No discussion of good news for conservatives is complete without mention of Jon Chait’s excellent compendium of Weekly Standard good news proclamations from 2005-2008, which probably were — and this is no exaggeration — the most disastrous run of years for Republicans in modern political history. Most of it’s a twofer, because not only is it all good news for conservatives, it’s all contrarian good news for conservatives: “Everyone thinks that Bush’s low approval rating/McCain’s poor fund-raising and poll numbers/the American public’s dislike of Sarah Palin is bad for Republicans, but if you look beyond the conventional wisdom of our liberal media overlords, you may be surprised to learn…”
Chait makes a good point about the Standard relative to the National Review.
This sort of argument is actually the signature style of the Standard. A magazine like National Review specializes in making the case for conservative ideas. The Standard’s contribution is to assert over and over that Republicans are succeeding, or at least doing better than you think they are. The idea is to buck up your side and encourage them to keep fighting, in order to ward off the self-defeating psychology of losing.
I think another part of the idea is to get your smart-ass, nonsensical good news talking points repeated by Halperin et al. Nearly every example of Kristol hackery that Chait cites is just a more extreme version of stuff that pundits were saying at the time (Broder’s mythical Bush comeback, Halperin’s insistence Dems would get creamed in the 2006 midterms for example).
Most of the stuff I read on the Corner is not like this; frankly, a lot of it is just too weird to get picked up by mainstream media. The Cornerites write strange things because they believe strange things. Kristol is an unapologetic propagandist.
burnspbesq
“A magazine like National Review specializes in making the case for conservative ideas.”
Setting a side for a moment whether that’s actually true, it certainly works as an explanation for why TNR is so thin.
sloan
Top story on Weekly Standard right now: The Future Is Bright – A three-part plan for taking advantage of the Obama-Pelosi agenda by Fred Barnes
sloan
hmmm lemme try that again
sloan
F%^*ing hell.
Well the whole thing is a Fred Barnes quote.
What happened to editing?
burnspbesq
@sloan:
Well, there it is. If Fred Barnes says it, it must be true.
burnspbesq
In other news, college basketball starts this week. ‘Bout damn time.
DougJ
What happened to editing?
It’s fucked up. Sorry.
licensed to kill time
@sloan: The future’s so bright, Fred Barnes has gotta wear shades.
licensed to kill time
@licensed to kill time: With the “extremely good news for Republicans” lenses.
mistersnrub
Whatever the party holds to be truth, is truth. It is impossible to see reality except by looking through the eyes of the Party.
mistersnrub
Whatever the party holds to be truth, is truth. It is impossible to see reality except by looking through the eyes of the Party.
Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle
@sloan: Tea-party populists? How can populism be supported by people like the Koch’s? Sounds like Fred Barnes failed reading comprehension in school.
calipygian
They keep on asserting that the American people don’t want what Obama is selling over and over like it’s true or something.
sloan
Bonus wankery from Michael Barone. This was written on Wednesday, the day after Democrats won the only two house seats up for grabs:
No comment.
gwangung
@sloan: Which, I suppose, is why new Rep. Owen cast the 218th vote.
Yeah, world class stupid.
Scott H
The Standard apparently represents the shamanistic shimmy-shake approach to treating metastatic cancer. The Republican Party is caught in a perfect storm of antirational religionists, reactionaries, and bass-ackwards libertarianism (aka glibertarianism). Sad for them – and not even entertaining to witness any longer.
MattF
That Weekly Standard/National Review distinction is interesting… And, needless to say, it’s good news for Republicans.
Leelee for Obama
@Scott H: I hasta tell you, you made me laugh out loud! That was extremely funnyish, and I enjoyed it berry, berry much.
MikeJ
Which is exactly opposite of what liberal blog comments do for our side. Obama has thrown X under the bus! Obama is the same as Bush! Any bill without everything I want is worse than nothing!
Anoniminous
DougJ:
But now the leaders of the party: Limbaugh, Armey, Palin, etc. have REALLY taken hold of the reins. Watch the 2010 elections … you ain’t seen nothing yet.
Martin
So, is it fair to say that had the GOP won the two house seats that the bill last night would not have passed? That would have left 217 aye votes out of the Democrats and the bill would have depended on Cao to vote aye – which I cannot imagine he would have made it to the floor of the chamber without a fire axe in his back if he insisted on voting for this.
So the ‘good news for Republicans’ of last Tuesday are already dispelled 4 days later.
sloan
@Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle: Tea partiers don’t know who the Koch’s are. They think Freedom Works is spontaneous and funded solely by small donors.
And Barnes seems to honestly believe that “talk of a third party … is good news for Republicans—extremely good news.”
W.T.F.
I wonder how
failed 1992 candidatetwo-term President Bill Clinton feels about those third parties.calipygian
Here are the people that the guys at the Weekly Standard and Eric Cantor have allied themselves with.
My favorite? “This guy [Elie Wiesel] is a Hebrew Al Sharpton.”
These are the Tea Baggers that Bill Kristol and Eric Cantor are so fond of.
Oh, and “Eli Wiesel should just go back to Indonesia.” Too. Also.
MattF
@Martin
Commentary I’ve seen says that Pelosi gave a pass to red-state Dems who needed to vote against. She got the required Dem majority– and plus one more, just so that Cao wouldn’t get the fire axe. I wouldn’t be surprised to find Cao running independent next year.
Leelee for Obama
Shhh! That’s supposed to be our little secret.
Davis X. Machina
Tea-party populists? How can populism be supported by people like the Koch’s?
In America, you can buy virtually anything in the form of a ready-to-go turnkey operation from a specialty contractor.
It’s what we do, and do well.
calipygian
@MattF: How’s that Rush Limbaugh declared Republican Big Tent working out?
I don’t think its working out for the courageous Mr Cao.
I guess “zipperhead” is too long for twitter and too difficult for Tea Baggers to spell.
calipygian
You mean like Andy McCarthy’s strange obsession with Obama’s birth certificate?
He was a federal prosecutor, doncha know?
New Yorker
My wingnut uncle keeps sending me negative articles about Al Gore (he’s obsessed with the man for some reason).
When I got one today, I replied asking why he wasn’t collecting his stuff and getting the kids ready to flee the country. After all, we’re all about to be sent to death camps and healthcare reform is the greatest threat to freedom this country has ever seen (worse than the Soviet Union, apparently).
I suggested he go to Iraq, since we all know it’s a peaceful, stable, prosperous democracy thanks to George W. Bush. It’s just that the treasonous lib’rul media tells us nothing but bad things because they want us to lose.
He hasn’t written me back……
parksideq
@sloan: Funny you should mention that; over at Malkin’s rage cage, one of her commenters actually gets it (for the wrong reasons, but still):
Even broken clocks are right twice a day. Which is good news for conservatives in and of itself.
calipygian
@New Yorker:
I recommend Somalia. Iraq has too much gubmint to be a modern day Galt Gulch.
Just Some Fuckhead
@New Yorker: Haha. That’s the sorta shit I do, along with making their lives a liberal hell on Faceborg.
WereBear
It was wild seeing the delusions pile up like a four track train wreck.
JK
@calipygian:
That was a great link. My favorite “Everyone knows that Obama is George Soros sock puppet.”
Cao should enter a witness protection program.
MBSS
i think that you guys finding out that all news is good news for the republicans, is good news for the republicans because now that it appears that all cards are on the table it is the perfect time for the gop to brew up their next, even more cunning, scheme.
conversely this is bad for the dems.
calipygian
@JK: Did you know that Elie Wiesel is now a “Jew in name only”?
A JINO?
Really?
MattF
@JK
‘Obama is just some white guy’s sock puppet’ is quite a wingnut meme– the white guy might be Soros, or Ayers, or whoever. Somehow, the notion that our lil’ Barry has a mind and a will of his own is just… too much to handle.
calipygian
@JK: And it’s funny how Dems are the REAL anti-Semites, yet Obama takes his orders from George Soros.
No one says that world views HAVE to be consistent I guess.
Mike G
The Weakly Standard should revert to its orginal name as proposed by Murdoch, The American Standard, before he found out it was a brand of toilet. Much more appropriate.
licensed to kill time
I don’t oppose Kristol. I floccinaucinihilipilificate him.
calipygian
OT, but relevant:
Teh Google has a long memory.
AhabTRuler
We have entered an era of unprecedented postmodernism. If the Bush era was so, it was in that they “created their own reality”. However, we now exist in a world where concept is completely decoupled from meaning.
It’s a shame that Burroughs couldn’t have lived to see this moment.
cleek
in the category of GOP fluffers, The Standard’s got nothing on RedState.
Bubblegum Tate
@MattF:
The icing on the cake is the fact that the same people who bleat the “sock puppet” stuff also believe that Obama is a brutal fascist dictator who will at best merely stick conservatives in internment camps or, at worst, order his “personal army” to eliminate them all.
Midnight Marauder
I don’t think there’s a better word that sums up this current, downward-spiraling version of the Republican Party than that. Self-defeating. And this article over at TPM about how they skipped critical votes that would have strengthened the Patriot Act, so that they could instead teabag away to their hearts content on the Capitol steps. I mean, these kids are absolutely clueless and completely unserious.
And nice to see you around again, JK.
burnspbesq
@Bubblegum Tate:
I expect that Makewi and/or Sanka will be here momentarily to explain to you why there is no inconsistency between those two statements.
jwb
@calipygian: I’m really wondering what stops the wingnut wurlitzer has left to play. I mean after they’ve burned through Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Castro, where do they really have to go? I have great faith in the inventive powers of greater wingnuttia, so I won’t by any means proclaim an end in sight, but it does make me wonder if we’ll get anything fundamentally new. (For connoisseurs of the wingnut wurlitzer, the linking of Dachau and health care was surprising and inspired playing, although it was really just finding new expressive possibility on the old Hitler stop.)
Tony J
@Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle:
No, it sounds like Fred Barnes gets paid a lot of money to say stupid things in in words his readership think they understand. It’s his job.
It’s the ‘lot of money’ bit that’s important, because it crops up so often in any consideration of why the people saying these things do it at all. They get paid to, and the readership doesn’t care as long as the product comes out on time.
Yes, that does make it like porn, and the trade in illegal drugs. Except in this case it’s not only legal, it’s sold as a patriotic alternative to unpalatable Liberal alternatives like ‘Making good arguments about things you think are important’ and ‘not being a bunch of whacked out loons who whine about the ‘Liberal Media’ whenever they don’t get a pony’.
Nellcote
@calipygian:
I’ve been quite surprised that groups like JDL etc. haven’t been outraged and speaking out about the anti-semitism and abuse of Holucaust imagery at the tea-parties/townhalls. That Dachau poster even shocked me.
Tonal Crow
@jwb:
Clearly to AL GORE, whose “Global Warming” Holocaust is waiting in the wings, ready to swoop down and gut what’s left of us after Pelosi’s historic sellout of freedom!
The wingnuts’ chorus is more than metaphorically related to the ever-declining musical tone paradox (listen here).
calipygian
Pogroms. Malkin and her commentariat are on the verge.
AhabTRuler
Well, to be fair, not all of the arguments are good, per se, but at least they are trying.
sloan
@Bubblegum Tate: They’re having a helluva time trying to define Obama in negative terms. He’s a pacifist dictator, an atheist muslim and a socialist fascist communist Marxist Wall St. corporate whore.
He’s Adolph Hitler and Neville Chamberlain. Quite a trick! Republicans really have no choice but to keep throwing shit at the wall to see what sticks. So far they’ve done little but recycle John McCain’s failed 2008 memes.
Case in point: An aggressive attempt to link (MUSLIM) Obama to (TERRORIST) Ft. Hood shooter. (OMFG 9/11!)
Look for “policy of appeasement” and “global apology tour” memes to reappear in the next few days.
Bubblegum Tate
OT: Please enjoy this account of Sarah Palin’s address to Wisconsin Right to Life. This account is all you can get because video cameras, recording devices, still cameras, and even cell phones were strictly prohibited. In a super-hilarious touch, strollers were banned. At a right to life rally. Also.
Nellcote
@Midnight Marauder:
How can we get LaPalin & Bachmann to have a tea party during the senate health care vote?
Martin
@MattF:
Actually, that makes sense. Nice to see that Pelosi knows how to keep everyone reasonably in line.
sloan
@cleek:
Here’s a blast from the past:
Mr. Republican Strategist then goes on a rant about the “feminized, elitist media”, PUMAs and the Bradley effect. And this was only a year ago. It seems like a lifetime ago.
Nellcote
@Bubblegum Tate:
LaPalin’s ‘no witnesses’ edicts always make me think of those heroes that stealth recorded concerts for bootleg recordings. Those guys had it down to an art!
MikeJ
@sloan: I love that complaining about the feminized media and counting on PUMAs to save the GOP.
calipygian
@sloan: This is from the article at Red State on why Palin-McCain was a mortal lock.
LMAOROFL!
eric
The dachau analogy really startled me. I mean come on. These people believe the shoah was all made up as it is. Doug. Nice touch on the lauryn hill.
kay
@MikeJ:
It’s so encouraging, because PUMA’s as a voting block were wholly media-created.
I love, love, love that they continue to rely on this stuff.
They must never change.
Scott de B.
Somebody needs to attend one of those events with a camera concealed in a crucifix, then publicly reveal it after the fact. Then, just sit back and watch their authoritarian and Christianist instincts collide.
jwb
@calipygian: “pogroms.”
So you’re saying that the next step is to revoice the wingnut wurlitzer so that rather than sounding the Hitler, Stalin, Mao stops for Obama and the dems they will instead be mixed back into the wingnut chorus. I agree that it will make a terrible, awesome sound, but it’s not really all that original. In fact, I’m pretty sure it’s a preset: full organ—totalitarian.
Just Some Fuckhead
@MikeJ: In fairness to Sloan, Dana Milbank is a little, uh, prissy.
Corner Stone
Get in the fucking end zone!!
Corner Stone
Ummm, football thread one day?
geg6
Corner Stone: No Stillers today. So JC no care. Monday night is the only important game. Also.
Corner Stone
Ok. I’m old – that’s a given. But am I wrong to really be enjoying the Taylor Swift Era?
kommrade reproductive vigor
@calipygian: Waaah! Pointing out anti-Semitism is anti-Semitic!
Christ. This shit always brings the fucking neo-Nazi’s and denialist sons of bitches out of their holes to explain the Holocaust wasn’t really that bad and share their theories on photo-doctoring.
Corner Stone
@geg6: Don’t get me wrong – I totally dig the photo open threads.
But, um, cursing and stuff seem to go better on football open threads.
Corner Stone
Super Mario!!
Fuck you Peytons Place!
jwb
@Corner Stone: Plus, the other football followers don’t know where to find your, um, comments.
Corner Stone
@jwb: Um, here maybe?
Texans v Colts.
jwb
@Corner Stone: But without a football thread, you have to know to look here to know that football commentary is going on here. Otherwise, people might think we’re talking about Bill Kristol. And why ruin a perfectly good football thread with the presence of Bill Kristol?
Mike in NC
If he flipped parties he’d probably have a lock on that seat for years to come. Can’t imagine the hate mail he’s getting today. Republican outreach to minorities and all that.
Corner Stone
@jwb: We’re on the same page here jwb.
Corner Stone
Ballgame.
jwb
@Mike in NC: I’m sure the haters are telling him that if he’s going to be a RINO he may as well join the Democrats. Fine by me.
4jkb4ia
OT: NYT story on movie “2012” has the following expert quote:
“It is not the end of the calendar, by any stretch of the imagination, and the Maya never said anything of the sort,” Dr. David Stuart, a professor in the art and art history department of the University of Texas at Austin, who has studied the Maya since he was a teenager, said in a phone interview. Dec. 21, 2012, is the beginning of a fourth phase, or baktun, (represented by the date sequence 13.0.0.0), in the Maya long-count calendar, but “there’s going to be a fourteenth baktun,” Dr. Stuart said….What the Maya might have done, he added, was project patterns of past baktuns onto the future, “but they’re not really prophecies.”
I am not sure how Pitt gets to be #8 after beating Syracuse, which was a foregone conclusion, but I’ll take it.
Corner Stone
Oh, and fwiw, I have a nice beef stew cooking in the crock pot.
I coated the stew meat with a nice flour/curry/cayenne powder mix, browned it in a sautee pan, then dumped it on top of a yellow onion/carrot/celery (mirepoix) & quatered home grown potatos, and covered with beef stock for 8 hours in the CP.
It’s actually a soup at this point but I took the flour combo and made a roux out of it after I put the beef into the CP. I’ll thicken it up later.
It’s going to be the balls. That’s right. Balls.
Mark S.
@jwb:
Why not combine the two?
Perhaps Kristol missed his true calling.
4jkb4ia
And the Big East was supposed to be nothing this year!
4jkb4ia
@jwb:
It is a function of districts, but Anh Cao can vote for this thing and Travis Childers appears to be entirely useless outside of voting for spending bills.
Corner Stone
Who the F throws the ball into the middle with 14 seconds and no timeouts left?
Missed left. Fuck me.
MBSS
i’ve got money on whichever football team kristol doesn’t pick.
jwb
@MBSS: A sure winner.
calipygian
@Mark S.: Holy shit that’s funny.
Ben Richards
@Corner Stone: that wide left sucked. Two weeks and we get ’em in Reliant
Corner Stone
@Ben Richards: Well, if Peyton throws 40 attempts in the first half next time I’m sad to say we’re prolly just as F’ed.
joe from Lowell
Absolutely. I remember reading about Ahmed Chalabi and Terri Schiavo in the Corner before 9/11.
Jack
Fred Barnes’ contributions to the genre should not be overlooked.
slippy
@sloan: The link you provided had a hilarious comment:
From commenter Tom Betz: “Stupak: A medical condition (subset of sepsis) resulting from unsafe – unnecessarily so – back alley abortions as a result of the “Stupak Amendment” to the 2009 Health Care Reform Bill.”
I think this should go in the BJ lexicon right away.