Swiftboating, Salon does it again

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2006/06/03/kennedy/index_np.html

What is it with Salon lately: this moron attacks both Mark Crispin Miller and RFK Jr while defending the fraud that went on by claiming it cannot be proved.

Salon is so busy rushing toward credibility on par with fair and balanced that it has lost any ethical standing it had, with me anyway.

"Whatever his aim, RFK Jr. does not appear intent on fixing the problem. He's more content to take us through a hit parade of the most popular, and the most dismissible, theories purporting to show that John Kerry won Ohio, theories that have been swirling about the blogosphere ever since the race was called. I scoured his Rolling Stone article for some novel story or statistic or theory that would prove, finally, that George W. Bush was not the true victor. But nothing here is new. If you've spent time on Democratic Underground or have read Mark Crispin Miller's "Fooled Again," you're already familiar with everything Kennedy has to say."

Start here http://www.salon.com/news/cookie756.html.

At least for now.

The GAO report is not a theory. Nor is the Conyers Report.
Salon could at least take a strong stand on right wing corporations
using secret software to count our votes which on its face is a subversion of democracy. Yeah keep dismissing the ever expanding list of facts and bizarre coincidences you traitorous shitbag gate keepers.

:nuke:

Yeesh.

And ARRGH!

Ironically, as a Premium subscriber to Salon! I hold that website in high regard, and will read their article carefully. I owe them that much. But at first glance it looks sorta "squishy", and may not really refute it. I had already been planning on referring to that Rolling Stone article on my union BBS (a few Bush-lovers there!), when I spotted this. But I'll hold off pending serious reading of both articles. I suggest others here to do the same. I'll follow this thread and hope to see the sort of open-minded discussion I've come to expect here at DU.

pnorman

security vs. insecurity

Nope, it's the other way around. The powers-that-be who run elections have to prove that he was.

Most basic rule of democratic elections. Transparency.

Salon.com is a superficial gossip rag. "A hit parade of the most popular..." They're talking about themselves. THEY are a 'hit parade" of the "most popular," the most sellable, the least substantative, the most candyass, the least rigorous, the most unimportant, the shallowest, the least revolutionary, the most fluffy and the least useful claptrap of the Left. RFK Jr. has more intellectual strength and integrity in his little finger than can be found in all of salon.com. "Salon" is a good name for them--a place where the idle rich dabble in poetry and ideas.

Where salon.com will be, when Homeland Security comes to drag you away...

:hide:

That's always been my impression too.

They were the "there is no stolen election" cheerleaders when all the bizarre glitches in the 2004 election first started coming out. Haven't they ever heard of the saying "the tip of the iceberg"? I guess they don't believe you can steal an election by rigging the vote.

But I have to say RFK Jr. sure did a fine job on that Rolling Stones article. He had over 200 footnotes. Where are Farhad Manjoo's footnotes? Does he make up his facts or are we suppose to trust him?

CNN had RFK Jr. on last night and he told Wolf that Wolf was wrong. I loved it.

Now CNN is having a fit because they found out Chavez owns one of the major voting machine companies. I am just :rofl:

Our intrepid reporter, Farhad Manjoo, was dispatched by Salon right after the '04 election to determine if there were voting irregularities in Ohio.

Manjoo looked at a couple documents, and filed a lenghthy piece where he decided the answer was "No."

For months afterward, he was challenged by readers, and bloggers like Josh Marshall. He started to get nasty. He kept insisting that there was nothing to see here, Bush won, fair and square, get over it.

I haven't seen anything written by Manjoo on Salon's front page in ages. Until I clicked this morning, and this Buckeye's blood began boiling all over again.

I'm not sure what Manjoo's motive is, but I'd sure like to find out.

I won't be renewing it. I've noticed the same thing with them. I'm fed up and pissed off. They look more and more like TNR now.

I've been a Salon Premium subscriber since at least 2001.

I, too, have watched the online magazine morph from a lone voice of sanity in the post-2000 election wilderness to a mainstream, middle-of-the-road, rather poorly-written and irrelevant online rag in just about five years.

When I first subscribed, Salon was relatively alone. Since then, I find myself reading Atrios, TalkingPointsMemo, Huffington Post and the like far more, and for free, I might add.

Not to mention that their television writer, Heather Havrilesky, is just awful. Really, really awful. She writes like a high-schooler, and it's pretty embarrassing.

That Manjoo character really pissed me off just after the 2004 election, but I held on, because Sidney Blumenthal, Peter Daou and Tim Grieve are so good.

But, come the end of June (when my sub expires), I'm dunzo with Salon.

because of offensive "reportage" such as this--the prime offenders being Manjoo and Michelle Goldberg. I, too, appreciate Blumenthal and enjoyed their discussion board, but enough is enough!

Whatever happened to the Salon that ran the story that revealed the hypocrisy of the Republicans intent on impeaching President Clinton - the Henry Hyde "youthful indiscretion"?

I find little I even want to read there anymore. Blumenthal articles are usually covered by The Guardian.

:kick:

a mag reveals it true position. Helps us folk navigate the landscape better.

I expected RFK Jr to be swiftboated. But by fucking Salon?

to restoring democracy to the United States. To say he "does not appear intent on fixing the problem" is about as foolish as saying he is not intent upon protecting the environment. The author of the Salon article is a mere parasite, hoping to benefit from pretending to have an opinion about Robert's stance on this important issue.

That's rather like saying Melinda Barton represents all of Raw Story.

Barton's piece, while no one agreed with it, including me, was an opinion piece and the rebuttal was posted as well. This is a news piece attacking another news piece, and there is no rebuttal. That said, Salon had lost me a bit back when in their race to credibility they passed up integrity by cowering, by letting personal fights become a weapon against the free press, and so forth. Just like the NYT has no credibility with me for its inaccurate reporting and defense of it, Salon has no credibility with me for its pandering. I look at bylines now only and Risen I read, NYT proper, no way. Or Pincus I read, WaPo proper? No way.

Salon, has but two writers I read and they publish so infrequently that there is no point. Blumenthal writes for the Guardian mostly it seems of late and Conosan is doing more for other publications and focusing on books. Sorry, but I cannot respect an organization that attacks alternative media on a regular basis in order to be part of the establishment. The irony is that Salon was THE alternative media. It was fresh, it was honest, it was my place for news. As it grew in prominence, it became the very thing it was fighting against. That is not the same as a single opinion piece, one that I did not and do not agree with to begin with and said so over and over.

who regards both pieces as commentary based on the authors' interpretation of the facts as they see them.

That is how I read anything presented as fact, by first considering the source. My hometown newspaper is the Chicago Tribune, so I have the better part of a lifetime of experience picking and choosing among reporters and columnists to find sources I consider reliable, and I continue this tradition online. On Salon I have seldom seen Farhad Manjoo's work outside the War Room, where his point of view is usually a disappointment to me, but I am interested in what Tim Grieve reports on and how he reports it.

Grieve frequently cites Raw Story in his reporting, and Raw Story is a fixture on the War Room's blogroll. This has given me, an average reader, the impression that Raw Story is favorably viewed on Salon, where I can recall no concerted attack on alternative media. I can only guess that the "personal fights" you refer to involve Grieve's criticism of Jason Leopold, spurred by the recent tempest over his reporting.

Be assured that Jason Leopold and Melinda Barton are two topics of discussion that bore the piss out of me. After I got the gist of both sides of each argument I had to resort to hiding threads on DU, so thorough was my lack of interest. None of the arguments changed my mind about anything. As for Grieve, I suppose he had a dog in one of those fights, but he likewise had no impact on my opinion.

I am not a baby-out-with-the-bathwater kind of person. I don't see one criticism of alternative media (or even two counting today's story) any more reason to discount Salon than Barton's opinion or Leopold's past are reasons to discount Raw Story. Perhaps, as a Salon-favored alternative media source, Raw Story can offer Salon the rebuttal Manjoo's piece deserves.

but again, there is a world of difference between an opinion piece - which can be based on nothing more than day dreams, and a news piece. just to clarify: leopold wrote for RS for roughly 3 months last year, during which time we frequently bylined together. those RS pieces, all but three, were later confirmed by other news reports. so i am not sure how Leopold's past would discount RS. that said, Leopold's past has a direct relationship with Salon and is far more complex... the allegation is that Salon did not back him when they came under fire from higher ups. they claimed he sourced poorly and that he imagined or made up a source. but Paul Krugman came to Leopold's defense because the source allowed Jason to pass the information on to Krugman. I simply think that given the conflict of interest, they should have sat that one out, there were than enough attackers on the hunt.

on the point of alt media: there is much criticism, but it is done behind the scenes in a juvenile way (a good example would be the news list at HuffPo, where Alternet, To, RS, Mother Jones, Harpers, etc. are all missing, but drudge is there). i any case, i don't want to get into it, because this is not about RS vs. Salon and you are right that both (leadership) respect one another. i am simply speaking for myself, alone. as for barton: i was quite offended by her piece and said so, but it is opinion and it does not require facts - facts simply make it better opinion, nothing more. Grieve i have liked for a long time, but there is - again - behind the scenes crap that goes on which reminds me much of high school and it is not something i want to be part of nor can i admire those who engage in such tactics, even if i respect their work. yes, i am being vague, sorry.

i wish someone would write the rebuttal for RS as I am mired in Iran work and have been for some time. thanks for thoughtful comments. :)

Leaving aside for the moment the question of if the 2000 and 2004 elections were fixed, is there any provision in the law that would change the results if we were proved right? And if not what are we going to accomplish?

The main reason I bring up that question is that we're so focused on the last elections we could well be risking the next one over it. I posted a little on a debate board attached to a large online game yesterday and although they had a thread about the Rolling Stones article the debate was all about the past and if the allegations were true or not. They weren't even aware of the more recent Black Box Voting report that showed the machines we'll use in the next election can be hacked with five minutes of access and not leave a trace, the hack being persistent from election to election.

The problem we face for the next election should concern both sides, it has where I've pointed it out, but the past debate is more partisan and harder to prove. If we can't change the results of the last election and we risk the next one by losing/confusing a real and current issue behind old news then maybe it is time to evaluate the difference between making a gesture and working a change.

However deliberate election fraud is probably felony material, and a conspiracy to do so could be far reaching. I'd settle for a large number of asshats doing serious time in their lovely federal super-max gulag. I have a very long list and it gets longer every day of folks who need to go to jail.

I just don't want to lose the next election too in the process. If those machines aren't fixed, don't even show a trace of being hacked and can't be recounted that looks like an issue to me. It's also persistant from election to election, the hack doesn't go away.

Read this, I think we need to be on it. There is no security, the whole system is wide open and the next election at risk. http://www.blackboxvoting.org/BBVtsxstudy.pdf

We need to stop accepting lies in OUR media.

who make a mistake in their honest work in order to inform the public in good faith. the left attacks its own in order to buy credibility points with the very people they do not trust to begin with. a lesson that has not and probably will not be learned.

"If you've spent time on Democratic Underground or have read Mark Crispin Miller's "Fooled Again," you're already familiar with everything Kennedy has to say"

Most people reading Rolling Stone have not read "Fooled Again" or spent much time on DU.

And taking one example and then applying it to the rest of the article is highly un-professional. Especially when the other acts of voter disenfranchisement were so clearly targeted.

EDIT: And if he's spent time on DU, then he should know that the answer is YES!!!!

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of the RFK Jr. piece. He supports much of Kennedy's article, and offers some criticism.
Worth a read.

http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/blogs/tokaji/2006/06/back-to-ohio-rolling-stone-piece.html

He's a real weasel in this article. Blathering on about how the exit polls are not reliable saying the sources on this are not yet available. What a bull shit statement. There is the entirety of TruthIsAll's work plus ElectionArchive.Org (USCountsVotes). These are detailed examinations that have been tested in debate and, by any standards, prevailed. Tokaji is either lazy or uninformed to say we have to wait for Steve Freeman's book. What a disingenuous review. He should be ashamed. I'd like to see him stand up and debate a serious elections rights attorney. For an Ohio lawyer to say Ohio wasn't stolen means a few things, none of them good.

On edit: And yes, I know that he sued Blackwell and won...and Blackwell, who I meaintain is about twice as smart as most of his allies and opponents in Ohio, must have jumped for joy. Why? Because Tokaji won a decision that LEGITIMIZES DRE'S (TOUCH SCREENS) IN OHIO, AND THE REST OF THE 6TH DISTRICT.

THANKS TOKAJI, WE REALLY NEEDED DIEBOLD, ESS, AND SEQUOIA LEGITIMIZED AS THE MOST RELIABLE MEANS OF COUNTING VOTES. USELESS, ACTUALLY WORSE, HARMFUL.

the anti-DRE position in stewart v Blackwell, which is what i think autorank is alluding to, and Tokaji sued to invalidate paper ballot technologies of punchcards and central count optical scan (successfully, in the 6th Circuit), in favor of DREs and a special precinct based opscan. Paper ballots hand counted would have been invalidated under this test but were not litigated in this case. Perhaps the next one. Tokaji also opposes paper trails, paper records, paper ballots or whatever appended to DREs on principle (In contrast somewhat, I oppose paper "trails" on the basis of false confidence and long lines for bottlenecked DREs and the unacceptability of ever accepting secret electronic vote counting for even just the first count, subject to "correction" in a recount posing as an "audit" that changes vote totals, one that everyone knows the US Supreme Court will quickly shut down, just like FLorida 2000.)

He's taken this dismissive attitude toward the possibility of Republican election tampering for a long time. What bothers me is his absolute certainty on the subject. No doubts. No reason for investigation. It's the Bill O'Reilly technique. Those who disagree with him are pathetic.

DO NOT TRUST Farhad Manjoo.

it uses to publish an online mag.

In fact, I have little respect for them.

I'm not surprised at all.

I was on DU the afternoon Salon published the first piece by Manjoo that trashed the work of TruthIsAll and USCountsVotes (ElectionArchive.Org). There was a thread about it and about 30 people at least called in or emailed in and canceled their subscriptions.

They suck. With friends like them who needs Tony Snow;)

<http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2661019>

detailed 2000 word analysis above showing that these "debates' like Manjoo's stifle us with bickering while democracy dies. Thanks, Manjoo!

What a stupid statement:



With all due respect to DU - that is a small minority of Americans. Are they saying if the Natalie Holloway story was already covered by a TV station in Aruba, it's stupid for it to be covered non-stop by CNN, MSNBC and FOX?

These people act like having transparent elections that are clearly fair is not worthing caring about. Who ARE these people? Plus, they want proof BEFORE they will investigate, but it's a little hard to get concrete proof without an investigation. There is more than enough reasonable suspicion, even for these creeps, to warrant an investigation. Plus, most of us now just want the machines gone so it won't happen again. I'm tired of being dismissed as a nut!!! This is the BIGGEST issue we face now - IMO. If elections can be rigged, ANYTHING is possible - even unpopular, unnecessary, wars that drag on forever and ruin countries and kill innocent children. Even unconstitutional wiretapping on American citizens. Even ....

by flattering them: "You may not have read all this other stuff, but I have, and you're the sort who would, so you'll be able to appreciate my telling you that you don't need to."

Very tricky. Karl would be proud.

There is enough "proof' for a reasonable suspicion. Elections need to be CLEARLY fair. Even if people just suspect that an election was unfair, that means we should change the system. Elections should be transparent and everyone should have faith in the system. Just like my bank doesn't say "trust me" and instead gives me documentation of each ATM transaction, returned checks, and a monthly statement of all transactions, elections should be proven to be fair. The burden of proof is on the system to prove it's fair, not on others to prove it's unfair. These new voting machines are designed to not give "proof" - no paper ballots, etc. Doesn't that bother you?

or any of that.