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- Stephanie Mencimer: "When it comes to employing Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and other social-media sites, Republicans are whipping their opponents across the aisle, creating a growing tech gulf that threatens important implications for the 2010 mid-term elections" (emphasis mine). Really? In general, I'm pretty dismissive of social media's impact on politics, although clearly they're tailor-made for organizing and fundraising. But I'd say the "enthusiasm gap" between Democrats and Republicans this election year is more a product of the party out of power having something to rally around, rather than having new tools to organize the rallying.
- Former Bush speechwriter Jay Nordlinger has been on a language tear today, excoriating liberal buzzwords like "progressive" and "sustainable," but he reserves his true ire for "social justice," which he describes as nothing less than "the most disgusting, meaningless, abused phrase in the English language." Hey, to each his own. But if it really is "meaningless," then how is it "abused?" Is there a conservative-approved meaning of the term that I am unaware of? I expected more from someone whose trade is wordsmithing.
- Indeed, while conservatives obsess over the words liberals use, they also obsess over the ones that are omitted. This is morally outrageous, according to the deranged Andy McCarthy, because it says "we lack the capacity even to speak of the evils arrayed against us." I've spoken before about this bizarre conceit that pointing out the existence of evil is somehow morally courageous, but even if we accept this premise, it turns out that McCarthy's evidence doesn't stand up under scrutiny. So to recap, not only is the idea that liberals refuse to identify evil incredibly stupid, but the evidence in support of it is a total fabrication.
- Remainders: The many conspiracy theories of Rand Paul; it's a good thing Fox News hired a sociopath to communicate with the wingnuts; 2010 Barack Obama would do well to listen to 1996 Barack Obama; Peggy Noonan is out of touch with reality; Jake Tapper is an astute observer of politics; and Rasmussen's polls skew the polling industry as a whole.
--Mori Dinauer
