Letters to the Editor
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Confused
So, wingnuttia is admitting Boylan wrote the email he denies writing, correct?
And Greenwald is "mendacious" for not publishing the entire email. Which he published.
Meanwhile Boylan spends the rest of his Sunday praising Ahmed Chalabi (no I'm not kidding).
And Petraeus gets mentioned as a VP candidate for Mitt Romney. By Bill Safire, who I'd hoped was safely dead.
Hopefully, Boylan can still be his flack. Once he figures out which emails he writes are actually, you know, written by him.
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It's simple, really...
...accusations, especially ones that are screamed about, appear on the front page and grab everyone's attention.
Since liberals are, by definition from the rightwing bloggers, evil liars...that is justification alone for the "gotcha" tactics of slander, misinformation, and exaggerations. Like most arguments and beliefs of the right, their ends justify any means.
And if they are wrong, they don't care. Retractions/corrections always appear 3-4 days later, on page 16, or never at all.
What matters is that in their eyes, we are evil, and they believe in their constant vigilance against our evil. What they don't understand, and why they are ignorant (not stupid), is they are -exactly- what they accuse us liberals of being...and they don't even realize it.
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"what else besides abject stupidity can explain this?"
I would propose contempt:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/06/29/authoritarianism/
Have you ever seen Dick Cheney give a speech? I mean, the contempt for the audience is palpable... [h]e looks like he should be eating a sandwich while he's doing it...
I truly believe that, taking their cues from their "leaders," the authoritarian right really does not give a shit what anyone thinks that doesn't already agree with them. Thus we get slapdash hack jobs like that blog, or high-school A/V club-level fake news conferences like FEMA did last week, or Dick Cheney eating lunch while giving a speech.
They don't give a fuck, they're not open to debate, and they have unending disdain and contempt for you me, and any inconvenient facts that may get in the way of their story. So much the worse for us.
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it's more than abject stupidity
In fact, I'd say that Greenwald exceeds mere exaggeration and mischaracterization and flirts with outright lies in that section of his post. …I hope the Colonel did write it, and, if he did, that he gets a commendation for it. ~Bluto at Dread Pundit
And what did Glenn exaggerate? Where did he “flirt” with lies?
Bluto doesn’t say. He just makes those unsubstantiated charges with nothing to back them up. And that, of course, is all that the wingnuts need to send them into another hysterical hissy fit over nothing – they just need someone, anyone, (even a drooling Bluto) to make some charges.
It doesn’t make a bit a difference to them if there’s nothing to those charges, they’ll repeat them, embellish them and embrace them as fact.
No Glenn, it’s more than abject stupidity (although that’s there in abundance too). It’s intentional distortion and defamation based on a deliberately disingenuous reading of your post.
Since they aren’t able to adequately argue with what you say, they’ll attack you for something you didn’t say. They don’t care, just so they can attack.
That they want this embarrassing e-mail to be authentic, and want Col. Boylan to win a medal for his partisan politicization of the army says all you need to know about their lack of ethics, honesty and intelligence.
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They are also...
Fanatical.
Truth, fiction, smart, stupid... they don't care.
What matters is that they are attacking teh enamee. And you gave them an opening by asking questions of one of the untouchables.
What matters is that they are effective. So I hope that when you slam these D-List bloggers you are clear that this is a sensible use of your time. I rather feel your energies are better spent unpacking more serious government deception; these people are either too stupid to engage, or too fanatical to reason with. Your attacking them may make them feel they have a point. So by all means go after Boylan, but I don't feel there is much mileage going after someone like Rusty Bedsprings.
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What else could explain it?
How about abject, blatant and diliberate dishonesty? I think that could explain the right wing blogosphere. It could explain much about the right wing of American politics.
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Think maybe you touch a nerve, GG?
This fascinating e-mail and the follow-up hysteria cautions me to offer this one, unfortunately morbid, word of caution to you, Glenn: whatever you do, please do not get baited into actually going to Iraq to "see for yourself." You will likely be dead fifteen minutes after you land, shot in the back by an un-located "sniper" using an AK-47 with gunpowder residue made in America. I hate to say that about my country and those in power in it, but assuming (hopefully) it would still be too obvious to "rendish" a guy like you, they could still try to sell an "accident" and get noted liberal reporters from the NY Times to write it up and send it in.
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Just saying
I recall that wisdom is characterized in knowing that you don't know everything; thus, the classic definition of a liberal is one who seeks to understand a subject before making a decision.
The classic conservative seeks to maintain the status quo; they don't need to understand anything beyond that; so the highlighted bloggers already know everything they want to know--apparently they learned everything they needed to know by middle school.
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Don't be distracted
Glenn,
Your postings that hold both our government and the media to account are too important for you to be distracted by what might be a hoax or by the right-wing trolls who distort what you say.
I'm no expert in ferreting out false e-mail headers, but I am an expert in reading comprehension. There is nothing in your posting about this matter that is clarified or corrected by the entire e-mail exchange.
My heartfelt advice: Forget about it! Don't take your eye off the ball! Get on with your primary work of being a national watchdog!