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Bob Somerby on the threat to non-political truth
Like me, Bob Somerby is worried about the way liberals are sliding down the slippery slope of spin. He first quotes from Paul Krugman’s column Friday: [W]e’re not living in the America of the past, where even partisans sometimes changed their views when faced with the facts. Instead, we’re living in a country in which
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de Marchi and Munger on Senate Judiciary polarization
Scott de Marchi and Mike Munger, two of my illustrious professors, have published a nice analysis of polarization on the Senate Judiciary Committee in the Raleigh News & Observer. Here’s the conclusion: [T]here is no room for compromise, no “swing” votes for the chairman to appeal to. In fact, if Specter tries to compromise, his
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Matt Bai on George Lakoff
Matt Bai’s much-touted article on professor/framing guru George Lakoff came out in the New York Times Magazine this week. I have to admit that I was hoping for more new material (see my previous posts on Lakoff), but Bai does carry the ball forward in a few areas: 1) The disturbing ubiquity of Lakoff among
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A Washington Post primer on the Plame/Wilson/Rove saga
Via Josh Marshall, make sure to check out the Washington Post’s recap of “Plamegate,” which does an admirable job of laying out the whole saga for readers who haven’t followed every twist and turn — something newspapers don’t do nearly enough.
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Michelle Cottle on Bush administration relativism
More on the conservative movement’s slide toward relativism from TNR’s Michelle Cottle: [Karl] Rove is just the latest, most egregious example we’ve seen. Before that, America watched as the CIA head who screwed up the Iraq WMD intelligence was given a pass–and then a medal. Ditto the geniuses who botched–or rather failed to do any–postwar
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Bill Frist tries to criminalize dissent
In response to a Democratic amendment intended to strip Karl Rove of his security clearance, Republican leaders retaliated “with a measure designed to strip the security clearance of the chamber’s top two Democrats.” Here’s the Post’s summary of the stunning amendment: Frist offered his aimed at Reid and Democratic Whip Richard J. Durbin (Ill.). Frist’s
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What is Anne E. Kornblut talking about?
New York Times reporter Anne E. Kornblut needs a history lesson. Here’s what she wrote about Ken Mehlman’s apology yesterday: Ken Mehlman, chairman of the Republican National Committee, spoke at the N.A.A.C.P.’s convention in Milwaukee. In his most extensive comments yet on the subject of race, Mr. Mehlman apologized for the so-called Southern strategy that
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Failure of private accounts buried
Why isn’t this on the front page of the New York Times? With no consensus in sight, even among Republicans, the chairmen of the Senate and House committees with jurisdiction over Social Security have decided to postpone further consideration of the issue at least until September. With every passing week, the prospects for major Social
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John Gibson and the WSJ reach a new low
Almost every prominent conservative in Washington, including the President, denounced the leak of Valerie Plame’s identity two years ago. But now that Karl Rove is in trouble, Fox News host John Gibson and the Wall Street Journal are arguing that it is a good thing that Valerie Plame’s identity as a CIA agent was revealed.
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The New York Post joins the post-London attack on dissent
Following in the footsteps of Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity, the New York Post has published yet another vitriolic attack on dissent in the wake of the London bombings: Democratic attacks on the president, his party and his war policies come in two basic categories — essentially self-serving and insidiously subversive. Sens. Chuck Schumer and