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While I have often found National Review articles to be quite entertaining, I hadn't laughed out loud while reading one until last night. If you don't know already, National Review is a far-right publication that is always quick to pickup the current line of right-wing punditry, but this quote really takes the cake:

Two years after President Bush's much bemoaned 2002 State of the Union address, the charges that he leveled against the "Axis of Evil" have been proven. As President Bush had alleged, Iran, Iraq, and North Korea were seeking to develop weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) in violation of their international obligations. That Bush was justified in his public indictment of these states is rarely acknowledged. That in each case Bush was vindicated by an intelligence failure is insufficiently discussed.

In each "Axis of Evil" state, the successful concealment of WMD efforts went hand-in-hand with eluding detection by U.S. intelligence. The extent of deception in Iraq was so great that even after ten months of controlling the country, the U.S. has been unable to fully unravel and explain Saddam's WMD programs.

from Apostolou: Guilty as Charged

The first thing that struck me about Andrew Apostolou's article is his focus on Bush's 2002 SOTU address. I can only surmise that Apostolou wisely choose to skip back over the 2003 SOTU since it was filled with "facts" that have since been proven false. The spin Apostolou's putting on the failure of U.S. weapons inspectors to find any concrete evidence of WMD programs is unbelievable. Apparently, the reason we haven't been able to find those fabled WMD's is because Saddam did such a great job concealing them, that even after scouring with a fine toothed comb for 10 months, we can't turn up anything. (Maybe he hid them in a mud tunnel in Adwar.)

Look, I'm sorry, but ignoring the obvious implication for why we can't find WMD's in Iraq (they didn't have any), and spinning it into Saddam's amazing ability to hide them so well is analogous to claiming that the sky is, in fact, green, and the only reason we haven't realized that yet is because aliens from the planet Mars have been hiding it from us for thousands of years. (Not to worry though, we'll be invading it in 10 years.) I do feel bad for Apostolou, however, spinning that much must make him really dizzy.

The New York Times reports that the Columbia Journalism Review is launching a new web site to lead a nonpartisan review of the media's coverage of the 2004 presidential election. The site, called Campaign Desk (RSS feed), touts its goals it its opening post:

One of the minor rituals of American presidential politics is the post-election self-examination (or perhaps I should say self-flagellation) by the press. Quadrennially, we regret having pursued some lines of inquiry while ignoring others, or having gotten caught up in momentary feeding frenzies over unimportant things, or having been too susceptible to spin -- and then we resolve to do a better job next time. But now we have a new tool. In 2004, the Web makes it possible to analyze and criticize press coverage in real time, so that suggestions for improved coverage might actually be heeded, and incorporated into campaign coverage, while the campaign is still under way.

Thanks to generous funding from foundations -- mainly the Rockefeller Family Fund, the Revson Foundation, and the Open Society Institute -- we have set up a campaign press criticism "war room" here at the Journalism School, with the beginnings of a full-time professional staff of seven that will monitor as much of the campaign coverage as possible, and write about it here. The managing editor of CampaignDesk.org, Steve Lovelady, is already on board, and he and Mike Hoyt, the editor of CJR, are well into the hiring process. Steve is a veteran journalist who earlier served as a deputy page-one editor at The Wall Street Journal; then, as part of Gene Roberts's dream team at the Philadelphia Inquirer, helped supervise eleven Pulitzer Prize-winning works of journalism over twenty years; and, more recently, was an editor-at-large at Time Inc. Bryan Keefer, assistant managing editor, was one of the co-founders of the website Spinsanity.org. CampaignDesk.org will be updating the site several times daily, with particular emphasis on speed when the staff feels it can get inside the news cycle and try to improve coverage as it's being formed.

from Welcome to CampaignDesk.org

I think it'll be interesting to follow what they report upon. I have felt that the media's coverage to date has been far from complete and often sounds like its just repeating the party line, whether that line comes from the RNC or the DLC. At the very least, it might be a good source for people who are too busy to read a wide range of stories, as it seems they'll do a lot of the data mining to reach their goals. On a related note, I thought Salon's article, "The media vs. Howard Dean," was an intriguing look at how the media has already been acting as the RNC's echo chamber, touting Dean as "angry, gaffe-prone and unelectable." The extent to which the media plays along with this administration is sickening, so here's to hoping that Campaign Desk can shake things up a little bit.

In an apparent admission that he doesn't care about the thoughts, and opinions of the American people, Tom DeLay's office staff effectively began refusing calls from citizens of the United States who disagreed with his policies. Basically, when people called to complain about his attempts to block a vote on a resolution to roll back the FCC's media ownership rules, his staff began forwarding those callers to MoveOn's telephone number. He, apparently, didn't feel that the voice of the Americans who called in mattered, since they weren't in his constituentcy, despite the fact that he was blocking legislation that affects the entire country. Don't you think DeLay has a responsibility to serve the American people on this important issue?

DeLay's office doesn't see it that way. As a MoveOn member wrote in an e-mail to Pariser, "I was also able to reach Rep. DeLay's office. There, I was interrupted in the middle of my first sentence, asked if this was about the FCC, and placed on hold. After a few seconds someone else answered and I learned that Rep. DeLay's office had forwarded my call to MoveOn.org. Evidently, they have no interest in the opinions of a citizen." Pariser has since changed the message on his cellphone, urging callers to try DeLay again.

from Right-wing crank yankers

Frankly... I think his, and the behavior of his staff, is abhorrent. He has turned his back on the American people, ignoring the complaints of thousands. I guess this means that in Tom DeLay's mind, you're opinion is only worth as much as the money you're putting into his pocket.

Guess he's just following the Worthington Law (aka "More money = Better than"). If you disagree with this policy, feel free to let him know... you can reach his office at (202) 225-4000.

FYI- Apparently, Rupert Murdoch's New York Post pulled a similar trick, after MoveOn members called to complain about Novak's article that endangered national security.

For those folks who aren't part of MoveOn's email list, the Texas 11 will be in Denver tonight.

Dear Denver-area MoveOn member,

Please join members of the Texas 11 for a discussion and fundraiser at the Denver IBEW hall tonight at 6 pm.

Donations of any amount -- no matter how small -- will be graciously accepted. Donations will go to supporting the Texas 11 as they continue to stand strong against an underhanded redistricting effort designed to arbitrarily remove up to seven Democrats from congress.

Here are the details:

IBEW hall, 6 pm
(on Logan Street just off 1-25 at the 58th Street Exit)

There is, also, a recent article about the Texas 11 on Salon that is worth reading. This quote seemed particularly poignant:

"Those people don't want to govern," [Barrientos] says. "They want to rule."

from They can't go home again

And finally, MoveOn is accepting donations in order to fund an ad campaign in Texas to strike back against the Republican-controlled Texas Legislature.

Salon has posted the most recent excerpt from Joe Conason's new book, "Big Lies: The Right Wing Propaganda Machine and How It Distorts the Truth." This portion concerns the claim by many conservatives that liberals are weak on terrorism, and reference facts about information provided to Bush administration officials before the terrorist attacks on September 11th.

Departing National Security Advisor Sandy Berger and the National Security Council's counterterrorism chief, Richard Clarke, who was held over by Bush, gave Condoleezza Rice a series of urgent briefings on terrorism during the presidential transition in January 2001. "You're going to spend more time during your four years on terrorism generally and al-Qaida specifically than any issue," Berger told his successor. Clarke delivered similar emphatic briefings to Vice President Cheney and to Stephen Hadley, Rice's deputy. But the supposedly competent national security managers in the new administration, including Rice, Cheney, and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, were too preoccupied with other matters (such as national missile defense) to pay heed to the most serious threat since the end of the Cold War.

The failure of Bush's national security team to recognize the threat of al-Qaida, even after they were clearly warned, will rank among the most serious mistakes ever made by U.S. government officials. They had billed themselves as "the grown-ups," condescending to the Democrats they replaced and asserting that their experience would return steady guidance to American policy. Instead, these veterans of previous Republican administrations fumbled and fooled around with ancillary issues while an elusive new enemy prepared to strike. They weren't prepared. They had no plan. They hadn't seen what was coming. They had ignored the warnings. Their judgment was as deluded as their self-image.

from Who's tougher on terror?

This section is the last in the series. If you haven't already, now would be a good time to go order the book.