Sunday, March 21, 2004

Tonight's Political Rant

The frustrating thing about Richard Clarke's revelations (if that's the correct word) on 60 Minutes tonight is that they will not, for the most part, be debated by folks with an eagerness to get at the truth. The Democrats will declare that Clarke's the man, he knows, that's how it was, Bush ignored warnings about terrorism before 9/11 and then after, tried hard to believe that Iraq should be attacked in retaliation. The Republicans will insist that Bush was focused; that Clarke's a disgruntled and/or partisan has-been who's saying "I told you so" when he didn't really tell them so. Somewhere between those extremes there's an interesting discussion and perhaps some truth but we'll never get near it, at least not this year. The debate will get drowned out by those eager to spin this to help their guy in the coming election.

I am inclined to believe Clarke's claim that the Bush administration wrongly — and this may be one of the largest, most deadly errors any White House has ever made — believed in an al-Qaeda/Iraq link despite a pile of intelligence reports to the contrary. I believe this part because Bush and his top officials once said there was a link and they now seem to arguing they never said it. (This morning on Face the Nation, Senator Arlen Specter insisted, "The Bush administration never made any claim that there was a connection between Saddam and al-Qaeda." He actually said that...and it was kind of surreal. Senator Specter had some sort of accident and his lip was all swollen and red as he appeared on the program. It looked like someone had worked him over to get him to say what they wanted him to say.)

I am also inclined to believe Clarke's claim that fighting terrorism was downgraded from the Clinton to the Bush administrations — fewer meetings, less attention, etc. — because we've heard the charge before and if untrue, it could so easily be disproved. Perhaps it will be.

Beyond that, it's hard to say from afar how much of Clarke we should accept. I'd love to hear someone non-partisan bat some of the other allegations around but like I said, this won't be about getting at the truth. It'll be about selling or assaulting the image of George W. Bush as a strong battler of terrorists. That's pretty much what this election is going to come down to.

• Posted at 10:58 PM · LINK

Altercation

Last week, Eric Alterman (an author I like) appeared with Dennis Miller (a comedian I used to like). Unlike a lot of folks, I actually started to lose my taste for Mr. Miller years before 9/11 and his political conversion. I think the disillusionment began when I went to see him at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. Rita Rudner was his opening act and she was fresh and funny and everything you want a stand-up comic to be. Then Dennis came out, mumbled some very dated material with an absolute minimum of effort, got his check (one presumes) and left. I can't recall ever paying so much to see a performer who was so disinterested in performing. Miller had a line he later used about how the models on The Price is Right were getting old, asking if they could be rotated every two or three millennia. I thought that was an odd comment from a guy who was still doing a joke comparing Dan Quayle, a forgotten politician, to Dan Tanna's sidekick on Vegas, a forgotten TV show.

Miller's occasional attitude of "I'm too hip to even try" was on display at the MGM Grand, and also on his show the other day when he had Alterman on. If you'd like to see a few minutes of it, this website has posted a video excerpt. If nothing else, it demonstrates why Miller's CNBC show is one of the lowest-rated things to ever appear on a network that's had some pretty low-rated shows.

What I find interesting is that if you cruise right-wing websites, you'll see plenty of messages from folks who loved the way Miller treated Alterman. They're happy Miller didn't dignify the guy's charges by responding to them and instead just treated the guy with disdain. There's a certain segment of the population out there that doesn't want to hear an exchange of ideas...doesn't even demand wit of its entertainers. They just want to hear someone saying Hillary Clinton is ugly or George W. Bush is a drunken fratboy or otherwise insulting whoever they've decided they don't like. Way too much of today's Talk Radio is about this. It's a shame that Dennis Miller, who once had clever material, has devolved into just calling people idiots. It even bothered me one day when I tuned in and heard him dumping on Joe Lieberman, a politician I like less than anyone who's recently gotten within spitting distance of the White House.

On his weblog here, Alterman tells of his experience on the show from his point-of-view. And here, he says that Miller later phoned him to apologize. If so, good for Dennis...and more so if he has the integrity to apologize on-air.

Leaving aside the political end of this and dealing only with the issue of creating watchable television, I think Miller made a bad mistake. Nothing has hurt David Letterman's ratings more than occasionally acting like he was bored with his own show and/or that he thought the guy in the guest's chair was a jerk. Sometimes, the guest is a jerk but in that case, you shouldn't have them on...and if one does get through, you try to do what Mr. Carson was so good at, which was making a stiff look good, steering him or her away from their jerkier behavior and making the spot work in spite of the subject. The coward's way out is to act like you don't know what this guest (whose appearance you approved) is doing there. I also think Miller is making a mistake if he thinks that he can outdo Fox News at their own game and attract the right-wing audience to CNBC.

• Posted at 8:26 PM · LINK

Quick Comment

Just watched the East Coast telecast of tonight's 60 Minutes interview with Richard Clarke. Oh, my God.

• Posted at 5:49 PM · LINK