Douchebag of the Day: James O'Keefe

James O'Keefe is a seriously mentally disturbed young man. What else could explain his bizarre plan to try have sex with CNN reporter Abbie Boudreau on camera. O'Keefe's plan was to isolate Boudreau on a private boat and attempt to seduce her. O'Keefe had a memo went a list of sexual items to help him entice Boudreau into having sex.



What could make this creep think he could get Boudreau into bed is beyond me. I can only imagine that O'Keefe has a problem with women and believes all sex is like a porn movie. This is an example of written speech O'Keefe's was going to attempt to seduce Boudreau with.

Abby, I want to take you to a higher place. CNN must be a tough place to work, let's make some headline love."

Attempting to film a woman having sex without her knowledge has nothing to do with conservative or liberal politics. It is just downright hateful and potentially criminal. Fortunately, O'Keefe's assistant Izzy Santa warned Boudreau in advance. I don't think it would be unreasonable to be concerned about Boudreau's safety if Santa went through with her part of the plan of getting Boudreau onto the boat. In the CNN video, Boudreau explains the conversation she had with Santa.



O'Keefe is getting rightfully condemned on both sides of the blogosphere.

Caleb Howe of Redstate.com

If an enterprising citizen can expose media bias with a video camera and good idea, that’s a good thing. But I fail to see how luring a lone female reporter to a remote location and isolating her on a boat, surrounding her with sex toys and pornography, and trying to convince her that the virtual stranger sitting next to her is coming on to her, possibly in front of a “sex tape machine,” does that. That’s not a recipe for a gotcha video, it’s more like a step-by-step instruction on how to cause discomfort and fear. What an ugly and potentially traumatic situation to create on purpose. It’s not clever or funny, it’s sick.

Lindsay Beyerstein

O'Keefe feared that Boudreau might get the better of him as a journalist, so he plotted to destroy her with sex. Happily, it all blew up in his face.

O'Keefe's above-ground career as a conservative activist may be over for the time being. He won't go away, of course. He'll just be pushed deeper in the shadows. There's always work for a dirty trickster in politics. I look forward to reading some day that O'Keefe has been arrested for a fourth-rate burglary.

This is without question the sleaziest story I covered since the Mark Foley scandal.

Update: Boudreau filed another story on O'Keefe's foiled plans.

Update: John Cole tweets a dead on observation.

O'Keefe's big mistake was to stop targeting black people. Media would have never noticed he was a scumbag until he went after one of them.

Regulating Condom Use in the Porn Industry

Lindsay Beyerstein argues the porn industry should mandate condom use.

Porn performers have legal jobs producing legal products in a multibillion-dollar industry. Yet in practice, they lack basic health and safety protections that other workers take for granted. Less than 20 percent of hardcore straight porn features condoms, even though condoms or equivalent protection are required by law.

Male porn star Marc Wallice may have knowingly performed after testing positive for the AIDS virus. It is believed Wallice transmitted the viurus to female porn stars Brooke Ashley, Tricia Devereaux and Barbara Doll. Wallice may have also given the virus to Caroline Delfin and Jordan McKnight. The porn industry made Wallice to take the PCR-DNA April 30, 1998. Test results found Wallice was HIV positive for a year.

The Wallice fiasco serves as a good reason for condom use in the porn industry. I seriously doubt the federal government will step in. Hopefully, California's government is progressive enough to regulate condem use.

The AIDS Healthcare Foundation has filed a complaint with California's the Department of Industrial Relations, Division of Occupational Safety and Health. The AHF want to mandate porn producer Larry Flynt require all male performers to use condoms. The courts have sided with the porn industry in past legal battles over condom use. It is time for the California legislature and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to step in.

My Giuliani Blogging Addiction

I blog about Rudy Giuliani any chance I get. The man is comedy gold. Giuliani could pass for Bilbo Baggins. The fact that a crossdressing New Yorker with former gay roommates and an adultery problem thought he could get the GOP nomination is hysterical. The other great thing about Giuliani is he says the craziest bullshit that literally gets him laughed out of the room.

Giuliani claimed China would soon drill for oil off the coast of Florida. Sen. Mel Martinez quickly debunked that b.s. on the Senate floor. Giuliani also claimed, during his U.S. Attorney days, he used "intensive questioning techniques" (torture) to get information out of mobsters. Lindsay Beyerstein asked the New York Police Department and Justice Department about Giuliani's "intensive questioning techniques" claim. A former Justice Department official told Beyerstein Giuliani's statement was bogus. NYPD spokesman Reginald Watkins said, "It goes without saying, you can not touch someone to get them to tell you about a crime."

Giuliani tops himself with his latest piece of crazy. In his attempt to attack President Obama for being soft on terrorism, Giuliani said there were no terrorist attacks under President Bush's watch.

Giuliani: We had no domestic attacks under Bush. We had one under Obama.

Giuliani's entire campaign was based on repating the numbers "9" and "11." The fact that he forget a terrorist attack in a city that he was Mayor proves he is not fit for the White House. However, Giuliani would make a great guest host for the Colbert Report.

Senate Health Care Provision Backs Faith Healing

The House bill will honor the Hyde amendment by forbiding any federal funding for abortion. Lindsay Beyerstein and Dave Noon note the Senate version has a provision for funding Christian Science prayer treatments. The funding will go to the Christian Science Church. The religious organization was founded by Mary Baker Eddy. She was influenced by Phineas Quimby. From Eddy's bio page at Christian Science.

Without a doubt, the Bible was the most significant influence in Mrs. Eddy’s life. She was a devoted student of the Scriptures from early childhood and gradually gained the conviction that spiritual healing was not limited to biblical times but could be practiced as effectively today. Chronically ill, she also investigated the medical systems of her time and gained insights into the mental factors of health from her study of homeopathy. For a time, her health improved under the care of Phineas P. Quimby, a self-taught healer in Maine who combined mental suggestion or hypnosis with what today might be called therapeutic touch. The improvement was not permanent, however, and she moved beyond his methods after his death in 1866. Convinced that genuine healing was rooted in God, not the human mind, she experienced a profound spiritual healing at age 44 as she read an account of Jesus’ healings. She spent the next three years of her life researching the Bible to understand how she had been healed and applying what she was learning to healing others through a system she eventually called Christian Science. She later wrote and published a textbook that is so closely tied to the Bible that she called it Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures.

The Senate version is allocating tax dollars for faith healing. The U.S. National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health found Christian Scientists have a higher death rate. I feel better if Christian Scientists don't pray for me.

Majority Leader Harry Reid has not decided on if he will add the Christian Science provision. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi stripped a similar it from the House bill.

Netroots Nation: 'Has Feminist Blogging Gone Mainstream?' Panel

Feminist blogging has gone mainstream. The women on the panel has been gracious enough to link to this blog. Samhita Mukhopadhyay is the only blogger I haven't communicate with. Lindsay Beyerstein helped me immensely on the "Faith In Teaching is A Paper Nonprofit". The feminist bloggers deserve credit for having open dialogues and linking to smaller bloggers like myself.

Check out their blogs.

Feministe
Feministing
Majikthise
Pam's House Blend
Pandagon

Update: Jill mentions the infamous pie fight. FYI: Daily Kos ran a Blogad that feautured two women dressed as Mary Ann and Ginger from Gilligan's Island. Many people found the ad tasteless. I was a part of the pie fight. My old post reprinted.

Markos Moulitsas Zúniga: Proud Member of the Men's Studies Set 2005-06-09

As far as I'm concerned, Kos can write whatever pleases him. I support free speech. That means I have to support the right for people to say things I don't necessary agree with. Kos should follow the same credo.

So over the weekend, certain segments of the community have erupted in anger over the TBS ad for their reality show, the Real Gilligan's Island. Apparently, having two women throw pies at each other, wrestle each other in a sexy, lesbianic manner, then having water splashed on their ample, fake bosoms is degrading to women. Or something like that.
Whatever. Feel free to be offended. I find such humorless, knee-jerk reactions, to be tedious at best, sanctimonious and arrogant at worst. I don't care for such sanctimony from Joe Lieberman, I don't care for it from anyone else. Some people find such content offensive. Some people find it arousing. Some people find it funny. To each his or her own.

But I am not Lieberman. I won't sit there and judge pop culture and act as gatekeeper to what I think is "appropriate", and what isn't.

And I certainly won't let the sanctimonious women's studies set play that role on this site. Feel free to be offended. Feel free to claim that I'm somehow abandoning "progressive principles" by running the ad. It's a free country. Feel free to storm off in a huff. Other deserving bloggers could use the patronage.

Me, I'll focus on the important shit.

Many that complained about the ad were women. I personally don't have a problem with things like porn. News flash: I've seen a few in my time. I do wonder why Markos feels so threatened that he has to lash out at his female readers and call them the "women's studies set."

Glenn Reynolds ran the same blogad on his site. I don't expect his readership to complain. Most of Instapundit's readers fear gays getting married. I don't expect him to stand up for the rights of women. Progressives are different and are not going to hang on to every word by Markos as if it is the gospel truth.

I too worry about pop culture becoming censored by the likes of James Dobson. Markos could have kindly said he needed to run the ad to pay for the bandwidth for his site. Instead, he lashed out at women. Not cool. It's a matter of tone. There a difference between saying, "please pass me the salt," and "gimme the fucking salt bitch!"

Here is reactions from female bloggers.

Dru Blood

I think comrade Kos should be commended for bringing his sexist thoughts out into an open forum, thus encouraging the other cockroaches to crawl out from the patriarchal rock they were hiding under. Next time, it might be a better idea to wave a tentacle or two, rather than swinging yr weenie around like you own the place.

Lauren

Is the ad in and of itself offensive? Not necessarily. What is offensive is Kos’ dismissal of feminist complaint, concern and criticism regarding a pretty sexist ad designed for het male titillation run on the most widely-known progressive blog for his own personal profit.

Objectifying and demeaning any minority group for the sake of profit, be it corporate or personal, is abhorrent. This is exactly why I resist the Democratic party and most of its advocates. Women and women’s opinions don’t matter if they run contrary to the bottom line.

Amanda

I'm not gonna dodge it like a coward, which was my first inclination. And I'm not gonna mince words, either--as someone who gets called a man-hater and a sexist on average once a day, if not more, I can safely say that Kos was being a big weenie about being called out for honest-to-god sexism in touting out the tedious stereotype that feminists are humorless wretches. Suck it up, dude.

Markos also attacked NARAL for endorsing pro-choice Republican Lincoln Chafee. Markos thinks that Democrats should be a party of ideals and not issues. He must not be familiar with the Will Rogers quote: "I belong to no organized political party -- I am a Democrat." I make this simple for him to understand. Republicans are about protection the establishment. Democrats are everyone else that falls through the cracks. The Donkey Party is about protecting the little guys and girls. I say that is a fine ideal. Someone who thinks that you must only vote for one party, even if you don't like a candidate, is an ideologue.

Main Entry: ideo·logue

1 : an impractical idealist : THEORIST
2 : an often blindly partisan advocate or adherent of a particular ideology

Female members of Daily Kos have left and started their own blog call Women Kossacks. Good luck with the blog, ladies.

Several links for this post stolen from the wonderful Media Girl.

I get misty eyed for when the progressive blogosphere was a smaller space.

Dick Armey & Big Phama

Lindsay Beyerstein has an exclusive story on Dick Armey's involvement with Freedom Works and his lobbying activities.

One wonders whether Armey had much time left over for his lobbying clients at DLA Piper that year, which included pharma giant Sanofi-Aventis and the Medicines Co.. (Armey represented Sanofi again in 2008 and continued to represent the Medicines Co. through 2009.)

Freedom Works is one of the major astroturfing groups behind the tea party movement. Armey resigned from DLA Piper law firm. He told Politico the phama companies he was representing would face too much media scrutiny.

Lindsay brings up the points that these kind of lobbying and political connections should be brought out into the open. Her second point is big phama companies don't want the negative stink of the Freedom Works and angry townhall meetings. Her article is worth reading.

Other Bloggers On Faith In Teaching

Lindsay Beyerstein and Matthew Lawrence have questions about the nonprofit Faith In Teaching. Florida Sen. Ronda Storms sponsored an amendment to create the I Believe licence plate. A sample plate would feature an image of Jesus. Lindsay and I have researched FIT have questions if it is a legitimate nonprofit.

Lawrence:

Money from the other plate would go to Faith In Teaching, which purports to support faith-based education but which actually may not even be real, since their website is down and their official mailing address is the office of a workers’ comp lawyer.

Lindsay has concerns about the lack of oversight on how organization's, such as FIT, are awarded plates.

I'm less concerned about the religious imagery than I am about the fact that the state is creating revenue streams with minimal oversight for obscure non-profits. It's not inherently evil, but it's troubling. Basically, what seems to have happened in this case is that a clique of politically well-connected Republicans managed to get their state senator to introduce legislation adding their ad hoc non-profit to the program. The group, FIT, seems to exist only as a clearinghouse for the money. FIT says it will divide the money among faith-based groups, but it hasn't offered any details on which ones, or what kind of programs.

There's nothing inherently illegal or immoral about creating a non-profit to take advantage of the program as long as the money actually goes to legitimate charities. Still it is a golden opportunity for political patronage and a back door way of subsidizing religious activities. In this case the state is acting as a pass-through and the non-profit covers the costs of developing and marketing the plates, so public money isn't going to religious education--but they are getting a valuable assist. What qualifies these people to divvy up the money to other charities?

Carla A. Mallen and Catherine L. Wellen are the president and vice-president of FIT. Their husbands are David Mallen and Robert Wellen. All have given campaign contributions to Vern Buchanan. David Mallen has worked as a lobbyist.

Check Out Morning Coffee

Congratulations to Lindsay Beyerstein. She is now writing "Morning Coffee" for the UN Dispatch. Beyerstein's column will provide news and links to articles about foreign affairs. Beyerstein is one of the best blogger/journalist working. Bookmark "Morning Coffee."

Socratic Irony

Conservative blogger Jim Johnson called Twitter "a sign of how the spread of new communication tools can bring major events to us in new and exciting ways." Johnson parses his post by implying Twitter is journalism. Never outright making the claim. Tech blogger Dave Winer wrote a post "Is Twitter journalism?"

"Whether it's journalism or not isn't a very interesting discussion, to me," Winer writes. Further proofing Winer is someone not to be taken seriously. Winer refuses to engage his own question about Twitter's journalistic merits.

Do a search in Johnson's State of Sunshine archives for investigative reporting. There is nothing. Long grueling hours of chasing down people and doing research is not something Johnson feels the need to blog about. Johnson will write about Janis Krums' photo of USAir Flight 1549. Johnson didn't deem the investigative reporting work by the Miami Herald and St. Petersburg Times on the Ray Sansom controversy worth mentioning.

Joe the Plumber is paid to go to Israel and spout off his opinions in safe zones. Real journalism is Lara Logan going into actual combat zones and reporting war's ugly truths. Johnson shares the mentality with other conservative bloggers that Tweets, blogs, and Facebook notes is real journalism. The media and print outlets are secretly part of the Democratic Party machine. How they are able to exclude Fox News, the National Review, the New York Post and Weekly Standard is a leap in logic.

I use Twitter. Many blogs post their RSS feeds to Twitter, including Pushing Rope. This is a convenient way for PR readers to follow the site. I make no claim that I am doing journalism (except in some of my Mark Foley coverage.) That would be disrespectful to fellow bloggers Ron Brynaurt and Lindsay Beyerstein. Both have broken news stories on their respective blogs. They now work as journalists. Ron pulls sixty hours a week editing Raw Story. Lindsay is working the financial beat at the Washington Independent. They earned the right to be called bloggers-journalists. The rest of us are voicing our opinions.

Twitter isn't journalism. It is texting and photo images. Technology will never make journalism. Dedicated individuals willing to unearth facts are journalists. Twitter isn't going to spend hours looking through zoning documents or cover the quality of life in crime ridden communities. There isn't anything sexy about field interviews or reading public documents. Conservative bloggers lament the media. Johnson is making a firm stance by writing about Twitter for the alt-weekly Creative Loafing. Johnson is a true master of Socratic irony.

Trickle Down Economics Not In Action

Another example that trickle down economics is a myth.

At the Palm Beach Ritz-Carlton last November, John C. Hope III, the chairman of Whitney National Bank in New Orleans, stood before a ballroom full of Wall Street analysts and explained how his bank intended to use its $300 million in federal bailout money.

Talking Business: In Search of One Bold Stroke to Save the Banks (January 17, 2009) “Make more loans?” Mr. Hope said. “We’re not going to change our business model or our credit policies to accommodate the needs of the public sector as they see it to have us make more loans.”

Banks are not required to explain how the bailout money is being used. Lindsay Beyerstein wrote, "It's absolutely ridiculous that banks aren't required to make more loans as a condition of accepting bailout money." Congress should have written tighter requirements in the bailout bill.

The bailout was needed. Lending institutions going under would have been the economic apocalypse. Let us not kid ourselve that bankers would want to suddenly spread the wealth. That is nonsense.

Quote of the Day

"Two memes the "Team of Rivals" cliche needs to die. It's rhetoric is designed to make a virtue out of indecisiveness, incoherence, and downright self-sabotage."

Lindsay Beyerstein, on counterproductive Obama's "Team of Rivals" rhetoric will be, if it is not ended.

Ted Stevens Spends Your Tax Dollars

Ted Stevens secured $29 million in federal funding to the Alaska Fisheries Marketing Board. $500,000 of that money went to airbrush an Alaska Airlines to look like a salmon.

The fishy paint job was done on a grand scale, company spokesmen said. A team of 30 painters and airbrush artists used more than 140 gallons of paint and took 24 days to render the lifelike chinook -- triple the time normally needed to coat an airliner.

"There's no question, at least in my mind, that this is the finest airline art ever conceived," said Bill MacKay, the company's Anchorage-based senior vice president. "People will just be amazed at the detail."

You may be wondering what exactly is the Alaska Fisheries Marketing Board. The members of the board were Stevens and his son Ben. The earmarked money went to Ben's clients. Lindsay Beyerstein blogs about the corrupt the AFMB setup.

The AFMB also gave $300,000 to Arctic Paws, a dog treat company owned by Duane Gibson, a former Stevens aide who went on to work for Jack Abramoff.

My question is how did Stevens get away with this for long?

Karl Rove Can't Drive 55

Investigative blogger Lindsay Beyerstein discovers a Karl Rove speeding ticket from September of 2007. Rove's speeding ticket was issued in Walton County, Florida. I keep wondering if he was listening to Sammy Hagar's I Can't Drive 55 when he was busted.

The Rove story gives me the excuse to Hagar's so-bad-it's-good video. Check out the the hair metal outfits Hagar and his band are wearing.

Majikthise Scoop

Lindsay Beyerstein has an exclusive on her blog.

Lobbyists for Viacom helped the producers of the film retain retired CIA agent and "countererrorism expert", John Kiriakou, according an Oct 4 article in the International Herald Tribune--before Kirkakou went public about his career as a torturer.

Kirkakou was hired the help the production crew of the motion picture The Kite Runner. Kirkakou is familiar with the Afghanistan region. Below is two videos of Kirkakou discussing the destruction of the torture tapes and waterboarding of Abu Zabaydah.

Kiriakou tells Dan Abrams he is positive that the White House knew that Zabaydah was waterboarded.





Bravo to Lindsay for the great reporting.

Military blogger Larry Johnson points out that Kiriakou is not trained to waterboard.

So who did the CIA turn to for help with “enhanced interrogation”? It was either the military or former military working as contractors. Why? Because the military did train interrogators at Fort Huachuca and they were familiar with enhanced interrogation methods, including waterboarding.

My money is on contractors. The Military does not want to be involved in interrogations after Abu Ghraib. Contractors are not under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Martin Peretz Channels Ann Coulter

Lindsay Beyerstein points out the latest piece of bile from Martin Peretz. He has the audacity to go after Mariane Pearl: the wife of slain Wall Street Journal foreign correspondent Daniel Pearl.

There's a tacky story on today's "Page Six" in the New York Post about Mariane Pearl -- yes, the widow of Daniel -- and her conflicts with the Wall Street Journal. It's about money and celebrity and Mariane's desires to use the Journal as the instrument of her fame. You see, when Muslim terrorists kill your husband it's only fair to profit off his death. Wasn't that a clause in Daniel's insurance policy?

There was something that bugged me about Peretz's post. The hatefulness is standard issue Peretz. His quote reminded me of something I read somewhere. I then remembered Ann Coulter made a similar attack against the 9-11 widows known as the Jersey Girls.

These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzies. I have never seen people enjoying their husbands’ death so much.

Peretz and Coulter feel it is their patriotic obligation to spit venom at those that have been personally victimized by terrorism. They are so emotionally insecure that they need to go after women that have questioned America's post-9-11 national security. Years from now, people will read the vicious things Peretz and Coulter wrote and wonder just how fucked up these Bush apologists are.

Lindsay accuses Peretz of being sexist. I'm not going to argue the point. I just think that is the beginning of his problems. Peretz tells everyone within shouting distance he is a diehard Democrat. He ran a publication that's specialty is bashing Democrats and producing Left-wing haters such as Michael Kelly, Andrew Sullivan, and Mickey Kaus. His publication had fact-check problems with Stephen Glass, Ruth Shalit and Scott Thomas Beauchamp that could be spotted by a high school editor.

Peretz has long ties to the American Enterprise Institute, publicly defended the convicted Lewis "Scooter" Libby, accused Jimmy Carter of being an Anti-Semite and a list of misdeeds goes on. Any respectable would of had Peretz removed for his conflict of interests and turning the New Republic into a money-losing laughing stock. Washington operates under a different set of rules. No other major American publication would let a former publisher run blog posts that makes Instapundit seem civil.

Eric Alterman's article of Peretz and the TNR horror show is worthy of reading.

A big thanks to Eric Alterman for linking to this post.

Blackwater Hell

Lindsay Beyerstein has a fascinating post on her encounters with Blackwater in New Orleans.

The Blackwater dude was acting as a glorified rent-a-cop on the sidewalk, about two blocks from the main media staging area for New Orleans, which was already amply secured by US military and law enforcement.

What I didn't realize at the time was that these Blackwater guys thought of themselves as frontline soldiers in a literal war zone, ready to use deadly force at the slightest provocation. That was an unfounded estimate, in the middle of the day in downtown New Orleans several days after the city had been secured by the legitimate authorities.

We certainly weren't seeing that level of aggression or anxiety from the 82nd Airborne or the NOLA police, or the National Guard, or anyone else in the vicinity.

Newsweek's Michael Hirsh wrote the best opening paragraph I have read in an op-ed in ages.

Imagine a universe where a man can gun down women and children anytime he pleases, knowing he will never be brought to justice. A place where morality is null and void, and arbitrary killing is the rule. A place that has been imagined hitherto only in nightmarish dystopian fiction, like “1984,” or in fevered passages from Dostoevsky—or which existed during the Holocaust and Stalinist purges and the Dark Ages. Well, that universe exists today. It is called Iraq. And the man who made it possible is George W. Bush.

U.S. military personal has been in shootouts with Blackwater. Servicemen view mercenaries with complete disdain. The Iraqi people hate Blackwater even more intensely. The Bush administration simply makes matters worse by allowing Blackwater to do what they want without fear of criminal prosecution. Bush refuses to public chastise the security firm. The White House wonders why things work out poorly for them. Blackwater is a classic example.

In related news: the Iraqi government claims they have a video of Blackwater security personal opening fire at civilians.

Pandagon TV

Jesse Taylor and Amanda Marcotte meet for the first time and are interviewed for TPMtv. Lindsay Beyerstein makes an unattended cameo appearance and is extremely camera shy. It's my favorite moment of the video.

Jesse and Amanda are extremely articulate. The great thing about the internet is the Left can have these bloggers speak into the camera. Having intelligent young people discuss politics on Youtube is a great way to counter conservative media and get 20-somethings engaged.

For Your Reading Pleasure

Lindsay Beyerstein - Florida to Let Felons Vote

Gatordem - Property Tax Puzzle

Libby Spencer - Bushenomics Boom Ring Hollow

Mixter - Cheney Links Saddam to al-Qaeda, Again

Think Progress - McCain: It’s ‘Fun’ When I ‘Misspeak’ About Progress In Iraq

CIA and NYPD Spying On Protest Groups

Lindsay Beyerstein informs us that the NYPD Billionaires For Bush and the Men (and Women) in Black Bloc during the Republican National Convention. What a waste of taxpayers money.

“Activists are showing a well-organized network made up of anti-Bush sentiment; the mixing of music and political rhetoric indicates sophisticated organizing skills with a specific agenda,” said the report, dated Oct. 9, 2003. “Police departments in above listed areas have been contacted regarding this event.”

More.

Christopher Dunn, the associate legal director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, which represents seven of the 1,806 people arrested during the convention, said the Police Department stepped beyond the law in its covert surveillance program.

“The police have no authority to spy on lawful political activity, and this wide-ranging N.Y.P.D. program was wrong and illegal,” Mr. Dunn said. “In the coming weeks, the city will be required to disclose to us many more details about its preconvention surveillance of groups and activists, and many will be shocked by the breadth of the Police Department’s political surveillance operation.”

What is more troubling is the CIA worked with the NYPD to collect intelligence on protest groups. This reeks of the Hoover FBI days of government intrusiveness.

Lindsay Beyerstein Turned Down Edwards Campaign

File this under I'm not surprised.

Lindsay Beyerstein wrote a Salon article about how she was offered the John Edwards campaign blogging gig before Amanda Marcotte and Shakes. It makes sense. Lindsay has a high media profile. She writes articles and blogs at Alternet. She is one of the few lefty bloggers on both Atrios's and Daily Kos' blogrolls. Lindsay is star.

An Edwards staffer (whom Lindsay won't name) offered her the job. Lindsay proceeded to do everything in her power to convince him not to hire him.

"I'm probably not ... the person you want," I said, finally. "I mean, I'm on the record saying that abortion is good and that all drugs should be legalized, including heroin. Don't you think that might be a little embarrassing for the campaign?"

I can't think of many lefty bloggers that could run a campaign blog. Josh Marshall is the only one that comes to mind. He is about as noncontroversial as an A list progressive can get. Duncan Black would be chased out of the Edwards campaign by an angry mob. Tas of Loaded Mouth has gotten into major profanity-laced flame wars with Wizbang, Say Anything and Jeff Goldstein. He was shocked by how angry some of Amanda's posts came off. That is a good sign the Edwards campaign didn't read the Pandagon archives. Then again, the campaign didn't seem to care.

"The thing you have to realize about Amanda is that she's got real enemies," I said. "We've all got trolls, but Amanda gets a whole different level of abuse."

I told Bob this story to give him some idea of the kind of seething hatred the campaign might have to deal with: The first time I heard Amanda on the radio, an angry caller phoned up to say, "You're Amanda Marcotte, and you're a clerical worker at the University of Texas at Austin." He had his facts wrong, but his message was clear. He was trying to get Amanda fired while leaving some darker threat hanging in the air. The host had to cut him off. Since that incident, at least one of Amanda's trolls had called her then-employer and tried unsuccessfully to get her fired.

I tried to suggest that the campaign might not want high-profile bloggers. I thought it might be better off hiring a well-connected political operative with good connections in the blogosphere.

Lindsay makes a good point in the article on how conservatives use the internet as a trial balloon. They learned from the Monica Lewinsky scandal that if a story gains traction on the web they are safe to run with it. If the balloon pops then Matt Drudge or Glenn Reynolds takes one for the team. Michelle Malkin ran those horrying Hot Air videos. Bill Donahue followed after the Amanda attacks gained enough traction. The media runs with it because they need to fill air time. Repeat cycle when the next scandal comes around.