Sarah Palin: Party like it's 1773!

By Michael J.W. Stickings 

Those who have read this blog before, or who know me at all, know that I'm a proud and dedicated liberal who supports the Democratic Party and whose politics are, for the most part, deeply progressive.

But you know what? Sometimes liberals (and those otherwise on the left) fuck up.

To wit, there has been much ado today over remarks Sarah Palin made at a Tea Party rally in Reno, Nevada yesterday. Specifically, she told the mob that they shouldn't "party like it's 1773" until conservatives take over Washington.

Party like it's... 1773?

On Twitter, a small handful of liberals, including Markos Moulitsas, made fun of Palin for apparently getting the date wrong. Even PBS's Gwen Ifill, Biden-Palin debate moderator, called Palin out:

Sarah Palin: party like its 1773! ummm,

Earlier today, she tried to explain herself:

Stand down everybody. I was quoting Sarah Palin from her Nevada speech yesterday.

Which isn't entirely convincing. What was the "ummm" for if not to suggest that Palin had gotten it wrong?

Whatever the case with Ifill, conservatives are all over this. (Check out the wild reaction at Memorandum.) As they point out, rightly, Palin did in fact mean 1773, not 1776, because the Boston Tea Party happened that year. And, yes, she was obviously referring, with her speech right in front of her, to that event and not to the signing of the Declaration of Independence three years later.

Yes, yes. Fine.

But a simple, knee-jerk mistake by a few liberals/progressives hardly constitutes mass ignorance. Michelle Malkin refers to "[m]oron leftists" and Allahpundit refers to "left-wing imbeciles," as well as to the supposed "[l]efty insta-meme" that the "[i]diot Sarah Palin doesn't know that the Declaration of Independence was signed in 1776," but, again, so what? It's not like the mistake of a tiny minority should be held against everyone else, even if rightists like these try to tie us all together. Most of us know that the Boston Tea Party took place in 1773, or at least not in 1776 -- and, of course, most of us didn't jump all over Palin for supposedly speaking in error.

So. Big deal. Whatever. A few liberals fucked up. That's all.

Besides, Palin is often wrong and Markos is usually right. Indeed, earlier today, he tweeted, citing TPM, that Palin (via Twitter) mistakenly endorsed John Raese for Senate from Pennsylvania. Actually, he's running for Senate from West Virginia. Duh.

What's more, I would add that the rallying cry of partying like it's 1773 just doesn't make any sense. It's not things were so great in 1773 -- hence the tea party, which was an act of rebellion (not partying). If you want to party like it's 1776, or 1789, or whatever, that's fine, I suppose, but partying like the British are still your overlords and you have to dump a boatload of tea into Boston Harbor to make a grand political statement is ridiculous.

Just like Sarah Palin is ridiculous, and far worse, however much the mob may cheer and her various supporters and apologists on the right may rush to her defence and lash out at her critics at every opportunity.

I'm not excusing getting the whole "party like it's 1773" thing wrong -- we liberals need to hold ourselves to high standards, and that, unlike for the other side, means getting the facts right -- but, when it comes down to it, it's really just a tempest in a right-wing teapot that shouldn't obscure the fact that Palin is often appallingly wrong when she opens her mouth.

Let's move on.

MSNBC blacklists Kos: A tale of murder, Twitter, and media double standards

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Did you know that in 2001, around the time Chandra Levy, an intern at the Federal Bureau of Prisons, disappeared and media attention focused on Democratic Rep. Gary Condit, with whom Levy, who was from Condit's district, had had an affair, there was another serious incident, if one that received far less attention, involving a young woman, one Lori Klausutis, who worked for then-Rep. Joe Scarborough, now a big-shot MSNBC host?

I didn't either, until I read about Markos "Kos" Moulitsas being blacklisted from MSNBC.

It's still not clear what happened, but the 28-year-old Klausutis died at Scarborough's office in Fort Walton Beach, Florida. The mystery surrounds how she died, and if anyone else was involved. Conspiracy theories abound that Scarborough himself was involved, but nothing, it seems, has ever come of them. Kos wrote about the incident back in 2005.

Well, as Kos writes, Scarborough was all over the Joe Sestak "scandal" (the allegation that the White House offered Sestak a job to keep him from challenging Republican-turned-Democrat Arlen Specter in this year's Pennsylvania Senate race. (Sestak challenged and won the nomination.) Scarborough accused the media of neglecting to give the story, such as it was one, its due. In response, Kos tweeted: "Like story of a certain dead intern..." Scarborough fired back, accusing Kos of having "a long history of spreading lies" and of calling him a murderer. Kos replied that he had never called Scarborough a murder, noting that the issue was "media hypocrisy": "But he was Dem. You aren't."

Maybe there's nothing to the conspiracy theories, but Kos certainly wasn't pushing them. Rather, all he did was bring up the lack of media coverage of Klausutis's death. But that was enough to send Scarborough over the edge, and the upshot is that Kos has been blacklisted from MSNBC. As MSNBC head Phil Griffin put it in a statement reprinted (in full) by Kos:

Yes, after I became aware of the ugly cheap shot  you  took at Joe on Twitter, I asked the teams to take a break from booking you on our shows for a while. I found the comments to be in poor taste, and utterly uncalled for in a civil discourse.

I'm hoping this will be only temporary and that the situation can be resolved in a mature fashion, but until then I just don't know how one could reasonably expect to be welcomed onto our network while publicly antagonizing one of our hosts at the same time.

The DailyKos community has been among the most supportive of MSNBC, and we continue to appreciate that support.

Well, a lot of people antagonize MSNBC hosts. Are you not welcome on the network if you've ever criticized Chris Matthews or Rachel Maddow or Keith Olbermann? And, again, it's not like Kos called Scarborough a murderer. All he did was bring up a subject that Scarborough finds uncomfortable, one for obvious reasons he would rather consign forever to the dustbin of his own sordid past, far away from prying eyes.

What Kos is getting at here is that there appears to be a double standard, just as there was with the coverage of Levy/Klausutis, one driven by partisanship and ideology. And it's all about the media giving conservatives a free pass. It may not be clear-cut, and there may be exceptions to it, but that doesn't mean it isn't there.

Meanwhile, the Kos-Scarborough flare-up probably could have been handled more maturely, but it's really only Kos's first tweet that went a bit too far (if anything, he could have been more tactful). After that, it was Scarborough who lost it, throwing a "temper tantrum" and complaining to his boss (who "lets Scarborough call the shots" and so who was bound to side with his low-rated morning host).

Regardless, it's pretty stupid for MSNBC to blacklist a major progressive voice and new media icon like Markos Moulitsas. It would do well to rethink its priorities, and to think through its double standards.

Contra Kucinich

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I generally have quite a bit of time for Dennis Kucinich, even when I disagree with him. But his self-defeating opposition to Obama's health-care reform package, and to the Democratic plan in Congress (Senate bill + minor patches passed through reconciliation), is, at this point, simply indefensible.

Advocate for a better bill, including a robust public option? Sure.

Threaten to vote against the only bill that has a chance of passing, hoping to bring it down? What the hell is he thinking?

Well, he's thinking like Ralph Nader, and we know how that turned out in 2000.

And so I'm with Markos Moulitsas on this (video below):

[Kucinich] is not elected to grandstand and to give us this ideal utopian society. He is elected to represent the people of his district and he is not representing the uninsured constituents in his district by pretending to take the high ground here...

What he is doing is undermining this reform. He is making common cause with Republicans. And I think that is a perfect excuse and a rational one for a primary challenge.

Like it or not, this is where we are. As I put it the other day:

It is a bitter thing, I know, to have to swallow a compromise bill written to appeal to "ConservaDem" support, and to accept demands made by the likes of Ben Nelson and Joe Lieberman. It doesn't seem like a win. But it is, and it's a big one, and it's time, long past time, to put aside our differences and to accept that this is it, like it or not, that it's much better than nothing, that it contains some genuinely progressive elements, that millions of people will benefit from it, and that it could very well be the start of a major shift in America towards greater justice and fairness not just with respect to health care but more broadly within society as a whole.

That, it seems to me, is worth fighting for -- and, to that end, worth uniting for. 

It's time for Kucinich to get on board -- or else. As Jon Chait writes, "this is an extreme circumstance, and the Democratic base needs to let its representatives know that they will intentionally work to defeat members who try to save their own skin in a way that just gets everybody (including themselves) killed."

There's just too much at stake here, not just for the Democratic Party, and for individual Democrats, but for millions and millions of Americans. This historic opportunity to pass meaningful and progressive reform of an unjust and unfair system must not be allowed to be tossed into the dustbin.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Top Ten Cloves: Things Markos Moulitsas will have to look out for when working with Karl Rove at Newsweek

News Item: Karl Rove Hired As Newsweek Contributor To ‘Balance’ Markos

By J. Thomas Duffy

10. Markos will need to remember, when they bump into each other, to call him "Turd Blossom", not "Turd Face."

9. Markos have to come up with a good response, when trapped in the elevator and Rove, boastfully, challenges him with "And how many times did the Grand Jury call you in?"

8. Markos can't look sheepish when Rove presses him on "How many governors did you get thrown in jail?"

7. It's back to school for Markos, to brush up on and learn that New Math of Roves'

6. If Markos wants to vote in 2008, as long as Markos works with Rove, he needs to verify - frequently - with his local voting commission that they have his correct address.

5. One thing Markos can definitely ignore -- dancing lessons from Karl Rove.

4. Markos shouldn't bite when Rove tries to get him to answer "And how many U.S. Attorneys did you get fired?"

3. If Markos has any family or relatives that work, covertly, for the CIA, he's got to keep that info away from Rove.

2. Markos will have to come up with somebody, to be their brains, or have to endure Rove's sing-song taunts of "I'm Bush's Brain ... I'm Bush's Brain ..."

1. Markos shouldn't bring up, or interview, Margaret Spellings... Karl's still a little touchy about it ...















Why, It's A Mini Rovepalooza Linkfest

Kos: It's Karl Rove

Karl Rove's New Gig

Jane Hamsher/Firedoglake: Newsweek to Hire Karl Rove

Steve Benen/The Carpetbagger Report: Juan Williams defines ‘journalist’

Digby: "It's A Great Lie"

A Further Embellishment On The Appropriately Named CREEP

Logan Murphy/Crooks and Liars: Keith Olbermann Says Goodbye To Turd Blossom

Joan Walsh/Salon: The man who sold the war

Lou Dubose/Salon: The collapse of Karl Rove; The Pygmalion strategist from Texas built up the Republican Party by exploiting the religious right -- and now his handiwork is crumbling.

Markos: If he offers, pass on the dancing lessons.


















(Cross-posted at The Garlic.)