Well, yeah, I can see left and right saying that about agricultural subsidies. Ike's otherwise usually sensible positions notwithstanding.

But yanno, Nixon was all about Ike, and subverted and betrayed Earl Warren's attempt (to which he had pledged himself), and secretly worked to secure the nomination for Ike, and also did everything possible to destroy the most right-wing candidate, Taft. (And got the VP spot on the Ike ticket as a result.) Nixon's right-wing bona fides rest almost solely on his HUAC mebership and anti-communist hyperbole. He did, after all, as prez give us wage and price controls.

I've never understood the right's loyalty to Nixon, at all.

I spell it "ignerrent" ... but then IANAL. ;-)

And speaking of not totally relying on the credentialism or spelling of lawyers, I once received a complaint charging my client with "liable," as in, defamation. I assume his secretary did this per a dictation machine, but even so....

It's not like being a professor is mutually exclusive with being moronic. Prof. Smith needs to grow up and realize that stamping his feet about his qualifications is not in itself convincing.

Oh my, you sing it brother, and I'll turn the pages. The good professor seems not to realize that the readership here is teeming with those who either have tons of alphabet soup after their own names, and/or who are highly insightful autodidacts.

Professor, you'd best be about examining the actual points Greenwald made, rather than spewing ad hominems and pitching a hissy fit. As an (adult) faculty brat, I can assure you that your credentials here, merci a dieu, mean exactly *nothing.* Substance reigns.

Very truly -- and well-credentialed, and whose mommy and daddy both have journalism degrees, one of whom holds a Ph.D. and taught with other infantile egomaniacs at a university -- yours,

whose WaPo op-ed Glenn recommends in an update, lost his son in Iraq in May of last year. Bacevich -- a Vietnam Vet and officer -- thought both wars wrong. Before his son died, Bacevich had been intelligently and loudly opposing the Iraq war.

His column about his son's death is well worth reading, including for this filth:

Among the hundreds of messages that my wife and I have received, two ...held me personally culpable, insisting that my public opposition to the war had provided aid and comfort to the enemy. Each said that my son's death came as a direct result of my antiwar writings.

.

This may seem a vile accusation to lay against a grieving father. But in fact, it has become a staple of American political discourse, repeated endlessly by those keen to allow President Bush a free hand in waging his war. By encouraging "the terrorists," opponents of the Iraq conflict increase the risk to U.S. troops. Although the First Amendment protects antiwar critics from being tried for treason, it provides no protection for the hardly less serious charge of failing to support the troops -- today's civic equivalent of dereliction of duty.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/25/AR2007052502032.html

Even if that's true [that Paul and Kucinich are shunned/reviled by the MSM], so what? Are you saying that's the reason why they aren't the front runners - because people don't know what they stand for?

It is certainly what *I* am saying. My adult son and daughter-in-law hate Bush (after voting for him in '04) and have decided for the near- to mid-term they are Democrats. But they noticed all these Ron Paul signs around, and were intrigued when I said I was voting for him in the MI primary, since they know that I, too, in general despise contemporary Republicans.

But they don't know what Paul really stands for, or Kucinich for that matter. They have, however, heard all about Edwards' haircut, Hillary's cleavage, and the Obama is a Muslim mole. They think that is all horsehit, but as busy working parents of four children they lack the luxury of getting news primarily from the Internet, rather than NBC.

Further, Paul really is not the *ideal* candidate, because he does have some racial baggage and bugbear obsessions that divide even the rest of us libertarians as to his fitness. And Kucinich is too far left for many, even tho he is awfully good on several issues, and he and Ron Paul are friends.

The reality is that on the issues of Empire-building, war-mongering and razing the military-industrial complex, the MSM will not give the time of day to a serious candidate who wants to talk about THOSE issues. And as has been said, the medium is the message. Russ Feingold decided not to run, I think, because he knew it would be futile in light of this reality.

One can absorb far more in a half hour of reading than a half hour of listening to even the fastest talker.

The "I'm too busy to do more than watch the nooz on TV" excuse doesn't cut the mustard in the final analysis.

I tend to strongly agree with that. But reality is that households with parents working two demanding jobs and raising four rambunctious kids, are very time-consuming indeed for the adults involved. It just is easier to collapse on the sofa and tune into Brian Williams than to read blogs -- especially when they read stuff and/or crunch numbers all day at work.

But I do my best to explain "where they are going wrong," without becoming that dread beast, the "domineering harpy of a mother/mother-in-law"). And because I do that, they both ask my opinion on various issues with some frequency.

Finally, Glenn's constant (and incisive) railings about the Establishment media are so important precisely because we just must accept that the dominant media create the dominant narratives. And that is partly due to the fact that most people don't have the time to form their opinions in the alternative media of the blogosphere.