Gee, now that, as Broder says, McCain’s becoming the ‘anti-Bush’ again, he’s dropping a prominent staffer who’s one of his main links to the religious wingnuts. It may be too early to say that McCain’s reversing his two-year-old ‘kiss up to the fundies’ strategy, but it’s worth watching to see if he does a full-fledged flip-flop here, too.
Could it be that Broder’s long list of Democrats consists of Joe Lieberman? As an ‘Independent Democrat’ and a ‘moderate’, Joe is a list unto himself.
You’ll note that he didn’t say “a long list of Senators of each party,” which would have required multiple Democrats. “A long list of senators of both parties” needs only be long, and have at least one Senator from each party.
So since Broder probably still thinks of Loserman as a Dem in good standing, a passel of concern-trolling Republican Senators plus Loserman would suffice, from his POV.
I’m pretty skeptical that Liebermann has said that he thinks Reid should step down. They may disagree with the war, but I think Joe is pretty careful not to openly critisize the Dem leadership like that.
I just checked Lieberman’s website and his statement regarding Reid’s quote was that he “respectfully disagrees”. Hardly a vote of no confidence in the Senate leader.
Also, I assume that “all 50 members of Mr. Reid’s caucus” that signed the letter expressing support would include Lieberman.
Apparently, it does, but I haven’t found the complete list of signers yet. It begins to look like Broder just lied about the composition of his long list of senators.
Libermann is deffinately a caucus member (I just double checked). There are technically 51 members, but I assume the missing name is Tim Johnson, the senator that was hospitilized shortly after the 2006 election. Had Liberman not signed, I don’t think the Washington paper that published the letter would’ve put “all members” at the end.
Actually, it looks more like people are reading whatever they want into his words and then either claiming great victory (“eviscerate”?) or taking great umbrage over things he never said.
No one has posted any quotation where he said that any senators were calling for Reid’s resignation. His explicit statement was
That is not a call for anyone to be thrown out of office. It is a statement that the senate, in general, is tired of the screw-ups. It could be resolved by resignations or it could be resolved by the actors getting their acts together and behaving intelligently, but there is so much projection by those who really want to engage in partisanship that no one is actually respondoing to what Broder said but to what they want him to have said so that they can cheer or jeer.
(This is not a claim on my part that Broder is some “dean” of anything or that he is full of wisdom or that he has not been listing increasingly to starboard for the last 15 years, or so, or even that his opinion, in this case, is correct. It is simpy an observation that the real excessive partisanship occurs when people are more interested in cheering their side that they parade around acting as though he said something that is not actually discovered in the text of his piece.)
You know, I never claimed that any senators had called for Reid’s resignation. Can you name a Democratic Senator who is ready for Reid’s ‘springtime ineptitude’ to end? Of course you can’t, and neither can Broder.
I think you could argue that Lieberman qualifies there, he certainly disagrees with Ried’s latest comments.
I was going off Elucidator’s partial quote above, which does misrepresent Broder as talking about senators discussing Reid’s resignation rather then his "springtime ineptitude’. My bad.
Squink asked for a *Democratic * Senator. “Both parties” could, if one were being lawyerish enough, mean the Republicans and the Connecticut-for-Liebermans.
But still, Broder is pulling the old false-equivalence* tu quoque* crap we so regularly see, and shoot down, right here in this forum. I wouldn’t call him a partisan, though, not exactly - he’s better defined as a Beltway media man, part of the permanent priesthood that considers itself the true custodians of the government, in alliance with the Providers of Access in the administration. Now that the order is being threatened, it is necessary to discredit the threateners.
I guess, but if Broder said “both parties” and ment Lieberman, I wouldn’t say he was lying, since Lieberman is basically a Democrat.
In what ways that matter?
He caucuses with the Dems, which matters a hell of a lot, as I’m sure Harry Reid would tell you.
Grouping Lieberman and Sanders (the other senate independent who caucuses with the Dems) under the heading of “Democrats” when discussing the makeup of the senate or the party breakdown of votes is fairly SOP.
And the Pubs pointing to Fightin’ Joe’s warmongering, Defeatocrat-bashing rants as an example of “sanity” from the “Democrat party” is at least equally SOP.
Has Liberman ever bashed the “Defeatocrats”? The statement about Reid’s statements I mentioned earlier were careful to be respectful of the senate leader even while disagreeing with his stance. In general Lieberman has seemed careful to keep his support for the war from becoming a criticism of the Dems in general.
It’s about all he does anymore.
Hours before Senate vote, Lieberman says proponents of Iraq withdrawal play into al-Qaida hands
More directly,
War Is Not Lost, Lieberman Says, Unless Democrat Plan Is Followed
Even without it, do you really think there’s a useful difference between “respectfully disagreeing” with the Democratic leader himself and with the rank-and-file that is unanimously behind him?
First rule of holes, Tom. Stop digging.
Broder’s not just ‘listing to starboard,’ he’s being a hack about it, overlooking McCain’s massive flipflopping, while zeroing in on a few instances of Reid shooting from the hip, and equating that with Gonzales’ entire wall-to-wall day of incredible testimony before Congress.
It’s possible for one to hold a POV but be fair to holders of other POVs. Broder isn’t even trying. That’s what makes him a partisan hack.
Of course, when one’s own perspective causes one to misread every statemenrt by any person who is not in 100% agreement with one’s own position, it is easy to cherry pick enough statements to “prove” whatever one wants.
I see no significant difference between your characterization of Broder and your actions.
You’re the one with the shovel.
I think anyone, like Broder, who could ever write the words “I like Karl Rove” and wax lyrical about eating quail at his table and having long conversations with him may have pretty much come out of the partisan closet of his own accord.