On Jun 15, 2006, at 5:07 PM, Carrol Cox wrote:
> Add Cockburn's voice to those who are not particularly bothered by the
> Rove & the Plame affair.
>
> http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060703/cockburn
>
> "Thank God Rove is not to be indicted, so the left will have to talk
> about something else for a change. As a worthy hobbyhorse for the
> left,
> the whole Plame scandal has never made any sense. What was it all
> about
> in the first analysis? Outing a CIA employee. What's wrong with that?"
What a splendid column - it's like the Ace of old. I love this bit:
> Rove and Cheney, the White House's answer to Bouvard and Pécuchet,
> have driven George Bush into the lowest ratings of any American
> President. Yet the left remains obsessed with their evil powers. Is
> there any better testimony to the vacuity and impotence of the
> endlessly touted "blogosphere," which in mid-June had twin deb
> balls in the form of the Yearly Kos convention in Las Vegas and the
> Take Back America folkmoot of "progressive" Democrats in
> Washington, DC?
>
> In political terms the blogosphere is like white noise, insistent
> and meaningless. But MoveOn.org and Daily Kos are now hailed as the
> emergent form of modern politics, the target of an excited article
> by Bill McKibben in The New York Review of Books.
>
> Beyond raising money swiftly handed over to the gratified veterans
> of the election industry, both MoveOn and Daily Kos have had zero
> political effect, except as a demobilizing force. The effect on
> writers is horrifying. Talented people feel they have to produce
> 400 words of commentary every day, and you can see the lethal
> consequences on their minds and style, which turn rapidly to slush.
> They glance at the New York Times and rush to their laptops to
> rewrite what they just read. Hawsers to reality soon fray and they
> float off, drifting zeppelins of inanity.