He was never a “darling” of the right
Don’t just make stuff up. I was blogging long before that, and trust me, Pax was used by Reynolds & Co. to justify the war.
We used to be for that, we liberals.
We still are. That’s why we are against the war. Some of us still believe that killing people and occupying their country isn’t the way to promote democracy.
I am in favor of military action. I was in favor of removing Saddam from power. So was Howard Dean and most Democrats. What we were and are against is doing it George Bush’s way (1,300+ soldiers and counting, over 10,000 injured and counting). We were right. You were wrong.
And Jeff, you’d have better legs to stand on if you weren’t calling people “Pondscum”.
Most Germans would prefer to forget the Holocaust and are tired of hearing about Nazi crimes during the Third Reich, according to a newly released poll. In the German parliament, the Home Affairs Committee is urging de facto limits o
Oliver, you would have better legs to stand on if you didn’t focus on Michelle Malkin’s ethnicity.
And we would have been so much better off if we had just waited for all of the nations bribed by oil-for-food money to suddenly have a change of heart about military action. Yep.
And we’ll probably never know what was in all those trucks that crossed the Iraqi border into Syria while we were playing Saddam’s game with Jacques & Co. in Turtle Bay.
And I’m still waiting for an explantion from someone who just thinks Bush did this the wrong way as to what that has to do with the Iraqi elections or Cheney’s coat.
Bueller? Bueller?
People who jeopardize the lives of good men for no reason on no basis — pondscum.
People who call people morons — morons.
Oops, I just called him a moron, didn’t I? Yeah, I did.
Jeff took my tinfoil hat!
Say, where did Oliver go? Guess he’s become a drive-by troll now.
Jeff Jarvis, yesterday on his Salam Pax attack from early 2003:
“Salam Pax was being attacked by those who speculated — it’s going around — that he was not real, that he was not in Baghdad, that he was a plant. I was suggesting — naively, I will now fully confess — that he should have revealed his identity to deal with that. The war was over, I thought. Well, that was wrong, and that is why I understand the importance of identity for many people there now.”
Jeff Jarvis, today:
“People who jeopardize the lives of good men for no reason on no basis — pondscum.”
I try to determine where the clueless, naive Jarvis leaves off, and the former tv guide/ew snarky blogger trying to make a buck off of blogging begins.
Jeff, see what you put yourself through?
How much praise would you get from the people who now hold you in contempt for considering yourself on the left if you merely called yourself a conservative?
You would be called open-minded for your views on the FCC, you would be called hip for your knowledge of pop culture, you would be called progressive for your views on religion… Instead of being so stupid and pigheaded, you could be “Pretty smart, for a Republican” and “Pretty open-minded, for a Republican” and “Actually willing to engage in dialogue, for a Republican”.
The Democrats would no longer see you as a betrayer but as someone on the other side with whom they could have, yes, a *CONVERSATION*.
And you know that the Republicans won’t turn you away. We love to talk to people who disagree with us on trivia. We love to philosophize and discuss… and we won’t even call you a hypocrite for having a viewpoint we agree with and one we don’t (because, after all, isn’t that the main reason Oliver calls you a hypocrite?)
Come to us. We’d WELCOME you. The people who hate you now would respect you for not being anywhere near as evil as the rest of us.
And when you criticize Democrats, of course they’ll still call you a hypocrite for not criticizing Republicans but when you criticize stuff like the FCC and censorship of the airwaves, they’ll actually be impressed that you’re making a stand (though, of course, you’ll still be a hypocrite for criticizing Democrats).
It’s so much nicer her. It’s so much more urbane. We have class, over here. Don’t you miss being part of a party that has class?
Jay,
So Jeff admits identity was an issue, has learned from it and objects to baselessly smearing the ITM bloggers as CIA plants. That’s quite an indictment.
BTW, since the trolls that have run away seemed so concerned abut what Jeff wrote about Salam, it should be noted that the blogs to which Jeff linked discussing Salam actually based their conclusions on what Salam wrote in his blog, not on etheric transmissions picked up on the tinfoil hats at MR.
“And are we on the left really reduced to the Mr. Blackwell party? I’ve got it: If we can’t decide who should head the DNC, let’s elect Joan Rivers.”
Brilliant, Jeff!
first off, I would like to apologize for accusing Jeff of EverKarl’s intellectual dishonesty. (and Karl, just because Jeff didn’t drink ALL the Kool-Aid does not justify his support of the war. There was no “humanitarian crisis” in Iraq that required an invasion. Iraq was not Auschwitz, it wasn’t Kosovo, it wasn’t the Sudan.)
secondly….as others have noted, you make a habit of using ad hominems, Jeff. As do many of your wingnut readers who don’t get called on it. I call someone a “moron” because he thinks that the USA liberated Auschwitz (and lets face it, anyone who is that chauvinistic that he ignored all the news reports in the last few days that SAID that the Russian’s liberated Auschwitz sixty years ago deserves to be called more than a “moron”).
However, feel free to ban me for doing the EXACT same thing that you and your supporters do all the time. It would be just one more example of your overwhelming hypocrisy and intellectual dishonesty.
“I’ve got as much to do with the right as Jeff does with the left nowadays.”
I always figured you ate with both hands.
paul,
I didn’t know there was a statute of limitations on genocide. Thanks for the update.
So Jeff admits identity was an issue, has learned from it and objects to baselessly smearing the ITM bloggers as CIA plants. That’s quite an indictment.
of Jeff, perhaps.
because what Jeff was initially upset about was the fact that the NYTimes identified the Fadhil brothers by their full names. He ranted and raved over that….until it was pointed out that not only were the names of the brothers public knowledge, he had identified them himself by their full names.
The REALITY is that suggesting that the Fadhil brothers are being funded by the CIA places them in no more danger than what they have to say does. Anyone in Iraq who supports the Bush regime and its objectives is at great risk — look at the number of Iraqi Guardsmen, police, and poll workers who have been killed by the insurgents. It is completely dishonest to suggest that speculation about CIA funding enhances the danger that the Fadhil brothers have placed themselves in (and for which they are being nicely rewarded–by Iraqi standards–by the people who want people like the brothers to say what they want to hear.).
“The REALITY is that suggesting that the Fadhil brothers are being funded by the CIA places them in no more danger than what they have to say does.”
Oh. I didn’t get it until paul put it IN CAPS. It makes sense now.
Funny that the ITM guys don’t see it that way, but paul would know.
Paul gets all bent out of shape over the Russians and Auschwitz, but that wasn’t really the point. Try this paul – Do you think the prisoners at Dachau cared what the American soldiers were wearing?
I didn’t know there was a statute of limitations on genocide. Thanks for the update.
There isn’t. But if the USA is going to send its children off to die, and spend hundreds of billions of dollars to prevent genocide, it should probably spend it where genocide is occurring, rather than where mass killings were taking place a decade ago.
And if saving innocent lives is the goal, then why is Bush only proposing to spend $15 billion over 5 years to combat AIDS in underdeveloped countries…while he is spending ten times that much in less than half that time in Iraq (not to mention the lives of the Americans and Iraqis who have died because of this stupid war…)
In other words, there is nothing more hypocritical than those who claim that there is some kind of “humanitarian” mission going on in Iraq.
What Jeff doesn’t seem to get is that it isn’t the fact that he criticizes Democrats and liberals.
It’s that he critizes ONLY Democrats and liberals. Oh, and Michael Powell.
What kind of assumptions can one make about someone like that?
Why not even a weak “I disagree” when Professor McCarthy launches a broadside like he did yesterday?
Apparently, in Jeff’s mind, it’s worse to criticize Dick Cheney’s parka than to call everyone on the left an America-hating traitor who celebrated 9/11 and support Osama bin Laden.
Is that the opinion of someone who can honestly describe himself as “on the left?” Jeff’s the only person ‘on the left’ who thinks so.
The old “we aren’t doing this, so we can’t do that” dodge. I thought paul could do better than that. Same for the “sending the children off to die” trope. Last time I checked the military did not accept children. They are adults; they volunteered; they overwhelmingly support the mission.
All over the net there are Iraqis quoted about the election — most seem to see it as humanitarian. But paul would know better.
I am in favor of military action. I was in favor of removing Saddam from power. So was Howard Dean and most Democrats. What we were and are against is doing it George Bush’s way (1,300+ soldiers and counting, over 10,000 injured and counting). We were right. You were wrong.
You were right? Your way of removing Saddam would have taken another twelve years to accomplish any results.
And a majority of those soldiers you’re so concerned about happen to be very aware of the cost of what they’re doing in Iraq. You make it sound like we’re feeding them into shredders.
Geek wrote:
“What Jeff doesn’t seem to get is that it isn’t the fact that he criticizes Democrats and liberals.
It’s that he critizes ONLY Democrats and liberals. Oh, and Michael Powell.
What kind of assumptions can one make about someone like that?”
What Geek doesn’t seem to get is that Jeff has been calling James Dobson and Focus on the Family religious right-wing nutjobs. And blasting Brent Bozell and the Parents’ Television Council. None of whom are liberals. All within the past couple of weeks.
So the assumption I must make about Geek is that he doesn’t know what he’s writing about.
Thanks for the air cover, EverKarl.
I have also criticized the administration’s lack of planning and bad execution of the aftermath to war.
I was very critical of Tom Ridge and of our security.
I believe that Bush did jackcrap nothing about the health care crisis.
I think that his education policy will be a disaster in the longrun (all testing, no substance).
I am for gun control and pro choice and against the tax cuts and …
But then, I don’t need to justify myself to you.
This happens both ways. One day, I piss off the conservatives, the next day I piss off the liberals. One day, I’m brought on TV to argue with Buchanan and Medved, the next day to argue with Alterman.
I’m not your liberal. I’m not your monkey. I think for myself. Try it sometime.
Ah, but Jeff… the people that you consider your brethren on the left (but who do not consider you their brother) see those positions of yours as “gimmes”. Of course anyone with even a shred of common sense or decency would say that they were for gun control and be pro-choice and be against the tax cuts and would criticize Tom Ridge and would hate the NCLB act and would think that the planning and followup to the war was perfectly awful.
Of course. *EVERYBODY* has *THOSE* positions.
What is interesting is that you criticize Democrats too.
That makes you a hypocrite and a hypocrite forever.
Come over to us. We welcome different opinions. Hey, there are a lot of people over here that actively want Dobson and Falwell to go the hell away.
You could do a better job of criticizing them from over here, don’t you think? People might listen to dissent rather than yet another democrat complaining about Dobson.
And it’s not like anyone over there calls you “brother” anymore.
It only hurts for a short, short while. After that, you won’t believe that you hesitated for so long.
But don’t take my word for it. Keep asking Oliver what real democrats think of people like you. He’ll tell you. You’d be far more welcome with us. And your positions might even result in the party changing.
The nerve of the man, when surely bear-skin robes and a coon-skin hat were the obvious protocol!
Thanks to all for the previous citation of the number of papers covering this yawner. When someone asks “what leftist media,” I can show them. This story is the epitome of “style over substance.”
Wow, if the attacks on Jarvis as not being “left enough” and whether it was appropriate for the Vice President to wear a parka are what democrats want to fight about these days, its pretty obvious that Republicans will simply continue to consolidate their power in this country. Mehlman must be smiling like a little kid at Christmas over this insanity.
Maybe his bags got lost. Seriously, it has to happen to the VP once in while.
Probably got his Jackson Hole vacation bag mixed up with his “state occasion” bag.
Staff 2001 – that had to be borrowed.
Jeff, are you aware that the Wingnutty Professor is using your posts as indirect proof of his claim that the left, as a whole, hates America and celebrated 9/11?
Do you agree that Ward Churchill is representative of the left, or do you find that statement absurd?
Surely you have an opinion on that. Reynolds is implying that you agree with him. Silence indicates assent here.
Jeff, are you aware that the Wingnutty Professor is using your posts as indirect proof of his claim that the left, as a whole, hates America and celebrated 9/11?
Now if that isn’t a deconstructive reinterpretation I don’t know what is. I am boggled trying to follow…
From Oh-so-understanding Republican:
Come over to us. We welcome different opinions. Hey, there are a lot of people over here that actively want Dobson and Falwell to go the hell away.
Yes, but Dobson and Falwell will never go away. They and their ilk own the Republican Party.
And no, they don’t welcome different opinions. Just ask Paul O’Neill, Christie Whitman and Colin Powell.
Yes, Geek, Ward Churchill unfortunately does represent too large a segment of the Left. He has lots of looney company that the Left and all America should be ashamed to be associated with.
Even your making the charge against Reynolds just goes to show how out of touch with reality you are–I read what he wrote and then I wondered if you read the same thing.
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=16711
It’s people like Churchill that me switch from a Democrat to a Republican.
People who jeopardize the lives of good men for no reason on no basis — pondscum.
So, taking in your comments about Salam Pax, I guess that makes you pondscum too? I’m just trying to grok your parameters here.
Oliver,
Jeff addressed that yesterday. Jay Scott notes it above, around 7:52.
At least Jeff didn’t focus on Juan Cole’s ethnicity, the way you do with Michelle Malkin.
Moreover, if you read Jeff’s most recent post, it would be easy to figure out that Jeff’s probably asleep now, before his 6 a.m. shift at MSNBC. Or maybe you had to wait until he fell asleep to do your pathetic little drive-by stinkbombing.
PS: I’m really enjoying the smiling, cheering Iraqis going into the polling booths. How ’bout you?
“They and their ilk own the Republican Party.”
But, but… I thought the eeeevilll NEOCONS owned the GOP. Or maybe Haliburton! and Big Business! owned the GOP. Or maybe the Military Industrial Complex owned the GOP. Or maybe Richard Melon Scaife owned the GOP. Or was it the country-club set that owned the GOP. Wait, didn’t the NRA own the GOP? Don’t the libertarian think-tanks secretly control the GOP? So many different people own the GOP… so many different opinions.
They certainly don’t accept some opinions. Just ask Trent Lott, or Pat Buchanan, or David Duke.
“So, taking in your comments about Salam Pax, I guess that makes you pondscum too? I’m just trying to grok your parameters here.
Uh. Just what group in Iraq threated to sacrificially slaughter people for being anti-Bush and anti-Saddam? Too nuanced for you?
“At least Jeff didn’t focus on Juan Cole’s ethnicity, the way you do with Michelle Malkin.
Karl, you missed the nuance. There is nothing to see when a Redskins fanatic is derogatory about someone else’s racial background, and has a hair-trigger on their own. No irony at all. I’m sure it is appreciated on the Pine Ridge Reservation.
Thanks, Eric, I’ll keep that in mind!
Jeff,
I bet Cheney’s clothing at Auschwitz will get more press and moral indignation on the left side of the blogosphere then the current genocide in Sudan ever will.
Erik Anondson
Oliver,
I am in favor of military action. I was in favor of removing Saddam from power. So was Howard Dean and most Democrats. What we were and are against is doing it George Bush’s way (1,300+ soldiers and counting, over 10,000 injured and counting). We were right. You were wrong.
Oh, this is good. Oliver favors military action to remove Saddam, but unlike George Bush and the wacky neocons, the super-secret Democrat PLAN would have been been costless for America.
Here was the PLAN. John Kerry was going to apply his superior diplomatic talents and exploit his relationships with unnamed foreign leaders so that they would sacrifice their national blood and treasure to remove Saddam so that we didn’t have to sacrifice ours. Got that?
And if that PLAN didn’t work because Saddam had bought off all those unnamed foreign leaders who were in on the PLAN, George Soros could outbid Saddam and switch their allegiance. Of course the only problem with that PLAN is that it wouldn’t leave Soros any money to pay Oliver Willis to troll around in other people’s comments and decree who is and isn’t a liberal.
Dumbass.
‘pondscum’?
Oliver’s delicate sensibilities are sent all atwitter … no …
aflutter? … no …
jiggling? … yes ..
are sent all all jiggling because Jeff uses the term ‘pondscum’ to describe Juan Cole?
Given the number of times Oliver’s brought this up on his own “blog” and on in this comments thread, apparently so.
Sad.
Really sad.
Wankerish, almost.
But, but… I thought the eeeevilll NEOCONS owned the GOP. Or maybe Haliburton! and Big Business! owned the GOP. Or maybe the Military Industrial Complex owned the GOP. Or maybe Richard Melon Scaife owned the GOP. Or was it the country-club set that owned the GOP. Wait, didn’t the NRA own the GOP? Don’t the libertarian think-tanks secretly control the GOP? So many different people own the GOP… so many different opinions.
If you drew a Venn diagram of all these groups, it would be a series of concentric circles.
They certainly don’t accept some opinions. Just ask Trent Lott
Do you mean the Republican senator from Mississippi? The chairman of Bush’s Inaugural committee? If they really wanted to discount his opinions, I doubt they would put him in charge of the inaugural.