[Population: One] <A HREF="http://popone.innocence.com/ar

[bryant]

For some reason, Glenn Reynolds is very interested in the Volcker Report, which implicates the UN in corruption involving Iraq's food for oil program, but hasn't said a word about CNN's report that the US condoned Saddam's oil smuggling.

Comments

[editswlonghair.livejournal.com]

Why am I not shocked? Whether stovepiping intelligence on Iraq, or cherrypicking scientific data on global warming, nobody has any respect for facts anymore. It is all spin and blinders.

[robotnik.livejournal.com]

Global warning is a myth perpetuated by eco-terrorists and super-intelligent Congolese apes, John. Michael Crichton says so.

[robotnik.livejournal.com]

Uh, warming.

[multiplexer.livejournal.com]

Why are you reading Glenn Reynolds?

[st-rev.livejournal.com]

Dude, calm down. He's been following the oil for food program for years.

[editswlonghair.livejournal.com]

Holy freudian slip, Superman!

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

You beat me to it.

[thebitterguy]

What's funny is that his bio page has a blogad from the UN.

[bryant]

That's kind of the point. He's happy to cover it when it's the UN screwing up and being corrupt. He's also happy to ignore any US involvement.

Just checked back -- he posted another update today... about the UN. Still no mention that the US might have winked at Saddam's oil sales. Intellectually dishonest.

[bryant]

I'm not. I noticed the story about the US involvement, I knew Reynolds loves what he calls "UNSCAM," so I popped over to see if he had the integrity to talk about the latest development. I admit I was not terribly surprised to find out that he didn't.

And fuck, of course it's worth talking about. Reynolds is scoring points on Ward Churchill. When someone's an idiot, you say "Hey, look at that stupid idiot." It's good for the public discourse.

[bryant]

Heh. He had a comment about that somewhere to the effect of "I'd rather the money was in my hands than in theirs." Which is goofy; it's not as if the UN wouldn't spend the ad budget elsewhere. But that's Reynolds for you.

[st-rev.livejournal.com]

So you'd prefer he only accept ads he found ideologically acceptable? Please.

[bryant]

No, and that's not what I said. I think his excuse for taking the ad is goofy and doesn't stand up to examination. If he'd said "I don't apply an ideological filter to the ads I take," I'd be all for that.

[st-rev.livejournal.com]

He has stated that, repeatedly. If you're going to hate someone for their beliefs, hate them for what they actually believe. Jesus.

[bryant]

Interesting. Are you assuming that I hate him because I disagree with him? Or is it that I can't disagree with him for any rational reason, so I must hate him?

What he has actually stated, by the by, is this: "I decided early on to take ads from pretty much anybody unless I thought they were offensive to me or to too many readers. I'm not easily offended by political views short of Nazis, Communists, etc." The "unless I thought they were offensive" bit? That's an ideological filter.

I'm not talking out of my ass here. Back when I worked at Netcom, we had a subscriber who was into neo-Nazi hate speech. Actually, you've been around Usenet a while -- you might remember him. Dan Gannon. Total wad. So he had an account with us, and from time to time someone would say "should we be letting this guy post hate speech through us?"

And I always said "Yes." Because I think free speech is good. We had an agreement with Dan about what was reasonable to post where; he had to work under the same AUP as everyone else. No posting Holocaust revisionism to inappropriate groups. Eventually he decided that he wasn't gonna abide by the agreement anymore, so we did wind up cancelling his account, but as long as he played by the same rules as anyone else we were willing to transmit his content.

So this is not just some hypothetical exercise for me.

Alllll that said, I still think it's pretty goofy to say "Well, better the money is with me than with Soros," because if he didn't take the ads the money would go someplace else. It's got that "wink wink I'm putting something over on the opposition" quality that I dislike no matter which side it's coming from. "Ha ha, I used Kerry/Bush's sign generator to make funny signs!" Yeah, great.

Now, if you ask nicely, I'll tell you why I hate America.