They call that arson, Mike
By DougJ, Head of Infidelity April 21st, 2010
Kevin Drum digs up a paragraph from a Times magazine about Politico:
As a practical matter, here is how Allen’s 10 stories influence the influentials. Cable bookers, reporters and editors read Playbook obsessively, and it’s easy to pinpoint exactly how an item can spark copycat coverage that can drive a story. Items become segment pieces on “Morning Joe,” the MSNBC program, where there are 10 Politico Playbook segments each week, more than half of them featuring Allen. This incites other cable hits, many featuring Politico reporters, who collectively appear on television about 125 times a week. There are subsequent links to Politico stories on The Drudge Report, The Huffington Post and other Web aggregators that newspaper assigning editors and network news producers check regularly. “Washington narratives and impressions are no longer shaped by the grand pronouncements of big news organizations,” said Allen, a former reporter for three of them — The Washington Post, The New York Times and Time magazine. “The smartest people in politics give us the kindling, and we light the fire.”
On the same topic, Ben Smith writes the most nauseating sentence I have ever read in my life:
Playbook is my first read every morning (and unlike some of my colleagues, I’m more about fighting the morning to a draw than winning it), and has always struck me as an unusual phenomenon, in part—though this isn’t the focus of the piece—because it’s so collegial, warm, and small-towny in a city whose inhabitants are, in reality, trying to destroy one another.
Because that’s what matters, that all the Villagers can jerk each other off in a glorified gossip page, while our civilization collapses.
Posted in Good News For Conservatives, We Are All Mayans Now
You have a way with, uh…words. Now who’s hungry for lunch?
April 21st, 2010 at 1:25 pm
Is this where we hear how the Politico guys are the Smartest Guys In the Room or have they been annointed Masters of the Political Universe, yet?
April 21st, 2010 at 1:26 pm
Oh, they didn’t start the fire. It was always burning.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:28 pm
@Garrigus Carraig: Harry Truman, Doris Day, Red China, Johnnie Ray
South Pacific, Walter Winchell, Joe DiMaggio
Joe McCarthy, Richard Nixon, Studebaker, television
North Korea, South Korea, Marilyn Monroe
Rosenberg’s, H-Bomb, Sugar Ray, Panmunjom
Brando, “The King and I” and “The Catcher in the Rye”
Eisenhower, Vaccine, England’s got a new queen
Marciano, Liberace, Santayana Goodbye
April 21st, 2010 at 1:30 pm
“And then we burn down journalistic integrity and our own damn house”.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:30 pm
When Ben Smith is good, he’s very good; when he’s bad, he’s just fucking awful. Christ.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:31 pm
@Garrigus Carraig:
They just built a better fireplace.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:32 pm
Mike Allen, burning down the house! Who got a match?
Talk about fiddling while Rome burns.
.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:32 pm
There has to be a way to monetize the Village Enron-style—and then destroy it in a beautiful bubble of burst ego. Hold your noses though: that isn’t helium they’re filled with.
The only danger is they’ll ask for a bailout, and get it.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:32 pm
It’s almost like these people take pride in being assholes.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:32 pm
@Omnes Omnibus:
Space Monkey Mafia, Hoola-hoopin’ Castro…
uh…I think I got something wrong there.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:33 pm
I can’t claim any originality for this observation, but these people really are soulless cretins.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:33 pm
I hate Ben Smith. HATE THE GUY.
Also: why won’t anyone talk about the fact the Mikey’s dad wrote speeches for George Wallace? Doesn’t that explain a lot of the bias from Politico?
April 21st, 2010 at 1:33 pm
You mean like the JournoList.
John get you a invite yet?
April 21st, 2010 at 1:35 pm
@licensed to kill time:
I recall an old (though obscure) saying about someone so self-centered they “would burn down their house to roast eggs.” Sounds right to me—far right, actually.
Ed
April 21st, 2010 at 1:35 pm
Shows how stupid I am. Never heard of Allen or the fucking Playbook. And I’d be happy to never hear about them again.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:36 pm
Oh and you actually missed the best line from that piece:
This is the powerful. In Washington DC. A city that is majority black. Anyone wonder why the media is so biased and the blacks are so poor in DC?
April 21st, 2010 at 1:37 pm
@Kris: What does that even mean? How was Soul Train partisan? What is whie hip hop?
WTF does any of that mean?
It’s too early to start drinking.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:42 pm
The closed circular flow of ideas, nuggets, thoughtbites, themes is a kind of intellectual derivaties market, with a huge multiplier.
Except it will never crash. This is progress, and you people just don’t recognize it.
And, looks like Ben Smith stole my comment style. Can I sue?
April 21st, 2010 at 1:45 pm
@John Cole
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lvieb2OedWE
April 21st, 2010 at 1:46 pm
courtiers are courtly.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:47 pm
@John Cole:
You are obviously unqualified to run a political blog.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:47 pm
@jeffreyw: Prepare to die.
.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:49 pm
@John Cole:
Black people=partisan and poor! See! Maybe if we weren’t so damned partisan we would be invited to these “parties” and we wouldn’t be poor! See!
I hate POLITICO.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:49 pm
IOW, “We create our own reality”.
I hate these people.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:49 pm
I agree with MikeJ
April 21st, 2010 at 1:50 pm
@jeffreyw: You are a bad, bad man.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:52 pm
John may feel differently, but I would never be on something like JournoList or TownHall (not that I would ever be invited, anyway). I don’t like backroom conversations the reader can’t see.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:52 pm
Well, Ben, this wouldn’t have anything to do with who PAYS YOUR F@%KING SALARY!
This isn’t just wankery, this is ass-kissing at its worst.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:53 pm
@Kris:
That paragraph is more terrifying than anything ever written by Stephen King:
(old white people getting down to hip hop)
Is there anything cuter than puppy love?
April 21st, 2010 at 1:54 pm
Give Tunch some catnip. Then contemplate the bender he goes on to calm yourself.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:54 pm
Well, Ben, this wouldn’t have anything to do with who PAYS YOUR F@%KING SALARY!
This isn’t just wankery, this is a$$-kissing at its worst.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:54 pm
@John Cole:
It was excerpted from a DC party description. Perhaps more context will help:
.
April 21st, 2010 at 1:55 pm
@JGabriel: That just makes it worse.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:00 pm
Boy that NYT article is long and nauseating.
I’m in with the In crowd
(do you wanna be In with me?)
I go where the In crowd goes
I know every latest dance
When you’re in with the In crowd
It’s so easy to find romance
April 21st, 2010 at 2:00 pm
@Kris: Did he write “Segregation now, segregation forever?”
April 21st, 2010 at 2:02 pm
We don’t need no water let the motherfucker burn
Burn motherfucker burn
April 21st, 2010 at 2:02 pm
OT, Taibbi on the draft. I have long thought this:
April 21st, 2010 at 2:02 pm
“The smartest people in politics give us the kindling, and we light the fire.”
In other words, we make shit up and then run another story when our planted “rumors” have been denied.
Don’t really care what we write as long as we can generate the hits to impress our advertisers.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:03 pm
So I read that White House communications director Dan Pfeiffer sleeps only 4 hrs a day and talks to Mike Allen before he goes to sleep and after he wakes up. How crazy is that?
And more importantly, Politico doesn’t have that many page hits. It is (almost) only read by the innermost circle of beltway jerks. If Dan Pfeiffer ignored that beltway bubble the way Obama somewhat promised to do, Politico would become irrelevant.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:05 pm
@Omnes Omnibus: Yes. It is terrifyingly epic or epically terrifying in its sheer perfection and I’m off to shudder in a corner until I work up the courage to got out and buy the means for some serious drinking. Utterly alone and with no sounds permitted whatsoever in order to avoid any overlap with that image. Death to cupcake towers!
April 21st, 2010 at 2:07 pm
TeaTards get their revenge after a nasty voicemail message from the GEICO gecko.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:07 pm
@Garrigus Carraig: @Omnes Omnibus:
fuck both of you. there would be a special place in hell for earworm instigators, if hell existed.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:08 pm
@Alex S.: Rahm makes him do it.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:09 pm
@MikeJ:
This might actually be true… sometimes…
April 21st, 2010 at 2:12 pm
@JGabriel: How? How the fuck was that supposed to help? Now I’m baffled and I want cupcakes.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:14 pm
@El Cid:
Not the gecko, a different voice over guy in the ad.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:16 pm
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yes, I am. To atone, here is the url for Fats Domino’s “Blueberry Hill”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dl5hknXqXps
April 21st, 2010 at 2:18 pm
How the author of that long Times Mag piece on Politico got through the whole thing without using the term “Villager” I’ll never know. Though he did do a good job of defining it.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:18 pm
@Nellcote: Oh, thank god—at least GEICO is not left without representation.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:19 pm
@twiffer: If it makes you feel better, I am listening to Vivaldi.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:20 pm
I thought this graph was the money shot in showing how utterly worthless Mike Allen is to anyone other than cable news producers:
April 21st, 2010 at 2:21 pm
@El Cid:
They would never have fired The Gecko!
April 21st, 2010 at 2:22 pm
Insulting Teabaggers: So easy, a caveman can do it.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:26 pm
Politico is the deformed mutant offspring of the incestuous DC media bubble.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:28 pm
They’re writing about themselves, again!
I just think this is a terrible idea, and they should resist the temptation.
They have to stop talking about themselves incessantly. They really weren’t given these various forums to promote each others careers.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:29 pm
Alright, I am really depressed now, no I mean really. What hope is there in this kind of world. All the references to the later Roman Empire or the French Kings seem so right. Crap.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:35 pm
Wondering if the gecko is a TEA-bagger?
The voice over guy sure isn’t!
Oh, Freedom works! HAR-HAR!! Great name
http://www.prweb.com/releases/.....906104.htm
April 21st, 2010 at 2:35 pm
But, but … that’s what I like about this BLOG!
April 21st, 2010 at 2:36 pm
To us, that party sounds like something Sauron crafted in Mt. Doom.
To Sally Quinn, it’s a critical part of her life’s work and validates her existence.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:45 pm
Oh, speaking of Mt. Doom...
April 21st, 2010 at 2:48 pm
@jeffreyw: You might enjoy this picture. Taken by a friend of a friend, etc.
http://flic.kr/p/7VfqCn
April 21st, 2010 at 2:50 pm
Fuck you, Villagers. Fuck you with a rusty pitchfork, and then I’m going to drive over you with a backhoe just to make sure the job is done. What a bunch of bullshit.
@Linda Featheringill: Love it! That should be on LOLCats.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:54 pm
@twiffer: My work here is done.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:54 pm
@Linda Featheringill: Hee hee
Back atcha
April 21st, 2010 at 2:56 pm
@someguy:
WIN!
April 21st, 2010 at 2:58 pm
@jeffreyw: Right.
This should help with anyone experiencing unwanted earworms: Born Under Punches / The Great Curve – Talking Heads w/ Adrian Belew, Live in Rome 1980.
.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:59 pm
Linda, that was great and Jeffrey’s back at you was pretty good also.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:59 pm
Because that’s what matters, that all the Villagers can jerk each other off in a glorified gossip page, while our civilization collapses.
One thing we can do about this is try to get our Congresscritters to turn off cable news and the like in their offices. Last time I called, a person at my representative’s office said that they had C-Span on unless some major news was breaking.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:01 pm
Warning: OFF TOPIC:
_____________________________
Wed Apr 21, 2010 10:36 am EDT
Roethlisberger officially suspended for six games
By MJD
Follow our NFL blog, Shutdown Corner, on Facebook and on Twitter.
[UPDATE III: If you’re wondering how the commissioner justifies the suspension, in light of the fact that Ben Roethlisberger(notes) was never charged with anything, here’s how Roger Goodell explained his decision:
“I recognize that the allegations in Georgia were disputed and that they did not result in criminal charges being filed against you,” he said in his letter to the two-time Super Bowl winner, a six-year veteran.
“My decision today is not based on a finding that you violated Georgia law, or on a conclusion that differs from that of the local prosecutor. That said, you are held to a higher standard as an NFL player, and there is nothing about your conduct in Milledgeville that can remotely be described as admirable, responsible, or consistent with either the values of the league or the expectations of our fans.”
Roethlisberger has yet to comment publicly.
—-
[UPDATE II: The NFL has officially confirmed that Roethlisberger’s suspension will be for six games. In the meantime, Roethlisberger will undergo a league-mandated “professional behavior evaluation” and “must adhere to any counseling or treatment that is recommended by the professional evaluators.”
If commissioner Roger Goodell is satisfied with the progress Ben makes in the time between now and Week 4, he could reduce the suspension to four games. If he’s displeased with Roethlisberger’s progress or behavior, he could increase the length of the suspension.]
—-
[UPDATE: CNBC’s Darren Rovell says that a six-game suspension would cost Roethlisberger $2,841,174.]
—-
Several sources are reporting today that Ben Roethlisberger will be looking at a four-to-six game suspension from the NFL. Adam Schefter was first with the report:
Filed to ESPN: @mortreport and I are reporting that Ben Roethlisberger will be suspended four to six games, with conditions attached.
So that’s the early word. Of course, we’ll keep you updated as the story develops and/or becomes official. I’m especially curious about the “conditions attached.”
Roethlisberger, of course, has twice been accused of sexual assault, though charges were never filed in either case. A punishment from the league has been expected, with no particular timetable attached to it, but it’s looking like today will be the day.
At the same time, rumors of the Steelers trying to trade Ben Roethlisberger are picking up steam. Schefter also reports on Twitter that the Steelers are actively trying to trade Ben Roethlisberger for a top 10 pick in tomorrow night’s draft.
A trade would be an incredibly bold move, and something that would’ve been absolutely unthinkable even a month ago. Roethlisberger’s proven himself to be a franchise quarterback, and franchise quarterbacks, in their prime years, simply are not traded.
That the Steelers are considering it at all is a statement about how seriously they take their reputation as a franchise, and perhaps, about their confidence (or lack of confidence) in Roethlisberger to stay out of trouble going forward.
http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/bl.....nfl,235656
April 21st, 2010 at 3:03 pm
I am surprised no one posted this yet:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNnAvTTaJjM
April 21st, 2010 at 3:03 pm
Is this an email or mash note?
It’s like these people are desperately trying to believe that they live in a pornographic Lake Wobegon, where the men are studly, the women are beautiful, and all are brilliant, preternaturally irresistible, and the envy of the rest of humankind.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:06 pm
@blueintheface: Don’t forget, Mike Allen’s dad was a Bircher. Not to mention that Drudgico is funded by right-wingers.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:08 pm
@Joshua:
So give Sally Q her precious and then throw her into the lava. That’s volcano monitoring we can belive in!
April 21st, 2010 at 3:11 pm
JeffreyW: Very nice.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:11 pm
And this is what we Villagers do for our mascot!
ETA It’s safe for work, I swear
April 21st, 2010 at 3:13 pm
@Admiral_Komack: I wasn’t going to mention the Big Ben problems cuz it might cause Tunch to drink. I did see this at MSNBC though.
The only team that seems likely is the Raiders. The Seahawks maybe but probably not.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:14 pm
@Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle:
Calvin, see post #8.
.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:15 pm
@licensed to kill time: I thought you were going to post this. You didn’t, so I did.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:17 pm
This is a true story – this one’s for you Frank Wosznicka, wherever you are. A freind of mine and a high school friend got a job for a local door manufacturer. Frank used to wear a pimp hat all the time. He would take of the hat with a theatrical flourish while loudly exclaiming “This hate reminds me of the Three Musketeers” His boss, who grew weary of this after the first few times quipped. “That hat reminds me of the unemployment line.” I hope the day never comes when we have to choose between round head and cavalier because it’s always cavalier for me. That’s just how I roll.
If you just said WTF? Google “Third English Civil War”
April 21st, 2010 at 3:18 pm
@Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle: That would explain Allen’s Richmond Times-Dispatch gig, as well as my former hometown rag and apparently Mikey’s first employer in the industry, the Fredericksburg Free Lance Star.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:21 pm
@asiangrrlMN: Ha! We could combine the two for extrafunsexytimez ;-)
April 21st, 2010 at 3:21 pm
@Bob K: Is it the lace cuffs or the feathered hats that tip you over?
April 21st, 2010 at 3:25 pm
@demo woman:
I think Tunch would be down with trading him. I’ve never seen a player turn into toxic waste so quickly.
ETA: I’d rather rebuild with Michael Vick and Plaxico Burress than Ben.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:27 pm
@licensed to kill time: You almost made coffee shoot out of my nose!
April 21st, 2010 at 3:28 pm
The amazing libertarian Bob Barr clarifying that Bill Clinton shouldn’t ought to be lecturing Americans against dangerous political rhetoric on the anniversary of right wing domestic terrorist Timothy McVeigh’s militia & shortwave fueled attack against federal employees and babies because Bill Clinton didn’t say what Barr thought he should have regarding sex with Monica Lewinsky:
Stupid mother fuckers. I god-damned hate all these moralizing Clinton panty-sniffers.
Clinton was vague while being interviewed relating a court proceeding about his own sex life—he didn’t fucking mockingly suggesting that a guy flying his plane into an IRS building and killing a Vietnam vet working there was, you know, heh heh, somethin’ that oughtta teach the IRS how fed up ‘we all’ were.
So, fuckhead, what were the dangerous consequences of Bill Clinton evading your asshole god-damned inquisition about what he did with an intern?
Oh, I forgot, he single-handedly (or other body part wise) caused teenagers to start engaging in oral sex.
And also there was that one crazed liberal who ended up flying a giant dildo into the Regency University bell tower.
Deny that, LIBS!
April 21st, 2010 at 3:28 pm
On the upside, we’ve finally got people (1,000+) demonstrating in favor of tax increases. I do enjoy an argy bargy some days.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:31 pm
@El Cid: Um, this is how far wingnuttia is gone these days. I actually had to stop at the dildo story and think, “Might the rightwing have said this at one point?” By the way, FH#3, you are killing me with all your not constitushnl stuff. Carry on.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:34 pm
@asiangrrlMN:
Almost? Darn, I was going for the full Coffee Geyser, nasal edition.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:36 pm
@El Cid:
Jeez, Barr really had to do a reacharound for that bit of pretzel logic.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:45 pm
@licensed to kill time: That would be unpleasant since I enjoy my coffee boiling hot—literally.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:49 pm
The only thing worse than the noise machine, echo chamber, circle jerk, etc. are the congratulatory media glory-holes.
Hooray for having one source, be it Drudge or Politico “make” the news for the whole rest of the paper, radio, and television news industry.
There’s no diversity of thought, there’s no “liberal” media, there’s nothing but what one dumb gatekeeper wants us to know and think.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:49 pm
@maus:
That would be a great tag.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:52 pm
Doug, you are probably not paying your therapist enough to made it worth continuing to torment yourself this way. Dude, if you think our civilization is nearing collapse, you need to step away from the internet and find someplace go and meditate. Seriously, you’re going to develop an ulcer if you continue to take this shit so close to heart.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:53 pm
@asiangrrlMN: I’m not saying I’m opposed to people flying giant dildos into Regency University buildings, but I do think it should be consensual.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:58 pm
I wonder if Mike Allen goes to bible-study at C-Street.
April 21st, 2010 at 3:59 pm
@DougJ:
Bravo DougJ. I don’t like that sort of thing either. No matter at what level.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:01 pm
Somebody must now assume this mantle, but who, who that we all revere and trust could be like Spock? I know the obvious – but how are they going to work out the ear thing?:
http://dimewars.com/Blog/ViewB.....a90a1c3484
April 21st, 2010 at 4:02 pm
@El Cid:
You know where that will lead. Buildings marrying their dildos. Slippery slope!
April 21st, 2010 at 4:03 pm
@asiangrrlMN:
I once read between the lines in a BOB post that he works in “Condoms Galore” – This explains why THAT happy meal is more than a few french fries short.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:04 pm
@El Cid: Consensual? I thought you were going for constitutional! Man, that’s hi-larious.
@Bob K: OK. You wrote B.o.B. and condoms in the same sentence. I may pie you for that alone!
April 21st, 2010 at 4:04 pm
@El Cid: As long as it’s shaped like this. Warning, NSFWOFC (or for Christians).
@licensed to kill time: Holy hell. Glad I was done with my coffee before I read this.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:08 pm
@asiangrrlMN:
I make sure to have only CONSTUSHULL sex with incensing adults.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:09 pm
@Church Lady:
Official Positions of the Republican Party:
1) Obama is secretly the so-called “Antichrist”.
2) God smote Iceland with a volcano to punish America for enacting moderate regulation of health insurance companies by a majority vote.
3) The world will literally come to an end in our lifetimes, as explained in the “Left Behind” series of non-fiction books.
But apart from Satan’s spawn ruling the free world; the wrath of God raining down upon seemingly random countries; and imminent Armageddon, Church Lady thinks we’re doing jes’ fine.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:10 pm
@El Cid: You’re killing me on this thread and the previous one. How about with incessant adults?
April 21st, 2010 at 4:10 pm
@asiangrrlMN:
These days, people with bladder control problems can still have a satisfying sex life, particulately in commissioned monopsonous inflation ships.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:18 pm
I’m waiting for all these execrable people to disappear up their own asses in a sort of gastrointestinal Klein bottle. Maybe the only way to get rid of them is to put on a cocktail party on a Potomac dinner cruise, cut the engine, and hope they’re somewhere out near the Canary Islands before any one of them notices the rest of the world is missing.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:25 pm
@ericblair: They’d only titter every time someone mentioned the word “Belgium” and making flying raids on the planet in search of cheese crackers and cupcakes.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:30 pm
Why is it 4:30 and we are still not making jokes about paying doctors with chickens? I gotta go to twitter for everydamnthing now? The #LowdenCare hashtag is the funniest thing this week, no contest.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:31 pm
@asiangrrlMN: Wouldn’t you rather think of B.O.B. with condoms that not? The idea that he could be spawning little b.o.b’s is right out of a Stephen King novel.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:31 pm
@ericblair:
I listened to part of the White House press briefing today, in the car. They were almost painfully serious, and attempting to ask real questions, although, sadly, they asked poor questions. I was wondering if Gibbs got under their skin.
An example:
Q On financial regulatory reform, would the bill being considered in the Senate or the one that passed the House, would either of them have prevented the alleged fraud that the SEC is currently suing Goldman over?
This would be my answer:
Well, no. Fraud is against the law now, hence the current “lawsuit”. There will always be law-breakers.
Gibbs just blew it off.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:50 pm
@Mark S.:
I will pay cash money for video of anyone at that party who spotted Mitchell wearing the beads and shouted SHOW US YOUR TITS!
April 21st, 2010 at 4:52 pm
I saw interviews of Vanderhei and Harris just after they launched Politico. Their smuggness, their naked interest in “traffic uber alles” was off-putting in the extreme. It was plain that fame and forture were the goals – not the truth and not journalism that would inform the public. It was at that point that I decided not to read Politico. I have honored that decision except for a few instances of following links early on. No more. A link to Politico does not get a “click” from me. Since that is what they care about, it is the one thing I care about withholding from them.
April 21st, 2010 at 4:59 pm
@TuiMel:
Go by there once just to read the comments. It’s all insane wingnuts. That’s the readership. Every subject turns into a cesspool of random Muslim hatred. I’ve never seen anything like it.
April 21st, 2010 at 5:02 pm
@jibeaux: Holy shit, I can’t stop laughing.
April 21st, 2010 at 5:24 pm
@Napoleon: I’m so fucking sick of self-generated content offered as news. There’s a whole fucking world out there that I can’t get news on because they’re busy peering up each other’s assholes for “insider” stories.
April 21st, 2010 at 5:35 pm
Shorter DC Villager Idiots:
Will the doctor with the cure for cancer please sit the fuck down? Newt Gingrich has a new book out!
April 21st, 2010 at 5:40 pm
@kay:
I think I will have to take your word for it. I cannot keep up with the commentary on on this blog and others that I want to read,. Politico is all about the monetizing. I cannot spend what little time I have blowing my blood pressure on right-wing rantings. Hopefully this won’t cause me to lose sight of how the other side “thinks.”
April 21st, 2010 at 5:57 pm
What, no one linked to the video of the Politico editorial meeting in the super-secret Politicave (2:16)? It features
Mike AllenNews Cycle Man!April 21st, 2010 at 5:59 pm
@demo woman: NO! I would rather not think of B.o.B. copulating at all!
April 21st, 2010 at 6:56 pm
Well, yes, that’s what matters to Ben Smith, which merely proves that he is a self-absorbed wanker.
Does this surprise you? Any hope of salvation for either “Civilization” or our children’s future undoubtedly involves the complete destruction of the infrastructure that supports Ben Smith, and quite a few other things.
In a world where every conceivable entity has been utterly corrupted, and where the people responsible for reporting it have no interest whatever in doing their jobs, democracy doesn’t stand much of a chance unless the “reset” button gets pushed.
April 21st, 2010 at 6:59 pm
@binzinerator:
Easy to do. But they don’t care about our feelings any more than a New York City cockroach.
April 21st, 2010 at 7:06 pm
This guy is happy that his favorite insider-reporting, serial feature is misrepresenting the relationship that is actual news. WHAT A DOUCHE.
April 22nd, 2010 at 11:57 am