The original anti-homeowner-bailout rant clip has been making its rounds on the internet. I originally saw it sometime last week and was thoroughly disappointed (I believe I saw it linked from The Big Picture originally). The hosts made it out as if Santelli was leading some sort of revolt, but it really only looked like a few people around him in a very narrow demographic were really engaged in his lame rant. And the even lamer hosts of the program were playing it up and overreacting to it just like Kathie Lee would. But enh. Whatever.
Somehow it managed to become a minor media and internet sensation though (Ritholtz follows it a bit here), and some have expressed some suspicions that the embrace of the rant – or the appearance of a popular embrace of the rant – could be due to some organized ’sponsorship’, and perhaps even advanced planning and staging by political groups.
Mark Ames and Yasha Levine of Exiled Online (it was also originally posted at Playboy.com but can no longer be found with the original link there) provided some evidence, largely circumstantial, that raised some doubts about any spontaneity on the part of Santelli. More convincingly, Ames and Levine succeed in casting very significant doubts on the popularity or grassroots origins of the support that arose for Santelli’s Chicago Tea Party idea shortly after the CNBC clip aired.
That an individual talking head or commenter would attempt to create a media event is not surprising (kind of his job…), or even that various interested groups (such as commercial and political groups) would embrace and actively lay down an astroturf campaign to support Santelli’s idea (kind of their jobs…) seems only common sense to me. What is shocking is the reply by what I would have thought to be respectable and responsible members of the media.
In a more recent article written by Ames and Levine in response to the denials by the parties they accused in the original article, they do a fair job of attacking the character and motives of some who have been critical of thier original reporting. One person in particular – Megan McArdle of The Atlantic Monthly – is singled out as an oppositional voice to Ames’ and Levine’s accusations. I find myself agreeing to most of the points she makes in her blog post but, as Ames and Levine points out, she has a MASSIVE conflict-of-interest that she, to her credit, discloses at the end of her post:
“It’s pretty much an open secret in DC, but given the content of the article I’m discussing, I think I ought to mention that I live with Peter Suderman, who once worked for Freedomworks. Other than giving me the name of the right employee to email to make inquiries (no word back yet), I haven’t asked him about his former employer, and he hasn’t told me anything. I debated whether to write about this, but since I’m not actually defending Freedomworks, I think it’s kosher.”
Wow.
I don’t want to make any assumptions about the nature of her relationship with Suderman (which Ames and Levine happily do), but if you live with someone, and they worked for the company that is being attacked in the article you are offering a rebuttle to, then yes, that’s a big fucking conflict of interest. And I personally feel there are many grey areas when it comes it this issue, and McArdle certainly deserves credit for considering the conflict and I can understand her thinking as well, but Mr. Suderman was, while working for Freedomworks, engaged in PRECISELY THE TYPE OF FAKE GRASSROOTS INTERNET ORGANIZING THAT IS CENTRAL TO THE ACCUSATIONS MADE BY AMES AND LEVINE!
In my opinion, the first comment she should have made in response to Ames and Levine’s article is that ‘yes, Freedomworks definitely could be involved in creating fake amateur sites supporting this cause for their own ends because the person I live with actually used to do exactly that for them’. And if she wanted to proceed to make her very reasonable defense that notwithstanding that point, Santelli’s rant is no less legitimate in itself, then so be it.
But holy fuck. Your pal makes fake grassroots websites. I know it’s a blog (and this little blog of mine certainly wouldn’t survive similar scrutiny – yes, I’m a big hypocrite) but jesus. I really would have expected better from The Atlantic.
(and for those interested in hypocrisy, Ames and Levine have a follow-up article attacking CNBC more directly. GE certainly is the beneficiary of Federal support, and CNBC is a GE subsidiary. It does seem to be shoddy journalism if nothing else to attack a bailout for homeowners when your parent company has already stuffed its pockets full)
Full disclosure: I am currently engaged in a raucous four-way with Mark Ames, Megan McArdle, and Milton Friedman’s spinning corpse. Since I’m not discussing multiple-partner sex in this post, I feel my post is still kosher.
… and the cow goes moo
