Freed hostage Jill Carroll is being bad-mouthed by some, but after spending three months as a hostage to a group that murdered her translator right in front of her I, like Rusty, am willing to cut her some slack. She's seen a lot of things that none of us ever will, and endured mental stresses none of us will likely ever have to face, so I can excuse the anti-Americanism she expressed in captivity. I suggest that her comments both before and after her ordeal should be viewed through the new prism of her recent experience.

Remind me, howeverÂ… what were Eason Jordan's excuses for coddling terrorists?

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In news related to the five FISA court judge's testimony, competing articles today by Eric Lichtblau of the New York Times and Brian DeBose of the Washington Times paint radically different pictures of the judge's testimony today, with Lichtblau's article making it appear that the five judges were siding against the president, and DeBose stating that the judges said Bush's executive order was legal. Obviously, one is wrong, and possibly being deceptive. The "verdict" from the lawyers of Powerline:

Having reviewed the transcript, I conclude that the Washington Times' characterization was fair, but arguably overstated. The New York Times, however, badly misled its readers...

...New York Times reporter Eric Lichtblau has a considerable career investment (and, I suspect, an ideological investment as well) in the idea that the NSA program is illegal. It would seem that Lichtblau's preconceptions and biases prevented him from accurately reporting what happened in the Judiciary Committee hearing yesterday. His suggestion that the main thrust of the judges' testimony was to "voice skepticism about the president's constitutional authority" is simply wrong; in fact, I can't find a single line in more than 100 pages of transcript that supports Lichtblau's reporting.

Eric Litchblau seems to have either lost his objectivity on this story so completely that he cannot even report facts, or he has made the conscious decision to misrepresent the story to the point of outright fabrication.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 10:55 PM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
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I have a confession to make: I never heard the name "Ben Domenech" until the Washington Post launched the blog Red America several days ago.

Since his first substantial post hit Tuesday, he has generated an outburst of outrage that I haven't seen on the left since... well, since the last one. True to form, the left has engaged in what they call opposition research, what we call dumpster diving, and what Chuck Schumer's office called an isolated incident after the plea deal last week.

And they have scored hits.

They've uncovered what David Brock's Media Matters for America called, "new evidence of Domenech's racially charged rhetoric and homophobic bigotry,” in an effort to have Domenech fired for what they claim are his past views, including the following:

• In a February 7 post on RedState, Domenech wrote that he believed people should be "pissed" that President Bush attended "the funeral of a Communist" -- referring to the funeral for Coretta Scott King. As you know, labeling the King family "communists" was a favorite tool of the racists who opposed them.
• In another RedState post, Domenech compared "the Judiciary" unfavorably to the Ku Klux Klan.
• In still another RedState comment, Domenech posted without comment an article stating that "[i]t just happens that killing black babies has the happy result of reducing crime" and that "[w]hite racists have reason to be grateful for what is sometimes still called the civil rights leadership" because black leaders "are overwhelmingly in support" of abortion rights.
• In yet another, Domenech wrote that conservative blogger/journalist Andrew Sullivan, who is gay, "needs a woman to give him some stability."

I'm sure that David Brock, being honest and not the kind of guy to write a hit piece, would certainly encourage us to look into his charges. Surely, nothing he charges would be hyperbolic, would it?

Let's look at Brock's first charge:

In a February 7 post on RedState, Domenech wrote that he believed people should be "pissed" that President Bush attended "the funeral of a Communist" -- referring to the funeral for Coretta Scott King.

Posting under the screen name "Augustine" on Red State Domenech did in fact call King a communist. As I asked earlier today, whether or not Domenech was right about King's political affiliation, when did communism become a race?

Brock's second charge is even more volatile.

In another RedState post, Domenech compared "the Judiciary" unfavorably to the Ku Klux Klan.

But what exactly did Domenech say? Brock doesn't directly link to the comment, or provide it in context, instead burying it in text of another Media Matters article.

The Red State post and its comments are here, and Domenech's comment is in response to a charge by James Dobson that men in white robes (the Ku Klux Klan) "did great wrong to civil rights to and to morality" and now we have men in black robes (judges) also doing great wrongs to civil rights and morality. [Note: the comment below is the wrong comment. This is Domenech's first comment in this thread, not the one Brock cherry-picked that was far less descriptive and inflammatory. My mistake ofr grabbing the wrong comment. See comments of this post for details.]

Domenech's comment:

Actually, Dobson's soft-pedaling it. The worst black-robed men and women are worse then the KKK, and not just because they have the authority of the state behind them. They don't even use the vile pretense of skin color - they dismiss the value of all unborn lives, not just the lives of ethnic minorities.

Domenech says that the worst judges, with the authority of the state behind them, are more dangerous than is a specific marginalized extremist group. Does anyone dare to argue the absolute truth of that statement?

Domenech then makes an allusion to the millions of children (of all races) aborted since Roe v. Wade was decided. No one can argue the fact that many more lives have been cut short by abortions than by lynchings.

Domenech is 100% factually correct.

Brock's willful misrepresentation of the meaning and context of Domenech's statements are even more offensive than the charges of racism Brock is peddling because the charges are so obviously contrived.

Next.

In still another RedState comment, Domenech posted without comment an article stating that "[i]t just happens that killing black babies has the happy result of reducing crime" and that "[w]hite racists have reason to be grateful for what is sometimes still called the civil rights leadership" because black leaders "are overwhelmingly in support" of abortion rights.

The Dowdified quote Brock provides was Swiftian satire written by Richard John Neuhaus (full article here) about the book "Freakonomics," and the disgusting thought that a high level of minority abortions cuts the crime rate. Domenech himself states:

Neuhaus, one of the most outspoken, respected and influential pro-life intellectuals in America, finds this logic as morally disgusting as I do. He is putting this logic in its bluntest terms to show the full degree of its inhumanity. A few people have noticed this, but for those who are still having trouble, I highly recommend this.

Once again, Brock is guilty of misrepresenting Domenech.

Last and least of Brock's bulleted list of charges:

In yet another, Domenech wrote that conservative blogger/journalist Andrew Sullivan, who is gay, "needs a woman to give him some stability."

Sullivan, is Domenech's target in this post, and he does end with the line Brock cites. According to Technorati, there are no less than 239 posts about Andrew Sullivan freaking out. Sullivan needs something, but the answer is probably not estrogen-based.

In short, Brock presents four bullet-point charges that he states should be reasons for the Washington Post to fire Ben Domenech. Of those four points, Brock catches Domenech using excessive hyperbole once, and projecting a sexuality-based thought against an erratic writer in another instance.

In between these bookends, Brock intentionally misrepresents Domenech not once, but twice.

In living up to his own high standards of moral clarity, I'm sure we'll see David Brock's resignation letter tomorrow.

* * *

Brock's creativity aside, there seems to be a strong argument for Domenech to resign his Washington Post blog, not for the reasons listed above, but for his lack of creativity... and originality.

Apparently Domenech plagiarized the work of P.J. O'Rourke, and maybe others.

Dan Riehl adds:

Frankly, the attack by Media Matters was about as fair, or accurate as the New York Times - not very. However, if any, let alone all, of the charges of alleged plagiarism are deserved, Domenech is an embarrassment to all bloggers, not just conservatives.

Now, even the defense of him I made is in question if he can't produce a link to an original article containing the deficit quote re the above link.

Though apparently a co-founder, I would also encourage RedState to think very seriously about his role as a RedState blogger going forward. If Domenech plagiarized as freely and often as it would appear, there is no excuse for it.

I can forgive someone who runs across a concept and inadvertently "thinks" it at a later date. It can happen. Ripping content, however, word-for-word, line-by-line, post-by-post... if true, that is no mistake.

Hello, Ben. Goodbye.

Update: It Ain't Over, Fat Lady.
John Cole of Balloon Juice, hardly a "Bush loyalist," puts up a spirited defense of Domenech's character while gutting one of the almost incoherently rabid far left blogger Jane Hamsher:

Hell, half the things in that despicable Hamsher post were not even WRITTEN BY BEN. Even as I grow more and more disgusted and sick of the Republican party, I am still amazed at the gutter antics of the rabid left.

I don't agree with Ben Domenech on nearly any social issue, but I have read thousands of his private emails at Red State (we have an Editor's listserv of sorts), spoken with him (via AOL IM) dozens of times, and I have never seen or heard one shred of racism come from him. I think Ben Domeonech is wrong on a lot of things, but he is no racist, and I think the distortion of what Ben has written by Jane and others is outrageous and disgusting.

Nor is the Washington Post willing to show Demenech the door just yet:

Late yesterday, the liberal Web sites Daily Kos and Atrios posted examples of what appeared to be instances of plagiarism from Domenech's writing at the William & Mary student paper. Three sentences of a 1999 Domenech review of a Martin Scorsese film were identical to a review in Salon magazine, and several sentences in Domenech's piece on a James Bond movie closely resembled one in the Internet Movie Database. Domenech said he needed to research the examples but that he never used material without attribution and had complained about a college editor improperly adding language to some of his articles.

The ante has been upped.

Domenech is either going to be proven a serial plagiarist and a liar, or quite a few liberal blogs are going to have to explain to their readers how they were wrong on a very serious charge.

This seems far from over.

Update: What was the last thing I said?
Ben Domenech has resigned.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 12:44 AM | Comments (20) | Add Comment
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The Real Ugly American (hey, he said it, not me) scores an interview with Fred Barnes of the "Beltway Boys," author of Rebel in Chief.

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The local North Carolina news media, and adminstration at UNC Chapel Hill, and even the Daily Tarheel itself do not seem willing to call the "Jeep Jihadi's" Friday afternoon attempt to run down multiple UNC-CH students in the name of Islam an act of terror.

A quick cross-section of local media:

Raleigh, NC News and Observer: The UNC-Chapel Hill graduate charged with driving into a lunchtime campus crowd Friday is scheduled to be in court today, accused of what some students are condemning as an act of terrorism.

Raleigh, NC WRAL-TV: Headline: "Students To Protest UNC's Reluctance To Label Pit Incident Terrorism."

Raleigh-Durham, NC WTVD-TV: Reports on the assualt and the protest and doesn't even use the words "terror" or "terrorism" when describing the attack or the anti-terror protests.

Apparently, when launching an attack from a vehicle, using a bumper as a weapon is somehow different that detonating the same vehicle, or shooting from it into the same crowd. It doesn't matter how many people are injured or even why, but how they are injured that matters.

It isn't the madness that counts, but the method.

Future campus terrorists take note: if you want to be taken more seriously than Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar, be sure to use something more conventional in your attacks, like explosives or automatic weapons. If it doesn't have the Good JihadKeeping Seal of Approval, the liberals in academia and the press just won't give you the credit you deserve.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 01:57 PM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
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