The hardtracking staff has kept an eye on the viewership of Rick Perry’s web ad Proven Leadership the past few days, and here’s a handy clip ‘n’ save summary:
Wednesday, 9/21: 1,101 views
Friday, 9/23: 445,866 views
Saturday, 9/24: 495,187 views
Fade to bleak?
So the hardworking staff ventured forth from the Global Worldwide Headquarters yesterday and trundled over to the Fenway cinemas to take in the new movie “Moneyball,” the story of Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane’s (legal) tender love affair with baseball statistics.
The hardworking staff was whelmed.
Sure, sure – the big league film critics called it a home run. Here’s Manohla Dargis in the New York Times (“Throwing a Digital-Age Curveball”):
The hungry heart of “Moneyball,” a movie about baseball in the digital age, is a beautiful hard case named Billy Beane. Coiled yet cool, Billy has the liquid physical grace and bright eyes of a predator. He was built to win. Even his name, with its short syllabic bursts, sounds ready for ESPN exultations. That he’s played by Brad Pitt giving the quintessential Brad Pitt performance just seals the deal. It didn’t turn out that way, and in 2001 this high school star turned major-league washout was no longer a player but the general manager of the Oakland Athletics, the little team that could but didn’t.
And here’s Joe Morgenstern in the Wall Street Journal (“Stars, Stats and Perfect Pitch”):
One of the best sports movies ever, “Bull Durham” has one of the best opening lines ever: “I believe,” Susan Sarandon’s ardent groupie declares, “in the church of baseball.” The church is desanctified in “Moneyball,” whose context is runaway commerce, and whose subtext is statistics—i.e., a scientific approach to the major-league version of the game that seeks to sweep away nostalgic notions and dry the moist eyes of the faithful. Never before, though, have statistics added up to such electrifying entertainment. After the mostly minor-league productions of recent months, this movie, which was directed by Bennett Miller, renews your belief in the power of movies.
Then again, the movie was also overlong, overwrought, and overstated (as Allen Barra pointed out in his WSJ column “The ‘Moneyball’ Myth”).
Not to throw spitballs or anything.
New York Times columnist Gail Collins extends her Seamus Streak in today’s op-ed:
Gloom pervades the land. Some people believe it’s the economy. Others blame the weather. I think it’s because the country is gradually coming to grips with the fact that Mitt Romney is going to be the Republican nominee for president.
It is a scientific fact. Every minute, somewhere in America, another citizen realizes that Mitt is going to be in our face for the next 14 months. Conceivably for the next nine years. Children now in third grade might graduate from high school without ever experiencing a totally Romney-free day.
This is not something I’m happy pointing out. For one thing, I don’t want to believe I live in a country that would seriously consider bestowing the nation’s highest office on a man who once drove to Canada with the family dog strapped to the roof of the car.
Yes!
To recap Campaign Outsider’s excellent contest:
Guess the date on which Collins will write about Romney without mentioning his cartop pooch, and you could win an all-expenses-paid lunch with the hardworking staff.
Enter early. Enter often.
But enter. Seriously. We’ve got some significant lunch money here at the Global Worldwide Headquarters.
And we’re eager to spend it.
In its frantic – and likely futile – campaign to flack the Obama administration’s American Jobs Act, the Democratic National Committee has launched another “Pass This Jobs Bill” TV spot (tip o’ the pixel: Politico).
NEW DNC TV AD, “Get Going” (30 seconds) – peppy male voiceover: “You know that saying, ‘When the going gets tough, the tough get going’? Well, America invented it. And we’ve gotta to get going right now. The president’s American Jobs Act creates jobs fixing roads and bridges. Helps small businesses that hire more workers. Fifteen hundred dollars more in your paycheck. It’s paid for. Ends tax breaks for the wealthiest. And closes corporate loopholes. Tell Congress: No more games. Pass the plan.”
Media buy: Col.: Denver … Fla.: Tampa, Orlando … Iowa: Des Moines … Nev.: Las Vegas … N.H.: Manchester … N.C.: Raleigh, Charlotte … Va.: Norfolk, Richmond, Roanoke, D.C. – all battleground states.
Prediction: BattleGround Zero effect.
Roughly 48 hours ago the hardworking staff posted an item about a new web ad from Rick Perry (R-Is the Debate Over Yet?):
At that point the ad had been viewed 1,101 times.
And now?
445,866 views – an average of 9300 an hour since then.
We’ll check it out again in another 24.
*** EXCLUSIVE CAMPAIGN OUTSIDER EXCLUSIVE ***
For the past month the hardworking staff has been following – and trying to determine the identity of – @BCSubpoenaNews, whose Twitter feed and blog promise to “keep you up to date on the latest news involving Boston College’s fight against the subpoenas seeking the Burns Library’s Belfast Project Oral History of the IRA.”
(So as not to bury the lead, the answer is: The wife of Anthony McIntyre, who did the interviews for the project.)
Here’s the backstory:
Splendid reader Ted Folkman was the first to come forward with a theory:
I am not sure, but I believe the Twitter feed belongs to Ed Moloney. The Broken Elbow blog, appears to belong to him, and it references the Twitter feed.
(That would be Ed Moloney who directed the oral history project at BC.)
But Folkman’s conjecture was soon shot down by the mysterious commenter Digital History:
The Broken Elbow is Ed Moloney’s blog, and Ed Moloney did post about the BC Subpoena News site. But using Ted Folkman’s logic, it could also be said that as you have posted about the site, you are the one behind it. In both cases that would be wrong. Neither you nor Ed Moloney are behind the BCSN blog, although you have both drawn attention to it via your own blogs.
The BCSN is simply a reference site for people who are interested in, or should be interested in because of its impact or ramifications, the case and its outcome. All relevant material is collected at the site so that an informed opinion, rather than off-the-cuff, inaccurate and incorrect supposition, can be made on the subject. Court documents, affidavits, exhibits, news articles and a good deal of background information, is all readily available and updated regularly to help people not familiar with the case’s nuances understand all that is at play in this complex issue. The site is structured so it is easy to navigate and discover all the detail.
Except, of course, who is behind it, as the BCSN prefers to remain anonymous. ʘ‿ʘ
Folkman wasn’t done yet. Yesterday he wrote:
Well, to respond to Digital History, here is the post from Moloney’s Broken Elbow blog that led me to conclude that he’s behind the new blog, too.
In an escalation of the campaign to resist the PSNI/US Department of Justice invasion of the Boston College oral history archives, we have created a website which gathers together all the publicly available documents & articles about the affair, opened a Facebook page and activated a Twitter feed on developments.
This supplements our recent attempt to intervene legally in the case with a strategy devised by our lawyer Eamonn Dornan. You can read about that here.
Here is the website [Links to the new blog].
Which led to this startling revelation from Digital History:
Good catch, Mr Folkman – perhaps I am parsing hairs at this point but my interjection here was that it was not Ed Moloney’s personal blog nor specific to Mr Moloney alone. I built the website originally as my own reference source for easy access to quickly accumulating material and it was made public as the interest in the case has grown. I am Anthony McIntyre’s wife. As such neither the Twitter feed nor the blog belong to Moloney, as had been previously suggested on this blog.
(That would be Anthony McIntyre who interviewed 26 former Irish Republican Army members for the project.)
Last word (for now) to the resourceful Mr. Folkman:
Fair enough! You may or may not be interested in my posts on this case, which deal with it from a purely legal perspective without really asking about the political or policy implications:
Initial post on the motion to quash
Post on the government’s opposition to the motion to quash
Post on the motion to intervene
Post on the government’s opposition to the motion to intervene.I’m not sure the conclusions will be to your liking, but I do think BC and particularly the intervenors have a very tough row to hoe.
The hardworking staff will do its best to keep up.
Facebook is facing “access tension” according to Thursday’s Wall Street Journal:
Technology start-ups are stepping up their bets on Facebook Inc., as more developers create companies that rely on the social network’s 750 million members, rather than build a user base of their own . . .
The rise of such companies is likely to be apparent at f8, as Facebook is set to make a slew of announcements about integrating media more deeply into its network. The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this month that Facebook is preparing changes designed to make the site a hub for listening to music, watching movies and playing videogames.
That might have been a good place for the Journal to have noted that the paper itself has developed a Facebook app – WSJ Social – that, according to Forbes.com, “filters Journal content through the so-called social graph to yield a news product that lives entirely within the walls of Facebook.”
And there’s money involved, the Forbes piece notes:
As far as the money part goes, the Journal keeps all the revenue from ads that appear within the borders of the app, while Facebook sells ad positions outside it.
Bottom line: the Journal should have disclosed its financial interest in the story it was reporting.
Not to get technical about it.
This week’s Wall Street Journal column from Peggy Noonan (the not-so-Noodnik twin) pretty much eviscerates GOP presidential hopeful Rick Perry (R-Neville Chamberlain Patrol).
Noonan contrasts Pres. Obama’s turn at the U.N. (“Mr. Obama’s speech Wednesday at the United Nations was good. It was strong because it was clear, and it was clear because he didn’t rely on the thumping clichés and vapidities he’s lately embraced”) with Perry’s statement on the Mideast the previous day:
The Obama administration’s policy, the Texas governor said, amounts to “appeasement.” It has encouraged “an ominous act of bad faith.” We are “at the precipice of such a dangerous move” because the Obama administration is “arrogant, misguided and dangerous.” “Moral equivalency” is “a dangerous insult.”
Noonan’s conclusion:
[I]n his first foreign-policy foray, the GOP front-runner looked like a cheap, base-playing buffoon.
And that was before Perry’s performance in last night’s Grand Old Panderthon. Wonder how Noonan feels now.
If you watched last week’s GOP presidential primary debate – and I know you did – you no doubt remember this heartwarming moment:
Well, the progressive group Protect Your Care won’t let that clip die. TPM reports that the group is using it in TV spots targeting the Republican presidential pack, which is reconvening for tonight’s debate in Orlando.
The hard-hitting TV ad attacks the presidential contenders for their open courtship of the tea party, which Protect Your Care says is exemplified in the moment when the candidates “stood silent” while members of the audience cheered on the idea of letting an uninsured man die.
The spot:
The website: LetHimDie.
Lively campaign, yes?
The hardworking staff asked the other day, “Why Is ABC Letting Claire Shipman Shill For Agribusiness?”
At issue:
[Today] an outfit called U.S. Farmers & Ranchers Alliance is hosting The Food Dialogues, “a town hall-style discussion to address Americans’ questions about how their food is grown and raised and the long-term impact of the food they are eating – on their own health and the health of the planet.”
Moderator: Claire Shipman, senior national correspondent at ABC’s “Good Morning America.”
This is an agribusiness front group with a grubstake of $11 million dedicated to solidifying its monopoly position in the food chain.
It’s obvious why agribusiness is funding this effort. But why is ABC allowing Shipman to front it?
In response, an agribusiness flack sent this:
Ms. Shipman is not “shilling” for the U.S. Farmers & Ranchers Alliance (USFRA), agribusiness or any other organization. She is serving as an emcee for the entire program which includes panel discussions in four different geographic locations. She is not participating to express opinions, but to keep the program going and on schedule. Each panel discussion will have a diverse group of participants representing many points-of-view on today’s agriculture, and will be moderated by four distinct individuals, none of which is Ms. Shipman. I would encourage everyone to participate in the “Food Dialogues” by visiting http://www.fooddialogues,com to learn how. Thanks!
No – thank you.
So Claire Shipman is not a shill – she’s just a traffic cop.
Not sure that makes things any better.
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