Just An Observation

It was a Republican staffer who wrote the controversial Schiavo memo.

Powerline, who was on this at the beginning is acknowledging the story, but also shooting holes in any facts it can, along with taking shots at the AP, ABC and the WaPo for good measure.

The latest story also confirms how absurd it was for ABC, the Post, and other news outlets to label the anonymous memo a "GOP talking points memo." We have no idea who the unidentified Martinez staffer is, but he apparently was not authorized to speak for his boss, and most certainly was not empowered to speak for the leadership of the Republican party.

I find it ironic that as one of the loudest and more would be professional voices of the objective and quick to correct itself, as well as demand correction, new media, they didn't first simply scroll down their own site and correct this item.

The Washington Post isn't the perpetrator of the underlying offense here, but it is in the middle of its own Watergate-style cover-up. Who will guard the guardians? Where's Mistah Kurtz? Calling Mistah Kurtz...

HINDROCKET adds: Heaven knows we're not in this for the glory (Ed.: No, it's the money.), but wasn't it a little cheesy of the Times not to acknowledge that this story was broken and pursued by us and a handful of other bloggers? We know that we are widely read at the Times; the day is long past when newspapers and magazines can fail to credit bloggers in the expectation, I assume, that no one will notice.

Also, if you follow the links from Powerline to Malkin and back, you get to, I believe, the original Powerline post. Let's look at some quotes from Powerline.

The Washington Post reported yesterday on an anonymous memo relating to the Terri Schiavo case that allegedly was sent to all of the Republicans in the Senate.

Maybe I missed it but I saw stories that said the memo was "circulated on the floor of the Senate," or "among Republicans," nowhere did I see a story claiming it had been distributed to "all" Republicans in the Senate. There are many such instances where I could do to Powerline what they are doing to the MSM in this case. Here's another, quoted at the very end of a Kurtz piece.

"The content of the memo tells me it wasn't prepared to benefit the Republican Party, it was prepared to benefit the Democratic Party," Hinderaker said.

My point here is not to simply trash Powerline, a needed and valuable new source of information. But as someone who is conservative, as well as having studied and worked in the field of journalism, there are some things here I believe worth pointing out.

The news business is not always as neat a business as we might like, as stories are seldom if ever simply delivered to one's door complete and intact.

A Powerline is just as likely to use a poor word choice, or let their thoughts or feelings appear to cloud the facts, or even get ahead of the facts because it is human nature. Almost unconscious decisions always get made when putting our thoughts down in words.

There is no credit due Powerline for "breaking" a story ... following the tact they chose, there was no story. And as for "pursuing" the story, it seems the MSM did that in this case and Powerline's "reporting" did little more than muddy the waters with speculation and innuendo while it went on.

Powerline and or the blogs can, if they choose, and they likely will call this a great victory because they kept the heat on the MSM. But that, too, is really only speculation. There is nothing to suggest that competing MSM outlets wouldn't have dug to get to the bottom of this for their own competitive reasons, quite apart from whatever Powerline chose to do.

As it stands now, Powerline has no comments area and no longer accepts trackbacks, though the link is present as if it did: they don't open to any effect for me, anyway. And as for e-mailing Powerline, I haven't done that in over six months as result of never having received the slightest acknowledgment whenever I did. And I also know large blogs often bemoan their tons of email and inability to handle same.

Point being, I can directly contact, disagree with and reach the WaPo and probably ABC with more ease, efficiency and acknowledgment than I can Powerline. So, who is it they talk to? Who is it they are so accountable to, while they seem to demand the Times, ABC, WaPo or anyone else should be so accountable to them? Their readers?

Powerline doesn't even have a letters to the editors column as every large MSM publication offers. And if the answer is "their readers," I'd submit that's really not much more than a lot of clicks on some meter that no one can claim as truly accurate, or even be certain of what it conveys. And given that every MSM outlet they disagree with has significantly more documented readers or viewers than they, what ground is it really that they stand on to demand accountability from anyone, except on behalf of the three fellows who write it?

Take my conservative cred if you wish for saying it, but I believe that objective observation this time out could easily lead to the conclusion that there was more conclusion jumping, false assumption and premature casting of aspersion done by Powerline in this case than by the MSM against the right.

That said, it's wonderful to see the new media come about, though it is incredibly far from mature. And, honestly, I wish Powerline nothing but well. But sometimes yapping at someone's heels is really nothing more than that, just yapping - and I am far from convinced that it is a good thing for an element of any new media that does so much of the yapping, to also have gone to some fairly great lengths to make certain they are above the din of anyone who might want to yap back.

And if the MSM is mis-reporting some aspects of blogs and blogging, one aspect I have never seen mentioned is that, by and large, the overwhelming numbers of blogs and bloggers out there, left or right, are rarely if ever even heard from in most of these great debates.

In a quote above Powerline makes it very clear that it purports to speak for bloggers when it castigates the MSM for not crediting bloggers because no one will notice. Well, excuse me, but isn't it safe to assume that but for a handful of the most elite blogs Powerline does the very same thing day in and day out and no one notices?

While not a party to it, I know for a fact that a truly great many conservative bloggers tried for a long time to gain the attention of some of the larger conservative blogs on the Schiavo matter. Until it became more click worthy as result of the MSM, they went mostly if not completely ignored. I even saw Captains Quarters complain about the attention getting efforts, I assume through emailing him.

Think about this - any large blog was and is entitled to their own opinion on the matter. No one should have a right to expect them to take a side on any matter they didn't believe in, or weren't ready to address. However, if they would purport to speak for bloggers as they do, wouldn't the right decision of someone tuned in to the so-called blogosphere and in that position be to report it - objectively, as news?

Sorry, but in that case I honestly believe they all but ignored a very significant component of the very thing they so often claim to represent - that's illogical at best and disingenuious at worst.

Perhaps some bloggers would be better off calling it a day and going back to simply writing letters to the Editor - at least then there was a certain confidence that who was being written to or about was actually reading.

Comments

[Steel]

Man, I wonder when the bombs will off regarding this post ... good job. Perhaps they should spend more time working on the blog and less on TV. Kudos.

[Steel]

Some more fodder ...

http://www.moltenthought.com

... scroll down

[Cassandra]

Dan, very well put. I, myself was guilty of the same thing in one of my posts, more in the title than in the body of the post, but all the same it was just plain sloppy writing.

Great job, and a point that needs to be made more often. We need to subject ourselves to the same scrutiny and review as the MSM, and moreover to be able to admit when we are wrong. And I was guilty of jumping to the wrong conclusion on this one (or at the very least, casting the wrong aspersion).

[Fausta]

Well said, Dan.
The only blog that speaks for me is my own. I don't like it when any blog purports to speak "for bloggers".

[Beth]

How did I miss this gem? Next time you whip on Powerline and the like, clue me in if you don't see me in comments. I've been away from everyone else's blogs for the last few days.

All I can say is, Fuck Powerline. Their day is over--a flash in the pan and their heads got too big to pay attention to anything going on in the real world. Fucking BOOOOORING. You're right on target too, with the trackbacks, email, "letters to the editor", etc.

I can't understand how they get the traffic they still do--I KNOW I'm not the only one who has noticed how irrelevant they are compared to the Rathergate days. Obviously, I'm also still disgusted with their conspicuous silence on Schiavo until it was on TV 24-7. Glenn Reynolds, I can understand, but Powertool had written about it in 2003 and APPEARED to be interested in it then when the issue was less of a known entity.

I laugh when I see moonbats ranting about Powerline being the leader of wingnut blogs-- they sure aren't who I turn to for anything. Unless, of course, I WANT to read a bunch of lawyers prattle on about shit we either already know or don't give a rat's ass about (i.e. this shit).

[flenser]

"I believe that objective observation this time out could easily lead to the conclusion that there was more conclusion jumping, false assumption and premature casting of aspersion done by Powerline in this case than by the MSM against the right."

Unless you are possession of some facts I have not seen, I don't see how you can say this. The most charitable explanation for the MSM behavior is that they "jumped" to the concluson that this was a "GOP talking points memo", that it was in fact "A one-page memo, distributed to Republican senators by party leaders". Those are Mike Allens own words. And they are not correct.

http://news.orb6.com/stories/washpost/
20050320/a49701_2005mar19.php

He either jumped to a conclusion, or he lied. I imagine it was the former, although given media behavior of late you cannot be sure.

It is unfortunate that so many right-wing bloggers are willing to team up with the enemy to bring down one of their own. Reminds me of the scene in Braveheart where Longshanks is able to set the Scots against each other.

Maybe everyone needs to remember Reagan's eleventh commandment; thou shalt not speak ill of a fellow Republican.

[Snowy]

>Powerline has no comments area and no longer accepts trackbacks

And the overly invasive ads are a bit much too. I think for all of these reasons PL will be losing readership.

I used to read PL faithfully, now haven't read it for months. I don't consider it a real blog any more.