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December 20, 2004
Something to Brighten Your Day

Posted by Bill

This quote annoys me on many levels ...

What did you think of the bloggers' role in the Dan Rather affair?

I think they did a disservice to the debate because they made the debate about the documents and not about the president of the United States. There was another half to that story that had to do with verifiable events of what Bush may have been up to.

... namely the typically clueless questioning publication, the narrow minded, ideologically-driven inaccuracy of the quote itself ... and the distasteful identity of the overhyped interviewee. The merit of Bush's service can be viewed as a completely distinct issue from the use of blatantly false documentation by a major news organization just prior to an election.

Guess who? No peeking.

(Via a ticked off e-mail from Geraghty)

UPDATE: Powerline bothers to rip her line to shreds. Hypothetical, abstractly analogous question for Newsweek: would you interview a stripper for her expertise on brain surgery? The woman's most notable "contributions" consist of snarky jokes about anal sex and pimping the career of a prostitute with cooperative reporter-subject faux-lesbian pics* - what are the odds that she grasps that the maintenance of a fragile public trust is necessary to ensure the healthy function of the fourth estate in a representative democracy?

UPDATE: Malkin has more.


* Ok, ok, so maybe there's a possibility that I asked Bob Schieffer to cooperate in a similar ploy, but he refused, dammit.

UPDATE: "Angers" changed to "annoys" - more accurate.

Posted by Bill at December 20, 2004 02:48 PM | TrackBack (9)

Comments

Posted by: Sharp as a Marble [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 03:02 PM

Ah, yes - the Monica Lewinski of the Blogosphere - or is it the Anna Nicole Smith?

Posted by: Parker [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 03:06 PM

heh. Like I needed any more assurance that she who need not be named is well and truly enamored of the MSM and their quasi-worship of her. Either that or she's just pissed someone else got headlines....

I stopped taking her seriously months ago.b

Posted by: Caltechgirl [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 03:20 PM

But as far as the MSM is concerned, she is the only "blogger" out there. So she is only doing a disservice to herself.

I'm thinking of a two-word phrase. First word is "cluster". Second word is not "bomb".

Posted by: Cranky Neocon [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 03:32 PM

Clusterberries!

Mmmmmmmmmmmmm!

Posted by: Bill from INDC [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 03:36 PM

Cluster Migraine?

Posted by: Sharp as a Marble [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 03:47 PM

The wonderful thing about Cox is that though other middling bloggers can occasionally astound you with their insights, she manages to keep her commentary consistent with what you expect of her.

Of course, what we expect from her isn't much.

Posted by: C.Y. [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 04:00 PM

Dang, I guessed wrong. I was gonna say David Brock.

Posted by: SeanGleeson [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 04:17 PM

. . . There was another half to that story that had to do with verifiable events of what Bush may have been up to . . .

. . . which she was perfectly free to investigate, along with another half-million bloggers and thousands of journalists backed by the multi-billion-dollar resources of the MSM. If it was all so "verifiable," why was the best anyone could come up with was (1) re-heated four year-old testimony from a vice-chairman of the Kerry campaign (contradicted by his own daughter) and (2) forged documents obtained by (3) a whack-job Bush-hater who got them from a mystery man at a rodeo after even Michael Moore rejected them?

Posted by: Raving Atheist [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 04:47 PM

"Verifiable" and "may have been" are a wee bit contradictory, eh Wonk?

Posted by: Beck [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 04:52 PM

You think she learned her logic skills from Michael Moore? I mean they appear to have the same incoherancy that you find in most of his letters, books, or movies.

I bet that being quoted by Powerline and INDC just makes here day. Well, as long as she doesn't read any of the comment sections. You guys are brutal. Usually factual, sometimes really funny, but brutal.

Keep up the good work.

Posted by: Nylarthotep [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 05:00 PM

Everything y'all have said about Wonkette is true.

Plus, she's not anywhere near as hot as that skank friend of hers.

Posted by: Doug F [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 05:26 PM

So some bloggers who sold out and became mouth pieces for the Democratic party line (Wonkette and Andrew Sullivan come to mind), are now becoming the most quoted, media-darling representatives of the blogosphere in the MSM.

And people are surprised by this?

Posted by: jmaster [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 05:46 PM

So typical of the dishonest mainstream media to highlight someone who on Election Day made a fool of herself, and to allow her to say such stupid things without being challenged.

I wonder what she thinks about kerry's Vietnam and post-Vietnam activities? Or are they things which happened along time ago and thus not important?

Posted by: max [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 05:50 PM

Wankette, in this little sound bite, fails to recognize that the whole (non-)issue of Bush's ANG history has been thoroughly combed for inconsistencies for YEARS, going back to his days as Governor of Texas. Once again, though, she--like other liberals--chooses to ignore the inconvenient facts to further her own anti-Bush agenda. Stupid tramp.

Every time that irritatingly giggly Barbie-blogger gets treated seriously, it reminds me of the completely dumbed-down white trash-ification of the media in general. I suppose if I, as a female, decided to start writing smutty MTV News-like rubbish, I might get more readers as well. I just don't care to have the type of "readers" who get their news or opinion peppered commercially and cheaply with innuendo. My twelve readers are smarter than that.

Posted by: Beth the VRW Conspirator [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 07:24 PM

Clusters? Globular clusters maybe? :)

Posted by: mshyde [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 08:33 PM

Why do people issist on fighting a lost battle. This was one of the worst written things I've ever read. And through News Week's awesome journalistic integrity, fails to mention that this "satirical blog" writer is a moonbat and is pretty damn nuts.
Cluster nucking fut

Posted by: Big Mac w/ an Egg [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 09:00 PM

Okay, after reading her comment and following the link to her blog, I'm pretty damn sure I'm in love with Beth the VRW Conspirator. I suspect I'll have to start a blog now just to give her an excuse to notice me *sigh*

As for the topic - the MSM's absurd fascination and deference to Wonkette boggles me. It can't just be lefty bias, that's not enough. There's plenty of intelligent lefties - okay, scratch that, lefties who are better at fooling folks into thinking they're intelligent - than she is. The only explanation I can think of for it is that they simply want to keep people away from the blogosphere altogether, both left and right, because they know that the right regularly kicks the left's ass in the blogosphere, so they make her the entryway so that no one will bother looking any further.

Qwinn

Posted by: Qwinn [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 10:02 PM

Oh, and one more thing:

"...verifiable events of what Bush may have been up to."

How can anyone possibly say that Bush "may have been up to" something that she just deemed as "verifiable", and not be driven mad by the intensity of her own ideological spin? That chick's got enough torque going to form a pulsar.

Qwinn

Posted by: Qwinn [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 20, 2004 10:31 PM

Personally I think the NewsMedia's embrace of Wonkette is exactly because she is such trash that it demeans the blogosphere by association.

I don't care that the Washingtonienne invented stories of anal-sex favors with the Washington elite... but it certainly speaks to Wonkette's credibility that she participated in the propagation of that fraud.

So of course Wonkette defends Dan Rather... Wonkette has no choice but to defend Dan Rather's use of fake documents just as the Wonkette/Washingtoniene used fake 'documents' to sell their story.

Wonkette is Dan Rather.

Posted by: DANEgerus [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 21, 2004 12:19 AM

Nobody wants to say it, but I can 'cus I'm a non-blogger:

It's Glenn's fault, if he wouldn't have linked to her weak stuff early on, she'd be a nobody.

Posted by: JFH [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 21, 2004 09:25 AM

Wow my own INDClanche. I don't know how you found that post but thank you.

Posted by: Jane [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 21, 2004 11:29 AM