Waiting for right-wing blogosphere to own up to reality
What’s the best thing about being a confirmed Right-wing Conservative with a weblog? It’s never having to say you’re sorry when denying reality turns out to be just so much smoke and mirrors. Admit you were wrong? Admit that you were simply trying to deflect attention from the craven self-interest of those you so slavishly follow? Ha! You’re RIGHT, and one little boo-boo isn’t going to change that, eh??
Of course, you can’t actually apologize for being wrong, because then you’d have to maybe own up to the reality that maybe you don’t have all of the answers. The Houston Chronicle’s Cragg Hines, no Left-wing ideologue himself, has an interesting take on one of the ugliest aspects of the Terri Schiavo case- the “talking points” memo discovered by ABC News laying out how Republicans could take political advantage of the situation.
Perhaps to anticipate a properly obsequious note of regret would have been expecting too much. Well then, what about a modest mea culpa? Or even a straightforward explanation? But, no, hardly a word….
Quickly, hard-right commentators, especially those in cyberspace, began to question the authenticity of the memo. E-mail and damning links flew. With Dan Rather’s foolish blood still in the water, they were hoping for another high-profile big-media flame-out about a phony document….
The reaction of the neander-bloggers? So much noise was followed by what sounded a lot like silence.
A small part of their wrath, especially from the Houston-area coven, had been directed at me.
On March 23, in a column about the absurdities of the legislative effort surrounding the Schiavo case, I wrote:
“Most interesting is a talking-points memo from the Senate side of the Capitol that spells it right out in stark political terms … .”
Although I had not seen a copy of the full memo at the time, I confirmed with a trusted source on Capitol Hill the existence of the memo and the quotes I wanted to use.
My characterization of the memo and its contents was accurate.
Accurate, perhaps, but not at all appreciated by Right-wing bloggers, who don’t cotton to those who have the temerity to jump on their mistakes in the same way they skewer those of us on the Left.
I would never expect a Right-wing blogger to have the cojones or the class to own up to the reality that they were wrong- flat out, unmistakenly wrong. Of course, being Right means never having to say that you’re sorry, eh?
As far as I can tell, the once-blazing bloggers have commented little either on the accuracy of the initial reports about the memo or on the condition within their movement that allows a woman’s suffering to be reduced to political capital.
There is enough egg left over from this sorry episode to cover the face of a number of politicians- Tom DeLay, Bill Frist, Mel Martinez- but it’s the Right-wing bloggers who deserve to be cleaning their faces more than anyone. I would expect craven, self-interested, politically-motivated spin-doctoring from Senators and Congressman. They owe their success to knowing which way the political winds blow. But Right-wing bloggers should be expected to at least have the decency to at least utter a muted “mea culpa”, no? Then again, staying true to their “We only jump on mistakes when a Liberal makes one” philosophy, if you listen closely, you can hear…well, nothing.
It’s not easy to be perfect, but it sure is easy to think that you are. Remember, if you’re not Right, you’re just plain wrong.
WhatEVER….
HINES NOT A LIBERAL IDEOLOGUE?! Jack, come on... My willing suspension of disbelief doesn't go that far.
Actually Cragg isn't telling the WHOLE story, or at least not all of it.
I e-mailed him and asked him what his THOUGHTS were regarding the RUMORS that the memo MAY not be as advertised. (a high-level Repub stratagy memo).
He never responded, as a matter of fact, he STILL hasn't responded, except to type blatent lies.
The fact is EVERYONE observing this was wrong. It wasn't a high-level Republican strategy memo, it wasn't a plant by the Democrats. It was ONE FRESHMAN STAFFER, being stupid.
I've admitted that on my blog, Hines still maintains he was right all along.
Full disclosure: I voted for Clinton once, and Kerry (I did however vote for Bush the first time)
No Right wing idealogue am I.
Hines IS a far left-wing writer. He's a socialist through and through. If he would own up to that people might take him more seriously. They still wouldn't like him, but they might accidentally respect him.
S.
Jack, you're a good spirited sort, and I don't think of you as dishonest.
So, I can only presume you (and Cragg Hines) must have missed the numerous PowerLine updates on the memo in question, and how they characterized it?
Or blogHOUSTON's updates (posts and comments) -- which, unfortunately, did not have the benefit of Cragg Hines' elaboration on his work, since he refused to answer emails.
The Hines refusal to answer our extremely polite emails (Anne Linehan is the epitome of polite!) is a real contrast to the willingness of other Chron writers to answer our emails -- including Rick Casey (I'm not a fan of his, but he's answered our email queries promptly and respectfully), James Campbell (of late), Dan Feldstein, Kyrie O'Connor, and several others. We can't do much more than speculate about what Hines knew when he wrote that article if he refuses to answer emails!
However, he now admits he never SAW the memo that he wrote authoritatively about, but only heard about it from a trusted source. He didn't bother to let readers know he was effectively repeating hearsay in his column, and that's a problem in my view.
His Houston-area coven remarks were patently silly, since he is the DC columnist of a rag that portrays itself as a major daily. A good editor would have struck them. We're pleased they didn't, though, as we were quite entertained!
You're just kidding us by asserting Hines isn't a lefty, right? :)
Jack, You're "kool-aid" response was disheartening to say the least.
Obviously you didn't even take the time to read my reply, you just made an assumption and started name calling, insulting my intelligence et al.
From your blog I suspected you to be better than that.
S.