Mendacious Mouthpiece for Myopic Morons

I can't avoid the agency of alliteration, when indulging in a retributive rhetorical rejoinder with Michelle Malkin. The younger Asian version of Ann Coulter, who hates the Phillipines, land of her ancestors. Last night she made an appearence on HardBall, and Tweety, who seems to have momentarily forgotten which side the bread is buttered on, was a bit antagonistic, and MM isn't pleased. You see, (and I'm reasonabley sure you have, here, here, over here, etc) Michelle went on the show to propogate inuendo and Matthews to his credit was having none of it. The talking point she held on to like a pitbull was the loaded phrase "self inflicted wound". Words and phrases can have a variety of meanings and in many cases this is not a problem because meaning is sifted through context. Some times though you like to use loaded phrasing to impugn your enemy. To the target audience "self inflicted wound" is supposed to mean shot himself to get out of combat at worse, or to suggest incompetance in deployment of the weapon at best (Coulter's slander of Cleland comes to mind.

Hopefully that army of fighing strawmen will have her back, but lets start with her side of the story. With a column titled: AMBUSH JOURNALISM...OR MY EVENING WITH CAVEMAN CHRIS MATTHEWS which makes clear that she intends to keep the high ground and avoid the ad-hominem:

Here's a peek behind the cable TV curtain. It's not pretty.

So, my publicist arranges for me to go on MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews on Thursday night to talk about my recent columns on the FBI and national security profiling and my new book. Despite the show's basement ratings, we figure it's a good opportunity to reach out to a new audience. FOX News, with whom I have a contract, has generously allowed me to appear on some competing networks to talk about the book. Thursday was the second to the last day that I could make such appearances.

A few hours before the show, a producer calls to tell me I will be on for two segments--the first topic will be the Swift Boat Veterans, the second topic will be related to the book. Fine. This is the news business. I understand the need to go with the flow and cover the hot issues of the day. I am prepared to discuss both topics.

Oh the generosity, to appear on a show who's ratings are in the basement, I can see why you thought they would be more respectfull of your journalistic and intellectual integritude, specially since you have a contract with the network of deceptive dissemination, darling.

As I am seated at the table with Matthews, who I am meeting for the first time, he cracks a joke--and not in a well-meaning way--about how I look. (There are quite a few people who are hung up on this.) "Are you sure you are old enough to be on the show? What are you? 28?" I grit my teeth. He badgers me again with the same question. I politely answer his question and supply my age.

(I wonder how Matthews' wife, the respected TV journalist Kathleen Matthews, who hosts a show about working women, would react if informed about her husband's treatment of a fellow female journalist. I've been in the business a dozen years and would be happy to talk to Mrs. Matthews about my firsthand experience with Neanderthal chauvinism in the workplace.)

She's good, she takes a swipe at Atrios, tries to drag tweetys wife into the fray and insults good neanderthals everywhere. And she thinks she belongs to the party of moral turpetude, she conveniently seems to forget that a little bit of grab ass (aka Neanderthal chauvinism) forced the retirement of Senator Bob Packwood,

2) When I tried to make a point about how the mainstream media ought to subject John Kerry to as much skull-pounding interrogation as private citizens such as Swift Boat Vet Larry Thurlow had endured from Matthews and the Washington Post, Matthews cut me off and snorted that he had never been thought of as "mainstream." Yeah, keep snorting.

3) In response to Matthews' claim that the Swift Boat Vets campaign was orchestrated by the White House, I noted that the Boston Globe--hardly a hothouse of GOP operatives--had raised many of the same questions about Kerry's war record as the Swift Boat Vets had. No response from Matthews.

Can we hook up this spinning top to a turbine. Michelle would you like some chees and apples with that whine, Oh poor Lulu, embracing the victimhood that is a staple of conservative crybaby's everywhere. And poor Larry Thurlow, who was just trying to malign the character of a presidential canditate, with no intention of profit. Lets get on with the transcript of the show

MATTHEWS: Do you think Massachusetts politics is softball?

BROWN: I think Massachusetts politics is always been very respectful of the other person‘s view and very committed to the idea they don‘t want to seem negative and they don‘t want to be criticized for an absence of integrity.

MALKIN: He is a boy in the bubble, Chris. And...

MATTHEWS: What does that mean?

MALKIN: He hasn‘t been subjected to this kind of heat. And as Willie Brown is suggesting, if he can‘t stand the heat from his fellow veterans, do we really want to trust him to stand up to Islamic extremists?

By the way, it‘s not just—not just these right wingers who have been questioning his record. The “Boston Globe” isn‘t, aren‘t operatives of the Bush campaign and they have said the same thing as the veterans did about all three incidents regarding the purple hearts. You were hammering Larry Thurlow about specific name.

BROWN: He volunteered twice. He volunteered twice in Vietnam. He literally got shot. There‘s no question about any of those things. So what else is there to discuss? How much he got shot, how deep, how much shrapnel?

MALKIN: Well, yes. Why don‘t people ask him more specific questions about the shrapnel in his leg. They are legitimate questions about whether or not it was a self-inflicted wound.

No Michelle they are not legitimate questions. At best they are loaded questions e.g. "have you stopped beating your wife?" at worst they are a repetition of unfounded accusation from people with questionable motives, and that's as charitable as I can put it. Thus begins the decent into lunacy, and the attempted hot beef injection of the ambiguous phrase, "self-inflicted wound"

MATTHEWS: What do you mean by self-inflicted? Are you saying he shot himself on purpose? Is that what you‘re saying?

MALKIN: Did you read the book...

MATTHEWS: I‘m asking a simple question. Are you saying that he shot himself on purpose.

MALKIN: I‘m saying some of these soldiers...

MATTHEWS: And I‘m asking question.

MALKIN: And I‘m answering it.

MATTHEWS: Did he shoot himself on purpose.

MALKIN: Some of the soldiers have made allegations that these were self-inflicted wounds.

MATTHEWS: No one has ever accused him of shooting himself on purpose.

MALKIN: That these were self-inflicted wounds.

Pardon me, but I think that this is a very simple question and no Michelle, you are not answering it. Did JK shoot himself on purpose? A very simple question, to which your answer could come in three forms; 1. Yes. 2. No. or 3. I don't know. See how easy that is. You could simply answer the question and then discuss the definition of "self inflicted wounds" and then argue whether there was anything other than hearsay to substantiate these claims. But then you would lose the intended effect of the accusation, which is to paint Kerry with a cowards brush. And paint Michelle must.
Back to Lulu's column:

Matthews frantically stuffed words down my mouth when I raised these allegations made in Unfit for Command that Kerry's wounds might have been self-inflicted. In his ill-informed and ideologically warped mind, this transmogrified into me accusing Kerry of "shooting himself on purpose" to get an award.

I repeated that the allegations involved whether the injuries were "self inflicted wounds." I DID NOT SAY HE SHOT HIMSELF ON PURPOSE and Chris Matthews knows it.

You avoided that statement like the plague, yet not once did you answer his direct question in the negative. Cry as much as you like little girl, but your intention was to leave the impression that Kerry shot himself on purpose, please don't try to deny this.
Your reason for appearing on the show simply put, was to leave people with the impression that Kery was a coward, period. That tweety declined to play your game and challenged you is your problem. I know you though "but I thought it would be like Fox - they wouldn't challenge my mendacitude there" I know so dissapointing when you are used to a stacked deck and find out that you actually have to play fair every once in a while, at least you can ply your trade unchallenged over at Fox, Town Hall, Regnery Publishing, so please quit yer bitchin'.

Only someone who had not read Unfit for Command would interpret what I was saying the way Matthews did. The book raises questions by vets, many of whom were with Kerry, about whether there was or wasn't enemy fire during the Dec. 1968 incident that led to his first Purple Heart

Bullshit bitch, Matthews knew exactly what you were trying to do and called you on it.
Only someone who had not read "Mein Kampf" would interpret.............................
Only someone who had not read Jenson's the "Bell Curve"..........................................
Only someone who had not read "yet another nutjob theory".......................................
When the integrity of a source is less than solid, one might wish to distance herself from that which might impugn her integrity.

MATTHEWS: I want a statement from you on this program, say to me right, that you believe he shot himself to get credit for a purpose of heart.

MALKIN: I‘m not sure. I‘m saying...

MATTHEWS: Why did you say?

MALKIN: I‘m talking about what‘s in the book.

MATTHEWS: What is in the book. Is there—is there a direct accusation in any book you‘ve ever read in your life that says John Kerry ever shot himself on purpose to get credit for a purple heart? On purpose?

MALKIN: On.

MATTHEWS: On purpose? Yes or no, Michelle.

MALKIN: In the February 1969 -- in the February 1969 event.

MATTHEWS: Did he say on it purpose.

MALKIN: There are doubts about whether or not it was intense rifle fire or not. And I wish you would ask these questions of John Kerry instead of me.

Just answer the question Michelle, OK I'll do it for you. No, I have only unsubstantiated rumors from a highly questionable source that alledge all kinds of nefarious "plans" and "suspicious activities" of a vietnam veteran, but thats enough for me. Because I think that it is OK for Muslim Americans to sacrifice their liberty in exchange for my security.