via Jordon Cooper, via Rebecca’s Pocket
Some might call it Treason: an open letter to Salon Considering such trenchant work throughout the presidential race, it seemed, to say the least, quite odd that Manjoo suddenly and absolutely shifted ground as soon as Bush\’s unexpected victory was official. Where he had indeed been dogged and impartial in exposing some real threats to the integrity of the election, ex post facto he seemed far less interested in dealing with the evidence of GOP malfeasance than in jeering every effort to discuss it. Instead of careful scrutiny of that evidence, he resorted mainly to sarcastic hooting and ad hominem assault — the same tactics that the Bush Republicans themselves have always used to cast all argument about their unexpected win as sheer insanity.
This “sarcastic hooting” and “ad hominem assault” is exactly the main modus operandi used by 99% of the Bush-supporting crowd (as the end of the above quote also points out). Every spokesperson who is exposing the absolute ineptitude of the Bush administration (or any who are merely trying to expose actions and coverups which they think that the American people ought to know about) is summarlily dismissed as partisan and deeply troubled. With no actual refutation of specifics, these bits of evidence that have combined to create a mountain of literature (and outnumbering the literature of the “contrary” view at a staggering rate— a bit of food for thought for anyone who cares to make a simple perusal of the bookstore politics shelves, and see how the “exposing Bush” books outnumber the pro_bush books by a rather large amount)…and therefore the defense of simply attacking the evidence gatherers without much an attempt to address the actual content, is not much of a defense at all……Whenever I offer a bit of the story told by Richard Clarke or Joseph Wilson, the reply is a nod of familaiarity and a sarcastic laugh and a retort “Richard Clarke is…….or Joseph Wilson is……..” ; an immediate knee-jerk dismissal.
On the other hand, those maverick Democrats who had seen evidence of fraud, and who were keen to publicize it — Conyers, Jackson, Stephanie Tubbs-Jones and others — weren’t consulted by the press, which largely snubbed those activists and statisticians who had studied the election fraud in depth.
—same source as above quote
Same sort of dismissal as “crazies” ; no coverage of credible figures. Kennedy’s article has hopefully staged a coup of responsible, uncensored journalism that cares more for accuracy than it does for reputation (they fear giving credence to things widely perceived as “sore losers”—a perception , ironically enough, caused by the same media)
Making this paragraph extremely frustrating (frustrating in its accuracy) :
Kerry won’t discuss the issue frankly on the record, we’ve been told, because he’s worried that the media will smack him for it. (“They’re saying that, if I don’t concede, they’ll call us sore losers!” he reportedly said to a stunned John Edwards just before he called it quits the morning after.) That may be what Kerry, among others, actually believes, but it’s absurd, as no amount of public scorn, however withering, could ever be as frightening to a democratic politician as the twilight of democracy itself.
I also noticed this on the final episodes of The West Wing, when Arnie Vinnick refused to contest the election. It seemed actually a slap at the folks who have been voicing concern over the 2004 Ohio escapades. (btw, I have a few reflections on The West Wing forthcoming)
Back before the election, in the summer, Jimmy Carter’s assesment of the state of election perparations in Florida was disturbing; he basically said it was laready too late; that the forces of “lock-down” and “manipulation” had already won; voter registration rolls had already been “massaged”, voting machinery had already been “certified” without a paper trail requirement (and the much feared “electronic switch Kerry vote to Bush” was widely reported—– and I’m sure that the knee-jerk scoffers get as good laugh over that one, all without any consideration of the possibility that such things can happen and have been made likely to happen if someone just wishes it so), Seybold systems , the voting machine folks, is owned by a man who is a Bush operative, as well as Ohio’s Secretary of State. If this were the case on the opposite side of the fence, the Senate investigations would be running full steam, and the Impeachment proceedings would be in full force with the mountain of “insider” lying and manipulating going on starting with the attempts by the Bush administration to prevent the creation of the 9/11 Commission, to Iraq, to Abu Ghraib, to Rove-gate, to “spying on Americans” and on and on and on.
It would be too late at this point to say “don’t get me started”.