Glenn Greenwald never passes up an opportunity to take a crack at Pres. Obama

[woo me with science]

219. Thank you very much for posting the links to all those Greenwald pieces,

Last edited Sat May 11, 2013, 11:53 PM - Edit history (13)

because people really do need to read them. I hope and expect that these past few days of persistent attempts by you and others to smear Greenwald will invite people who've not yet read the articles to actually do so. There is some excellent information here, and I thank you for putting so much of it in one place.
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That being said, let's review what you wrote here:

First, what's the difference between a smear and an argument? One of the most reliable and telling aspects of the corporate smear and propaganda machine is its heavy dependence on emotional bids and empty namecalling in lieu of actual argument. Look at the language of your first paragraphs, including what you chose to cut and paste as "support" for your argument: There is almost no real content here, but lots of emotional smear words and phrases like "trolling," "extreme libertarian," "pretend liberal," "like a Tea Partier," and "radical positions." It is quite telling that you begin with lots of smear language, rather than actual arguments.

So what is the content you *do* consider important enough to offer as substance for the body of your post, and does it support these extreme words? What are your best examples? Well, you are apparently offended that Greenwald points out Obama's political gamesmanship on LGBT issues...a point that even the writer you cite admits is fair game and cannot really be argued. Hmm.

But even more ludicrous and offensive is your second attempt at a smoking gun: You suggest, apparently with a completely straight face, that we should be offended when Greenwald criticizes Tom Friedman for supporting more warmongering in Syria. And your reasoning? You claim that both supported the Iraq War, but that is demonstrably false. Greenwald himself flatly denies it, and you can provide no statement by him to support your accusation. But here's the point, smears and misrepresentations aside: Even if *any* criticizer of Friedman had been duped about Iraq, like some others who have since come to reason, it still would not make your point, because Friedman *continues* to rationalize warmongering and therefore his history of doing so remains particularly relevant here. You actually expect people to swallow THIS: that "consistency" should prevent anyone who previously failed to oppose a bad war but now holds the morally correct position, from criticizing someone else who also failed to oppose bad war and CONTINUES TO DO SO.

Wow. Just wow. A baseless accusation, used to prop up even *worse* moral logic.

The audacity and nastiness of the smears ("like a Tea Partier, "trolling," "extreme libertarian," "pretend liberal," "radical positions&quot are stunning given that these two absurd complaints are the best you can offer here....but I guess that's how smear propaganda works. It's certainly how the two-party game works. We are admonished to circle our Blue wagons and be OUTRAGED at criticism...not because Obama is *not* pursuing the many, many malignant corporate policies catalogued in the Greenwald articles, but because...

Because why, again? Because he's a Democrat?

There's our problem. We have a purportedly Democratic administration carrying out an extreme corporatist agenda in virtually every single major policy area important to the one percent. And we have a corporate propaganda machine that specializes in hurling smears at the messenger or convoluted rationalizations as to why the Other side, but not the Team you align with, should be held accountable for the very same direction of policy.

But, true to form, the policies themselves are never refuted....because they can't be.

Keep posting Greenwald pieces that document a policy agenda you cannot refute. Keep trying to argue that criticizing the *actual* policies pursued by this administration equals "a vendetta." You show through your examples here just how thin, and how based in smears and bids for partisan loyalty, the arguments really are.