The Narrative.
Even Lefty bloggers should be skeptical of such a shoddy hit-piece - and would be, except that it fits their "all republicans are racist" narrative.
By Leon H Wolf Posted in 2006 — Comments (15) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
The Allen-Webb campaign has gotten... shall we say, a little bizarre and ridiculous over the past couple weeks. The stuff about Allen's mother, and "when did you stop being Jewish," is enough to make almost everyone feel uncomfortable. Now comes this ridiculous hit piece, and the same people making hay out of Allen's Jewish heritage have decided, without any apparent sense of irony, that despite its many, many flaws (discussed below) it must be true, because after all, all Republicans are racist.
More below...
UPDATE: Dan Riehl turns the hairy eyeball on the one guy willing to go on the record, and finds that his motivations might not exactly be pure as the driven snow.
The Salon hit-piece in question purports to drop a bombshell, in which three former teammates of George Allen recall him being a garden-variety Republican Racist. But the story isn't quite that simple. The piece begins by quoting the one guy who is willing to go on record with his claims, a Dr. Ken Shelton. About the other two individuals who provided the material for this bombshell, Salon offers this:
A second white teammate, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he feared retribution from the Allen campaign...
...
A third white teammate contacted separately, who also spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear of being attacked by the Virginia senator...
I'm sorry, but this is ridiculous. George Allen is a friggin' Senator. Senators do not have goonies or pipe-wielding fiends at their disposal, they have staffers: people fresh out of ivy-league colleges with their political science degrees; a fearsome lot, to be sure. What exactly are they afraid of, that Allen will take a running haymaker at them in the midst of a campaign? Keep in mind, these two individuals are slinging an accusation that Allen is a racist, that he used racist epithets, etc., and are doing so in a very public forum. The only thing they have legitimately to fear is that Allen might respond in kind - say, by calling them liars. This is not a concern that people who are not lying have. I rather suspect that the actual concern is that if their real names are exposed, others on the team or who were close to the situation will be able to conclusively identify whether they were ever in a position to have known what they claim to know, and they will be exposed as frauds. Alternately, they may be afraid that if their names are revealed, people will be able to, say, check their contribution records, or otherwise determine if their motives are less than pure. I'm more than content at this point to write the two anonymous sources off as either hacks, liars, or outright fabrications of Salon to bolster the one named source they were able to find.
Okay, so what about this Dr. Shelton? Doesn't the article still have him? True, they do, but they also have this, buried somewhat beneath all the anonymous accusations:
Over the past week, Salon has interviewed 19 former teammates and college friends of Allen from the University of Virginia. In addition to the three [including the two anonymous hacks/liars/fabrications] who said Allen used the word "n****r," two others who were contacted said they remember being bothered by Allen's displaying the Confederate flag in college, but said they do not remember him acting in an overtly racist manner. Seven others said they did not know Allen well outside the football team, but do not remember Allen demonstrating any racist feelings. A separate seven teammates and friends said they knew Allen well and did not believe he held racist views. "I don't believe he was insensitive," said Paul Ryczek, who played center in Allen's year before joining the Atlanta Falcons. "He had no prejudices, biases or anything else."
In the interviews, old teammates generally spoke of him highly, as a good friend, a bright and ambitious student, and a colorful character who embraced Southern culture, listened to country music, and attracted the nickname "Neck," as in redneck. "If a black guy dropped a pass, he would say something to him," said Gerard Mullins, who played defensive back in Allen's year. "If it was a white guy, same thing. It really didn't matter where you were from, who you were, or anything."
So - the whole team rejects this absurd characterization of Allen, but Salon leads with one guy who remembers, with shocking detail, a racist monster and Klan sympathizer. Let's be fair, though: Salon doesn't really pretend to be fair, as evidenced by this sentence found about midway through the piece:
Last week, Allen again created controversy by appearing offended when a reporter asked about the Jewish lineage in his mother's family, which he has since acknowledged.
Ah, so Allen created this whole ridiculous stir about his mother. Thanks for clearing up where you stand, Salon, in case any of us didn't know already. Seriously, though, who would believe this tripe? Well, apparently, this guy, this guy, this guy, and this gal, who included her post (apparently with a straight face) thusly:
Salon interviewed a number of Allen's teammates, many of whom didn't have clear memories of any racist remarks by Allen [Ed. note - they had no memories of racist remarks by Allen], but the details provided by these three, particularly by Shelton, are extremely damning.
Don't ask why, just understand that it fits the narrative, therefore it must be true.
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The Narrative. 15 Comments (0 topical, 15 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
Their IP addresses are at Glenn Greenwald's house ;)
"No compromise with the main purpose, no peace till victory, no pact with unrepentant wrong." - Winston Churchill
This comment will inevitably show up on a Google search, and Thomas Ellers will be here to set this particular record straight. He will be followed by Ellison and Sam Matthews and Wilson. When that is done, you will have surely lost your argument.
Hey, the other day I got called a racist. Why? Because I referred to Hugo Chavez as a dictator!
Ever seen Star Trek VI?
Uhura: "Crewman Dax?"
Dax: "Yes, Commander. What is the problem?"
Chekov: "Perhaps you remember Russian epic of Cinderella. If shoe fits [drops gravity boot at Crewman Dax's feet], wear it!"
Uhura: "Um, Chekov..." [points to Dax's feet]
[Camera pans down to reveal feet that look nothing like human feet and could not possibly fit into the boots. Everybody grimaces.]
"In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock."
--Thomas Jefferson
Of course, any good hack job hit piece will build on some truth so as to give credibility to the more outrageous charges. Allen's affinity for the Confederate flag is well-known, and so we see a whole bunch of people agreeing with that one. But while a limited point about racial insensitivity (vs. respect for Southern culture, etc. - I'm shorthanding that whole debate here) can be made about association with that flag, it's a whole 'nother subject from promiscuously using the N-Word and randomly leaving a dead deer in someone's mailbox.
"No compromise with the main purpose, no peace till victory, no pact with unrepentant wrong." - Winston Churchill
If Salon were a reputable news organization, they should be scolded for this stunt: Using anonymous sources to smear a candidate and influence the outcome of an election. It makes one wonder, rhetorically, if the quotes were faxed to Mike Scherer from a Kinkos in Abilene.
Salon.com is a tabloid without a supermarket. They contribute nothing of merit to the online political dialogue and should return to writing dKos diaries.
First of all, it must be close to November because here come all the anonymous, unproven allegations. Did you ever notice that when liberals run out of facts or truths the anonymous sources abound? But I digress.
So the statement is very publicly put on the record that Allen has Jewish heritage. Since this was accomplished as an attempt to uncover a negative, I posit the intention was;
- Promote negative impressions amongst Jewish voters (i.e. Allen is somehow ashamed) or
- Promote his heritage as a negative for the anti Semite population
Salon now opines he is a racist, obviously a big negative across the voting public.
Allen’s experience in dealing extensively with people yields one questionable source and some anonymous curmudgeons.
The only thing this conclusively proves is that Democrat’s believe they can appeal to voters through their prejudices. That is an insulting attempt to keep voters from making an informed choice by using tactics which conclude;
- There are enough anti Semites to swing the election
- There are enough dolts among Virginian’s to believe baseless accusations of racism
Where I come from, that is called intellectually insulting.
"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori"
It seems to me that Webb can't debate the real issues so the campaign has stooped to this low level of attacks. I don't think this nonsense will resonate with voters in Virginia as plausible.
Webb has no record of successful leadership. He shouldn't even be running for US Senate. Maybe, just maybe, a state senate run would be more fitting.
I'm sad to say that the Larry Sabato claim is going to be hard to refute. I don't think Sabato would risk his own cred unless he thought Allen is going down.
I don't think George Allen is a racist today, but he has made some bad mistakes that feed right into the Democrats strategy of painting Republicans as racists (especially after Katrina), and the macaca episode has set a wheel in motion that will be hard to stop, especially now with Sabato adding to the problem.
What can we do to stop the bleeding? I think that Allen is a lost cause. The Republican party needs to distance itself from him.
...is politely escort you off of the premises and hand you back to your handlers over at dKos and MyDD.
We don't *care* if you're a liberal, but we do care if you lie to us about it.
Ta.
Moe
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC.
If you mean has Allen's poll rating for his Senate re-election bid taken a hit, then, yes, it has.
If you mean is that hit permanent rather than temporary, that remains to be seen.
If you mean is he now likely to lose, no, even if he had no time to recover, he is currently leading, and Sabato rates Virginia as 'leans Republican'.
If you mean has his possible 2008 bid taken a hit? Yes, definitely. It is early days, but these are the days when he needs to be storing up capital and favours. He will have to spend more time in Virginia between now and November, instead of campaigning for Jim Nussle in Iowa. Staffers may hesitate to join his campaign if they consider him a possible racist or doubt his judgement, or both. The hit he has taken in online polls may be temporary, but it may also create a gap for someone else to grab the southern conservative mantle in the run up to Iowa.
Quentin Langley
Editor of http://www.quentinlangley.net
going on around Allen right now. Its on the radio and in the Post every day. I haven't seen anything like it since Clinton.
Sabato's claims are very probably true. So what? Let he who is without sin cast the first stone. In the early 1970's, Virginia still had segregated schools and anti-miscegenation laws, and we all know how badly behaved testosterone-addled young men can be. It's hardly surprising that a college athlete, of all people, would behave badly, or that, given the milieu, his bad behavior would manifest itself in then commonplace racial epithets. What's next? Did he feel up one of UVA's then few co-eds? Allen's been in politics for 27 years now, and that ought to provide all the information necessary for people to decide whether he's worthy of reelection, without dredging up this antique bovine fecal matter.
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Anyone who claims that globalization is a conservative process is either a liar or a fool. - James Kurth
of God, go we all. If these are to be the tests, rule out all but about three Southerners over the age of 50. Good manners dictated "that word" was not much used in public and never as a direct address, but that doesn't mean it wasn't ubiquitous in everyday conversation amongst whites and blacks.
And the folkways and mores of those days, especially in rural areas, were so different that many of us who pursued the usual behaviors of adolescent males of those days would be felons doing long sentences today, e.g., it is possible in many states to become a felon for repeat minor consuming or minor in possession. Had my high school and college friends of the late sixties been subjected to that, we'd still be in jail.
And why was the "n-word" question never asked of WJC; he's the right demographic and I'll guarantee you he'd either have to apologetically and tearfully admit that in a youthful indiscretion he did use that word or he'd have to lie. Where's your money on that one?
In Vino Veritas
Don't forget another reason the other two remain anonymous:
Had their names been revealed it may turn out that they only exist in the authors imagination and maybe a current Chicago registrar of voters.
Its hard to pin a whole article on one persons opinion, but, if backed up by two imaginary friends, then, well, it MUST be fact.