On What Planet Has Richard Cohen of the WaPo Been Living?

[paineinthearse]

http://www.conyersblog.us/archives/00000264.htm

Blogged by JC on 10.04.05 @ 08:33 PM ET

Richard Cohen of the Post on DeLay, Bennett -- What Planet Has he Been Living On?

It is a further sign of the rightward lurch of the Washington Post when Richard Cohen can write that its the Democrats' fault for criticizing the corrupt DeLay Republicans and the racist remarks of Bob Bennett. But that still doesn't make it right, and today Cohen was way off the mark.

First, he complains that Democratic Leader Pelosi should not have responded to the first DeLay indictment (there was no mention of the new charges brought yesterday) by decrying the GOP "culture of corruption." This he declares, is ignoring the presumption of innocence in our society. My response is, did Cohen not read his own paper's story about the K Street Project? Has he not observed that lobbyists are now writing the bills and setting the strategy on the Hilll and in the White House? Is he not aware of the special interest provisions dropped into the Energy Bill, the Homeland Security Bill, the Medicare bill (not to mention the arm twisting) or the Appropriations Bills, or seen how the credit card industry rammed through the Bankruptcy Bill? What we have in legal parlance, is a "pattern and practice," and for Pelosi to have ignored it, would have been to have ignored the "elephant in the room." If anyone is ignoring the presumption of guilt in our society, its the GOP which is pushing mandatory DNA testing for all arrested, but not convicted individuals, gutting habeas corpus, seeking to issue warrants and writetaps without judicial review, and attacking our independent judiciary.

Second, Cohen tears after myself, and Senator Reid and Rep. Pelosi for having the temerity to criticize Bob Bennet for his now infamous remarks regarding aborting Black babies. Cohen falls for the red herring about Bennett's creative thought experiments regarding abortion which Bennett later decrities. In doing so, Cohen misses the point completely -- Bennett is linking "Black" with "Crime," and in doing so reinforces the worst kind of stereotype. Cohen somehow argues that we're missing the great marketplace of ideas, when all Reid and Pelosi did was enter the market place and condemn one particularly repugnant idea -- equating Black with crime. I did call for a suspension of Bennett's show until we could at least get a chance to ask Salem Radio what was up. After all, they only broadcast by virtue of the public airwaives, so they are at least supposed to have some semblance of public responsibility. I must ask, where was Cohen when the Republicans were demaoguing the Janet Jackson "wardrobe malfunction," or passing constitutional amendments to limit freedom of speech via their flag desecration amendments?

Next time Cohen tries to lecture Democrats on the First Amendment, I suggest he consider the facts and the context of what we're saying and the times we have been living in under the last ten years of iron-fisted, special interest dominated, and First amendment hostile GOP rule?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/03/AR2005100301492.html



This Is the Free-Speech Party?

By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, October 4, 2005; A23

There are times when I sorely miss boilerplate -- those entirely predictable statements made by politicians that often begin with the word "frankly," then proceed to the phrase "I don't think the American people want," and conclude with a thundering banality that a drowsy dog could see coming. That was especially the case last week when I started reading what Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader in the House of Representatives, had to say about Tom DeLay, her Republican opposite. I fully expected boilerplate, something about innocent until proved guilty. But Pelosi crossed me up. DeLay, as it turned out, was guilty until proved innocent.

"The criminal indictment of Majority Leader Tom DeLay is the latest example that Republicans in Congress are plagued by a culture of corruption at the expense of the American people," Pelosi said -- apparently forgetting to add the boilerplate about the American system of justice. If she had those thoughts, they're not on her Web site and not mentioned anywhere. Instead, the reference to a Republican "culture of corruption" shows that when it comes to a punctilious regard for the legal process, in this instance the Democrats ain't got no culture at all. This is an example of why the Democratic Party is in such trouble. Democrats are aping what Newt Gingrich once did to them when he was speaker of the House, a leader of the GOP and a self-proclaimed dazzling revolutionary. His incessant cry of "Corruption! Corruption!" helped end Democratic rule of Congress, but it was accompanied -- Democrats seem to forget -- by an idea or two and by emerging Republican majorities in the country as a whole. Stinging press releases alone do not a revolution make.

For prominent Democrats, it seemed it was not enough to forget their manners about DeLay. They then abandoned their party's tradition -- I would say "obligation" -- of defending unpopular speech by piling on William Bennett, the former education secretary, best-selling author and now, inevitably, talk show host. Responding to a caller who argued that if abortion were outlawed the Social Security trust fund would benefit -- more people, more contributions, was the apparent (idiotic) reasoning -- Bennett said, sure, he understood what the fellow was saying. It was similar to the theory that the low crime rate of recent years was the consequence of high abortion rates: the fewer African American males born, the fewer crimes committed. (Young black males commit a disproportionate share of crime.) This theory has been around for some time. Bennett was not referring to anything new. But he did add something very important: If implemented, the idea would be "an impossible, ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do." He should have saved his breath. Prominent Democrats -- Harry Reid in the Senate, John Conyers and Rahm Emanuel in the House and, of course, Pelosi -- jumped all over him. Conyers wanted Bennett suspended from his radio show. Emanuel said Bennett's comments "reflect a spirit of hate and division." Pelosi said Bennett was out of the mainstream, and Reid simply asked for an apology.

Actually, it is Reid and the others who should apologize to Bennett. They were condemning and attempting to silence a public intellectual for a reference to a theory. It was not a proposal and not a recommendation -- nothing more than a possible explanation. But the Democrats preferred to pander to an audience that either had heard Bennett's remarks out of context, or merely thought that any time conservatives talk about race, they are being racist. The Democrats' obligation as politicians, as public officials, to see that we all hear the widest and richest diversity of views was suspended in favor of partisan cheap shots. (The spineless White House also refused to defend Bennett.) Because I came of age in the McCarthy era, I have always thought of the Democratic Party as more protective of free speech and unpopular thought than the Republican Party. The GOP was the party of Joe McCarthy, William Jenner and other witch-hunters. Now, though, it is the Democrats who use the pieties of race, ethnicity and gender to stifle debate and smother thought, pretty much what anti-intellectual intellectuals did to Larry Summers, the president of Harvard University, when he had the effrontery to ask some unorthodox questions about gender and mathematical aptitude. He was quickly instructed on how to think. A little boilerplate would do the Democrats good. It's never bad to remind the American people that an indictment is not equivalent to conviction and speech is not free if it's going to cost you your job. These spitball press releases, these demeaning zingers, only tend to highlight the GOP argument that the Democrats are out of ideas. If so, I have one to offer them: Think.

Mr. Cohen can be reached at [e-mail]

[TaleWgnDg]

1. This blog commentary is way the hell off base . . .

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This blog commentary is way the hell off base . . . and it demonstrates someone who cannot (or will not) understand the distinction between an opinion-editorial (op-ed) article and a journalism article written in a newspaper! Again and again I see this on msg boards and blogs across the internet.

An op-ed piece does not demonstrate the opinions of the newspaper or of the editorial pages. Instead, an op-ed piece is the sole opinion of the author of the article. Newspapers have op-ed pages for this very reason! To include various points of view, period.

.

[paineinthearse]

5. Wiki says Cohen is "a syndicated columnist for the Washington Post..."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Cohen_%28Washington_Post%29

Richard Cohen (Washington Post)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Richard Cohen, a syndicated columnist for the Washington Post, is a graduate of Far Rockaway High School and attended Hunter College, NYU and Columbia. He was a four-time honorable-mention winner in Pulitzer Prize competitions (he doesn't know if that's a record, but says it's his personal best). Cohen splits his time between Washington, D.C. and New York City.

Email: [e-mail]
This article about a journalist is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

[TaleWgnDg]

6. paineinthearse, that may well be . . .

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paineinthearse, that may well be; however, take a gander at . . . how he self-describes and how the washingtonpost.com describes him re the .gif to his own article as its posted on the washingtonpost.com website:


(see also: the OP post for the same .gif header)

Also, the content of his article that was posted in the OP was op-ed in content, not journalism in content.
.

[paineinthearse]

7. I understand he is an op-ed writer

...and identified him as such. What's the issue?

[loudsue]

2. I LOVE John Conyers!!!

:loveya: I wish EVERY SINGLE DEM IN WASHINGTON had even half the sense that Conyers has. :applause:

We need more like him, but I'm sure glad we at least have him!!!

:kick:

[depakid]

3. Pravda on the Potomac

and equivical writers like Richard Cohen are the reason that the Post has lost all respect and credibility- to the point where it must really be embarassing to admit that you work there.

People in grad school literally laugh at some of the things the Post had published over the last several years. Frankly, I'd be extremely hesitant to cite them in any of the papers that I write- and would NEVER rely on them for factual information.

How sad. Katherine Graham must be rolling over in her grave.

[Der Blaue Engel]

4. John Conyers tells it like it is

I love him too. :loveya:

Off base? Not a bit. It is clear when a paper consistently prints a certain type of editorial that they have a bias, and I'm glad he called them on it.