If you want to get a glimpse of the sheer psychosis of the right wing mind, click here to read the ravings of a particularly alarmist winger who predicts that if Barack Obama becomes president, literally, all hell will break loose. Note that he includes "high gas prices" as one of the calamities. Clearly, this guy is a bicycler... What's really scary, is that he is not at all unusual.
Excuse my French, but these people are NUTS!
To be fair, many on the right are simply frustrated that Obama simply will not fade away. Few actually like John McCain, but their only hope of shoe horning him into the White House is for the mainstream media to take Obama down ... hard. That's not happening as yet, so they're down to attacking his new political director (Patrick Gaspard, with whom I worked back in my ACT days, and who, contrary to RedState, really isn't all that scary, and who as field director ... and I'll go slowlhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gify for the wingers, didn't direct or implement financial policy for ACT ...), sputtering on about "victory in Iraq," whining that the media are turning Obama into an icon, and writhing in agony as once again, the popular culture trends against them. This video has got to be particularly galling:
Ironically, neither the press nor the Obama campaign find their relationship quite so cozy. In fact, quite the opposite. And yet, the myth persists with righties, who apparently haven't noticed their candidate's eight-year media free ride.
By the way, not ONE pro-McCain article today on RedState. Very sad, but proof that the GOP will make the election all about Barack, with John McCain merely along for the ride.
I'll be doing some guest blogging for the Miami-Dade Democratic Party, starting in earnest next week. Feel free to give Larry Thorson and the gang a look-see here (or refer to the blogroll.) I know I live in Broward, but Dade is sort of my home away from home... besides, there's nothing going on up here but foreclosures and the price of gas. Maybe someone will wake Broward from the dead before the election is over...
Just in case you had any remaining doubt that the leading right wing bloggers are little more than stenographers for the White House and the GOP, dutifully tapping out talking points garnished to look like original thoughts, RawStory cops a link that utterly clears the fog:
At the urging of top conservative bloggers, the White House set up a Friday morning conference call to promote its message on the subject of executive privilege, RAW STORY has found.
"The White House hosted a blogger conference call to discuss the issues surrounding the Bush administration's use of executive privilege in the probe of the firings of eight federal prosecutors," wrote Ed Morrissey, who produces the blog Captains Quarters. "The White House arranged the call based on a recommendation by this blog, in order to familiarize the blogosphere with the legal and political arguments on which the administration will rely to prevail in the upcoming fight regarding the contempt citations Congress seems likely to approve." ...
Morrisey did not name any other participants in the call or identify the administration official who spoke to the assembled bloggers. But he showed that the message being delivered by the White House was short and to the point.
"The power to hire and fire federal prosecutors belongs exclusively to the executive branch," Morrissey wrote. "Congress has no particular oversight in these matters, and so the executive privilege claim is very compelling in this instance."
At least one commenter was critical of Morrissey's efforts.
"Thanks for reporting the administration's talking points, Captain Steno," wrote the posts only commenter. "You have a reputation for being a rational thinker, so how's about a little more in-depth analysis of the legal merit of the points?"
The offending post can be found here. Some of the commenters appear to be rightfully appalled at Captain's new job as Tony Snow's virtual lieutenant, but many of the BushBots are circling the wagons around the president and his lackey attorney general. Typical of the lap-dog commenters is someone called "Skywatch":
We are at war.
That does not forgive everything. I was and still am very worried about some of the patriot act (tho some concernces have been addressed).Like a Dem commentor said above would you want Hillary having this power? I would not. I trust the Bush toadies to use the powers to protect me. To listen and collect data on folks that wish harm on the country but I think Hillary would use those same powers to collect data on political foes.
Do you, now? Well that'll do, then, donkey, that'll do...
But there are also some lucid commenters over at Ed's, including someone called "Shieldvulf":
Lying to Congress and the people, politicizing law enforcement, and ignoring Congressional subpoenas are not at issue at all! The only question to be asked is, which side is someone on? Them over there? They are bad! It doesn't matter how well documented their outrage may be. All that matters is whether or not they get in line.
“I want to share with you how two Iraqi bloggers — they have bloggers in Baghdad, just like we’ve got here,” Mr. Bush told an audience of ranchers and cattlemen, after remarking that Iraqis were beginning to see “positive changes.”
He went on to quote the bloggers directly: “Displaced families are returning home, marketplaces are seeing more activity, stores that were long shuttered are now reopening. We feel safer about moving in the city now. Our people want to see this effort succeed. We hope the governments in Baghdad and America do not lose their resolve.”
But just who were these anonymous bloggers? The deputy White House press secretary, Dana Perino, spent a good chunk of her regular briefing on Wednesday deflecting that question, and defending the propriety of the president’s use of anonymous quotes.
Ms. Perino called the bloggers “one input from many different inputs that are coming in regarding progress on the ground,” and said she herself had often responded to anonymous quotations. “Blogs are new for all of us,” she said, “and I know that you all look at them, because you call me and ask me what we think about the blogs.”
As for the writers’ identity, it remained a mystery — until the White House distributed a transcript of the briefing. In a footnote at the end, the administration disclosed that the bloggers were Omar and Mohammed Fadhil, two brothers who are both dentists and who write an English-language blog, IraqTheModel.com, from Baghdad. The White House said their writings had been cited in mainstream news outlets; on March 5, the Fadhil brothers wrote an opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal titled “Notes from Baghdad.”
Oh, yes, and on Dec. 9, 2004, they met in the Oval Office with Mr. Bush.
Now that the subject is old and tired, the Times has stumbled on the “news” that the blogosphere is more aptly termed the propaganda-sphere.
Boxer takes on the case of Iraq the Model, a website that captures in its very name the neocon vision of a democratized and properly domesticated Middle East. The pro-war bloggers have been touting the brothers Fadhil, as exemplars of the “good news” from Iraq. Their capstone of their triumphant American tour, sponsored by a “charitable” organization known as the “Spirit of America,” occurred when two of the brothers were received at the White House for face time with the Prezt. But there’s a fly in this ointment, as I pointed out at the time, and I?m glad to see that the MSM, in the person of Ms. Boxer, has fished it out: the disenchantment of the third brother, Ali, whose last post on Iraq the Model read as follows:
“This is the last time I write in this blog and I just want to say, goodbye. It’s not an easy thing to do for me, but I know I should do it. I haven’t told my brothers with my decision, as they are not here yet, but it won’t change anything and I just can’t keep doing this anymore.
“My stand regarding America has never changed. I still love America and feel grateful to all those who helped us get our freedom and are still helping us establishing democracy in our country. But it’s the act of some Americans that made me feel I’m on the wrong side here. I will expose these people in public very soon and I won’t lack the mean to do this, but I won’t do it here as this is not my blog.
“At any rate, it’s been a great experience and a pleasure to know all the regular readers of this blog, as I do feel I know you, and I owe you a lot.
“Best wishes to all of you, those who supported us and those who criticized us as well.”
Boxer got in touch with Ali, and her depiction of his ambiguity about the American occupation, and the tenuousness of his position in relation to the realities of Iraq, ruined the Potemkin Village rah-rah propaganda regularly emitted ? in English ? on ?Iraq the Model? and a slew of other pro-occupation Iraqi blogs:
?Why did he quit Iraq the Model? When was he going to expose the Americans who made him feel he was on the wrong side? He was surprisingly frank. The blog had changed him. When the blog began, he said, ?People surprised me with their warmth and how much they cared about us.? But as time passed, he said, ?I felt that this is not just goodwill, giving so much credit to Iraq the Model. We haven’t accomplished anything, really.?
“His views took a sharp turn when his two brothers met with the president. There wasn’t supposed to be any press coverage about their trip to the United States, he said. But the Washington Post wrote about the meeting, and the Arabic press ended up translating the story, which, Ali felt, put his family in real danger. Anyway, he said, he didn’t see any sense in his brothers’ meeting with President Bush. ?My brothers say it happened accidentally, that it was not planned.? But why, he asked, take such an ?unnecessary risk?? He explained his worries: ?Here some people would kill you for just writing to an American.??
Ali, in short, was tired of being used by the War Party to make propaganda in America. The pro-war bloggers are now getting up on their high horses, screeching that Boxer has put the Fadhil brothers in danger. But Ali is right: it is the propagandists in America, including the laptop bombardiers? brigade, who put them in danger the minute they started holding them up as model New Iraqis, the offspring of the “liberation.” But since Glenn Reynolds-Powerline-Little Green Footballs crowd is definitely not part of the reality-based community, the hard reality of Ali?s comment that ?Here some people would kill you for just writing to an American? is inadmissible, becasue “some people” means an awful lot of people.
Boxer takes up the suspicions first raised by Martini Republic that ?Iraq the Model? might have informal connections to the U.S. government, a suggestion that was greeted with outrage by pro-war bloggers, but Ali?s account doesn?t dispel the murky aura of intrigue that hangs over the whole affair:
“Ali never did expose the people who made him feel that he was on the wrong side, and in fact conceded that he couldn’t. As he confided on the phone, ‘I didn’t know who the people were.’”
Hmmmmmmmm?.
But Ali isn’t disenchanted with the idea of human freedom: it’s just that now he doesn?t identify this idea with the U.S. government:
“‘Me and my brothers,’ he said, “we generally agree on Iraq and the future.’ (He is helping his brother Mohammed, who is running on the Iraqi Pro-Democracy Party ticket in the Jan. 30 election.) But there is one important difference: ‘My brothers have confidence in the American administration. I have my questions.’”
So it's not that simple, Mr. Bush. Much of what you read in blogs is pure political propaganda (think Pajamas Media, LGF, Wizbang (sadly, because there are some good guys over there, but they're becoming subsumed by the Kim Priestaps of the world), Redstate, and on and on). But there are also some independent-minded writers, too, like Rick Moran, Mark in Mexico, Alex Nunez (who I wish had more time to blog) and others, and even some bloggers, even of the Iraq the Model variety, for whom the Kool-Aid eventually wears off.
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"[T]he practice of arbitrary imprisonments, have been, in all ages, the favorite and most formidable instruments of tyranny.' Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 84, August, 1788
