And one of the best parts . . . if you look at the copyright page:

(C) 2006, Olbermann Broadcasting Empire.

Gotta love the snark! :)

Way to go Keith… America needs more people like you!

Dear Congressman Meehan,

I saw you opposite Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn last night on the PBS Newshour. While I fully agree with you, and believe you presented the superior factual argument, I was distressed at how the Congresswoman controlled the ideological terms of the debate, in unmistakably McCarthyite tones that replicated those of Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and served to define you as part of the problem. What follows is a post mortem on the exchange, on which I am being perfectly blunt for the greater good. I hope you will excuse me for not mincing words.

Here is one of her opening remarks about you after you laid out facts that no reasonable person would dispute:

“Well, I think that he is misunderstanding many of the things that are there, and maybe he chooses to do so, but I do disagree with that.”

You let that one slip by. Also this one:

“You know, it’s more like the Cold War. We knew when we started fighting … that, yes, indeed, there would be some that were going to disagree with that. That is always going to happen.”

This is the “stab in the back” theme that resonates so well. Commentators have written about it in the US. Now it is being heard in Israel in the wake of the Lebanon disaster. It calls for a sharp comeback. All you said in response, however, was that “only” 5 to 7 percent of the combatants in Iraq are foreign terrorists. Only? Had only 7 percent of the Viet Cong been Soviet troops, would that have been reason not to fight them there, to call Vietnam a civil war?

You completely missed the depth and power of the false rhetoric that was flung in your face. It put you in the category of “fellow travelers” who saw Stalin as a revolutionary reformer and Communism as a system that would ameliorate over time.

Then there was this shot across the bow, when Jim Lehrer threw the Congresswoman a grapefruit to hit out of the park, asking her whether the Democrats’ debating points were legitimate to bring up. She handled it quite effectively, a sort of kinder, gentler version of the “are you now or have you ever been …” question:

“You know, I think, Jim, that it is a debate that is going to be had, regardless of whether we would call it ‘legitimate’ or not or ‘appropriate’ or not. There are people who are always going to be against fighting for freedom, always is going to happen.

“You know, when I talk to my parents and individuals that lived through World War II, you hear some of the same rhetoric that they endured during that time.

“But one of the things I think that is very important to look at and to understand, when you have Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants saying the centerpiece of the war on terror is in Iraq, that is the battle that is at the forefront right now, then we know it would be foolish of us to leave and to let them take that battlefront. It would be a foolish move for us to do that.”

Never mind that two-thirds of the public now question the war in Iraq and that the Republicans get this support (if they don’t simply make it up) within their echo chamber. The message was simple: There are always those who are morally and intellectually confused or out-and-out traitors. There were communists in the State Department in the ’50’s, Nazi sympathizers and America firsters in the ’30’s. And now there is Congressman Meehan.

This was the Rumsfeld speech all over again. Where were you when your chance came to stand up and call out this outrage? Nowhere. All you did was repeat: It’s a civil war, it’s undermining our counterterrorism efforts. We should be smart.

Smart? Shades of Michael Dukakis! Had you put on a tank helmet you would have rounded out the analogy.

And, at the end, a last grapefruit for the Congresswoman from Jim Lehrer: Is this man to your right undermining the fight against terrorism? What about all he is saying? The effective response:

“I don’t think it is helpful when we have statements like that. I honestly do not. Our men and women need to know that we are there and that we are supportive of them and we are supportive of these efforts.

“The Iraqi legislators — you know, when you talk to Iraqi legislators, they are not trying to divide that country along sectarian lines, with Sunni, with Shia, with Kurds, with the Chaldean Christians.”

Whoops! There goes your factual claim. All those legislators. All those purple fingers! One could almost see democracy on the march saying, “Stay the course! Please don’t abandon us!”

She got the last word in: no civil war. And she threw in Christians. Lots of votes there! And it painted you as a secular liberal, ready to throw the Christians to the lions. Don’t you know that this is a Christian nation to their thinking? That this is a Crusade?

I was sitting there watching this transpire and wishing you had made a CD of Keith Olbermann’s blast at Rummy, pushed the “repeat” button, and gone to bed playing the recording under your pillow as you went to sleep the night before.
The courage is there — Nancy Pelosi showed it against that Bushovic Nora O’Donnell. What you all need to do is SAY it! Over and over, in forums like these. You are being swiftboated, defined as soft on terror! This is not all that new.

And please, PLEASE link this scam to the assault on our Constitution. On the USA PATRIOT Act, you MUST ask the public to reflect on that fact that an administration that was unconcerned about a terror risk pre-9/11 was somehow able to roll out a draft act within days of the event, even as the NSA were going over the warnings of a terror threat that Clinton had left behind and Richard Clarke had been trying to put under their noses.

What this shows is that the events of 9/11 were used as a pretext for an assault on the Constitution that had always been in the Republicans’ plans. People can put such fact together … if they are put before them. Already people think — mistaken, I believe — that 9/11 was staged by the Republicans. How much easier to say it was exploited and that it ties to the NSA wiretaps and that all of this is being implemented because of a supine Congress that needs to change hands.

And where is the protest about the upcoming ABC false narrative on the Clinton version of GWOT? A demand for equal time? Anything to head off another electoral disaster?

I do hope you will read this and learn from it. I would be happy to know that it has sunk in, either in what I hear from Democrats or through the courtesy of a reply.

We are all trying to find our voices, but if your party does not get ahead of the game and find its own, I see a fall disaster ahead of us.

Respectfully,

As for Dems not appearing on Hardball, yeah, part of it could be because they’re spineless and disorganized. But it could also be because “why bother”. Hardball’s audience isn’t exactly going to be friendly to any Dem and their message will most likely be lost or ignored. I watched Tweety’s treatment of Dr Dean and yeah, it’s no surprise why Dems feel they have better outlets for their messages. And Nora can spout Rethug talking points with the best of em so let her whine.

GO KEITH!!

If to be old and merry be a sin, then many an old host that I know is damned….No, my good lord: banish Peto, banish Bardolph, banish Poins; but for sweet Jack Falstaff, kind Jack Falstaff, true Jack Falstaff, valiant Jack Falstaff, and therefore more valiant being, as his is, old Jack Falstaff, banish not him thy Harry’s company, banish not him thy Harry’s company. Banish plump Jack, and banish all the world!

–King Henry the Fourth, Part I (II, iv)

Banish Donald!