"Bush campaign ads using team"

[klaptonic]

ouch

I like your “quotes” and I do see where your coming from....

hrmmm? you see where i'm coming from? I only said 'ouch'.
I was actually trying to highlight out how rude those remarks were, especially since they were coming from a 'moderator'.

[Occhidiangela]

Not a moderator. Joined the admin team in the winter, got started and promptly had HD and MB eat each other. Got back in gear only to be sent "East, always east." ;)

I do not think I have the tempermant, at present, to be a Mod. The mods we have are a very well harmonized team. No need to add to that mix at the risk of spoiling the tone they set.

Occhi

[Occhidiangela]

What I was not clear enough on was the picture of the Bush campaign team getting into the mud to wrestle with pigs, not the Kerry campaign team. Now that I look at what I wrote, I could have been a bit clearer. I also did not mean to imply that MEAT's critique is shrill, your posts have been most temperate. The screeching of baboons and sages alike has been at a high pitch since about . . . January 2000. ;) What has followed has been, in my view, a steady decline in the "civil" nature of what is supposed to be "civil discourse." The mean streak has always been present in American political commentary, see David Crocketts stabs at "King Andrew Jackson" while the frontiersman was in the House of Representatives, it just seems to be getting more threads per square inch these days than previously, amplified by the 24/7 blathering of international media.

If private citizens wish to speak out in a political campaign, and they can get their voices heard, all to the good. I am not clear enough on campaign funding laws, etc, to understand some of what I heard yesterday on the radio about the funding and influences that were behind the adds. Not at all surprised that some folks smelled "something rotten in the State of Denmark." However, the plethora of Senator Kerry bashing internet sites should have prepared those of us who are are watching this farce, and both campaigns, for sallies of this sort.

Free speech, on the surface at least.

Occhi

[Occhidiangela]

For Crusader. Is CNN government controlled? Not only not, but your question makes me laugh. CNN's slant is significantly anti government. Indeed, any American based news organization will have a certain wariness regardins our government, it is built into the education and training of our journalists. Skeptics all.

Only PBS is government funded.

None of the major American news organs are government controlled, unlike the media organs in many other nations, including not a few of our "liberal" allies. What is obvious is that the editorial agenda of the management of most "news" organs is being presented on right, left, and center, and whatever other side you'd like to find.

CNN's founder, Ted Turner, could be described as a liberal.

[Occhidiangela]

Follow on to your theme of "good news bad news" reporting trends . . .

Take this with a grain of salt. WT tends to right of center. Reporter is an ex SF guy. One of the reasons that the info continually provided by the official channels is ignored is that it is assumed by reporters to be spun or false, which is in the main crap. Its other sad feature is that much of it offers little in the way of the "if it bleeds it leads" titillation, a perceived flaw in content, not in presentation.

Washington Times August 20, 2004 Pg. 19
Silver Linings In Iraq Clouds By F. Andy Messing Jr.

BAGHDAD Iraq. — During a recent mortar attack on the main U.S. compound in Baghdad, which formerly was Saddam's grand palace, an optimistic chief of logistics explained how the expanding flow of $18.4 billion of U.S. aid would produce long-term change. He also thinks things had already improved in the 12 months he had been there.

In an earlier interview, Ambassador John Negroponte said correctly that, without security, the other facets of economic, sociopolitical change could not occur. Accordingly, these points were further amplified by his comments that Iraq's future must be viewed not in the short term but "a longer view" and that there is important traction. He saw Iraq filled with promise.

The Defense Department puts out daily reports on some 2,000 successful projects based on information accumulated from civilian and military sources on the ground. However, most of the American media have diligently avoided reporting on this plethora of good news, negatively flavoring the worldwide impression of our efforts. Furthermore, historical perspectives like comparisons of American efforts under Democratic administrations in Japan, Germany and Korea have also been avoided. Therefore, our altruism is downplayed while the combat mission supporting the Iraqi government is highlighted.

Day after day, these media reports on a narrow band of dissident combatants that include outside agitators color perceptions while affecting both our military and civilian morale. Meanwhile, a mixed group of committed coalition people are working hard and risking their lives to bring Iraq from ruin to future stability and prosperity.

In the U.S. Military Hospital in Baghdad, as Medivac helicopters fly in from Najaf, the staff works feverishly trying to save a critically wounded Iraqi soldier — who lies next to an American soldier from the 1st Cavalry. This while another group of medics attend to a accidentally burned child, as her traditionally garbed mother fingers prayer beads beside her bed.

In another part of the city, coalition elements work on clean water and electricity generation, and how to rejuvenate cash-making oil production amidst turmoil. They are addressing some basic infrastructure issues for the first time since before the Iran-Iraq war. As one British consultant said: "The faster we help the Iraqis, the faster they get a better life, the faster people quit fighting." For America, that means the faster we get out of there.

A first lieutenant in the 10th Mountain Division, caked in dust, said, "Our helping Iraqis makes sense." When told he was a long way from the West Point parade grounds, he said: "This was what I was meant to do, help people." This statement, as we pass 1,000 American military killed in action, illustrates the deep seriousness, selflessness and intent of our cause.

So, while there are fainthearted, non-Trumansque types running for the door to abandon a John Kennedy-like noble effort, remember that the patient and earnest helping of Iraq will prove correct even if it takes 10 years. In the short term, it may look ugly but President Bush's political heroism will only become evident after the current election, as success in Iraq starts kicking in. Admittedly, as a side benefit, this may give America access to much needed oil to keep our economy going. This, while radical environmentalists slam the door on development of oil in our own Alaskan Arctic Wildlife Reserve.

Even amid our mistakes and blunders, Iraqis are becoming better off, receptive and appreciative. It can be hoped this will later be reflected in the Arab world, relieving pressure on Israel.

Last, we must make atonement, in the collective, cosmic sense, to our forefathers, our American military dead and those almost 3 million innocents killed after we abandoned Indochina in 1975. America must not repeat that history. This atonement comes by helping Iraqis and as many others as we can, people yearning to be free. Otherwise, we will be condemned to a spiral of expanding warfare unprecedented in human history, as "evidoers" take charge and flourish.

F. Andy Messing Jr., a retired U.S. Special Forces major, is executive director of the National Defense Council Foundation in Alexandria. Mr. Messing has been to 27 conflicts, and just returned from a medical fact-finding mission to Iraq. NDCF has provided 140 tons of medical relief to combat areas worldwide.

[Crusader]

I also heard on the news here that this organisation of Kerry critics saying he wasn't the hero he's saying he is are being funded by the same people who fund Bush's campaign.

Politics are a dirty game.

[Occhidiangela]

Politics are a dirty game.

Yep, that is a world wide constant, almost as universal a truth as the existence of hydrogen and stupidity. B)

Occhi

[kandrathe]

...are being funded by the same people who fund Bush's campaign.

Rich republicans from Texas? Yup.

Behind the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth are veteran corporate media consultant and Texas Republican activist Merrie Spaeth, who is listed as the group’s media contact; eternal Kerry antagonist and Dallas attorney John E. O’Neill, law partner of Spaeth’s late husband, Tex Lezar; and retired Rear Adm. Roy Hoffman, a cigar-chomping former Vietnam commander once described as “the classic body-count guy” who “wanted hooches destroyed and people killed.”

Merrie Spaeth

Pot, kettle, black?

Moveon.org compares Bush to hitler, and Fox news to Pravda.

Or,

Last winter, Kerry himself was accused by his rival Howard Dean of using a front group to run a hard-hitting TV ad in early primary states New Hampshire and South Carolina, featuring a grainy image of Osama bin Laden.

“There are those who wake up every morning determined to destroy Western civilization. Americans want a president who can face the dangers ahead, but Howard Dean has no military or foreign policy experience,” the ad’s narrator said as the ominous image of bin Laden grew larger on the screen.

A 527 group called Americans for Jobs, Healthcare and Progressive Values paid for the ad.   Among the group’s financial backers were the International Association of Machinists, a union that had endorsed Rep. Dick Gephardt for the Democratic nomination, and former New Jersey Sen. Bob Torricelli, who raised funds for Kerry and donated $2,000 to Kerry’s campaign.   “What we now see is that John Kerry is part of the corrupt political culture in Washington," Dean said in February after finding out about the funding of the ad. About SBVT -- Disinfopedia

What Matters Most Happened After Johnny (Kerry) Came Marching Home -- Wanda Valmora

[Sir_Die_alot]

When it comes to people funding a political party and also a 527 advocacy organization, moveon.org holds a top spot on that one with the funds coming in the multi-millions. Swiftvets by compairison can't even get themselves a relyable server.

But the real reason I give this site credability is it's not just 2 or 10 people.

Overall, more than 250 Swift boat veterans are on the record questioning Kerry's fitness to serve as Commander-in-Chief. That list includes his entire chain of command -- every single officer Kerry served under in Vietnam. The Kerry game plan is to ignore all this and pretend that the 13 veterans his campaign jets around the country and puts up in 5-star hotels really represent the truth about his short, controversial combat tour.

That's too many people for me to write off as just political hacks.

[jahcs]

EDIT:  Oops, I forgot to answer your other question.  "The need to know bad news."  Ever make an omlette?  You break some eggs, you add some milk, baking powder, and then you beat the bejesus out of it with a fork or an egg beater.  In that state it is a bit of a mess.  You then put it on a warm griddle or pan, and add a few things that will improve its flavor and appeal.  Hmmm, avocados, finely chopped onions, minced tomatoes, cheese, a bit of crumbled bacon . . .  yummy.  It still looks sorta  funny.  You then spend some time and effort and eventually, you roll it over, lightly brown it, and then slide it onto a plate.  The "Iraq omlette" seems to me to be somewhere just past beat the dickens out of the eggs and the add some yummies stages, though the griddle in Iraq is plenty hot for the cooking.

Your example of cooking an omlette is apt. "...the griddle in Iraq is plenty hot for the cooking." Trying to cook anything, especially eggs, on an overheated griddle usually creates inedible, messy, waste. Turning down the flame under the griddle doesn't take long, cooling the griddle down does.

We have a whole bunch of cooks arguing what kind of omlette to make as they try to find a recipie in their books. There is no magic recipie that eveyone will agree tastes the best. I have never seen a restaurant menu list only one omlette that will make everyone happy - especialy since there is always that one guy that orders steak and eggs. :P

[Occhidiangela]

I had the chance to serve with three senior officers who served in Viet Nam as junior officers commanding Swift boats. Two retired as Rear Admirals, one recently as a four star. (ADM Natter, who I only worked with for a very short op when he was a CO of a cruiser.) These men were well above average leaders in any case, having become destroyer and Cruiser Captains in due course, but if they are at all representative of the Swift Boat commanders throughout the theater of operations, even being half the officer that these men are would put an average Swift Boat commander in pretty good company. I wonder where is a "bell curve" Senator Kerry fell out. There are obviously folks who served with him who held him in high regard.

That said, commanding a Swift Boat is hardly the same as navigating the Ship of State through the rocks and shoals of global realpolitik! President Kennedy pulled it off reasonably well, but then, he was a different breed of liberal than Senator Kerry: a liberal who was also a devout anti-Communist, a pre 'Great Society' liberal.

Occhi

[bernard shakey]

[QUOTE]When it comes to people funding a political party and also a 527 advocacy organization,

As I understand it, Its not people who FUND both a political campain and a 527 that the question of illegel and/or unethical behavior lies. It's when someone who RUNS a political campain becomes involved in the content of a 527. whether a person who runs a political and funds a 527 is breaking the law or not is a murkie issue that I'm sure will be tested in the corts by who ever loses the election, in order to begin the '08 mud slinging. I cant wait

[RogueMage]

Take this with a grain of salt.  WT tends to right of center.

That's quite an understatement. The Washington Times is a mouthpiece owned by Sun-Myung Moon, the self-proclaimed messiah of the religious cult, Unification Church.

[RogueMage]

Moveon.org compares Bush to hitler, and Fox news to Pravda.

The only reference to Hitler on MoveOn's site is this:

The right-wing apparatus now has us on their radar – including Matt Drudge, Fox News, the Republican National Committee, and the Bush Campaign.  They have launched a series of attacks to attempt to discredit and silence us.  But they have failed.

One prong of this attack is the persistent attempt to characterize one of the 1500 entries in the BushIn30Seconds contest – the now infamous “Hitler ad” – as an ad somehow supported and aired by MoveOn.  Of course, this is not true, and in fact the ad itself only appeared to the public at large on the RNC and Bush campaign web sites.  While their consistent harping on this lie has gotten press, in the end it’s backfired.

As for MoveOn's comparison of Fox to Pravda, if the shoe fits...

[kandrathe]

http://www.thememoryhole.org/pol/bush-hitler-ads.htm Yeah, well, what ever defense they want to use. Two out of 1500 compare Bush to Hitler, and of the 50 or so I looked at on that site -- 50 were deceptive in other ways. This tit for tat smear crap has to stop. Even in the Moveon.org response to the RNC they reference as earlier conservative 527 organization ad that morphed Max Cleland into Osama Bin Laden.

Kerry smeared Dean during the primary, that was my point. Both sides use these unregulated 527 groups to do the "dirty politics".

[gekko]

The dirty tactics won't stop until the population becomes better educated. Fact is, the smear campaigns usually are far more effective than any of the "pro-me" campaigning political icons do for themselves. One of the major concerns of the pro-Kerry people I've talked to (I'm technically pro-Kerry, but since I'm Canadian and not a real political activist, I consider myself more of a follower of the news than a supporter of any side in the US election) was the huge cash and time advantages that Bush had -- and the effect that cash and time would have when the expected "Kerry is a waffler" etc, etc, etc. ads began appearing. Of course it goes both ways.

Simply put, can you really fault the politicians for using said tactics? The population, who (in theory :P ) decide who wins, respond to smear campaigns. If a politician takes the 'high road' and avoids supporting or using smear campaigns, it's usually a fast track to defeat (obviously not always, but it certainly doesn't help their chances).

gekko

[Sir_Die_alot]

"Kerry is a waffler" adds are hardly smear campaigns. Elections should be about a cantidate's record. A smear campaign is like that story that floated around a few months ago that Kerry had a relationship with an intern, or Bush's service in the National Guard.

How quickly we forget this whole millitary service shoe was on the other foot a few months back, and how aggressive the media was with Bush for records and proof the accusations were false. I recall whole press meetings, that weren't even suppose to be on that topic, full of "is this true" questions. Funny how this hasn't happened to Kerry. I don't think Fox is the only news outlet that has bias issues. :P

[Occhidiangela]

The leadership in both parties, to show that they are different from the other guy, seem to have to adopt the rhetoric of the extreme factions within their parties since the centrists in both parties have quite a bit in common. This need to differentiate colors the rhetoric. One then has to choose a style, and it seems that the influence of corporate America is felt in both parties, along with a handy dose of Joseph Goebels: make the other guy look bad rather than focusing on what is good about you.

Along with the choice of style is how the media reports and covers political activity for their own ends and aims at larger market share.

The mass media organs seem convinced, rightly or wrongly, that they are dealing with short attention span audiences. Within that framework, reductionist rhetoric is the word of the day. A slogan is fine to draw attention to a particular platform (remember the "It's the economy stupid" line used by a group who then signed NAFTA and kept up the already slow hemoraging -- Perot's "Sucking Sound" -- of labor demand from US locales.) The trouble is, slogans do not often represent deep thought. Anymore, they seem to be like a deflector shield aimed at preventing "the follow on question."

So even if the educational standards are improved, and the general level of critical thinking is raised, the media organs won't change unless there is a compelling reason to drive their leadership to change both their guiding principles, and their agendas, in order to continue to pipe information via all transmission means available.

The message will need to come to them, forcefully, from their viewing and listening public. We will get what we will put up with, with "we" being the global media audience.

Occhi

[RogueMage]

This tit for tat smear crap has to stop.

Your post illustrates how smear campaigns propogate: they flatten the details of an event into a provocative slogan that deliberately misrepresents the facts. When we dig deeper into your initial accusation:

Moveon.org compares Bush to hitler

We find that it was not MoveOn that produced ads that compared Bush to Hitler - it was a pair of third-party, rejected submissions to a MoveOn contest that did so. MoveOn did not attempt to publicize these submissions beyond the contest itself, it was the Republican Party that did so, in an attempt to start a smear campaign against MoveOn.

Ironically, the submission that MoveOn chose to broadcast during the 2004 Super Bowl was itself rejected by CBS, citing a policy that prohibits "advocacy" ads. The effect of this controversial act of corporate censorship was to create even more publicity for MoveOn than the ad itself would have, had it been aired (especially considering what actually was shown at Super Bowl XXXVIII ).

[Occhidiangela]

Even before Pres Bush was innaugurated, after what was an ugly revelation that election mechanics in the United States are laced with buffoonery -- highlighted by Florida of course -- the assault on him began: shrill, loud, and angry.

"He disenfranchised voters."
"He stole the election."
"Moron."
"Frat boy."

There were claims that President Bush was culpable for 9/11, in that it was deliberately allowed to happen. Like the man or not, like his policies or not, that kind of crap is complete BS.

"We need a regime change, we need to disarm America."
(If you advocate disarming America, you admit that you want chaos and anarchy in the rest of the world. Good for you, the death toll will just go up. See Rwanda for a fine example of just letting things go, Serbreniza, Kuwait 1991. When America sits back, that is what you get.)

The deliberate allusion to the regime change policy statement in re Saddam Hussein was one of the Left's many sound bytes. It is also characteristic of the worst in liberalism, those who hate an America unfettered by constraints to sovereignty. Of course, my comment on regime change at that time was, and remains, "there may well be one in November of 2004. Make sure you vote your conscience." We lived through 8 years of WJ Clinton, I am sure we can survive 4 or 8 years of GW Bush. ;)

Then the real idiocy began. "No BLood for Oil" about the Operation Enduring Freedom, in Afghanistan. What a crock. That was retribution, plain and simple. It continues. (Gee, big surprise. Still in Bosnia too.)

Of course, the administration did itself no favors by squandering Secretary Powell's credibility on the UN briefing. Used him.

I heard from the Left that it is censorship for a privately owned radio station to stop playing records if they did not care for an artist. That happens all the time, typically when a record stinks. In the case of the Dixie Chicks, I imagine it is because a bunch of station owners thought their attitude stunk. (Me, I don't give two craps about them, was never a fan in the first place.) You don't have a right to be successful, you have to earn it. If you throw your hat into the political ring, you have to be brave enough to accept the consequences of your actions. Politics is played by Jungle Rules, it is ugly.

Deal with it.

The sheer venom in the anti-Bush rhetoric was repulsive. Unlike Vice President Gore's speech, in which he noted that he disagreed with but would accept the Supreme Court's ruling*, the opponents of President Bush have done little to show much class. It is the shrillness that churns my stomach, not the issues of disagreement, many of which are concerns of my own.

*(one of the finest pieces of public speaking I have ever seen him do ; indeed, had he been left alone by his handlers to just be himself, I think he'd have won the election. No wooden Al.)

I do not know how much of the venom was in pure retaliation against the venomous rhetoric against President Clinton during the #$%&*@# caper, and how much was for other reasons.

To characterize the two party's rhetoric as "the same" seems an apples and oranges comparison. Terry McAullife went on the attack about President Bush and the Air National Guard bit. DNC. Not a 527 group, the head of the DNC. That slam has been, of course, returned. I don't see it getting any better, but it shows real moral cowardice to me that the attempted remedy is CENSORSHIP!

"YOU CAN"T SAY THAT"

Actually, yes they can. First Ammendment. You can say what you please, though the libel and slander statutes could use, I think, some tightening up. Facts would be NICE!!!

Does it reflect well on the Bush campaign if they endorse personal attacks on Senator Kerry? Not as I see it. Their best ammunition is Senator Kerry's record in the Senate.

Does it reflect well on the Kerry campaign that they make personal attack on the President, Vice President, etc? No. Issues and vision would be interesting, not empty rhetoric like"I could find a better solution, and let someone else do it." Yeah, who else? What course of action that might actually work? I am dying to here it, dear sir.

Who to vote for? Is either worth voting for?

OK, who to vote against?

Damnit, not again! This is getting old. :angry:

Occhi