Following is a comment I posted at Connecticut Local Politics, which, as usual, is being "held for moderation". Of course, the original posting that quoted a highly distorted and dishonest report by Teri Puhl was published right away. I think it's important to get the truth out, so here it is:
This report is a pack of lies. First, Teri Buhl did not attend Lawrenceville Prep with Jim Himes, because Jim Himes never went to Lawrenceville Prep. He attended and graduated from a public school, Hopewell Valley Central High School in New Jersey. Second, the strong majority of the audience was in favor of health reform and the public option. I was there, sitting half way up on the middle isle on the right side. No one who attended that meeting could suggest that the anti-reform people were in the majority. It was a clear lie. And the audience inside was closer to three hundred people counting all those standing in the back. It was also not true that anyone packed the venue. Lots of people showed up early enough to get in. The person at the front of the line to get in was against reform. That woman, who had a nametag with "Ann" on it, started out by defacing an entire sheet of stickers that said "I support the public option". Real class act! And according to Greenwich Post reporter Ken Borsuk whom I spoke with as we were leaving the meeting hall at the end, the crowd outside numbered about a hundred and were evenly split between supporters of reform and those against. So most of the people who wanted to get in did get in.
Furthermore, I went outside afterwards to the front of Town Hall where Congressman Jim Himes came out to address the crowd. There were not eight police officers out there. I could see the gathering clearly, as I stood to the left of the main entrance about ten feet away from the steps. There were about fifty people remaining, most of whom were against reform. There were three police officers: two who were stationed at the front door of Town Hall, and had been stationed there since before the meeting began, and one additional officer who stood at the back of the crowd. The suggestion that Jim Himes was somehow protected by a phalanx of cops is a lie, although that sort of dishonest reporting is the hallmark of Greenwich Time's Neil Vigdor, who reported that. There certainly was a need for police officers, however, because the people in the crowd were ugly and bent on trying to harass and intimidate anyone who disagreed with them. When Congressman Himes came out to talk with them, they yelled insults, shouted him down, and generally acted like the low-life thugs they were. They frequently refused to permit him to answer their questions, and shouted him down when he tried to. It was a thoroughly disgraceful display by people whose behavior treaded the line that could have had the cops putting them in handcuffs.
Hearst Newspaper Company Senior Vice President Lincoln Millstein continues to slime Democrats in his Greewich Time blog, "Lincoln's Log". Let's keep this straight: Millstein is one of just four senior vice presidents in the entire company, and he reports to the company president. He is also the Senior VP responsible for all digital media at Hearst. Yet he promotes his own blog on the online edition of the newspaper for which he's responsible. And he still continues to mislead readers by not clearly identifying himself. The front page of his blog only says, "Lincoln Millstein offers his unique views and insights on Greenwich and its community". No mention on the front page that he's a senior executive, senior, in fact to everyone working at Greenwich Time.
He writes a very twisted version of the truth:
"(In a previous post, I was lambasted for referencing dictator Chang Kai-shek's regime, under which I spent my formative years, because he built both good schools and police stations."
No, I lambasted him for comparing the government and political system of Greenwich to the repressive regime of Chang Kai-Shek. He was not criticized for saying that Chang built good schools and police stations. That speaks volumes about the low standard of journalistic ethics with Millstein and Hearst. His suggesting that our town government in any way was equivalent to Chang's repressive dictatorship was highly insulting. But Millstein doesn't seem to think insulting our town's government in that manner is a problem.
The funny thing is that he is also writing critically about the town's educational system, which their education beat reporter Colin Gustafson refuses to criticize. Now how is it that a senior VP is writing about education in Greenwich Time when the paper has its own education reporter? Talk about making his own employees look bad. Is he sending Gustafson a message? If so, it's a lousy, very public way to embarrass one of the newspaper's reporters.
He writes:
School board issues self-congratulatory report on latest test scores (what's more important is not whether scores go up or down in one year or another. How we compare to the rest of the state is more important. I will follow with a detailed analysis in a separate post ...)
He says that comparison with other towns is most important. But shouldn't that message be conveyed by the GT publisher or editor to Gustafson? Why is Millstein trying to show him up? No class, that's for sure. Colin, get your resume together.
Why Hearst permits a senior executive to write a blog insulting local political leaders, while continuing to mislead readers by not pointing out clearly his position in the organization is inexplicable. The only answer is that the organization has no attachment to journalistic ethics.
(Op-ed edited to meet Fair Use requirements. Use link provided to read the entire piece. - promoted by Jon Kantrowitz)
Jim Himes has gone on record with his views regarding health care reform. Here is his oped that was carried in Greenwich Time today:
Health plan good start but must control costs more
By Jim Himes
...Health care reform must have two primary goals: provide Americans with stable access to high-quality care, and substantially reduce the costs in the system. Fail in the first goal, and we will continue to live with the moral and economic costs of a broken system. Fail in the second, and we will simply accelerate the unsustainable trajectory of this system.
The reform proposal being discussed in the U.S. House of Representatives does well on the first goal. It would cover almost all Americans, and provide subsidies to those households unable to afford it...
The public option has been the subject of much debate. Properly structured to assure a level playing field, a public option will provide much needed competition for the insurance companies and help bring down costs nationally..
Unfortunately, the proposal before the House is weak on the second key goal: cost reduction...
We must revisit our current fee-for-service, volume-based model, in which every provider at every step has powerful incentives to order test after test, procedure after procedure, with little regard for what is actually effective.
Instead we should reward hospitals and doctors who deliver higher quality health care. Doctors and patients need access to the best information and evidence on effectiveness. True health care reform must encourage proven best practices...
I've just learned that Sarah Littman is returning to her position as columnist for Greenwich Time at the invitation of the managing editor Bruce Hunter and the editorial page editor Thomas Mellana. In fact, her first column is due to be published March 6th.
I understand that the paper concedes that she never should have been fired, etc. etc. In any case, it is a win for everyone who supported Sarah, whose courageous progressive voice has been a singular beacon in our region's right-wing print media.
Sarah was let go in July of last year less than two days after calling out congressional candidate Lee Whitnum for her anti-Israel views.
First, kudos to billg for providing a link to the Connecticut Department of Revenue Services' February 1, 2008 Estate Tax Study. Let's be clear that the state's study was completely bogus. But we'll come back to that. Take a close look at that study and you see that Republican state senator L. Scott Frantz' (R-36) contention that the estate tax is motivating people to leave the state and hurting our economy is total hogwash. And, though "reporter" Neil Vigdor has responded to billg that he's going to make corrections to his first article about Frantz' submitting a bill recently to eliminate the estate tax, he's got a lot of corrections to make. First the numbers.
Perusing the DRS study's figures, it turns out that over the four year period covered by the study, the state lost 175,700 residents to other states, while 153,094 people moved into Connecticut, a net emigration of 22,606. Now keep that out-migration figure in mind: 175,700 left. Now take a look at the household incomes of each group. Those leaving the state averaged $66,357 in income; those coming into the state averaged $68,124 in household income. So far from the estate tax causing a mass out-migration of wealthy Nutmeggers, in fact (are you reading this, Senator Frantz?), the statistics show that those coming into the state earned higher incomes than those leaving. Furthermore, Senator Frantz concentrates on the emigration of older retirees, while completely ignoring the fact that since 2000 Connecticut has ranked dead last among the fifty states in the percentage of its young people who emigrate to other states, according to a recent study by Central Connecticut State University.
Now another set of data. Emigration to the state of Florida totaled 27,773 people, while 11,603 individuals moved from Florida into Connecticut. That means a net loss of 16,170 people to Florida. Those moving from Florida to Connecticut had household incomes of $45,870, while those leaving for Florida had household incomes of $70,067. Now there is a net outflow of people who are wealthier, but take a look at more numbers. Look which state accounts for the second largest net out-migration from Connecticut: North Carolina. While 3,252 people moved from North Carolina to the Nutmeg State over that period, 6,790 moved to the Tarheel State. And North Carolina- yep! you guessed it!- has an estate tax.
Greenwich Time/Stamford Advocate published an editorial today taking Senator Chris Dodd to task for not being forthcoming on the matter of his mortgage from Nationwide Financial. I agree that Dodd should have been more forthcoming.
But let's all remember that this is the same newspaper management that fired popular progressive columnist Sarah Littman and steadfastly refused to tell their readers that they had fired her, and refused to tell anyone the reasons why they did it. It's been seven months, and even after Littman was named one of Connecticut's "Jewish Movers and Shakers for 2008" for calling out Lee Whitnum for her anti-Semitism and anti-Israel rhetoric, GT/Advocate management still won't explain themselves. Indeed, in the editorial they write that, "This week, the Dodds finally responded to requests they have dodged since last summer to reveal their Countrywide dealings in detail." Yet it was last summer that GT/Advocate fired Sarah Littman and they have "dodged since last summer" all requests that they "reveal their...dealings in detail."
Let's be clear here: for GT/Advocate to remain silent about their truly dirty actions in firing Sarah Littman, but criticize Chris Dodd for not being forthcoming on his mortgage from Nationwide is an example of blatant hypocrisy. They have no standing to criticize anyone for not coming clean.
Let's hope that those papers' new publisher displays a little more- no, a lot more- journalistic integrity than her predecessor John Dunster, and that she begins to require a minimal standard of journalistic ethics from her staff. In addition to explaining what GT/Advocate did to Littman- and apologizing for that indefensible action- she could also come out and state that her editorial page editor will not publish any altered texts without the permission of the author from now on. That is the simple standard adhered to by New York Times. It should be good enough for GT/Advocate. And not a difficult policy to implement. She should also end the practice of altering the texts of articles to insert "D-Conn" after Joe Lieberman's name when the original text reads "I-Conn". Again, it's a deliberate slap at Democratic voters who loath the guy. And she could also force political reporter Neil Vigdor to be fair in his articles. Yesterday Vigdor was up to his old tricks in his article about Jim Himes' support for salary caps for businesses (mostly banks) receiving federal bailout money. The first four sentences were about Himes' position. But the next eight sentences were all criticisms from Connecticut Republican Party chairman Chris Healey. So the article was really a critical Fox News-style screed against Himes. Balance does not consist of most of an article being a criticism of the person about whom the article is supposed to be.
There's so much more. But suffice it to say that Greenwich Time/Advocate have no standing to call out Chris Dodd or anyone for being less than forthcoming when those papers' management have stonewalled the truth for so long. They're working in a glass house. They should put down the stones.
A number of credible individuals have told us that Greenwich Time/Stamford Advocate publisher John Dunster has been dumped and will be leaving soon. If you don't know who he is, he's the guy behind the firing of progressive and popular local columnist Sarah Littman. He's the guy who fired her less than two days after she called out the newspaper for its sanitized coverage of bizarre anti-Semitic congressional candidate Lee Whitnum. But though he was behind the firing, he refused to even tell his readers that she had been fired, or to explain why he fired her to the many readers and Littman supporters who flooded his office with emails, phone calls and letters demanding that she be brought back. That's what Dunster will be remembered for. And a few more things, none of them good.
Check out this banner headline in the December 28, 2008 issue of Greenwich Time:
"Bush departs with legacy in question"
In question? The only questions for most Americans seem to be: "Can't he leave sooner?" and "Is he the worst president in American history, or only the second worst?"
But if you thought that headline strange, take a look at the first sentence of reporter Neil Vigdor's article:
"Some will remember him as Bush the protector, the president who prevented another terrorist attack from befalling the U.S. on its own soil during his watch."
Some will? Perhaps, but certainly extremely few, especially in this state. Vigdor goes on to write that in Greenwich,
"Where the seeds of his family's political dynasty were planted, George W. Bush is seen among many of his most ardent Republican supporters as an enigmatic figure at the close of his presidency."
An "enigmatic figure"? He carries the lowest approval ratings in modern history, thousands are dead in his pointless Iraq War, the country is racking up the worst economic numbers since the Great Depression, and Neil Vigdor believes that there is something "enigmatic" about Bush? No, he's an unmitigated disaster. Period.
Stamford Mayor Dan Malloy called Lee Whitnum "anti-Semitic" at a press conference yesterday afternoon in Stamford. Mayor Malloy was joined at the press conference by Rabbi Marc Disick of Temple Sinai in Stamford, Rabbi David Walk of Congregation Agudafdath Sholom in Stamford and Rabbi Eric Eisenkramer of Temple Shearith Israel in Ridgefield.
According to the Greenwich Post article written by Ken Borsuk, Mayor Malloy stated:
"I've observed this campaign and I've been bothered by this campaign and the things that have been said. I thought for a moment that ignoring this woman and some of the most outlandish thing she's said would be the best policy to not give it more credence but when I saw her statement in the Advocate I found it to be most offensive and taking a full swing at those of us in this country who support the state of Israel...To claim that Israel is somehow to blame for 9-11 is deeply disturbing and quite frankly belies a disturbed sense that Ms. Whitnum has. I also have come to the conclusion that her statements are unfortunately anti-Semitic in their nature...She has crossed the line and is clearly anti-Semitic."
Also disturbing is the silence from Greenwich Time and Stamford Advocate, neither of which carried Mayor Malloy's remarks in their paper or electronic editions, nor even acknowledged that the press conference took place. Let's keep in mind that today's editions of both papers would have carried a column by progressive Democrat Sarah Littman, had she not been fired two weeks ago for calling out Lee Whitnum for her bizarre positions and her anti-Semitism in her column. As many know, GT/Advocate publisher John Dunster seized on a pretext to fire her right after that column appeared. Yet when Stamford Mayor Dan Malloy also forcefully denounces Whitnum for her anti-Semitism, Dunster's papers remain silent. Is there any doubt that GT/Advocate have been sanitizing their coverage of Whitnum, going as far as to pretend that a major statement by Stamford's mayor denouncing her never took place? Ignoring the presence of several prominent rabbis in this congressional district at that press conference?
To call GT/Advocate's sanitized coverage of Lee Whitnum disgusting and unethical somehow just doesn't come close to expressing the revulsion I feel for their commission of unethical journalism and convenient ommission of the facts from their reporting. Let's recall that GT/ADvocate had no problems insinuating that Ned Lamont was anti-Semitic, carrying a front-page article about anti-Semitic postings regarding Joe Lieberman on MoveOn.org's website in 2006, and suggesting that the Lamont camapign was somehow inmplicated. They even highlighted the article in dark gray.
With the acquisition of MediaNews Group's minority stake in a joint venture, George Irish, CEO of Hearst Newspapers, is now directly responsible for Greenwich Time and Stamford Advocate. Let's hope that he is equally dismayed by the low state of journalism at those papers. He works in Manhattan, so let's hope that he takes a special interest in those two papers that are just a few minutes' drive from his office.
Greenwich Post (the only non-MediaNews Group publication in the town of Greenwich and Stamford) came out with an article whacking Greenwich Time for their firing of popular progressive columnist Sarah Littman last week.
The article states:
Greenwich progressives are demanding Sarah Littman get her job back after she was abruptly terminated last week as a Greenwich Time columnist.
Ms. Littman, a children's book author who had been contributing to the paper since 2001, had been a regular columnist since 2003. Readers of her column said her departure came as a shock. She said she was fired after she wrote a column sharply criticizing congressional candidate and Greenwich resident Lee Whitnum.
Rather than the bogus reason of comprising the newspaper's integrity, Littman said:
...she feels the reason for her dismissal goes beyond this particular column. She said people at the paper knew long before she wrote the column that she had held the event for Mr. Himes and that it reflected her desire to remove her point of view from the paper.
Sounds like a set-up to me. And according to Sarah:
(Outrageous nonsense from a crappiest newspaper in the state. - promoted by ctblogger)
Progresssive columnist Sarah Littman, whose essays are carried in Greenwich Time and Stamford Advocate, was fired by publisher John Dunster on Thursday for having written a column critical of Loony Lee Whitnum while having held a "meet-and-greet" for Jim Himes last year. According to Sarah, Dunster said that having criticized Loony Lee while having supported Jim Himes campaign "compromised the integrity of the paper".
What's the truth? This is a right-wing rag that has been shilling for Whitnum for months. In virtually every article about Jim Himes, Greenwich Time's political reporter Neil Vigdor has been boosting Whitnum's candidacy, covering up her whacky utterances and essentially portraying Whitnum as a courageous fighter against the Democratic machine.
But this appears to have been nothing but a pretext. In an appearance before the Greenwich Retired Men's Association about a month ago broadcast on Greenwich Community Television channel 79, Dunster, responding to a complaint about "liberal" Sarah Littman, admitted that he personally "on the conservative side of the spectrum", and said that he was going to make changes in the editorial page.
It is absurd for Dunster to have fired Littman, because she's not a reporter who is required to be objective, but in fact is paid to give her subjective take on political and social issues. Does anyone believe that David Brooks, George F. Will, or the editors of the Wall Street Journal don't contribute to political candidates? Of course they do. And George F. Will has actually served as an advisor to Republican candidates in the past.
Greenwich Time/Stamford Advocate's latest editorial"Lawmaker right to target homelessness", praises Republican state senator John McKinney for setting "his sights on effectively ending homelessness in Connecticut."
"A rich state", it continues, "Connecticut is beset by persistent problems with people who can't find a home, can't keep a home or are in danger of losing a home. Mr. McKinney, hte Senate minority leader, is proposing what he calls a potential solution to the problem, vowing to commit significant state resources to building hundreds of affordable and permanent supportive housing units across the state"
Great. The problem is that the editorial praises Republican McKinney, while completely failing to mention that the Democratic candidate for Congress Jim Himes, a resident of Greenwich, has spent the past four years of his life working full time to solve precisely the problems of the housing shortage and housing affordability that the newspaper says needs to be addressed. Himes is a national director of Enterprise Foundation, the prominent non-profit organization whose purpopse is to fight the problems of housing throughout the United States. Jim Himes is the man responsible for the entire Northeast region for Enterprise. That organization has invested billions in public/private partnerships to develop affordable housing around the country. Himes also served as the commissioner for housing in the town of Greenwich, striving to convince the town's Republican leadership of the need to expand affordable housing.
So while Republican McKinney was contemplating his navel for the past several years when it came to the housing problem, Jim Himes was out there actually doing something about it. But where was the mention of Jim Himes in Greenwich Time/Stamford Advocate's paean to one of its darling Republicans? Not a word in the editorial even acknowledged Himes' contributions or efforts. Let's be clear: this wasn't an editorial in The Day of New London or equally far-off Hartford Courant. No, this editorial was penned by an employee in Himes' hometown right smack in the fourth congressional district. In other words, the author of that editorial knew full well all about Jim Himes' efforts and accomplishments. The paper just didn't possess the intellectual honesty to tell its readers the truth. No, far better to paint a rosy picture of a Republican politician courageously leading the way for Greenwich Time's largely Republican leadership. Forget honesty; it's the ideological spin that counts for that crew.
Of course, there's far more with which to take issue in that twisted editorial. For example, the editorial states,
"Poor people, though, don't vote, at least not in large numbers; it's mostly safe to ignore their issues come campaign season."
You really wonder where these journalists have been and what they were doing to be so oblivious about the real world. Politicians "ignore their issues"? Not John Edwards, who has been campaigning on a platform of closing the gap betwen the "Two Americas". Robert F. Kennedy cetainly didn't ignore the plight of the poor. President Johnson, who launched the "Great Society" programs to eliminate poverty in America, certainly didn't ignore the plight of the poor. And the Democratic Party as a whole has certainly not ignored the downtrodden over the past eight decades. Could it really be that the editorial's author was unaware of FDR's accomplishments in sharply cutting poverty among senior citizens with his Social Security program? Could it be that he was unaware of the efforts to improve housing for the poor under Johnson? Could he have been oblivious as to the damage done by the Republican Party recently with its passage of the bankruptcy bill in the last congress that made it more difficult for average Americans, who were being financially wiped out by overwhelming medical bills, to get out from under those crushing debts? Suppose not. No, Greenwich Time/Stamford Advocate prove again the old adage that "ignorance is bliss".
But it ain't gonna work. Every time GT/Advocate twist the truth and leave out key facts, they diminish their own fast fading reputations as journalists. Jim Himes is the guy who's been working is butt off to solve the housing problem. Nice to see that McKinney has finally realized that there is a problem. But pretending as if he's the champion here is just plain dishonest. Got that, Greenwich Time?
Mr. John Dunster
Publisher- Greenwich Time and Stamford Advocate
Dear Mr. Dunster,
When Greenwich Time cleaned house a few weeks ago, we Democrats in this town hoped that the long era during which the newspaper actively denigrated and insulted Democrats might just come to an end. Sadly, we were wrong. One had only to glance at the December 3 edition of Greenwich Time to understand that dissing Democrats remains an honored tradition at the paper. That edition, under the front page headline "Inauguration day 2007", highlighted large color photos of the new Republican first selectman Peter Tesei and his family and, just below that, Republican selectman Peter Crumbine and his family. Where was Democratic selectman Lin Lavery's photo? Predictably, Greenwich Time buried her black-and-white photo showing her being sworn in by Connecticut's attorney general and Greenwich resident Richard Blumenthal on page four. Never mind the fact that Lavery soundly defeated Crumbine in their head-to-head race, winning in the process nine of the town's twelve electoral districts, and almost winning a tenth. In typical Greenwich Time style, she was predictably dissed by having her photo shunted into the paper's inner recesses.
In oh-so-typical right-wing/Fox News fashion, Greenwich Time pulled another slick move yesterday. They changed the text of AP reporter Andrew Miga's text of his article entitled on Dodd in Iowa. How did they change it? Here it is:
First, in the second paragraph they identified Lieberman as "D-Conn," even though the original text of the article had Lieberman as "I-Conn." The Stamford Advocate carried the original "I-Conn" description. AP's Southern New England Bureau Chief David Marcus confirmed that AP no longer desribes Lieberman as a Democrat, but always as an independent. Then farther down, GT changed the sentence that read: "Lieberman became an independent senator after losing the 2006 Democratic Senate primary..." to "Lieberman became an independent Democrat senator after losing..."
So the editors over at Greenwich Time twisted the words of the AP story to fit their ideological slant. And of course they also managed to insult Democrats by using the noun form of the party's name as an adjective ("Democrat party"), the same way all of the far-right Republicans do these days. But apparently they figured they could only get away with that little trick in heavily Republican Greenwich. They didn't fool around with the Stamford Advocate version of the story. Too many Democrats there, perhaps?
Well, the paper has been sold, the publisher has been sacked, and perhaps the new owner will do something about Bruce Hunter, the paper's editor who's been smearing Democrats in town for so many years. Perhaps they will also call reporter Neil Vigdor to account for all of the really slimy articles he's written that denigrate Democrats. Perhaps they can start with the one he wrote last year dismissing Frank Farricker and Ed Krumeich, who were running respectively for state senate and state representative, with the opening line: "Lattes and longshots?" Or perhaps Hunter can explain to new management how he could publish the headline at the end of that week: "Democrats Cough Up 11th Hour Candidates," equating Democratic candidates with hair balls.
Frank Farricker is now running a spirited, issues-oriented campaign, and has knocked on literally thousands of doors around town. Predictably, Greenwich Time today endorsed both of the Republicans.
But perhaps for Greenwich, we'll see big changes ahead that will result in even-handed treatment for Democrats in that town. We sure can hope.
Most of us already know that press censorship and propaganda have replaced a media that formerly served to inform the public. What may be less obvious to some readers is an additional "dumbing down" of the news, prompted by an apparent failure of our education system. An avid news hound and hopeless bookworm, I have become acutely aware of the fact that many otherwise good writers -- if you simply evaluate ideas or creativity -- no longer understand the concept of noun-verb agreement and also cannot distinguish between a noun and an adjective. In the latter case, politics have come into play. I recently submitted the following letter to two Connecticut publications; however, it is unlikely that either paper will print it, as my comments reflect poorly on the publications themselves. Here's the letter:
Shays made an appearance in front of a group of Greenwich seniors and, despite the Stamford Advocate's and Greenwich Time's see-no-evil coverage of his Hatch Act violations cover-up, Shays still complained about the "biased media."
Neither the Greenwich Time nor Stamford Advocate have covered the story surrounding Lurita Doan and Shays' cover-up of Doan's and Karl Rove's Hatch Act violations. Heck, they even turned down letters to the editor about such stuff (h/t Ann Galloway) ... so it makes me wonder who the media is biased against?
According to Shays, here are the issues that the media should be covering:
Along with global warming and road kill by drunken drivers - inconvenient truths - Shays declared issues needing to be continually explored and reported on in depth by the media include over-population, illegal immigrants and Islamic terrorists.
Never mind the Iraq War, health care, affordable housing, illegal wiretaps, traffic on I-95, or violations of the Hatch Act covered up by Chris Shays.
Oh yeah, and the biased media -- we need to do something about that too.
This past week, both the Washington Post and the Hartford Courant ran stories that were particularly relevant to Connecticut's Fourth District. Yet not a word found its way into either The Advocate or Greenwich Time.
In "How Rove Directed Federal Assets for GOP Gains: Bush Adviser's Effort to Promote the President and His Allies Was Unprecedented in Its Reach" (August 19) and "Rove Gave Shays a Boost" (August 20), these papers disclose that Karl Rove was instrumental in helping to return the so-called "moderate" Chris Shays to Congress.
In a Letter to the Editor, I focused on this not-so-unusual omission and then inserted a few additional particulars:
I'm cross posting this from my Saramerica blog, because I thought you guys might like to see some of the cr*p mail that is one of the "joys" of being a political columnist.
This one particularly pissed me off because it was written by the father of my daughter's best friend from nursery school. But read on, my fair MLNers:
MLN is powered by