SOMETHING'S HAPPENING HERE, IT'S A BEAUTIFUL DAY

What is Chris Matthews doing playing gratis campaign ads for John Kerry? He returns from the 7:40 commercial with a Hardball-edited thirty-second music video featuring Buffalo Springfield over Vietnam-era snapshots of Kerry, which then segues to U2's Beautiful Day over video of Kerry on a motorcycle and on the trail.

Bob Kerrey, late of the Senate, now of the New Schoool, said immediately: "That gave me a chill."

Maybe Matthews has done a similar spot for Bush -- with what songs, I wonder -- but I've missed it. But in any case, it's empty filler that should be conduct unbecoming an allegedly newsworthy program. Chris Matthews, you're still no Tim Russert.

IMMANENTRIOSING THE ESCHATON

Here's a short piece in the Philadelphia Magazine about the anonymous blogger Atrios, of the anti-conservative "Eschaton," that treats him like an international spy while quoting him at his vitriolic worst. And what's more, he is, apparently, influential. Among his attributed victims:

Trent Lott, who succumbed to the flames of a scandal that was fanned in large part by Atrios and a few other bloggers. Tell that to Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard, who -- when he lamely tried to smear gay Episcopalian bishop Gene Robinson -- was outed by Signorile and Atrios as a board member of a conservative Episcopalian group. Atrios specializes in scoops that reporters should be digging up but don't.

As far as I remember, Josh Marshall and Andrew Sullivan were the first to put the Lott situation under the mainstream media's noses. I know Atrios is widely read, and you can cite him, but it should be frowned upon. Those columnists who do quote him -- Paul Krugman is an example given -- are partisan hacks themselves. As for "outing" Barnes as an Episcopalian, whatever the merit of his Robinson critique, I find it befuddling to his Episcolalianism disqualifies him from having an opinion. Atrios specializes in scoops that others are taking seriously.

Atrios is a bully -- no different from Ann Coulter, Al Franken, Michael Savage or Michael Moore. He's just a jerk. That vitriolic worst was calling Republicans "bigoted assholed bastard fuckheads." Persuasive! I suppose there's a market for this sort of thing, but if Armed Prophet ever uses the above phrase, please ask Blogger to have this account removed.

P.S. I'll give the author some credit -- he did call Krugman an "attack pundit."

P.P.S. Yet, I should admit, Democratic congressional candidates advertise on it. I urge the Democrats of Georgia's 12th District to vote against John Barrow, and for those of Ohio's 3rd to vote against Jane Mitakides.

P.P.P.S. If you get the title, go ahead and pat yourself on the back.

A WOLF AT THE DOOR

At New York Magazine, it's usually wannabe mogul Michael Wolff who gets the most ink outside the pages of New York, but this week progressive feminist Naomi Wolf is making waves with an article slamming Yale for not doing something it couldn't about a case of alleged sexual harassment (or at any rate, rudeness) on the part of the likewise well-inked professor Harold Bloom. And it isn't making the kind of waves she intended.

The issue date hasn't even come yet -- March 1 -- but already there are two devastating takedowns of Wolf's arguments and their consequences, one by Slate editor Meghan O'Rourke and another by former Slate writer now-Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum. I haven't read much of O'Rourke, but I respect Applebaum a lot. And I'll leave it to them. By virtue of my XY chromosome, I have no right to think I can understand what it is to be oppressed like the modern American woman. I've been told this by Naomi Wolf-types for years, and who am I to question? I am, after all, a man (boo! hiss!).

Is there anyone else out there qualified to comment? Michelle Cottle, are you there?

P.S. Against my better judgment, Maureen Dowd is welcome, too. There's very little to recommend her, but among the few instances are her columns taking to task the Gloria "One Grope" Steinem feminists to task during the Clinton years. Maybe she has another one like those in her.

A CLARK POSTSCRIPT

All right. During the last few weeks I celebrated my victory over Ret. Gen. Wesley Clark Sr., albeit offline. Had I been posting at that time, I might have torn him apart in a mildly vicious post-mortem. Instead I counted to ten and the urge passed. But then just last week, after Clark had done right by his party and endorsed -- nay, heaped praise on -- the opponent he'd maligned so relentlessly, a couple of random Clark items caught my eye. This time I counted to ten, then twenty, without any noticeable change. So I held on to the clips in question, and here we go:

I. The first is the astonishing and so far mostly unreported revelation that Clark has decided to retain his delegates going into the convention. When he did so early last week, he had already endorsed John Kerry and campaigned with him. So what's he want these delegates for? Shouldn't he be directing them to vote for the candidate he supports? Well, it seems the candidate he supports the most is still Wesley Clark. Here's what he wrote in his letter announcing this to DNC chairman Terry McAuliffe:

I write to inform you that I wish to suspend my candidacy ... effective immediately. As of this date, I believe I have earned the right to be represented at the 2004 Democratic National Convention by 63 delegates pledged to support my candidacy ... It is my understanding that I will retain the right to be so represented during the pendency of my campaign's suspension. ... If for any reason you believe that any of the foregoing is inaccurate, or if you require any further filing from my campaign, I request that you contact my attorney.

What's he trying to do, use his delegates to bargain for more time at the convention, as Howard Dean is sure to do? That is, haggle with the nominee whom he continues to campaign for, has nothing but public phrase for, and understandably wants a Cabinet-level appointment from? Well, that's my best guess.

In any case, what's really astonishing about this is not that Clark would be so duplicitous, but that this hasn't made the newspapers, even in coverage about Kerry, nor (I believe) has it made the blogs. It should be relevant to coverage of Kerry -- it would be a worthy addition to the mounting evidence that Democrats themselves are hardly attached to him. But about Clark, it's not much of a surprise -- the man never displayed any loyalty or integrity.

He helped raise money for Bush yet within the year was, to the specific phrasing, questioned his patriotism. He tried to talk his way out of previous commitments and statements before and after he became an official candidate -- on the war, on who called him about Iraq shortly after 9/11 and others.

Like Dean, whose antipathy for Kerry is manifest, Clark has only "suspended" his candidacy. I'm not sure Kerry wants Clark on his side in a battle.

II. The second item is an op-ed by Washington Monthly editor Paul Glastris for the New York Times -- promoting a longer feature in his own magazine. Glastris' central theme is that sure, Dean's Internet thing was neat, but in "crucial ways, however, General Clark's candidacy changed not only this election but also elections to come." (Emphasis mine. Besides, the Times hasn't warmed up to boldface yet.)

Glastris purports to offer a handful of justifications for this over-the-top assertion. One statement -- the why of it I'll get to in a minute -- is that "Clark made national security the crux of his campaign." Really? I still have no idea what Clark's position on the war is. From his hawkish and Bush-praising Times of London op-ed early in 2003 to his repeated condemnations of the war and Bush-insulting, I think it's hard to say anybody thought he had gravitas -- except maybe liberal Beltway pundits who wanted a fresher version of Kerry.

But assuming Glastris is right, this is so important because "if a candidate could persuade voters that they would be safer he would be able to interest them in other issues like the economy or health care." He must be kidding, because Clark himself has joked about launching his campaign without any position papers. And it showed, no less than when he said there should be absolutely no restrictions on abortion whatsoever, a position much further left of his fellow Democrats field, excepting Al Sharpton. Then a few days later he muddied up his position while talking to reporters, and was gone from the race before it could come up again. And when he did talk policy, accounts of his stumping in New Hampshire were decidedly cool.

But Glastris doesn't get this. He's too busy getting excited about his belief that Clark brought credibility to the party on foreign policy, and that factor explains why primary voters ditched Dean and -- as it was predicted on bumper stickers -- "married" Kerry. Clark eschewed "platitudes and generalities" as he "explain[ed] the specifics of how [multilateral action] could win wars and secure peace." (Remember, he led a war Clinton launched unilaterally.) It's telling that Glastris offers no examples -- there simply aren't any. Clark was incoherent and inarticulate from the get-go and never improved.

The last preposterous Glastris claim I'll mention is that "Clark spoke with evident sincerity and knowledge about faith, especially his own. Other Democratic candidates soon followed, including Howard Dean." Correction -- Clark has changed denomination several times for decidedly un-spiritual reasons -- because there was a Catholic church near his station in England, back to Protestantism because he married one. And he may have spoken movingly about it on the trail, but this supposed strength was not one he emphasized in interviews or debate. And apparently it was Dean, again, who felt this heat. Well, John Edwards, John Kerry and others -- even hyper lefty Dennis Kucinich -- were talking about religion, too. That Dean overdid it, clumsily, was not prompted by Clark.

Ultimately, Glastris fails to explain why this would influence future elections, even if they were true. These paragraphs are missing. Or more likely, it just didn't occur to Glastris that he had to explain any further. I'll tell you why it won't: Dean's telethon-style Internet fundraising was an unqualified and wide-ly reported success (for what it was worth -- tens of millions of dollars, but not a guarantee of nomination). I'll give you another: Glastris apparently believes these things Clark did changed the thinking of the electorate -- mostly moving Dean supporters back to Kerry. But if you think Clark was responsible for this, you somehow missed the last six weeks before Iowa. The aspects of Clark's candidacy that Glastris highlights are were at best too underreported to make a difference, or so far off the mark that they aren't worth considering (my contention).

Overall, as I hinted at before, I think Clark appealed to a segment of educated Democrats who wanted a tough liberal with solid foreign policy credentials. Even though Clark was not that, they allowed themselves to believe it for awhile. But not enough people believed it, and Clark is now something less than a footnote. Good.

P.S. To summarize more succinctly the kind of enthusiasm for Clark illustrated here: smart people acting stupid.

OH, ALL RIGHT

Armed Prophet will resume regular blogging shortly. To fill in recent events, I ended up losing the entire contents of my home laptop, and all but some work-related emails on my office PC. As you can imagine, I couldn't be happier about it.

But both are now functional, and I need the outlet, so expect Armed Prophet to resume normal activity shortly. Like a bad couple who will never divorce, my urge to comment and my blog -- even if/when the operation moves to another address, maybe under a different title/moniker -- will never separate.

So as I said, I'll be back up again with something again shortly -- though if pressed, I couldn't really define "shortly."

WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED

Judging by the comments to the immediate past post, a few of you have noticed Armed Prophet has gone silent through the apparent end of the primary race, even as Matt Drudge has made it all interesting again.

In the past week I've suffered the total failure of my work PC, taking down a year-and-a-half worth of files, and then potentially the total failure of my personal iBook. It's in the shop right now, and the picture is very grim. I have probably lost everything on my hard drive. And it's an open question whether Apple will consider the damage covered under warranty. This, plus a few other less-serious distractions, and of course it being the busy season at work, has essentially killed this blog.

Flog™ has speculated I've given up politics for sports. If only. At this point, the future of that project is in question as well. If all of my free internet time amounts to just the hour or two after work is done and before I head home, it will be next-to-impossible to keep either going. Being a fledgling project, I've maintained that as best I can for a few days, but that's been on what I've assumed is a temporary schedule. I'm going to try to keep that alive, but I just can't say what will happen yet.

The situation could change, so go ahead, check back in every once in awhile. The readers I know personally will probably hear about it before I resume. But until then Armed Prophet is on indefinite hiatus.

OH, YOU ADORABLE LITTLE DEMOCRAT...

Armed Prophet isn't necessarily a big Michael Kinsley fan, but his newest Slate/Washington Post column is worth reading. And not just because it's vaguely complimentary toward Republicans, a species Kinsley's other columns usually malign whether he has a serious argument. But this one's pretty good. Good enough to quote the first two paragraphs:

Democrats are cute when they're being pragmatic. They furrow their brows and try to think like Republicans. Or as they imagine Republicans must think. They turn off their hearts and listen for signals from their brains. No swooning is allowed this presidential primary season. "I only care about one thing," they all say. "Which of these guys can beat Bush?" Secretly, they believe none of them can, which makes the amateur pragmatism especially poignant.

Nevertheless, Democrats persevere. They ricochet from candidate to candidate, hoping to smell a winner. In effect, they give their proxy to the other party. "If I was a Republican," they ask themselves, "which of these Democratic candidates would I be most likely to vote for?" And by the time this is all over, most of the serious contenders will have been crowned the practical choice for at least a moment. First it was Lieberman the Centrist. "I'm actually for Dennis Kucinich," a Democrat might say, "because I like his position on nationalizing all the churches. But I'm supporting Joe Lieberman. His views on nearly everything are repellent to me, and I think that's a good sign."

Read the rest of it here. And that's all the posting from me right now. It's a Friday. It's time for Armed Prophet to depart and become Boozed Prophet.

GROUNDHOG FLAY

Trenton Times columnist Harry Blaze -- exposed on this blog as the Man Who Loved Trains Too Much -- comes forward this week with his own bombshell report:

The Associated Press calls Punxsutawney Phil "the world's most famous furry forecaster." Nice alliteration, but it's nonsense.

From all I hear this rat-like critter doesn't do much of anything. There are nasty rumors that Phil lives in a climate-controlled burrow and has to be dragged out on a leash or something.

From the tone of voice of the folks out in central Pennsylvania, this whole thing is just to provide a good time.

You don't say. To be fair, Blaze does include a revealing quote from Bill Cooper, president of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club, who admitted: 

"We couldn't care less if he sees his shadow."

Then again, Blaze had to lift the quote from the AP. As the column meanders through a recitation of the how-much-wood-could-a-woodchuck-chuck tongue "twister" and a riff on Alvin and the Chipmunks, you really have to wonder -- why isn't this man nationally syndicated?

THIS COULD HAVE BEEN MY ONE BIG CHANCE

Had Armed Prophet been trying out different domain names at Network Solutions this morning, I could have seized upon a hot commodity. From an internal e-mail circulated to Washington Post staff this morning:

(sent to: ALLNEWS) Early this morning, the domain name washpost.com expired. Network Solutions, which manages internet addresses, apparently notified the Post of the pending expiration via a drop-box that was not being monitored...

I've never been one to engage in blackmail, but then I've never specifically sworn it off, either. Damn Sure, they probably would have sued me for it and won. But handled properly, I could have parlayed the attention into a book deal. Damn!

Hat tip: Wonkette.

SERVICE RESTORED

At least temporarily. Stay tuned.

PLEASE STAND BY FOR TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES

IT'S ALL JOE-VER NOW

Just after the polls closed in Delaware Armed Prophet walked down to the Hyatt Regency a few blocks from where I live in Arlington, Virginia. The Lieberman campaign had spread the news that if the self-pushed Joe-mentum didn't translate into a single victory tonight, Joe Lieberman would be getting out of the race. Most of the afternoon it was clear he would not; John Kerry ended up bouncing him 51% to 11%. It was his best showing of the entire campaign. So you could say he went out on an high note.

So after walking the long way through Crystal City and nearly out to Reagan National, I made it to the Hyatt Regency, prepared to bullshit my way in with a business card. That's where I found out that Lieberman was actually conceding a few miles north, in another Hyatt Regency. I was still in busy-journalist mode, so I consented to let the door man jot down some notes and hand them over. All it says is:

(703) 535-1234

LEFT WILSON BLVD

RIGHT

Even if I had a car, there wouldn't be time. And in fact as I walked back in my front door about ten minutes later, there was Joe Lieberman walking up to give a good-natured concession speech.

So there you have it. I didn't get to see anyone cry, I didn't get a better look at what I believe may be one hot-looking Lieberman daughter, and I didn't even get any discarded Lieberman campaign memorabilia.

Moral of the story: Spur-of-the-moment journalism rarely yields results. Take it from one who knows.

OOH, EXIT POLLS!

Armed Prophet isn't going to do the kind of up-to-the-minute blogathon I did with Iowa and New Hampshire in past weeks, for any number of very good reasons but suffice it to say that I'm lazy.

However, the exit polls are all over the Internet, starting first it seems with National Review's The Corner, then Drudge, even Wonkette and all the way on down to... well, not me. But there's some links for you.

Kerry seems poised for confidence-inspiring wins in Arizona, New Mexico, Missouri and Delaware. I assume he's winning in North Dakota, but apparently no one cares enough to do any polling there. (Hey, they got two senators, what more do they want?) But Edwards is going to win South Carolina and Oklahoma is too close to call between them.

So says the exit polling. But even if Edwards takes it, I doubt it changes much. The next contests are in Washington, Michigan, and Maine (though the delegate-obsessed will note that Democrats Abroad actually select theirs next, and they need to stop being obsessed). Those states are far more hospitable to Kerry than Edwards, and Michigan in particular is a huge prize with 152 delegates. After that are Virginia and Tennessee, which arre potential Edwards territory, but at that point the Kerry bandwagon will probably be moving too fast.

As John Kerry likes to say (a lot) these days, bring it on.

THIS IS WHAT'S NEWS TODAY

I watch too much news on TV, and I know it. It's numbing, actually, which is perhaps why I hardly noticed when Dean went nuts after his loss in Iowa. And it's a near miracle that I noticed how odd it was for Chris Matthews, who is hosting presidential also-rans Pat Robertson (ugh), Jesse Jackson (boo) and Jerry Brown (actually, I like the Moonbeam in his old age), to introduce them and the topic of the presidential race, then veer into discussion of Janet Jackson's attempted Rolling Stone cover reenactment.

Incidentally, Janet Jackson has apparently confided to Jesse that the boob-flash was a total accident, and he claims to believe it. Well, that's enough evidence for me. If Jesse says it really was a "wardrobe malfunction," then it was definitely a setup.

THE DEAN ON DEAN

This morning David Broder, who is at least as often called the "dean" of political journalism as he is made fun of for it, wrote a variation on the quick-crystallizing cliche that Dean's fall is analogous to the dot-com boom and bust of a few years back. Or at least he starts to. Here's Broder, writing in his capacity as Washington Post columnist:

Dean offered the Democratic Party a different model of organizing, a distinctive approach to political mobilization. Its conspicuous failure in its first road tests in Iowa and New Hampshire carries a message bigger than Dean himself. It brings into question the whole notion that Internet-based populism is the wave of the future for the Democratic Party.

I have plenty of doubts about Dean's face-falling primary finishes being comparable to the tech bubble, but Broder's column didn't bother challenging them. Instead, he makes note of other facts that felled the Internet juggernaut -- the electability question and the campaign's Bewster's Millions-like spending habits. Those are much more compelling explanations.

Meanwhile, there are arguments to be made that the Internet success eventually hurt the campaign -- i.e. the blog served as an echo chamber, the campaign message eventually became about the campaign itself, etc. -- but Broder doesn't make them.

Broder's knocking down a straw man, no? Only the most die-hard Deaniacs believed the Internet was so powerful a tool that it superseded other factors. With a viable candidate, the kind of networking Dean and Joe Trippi pioneered is still viable -- and will be for future candidates of both parties. Not every candidate will have the same kind of excitement around them as Dean did, but every one of them will have a blog and a MeetUp listing. Those that do may not have a leg up per se but those who don't will definitely be at a disadvantage.

P.S. Weirdly enough, the headline over Broder's piece -- in all likelihood written by someone else, even if it is "the dean" -- captures my sentiment exactly: "When The Web Is Not Enough." Precisely. The Internet did what it was supposed to; fault for Dean's electoral failure lies in his own weaknesses as a candidate, not his campaign's innovations.

A SHOCK TO THE SYSTEM

Did you know Ann Coulter and David Horowitz are really liberals? It's true! At, it's true if this website is to be believed. Once Armed Prophet's head stops spinning, I'll attempt to draw my own conclusions.