Sunday, January 26, 2003
Another column on astro-turf.
Nice to see this getting some exposure, but the media sure do follow the herd... People have been alerting editors about this stuff for months and months.
Nice to see this getting some exposure, but the media sure do follow the herd... People have been alerting editors about this stuff for months and months.
Tom Spencer has more on John Lott's survey alibi - including this fascinating letter to the editor (which Mac Diva had also sent to me previously but I for some reason forgot to post it).
Hey, no one told me that Richard Powers had a new book out.
I quite like most of what Powers has written. His big flaw is that, to me at least, writing always seems hard for him - as if he has to labor over every sentence. And, admittedly, his characters are bit of the cardboard cutout variety. Still, he was writing novels about Big Ideas when that was horribly untrendy. I'd recommend Three Farmers on Their Way to a Dance, The Prisoner's Dilemma, The Goldbug Variations, and Galatea 2.0. The last one is sort of autobiographical, so it helps to have read a few of his previous novels.
I quite like most of what Powers has written. His big flaw is that, to me at least, writing always seems hard for him - as if he has to labor over every sentence. And, admittedly, his characters are bit of the cardboard cutout variety. Still, he was writing novels about Big Ideas when that was horribly untrendy. I'd recommend Three Farmers on Their Way to a Dance, The Prisoner's Dilemma, The Goldbug Variations, and Galatea 2.0. The last one is sort of autobiographical, so it helps to have read a few of his previous novels.
If you take away the black vote...
Josh Marshall has a post about how the media regularly portrays minority votes as somehow being second class votes - or as he puts it:
It's as though a party's political viability and health are best judged by how it fares in the white electorate.
He's right. It's bad enough when Rush Limbaugh loudly proclaims that "If you take away the black vote, Bush won by the landslide!" as if this were relevant, and not incredibly racist. But, it isn't just Limbaugh - seemingly inspired by him, CNN's Bill Schneider pretty much echoed this sentiment when he presented this piece (from April 25, 2002), which I originally posted about here:
A hopeless minority.
My jaw literally was on the ground when I watched him do this.
It's as though a party's political viability and health are best judged by how it fares in the white electorate.
He's right. It's bad enough when Rush Limbaugh loudly proclaims that "If you take away the black vote, Bush won by the landslide!" as if this were relevant, and not incredibly racist. But, it isn't just Limbaugh - seemingly inspired by him, CNN's Bill Schneider pretty much echoed this sentiment when he presented this piece (from April 25, 2002), which I originally posted about here:
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WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST: Judy, how dependent are Democrats on the African-American vote?
Without black voters, the 1992 and 1996 presidential elections would have been virtually tied,just like the 2000 election. Oh no, more Florida recounts!
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(voice-over): What would have happened if no blacks had voted in 2000? Six states would have shifted from Al Gore to George W. Bush: Maryland, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin and Oregon. Bush would have won by 187 electoral votes, instead of five. A Florida recount? Not necessary.
Right now, there are 50 Democrats in the Senate. How many would be there without African-American voters? We checked the state exit polls for the 1996, 1998, and 2000 elections. If no blacks had voted, many Southern Democrats would not have made it to the Senate. Both Max Cleland and Zell Miller needed black votes to win in Georgia. So did Mary Landrieu in Louisiana, Bill Nelson in Florida, John Edwards in North Carolina, and Ernest Hollings in South Carolina.
Black votes were also crucial for Jon Corzine in New Jersey, Debbie Stabenow in Michigan, and Jean Carnahan in Missouri. Washington state and Nevada don't have many black voters, but they were still crucial to the victories of Harry Reid in Nevada and Maria Cantwell in Washington.
Nebraska and Wisconsin don't have many black voters either, but Ben Nelson would have lost Nebraska without them and Russ Feingold would have lost Wisconsin, too, in both cases by less than half-a- percent. Bottom line? Without the African-American vote, the number of Democrats in the Senate would be reduced from 50 to 37.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SCHNEIDER: A hopeless minority. And Jim Jeffords' defection from the GOP would not have meant a thing -- Judy.
A hopeless minority.
My jaw literally was on the ground when I watched him do this.
Saturday, January 25, 2003
The Horse is trumpeting some falsehoods in the book review of Susan McDougal's new book. Mentioned by the Horse, and in the review, is the book Blood Sport. Throughout the whole Whitewater affair, there were various moments of press coverage that were so egregioiusly bad that you couldn't help but realize the entire press corps had taken the red pill on this one. One of the biggest ones was Jeff Greenfield's cut-and-pasting of footage of an interview with Hillary Clinton which deliberately turned what she had said upside down. Another was the surreal moment on Nightline when James Stewart, who had just written this breathless tale of Arkansas corruption, was asked the $64,000 dollar question by Ted Koppel (on the March 11, 1996 show):
TED KOPPEL: What then, do you conclude, that- I mean, try and give it to me in a broad sense. What is it that you would say if you were obliged, in 15 or 30 seconds, to summarize what is troublesome about Whitewater and what will still come back to haunt the Clintons?
So, the man was given the opportunity to say concisely just what the Clintons had done wrong - legally, ethically, morally, whatever. The *worst* thing.
What does he come up with?
JAMES STEWART: Well, I think the Whitewater investment and the story of that is important because it shows many things about the Clintons. It shows their willingness to hold themselves to the standards that everyone else has to meet. It shows their willingness to abide
by financial requirements in obtaining mortgage loans. But I think, most of all, it shows their willingness, while in Arkansas, to accept the favors of people who were regulated by the state. Their attitude to this, which bordered on the negligent in the beginning, clearly
indicated a mindset which said, 'Somebody else will take care of us because of our power as highly elected officials in the state of Arkansas.'
TED KOPPEL: In a sense, Jim, that's a negative way of saying the same thing we heard Mrs. Clinton say at the beginning of this broadcast. In other words, let somebody else take care of this. She put, in a more positive sense, i.e., 'We had nothing to do with this. If Jim
McDougal came and said, 'You owe so-and-so-much in interest,' we paid it, but we never saw documents, we never had an active role in this Whitewater affair.' To which you would say what?
JAMES STEWART: Well, that simply isn't true. I think it may have been true in the very beginning of the investment, when there were still high hopes that this would make money and the McDougals could handle everything, but by 1986, when the McDougal empire was
crumbling, it was not true. At that point, Mrs. Clinton essentially took, singlehandedly, the control of this investment. She was the one who negotiated the loan renewals with the bank that held the mortgage. She was the one who handled all the correspondence. She was the
one who went over all the numbers. She had possession of all the records.
TED KOPPEL: It is your contention that she vastly inflated the value of the Clintons' interest in Whitewater.
JAMES STEWART: That's correct.
TED KOPPEL: Correct?
JAMES STEWART: As I'm sure anybody who has ever applied for a mortgage knows, you have to disclose your assets in such a financial disclosure statement, and there are warnings on these forms to be honest about this, to be accurate, to be careful, not to use uncertain
judgments, because to inflate that can be a federal crime. And yet Mrs. Clinton valued Whitewater at $100,000 on a 1987 financial disclosure document, right after the bank itself had visited the property and concluded the most generous estimate for their half-interest would
be $52,000.
TED KOPPEL: So when you're talking about a $100,000 evaluation, you're not talking about the value of the whole property, but the Clintons' half-interest?
JAMES STEWART: They valued their half-interest at $100,000.
TED KOPPEL: I ask you this question advisedly, reminding our viewers that you have some experience as a lawyer. Is that a crime?
JAMES STEWART: It is a crime to submit a false financial document. In fact, their partners, the McDougals, are on trial in Little Rock this week for having submitted false financial documents to financial institutions. But to prove a case like that, a prosecutor would have to
prove that it was knowingly a false submission. We haven't heard an explanation from either Mrs. Clinton or the President about that document, and that ultimately would be a question for a prosecutor and a jury to decide.
A supposedly fraudulent loan application. So, a few hundred page book gets distilled down to a fraudulent loan application.
Which, of course, we know was only "fraudulent" because James Stewart was missing a page.
As Conason says:
As it turned out, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author had simply failed to notice that the loan document had two sides -- a back and a front –- and that Mrs. Clinton had completed the document without error, let alone fraudulent intent. Stewart's revelation was merely another of
many, many ominous but ultimately phony insinuations that stoked public suspicion.
TED KOPPEL: What then, do you conclude, that- I mean, try and give it to me in a broad sense. What is it that you would say if you were obliged, in 15 or 30 seconds, to summarize what is troublesome about Whitewater and what will still come back to haunt the Clintons?
So, the man was given the opportunity to say concisely just what the Clintons had done wrong - legally, ethically, morally, whatever. The *worst* thing.
What does he come up with?
JAMES STEWART: Well, I think the Whitewater investment and the story of that is important because it shows many things about the Clintons. It shows their willingness to hold themselves to the standards that everyone else has to meet. It shows their willingness to abide
by financial requirements in obtaining mortgage loans. But I think, most of all, it shows their willingness, while in Arkansas, to accept the favors of people who were regulated by the state. Their attitude to this, which bordered on the negligent in the beginning, clearly
indicated a mindset which said, 'Somebody else will take care of us because of our power as highly elected officials in the state of Arkansas.'
TED KOPPEL: In a sense, Jim, that's a negative way of saying the same thing we heard Mrs. Clinton say at the beginning of this broadcast. In other words, let somebody else take care of this. She put, in a more positive sense, i.e., 'We had nothing to do with this. If Jim
McDougal came and said, 'You owe so-and-so-much in interest,' we paid it, but we never saw documents, we never had an active role in this Whitewater affair.' To which you would say what?
JAMES STEWART: Well, that simply isn't true. I think it may have been true in the very beginning of the investment, when there were still high hopes that this would make money and the McDougals could handle everything, but by 1986, when the McDougal empire was
crumbling, it was not true. At that point, Mrs. Clinton essentially took, singlehandedly, the control of this investment. She was the one who negotiated the loan renewals with the bank that held the mortgage. She was the one who handled all the correspondence. She was the
one who went over all the numbers. She had possession of all the records.
TED KOPPEL: It is your contention that she vastly inflated the value of the Clintons' interest in Whitewater.
JAMES STEWART: That's correct.
TED KOPPEL: Correct?
JAMES STEWART: As I'm sure anybody who has ever applied for a mortgage knows, you have to disclose your assets in such a financial disclosure statement, and there are warnings on these forms to be honest about this, to be accurate, to be careful, not to use uncertain
judgments, because to inflate that can be a federal crime. And yet Mrs. Clinton valued Whitewater at $100,000 on a 1987 financial disclosure document, right after the bank itself had visited the property and concluded the most generous estimate for their half-interest would
be $52,000.
TED KOPPEL: So when you're talking about a $100,000 evaluation, you're not talking about the value of the whole property, but the Clintons' half-interest?
JAMES STEWART: They valued their half-interest at $100,000.
TED KOPPEL: I ask you this question advisedly, reminding our viewers that you have some experience as a lawyer. Is that a crime?
JAMES STEWART: It is a crime to submit a false financial document. In fact, their partners, the McDougals, are on trial in Little Rock this week for having submitted false financial documents to financial institutions. But to prove a case like that, a prosecutor would have to
prove that it was knowingly a false submission. We haven't heard an explanation from either Mrs. Clinton or the President about that document, and that ultimately would be a question for a prosecutor and a jury to decide.
A supposedly fraudulent loan application. So, a few hundred page book gets distilled down to a fraudulent loan application.
Which, of course, we know was only "fraudulent" because James Stewart was missing a page.
As Conason says:
As it turned out, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author had simply failed to notice that the loan document had two sides -- a back and a front –- and that Mrs. Clinton had completed the document without error, let alone fraudulent intent. Stewart's revelation was merely another of
many, many ominous but ultimately phony insinuations that stoked public suspicion.
You know, I'm pretty sure that the kind of people who would get upset about Serena Williams sitting on a flag are the same people who attached flags to their automobiles in violation of any protocol, then let them get shredded in the wind and rain until they flew off on the highway only to be run over and pulverized into the ground by an oncoming truck or 50.
First thing we do, let's..
Jeanne D'Arc points us to some truly insane prosecutors.
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Prosecutors... were going to great lengths to skirt Ryan's order, in some instances searching for technical legal glitches -- the kind they usually lament for freeing the guilty -- in the hope of sending some who received clemency back to death row. They were combing old records to see if perhaps sentencing papers had not been signed or otherwise properly processed, on the theory that if an inmate had not been legally, technically, sentenced to death he could not be granted clemency from that sentence.
Digby sez:
Indeed.
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I do look forward to Rush Limbaugh and all of his imitators, the entire Barbizon School of Dyed Blond Former Prosecutors, the editorial board of the New York Times and the Washington Post, William Safire, Maureen Dowd and every other columnist, Lucianne Goldberg and her coven of hideous bitches, AND EVERY OTHER REPUBLICAN WHO SAID THAT CLINTON WAS A CRIMINAL, to now prostrate themselves at the feet of Bill and Hillary for the despicable, cruel and outrageous lies they spread from the years 1992 through the present.
If I've got to apologize publicly for posting one inaccurate article, the entire Republican establishment will be spending the rest of its natural life trying to find the time to eat and sleep in between confessions of guilt.
Better get started, Kids. I suggest that you begin with the false allegations of holding up Air Force One with a haircut, go on to the bogus accusations of influencing Beverly Bassett on Madison Guarantee (and ALL Whitewater related smears for that matter.) Don't forget Vince Fosters much investigated "murder", through Safire's "scoop" that Hillary was about to be indicted and just keep going until you hit Clinton's illegitimate love child and the phony White House trashing story.
Indeed.
The Horse reminds us of how the press's treatment of Dubya is increasingly resembling their treatment of Reagan - first, falsely pretending that he was incredibly popular, and the second using that popularity as their reason for laying off him, or being On Bended Knee as the book is titled. His Alzheimer's was also an open secret among the media for years . Contrast that with their treatment of Clinton, who was truly popular - with both his average and top Gallup poll rating exceeding Reagan's.
The invaluable PollKatz gives us this Gallup Poll comparison chart. The interesting thing is how closely Clinton's poll numbers track Reagan's up until about 5 1/2 years in, when Reagan's drop substantially and Clinton's surge. For a good third of his presidency, Reagan's numbers were essentially in the 40s. It really is a sharp contrast the media's portrayal of Reagan as an exceedingly popular president. He wasn't.
The invaluable PollKatz gives us this Gallup Poll comparison chart. The interesting thing is how closely Clinton's poll numbers track Reagan's up until about 5 1/2 years in, when Reagan's drop substantially and Clinton's surge. For a good third of his presidency, Reagan's numbers were essentially in the 40s. It really is a sharp contrast the media's portrayal of Reagan as an exceedingly popular president. He wasn't.
Stephen Phelps has written a column about astro-turf here.
Let me chime in here. Aside from taking an amusing swipe at 'the other side,' let me explain why the whole astro-turf issue is a bit more than that. A lot of people have said that all political parties and interest groups regularly issue various "action alerts" including sample letters to send to various people. This is true, but most of the time the "click here to send this form letter under your name" systems are directed not at newspapers for the purposes of publication but for congressional representatives. As such, they are more like signing a petition. I've sent a few of those and I've never expected the recipients to assume it was a letter written in my own words.
In addition, GOPTeamLeader allows the user to send the identical letter simultaneously to up to 5 media sources - which is a bit indecent.
But, really, the main issue about this astroturf was that so many editors published it even though it was so obviously a piece of astro-turf. In fact, one editor communicated to one of my readers that they published it knowing full well that it was astroturf "as a courtesy" to their many GOP readers.
Let me chime in here. Aside from taking an amusing swipe at 'the other side,' let me explain why the whole astro-turf issue is a bit more than that. A lot of people have said that all political parties and interest groups regularly issue various "action alerts" including sample letters to send to various people. This is true, but most of the time the "click here to send this form letter under your name" systems are directed not at newspapers for the purposes of publication but for congressional representatives. As such, they are more like signing a petition. I've sent a few of those and I've never expected the recipients to assume it was a letter written in my own words.
In addition, GOPTeamLeader allows the user to send the identical letter simultaneously to up to 5 media sources - which is a bit indecent.
But, really, the main issue about this astroturf was that so many editors published it even though it was so obviously a piece of astro-turf. In fact, one editor communicated to one of my readers that they published it knowing full well that it was astroturf "as a courtesy" to their many GOP readers.
Make sure to listen in to Johnny Wendell today from 12-13pm PST on KFI out of LA (streaming) . KFI is like this black hole on the AM dial, sucking everyone's radio tuner to it - huge audience. He's one of the few, but hopefully growing, number of liberal hosts on the radio - and tuning and and sending positive comments to management could help.
Ampersand brings to our attention the non-impact of affirmative action on white admissions rates to elite schools.
The Hamster lays into the ridiculous Alan Colmes. Eric had corresponded with Alan Colmes previously about his ineffectiveness.
No need to teach 1960s history anymore, we're repeating it for the kiddies:
Wonder if they've interviewed Max Klinger yet...
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Saturday, January 25, 2003 -Federal authorities have begun enlisting campus police officers in the domestic war on terror, renewing fears among some faculty and student groups of overzealous FBI spying at colleges and universities that led to scandals in decades past.
On at least a dozen campuses, the FBI has included collegiate police officers as members of local Joint Terrorism Task Forces, the regional entities that oversee counterterrorism investigations nationwide.
Some officers have been given federal security clearance, which allows them access to classified information. Their supervisors often do not know which cases these officers are working on because details cannot be shared, officials said
...
Distrust of the FBI runs high among some faculty who remember the counterculture demonstrations of the 1960s. Under J. Edgar Hoover's 15-year COINTELPRO program, the bureau engaged in broad and questionable tactics aimed at monitoring and disrupting student activist groups.
FBI agents infiltrated leftist antiwar and civil rights groups with informants, tapped into radio frequencies to disrupt protest plans, stole membership rolls and compiled dossiers on student political leaders. The FBI even produced bogus student newspapers, one conservative and one liberal, to spread inaccurate information and sow dissension among student groups. The COINTELPRO program was halted in 1971.
...
At the University of Toledo, police chief John A. Dauer said that one full-time and one part-time officer are assigned to the FBI terrorism task force based in Cleveland. Although he is not privy to the details of his officers' work with federal agents, Dauer said the arrangement gives him a better handle on possible terrorist threats on campus than he previously had.
"We have a large Arab population between here and Dearborn that they are concerned about, and a considerable international population on campus," Dauer said. "Having the detectives work with them helps us be more proactive in terms of information. Without that, we'd probably have very little information at all."
Wonder if they've interviewed Max Klinger yet...
The MinuteMan has a few words about Sully's blame deflection regarding the Confederate Wreath issue.
He links to someone who says that the career of the reporter who did the Time story is probably on thin ice. If only that were so. This is Micahael Weisskopf we are talking about, one head of the two headed Ken Starr lie dissemination hydra known around these parts as the Scheisskopf (the other head of this filth spewing monster being 'Steno' Sue Schmidt.)
Interesting Times notes the whole story may have started with this press release on a confederacy site.
He links to someone who says that the career of the reporter who did the Time story is probably on thin ice. If only that were so. This is Micahael Weisskopf we are talking about, one head of the two headed Ken Starr lie dissemination hydra known around these parts as the Scheisskopf (the other head of this filth spewing monster being 'Steno' Sue Schmidt.)
Interesting Times notes the whole story may have started with this press release on a confederacy site.
Thanks to everyone who has been sending me nice gifts through amazon! I may waste the weekend watching my Lord of the Rings DVDs..
So, this is where we are
-
BROWN: All right. Back to Iraq and a couple stories that brought a chill today. The State Department warned all Americans living abroad to be prepared to be evacuated. A senior official not denying that the possibility of war triggered this most unusual worldwide advisory.
Also today, we learned the FBI is trying to get a handle on Iraqis who are living in the United States; living here legally or otherwise. For more on this, we go to Washington and CNN's Kelli Arena -- Kelli, good to see you tonight.
ARENA: Hi there, Aaron. Well the FBI is very busy trying to locate and interview as many as 50,000 Iraqis currently living here in the United States. Now, officials say that agents are searching for everything from potential terrorist cells to individuals who may be able to provide information that would be helpful if the U.S. goes to war with Iraq: for example, someone who may have a relative that's still in Iraq who may be able to contact people that are interested in defecting or providing information to the U.S. military.
Now, agents have been interviewing Iraqis in their homes, at work, in mosques. But it is a very delicate balancing act. They need cooperation from these communities. And when FBI agents come sniffing around, especially these days, Aaron, law enforcement sources say that people tend to clam up, especially if they're here illegally.
Now, separately, sources say that there are as many as 600 to 1,000 individuals under constant surveillance here in the United States, some of them Iraqi, but definitely not all of them. And these people, sources say, may be capable of doing harm to the United States. So, that is what's going on, at least on the domestic front, as we approach a possible war, Aaron.
BROWN: If you know, when the FBI contacts people who are here illegally and seeks their cooperation, are they told that they'll get a pass from immigration or not, if they cooperate?
ARENA: Not always. Not always. It really is done on a case-by- case basis.
Sources have said that, in some cases, the threat of deportation does make people cooperate in some instances. But headquarters has sent out a very clear message, Aaron. They have said: Look, we're looking from cooperation from these communities. Do not go out there and use a heavy-handed approach. Do not go out there and intimidate. People can come forward voluntarily. We want them to come forward voluntarily. So, let's not go out there and smash people with this. We want to make sure that we get cooperation now and in the months ahead, when it's going to be really crucial.
BROWN: And just as perhaps a matter of common sense, while it's certainly possible -- I don't know if it's likely, but it's certainly possible there are Iraqi bad guys in the United States. One would think that most of the Iraqis who found their way to the United States were desperately trying to get out of Iraq, because it's not a very pleasant place to be, necessarily.
ARENA: That's right.
BROWN: And they're more happy to be here, legal or otherwise.
ARENA: That's right. That's right.
And FBI officials do point out that the majority of Iraqi nationals living here, they have absolutely no evidence to support that they're here to do any harm. But they are very concerned about possible terrorist cells that may have been sent here after the first Gulf War by Saddam Hussein, waiting to be ignited, waiting to be put into action.
Now, I have to underscore, Aaron, that officials say that they have absolutely no evidence of any Iraqi cells or any terrorist cells in general that they've been able to locate. But it is a concern. And they want to get as much information, intelligence-wise and military operation-wise, as they can.
BROWN: Thank you, Kelli Arena -- and one more sign of how the country is preparing at least for the very real possibility that war could come.
Thank you, Kelli Arena.
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