I know this will come as a surprise to all Kossacks, but the preferred "Democratic" strategist of Faux News would appear to be a Democrat in name only (DINO). Over the jump for more.
Michelle Malkin has a post on her (full of) Hot Air blog (to which I refuse to link, but it's not hard to find) of an appearance on the O'Reilly Factor discussing the Edwards bloggers "scandal." O'Reilly, in his neverending efforts to appear unbiased (*cough right cough*) has on a "Democratic" Strategist named Kirsten Powers.
Ms. Powers spends her rant time (which is significantly longer than Malkin's, I might add) going off on how these bloggers are obviously anti-Christian, anti-Catholic, sick, sick, pagan baby-eaters (ok, maybe she skipped that last part, but it was implied). She talks about how Edwards should not even have hired anyone who hates Catholics so much (despite the fact that there are many Republican-voting extremist Christians who think the Pope is the anti-Christ and Catholics are devil worshippers). Anyway, the thrust of her argument is that Edwards would have fired the bloggers sooner, but the blogosphere beat him into submission, forcing him to retain their services.
I was suspicious of this woman's credentials, so I did what anyone would do: I Googled her, and soon found myself in her Wikipedia page. At first glance, she seems pretty legitimate: worked for Andrew Cuomo, in the Clinton administration, was a member of the New York State Democratic Committee, opposed Bloomberg's efforts to end primaries, and
is a contributor for Change the Party, a group created to give "a forum for new voices on the progressive side of American politics and in the Democratic Party."
Damn, maybe she is the real deal? And then there's a section titled "Positions on Key Issues"...
Powers opposes abortion, and federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, affirmative action, gun control, environmental protection, providing a path to citizenship to illegal immigrants and eliminating tax cuts supported by the Bush administration. [citation needed]
She supported the U.S. intervention in Kosovo and the war in Afghanistan but opposed the Iraq War.
The only stance she holds that could be considered a Democratic stance is her opposition to the Iraq War, a position shared by may libertarians. Would I be inclined to call her basic positions Progressive? No, definitely not. And while I believe in a "big tent" theory for the Democratic party, I can't imagine a tent big enough to include someone who opposes almost the entirety of the party's platform. In fact, she's not even on the platform itself, she's standing on a splinter, so to speak.
However, if anyone is still in doubt about Kirsten Powers, there are some more key weaknesses to her "progressivism." For example, News Hounds found our Democratic strategist taking a rather perplexing perspective on issues of the day (posting dated October 1, 2006):
However, she outdid herself Friday night, 9/29/06, when she overlooked George Allen’s tacit admission of using racial slurs, knocked Democrats for "pretending" that Iraq was better off under Saddam Hussein and wrapped up her appearance with a gratuitous, enthusiastic endorsement of Bush’s detainee interrogation bill. For those reasons, Powers is our newest resident of the dog house.
And here she is bashing liberals in the New York Post in an article ostensibly about the Saddam trial and hanging:
But Lehrer's question came closest to revealing the unspoken view of virtually all the liberal critics: They don't really believe that Saddam was uniquely evil.
I can only hope her bullshit is well-known inside and outside the blogosphere. Kirsten Powers is not a Democrat, no matter what she may say.
UPDATE- I got an e-mail from Kirsten Powers which, in the interest of fairness, I feel obligated to include here:
Hi -- I followed your link back and saw your post. I have no trouble with you criticizing me...but you should know that the wikipedia page has been repeatedly vandalized and what you posted was incorrect.
This is correct:
Powers opposes abortion and federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. SHE SUPPORTS affirmative action, gun control, environmental protection, providing a path to citizenship to illegal immigrants and eliminating tax cuts supported by the Bush administration. [citation needed]. She supported the U.S. intervention in Kosovo and the war in Afghanistan but opposed the Iraq War.
Best,
Kirsten