the woman hasn't had an original thought since forever. she's useful as a weathervane on what the punditariat are thinking (though you can figure that out just as easily by watching the sunday morning blab-a-thons [if you have a strong enough stomach]) and little else.
and oh yeah, re this "being turned down for the prom" -- it wasn't me that revived this thread this time round.
― Eisbär (llamasfur), Sunday, 14 March 2004 20:18 (twenty years ago) link
― youn (youn), Saturday, 1 July 2006 11:37 (seventeen years ago) link
http://i24.tinypic.com/2s1qgsj.jpg
― jhøshea, Friday, 4 January 2008 00:43 (sixteen years ago) link
By MAUREEN DOWD
Published: June 29, 2008
Go to Columnist Page »
OBAMA'S TROUBLING INTERNET FUND RAISING
Certainly the most interesting and potentially devastating phone call I have received during this election cycle came this week from one of the Obama's campaign internet geeks. These are the staffers who devised Obama's internet fund raising campaign which raised in the neighborhood of $200 million so far. That is more then twice the total funds raised by any candidate in history - and this was all from the internet campaign.
What I learned from this insider was shocking but I guess we shouldn't be surprised that when it comes to fund raising there simply are no rules that can't be broken and no ethics that prevail.
Obama's internet campaign started out innocently enough with basic e-mail networking , lists saved from previous party campaigns and from supporters who visited any of the Obama campaign web sites.
Small contributions came in from these sources and the internet campaign staff were more than pleased by the results.
Then, about two months into the campaign the daily contribution intake multiplied. Where was it coming from? One of the web site security monitors began to notice the bulk of the contributions were clearly coming in from overseas internet service providers and at the rate and frequency of transmission it was clear these donations were "programmed" by a very sophisticated user.
While the security people were not able to track most of the sources due to firewalls and other blocking devices put on these contributions they were able to collate the number of contributions that were coming in seemingly from individuals but the funds were from only a few credit card accounts and bank electronic funds transfers. The internet service providers (ISP) they were able to trace were from Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other Middle Eastern countries. One of the banks used for fund transfers was also located in Saudi Arabia.
Another concentrated group of donations was traced to a Chinese ISP with a similar pattern of limited credit card charges.
It became clear that these donations were very likely coming from sources other than American voters. This was discussed at length within the campaign and the decision was made that none of these donations violated campaign financing laws.
It was also decided that it was not the responsibility of the campaign to audit these millions of contributions as to the actual source (specific credit card number or bank transfer account numbers) to insure that none of these internet contributors exceeded the legal maximum donation on a cumulative basis of many small donations. They also found the record keeping was not complete enough to do it anyway.
This is a shocking revelation.
We have been concerned about the legality of "bundling" contributions after the recent exposure of illegal bundlers but now it appears we may have an even greater problem.
I guess we should have been somewhat suspicious when the numbers started to come out. We were told (no proof offered) that the Obama internet contributions were from $10.00 to $25.00 or so.
If the $200,000,000 is right, and the average contribution was $15.00, that would mean over 13 million individuals made contributions? That would also be 13 million contributions would need to be processed. How did all that happen?
I believe the Obama campaign's internet fund raising needs a serious, in depth investigation and audit. It also appears the whole question of internet fund raising needs investigation by the legislature and perhaps new laws to insure it complies not only with the letter of these laws but the spirit as well.
― and what, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:17 (fifteen years ago) link
http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/donations.asp
― akm, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:22 (fifteen years ago) link
also, i don't understand why you continue to repost these ridiculous screeds that you know are wrong without comment; it does nothing but give them yet another undeserved airing where some gullible dumbfuck might run across them and believe them
― akm, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:24 (fifteen years ago) link
yes, and what, how dare you not tell the truth on the internets
― Mr. Que, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:27 (fifteen years ago) link
won't anyone think of the gullible dumbfucks
― Mr. Que, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:28 (fifteen years ago) link
ilx: home of gullible dumbfucks
― and what, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:28 (fifteen years ago) link
come on, maudow doesn't even sound like that. n she writes about celibate priests matchmaking and all other kinds o shit
if people turnin, they turnin
― yungblut, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:31 (fifteen years ago) link
May all your futures be pleasant ones Not like our present ones Drink, l'chaim, to life To life, l'chaim
― yungblut, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:32 (fifteen years ago) link
27 new "please delete abusive post" threads in Mod Req by midnight.
― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:32 (fifteen years ago) link
as a gullible dumbfuck i have the right of deletion for this post directed at me
― and what, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:37 (fifteen years ago) link
Nasty stuff. Saudi Arabia and China are just thrown in without special emphasis, but are obviously the poisoned pill you are meant to swallow.
This dirty trick is a lot more subtle than the false madrassa story. Whoever did it has a pretty good idea of how to plant a really flourishing false rumor.
Hatching one takes one or a few people a few days to brainstorm and refine. Squashing it takes a much larger effort and, like cockroaches, you can never kill them all. This one will almost certainly hurt Obama among many hundreds of thousands of voters.
― Aimless, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:43 (fifteen years ago) link
The New York Times is absolutely pathetic these days. Wasn't it once some kind-of newspaper of record?
― burt_stanton, Thursday, 10 July 2008 19:46 (fifteen years ago) link
I can't find him writing about that particular column, but Bob Somerby has his usual coronary going after her bullshit for the last few weeks. Shit, it's a regular occurance now.
― kingfish, Thursday, 10 July 2008 20:01 (fifteen years ago) link
SHE DIDNT WRITE THE COLUMN GUYZ
― and what, Thursday, 10 July 2008 20:02 (fifteen years ago) link
srsly have yall even read maureen dowd before? no refs to clinton sex-life or bush as 'boy king', just a bunch of worldnetdaily style rumor-mongering
Looks like she did. It's got the byline and everything
― burt_stanton, Thursday, 10 July 2008 20:03 (fifteen years ago) link
-- and what, Thursday, July 10, 2008 7:28 PM (34 minutes ago) Bookmark Link
― Mr. Que, Thursday, 10 July 2008 20:03 (fifteen years ago) link
http://tbn0.google.com/images?q=tbn:uGC1YOmb7VEIyM:http://cardioplegia.files.wordpress.com/2007/12/sockpuppet300x386.jpg
― and what, Thursday, 10 July 2008 20:04 (fifteen years ago) link
RIP Dowd.
― brownie, Thursday, 10 July 2008 20:12 (fifteen years ago) link
Somerby has been having a field day with NYT "Public Editor" Clark Hoyt's very public verbal defenstration of Dowd several weeks ago - over her her deeply weird gender politics. And Somerby's traced how chastened her columns have been since then. "Clark Hoyt gets results!"
― Tracer Hand, Thursday, 10 July 2008 21:33 (fifteen years ago) link
http://www.236.com/images/photo2/3702/original/original.jpg
― El Tomboto, Thursday, 10 July 2008 21:40 (fifteen years ago) link
^ Heh heh
I can't type.
― Tracer Hand, Friday, 11 July 2008 00:33 (fifteen years ago) link
her column about the catholic priest who gives marriage advice was incredible. she's a bitter old hag.
― m coleman, Friday, 11 July 2008 10:41 (fifteen years ago) link
Didn't it basically conclude that all men suck and aren't good enough to marry?
― Nicole, Friday, 11 July 2008 11:20 (fifteen years ago) link
Yes. What was also awesome about that one is she didn't even have to write anything for it. (Unless she made the priest up completely.)
― Tracer Hand, Friday, 11 July 2008 11:27 (fifteen years ago) link
i doubt she made it up. I went to parochial school around the same time as Dowd and there were priests who specialized in this. in like 7th or 8th grade there was a padre who went around to all the schools in the diocese and gave a "sex talk" to the kids, separated by gender of course. the girls told us afterwards that he instructed them to "bite a guy's tongue if he sticks in your mouth." scare stories from a nominal celibate.
when Dowd righteously invokes her working-class catholic roots I just see red. what a phony.
― m coleman, Friday, 11 July 2008 11:44 (fifteen years ago) link
LOL @ middle aged single woman looking to priests as fonts of wisdom on marriage and sexuality. maureen should have coffee w/peggy noonan sometime.
― m coleman, Friday, 11 July 2008 11:47 (fifteen years ago) link
Dowd is like a bitchier version of Custos.
― Nicole, Friday, 11 July 2008 17:04 (fifteen years ago) link
haaaaa omg holy shit
― goole, Friday, 11 July 2008 17:07 (fifteen years ago) link
Nicole's description just above = lols, but I just stumbled across an equally worthy one due to this sequence of events:
A Dowd column.
Ta-Nehisi Coates's first response.
His second response, apologizing for having 'missed the tongue squarely positioned in Maureen Dowd's cheek.'
One of his commenters in response to his second post:
Irony should be a stiletto -- in Dowd's hands it's more like a lobster mallet.
― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 12 November 2008 15:04 (fifteen years ago) link
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/12/opinion/12dowd.html
But Sarah Palin can come across as utterly unready to lead the world — or even find the world on a map — and that doesn't reflect poorly on the rest of us.
It only means that she doesn't have enough mind grapes or thoughtsicles, as Tracy Morgan refers to brain droppings on "30 Rock," to be president soon.
― mizzell, Wednesday, 12 November 2008 15:09 (fifteen years ago) link
a screaming lobster mallet?
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 12 November 2008 15:16 (fifteen years ago) link
...of love
― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 12 November 2008 15:20 (fifteen years ago) link
don't know if I've ever read her, but I saw her on BBC on election night, and she was so tasty !!!
― the pinefox, Wednesday, 12 November 2008 15:34 (fifteen years ago) link
she's best with a bit of drawn butter, IMHO
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 12 November 2008 15:34 (fifteen years ago) link
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090518/ap_on_re_us/us_times_dowd
― "the whale saw her" (gabbneb), Monday, 18 May 2009 12:04 (fifteen years ago) link
She claims she never read Marshall's post last week and had heard the line from a friend who did not mention reading it in Marshall's blog.
Uh, yeah.
― Johnny Fever, Monday, 18 May 2009 12:16 (fifteen years ago) link
So she'd willingly plagiarize her friend as well?
The early days of Dowd, reporter
― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 26 July 2012 19:31 (eleven years ago) link
Ok, do i want to actually read a column titled "The Tortured Mechanics of Eroticism," or should i just use that as a new display name?
― JoeStork, Sunday, 14 July 2013 16:23 (ten years ago) link
hehe
― Treeship, Sunday, 14 July 2013 16:29 (ten years ago) link
it's about corsets, p. informative by modo stds.
― j., Sunday, 14 July 2013 18:55 (ten years ago) link
surprised nobody has said "i'd let her torture my mechanics of eroticism" yet
― Treeship, Sunday, 14 July 2013 19:02 (ten years ago) link
really, you are? really? now that you've typed it out?
― j., Sunday, 14 July 2013 19:32 (ten years ago) link
More than surprised. "Flabbergasted."
― Treeship, Sunday, 14 July 2013 19:35 (ten years ago) link
Her latest screw-up re the NYC mayoral race made Bill de Blasio's wife sound like she was calling Christine Quinn a childless, uncaring lesbian.
http://www.salon.com/2013/08/22/please_fire_maureen_dowd_or_get_her_a_fact_checker/
― Miss Arlington twirls for the Coal Heavers (Dr Morbius), Thursday, 22 August 2013 13:46 (ten years ago) link
Jake Silverstein @jakesilverstein 10mThrilled to announce that the incomparable @NYTimesDowd is joining the @NYTmag as a staff writer. Drug test not required.
― lag∞n, Monday, 11 August 2014 14:11 (nine years ago) link
she is like, america's cool aunt. as a kid, her jokes at thanksgiving seemed sophisticated and cool, like a portal into another, less humdrum world than the one you were familiar with. but looking back, as an adult, it's clear that she was a poseur in the end.
― Treeship, Tuesday, 2 August 2016 23:32 (seven years ago) link
"in the end"
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 2 August 2016 23:34 (seven years ago) link
Reading her and colleague William Safire's attempts at bon mots and sophisticated banter was like watching old men trying to pee into the urinal.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 2 August 2016 23:35 (seven years ago) link
still, the Clintons are subhuman garbage and i don't give a shit about style in political writing
xo
― The Hon. J. Piedmont Mumblethunder (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 3 August 2016 03:27 (seven years ago) link
that was obvious from the revive
― El Tomboto, Wednesday, 3 August 2016 03:35 (seven years ago) link
"subhuman garbage"
― wizzz! (amateurist), Wednesday, 3 August 2016 04:30 (seven years ago) link
thanks for staying out of the election thread morbs, my blood pressure thanks you.
― wizzz! (amateurist), Wednesday, 3 August 2016 04:31 (seven years ago) link
fuck you, that thread is for you and your fellow tourettesians
I was happy to see my friend's teenage son posted her 'HRC is the perfect Republican nominee' column on FB the other day, STYLE be damned
― The Hon. J. Piedmont Mumblethunder (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 16 August 2016 11:12 (seven years ago) link
'scaling wokeback mountain'
― mookieproof, Monday, 15 July 2019 18:29 (four years ago) link
her writing style is overwrought in a way seldom seen in this era, as if in crafting prose she's invented as version of 'wit' that has neither humor nor insight
no clue why you'd use a word like 'mandarins' to refer to people with perceived power in 2019, but she did it recently
― untuned mass damper (mh), Monday, 15 July 2019 18:36 (four years ago) link
she was best buds w/ Poppy Bush so she sure can pick em
― a Mets fan who gave up on everything in the mid '80s (Dr Morbius), Monday, 15 July 2019 18:37 (four years ago) link
plus using Rahm Satan Emanuel as her primary source this week
― a Mets fan who gave up on everything in the mid '80s (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 16 July 2019 01:15 (four years ago) link
credit where credit is due. this opening was good:
My favorite “Twilight Zone” episode is the one where aliens land and, in a sign of their peaceful intentions, give world leaders a book. Government cryptographers work to translate the alien language. They decipher the title — “To Serve Man” — and that’s reassuring, so interplanetary shuttles are set up.But as the cryptographers proceed, they realize — too late — that it’s a cookbook.That, dear reader, is the story of OpenAI.
But as the cryptographers proceed, they realize — too late — that it’s a cookbook.
That, dear reader, is the story of OpenAI.
― treeship., Thursday, 7 December 2023 14:38 (five months ago) link
Unless you haven't seen that episode before. Maybe a spoiler alert, Mo?
― henry s, Thursday, 7 December 2023 17:58 (five months ago) link