Tuesday, May 15, 2007
Con Blogs Ignore Whales, Try to Harpoon Minnows
So there is a big to do on the intertubes regarding various right wing blogs targeting House Republican leadership over the seating of an ethically challenged California Republican on the Appropriations committee. The effort was kicked off by Redstate.com and Anklebitingpundits have added their conservative imprimatur to the effort. Let me note here that I did not link Redstate.com in the last sentence because I blog from work, and my company has their site blocked for whatever reason. (Daily Kos has been blocked as well, and on the blog scales of weightiness, the loss of Kos far outweighs the loss of Redstate from my perspective.)
Yesterday when I first heard about this my immediate reaction was to wonder if the concern for ethical standards stopped with the appropriations committee, or perhaps there would be an entirely new attitude on these sites regarding the entire Republican machine in Washington, including administration figures neck deep in scandal. So after work, I went home and loaded up Redstate.com and did a search of their home page for the word "Bush". As of last night at approximately 8 pm pst, there was 1 mention of Bush, from an advertisement. Now Redstate has a chronological order to it's posts so I went through each story one by one. Of all the diaries on their home page, not one mentioned anything at all regarding any sort of Bush administration story, not to mention stories focusing on administration scandal. The stories mainly focused on the attempt to have the ethically challenged Republican replaced on the committee, and their disdain for Democrats (and by extension the American people) when it comes to the Iraq war. I then loaded up the previous page in the chronology of Redstate, and the same applied.
Well today brings news that Ankle Biting Pundits is the latest to take up the cudgel to beat House Republican leadership about the head. I can load their site from work so this is contemporary information as of the time I'm bashing out this post. Performing a search for "Bush" on their home page offers no hits. In fact, the list of categories that can be searched for pertinent stories in the history of ABP does not even include a category for Bush, or any permutation there of.
First, let me focus on the area of agreement between these conservative sites and myself. House Republican leadership seems determined to ignore the ethical foibles of their members, and I can't blame the other side for getting fed up with it. It does occur to me that this level of outrage may have better served their cause prior to the midterm election last year, but you go to the ballot box with the candidates you have, not the candidates you would like to have. Thus, I welcome the addition of Redstate and APB to the vast ranks of Americans, concerned by the utter contempt demonstrated time and again by Congressional Republicans for ethical standards.
BUT... the notion that House Republicans ought to be the sole focus of outrage over unethical behavior in Washington D.C. is simply laughable! The Bush administration has set the bar very low for ethical limbo. House Republicans look positively angelic next to the criminal enterprise currently running this administration. Bush's 2000 campaign antics where in he would solemnly raise his right hand as if taking an oath and promise to "restore" integrity and honor to the White House would make a great Saturday Night Live skit in the waning days of the Bush error.
Focusing on the House Republican leadership for turning a blind eye to ethics standards is the conservative blogs ignoring the diseased and stinking 4000 pound elephant in the room, to focus on freshening up after a flatulent mouse. The priorities seem just a bit out of whack here oh ye of the conservative blogosphere! I mean welcome aboard the 'bash Republican Congress critter band wagon'... just try not to ignore the 'Bush is worse than Nixon, cronyfilled administration criminal enterprise must be stopped' freight train that is currently blowing the doors off of the entire Republican establishment.
Yesterday when I first heard about this my immediate reaction was to wonder if the concern for ethical standards stopped with the appropriations committee, or perhaps there would be an entirely new attitude on these sites regarding the entire Republican machine in Washington, including administration figures neck deep in scandal. So after work, I went home and loaded up Redstate.com and did a search of their home page for the word "Bush". As of last night at approximately 8 pm pst, there was 1 mention of Bush, from an advertisement. Now Redstate has a chronological order to it's posts so I went through each story one by one. Of all the diaries on their home page, not one mentioned anything at all regarding any sort of Bush administration story, not to mention stories focusing on administration scandal. The stories mainly focused on the attempt to have the ethically challenged Republican replaced on the committee, and their disdain for Democrats (and by extension the American people) when it comes to the Iraq war. I then loaded up the previous page in the chronology of Redstate, and the same applied.
Well today brings news that Ankle Biting Pundits is the latest to take up the cudgel to beat House Republican leadership about the head. I can load their site from work so this is contemporary information as of the time I'm bashing out this post. Performing a search for "Bush" on their home page offers no hits. In fact, the list of categories that can be searched for pertinent stories in the history of ABP does not even include a category for Bush, or any permutation there of.
First, let me focus on the area of agreement between these conservative sites and myself. House Republican leadership seems determined to ignore the ethical foibles of their members, and I can't blame the other side for getting fed up with it. It does occur to me that this level of outrage may have better served their cause prior to the midterm election last year, but you go to the ballot box with the candidates you have, not the candidates you would like to have. Thus, I welcome the addition of Redstate and APB to the vast ranks of Americans, concerned by the utter contempt demonstrated time and again by Congressional Republicans for ethical standards.
BUT... the notion that House Republicans ought to be the sole focus of outrage over unethical behavior in Washington D.C. is simply laughable! The Bush administration has set the bar very low for ethical limbo. House Republicans look positively angelic next to the criminal enterprise currently running this administration. Bush's 2000 campaign antics where in he would solemnly raise his right hand as if taking an oath and promise to "restore" integrity and honor to the White House would make a great Saturday Night Live skit in the waning days of the Bush error.
Focusing on the House Republican leadership for turning a blind eye to ethics standards is the conservative blogs ignoring the diseased and stinking 4000 pound elephant in the room, to focus on freshening up after a flatulent mouse. The priorities seem just a bit out of whack here oh ye of the conservative blogosphere! I mean welcome aboard the 'bash Republican Congress critter band wagon'... just try not to ignore the 'Bush is worse than Nixon, cronyfilled administration criminal enterprise must be stopped' freight train that is currently blowing the doors off of the entire Republican establishment.
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