Memo to Republican candidates: There is actually an outer limit to fake outrage stories. Let's allow NJ-03 Republican candidate Chris Myers to demonstrate, shall we?

Release Date: Jul 22 2008

Myers Demands Adler Apologize to Troops, Veterans, Military Families for Web Video Comments

Adler referred to radical liberal bloggers as "the new citizen soldiers"

         Mount Holly, July 22, 2008-Decorated combat veteran and congressional candidate Chris Myers (NJ-3) today demanded that his opponent, career Trenton politician John Adler, apologize to United States active duty troops, veterans and military families for comments he made in a YouTube video posted on his web site.

         In the video, entitled "John Adler: a progressive," Adler admiringly refers to radical liberal bloggers from the Daily Kos and other liberal blog sites as "the new citizen soldiers".  The video can be found at Adler's campaign web site (www.adlerforcongress.com/video), or on YouTube at the following link: http://youtube.com/...

         "On behalf of our active duty military personnel and their families, and the tens of thousands of veterans living in the 3rd Congressional District, I am calling on John Adler to remove this video and apologize for his outrageous comments," said Myers, himself a former Navy Lieutenant and decorated combat veteran of the Persian Gulf War.  "These radical liberal bloggers are in no way, shape or form ‘soldiers,' and referring to them in that way is an affront to the brave men and women in uniform fighting to defend our freedoms around the globe, the veterans who have done so in generations past, and their proud families."

Without even bothering to get into the fact that the progressive netroots do in fact encompass many actual soldiers (which should come as no surprise, since all you need to have is a computer and a modem -- there are lots of dentists, too, but Republicans don't get outraged about dentists, even "radical liberal dentists"), I think we can safely say that Myers' ridiculous tirade is about as stupid a thing as anyone could ever imagine a candidate attaching his name to.

Thank God for geniuses like Myers, who can finally save confused New Jerseyans from metaphors, analogies and all sorts of linguo-fascism! They hate us for our figurative language, you know!

Does anyone think Myers would ever be able to find us the critical mass of soldiers who demand this apology? Who need it more than, say, some body armor and a lift home for their buddies?

The "falling off a log" response to this idiocy (note to Myers: I'm not actually on a log) would be to name some of the prominent members of our community who've served. But that understates the mendacity of his comments and legitimizes them. Better for residents of New Jersey's third district to take a closer look at Myers' own rhetoric and remember that everything he says must be taken literally. Anyone care to scour his web site and see who's owed an apology next?

With the need for constant vigilance against comparisons of mass destruction, one wonders when Myers will find time to campaign. By which I mean campaign for office, not conduct a military campaign! My apologies to everyone who ever has conducted such a campaign, or watched one on the History Channel!

What a friggin' dork.

UPDATE: Local color and the Adler response at (where else?) BlueJersey.

Race tracker wiki: NJ-03

Here's another roundup of Netroot Nation 2008 coverage in the media and on the blogs.  There will be a special Daily Kos edition soon along with a final roundup edition when I can get them pulled together.  

Check out the previous NN08 roundups:     #1      #2

Crossposted at Reality Window

Rewrite:  I've lost the bait and switch headline referencing Hillary's "I've got the popular vote so if I don't get the nomination, we're like Zimbabwe" line in May.

Because the real parallel between us and Zimbabwe is a lot deeper and more ominous than a toss-off line in a primary campaign.  It goes straight to the heart of who we are as a nation, and why that matters to the rest of the world.

I'm always curious about how events like NN08 are covered so I poke around to see who's saying what.  I thought I'd pass along some of the more interesting bits I've found. It's not an exhaustive list.  Please feel free to add your finds in the comments.  

So, here's a round up of news and blog coverage of Netroots Nation through about 2pm EST on Saturday.  Check out the links including lots of video links below the fold.

Here's yesterday's edition.

Cross-posted at Reality Window

There's obviously a lot of noise about Barack Obama's "shift to the center" inside the blogosphere, and today it bubbles up into the mainstream.  The LA Times thinks that most Democrats don't care (based on nothing but anecdotes from insiders), while the Washington Post thinks his ideology is problematic, saying that liberals are calling him a centrist and Republicans are calling him a liberal, so who knows???

I think these thumbsucker pieces offer little in the way of identifiable information.  Then again, so does the blogosphere, increasingly.  That herd mentality we've all noticed in the traditional media has definitely migrated over, and the narrative has definitely hardened.  There is perhaps no bigger critic of Obama's vote on the FISA bill than I.  At the same time, I can't believe that this wasn't a far bigger story, particularly in the blogosphere.

We agree with Jon Henke that "there will always be a place for the amateur blogger who can get good information and write with a unique voice."  And we believe that once people get a taste of activist, netroots democracy it will be difficult - if not impossible - to convince them to return to mass media passivity.  For candidates, the challenge will be to harness the power of the netroots or lose to those candidates who do.  Either way, as the Washington Post concluded following the Yearlykos Kos convention in early August 2007, "Like it or not, the [netroots] appear to be here to stay".

So conclude Lowell Feld and Nate Wilcox in their new book (published June 30) Netroots Rising: How a Citizen Army of Bloggers and Online Activists Is Changing American Politics  I will tell you now that I think anyone interested in understanding the netroots would be well advised to read this book.

Tired of being asked for money by campaigns...take a little break to help out a fellow blogger, a foodie community and farmers being affected by the floods.

Subscribe to Edible San Francisco today and we’ll donate 100%of your subscription to the Iowa Farm Aid fund (valid 6/19/08 - 07/01/08).

And why should you do this you may ask? Well...

I've just read a half-hour's worth of angry bloggers bemoaning Obama's support of the FISA compromise.

At first glance, I was also disappointed in Obama's decision.  However, upon closer inspection, I can see now that the fight isn't over yet.  

In this week's issue of TIME magazine, arriving in print and online tomorrow, columnist James Poniewozik uses the passing of Tim Russert to highlight the decline of the Old Media and the rise of the New Media, described as  "bloggers and YouTubers: a diffuse army of the uncredentialed, uninhibited and - most terrifyingly - unpaid.  In Russert, the press lost its most authoritative mass-market journalist, just as it is losing its authority and its mass market."

Poniewozik  explains: "It's too simple to say that the new media are killing off the old media.  ...What's happening instead is a kind of melding of roles.  Old and new media are still symbiotic, but it's getting hard to tell who's the rhino and who's the tickbird."

So, rhino or tickbird, hear this: He goes on to cite a DailyKos "scoop" this week in his evidence of the trend.

I have a question;
   I realize this may be a bit neurotic, but some professions are inundated with rumors and issues of legal liability;  so, in that context, I may have lost my mind, but I need to ask:

  What are the liability laws for bloggers? If I recommend something am I responsible for it? Someone asked about home insurance yesterday and I told my experience. Then I became scared that somehow I was responsible for my suggestion. Am I?

If a blogger on one blog mentions professional credentials does that mean their advise could be seen as professional advise?

I won't make this a long entry. But there's a major Boycott of the Associated Press going down.

A wonderfully angry SadlyNo blog entry raised the question as to which of the big name, respectable liberal bloggers who have been credentialed by the DNCC was against the Iraq authorization and invasion from the beginning... and who blew it?

Obama got it right, so did many Democrats including the then chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee Bob Graham, Defense Committee chair Levin, and of course Chariman Dean.

So many MSM/SCLM pundits got it respectably wrong and still have their jobs. Many of those who got it right and opposed the Iraq war suffered as a consequence.

The blogosphere is supposed to be an alternative to the SCLM/MSM.

Yet some bloggers whose judgement was wrong on Iraq have become very prominent and respected on the liberal/progressive/left since then. Presumably they have been getting most thigs right since then. But still. Let us remember who got it wrong at the time. And more honor to those who got it right!

Though my understanding of biology is basic, I know definitively that at one time you had a mother and a father, which makes you someone's son or daughter and that fact alone should give you the perspective to be able to figure out that the person who passed away in the last twenty four hours... the person you've chosen TODAY to air you grievances about... the person whose faults and foibles you MUST bring to light AND IMMEDIATELY... ALSO has or had a mother and a father and quite possibly a wife and maybe even sons and daughters all of whom are, as you sit at your computer hoping to receive tips and recommendations, likely staring at a wall, their subconscious minds awash with all the days forward that will be without their son or daughter or father or brother or husband.

And as they rise slowly, telling themselves to just keep breathing, the unbelievable, unfathomable, awful details of things like funerals and open caskets and life insurance policies and WHAT THE FUCK JUST HAPPENED rushing past their regrets of things unsaid and opportunities missed and neverevermores... let me say to you what they would, if their hearts had not just been ripped from their chests:

"Couldn't you have waited. Just a little?"

And then let me add my own two words of observation...

If one chooses to listen to Bill Moyer's address to the National Conference for Media Reform, the message is clear to all who will digest it - the media and press are at a critical crossroads. Like David and Goliath in the Valley of Elah, what will be our "stone" that challenges and reforms the corporate control of our airwaves and print news?

My sincere opinion, for what it is worth, is for us to unite, develop, and launch a mainstream alternative cable news network.  Grand and unattainable as it may seem, one must believe that new, true voices of reporting can reach the masses.  Is it possible, I believe it can be done!

I'd say this notion of a "Knowledge Economy" is a subversive elitist campaign translated to mean, "The American Dream now comes with an IQ Test, administered by us. Do you have your application fee?"

Appalachian Voices and iLoveMountains.org are pleased to announce the America's Most Endangered Mountains video series and the innovative new Bloggers' Challenge.

We have spent months out in the field talking with and filming people who live in communities endangered by mountaintop removal. They have shared their hopes, their fears, and their amazing stories.

To spread their stories, we decided on a new-fangled grassroots technique called the Bloggers' Challenge to share what mountaintop removal is doing to our beloved mountains and culture.

The cutting edge Bloggers Challenge program will be run through the most powerful communications tools in the world - blogs - and it's success will depend on your participation.

During this extraordinary presidential campaign, for all the engagement of millions of people and for all the complaints that we have regarding the media coverage of this campaign (or the coverage of the Iraq war, or everything else for that matter) there is not much debate on what to do about it, on what we can and should do about the media coverage.

This is an imperative issue!

It doesn’t matter if some of us, who get the news primarily online on alternative media outlets, are able to sift through the bullcrap of the mainstream media (MSM).

Let’s not forget that every vote of every person bares the same weight towards electing the next President. The vote of the well-educated well-informed Jane counts the same as the vote of the less-educated low-information Joe who gets the news from the MSM.

Hello, this is my Daily Kos diary. I hope to help make a small difference by pitching in my 2 cents here at Daily Kos.

I'm sort of trying to kick CCN to the curb as well. I've had 2 blogs over there since 2006. The first was prior to Gen. Clark announcing for Hillary and it was alot of fun. Then Gen. Clark declined a candidacy and announced for Hillary and my relationships with other bloggers there went downhill fast. After awhile, I quit. Then I reflected a little bit, decided that I could maybe make a few changes to my style and perhaps champion Obama there somewhat, so, in good faith, I deleted my old blog and started a new one. This was a short time after doing some blogging about having gone to New Orleans to volunteer helping Katrina victims.

However, I am somewhat unhappy to relate, CCN sort of got taken over by a pretty nasty lot, people I really don't remember having been there before and they are really sort of dominating the blog now. They do it with support of a few old timers who might have good intentions of trying to make things right once the primary is finally settled, but frankly I don't have any faith that they are going to be able to do it. *(At least within a timeframe that I can work with right now.)*