Bloodless Coup

an interesting situation (although i had to google it to figure out what you were talking about, as i hadn't been looking at pandagon (or presidential campaigns) all that often lately and hadn't heard a whisper of this controversy).

i struggle with this, because i find it hard to imagine that someone so iminently research-able wasn't researched by the young, internet-savvy workhorses on the edwards campaign but, on the other hand, i find it hard to believe they would have hired her if they'd been entirely familiar with her work. they certainly should have anticipated that she'd be a lightning rod for detrimental publicity -- whether they did, and it was part of their strategy, i wouldn't speculate.

i agree, most bloggers swear, and it's pretty silly to worry about some swear words or hyperbole (or to exclude all such bloggers from big-ticket politics). but regardless of whether one agrees with amanda's politics (and i do, at least on most issues), she has been pretty consistently over the top in how she expresses herself, even to me, and i've been one of those hyperbole-employing curse-spewing bloggers.

if it's such a no-big-deal sort of thing, then why is everything people are focusing on getting taken down from her site. surely the tech savvy people in the campaign, and amanda herself, understand that disabling the posts presents no real obstacle to tracking down what she's said, since plainly she didn't do anything to preclude the caching and archiving of her site by the numerous webcrawling applications that do that sort of thing (i, on the other hand, deliberately placed all of the prophylactic code into my blog early on, although i don't know how effective it is).

i agree with you that the edwards can't worry itself about the malkins of the world, since if it wasn't this they were railing about it'd be something else. although edwards has been pretty low profile so far, it's hard not to think that he might surprise the field, given his name recognition and his pro-middle-class platform. the right has to be undermining him from the get-go, if not as enthusiastically as they are doing with hillary.

but there are others, more centrist and even left of center, who are more amenable to edwards' entreaties but still will see amanda as a foul-mouthed impetuous youngster who is entirely off-putting. they might not have discovered her past "transgression" on their own, but malkin and others can see to it that they know what she was about before she santized herself for the campaign, and that can't help edwards with the center in such a crowded primary campaign. and for that reason alone, i have to wonder what the campaign was thinking in bringing her on board.

to be clear, i think it's ballsy, and could be great. i agree with amanda's first post at the edwards site that the web holds untold potential for political campaigns, and that someone with her familiarity with and presence on the internetS is ideally suited to maximizing that potential. i'm just not sure that she herself was an appropriate choice.

It would be interesting to see the "fake outrage" if, for instance, Hugh Hewitt or Malkin got hired by the Romney campaign -- and then proceeded to airbrush their blog archives.

(It would also be interesting to find out who among the first-tier bloggers has been recently airbrushing their archives in hopeful anticipation of future job opportunities.)

Oh, and re the "fake outrage" at hand, Jay Reding's take captures it quite reasonably, for me. Key quote, which nicely cans my feelings about much of the left-blogosphere: "For anyone who doesn’t drink the Kool-Aid already, it’s not only unpersuasive, it’s horrendously off-putting."

It's rather amusing to (suddenly) see the right so offended by "hate speech." Amanda is relentless in pushing pro-life logic to its most ridiculous and betraying conclusions, and pursuing its promoters for their hypocrisy and autocracy. What comes out of this is that a punch up between those who call Amanda and cohort sluts, whores and murderers get the vapors when she fires back with a fuck you and the oppressive hypocritical religion you rode in on.

TO Moon: Given that there are something like 37,000 posts about this, either listing or browsing was beyond my energy. Plus, I assume our highly intelligent readers are reading all the blogs, and know from google searches.

As to the scrubbing allegations, those have been retracted. Malkin leaped to conclusions and assumed that the fallout from server failures was a coverup. Not a cover-up, but a tech cock-up.

Oopsie! Blogger cussing!

The part that is getting more traction is the accusation of anti-Catholic bias, from a fringe (and apparently hate speech using) pundit. But as Scott Lemieux puts it: It seems worth noting at this time that if opposing Catholic teachings on contraception makes one an anti-Catholic bigot, I think about 90% of Catholics are anti-Catholic bigots.

And of course, as to the potty mouth outrage, if it's a good enough word for Dick Cheney to use in the Senate, how can it not be a good enough word for bloggers?

And of course, as to the potty mouth outrage, if it's a good enough word for Dick Cheney to use in the Senate, how can it not be a good enough word for bloggers?

Nobody worth paying attention to is saying that it's not good enough for bloggers. The question is, is it good enough for a highly visible paid member of the Edwards campaign? Who vetted her and who recommended her and why and what does that say about the Edwards organization are the interesting questions. Is there a new standard emerging for campaign personnel? Should there be? Are you going to stfu and apply that new standard when, say, Brownback hires someone who wrote a racist article thirty years ago?

Wow. Even John Cole is pro-Amanda. Sort of.

It is a cold day. Is Morgantown hell?

i'm certainly sorry that i didn't catch the retraction regarding the accusations of modifying or removing posts, and i'm glad that it turns out not to have been true, all else aside, because it would seem to me too great a compromise from a respected commentator to sweep over her work just to get a job -- any job.

but the only really serious point i tried to make, and no one has responded to it (except inasmuch as jacflash implicitly echos its substance), is what can it say about the edwards campaign that they've cracked the door, vis-a-vis the low-key but offendable middle-aged political center, to a hailstorm of exasperating insinuations from the right.

hiring marcotte doesn't alienate me any more than it increases the probability of my voting for edwards (i'm not even beginning to consider whom to vote for yet, and he's certainly not out of the question, but then in pennsylvania my primary vote will probably be meaningless, even given a crowded field) -- but i can't imagine it helps with some of the older democrats.

however dishonest the hue and cry from the right has been, it's nothing if not predictable, and edwards surely pays a lot of people to predict it. they decided it was ok, and i'm curious as to why -- what does she bring to the table worth the price?

oh, and as to "cheney does it," i'm pretty sure that's no defense to anything. if he's your benchmark, you're certainly doing something wrong.

Moon -

Maybe he did predict it? Could this be the opposite of a Sister Souljah moment? I mean if Edwards is planning to run to the left of Hillary and Obama (which looks like his current strategy) and wants to cut into any advantage Hillary has among women ... maybe this was planned?

Of course I have no knowledge that that's true, but Edwards is a bright guy and has run a race before, so knowing how they work ...

Re: cheney... the point was merely to highlight the hypocrisy, not to set standards. As to language, I don't want any standard that doesn't include "fuck." I mean, shit, fuck is my favorite word.

fair enough, binky. armand, that's as good an explanation as any.

p.s. did anyone notice a separate comment regarding the snickers ad? i remember posting something in addition to what appears in that thread to the effect that, come to think of it, i don't even know what makes it homophobic. although i don't know whether the alternate ending(s) i haven't seen would change my view, my suspicion is they would not if all they do is show men being grossed out about kissing each other. i can think of a number of gay men with no compunction about expressing revulsion at the thought of kissing women who i don't think of as straight-o-phobes.

You might not think of it that way - but ... are they?

I mean if "homophobic" means fear of the gays, how in the world is the ad not homophobic in that you've got two guys who are petrified and feel they have to harm themselves in some way b/c they have done something they construe as gay?

Posting a link for Moon over in the right thread. Also, we have been hit by about 2000 spams in the last two days, and I (and the others) have to go through them all to find your real comments in there. It is entirely possible that I accidentally deleted one.

Just for you, Binky dear. :-)

Trying to steal my schtick, I see. ;)

Aaaaaand it's over.

Shit, I thought it was over before, when Edwards said they weren't fired, and seemed to be standing by them. I'm confused.

It's possible that she really did just fire herself, out of frustration or something.

No, I'm not doubting that part. I'm concerned because I thought this whole issue died a couple of days ago, and it still came back to bite her.

I've never been hugely impressed by her blogging, but she seemed a good choice for a campaign to try to round up the internet vote/energy. That she could be ousted (or forced to resign; same difference) isn't a good sign for discourse (right or left wing).

My point was that she might not have been forced. She might really have decided on her own that this wasn't what she wanted to do. She might have just found it too constraining, both the restrictions around what she could say on the Edwards blog and around what she could say and do under this new spotlight.

But I'm sure she'll tell us.

I'm not so sure. Someone asked early in the thread which it was, and while she has responded to several other comments, she has not responded to that question.