Not that I don't think you're a smart guy. You are intelligent, but in that regard, you're not unique. There are plenty of smart people around, including many of who are in the media. You're no genius, and neither am I. But you get this. I get this. A LOT of people get this.

So I have to ask any reporters who might be reading this, why don't you?

I think the reporters think that if they fellate Bush and Cheney enough, they'll like them.

It's ALL about access, and Rove et. al. know this.  They know they can get their way if they withold access enough to get a friendly press.  In this way, the press has sold out.  The days of Nixon are gone.

Hey Matt,

So you're a fan of Fire-Sign Theatre too!! "Nick Danger".. so many of our brains are awash with the indelible sweet hilarity of the Fire-Sign Theatre wackos.

When will the reporters figure out that access to propaganda is no access at all?  They could just dial that crap in from home, in their PJ's!  (hmmmm?!)

Or do they all think they're going to get rich like Knees Woodward?  

Clearly, in the latter case, they are in the wrong profession.

Y'all are assuming that Beutler's arguing in good faith.  He's not.

Kos pegged it it the last Beutler thread: Beutler's a Republican; he told Kos this himself.  And as a Republican, he has a vested interest in trashing the liberal part of the blogosphere.

I like how we are considered "the party of conspiracy theories" but the right-wing bitterly chants the biggest conspiracy of all, the "liberal media."

To them, Glenn Greenwald wrote, ANYTHING and ANYBODY is a cog in the "liberal media" if it/they are not as blind to the truth about the Bush administration as they are. Plain and simple.

then logically it follows that fair journalism will have a liberal agenda too.

Being "fair" does not mean giving equal consideration to different viewpoints (where one is based on shameless lying), it means standing up for the truth no matter what.

Journalists have failed that test miserably. They are not standing up for the truth but engaging in postmodern "he said she said" relativism.

In the US today facts indeed have a liberal agenda. Our system is tilted to the right - there are no parties like the GOP in the rest of the western world. The reason is that GOP would not survive if the media here was less biased and less occupied with "he said she said" nonsense.

Bush has liead to the American people repeatedly, this is a F-A-C-T and there is no need to balance that fact with more GOP lies.

note: I assume this is legit.

Robert Hahn, Executive Director of the Free Republic Network, posting as "Nick Danger" explains how he met JD Guckert at Grover Norquist's Wednesday meeting.

In the interests of full disclosure, can you briefly describe the Free Republic Network's connections to Grover Norquist?

   Allow me to answer that. Grover Norquist is one of several people who informally advises FRN on a number of issues. By 'informally' I mean that none of these people has any authority over anything we do; they just give us ideas or advice when we ask for it.

   As you may know, Norquist's office is host every Wednesday to a meeting that is attended by representives from practically every conservative organization on the planet. The White House, Senator Frist's office, and Speaker Hastert's office also send representatives, and they tell us about the legislative agenda or other policy topics. Conservative candidates from around the country come there to introduce themselves. Virtually any group that has something going on can get a minute or two on the agenda, and I have done so numerous times to promote things the FRN was doing, such as the "Rally for America" events we did back in March. This is also how I was able to arrange for Angelwood to attend a speech given by President Bush. It is how we met Jeff Gannon of Talon News, who now hosts a program on Radio FR. In short, Grover Norquist has been of enormous help to us in connecting us with other people and organizations that share our goals.

   He can do that because he is widely respected in the conservative community in Washington. I wish that I could take a webcam into the Wednesday meeting with me so that I could flash it around and show our fellow Freepers just how seriously people in Washington are taking Mr. Gaffney's crusade. You are making this out to be some kind of big deal, when in fact it's just one Nut On A Mission who has managed to convince a few people that he has something. What he has is a list of scary-sounding Arab names and a gift for placing them in the same sentence with the words "Grover Norquist" and shouting Booga Booga!

   If I ever see any guys in sheets with AK-47's in his office, I'll let you know. So far all I've seen in there is a veritable Who's Who of conservative politics.

http://ancapistan.typepad.com/photos/bec oming_gannon_photos/norquist_hahn_frss.h tml

So, they feel compassion for Cheney.  He made a mistake.  Wonder where their compassion is when they're screaming to "string up" other people who have made "mistakes" and get to rot in hell.  Drugs would be one good example of this.

Some good posts here that start to to answer the questions about where does the BS and start and where does it go ?

WHO distributes the GOP talking points, the key phrases on everyone's lips each Sunday. You know, like when John Stewart get clips of people on 6 different shows using the same words like "tipping point?" Is this Grover Norquist ?

WHO actually watches the bizzare scripted town meetings with Bush where people (I mean prescreened shills and plants) get up and say "How can WE help you Mr. President?" and "I want to say that we thank God you are our leader." I mean, they spend a lot of time and money on this crap. Is this going out to some sort of cable radio channel ? It's going going SOMEWHERE, what is the outlet?

There are many different animals in the zoo. There is an old paleoconservative culture, these folks are not very disturbing to me, they just have a different culture, agenda goals, etc. Then you have the neocons, who want to use the American military to create an actual empire. They will stop at nothing to accomplish this. They will lie, cheat, steal, dissemble, etc. I think there is also a group of people who act as if they are sort of confused about whether they are paleoconservatives or neocons; in general, you could say they haven't quite finished drinking the cool-aid. I would put Ronald Reagan and George F. Will in this category.

You can almost always tell which type you are dealing with if you can determine how insincerely they are dealing with you. This Nick Danger at Redstate, like 90% of the others there, is pure neocon. He (she?) is a slimy thing. I have argued about some things with this Nick Danger at Redstate -- for example Scott Ritter, the republican paleoconservative weapons inspector who tried to prevent the step into empire that the Iraq occupation represents. He hates Ritter. You can be sure that none of the paleoconservatives is at all fond of the Redstate chumps -- whate sane person would care for a site that is actually run by and for these neocon trolls?

I will never go back to Redstate again. When I first signed up there, I noticed in the corner of my eye the declaration "We turn trolls into cash." (Of course, this is said by the nasty neocon trolls themselves.) I think what it really means is, if they do not think you are a neocon like them, they will sell your registration information to spammers. That is exactly the low and dirty kind of thing these cheesy neocon trolls would pull. 90% there have no honest bone in their body. They like having an empire so they can push other people around, and they love to lie and cheat.

If this Beutler came around, and didn't let on that he is a Republican, but is one, then you can probably bet that he is also a neocon.

I have given up 100% on the corporate media machine and it's employees. It is like a vast wasteland, which I may have to travel regularly, but you will not find me investing any energy in trying to renovate it.

"This is part of the human condition. We all make mistakes, and every once in a while one of the mistakes causes something really, seriously, bad to happen. To beat somebody up over one of those things, as Democrats who work for media companies have been doing to the Vice President for two weeks now, is positively inhumane."

Gee, I don't recall anybody over there on the Right expressing this kind of sympathy for Bill Clinton when he made a mistake....

I've come to think of the mass media as a designed foil for republicans to point their sheeple to and say: "Those people are the enemy" because occasionally they have something that sounds liberal (i.e. may have a grain of truth to it) on television though always in a carefully couched and controlled way. While the media owners and Conservative leaders wink to eachother behind closed doors.

The two have the same goals, making money by farming the dutiful little sheeple and making sure those sheeple stay quiet and focused on enemies other than them.

Many reporters are right wing nuts and/or deeply connected to right wing politics. I don't think the press is mistaking the intent of right wing pressure, I think the "liberals" are still living in a world of crusading newspapers and muckraking reporters which is totally gone. Reagan purged the papers and 30 years later there is an entrenched culture in which poor medicaid sufferers and Iraqi cripples are laughable, and it is conventional wisdom that dropping wages imply good economy.