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From the diaries -- kos)
We all know by now that the GOP is upping their ongoing efforts to pretend that political scandals are either "bipartisan" or wholly Democratic in nature. They've got so good at getting the US corporate media to dance to their tune that even the best of us can find ourselves humming along.
The good news is that we're getting a lot better at fighting the GOP's efforts -- to the point where their most recent smear attempts haven't got that much traction.
The Dorgan Smear (which along with the earlier Reid smear was an attempt to soften the huge self-inflicted GOP blow that is the Abramoff scandal) was debunked immediately by several different parties, including Dorgan himself.
DailyKos's Kagro X did a stellar job of researching the source for the original AP article on Dorgan -- and found that, among other things, the source is Jimmy Faircloth, a GOP operative with his own agenda.
Media Matters notes the inaccuracies and slant of the Faircloth-sourced AP article.
Media Matters also took a swipe at current media efforts to pretend that "both sides do it equally".
And Josh Marshall asked his readers to join the "Nice Try Brigade" in order to spot and document efforts to muddy the waters WRT Republican corruption by pretending that Democrats are as bad or worse.
I suspect that this rapid and heavy response on our parts is why the GOP's attempt at creating a massive new fauxgate (or fake scandal) around Dorgan and Reid has died a lonely death. The scandal-pimping machinery that worked so well for the GOP in 1995, when it worked virtually unopposed, now has to work a lot harder for less effect.
Pat yourselves on the back. We're changing the direction of the tide, slowly but surely.