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November 2, 2006
WB: Treason in the Blood

Billmon:

Halperin makes a fairly plausible substitute for Zinoviev or Kaminev or Bukharin, or any of the other "Old Bolshevik" who groveled before the cameras and meekly confessed their mostly imaginary crimes in Vishinsky’s court. They begged Stalin for forgiveness and were shot for their troubles — just as I suspect Halperin is still going to lose his job one of these days, no matter how hard he cries for Hewitt’s mercy. He just can’t shake those "liberal" social origins.

Treason in the Blood

Posted by b on November 2, 2006 at 06:46 UTC | Permalink
Comments

And remember the scenes when the court-appointed defense lawyer would get up and say that the crimes of which his client had been accused were so heinious and execrable that there was no possible defense?

Posted by: ralphieboy | Nov 2 2006 6:57 utc | 1

All of this simply reinforces my long-standing belief that there are basic totalitarian personality types, and that these are essentially the same across societies and ideologies.
Case in point: Bush, Cheney, Rummy, and Condi = The Gang of Four.

Posted by: Night Owl | Nov 2 2006 7:06 utc | 2

If I wasn’t already on ethnic humor double secret probation
;D

Posted by: annie | Nov 2 2006 7:52 utc | 3

Man, that was one repulsive interview. It’s a good thing I had’nt just eaten, or I would’ve hurled, for sure.

Posted by: anna missed | Nov 2 2006 8:33 utc | 4

Can you imagine how quickly Helprin would have lost his job if he was caught begging Michael Moore to stop calling him a conservative? Can you imagine for how long the conservatives would be pulling that incident out of their bag when they needed an example of MSM liberal treachery?
Reading the interview and especially the e-mail afterwards made me feel like I was seeing something that should have been enacted in private. There was something very ritualistic about Hewett’s enjoyment of dishing out the humiliation and Helprin’s total acceptance of and complicity in being its target.

Posted by: NickM | Nov 2 2006 9:55 utc | 5

That shit is up there on par with the Moscow show trials, for sure. That’s definitely 1984 territory.

Posted by: CluelessJoe | Nov 2 2006 10:01 utc | 6

If I wasn’t already on ethnic humor double secret probation …
So much for having a dry keyboard today! 🙂

Posted by: Sizemore | Nov 2 2006 10:32 utc | 7

With this particular performance, I do not think anyone (except the media) can view Halperin as a journalist. He has joined the Party and now is a lifetime Member.

Posted by: della Rovere | Nov 2 2006 13:34 utc | 8

To carry the Solzhenitsyn/GRU-Smersh-NKVD anology a little further, Halperin needs to be aware that when someone in the apparat decided an informant had reached the end of their usefulness, they were generally arrested and executed. If by a slim chance thet ended up in the Gulag, they might survive — as informants within the camp system….

Posted by: Austin Cooper | Nov 2 2006 16:28 utc | 9

Days later, reading Oberman’s Special Comment it is clear that Corporate Media took Senator Kerry’s punch line out of context. Howard Dean’s Scream, all over again.
“Senator Kerry, as you well know, spoke at a college in Southern California. With bitter humor, he told the students that he had been in Texas the day before, that President Bush used to live in that state, but that now he lives in the state of denial.
He said the trip had reminded him about the value of education — that quote “if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t, you can get stuck in Iraq.”
The Senator, in essence, called Mr. Bush stupid.
The context was unmistakable: Texas; the state of denial; stuck in Iraq. No interpretation required.”
The White House control of Corporate Media gives the Kremlin a good run for their money.

Posted by: Jim S | Nov 2 2006 16:44 utc | 10

Olbermann’s Special Comment Corrected link. Sorry

Posted by: Jim S | Nov 2 2006 16:57 utc | 11

I have to speak up for an Old Bolshevik here.
Nikolai Bukharin didn’t grovel or beg.
At trial he defended himself ably to the end, for all the good it did.
He is reputed to have spit at and cursed his executioners. Sterner stuff than some.
See Stephen F. Cohen’s excellent biography.

Posted by: farmergiles | Nov 3 2006 0:47 utc | 12

there is in jack henry abbots second book ‘my return’ , an exposition of ‘confession’ as seen through the history of nikolai bukharin
there is also a novel by frank hardy, ‘but the dead are many’ – that centres on bukharin also & elaborates the failure of the left in relation to that moment
niki was a big & brainy boy & he knew what history he was speaking of – he is in fact credited with writing j v stalin’s book on the national question

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Nov 3 2006 1:07 utc | 13

jim #10. they(WH,gop)knew exactly what they were doing w/that. i saw mark halperin on charlie rose night before last,he acknowledged as much. said kerry was actually making a statement about bush, i was surprised to hear him admit it. of course then he continued his newspeak/tirade about how clueless kerry for not realizing he can’t say stuff like that while campaigning especially right after kerry said he’ld learned his lesson and wouldn’t be repeating the mistakes he made in 04 again. i was a little surprise rose interviewed him, even if it was from a newsroom/telecast for just a brief period.

Posted by: annie | Nov 3 2006 1:48 utc | 14

@Austin Cooper #9
Good thinking Austin…
Also, I posted this a while back:
Solzhenitsyn breaks last taboo of the revolution
Nobel laureate under fire for new book on the role of Jews in Soviet-era repression
I think many think that Solzhenitsyn is dead, but he’s not. He is still writing.
Here’s his lastest Interview…
“Blow the dust off the clock. Your watches are behind the times. Throw open the heavy curtains which are so dear to you — you do not even suspect that the day has already dawned outside.”~Alexander Solzhenitsyn

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Nov 3 2006 6:29 utc | 15

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