Sunday, May 21, 2006

Man, those retractions sure are taking a while.


I'm sure it's the long weekend. Yeah, that has to be it since we know how seriously the Blogging Tories take their journalistic accuracy and objectivity.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Oh, man, I have to stop doing that.

In any event, to recap, remember all these hyper-ventilating doomsayers from a previous post?

The Strong Conservative.
Christian Conservative.
Damian Penny.
Socialist Gulag.
Civitatensis.
(The positively incomparable wingnuttery of) Dr. Roy.
Dust My Broom.
Crazy-Assed Racist Redneck.

(I dropped the post by "Gay And Right" since it actually referred only to the reported dress code issue, which was a different story, so that piece really shouldn't have been included in the original list. My mistake.)

And, so far, we've had some form of back-pedaling (some notable, some not) from just the following:

Christian Conservative: Respectable.
Dr. Roy: Lame-ass suckitude.
Damian Penny: More lame-ass suckitude, with some childish misdirection thrown in.

We'll give the last word to Mr. Strong:

Its amazing how those on the left express more disdain and hatred for conservatives, Bush and Harper than they do for terrorists and those like Ahmadinejad.

Um, yeah. Kind of like the way it's amazing how those on the Right can put so much more vibrancy and enthusiasm into their original accusations than into their corrections and retractions. Funny that.

AFTERSNARK: I'm guessing we won't be seeing any meaningful mea culpa from this guy, what with this kind of weaselly, defensive petulance:

I don't see why I would have anything to retract. I am not the source of the info, even if it is erroneous, and the error is now part of the record. Did I fall for something? Not really. I made a comment about news as it was presented. Unlike many bloggers, I am not under the delusion that I am a journalist.

As to my own comments: Iran did change its name for the purposes that I mentioned, and their president has made all the intemperate comments that I linked to. Neither is it untrue that the theorcracy of Iran, like that of the Taliban, has serious totalitarian streams.

The reported story may be untrue –and if that is the case, it's good news for Iranians. But my personal comments stand.

In short, "I didn't make up that stuff, I just gullibly and uncritically presented it as fact to my readership."

You know, if you close your eyes and listen to that again carefully, you can almost make out, "It's not my fault, I was just following orders."

10 comments:

M@ said...

On Civatensis, the "I have nothing to retract" guy... I guess the shorter way to say this would be "I have nothing to say... why are you reading this?"

But he does have something to say. Just check this out:

It is not lost on me that the Persians changed the name of the country to Iran to emphasize their Aryan origin, and that they sympathized with the Hitlerites.

This utterly bizarre inversion of history -- Iran naming itself after Hitler's racist fantasies, honestly, he said that -- and the complete lack of comprehension about the colonial past of Persia... well, let's say that the accurate repetition of a false story is a lot closer to truth for Civitensis than is usual.

I've left a comment on his blog, pointing out the error. We'll see whether my comment gets approved.

Anonymous said...

I'm seeing so many people's credibility vashishing with this story it's actually becoming, for me, the only story here. The blogosphere should have a system set up to rate the blogger in terms of journalistic ethics. At least something more than simply a link to The Blogging Tories, which is a little too cryptic and subtle.

Anonymous said...

Does anyone expect to hear Colin Mayes calling for the jailing of Taheri and Wattie for their false reporting on this story?

Anonymous said...

You are a disgusting little toilet bug, aren't you? You jump all over conservatives for not retracting their comments about this story (or not retracting them in a way you approve of), but I don't see you retracting your comments about, oh, the false story about Karl Rove's alleged indictment. Hypocrite.

Oh, but please explain to us how the two things aren't the same. Explain to us how the Iran story is far worse than the Rove story. Explain how left-wing jackasses like yourself don't practice what you preach. Explain to us how your shit doesn't stink.

Weasel your way out of it. I know you'll try. It's what you do best when you're confronted with your own hypocrisy.

M@ said...

Disavowed -- so what you're saying is, Clinton did it, so it's okay? Except for "Clinton" you're putting in "left-wing jackasses" and "toilet bug" (that's a new one for me, and I might start using it).

But I'd be glad to explain why the Iran story is worse than the Rove story. The Iran story was intended to inflame irrational fear and hatred of the country by falsely claiming that it is adopting policies reminiscent of Nazi Germany.

The Karl Rove story was speculation that a dirty, corrupt bastard would finally get what's coming to him.

And the Rove story still has a good chance of being true (or maybe you think Fitzgerald isn't still investigating him?).

The Iran story, uh, not so much.

Anonymous said...

m@ said...

"We don't have to retract anything because we're hypocrites."

I paraphrased. Thanks for proving me right.

Anonymous said...

Ti-Guy, you should ask Zorpheus to ressurect the "Blogging Tories, Blogger's Code".

About a year or so ago, various BTs were harumphing about how certain bloggers violated certain blogging ethics and the sacred "Bloggers Code"

This did not carry on very long, after Zorph made up a list of all these "code rules" and did a running count on how many violations, making up the rules as you go along exceptions were being made by BTs for their fellow BTs, whilst jumping up and down like idijits with their hair on fire if somebody on a left blog violated their "sacred code"

Perhaps the funniest one was the revelation that some of Canada's "Top Bloggers"(TM) were guilty of going into comments sections of their blogs and making up shit, and attributing it to various people who dared to disagree with them in order to bolster their own sad and flailing arguments (or what passses for such in BT Circles).

No indeed, we haven't heard much about the "sacred bloggers code" since that time. No indeedy.

M@ said...

I paraphrased. Thanks for proving me right.

Your reading comprehension skills need work. Get an education and c'mon back, eh?

Blake Kennedy said...

"In short, "I didn't make up that stuff, I just gullibly and uncritically presented it as fact to my readership.""

PWNED! You just...totally...devestated him. Very, very well done.

Anonymous said...

I wonder, Mr. Cynic, will you be demanding retractions from Karen Redmond and other LIBERAL leftists who raised this issue in Parliament (you're Cdn., I know at least you know what `Parliament' is)?

...In parliament no less?

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