Misinterpreted

You wrote

The Bush reaction to this — he didn’t try to block it. He didn’t try to postpone it. He didn’t spend weeks, he didn’t ask the intelligence community ‘give me a couple of weeks, let’s see if we can figure out some kind of negotiating initiative or some way to respond to this.’ He didn’t try to spin it to our advantage. This is an amazing moment of candor by the United States.

Doesn't that sound like you're praising Bush for facilitating the candor?

Facts are not "candor." Facts are facts.

Correction: you you didn't write, you said. I suppose that's a little different.

He didn’t try to spin it to our advantage.

What do you call this:

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/060349.php

OBviously, I was referring to the NIE itself as a remarkable moment of candor for the United States

stop lying, Klein. Tom T posted your verbatim remarks on Scarborough. Its obvious that you were referring to BUSH...not the NIE.

Do you even know the difference between the truth, and the right-wing lies that you keep spinning?

Joe Klein is not only a disgrace to his profession, he may be nuts, too.

Joe Klein has been liar for many, many years. Don't expect him to change now.

The problem is not with Klein, who everyone knows is a liar, but with the people who employ him and put him on tv. They know he's a liar but they like him anyway because he tells their type of lies.

Wiggle wiggle squirm squirm!

Joe, you seem to have descended the tree of life and are now showing some distinctly fossorial habits!

Do you think maybe the sting of FISA is still fresh in your mind?

How about trying to get it right on the NIE report the FIRST time!

Maybe you're not a fool after all, maybe you're just a liar.

"This is wrong."

Is this not a verbatim transcript? Do you mean to say, "I misspoke"? Do we need a broader transcript? If so, shouldn't you provide one?

You seem to have a problem acknowledging error.

In the language of the campaign, perhaps you have a "character issue".

You are wrong.

"He didn't... he didn't... he didn't... This is an amazing moment of candor by the United States."

It is clear to me that you are inferring Bush's inaction to stop an intelligence (which should be the norm )= amazing candor by US.

This is so sad watching you spin the FISA and now this.

Please, please, fire Joe Klein.

The main question about Bush on the Iran NIE is has he been lying since August, or for more than one year?

Obvious. Just like this?

"In the original version of this story, Joe Klein wrote that the House Democratic version of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) would require a court approval of individual foreign surveillance targets. The bill does not explicitly say that. Republicans believe it can be interpreted that way, but Democrats don't."

Perhaps this better explains your best intentions:

Joe, Schmo
Blowhard Time pundit sings a song of himself

By John Cook

When Joe Klein signed up with Time magazine as a political columnist in 2003, he turned to this quote from Teddy Roosevelt for the name of his weekly dispatch, which he dubbed "In the Arena": "It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. ... The credit belongs to the man in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood ... and who, at worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly."

Klein has written that he intended the reference as a sort of self-effacing rebuke, a constant reminder that he is but a humble critic who chronicles the doings of deeds. But to believe that interpretation, one must ignore the fact that Klein's body of work amounts to little more than a festival of projection and poorly disguised vanity. This is the man, after all, who, unsatisfied with writing about Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential campaign as a mere critic, rather famously refashioned himself into a central player in that campaign in his 1996 novel, Primary Colors. If Joe Klein is contemplating a man in an arena, his face marred by dust and sweat and blood, daring greatly, you can rest assured that the man he is contemplating is Joe Klein.

And, oh, how our hero has dared in the arena of late! For the past three weeks, Klein has been the subject of withering attacks from left-wing bloggers after he wrote, falsely, in his November 21 column that the Democratic proposal for amending the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) would "give the terrorists the same legal protections as Americans." The debate is arcane and ludicrously complicated, and it has generated literally tens of thousands of words online and in print, mostly condemning Klein, and most of them from Salon's Glenn Greenwald (who, God love him, has approached his subject with the tenacity and righteousness of an obsessive-compulsive IRS auditor). But suffice it to say that (a) Klein made a stupid error, and (b) his preposterously arrogant and ham-fisted attempts to walk himself back from that error have almost rendered reasonable Greenwald's claim that the episode illustrates "everything that is rancid and corrupt with our political media."

The FISA dispute is but the latest skirmish in an ongoing campaign that has been marring Klein's brow with dust and blood and sweat since January, when Time launched its political blog, Swampland. Klein is one of its regular contributors, and there is no better conceivable foil than he for the blogocentric criticism that the political journalism establishment is populated by preening, clueless, lazy, and pompous regurgitators of conventional wisdom. Swampland's commenters have joined the battle with glee; the first comment to one of Klein's first posts on Swampland read simply: "Just because I hate to see the lefties get all the credit, let the record show that at least one moderate Republican finds you despicable." More than 3,000 comments followed that post alone, and the vicious mockery has continued, virtually unabated, all year.

Klein's reactions on Swampland to his FISA critics are precious goldmines of self-aggrandizing pretense that must be savored at length to appreciate their rich subtleties and overtones. His first response acknowledged—in an insufferably cloying way—that although partisan murk clouded the issue, he "may" have made a mistake, before going on to claim that if he indeed had made a mistake, "we are talking about relatively obscure and unimportant technical details." In other words, Klein sat down to write a column about obscure and unimportant technical details.

Klein's next weigh-in on the blog, two days later, was headlined "FISA: More Than You Want to Know," as though his responsibility to assess the veracity or lack thereof of the claims he made in his columns involved some kind of burdensome slog through legislative thickets beyond the comprehension of mere mortals. Why are you making me do this? This is hard! His post artfully shifted the issue from whether the bill says what he said it says to whether his Republican sources or Democratic sources were correct in their interpretations (who knows? This law stuff is complicated) before actually committing to pixels the following words, which will live on as one of the finest specimens of sheer journalistic hubris ever issued from one of the genre's most accomplished practitioners: "I have neither the time nor legal background to figure out who's right." I don't have time find out if what I write is true, people! I'm too busy claiming that other things are true. And even if I did have time, I'm not qualified to say whether the things I write are true anyway!

Mercifully, that was Klein's last comment on the issue before issuing a correction acknowledging that "the bill does not explicitly say" what he said it says (though Time stupidly posted a correction online that was weaker, claiming only that there was a partisan dispute, resulting in a correction to the correction).

It's that sort of unrestrained ego that has turned Klein's foray into the world of blogging into what has become, essentially, a yearlong self-immolation. His style is suited—if it is suited to any kind of journalism—to the sort of self-inflating pronouncements that Time's print edition encourages. To wit: In June, Time published a feature called "The Courage Primary," wherein Klein laid out his political program, chock-full of policy prescriptions swaddled in mawkish and content-free bromides that would make Dan Rather, he of the "courage" sign-off, proud. "[O]ccasionally, there comes an election where the ability to be courageous, to tell the public things it may not want to hear, is the most important quality we need in a leader. I suspect that 2008 will be that sort of election." The piece amounted to a primer on The Joe Klein Primary—a guide to the candidates on how to get his support, with the implication that divergence from his prescriptions constituted cowardice. Fine. He's a pundit. That's what they do. But the penultimate paragraph offers a window into a mind that has been blinded by self-regard: "As I've thought about these issues, a pattern has emerged: They are synergistic, mutually reinforcing. They fit together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. ... When you put the jigsaw puzzle together, the nation that emerges is more equitable, more efficient, with a reinvigorated citizenry—a safer and more powerful nation, braced by the power of moral example as well as military supremacy." Huzzah! Can you make the nation more equitable, efficient, safe, powerful, and invigorated in 4,300 words or less, Glenn Greenwald? I didn't think so! When Klein writes about the courage necessary to lead the country out of its current quagmire, he's thinking of someone in the arena, amid the blood, sweat, and dust. And it's not one of the candidates.

Combine that posturing style with a vanishingly thin skin, put it online, and you get the periodic hissy fits that have seized Klein since he started blogging. In June, he wrote a column called "Beware the Blogger's Bile," which recounted an episode in which he reported—falsely—on Swampland that Rep. Jane Harman had voted for a bill to fund the Iraq war, and was "blasted by a number of left-wing bloggers: Klein screwed up!" The lesson, Klein argued, was that "a fierce, bullying, often witless tone of intolerance ... has overtaken the left-wing sector of the blogosphere." True, except—Klein did screw up! Harman had misinformed him about the way she was going to vote, so it was an understandable error (though one that a check of the Congressional Record would have avoided). But is the time you got something wrong, and the left-wing blogosphere correctly (if rudely) hammered you about getting that thing wrong, really the best set of facts with which to make your case against the left-wing blogosphere? As with the FISA case, a simple "I made a mistake" would have sufficed.

In a bizarre and revealing podcast that Time posted on Swampland as a companion to the column, Klein railed wildly against the insolence of those who dared to criticize his reporting, repeating four times that he'd been doing this for 38 years, which is apparently long enough to have earned the right to be wrong without people hassling you about it. In the space of 10 minutes, he bragged about how he "[hasn't] called the White House in years" to deflect criticism that he spouts the Administration's line, and then criticized Greenwald for failing to call him. Referring to the Harman error, Klein said, "[T]his is a war we're talking about, and I don't really care about these stupid little details. ... The important thing here was my feeling that voting against the war funding was a bad idea." As with the FISA column, the way Klein felt was important; the factual error he made in advancing his argument was a stupid little detail.

The subtext to Klein's blog tantrum is the galling fact that his attackers are coming from the left. Klein wrote a biography of Woody Guthrie, for Christ's sake! Don't his attackers realize that he's a liberal? That he hates Bush as much as the next guy? That he's Joe Klein?

In a couple weeks, for his year-end column, Klein will distribute his "Teddy Awards," which he does every year in a tip of the hat to public figures who have "performed honorably as winners and losers in the public arena," and, per Roosevelt's stirring words, honor those who, if they've failed, have done so while "daring greatly."

Past winners have included George W. Bush and David Petraeus; it's anybody's guess who'll get the nod this year. But I know who Joe Klein really wants to give it to.

http://radaronline.com/features/2007/12/joe_klein_new_york_time_magazine_glen_greenwald_swampland_01.php

Joke Lyin wrote, "This is wrong."

See Joke Lyin,
See Joke Lyin again,
See Joke Lyin not resign from TIME,
See TIME confirmed as a
T - Totally
I - Incompetent
M - Media
E - Enterprise

Leave, Joke Lyin, Leave.

I myself found your quote ambiguous. I will give you the benefit of the doubt, though I'm sure I'll be in the minority.

For some reason I have trouble condemning you, probably because I try to see the best in everyone.

You can do a lot as a reporter, you have the connections. Just realize how important your role is, and how crucial it is that you work extra hard to keep lies from entering the discourse.

Joe, I mean this in friendship, really I do:

When you place being "reasonable" above being right, when you place comity (c-o-m-i-t-y) above truth, when you place more stock in your thirty-eight years experience than in the facts, you going to trip over your own.... tongue.

(See: Your endorsement of the Iraq war on MTP, because you didn't, for whatever reasons of your own, want to dissent from the Friedman-Russert consensus).

The man is on video praising Bush for candor and still says he didn't...

This is becoming completely surreal.

Here's my comment with the links:

Joe Klein is not only a disgrace to his profession, he may be nuts, too. See this article from Salon.com from July 18, 1996: http://www.salon.com/media/media960718.html

Joe Klein has been a liar for many, many years. Don't expect him to change now.

The problem is not with Klein, who everyone knows is a liar, but with the people who employ him and put him on tv. They know he's a liar but they like him anyway because he tells their type of lies.

He's been spinning this report for months. And by all evidence he's going to continue to spin it. Here's Dan Froomkin:

[A] close examination of his word choice over the past year suggests that he learned something around August that got him to stop making claims that were apparently no longer supported by American intelligence.

Instead of directly condemning Iranian leaders for pursuing nuclear weapons, he started more vaguely accusing them of seeking the knowledge necessary to make such a weapon.

As he did that, he and the vice president accelerated their rhetorical efforts to persuade the public that the nuclear threat posed by Iran was grave and urgent. Bush even went so far in late August and October as to warn of the potential for a nuclear holocaust.

Indeed, a careful parsing of Bush's words indicates that, while not saying anything that could later prove to be demonstrably false, Bush left his listeners with what he likely knew was a fundamentally false impression. And he did so in the pursuit of a more muscular and possibly even military approach to a Middle Eastern country.

It's an oddly familiar pattern of deception.

Yes it is.

How many times are you going to get fooled?

Strung up on your own words again, Joe. It's like Groundhog Day.

Oh, no, Joe. Not another lie out of your lying punim... and during Hanukkah, too... what will we tell the children!
The Administration witheld the NIE for as long as they possibly could. Nobody denies that. Not even them! Face it: You were trying to play into what you *thought* Scarborough's angle would be at the top of the show, and you thought he'd go all GOP and Bush-protecting ... so you said what you said, just to be seen as the "good guy," but Scarborough wasn't having it -- he doesn't truck w/ lies, even from a Republican president... so you had to back-peddle. Look in the mirror, Joe... you like what stares back? A vacillating, round-heeled man who does everything he can to please those who will put him on the tee-vee ... only to be continually shut down by the facts on the ground. Hang it up... you and Bush are two peas.

From - http://www.salon.com/media/media960718.html

That night I was at a table with Jacob Weisberg, the political scribbler for New York magazine. We were gossiping about fellow journalists, when Klein passed by. He spotted Weisberg and came to a stop. That week New York had published a piece about how a literary expert had used a computer program to pinpoint tell-tale similarities between Klein's bylined writings and "Primary Colors." Weisberg had written a sidebar noting that there were other reasons to suspect Klein. The author of the book, Weisberg reported, was knowledgeable about New York politics, a onetime Clintonphile who now felt betrayed, and a man obsessed about the subject of race. All these attributes fit Klein.

Klein was enraged. He launched into a blistering attack on Weisberg. Why hadn't New York -- where Klein once had been the political columnist -- called him, he yelled, for a comment? (A comment which, obviously, would have been a lie.) "Thanks, thanks, a lot, Jacob," he said with bitter sarcasm. "That was real nice." Klein's face was red. His eyes steely. He wouldn't let Weisberg talk. "And that bit about being obsessed about race -- I really liked that. Do you think being concerned about an important national issue is the same as being obsessed?" How could the magazine do this to him, he demanded to know, playing the wrongly accused to perfection.

Increasingly wound up, he charged Weisberg with possessing no class and making improper use of off-the-record information. Getting meaner, Klein said Weisberg was gaining a reputation in journalistic circles as an unlikeable fellow not worthy of a dinner-party invitation. (I know of no evidence of this and find Weisberg entirely likable.) When Weisberg tried to squeeze in a word, Klein shot him the look of daggers and hissed: "You don't understand. This is the very last time you and I will ever speak. The last time."

I had rarely seen such a display of unrelenting anger. Weisberg turned white. Finally, Klein huffed, "By the way, this is off-the- record. You do know what off-the-record is, Jake, don't you?" Then he stormed off. (Since I do not believe public outbursts can be placed off-the-record ex post facto, I do not feel bound by Klein's parting comment.)

Until his explosion, I was a member of the it's-probably-Klein school of thought regarding the identity of Anonymous. But this performance made me question that theory. How could he have been that upset -- and so vicious in attacking a colleague's story on the subject -- if he was indeed Anonymous?

Now that we know the truth, I am even more curious about that episode. Was Klein just being a good actor? Or had the strain of deceit gotten to him? Maybe he had adopted a schizophrenia that allowed him to live his lie -- that is, until he went to deposit his royalty checks in the bank. Or perhaps he would do almost anything -- including mistreating a colleague -- to protect his cover.

Yesterday Klein defended his previous denials -- such as the one in which he said he would stake his "journalistic credibility" on his statements that he was not Anonymous. He likened such statements to "lying to protect a source." That's an odious comparison, and one which gives the protection of sources a bad name. Klein's con job can only contribute to the already too-high level of public cynicism regarding journalists and journalism. Media consumers will be right to ask, "What else is he (and they) lying about?"

This is wrong. Pete Hoekstra said so.

You're lying. You said Bush didn't block the report. He blocked it for months.

Joe

If in August you tell me a secret and in December I deny that you told me anything that is a LIE not candor

Criminy Joe, it's not obvious at all. You were clearly and directly referring to Bush.

If you want to claim it's not what you meant to say, ok I guess, but it is in fact what you *did* say.

In light of your total FISA failure - and that wretched column is still out there with glossy photo and big headline - you don't have much benefit of the doubt with me.

Of course, I'm just a reader so I don't matter. But I can't imagine how it is you and similarly incapable pundits continue to get big paychecks for delivering stupid comments.

What did I do wrong in my life that I don't get to do that?

I read with interest your piece:

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1691625,00.html

Aside from the fact that your video obfuscation is very, VERY odd, to say the least, I thought it was a very thoughtful analysis of the situation.

But, that link includes what you said, and TomT reposts it in this thread.

You may not have intended to say that this was a moment of statesmanlike condor for Bush when you were on TV... but you did, in fact, say it.

I accept as true the assertion that you've said otherwise at other times.

All you have to do is Hoekstra about this. he's the one who ghost-writes all of Joke Line's articles for him. joke line doesn't have the time or understanding to do it himself.

I was surprised to hear how different the TIME story was from the quotation. But, Joe, the TP clip and comment is about the TV show.

TV is hard. But you said what you said. And, at this point, saying "I didn't mean what I said" is very very thin.

Joe, this is your beat. You have your super-duper inside sources. You're hooked in to the intelligence community. You know their aspirations and their dreams.

And you're getting killed on this story by people who only have access to the public record. You ned to rethink your journalistic approach.

Joe if you want to try clawing back some credibility why don't you investigate when Bush started lying abut Iran?

In addition, an article on how Joe Lieberman has lost all credibility would help to.

Klein: This is wrong. Obviously, I was referring to the NIE itself as a remarkable moment of candor for the United States.

Given the context of your remarks, Joe:

"The Bush reaction to this — he didn’t try to block it. He didn’t try to postpone it. He didn’t spend weeks, he didn’t ask the intelligence community ‘give me a couple of weeks, let’s see if we can figure out some kind of negotiating initiative or some way to respond to this.’ He didn’t try to spin it to our advantage. This is an amazing moment of candor by the United States. It's saying, 'We want to work with you...We're gonna play this one straight up. '" [emphasis mine]

it's not obvious. Candor on the part of the intelligence community does not equal candor on the part of the President for allowing the NIE to be published. Your statement conflates the two.

The release of the NIE is not an indicator of a change in Iran policy on the part of the Bush administration - Bush still hasn't changed his mind - it represents the effort of the diplomatic and intelligence communities to not have the facts fixed around the policy as they were in the runup to the invasion of Iraq.

Sanity prevailing over madness.

Joe, I'll give you a pass on the antecedent of the pronoun. I think the interpretation ThinkProgress took from your words is the more natural one, but your alternative is still plausible.

But I won't give you a pass on your assertion that the White House “didn’t try to block it [the NIE]”. Why else do you think it was held up for months? They obviously failed to block it at some level or maybe (I'm being generous here) even voluntarily relented at some point, but they clearly did try to block it.

And I definitely won't give you a pass on the FISA stuff. Do you stand by your contention that someone was "well beyond stupid" on the surveillance bill? If so, who?

Or you know, at least, instead of saying "misinterpreted" and blaming your audience, you could say "mispoke" or "wasn't clear."

Nice weaseling words, Joe.

The Bush reaction to this — he didn’t try to block it.

Well, technically, you're right. Cheney blocked it for a year, so I guess that means you can just absolve Bush because ... well, I'm not sure why. I guess you think Bush is some sort of stooge who's left in the dark about matters of national security, then. Otherwise, there's no other explanation for absolving Bush.

And if you meant that the NIE was refreshing candor and not Bush's reaction to it, why didn't you state that during the segment? You're not a novice, Joe, stunned and awed by the klieg lights.

You were clearly on the topic of the Prez, and it seems odd that you would switch gears right in the middle without any clarification or warning. After all, dangling participles usually aren't your style.

So you're either an incompetent who can't keep his thoughts straight (bad), or you're lying once again to save your own ass (worse).

If there's another explanation, I'd love to read it.

If your goal was to render breath-taking mendacity mundane, then, congratulations.

If you thought you would not be called on it, well, obviously, you're wrong.

One example of people working with the public record eating Joe's lunch on this story.

If journalistic weaseling were an Olympic sport, Joe Klein would be a gold medalist. He can't bear to say that Bush is an incompetent buffoon, but he can't deny the evidence, so he weasels ever more furiously around and around, pretending that he dislikes Bush, while staying friendly with his precious Republican contacts.

Just go away, Joe.

Joke Line-

I just watched the video of your performance and the video doesn't support your take on the incident. Who am I supposed to trust? You or my lying eyes?

I'm sorry, but this just doesn't pass the laugh test.

You're on television enough to speak clearly. And Scarborough challenged you.

Try again.

It's pretty clear what happened here: Joe likes to pal around with righties like Hewitt and Scarborough (probably because they ultimately provide good venues to pimp his books), and part of this involves going on about what a "candid" straight-shooting, likable, decent guy The Decider is. Whether or not Joe actually believes this, who can say? But he has a record of doing it and this is just the latest example.

I agree with zota -- this is becoming completely surreal.

Confronted with *videotape* of his absurd claims... Joe denies making the claims! It really is surreal.

Joe increasingly reminds me of John Lovitz doing his Pathological Liar routine on SNL.

Joe,

Don't sweat it. I understand Pete Hoekstra's okay with both the article and the TV appearance. Relax, I hear that both Rush and Ann Coulter aren't going to say nasty things about you.

Also, Sally still expects you at Sunday Brunch with Al and Andrea. I understand that Mrs. Dan Senor is going to bring in some bloody Marys. Howie's going to bring in some bagels and lox! And everyone expects you to regale them with tales of John Kerry.

So don't let of a bunch of anonymous, liberal, hippie bloggers get to you!

Texas Monthly Talks

Dan Bartlett

Interview by Evan Smith

...

Smith: How much attention did you pay to the programs on cable?

Bartlett: I never worried about a certain cable show. What I was looking for were trends that were shaping the narrative and the conventional wisdom and whether we had to be in front of or behind those things.

Smith: What about the blogs?

Bartlett: We had to set up a whole new apparatus to deal with the challenges they pose. Are they real journalists? The Washington Post, for example, has journalists who are now bloggers. Do you treat them as bloggers? Do they get credentials?

Smith: Let’s think of it as a practical matter. If one of those journalists-turned-bloggers, Chris Cillizza, e-mails you to say he needs an interview, and at the same time one of the Post’s print reporters—say, Dan Balz—e-mails you and says he needs an interview, and you can do only one . . .

Bartlett: Balz.

Smith: Because the print edition of the Post has more of an impact?

Bartlett: Because Balz is on multiple platforms. He’s booked more easily on television. He’s read by more people. He influences people a bit more. Now, the question might not be as much Chris versus Dan as maybe, “Is it Dan Balz or one of the guys at [the conservative blog] Power Line?”

Smith: Yeah, or what if [conservative blogger] Hugh Hewitt called?

Bartlett: That’s when you start going, “Hmm . . .” Because they do reach people who are influential.

Smith: Well, they reach the president’s base.

Bartlett: That’s what I mean by influential. I mean, talk about a direct IV into the vein of your support. It’s a very efficient way to communicate. They regurgitate exactly and put up on their blogs what you said to them. It is something that we’ve cultivated and have really tried to put quite a bit of focus on.

...

http://www.texasmonthly.com/2008-01-01/talks-1.php

Something you want to tell us Joe, or is that obvious too?

Let IS assume for the predictable Sidney Bloominshorts media incest the best for our little male Lara Loganov dearest anonymous fickle Time-CNN-AOL leader, and group guess that Iran did indeed Stand Down from nuke deep labbing oh about 2003 or thereabouts.

Who gets credit for that, if true (it ain't, but why diss the obvious)?

Hillary? Edwards? My dog Trey? Santa Claus perhaps?

http://rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_2008__1/2008_presidential_election/south_carolina/election_2008_south_carolina_democratic_primary

Iran IS no less a threat today than they were this time last week, or last year, or last decade, or last democrapic Regime Changers.

Anyone that says otherwise IS either an idiot, a mole, or Say Joe Klein.

The funny thing, is Joe's use of the word "obviously" to describe his intent. He does this frequently. If it was "obvious," we wouldn't have all reached the same conclusion -- at odds with your portrayal.

For example, when you say that invasion of Iraq is "probably" the right thing to do, we don't see you as opposing the war, when "obviously" that was what you meant to say.

Words have meaning Joe.

These days, if I were you, I'd double and triple-check everything you write or say. You may have noticed, we're paying especially close attention these days.

It might advance the ball if you stated clearly your view of the ethics and truthfulness of this administration, in an unambiguous, strong statement.

I don't think you will do that, though. Too potentially costly. You'd rather float around, with a leaning-left post here, followed by carefully-placed propaganda piece there. To keep folks on their toes.

What a horrendous way to go through life.

Once again you support the president against his critics with your spin from your giant soapbox and then you run here to this little blog to try to appear balanced.

It's clear what you are doing Joe.

Why were Democratic leaders not allowed to respond to your hit piece on their FISA bill?

Oh my God...you did it again!

I'm speechless...

Joe,

You really should stop using the QuestionHillary monicker. People are going to mistake you for Dana Rohrbacher or worse, Grover Norquist.

What a distraction. Bush got on National TV and directly lied to the American people about what he knew and when he knew it.

And now were debating whether its he or the intelligence community that should be credited with CANDOR!

What a PATHETIC display. And I don't just mean Joe.

Why were Democratic leaders not allowed to respond to your hit piece on their FISA bill?

I think Stengel is allowing Feingold's letter to be published in letters to the editor, 2 weeks later.

I bet Republican leaders wouldn't get this treatment.

The United States is a "He"?

You know ... all of this stuff -- the FISA debacle, the Jane Harman fiasco, this issue ...
It's sad, really, especially when one considers that Joe has, in every objective reality, done some great work in his 38 years.

But what he still has yet to realize is that he no longer has a stranglehold on information, thought and debate. His success makes him a big target, and he has yet to fully comprehend that every single thing he writes or says will be analyzed. He's still working within the old model.

At this point, Joe (I can all you Joe, right?) it appears that you have two choices:

1. You can either take all of this as a positive development, one that forces you to double check every fact, question every source, and put real thought into your writing and, thus, make you a much, much better writer in the long run.

This will require the swallowing of a bit of crow and the suppression of some ego. But considering the reach your work has, it's vital not just for you or your employer, but for the whole country as well.

Or ...

2. You can act like a petulant child and continue doing what you're doing: lazy-to-non-existent research, taking every source at his/her word, and spitting out half-baked columns and blog posts.

This is the easy route as far as effort goes, but it will lead to the pissing away of nearly four decades of work because, eventually, people will stop paying attention to you.

So ... Are you willing to set aside your ego, admit your mistakes without the hemming and hawing, and grow from this experience?

Or are you willing to throw away all you've earned just to tell all of us amateurs to get off your journalistic lawn because we dare to ensure you're doing your job correctly?

It's your call, Joe.

And please note: This is NOT to say that you need to bash Bush at every turn or run all of your columns by Atrios or Kos. What we're asking for here isn't some sort of leftist ideological purity. And no one has requested that you not express your opinions.

We only ask for one thing: The Truth. It's as simple as that.

Ok - I FINALLY broke down and had to sign up for an account because I cannot take this anymore.

This is just too much... The video is very clear and now Joe is trying some kind of bait and switch between what he says on the video (clearly referring to Bush) and an article he wrote about the NIE.

Not only is this disingenuous on so many levels, following his recent FISA debacle, I find it hard not to believe Mr. Klein is just flat out too incompetent for this job.

Mr. Klein complains of the 'vicious blogs' but what he really cannot seem to tolerate (or survive) is the basic scrutiny these bloggers provide - an experience that he apparently has never had to endure.

Leopards don't change their spots. Why do we keep expecting that they will?

Reagan's response to Carter was, "There you go again!"

That gets rid of a lot of the huffing and puffing.

Senor Joe, that word, credibility, you like so much.. I do not think it means what you think it means.....

Dear God, Joe, don't you know when to quit lying and go home to the family? Candor? From the Bush administration? What are you on, other than the neocon paylist? It is so pathetically obvious that Joe has to shill for the GOP, because otherwise he has NO SOURCES! How anyone calling himself even vaguely Democratic or liberal can waste ten seconds on Hoekstra is beyond belief - unless you realize that Joe has no meal-ticket without his "sources" - all of which are either giving him talking points to include, or are simply made up as Joe's needs require. Meet Joe Klein - the Walter Mitty of Washington DC!

http://rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_2008__1/2008_presidential_election/south_carolina/election_2008_south_carolina_democratic_primary

I just can't stop laughing at YOU libs!

Why, O, Why do I continue to return to the repeated, slow-motion train wreck that is Joe Klein? Why can I not avert my gaze while the man humiliates himself again and again?

The solid work of Karen Tumulty and the amusing snark of Ana Marie are continually undermined by his antics. He surely needs a blog of his own, to quarantine the others. Then, people would come to Swampland for positive reasons - to read real reporting and insight - instead of coming to witness the awkward spectacle of a weak man who cannot admit when he is wrong.

English Motherf@cker! Do you speak it!

Is this like you on MTP in 2003 saying the invasion of Iraq was 'the right thing'?

You sir are a sad and pathetic clown. A laughingstock but not funny.

I'd like to know if Bush informed Kyle and Lieberman about the findings of the Iran NIE, and when.

Klein thinks this is a no spin zone:

First, let’s examine what Bush said at his Tuesday press conference:

“Iran was dangerous, Iran is dangerous, and Iran will be dangerous if they have the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon.”

Note well that he didn’t say Iran will be dangerous when it acquires such a weapon, but prior to that, when it acquires the knowledge to make one. That’s a big difference, and it shortens the timetable laid out in the NIE, which doubted Iran would have such a weapon until 2015.

Who knows when Iran will have the “knowledge to make” one? Maybe it has that knowledge already and lacks only the technical sophistication.

Bush’s new definition allows him to denounce Iran at almost any time on the nuclear issue.

He reiterated that “Iran needs to be taken seriously as a threat to peace,” adding: “My opinion hasn’t changed.” And he remained as macho as ever in boasting that he wouldn’t allow Iran to acquire such a weapon while he’s around.

“If Iran shows up with a nuclear weapon at some point in time, the world is going to say, what happened to them in 2007? How come they couldn’t see the impending danger?” He added five more similar rhetorical questions, and concluded by saying: “It’s not going to happen on my watch.” He also said yet again that “the best diplomacy” is when “all options are on the table.”

Second, let’s put the nuclear issue to the side for a moment. There are other pretexts that Bush can seize upon.

The 2006 U.S. National Security Strategy says point-blank that “we face no greater challenge from a single country than from Iran.”

And its discussion of this challenge is not limited to the issues of Iran’s nuclear capabilities.

“As important as are these nuclear issues, the United States has broader concerns regarding Iran,” the document states. “The Iranian regime sponsors terrorism; threatens Israel; seeks to thwart Middle East peace; disrupts democracy in Iraq; and denies the aspirations of its people for freedom. The nuclear issue and our other concerns can ultimately be resolved only if the Iranian regime makes the strategic decision to change these policies, open up its political system, and afford freedom to its people. This is the ultimate goal of U.S. policy.”

The United States won’t be able to attain that goal while Ahmedinejad is in power, and beyond that, while the mullahs are in power.

Well, stuart, I mean, Joe, at least you are not lying when you say the Bush did not respond with intelligence, we know that he is incapable of that, but we don't appreciate the fact you have not made an appropriate apology for your lies against the DNC.

Do the right thing and resign.

QH:

You are so brain dead that the only thing you know about the difference between Iraq and Iran is that one ends with an 'n' and the other a 'q'.

I could then claim that aliens have taken over Ft. Lauderdale and and find some looney out there and paste his/her link here.

But, unlike you, I won't bore these decent Americans with such drivel.

Maybe you should try to actually get a job at that union shop you claim to have fired someone from!

Like I posted yesterday, Venus or Pluto, take your pick. At least there are no Black people there.

And, I STILL have yet to work out what my cockles are for, other than warming at the thought of you "changing your residency"!

What is it about Joe that he can't say, "Maybe I shouldn't have said it that way?" How could that clip have been misinterpreted. If he said "I didn't mean it to come out that way," I'd be fine with that but he always blames the listener or reader for misinterpreting him.

You're the communicator here, Joe. We're not misiniterpreting you on purpose. Don't you see that something's wrong?

He didn’t try to spin it to our advantage.

Who exactly is "our" in the "our" advantage? "Our', such as you and the administration's advantage?

Your syntax is increasingly bizarre.

I'm beginning to think Joe's engaged in some kind of elaborate performance art thing.... How else to explain it all.

Mike M:

ALL Republicans claim "misinterpretation" or "taken out of context" when they get caught. You see, like many other Republicans, they croon one thing to us, the American people, and say entirely another when in front of their core constituancy.

Trent Lott is the most famous example, oozing euphemisms during his now-famous Blaxpology tour immediately after being taken to task for a 45 minute racially charged tirade in front of dozens of his peers.

Typical Republican forked-tongue speech...

Some people say Think Progess is wrong. Others say Joe Klein is wrong, because he has a track record of being wrong. Who is right? I do not know, and I have neither the time nor the legal background to find out.

"I'm beginning to think Joe's engaged in some kind of elaborate performance art thing.... How else to explain it all."

Indeed. There's something very Andy Kaufman-esque about Klein.

Except that Kaufman's hissy fits were intentionally staged and meant to be insincere.

Mr. Klein, this is a matter of nuclear war. If you and Time insist on inserting yourselves into this national and international discussion is it too much to expect some quality?

Your own post of "this is wrong" coupled with the video shows there's a problem. We're all now asking the same question of you and Time that we're asking about the Bush administration -- what is the ratio of incompetence to iniquity. And all we get for an answer is intransigence.

Your false FISA propaganda piece, Rick Stengel's handling of that issue and his appointing you to this extremely important cover story, and now this ridiculous, obviously false defense all add up to one conclusion: you are a liar.

We must boycott Time's business partners until they force stuart, I mean, Joe, to repent for his sins of DNC slander over FISA!

It is up to us to make sure these abuses do not happen anymore!

One thing that occurs to me: how very odd to praise an intelligence report as being "candid." Isn't that expected?

Joe's explanation doesn't even parse.

You're a pathetic excuse of a man, Joe. You say something and when called on it, you refer to something you said somewhere else as proof you didn't say it.

Wow.

You're a liar and a coward and for the sake of all of us, stop talking. Stop writing.

You went on the air and praised your BFF President:

"The Bush reaction to this — he didn’t try to block it. He didn’t try to postpone it. He didn’t spend weeks, he didn’t ask the intelligence community ‘give me a couple of weeks, let’s see if we can figure out some kind of negotiating initiative or some way to respond to this.’ He didn’t try to spin it to our advantage. This is an amazing moment of candor by the United States."

THAT'S WHAT YOU SAID, YOU PUTZ. The interetS is a wonderful thing.

You praised Bush his candor and for not spinning the NIE, which he did and which BUSH & CHENEY delayed by for MONTHS so they can TWEAK IT AS MUCH AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE. Also called spin, Joe.

It's time to find another line of work, Joe. Like Bush & Cheney and ALL the neo-con lunatics, you have NO credibility left whatsoever.

You're a joke.

"WHAT A WASTE IT IS TO LOSE ONE'S MIND" - Dan Quayle

Somehow, Mr. Klein's recent behavior reminds us of Dan's Faux Pas, even though Dan was in the arena facing those brilliant words in huge letters. Alas, Dan did not, or could not read them.

The more Joke tries to explain, the worse it becomes. It is though he is in a one man race, and he is intent on losing. Something. Actually I owe him an apology. Dan Quayle, that is. Considering that they are close in age, it is clear that in a race for clarity, honesty, integrity and intelligence, the former VP is heads and shoulders above Time's pretend liberal j-man. Comparing Klein with Quayle is simply unfair to Dan.

They do have other similarities. Dan won the 1991 Ig Nobel Prize for ejukashun. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Nobel_Prize

Clearly, Joke is leading the pack (even the entire staff of Fox News) for the Ig Nobel for journalism. Showing the world, in painful, agonizing, and laughable detail, just how an alleged talking head or journalism should not act.

Joe, Joe, Joe. You clearly need some adult supervision when you are online. Perhaps you can hire someone to turn your screed into something more substantive, less fact-free, and hopefully something accurate for a change.

I think it's pretty clear that Think Progress was accurate in its reporting of your statements. If anyone is misinterpreting anything, it's you, Klein.

It's just sad and embarrassing the way you constantly shoot yourself in the foot like this. As though you want to be a liberal critic, but not a shrill one. So you try to be "balanced" by forwarding statements from Republican bigwigs without checking up on them, and try to put the President's idiocies in the best possible light ("he didn't try to spin it", come on!) while claiming he is not to be believed. Which is it?

You can't have it both ways. You can't be in the middle of the road; the Republicans have destroyed the middle of the road for the foreseeable future. You must be a partisan of the truth, call a spade a spade, question authority at all times. If you can't do that, you're worthless to me as a pundit.

http://www.zogby.com/news/ReadNews.dbm?ID=1393

Polls shmolls!

We only ask for one thing: The Truth. It's as simple as that.

I couldn't have said it better myself.

For your further education QH, please review the concept of "Self-selction bias"

"If the selection bias is not taken into account then any conclusions drawn may be wrong."

liberalrob - I wholeheartedly agree with what you said about questioning authority, but when Hillary is President and we have an obstruction-proof congress there will be no need to question it because it will be good authority of the people, by the people and for the people.

Hillary will bring back the balance!

TP is hardly a major news site. They are to be ignored on many occasions, as are sites like Malkin and Town Hall.

http://www.political-buzz.com/

Joe,

You have no credibility. Start speaking the truth, admit mistakes, and maybe someday down the road your credibility will return. Don't you see the opportunity here? Use your writing skills to tell us objectively and honestly how you have come to be in this position. Glenn Greenwald has started that narritive and it could be the story of the year if you are honest about it.

Joe:

Tis more noble to admit a mistake rather than to deny and fume. You said:
"OBviously, I was referring to the NIE itself as a remarkable moment of candor for the United States. "

No, not obvious. All the sentences around the "candor" sentence were about Bush. Bush-Bush-Bush-USA candor - Bush -Bush.

Joe, Joe, Joe.

At the risk of being viewed as redundant, since these quotes have been posted by other bloggers, I am going to make some simple observations about the content of Mr. Klein’s comments and see if it can be reasonably seen as having been meant in the way Mr. Klein later claims.

I am going to evaluate the content using the Scientific Content Analysis system designed by the Laboratory for Scientific Interrogation Inc. and Interrotec™ system for statement analysis. (Yes, this is what I do for a living).

http://www.lsiscan.com/index.htm

http://securitymanagementservices.com/seminars/investig.html

Starting with his statements on television:

“The Bush reaction to this — he didn’t try to block it. He didn’t try to postpone it. He didn’t spend weeks, he didn’t ask the intelligence community ‘give me a couple of weeks, let’s see if we can figure out some kind of negotiating initiative or some way to respond to this.’ He didn’t try to spin it to our advantage. This is an amazing moment of candor by the United States.” – Joe Klein

Mr. Klein was speaking in very plain terms about the reaction of President Bush to the revelations about Iran’s nuclear program in the NIE, or more specifically to the revelations in the NIE being made public. There is no question about a change in topic. Mr. Klein intended his comment as a single united statement, that Mr. Bush’s reaction to the NIE and subsequent behaviors and statements are the “amazing moment of candor” Mr. Klein is referring to.

Now, speaking to the content of the statement:

Mr. Klein opens with “The Bush reaction to this” but beaks off the subsequent thought (probably because he was going to make a concrete statement which would be false) and changes course to “He didn’t try to block it…etc” which is a ‘soft truth’ and much easier for a person to state without the psychological guilt/shame tied to a lie. This is expressly true, Mr. Bush didn’t TRY to block, postpone or delay the NIE, he succeeded very admirably in doing so and waiting for months before the pronouncements were made public.

It is interesting to note that Mr. Klein also views the actions of the President as being “The United States”, not just the president or the executive branch. To his mind they are one and the same entity, and as much as Mr. Klein speaks to his own involvement – he considers himself to be one of ‘players’ in Washington power, perhaps even associating himself with having a personal stake in the decisions reached as though through his writing he steers the course of policy. This interpretation of his role becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy when he regurgitates the policies of the administration, then marvels at his own genius as those predictions are fulfilled.

Examine the TIME cover story, when Mr. Klein quotes a source (no matter how dubious) he usually refers to himself as occupying a position of privilege and authority: “a former CIA officer TOLD ME”; “A senior U.S. intelligence official TOLD ME last week”; “a senior U.S. diplomat TOLD ME”. As though the act of telling Mr. Klein something adds weight and credence to it, as he is a very important person, with vital ties to the circles of power and authority.

Mr. Klein plainly believes he is ENTITLED to say what he wants and have it accepted as fact because he has earned that right; he is an insider and thus has deeper and more meaningful perspective due to his own perceived high level of involvement and inclusion.

The opening line in Mr. Klein’s blog post “Misinterpreted”: “This is wrong” shows his tendency to hubris and resentment at those who fail to recognize his stature.

The word ‘Misinterpreted’ places the blame onto those who are interpreting his comments, but does NOT argue that he did not make them, just that others fail to recognize the inherent correctness of his statement, no matter how vague it might have been.

“This is wrong” does the same psychological trick, Mr. Klein is not upset about the supposed “misinterpretation of his comments, he is upset by his fine pontifications being reduced to buffoonery – thus “This is wrong” versus “I was misunderstood”, to his mind the entire idea that he could become the subject of suck mocking by his “people” in the press is the issue.

I do not think Mr. Klein does this on purpose, it would take a true master of linguistic deception to be that subtle at all times and use these ploys knowingly. Rather, Mr. Klein, like the rest of us places a lot of subconscious cards on the table unknowingly which serve to reveal the intent behind the words.

{I am not an employee of either of the fine institutions mentioned earlier, and claim no connection to either}

He did try to block it, he did postpone it, he and his people are working to spin it as we speak. Pathetic. Always trying to catch the wind of conventional wisdom and seeing that as eminently noble, profound. That must by why you don't have the shame you should.

Joe do you understand that with each day, with each utterance or scribble, you sink deeper? The only way to save yourself is to come clean, but you seem to suffer from the Bush disease. Unable to admit fault. Try to do what Bush can't do, step out of yourself, look at your recent missteps objectively. Holy sh*t! I'm a total jackass.

When you come to that realization and make the next step, APOLOGIZE, you may not have integrity, but at least you'll have the appearance of an effort. And America loves the effort even more than actual integrity. You can get a job at some irrelevant, phony, striving for middle brow magazine.

Joe, you're a lousy journalist, a lousy prognosticator, a lousy strategist, and a lousy pundit. I hope this FISA fiasco causes you to lose your job, because there are thousands of people out there who could do it more competently, more thoroughly, and more honestly.

Just a small salute to a true American hero, from the Daily Kos:

Joe, Schmo
Blowhard Time pundit sings a song of himself
By John Cook

IT AIN'T SO, JOE
When Joe Klein signed up with Time magazine as a political columnist in 2003, he turned to this quote from Teddy Roosevelt for the name of his weekly dispatch, which he dubbed "In the Arena": "It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. ... The credit belongs to the man in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood ... and who, at worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly."
Klein has written that he intended the reference as a sort of self-effacing rebuke, a constant reminder that he is but a humble critic who chronicles the doings of deeds. But to believe that interpretation, one must ignore the fact that Klein's body of work amounts to little more than a festival of projection and poorly disguised vanity. This is the man, after all, who, unsatisfied with writing about Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential campaign as a mere critic, rather famously refashioned himself into a central player in that campaign in his 1996 novel, Primary Colors. If Joe Klein is contemplating a man in an arena, his face marred by dust and sweat and blood, daring greatly, you can rest assured that the man he is contemplating is Joe Klein.

If Joe Klein is contemplating a man in an arena, his face marred by dust and sweat and blood, daring greatly, you can rest assured that the man he is contemplating is Joe Klein
And, oh, how our hero has dared in the arena of late! For the past three weeks, Klein has been the subject of withering attacks from left-wing bloggers after he wrote, falsely, in his November 21 column that the Democratic proposal for amending the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) would "give the terrorists the same legal protections as Americans." The debate is arcane and ludicrously complicated, and it has generated literally tens of thousands of words online and in print, mostly condemning Klein, and most of them from Salon's Glenn Greenwald (who, God love him, has approached his subject with the tenacity and righteousness of an obsessive-compulsive IRS auditor). But suffice it to say that (a) Klein made a stupid error, and (b) his preposterously arrogant and ham-fisted attempts to walk himself back from that error have almost rendered reasonable Greenwald's claim that the episode illustrates "everything that is rancid and corrupt with our political media."

ROMAN A KLEIN Primary ColorsThe FISA dispute is but the latest skirmish in an ongoing campaign that has been marring Klein's brow with dust and blood and sweat since January, when Time launched its political blog, Swampland. Klein is one of its regular contributors, and there is no better conceivable foil than he for the blogocentric criticism that the political journalism establishment is populated by preening, clueless, lazy, and pompous regurgitators of conventional wisdom. Swampland's commenters have joined the battle with glee; the first comment to one of Klein's first posts on Swampland read simply: "Just because I hate to see the lefties get all the credit, let the record show that at least one moderate Republican finds you despicable." More than 3,000 comments followed that post alone, and the vicious mockery has continued, virtually unabated, all year.
Klein's reactions on Swampland to his FISA critics are precious goldmines of self-aggrandizing pretense that must be savored at length to appreciate their rich subtleties and overtones. His first response acknowledged—in an insufferably cloying way—that although partisan murk clouded the issue, he "may" have made a mistake, before going on to claim that if he indeed had made a mistake, "we are talking about relatively obscure and unimportant technical details." In other words, Klein sat down to write a column about obscure and unimportant technical details.

Klein's next weigh-in on the blog, two days later, was headlined "FISA: More Than You Want to Know," as though his responsibility to assess the veracity or lack thereof of the claims he made in his columns involved some kind of burdensome slog through legislative thickets beyond the comprehension of mere mortals. Why are you making me do this? This is hard! His post artfully shifted the issue from whether the bill says what he said it says to whether his Republican sources or Democratic sources were correct in their interpretations (who knows? This law stuff is complicated) before actually committing to pixels the following words, which will live on as one of the finest specimens of sheer journalistic hubris ever issued from one of the genre's most accomplished practitioners: "I have neither the time nor legal background to figure out who's right." I don't have time find out if what I write is true, people! I'm too busy claiming that other things are true. And even if I did have time, I'm not qualified to say whether the things I write are true anyway!

Time4Tolerance

I wish you pinkos would leave this country that you despise so much.

Our Dear Leader, who bravely served in Texas at the height of the Vietname War, has reduced the national debt, eliminated abortions, disenfranchised African Americans, provided trillions of dollars to GOP operatives in Mississippi and Alabama. What past President can claim such accomplishments?

The surge documents are required reading from Sandhurst to St. Cyr to Tironaut to Dehra Dun. Political leaders around the world are vainly trying to imitate the "man's man" Dick Cheney by claiming their daughters are lesbo.

Whereas Ronald Reagan had to grovel before the Ayatollah with a plane load of arms and cake shaped like a Bible, our Dear Leader only handed over the oil wealth of Basra to the Persians. And you commies tell me that there is no value to having an MBA running this country!

So Time4Tolerance, rarely have 8 years produced military victories as the 'Surge', the tremenedous economic growth with low inflation (gasoline prices are cheaper in Chicago than they are in Harrre). You really should start listenting to Rush and read the WSJ editorial page.

And of course read Joke Line

"This is wrong."

What, you mean that you were allowed to remain in your job and write a cover story?

We know that already.

You (and your editors) have succeeded in making Time a laughing stock. There's no reason to look to Time for news anymore. Now it's more like the National Enquirer, fit for check-out lines only.

For all of our sake, take a long vacation Joe.

Joe tells Ana that he doesn't read the comment threads. He also says he doesn't really think that Swampland should exist.

Hear it in his own words:
http://i.timeinc.net/time/podcast/klein/time_klein.mp3

Not much sense writing comments to Joke Line when he's refusing to read them.

Bye, bye!

"For all of our sake, take a long vacation Joe."

My very senior source in the Administration (affectionately referred to as Deep Fat), tells me that parts of Iraq are just to die for at this time of year. Of course, I have neither the time nor background to check out what he says.

@Diogenes

Given that Joe doesn't read bills that he is commenting on, I can't imagine that he would read comments to his despicable falsehoods. Perhaps it is time for readers to consider a class-action suit against Time?

Regardless whether Klein reads the comments here, I for one find most of them to be both illuminating and hilarious.

This is just speculation, but I don't think the commenters here need to have their identities, their worldviews, or their senses of self-worth acknowledged by the likes of Joe Klein.

Interesting. Is there a legal definition of 'news'? Does Time advertise itself as a purveyor of 'news' and if so does this constitute fraud under the truth in advertising statutes? It would be wildly entertaining to see attorneys for Time defend the rag on the grounds that it's only meant as entertainment and therefore not beholden to any definition of 'news'. Just sayin'.

This is just speculation, but I don't think the commenters here need to have their identities, their worldviews, or their senses of self-worth acknowledged by the likes of Joe Klein.

Posted by Enceladus

Indeed. My only hope is that (Democratic) politicians get it through their heads that Joe Klein, whom many of them (according to Klein and their own accounts) consider to be an ally and even advisor, is not honest, not competent, and not to be relied on, heeded, or respected in any way. Ditto Russert, Broder, Imus, Tweety, Friedman, Ignatius et cetera, et cetera, ad nauseum et ad infinitum.

Perhaps there should be some sort of Klein Test for honorable Democrats. Any Democratic candidate who endorses Joe Klein as adviser, campaign consultant or source of political savvy shall immediately forfeit the respect and support of all registered Democrats, as well as their donations. Admittedly, judging by the results of the Kerry presidential run, that seems to be what happens by default, by why not make it official? Contact your Democratic representative, or proposed candidate, and require full Klein disclosure. Act now!

Posted by Titus Pullo | December 6, 2007 5:25 PM

"...'Greenwald's larger criticism of the arrogance of the mainstream media, especially those who opine without reporting, has value...but too often he finds great significance in the insignificant, mistaking a twig for a forest.' -Joke Line responding to criticism from Greenwald."

...the "insignificant" being any set of facts or circumstances that happen to undermine his ideology, which proposes that every brilliant idea is somehow the mean between Jesse Helms and Nancy Pelosi.

Don't forget, Joe isn't actually interested in the actual events or (heaven forbid) bills about which he writes. These are only excuses for him to blab on and on about his one true Important Political Idea.

Joe is the Leon Trotsky of "centrism".

Here Joe....

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/06/washington/06cnd-intel.html?bl&ex=1197090000&en=3a8e1ed53c7d157e&ei=5087%0A

It's called journalism. You should try it sometime!

I just listened to Ana's interview of Joe from the link Diogenes put up -- http://i.timeinc.net/time/podcast/klein/time_klein.mp3

Joe really does come off as a bit unhinged, as a guy with emotional problems that cloud his judgment and his ability to reckon honestly with his own conduct. He's so thin-skinned and insecure that it's literally debilitating. Weird.

Anyway, we'll find out pretty soon if being publicly outed as utterly incompetent and pathologically dishonest is enough to get you fired from a star journamalist gig at Time magazine.

Does anyone know a lawyer, involved with news and media, who could comment on the merits of a class-action suit? Anyone have Glenn Greenwald's number?

BadKarma: That was a compelling post! I'd be interested future parsings of Joe's posts. Next time?