Well, heck, what Kerry should have done is tried to join Swift-Boat Veterans for Truth, pointing out that he was a swift-boat veteran and he liked truth.
On MSNBC Countdown tonight, Eric Burns, a long term journalist and authors notes that some disproportionate number of the footnotes in this book are, when you look at them, references to Corsi himself. So much of his so-called documentation is complete crap.
I really wonder, of all the copies that are printed of the hate-mongering books, what percentage of the copies actually were read. I would make a substantial bet that it is less than 10%.
Nevertheless, those that want to buy into it will put it on the shelf as “proof” that thier biases have credibility.
It’s like the Bible. There are all of these people that cite it as the basis of truth, the guide of their existence and the literal word of God yet they have never actually read the thing cover-to-cover and only can base their beliefs on chosen snippets.
There is no rational way to deal with such people.
I oppose the death penalty, but I don’t dispute that it is a rational act.
I don’t know that someone who has a goal and achieves that goal by taking deliberate steps is an idiot. They may be an asshole, but they are not necessarily an idiot.
Jeebus Christ! I can’t believe I didn’t realize that “Obama Nation” = abomination until one of my dreams pointed it out to me last night. :smack:
It’s okay. The author apparently doesn’t trust his readers to recognize the hilarious calembour either, because (IIRC from my brief glance) it’s the first thing explained on the inside jacket, or maybe the rear cover.
Just wanted to chime in on this- Ross wasn’t the first. I know this tactic has a long, sordid history. I worked for a chain bookstore in the mid 90’s that no longer accepted bulk orders specifically for this reason. In their case, it was when ‘Dianetics’ first came out, and the Church of S decided to order lots and lots of copies to get it to the NYT best-seller list, then return them all.
So, er, for research purposes, which branch are the bottoms?
Not sure. 
Look up “Dirk Yates”…he was the particular producer involved in the Camp Pendleton scandal, and he has HUNDREDS of titles involving Marines from that base.
My bold.
Hey, thanks for that word. It’ll be my new word of the day.
And thanks to those who let me in on the “best seller” secret. I had no idea.
Learn something new every day.
Huh. Well, I think it is possible to learn the wrong lessons from four years ago, myself, especially if your response has some factual mistakes itself (or at least ones that can be vigorously debated.)
For instance, Obama calls assertions that Bill Ayers isn’t a good citizen flat out lies - frankly, I think that point can be fairly debated, regardless of how well integrated Ayers is into Democratic politics in Chicago.
He calls Bob Beckel a “Republican strategist” which is just silly, as anyone with a passing familiarity with Beckel’s career can attest to (and for those not familiar, he worked for the right-wing Bobby Kennedy and Walter Mondale campaigns, plus the fascist Carter administration. ;))
Mind you, there might be more. But that’s the problem with trying to go point by point here - you fail on a point or two and you risk lessening the total impact of your own response - whereas a curt dismissal (which Kerry didn’t engage in either until too late) might have worked better.
There are numberless factchecking sites and publications now - I’d leave this sort of job to them and just issue a brief dismissal. When did George Bush ever respond with minutia, apart from a document dump? While you might disagree with his actions in many ways, he probably was pretty politically astute by doing so.
It is really interesting that minor issues with the debunking threaten to invalidate the entire debunking, but proven errors in the source material should be disregarded in order to evaluate the remainder of the points, which may be true.
It strikes me that the two positions are in conflict with each other.
I never claimed that they invalidated the whole debunking - only that they lessened the impact of it. And really, does Obama want people discussing all of these points one by one anyway? They might remember the allegations and not the proof against them.
I just don’t think this was the right approach for him (admittedly, I am not a supporter.) He should have just rolled his eyes, said politicians have to put up with nuts all of the time, and left it at that.
There will be other books that can’t be dismissed so easily - one is out now by Dick Morris and another by a guy called Freddoso - it appears at first glance that these make a case against Obama without using quite so much hyperbole or fantasy. Perhaps Obama is trying to discredit the genre by going after the worst offender - if that’s the case, I have to give him credit for trying.
But the Washington Post just mentioned both of these other books in an article, so perhaps people will be watching to see if Obama gives them the full treatment.
Bush never responded with “minutae” (which I guess is righty-speak for “facts”) because he couldn’t. Everything said about him was true. Bush bashers don’t have to make shit up.
Bill Ayers is a perfectly fine, upstanding citizen, by the way, notwithstanding a few silly acts of politically motivated vandalism 40 years ago (acts during which great care was taken to ensure that no human beings would be harmed, and – not by accident – the Weathermen never injured anyone. That fact alone puts a lie to the stupid righty allegations that he was a “terrorist.” Terrorists, by definition, target people. The Weathermen not only didn’t target people, but went out of their way to make sure it wouldn’t even happen by accident). Plus Obama barely knows him. Who cares if an ex-radical hippie lives in his neighborhood? If you want to talk about embarrassing associations, let’s talk about John McCain with his face lovingly buried in the bosom of history’s dumbest monster.
Dick Morris’ “case” against Obama basically just consists of calling him a liberal, by the way. What’s to dismiss? What revelations exist in either his book or Fredosso’s book that anyone should care about?
golf clap.
Has a republican come out to denounce this book?
*Asked by a reporter today to comment on the book, McCain said: “Gotta keep your sense of humor,” before his aides whisked him away… *
Sometimes McCain just rocks when it comes to oneliners. 
Uh, when that townhouse blew up in 1970, they were building bombs so that they could attack an officer’s club dance at Fort Dix. How isn’t that a terrorist act? And the fact that their own incompetence was the only thing that saved those Army officers from bombing isn’t much of a defense.
In any case, several of their own members died, so it seems like the care you mentioned wasn’t present to the necessary degree for them, either.
And of course, Ayers remains pretty unrepentant about the whole mess - as has been shown by his own words.
I hesitate to put words in your mouth, but if we were talking about an abortion clinic bomber here, you wouldn’t be giving him slack at all. And if he were associated with John McCain, even tangentially, hell would break loose.
Sure, Ayers works in the educational establishment in Chicago, and liberals tolerate his presence there. But we shouldn’t ask why he is so welcomed and tolerated. That would be rude.
:rolleyes: