Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

If you can’t control your emotions, someone else will.

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

Today in our ongoing national embarrassment…

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

Well, whatever it is, it’s better than being a Republican.

Weird. Rome has an American Pope and America has a Russian President.

Oh FFS you might as well trust a 6-year-old with a flamethrower.

Conservatism: there are people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

We will not go back.

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

Balloon Juice, where there is always someone who will say you’re doing it wrong.

The real work of an opposition party is to oppose.

The real work of an opposition party is to hold the people in power accountable.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

Everything is totally normal and fine!!!

He seems like a smart guy, but JFC, what a dick!

Speaker Mike Johnson is a vile traitor to the House and the Constitution.

SCOTUS: It’s not “bribery” unless it comes from the Bribery region of France. Otherwise, it’s merely “sparkling malfeasance”.

When I was faster i was always behind.

You are here: Home / Economics / C.R.E.A.M. / Open Thread: Speaking of Desperate GOP Clowns…

Open Thread: Speaking of Desperate GOP Clowns…

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Oh, yeah, back in the day… PandoDaily let Mark Ames reprint his 2013 Hall of Shame coverage on Sullivan, so let’s step in the wayback machine for a pertinent excerpt:

…[I]t was in 1994 that Andrew Sullivan’s recklessness and media fraud went berserk. First, he published a devastating three-part series destroying President Clinton’s universal health care legislation, articles that are generally considered the reason why “Hillarycare” failed to pass. The author, a Republican operative from the rightwing Manhattan Institute named Betsy McCaughey, had secretly prepared her articles in cooperation with Philip Morris (much of Hillarycare coverage was to be funded by hiking tobacco taxes). McCaughey’s article, “No Exit,” won for The New Republic that year’s National Magazine Award. However, her articles were complete frauds; not journalism, but the very opposite of journalism: Tobacco industry propaganda designed to kill off health care for Americans in order to protect big tobacco profits.

A secret 1994 memo from a Philip Morris executive outlining the tobacco giant’s role in crafting McCaughey’s articles reveals just how grotesquely corrupt journalism under Andrew Sullivan’s editorship had become…

The articles were so full of obvious lies and embarrassing flaws that in 2006, The New Republic publicly recanted. But as with the October Surprise smear, the damage was done — health care reform was dead for another 15 years. When you consider that a recent study estimated 45,000 Americans die every year from lack of health care coverage, and you multiply that by the nearly two decades since Andrew Sullivan helped kill Clinton’s health care reform, you start to understand who the real terrorist is.

But that’s no sweat off Sully’s whiskers: The pattern, set early, proves that no matter how hard he fails, no matter how disastrous the consequences for journalism or his adopted country, Sullivan’s career advancement is guaranteed to keep rising. Journalism, schmournalism: He’s a proven reliable waterboy for the tobacco lobby and the Republican Right, what value can journalism have that can possibly compete with that?…

Even after his own magazine recanted the article, in 2007, Sullivan, while admitting “I was aware of the piece’s flaws but nonetheless was comfortable running it as a provocation,” defended his failure, and the catastrophic consequences to millions of Americans, with all the aggressive conviction of a sociopath:

I think the magazine’s refusal to be mau-maued by the Clintons at the time – and Hillary was threatening blue murder against anyone who so much as dared to criticize her – is a feather in the magazine’s cap. We weren’t “out to get the Clintons.” Some of us – well, two of us – were merely worried that America’s excellent private healthcare system would be hobbled by too much government regulation. I am glad we helped head off the Clinton-Magaziner behemoth. Proud, actually.

That was in pre-internet, pre-social-media days, when publicly rebutting outright liars and exposing shills like Betsy McCaughey was a process requiring months, not hours. Sullivan’s been a well-paid whore for the worst elements of the American moneyed right since the day he took Marty Perez’s gig, so when you read encomiums to his vast dedication and tributes to his tireless intellectual curiosity, remember the evils to which he’s put those gifts. If he’s getting out of blogging now, it’s because there’s no longer a thick scrim of “professionalism” to protect his tender sensitivities from the vulgar assaults of truth.

Reader Interactions

98Comments

  1. 1.

    Corner Stone

    so when you read encomiums to his vast dedication and tributes to his tireless intellectual curiosity, remember the evils to which he’s put those gifts. If he’s getting out of blogging now, it’s because there’s no longer a thick scrim of “professionalism” to protect his tender sensitivities from the vulgar assaults of truth.

    If anyone says any incarnation of this variant they can be safely ignored. Forever.

  2. 2.

    Pogonip

    Looks like no Pupdate tonight. I’m starting to get concerned that one or more of the visiting dogs has died and John’s trying to figure out how to break the sad news to his audience. Or else he’s found a girlfriend at the worst possible time.

    Hope springs eternal, I’ll check again tomorrow. Goodnight!

  3. 3.

    Hal

    were merely worried that America’s excellent private healthcare system would be hobbled by too much government regulation

    Eyes roll right out of head. Keep in mind that if worse came to worst, and Sullivan lost his excellent US health coverage, he would have jetted right back to the UK.

    I wonder how many HIV positive people could have benefited from healthcare coverage 15 years ago. This sentiment really is I got mine so you can kiss off.

  6. 6.

    khead

    The dude cashed out. That’s great. I love capitalism and would also love to get suckers to buy subscriptions to my ramblings and then stop doling them out. Someone else pointed it out in the earlier thread in about 5 posts.

    Let’s not make it into anything more than that.

  10. 10.

    Mike J

    and tributes to his tireless intellectual curiosity, remember the evils to which he’s put those gifts.

    Genetically speaking, he’s not really on the high end of the curve, is he? Shouldn’t all the punditizing spots be taken by Asians?

  11. 11.

    rikyrah

    @Hal:
    That has always stuck in my craw. He is a FUCKING HIV+ patient who never had to face the reality of the American healthcare system pre-Obamacare.

  13. 13.

    Felonius Monk

    Betsy McCaughey is a vile, inhuman piece of shit. That Sully was pimping for her puts him pretty much in the same category.

  14. 14.

    lamh36

    St. Louis City Hall Meeting Reportedly Interrupted By Brawl

    …While it was not immediately clear who started the fight or for what reason, the meeting allegedly took a turn for the worse after an exchange between St. Louis Alderman Terry Kennedy and Jeff Roorda of the St. Louis Police Officers Association, St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s Nicholas Pistor reported. Photos from the scene showed Roorda wearing a bracelet that said, “I Am Darren Wilson,” the Ferguson police officer who shot the unarmed, black, 18-year-old Michael Brown….

    @sdkstl

    Claims Jeff Roorda, the controversial police union head, pushed a woman: RT @search4swag: this is who Jeff pushed https://vine.co/v/OTLO3FJ97qQ

  15. 15.

    Morzer

    I am wondering what Sullivan was caught doing that necessitated this hasty folding of tents and need to spend time with the family.

  17. 17.

    Anne Laurie

    @Corner Stone: When one is a made man in the Wingnut Wurlitzer, there’s always another sinecure available. If Sullivan’s yet-to-be-revealed new gig doesn’t work out, one of the many many rich men who’ve been fluffed by Sully in the past will find Andrew something… suitable.

    I’m sure the brutal internet beatings (/snide) Chait’s taken over the past couple days had something to do with Sulllivan deciding now was as good a time as any for his latest “swan song”, though. He’s never been a fan of vulgar democracy (I remember him whining that America was founded as a republic back in his early TNR days) and small-d democratic social media has been nothing but a source of aggravation to Our Mr. Sullivan.

  19. 19.

    Trentrunner

    The main thing to remember about Andrew Sullivan (aside from his knowingly infecting others with HIV while publicly decrying gay men’s promiscuity) is that HIS FIRST INSTINCT after the 9/11 attack was this:

    The middle part of the country – the great red zone that voted for Bush – is clearly ready for war. The decadent left in its enclaves on the coasts is not dead -and may well mount a fifth column.

    He has principled objections to right wing excesses, but he HATES the left, women, and “hippies.”

    He has been, on balance, a blight. He is best eradicated from public discourse.

  20. 20.

    CB

    …so when you read encomiums to his vast dedication and tributes to his tireless intellectual curiosity, remember the evils to which he’s put those gifts.

    This. I used to admire him for his ‘openess’ to dissent and his talent as an editor, but the further you dig, the uglier it is. His talent as an aggregator is blown to smithereens by his pomposity and verbal flatulence. The guy is a hypocrite and huckster, whose interests extend as far as ‘Andrew Sullivan’, and that’s it.

    Also, it does not take a million fucking dollars to operate a god damn blog.

  21. 21.

    Howard Beale IV

    @Anne Laurie: Actually, I think his latest health bout means the old boy’s health isn’t what he proclaims it to be-he ain’t no Magic Johnson fitness-wise; those cocktails aren’t side-effect-free, and he’s no spring chicken.

  23. 23.

    CB

    Can I also mention that the man would regularly take shits all over NYC, and then turn around and wax poetic about his longing for DC? A person like this is not to be trusted.

  26. 26.

    Gin & Tonic

    @CB: If I recall correctly, he found that living in NYC in the style he felt he should was actually beyond his means.

  29. 29.

    catclub

    @Mike J:

    tributes to his tireless intellectual curiosity,

    Huh? He fluffs Paul Ryan as but those budgets Ryan produces have totally made up numbers. His curiosity is only piqued after someone points out to him repeatedly that they would do harm him.

  30. 30.

    Gin & Tonic

    To break from the Sully-bashing, maybe I’m the only old Zappa fan who finds it pretty amusing that recent (apparently) seismic changes in a part of copyright law are due to the efforts of a “Flo & Eddie, Inc.”? I am most definitely NAL, but from what I’ve read, next time somebody says “I want to hear the big hit record, and I wanna hear it now, an’ I wanna hear the big hit record now with a bullet!” the answer will be “pay me.”

  33. 33.

    lamh36

    Lord…alcohol and sports fans…stay classy Rush hockey fans…stay classy…

    Hockey Fans Pour Beer On Native Kids, Tell Them To ‘Go Back To The Rez’

    Fans in Rapid City, S.D. poured beer on a group of Native American children and shouted racial slurs at them during a hockey game, television station KOTA reported on Monday.

    The 57 children who attended the Rush hockey game on Saturday were students at the American Horse School and were invited to the game as part of a program with the hockey team, KOTA reported.

    Saturday’s incident got so out of control that chaperones reportedly removed the students from the arena. And, according to the station, the incident was eventually reported to management.

    “They were getting drunk and around the third quarter they were talking crap to our kids and throwing down beer on some of them, including our staff and students … telling our students to go back to the rez,” Poor Bear wrote…

  36. 36.

    Howard Beale IV

    @Gin & Tonic: Gotta love technology moving faster than laws, yet again.: Even worse here is that you got state laws in the mix:

    Sirius XM first advances the argument that since Congress has never granted pre-1972 sound recording performance rights, no right exists at all. 26 This argument is rather curious because under the copyright act, pre-1972 recordings are explicitly removed from the purview of the statute. “With respect to sound recordings fixed before February 15, 1972, any rights or remedies under the common law or statutes of any State shall not be annulled or limited by this title until February 15, 2067.” 27 So, not only did Congress recognize the continuing protection of State copyright protection for sound recordings, but it explicitly stated that nothing in the Act “annulled or limited” any State law, other than providing for a terminal date of 95 years from the first granting of sound recording rights, so that pre-1972 sound recordings would not enjoy perpetual protection under the law of any State. So how can the failure of Congress to act proceed to annul a State law providing for sound recording protection for public performances? This would not have been my first argument.

    Next up, without actually mentioning the words “public domain,” Sirius advances the argument that all pre-1972 sound recordings are in the public domain, presumably because of publication without copyright notice. 28 The failure to mention the words “public domain” is gleefully pounced upon by Flo & Eddie in their response, quoting verbatim deposition testimony from Sirius XM Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, David J. Frear: 29

    Q: Is it Sirius XM’s position the pre-1972 sound recordings are in the public domain?

    A: Yes. 30

    Later there was this response:

    “To my knowledge we’ve never entered into discussions with The Turtles with respect to their songs. That-my understanding is that they’re in the public domain and so we are simply using them under that theory.” 31

    Under the then current edition of the copyright act in 1972, it was true that publishing your work without copyright notice would inject your work into the public domain. The problem with this argument is that sound recordings did not fall within the “subject matter” of copyright before 1972, when the right was first granted. Not being within the subject matter meant that Federal copyright law absolutely did not apply to pre-1972 sound recordings at all, so the rule against publishing without copyright notice does not apply. A Federal Judge from the Middle District of Florida agrees on this point. 32 Again, a very curious argument.

    Sirius XM’s final major argument is that State regulation of what is in effect a national broadcast operation would interfere with interstate commerce, and only Congress has the power to control interstate commerce. Any detailed discussion of the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution would induce sleep and is much better suited to a law school classroom. In short, Sirius XM made this same argument in the California action, and the Judge was so unimpressed with the argument that he dismissed it in a footnote, citing controlling U.S. Supreme Court case law. 33

    The difference between the California and the Florida action is that California had an actual statute in place, where the Florida action is based upon the “common law.” The “common law” is a series of legal principles established through case decisions rendered over time and are not generated by the State Legislature.

    Then there’s the biggest question of all: what about terrestrial analog broadcasters? For all these years, have the analog broadcasters been getting away with not paying something they should have been paying for? It seems that the decision in favor of Flo & Eddie points to “yes.” 42

  37. 37.

    mai naem mobile

    @Corner Stone: you forget that hes been making a decent living for decades now. If he was saving all along, he should have saved a nice nestegg. I am assuming his husband makes some kind of living. They don’t have any kids. He’s got a green card which means he can get health care through the ACA. He’s cashed out and does.not have to work anymore.

  38. 38.

    grandpa john

    @efgoldman: yes , just proof of the old adage that the more things change the more they stay the same.
    Samuel Butler (1612-1680) understood human nature even then

    “There are more fools than knaves in the world, else the knaves would not have enough to live upon.”
    ―Samuel Butler (poet)

  41. 41.

    jl

    Sullivan was still, very bravely in his eyes, defending The Bell Curve just a few weeks ago. And he was still pushing his bad habit of claiming it was all in the name of open scientific inquiry, and implying that no one had answered the analysis of that incompetently done book. I remember because that sparked another one of the BJ blog Bell Curve festival bashes, in which I always eagerly participate.

    Grifter or densely innumerate. Not sure which. Hope he stays retired this time and out of media in the future.

    Probably no more BJ blog Bell Curve parties, since no one else who is prominent in the media is willing to fluff that botched research anymore.

  42. 42.

    Cliff in NH

    health care reform was dead for another 15 years. When you consider that a recent study estimated 45,000 Americans die every year from lack of health care coverage

    stupid to not simply do the math for your readers, why not just add “that is approx 675,000 Dead people over the last 15 years”

  43. 43.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Howard Beale IV: As far as I can tell, Sirius’ lawyers pretty much just got their balls sliced off and handed to them on a plate in NY as well.

    I just find it funny that this is all attributable to two guys who haven’t been relevant for 40 years.

  44. 44.

    jl

    ” Andrew Sullivan saves himself from liveblogging the Clinton Restoration. ”

    Given his Matthews-level of fear and hatred of HRC (that is, well past ‘completely unreasoning’), this might play a role too, along with “dude cashes out” and possible health issues.

    I remember reading one of is pieces when he became editor of THR. Sullivan wrote that he like the cut of Dub’s jib, and he would be a very successful president. Sullivan was the High Baroque period of the ‘even the liberal New Republic’ era.

  45. 45.

    Howard Beale IV

    @Gin & Tonic: It gets worse:

    The implications get bigger when you consider YouTube. Here are The Turtles performing “Happy Together” on YouTube. 35 The lead vocals are live, but everything else is mimed to the original sound recording. If YouTube is not currently paying Flo & Eddie for this performance, then they’re going to have to start. The bigger question is, does the DMCA “safe harbor” provisions apply to pre-1972 sound recordings? The New York state appeals court has ruled that it does not. 36 A New York Federal Court says that it does. 37 That ruling is currently under a special appeal to the Second Circuit to resolve the question. 38 If the answer to the question is “no” then YouTube has committed copyright infringement every time the video containing a pre-1972 sound recording has been streamed.

    Good Thing YouTube has all those hit counters.

    As the late Carl Sagan said: “Billions and Billions…..”

  48. 48.

    Cliff in NH

    and of course that would be 945,000 Dead People thru 2015 … It’s getting better now, so the per year number should be decreasing as there are now 9,500,000 more people covered (takes time for that insurance to save their lives though.)

  50. 50.

    scav

    @sharl: The little Superman icon she (Offendicer Whitilatch) is altogether too precious as well — usual delusions in full bloom with that one.

  51. 51.

    different-church-lady

    I am glad we helped head off the Clinton-Magaziner behemoth. Proud, actually.

    Dude isn’t even a FUCKIN’ U.S. CITIZEN, but he’s proud he had utterly inproportionate influence over how it would work for those of us who are.

    Asshole.

  56. 56.

    jl

    The relentless sterile cynicism and incompetence of the US media:

    Exclusive: Spending- why ‘red’ states shoulder the deepest cuts under Obama
    Reuters By Andy Sullivan

    [Under Obama] Red states still came up short. After 2011, the average red state got 15 percent fewer grants and 1.3 percent fewer grant dollars…
    …
    Under presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, Hudak found that purple states got about 7.3 percent more grants and 5.7 percent more grant dollars than states that were firmly in one camp.

    http://news.yahoo.com/exclusive-spending-why-red-states-shoulder-deepest-cuts-062930803.html

    Note: emphasis added.

    It is true that some huge percentage cuts in grant dollars under Obama are reported for some red states such as Texas, but the reporting is so incompetent that it is impossible to figure out the significance. Can’t tell whether those are total dollars or just for one grant category.

    The piece also reported that no bias was found in the Recovery Act spending.

    So, why is not the piece about the relative fairness of Obama grant spending? I don’t know. Maybe the reporter would have to understand the numbers, and couldn’t gin up a canned cynicism story by picking out whatever hodge-podge of numbers that looked cool.

    I assume the Sulivan who wrote this is another Andy Sullivan, and the name is just a coincidence.

    Edit: Reuters story, so I should have just said ‘media’.

  58. 58.

    dubo

    The other day that interminable pasttime “Where is the Buckley of today?” reared its head again, and today it struck me that Sullivan is today’s Buckley to a T

    A pundit and editor who tries so hard to be provocative and erudite that he hoodwinks people into overlooking that the actual content of his message is aggresive stupidity. Well-respected and thought of as Serious even among most of his critics, despite the fact that as far as I can tell he’s never uttered a thing that wasn’t dishonest, ignorant, or bafflingly insane. Willing to engage his critics, but rarely honestly, and with a vicious streak a mile wide. Even when admitting he was wrong, he was wrong for the right reasons while his opponents were right for the wrong reasons.

  59. 59.

    jl

    @jl: I can’t even find where the article says whether the numbers are adjusted for population or size of the state economies. The reader is supposed to just guess about it. Why is this dreck published and who bothers to take it seriously?

    Oh well, maybe some Chicago gangsta thug Obama machine politics stories peddled by GOP coming soon.

  62. 62.

    Ken

    But Andrew Sullivan was kind of a train wreck and you couldn’t keep your eyes away. I did give him $25. But I made up for that by giving Digby $50.

  63. 63.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @Ruckus: I’m thinking of using that on my landlord. I returned home from my walk tonight to find, yet again, shit in my bath tub.

  64. 64.

    Rich (In Name Only) In Reno

    Notice how Sully waited until Driftglass was on hiatus before he buggered off?

  65. 65.

    The Pale Scot

    If this is real, I think it will be significant.

    Scientists slow the speed of light

    They sent photons – individual particles of light – through a special mask. It changed the photons’ shape – and slowed them to less than light speed.

    The photons remained traveling at the lower speed even when they returned to free space.

    Edit; for link

    Dang Dbl post

  66. 66.

    maeve

    i dip into his columns now and then –

    I remember when he was recently praising ACA because as a new small enterprise he was on the individual healthcare market plus had a pre-existting condition.

    Yeah – Hillarycare was bad because it undermined the oh so excellent and innovative US healthcare system – not so much condemnation of the supposed undermining of the existing”excellent US healthcare system” now when it actually affects you

  67. 67.

    eric nny

    So OT, but terrible in its own way, it’s 1:30, I’m at a house fire waiting in queue to bring the engine up for our turn and its -15. Owner is distraught and lashing out, interior firefighters are covered in sheets of ice as soon as they exit the building and I forgot to put on socks. Fires always suck, and have a terrible heartbreak factor.

  68. 68.

    Ruckus

    @dubo:
    Not a bad comparison, however Buckley at least sounded more authentic. Sully hasn’t figured out how polish his bullshit anywhere near as well as Buckley had.

  69. 69.

    Ruckus

    @BillinGlendaleCA:
    Yeah, that’s not where it is supposed to be. But I’d bet good money you knew that.
    You no give me functioning plumbing, I no give you rent. When we go to court, and I explain the shit in the bathtub and you explain how you want to be paid regardless, I wonder how that’s going to sound to a judge?

  70. 70.

    Mike G

    “I was aware of the piece’s flaws but nonetheless was comfortable running it as a provocation”

    What a mendacious asshole. This and his “fifth column” slur should be his journalistic epitaph.

  71. 71.

    piratedan

    seemingly genteel shitheels like Sullivan can go diaf for all I care. Erudite posturing masquerading as intelligence is all well and good until you actually start toting up the damages and it’s not as if this bastard couldn’t take the time to learn something, The asshat couldn’t be bothered to actually read anything and apply the knowledge within when it went against his own personal coda and once he had to admit he was wrong he still tried to make you feel like you lost the argument because he could write so well and after all, his heart was in the right place, namely his own wallet.

    I hope he gets audited or even better gets confronted by one of those fabled “salt of the earth” types and gets the rude awakening he so fervently needs or maybe gets food poisoning from some of McCardle’s pink Himalayan Salt.

  72. 72.

    seaboogie

    @Morzer: He’s just an attention whore. What he does is not analysis, but cocktail party banter to be the center of attention. That whole “Ohhhhh, I am “leaving to join real life” could have been done by a self-obsessed twenty-something who is “ironically” self-aware and obsessed and writing something for Salon. We should just look away, never click, and let him/them fade into deserved and well-earned oblivion.

  73. 73.

    GregB

    Let’s be honest here folks.

    How many people attacking Sullivan in this thread live in decadent liberal enclaves?

  75. 75.

    sharl

    @eric nny: Late to show up & see this, but… dayum. Best of luck and warm thoughts to you and all involved. (Maybe things are all wrapped up by now?)

  76. 76.

    piratedan

    @GregB: not sure Arizona counts…. Sullivan is like the premise to a Stephen King book, it’s starts off seemingly plausible and before you know it you’re in funhouse mirrors and then living in an alternate reality within a damned nightmare. Except King writes better and has cool music lyrics in front of his stuff.

  77. 77.

    cmorenc

    @jl: Regardless of which fifth column much of the democratic base marches with, too many of them march to the tune of a diffident drummer.

  78. 78.

    Steeplejack

    @Howard Beale IV:

    [. . .] what about terrestrial analog broadcasters? For all these years, have the analog broadcasters been getting away with not paying something they should have been paying for?

    I am definitely not a lawyer, but I thought that all music played on terrestrial radio stations—even pre-1972 stuff—was licensed through, and royalties paid to, ASCAP and BMI. The royalties may have ended up going to Morty Feinbaum of Hi-Tone Records instead of his mistreated artists, but someone was getting paid, no?

  80. 80.

    Howard Beale IV

    I don’t think Sully will make it to 2016-especially if Hillary wins the nomination, he’ll probably commit masturbatory autoasphyxiation.

  81. 81.

    Arclite

    While Sully was an asshole, I still appreciated his blog for its wide variety of aggregated stories. A shame it will be going away.

  82. 82.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @efgoldman:

    Royalists can never be terrorists (yeah right!)

    Burke was appalled at the excesses of the French Revolution. Not the terror itself, but who the terror was ostensibly directed at. The monarchists, the aristocracy. If you’re going to engage in that kind of shit, do it in the defense of the Ancien Régime.

    Burke underscores the obvious truth: that “Conservatism” is about preserving the privilege of the haves at any price.

  83. 83.

    Howard Beale IV

    Bryan Fischer fired as policy director of American Family Association, but still has his radio show.

  84. 84.

    Mike J

    @Howard Beale IV: SPLC went to the Israeli press about the hate group funding the RNC junket (60 people for 9 days, paid for by AFA). Wildmon claims he fired Fischer over a quote from 2013. That sounds to me as if he’s bearing false witness. Fischer managed to embarrass the RNC, and that is an unforgivable sin to the fundegelicals.

  85. 85.

    raven

    Can we move on to another dead horse topic?

    Confused About How You’re Supposed To Feel About ‘American Sniper’? Here Are 20 Thinkpieces That Can Help You Put Things In Perspective

    6. “Good Men Killing Bad Men For Bad Reasons For A Good Cause: Good Or Bad?” (by Prof. Olivia Mayberry)

    This utilitarian argument by a philosophy professor explains that it’s bad when you do bad things, but not if the bad things do more good than the bad they do, unless the good things they do are bad.

  86. 86.

    The Ancient Randonneur

    This was Randy Andy’s kinder, gentler GBCW. Like a pimple on a teenager, he isn’t going away for long.

  87. 87.

    Schlemazel

    Never was a fan of that magazine so I never saw that particular series. But it is fascinating that even from the very beginning Lil Andy’s M.O. is exactly what I have been saying about him since I caught on to his act a decade ago. He will reliably publish the greatest filth cloaked in pseudo intellectual BS in support of rightwing positions when it matters and do what he can to undermine decent America. Then, after it no longer matters, he will deny, obfuscate, justify or ignore what he wrote and pretend it is now irrelevant. He really needs to get a job on FOX.

    @Arclite: NO, it is not.

  88. 88.

    Sherparick

    @grandpa john: Lovely old word “knave.” It pretty much means the same as “Grifter,” “Con man,” “reiver,” etc. As a writer, I somewhat agree with Ta-Nehisi Coates who admires Sullivan’s obvious talent as writer and editor, while deploring the corruption of that talent by all the bad right wing memes lurking in Sullivan’s brain and his total lack of empathy for people different then himself.

  89. 89.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Steeplejack: Late returning to this thread, but the distinction here is between the “song”, which has always been licensed as you say, and the “performance”, which, until 1972, was arguably not licensed.

  90. 90.

    Kay

    Just wanted to add that I thought Sullivan’s obsession with Palin’s pregnancy was bizarre and really disturbing.

    I recognize it’s just example number 5000 of how he treats women like they’re somehow outside the “norm” but I can’t think of anything more intrusive and dehumanizing than him peering at those pictures of her when she was pregnant and trying to determine how far along she was. Have to love too how she was presumed NOT CREDIBLE on her own godammned pregnancy without documentation from an outside source.

    Lots and lots of women feel fine when they’re pregnant and don’t change their activities, and lots and lots of women don’t “look” pregnant (to strangers) until they’re closer to the end. His rigid “this is how the female of the species behaves when pregnant” fake-science analysis was complete and utter bullshit and disgusting. In true Andrew Sullivan fashion, it completely denied any agency, decision-making capability or individual humanity to the pregnant woman apart from the pregnancy.

    One of the things that women have to deal with when they’re pregnant is how people pile their own fucked-up societal and personal views and history onto you and your pregnancy. What it does it put women into a category “pregnant female” and then everyone gets to state an opinion on what that group describes and encompasses. The pregnant person disappears. He did that, and he did it in 2008, not 1908.

  91. 91.

    Matt McIrvin

    @The Pale Scot: It’s an interesting curiosity, but some media outlets flogged it as some kind of challenge to relativity, which it’s not. The “speed of light” they’re talking about is not the one Einstein was talking about.

  92. 92.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Steeplejack: There are the rights to the song itself, and the rights to the particular recording of a performance of the song. ASCAP and BMI broker the first, not the second. If you record a song you didn’t write, you get nothing though ASCAP or BMI.

    My understanding is that terrestrial radio pays per-pay royalties for songs but not for recordings of songs. This was a sore point when it was decided that “Internet radio” streaming did have to pay for both, which, interestingly, Sirius seems to have been ignoring.

  93. 93.

    Tenar Darell

    @dubo: Worst part of this? He’d really think it was a compliment, Sully’d hear Buckley and elide all the rest. If he watched Buckley and Baldwin 20 million times he’d never understand how truly vile Buckley’s behavior was during that debate. He may love us, and want to be with us, but he often profoundly misunderstands us and therefore hurts us. OMG Sully is a bad boyfriend!

  94. 94.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Somebody negotiates the payments for performance, and people do continue to be paid for that. That’s why you hear so many popular songs re-recorded by soundalikes for use on TV and other outlets — it means you pay songwriting fees to the original artist but avoid paying their performance fee.

    I don’t know exactly how it works because it’s very, very complicated and often includes union contracts, but songwriting fees and performance fees are two separate things.

  96. 96.

    Hunter

    I stopped reading Sullivan years ago, after coming to the conclusion that he’s shallow, self-absorbed, and not really all that intelligent.

  97. 97.

    Samuel Knight

    The Jon Chait and Sully stories are really tightly connected. They’re one of a gang of former blogging “superstars” who’ve fallen by the wayside because people realized that they’re mendacious assholes who can’t be relying onto explain anything. That whole TNR crew, Kaus, Chait, Sully, Kinsley, together with their right wing lying buddies like Krauthammer and Barnes.

    Think about it, a lot of the liberal writers – Krugman, Duncan Black, Digby, Drum they’re really good at figuring things out. e.g. Krugman, econ, Black -Social Security, Digby – sexism in the Obama campaign, Drum – lead. Each and every one of them look at data and trends and figure something insightful to say.

    The TNR crew – not at all. Like the Economist and the right wing they just BS.

    That’s why Jon Chait wrote that stupid piece and that’s why Sully’s retiring. People have figured out their con.

  98. 98.

    dmhlt

    Was hoping against hope for some gracious comment, but NOPE!

    BJ has, yet again, decided to take the low, LOW road.

    What a bunch of petulant people you are.

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