C’mon, ya’ll. REALLY!?
Just to add to my post about federal coordination of the raid, the “Obama DOJ DHS coordinated the raid” narrative has taken off. Here’s Wonkette with a post about DHS and coordination. (And here’s Juan Cole citing Wonkette.) Wonkette acknowledges the Examiner as a disreputable source, but then points to an AP report which Wonkette claims verifies everything ”except the specific mention of DHS coordination.”
::blink blink::
The “DHS coordination” aspect is the aspect that is supported solely by the Examiner! Get it? The Wonkette headline reads “Surprise, Homeland Security Coordinates #OWS Crackdowns” but the only citation for Homeland Security involvement comes from the fucking Examiner. The AP report is a generic article about coordination by police chiefs in the various cities (which doesn’t strike me as all that out of the ordinary, by the way.) The AP report says absolutely nothing about FBI or Homeland Security involvement. NOTHING.
Again, the Examiner claimed the following:
“According to this official, in several recent conference calls and briefings, local police agencies were advised to seek a legal reason to evict residents of tent cities, focusing on zoning laws and existing curfew rules. Agencies were also advised to demonstrate a massive show of police force, including large numbers in riot gear. In particular, the FBI reportedly advised on press relations, with one presentation suggesting that any moves to evict protesters be coordinated for a time when the press was the least likely to be present.
Local cops were advised by the feds to demonstrate force! To wear riot gear! To disappear occupiers under cover of night!
This is insanity. I have not found a source confirming DHS or FBI involvement. Thus, a citation is needed to support the notion that those agencies were actually involved, and Quan reporting to the BBC that “she was one a conference call just before the recent wave of crackdowns began” does not support Wonkette, Michael Moore, and whomever else’s claim that Homeland Security ran point on this op. Thus far, it is fantasy.
Then again, I’m just an Obamabot, so what the hell do I know.
I do know this: given that the November 6 “issue” of the Examiner contains this doozy –
Two former participants in the CIA’s Mars visitation program of the early 1980’s have confirmed that U.S. President Barack H. Obama was enrolled in their Mars training class in 1980 and was among the young Americans from the program who they later encountered on the Martian surface after reaching Mars via “jump room.”
Andrew D. Basiago, 50, a lawyer in Washington State who served in DARPA’s time travel program Project Pegasus in the 1970’s, and fellow chrononaut William B. Stillings, 44, who was tapped by the Mars program for his technical genius, have publicly confirmed that Obama was enrolled in their Mars training class in 1980 and that each later encountered Obama during visits to rudimentary U.S. facilities on Mars that took place from 1981 to 1983.
– I’d say my skepticism is more than justified.
This is milk from the Fox News media teat, and people are lapping it up.
I thought we were better than this. We’re being gamed.
[partially cross-posted at Balloon Juice]
(edited to fix Examiner link)
RELATED POST: About that DHS Coordinated Crackdown on Zuccotti Park…
Holy crap. I am letting out a big sigh. I read the Cole piece and was shocked. He chose to believe the Examiner?
Many of the Pro Lefties who are running with this story are linking to secondary sources with more respectable pedigrees that themselves cite the Examiner, like the Guardian or Wonkette. That way, they think they’ve inoculated themselves from charges of spreading a smear. “Oops!” they’ll say, if called on it.
Yeah, I was really disappointed to see Prof. Cole not only believing this but helping to promote it. I don’t always agree with him but he’s not usually one to do something like this, I thought. I hope he retracts it.
The others listed by Allan I consider “the usual suspects”.
Reposted from prior thread: I think it would be useful to keep a tally of which members of the Pro Left swallowed this story hook, line and sinker. Here’s who I’ve caught so far:
Michael Moore
Greg Mitchell
Gregg Levine of FireDogLake
Mike Elk
Digby
Juan Cole
Wonkette
Let us know here in the comments where else you’re seeing this story amplified by the Pro Left Human Mic.
Add Kos.
And I’m shocked that Saint Glenn Of Greenwald and Sirota haven’t jumped on the crazytrain (ay ay ay!).
Huffpost hasn’t jumped on this train either.
Here’s one to add to the list Allan.
http://progressivealaska.blogspot.com/
The guy running the blog is a Hampsher disciple and writes for Firedoglake.
Get a load of the picture of the President he chose to run with the piece.
A few posts down he’s got a doozey about President Obama blowing up brown kids in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, etc., complete with a picture of one of them.
These folks are off their rockers and won’t be happy until a Republican is back in charge so they can make even more money than they are with their insane professional left schtick.
In the immortal words of Tonto, “What you mean *WE*, white man?”
OMG, Obama’s evil influence even controls the UK:
Occupy London: eviction notices attached to tents outside St Paul’s
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/nov/16/occupy-london-eviction-notices-tents?newsfeed=true
The conspiracy is so vast, it overwhelms my mind! /snark
I wouldn’t be surprised if there was some coordination among the mayors, at least to the point they decided there was safety in numbers if they all moved at the same time. I also wouldn’t be surprised if there was a bandwagon effect that now that mayors have seen that other cities succeeded with it, they feel ready to act.
How this gets to “Obama ordered DHS and FBI to shut it down” is another question entirely. That’s where the left really goes into Fox News territory.
At least this is showing me which liberals are nothing but hacks if not worse.
Exactly! And if I were a mayor, I would be immensely heartened by the NY judge’s ruling, and talking to lawyers and law enforcement about how to proceed with that in mind.
Whee – today’s xkcd has it spot on regarding {citation required} – http://xkcd.com/978/
brilliant.
Remember the last time Wonkette falsely tied the Occupy Oakland crackdown to Obama?
http://wonkette.com/455208/obama-raises-money-in-san-francisco-as-cops-gas-oakland-protesters
Wonkette will say anything or put anybody in the least favorable light available to get a laugh. There are as “reputable” as the Onion, and I mean that in a good way.
This is unsubstantiated rumor.
There is no proof. I will wait for proof.
Democratic Underground believes it as well.
Thank you for reporting on this. I wrote about it also – http://bpicampus.com/2011/11/16/furthermore-rumors-and-blame/ – but my story only fueled rumors that I was the squirrel who caused the power outage in Flint, Michigan (Moore’s hometown). Some people will believe anything….
Good day and good nuts.
/face palm
Has anyone bothered to mention that Chicago – as in, the city that currently has Pres. Obama’s former Chief of Staff as its Mayor – somehow was left out of this DHS cabal? Odd, isn’t it, that if there was in fact some coordinated effort on the part of the White House to get mayors to crack down on protestors, that The Evil Doctor Mayor Rahm Emanuel™ wasn’t involved?
And yes, there are too many “thats” in that last sentence. Because that’s how I roll.
funny, that!
Come on … we all know the reason why here and we know who started it. People have got to start screaming at Moore.
Wow, really? Is the Professional Left so bereft of political analysis that we honestly think Obama is leading the charge to throw hippies off city streets. Sorry kids, reality is alot clearer and simpler – the 1% run the municipalities and frankly no city wants a bunch of angry smell hipsters squatting in city parks.
I guess going into a tizzy over tinfoil conspiracies that frankly don’t have a shred of evidence – how about the Professional Left and the Occupy Wall Street so-called ‘leaders’ who actually start organize tangible political steps. But, these guys are into ‘political theater’ – protest for the sake of protest without an end goal.
If the 99 Percenters want to move beyond a bunch of unemployed college kids camping in tents on the city commons and recycling dead slogans from the late 90′s IMF protest – its going to take strategy and sacrifice. The Occupy movement open a crack in the door, its time for real leaders to step in.
But, by propagating this DHS vs OWS story, the Professional Left is saying “Fuck that ‘real organizing’ shit, that’s shit hard”. Political theater and bullshit pontification doesn’t take any real work, planning or sacrifice, just massive egos and a myopic world view. And one thing we know is the Firebaggers and their PL overlords love nothing more than self-inflated egoism and bullshitting.
Beyond the fact that this rumor is probably bullshit, who cares? Its more important to work for a bigger movement and not sit around worrying about the third man on the grassy knoll. It take virtually no brain cells to sit around and mentally masturbate about how Obama is secretly sending vegans to Gitmo. However, it takes a lot of brains and balls to say, “This isn’t about Obama, Bloomberg or a goddamn park in the financial district, its about real change for the masses. What’s our next move?”
If even if he was, so
And lets be clear about what exactly the “The Examiner” is. It isn’t just an unreliable and largely unedited conglomeration of local-focus blogs masquerading as journalism. It IS that, but it is more importantly a piece of “Clarity Media” which also owns the Weekly Standard and slightly more serious dead-tree Examiner newspapers, including the SF Examiner and Washington Examiner. Clarity is a project of Philip Anschutz, a right-wing theocrat who has also been involved in the Discovery Institute (the creationists, not the TV channel) and other crypto-Dominionist organizations. He is a key funder of the right-wing noise machine, arguably as important as Rupert Murdoch but operating much more quietly.
I don’t know anything more than is on his site about Rick Ellis, but writing as the MN expert for The Examiner doesn’t exactly reinforce confidence, and his claimed use of a single anonymous DoJ source for the story would be an embarrassment for any real journalistic operation. Given the egregious disinformation printed by the Weekly Standard and Washington Examiner, it would not surprise me if this as a complete invention. Even if Ellis really talked to someone at DoJ, it is helpful to keep in mind that DoJ is full of “Loyal Bushie” holdovers who got hired by the likes of Monica Goodling and Kyle Sampson, as well as burrowed-in political appointees. It can’t be hard to find someone who will spout bullshit to a 3rd-string blogo-journalist “on background” to smear the Obama Administration. It’s a free punch, and the wingnuts do not fight fair.
Why are you all still talking about this? This was yesterday’s news. It’s over, as if this blog is any more respectable than Examiner!
Drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son.
Yeah, and when was this blog ever mentioned by an Academy Award winner with a following like Michael Moore? (Crickets chirping.) Truth hurts.
“Yeah, and when was this blog ever mentioned by an Academy Award winner with a following like Michael Moore? (Crickets chirping.) Truth hurts.”
Free country dude.
Don’t like what is written here?
Stop reading it.
Solved your personal problem for you.
I don’t take advice from an overused cliche “like Angry Black Lady”
Well I don’t take advice from Angry White Male Firebaggers, so I guess we cancel each other out.
I don’t take advice from an overused cliche “like Angry Black Lady”
Not interested in your advisors.
Sounds like you have a personal problem. Suggest a visit to your chaplain
Once again Angry Black Cliche fails to blow my mind figuratively.
Dearest Bob- Your trite comments and pathetic attempts to make “Angry Black Cliché (yes, there’s one of them there funky accents on it and everything)” happen demonstrates that your claim to having a mind, whether or not capable of being blown, is false. You are but a brainless toy dog, nipping at my ankle, pulling on my pantleg, and begging for some attention. Now I have wasted 20 seconds giving you the attention you crave. Cherish it. Let it wash over you. Now run along back to the kiddie table and regale them with tales of how you thought of a really “sick burn” but never got to use it because your dumb ass got stuck on “Angry Black Cliché (don’t forget the accent!)” You sure did try, Bob, and bless your heart for that. Sadly, though, I must ban you from my fine establishment. You’re a dimwitted nuisance. It’s been a pleasure. Best, ABL
Speaking of blowing, don’t you have a pair of kneepads to buy off of Firebagger.com? After all, while you are down there worshipping at the feet of (insert name of fauxprogressive hero) you might as well take care of business.
“Once again Angry Black Cliche fails to blow my mind figuratively.”
You do have a personal problem.
What you do about it is your affair.
Bob is the kind of maroon who shows up at the same diner every week and bitches “Such bad food! And such small portions!” If you don’t LIKE a blog, you’re not required to keep reading it.
And honey, sometimes in order to BLOW a mind, there has to be a mind present to blow. Now skedaddle, sweetie. The grown-ups are talking. Go play with your Firebagger Action Figures. (I know, I know — they don’t actually take action and just sit there doing nothing.)
And Michael Moore is the guy who told us that there was “no difference” between Bush and Gore in 2000. How’d that work out, again? Also, you DO know that the Academy Award is a popularity contest — not irrefutable evidence of failsafe political perspicacity, right?
Bob has been dispensed with.
Bye Bob!
http://capitoilette.com/2011/11/15/oakland-mayor-jean-quan-admits-cities-coordinated-crackdown-on-occupy-movement/
“Embattled Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, speaking in an interview with the BBC (excerpted on The Takeaway radio program–audio of Quan starts at the 5:30 mark), casually mentioned that she was on a conference call with leaders of 18 US cities shortly before a wave of raids broke up Occupy Wall Street encampments across the country. “I was recently on a conference call with 18 cities across the country who had the same situation. . . .””
The only thing ABL’s post serves is as a reminder to verify your sources.
But to believe that the one security organization who makes it their job to be in touch with all other security organizations is necessarily _not_ involved just because a specific source doesn’t happen to cite them, is beyond naive.
If you want to see how that mindset grew in politics and law enforcement, go see J. Edgar. While not a documentary, it serves as a reminder that there are vested interest to put down dissenting opinion.
Honestly, if I were to venture a guess on why ABL posted this is that to somehow “debunk” it helps divert criticism from Obama, or his silence on the matter.
There is more than one way to be “had”.
TL;DR Remember to verify your sources or you will blow the big story, but don’t stop asking questions just because “skeptics” and “reasonable people” tell you to.