Sunday, October 25, 2009
Saturday, October 24, 2009
ACTUALLY, AN IDEAL JOB FOR THE MAINSTREAM PRESS -- EXCEPT THEY'D SCREW IT UP
Steve Benen looks at this week's "Obama thesis" story and sees it as yet another reason why the mainstream press shouldn't be trying to pursue stories percolating in the right-o-sphere. I feel just the opposite: it's a good argument for a mainstream-press focus on such stories ... at least in theory. I agree that it probably wouldn't work in practice.
Here's what happened: Back in August, Brian Lancaster at the blog Jumping in Pools posted an alleged excerpt from Barack Obama's senior thesis at Columbia, the first ten pages of which, Lancaster said, had been given to Joe Klein of Time "for an upcoming special edition about the President." The thesis, as described to Lancaster, contained some rather un-thesis-like language ("In Los Angeles and New York, the poor reach to me with bleary eyes and all I can do is sigh"). It contained some language that seemed more appropriate to a wheat-pasted political flyer on a lamppost: ("Entitled Aristocracy Reborn, this paper chronicled the long struggle of the working class against, as Obama put it, 'plutocratic thugs with one hand on the money and the other on the government.'") And it insulted the Constitution in, well, precisely the way right-wingers would assume Barack Obama might have back in his undergraduate days (or now, for that matter):
... The so-called Founders did not allow for economic freedom. While political freedom is supposedly a cornerstone of the document, the distribution of wealth is not even mentioned. While many believed that the new Constitution gave them liberty, it instead fitted them with the shackles of hypocrisy.
Michael Ledeen learned about this from a reliable source -- somebody on Twitter. He didn't look at the date of the Jumping in Pools post, didn't notice that JiP describes many of its posts as "satire," and didn't check with Joe Klein, or even Google the passage to read how it was described by Klein in Time (or even to determine whether any "special edition" of this kind had been published since August). He just ran with it, in a Pajamas Media post. Rush Limbaugh ran with it also.
Klein pointed out that none of this was true. Learning he'd been stupid and gullible, Ledeen backtracked (though he stupidly described the quotes as "plausible"). Limbaugh made similar noises.
In a better world, this would be a great story for the mainstream press. It could go in the slot usually reserved for the bank robber who writes his note to the teller on an envelope with his home address on it -- y'know, not "The World's Dumbest Criminals," but "The World's Most Gullible Political Polemicists."
Or maybe the mainstream press could just regularly fact-check kerfuffles from the non-traditional media, the way campaign ads re regularly fact-checked. Done right, this would be a service -- and would be quite revealing. There'd be some fringy left-wing theories to be debunked, but most of them would come from way, way off the beaten path. Other subjects of debunking would come from ideologically unaffiliated kooks like Alex Jones -- again, far off on the fringes.
The right-wing stuff, by contrast, would come from "respectable" figures, with direct ties to the GOP and the conservative mainstream. And there'd be much, much more lunacy coming from the right. It would be good for America to have that pointed out on a regular basis.
That's what we'd learn if the press did this debunking correctly. Alas, what would really happen, in all likelihood, is that the debunkers would desperately seek "balance," so they'd make sure it seemed as if the wackaloon quotient was roughly equivalent across the political spectrum.
Still, in a better world, this could be done properly. It would be a service to America -- and an embarrassment to the right and the GOP.
Steve Benen looks at this week's "Obama thesis" story and sees it as yet another reason why the mainstream press shouldn't be trying to pursue stories percolating in the right-o-sphere. I feel just the opposite: it's a good argument for a mainstream-press focus on such stories ... at least in theory. I agree that it probably wouldn't work in practice.
Here's what happened: Back in August, Brian Lancaster at the blog Jumping in Pools posted an alleged excerpt from Barack Obama's senior thesis at Columbia, the first ten pages of which, Lancaster said, had been given to Joe Klein of Time "for an upcoming special edition about the President." The thesis, as described to Lancaster, contained some rather un-thesis-like language ("In Los Angeles and New York, the poor reach to me with bleary eyes and all I can do is sigh"). It contained some language that seemed more appropriate to a wheat-pasted political flyer on a lamppost: ("Entitled Aristocracy Reborn, this paper chronicled the long struggle of the working class against, as Obama put it, 'plutocratic thugs with one hand on the money and the other on the government.'") And it insulted the Constitution in, well, precisely the way right-wingers would assume Barack Obama might have back in his undergraduate days (or now, for that matter):
... The so-called Founders did not allow for economic freedom. While political freedom is supposedly a cornerstone of the document, the distribution of wealth is not even mentioned. While many believed that the new Constitution gave them liberty, it instead fitted them with the shackles of hypocrisy.
Michael Ledeen learned about this from a reliable source -- somebody on Twitter. He didn't look at the date of the Jumping in Pools post, didn't notice that JiP describes many of its posts as "satire," and didn't check with Joe Klein, or even Google the passage to read how it was described by Klein in Time (or even to determine whether any "special edition" of this kind had been published since August). He just ran with it, in a Pajamas Media post. Rush Limbaugh ran with it also.
Klein pointed out that none of this was true. Learning he'd been stupid and gullible, Ledeen backtracked (though he stupidly described the quotes as "plausible"). Limbaugh made similar noises.
In a better world, this would be a great story for the mainstream press. It could go in the slot usually reserved for the bank robber who writes his note to the teller on an envelope with his home address on it -- y'know, not "The World's Dumbest Criminals," but "The World's Most Gullible Political Polemicists."
Or maybe the mainstream press could just regularly fact-check kerfuffles from the non-traditional media, the way campaign ads re regularly fact-checked. Done right, this would be a service -- and would be quite revealing. There'd be some fringy left-wing theories to be debunked, but most of them would come from way, way off the beaten path. Other subjects of debunking would come from ideologically unaffiliated kooks like Alex Jones -- again, far off on the fringes.
The right-wing stuff, by contrast, would come from "respectable" figures, with direct ties to the GOP and the conservative mainstream. And there'd be much, much more lunacy coming from the right. It would be good for America to have that pointed out on a regular basis.
That's what we'd learn if the press did this debunking correctly. Alas, what would really happen, in all likelihood, is that the debunkers would desperately seek "balance," so they'd make sure it seemed as if the wackaloon quotient was roughly equivalent across the political spectrum.
Still, in a better world, this could be done properly. It would be a service to America -- and an embarrassment to the right and the GOP.
Friday, October 23, 2009
Just A Suggestion? Poker: Not Your Game.
I don't find Talking Points Memo all that reliable. They love the play by play too much, and their headlines are frequently misleading. But this story is all over the net tonight and, as usual, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. On the one hand we have unequivocal statements from the White House that they not only support the Public Option --they want the Public Option. On the other hand we have Rahm Emmanuel et al sitting on Harry Reid's shoulder throughout these negotiations without, apparently, using any of their persuasive skills on the wobbling conservative Democrats or Snowe and Collins. What is Rahm's function in this story if Obama and Reid are agreed on the Public Option (per their public statements?). Rahm only makes sense in this picture if, in fact, the White House is pressuring Reid to take a watered down, fake, "trigger" proposal simply to attract Snowe's vote on Cloture.
But why does Snowe have any credibility at all at this point--she has been consistent in one thing only: demanding that her demands be met, and then reneging on even implied promises to consider voting with the Democrats. Furthermore, her vote on Cloture is, as millions have pointed out already, meaningless--she could vote for cloture on a weaker bill and still oppose it on the floor. In fact, she probably will. Why should her vote on cloture be so important that the rest of our caucus is prevented from voting for a stronger bill?
I am reminded of the Simpson's episode (Season 6, Episode 17) in which Homer tries to make a fortune by cornering the market on Pumpkins just before Halloween. He watches the price rise and rise as Halloween approaches, but fails to sell his pumpkins when demand is high. My problem (and ours) is that I'm not sure whether Homer, in this scenario, is Obama or Snowe.
aimai
I don't find Talking Points Memo all that reliable. They love the play by play too much, and their headlines are frequently misleading. But this story is all over the net tonight and, as usual, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. On the one hand we have unequivocal statements from the White House that they not only support the Public Option --they want the Public Option. On the other hand we have Rahm Emmanuel et al sitting on Harry Reid's shoulder throughout these negotiations without, apparently, using any of their persuasive skills on the wobbling conservative Democrats or Snowe and Collins. What is Rahm's function in this story if Obama and Reid are agreed on the Public Option (per their public statements?). Rahm only makes sense in this picture if, in fact, the White House is pressuring Reid to take a watered down, fake, "trigger" proposal simply to attract Snowe's vote on Cloture.
But why does Snowe have any credibility at all at this point--she has been consistent in one thing only: demanding that her demands be met, and then reneging on even implied promises to consider voting with the Democrats. Furthermore, her vote on Cloture is, as millions have pointed out already, meaningless--she could vote for cloture on a weaker bill and still oppose it on the floor. In fact, she probably will. Why should her vote on cloture be so important that the rest of our caucus is prevented from voting for a stronger bill?
I am reminded of the Simpson's episode (Season 6, Episode 17) in which Homer tries to make a fortune by cornering the market on Pumpkins just before Halloween. He watches the price rise and rise as Halloween approaches, but fails to sell his pumpkins when demand is high. My problem (and ours) is that I'm not sure whether Homer, in this scenario, is Obama or Snowe.
aimai
LONG-GAME STRATEGY REGARDING FOX?
I suppose, if the Obama White House is playing its usual long game, then one reason for the war with Fox News is to inspire his enemies to overreach angrily -- more or less what Bill Clinton often managed to do with his enemies, notably with the guy who shut down the government and whined about his seat on Air Force One, Newt Gingrich. Via Politico, this, I guess, is a hint of what Team Obama's hoping for:
Friends and associates are encouraging Fox News chief Roger Ailes to jump into the political arena for real by running for president in 2012, top sources tell POLITICO.
"Ailes knows how to frame an issue better than anybody, and that's what we need now," says one Ailes friend who is encouraging the Fox founder, chairman and CEO to seek the Republican nomination to run against President Barack Obama.
Ailes, 69, has an aggessive, winning personality that made Fox News a huge success -- and a huge target for liberal critics....
I think it's safe to assume that Ailes himself is behind this story. (I imagine him thinking, "If he's going to push me around at my job, I'm gonna take his fuckin' job.") This particular outburst is harmless -- but if the White House is inspiring a big burst of testosterone in Ailes, and in the rest of the Foxsters, maybe they're going to be motivated to do something that's excessive in a non-shrewd way, i.e., in a way that goes over the line even by the degraded standards of decency Fox has so successfully managed to define down. To use a dreaded sports metaphor, Obama may be hoping to draw a flagrant foul. I don't know what would qualify as flagrant in this environment, but the Foxsters may show us soon.
By the way, I love that bit about Ailes's "winning personality." I suppose that's what was on display back in 1992 when he said of the then-Democratic presidential nominee's wife,
"Hillary in an apron is like Michael Dukakis in a tank."
Charming.
I suppose, if the Obama White House is playing its usual long game, then one reason for the war with Fox News is to inspire his enemies to overreach angrily -- more or less what Bill Clinton often managed to do with his enemies, notably with the guy who shut down the government and whined about his seat on Air Force One, Newt Gingrich. Via Politico, this, I guess, is a hint of what Team Obama's hoping for:
Friends and associates are encouraging Fox News chief Roger Ailes to jump into the political arena for real by running for president in 2012, top sources tell POLITICO.
"Ailes knows how to frame an issue better than anybody, and that's what we need now," says one Ailes friend who is encouraging the Fox founder, chairman and CEO to seek the Republican nomination to run against President Barack Obama.
Ailes, 69, has an aggessive, winning personality that made Fox News a huge success -- and a huge target for liberal critics....
I think it's safe to assume that Ailes himself is behind this story. (I imagine him thinking, "If he's going to push me around at my job, I'm gonna take his fuckin' job.") This particular outburst is harmless -- but if the White House is inspiring a big burst of testosterone in Ailes, and in the rest of the Foxsters, maybe they're going to be motivated to do something that's excessive in a non-shrewd way, i.e., in a way that goes over the line even by the degraded standards of decency Fox has so successfully managed to define down. To use a dreaded sports metaphor, Obama may be hoping to draw a flagrant foul. I don't know what would qualify as flagrant in this environment, but the Foxsters may show us soon.
By the way, I love that bit about Ailes's "winning personality." I suppose that's what was on display back in 1992 when he said of the then-Democratic presidential nominee's wife,
"Hillary in an apron is like Michael Dukakis in a tank."
Charming.
APOCALYPSE NOW, RIV VU
New York's a fairly liberal city, but there's a thriving market here for a kind of steely-eyed-rocket-man hero porn -- breathless articles about titans of business, particularly the real-estate business (which is an absurdly large part of the local economy).
So The New York Observer, which used to be a rather Salon-like weekly but is now literally half real-estate porn, is responding to a real-estate story with words such as "apocalypse" and "seismic." What's going on? This might be a bit confusing for you non-New Yorkers, but here goes:
Speyers Dealt Tremendous Hit as Court Rules for Tenants at Stuy Town
In a decision with seismic implications for Stuyvesant Town and property owners throughout the city, the state's top court has ruled against real estate giant Tishman Speyer on a far-reaching rent regulation lawsuit, declaring the landlord had no right to deregulate some 4,440 apartments.
In a 4-2 decision, the Court of Appeals upheld an appellate ruling that said Tishman Speyer was not allowed to take apartments out of the rent stabilization program at the 11,000-unit complex because it was accepting a tax incentive meant to encourage renovations. The ruling is a sharp reversal of the way the law has been interpreted for years, and even the New York State government previously advised landlords who accepted the tax incentive, called J-51, that they were permitted to deregulate apartments....
So: we have a law here that allows people to stay in apartments they've rented at regulated rates -- but at a certain point, if those tenants leave (or are legally forced out), the rents can rise to (strikingly high) market rates. This court ruling says that if you take the J-51 tax abatement, you can't deregulate. You have to keep the rents at rates that are still preposterously high by national standards, but are a pittance by local standards.
So that's the "apocalypse" -- something bad has actually happened to really rich real estate moguls.
How rich? Jerry Speyer of Tishman Speyer is worth $1.5 billion, according to Forbes. (Ah, but he was worth $2 billion two years ago! Weep for him!)
Oh, and he and Rob, his son and partner, don't even have much skin in this game, and have already cashed in to some extent, according to the Observer:
According to a person familiar with the financing structure, Tishman Speyer and its affiliates put only $112 million of equity into the deal. They also have taken an untold amount in fees for managing the property, likely worth tens of millions.
And Tishman Speyer did not mortgage any of their other holdings for the deal. That means their empire, which includes Rockefeller Center and the Chrysler Building, seems safe.
Still, the Speyer name is certain to be scarred.
Oh, boo hoo!
Apparently the Speyer name is going to be scarred by this apocalyptic, seismic ruling in favor of tenants -- not by the Speyers' own lousy deal-making. You see, they and their partners bought the building at the top of the market for $5.4 billion; even before this ruling, it was being valued at less than $2 billion. It's not just the recession -- they thought they could put legal pressure on rent-regulated tenants, drive a lot of them out, and cash in on a pile of now-unregulated apartments ... but, alas for them, tenants know the law, and know how to hire lawyers of their own, and not nearly enough tenants were evicted to make this deal worthwhile for the owners.
What an apocalypse.
So we're supposed to weep for the Speyers and their partners. Some of them, to be sure, may actually be on the hook for a lot of money. That's tragic because, see, even though these titans are the manly, risk-taking heroes of our age, and have been ever since Reagan walked the earth, they're never actually supposed to fail.
The New York Times is, at least for half a sentence, even more breathless in its assessment of what this all means:
Real estate moguls feared the news would cripple their industry....
Oh, please. The big money in residential real estate is in co-ops, not rentals -- and sales (here in Manhattan, at least) went up between 46% and 69% in the third quarter of 2009. Prices are still down, but they're a wee bit high even yet:
Studio apartment prices fell 6 percent from a year earlier to a median of $399,000.... One-bedrooms dropped 11 percent to $645,000; two-bedrooms fell 23 percent to $1.18 million and three-bedrooms dropped 41 percent to $2.25 million.
Yes, folks, those are the median prices. And, of course, with Wall Streeters on track to take in record earnings in 2009, these numbers have nowhere to go but up. (Wall Street and real estate largely drive the local economy.)
Elsewhere, the Times story adds words like "devastating" and "potentially crippling" to describe how this affects the wheeler-dealers behind this deal.
Later in the story, a tenant is quoted by the Times who until this ruling was facing a 26% rent increase; he might have found that devastating, especially in this economy, but the word is never used in New York in reference to jacked-up rents -- that's just business as usual.
Reason's blog uses this story as an opportunity to take a libertarian swipe at the city's rent law:
The real bad part is the lack of freedom it gives to the building owners--and the lack of incentive to provide apartments for all future New Yorkers that will create widespread aggravation and shortages down the line.
Dude, have you been here lately? Or ever? There's a tremendous amount of building going on (although somewhat less now -- hey, but that's a response to the conditions of the marketplace.) The real-estate industry can't stop building; the only thing it can't seem to provide is housing that's affordable.
And yes, I know even some liberals (e.g., Atrios) dislike rent stabilization. They say it's a horrible system -- people pay wildly disproportionate rents for similar apartments. Well, yes, it's the worst possible system ... except for all the others. It's what's kept at least some middle-class people in town, where we can do the scut work that keeps wealthy people wealthy. Overturn the rent laws and there'd be a mass middle-class exodus from the city. Libertarian pipe dreams aside, nothing's going to motivate the moguls to build affordable housing. A lousy solution to that problem is better than none.
New York's a fairly liberal city, but there's a thriving market here for a kind of steely-eyed-rocket-man hero porn -- breathless articles about titans of business, particularly the real-estate business (which is an absurdly large part of the local economy).
So The New York Observer, which used to be a rather Salon-like weekly but is now literally half real-estate porn, is responding to a real-estate story with words such as "apocalypse" and "seismic." What's going on? This might be a bit confusing for you non-New Yorkers, but here goes:
Speyers Dealt Tremendous Hit as Court Rules for Tenants at Stuy Town
In a decision with seismic implications for Stuyvesant Town and property owners throughout the city, the state's top court has ruled against real estate giant Tishman Speyer on a far-reaching rent regulation lawsuit, declaring the landlord had no right to deregulate some 4,440 apartments.
In a 4-2 decision, the Court of Appeals upheld an appellate ruling that said Tishman Speyer was not allowed to take apartments out of the rent stabilization program at the 11,000-unit complex because it was accepting a tax incentive meant to encourage renovations. The ruling is a sharp reversal of the way the law has been interpreted for years, and even the New York State government previously advised landlords who accepted the tax incentive, called J-51, that they were permitted to deregulate apartments....
So: we have a law here that allows people to stay in apartments they've rented at regulated rates -- but at a certain point, if those tenants leave (or are legally forced out), the rents can rise to (strikingly high) market rates. This court ruling says that if you take the J-51 tax abatement, you can't deregulate. You have to keep the rents at rates that are still preposterously high by national standards, but are a pittance by local standards.
So that's the "apocalypse" -- something bad has actually happened to really rich real estate moguls.
How rich? Jerry Speyer of Tishman Speyer is worth $1.5 billion, according to Forbes. (Ah, but he was worth $2 billion two years ago! Weep for him!)
Oh, and he and Rob, his son and partner, don't even have much skin in this game, and have already cashed in to some extent, according to the Observer:
According to a person familiar with the financing structure, Tishman Speyer and its affiliates put only $112 million of equity into the deal. They also have taken an untold amount in fees for managing the property, likely worth tens of millions.
And Tishman Speyer did not mortgage any of their other holdings for the deal. That means their empire, which includes Rockefeller Center and the Chrysler Building, seems safe.
Still, the Speyer name is certain to be scarred.
Oh, boo hoo!
Apparently the Speyer name is going to be scarred by this apocalyptic, seismic ruling in favor of tenants -- not by the Speyers' own lousy deal-making. You see, they and their partners bought the building at the top of the market for $5.4 billion; even before this ruling, it was being valued at less than $2 billion. It's not just the recession -- they thought they could put legal pressure on rent-regulated tenants, drive a lot of them out, and cash in on a pile of now-unregulated apartments ... but, alas for them, tenants know the law, and know how to hire lawyers of their own, and not nearly enough tenants were evicted to make this deal worthwhile for the owners.
What an apocalypse.
So we're supposed to weep for the Speyers and their partners. Some of them, to be sure, may actually be on the hook for a lot of money. That's tragic because, see, even though these titans are the manly, risk-taking heroes of our age, and have been ever since Reagan walked the earth, they're never actually supposed to fail.
The New York Times is, at least for half a sentence, even more breathless in its assessment of what this all means:
Real estate moguls feared the news would cripple their industry....
Oh, please. The big money in residential real estate is in co-ops, not rentals -- and sales (here in Manhattan, at least) went up between 46% and 69% in the third quarter of 2009. Prices are still down, but they're a wee bit high even yet:
Studio apartment prices fell 6 percent from a year earlier to a median of $399,000.... One-bedrooms dropped 11 percent to $645,000; two-bedrooms fell 23 percent to $1.18 million and three-bedrooms dropped 41 percent to $2.25 million.
Yes, folks, those are the median prices. And, of course, with Wall Streeters on track to take in record earnings in 2009, these numbers have nowhere to go but up. (Wall Street and real estate largely drive the local economy.)
Elsewhere, the Times story adds words like "devastating" and "potentially crippling" to describe how this affects the wheeler-dealers behind this deal.
Later in the story, a tenant is quoted by the Times who until this ruling was facing a 26% rent increase; he might have found that devastating, especially in this economy, but the word is never used in New York in reference to jacked-up rents -- that's just business as usual.
Reason's blog uses this story as an opportunity to take a libertarian swipe at the city's rent law:
The real bad part is the lack of freedom it gives to the building owners--and the lack of incentive to provide apartments for all future New Yorkers that will create widespread aggravation and shortages down the line.
Dude, have you been here lately? Or ever? There's a tremendous amount of building going on (although somewhat less now -- hey, but that's a response to the conditions of the marketplace.) The real-estate industry can't stop building; the only thing it can't seem to provide is housing that's affordable.
And yes, I know even some liberals (e.g., Atrios) dislike rent stabilization. They say it's a horrible system -- people pay wildly disproportionate rents for similar apartments. Well, yes, it's the worst possible system ... except for all the others. It's what's kept at least some middle-class people in town, where we can do the scut work that keeps wealthy people wealthy. Overturn the rent laws and there'd be a mass middle-class exodus from the city. Libertarian pipe dreams aside, nothing's going to motivate the moguls to build affordable housing. A lousy solution to that problem is better than none.
A WACKALOON WITH A (ONCE-)POWERFUL FRIEND
Frank Gaffney was on Hardball yesterday debating (and insulting) Ron Reagan, son of the former president, who doesn't share Gaffney's neocon views on Afghanistan. ("Your father would be ashamed of you," Gaffney said.) Steve Benen has a very good post listing some of Gaffney's loonier notions -- birtherism, suspicion that Barack Obama is secretly a Muslim, the belief that Saddam was involved in both World Trade Center attacks -- but I want to add one more point.
Gaffney is also the founder and president of the Center for Security Policy. That organization just gave Dick Cheney its annual "Keeper of the Flame Award" ("to recognize those individuals who have enhanced American security through their commitment to a strong military, the propagation of democracy and respect for individual rights throughout the world"), and in fact, the Cheney speech you've been hearing about this week, the one in which he accuses Barack Obama of "dithering" on Afghanistan, was the acceptance speech for that award.
So Gaffney's a lunatic, but he's a well-connected lunatic.
Frank Gaffney was on Hardball yesterday debating (and insulting) Ron Reagan, son of the former president, who doesn't share Gaffney's neocon views on Afghanistan. ("Your father would be ashamed of you," Gaffney said.) Steve Benen has a very good post listing some of Gaffney's loonier notions -- birtherism, suspicion that Barack Obama is secretly a Muslim, the belief that Saddam was involved in both World Trade Center attacks -- but I want to add one more point.
Gaffney is also the founder and president of the Center for Security Policy. That organization just gave Dick Cheney its annual "Keeper of the Flame Award" ("to recognize those individuals who have enhanced American security through their commitment to a strong military, the propagation of democracy and respect for individual rights throughout the world"), and in fact, the Cheney speech you've been hearing about this week, the one in which he accuses Barack Obama of "dithering" on Afghanistan, was the acceptance speech for that award.
So Gaffney's a lunatic, but he's a well-connected lunatic.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
WHEN BUSH WRAPPED HIMSELF IN HIS OWN FAILURE
It's hard to have a simple response to Peggy Noonan's opening paragraphs this week:
At a certain point, a president must own a presidency. For George W. Bush that point came eight months in, when 9/11 happened. From that point on, the presidency -- all his decisions, all the credit and blame for them -- was his. The American people didn't hold him responsible for what led up to 9/11, but they held him responsible for everything after it. This is part of the reason the image of him standing on the rubble of the twin towers, bullhorn in hand, on Sept.14, 2001, became an iconic one. It said: I'm owning it.
"I'm owning it." Noonan's partly right about that: after running scared on 9/11 and ducking the situation for a couple of days, Bush began on that Friday to act as if having presided over the worst act of terrorism ever on U.S. soil was a mark of virtue. In retrospect, it's as if he was pleased about it -- proud of it. Eight years later, I can't help thinking he really was pleased: now he'd be consequential, rather than the no-account black sheep of his family.
It's true that he wasn't held responsible for what led up to 9/11 -- his administration and its propagandists took great pains to shift the blame to his predecessor -- but it's odd how Noonan puts that. She mentions responsibility for what went before (presumably so her right-wing base can think about how it's all Clinton's fault) and responsibility for what came after (it's OK now, if you're a Republican, to say bad things about Bush), but it's as if she still can't face the fact that what we need to talk about is responsibility for what happened on 9/11. Yes, I'm playing with words a bit -- but it's as if Noonan doesn't want to address the point that something unspeakably horrible happened that day -- and on whose watch? It's as if she can accept the build-up (all the fault of the Democrats) and the aftermath (so much failed Republican promise), but looking at the actual event is unthinkable. Which it wouldn't be if it had happened in a Democrat's administration; then failure to obsess over the awful day would be unthinkable.
Noonan pivots to Obama:
Mr. Bush surely knew from the moment he put the bullhorn down that he would be judged on everything that followed. And he has been. Early on, the American people rallied to his support, but Americans are practical people. They will support a leader when there is trouble, but there's an unspoken demand, or rather bargain: We're behind you, now fix this, it's yours.
President Obama, in office a month longer than Bush was when 9/11 hit, now owns his presidency. Does he know it? He too stands on rubble, figuratively speaking -- a collapsed economy, high and growing unemployment, two wars. Everyone knows what he's standing on. You can almost see the smoke rising around him. He's got a bullhorn in his hand every day.
It's his now. He gets the credit and the blame. How do we know this? The American people are telling him. You can see it in the polls. That's what his falling poll numbers are about. "It's been almost a year, you own this. Fix it."
"It's his now." The first eight months of Bush's presidency weren't his, and that's fine, but rubble from a collapse that began long before Obama became president is his rubble. Bush chose to own his rubble (actually, he chose to milk it for sympathy and to wave it like a bloody shirt that justified unrelated foreign adventurism, and inept adventurism than that). But Obama doesn't have agency. We tell him -- or, rather, Noonan, purporting to speak for us, tells him -- what's his responsibility and what isn't.
If you want to use a 9/11 metaphor for Obama, compare him to the people in charge of rebuilding on Ground Zero. Blame him for failing to get that job under way quickly enough. I blame him for not doing enough by now to rein in the fat cats, and not enough to jolt Main Street's economy until we can feel a pulse. And the public is, yes, blaming him for that, too. But, sorry, Peggy: it's not his rubble -- and the public knows that, even if this self-appointed spokeswoman for the public doesn't realize that.
55% Still Blame Bush for Economic Problems --Rasmussen, October 5, 2009
If even Rasmussen gets numbers like that, it's Bush's rubble, even if it's Obama's job to clean it up.
It's hard to have a simple response to Peggy Noonan's opening paragraphs this week:
At a certain point, a president must own a presidency. For George W. Bush that point came eight months in, when 9/11 happened. From that point on, the presidency -- all his decisions, all the credit and blame for them -- was his. The American people didn't hold him responsible for what led up to 9/11, but they held him responsible for everything after it. This is part of the reason the image of him standing on the rubble of the twin towers, bullhorn in hand, on Sept.14, 2001, became an iconic one. It said: I'm owning it.
"I'm owning it." Noonan's partly right about that: after running scared on 9/11 and ducking the situation for a couple of days, Bush began on that Friday to act as if having presided over the worst act of terrorism ever on U.S. soil was a mark of virtue. In retrospect, it's as if he was pleased about it -- proud of it. Eight years later, I can't help thinking he really was pleased: now he'd be consequential, rather than the no-account black sheep of his family.
It's true that he wasn't held responsible for what led up to 9/11 -- his administration and its propagandists took great pains to shift the blame to his predecessor -- but it's odd how Noonan puts that. She mentions responsibility for what went before (presumably so her right-wing base can think about how it's all Clinton's fault) and responsibility for what came after (it's OK now, if you're a Republican, to say bad things about Bush), but it's as if she still can't face the fact that what we need to talk about is responsibility for what happened on 9/11. Yes, I'm playing with words a bit -- but it's as if Noonan doesn't want to address the point that something unspeakably horrible happened that day -- and on whose watch? It's as if she can accept the build-up (all the fault of the Democrats) and the aftermath (so much failed Republican promise), but looking at the actual event is unthinkable. Which it wouldn't be if it had happened in a Democrat's administration; then failure to obsess over the awful day would be unthinkable.
Noonan pivots to Obama:
Mr. Bush surely knew from the moment he put the bullhorn down that he would be judged on everything that followed. And he has been. Early on, the American people rallied to his support, but Americans are practical people. They will support a leader when there is trouble, but there's an unspoken demand, or rather bargain: We're behind you, now fix this, it's yours.
President Obama, in office a month longer than Bush was when 9/11 hit, now owns his presidency. Does he know it? He too stands on rubble, figuratively speaking -- a collapsed economy, high and growing unemployment, two wars. Everyone knows what he's standing on. You can almost see the smoke rising around him. He's got a bullhorn in his hand every day.
It's his now. He gets the credit and the blame. How do we know this? The American people are telling him. You can see it in the polls. That's what his falling poll numbers are about. "It's been almost a year, you own this. Fix it."
"It's his now." The first eight months of Bush's presidency weren't his, and that's fine, but rubble from a collapse that began long before Obama became president is his rubble. Bush chose to own his rubble (actually, he chose to milk it for sympathy and to wave it like a bloody shirt that justified unrelated foreign adventurism, and inept adventurism than that). But Obama doesn't have agency. We tell him -- or, rather, Noonan, purporting to speak for us, tells him -- what's his responsibility and what isn't.
If you want to use a 9/11 metaphor for Obama, compare him to the people in charge of rebuilding on Ground Zero. Blame him for failing to get that job under way quickly enough. I blame him for not doing enough by now to rein in the fat cats, and not enough to jolt Main Street's economy until we can feel a pulse. And the public is, yes, blaming him for that, too. But, sorry, Peggy: it's not his rubble -- and the public knows that, even if this self-appointed spokeswoman for the public doesn't realize that.
55% Still Blame Bush for Economic Problems --Rasmussen, October 5, 2009
If even Rasmussen gets numbers like that, it's Bush's rubble, even if it's Obama's job to clean it up.
UTTERLY OBLIVIOUS TO THE IRONY
Eventually I'm going to sit down and actually read the speech Dick Cheney gave last night, but I keep getting tripped up by the cluelessness of the Cheney coat-holders. This morning it was the first sentence excerpted by Bill Kristol on The Weekly Standard's blog before the speech was delivered. ("Most anyone who is given responsibility in matters of national security quickly comes to appreciate the commitments and structures put in place by others who came before." Really, Dick? Did you?) Now it's this headline for an online transcript of the speech:
Cheney: "We cannot protect this country by putting politics over security, and turning the guns on our own guys"
When I saw that headline at Memeorandum, I assumed it was Think Progress or Media Matters highlighting a particularly ironic Cheney quote. But no -- the headline appeared at the blog of Frank Gaffney's Center for Security Policy -- the group that hosted Cheney's speech and just gave him an award.
These people are utterly unable to grasp the fact that when Cheney said this, he was attacking someone else for something he himself is not only doing, but has now made his life's work. Either they don't understand that or they're very much aware of that and are rubbing our faces in it. Or they simply don't think Democrats are "our own guys" -- i.e., Americans.
Eventually I'm going to sit down and actually read the speech Dick Cheney gave last night, but I keep getting tripped up by the cluelessness of the Cheney coat-holders. This morning it was the first sentence excerpted by Bill Kristol on The Weekly Standard's blog before the speech was delivered. ("Most anyone who is given responsibility in matters of national security quickly comes to appreciate the commitments and structures put in place by others who came before." Really, Dick? Did you?) Now it's this headline for an online transcript of the speech:
Cheney: "We cannot protect this country by putting politics over security, and turning the guns on our own guys"
When I saw that headline at Memeorandum, I assumed it was Think Progress or Media Matters highlighting a particularly ironic Cheney quote. But no -- the headline appeared at the blog of Frank Gaffney's Center for Security Policy -- the group that hosted Cheney's speech and just gave him an award.
These people are utterly unable to grasp the fact that when Cheney said this, he was attacking someone else for something he himself is not only doing, but has now made his life's work. Either they don't understand that or they're very much aware of that and are rubbing our faces in it. Or they simply don't think Democrats are "our own guys" -- i.e., Americans.
ANOTHER POST YOU'RE NOT GOING TO LIKE
I don't exactly agree with what Adam Serwer says about the Obama/Fox war with regard to at least individual he mentions -- Jake Tapper, I think, is taking Fox's side because he likes to suck up to the right -- but I believe Adam's right when says that at least some of the journos who are coming to Fox's defense have motivations along these lines:
Louis Brandeis wrote what is (ironically) probably the most famous legal defense of free speech in which he counsels that "the path of safety lies in the opportunity to discuss freely supposed grievances and supposed remedies, and that the fitting remedy for evil counsels is good ones."
Brandeis actually had a far more restrictive view of free speech than we have today, but his point still stands: the best way to beat back lies in public discourse is with the truth. Using the force of government against the media is wrong and should make us uncomfortable even if it's just the bully pulpit. For some journalists, ignoring the administration's criticism of FOX means agreeing to be treated the same way next time one of them writes a story critical of the White House that gains traction. For them, there's a larger question of free speech -- and in journalism, such questions have often centered around less-than-reputable journalistic organizations.
Now, before you start typing your nasty comments to me (or Adam), please note that he says this while also asserting that the White House campaign doesn't come close to Nixon-level press intimidation, as well as agreeing wholeheartedly that Fox is a propaganda outfit that very much needs countering. He just thinks it's the press's job to do that (though the press is falling down on the job):
If we believe that Brandeis is right, that the solution to "evil counsels is good ones," it stands to reason that it is the role of the press, not the government, to remedy FOX's propaganda. But because of years of conservative bellyaching over the "liberal" press, the media is reluctant to criticize FOX News, as though it were the only free expression available to an embattled minority.
... as it stands, much of the press is not fulfilling its role in fighting lies with truth. This is what Jacob Weisberg was advocating -- that real reporters stop legitimizing FOX. He was not endorsing censorship of any kind. He was encouraging the press to remedy bad counsels with good ones. That's not really happening.
That's also the job I was advocating when I defended the assignment of a New York Times editor to monitor partisan media for stories that hadn't bubbled up to the mainstream press -- I wanted (and still want) someone to cover truthfully what they're babbling about deceptively in Beckland, because those stories are getting noticed by the public, but only as spun by the right. (Yes, I know I'll never get any of you to agree with me on that.)
I don't agree with Adam that the White House needs to take a completely hands-off approach to Fox -- a bit of denunciation is fine, as is White House truth-squadding of lies and distortions. But there needs to be a light touch; even if it's not meant as intimidation, it's going to be seen as intimidation if it's the least bit heavy-handed. And, from a purely practical point of view, if it just inspires the press to rally around the White House's target -- as it clearly has -- then maybe the White House ought to consider whether a strategy reevaluation is in order.
I don't exactly agree with what Adam Serwer says about the Obama/Fox war with regard to at least individual he mentions -- Jake Tapper, I think, is taking Fox's side because he likes to suck up to the right -- but I believe Adam's right when says that at least some of the journos who are coming to Fox's defense have motivations along these lines:
Louis Brandeis wrote what is (ironically) probably the most famous legal defense of free speech in which he counsels that "the path of safety lies in the opportunity to discuss freely supposed grievances and supposed remedies, and that the fitting remedy for evil counsels is good ones."
Brandeis actually had a far more restrictive view of free speech than we have today, but his point still stands: the best way to beat back lies in public discourse is with the truth. Using the force of government against the media is wrong and should make us uncomfortable even if it's just the bully pulpit. For some journalists, ignoring the administration's criticism of FOX means agreeing to be treated the same way next time one of them writes a story critical of the White House that gains traction. For them, there's a larger question of free speech -- and in journalism, such questions have often centered around less-than-reputable journalistic organizations.
Now, before you start typing your nasty comments to me (or Adam), please note that he says this while also asserting that the White House campaign doesn't come close to Nixon-level press intimidation, as well as agreeing wholeheartedly that Fox is a propaganda outfit that very much needs countering. He just thinks it's the press's job to do that (though the press is falling down on the job):
If we believe that Brandeis is right, that the solution to "evil counsels is good ones," it stands to reason that it is the role of the press, not the government, to remedy FOX's propaganda. But because of years of conservative bellyaching over the "liberal" press, the media is reluctant to criticize FOX News, as though it were the only free expression available to an embattled minority.
... as it stands, much of the press is not fulfilling its role in fighting lies with truth. This is what Jacob Weisberg was advocating -- that real reporters stop legitimizing FOX. He was not endorsing censorship of any kind. He was encouraging the press to remedy bad counsels with good ones. That's not really happening.
That's also the job I was advocating when I defended the assignment of a New York Times editor to monitor partisan media for stories that hadn't bubbled up to the mainstream press -- I wanted (and still want) someone to cover truthfully what they're babbling about deceptively in Beckland, because those stories are getting noticed by the public, but only as spun by the right. (Yes, I know I'll never get any of you to agree with me on that.)
I don't agree with Adam that the White House needs to take a completely hands-off approach to Fox -- a bit of denunciation is fine, as is White House truth-squadding of lies and distortions. But there needs to be a light touch; even if it's not meant as intimidation, it's going to be seen as intimidation if it's the least bit heavy-handed. And, from a purely practical point of view, if it just inspires the press to rally around the White House's target -- as it clearly has -- then maybe the White House ought to consider whether a strategy reevaluation is in order.
This Has All Happened Before, and It Will All Happen Again.*
*Lest We Forget with Bonus Jeff Gannon/Guckert pix!
*Lest We Forget with Bonus Jeff Gannon/Guckert pix!
REPUBLICAN FRATRICIDE WILL STOP WHEN IT ACTUALLY HURTS REPUBLICANS
David Frum is fretting about his party, as he sees Democrats doing surprisingly well in the New Jersey governor's race and a special election in New York's 23rd congressional district, in both cases partly because of strong third-party challengers:
Prelude to Republican fratricide
GOP candidates in New York and New Jersey should be cruising to victory this November. But angry conservatives would rather hand power to Democrats than help moderate Republicans win.
...What lessons will Republicans draw? You might think that the impending defeats in New York and New Jersey would drive home the need to broaden the Republican coalition....
But the risk is that the party will draw a very different conclusion. From the New York experience, Republicans will be tempted to draw the lesson: Always nominate the more conservative candidate. From New Jersey: We need to drive pro-environmental fiscal moderates out of our party and into the Democratic Party where they belong!
... But a political formula that encourages Republicans to write off the suburbs, the Northeast, and California is not a formula for a national majority. It's a formula for a more coherent, better mobilized, but perpetually minority party....
To which Republican supporters of right-wing purism may well respond: Yeah? So what?
And, really, you can't blame them, can you?
Democrats lost a big test vote on health care legislation on Wednesday as the Senate blocked action on a bill to increase Medicare payments to doctors at a cost of $247 billion over 10 years.
The Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, needed 60 votes to proceed. He won only 47. And he could not blame Republicans. A dozen Democrats and one independent crossed party lines and voted with Republicans on the 53 to 47 roll call.
... Republicans said [the bill] was fiscally irresponsible, and some Democrats said they shared that concern....
This was a key test of strength -- at a time when many (most?) Democrats and progressives think the passage of a good health-care bill is inevitable -- and Reid fell 13 votes short. If this is the best Democrats can do, why the hell should Republicans worry about being a permanent minority party? What difference does it make if (along with Democrat-hating Democrats) they have a comfortable cushion whenever there's a key vote and they want to gum up the works?
Maybe if Democrats are looking at 70 or 75 seats in the Senate there'll be trouble for the GOP -- because only then (maybe) will a Democratic agenda be able to garner 60 votes in the Senate predictably. But we're not even close to that. So Republicans have no motivation whatsoever to broaden their appeal.
David Frum is fretting about his party, as he sees Democrats doing surprisingly well in the New Jersey governor's race and a special election in New York's 23rd congressional district, in both cases partly because of strong third-party challengers:
Prelude to Republican fratricide
GOP candidates in New York and New Jersey should be cruising to victory this November. But angry conservatives would rather hand power to Democrats than help moderate Republicans win.
...What lessons will Republicans draw? You might think that the impending defeats in New York and New Jersey would drive home the need to broaden the Republican coalition....
But the risk is that the party will draw a very different conclusion. From the New York experience, Republicans will be tempted to draw the lesson: Always nominate the more conservative candidate. From New Jersey: We need to drive pro-environmental fiscal moderates out of our party and into the Democratic Party where they belong!
... But a political formula that encourages Republicans to write off the suburbs, the Northeast, and California is not a formula for a national majority. It's a formula for a more coherent, better mobilized, but perpetually minority party....
To which Republican supporters of right-wing purism may well respond: Yeah? So what?
And, really, you can't blame them, can you?
Democrats lost a big test vote on health care legislation on Wednesday as the Senate blocked action on a bill to increase Medicare payments to doctors at a cost of $247 billion over 10 years.
The Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, needed 60 votes to proceed. He won only 47. And he could not blame Republicans. A dozen Democrats and one independent crossed party lines and voted with Republicans on the 53 to 47 roll call.
... Republicans said [the bill] was fiscally irresponsible, and some Democrats said they shared that concern....
This was a key test of strength -- at a time when many (most?) Democrats and progressives think the passage of a good health-care bill is inevitable -- and Reid fell 13 votes short. If this is the best Democrats can do, why the hell should Republicans worry about being a permanent minority party? What difference does it make if (along with Democrat-hating Democrats) they have a comfortable cushion whenever there's a key vote and they want to gum up the works?
Maybe if Democrats are looking at 70 or 75 seats in the Senate there'll be trouble for the GOP -- because only then (maybe) will a Democratic agenda be able to garner 60 votes in the Senate predictably. But we're not even close to that. So Republicans have no motivation whatsoever to broaden their appeal.
THE SHAKESPEARE OF CHUTZPAH
Did Dick Cheney really have the gall to say this in a speech last night?
Most anyone who is given responsibility in matters of national security quickly comes to appreciate the commitments and structures put in place by others who came before.
Does anyone remember Dick Cheney ever expressing appreciation to Bill Clinton for leaving behind a military strong enough to overthrow the Taliban in Afghanistan and Saddam's regime in Iraq (if, alas, not strong enough to overcome Bush and Cheney's own massive cock-ups)? Anyone? My right-wing trolls, got a link?
I know Cheney (and Bush) spent a great deal of time in the 2000 campaign accusing Clinton and Gore of "running down" the military and leaving it "in decline." Did Cheney (or Bush) subsequently "come to appreciate" what Clinton had done? If so, did they ever say so?
Did Dick Cheney really have the gall to say this in a speech last night?
Most anyone who is given responsibility in matters of national security quickly comes to appreciate the commitments and structures put in place by others who came before.
Does anyone remember Dick Cheney ever expressing appreciation to Bill Clinton for leaving behind a military strong enough to overthrow the Taliban in Afghanistan and Saddam's regime in Iraq (if, alas, not strong enough to overcome Bush and Cheney's own massive cock-ups)? Anyone? My right-wing trolls, got a link?
I know Cheney (and Bush) spent a great deal of time in the 2000 campaign accusing Clinton and Gore of "running down" the military and leaving it "in decline." Did Cheney (or Bush) subsequently "come to appreciate" what Clinton had done? If so, did they ever say so?
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
OPRAH'S RATINGS HAVE ALREADY REBOUNDED -- WITHOUT RIGHT-WING HELP
On the right-wing message boards, they're already picking up on this Washington Post story about Sarah Palin's Oprah interview, even though the author of the piece, Lisa de Moraes, makes it fairly clear that the wingers' belief isn't quite accurate:
Oprah Winfrey, on a campaign to climb back from last season's ratings slump, will attempt to kiss and make up with conservative viewers on Nov. 16 when she has Sarah Palin on her syndicated talk show....
She's going whole hog this season to try to recover from the ratings tumble she took last season when her audience slid to under 7 million viewers. And, during one awful week in July, "The Oprah Winfrey Show" suffered its smallest ratings since its debut way back in 1985.
Industry navel gazers speculated Oprah had turned off some of her conservative viewers -- or, more accurately, they had turned her off -- when she not only endorsed then presidential candidate Barack Obama but even campaigned for him....
Yes, her ratings did go down 7% last year (though she continued to be the top daytime talk-show host on TV). But so did a lot of other people's:
...it's not just her. "Live with Regis and Kelly" had the same 7 percent decline last season. Shows with Jerry Springer, Maury Povich and Martha Stewart all had double-digit declines.
The right took all the credit for Oprah's ratings slide -- but this year she's staged a lovely comeback without right-wingers, thank you:
Nielsen ratings released Tuesday for that first week show numbers for "Oprah" up 30 percent compared with the same week a year ago. With a 6.1 household rating, it enjoyed a 144 percent edge over second-place "Dr. Phil" at 2.5. In fact, "The Oprah Winfrey Show" wasn't just the No. 1 syndicated daytime talk show for the week, it was the top show in all of syndication for the first time since November 2005, topping "Wheel of Fortune" and "Jeopardy."
In the WaPo, de Moraes has the real explanation:
... Oprah has largely abandoned her whole aspirational programming mantra this season and gone in for the more purely commercial.
That has translated into the longest-two-day-interview-ever with Whitney Houston to kick off Houston's latest comeback attempt; Oprah's deliciously detailed interview with Erin Andrews, the ESPN reporter who was unknowingly videotaped nude in a hotel room by some stalker guy; and her highly touted, things-could-get-rough, face-to-face meeting between former world champion boxers Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield -- their first meeting since Tyson bit off part of Holyfield's ear during a 1997 WBA heavyweight title fight.
And now, add to that list Palin...
It surely can't hurt for Oprah to try to mend fences with the right. But booking Palin is at least as much about landing a really big, controversial, ratings-grabbing name as it is about kissing up to Palin's base. That's what this is all about. So, righties, don't flatter yourselves.
****
Also on the subject of Palin, I don't know why Nate Silver's partner Tom Schaller thinks she won't run in 2012. I suspect it's because he's thinking logically, like a pollster:
... some candidates who run and lose still gain because they emerge as national figures. But Palin already achieved that status in 2008; her marketability is secure, especially given that she presently has a book that rose to the top of the Amazon rankings before it was even available for (non-advance) purchase. (As of this writing it ranks #2.) Palin's star burns bright enough that only a successful bid for the nomination would brighten it, while a failed bid might diminish it.
... the opportunity costs of running seem to me higher for her than not running....
To explain why I think she'll go for the biggest brass ring regardless of any possible "opportunity costs," I could insert some "Sarah Palin, attention junkie" snark here, but really, she's not all that much worse than a lot of other people who run for president even though everyone on earth knows they don't have a snowball's chance in hell of winning nomination or election. (Hello, Christopher Dodd.) Really, what else is the point of her recent career arc (for want of a better expression), except clearing time to prepare for a 2012 run?
OK-- she trails Huckabee and Romney in a Rasmussen poll. Well, she probably thinks her book tour, like Obama's, could be a game-changer. (She may not be crazy to think that.) And while I agree that Huckabee has more credibility with the Christian right, as Romney does with Republicans who want at least some vague appearance of seriousness in their nominee, we in the Lower 48 still haven't seen Palin go negative on a fellow Republican -- it could get ugly, and she may be counting on an ability to run a really nasty campaign as her best hope to beat back her chief rivals.
I have no doubt that she's running. I'm a lot less sure than I've been that she's in a good position to win the nomination (no way in hell will she win the general election), but I'm sure she's going for it.
On the right-wing message boards, they're already picking up on this Washington Post story about Sarah Palin's Oprah interview, even though the author of the piece, Lisa de Moraes, makes it fairly clear that the wingers' belief isn't quite accurate:
Oprah Winfrey, on a campaign to climb back from last season's ratings slump, will attempt to kiss and make up with conservative viewers on Nov. 16 when she has Sarah Palin on her syndicated talk show....
She's going whole hog this season to try to recover from the ratings tumble she took last season when her audience slid to under 7 million viewers. And, during one awful week in July, "The Oprah Winfrey Show" suffered its smallest ratings since its debut way back in 1985.
Industry navel gazers speculated Oprah had turned off some of her conservative viewers -- or, more accurately, they had turned her off -- when she not only endorsed then presidential candidate Barack Obama but even campaigned for him....
Yes, her ratings did go down 7% last year (though she continued to be the top daytime talk-show host on TV). But so did a lot of other people's:
...it's not just her. "Live with Regis and Kelly" had the same 7 percent decline last season. Shows with Jerry Springer, Maury Povich and Martha Stewart all had double-digit declines.
The right took all the credit for Oprah's ratings slide -- but this year she's staged a lovely comeback without right-wingers, thank you:
Nielsen ratings released Tuesday for that first week show numbers for "Oprah" up 30 percent compared with the same week a year ago. With a 6.1 household rating, it enjoyed a 144 percent edge over second-place "Dr. Phil" at 2.5. In fact, "The Oprah Winfrey Show" wasn't just the No. 1 syndicated daytime talk show for the week, it was the top show in all of syndication for the first time since November 2005, topping "Wheel of Fortune" and "Jeopardy."
In the WaPo, de Moraes has the real explanation:
... Oprah has largely abandoned her whole aspirational programming mantra this season and gone in for the more purely commercial.
That has translated into the longest-two-day-interview-ever with Whitney Houston to kick off Houston's latest comeback attempt; Oprah's deliciously detailed interview with Erin Andrews, the ESPN reporter who was unknowingly videotaped nude in a hotel room by some stalker guy; and her highly touted, things-could-get-rough, face-to-face meeting between former world champion boxers Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield -- their first meeting since Tyson bit off part of Holyfield's ear during a 1997 WBA heavyweight title fight.
And now, add to that list Palin...
It surely can't hurt for Oprah to try to mend fences with the right. But booking Palin is at least as much about landing a really big, controversial, ratings-grabbing name as it is about kissing up to Palin's base. That's what this is all about. So, righties, don't flatter yourselves.
****
Also on the subject of Palin, I don't know why Nate Silver's partner Tom Schaller thinks she won't run in 2012. I suspect it's because he's thinking logically, like a pollster:
... some candidates who run and lose still gain because they emerge as national figures. But Palin already achieved that status in 2008; her marketability is secure, especially given that she presently has a book that rose to the top of the Amazon rankings before it was even available for (non-advance) purchase. (As of this writing it ranks #2.) Palin's star burns bright enough that only a successful bid for the nomination would brighten it, while a failed bid might diminish it.
... the opportunity costs of running seem to me higher for her than not running....
To explain why I think she'll go for the biggest brass ring regardless of any possible "opportunity costs," I could insert some "Sarah Palin, attention junkie" snark here, but really, she's not all that much worse than a lot of other people who run for president even though everyone on earth knows they don't have a snowball's chance in hell of winning nomination or election. (Hello, Christopher Dodd.) Really, what else is the point of her recent career arc (for want of a better expression), except clearing time to prepare for a 2012 run?
OK-- she trails Huckabee and Romney in a Rasmussen poll. Well, she probably thinks her book tour, like Obama's, could be a game-changer. (She may not be crazy to think that.) And while I agree that Huckabee has more credibility with the Christian right, as Romney does with Republicans who want at least some vague appearance of seriousness in their nominee, we in the Lower 48 still haven't seen Palin go negative on a fellow Republican -- it could get ugly, and she may be counting on an ability to run a really nasty campaign as her best hope to beat back her chief rivals.
I have no doubt that she's running. I'm a lot less sure than I've been that she's in a good position to win the nomination (no way in hell will she win the general election), but I'm sure she's going for it.
I'M SORRY THE WEEKLY STANDARD NEWSROOM COULDN'T HEAR THE CHOPPER GOING DOWN
Wow, good thing the 2016 Olympics didn't go to crime-ridden, gang-dominated Chicago, hunh?
RIO DE JANEIRO -- Just over two weeks ago, this striking city landed the 2016 Olympic Games, the first ever in South America....
Then over the weekend, in a chilling outburst of violence, drug traffickers wielding what the police say they believe was a large-caliber weapon shot down a police helicopter just one mile from Maracana stadium, where the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympics will be held and the World Cup final will be played two years before the Olympics....
The police said the weekend's violence started after a trafficker in prison ordered his followers to invade a rival's territory. The attack set off clashes between the police and drug bandits in several favelas, leaving at least 26 people dead, including three policemen and three bystanders....
Rio has one of the world's highest murder rates, with 4,631 homicides in the metropolitan area last year; that number represented a decline from 5,143 murders in 2006, government figures show. There were 523 murders in New York City last year....
(Chicago, by the way, had 509. Admittedly, the Rio metropolitan area has a population about four times the size of Chicago's -- but the murder rate was about nine times the size.)
Recall the right-wing reaction to the notion of a Chicago Olympics:
[Glenn] Beck: "... Oh, Chicago is good at community organizing, and organized labor, and organized Mafi-- oops. Did I say that out loud?"
... [Sean] Hannity: ... "[E]arly this morning a 14-year-old boy was chased down a Chicago street and beaten with a pipe. ... This event occurs on the heels of the murder of Derrion Albert, the 16-year-old honor student who was beaten to death in a gang fight, and at the same time the president is lobbying to bring the Olympics to Chicago, which begs the question: Is this a city where we want the Olympics taking place?"
... Fox News contributor Kimberly Guilfoyle [asserted] that Chicago has "pressing problems" such as "lawlessness, violence on the street, innocent bystanders being killed, children beaten and unable to go to schools" ...
Weekly Standard newsroom, your thoughts?
Wow, good thing the 2016 Olympics didn't go to crime-ridden, gang-dominated Chicago, hunh?
RIO DE JANEIRO -- Just over two weeks ago, this striking city landed the 2016 Olympic Games, the first ever in South America....
Then over the weekend, in a chilling outburst of violence, drug traffickers wielding what the police say they believe was a large-caliber weapon shot down a police helicopter just one mile from Maracana stadium, where the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympics will be held and the World Cup final will be played two years before the Olympics....
The police said the weekend's violence started after a trafficker in prison ordered his followers to invade a rival's territory. The attack set off clashes between the police and drug bandits in several favelas, leaving at least 26 people dead, including three policemen and three bystanders....
Rio has one of the world's highest murder rates, with 4,631 homicides in the metropolitan area last year; that number represented a decline from 5,143 murders in 2006, government figures show. There were 523 murders in New York City last year....
(Chicago, by the way, had 509. Admittedly, the Rio metropolitan area has a population about four times the size of Chicago's -- but the murder rate was about nine times the size.)
Recall the right-wing reaction to the notion of a Chicago Olympics:
[Glenn] Beck: "... Oh, Chicago is good at community organizing, and organized labor, and organized Mafi-- oops. Did I say that out loud?"
... [Sean] Hannity: ... "[E]arly this morning a 14-year-old boy was chased down a Chicago street and beaten with a pipe. ... This event occurs on the heels of the murder of Derrion Albert, the 16-year-old honor student who was beaten to death in a gang fight, and at the same time the president is lobbying to bring the Olympics to Chicago, which begs the question: Is this a city where we want the Olympics taking place?"
... Fox News contributor Kimberly Guilfoyle [asserted] that Chicago has "pressing problems" such as "lawlessness, violence on the street, innocent bystanders being killed, children beaten and unable to go to schools" ...
Weekly Standard newsroom, your thoughts?
I AM WOMAN, DON'T TOUCH ME
Is Sarah Palin's public appearance schedule a sign that she's trying to use some sort of bizarre anti-sex feminism as a way to rally female voters for 2012?
Her major appearances in the Lower 48 earlier this year included a speech at an Indiana Right to Life dinner ... and a tour of sites commemorating early feminism in Seneca Falls, New York. Now she's going to appear on Oprah -- hey, you go, girl! (and I guess this means last year's right-wing Oprah boycott never panned out) -- and she's also making a speech to Wisconsin Right to Life, as well as another at Missouri's College of the Ozarks, a Christian school that, as Wonkette notes, tells students things like this in its handbook (PDF):
Maybe she can sell an anti-sex pseudo-feminist message to a disturbingly large part of America. But given her, um, family's history, I don't think she's going to pull off the trick of selling it to anyone outside the base. But that may not stop her from trying.
The Amy Siskind column explaining why all these Christianist appearances mean that Palin is really, really good for women will be along any day now, I'm sure.
*****
(Wonkette link via Rumproast.)
Is Sarah Palin's public appearance schedule a sign that she's trying to use some sort of bizarre anti-sex feminism as a way to rally female voters for 2012?
Her major appearances in the Lower 48 earlier this year included a speech at an Indiana Right to Life dinner ... and a tour of sites commemorating early feminism in Seneca Falls, New York. Now she's going to appear on Oprah -- hey, you go, girl! (and I guess this means last year's right-wing Oprah boycott never panned out) -- and she's also making a speech to Wisconsin Right to Life, as well as another at Missouri's College of the Ozarks, a Christian school that, as Wonkette notes, tells students things like this in its handbook (PDF):
Maybe she can sell an anti-sex pseudo-feminist message to a disturbingly large part of America. But given her, um, family's history, I don't think she's going to pull off the trick of selling it to anyone outside the base. But that may not stop her from trying.
The Amy Siskind column explaining why all these Christianist appearances mean that Palin is really, really good for women will be along any day now, I'm sure.
*****
(Wonkette link via Rumproast.)
Let the Witch Hunts Begin!
via digby:
aimai
via digby:
To me, now more than ever, the conservative movement must purge itself of those in its “leadership” who are not worthy of the cause they claim to champion. Over the past year I have begun to suspect that David Keene, the head of the American Conservative Union and the Chairman of CPAC (the largest annual gathering of conservatives) may fit into this category.This is starting to look like a repeat of the early chapters of Thomas Franks' What's the Matter With Kansas. That's the part where the rank and file Conservatives--the secretaries and the holy rollers--stopped taking marching orders from the upper class, corporatist, Republicans and took over the party from underneath. That was good for the Republican Party for a while since it gave them an energized base. But since party identification has fallen to its lowest level ever, and they are splitting off between social conservatives and small government conservatives its not clear that this will still be a winning strategy nationally. In fact, its not going to be until the social conservatives free themselves of the corporatists and reach out sucessfully to hispanics and blacks, or the corporatists free themselves of the social conservatives and reach out sucessfully to everyone else. As long as they are locked in a struggle to control the same base its like watching two alligators clawing at each other as they spiral down to a watery death. Yay.
aimai
WATCH OUT FOR THAT WINDMILL, KELLYANNE
Right-wing pollster and frequent TV talking head Kellyanne Conway is upset:
The Washington Post poll is the latest example of a "public poll" in the past 2–3 weeks that curiously shows a growing number of Americans supportive of the "public option." AP and Gallup were others. This is agenda-driven polling.
The fact is: Asking an ignorant public about the "public option" is incomplete polling. It calls for a response to feel-good phraseology rather than a probing of underlying ideology. "Public option" in health care is not so different from "campaign-finance reform," "Violence against Women's Act," "revenue enhancements," and such.
Our side has not done enough to discredit and expose the positive-sounding "public option" ...
Interesting point ... um, except for one problem: The Post's actual poll questions didn't use the word "public" or "option." Here are the questions:
8. Would you support or oppose having the government create a new health insurance plan to compete with private health insurance plans? Do you feel that way strongly or somewhat?
9. (IF OPPOSE/NO OPINION FOR GOVERNMENT PLAN) What if this government-sponsored plan was run by state governments and was available only to people who did not have a choice of affordable private insurance? In that case would you support or oppose this idea?
10. Which of these would you prefer - (a plan that includes some form of government-sponsored health insurance for people who can't get affordable private insurance, but is approved without support from Republicans in Congress); or (a plan that is approved with support from Republicans in Congress, but does not include any form of government-sponsored health insurance for people who can't get affordable private insurance)?
And the AP/GfK poll (PDF) didn't ask about the public option in any way; it just asked, "In general, do you support, oppose or neither support nor oppose the health care reform plans being discussed in Congress?," then asked follow-ups about bipartisanship.
Of the three polls Conway mantions, only Gallup used the word "public" at all (but not "option") in the question red to respondents -- and its results show less-than-spectacular support for the public option:
But Kellyanne, please, be my guest. By all means continue to denounce this biased poll wording that doesn't exist. Demand the removal phrases that aren't there. Heaven knows I don't want to stop you from expending a lot of energy on this utterly futile pursuit.
****
And speaking of nonexistent problems, here, from Gallup, is yet another example of right-wingers denouncing a menace that doesn't actually rxist:
Yup -- a majority of gun owners think Barack Obama will try to ban all gun sales. (Other numbers: 62% of Republicans and Republican leaners believe this, as do 60% of conservatives.)
You know what? If Obama wins reelection, and it's December 2016 -- a month before the end of his second term, with a new president already elected, and no effort whatsoever having been made by the administration to ban guns over eight years -- and you ask this question again about Obama, I bet you'd still get GOP/conservative/gun owner majority support for the proposition that "Obama plans to ban guns."
Right-wing pollster and frequent TV talking head Kellyanne Conway is upset:
The Washington Post poll is the latest example of a "public poll" in the past 2–3 weeks that curiously shows a growing number of Americans supportive of the "public option." AP and Gallup were others. This is agenda-driven polling.
The fact is: Asking an ignorant public about the "public option" is incomplete polling. It calls for a response to feel-good phraseology rather than a probing of underlying ideology. "Public option" in health care is not so different from "campaign-finance reform," "Violence against Women's Act," "revenue enhancements," and such.
Our side has not done enough to discredit and expose the positive-sounding "public option" ...
Interesting point ... um, except for one problem: The Post's actual poll questions didn't use the word "public" or "option." Here are the questions:
8. Would you support or oppose having the government create a new health insurance plan to compete with private health insurance plans? Do you feel that way strongly or somewhat?
9. (IF OPPOSE/NO OPINION FOR GOVERNMENT PLAN) What if this government-sponsored plan was run by state governments and was available only to people who did not have a choice of affordable private insurance? In that case would you support or oppose this idea?
10. Which of these would you prefer - (a plan that includes some form of government-sponsored health insurance for people who can't get affordable private insurance, but is approved without support from Republicans in Congress); or (a plan that is approved with support from Republicans in Congress, but does not include any form of government-sponsored health insurance for people who can't get affordable private insurance)?
And the AP/GfK poll (PDF) didn't ask about the public option in any way; it just asked, "In general, do you support, oppose or neither support nor oppose the health care reform plans being discussed in Congress?," then asked follow-ups about bipartisanship.
Of the three polls Conway mantions, only Gallup used the word "public" at all (but not "option") in the question red to respondents -- and its results show less-than-spectacular support for the public option:
But Kellyanne, please, be my guest. By all means continue to denounce this biased poll wording that doesn't exist. Demand the removal phrases that aren't there. Heaven knows I don't want to stop you from expending a lot of energy on this utterly futile pursuit.
****
And speaking of nonexistent problems, here, from Gallup, is yet another example of right-wingers denouncing a menace that doesn't actually rxist:
Yup -- a majority of gun owners think Barack Obama will try to ban all gun sales. (Other numbers: 62% of Republicans and Republican leaners believe this, as do 60% of conservatives.)
You know what? If Obama wins reelection, and it's December 2016 -- a month before the end of his second term, with a new president already elected, and no effort whatsoever having been made by the administration to ban guns over eight years -- and you ask this question again about Obama, I bet you'd still get GOP/conservative/gun owner majority support for the proposition that "Obama plans to ban guns."
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
WINGNUTS, DESPERATE FOR A FOLLOW-UP HIT (AND FLOPPING AGAIN)
The Glenn Beck/Andrew Breitbart/right-wing blogosphere nexus scored a couple of quick hits a while back -- Van Jones, ACORN -- and it's almost as if that rapid success has become a curse rather than a blessing. These guys want another kill, desperately; they're like a band that topped the charts early in their career and are now feeling dread as they face the possibility that they may have peaked at the age of 23. So they're trying to reduce their previous success to a formula that they can clone -- and it ain't working.
They've tried to make Anita Dunn into their next victim -- but nobody outside the base is buying their campaign against her, and, since she's someone The Washington Post called "a D.C.-certified grownup," she's safe unless she does something really awful.
So the 'nuts are trying again.
The latest attempt -- from Breitbart (again) and some rightbloggers -- is this (heavily edited) video from Ron Bloom, who is (wingnut version) the "Manufacturing Czar" or (Bloom's own version) a "senior adviser to Secretary of Treasury Timothy Geithner":
Bloom speaking in 2008, as the economic downturn is just beginning, says:
Generally speaking, we get the joke. We know that the free market is nonsense. We know that the whole point is to game the system, to beat the market, or at least find someone who'll pay you a lot of money because they're convinced that there is a free lunch. We know this is largely about power, that it's an adults-only, no-limit game. We kind of agree with Mao that political power comes largely from the barrel of a gun....
The wingers are screaming, "ANOTHER MAOIST!!!!!1!1!!!!!" -- and noting that Bloom worked for (gasp!) unions.
Well, yeah -- Bloom did work for unions. Here's his bio:
Ron Bloom is an expert of restructuring of companies and organizations. He has previously organized the restructuring of the investment bank Lazard Freres and several labor unions....
After graduating from Harvard Business School in 1985, Bloom worked at investment banking firms for about ten years. He was one of the founders of the investment bank Keilin and Bloom. The firm was involved in transactions on behalf of the United Steelworkers. Bloom has served as special assistant to the president of USWA since 1996. He has focused on issues the union faced in its collective bargaining program when it negotiated with companies that were financially troubled.
Investment banker! Harvard Business School! Yeah, sounds like a real pinko to me.
And here's the pinko-commie-Maoist confab he was addressing:
6th Annual Distressed Investing Forum
Union League Club, New York City
February 27-28, 2008
Distressed Investors have been poised for the next wave of defaults and a downturn in the credit cycle and the new opportunities it may bring.
... Standard & Poor's estimates US corporate defaults could rise to more than $35 billion over the next 15 months, breeding multiple opportunities for private equity firms and hedge funds that specialize in seeking deals within troubled industries.
This sixth annual forum, produced by Institutional Investor Events in association with Credit Investment News, will explore where investors are finding their opportunities--be it from the defaults occurring within subprime, the struggling automotive industry or from new opportunities emerging following the turbulence which has rocked the financial industry....
This was a gathering about profiting from corporate failure! Quintessential modern American capitalism! Bloom spoke there, and these morons are calling him a Maoist!
And what was the subterranean cell where this commie gathering took place? Oh yeah -- New York's Union League Club:
... Many prominent civic, state and national leaders have enjoyed the fellowship of the ULC. Theodore Roosevelt managed his early political career from the Club's chambers. J. Pierpont Morgan was a regular, along with John Jay, William Cullen Bryant, Chester A. Arthur, and Thomas Nast. Fifteen Presidents, seven Senators, many Congressmen, diplomats, cabinet members, and scores of chief executive officers of major corporations have been members of the Club during the past hundred and forty years and have participated in its programs.
Architect Benjamin Wystar Morris (1870-1944) designed the Clubhouse at 37th Street and Park Avenue, property that once belonged to the family of J. P. Morgan. It was completed in 1931. The Georgian exterior, with its symmetrical red brick facade, reflects familiar motifs from Park Avenue brownstone mansions, but on a grand ten-story scale. The architectural ensemble formed by the entrance foyer and grand staircase stands as one of Morris's great successes and as a New York landmark interior....
The Club contains 60 bedrooms for members and guests, a variety of meeting rooms for business and social functions, and one of the most extensive club reference and lending libraries in New York City. The Union League is also home to a distinguished art collection and an art gallery with rotating exhibits....
Typical commie crash pad!
Actually, what difference does it make? Even if this had been said in some malcontent's bug-infested cold-water flat from beatnik 1959, what did Bloom say that was so controversial? The capitalist game is rigged? It's a power game? What sensible American doesn't believe that?
McCarthyism FAIL.
The Glenn Beck/Andrew Breitbart/right-wing blogosphere nexus scored a couple of quick hits a while back -- Van Jones, ACORN -- and it's almost as if that rapid success has become a curse rather than a blessing. These guys want another kill, desperately; they're like a band that topped the charts early in their career and are now feeling dread as they face the possibility that they may have peaked at the age of 23. So they're trying to reduce their previous success to a formula that they can clone -- and it ain't working.
They've tried to make Anita Dunn into their next victim -- but nobody outside the base is buying their campaign against her, and, since she's someone The Washington Post called "a D.C.-certified grownup," she's safe unless she does something really awful.
So the 'nuts are trying again.
The latest attempt -- from Breitbart (again) and some rightbloggers -- is this (heavily edited) video from Ron Bloom, who is (wingnut version) the "Manufacturing Czar" or (Bloom's own version) a "senior adviser to Secretary of Treasury Timothy Geithner":
Bloom speaking in 2008, as the economic downturn is just beginning, says:
Generally speaking, we get the joke. We know that the free market is nonsense. We know that the whole point is to game the system, to beat the market, or at least find someone who'll pay you a lot of money because they're convinced that there is a free lunch. We know this is largely about power, that it's an adults-only, no-limit game. We kind of agree with Mao that political power comes largely from the barrel of a gun....
The wingers are screaming, "ANOTHER MAOIST!!!!!1!1!!!!!" -- and noting that Bloom worked for (gasp!) unions.
Well, yeah -- Bloom did work for unions. Here's his bio:
Ron Bloom is an expert of restructuring of companies and organizations. He has previously organized the restructuring of the investment bank Lazard Freres and several labor unions....
After graduating from Harvard Business School in 1985, Bloom worked at investment banking firms for about ten years. He was one of the founders of the investment bank Keilin and Bloom. The firm was involved in transactions on behalf of the United Steelworkers. Bloom has served as special assistant to the president of USWA since 1996. He has focused on issues the union faced in its collective bargaining program when it negotiated with companies that were financially troubled.
Investment banker! Harvard Business School! Yeah, sounds like a real pinko to me.
And here's the pinko-commie-Maoist confab he was addressing:
6th Annual Distressed Investing Forum
Union League Club, New York City
February 27-28, 2008
Distressed Investors have been poised for the next wave of defaults and a downturn in the credit cycle and the new opportunities it may bring.
... Standard & Poor's estimates US corporate defaults could rise to more than $35 billion over the next 15 months, breeding multiple opportunities for private equity firms and hedge funds that specialize in seeking deals within troubled industries.
This sixth annual forum, produced by Institutional Investor Events in association with Credit Investment News, will explore where investors are finding their opportunities--be it from the defaults occurring within subprime, the struggling automotive industry or from new opportunities emerging following the turbulence which has rocked the financial industry....
This was a gathering about profiting from corporate failure! Quintessential modern American capitalism! Bloom spoke there, and these morons are calling him a Maoist!
And what was the subterranean cell where this commie gathering took place? Oh yeah -- New York's Union League Club:
... Many prominent civic, state and national leaders have enjoyed the fellowship of the ULC. Theodore Roosevelt managed his early political career from the Club's chambers. J. Pierpont Morgan was a regular, along with John Jay, William Cullen Bryant, Chester A. Arthur, and Thomas Nast. Fifteen Presidents, seven Senators, many Congressmen, diplomats, cabinet members, and scores of chief executive officers of major corporations have been members of the Club during the past hundred and forty years and have participated in its programs.
Architect Benjamin Wystar Morris (1870-1944) designed the Clubhouse at 37th Street and Park Avenue, property that once belonged to the family of J. P. Morgan. It was completed in 1931. The Georgian exterior, with its symmetrical red brick facade, reflects familiar motifs from Park Avenue brownstone mansions, but on a grand ten-story scale. The architectural ensemble formed by the entrance foyer and grand staircase stands as one of Morris's great successes and as a New York landmark interior....
The Club contains 60 bedrooms for members and guests, a variety of meeting rooms for business and social functions, and one of the most extensive club reference and lending libraries in New York City. The Union League is also home to a distinguished art collection and an art gallery with rotating exhibits....
Typical commie crash pad!
Actually, what difference does it make? Even if this had been said in some malcontent's bug-infested cold-water flat from beatnik 1959, what did Bloom say that was so controversial? The capitalist game is rigged? It's a power game? What sensible American doesn't believe that?
McCarthyism FAIL.
LIMBAUGH ET AL.: FLIPPABLE? I DON'T THINK SO.
OK, I'll play. David Frum posted this on Saturday:
... Suppose an agent arrived in the offices of Limbaugh/Beck/Hannity/O’Reilly etc. with an offer. "I can guarantee you a deal that will pay you twice as much -- bring you twice as much fame -- and extend your career twice as long -- if you'd say the exact opposite of what you are saying now.” Which of them would sign?
My nominations: O'Reilly accepts for sure. Beck likewise almost certainly says yes. Limbaugh would want to think it over, but would ultimately say no. Mark Levin: certainly not. Sean Hannity would need the offer explained a few times. Ann Coulter -- that one puzzles me -- but probably no. Roger Ailes? Do you even need to ask?
Steve Benen agrees that Ailes, Coulter, and O'Reilly would take the offer, but that Beck wouldn't ("he seems more motivated by the voices in his head than financial rewards"). Levin and Hannity? No. Mori Dinauer at Tapped seems to doubt anyone would switch:
I'm skeptical. Some of the people [Frum] name-checks probably started out as opportunists, but there had to be a kernel of belief that motivated them to become conservative rather than liberal entertainers in the first place. And now they've moved beyond opportunism into full-fledged conservative brands. To accommodate the switch they would have to engineer a full-fledged public political conversion that, frankly, would be impossible to believe.
I think most of these folks, if not all of them, would reject the offer -- largely because they wouldn't believe that our side could deliver.
I don't think it's an either/or question -- Are they true believers or are they opportunists? I think nearly all of these people are sincere right-wingers who became professional right-wingers in part because they're opportunists. I think they believe that, if you're a professional right-winger, the money's always good (while it never seems nearly as good on the left). Even Limbaugh, who's regarded as a talk radio pioneer, had the success of people like Joe Pyne, Bob Grant, and Morton Downey Jr. to model himself on -- radio talk has always skewed right, hasn't it?
I think these guys would happily go apolitical -- Ailes ran the precursor to MSNBC (and hired hosts such as Charles Grodin), Beck was a shock jock, Limbaugh was a Top 40 DJ (and later tried fottball color commentary), O'Reilly hosted A Current Affair -- but I don't think they'd go left-wing because they'd doubt that the money and fame would really be there. Why switch? Right-wing audiences are fanatical. And if the audience disappears, there's always serious foundation money, right?
I think these people would happily tack within conservatism -- just watch, as the midterms approach, how Beck and the other Foxsters suddenly start saying nicer and nicer things about the Republican Party -- but tack all the way left? Nahhh. They just wouldn't believe it was a good move, even with the hypothetical agent's ironclad guarantee. Once you succeed with a wingnut audience, you're set for life.
OK, I'll play. David Frum posted this on Saturday:
... Suppose an agent arrived in the offices of Limbaugh/Beck/Hannity/O’Reilly etc. with an offer. "I can guarantee you a deal that will pay you twice as much -- bring you twice as much fame -- and extend your career twice as long -- if you'd say the exact opposite of what you are saying now.” Which of them would sign?
My nominations: O'Reilly accepts for sure. Beck likewise almost certainly says yes. Limbaugh would want to think it over, but would ultimately say no. Mark Levin: certainly not. Sean Hannity would need the offer explained a few times. Ann Coulter -- that one puzzles me -- but probably no. Roger Ailes? Do you even need to ask?
Steve Benen agrees that Ailes, Coulter, and O'Reilly would take the offer, but that Beck wouldn't ("he seems more motivated by the voices in his head than financial rewards"). Levin and Hannity? No. Mori Dinauer at Tapped seems to doubt anyone would switch:
I'm skeptical. Some of the people [Frum] name-checks probably started out as opportunists, but there had to be a kernel of belief that motivated them to become conservative rather than liberal entertainers in the first place. And now they've moved beyond opportunism into full-fledged conservative brands. To accommodate the switch they would have to engineer a full-fledged public political conversion that, frankly, would be impossible to believe.
I think most of these folks, if not all of them, would reject the offer -- largely because they wouldn't believe that our side could deliver.
I don't think it's an either/or question -- Are they true believers or are they opportunists? I think nearly all of these people are sincere right-wingers who became professional right-wingers in part because they're opportunists. I think they believe that, if you're a professional right-winger, the money's always good (while it never seems nearly as good on the left). Even Limbaugh, who's regarded as a talk radio pioneer, had the success of people like Joe Pyne, Bob Grant, and Morton Downey Jr. to model himself on -- radio talk has always skewed right, hasn't it?
I think these guys would happily go apolitical -- Ailes ran the precursor to MSNBC (and hired hosts such as Charles Grodin), Beck was a shock jock, Limbaugh was a Top 40 DJ (and later tried fottball color commentary), O'Reilly hosted A Current Affair -- but I don't think they'd go left-wing because they'd doubt that the money and fame would really be there. Why switch? Right-wing audiences are fanatical. And if the audience disappears, there's always serious foundation money, right?
I think these people would happily tack within conservatism -- just watch, as the midterms approach, how Beck and the other Foxsters suddenly start saying nicer and nicer things about the Republican Party -- but tack all the way left? Nahhh. They just wouldn't believe it was a good move, even with the hypothetical agent's ironclad guarantee. Once you succeed with a wingnut audience, you're set for life.
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