Centerfield

First, none of this is intended as criticism of the practices described. As Tully regularly notes, politics is played hardball, and that's all this is. I'm just calling attention to it to explain why I see little point in getting bent out of shape by Santorum's comments, given this context.

I have no way of knowing how the Philadelphia columnist came across Santorum's 3 year old online article. Given that he was clearly writing a column to attack Santorum and draw attention to what he has said in the past, it's entirely possible he did a search for articles by Santorum and ran across it. Of course, it's also possible that an opposition research for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee sent it to him.

I feel on more certain ground speculating that somebody connected to the DSCC brought the Philadelphia column to the attention of the Boston Globe columnist. My bet is that he had dinner or drinks with a Democratic operative (a covert one, of course!) who carefully slipped him a copy of the Philly column. He may even have owed a favor to some Democrat (in return for an exclusive interview or juicy leak or something), and thus given the Dems a heads-up about when the story was coming out.

His editors were obviously aware of his upcoming column, and thus had a reporter primed to do a hard news story on it, once the columnist made it a current story by getting Santorum's spokesman to reaffirm it in some fashion, although the column is unclear exactly what question the spokesman was asked. The DSCC, having tipped off the Globe columnist to begin with, were fully prepared to use Senator Kennedy to rake Senator Santorum over the coals. And thus was born a national outrage of the day story.

Posted by: PatHMV at July 14, 2005 04:48 PM

Also, I would point out what is not clear from Baer's column, that Senator Santorum has apologized for his Nazi comment (for which he was soundly criticized by the right as well as the left), and the comments about different sexual practices are hardly unique to Santorum and in fact have been used by many serious commentators to argue the weaknesses of the Supreme Court's opinion in the Lawrence case (but I hasten to add that this thread is not the place to get into those issues).

Posted by: PatHMV at July 14, 2005 04:56 PM

I've sent a trackback to a post I made on this topic three weeks ago. This post was before the Brian McGrory column in the Boston Globe, but after the John Baer article.

It seemed at the time - June 28 - that much of the fanning of the flames on this topic came from a blog called CapitolBuzz (www.capitolbuzz.com). Many of the political bloggers here in Massachusetts, including me, received multiple e-mails on the topic from CapitolBuzz. I suspected at the time that this blog was being run from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. While the anonymous author of CapitolBuzz has denied that CapitolBuzz is an official organ of the DSCC, he/she admits to "working on the Hill." Despite these denials, I still think that there is a connection - either tacit or official between CapitolBuzz and the DSCC.

That having been said, I have no problem with Sen. Santorum's record being aired. As I said three weeks ago, he is an embarrassment to the Senate and to Pennsylvania. I think though that if CapitolBuzz is connected - even unofficially -to the DNC or the DSCC, this connection should be made public.

Posted by: David Eisenthal at July 14, 2005 07:34 PM

the Catholic priest pedophile scandal in Boston should be no surprise since Boston is "a seat of academic, political and cultural liberalism in America." In other words, Harvard, the Kennedys, Kerry and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts are to blame for priests preying on altar boys.

There's an interesting book by self-proclaimed "lesbian feminist" Tammy Bruce called The Death of Right & Wrong which actually addresses this link, but - helpfully - I can't remember what she had to say. Posted by: Simon at July 14, 2005 08:55 PM

I take issue with the title of this thread. I don't think an accurate recounting of someone's direct and reaffirmed published comments even remotely qualifies as "hardball politics." In fact, it's one of the fairest ways I can think of to point out differences of opinion.

I see little point in getting bent out of shape by Santorum's comments

Why not? Is it because the comments are three years old? Is it because you find a modicum of truth in them? Is it because (according to your conjecture) they were unearthed by the DSCC?

Or is it because you feel politically motivated to shield Santorum from criticism?

Santorum is a slimeball. So is Kennedy. When I see someone going out of their way to defend either of these bozos from honest criticism, I have serious doubts about their status as a "centrist".

Posted by: Tractarian at July 14, 2005 09:30 PM

Tractarian,

I made this post because several people on this site were jumping onto a partisan bandwagon that was pretty clearly orchestrated by the DSCC. I'm not defending Santorum; his remark about Boston was foolish, and he responded this week foolishly. But I also think, and have said many times before, that helping create a political firestorm over careless word usage is a waste of time, or the occasional overblown rhetoric.

Now, if Senator Santorum had in fact just used that one liner last week for the first time, I'd be right there with you, just like I railed against Howard Dean. But, although Santorum helped fueld the flames, it was the DSCC who lit this particular fire. I don't see why centrists (and I try not to worry about labels too much) should join in the partisan bickering.

Posted by: PatHMV at July 14, 2005 09:47 PM

I see your point.

But it still seems to me that you a giving a Santorum a free pass, under the name of avoiding "partisan bickering."

I would argue that this isn't just partisan bickering, and it isn't merely "careless word usage"; on the contrary, it appears Santorum meant every word he said. We are talking about a member of the Senate Leadership openly implying that liberalism encourages child rape. If that's not worthy of condemnation on both sides of the aisle, I don't know what is.

Posted by: Tractarian at July 14, 2005 10:00 PM

I dunno Pat, you seem to have painted yourself into a real uncomfortable corner where, despite your best protestations, you're left sounding an awful lot like you're defending a super grand prize jackass.

I object to the notion that I or anyone else is jumping on a bandwagon. If Santorum is running for re--election any time soon, his record is worth discussing. And it reveals him to be, I repeat, a super grand prize jackass. Granted, no surprises there.

What I wonder about is why we, especially here at centerfield, should care more about the source and the motivations of the story than about the matter of the mind of this super grand prize jackass. That's what you seem to be suggesting, that due to the nature of the messenger and how the message has gotten out, we should not really care about the actual information.

Well, I'm from Boston, and I don't care whether this super grand prize jackass hurled outrageous insults at us yesterday or yesteryear. I just found out about 'em a few days ago, and I'm just not feeling your suggested expiration date. My main purpose in posting about this in the first place is to use my preferred forum to say, Hey Rick, up yours, the hard way, no lube. You can't even admit you're wrong when caught talking out your @$$, then you're a disgrace.

And I say that with a shrugging laugh. I can't really take him seriously, at least not unless he gets a knucklehead army to march to his tune. I'm not even "bent out of shape" as you put it. My pulse has barely risen. I don't respect him enough to give him the power to truly anger me. All I'm really doing is posting on Rick Santorum, super grand prize jackass, part 47. I look at it as minimum due diligence, a hedge against that pube's chance that he actually fields that army.

As a thought experiment, suppose 3 years ago this super grand prize jackass had made outrageous negative comments about you or your family, and then yesterday you just found out about them because some politically motivated hack was rabble rousing. How willing would you be to just shrug them off?

Oh, and as a Bostonian, I'll also open myself to charges of being a democratic tool (Carla will straighten out anyone claiming that) by defending my state's senior senator on the suggested moral equity between him and Santorum. Ted kennedy is a flawed and indeed tragic figure, bloated and indeed at times something of a reflexive buffon. But he's also a kind-hearted man who cares deeply about our country, and if his policies are misguided, his heart is in the right place.

But Rick Santorum is a hater.

Posted by: bk at July 14, 2005 10:24 PM

Yep, a pretty stupid and bigoted statement by Santorum. He's had a lot of practice at that, so he oughta be good at it by now. The only point in his "favor" is that he seems to be sincere. If he wasn't it would be even more reprehensible (IMAO). Sad as it is, I'll take an honest bigot over a fake one, any day. Honesty and sincerity are at least virtues, even in a bigot.

I think Baer is WAY off base, though. Even Santorum isn't stupid enough to imply that a Kennedy would have any interest in altar boys.

Posted by: Tully at July 14, 2005 10:31 PM

Brian,

I do agree with you that Senator Santorum is not a terribly nice guy. His actions and comments during the Schiavo case were shameful.

But the fact remains that the DSCC rang a bell, and people jumped. They successfully dug up an obscure 3 year old article and turned it into a minor national story. As a political junkie, I frankly am impressed with how skillfully they did it.

Are you not interested in how the political parties manipulate the media to get their stories of choice on the front lines? There are so many far more substantive things we could be discussing today, from CAFTA to China, but because of the shallowness of both the political powers that be and the national media, we are focused on a dredged-up old-news story.

Posted by: PatHMV at July 14, 2005 10:38 PM

Which is so unlike Whitewater, a ten year old failed land deal, right, Pat? ;-)

Posted by: Blue Jean at July 14, 2005 10:56 PM

Hey, I always thought my party way-over obsessed about Clinton, Jean. He was pretty bad in a lot of ways, but we were really, really foolish how we handled it politically. We got caught up in the politics of personal destruction because Clinton was able to out-politic us on a regular basis. In the end, we got a lot of our substantive policy choices enacted (welfare reform, balanced budget, etc.), but because Clinton was getting all the credit, we got ticked off and lashed out. Not very bright.

Posted by: PatHMV at July 14, 2005 11:08 PM

If I hadn't experienced first-hand the wingnuttery of the 70's and 80's, I might have actually thought that the 90's was something unique. It wasn't, really. It was just noisier.

Instead of scandal being peddled to us retail in small dribbles, it is now available in volume and at ROCK-BOTTOM PRICES!. It is not that our politics itself is more squalid than in the past. It's not. Nor is it much cleaner. If anything it's almost ordinary. It's that a helluva lot more people get the sordid details, and in greater quantity (if not quality) than ever did before. The scandals themselves are pretty ordinary. But they're more immediate, if you take my drift.

Welcome to the information age, friends.

Posted by: Tully at July 15, 2005 12:57 AM

But the fact remains that the DSCC rang a bell, and people jumped. They successfully dug up an obscure 3 year old article and turned it into a minor national story. As a political junkie, I frankly am impressed with how skillfully they did it.
Yeah, I still bristle at that characterization. I didn't publish the original story, and i didn't even turn this into a thread-level issue. (You did, by the way, irony of ironies.) I can't control what gets into the mainstream media. My policy will be to continue to comment on the content of stories such as this. I'm also willing to talk about the motivations behind them, but the content is more important to me. In this particular case, you're really suggesting that a politician can insult a large city but get a pass if he can get away with it for a long enough period of time. That doesn't make sense to me. Bemoan or admire the mechanisms of getting this story out all you want, but if you ask me, the nature of the comments is such that they merit discussion. regardless of the DSCC's motivations, they've done us a favor by helping us in our due diligence at recording the grand idiocy who has (granted a small) potentially to be dangerous to our country. I'll take that help wherever I can get it. Santorum is a deserving jackass. And he's not alone.

Are you not interested in how the political parties manipulate the media to get their stories of choice on the front lines? There are so many far more substantive things we could be discussing today, from CAFTA to China, but because of the shallowness of both the political powers that be and the national media, we are focused on a dredged-up old-news story.
***Interested? Very much so? Distracted? I generally agree with this sort of hypothesis, but in this case it seems a rather minor point. Likely to come and go pretty quickly. I only ever brought it up, as previously mentioned, as due diligence and to defend my peeps. And not even as a main thread topic.

But, as a centrist, I also make the connection that documenting nutbaggery of both sides is a worthwhile pursuit. I'd like to see guys like Santorum democratically expelled, ASAP. So whatever minor dust-up has occured, it may well be worthwhile. I'm happy to patiently pound centrist nails into Santorum's jackass coffin. If whoever replaces him is marginally more thoughtful and a hair's breadth less extremist, that's at least something.

Posted by: bk at July 15, 2005 09:24 AM

Simon,

I used to read Tammy Bruce's column over at Newsmax on a fairly regular basis. She's one of my favorite political writers. Essentialy I think one of her major concentrations was how the idea of "relativism" and "acceptance" when overemphasized could lead to a breakdown in personal ethics/responsibility. There is a good deal of truth (IMO) in such a concept....as long we are congnizant of degrees of scale.

Posted by: cengel at July 15, 2005 10:03 AM

Brian,

Does that mean you no longer agree with this statement:

No story here. O'Reilly's doing his job by being outraged.

Dean is doing his job by amusing the party faithful, and making them feel good about opening their wallets.

For the zillionth time, Dean's most important role in his new job is to raise money. He's not going to give speeches telling the faithful things they don't want to hear, and he's not going to raise much money by being bland, and politically correct either.

Dean will have been a good choice if he raises lots and lots of money. Period. By and large, the things said by party leaders just are NOT going to be campaign issues.

Posted by bk at April 21, 2005 02:40 PM

Or do you make a distinction between pandering to the base by the official party leader and pandering to the base by a party member elected official?

I trust you won't mind in the future if I do some google searches on Democratic officials and find some bizarre writings they've done, pandering to their base, and pepper them into the comments section? Or do we only bother to do that when the DSCC succeeds in getting it into the mainstream press? We'll start with how unacceptable it was for Senator Kennedy to refer to judicial nominees Janice Brown and Miguel Estrada as "Neanderthals". I mean, in this day and age? To call a black woman and an hispanic man Neanderthals is beyond the pale.

Posted by: PatHMV at July 15, 2005 12:03 PM

No, I stand by it, with clarifications. My point is that it's a given that Dean's going to do these things in large part because of the role he's been cast in. And I'm Ok with all the people who don't like and who even fear him doing their own form of "due diligence" like the kind I've referred to elsewhere. It's just that I'm just not worried about it personally, especially because he's not running for an office. This means there's not gong to be any referendum on him any time soon. If Dean runs for an office at some later date, bringing up any of his old comments makes sense to me, so that they can be examined for what they are worth.

It would be especially fantastic if Dean were running against Santorum, so that we could evaluate whether whatever Dean said (was it the "never worked an honest day" thing?) stacked up with Santorum blaming liberals for fostering pedophila.

I trust you won't mind in the future if I do some google searches on Democratic officials and find some bizarre writings they've done, pandering to their base, and pepper them into the comments section? Or do we only bother to do that when the DSCC succeeds in getting it into the mainstream press? We'll start with how unacceptable it was for Senator Kennedy to refer to judicial nominees Janice Brown and Miguel Estrada as "Neanderthals". I mean, in this day and age? To call a black woman and an hispanic man Neanderthals is beyond the pale.
Absolutely not. Pepper away, so long as you don't expect me to reflexively rise to their defense. I'll disappoint if the criticism turns out to be deserved

But I don't find myself troubled by the actual quote by Kennedy, which makes no connection between minorities and the term neanderthal. Neanderthal isn't even a word I associate with racist connotations. It seems to me that this connection was constructed by Kennedy's critics. here's the quote, from YOUR source:

"What has not ended is the resolution and the determination of the members of the United States Senate to continue to resist any Neanderthal that is nominated by this president of the United States for any court, federal court in the United States."

I don't know how you read it, but I interpret it as saying that if a neanderthal is nominated, he or she will be opposed, implying that a non-neanderthal would be accepted. And naming no neanderthals by name. But I guess if you are poised to take offense and assume the worst about Ted Kennedy, you'd leap to the asssertion that Ted Kennedy called Janice Brown a neanderthal.

I think you're embarassing yourself here Pat. Surely it couldn't have been all that hard to find a good example of a truly offense liberal quote, instead of an example of manufactured outrage.

By the number of times I've been accused here of acting as an adminstration apologist, I am comfortable claiming that I've repeatedly bent over backward to give GWB the benefit of the doubt. It's not even a slight stretch to give it to Kennedy in this particular case, unless more extensive portions of the quote are missing which include something much more damning.

Posted by: bk at July 15, 2005 01:38 PM

Well, Brian, I think you're the one who is embarassing himself here, but I guess that's a matter of opinion and whether you want to start making personal comments about other posters.

Senator Kennedy was making those comments in the context of an existing set of nominees, not some abstract bunch. He was saying that the nominees he was helping to block were Neanderthals. I'm not particularly suggesting it was racist, but it was claiming that the president's judicial nominees (all of whom were rated qualified or highly qualified by the ABA) were of extremely low intelligence. If I had wanted a Democrat racism quote, I would have gone with Robert Byrd's calling someone a "white N____". I feel certain with a little time I could find ample examples of Democratic Senators referring rudely to christians as American Taliban or suggesting that all Republicans are racist, but I didn't see much point to wasting that much time.

My larger point is that thare are substantive issues to be debated. I think there is tremendous value in a debate between the idea that Mod espoused (that the permissiveness of modern society has made children safer from molestation) and the idea that Santorum espoused (that society's focus on individual "rights" uncoupled from individual responsibilities to larger groups or ideas has made sexual exploitation of children more likely to occur or be tolerated). Frankly, my gut tells me that Mod is right. But I would like to see the evidence to support that point of view. That would be a worthy debate.

But jumping to strings pulled by the DSCC (or the RSCC I hasten to add), focusing on the one sound bite rather than the concept being advocated, does not, in my opinion, advance the cause of centrism or help the body politic in any way.

Posted by: PatHMV at July 15, 2005 02:02 PM

Senator Kennedy was making those comments in the context of an existing set of nominees, not some abstract bunch. He was saying that the nominees he was helping to block were Neanderthals.

Pat, all I have to go on is the actual quote you linked to, not the entire text, which I didnt find. If the actual more complete, and currently unprovided full text supports the meaning you claim, I'll be happy to acknowledge it. I have no qualms about calling Teddy a buffoon when he plays preacher to the choir and goes overboard. I seen him do it on many occasions, and never liked him for it.

But based only upon what I have available, I think a much more sensible interpretation of his statement is that he stands ready to oppose each and every nominee that is a neanderthal. (he said he'd oppose "any neanderthal," not, for example, "these neanderthals") Nothing in the actual quote you linked to (or the link that this quote included) gives me any evidence whatsoever that Kennedy's meaning was that each and every one of Bush's possible nominees was necessarily a neanderthal.

That's what you are saying he meant, but you've given me no actual evidence that supports he reallt said this or even strongly implied it. How can I come to the conclusion you suggest is correct, if that sort of evidence is missing?

In the absence of such evidence, I'm willing to wait for Ted Kennedy to voice his opinions on a nominee-by-nominee basis, instead of assuming that he feels each and every Bush nominee (or a laundry list of names) must necessarily be a neanderthal.

Maybe you're right about TK's meaning. But if so, you've failed to show any of us. Do you see my point, because it's pretty clear to me. Where's the evidence that directly connects the use of the word neanderthal to specific names as a broad brush smear of every potential Bush nominee? Without this evidence, it feels to me like it's actually YOU that's making the leap, not Ted Kennedy, because you are assuming malice on his part.

Posted by: bk at July 15, 2005 04:05 PM

Brian,

There was a slate of nominees whom the Democrats were stalling as of November 14, 2003, when Senator Kennedy made his remarks. He spoke them in the context of the first significant Republican effort to end the filibuster debate. The three judges who were up for a vote if cloture could be had were Janice Rogers Brown, Priscilla Owen, and Carolyn Kuhl (my "ballon_juice" site source for the quote erred in including Estrada, I guess). So yes, I think an emminently fair reading of his comments was that those 3 judges, including Judge Brown, were "Neanderthals".

But who cares at this point? Why dredge up junk that's that old for political game playing? If we were in Philly and the election were next month, fine... But now? Please...

Posted by: PatHMV at July 15, 2005 04:47 PM

Well, I'm willing to let it drop for now, subject to picking it up should Kennedy actually make any specific pronouncement about the suitability of the nominees.

If you were a sporting man, based on the evidence you have cited, you'd admit that you have none, that Kennedy didn't directly call any of those people neanderthals. You assumed that he implied it. Which he may have been doing. But YOU made the leap. He didn't say it. You put the words in his mouth. Here's what you said:

We'll start with how unacceptable it was for Senator Kennedy to refer to judicial nominees Janice Brown and Miguel Estrada as "Neanderthals". I mean, in this day and age? To call a black woman and an hispanic man Neanderthals is beyond the pale.

Posted by: bk at July 15, 2005 05:12 PM

Well, I would argue that I took one sentence out of context and put some spin on it, which is pretty much what I think the Santorum critics have done. But as you say, let's go ahead and let it drop.

Posted by: PatHMV at July 15, 2005 06:41 PM

A bit of spin on both sides? Yup.. But insofar as I (leaving aside other critics) interpreted his remarks, I focused on how the facts of the unfolding scandal made Santorum's contention that Boston was at the center of it pretty much unsupportable.

And yet he stood by his initial remarks. I'm not seeing much spin in that description. Others may have taken a leap, but that part is on the mark, and IMO spin free.

On credit where it's due, the later link you posted to the full speech proves that the main point of the speech was broader than the quote itself suggested. Do you think it was Santorum who actually wrote that speech, Pat? I have no idea.

OK, I'm out.

Posted by: bk at July 16, 2005 11:22 AM

Somehow I missed all of this last week. Just Google the word "Santorum" and click on the first thing that shows up. Sorry...it's cheap and tawdry, but hey, life's about being able to laugh... ;)

Posted by: AR at July 18, 2005 09:36 AM