politics: Incredibly misleading

Oh, how I love getting e-mail from the American Family Association. Better than a Thirstbuster-sized espresso for getting me energized and worked up. Really, what got me most was this paragraph:

"The media has put out so much misinformation concerning this situation that we did an interview with Sen. John Cornyn of Texas to clear up the confusion. Sen. Cornyn is recognized as the leading authority in explaining the battle over which rule will be used to confirm judges, the traditional 51 vote total required by the constitution or the 60 vote total desired by liberal Democrat Senators."

Erm. All-righty, then.

Tradition, is it? Shall we talk tradition? The filibuster has been around a lot more than this pissant little organization. The filibuster is one of the most important checks on the tyrrany of the majority, ensuring that, even if the little guy can't win the fight, at least he can make himself heard.

This paragraph makes it sound as if Democratic senators are trying to unfairly wrest control of the senate from the Republicans and rewrite the time-honored rules of order.

Projection, anyone?

I'm not sure if they're lying or if they honestly don't understand the difference between a filibuster and a confirmation vote, because, though this may be a small quibble, a vote to end a filibuster is not a vote on the measure in question.

While the cause-and-effect chain may be something like 'A causes B causes C causes D', the assertion here is that 'A causes D', omitting certain important and mitigating steps in between.

I was pondering this when I remembered something else I read today, an article to which I was led by Daily Kos.

It turns out that US diplomats told our allies that North Korea had been selling nukes to Libya, surely an alarming assertion and one that bears telling, if true.

But this is the Bush administration -- since when have they been sticklers for the truth? This story is, oddly enough, almost true, in that 'A causes D' sort of way. But B and C are doozies.

See, North Korea sold nukes to Pakistan, our friends of convenience in the region. And Pakistan, our close, personal friends, out of whose ass the sun always shines, sold the nuclear material to Libya.

So two examples don't exactly make a trend, but they are an interesting confluence of tactics. Is this a conservative thing or what? And do they realize they're lying, or do they rationalize editing out the in-between steps because people are too stupid to follow a chain of causation?