O’Reilly and Malkin fairly dismember PBS scion Bill Moyers, who has been peddling his own reality so long that one is tempted to give him the benefit of the doubt and conclude that he has actually come to believe his own delusions. Which is what happens, by the way, when millions of your fellow Americans cheer on the alternate reality you’re selling—knowing full well that it doesn’t jibe with any empirical overview of history—because it shapes the “narrative” and so helps to usher in policy that fits their world view.
The emperor may be naked, they seem to be saying, but they sure do like his great big set of balls.
Reader CJ Burch emails:
The most telling part of this segment was the practiced ease with which Moyers lied, and the practiced ease with which [liberal analyst Marvin] Kalb excused Moyer’s lies [during the segment]. Neither of these men got this way by accident.
Maybe, maybe not. As I noted above, I believe it’s possible that “accident” plays some role—given that subjectivity, constantly reinforced, can ossify into “proof” that one’s conjectures are correct. It is reality by consensus (hi, Andre!)—and while it can indeed be used, once the mechanism is understood, as a cynical force in world reduced to competing narratives, it is oftentimes merely the result of a self-selected feedback loop.
However, the perpetuation of faulty assertions—their repetition, once they’ve been thoroughly and convincingly proven false—is where the real cynicism lies, particularly when self-selected feedback loops become carefully policed feedback loops. And we see this all the time on certain “progressive sites,” where opposing viewpoints, when they come from someone quickly identified as being from outside the tribe, are deleted (or their content altered)—all in the name of preserving the narrative.
In my debates with Glenn Greenwald(s) (back before he’d been managed into a leftwing media star) on the topic patriotism, I—along with Glenn Reynolds — made the distinction between patriotic “dissent” and knowingly passing along falsehoods in the service of your own idea of the greater good, which, in a time of war, is particularly dangerous, and decidedly anti-democratic.
Greenwald(s), naturally, defended this tactic—hardly surprising given that “progressives” (or, in Greenwald’s(’s) case, “conservative libertarians who happen to be on secret progressive mailing lists and parrot progressive talking points with the regularity of an automated sprinkler system) treat anyone who doesn’t hold their views as an enemy of justice and liberty, and so are able to rationalize away any deplorable machination as a necessary evil in the service of a greater longterm “good,” the content of which they alone are permitted to define, and one which they convince themselves is laudable on the (circular) basis that they themselves hold that position.
For my part—and for Reynolds’, as well, if I’m remembering correctly—it is this intent to willfully perpetuate falsehoods for partisan gain, coupled with the kind of arrogance that would factor out of a representative democracy the viewpoints of those with whom they disagree (recall Mona’s argument that those who express particular viewpoints should be shunned), that is unpatriotic. And what makes it unpatriotic is not that it is necessarily “treasonous” or “seditious”; but rather that it is intended to frustrate the democratic process by preventing citizens from making informed decisions based on reliable facts.
It is, in short, the forging and defense of an ideological narrative that must, of necessity, beat back facts that upset its vision of a Utopian endgame. And those who stand in its way are treated as hostile enemies — even as the real enemies of our country are given a virtual pass, excused for their actions under appeals to sociological factors that, in the progressive’s materialist worldview, can be used to justify nearly anything done by those battling US hegemony.
It is a battle that it rhetorical in nature—but one that, should it be lost by those of us who see in it the potential for totalitarian abuses, will doubtless have consequences far beyond the boundaries of mere linguistic play.
Notes Bryan Preston at HotAir:
Describing someone as “far left†is a pejorative, according to Marvin Kalb. If folks like Mr. Kalb get their way, at some point, literally any word or phrase that we use to describe someone else’s ethnicity, politics or religious beliefs or any other identifying characteristic will be defined as “pejorative.â€Â
Well, with the exception of “far right,” one presumes.
But Preston’s point is well taken: in the Orwellian world of progressivist rhetorical maneuverings, simple descriptors—be they conventional logistical markers (such as where someone’s politics places them on the political continuum, itself empirically formed from years of people staking out known political positions) or ethnic / religious ones—will be considered “demeaning” or even “racist” when not used by those who have the proper authority to do so.
It is identity politics, which permits only the “authentic” and their supporters to deploy the language necessary to describe it.
Policing the narrative.
And so it goes.
It’s sort of funny, isn’t it, how when you read Bill Moyers’ name in public, you rarely, if ever, see the words “Press secretary to Lyndon Johnson” coupled to it, do you?
Nor do you routinely see stuff like this.
But it’s there just the same. Wonder how the LBGT crowd likes that?
Strangely enough, the bulk of your argument here demonstrates that “far left” is a pejorative.
Professor, not to change the subject, but are you going to mention anything about the Lynch/Tillman testimony from yesterday.
Obviously, it’s your blog and you write about what interests you, but, since you’re excoriating “truthiness” from some Texas journalist who <gasp> uses the words of the press to indict their own uncritical coverage, you’d think you could continue that thought toward the lies the Pentagon told the Press after the war was started.
Or, is that too uncomfortable? Just seems to me if the Truth was so fascinating to you, you could actually….well, I don’t know, talk about it?
You mean like the girl fired until her magazine was empty or the hospital was filled with evil Iraqis or the Army Ranger died in action with the enemy?
Wouldn’t want to demand consistency from you. After all, you’ve got a point to make
This just in: Rosie O’Donnell is leaving “The View.”
A mighty oak has been felled. Or something; anyway, I just felt the ground tremble. Maybe she fell down.
Sorry, timmy. Is my posting schedule not working for you?
As it happens, I’m staring at a page I cut out from today’s RMN, “Vets shoot down Army’s stories”—by NYT writer John Holusha.
I had planned to do a post on it, but since you’re convinced I am somehow avoiding the topic by not making it the first thing I posted on this morning, I’m not in any rush to post on it now.
I’d rather just chap your ass.
Short version of it might go something like this, though: Col. Nixon’s explanation seems plausible to me—and having seen the documentary done by Outside the Lines, in which the platoon members were interviewed, I don’t think there’s any doubt Tillman was indeed acting heroically.
The delay in getting the information out to the public that Tillman was killed by friendly fire is certainly unfortunate, but the military has to do their investigation first, and eventually the information was released.
And the Lynch “firefight” story was long ago questioned by both conservatives and liberals, and ultimately corrected. Early reports that Lynch’s wounds were bullet wounds were eventually corrected, too; and further reports started trickling out that it was Lori Piestewa who may have been firing back during the ambush in which Lynch was captured.
The topic is identity politics, not the war. But thank you for demonstrating the subject. As you just did, the far left( or “socialists” as I like to call them) can only survive an intellectual debate by changing the subject, and thereby altering the conditions so that the previously stated facts are no longer relevant.
You’ve been thoroughly pwned!
Did I make those claims?
What consistency are you talking about? Or am I now representative of everything ever said by anyone not like you.
You are referencing early reports from the battlefield.
And in fact, an Army Ranger DID die in battle with the enemy, and Lynch WAS taken hostage. That Lynch doesn’t consider herself a hero—or that Tillman’s brother thinks not releasing the info that Tillman was killed by friendly fire during an ambush means the army was trying to exploit Tillman’s death—are their opinions.
But it is not uncommon for many whom we call heroes to deny they did anything “heroic.” “Just doing my job; just doing what anybody else would have done,” etc.
Now. Do you have an answer to any of the points raised in this post? Or are you going to try to play tu quoque with me all day?
Jeff, you already know the answer to that question. Now, go finish that Tillman post, timmyb has spoken.
Let me get this straight: Timmuh is comparing a situation in which additional facts comes out and are processed by conservatives (forcing some to change their understanding of an event) with a sad, tired cliche like Bill Moyers who’s stuck in a continuous closed loop of leftist feedback that has caused him to sound ever more ridiculous?
Is that about the size of it, Timmuh?
And stay on topic, like the man said.
Jesus, the Professor doesn’t like being questioned!
Professor, the Army knew what had happened the moment it happened. Command structure forbade members of Tillman’s unit to tell his brother what happened, they burned his body armor, they wrote up a citation for the action, they made a recrituiting poster for him, held a press conference, and then announced later (a month later!) in a whisper “Oops, we were wrong.”
That’s propaganda, Professor.
Speaking of such, I just watch the O’Reilly clip on Hot Air. How exactly did they dismember Moyers documentary? They called him names. they ambushed him on the street about calling Bill names, but there was no substantive disagreement with the piece that airs tonight.
Here’s a crazy idea: Let’s watch it and see what we think.
P.S. Is there a post coming on the Gonzalez disaster from last week? The multiple FBI raids on Republican Congressmen? Are those on the schedule?
Bl;ogs are about what interests the writer and, since I don’t read your mind, I apologize for not knowing your post schedule. Perhaps one of the sycophants can crib your staff notes and post it as a “Coming Attractions”?
Sometimes I forget how touchy you are.
Far left is as far left does, a4g.
Timmyb,
Yes, yes this is very excellent. The reputation of the American military must be destroyed. And to do it we should use the same strategy we sued to hamstring the infidel war against Islamic Facist Ascendence. Pretend that things which were not covered up were covered up. Call mistakes crimes, equate soldiers with hardnened teorrorists who purposely kill women and children.
Excuse out right lies so transparent as to be breath taking but referring constantly to transgressions that have been uncovered and punished by the military we wish to ruin. nullify. Excellent, excellent, you follow the hand book beautifully.
We will destroy free thought, women’s rights, democracy and all personal porperty rights together yet timmyb. Now give us a chorus of toss the jew down the well.
Timmyb,
And after “Throw the Jew down the well,” you can explain to us how the infidel Ayaan Hirsi Ali should be killed. Use lots of descriptive adjectives…that’s where you truly excel.
Here’s an idea, timmy. Go start your own site and write whatever you want.
To help you get motivated, I’m going to take away your commenting privileges.
That way I don’t have to spend my entire morning answering your questions—which aren’t so much questions as accusations, and which aren’t so much on topic as they are hoping to derail it.
Bye now!
I understand Moyers was a minister before getting into politics?
I just have to wonder why he would have left the ministry? Could that whole “Thou shalt not bear false witness” thing have been just a little too oppressive for him?
And timmyb has violated two rules in this one thread alone—he’s hijacking and trying to dictate content. Jeff, I’m willing to lend you my own Rule 4 if you like. It reads, “If you don’t like what you see here, go away.”
No charge, and if you put less than 5,000 miles on it I’ll even pay for your gas.
Or, you know, I could reload the thread before hitting “Submit.”
I apologize for the typing mistakes infidels but watching a true terrorist sympathizer at work…doing the nuts and bolts sort of labor that allows me and those like me to enslave, torture and murder millions upon millions…it just gets me so excited.
Now timmy, tell us about Abu Grahib, tell us that the infidel Chimpears Bush is worse than Saddam Hussein ever was, tell us that Saddam Hussein was a buffer gainst terrorism, tell us that the TANG memos were true. Tell us that the path to peace lies through Asad. Tell us that the Iranians need nuclear weapons to couter balance american aggression. Tellus that suicide bombers are heroes. Tell it to us again and again, fight your propaganda war like the true soldier of darkness you have become. Ruin all your fathers have built with their sweat and blood, then celebrate the triumph of religous totalitarianism. Be proiud that you are a force for evil. Rejoice in the suffering and the squalor of it all. Make me stronger.
I think that’s the right call, Jeff. Timmy wasn’t interested in discussing the topic of this post. He was interested in changing the subject, and I’m sick of it. This could have been (and may well be, if leftists interested in discussing this topic show up) an interesting debate on political rhetoric. But it was never going to be that with Timmy’s consistent efforts to distract the discussion.
He came here to shout at “conservatives”. He’s the blog equivalent of one of those idiots that shout down speakers at campus lectures.
Because Timmy can still read if he so desires (though he doesn’t seem to read the posts anyway, except to find some entry point for launching one of his silly tu toques—today’s being remarkable for the speed with which it happened: hell, I haven’t even changed the kid’s diaper and gotten him dressed, but that’s no excuse for not “covering” Gonzales and Kevin Tillman before 8:30 local time), I’m just going to quote Powerline on this Waxman show hearing:
Oh. And propaganda in a war? Pretty standard stuff—though the times are such that we are less likely to use it effectively, given that much of our population sees themselves as the real enemy.
Which, ironically, doubles the ability of the REAL enemy propaganda to prove effective.
That clip that O’Reilly showed was very instructive. Moyers has been shown to be a bald faced liar.
I didn’t know he used to be a minister, but that explains one thing I’ve never liked about him: he came across as too preachy when spouting his leftist crap.
t/w: had69, I wish…
Sweet.
Great post too, Jeff, one that calls to mind the increasing level of legitimate criticism of the Left for a deeper, collective mental disorder. In other words, you’ve pointed out symptoms of something that one of these days is going to have to be recognized as something both more serious and simpler than the usual individual fisking can do, that being in a way counterproductive to a better, more efficient use of time beating back this lunacy.
So what is this affliction of the contemporary “liberal” mind anyway? Does “delusion” carry any weight in these our blog-centric times? It’s entirely apt but lacks the weight of an objective consensus about the obvious, self-hating disease of Leftism.
The Left is primarily instituted theft in a time of law; gross covetousness and envy in a time of fairness and freedom; the destruction of principle among reason. To cover it up, the Left lies pathologically. Surely this is a disorder of some sort.
So what is this disorder, exactly? I only know that it’s serious—fatal to, as you say, the Western values of classic liberalism. Fatal enough to think about a new definition that history will regard—late twentieth and early twentyfirst century…what?
tw: science95
Yes! Equality of treatment demands it. I only wish we still had those B.F. Skinner child-retention cages as an option.
I suspect you have already read it, Jeff, but for other interested participants in the discussion, Thomas Sowell’s “Vision of the Annointed” fleshes out this particular point very well.
I’ve been amazed—nearly since day one of the war—by the left’s insistence that acting on, and even merely reporting, incomplete information is “lying”. I realize that much of this impulse is for partisan purposes, but sometimes I wonder if there’s a mental, emotional, or educational reason for it.
I’d love to see them deal with a double-blind simulation like the “National Security Decision-Making Game” they run at Origins each year Two teams of decision-makers, with referees in the middle. The referees control the information flow, and realistically, each team gets incomplete or incorrect information.
I wonder if, after it was over, they’d be shrieking about the referee’s “lying”.
It is not possible to be wrong about everything without a method. Bill Moyers proves this.
Error is the discipline through which we advance. Yet when we defend our errors as if they were our inheritance, that is what they become. Propaganda does not deceive people, it merely helps them to deceive themselves.
A man’s own vanity is a swindler that never lacks for a dupe. This leads to a weakness of character, which is the only defect that cannot be amended, and explains the difference between liberals and conservatives. Conservatives bump about beween errors, finding truth occasionally; liberals abuse language, as they do their very thought processes, to fashion themselves a better self-conceit.
‘The miser sees himself as thrifty, the coward as cautious.’
Rochefoucauld, Channing, Burke, Dalrymple, Balzac, Syrus. Now we face a facile new world- Marx, Satre, and relativism.
The issued JHoward raise have been bothering me for a long time. It truly does look to me like the Left suffers from a type of mass hysterical delusion not unlike those seen in history (e.g., isolated convents where some crazy idea takes hold, magnified and amplified by their isolation from outside information.)
The difference seems to be one of magnitude – the first long-term mass media example, and affecting millions?
What worries me more than the diagnosis is the prognosis – do we have any reason to hope for a recovery, or will a delusional “fifth column” become a permanent feature of our society?
It really distresses me to see friends – who are otherwise *extremely* rational, scientifically-minded people – lost to this nonsense, apparently irrevocably. It’s a feeling not unlike (I would imagine) having a loved one struck by Alzheimer’s.
Well, Robert A. Heinlein called our age, “The Crazy Years”.
But then, he was kind of old fashioned.
I think that Timmyb’s Daffy Duck moment (demanding to be shot at point blank range) was a great, though inadvertant example of this thread. He had an ideological theme, and he was demanding that everyone else follow it, to the exclusion of what anyone else thought, wished or was doing at the time of his tantrum. The source article and Jeff’s summary noted that these purveyors of truthiness are hostile to persons or viewpoints that dare to exhibit any disagreement, and seek to quell this through obfuscation, lies, demonization and attempts to invent sins and conspiracies.
Great job Timmyb!
Next: A troll gallantly defies the Law of Gravity, because Bush’s Supreme Court failed to strike it down!!!!
Timmyb shouldn’t be the only point to trifle with danger.
How about we have a thread sometime concerning a seance with The Ghost of Musab Al Zarqaiw? We can think up a list of participants, and who the con artist, I mean spiritual moderator would be.
We should go for a psychic that is a positive, cheerful person, because everyone wants a happy medium.
TIMMAH WILL NOT BE SILENCED!
Just received this via email, with the subject line: “Does that mean I won”:
Uh, okay.
At any rate, glad I could help you service the narrative, Timmy!
As I’ve long said, I’m a giver!
I suspect the Army’s “coverup” was more of a knee-jerk, “wait for the investigation to get finished before you talk” kind of thing than anything else. And it’s understandable: it’s embarrassing enough to admit that you killed your own guys, and it’s hard as hell to conduct an investigation in the glare of publicity and a bazillion different conflicting stories.
I’m not terribly surprised that the Army wanted the answer to be anything other than what it was, and I’m not surprised that the officers involved asked “are you absolutely positively CERTAIN this is what it appears to be,” because, good grief, it is embarrassing. But they did the investigation, and they admitted the truth to the family – and that took a month, which is NOTHING in bureaucracy-years.
It’s not perfect, but if you think that’s a coverup, you need to go back and read about a REAL coverup. You might start with the Navy families who spent years trying to get the service to admit that defective ammunition, rather than a gay suicide, killed fifty sailores on the “Iowa.” THAT was a real coverup. This is just bureaucracy doing its thing.
For some time now, I’ve also been trying to work out the derangement which the Left demonstrates – well put above, and now also demonstrated by timmahi’s email – and the magic bullet which will cure it.
But, hey, maybe its a quagmire kind of thing and we should just surrender? Or evolve.
Anyway, if you haven’t already, take a look also at Dr. Sanity’s analyses @ drsanity.blogspot.com.
[I refuse to exclude genetics as an operant, but that does not suggest any ready cure, either.]
Jeff, timmyb’s e-mail was a classic example of projection. You won’t listen to dissent; you run away from difficult questions; you are the thin-skinned whiner.
A quick skim over his comments demonstrates that he has described himself to a “T”. I think back in the day I described him as alphies long-winded brother, and that e-mail certainly is consistent with that.
Nanonymous: You are likely correct. My experience with large bureaucracies is that people would rather adopt a ‘wait and see’ sttitude or buck a question up the chain rather than risk making a preliminary statement that may be totally wrong and put a lot of egg on the organization’s face. Few are willing to take that risk with their careers. What looks like stonewalling and cover-up are people trying to figure out what did happen and being cautious about what they say without having everything signed, stamped, and sealed.
More like a foundation stone, I would think.
In a follow-up email he called me “authoritarian.”
Which is what it’s called when Timmy is not allowed to do what Timmy wants when Timmy wants to on a site that is not owned or financed in any way by Timmy, but which Timmy seems to believe is his own private forum, upon which I am expected to write according to Timmy’s whims, and to perform as Timmy’s dancing monkey.
Not sure that’s the best definition of “authoritarian,” but hey—if Timmy says that’s what it means, that’s what it means.
My dancing monkey! Mine!
Guess timmah was just too smart for you, Jeff. And intimidating, given the whole fear thing. Unfortunately I’m not perceptive to pick up on those traits, so to me he always seemed petulant, with a side of unrealistic self-regard.
Must be that I’m lacking nuance.
Timmy just posted an off-topic comment on my blog, in an attempt to not respond to my comment here where I accused him of threadjacking.
He seemed to be of the opinion that as long as there was some way in which an imaginative person could claim a relationship within six degrees of separation between his text and the text of Jeff’s comment, that he was not hijacking.
He also called me by my wife’s first name.
I linked this the other day but today it’s actually on-topic. Hear Bill Moyers splain how having a conservative give a viewpoint in counterpoint to leftist views is bad truth-obscuring journalism. Or you can give them $4 to get a transcript of the interview your taxes helped produce. Your choice.
Jeff, you are far too indulgent with your antagonists.
Can a visit from Children’s Services be far behind?
Having been a contributor at another site, it always seemed to me that lefty trolls have a different English language dictionary than we do. You can look up the same words in both dictionaries, but the definitions are different. There’s absolutely no use trying to argue with them using the rules of logic and the generally accepted definitions of words. I’m still trying to figure out how “is” can mean different things to different people.
*Jesus, the Professor doesn’t like being questioned! *
No fucktard, the professor doesn’t like smarmy simpletons like yourself dictating what he puts on his blog and what is discussed in the comments. If you’re so interested in debating something, go make your own blog. We won’t come to it but quite frankly, I’ll pay about the same amount of attention to your “viewpoint”.
If I’m Jeff, I don’t respond to that kind of BS and considering banning the trolls who can’t follow simple instructions like “try to discuss THE FUCKING TOPIC IN THE FUCKING THREAD”.
Pardon my french, I’m trying to channel that Marcotte chick. Because I’m so damn progressive.
Boy was I late to the party with that last post.
Not that anyone here was going to draw a parallel, but I want to make clear that this, IN NO WAY, makes me of a mind with Mona.
My point is that, if you can’t agree on the rules of civil discourse, and you can’t even agree on the meanings of the words used in the rules, there’s no point trying to play the game.
Where is Nate Charlow when we need him? :-D
It doesn’t really matter who won what, if anything, because Timmah! will simply assure himself that things are what he wants them to be.
And he will probably refer to this comment as proof of the reality of his delusion.
OK, I’m late to this, but in the middle of Timmy’s filibustering I couldn’t help but notice this:
Proof of this? I thought not.
But it IS revealing of the Timmy Mentality. You see, they give far more credit to the Army than those of us on the Right, who understand that the Army is a big dumb bureaucracy, albeit a necessary one. To them, the Nanny State can be omniscient.
It’s not too far to go from there to the assertion that Mr. Tillman was deliberately killed to score propaganda points.
Or am I giving Timmy ideas?
Pablo:
Looks like timmyb has defined victory as “making myself such an annoying pest that I’m shunned by polite company as my intellect is scorned”. He, of course, is welcome to that. I’ll stick with the traditional definitions.
let’s see…you accuse moyers of peddling his own reality…lying…but offer no examples…you say o’reilly and malkin dismember him…but those two couldn’t dismember a roast chicken…o’reilly is a documented liar…and malkin is a friggin’ idiot. i also saw hannity talking about it and i know he was lying. then you quote some schmoe who e-mailed you to say moyers is a liar…and he also fails to offer examples. am i simply to trust you that he is a liar? convince me you aren’t a liar. thanks – i think i’ll watch the show and form my own opinion based upon fact. if only the rest of you would give that a try.
…and the angels asked me to recall –
– the thrill of it all –
and I will tell them I dismembered –
– tell them I dismembered –
– tell them I dismemberrred youooooo
What the heck was the name of that song?
No, you;re supposed to read the fucking links, moron.
I’m confused. Are you taking requests or not, Jeff? If so I want more Martha journal entries & another trip to a national political convention. Remember, I come to your site & read your writing for free, so you have to do what I say.
I want96 new personally-selected posts right now.
OK, I think I have it! What we need is a relational database of all the quotes and links that have ever been posted as support for a point of view. Then, when some mole pops up to be whacked, we can just create a link with a SQL query to the MOAD (Mother Of All Databases).
Let’s throw some Heisenberg in there too: jay k. may or may not be a liar. Here’s what I found when I opened the box to see if that cat was dead:
1. Watched enough of the Hot Air clip to see Moyers deny characterizing Fox News of “using a Slime Machine” to discredit dissenters.
2. Googled “slime machine moyers rolling stone” and went to the Rolling Stone site to listen to Moyers characterize Fox News of using a Slime Machine to discredit dissenters.
QED and PWNED.
Must be a rightwingnut trait to call people liars when they quote facts.
Facts like – there was no Iraqi nuclear program.
Facts like – there were no mobile biological or chemical weapons labs.
Facts like – Bush lied to us about Niger yellow cake.
Facts like – there was no Saddam – 9/11 connection.
Add Abramoff, Libby, Safavian, Ney, Cunningham, Delay, Halliburton, Katrina, Gonzales, Abu Graib, Tillman, lost emails, Renzi, Doolittle, and on and on.
I bet every single scandal is answered by calling liberals liars in your poor excuse for a mind. That’s OK. You and Dumbya can go ahead and live in your imaginary wonderland while the rest of us try to clean up the mess 6 years of Republican dictatorship have created.
Must be a leftwingnut trait to call things facts that are in fact not true.
Is there nothing that timmah cant’ get completely wrong?
Sooner or later, he’s going to discover that he can have his own blog, and then, Professor, you will be in a world of shit. Because then, timmeh will not be silenced!
Here’s another Fun Fact: the idiot democrats are forcing Rice to the Hill to answer more of the same questions about yellow cake and Niger.
Fully four years and a contested presidential election after these issues were first aired, our democrat friends are raising these matters again. Whatever could they be thinking?
Its a real puzzler.
Unbelieveable.
Yet, all too believable. Sadly.
I don’t remember that one. Do you have a link?
Now, that one I DO remember, because it was first asserted by Bill Clinton in, let’s see, 1998?
I’m not sure what you mean about Niger yellow cake. Here’s a source that reveals Joe and Valerie Wilson’s lies and cites European sources that support the assertion that Iraq (and Korea, China as well) were trying to buy yellowcake from Niger as early as 1999.
Are you saying the President said there was such a connection? When? Do you have a source for the quote? The persident never asserted such a connection.
Little help for AFKAF,
The Dems are probably thinking that since they weren’t in power, and those that were acted as sycophants to the Bush regime, now might be a good time to figure out how something went SOOOO wrong.
You know, since the Repubs in Congress abdicated their civic duty to be a check on power, the grown-ups who have taken over will start looking into how America (and congress themselves) were misled into believing Saddam, not only had WMDs (factually wrong), but how those non-existent WMDs might be used against Americans.
No problem. Always happy to point out the obvious to the rubes.
TheGeezer,
How dare you post links to news sites that prove your assertions! You’re supposed to say, “My guys don’t lie, YOURS do.” and leave it at that. Get with the program!
Alternatively, I would enjoy a retort from liberalpercy that includes something about Salon and CNN being right-wing propaganda tools.
timmyb would do well to go to Blogger – it’s free. God knows that’s the only reason I use it…
They gonna subpoena Bill Clinton? Because he ordered military strikes based on the same evidence.
“Desert Fox”—Google it.
(Oh, and timmah! is emailing me, too. Apparently he can’t believe no one ever got to the bottom of how discipline was allowed to disintegrate at Abu Ghraib. Never heard of Brigadier General Janet Karpinski, I guess. Nah, gotta be the result of memos from Rumsfeld that no one could ever find, and that never reached any other unit.)
Gee, I hope they do investigate BILL CLINTON.
MTR: It makes it even more fun when a jerky lefty repeats a lie on the same page where you can cut-and-paste the same CNN link you just used to refute exactly the same previous lefty lie! Half the work, twice the fun! Like shooting BDS fish in a barrel! What a stooge.
You mean the sycophants like the Senate Intelligence Committee, Robert? Or the many prominent members of Congress who made statements about Iraq and WMD back in the 1990’s?
Which sycophants would you like to focus like a laser on?
In any case, the still small voice that exists in all of us that tells us when we are being not as honest as we could be is apparently shouted down by the massive sense of self in folks like Timmah, and jay k and liberalpercy. Otherwise they would know that posting about off topic issues, or pointing out that other people lie too is just, in fact, noise.
I wonder if we could get from Moyers examples of the apparently brave stalwarts who always “knew the truth” and were shouted down by the vast right wing conspiracy. Because, to me, that is the point of all of this, the notion that having established the “truth” as they wish it established, they now want to set themselves up as always having been brave defenders of it. It just too bad that other, more evil folks were constantly shouting down their telling of truth with their right wing patriotic zeal.
In other words, setting up their victim bona fides to go along with their vastly superior intellects and super-sleuthing skills.
I have a feeling if one were to ask Moyers for proof of these supposed cowed journalists, that we would be treated to a puzzled look or perhaps a squid like spraying of words in an attempt to run away from the question.
What—did Timmah get his dormmates jay k, Robert, and LiberalPercy to log in and keep up the narrative?
Cool! That’ll show us!
By this list, Sandy Berger, Dianne Feinstein, John Kerry, Madeline Albright, Barbara Boxer, Wesley Clark and more! Gonna be a LONG set of hearings.
According to Harry Reid: yes.
those links proved moyers is a liar??? c’mon. it’s pretty clear if y’all are down to a relying on a tired clown like o’reilly to defend your positions, that you are in sad f’ing shape. why not admit that you, like the mainstream media, bought the lies and now you are embarrassed by your foolishness. then you can jerk off to malkin and coulter with a clear conscience.
Speaking of sycophants, I always rather liked this video.
Yes, it’s GOP propaganda, but damn those puppets look REAL. I know they’re puppets because no Democrat ever said those things.
Paging Jay’s shift key…please report for duty.
So taped proof that Moyers either lied (intentially or otherwise) is somehow not valid because it was on O’Reilly’s show? You get to recognize truth that subjectively? Actually, you need not answer that – that fact has been pretty firmly established by now.
And let’s pretend for a moment that Moyers simply didn’t recall using the words “slime machine” and “venom” – didn’t Scooter (not me) Libby get convicted of perjury for exactly that? Why the double standard, jayk?
Leave me out of this!
Besides, I don’t duck the questions, so much as make snarky asides about them.
KATRINA! <death throes>
Close the site, Goldstein. They have us.
Went home for lunch and, lo and behold, timmy emailed me as well quoting my comment upthread thanking Jeff for banning him and “thanking” me for contributing to the “silencing” of dissenting views. My return email simply pointed out, inter alia, that this is Jeff’s blog and that I had noticed timmy’s increasing hostility toward him in the comments.
My final words for him:
I must admit to a tinge of guilt, however, since I was the one to suggest his initial handle when he first showed up, “neoconsstink”, was rather grade-schoolish.
And, BTW who let the ‘tards’ out of class early today?
Not sure if this is related, but my daughter’s Kindergarten was closed today because the pump died in the school’s well.
So since they had no where else to, erm, “go”, they came to PW!
timmyb e-mailed me also:
Thanks for the good wishes, timmyb, I will.
And you might want to tone the bitterness down a notch.
no scooter…i just don’t see how a couple sound-bites of moyers linking a bunch of right wing propoganda outlets together, and then being called out on a specific one some time later is indicative of anything. absolute worst case…he didn’t have the balls to own up to it when confronted. big f’ing deal. you are comparing that to the administration making up intelligence in order to sell a war, and the mainstream media buying it hook-line-and-sinker and never asking a f’ing question about it…which is what moyers program seems to really be about. i mean…if the guys a liar then impeach him on the real issues, not on this mamby pamby stuff. there are people dying and y’all have your panties in a twist over moyers calling fox a slime machine…of course they are…murdoch has admitted it. get over it…and focus on something important.
Like why we’re still in Kosovo?
Paging jay k’s shift key. Second notice. Please pick up the white courtesy phone.
Is anyone going to watch Moyers tonight?
“And we see this all the time on certain “progressive sites,†where opposing viewpoints, when they come from someone quickly identified as being from outside the tribe, are deleted (or their content altered)â€â€all in the name of preserving the narrative.”
I’ve had this happen to me as a poster numerous times on conservative blogs. I take it as a point of pride, actually.
In some cases, I’ve gotten conservatives to update their posts in response to one of my comments, even after deleting that very comment!
I can specifically remember getting a comment deleted for pointing out the poster’s rediculous circular logic… Sister Toldjah was using a mis-quote as proof of the veracity of…wait for it… that very same quote! When I pointed this out, my comment was deleted. I was then delighted to read the others crow about how I must have said something really rude to get deleted, and how liberals always turn so rude when they “lose” an argument. Of course I hadn’t been rude or even snarky… just pointing out blatant stupidity/dishonesty. In the end, I have to admit, it was fun watching them be all so blatantly wrong and self-righteous and smarmy.
But intellectual dishonesty plagues the right-wing blogosphere. Pot, meet kettle.
Furthermore, in the video you linked to, Moyers never lied. But Bill did, multiple times, making himself look like an ass. Or maybe it was just stupendously bad comprehension skills, layered with pomposity and Gotcha-style noise and fury.
Moyers was accused by BillO’s producer of saying specific things about Bill Orielly. Then a tape is played in which Moyers says general things about the right-wing meadia attack machine as a whole, and its supposed to prove Moyers is lying. What a joke!
I mean, After Moyers says he offered BillO a chance on his program, and that he refused, Bill sits there and says, “That’s a lie, Moyers, because we accepted your invitation. We simply demanded that the interview be taped on our set so that we’ll be able to retain a copy.”
Does anyone believe that? Does anyone believe that asking Moyers to go on BillO’s show (where he regularly shouts down guests and cuts off mics) is an acceptance of Moyer’s invitation to go on MOYER’s show?
It’s not…and there’s plenty of other transparent falshoods in BillO’s screed…. if you right-wingers could up the reading/viewing comprehension and attention to detail a bit, you might see it for yourselves.
Anybody know what the definition of is is?
See, this is the sort of stuff that absolutely undermines your credibility, jayk (can I call you “jake”?). Did you check that video I linked to earlier? Just want to hear you rectify how it wasn’t “made up” when it comes from the mouths of Democrats.
Sorry, “extremely realistic Democratic Muppets.” Come to think of it, Albright does look a lot like one of those balcony guys from the Mupper Show…
Heh!
Good post, Jeff.
I just got an E-Mail from timmy telling me that he was out at PW. First I asked him what he had done, then I came here and read what he wrote.
Short version, I told him that he has no one to blame but himself for his suspension and I was disappointed in him for letting his bitterness shine through … again.
I hope that he’ll be allowed back eventually. When he’s not foaming at the mouth or wandering down paths of blanket condemnation he does add something to the debate.
It’s your blog, Jeff, and I would have done the same thing in your shoes.
Oh, and Bill Moyers is a penis and the quality and critical thinking skills of this b atch of trolls is lacking. Thank-you. Good day!
yeah…i would spend a lot of time worrying about kosovo because we have lost so many troops there…like…i think…zero? and we have that pesky nato coalition with us. the interesting thing is that the same people who are calling the dems unpatriotic and treasonous because they are asking for time-lines and exit strategies from iraq are the same ones who wanted the same things when it was kosovo. look…the dems and the republicans are hypocritical liars.that’s politics and that’s why the press is so f’ing important to america…and they either dropped the ball on this big time…or they ran propoganda as murdoch has openly admitted fox did. i think…i hope…that is what moyers piece is about, and it does some good. but most of y’all have already decided before you see it because bill o’reilly told you so.
I hope that, by this point in the thread, you would assume that at least one person actually went to the Rolling Stone site and listened to the original recording. Especially when I went out of my way to say that I did exactly that. Moyers EXPLICITLY includes O’Reilly’s name in a list of conservatives he then groups together as using a Slime Machine. (Gotcha prophylaxis: Yes, I know I said Fox News in that comment. O’Reilly AND Hannity are on Fox News and they were both mentioned explicitly)
If you left-wingers could tone down the snark and the BDS, you might actually perceive that there is a whole Universe out here based on Truth and not truthiness.
If Moyers is allowed to “forget” that he mentioned O’Reilly’s name, then this whole meme of pounding public speakers for contradicting themselves should be abolished once and FOR ALL (this means YOU lefties, too, in case you weren’t paying close enough attention to the detail)
I listened to those and I heard Moyers attribute the “Slime Machine” comment to Dan Rather (everybody’s favorite disgraced anchor).
Besides, since when is an ambush interview journalism. It’s hokie when it’s done by Channel 6 and it’s pathetic when O’Reilly attempts it
Don’t be silly. We’re all Hannity types around here, jay. Can’t you tell, dipwad?
Personally, I don’t give a shit about which TV person caught which other TV person in a lie. Don’t care. Wait, let me check…nope, still not caring.
What pisses me off is Moyers getting a ripe–tax-payer funded, prime time–chance to lay down cover for all the Dems who voted for the Iraqi invasion–do I have to enumerate all of them for you, jay?–but who now want to cravenly act as if they didn’t. The same cretins were saying the exact same thing about Saddam in 1998 and you glibly elide right over it. And here’s Moyers, aging maven of all things liberal, busily shoveling enough shit about how Bush misled these poor dupes. RIGHT. ON. CUE.
If this is an example of your listening skills, ME, then I’m not very impressed.
O’R specifically stated that “We agreed to the interview as long as it was shot on the factor set”, and then Moyers would appear on the Factor the next day.
So try to keep up ME.
I’ll cede that there is a bit of semantic quibling here… but that doesn’t make O’Reilly’s attack-mode accusations any more appropriate… it’s foolishness either way.
But yes, I agree that this sort of gotcha BS happens all the time on both sides, where one statement or action is reinterpreted by everyone on their soapbox until it is turned into some horrible thing and they are endlessly attacked for it.
But BillO is a genuine liar of the highest degree…and this is not semantics. Just one example (of hundreds, if not thousands already documented):
BillO made up the name of a magazine that, he claimed, said that BillO’s boycott of France has cost them Billions!
This was an obvious enough lie, as France’s total annual income from the US is 2.6 billion….so France losing “billions” would be quite incredible indeed.
But if ME were caught lying about one thing, or even about a million things, and he came back claiming to have the truth about something, he’d damn sure demand we deal with what is being said, not who is saying it.
Who let all the “progg” chicks in here today? They’re not chicks? Funny–they look, act and whine like little baby girls.
Grow up “proggs”, er, I mean “priggs”. BDS is very irritating.
Appropriate for what?
“Everybody does it” is not much of an argument. Is there no support for Moyers out there?
Sparky, if you are looking for someone around here to take up for O’Reilly, you’ll be waiting a loooooong time.
Kelly at 3:25,
Same deal.
The intelligence community (and Powell, Rice, etc) were saying Saddam was NOT a threat to America before 9/2001.
And who glides right over it?
You are sort of not very prone to google stuff are ya?
“Everybody does it†is not much of an argument. Is there no support for Moyers out there?
This thread has really degenerated. I think Moyer’s supporters have already made the case. Who cares if he either lied or didn’t remember what he had called whom? Again, who cares? Did he falsely claim to have won a Peabody award or otherwise trump up his journalistic credentials?
Now that would be a reason for me to doubt his credibility!
Until someone can honestly and convincingly show how what he said has any relevance to the special airing (to the chagrin of the right wing) on PBS tonight, this thread amounts to no more than an ad-hominem attack.
And citing O’Really and Malkin is just pathetic.
And who went before the UN to make the case for the seventeenth UN resolution condemning Saddam and ordering him to give up on his WMD research and let the inspectors back in, Robert? His name escapes me at the moment. Just another poor dupe of the evil Bushco?
But honestly all this ex post facto bullshit is so tiring. The Bush intel was the same as the Clinton intel. If you really think otherwise, you’re beond reasoning.
In your earlier post you toss off the good little throwaway about the US invading a country that wasn’t a threat to us. Why, pray tell, did we have US and NATO jets in the skies in the north and south of Iraq from about 1991, again? Jets who were also getting fired on daily? Any clue?