Blue Collar Politics

[BREAK] Well, my fervor for Tasini takes a boost from a NY Times knock. And don't you just love it when the premiere media organ to help garner support for Bush's Baghdad Blunder, by publishing weeks on end worth of lies as to WMD and Iraq connections to Al Qaeda, deigns to explain and render innocuous Hillary's support for the war??? The Times has yet to successfully explain its own war mongering. And the Times, in a rare glimpse beneath the Gray Lady's skirts, seems to allow why it comes out so soon with an endorsement against Jonathan Tasini:

Mr. Tasini, a labor leader who once successfully sued The Times on behalf of freelance writers, is the politically impractical candidate from the left that many commentators incorrectly imagined Ned Lamont to be when he challenged Mr. Lieberman in Connecticut. Mr. Tasini deserves credit for making the run and we are sorry that Mrs. Clinton did not respond to his demands for a debate. But it is hard to imagine him working well in a large body of egotistic and generally conservative politicians.

Tasini fought the Times . . . and Tasini won! ===== [/BREAK] A Senate Primary in New York - New York Times - - - SNIP Mr. Tasini, a labor leader who once successfully sued The Times on behalf of freelance writers, is the politically impractical candidate from the left that many commentators incorrectly imagined Ned Lamont to be when he challenged Mr. Lieberman in Connecticut. Mr. Tasini deserves credit for making the run and we are sorry that Mrs. Clinton did not respond to his demands for a debate. But it is hard to imagine him working well in a large body of egotistic and generally conservative politicians. - - - End of SNIPPET More Here

[BREAK] Some members of a "daily news" mailing list I run have mentioned that I seem to have little love for America's paper of record. And, I'll admit that there are times that I question my own antagonism to the more recent incarnation of the NY Times. Not often, but there are times. (And it is not just a reaction to a publisher who decides that those who can't afford subscriptions to "Times Select" should not benefit from the edification provided by some great minds.) Then, something like this Lieberman story comes along (kudos to Atrios), and I realize that far from beating a dead horse named Judy Miller, my internal blood-boil at the gray lady is really justifiable anger. Through the years, the Times was really NOT a Liberal paper in its news content, but mainly in its editorials and commentary. As with it's Conservative sister, the Wall Street Journal, you could usually count on the news stories in both papers to be factual and unbiased. (While the editors at both papers might differ on which stories they found worthwhile to publish, with each choosing stories more reflective of their editorial outlook, the stories rarely strayed from the factual path.) But over the past decade, the NY Times has not only left a grand tradition of factual journalism behind, it has gone on to where facts are cut from stories, leaving the exact opposite meaning in a story than the facts truly portray. In the Jennifer Medina story in the Times, the headline reads "Lieberman Points Out a Turnabout by Lamont", yet, when one actually reads the full Lamont letter, one can't help but realize that the letter chastised, and did not just praise, Lieberman. Here's the verbatim first paragraph of Lamont's letter:

Dear Joe, I reluctantly supported the moral outrage you expressed on September 3. I was reluctant because I thought it might make matters worse; I was reluctant because nobody expressed moral outrage over how Reagan treated his kids or Gingrich lied about supporting term limits (in other words, it was reluctant outrage); I was reluctant because the Starr inquisition is much more threatening to our civil liberties and national interest than Clinton's misbehavior.

As with many of us, Lamont lamented Clinton's idiotic tryst in the White House. And, like most Americans, including this Liberal, Lamont was probably angry at Clinton for his televised lie to the nation. But, as with those of us who loved our country too much to allow it to be used as a venue for internecine blood sport, he found much more offence in the manner the Repugnants in Congress and their henchman, Ken Starr, dragged our country down to where America looked like a rejected episode of the Jerry Springer TV show. After the jump to "Continued Reading", below, I'll place the story, followed by the actual letter Lamont sent to Lieberman.

You be the judge!

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[BREAK] You can spend hours arguing with a Bushie about the way the country has gone downhill since Bill Clinton left office. The economy, deficit, world standing, Iraq etc., etc.. But, with most of those arguments, one side continually answers with "Clinton lied." So, you'd be forgiven if you thought that all Republicans demand absolute honesty to the public, even if the subject was something as personal and not germane to the carrying out of his Presidential duties as an extramarital affair. Astonishingly, even if the lies were about an attack on the United States, an attack that was used as an excuse to send nearly 3,000 American troops and over a half-million innocent Iraqis to their death, you'd be wrong! It seems that only personal sins upset a large portion of the Bush followers. Lies told to the nation that cause waves of blood to be spilled are not as important as one that is attached to a stained blue dress. Let me be straight here. I don't believe the Bush administration has been honest about 9/11, and I'd still carry an umbrella if Dick Cheney called and told me it was sunny and dry out. I'm biased, but it is a bias based on past experience. ("Saddam wouldn't let the inspectors in" Bush says, as I watch them monitoring missiles being sent to destruction.) But I always assumed that some difference in genetics made it impossible for Bush's followers to understand that they were being led down a path paved with lies, deception and misdirection. I figured that genetic tic was what caused those Bushies to now rally against David Kuo's stunning indictment of the whole White House "Faith Based" circus and to ignore the incompetence chronicled by so many recent books on the Bush admin... I was wrong. Polls keep showing that, even at his worst, Bush has about a third of the people who view him favorably. Yet, a new poll shows that only about half those fans actually believe the Bush Administration tells the truth about something as serious as the September 11, 2001 attacks.

- - - SNIP Only 16 per cent of respondents say the government headed by U.S. president George W. Bush is telling the truth on what it knew prior to the terrorist attacks, down five points since May 2002. - - - End of SNIPPET

Boy, finding out that the vast majority of the American people, who I might have said were kept ignorant by the corporate media, actually believe that Bush/Cheney are frauds . . . well, that's encouraging, to say the least! Finding that only 16% believe them, but twice that number supports them, says some interesting things about Republican politics, to say the least. This should be some election! [/BREAK]