Markos Moulwhatever — “Kos” — will be debating Harold Ford Jr on “Meet the Press” this Sunday. Kos, evidently, is going to tell us all where the “real” center of American public opinion lies.
Just as he did in a Washington Post editorial.
POSSIBLE SPOILER ALERT: the American “center”? Turns out it aligns perfectly with the “progressive” netroots movement!
Which means, of course, that Hillary Clinton and Harold Ford Jr are practically Goldwateresque, while people who cotton to the likes of Hugh Hewitt and that Captain Ed fellow…well, they’re so far to the right that, should the earth hit a bump on one of its axis rotations, these Christo-fascists will find themselves adrift in space like so many racist, sexist, homophobic Major Toms.
Meanwhile, “progressives” — with the help of their media sympathizers — are actively working to define themselves as centrist, in this, their latest attempt to turn “conservatives” into the kind of cancerous reactionaries that any “right-thinking” American will treat as fringe monsters, or malignant tumors on the body politic.
We stood by once and allowed these power-hungry ideologues to appropriate the “liberal” label — even as they’ve consistently promoted the kind of public policy that is decidedly illiberal, and that runs counter to the dictates of our founding principles.
Are we really willing to stand by now and watch these quasi-totalitarians appropriate what comes to count as the political “center,” too? — just because, you know, they’re people just like “us”?
Not me. Kos is “centrist” in the same way Harry Reid is a “heartthrob” or John Edwards is a “viable candidate.”
Anybody who tells you differently has simply gotten used to pretending that the Emperor’s hairy beanbag is a delightfully insouciant fur-lined codpiece from Armani Exchange…!
****
update: Here’s America’s newest self-styled “everyman” speaking on the subject of the DLC, whom he calls “a bunch of cranks” while off-handedly agitating for a party purge.
Which is just what most Americans want to see — political pogroms from today’s very own Kossacks.
Nuance.
****
More here.
****
Sunday update: Michelle Malkin is hosting an open thread on the “debate.” Video provided.
And Sister Toldja takes on the Kos op-ed here.
TW: Passions emigra.
That’s what I was gonna say…just… not as succinctly.
Kos is “centristâ€Â
Most megalomaniacs find themselves at the center of things.
Just say no to Sunday Morning Jedi Mind Tricks
TW: King refractory
The DLC whose American Dream Initiative is chaired by the likely Democratic nominee? I knew there was some reason I didn’t like her.
I read the WaPo column earlier. I like how he completely ignores Congress’ currently abysmal approval rating. but darn it Pelosi is in control!
This is like a trackback cause you got Hot Aired.
We stood by once and allowed these power-hungry ideologues to appropriate the “liberal†label
…
Are we really willing to stand by now and watch these quasi-totalitarians appropriate what comes to count as the political “center,†too?
Hell yes, and you should too. Joe Lieberman couldn’t have been helped more by Kos and the Nutroots.
You’ve gotta love how Kos lists Ned “The Freshmaker” Lamont’s primary victory as one of the nutroots’ awesome accomplishments in his WaPo op-ed without, you know, mentioning his eventual defeat at the hands of Joe Lieberman. Funny that he would omit that part.
With the DLC and the Bush Administration mulling closer relations with the Muslim Brotherhood, I’m not surprised Kos thinks he’s close to the center.
Don’t know what happened to that link.
Ko’s really think that they can save the World eh?
Ko’s really think that they can save the World eh?
not at all. Kos, et al, only are interested in “saving” those parts they can control themselves.
Think of their totalitarian, illiberal ideology as a kind of secular Sharia.
The misappropriation by American socialists of political labels like “liberal,” or “centrist” is made easier when Conservatives muddy their side of the semantic debate.
Do the Republicans really stand for states’ rights and limited Federalism? Do we really want to constrict the size of government? Do we actually believe in individual autonomy? The message is, we don’t know.
So, at just the time that we require clarity of message and purpose to meet this “Centrist” pincher-action-ploy head on, we’re instead hamstrung by ambiguity.
The sweater that Reagan knitted is getting moth-eaten, and needs some earnest patching. Just sayin’s all.
The Democrats had and kept its House majority from the 1950s right up to 1994, and its Senate majority for all but six of those years. But 2006 was Kos’ victory and the first of its kind in decades.
Of course, 1992 was “the worst economy in the last fifty years,” especially if you forget Jimmy Carter’s presidency. And if you’re a Democrat, why wouldn’t you want to forget Jimmy Carter’s presidency? Hell, I’m a Republican and I want to forget J…
What was I talking about again? Who gave me this funny-looking oil lamp and why is it belching out pink smoke?
Delusions like that take the really high quality meth, not your cheapo, Bakersfield trailer park meth.
Ambiguity bought and paid for by George Soros.
Whatever the drawbacks of the GOP’s lack of coherence, for KOS to be centrist, about half of the country would have to be carpet-chewing Stalinist/Maoist Che-impersonators. I think I would have noticed.
The only places KOS is centrist are newsrooms and college staff meetings.
TW: indication 15th ( yeah, man, beware the ides! )
Re: happyfeet on 8/11 @ 6:31 pm #
Soros is about as close as the real world gets to Bondian mega-villains. It’s too bad the press corps is basically sympatico with him, otherwise he’d get the kind of incessant probing coverage that only Republicans seem to need. We really need a new school system and press corps.
TW: breeding Univ (whohoohooooo…)
“Delusions like that take the really high quality meth, not your cheapo, Bakersfield trailer park meth.”
I think many of them actually either believe this is true, or believe it would be true if only everyone would educate themselves on the issues or be a little more smarter. What I find very interesting is the total disability to debate their views. Either they attempt to discredit the other person or they shift the goalposts. I have a good friend who is about this far left and he truly considers himself a libertarian. It’s frustrating talking politics with him and he shifts back and forth and absolutely refuses to research anything himself. The last time I tried this he wanted half the executive branch executed for outing a top secret CIA agent, and wanted to restore the assault weapons ban because the “majority of police chiefs credit it with the reduction of crime in the 90’s” And this is a smart guy with a really good job, wife and kids. Now we just talk about basketball.
I don’t think most of them think they are deceitful, but rather live in the world that they think it should be, rather than the world as it actually is.
Wait…
So Harold Ford and Kos are debating whether a) Harold Ford represents the center, or b) Kos represents the center…
Um…how about c):
Neither
Liberalism went off the rails between 1967 and 1972 when the New Left took over the Democratic Party; they adopted the ‘liberal’ tag while discarding the truly liberal aspects, including LBJ, the most liberal president since FDR. Instead, liberalism became socialism in sheep’s clothing and American politics has been the poorer. Now, we have the nutroots, the New Left’s successors with even less practical experience but lots of passion, making the Dems dance like monkeys, to the politicians’ noticeable distaste. But still they dance.
You know, the upside of this is, the more their message gets broadcast, the more people will get disgusted with what they’re hearing… McGovern, Ms. Clinton?
TW: NOISES AMONG the deinstitutionalized rabble and trust-baby block commissars…
One upside of this is, the more widely the lefties’ message gets broadcast, the more the real mainstream American public will get disgusted with it. McGovern, Ms. Clinton?
Memo to Harold: Screw them.
Every time that little twat shows his face, that needs to be rammed down his throat.
tw: study history
Seriously, I don’t think we should. You know and I know that these people are deluded, but they get air time disproportionate to their importance. WTF is a drooling imbecile fascis like Kos doing on Meet the Press? Really. WTF? That’s the stamp of validation right there.
It’s easy to say that exposure of his insanity will just enlighten Americans–but is that really true? The public has seallowed all kinds of Leftist brainwashing for the last 50 years because there’s been so little push-back. Our complacence leaves the MSM believing they are the arbiters of reality. We allow their closed system to flourish.
I am truly fucking sick of it. Silence gives consent. We can’t afford a lofty attitude. What kind of world are we going to leave to our children? I’m all for pushing these bastards back into their holes–starting right now.
Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve seen that it can be done: with immigration, with TNR. Let’s just resolve to do it. There are enough of us. All it takes is for each of us to contact these bums and call them on their intellectual backruptcy any time they cross the line. We should start by contacting Meet the Press and letting them know that we’re aware Kos is a fraud. Let them know we’re calling them on their bullshit.
I think Buzz hit the nail on the head, at least for me. I also have a friend like that, someone who’s all over the landscape. About the only consistency he has is a hatred for Bush, and he has a tendency to throw around the word “fascist” just enough to be annoying to someone like me getting an MA in military history. He’s an atheist who prides himself on human reason, yet becomes absolutely irrational and rabid when it comes to the subject of religion. He loves Reagan as an icon, yet he doesn’t remember anything about Reagan’s administration, and I don’t think he really understands anything about him.
More disturbingly, he has a penchant for conspiracy theory, and a dislike for Israel that becomes a little creepy at times. Whatever, I try to avoid talking to him about anything other than women, scotch, and baseball anymore.
You can email them here at the Meet The Press mailbox. I did my part.
[…] II: Jeff Goldstein thinks Kos’ declaration is a sign of the apocalypse. Posted By: Sister Toldjah in: Clueless […]
“the Emperor’s hairy beanbag is a delightfully insouciant fur-lined codpiece from Armani Exchange”
Fucking brilliant!!!
Because purges worked so well in Russia! And China! And Vietnam! And N. Korea! And Cuba! And Venezuala!
Oh, no, wait. That last one hasn’t happened. Yet.
Ye Gads. Can any of these Leftards learn anything from history?
How to be a living brain donor without drooling?
Or were you not talking about history professors?
(TW: therefore conquered — pessimist.)
The upside of this is that the more they try to mainstream the likes of Kos, the harder it is to gloss over their repellent message and beliefs. McGovern, Senator Clinton?
d00d where’s that pub link?
lazy
found it
kthxbai
this can’t just happen
24) I know that guy’s brother!
Except my guy hates all Republicans: after the first time Schwatzen-, Shwartz-, Conan the Barbarian won the CA governor’s race, he looked at me and said that there wasn’t a dime’s worth of difference between me, Conan, and Hitler. He later tried to convince me he it was a joke. No, really. Haha.
He’s also a big conspiracy guy (did you know each NFL season is actually scripted beforehand?).
He made a comment once about how he had figured out the Vietnam war back when he was 14. I believe he is correct: very few of his abilities to interpret the real world have gotten past that point.
But ask him about baseball, he turns into Tony effing La Russa (apologies to Neal Stephenson).
It would be great to take back the language so I could be a “gay liberal” without being at all weird. Screw you Markos!
If I slather myself in mayonnaise can I call myself a turkey sandwich? Of course not, I’d need lettuce and a slab o’ bread too.
I’ve enough faith in the intelligence of the American people not to be too terribly worried about this. The better look people get at The Kos’ Cause the more repelled I think they’ll be.
And yes, let’s not let The Kos forget that Screw Them” remark. He was a Beauchamp before Beauchamps were kool.
TW: Allende chemistry. Indeed.
Does he by any chance identify with any of the Government Registered and Sanctioned Victim Identity Groups? ‘Cause one thing I’ve noticed is that GRSVIG members are absolutely susceptible to conspiracy theories. For a long time I thought it meant GRSVIGs merely attract those who are already stupid, but lately I’ve begun to believe that otherwise intelligent people who choose to belong to a GRSVIG actually become stupid as a result.
And for all their willingness to believe in conspiracies, it never seems to occur to them there might be a nefarious, genocidal purpose to the whole GRSVIG thing. Of course there isn’t <wink wink, nudge nudge> but they don’t know that.
I remember Howard Dean, “the next President of the United States.” Remember what the MSM did to him? They took him out. Sure, the people with real power are stroking Mr. Markos Zúniga right now. He will end up discredited or he will become a team player like Dean. How long has Howard Dean been silenced now? He’s the fucking chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) for god’s sake. Did you hear anything from him at YearlyKos?
The Emperor may have no clothes but the MSM can still cut the balls off of any pretenders to the throne like Kos. Once they’re done using him to mollify the extreme left.
Yes, I get the irony of suggesting Kos has any balls yet to be removed. Screw them.
Let me get this straight. Cindy Sheehan is a centrist, and Nancy Pelosi is off to the right fringe of American politics?
Former Nutroots heartthrob Paul Hackett knows all about that, and the shiv Markos left in his back.
36) I think a predilection for conspiracy theories comes first. At least with those I know. Or it may be two separate data points, a correlation is not causation thing.
It’s sort of amusing in a head-shaking way to hear mention about conspiracies that didn’t pan out (in the 80s, Reagan was going to arrest everybody… or something, sorry, my ears glazed over). These failures never seem to result in questioning the whole usage of conspiracies to explain reality. No, it’s on to the next conspiracy.
> a nefarious, genocidal purpose to the whole GRSVIG thing
Heh.
I notice that Kevin Barrett is now threatening to send uncooperative journalists to the scaffold, come the revolution.
We are the middle’ has no meaning when you examine the chasm between the two sides. Just as shifting wealth is erasing the notion of a ‘middle class’, so too, the divisive exacerbations of polemics takes the equator off the map of North/South.
East/West will never meet.
BTW; Kos pretty much kicked the DLC’s (as well as Ford’s) ass.
Spies, Brigands, and Pirates,
*jaw drops to floor, eyes roll out of head and toward the door.*
Tell it to Paul Hackett, ‘cleo. And Ned Lamont, while you’re at it.
BTW, are you betting on the side of the “chasm” that doesn’t have any money? Heh.
cleo
any more inanities to offer?
What’s “shifting wealth”? What “chasm”?
See, I find that most people are pretty much in control of their own lives through their own choices….and sometimes they choose foolishly. And that “chasm” you see between Left/Right really is between Left and the rest of us…kinda like how jihadists lump non-ideological (aka moderate or apostate) Muslims in with the infidels.
are you betting on the side of the “chasm†that doesn’t have any money?
Check the Dems fund raising totals, Pablo. Then check the number of millionaires and billionaires
buyingfunding the Dems.Ah, so we may not be polarized along class/wealth lines! That explains all of ‘dem white folks at Yearly Kos.
It ain’t so black and white after all, ‘cleo.
Please tell me that you captured Moulitsas saying about Iraq that “Whether we leave in 3 months, or 6 months or a year, it’s just a matter of semantics.” That was outrageous enough but then he said that John Breaux’s crafting the Bush tax cuts were to blame for the I-35 bridge collapse. I wrote about them here. He’s better off just running his website.
Kos is capable of rallying enough storm troopers to tip any local or state primary and a tight dem/rep election. And that include the states representatives to congress. (Lamont)
Where he falls down, and what’s really at the core of his delusions, is that he can’t muster enough dedicated troops to effect more than a couple of races at once. And dedicated doesn’t mean commenting on DailyKOS. It means willing to get out there and work the real world hustings and willing to travel and live on their own dime while doing so. And it’s a couple only in races that would be close runs anyway. Anything other than a close run takes all Kos’ resources. He pulled out the primary for Lamont by an intensive effort. Had he put that same effort into Lamont’s election, or had Lamont been perceived as a serious national candidate by anything remotely close to a majority even in liberal CT, he might have pulled that off too. Instead he spreading his attention too widely over too many races and achieved nothing (I don’t believe for a moment that the nutroots gave the Dems the House and Senate. The prior republican leadership did that).
What it really comes down to is that Kos and his followers are bit players. In an election cycle, and just after the YearlyKos where candidates did show up to preen, he’s news and any news is good news to the MSM. That doesn’t mean they take him seriously or won’t marginalize him if need be.
– The far Left idiots can raise money till they’re awash in it, rig polls until doomsday, and proclaim every sort of fake but accurate victory they can invent, but on election day the results will still be the same. Defeat. Their brave attemps to gain power through anti-pasta politics just cannot survive its own fatal flaws. KosKlackers and the good Komrads enclave is still a trainwreck waiting to happen. The MSM is using them to blolster sales through yellow/sensationalist journalism. The Leftards know that, but without that sales driven support, you wouldn’t even know they exist.
– We have nothing to be concerned about from people so desperate and delusional they cosider the Lamont disaster to be a success. Lieberman was so much preferable to the Conn. voting base, once they understood just whom the perps were supporting Lamont, Joe was able to even switch parties, and STILL kick the happless Kos Kandidates ass. Thats political impotence you seldom find on a national level, unless maybe your name is Kucinich or Kerry.
The more I think about it, the more I think that Kos made a serious mistake. No one viewing MTP could miss the reference to both Kos’ website and the fact that it might be controversial. His site will get visited by a lot of people who might not otherwise have done so. That won’t increase his following by much if anything. That maxed out for all intents and purposes long ago. It will however give a lot of people without prior first hand knowledge of the entrenched fascism of the kossacks very grave misgivings.
Kos is no dope concerning the power of the net, and the fact that hate sells. I doubt that he misses the fact that selling hate has to be done low key and below the radar of the general public. It’s odd that Kos would make the mistake of leaving a trail to his online ass so blatantly on national media. It really did have to be his ego suppressing his instincts.
Which brings up another point. If this guy could truly extend the power that a widely accepted political spokesman would have, he would have a front site in place more acceptable to the general public. The fact that he doesn’t indicates either that he doesn’t control enough resources to make it happen or, and I think this the more likely reason, he knows his followers would never be disciplined enough to project enough reasonableness to construct an acceptable public face. The third possibility is that he’s well aware that his followers would eat his lunch if he strays to close to the boundaries he himself set.
I think it inevitable that his ego will eventually drive him to make the mistake he’s avoided so far. That’s going head to head on national media against someone without any interest in the support of or rather the anger of the nutroots. If/when that happens, Kos and the mindset he represents will be chewed up.
[…] *** Update III: Jeff G. on “signs of the apocalypse.” […]
[…] If conservatives are hypocrites because they only focus on one end of law enforcement, wouldn’t logic dictate that Sirota is a hypocrite for focusing only on the other end? *** & **** Perhaps together, Tancredo and Sirota can work hand in hand to create on statist monster police state (or what DailyKossaks laughably call the center). […]
Kos has already gotten people, the kind that coordinate a WaPo oped with an MTP appearance. He’s so doomed.
I mean no disrespect to anybody, but haven’t the Republicans been in total control of the Government for practically 6 years (until the recent change in Congress)? It seems as if the loony left has been persecuting conservatives by reading many of the posts. We got ourselves a war, lower and lower taxes, oil lobbyists working at environmental protection agencies, faith-base initiatives rampant in the government. What is it there to complaint about? I’m serious.
We got ourselves a war, lower and lower taxes, oil lobbyists working at environmental protection agencies, faith-base initiatives rampant in the government. What is it there to complaint about? I’m serious.
Are you really? You think that’s the kind of conservatism people are looking for around here? Christ, read a book already.
We got ourselves a war
That would be the war that Clinton, Feinstein, Schumer, Daschle, Kerry, Kennedy, and Reid all voted for, yes?
Oh, right: that’s gone down the left-wing memory hole, hasn’t it? The new pravda is that it was a unilateral action by BushChimpHitlerBurton or something.
Whoops, Kennedy voted against it. Kerry didn’t, though.
Of the potential 2008 Democratic candidates who were in the Senate at the time:
Clinton: yea
Edwards: yea
Biden: yea
3 for 3.
Dodd?
Lower taxes suck ASS!
I’M SERIOUS!
Yep, Dodd (assuming he counts as a candidate) also voted yea, so 4/4.
“…We got ourselves a war…
– No you have yourselves an idiotic cult movement, and little else to show for 7+ years of antisocial behavior, and spoiled brat antics. With your plan we’d end up with endless add-on welfare legislation, spiraling taxation, a stock market sag of record proportions, high unemplyment, yet more government pork barral social engineering that ends in disaster, Environmental opportunists driving up business costs “to get the man”, and a faithless based initiative to demean and eliminate every shred of common decency and moral self control in sight, leaving us a bankrupt nation with zero principles, and self hate run amok. Just to make it all perfect, you’d throw open the borders so whatever is left of America would be indistinguishable from France, while we sat and waited for al Qaeda to come calling, or an Iranian bomb in one of our cities.
– No. If there is something you are decidely not, its any kind of serious. What you are is young turk dickwads lookung for a free lunch and any way to avoid personal responsibility. As a group, you couldn’t find your dicks if your balls were on fire, let alone “lead” anything but a massive cluster fuck.
– The only thing serious about your braindead gaggle is seriously fucked.
Luis – If you are serious about that comment, then it proves the futily of my trying to actually discuss these matters with you previously. You have a comic book vision of what we are.
I think if you’re of a conspiratorial mindset, the ground is more fertile in speculating as to what degree Beauchamp was delivering themes tailored for TNR’s editorial stance. If you broadly contextualize the three pieces into the broader MSM narrative, they fit hand in glove. In his first piece he underscored that US troops were a catalyst for the violence, in his second piece he resonated with the “we can’t police a civil war” meme. In the third piece he dovetailed with the damaged soldiers memes which are a part of the subtext of the WaPo’s endless Walter Reed coverage and NPR’s post-traumatic stress fetish. So the question is to what degree TNR was commissioning pieces expressly tailored for a particular viewpoint.
IF you are of the opinion that much of Scott’s work was contrived and untrue, then you have to wonder what governed his decisions to contrive the particular tales he did. “I’s gonna be a famous writer” does not square particularly well with anonymity.
oops wrong thread
Let’s all email our favorite news programs and ask why they haven’t had the Kos on yet. Because he’s so photogenic! You’d almost think that Karl Rove planted him on the Democrats.
Centrists of the world, unite! They truly make Hillary seem rational, which is scary.