MoveOn.org

MoveOn, the online network that connects more than 3 million progressives nationwide , has officially endorsed Barack Obama. This may seem like a big deal, since MoveOn has 1.7 million members in the 22 states that will vote next Tuesday, but it probably won't amount to much.  read more »

For weeks, The New York Times has been defending itself against charges they gave a special rate for a controversial lfull-page ad to the liberal antiwar group MoveOn.org.

The ad, with the headline "General Petraeus or General Betray Us?", elicited outraged responses from President George W. Bush, Rudolph Giuliani and other leading Republicans, and more so when it was revealed that MoveOn was given a "standby rate" of $65,000. Times spokespersons said last week that this was a typical rate. But the fashion in which it was given, it turns out, was not typical.

Times public editor Clark Hoyt wrote in his Public Editor column yesterday:

Eli Pariser, the executive director of MoveOn.org, told me that his group called The Times on the Friday before Petraeus’s appearance on Capitol Hill and asked for a rush ad in Monday’s paper. He said The Times called back and “told us there was room Monday, and it would cost $65,000.” Pariser said there was no discussion about a standby rate. “We paid this rate before, so we recognized it,” he said. Advertisers who get standby rates aren’t guaranteed what day their ad will appear, only that it will be in the paper within seven days.

Catherine Mathis, vice president of corporate communications for The Times, said, “We made a mistake.” She said the advertising representative failed to make it clear that for that rate The Times could not guarantee the Monday placement but left MoveOn.org with the understanding that the ad would run then. She added, “That was contrary to our policies.”

And then there's the somewhat baffling response of publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr.: “If we’re going to err, it’s better to err on the side of more political dialogue. ... Perhaps we did err in this case. If we did, we erred with the intent of giving greater voice to people.”  read more »

• The New York Times

Rudy Giuliani has a new radio ad in which he (once again) embraces the attacks on him by MoveOn.org.

Here’s the script.

Voiceover: MoveOn.org is the most powerful left wing group in the country. They spent millions electing anti-war liberals. And publicly brag how the Democratic Party is theirs - bought and paid for.

Why is MoveOn attacking Rudy Giuliani?

Because he’s their worst nightmare.

They know Rudy is a Republican who can beat the Democrats. And they know, no matter what they say- Rudy will never, ever back down.

Rudy Giuliani: I’m Rudy Giuliani, and I approve this message.

Voiceover: Paid for by the Rudy Giuliani Presidential Committee, Incorporated. joinrudy2008.com.

This is getting very, very silly.

Rudy Giuliani's first web ad, attacking Hillary Clinton for shifting her position on the war and refusing to speak out against MoveOn.org for it's 'Petraeus or Betray Us' ad, is up on his campaign web site.

Here's the script for "She Changed."

 

NARRATOR: "In 2002, Hillary Clinton voted to authorize military action in Iraq ... because she believed it was the right thing to do."

CLINTON: "If left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons."

 

CLINTON: "He has also given aid, comfort and sanctuary to terrorists, including Al-Qaeda members."

 

CLINTON: "So it is with conviction that I support this resolution as being in the best interests of our nation."

 

NARRATOR: "But now that she's running for President, Hillary Clinton has changed her position, even joining with the radical group MoveOn.org in attacking American General Petraeus. Clinton stood silently by when MoveOn.org ran this venomous ad in The New York Times."

 

NARRATOR: "The same General she called an expert not long ago."

NARRATOR: "Now, she is questioning his honesty."

 

HILLARY CLINTON: "The reports that you provide to us really require the willing suspension of disbelief."

 

NARRATOR: "Just when our troops need all our support to finish the job, Hillary Clinton is turning her back on them. General Petraeus and the brave men and women now serving under him deserve an apology. And our nation deserves better. Senator Clinton, do the right thing. Apologize for your comments and condemn the MoveOn.org ad."

 

 

Here, fresh off the "Betray Us" stuff, is a new ad from MoveOn.org attacking President Bush's latest Iraq plan.

9:30 a.m. The U.S. Department of Labor will hold an Equal Employment Opportunity Awards program at the National Museum of the American Indian, George Gustav Heye Center, at 1 Bowling Green.

10 a.m. The Food Bank for New York will launch a backpack program to address childhood hunger at home at the Citizens Advice Bureau, 1130 Grand Concourse, in the Bronx.  read more »

11 a.m. The state chapter of the NAACP, the local chapter of Coalition of One Hundred Black Women and ACORN will demand that Don Imus be fired at 30 Rockefeller Plaza.

I can't stop talking about the wonderful-horrible AJC report, it's so changed the landscape. Again I say, give credit where credit is due: this was the AJC's reactionary pushback against Carter and Walt and Mearsheimer, and it blew up on the Jewish right/mainstream when the Times actually chose to write about it. Thus the anti-intellectual, vicious, omerta practices of the Jewish leadership were revealed, to its shame.

But I'm going to try to not be self-serving here. The fascinating thing about this Jewish perestroika is that it liberates everyone. Not just my camp, the anti- or non-Zionist camp that wonders if the dream of a Jewish state hasn't slid hopelessly away, but also the We-are-very-upset-about-Israel's-current-policies-but-we-love-her-and-believe-in-her camp. The Zionist left is angered and embarrassed by the AJC report, feel that it's broadbrush and reactionary, and so are standing up with renewed energy, as if the ball is about to be handed to them, at last—the rightwing having shot itself in the foot.

Gershom Gorenberg, who is in that camp, yesterday said the real story is that the left is alive, it's empowered groups like the Union of Progressive Zionists, which is harshly critical of the occupation. Isn't it great they haven't been thrown off the Israel on Campus Coalition, Gorenberg writes, despite the best efforts of the ZOA. And he is right. Tamara Shapiro, the 24-year-old who runs UPZ, is an amazing young woman, idealistic and tough. She brought Breaking the Silence to America last year; she gets it from the right (ZOA) and the left (me). Now the AJC report has given her more room to operate, by blasting open the debate. (Leonard Fein makes the same point in the Forward this week).

Just as the AJC gave leftish John Judis of the New Republic freedom to talk about something he has probably been secretly bitching about for years: the pressure on Jewish intellectuals to be loyal to Israel, from people like his boss, Marty Peretz (he didn't say that part out loud). When is Mickey Kaus, another not-all-the-way-on-the-reservation Jewish intellectual whose career has been boosted by Peretz, going to speak up about this pressure? Or Mike Kinsley? Time is now, boys. Everyone's letting their hair down in the sweatlodge.

The best analysis I've seen yet of the politics of the Jewish left in America is from Daniel Sieradski—"Mobius," of Jewschool. He explains to me that the two big roadblocks are a, ideological differences, and b, dough.

I question as to whether recent events indicate the presence of a movement so much as what I regard as fractious groups with overlapping areas of interest and little coordination. Some folks are focused on liberal domestic political issues such as labor practices, women's rights, gay rights, etc., others are focused on shifting the priorities of the Jewish funding establishment away from intermarriage and Israel advocacy towards Jewish education and cultural initiatives; while others yet still are focused on finding a just resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

That last group is broken into left-leaning Zionists (of the Meretz/Labor cadre), post-Zionists (who believe either in two states or a binational solution, yet overall, a solution which respects both Jewish and Palestinian rights), and anti-Zionists who are more often than not anti-Israel reactionaries.  read more »

The one thing these three groups can agree on is that things are headed in the wrong direction and that the mainstream Jewish leadership is steering us down a dark road.

However, it is practically impossible for these groups to collaborate because of:

Here is one of the graphs MoveOn.org just sent out.

On the left is the number of phone calls their supporters made to voters on behalf of Democratic challenger John Hall in his race against Rep. Sue Kelly.

On the right is the margin by which Hall won.

Message: MoveOn put Hall and other Democrats over the edge.

In an email to supporters, the group goes on to say:

"It's not an overstatement to say that MoveOn members may have turned out the extra votes that put the Senate over the top."

Maybe. But Kiryas Joel would probably say the same thing.  read more »

UPDATE: Here's what they sent out. (pdf)

-- Azi Paybarah

Pete King says he is completely confident that he will win reelection tonight, and he is still trying to figure out why, aside from a couple of questionable polls, anyone ever thought he was in trouble.

His answer: It was Newsday.

"It's five hours to the polls, but based on everything I know, as of 4:35 this is a campaign totally contrived by Newsday," he said.

He said the reports of his fund-raising were greatly downplayed in the paper while the reports of money raised by his opponent, Dave Mejias, were inflated. He pointed out that neither MoveOn.org, NARAL or any other national liberal organizations even got behind Mejias, as far as he could see.

"And also you haven't seen any poll released by him," King said. "And I know he has taken polls."

So, in King's calculations, that leaves Newsday. "I have something to say tonight about Newsday , and it is not going to be a rant, it is going to be something fairly thoughtful, I hope, on what they have done here."

When told about King's comments suggesting that Newsday exaggerated the competitiveness of Mejias' campaign, John Mancini, the paper's editor, said, "We disagree strongly."

"All we have done," Mancini said, "is cover a Congressional race on Long Island."

--Jason Horowitz

MoveOn.org hasn't been friendly territory to Joe Lieberman for some time, but some of the criticism of the hawkish "independent" Senator on its website has now drawn the attention of the Anti-Defamation League.

Lieberman's spokesman Dan Gerstein forwards this letter from the ADL, denouncing the tone of some of the comments on MoveOn's message board.

"Specifically, we would urge you to exercise your own First Amendment rights and issue a statement making it clear that your organization finds such message abhorrent."

-- Azi Paybarah

A reader forwards her thoughts on the MoveOn.org survey about whether the group which put Ned Lamont on the map should get behind Hillary Clinton's anti-war challenger, Jonathan Tasini.

First problem is, the Clinton-Tasini question was No. 4 in a mailing with the subject line, "Help Set MoveOn's Course." Second problem is that it went to a select number of New York members, not the full membership.

The survey is now closed and "The results are confidential and are only used for planning purposes."  read more »

-- Azi Paybarah

During a very friendly appearance on conservative commentator Glenn Beck's radio show, Greg Sargent reports, Joe Lieberman agreed with just much of what Beck said, including that the real reason we invaded Iraq wasn't over WMD but because we wanted to "pop the head of the snake in Iran."

After receiving some attention from the editorial boards of The New York Times and New York Post, Jonathan Tasini finds out from The Huffington Post why he has seen practically no love from his fellow travelers in MoveOn.org. Executive Director Eli Pariser says that they follow the lead of their members and "we've heard almost nothing from MoveOn members on Tasini."

On the Republican side of the Senate race, KT McFarland, on hiatus to deal with her daughter's shoplifting, shows that she has not completely checked out. Her press secretary, Morgan Ortagus takes issue with John Spencer calling for a debate with Hillary while ignoring McFarland's calls for a debate. We especially like the use of underlining.

"I think you well know that Mrs. McFarland is taking a few days off to deal with a family crisis, but that doesn't make you the Republican candidate for Senate"

--Jason Horowitz

In his latest fundraising email --"Support My Fun New Ads -- and Submit Your Own" -- Freddy adds a MoveOn.org-style appeal: I'm also asking all of my friends and supporters to film their own "Salsa" ads and email them to me so we can post them on our website. Put on your favorite salsa, merengue, polka, klezmer, or whatever music makes you dance, and make your own statement celebrating our City. Please help show New York how inspired we are by our message of building one New York by emailing your own "Salsa" ad to: info@ferrer2005.com. The possibilities are endless. And, seriously, this is the sort of thing that we'll be seeing lots more of. Just ask Micah Sifry.  read more »

Almost five months ago in this space, I offered some respectful advice to my candidate for President  read more »

The geek organizer, Mr. MoveOn.org, the Ralph Reed of the left: Sept.  read more »

On a rare summery afternoon in Manhattan, several hundred people crowded into a dark union hall to c  read more »