I'm proud of them also.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

The right-wing will not let O off on these issues. He needs far better responses in order to have any real hope of winning the GE.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

Particularly the one about why he dis-invited his minister from his announcement a year and a half ago.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

a GPS to follow this guy. Seriously.

There was a comment elsewhere a few days ago about a little 9 year old girl listening to the Faith Forum the other night. She said, "his words bounce off my ears". Couldn't have said it better myself. He's exhausting.

Yours and hers, actually

"Our public servants work for us - we don't work for them. We have an obligation, as citizens of this country, to always remember that - and to never let them forget it." - DeadMessengers

I worry that both candidates and the Democratic Party lost last night. In the words of the BBC the first half of the debate was about "gaffes." In the words of one correspondent on the BBC Worldservice it was "tawdry." 

Barry
Are you safer today than you were seven years ago?©

It's hard to imagine what could be more tawdry than KO lately, other than Fox, upon which it was apparently modeled. As we've seen, the partisan approach right or fake left results in micro-partisanship, not neutrality which we are all ill-served by in the end.

The golden age of journalism, if there ever was one, is long over, but bloggers & online activists would like to at least provide us with a silver age, or maybe some kind of new-fangled titanium age. Certainly a David & Goliath dynamic & a lot of the big blogs have already gone bad & rejected the lesson of measured dispassion. Voters & bloggers are supposed to be passionate- news outlets are not. It's great that we can scream back at the tee vee now, better yet, collectively, and catch it in type.

I find it interesting that this surfaces now, 15 months into the stupidest presidential campaign ever. YES WE CAN & we have collectively documented the whole ugly thing, bit by bit, story by story, hour by hour. At least now there is a record of it for online archeologists & social scientists of the future. Search these archives for debate threads - they'll knock your head off. Yes, there have been other debates where no self-respecting question was asked for 35 minutes. This isn't new. Honestly this debate didn't even stick out to me in that regard, and I've watched most if not all of them (also a pathetic measure, by any measure!!!).

I find it sad that our supposed brothers & sisters in arms blogwise seem to have forgot the savage pleasure with which those cultural forces which are in fact tawdry raise up a hero, or perchance heroine, only to rip them down. Doesn't make it right but there has been no gravity on Planet O! and all of these creepy insiduous lame ass charges should have been out & aired & long over & his path cleared- they have themselves in large measure set him up for failure by treating him themselves like a fatted calf. Not to blame the victim but there has been something so fundamentally unreal & in fact, frankly engineered about this whole thing.

I surveyed the HuffingtonPost immediately after the debate & Arianna & her gang of tastemakers (am I saying that in a vanilla, yet suggestive enough way?) gleefully crowned the debate "The Gotcha Debate" despite the fact that the specialty of that site is nothing but traffic in rumor, gossip, speculation, bad advice, tea leaves, micro-partisanship & whatever the ill-concealed fakeout progressive agenda really is behind that place.

Media consolidation & control of messaging has been a problem as long as there has been media- but with the demise of the Fairness Doctrine under Reagan & the rise of corporate personhood & well... here's a place to start, from 1983.

The Media Monopoly by Ben H. Bagdikian

excerpt:

In the last 5 years, a small number of the country's largest industrial corporations has acquired more public communications power-including ownership of the news-than any private businesses have ever before possessed in world history.
Nothing in earlier history matches this corporate group's power to penetrate the social landscape. Using both old and new technology, by owning each other's shares, engaging in joint ventures as partners, and other forms of cooperation, this handful of giants has created what is, in effect, a new communications cartel within the United States.
At issue is not just a financial statistic, like production numbers or ordinary industrial products like refrigerators or clothing. At issue is the possession of power to surround almost every man, woman, and child in the country with controlled images and words, to socialize each new generation of Americans, to alter the political agenda of the country. And with that power comes the ability to exert influence that in many ways is greater than that of schools, religion, parents, and even government itself.
Aided by the digital revolution and the acquisition of subsidiaries that operate at every step in the mass communications process, from the creation of content to its delivery into the home, the communications cartel has exercised stunning influence over national legislation and government agencies, an influence whose scope and power would have been considered scandalous or illegal twenty years ago.
The new communications cartel has been made possible by the withdrawal of earlier government intervention that once aspired to protect consumers and move toward the ideal of diversity of content and ownership in the mass media. Government's passivity has emboldened the new giants to boast openly of monopoly and their ability to project news, commercial messages, and graphic images into the consciousness and subconscious of almost every American.
Strict control of public information is not new in the world, but historical dictatorships lacked the late twentieth century's digital multimedia and distribution technology. As the country approaches the millennium, the new cartel exercises a more complex and subtle kind of control.
*****
Because each of the dominant firms has adopted a strategy of creating its own closed system of control over every step in the national media process, from creation of content to its delivery, no content-news, entertainment, or other public messages-will reach the public unless a handful of corporate decision-makers decide that it will. Smaller independents have always helped provide an alternative and still do, but they have become ever more vulnerable to the power of the supergiants. As the size and financial power of the new dominant firms have escalated, so has their coercive power to offer a bothersome smaller competitor a choice of either selling out at once or slowly facing ruin as the larger firm uses its greater financial resources to undercut the independent competitor on price and motion. In the process, consumers have become less influential than ever.
*****
Perhaps the most troubling power of the new cartel is its control of the main body of news and public affairs information. The reporting of news has always been a commercial enterprise and this has always created conflicts of interest. But the behavior of the new corporate controllers of public information has produced a higher level of manipulation of news to pursue the owners' other financial and political goals. In the process, there has been a parallel shrinkage of any sense of obligation to serve the non-commercial information needs of public citizenship.
The idea of government interceding to protect consumers is contrary to the ideology of most of the media cartel's leaders, who with few exceptions, pursue the conservative political and economic notion of an uninhibited free market that operates without social or moral obligations.
*****
... earlier, it was possible to describe the dominant firms in each separate medium-daily newspapers, magazines, radio, television, books, and movies. With each passing year ... the number of controlling firms in all these media has shrunk: from fifty corporations in 1984 to twenty-six in 1987, followed by twenty-three in l990, and then, as the borders between the different media began to blur, to less than twenty in 1993. In 1996 the number of media corporations with dominant power in society is closer to ten. In terms of media possessions and resources, the newest dominant ten are Time Warner, Disney, Viacom, News Corporation Limited (Murdoch), Sony, Tele-Communications, Inc., Seagram (TV, movies, cable, books, music), Westinghouse, Gannett, and General Electric.
*****
The magnitude of the new media cartel's power is reflected m the simple dollar size of recent transactions that produced it. At the time of the first edition of this book, in 1983...

I won't argue with you on that. However, KO,Fox and ABC aren't running for president. We do need a president who can cut through the media fog but instead we get candidates who go along with harping of gaffes rather than the real issues.

Barry
Are you safer today than you were seven years ago?^©

of reality & pragmatism vs. idealism that we all find so painful. We have a sort of inverse microcosm oriented press & political process - serial obsessions, as Gore calls it. 

Voters need to look at many things other than "gaffes".

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

can and often do disagree, but they also keep open minds. At least, that's how we were all raised.

Thanks. I'll pass that along.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

She always makes BO look like a stammering schoolboy and did so again! Hopefully, on this network station, more people saw the debate. As for the proclaimation by BBC et.al. that the debate was about gaffes: the scandals involving BO's associates are not gaffes! Hillary's misstating the Bosnia situation is a gaffe, which she should have put to rest last night with the declaration that she isn't dumb and would not intentionally say something different from what she wrote in a book! The Obamaniac media has given him a pass on his faulty assertions involving his father's coming to America and his parents' meeting. But, according to my husband, Olbermann referred to the Bosnia mistake as a FIASCO! I thought Charlie and George did a good job, but twice George missed a chance to nail Obama on the controversy over his not hearing Wright's outrageous comments. BO, when asked, explained that he requested that the preacher not attend his announcement because of OTHER things he said. Why not ask BO, "What, exactly, did he say that caused you to make that decision?" Obama probably would have hemmed and hawed and come up with another of his absurd "explanations". Also, last night was the first time I heard that the domestic terrorists held a fund raiser for BO in their home! I have friends, co-workers, and neighbors who respect me but would not raise money for any candidacy I might seek simply because my policies are more left-wing than theirs. And, if one of them were an admitted criminal who beat the rap, brags about it, and wishes he had done even more--I wouldn't accept a dollar from him and would beg him to stay out of the picture!

There's now a link to that in my diary.

I think you're right, madspawn, and (for example) more and more young people will be coming around to join the ones already with Hillary.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

Me too.

That thread ties our reactions together very nicely.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

are, for the most part, not going to buy the propaganda of KO and CM because it's so obvious and because the two use cafeteria-style polling. KO particulary has always been, clearly, a lefty, and now he appears to be on the lunatic fringe. If he's still throwing those papers (I haven't watched him since the mania became apparent)then it must now appear to be the actions of an hysteric instead of those of a satirist. If anything, these drooling far-lefties are going to cause the radar of common people to go up.

You're starting to sound like BillO.

I could agree with your first sentence. Keith and Tweety are obviously biased and I HOPE most people can see that and take what they say with a grain of salt. My husband is a big KO fan and it took him a while, but he finally has come around. He saw thru Tweety's sexism right away, but it seeing it in KO was harder, perhaps because he liked him so much.

But just because KO is anti-Clinton does not make him a lefty, much less anywhere near the "lunatic fringe." You forget that Obama is actually far less progressive than Hillary. And I doubt anyone thinks his throwing papers makes him look "hysteric."

I think many people, like my very-pro Clinton hubby, continue to watch KO and just tune out his Hillary-hatred. I'm afraid many however are not as discerning.

become so pro-Obama that it's one long propaganda piece. "Countdown" used to be my favorite show, and I actually don't think KO is sexist! I just think he's so enamoured of BO that he's viciously attacking anyone who stands in his way. CM, on the other hand, is probably at least somewhat sexist--and I think he definitely hates both Clintons. Until recently, I'd listened to KO for years, and I'd say he's definitely a lefty--like me! But--hey--I was just kidding about him being hysterical! (It's just a dream of mine that he might become that way!)

It should be "slamming" and not "slaming."

Thanks, marinerfan.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

this morning were particularly good, and especially relative to your comment:

"The questions O! was asked were long overdue. And he handled them poorly. Very poorly. He is not the least bit qualified or prepared for this job. Bottom line."

marinerfan, you put it beautifully.

Sestak's basic comment was that, leaders show their ability to lead in how they handle themselves under pressure, under harsh, difficult, trying circumstances. And, Obama did not handle himself well. Hillary did, and almost always does.

Whinning about the debate format, and that the moderators were being unfair in hammering him on his comments and behaviour toward his associations, is not the comportmant of a leader. Leaders take their lumps and keep going. Really good leaders smile while they do it.

"Our public servants work for us - we don't work for them. We have an obligation, as citizens of this country, to always remember that - and to never let them forget it." - DeadMessengers

I don't consider gaffes to be issues. Spending half of the debate on how the candidates have managed to put their foot in their mouths does nothing for me. 

Issues are things like our failing educational system, the collapsing economy,  Iraq, the isolation of the US in the world etc.

Barry
Are you safer today than you were seven years ago?^©

to reply to you Professor because from my experience you always get the last word -- but that's okay. ;-)

The thing about all the O! supporters (and others) suddenly getting all outraged over the way the debates are conducted is where the f was everybody after all the previous debates, which were just as bad, or worse with the "gotcha" stuff aimed at Hillary?

We Hillary supporters have been screaming about the sorry state of the media, the hacks moderating the debates, writing letters, etc. and the O!! gang was off on the sidelines cheering them on and encouraging them. THAT'S what's disgusting. If the outrage, petitions, and letters had been coming from all of us, all the time, I would be equally outraged. As it stands now, I am on the sidelines, laughing my a** off at the payback. And that's not a good thing, but I'm not going to go out of my way to help O! and his supporters because, yes, I am that pissed off. So once again, Corporate Press wins. (Don't they always?)

Back to you, professor...

Leaving Pet Network now, and gotta go home and get dinner, so will check in later for my repremand...

Once in a while you get shown the light, In the strangest of places if you look at it right.

I can't hardly pass up a challenge like that! :)

As I recall many of us, and if I remember correctly you're included, were complaining about the media long before this campaign even started. In that sense neither campaign should have been surprised by any of this.

I did notice that earlier in the campaign Clinton supporters were up in arms about the media, now the tables have turned. What worries me is that once this is over most of those, from both sides, who have been screaming will turn their backs and ignore the problem again. The few of us who are left will be listening to the echoes of our own voices in an empty room again. 

Barry
Are you safer today than you were seven years ago?^©

while things cook...

The way the O! wing of the Dem Party has been praising and cheering the press during this entire race is one of the things that has baffled me the most.

Before this began, most of the progressive blogosphere knew the media was fecked up -- hence orgs like Free Press, Media Channel, Media Matters, and a slew of others that were formed just for the purpose of exposing and gathering support to combat and somehow? defeat or change the fact that so few corporations owned so much of the media.

I have long held that almost all the battles we've been waging the past decade or longer are all hindered and held back by the very fact that we don't have a free press.

And of course, Professor, you are correct that many of us, H and O! supporters alike, were all outraged and disgusted at what the U.S. press has become. So yeah, I have to say I am bitter and pissed to the core that the people supporting O! suddenly decided as long as the press was propping up "their guy" and shooting down "our gal" they were doing a really good job.

You can be sure that since a Corporate owned and controlled media is, in my opinion, the cause of most of our troubles in this country, I will never give up fighting them and supporting orgs that are dedicated to doing that. But for right now -- for this one debate to see O! get a taste of the treatment Hillary's been getting all along -- well, yeah, I'm enjoying it. And yeah, it's due to the fact that the O! and his supporters have left us hanging for the past however many months with not a word about the bias and unfairness of the way they treat Hillary and all things Clinton.

Not even would they acknowledge that, hey, yeah, the press is pretty hard on her. Never. And they still don't/won't. Just last night, the O! guy that changes his name here every few months seriously asked for instances where the press has been unfair to Hillary. He honestly never saw it. Now to me, that is some scary **hope** O! has spread over these folks.

Once in a while you get shown the light, In the strangest of places if you look at it right.

When lots of people are talking about something, it becomes a legitimate issue, but I do think they spent too much time on the gaffes.

Stan Davis
Lakewood, CO
Wes Clark -- Make America All It Can Be!

I think the mainstream media types too often leave it up to SNL and JS to deal more thoroughly with the substantive issues. ;)

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

but NO, GAFFES ARE NOT ISSUES. 'Lots' of people are talking BECAUSE the media is/are [which?] doing so; the 'real' people I ask are all interested in real issues.

Just spoke with a National Guard trainee here in Fla (where I'm visiting) and asked her if she had heard debate; 'no.' Was she interested in election: yes, wants to learn about candidates positions on issues, like education, health care, war.

Mentioned to my family yesterday, as I left the room after 5 minutes of b.s. questions on 'debate,' that media talks about the b.s. and not the substance; brother, who 'somehow' (snark) thinks I've made my mind up but he has my decision wrong, later complained and agreed with my complaint; debate WASN'T.

PS, was impressed to hear Philly Mayor on Tavis Smiley yestereday; sounds like the guy is taking some s**t from some for supporting HRC. Asked why, he said he interviewed both of them early, and it was clear to him that Hillary is thoroughly informed about urban issues, and her experience will enable her to tackle such.

I can't afford $, but I'll write him a thank you.

Others here, maybe?

Real people who vote in Democratic primaries care about whether Hillary or Barack can beat McCain. I would estimate about half of the Obama supporters I know first started giving him a look solely because they were convinced Hillary had too much baggage and favorability ratings too low to win.

In that sense, they do care about the gaffs. McCain is still pretty popular in the fly-over states, especially among indies and moderates. Many undecided Democrats fear he cannot overcome that popularity, and the gaffs, and more importantly how he reacts when they are raised, inform their fears.

Especially right after the Bush/Cheney years where ideology has so often trumped all rational thinking.

Hillary's solutions campaign beats Obama's hope campaign seven ways to Sunday on the reality dimension. So does her demonstrated real ability to withstand the attacks of the right-wing noise machine. Until this debate, Obama offered an un-tested "hope" that he will be able to deflect it. Since the debate, though, it looks like that particular "hope" is unfounded. When put on the defensive, he evidently just doesn't cut it; and that is very important for Democrats to realize if we want to win the election.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

most importance - unless Dems are willing to settle for second strongest as too often has been the case when we've let early momentum and/or premature calls for party unity determine our candidate.

Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton came from far behind and won, because they were our strongest candidates.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

http://noquarterusa.net/blog/2008/04/17/obama-stands-accused-of-conduct-unbecoming-a-presidential-candidate/#more-2215

Also, there's some discussion here:

http://securingamerica.com/ccn/node/15294#comment-297203

and here:

http://www.taylormarsh.com/archives_view.php?id=27440

and CBS has the video here:

http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=4025010n

and, astonishingly, Obama has the video at his website:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlR9DNfqGD4

although it doesn't give the same crowd-view.

Perhaps this video that I posted before in the GD thread gives the best view:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YbDm3IeNxo

It really does look like that middle finger is the only one fully extended.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

last night and this morning. Another mistake complaining about not getting the extra pillow usually earmarked to him.

Nick Kelly, as always, thanks for lining it up.

...I should hope he knows how to "dissect everything to the nth degree." I think that's what they are trained for. Like Richard Clarke. Live Valerie Plame.

As for Mr. O's "odd body movements," there is an old saying: "What you DO speaks so loudly I can't hear what you say." His audience obviously "heard" what his body was saying.

As with his gaffs, is there now to be a body language edition of What He Really Meant? If he did not mean this gesture, then it's time to get him a body coach. (I'll bet he already has one.)

imagine that we'd have to be endlessly defending people like Joe Wilson, Valerie Plame, Wes Clark and Larry Johnson to the so called progressive blogosphere???

Boggle
Boggle
Boggle

I guess it's more of that new fangled kind o politics that emphasizes unity.... for "some".

Selective Unity.

Let's be honest about it.

Unity for OUR CLUB! Yay! :/

Almost sounds elitist....

...thinking about casting my vote for Nader if it is Obama/McCain (and it won't be because of any particular dislike of Obama, but rather the behavior of his supporters).

of writing in Wes. Wish I had last time. Wish we all had, maybe things would have been different for him in terms of running again, who knows?

...but they don't count it where I'm at in Texas unless there is some other organized effort to reach some minimum threshold (unless they've changed things since 2004).

that determines the value of an information. The information is subjected to an ongoing evaluation that may go up or down depending on the investigation. Whether it is Larry Johnson/Fox or so called reliable souces, we are all obligated to vet any item of information. This site, so far, has been helpful to me. Thanks anyway.

Larry Johnson is a national defense professional who was one of the first to have the courage to expose Bush's lies before the Iraq invasion. He is hardly a "nutcase" or "off the charts-paranoid." He used to be considered one of the heroes of the left -- delivered the Saturday radio address for the DNC back in July 2005 -- until he dared to criticize The Anointed One.

Now I guess Johnson joins the ranks of former progressive heroes who are disrespected by the left because they won't jump on Obama's bandwagon. People like George McGovern, Joe Wilson, Tavis Smiley... Wes Clark....

RFK Jr....

The list grows by the hour.

Wes was called a nut job on Daily KObama as well.

So many "nutjobs"... so little time.

Extrapolate outwards and half the democratic electorate are now nutjobs, nutcases, nutters and out of their minds!

I'm a proud nutcase in la....

about you, ms in la. ;)

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.

for our General, on rare occasions; and this is not one of those.

If you read the links I gave before you posted, you might have noticed that we were quietly discussing this matter and attempting to give O the benefit of the doubt on the GD thread before anyone linked to Larry Johnson's blog.

I also disagree with you concerning Larry Johnson. He is an objective, reliable, and thorough observer; and if all you have to counter his diary on this matter is your personal impression of "odd body movements", your argument is one of the variety we generally fail to appreciate here. Namely, weak, unsupported by any linked evidence, and (lacking such evidence) entirely subjective. You are welcome here; but I now feel it necessary to advise you to please try harder to make convincing posts; and please do not go ad hominem without due cause, such as someone giving you the finger....

Nonetheless, thanks for having the courage to state your opinion, unfounded as it appears to be.

Nick Kelly

Wes Clark could still secure America as a national security candidate.