Damned Liberals
[ Posted Tuesday, August 28th, 2007 – 06:00 UTC ]
Duelling Spin On Iraq
[ Posted Monday, August 27th, 2007 – 16:18 UTC ]
The next few weeks are going to be critical for the debate on the future of the war in Iraq, and for the future of Iraq itself. Because everyone knows this, the spin doctors are sharpening their tools and trotting out their market-tested phraseology in an attempt to frame the debate before it even begins. While I will be addressing other phases of the situation in upcoming articles, today I want to focus only on the perceptions that are being filtered out to the public, and how effective their influence currently is. We've all been told how important "framing the issue" is, so I want to examine the framing so far.
Bumpersticker Slogan Contest (Winners)
[ Posted Saturday, August 25th, 2007 – 21:56 UTC ]
Yesterday, I ran a bumpersticker slogan contest here, in order to help the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee with their own campaign slogan bumpersticker contest.
Nah... actually, I ran it just because I thought it would be fun.
The results were overwhelming. In one day there were almost 150 posts. Narrowing these down to a list of winners was extremely hard, due to the fact that almost all the entries were excellent.
The only thing about the contest which disappointed me was there was absolutely no blatant attempts to bribe the judge. Oh, well... maybe next time.
The judging panel consisted of me and my wife. Our cat decided tiebreakers.
Bush Practices For September
[ Posted Saturday, August 25th, 2007 – 06:00 UTC ]
Bumpersticker Slogan Contest
[ Posted Friday, August 24th, 2007 – 16:44 UTC ]
"Immature humorists borrow.
Mature humorists steal."
-- attributed to Mark Twain
While I consider myself neither a humorist nor mature, I've always like that quote, and it seemed an appropriate witticism to open with. Because I'm about to blatantly steal someone else's great idea. Tim Grieve, who writes the War Room blog at Salon, is the author of this great idea.
He recently drew attention to the fact that the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (the guys in charge of getting more Democrats elected to the Senate next year) are actually running a campaign bumpersticker contest over at their website. You can enter a slogan (40 character limit) that you think would be the best bumpersticker to use in order to get Democrats elected. (I'm not making this up -- feel free to go to their site and enter a slogan, if you wish.)
An Ad For Democrats To Run
[ Posted Thursday, August 23rd, 2007 – 12:17 UTC ]
I've been thinking about campaign ads again, largely due to the book I am currently reading, "The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation," by Drew Westen. This morning, I read an International Herald Tribune article about how President Bush is going to continue to allow "mountaintop removal" mining in Appalachia, and it fit so well with what I had just read that I wanted to highlight it here.
From "The Political Brain," an ad for Democrats to run:
What Will Crocker Report In September?
[ Posted Wednesday, August 22nd, 2007 – 04:38 UTC ]
Last week, I wrote an article which detailed why General Petraeus' upcoming report to Congress may not be as trustworthy as it's been built up to be. This week, I would like to look at the other side of the coin -- American Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker's companion report to Congress.
Now, initially everyone though these were going to be two separate reports, but the White House has announced in the meantime that there will only be one report to Congress, and that -- by the way -- Petraeus and Crocker will have input to this report, but the White House will be actually writing this report. Unfortunately for Congress, they had written this into the law -- the text actually said:
Tuesday Loose Ends
[ Posted Tuesday, August 21st, 2007 – 15:58 UTC ]
Time for another three-dot column, to clear up some odds and ends. [As always, genuflect to the late, great Herb Caen before reading.]
. . . More good news for the ACLU was reported this week. Seems the Pentagon will be scrapping its TALON database. This is the one that the U.S. military was using to keep track of anti-war protesters in the guise of "fighting terrorism." But the bad news is that the data's not going to just get thrown out. From the AP article:
No Debate For You
[ Posted Tuesday, August 21st, 2007 – 06:00 UTC ]
Karl Rove Previews The VRWC's Attacks On "Hillarycare"
[ Posted Monday, August 20th, 2007 – 17:26 UTC ]
Watching the Karl Rove blitzkrieg on the Sunday morning news shows this week was a little hard to take. Three shows I regularly watch all had Rove as their star interview for the week. That's a lot of Karl to take, early on a Sunday.
Others have pointed out how he defended his remarks about Hillary Clinton being "flawed" as a candidate, and how the right wing has been focusing on Clinton (possibly because she's the one they really, really want to run against next year), but what struck me was Karl's attacks on Hillary on the subject of health care. These attacks will likely not be used just against Hillary, but their broader argument is going to be the GOP's list of talking points against any of the Democratic candidates' health care plans. So even if you're not a Hillary supporter, it is interesting to see this preview of the campaign attack ads which will be run next fall by the "Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy" (VRWC).