Heard Dick Morris on the radio the other day, and he was promoting something he worked on called Fahrenhype 911, a documentary put together to rebut Moore and his movie. One of the things that he said was that Moore gets some mileage about Saudi investment in Harken Energy, the company that a lot of poeple got exercised about regarding a stock sale that Bush made while a director, claiming there was some crime there. There wasn't, of course, but it was certainly good fortune (literally) for Bush, because the proceeds of that sale went to his investment in the Texas Rangers, which did make him wealthy on his own.

But Morris says that the biggest investor in Harken Energy was George Soros - and sure enough, he's right.

Soros is the money behind all of those 527's and who pays Oliver Willis' blog salary, for example. So, the Wikipedia entry says "Ironically, Soros's Harken Energy bailed out Bush in 1986 by buying his ailing oil venture, Spectrum 7."

Or maybe not so ironic. Because all that 527 action is falling flat - and it is causing Kerry to lose.

Imagine the mechanism that it would take to put all that together. The President coopts McCain-Feingold, which forces unions and corporations out of the Democrat soft-money pool, and then Soros (who is the root of Bush's wealth) floods the airwaves with crackpottery to scare off all the undecideds. Those who think that Karl Rove is behind the CBS forgeries just aren't thinking big enough.

Whenever serious journalists get on TV and talk about Dan Rather and CBS and stuff, they are always "mystified" why CBS kept doing things that serious journalism organizations would [EDIT]not[/EDIT] do.

A quote from Ayn, for all you objectivists out there: "Check your premises."

Another way these oldline journalists are failing to get it is they keep trying to frame the CBS controversy in the context of "serious journalism," and can't figure out why it doesn't fit. The blogosphere doesn't suffer from such delusions. The reason why CBS didn't, and still hasn't, acted like a serious journalism organization is because it isn't a serious journalism organization. If you frame the story in the context of "they're really just partisan hacks," then the whole story makes sense. There isn't any mystery at all.

Let me put my 2 cents in on pittspilot's post below. First of all, welcome back. Second of all, the treatment by the Democrats of Allawi is simply shameful. Only 19 of the 49 Senate Democrats bothered to show for the speech, one Democrat, a Senator Dayton (Can't be bothered to look up his state right now), said he wouldn't go and he wouldn't watch it on TV, it was just a put up job for President Bush. But he's got nothing on Kerry. Imagine what effect Kerry's election would have on Allawi. All of his authority would be undone. Good thinking, Mr. We Can't Go it Alone.

I think it is a good thing, though, that we are now, after months of talking about Vietnam, arguing about the WOT and particularly Iraq. We need to have this election as a national referendum on it. Michael Moore thinks that breaks his way. And if it does, so be it, at least we will have honestly debated the issue and made an informed choice.

No longer is Kerry and the Democrat party going to make the claim that they are Bush-lite or Bush-plus on Iraq. They are anti-Bush, pure and simple. So let's decide.

UPDATE: Turns out Dayton is from Minnesota, so the Powerline fellas have the goods on him.

It continually amazes me how low we have sunk in the level of political discourse in this political campaign. It's like a debate between teenagers, who lack maturity. Let me give a specific example:

I often hear how the Administration is "politicizing" the War on Terror. However most of these objections revolve around how the President brings up 9/11 and the War on Terror during this campaign. I have news for these folks. War, is a political act. 9/11 was a political act.

You see, we do not need to politicize the war, because it already is! Don't believe me, or are dealing with someone who doesn't understand this, ask them a simple question; If not politics, how do we deal with all the various aspects of a war, in a Republic such as ours?

Of course we have to talk about this politically. And vigorously. How we conduct the war, what we are going to do next, whether we should stay in it, and who has the best plan are only some among the many things that urgently require discussion.

What Bush has done, and what he plans to do are all on the table. What Kerry plans to do is also on the table. Forget hurt feelings, forget Vietnam, let us concentrate on the pressing task ahead.

However, as in anything, it is possible to carry something too far. Examples? Well today provided the impetus to this post.

Item 1: Teresa Heinz Kerry said that she would not be surprised if UBL shows up next month.

If you are going to level this kind of charge, you need to have proof. You also need to explain how the capture of UBL is a bad thing. And you also need to explain how this type of comment helps the war on terror, because it is abundently clear to me that this comment undermines the war on terror. You see, the context suggests that the only reason that Bush wants to capture UBL is to assure electoral victory. This is different from arguing that the opposition is incompetent. You are arguing that the opposition is corrupt. For that type of charge you need to have more then innuendo.

Item 2: "The last thing you want to be seen as is a puppet of the United States, and you can almost see the hand underneath the shirt today moving the lips," said Joe Lockhart, a senior Kerry adviser." What the hell is that? I heard it this morning on Laura Ingraham and almost drove off the side of the road.

First, if you have paid attention to Allawi you would notice a couple of things. One is that Allawi appears to be very independent. He often says and does things that indicate that he is independent of the United States. This is of paramount importance. And in one fell swoop, the Kerry campaign has undermined Allawi badly. Secondly, if Kerry should win, he is going to have to deal with Allawi. Unless Kerry plans to replace Allawi, but then wouldn't Kerry's guy be a puppet?

Secondly, it is disgraceful treatment of the man. I am not completely sold on Allawi yet, but thus far he has impressed me. The man is doing work under circumstances that would try any mortal, and furthermore under grave danger for his life. Allawi faces more danger on a daily basis then either Kerry or Bush ever did, and his future is far less secure then Kerry or Bush's ever was. If this all turns to crap, Kerry retires to Aspen to ski, Bush returns to Crawford, but Allawi is likely to lose his life in a most painful manner, and likely his family will be wiped from the face of the earth as well. The man, with a number of brave others, is carrying Iraq on his back, and for that they should be given a large amount of slack.

I am utterly sickened by the Kerry campaign. The man is a disaster. He would be an unmitigated menace as President, and is one as a Senator. Thank you Mass. we really appreciate the gift.

Update

"You cannot lead the war on terror if you wilt when times are tough," Bush said in front of a flag-draped airport hangar. "You cannot expect the Iraqi people to stand up and do the hard work of democracy if you are pessimistic about their abilities. You cannot expect the Iraqi people to do the hard work if you say that they'd be better off with Saddam Hussein in power.

"What kind of message does it send our troops, who are risking their lives and who see firsthand the mission is hard, but know the mission is critical to our success?"

Still going to be voting for that Libertarian, Grant? We need all the help we can get.

And CA has shown signs of closing. 19 points to eight points.

Not my guy, but good enough. Back in June, I posted that the President should not postpone the nomination of a DCI until after the election. And he didn't, and Goss passed, overwhelmingly.

This is a good thing for the country, and the war effort, that we have a real DCI, not an acting one. And I think that it shows that the President still has good political instincts. Which is good for him.

Where I am this week.

Still kinda lagging in the bloggage, I couldn't keep up with the fire around the CBS memos. And now, after the storm, quiet.

Well, not entirely. Seems that John Kerry is now saying that Bush will reinstate the draft. I said that this issue was coming, though not exactly in this way. Still, as I have documented time and time again, the only people talking about the draft are Democrats. So if Kerry thinks the draft is a bad idea, he needs to talk to his fellow Democrat Senators.

So far, the prediction on CBS is holding out. Of course, not yet a day old, but there you are. I heard what Rather said on a radio broadcast, and he didn't even get Burkett's branch of service right! And, oh yeah, notice how the blogosphere ferreted out Burkett? That's pretty darn impressive, I think, and I had nothing to do with it. At any rate, why isn't anyone birddogging Rather on all that "we were super extra careful in our authentication" stuff, now that he says, well, we just trusted this guy, and so we didn't authenticate it, especially since the White House didn't push back.

So Rather admits he lied in his own defense. He should get fired, or resign. But he'll ride it out.

I don't buy it, not as presented. Novak is not plugged into this administration. He was against a war in Iraq. So I don't believe him on these inside the administration stories.

Though I do expect many troops will be leaving Iraq after the election. But they'll be headed for Syria or Iran.

Flipping through the pages of a newspaper will never be replaced by internet browsing, I think. For one, it is easier to sit at the kitchen table with your coffee with a paper. And web browsing is too random access - you can hit the articles you want without seeing anything else - which can be bad. That is one downside to the use of blogs as news services, since they focus exclusively on what is available online.

For example, this story - a column, really - I would have missed had I not flipped the pages in the post over coffee this morning. A column by Elizabeth Wilner, a political director for NBC News, entitled "Hey, Pal, What Happened to Your Gloves?"

Ms. Wilner is peddling the line that Democrats aren't mean enough to play ball with the Republicans, and that's why Kerry is getting his clock cleaned. (Evidently, she must have gotten called by Bill Burkett, too!) To support this theory, she includes this:

And throughout August, the Democrats' roughest month to date, Kerry advisers insisted that taking the high road amid attacks on Kerry's Vietnam service by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth was the way to go. They referred to polling and focus group data showing that negativity turns voters off. Meanwhile, several Democratic consultants not working for the Kerry campaign cringed in frustration as their own experience and polling data told them the charges were resonating.

The Bush campaign doesn't go into a defensive crouch. When attacked, it does a quick two-step, moving quickly from defense to offense so the coverage of their reaction includes an immediate and even preemptive strike against the credibility of the source -- be it "60 Minutes" or the new Kitty Kelley book on the Bush family that began to make the pre-publication publicity rounds last week.

What Ms. Wilner and other Democrats (come on, what are the odds she's a Republican?) is apparently blind to is that the story lines are not equivalent. Even if you find the Swift Boat ads distasteful, you have to admit that they have forced the Kerry campaign to retract 2 of Kerry's hero stories: being in Cambodia, Christmas, 1968, and that his first Purple Heart was the result of an injury caused by himself, not enemy fire. The 60 Minutes allegations are based on forgeries (Ms. Wilner might watch her own network, or read the paper her column is in, if she is in any doubt.), and the Kitty Kelly stuff is just ludicrous. This isn't a question of whether each side deals with filthy lies differently - it is that one side is dealing with filthy lies, and the other is trying to duck filthy truths.

This blindness on the part of Democrats is leading them down to disaster. The problem isn't the charges that the Swift Boats have levelled, the problem is that Kerry keeps talking about Vietnam. The problem isn't that Bush has legions of Republican operatives giving him stand-off protection from the Killian memos, the problem is that the memos are laughably bad forgeries.

If there is any question over whether the Democrats are mean enough to be in the race, check out the post I linked to at Ace's, or this one at Allah's and just keep scrolling down.

A couple more fearless predictions - they don't cost nothing, why not?

1. Dan Rather will not get fired, and CBS will not retract its story on the memos. They are going to take a Bill Clinton "we just have to win" strategy. And like Clinton, it will work. But, again, as with Clinton, the damage is done. There will always be some amount of snickering whenever Rather or CBS News is mentioned.

Nader will pick up in the polls. Deanites who swallowed their pride and anti-war fervor for "electability" are going to feel betrayed as "electability" gets to be more and more an unlikely trait for Kerry. Nader is more politically aligned with the Deanites - the "Democratic wing of the Democratic party," so to speak - so those who compromised their principles to win will return to their principles rather than betray their inner selves and lose.

UPDATE:That was quick! But the prediction still stands, because they appear to be going with the "Fake but Accurate" play. That's not a retraction:

"The editorial story line was still intact, and still is, to this day,'' he said, "and the reporting that was done in it was by a person who has turned in decades of flawless reporting with no challenge to her credibility.''

Not a retraction at all.