Allen Campaign on Webb's Novels
I just found a piece of paper stuck to the Jim Webb sign on my office door--a printout from Drudge (who I never link to), who gets the info from Allen's new press releases. The Allen campaign has gone through Webb's novels and pulled out a bunch of sex scenes and suchlike, and then prefaced them with a paragraph about how the novels are shot through with scenes that are disrespectful to women.
Many of the scenes don't even have anything at all to do with women, and in none of the cases is there any reason to think that the characters are expressing Webb's views. The Allen campaign asserts that there are no strong, sane women in any of Webb's novels. That would, indeed, be a surprising fact, though there's no way to check it without reading all the novels.
Very little is beneath the Allen campaign, so I don't take this [report] very seriously. I'd have to have the claims in question checked by a reliable source, to begin with. Even then I'm not sure what to make of them. Writing a novel in which someone gets brutally killed doesn't mean that you think that brutal killing is a good thing, and writing a novel with a racist character who thinks racist thoughts doesn't mean you're a racist.
I'm already suspicious about Webb's views about women, though, so I do take this [issue] seriously even though I loathe the source. But by itself one singe report--especially one on Drudge--isn't going to do the trick.
Um don't get me wrong: Allen is a bad guy, and dumb as a sack of hammers...so it's not like this is going to have any effect on who I support. I actually vote in North Carolina, though, so my vote isn't an issue here anyway.
[Update: here's the lead scene in the Drudge piece, but on an Allen site. As you can see, it's quite weird. Nothing there about women, though, incidentally.]
[Update: Turns out there's almost NOTHING in this three page propaganda sheet that can be construed as disrespectful to women. Jeez, these Allen guys will stop at nothing. Stay tuned... I'm sure they'll get more desparate as election day gets closer.]
I just found a piece of paper stuck to the Jim Webb sign on my office door--a printout from Drudge (who I never link to), who gets the info from Allen's new press releases. The Allen campaign has gone through Webb's novels and pulled out a bunch of sex scenes and suchlike, and then prefaced them with a paragraph about how the novels are shot through with scenes that are disrespectful to women.
Many of the scenes don't even have anything at all to do with women, and in none of the cases is there any reason to think that the characters are expressing Webb's views. The Allen campaign asserts that there are no strong, sane women in any of Webb's novels. That would, indeed, be a surprising fact, though there's no way to check it without reading all the novels.
Very little is beneath the Allen campaign, so I don't take this [report] very seriously. I'd have to have the claims in question checked by a reliable source, to begin with. Even then I'm not sure what to make of them. Writing a novel in which someone gets brutally killed doesn't mean that you think that brutal killing is a good thing, and writing a novel with a racist character who thinks racist thoughts doesn't mean you're a racist.
I'm already suspicious about Webb's views about women, though, so I do take this [issue] seriously even though I loathe the source. But by itself one singe report--especially one on Drudge--isn't going to do the trick.
Um don't get me wrong: Allen is a bad guy, and dumb as a sack of hammers...so it's not like this is going to have any effect on who I support. I actually vote in North Carolina, though, so my vote isn't an issue here anyway.
[Update: here's the lead scene in the Drudge piece, but on an Allen site. As you can see, it's quite weird. Nothing there about women, though, incidentally.]
[Update: Turns out there's almost NOTHING in this three page propaganda sheet that can be construed as disrespectful to women. Jeez, these Allen guys will stop at nothing. Stay tuned... I'm sure they'll get more desparate as election day gets closer.]
posted by Winston Smith at
1:22 PM
6 Comments:
Even if Allen survives this campaign, I'd think his chances for the presidency are kaput. For this, the grateful nation owes its thanks to the Democratic Party.
Yeah, that's one sigh of relief we can sigh...
Why would you even think that a man who keeps a hangman's noose and a confederate flag in his office deserved more than a moment of your time?
Um, because he's a United States senator and is trying to become president?
Josh Marshall over at talkingpointsmemo.com seem to think Allen just pulled this "issue" out of his ass to get the media glare pointed back at Webb, and that by the time the media get tired of this little song and dance, the election will be over.
Incidentally, I live in Asheville now (I started reading your side back when I was still in Massacusetts).
His isn't the first campaign this election season to take a piece of fiction written by the candidate and equate it to immorality.
(Warning: Lots of pink and strong language.)
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