Hi, Christy!

Hi again Christy!!

dos again…

With all this hypocritical posturing, Allen should find it a shoo in to run. I’m surprised she’s had any traction at all in Maine — they tend to be pretty straight foward over there…

Sounds to me like she’s taking one too many pages from the Joe Lieberman whine book.

She can have some Fromunda cheese to go with that whine too.

peanutbutter at 4 — The crazy thing is that the Collins campaign arrogantly thought that no one would call them on pulling this stunt twice. Hellooooo?!?

Does anyone know where the text of the NIE released today can be found?

Hugh at 8 — I’ve been looking for it, too, and haven’t found it yet. Let me know if you find a link anywhere…

Christy Hardin Smith @ 7

peanutbutter at 4 — The crazy thing is that the Collins campaign arrogantly thought that no one would call them on pulling this stunt twice. Hellooooo?!?

Maybe they do some of hte stuff they do on the assumption their complicit media won’t report it? I’m truly at a loss…

btw, Froomkin is up…

Christy Hardin Smith @ 8

Hugh at 8 — I’ve been looking for it, too, and haven’t found it yet. Let me know if you find a link anywhere…

TPM has it up.

This comes from someone who supported the Patriot Act with the attitude, “If you’re not doing anything wrong, it shouldn’t bother you.”

everyone should be prepared for people that come up with this “if you’re not doing anything wrong it shouldn’t bother you” crap

the response is;

“what?…I’m sorry, I don’t want these idiots stealing my information, looking up my wifes dress or taking pictures of my…maybe YOU think that’s fine but I don’t “

shut their mouths RIGHT up

A bit OT from downstairs, regarding the idea t hat Rove is attacking Clinton to draw away from Edwards.

I dunno about others, but I thought that sounded a little far fetched. So I went a-googling, and immediately found this, which was a real eye opener…
Rove’s shot at Clinton could mean anything

Hugh @ 7

Does anyone know where the text of the NIE released today can be found?

I’m guessing you can find most of it at think progress since they have some snippets posted right now

Hugh @ 7

Does anyone know where the text of the NIE released today can be found?

Believe it or not, you’ll find the pdf file of this at Faux News here (the blue link in the middle of the article.

MayDaze @ 12

Christy Hardin Smith @ 8

Hugh at 8 — I’ve been looking for it, too, and haven’t found it yet. Let me know if you find a link anywhere…

TPM has it up.

Thanks

EPU’d from downstairs

Lahoma @101: Hello

Hi, Lahoma! I’ve been hoping you’d join us here at the lake in person.

Welcome!

FunnyDiva

here’s the pdf of the nie from think progress

http://thinkprogress.org/wp-co…..07-nie.pdf

here are some snippets of the nie listed on think progress

Decrease in Baghdad violence due to sectarian cleansing:

The polarization of communities is most evident in Baghdad, where the Shia are a clear majority in more than half of all neighborhoods and Sunni areas have become surrounded by predominately Shia districts. Where population displacements have led to significant sectarian separation, conflict levels have diminished to some extent because warring communities find it more difficult to penetrate communal enclaves.

Violence to remain high over next six to 12 months:

[L]evels of insurgent and sectarian violence will remain high [over next six to 12 months] and the Iraqi Government will continue to struggle to achieve national-level political reconciliation and improved governance.

National government to become more “precarious” over next six to 12 months:

The Iraqi Government will become more precarious over the next six to 12 months because of criticism by other members of the major Shia coalition, Grand Ayatollah Sistani, and other Sunni and Kurdish parties. … The strains of the security situation and absence of key leaders have stalled internal political debates, slowed national decisionmaking, and increased Maliki’s vulnerability to alternative coalitions

Refugee crisis will continue to spill over during “next six to 12 months”:

Population displacement resulting from sectarian violence continues, imposing burdens on provincial governments and some neighboring states and increasing the danger of destabilizing influences spreading across Iraq’s borders over the next six to 12 months.

I hope people ignore her on re-election day. Oh, she’s promised to only run for two terms….I forgot.

Are Ms. Collins’ constituents going to buy the complete regimen of Bushco Fear and Terra Products again? Seems like that will be a hard sell this election cycle.

pb at 13

Thanks for the link. Really interesting.

Good Morning.

Re: Collins.

I kind of hate to get into this, but I am wondering if anyone thinks that it is an added disadvantage to Collins to be whiny because she’s a woman? Do people sense that the male/female perception paradigm which makes us call a screaming male boss “tough” and the female version “bitch” comes into play here?

Specifically, do women have an extra burden to seem unflappable in the face of this stuff, lest they be pegged as unstable and overly emotional? (Interestingly, the tape the Dems put out of the “confrontation showed collins handling the incident perfectly – polite, not terribly concerned.)

I think the Collins campaign is being stupid, and if she were a man I’d think exactly the same. But I wonder where people think we are on the gender politics of this issue.

Mutant at 23 — No — she’s crying wolf and ought to be called on it — because she has used this tactic in the past and it is dishonest and smarmy. Her boobs have nothing to do with it whatsoever.

This would have been a more appropriate link during the last thread, but I’ve been busy making a sleeping potion powerpoint presentation for my big lecture class.

Here’s Ray McGovern on Why Cheney shivved Rove – so they can do Iran.

I just love the leadersheep in that ad! They really struck me in the Straight Talk video from yesterday and I’m glad to see them become stars in their own right.

Is that *crickets* I hear instead of an apology?

check out my bold on the following quote from think progress;

TNR’s Chait takes on Kristol. The New Republic’s Jonathan Chait takes on the “decrepit intellectual state of neoconservatism,” and its intellectual driver, Bill Kristol. Chait claims there was a time when “there was something inspiring” about the neoconservative vision, but no longer:

As the Iraq war has curdled, the idealism and liberalism have drained out of the neoconservative vision. What remains is a noxious residue of bullying militarism. Kristol’s arguments are merely the same pro-war arguments that have been used historically by right-wing parties throughout the world: Complexity is weakness, dissent is treason, willpower determines all.

Kristol’s good standing in the Washington establishment depends on the wink-and-nod awareness that he’s too smart to believe his own agitprop. Perhaps so. But, in the end, a fake thug is not much better than the real thing.

I have alwasy said it looks like krystol doesn’t believe his own self when he’s being questioned, he always has this little smirk like;

“ya, that’s our story and we’re sticking to it”

I guess everyone gets that feeling from him

turd

Juan Cole has this tidbit up:

http://www.juancole.com/2007/0…..-iraq.html

I also just checked MSNBC and their headline is this: “U.S. report sees precarious Iraqi government: Intelligence analysts say ‘leaders remain unable to govern effectively’”

So I’m putting two and two together…

Seems to me a coup is a viable option to get the Bushies off the hook in Iraq. Publicly, they can just throw up their collective hands and say there’s nothing we can do about it. You know, Iraqi sovereignity and all. It’s also a convenient excuse to keep U.S. troops in place to provide security.

Privately, however, W may even be in on the planning. Bush can say he supports al-Maliki all day long while he raises the knife to firmly plant it in al-Maliki’s back. He’s done it before.

Have folks been watching Christine Amanapours three part special on “God’s Warriors”. Religious Jewish, Muslim and Christian zealots

Her reporting on this issue is quite amazing.

Cnn will air the third part this evening.

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2007/gods.warriors/

Mutant Poodle @ 23

Good Morning.

Re: Collins.

I kind of hate to get into this, but I am wondering if anyone thinks that it is an added disadvantage to Collins to be whiny because she’s a woman? Do people sense that the male/female perception paradigm which makes us call a screaming male boss “tough” and the female version “bitch” comes into play here?

Specifically, do women have an extra burden to seem unflappable in the face of this stuff, lest they be pegged as unstable and overly emotional? (Interestingly, the tape the Dems put out of the “confrontation showed collins handling the incident perfectly – polite, not terribly concerned.)

I think the Collins campaign is being stupid, and if she were a man I’d think exactly the same. But I wonder where people think we are on the gender politics of this issue.

Also consider the flip side, that they are playing off the general cultural distaste for “beating up on a woman.” The classic example being the debate when Hillary was running for Senate, when her opponent marched across the stage to press her to sign some sort of pledge, and ended up looking like a bully.

It’s hard to imagine the complaint of feeling threatened by a guy with a camera working from a male perspective (annoyed, yes, threatened, no.) But since it is quite conceivably threatening to a woman who is not a public figure, I can imagine that working in their favor.

I certainly agree that gender politics figures into this, I’m just not sure which aspect is stronger.

Either way, it’s probably good that a fem-blogger is the one to call them out on this. *g*

Massive Nonviolent Resistance: General Strike!

One thing that strikes me about the donors to Susan Collins campaign (see link below) is the huge amount of lumber (and paper) firms scattered through out the list, comprising a significant chunk of change. Lumber is important in Maine but I wonder if her family’s lumber company in Caribou is benefitting materially from this in other ways as well.

http://www.opensecrets.org/pol…..cycle=2000

Do we have comparisons for other campaigns elsewhere. And, any specific issues before her on this?

good day pups – lurking today i’m surrounded by testostrone – 4 grandsons visiting at one time – a bit much lol – they return home tomorrow so its hard to keep up lakeside…soo much going on and i want to remain in the loop – september is fast approaching and lots of activities are planned…

Christy Hardin Smith @ 24

Mutant at 23 — No — she’s crying wolf and ought to be called on it — because she has used this tactic in the past and it is dishonest and smarmy. Her boobs have nothing to do with it whatsoever.

I agree – which is why I referenced the actual tape where SHE actually is fine with it – it’s the manufactured scandal that’s at issue here.

Mine was a more general question. I’m thinking of how Hillary might be attacked if she’s the Dem nominee, for example.

Redshift @ 30

Either way, it’s probably good that a fem-blogger is the one to call them out on this. *g*

I believe, when referencing Collins, it’s “foul-mouthed fem blogger.”

peanutbutter @ 13

A bit OT from downstairs, regarding the idea t hat Rove is attacking Clinton to draw away from Edwards.

I dunno about others, but I thought that sounded a little far fetched. So I went a-googling, and immediately found this, which was a real eye opener…
Rove’s shot at Clinton could mean anything

John Edwards for President.

The MSM and the pundits are trying to drag him down. Rove is attacking Hillary. It adds up.

Christy Hardin Smith @ 6

peanutbutter at 4 — The crazy thing is that the Collins campaign arrogantly thought that no one would call them on pulling this stunt twice. Hellooooo?!?

The Collins campaign is operating in something of a pre-blog mindset.

They don’t realize (yet) that they can’t recycle their old tricks without being called on it.

Meanwhile, we at FDL and in the progressive online community have learned all about these sort of tricks, both through our online review of Collins’ own campaign history and through our recent trial by fire with the Lieberman campaign.

So, on one hand we have a Republican senator who is trying to hide her party affiliation and her support for Bush and the war behind a veneer of bipartisanship while simultaneously trying to recycle the political tricks she and her allies like Lieberman have employed in the past.

On the other hand we have a progressive blogosphere that has successfully pulled back the mask on one fake “moderate” (Lieberman) and which has learned a lot about how to counter the dirty tricks of our opponents.

Maine is going to be really fun.

the way to solve the “bully” charge is to assign a petite little woman to manage the camera…

mc @ 28

Juan Cole has this tidbit up:

http://www.juancole.com/2007/0…..-iraq.html

I also just checked MSNBC and their headline is this: “U.S. report sees precarious Iraqi government: Intelligence analysts say ‘leaders remain unable to govern effectively’”

So I’m putting two and two together…

Seems to me a coup is a viable option to get the Bushies off the hook in Iraq. Publicly, they can just throw up their collective hands and say there’s nothing we can do about it. You know, Iraqi sovereignity and all. It’s also a convenient excuse to keep U.S. troops in place to provide security.

Privately, however, W may even be in on the planning. Bush can say he supports al-Maliki all day long while he raises the knife to firmly plant it in al-Maliki’s back. He’s done it before.

It may well be happening, but I don’t think it’ll get the Bushies off the hook. One of the main arguments against the occupation is that our troops are in the middle of a civil war. A military coup just reinforces that — everyone understands that a coup is a civil war. In addition, non-wingnut Americans think coups are pretty univerally bad things. They’re occasionally less bad than the government they overthrow, but when they’re overthrowing a government that we put in power, and especially if Bush follows it up by saying “okay, our forces are going to work with the coup leaders now,” it just strengthens the idea that he really, really screwed up and doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing.

Ed*ard Teller @ 25

This would have been a more appropriate link during the last thread, but I’ve been busy making a sleeping potion powerpoint presentation for my big lecture class.

Here’s Ray McGovern on Why Cheney shivved Rove – so they can do Iran.

I think this McGovern piece is weak. I dispute the presumption that Rove would have scruples about attacking Iran, or that he wouldn’t welcome another war as a desperate electoral gambit. More importantly, he never made the foreign policy decisions, and he knew it.

Ed*ard Teller @ 25

This would have been a more appropriate link during the last thread, but I’ve been busy making a sleeping potion powerpoint presentation for my big lecture class.

Here’s Ray McGovern on Why Cheney shivved Rove – so they can do Iran.

A*P*C pushing hard hard hard for confrontation with Iran.
http://www.aipac.org/

Three top action issues have to do with Iran.

Take Action

Support Sanctions Against Iran
Support Military Aid to Israel
Support Divestment from Iran

No agenda here

OT Progressive Patriots has a very fun youtube up:
http://www.progressivepatriots…..president/

Redshift @39:

It wouldn’t be presented in the media as a coup.

new thread upstairs

Mutant Poodle:

I’m thinking of how Hillary might be attacked if she’s the Dem nominee, for example.

Oh not to worry. In all sort of ways and guises that I cannot even begin to enumerate here. But I’m hoping it won’t come to that…*g*

*xyz @ 37:

You’re dead on the money on the preblog mindset.

brendan:

I left you a comment at the tail end of the last thread.

perris @ 27

check out my bold on the following quote from think progress;

TNR’s Chait takes on Kristol. The New Republic’s Jonathan Chait takes on the “decrepit intellectual state of neoconservatism,” and its intellectual driver, Bill Kristol. Chait claims there was a time when “there was something inspiring” about the neoconservative vision, but no longer:

As the Iraq war has curdled, the idealism and liberalism have drained out of the neoconservative vision. What remains is a noxious residue of bullying militarism. Kristol’s arguments are merely the same pro-war arguments that have been used historically by right-wing parties throughout the world: Complexity is weakness, dissent is treason, willpower determines all.

Kristol’s good standing in the Washington establishment depends on the wink-and-nod awareness that he’s too smart to believe his own agitprop. Perhaps so. But, in the end, a fake thug is not much better than the real thing.

I have alwasy said it looks like krystol doesn’t believe his own self when he’s being questioned, he always has this little smirk like;

“ya, that’s our story and we’re sticking to it”

I guess everyone gets that feeling from him

turd

And shame on Chait for ever taking the closeted little fascist seriously….

fahrender @ 36

peanutbutter @ 13

A bit OT from downstairs, regarding the idea t hat Rove is attacking Clinton to draw away from Edwards.

I dunno about others, but I thought that sounded a little far fetched. So I went a-googling, and immediately found this, which was a real eye opener…
Rove’s shot at Clinton could mean anything

John Edwards for President.

The MSM and the pundits are trying to drag him down. Rove is attacking Hillary. It adds up.

Hillary = Republican Lite and Corporate Heavy

Ed*ard Teller @ 25

This would have been a more appropriate link during the last thread, but I’ve been busy making a sleeping potion powerpoint presentation for my big lecture class.

Here’s Ray McGovern on Why Cheney shivved Rove – so they can do Iran.

Wow. Thanks for the link. Ruined my lunch but, still, great article.

Biodun @ 47

brendan:

I left you a comment at the tail end of the last thread.

Thanks.

“This comes from someone who supported the Patriot Act with the attitude, “If you’re not doing anything wrong, it shouldn’t bother you.”

bing-damnit-o!

When the Admin sez “we done nuttin’ wrong” out one side of their mouth, and “we ain’t talkin’, ’cause it’s privileged” out the other, this is the 2×4 that needs to be applied to their head!

Being a long-time Mainer, I am really grateful to FDL for highlighting this race.
I am so sick of hearing Collins – and Snowe – referred to as ‘moderate’; nothing could be further from the truth.
The most cursory look at her voting record clearly shows that she and Bush are BFF…

OldCoastie @ 38

the way to solve the “bully” charge is to assign a petite little woman to manage the camera…

ooooh, wicked funny!

Of Course Collins finds video taping of her wrong. She has no idea that newspaper editors are supposed to be impartial, even when they are married to one of her staffers.

Senator Susan Collins gets amazing press from the Bangor Daily News. AMAZING. Her press release’s complaints that she was being taped by the Allen campaign – while, gasp, marching in a parade – got the BDN to do a front page story and to run an editorial tut-tutting over it as bad for civil discourse in Maine.

When she first ran, the BDN got all agog because people had looked at information in the public record about her.

They are her biggest fans, excusing away every pro-war and pro-Bush vote. They help keep the myth alive that she is a thoughtful moderate.

Well, what almost no one knows is that the Executive Editor of the BDN (Mark Woodward)’s wife (Bridget Woodward) is on Senator Collins’ Bangor staff. This is a clear conflict of interest.

How can we inform the people of Maine about it? You know darn well that the BDN won’t tell anyone!!!

For a bunch of folks who are SO concerned with potential problems in how campaigns are run, the BDN is living in a big glass house.

Two sourses:”met them both (23 / 0-)

Recommended by:
jxg, Rolfyboy6, juls, chimpy, Spud1, aggressiveprogressive, homo neurotic, inclusiveheart, citizenx, GTPinNJ, QuickSilver, blue jersey mom, wiscmass, Spathiphyllum, lgmcp, Prof Dave, Ellicatt, Craig Burnham, A Mad Mad World, Rumarhazzit, KansasLiberal, ArgusRun, Oliver W Holmes the 3rd, BlueGenes

I met both of them at an event, where we chatted about any number of things and where I learned that Mark, the executive editor of BDN, is married to Bridget Woodward, a Collins staffer. Then when the BDN started criticizing the Allen campaign, I was talking to the person who invited me to the event, who reminded me of this relationship.

I haven’t found anything listing both on-line, but here is Mark http://company.bangordailynews.com/… and here is Bridget http://www.themha.org/… listed under the Maine (Bangor) office.

Anyone who is involved in Bangor area civic life/politics with folks at this level should be able to confirm this. Or just call either of them and ask them. I doubt they’d deny it.

by maineiac on Thu Aug 23, 2007 at 12:55:44 PM PDT”

And this NYT article, seventh paragraph:
http://www.nytimes.com/specials/teens/wine.html

“When Zach asked his mother about Brian’s moving in, Bridget Woodward said, “I have to talk with your dad” — Mark Woodward, the editor of The Bangor Daily News — even though she knew it would fall mainly on her. Mrs. Woodward, an aide in the local office of Senator Susan Collins, is finicky about her home, and kept mentioning the extra laundry, the food and how they would fit everyone’s beverages in one refrigerator. But what she was thinking was, “Do I want all this responsibility?”

TSK TSK, Senator Collins shame on you for your double standard, and blatant dishonesty with the Maine voters.