I’m always looking for interesting things to read around the net and usually after a few headlines from newsites get bored of sifting through the trash trying to find articles of substance.

Althought I have not read all of the linked articles yet the ones I have browsed are right up my alley - I wish you could do this kind of post a few times a week :).

Please?

There are all kinds of reasons to support NFD (look a new acronym, hurray!). For me the big one is that if it is an amicable parting (relatively speaking), it can be done affordably. NFD doesn’t work for those who are going to fight about splitting money, possessions, children and the rest of it. Hell, many lawyers discourage NFD because there’s more money if they can get the divorcing couple to fight about stuff. But if there is no fight, just a wish to no longer be married……why should it cost lots and lots and lots of money?

Why should people who made a bad decision lose most of what they have? Oh, I’ve got a million analogies for this but I’ll skip ‘em.

Or maybe I’ve misinterpereted the whole thing.

i get criticized for not having seen “braveheart” because i’m part of the bruce lineage. bah.

Thanks for the corrections, John and Stephanie. And John, I - and a lot of people - disagree that that’s the only interpretation of McKinney’s remarks, and as Palast remarked it would have been good if the stories had done the basic thing of asking her how she meant her remarks. But we’ve already discussed this at length, and I don’t think we’re going to get anywhere new by discussing it more.

Nate, I used to do a lot more of these sort of posts, and I’m glad you enjoyed it. But I only do posts like that on days when I have a lot of time & inclination to sit around for hours doing nothing but reading blogs, and I haven’t felt like that a lot lately. :-)

Well, for one — I can’t do that. But for another — even if I could, I wouldn’t want to. I don’t believe in supporting misogynist scum in any way whatsoever. I boycott stores that use practices I disagree with, and I boycott movies that I disagree with, and I boycott movies that star actors I disagree with.

Bean: “Well, for one — I can’t do that. But for another — even if I could, I wouldn’t want to. I don’t believe in supporting misogynist scum in any way whatsoever. I boycott stores that use practices I disagree with, and I boycott movies that I disagree with, and I boycott movies that star actors I disagree with.”

I just know I’m going to get nailed for this….

I feel the same way you do, Amp. I’ve always liked Roman Polanski movies, although I haven’t seen “The Piano” because it doesn’t interest me. The first Polanski movie I ever saw was “Repulsion,” while I was in college, and it blew me away.

I used to like Woody Allen , in particular his older works (especially his plays), but I don’t care that much for them anymore. I’m not sure why, but I developed the distaste long before he seduced his step-daughter. Allen and Polanski are asses in real life, but that doesn’t change my enjoyment of some of Polanski’s movies. Woody Allen now drives me bonkers. Too much self-involvement for my taste.

- his column did not actually reproduce a “made-up quote” from any newspaper. To wit:

According to those quoted on National Public Radio, McKinney’s “a loose cannon” (media expert) who “the people of Atlanta are embarrassed and disgusted” (politician) by, and she is also “loony” and “dangerous” (senator from her own party) … According to NPR, “McKinney implied that the [Bush] Administration knew in advance about September 11 and deliberately held back the information.”

The New York Times’ Lynette Clemetson revealed her comments went even further over the edge: “Ms. McKinney suggest[ed] that President Bush might have known about the September 11 attacks but did nothing so his supporters could make money in a war.”

That’s loony, all right. As an editor of the highly respected Atlanta Journal Constitution told NPR, McKinney’s “practically accused the President of murder!”

Problem is, McKinney never said it.

None of those statements were quotes. They were paraphrases. News organizations summed up what they thought McKinney said. What she said can be found here, in the Pacifica Radio transcript of March 25, 2002.

Moreover, persons close to this Administration are poised to make huge profits off America’s new war. Former President Bush sits on the board of the Carlyle Group. The Los Angeles Times reports that on a single day last month, Carlyle earned $237 million selling shares in United Defense Industries, the Army’s fifth-largest contractor. The stock offering was well timed: Carlyle officials say they decided to take the company public only after the Sept. 11 attacks. The stock sale cashed in on increased congressional support for hefty defense spending, including one of United Defense’s cornerstone weapon programs.

Now is the time for our elected officials to be held accountable. Now is the time for the media to be held accountable. Why aren’t the hard questions being asked? We know there were numerous warnings of the events to come on September 11. Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, delivered one such warning. Those engaged in unusual stock trades immediately before September 11 knew enough to make millions of dollars from United and American airlines, certain insurance and brokerage firms’ stocks. What did this Administration know, and when did it know it about the events of September 11? Who else knew and why did they not warn the innocent people of New York who were needlessly murdered?

The newspapers and NPR correctly reflected what McKinney said in that interview. Palast either failed to find that out - which reflects poorly on his cred as an “investigative journalist” - or he lied to cover up for a politician that he admired. Whatever the case, I’ve lost most of my respect for him and his standards.

Me, too. I read Kate’s post last night, and most of the comments, but I did start to skim after a bit, in self-defense. There were a number of sensible, thoughtful comments, but between the self-righteous pontificating and the laboured descriptions of Why Men’s Brains Work Different From Women’s… I mean, we know so little about how brains work to begin with, we cannot possibly have any useful data on men’s v. women’s that would supercede cultural explanations for observed behaviours.

Anyway, I was still thinking about her essay itself when I woke up this morning, so I blogged about it and inadvertently trackbacked to this post, still don’t know why that happened, it’s a touch egregious, but there it is.

You’re claiming that Palast was being deceptive by directly quoting the paraphrases, in a way that made it obvious they were paraphrases, right in the first paragraph or two of his article. I’m sorry, but that’s just silly.

On the other hand, inaccurate or dubious paraphrases are deceptive. For instance, when the New York Times wrote: “McKinney?s [opponent] capitalized on the furor caused by Miss McKinney?s suggestion this year that President Bush might have known about the September 11 attacks but did nothing so his supporters could make money in a war,” that is deceptive.

That doesn’t suggest to Times readers that “McKinney said some things on the radio which could be interpreted this way, although there are other ways to interpret what she said, and she herself denies that’s how she meant it” - which is what the truth would have been. What it tells Times readers is that she said that: and that was deceptive.

As for your long quote from the radio interview (which has been reproduced on this very blog at least two or three times before, by the way), your problem seems to be that you are unable to imagine that anyone could possibly disagree with you about anything, or interpret a passage differently, unless they’re lying. In reality, people can disagree with you without being liars, Greg.

Your reading is one possible reading, but it’s certainly not the only possible reading. I think Palast’s interpretation is a good deal more plausible:

Now look back at McKinney’s words. What was she saying? As she has explained again and again, she was citing reports from BBC Television and Britain’s Guardian and Observer newspapers, even USA Today, that there was a massive intelligence failure before September 11. Crucial information was ignored by US intelligence agencies, these reports say. Furthermore, the BBC and Guardian reported, this blindness in intelligence gathering seems to have its source in the long-standing US government policy of not discomfiting Saudi Arabia, well-known source of terrorists and terrorist funding. Furthermore (and I’m sorry if there is a complex ‘furthermore’ ? the REAL news does not always fit into nice one sentence sound-bites) ? the Bush Administration’s see-no-Saudi-evil policy may be prejudiced by the notable investments in Bush family enterprises by the self-same Saudis suspected by some European governments of funding terror.

It’s a complex but important story, one the Congresswoman thought deserved investigation: the money-poisoning of America’s foreign policy. It is NOT NOT NOT about Bush having specific knowledge of a September 11 al-Queda attack and deliberately withholding the info.

An advantage of Palast’s interpretation over yours is that McKinney says that’s what she meant. Do you really think it was excusable of the Times to print their (and yours) radically anti-McKinney interpretation without even asking her if she meant her comments that way?

This doesn’t excuse Palast from referring to a “made-up” “quote.” A quote can only be taken verbatim from the source’s mouth. None of the papers Palast impugned claimed to be quoting McKinney’s exact words. Saying that a reporter fabricated someone’s statement is different than claiming he paraphrased it in an unflattering way. The first case would be libel - the second case wouldn’t.

It’s silly to call out reporters for not asking politicians if they meant what they said in another interview. Did you think the media “screwed” George Bush when he said “There are some who feel like that the conditions are such that they can attack us there. My answer is bring them on”? There were dozens of stories following up the controversy of the statement, and Democrats went on the record to criticize Bush. They were right to do that, and make their own interpretation of Bush’s comment. They didn’t call the White House and ask what he meant. He was on the record, and he said what he said.

Also, McKinney used the formulation “What did this Administration know, and when did it know it about the events of September 11?” That’s a loaded phrase, harkening back to Howard Baker asking about Watergate: “What did the president know, and when did he know it?” It’s a phrase you use when you expect someone of wrongdoing. That factored into how I interpreted it, and it would be fair for another reporter to think the same way.

Yeah, you can come to different conclusions about what McKinney meant. If she was referring to terrorism in general and “NOT NOT NOT” to Bush knowing about September 11, McKinney should not have questioned what Bush “knew about the events of September 11.” I don’t expect reporters to make nice and check with Dubya to see that he approves their coverage, and I didn’t expect them to do that for Cynthia McKinney.