Smear Pattern (The Wilsons weren't the only victims)

[No Exit]

Smear Pattern

Dec. 3, 2005

by Paul Sperry

On July 15, 2003, ABC News aired a story about the plummeting morale of U.S. troops in Iraq. It quoted soldiers questioning the war and the judgment and candor of their commanders. One frosted GI even went on camera to call for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to resign.

It was a devastating report, and the White House went into orbit over it. Rather than address the issues the soldiers raised, angry White House officials devised a plan to attack the messenger – the ABC correspondent who filed the story, Jeffrey Kofman.

He's gay, officials whispered to cyber-gossip Matt Drudge, a reliable Bush toady. Not only that, they sneered, he's not even an American. He's a Canadian.

Drudge, no longer the gadfly he once was during the Clinton years, dutifully posted a banner smear of Kofman on his Web site the day after the powerful ABC story, which had made national headlines. Drudge, who supports the Iraq invasion, later acknowledged the White House tipping him off, remarking that it "has become slightly more aggressive about contacting reporters."

(snip)

http://www.antiwar.com/sperry/?articleid=8201

[xchrom]

1. gay and canadian!?!?!?!

well, that's just too much -- and i'm gay.

[xchrom]

2. and the info re: leo straus is great.

it's very important to know the history of neocons.

[No Exit]

3. The horror! The horror!

It sort of reminds me of the brouhaha about NJ Gov. McGreevey. His alleged "ex-lover" (Golan Cipel) threatens to sue him, then, after McGreevey has been thoroughly trashed and has resigned in disgrace, the "ex-lover" drops the incipient lawsuit and escapes to Israel.

If that whole thing didn't stink to high heaven, I don't know what does.

[xchrom]

4. you are picking maybe the perfect incident in modern politics

to explain leo straus.
his legacy is very deep -- there is a history professor that is one of his major proteges teaching at harvard now -- i forget his name -- but it's examples like that show the amoeba like spread of strausian thinking.

[No Exit]

7. Yes--his legacy, which includes deliberate lying and elitism, is

frighteningly in evidence all over America, especially in Washington, D.C.

[xchrom]

8. it's frustrating that our dem leadership seems so woefully ignorant

of strausian apostles and how they operate.

i don't get it - i mean i get the dlc -- i don't get the more traditional progressives seeming so weak in the face of it all.

[karynnj]

9. As a New Jerseyan, the reason he resigned is that he

was involved in a huge amount of corruption. He tried to put said lover, who had no relevent experience in the position that was head of the State's equivilent to homeland security. Several people associated with him were in trouble for pay to play abuses.

NJ is pretty liberal - being gay wouldn't have been a huge issue - though likely it would have been a huge story. and he did the Department of Motor Vehicles to work much better than anyone in decades.

[No Exit]

10. Be that as it may, I'm guessing that said lover was probably

a better choice to head a state "homeland security" agency than was Tom Ridge to head the national one. Or Bernard Kerik.

At least, he might have been a better choice, if he had not actually been a "plant"--which is what he now seems to have been.

When a politician takes office, I'm sure there are many, many, rackets who are waiting their turn for him to give them their usual piece of the action. It must be hard to figure out what to do--whether to thumb one's nose at all of them (risking disaster and even assassination), or to play along until you gather the power to oust them while still being personally protected.

[donkeyotay]

11. Kind of makes you wonder how many of our reps are being blackmailed

The lobbyists show them a really, really good time.

[xchrom]

5. kick

[xchrom]

6. kick

lol -- maaaaaybe somebody else will get interested in this.