perfidy

Lileks, true to form, has some excellent perspective on the fallout from the forgery scandal.

But I think the number of people who regard the evening news as straight truth delivered by disinterested observers, can be numbered in the high dozens. Blogs haven't toppled old media. The foundations of Old Media were rotten already. The new media came along at the right time. Put it this way: you've see films of old buildings detonated by precision demolitionists. First you see the puffs of smoke - then the building just hangs there for a second, even though every column that held it up has been severed. We've been living in that second for years, waiting for the next frame. Well, here it is. Roll tape. Down she goes. And when the dust settles we will be right back where we were 100 years ago, with dozens of fiercely competitive media outlets throwing elbows to earn your pennies.

In retrospect, TV looks like a big smothering quilt: it killed the afternoon papers, forced the survivors to consolidate; it reshaped the news cycle to fit its needs, shifted the emphasis to the visual. It fed off the Times and the Post and other surviving papers, which had institutionalized the Watergate and Vietnam templates as the means by which we understand events. The old-line media, like its Boomer components, got old, and like the Boomers, it preferred self-congratulation to self-reflection. And so the Internet had it for lunch, because the Internet does not have to schedule 17 meetings to develop a strategy for impactfully maximizing brand leverage in emerging markets; the Internet does not have to worry about how a decision will affect one’s management trajectory; the Internet smells blood and leaps, and that has turned the game around, for better or worse. So we’re back to where we were in 1904 – except that the guys on the corner shouting WUXTRY, WUXTRY aren’t grimy urchins selling the paper – they’re the people who wrote the damn thing, too.

In some respects we are seeing a return to 1904. But it's a jazzed up, 21st century 1904. Back in the golden age of yellow journalism and muckraking, competing papers created wars and didn't worry too much about the truth. The competition is returning - Fox amidst the major media, and the thousands of blogs and webzines in the increasingly powerful new media. But it's different now. Like open source software and open source intelligence, we are seeing open source journalism. This is the 21st century stamp on the metaphor.

I think a closer historical analog to what we're seeing now is the pamphleteers of the revolutionary era. In many respects, the golden age of newspapers was the late eighteenth century. Small papers, they carried little of what we would think of as news. The occasional dispatch from europe, advertisements, and essays on politics, morals and religion. This is much of what blogs are today. However, instead of a small number of papers with circulation numbering in the thousands, today's Tom Paines and Alexander Hamiltons can reach millions with their essays and commentary. And again, they don't have to go through semi-monopolistic corporate media giants to get access to the public. Anyone with a computer and a phone has access the writers of the federalist papers would likely have killed for.

Personally, I can't wait for the building to come down.

Brendan Miniter of the Opinion Journal is predicting a big win for Bush in November. He doubts that Kerry will even get as many votes as Dukakis. Like a similar forecast I linked to a while back (21 Reasons Bush will win, by the same entity that does the election projection site) this article lays out some thinking point by point. Here are some of them:

Central to Mr. Kerry's campaign is his promise to raise taxes. Walter Mondale had a similar idea, and he went down in a landslide defeat at the hands of the last Republican president to be re-elected. Similarly, the last Republican president to lose his re-election bid, George H.W. Bush, lost partly because he raised taxes. When skeptical voters--otherwise known as independents--are worried about taxes, they are looking for an unequivocal position. They know that promises to only tax the "rich" almost always morph into taxes on the middle class. Mr. Bush is already capitalizing on this. In his speech Thursday night, he noted that Mr. Kerry is "running on a platform to increase taxes--and that's the kind of promise a politician usually keeps."

And the electorate does know where Bush is on taxes.

Americans may be the most highly scrutinized and studied electorate in the world, but there's still plenty of activity going on under the radar. Voter turnout is going to be crucial to this election. Indeed, presidential adviser Karl Rove is banking on it. As many as four million evangelical Christians--a group that overwhelmingly supports Mr. Bush--sat out the 2000 election. Getting them to the polls will likely make the difference in several key states. Meanwhile perhaps another 80 million eligible voters didn't cast ballots in the last presidential election. After a close election in 2000 and a sense that this year will be a "historic election" because it will decide whether the nation aggressively pursues terrorists, many are predicting a record turnout in November. Mr. Kerry may be hoping for an anti-Bush surge, but concern for national security is a better motivator for new voters.

The Bush campaign back in '02 used special teams that went into action in the last 72 hours before teh election. By all accounts, they were very effective. They will certainly be in use in November.

Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia are swing states with strong unions, but many of the union members there are actually Republicans or are the kind of Democrats who will find it hard to pull the lever for Mr. Kerry. These are the union Democrats who drink beer, watch Nascar and own guns. They have no cultural affinity for a Northeastern liberal who spends his time on the Idaho ski slopes outside one of his billionaire wife's many mansions or windsurfing off Nantucket. Pennsylvania's Gov. Ed Rendell, a Democrat, picked up on this and told a reporter: "I might have gone windsurfing--you certainly have a right to clear your head. But I'm not sure I would have taken the press with me." Look for all three states to show up red on election night.

Ohio and West Virginia are already in the Bush side of the ledger, as are Wisconsin and Missouri. Pennsylvania is a statistical dead heat.

Which brings us to the final reason Mr. Bush is probably going to walk away with the election: Mr. Kerry is not a very good politician. He's cultivated a reputation as a fighter, a good "closer," because of his last-minute surge past William Weld to win re-election in 1996. But that was in Massachusetts. Why was a two-term Democratic senator having trouble beating a Republican challenger in the only state George McGovern carried? One reason is that unlike Ted Kennedy, Mr. Kerry is not seen as a man who can get things done. No significant legislation bears his name.

Interesting stuff, as is the list of 21 - still relevant after all these months.

Watch and laugh.

Courtesy of Spoons

I was just informed by Teresa Heinz-Kerry that I am an idiot. I was surprised by this, seeing as I've never met the woman, but here it is:

Teresa Heinz Kerry says "only an idiot" would fail to support her husband's health care plan. But Heinz Kerry, the wife of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, told the (Lancaster) Intelligencer Journal that "of course, there are idiots." Kerry's proposal includes health care subsidies for children, the unemployed, small companies and more; and government assistance to insurers and employers that keep premiums for workers down. If Kerry is elected, Heinz Kerry predicts that opponents of his health care plan will be voted out of office. She says, "Only an idiot wouldn't like this."

In an ABC report on the CBS document pooch screwery, the officer's wife and son also doubt that the memos in question could have come from Killian. At the end of the piece is a very droll understatement:

Many Democrats are worried that if they are found to be forgeries, it will be a setback for Sen. John Kerry's campaign to defeat Bush in November.

I guess worrying about the professional integrity of a major news outlet, concurrant slander on a sitting president, and the fact that some of your allies are incompetant scumbags rate pretty far down the list.

John Hawkins serves up an interview with John O'Neill of the Swifties. Interesting article, in that for the first time I've gotten to hear O'Neill's whole story uninterrupted by, say, a screaming Chris Matthews. We report, you decide.

Via Cold Fury, this gem from an unlikely source - Something Awful:

Anti-Republican protestors - I cringe whenever hearing that the Republicans are planning some upcoming meeting, convention, or fundraiser to earn more money for the "Buy Jesus Christ a New Diamond Beard Foundation," not because I hate Republicans, but because I hate anti-Republican protestors even more. These loudmouthed, braindead raving cliches make me want to start voting Republican just to spite them, but naturally I avoid doing so because that would only ensure four more years of unwashed horse-like creatures parading down busy intersections while waving "BU$H IS EVIL" signs they drew with their parents' Magic Markers. The general idea here seems to be that if you are too fucking stupid to intelligently explain your position on a few political issues because you often break down into tears when losing arguments to eight-year olds regarding the quality of Willie Wonkie candy in the Hy-Vee parking lot, you can compensate for your lack of debate skills by being as loud and belligerent as possible. I mean, hell, that tactic works all the time, doesn't it? Do you know how many women have been converted to the ranks of Christianity thanks to the ceaseless efforts of the anti-abortion lobby and their rock-solid tactic of "standing outside abortion clinics in the middle of the rain and shrieking like the Pod People from 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers' whenever they spot a pregnant woman walking within a 20-mile radius of the clinic? I'm guessing somewhere between nine and ten hundred million billion thousand. Maybe even more if you count fat women as two people each. The insane liberals, despite how much they claim to loathe insane conservatives, seem to have absolutely no qualms with adopting their awesome policy of forming large groups waving crudely misspelled signs, stomping around public places to disrupt the daily routines of normal non-insane folks, and screaming at everybody they see with the ultimate goal of annoying them into submitting to their wills. If people have to choose between George Bush and a crowd of furious bicyclists whose biggest claim to fame is that one of their blogs was mentioned in passing by Al Franken on that one AM radio station nobody turns on because it's about as exciting as listening to NPR at 50% speed, they'll either choose George Bush or they'll choose to look away when the riot police start caving in skulls with their nightclubs.

 

Wow! Suddenly I hate George Bush and think America is just like Nazi Germany, all thanks to a fucking posterboard sign held by some fat unemployed shithead! The power of advertising in action!

Here's a newsflash you guys and gals who believe George Bush is going to physically break into your bathroom and steal the awesome weed you have hidden in that prescription gout medication bottle next to the Drano: most people might actually listen to you if you present your facts clearly and act confident enough in what you believe in to know that these facts will speak for themselves. Most people will NOT listen to you if you're stomping around and blocking traffic while shouting tremendously catchy slogans like "two, four, six, eight, George Bush is a fucking liar and is Hitler and Satan and fuck you George Bush you cocksucking father of whores." Whenever chucklefucks like you begin blocking up traffic and causing me to be delayed, my first two priorities instantly switch to running you down with my car and voting Republican across the boards, not necessarily in that order.

Allah has a roundup of links to various speculations that recent documents regarding Bush's Guard service might have been, well, not exactly authentic.

[wik] The Weekly Standard talked to a few of its own document specialists, and reached a similar conclusion. If this all proves out, CBS and 60 Minutes are going to have some serious egg on the face. It seems that a desire to make the president look bad might have overcome any lingering sense of journalistic integrity at CBS.

[alsø wik] In a space of hours, several blogs (Powerline, Allahpundit, LGF, Command Post and others) have taken a suspicion, tracked it down, analysed it, and have begun to reach conclusions.

We hear a lot about new media lately, and naturally, within the blog world many are quick to dislocate a shoulder patting themselves on the collective back for the growing influence of the blogosphere. But occasional egomania should not distract us from the very real, and fast growing power of blogging on the media. This story is a perfect example. In a space of literally hours, bloggers have pushed a suspicion into informed speculation, and driven the story into the traditional media outlets. Fox news has mentioned it, and several papers are likely to put it on the front page tomorrow. UPI has picked up the story as well.

The beauty of all this is not so much that CBS and Dan Rather will be deeply embarrassed, or that lame attempts to make Bush look bad are exposed. (Though these are good things in their own right.) The beauty lies in the way that this happened. Private citizens, in their spare time, have cracked a story that the entire news department at a major broadcast network completely missed. Information bouncing back and forth between Powerline blog, Allahpundit, Command Post, LGF and all their commenters and email correspondants was sifted, processed and error checked almost instantaneously. Savvy professional newscritters picked up the thread, and used their own resources to further develop the consensus.

We are seeing an open source news media in action. This is not a new idea, to be sure, but one of the most powerful instances of the idea since the fall of Trent Lott. As this phenomenon grows, the major media will be ever more unable to ignore the findings of the blog consensus. And the benefit to the media consumer will be immense, when legions of the obsessed are fact checking everything the media produces.

[alsø alsø wik] CBS is launching an internal investigation, anf the Washington Post is covering it as well. One day turn around. Let's see what we can do about Kerry's trips to Paris.

Murdoc has a fantastic video that gives us some great insight into the situation in Northern Iraq.

A group of British scientists have added themselves to Perfidy's ever growing list of traitors to the human race. They are developing a robot capable of devouring flies to support its inhuman activities. Granted, flies are easy to kill and devour; but given the accelerating rate of technlogical change, how long will it be before vampiric robots are using super sensitive chemical detectors to find and consume their creators? The end is nigh.

Thus sayeth the Acts of Gord, chapter seven:

"Do you sell mod chips?"

"Go ahead, ask me what I sell."

"What do you sell?"

"I sell video games. What a stupid question."

"What does a mod chip cost?"

"Apparently one of us isn't keeping up."

"What do you mean?"

"If I sold you a mod chip, then you would never buy a game from me ever again. And that would be very much in opposition to my being able to run a profitable business."

"I just want one to play copied games."

"What? Do I look like an idiot? What the hell did you think I thought you wanted it for?"

"err..."

"Exactly. Now look, if I were to sell you a mod chip I would lose you as a customer. Now, if I were going to lose you as a customer I'd rather do it on a high note like setting you on fire. At least then I would have some satisfaction of a job well done."

"I'm leaving!"

"But I haven't set you on fire yet!"

If you are interested, you can read Kerry's book The New Soldier online here. The book was written in the seventies with the group Vietnam Veterans Against the War. The page also has a link to Kerry's 1971 congressional testimony that has been the center of some controversy lately, or so I hear. The site is sponsored by the Federalist, which is a partisan but so far as I am aware honest group.

Ace of Spades digs up a link to the recent Time Mag poll that shows Bush with a double digit lead over Kerry.

The meaty stuff:

Friday, Sep. 03, 2004
New York: For the first time since the Presidential race became a two person contest last spring, there is a clear leader, the latest TIME poll shows. If the 2004 election for President were held today, 52% of likely voters surveyed would vote for President George W. Bush, 41% would vote for Democratic nominee John Kerry, and 3% would vote for Ralph Nader, according to a new TIME poll conducted from Aug. 31 to Sept. 2.

Most important issues: When asked what they consider are the most important issues, 25% of registered voters cited the economy as the top issue, followed by 24% who cited the war on terrorism as the top issue.

And this:

• Iraq: 53% trust Bush to handle the situation in Iraq, while 41% trust Kerry.
• Terrorism: 57% trust Bush to handle the war on terrorism, while 36% trust Kerry.
• Providing strong leadership: 56% said they trust Bush to provide strong leadership in difficult times, while 37% said they trust Kerry to provide leadership in difficult times.

Thanks to Ace, who I have been sorely remiss in linking. Bad me. Of course, I wasn't even posting for most of the summer, so I wasn't exactly tootin my own horn, either.

By way of my favorite supreme being we find this interesting article from, of all places, the San Francisco Chronicle. Debra Saunders has an interesting analysis of the two conventions:

A New York Times/CBS News poll in July found that three-quarters of Democratic voters and 86 percent of Boston delegates opposed the war in Iraq. Yet both John Kerry and John Edwards voted for the resolution authorizing force in Iraq in 2002.

The same poll found that 19 percent of GOP voters and 3 percent of GOP delegates oppose the war. Those delegates are in harmony with Bush and Veep Dick Cheney, even if 51 percent of all voters polled oppose the war.

That's the central difference between the GOP and the Democrats: The Democrats were willing to -- no, they chose to, by nominating Kerry -- sell out their core issue in order to beat George W. Bush.

That's how fanatical their hatred is.

Republicans, on the other hand, are willing to lose an election for a cause they believe in. Bush knew when he began that the war in Iraq could cost him the election, but he did what he thought was best. And he still isn't flinching.

This also sheds some light on the character of the two conventions - one sidestepping the records of its candidates, and some softshoe on the military service Kerry did three decades ago; the other aggressive, focused on the importance of one issue - the war on terror.

Debra concludes:

And many Democrats think that they're going to lose. A famous wartime poster had Winston Churchill's face looming over the words, "Deserve victory." You deserve victory when you believe in a cause so much that you are willing to take risks for it.

This year, the Democrats abandoned their principles, implying either that they don't trust the America people to appreciate their message, or that they don't trust their message. Democrats aren't willing to take risks, but they are willing to choose someone whom they want to mislead the public. For that alone, they deserve to lose, and I think they know it.

Just when you thought you'd seen the craziest lunacy the interweb had too offer, the Ministry is here to disabuse you of that notion. Herewith, a collection of truly disturbing gems from the darkest corners of the world spanning internet:

• Doing the Lynndie. Not sure what that is? Well, remember the disturbing image of Lynndie England pointing at the Iraqi POW's unit? Apparently people are taking it upon themselves to imitate her. Like this guy:

  

  Don't try this at home, as you'll likely get your ass whupped.

• Ever feeling a burning desire to crush your own nads? I never have, but the interweb has resources to help you do it correctly and effectively.

• Islam is the religion of peace - this is well known. But until recently Islam had lagged far behind other world religions in kitschy clocks. No longer! Welcome to Mosque Clock, home of the mosque shaped alarm clock! Don't miss your appointment with Allah, set your mosque clock, and it will tell you when to face Mecca.

  See the clock!

  

  Hear the clock! Now, if they were really smart, they'd include a compass.

• If you love someone set the free. If they don't come back, cremate them and turn their ashes into a diamond.
• Here are two completely different ways to increase productivity.
• Transformers breakdancing. And if they come into your room, you can retreat to your NBC protected, bulletproof and internet ready plush coffin.
• Finally, I am inflamed beyond the power of modesty! Touch my vitals quickly, lest I die!

Kerry's late night speech rather suprised me. You'd think that a nominally intelligent candidate for the highest office in the land would not, immediately after a opponent's convention that savaged his Senate record, jump right back to the one issue that has been the source of all his troubles for the last month.

"For the past week, they attacked my patriotism and my fitness to serve as commander in chief. Well, here's my answer. I'm not going to have my commitment to defend this country questioned by those who refused to serve when they could have...

The vice president even called me unfit for office last night. I guess I'll leave it up to the voters whether five deferments makes someone more qualified to defend this nation than two tours of duty.''

This ill-conceived rally, right after the end of the GOP convention, makes him look desperate. The tone and content of the speech makes him look ridiculous.

Now why would they be protesting the Republican National Convention?

Interested Participant links to a list of groups protesting the GOP confab, and I have to say that this list is the first evidence I've seen that the far left has a sense of humor. Oh wait, they're serious about those names. Sorry!

Here is an excerpt of the excerpt:

House of The Goddess Center for Pagan Wombyn
African Ancestral Lesbians United for Societal Change
Code Pink
Committee to Free Pedro Pacheco
Communist Party USA
Labone Branch of Ghana United Nations Association
League of Revolutionaries for a New America
Missing Kitten TV
Ronald Reagan Home for the Criminally Insane
Ruckus Society
Ukuleles For Sanity

and my personal favorite:

Victims of Direct Energy and Electronic Harassment

You can get the whole list here.

TL Hines alerts us to an article that is of particular relevance to our madly music reviewing minister Johno:

Clichés manage to find their way into our everyday language easily enough, but they're perhaps even more insidious in writing--so much so that certain communities of writers begin to fall prey (Was that a cliché? Yes, I think it was.) to a unique, snippet-filled shorthand.

Though the article is aimed at book reviewers, it is chock-full of tips for avoiding the landmines that litter the landscape of modern review writing.

A sprawling epic of an essay, an emotional rollercoaster that hits the ground running at breakneck speed.

Again via Rocket Jones, a link to the Winds of Change roundup of all the good news from Iraq. It's a long, long list.

Kerry really seems to want his cake and eat it too. If the soldiers in Vietnam were responsible for rapes, atrocities, and behaving in a manner reminiscent of Ghengis Khan as Kerry claimed that they did, perhaps that does make those who didn't serve there better qualified to be the leaders of our country. If soldiers in Vietnam, including Kerry, didn't do those things then perhaps if Kerry is to make such political hay out of his many medals he really ought to repudiate his comments from 1971. Either way, he's being hypocritical.

More information on Kerry's behavior after he came back from the 'Nam can be found at QandO, focusing on Operation RAW. (Link courtesy of Rocket Jones who has had a lot of good posts up recently.) Also, he apparently met with the North Vietnamese more than he had previously admitted, as FBI files show. This is arguably illegal. I don't think Kerry is being particularly forthcoming about his activities in the seventies in connection with the VVAW.