Kos Kerfuffle and Stoller's Comments

Kos Kerfuffle and Stoller's Comments

Blogger Matt Stoller has some interesting thoughts on the whole Daily Kos "Screw 'Em" kerfuffle.

This bit, however, caught my attention.

When Mainstream Political Kibitzing Comes Online

Because normal political speech is now part and parcel of the pseudo-scandal industry, we are currently in political crisis mode where communications is becoming impossible. It's not that there's too much information; it's that there's too much spin with too much ammo. Just as an increasing amount of cultural product is becoming regulable because it's moving online, so too is there now an unlimited amount of information that you can connect to any political movement. No doubt, three clicks away from GeorgeWBush.com lies some nutty neo-Nazi site, and the same goes for JohnKerry.com. A media that won't differentiate between what the candidate says and who the candidate is near can't effectively describe modern democracy, because in the online political world, everyone is three clicks away. The only check upon the political pseudo-scandal industry, the inability to find damaging information to link to a candidate, is now gone.

Stoller seems to be implying that there is something wrong with having information, and the ability to comment on it, adding your own opinion and analysis (pejoratively referred to as "spinning"). Or maybe it is just that too many have the opportunity to do so ("it's that there's too much spin with too much ammo")? Or is it that a few people express their opinion and analysis too often or with too large an audience? Or even that it's too easy to "spin" info in such a way that it connects to a campaign?

Would he think it wrong of someone to say that Bush is wrong for linking to a site that harbors Neo-Nazi sentiments? Of course the Bush campaign would not do so directly, but what if it were second or third hand? Wouldn't Stoller expect, rightfully so, the Bush campaign to either

1. delink from the further referring site or
2. convince the site they link to to delink the offending site?

Seems only natural to hold them accountable for this sort of thing. As a conservative who finds such sentiments reprehensible and wrong, I would be in the front of the parade to convince Bush to repudiate the attachment.

Just as I would find Bush absent malice if his campaign did delink from such a site, I do not think for a moment that Kerry's campaign supports Kos' statements based on their immediate renunciation upon hearing what Kos had said. Bravo on them!

Stoller is right that the MEDIA should differentiate between the candidate and sites linked to linked to linked to sites. But websites on which the candidate DIRECTLY ADVERTISES must be held accountable by the candidate.

The candidate should be given a chance to repudiate statements with which he or she disagrees. If the candidate refuses to do so and continues to advertise despite the content therein, the candidate should be held accountable for all the content on those sites.

Given a chance to repudiate incorrect, wrong, even evil sentiments, candidates who refuse to do so implicitly (or worse, explicitly) support those ideas.

In the end, it is not the blogsphere that would sully a campaign, but rather a campaign that sullies itself by not disavowing comments made by sites on which they chose to advertise.