Couldn’t Help But Comment (052708)

Given certain positions I hold, this is an odd “honor” indeed:

Exhibiting the investigatory powers of Inspector Clouseau (except Clouseau could probably have navigated web pages more effectively), Dave Harding at Progress Ohio “congratulated” yours truly on his appearance while missing at least the following Ohio blogs appearing in the Conservative category:
- Bearing Drift Ohio
- Keeler Political Report
- Naugblog, via the old Right Angle Blog
- The Truth in Blogging impresarios at Weapons of Mass Discussion
- Wizblog

As hopelessly craven and corrupt capitalists, I’m sure they welcome the attention (as do I). But based on internal e-mail conversations the SOB Alliance has been having, I can nonetheless confidently say that there is quite a bit of mutual ambivalence about getting noticed by the McCain Campaign. I hope McCainiacs who visit aren’t assuming that they’re entering wholly friendly territory.

Oh, and a memo to the McCain Campaign (cc: Mr. Harding, who probably already knows better) — There’s no space in BizzyBlog.

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Speaking of McCainiacs who happen to be visiting — Assuming that you have any influence over the candidate, you might want to let him know that Objectively Unfit Mitt Romney’s Commonwealth Care in Massachusetts continues to blow up. I would consider it the political campaign equivalent of an IED that could go off at any time during the last 60 days before the election.

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On the heels of this first-hand report at Pajamas Media last week comes this too-timid Wall Street Journal editorial:

It’s hard to exaggerate the significance of Mohammed al-Durra, the 12-year-old Palestinian boy allegedly killed by Israeli bullets on Sept. 30, 2000. The iconic image of the terrified child crouching behind his father helped sway world opinion against the Jewish state and fueled the last Intifada.

It’s equally hard, then, to exaggerate the significance of last week’s French court ruling that called the story into doubt. Not just whether the Israeli military shot the boy, but whether the whole incident may have been staged for propaganda purposes. If so, it would be one of the most harmful put-up jobs in media history.

You probably didn’t hear this news. International media lapped up the televised report of al-Durra’s shooting on France’s main state-owned network, France 2. Barely a peep was heard, however, when the Paris Court of Appeal ruled in a suit brought by the network against the founder of a media watchdog group.

….. Judge Laurence Trébucq did more than assert (media watchdog Philippe) Karsenty’s right to free speech. In overturning a lower court’s ruling, she said the issues he raised about the original France 2 report were legitimate.

….. Under pressure from media watchdogs, and after years of stonewalling, France 2 eventually shared the additional film. ….. The extra material shows what appears to be staged scenes of gun battles before the al-Durra killing.

….. It suggests the Israelis may not have been to blame. It makes it plausible to consider — without being dismissed as an unhinged conspiracy theorist — the possibility that the al-Durra story was a hoax.

I would suggest substituting “possibility in the last excerpted sentence with “near certainty.”

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While the congressional majority would probably welcome a poster child for the “nationwide housing crisis”, I would think it might prefer that said poster child not come from within its own ranks. But California Congresswoman Laura Richardson (D-CA) is ready, willing, and able to step into the breach:

California Rep. Laura Richardson claimed Friday that her Sacramento home was sold into foreclosure without her knowledge and contrary to an agreement with her lender.

She said she is like any other American suffering in the mortgage crisis and wants to testify to Congress about her experience as lawmakers craft a foreclosure-prevention bill.

Richardson turns out to be a perfect exemple of someone that a mortgage bailout bill had better NOT be helping. From “Third Time’s the Charm” file (HT LA Land) —

Richardson, who lost her Sacramento home in a recent foreclosure auction, has also defaulted on properties in Long Beach and San Pedro, records show.

Richardson, D-Long Beach, was able to bring her payments up to date on the Long Beach home relatively quickly, but the San Pedro property lingered in the foreclosure process for almost eight months, and still has a pending auction date.

Note that the LA Daily Breeze, where the excerpt came from, did a better job of identifying Richardson’s party than most of Old Media typically does with other Democrats involved with bad news.