“More and more the timeline is raising the question of why, if the torture was to prevent terrorist attacks, it seemed to happen mainly during the period when the Bush crowd was looking for what was essentially political information to justify the invasion of Iraq.”
“More and more the timeline is raising the question of why, if the torture was to prevent terrorist attacks, it seemed to happen mainly during the period when we were looking for what was essentially political information to justify the invasion of Iraq.”
All Dowd did was change “we were” to “the Bush crowd was”.
Now, I’m all for cutting & pasting. As a blogger I do it all the time, but I always give credit.
So, if this isn’t outright plagiarism by a top NY Times Editorialist, than I’m a happily married, straight man with 4 kids, 2 dogs, a lovely 2nd wife of 15 years with a girl half my age on the side.
Which I assure you all, I am not.
Josh has a valid point. When we bloggers use content from other sites, or we copy something, we ALWAYS; well unless someone’s being an prick or something like that, credit the original source and link to that source article. Like I did this piece. What Dowd did was totally unprofessional and just plain rude. Of course, when called on it; Dowd is in full backward cat crawl mode:
New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd, in an email to Huffington Post, admits that a paragraph in her Sunday column was lifted from Talking Points Memo editor Josh Marshall’s blog last Thursday.
Dowd claims that she never read his blog last week but was told the line by a friend of hers. In a follow-up email, she forwarded her desire to apologize to Marshall, writing that had she known, she would have gladly credited Marshall.
josh is right. I didn’t read his blog last week, and didn’t have any idea he had made that point until you informed me just now. i was talking to a friend of mine Friday about what I was writing who suggested I make this point, expressing it in a cogent — and I assumed spontaneous — way and I wanted to weave the idea into my column. but, clearly, my friend must have read josh marshall without mentioning that to me. we’re fixing it on the web, to give josh credit, and will include a note, as well as a formal correction tomorrow.
Oh Yeah, the old “I got it from a Friend” line…. Josh chimes in here:
Indeed. Dowd got busted and now she’s trying to walk it back. She’ll be either fired or will take vacation till the heat blows over…. or at wost, end up as lackey over at MSNBC with the rest of the Plagiarizing idiots. (You know who I mean… I hope.)
Boy. Take a break from Blogging and all the cool stuff happens. Wow! 😮
How the news coverage of the swine flu isn’t so much indicative of any serious crisis, but the mainstream media’s corporate and government, PC sensibilities.
I post this because I believe that it is interesting. Alex Jones has always struck me as a kook. Someone amongst the “Tin Foil Hat” crowd. However, it is something interesting to watch.
Enjoy…
What do you think? Do you think that there is any truth to this?
Yes, I’ve heard about it. I really do not have anything negative to say about him going to the NYT. Douthat on the other hand, I found to be a bit snobbish. I once sent him an e-mail and never got a response. I suppose that Mr. Douthat, a beltway type; has no time for us amateur basement dwellers. Which is pretty fucking ironic, because that is how this whole blogging thing got started, by a bunch of basement dwellers who decided to start writing about politics; Liberal, Conservative, and yes even Libertarian…. and decided to make our own damned community.
I agree with the fact that Douthat will most likely will do better than David Brooks, and believe that is not saying much at all. Brooks was about a fucking idiot. He was a perfect example of the idiotic mumbling that comes out of the Neo-Conservative circles anymore. Which is why the Harlem globetrotter is in the White House now.
Anyhow, I hope he does well and gets his facts straight, because God-knows the Republican Party needs a image makeover right now.
Sources close to the White House say Mr Obama and his staff have been “overwhelmed” by the economic meltdown and have voiced concerns that the new president is not getting enough rest.
British officials, meanwhile, admit that the White House and US State Department staff were utterly bemused by complaints that the Prime Minister should have been granted full-blown press conference and a formal dinner, as has been customary. They concede that Obama aides seemed unfamiliar with the expectations that surround a major visit by a British prime minister.
But Washington figures with access to Mr Obama’s inner circle explained the slight by saying that those high up in the administration have had little time to deal with international matters, let alone the diplomatic niceties of the special relationship.
Allies of Mr Obama say his weary appearance in the Oval Office with Mr Brown illustrates the strain he is now under, and the president’s surprise at the sheer volume of business that crosses his desk.
A well-connected Washington figure, who is close to members of Mr Obama’s inner circle, expressed concern that Mr Obama had failed so far to “even fake an interest in foreign policy”.
A British official conceded that the furore surrounding the apparent snub to Mr Brown had come as a shock to the White House. “I think it’s right to say that their focus is elsewhere, on domestic affairs. A number of our US interlocutors said they couldn’t quite understand the British concerns and didn’t get what that was all about.”
The American source said: “Obama is overwhelmed. There is a zero sum tension between his ability to attend to the economic issues and his ability to be a proactive sculptor of the national security agenda.
“That was the gamble these guys made at the front end of this presidency and I think they’re finding it a hard thing to do everything.”
Oh, it gets better, trust me… Too Tired?!?! Seriously? Think that’s bad?
President Obama declared in an interview that the United States was not winning the war in Afghanistan and opened the door to a reconciliation process in which the American military would reach out to moderate elements of the Taliban, much as it did with Sunni militias in Iraq.
Mr. Obama pointed to the success in peeling Iraqi insurgents away from more hard-core elements of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a strategy that many credit as much as the increase of American forces with turning the war around in the last two years. “There may be some comparable opportunities in Afghanistan and in the Pakistani region,” he said, while cautioning that solutions in Afghanistan will be complicated.
[…]
“I don’t think that people should be fearful about our future,” he said. “I don’t think that people should suddenly mistrust all of our financial institutions.”
As he pressed forward with ambitious plans at home to rewrite the tax code, expand health care coverage and curb climate change, Mr. Obama dismissed criticism from conservatives that he was driving the country toward socialism. After the interview, which took place as the president was flying home from Ohio, he called reporters from the Oval Office to assert that his actions have been “entirely consistent with free-market principles” and to point out that large-scale government intervention in the markets and expansion of social welfare programs began under President George W. Bush.
Sitting at the head of a conference table with his suit coat off, Mr. Obama exhibited confidence six weeks into his presidency despite the economic turmoil around the globe and the deteriorating situations in Afghanistan and Pakistan. He struck a reassuring tone about the economy, saying he had no trouble sleeping at night.
[…..]
Asked if the United States was winning in Afghanistan, a war he effectively adopted as his own last month by ordering an additional 17,000 troops sent there, Mr. Obama replied flatly, “No.”
Again, can someone please tell me why we elected this feckless idiot douche nozzle? I am really beginning to believe that America blew it. In a really, really, really, big way.
Those who were actually stupid enough to vote for this socialist idiot, get what is coming to them. (yes, that applies to my family too.)
I mean, this asshole is acting like this is some sort of a community organizer job. Being the President is a serious job and this idiot is not even acting remotely like a President. 😡
As much as I disagreed with President George W. Bush on Iraq, I will say this; you never, EVER heard George W. Bush complain or his staff ever say to reporters, even anonymously say that the job was making him tired! Not once.
Well, that didn’t take long. Just 44 days into the job, and President Obama is going gray.
It happens to all of them, of course — Bill Clinton still had about half a head of brown hair when he took office but was a silver fox two years later, and George W. Bush went from salt and pepper to just salt in what seemed like a blink of an eye.
But so soon? “I started noticing it toward the end of the campaign
and leading up to inauguration,” says Deborah Willis, who, as co-author
of “Obama: The Historic Campaign in Photographs,” pored through 5,000
photographs of the first head over the last year.
Mr. Obama’s graying is still of the flecked variety, and appears to
wax and wane depending on when he gets his hair cut, which he does
about every two weeks. His barber, who goes by only one name, Zariff,
takes umbrage with bloggers who alternately claim Mr. Obama, 47, is
dyeing his hair gray (to appear more distinguished) or dyeing it black
(to appear younger). “I can tell you that his hair is 100 percent
natural,” Zariff said. “He wouldn’t get it colored.”
And for all of his 16 years giving Mr. Obama his “quo vadis” haircut
— black parlance from the 1960s for close-cut locks — Zariff said he is
not about to start ribbing Mr. Obama. “We do not tease about the gray
at all,” he said.
For a guy who prides himself on projecting a stress-free demeanor,
the changes above his temples are speckled evidence that perhaps the
psychological and physical strains of the job — never mind the long
process of winning it — are in fact taking something of a toll.
(Experts say stress can contribute to whitening locks.)
Mr. Obama seems to have noticed it at least as far back as last
summer. “I’ve been running for president for about 19 months now,” he
told supporters at a campaign event in Virginia in August. “Folks are
noticing that I’ve got a lot more gray hair now than when I started.”
But with the economy struggling, two wars raging and countless other
pressures facing him, the president is very likely to see additional
signs of wear and tear in the mirror each morning.
Good Lord. The man is 47 years old. I am quite frankly surprised he did not start getting Gray sooner. Hell, I starting seeing my gray hairs when I was in my early 20’s or so. Did I flip out? For about a second, it was more of a sobering realization that my younger days were over and I was becoming a older man; and that I should at least try and act the part. I’m still working on that. 😉 😛 😀
I would sure as hell hate to see the poor man slip and break his arm or something. Damn news world would come to a screeching halt! 🙄 Not that I want him to really do all that, I’m just saying, that’s all. 😀
Of course, because I’m a Conservative; I must be the one to say it. If President Obama doesn’t do something here really quick and um, smart, to pull our economy out of the toilet and get our stock market out of the basement, He is really going to have some gray hairs coming pretty quick. I mean, Obama just started and he is really not getting off to a good start.
I must confess, I find this to quite laughter provoking….:
Those of us who consider ourselves moderates — moderate-conservative, in my case — are forced to confront the reality that Barack Obama is not who we thought he was. His words are responsible; his character is inspiring. But his actions betray a transformational liberalism that should put every centrist on notice. As Clive Crook, an Obama admirer, wrote in The Financial Times, the Obama budget “contains no trace of compromise. It makes no gesture, however small, however costless to its larger agenda, of a bipartisan approach to the great questions it addresses. It is a liberal’s dream of a new New Deal.”
Moderates now find themselves betwixt and between. On the left, there is a president who appears to be, as Crook says, “a conviction politician, a bold progressive liberal.” On the right, there are the Rush Limbaugh brigades. The only thing more scary than Obama’s experiment is the thought that it might fail and the political power will swing over to a Republican Party that is currently unfit to wield it.
The smart mouthed punk part of me says, “Well then David… Why the fuck did you meet with that Communist shill for dinner then?!?!?”
However, I do try and conduct myself with a bit more decorum. (Well, I think so anyhow! 😉 :P)
The painful fact is that the Moderate Conservatives like Brooks and some Libertarians voted for the guy, because they were drawn into his slick style and smooth delivery of a speech. I can cheerfully say, that I was not one of those people. I knew what Obama was about from day one. He was a Liberal. Any journalist or blogger who was not trying to swoon or slobber all over themselves about Obama could see this.
The facts are this; Obama tried to work with Conservatives, and tried the bipartisanship approach and it did not work. So, President Obama is going to further his agenda and quite frankly does not care what the Republican Party nor the Republicans and Conservatives who are in or out of power in D.C. think about it.
Is this wrong, evil, immoral, or fattening? Not necessarily. Obama won the election. The Republican Party lost. Happens like that, when your past leader of eight years abandons his campaign promises and so forth.
The facts are that the Moderates got played, and played hard. Now they’re crying, “We were deceived!” Way I see it, that deception is a two way process. Takes actions on your part. Obama did not come by with a wand and go “Pwaaaang!” and put the Moderates under a spell and force them to vote for him. It took them to look at him and his record, and then they listened to his speeches, and decided to ignore his political record and voted for him. I have zero pity for them, at all.
Barack Obama could learn a lesson from Japan. There’s a very good article in the New York Times today, on the mistakes made by the country of Japan in the 1990’s to fix their failing economy:
The Hamada Marine Bridge soars majestically over this small fishing harbor, so much larger than the squid boats anchored below that it seems out of place.
And it is not just the bridge. Two decades of generous public works spending have showered this city of 61,000 mostly graying residents with a highway, a two-lane bypass, a university, a prison, a children’s art museum, the Sun Village Hamada sports center, a bright red welcome center, a ski resort and an aquarium featuring three ring-blowing Beluga whales.
Nor is this remote port in western Japan unusual. Japan’s rural areas have been paved over and filled in with roads, dams and other big infrastructure projects, the legacy of trillions of dollars spent to lift the economy from a severe downturn caused by the bursting of a real estate bubble in the late 1980s. During those nearly two decades, Japan accumulated the largest public debt in the developed world — totaling 180 percent of its $5.5 trillion economy — while failing to generate a convincing recovery.
Now, as the Obama administration embarks on a similar path, proposing to spend more than $820 billion to stimulate the sagging American economy, many economists are taking a fresh look at Japan’s troubled experience. While Japan is not exactly comparable to the United States — especially as a late developer with a history of heavy state investment in infrastructure — economists say it can still offer important lessons about the pitfalls, and chances for success, of a stimulus package in an advanced economy.
The Lesson to be learned here is:
“It is not enough just to hire workers to dig holes and then fill them in again,” said Toshihiro Ihori, an economics professor at the University of Tokyo. “One lesson from Japan is that public works get the best results when they create something useful for the future.
But the real lesson to be learned here is the follow and pay special close attention to what is said here:
In the end, say economists, it was not public works but an expensive cleanup of the debt-ridden banking system, combined with growing exports to China and the United States, that brought a close to Japan’s Lost Decade. This has led many to conclude that spending did little more than sink Japan deeply into debt, leaving an enormous tax burden for future generations.
Gee, is that not what Ron Paul said ALL ALONG, while he was running for President of the United States? For Ron Paul’s troubles and hard work he was slandered, maligned and marginalized by the Neo-Conservatives who hated him and the Liberal Democrats who were sacred to death of him.
I highly suggest that you read the rest of this article. The United States could learn much from this lesson that Japan had to learn. We could very well end up causing more harm than good to our economy.
Another victim of the worldwide economic collapse:
Panasonic on Wednesday said that it was shedding 15,000 jobs, the second significant layoff in Japan’s electronics industry in less than a week, and the latest example of how Japanese companies, exporters in particular, are scrambling to cut costs as demand evaporates.
Panasonic, along with Mitsubishi Motors and Mazda, also joined the rapidly lengthening list of companies to sharply revise their full-year outlooks Wednesday, with Panasonic now projecting a net loss of 380 billion yen or $4.2 billion for the year ending March 31, rather than the 30 billion yen profit it forecast on Nov. 27. Mitsubishi expects a net loss of 60 billion yen and Mazda 13 billion.
The speed of the demand downturn in recent months has taken manufacturers and economists by surprise, and forced many companies to sharply lower profit warnings made only months or even weeks ago.
I hate to sound like I am repeating myself. But this is more damage done by the Clinton Administration and the inaction of the Republican Majority of 2003. The easing of the housing loan regulations is what created all this, thus creating a economic bubble. Which has now burst. Of course, throwing money at it, will not fix it. Now, we have the tech sector taking the hit, because of the downturn in the economy. Expect more of this to come as time goes on.
Now this is a switch! It seems that the cheerleader section for the Obama Administration has basically thrown one of their own under the bus. How quaint.
When President Obama nominated former Senator Tom Daschle to be his secretary of health and human services, it seemed to be a good choice. Mr. Daschle, as the co-author of a book on health care reform, knew a lot about one of the president’s signature issues. As a former Senate majority leader, he also knew a lot about guiding controversial bills through Congress, where he remains liked and respected by former colleagues.
Unfortunately, new facts have come to light — involving his failure to pay substantial taxes that were owed and his sizable income from health-related companies while he worked in the private sector — that call into question his suitability for the job. We believe that Mr. Daschle ought to step aside and let the president choose a less-blemished successor.
Mr. Daschle’s tax shortfall is particularly troubling because it comes on the heels of another nominee’s failure to pay taxes due. We were not pleased when the president’s Treasury secretary, Timothy Geithner, admitted that he had failed to pay tens of thousands of dollars in federal self-employment taxes while working for the International Monetary Fund despite having signed paperwork acknowledging the obligation.
Now we are confronted with an even larger lapse by Mr. Daschle, who failed to pay $128,000 in taxes, primarily for personal use of a car and driver provided to him by a private equity firm for which he consulted. Although the firm — headed by a major Democratic donor — had not issued a form 1099 for the value of the car service, Mr. Daschle said he became concerned last June that he might owe taxes on it and instructed his accountant to investigate. Neither was concerned enough to actually pay the taxes.
[……]
In both the Geithner and Daschle cases, the failure to pay taxes is attributed to unintentional oversights. But Mr. Daschle is one oversight case too many. The American tax system depends heavily on voluntary compliance. It would send a terrible message to the public if we ignore the failure of yet another high-level nominee to comply with the tax laws.
[…..]
Mr. Daschle is another in a long line of politicians who move cozily between government and industry. We don’t know that his industry ties would influence his judgments on health issues, but they could potentially throw a cloud over health care reform. Mr. Daschle could clear the atmosphere by withdrawing his name.
I could sit here and tell you, that I am shocked that the New York Times is turning on this appointment. But honestly? I am not, and I will tell you why. Honesty and integrity go a long way in Government. It would be derelict of me, however not to point out that a few other Senators are guilty of the same thing. Like Al Franken and Charlie Rangel for instance. As this article above says, our tax system, as unfair and heavy handed as it might seem to some, does rely heavily on a voluntary compliance. The question is what kind of message does it sent to the American people, if we have tax cheats in our high ranking offices in the United States Government? Not a very good one, I am afraid.
The real question is; will President Obama heed the advice of the New York Times? Something tells me that he will not, because Obama has said in the past, that he is not going to make decisions based upon what other people think. (Kind of like the guy that proceeded him….) So, it will be interesting to watch this unfold. Obama, the man whom basically the New York Times and other Liberal media outlets elected basically tells those same people to stow it and does what he wants to. Now that will make for some interesting blogging!
Update: It is being reported now, by various outlets that Tom Daschle has withdrawn his name.
