"I'm not a leftist, but I play one on TV" ... Right battles center.

[madfloridian]

Very interesting comments about the "left" and "right" pundits on TV shows, and I find it pretty much the way I feel. The Democratic pundits on the whole are pretty much in the center/right.

http://www.fair.org/extra/0409/not-a-leftist.html

SNIP..."Debates matching conservatives with centrists are a cable television tic so pervasive that a small army of centrist pundits has formed whose motto might as well be, "I'm not a leftist but I play one on TV."

SNIP..."Begala cheers his former boss for turning the party right, away from its traditional liberal base (Meet the Press, 4/11/99): "You know, Bill Clinton saved the Democratic Party with Al Gore by pulling us back to the center, by disagreeing with the liberals on welfare reform and on crime and on trade."

Carville has similar praise for Clinton's centrism (CNBC, 2/23/00): "What he did was a political feat that is unmatched in American political history. He moved the Democratic Party to the center... and kept the core Democratic voters."

Carville's client list raises even more questions about his qualifications as a progressive pundit. He served as a political gun-for-hire for conservative Greek Prime Minister Constantine Mitsotakis in a losing 1993 campaign against socialist Andreas Papandreou (London Times, 10/30/93.) And Carville worked for the Venezuelan opposition in its recent failed attempt to oust President Hugo Chavez, a left-wing populist, in a recall referendum (New York Times, 4/18/04.)"

This is quite long, with paragraphs about Peter Beinart, Joe Klein, Susan Estrich, Chris Matthews, and many others.

I like this comment about the left-leaning magazines:
SNIP..."If the left is so out of favor as to deserve next to no representation, why does the left-leaning Nation magazine lead all American opinion magazines in circulation? With 165,000 subscribers, The Nation not only edges out National Review, the leading right-wing opinion journal (155,000), it trounces the centrist New Republic (61,000). Writers from the New Republic and National Review (and several smaller circulation conservative magazines) appear on national television on a daily basis, while pundits from The Nation and other left-of-center magazines—like Mother Jones, an investigative monthly with a paid circulation of 236,000—appear far less frequently...."

[Lorien]

1. This is why the party needs a major shakeup

had Kerry and Edwards been running in the 1970s, we would have called them Republicans.

[salvorhardin]

2. Exactly!

Kerry is the best Republican candidate running.

[madfloridian]

3. And if we had a real media...those dogs would hunt! I must do this, Jen6.

[NYCGirl]

4. Remember what Michael Moore said about Bill Clinton?

Bill Clinton was the best Republican president we've ever had.
:evilgrin:

[ghostsofgiants]

5. About damn time...

Someone pointed this out. I was watching Crossfire today and the dude on the right was asking why Kerry was so hesitant to call himself a liberal.

Answer: BECAUSE HE ISN'T!

[madfloridian]

6. Bruce Springsteen just spoke eloquently. Opposite of Begala, Carville.

What a difference. He listed our values as a country. I felt I belonged again. When I see some on TV, I know something is wrong. I am not being represented, and I am a moderate. I never moved. But now I am considered leftist because I oppose the war and support a woman's choice.

Sorry, folks, but our country and our party have issue problems. I expect the Republicans to have those issue problems, but not us.

[madfloridian]

7. Interesting statistic....Independent voters increasing.

SNIP..."Increasing numbers of voters do not identify with either of the two dominant parties; according to a 2002 ABC/Washington Post poll, more than a third of the electorate (35 percent) think of themselves as independents, a larger proportion than identified as Democrats (32 percent) or Republicans (28 percent)."

[TahitiNut]

8. Propaganda: "Independents" are midway between left and right.

Nonsense, of course. I'm an independent. I'm to the left of Kerry and Edwards - closer to Kucinich and Sharpton than any of the other Dem primary candidates, but 'lower' and 'lefter' on the Political Compass.

[madfloridian]

9. I have no comment on your chart.

If you believe Sharpton is really that liberal, then you need to check who financed his campaign.

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. Political Compass base the chart on announced positions

not where funding comes from. Most people from DU (and who post their results here, anyway) who take the test show up as more left and libertarian than any of the US political candidates - more like the Dalai Lama.

[Blue_Tires]

10. is there any job more worthless, overused and overhyped

than the 'pundit'?? i get tired of seeing all of them

[Gaffey Duck]

11. Smoother words, nicer suits...

Don't be fooled, they're still wearing jackboots.

[rman]

13. "Socialism, real and fake" (Chomsky)

http://www.zmag.org/chomsky/sam/sam-3-4.html
http://www.zmag.org/chomsky/sam/sam-contents.html