McCain's campaign mgr tied to Freddie Mac

In a tragic sort of way, I'm simultaneously angry and amused at how the left and right are falling all over themselves, trying to score cheap political points over arguably our worst economic collapse since the Great Depression. (And most are saying that we are far from out of the woods - there's a cheerful thought as we head into the weekend!)

Anyway, there isn't a person anywhere along the political spectrum who can't point to the other side and find some political advertisements that are misleading in some way, Barack Obama included. My message to those people, especially the ones who get fired up, is to take a step back and research the facts, not the wind-blown rhetoric of a political campaign. Yes, I occasionally list and discuss some political ads, but I try and take ads from both sides at face value - just about anyone from any political persuasion can take a snowflake of truth and turn it into an avalanche of bullshit.

A few nights ago, Rachel Maddow (above video) sat down with Newsweek's Michael Isikoff to discuss revelations that John McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis, was paid $15,000 a month by Freddie Mac as recently as last month, directly contradicting statements made by the McCain campaign as late as Tuesday.

The New York Times has plenty more where that came from:

One of the giant mortgage companies at the heart of the credit crisis paid $15,000 a month to a firm owned by Senator John McCain's campaign manager from the end of 2005 through last month, according to two people with direct knowledge of the arrangement. The disclosure contradicts a statement Sunday night by Mr. McCain that the campaign manager, Rick Davis, had no involvement with the company for the last several years. Mr. Davis's firm received the payments from the company, Freddie Mac, until it was taken over by the government this month along with Fannie Mae.

Wait - it gets better: (Hat tip to C&L) For the last few weeks, the McCain camp has been trying to tie Obama to disgraced former Freddie Mac CEO Franklin Raines, arguing that an alleged "relationship" (a single contact from an Obama campaign official that both parties deny amounted to anything) somehow taints Obama, despite the inconvenient truth that McSame's senior campaign official was receiving thousands from Freddie Mac as late as last month. This isn't the first time that the stench of political hypocrisy from the McCain camp has been overpowering, it's just the latest. (My personal favorite has got to be "I will veto any legislation with earmarks!" during McLame's acceptance speech, just days after selecting the queen of earmarks, Sarah Palin.)

Here's a little more, from DNC Rapid-Response Manager Jesse Lee (h/t C&L):

The two sources, who requested anonymity discussing sensitive information, told NEWSWEEK that Davis himself approached Freddie Mac in 2006 and asked for a new consulting arrangement that would allow his firm to continue to be paid. The arrangement was approved by Hollis McLoughlin, Freddie Mac's senior vice president for external relations, because 'he [Davis] was John McCain's campaign manager and it was felt you couldn't say no,' said one of the sources.

I've been highly entertained by John McCain's reaction to the financial crisis, especially when he "suspended" his campaign to rush off to Washington to "deal with our financial crisis." I can't recall a more pathetically transparent political move during a presidential election in memory, period. He's a desperate campaigner, running out of time ~ his convention bounce is a memory, as is the time when his moniker Maverick actually meant something. If McCain were so concerned with coming up with a solution to our economic crisis, why did he wait until a little over 48 hours before the first presidential debate to "suspend" his campaign? My theory will surprise no one - McCain's running scared, specifically on economic matters, because quite frankly, he's the man without a plan. But, he certainly has his PR spin skills honed to a dull edge. From McCain's presser the other day, just in case you missed it...

And it looks like McCain's wind-blown PR rhetoric was just the big sham we all knew it to be anyway; he showed up at the White House today for the big meeting with Bush, and according to Politico (another noted right-wing Website masquerading as an objective news source) he reportedly had very little to say in the meeting. Ironic, since he's been the one all over the media in the last 48 hours saying he "had to suspend his campaign" so he could go help fix the crisis. Maybe he thought that just by being in the room, his "expertise" would rub off on the rest of the attendees. You know, in the way McCain asserts that Palin "knows as much about energy as anyone else in the country because she lives in Alaska." Seriously folks - what's next? Are we going to elect the wholly unqualified and dishonorable profiteer Rudy 9iu1ian1 as president because he was mayor of New York City during 9-11? Oh wait, we weren't dumb enough to fall for that one. I guess there IS hope for America after all. *Smirk*

KO's worst people - spot on again

This episode of Keith Olbermann's Worst Person in the World, from yesterday's show, is notable for a number of reasons.

First - Matt Drudge. It really angers me that a person like Drudge, who has ethics and scruples much lower than the rest of the civilized world, will smear any enemy of the Republican Party, or even someone who has merely embarrassed the GOP.

Drudge's latest target - CNN Iraqi Correspondent Michael Ware, who has more than embarrassed Republican Presidential Candidate John McCain before and during his current visit to Baghdad. Really, McCain has embarrassed himself; Ware has merely succinctly pointed it out.

Yesterday, Drudge posted some inaccurate and disparaging information about Ware on his über-popular Website, The Drudge Report, as Olbermann states above, including that Ware heckled McCain and Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) at a press conference along with the insinuation that Ware has a drinking problem.

As soon as Ware flatly denied the report, stating on CNN "check the videotape," video indeed appeared on the Web, backing up Ware's claim - not a speckle of heckle. Mysteriously, Drudge's entry on Ware disappeared from his Website. Surprise!

Drudge has a history of disparaging individuals on his site - Sidney Blumenthal comes to mind as one of the more noteworthy cases. Drudge posted libelous statements about Blumenthal, senior political adviser to President Clinton in his second term, (I won't rewrite them here) and Blumenthal sued him. Blumenthal later dropped the suit when it became clear that it wasn't worth the time or effort to go after Drudge. (Quick plug - Blumenthal's tome, The Clinton Wars, is arguably the best book on Clinton's presidency available anywhere. [aside from Clinton's autobiographical My Life] Sid's book is an awesome political read. )

It's not a stretch to say that Drudge has a "post it now, verify later, if at all" mentality, journalistic standards be damned. This right-wing shill dares people he's disparaged to come after him. It's also a well-known fact that Drudge is in regular contact with leaders of the Republican National Committee, who give him talking points.

And Drudge's stories make it into the mainstream media with stunning regularity. The Ware case is the latest example - I'll repost the CNN footage:



Notice how Soledad O'Brien brings the rumor up in this exchange with Ware. Two schools of thought here: 1. She brought up Drudge's b.s. to give Ware an opportunity to respond to the ridiculous allegations, or 2. O'Brien did what many other MSM anchors do these days - if it's on Drudge, it's news. History suggests the latter is more accurate - since Drudge "broke" the Monica Lewinsky Scandal on his site, he's shockingly become the darling of MSMs looking for news on the Web.

One recent example - when John Edwards announced a few weeks ago that he would have an announcement about his wife's health the following day, Drudge and The Politico leaped into action (these two Websites seem to be entangled in a passionate love affair as of late). The Politico, which has plenty of credibility problems of its own as of late, reported that Edwards would drop out of the race with a one-source story. Drudge pounced, reporting it on his site as fact, and from there, it went to all of the cable news networks, including CNN. The next morning, I was listening to Thom Hartman on my drive in to work, and he announced that Edwards was dropping out of the race, "according to CNN."

Twenty minutes later, Edwards was on television announcing he intends to stay in the race.

Whaaaaa Whaaaaa Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaant.

Virtually every cable news network got the story wrong - because they relied on dopes like Matt Drudge to get their story, in lieu of getting a story the old fashioned way - by cultivating sources and doing some investigating. I guess that's too much work for journalists these days. Drudge is as credible as a jilted spouse who's been cheated on, looking for revenge in a divorce proceeding. Reliability police - pull over!

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Anyway - Olbermann's other target in the clip above - Bill O'Reilly. It's beyond comedy the way O'Reilly treats people, especially military veterans who know more in their toenails about the military than O'Reilly could ever hope to learn in a lifetime.

Update: I found the video of Billy dressing down Col. Ann Wright, a 29-year military veteran. Check it out:



There you have it - Fox News - Fair and Balanced; Bill O'Reilly, fairly imbalanced.

Birth of "Slow Bleed"

Anyone who has spent time reading or watching political developments in Washington in the last few weeks knows that it's been impossible to avoid the phrase Slow Bleed. Republicans have fallen madly in love with the phrase to describe Congressman Jack Murtha's (D-Pa.) proposal to slowly draw down U.S. troop levels in Iraq.

It has died down a bit as of late, but I heard Senator Trent Lott use it on Face the Nation last Sunday.

Where does the phrase come from? One place where it doesn't originate - any Congressional Democat, in either House of Congress.

Yet, Republicans have been quick to adopt it as their own, incessantly describing Murtha's plan as Slow Bleed whenever given the chance.

I've seen John Boehner, Trent Lott and other prominent Republicans use it on TV to the point of triteness. My favorite example was one South Carolina Republican Congressman, Johnny Iforgethisname, use Slow Bleed in a sentence, saying "quote" before and after the term, as if a Democrat had said it.

Arrrrrrnnnnnnnnt!

The Republicans got busted again, and they got busted by none other than the originator of the phrase himself.

The phrase Slow Bleed comes from a political blog that's been getting a lot of attention lately, and it isn't Count Me Blue. It's Politico. And this isn't a rumor, it's a fact. How do I know that? Because Politico's editor, John Harris, a WaPo veteran, has said as much.

A few days after high-profile, broken-record Republicans began publicly using the term, Harris ran a mea culpa of sorts on Politico's Website. It read:

That's where I come in. "Slow bleed" is my phrase. Murtha had nothing to do with it. Neither did John Bresnahan, the reporter whose name was on the Politico story in which the "slow-bleed strategy" made its debut.

You can understand my pride of authorship. Editors labor in obscurity. Our job is to keep reporters from looking bad, and to let them take the credit when they look good. Rarely is there tangible evidence that we are having any impact. But in 20-plus years in the business, I can scarcely recall an instance when words typed on my keyboard have had such a loud and immediate echo. [Emphasis mine]

Harris wrote that the phrase was nothing more than a fix for flat prose in a draft of a story about Murtha's plan:

We rushed the patient to the operating table for emergency surgery. With VandeHei hovering over my shoulder, this is what I came up with:

"Top House Democrats, working in concert with anti-war groups, have decided against using congressional power to force a quick end to U.S. involvement in Iraq, and instead will pursue a slow-bleed strategy designed to gradually limit the administration's options."

That is not exactly prize-winning prose, but it seemed a little snappier to us -- and more on point. Please note the context: What is slowly bleeding away is the administration's political support to keep fighting the war. Republicans pounced on the phrase because of the ease with which that context could be shorn away, to give the impression that what Democrats were slow-bleeding were the bodies of troops in Iraq.

That willingness to wrest words from context -- and to attribute the phrase to Democrats even though it was not theirs -- was demagogic on the part of Republican operatives. But it was never my plan to make their work so easy.

In the words of Attytood's Will Bunch, "You might think [Slow Bleed] came straight from the war room of the Republican National Committee."

It's delightful to see Congressional Republicans finally doing something in a timely manner for a change. Too bad what they're in a rush to do is using a derogatory term to conjure up unpleasant images of our troops wounded in battle while trying to tie it to Democrats. When the GOP was in power, if it would have been a little quicker to stop, or investigate or at least question President Bush, we wouldn't be in the mess we're in.