Dan Gerstein picks a scab

February 16, 2007

As the communications director for Joe Lieberman’s 2006 Senate campaign, Dan Gerstein developed a relationship with the broader blogging community. It wasn’t a good relationship — I think I’d call it “tense,” and maybe “acrimonious” — but the two sides got to know each other fairly well. By November, Gerstein’s contempt for the netroots was palpable, and most liberal blogs felt largely the same about him, but the campaign was over and the pugilists went to their respective corners.

Today, Gerstein decided to kick the sleeping dog. Hard.

If the liberal blogs want to understand why so few people outside their narrow echo chamber take them seriously, and what it will take to gain the broader credibility they crave, they should look no further than their handling of the recent flap over John Edwards’ foul-mouthed blogger hires.

This ugly morality tale – which mercifully concluded Tuesday with the second of the two offending online staffers resigning from the Edwards campaign – revealed the Kossacks in all their angry adolescent glory: impudent, impotent, unreflective and unaccountable. […]

[T]he liberal blogosphere…decided that the best way to fight the “right-wing smear machine” that they so despise is to create an even more venomous, boundary-less, and destructive counterpart and fight ire with more ire.

Don’t hold back, Dan; tell us how you really feel.

Gerstein’s harangue was inspired by the controversy surrounding John Edwards’ former bloggers, and the netroots’ reaction to the story, but Gerstein seems to have made this very personal. He’s not just bothered by one hullabaloo about some intemperate blog posts; he seems outraged at everything about the way liberal blogs operate.

And he wants the blogs “punished.”

[I]t wouldn’t hurt if the party’s top leaders step in and provide some adult supervision. If the bloggers are going to behave like spoiled children, then maybe it’s time to punish them accordingly.

Shut the line-crossers out of press briefings. Deny them jobs that confer party approval. And for god’s sake, please quit kissing Kos’s ring at his convention until he and his acolytes grow out of their high-tech tantrum tactics.

First, Gerstein’s anger at the blogs seems misplaced. The netroots are “spoiled children,” apparently, because some use profanity. Worse, many more criticize right-wing blowhards like Bill Donohue. As a result, Democratic leaders, anxious to get their message to netroots activists, should stop talking to bloggers and their readers? This may make sense in Joe Lieberman’s office, but I’m having a hard time grasping the logic.

What’s more Gerstein fails to appreciate the broader dynamic. As Chris Bowers put it:

Stupid, ignorant ass. Selfish, confused, dishonest President. Hypocrite liar. Stubborn, irresponsible jerk.

These are just some of the words the American people used to describe Bush in the latest Pew survey. Considering the harsh language used by the American people to describe Bush, as far as I am concerned, the American people should be shut out of all press briefings and denied any jobs within “our” party until they learn to mind their manners.

Gerstein’s message probably won’t change many minds within the party. Call it a hunch.

Eat my shorts, Gerstein. This is just pure juvenile sour grapes over the fact that the game is up, your mealticket won’t work anymore, and you yourself are about to get kicked into the ashcan of history.

What Gerstein can’t stand is the fact that we see reality like it is, not like his leash-holders wish we would see it. He no longer controls the message and so he sputters like a ’57 Chevy.

Tough cookies, you talentless asshole.

  • I’m wondering why right-wing Lieberman’s boy thinks the left blogosphere would listen to him about anything.

    One thing I’ve been wondering about. We’re quick to call Dem politicians cowards for not standing up to Republicans and their noise machine, so why wasn’t it cowardly for Marcotte to quit in the face of the same machine? (I fully understand it and I’d probably do the same AND she’s not exactly a politician, but still isn’t there a bit of hypocrisy there?

  • There is a virtual revolution going on and it’s exciting to actually have our voices heard. That must be frightning to people who are acustomed to being insiders and don’t want to rock any boats or include and new factions.

    I think I remember something in The Federalist Papers (10) about the need to expand democracy to include more people so we do not degenerate into factions. A lot of people have been shut out of the prcess of decision making for a long time, and that is why the netroots is such a gift to democracy.

    As to the insiders who are concerned that some of their power might be deminished? Too bad; if you would have listened to the people, perhaps they might have been able to stall this change for a time, but we do live in a democracy, and the people seem to be prevailing.

  • Has anyone established what exactly the current Senate rules say about what happens if Lieberman becomes a Republican? I know there was discussion about whether they’d be written like they were in 2001, to allow a change in leadership, or like they were in some earlier times, when the leadership didn’t change for the whole life of a Congress even when the party breakdown did. Atrios was asking for a definitive answer recently, but I didn’t see that he got one. The Rules Committee website doesn’t seem to be useful in answering the question.

  • Huh. Gerstein says that liberal bloggers aren’t taken seriously, but nevertheless that someone should step in and supervise them.

    Personal vendetta, much, Dan?

  • apparently the bloggers forgot that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar … tact is not high on their list, but when it comes to politics and diplomacy, you must have some skills besides name-calling & tossing insults …

  • I’ll say it again, CB… Another day, yet another post related to Lieberman….

    I will say, Gerstein did get the last laugh with Joe’s overwhelming win over the bogoshere’s lap dog, otherwise known as Ned.

  • …if Lieberman becomes a Republican?

    Lieberman already IS a republicant. This morning while listening to a discussion about homeland security on NPR, the only quotes came from Lieberman, Cornyn from Texas and Coburn from Oklahoma. Three of the republicants right wing partisans. I had to turn it off… not because of Cornyn and Coburn’s remarks. You expect them to be assinine. I just could stand Lieberman’s whining.

  • A stupider Dan than I wrote:
    “[T]he liberal blogosphere…decided that the best way to fight the “right-wing smear machine” that they so despise is to create an even more venomous, boundary-less, and destructive counterpart and fight ire with more ire.”

    Reason doesn’t work with you guys. Being nice didn’t work either. If we take Von Clausewitz’s maxim “War is the continuation of politics by other means” and put it on its head then we are the insurgents against the whole political spin machine. Not trying to glorify any of the blogs or bloggers here, just making a mere statement of fact.

    Isn’t it funny that we ordinary folks with PCs and internet connections and no access to their chums in the print or TV media are so reviled by guys in $5000 suits? Is it because we can obsolete the guys in the $5000 suits?

    Enjoy it while it lasts, Dan. See you on the unemployment line, but you might notice that Professional Assholes aren’t all that much in demand.

  • couldn’t… couldn’t… that should have been “couldn’t stand Lieberman’s whining”. Damn fingers.

  • Anybody else smell the fear in this tirade? If Gerstein wasn’t so scared of the power and influence of lefty blogs, he wouldn’t have written such a nasty screed. I say keep it up liberals, if a guy like Gerstein thinks we should be punished, we must be doing something right.

  • All bullies have a deep seated inferiority complex combined the fear that their very real inferiority will be exposed. They talk tough but they are basically just viscious little cowards. To them, theirs is the only opinion that is correct or has any validity. They can’t admit that others are right because then they would be wrong, that they themselves have no validity. Deep inside they know they have no substance and bitterly resent anyone who they they think has. The implications of this in regards to the american right are huge.

  • Another self hating DEM who willl have nowhere to go once Lieby is voted out of office

    DEMS wont take him…..Repubs wont take him good luck

  • (Correction) All bullies have a deep seated inferiority complex combined (with) the fear that their very real inferiority will be exposed. They talk tough but they are basically just viscious little cowards. To them, theirs is the only opinion that is correct or has any validity. They can’t admit that others are right because then they would be wrong, that they themselves have no validity. Deep inside they know they have no substance and bitterly resent anyone who they they think has. The implications of this in regards to the american right are huge.

  • I’m still trying to figure what the holy hell Shakes did during this whole thing — it’s almost as if her only crime was the lack of a Y chromosome.

    And would it be “venomous, boundary-less, and destructive” if I posted that Gerstein’s screed makes him look like a small-dicked, idiotic, fightened little fucktard?

    Can I get a ruling on that … ?

  • The netroots are “spoiled children,” apparently, because some use profanity.

    C’mon. If you didn’t find some of the alternatively blustering, strutting, and apocalyptic visions at MYDD (“pretty vicious rant and immediate action alert”) either amusing or spoiled, you need to stop drinking the Kool-Aid.

  • Gerstein is still mad at the flood of ridicule directed at his idiotic postings on Lieberman’s “Cup of Joe” blog during the campaign. I must say that was one of the most entertaining blogs; many of the comments were side-splitting. After just two weeks, Gerstein being the thin-skinned, snivelling, little coward that is, disallowed comments.

  • Since Gerstein worked on a Senate campaign against the Democratic nominee, I assume he has been kicked out of the Democratic Party. He sure doesn’t speak for anybody in the party.

  • There was a — rather nice, I thought– article in NYT yesterday about the bloggers at Libby’s trial. It concentrated especially on Jane Hamsher of Firedoglake. Could have been what tripped Gerstein’s fuse-wire…

  • Well, Gerstein obviously has an ax to grind, but I think he’s basically right. I started out as a recovering Republican excited by the netroots, and am now a determined Democrat pretty much revolted by the bully-boy tactics and incessant whining of the self-proclaimed core of the online left.

    What was most instructive about the Marcotte bullshit (I’m beginning to think of McEwan as sideswiped bystander) is how no one asked the tough question of why the hell Marcotte had been hired in the first place. I’ve yet to hear what she was supposed to bring to the Edwards blog. I’ve been paying more attention to which bloggers are connected to which others, and then with what publications, think tanks, campaigns, etc. The netroots has lost much of its radical edge and has gained a great deal of volume. It has also “professionalized” in a not entirely admirable way.

    In short, I see the “netroots” as becoming a rather tightly knit band of political insiders closely connected to money sources and pretty much serving as a patronage/job mill. I see a lot of intimidation and threats being offered to campaigns, a lot of demands being lodged, and mountains of “or else” trash talk. When netroots polemicists start overtly tying their posts to support of candidate X or Y (or, no less crucially, opposition to candidate X or Y), there is a rotten smell in the air.

    That Gerstein is a jerk does not reduce the fundamental accuracy of his observations.

  • I think fercryin has a point, but I also think the reference is to a group of well-known liberal bloggers whose names we all know who have, in fact become rather unpleasant professional innies. Carpetbagger and a raft of other blogs are doing a splendid job and they are by far in the majority, at least on my own blogroll!

    My advice: dump the insider-bloggers, stay away from bloggers who are tied to candidates and even a single point of view. In blogging as in life, hang out with people who ask questions, not those who try to convince you they have the answers. The kind of work Hamsher has been doing is terrific. There is something very heartening and old-fashioned-American about using one’s own time, energy, and the best resources one can find to promote discussion and small-d democratic process.

  • Dale,

    …so why wasn’t it cowardly for Marcotte to quit in the face of the same machine?

    Because she is not the candidate and didn’t want to be a distraction from his candidacy. Agree with the decision or not, but to call it cowardly is assuredly wrong. I would call it act of moral courage.

  • “high-tech tantrum”

    The tubes of the inder-net are rather mainstream, at this point, and using a computer no longer qualifies as “high-tech”. Unless he means “readin’ n’ writin'”.

    Please, voters, keep your opinions to yourselves. No one gives a rat’s ass.

  • And would it be “venomous, boundary-less, and destructive” if I posted that Gerstein’s screed makes him look like a small-dicked, idiotic, fightened little fucktard? Can I get a ruling on that … ?
    ————–Unholy Moses

    You didn’t openly threaten him with assassination—so I’d have to say that you’re still within bounds, Moses….

  • He says :” If the liberal blogs want to understand why so few people outside their narrow echo chamber take them seriously…” Don’t most conservatives get their talking points from the White House? And who is taking conservatives seriously these days outside the conservative demographic? The younger generation seems to be getting more liberal. Hispanics and immigrants are an increasing part of the American demographic. The GOP attempt to reach out to such groups is falling flat. They are a minority slowly being left behind by a political and cultural landslide which is slowly undermining their foundations.

  • You have to feel sorry for someone that claims he was a Blogger, but was really just a shill for failed Bush policies. His infantile rage towards Bloggers on the left and a party he no longer has any part of is not surprising, to say the least. What can you expect when you made your bed with insane politicians the likes of Bush and Lieberman and are now watching what little of your credibility that wasn’t already shredded go down the tubes.

  • fercryingoutloud: i would get my eyesight checked if i were you.

    as for gerstein and lieberman (and i think we have to see them as one entity from a message standpoint) are the kinds of people who think that the right-wing are actually the adults. it’s quite amazing, really….

  • One thing I’ve been wondering about. We’re quick to call Dem politicians cowards for not standing up to Republicans and their noise machine, so why wasn’t it cowardly for Marcotte to quit in the face of the same machine?

    Probably because unlike the politicians, neither Marcotte nor McEwan are able to call on the DC Capitol Police to protect them from bozos making death threats.

    By the way: Looks like Donohue and the other quasi-religious fronts for the GOP may well be in serious violation of their 501(c)(3) status. Click here for details, and what we can do about this: http://phoenixwoman.wordpress.com/2007/02/13/sow-the-wind-reap-the-whirlwind/

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