Atrios catches a real winner from Mary Matalin today on CNN:
We inherited a recession from President Clinton and we inherited the most tragic attack on our own soil in our nation’s history. And President Bush dealt with it. And within a year of his presidency at this comparable time, unemployment was at 5 percent. And we were creating jobs.
It’s an outright lie and not just because they didn’t “inherit” 9/11 — unemployment was actually 5.7% December 2001, as compared with 4.2% when Bush took office, and it rose to 6.3% by 2003. Obviously, no one called Matalin on it, the same way no one in the media will call Joe Klein’s friend Pete Hoekstra on any of his craziness.
The main thing I’ve learned since I began blogging and following national media closely the last year is that Republicans are simply not held to the same standards that Democrats are. There’s so many examples but compare “it was standard practice not to pay for things” to the constant — and often nonsensical — budget-scolding that we see now. I don’t know why this is. Maybe it’s that conservatives will always follow their old men wherever they want to go while liberals prefer to call their leaders sell-outs and phonies. Maybe it really is that reporters are liberals who regard Republicans as redneck retards who should be lauded for not fucking things up even worse than they do.
None of this is necessarily good for Republicans in a larger sense. They’d be better off if they felt pressure to come up with their own alternative health care plan, their own climate change proposals, realistic economic policies, and so on. Sometimes I think they’ve gotten so good at working the refs that they don’t even bother to play the game anymore.
cmorenc
Was Matlin’s husband James Carville out sick today? He’s called his wife out on her bullshit before when they’ve appeared togehter on CNN (they usually appear as an “odd bedfellows” political team). Or has she finally P****whipped him into submission at home so bad he’s timid about challenging her on joint television appearances?
demkat620
What does that even mean inherited the terrorist attacks?
She is insane.
evinfuilt
I guess since we didn’t kill Osama after the first WTC attack?
Rey
Anybody with half a brain would laugh in her face. Inherited a recession from Clinton????? 99.9% of Americans today dream about the “good old days” when Clinton was President. Cheney needs to shoot her in the face.
cmorenc
How did the Bush Administration “inherit” an attack that occurred on 9/11/2001, nearly a full eight months into Bush’s first term in office? AFTER National Security Advisor Richard Clarke (an initial holdover from the Clinton Administration) specifically warned Bush/Rice/Rumsfeld/Cheney et. al. that the potential for an attack by terrorists was high, this matter needed their urgent priority?
General Winfield Stuck
Given this statement Dougj, which I generally agree with btw, it is hard to see how it hurts the republicans in a one person one vote democracy. Especially when liberals abandon their leaders at first sign of the slightest loss of fealty to their ideals.
A recipe for disaster for the country, and the dem party. Not so much for repubs, especially with the press letting them lie with abandon on our teevees, and calling it legitimate political discourse to appease the equivilency gods for getting wingers to tune in for better ratings.
Midnight Marauder
This…this cannot be not real.
ds
Dude, this is the beginning of a 30 year campaign. Conservatives don’t mind if they sound insane. They’re in it for the long haul.
Repeat something you know is a complete lie millions of times, and soon people won’t even bother correcting you, and eventually people just adopt what you’re saying as fact.
Kids in the next generation are going to talk about how Clinton was a pretty good president, but really fucked up on 9/11.
The Republic of Stupidity
“… we inherited the most tragic attack on our own soil in our nation’s history…”
Huh?
WTF does THAT SHIT even mean?
How do you ‘inherit’ a terrorist attack that occurred EIGHT FUCKING MONTHS into your administration?
Here’s a little refresher for ya, Mary…
The sheer F-in’ gall…
smiley
They’re both media whores. Isn’t that obvious?
DougJ
it is hard to see how it hurts the republicans in a one person one vote democracy.
I think it hurts them because it makes it easy for them to skate by without governing successfully at all. But in the end, they’ll never be a real majority party until they govern successfully. It’s the same way that if all the students in a class know they’ll get a good grade regardless, the weaker ones will never actually learn the material.
gbear
Maybe it’s that conservatives will always follow their
old menchronic bullshitters wherever they want to go while liberals prefer to call their leaders sell outs and phonies.They have a playbook. Reality doesn’t matter.
General Winfield Stuck
Sure seems so, don’t it./
ds
Within a week after 9/11, some conservatives I know blamed it on Clinton. I assume it started on talk radio.
Within a month, George Bush himself was blaming the attack on Clinton.
Their aim is to alter the history books so that they say “Some Democrats say that the 9/11 attacks occurred under president Bush, while Republicans argue … ”
I’m pretty sure they’re going to be successful.
mai naem
The one who inherited any kind of attack was Clinton inheriting the Mogadishu thing from Daddy Bush. Also too, what does Carville see in Matalin. She isn’t even purdy. Also too, how come Matalin hasn’t taken hubby’s name like all good republican wimmen do? Yeah, these attacks are personal but she makes my skin crawl.
El Cid
If you say something aligned with conventional establishmentarian wisdom, you don’t have to prove your case.
If you say something to the right of conventional establishmentarian wisdom, you don’t have to prove your case.
If you say something to the left of conventional establishmentarian wisdom, you’d better be prepared to present documents and videotapes for every single moment of human history, social science, and economic theory for the last 10,000 years, and even then you won’t get a chance to do so in the 15 seconds you’re given, if everyone stops screaming at you.
Annie
@ds:
Good points. Republicans are in it for the long haul and truly believe if you say a lie over and over, it becomes true.
Following Mary’s logic, Obama inherited the failed airline bombing, the current unemployment rate, the entire Middle East conflict, and everything else that went on prior to his election. Republicans basically have nothing to run on in 2010 and 2012.
Laura W
@DougJ:
I think you mean “irregardless” there, DougJ.
I hope you are happy with what you started this morning in the Has/Have Great Grammarian Flame War of 12/27/09.
I do not know that the issue was ever resolved, which troubles me. I do note that you never returned to mediate or provide conclusive evidence that you were correct.
You are a Title Troll.
There. I said it.
General Winfield Stuck
@DougJ:
This true, but is highly mitigated by the short attention span of voters. The GOP has erased the voter ID gap that was huge favoring dems just 6 months ago. The wingnuts know how to play the refs,, as you say, and are much superior to dems in message discipline, Just like Ds says.@ds: And it does not matter if a single word they say is true./ We, as a country are slum lazy at maintaining our democracy, by not taking the time needed to become informed.
mai naem
@ds: I specifically remember listening to the 9/11 coverage on the afternoon of 9/11 and Dana Rohrbacher was already blaming it on Clinton. Keep in mind that this is within 10 hrs of the attack when everything is not even known and people are still in shock over what has happened. I truly was shocked at his response.
Chad S
So, if Bush “inherited” things from Clinton that happened 8 months into Bush’s term, I’m guessing that Matalin thinks that the current recession was caused by Obama declaring his run for the Presidency in 2007? Why stop there Mary, why not blame Obama for the Katrina disaster.
calipgyian
Bush inherited the 9/11 attacks in as much as Clinton warned Bush during the transition that he will spend more time on Bin Laden than any other thing in office and Bush ignored him.
Bush inherited the 9/11 attacks in as much as Clinton tried to kill Bin Laden in two different cruise missile strikes (one in Sudan and one in Afghanistan) that the Republicans went batshit over because it was an obvious distraction from the overwhelmingly important issue of the day – who was sucking whose dick in the Oval Office.
noncarborundum
It’s “Matalin”, BTW.
DougJ
I hope you are happy with what you started this morning in the Has/Have Great Grammarian Flame War of 12/27/09.
What I wrote was correct. I had a feeling it would cause an argument.
Dannie22
The two ugliest people on earth find each other, fall in love and get married. They stay together because they are both power- hungry, attention-grabbing whores. Carville probably respects Matalin like no other woman before for her killer quest for raw power. That she can lie without blinking only sweetens the pot. In their industry, politics, it’s all about power. Helping people is secondary. Matalin makes no bones about her lack of desire to help the people. And he loves her for it.
Annie
@General Winfield Stuck:
Ah, but we have serious journalists like Glen Beck, Rush, and Sean Hannity to inform us. Who says we are lazy. You are just an elitist snob, probably from some elitist school that educated in you in anti-American ways, who does not care for real Americans, Church, and the military, and is unpatriotic to boot because Obama is Kenyan.
So there…..
PS. Kisses to Charlie
DougJ
It’s “Matalin”, BTW.
Thanks. I fixed it.
KG
@ds: sorry, no. I can speak as someone who not too long ago was pretty well into the movement (lapsed member of the Federalist Society). They aren’t thinking long term at all. They are stuck in the 90s, it’s all about winning the next news cycle, which they think is getting smaller and smaller. When they go on the talk shows, they’re only interested in winning that segment. Once the segment is done, they don’t care anymore. They don’t get the long game anymore, they don’t have the “vision thing” as Bush 41 use to say. They lie or misrepresent stuff like this because they know that in the very few seconds their opponent has to respond, they can’t look up unemployment records for 2000-2001. It’s all about right here and right now for them, no thought about consequences or facts.
The Republic of Stupidity
@Chad S:
Well, according to Rush, it became the Obama Recession immediately after the election…
SiubhanDuinne
@DougJ
Yes. It was.
Yes. It did.
calipgyian
@noncarborundum:
Who gives a fuck? She’s a piece of shit idiot anyway.
(nothing personal :))
Who gives a fuck what her name is?
General Winfield Stuck
@Annie:
he is sitting on my lap snoozing, one tired doggie:)
Chad S
@The Republic of Stupidity: Yeah, the conservative movement is all about headlines instead of substance, and you know what: that works when people think things are going fine. When things aren’t, they want ideas and solutions, and thats why the Dems really creamed them in 2 straight elections.
JD Rhoades
@cmorenc:
Carville was there, and this was his reply, per the transcript:
CARVILLE: There’s not a single analyst that looks at this that says Obama is infinitesimally responsible for what we have as the long-term debt in this country. And the other thing is this president is, if you believe the CBO, by the way, they’re bending the cost curve on the health care thing. So what Governor Romney said just doesn’t fit with the facts. But his first real budget is going to come out I think it is in February. And let’s see where that budget is because when they take office, they’re still dealing with the predecessor’s budget. So, and again, you know, I was reading something on the Peterson Institute, which is probably the most aggressive people on the deficit there is and they’re not for pulling back the stimulus because that’s a one- time expenditure. What they’re going to have to do is something in these out years. I think these guys are going to put a budget out there that’s going to be pretty reasonable. But you’ve got to give them some enormous credit here. They have got this economy in a lot better shape today than it was a year ago. And that’s for a fact. And they’ve done it with all Democratic votes at every juncture. I think they can really take some pride in that.
No he didn’t address the “inherited the attack” nonsense. I think it’s a common thing on these shows: the Republican says something that’s just so outrageously batshit that it doesn’t even register at first.
Max
Too bad the Hamsters and America Blogs on the Left would rather fight their own party.
If we could get our shit together, we could really take these fuckers down for a generation.
Cathie from Canada
Sigh.
Napolitano was on CNN today saying “the system worked” What??? The system that let a known nutcase with explosives onto an airplane? The system where catastrophe is prevented only due to a broken detonator and alert fellow passengers? It was the stupidest talking point I’ve ever heard and the Republicans will call her on it.
General Winfield Stuck
@The Republic of Stupidity:
Yup, if we could just get back to the Reagan boom of the nineties.
AkaDad
If the media is Liberal, they’re doing it wrong.
General Winfield Stuck
@Cathie from Canada:
Yes, it was a dumb remark, but not reason to call for her firing.
Loneoak
W. made every
personpantswetter in the US feel like they had a really big dick for the first time. That’s all you really need to know about political history for 2001-2009: conservatism is a phallic cult.Cathie from Canada
Did someone call for her to be fired already? Oh, why would I be surprised?
Cat Lady
Mary Matalin has said stupid and dishonest things on CNN for years. I don’t know why CNN keeps having her on, but it says more about CNN than Mary Matalin. I think they have her on with her husband because CNN assumes they’ve already worked on the “she said he said” before they got to the studio, so CNN is buying a canned argument to put on air for cheap on a holiday weekend. My question when I read the post did anyone other than Carville push back? If not, then it just confirms my suspicion that CNN’s deal with the Carvilles is that they get both sides of the “controversy” as buy one get one free.
General Winfield Stuck
@Cathie from Canada:
Pantsload
they were calling for her to be fired before she was even hired.
And after Bush’s terror report came out saying we need to keep an eye on RW crazies, the RW crazies went, well, crazy, and called for her firing then again.
The Republic of Stupidity
I just hope Mary didn’t forget to leave a $100 bill on the night stand when she was thru… or perhaps the good people of CNN have one of those new-fangled credit card thingies by now…
The Republic of Stupidity
@Cathie from Canada:
Yes…
…the inestimable Doughy Pantload hisself… but he will undoubtedly be just the first.
I predict the refs will have to throw a flag for piling on before this one is over.
eastriver
@Laura W:
You’re wrong. Irregardless is a double-negative. “Ir” and “less” cancel each other out. Regardless means “without regard”.
Max
@eastriver: Correct. “irregardless” is not a word and it’s one of my pet peeves.
Along with “conversate”. Yikes.
ETA – I see my snark meter is broken.
SiubhanDuinne
@eastriver: Someone lost his snarkasm detector.
Laura W
@eastriver: Oh for Christ’s sake! All those God damn John Cole pet pictures have done eaten up my brain cells!
Curse you and your blasted fur fotos, Cole!
I used to could be smart.
eastriver
@Max:
Don’t get me started. Life is too short.
General Winfield Stuck
@SiubhanDuinne:
I think maybe eastriver needs some cute pet pics to get his mind right.
kay
@Cathie from Canada:
That wasn’t what she was talking about. She was talking about the system where they distribute the information on the event to other airplanes and ground locations, to try to determine if it’s an single incident, or a planned multi-plane attack. She said they notified all 138 flights in the air of the event.
Presumably so those in the air could prevent the next phase, if there were a next phase, if the objective were indeed to blow up an airplane over “US soil”.
I think she and Crowley were not on the same track. It makes sense to me that the big area of concern for HS at the time was not the foiled attack, which was over, and they can’t do anything about, but the (possible) next phase of any larger plan.
I know it doesn’t matter politically, incidentally, but I think the context is important.
She addresses the two other “systems”, the screening procedures and the watch list(s) later in the interview.
eastriver
@SiubhanDuinne:
My apologies for not reading each every comment. And by “my apologies” I am most certainly not apologizing. Sincerely.
General Winfield Stuck
@kay:
This makes sense, since I don’t watch CNN, I am glad somebody does.:)
eric
@Cat Lady: it makes for “good television.” it is as simple as that. She and James are great at cocktail parties, while always “smiling” as they lie or spin or whatever it is that they are doing at the time.
If CNN cared about getting it right, people like Dean Baker would have been on all day everyday as the real estate market was tanking. But that is not what they want. They want “colorful” and “animated” sound bite throwers.
eric
eastriver
@General Winfield Stuck:
Oh, yes, more pet pics, please! I most especially like the ones with their little heads stuffed and mounted above an old fusty fireplace. With marbles for eyeballs. Anyone have any of those?
General Winfield Stuck
@eastriver:
But you are sorry, irregardless.
General Winfield Stuck
@eastriver:
We have some stuffed and mounted trolls. They are sorta like pets.
Laura W
@Max: Oh for fuck’s sake. Et tu, Max?
Guess this is what happens when you stop commenting 897 times/day.
Can a girl get some shelter?
DonBelacquaDelPurgatorio
Mary Matalin, professional liar, makes shit up to shine GOP and blacken Dems!
Film at 11.
MTiffany
The Bush administration is blameless! Of course they inherited 9/11, and a budget deficit, and an epidemic of partial-birth abortions, and hospital wards full to overflowing of people NOT in persistent vegetative states who should NOT have been unplugged because there was every reason to believe they would someday recover and and and and… well, the rest doesn’t really matter. Suffice to say that Everything is Bill Clinton’s fault dammit!
SiubhanDuinne
@General Winfield Stuck: Yes please! Pet photos, stat!
Is Charlie still in your lap, or would he be willing to pose? (Or, might we have a View From My Lap[top] from you?)
General Winfield Stuck
@SiubhanDuinne:
Don’t want to hijack Doug’s thread. Waiting for open one.
eastriver
@General Winfield Stuck:
How about an old, grizzled vet who’s too scared to fly? You got any of them mounted?
SiubhanDuinne
@eastriver: By accepting your apologies, I am most certainly not accepting your apologies.
General Winfield Stuck
@eastriver:
Maybe! You volunteering?
edit. or, if you were referring to moi. I will fly, long as they let me take my parachute.
eastriver
@SiubhanDuinne:
Douché
kay
@General Winfield Stuck:
I read the transcript.
Candy Crowley didn’t let it get her down though. She continued to pursue her own line of statements posed as questions, independent of any response from her guest.
Candy Crowley would like you to know that this could have been prevented, and you’re not safe. The director of Homeland Security was just sort of a prop. I really don’t know why they bother with the guest.
Max
@Laura W: I owe you some cover on a future thread.
The Republic of Stupidity
@eric:
And when they’re not available, CNN will just flat-out settle for good, old-fashioned shit slinging…
General Winfield Stuck
@kay: @kay:
One of the many reasons I don’t watch CNN
eastriver
@General Winfield Stuck:
Oh, no, Generally Stuck, I was referring to you. I misremembered your parachute caveat. Well-played. Snark onwards, Christian soldier.
Max
Sadly, I must admit that I am cheering for the Cowboys this evening.
My apologies all around.
eastriver
@Max:
The ‘Boys are God’s team.
SiubhanDuinne
@General Winfield Stuck: Screw what eastriver needs. *I* need pet photos!
DougJ, John Cole, Anne Laurie, Tim F: If we ask nicely, pleasemaywehaveanopenthreadandshowpetpictures? Thank you.
General Winfield Stuck
@Max:
When playoff spots are at stake, sometimes rooting for the devil can be accepted. Buuuuut The Cowboys? Better you than me.;)
DonBelacquaDelPurgatorio
I just read this again and found myself, you know, myself.
Tell me Doug, how long did it take you to figure this out? Five minutes?
Dems held to a different standard, Mary Matalin telling lies about current politicial history …. what’s next? Don’t tell me … rocket belts?
Good Christ.
eastriver
@SiubhanDuinne:
Thanks for the lookout, Siubhán Dúinne. New thread! Pet pics!
Max
@General Winfield Stuck: Not playoff’s. Cash money for Maxy. I’m a football pool whore.
Laura W
@Max: Project Runway or Top Chef, 2010.
I’ll be counting on you, Max.
General Winfield Stuck
@SiubhanDuinne:
eastriver needs to be annoyed. So here goes
#1
#2
Forgive my DougJ. I know not what I do.
kay
@General Winfield Stuck:
I think it should be a red flag for reporters if their questions are longer than the answers. If you have to set it up with a framing paragraph, it’s not really an interview.
It’s more about…what you think.
Anyway. Ms. Crowley left where she started. Very concerned.
Max
@Laura W: Consider your back gotten.
eastriver
@General Winfield Stuck:
Well, I must say. That’s a damn cute critter. You must be very proud.
eastriver
@Max:
Now that’s just d-i-r-t-y.
Corner Stone
Doesn’t this pretty much sum up how you came to be front paging here DougJ?
Shell
Oy. I guess the long Christmas weekend is over, with it’s lovely, promised, intermission from political crazy-town.
I used to like Matalin. But has she said anything in the past 2 years approaching anything beyond partisan hack?
SiubhanDuinne
@Charlie Stuck: OMG you are the *cutest* thing! I just want to hug you and kiss you and nuzzle you nom nom nom nom nom! (Say thanks to the General for me.)
eastriver
@Corner Stone:
Ouch. You better tape an aspirin to that one, Dougie.
Corner Stone
@eastriver: Ahh, someone will post a cute pet pic and it’ll all be good again.
eastriver
@Corner Stone:
I’m still waiting for some taxidermy shots: “Cute for all time!”
DonBelacquaDelPurgatorio
@eastriver:
Great idea.
I used to have a dead lizard on my desk, named Larry. Larry the Dead Lizard. He was dessicated, basically leather.
He was always there for me.
Until the cleaning lady accidentally vacuumed him up.
GregB
9/11, or as it is known in GOP World as The Bush Mulligan.
-G
DougJ
Doesn’t this pretty much sum up how you came to be front paging here DougJ?
Too good.
DougJ
Tell me Doug, how long did it take you to figure this out? Five minutes?
I always suspected but it took me a year to amass enough evidence to say something conclusive.
SiubhanDuinne
@DonBelacquaDelPurgatorio: Hah! When I was a little girl I had a stuffed horned toad named Oscar Levant. I don’t know who did the taxidermy, but it wasn’t a very professional job. The stitching up Oscar’s belly was both ugly and, as it turned out, not very secure, and after a few years his stuffing all came out and he disintegrated. Trust me, it was *not* pretty.
FlipYrWhig
I know the answer to this, obviously, but it’s utter bullshit that bad things from the early months of Bush are “inherited” from Clinton, but bad things from the early months of Obama are, like, spontaneously generated, or something.
Anne Laurie
@General Winfield Stuck:
LOL!
P.S. What makes the sometimes harrowing/tedious/heartbreaking part of adopting a rescue dog worthwhile are those moments when they look around and you can see them thinking “Life is good. I always hoped my life would be good someday, and now it is.”
DonBelacquaDelPurgatorio
@DougJ:
I like that. Methodical, thorough.
CalD
Woo DougJ! Git ’em.
SIA aka ScreamingInAtlanta
@General Winfield Stuck: Looks like this thread is about done, but GWS I LOVE your Charlie! I looked at all the photos on Flickr. Was he a Christmas present? Did you adopt him? I must have missed the thread where he was introduced.
noncarborundum
@calipgyian:
I do. People who care to identify people correctly do. People, for example, who use search engines.
DougJ apparently does.
You don’t. I can live with that. Just don’t expect me to care what you think.
General Winfield Stuck
@SIA aka ScreamingInAtlanta:
Yes, from the Humane Shelter a few weeks ago.
calipgyian
@noncarborundum: Lets just say that I don’t care to learn the proper spelling of the name of that harpy piece of shit.
It’s my way of dehumanizing her.
Corner Stone
@calipgyian: I, for one, understood that. FWIW.
Sly
What Matalin means was that Clinton dropped the ball on getting Bin Laden when he was in Sudan in the late nineties.
Of course, when Clinton was ordering cruise missiles into terrorist camps in the Sudan at the same time, and the FBI was telling the administration that they didn’t have enough evidence against him to secure a conviction in Federal courts, Matalin and her ilk were screaming “No war for Monica! Wag the dog!”
Fortunately, Bill Clinton was too fucking boss to let that shit prevent him from doing his job to the extent that he could.
Ron
Bingo!
Steeplejack
@Laura W:
Hee-hee-hee. Agitator that you are, you tried to stir things up at #18, and it came back to bite you on the ass. Any of my lips is smiling.
“Gimme Shelter” was a high point–right up until Mick Jagger inserted himself into the proceedings. Ngrr!
Jim Pharo
I start with the liberal media actually being liberal because, they are, you know, non-insane. Then as actual conservatives start to join the media, they discover, a la John Cole, that much of what they thought was true is, well, insane. When we see media figures standing up to say the liberals are right, they’ll surely have been conservatives.
Tom Hilton
Google Goebbels+”big lie” and you’ll figure it out. Republicans get away with it because they’re completely shameless. Democrats don’tbecause they actually care about stupid shit like truth and reality. Life, as Kennedy said, is unfair.
The question isn’t why the bad guys have it easier; the question is how to prevail given the constraints under which we (rightly) operate. It’s useful to point out the double standard to the general public, but it is not useful to internalize the fact of the double standard as an excuse for our own failures.
bob h
Republicans are atwitter about Baucus’ infidelity. They don’t cover Diaper Dave Vitter, Gov. Sanford, Senator Ensign, et. al., on Fox? Just relieving the stresses of doing God’s work?
Will
Irregardless might not have been a word when it was used a century ago, but it’s one now. Words get coined, enter common usage and then get codified by reference material. That’s how language works.
Grammar scolds tend to be pretty ignorant when it comes to the actual ways languages evolve and change shape. I guess that their function, to be the irrational conservatives of common conversation.
Harry R. Sohl
According to Mary Matalin, we inherited the crotch bomber from Bush.
Wag that dog, bitch!!
Jody
“Sometimes I think they’ve gotten so good at working the refs that they don’t even bother to play the game anymore.”
That’s the best explanation I’ve heard about GOP tactics in a long time. It certainly goes a long way to explain the level of sheer disconnect they exhibit.