Be Gone, Fog, Be Gone!

I have to admit that my curiosity was piqued a bit yesterday when I read the remarks of The Florida Masochist regarding the Valerie Plame matter (and again, James Moore’s entry today on that at The Huffington Post and The Smirking Chimp is the best analysis I’ve read to date). It was similar to the sensation I recall from watching a horror movie to find out how many times the soon-to-be-victim would do something truly dumb, like continuing to wash clothes or paint a fence while whistling and leaving the cottage gate unlocked while Frankenstein, Dracula, The Wolf Man or The Mummy lurked nearby, as the threatening music built to a crescendo and the shadows grew longer (the old Universal Studios monster movies were always on in my house growing up, and you can read into that however you want).

Since the country is in such wonderful shape (ahem…), I thought I would journey further into Wingnuttia to find out how some of the big-hit propagandists are faring these days as they thoroughly analyze the critical issues facing our republic (I made sure to take an antacid to coat my stomach first to try and prevent fits of nausea).

This is what I found instead…

- The site of the American Enterprise Institute has a link to an article about “The Future Of The U.N.,” from that well-known consensus builder, voice of moderation and author of the “Contract on America” himself, Newt Gingrich. He provided Senate testimony regarding U.N. “reform” (I’m beginning to think that no politician should ever be allowed to use that word again), which would entail abolishing the U.N. Human Rights Commission. Golly, why didn’t I think of that…

- The National Review’s “On The Corner” page has more Reagan nostalgia from that paragon of journalistic integrity, none other than Rush Limbaugh. The site also contains a diatribe against “pushy” women reporters from someone named Kathryn Jean Lopez (interesting to see that Bushco’s PR job on the Harriet Miers nomination is still falling flat among the faithful, by the way, which is commented on at this site).

- Instapundit was railing today against what appears to be a defeat in the Senate of an amendment sponsored by Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma (that automatically makes me suspicious) to a previous legislative appropriation. Here is the purpose of the amendment (from the “Power Line” blog, which must be a big deal with the neo-con crowd):

The amendment is very simple: it proposes to redirect the ridiculous $220 million earmarked for the Alaskan "bridge to nowhere" to Hurricane Katrina relief; specifically, reconstruction of the Twin Spans Bridge that connects New Orleans with Slidell, Louisiana.

(And by the way, whenever someone says something is very simple, it usually isn't.)

Power Line uses typically understated rhetoric to describe the battle for the amendment, referring to whole episode as “a hill to die on.” With that in mind, I should point out that people I know who have served in the military, including family members, have been usually very judicious in my experience, taking care not to throw around such language for no good reason.

Also, since the amendment represents a fight among Repugs (Stevens and Murkowski both being from Alaska), does this represent another “divide and conquer” moment among the “falling out of favor” party?

Update 10/23: Can I hold the door for you, Sen. Stevens, you bleeping egomaniac?

- Tune into Little Green Footballs today for All Terrorism, All al Qaeda, All Palestinians All The Time (the online version of “The Two Minutes Hate” I guess). They post an article from Reuters about Dubya meeting with Mahmoud Abbas today, so that’s something timely they have the right to comment on, but I’m not entirely sure why they took a shot at the Reuters news agency (though what is a Repug without someone to snarl at, I suppose?). Still, I have to admit that the site has a nice layout.

Well, this was all I could tolerate for one sitting, so I said enough (the title of this post describes one of my reactions).

By the way, I definitely understand the distinction between these four sites and have for some time. Instapundit and Little Green Footballs pretend to present something in the way of serious news analysis, The National Review site has some of that but mainly contents itself with presenting scholarly-sounding verbosity to keep the faithful properly anesthetized, and the American Enterprise Institute site is the location for this week’s gaggle of preferred Repug “shouting” points (I don’t refer to them as “talking points” since these individuals are never really interested in a discussion about anything that deviates from their agenda).

In search of a dose of propaganda-free reporting, I came across the latest from Molly Ivins and was properly sated. This was all intended to lead into the link to her column anyway, so I guess it was a bit of overkill to review these other areas of “the dark side.” Still, though, this is a necessary exercise from time to time, since it will help us to recognize the face of the enemy when we see it.

Update 10/21: This item is part of the continuing effort by the Repugs and their media accomplices to prop up Dubya (tied a bit to the Reagan/jellybean reference in the "Betraying Our Kids" post). Also, I have a message for Ahh-nold; as I said before, I once did a Google search for "George W. Bush" and "Bait and Switch" and came back with 96,500 hits. There's a message there.