You could call this a cold tug-of-war.
The only winning move is…not to play!
by Tim F| 30 Comments
This post is in: Dog Blogging
You could call this a cold tug-of-war.
The only winning move is…not to play!
This post is in: Election 2012, I wish a motherfucker would!
If this helps defeat enough of the current Republican crop of thieves, perverts, nutballs and miscreants, I may have to forgive Mr. Brock for his sins against Anita Hill. From the NYTimes, “Trailing G.O.P. With Cameras, Seeking Gaffes“:
AMHERST, N.H. — Aaron Fielding quietly stalks his prey — Republicans — with his video camera, patiently waiting for a political moment worthy of YouTube.
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At 27, he is a full-time “tracker” for American Bridge 21st Century, a new Democratic organization that aims to record every handshake, every utterance by Republican candidates in 2011 and 2012, looking for gotcha moments that could derail political ambitions or provide fodder for television advertisements by liberal groups next year.
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The organization has hired a dozen professional trackers like Mr. Fielding, outfitted them with the latest high-tech cameras and computers and positioned them in key states where Republican candidates are busy chattering away to voters. If all works as planned, incriminating moments captured by American Bridge will quickly become part of the political bloodstream.
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Combined with a team of 20 researchers in a Washington “war room” that has a large rack of computer servers, the effort is part of a push by Democratic groups to bolster their opposition research. Republicans also have trackers, but so far have not assembled the kind of centralized video archive of political caught-on-tape moments that their rivals envision.[…] __
American Bridge is the creation of David Brock, the founder of Media Matters for America, which critiques conservative media outlets, particularly Fox News. Once a leader of right-wing attacks on Mr. Clinton, Mr. Brock is a liberal convert, now seeking ways to have a bigger impact.[…] __
By tapping into his network of Media Matters donors, American Bridge officials say they have raised several million dollars and hope to bring in $15 million to make the group part of a new liberal infrastructure that will last far beyond the 2012 cycle.
I’m sure all the right-minded Centrist goo-goos will hastily draw the skirts of their togas aside from the contamination of such low political activism, and David Brooks will press the back of his lily-white hand to his brow as he laments the coarsening of our political discourse on the Sunday talking-heads shows. But here in the real world we’re stuck combatting an opposition that bases half of its electoral strategy on lying, denying, and fakery — we need to start documenting Republican dishonesty in formats where their perfidity can be explained, with short words and vivid pictures, within the severely limited attention span of the average low-information voter.
Taking the Battle to the Enemy’s TerritoryPost + Comments (104)
This post is in: Assholes, Manic Progressive, OBAMA IS WORSE THAN BUSH HE SOLD US OUT!!
These people are fucking clinical:
Any good liberal in the year 2011 would be confused when choosing between Obama and Bush for the title of “Worst President Ever.”
Fuck these lunatics. Fucking sociopaths.
This post is in: David Brooks Giving A Seminar At The Aspen Institute, Republican Stupidity
…and Bobo makes sense.
…in the middle of this golden age of behavioral research, there is a bill working through Congress that would eliminate the National Science Foundation’s Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences. This is exactly how budgets should not be balanced — by cutting cheap things that produce enormous future benefits
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People are complicated. We each have multiple selves, which emerge or don’t depending on context. If we’re going to address problems, we need to understand the contexts and how these tendencies emerge or don’t emerge. We need to design policies around that knowledge. Cutting off financing for this sort of research now is like cutting off navigation financing just as Christopher Columbus hit the shoreline of the New World.
Maybe this is just a case of a blind pig finding its once-a-year acorn…
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…or perhaps (we live in hope) David Brooks has finally noticed that the party he’s been touting for years is on a catastrophic mission to destroy America, a quest that depends, in part, on ensuring we never, ever put ourselves in the way of learning inconvenient truths about the world.
I do hope it is the latter. These are parlous times, and I’ll welcome even the latest of late-comers to the fray. If I were a betting man, though, I’d guess we’ll see a reversion to the BoBo mean by early next week — but even so, we have a few days to bask at the glow of David Brooks saying something useful.
Image: Gustave Courbet, Peasants from Flagey Returning from market, 1850
Pigs Fly; Satan Cuts Ribbon on Hell’s Newest Ski Lift…Post + Comments (61)
This post is in: Open Threads
Dinner was good:
Hanging out with my brother and friends. You?
by John Cole| 77 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads
Having company for dinner again- on the menu, cajun seasoned Swai, chilled black eyed pea salad with lemon, onion, and cilantro, the usual tomato/cuke/onion salad, and surprise- steamed kale with a little spinach mixed in. Also too, a bottle of Nobilo.
This post is in: Open Threads, All we want is life beyond the thunderdome