Roundup: Media's Take

Jul 27, 2004

Robert Sheer: 9/11 Commission Contradicts Bush At Every Turn

Robert Sheer, in the Los Angeles Times (July 27, 2004): Busted! Like a teenager whose beer bash is interrupted by his parents' early return home, President Bush's nearly three years of bragging about his"war on terror" credentials has been exposed by the bipartisan 9/11 commission as nothing more than empty posturing. Without dissent, five prominent

Jul 27, 2004

Howell Raines: The Disingenuousness of Republican 'Populism'

Howell Raines, in the Washington Post (July 27, 2004): [Howell Raines is former executive editor of the New York Times.] In times gone by, Democrats were regarded as the master panderers of American presidential elections on the basis of their supposed belief in generous benefits for the working class. But as Democrats gather in Boston, they do so as a party that has surrendered the title. The R

Jul 27, 2004

R.W. Apple: My Favorite Convention Year Was ...

R.W. Apple, in the NYT (July 27, 2004):I guess 1964 was the best year for conventions during my time at bat. As F. Clifton White completed his conservative coup d'état on behalf of Barry Goldwater at the old Cow Palace in San Francisco, the galleries booed and brayed at their bête noire, Nelson A. Rockefeller, who struggled to make

Jul 27, 2004

Michael Barone: Why Conventions Have Become So Dull

Michael Barone, in the WSJ (July 26, 2004): ...There is no way to reproduce the old conventions. I stumbled upon the reason why in the '80s, when I was researching my political history narrative "Our Country." In his book on the 1936 election, FDR's campaign manager James A. Farley revealed how he was able to predict, accurately, that Roosevelt would carry 46 of 48 states. He took the e

Jul 26, 2004

Convention Speeches that Have Made History

Tom Zeller, Jr., and Hugh K. Truslow, in the NYT (July 25, 2004): The nominee is a foregone conclusion and platform debates long ago gave way to choreographed displays of party unity. So what constitutes drama at a national political convention? For most Americans - and certainly for the news media, which will lean in most attentively during prime-time hours - the drama now resides al

Jul 26, 2004

Modern Political Conventions Belie Raucous Past

Reuters (July 25, 2004): When William Jennings Bryan rose at the 1896 Democratic convention in Chicago to deliver what would become one of the most famous speeches in U.S. history, he was not even a candidate for president, much less a leading figure in the party.The 36-year-old junior congressman from Nebraska stepped to the podium to voice support for a controversial resolution advocating the free c

Jul 26, 2004

Do Political Conventions Matter?

Peter Grier, in the Christian Science Monitor (July 26, 2004): The first party convention in United States history was held in 1831 in Baltimore by the Anti-Masons, a tiny movement dedicated to the notion that the benign fraternity of Freemasonry was in fact an insidious political cabal. Strangely, that convention tapped as its presidential candidate a man who was himself a Mason. Some would say it has been all

Jul 26, 2004

William Raspberry: 9/11 Commission Was Simplistic and Politicized

William Raspberry, in the Washington Post (July 26, 2004): For all its somber-faced seriousness, the report of the Sept. 11 commission turns out to be a childlike explanation of what went so tragically wrong nearly three years ago. It acknowledges the obvious, but it manages to avoid any semblance of individual responsibility."The lamp broke," a child might say. Or, as the report would

Jul 25, 2004

Michael Kinsley: The Folly of 'Liberal' Self-Denial

Michael Kinsley, in the Washington Post (July 25, 2004): As all eyes turn to Boston, where the world's oldest political party meets in con- vention beginning tomorrow evening, the Democrats face both a challenge and an opportunity. They must demonstrate that they have abandoned McGovernite liberal extremism and have restored their party to the mainstream moderate tradition of Harry S. Truman and John F

Jul 23, 2004

WW II Guidebook to Iraq Contains Lessons That Are Relevant Today

Rick Hampson, in USA Today (July 16, 2004): ...Since invading Iraq, Americans have discovered that the country is a military, political and cultural minefield. But it's a lesson they could have learned from a pocket-sized booklet published six decades ago by the U.S. government.A Short Guide to Iraq was written to educate World War II servicemen about a place most of them had never heard of. It describes an Iraq familiar to soldiers there today: the heat, th

Jul 23, 2004

Norman Solomon: Girly-Men, Gays and Macho Politics

Norman Solomon, in his media beat column (July 22, 2004): [Norman Solomon is co-author, with Reese Erlich, of “Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn’t Tell You.” His columns and other writings can be found at http://www.normansolomon.com.] With two words, the governor of California has managed to highlight the confluence of anti-gay bias and misogyny. Open contempt for “girlie men” would have raised fewer eyebrows in t

Jul 23, 2004

Dilip Hiro: Why Kirkuk Is the Obvious Flashpoint with Iraq and Its Neighbors

Dilip Hiro, at TomDispatch.com (July 23, 2004): [Dilip Hiro's latest book is Secrets and Lies: Operation"Iraqi Freedom" and After, a sequel to Iraq: In the Eye of the Storm (both Nation Books). Hiro is based in London, writes regularly for the New York Tim

Jul 23, 2004

Slate: Whatever Happened to States Rights? Don't Ask Conservatives

Steve Chapman, at Slate.com (July 22, 2004): The modern Republican Party is the offspring of Barry Goldwater, whose 1960 manifesto "The Conscience of a Conservative" provided the intellectual framework for a movement that would eventually raise up Ronald Reagan, Newt Gingrich, and George W. Bush. Goldwater saw the future as a choice between states' rights and individual liberty on the one hand, and centralized tyranny on t

Jul 23, 2004

Sharon's Advice to the Jews of France Is Wrong ... But He's Right There's a Problem

Andre Glucksmann, in the WSJ (July 22, 2004): [Mr. Glucksmann is the author, most recently, of"Ouest Contre Ouest" (West Against West), published in Paris by Plon.]On Sunday, in Jerusalem, Ariel Sharon solemnly called on "our brothers in France [to] move to Israel, as soon as possible" to flee the "the wildest anti-Semitism there." T

Jul 22, 2004

L.A. Times: G.O.P. Has Found Another Whipping Boy

From the Los Angeles Times (July 22, 2004): There is not much to rue about the departure of Clinton-era national security advisor Sandy Berger from his unpaid, informal advisory role in John Kerry's campaign. Berger has always been a plodder, unimaginative but diligent. Only now has he become interesting, as his apparent mishandling of classified documents on

Jul 21, 2004

Joe Wilson Responds to the WSJ et al's Right-Wing Revisionism

Joseph C. Wilson IV, in the Los Angeles Times (July 21, 2004): For the last two weeks, I have been subjected — along with my wife, Valerie Plame — to a partisan Republican smear campaign. In right-wing blogs and on the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal and the National Review, I've been accused of being a liar and, worse, a traitor. This is t

Jul 21, 2004

Robert Kuttner: Class Should Be Working to Kerry's Advantage

Robert Kuttner, in the Boston Globe (July 21, 2004): SOCIAL CLASS is one of the most explosive issues in American politics. Like any explosive, it can dramatically transform a landscape -- or blow up in the user's face. There are far more ordinary wage-earning people than wealthy investors and corporate moguls, but the political right has done far better

Jul 21, 2004

Jeff Cohen: Nader's Now Getting Real Help from Republicans (Guess Why)

Jeff Cohen, in a column emailed to HNN (July 20, 2004): Four years after the Florida debacle, with nearly all of Ralph Nader's longtime progressive allies now tactically supporting Kerry in swing states to retire the Bush regime, the Nader campaign has created none of the grassroots thunder of 2000. Indeed, it's been a hollow enterprise -- attracting a few leftwing sects and polemicists. Given this vacuum, it's no surprise that pro-Bush forces have rushed to Nader's

Jul 21, 2004

The Latest Presidential Rankings

Leonard Leo, in the Boston Globe (July 19, 2004): [Leonard Leo is Executive Vice President of the Federalist Society for Law and Public Studies] NEXT WEEK'S Democratic Convention is a national moment when Americans are by turns nostalgic about the presidency and unsparing in their comparisons of the candidates. Nostalgia comes about because politic

Jul 20, 2004

Felix Rohatyn: Why I Am Voting for John Kerry

Felix Rohatyn, in the WSJ (July 20, 2004): As a first-generation American I care passionately for this country and I fear for its future. And as an active Democrat, I support the Kerry-Edwards ticket for two fundamental reasons: First, I believe that their view of America and of our domestic economic and social priorities will improve the prospects of a better future for all Americans; and second, I believe that their view of America's position in the world and its relationsh