Showing posts with label David Weigel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label David Weigel. Show all posts
In case anyone cares what a bunch of lefty academics in Berkeley are saying at a conference called "Fractures, Alliances, and Mobilizations: Emerging Analyses of the Tea Party Movement."
David Weigel has typed up his notes for your enlightenment. Good lord, the very idea of a Center for the Comparative Study of Right-Wing Movements makes me want to run in the other direction.
"Weigel v. Kaus Detwitterfied."
When something interesting happened on Twitter, can you save it from oblivion? Mickey Kaus tries, but it's a tedious tangle of terseness. Twitter is the Memory Hole and you don't want to stick your arm down there.
The Davids, Weigel and Frum on Bloggingheads.
They talk about Weigel's recent Journolist-related ouster from the Washington Post, among other things. I haven't watched yet, so I can't vouch for how interesting the discussion is. It's interesting that they're on, so that's how my interestingness standard is met. Will they push each other or just natter on? Maybe listen while you're cooking dinner or something.
Andrew Breitbart offers $100,000 for the full Journolist archive — with a promise to keep the source secret.
Surely, somewhere among the 400 members of that former discussion group, there is someone who feels motivated to fulfill the desire of the information to be free. I've listed reasons why I think it would be doing a good thing to make the archive public, and now there is an additional motivation — $100,000. Now, virtue is mixed with venality. But virtue is mixed with venality when it comes to keeping the archive private. The motivations for not disclosing are not pure. People are protecting their careers, hoping for favors from powerful and well-placed co-Journolisters. Breitbart has added economic incentive to the other side of the balance, and he fortifies his offer of payment with an ethical argument:
AND: Then there's the nothing-to-see-here-move-along gambit: Jonathan Chait insists that the conversations were "mundane..... requests for references... instantaneous reactions to events, joshing around, conversations about sports, and the like...." Matthew Yglesias portrays it as talk about sports, links to published articles, and "failed efforts to get an interesting discussion going."
Ezra Klein’s “JournoList 400” is the epitome of progressive and liberal collusion that conservatives, Tea Partiers, moderates and many independents have long suspected and feared exists at the heart of contemporary American political journalism. Now that collusion has been exposed when one of the weakest links in that cabal, Dave Weigel, was outed. Weigel was, in all likelihood, exposed because – to whoever the rat was who leaked his emails — he wasn’t liberal enough....ADDED: Mediaite thinks it's "unlikely" that any Journolister will spring for the $100,000. I don't really understand her argument. It only takes one person to decide to disclose. I think it's obvious someone with a mix of motives, including a desire for $100,000, is likely to do it. There's a great argument for transparency and freeing information — for the public good. I, personally, believe that argument. And it's impossible for me to believe that in a group that size, with that many people, people who are in competition with each other, that there isn't one person who feels on the outs and isn't interested in protecting anybody. Indeed, human nature being what it is, there are probably a few people who would love to see some of the prominent Journolisters exposed as... whatever the exposure would expose them as.
AND: Then there's the nothing-to-see-here-move-along gambit: Jonathan Chait insists that the conversations were "mundane..... requests for references... instantaneous reactions to events, joshing around, conversations about sports, and the like...." Matthew Yglesias portrays it as talk about sports, links to published articles, and "failed efforts to get an interesting discussion going."
I'm not involved in any sharing of ideological talking points.
For example, I don't know what Glenn Reynolds means by "I've got your man right here" in his post that links to me. I'm not involved in any conservative bloggerly equivalent of Journolist, nor has any fellow blogger of note ever emailed me to suggest that I get on the same page with others to serve some larger goal.
I genuinely don't know whether Glenn is doing some sort of Alpha Male routine, whether he's tweaking Weigel as a Beta Male or if he's serious that David Weigel is the Journolist member with the best justification for sending me the whole Journolist archive (after I requested a Journolist "Deep Throat").
Now, it does make sense to me that Weigel should do it. He's been hurt, shot down. So he might feel like striking back in some extravagant way. But, more important, he's the one with the biggest interest in getting the whole archive out. His statements have been leaked out of context, and what he wrote might seems quite moderate if we could read what everyone else was saying — if we could understand the culture of Journolist.
Our need for the full context, in order to understand the part that is already public, will be #1 on a list — help me add to it — of why the entire Journolist archive needs to be made public.
I genuinely don't know whether Glenn is doing some sort of Alpha Male routine, whether he's tweaking Weigel as a Beta Male or if he's serious that David Weigel is the Journolist member with the best justification for sending me the whole Journolist archive (after I requested a Journolist "Deep Throat").
Now, it does make sense to me that Weigel should do it. He's been hurt, shot down. So he might feel like striking back in some extravagant way. But, more important, he's the one with the biggest interest in getting the whole archive out. His statements have been leaked out of context, and what he wrote might seems quite moderate if we could read what everyone else was saying — if we could understand the culture of Journolist.
Our need for the full context, in order to understand the part that is already public, will be #1 on a list — help me add to it — of why the entire Journolist archive needs to be made public.
1. "I take them seriously; they’re building something brand new, something that defies conventional wisdom. If readers get a deeper understanding of these people, their strategy, and their ideas, then I’m doing my job."
2. "Honestly, it’s been tough to find fresh angles sometimes–how many times can I report that these [tea party] activists are joyfully signing up with the agenda of discredited right-winger X and discredited right-wing group Y?"
The public (1) and the private (2) David Weigel (if by "private," one means in the company of 400 of your bestest friends, at least one of whom is ready to tea-bag you before you teabag him).
ADDED: Glenn Reynolds, noting the photograph, says "Check out the photo if you want to see the face of modern journalism. In your nightmares . . . ." This is the photograph:
The public (1) and the private (2) David Weigel (if by "private," one means in the company of 400 of your bestest friends, at least one of whom is ready to tea-bag you before you teabag him).
ADDED: Glenn Reynolds, noting the photograph, says "Check out the photo if you want to see the face of modern journalism. In your nightmares . . . ." This is the photograph:
Jeffrey Goldberg says "I've been leaked postings from JournoList before — wonderfully charming things written about me..."
"... I haven't had the opportunity to use them, but would be happy to if the need arose. Why anyone would think that a listserv with 400 people is private is beyond me. It's McChrystal-level naivete."
Ha. And somebody must be scared. He's got your email and he knows how to use it.
John Cole paraphrases, scornfully: "I’m not against using my perch at the Atlantic to publish someone’s private emails to viciously destroy their character and career, but what really bothers me is if someone makes a joke privately!"
The Journolisters — including Cole? — must be desperately trying to discipline each other not to leak. And yet the evidence is — if Goldberg is to be believed — that the leaks have been going on all along. Whenever someone not on the list was talked about, somebody in that 400 may have seen fit to let that person know what was being said. Think of all the reasons you might decide to forward the email. You might know the person being talked about and think they needed to be be alerted about some scurrilous accusations or plans. You might object to what was being said or dislike the person saying it and want to do something about it without drawing attention to yourself.
It's really too late now to get the 400 listmembers into line. Stuff has gone out. People like Goldberg have it and will use it when they decide it's right. You can try, like Cole, to say that using it will be vicious and destructive, but presumably, the email was vicious and destructive, which is probably why it got forwarded! And, anyway, you can't beat that many people into line. In that huge group are some writers who take orders, but there have to be others who are vindictive or careless. Some may be unsuccessful and jealous. Some may believe staunchly that information wants to be free or that a list of 400 is pretty much a public list with no valid restrictions. You can't control them all.
And there is, it seems, a new, smaller list being formed without the dangerous riffraff. The true insiders are determining what the scope of the inner circle is. And the others, the left-behinds? Well, they're sitting on a pile of hot, nasty words written by the cool kids who just shut the clubhouse door on them.
ADDED: Cole responds to this post and I respond to that here.
Ha. And somebody must be scared. He's got your email and he knows how to use it.
John Cole paraphrases, scornfully: "I’m not against using my perch at the Atlantic to publish someone’s private emails to viciously destroy their character and career, but what really bothers me is if someone makes a joke privately!"
The Journolisters — including Cole? — must be desperately trying to discipline each other not to leak. And yet the evidence is — if Goldberg is to be believed — that the leaks have been going on all along. Whenever someone not on the list was talked about, somebody in that 400 may have seen fit to let that person know what was being said. Think of all the reasons you might decide to forward the email. You might know the person being talked about and think they needed to be be alerted about some scurrilous accusations or plans. You might object to what was being said or dislike the person saying it and want to do something about it without drawing attention to yourself.
It's really too late now to get the 400 listmembers into line. Stuff has gone out. People like Goldberg have it and will use it when they decide it's right. You can try, like Cole, to say that using it will be vicious and destructive, but presumably, the email was vicious and destructive, which is probably why it got forwarded! And, anyway, you can't beat that many people into line. In that huge group are some writers who take orders, but there have to be others who are vindictive or careless. Some may be unsuccessful and jealous. Some may believe staunchly that information wants to be free or that a list of 400 is pretty much a public list with no valid restrictions. You can't control them all.
And there is, it seems, a new, smaller list being formed without the dangerous riffraff. The true insiders are determining what the scope of the inner circle is. And the others, the left-behinds? Well, they're sitting on a pile of hot, nasty words written by the cool kids who just shut the clubhouse door on them.
ADDED: Cole responds to this post and I respond to that here.
Burn, Davey, Burn — The Self-Immolation of David Weigel.
Consider poor, conflicted David Weigel. Hired by the Washington Post, he had the trappings of prestige and therefore he deserved the admiration of the cool young journalists of Washington, D.C. But his assignment was to cover the conservative movement, and that threatened to make him toxic, a man to be shunned. He needed a way to wriggle — to wiggle-Weigel — into the good graces of the cool kids. He had to show that he was covering conservatives, but he was not one of them.
He could try to do that subtly, and without deviating from the good-faith performance of his assigned task, perhaps by writing in a neutral, questioning style about what was going on with the righties these days and carefully raising doubts, undermining foundations, and strategically inserting a knife blade now and then. But would they get it? Didn't he need something a little more emphatic... and a little hipper?
So David started letting his need for lefty approval express itself on the email list, the Journolist, where the cool kids were being intimate and snarky. But those other kids were not tasked with covering conservatives. While they might have been embarrassed if the mean things they wrote in the email were ever leaked, they didn't have careers founded on their suitability for covering conservatives. The risk poor Dave took was of an entirely different nature. Why, Dave, why? Why did you risk the plum job?
UPDATE: Weigel resigns.
AND: In smugger days:
He could try to do that subtly, and without deviating from the good-faith performance of his assigned task, perhaps by writing in a neutral, questioning style about what was going on with the righties these days and carefully raising doubts, undermining foundations, and strategically inserting a knife blade now and then. But would they get it? Didn't he need something a little more emphatic... and a little hipper?
So David started letting his need for lefty approval express itself on the email list, the Journolist, where the cool kids were being intimate and snarky. But those other kids were not tasked with covering conservatives. While they might have been embarrassed if the mean things they wrote in the email were ever leaked, they didn't have careers founded on their suitability for covering conservatives. The risk poor Dave took was of an entirely different nature. Why, Dave, why? Why did you risk the plum job?
“Honestly, it’s been tough to find fresh angles sometimes–how many times can I report that these [tea party] activists are joyfully signing up with the agenda of discredited right-winger X and discredited right-wing group Y?” Weigel lamented in one February email.He also said:
In other posts, Weigel describes conservatives as using the media to “violently, angrily divide America.” According to Weigel, their motives include “racism” and protecting “white privilege,” and for some of the top conservatives in D.C., a nihilistic thirst for power....
Of Matt Drudge, Weigel remarked, “It’s really a disgrace that an amoral shut-in like Drudge maintains the influence he does on the news cycle while gay-baiting, lying, and flubbing facts to this degree.”
“This would be a vastly better world to live in if Matt Drudge decided to handle his emotional problems more responsibly, and set himself on fire.”Such nastiness doesn't hurt Matt of course. Matt drops another link, gets all the traffic, and moves on. Ironically, it is Dave who is undone. Having shown us his vivid hostility to the conservatives he was supposed to explain to us, we no longer have any reason to read him. Having destroyed the appearance of his capacity to enlighten us, he has lit the flame of his own self-immolation.
UPDATE: Weigel resigns.
Various readers suggest that the email-leaker was after Dave’s job. I think the WaPo should have a no-journolister rule for Weigel’s replacement, which would solve that problem, among others.Indeed. One of the problems that might be somewhat solved is the cheeky smugness of the young journalists. The exclusive little club turned deadly for one of its members. And isn't funny how people who should be in the know still don't get modern technology. Tiger Woods brought down by texting, Dave Weigel by email, etc. etc.
AND: In smugger days:
David Weigel|6.14.10 @ 5:01PM|#(Thanks to C3 for pointing to that.)
Well, I really enjoyed the two and a half years I spent here, and I'm constantly confused as to why mentions of my name lead to a lot of schoolyard insults. I really can't figure out why they do it -- lack of fulfillment seems like a good enough theory. After all, I'm here, and they're where I left them in 2008.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to return to my rewarding job and large circle of friends. I don't know how my ego will ever recover...
"This would be a vastly better world to live in if Matt Drudge decided to handle his emotional problems more responsibly, and set himself on fire."
Wrote the WaPo's Dave Weigel, who covers conservatives but writes things he's ashamed to see get beyond the confines of the lefty "Journolist" email list.
Apparently, to North Carolinians, the words "Do you fully support the Obama agenda?" are fighting words.
What is wrong with that man tortfeasor?
How can Congressman Bob Etheridge (D-NC2) think he can lay hands on someone for asking a question like that? Why did that question make him so angry? Look how much he believes in his own capacity and right to intimidate! Quite aside from the manhandling, where does Etheridge get the idea that someone who asks a question is required to divulge his name? Is he completely deranged? Does he not remember what a camera is? Has he never heard of YouTube? I bet he has now.
ADDED: Here's how WaPo's Dave Weigel minimizes the story:
MORE: This came in the email:
How can Congressman Bob Etheridge (D-NC2) think he can lay hands on someone for asking a question like that? Why did that question make him so angry? Look how much he believes in his own capacity and right to intimidate! Quite aside from the manhandling, where does Etheridge get the idea that someone who asks a question is required to divulge his name? Is he completely deranged? Does he not remember what a camera is? Has he never heard of YouTube? I bet he has now.
ADDED: Here's how WaPo's Dave Weigel minimizes the story:
But without any name or organizational support, just by riling up a member of Congress, the students have created the first conservative meme of the week. They seem to have learned from organizations such as ThinkProgress that any video of a member acting strangely, no matter how grainy, is grist for the Web.And Weigel is aptly embarrassed by the first comment:
You refer to this dismissively as "video of a member acting strangely." Sorry, this isn't so easily dismissed. It's video of a member acting thuggishly, committing an assault and battery. And it's video of a member who has the arrogance to claim he has a right to know the identity of someone who asked me a question on the street. He doesn't have any such right. What he has is the dangerous notion that he's exempt from the laws of the District of Columbia and from the dictates of a civil society. And by your so cavalierly dismissing his outrageous behavior, you're complicit.Of course, the big question now — for anyone with a Weigel-y mentality — is: Who's Rob_?
Posted by: Rob_ | June 14, 2010 10:52 AM...
MORE: This came in the email:
I'm Rob_(Rob gave me permission to copy this.)
I know your question at the end of the Etheridge post was facetious, but I figured I'd answer it anyway. I'm Robert Cantor, a retired lawyer and amateur photographer in Rockville, Maryland, unaffiliated with Andrew Breitbart or any other political or journalistic operation but fascinated both by Etheridge's outrageous behavior and the way it was covered in the media. Not only did Weigel mischaracterize it and treat it dismissively, but others like CBS chose to edit down the battery to eliminate Etheridge's very rough grabbing of the young man's neck as well as the repeated requests from the young man that Etheridge let him go. The New York Times, following the pattern of its coverage of Van Jones and Helen Thomas, waited to report anything about the incident until Etheridge had apologized, then made his apology the story and reported little about the incident itself. Thank goodness for Glenn Greenwald, who had the integrity to call for Etheridge to be arrested and the courage to call out the commenters to his post who defended Etheridge.
"What do we know about the retirement of Rep. David Obey (D-Wis.)?"
Asks David Weigel, noting the hot political news of the day:
ADDED: I was just reading Obey's bio on Wikipedia. It's surprisingly short — considering that he's been in Congress since 1969. (He replaced Melvin Laird, who became Nixon's Secretary of Defense.) Under "Controversies," there's only one item. If you're going to have exactly one controversy, it might as well be this:
Why would one of the most powerful men in Congress, elected in 1968, in a district that went for the Obama-Biden ticket, bail out of reelection? Republicans point to the campaign of Sean Duffy, a telegenic (literally) district attorney who raised a lot of money, built a following among national conservatives and, according to everything I'm hearing, was giving Obey a real battle in his internal polls.
I've talked to Duffy several times and been so impressed...
Talk like that attracted the attention of conservatives who helped Duffy raise about $500,000 -- less than half as much as Obey, but for a campaign that explicitly promised to replace a power-broker who could bring money to the district with a small government conservative who would be totally disinterested in pork. You'll hear people credit the endorsements of Sarah Palin and Tim Pawlenty for Duffy's success, but that gets the story backward.You may remember that we were talking about the Obey/Duffy face-off a few days ago, in the context of the problem of Republicans having a big advantage looking toward November but needing real candidates. Duffy is real. (And he was on "The Real World.")
ADDED: I was just reading Obey's bio on Wikipedia. It's surprisingly short — considering that he's been in Congress since 1969. (He replaced Melvin Laird, who became Nixon's Secretary of Defense.) Under "Controversies," there's only one item. If you're going to have exactly one controversy, it might as well be this:
On June 25, 2009, Obey got into a fight on the House floor with fellow Democratic Congresswoman Maxine Waters of California.LOL at the dumb Wikipedia writing (which makes Obey a woman). Let's switch to the Roll Call text...
House Appropriations Chairman David Obey (D-Wis.) and Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) engaged in a shoving match on the House floor early Thursday evening that ended with Obey raising his voice and bellowing, “I’m not going to approve that earmark!”"You are out of line!" "You are out of line" "He touched me first, he pushed me first!" Ha. How did I miss that story last summer? Let's see what I was blogging on June 25, 2009. There were a bunch of new Supreme Court cases to digest. Farrah Fawcett died. And then Michael Jackson died. So the Waters/Obey catfight didn't get an audience. Farrah and Michael and death beats Dave and Maxine and pseudo-shoving any day.
Waters has been seeking $1 million for an employment center in her district that bears her name, but Obey has decided to ban any “monuments to me” when it comes to funding project requests this year.
The confrontation began with the two talking in each other’s faces and gesturing animatedly with their hands. Obey then attempted to walk away, but Waters kept following him. Obey then put his hand on Waters arm and shoulder, and Waters became irate.
Obey again turned away, dismissing Waters by throwing up his hands, but Waters continued to stalk him, talking to his back and making a shoving motion.
Waters followed Obey down to the well of the House, and as the confrontation — and shoves — continued, Obey turned and told her: “You are out of line.”
To which Waters retorted: “You are out of line.”
“I am not going to approve that earmark!” Obey exclaimed, then hustled away from Waters.
Waters then retreated to a group of fellow members of the Congressional Black Caucus, but her conversation could be heard from the press gallery.
“He touched me first, he pushed me first!” she said. She then left the House floor, while Obey sat down to talk with House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.).
"The domestic issues Mr. Obama ran and won on — health care, education, climate change, rebalancing the distribution of wealth..."
From a NYT article called "Obama’s Battle on Stimulus Shows Threats to His Agenda."
Obama ran on a redistribution of the wealth agenda? So, back when he was campaigning, and his opponents characterized things he said as meaning that he wanted to redistribute the wealth, and his supporters shouted that down as typical right-wing distortion, Obama was really laying the groundwork for claiming that he had won a mandate to redistribute the wealth? Incredible!
BUT: The redistribution will be $13 a week.
AND: David Weigel responds:
I think Obama's mockery was a denial of the accusation. If Obama had said, "I didn't just accidentally say 'spread the wealth around,' I really believe in the redistribution of the wealth, and I want you to vote for me because you do too," he would have lost.
Obama ran on a redistribution of the wealth agenda? So, back when he was campaigning, and his opponents characterized things he said as meaning that he wanted to redistribute the wealth, and his supporters shouted that down as typical right-wing distortion, Obama was really laying the groundwork for claiming that he had won a mandate to redistribute the wealth? Incredible!
BUT: The redistribution will be $13 a week.
AND: David Weigel responds:
Err, yes. Sen. John McCain’s campaign spent the last three weeks of the presidential race accusing Obama of “socialist” tendencies because Obama told Sam Wurzelbacher that “if the economy’s good for folks from the bottom up, it’s gonna be good for everybody. I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.”
Obama didn’t really back down on this — he mocked it: “By the end of the week, he’ll be accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in kindergarten.” But he didn’t deny that he planned to cut taxes for middle- and lower-income Americans while raising taxes on the rich.
If Republicans didn’t want to give Obama a mandate for “spreading the wealth,” they probably shouldn’t have made that their message and then lost the election to him.
I think Obama's mockery was a denial of the accusation. If Obama had said, "I didn't just accidentally say 'spread the wealth around,' I really believe in the redistribution of the wealth, and I want you to vote for me because you do too," he would have lost.
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