Category: The Dish

Clinton fans take it out on a HuffPuff blogger. My email in-tray isn’t as rough. Have I scared them all away? C’mon. Give me hell.

JPod on the Clintons’ strategy for staying in the race. They’re hoping for more Wright stuff.

Even Fallows is unsure.

In one study, this blog is the most read by other media sources:

Rendell thinks he could beat McCain. A new poll suggests Rendell’s on to something. Losing to Clinton in the primary doesn’t mean anything about the general.

A typically sane post from Ambers.

James Piereson writes about the recent slate of faux-poor false memoirs:

Ms Seltzer, along with her partners in literary crime, deserves some credit at least for crafting a hoax that she must have known would appeal to the sentimental sensibility about the poor and downtrodden that is pervasive among reviewers at publications like the Times. It is more than a little interesting that contemporary novelists, when they stoop to such fabrications, invariably come up with harrowing stories about addiction, mental illness, sexual abuse, family dysfunction, prostitution, gang wars, and life on the run or among the down and out. On rarely hears of fabrications from the poor (or even by the rich) about life in the suburbs, boardrooms, or country clubs. Our novelists, even when they lie or especially when they lie, reveal what sells among publishers, reviewers, and contemporary readers.

Their spinning ability is looking increasingly threadbare. Fallows:

Listen to the clip to hear for yourself, if you haven’t already done so — but it came down to a "how stupid does she think we are?’ argument that it was Obama’s own fault that he obeyed the party’s rules (as other candidates did) and took his name off the unauthorized Michigan ballot. "We all had a choice as to whether or not to participate," she told Inskeep. "Most people took their names off the ballot, but I didn’t. And that was a wise decision, because Michigan is key to our electoral victory in the fall."

My point is not really the merits of this argument. It is the Clinton-v-Clinton contrast. Am I right in remembering that in his prime, Bill Clinton didn’t — or didn’t have to — do things quite this bluntly and ham-handedly? Are we seeing a demonstration during the campaign of a talent gap in basic political skill between the two members of the household? One reason not to think so is that Bill Clinton is presumably involved in these very strategies, which seem so much clumsier than he was in 1992. Another is that he himself has struck same of the same off-notes this year.

Another exaggeration?

Somewhat worrying:

The three people selected to head the Democratic Convention credentials committee that could have a final say on Florida’s presidential-delegate controversy are all former Clinton administration employees.