Bob Somerby needs his own Bob Somerby

Today painfully redundant media critic Bob Somerby was all over The New York Times and (surprise!) Rachel Maddow not for misquoting Condi Rice but for using a quote from her to “produce the desired result”:

Paraphrasing Condi/the sequel: Speaking of intellectual gongistry, today we hit the New York Times, with its typically hapless attempt to “quote” Condoleezza Rice:

 

NEW YORK TIMES EDITORIAL (5/7/09): While such accounts are suppressed, culpable ex-officials are busily trying to rewrite history. Consider a recent chat at a college reception between a student and Condoleezza Rice, who as White House national security adviser was deeply involved in the development of the authorization of brutality and torture.

  Among the many absurd things Ms. Rice did was to offer this argument that waterboarding is legal: “By definition, if it was authorized by the president, it did not violate our obligations under the Convention Against Torture.”

  That notion is just as ludicrous today as it was when Richard Nixon used it more than 30 years ago to excuse his own brand of lawbreaking.

Yesterday, we sent several e-mails critiquing this specific act of “quotation.” The Times starts “quoting” Rice about halfway through the remarks she made at Stanford. In all candor, you have no real way of figuring out what she said or meant if you start your “quotation” there. But it does produce the desired result! Rice has made an historically “ludicrous” statement, the outraged Times gets to assert. [...]

By the way: This is how Rice was repeatedly “quoted” on Monday evening’s Maddow program. Our view? When even Rhodes Scholars with staffs “quote” public figures that way, the intellectual/moral problem we face has become apparent. (Again: As a general matter, you can’t figure out what somebody said or meant if you start to “quote” them halfway through their statement.)

Now here’s the kicker.  The intellectually and morally superior Somerby started today’s post by implying that he shamed Rachel Maddow (“getting results!”) into booking Naomi Klein as a guest on her show last night:

Biggest heist in history: Your HOWLER just keeps getting results! Last night, Naomi Klein appeared on the Rachel Maddow Show. See THE DAILY HOWLER, 4/21/09.

We know what you’re thinking. Yes, we could go into court and demand pay, pleading theft of services. We could do it. But it would be wrong.

No, “they” couldn’t go into court and demand pay because “they” would be laughed out of it.  Here are the relevant portions of Bob’s 4/21 post (you can read it all here) pertaining to Maddow and Klein:

Is Klein right about [Larry] Summers? Here at THE HOWLER, we aren’t really sure. But as we read Klein’s piece, a question wormed its way into our mind: How often has Naomi Klein been featured on our “progressive” news programs? Why don’t we ever seem to see her on Countdown? On the Maddow show?

With respect to that initial question, the answer would seem to be: “Once.” According to the Nexis archives, Klein has never appeared on the Maddow show. She has appeared on Countdown exactly once—on November 29, 2007, when she appeared to discuss her new book, The Shock Doctrine. [...]

We have no idea why Klein hasn’t been back on either of our “progressive” news programs. (We have no idea if she has been asked.) But her Post piece dealt with a serious topic. We’d love to see qualified people like Klein asked to discuss Summers’ record—and the possible meaning of his prominence within the Obama Admin. [...]

Why hasn’t Klein been back? We don’t have the slightest idea.

Well, since the colossally lazy and willfully dishonest Somerby had “no idea if she has been asked,” I sent one email on 4/21 to find out if she had.  Here’s the reply I got from a source close to Klein, who wished to remain anonymous, on 4/22:

Hi Kevin:  Thanks for your email and passing us the howler link!  Naomi has been booked on the Maddow tv show in the past but was unfortunately bumped due to news…but she is booked as a guest on May 6th!

I encourage anyone, including Somerby, to fact-check that info (Bob, email me and I’ll explain what that means). Klein was clearly asked to be on Maddow’s show not once, but twice, and last night’s appearance, which was booked in advance (Bob, once again, email me), had nothing to do with the taunting of the mighty Daily Howler, but that didn’t stop NewsBusters’ latest staff member from more or less stating that it did.

What valuable lesson did us rubes learn today? If you’re going to lambaste the media for utilizing quotes to “produce the desired results” and engaging in “intellectual gongisty,” it’s a pretty good idea not to get caught red-handed wielding the fucking mallet.

Posted by Kevin K. on 05/07/09 at 05:30 PM • Permalink

I was just cleaning out some spam comments from old posts and found this one from Gil Mann. He rolled in late on the post, so wanted to move it up here because it’s a classic.

I guess Somerby’s so hung up on Gore he’s trying to restart the PMRC.

So I was leafing through the archives (incomparably tedious, am I right, folks?) and I’m a little confused. Lemme get this straight—in addition to waging war against double entendres, is he actually defending Senator Bank Run and the Teabaggers from the nefarious Dr. Maddow? Seriously?

I mean, I like Olbermann, but I understand where people who don’t are coming from. Maddow, though? The only way she could be more awesome is if she had side-mounted rocket launchers.

I love how, now that the GOP’s incapable of mounting a credible opposition, Dems are perfectly happy to step in and do it for them. They’re like the bulldozer operator in Hitchhiker’s Guide.
Comment by gil mann on 04/18/09 at 10:03 AM

Yeah, why is Maddow so shallow when Sean Hannity is doing excellent, Pulitzxer-worthy mustard stories?

Awww, c’mon, Steve, Rachel is “the fakest person in the world.” Hannity can’t compete with that.

BTW, the post got a little long, so I didn’t add this bit of info.  On 4/23 Bob did a post implying that MSNBC wasn’t sending Maddow’s transcripts to Nexis to make it “harder to report the things she says.” The next day I called up Nexis tech support and was told a) no one had reported that the transcripts were missing (including, one can assume, Somerby) and b) they had a similar “technical problem” on 3/22 with Maddow transcripts. Instead of calling Nexis to find out what the deal was, Bob just jumped right to writing: “It’s hard to avoid a certain thought.”
No, it’s not hard to avoid a certain thought, unless your a disingenuous hack looking to “produce the desired result.”

I knew from reading way too much of that crank’s gibberish that he’s brought up her being a Rhodes Scholar more than twice.  I was right. This was my favorite one:

Maddow endlessly promotes herself as an endlessly brilliant Rhodes Scholar.

No.  No, she doesn’t.  I watch her TV show enough to know that’s not true.

Sure, Betty, Oxford Clown School graduate Maddow was an activist (did crude Ana Marie Cox make AIDs jokes to cheer her up?), but the mighty Bob Somerby has been toiling away for progressive causes for decades by working the front lines of the D.C. corporate comedy circuit (see “SPONSOR SPOTLIGHT”). We asked our analysts and they told us they weren’t sure, but they thought there was no comparison.

If you want to check out one of his marvelous routines, you can do so here. He starts at about the 02:10 mark (following, I shit you not, Grover Norquist).

And if you want to know why he hates Ana Marie Cox so much, this may explain it. Her routine starts at about the 00:38 mark and his starts at about the 02:17 mark.  I’ll let you decide who went over better.  In fact, Christopher Hitchens (01:15) kicked his ass, too.

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