CJR Campaign Desk, a fine group blog from Columbia Journalism Review, today launched “a brief, daily summary of notable commentary from the political blogosphere.” NewMexiKen provides the debut post in full.
The president’s Sunday interview with Tim Russert on NBC’s “Meet the Press” is the big issue in the blogosphere, and no one seems overly impressed with either participant.
Josh Marshall excoriates Tim Russert for not following up when the president declared that he had released all of his military records in 2000. It’s fair to say Marshall wasn’t blown away by the president’s performance.
Andrew Sullivan comments charitably on the administration’s “simple exhaustion factor. They’ve been thru an awful lot; they’re tired out; and it’s beginning to show.” Makes you wonder what the president would look like if he hadn’t grabbed some zzzz’s (google cached page) during the Superbowl halftime show.
David Adesnik on Oxblog points out that Russert’s questions, “while relatively tough … [were] also relatively predictable. How much you wanna bet that Bush’s prep team asked him almost exactly the same questions in their rehearsals for the Russert interview?”
Matthew Iglesias has got the goods on the questions Russert should have asked. And Bob Somerby at the Daily Howler asks, “What became of Bulldog Tim? That ‘dog’ didn’t bark, hunt or slobber.”
Calpundit has a document purporting to show that Bush was transferred to a Colorado-based National Guard unit in 1972 as a disciplinary action. Unsurprisingly, it raises more questions than it answers.
On the Kerry beat, Mickey Kaus continues to cling to the hope that the Massachusetts senator will lose. There’s “still plenty of time for feet to cool” on Kerry, he tells us, but even Kaus seems to have trouble buying his own arguments.
And Ryan Lizza, writing on his New Republic weblog Campaign Journal, convincingly dispels the notion that Edwards hasn’t gone negative on Kerry because he doesn’t want to damage his chances for the Number 2 spot. Rather, says Lizza, it’s because Edwards first needs to knock Clark and Dean out of the race and set up a head-to-head with Kerry. Then he’ll come out swinging.