Comments down

Just got an e-mail from someone wondering why we decactivated comments on the Outpost website. I looked and, sure enough, comments were down.

We didn't do it on purpose and will try to get it fixed as soon as possible. But it explains why we have had no reader reaction to our endorsements last week -- an unusual development.

What it doesn't explain is why spam comments continued to get through. For the last week, we have had a website that blocks reader comments but allows spam to pass through. Now that's technology.

Push polled

I keep trying to listen to one of these automated push polls all the way through to the end, but I always get mad and hang up. It happened again Saturday. The poll asked if I intended to vote for Tester. Then it asked if I intended to vote for Burns. Then it asked if I would prefer lower or higher taxes.

OK so far. But the next question got to me. It was, approximately: "Do you believe that terrorists should have the same constitutional rights as American citizens?" (If anybody else who was called got the question down more exactly, please let me know.)

I said, "What do you mean?"

Of course, the automaton on the other end couldn't handle that. It said that the call would be terminated unless I answered "yes" or "no."

I shouted into the phone.

"Good!" I said. "Then stop asking such moronic questions."

So I never got to hear the rest of the poll. But what the heck? Suspected terrorists who are Americans obviously have the same constitutional rights as other Americans. You can't deprive someone of constitutional rights simply by hanging on a label. Only Americans who have been caught actually carrying out or plotting acts of terror, or who have actively taken up arms against the country, lose any constitutional rights.

Terrorists who aren't Americans don't have the same constitutional rights as American citizens, but then neither does, say, Tony Blair. So what's the point of the question?

Sounds to me like a subtle way of asking if I'm OK with torturing terror suspects and eliminating habeas corpus and locking people away forever with no charges, no trial and no lawyer. And no, I'm not OK with that. On that point, the push-poll recording was as dense as the president.

Endorsements

Outpost endorsements are here. By far the toughest was the Rehberg-Lindeen race.

On one hand, I've gotten to know and respect Rehberg a bit over the years. I think he has gotten better as time has gone by, and I think he listens to his constituents. On the other hand, I have a very tough time endorsing anyone who voted for the war in Iraq and who sat by as the Bush administration assaulted liberty and institutionalized torture. The entire Montana delegation has been pathetically weak in standing up for liberty.

I guess the consolation is that our endorsement is likely to have little effect either way. But in my heart, I still am not sure how I will vote.

CBS in the dumps

CBS reached a low tonight that makes the Bush fake documents story look like Pulitzer quality work. Katie Couric introduced Sean Hannity as guest commentator.

Sean Hannity! Don't we get enough of this blowhard? Three hours a day on the radio, an hour on cable TV, a couple of crappy books -- what insight into the political world could Hannity possibly have that we haven't already heard a hundred times?

None, actually. He used his time to decry the politicization of the war on terror. Incredibly, the only examples he could find of politicians who have tried to exploit the war for political purposes were Democrats. Amazing. It's the same theme he has pounded on his radio show virtually every single day for the last five years. And he still hasn't found a single Republican who has had anything but the highest possible, thoroughly apolitical motives in discussing the war. Edward R. Murrow would be spinning in his grave if he hadn't already burrowed his way to the other side of the earth.

Tuesday night: Arianna Huffington. I can't wait!

Profiling

The Montana Department of Transportation just got a $644,000 federal grant to deter racial profiling. Just asking: Is racial profiling really a $644,000 question in Montana?

One for Tester

In tonight's debate, Jon Tester nailed Conrad Burns on Iraq. Burns' implication that a secret plan exists that will tell us when we have won the war is the most ludicrous thing I've heard in any of the debates. Tester responded with real eloquence and passion, and may have salted the election away right there.

No surprises in the first debate. I like both candidates and thought they both acquitted themselves well. Denny Rehberg came across as a tad more polished and knowledgeable, but Monica Lindeen may have won just for beating expectations. I can't see that the debate will put any dent into Rehberg's lead.

Guns for Burns

From the National Rifle Association comes a news release touting its campaign support for Conrad Burns: seven billboards, 4,143 radio ads on 88 stations, 1,824 cable TV ads, inserts in 11 newspapers.

I wonder why? Jon Tester claims he's a strong Second Amendment guy, and I haven't heard any reason to dispute that. Why isn't the NRA spending its money where it might make a real difference?

I can think of only three reasons:

1. The NRA is supporting Republicans everywhere.

2. The NRA thinks Burns will win and wants him to be happy.

3. It's payback time.

Votes for Tester

I had my journalism students at Rocky Mountain College watch last week's Burns-Tester debate and write a brief story about it. When I asked for a show of hands on who they thought won the debate, they favored Tester by about 4-1.

Bear in mind: This is a group of busy college students. None had seen any of the other debates and none has followed the race closely (on a recent editing quiz, no one caught the error in this phrase: U.S. Sen. Conrad Burns, D-Mont.). Their responses to the debate seemed to be based less on the candidates' positions than on how they answered questions and stated their positions.

I don't know that any of that means anything, but I thought the edge the students gave to Tester was striking. I've seen three of the debates and rated them all roughly as draws.

Tough talk

Even by the standards of this year's Montana Senate campaign, the latest news release from the Montana Democratic Party seems harsh. The release goes after ads in which former Gov. Marc Racicot backs Conrad Burns' candidacy.

"Marc Racicot, fondly recalled by some in Montana who have lost track of his career, is at the very heart of the culture of corruption in Washington under Republican control," the release says. The release goes on to call Racicot a "Jack Abramoff-type figure in Washington" and adds, "Racicot is a paid agent of big corporate special interests who game the system in Burns and Rehberg’s Washington everyday.”

Next target: Abe Lincoln, another Republican who came to a bad end in Washington.

Torturous

One of my Democratic friends was railing again last week against the ruination of America brought on by Bush and his minions. My usual response to this tirade is to advise her, in various ways, to chill out. Things aren't that bad, I say. Stick around a bit and watch them change.

But last week I didn't have it in me to argue. What brought me down was passage of the administration's pro-torture bill. As time allows, I've been struggling to understand the full impact of the bill. I haven't got through it all yet, and I still hold out some hope that I am misunderstanding much of this. But the search is profoundly discouraging, and I am losing hope. I keep thinking: The war on terror is over, and we have surrendered.

I've been critical of this country at times, but I have never felt ashamed to be an American. Now I feel shame.

Tester online

My Jon Tester profile for Montana Quarterly is now available to those of us in the cheap seats. In case your computer-generated ADD prevents you from reading the whole thing, Ed Kemmick has a spot-on summary.

In the Outpost comments, Rocky Smith says we should now bill ourselves as the "Democrat party weekly." Funny thing is, because of various deadlines, I did most of the reporting for that piece a couple of months ago, so I just sort of assumed that its fundamental assertion -- that Tester is a decent, likeable guy who may (or may not) have the stuff to make a good senator -- would have been called into question by now. But it hasn't. No matter how hard Burns attacks, I haven't heard him or anyone else go after Tester's basic integrity and decency.

So when a report of a near universal consensus that a human being is an OK guy is dismissed as partisan fluff, I am left to wonder what could possibly remain that isn't partisan.

Segregated swimming

Occasionally, a student nails it. In the business class I sit in on at Rocky, discussion yesterday turned to laws banning smoking in restaurants and other public places. One student expressed frustration over restaurants that place non-smoking areas just a table or two away from smoking areas.

One student chimed in: "That's like having a 'peeing area' in a pool."

Richards vs. Keenan

I watched the Butte debate between Burns and Tester this a.m., and I came out wishing that Bob Keenan and Paul Richards had been slugging it out instead. Keenan, at least, would have given us honest talk about the government's pitiful record on deficit spending, and Richards would have made sense about Iraq.

Instead we get Burns hypothesizing that we will grow our way out of the deficit, just the way Jack Kennedy and Ronald Reagan did it. Except, of course, that what Kennedy and Reagan did didn't work. Tax cuts were followed by revenue increases, to be sure, but that didn't stop deficits from growing. Now, with a wildly expensive war going on, we get deficits piled upon deficits, with no end in sight.

And from Tester we get - what exactly? - about Iraq. I don't hear him flip-flopping, the way Republicans claim they do. I just don't hear any clear position at all. Richards would have pointed out that, if in fact the war in Iraq is leading to more terrorism, not less, then "stay the course" is not only expensive and impractical, it's downright stupid. We need a change of course, and fast. Creating the first pro-torture presidential administration in U.S. history isn't going to get the job done.

So we get a lame, watered-down debate, a greatest-hits edition of sound bites and conventional wisdom. I'm holding out for Keenan-Richards.

UPDATE: Interesting comments below about the merits of staying and leaving Iraq. This month's Harper's magazine has a plan by George McGovern and William R. Polk on how to get out of the war. I'm not expert enough to judge the merits of the plan, but what strikes me is that it is at least a plan. Why can't we get a plan from our own government? All we get are "stay the course" and "cut and run," neither of which makes any sense. Everybody knows we have to leave Iraq sometime -- my grandkids may have to fight there, but their grandkids won't -- so why not plan for it? And why not have that discussion in a public forum among representatives chosen by the people to stand up for our interests -- say, Congress, for example?

Bob Lyon

I was sorry to see in the Gazette this morning that Bob Lyon had died. He was one of a disappearing breed: a tireless Democratic loyalist with a keen sense of the larger needs of the nation and the community.

I didn't always agree with him, and he didn't always agree with me. He subscribed to The Outpost from its inception until we began running Rob Natelson's column in The Outpost -- that was too much for his liberal sensibilities. As a letter writer, he was an indefatigable jewel: His letters were varied, succinct, and capably written. Although he often wrote both to The Outpost and The Gazette on the same topics, he always recast his message so we each got a fresh letter.

He had been ill for some time, and his death is no surprise. But it is a loss.

Punch the clock

I like this idea.

R but not quite IP

What's Right in Montana takes note of the general lack of posting here and draws the usual sort of comments. I can't apologize for not posting more; with my schedule, it would be irresponsible to even try. I started this blog (the first by a working journalist in Montana) in part out of a hope to supplement the Outpost's weekly news coverage with daily updates and commentary. That still sounds like a good idea to me, but it just isn't practical at the moment. I've got to earn some cash.

Infrequent posting does mean that I will miss commenting on some things of which I might otherwise have taken note, including a couple of things on What's Right in Montana:

1. The remarkable discovery that "disavowed" implies liberal bias.

2. This enlightening essay on how much Jon Tester and Conrad Burns "like" taxes. The post misses an obvious point: In my 2 1/2 decades around politicians, I don't believe that I have ever met one who "likes" taxes. What politicians like is spending because spending allows them to keep constitutents happy and make election-year claims about how successful they are at bringing home the bacon. Responsible conservatives resist the urge to spend; responsible liberals have the political courage to tax. That natural tug of war is supposed to keep the system in balance.

But Tester, whose experience is in state government, doesn't have the same luxury that Burns has in Congress. The Montana Legislature has to balance its budget, so if Tester wants to spend money, he has to find revenues somewhere. Burns just has to tack a few hundred billion more onto the deficit.

What I'm waiting for is some genuine conservative to explain to me how it is fiscally responsible for a senator to support, say, a war that costs a billion or so bucks a day and then not only refuse to levy the taxes to pay for it but actually support tax cuts that dig the hole even deeper. Any takers?

Finally, I might just note that my interest in the whole blogging phenomenon has waned in recent months. I'm not persuaded that it is a good use of my time, and I'm not persuaded that I have the temperament for it. This may sound odd coming from a guy who has probably a million words in print, but writing always has been a struggle for me, and adding it to the responsibility of running a business and teaching doesn't make it any easier. Lots of days I just look at that blank computer screen and think, not my job to fill it.

P.S. I did a profile on Tester for Montana Quarterly that is now hitting the stands. Look for it everywhere!

Dem bloggers

Get your blogger kit today!

So long as you are a Democrat.

Blogging up

I asked my journalism students my usual questions about blogging, something I have done for about five years now. The first couple of years few students had even heard of blogging; now they all have. But none read any of the prominent political blogs (although one blogs here) and only a scattered few had heard of any of them. Instapundit, Daily Kos, etc., all pretty much drew a blank. They do their blogging, if any, at myspace.com.

Where do they get their news? Nothing got a majority of votes, but local TV news appeared to be the main source. The Gazette probably ran second, especially when online reading is counted. Comedy Central and radio got a few scattered votes, but national TV, including the 24-hour news channels, didn't get much. I didn't ask about the Outpost; no need to give anyone an incentive to lie.

So how much do they know about the news? Too early to tell, but not much, if past experience holds. Not that that's a bad thing: My days on the road and my college days were the only two times in my life when I didn't read a paper every day.

And there's this: Of the 35 students in my two classes, only one had seen "An Inconvenient Truth." So you ideologues who worry that Al Gore is corrupting young minds can rest easy.

UPDATE: In comments, someone asks how many of my students had seen a Michael Moore movie. Just for the heck of it, I asked my 15 English students that question this morning. About four hands went up.

blogged down

There actually are good reasons why you don't see me blogging here. School started at Rocky Mountain College on Aug. 22, so I've been teaching my journalism and first-year writing courses out there. MSU-Billings begins Wednesday, and I will be teaching two German courses there. And I'm teaching a community outreach course on media issues at MSU-Billings beginning in late September. And tutoring for a few hours a week.

On top of all that, the Outpost just had one of its most profitable months ever. That's good news, but bigger papers mean a lot more work. So I've been a busy boy.

And, as a final note, we also are working on a pretty dramatic overhaul of the Outpost website that could make it far more useful than it has been up to now. When that happens, the blog, at least in this form, is likely to go away forever.

So if you are wondering why there is nothing to see here, that's why.

Rethnking executions

A colleague takes me to task for my comments on the Gazette's coverage of the Dawson execution. This required me to actually think about what I wanted to say, rather than just mouthing off in grand blogger fashion. So here are the relevant parts of my response to him:

Please understand that much of my reaction to this story was as a citizen and a reader rather than as an editor. As an editor, I understand the arguments Dave Rye made on my blog, and I would have taken that into account if I had been the one making the calls at the Gazette. I would have played the story down some but would have run most of the same stories. Most of those stories are almost obligatory in a case like this: the last meal, the witness to the execution, the recounting of the crime, the protests, etc. I probably even would have run the story about Dawson not giving interviews, but I would have boiled it down and buried it inside. Also (in one other specific example that comes to mind) on the day that the Brits broke up the terrorist plot, I would have played that above Dawson.

In short, as a reader and citizen I probably would have been just as appalled by the Gazette's coverage if I had been directing it. I have no moral objections to the death penalty, but I do object to the wall-to-wall coverage that these cases always seem to generate. Some people say the death penalty deters criminals. I doubt that, and I suspect that the extensive coverage these cases generate actually appeals to a certain sort of sick criminal mind -- the sort that is, in fact, most likely to commit such hideous crimes. If I were to make a case against capital punishment, media coverage of any recent execution would be Exhibit No. 1.

When I say that I really don't care whether a character like Dawson lives or dies, I mean that. I doubt that I read 10 percent of the Gazette's coverage, and I don't think I read any of the stories about legal efforts to stop his execution. I just didn't want to know.

So my real complaint is not that the Gazette abused journalistic discretion. The Gazette did, by and large, what the tenets of daily journalism compelled it to do. It's the tenets of journalism that worry me, both as a reader and a citizen, and I should have made that clearer in my comments.