Category: Edgewise

  • Torturing the Death out of Them: Ours

    Al-Qaida detainee recants claims, The New York Times 7/31/04 A senior leader of al-Qaida was the main source for intelligence…that Iraq had provided training in chemical and biological weapons to members of the organization…. Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, a member of Osama bin Laden’s inner circle, recanted the claims sometime last year, …. about links between…

  • Is Vietnam over?

    Jeff Jarvis notes that Vietnam is no longer a dirty word for Democrats. Vietnam split and weakened the party and divided the whole country. We’ve been living with that cultural cold war ever since. This reminds me of my suggested campaign theme (or meme) for Kerry: Kerry the Redeemer: Kerry has stood on both sides…

  • I just want to savor the moment

    Tonight, at least, Pat Buchanan is a Kerry booster. (What is up with that, by the way? For the last several weeks I’ve noticed him shifting into a Bill Kristol-style-almost-neutral-observer-who-happens-to-be-a-hard-righter mode. Is it a carrer move? Or, as someone over at dailykos.com speculated, is it a by-product of his longstanding dislike for the Bush family?)…

  • Matt Drudge: Liar

    I’ve been extra-super-special repulsed by Drudge’s coverage this week (with apologies, I just can’t stand to throw a link to this guy). There’s been a different piece of tear-them-down news for every cycle, all timed so evenly you have to figure it was all drawn out well ahead of the convention in color-coded crayon —…

  • Republicans in denial

    Interesting Edwards thread over at Talk Left (TalkLeft: Edwards Shines). Lots of bluster about how Bush’s base will support him and Kerry’s are undecided, or something. Then some corrective posts looking at where an incumbent should be by now and how the electoral college is stacking up, which just made me want to reply Shhh….…

  • Bob Dole and the return of the old nasty

    Back before the ’96 election, Bob Dole gave the GOP response to a Clinton State of the Union. And it was just shattering in its glowering negativity. In fact, his response was such a nasty, nutty, powerfully awful speech, it struck many as the very moment Dole’s campaign was plaster-wrapped and buried at sea. The…

  • Backfire

    You have to wonder: at what point will the GOP attacks on Kerry’s wife backfire? When will it start to seem petty and crude to the independent voter? Could it be, perhaps, when they start making a big deal out of inter-personal “I don’t like Ted Kennedy” type comments she made back in 1976? (I…

  • Luntz says “Kerry will win”

    Tom Schaller posts an interesting scoop over at the Gadflyer, recounting a “tipsy” conversation with Republican pollster and message crafter Frank Luntz (thank goodness for blogger ethics): “What do you think?” I ask him, in a tone that indicates that I’m not talking about last night’s Sox-Yankees brawl. “Kerry will win,” he says. I feel…

  • The sober case for Kerry

    Hyperbole aside, Thomas Oliphant’s balanced paean to Kerry in the American Prospect Online makes a solid case for the Democratic nominee-presumptive. In other news, Kucinich has endorsed Kerry.

  • Americans tortured children at Abu Ghraib

    Boing Boing: Evidence for Hersh’s claims of child sexual abuse at Abu Ghraib? This story just gets more and more nauseating. What the fuck were these people thinking?

  • Nondenial denials

    Holden at Eschaton is obsessed with the White House press corps’ daily gaggle: Q Why don’t you answer the question? Do we have secret detainees and is it possible that they could be subjected to the same treatment as in Baghdad prisons? MR. McCLELLAN: We work to address these issues that the Red Cross raises…

  • Pelosi’s bold prediction

    CNN.com – Pelosi predicts Democrats will take back House – Jul 15, 2004: At a news conference with Rep. Bob Matsui, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Pelosi cited strong showings in various polls and victories in the last two special elections to bolster her assertion. “We’re putting our credibility on the line,” she…

  • and also

    for the weblog for my forthcoming book

  • Bananastand

    I have taken to looking at the paper every day for articles about the place that harbored the people who attacked our country in the first place (remember afghanistan?), and it seems that nobody cares about it anymore. They are typically in the “and in other news” column, and the news is never good. Couldn’t…

  • Pipecasting

    Progressive Pipes turns 39 progressive mailing lists into one (queriable?) webfeed. I have added the RSS feed to the sidebar here at Edgewise.

  • We’d like to thank you Herbert Hoover

    …for really showing us the way

  • Chimps disavow president

    George W. Bush is NOT a chimp

  • More fun with statistics: Iraqi death toll

    This morning I heard a report on TV – Fox I think, but it could have been CNN, about the mounting death toll in Iraq. The hawk guest quickly noted that Saddam killed an estimated 35 people per day from the time he took control of Iraq. 35 per day! That’s a staggering number. And…

  • Iraq Is Free! Rejoice!!

    Hooray!! Iraq is now a free, sovereign nation! Let me repeat that because it just sounds so sweet… Iraq is free!!! What a blessed day! I woke to the news yesterday morning and ran out into the street, heart and bathrobe aflutter, waiting for the throngs to join me in spontaneous celebration… Hmm. Well, it…

  • Is ‘Fahrenheit’ Swinging?

    I think the people who say Fareihnheit won’t reach many of the undecided have forgotten about the kids. For one thing, millions of kids have going to the movies built into their weekend schedules. They don’t have to be pried loose from their homes by special interest in a parcticular film. And given that you…

  • A one-story state?

    It seems to me that it’s easy enough to dismiss or reject Michael Moore’s worldview and interpretation of facts and documentary evidence (hint to pundits: “documentary” means “based on documents”), but isn’t the nation entitled to at least have a counterstory to consider? Or is it unpatriotic to propose such a different storyline? Since ’96…