OK, for once there has been some fitful pushback in the MSM against McCain's GOP-politics-as-usual attack ads.  But the MSM has worked hard to avoid confirming the obvious comparison to the racist ads used against Harold Ford in '06. When they do acknowledge the comparison at all, they couch it in a question for debate and downplay that McCain's initial reaction to the racist anti-Ford ad was to hire the people who made it.

But I haven't seen media coverage of the most relevant information on the ad:  McCain had ads ready to attack Obama over the troop visit either way; if he had gone, McCain was going to accuse him of politicizing the troops.  Hat tip to Matthew Yglesias.

This information should tell the voting public everything we need to know about who is the craven political hack here.  So, here's a "debate" question the MSM could use:  Why aren't they talking about this?

(Please follow below the fold)

Today, Joe Scarborough probably made them very mad.  He noted that Pakistan is the source of Islamist terror and now that we've seen yet another instance of Pakistan-related or Pakistan-trained terrorists attempting to attack us, maybe it is about time we moved our focus away from Iraq--which, once again, had nothing to do with a major terrorist attempt--and focused on the actual problem.

Following this simple and absolutely correct logic, I am at a loss regarding the right-wing's latest talking point.  I heard all over tv today that this reinforces the case for staying in Iraq.  It seems to me that it reinforces the argument that we aren't eve fighting the right people.  What am I missing here?

It contains an email exchange that she had with an organizer for a conservative college student convention.  She was denied a press pass to report on the event by ... get this ... the same guy who has received press passes from Campus Progress for the past two years straight!!!

Please read below the fold for the author's (Julie Brinn Siegel) email exchange with the jackass (remember this name: Jason Mattera):

I have seen Durbin's statement quoted in just a few places.  It needs to be all over the media.

To my recollection, this is probably the first time--and certainly the most well-spoken--that a member of Congress has directly confronted a Bush official on their policy of dishonoring the troops:  We have repeatedly seen the Bush administration smear the troops for following orders and promote their chickenhawk superiors for giving those orders.  Yesterday, Senator Durbin called them out.  Please read below the fold!

However, I was disappointed in the interview on two points and I'd like to know if Gore gave a better answer in his new movie (I won't be able to see it for a couple of days).

Please see below:

He's interviewing the guy Daily Show had on last night about corruption.

First, Tweety puts out a "hypo": "So, how it works is trial lawyers basically bribe some Democrats (because that's the only industry the Dems control)...."

Then, "Y'know, I ask Republicans if they think they are more moral than Democrats and, to their credit, they say corruption is pretty much the same: the corruption is endemic."  

I cannot !@#^%!ing believe this guy.

Again, I am asking all you well-informed Kossacks out there to tell me if I am wrong on the tax breaks, and either way, to give me some more information on the details of all that.

And I amm asking you all this: If there is indeed some big unnecessary tax break for Big Oil out there, why isn't any one out there in the MSM or leadership talking about it?  

I mean, the fact that the most prominently discussed solution we have is a handout from Congress to pay for 2-3 visits to the gas station is pathetic, embarrassing, and the most obvious kind of "legal" bribery for votes I've ever seen.

Yesterday, yet again, Bush got mileage out of the Texas rancher narrative.  Even though it was in the context of denying knowledge of a popular movie about gay ranchers during a public event in very red-state Kansas (while out of DC for the 6th straight time during a Roe v. Wade anniversary), the media wrote and commented ad nauseum that Bush himself is a rancher.

The facts:

George W. Bush is the most privileged sitting president we have ever had.  He is the first president to completely inherit a party apparatus directly from his father.  He was raised on the east coast he so derides.  (If Massachusetts is un-American, what does that make Texas?)  He went to prep school there.  He was a cheerleader in college.  His ranch has no animals.  He bought it in 1999.

The line reminded me of a Daily Show episode, where John Stewart recently summarized how the White House had a Presidential Daily Briefing warning of Bin Laden plots to attack the US, and information on Al Qaeda plans to use commercial airplanes, the identities of at least two of the hijackers, and CIA information on flight training of suspicious persons who turned out to be hijackers.  

With all this information, the Bush Administration failed to take the necessary measures to protect America (instead, Bush set a record for amount of time a sitting president spent on vacation in one year--he's since broken his own record).  So, with their new talking point, is the GOP admitting that the 9/11 attack is on the hands of their party's leader, President Bush?

Considering that the conservative majority even stated that its decision in Bush v. Gore should not be followed as precedent, it is dead law, so there is no excuse for not answering questions about it.  

That opinion was patently partisan and anti-democratic.  Its writers were too ashamed to even put their name to it.  And they even went so far as to say that their opinion should not be followed in the future.  

Considering that Bush v. Gore did not set a precedent for anything (the opinion itself said so), there is no excuse to avoid answering the question.

Refusal to answer questions on Bush v. Gore should, by itself, be cause for filibuster.  

This is not a Democrat vs. Republican issue; it is a DEMOCRACY vs. Anti-Americanism issue.
 

This is the point that needs to be made every time these cowards smear the friends and family of the young and men and women who are actually facing the consequences of the Bush-Cheney cluelessness and photo-op bravado.

Here's what Bill Frist had to say about the revelation that the Bush administration has secret torture prisons in Eastern Europe:

This guy is amazing.  Considering that Frist is an unofficial Rove appointee and that he has made Congress completely subservient to the Bush administration, I take solace in the fact that this moron is yet another idiot Bush proxy who can't keep his foot out of his mouth.