August 09, 2006

Lanny vs. the Nutroots

Former Clinton crony Lanny Davis had an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal the other day ripping the "netroots" supporters of Ned Lamont for their venom towards Joe Lieberman, which he compares to the "McCarthyism" of the right of his youth, and "sanctimony and vitriol displayed by the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, and Michael Savage" today.

The author shares examples of hatefulness, and anti-Semitism, from commenters on the Daily Kos and Huffington Post. Which led Bill O'Reilly, on his radio show last night, to ask why the "liberal media" made such a big deal about Mel Gibson's anti-Semitic comments, but was dead silent about the anti-Semitic Lieberman-bashing on the blogs.

I know I've been ripping O'Reilly a lot lately. But come on. Anyone with half a brain knows the answer: Mel Gibson is an internationally known public figure. "Rim," a commenter on the Huffington Post, is not (that's the person who said on HuffPo that Lieberman is "beholden to the Jewish Lobby"). What "Rim," or any other random blog commenter says, isn't really news. Thousands of people, left and right, say stupid things in blog comment sections every day. It's also pretty clear that O'Reilly doesn't read blogs and has no idea what the difference is between a blogger and a commenter.

(Davis also rightfully rips Michael Savage, who is so off-the-charts insane that he can't help but be entertaining. Savage, of course, long ago turned against Bush because he's too liberal. I listened to his show for five minutes last night, just long enough to hear him refer to Lieberman as a "far-left-wing liberal" and Lamont as a "Leninist" who "almost certainly supports Hezbollah.")

The debate over which side, the left or the right, has more "crazies" on it, is a stupid and irrelevant one. Both sides have way too many, who have way too much influence. Whether it's 10% on one side and 12% on the other isn't terribly important. The crazies on the left knocked off a moderate Senate candidate, yes- but the crazies on the right bought millions of copies of Ann Coulter's book. And for every Kos comment that Lieberman is in the pocket of the Jews, I can show you a Little Green Footballs thread in which someone (or 20 someones) calls for the nuking of the entire Muslim world.

Posted by Stephen Silver at August 9, 2006 04:05 PM
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