Well, I was going to respond to a few loose ends about Bill Clinton, e.g. disputing that he was in any way a genuine anti-corporate populist, and also noting that he failed to inspire unconditional positive regard from the corporate media because the DC Beltway mandarins despised him as an interloper, and outsider. But Glenn took care of the latter point already.

So I'll just observe that Gloria Borger is another splendid specimen of the modern Infotainwhore. I coined this neologism many months ago, although it may have gotten me bounced by blog censors on some sites. (Who knows why blog censors zap what they do? They are notorious for not only censoring content; they also retreat behind a posted set of "rules" that are entirely subjective in practice, and refuse to explain themselves or establish interactive feedback. But that's another rant...)

Anyway, I've been calling 'em infotainwhores because that's what they are. The fact that they present themselves as non-fiction writers, as it were, is the biggest fiction of all. I'm gratified that Glenn is using his bully pulpit to call them out, without using sophomoric terms like "infotainwhore" that drive away prim and staid readers. ;)

These corporations employs thousands of people. Isn't it weird that none of them -- not a single one - -has ever revealed the Great Corporate Plot whereby corporate heads tell the pundits and reporters what to say? You would think at least one of them would spill the beans on the conspiracy.

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Pardon my tangent, but I hope there's at least a trace of facetiousness in this observation; at first, I thought it was an intentional parody of the rhetoric of anti-conspiracist reactionaries. One of their favorite straw men is to postulate that it defies common sense to believe that any large-scale hidden agenda or plan would not be discovered as a result of betrayal and leaks by the hordes of agents carrying out the nefarious scheme.

But this begs the question of "conspiracy". Whether it's the manufacture of consent or terrorist acts (arguably related endeavors, by the bye), no astute observer or critic believes that such large-scale actions are executed by leaders gathering agents together in various assemblies and issuing Conspiracy Instructions-- "beans" in a jar. It's far likelier that concerted action is achieved by clandestine and incremental, discrete means, not unlike those commonly attributed to spies, secret agents, and terrorists-- the difference is that these actions are embedded in the everyday, routine business of legitimate organizations and agencies.

As in the well-known and extensively fictionalized field of espionage (and confidence games), with its isolated cells, codes and ciphers, trustworthy contacts, blind or innocuous go-betweeners, and other control mechanisms, things get done. Yes, this reads superficially like a paranoid perspective. But that doesn't invalidate it.

And conversely, it's also the case that "real" conspiracies hide in plain sight; that is, to the extent that sources do act or disclose information that betrays the possibility of a hidden scheme or agenda illicitly promoted by the powerful, complacent or co-opted observers simply overlook or rationalize away its unsettling implications in the dazzle and clamor of everyday life. I think it's far more of a straw man to presume that there are necessarily whistleblowers or screw-ups who have the requisite quantity or quality of beans to spill; especially in the face of ordinary skepticism and damage-control by those who really would rather not contend with the "beans".

Heaven forfend I should challenge Glenn-- watching him respond to his ineffectual detractors is like attending a joust at Camelot, watching Lancelot in the lists shiver shield after shield of foolish opponents. But I think it's a little too facile, even naïve, to discount claims of collusive action, pejoratively branded "conspiracies", on the grounds that such things couldn't be accomplished without some whistle-blower giving away the game.

I weeped too.

Say it ain't so, Dave!