Why Gannon's Fixation With Daschle?

[ulTRAX]

Going though what's been archived of Gannon's old site and his articles at Talon at www.archive.org... the vast preponderance of articles deal with Tom Daschle.

Were the "reporters" at Talon specializing in certain areas or was this an unhealthy obsession?

[DELUSIONAL]

1. That's what his boyfriend Rove wanted him to do

would be my guess.

[tanyev]

2. Or, taking Daschle down was something he was

asked/told/ordered to do.

[ewagner]

10. There's a clue here......

Daschle and his staff have said that Gannon ws the "dumping ground" for all of the Thune Campaign's "opposition research".

To me that means that Gannon had close ties with Thune's campaign operatives, who, in turn, had close ties with top Repub operatives in DC....

there's a clue to where this guy got his connections.....

[Arkana]

3. Unhealthy obsession, to be sure.

Gannon/Guckert is a sick fuck. I can just picture him hunched over his computer, shaking violently, with a cigarette and a bottle of Jack Daniels, writing smear pieces about Daschle.

[Logiola]

4. don't forget while also hitting alt-tab every few mins to check if

he had any more clients who wanted to meet the bull dog..

[ulTRAX]

7. What's this about LIBERAL hypocrisy?

This is in the source code for his site:

"meta name="description" content="The Conservative Guy believes that more Americans are conservatives than anyone would believe. Americans share the core values of individual freedom and personal responsibility. The growing conservative movement is the result of the hypocrisy and failure of liberalism and the feminist agenda. The Conservative guy is a writer, speaker and lecturer, commentary and essays on politics and policies, liberalism."

What's this about LIBERAL hypocrisy?

[emulatorloo]

11. No it was his JOB - GOP wanted Daschle gone, Gannon part of the team

see my posts below, especially the one w link to Conason article. . .

[blm]

5. It was his job. Bush wanted Daschle taken out, just to prove he could.

And to scare other Democrats in red states.

And all the while Gannon had some friends here at DU helping him because "Daschle has to go."

Isn't that special?

[Canuckistanian]

6. Daschle was a link to the heartland

Probably the highest ranking Democrat in a mostly rural area.
With Daschle out of the way, there's a smooth, unbroken sea of red in "God's Country".

[emulatorloo]

8. Gannon's involvement in taking down Daschle all but proves he was Rove's

and the GOP's plant/paid agent.

Taking Daschle Down in 2004 was the GOP's #2 Priority after smearing Kerry

do a google for:

GOP targets Daschle

[emulatorloo]

9. Be sure to check out Conason's article on Gannon/Thune campaign links

To me the smoking gun re Gannongate is contained somewhere in the Daschle connection. . .Jeff was GOP/Rove agent. . . .


http://www.salon.com/opinion/conason/2005/02/18/gannon/index_np.html

<snip>

Gannon: The early years
Before he was buttering up Bush at White House press conferences, "Jeff Gannon" was doing the GOP's dirty work in attacking Tom Daschle.


- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
By Joe Conason


Feb. 18, 2005 |

Long before "Jeff Gannon" became a household pseudonym in the nation's capital, he had earned considerable recognition among the political elites of South Dakota. During that state's closely contested Senate race last year, the Talon News writer -- whose real name is now known to be James Dale Guckert -- dug his claws deep into Tom Daschle, the former Senate minority leader narrowly defeated by Republican John Thune.

In 2004 Republican leaders placed no higher price on any head, besides John Kerry's, than on the Senate Democratic leader's. For years, conservative organizations had attacked Daschle with campaigns that included notorious ads that paired the Army veteran with Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. The smear efforts damaged Daschle's standing with the state's voters, and as the election grew nearer, Republican blogs and Web sites took up the dirty work. In what has now been exposed as a blatant Republican strategy, the seemingly independent bloggers had in fact been paid by the Thune campaign.

<snip>

[PeaceProgProsp]

12. Why DU's fixation with Daschle? He was an easy knock-off for Republicans..

...and the bloggers went after him...and it worked.

[candy331]

13. Seems Daschle didnot/wouldnot fight the dirty fight he needed to

win. Seems also Daschle knew the inside dirt but was too afraid to use it since he valued life more than winning elections. In the end who could blame him.

[KittyWampus]

14. why the apologist for the Rove attack machine? why the conflating of

independant bloggers with political operatives working for a machine?

[PeaceProgProsp]

15. In this case, inependant bloggers were working for the Rove machine...

[gottaB]

20. Thune beat Daschle by a margin of 535 votes

Thune had a huge warchest. So why assume "Jeff Gannon" was the only political operative involved?

The right side of the blogosphere was solidly behind Thune. They repeated talking points attacking Daschle while avoiding any criticism of Thune or the Republican Party. They understood that after the presidential contest this was most important race in the country. Look, here's an example:

http://southdakotapolitics.blogspot.com

What was the left side of the blogosphere doing? Spouting off mostly. When it came to the Daschle-Thune race, most of the bloggers on the left appeared not to be paying attention.

On DU and a few other forums there was an awareness of Daschle. He was made to symbolize the weakness of Democratic Party leadership in Washington. Kind of makes you go hmm.

Of course a lot of people here had understandable motives for criticizing Daschle. Perhaps they felt genuinely betrayed by a few of the positions he took. Perhaps they supported candidates who were more strident in their opposition to Bush. But why did this sort of criticism continue throughout 2004, long after Kerry had sewn up the nomination? Chalk it up to sour grapes, with a side of useless idiocy.

For the most part, Daschle's critics were coming at him from both sides of the political spectrum. That's a danger of entrenched rhetorical centrism. And yet there were cases of overlap, where talking points disseminated through Gannon & Associates were echoed by critics on the left. Purely coincidental? It would hardly be the only known case of attacks "from the left" in actuality being planted by the right.

Too much suspicion would be unhealthy. Too much naivité is deadly. Democratic partisans who are active online will be more effective to the extent that they: (a) think strategically about how to advance the Democratic agenda in the face of a powerful and well organized opposition from the right; and (b) do their homework, check their sources before repeating arguments, opinions, facts, or memes, even those that appear to be popular or self-evident on the left.

[Democrats_win]

16. I don't get it. Is it the hypocrisssisy of the homophobes using a

gay whore to destroy a good man, or is it just the immoral acts of a sick power hungry republiKLAN party on the steroids of abuse of power and hatred to destroy American.

Why isn't Gannon being swung like a big guerilla sweeping the republiplants from power?!!!!!!!!!!!

[AlCzervik]

17. Daschles numbers weren't too good so they went for the kill

i think they would have gone after who ever was the senate leader.

[NVMojo]

18. my theory has been that someone connected to Reid helped OUT

Gannon as his obsession with Daschle was already noted ...look at the timeline of events since the election was certified in January. Within 24 hours after the certification/protest, Reid, Kennedy and Lautenberg came out with their foia investigation into the fake reporter Williams case. Follow that up with a few more firm stands by Reid. Then the RNC sends out a nationwide 13-page smear job on Reid similar to what was done to Daschle, and look at the timing of when this Gannon thing broke in connection with the attempt to smear Reid ...this is so KKKarl Rove ...

Reid's people are not stupid on these issues. They knew what had been done to Daschle, Daschle knows what the repukes did. By taking out Daschle, the repukes scored a major victory. Reid would be the next logical target.

Also note how quiet Reid's office has been during the Gannon outing...

[Al-CIAda]

19. Gannon was an operative on orders from the highest levels

[JI7]

21. because Daschle was the biggest target other than Kerry in the 2004

elections.

there is nothing new about that.

[Goldmund]

22. Look at this:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3158266&mesg_id=3158266