It's The Media, Stupid.
www.dailyhowler.com: Al Qaeda plots around the world, hoping to destroy your society (more below). And Maureen Dowd—at our greatest newspaper—is concerned because a White House candidate doesn’t make his own peanut putter sandwiches! She draws her inanity from
the profile penned by Wilgoren, of course.
How inane—how ill—are Wilgoren and Dowd? As Wilgoren
wrote in yesterday’s profile, “[e]very modern
presidential candidate has a factotum, or ‘body
man,’”—a guy who serves as personal assistant to the
candidate himself. But for reasons only she can
explain, Wilgoren zeroed in on Kerry’s assistant,
painting him as Kerry’s “butler,” his “glorified
valet,” who exists because John Kerry “is comfortable
being catered to.” (Like Katharine Seelye’s report
about Kerry’s war record, Wilgoren’s imagery mimics
RNC spin. She also lards her slimy piece with
homoerotic imagery.) Why, the “butler” even makes
Kerry’s sandwiches, the troubled Wilgoren “reported.”
Today, this screaming trivia makes its way to the top
of Maureen Dowd’s worried piece.
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http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh042904.shtml
LET THEM EAT PEANUT BUTTER! The Washington press corps
is deeply disordered. Here—let the New York Times show
you:
THURSDAY, APRIL 29, 2004
LET THEM EAT PEANUT BUTTER: Ask yourself a simple
question: What kind of “letters editor” would actually
publish the following text? This letter receives
prominent display in today’s New York Times:
To the Editor:
As a Vietnam veteran, I know the value of serving our
country in time of war. The medals are personal
service decorations awarded to us by our country for
serving with honor.
The medals John Kerry received represent an award
earned in battle. But with only fingernail scrapes to
show for his three Purple Hearts, it’s no wonder Mr.
Kerry was so willing to throw medals away.
Which of our servicemen now serving overseas would
want a commander in chief who has so little regard for
the medals they have earned that he would throw them
away, for political reasons? Truly they would have no
respect for him.
COOK BARELA
Riverside, Calif., April 26, 2004
Barela, of course, is a consummate rube, of the kind
found in every society. But what kind of journalist
would publish this letter—a letter whose “facts” are
so blatantly bogus? In fact, no one has ever so much
as claimed that Kerry had “only fingernail scrapes to
show for his three Purple Hearts.” Last week, the
claim that he received such a scrape when he got his
first Purple Heart was shown to be blatantly false.
But a week later, what does the great Times do? An
editor receives this idiotic letter—and incredibly, he
puts the letter in print! The Times of course knows
the letter is false. But how many readers will know
this?
Readers, only a fool could fail to see the truth in
this morning’s Times. The Washington press corps is
deeply disordered—in effect, mentally ill—and the
Times is quite eager to prove it. We principally speak
of Maureen Dowd’s column, which plays off Jodi
Wilgoren’s “profile” on the front page of yesterday’s
Times (see THE DAILY HOWLER, 4/28/04). Why do we use
the term “mentally ill?” At a time of building
national peril, Dowd is concerned about this:
DOWD (pgh 1): So let’s see. What’s our swell choice
here?
(2) A guy who mimed being a fighter pilot on a carrier
versus a guy who mimed throwing his medals over a
fence?…
(5) A president who can’t go anywhere without his vice
president to give him the answers versus a candidate
who can’t go anywhere without his campaign
butler/buddy to give him peanut butter and jelly
sandwiches?
Al Qaeda plots around the world, hoping to destroy
your society (more below). And Maureen Dowd—at our
greatest newspaper—is concerned because a White House
candidate doesn’t make his own peanut putter
sandwiches! She draws her inanity from the profile
penned by Wilgoren, of course.
How inane—how ill—are Wilgoren and Dowd? As Wilgoren
wrote in yesterday’s profile, “[e]very modern
presidential candidate has a factotum, or ‘body
man,’”—a guy who serves as personal assistant to the
candidate himself. But for reasons only she can
explain, Wilgoren zeroed in on Kerry’s assistant,
painting him as Kerry’s “butler,” his “glorified
valet,” who exists because John Kerry “is comfortable
being catered to.” (Like Katharine Seelye’s report
about Kerry’s war record, Wilgoren’s imagery mimics
RNC spin. She also lards her slimy piece with
homoerotic imagery.) Why, the “butler” even makes
Kerry’s sandwiches, the troubled Wilgoren “reported.”
Today, this screaming trivia makes its way to the top
of Maureen Dowd’s worried piece.
What does Dowd have on her mind today? George Bush
can’t answer questions about 9/11. And John Kerry
doesn’t make his own sandwiches!
Of course, inanity has been this corps’ stock-in-trade
over at least the last dozen years. When you read your
paper each day, you read the work of a vacuous press
which is happy to display its Millionaire Pundit
Values—a press corps addicted to trivia and inanity.
While Osama plotted in the summer of 2001, they rubbed
their thighs about Chandra Levy. Meanwhile, they’ve
turned your elections into trivia festivals, built
around earth tones, Love Story, dog pills, blow-jobs.
Now we’re handed our current fare. What is the
headline on Dowd’s piece? “Guns and Peanut Butter,” it
says.
And yes, simply put, it’s an illness. Even faced with
growing peril, the Wilgorens, the Dowds—and the
letters editors—simply can’t stop their incessant
group clowning. Are there real topics Dowd might have
explored? At one point, after all, she writes this:
DOWD: Communing with the Higher Father and the
Almighty, President Bush has either stumbled into a
Holy War or swaggered into one.
In their new book, “The Bushes,” Peter and Rochelle
Schweizer, who interviewed many Bushes, including the
president’s father and his brother Jeb, quote one
unnamed relative as saying that W. sees the war on
terror “as a religious war”: “He doesn’t have a P.C.
view of this war. His view of this is that they are
trying to kill the Christians. And we the Christians
will strike back with more force and more ferocity
than they will ever know.”
Does Bush have some sort of religious view which
Americans ought to know more about? We don’t know, but
this passage from the Schweizers’ book is hardly the
first indication. Bush has made several odd statements
recently, including those made to Bob Woodward,
statements which produced this exchange when the
author did 60 Minutes:
WOODWARD: The president still believes, with some
conviction, that this was absolutely the right thing,
that he has the duty to free people, to liberate
people, and this was his moment.
MIKE WALLACE: Who gave George Bush the duty to free
people around the world?
WOODWARD: That’s a really good question. The
Constitution doesn’t say that’s part of the
commander-in-chief’s duties.
WALLACE: The president of the United States, without a
great deal of background in foreign policy, makes up
his mind and believes he was sent by somebody to free
the people, not just in Iraq, but around the world?
WOODWARD: That’s his stated purpose.
WALLACE: Right.
WOODWARD: It is far-reaching and ambitious, and I
think will cause many people to tremble.
It will cause many people to tremble! But what has
made Bush believe that “he was sent by somebody to
free the people, not just in Iraq, but around the
world?” It was fairly clear that Woodward and Wallace
believed—based on Bush’s statement about serving a
“higher father”—that the president might feel a
religious calling when he makes these surprising
statements. At any rate, Bush’s new belief is quite a
shift from his “humble foreign policy” of Campaign
2000, and when he talks about “the duty to free people
around the world,” that seems to suggest a different
mission than ridding the world of WMD. Does George
Bush feel a religious mission which Americans need to
hear discussed? We don’t know, and we never will,
because your press corps will never dare ask him.
Instead, Dowd’s headline talks about peanut butter. Is
she concerned about global war? Yes, but she’s also
concerned about John Kerry’s sandwich, the one we read
about on page one on yesterday’s inane New York
Times..
Their focus on trivia is an addiction—a raging,
millionaire’s mental illness. Their opinion leaders
are multimillionaires, and they do behave like a
perfumed court—like Marie Antoinette’s inner circle.
As they’ve long shown, they are impervious to serious
thought, as their class has always been. And they
continue to clown at a dangerous time, at a time that
imperils the world.
While they clowned about Gary Condit, Osama’s men were
tooling those planes. And now, as they clown about
peanut butter, Osama’s men are still at work. And what
will happen to your country because Wilgoren and Dowd
set the tone? Let us finally tell you your future:
Osama’s men will come with a bomb (see below), and
they’ll destroy an American city. American society
will end on that day. And when it does, you can think
of Wilgoren and Dowd—and you can think of the “letters
editor” who laughed in your face with that letter
today. They’ve made a joke of your discourse for
years—while your enemies hunt for a bomb. There is
little chance those enemies won’t succeed, because
screaming idiots—screaming idiots—have long been in
charge of your discourse.
History makes it crystal clear—those who clown will be
destroyed. Marie Antoinette’s posse lost their fine
heads. A larger disaster awaits you and yours. Let
them eat peanut butter, the Times says.
REMEMBER, CASSANDRA WAS RIGHT: Richard Gephardt, on
Hardball last November:
GEPHARDT: What are we worried about? We’re worried
about an A-bomb in a Ryder truck in Washington, in St.
Louis, in L.A. It can’t happen. We have to prevent it
from happening. It cannot happen.
“We have to prevent it from happening,” Gephardt said.
But readers, it won’t be prevented from happening if
we clown about peanut butter! We can’t put idiots in
charge of vital functions—and idiots currently run our
press corps. Go out and spend a dollar today. Let the
Times show you it’s true.
TINA BROWN, FULLY SANE: Yes! This disordered
discussion really occurred on last night’s Hardball.
Chris Matthews rapped about medals v. ribbons with RNC
chief Ed Gillespie (MSNBC transcript, including
quotation marks):
MATTHEWS: It turns out later that they were not
his—they were his service ribbons, which he now says
last night were the same as medals. What’s wrong with
him saying they’re medals if they’re ribbons, or
they’re both the same thing?
GILLESPIE: Because what he said was, he said, “Well, I
never implied that I threw my own medals.”
MATTHEWS: But he threw his ribbons, though.
GILLESPIE: He did. But hang on one second. Because he
said, I never implied that I threw my own medals. And
then he said on an interview on television—
MATTHEWS: Channel 4.
GILLESPIE: Yes. He said, “I threw my medals.” So
there—
MATTHEWS: OK. What happened was—I agree with you. I’m
with you on this but here’s the problem.
GILLESPIE: Can I finish the rest?
MATTHEWS: You’re arguing—you’re arguing about a third
of a century ago and a local Channel 4 reporter here
in Washington, WRC, saying you threw your bronze and
your star and he said beyond that and then he said
other ribbons, other medals, right? But he didn’t
actually say, “I threw my bronze and my—and my
silver.”
GILLESPIE: What she said was, you threw your Bronze
Star, your Purple Heart and your Silver Star, and he
said, “That’s right, and then a few other medals.” And
so the fact is he said—
MATTHEWS: But he said he threw away those ribbons.
GILLESPIE: But then fine. Then later on he said…
In a dangerous world, that discussion is insane. But
Matthews has hosted discussions like this for year
after year after year. By the way: True to the way
your discourse works, neither Matthews nor Gillespie
had a transcript of Kerry’s 33-year-old comments. Each
man kept misstating Kerry’s remarks. This is the way
the clowning clown Matthews has treated your lives for
seven years. (Happy anniversary, Chris!}
Yes, this is a form of illness, but they insist on
indulging it. They’ve built your discourse around this
nonsense for at least the past dozen years. Four years
ago, it was earth tones, Love Story, dog pills and
Love Canal, with RNC shills like Katharine Seelye
coming up with strange “misquotations,” and with
screaming mimis like Matthews lying in your face each
night (for one extended example, see THE DAILY HOWLER,
11/18/02). You must see this for what it is. And you
must understand that this bizarre group will never go
away until forced.
But one person—one—is quite sane today. In this
morning’s Washington Post, Tina Brown lays it out nice
and clear:
BROWN: The Republican attack machine—again—has made
the right calculation: Hit ’em with trivia. Bait the
hook with the absurd “issue” of whether it was medals
or ribbons that Kerry hurled over the wall when he was
a 27-year-old hothead. Then watch the media
bite—they’ll do it every time—and let Kerry rise to it
and blow it. Presto, a thrice-wounded, decorated war
hero running against a president who went missing from
the National Guard is suddenly muddying up his own
record on the morning talk shows. Shades of 2000, when
Bush jokily bowled oranges down the aisle of his
campaign plane while Gore argued about whether he did
or didn’t say he invented the Internet.
Tina is wrong on one point; Gore almost never
discussed the endless inanity about invented the
Internet. (Gore was criticized for not taking on the
endless trivia. Today, Kerry is being criticized for
having done so.) But the press corps flogged invented
the Internet for two solid years, feigning concern
about Gore’s troubling character, and they flogged
other fake inventions—Love Story, Love Canal, doggy
pills, earth tones—as they made a vast joke of your
lives.
“Hit ’em with trivia,” Brown derides. But why does the
press corps luv such talk? In October 2000, Margaret
Carlson explained. Carlson appeared on the Imus show
to discuss press coverage of Bush and Gore’s first
debate. As she noted, Gore was being slammed as a liar
because of a few exceptionally trivial misstatements.
(To state the obvious, most of Gore’s alleged
“misstatements” weren’t misstatements at all.)
Meanwhile, much larger howlers were being
ignored—misstatements by Bush about policy matters.
Speaking with Imus, Carlson explained the double
standard. Here she was, explaining why Bush’s groaners
were being ignored:
CARLSON (10/10/00): You can actually disprove some of
what Bush is saying if you really get in the weeds and
get out your calculator or you look at his record in
Texas. But it’s really easy, and it’s fun, to disprove
Gore.
Amazing, isn’t it? (And perhaps you can sense the
“liberal bias.”) According to Carlson, the press was
trashing Gore over trivia because it was “easy” and
“fun” to do so! The millionaire pundit kept talking:
CARLSON: I actually happen to know people who need
government, and so they would care more about the
programs, and [less] about the things we kind of make
fun of…But as sport, and as our enterprise, Gore
coming up with another whopper is greatly entertaining
to us. And we can disprove it in a way we can’t
disprove these other things.
The press was chasing trivial errors because it was
“greatly entertaining.” Meanwhile, they were ignoring
Bush’s serious errors because they weren’t as easy to
disprove! According to Carlson, Candidate Gore was
being flogged because it was “entertaining” and “fun.”
The coverage of this election was “sport,” Carlson
amazingly said.
Much of what Carlson said this day was disingenuous,
of course. In fact, it was perfectly easy to
“disprove” much of what Bush was saying (see THE DAILY
HOWLER, 9/4/03). But on this day, Carlson gave an idea
of why you’re reading fake letters in today’s Times,
and why you’re reading about peanut butter. Brown is
quite sane, but she’s also polite, so let us say it
one more time: Your Washington press corps is deeply
disordered. Wilgoren and Dowd are eager to prove it.
There’s no sign they ever will stop.
TODAY’S OTHER CONSUMMATE FOOL: Today’s other
consummate fool is the Washington Post’s Richard
Cohen. Peanut butter makes his lead paragraph. Cohen
is part of a vacuous elite—pampered, perfumed,
overpaid, fat and happy. These people can’t grasp the
damage done by the trivialization of your discourse.
And Cohen, of course, is scolding Kerry because he
dared fight back this week. Understand how these
people “think.” Gore is wrong when he doesn’t fight.
Kerry is wrong when he does.
Cohen is a screaming fool. But it’s good to be Cohen,
squire of New York, overpaid and over-praised. As a
matter of fact, it will be good to be Richard Cohen
until al Qaeda comes to New York and puts an end to
all New Yorkers’ lives.