The Notion

With Harvard's Help, Congress May Keep Bloggers Out of Jail

By Ari Melber

It's hard out here for a blogger.

And hard for online journalists, unemployed new media producers, and just about anyone else dabbling in journalism without professional backing.

Beyond the basic financial challenges, there is scant legal help for members of the new media, even though they face the same complex, pricey legal threats as traditional media. Plus extra threats -- like government attempts to out anonymous bloggers, which can cost a lot to fight in court.

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November 19, 2009

Newsweek Taps Bush Aide For Obama Reporting (Updated)

By Ari Melber

See if you can follow this logic.

A recent article in Newsweek states that Democrats could have won a "very significant number of Republican votes in Congress" for the stimulus -- had there only been a "meaningful tax-cut component." Political journalism is often imaginative, but this verges on delusion. After all, Obama labored to add about $280 billion in tax cuts to the stimulus -- over objections from many Democrats -- and still netted zero Republican votes in the House. Then, the piece asserts that Obama has no "coattails," based on 2009 elections, and reports "early signs of Obama fatigue are emerging." (Again, another observer might note that Democrats have won all 5 special congressional elections this year.) The article also predicts that gubernatorial losses in Virginia and New Jersey "will" make some Democrats "very nervous" about health care reform, which is a "political risk" for the party.

"We appear to be witnessing the beginnings of a significant Republican revival," continues the piece, bringing home its quirky counter-narrative. Lucky for struggling Democrats, however, this Newsweek item closes with some free political advice. "Liberals in Washington would do well to let go of the Republican breakdown narrative," notes the final sentence, "and pull back to the center--or suffer the consequences."

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November 17, 2009

Obama's Organizing Army Finally Targets Republicans

By Ari Melber

In an unusually aggressive move, Organizing for America announced Wednesday that it is mobilizing its volunteer army to confront the 32 Republican legislators who voted against health care reform -- despite representing districts that voted for Obama.

The pressure campaign is designed "to remind these members that voters in their districts voted for change last year," explain OFA officials, "and urge them to reconsider their position when the House votes again on a final bill later this year."

The program calls on OFA activists to visit the district offices of their members. OFA officials say the effort will begin "as early as" Thursday and continue through next week. At the height of the presidential campaign, OFA's supporter list topped 13 million, making it the largest political network of its kind.

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November 12, 2009

Obama, Democrats Face Liberal Fundraising Boycott

By Ari Melber

Politico's lead story today tracks how both progressive and conservative activists are using intramural fundraising threats to challenge the party establishment.

For Democrats, the fight is about accountability for campaign promises. For Republicans, sophisticated grassroots fundraising is a tool in the ideological squabbles over new congressional candidates and party leaders. The story suggests conservative strategists have led the way:

For months, most of the action was on the Republican side, where conservative activists targeted the National Republican Senatorial Committee for its recruitment of moderate candidates and the National Republican Congressional Committee for its role in supporting a liberal GOP nominee in an upstate New York special election. But now Democratic officials are also feeling the lash, with the [DNC] coming under fire for allegedly not working hard enough on a recent Maine ballot initiative to repeal same-sex marriage and the [DCCC] taking flak for supporting incumbents who voted against the health care bill. In each case, activists have dispensed with the pleasantries and gone straight to the committees' wallets--a move guaranteed to raise alarms at party headquarters.

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November 12, 2009

Video: Michelle Obama Hits Sesame St., Republicans Slam Oscar

By Ari Melber

Sesame Street hits the airwaves for its 40th season on Tuesday, with a guest appearance by First Lady and Gardener-in-Chief Michelle Obama.

In the segment, Ms. Obama huddles with Elmo, Big Bird and several children to go over the fine points of seed-planting. Elmo loves cucumbers, it turns out. Ms. Obama has appeared on Sesame Street before, in a "healthy habits" segment with Elmo in May.

There's no word yet on whether Obama critics while reprise their complaints about exposing children to the First Family -- The President's speech to students drew plenty of mock outrage -- but some conservatives were recently slamming Sesame Street for a scene where Oscar The Grouch (arguably) spoofs Fox News. Both videos are below.

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November 9, 2009

Twitter Tweaks Social Media with New Lists Feature

By Ari Melber

Twitter, the over-hyped, under-appreciated social network for sharing chit-chat and links, just launched a tool enabling users to create their own lists on the site. The Journal explains the basics:

The new feature allows Twitter users to organize the people they follow and streamline their feeds. Others can then follow their lists, sparing them the time of hunting for individual Twitterers with shared interests

So what, right?

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October 30, 2009

How Many Experts Declared Public Option Dead?

By Ari Melber

As the Senate moves towards including some form of public option in health care reform, it is worth remembering all the Washington "experts" who already declared the public option dead.

The list is long, distinguished, sometimes surprising and, thanks to the open source web, the list is growing. A diarist at DailyKos, "BrookylnBadBoy," just began counting. It ranges from bearish Senators (Kent Conrad) to Republican operatives (Brad Blakeman, Dana Perino) to sympathetic progressives (Nate Silver, Jane Hamsher) to, naturally, a long list of professional pundits (Klein, Gergen, Cillizza, Brooks, O'Donnell, Krauthammer, O'Reilly). You can add to your own nominations over at "Daily Kos," or here in our comments section.

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October 27, 2009

Backing Obama, MoveOn Urges Congressional Dems to Join Fox Fight

By Ari Melber

MoveOn.org jumped into the battle between Fox News and the Obama White House on Tuesday, urging its 5 million members to call on Congressional Democrats to stay off the network for the rest of the year -- the same timetable announced by the White House.

"To draw attention to its biased coverage, President Obama will not appear on FOX for the rest of this year," notes a MoveOn email, citing recent reporting by The Times. "It's about time Democrats stood up to FOX," continues the missive, which calls on MoveOn members to sign a petition "asking Democrats to support President Obama's stance by staying off FOX as long as he does."

While Obama aides have forcefully singled out Fox for two weeks running, Congressional Democrats have been oddly subdued, as The Hill recently reported:

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October 20, 2009

Caught On Tape: Obama Adviser Explains How To Control Media

By Ari Melber

White House Communications Director Anita Dunn made headlines last week for calling out Fox News, now she's drawing attention for comments she made about how the Obama campaign managed to control and route around the traditional press. You can bet this video is going viral. (Embedded below).

In footage from a January conference, Dunn candidly explains the campaign's disciplined emphasis on disintermediation:

The reality is that whether it was a David Plouffe video or an Obama speech ... a huge part of our press strategy was focused on making the media cover what Obama was actually saying -- as opposed to why the campaign was saying it, what the tactic was.... One of the reasons we did so many of the David Plouffe videos was not just for our supporters, but also because it was a way for us to get our message out without having to actually talk to reporters. We just put that out there and make them write what Plouffe had said -- as opposed to Plouffe doing an interview with a reporter. So it was very much we controlled it, as opposed to the press controlled it. And it did not always make us popular with the press... increasingly by the General Election, very rarely did we communicate through the press anything that we didn't absolutely control.

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October 19, 2009

Maddow Responds to Bush Sr. - And 9 of 10 Republicans Fear Her

By Ari Melber

Rachel Maddow invites Republican officials to appear on her show "every day," the popular MSNBC anchor said Saturday, but only about one out of ten take up her offer.

Those numbers suggest Congressional Republicans are especially wary of a Maddow interrogation, since most politicians jump at the chance to appear on prime time news shows with good ratings. The "incentives" to appear differ for elected officials and operatives, she said, and the show draws more conservative "lobbyists and P.R. guys," who are paid to push their clients anywhere they can. (See Phillips, Tim.)

Maddow's comments came during an appearance at The New Yorker Festival on Saturday, in a sold-out session moderated by staff writer Ariel Levy.

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October 17, 2009