CircleID

I posted this to my blog in September: not about telecom blogs, but yes, about astroturf. And about political blogs in general.

2007.09.24 11.13
The Petraeus ad and my reactions to it

Seeing all the noise around this made me think a bit.

Sneak propaganda and personal attacks masquerading as political action is reprehensible, whether it is Eli Pariser and Moveon.org doing it, or purveyors of right wing froth like Ann Coulter, or backstairs political manipulators like Karl Rove.

If you condemn swift boat (and I do) and think Ann Coulter is a brainless rabble rouser (and I do that, too) you should condemn the Petraeus ad.

For just about the same reasons as I have condemned moveon and other organizations's campaign against Goodmail (www.circleid.com/posts/eff_use_of_propaganda_karl_rove/ ).

Someone has to take the high road - a road that doesn't include simply operating in a "moderate" area demarcated by extremists on the right (coulter) and the left (moveon.org), with the boundaries made very gray indeed by Karl Rove and his ilk.

With "friends" like moveon, the democrats don't need enemies. Of course, unless the ultimate goal is just winning elections (isn't that every political party's goal, anyway..)

One bonus that seems to have come out of this entire mess is that Moveon has had to cough up a much larger sum for their attack ad than they figured to pay - and the NYT is out to collect the same from Guiliani. Nice take on it on the NYT's political blog

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/09/23/moveon-to-pay-full-times-ad-rate/?hp

Pasted below (omitted for circleid), makes entertaining reading. Particularly:

… And so, here’s what MoveOn’s Eli Pariser had to say today. In effect, he’s trying to move away from the controversy, while saying the organization stands by its message ...

Sad, for organizations that claim to speak plain, unvarnished truths (and what political action campaign doesn't?)

--srs