Democrat presidential candidate John Edwards' "blogmaster" - Page 2 - Big Big Forums

Jolie Rouge · 02-09-2007, 01:01 AM

Edwards to retain embattled bloggers
By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards said Thursday he was personally offended by the provocative messages two of his campaign bloggers wrote criticizing the Catholic Church, but he's not going to fire them.

Edwards issued a statement and answered questions about the fate of Amanda Marcotte and Melissa McEwan, two days after the head of the conservative Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights demanded they be fired for messages they wrote before working on the campaign. "I talked personally to the two women who were involved. They gave me their word they, under no circumstances, intended to denigrate any church or anybody's religion and offered their apologies for anything that indicated otherwise. I took them at their word," Edwards told reporters during a campaign stop in Charleston, S.C.

An angry Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League, which counts 350,000 members, criticized Edwards for not firing the two bloggers. Donohue also promised a nationwide public relations campaign in newspapers, magazines and Catholic publications to tell voters what the candidate had done. "When Mel Gibson got drunk and made anti-Semitic remarks, he paid a price for doing so. When Michael Richards got angry and made racist remarks, he paid a price for doing so. ... But John Edwards thinks the same rules don't apply to him, which is why he has chosen to embrace foul-mouthed, anti-Catholic bigots on his payroll," Donohue said.

Edwards has never met the two bloggers and his first conversation with them came when he called to discuss the uproar. The 2004 vice presidential nominee told reporters in South Carolina: "It will not happen again. That you can be sure of."

The campaign distributed written regrets from the two women, who stressed they were writing on personal blogs. Edwards said in the statement he believes in giving everyone a "fair shake."

On Tuesday, Donohue called for Edwards to fire the bloggers, citing posts that the women made in the past several months in which they criticized the church's opposition to homosexuality, abortion and contraception, sometimes using profanity. "The tone and the sentiment of some of Amanda Marcotte's and Melissa McEwan's posts personally offended me," Edwards said in the statement. "Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but that kind of intolerant language will not be permitted from anyone on my campaign, whether it's intended as satire, humor or anything else."

The two were hired last week as part of Edwards' outreach to liberal voters and online activists.

Edwards spokeswoman Jennifer Palmieri said the campaign was aware that Marcotte and McEwan, like many bloggers, had written provocative postings on their personal sites. But the campaign had not read them all and had not seen the postings criticizing the church until Donohue put out a statement Tuesday, Palmieri said.

For instance, Marcotte had written that the church wants "to force women to bear more tithing Catholics" and McEwan had written that the pope is among those who "regularly speak out against gay tolerance." Other postings used more graphic language.

Edwards remained silent for two days as the controversy grew on the Internet. Most of those posting on liberal Web sites were calling for Edwards to keep the bloggers on staff and stand up to Donohue, and many were vowing to work against him if he didn't.

Donohue is a frequent critic of those who speak out against the church and what he calls "political correctness run amok," such as the separation of Christmas and the holiday season.

Donohue also doesn't shy from blunt language sometimes in his criticism of gays, Hollywood's control by "secular Jews who hate Christianity" and even the Edwards bloggers, whom he referred to as "brats" in an interview Wednesday on MSNBC.

Palmieri said Edwards had been traveling through Michigan, Missouri and Oklahoma and wanted time to discuss the bloggers' statements with them and weigh their future. "We're dealing with people's careers and reputations and livelihoods," Palmieri said.

In her statement, McEwan said she doesn't expect Edwards to agree with everything she's posted, but they share "an unwavering support of religious freedom and a deep respect for diverse beliefs."

Marcotte's statement said her writings on religion on her blog, Pandagon, are generally satirical criticisms of public policies and politics.

Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good, a nonprofit formed to highlight Catholic social justice teachings, also issued a statement condemning the bloggers' remarks but accepting Edwards' assurances that he was also offended. "Catholics comprise more than one quarter of the U.S. public, and neither John Edwards nor any other candidate can afford to take this constituency for granted," said executive director Alexia Kelley, who served briefly as a religious adviser to 2004 Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry.

___

Associated Press Writer Bruce Smith in Charleston, S.C., contributed to this report.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070209/...s_bloggers2008

Quote:

Edwards spokeswoman Jennifer Palmieri said the campaign was aware that Marcotte and McEwan, like many bloggers, had written provocative postings on their personal sites. But the campaign had not read them all and had not seen the postings criticizing the church until Donohue put out a statement Tuesday, Palmieri said.

So they are trying to sell the idea that they hired them without ever reading what they actually write ? Is that supposed to inspire confidence ?

I realise that the AP won't put their more *earthy* prose in print because it is so profane, but they are realy whitewashing this ....

Jolie Rouge · 02-13-2007, 12:00 AM

Edwards' blogger resigns
Edwards' blogger resigns
By Michelle Malkin
February 12, 2007 08:42 PM

"Blogmaster" Amanda Marcotte has resigned from the Edwards' campaign. Of course, it's all the right wing's and Catholic activists' fault (a blame-avoidance strategy I highlighted on The O'Reilly Factor tonight before news of Marcotte's resignation broke). Writes Marcotte this evening:
http://pandagon.net/2007/02/12/announcement/

Quote:

I was hired by the Edwards campaign for the skills and talents I bring to the table, and my willingness to work hard for what’s right. Unfortunately, Bill Donohue and his calvacade of right wing shills don’t respect that a mere woman like me could be hired for my skills, and pretended that John Edwards had to be held accountable for some of my personal, non-mainstream views on religious influence on politics (I’m anti-theocracy, for those who were keeping track). Bill Donohue—anti-Semite, right wing lackey whose entire job is to create non-controversies in order to derail liberal politics—has been running a scorched earth campaign to get me fired for my personal beliefs and my writings on this blog.
In fact, he’s made no bones about the fact that his intent is to “silence” me, as if he—a perfect stranger—should have a right to curtail my freedom of speech. Why? Because I’m a woman? Because I’m pro-choice? Because I’m not religious? All of the above, it seems.

Regardless, it was creating a situation where I felt that every time I coughed, I was risking the Edwards campaign. No matter what you think about the campaign, I signed on to be a supporter and a tireless employee for them, and if I can’t do the job I was hired to do because Bill Donohue doesn’t have anything better to do with his time than harass me, then I won’t do it. I resigned my position today and they accepted.

The Associated Press has a typically fair and balanced--not--headline:

Targeted Blogger Quits Edwards Campaign
Feb 12 8:14 PM US/Eastern
By MIKE BAKER -- Associated Press Writer

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2007/02/12/D8N8H2D00.html

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- One of the chief campaign bloggers for Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards quit Monday after conservative critics raised questions about her history of provocative online messages.
Amanda Marcotte posted on her personal blog, Pandagon, that the criticism "was creating a situation where I felt that every time I coughed, I was risking the Edwards campaign." Marcotte said she resigned from her position Monday, and that her resignation was accepted by the campaign.

Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, demanded last week that Edwards fire Marcotte and a second blogger, Melissa McEwan, for remarks he deemed anti-Catholic. Edwards, a former North Carolina senator, called the messages personally offensive, but decided to keep Marcotte and McEwan on staff.

"No matter what you think about the campaign, I signed on to be a supporter and a tireless employee for them, and if I can't do the job I was hired to do because Bill Donohue doesn't have anything better to do with his time than harass me, then I won't do it," Marcotte wrote Monday night.

Marcotte vows revenge

Danny Glover points out: http://beltwayblogroll.nationaljourn...ds_campaig.php

Quote:

Unencumbered by her work for Edwards, she vowed to strike back. "The main good news," Marcotte wrote, "is that I don’t have a conflict of interest issue anymore that was preventing me from defending myself against these baseless accusations. So it’s on."

So much for that sincere apology. http://www.catholic.org/national/nat...y.php?id=23005

Good news for the nutroots: She's free, free again to yell "Jeebus" all she wants! http://pandagon.net/index.php?s=jeebus

As for this being all the fault of conservative bloggers and Catholics, here is a liberal blogger named "Faithful Progressive" at the Christian Alliance for Progress blog, responding to MyDD blogger Matt Stoller's attack on religious lefties who criticized Edwards' initial decision to hire and stand by Marcotte and McEwan: http://blog01.kintera.com/christiana...iberal_bl.html

Quote:

...what I find most disturbing is the absolute unwillingness of people like Mr. Stoller to admit that people on the left can engage in hate speech and can needlessly offend both allies and potential ones just as easily as extremists on the right. Edwards said the quotes offended him, and the bloggers in question have apologized. They have accepted responsibility for their posts. But people like Matt Stoller can only see that the source of the quotes was a bigot himself, so whatever he says should be dismissed--even when there is no dispute that his claims this time were true. There will always be right wingers who will make charges against those on the left--if it's not Bill Donahue, it will be Karl Rove or Michelle Malkin, or Ann Althouse, or--do I need to go on? The press will report their charges and will ignore their bias and past track record. It is naive to think otherwise. What matters is whether or not there is any substance when the mud has been thrown by the designated attack dogs. In this case, there was substance to the charges made.

To deny that is a staggering and disturbing level of moral blindness that, fortunately, appears to be very much a minority and marginal point of view even among the most strident liberal blogs.

Donahue, Rove, Althouse, and Malkin--that's a bizarre group to be lumping together under the banner of united right wingers. But still, Faithful Progressive makes the right point about the nutroots being so blinded by their hatred of their political opponents that they can't see the gobsmackingly obvious substance of the charges against Edwards' unhinged bloggers.

And here was another lefty Democrat critic of Marcotte's, http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmi...rgin_Mary.html quoted at Ben Smith's blog in response to her latest diatribe attacking the Virgin Birth: http://www.professorbainbridge.com/2...ofessiona.html

Quote:

Brian O'Dwyer, a New York lawyer and Irish-American leader, who attacked Edwards the first time round, just came out with a statement:

Quote:

"The blogger’s continuing hostility to Catholics and other Christians, especially in the centrality of the Virgin birth, is both morally wrong and, for Senator Edwards, politically stupid. Senator Edwards was horribly flawed in refusing to see the importance of how offensive the blogger’s earlier comments were to people of faith. This latest so-called review, published after Edwards refused to fire her for earlier anti-Catholic writings, should now wake him up and lead him to finally do the right thing as his campaign tries to move forward. Bigotry of any kind should have no role in the Democratic Party, or in any presidential campaign."

O'Dwyer, also, is hard to cast as a GOP hitman. He's the chairman of the National Democratic Ethnic Leadership Council, the Democratic Party's official white-ethnic grouping; close to some labor union leaders; and a leading member of a prominent New York democratic family.

Jolie Rouge · 02-13-2007, 12:08 AM

More reax:

Ed Morrissey: http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/...ves/009150.php

Quote:

Contrary to her assertion that we "right wing shills don’t respect that a mere woman like me could be hired for my skills," we Catholics drew attention to the fact that she engages in vituperative and demeaning attacks on religion and that Edwards appeared to have endorsed that by hiring her.

Along the exact same lines, I would have criticized a Republican dumb enough to hire Fred Phelps* as a spokesperson, as would Marcotte herself. She simply refuses to accept the fact that she wrote incendiary and bigoted essays about Christians and embarrassed Edwards by agreeing to work for him after doing so.

Jeff Goldstein: http://proteinwisdom.com/index.php?/weblog/entry/22375/

Quote:

Sadly, it seems, Marcotte hasn’t learned anything from this experience. Instead, she continues to see conspiracies rather than geniune outrage—and in so doing, she continues to lean on the crutch of her collective rather than taking a good hard look at her method of discourse.

Patterico: http://patterico.com/2007/02/12/5816/marcotte-resigns/

Quote:

Yes, I’ve said the f-word myself. Many, many times. And plenty of other profane words to boot. I’m not a Puritan and don’t pretend to be.
And if a presidential candidate ever hired me (ha!), and he was seeking the vote of the crucial long-haired-stoner-resembling-Shaggy’s-unkempt-cousin constituency, or the dishonest-self-righteous-innuendo-spreading-sock-puppet-lefty-lawyer constituency . . . well, I’d sit him down before he hired me, and warn him about a few things.

Marcotte alienated constituencies a little wider than this. Just to take one example, she bagged on every anti-abortion Christian in the country, branding them all as misogynists. If Edwards didn’t know about this, she should have been savvy enough to tell him. It’s not all about the f-word, it’s about how it’s employed.

Jim Treacher:

Quote:

Marcotte didn't mention the Catholic Democratics who are unhappy with her, presumably because they're just dupes of the right-wing spin machine (which really tones the thighs, glutes, and calves).

Jolie Rouge · 02-14-2007, 12:49 AM

A Shred More Class

Melissa McEwan of Shakespeare's Sister has followed Amanda Marcotte in resigning from the John Edwards Presidential train wreck: http://shakespearessister.blogspot.c...ouncement.html

Quote:

I understand that there will be progressive bloggers who feel I am making the wrong decision, and I offer my sincerest apologies to them. One of the hardest parts of this decision was feeling as though I'm letting down my peers, who have been so supportive.

There will be some who clamor to claim victory for my resignation, but I caution them that in doing so, they are tacitly accepting responsibility for those who have deluged my blog and my inbox with vitriol and veiled threats. It is not right-wing bloggers, nor people like Bill Donohue or Bill O'Reilly, who prompted nor deserve credit for my resignation, no matter how much they want it, but individuals who used public criticisms of me as an excuse to unleash frightening ugliness, the likes of which anyone with a modicum of respect for responsible discourse would denounce without hesitation.

This is a win for no one.

I don't think I've read enough of her blog to know much about McEwan, but I can say this: she exhibited more class and dignity than Marcotte, even as I find it somewhat ironic that someone who calls my fellow Christians "christofascists" accuses others of unleashing "frightening ugliness, the likes of which anyone with a modicum of respect for responsible discourse would denounce without hesitation."

They did denounce the frightening ugliness, Melissa. You should know.

You wrote much of it yourself.

http://confederateyankee.mu.nu/archives/215551.php

As usual, guess who's getting blamed. http://www.mydd.com/story/2007/2/13/185748/467

More blame-the-messenger hysterics and hyperbole at--where else?--HuffPo. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lane-h...l_b_41171.html

Bryan Preston responds to McEwan's claims of hate mail and death threats:
http://hotair.com/archives/2007/02/13/mcewans-out-too/

Quote:

Blogs in general have a collective new dent thanks to the promotion of two of its worst to positions where they would attract mainstream coverage and attention. The credibility of better, more reasonable bloggers on both sides will suffer for this episode. And to the extent that the two actually received threats, it’s deplorable and unacceptable. Around here at Hot Air, we know that feeling all too well.

Once again, the Associated Press plays spin doctor for the nutroots--blaming conservatives for turning "Christofascist"-basher Melissa McEwan into a victim while ignoring increasing criticism from religious liberals and Democrats:

Quote:

A second blogger working for Democratic presidential prospect John Edwards quit Tuesday under pressure from conservative critics who said her previous online messages were anti-Catholic.

Melissa McEwan wrote on her personal blog, Shakespeare's Sister, that she left the campaign because she was becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the level of attention focused on her and her family. "This was a decision I made, with the campaign's reluctant support, because my remaining the focus of sustained ideological attacks was inevitably making me a liability to the campaign," she said Tuesday night.

McEwan's resignation comes just one day after another blogger, Amanda Marcotte, left the Edwards staff for similar reasons.

Danny Glover: And then there were none. http://beltwayblogroll.nationaljourn...ds_blogger.php

Jolie Rouge · 02-15-2007, 10:35 AM

Edwards shouldn't let campaign get blogged down
Froma Harrop / Syndicated columnist

Some of John Edwards' helpers have been busy, busy, busy insulting about 44 percent of the American electorate. The Democratic presidential candidate should have fired two bloggers who trashed Christian conservatives in general and Catholics in particular, but didn't. Democrats have to get real tough with these people.

The former senator from North Carolina understandably wants a big presence on the blogs. They attract lots of young people who don't subscribe to Newsweek but would probably vote for Democrats, if they voted. So it seems good strategy to throw raucous online parties for this often politically disengaged group. The wise candidate will come as a guest, however, not the host.

Edwards seemed too smart to let loose-cannon bloggers muck up his campaign. But he hired as his net-roots coordinator Melissa McEwan, who thought it a good idea to tar Christian conservatives as "Christofascists" on her personal blog, Shakespeare's Sister. Another blogger on the payroll, Amanda Marcotte, wrote on the Pandagon Web site that the Catholic Church opposed birth control "to force women to bear more tithing Catholics."

The Edwards campaign should have put McEwan and Marcotte on the next bus home. Instead, it issued an apology on their behalf and told them to soldier on. Perhaps Edwards feared dissing the youthful blogo-sphere community, which prides itself on uncensored discourse. Perhaps he figured that his ability to deliver a populist message in a Southern accent would cancel any offense. Still.

And Republicans have their blogging big mouths. John McCain's campaign employs Patrick J. Hynes, who insists on declaring that the United States is a "Christian nation." After the Arizona senator hired him, Hynes put a picture of Rep. Henry Waxman, Democrat of California, on his Web site and asked readers to provide nicknames. Several responded with anti-Semitic slurs, which Hynes dutifully let pass.

To run a netroots campaign is to slog into a politically dangerous place. Many online communities are sealed worlds in which everyone uses the same expletives and shares the same radical thoughts. Some blogmasters may think that their large number of hits represents like-minded followers, when it's just tourists gawking at an outrageous show.

Like members of any self-contained group, the Web-site activists may start thinking they're the norm. In the past, their crazy talk would have stayed in the drunken confines of late-night partying. Now it can be examined by anyone with an Internet connection.

(There's also a lot of double-agentry going on. Bloggers intending harm sometimes pose as allies. They say awful things that sound supportive but actually make enemies in the outside world. So-called journalists find this stuff and quote it as representative of a politician's followers.)

Ned Lamont was very much a political moderate, but his message couldn't break free of the lefty bloggers who helped launch his campaign. Shortly after his stunning Connecticut primary victory over the Democratic incumbent, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, Lamont ran ads that prominently showcased Markos Moulitsas, founder of DailyKos.

I asked Lamont whether he would put distance between himself and the leftist blogs, and he responded: "I think they're a great neighborhood to be in. It's like an enormous bulletin board." He also conceded that he was new to the blogosphere culture.

Lamont wasn't even paying Moulitsas, yet the Lieberman campaign managed to link him to the profane language and radical politics of DailyKos. That may partly account for Lamont's failure to pick up enough independent votes to win.

Once a campaign starts stroking checks to bloggers, they're sharing a bed. So while the blogs remain great hunting grounds for Democratic voters, candidates must choose their online partners with great care.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/htm..._harrop13.html