BigFooting Matt Yglesias

Apparently Third Way is thin-skinned and didn’t like something Matt Yglesias wrote on his blog about them. The acting CEO of the place that provides him blog real estate decided to bigfoot on Matt’s blog.

A Special Note Re: Third Way

This is Jennifer Palmieri, acting CEO of the Center for American Progess Action Fund.

Most readers know that the views expressed on Matt’s blog are his own and don’t always reflect the views of the Center for American Progress Action Fund. Such is the case with regard to Matt’s comments about Third Way. Our institution has partnered with Third Way on a number of important projects – including a homeland security transition project – and have a great deal of respect for their critical thinking and excellent work product. They are key leaders in the progressive movement and we look forward to working with them in the future.

Hilarity ensued in the comments. Most people think it’s pretty shocking to post on someone else’s blog, especially to "correct" the misapprehension that Matt’s opinions are in some way the opinions of the CAPAF. But delving into it, there’s even more that’s funny.

Here’s what Matt said that apparently so offended someone at Third Way who then managed to get Ms Palmieri to pounce on Matt’s blog, using her publisher’s keys:

I’m getting sort of tired of the endless discussion of whether Barack Obama is a wholesome liberal or an evil centrist, but I have to say something about one aspect of this story:

“Barack Obama has never made any bones about it: He is a moderate,” said Matt Bennett, co-founder of Third Way, a moderate public policy think tank. “People who ignored that did so at their peril.”

Third Way is a neat organization — I used to work across the hall from them. And they do a lot of clever messaging stuff that a lot of candidates find very useful. But their domestic policy agenda is hyper-timid incrementalist bullshit. There are a variety of issues that they have nothing whatsoever to say on, and what policy ideas they do have are laughable in comparison to the scale of the problems they allegedly address. Which is fine, because Third Way isn’t really a “public policy think tank” at all, it’s a messaging and political tactics outfit. But Barack Obama’s policy proposals aren’t like that. At all. Nor do personnel on his policy teams — including the more ideologically moderate members — stand for anything that’s remotely as weak a brew as the stuff Third Way puts out. And yet, Third Way loves Barack Obama and says he’s a moderate just like them. Which is great. But everyone needs to see that these things are moving in two directions simultaneously. At the very same time Obama is disappointing progressive supporters on a number of fronts, he’s also bringing moderates on board for things that are way more ambitious than anything they were endorsing two or three years ago.

Without regard to the truth of what Matt said about Third Way, hyper-timid incrementalism , or Obama’s movement of moderates into more progressive suiting, the blogospheric moral of the story is this: the original blog post that so offended had 14 comments. The rude apologia that will always call into question Matt Yglesias’s editorial independence from the Center for American Progress Action Fund? 313 comments at this writing, and climbing steadily. Talk about calling more attention to something than it ever warranted. But I guess the pressure brought to bear must have made it all worth it, right, Jennifer?

Oh, and who is Jennifer Palmieri, you might ask? Why, she was mentioned in the same Mike Allen Politico EXCLUSIVE that was the source for my Lieberman/DHS Spokesbot post on Sunday night:

—Jennifer Palmieri – a Clinton White House veteran who is now acting chief executive officer of the Center for American Progress Action Fund and senior vice president for communications at American Progress – is being considered for assistant secretary of defense for public affairs. This is different than the job how held by Geoff Morrell, who briefs journalists as Pentagon press secretary. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, who is remaining from the Bush administration, has said Morrell will stay in that role.

Aren’t progressive DeeCee politics fun? And shouldn’t our progressive public relations people understand better how things work in the blogosphere?

{h/t atrios}

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