Posts by Jason Linkins

Jason Linkins is an associate editor at the Huffington Post, based in Washington, DC.

WaPo Unleashes Army of Anonymous Sources to Slag Public Option
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on August 19, 2009 at 3:49 PM.

I've said for a long time now that the press has long endeavored to diminish the public support for the "public option," characterizing it as one of those foolish and untenable pipe dreams of "the left" when it actually has mainstream support. At the same time, the Obama administration has spun like a weather vane, conveying that a robust "public option" was essential to health care reform on one day, shruggingly suggesting that it would not be all that important the next. In today's Washington Post, we have an article in which they attempt to make these two great tastes taste great together.

Michael D. Shear and Ceci Connolly's piece is headlined, "Debate's Path Caught Obama by Surprise." Of course! WHO KNEW THAT THE PUBLIC OPTION WOULD BECOME SO IMPORTANT TO PEOPLE? Circa August 19, the President apparently had no idea that people were so het up over it!

But at a time when the president had hoped to be selling middle-class voters on how insurance reforms would benefit them, the White House instead finds itself mired in a Democratic Party feud over an issue it never intended to spotlight.

This makes perfect sense! When you want to be busying yourself "selling middle-class voters on how insurance reforms would benefit them," you don't want to be caught flatfooted by something like the "public option," even though it's basically how you get to the beneficial insurance reforms. Now, the President has to hold a "strategy call" on which "he will not 'draw a line in the sand' about the inclusion of a public plan and make clear that no one provision is a 'deal breaker' as long as the final legislation embraces his broad principles for reform." I HOPE YOU ARE SATISFIED, "public option" proponents.

By the way! This article has some of the finest anonymous sourcery I have ever encountered. Shear and Connolly turn loose all sorts of critics on the "public option," none of whom have the guts to sign their name to their criticism:

"I don't understand why the left of the left has decided that this is their Waterloo," said a senior White House adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "We've gotten to this point where health care on the left is determined by the breadth of the public option. I don't understand how that has become the measure of whether what we achieve is health-care reform."

Nice work! An unnamed White House official blasts "the left" with the GOP's "Waterloo" talking point, and frames the popular "public option" as a fringe-supported side item. Fantastic. You should DEFINITELY LET THE WHITE HOUSE GET AWAY WITH THAT, MICHAEL AND CECI!

Elsewhere, we have "another top aide" expressing "chagrin that a single element" in the "sprawling health-care initiative" is a "litmus test" for the administration's seriousness. You also get an anonymous Democratic "strategist" lamenting that the emphasis on the "public option" was the equivalent to "leading with our glass jaw," telling the post, "We felt we probably shouldn't make health-care reform be about this because it falls so easily into the socialized medicine, big-government theme."

In fact, these aides and advisers are wrong and the "left of the left" is right. A new poll from Rasmussen shows that Americans want a public option, and support for reform collapses without it.

Just 34% of voters nationwide support the health care reform plan proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats if the so-called "public option" is removed. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that 57% oppose the plan if it doesn't include a government-run health insurance plan to compete with private insurers.

The article does feature Richard Kirsch of Health Care For America Now, supporting the public option on the record. Unfortunately, he is set off by this guy:

One Democratic Obama ally lamented that the push for a public plan has become synonymous with victory on health-care reform.

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Lou Dobbs Accused of Acting Like "Grassy Knoll Nut"
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on July 30, 2009 at 8:00 AM.

Lou Dobbs, whose flaxen locks change color and hue depending on how terrified he is that day of the coming Mexican reconquista, is all about the birthers now. And everyone is yelling at him, save his boss, Jon Klein, who's busy pretending that Dobbs is covering the controversy instead of fanning it. Who's yelling at him today? Chris Wallace and Don Imus, for starters!

[LISTEN]

WALLACE: You know, I guess what surprises me is that one of our competitors, I'm not going to say their name, but their initials are CNN, they're saying, well, we really can't decide for the public what a legitimate news story is, so we'll cover it; what if a bunch of people decided the earth is flat, we're now going to report that story and let people vent on that? That's what news organizations are about, is debunking and editing and deciding what's relevant and what's worth talking about, and what isn't, and clearly the birth certificate story isn't worth talking about because it isn't true. And I think to everybody's satisfaction it's been demonstrated it's not true. I'm a little surprised -- you know, I'm not surprised that people will do things, because some people will do something for ratings every time.

IMUS: Like, uh, I guess leading the charge is my friend, by the way, Lou Dobbs, who appears on this program on a regular basis, and I like -- love Lou, known him for years, but it makes him look like a grassy knoll nut.

WALLACE: Well, exactly, exactly. But either grassy knoll nut or just so calculating in his sense, well, there's some audience out there and I'll chase it.

IMUS: I can't believe Lou Dobbs would do that, do you?

WALLACE: Oh no, no --

IMUS: Or you either.

I know. You're going to want to take a minute to wash that thick film of irony off of your hands and face. Go ahead. I'll give you a minute.

Also yelling at Lou Dobbs? Time Magazine's Mark Halperin, for Pete's sake! You know you've messed up when Halperin's walking around with the upper hand on you.

[LISTEN]

Mark Halperin reserves the right to revisit the issue if at some point in the future he can construct a list of nine random factoids about it.

John Ensign Sex Scandal Escalates: "It's Not Good"
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on July 10, 2009 at 3:00 PM.

For a long while, the inspiring tale of Mark Sanford's Latin American jaunt on or near "the sex line" had gripped America with its romantic melodrama. You can read more about it in the forthcoming Tropic Of Capricorn 2: Buenos Aires Nights, by Henry Miller. But as much as the heart wants more from the Mark Sanford story, like "positions explored" and "quantity of white zinfandel consumed," it's now time for the body to get really interested in this whole John Ensign affair story.

So, the dilly: John Ensign, Nevada Senator, copped to having an affair with Cynthia Hampton, who was for a time on his campaign staff. The television media got all worked up about it, saying things like, "This is bad news for Ensign, one of the GOP's presidential contenders." And people like me replied, "Wait! John Ensign is a presidential contender?" later adding, "Seriously, you can't possibly think this guy was ever going to be a presidential contender." And Ensign was thought to be working out all his difficulties with some group called the "C Street Foundation," which describes itself as a "Bible study group" but is actually some sort of detox facility for Congresspersons who are way into sexcapades.

That's when the even shinier Mark Sanford story hit the news, along with Sarah Palin's "Oration On The Verbal Frappe Currently Coursing Out Of My Mouth In Alaska, Because I Have No Political Advisers Who Are Worth A Good God Damn." And Marion Barry straight up stalked a lady, in DC, because he is crazypants. But now: Ensign!

Driving Ensign back into the news are escalating exchanges between Hampton's husband and Ensign's allies over who got paid how much and for what, why, and when. It's all crazy confusing, the sex-scandal equivalent of the Purple Ticket Inauguration fiasco, but I think we have a handle on it:

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Release of "Holy Grail" Torture Document Delayed
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on June 26, 2009 at 2:42 PM.

About a month and half ago, we made note of the way the stars seemed to be aligning for the release of ex-CIA Inspector General John Helgerson's classifed report on the CIA's detentions and interrogations program, the so-called "Holy Grail" of torture-related documents.

This document was believed to have ramifications in the ongoing debate about the efficacy of torture, which has been cast only too recently by the media as an epic national security battle between President Barack Obama and former Vice President Dick Cheney. As Greg Sargent noted, back in May:

Dem Congressional staffers tell me this report is the "holy grail," because it is expected to detail torture in unprecedented detail and to cast doubt on the claim that torture works -- and its release will almost certainly trigger howls of protest from conservatives. Tellingly, neither the CIA nor the White House knocked down the story in response to my questions, with spokespeople for both declining comment.

A month ago, I wondered of the threat of this disclosure might temper Cheney's outspoken support for those torture policies. Clearly, it did not!

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Michael Savage Issues Fatwa Against Media Matters
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on June 25, 2009 at 6:00 AM.

I'm having a hard time discerning the logic behind talk-radio host Michael Savage's recent threat to post pictures and "pertinent information" about the people who work for Media Matters For America on his website. Oh, wait! I see my mistake! I am sitting here, contemplating Michael Savage, and attempting to "discern logic." Okay, my bad.

The story goes like this: Michael Savage hates him some Media Matters folks, for constantly harping on his craziness, and probably because he blames the media watchdog organization for the way he was banned from entering Great Britain by Home Secretary Jacqui Smith. So, Savage recently called upon "all people in the media who have been harassed by this Stalinist group, Media Matters, to join forces to publish the names of the people and put their pictures up on their websites." Ahh, yes! Who can forget the robust growth of media watchdog groups that flourished under Stalin!

[LISTEN]

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GOP Senate Candidate: What Iran Needs Is More Guns
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on June 22, 2009 at 1:30 PM.

If you are not a regular user of Twitter, you might have some sort of "life," filled with "friends" and "activities," which offers you a sense of "meaning" and "solace" in these uncertain times. But at the same time, you would have almost certainly missed out on the wit and wisdom of Florida senatorial candidate Marco Rubio, who opined, thusly:

I have a feeling the situation in Iran would be a little different if they had a 2nd amendment like ours. #sayfie #tcot #nra

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Obama FCC Nominee Comes Out Against Fairness Doctrine -- Will Conservatives Finally Stop Freaking Out?
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on June 18, 2009 at 4:44 AM.

So, for the better part of the past year, right-wing radio talkers have been sore afraid that President Barack Obama was going to reimpose this piece of legislation called the "Fairness Doctrine." And right along, I've been trying -- vainly! -- to chill people out, and let them know that no such thing was going to happen.

What is the "Fairness Doctrine?" Imposed in 1949, the Fairness Doctrine mandated that the scarcity of media resources made it necessary that FCC license holders allow competing points of view to have equal time and access. In practice, the Fairness Doctrine was always tricky to enforce, and so in 1987 is was done away with. In the immediate offing, right wing radio flourished. Of course, since then, the media has expanded to include satellite radio and cable television and the internet, eliminating the original "scarcity of resources" argument that underpinned the Fairness Doctrine in the first place, while greatly complicating a media sphere that the law couldn't handle well when it was implemented nearly sixty years ago.

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So Much for Not 'Looking Backwards' ... RNC Remixes 1964 'Daisy' Ad for Gitmo
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on May 22, 2009 at 11:03 AM.

Hey kids! Am I mistaken, or did some "titular" head of the Republican National Committee recently stand in front of teevee cameras and say all this junk?

Today we are declaring an end to the era of Republicans looking backwards. We have just endured two successful elections where we were soundly defeated. As a result, many of us, me included, have done some soul searching. We have looked closely at the places we went wrong. We have talked openly and publicly about our mistakes and our deficiencies. If you don't learn from the past, you're doomed to repeat it. This has indeed been a difficult, yet I think healthy and necessary task for the party.

Yes! 'Twas Michael Steele, who went on to admonish "navel gazing" and reiterate that "the time to fix or focus on the past had ended," and that new Republican ideas would hitherto come free with any medium or large pizza, at Pie-Tanza.

And so, with that in mind, the reinvigorated RNC, focused on the future, spurred on by hip-hop beats, strode out of the hall and -- immediately cut an ad that referenced a 1964 ad from Lyndon Johnson?

That's right! Behold the RNC's new remix of "Daisy," the sixties-era bit of LBJ fearmongering that remains one of the most well-known campaign ads of all time. FROM THE PAST. In it, the RNC builds a powerful case that closing Gitmo will result in the ghost of Nikita Khrushchev blowing up the past with hydrogen bombs so that Oceanic Flight 815 never crashes or something.

Oh, and watch carefully! In the middle or so, you'll hear Press Secretary Robert Gibbs clipped in such a way that it appears he is saying that closing GITMO was a "hasty decision" the Obama administration made. Actually, Gibbs was referring to the poor decision-making of the previous administration. Another future-minded thing the RNC might want to focus on is not including such easily debunked content in their issue ads.

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Jon Stewart Mocks the Nonsensical Aversion to Closing Guantanamo Bay
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on May 20, 2009 at 2:14 PM.

Previously, on Eat The Press, I had taken great pains to mock many of the inane arguments for why it is nonsensical to be told by the grown-ups who preside in the House and Senate, as well as those who pundit for a living on the teevee that American prisons -- sufficient to house all manner of depraved criminals -- were not up to the task of also housing the terrorists currently at Gitmo. Apparently, these grown-ups are unaware of America's awesome and terrifying ability to incarcerate people while simultaneously possessed by the belief that these detainees have MAGIC POWERS. Last week, the House GOP crafted a dumb bill called the Keep Terrorists Out Of America Act, sculpted from pure angel feces. And this week, the Senate Democrats caved in to the nonsense, removing the funding that President Barack Obama requested in the war spending bill to close the prison.

Jon Stewart took up the matter last night, and in just six minutes time, delivered what should be considered the most comprehensive mocking of this cavalcade of poor reasoning, bad decisions and unadulterated stupidity. You get the weird fears over the detainees, the illogic of NOT housing them in the middle of a prison in the middle of an Army base and the shrugging irresponsibility of Republicans and Democrats alike. And just for good measure, he adds to the mix a guy named Joseph Garner, who pulled someone's brain out of a person, ATE it, and is TERRIFYINGLY INDIFFERENT about it.

By the way, I'm guessing that the plucked brain was the one that used to belong to New York Representative Peter King.

[Watch the video after the flip.]

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Jesse Ventura Goes Head to Head With Sean Hannity
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on May 19, 2009 at 11:49 AM.

Thanks to all the Media Monitors who highlighted last night's entertaining tilt between Sean Hannity and former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura. Hannity, didn't "want to go down the old road" last night with Ventura, who's made his antipathy for the Bush administration abundantly clear. So the Fox host instead pitched a segment of "new questions" to Ventura. And then, within seconds, the conversation immediately shifted to teleprompters. Jeezy creezy. Have you heard about how our monster president became the first person to ever employ this Satanic device of Pure Fraudulence?

This is new: "George Bush inherited the negative impact of 9/11." That's apparently a new counter to the old refrain about how Obama "inherited" all sorts of turd sandwiches from his predecessor. I suppose I'm supposed to accept the premise that a President can "inherit" the fallout of an event that happens nine months into their term.

Jesse Ventura, I like the way his mind works! Hannity attempts a weird a rambling case about the Clinton administration's inattention to terrorists, and just as I am imagining the obvious rebuttal, Ventura calmly enunciates it:

HANNITY: There were a group of radicals that were at war with the United States and we weren't at war with them. We saw the first Trade Center bombing, the Embassy bombings, the USS Cole, and we think radicals that think God is going to reward them in Heaven with virgins. Jesse, how do you stop them.

VENTURA: Well, you pay attention to memos on August 6 that tell you exactly what bin Laden's gonna do.

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Jon Stewart Slams Obama's Poetry Jam
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on May 14, 2009 at 11:02 AM.

Jon Stewart may have couched the criticism in a self-deprecating way -- by casting himself as "Old Man Stewart" standing alone, fists a-shakin' in the general direction of the White House -- but he nevertheless continues to prove wrong the people who say that comedians aren't willing to mine the Obama administration for laughs. In this clip, Stewart lampoons the recent "poetry jam" that the first family held at the White House, which honestly does come off a little on the thuddingly pretentious. But listen to me! If Barack Obama were to host Fugazi in the Map Room I'd probably "spend my wad," like Michele Bachmann says. "Mr. President, it's less than four months and you're letting spoken word artists into the People's House? Take it down a notch. What are you going to start running a college radio station out of the basement."

That's Old Man Stewart. You surely know that there was once a Jon Stewart who played soccer at William And Mary who would have totally eaten the Barack Obama White House Def Poetry Jam up. Because he would have done it on weed.

WATCH:

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Busted: Fox News Caught Repeatedly Cropping, Manipulating Video
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on May 5, 2009 at 10:39 AM.

Hey, kids! Do you ever get tired of Fox News' crops? I don't mean the food they might be literally growing, in Glenn Beck's Doom Room, in preparation for Imminent Socialist Panic. I'm talking about the way they manipulate video to make it look like people are just straight up saying the opposite thing they actually said. Well, it's been bothering the media critics at Media Matters For America for some time, and they have, for a long time, been cataloging "examples of Fox News hosts and correspondents cropping comments by progressives and Democratic political figures in a manner that misrepresents them." A new mash-up video offers some side-by-side examples of what they're talking about:

Some constructive criticism? I think the third example -- Obama's "empathy" criteria for Supreme Court justice -- isn't the best example of a Fox cropping. While it's certainly true that Major Garrett's statement, "That aggravates those who feel that justices should follow the Constitution and legislative intent," seems to neatly ignore the fact that Obama's next statement was "I will seek someone who is dedicated to the rule of law, who honors our Constitutional traditions, who respects the integrity of the judicial process, and the appropriate limits of the judicial role," the fact is, just about every news organization honed in on the "empathy" part of the statement. It became the sound bite from that press exchange.

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GOP Pigs Stripped 'Flu Pandemic Preparedness' From Stimulus
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on April 27, 2009 at 9:17 AM.

Remember way back in the day, President Obama delivered his Not Really The State Of The Union address, and the GOP trotted out Future Of The Republican Party Supra-Genius Bobbly Jindal to provide a rebuttal? Well, we all had some laughs, didn't we? Mainly because Jindal was all: "They want to spend stimulus money on volcano monitoring? Why everyone knows that the Hill Witch keeps tabs on our volcanoes by floating chicken bones in her own intestinal ichor!" And then Alaska's Mount Redoubt erupted, suggesting there might be something to this "let's monitor volcanoes with government-funded science" idea.

Well, as it turns out, volcano monitoring wasn't the only worthwhile public safety program that was deemed extravagant in the stimulus package, funding for pandemic preparation was axed as well. And playing a critical role was Susan Collins -- for whom the necessity of obtaining her vote is in inverse proportion to the intelligence she shows in policy making:

Famously, Maine Senator Collins, the supposedly moderate Republican who demanded cuts in health care spending in exchange for her support of a watered-down version of the stimulus, fumed about the pandemic funding: "Does it belong in this bill? Should we have $870 million in this bill No, we should not."

Even now, Collins continues to use her official website to highlight the fact that she led the fight to strip the pandemic preparedness money out of the Senate's version of the stimulus measure.

Naturally, it's tough to keep an economy stimulated if productivity gets diminished by a pandemic. And, hey, it turns out that the lack of a stable and well-funded public health infrastructure may not be so good for economic recovery as a whole:

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Lesbian YouTube Video Embraced By Virginia GOP
Posted by Jason Linkins, Huffington Post on April 14, 2009 at 11:04 AM.

Ahh, the Republican Party of Virginia. You know, in the recent past, they've sort of given the world no indication that they're anything other than a dysfunctional, Twitter-abusing, confused and chagrined state party in precipitous decline. This hasn't changed at all. But we have to hand it to them: they're finding even newer ways to screw up, royally.

As Virginia political blog Not Larry Sabato details, someone who runs the RPV's official YouTube channel was apparently way into a YouTube video titled "The Kiss," a video that could potentially redefine the age-old "Virginia is for lovers" motto to include lesbian softcore erotica. I think you'll agree, this video is probably NSFW, unless you work for the Republican Party of Virginia.

Sadly, however, this brief flirtation with edge came to an end after someone removed this content from the RPV's YouTube channel. It's just like the Amazon fail in reverse! That's too bad! Those ladies worked very hard on their phallic simulacra and really appeared to care about one another as they convincingly navigated the awkwardness of their feeling for one another to the swelling strains of some annoyingly repetitive piano vamping. Luckily, Not Larry Sabato preserved the memory with this screenshot.

Sadly, nothing that remains on the RPV's YouTube Channel is remotely erotic, not even this MESSAGE FROM THE SAXMAN, which I had high hopes for, but was ultimately sort of a let down:

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Jon Stewart Says 'F*ck You' to Cramer; Update: Cramer Strikes Back
Posted by Jason Linkins, Nick Sabloff , Huffington Post on March 10, 2009 at 11:55 AM.

Editor's note: Continue through to the end of this piece to read Cramer's response.

Jon Stewart, whose pointed takedown of the network CNBC last week has already become legendary, returned to the subject Monday in response to host Jim Cramer's complaint that he was taken out of context during the segment.

Stewart began by clarifying that the "Daily Show" had planned to air its epic dissection of CNBC's follies before the now infamous Rick Santelli was scheduled to appear on the program, as opposed to having done so in response to him canceling on that appearance.

In regards to Cramer, Stewart addressed the host's suggestion that the "Daily Show" had used a particular clip from his show "Mad Money" to make it look as if he had recommended buying Bear Stearns stock a week before it collapsed.

Stewart conceded the point to Cramer, saying with mockery, "I apologize, that was out of context, technically you were correct, you weren't suggesting to buy Bear Stearns." But wait: "That was something you did five days earlier, in your buy and sell segment."

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