Document The Atrocities

by hilzoy

Today's stupid fake equivalency comes from Cokie Roberts on ABC'S This Week (video). The exchange that follows comes from 3:36 before the end:

"Krugman: This is not just about McCain and what he did. The fact of the matter is, for a long time we have had a substantial fraction of the Republican base that just does not regard the idea of Democrats governing as legitimate. Remember the Clinton years. It was craziness, right? They were murderers, they were drug smugglers, and the imminent prospect of what looks like a big Democratic victory would drive a lot of these people crazy even if Sarah Palin wasn't saying these inflammatory things. It's going to be very ugly after the election.

Roberts: On both sides that's true. I think that you've also had a huge number of Democrats who think that the Republicans are illegitimate, and that was particularly true after the 2000 election, and to some degree after 2004. And so you really do have at the core of each party people who are not ready to accept the verdict of the election.

Krugman: I reject the equivalence."

I do too, on two counts. First, there is no analogy between 1992 and 2000. In 1992, there was no question that Bill Clinton won the election. He had 370 electoral votes to Bush's 168. He got 5.6% more of the popular vote than Bush. It was not close.

In 2000, by contrast, Gore won the popular vote, and the electoral vote turned on Florida, whose results in turn were decided by the Supreme Court. And the decision in Bush v. Gore was very hard to explain as a principled decision: justices in the majority not only abandoned long-held positions on federalism, but announced that their decision should not be cited as a precedent in future cases. I really do not want to re-argue the 2000 election. But I think that the idea that there's some sort of equivalence between doubting the fairness of the 2000 and 1992 elections is absurd.

Second, while a lot of Democrats had deep concerns about the outcome of Bush v. Gore, the overwhelming majority of us accepted that the courts had the right to adjudicate questions of law. As a result, most of us accepted the idea that whether or not George W. Bush had actually won the election in straightforward common-sense terms, he was entitled under the law to be our President.

Or, in short: we had a lot more reason to regard George W. Bush as illegitimate than the Republicans had to regard Clinton as illegitimate. Despite that fact, most of us accepted the fact that, like it or not, he was our President. We did not go around claiming that he had killed one of his closest associates, or was a drug smuggler, or hung crack pipes from his Christmas tree.

There is no equivalency here. None at all.

Maybe next week I'll take on the (cough) challenging task of explaining why there is no equivalence between saying that Clinton was a murderer and saying that George W. Bush is a war criminal. Hint: it's the same reason there would be no equivalence between saying that Bush held up a convenience store and saying that Clinton was unfaithful to his wife.

Comments

[Incertus]

You said it a lot more nicely than I would have, hilzoy. The two are nothing alike. I'd add that when it was Clinton, we had a Republican Congressman shooting melons with a high-powered rifle to prove, well, it's kind of hard to say, really, since logic and reasoning wasn't a part of the equation.

[Don the libertarian Democrat]

Via Glenn Greenwald:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/10/12/mccain_campaign/index.html

"UPDATE II: Ezra Klein points to this Marc Ambinder post, in which Ambinder writes: ”Ron Brownstein, our in-house Atlantic Media political safe, pens a balanced column on health care that neither campaign will like (which is why it’s worth pointing to)!” (emphasis added). It’s not “worth pointing to” because it’s true or informative, but because it’s “balanced” — meaning both sides will hate it equally — and, therefore, for that reason alone, it must be worthwhile, regardless of whether the “balance” is warranted by the truth."

[ThatLeftTurnInABQ]

There is no equivalency here. None at all.

I'm not sure I buy this argument. Of course there is equivalency.The impeachment of President Bush in the House and the vote in the Senate to convic...

What?
No impeachment?
Not even an investigation?

Ooops, nevermind.

[John Thullen]

Well, you haven't seen too much crime perpetrated since by your melon species, have you now?

Melons in neighboring melon patches have been peaceable by comparison to their behavior prior to Burton's brave intervention.

As with the 1994 Gingrich Congress, it's "High Noon" all over again, with Gary Cooper single-handedly dispatching an entire boxcar of Left-coast melons headed for town at the behest of shadowy vegetarians.

Congressman Burton's melon atrocities are viewed, too, by say, many of NRO's writing staff, as a blow against elitism, on account of the fact that your average melon possesses exactly one MORE brain cell than your average Republican Congressperson.

One would have wished John McCain had named Dan Burton as his running mate, so that we could been the lucky recipients of campaign ads showing a triumphant Burton cleaning and dressing a wild cantalope he had spent days tracking through the bush via helicopter through high-powered gunsights.

During an Obama Presidency, I expect the Republican noise machine to report vigorously on Obama's slaying of and consuming a slice of melon for breakfast each morning as he peruses the morning papers.

Melon rinds will be produced from the edges of landfills as proof of foreign influence over our melon heritage.

No doubt the one remaining Republican Congressperson after the 2008 election will invite Redstate front-page posters and Mark Levin to his backyard to witness his scientific investigation of melon murder by tying a black man to a tree and taking shots at him with a high-powered rifle, local code notwithstanding.

[cynic]

Hawaii == some sort of foreign, exotic place

Bosniaks == gaffe

Cokie Roberts == journalist

            I reject the equivalence ...

[MandyW]

ROFL at John Thullen's "melongate".

Agree with cynic that of late Cokie Roberts' "analysis" gets dumber and dumber. I have vague recollections that before she went from NPR to ABC, some of her reports made sense (although that may only be through a haze of nostalgia). I suppose NPR continues to broadcast her stuff for old times sake, but imho it's a waste of air time. (Ditto for Juan Williams now that he's become a Faux News regular.)

Another example of Naked David Broder Syndrome, hilariously explained by Publius in an earlier post. Any new readers who missed it should definitely check it out.

[byrningman]

That was an interesting video. It was painfully obvious only Krugman had any idea what he was talking about, George Will made a fool of himself blathering on about market psychology.

I don't know if it's too late for McCain, but if it's not, whichever of he and Obama learns from Gordon Brown first will win this election. My fear is that that is what McCain might have done this weekend.

[RobW]

The opposition to Clinton flirted with open armed rebellion, seeking remedy for perceived wrongs through terrorist violence. The opposition to Bush seeks Congressional oversight, impeachment, and trials for war crimes, seeking remedy through the Constitutional separation of powers, restoration of the Bill of Rights and the application of established international laws, conventions and treaties.

The difference between the oppositions to Clinton and Bush is the difference between lawlessness and rule of law.

There is no equivalence here at all.

[tomeck]

Some number of years ago I used to thing that Cokie Roberts was a good reporter. But not for some time now. There is no equivalence between

2000 Democrats: Our guy won the election and the least you Republicans can do is admit you cheated.

and

1992 Republicans: He won the election but he killed Arkansas state troopers and Hillary killed Vince Foster and how could he fire those good people in the WH travel agency and what about that land deal he lost money in!!!

My favorite 1990's memory is a senator from New York named D'Amato warning us about the "Arkansas Mafia." Shit.

[dnfree]

A man named Dennis Prager is now being published by one of our local newspapers (they are publishing exclusively right-wing columnists). In almost every column, he insists that those on the right are open-minded enough to read left-wing commentators, and it's just too bad that the left ONLY reads its own commentators. I always wonder where he gets that idea. The right wing is more open to different ideas than the left?

[tomeck]

dnfree

They consider George Will to be on the left, that's why they're so open minded.

[ThatLeftTurnInABQ]

They consider George Will to be on the left

Well you have to admit that compared with Bill Kristol and Charles Krauthammer, he is kinda squishy - in a limp wristed euro-weenie pointed headed academic sort of way, if you know what I mean [wink, wink].

And lately I'm not so sure about Krauthammer, either. He said nice things about Obama, so I'm not sure he can be trusted anymore.

For that matter, Josh Trevino just admited to writing in "Bobby Jindal" on his 2008 ballot instead of voting for McCain, so somebody needs to check out RedState and make sure that they aren't going all **cough** pink **cough** on us.

Ye gods, the rot is everywhere.

[jonnybutter]

I have vague recollections that before she went from NPR to ABC, some of [Roberts'] reports made sense (although that may only be through a haze of nostalgia).

She is the one who, like Broder, is stuck in the haze of nostalgia. Ah, the good old days of Consensus! I remember her as always being pretty smug and supercilious - she was born an 'insider' you know - but she has probably gotten worse as the times have changed and changed and her worldview hasn't. I can't listen to her speak for more than 15 seconds before getting really annoyed.

[Warren Terra]

I remember really liking Cokie Roberts on NPR during the Reagan ad.inistration. Of course, I was 12 (not, perhaps, a typical 12 as I was listening to NPR) and so my judgement was not necessarily reliable. Still, it seems possible she was once better - whereas Atrios showed with some Nixon-era columns that Broder's been an absolute tool for an absurdly long time.

[Eric]

A few years ago, I remember hearing an interview with Cokie Roberts on NPR, in which she talked very fondly of how they had allowed her to phone in her NPR stories from her house. (She had some personal family reason for working from home, but I forget what it was.)

It was around that time that I started noticing that her stories often missed the point, or sounded uninformed. I suspect her "phoning it in" has a lot to do with that. After all, if all she does is read a couple newspapers each day, and doesn't do much actual reporting (and never reads anything online), what is she really going to have to say? About all she can add is some context relating back to elections that happened 20 years ago, back when she probably did go out to do some research.

I can remember an interview she gave after Howard Dean became the head of the DNC. She weirdly talked about it as though he were still running for office, saying things like "this will appeal to the base". She said absolutely nothing about what the head of the DNC actually does, or how a guy like Dean might do it differently. Given that Dean went on to push the "50-state strategy" there was a good story there, if only Roberts had done some research.

Sigh.

[Tony P.]

Cokie Roberts does not embarass me nearly so much as George Stephanopoulos does. For one thing, I don't share my ethnic roots with her. For another, she was never (in my memory) an actual political co-partisan of mine. I suppose young George needs to earn a living, like the rest of us, but it's a shame he can't find a more honorable way to do it.

--TP

[Eric]

I definitely agree with the previous commenter, who said the only one on the panel who seemed to actually know anything was Krugman. I thought he did a pretty good (civil) takedown of George Will, who seemed to be making a version of the Phil Graham "nation of whiners" argument.

Krugman is a lot more enjoyable to listen now than he was during the primaries, when he was such a Hillary partisan. On talk shows back then he seemed kind of angry. Today, on a topic where he is very comfortable, he seemed completely relaxed.

[now_what]

Krugman is a lot more enjoyable to listen now than he was during the primaries, when he was such a Hillary partisan

Krugman is not much of a partisan. Reflection, maybe?

He's an honest voice, and worth listening to no matter who you plan on voting for. He's been that voice since he used to rag on the other Clinton when necessary, back in the 90s.

[Eric Martin]

Krugman preferred Hillary's health care plan because that is an issue that he takes very seriously. I think this put him in her camp, and that he probably let that allegiance begin to color his views toward Obama a bit, but still, there was a reason for Krugman to side with Hillary.

[The Fool]

You're damn right there is no equivalence. Bush and his confederates STOLE the 2000 election.

[thoreau]

Yep. We Bush haters accuse him of doing things that he has done very openly: Torture, detention without trial, warrantless wiretaps, and lying to start a war. The haters on the right are always about black helicopters, Secret Kenyan birth certificates, dead state troopers in Arkansas, etc.

[Gary Farber]

"...a version of the Phil Graham
'nation of whiners' argument."

Gramm.

[Warren Terra]

Gary, it's somewhat fascnating to watch you try, but you do know that you can't correct the entire internet, or even this one website, don't you? To adapt the old advertising slogan, Correct all you wan't; we'll err more.

[Geoff G]

Bush held up a convenience store? I guess the liberal media refused to report this because it conflicts with their portrait of him a feckless, lazy, ignorant moron who can't even tie his shoes without using a mnemomic nursery rhyme. Maybe Cheney wasn't pulling the strings after all.