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June 29, 2005

Comments

Torridjoe

On offering up non-neocon alternatives:

Harry Reid rubber stamps 4 GOP Sens for the next SCOTUS vacancy.

Is it more political PR than substantive dialogue? Yes. Were Bush to nominate any of these four, is Reid essentially pledging to back them as a party? Yes. So for whatever it's worth, alternatives are being proffered.

One complicating factor is that it's stupid to offer an alternative to a plan that doesn't exist. The whole "Dems have nothing to offer on Social Security" thing is not only generally false--they have offered raising the cap, raising the rate, and cutting some benefits, or private accounts as add-ons rather than carve-outs--but it ignores the fact that the White House and GOP leadership haven't offered an actual plan for SS privatization, either. They've alluded to how it might work, but no plan. Why? Because plans can be attacked, and if you're the only one with a plan out there, yours will be the one attacked.

On topic, I'd be more persuaded about the utility of the thesis if they had asked 20 conservatives what the most important book of the last 15 years was, to compare...

Zap

Good point. It's that PR machine driving the media message and even John Stewart played along. Had Dean been on his toes and responded like you just did, that would have been sweet.

On topic, I think a similar question was recently asked of the right, but it was specifically about philosophy. I'll seek it and share if it applies. BUT really, just surf both sides of the fence and it does become apparent that there is less focus on international issues on the left than on the right.

I spent some time at PNAC last night trying to write something about them and Iraq, and they have provided a veritable non-stop, drum pounding, war mongering, discourse on foreign policy since 97. BTW, I did discover Democracy Arsenal this week and added them to the left. Nice blog on topic.

Ron Rutherford

Zap. That is great you are adding links for your readers, but I have been trying to tell you that you have problems with some of your links. "Joe Gandelman" is suppose to go to http://themoderatevoice.typepad.com/ and there is nothing there. I tried in Firefox and IE with no success.
Linkchecker which an extension for Firefox will check any web page for good, bad and misdirected links. I e-mailed you with a sample of the work.

Thanks for all the good posts!

Ron Rutherford

Sorry to ask one more queestion...
Do you belong to the The Big Brass Alliance.
The Big Brass Alliance was formed in May 2005 as a collective of progressive bloggers who support After Downing Street, a coalition of veterans' groups, peace groups, and political activist groups formed to urge that the U.S. Congress launch a formal investigation into whether President Bush has committed impeachable offenses in connection with the Iraq war. The campaign focuses on evidence that recently emerged in a British memo containing minutes of a secret July 2002 meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair and his top national security officials.
I have not seen any mention on your posts???

Zap

Yeah, Torrid signed us up for BBA, which I support. Mostly, I'm a supportive observer, and I am not surprised at all by the DSMs, or the media's lack of any real investigative reporting. I think I have to make the extra effort to trackback to link posts from here there, and well... I'm lazy like that. Nor have I written much on the topic. If I do, I will link it up there.

Gandelman moved around. He was over at Dean's World then he quit or something, then he started back with guest bloggers. I'll fix the link. I've noticed some of my think tanks are not linked properly also. Anything else you noticed?

Zap

Ran the linkchecker, thanks. Sheesh, I was amazed how very few (2) were bad.

Torrid

Ron, I'll have to check linkchecker out. I'm still frustrated now and again when things aren't formatted properly for Firefox, but otherwise it kicks some royal ass.

On BBA:
That was me. I try to keep "alliances" to a minimum. Also Also was selected as a front-page syndicated site to the Northwest Portal, so we're proud to raise their banner. Beyond that I want to respect our co-founding nature, but we're of the same mind on the memos. I have not specifically posted on the need for an investigation into impeachment; although I believe the President certainly deserves it in this case, I am very fearful of the pattern set if each of the last two Presidents is impeached. If it happened I would support it, but I will not advocate strongly for it at this time.

However, we have produced some posts on the DSM. Before it disappears off the "recent" list, check out "DSM -type Stuff: Front Page News."

Ron Rutherford

If you are interested in talking about blogging and weblogs, would you mind opening up an open thread? Maybe Firefox. I hate it when we are too far off a specific subject.

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