Not quite. When the NYT or the WaPo reports something from anonymous sources as news, we know that there is an editor somewhere doing his best to make sure those sources are credible. When an blogger or an editorialist does the same, we really don’t know what his standards are. An editorial, in and of itself, is not a primary source. Neither is a blog. A bone fide news story is.
Yeah, sure. It could happen, “Autumn”–if that is your real name. But look what happens when we rip off this mask!
? Aren’t we in agreement, then? I said that the problem with editorials/op-ed pieces/blogs is that we don’t know what their sources are (and hence don’t know whether they’re reliable). You appear to be saying the same. So, kissy-kissy, right? (Maybe I just wasn’t expressing my point clearly enough to be understood, and if so, sorry about that.)
Huh? I never said the OP’s comments alleging any Rove roles to be accurate. All I said was that Rove has a 36-year record of political dirty tricks, and that the OP’s comments concerning Rove would be right up his (Rove’s) alley.
Sorry if I misread your post. But you didn’t say right up his alley-- you said it would be a cakewalk, meaning it would be easy for him to do. I took that to mean you were agreeing with the OP.
BTW, I still think my scenario better explains how a real evil genuis would operate if he knew he had a ticking time bomb in Congress-- get rid of the guy before he explodes. You can’t postulate, as our OP has, that he’s really good at his job and then say he just pulled one of the stoooopidest stunts ever.
Seems that the blog operates under the primatur of the New Republic. Quoted within: “…a source close to Foley explained to THE NEW REPUBLIC…”. So, for all practical purposes, this is sourced to NR, no?
I wouldn’t know. I think the person quoting the blog needs to tell us what type of journalistic standards it operates under and how he has determined that.
Besides, what kind Evil Genius finds a Congressman who’s trying to bone 16 year old boys and says: Man, we need to make sure we don’t lost that guy! I don’t know about you, but I learned not to do that in my first semester of Evil Genius 101. And note that even the blogger doesn’t make the same inference that our OP does. It skips from a paragraph about the House Leadership and the page scandal to Rove pressuring Foley. The blogger never says Rove knew anything about the page stuff. So, what if Rove did pressured Foley to stay? Like I’ve already said, if he did, then I think we can be pretty sure he didn’t know. Remember, he is an Evil Genius.
So, I’d say that either Rove knew about the pages and didn’t pressure Foley, or he pressured Foley and didn’t know about the pages.
If Foley’s district is so safely Republican, then why didn’t Rove and/or Tom Reynolds let him step down when he wanted to, so they could simply run a (non-pedophile) Republican in his stead?
Seniority for House committee assignments?
By itself you don’t, but the wonders of the internet mean that you can go and plug the author’s name into a search engine and find out. And you can similarly check the facts presented. And let’s not forget the howlers the traditional press have made. Jayson Blair, anyone? Dan Rather? Let’s also not forget journalistic bias. Fox News, anyone? Or Air America, whose loss other Dopers are currently lamenting.
Dismissing a blog simply for being a blog is arrogant idiocy. Would you dismiss Nick Robinson’s blog on the BBC? I doubt it. Where do you draw the line? Personally, my starting point is the person using their real name.
This blog article fails to cut it for me because it cites an anonymous, mysterious source, not because it’s a blog entry. It’s unverifiable.
Those are great suggestions for the person using that cite. I think EC should do just that and report back to us. Me, I try to cite the NYT or WaPo so readers don’t have to do any legwork.
I don’t dismiss it so much as I don’t accept it. There is a difference. I’ll accept it if it’s demostrated to be a good source, but I’m not going to check it myself.
But the thing is, even if we assume the blog is 100% accurate, so what? What does the blog tell us-- that Foley was pressured by Rove to stay one. BFD. The main problem I have is connecting the dots as our OP has. Them dots just don’t connect-- do you think they do?
[QUOTE=John Mace]
Those are great suggestions for the person using that cite. I think EC should do just that and report back to us. Me, I try to cite the NYT or WaPo so readers don’t have to do any legwork.
Jeebus, John, just because you confuse an article by an editor at TNR Online for a post on a random blog, you don’t have to get all defensive. Here’s Ryan Lizza’s bio:
Sounds like a credible journalist to me. The sort of guy who might have actual sources. Who know stuff. Granted, Lizza didn’t reveal his sources, but that’s part of investigative journalism. I’d say the facts are all leaning toward my interpretation. When you try to defend Rove from accusations of dirty tricks, you’re like some desperate country lawyer defending Billy Joe Bob Worthless in his 50th convenience store robbery trial. “Sure, Billy Joe Bob has knocked over a couple of convenience stores, but he didn’t knock over THIS one. So what if the robber used Billy Joe Bob’s m.o. So what if the manager identified Billy Joe Bob in a lineup. No one but the manager saw him do it, and he could be lying because he hates the way Billy Joe Bob keeps reading the magazines and not buying them.”
Mmmm-hmmmm.
Sure, you can believe that Rove, master of dirty tricks who is supposed to have a near-eidetic memory wouldn’t have known about all the rumors of Foley’s page-ination. But your belief doesn’t seem all that reasonable.
Ever heard of hubris, John? Rove thinks he can get away with ANY FUCKING THING. He and the Bush Administration have used the Constitution as toilet paper for six years. Rove’s whole life has been one long litany of dirty tricks and sleazy doings. What Rove saw was, “Incumbent Republican threatening to leave district prior to 2006 elections. Incumbents are almost impossible to beat. So he likes to diddle pages. Big deal. We’ll just hush it up until the 2006 election is over and then toss Foley out like used tissue paper if he proves troublesome thereafter. I’ll send one of the gang over to let Foley know that if he drops out prior to Nov. 7, 2006, he can kiss his lobbying career goodbye.”
Rove believes he could get away with it because he has gotten away with far worse, including actual treason, already. Where you been the last six years?
I personally think Karl Rove is utterly devoid of any morals and there is no crime I feel is beyond him. If I saw evidence next week that Karl Rove was holding ten year old boys down while Mark Foley had his way with them, it wouldn’t surprise me.
But that said, I haven’t seen any such evidence. Or any reasonable evidence that Rove was aware of Foley’s actions. And until there’s some actual facts being put out, I’m not going to believe that Karl Rove must be guilty of doing something evil just because he’s evil.
And this is where your convenience story robbery analogy fails.
You’re equating a very specific crime, an almost “signature” M.O., with any bad thing at all. Rove is guilty because he believes he can get away with anything. He must have known about Foley because he knows all that stuff.
You want us to believe Billy Bob Worthless vandalized the post office, just because he’s robbed a bunch of convenience stores, he’s known to have a bad temper, and he once got a letter that really pissed him off.
You know what? Let’s drop this discussion about the validity of the blog. It doesn’t matter. If we accept it as 100% valid, so fucking what? Go back and address my issues with the conclusions you are drawing. I really don’t care about the blog. If you want to claim it’s true, fine. It makes no difference.
Your main issue seems to be that I haven’t proven that Rove knew Foley was a page-o-phile when he pressured Foley into resigning. That’s true, there’s no PROOF to be had of that at the moment. But the fact of the matter is that Rove is a proven past master of dirty tricks, and part of dirty tricks is knowing the dirt. I agree, I couldn’t convict the guy in a court of law, but this is a discussion board, and if you think it’s just OUTSIDE the BOUNDS that Karl Rove could have known … wait a minute, if you think it’s anything other than VERY LIKELY that Karl Rove would have known about Foley’s page-o-philia … you’re just being incredibly naive. Rove’s a professional dirty trickster, among other things. Stuff like Foley’s weakness for pages is stock in hand to someone like him.
EC: You can’t convict the guy of this “crime” even here, on this MB. It’s not just me-- I don’t see anyone else agreeing with you. We’re the jury here, and no one is convinced. Now, that doesn’t mean you’re wrong, but quit pretending like it’s just a matter of not meeting the standards of a courtroom.
This is a discussion board, yes. And this is a GD thread.
Please read up on argumentum ad ignoratiam, the logical fallacy you’re peddling.
If I had made such an argument, I would surely be chastised by your post. But I didn’t, so I’m not. We have Rove, a man predisposed to commit dirty tricks. We have an account from a trusted source that Foley claimed Rove pulled a dirty trick by pressuring him to remain in Congress by threatening to ruin his prospects as a lobbyist if he did. We know that maintaining a Republican majority in Congress was important enough to the Republican leadership to keep Foley in Congress long after they knew of his weakness for young male pages. It all fits together very nicely. Does it constitute absolute proof that Rove did what was alleged? Of course not, otherwise I and others would be calling for an investigation of what Rove did and knew and so forth.
Is it enough to add to the list of “dirty tricks Rove probably did but we don’t have solid evidence on him just yet”? Why yes, yes it is.