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Wow. It's just amazing how the fraudulent reporting of USA Today reporter Kelley has set off a firestorm in the media and blogging worlds. Not. As this letter writer to Romanesko says:
From PETER CARLIN: I agree with Tom Jackman that the Kelley miasma isn't rating near enough conversation. Not just for the professional and ethical questions it raises, though those are clearly legion. But the more you read about Kelley, the more fascinating his lunacy becomes. Note how he continues to swear by his stories, no matter how much evidence -- much of it rock-solid, such as the drowned woman who turned up alive and well -- to the contrary. He's the energizer bunny of liars, just beating that drum all the way across the room, out the door and down the hallway.
I was tickled to see, via a link on Drudge's site, (speaking of lunatics, but that's another story) a lovely story about Kelley on some religious website in which he described the transcendent joy of journalism: "I feel God's pleasure when I write and report," Kelley enthused. Which is strange and wondrous indeed, when you consider the sort of reporting Kelley was doing.
And then there's this priceless bit of what has to be whole cloth that Kelley spun for his faithful friends, regarding his experience in Moscow when he ran afoul of Russian mobsters and, as his pursuers gained, could only pray for help. Let's let Jack tell us what happened next:
"I got this vision of an apartment building with the number 925 on it and an elderly man next to the door up one flight of stairs. Next thing I knew, I came upon building number 925. Walking in, I found an elderly man on the right who told me to come in until my pursuers passed," Jack recalls.
Yea and verily!
The thing about the Jasyon Blair story was that it didn't matter. Sure it was egg on face of the New York Times, but his fabrications were almost entirely harmless and trivial. Kelley's fabrications were frequently inflammatory pieces on inflammatory issues. And, while Blair's agenda was just preserving his career, Kelley possibly had a much larger one though I haven't read much analysis of his fabrications in that context.
When the Blair scandal came out there were endless ruminations about the poisonous impact of affirmative action on the newsroom, and many many people who declared solemnly that "of course" his race was a factor. People like the brothers Hack, Crazy Andy, etc...
What's their explanation for this guy, who got away with the equivalent of murder for years? We'll never know, because as a quick glance at their site shows - they don't care a bit.
WASHINGTON, March 19 — Senior Clinton administration officials called to testify next week before the independent commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks say they are prepared to detail how they repeatedly warned their Bush administration counterparts in late 2000 that Al Qaeda posed the worst security threat facing the nation — and how the new administration was slow to act.
They said the warnings were delivered in urgent post-election intelligence briefings in December 2000 and January 2001 for Condoleezza Rice, who became Mr. Bush's national security adviser; Stephen Hadley, now Ms. Rice's deputy; and Philip D. Zelikow, a member of the Bush transition team, among others.
One official scheduled to testify, Richard A. Clarke, who was President Bill Clinton's counterterrorism coordinator, said in an interview that the warning about the Qaeda threat could not have been made more bluntly to the incoming Bush officials in intelligence briefings that he led.
At the time of the briefings, there was extensive evidence tying Al Qaeda to the bombing in Yemen two months earlier of an American warship, the Cole, in which 17 sailors were killed.
"It was very explicit," Mr. Clarke said of the warning given to the Bush administration officials. "Rice was briefed, and Hadley was briefed, and Zelikow sat in." Mr. Clarke served as Mr. Bush's counterterrorism chief in the early months of the administration, but after Sept. 11 was given a more limited portfolio as the president's cyberterrorism adviser.
The sworn testimony from the high-ranking Clinton administration officials — including Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright, Defense Secretary William S. Cohen and Samuel R. Berger, Mr. Clinton's national security adviser — is scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday.
Oy. I'd forgotten that our ambassador to Spain was a former nemesis of mine, George Argyros, from my days when I was trapped behind the Orange Curtain.
Sen. John F. Kerry is setting the stage to raise as much as $100 million for his presidential campaign by seizing control of his party's fundraising machinery, winning the support of top money people for vanquished rivals, and attracting thousands of new small donors via the Internet, according to officials inside and outside his campaign.
In the two months since the Jan. 19 Iowa caucuses, the Massachusetts Democrat's campaign has pulled in more than $26 million, including $18 million over the Internet, aides said. Just two weeks ago, the campaign had announced a goal of raising $80 million -- and was greeted with initial skepticism among some party fundraisers.
...
Although Bush is virtually certain to raise more money than Kerry -- and perhaps double -- Democrats are no longer concerned that the president will spend the Democratic nominee into the ground even before most voters tune into the race months from now. Some Republicans privately express concern that Bush's money advantage will not prove invincible, as they had once believed.
...
First, Democrats are more united than they have been in decades, and the base of Democratic donors, especially new and smaller ones, appears deeper than most party officials originally projected.
"George Bush promised that he would be a uniter and not a divider," said Alan D. Solomont of Massachusetts, one of Kerry's top money men. "The one group he has united are Democrats."
Second, Democrats are copying Bush's successful model of creating scorecards for their top fundraisers, and have added special Internet tracking systems so that the people who raise large amounts get credit from the campaign and their peers.
One point that seems to have been overlooked in much of the discussion is the fact that if our bold adventure in Iraq is really on such shaky ground that the withdrawl of Spain's 1300 troops will make a substantial difference then we are truly screwed.
...look, even the "symbolic" importance just isn't really important. Once upon a time Aznar stood on the stage with Bush and Blair and that probably did grant the adventure a bit more legitimacy than it otherwise would have had, but at this point it's absolutely meaningless. It looks bad for the Bush administration, I suppose, but even then only in a kind of petty "nyah nyah" scoring points way, not so that it genuinely lessens Bush's stature in the international community. I mean, that's pretty much impossible to do at this point.
If you want to argue 1300 of them means 1300 less of us, well then that's a good thing if you value Spanish soldiers' lives less than the lives of US troops. You're free to do that, I suppose, but it isn't exactly an argument which is going to persuade the new Spanish PM.
The reality is that this was always a US endeavor with a bit of token support. Now there will likely be a tiny bit less token support. My point is that if the success or failure depends entirely on the tiny bit of token support we managed to obtain, then this just highlights what an utter diplomatic and subsequent military failure this is turning out to be.
Roger Ailes informs us that while Howard Kurtz interrupted his honeymoon to write an endless series of articles about Jayson Blair, he buries the story about the USA Today journalist getting caught making far more serious fabrications.
Big Media Matt's right that the Vanity Fair article by James Wolcott on blogging is quite good, and not simply because it's sympathetic to us feisty liberal bloggers. So, go buy a copy. It'll only take you about 15 minutes to find the table of contents in that damn magazine.
The blogger formerly known as Calpundit lets us know that the Aznar government wasn't just misleading the press, they were also misleading the German equivalent of the FBI in an attempt to maintain their story. Perhaps one of the right wing trolls can explain to me how impeding an investigation of a massive terrorist attack is, actually, being strong on terrorism. Who are the real appeasers?
Germany was reminded of this last weekend. Its federal criminal bureau said the Spanish authorities intentionally withheld information and misled German officials over the explosives used in the Madrid bombings. The Spanish conservative government had insisted the Goma 2 Eco dynamite for the explosives had been frequently used by Eta, the Basque separatist movement. On Monday, it admitted that was not the case.
The official merchandise Web site for President George W. Bush's re-election campaign has sold clothing made in Burma, whose goods were banned by Bush from the U.S. last year to punish its military dictatorship.
The merchandise sold on www.georgewbushstore.com includes a $49.95 fleece pullover, embroidered with the Bush-Cheney '04 logo and bearing a label stating it was made in Burma, now Myanmar. The jacket was sent to Newsday as part of an order that included a shirt made in Mexico and a hat not bearing a country-of-origin label.
The Bush merchandise is handled by Spalding Group, a 20-year-old supplier of campaign products and services in Louisville, Ky., that says it worked for the last five Republican presidential nominees.
Ted Jackson, Spalding's president, said, "We have found only one other in our inventory that was made in Burma. The others were made in the U.S.A." He said the company had about 60 of thefleece pullovers in its warehouse, and that a supplier included the Burma product by mistake.
Bush campaign officials did not return calls seeking comment. The imports are potentially an issue because outsourcing has become a hot political topic in the election.
Bush last July signed into law the Burmese Freedom and Democracy Act, saying "The United States will not waver from its commitment to the cause of democracy and human rights in Burma."
Senator Rick Santorum visited the WICK Goodtime Oldies studios on Friday, August 11th, to tape the Republican response to the President's address to the nation. (scroll down to see picture)
WWDL-Wilkes Barre-Scranton owner Doug Lane [who also owns WICK], 60, has been arrested on sex charges in Lackawanna (PA) County.
Authorities searched the radio station and Lane's home earlier this week. District Attorney Andy Jarbola said they found evidence to back up the story. Officials said Lane got rid of a computer Wednesday morning that may have contained more evidence.
Police say Lane started a four-year relationship with a child when the boy was just 12 years old.
Innocent until proven guilty, of course, but apparently he isn't even denying it.
A BULLETPROOF LandCruiser at high speed bursting out of a tribal compound in Pakistan's South Waziristan region was just the latest infuriating setback in the US's quest to bring down the top of the al-Qa'ida tree.
The car, followed by two armoured vehicles and a phalanx of heavily armed militants able to wipe out dozens of crack troops sent to blast the terrorists from their nest, is believed to have contained Ayman al-Zawahiri, right-hand man to Osama bin Laden.
After mounting speculation that US and Pakistani forces ranged on either side of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border were about to pounce on al-Qa'ida's key planner, a senior Taliban spokesman yesterday made the claim Washington least wanted to hear - that both Zawahiri and bin Laden were safe in Afghanistan.
"He may have slipped the net," the official said.
(thanks to woot)
...Count me among those who think the whole thing was a bit of theater.
It's been awhile since we've taken a look at how extreme affirmative action policies have filled our media with disproportionate numbers of minorities. Here's my latest look at CNN's hosts, weekdays 5AM-11PM, and major weekend programs.
Investigators say he fabricated parts of substantial numbers of stories. Why oh why do we have affirmative action for white christian evangelical men? Why oh why do newspaper editors let their biases about such people cloud their judgment? I'm sure the brothers Hack, Glenn and Mickey, will spend weeks discussing how this guy's race and religion allowed him to get away with things that other journalists couldn't get away with.
From JOHN PHILLIP SANTOS: There was a troubling sidebar to the NYT coverage of the Jack Kelley flap, reported by Times media correspondent, Jacques Steinberg.
Reporting on an interview with Johanna Newmann, Kelley's onetime foreign editor at USAT, now at the LA Times, Steinberg reports that Kelley, because he was so widely trusted, was allowed to use only a first name to identify the author of an alleged Serbian girl's diary that contained murderous anti-Croat vituperations. The story ran on USAT's front page. "That trust, she (Newmann) said, was rooted to some extent in his openness with his colleagues about being an evangelical Christian. 'He was this very earnest, moralistic Christian reporter,' she said. 'It made people trust him in ways they didn't trust other reporters. If he was reporting he had the diary of a Serbian girl, and no one else had it, you tended to say: 'He just has a way with people. People just respond to him.' "
Steinberg moves on without probing further the implications of Newmann's remarks.
How many newsrooms operate in the shadow world of such an ethic? What kind of an editor would factor a reporter's evangelical Christian beliefs into whether or not to go with a dubious piece of reporting, much less admit to it in the New York Times? Would a good Muslim reporter be likely get the same green light from Newmann? A righteous Bahai or a compassionate Buddhist?
I guess even the most upright Atheist would have to be willing to account for every fact they want to report to the public.
So, I'm listening to Howard Stern who just go fined by the FCC. He's trying to play a clip from the Oprah show, which was on Jimmy Kimmel's show last night, but his producer won't let him. The point of playing the clip is that by the current FCC standards, it's "indecent," but they'd never fine Oprah for it. So, the question is - would they fine Howard Stern for playing a clip from the Oprah show? In any case, they won't even let him play the clip.
But, never let it be said that this is a decent website. Here's the transcript:
WINFREY: Yeah. So you say--let's talk about that secret language, Michelle.
Ms. BURFORD: Yes.
WINFREY: I didn't know any of this.
Ms. BURFORD: I have--yeah, I have--I've gotten a whole new vocabulary, let me tell you.
WINFREY: I did not know any of this. Does this--does this mean I am no longer hip?
REED: ...(Unintelligible).
Ms. BURFORD: Salad-tossing. I'm thinking cucumbers, lettuce, tomatoes. OK? I am definitely not hip.
WINFREY: OK--so--OK, so what is a salad toss?
Ms. BURFORD: OK, a tossed salad is--get ready; hold on to your underwear for this one--oral anal sex. So oral sex to the anus is what tossed salad is. Hi, Mom. OK. A rainbow party is an oral sex party. It's a gathering where oral sex is performed. And a--rainbow comes from--all of the girls put on lipstick and each one puts her mouth around the penis of the gentleman or gentlemen who are there to receive favors and makes a mark in a different place on the penis, hence, the term rainbow. So...
In fact, the Bush administration has done the very thing it falsely accuses Mr. Kerry of doing: it has tried repeatedly to slash combat pay and military benefits, provoking angry articles in The Army Times with headlines like "An Act of `Betrayal.' " Oh, and Mr. Kerry wasn't trying to block funds for Iraq — he was trying to force the administration, which had concealed the cost of the occupation until its tax cut was passed, to roll back part of the tax cut to cover the expense.
But the bigger point is this: in the Bush vision, it was never legitimate to challenge any piece of the administration's policy on Iraq. Before the war, it was your patriotic duty to trust the president's assertions about the case for war. Once we went in and those assertions proved utterly false, it became your patriotic duty to support the troops — a phrase that, to the administration, always means supporting the president. At no point has it been legitimate to hold Mr. Bush accountable. And that's the way he wants it.
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...
Gavin of Gavinsblog is getting nasty letters from the lawyers of Dr. "Ph.D From Accepted But Not Accredited University" Gray, of "Men are from Mars..." fame. Calpundit Political Animal explains.
I for one am hoping for a nasty dose of winter weather. But, I'm a carless city dweller with nothing to shovel, so my opinion is probably not representative.
Tim Dunlop reminds us that once upon a time Colin Powell was bragging about countries which secretly supported the war in Iraq, the names of which he couldn't reveal.
SECRETARY POWELL: Well, one, we didn't put together just the coalition of the willing. A coalition is always a coalition of the willing. And this particular coalition of the willing now has 47 nations; 47 nations are openly members of the coalition, and have asked to be identified with this effort. And there are many other nations that for a variety of reasons don't want to be publicly identified, but are also a part of the coalition of the willing.
Secretary of State Powell yesterday challenged Kerry to name names. Interviewed on "Fox New Sunday," Powell said if Kerry can't list names, he should -- quote -- "find something else to talk about."
Max explains that the economic downturn has caused little of the increase in the deficit. Though, as he explains, the administration does have one amusing way out of that:
It is possible that the GDP gap is understated, which means the cyclical component of the deficit would be as well. For instance, if you factored in labor force drop-outs, the unemployment rate now could be measured in excess of seven percent. So an adjustment to the observed deficit for 2004 assuming "full employment" -- a move from seven to five percent, rather than five-point-something to five percent -- would knock the stuffing out of the observed deficit.
So if they liked, the Bushies could claim the structural deficit is actually much lower than the observed one. The fly in this ointment however, is that they would also be admitting that unemployment now is much higher than apparent. If they had any interest but their own at heart, they would admit this. It would even give them an excuse for more tax cuts. But nooooo . . . .
Sen. Arlen Specter has a 49 -- 36 percent approval, compared to 53 -- 32 percent in a February 18 poll. Only 36 percent of Pennsylvania voters want to see Specter reelected this year, while 44 percent want a new senator, compared to 40 -- 44 percent for reelecting Specter in the February 18 poll.
But Specter still tops U.S. Rep. Joseph Hoeffel, the possible Democratic challenger, 45 -- 29 percent, compared to 50 --- 31 percent last month.
Obviously, Rep. Hoeffel has a ways to go, but he hasn't yet run any television ads. He currently has low statewide name recognition, but there's plenty of time to change that.
And, the chance that Specter loses the primary to wingnut challenger Toomey is also increasing. The latest poll has them at 47-38. CW says Toomey would be an easier opponent, though I'm not so sure... Still, it would be sort of fun to see Specter go down in flames like that.
Anyway, what was so weird about it was how professional it seemed until I finally sat down with Miller. It was set up long in advance by the book's publicists. The car came on time. In my dressing room, which was pretty elaborate as such things go, I met with a series of staff members who informed me that Dennis would be wanting to discuss topics such as George Soros and the funding of 527s; whether Bush was exploiting the 9/11 families, and I forget what else, just like a real talk show. Then I go out there and what? I'm talking to a stoned teenager, who can't be bothered to say more than, "Whoh, man, you are so totally screwed up. Like, you really believe that stuff, dude?" I paraphrase, but really, Dennis did not say much more than that. Everyone on staff was extremely apologetic afterward and the word "unprofessional" was used over and over.
I try to avoid most of these guys, though I've been on O'Reilly, and Scarborough and Michael Medved's silly radio program a couple of times but never have I encountered a guy who could not be bothered to make his own case on his own show. Really, what can CNBC be thinking with this guy? His ratings are not just in the toilet they have traveled all the way to the septic tank. And as we all know, they need to pay audience members to show up. It has got to cost more than the Phil Donahue show to produce, given the size of the audience and the set and that was yanked even though it was then the highest rated show on MSNBC.
I used to think I should be given half of Joe Scarborough's show. His ratings aren't so hot and we sort of get along and things could only improve. Now, perhaps I should be patient and just wait for Miller to implode a couple of more times and then offer my services to the machers up at NBC News. No need for lengthy negotiations. I'll take whatever Dennis was getting, plus money for liquor and food for my friends when they do the program
If anyone has a clip or transcript, that'd be great.
Thanks everyone! We've hit today's $10,000 goal already... Though, I wouldn't discourage you from pushing that number up to $75,000. 11:15 left in John Kerry day after all.
Oh, and the Kerry people are hiring some tech people. So, if you need a job click here.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Kevin Drum, over at his fancy new place, takes care of Tom Friedman's latest. I agree with him completely. What I found absolutely astounding about the column, aside from the offensive illogic contained within, was that it truly does sound like a not very bright 8th grader wrote it. Can't the Times do any better?
