MoveOn.org Flexes Its Muscle Amid Iraq War Debate

The New York Times:

There is no mistaking the influence of MoveOn.org, with its 3.2 million members and powerful fund-raising apparatus, within the Democratic Party.

This liberal activist group has come to occupy a prominent seat at the table among the party elite, so much so that Republicans leaped at a chance to hold Democrats and their presidential candidates responsible for the organization's positions after it ran an advertisement attacking the credibility of Gen.

Read the whole story: The New York Times

Comments

[negogato]

07:53 PM on 09/15/2007

We don't want military leaders making policy. There is a name for that.

I say shame on George Wishful Bush for hiding behind military men, sending them out to fight for him and all the while refusing to even talk to his adversaries. So brave is he.
Shame on Bush for using military leaders to buy a little more time so that his precious failures don't come out and dirty his glorious legacy ~ for a few days a few months longer.

Bush is in one day a time denial. And America bleeds and Iraq burns and he sleeps well.

Our Constitution is decisive about where the responsibility for command lies -- the president is the commander in chief. The policy is wrong. The war is wrong. The president is wrong.

Again, I say, MoveOn had my support since the days of the Clinton impeachment “managed by” the gop.

But, MoveOn has given the gop an easy out by the use of such a childish tag, a play on a man’s name.

The gop has no answers, only slogans. The gop has scorn aplenty, and if we have learned anything - a readiness to use it.

MoveOn might as well have written the slime that the gop was so predictably swift to use in its war of diversions that is keeping a real war going.

If MoveOn stumbles, as they certainly have here, we had bloody well speak up. There is too much at stake to remain silent.

Ending the war will not be a cake walk.

[Podewumun]

06:28 PM on 09/17/2007

Leave it to the last one out to make a statement worthy of silkscreening on a Tshirt.

Awesome soundbite, Negogato (minus cat?)!!!!

[mpgarr]

02:48 PM on 09/15/2007

I was surfing through channels earlier and a story on FAUX caught my attention--it was basically about how evil and liberal MoveOn is and of course "dangerous" since its power is growing---

Don't cha just love the FAUX News folks???

I have to thank Bill O'Reilly for turning me on to The DailyKos

Arianna needs to figure out how to get the aholes at FAUX-News to rant and rave about how liberal and evil she is and that HuffPost is a bastion of hatred and vile towards conservatives.

It is funny--FAUX News loves to list all of the ways that "conservatives" are attacked by we horrible liberal types--but doesn't playing the victim kinda go against the conservative, "He-man, rugged individualist American" image that doesn't care about if someone likes you or not and you just keep on going even if they do????

I thought that among the many things conservative types hate, is someone claiming some sort of "victim status."

[KRANKY]

10:35 PM on 09/16/2007

"I thought that among the many things conservative types hate, is someone claiming some sort of "victim status."
______________________________________________

NAHHHH!
The men are sick, self loathing, insecure, pot-bellied bullies with short weenies.
The most masculine among them are the Harpies: the shrill, skeletal uber blondes.

Repukes are a disease that is degenerative and has no cure. The individuals are social parasites that can only exist by causing pain, misery, and death to the host culture.

Intelligent people need to view and treat them as we would any virulent bug, bacteria, or other incessant scourge.

[Doug]

02:43 PM on 09/15/2007

"Attacks On MoveOn Sign Of Group's Growing Power"

Um.... so attacks on the GWB and the HW are signs of his increasing power?

How idiotic.

[Libsrule]

02:40 PM on 09/15/2007

Ya gotta love Moveon, they are REALLY getting under the skin of the party of Grand Old Pedophiles, or party of the GAY OLD PERVERTS when they unlease their hounds at Fake News/Fox Noise in calling for ALL AMERICANS to call their congressman and tell them to denounce Moveon, and....yet, there hasn't been a single one.

Well except from the usual rightwing whackjobs.

It's still hilarious, in a sad way,how they get all upset over calling Bush's yesman out on his Bushlicking ways, but have no problem with insulting, dishonoring, and denigrating a man who actually went to Vietnam, served under fire and who went back for a second tour, by calling him a coward(like their hero did anything but get drunk and snort cocaine and avoid actual service in Vietnam because he was busy protecting the bars of Alabama from the VC and HE'S THE HERO?).

Yeah, sure they know what they're talking about. They're just pissed that their little buttboy got called out for lying to keep the war going and the war profiteers getting rich on the backs of dead soldiers.

[starwheel]

02:52 PM on 09/15/2007

All they have left is "show me the links!" As if Fallon's words, if verified, would even have an impact on their belief system.

When all they have to do is just listen to Petraeus's words and his role in executing the Bush strategy over the past several years.

Remember all that "good news" the wingnuts whined wasn't being reported over the past few years Then that was replaced with Petraeus's brilliant "surge" that apparently was needed (even though things were going just great but the librul media didn't report on it) and is now supposedly "working" (as long as you don't count all the casualties).

Really, the wingnuts need our sympathy right now. They're hurting real bad.

[hydenorhare]

02:11 PM on 09/15/2007

MoveOn.org in an e-mail to its members,

"Now it's our party. We bought it. We own it."

And they do.

And you will never hear any Democrat acknowledge that.

The Democrat Party cannot survive on left-wing nutball support alone once the rest of the country is apprised of who they're beholding to.

They are going to have to either sever visible ties with the nuts or come to some kind of understanding.

[starwheel]

02:29 PM on 09/15/2007

70% of the rest of the country are more apprised of what the Republicans are beholding to.

Even the Republicans don't think the Republicans can win. Look at their candidates.

Bush's leadership team is gone and the Republican presidential candidates don't even want to be seen with him.

The Republicans have thrown in the towel. The only thing they are hoping for IS another terrorist attack because fear is all they have left to sell.

[negogato]

08:32 PM on 09/15/2007

"We're Kicking Ass" George Bush Sept. 7 2007 Sidney, Austria.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2007/09/07/bush-on-iraq-were-kicking-ass/

[StillAmused]

03:04 PM on 09/15/2007

____________

"Now it's our party. We bought it. We own it."

And they do.
____________

They DO?

A little self-congratulatory bravado on the left... and YOUR knowing assessment is that it constitutes FACT?

Ron Suskind (NYT), reporting his conversation with a White House aide:

The aide said that guys like me were ''in what we call the reality-based community,'' which he defined as people who ''believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.'' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ''That's not the way the world really works anymore,'' he continued. ''We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.''

Guess we can, according to your reasoning, assume that the above defines YOUR world.

Should I address you as 'emperor'?

You are going to have to either sever visible ties with the nuts or come to some kind of understanding.

[TimN]

01:58 PM on 09/15/2007

MoveOn.org is Hillary Clinton's Achilles heel.

Where once the proud Democratic Party was ruled by justice and equity it is now infested with with an increasingly powerful Leftist element espousing shrill anti-American lies and propaganda.

In the public eye MoveOn.org has effectively replaced the Democratic Party momentum on Iraq with absolute shock that the patriotism of the Presidential candidates of this party could be purchased so easily.

[StillAmused]

02:03 PM on 09/15/2007

One more time...

________

WASHINGTON, Sep 12 (IPS) - In sharp contrast to the lionisation of Gen. David Petraeus by members of the U.S. Congress during his testimony this week, Petraeus's superior, Admiral William Fallon, chief of the Central Command (CENTCOM), derided Petraeus as a sycophant during their first meeting in Baghdad last March, according to Pentagon sources familiar with reports of the meeting.

Fallon told Petraeus that he considered him to be "an ass-kissing little chickenshit" and added, "I hate people like that", the sources say. That remark reportedly came after Petraeus began the meeting by making remarks that Fallon interpreted as trying to ingratiate himself with a superior.
________

Sound familiar?

Consider it a 'Swiftboat' up your colon... only it's the truth, this time.

Practice repeating "permanent minority" to yourself. The GOP is now vying with the Branch Davidians for most irrelevant organization in the country.

[hydenorhare]

02:14 PM on 09/15/2007

Again, please provide a link to the quote from a reputable source.

That means not another leftwing blog.

I've heard that quote before and all sources seem to have one thing in common.

[TimN]

02:18 PM on 09/15/2007

This would be important - except that it is untrue.

If you had any capacity for critical thought you could easily discern that this is a fake.

1) Unnamed sources

2) Fallon is a Navy Admiral, Petraeus is an Army General. They both have clearly delineated responsibilities within Theater. Fallon would know that Petraeus takes his orders directly from the President.

3) If there were such a disagreement either Fallon or Petraeus would have been replaced.

4) This quote supposedly was said last March - and yet it was withheld until 12 September (coincidentally the week of Petraeus's testimony)

You've just validated my contention. This story is a lie and propaganda. As such, for you to repeat it is anti-American.

[lornejl]

02:07 PM on 09/15/2007

The once proud dem party is infested with corporate whores, get your facts straight troll.

[TimN]

02:23 PM on 09/15/2007

Are you talking about Soros's investments in Halliburton?


http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_14/c4028009.htmurprise In The Soros Portfolio

A Surprise In The Soros Portfolio

Conservative commentators are having a field day over a Feb. 14 securities filing by Soros Fund Management, run by billionaire philanthropist and antiwar activist George Soros, who financed a $25 million media campaign to unseat President George W. Bush in 2004. The filing reports that in late 2006 the fund bought 2 million shares of Halliburton, whose KBR unit is the military's biggest Iraq war contractor. Soros Fund now has a 0.2% stake in Vice-President Dick Cheney's former employer. Halliburton is in the midst of spinning off KBR to focus on core oil services, but that didn't stop critics from denouncing what one called "the hypocrisy of the liberal elite." Soros spokesman Michael Vachon declined to comment, citing company policy. But Rush Limbaugh had plenty to say: "Halliburton has become a buzzword for corruption and lying and deceit as far as the left is concerned, and here's their guru now buying 2 million shares of Halliburton," he blogged. "It just doesn't get any better than this."

[Kungfublood]

01:57 PM on 09/15/2007

Typical deluded rhetoric from the small powerful neo con subversives within the Republican party who want to deny that many true Republicans are finding it necessary to join with groups like Move On in order to curb the neo con polices that have befouled the nest of the Republican party with their contemptible criminal behavior and the gross engorgement of the roll of the American Government at every level of life and business in America. Of course if you pay the neo cons their members are only to happy to stop that investigation and look the other way for their friends. This is NOT the Republican way that is the Communist way no wonder the "fake republicans" are upset we the People Have found a way to end run around the people who would control every aspect of our personal and business lives for the sake of money and perversity.

[starwheel]

01:36 PM on 09/15/2007

Remember when the wingnuts blasted Muslims for getting all worked up in a tizzy over the Danish cartoons insulting their key religious figure?

Print an ad insulting the Great New Holy Lord of Hosts on High General Petraeus and watch the wingnut reaction.

[hydenorhare]

02:00 PM on 09/15/2007

Say now, there's a well thought out analogy.

[starwheel]

02:22 PM on 09/15/2007

Not nearly as prescient as your well thought out comeback.

Petraeus is Bush's bitch.

[TimN]

02:01 PM on 09/15/2007

Just a tad exaggerated don't you think?

To the best of my knowledge no Republic has issued a fatwah calling for the death of any member of MoveOn.org.

[starwheel]

02:20 PM on 09/15/2007

...yet. And as far as we know. I imagine Eli Pariser has received his share of death threats from wingnuts this week.

And with the wingnut track record of collecting arsenals, shooting doctors and blowing up federal buildings, it's just a matter of time before one of them does something stupid again, dontcha think?

Why else would the entire Fox News network be working up their loyal viewers into such an idiotic frenzy over an ad?

[esquire07]

01:02 PM on 09/15/2007

"Ms. Pelosi said on “Good Morning America” on ABC that she “would have preferred that they not do such an ad.”

Impeachement-off-the-table Pelosi is a gutless degenerate that does nothing to stop the illegal and Immoral Occupation of Iraq.

Our troops DIE for Oil, Arms profits and Bush lies. Pelosi does nothing.

Pelosi will be looking for a new job come next November.

[lornejl]

01:55 PM on 09/15/2007

In San Fran, they call her Punxsutawney Pellosi, she pops her head out of her hole, then ducks back down.

[hotpotatomash]

12:37 PM on 09/15/2007

Here's the link:

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5070

[hotpotatomash]

12:36 PM on 09/15/2007

Fox 'News' Attacks Moveon.Org Mashup at BRAD BLOG

[KBAR]

12:34 PM on 09/15/2007

The backlash against MoveOn.org is already brewing. "MoveOn put out a dishonest poll that did not offer its members a real choice to end the war, and now the peace movement is lobbying activists to reform MoveOn or drop off its list," said David Swanson, a board member of Progressive Democrats of America, said in an e-mail to The Politico. "I unsubscribed from MoveOn this morning." Why would MoveOn.org, a supposed liberal organization that opposes the war, pressure anti-war Democrats to vote for a bill that will ensure the war rolls on? Because they are nothing more than a bought and paid for front organization for the elite that pose as an independent advocacy group yet act as nothing more than a steam valve for anti-war sentiment that has now enveloped the vast majority of the body politic.

[StillAmused]

01:57 PM on 09/15/2007

________

WASHINGTON, Sep 12 (IPS) - In sharp contrast to the lionisation of Gen. David Petraeus by members of the U.S. Congress during his testimony this week, Petraeus's superior, Admiral William Fallon, chief of the Central Command (CENTCOM), derided Petraeus as a sycophant during their first meeting in Baghdad last March, according to Pentagon sources familiar with reports of the meeting.

Fallon told Petraeus that he considered him to be "an ass-kissing little chickenshit" and added, "I hate people like that", the sources say. That remark reportedly came after Petraeus began the meeting by making remarks that Fallon interpreted as trying to ingratiate himself with a superior.
________

Sound familiar?

Consider it a 'Swiftboat' up your colon... only its the truth, this time.

Practice repeating "permanent minority" to yourself. The GOP is now vying with the Branch Davidians for most irrelevant organization in the country.

[RedWhiteandBrooklyn]

12:33 PM on 09/15/2007

Really? Then why did every single man who served on the swiftboats with John Kerry come forward to campaign for him and to say that the book was an out-and-out lie? They were there, chumpass, the guy who "wrote" it was 15 miles away.

[RedWhiteandBrooklyn]

12:31 PM on 09/15/2007

Pwoor widdle Wudy! Big bad Hiwwawy fwightened him so much he had to attack a group net even associated with her!

What a siwwy widdle bwoy he is.

[MinneapolisBob]

12:26 PM on 09/15/2007

Does the Swfitboat Veterans come to mind? What's good for the goose is good for the gander. Does anyone recall any reBushlicans denouncing those lyres when they assassinated John Kerry's character? At least Move-On is using facts.