HeadlineUpdate

George Allen goes (Ma) Ca Ca**Updated Again!**

If like me, you can't get enough of George Allen, a couple of good links to chew on (like a good ham sandwich or pork chop).  And last week's interview his mother gave to the Washington Post was pathetic:

When I told Georgie, I said, 'Now you don't love me anymore.' He said, 'Mom, I respect you more than ever.' "

And confirming suspicions that Richard Nixon's favorite coach might not have been the most tolerant of souls:

"He didn't want me to tell his mother," she said of the elder George Allen. "At that time, that was a no-no, to marry outside the church."

But Etty Allen does confirm part of my theory advanced below, that she doesn't go around referring to dark-skinned humans as "macaca."

Etty Allen said Wednesday that she had never used the word "macaca" before and had to go to a dictionary to look it up when she heard of the controversy. She said the word did not exist in her dictionary.
"I swear to you, I have never used that word," she said. "I must have used a lot of bad words, but not that word."

I believe her.  As noted below, I believe her son George was simply, and typically D-R-U-N-K. He was babbling like Jerry Lewis doing his idiot boy routine and "macaca" came out.  Usually Allen is in better control, but what with that and this new Jewish conspiracy he's railing against, he must be hitting the sauce even earlier in the day.

 

More from the madman of Richmond in the press today.  George Allen is finally apologizing to the young man he was caught babbling to last week. But it doesn't matter. I said it below and I'll say it again, only more clearly this time:  the man is a drunk.  He was famous as Governor for showing up drunk.  He was drunk when his brain failed to tell his mouth to speak intelligibly.  He seems to have a problem with that sort of thing.  No one seems to be willing to say this out loud, but that's what blogs are for, innit?

The kerfuffle over Virginia Senator, former Governor and future candidate for president George Allen's "racial" remarks yesterday, while extensively  covered here in the Times, the Post, and everywhere else, misses the pint, I mean point.

No matter what the dictionary says, I am sure that neither George Allen nor for that matter, anyone else on the planet,uses the word "macaca" in conversation, whether in polite company or when out drinking with Mel Gibson.  Nor was anyone refering to the young man's haircut, although I love the image conveyed in the Times' story of Allen's PR machinery working overtime to come up with a credible lie:

The senator’s communications director, John Reid, said in an interview Tuesday that Allen campaign workers had good-naturedly nicknamed Mr. Sidarth “Mohawk” because he would not disclose his name and the sobriquet seemed appropriate for Mr. Sidarth’s hairstyle.

Perhaps, Mr. Reid suggested, “Mohawk” morphed into “macaca,” with results that turned out to be regrettable.

Perhaps. But perhaps the boss was just out of his head again.  He gets like that.  Mean too, like Nixon (and George W. Bush, who stayed mean even after he quit drinking). Usually Allen does a better job acting normal--Webb must have him wattled, I mean rattled...

Check, please!

White House Office of Rebuttal and Denial

One of my 14.56 regular readers sent in this link.  Pretty scary stuff, eh kids?  As an unapolgetic--although not uncritical--propagandist, I have nothing against advancing a point of view, but the news that the White House has devoted part of it's website to saying "Oh Yeah?" to press critics is typical of the control freaks in the Bush Administration.  I trust that no actual reporters take this stuff seriously, but readers are invited to google, nexus and otherwise search these posts to see how the White House astroturf grows.

Politicians' Egos

    As a dedicated Anglophile, I of course am fascinated with what's happening to Tony Blair's leadership.  (My previously noted obsession with the Guardian puts the best coverage of this story in my browser, as does the BBC.) It began with an interview Blair gave to the Times in which he refused to be pushed in to setting a date for his departure.  Reading between the lines as usual, I thought I detected a secret plan (and the hidden had of Alistair Campbell) to use Blair's upcoming speech to the Labour Party convention on September 24 to finally address the issue. After saying he wouldn't set a date (or set a date to set a date), Blair could make a dramatic gesture and get to be the framer not the framed.
     Maybe that was the idea for awhile, but it all went pear-shaped when Gordon Brown or people pretending to speak for him started getting snippy. Also when a bunch of junior M.P.'s (mostly "parliamentary private secretaries", who, under the British system, perform menial tasks for other lawmakers that U.S. pols would find alarmingly democratic) quit Blair's government.
    Tony Blair rightfully took credit for the being the first Prime Minister to not say he'd go "on and on and on."  But now, his public dithering has riven the party.  There's pressure, albeit so far, not very serious for a contested battle,which could allow a victorious Brown to put political credit in the bank years before he faces an election. But presumably Brown would rather move into #10  not a year from now, but now. 
    If Blair really cares about his legacy,he should, like Joe Lieberman, just go.  Whose interest is served in politicians staying on after their Party rejects them?  Only the self-interested party himself.
    I said it before,and I'll say it again.  There's only one word for politicians who put their own drive for power ahead of everything else, and it's one of my favorites: Nixonian.

   

Say It Aint So, Joe (Already)!!

    Enough already.  I predict Joe Lieberman will end up not running as an Independent under intense, though for a party of donkeys, surprisingly delicate pressure.  He's waiting for the first (or second) round of polls to show that Lamont has a clear lead and then he'll cave.  But I wish he'd do the right thing now.  There's only one word for a politician who so cravenly puts his own self-interest above his party or the voters, and it's one of my favorites:  Nixonian.

More from me later, I'm back from my bucolic Northern location and grumpy about it...

Armey's Army

In my other life as a direct mail insultant, I am well familiar with stories like this about direct mail scams. group using the promise of tax-free medical savings accounts to lure members. In this case, former House Majority Leader Richard Armey heads a nice little earner called FreedomWorks (formerly Citizens for a Sound Economy--I bet that title change cost them a pretty penny in consultants' fees, focus groups and polls) that is giving my beloved profession of direct mail manipulation a bad name.

As this paragraph shows, the object here is really just to sell names to other mailers. 

FreedomWorks and its predecessor, CSE, were careful about the deal's financial aspects. In a Sept. 13, 2000, letter, CSE's Quinn said documents should overtly refer to dues, suggesting they be set at $12 a year, to be raised at CSE's discretion upon notifying Medical Savings Insurance Co. She also noted: "I would assume that these people will become CSE members for all purposes and therefore will go on the CSE mailing list. Since the CSE mailing list is rented, as a matter of course, those names would be rented as CSE members . . . without specific identification as MSIC insureds."

Bejewelled with right wing mantras like "Flat Tax," "Across-the-Board Tax Cuts,"  "Limited Government" and "School Choice" this direct mail come-on attracted enough suckers to launch a lawsuit. But when it works, direct mail gives people a chance to act on their most deeply held values and beliefs. Whether it's putting an Amnesty International sticker on your car or sending a contribution to your favorite candidate, odds are you've responded to a direct mail appeal or two.  So don't blame the messenger, unless it's Dick Armey.  Him, blame all you want. 

O Condi! O Mores! (and Maureen)

I know, I really shouldn't try to pun in Latin. But I did just buy at a yard sale a copy of Henry Beard's "Latin for All Occasions" after I opened to this:

    Things to Say to your Psychiatrist

    Sometimes I get this urge to conquer large parts of Europe.

• Interdum feror cupidine partium magnarum Euroopae vincendarum.

    I think some people in togas are plotting against me.

• Sentio aliquos togatos contra me conspirare.

Read Maureen Dowd today on Condi Rice's peculiar definition of diplomacy:

“I could have gotten on a plane and rushed over and started shuttling, and it wouldn’t have been clear what I was shuttling to do,” she said.

Keep more civilians from being killed? Or at least keep America from being even more despised in the Middle East and around the globe?

You can always count on Maureen Dowd to get it right, even if she does like her popular culture references a bit too much.  This one name-checks Uma and Oprah and then pounds comparisions with the new  "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie into a bloody pulp of metaphor. 
But Dowd is worth reading, even if the Times does make you jump through hoops now to do so.  Also on my fave rave list of columnists are:

Simon Hoggart of the Guardian
Harold Meyerson and E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post
David Corn of the Nation
Murray Waas of the National Journal

Me and Kinky Friedman

I've been a fan of the Kinkster since his days as a touring partner of Bob Dylan, witty singer songwriter and with his band, the Texas Jewboys, performer of such classics as "They Don't Make Jews Like Jesus Anymore" and "I'm an Asshole from El Paso."  He  skyrocketed to success in 1984 with the first of his comic mysteries starring himself, his friends, and a thinly drawn plot. I've borrowed this formula for my novel in progress, Murder in the Propaganda Factory, in which every word is true, except for the parts that aren't. 
Now, of course, Kinky Friedman is running for Governor of Texas in a four way race that, as Dan Rather would say, is tighter than a tick on a jackrabbit..or something like that  Read all about Kinky's campaign here as he runs for the office once held by George W. Bush.  As Kinky likes to observe, if he could do it, how hard can it be?

Bush Being Bush? Or Bush Being a Buffoon? We Report: You Decide

Link: CNN.com - Bush caught off-guard in chat with Blair - Jul 17, 2024.

I hate to direct readers to CNN, the least important news organization in the world, but they do have a video of George Bush's private chat with Tony Blair.  As Chris Matthews observed earlier today, if you're a world leader you're supposed to know not to speak with your mouth full or talk when the microphone is hot, but Bush apparently forgot to do both. His smirk when he confides to Blair what's "ironic" (presumably in the Alanis Morissette sense of the word) is classic.  And isn't Blair egging George on by agreeing with him about Kofi Annan's obstinance?  He's still Bush's poodle.  Follow what they're saying about all this on the Guardian's website here.

The Conventional Wisdom is (Almost) Always Wrong

It's an age old theme, perhaps best expressed by the philosopher Groucho Marx:

"Whatever it is, I'm against it."

Whether you call it conventional wisdom or the "prevailing view" as Thomas Mann prefers in his  excellent piece today in the Washington Post, it's headed for a train wreck. Can someone please start printing those old "Question Authority" buttons again? (True story. I was wearing one once and someone inquiringly approached me and said, "I have a question.")
Harold Meyerson said much the same thing in his piece the other day about how Ned Lamont is upsetting the CW and is going to beat Joe Lieberman. 
Thomas Mann cites the Republicans' "traditionally  higher turnout rates" and "vaunted get-out-the-vote operation" but I think that's going to prove to be their Achilles Heel this year.  There are so many local races generating massive Democratic enthusiasm that I see a "'trickle up" effect from the middle to the top of the ticket.  Republicans may end up losing some of their base this year as they continue to argue over stem cells and fences on the border.  Democrats, meanwhile, are finding new energy in that most old-fashioned political tool:  the door to door canvass.

Here in my part of Maryland, Jamie Raskin is generating massive grassroots enthusiasm in his race for State Senate as this short documentary makes clear.  Full disclosure:  I'm working on Jamie's campaign, but see for yourself why I and so many people think Jamie Raskin's campaign is a reminder of why we started out caring about politics in the first place. (For me, it has a lot to do with this quote from Robert Kennedy.  What inspired you?  Please comment below.)  One of the groups endorsing Jamie, 21st Century Democrats, has a slate of endorsed candidates at all levels of government who are in a position to strengthen the position of other Democrats on the ticket.

So the next time someone knocks on your door, or phones you at home, or (my favorite) sends you a mailing, remember the grassroots and I don't mean that one hit wonder band.  Back when he was mostly sensible, Ralph Nader, one of the many unlikely people I've written for over the years (including, in the same season, Walter Mondale, Jesse Jackson, Bishop Tutu and Mario Cuomo) used to talk about the "democracy toolbox" and in 2006, there's finally going to be one in the hands of every voter.  Watch out!

Grover Norquist Ha Ha Ha

    It is truly the season of joy and wonderment here in Washingtron.  First Abramoff, then DeLay, (and Ney), Ralph Reed and now Grover Norquist. They're all getting their comeuppance, and it feels so good! 

I particularly enjoyed the quotes from Norquist's fellow wingers who after years of backstabbing, now  enjoy stabbing people in the front.    

"People were willing to cut him a lot of slack because he's done a lot of favors for a lot of people," said J. Michael Waller, a vice president of the right-leaning Center for Security Policy who for several years was an occasional participant at Norquist's Wednesday meetings. "But Grover's not that likable."

 

...Frank J. Gaffney Jr., the firebrand director of the Center for Security Policy, has developed an anti-Norquist presentation, complete with charts and graphs, that he has shopped around to other conservatives.

The Democrat We Don't Need **Updated**

The indespensible politicalwire.com has this update to the question I asked below, a post that generated a flurry of emails from readers--well, two.

One of the games Washington people play is to ask each other's opinions on what to the rest of the country is pretty obscure stuff--like who's going to win the Democratic Senate nomination in Connecticut.  "Get a life," you're saying on beyond the Beltway, but here we're all over today's news that Joe Lieberman is planning to run as an independent if he's rejected by the Nutmeg State's Democrats in favor of challenger Ned Lamont.

Lieberman, Al Gore's Brilliant Mistake (or one of them, at least, along with not letting Bill Clinton campaign for him in West Virginia and New Hampshire) has morphed into a Bush-kissing, mollycoddling mealy mouthed jerk.  (See talk radio?  I can dish it out too.  Call me.)  If Gore had picked Florida Senator Bob Graham-- or Flipper, for that matter,anyone who could have attracted votes in Florida-- he'd be President and Lieberman would be mostly harmless.  (Warning: Preceding link is loud).

Even so, a month ago I wouldn't have bet against him, but now all bets are off.  Lieberman's own polls must show him dead in the water, his feet in concrete,pushing up daisies, an ex-Senator.  Democrats who weren't feeling the anger driving Lamont's supporters are feeling it now, as Lieberman's behavior becomes positively Nixonian. 

The Times article cites the fate of one of the last of the really good Republicans, my own former Senator Clifford Case:

The senator's remarks about a possible independent campaign may reflect a knowledge of history as well as an abundance of caution. He was a member of the Connecticut State Senate in 1978 when Senator Clifford Case, a longtime New Jersey Republican, made a fatal mistake: underestimating an opponent.

Mr. Case paid little attention to Jeffrey Bell, a Ronald Reagan protégé who was much more conservative than the senator. Instead of running hard against Mr. Bell in the primary, the senator looked ahead to the general election against the Democrat Bill Bradley. But Mr. Bell triumphed in the primary, sending Mr. Case into retirement.

The key word here is "retirement" which Senator Case slipped into like the gentleman he always was (unlike his Garden State Senate colleague, extra bonus points--no fair Googling--for readers who recall his name, including nickname, his notable contribution to history, and the name of his press secretary). 

Then there was the case of Case's colleague from New York, Jacob Javits, who after being defeated in the GOP primary by Alphonse D'Amato, ran as a Liberal, took votes away from the Democrat and handed the election to D'Amato.  Six years later, I worked on Mark Green's campaign to beat D'Amato but unfortunately he stayed on to do damage for three whole terms until he was finally beaten by Chuck Schumer.  Now, of course, Schumer is head of the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee, and Chuck, as they say in Brooklyn, dis is what I wanna know.

Do you have a tacit understanding with Lieberman that you won't undermine this Independent talk?  Or are you going to say that you'll support the winner of the Democratic primary?  Isn't that your job?

 

Ralph Reed Ha Ha Ha*Updated*

Sure we could see this coming for months, but it still feels great, doesn't it?  I've been wallowing in Ralph Reed's defeat all day, and I thoroughly recommend it.  Start here and then dig in there. And thanks to C-Span, watch the little creep's concession speech here.

This is just the first political casualty of the every growing Abramoff story.  Imagine what will happen when indictments hit elected officials and

(Roddy Doyle link I couldn't put in the Title here)

Oh there's nothing like the Jack Abramoff scandal to keep us Democrats happy...as Bob Woodward said about Nixon, it's the gift that keeps on giving.  The latest chapter incriminates Ralph Reed, former President of the Christian Coalition and former political consultant who fancied a political career of his own.  I predict his race for Lt. Governor of Georgia in 2006, and presumably President in 2016, will soon collapse under the weight of all this scandal. How long can Ralph hang on?  Place your bets.

In the meantime, let's all revel in "Gimme Five," the riveting new report from John McCain's Indian Affairs Committee hearings detailing how more than $5 million in Indian payments to Ralph Reed were filtered through Abramoff-controlled corporations. The Washington Post beat the Times in getting this quote:

The report cited interviews with Mississippi Choctaw and Louisiana Coushatta tribal representatives. Reed "did not want to be paid directly by a tribe with gaming interests," said Choctaw official Nell Rogers. "It was our understanding that the structure was recommended by Jack Abramoff to accommodate Mr. Reed's political concerns.

It's clear from reading the emails in the Abramoff/Savafian/Reed imbroglio that like so much in politics, at the heart of these scandals are big boys playing with big toys, in this case power and money.  Sometimes they even reveal their inner idiot to the press:

"I want to be invisible. I do guerrilla warfare. I paint my face and travel at night. You don't know it's over until you're in a body bag." --Ralph Reed, Norfolk Virginian-Pilot, November 9, 2024

"It's like guerrilla warfare. If you reveal your location, all it does is allow your opponent to improve his artillery bearings. It's better to move quietly, with stealth, under cover of night. You've got two choices: You can wear cammies and shimmy along on your belly, or you can put on a red coat and stand up for everyone to see. It comes down to whether you want to be the British army in the Revolutionary War or the Viet Cong. History tells us which tactic was more effective."--Ralph Reed Los Angeles Times, 3/22/92

I'm going to enjoy watching the evil boy genius implode.

Note to Reader(s):   You know who you are, Art.  And you too Karen.
Has it really been more than a month since I last posted here?  I plead...alien abduction, yeah, that's the ticket.  Come support one of the reasons I've been busier than usual lately, and check this space again over the weekend. 

Kos Is Wrong About Hillary

Markos Moulitsas, proprietor of the of-course-I'm-jealous Daily Kos, opines in the Washington Post on why Hillary Clinton may be the wrong choice for the Democrats. Of course I'm jealous of his blog (did I mention that?) but let us count the ways he's wrong:

Hillary Clinton has a few problems if she wants to secure the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination. She is a leader who fails to lead. She does not appear "electable." But most of all, Hillary has a Bill Clinton problem. (And no, it's not about that. )

Actually, there's nothing wrong with this paragraph except that I don't agree with it.  But that doesn't mean the writing isn't lively and clear, even if the Clinton joke is kind of, well, obvious.

Moving into 2008, Republicans will be fighting to shake off the legacy of the Bush years: the jobless recovery, the foreign misadventures, the nightmarish fiscal mismanagement, the Katrina mess, unimaginable corruption and an imperial presidency with little regard for the Constitution or the rule of law. Every Democratic contender will be offering change, but activists will be demanding the sort of change that can come only from outside the Beltway.

Hillary Clinton leads her Democratic rivals in the polls and in fundraising. Unfortunately, however, the New York senator is part of a failed Democratic Party establishment -- led by her husband -- that enabled the George W. Bush presidency and the Republican majorities, and all the havoc they have wreaked at home and abroad.

You know, the Establishment is a moving target.  When Jimmy Carter ran for president, his campaign manager was quoted saying if Carter got elected and appointed Establishment figures like Cyrus Vance and Zbigniew Brzezinski he'd quit --Carter did and Hamilton Jordan didn't. Ronald Reagan ran as an outsider and so did George W. Bush. The only people who talk today about a "failed Democratic Party establishment" are embittered Howard Dean fans.

Of course, it's still early. At this point in the last presidential cycle, the first hints of Howard Dean's transformational campaign were barely emerging. In 2002, the Democrats had no clear front-runner, but the conventional wisdom was betting on a handful of insider candidates with money and connections: Sens. Joseph I. Lieberman and John F. Kerry, and Rep. Richard A. Gephardt. These three were supposed to contend. The early polls gave them (especially Lieberman) the inside track to the nomination, and the media gave the rest of the field no more than its usual dismissive coverage.

See what I mean?  Bloggers are about the only ones who still have time for Howard Dean, because he gave them credibility.  And it's disingenuious to say that Lieberman was ever a front-runner: all he ever had in the early polls was name recognition.

But the netroots -- the far-flung collection of grassroots political activists organizing online -- proved to be a different world, one unencumbered by Washington's conventional wisdom. Even as the establishment mocked Dean and his supporters ("like a scene out of the 'Star Wars' cantina," laughed a rival campaign aide), his army of hyper-motivated supporters organized across all 50 states. This movement exploded onto the national scene when Dean began reporting dramatically higher fundraising numbers than his opponents. Had Kerry not lent himself millions to reach the Iowa caucuses, and had Dean not been so green a candidate, Dean probably would have been the nominee.

Clever Kos, gets his plug in for the netroots and reiterates the popular myth that Dean could ever have beaten Kerry in Iowa and New Hamshire.  It wasn't money or the "Dean Scream" that finished his campaign--it was Dean himself.  And Joe Trippi, of course.  And the consultants...

The Gift that Keeps on Giving

Link: More Questions Surface in the Wake of a Congressman's Bribery Case - New York Times.

The Congressional influence-peddling scandal grows juicer by the day. Now the FBI is interviewing call girls who might have ridden in limos with formerr Republican Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham. And as Maureen Dowd observed the other day, in a political climate rife with satirical opportunities, the tale of Duke, Dusty Foggo, poker and prostitutes just can't be ignored. I'm still eagerly waiting for the other shoes to drop in the Abramoff/Safavian/DeLay/Ney scandals, aren't you?

We're Busy Making Plans for Niger*

    Today's Washington Post has a good behind the scenes look at the Marx Brothers farce that the Bush White  House has become.  As other bloggers such as the very informed on this topic David Corn report the internecine developments of in the Blame Plame Game Fame, allow me to extract this nugget from today's coverage.  All of us who have worked as speechwriters can recognize when we're being set up; well, except for Peggy Noonan, and I defer to my colleagues who are far more experienced than I to read between these lines:

But the White House Iraq Group, formed in August 2002 to foster "public education" about Iraq's "grave and gathering danger" to the United States, repeatedly pitched the uranium story. The alleged procurement was a minor issue for most U.S. analysts -- the hard part for Iraq would be enriching uranium, not obtaining the ore, and Niger's controlled market made it an unlikely seller -- but the Niger story proved irresistible to speechwriters. Most nuclear arguments were highly technical, but the public could easily grasp the link between uranium and a bomb.

"Irresistable to speechwriters, eh?"  I'm sure that's just how it worked.  The speechwriter found a reference on page 24 according to the New York Times, and still smarting over losing credit for that "axis of evil" line, the real live version of the terrific parody here slouched into action. Don't blame George Tent, George Bush or Dick Cheney, it's that kid in speechwriting with the Pat Buchanan haircut.

Hey messengers, you're getting blamed --speaking of which --how many hours does Scotty McClellan  have left before he goes home to run his Mommy's campaign?  Wager in the comment section below.  If I could trust you not to send me spam, I'd turn off the registration...

*To deliver on that XTC reference in the title, click here.

The Hammer Gets the Axe*Updated*

Not since the golden era of Watergate have we enjoyed a political scandal so delicious as the current troubles besetting House Republicans. And as the Wall Street Journal reports, there's even a sex angle.  Read all 1,153 news stories about the final fall of Tom DeLay...and remember, you heard it here first.

Originally posted 1-07-06

    I've had it in for Tom DeLay since 1994, when I turned the bug man from Sugar Land's own words against him in a direct mail package I created for Public Citizen.  I had an artist create a landscape of smokestacks and pollution, and quoted DeLay's view that DDT is "not harmful." I alerted fans of Ralph Nader about the forerunner of the K Street Project, a group of businesses, trade associations and PACs he called "Project Relief."
    Now the GOP is relieved of the albatross they used to call The Hammer.  I still maintain the man is dumb as a box of rocks.  If the Republicans are smart they'll decide on a new leadership team and do what Republicans do so well, stage a coronation.  But it will be more fun if they continue to eat their young.

To War with Wal-Mart

As I've said before, I love the smell of P.R. scandals in the morning...
This just in from the New York Times:

March 30, 2024
Wal-Mart Begins Quest for Generals in P.R. War

By MICHAEL BARBARO
Wanted: two people to help defend the nation's largest retailer against critics. Requirements: plenty of experience managing a crisis.

Crisis management is a very specialized kind of PR, but it's what most people think of when they think of public relations.  The Tylenol scandal.  New Coke.  Gary Hart.

Wal-Mart Stores has begun circulating two senior-level job postings — both in public relations — and if the language used to describe the positions is any indication, the giant discount retailer is on the P.R. equivalent of war footing.

Fans of modern journalism can see what's coming. This story is newsworthy if some words (probably written by a drone who''s in big trouble today) are an indication of how the Wal-Mart  heart beats, if it can be said to have a heart.  (Hey guys, why not borrow that slogan from the right to life crowd:  Every conglomerate is a beating heart")  Seems like a rationalization to spin some tension and "color" out of a very thin premise:  a classified ad on the internet.  News editors are increasingly beholden to the  "We're Desparately Losing Readers So Let's Jazz Up Our Coverage" Department.

One job includes "opposition research," presumably into Wal-Mart's major critics: Wal-Mart Watch and Wake Up Wal-Mart. The other requires the ability to "mobilize resources" during a "crisis situation."

Woo-hoo!  They used the words "opposition research" did they?  And "crisis situation" too?  Gosh in my 25 years in politics I've not heard words like that used more than once every fifteen or twenty minutes.  I guess the syllogism is that "oppo" is a negative term and "crisis" is an overheated analogy so therefore Wal-Mart is at war.  Huh?

The two jobs reflect how much life has changed at Wal-Mart, which has come under withering criticism over its wages, health benefits and treatment of workers. The company barely had a public relations department in the early 1990's, but now has a staff of dozens, including a public relations war room full of former political operatives who dispute the assertions of its opponents. T 

 

Quaint Public Relations myth #97b.  Back in the old days Sam Walton didn't have much truck for citified public relations.  He could run his folks business with his folksy ways and pay his folksy as little as possible, and no one would ever challenge him.  Reporters love to speculate how things would be if there were no one to spin them (answer:  they'd have to do a lot more work).

The job postings, which were circulated by Crowe-Innes & Associates, an executive search firm, were given to The New York Times by Wal-Mart Watch, a group backed by unions and foundations that is pressing Wal-Mart to enhance its wages and benefits.

Crowe-Innes, join Eryn Witcher and Rock Creek Creative in the HeadlineUpdate PR Hall of Shame.

According to the posting for the first job, director of media relations, the successful applicant will oversee Wal-Mart's "crisis communications program."

Rather than simply handling phone calls from the press, the employee must be able to help "triage" those calls, managing messages "in rapid response mode." Mona Williams, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman, said the company received hundreds of calls a day from reporters.

"Triage" Now there's an incendiary word.  Listen, I'm enjoying this as much as the next Wal-Mart protester, but really this is just about a few ill chosen words.  Props to Wal-Mart Watch for milking it this far, but really,if I were the boys in Bentonville I'd put out a palliative press release and move on.  When in a hole, stop digging.

And, of course, the employee must be on call "24/7" to assist with "emergency response" within the public relations department.

Of course.  Just like that kid, speaking of non-news stories, who "lived" at a  Wal-Mart during his spring break and despite the best efforts of the NPR reporter to draw any kind of insight from him  had none whatsoever to offer. It was just a dumb thing to do, and it made the news.

The job requires 10 years' experience in corporate communications and "proven media relationships."

The second job is senior director of campaign management, an executive who will oversee all corporate communications support staff and the war room.

This person, like the media relations director, must have 10 years experience in communications, but also a track record "addressing high- profile political activities," according to the posting. Candidates must "operate successfully in a campaign mode."

Another constant theme of this space is the culture of consultants and how people like me can be bad for democracy.  Here, we surely see the result of a consultant telling the company, let's run this like a political campaign.  Exactly like a political campaign.  (And as previously noted here, the Wal-Mart party has a lot more money than the anti Wal-Mart party.

One responsibility of the job is to research opponents — a position usually found in presidential political campaigns.

Right, got that. That's why you're writing this story; they used the word "opposition research" and the editors of the WDLRSLJUOC deparment (see above) thought this would be a good, "edgy" story.

Another is overseeing Wal-Mart's relations with bloggers, many of whom frequently write about the company.

Oh, this story got even better. I love it when they slip in a really vital fact at the very end of a news story.  As a blogger and PR person myself, I want to know more about that "oversight" relationship.  Does that mean they sign the checks?  Make up the phony names?  Register the Potemkin websites?

The executive search firm, Crowe-Innes & Associates, did not respond to phone and e-mail messages.

Bye bye, Crowe, Bye Bye Associates...hello loneliness, I think you're going to cry...

Wal-Mart doesn't like contractors who embarrass them, know what I mean?  Badda bing!

Both of the posted jobs, which would be based at Wal-Mart's headquarters in Bentonville, Ark., offer "competitive base salary, bonus opportunity and stock options" plus an "excellent benefits package," which are not specified.

OK, I'm convinced.  Since no one's reading this blog anyway, I'm going to apply for this job, get it, and then report back from the dark side...Here's a new slogan.  Wal-Mart.  It's better than Baghdad.

Copyright 2006The New York Times Company

      

The Issue is Still Privilege

    Back in 1976, when I was a nascent political junkie growing up in suburban New Jersey, the last great American populist presidential campaign rolled into town. My friend and I drove over to a church in East Orange to hear Fred Harris, the fiery senator from Oklahama.  "The Issue is Privilege" Harris used to say, meaning there where those who thought they were entitled to it and those who where actively denied it.  Harris didn't get a lot of credit at the time, but think how right he was.
    David remembers that afternoon for the lesson in retail politics Senator Harris taught by shaking the hand of everyone in the room.  I remember the guy who introduced Harris, a Texan named Jim Hightower.  It was the first populist speech I ever heard in my life, followed closely by the second. Years later, I had the pleasure of having a drink with Harris, who told me the story I quoted in my Monitor piece here:  "If we can't take their money, drink their liquor, screw their women (I cleaned that up for the Monitor) and then vote against them, we have no business here.")
    I followed Hightower's career as an elected official in Texas, prayed for him to get elected to the Senate (and tried to get his direct mail contract) heard him speak at rallies and marches like the one I wrote about here; and was pleased to meet him again last night.  Hightower spoke at a fundraiser for Jamie Raskin, about whom you'll be hearing much more in the months to come as I'm spending a good deal of time helping his campaign for State Senate in Maryland's District 20.  So much time, that I"ve been neglecting this blog.  During my absence I was pleased to hear from loyal reader the Urban Prisoner, who sent this great link from the creators of that essential internet video "Chickenhawks."

Storm the barricades!

 

Cheney Blasts Hunter, Wounds Bush

    Oh well done, Dick. Who's the big guy now?  I'm sure you've always wanted to know what it was like to shoot something bigger than a quail, you little draft dodger.  You know, you kind of resemble a fat little bird yourself, don't you?  And speaking of your weight, you don't look the kind of heart patient who's improving his diet.  Why is that you refuse to release your cholesterol numbers, anyway?  Remember when Mary Matalin said your "undisclosed location" was the basement of the Palm? That was bad PR, in the next few days there's going to be a lot more of it.  Starting with questions about why the White House sat on this story for 24 hours.  Spin this, Karl.

   

Bonus video:  Watch (or read) Scotty McLellan sweat and squirm  at today's briefing. 

    "Q: But let's just be clear here. The Vice President of the United States accidentally shoots a man and he feels that it's appropriate for a ranch owner who witnessed this to tell the local Corpus Christi newspaper, and not the White House press corps at large, or notify the public in a national way?"

"If You Tell the Truth, You Don't Have to Remember Anything"

Mark Twain said that.  In politics, it's sometimes hard to find folks who understand the value of truth.
Take the campaign of the flying Dutchman of politics, William Weld, as reported in the New York Times story below.

February 4, 2025
Aides Re-edited News Articles on Candidate's Web Site

By PATRICK D. HEALY
As William F. Weld runs for governor of New York this year, his campaign has put a new spin on the old political rule of having a positive message.

I love political stories that start like this: establishing cred by quoting some "old political rule" that really isn't a rule at all, like, say, the importance of getting more votes or in this case, "having a positive (as opposed to negative?) message.  Beware of false prophesies.

Campaign aides have significantly altered two newspaper articles on his Web site about his bid for governor, removing all negative phrases about him, like "mini-slump" and "dogged by an investigation," and passages about his political problems.

You see, this is why you need actual newspapers and real reporters, as opposed to getting all your news from Wikipedia. It takes a journalist to find colorful words like "mini-slump" and "dogged" to put in embarassing public places, like the front pages of newspapers.

Also removed were references to a federal investigation of Decker College, a Kentucky trade school that Mr. Weld led until he left to run for governor last fall; the college collapsed into bankruptcy weeks later amid allegations of financial aid fraud. And criticism of Mr. Weld by a former New York Republican senator, Alfonse D'Amato, was removed.

Unlike much of what I write about here, this is a subject I know quite a bit about.  I've reprinted news articles countless times in the direct mail packages I've created for national, state and local campaigns.  I've highlighted the good parts of a clip, pulled out quotes and of course, made fair use of our friend the ellipses.  But this, as the WASPs say, is just not done.  How rude!

The Weld campaign placed the sanitized articles, still under the reporters' bylines, on its Web site, weldfornewyork.org under the heading "news." Nothing told readers about the changes.

Lively newspaper writing, you can't beat it.  "Sanitized articles."  Then the voice of doom sentence, as ominous as those four notes from Beethoven. "Nothing told readers about the changes." 

But wait, there's more.

It is generally considered inappropriate for a political campaign to alter news articles or photos and then render them as the true content. "It's totally dishonest" said George Arzt, a New York political communications consultant who worked for Eliot Spitzer, now the leading Democratic candidate for governor, in 1998. "I've never heard of such a thing done by a major player in a gubernatorial race."

But a Weld spokesman defended the practice, comparing it to selecting positive blurbs to run in movie advertisements.

"Inappropriate?"  I'll say.  Like a movie blurb?  What do you want to bet that the Weld spokesman speaking here spake before for a commercial, not political boss and will not speak tomorrow? 

      Continue reading the Times article below, and come back later for more truth-avoiding from NASA. 

Newspapers: Tactile or Virtual?

    I had an interesting conversation recently with a New York Times reader who wanted my views, as a Washington insider and part time pundit, on why they were making him pay for Tom Friedman.  Newspapers are scared to death of the Internet, I opined.  "I read him a lot less often now,"  he said. I've heard this a lot lately.  Is Times Select the new New Coke?

    More proof of the fear lurking in the news business is found at Washingtonpost.com, where online versions of Post stories include links to carping bloggers like me.  Word has it the Post did a focus group and asked the coveted younger demographic what it was that kept them from reading newspapers.  It was the way they tended to pile up in the house, they said. News executives are sure they're hearing the voice of doom.  Even Michael Kinsley, perhaps embittered by his recent eviction, says he won't bother getting the real paper in front of his house if it's more than 10 feet away.

    I, on the other hand, love to hold newspapers, turn their pages, serendipitously find stories I wouldn't find by scrolling down a list of headlines.  I used to love to buy the Guardian, even though I could get all the same content on line, and luxuriate in it's over-sized pages, finding news stories that the U.S. press wouldn't discover for a year.  (Notably the one about that little translation error about the virgins in the afterlife on offer to suicide bombers)  But they stopped shipping the real paper to the States a couple of years ago, replacing it with a faxed version that's as reader unfriendly as a utility bill. Now I pay twice as much for a digital version which I read far less often, and always less completely than I used to. I used to at least glance at every page of the paper, now days go by and I don't even look at it.

    A surgical resident in a New York City hospital told me once that the gloves they used were called "New York Times" gloves, because they were designed to protect from the Old Gray Lady's seepage. All those in favo(u)r  of printed newspapers please comment below.

    One more thing.  The inscrutably named Jennifer 8.Lee has a surprisingly wonderful article in the Times about Chinatown life.  Is there still such a thing as the New York Times Style book, and if so, does it say anything about punctuating numbers in surnames?

Is this the end of Gorgeous George?

"Love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal," sang Phil Ochs.  But some liberals make it so hard to love them.  Take that scalawag George Galloway, M.P. from Bethnal Green and Bow and currently cut off from contact with the outside world as a resident of the "Big Brother" house on British reality TV.  According to the Guardian, Galloway may be facing a criminal inquiry based on all the nasty things Norm Coleman said about him. 

HeadlineUpdate reader LeRoy Hartle saw this coming, when he emailed us this picture

View this photo

of Galloway cavorting in a tight red leotard on the Big Brother show.  As much as it pleases the mind to consider, say, Rick Santorum in a similar get-up, it's probably best if American politicians don't start cross-dressing in public.  (Two words:  Dick Cheney)

The Meaning of Messages

    A favorite topic of this space is the way words are turned into messages--persuasive language intended to motivate people to do hard things like giving money or voting.  Today's Washington Post brings an update from the Democrats, who as previously noted here have been lumbering towards cohesiveness with the grace and subtlety of an elephant.  First they're days away from announcing their new campaign theme; than they're not.  First Nancy Pelosi finds a guru she trusts, then he's out.   According to the Post, announcement of the Democrats' latest national agenda has been "pushed back and no hard launch date has been chosen."  I can only imagine how many drafts they've been through and consultants and writers they've fired.

    Words matter.  Years ago, when I was learning the art of political propaganda from a very smart media consultant named Arnold Bennett, he showed me a neat move we used in a Florida Congressional race. In those days, radio and TV spots had to include the spoken words of the campaign "authority line" which was invariably something generic like "Citizens for Trotsky" or "Friends of Bebe Rebozo."  But Arnold saw an additional propaganda opportunity in the authority line, and named the committee "Senior Citizens and Working  Families for George Sheldon." 
     Now, federal candidates have to say "I'm Monty Python, and I approved this message," which takes the fun out of that trick completely.

   

In praise of Gorgeous George **Updated**

He came, he saw, he conquered --then he went back home and made a fool of himself.  British MP George "Gorgeous George" Galloway, who socked it to the Senate last year, is currently locked in the "Big Brother" house on the British reality TV show of that name.  Told to act like an animal, Galloway, according to the Guardian, "got on all fours and pretended to lick milk from the cupped hands of the once-famous television actor Rula Lenska. She rubbed the "cream" from his "whiskers" and stroked his head and behind his ears."

Transcript is at the end of the story linked above, don't miss it, or these pictures.  Looks like George Galloway is more Al Sharpton than Tony Benn.  I guess if I want a leftist hero, I'm going to have to stick with Hugo.

(Originally posted July 2006) No, I'm not talking about the "original showman of professional wrestling."  I refer instead to the newly elected M.P. for Bethnal Green and Bow, George Galloway, who after being kicked out of Tony Blair's Labour Party for being too anti-war, booted the Labour incumbent and came back to Parliament as an Independent.  Listening to him lose his cool on election night was one of the joys of watching BBC coverage on C-Span; his delicious Scottish burr soaring to new heights of invective and lows of bitterness. 

The rest of America got a chance to meet Galloway after Senator Norm (going to get his butt kicked by Al Franken) Coleman charged Galloway with aiding and abetting Saddam Hussein, charges Galloway has already beaten in Britain.  Galloway leapt at the chance to testify in Washington.  He came, he saw, he conquered.  Now, he's cashing in with a U.S. speaking tour where he'll make more money than he ever could have squeezed from Saddam.  As Margaret Thatcher said, "it's a funny old world."

Sometimes politics is great theater.  Sometimes, as Michael Waldman writes in his book/CD of great Presdiential speeches "My Fellow Americans,"  it "gives us the chance to hear for ourselves how,in our best moments, our leaders have challenged our ideas, stirred our hearts, and moved our nation."

Jack Abramoff's Shoe

My favorite story is breaking in all sorts of wonderful ways. While we wait for the shoe to drop, we can speculate and revel in what's to come.  A HeadlineUpdate reader was kind enough to forward this quote:

"Words will not ever be able to express my sorrow and my profound regret for all my actions and mistakes," Abramoff said, addressing the judge. "I hope I can merit forgiveness from the Almighty and those I've wronged or caused to suffer."

More from me later.  Remember, the bottom line on this scandal is how quickly it will grow to include other lobbyists. Does anyone believe that Abramoff was the only one to cosy up to Members of Congress, and their wives?  People who own skyboxes in sports stadiums are quaking in their Versace tonight...

Doug Bandow, Armstrong Williams and me

   Today's papers update two of my favorite long-running stories; the Jack Abramoff follies and the pay for play opinion writers' racket.  Business Week has a scoop which has already led to the resignation of columnist Doug Bandow from the Cato Institute and the suspension of Bandow's column.  Read an excerpt from a Bandow column extolling the virtues of that favorite Abramoff client, the Choctaw Indians.  Apparently Bandow got $1000-$2000 every time he wrote an "opinion" column plugging an Abramoff client. I'm thrilled to read this and not just because I love this scandal so much.

    I've been thinking about marketing my skills as an op-ed writer to clients and now I know what to charge.

R.I.P. Eugene McCarthy

    I was twelve in 1968 and just starting my fanatical obsession with politics.  My parents were for McCarthy, my best friend's family for Kennedy.  I watched every minute of the Chicago convention and saw Mayor Daley say to Abe Ribicoff (readers who caught the "fnord" reference in a previous post will want to see what happened when I googled that) what Dick Cheney would much later say to Patrick Leahy.  The events of 1968 put politics in an urgent spotlight that never faded for me. I read all the books, sang the songs, learned about some new heros. I didn't realize it then, but my political consciousness was kick-started by Eugene McCarthy. 

    I appreciated this obit in the New York Times, and this recollection of McCarthy's wit,though it doesn't include my personal favorite:  "Reporters are like birds on a telephone wire. One flies off, they all fly off. One flies back, they all fly back."

HeadlineUpdateWeekendUpdate

    Apart from the occasional outburst from Dick (what about that heart condition, fatso?) Cheney and that wacko Congresswoman from Cincinnati, actual invective is rarely hurled on Capitol Hill. 
    But across the pond, in the mother of all Parliaments, they show us Yankee cousins how to really play hardball.  Be sure to watch the video on this BBC story about a left-wing M.P.'s "Tory cocaine jibe," and read this or any political sketch by Guardian columnists Simon Hoggart and John O'Farrell.(Breaking news: O'Farrell says this is his last column for the Guardian.  Guess he's fed up with them too...)  (Even more reason why you should read his funny, touching book about coming of age as a left winger during the Thatcher years.)
    Meanwhile, we have the great Kinky Friedman, who summed up the rigors of being Texas governor here and needs your support there.

    A long time ago, for the wise and important media watchdog FAIR, I invented a media bias detector that helped decode the evening news.  Today, I'm passing along a new tool to pry inside the spin machine.  It's called "x-ray the e-mail" and here's how it works.
    If a newsmaker or source's quote is reported to have come from an "email interview or comment" immediately put down your newspaper and find an alternative view.  As this article from the American Journalism Review should point out even more firmly, allowing sources to answer interview questions via e-mail opens the door to more spin and packaged news.

"Mike Foley, a former executive editor of the St. Petersburg Times who now teaches at the University of Florida's College of Journalism and Mass Communications, says he is constantly fighting students on the e-mail issue. When they rely too heavily on e-mails in their assignments, "I jump up and down and scream at them not to use it," he says.
To Foley, dependence on e-mail is the ultimate sign of laziness. "There's something to be said for the old-fashioned shoe-leather reporting. E-mail requires no shoe leather... It's easy, like quoting from a press release, and then your stories are sterile and boring, neither of which compels me to read them."
Unreliability is the drawback that he most fervently drives home to his students. "You don't know who you're talking to," he says. "It could be the CEO, the public relations VP, the secretary, a clerk — it could be the janitor who just happened to be in there cleaning up."

Holy Astroturf! *Updated*

As I shamefully boast below, my most widely reprinted column was my op-ed for the Christian Science Monitor about phony grassroots, or "astroturf" letters to the editor.  If you follow my logic on the links below, you'll see that when it comes to ghostwriting, propaganda and public relations, sometimes I'm for it, sometimes I'm agin it.  But even I was gobsmacked (as Guardian readers might say) to read this, from the Guardian by way of the L.A. Times.  Now, your tax dollars are at work paying for phony news stories that Iraqi middlemen pay to play in the press.  Stop the spin machine.  I want to get off!

More on this story from the NY Times, the Washington Post and Romanesko. (Can you see Scott McLellan squirm?  Squirm, Scott, Squirm)

Watch this story blow up over the next few days as government officials express shock, shock, that they paid to place news articles in Iraqi papers.  Wasn't it easier when the CIA just paid U.S. journalists directly ?

Originally posted 9 July 2005  On Thursday, The New York Times printed an op-ed by Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, archbishop of Vienna called "Finding Design in Nature," in which he wrote: 

"Evolution in the sense of common ancestry might be true, but evolution in the neo-Darwinian sense--an unguided, unplanned process of random variation and natural selection--is not."

Then, Saturday's Times contained a page one article on reaction to the Cardinal's views and the links between the Cardinal and the Discovery Institute in Seattle, which promotes the theory of "intelligent design."  Read the article in full for yourself, and prepare for the coming storm over evolution.

Book your seats now for the next monkey trial on TV. 

But while we wait, consider this nugget dropped in the eleventh graf of the Times story, after the jump to page A11: 

"The cardinal's essay...was submitted to The Times by a Virginia public relations firm, Creative Response Concepts, which also represents the Discovery Institute."

Holy Astroturf, Benedict!

Is it shocking that the Church has the same PR acumen as, say, the tobacco industry ( I just like mentioning them whenever this blog needs a villain)?

The Creative Response Concepts website describes the services it performed for Cardinal Chris thusly:   
Opinion editorials and letters to the editor enable the author
to comment directly on important news of the day. They provide an
unfiltered opportunity to reach readers. Op-Eds enable you to reach
opinion leaders and help you shape the terms of debate on issues of
concern to you, your industry or your constituency.
 
My most widely reprinted column (thank you, Google) was about the retailing of one of the last homes to honest discourse in the daily paper.  It was even reprinted in a media textbook that included the words "like Malcom Gladwell" in its bio of me.  OK, they were referring to a fact only slightly more distinguishing that we both breathe oxygen but still...

Is the answer really more truth in labeling?  Should The Times note which  columns are submitted by professional interests? 

I'm not sure that's a good idea.  As a professional writer, I appreciate professional writing, and if a public figure signs an op-ed I actually enjoy reading, I consider the ghostwriter a good investment. 

But I bet the Times' ombudspeople are busy as bees tonight...

Turning Safavian

    As noted before in this space, one of the ways journalism has changed in recent years is the shifting of the most important information from the beginning of a story to the very end.  This update on the ever-expanding Jack Abramoff scandal waits until the very last two grafs to make an important, if indirect point.
    First, credit where credit's due:  there's lots and lots of solid reporting and juicy tidbits here, including how Abramoff put wives of GOP bigwigs (including Tom DeLay!  Yea!) on monthly retainers to do things like answer phone calls for a fundraiser that ended up cancelled, and in Mrs. DeLay's case, determining the favorite charity of every member of Congress.  (Can you say, "busy work?")
    The article also makes clear that "plea deals have become more likely" as Justice Department investigators enter a "highly active" phase in their investigation of "at least half a dozen members of Congress." 
    So it was with great interest that I read between the lines of these two last grafs:

The Justice Department investigation is also looking into Abramoff's influence among executive branch officials. Sources said prosecutors are continuing to seek information about Abramoff's dealings with then-Deputy Interior Secretary J. Steven Griles, including a job offer from the lobbyist at a time when he was seeking department actions on behalf of his tribal clients.

The former top procurement official in the Bush administration, David H. Safavian, has already been charged with lying and obstruction of justice in connection with the Abramoff investigation. Safavian, who traveled to Scotland with Ney on a golf outing arranged by Abramoff, is accused of concealing from federal investigators that Abramoff was seeking to do business with the General Services Administration at the time of the golf trip. Safavian was then GSA chief of staff.

    What does David Safavian know, and who in the White House does he know it about?  Can you see the invisible words after the first sentence in the second graf?  The full sentence should read:

The former top procurement official in the Bush administration, David H. Safavian, has already been charged with lying and obstruction of justice in connection with the Abramoff investigation and is currently cooperating with prosecutors.

Buy Citgo (You Go, Hugo!)

    Did you know that the government of Venezuela owns the Citgo oil company?  According to this article in the Washington Post, they gained control of the company that began as Cities Service in 1990.
     That sign in Fenway?  Hugo's.  Now, Hugo Chavez is sending discounted heating oil to the U.S. and donating gasoline to the Gulf Coast. The Post says that several Citgo refineries are in operation in the U.S., and "about 14,000 independently owned gas stations carry the company's name." 
    So if want to spend your petro dollars on leftists, not Texans, now you know where to go.

   

    Happy Thanksgiving...more from me after the holiday...

Sunday Brunch

    The tastiest news today is surely the continuing saga of Jack Abramoff, Michael Scanlon, "Lawmaker A," Grover Norquist...like Bob Woodward said about Nixon, this is truly the gift that keeps on giving.

    This could build the tidal wave that sweeps Republicans out of power.   Crucial grafs from today's Times story:

Scholars who specialize in the history and operations of Congress say that given the brazenness of Mr. Abramoff's lobbying efforts, as measured by the huge fees he charged clients and the extravagant gifts he showered on friends on Capitol Hill, almost all of them Republicans, the investigation could end up costing several lawmakers their careers, if not their freedom.
The investigation threatens to ensnarl many outside Congress as well, including Interior Department officials and others in the Bush administration who were courted by Mr. Abramoff on behalf of the Indian tribe casinos that were his most lucrative clients.
The inquiry has already reached into the White House; a White House budget official, David H. Safavian, resigned only days before his arrest in September on charges of lying to investigators about his business ties to Mr. Abramoff, a former lobbying partner.

"I think this has the potential to be the biggest scandal in Congress in over a century," said Thomas E. Mann, a Congressional specialist at the Brookings Institution. "I've been around Washington for 35 years, watching Congress, and I've never seen anything approaching Abramoff for cynicism and chutzpah in proposing quid pro quos to members of Congress."

    I'm sure one or two Democrats will be found to have taken Abramoff's money, but six months from now voters will have a new meaning for G.O.P. -- Get Out Pronto.  Earlier campaigns to "Clean Up Congress" used a broom as a graphic symbol --this next one will require a vacuum cleaner.

 

    Moving on from stories of political mortality to real death--no, this won't be about Iraq--check out this fascinating obituary from today's NY Times.  One of the reasons we need newspapers is for stories like this --nobody online has the kind of obituary file the Times famously built.

Woodward, We Hardly Knew Ye

    Thanks to reader Bill Kalish for passing on this blogger's take on Bob Woodward's "oops!" moment.  Good background on the story can be found in the Times and the Post today, stating the obvious that Mr. Woodward has come a long way from the seat-of-the-pants journalism he practiced during Watergate.   Now he posts transcripts of taped interviews with top sources on government websites.

    Once upon a time, the very use of tape recorders was considered suspect; the machine was said to add an unnatural external element to the interview, obstructing natural conversation and leading people to "talk to the tape."  Now "star reporters" submit 18 pages of questions in advance, show up with a tape recorder, and consider that "investigative journalism."

    The great Truman Capote not only refused to use tape recorders; he'd often not even bring a pencil.  He told George Plimpton about this in a 1966 interview:

You never used a tape-recorder?

Twelve years ago I began to train myself, for the purpose of this sort of book, to transcribe conversation without using a tape-recorder. I did it by having a friend read passages from a book, and then later I'd write them down to see how close I could come to the original. I had a natural facility for it, but after doing these exercises for a year and a half, for a couple of hours a day, I could get within 95 percent of absolute accuracy, which is as close as you need. I felt it was essential. Even note-taking artificializes the atmosphere of an interview, or a scene-in- progress; it interferes with the communication between author and subject--the latter is usually self-conscious or an untrusting wariness is induced. Certainly, a tape-recorder does so. Not long ago, a French literary critic turned up with a tape-recorder. I don't like them, as I say, but I agreed to its use. In the middle of the interview it broke down. The French literary critic was desperately unhappy. He didn't know what to do. I said, "Well, let's just go on as if nothing had happened." He said, "It's not the same. I'm not accustomed to listen to what you're saying."

F*!@ the South???

    This is a family website, and I don't want to get in even more naughty search engines than I am already (thanks to the headlines of this post and also this one) so I won't repeat what one Democratic strategist told me years ago.* But Tim Kaine's victory in Virginia, and the lessons from Loudon County, force me to reassess my views, and you know how painful that can be. 

    Like Tim Noah, I read with interest an article in the Washington Post during the 2004 campaign by political scientist Thomas Schaller that reinforced this view.  But now I'm not so sure.

    If you were following the Virginia Governor's race,you heard a lot about Jerry Kilgore's ads attacking Kaine for being against the death penalty.  Did those ads turn people off from Kilgore?  Yes.  Did they make the critical difference in the election?  No.  The ads that I think really sold Kaine to voters were the ones showing Kaine behind the wheel of his car, talking about transportation and suburban sprawl. 

    These are natural issues for Democrats, as they tie into rebuilding infrastructure which means jobs.  Kaine's ads were startling in part because you never see a politician driving himself, and effective because like all good propaganda, they hit people where they live.  Right on, Tim.  Maybe you're showing us how we can win in the South.   Holy #$@!

   *But it's of course the same language the great Steve Earle uses in the song of freedom and democracy I compare to "This Land is Your Land"

When Presidents and Trustees Fight: Bad Behavior Behind the Ivy Walls*Updated Again*

Today's Washington Post updates the story at American University, and includes quotes from trustee David Carmen, who comments on my original post below.   I'm in agreement with him that AU could emerge from this as a national model for good governance; I know from personal experience that governance issues occupy a great deal of a Board's time. 

Goddard College went through a turbulent patch or two, too, and like the Trustees of AU, the Goddard Board had one of their meetings interrupted by angry students.  But as  H.L. Mencken said, "The cure of the evils of democracy is more democracy."  Goddard's Board re-emphasized it's commitment to transparency and inclusiveness, and it sounds like the AU Board is doing likewise.

What's truly shocking about the fracas at AU is how it split the Board into factions, and how a rump group of trustees formed an ad hoc committee behind the rest of the Board's back.  As the Post reported earlier:

Opposition to the executive committee, led by then-board Chairman Leslie E. Bains, grew to the point that 13 trustees banded together, calling themselves the ad hoc committee, and hired an attorney.

Hey, I'm on my Board's  Executive Committee and no one is meeting beind my back...at least I don't think they are...

Actually the elephant in the room is called Sarbanes-Oxley --seems like some AU trustees were worried they'd be held personally liable for the Ladner spending spree...

(Originally posted October 9) "There's a lot of politics in politics," my girlfriend said when I was fired from a presidential campaign.  She could just have easily been speaking of campus politics.

The scandals surrounding Ben Ladner and his performance as American University's president are different than the scandals surrounding Ladner's predecessor but similar enough to other hubris-fueled spending sprees/power grabs. 

If you read between the lines of the reporting on this story, you can perceive a Board of Trustees riven by factionalism, secret deals and mistrust.  Power corrupts, even in ivory towers.  Too bad.

I'm on the Board of Trustees of Goddard College, a school known more for Phish than phoul (though there's plenty of good vegetarian food in the area).  Once or twice, our Board has made news, but mainly we concern ourselves with oversight, serious leadership issues, and how to get better food at Board meetings. 

American University is in for some tough times.  Ladner will go, the accusations will linger, the school will be damaged.  Message to AU's Board:  Take immediate steps to reassure the faculty and students, apologize and make necessary changes.  Ben Ladner's the bad guy now --if you're not careful, you're next.

Weekend Update--This dispatch from the Day After --following the fall of Ladner, the purging of the Board, why it's all, as one expert quoted here says, "very unusual" for Boards to take potshots at each other.  Note the heroic efforts being made by a reader of this very post.  And if any readers are themselves members of a Board of Trustees, circulate this story to your colleagues and count your blessings...

Inside Baseball or Dizzy Dean's Revenge

    Yes, sports fans, I'm using a sports metaphor, which as you may know is most unusual for your bookish blogmeister...

    But in the car just now I was listening to Tavis Smiley, who was interviewing Howard Dean.  Smiley said, "I know this is inside baseball, but there are reports the Democrats are looking for a slogan and are choosing between 'Together, We Can Do Better' and 'Together, America Can Do Better.''  Is this true?"

    Foolishly, Dean told the truth and said it was, and that he preferered the version with "America." I had  read the same story and was incredulous that such a conversation was being held in public.  I can imagine the conversation among consultants and politicos, having been in many similar rooms.

    Consultant:  We have to use the word "America."  It tests off the charts in focus groups.

    Politician:  I always like to say "together," people really respond to that.

    Politician's aide:  It's a positive message.

    Consultant: The whole message is positive, whether we say we, you, your family or your country.

    Second Consultant:  That's what's wrong with it.

    Politician:  Not that again.  I told you, voters want a positive message. They're tired of old fashioned politics.

    Second Consultant:  Don't be so sure. Old fashioned politics is what elected you.  Besides you can be negative and positive at the same time. Look at Britain.  In 1997, Tony  Blair's slogan was "Because Britain Deserves Better."  That word 'deserves' makes all the difference.  Why does Britain deserve better? Who's responsible for Britain not being as good as it should be?  See what one word can do?"

    Politician: What do the rest of you think about that.  How about "Because America Deserves Better?"

    First Consultant:  We can test it.  We can add it to the DNC tracking poll tonight and see what happens.

    Second Consultant:  You can't test it.   You can't use it.  You'll get the Joe Biden treatment.

    Politician:  I'm not going back to the drawing board.  We've spent a half million dollars on focus groups getting this far.  Let's flip a coin.  Heads it's "America" and tails it's "We"  Who's calling it?

STAY TUNED FOR THE EXCITING CONCLUSION OF "A PARTY SEARCHES FOR A SLOGAN

Oh Harriet, Poor Harriet

The Scene:  An Oval Office
George:  Well that worked out real well.
Laura:  Now, Bush, you know it was just as much your idea as mine.
George:  Seemed like the right thing to do.  It's what Dad always did.  Appoint the family lawyer.
Laura:  I thought you were ticked off at Baker?
George:  Well yeah, he forgets he's not the President sometimes, but he's still reliable.
Laura:   Like Harriet.
George:  And Al.  One saved my butt in Texas, the other in Maine.
Laura:  You can't put  Al on the Court, I've told you this already.
George:  I know.  Maybe Jeb can.
Laura (sotto voce):  Or me...
George:  What?
Laura:  I said, we'll see.  Now let's wrap this up, the West Wing is almost on.
George:  I wish you'd get over that Martin Sheen thing.  It's embarrassing.
Laura:  Now hush.  I like Alan Alda too.  Listen, who will the Senators approve easiest?
George:  I don't know, Karl, I mean, somebody is working on it.
Laura:  Forget that, listen to me.  You want to make a Senator happy, appoint a Senator.
George:  I like that.  Who? I'm not going to appoint Specter if that's what you're thinking.
Laura:  No, not Pennsylvania.  Think closer to home.  Think Texas.
George: Kay Bailey?  She wants to run for Governor, that's a great idea, wait till I tell Rick.
Laura:  No.  Not Kay Bailey.  The other one.  The one who's on the Judiciary Committee.  The one who's been an Attorney General and a judge.
George:  Cornyn, huh.  John Cornyn.  Good hair, good man.
(Picks up the phone)
Andy, cancel tomorrow's meetings, I've worked out the Court nominee.  No listen, you'll love this.
Yes, I know that's what I said last time...Hey I was kidding when I said I wanted to appoint my CPA to the Fed!  No, this wasn't Laura's idea...

Who'll be Indicted? *Updated*

Wrong again, it seems.  Last night's hopeful prediction we'd be glued to the tube by now was off.  The AP says the grand jury has adjourned for the day, and that the judge could extend its life beyond Friday at Fitzgerald's request.  The fact that investigators were still conducting interviews today indicates that the report isn't quite at the printer.  For more on who knew what about Valerie, read this very interesting column by Cliff May.  Did you tell Fitzgerald what you just told us?

I don't mind waiting another day or two.  The anticipation is sweet.  I haven't felt this enthralled since Watergate...

(Posted 10/26)Fitzgerald meets with the grand jury on Wednesday and Friday.  Will Fitzgerald wait till Friday, or will the hammer fall tomorrow?

I'm betting on indictments of Libbey and Rove, and praying for an "unindicted co-conspirator" rap for Cheney.

Tune in for the perp walk tomorrow...reminds me of what my friend said when I asked his advice on being a spin doctor for Michael Milken...

When It Says Libby Libby Libby...*Updated*

    Until recently, when I heard the word "Libby" I thought of canned food and an old advertising jingle.  Now I, along with the rest of DC am salivating over Scooter (also agog about Abramoff, delighting in DeLay and mired in Miers).  As we wait for indictments (Libby and Rove?  One and not the other?  How about Cheney?) and enjoy the Sunday papers (unless your name is Judith Miller, in which case you probably should spend the day at the movies), we wonder what scandal is coming next.  I predict it will be connected to what in this story GOP lobbyist Charles Black called the "lingering nuisance" named Jack Abramoff. 

    Oh, and speaking of the most qualified person in the country to be nominated to the Supreme Court, here's some hitherto undiscovered evidence of Miers' intellectual heft.   A year ago, then Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Miers participated in the "Ask the White House" forum on the official White House web page.  She was tasked to answer important questions like this:

Sam -- Thanks for your strong support in Miami Beach!

I hope this doesn't disappoint you too much, but I understand that the real Camp David was not used to film episodes of the West Wing. Camp David is a beautiful, serene place. It provides a perfect backdrop for the President to meet with and entertain foreign and other visitors. It is a real asset for the United States Government.

Recent reports that President Bush is spending a lot of time watching West Wing reruns suggest he thinks the show is a documentary too.

...This Just In....(with thanks to Taegan Goddard's Political Wire)...............
UPI reports that Fitzgerald's investigation includes the forgery of the stories about uranium in Niger

NATO sources have confirmed to United Press International that Fitzgerald's team of investigators has sought and obtained documentation on the forgeries from the Italian government.

Fitzgerald's team has been given the full, and as yet unpublished report of the Italian parliamentary inquiry into the affair, which started when an Italian journalist obtained documents that appeared to show officials of the government of Niger helping to supply the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein with Yellowcake uranium. This claim, which made its way into President Bush's State of the Union address in January, 2003, was based on falsified documents from Niger and was later withdrawn by the White House.

This opens the door to what has always been the most serious implication of the CIA leak case, that the Bush administration could face a brutally damaging and public inquiry into the case for war against Iraq being false or artificially exaggerated. This was the same charge that imperiled the government of Bush's closest ally, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, after a BBC Radio program claimed Blair's aides has "sexed up" the evidence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

Ooops!

I was wrong about the Supreme Court nominee.  Now I understand why Laura Bush was dropping all those hints.  They hired the family lawyer again.  James Baker, Alberto Gonzalez, Harriet Miers --they all toiled to hush up family scandals and fulfill the Bush family's manifest destiny. 

Fun fact: Harriet Miers was the person who first introduced George W. Bush and Alberto Gonzales.

Dumb DeLay Dum*Updated*

This one I got right.  Today's indictment of TomDeLay was foretold in this space back in April.  We may not be able to stop the war, but at least an organized and determined opposition managed to get the House to take back their corrupt rule which would have allowed Tom DeLay to keep his post after indictment.

Originally posted 4/10/05  More distractions than usual and melted computers keep me from dissecting a lengthy news article today, but here's the truth about Tom DeLay: He's just not that smart.  If you go back and study his role in the abortive coup (before the successful coup) against Speaker Newt Gingrich, you'll see how the former flyswatter from Sugar Land just got caught in the middle and didn't know what to do.  He got a good rep with this colleagues for bringing in Texas barbecue on Thursday nights.  Who can resist the power of good barbecue?  Why it's enough to make a yellow dog turn red.

Of course, being dumb is no impediment to success in politics, as we all know.  Does anyone but me remember watching the 1988 primary debate in which Michael Dukakis said, "if we can't beat George Bush, we should find another country?"  Ha ha, big joke. 

But now I'll go out on another limb and join those who see the writing on the wall for Tom DeLay.  He'll be indicted, or all those pesticides he used to spew will turn him into a cockroach.

Going out on a Limb, V.2

Since my last wild prediction has fizzled into nothingness (althought technically it still could happen), just like the one before and the one before that, it's amazing I would ever prognosticate again.

But hey, what are blogs for:

I predict Bush picks Larry Thompson for the Court.  He's got the right credentials, the right amount of proven loyalty and is a diversity pick from W.'s favorite place, his inner circle.  (Where people think Condi Rice and Karen Hughes are actually smart...)

If I'm right, tell them you heard it here first.  If I'm wrong, come back and watch me eat crow.  (No it won't be a streaming video...)

This is Funny

Badmash has a short comedy film about the "genius" behind Bush's Bushisms.  It's hilarious, and worth sending to your friends. I understand it stars someone known in Hollywood as "omnisexual menace Andy Dick."

Live (sort of) from New York! It's the Democratic Party!

I went to a fascinating conference yesterday on politics and the internet, and one of the discussions was about how newspapers are using the Web.  Although our speaker was from Washingtonpost.com, his remarks could have been titled "The Times, they are a Changing"....ouch! sorry...but what's the deal with this new Times Select?  Remember when we thought that "information wants to be free?  Not at today''s Times, I guess.

The first blow from W.43rd Street to news junkies like me in D.C. was when they decided to stop sending the New York City editions of the Times to  Washington.  The Sulzbergers decreed that Washingtonians needed local TV listings more than the NYC news a lot of former New Yorkers and New Yorker wannabes counted on from the Times.  I had to go online to find this account of the latest from the NYC mayoral election.

September 22, 2024
Ferrer Campaigns With Green and Criticizes Bloomberg
By PATRICK D. HEALY and THOMAS J. LUECK

Hello Mark! I've been wondering when Mark Green (disclosure:  I've worked on his campaigns) would make an entrance in the 2005 mayoral race.  The Times could have written one of those "Former Rivals in bittersweet embrace" headlines but chose to play it cool.  Besides, now that the paper has it's must-miss gossip column "Boldface Names" that headline is saved for news from J-Lo or Gwyneth)

Fernando Ferrer, the Democratic nominee for mayor, campaigned for the first time yesterday with his former political archnemesis, Mark Green, while also unveiling his first television commercials against his new rival, Michael R. Bloomberg, one of which suggested that the Republican mayor had failed to tackle poverty in the city.

Archnemesis ---ooo, scary.  I guess they couldn't fit that into the headline so they used it in the lede.  But all in all so far this story is handing the Ferrer campaign the mike and letting them say their piece about Mike Bloomberg.  They'll beat up on Freddy again, but for now the press had decided that after being reborn by his primary win he's got hybrid vigor.

Bush Family Quote of the Week

Leave it to Barbara Bush, the meanest one (read halfway down that article, for Bush's great line about his mother's cooking:  "the woman had frostbite on her fingers...") in the family, to lay it out on the line: 

In a segment at the top of the show on the surge of
evacuees to the Texas city, Barbara Bush said: "Almost
everyone I’ve talked to says we're going to move to
Houston."

Then she added: "What I’m hearing which is sort of
scary is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is
so overwhelmed by the hospitality.

"And so many of the people in the arena here, you
know, were underprivileged anyway, so this--this (she
chuckles slightly) is working very well for them."

Remember when her husband showed a picture of his grandkids to President Reagan, not knowing the mikes were catching his comment, "That's Jebby's kids from Florida, the little brown ones."

Woody Guthrie got this one right a long time ago.

10,000 Dead?

The Guardian says it, quoting an educated guess from Senator David Vitter. The U.S. press is still too skittish.  But today's New York Times does have this heartbreaking story that includes a great question from Ted Koppel to the head of FEMA: "Don't you guys watch television?"

One horrorshow we've all been watching over the years is the genre known as the disaster movie.  The poor people of New Orleans found themselves living in one this week.  Is it really a surprise that powderkegs explode?   W.B. Yeats was right...

I wrote the other day that Katrina's toll might exceed 9/11 -- it's sure to now.  Maybe it will take that attack's place as our most vivid national nightmare.  The trauma is only going to get worse, but Bush still doesn't get it (see below).

In the meantime, I'm staying tuned to NPR.  Their coverage has been gripping, like this report by Anne Hawke and this commentary by Leon Wynter. 

And I wouldn't be surprised if Mr. Wynter also read, as I did, this wondrous excursion into the mind of the great Hank Jones.
I'm grateful to Ben Ratliff for providing a needed breather from the news. 

Bush Can Count

"In a time of crisis, for all our cynicism, we look to the president for inspiration, information, and direction...in our best moments, our leaders have challenged our ideas, stirred our hearts, and moved our nation." 

                      Michael Waldman, My Fellow Americans

"The Department of Transportation has provided more than 400 trucks to move 1,000 truckloads containing 5.4 million meals ready to eat, or MREs; 13.4 million liters of water; 10,400 tarps; 3.4 million pounds of ice; 144 generators; 20 containers of prepositions disaster supplies; 135,000 blankets and 11,000 cots. And we're just starting.  There are more than 78,000 people now in shelters."                  

George W. Bush, 8/31/05

The death toll and devastation from Katrina (and what band is wishing it had a different name today?)  may well exceed 9/11.  This is a time for big thoughts and meaningful words.  All George Bush knows how to do is read lists.

More soon...and note to readers (all three of you):  Summer's Over.  Watch this space for daily updates.  Bug me if I fail to produce.  I read in the New York Times (so it must be true) that in the internet, everyone will be famous for fifteen people.  I'm working hard to interest mine.

Naral Crumples, Democrats Dither**Updated**

Gather round, politics fans, for this is a classic story of how things go wrong in the high-stakes world of propaganda. 

As everyone knows by now, Naral Pro-Choice America was first out of the box with an anti-Judge Roberts commercial.  It was hard hitting and only "fair" by the standards of political advertising, where guilt by insinuation is part of the frame.  Conservatives protested, bloggers bleated, moderate Democrats and Arlen Specter caviled, (and Carville carvilled) and Naral withdrew the ad.

The result is that Naral looks weak (check out the photo in today's Washington Post story), the Democrats are back on the defensive, and the real culprit is so far off the hook.

Who's that?  Who hasn't been mentioned in any of the news stories?  Whose name hasn't been leaked by Naral staffers eager to spread the blame for greenlighting an ad they couldn't defend?  Who, even now, has Naral by the, uh, reproductive organs as they scramble to put together a replacement ad?

If this were a political campaign,by now we'd have read sniping by insiders about the media consultant who thought up this ad, and quotes from other consultants who smelled potential new business. 

In politics, when the going gets tough, the tough blame their consultants.  Come on, Naral, play hardball.

**Update**
Not good enough.  Naral's communications director seems to be trying to take the bullet, but it won't work.  Watch for the new improved Naral ad to fizzle too, and then watch Naral hire a new consultant. 

Push the (NY) Primary Up!

What the Gray Lady gives on one day, she takes away the next.

Yesterday, the New York Times ran a story that quoted Democratic operative Howard Wolfson taking to task Democratic donors who have been making campaign contributions to plutocrat Michael Bloomberg.  This contributed to the general impression in news coverage that Bloomberg will easily win re-election.

Today, the Times flips to the other perspective, and offers a headline with an extra dose of hype:  "Big Bloomberg Concern: United Democratic Party," which includes the view that  Fernando Ferrer "could win the Democratic primary outright, giving the party a nominee unbloodied by a divisive runoff and signnificantly enhancing the chances for a Democratic victory in November."

News media always want to make news more exciting, whether it's reporting on the "horse race" aspect of elections or, in the case of the New York Post, running a story about the "runaway bride" every day for three months.

This year's race for Mayor has been a yawner since the start, with occasional media reports of gaffes and mishaps.  Although I've been wrong (except here, where I was right) about New York politics in the past, it sure looks as if Bloomberg put away this race early with his money, and also by exceeding expectations and governing the city in a way that appeals to many Democrats.

The increasingly factional --and occasionaly feudal--nature of New York City politics makes it more difficult for Democrats to unite the electorate.  In the equation of "Us vs.Them," everyone loses.

Even more reason, then, for New Yorkers to change the state's brutal election calendar, with a September primary followed by a runoff if no one gets 40% of the vote. 

In 1986, Mark Green stunned the establishment by winning the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate against a millionaire who massively outspent him. If the primary had been in May rather than September, Green could have fundraised and organized enough to beat Al D'Amato.  (Noted with vested interest:  I worked on that race and on succeeding Green campaigns and projects, although none in this century.)  (And I'm not above giving Mark's campaign for NY Attorney General a plug, either).

In 2001, Green and Ferrer competed in a runoff election that was held on, yes, September 11.  That election was cancelled, rescheduled, Green won, the city was in chaos, Guiliani embraced Bloomberg, Bloomberg spent $74 million, Green, again, had little time to fundraise and organize, and now the Democrats in New York are heading for their fourth straight loss of the Mayoral race.

I've proposed simple solutions to complex problems in the past, so here's another:  push the primary up. Of course, the Republican state legislature is hardly inclined to do Democrats any favors, but let's at least get this subject on the agenda. 

 

You Can Scare Me, I'm Sticking with the Union

These are sad days for the house of labor.  As the New York Times and the Washington Post update the story, the long-simmering fratricide at the AFL-CIO is almost complete. 

When I first got to Washington, when I met with union officials I was struck by how much they resembled the stereotype --cigar-smoking men with no necks and lots of jewelry.  Dose guys are gone, mostly. I think some of the best people in politics work for unions, and their talent is needed more than ever as elected officials and corporate powers target working families.

The question must be asked, as the fight comes down to one man's determination to stay in office:

John Sweeney, why don't you go?  You have been a good leader but if your departure can keep this from happening, then go.  (P.S. to Andy Stern:  if you target Wal-mart, you have to beat Wal-mart, and they would spend $50 million before breakfast to stop you).

I Felt It Was Felt *Breaking News Update*

My lifelong obsession (click here) with Richard Nixon has paid off. 
You heard it here first.  I thought I remembered reading the first mention of Mark Felt being Deep Throat in J. Anthony Lukas' 1976 book about Watergate, Nightmare

but I hadn't checked the reference until recently.  There it is, in the index:

Felt, W. Mark, Jr. as "Deep Throat," 273; and FBI investigation of break-in, 230-31; and Sullivan demotion, 285

Go to page 273 of this groundbreaking and essential book and you find:
Woodward had one supersource whom he called "Deep Throat" and met in drafty parking garages (and whom many believe to have been W. Mark Felt, Jr., then deputy associate director of the FBI).

So credit where credit is due -- all hail the late, great reporter and writer Tony Lukas!

Below is my post from earlier this month:

As Tim Noah writes in Slate, the news that former FBI official Mark Felt(and not Fred Fielding) was Watergate source Deep Throat comes as no great surprise. While it's a shame that this revelation will bring to a close all the wacky speculation about his identity, it's satisfying to join Nora Ephron in saying, "I told you so."

It was the flowerpot that tipped us off.  Woodward wrote in All the President's Men that when he wanted to meet with his "friend" he would move a flower pot on his apartment balcony.  So whoever Deep Throat was, he had to know surveillance tradecraft. 

Then there were the hints dropped by Ben Bradlee. In 1975, a college teacher of mine took our political science class to Washington, where we met Bradlee in his office at the Washington Post.  When we asked him about Deep Throat, he told us if you could put into a computer the schedules of everyone who was mentioned as possibly being DT, and cross indexed it with the dates of Woodward's meetings, the mystery would be solved.  So that meant it had to be an official whose schedule would be more or less part of the public record.

For those who, like me, are still wallowing in Watergate, links here, here, and here can keep you busy until Woodward's next book comes out.

War-gate

Reader S.A. Colvin in Portland, OR writes:

Ample evidence has been uncovered to impeach Bush.  For me, the Downing Street memo confirms what I've known all along, the problem is, everyone knows. But now the evidence can't be ignored.  I watched John Conyers' hearing and heard many dedicated Congresswomen delve further into timelines that don't connect with the White House's version of events. This isn't about Republican or Democrat it is about the Office of the President and its credibility. So I figure the only way to get the media involved is to give them a slogan.  I'm suggesting this one:

War-gate.

Love it. And not just for the obvious connecton with My Favorite Scandal.

War-gate.  Pass it on.

Yes, Virginia Will be the First State to Honor Tibet

Yes, Virginia will be the first place in the world to issue “Friends of Tibet” license plates.  But it’s up to traveling monks, Virginia schoolchildren and Tibetan exiles to make it happen.  If you live in Virginia or know someone who does, please pass this on.

Bernie Bernie Bernie ** 2nd Update**

Political Wire has an item about some hesitation by Democrats about whether to endorse Bernie Sanders' candidacy for Senate.  There's no way the Democrats can field a credible candidate against the longtime Independent.  Calling Doctor Dean!  Would Terry McAuliffe have let this situation simmer so long? Appoint Bill Clinton as your special envoy to Vermont and have him work this out. 

OK, so when I first posted this I wasn't alone in the blogosphere predicting that Bernie Sanders would run for Jeffords' seat --but he still hasn't announced, leaked or hinted that he'll run on both ballots.  I'm sure he and Doctor Dean are downing a lot of spaghetti with vodka sauce at Boves hashing this one out.

*****Warning*****  The following punditry is Misinformed and Wrong!

The news today that Senator Jeffords won't run for re-election invites me to go out on another limb.

I predict that Bernie Sanders runs for Senate as both a Democrat and an Independent.  How can the Democrats run anyone against him? 

    Of course, if I had bothered to check I would have learned that you can't run on two party lines in Vermont.

    Which only makes Dean and the Democrats' dilemma more difficult!

Nervous Nellies at NPR

A Washington Post interview gone wrong with the "Car Talk" guys becomes an object lesson in how not to handle media relations

Oh, Brother: 'Car Talk' Guy Puts Mouth in Gear
Tom Magliozzi Opines and NPR Goes Into Reverse
By Mark Leibovich
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, May 4, 2005; C01

“Thou shall make the client available to the media—and then leave.”
                    --Ted Klein’s 3rd Commandment of Public Relations

We all love NPR, and we’re all concerned about reports of new interference from the Corporation of Public Broadcasting (CPB) into NPR and PBS operations.  But this is not the way to keep the wolf from the door.  (Oh right, that's the World Bank)

The guys who host "Car Talk" on National Public Radio -- brothers Tom and Ray Magliozzi -- were in Washington yesterday to visit with some of the powerful government officials whose support for public radio is so vital. They also sat for a rare interview.

"George Bush is a [unprintable vulgarity]," Tom Magliozzi says, about three minutes into the interview.

You might be thinking, well, that’s a good lede –this should be an interesting profile.  I’m afraid not!

Rule Number One: When you're trying to ensure government funding, it's best not to refer to the head of said government as an unprintable vulgarity.

Now, if this were an ordinary interview and not one specially designed to implode in an embarrassing public spectacle, Click (or is he Clack?)’s comment would have been a throwaway the writer might have used at the end of the article.   Too bad NPR blew it—big time.

Maybe this is why the "Car Talk" guys rarely give interviews.

"Yeah, you probably shouldn't say that," says Doug Berman, executive producer of public radio's most popular weekend show, who is sitting across the breakfast table at Cafe Luna on P Street. NPR spokeswoman Jenny Lawhorn agrees. As do Ray and Tom, aka "Click and Clack, the Tappet Brothers" at least until Tom essentially repeats himself, twice.

Even here, this story could have gone on to a happier ending, if the NPR mis-spokeswoman had just left this alone after registering the obligatory disclaimer.  As Zero Mostel said to Gene Wilder at their first awkward meeting in The Producers, the appropriate word is “oops.”  That’s all.

You can read it in the sunday papers

    A story in Sunday's New York Times underscores the main point about Bush's Social Security plan.  He said it himself at his "news conference."  Social Security's mission, he said, was to keep people from retiring into poverty. 

    Oh Yeah?  A friend told me about a conversation she had with a rich young thing who scoffed at the Social Security system and said, "Imagine!  Who in the world could live on just Social Security?"

    My friend said, "My mother."  And lots of other mothers and fathers, kids and siblings, disabled and widowed Americans.  Bush has it all wrong, as usual. Social Security isn't a poverty program.  As this article in the Sunday Post quotes Warren Buffett's investment partner, "it's  one of the most successful things the government has ever done."  (And Republicans, he said, are "out of their cotton-picking minds" to make radical changes.)

    Over at the Washington Post, (and also in the NYT Sunday Magazine) the orgy of revelations about uber-lobbist Jack Abramoff continues.  For devotees of the money and politics nexus, Abramoff is truly the gift that keeps on giving.  Of course what makes this story truly scrumptious is the heat it continues to turn on Tom DeLay.  I continue to say the man smells like burnt toast.      

The Pope

It seems like only yesterday that the new pope who was called John Paul died and the speculation was the next one would be named George Ringo. 

Now, according to Beliefnet's Steven Waldman, the successor to John Paul II might be black, Hispanic, Jewish or even an American. It reminds me of an old New York magazine competition, in which readers were invited to compose greeting cards for use in very special occasions, like this one for a cardinal who just got the Nod:  "Watched your smoke. Now you're Pope.  Congrats!"

(Aren't you glad Bush doesn't get to appoint this one?)

Wall Street Weak

More tremors in the firmament -- Wall Street is cracking down on ethics.

March 29, 2024

The New York Times
On Wall Street, a Rise in Dismissals Over Ethics
By LANDON THOMAS Jr

The opening of this story reads like a spy thriller.  The nervous bankers described here could have been hauled in front of the Bulgarian mafia.  Instead, it was bank lawyers and regulators.  And the difference is?

Two senior investment bankers at  Bank of America were summoned to a meeting this month where their boss, visibly uncomfortable and flanked by bank lawyers, read them a statement. They were both dismissed and asked to leave the building immediately. The decision was final.

Stunned, the bankers asked if they had broken any regulations. No, they were told. Nor had they traded on any inside information. Within the hour, they had turned in their BlackBerrys and laptops and were on their way home to the suburbs.

You know that game some people play with fortune cookie messages? Instead of mocking the AP for their dunderheaded decision to goose the truth, I'm trying it their way today.

Kids, this is a fun game  you can try at home.  Enhance stories like these, where one can easily twist reality just a little and substitute one key element for something more exciting.  Today's game is called Widely Sniplash, in which we switch one key villain while retaining the original protraganist. So, for example:

Two senior investment bankers at  Bank of America were summoned to a meeting this month where their boss, visibly uncomfortable and flanked by renegade Bulgarian secret police.  After hours of torture, they were both dismissed and asked to leave the building immediately. The decision was final.

Stunned, the bankers asked if they had broken any of the mob's unwritten laws or regulations. No, they were told. Nor had they traded on any inside information. Within the hour, they had turned in their BlackBerrys and laptops and were on their way home to the suburbs.  There they were ruthlessly murdered.

See how easy?

Ghostbloggers

More PR Than No-Holds-Barred On Bosses' Corporate Blogs
By Amy Joyce
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, March 19, 2005; Page A01

Is it really a surprise that the new medium of blogging has spawned its own version of Astroturf?

The soul-baring, anything-goes, free-for-all phenomenon called the Web log has come to this:

"This is the first of many commentaries I will make on this forum," wrote General Motors Vice Chairman Robert A. Lutz in January when he first started his blog, fastlane.gmblogs.com, "and I'd like to begin with, surprise, some product talk -- specifically, Saturn products."

Web logs -- or blogs -- started as a way to talk about new technologies, vent about life and interact in a no-holds-barred forum. Since blogs became the next big thing, an increasing number of companies have come to see them as the next great public relations vehicle -- a way for executives to demonstrate their casual, interactive side.

“What’s a blog?,” people ask me with surprising frequency.  A new survey shows that blogging is catching on, although it may be a guy thing.

But, of course, the executives do nothing of the sort. Their attempts at hip, guerrilla-style blogging are often pained -- and painful.

Hey, this writer must have read that AP memo about “alternative leads.”  Instead of boring old facts we’ve got words like “hip” and “guerrilla.”  And we don’t have to wait for the end of the story to jump to conclusions . 

"Looking back before the dust settles on 2004, it was a great year of building momentum for BCA [Boeing Commercial Airplanes]. Our orders went up, with 272 in '04 compared to 239 in '03. It was a super year for widebodies for us," wrote Randolph S. Baseler, Boeing Co.'s vice president of marketing, on Jan. 17 in his first entry at boeing.com/randy.

With blogs like that, who needs news releases? Some Internet watchers wonder if a blog that sounds like nothing more than a corporate press room is worth the effort.

We’ve been through this before.  What is a legitimately expressed point of view, and what is propaganda?  If a ghostwriter puts words in a writer’s mouth, does anyone hear them?

Or Is it A Death Grip

For Bush, a Long Embrace of Social Security Plan
By RICHARD W. STEVENSON

I’m not going to take apart this insightful New York Times story with smart-alecky remarks and critique its adherence to journalistic standards. Well, not much.

WASHINGTON, Feb. 26 - The conservative economists and public policy experts who trooped in to brief George W. Bush on Social Security not long after he was re-elected governor of Texas in 1998 came with their own ideas about how to overhaul the retirement program. But they quickly found that Mr. Bush, who was well into preparations for his first presidential race and had invited them to Austin for the discussion, already knew where he was headed.

"He never said, 'What should I do about Social Security?' " said one of the participants in the meeting, Martin Anderson, who had been a domestic policy adviser in the Reagan administration. "On the day we talked about Social Security, he said, 'We have to find a way to allow people to invest a percentage of their payroll tax in the capital markets. What do you think?' "

According to the Doug Wead tapes, in 1998 Bush vowed, “I want to lead.”  This story shows how he got ready.

Mr. Bush had long been intrigued by the idea of allowing workers to put part of their Social Security taxes into stocks and bonds. One Tuesday in the summer of 1978, in the heat of his unsuccessful race for a House seat from West Texas, Mr. Bush went to Midland Country Club to give a campaign speech to local real estate agents and discussed the issue in terms not much different from those he uses now.

Social Security "will be bust in 10 years unless there are some changes," he said, according to an account published the next day in The Midland Reporter-Telegram. "The ideal solution would be for Social Security to be made sound and people given the chance to invest the money the way they feel."

Exhibit A in the case against the case against Bush:  remember he first ran for office in 1978.  As my mentor in politics told me long ago, “no one who runs for office doesn’t want to be President. The ones who lack ambition only want to be Speaker of the House.”  He aint as dumb as he looks.

Two decades later, Mr. Bush's desire to change Social Security intersected with the promotion of private accounts by well-financed interest groups and conservative research organizations, which viewed the concept as innovative if ideologically explosive. What was once a fringe proposal has been propelled to the forefront of the national agenda in one of the biggest gambles of Mr. Bush's political career, and in one of the most concerted challenges since the New Deal to liberal assumptions about the relationship of individuals, the government and the market.

They don’t call Social Security the “third rail” of politics for nothing. Some call it a “giveaway” and some say it’s a guarantee.  Washington hasn’t forgotten the image of angry seniors surrounding one of Congress’ most powerful members.  

Mr. Bush has told aides that he cannot remember precisely when he was introduced to the idea of individual investing as part of Social Security, and until he ran for president he did not have a high profile on the issue. But he comes from a family with deep roots on Wall Street; his great-grandfather founded an investment bank, and his grandfather later ran Brown Brothers Harriman, one of the most prominent firms in the world of finance. His early political education included exposure to the ideas of Senator Barry Goldwater, the conservative standard-bearer who in 1964 was among the first Republicans to make a national issue of private investing as an alternative to traditional Social Security, and Ronald Reagan, who also took up the idea.

Hey, “aides,” can I make a suggestion?  If you’re going to give a New  York Times reporter a crumb of behind the scenes color, try not to use the words “Bush” and “cannot remember” in the same sentence,know what I mean guys?

Politics Ain't Beanbag

It used to be fair to say that "you'll never get rich" in politics.  But today campaign consultants can earn bond-trader size bonuses on what's called the "buy."  Caveat elector -- let the voter beware.

From the Associated Press
COLUMBUS, Ohio -  The battle for Ohio in last year's presidential campaign came with a huge price tag: $100 million for television advertising alone, according to a new study.

Ohio residents saw "a level of campaign activity unprecedented in modern times," according to the study released last week by five political science professors from the universities of Cincinnati and Akron.

Thank goodness for the AP.  They sue for information, pursue investigations and dare to quote five political science professors from Ohio. 

"Everyone had the sense that this was the most intense campaign ever and, by gosh, it was," said one of the authors, John Green, of the University of Akron.

Golly gee, see what I mean?  If you want homespun news, stick with the A.P.

The election turned on Ohio's 20 Electoral College votes. Not until preliminary results were available early on Nov. 3 did Democratic challenger John Kerry  concede.

Yes, we remember.  Tim Russert and his silly little whiteboard, the exit polls that proved to be wrong, which led to the eight hours of the Kerry administration, when Terry McAuliffe thought "I was Secretary of Commerce, I was Ambassador to England." 

Kerry and his Democratic allies spent $61 million on television ads compared with $39 million by President Bush and Republican groups. Together, the two campaigns spent as much on television ads as Bush spent nationwide to win the 2000 Republican nomination, the study said.

$100 million in Ohio, $4 billion nationwide, pretty soon election spending adds up to real money.

Memo to Headline Writers: Try not to get your knickers in a twist over gay marriage

NY Mayor Bloomberg in a Bind Over Gay Marriage

Let’s give them the benefit of the doubt, OK?  I’m sure no one, no one at all, thought twice about the use of the word “bind” in a headline about gay sex.  NTTAWWT!

NEW YORK (Reuters) - New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg faced pressure from both sides over gay marriage on Monday after saying the city would appeal a court ruling overturning a ban on gay unions even though he supports them.

Gay unions?  Is that a new pressure group within the AFL-CIO?  Here we have a classic “conflict first” lede graf.  In the old days, journalists were told to start with the “five W’s”—now it’s if it bleeds it ledes.  And if there isn’t any actual blood,action-oriented words like “pressure” and “bind” are worth mentioning up front.  Let’ s see how many paragraphs in the story below include this kind of colorful language, or as the 2000 year old man used to say, “my peppy words.”