Earlier I spoke via email with Glenn Greenwald and agreed to run a response from him.
Here is what he wrote:
*************************************************
What you wrote about Accountability Now is a complete falsehood topped off by reckless innuendo:
(1) Every single fact about expenses that you cited by linking to some third party — as though these expenses were hidden and only unearthed by some intrepid investigation — were, in fact, copied directly from the Accountability Now website, where every penny spent is fully and publicly disclosed. The only reason you or anyone else know about any of this is because we fully disclosed every penny spent and on what it was spent.
It’s impossible to have greater disclosure of expenses than what we provided — both publicly (far beyond what the law requires) and to our donors.
(2) Contrary to the myth under which you are inexcusably and slothfully laboring, the purpose of Accountability Now — which I founded right on my blog — is not and never was to collect money to give them to candidates. If we had given the money we raised to candidates, that would be a total violation of the organization’s purpose. I just saw now that you retracted that claim you made, but two seconds of research by you — before recklessly spitting our your accusation — would have revealed how wrong you were.
The purpose of Accountability Now is and always was two-fold, and it’s exactly what we stated clearly from the start: (a) to create a network of organizational donors and supporters, to form an infrastructure that will enable progressive candidates to mount a credible challenge against incumbents, and (b) to recruit credible primary challengers by identifying vulnerable incumbents, finding good challengers, and then persuading them to run. That’s why the expenses are not contributions to political candidates. That has nothing to do with the group’s function.
(3) Contrary to the lie you told, the PAC is a resounding financial success, not a “financial failure.” Our accomplishments are long and publicly documented — and are detailed in our 2009 Year-End Report to donors, which is published right on the front page of the PAC’s site. Most of our accomplishments have been publicly reported in large news outlets.
We began by assembling a truly unprecedented and formidable coalition of some of the largest unions, grass-roots and advocacy groups, and top liberal bloggers to provide the infrastructure of support for recruited primary challengers, culminating in a half-day session of presentations we sponsored and organized for them in DC. For the last half of 2009, we played the lead role in recruiting Bill Halter to run against Blanche Lincoln: by physically visiting the district, interviewing local political leaders, communicating with Halter for months, forming a Draft Halter campaign, hosting an event for him in DC, and preparing reports and election analyses on his prospects for our coalition partners whose support was vital to convincing him to run (MoveOn, SEIU, Daily Kos, DFA and many others).
Recruiting Bill Halter to run against Blanche Lincoln — by outlining for him his path to electoral success and persuading him that the coalition we assembled would enable a real challenge to be mounted — was our top priority for the last six months and was a major success.
For the last year, we also physically visited many other districts around the country, conducted in-district polling, launched campaigns against bad incumbents to weaken them for a challenge, prepared lengthy reports for our coalition partners analyzing possible races, held regular conference calls with them to discuss who should be targeted, and met with numerous other potential primary recruits. The perception that this is a truly hideous political climate for Democrats made it difficult to convince people — beyond Halter — to endure the huge costs and risks to challenging a incumbent, but the network we created will endure.
We did all of that: (a) with only three people working regularly on all of this — me, Jane and an Executive Director, as well as a few per-project contractors (such as for communications and PR); (b) on a shoestring budget; and most of all (c) without ever once having to go back to our donors to raise funds after our initial mid-2008 fundraiser. That was possible because of how frugal we were with the hiring and spending.
An organization that functions for almost two full years based on one initial fund-raising event, that never has to go back to raise further funds, and that has accomplished what we have, is a huge financial success.
(4) All PACs — large and small — are subject to extremely rigorous legal, accounting and filing requirements. It’s impossible to comply without having lawyers and accountants who are familiar with these requirements do that work. That means that a PAC with a small budget, like ours, is going to spend a large amount of money on legal, accounting and administrative expenses. There’s no way around that. It’s true for every PAC that complies with these laws, as we did.
(5) Because all of the PAC’s work was done by 3 people, the work I did on Accountability Now was more time-consuming and demanding that anything else I did with the exception of my blog. Some months, it competed with my blogging work in terms of the time required. Had we hired someone to manage the PAC, we would have had to spend a lot more than $48,000/year (it was impossible to find a competent Executive Director anywhere near that amount, and the EDs we hired — none of whom we had any prior personal relationship with — were paid almost double that). Several months after the PAC was formed, we decided that, rather than hiring a full-time PAC Manager, Jane and I would split the responsibility of managing and overseeing the PAC and the minimal compensation for it because (a) we didn’t want to spend the far greater amounts of money to hire a PAC Manager full-time and (b) we knew best why our donors supported the PAC and how it should be run to fulfill that mission.
If someone is independently wealthy, I suppose they can work at what amounts to a demanding part-time job without pay, but that’s not my situation. For the work we had to do and still do managing it, $2,000/month is a significant under-payment. Go look at what people who run political PACs are paid – it’s usually 5 times that, at least.
In any event, all of this — payments to every last person — is and was fully disclosed for all the world to see. That’s the only reason you know about it.
(6) This smear comes from one place: blogs that are devoted to revering Barack Obama and despising anyone who speaks ill of him. Just like Bush followers invariably tried to slime the personal credibility of anyone who dissented from their movement (Richard Clarke, Joe Wilson, Paul O’Neill, David Frum), the real purpose of this is to try to smear Jane Hamsher (and, much more distantly, me) for the Crime of Speaking Ill of the Leader. If enough money signs are thrown around enough times with her name, Obama cultists who view her as a Traitor will declare that some great impropriety has taken place. But the smear lacks even a single concrete accusation, let alone a true one.
That’s why it’s all coming from Obama-revering circles. It has nothing to do with the issues raised and everything to do with the standard political cult behavior of trying to smear those who oppose the Leader.
In this case, it backfired. What you said was blatantly false. You were so reckless in what you said that you had to retract it. Every actual fact that you cited was disclosed long ago by Accountability Now as clearly and publicly as possible.
Being able to accomplish what we accomplished with AN, with a tiny budget of small donors who were never asked again to donate, is one of the things about which I’m most proud in terms of the work I’ve done in the past 18 months. What is missing more than anything from Washington is a credible infrastructure to recruit and support primary challengers against unaccountable incumbents, and from scratch, we created that. Every last aspect of the group’s activities and finances were publicly disclosed way beyond what the law requires. The ones who have been exposed and whose credibility has been damaged are people (like you) willing to spout false and baseless accusations without bothering to do the slightest work to first find out if what you’re saying is true, all because the people you’re smearing don’t sufficiently revere your Leader.
Chyron HR
Pfft, how dare you “slothful” “Obama cultists” criticize the great Greenwald?
(P.S. He wrote two bestselling books and is therefore right.)
furioso ateo
OK, I got halway through that. WTF is his problem?
He probably used the word “slothfully” because he thought it particularly biting.
D0n Camillo
Stop pussyfooting around Glen, and tell us how you really feel.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
Nothing like a bunch of people on the same side agreeing to shoot each other in the head.
Robertdsc-iphone
Minus points for the Dear Leader shit. That’s a big fucking problem.
wesosan
Glenn Greenwald uses a lot of words.
He should have just said – “Fuck you, DougJ – I am demoting you to Lukore [LK]!”
Seebach
Pretty feisty for a guy who thought he could ignore politics until 9/11.
After Reagan and Iran-Contra, still thought both parties were comprised of mature technocrats who balanced the ship of state for the good of humanity. Heh.
Mnemosyne
And yet when Greenwald falsely accuses people of concealing their financial interests, he only does it for Truth and Justice so it’s A-OK, unlike us lowly Obots.
different church-lady
Is this one of these things I should care about but don’t have time to care about, and if I did have time to care about it I’d better understand how it’s yet another tempest in a teapot?
GReynoldsCT00
too many words!! Can’t he say it in a few paragraphs?
EdTheRed
WALTER: Huh. I did not know that. Well, it’s water under the bridge. And we do enter the next round-robin, am I wrong?
DUDE: No, you’re not wrong–
WALTER: AM I WRONG?!
DUDE: You’re not wrong, Walter, you’re just an asshole.
;-)
arguingwithsignposts
Who is the “executive director” who is not named? Just curious. And yes, I’m still wondering about the e-mail list.
Oh, and BTW, Glenn – Grover fucking Norquist!
ETA: tl; dr all of it.
Max
And again GG reverts to “dear leader” and “Obama cult” phrasing.
So mature.
Mnemosyne
In case anyone is keeping note of thin-skinned people who are happy to deal in innuendo and speculation about other people but freak out when the same treatment is applied to them, Greenwald should clearly be at the top of that list.
Dimmic Rat
So what did contributers to your PAC get for the money paid to you? Nothing. Not one candidate from AN.
Maude
Someone read it and distill it down to a few sentences. I can’t make myself go through that.
If LT is around, you know I meant that no front pager derives any income from the blog. Nice answer, I must say. I hope you keep commenting here.
joes527
@Seebach:
Interesting comment on the blog of someone who thought that the Republicans were the the bee’s knees ’till Terry fucking Schiavo
LarryB
@GReynoldsCT00:
No. They don’t call him “the Glenzilla” for nothin’, ya know.
Yaco
So, when did you guys start laughing? I managed to make it to the last paragraph.
It kind of reminds me of this classic Kids in the Hall skit.
LT
Oy.
He’s right, and I’ve said as much here today, and Christ on three coins, I’ve held my tongue about this for a long time because I think he does invaluable work and deserves some wiggle room, but GG – why the fuck do you have to be so vicious in retorts like this? It’s not a small thing. You’re right. Why can’t that be enough? Unless you hate every single person here, and believe that the bloggers and commenters here are all followers of “Dear Leader” – how fucking childish – it just takes authority away from you. Authority you deserve.
And I fought like hell at DKos and here against these smears, just to note.
dmsilev
Yeesh. If he’d strip out all the ad hominems, that screed might actually have been reasonable to read. As it is, accusing your audience of being cultists is probably not conducive to convincing them of anything.
-dms
cbear
That’s going to leave a mark.
LT
@Chyron HR:
It is so unfortunate that that comment led this off. You obviously did not read the post.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I made it as far as “slothfully and inexcusably”. Jesus. Doesn’t this guy get altitude sickness, never getting off that high horse? What a tiresome, pompous windbag he is.
AuldBlackJack
Well, they don’t call him Glennzilla for nothing.
Tell him there is a silver lining in all this, free publicity. I had never heard of Accountability Now until just now and I’m sure that’s true for many other blog readers. Maybe Glenn and Jane get more coin ’cause of this ‘misunderstanding’.
Come’on, group hug! Kumbaya, my lord…..
Seebach
@joes527: Oh, I’m sorry. You seem to have me confused with John Cole. Who didn’t even post this blog post, let alone my comment. Just imagine what Greenwald and Hamsher could have done had they paid the fuck attention TWENTY GODDAM YEARS AGO, MOTHERFUCKERS.
joes527
@GReynoldsCT00:
Wait till he starts adding the updates. There is no point in even reading a Glenzilla post until there are at least 3 updates.
The Grand Panjandrum
Yawn. Did I miss something today?
LT
@arguingwithsignposts: Arg. the exutive director is named.
sheesh. It continues.
JoePo
The Dear Leader section is missing a !1!!1!!!
arguingwithsignposts
Just a note: can we leave the whole “best-selling book” thing out of it. Glenn Beck has had NYT bestsellers. Best-selling books don’t mean shit, and adds absolutely *nothing* to one’s credibility (c.f., Sarah Palin).
Dan
What a dick
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@dmsilev:
But no fun to write.
AhabTRuler
@LT: Yes, well, that just goes to show that the only person who comes out of this looking judicious and thoughtful is John Cole.
We’re dooooooooooooomed!
Mike Kay
could John tell Glennster to dial it down to 11 and take a pill?
joes527
@Seebach: Someone is excited. I didn’t confuse anyone, just noted the juxtaposition of your comment and the history of this blog.
arguingwithsignposts
@LT:
where? I didn’t see it in the response above. I’m genuinely curious about this. Not trying to be snarky about that.
Jade Jordan
GG you are the weakest link. I banish you to firebagger hell.
Go drink a beer with McCain. He is very very angry too.
Chyron HR
@LT:
No, I read his entire screed. That, I might add, he was invited to write for the front page of an “Obama-revering” blog by one of the resident “Obama cultists”.
P.S. He wrote two bestselling books. This is apparently relevant because somebody brings it up whenever Greenwald is criticized.
dmsilev
@Maude: I’ll try.
“The PAC is a great success since it was the primary motive force in getting a primary challenger for Blanche Lincoln. The money paid to me and Jane is reasonable considering the amount of time and effort involved. Anyone who says otherwise is an Obama-bot cultist.”
-dms
Max B.
Greenwald is an arrogant, elitist, pretentious, prickish, egotistical asshole. Fuck him.
The Grand Panjandrum
@arguingwithsignposts: Word. This is the current NY Times Nonfiction list. The Halperin and Heileman book is STILL on it and Karl Rove is on the list now.
SRW1
Can I agree with Belafon?
Mike Kay
@LT: sniveling little toesucker
JGabriel
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
BINGO! My sentiments exactly.
.
Tonal Crow
I don’t think this intramural grudge-match is helping us defeat the GOP.
Martin
Greenwald is shrill.
arguingwithsignposts
I’m still wondering about the e-mail list – where did the list come from? Did the people on the list agree to have their info disclosed to a third party? Why did they have to go to FDL for the list? Are there not other “progressive” e-mail lists out there?
Seebach
@joes527: Good catch. Sharp eye, Joey-boy.
If John Cole becomes a self-righteous soldier of American justice I’d call him out on it, too. That’s not this post, though.
What were you doing 20 years ago when you could have been auditing the Fed?
Mike Kay
@Max B.: suck language. John may faint.
Arkon DougJ
@JGabriel:
Fights like this are why we don’t have left-wing Hannities flying around in chartered planes paid for by charities.
furioso ateo
I think what Glen really wanted to call us was a bunch of goat fucking child molesters.
Seebach
@Max B.: Who also didn’t care about politics until 9/11. Mentioned in his first bestseller, BTW.
LT
@Mike Kay: You’re pretty.
Greg
So why is Firedoglake selling their user’s contact info in violation of their own privacy policy?
http://firedoglake.com/privacy/
“Information you share with this site in the course of your registration will remain confidential and unavailable to the public or to any entity other than Firedoglake, with the exception of any content you explicitly designate in your user profile for public view. This will be in your explicit control as you manage your profile.”
GambitRF
I really like Greenwald. I think he’s written a lot of tremendously important stuff on his blog. That said, this e-mail… LOL. If someone was trying to do a parody of him and intentionally making it way over the top, I’m not sure they’d bring it to this level.
Mike Kay
Shorter Glenster: “I did not have sex with that women”\
Sure glenn, you used a cigar.
arguingwithsignposts
@Greg:
keep fucking that chicken, greg. I saw that in the previous thread, and it’s a question that needs to be answered. :)
Pavlov's Dog
Glenn had me until point #6, then he turns into a major dick. Cult? That’s a lot of projection coming from someone running with the Hamsher crowd.
Svensker
@LT:
What you said.
LarryB
@LT:
A quick read back through the last few threads might refresh your memory. This blog [especially us commenters] did, with plenty of relish, baselessly accuse him of lying, cheating his donors and generally being a cynical political hack. It’s so unfair that he got P.O.’d.
Mike Kay
@LT: yup, if Jane looked like Bella Abzug, you wouldn’t be here right now.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
Damn, he almost made it thru the scree and not parody himself of claiming smear on himself and then doing just that to others.
Bravo GG, you make it easy to treat you like a wingnut, or worse.
debbie
Why are genuine apologies so difficult to get from people — regardless of where they are on the political spectrum — anymore?
Comrade Dread
No, I get the impression that this is a blogger pissing contest. Nothing to see here.
demo woman
@Mike Kay: lol!
After reading Glenn’s response, the first thing that came to my mind was that I was going to burn his f……g book. I’m not sure now whether he was the author.
Chad S
Frankly, if the allegations were false, the accused would just stick to the facts and not try to link the allegations to some giant Obama-Blumpkin conspiracy.
Shalimar
Wait…I’m not a big Obama fan, I actually agree with Greenwald that Obama’s record on civil liberties and secrecy has been a disgrace, and yet I still think Glenn comes across as a paranoid, sanctimonious asshole here. How do I deal with this cognitive dissonance?
LT
@arguingwithsignposts: “@LT:
where? I didn’t see it in the response above. I’m genuinely curious about this. Not trying to be snarky about that.”
On the Accountability Now site. Here/s an early post that names the first.
different church-lady
@Comrade Dread:
That’s what I said!
LT
@LarryB: Fair enough. But I wasn’t speaking to just this response, but a pattern. But you’re absolutely right.
Mike Kay
Glennster’s post = self-destruct button.
if ya give enough rope, they’ll hang themselves.
Bravo Glenn, I haven’t seen someone blow their brains out this way, since BillO went, “FUCK IT! WE’LL DO IT LIVE!”
jibeaux
that’s a lot of words to say fuck you and to explain that the money went to….well…I think it went to an infrastructure. No candidates, but the highways the candidates are on, or something. Does he sleep, or does he just pop trucker pills 24-7?
Martin
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): So, are we against accountability now, or only when it involves the people we’ve given money to rather than our votes?
Glenn seems pretty pissed for a guy coming under the same kind of scrutiny that he wants to run elected officials though. I thought DougJ was off-base with his original post, but based on how over-the-top the reaction was, now I’m less certain.
furioso ateo
@Shalimar: Liquor is as good an answer as any.
And I agree with you all the way.
different church-lady
@Shalimar:
The dichotomy: it is false.
indubitably
Hm. It’s my understanding those numbers weren’t posted until *after* the article was originally published. IOW, CYA.
Oh, Glenn’s righteous outrage is so … so … predictable!
LT
@Mike Kay: Someone needs to throw you a rope. Or not.
Jennifer
Well Obama has been getting so much opposition from the right.
Sad Iron
I’m sorry, but I’m with Glenn Greenwald and don’t blame him for being feisty. The original post mocked and wrongly represented something the guy has worked very hard on and strongly believes in. Don’t mess with the Glennzilla if you don’t want him to eat your feeble city in response. The original post was cavalier and wrongly called his successful efforts a failure–deal with the strong response people; it was well deserved.
tofubo
John ?? those keys ??
Elise
So…what I got from this was, “Obama Obama Obama. This is all Obama cultists fault. How dare you ask us questions.”
You know what – you hadn’t disclosed ANYTHING in detail until people started poking around and asking questions – and the reason I know that is that I started poking around FEC reports and looking at the records and blogs last summer and checked on it periodically throughout last year and this year. When people started asking questions – there seemed to be a defensiveness (not a willingness, but a defensiveness) on your parts to post some information.
Your PACs website said very little about Halter until March 1 2010. Well after you’d been notified that people were looking into your FEC filings.
You demand transparency on a regular basis from figures all over the political spectrum – from journalists, appointees, from the Administration, from the military, etc. You want it from Republicans and Democrats, but god fucking forbid anyone ever ask YOU to be transparent – the result is that you flip out and call them a CULTIST. Transparency is important – I don’t see why it’s so hard for you to deal with the request.
Mike Kay
Shorter Glennster: GET OFF MY LAWN!
jibeaux
@Sad Iron:
Well, it was long, and that RHYMES with strong…
Tsulagi
@AhabTRuler:
The Rapture must be nigh. Dogs will lie down with cats…okay, that already happens here in photos.
GG tagged you, Arkon, and correctly so. You’re busted to Bronze Rifleman. He went to the Dear Leader well a few times too many in his response, but on balance…
AhabTRuler
@arguingwithsignposts:
Because it was the list that was available and overlapped with a demographic that self-identified as sharing the general political aims of the PAC. I got on a FDL list by signing a petition, although I haven’t been hit to hard with crap from them.
Surely you know that mailing lists, e- (cyber-??)
or otherwise, are big, big business?
If you subscribe to Mother Jones magazine, they are upfront in telling you that the mag is $10 a year because they take tobacco (American Spirit, BOC) ads and sell your list to any fucker with the cash. You would not believe the crap that has shown up in my email since I subscribed.
Mike Kay
@LT: keep licking those toes, gimp.
arguingwithsignposts
@LT:
thanks.
Genine
I get what Greenwald is saying…. but it could have been said less insultingly.
Okay, Dougj was wrong, but we’re all on the same side here. This kind of response isn’t necessary at all.
This is all so… sad.
Sad Iron
I’m sorry, but I’m with Glenn Greenwald and don’t blame him for being feisty. The original post mocked and wrongly represented something the guy has worked very hard on and strongly believes in. Don’t mess with the Glennzilla if you don’t want him to eat your feeble city in response. The original post was cavalier and wrongly called his successful efforts a failure—deal with the strong response people; it was well deserved.
Glenn Greenwald
Balloon-Juice commenters, all day long:
After my response showing how false that all was (and even after a retraction had to be posted by the blogger who irresponsibly started it):
Balloon-Juice commenters:
Is there even a molecule of self-awareness here?
LT
@indubitably:
Well as long as that’s your understanding!
Jesus. What people.
Comrade Jake
You know who else was this kind of intellectual bully?
MRK
Twenty years ago…I was six.
So, that’s my excuse.
In re: Glenn’s response…you know what, it all got said before I got here. He’s right on substance, but so wrong on style that he loses on points.
Not to mention that the Arkon’s post was at best arguably accusatory, whereas Glenn goes into full-on rabid foaming.
I agree that the best impression to come out of this is of John Cole, and now that I have made absolutely no original addition to the debate, it’s time for me to retire to a showing of the Vagina Monologues.
DarrenG
The real fun in all this is that this message is from the same guy who got into a Twitter slap-fight with Ezra Klein, Jon Cohn, and DougJ over them supposedly being intemperate and uncivil in their criticism of Hamsher just last week.
/something about logs lodged in eyes
Joel
@wesosan: Win.
neil
That strawman is really convincing.
The fact remains that Glenn Greenwald is a member of a PAC devoted to defeating health care reform legislation and defeating Democratic candidates. You don’t have to blindly follow Dear Leader to oppose this kind of thing. It’s more like the liberal equivalent of the Club for Growth. Ideologically pure and tactically counterproductive.
Jody
Oh, good. There weren’t enough posts in today’s FDL/Balloon Juice pissing contest. Maybe we can get a couple more in before the day’s over.
Seebach
@Sad Iron: Yeah, Glenn has always been feisty. Y’know… after 9/11. When he could finally bothered to pay attention to politics. After it was too late. But yeah, screaming at Bush and Obama on his blog has been helpful.
LarryB
@LT: Agreed. You don’t mess with the Glenzilla. That’s actually why I like the guy. His polemic is meticulously researched, extremely well reasoned, and utterly scorched earth.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@LT: Like I said in the other thread, there is no same side finery here. It is and has been all out pol warfare with mr. GG and those of us who demand solid evidence of Obama misdeeds from claims of him being Bush like, from those who want to also call themselves democrats, or liberals.
randiego
The internets live forever, never hit “send” on something you’ve written when you’re angry, etc, etc.
I’d be pretty pissed too if I were him, but lashing out using the Dear Leader and OBOT stuff doesn’t help your case and makes you look like a nut in front of the jury.
I watch a lot of L&O.
different church-lady
This is all getting rather Kos-sian, isn’t it?
Libby
Sigh. Like I said in the original thread: Slow news cycle=blog wars.
Have to say I have no problem with criticizing President Obama from the left but I could have done without the “Dear Leader” and “Obama cult” framing in the response. Just don’t understand the logic of adopting Luntz approved language.
ondioline
Glenn:
So what exactly did you do for all that money?
I can’t say that you’ve made that clear.
And why were you so weird about disclosing your Hamsher connection in that old January BJ thread?
There’s a lot of pushback and not many facts. That’s not good.
r€nato
I fail to understand why GG insists on calling others ‘liars’ when ‘mistaken’ or ‘poorly informed’ are entirely within the realm of possibility. Surely GG is intelligent enough to understand the difference between a lie and simply being wrong.
(leaving aside the matter of whether DougJ was actually mistaken)
I get suspicious of ANYONE who loses their shit just because someone asks a few good questions.
@ondioline:
he sure is throwing up a lot of chaff, isn’t he.
arguingwithsignposts
@AhabTRuler: Check out greg’s question above. If FDL said they wouldn’t share info, they may be violating their own privacy policy.
Ed Marshall
Uh, I really don’t believe filing the paperwork on their little LLC could have been what any normal person would consider heavy lifting. He can pad up the billing hours any way he wants to and I’ll just give it a pass but I really, really, don’t think the small change donors realized Glenn and Hamsher were paying themselves like that. If they do and think that’s a great investment, more power to them I guess.
liberty60
As one who doesn’t have a dog in this fight, and reads both blogs, agreeing with most of what is said most of the time, it isn’t a pretty sight.
I really think though, this is an opportunity to talk about the blogging culture of flamewars and “enemy camps”;
I notice there is a generalized culture on blogs (politicial, lifestyle, or otherwise) where things have a tendency to devolve into high school cliques, with enemies, blood feuds, favored persons and personna non grata.
I would hate to see people on my side of the political fence fall into that.
IMO, if Doug was wrong on the facts, even unintentionally, I see no harm in shrugging , issuing a correction, and everyone getting on with their lives.
eemom
@jibeaux:
This. The so-called “mission” is so vague as to be meaningless.
Glenn didn’t practice law for very long, but he sure got the “Cover your ass” rule down.
FlipYrWhig
Dammit. I was actually all set to defend him. He was fine. He was aggrieved but with cause, and he was defending his points. And then he started on the “cult” bullshit. And the guilt-by-association bullshit. Too bad Rahm Emanuel didn’t make his usual appearance as the Keyser Soze of Why Obama Sucks.
Oh, yes, Glenn Greenwald, what a pathbreaking critic of Bad Things, he’s so brave in his Speaking Truth To Power, he’s practically Shirin Ebadi. What has he not suffered for all of our sakes?
What a motherfucking fuckstick.
Mnemosyne
@Sad Iron:
As I said, he can dish it out, but he can’t take it. If you’re going to build your career on innuendo and speculation, you don’t get to cry like a whiny-ass titty baby when someone turns your own weapon on you.
More like he tripped and fell and landed face-down in a mud puddle while trying to stomp someone’s sand castle. And now he wants us all to stop laughing at him or he’s going to call us more names and tell his mommy we were mean!
Mike Kay
@Comrade Jake: Hitler!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Glenn Greenwald:
Nope. Quite a few of us said: “Hamsher and Greenwald are irritating, self-righteous, thin-skinned, histrionic egomaniacs, but I don’t see a big scandal here.” You could have, if you had taken a deep breath and gotten over yourself for an hour or so, proved one of those and disproved the other. Instead, you proved both. One more than the other, and now you’re doing it again.
Congratulations. I guess.
LT
@LT: God damn it, what is wrong wiht the blockquotes? this comment should have looked like this:
Well as long as that’s your understanding!
Jesus. What people.
arguingwithsignposts
@Glenn Greenwald:
Answer Greg’s question, why don’t you.
Mike Kay
@FlipYrWhig:
I told ya he was a McCarthyist. Same tactics, different targets.
freelancer
@neil:
This, though you know who else liked to look at things…
Osprey
Doug, did he write that IN DIRECT RESPONSE to what you posted, or was this meant as a general response? If it was just directed at you and BJ, then he’s got some real fuckin’ issues.
Because this place has nothing to do with revering ‘dear leader’, and he went off into outer-fuckin’-space with that whole line of retort. He just completely lost control of his mental shit with that.
I’ve been reading his blog since the old UT days, and he writes a lot of insightful pieces dealing with a whole range of political malfeasance, and the AN work is commendable (though I’m sure it’ll run off and start finding people to primary Bernie “if I was any more liberal I’d be Ghandi” Sanders) but this is what I think you’d see him write if Obama himself tit-punched Jane, fire-bombed the AN website servers, and sent Glen off to GITMO.
AhabTRuler
Shit, I’ll throw you in with John as being both correct and judicious, too.
Not nearly as shocking, though.
MacLaurin
Ouch. A bit too touchy tho Mr. Glenn. On one hand, you gotta defend your turf and your credibility. On the flipside, let’s not burn our fucking bridges and go after a fly with a bazooka! (not that this blog is small fry, but this flap got corrected pretty quickly). Fuckin A, flip out on GOS if that’s the clearinghouse for such ‘smears.’
Mike Kay
@Glenn Greenwald: is this sarah palin?
williamc
DougJ,
Total fan of yours here, but Glenn has a point. Today, all day, folks here have been dissing this man, pretty much implying he’s a crook, knowing that he was going to blow in and go big-word-lawyer ballistic. This blog has been on a jihad against Jane Hamsher (totally deserved IMO), but also there has been some simmering anger at Glenn because of his alliance with her. Hamsher allied herself with Norquist, so she deserves our scorn; the enemy-of-my-enemy is my friend stuff that she engaged in during the HCR fight tarred her to a lot of people because we understand that there is no progressive alliance to be made with the CFG, they want to destroy us and everything we believe in.
Glenn though is scorned here because he accuses folks here of Obama worshiping (which most of us freely admit we do), and people get angry at being called out on it. Why?
I can’t find the link now, but JMM at TPM at the beginning of the HCR fight published a letter from a reader along the lines of “if Democrats can’t get a HCR bill with a strong public option, with these historic majorities in Congress, with a President this popular, with Republicans this untrusted, this nation is broken”. And here we are, fighting with each other to discredit Hamsher and Greenwald for no reason. He calls people here “cultists”, because in all this stuff going on all year, no one here blamed the President for anything that went wrong, even though he is responsible for the schism in the prog blogosphere now. This whole thing started because the President suggested a public option for HCR, didn’t lobby for it, and when he had the chance to add it in reconciliation, he released his plan without it, while some decided to just submit to the President while other people fought for what they wanted, and were ridiculed for it.
I read the blog here everyday, and can’t remember there being one post were the White House was responsible for anything bag happening all year…no one’s perfect, but apparently this White House is…
r€nato
@Shalimar:
go for a walk. get some fresh air. not everything in the world is about politics.
even when Bush was president, I still managed to enjoy a sunny day.
Jenn
Wow.
The last remnant of my once-enormous respect for Glenn just fell to the ground. I’m glad that he engaged to defend himself; though I will point out that it seemed most commenters (if no longer most comments) in the original thread didn’t think there was anything nefarious about the PAC to begin with.
But I am not some mindless drone in a Cult of Personality surrounding the President. And accusing all dissenters from Glenn’s Version of Truth to be such is despicable. It is entirely possible to sincerely, respectfully, and reasonably disagree about an issue, and some of the best conversations of my life have been such debates — every now and then I’ve changed someone’s mind; sometimes they’ve changed mine; but very often such debates clarify the limits of what you believe, and that’s a fabulous thing.
The world is a complex place, with some issues pretty black and white, and other issues in an impressive array of grays. Reasonable people can reasonably disagree, mindfully and in absolute good faith. I have appreciated Glenn greatly in the past, because even when we disagreed, my internal response to his positions frequently clarified and improved my thoughts/positions. His dismissive insults referencing the Dear Leader shut all of that down.
ondioline
Did the PAC’s donors knew that the money would go into the pockets of the PAC’s founders?
I don’t know the answer to that question, but it’s important.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
Oh puhlease! It might have been at one time, though I now have doubts based on recent behavior. Now it’s full of gossip, inuendo, and conspiracy theory, most of all conflation of topics and dubious assignment of motives to reach his Obama like Bush meme.
blahblahblah
Greenwald is right. Dougj was wrong. Get over it.
Ed Marshall
Glenn yelled at everyone because he’s a lawyer and that’s what you do when the facts are thin. If you are mad at him for calling names he did his job. It’s distracting you from the original question: What did you do that required that sort of compensation from the donors?
Comrade Jake
@Mnemosyne:
Mnemosyne, FTMFW!
r€nato
@Osprey:
I understand more and more how GG and Hamsher got hooked up. Birds of a feather, it would seem.
Now y’all know how the infamous Democratic Circular Firing Squad comes about.
Malron
Hahahaha another Greenwald rant about us O-bots. Thanks for Bill Halter, but let’s not act like you’re saving America with a new herd of progressive candidates just yet, OK?
As for baseless accusations, I refer you to your girlfriend Jane and her endless Rahm obsessions and constant attempts to every event as Obama shitting on the progressives. Sweep around your own front door, dude. And Fuck you. Also.
LT
@Glenn Greenwald:
What molecule do we need to understand you basing this on “Obama cultists”? We read this site enough to know that’s a silly charge.
And to whoever said upthread that GG makes false accusations about Obama, come on. I don’t have a clue how Obama is supposed to deal with the mess we’re in, but it is 100% correct to call him or any president out on detntion policies. It doesn’t matter if he inherited it.
The Radok's A Ni-
@williamc: site:balloon-juice.com “Timothy Geithner” “Larry Summers”
Go ahead. We’ll be waiting.
Joel
well, i still don’t see what their PAC is actually doing, aside from not raising very much money.
Mike Kay
@Glenn Greenwald:
What is DMDM Enterprises LLP ?
different church-lady
@williamc:
Dude, pass that bong around!
Arkon DougJ
@williamc:
I don’t think my original post was that far off the mark, consisting mostly of a link to something that no one has said was factually inaccurate. I said something I should not have said in the last sentence of it.
But I believe in letting people reply, in general — hence this post.
Mnemosyne
@DarrenG:
Yep. And just couldn’t understand why Ezra would be angry about being called a shill spreading propaganda for the administration. I mean, all he did was put “shill,” “propaganda,” and Ezra’s name in the same sentence. He didn’t directly say that Ezra was a shill spreading propaganda for the administration so clearly Ezra was in the wrong, not him!
liberty60
Re: someone upthread “cognitive dissonance”- I see no trouble at all with saying I like almost all of what Obama does, except think he is 180 degrees wrong on civil liberties and the GWOT; agree totally with Glenn on those issues, but disagree with him on HCR; agree with most of what the BJ posters write, but disagree with them sometimes.
I don’t know why things need to be framed in so polar a fashion; “fer us or agin’ us” was a stupid Bush-ism, not something we should embrace.
Malovich
*facepalm*
Alright kids, here’s the reason why I read this Blog-
Sometimes, people are wrong, and if they’re big enough, they’ll admit it. This is the critical difference between BJ and Politico, or Drudge, or WaPo (To some extent. They still do those bottom-of-the-eighth-page retractions in 6-type in Spanish when they messed up, right? No? My bad.). When they get something wrong, they’re not afraid to stand up and take it on the chin. DougJ didn’t have to print a damned thing. Glenn didn’t have to write it.
What that e-mailed response up there indicates is that Glenn seriously thinks that AN is an important endevour, that he cares enough about the readership here to set the record straight, and actually thinks this place knows what being responsible and desiring factually correct news is about.
Can you imagine Fox News giving Pelosi the same face-time they give the Wasilla Wingnut to respond to all the trash written about her? To actually give her a *guest appearance* or interview to clear the air about the accusations?
Granted, Glenn writes a lot, his posts are likely going to be fairly beefy, and that appeals to a particular audience. However, he was given space to respond. That says a *lot* about this place.
Jon Stewart could have done a lot worse by doing the same in regards to ACORN.
Mike Kay
@Glenn Greenwald:
Surely with your fealty to transparency and principal, you’ll be forthcoming and answer, What is DMDM Enterprises LLP ?
What are you hiding?
Martin
@Glenn Greenwald: You’re reading an awful lot out of the commenters here, Glenn. I don’t think a reputation of making mountains out of molehills really serves you well.
Sad Iron
@Mnemosyne
Touche. I love any extension of a Godzilla metaphor. (Full disclosure–GG is always my first stop in the blogosphere, and this site is right after. I really appreciate and respect his work, and find it built on a lot more than innuendo. That said, I concede the point that sometimes he brings a hurricane when a more moderate climate would do just fine.)
Ailuridae
@Glenn Greenwald:
Glenn, you deliberately misrepresent the overall tenor of the posts in the threads by selecting the most vitriolic. That is just weak sauce. Weak Sauce.
Guster
Good on DougJ for posting this.
I will now attempt to be more gracious in all my interactions, even though it’s passover and that means family.
cbear
@Arkon DougJ:
Uh, that’s pretty weak tea DougJ.
I’m very interested in your detailed response to Greenwald because from where I sit, you just got owned.
And, yeah, I think the Dear Leader crap is just that–crap–but directly or indirectly, you and a lot of other people here basically called the guy a crook.
Do ya think maybe you too might engage in some over-the-top invective if positions were reversed?
Just saying.
LT
@Mnemosyne: “As I said, he can dish it out, but he can’t take it.”
Are you six? And please point to where he “dished it out” in regards to the falsehoods posted here today. That would at least make six-year-old sense.
FlipYrWhig
@Glenn Greenwald:
Wouldn’t a
moleculemodicum of self-awareness also suggest that you look better using some restraint rather than impugning the motives of anyone who disagrees with you and saying that they have to be part of an unthinking and slavish cult of personality? What does that add? Why do you do that every time? Do you write about Obama’s civil liberties record sharply and critically and then say he’s proven himself a sadist with a collection of torture p0rn? Why take that last leap? How does it help?Mike Kay
@Mnemosyne: Got a link. Sounds like a fun read.
clonecone
Glenn,
On 7/18/08, you said on Salon: “Yeah – you exposed me. It’s so much fun to work 18 hours a day on a political project for no compensation that I’m just doing it for my own amusement, just to raise lots of money with no intent to spend it on things that can matter, because . . . well, there must be some reason I’m doing that.” (http://letters.mobile.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/07/18/bob_barr/view/index15.html)
We know based on FEC filings that you, through DMDM Enterprises, were paid $3813.74 less than a month later on 8/12/08. Was that payment for any consulting prior to the 7/18 statement? If not, what changed between 7/18 and 8/12 to prompt such a large consulting fee? When did you first disclose on Salon that you were getting paid by Accountability Now? Did you make any fundraising pitches on Salon after the 7/18/08 statement but prior to disclosing the payments?
Felonious Wench
Glenn,
Thanks for the information about Accountability Now. You’re still a raging dick.
Paula
Apparently he can dish it out but woe to anyone who dishes it back. Talk about thin-skinned.
r€nato
@Glenn Greenwald:
Glenn, I honestly don’t have a strong opinion about you one way or the other. Jane, on the other hand, I do. She is well-known for being completely intolerant of those who don’t toe the Hamsher party line. If I want that crap, I’ll go hang at Little Green Footballs or Free Republic.
And yet, I personally never accused her of theft.
I suppose one of the casualties of spending too much time blogging about politics, is that one begins to perceive honest questions as bitter partisan attacks, and respond in kind. Speaking of ‘modicum of self-awareness’… are you aware of how incredibly defensive you sound? Ask your inner attorney… when someone screams, “HOW DARE YOU QUESTION MY INTEGRITY?”, which alarm bells go off in your head?
Get some fresh air, Glenn, and the next time you feel the need to fire off an angry missive like this… save the draft and come back to it an hour later and see if you really want to send it as-is, or not. You’re better than this… and we really are all on the same side.
lol
Are there any candidates aside from Halter that Glenn and Jane “recruited”?
joe from Lowell
Glenn Greenwald has a weird obsession with Barack Obama.
Whenever Glenn gets any criticism, or even disagreement, he throws a hissy fit about the ‘Obama cultists’ who dare – DARE! – not to treat every word on Glenn’s blog as gospel.
Here’s a crazy idea – maybe there are people who actually don’t agree with him! Whoa! We’re through the looking glass here, people.
Frankly, I didn’t like this movie the first time, when the role of Greenwald was played by George Bush.
Comrade Jake
It would be irresponsible not to speculate further on GG’s motives here.
Mike Kay
@FlipYrWhig: C’mon. The rules are different for the Blogging elite. He’s not part of the unwashed masses, like you and me, who need to dial it down to 11 and take a pill.
Seebach
@blahblahblah: Yeah, Greenwald was right. After 9/11. Too bad he didn’t work with Jane Hamsher earlier, and been right then. She could have been working with Norquist instead of producing Natural Born Killers.
Mike Kay
@Comrade Jake: that’s because you’re a cultist and robot and follower and blah, blah, blah…
it’s okay if your glenn greenwald
IOKIYGG
mcc
This sounds like an impressive accomplishment. Can anyone point to any sources not affiliated with Accountability Now that can corroborate this picture of AN’s role in the Halter recruitment?
My Truth Hurts
You can all criticize Greenwalds tone as much as you like but the fact remains he is right more often than he is wrong. All you people have done here is prove that being right isn’t always the same thing as being popular.
Give em hell, Glenn. Too bad if their precious sensibilities are offended by you pointing out the facts.
arguingwithsignposts
@williamc:
{cough}Grover fucking Norquist{cough}
Hamsher discredited herself FOREVER when she signed anything with that piece of shit masquerading as a human being.
Francis
Intro: I am, like Glenn, a lawyer.
Rule 1: by the time you’re using adjectives, you’re losing. Witness Glenn’s opening line: “… a complete falsehood topped off by reckless innuendo.”
Now, the only thing DJ wrote of substance was the words: “a complete failure.” That’s an opinion, as Glenn well knows. There is NO, ZERO, NONE WHATSOEVER statement of fact that is false.
So right off the bat Glenn’s just wrong.
Rule 2: When your position is weak, attack without mercy. Now, see the same opening line. Though (because?) Glenn knows full well that there’s nothing false in what DJ wrote, he’s on full-force attack.
As good ol’ Willy once wrote: “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.”
Rule 3: When in doubt, bury them in b*llsh*t.
There was no need for 19 paragraphs of diatribe, if he was trying to persuade his audience (or even get anyone to read all the way through). But by god, everyone here now knows for a certainty that Glenn is 100% correct, because he has 19 paragraphs of text to prove it.
One big problem with issue PACs is that relatively few people actually want to give money to a bunch of party operatives. Donors envision their money making a real difference. Hence the extremely careful wordsmithing at Accountability Now’s website. I’ve written plenty of stuff like that in my life, that’s absolutely correct but not terribly informative.
The odd thing is that I think Glenn for the most part has the better argument. Obama has been weaker on civil rights issues than I had hoped. I attribute that to two things: the Blue Dogs and the love of power.
But ye gods, Glenn, people can disagree with you, especially with regard to your flamethrower manner (as evidenced in your response), without being an Obot.
r€nato
@My Truth Hurts: Being right is important… but it isn’t everything.
People who go through life believing that being right is all that matters, usually end up unpopular and ignored.
What good does it do to be right, if you’re so arrogant and nasty about it that all anyone remembers is you’re a huge dick?
Sly
My two cents on this whole matter:
1) Rogers Cadenhead published the FEC filings. These are available to the public, sure, but he did not repost information directly from AN’s website. AN’s website does not list total donations, only expenditures, and does not provide for the purpose of disbursement. Questions about the financial effectiveness of AN’s work can not be answered in internal expense and (an overly generic) year-end activity reports. Without what those expenses are for (which Greenwald now provided), and without how much of the PACs revenue is being eaten up by those expenses, there is no context in which to make any kind of judgement.
2) Jane Hamsher and Glenn Greenwald are not the new Richard Clarkes. For one, Richard Clarke never struck me as a self-absorbed fuckwad with all the personal charm of a syphilitic grizzly.
But hey, I’m just a deluded cultist. What do I know.
MattR
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
This was from a previous thread, but it seems instructive since it is indicative of the naivete of many of the commenters here. Let’s compare that to what Glenn says they actually did
Mike Kay
@joe from Lowell: it’s an old lawyer’s trick.
A) if the law is against you, argue the facts.
B) if the facts are against you, argue the law.
C) if the law and facts are both against you, call the otherside names and hope you can confuse the jury.
It’s simple. Some like Glenn only gets starts throwing mud when facts and principles are against him.
Chris do Cavaco
Maybe Accountability Now can take some credit for the Halter challenge, I don’t know.
But the only other thing they really seem to have done is set up websites that attack certain incumbents and troll for candidates w/o success. See:
http://www.cooperuncovered.com/
That’s pretty weak and doesn’t justify all those Strategic Consultants. Cong. Cooper voted for HCR, by the way.
Chad S
Glenn, if the initial story got the facts wrong, you would just have said so and moved on without the lashing out. You’re still lashing out. I guess a nerve was touched.
Martin
@Arkon DougJ: It wasn’t that far off the mark. Considering that Glenn and Jane have breezed through here a few times, probably the better way of handling it would have been to ask him and or Jane to respond to the link and then putting up the link and their response. They get their side out up front, and if the response is a good one then the post strengthens their position. If it’s a bad response, then the post strengthens the other position. But at least both sides are put up front.
I mean, we whack at the state of journalism pretty hard here – might as well pick up their better habits when the occasion warrants.
freelancer
@Glenn Greenwald:
I don’t need 16 graphs to know what a strawman is.
Yes, you’re right. And there’s nothing wrong with being mean, in the right context, but don’t protest too much, lady. Where there’s smoke there may be fire.
/GG modus operandi
lol
@clonecone:
Don’t expect to see an answer anytime soon.
williamc
@Arkon DougJ:
It wasn’t what you said DougJ, it was the commenters. I was at work, so didn’t read the thread at first, but as I go through it, its roughly a half-half breakdown of “I’m sure Glenn has an explanation”, and “burn him, he’s a crook in league with that witch we hate!”. I’m reducing it to a really simple deduction, but for some reason, Hamsher, Sully, and Glenn just bring out the fire in some people here…
@The Radok’s A Ni-:
I don’t have to Google it. As always, those people serve at the pleasure of the President. They aren’t doing anything he doesn’t want them to do, yet he never takes the hit for any of it here, its always his advisors fault. I’m all for circling our wagons around the WH against the Republicans and the tea party, but families fight, and the Democratic Party is the most chaotic family ever and we have to let the fights happen so we can find the best way forward. This top down thing works for Republicans because they just want to be lead, it doesn’t work for us because we are all always right all the time and need to be convinced into following along, not shamed into it by being called manic.
Mike Kay
@Francis:
THIS! 1,000 times. THIS!
FlipYrWhig
@My Truth Hurts: On the other hand, being a gigantic engorged dick isn’t the same thing as being right.
Honestly, this time I feel like he was in fact right. They collected donations to support their advocacy mission. Nothing amiss about that to me.
But why set things up so that EVERY FUCKING TIME you draw criticism, it has to be because you’re poor Saint Sebastian being impaled by the mindless ObamaCult arrows? It’s not just a chip on the shoulder, it’s a full-blown martyr complex.
JabbaTheHutaree
I think Greenwald is cleverly using a mistake on your part to imply that all opposition to Dear Leader Hamsher-Norquist is mistaken.
BombIranForChrist
I have always enjoyed reading Glen, but it seems to me that he is getting pretty screechy these days. I’ll still read him, but good god man! For someone who ostensibly stands for reason in a political landscape that is scorched with emotion, he sure seems to be losing his shit more than should be tasteful for a Man of Reason such as himself.
Kudos to Doug J for posting.
Ed Marshall
I can’t believe the man buried in all those paragraphs that he took the equivalent of a starting state prosecutor’s salary for fucking the dog and everyone is talking about his pissy attitude towards other bloggers. That’s a hell of a lawyer right there.
liberty60
@r€nato:
Amen to that; I guess this hits close to home, as someone who around the mid 1990’s, had to re-examine and eventually come to realize most of my political positions from my youth were in fact, wrong.
Being able to say, “Y’know, I was wrong about that” can be incredibly liberating.
Mike Kay
@Glenn Greenwald:
Surely with your fealty to transparency and principal, you’ll be forthcoming and answer, What is DMDM Enterprises LLP ?
Come on Glenn, stop hiding.
Seebach
@My Truth Hurts: When are one of you Hamsher/Greenwaldites going to mention the fact that Glenn didn’t even bother will following the news until after 9/11? Some crusader.
The Radok's A Ni-
@williamc: site:balloon-juice.com “cossacks work for the czar”
Again, we’ll be waiting.
Mike
Love it. You f*ing ‘bamafanboyz got your ass handed to you, bigtime.
Elise
@My Truth Hurts: So, because he’s right more often than he isn’t you just inherently trust him?
Mike Kay
@FlipYrWhig:
He’s turned into David Sirota.
LT
Now it’s a War on Adjectives.
We need a fucking Adjective Czar.
r€nato
GG reminds me of the time I was listening to Diane Rehm and she had on some GOP operative… I think it was the guy who was convicted for the NH phone bank slamming ratfuck on the Dems in 2004 or 2006, who subsequently wrote a book about it.
Now, naturally DR listeners are mostly liberals so the guy got some tough questions. But, I swear that every single question this guy got, no matter now reasonably phrased, was interpreted by him as an all-out attack, and he retaliated in kind – with great hostility and anger. It was remarkable, I’ve never heard anything like that, I don’t think even Karl Rove would act that way in an interview.
Diane finally had to call him out and calm him down and ask him not to attack callers for asking perfectly reasonable and civilly-phrased questions.
Glenn, why do you want to be that guy?
Steve
@williamc:
This. Yeah, Glenn has a mockable schtick, but he’s on target more than just about anyone. The fact that he doesn’t understand Jane’s sin is something other than “criticizing Dear Leader” is a strike against him, but maybe he’ll figure that part out at some point.
I don’t think this is an Obot blog by any stretch of the imagination, but the tone is often pretty aggressively mocking towards Obama critics. Not all of whom are Larry Johnson, after all.
You know the line about how everyone driving slower than you is an idiot, and everyone driving faster than you is a maniac? That’s kind of how it is with criticizing Obama. I think when people stop seeing PUMAs behind every bush we’ll have a happier planet.
Malron
I think it was pretty civil of Arkon Doug to give front page space to Greenwald’s response…..as shitty and childish as it was. I also think bloggers like Greenwald make themselves hard to take seriously when they decide to show up in response threads on other people’s blogs and engage in flame wars with us lowly Obamatons. On the plus side, I do enjoy every opportunity to point my finger and laugh.
williamc
@The Radok’s A Ni-:
I don’t think so. I’m done with this fight. This gonna be another one of those Glennzilla vs. BJ foodfights where no one wins and everyone looks like assholes at the end.
BTW, I am a total Obot, I think the President is one of the smartest people I’ve ever seen in elected office, and when he talks, I always feel like he’s talking to me, a trait that no other politician I’ve ever seen is able to do. It bothers me that people refer to him as Obama and not the President for instance, just because it signifies a lack of respect for what he’s accomplished. But even I can see he’s been deficient in his duties, covering up the Bush War Crimes, and pushing the Democratic Party towards embracing a lawless preventative detention scheme that really will be a fasc!st regime of the teabaggers dreams. Still gonna go out and campaign for him in 2012, because he’s what we got.
With that said, I’m going out for margaritas, there’s sluts out there that need sexing.
MattR
@Mike Kay: I am pretty sure that this is why John asked you to take a pill and tone it down a bit. We fucking get it already.
Cat
@Shalimar:
Paranoid sanctimonious asshole’s can be right about many things. Its a trap that a lot of people fall into to think they can’t agree with them and still be nice person.
r€nato
@williamc: finally some reason around here!
Paula
ROFL
You know, I should feel guilty about piling on, but GG has done plenty of that so whatever … payback’s a bitch.
joe from Lowell
It’s simple. Some like Glenn only gets starts throwing mud when facts and principles are against him.
No, some people only throw mud when facts and principles are against them, but that certainly doesn’t describe Greenwald. The guy starts ranting about “Obots” and “Dear Leader” if the toothpaste falls off his brush in the morning.
It’s just who he is.
Mark S.
I certainly didn’t read all 5,000 comments on that other thread, but it wasn’t exactly all “GG is a criminal. Fuck Jane Hamsher.” I’m sure Glenn will come back and pick out the ten worst comments but that wasn’t indicative of the entire thread. There were a lot of comments along the lines of: this wasn’t a helluva lot of money; it was a start-up PAC; it’s difficult to tell just from these filings what was going on, etc.
Doug was inaccurate in his original post but he did correct it.
The Radok's A Ni-
Such abundance of critical thinking! Such witty retorts! Such… blind adherence to whatever their fearless blogger leader says!
Dare I say it… we have Glennbots.
DB
@francis
I’m no lawyer, but if I worked really hard for a year on something for little personal gain, and then some group of people baselessly accused me of being a liar/thief, I’m pretty sure I’d tell them to go fuck themselves while dying in a fire. And then I might say something I’d regret.
This entire episode has been pathetic.
arguingwithsignposts
BTW, Jeff Hauser left as Exec. Director in July 2009. If @LT is still around, perhaps he could link to who is the new exec. director.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@MattR: Well, I honestly didn’t know and have never joined in for the funding arguments over Jane and GG. My problem is with what they write and do as so called liberal activist, especially with their whacked out conspiracy theories. I admit that though I see these money charges as shaky and uninteresting to me, I am about turnabout is fair play, as these two cannot complain honorably about being smeared. It is what they themselves do on a regular basis with shoddy facts and false meme making.
Dannie22
I think poor Glenn should live in Brazil all year long so he won’t have to worry about obots questioning his integrity
Jason Bylinowski
I’ve been keeping up with the comments on this topic all day, but didn’t have time to write, and now I’m glad I didn’t because at this point, I personally feel that all of this is manufactured drama. It’s like watching WWE on Pay-per-view. Yeah, there might be some anger here or there (in this case for sure, because Glenn is seemingly only capable of feeling slow simmering anger), but mostly it’s all done to drive page-views. And hey, nothing wrong with that, these guys all deserve to be read, but really, I just think it’s all bullshit. Either that or this latest retort is some kind of spoof. Or of course, I suppose it is possible that Greenwald is actually emotionally unstable to some extent, but I hope that is not the case, as I am a fan of his thorough takedown style of writing.
Just back up, read it again and this time picture him in a red kilt and white t-shirt, while butterfly-curling two six packs of Milwaukee’s Best, and tell me you still think this is all completely sincere. No(t much) disrespect, but I think everyone involved in this mess has a big hardon right now, including GG and DougJ.
r€nato
@Chad S:
bin-fucking-go
Paula
Guess what. His “mockable schtick” makes it really, really difficult to take him seriously when he is on target. Which, as it happens, makes him a poor advocate for whatever he’s advocating for, whether it be civil rights for detainees, lobbying against civil liberties infringements, or the right wing framing of the MSM.
Also, horrible overwrought writing is horrible, overwrought writing. Given that I’ve punished myself for this sin often enough, I have no problem seeing that other people should be at least reprimanded for it.
slag
@Glenn Greenwald: I’m with LT on this.
Really…all the “He hit me first!”s are becoming exceedingly tiresome. From everyone. Stupid. And counterproductive.
Now, kiss and make up. Jackasses.
Mnemosyne
@LT:
You mean other than stuff like this?
Because, of course, the only possible reason anyone could ever criticize Greenwald or Hamsher, for anything, ever, is because they’re evil Obama cultists.
I especially love how he compares himself to Richard Clarke and Joe Wilson. Self-important much, Glenn?
Jibeaux
@r€nato:
Been to lgf recently? Not the warm fuzzy goodness of this place, but not freepers.
Oliver Willis
I would read all of this, but I have an Obama worship class to get to. Just got back my golden Obama statue from the cleaners!
Cat
@Joel:
That was by design they say. They only raise money for a brief period and then spent their resources researching upcoming elections and finding candidates to support.
Anya
@Maude: Fuck you DougJ, you Obama cultist. You and your fellow Dear Leader worshipers are slandering the sainted Hamsher. That’s what I got.
I really like GG’s stand against torture and warrentless wiretapping but his obsession with Obama and his attack on anyone who disagrees with his extreme dislike of Obama is just crazy. The man losses all sense and perspective.
DougJ, is a good man, certainly a better person than I am. I am not sure why if the two of them spoke on the phone is he attacking him this vehemently. He did not even acknowledge that telephone conversation in his rant.
Mike Kay
@Oliver Willis: Winnah!
arguingwithsignposts
@Oliver Willis:
Damn, OW and GG in one thread. Is it possible we could get the Jane Hamsher of the Left in here too for the trifecta! Whee!
FlipYrWhig
@Mike Kay: Sirota is annoying, but he’s far less consumed by his own sense of righteousness. Sirota is a careerist who masquerades as a person of high principle.
Greenwald IMHO genuinely has principles, which I respect, but he just has a complete dedication to the notion that it’s so inconceivable that someone might have a different opinion than he does that he _immediately_ deduces that there is only one possible explanation: that difference of opinion must arise either from some sort of deep-seated characterological defect, or perhaps (1) brainwashing or (2) corruption.
When Glenn disagrees with you, he thinks you’re not just wrong, you’re broken inside. You’d have to be, you see, to disagree with him.
I think he might be the left-wing Rorschach.
r€nato
@Paula:
Lawyers are trained in the use of rhetoric; but perhaps writing up all those voluminous legal briefs makes them forget the virtue of, ‘less is more’.
When you’re suing someone (or defending a suit), it may be a virtue to drown the other side in facts and case cites and so on.
When you’re making an argument, however, it’s often best to make it short and sweet. Choose your best words and let them stand on their own.
Comedians know this. Jon Stewart makes more impact with a clever quip, than GG often does with his ponderous posts.
Shalimar
@different church-lady: The point was that Glenn states as a matter-of-fact that all of his/their opposition is motivated by slavish devotion to Obama (something he couldn’t possibly know unless he has a motivation-divining machine), all the while being a hypersensitive asshole to anyone he doesn’t agree with, when there seems to be quite a bit of evidence through people actually saying so that most of the disgust at Hamsher and to a lesser extent Greenwald is really at the whole being a hypersensitive asshole to anyone they disagree with thing.
I like Greenwald’s writing, still read him, and generally agree with his points far more often than not. That doesn’t mean he seems like someone I would actually want to know.
Jay B.
Holy fuck.
Apparently he can dish it out but woe to anyone who dishes it back. Talk about thin-skinned.
What does that even mean? He not only took it, he then proved that it was baseless and stupid using facts AND vitriol — hey, welcome to the Internet. Was he supposed to be gracious?
And, even after John sticks up for them and DougJ backs down all some of you fucking assholes take away is “Glenn’s being mean about Obama“, as if there was nothing else in the whole post that actually addresses what many of you were accusing him of.
Getting bent over the tone of a response rather than addressing the points — a classic move for the loser of the argument.
You guys wanted to nail the guy because, for some idiotic reason, you don’t give a shit about civil liberties and don’t like HOW he writes.
Here’s a fucking hint, you geniuses, if you want to go after the guy, you better have him by the short hairs because he’s smarter than you. Good Jesus. You think HE was the asshole in this exchange?
El Tiburon called it in the first post. He was going to offense to insinuations that he was crooked and corrupt and destroy it. And El Tiburon said he was going to call you on it.
Malron
@williamc: After reading BooMan today, I think the official term for us should be “Obamacrats”.
I’m damn proud to be one, too.
Joel
@My Truth Hurts: Serious question. What makes your truths hurt more than others? I find a liberal application of mace works wonders.
r€nato
@Jibeaux:
you’re right. Charles Johnson has changed and so has LGF.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Oliver Willis:
I keep a squad of Plastic Unicorns to hug on and sometimes chant to. I think I saw one glow once with a halo, but can’t prove it.
LT
@arguingwithsignposts: Good god – can you look for it yourself?
Chuchundra
Glenn Greenwald DRIVES A DODGE STRATUS!
Meanderthal
@FlipYrWhig:
This, to the nth power.
eemom
hey, anyone remember that time Jane and Glenn both gave front page post space to a guy who called them liars, sloths, smearers and cultists after they’d already admitted they were wrong about something?
Nope, me neither.
Yer a class act, DougJ. Glenn, not so much.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Jay B.:
Jay Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!
furioso ateo
@Anya: Where did he say they talked on the phone?
He mentions the email talk, but I must’ve missed the phone conversation mention.
mcc
@Jason Bylinowski: I’m inclined to say that mostly what we’re seeing here is that the outraged commenters in the last story weren’t really reacting to the FEC information linked, they were working out anger about something else that happened previously. And Glenn’s responses maybe aren’t about DougJ’s incorrect single sentence about Accountability Now’s mission, he’s also angry about something else. Just a guess ;shrug;
Will
You’re a bigger man than I, Doug. If Glenn (or anyone else) had asked me to post a response that arrogant and insulting, I would have just told him to go fuck himself.
Yeah. Go fuck yourself, Glenn.
r€nato
@Jay B.:
Try out this little experiment when you get a chance:
The next time at work when a co-worker makes a mistake or is wrong about something, berate the fuck out of them for being mistaken or wrong. Be sure to question their motives, their education, and their intelligence. Call them a liar too, even if it was just a simple error.
See how far that gets you in life.
Being right is important; but it’s not everything and it certainly isn’t the only thing.
taylormattd
This stupid fucking shit is why I dislike Glenn Greenwald. Fuck him and his non-stop smears. If he wants to know why some at Daily Kos dislike him (and, I might add, the “some” is very clearly a distinct minority there), it’s because he starts from the position that people who disagree with his interpretations are “cultists.”
Hamsher does the same thing, except she also makes common cause with racist teabaggers and wingnuts dedicated to destroying all things progressive.
This story might be wrong, but they can both still fuck off.
joe from Lowell
Hmmmm….
but two seconds of research by you—before recklessly spitting our your accusation
This smear comes from one place: blogs that are devoted to revering Barack Obama and despising anyone who speaks ill of him. Just like Bush followers
It has nothing to do with the issues raised and everything to do with the standard political cult behavior of trying to smear those who oppose the Leader.
people (like you) willing to spout false and baseless accusations without bothering to do the slightest work to first find out if what you’re saying is true, all because the people you’re smearing don’t sufficiently revere your Leader.
stuckinred
@Jay B.: How bout we go after you shit head?
Arkon DougJ
@Anya:
We spoke via email, not by phone.
r€nato
@DB:
I would hope you’d make a stop at, ‘you’re mistaken, and here’s why’ and see what response that garners, before proceeding to full meltdown jacket.
snarkyspice
That response is like a microcosm of everything Greenwald has ever written – self-righteous, condescending, humorless, self-congratulatory, and waaayyy too long.
I really hate people who won’t use one word when 25 will do. I don’t think I’ve ever made it to the end of one of his wordy screeds and this is no exception. Learn to edit, Glenn.
max hats
Everyone here is shocked, SHOCKED, that Glenn Greenwald gets angry at people. I mean, seriously. Talk about being willing to dish it out but unable to take it. (That goes for both sides here)
And Another Thing...
@williamc: Let’s see, there’s been lots of criticism of the WH on HCR policy & process, LBGT issues, DADT, detainee treatment and war crimes issues, Iraq & Afghanistan, and more. John, who really is the Dear Leader, has to discipline us frequently. Oh, yea, and there’s been a bit of a war over Rahm, and the last time I noticed, he’s part of the White House. Do you have us confused with some other group of trouble makers?
And Glenzilla has REALLY over-reacted. There’s been plenty on all sides of the issue today.
Can’t think of any issue where there’s much of an orthodoxy here…well, maybe B.O.B.
LongHairedWeirdo
Let me see if I’m reading this right.
“You said some unkind things, well, I’m going to say some unkind things in return! Also, we got some good money, we spent it the way we wanted to, and we accomplished some things that we’re personally proud of. Oh, and you stink because you like Obama too much!”
I like Glenn Greenwald; I respect his brainpower, I like his sense of outrage. But I don’t like his automatic assumption that, if you’re feeling a bit queasy about how PAC money is being spent, the only possible explanation is that you’re an Obama-worshiper.
SGEW
This has been another episode of “Why We Can’t Have Nice Things.”
Ugh.
lol
@Cat:
Except there’s also a distinct lack of candidates that they’ve supposedly been recruiting.
I mean, aside from taking credit for recruiting Halter. LOL
Alien-Radio
@The Radok’s A Ni-:
Dude, I Heartily Lol’d at the new handle.
LaMancha
@LarryB:
Word. Asking questions is one thing. Its like we got bored picking on the Right (too easy, perhaps) and now we’re saving all our anger for Jane and friends.
I don’t mind healthy and even vigorous debate. The occasional “fuck you” is fine too. I’d rather that we stuck to facts and stayed cool, though. Not that it does us any good.
Its pretty sad when accusing people of being grifters is called a “class act”.
I’m bitter. A little petition kid was in front of my grocery store. “Its eco friendly!” He says. Reading it, Its to repeal environmental protections. I signed it “Dick Morris” with the hope the petition is thrown out.
Compared to that, I’ll take DougJ and Greenwald throwing spitballs at each other any time.
tommybones
Greenwald is 100%, absolutely correct.
shortstop
Yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s it.
Christ, this is all so pointless except to the people who fucking thrive on a daily dose of outrage.
DB
This is really like a car crash that I can’t take my eyes off.
Seriously, the only thing more pathetic than watching people baselessly accuse GG of being a liar and thief is watching these same people whine that he isn’t talking pretty enough to them now.
Honestly, if people were writing up crap that was damaging to something I’ve worked hard to achieve, I would tell them where to find a couple balls to gargle.
And if they spent the rest of the night typing about how uncivil I was, I’d sleep like a baby.
r€nato
This might help you understand, you fucking Obamabot.
first result: “harness authentic blogospheres”
Heh indeedy.
FlipYrWhig
@taylormattd:
It’s also because that’s so much his worldview it becomes how he sees politics and policy. Why is Obama doing policy X, which Glenn Greenwald doesn’t like? Why, it must be because Obama has conspired with the malevolent forces he secretly supports, forming a sinister alliance bent on… spiting Glenn Greenwald!
Paula
@ renato:
Crap doodle. I was an English major, thinking of going into law, and if this is what legal briefs do to your command of rhetoric and written language, I am truly repelled.
This fight has been really fun to watch, mostly because I get the feeling that the activists who are actually out there supporting candidates and lobbying for issues were never acolytes of BJ, FDL, JH, or GG in the first place. So the idea that anyone’s progressive political will is being discouraged in this food fight is probably self-indulgent. (AN’s numbers seem to prove a lack of a burning following.)
So, if u ha z sads, get over it. The only reason it hurts is because other bloggers (not Cole) have ascribed an outsized importance to their own work and now they’re being mocked. It might be best if you take it with a sense of humor.
I’m mainly here for the schadenfreude, and the only important business I’m missing is actual work, which I will make up by being very late going home.
AB
Okay, I get where the post was wrong, but was it necessary to bring the cannon to the
knifeflowerfight, lol. Props to you DougJ for posting this.J.W. Hamner
Missed all of this, as I was busy most of the day, but add me to the list of people not impressed with the childishness of Greenwald’s reply. The schoolyard taunts don’t reflect well upon him, and I have trouble understanding why anyone would feel comfortable giving money to a PAC run by someone with that maturity level.
arguingwithsignposts
@LT:
What is the emoticon for a big fat middle finger?
BTW, GG has never answered the question Greg asked earlier in the thread. If FDL’s privacy policy says they won’t sell names, where did those names come from?
BTW, exec director from feb. to july. pretty pathetic, if you ask me.
r€nato
@DB:
So, you wouldn’t first try to persuade them of their erroneous views, with facts and evidence? You’d just proceed to flame them?
That’s a hell of a way to win friends and influence people.
Not everyone who disagrees with you is The Enemy. If you don’t leave people the space to admit error and change their minds, your world is going to become very small indeed.
We are not logical machines, we are humans with feelings. Tone matters.
GG may be factually correct, but I certainly don’t leave this discussion feeling like I want to lend a hand to AN in any way whatsoever.
shortstop
You like and respect the Greenwald of 2005-07, then. Shrug…all good things, and so forth.
JMY
All he had to do was say that DougJ was wrong and explain the situation – end of story. DougJ caught on to something that seemed interesting, decided to post it, was mistaken about, Glenn set the record straight – THE END. All that other BS wasn’t necessary. So I guess when he posts something on Salon that is wrong he can expect the same response.
All this Obama worship BS that he pulls is laughable. It’s not a matter of people “following their leader”, it’s about people wanting to see their president do good, see their country do good. You can yell at the top of your lungs about his record on civil liberties and the like – fine. But the most annoying thing is when people harp on the smallest stuff – petty things. “Oh Obama didn’t post his speech to gays and lesbians on the WH website, why does he hate teh gays?” “Dawn Johnsen isn’t confirmed yet, so it must be Obama just fucking with liberals to get their hopes up just to screw ’em later.” “No public option? Obama has abandoned the base.” “DADT hasn’t been repealed yet? Worst than Bush!” That’s the type of BS that most BJ are opposed to.
It has nothing to do worshiping this man, but wanting to see him do good things. It’s not gonna happen all the time, but you take the good with the bad. People, mainly the Hamsher, Glenn-types just refuse to give him time to do anything as if his presidency ends tomorrow.
joe from Lowell
True story about Glenn Greenwald:
The last time he decided to come down from Mount Glenn and chastise we O-bots, I wrote that his writing about Barack Obama has been so awful that it’s caused me to question his writing about George Bush.
Please note the last five words of that sentence: his writing about George Bush.
Glenn responded with one of those forced-laughter comments you see from real assholes on the internet, about how I had “made his day” because I was so upset about his writing about Barack Obama that I was reconsidering my opinion about George Bush.
Note, again, the last five words of the sentence: my opinion about George Bush.
Note how they are not the same five words as “Glenn’s writing about George Bush.” Not even close. In fact, they convey a completely different point.
But not to Glenn. I found that very illustrative about Mr. Greenwald.
hypusine
@ Arkon DougJ: Unfortunately I didn’t have time to write in to your original post or I could have helped clear this up. I followed the development of AN quite closely when Glenn premiered the idea back in 2008 and meant to point out that it isn’t for funneling money to candidates, nor is it even to raise particularly large amounts of cash – although enough to be credible. AN exists to scare incumbents into doing the right thing. In general this goal is pursued either by generating legitimate primary challenges (recruiting) or with targeted ads shaming them. Glenn made all that pretty clear in his response I guess.
I contributed a small amount (as much to be counted as a supporting human being as for the financial support) to the organization because I agreed strongly with their stated goals and methods. I continue to agree.
@Glenn Greenwald: I agree almost completely with commenter LT’s (#20) admonition to you. Those of us who regularly follow you do so because of a genuine, earned appreciation for your insight and diligence. Nonetheless, the tone and phrasing of your responses are often far, far more harsh than is necessary or advisable. DougJ is a smart blogger who agress with you on a huge variety of issues. You – of all the articulate people on the intertubes! – can and I think should argue your case without demeaning a natural ally.
Lastly, Glenn: assigning a motive to posts like this, particularly with so broad a brush as the “Dear Leader” sarcastic device, is unnecessary and almost certainly inaccurate when applied to a diverse cluster of people who visit a web site. It is most certainly not an accurate representation of me, who visits hourly and rarely comments. That was uncalled-for. I have enormous respect for you and nonetheless think you should apologize.
@ Many other commenters: I’ve mentioned this before in comments but I think it bears repeating. Get your ad hominem on if you must but it’s just a stupid waste of the immense intelligence and wit on display here. “Yeah but Greenwald’s a dick” doesn’t really add anything of value on its own. It’s not a retort even if it were true. WTF is that accomplishing besides reinforcing tribalism among those who agree with you? Calling someone out and gratuitously insulting them are in different universes of motive – and effectiveness.
Also, AN did score a wonderful challenger, Halter, as GG noted. Someone in the peanut gallery seemed to imply otherwise. So…there’s that.
/endofrant
JD Rhoades
@GReynoldsCT00:
You’ve never read Greenwald, have you?
Jim Pharo
I’ve admired Glenn for some time now. (I’ve admired Doug for a while too.)
Glenn is a national treasure on the order of IM Stone. I hope my grandchildren will one day attend the Glenn Greenwald School of Journalism at Harvard. While his reaction could have been more restrained or charitable, that’s simply not who he is. (I especially could live without the “Obama revering” stuff, but if you read the comments here regularly, it’s not off the mark for many of you.) He is demanding, thorough, meticulous, and holds himself to the highest standards. That’s why his contribution is so valuable.
If you read Glenn, you must know this. I would think long and hard before mounting any criticism of him. (And I have.) My guess is Arkon Doug would appreciate a mulligan here — he’s got one from me, even if not from Glenn. His retraction is honorable, as is his posting Glenn’s lambasting of him.
That’s it, kids. Time to, you know, move on.
Cat
@eemom:
You don’t read GG blog on salon then. He prints unedited responses from people he disagrees with often or he links to their responses.
I can’t say about JH as I dont read her blog. Does she even still have a blog a FDL?
The Raven
Y’know, the whole article this comes from is the numerical equivalent of quoting someone out of context. It’s nonsense. If Accountability Now truly recruited Bill Halter to run against Blanche Lincoln its donors got their money’s worth, and every blogger and almost every regular poster here did, too.
Drop it, folks, unless you really want to create more food for corvids.
Croak!
DFS
“slothfully laboring” seems kind of like a contradiction in terms to me. Or at least a peculiar juxtaposition.
Other than that I can see nothing useful to say here.
NR
Tactically counterproductive? Not so much. The Club for Growth has been hugely successful at both moving the Republican party to the right and enforcing tremendous party discipline. And they did this with an unpopular program. The things the left wants are popular, and we can’t even get the Democratic leadership to give us the time of day. Sounds like we need a little “tactical counter-productivity” on our side.
r€nato
@joe from Lowell: great observation there, and well-made.
DB
@r€nato:
He included a number of facts. Including, of course, providing all the information that was somehow characterized as proof he was hiding something.
Friends? Seriously? Why would he come here looking to make friends after getting this kind of treatment from this crowd? Why would he want Mike Kay to be his friend?
arguingwithsignposts
@Jim Pharo:
Um, no. Glenn aspires to be on that order. He’s got a looooonnnnggg way to go before he reaches that height.
Cat
@r€nato:
You think what went down today about the ANPAC was a simple error?
Its more like someone telling your boss you stole a work computer. When the facts were they heard a rumor your stole a work computer, but had actually been given to computer to do work from home.
In that situation a lot of peoples response would be a closer to GG’s then not.
srv
@DB:
Yeah, a 400+ comment thread which was basically just another drive-by smear of that bitchy Jane and all they can talk about is how right they still are, except for all those facts.
Great work Doug, hope you’re proud of yourself. Mission accomplished.
r€nato
@DB: you’re right DB, we’re no different than the teabaggers, just like Bush is no different than Obama.
Where have I read that before?
tommybones
Glenn hit a nerve, I see. He’s the best blogger on the planet who happens to call Jesus Christ… er sorry, Barack Obama out on numerous egregious policies, which obviously hit nerves with the Obamabots here and elsewhere.
Mike Kay
@DB: and yet your idol refused to be forthcoming and answer, What is DMDM Enterprises LLP ? So much for transparency and principle.
FlipYrWhig
@LongHairedWeirdo: Well, look, it kind of makes sense. Greenwald wrote about Bush’s bad policies and got abusive comments and emails from Bush-worshipers. So when he writes about Obama’s bad policies, he gets abusive comments and emails from Obama-worshipers. I’m sure that’s true.
But that doesn’t prove that every time he gets an abusive comment or email it comes from an X-worshiper. It could be that he’s, like, wrong.
But now he seems to believe that the only reason you might think he’s wrong about anything, regardless of the underlying facts or policy, it’s because you want to tear him down because he’s an obstacle to your great desire to worship X. That gets pretty tedious. It’s a pretty convenient and self-congratulatory way to react to the notion that someone has another view. And it’s frankly reminiscent of Bush and “they hate us for our freedom.”
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Jim Pharo: I love when people come here and pontificate on
That’s some pretty good turd polishing on GG’s behalf.
And then bring us
Which is precisely what GG and you allege about “many” of us. Or, the worship thingy.
Unintentional self parody much, and I can see how you would revere Mr. GG who is the master at this.
And Obama happens to be the POTUS, a sight more important than any wanker at Salon. Not demanding evidence of Obama’s failing, which is really what “many” of us do here, could result in lost electorate support, that could well lead to a GOP administration in 2012/
Not giving the GG’s of the world any quarter for false meme making, will not cost hardly anything.
Ed Marshall
@hypusine:
This is a serious question: Did you imagine this endeavour required $40k of Glenn Greenwald’s services and how would you feel if it worked out to something like $1000/hr?
tgp
The original post was wrong. Instead of holding the high ground and issuing a civil reply which would have embarrassed an author who might actually feel some shame over it Glenn has lobbed a Molotov Cocktail at this blog. Allegations of stealing money, which is what the original post amounts to, are serious. They deserve responsible treatment.
This blogwar is totally unnecessary and giant waste of time. An apology on both sides is warranted and then we can return to trashing people who deserve it. Republicans and Joe Lieberman for example…
LT
@arguingwithsignposts:
Because I told you to go find a link to the present exec. director of ANPAC yourself? Um. Okay.
RedKitten
Ugh…another blog pissing war. Another case of someone slapping Glenn, and he retaliates with a chainsaw.
Glad I’ve been too busy to read or comment for the last couple of days.
WRT the whole “Obot” bullshit, I think most people here think that in the grand scheme of things, he’s a good person, and a smart man, and he’s doing moderately well. He still has some room for improvement, but holy shit, when you look at what you COULD have had as President, is it any wonder that so many of us thank the FSM on a daily basis that Obama is the President instead?
eastriver
I agree with GG on the substance of his response. He’s right. Dougie’s original post, and most of the comments, were ignorant pot-shotting. GG had every right to slap back. Sure, his rhetoric was a touch too scorched earth, but so what? Dougie’s a big kid. I think. If not, grow up.
ChrisWWW
I like how half the comments on this post are accusing Greenwald of being shrill. Congrats on using the favorite hammer of Beltway pundits instead of admitting you were wrong.
furioso ateo
@Mike Kay: Have you emailed this question to him? Posted it on his own blog? Because I seriously doubt that he’s scouring this comment thread looking for hostile questions aimed at him.
FlipYrWhig
@Jim Pharo: I think Greenwald is much more like Alexander Cockburn. Outspoken, contemptuous, accusatory, grudge-holding, and unpleasant. Still more right than wrong.
Oliver Willis
@Jim Pharo: I really hope that post was a parody. Please tell me it is. Please.
Somebody hold me.
O-bots only.
joe from Lowell
Ooh! Ooh! Mr. Kotter!
Ahem.
“Because he’s more interested in progressivism and the advancement of a broadly-shared vision of liberal politics (one he shares with almost everybody who comments here) than in self-promotion, his status, trash-talking, personal vendettas, or demonizing those who disagree with him?”
That, ma’am, is why a different sort of person would have responded in a manner intended to promote unity and healing, and why Glenn did not.
Fern
I have been know to write reports intended to disguise the fact that very little had been accomplished.
Glen Greenwald appears to be a master of the art.
slag
@joe from Lowell: I completely understand where you’re coming from here. What I don’t understand is why these presumably smart people invariably resort to such stupidity. It just seems so…unnecessary.
Mary
ugh, his main point, which is absolutely correct, is completely buried under his defensive and insulting screed. It’s really hard to defend people who are so intent on pissing people off.
DB
@r€nato:
I don’t know where you read whatever, but I didn’t write any of that.
@Mike Kay: My idol? You obviously know as much about me as you appear to know about anything else in this thread.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Oliver Willis: I wondered that too, but reread it several times and could find no tells. Though I am not always very good at that.
Misha
DougJ +pwned
clussman
I read Glenn’s response but I don’t have time to read the comments today, sorry. Glenn really comes off looking like an ass here. You made a mistake, you retracted it and apologized. You presumably read that bile he wrote before publishing it and still published it in full and without comment.
On top of everything else he seriously goes off the rails with that obot stuff. After all that talk about posting without facts he’s going to toss out speculative bullshit like that? Asshole.
And don’t give me any crap about participating in a circular firing squad. I can support Democrats and democratic causes and still call an asshole an asshole, regardless of party affiliation. I can even support an asshole if I so choose. Hell, I am an asshole.
Mike Kay
@furioso ateo: yeah, he’s a complete phoney. He won’t reply.
I mean, it’s a short neutral question, with absolutely no additional remarks. Yet with all his stated fealty to transparency, he won’t reply.
FlipYrWhig
@Mary: “I am right, and here are several enumerated reasons. You are wrong. And before I go I will add that the reason why you are wrong, nay, the reason you challenged me in the first place, is that you are a mindless automaton.”
Jay B.
@r€nato:
How’s this: The next time at work when a co-worker floats the idea that my numbers don’t add up because he can’t read a budget and knows fuckall about the situation and all of the other co-workers take that to mean that i’m a fraud who is skimming off the top, I would take it personally.
DougJ was being terminally sloppy. I like Doug’s writing and POV, and am certain it was an error, but simple it wasn’t. In fact, many people called out how irresponsible it was right from the start to post numbers without any context. Including the site’s proprietor. It wasn’t like he got numbers wrong.
It’s that in an environment like this — with a visceral hatred toward the people who started Accountability Now — he went with the idea that the numbers were evidence of “failure”. And Greenwald’s integrity was called into question by scores of people who had no fucking idea what they were talking about, but sought out the biggest conclusion to which they could jump.
Immanentize
Has DougJ just said, “Sorry, I was wrong?” Or does the second hand Glenn Reynolds (it wasn’t me! It was that real jerk over there who I linked to favorably!!!) approach prevent that?
burnspbesq
@furioso ateo:
That would have been closer to the truth than what he actually called us.
Time for a hefty dose of Scott Horton – the antidote to Greenwald syndrome.
Paula
As for what he actually wrote, it’s in the same general spirit as that piece on AN’s “upcoming work”. There’s not a lot of specific groups and names. I think people would be a lot more willing to believe this defense if it wasn’t so context-less. I mean, do they work w/ SEIU, AFL-CIO, Color of Change, any local Arkansas groups, the frakkin’ Socialist Workers’ Party?? For all of their “meetings”, you think they may have kept a card or two of the people they sat with.
I’m really not assuming wrongdoing, and that’s a really paltry sum they’ve amassed. BUT, the paltriness of that sum and their seeming lack of presence among all of these other progressive groups in the real world stands in contrast to their outsized presence within the blogosphere and their constant harping on other people for not being effective at shifting the Overton Window or whatever. It takes balls to accuse people of progressive failure when you ain’t doing much yourself.
joe from Lowell
Mary
ugh, his main point, which is absolutely correct, is completely buried under his defensive and insulting screed. It’s really hard to defend people who are so intent on pissing people off.
Exactly. I can find one legitimate, on-topic point in Glenn’s entire screed: Accountability Now hasn’t given money to candidates, because that’s not what AN does. It isn’t a fund-raising organization, but one that does other, useful things.
Imagine if Glenn had simply made that point, and took the opportunity to educate the readership of this blog about what AR actually does. How many people reading this would have gained new insight? I want everybody to notice that, in an environment chock full of the sort of people who might kick a few bucks to an organization that works to accomplish progressive change and bring pressure to bear on our very least favorite Democratic legislators, Glenn chose not to promote his organization, not to explain it in a manner that could have gained supporters, but to alienate perhaps thousands of potential allies.
I’ve stood in front of hostile crowds, people who said all sort of unpleasant things about me, and I tried to win them over and gain their support for shared goals. But, then, I was actually trying to advance those goals, first and foremost.
Edwin
If Greenwald wants to win friends and influence people, this is not the way to do it. He’s alienated a lot of potential donors with this response, myself included. In politics, being liked is as important as being right.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
Gaaah!!! I was going to say something about putting everyone of you out of my misery, but then I’d have the FBI after me. Doug posts some speculation about FDL’s associated PAC’s funding, barely saying anything other than a liberal PAC not spending money on candidates – which we’re finding out wasn’t the mission of that PAC – Glenn sends a Glenn-style rebuttal that’s hides the facts in a bunch of condescending remarks partially earned by posters on the previous thread, of which Doug posts because if you can’t post a rebuttal you shouldn’t be doing this in the first place, and we’re still at each other’s throats.
Get off of it, all of you.
stuckinred
@Jay B.: Jane never does than now does she?
DB
@joe from Lowell:
You are clearly bigger than he (or I).
But just to be clear: “Those who disagree with him” is not the same thing as “those who falsely accuse him of being a liar/thief and seek to damage the ability of his organization to succeed.”
r€nato
@FlipYrWhig: Overall, I like Obama. He’s a lungful of fresh air after Bush. Hell, even without having to follow up that act, he’s still more than we could ever have hoped for in a president.
Liking Obama != being an Obamabot. I am greatly disappointed that there will be no war crimes prosecutions. Hell, there was hardly even a slap on the wrist for Yoo.
I’m disappointed that HCR will not include a public option. If I had my way, we’d get rid of the private health insurance companies entirely, except perhaps to offer policies to those who want coverage above and beyond the universal government-run health care.
I want the US out of Afghanistan like, yesterday.
But there are political realities in this world. The political reality of Congress is that while we have a majority, many of those Democrats come from districts which lean right but somehow we poached those seats from the GOP (probably due to the manifest failure of so many Bush policies and the general corruption of Congressional Republicans). I remember well how much GG dislikes the Blue Dogs. The fact at the end of the day, though, is that those Blue Dogs owe their seats to voters in their districts, not to the DNC nor to GG.
The reality of Afghanistan is that if we just up and left today, we’d make the Code Pink crowd feel good for a month or two. And then when the country descended into a Taliban hell (along with the very possible resurgence of the country as a base for al-Qaeda operations, not to mention destabilizing Pakistan, a country with nukes), the world would cry out for the US to do ‘something’. ‘Uh, didn’t we just leave there?’ Americans would say. And the Pentagon would never tire of saying, ‘we told you so, but you made us leave!’
People like Glenn are useful as far as creating pressure to move the administration in this direction or that one, or to shift the Democratic majority leftward. But when you don’t get your way 100%, the adult response is not to burn the whole fucking place down and declare Obama is no better than Bush, or to make alliances with devils like Grover fucking Norquist because HCR is not what you’d hoped for.
A child would know there’s a difference between Bush and Obama, and that if we’re lucky, it will only take 8 years of Obama to reverse course from the worst blunders and policies from 8 years of Bush. He’s the president, not a dictator.
I respect Glenn’s insistence on his principled views on the rule of law and the Constitution. Sometimes, however, people who stand too much on their principles end up doing more harm than good. A little recognition of realities would go a long way.
Cat
@Ed Marshall:
How can that be a serious question when you post no facts? Its a trap plain and simple.
Paula
“preparing reports and election analyses on his prospects for our coalition partners whose support was vital to convincing him to run (MoveOn, SEIU, Daily Kos, DFA and many others)”.
Does that mean they work w/ those orgs, or that they produce some kind of white paper on the candidate that can go to anyone? What kind of analyses? How wide is their polling base? Cuz if their research is wonky then it may explain FDL’s brand of crazy campaign tactics.
burnspbesq
@Shalimar:
So do I, but life is far too short to put up with his schtick.
Two possibilities:
(1) Take the bad with the good.
(2) Dig into the archives at Balkinization. Read all the great, non-histrionic, beautifully thought-out stuff that Marty Lederman contributed before he went over to DOJ, and that Brian Tamanaha continues to contribute almost daily. Greenwald is a minor-leaguer, and always will be.
El Tiburon
Those of you who were completely and utterly wrong going back to the original post from DougJ now need to either come forward and do your mea culpa or Shut The Fuck Up for at least one week.
Your overriding desire to attack and destroy while having neither the facts nor the desire to have the facts gives you away as useless hacks.
Agree or disagree w/ Greenwald (or Hamsher), you can’t deny they are both strong and respected voices for the progressive community. Yet I guess many of you choose to hold onto your hatred like little spoiled O’Reilly’s looking for any reason to shit on them.
Good day sirs, I said good day.
Joey Giraud
What a bunch of big babies….
( except for Big Iron, williamc and a few others… )
Of course Glenn is pissed, the OP as much as called him a dishonest pocket-stuffer, as if PAC work was expense-free. I think Glenn’s response was pretty restrained in tone, if not in volume.
And my respect for the posters here has wilted.
MB
Props to DougJ for handling this well, but this has inspired serious disappointment in the comments, here. More chickens pecking in their own circles instead of surveying and understanding the farmyard.
BruceFromOhio
ZULIF-ZILLA DESTROYS YOUR CITIES WITH UNSTOPPABLE ZILLA-WORDS, AND EATS YOUR PUNY BLOG AS A SMALL POST-DESTRUCTION CONFECTION.
Had to go get the gas can, dincha? DINCHA?!
Cat
@Edwin:
Which is why we have a lot of worthless scum in office.
David in NY
@Paula:
Feel free to become a lawyer, Paula. Real lawyers don’t write like that.
Actually, they do a little. Take some of the middle of Glenn’s post, say the part about what he says they did to recruit Halter, edit it down just a little, and it’s fairly powerful. But real lawyers don’t go on to deal in the ad hominem, even when they’ve been attacked. They know that it raises questions about the soundness of their position. So I only doubt the truth of Glenn’s heroic account of his and Jane’s recruitment of Halter because he unaccountably need to buttress it with attacks on Obots.
Anyway, Glenn is not acting as a lawyer here but as a politician-salesmen, and you know how well they write. Lawyers, on the other hand, have to write for judges, who have no patience for the kind of overstatement and personal attacks in which he engages.
r€nato
@DB: you missed my point.
We *should* be friends of GG. We’re not teabaggers.
Don’t you take a different tone with friends when they are mistaken, than you do with sworn enemies when they say untrue things about you?
I sure hope so.
Holly McLachlan
r€nato
@DB: you’re right DB, we’re no different than the teabaggers, just like Bush is no different than Obama.
Read the post immediately after yours (264) and consider why someone might view the commentariat here in that light.
It’s become a matter of practice for certain members of this community to crap on Glenn — when he’s right, when he’s wrong…. when he’s breathing.
This has only come about since he started giving those now in power the same treatment he gave the previous administration. His unflattering assumption about the reason why seems fairly close to the truth.
His very real lack of cool was no less evident then than it is now, but now, somehow, it’s a focus of contempt.
I’m sure that sudden eruption of contempt has no relationship to the change in administrations. Of course. Rationality is inherent in the Democratic mind.
tomvox1
Glenn Greenwald, January 17, 2010:
Glenn Greenwald, March 30, 2010:
I guess since we’re only cult-like Obots, GG can fob us off by claiming that these two statements are mutually exclusive and both are technically true, so we should feel shame for acting just like Dear Leader-worshipping Bushies by asking these questions of him in the first place.
But the absolutist nature of his initial rebuke of anyone questioning the financial ties between he and Hamsher; (or anyone who dares hold him to the same pristine standards he regularly demands of others, really) makes it easy to accuse him of splitting nits and being less than fully forthcoming back in January.
rootless-e
I think that the only reasoned response has to be “what a douchebag”.
tommybones
@Glenn Greenwald:
Amen, Glenn. It’s embarrassing.
eemom
Just to clarify, I don’t think DougJ was wrong about shit — and neither were the rest of us.
Nobody accused these self-important assholes of anything illegal. Nobody accused them of misrepresenting how they spent the money.
The point is that “Accountability Now” is a bullshit organization with a “mission” so vague as to be meaningless, and it functions as a vehicle to pay money to its founders — including rent for nonexistent space and multiple thousands of dollars to purchase an e-mail list controlled by such founders, comprised of people who thought their privacy was being protected.
The only substantive accomplishment they report is a highly questionable claim of responsibility for Halter’s primary campaign.
Those are the fucking facts. If the people who gave them money are cool with it, fine. But as many others have said, I doubt if that’s what most of them had in mind.
kc
Robertdsc-iphone
Minus points for the Dear Leader shit.
Agreed. That’s getting old.
Peter J
What you wrote about Accountability Now is a complete falsehood topped off by reckless innuendo:
1.The expenses can be found on the site. It’s all fully disclosed.
2.AN was never about giving cash to candidates. It would violate the organizations purpose. It was about creating a network and infrastructure to find and recruit challengers to vulnerable incumbents.
3.The PAC is a financial success. Our accomplishments are on our site. We’ve assembled a coalition of unions, grass-roots, advocacy groups and top liberal bloggers to accomplish (2). We played a major part in recruiting Bill Halter, by visiting Arkansas, interviewing local leaders and forming a campaign to draft him. This was our top priority for the last six months. We also had time to poll with Grover, weaken democrats, meet with Teabaggers.
(a) We did all of this just me, Jane and Grover, and a couple of Teabaggers too. (b) Jane bought some great new shoes for her part of the loot. It was possible since we didn’t share the loot with anyone else. That we didn’t care to ask for more money means that this is a success. Financially. For us.
4.My work, as a lawyer, was to make sure all the legal was in order. Jane put all the FDL registration information in a big file and sold it to herself. We left the economy parts to Grover. We did such a great job that we needed to give us all the loot. That’s what all PACs are for.
5.Because it was just me, Jane and Grover we did a lot of work, I almost was unable to write long posts at my blog and I was only able to write six updates to every post. Had we let someone else manage the PAC, our share of the loot would have been smaller. There wasn’t a competent Executive Director anywhere so Grover got to stay on. Rather than hiring a PAC Man. Jane and I decided to keep the loot for ourselves, and also because we know best.
While I’ve written two very successful top selling books, I don’t work for free. If I don’t get paid, it’s not worth it. That’s for all the Obama cultists working to get the Dear Leader elected. People like me, who do the work I do, should get a lot more money, but somehow I still accepted to do the work despite being really underpaid, but at least I didn’t do it for free.
All has been disclosed, every payment, especially DMDM Enterprises Ltd.
This is all about smearing me and Jane by all those Obama cultists. If I repeat this enough then it becomes a truth. So I’m writing this a couple of times more. Smear. Smear. Smear. Smear. Obama cultists. Obama cultists. Dear Leader. Dear Leader.
It’s all false.
I’m proud of my loot, and that Grover wants to hunt Democrats with me and Jane.
Let me repeat it again. Smear. Smear. Smear. Smear. Obama cultists. Obama cultists. Dear Leader. Dear Leader.
Bobzim
@Joey Giraud:
If you lay down with dogs, people are going to look for fleas.
rootless-e
@Holly McLachlan:
Way to argue by smear. In fact, the root problem is Glenn’s inability to deal with disagreement except by characterizing it either as lies or as the work of cult members.
srv
Let’s see,
1) P unch Hippies
2) U nmask latest offense
3) M ake shit up when facts are easily available
4) A ct offended when called on it, blame hippy
Balloon-Juicers really are out-doing themselves trying to remind me of someone, but can’t figure out who.
BruceFromOhio
@Glenn Greenwald:
Occasionally.
And that concludes today’s SATSQ.
John Cole
This thread sucks.
And btw- I’m not at war with Jane, I’m at war with people when they do more harm than good. I link Glenn constantly, almost always praising his work. I side with Jane and promote her ideas when I think they are good- like the student loan reform in reconciliation. Somehow, a lot of you who hate her personally missed that- we got the student loan reform done, and that was huge, and Jane was in front of that issue.
When I think they are bad ideas and destructive, I say it (like engaging in partisan warfare against a Chief of Staff and joining with someone who just wants to bring down any Democratic administration, or trying to kill a bill that is still a major improvement over the status quo with the bizarre notion that the issue would be revisited).
And while I probably would not have linked to the FEC rulings post from that guy, I’m not at all embrassed by the way DougJ handled things, with multiple posts, updates, and then allowing Glenn to make a long rebuttal. And I can totally understand why Jane and Glenn would be pissed. As Glenn has noted to me- if he linked to someone calling me a thief and a child molester, and then later let me clear the air, I’d be pissed, too.
If you folks can’t handle that, suck it.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@r€nato:
I would like to resemble this comment.
Paula
GG and his acolytes are complaining about this blog’s tendency to frame his position and/or the DKos OP in absolutist ways? Pot kettle black.
Well, I think GG does more harm than good. It’s not out of slavishness to Obama, or a desire to punch hippies. It’s that his tendentiousness gives arguments I agree with a dishonest spin. And that he does it for a wide audience is galling. Of course, I’m not a lawyer, so I know nothing.
lol
What exactly is Accountability Now doing aside from “recruiting” one single candidate who was already being courted by organizations with actual credibility?
Glenn’s supporters here keep saying “It’s not their mission to give money to candidates – it’s to recruit them!”
Well, where are all these candidates? Any primary challenger who was planning on winning needed to have announced last year.
This doesn’t necessarily mean the PAC is a corrupt slushfund but it does mean they’re not actually accomplishing their stated mission.
Cat
@eemom:
I’ve read all 3 threads on this here and not ONE person has posted proof the email list purchased was of FDL subscribers who DIDNT want to be contacted.
There have been many posts stating why it had to be purchased for legal reasons and then argument that wrong doing had to have occured pivots to “But think of our privacy!” with zero proof any wrong doing, just like the original accusation about the email list.
Mike Kay
@El Tiburon: Is this snark?
Seriously,
Is this snark?
Jay B.
@stuckinred:
Who fucking cares? If you want to be more like Jane Hamsher, or think that somehow constitutes a defense for doing something stupid, that’s your choice.
I like Greenwald. I like Obama. I can handle him criticizing Obama because I understand the criticism — it’s not a bizarre thing like “teleprompters” or “soci@list!!11”. It has the benefit of being intellectually consistent and merited.
But given the overall tenor of this site — exactly like a mirror image of Hamsher’s — I don’t particularly blame him if he accuses people of bad faith.
Anya
@Arkon DougJ: Sorry, I was so shocked by the whole thing. I did not read most of the comments in this thread and any of the original thread when I posted that earlier.
I found GG’s response hysterical at best. He could have explained his side without childish name calling or calling you a lier. This is astonishing, particularly considering that he was pestering Ezra Klein because Ezra used “purposefully misleading” when he addressed Ms. Hamsher’s arguments against the HCR bill.
JMY
DougJ questioned something about GG without context and facts, which most people do. GG explained the situation and DougJ realized he was wrong and handled it well from there. Again, all Glenn had to was just explain what the PAC does and that’s it and leave everyone else with egg on their face. But he can’t do that…he has to get his little punches in. Be the bigger person. You were right, everyone else was wrong ,whatever, move on.
Paris
Someone is awfully defensive. Maybe a little clarity of their intentions would have been helpful. I checked the website and the successes were all vague jargony boilerplate with mentions of the ‘Executive Director’ that made me think of Frank Zappa. On the whole – maybe they accomplished a good thing – but I wouldn’t be so defensive about it.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@John Cole: Well, I agree that this thread sucks, as did the last one about PAC’s and funding and all that shit. But don’t agree with the good intentions and honesty in either Jane’s or especially GG’s recent work. It is largely hackery when it involves Obama.
I see them both as part of the problem and not part of the solution, and will treat them that way, but on what they actually write about politics, policy and governance. Not this stupid funding navel gazing.
Anya
@furioso ateo: poor reading comprehension on my part.
srv
@r€nato:
Jesus Christ, here’s your first comment on the original thread:
And it gets worse from there.
Anyone who considers you a ‘friend’ is a fool
Ed Marshall
@Cat: @Cat:
Well:
I’ve formed and been on the board of a number of LLC’s. $2000/mth seems incredibly steep.
Who is he comparing his PAC to decide he was underpaid? The people I believe he is comparing himself to a) run WAY bigger organizations this and b) are HUGE thieves and scoundrels. I don’t think people understand that is his defense. “Salon doesn’t pay me enough to work on my political project for free and HEY! Look over there at the K-Street scum!”.
gwangung
Given that
a) he originally said that Accountability Now was a financial failure,
b) this statement came from ignorance of how PACs in general and Accountability Now works, AND
c) almost all of the supporters of Greenwald and Hamsher could NOT explain or alleviate that ignorance,
I’m not sure how you could be embarassed.
(Mostly, it’s c) that gets me).
eemom
See also, Doug L’s informative comment at the end of DougJ’s first post.
drlemur
You know, here’s the thing. If Glenn’s answer had simply been, “Accountability Now was formed to find candidates. We played a big role in getting Bill Halter to run. I think that benefit alone is worth the cost.”
I’m pretty sure everybody here would have been pretty enthusiastic in support of AN and apologetic to GG about anything uncharitable previously thought or said.
This blog whipped HCR phone calls to Reps pretty damn hard for that big victory. Seems like it’d be nice to have allies here to whip calls on the topics we are all concerned are moving too slowly (esp. GG): DADT, civil liberties, closing Gitmo, etc.
You’d think a guy who wanted to affect politics positively by finding/encouraging candidates would be, well, a little more politic.
Morgan
@snarkyspice:
Almost, but not quite. If he’d quoted himself at length it’d be perfect.
Mike Kay
@John Cole: you don’t seriously think anyone in the white house or in congress listens to jane?
you don’t really think the issue of student loans moved a millimeter because of FDL?
Please, we all have egos, but that’s taking it a bit far.
furioso ateo
@Holly McLachlan: Actually, I’ve been reading Glenn for a while, but this is the first time I’ve seen him respond to criticism on someone else’s blog. And he turned out to be a quivering fuckwad who didn’t handle this like an adult. Was he right? yes. Will I still read him and take him seriously? of course. Did he come of as an asshole in the rebuttal? totes.
burnspbesq
@El Tiburon:
Sure I can. I don’t respect either of them. And no one who makes common cause with Grover Norquist is “for the progressive community,” whatever that means.
Sly
@Jay B.:
Most people here don’t have the time or energy to have visceral hatreds for people with whom we agree on most things but think are acting like self-absorbed morons. We tend to narrow our efforts to contempt and sarcastic derision. The accusation of progressives hating Jane or Glenn is a product of Jane’s martyrdom complex and Glenn’s inability to not be a pompous asshole, whether he’s defending himself from specious allegations by commenters or levying specious allegations against others.
@El Tiburon:
Yes We Can.
stuckinred
@Jay B.: I’ll buy “who fucking cares”.
El Tiburon
@drlemur:
Shorter drlemur: Glenn say mean thing hurt feeling why he no play nice where’s my bottle. WAAAA!!!
You can’t fucking win with some of you people. Glenn gets shit on by half the commenters over her and he defends himself using forceful and heated rhetoric and you bitch because he didn’t use his library voice?
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I just don’t know what to say.
Jennyjinx
I haven’t read all 318 (as of right now) comments, so excuse me if this has been addressed.
Re: the email list
Last summer when Slinkerwink was doing a campaign to get personal stories about the poor state of health insurance, she invited her readers to sign a petition. I did so. Not long afterward I began receiving spam “newsletters” from FDL. Why did I consider them spam? Because I didn’t sign up to receive anything from FDL Actionwhatthefuckever and yet there it was in my inbox.
So, she might not have sold the email addresses of those who comment on her
fan club siteblog– she may have sold the addresses of the people who signed the eleven gazillionty petitions that her bloggers were hawking. No doubt those email lists (from the petitions) were way more valuable than anything she can gather from her blog comments.shortstop
The odds of Glenn reading every single comment in this thread come in slightly higher than the sun rising in the east tomorrow.
Cat
@Ed Marshall: Sorry, but unless you are going to put out some facts stating how many hours GG had to travel and work for ANPAC your question is just a trap.
Jennyjinx
Also, JC, there’s a nifty plugin called “Live Comment Preview” that may cause your commenters to love you even more than they already do. Just sayin’…
eemom
@Cat:
““But think of our privacy!” with zero proof any wrong doing, just like the original accusation about the email list.”
Then you haven’t been reading very carefully, because there were comments (1) quoting the FDL “privacy policy,” which is directly contrary to what they’re doing; and (2) pointing out that $14K is a fuckload of a lot of money to pay for an insider mailing list.
Cat
@drlemur:
No they wouldn’t have. There are several people still criticizing ANPAC for things they only assume they did with no facts to back up their accusations.
Emma
Well, there may well be Obamabots on these threads, but the Glennbots are a fascinating new experience for me. They do exactly what they accuse the Obamabots of doing… worship their chosen leader even when he acts like a spoiled brat.
Adults accept apologies gracefully and try to smooth over the situation. DougJ tried. Greenwald declined in the most vicious way possible.
And the Obama-hatred is a bit creepy. I mean I hated George Bush with the fire of a thousand suns, but I didn’t see him behind every negative professional or personal interaction. Things DID happen in the world that had nothing to do with him! But I have encountered Mr. Greenwald twice in these threads, and he dismisses anything said to him as “you’re Obama worshippers and you’re probably conspiring with him” or some such. Good Lord.
And for the record, I don’t give a flippin’ flip if he got paid or not. His financial arrangements are his business as long as they don’t violate the law. His manners, though… well, bless his heart.
El Tiburon
@Sly:
Sly, you can disagree all you want they are strong and respectful voices for the progressive community, but you would be demonstrably wrong.
Again, disagree all you want with them on issues or style, but how anyone can argue with a straight face they aren’t respected voices (except by some of the hacks around here) is ridiculous.
Hamsher may have hurt her credibility w/ some on the HCR issue, but it does nothing to her overall credibility and worth to the progressive/liberal fight.
Malron aka eclecticbrotha
@tomvox1: interesting catch, sir.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
A hundred plus percent then.
DB
I’ll make one last comment… ACORN got completely fucked out of existence because of some false accusations that were amplified by people who wanted them taken out. That’s how shit works in DC, a town so completely disconnected from humanity that the people who work there can’t even bring themselves to condemn death threats against their colleagues’ children, choosing instead to score a few political points on a crappy Sunday talk show.
All they give a shit about in DC is how things look. What are the optics?
This is the environment in which ANPAC is trying to make some headway. Not only are they counting on people to give them donations in order to succeed, they need to appear free of scandal in order to attract quality candidates.
Reasonable people here can say that GG should’ve been more civil if he wanted to get people to support his cause. Fine.
But the shit that was coming out — with ZERO proof — is completely toxic to what he is trying to accomplish.
ACORN, BITCHES!!!!!
And r€nato, none of my friends would ever try to screw me over like that. And if they did, you can bet my tone would leave a mark.
Anya
@John Cole: I guess you’ve never been on a non-for-profit board. People always ask about where did the money go and they challenge the spending and such. I once worked for a non-for-profit org. and almost at every AGM people challenged the board.
GG, could have challenged the assumptions and the accusations without insults and childish taunts. He could have responded with facts not accusations. I read DougJ’s opinion and I do not think it warranted this vicious post.
earthmann
When the political pantywaists (along with your favorite presidential candidates) were huddled in the corner, enabling King Bu$#!+’s assault on our constitution, Glen Greenwald had the courage to shout “tyranny.”
He has all my respect for that.
I’m astounded some would assault his character because he didn’t strike the right tone when responding to certain garbage accusations.
We need more Glens. End of story.
FlipYrWhig
@kc:
Here’s the difference:
That’s rude, but within the bounds of blog discourse.
Hmm…
Later that year…
Um, the first part is logical, but that last bit doesn’t seem like it has much to do with anything. Seems more like an old grudge.
Scene.
Bentley Stanforth III
Well, I don’t have a dog in this fight. In fact, the blogosphere infighting just depresses me. However, it seems to me that GG hit it out of the park — not that you’d know it from some of the posts in this thread.
Talk about graceless in defeat.
burnspbesq
@El Tiburon:
Does that mean you’ll shut up now?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@El Tiburon: LOL, Grover Norquist don’t troll this blog.
burnspbesq
@El Tiburon:
Really? Demonstrate.
El Tiburon
@Emma:
So sorry the adults used some adult-themed language and called a lie a lie. We’ll let you know when you can come back to the adult’s room.
Right, I read where Greenwald said, and I quote: “Doug J, I decline your apology you disgusting abortion who has sex with retarded dogs may you get butt cancer and die”
DougJ committed the ultimate sin, stating something as fact that was not fact. His original post perhaps did a lot of damage. I suspect DougJ’s original target was Jane Hamsher. Regardless, DougJ manned up and owned it, so we shall all move forward. Greenwald was rightly pissed to have himself and his organization’s integrity questioned , yet it’s Greenwald who is at fault here.
rootless-e
“As Glenn has noted to me- if he linked to someone calling me a thief and a child molester, and then later let me clear the air, I’d be pissed, too.”
I missed the part where Glenn was accused of anything other than not giving any money to candidates from his PAC. Considering that Glenn’s rebuttal is mostly personal attacks and dubiously truthful statements, I’m not sympathetic to him.
And I think Glenn is a sometimes interesting pundit, but neither he nor Ms. Hamsher get to use elbows all the time and then scream about touch fouls so loudly – without getting a well earned bit of pushback.
In particular, Glenn’s unsavory habit of insisting that any critic must be a cultish Obama worshiper means that he can fuck off if he wants to bring his sensitive feelings up.
terry chay
And yet he doesn’t contradict one fact presented nor the complete absence of disclosure beyond what is there in the filings, just insinuates that anything written about is a lie done by slothful idiots (so slothful, they found the careful parsing in his emphatic denials of “never receiving any money from Jane or FDL, nor being on any FDL-based stearing committee”—something true in fact, but extremely misleading) He just calls us all Obamabots.
Gee, what an ass. (Though perfectly in line with his normal level of righteousness.)
All for $24k, too. That makes his assholeness quite funny.
rootless-e
@El Tiburon: That’s great, please now quote what was not a fact in DougJ’s original statement.
Mike Kay
@FlipYrWhig: You win the internets!
Bruce (formerly Steve S.)
@John Cole:
Yeah. Sometimes you piss me off, John, but you’re generally a cogent observer and that’s why I cruise through this blog on a regular basis. But you have a persistent core of commenters about whom the kindest thing that can be said is that they lack self-awareness.
Indeed.
FlipYrWhig
@El Tiburon:
I don’t think Greenwald is “at fault.” I still think he’s a dick. It’s not that hard to separate the two. He can be dickish and right, or dickish and wrong. Still would be nice for him to work on that whole dickishness problem.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@FlipYrWhig: Nicely done.
But would add
Shorter commenter — do not conflate Obama not cleaning up Bush’s mess the way you want too, with him committing the same crimes.
Cat
@eemom:
Lets try again.
Nobody is disagreeing FDL has a privacy policy. I’m just asking for proof the list FDL sold contained people whose were on the no contact list. Its possible for FDL to be in control of more then one email list and even an email list that has none of its site’s members emails.
You have not demonstrated at ALL that the email list wasn’t worth 14k. You didn’t say how many people were on the list or any of the factors that might make the list worth more or less. Your whole argument is “I, eemom, say $14k is a lot of money so there for the email list can’t be worth $14k”.
PixieThis
Once again, glenn, this is where you lose me. You tend to whine and complain about and insult anyone who happens to like, support and admire our president. I guarantee you that the majority of his supporters are smart, grounded people who do not slavishly agree with President Obama on every issue. Comparing us to bush supporters is wrong.
And my main problem with you? You can’t even seen the hypocrisy of your excuses and defenses after your horrible, uneducated and ridiculous tirades about Gruber. Insulting to everyone in my industry and to academia, yet you think that any questions about money given to you are out of bounds or automatically factually untrue. YOU brought this on yourself, not me or anyone else who questions your integrity now. If you hadn’t been so fundamentally wrong on the Gruber issue and hadn’t called for transparency over and over and over again, you wouldn’t be on the extreme defensive – which is how you’re (once again) coming across.
We’re not all less intelligent than you if we disagree or if we question you and your pompous and arrogant manner is unwelcome by this reader. I normally keep to myself here at BJ, but you’ve rubbed me the wrong way for more than a year. I had to stop reading you on Salon because I intellectually and fundamentally disagreed with almost every one of your assertions.
D-Chance.
Excuse me…
/”more popcorn, please!”
OK, now continue.
Gus
This may well have been the most tedious post and comment section in the history of Balloon Juice. Who really give a fuck?
Crusty Dem
DougJ:
I don’t think my original post was that far off the mark, consisting mostly of a link to something that no one has said was factually inaccurate. I said something I should not have said in the last sentence of it.
But I believe in letting people reply, in general—hence this post.
GG:
I thoughtfully disagree with you original post and appreciate the space to correct it.
Oh wait, it was more like this.
I find this whole thing tedious and depressing. Non-story + minor error + some good comments + lots of stupid comments + RAGE MACHINE + more comments = here.
Mike Kay
@El Tiburon: Geez, I hope Glenn at least hands you a towel to clean off your faces after he finishes. Gimp.
low-tech cyclist
This smear comes from one place: blogs that are devoted to revering Barack Obama and despising anyone who speaks ill of him.
Drinking your own Kool-Aid, Glenn?
gwangung
This is bullshit and a complete lie.
Bobzim
@El Tiburon:
She has ZERO worth there, IMO, because her first goal is to fill a niche – the left’s Perpetual Lady Of Outrage – which we don’t need.
Hamsher wants to into conservative districts and primary Democrats from the left which is incredibly stupid and self-defeating, but sure seems to generate cash for herself.
As I said above: If you lay down with dogs, people will look for fleas.
Paula
@ David in NY:
That’s a relief.
I dunno, I still think the “controversy” here is that AN’s outreach appears to be moving on a snail’s pace. Which doesn’t bode well for the progressive utopia, the impending arrival of which is currently blocked by Obama and his minions.
hypusine
@Ed Marshall I’m pretty comfortable with paying someone reasonably well to promote the kind of change I want to see. Particularly in the case of AN’s reason for being. If someone can strike fear into the right politician’s heart and get them to do the right thing, great.
Also, if anyone was going to advocate effectively for a project like this, well, why not the person who advocated for it effectively enough to make it happen in the first place? Someone whose voice, values and reasoning I respect?
Glenn claims that this ended up being a part time job for him. That could mean 40 hours a year, in which case yes he ends up being stupidly well-compensated. More likely, I figure, given the nature of the endeavor, it takes an much more serious chunk of time.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Glenn Greenwald:
Take that broad brush and shove it up your fucking ass along with all the other industrial equipment you have lodged there.
MattR
@Crusty Dem: Nice link.
joe from Lowell
What lie was that? Please, go back to the post, and quote me the lie.
LT
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Is that homophobism added to this shite? Beautiful.
burnspbesq
@Cat:
Now you’re being a bit silly. You do recognize that the core of what you wrote is just as purely speculative as what eemom wrote, yes?
As far as I’m aware, none of the commenters here have subpoena power, or are engaged in litigation with Jane that would give them the ability to conduct discovery. The proof, if any proof is to be adduced, has to come from FDL. There’s nothing wrong with saying “based on what I can discern from publicly available information, this smells a little funny.” If Jane cares to clear the air, she can. If not, she has to live with the smell.
John O
@LT:
Nicely put.
taylormattd
@John Cole: John, please don’t gived her wholly undeserved praise.
She had nothing to do whatsoever with getting student loan reform passed.
For christ’s sake, to her last breath, she tried to prevent ALL of this from passing, so her belated post about student loans should be seen as nothing more than an attempt to jump on the bandwagon.
Mark S.
@tomvox1:
That may be technically true, but it’s incredibly lame. That would be like if I worked for Freedom Alliance and someone asked me if I worked for Sean Hannity and I responded, “No, I’ve never received a penny from Hannity and you are an asshole for even implying it.”
Why even set up a big smokescreen about it? We all know that GG is some sort of a political consultant, and we know that he has to eat, so unless he was taking money from, say, Karl Rove, or maybe Grover Norquist, does anyone here really give a fuck?
terry chay
BTW, I’m curious what sort of spoof DougJ sent to entice this response? :-D
rootless-e
Let me rephrase that into something that has the advantage of being true:
Balloon-Juice commentators, all day long:
Glenn Greenwald is a thin skinned, whiny hypocrite who has no problem generating shit storms over non-scandals so empty of content that even Paul Krugman has to call him out, but cannot tolerate any criticism and responds to criticism by lying about the motives and politics of his critics.
No trouble, but fuck off all the same.
Holly McLachlan
Actually, I’ve been reading Glenn for a while, but this is the first time I’ve seen him respond to criticism on someone else’s blog. And he turned out to be a quivering fuckwad who didn’t handle this like an adult. Was he right? yes. Will I still read him and take him seriously? of course. Did he come of as an asshole in the rebuttal? totes.
Oh Glenn definitely lost his cool and has done so here before. However, there is a back story. During the past couple of months there’s been a not-constant but, still, a concerted effort to diss him on Balloon Juice. (not John, BTW).
It wasn’t that way prior to Jane’s “traitorous” decision to break ranks on the healthcare bill. I didn’t agree with that decision – but the response from more establishment minded “liberals” on the political blogs made me wonder if I should have.
My great contempt for rightists is due to the fact that they talk a great game about it being a “free country”, then do all they can to prevent it being so.
Establishment Democrats are too much like them on this point.
Emma
El Tiburon: You must have limited social and professional interactions if every time someone makes a mistake about you and then apologizes is met with flames and spittle… but hey, your life.
Although coming from someone who likes to liken himself to a shark — well, no surprise.
Paula
Man, GG’s peeps are really upset!!
El Tiburon
@burnspbesq:
I think the fact that Hamsher has been the main topic of discussion on this site for about a month says a lot about her. Her blog is one of the most well-known in the liberal community.
Let Cole discuss GG:
The fact is GG has written three highly respected books on politics, two of them bestsellers. He writes for one of the most respected websites. His posts are always highly linked to and used by most of the other influential bloggers out there, including those on the right.
Cole on Hamsher:
I hate Kobe Bryant but I can’t deny he is one of the best in the NBA. You can hate Hamsher/GG all you want, but to say they are not respected is idiotic and childish.
rootless-e
I’m still waiting for El Tiburon to quote the sentence in DougJ’s post that was false.
tick
tick
tick
…
AxelFoley
@Malron:
LOL, can I co-sign on this?
Paris
@Jennyjinx: Me too.
joe from Lowell
This is such a laughably off-base description of Balloon Juice that it is impossible to believe the writer honestly believes it. BJ, which is always denouncing Obama for not prosecuting torturers?
I can only conclude that Greenwald read the Gruber post, and has spent each day since then waiting to take his revenge. The over-the-top hysteria and personal attacks in his reply are so excessive (did you see Doug J accuse him of stealing? Or of hiding the organization’s funding information?) that one can only conclude that Greenwald was looking for his chance.
rootless-e
As for Hamsher, her alliance with Grover Norquist crossed the line in my book.
If you think Grover Norquist is an ally and Rahm Emanuel is an enemy, you are either just stupid or your politics is detestable.
Greg
@Cat: “I’ve read all 3 threads on this here and not ONE person has posted proof the email list purchased was of FDL subscribers who DIDNT want to be contacted.”
Well, let’s break this down. Here’s what Jane said :
http://action.firedoglake.com/page/content/2009expenses/
“Email List: FDL corporation is the owner of an email list that was used by FDL PAC for the purpose of soliciting fundraising and encouraging activism. Without a robust and extensive email list FDL Action PAC could not conduct its activities, but since FDL corporation could not legally give its list to the PAC, it rented the list to the PAC using the same per-email cost that MoveOn uses.”
FDL Action PAC and Firedoglake link to the same privacy policy. Or at least, they did at one time :
http://web.archive.org/web/20080331194304/http://action.firedoglake.com/page/pt/mccainfec/
That’s how FDL PAC got my email address and the privacy policy was the same as it is now :
http://web.archive.org/web/20080402102802rn_1/firedoglake.com/privacy/
“Information you share with this site in the course of your registration will remain confidential and unavailable to the public or to any entity other than Firedoglake, with the exception of any content you explicitly designate in your user profile for public view. This will be in your explicit control as you manage your profile.”
Since Glenn has insisted the Accountability Now PAC is in no way an entity of Firedoglake (at least this is implied in his earlier denials that he’s not paid by FDL), then the transfer of email list from the FDL PAC to the Accountability Now PAC would be against their own posted privacy policy. Granted, Jane left a little wiggle room in her description. Perhaps the email list she’s referring to was gathered outside of the numerous petitions that FDL Action has circulated, but if that’s the case, then this should be a pretty easy charge to rebut.
MattR
@burnspbesq: If someone is going to make an accusation that Jane is violating the FDL privacy policy by selling an email list, then that person ought to have some sort of evidence that the email list was gathered subject to that privacy policy (and not, let’s say, some different petition gathering drive)
mcd410x
Progistania est omnis divisa in partes tres, quarum unam incolunt Belgae, aliam Aquitani, tertiam qui ipsorum lingua Celtae, nostra Galli appellantur. — Virgil
When a football team does less well than expected, two groups coalesce. One stays on the bandwagon til the bitter end; the other jumps ship at the first opportunity so it can criticize. Ever since the health care debate turned a bit contentious, the comment section at BJ has devolved the same exact way. It’s ridiculously stereotypical and pointless. I want to read witty banter. Not stereotypical tripe.
Glenn has been a leading light on torture, warrantless wiretapping and other govt abuses. If for no other reason than that, I’ll continue to read his site.
Sly
@El Tiburon:
Strong and respected leaders? They’re political bloggers, first and foremost. You are not a strong leader in politics unless you have a voting bloc. You are not a respected leader in politics unless politicians do what you want them to do.
Until that happens, and I would insist that their format prevents that from happening, Jane and Glenn will only be advocates. And advocates, while great, aren’t leaders. Paul Krugman is a great economist and a voice of sanity in a dark world. But he is not a strong and progressive leader. Know what a progressive leader looks like? This.
I’d say that her credibility has shrunk to such an extent that one could drown it in a bathtub.
gwangung
As John Rogers says, “Generally, you punch upwards, not downwards.”
(Just to be clear, I have nothing bad to say about Greenwald’s involvement in the PAC; I’m not sure there’s anything bad about Accountability Now in general. I do, however, have plenty of bad to say about the so-called supporters….).
El Tiburon
@Emma:
If someone mispronounces my name or thinks I’m 5’8″ (I’m 5’10” damnit) or thinks I’m a little arrogant, no problem. But if someone goes on about my integrity and questions my ethics and calls me a slimy snake for the whole world to see, then I’m going to defend myself. This is a blog. This isn’t church or the nightly news or tea with Granny. We are all adults here. DougJ knows what he did. He is taking his medicine like an adult and moving on. Yet you decide to question the manner in which GG responds. Whatever.
If you ever saw my dorsal fin and pearly whites, you would understand.
Mnemosyne
@Jay B.:
Okay, that’s bizarre — you seem to think that Glenn calling people he doesn’t agree with “Obama cultists” is somehow a smear on Obama, and not on, you know, the people that Glenn is claiming belong to a cult.
I guess that explains why you get so very upset if anyone dares talk back to Glenn — do you actually think that criticisms of him are personal insults to you?
FlipYrWhig
Oh, right, I had somehow forgotten the whole FDL vs. Gruber thing, which was all about the issue of undisclosed ties and accusations that people were shilling for money.
joe from Lowell
Hold it, Holly. There were a LOT of progressive bloggers who jumped off the HCR train.
Hamsher came in for a lot of scorn when, and only when, she started lauding the teabaggers and buddying up with Grover Norquist.
rootless-e
@El Tiburon: I’m still waiting for your quote of a sentence in DougJ’s original post that was false.
Morbo
@burnspbesq: Good plan.
LarsThorwald
I’m not internet blog famous, so this won’t register, but for whatever it’s worth, here’s my 30,000 foot view of this whole thing.
It was inevitable that out of the universe of those who blogged, some would become widely read and, in their own way, famous.
It was therefore inevitable that some of those widely read, famous bloggers would use that popularity to earn money for purposes of their choosing.
It is inevitable that there would be a public brouhaha stemming from the tension between the money-earning ability of some widely popular blogs and the view of the readership tending towards transparency.
These are big themes, and broad strokes, and they are ill-drafted, and I guess I’m trying to convey the point that at some point it was inevitable thatanything popular in America eventually gets tied to money, and where money is involved, motives are questioned. This is particularly true of the media.
As pamphlets evolved to the Washington Kaplan Test Prep Daily, so too will blogging evolve. It is inevitable.
Congratulations, internet blogging. You are growing up almost as tall as your mainstream media big brothers and sisters. And right before our eyes.
El Tiburon
@Sly:
Semantics aside, I know democrats in Congress have quoted Greenwald verbatim on the House floor. Hamsher has the ear of a lot of politicians and pushes forcefully for liberal causes.
Perhaps ‘political leader’ is not the best phrase, but you get what I’m talking about. They, like Cole, are leaders in that they have thousands of readers who use their blogs to help make decisions. So call it what you will, doesn’t really matter.
LarsThorwald
I’m not internet blog famous, so this won’t register, but for whatever it’s worth, here’s my 30,000 foot view of this whole thing.
It was inevitable that out of the universe of those who blogged, some would become widely read and, in their own way, famous.
It was therefore inevitable that some of those widely read, famous bloggers would use that popularity to earn money for purposes of their choosing.
It is inevitable that there would be a public brouhaha stemming from the tension between the money-earning ability of some widely popular blogs and the view of the readership tending towards transparency.
These are big themes, and broad strokes, and they are ill-drafted, and I guess I’m trying to convey the point that at some point it was inevitable that anything popular in America eventually gets tied to money, and where money is involved, motives are questioned. This is particularly true of the media.
As pamphlets evolved to the Washington Kaplan Test Prep Daily, so too will blogging evolve. It is inevitable.
Congratulations, internet blogging. You are growing up almost as tall as your mainstream media big brothers and sisters. And right before our eyes.
Joe Buck
Is anyone surprised that when you falsely accuse someone of being a crook, he gets extremely pissed off? I would be too.
Several commenters in this thread claim that Greenwald has falsely accused others of malfeasance. Who, when, and what’s your evidence?
Comrade Kevin
@Mike Kay: God, you’re a fucking idiot.
Arkon DougJ
@Holly McLachlan:
Wha wha? Who has dissed him among front-pagers?
joe from Lowell
OK, after you quote the lie in DougJ’s piece…which we’re still waiting for…please quote the part in which he, ahem, “goes on about my integrity and questions my ethics and calls me a slimy snake for all the world to see.”
Tick, tock. Just quote some language.
1) a lie
2) Doug J “going on” about Greenwald’s integrity and ethics, and calling him a slimy snake.
No paraphrases, please. Quote the actual words DougJ wrote in which he did these things.
Thx.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@LT:
OK, strike my inappropriate metaphor and substitute this:
Take your broad brush and throw it on that giant Savonarola bonfire you’ve got going there, along with all the bridges you’ve already consigned to the flames.
Better?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Sly:
ewww! that was like, so uncalled for, which is why I admire it.
Shalimar
@Holly McLachlan:
But, how can it be the same treatment if Obama is WORSE than Bush? He should be giving Obama an even harder time, which I guess many would argue that he is.
I think the problem alot of people have with GG is that he seems to obsess about the areas where Obama hasn’t been much of an improvement if any over Bush (i.e. the areas GG actually cares about) and seems to completely ignore the thousands of ways in which Obama has clearly been an improvement. No, he isn’t anything close to a savior. He may even be a mediocre President. But it’s very hard to imagine our country in it’s present condition electing anyone better, so you take what you can get regardless of how depressing it can be.
different church-lady
@LT: Since when does one need to be homosexual to dabble in anal discourse… er, intercourse.
burnspbesq
@El Tiburon:
No, it’s a simple and straight-forward statement of my views. I don’t respect them.
Jane has proven herself to be a traitor to the progessive cause.
Greenwald is a horrible writer who lacks either the skill or the inclination to do real reporting, and desperately needs an editor. He suffers badly by comparison to Scott Horton, or to any of the principal contributors to Balkinization or the Volokh Conspiracy (I rarely agree with anything I read at Volokh, but those guys can uniformly think and write). Greenwald’s schtick is totally counterproductive; it makes enemies unnecessarily, and detracts from his ability to get his message across.
If you choose to continue to respect them, knock yourself out. But you haven’t given me any reason to reconsider my position.
gwangung
@Arkon DougJ: Commenters, of course, did that…not front pagers. I would think that makes a difference. But, perhaps not. Though I would still quote John Rogers….
El Tiburon
@rootless-e:
If I misspoke, I misspoke. I was referencing this post from Doug J:
Arkon DougJ
@El Tiburon:
I’m not interested in defending myself in this thread, but what did I state as fact that was not fact? Saying something is a “big financial failure” is not a factual statement, it’s one of interpretation. I took it back when I read more about the PAC, but that too was a matter of interpretation.
I said nothing that was factually inaccurate.
And did not I ask to be referred to as “Arkon DougJ”?
Midnight Marauder
This was excessive.
terry chay
@LarryB:
Bullshit.
For every accusation there were at least two commenters who saw nothing illegal here or thought the money was so small as to be almost laughable. That’s not including the commenters who were defending Glenzilla and Hamsher here, either. Nor does it mention that John Cole defended him and DougJ, in his original article, had a lot of qualifications—though I’ll admit they could be misread—a lot of people, especially angry ones, can misread DougJ ;-)
There were a lot of commenters, including me, who saw things as possibly untoward, who found Glenn’s “denials”, while technically true, set up to create a deliberate false impression.
This dates back to January when this stuff was first discovered—his article was on proper disclosure regarding his pro-Hamsher HCR screed and many felt he should have disclosed his ties to Hamsher via AccountabilityNow, which he deceived on—recall his “ACLU defense.” Many of us commenters see nothing new in the DougJ report that we didn’t already know back then—in fact, there is little to none.
As for creating a deliberate false impression: in fact, many people in that thread in January harbored the impression that he had no relationship of a financial kind with Hamsher—something that is obviously untrue, he just used qualifiers like “I did not directly receive money from FDL, nor was involved in FDL-funded organizations.” (FDL and AccountabilityNow are two separate organizations legally, AccountabilityNow funds FDL, not the reverse, etc.). This deliberate false impression continues today: notice when you strip the accusations of “lying” “slothfull”ness and being Obamabots, his response actually hasn’t declared any of the facts in the accusations untrue, nor does it address the big questions: for instance how AccountabilityNow has had anything to do with “recruiting” Bill Halter, or even assisted in building up his $300k in ActBlue donations.
If we were to apply the “Club for Growth from the Left” criteria, we’d have to say that AccountabilityNow is a double failure: a failure to raise even a reasonable amount of money for the task at hand, and a failure to primary right candidates. (Note, we don’t see paying himself $20k+ and Hamsher/FDL $30k+ and right-wing glibertarian whackjob internet media outlets $20k+ as being one of those failures—that’s just a joke.)
BTW, I do not think it’s “unfair” he got “PO’d”. I think that’s just funny—and typical.
Glenzilla is a glacier. For every person he’s picked up to forward his cause, he’s pissed off three and lost them backward. :-)
This thing is clearly a sore spot with him. Probably because he stepped in it, regrets it, but can’t extricate himself from it (sounds a lot like what happens to people on the other side of his rants). Now he digs deeper. :-D
FlipYrWhig
@Joe Buck: What jogged my memory was the whole thing about how Jonathan Gruber was supposedly being paid by the Admin for data-modeling on health care and also being cited by the Admin as an independent expert on health care. It was a big to-do in the FDL circuit of blogs for like a week.
But IIRC Krugman among others said it was tendentious to treat that as a conflict of interest.
That was why there was an effort to ferret out who was in league with whom, who was getting paid by whom, on the side that had banded together to challenge HCR most vociferously. And that was why there was a thread here a few months ago where the Hamsher-Greenwald nexus was discussed, because it _might_ be a similar case. Greenwald popped in to defend himself and took a lot of abuse, some for his attitude, some for his closeness to Hamsher (financial or friendly), and some for his policy positions on HCR. But he insisted on saying that the real reason he was under attack was that he was daring to call out the Obama administration on civil liberties and surveillance and torture and such.
I think I have that right.
Dear God, why is this tying up my mind right now? I have so much else I should be doing.
Arkon DougJ
@El Tiburon:
That is quite different from stating something as fact that is not fact.
burnspbesq
@Arkon DougJ:
You did, but don’t take it personally. El Tiburon is lacking in manners. He disrespects everyone.
El Tiburon
@burnspbesq:
I get it that YOU don’t respect them. I get it. I don’t respect Hannity at all. But to say he is not respected by a lot of or most of the right-wing is foolish. So to say that Hamsher is not respected OVERALL, by a majority I would guess of liberals is foolish.
Once again, you can disagree with their views, their style, their hair color, I don’t give a shit. But to say they are not respected by the liberal community is stupid. YOU, burnsspecks are just one voice in the community of millions. We get it, you hate them.
J.W. Hamner
Just so we’re clear: all of this is because some random anonymous unmoderated comments on BJ said mean things about Glen Greenwald and/or his PAC? It certainly doesn’t seem to me that DougJ’s post, which was quickly corrected, warrants this kind of venom. But maybe I missing something?
kid bitzer
personally, i am very grateful to greenwald for his work during the bush years.
i think his closing comments above about obama cultists were immature and needlessly inflammatory, but it’s better to overlook that stuff in light of his good service on some important issues.
what i will not overlook, however, is hamsher’s alliance with norquist.
norquist is utterly beyond the pale. he is rove-level evil. working with him is unforgivable. and i have no intention of forgiving hamsher for it.
rootless-e
The tendency among FDL/Greenwald authors and supporters to label any criticism a “lie” is amply illustrated here.
I should also note that although Jane’s political point of view is something I do not comprehend, Greenwald’s libertarianism suffers from the usual moral solipsism of that point of view. To Greenwald, the actual core moral goal of the Democratic Party in terms of economic justice and self-determination means less than a rigid legalism that does not correspond to any observed reality.
El Tiburon
@Arkon DougJ:
I already said if I misspoke I misspoke. Apologies for my error. There is a reason I’m but a lowly commenter here in my pajamas in Momma’s basement. Again, I was referring to your comment that you said you shouldn’t have made.
Please, Arkon DougJ (such a pain to write, please feel free to call me Tibby) allow me to apologize for impugning your integrity. Feel free to go all Greenwald on my ass.
Arkon DougJ
@LarsThorwald:
I see what you’re saying.
Jules
hahahahahaha
Damn, I wish I could have watched this in real time.
The Radok's A Ni-
Three things to remember about Glenn:
1. He’s astute when it comes to legal stuff he knows about.
2. He’s a Libertarian who is too reasonable for Reason.
3. His ego could occupy half the state of Montana.
Sum those three up and you get this thread. I can readily believe there’s nothing fishy with AccountabilityNow and also see why he’d be a little testy about the subject, but that it took us a while to get here with Glenn laying ad hominem landmines all over did not help his case at all.
Jay’s already gone on record in this thread as static as absolute fact that Glenn is ‘smarter’ than all of us. If Glenn really wants to start talking about cults, he should start looking at some of his own defenders here.
joe from Lowell
Wait a minute, it’s “Arkon?”
I thought you moved to Akron!
What the hell’s an Arkon?
eemom
@El Tiburon:
with all undue respect, you’re full of shit.
Nobody “respects” Hamsher anymore except her brain-dead cultbots. That’s why her latest meme is what a martyr she is — poor brave Jane, alone against an entire WORLD of corporatist Rahmist anti-choice faux-progressive sellouts……abandoned by even Dennis Kucinich……and then, finally — the most unkindest cut of all — Bart Stupak, the last man “to stand on principle” in the U.S. Congress.
And she has “the ear of a lot of politicians”? RFLMAO.
rootless-e
“What you said was blatantly false.”
Just to ease the hook on El Tiburon, I’d be happy if Glenn could quote what Doug said that was “blatantly false”.
Those of us who have a more realistic sense of politics and a more coherent morality have been listing to this bullshit about Obamabots for 2 years now. When I need to be lectured about independent thinking from a libertarian sitting on a mountain of moral denial, I’ll ask. Thanks all the same.
myiq2xu
Kool-aid is a helluva drug.
Sly
@El Tiburon:
It’s not a question of semantics, its a question of substance. Being quoted for the congressional record, or “having the ear” of legislators is, in fact, the role of advocates. And we need more good ones to counter-act not only the shitheels from Heritage, CATO, and all the other Wingnut Welfare Institutes, but also milquetoast elitists like the Broders and Friedmans.
A leader in a political community gets people elected, and gets votes from those same people. They get legislation passed. Jane wants to be in that club, and I’d argue that a host of other high-profile lefty bloggers want in as well (Markos, etc). Hell, a common theme at NetRoots Nation is always “How to Get Progressive Legislators to Keep Their Promises”. The problem is they can’t. Not because they don’t make good policy arguments, but because they don’t have any political muscle. No constituency, no muscle. Small donations from lots of out-of-state sources can only take you so far when you’re up against a local incumbent supported by entrenched local interests.
The contempt levied against Jane is that she insists she actually has this muscle when she transparently does not. FDL has taken credit for passing student loan reform. That kind of self-obsessed egomania deserves nothing less than the scorn it has received.
db
“obama-revering” circles?
Dude, I was with you until that.
If I tell people that Obama has to cut pragmatic deals because that’s the unfortunate nature of politics, I now belong to some circular cult.
Now, if you get to rant on the internets about how Obama and some Democrats have failed to lived up to their ideals and we ought to recruit candidates to make them accountable, what religion does that make you?
rootless-e
If you want to see an example of lying though, please read this essay of Glenn Greenwald where in a late “update” he has to claim that the lynchpin of his hysterical essay has “nothing to do” with his point.
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2009/10/12/fringe/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%253A+salon%252Fgreenwald+%28Glenn+Greenwald%29
Sly
@eemom:
I don’t buy that either, to be frank, but it really is immaterial to the overall point.
MattR
@The Radok’s A Ni-:
I promise that I will never, ever say that any blogger, commenter, media personality or professor is smarter than all of us. But that is only because I am clearly smarter than all of you (and all of them).
El Tiburon
@Arkon DougJ:
While this is still going, let me ask you a few questions. Let me set this up saying, and I don’t want to tar you, but I have a suspicion you did the original post because you thought it was a way to get at Hamsher. GG was simply collateral damage.
So…
1. As a blogger here, what duty do you have, if any, when posting on a topic? I mean, obviously you did zero due diligence, such as contacting GG or doing some research on this topic.
2. Why did you use the phrase “tar”?
3. Why did you post this originally?
4. Do you have animosity towards Hamsher? If so, does this in any way cloud your judgment?
5. Did you go to the AN website before you posted this topic to get a sense of the organization?
The Radok's A Ni-
@MattR: I’d like to think that we’re all somewhere between Average and Creationist.
@myiq2xu: Meatprod! How’s that MUP working out for and your fellow Ratfuckers?
El Tiburon
@rootless-e:
darn, up until this point I really thought GG was infallible. That he is only human is so disappointing. That’s it. I will not read him again. Until tomorrow morning.
Jennyjinx
@Cat:
I’m going to argue that the email lists that she sold were perhaps part of the many “petition” drives she had and that it was probably worth at least $14k.
I’m saying this as someone who has knowledge of how marketers get their money via comment threads (this is why I always use a throw away email address when commenting) and as someone who received “newsletter” spam from FDL after signing one of those petitions.
Now the question becomes, did I expressly allow for that email address to be sold by signing that petition? No, I did not. Is my email in the list? I guess I’ll find out if I get any mailings from political PACs (or the like).
Another question is: Did any of the folks registered under FDL’s privacy policy sign those petitions and did they use the same emails for both purposes? Would they then reasonably believe that they were protected under that same policy?
These are all rhetorical, by the way. The real answer is that it’s not illegal to sell the email addresses and that anyone using the Internet should know that their address will be sold by this entity or that eventually. It’s slimy that she (they) used those particular petition drives (if we’re going under the assumption that it was the petition drives and not the site registrations) to generate the email lists for sale. It’s down right Black Hat– but legal.
Of course, shooting baby squirrels is legal too. Doesn’t make it right.
El Tiburon
@rootless-e:
I
yeah, he really owned up to lying. Perhaps you don’t have an understanding of what the word ‘lying’ means.
rootless-e
@El Tiburon: What is sad about that essay is that he begins with a full on virulent attack on the White House on the basis of what turns out to be easily detected bullshit and then rather than admitting error tries to claim it’s irrelevant to his point.
rootless-e
@El Tiburon: Excuse me, but for someone who just had to back down from a false claim of lying, a claim that you repeated multiple times, you are in no position to make that argument.
Arkon DougJ
@El Tiburon:
I’m not going to get sucked into an argument with you until you point out what I said that was factually inaccurate.
And why the fixation with the word “tar”?
terry chay
@williamc:
This year as in in the last 365 days? Because there are a lot of posts here on BJ calling Obama to task about
1) Not closing Guantanamo
2) State secrets
3) Being too quick with the bipartisanship
4) all the finanacial stuff
etc…
If you mean in the last three months, last I checked the only biggest thing on the docket has pretty much been the HCR thing. Obama’s position there (as in many places) has been right of the other Democratic candidates (which is why I was a late entry to the bandwagon), but I seem to remember a historic (“fucking big deal”) bill passing anyway…
Whatever.
LarryB
You lost me, guys. John, I recommend tear gas.
rob!
This thread makes me miss Brick Oven Bill.
cleek
got about 5 paragraphs into it.
get to the fucking point, Greenwald!
Wilson Heath
Glenn is generally more right than most on most things. I have high admiration for his clarity of thought and his persistence in calling things as he sees them. It continues to be disheartening to see many of the same torture and secrecy standards carrying over from the dark days of the prior administration, for example, and I think it’s a good thing for Glenn to call the Obama administration on it, and I don’t find the way he does it harmful to the areas where the administration is a welcome change. Further, I have great sympathy for the announced project of the PAC and the milestone achievement of the Halter candidacy.
What I have a problem with is people who go the way “the Jane Hamshers of the Left” do. Her goal is to bring down corporatist Dems like Lincoln, but she finds common cause with right-wing anarchists like Grover Norquist to try to enact the same agenda as Lincoln. WTF?! Yes, I also have issues with the HIR that passed. It’s a Republican plan that is too friendly to the parasitic industry that is the cause of the problem (the insurance/plan providers, that is) while it doesn’t do enough of the heavy lifting that we need to help our country. Still, it’s progress. It’s a framework to attach further pieces of reform to, and with the fundamental frame in place, the smaller pieces should be easier to do politically. If we killed the bill, though? Nothing. Trotskyite purity is the enemy of progress. Are you a progressive or a purist? Jane isn’t all Trotskyite. And calling a problem when you see it (torture/war/executive power) isn’t Trotskyite. But there’s that balance of not derailing whatever progress can be had. That point of not taking your ball and going home with the smug satisfaction that yours was the pure revolution that those ignorant others have denied the world.
I don’t think that Obama can do no wrong. I don’t have a shrine to him in my home. But he’s one of the best potential vehicles we have right now to get some good changes to occur in this country. I’ve got nothing against keeping him honest when he needs to be kept honest. But I’m not going to find common cause with those who would tear apart the social contract and civil society just because I don’t get my Utopian paradise and a pony right fraking now.
Silver
@Glennbots
Do you ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?
(Works better if you imagine it being said in a sneering Johnny Rotten voice, btw.)
different church-lady
I’m bored with this. Can we have a Mac vs. PC thread now?
Egypt Steve
I read Glenn. I’m a fan of Glenn. But jeezus fuck, he can be a supercilious c#nt when the mood strikes him.
Oh, is it homophobic to call him a “cunt”? I don’t care.
rootless-e
@Arkon DougJ: In comment 433 he backs off of it with a “If I misspoke” move.
Rogers Cadenhead
As the author of the PAC expenditure piece, I couldn’t help but notice that Glenn Greenwald is somewhat upset about the story.
Regarding his comment:
“Every single fact about expenses that you cited by linking to some third party — as though these expenses were hidden and only unearthed by some intrepid investigation — were, in fact, copied directly from the Accountability Now website, where every penny spent is fully and publicly disclosed. The only reason you or anyone else know about any of this is because we fully disclosed every penny spent and on what it was spent.”
I did not use the numbers from the Accountability Now year-end expense report in my story. I added up the numbers myself from the FEC filings because there were some minor differences.
Although the expense report was useful to determine the titles of the people being paid as consultants, I asked several questions of Jane Hamsher about AN PAC expenditures that she declined to answer.
I asked what the PAC was renting from Firedoglake for $4,000.
I also asked what KMP Research was, since it received several monthly payments of $2,000 from the PAC. (I was later able to determine that it is a company set up by Hamsher to pay herself.)
My story states that the purpose of his PAC is “to recruit primary challengers against members of Congress who ‘sell out the interests of their constituents in favor of corporations,’ according to its site,” so I didn’t claim that it was supposed to be raising money for candidates.
If the story is a “smear,” it is a smear in which everything I wrote about the PAC is an accurate representation of what it raised and spent in 2009.
Contrary to what Greenwald writes, it is not “impossible to have greater disclosure of expenses than what we provided.” His PAC could have answered questions about its FEC filings sent to its treasurer. They had four days. I even told her in advance that the story was being filed Monday and told her everything it would cover.
The suggestion that I’m doing all of this because I love Obama and I hate his critics is completely false.
I love Joe Biden. I gave him $250 minutes before he dropped out of the race. He sent me a nice letter in response.
mike in dc
When someone alleges that one is a purity troll(e.g., “firebagger”/PUMA/etc.) of a certain sort, is the proper response to counter-charge that they are a purity troll (e.g. “O-bot”/cult of Obama/etc.) of a different sort?
I’d note that the reason the label of “purity troll” is a harmful one is because it tends to color the perception of everything that person says or does. So it behooves people who may be subjected to such allegations to show instances where they have done or said things which counter this image. I know GG has praised Obama’s policies and tactics in other areas, just as Sirota, Hamsher, and even BTD have. And I know various alleged “O-bots” have voiced criticisms of Obama policies and tactics on several occasions.
So, are these labels useful and productive, or inaccurate, alienating and counterproductive?
Cyrus
@debbie:
Late to the thread, obviously, but when was it easy?
Sly
@rob!:
I think I might be able to offer a weak facsimile:
———-
Plato teaches us that women are both smelly and poor drivers.
This is “relevant” to a topic that no one else is discussing.
Do not underestimate Glenn Beck.
———-
How’d I do?
mvr
FWIW, there is at least one good point in there — that the original posting (not here but the diary quoted here earlier) at least led me to believe that the point of the PAC was to spend the money in ways other than it seems that it was spent. This response makes me wonder about that, and if I wonder about that I’m wondering about the main premise of the original complaint. Along with that point there is a lot of hyperbole and stuff that probably makes the point harder to see amidst the rest.
However, since we can’t control what other people say or how they say it, I think the better part of wisdom is to take the point for what it is worth and not focus so much on the surrounding stuff. While it can be fun to let off steam, politics matters because of how it effects folks with real problems and we should keep that in mind when we understandably might want to respond to somewhat inflammatory text with further inflammatory remarks.
goatchowder
Oh, horseshit. Go away Greenwald, you and Jane are not helping.
Ain’t no Obamabot here neither. Just a sane Democrat who wants to win progressive victories. As best we can, as often as we can.
Working within the system– as corrupt, stupid, and corporate-owned as it is– is the best way to do that; I’ll leave the gun-toting, bomb-making, and revolutionary rhetoric to the teabaggers.
Obama frustrates me too. But I get what he’s trying to do– keep the Constitutional government alive, and restore people’s faith and hope in it.
I do not “revere” him. He’s human. If he were super-human, he’d be able to reverse the 30-year-long right-wing and corporatist take over of this country overnight– something that you seem to expect him to do.
Bush torture policies, and all the other vile shit Repugs did, will be reversed. Eventually. Fucking chill out.
amorphous
DougJ, by not reading Politico you have managed to (possibly and this claim is being made baselessly) skyrocket your pageviews! Congratulations, YOU , sir, are the new Politico!
amorphous
@myiq2xu: When did this guy come back!?!
morzer
So Arkon DougJ said something which was wrong, gave Greenwald a chance to respond, as well as retracting, and Greenwald went into full-on self-righteous gonzo rant mode, causing quite a few giggles and not precisely enhancing his reputation for er.. fair and balanced self-evaluation? Is that the essence of this rhetorical cluster-copulation?
gwangung
Oh, quite. And folks shouldn’t be surprised at the original line of questioning (being clear and transparent for EVERYONE is not an easy task). I’ve helped run a non profit, and I’ve gotten questioned over returns that were about as detailed. So I understand the irritation (though not the flam throwing…).
Joel
@Emma: Here I was, having a laugh at this thread and out comes some truth!
terry chay
@cbear: Really because from where I’m standing (reality) I noticed that despite Glenn calling DougJ (and the commenters here) liars, he never once actually argued with the facts as they have been presented—only imputed that they are misrepresented.
The only mistake DougJ seems to have made is that saying AccountabilityNow is a “failure.” The jury is still out on that—but based on Glenn’s announcement post a year and a half ago, it seems to be set up as a left-wing version of The Club for Growth, and by that metric, sounds like a failure (to me).
Gus
@myiq2xu: See how annoying this fucking thread is? It brought this douche back. Why don’t both sides just have a beer and shut the fuck up?
Thomas
I like Glenn a lot but [as many others in this thread have said] the Dear Leader stuff is completely beneath him. At a base level many of us like Barack and the health care bill in particular because you know what, it was something actually possible to get through our useless congress and it will make people’s live better. Sure single payer would be best but trying to torpedo HCR when you know or ought to know that the only alternative is the status quo is ridiculous.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
This whole mess started with someone who interviewed Jane and got nothing specific from her regarding PAC expenditures, so they ‘went to press’ with the only information they could get.
The actual financial statements for her PACs.
Rather than being forthcoming and answering the questions put to her by rcade asking for the specifics of the PAC expenditures, Jane decided to grill the interviewer about what any of her ex-associates said about her and who said it. On top of that, rather than answering the questions and dispelling doubts (and being put on the record) instead Jane tried to ‘beat the press’ by getting her ‘story’ out asap which resulted in her posting the financial info about her PACs online four hours after the diarist posted their story at the GoS. All she posted was the financial data rcade used in his diary and nothing more.
By handling it this way Jane was able to turn the interviewer into the interviewee (her ‘which ex-associate of mine said what about me?’ questions to rcade), claim that her PAC data was online for everyone to see (which her supporters ran with in the diary by rcade while ignoring his pointing out the fact that they were posted online after the diary by him) and make it look like rcade wrote a hit piece on her. The diary by rcade was pretty dry (IMO) and there were only a few questions about who was paid what but the response by Jane’s supporters was far from dry.
All Jane had to do was give some specifics on how the money that was donated benefited the donors, rcade would have included it in his diary at the GoS and that probably would have been the end of it. Instead of getting the transparency that people like Jane demand, she preferred to dig in and play her own ‘game’. Jane could be completely legal in what she is doing, and very well may be, but that doesn’t mean that she is right about this. Two former employees were allegedly paid for their services yet that information is missing from her statement on who was paid what from the PACs. GG got $24,000 for services rendered and implied that he never got anything from Jane.
Maybe it’s just me but if I was doing something like what she was I would give my supporters a full, detailed accounting of where every dollar went and why it went that way. That way you are being truly open and transparent with not only your supporters but your detractors. If you have nothing to hide then I would think you would want to do something like this. Maybe Jane prefers controversy because it rallies her supporters (who donate) and drives page hits. That would make sense to me being that I think her PACs only exist to pay her and her cohorts for the work they do.
As someone else said here, you can do the same thing with a PayPal link without having to set up a couple of PACs. The only problem with a PayPal link is that it wouldn’t pay as good as a PAC with a pointedly nebulous mission statement that serves to drive donations. IMO I think that Jane has set up a libertarian version of the Wingnut Perpetual
MotionFinance Machine. FDL drives outrage which is then diverted into fundraising which is used to fund the machine that drives the outrage that drives the fundraising that drives the…Oops, I got stuck in a programing loop and had to break out. ;)
Polish the Guillotines
Wow. What happened here? Did I miss something?
Morbo
I hate to even touch this knowing full well what the response from certain people will be, but I have to ask:
Why might the expenses listed on the FEC form ($209471.01) not match the expenses listed on the website ($175438.23)?
Comrade Kevin
@eemom:
And that is different from Greenwald’s constant use of “Obama-worshippers” how, exactly?
bystander
@John Cole:
Yep. And, that’s why increasingly I scan your blog and, lately, eschew the threads altogether. I make an exception for those like this one. For posts like that, your commenters are funny as hell, and I enjoy the laugh. For the rest? Meh. People’s preference curves are pretty brittle around here. Ain’t no fun when they all shatter at once. Too much broken crockery to step around.
For political (or media) analysis, Greenwald is pretty hard to beat. He doesn’t care if he skewers a Democrat or a Republican. Whatever the flavor of the politician or political party, they’re all fair game to him. Works for me. It is what it is. I prefer to recognize and know, than pretend or excuse. Others feel differently. So it goes.
Tom65
Glenn –
Thank you for the clarification. Now I know that throwing money at a PAC whose greatest accomplishment appears to be jumping the speeding train that is Blanche Lincoln’s demise is a complete waste of time and money. Keep fucking that chicken.
And fuck you very much for calling me an “Obot” – I normally have to go to the PUMA blogs or RedState to hear such a sobriquet.
LongHairedWeirdo
FlipYrWhig @268:
Agreed – if I wasn’t clear, that’s what I was saying. I do think he’s wrong about that.
There was a time when I wished I could be Glenn Greenwald (not exactly *him*, but be like him – outraged, prolific, precise, etc.), and I realized I just didn’t measure up, and, okay, that sucks, but that’s life.
So, when I say I respect him, I’m not just blowing smoke. I really do.
But he shouldn’t be assuming that folks who question the PAC spending are automatic Obama worshipers. I saw he got 24 grand out of the deal. Is he saying he worked damn hard for it, and earned every penny? Well, I reckon he did work pretty damn hard for it, and I sure as heck don’t think he was bilking anyone out of any money. But it does make me feel a bit glad – just a bit, mind you – that I didn’t donate any money.
And that tiny bit of gladness? It has nothing to do with worship of Obama. I’m glad Obama has a pitbull like Glenn champing at his heels. As far as I can see, he’s deserved every bit of criticism Glenn’s leveled at him.
JMY
DougL for the win!
Kent
About 25% of the way through Glenn’s tirade, I was ready to throw some money at Accountability Now to help him out. Maybe even talk to my friends & family about it, and try to get some of them to do likewise. Sounded like a worthwhile thing to be involved with.
By the time I read the whole thing, I was resolving never again to mention to anybody that I read his blog!
I mean, he has all the right principles, but his assholery is completely over the top.
This man is not well, and his career in politics will not end well.
tballou
FYI – this is what it feels like when you get your ass kicked by someone who knows what he is talking about and is able to provide a full discussion of how you screwed up.
Craig
As one of Glenn Greenwald’s sock puppets, I would like to say that I have a lot of genuine affection for him and even respect and admiration, but the fact is that I rarely read him, because GEEZ, man, is this guy getting paid by the word or what?
But there’s a larger point, too, which obtains even if everything he says is 100 percent unvarnished truth (and I do have my doubts about this): you can’t go full-throttle psycho non-linear frothing at the mouth apeshit on every single person that pisses you off. This is lunatic country; pure padded cell territory. I mean, my God, what must Greenwald be like when they give him onion and chive cream cheese instead of garlic and herb at the bagel joint?
As a sock, I spend my life tasting peoples feet and smelling their shoes, and even _I_ don’t know where this guy finds his bottomless reservoir of rage. Sooner or later, you’ve got to learn to thicken your skin and pick your battles. And let me tell you: _that_ kind of vitriol is best expended on your _enemies_. Not your allies that disappoint and annoy you. If you treat every criticism like the “dirty fork” skit from Monty Python, sooner or later, no one is going to take you seriously at all. They start writing mocking comments about you in the guise of pretend characters, and then it’s all over, because if one person on Earth chuckles at the conceit of pretending to be Glenn Greenwald’s sock puppet, how much dignity can you possibly have left?
theturtlemoves
@Thomas:
Given that he uses that phrase every time he posts over here and frequently on his own blog, I’m not sure how much longer it should be viewed as beneath his vast dignity.
fourlegsgood
@Glenn Greenwald:
Actually, yes, plenty.
The hopey-changey thing is working out pretty well too. But thanks for asking.
rob!
@Sly:
Nice job. Brick Oven Sly!
Kent
One more thing that I think is critical. Greenwald updates his posts a lot. But I can’t recall the last time he ever updated a post to say that he was wrong about something. Even when he clearly was.
For instance, on March 20, Glenn writes
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/03/20/health_care/index.html
which is clearly wrong in its reading of what Ezra Klein meant to say, as Ezra points out (later on March 20)
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/03/re_interest_groups.html
and yet Greenwald updates on March 23
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/03/23/health_care/index.html
and continues to characterize Ezra thus:
“painfully absurd propagandistic attempt by the administration and its most loyal cheerleaders to depict the health care bill as some sort of bold act of “standing up to special interests” — or, as Ezra Klein put it, the White House, with this bill, has “neutralized” industry interests and banished them to their “twilight” of influence and power in Washington.”
Again, I say: this is not a well man. He is constitutionally incapable of admitting error, or even being willing to give people the benefit of the doubt. Whatever his virtues, and I agree that they are many, this will not end well.
fourlegsgood
@tballou:
I’m gonna disagree with you.
He could have made his points in less than 100 words without resorting to charges of “cultism” and “obot-ism.”
JMY
@tballou:
Who screwed up? Arkon DougJ? Saying that the PAC was a failure isn’t a screw up, it’s a matter of opinion. Not understanding the objective of the PAC, maybe. He recognized his mistake and apologized for it.
Reading the actual Workbench post confirms that the real screw up is Hamsher, not because she operates a PAC, that’s her prerogative, but for someone who expects transparency from others, to not be as forthcoming about simple expenditures as she was, is hypocritical.
terry chay
@El Tiburon: I never accused Glenn of any wrongdoing. I did accuse him of deceiving people with his statements that are factually correct but deliberately misleading. I provided two quotes from January showing how that was the case.
I missed this quote from July 2008 where he claimed/implied he never got paid, when, in fact, through DMDM media he does get the $2k/month (though it may also be factually correct, since DMDM is a LLC which is appears to be wholly owned by him—though we don’t know, we have only to know that this is probably the case because every time it’s been brought up Glenn doesn’t deny it and tell us to fuck off—he just tells us to fuck off).
Maybe you didn’t imply that I accused Glenn of wrongdoing. I don’t know, but I did have one of the lengthiest summaries of what was going on and I do think the whole AccountabilityNow thing is a joke (though maybe I’m just wishing it—the last thing I want is a left version of Club for Growth—I think the latter destroyed the Republican Party).
Unlike you (and other recent accusations here including Glenn’s response where he puts words in my mouth):
The quote above was apparently said by every commenter here “all day long”, but if we look at the original thread (all 464 comments!):
lying: “Glenn is cute, so could he be lying.” (I’m not sure what this was, I guess the person was trying to point out that Glenn was no different than Jane).
stealing: not one quote with the words “steal” or “stole” in the thread
dishonest: not one quote accusing Glenn with the words “dishonest”. There is one quote defending Jane as not lying.
embezzlement: one quote by a pro-Greenwald defender implying that people are accusing him of embezzlement. Note: not a single quote accusing Greenwald of embezzlement.
criminal: not one quote can be found in the thread
stole: again, not a single quote.
hiding: again a single quote from the same pro-Greenwald defender implying that people are accusing him of hiding things. Note: not a single quote actually accusing Greenwald of embezzlement.
…
In other words, Fuck you, and Fuck Glenn. :-)
Llelldorin
All this furor is actually obscuring a serious problem with the liberal infrastructure–the fact that a lot of us feel that it’s Deeply Unseemly to be paid a fair salary for work on liberal causes.
The Republicans don’t think that way–they’re deeply corporate, and pay for the entire wingnut welfare establishment. This plays to their advantage repeatedly.
Remember, no-one is even faintly surprised when, say, a Frum or Norquist is paid handsomely for their political services. (Indeed, in Frum’s case, it was shocking when he stopped being paid for his hackery.) On the Democratic side, we continue our terrible habit of treating the fact that Greenwald was paid by his outfit as a shocking, terrible breach.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@bystander: I bet Daffydills grow in your shit.
Rogers Cadenhead
@Terry Chay:
Don’t know if this helps, but in the FEC filings the address of DMDM Enterprises turns up in FindLaw.Com as the law firm of Greenwald Christoph PC, the firm Greenwald founded in 1996 according to his Wikipedia entry.
There’s a DMDM, LLC that has been registered with the New York Department of Corporations since Aug. 29, 2000.
Elise
@John Cole: No, John. Jane was NOT the front on that issue. There were 50 MAJOR groups who were out in front on that issue months ago and they worked on it for many YEARS. Jane jumped on the bandwagon at the last minute and once again is trying to take credit for shit she DID NOT DO.
SAFRA passed because Obama wanted to prove to young people that they had a reason to vote – that politicians could make change that would impact their lives directly. He was paying them back for their votes and their work and he was helping the economy and regulating the banks at the same time. They planned to pass this legislation all year – it just happened to fit with reconciliation so they pushed it in there so they could claim two wins at once. It was a brilliant strategic move.
And Jane had nothing to do with any of it.
Advocacy groups with decades of experience pushed SAFRA through.
beatty
I work for a university that gets loads of public money for science projects. Loads. You know how many i’s and t’s have to be dotted and crossed and approved and hmmph’d over for buying a single tube of dye from a cake decorating shop (food grade dye is better overall for the experiment, environment, and zzzz)? Well, let’s see. Last time I counted, four people had to spend more than one hour each in their day to get a $4 tube approved. A university is not a PAC. But it’s kind of the same thing when talking about public money. Which some of you LLC CEOs might not realize requires loads of justification, backup, receipts, whatnot.
As for those shrinking violets in this commentary, I think Glenn is reacting to a bunch of things, a few having to do with recent prior posts where everyone except for maybe one guy and John Cole piled up on him. I didn’t want to add to the discussion, even to give GG a thumbs up, because the piling on was so inane. You guys are an angry lot. I am an angry lot. A parking lot. But please try to remember the big picture here. George Bush and Cheney fucked our country to the dark ages. Maybe if we’ve got some extra venom, we could direct it to the fucking newspapers who got us in to war, the tv news programs that got us into war, and the politicians who got us into the war, the politicians who are still carrying out dark age type policies.
You don’t like Glenn’s tone? Comment and get over it if you must. But please someone tell me that all this anger and rage is actually getting deposited somewhere more appropriate?
adnoto
I copied the above quote early on and then proceeded to read through more than 200 comments and I gotta say – this blog appears to be filled with idiots. Accountability Now is for suckers but not because it is dirty. It’s for suckers because there is no hope of ever affecting fundamental change by working within the system as it currently stands. I don’t want to lump everyone here into the same boat but I gotta say that it is my belief that most of you are too clueless to even understand what I am talking about.
The only major things Greenwald has been wrong about in the past 5 years were his promotion, previous to last election, of Obama as being “vitally important,” and his continued commitment work within the a completely corrupted and broken system via things like Accountability Now PAC. To be sure, those are two major blunders (one of which he is still committed to for now) but from what I can tell, Greenwald and Hamsher are much closer to knowing what really has to be done than anyone – any of you “Democrats” – I have read here.
Glenn Greenwald isn’t a Democrat and I think he knows, in his heart of hearts, though he fights it, that there is no significant difference between the two wings of the corporatist war party. He gets attacked on his blog all the time by clueless, party first, our-guy-is-better-then-their guy, idiots. I am just guessing but I think the irritation in his response here actually has little to do with Accountability Now specifically and more to do with the overall state of the Democratic party supporters. I think his response to you all was so strident because he is beginning to realize what kind of people he is dealing with here (Democratic voters when their team is in power) and it pisses him off that he didn’t see it coming. I think he actually believed that all of those who were so against BushCo for their crimes and policies might actually be against ObamCo for furthering and because of Obama’s “liberal” bona fides, mainstreaming those crimes and policies. I think Glenn actually believed you all would fight Obama and the Democrats when it was obvious it needed to be done. Not so much huh?
In short, you morons, are losing Glenn Greenwald. It will be your loss. That is certain.
goblue72
@Elise: Can we just all accept that Jane Hamsher is a washed up Hollywood has-been (to the degree she ever was an “is-been”) who is desperate for the attention she only-sorta-kinda got when working in Tinseltown?
And that Glenn Greenwald has yet to deny that he has never given a goat a BJ?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@adnoto: It’s always nice to get visits from the nihilist crowd. Do they let you post often from the state hospital?
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
@fourlegsgood:
Shhh! Some people are impressed with the sheer volume of words from GG and figure that is what it takes to win an argument. Don’t shatter their illusion. Just play along with it and hopefully they will move on when they get bored or find the next bright shiny thing that distracts them.
Bill
Yeah. The difference is Greenwald piles on by himself but it takes dozens of Obots to pile on him and guess what…he’s still right about that hit piece that was full of distortion, innuendo and miscellaneous personal attacks that it was worthy of being a Rove Production.
How’s that closing Guantanamo thing going?
How about those pictures he was going to release before he wasn’t going to release them?
How are all those civilian trials going? How about allowing the Attorney General to run the DoJ and not the White House? How’s that going.
All we have now is a black Bush with a brain. Nothing else has changed. We got a health care bill that doesn’t do a damned thing…even about preexisting conditions. We still won’t have most of whatever benefits there were supposed to be until 2014 or whenever it’s politically safe to allow them to go into effect.
How’s it feel to support the second coming of Dick Cheney?
Billy K
Kudos to Our Arkon for running this unedited.
Shame on Glennzilla – a man I truly admire – for resorting to “Cult of Obama” language.
Mark S.
@Fern:
But . . . Bill Mother Fucking Halter
I bet if you gave Erik son of Erik $200,000 he’d have 25 teabaggers running in various parts of the country. They’d probably all lose, but at least he’d be trying.
@adnoto:
Oh please shut the fuck up.
PTirebiter
@adnoto: “I think his response to you all was so strident because he is beginning to realize what kind of people he is dealing with here…”
Whether you can hear it or not, the universe is laughing behind your back. Rotate your tires. deteriorata
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
Hey DougieJ, exactly what part of your OP on this did you retract? According to a diarist (in a diary on the Wreck List at the GoS) who talked with GG and posted this same screed from him also quoted him as saying about his communication with you and John that “they retracted the parts that were false”. I thought you just gave a short opinion at the end?
What false allegations did you remove that satisfied GG? Serious question here because I think I missed something. I will say that GG’s rant isn’t doing so well over there either. Go figure. ;)
tenkindsofgrumpy
This is very sad to me. And I don’t even have the courage to go into glennzilla’s comments. Glenn and BJ are at the top of my bookmarks, and to see this shit going on is very sad. You all may not have noticed that we are on the same side, and the other side doesn’t take any prisoners. Dougj can post whatever he want of course, but why this? There is a lot of serious shit gone badly wrong in this country and we really need to husband our resources for the battles that advance things, not tear each other apart. Plus, who the hell has the time to read thru 1,000 freekin comments, also.
gwangung
@tballou: No, it isn’t, you silly child.
Heh heh heh.
Arkon DougJ
@DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal):
I retracted the statement that the PAC was clearly a “big financial failure” because it didn’t bank or disburse money. It’s true that it didn’t bank or disburse money but, given its objectives, I cannot say with certainty that that makes it a failure.
tc125231
@tenkindsofgrumpy: I don’t read Glen much. Frankly, he’s a bit too shrill for my taste, and most of what he says is hardly a revelation to me.
Nonetheless, most of the defensive posts in this thread are pathetic — similar to Emo John’s calling democratic senators the “worst” people in the world.
Worse than Imhoffe? Cheney?
Give me a break.
Grow up and be constructive, or don’t whine about what’s coming.
Shygetz
Glenn Greenwald made an intemperate response to criticism, using a combination of straw men, overgeneralizations, histrionics, name-calling, and flat-out distractions.
In other news, water is wet.
Seriously, is this worth >500 comments? Glenn Greenwald got criticized, and Glenn went over-the-top apeshit to no one’s surprise. DougJ made a factual correction to the original post when his error was pointed out (still leaving some legit questions), which is DougJ’s responsibility. A gracious person would have said “Thank you for the correction, here are the answers to the other questions being posed.” But this is Glenn Greenwald. For all his strengths, grace and temperance are not among them.
Ninufar
To joe from Lowell: THANK YOU! And in case this hasn’t already been answered, the not-Akron thingy is one of the H. militia titles I think.
To rcade: THANK YOU TOO!
To Craig (the sock) — Wow. Lots of articulate people here (not meaning the snarky sense), but that was beautiful! Made my procrastinating worthwhile =-) I guess I’m the at-least-one-person, hey!
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
@Arkon DougJ:
IOW you “retracted” your one opinion you made on the subject, right? The person who contacted GG posted him saying:
Thanks for responding DougJ. It’s just that I noticed GG was using the plural form to describe the injustices you had done to his PAC with your “falsehoods and smears” of daring to utter a single opinion on the subject and then retracting it.
I think GG supports the Pope = Jeebus argument. ;)
Mike Kay
@Mark S.:
hahaahahhahahahhahahahahhahahahahhahahahhahaha
Oh, that was priceless.
Why are all these GlenBots such drama queens? Talk about kool-aid and worshipers.
Mike Kay
@adnoto: And the oscar for best actress goes to (rips open envelope) adnoto!
You Glenn cultists lay it on thick, doncha.
And for what, he’s not that cute.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
FWIW, here is a response* from the author of the diary that has GG in vapors regarding the above missive from GG:
* This was a comment by rcade in the diary at GoS discussing the above GG text posted by DougJ.
So GG was wrong again, it was a JOEBOT who started this. Figures that he would get that wrong too…lol!
Mike Kay
@Bill: but sweetheart, don’t been over now, because your own darling pin-up Tailgunner glenn supported the HCR bill. I guess, you’re the racist leftist version of a teabagger. But then again, Nader is a racist leftist as well.
zulif mclaren
The kooks and cranks and crackpots who infest this blog are out in force today.
You people have managed to cover yourselves with shames yet again. In other news, it gets dark at night.
The specific allegations here prove unimportant inasmuch as Greenwald is as usual correct: Obama has managed to betray essentially every single campaign promise he ever made, and thus he needs to be primaried hard from the left.
Moreover, 2012 is an ideal time to do it. The Republicans are self-destructing so fast there’s no chance at all that they’ll field a candidate any sane person will vote for. So this election cycle offers an ideal chance for someone from the left to challenge Obama, because if it splits the Democratic party, who cares? No one’s going to vote for Palin, so what does it matter?
We now return you to the regularly scheduled Kook-Aid drinking contest and mindless worship of a guy who violated every single campaign promise he ever made (except the promise to escalate in Afghanistan).
Newsie8200
@John Cole:
I actually think that Hamsher, Greenwald, and others want to and are trying to build up political infrastructure separate from established progressive organizations (hence, the ‘veal pen’ stuff). They aren’t particularly good at it, but they’ve been good at taking credit for the successes of others. If people want to donate to what amounts to piggybacking on the success and hard work of others, then, that’s their prerogative.
There are hundreds of groups that have been doing work on student loans, health care and so many other issues that have influence other than making a bunch of noise. There’s never been a political or activist project that they’ve been crucial to. It’s just typical of the netroots to amplify the actions of those they recognize and communicate with, while ignoring or downplaying the work of those who do so much outside the netroots.
Holly McLachlan
@Arkon DougJ
apologies for the extremely late response.
During the past couple of months there’s been a not-constant but, still, a concerted effort to diss him on Balloon Juice. (not John, BTW).
Wha wha? Who has dissed him among front-pagers?
Insinuating that their PACs are spendthrift failures is as “dissing” as it reasonably gets. And promoting the idea that he and Hamsher are self-dealing cheats is fairly extreme actually, anywhere outside the blogosphere…
Your post didn’t sink to the level of many of the comments. Obviously.
Mike Kay
@DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal): where do all these glennbots come from? I’ve read his posts, he’s a complete bore. But more importantly he’s a smear merchant. There was this one post back last august where he says someone at GOS was a corporatist against HCR reform simply for asking about the financial arrangement bwtn Hamsher the her two puppets. It was pure McCarthism, where tailgunner Joe accuses Army generals of communist ties because they rejected his request to give his lover a draft deferment, which led to the Army-McCarthy hearings and his end.
it’s just because he’s “cute” and have a crush on him, the same way so many isolated geeks have a pin-up crush on cutie-pie, Hanoi Jane?
Mike Kay
@zulif mclaren: oh honey, glenn isn’t that cute, save the drama queen outrage for rickey martin, someone who’s really handsome.
Let hamsher and greenwald run. What do they have to lose besides their graft and corrupt PACs
Paula
ROFL @ Bill …
Yeah , I can play that game, too man …
Has GG passed any legislation protecting civil liberties infringements in the US within the last decade?
Has GG actually gotten a politician elected based on an effort to highlight candidates’ position on Iraq?
Has GG successfully campaigned to skeptical, seated lawmakers and gotten them to change their votes on security issues?
Has GG been elected to any kind office in the United States where he would be in a position to affect any of the issues of which he writes?
Has been part of a DC watchdog committee? Has he written legal briefs that have been later used in defense of detainees (seriously, I’d like to know if he has because I’d be interested in reading that)?
Has he been an effective fundraiser for his PAC? (OK, probably not.)
*****************
I realize that’s there’s people who are making very reasonable overtures at the “why can’t we all just get along?” sentiment, but speaking for myself BJ is probably the one place I could get my rants on about my problems w/ the netroots without getting a shitpile of people calling me a corporate sellout. I think that if you want people to be respectful of GG there are a lot of other blogs you can go to. He’s a Hero in the Progressive Blogosphere, no snide comment section is going to ruin that.
Although let it be said that among BJ, GG, and FDL, there’s only one blog that doesn’t presume a Super Important Role in the General Political Conversation, either as advocates or critics. The qualification of “both sides are being silly and reductive” assumes that BJ doesn’t, in fact, mostly live to snark @ everyone and everything. (I could be wrong.) GG (and some parts of FDL, I gather) do see their roles as being important to holding people’s feet to the fire. That they can’t meet their own high standards in effective activism, even as they berate others for failing and alienate those who most agree with them (in abstract) is … contradictory, to say the least.
OK, now I’m tired of this thread, but thanks for not cutting it off, BJ mods.
Mike Kay
why doesn’t Glenn run congress. Pick a district and run, But no, that would take courage.
Comrade Kevin
I think Mike Kay is in a competition to see if he can be a bigger prick than Greenwald.
Mark S.
@Holly McLachlan:
Where did Doug say anything remotely like that?
Midnight Marauder
@Bill:
This definitely needs to be at the top of the site.
+9
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
@Mike Kay:
I’m a MeBot, I support Me. :)
I really have to laugh at those who use the line: The fact that [insert famous name here] did stellar work on [insert cause from long ago] assures me that I can trust everything they say. You are clearly a fool for daring to question the greatness/honesty/integrity of [insert famous name here].
I call that level of devotion “blind loyalty”, which is something I don’t expect to see from a thinking person. Reason and blind loyalty are not companions on the same trail so when I see someone use this as an answer to problems like what has been mentioned here, I quickly dismiss it as so much bullshit from someone who gave up on using their brain.
Anyone remember phuckstain? ;)
Mark S.
@Midnight Marauder:
Agreed.
adnoto
@Mike Kay:
Like I said – morons. You should head over to Glenn’s blog and check out some of my back and forth’s with him. You might learn something.
Mike Kay
@Midnight Marauder: who says blood-red lefties can’t be racist. After all, a bunch of soviet communists were anti-Semitic.
Comrade Kevin
@Bill: Jesus Christ, you’re a fucking moron. I bet you voted for Ralph Nader at some point.
mapaghimagsik
Are we to the point of checking out each other’s countertops?
Please don’t. Where the heck will the Teahadi move to when we move into SnipeyCrazyTown?
I can’t get through all of GG’s writing. I think that’s a failure in me as a reader. I get nervous when people start saying “Big words bore me” or “too long”. I get that plenty from my Republican friends.
I find it frustrating that GG went so over the top, but you don’t have to call someone a liar to insinuate it. I’d like to think that BJ is a little more of a higher minded blog than to just attack other blogs to get hits for ad revenue (see, I didn’t call John Cole a money grubbing whore, or at least I hope he charges more than ad revenue gives, but I can imply just as baselessly) but this recent fatal attraction over Jane and now anything associated with Jane… its getting a little stalkerish. John has not sipped tea and politely declined to disagree with Jane, and Jane has not “called shenanigans”, and GG certainly didn’t say that the insinuations were “not cricket”. I’m not calling anyone non self-aware, but perhaps a little less typing and a little more reflection by everyone, including the bloggers I do so much enjoy reading, would be good for all.
What, has writing about how crazy the Republicans are lost its luster? Is it just considered normal and not worth writing about? I’m frustrated that Obama hasn’t done as much as I’d like, but I also know I got caught up in the euphoria — forgetting just how intractable and scared people are. About 5 billion percent better than Bush, but so much of the good he’s done could get wiped away by the next asshat the Teabaggers get elected. There’s only so much political capital to spend, I get it. Its a hard reality. A real platitude when I’m not the one being denied rights. Asking someone who is being denied rights to just “suck it up” and not be angry feels wrong to me. And yet, I’d rather keep focusing on the real problems — Republican asshats, you know, the ones that want to pull the ladder up behind them because they got theirs, darnit!
And can we put to bed this whole idea that because you like someone’s ideas they are a cultist? I mean all of it? Can we throw that slap in the face under the bus or something?
Mike Kay
@Comrade Kevin: well, otter says in Animal House, “mine’s bigger”.
dude, as a new yorker, I’m not thin skinned like the distinguished former attorney.
Can you imagine, he was a former litigator, and his skin is a ripe an october grape in 100 degree weather. it’s no wonder he didn’t last long. It would be like a football player crying after every tackle.
Quiddity
@williamc
I agree with most of what you wrote.
@Steve
Your remark:
Is accurate. The tone at BJ shifted around the time of the Scott Brown win in Massachusetts. Don’t know why.
As to Greenwald, I suspect he’s not fond of the health care bill and may have been puzzled at the robust support it was getting at Balloon Juice. If he read the comments section in the weeks leading up to the passage of the bill, he would have seen numerous instances where HCR skeptics (especially of the Senate version) were rudely dismissed.
To repeat: It’s the comments, not the main posts, that are aggressively pro-Obama. Maybe there was a shift in blog traffic (both to and away from Balloon Juice). I think that the more activist role played by this blog recently (e.g. calling Congress, raising money) has been a factor.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
This is funny:
No, the tone [here] is often pretty aggressively mocking towards anyone on any side of any issue. It’s just that some mockers are thin-skinned when they are the mockee. They just can’t handle the give and take of an argument that is about something that is near and dear to them.
The pearl clutching, couch fainting, shark jumping, shit sandwich eating, under the bus throwing face slapping whiners just aren’t going to like talking about stuff that is near and dear to them here. I have been called just about everything in the book here and wow, here I am five years later and somehow I survived.
Constitution: It’s not just a document. ;)
Mike Kay
@adnoto:
shorter Adnoto: just think what you’ll be missing, you won’t have Nixon
Glennto kick around anymore!Admiral_Komack
Interesting thread.
I won’t be giving money to Accountability Now.
Carry on.
Mike Kay
@Quiddity:
The reaction has been overwhelming positive among democrats and across the non Firebag/PUMA side of the blogosphere — Obama received a 9 point bump in CNN’s poll.
Bill
Paula – You’re getting a little hysterical, aren’t you, Honey?
What has Obama actually accomplished since being in office except to basically firm up the concept of Executive Power being damned near complete whenever the Executive wants to use it?
He has not distanced himself from the worst of Bush’s excesses and, as a matter of fact, he’s actually taken a worse position on some of them.
His actions in re the health care bill were atrocious. One day he’s promising to support a public option (he actually campaigned on it) and the next day, he’s against it. One day he wants Congress to write the bill and the next day he’s sending drafts to the Senate – drafts written by the insurance lobby for christ’s sakes. He has failed to stick to even one important campaign promise, not even one. If anyone here claims this POS of a Health Care Reform is good, then they better read the damned thing. It’s going to actually make things worse for the middle class – while increasing the take by the insurance industry.
He’s a one termer and, write this down, he’s going to take a hell of a lot of decent Democrats with him once folks realize they’ve been had.
Lupin
Kudoes for the transparency, but in the end, it boils down to this: are individual donors OK with seeing $48K of their money go to Hamsher, Greenwald et al. If they are, fine, no reason to complain. You’ve got value for your money, I think.
Personally and subjectively, I think there are a lot more worthier causes out there, and I have no intention of donating to their PAC.
As for Greenwald, he is the Joe Klein of tomorrow, which is rather ironic. His heart is in the right place; he is correct 98% of the time, but he is also a crybaby who refuses to admit and correct mistakes when he makes them (the other 2%) and instead engages in whiny attacks on those who point them out.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
@Bill:
Hang around Bill, I think you will really like it here.
Yeah, that’s the ticket. :)
kid bitzer
first, all of yuz should shut up, make nice, and go back to beating the shit out of republicans. it’s what both bj and gg are best at, and it’s what the country needs.
second, somebody should be considering craig @493 for a front-page slot here. that was pitch-perfect hilarity.
ruemara
Wow. I go to work and BJ gets all agita.
As a person who’s donated, I am slightly annoyed & embarrassed.
Annoyed, because I find the petitions I signed are why my mailbox is full of crap and because I thought I was helping pay for the work on HCR and to support people who were supporting HCR. I didn’t know that was part of what my signature was for.
Embarrassed, because to see the filings and see 1 person in particular getting “paid” by companies they have founded, I dunno, kinda makes me feel taken like a country rube. I fully acknowledge that there probably are startup costs administrative issues, etc etc. It’s all perfectly legal. However, why not be up front and say donations help pay your salary? Also, since Mr. G said he had no financial relationship with Ms. H, how does that jibe with the work he’s done for her PAC? It’s perfectly legal. I’d be happy to share my pennies to keep good activists…activisting. I’d just like to be given straight truth from them.
Mr. G’s rant? I don’t care. Cuss away. These people don’t know you personally. This is the effing internet. Let your freak flag fly, type with no hands. I’m the last person to care about your author status or the O-bot stuff. You don’t matter to me. The work that needs to be done to keep this country from going over the edge matters, so I think I will stick to actblue and netroots from now on.
adnoto
@Mike Kay:
No, once again you don’t get it. You are losing Glenn Greenwald because you all are heading further and further off to the right. Glenn hasn’t moved in either direction to speak of. You will attack him even more in the future. I guarantee it.
You do realize that, 20 years ago, the vast majority of you would have been consider Republicans don’t you? I imagine you don’t. Hell, 20 years ago, if he is at least that old, which I am guessing he is, John Cole was a Republican. As I remember it, he was still a Republican until well into BushCo reign of terror. The consensus on this blog was pro-health-insurance-bailout bill correct? That piece of corporatist filth was originally proposed by Republicans a few years back and any decent, thinking human being rejected it as they should have.
So Mike, you go ahead and keep fighting for your half of the bought and paid for war team, as they kabuki through an intra-squad scrimmage, all the while calling each basket for your team “progress.” Those of us who actually know what is going on will keep trying to fend off your idiocy.
Jim Pharo
@Oliver Willis: Sorry, Ollie. No snark. Weird, huh?
Marc
adnoto: you don’t get it. You know nothing about the culture here. I do know that my daughter gets health care through this bill, and that fucking assholes like you have been trying hard to make sure that she doesn’t. So shove it where the Sun doesn’t shine, you arrogant asshole, and don’t presume to know anything about my politics, activism, or anything else.
brendancalling
@furioso ateo: @furioso ateo:
wtf’s his problem? Oh I don’t know, maybe seeing the organization he started and puts a lot of work into misrepresented as a scam, seeing his reputation dragged through the mud, and being portrayed as a crook has something to do with it?
Say, do you still beat your wife?
outoftown
Glenn Greenwald got accused of fundamentally unethical behaviour. Being accused of basically stealing, his response is completly justified.
Who made the ill-informed accusation? Who had their professional reputation potentially smeared by unfounded and untrue accusations?
And it should come as no surprise, if one has read much of Greenwald’s past work, that exposing of unethical behaviour is one of the main drums he beats upon. So being falsely accused himself, would not suprisingly create an outraged response on his part.
Last, after watching the swooning at places like dkos over the President and the health insurance bill (which in my opinion is largely a corporatist bill and does little to provide actual reform) that just passed, I had independently arrived at the evaluation that there is a serious case of Obama-worship developing among the progressive community. And this evaluation was reinforced by the vitriol directed at anyone dissenting or criticizing Obama/HIR.
There has been not enough criticism directed at the President from the larger progressive community. Things people were outraged at over Bush are now being glossed over as “pragmatism” or “political realities” because our president is now a Democrat.
Charles Onions
The tone in this discussion is pretty damn repulsive. 95% affected sarcasm straight out of a shitty Richard Linklater movie and almost nobody responding substantively to Greenwald’s very genuine grievance. It’s like a cartoon liberal convention hosted by Captain Planet’s stoner son
media browski
So Greenwald never even tries to defend his previous claims of having no financial ties to Hamsher.
Typical for the lying, inveigling, obfuscating Greenwald.
ricky
@media browski:
I noticed this too since it was the focus of many commenters, myself included.
But you know, the only reason this tie surfaced was because the AN PAC thoroughly disclosed it to us out of their devotion to transparency and IT IS REQUIRED BY LAW.
I was surprised. People with his streak of self righteousness
usually go to great links to prove their shit don’t stink. Perhaps he believes he does not shit at all.
over_educated
My favorite part of this thread were the Greenwald supporters showing up to tell us Greenwald is completely justified in being an asshat in his response because BJ “impuned his integrity.”
Seriously, a polite 3 paragraph response would have done much more to hammer home what he wanted to say and he would have come off as articulate AND a class act.
Ultimately progressivism and and the causes Greenwald himself champions are ill-served by name calling folks who stand in general agreement with him on many issues.
Seriously though, this thread does suck.
El Tiburon
@Arkon DougJ:
#439
Is this not enough of an apology for you? Right there where I said “Apologies for my error” See it? Right up there.
Also, GG wrote this and I assume he was writing this to you ArkonDougJ
If this wasn’t directed at you, then again, apologies, I misunderstood who he was writing to. Again, apologies if I didn’t see where you corrected GG for his false statement for saying what you said was “blatantly false.”
So, can you now get “sucked into” the questions I asked. And why do you feel you are getting sucked into anything? It’s very simple:
1. What duties do you as a featured blogger here at BJ have when posting something? Do you simply read something then link to it, or do you do any basic research so you have a better understanding as what you are talking about?
2. Why the term “tar”? That is a loaded phrase. Obviously you read the original reporting negatively. Otherwise you could have stated: “Wow, look at how much money AN has raised!!”
3. Do you have animosity towards Hamsher? And if so, does this possibly cloud your judgment?
Contrary to what you and others may think, I am not flaming on you. I’m not a GG-bot or cultist.
John
I don’t think anyone has really addressed this yet, but I don’t think it was at all unreasonable for people to assume that part of AN’s purpose involved giving money to candidates.
Here’s Greenwald, being “absolutely correct” and shaming Arkon DougJ for his mistake:
I’m not sure I understand what “a” means if it doesn’t involve giving money to primary challengers. How does one mount a credible primary challenge without money?
As for “b”, again, this seems like bullshit if you’re not giving money to the challengers. How on earth are Glenn Greenwald and Jane Hamsher going to persuade “credible primary challengers” to do anything? They don’t have any money to offer, nor do they have any discernable constituency. I guess they’re taking credit for Halter, but I’ve yet to see any evidence of that. Reporting by third parties has generally focused on Labor’s role in getting Halter to run.
Basically, so far as I can tell, Greenwald’s defense is that if you read this description to imply that they were about giving financial support to candidates, you’re a fool, because the description of the PAC doesn’t say that explicitly. In fact, Greenwald says, the purpose of the PAC is to do nothing at all.
Seriously, does Greenwald’s response give anyone have any real idea what this PAC has actually done, or intends to do? Its mission seems to be a mixture of bullshit and unrealistically high expectations.
El Tiburon
@rootless-e:
Glenn Greenwald wrote in his response:
This is what I was relying on and the fact that DougJ said he made a retraction. Now, if I misread who GG was directing his response to, then I do apologize for my confusion. I saw where DougJ explained the statement he retracted was perhaps not false. Either way, I should have made clear I was relying on GGs assertion that DougJ mad a “blatantly false” statement.
So, I was not creating something out of nothing.
Egilsson
Glenn Greenwald is right, and DougJ, whom I love, blew it here.
Man up, apologize, and stop trying to shoot people who are on the right side of things.
I think I’m going to throw a little jack at AN, because I think they deserve it.
Tom Hilton
To sum up: Greenwald is an even bigger asshole than many of us already knew he was.
xian
UPDATE XXXIV: I never really bought Glenn’s sockpuppet defense back in the day.
furioso ateo
@brendancalling: Nope, not since that last time when I beat her to death.
Oh, see, I didn’t turn into a petulant child there and write an exhaustive screed questioning your moral character. Imagine that.
theylivebynight
This has been one of the most depressing threads I’ve ever had the displeasure to skim. To paraphrase Sayre’s Law, blog flame wars are the most vicious and bitter form of politics, because the stakes are so low.
Steve
@adnoto:
Let’s just note that even Noam Chomsky supported the bill.
Steve
@John:
I think what “a” means is that you have a big network of progressives who are willing to give money to progressive challengers, even if the PAC itself isn’t all that well-capitalized. It’s sort of like how Stephen Colbert sponsored the Olympic speed-skating team without actually giving them any money; they know that it’s enough for him to simply tell his audience “this is a cause we should support.”
Bruce (formerly Steve S.)
@Steve:
Noam Chomsky supported the bill in the same sense that Greenwald, Armando (BTD), Atrios, and a good deal of the left did; hold your nose and pass the thing. So if history is any guide we should now expect several hundred BJer comments slandering Chomsky’s life’s work.
kindness
I like Glenn. Yes this was biting but hey, it sucks to be scolded. Let’s just say he may have a point about the original post & the spanking afterwards was non-consentual.
taylormattd
@myiq2xu: OMG, it’s the dumbshit PUMA from goldberry’s shithole blog.
LiberalTarian
Hey, we’re left of center. Piss on our own is what we do.
Blue Neponset
I still have a hard time with the idea that a PAC should pay its founders $48,000 when its cash receipts are $113,695 for the year.
If Sean Hannity did that I think a lot of Kossacks and Firebaggers would be outraged.
joypog
@Glenn Greenwald:
as Jay-Z said, don’t argue with fools cause from a distance they can’t tell who is who.
You may be right, you may be wrong (personally I don’t give a shit) but your tone definitely made you seem like the smaller man.
Remember you’re the guy taking the money – you got the cash so there is no need to lower us to the level of us nattering nabobs of nincompoops.
John
@Steve:
I suppose that’s what it means. I do think, as I said in my original post, that it isn’t at all unreasonable to read that description and think that it implies that the PAC is going to be giving financial support to candidates, in the absence of further context.
adnoto
@Marc:
Shorter Marc: “I got mine so fuck you.”
That’s the Liberal spirit Marc.
terry chay
@outoftown:
The only people who have accused Glenn Greenwald of “fundamentally unethical behavior” or “stealing” are people like you making Straw Man defenses for him. If you read the thread, most people were accusing him of being an asshole.
The same goes for the original post above, if you look, no where does he actually contradict the facts. He just sets up straw men to smash.
El Tiburon
@terry chay:
Which thread? Go back to the original thread before GG responded. There you will find plenty making unfounded accusations of GG’s “unethical behavior”based on one out-of-context report.
I’m sure if DougJ simply posted to a link describing GG as an asshole, GG would have ignored it. That is not what happened here.
Josef
@EdTheRed:
Nice pull.
James
Glenn Greenwald can really go fuck himself. I have no problem with Obama criticism, Greenwald does good work – but his incessant whining every time someone challenges him really exposes the bitch in Glenn. Instead of simply countering charges, he has to wet himself like the goddamn baby that he is and refer to people as “Obots” and mindless sheep that are following their “leader”. Pull your fucking skirt up you goddamn coward.
ChaoticGeorge
Dude, you suck, and Glen is right. I’d only add that I wish fan-voters who treat politics like it’s American Idol would STFU. This would mean you, dude. Go Glen!
Tom M
Max B. Greenwald is an arrogant, elitist, pretentious, prickish, egotistical, prolix asshole
You left out an adjective, well, more than one but you definitely missed an appropriate one.
James
@ChaoticGeorge:No one is shutting up, Glenn is an unrepentant asshole who seems to only have douchebag followers such as yourself. Greenwald is a whiny piece of shit, Fuck you Glenn.
Comrade PhysioProf
You gotta admit, Greenwald is a truly amazing polemicist.
ishmael
I love some of the responses on this blog.
Yes, Greenwald’s response is severe, but he is responding to charges against his character and credibility. Grow up.
James
I love some of the responses on this blog as well.
tenkindsofgrumpy
pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeez kill this thread.
James
Yes, please do kill this thread – Glenn Greenwald has been called a despicable douchebag enough.
Tattoosydney
@ChaoticGeorge:
vs
If you’re going to accuse people of treating politics as a reality TV show, it might help if the rest of your post didn’t sound like it was written by a love struck Valley girl.
Dayv
Man. Even when he’s right, Greenwald irritates me and somehow manages to expend three times as much text as he needs to.