Let's dare call it conspiracy

Can we use the word conspiracy ("to breathe together") to describe the following? Perhaps we can, if we grant the word a little elasticity of definition, and if we grant that this particular conspiracy is rather more benign than are some others that have been posited. Make your own call...

The vast new left-wing conspiracy sets its tone every morning at 8:45 a.m., when officials from more than 20 labor, environmental and other Democratic-leaning groups dial into a private conference call hosted by two left-leaning Washington organizations.

The “8:45 A.M. call,” as it’s referred to by members, began three weeks ago, and it marks a new level in coordination by the White House’s allies at a time when the conservative opposition is struggling for a toe-hold and major agenda items like health care reform appear closer than ever to passage.

The call has helped attempts to link the Republican Party to radio host Rush Limbaugh, and has served as the launching ground for attacks on critics of Obama’s policy proposals.

Yet more evidence, methinks, that the sheer shit we saw within the "prog" blogosphere -- the incessant lies and hate-mongering directed at Hillary, the cult of personality built around Mr. O -- was no grass-roots phenomenon. As the song says, you have to be carefully taught.

I am particularly sad to read that Media Matters launched an attack on Limbaugh as part of this White House campaign. Not that I harbor any affection for Rush. But what would David Brock have said, back in 2005, about a website participating in a White House-coordinated attack directed against (say) Al Franken? Brock here reveals that he is the same fellow he was back in his American Spectator days -- the only difference is that another hand signs the check. Same shit, different ideology.

Some on the left, however, remain skeptical of the White House’s embrace.

“When something works for us we'll pick up on it anyway, like the Rush Limbaugh story -- we don't need to be told,” said Jane Hamsher, the creator of the liberal blog Firedoglake. “I think we serve everyone better if we maintain our independence and preserve our ability to pick up on popular sentiment like that, rather than just bang on the same drum everyone else is.”

There is no Rush Limbaugh "story" -- or rather, that ghastly story has been what it is for roughly a quarter century. Nothing has changed; Rush remains the one fixed point of odium in a reeling world. The pretense that something truly new has happened constitutes the triumph of marketing over reality. Hamsher's protestation of independence reminds me of a story I once saw in an old issue of Soviet Life: In an interview, a Russian film director insisted that he made his third biography of Lenin on his own initiative, and not at the suggestion of the state.