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 Thursday, March 18, 2004
Irony Overload. Bremer yesterday. I wish we could laugh at these things. [Eschaton]
Why would we need political comics when this Admistration provides so many easy lines. Makes it a hard act to follow. 11:58:33 PM 
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$19810!. Wow. You all donated $19810 today, for a total of $75,513 since late Wed., Mar 3, when I first put the donation link up.
But, more importantly, there have been a total of 911 donations. Some have donated big, some small, but it's the willingness to donate at all that matters.
It's easy, therapeutic, and fun to read and rant online. But, now's the time when we can take some action. If you can afford to give a lot, great! If you can afford to give a little, great! If you can afford to give some time, that's great too! But, no matter what you do, if you've spent the last couple of years being pissed off and wanting change, you should make sure to do *something.*
I'm glad so many have.
and, uh, hey, an invite to the Unity Dinner wouldn't be out of line... [Eschaton]
One site that raised $75,000 online i 2 weeks. No wonder Kerry raised $10 million in 10 days. Maybe we will get to see some Kerry ads soon. 11:56:50 PM
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Mark Cuban: 5 Questions on Blogging. As I noted yesterday, Cuban also has a blog, and it definitely sounds like him. Just read the entries, and you won't be in any doubt.
I shot him a few quick questions about it by e-mail. He answered almost instantly. [Dan Gillmor's eJournal]
Not many times you see a millionaire owner of a sports franchise write so openly. It makes more human somene whom you only hear about when they say something about the lousy refs at a game. Kinda of fun to read. Read this one about how he will not answer reporters questions but will write his answers on a blog. Pretty funny. When is Trump going to have a blog? Would he be this interesting. 11:39:41 PM
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A Few Grown-Ups, At Least. John McCain: Senator John McCain added a rare bit of restraint to the escalating tone of the presidential campaign today,... [The Poor Man]
Restraint is needed if we expect to survive the next 8 months of ads. We see at least 3 Bush ads EVERY night with a couple of Kerry-supported ads thrown in. No real Kerry ad yet but then he does not have $150 million to spend. 8:54:36 PM
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Video of voting machine vendors and examiners admitting to the b0rkedness of voting machines. Douglas sez, "A group of us recently got our hands on unedited videos of the meetings where Texas's appointed voting system examiners meet with vendors. Very scary stuff. We've put together a downloadable 'greatest hits' version. My favorite moment: 'I just want to make sure this machine can add. Remember, we've had machines recently that didn't add.' 'We've certified other things that weren't tested' is a close second."
Link
(Thanks, Douglas) [Boing Boing]
Be afraid. Be very afraid. 8:49:31 PM
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Freedom Sausage. Poland steps off the ranch.
WARSAW (AFP) - In a first sign of official criticism in Poland of the US-led invasion of Iraq (news - web sites), President Aleksander Kwasniewski said that his country had been "taken for a ride" about the alleged existence of weapons of mass destruction in the strife-torn country.
"That they deceived us about the weapons of mass destruction, that's true. We were taken for a ride," Kwasniewski said Thursday.
He argued however that it made no sense to pull US-led coalition troops out of Iraq.
His comments marked the first time Poland has publicly criticized Washington's argument for invading Iraq and for winning support from Poland and other European allies such as Britain and Spain.
[Eschaton]
I wonder what will happen to Poland's foreign aid now? No body crosses Rove. 10:03:29 AM
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United They'll Stand. Hesiod has a few comments about the Kerry campaign. But, let me add some additional points.
The Democrats have about 250 members of Congress. They have numerous official and non-official allies. They need to figure out how to use them to run this campaign in the 24/7 news cycle in a media landscape which is much more fractured than it was back in 1992. At any point in time, they need to have dozens of people ready to fan out to every possible media outlet and perform the inverse judo flip any time the Bush machine turns on the slime. There should be a small army, including a couple top generals, ready to lend their voice on any subject at any time. They should be briefed and prepped with the latest talking points, and they should be out there screaming them at every opportunity.
Richard Holbrooke shows us how it's done:
BLITZER: Ambassador Holbrooke, thanks very much for joining us. A little revised version of what John Kerry said. He said, "I've met more leaders who can't go out and say it all publicly, but boy, they look at you and say, you got to win. This you got to beat this guy, we need a new policy, things like that." So there is enormous energy out there. The president today said, if he makes an accusation, he has a responsibility to back it up. What do you say?
RICHARD HOLBROOKE, FRM. U.S. AMB. TO U.N.: John Kerry committed an unpardonable crime in Washington: he spoketh the truth. What he said is self-evidently true. There's a new poll out today by the Pew Institute, a worldwide pool, which shows massive and growing anti-Americanism around the world. Now American voters need to make up their own mind who they prefer, George W. Bush or John Kerry. But they also ought to know this administration is isolating us in the world, weakening us. Recent events in Spain, this election are another example.
John Kerry said something everybody knows is true. And, Wolf, you know it's true. And why don't I say just one other thing. Why don't you, instead of staging a silly he said/he said between the White House, which is throwing all this mud at John Kerry after he said something true. Why don't you poll your foreign correspondents on CNN. And ask them who the population and leaderships in the world would prefer to see elected? Very simple."
Kerry's "foreign leader" comment, which he may not have even made, is in the universe inhabited by sane people about as controversial as claiming water is wet. Everybody knows it. Every journalist who has pushed this story knows it. Every person in government knows it. It's only a story because the media keeps reporting it as if it were scandalous. People hear "Kerry...controversy..." over and over again and they asssume that where there's smoke there must be fire, even though there is no story at all.
But, if the Dems can't get their media operation in place they're going to have big troubles. This nonstory shouldn't have played over multiple news cycles. Learn to throw it back in their faces.[Eschaton]
I loved Holbrooke's comeback. It should be trivial for real journalists to find out for themselves who are some foreign leaders who back Kerry, instead of being incredibly lazy and doing a talking heads revue. But then, we have become used to incredibly lazy journalism, occupied by people who do not really give a damn for the people they are providing news to. The contempt of so many in the press for what they actually do is pretty palpable sometimes. 10:02:48 AM
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That Liberal Media. So, I'm reading through this NYT article about Spain which starts off okay.
WASHINGTON, March 17 -- The Bush administration said Wednesday for the first time that the Spanish government had mishandled early information about the Madrid bombing when it played down evidence that Islamic extremists were behind the plot.
The strongest public statement came from Richard L. Armitage, the deputy secretary of state, who said in a television interview that the Spanish government initially "didn't get what information did exist out to the public."
He suggested that the Spanish government had clung to the supposition that a Basque separatist group, ETA, was responsible and failed to tell the public about emerging evidence that Islamic extremists might have detonated the bombs that killed about 200 and injured hundreds of others Thursday. In separate interviews, he twice said Spain "mishandled" the matter, The Associated Press reported. As a result, he said, the governing party was ousted in elections Sunday.
But then I get to this sentence and feel the need to reach for the bourbon:
At the same time, the White House and its allies tried to halt any notion that other nations might be tempted to follow Spain's example of bending to terrorists.
There you go. The writers, Sanger and Johnston, state unequivocally that Spain did the will of terrorists. Not "Bush administration's belief that..." Not "The belief of some..." Nope, just that it happened.
[Eschaton]
Very weak copy editors and writers at the NYT. I don;t think so. More likely just plain incompetant. Why have an article discussing that perhaps Spain voted because it did not trust its government to tell the truth than add the Administration's line that Spain bent to the will of the terrorists. Some reporters are such tools. 9:56:54 AM
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This is the smartest thing this Administration has done so far in its re-election bid. Cheney is the stalking horse so that Bush can rise above the negative ad fray. Unfortunately, their facts are still pretty mixed up but it does get Kerry appearing to respond to the Vice-President rather than the President. Kerry could waste his energy and credibility on the Vice President, allowing Bush to come in later much more refreshed and energized. Perhaps. 9:41:53 AM
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Another editorial discussing the Medicare fiasco. They do not mention that Skully, the fall guy for all this is no longer in the government but was given a waiver from the Adminstration to look for a job a job in the same industry he regulated (i.e. advising pharmaceutical companies) WHILE he still worked for the government. He now works for an Atlanta law firm that represents hospitals. Pretty nice reward for falling on your sword. 9:32:36 AM
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Your Tax Dollars at Work. YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK....The irrepressible Henry Waxman has a new website available for your perusal: Iraq on the Record, a compilation of public statements from Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, and Rice about the war in Iraq. According to an... [Political Animal]
Don't you just love new technology? Now it is a simple matter to do a datbase seach and find out exactly what members of the Adminstration said when abut Iraq. So when we get them out in public, they can be questioned as Rumsfeld was on Face The Nation. On the Internet, we will fact-check your ass. 9:16:19 AM
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