How things get ‘proven’ in Greater Wingnuttia:
1.) Wingnut #1 asserts that the NY Times gave MoveOn a super-sweet deal on the ad because they hate America, and not out of general business practices.
2.) Wingnut #2 repeats the claim, links to wingnut #1, and goes on a rant about the perfidy of the NY Times, to include a link to the NY Times stock performance in 2006.
3.) Wingnut #3 links to wingnut #2, and states:
Having done its best for the past four years to undermine the war effort, disrupt national security, aid and abet our enemies, and provide comfort to terrorists, the New York Times has now gone one step further in its efforts to undermine the war.
Newsbusters is reporting that MoveOn.org was given a discount from the New York Times for its anti-Petraeus advertisement. Mind you, it received the political advertising discount that every political advertiser gets, but received an additional $102,000.00 discount.
Verdict: PROOF the NY Times hates America. No one, of course, has examined NY Times past rates, no one has asked the NY Times for their input. Doesn’t matter- we have three links! IT IS FACT.
FYI- Pariser of MoveOn stated, on Hardball, that the ad cost “about 70k.” Tapper reports it was approximately 65k. Now I don’t know about you, but 65k is not “about 70k” in my book. I smell a CONspiracy. Someone better get to the bottom of this, because that 5k discrepancy is important. I am guessing the NY Times overcharged them, and then spent the five thousand off the books on hair dye for Osama’s beard so he looked good in his latest video. Or maybe they funded some underage abortions. Who knows? With the NY Times, anything is possible!
*** Update ***
And now Rush Limbaugh and the NY Post are in the act. Any truth to the matter- well, we still don’t know, no one has actually investigated, but repeat something often enough and it is fact! Add fact-free McQ to the mix.
Is one person going to actually investigate this- like, for example, ask about NY Times normal business practices? Sniff around and find out what other people actually pay, rather than the list price? Maybe ask Ari Fleischer or his group what they paid? or is it just FACT because enough droolers repeated it?
Zifnab
One thing is damn sure. They didn’t spend the money supporting our troops.
whippoorwill
It’s why we call them wingnut. Once they get to spinning sometimes they get to spinning so fast they launch themselves into outer space.
Jake
Shouldn’t this get the new tag?
OMG, Traitorz R in the NYT, aiding UR Enemeez!
Part of me wants this unhinged, Cheeto spittle-flinging, bullshit to stop before some whack job tries to Protect America by blowing part of it up.
Part of me thinks the spectacle of Wingnuts getting nuttier is a beautiful thing.
Oh yes: Damn you Scott T. Beauchamp!
And Jamil Hussein.
Chris Peterson
A relevant point from the comments at ConfederateYankee’s post by Jason Van Steenwyk, a mil-blogger I have read in the past:
Doesn’t say anything about the validity of any numbers cited above, but does give some context.
Bruno
This is what makes me just laugh at the greater wingnuttia on a regular basis; what they choose for their daily outrage.
cleek
context in general has a liberal bias
Fwiffo
It’s weird how people mindlessly repeat phrases without actually thinking about them. Like someone who writes “for all intensive purposes.” I mean, do they go around using words like “abet” in their everyday conversations? Ever?
Tlaloc
“FYI- Pariser of MoveOn stated, on Hardball, that the ad cost “about 70k.” Tapper reports it was approximately 65k. Now I don’t know about you, but 65k is not “about 70k” in my book. I smell a CONspiracy. Someone better get to the bottom of this, because that 5k discrepancy is important. I am guessing the NY Times overcharged them, and then spent the five thousand off the books on hair dye for Osama’s beard so he looked good in his latest video. Or maybe they funded some underage abortions. Who knows? With the NY Times, anything is possible!”
DO NOT ENCOURAGE!
These are the same people who don;t get that Colbert Report is satire.
Tlaloc
“It’s weird how people mindlessly repeat phrases without actually thinking about them. Like someone who writes “for all intensive purposes.” I mean, do they go around using words like “abet” in their everyday conversations? Ever?”
it’s “for all intents and purposes” not “intensive purposes.”
using “aiding and abetting” makes sense since it is the actual legal term.
Pb
I stopped reading here. Hilarious!
Nikki
And for some reason, that line made me laugh out loud.
jenniebee
The New York Times employed Judith Miller, whose Chalabi and Cheney funneled articles were a major contributor to the administration’s ability to divert troops away from Afghanistan, and they still employ Tom Friedman, whose apologias for going to war in Iraq have been so pervasive that his name is now synonymous with a unit of time he has repeatedly urged that we should stay there, just to see what happens. This was done at the cost of going after the guy who actually, you know, killed three thousand US civilians. This turn of events allowed Bin Laden to escape and stay alive and active.
So I’m going to have to agree with Red State on this one – the NYT has done an immense amount of harm to our national security. Red State’s time frame is just a little off.
We’re not so different, you and I…
Tsulagi
Unlike Wingnut #1 and #2, Wingnut #3 is slacking. Nothing puts the “known” in known truth like colorful charts and PowerPoint. Just ask Petraeus.
r4d20
Laugh? Cry? I dont know.
They are so determined to avoid confronting their mistakes, so its blame the media all day every day.
MBL
I think he gets that it’s not “intensive,” Tlaloc.
Oregonian
Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t the NYT edition with the MoveOn ad also have a full page ad from Ari Fleischer’s new group “Freedom Watch”? Does anyone have any evidence that the two groups paid different rates?
I didn’t find either ad to be very persuasive, but it’s hard to see a bias if both of them get published.
Bubblegum Tate
Not to mention the kerning. God knows what sort of unmitigated evil might be discovered if anybody checked that.
Pb
Heh, about those Freedom’s Watch guys, guess what they have in common…
Shock! They go into all the gory background details, too…
ThymeZone
Welcome to Usenet circa 1995, John. This is how “information” flows on the tubes and did long before the term “blog” was coined.
In the world of the information challenged, it’s all self-referential and complete bullshit.
I haven’t attended your classes on comms, but my impression of the reason why some people scream all the time about “the media” is because they fear that the simple dissemination of information — false or not — will cause people to just automatically believe it and then … well, you know, the terrorists win.
In fact, what I think happens is that over time people separate into demographics delineated by their capacity to process information. Some people just can’t do it, we call these people Red Staters. Some people do it very well, we call these people Markos Moulitsas and John Cole.
The GOP has ridden a wavelet of information-challenged political power for a while. I think that wavelet is now over, and that the information-savvy people are gaining the upper hand once again.
I know it’s a slim hope, but hey ….
Ripley
The folks at NewsBusters are also blatant bandwidth thieves. Check the source for some of their pics – little hot-linking bastards!
Punchy
Maybe Rush Limbaugh isn’t so fat after all….
The Other Steve
See this is what makes the English unit system so much better. Whereas a kilogram is defined by some block of metal in France, the pound is defined officially by
“A pint’s a pound the whole world round.”
Take that frenchy!
norbizness
Terrorists get the comfy chair? The soft cushions?
In any event, they’re right. Keep those independent newspapers’ column-space clear for straight re-printing of press releases and government propaganda… that’s what the First Amendment was designed for!
LITBMueller
Sure, its a KNOWN FACT that Iran has been smuggling IEDs and shaped charges across the Iraq border. But, I bet you didn’t know that the NYT was funding these efforts, as well as participating in them by helping Iranians hide the IEDs in rolled-up copies of the NYT!
Remember the 2001 anthrax attacks?…and if it wasn’t for the NYT, there wouldn’t have been that big run on plastic & duct tape at Home Depot a few years back. Yessiree!
Its not Industrial Light + Magic thats assisting Bin Laden’s crew with the special effects in their videos. Its the NYT!!!
There’s just no better way to warm your cave or hideout than with a fire started with a few pages of the NYT!
TRAITORS!
SpotWeld
Not to be dense here, but maybe Moveon just had the add “tipped”? Limited in circulation or issue. The price usually reflects a higher cost per reader, but due to the reduced number of total readers that see the ad it’s cheaper overall. Since the ad was bound to get commentary in the press after publication it’s not like they had to ensure it hit “every doorstep”…
Anyway to check that?
Mike S
I guess I should have known right off the bat that the idiots at Redstate would have been one of those wingnuts. They seem to be competing with Goldstein for idiot of the year award and this is one of the ways they expect to pull ahead.
jnfr
Hot-linking is a dangerous game.
X
The Times-MoveOn-discount item was read on-air by Rush Limbaugh today. And so now it passes into the realm of Wingnut Truth For All Time.
whippoorwill
Or maybe they figured that a controversial add from a controversial group about a controversial subject might mean there’d be added public interest meaning more sold papers and and on-line hits =[ greater profit margin. I’m dumb on bidness things but just speculating.
Teak111
And like nuclear waste, these chunks of GOP fluff have a half life of a billion years. My republican mother-in-law still spouts off about WMD are hidden Syria, Al Gore claimed to invent the internet, Saddam agents meeting AQ in Turkey, Iraq hidding terrorists, and Terri Shivo dancing the Mombo, and Clinton caused 911. Goebles could only be envious/proud of such excellent work by the GOP noise machine.
Dug Jay
I suspect most Republicans are very happy that the NYT published the ad, even if they did so well below market rates. The overall reaction to the ad, and to a much lesser extent, to the NYT, has rebounded to the great benefit of the Republicans and their cause; just check out how embarrassed and reluctant the Democrats are to even make a brief comment about the subject. Politico has reported that at least one Democratic congressman who is from a red state has returned his contribution from MoveOn, worried that any association with the outfit could hurt his reelection chances.
chopper
yeah, but a pint of beer weighs less than a pint of water. and a pint of strong beer weighs less than a pint of weak beer.
timb
Limbaugh TODAY was droning on about cattle futures, Chinese rocket technology, “money from the Peoples Liberation Army of China”, etc. All we needed was Craig Livingstone and it would have officially been 1997. Despite that every one of those claims amounted to absolutely nothing, they still live on with the 29% folks.
I assume, Chris Cox and Fred Thompson called him at break and told him to shut the hell up about their failure to indict such a criminal administration.
Tomorrow, it will be Hillary killing Vince Foster or Rose Law Firm billing records or all the “W” buttons torn off the White House computers…They live in a world where no claim was ever debunked.
Z
Well, chopper, a pint of strong beer certainly makes me feel lighter.
The Other Andrew
Dug Jay–yes, point out how ultimately moderate, centrist, and timid those supposedly-liberal extremists are.
Fwiffo
Yes, that’s exactly my point. They are repeating the phrase without understanding it. You don’t randomly substitute definitions for words in your everyday speech, unless you’re trying to be pretentious. So if you mean treason, you should just say “treason” instead of being a cunt.
Perry Como
Lemon party.
whippoorwill
Do you mean the twenty-nine percenter republicans who are a malignant, pus -filled, festering boil on the buttocks of America, the cause of which is to bring us secret torture chambers, permanent imprisonment without trial, political officers in every government agency, corruption as everyday business, unbound cronyism, prostitute solicitation, child abuse, and a quagmire war.
jake
I think this provides the ultimate example of Cog Dis:
Let’s say there is an administration that is trying to guide a country through the Epic All Time Battle of Good v. Evil (TM). And let’s assume that within the borders of that country there is an organization that is engaged in the following activities:
And let’s further assume that the administration, despite its sworn resolve to stop the bad guys and anyone who helps the bad guys, does nothing to stop this organization which blatantly commits its acts of terrorism on a daily basis.
But the CD sufferer can be dead certain this is going on, be outraged at the organization and yet never utter a word of criticism against the administration that sits on its thumbs while citizens commit treason.
I have to update Wiki.
JWW
To,
Those above with no honor. The NYT didn’t need a $65-$120k paycheck. They could have very easily said “thanks but no thanks”. You are a fool if you believe they are a fair news source. That really is not the point, they posted an ad that was a personal attack on the Commander of your countries combat forces for a reason. Weather you believe the war too be right or wrong or don’t care, you should be concerned. If the next war is based on something you believe in and the same actions are taken by an opposing organization, how would you respond.
That isn’t the important factor, Gen Petraeus arrived at the nations capital, first as a man, and an American citizen, then as an Armed Forces Officer, and then Commanding General. In any given instance, he should have been affored respect. Take a step back, get away from your political stand and ask yourself, if you were personally treated like this for carrying out the orders of your Commander and Chief with the approval of the Senate, how long would your patients hold?
I am not trying to justify anything, I do think that all measures taken by our Congress and Senate should display ample respect. I would guess, that the baseball players involved in the steroid investigation were not questioned in this manner.
NYT
JWW
Yes we all remember the respect that Gen. Shinsekei was given by the administration
And the respect that the RW noise machine gave to the retired generals who called for Rumsfeld to be replaced in April of 2006.
I won’t bother to go on. Its just yet another case of a political movement who spends about 80% of its time trashtalking and undermining its opponents by any means necessary and the other 20% deflecting attacks on them by calls for decency, bipartisanship, patriotism and the need to avoid causing any distress to Mrs Alito.
JWW
NYT,
Did you ever serve under Gen Shinsekei?
David
timb, Limbaugh brings up the Clinton name EVERY DAY and has done so ever since they left office in ’00. The obsession one talk show host has for an imaginary “rival” is both truly fascinating and sad. Limbaugh used to be a fun host; he always tweaked liberals and modern thought, but in an entertaining and humorous manner. The Montana Visitors Bureau, the Bungee Condom Company ads, Rita X, the various Updates and their themes, all hilarious.
But somewhere around the ’96 election cycle, he changed. Grandfather died, marriage sucked, and for some reason he decided that he could bring down the Clinton presidency all by himself with his “22 million” listeners and his “dittohead caucus”. That didn’t work out, and ever since then he’s seemed bitter and angry and has completely lost it. Six and a half years into the BUSH administration, and he can’t go a program without at least a half dozen CLINTON slams. He is to the Clinton family what Keith Olbermann is to Bill O’Reilly… obsessive almost to the point of mental illness.
JWW
NYT,
I have never seen, in any political forum such disrespect. The news channels, papers, bloggers, and street sayers are free too say what they will. The Senate and Congress should ask the questions and ask any question they want. They should also respect those they question and know the world is watching. The media is free do to do as they please, but wise decisions are not always made.
The Other Steve
You keep saying that, but I heard on the radio that Bush is going to have a press conference on Thursday announcing he is withdrawing troops.
Sounds to me like Bush is surrendering to Moveon.org.
The Other Steve
You must not read very many Republican blogs. After all, we’re all enemies of the state according to members of the red army.
The Other Steve
You have to understand the mindset of the wingnut. They felt the election was stolen from them in 1992.
Imagine how bad they must feel to have lost it again in 1996. And then to triumphantly won it in 2000 and 2004, only to realize the guy they selected is a fucking moron.
NYT
JWW
No I did not serve under Gen Shinseki. I simply read the facts on how noted military expert Paul Wolfowitz dismissed the Shinseki’s advice to Congress.
If you think that the questioning of Gen Petraeus was outrageous perhaps you could quote some, you know, facts.
From Wikipedia;
Paul Wolfowitz, called Shinseki’s estimate “far off the mark” [14] and “wildly off the mark”. Wolfowitz said it would be “hard to believe” more troops would be required for post-war Iraq than to remove Saddam Hussein from power. [1] Specifically, Wolfowitz said to the House Budget Committee on February 27, 2003:
DEP. SEC. WOLFOWITZ: There has been a good deal of comment – some of it quite outlandish – about what our postwar requirements might be in Iraq. Some of the higher end predictions we have been hearing recently, such as the notion that it will take several hundred thousand U.S. troops to provide stability in post-Saddam Iraq, are wildly off the mark. It is hard to conceive that it would take more forces to provide stability in post-Saddam Iraq than it would take to conduct the war itself and to secure the surrender of Saddam’s security forces and his army – hard to imagine.
jake
If the Merrie Shitheads of the 28 Percent Brigade were to pool their brain power they still wouldn’t scrape up the wattage to realize, much less admit that what they put in the White House is anything less than Rambo, Ronald Reagan and Angry Armageddon Jesus all rolled into one. To that set, Bush isn’t stupid, he’s not an elitist intellectual.
Just remember: The Democrats are Worse!
Dennis-SGMM
My dad always referred to Gen. Douglas MacArthur as “Dugout Doug.”
Dad was aboard the USS Utah at Pearl Harbor. He was career Navy and he fought through the entire Pacific Campaign, then in Korea and in the early days of Vietnam before retiring.
If you think that the NYT was tough on an Armed Forces Officer you should hear the troops. I served in Vietnam in the latter days and the NYT would not print some of what we had to say regarding certain officers.
DougJ
It sounds like Petraeus wants to run for president someday, according to this article.
Will it be okay to criticize him then?
TenguPhule
Respect is earned, not given.
Betray-us is a chicken-shit who buys personal advancement with the blood of his troops.
Fuck him with a jagged dildo.
TenguPhule
See Republicans, Clinton Years
We put up with dissent because only stupid people fail to heed the opposition, even if that opposition is a bunch of brain dead Republicans.
TenguPhule
Yes JWW, we know you are.
Now don’t you have to go attend a Klingon convention with the other Nutters?
Xenos
JWW: have you?
A block of highly politicized officers did make Shinseki a target, with the main subject of disagreement being the Stryker deployments. I don’t know if the Stryker, with its Canadian origins, its wheels instead of tracks, or its allegedly insufficient armor, or whatever, was the issue, but there was definitely an internal struggle over canning Shinseki that started long before Rummy ran the Pentagon.
But interestingly enough, the soldiers in Strykers are safer from IEDs, and the soldiers in the Stryker brigades seem to like them just fine. I can track down cites if you want, but I think this level of detail will bore most readers here.
What I am trying to get around to is that the Shinseki, like Clark, was widely hated in the military because he was identified as a ‘Clinton General’, and that current top brass has been purged of those insufficiently loyal to the GOP. This has not been helpful in dealing with the clusterfuck Bush has gotten us into, as the only people with credibility to address our strategic problems are now retired.
And has been widely reported, for the last two years the best and brightest young officers are getting out of the military because they can’t see a road to promotion in the politically compromised military.
jenniebee
I’ll take this one. It’d be something like:
Yay! Democracy and national debate survive another foreign policy crisis! We all win!
merlallen
How about the idiots going on and on about their “Commander AND Chief”, that cracks me up.
And didn’t the NYT hold the story about the illegal wiretaps until after the election?
What a bunch of dumbass fucking maroons.
Andrew
Presydent Bush is Commander-Chief of all the U.S. Americans.
yet another jeff
No, he’s the president of all Americans, he’s CiC in the sense of he who “shall be Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States”
AnonE.Mouse
“Weather”?”Commander and Chief”?”patients”?Not to mention the caveman syntax.
I think JWW is spoofing on your average dumbass from jake’s 28 Percent Brigade.I’ve been reading here for awhile,and the commenters here just aren’t that fucking stupid.Even the real dumbasses from the 28 Percent Brigade.
ThymeZone
Well, you are trying a little too hard with the fake misspellings as a presentation device.
Don’t take everything you see in the Troll Handbook as gospel, it makes you a little too obvious.
JWW
Hi all,
You are such an enjoyable group. I think though, you read way too deeply into what I write. Just take it as casual conversation about current events. Hell, I may be a swinger for all you know. You seem angry and want to add violent verbs where they do not exist. I also saw that funny word again “spoof”, I really wish I had the blogger definition for it.
No matter, just visiting you know, walk into a place and engage in conversation. If it’s not for you, walk away and find conversation elsewhere. If all hell breaks loose, you know your in the wrong place so you pay your tab and go somewhere quiet and ponder. You need only ask yourself one question about the encounter. ?