We've all seen the type. The standoffish, petulant misfit who doesn't really have any friends but wants to be in the center of everyone's group. When they don't get what they want they start playing gossip games and trying to turn one against the other.

Tucker Carlson is one of those. Eclipsed back in the day by Anderson Cooper on CNN, he moved on to MSNBC, where he didn't quite fit, and from there to Fox where he is comfortably nondescript and not particularly useful.

But Tucker is resourceful, cunning, cruel, and petty like most conservatives, so the idea of weaseling his way onto a private listserv where members thought they were speaking on a private email list in order to then publish those private emails selectively...well, that was too delicious for Tucker to resist. I'd call him the Hedda Hopper of the Internet age but that gives him too much stature.

Long story short: Tucker weasels his way onto a private listserv of journalists owned by Ezra Klein which, to everyone's shock and awe, has...liberal journalists on it. Oh, the horror, the awful, awful horror.

And then, I read his intellectually dishonest, lizard-scaly, creepy self-justification and just had to say it: This Daily Caller has no balls.

Tucker rushes to his own defense with this:

To be clear: We’re not contesting the right of anyone, journalist or not, to have political opinions. (I, for one, have made a pretty good living expressing mine.) What we object to is partisanship, which is by its nature dishonest, a species of intellectual corruption.

Errrrr...what part of being a senior fellow at Cato Institute isn't partisan, Tucker? Just sayin'. And no, it's not a species of intellectual corruption. Human beings are, by their nature, social and tend to gather in affinity groups where they share similar goals, outlooks, hopes and dreams. Partisanship is but one way of expressing that.

Again and again, we discovered members of Journolist working to coordinate talking points on behalf of Democratic politicians, principally Barack Obama. That is not journalism, and those who engage in it are not journalists. They should stop pretending to be. The news organizations they work for should stop pretending, too.

Why TUCKER, I'm so glad you looked in the mirror! You might have even seen your reflection if it weren't daylight and you weren't a slimy little vampire sucking notoriety off of ginned up blown out of proportion pronouncements. But hey, let's just see whether you actually measure up to your own standard.

• This interview with Ron Paul where you admitted you voted for him and "slobbered all over him"? You're right. It's partisan pretending, and shouldn't be considered journalism. (Pssss, Tucker. Ron Paul is a Republican. Partisan. Party. Republican.)
• How about admitting that liberals like Barney Frank "fill you with hatred"? Partisan. Not journalism.
• On supporting the Iraq War before the flip-flop to not supporting, how about your defense of Karl Rove? Partisan. Not journalism.
• Or perhaps this slam against Al Gore in 2007 where you said if he were President we'd be living in yurts? Partisan. Not journalism.
• Bashing Hillary Clinton in 2006? Partisan. Not journalism.

I could go on, and on, and on. But you get the idea. And while we're on the topic of the corruption of journalism, perhaps it's worth pointing out that Tucker Carlson's petty two-bit "who can pee farther" contest with MSNBC's Keith Olbermann smacks of desperate penis ratings envy?

But this-- this might just frame Tucker Carlson's hypocrisy perfectly. From a Salon interview when he was pimping his book:

...even though we claim to withhold judgment until we know all the facts, but we don't, all the times. And our prisons are nAoot packed with innocent men, but there are some. And I think we all, especially those of us in the press, ought to remember that.

Unless, that is, your name is Tucker Carlson and you're a slimy weasel named Tucker Carlson who slithered onto a private email list and made a lot of weaselly Tucker Carlson promises about not flaming and then cherry-picked the email list to paint liberal journalists as incompetent partisans because your name is Tucker Carlson and you're a pathetic loser who couldn't figure out a REAL STORY. If that's who you are, then you're just pathetic.

Not innocent. Not a journalist. Not immune. Just pathetic.

Update: Oh, Jon Perr and BlueGal just sent me more reminders of how "non-partisan" Tuckie is. Among the invited guests to the Daily Caller's launch? None other than Scooter Libby. Scooter is Tuckie's special friend after he talked him up all over cable news during his trial while Tuckie's daddy was promoting and managing Scooter's Legal Defense Fund.

Yeah, nothing says nonpartisan quite like the whiff of Daddy's BigBuckBuddies in the Republican Party. Good going, Tuckie.

Geek out! Now you can play the tenth Justice in Fantasy SCOTUS. (Keep comments below clean and violence-free, folks, and that includes any and all references to my personal fantasy, giving Alito a wedgie every time he votes in favor of Corporate Personhood.)

Open thread below...

UCLA vs Memphis

North Carolina vs Kansas

It's the first time in tournament history that all #1 seeds made the final four. I'm a big UCLA fan, but Memphis is very good and it should be a great game. Josh Shipp has been in a slump and needs to hit a few 3's if they are going to win it all because they will have problems if Collison is the only Bruin hitting outside shots. Kevin Love is awesome. NC looks like the team to beat, but they should all be good games and any one of them can win the title.

Update: Logan and Mike F. are big KU fans so they'll be rooting hard for the Jayhawks.

For college hoop fans, what say you?

Download | play Download | play (h/t Heather)

Bill Moyers finds parallels with the degradation of rampant steroid use in baseball to how degraded our country has become by those seeking quick ways to short cut and short circuit level playing fields.

You don't get a level playing field with performance enhancing drugs, any more than you get an honest government with political action committees and bundled contributions, or a fair economy with some derivatives, hedge funds, and private equity managers taxed at rates lower than their janitors. You get a level playing field only when the fans demand it. Suppose people stopped attending games in large numbers, stopped watching on TV, stopped buying the products hyped by the icons. The leveling would happen, or baseball as a money-making business would die. It's not likely to happen. If we can't organize to stop a brutal, bloody war in Iraq, or rectify an economic system that divides us further every day, we can hardly expect collective action from baseball fans.

There was a lesson in George Mitchell's report that I'm not sure even he recognized. The day Americans don't feel strongly enough about the need for level playing fields to fight for them -- the day when cutting corners and seeking an edge become the national pastime -- is the day democracy will be lucky even to find a seat in the bleachers.

The entire transcript available here.

But as close as we're going to get for a while.

(Thanks to Nate for the tip to this dKos diary)

The Gothamist interviewed The Daily Show's John Oliver on his feelings about the strike:

Someone from the WGA, I think it was the president, said the strike could go on for nine months. I did not hear that. To be honest I find brinksmanship like that difficult to stomach and it makes both sides sound equally bad. They're playing games with people's lives at the moment, and I'm not even talking about the writers. On The Daily Show we have a staff who are very concerned at the moment about losing their jobs - researchers, P.A.s, etc. - and I find talk like that quite difficult to stomach. I understand they're trying to play some kind of brinksmanship game but that doesn't make it any less difficult to hear when friends of mine who live paycheck to paycheck are being seriously affected by this strike. And they don't even stand to benefit from any of the negotiations!

I have some friends who are familiar with the negotiations--or lack thereof-- and they've been telling me that the companies may not feel compelled to negotiate in good faith until January or February, when their original content will be used up. United Hollywood has more videos as well as ideas on how you can show your support...

...except in a video game for Jesus.

NY Times: (h/t Rick)

First the percussive sounds of sniper fire and the thrill of the kill. Then the gospel of peace.

Across the country, hundreds of ministers and pastors desperate to reach young congregants have drawn concern and criticism through their use of an unusual recruiting tool: the immersive and violent video game Halo.[..]

Those buying it must be 17 years old, given it is rated M for mature audiences. But that has not prevented leaders at churches and youth centers across Protestant denominations, including evangelical churches that have cautioned against violent entertainment, from holding heavily attended Halo nights and stocking their centers with multiple game consoles so dozens of teenagers can flock around big-screen televisions and shoot it out.

The alliance of popular culture and evangelism is challenging churches much as bingo games did in the 1960s. And the question fits into a rich debate about how far churches should go to reach young people.

Far from being defensive, church leaders who support Halo - despite its "thou shalt kill" credo - celebrate it as a modern and sometimes singularly effective tool. It is crucial, they say, to reach the elusive audience of boys and young men.

Oh, I don't know....one would think the line has been crossed when one is encouraging kids to kill (even if only virtually) to bring them to Jesus. This is a whole new take on "WWJD" that sadly reflects more on our society than religion.

Many of C&Lers know I'm a huge baseball fan and post about the Yanks here...It starts today. The Phillies vs Rockies, Boston vs Angels,Yanks vs Cleveland,Cubs vs Arizona...SBNation has blogs that cover all of the teams. The Phillies were amazing and it's good to see Chicago represent!

The San Diego/Colorado game was awesome Monday night. I thought Holliday was out at the plate, but....TBS is doing the games this year and looks pretty decent.

Your thoughts please...

GuardianUK: (h/t Gregory)

Tension between British and American commanders in southern Afghanistan erupted into the open yesterday as a senior UK military officer said he had asked the US to withdraw its special forces from a volatile area that was crucial in the battle against the Taliban.

British and Nato defence officials have consistently expressed concern about US tactics, notably air strikes, which kill civilians, sabotaging the battle for "hearts and minds" and infuriating Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president.

The coalition of the "We're willing, but not with you here"? Why does there seem to be so much more common sense and thoughtfulness on the part of British military tactics? I'd like to see our brass adopt some of the British forces' techniques. Sadly, this is likely the only guideline they will likely imitate:

Sweeping new guidelines barring military personnel from speaking about their service publicly have been quietly introduced by the Ministry of Defence, the Guardian has learned.

Soldiers, sailors and airforce personnel will not be able to blog, take part in surveys, speak in public, post on bulletin boards, play in multi-player computer games or send text messages or photographs without the permission of a superior if the information they use concerns matters of defence.

The conventional wisdom is that the 110th Congress, which is getting close to its summer break, has been a let-down. Thanks to presidential vetoes and unprecedented Republican filibusters in the Senate, a Congress which had high expectations in January is ending July on a disappointing note.

Now is probably a good time to push back against this meme. There have been setbacks, and were it not for GOP games we would have seen even more successes, but Dems are proving to be quite capable of running an effective majority. In their weaker moments, even Republicans are willing to acknowledge this.

“[Congressional Democrats have] had a pretty strong quarter,” said Rep. Ray LaHood (R-Ill.), who praised [the legislation expanding SCHIP] as “creative” and suggested the homeland security bill would pass overwhelmingly. “The first quarter was not so good, and that’s why they’re not looking so good in the polls, but this quarter is looking very good for them. They can send their members home crowing about their accomplishments, and they’ve done it in a bipartisan way, which is exactly what they promised to do,” LaHood said.

Indeed, the Democratic Caucus published a fairly impressive list of legislative accomplishments. I heard some GOP lawmaker suggest the other day that this be labeled the “Post-Office Congress” because all the chambers have been able to do is rename post offices. The tale of the tape shows otherwise.

Kenneth Starr will take the side of an Alaska school board against a student who displayed a banner that said: "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" off school property.

Frederick was suspended in 2002 after he unfurled the 14-foot-long banner -- a reference to marijuana use -- just outside school grounds as the Olympic torch relay moved through the Alaskan capital headed for the Winter Games in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Even though Frederick was standing on a public sidewalk, school officials argue that he and other students were participating in a school-sponsored event. They had been let out of classes and were accompanied by their teachers.

Principal Deborah Morse ordered the 18-year-old senior to take down the sign, but he refused. That led to a 10-day suspension for violating a school policy by promoting illegal drug use. (h/t Joe)