alternative hippopotamus

The Town House is a bar in Washington DC. See here. Around the time of the 2004 presidential election a number of popular progressive bloggers were living in DC including Matt Yglessias, Matt Stoller, Josh Marshall, and Ezra Klein, as well as others. They would meet semi-regularly at the Town House. This was the origin of the Town House email list.

In 2006 Jason Zengerle of the New Republic posted a blog entry alleging that the Town House was being used to launder progressive talking points. Here’s how Glenn Greenwald responds to that post: (link)

Over the last few days, Jason Zengerle of The New Republic has been engaged in a bizarre crusade to depict “liberal bloggers” as a bunch of mindless, obedient zombies who take orders about what to write from Markos Moulitsas, all in order to ensure that they can continue to enjoy the great financial wealth lavished upon them by virtue of their participation in the “Advertise Liberally” network, which Markos founded but does not operate. To prove this “point,” Zengerle published what he purported to be various e-mails regarding recent accusations against Jerome Armstrong, which Zengerle claimed were sent to the “Townhouse” Google group — comprised of 300 or so journalists, political operatives, bloggers, advocacy organizations, and others designed to facilitate communication between these usually isolated groups. To the extent the “substance” of Zengerle’s accusations are worth responding to, Ezra Klein and Max Sawicky (among many) have done so quite thoroughly, respectively here and here.

So, it’s both laughable and predictable that the new Democratic-opposing bloggers, in this case the so called “pumas” recycle these old right-wing points. Take this post from Reclusive Leftist:

I don’t know if people here know about the “Town House” email list but it’s kinda interesting if you want to know how the political blogs operate or if you’ve ever wondered why you read the same messaging over and over again, in predictable cycles. Town House is/was a by-invitation only group that hands out acceptable talking points to be disseminated by its affiliated blogs. The idea of Town House was to create a method by which progressives could do what right wing radio does with its audience: get those memes started and re-enforced through sheer repetition. Challenge those talking points and you get chased off the blogs.

Of course, the Town House email list has nothing to do with handing out acceptable talking points. And why folks like Lambert repeat this kind of gossip is clear: this is a simple, if gossip-laden way of smearing progressive bloggers. This is what these formerly Clinton-supporting blogs have descended into: smearing the winners of the 2008 presidential contest.

There’s an old adage that conflict sells. And, anyone who disagrees with the adage is just cruising for a bruising.

That’s why I think the Post is tweaking this story up. To sell newspapers.

Like when I got to this part: “Hoho KO’s Obama”. Okay, that’s not exactly what it says. A more accurate quote is:

Founded by former Vermont governor Howard Dean, Democracy for America argues that inclusion of a Medicare-style public option in health-care legislation is “non-negotiable.”

You’d get the impression that this noted liberal group is breaking with Obama on the issue of healthcare. I question this impression. A couple of weeks ago Howard Dean spoke at DC for Democracy, the local chapter of Democracy for America. Dean spoke at length about healthcare, but emphasized he was not talking about single payer, but what has become known as the “Public Option.” Certainly, Dean is supportive of Obama, as is DC for Democracy.

Being generally supportive doesn’t mean acting in a state of obeisance. So, if Obama is asking progressive groups to stop attack ads, I’m sure that groups such as DC for Democracy appreciate his viewpoint. They’re not going to change their stripes, however.

And just between me and you, I haven’t been impressed with Ceci Connelly’s recent work. Let’s just say that she’s been writing to the theme of progressives vs. Dems recently. You may recall this from Open Left, for instance:

When asking me about the Progressive Change Campaign Committee’s TV ads (which begin airing Monday in DC) holding Senate Dems accountable for taking millions from insurance interests and being on the verge of opposing a public option supported by 76% of Americans, Connolly would ask me ridiculous questions like, “Why are you attacking your friends? Wouldn’t you agree that these Democrats are better for you on most health care issues than Republicans?”

I had to patiently explain to her that the public option is the defining issue of the health care debate — if Senators like Baucus and Nelson aren’t with us on that, they are not our friends.

Going back over the wording it maybe that the phrase “Medicare-style” are what’s creating the apparent debate. That wording would elide Single Payer (”Medicare for all”) with the still evolving “Public Option.”

If Lambert’s point is that the resignation of the Governor of Alaska, much less the former VP nominee is not a legitimate new story, then he’s clearly playing 11th dimensional chess in his own private Idaho with the FKD. (yes, I know that makes no sense. I’m trying out my Lambertese.)

I’ll note that his friends, the pumas, have their tongues a-wagging to the max.

This is how I commute when I take the Metro. Which I will probably avoid for the next week or maybe longer.

It’s actually quicker for me to bike. So, that’s what I’m going to do.

Update: Since the story broke yesterday it just keeps getting worse. WaPo has an update here. Nine people have died. And, it sounds like the train that initiated the accident was one that was being phased out. If the problem was in the signaling system why was it just being phased out? This is starting to sound like a more systemic problem. I’m waiting for a rational explanation of why Metro riders shouldn’t be concerned about the other cars in the fleet, that, like this train, are being gradually removed from the system.

Update 2: From the WaPo chat:

Very good idea to work from home today. I think this may be an underrated change in our response to emergencies over the past few years. Many people now have the inclination and the technology to telecommute.

In fact, I think that may have diminished the problems today. My personal experience involved wandering around downtown Silver Spring, then taking the Metrobus shuttle to Fort Totten, then boarding a Yellow Line train to Gallery Place and a Red Line train to Farragut North, so I could join you for this chat. What I saw was much better than what I expected to see, as of last night.

I’m going to make a derivative point. Which is that there’s usually other ways around town, but which involves knowing the various quirks of the Metro Bus system. These days everyone has a cell phone, and usually one with messaging capability. I can’t believe the routing software could be that complicated. You should be able to text a start and end destination and get back a couple of routes that include any emergency situations or scheduled construction.

Subtitle: Somebody went to the Whitehouse and all I got was this lousy blog.
Alternative subtitle: The 2008 Democratic primary is almost over, all over this world.

Vastleft interviews Eric Boehlert on the blog wars chapters of Bloggers on the Bus. Towards the end of this tedious cross-examination, Vast shoves this question down Eric’s throat:

At watchdog site, Media Matters for America, where you’re a Senior Fellow (and which, BTW, is a resource for many items in one of the posts linked in #6, above), you wrote arguably the definitive debunking of the “as far as I know” smear — a canard that convinced many Democrats that Hillary Clinton was slyly suggesting that Obama wasn’t, as it were, properly Christian.

Yet, I can’t find anything on Media Matters that debunked the RFK smear, in which a Democratic senator / presidential candidate was falsely accused on news program after news program and in news article after news article of just about the vilest thing one could imagine: that she was looking forward to the assassination of her rival, the potential first black president.

I don’t remember bloggers reacting this way to HRC’s remarks. Vastleft asserts that “news program after news program” said that HRC was looking forward to his assassination, but doesn’t include links. Remember Vast: heaven smiles on those who provide supporting documentation.

So, I asked the folks at Rumper Room how they remembered things. Here are some responses:

• YAFB: “If someone had suggested, “Oh, you know, Hillary’s ahead at the moment, but politicians have died/been assassinated before the election in times gone past,” I wonder how it’d have rung round their pointy heads? “
• Mrs. Polly: “trying to trigger an attempt? No. But I did think using the RFK assassination as a pure calendar marker was remarkably cold. “
• Betty Cracker: “I didn’t think Clinton was trying to trigger an assassination attempt (hell, even Olbermann, in the rather histrionic special comment inspired by the incident, admitted that). But it was at best remarkably tone deaf and at worst revealing of cold political calculus that did Senator Clinton no favors.”
• Tom65: “Was that HRC’s intent? I don’t think so, but it was highly irresponsible of her to even raise the issue. And don’t forget, this came on the heels of some serious dog-whistle racism from her campaign in South Carolina and West Virginia.”
• Marindenver: “The possibility of some nut job taking a shot at Obama was, (and still is) definitely on my mind. I was appalled that Hillary said that.”
• Kevin K: “It was a silly and stupid statement on her part and I don’t recall anyone thinking (or writing) that it was code from Hillary to let the assassinations begin.”

In the next version of Bloggers on the Bus perhaps Eric Boehlert would like to include these comments reflecting a number of bloggers thoughts. As Kevin K suggests perhaps he should also include the reaction by Hillary-supporting bloggers to the word “periodically.”

Update: this is just over the top, and a clear example of distorting the record:

It doesn’t matter, actually
By vastleft on Tue, 06/23/2009 - 11:19am

The key thing is to maintain the fiction, the equivalation. Because if it was just a “pie fight,” it was the noble and adult thing to have stayed clear of it and to leave the mess for the peons to clean up.

No matter that the atmosphere was so toxic that people in the highest tier of the New Media actually had to lie and turn blind eyes on the single most important topic of their blogging careers: replacing Bush/Cheney and their enablers with something new and much better.

First, it was a “pie fight” on the internet. Vastleft’s effort to turn it into some sort of Mongol invasion is patently ridiculous. But, unless he turns it into a progressive conspiracy, then there’s nothing to flame out about, is there? Second, if Vast is alluding to Digby’s statement that she was “chicken shit,” then he is exaggerating her statement to a point where he changes it entirely.

Last Thursday the question of what happened at the Washington Post regarding Dan Froomkin came up. I had heard rumors to the effect that Froomkin and Krauthammer had a falling out over the issue of torture. As I recall Krauthammer called Froomkin “stupid” at which point Froomkin called Krauthammer a “Poopie head” and gave him a wedgie. Not really.

So, via Jane Hamsher comes this Jeffrey Goldberg Atlantic piece of some interest.

Jeffrey Goldberg asks Fred Hiatt about what happened, vis a vis an Andrew Sullivan blog post.

Hiatt replies:

“It is so incoherent, it’s hard to know how to comment. But I will try. He says I was acting on neocon orders when we published a piece suggesting that Ahmadinejad may have actually had popular support. But elsewhere I am being attacked for publishing ostensibly neocon pieces criticizing Obama for not supporting Ahmadenejad’s opposition. It’s hard to see how both could be true.

I had forgotten until today that Dan (Froomkin) had gone after Charles (Krauthammer), which Sullivan says ‘almost certainly’ would have ‘enraged’ me. If Andrew wants to know whether it enraged me, why does he not call and ask? That’s called reporting, and I would be happy to tell him. In fact nothing pleases me more than when our columnists engage with each other, in print or on Post Partisan, as any of them could tell you. It’s good for traffic, and it makes for lively debate.

The disappointingly dull truth is that the decision not to renew Dan’s contract–which was not made by me, but which I supported–was based on viewership data, budget constraints and judgments about how well the column was or was not adapting to a new era.”

Jane points out that the Washington Post never advertised Froomkin’s articles the same way they publicize Krauthammer, or George Will, or Gerson. Quite true. I’ve noticed that as well. I’ve also noticed that Froomkin never hung around the water cooler frequented by regular denizens of the Post, such as Dan Milbank or Chris Cillizza. I’m sometimes critical of Milbank, and I don’t mean to be here. He’s a media celebrity in the same way that other writers at the Post have become over the years. Froomkin isn’t. Maybe he’d like to be. I don’t know, I’ve never asked him.

I question Hiatt’s assertion that he likes it when writers at the Post mix it up. This is a crowd that, how shall I put it, puts an emphasis on the notion that their ideas have a greater validity than those of their peers. Ultimately feelings get hurt, and that means some of these auteurs of the public logos come complaining to Hiatt. I’m sure Hiatt would prefer to be off doing whatever those of a certain class do. I’d like to think he’s online playing Quake Live. I like to think a lot of things.

If you look closely, by the way, Hiatt never says that the conflict between Froomkin and Krauthammer upset him. He responds to the general case of writers at the Post mixing it up.

I’ve been meaning to ask this for a while. But, first xylpdq. Count with me: not the first link, not the second, but the third. No, thank you.

Vastleft wants to re-examine the 2008 primary season. He throws out a number of things that calls to mind the old proverb about glass houses and stones. For instance, this:

Groupthink. Just about every aspect of Irving Janis’s model of fiasco thinking took hold. To cite but one manifestation: delegitimizing concerns of “out-group” Democrats (as “pie-fighters,” “Hillary obsessives,” “Obama haters,” “Rovian plants”).

Surely there are sites that qualify as Obama-hating sites. Yes? The confluence and pumapac to start with. I’m sure there are more. My purpose here is to look at the question of groupthink. I would say Janis’s thoughts on preventing groupthink are illuminating:

According to Irving Janis, decision making groups are not necessarily destined to groupthink. He devised seven ways of preventing groupthink (209-15):

1. Leaders should assign each member the role of “critical evaluator”. This allows each member to freely air objections and doubts.
2. Higher-ups should not express an opinion when assigning a task to a group.
3. The organization should set up several independent groups, working on the same problem.
4. All effective alternatives should be examined.
5. Each member should discuss the group’s ideas with trusted people outside of the group.
6. The group should invite outside experts into meetings. Group members should be allowed to discuss with and question the outside experts.
7. At least one group member should be assigned the role of Devil’s advocate. This should be a different person for each meeting.

I ask in all seriousness: do any of these ways of preventing groupthink occur at Correntewire?

Mrs. Polly:

Roastacon, Roastyricon, Rumproastanalia, however you would have it, was a glorious, blazing, whomping huge cavalcade of delight. It was hardly a surprise to find out that Rumproasters are hilarious, brilliant, and full of bonhom- and bonfemie. It was a just a swell confirmation.

Kevin K:

And for our stalkers’ benefit, the final head count was 22 people. Not quite as impressive as the most awesome political movement of our lifetime coaxing 60 or so shut-ins to an airport hotel on the outskirts of DC for a super-secret conference, but pretty good for one dinky blog that never pretended to be anything more than that.

Over the last month I’ve doing a crazy little thing called “paying the bills.” This is the first breather I’ve had for a while. I know a number of people who are out of work right now. Thank goodness I still have a job.

Around the same time I had to start scrambling on the work front, Timberlake’s restaurant closed. Technically it’s still open, but it’s more or less on beer support right now. So, the tiny piece of the progressive movement I’ve been nursing along, has had to look for another place. By the end of summer, I think we’ll have a new place settled. Last week we were at Elephant&Castle, and that could serve as a short-term venue if it comes down to that.

Also, last Saturday I attended the first annual Roastacon, a celebration of all things not PUMA, and all things not PUMA Lite. By the way, DC Blogger your name (or really, your handle) came up at Roastacon, as the saving grace to an otherwise dismal state of affairs at the AOL (Anti-Obama Lexicologists).

I really liked the folks at Roastacon. For a bunch of polisnarkists, they’re extremely well-adjusted. I really liked NYC. As KCinDC said to me, I started to sound like one of those Manhattan types. You know the type, NYC is the best place on earth, and everywhere else doesn’t even count types. I hate people like that, and I was starting to sound just like them.

Originally, I wasn’t planning to go to the conference formerly known as Take Back America. Now, I’m thinking of going. I’m interested in studying the question of whether there’s an actual rift among progressives, or whether there’s a microscopic sampling of former Hillary supporters bellowing and squawking that skew the sampling.

If there’s a rift, it would be along these fault lines:

1. Obama is a fundamentally progressive figure who is cautious in moving the country towards a more European model.
2. Obama is the anti-Christ, who cheated in the primaries, and who is indistinguishable policy-wise from Bush 43 or from Hitler.

Now, you may think I’m exaggerating the part about Obama and Hitler. But today, Paul Rosenberg at Open Left is pushing just that line:

But now, Obama thinks the Nazis were right, after all. Movement conservatives have always thought so, of course. But this is the first time that a Democratic President has agreed with them, in flagrant opposition to the rule of law.

So, score one for Rush Limbaugh, Glen Beck and all their wingnuts legions. Obama may not be Hitler, but he agrees completely with Hitler’s underlings, and he thinks that the Nuremberg prosecutors, Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman and Winston Churchill were all dead wrong.

If this isn’t evil, it will just have to do ’til the real thing comes along.

Now, I know a few of the people that run the Open Left site, and it pains me to say that over-the-top statements like this are why I don’t become more involved in commenting, writing posts, etc., on Open Left. It’s also painful that people like me need to explain why Obama isn’t a nazi. It makes me wonder whether the blogosphere is a waste of time.

The question here is not whether CIA interrogators tortured prisoners. They did. Nobody wants to defend that. Well, maybe Rush Limbaugh and Jonah Goldberg, but they’re special.

The question is whether a reasonable person would have received an order and deemed it kosher or not. And, I think that most people in that position, particularly given the state of our culture at that time, would probably have gone along with the legitimacy of the Bybee memos. Remember that this is a time and place where we see Kiefer Sutherland do the most outrageous things on 24. Popular culture doesn’t object to the notion of torture for information. It also doesn’t do a good job of distinguishing fantasy from reality, but that’s gruel for another day.

Now, let’s take a second and imagine that we’re nazis. It’s WWII, and we’ve just been given a new mission. Our mission is to round up all of the civilians belonging to particular religious and ethnic groups and put them on a train to nowhere. A fellow soldier has the mission to take the people off of the train, put some of them to work, but mostly lead them to mass execution chambers.

I am arguing that the scale of these two situations is so different that a comparison has no merit. In the first case I can believe that a CIA agent might believe that what he is doing is wrong, but within the boundaries of justice at that time. The soldier in the second case ought to understand that he is committing an atrocity on a planetary scale.

QED: Obama isn’t a nazi.

Next week: why Michelle Obama is not the same as Michelle Malkin.