Bloggers enlisted in Conference Call

Via Huff Po President Obama has enlisted the support of bloggers as part of his "all Obama-all the time" strategy on healthcare. In an invitation only conference call the President explained how he saw the bloggers playing a role in keeping the pressure on to pass healthcare reform legislation:

"I know the blogs are best at debunking myths that can slip through a lot of the traditional media outlets," he said. "And that is why you are going to play such an important role in our success in the weeks to come."

Yes, yes you read that right, he believes the bloggers are best at debunking myths.
Perhaps we should take a stroll down memory lane and revisit the tremendous strength of the blogs in myth debunking. Who can forget the crack reporting at Mudflats with the mysterious Anne Kilkenny charging Palin with book bannning? A fine example of the Palin refuses to fund rape kits because they contain "emergency contraception" myth can be seen at Democratic Underground. From LA Progressive we had an example of Palin's reported "Sambo" racist comment. More from Mudflats, who were "all Palin - all the time," we see an example of the Bristol is Trig's mother scandal that spread like a cold sore at college kegger. A google search reveals pages of headlines such as "Who is the Mother of Trig Paxon Van Palin?" Though Daily KOS seems to have been busy since then, scrubbing their archives of this sad excuse for reporting, a certain famous blogger, Andrew aka "We're all obstetricians now" Sullivan is still investigating this scandal. Still more "debunking" from Mudflats, we had the Palin had an affair with Tod's business partner scandal.

KOS has a few really remarkable myths such as Palin thinks Pledge written by Founding Fathers. My personal favorite from KOS though, has to be the rationale for publishing an obviously photoshopped pic of Palin in a bikini because,

"it communicates a certain kind of truth about the candidate even though it is a fake foto, in the way that fiction often can over non-fiction."

Mmmm yes, who can argue with that logic?

Well, I personally feel the President has placed his faith in the right crew of bloggers to debunk all those nasty myths likely to be spread by the right wingers who just want to kick old ladies and deny anyone who isn't rich medical care. We are mean like that. To set the tone the President trotted out his famous straw man argument,

The status quo is unacceptable... People who would defend doing nothing are defending the indefensible."

That's us, the defenders-of-the-indefensible, the ones who would rather do nothing than, oh say, passing legislation that effects upwards of 15% of the GDP while it fails to correct the problems it is supposed to address. To make sure we don't get away with this dastardly plan, Obama reiterates his threat to ram it through in reconciliation. Good thing he dropped all those Chicago style negotiating techniques when he moved to the White House. For the record though, there are plenty of health care reform proposals put together by the do-nothing crew including Senator DeMint, Paul Ryan, the bipartisan Wyden-Bennet Healthy Americans Act as well as the crucial bipartisan efforts of Baucus and Grassley on the Senate Finance Committee. Keith Hennessey, who has suggested his own reform, also debunks the reconciliation threat here and here, though it is possible Mr. Hennessey underestimates the determination of this administration who believes that some of the above-mentioned bloggers will be valuable in helping to "debunk myths" and spread the truth about the wonders of Obamacare.