American Politics Journal -- Pundit Pap

Pundit Pap
for Sunday, October 20
NBC Sunday Today becomes "must-see" pundit TV
by the Pundit Pap Team

October 20, 2002 -- NEW YORK (APJP) -- Once again, every pundit show -- with, thank goodness, the exception of The McLaughlin Group -- made "issue one" the Serial Sniper, who may have struck again last night.

The real "top story", however, is a bit more ominous: North Korea has an active nuclear weapons program -- and not only did Chimpy McSmirkster and his gang of goons conceal this from Democrat members of Congress for two weeks but the gang who engineered the hostile takeover of the West Wing still seem intent on sending our kids into action against Saddam Hussein.

Are they nuts? Here we have one of the most insular, militaristic and potentially destabilizing nations in the world announcing that they've upgraded their status in the Imbecile Prince's "Axis of Evil" to platinum membership -- or, more accurately, to plutonium membership. This is a nation that used the nuke card to blackmail the region and the West into forking over food -- a nation whose number one export is refugees fleeing Kim Il Sung's fake "communist" totalitarian regime.

Even China sat up took notice. They're pretty spooked by the prospect of "Little Kim" (no relation to the rapper), notorious for his often bizarre behavior, doing something stupid. They know he's far more dangerous than Saddam.

Meanwhile, the Texas Dauphin seems still fixated on Saddam -- if only to distract from Smirk-o-nomic disaster. He needs an all-GOP Congress to ram his own version of "compassionate" authoritarianism down our throats, starting with massive corporate tax cuts, the stripping of citizens' rights to sue large corporations, the abolition of regulations that keep air breathable and water drinkable, and erosion of the Bill of Rights. And he's using Saddam as the boogey man to scare Americans into voting for his henchmen.

Here's a little of what we caught:

Sunday Today
Where the real action was

Well, well, well -- those idiots at NBC underpromoted the best pap of this Sunday: Soledad O'Brien's brief but upbeat interview with the last elected president of this once great nation, Bill Clinton, taped last night as Clinton was being inducted into the Arkansas Black Hall of Fame.

Of course, we had to suffer through Today's cloying coverage of the latest vague information on what was thought to be the latest attack of the "serial sniper." The Today team even used a snippet from President Clinton's interview -- naturally, he is very concerned about the situation, as he has friends in the area and a home in Washington, but he encouraged people not to be intimidated by the shooter and has full confidence confidence in law enforcement organizations.

So what does the honor mean to Clinton? The Big Dog said that civil rights drove him to political activism, and he is honored to have been granted the honor by people he worked with for decades. He said he was surprised to be honored, but when he received the call from Toni Morrison telling him of the honor, he was thrilled.

Charles Stewart, the Hall of Fame's chairman, told Soledad that a major factor in giving the honor to Clinton was his decision to put black people in positions where they could make a difference -- and yes, there were a few people who were a little reluctant to induct a non-black person.

Clinton turned to one of his latest efforts: a foundation to expand AIDS care in Africa by working with governments and pharmaceutical companies.

Soledad asked Clinton about being named the "go-to" guy behind the scenes in the Democratic party; Clinton laughed at the description and said he's trying (emphasis on trying) not to do too much politically.

On the matter of Iraq, Clinton said that an unambiguous call for unfettered inspections from the UN actually will empower the US to build a solid coalition -- and Clinton said that Secretary of State Colin Powell is doing a good job bringing France and Russia around. He added that Americans have to look at this in the context of long-term regional goals and the war on terrorism -- and said he supports the Bush team on what they appear to be doing.

Clinton said that he planned to tell the Hall of Fame he thanks them for their efforts to bring people together, for reaching out beyond Arkansas and the US, and for judging him not on the color of his skin but on the content of his heart.

Sure, it was short -- but it was also upbeat and optimistic.

Soledad O'Brien deserves a far higher profile on NBC -- she's a savvy interviewer and good journalist.

But there's one other reason The Doc loves Soledad, besides the fact that he considers her a truly righteous babe. Last week, for example, Sunday Today had a goofy feature involving a mechanical bull -- her co-host, Clinton-basher David Bloom, got thrown early on, but Soledad did a good job staying put even when the mechanical behemoth was switched to the "puree" setting. And this was not the first time she's shown up her co-host: anytime the show has a feature involving some sort of physical exertion, Soledad inevitably makes preppy pretty boy Bloom look like a wuss.

You go, girl!

With the Clinton interview over, it was time to grab the remote and check out the hijinks over on...

This Weak
Katrina quashes triumph of G. Will

And wouldn't you know it: George Stephanopoulos was playing the latest uninformed pundit game -- an attempt to tie the Serial Sniper to Al Qaeda.

He was in mid-spin with two "experts", counterterrorism authority Neil Livingstone and former FBI profiler Gregg McCrary. Livingstone was talking about the timing of these shootings coinciding with attacks by "Al Qaeda" around the world.

Huh? We don't know that Al Qaeda masterminded the attacks in in Bali and the Philippines -- there are admittedly groups there that have loose ties to Osama, and any speculation about Al Qaeda being behind all this is a stretch.

And McCrary, in fact, expressed immediate skepticism -- we don't know who the Serial Sniper is, likewise we can't rule anything out. It could be someone on a personal "jihad" -- but there is not a huge body count, there is no martyrdom and there has been no claim of credit.

Livingstone said that there is a large-scale attack against American interests being planned and the Serial Sniper is -- catch this -- tying up ALL police resources in the area.

Huh? They're not paying attention to other crimes, or their day-to-day duties? Baloney.

Steph brought up recent (and vague) reports that Al Qaeda may be planning sniper attacks on golfing Senators. Livingstone also brought up the tarot card -- and he assumes the "Dear Policeman: I am God" message was written by someone who does not have English as a first language.

Huh? You mean it couldn't be a diversion? Or a reference to "death cards" left by US military as depicted in films and television shows?

Yes, this is how This Weak wasted viewers' time -- with silly, non-constructive speculation by "experts" feeding useless and counterproductive ideas to the public. We are a couple weeks away from a crucial midterm election, the economy continues to tank, the GOP conspires to strip people of their rights and drive us to a war guaranteed to kill thousands of young Americans -- and ABC continues to play the "tairist" card? George Stephanopoulos and ABC should be ashamed. There are more important issues confronting John and Jane Heartland than the Serial Sniper.

Al least the round table was a lot of fun this week -- mostly thanks to the presence of The nation editor Katrina van den Heuvel, who was combative and tough.

She focused much of her energy on dismantling the oily George F. Will's hard-right spin -- and Will did not sound or seem pleased.

Katrina started by making fun of Smirk's attitude toward diplomacy being "subversive", and making fun of Will's utterly simplistic view of nuclear proliferation. Will cried foul -- and even Steph had to remind the flustered, bow-tied pundit that North Korea was in fact hobbled in efforts to develop a nuclear program by diplomacy. Michelle Martin added that Democrats are not happy about being left out of the loop by the Chimp's team, who claim that they are such straight shooters -- but also said that Democrats had not expressed outrage. Katrina also attacked Will's view on diplomacy versus action -- pointing out that policy in place has kept East Asia from war, the Dissembler-in-Chief's team has a bad record as a result of being overly secretive, and Smirk himself has "been AWOL" (ha, ha!) on diplomacy.

Talk turned to the sniper -- and Katrina slammed Smirk's "fealty" toward the NRA and gun nuts, and called attention to the fact that law enforcement wants weapons "fingerprinted". She slammed Will, who tried to claim that anyone with steel wool can change a gun "fingerprint" in 30 seconds (but how much, George?). And Michelle fired back at one attempt by Will to draw a false dichotomy between technology and philosophy (privacy) by pointing out that people understand the balance between security and liberty -- especially those that use air transport.

Was George Will sending a message to Republicans this morning? Our writers usually make every effort to ignore the overrated, hypocritical twit, but this morning his three minute rant slammed the current trend toward early voting in nearly 40 states by mail-in or absentee ballot. We found it particularly interesting because right-wing organizations, including so-called "Christian" activists, have been encouraging their supporters to vote early -- and liberal-leaning ballot reform advocates have been raising serious questions concerning the rather easy gimmicking and abuse of mail-in ballots.

Interesting.

-- Dave "Doctor" Gonzo

McLaugh-In!
Prediction laff-o-rama

This was the McLaugh-In to watch this year -- the panel of campaign "geniuses" (a right-leaning gaggle of pundits if ever there was one -- supply-sider Larry Kudlow, Hotline's managing editor Vaughn Ververs, columnist Tony Blankley and American Enterprise Institute's Norm Ornstein) made their predictions for the outcomes of a slew of Senate races.

"Pope" John blessed the following candidates as winners in somewhat (but not too) close races:
Incumbent Max Cleland (D-GA)
Incumbent Tom Harkin (D-SD)
Incumbent Mary Landrieu (D-LA)
Incumbent James Inhofe (R-OK)
Incumbent Gordon Smith (R-OR)
Lindsey Graham (R-SC)
Lamar Alexander (R-TN)

Then -- the races the Grope... er, Group deemed close:

Arkansas -- Sen. Tim Hutchinson (R) vs. State Attorney General Mark Pryor (D)
Larry: Pryor
Norm: Pryor
Tony: Pryor
Vaughn: Pryor -- Hutch's divorce
John: Pryor

Colorado -- Sen. Wayne Allard (R) vs. Tom Strickland (D)
Larry: Allard
Norm: Strickland
Tony: Allard
Vaughn: Allard
John: Allard

Minnesota -- Sen. Paul Wellstone (DFL) vs. Saint Paul Mayor Norm Coleman (R)
Larry: Coleman -- Wellstone's outrageous
Norm: Too close to call
Tony: Coleman -- great ads
Vaughn: Coleman
John: Wellstone

Missouri -- Sen. Jean Carnahan (D) vs. ex-Rep. Jim Talent (R)
Larry: Talent
Norm: A hard one to figure, but Talent
Tony: Talent
Vaughn: Carnahan
John: Talent

New Hampshire -- Rep. John E. Sununu (R) vs. Gov. Jeanne Shaheen (D)
Larry: Shaheen -- the Sununu family hold on NH is weak
Norm: Sununu
Tony: Sununu
Vaughn: Sununu
John: Sununu

New Jersey -- former senator Frank Lautenberg (D) "after the auto-da-fé" vs. Doug Forrester (R)
Larry: Forrester -- because he went to divinity school
Norm: Lautenberg -- unless Forrester drops out and is replaced by James Gandalfini
Tony: Toss-up -- I abstain
Vaughn: Lautenberg, but close
John: Too close to call, however I shift to Lautenberg

South Dakota -- Sen. Tim Johnson (D) vs. Rep. John Thune (R)
Larry: Thune -- Daschle is hurting Johnson!
Norm: Johnson -- Saddam ad backfired
Tony: Johnson -- Thune blew the drought issue, too
Vaughn: Johnson -- Smirk hurts Thune
John: Johnson

Texas -- State attorney General John Cornyn (R) vs. former Dallas mayor Ron Kirk (D)
Larry: Cornyn
Norm: Cornyn
Tony: Cornyn by 6 points
Vaughn: Cornyn
John: Cornyn

So the "group" predicts a Republican pickup of one, making it 50 "R"s, 49 "D"s and 1 "I".

But here's what they forgot to mention: at least one GOP senator may jump ship. We say at least one, referring of course to the well-founded rumors that Dems have made major headway in courting Lincoln Chafee (R-RI) -- but our sources tell us that another GOP senator from the Northeast is giving Lott and Racicot headaches.

We predict Dems will hold the Senate even if the GOP "gains" a seat in elections.

Issue two! The debate on Iraq has triggered the real question: who is the real Democrat leader going into 2004?

John played footage of House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt supporting Smirk's war. Norm Ornstein said that Dick actually enraged Democrat rank-and-file with his support -- but to our surprise, Kudlow said that attacks on other issues are hurting Republicans Vaughn Ververs said that Gephardt was "inoculating" himself for a run.

Then -- footage of Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle talking exhaustion of diplomacy before an Iraq attaq. Is he not going for order over bluster? Vaughn said Daschle is just barely standing. Tony said Daschle's unable to manage the Senate and undercutting Democrat credibility. Kudlow said that Daschle was Hamlet-like in his handling of Iraq, but Norm said he had a tough balancing act and handled it well.

Then -- footage of Joe Lieberman (DINO-CT). Has Lieberman "carefully distinguished himself from the rest of the pack?" Tony predicted a successful war -- which may help Joe. John said that calls for diplomacy go against Lieberman's position -- and Norm said that calls for military action grate against Democrat rank-and-filers. Kudlow tied Joe's position to pro-Israel Jews supporting Smirky.

Then -- Sen. John Kerry (D-MA). Is Kerry being more nuanced than Daschle on the same position? Vaughn said that Kerry has the battlefield credentials and protested against the Vietnam war when he got home.

Then -- Sen. John Edwards (D-NC), with his "arrogance without purpose" speech. Norm said that the speech was incredibly well-crafted; Vaughn called it "me-too-ism".

Then -- "alpha male" Al Gore on placating the far-right wing of the GOP. Has Gore seized the guns issue and the butter issue? Vaughn dissed him as "popping up" and then disappearing -- but John said that Gore was actually paving the way for Gore. Kudlow said that only the left wing of the Dems are with Gore.

So who is taking the most daring position?
Larry: Gephardt
Norm: Gephardt
Tony: Gore
Vaughn: Gephardt
John: Gore

2004 nominee?
Larry (sneeringly): Gore
Norm: Keep your eye on Howard Dean -- he'll make waves but then falter
Tony: Hillary Clinton -- I was right about her Senate run, I'm right on this one
Vaughn: former senator turned New Yorker Bob Kerrey
John: If Gore wants it, the Dems can't deprive it, and he's showing leadership!

We quickly switched channels to catch...

Face the Nation
Rice gets grilled

Bob Schieffer looked a little surly as he introduced the "top" story -- you guessed it: what looks to be the reappearance of the Serial Sniper. You could sense he'd rather dive headfirst into politics, policy, and red-mean punditry -- or would rather be reporting some political news.

So we grabbed a refill on the hi-test, higher-caffeine Hawaiian kona in the APJ coffeemaker while a flustered Schieffer turned to correspondent Joie Chen. CBS poached her from CNN a couple months ago, and she's proving to be a highly capable hard-news correspondent.

Schieffer then welcomed "Doctor Dumbass", failed National Security Advisor Condi Rice, and gave her a chance to push the notion that the sniper could be a terrorist. "Don't close your mind... keep your mind open."

Gladly, Condi -- it will just serve to remind us that you and your posse have done next to nothing to stop Al Qaeda or keep the nation safe from more attacks.

It will also serve to remind us that you ignored the issue up until September 11, 2002. We're open to the notion that (p)Resident Goofus should have cashiered you for the biggest national security failure of the last half-century -- but didn't.

Condi was then forced by Schieffer to confront the North Korean mess. She did NOT look comfortable. Whenever she is put on the spot, you can see her face tense up and her lips stiffen -- and we saw plenty of both for the remainder of the segment. Condi's spin: the nuke agreement with North Korea was "only political."

Oh, give us a break, Condi. "Only political"? Does this apply to any other treaties we abide by? Is this your way of allowing Kim the Nutcase wiggle room?

Rice then said that Smirky's tutors have to consider "our" options, and this is -- catch this -- an opportunity for the international community to close ranks and demand North Korea heel. They've "blown a hole in this political agreement."

Gloria Borger, with a look of "who in hell do you think you're fooling" on her face, suggested that Condi is calling for an international embargo (translation: show us your cards, honey) -- and all Condi could say is that nobody wants North Korea with nukes.

God forbid that Rice should ever negotiate with a foreign power. This rank amateur has GOT to go!

Borger then confronted Condi with the fact that Smirk and friends concealed the facts concerning North Korea's nuke technology for nearly two weeks while the Iraq vote was on. Condi thereupon made a fool of herself by making the absurd claim that this is a "peculiar" view, and His Fraudulence needed "more time" to analyze the situation.

Utter horse hockey. Who do you're think you're fooling, Condi? At the VERY least, Congress should have been consulted -- even if George was playing Hamlet.

What surprised the US, said Condi, was not that there was a program by North Korea to enrich uranium -- what surprised the US is that North Korea admitted it.

And therein lies the problem behind another problem -- North Korea came clean and spoke the truth to the world, and our intelligence community may well have been caught off guard again.

Condi said that unlike Iraq, there is a chance that diplomacy can work with North Korea using international business as a lever. But she also spoke of oil in Iraq -- which only served to remind viewers that when it comes to Iraq, it's all about the oil.

Following the break, Bob welcomed Senators Bob Graham and Dick Lugar. When did Graham find out about North Korea's nuke program? Graham said he found out about it in the paper on Tuesday -- and is concerned that Smirky had to wait two weeks for a recommendation. And yes, Saddam is an enemy -- but is he the only enemy, and do we need a balanced program to deal with all of our potential enemies? There's been too much focus, he said, on Saddam.

Schieffer suggested that the dissemination of the North Korea information was manipulated, and Graham said that he had gotten information about the danger of putting Saddam's "back to the wall" weeks ago (translation: Smirk is playing games here).

Borger asked if there was a double standard -- one for Saddam, one for North Korea -- and Lugar said no; while conventional wisdom says that North Korea made two plutonium bombs in '94, there is the issue of the surrounding nations and how the matter should be handled. In '94, Clinton and defense secretary Parry were prepared to take military action.

Schieffer asked about the threat both Iraq and North Korea pose; Lugar said that one promising development is that China does not want another nuclear power is in their back yard. Graham said that North Korea has missiles with a 1000 mile range, and that they could soon have missiles that can reach the West Coast, while Saddam has limited missile technology. North Korea, he said, poses a larger threat than Iraq to the territorial US.

And that, readers, is the dirty little fact Smirk dare not utter, lest the whole "get Saddam" campaign be exposed for the gross miscalculation it is.

-- JJ Balzer

Dave "Doctor" Gonzo is a disgruntled recording and video producer. He lives in a fortified apartment compound somewhere in Manhattan.

JJ Balzer is a former television news producer. He lives in New York City.