I don't understand what the problem with this is: Yeah, Obama attacked John McCain for threatening to eliminate the tax exclusion for group health insurance, and of course the Villagers are calling President Obama a hypocrite because it's being tossed in as part of the health-care reform discussion, but the most excellent Jonathan Cohn at TNR explains the difference between the two:

But one of the worst kept secrets in Washington these days is that Obama and his advisers are willing to consider the idea of, you guessed it, taxing your health benefits. At least some of the time. For some of the people. To be clear, such a move would happen in the context of an entirely different health reform proposal than McCain was suggesting. McCain's plan would have undermined employer-sponsored insurance and forced large numbers of people to purchase insurance as individuals through an unregulated market, where it can be incredibly tough to buy decent coverage.

Obama's reforms, if executed properly, would make good coverage available to everybody. And they'd still leave in place most employer-sponsored insurance. Changing the tax treatment of health benefits would simply provide a nice way of financing these reforms.

John McCain would have destroyed any chance at health reform, and if this is what it takes, I don't see what the problem is. I make under the 250K, but I'll gladly pay more taxes to help pay for health-care reform. Hell, my private insurance is up to over eight hundred dollars a month now and it only covers me.

What the heck is he talking about?

Indeed, the big liberal blogs have a formal boycott against linking to TNR because they consider us the enemy on precisely those grounds. If you read these blogs, you'd think we do nothing but attack the left.

Is he paranoid? I usually bow down to the will of Kos, but I received no such orders! <snark>....Maybe I missed it. I've even cross posted with Ryan Lizza in the past......Scott Lemieux  brought this to my attention.

"Check out the links from TTLB and see where he's getting this notion of a boycott...."I see multiple links (in addition to FDL and GG) from such obscure sources as Ezra Klein, the Carbetbagger Report, Kevin Drum, Digby, Yglesias, TPM, etc. etc..."

Arthur Silber tells us why.

Siegel Aid...

Backstory...

It seems that the man who attacked bloggers so viciously is a sockpuppet.

TNR:

An Apology to Our Readers

After an investigation, The New Republic has determined that the comments in our Talkback section defending Lee Siegel's articles and blog under the username "sprezzatura" were produced with Siegel's participation. We deeply regret misleading our readers. Lee Siegel's blog will no longer be published by TNR, and he has been suspended from writing for the magazine...

Updated: Ezra Klein was the one who tells us about "the "Sprezzatura."

 But at least he gave us "blogofascism."

Atrios has much more

Blogofacism indeed.

I knew Martin Peretz was pretty much out of touch with reality, but this post seals the deal. Listen up, TNR readers: Lieberman lost because of Bill Clinton. He actually gets paid to write this stuff? Marty, sometimes a person needs to take a couple of deep breaths before they start typing.

Matt Stoller was on "To the Point" and did a great job of explaining that the Lamont/Lieberman race is much more than just about the war.

Click hear to listen to the debate.

Duncan:

The funny thing is that for Lieberman supporters it is all about the war. --Oddly the wanker Chait seems to think this is about obtaining power - that supporting Lamont is some sort of power grab by the netroots, and he worries we'll take over the Democratic party. It's a weird view of things. I really don't have much interest in being a kingmaker, and I'm too lazy to run much of anything. I do what I do because I actually give a shit about stuff, not to glorify myself (though just in case George S. is reading, I'm happy to be enriched.) Giving a shit seems to be alien to too many beltway pundits.

I started blogging because I wanted my voice to be heard. I knew that if I introduced video into the blogosphere it would have an impact in some sort of way. I knew that seeing what people say is much more powerful than just reading the text. I do what I do because I care-- which is why most of us do this blogging thing. And also Sauron told me to write this...

Steve Gilliard blasts the Boston Globe over their shoddy Zengerle column.

First, Zengerle used stolen e-mails to base a series of innaccurate posts where he did zero reporting. He interviewed no one involved and did nothing to check the accuracy of what he posted. Second, he acknowledged that he printed an e-mail which was false and claimed to be from me. He wrote the most churlish apology possible and left it at that, despite the clear ethical laspe. Third, management at TNR was clearly worried about his sloppiness and made that clear in several ways...read on

To the man that coined the phrase, "blogofascists."

Arthur Silber

                Dear Mr. Seigel...read on

I haven't read it yet, but Arthur finds a review....

The headline is from Steve's post. Gilliard gets a response from TNR's editor. He's not happy.

Jason Zengerle was wrong and Glenn Greenwald was correct. The right wing bloggers sure took a lot of shots at Glenn. I wonder if they'll apologize? (That was a joke)

On Friday, I wrote a post stating -- based on abundant evidence I had compiled that was indisputable and conclusive to all but the most fact-free eyes -- that an e-mail published by Jason Zengerle on the website of The New Republic was fraudulent. The e-mail was one purportedly written to the Townhouse list by Steve Gilliard, and it was clear that Zengerle's claim was false because no such e-mail was ever sent. Zengerle's silence over the weekend led a variety of right-wing bloggers and their commenters to spend the last two days calling me a liar, mocking my claims, giddily exchanging juvenile jokes with one another over my paranoia, and generally insisting that my accusation was false and baseless.

Jason Zengerle finally responded last night and, in doing so, confirmed that every single thing I said was, in fact, true...read on

Steve Gilliard now calls out Zengerle :

I don't think this is a minor error, nor does Frank Foer. Zengerle attributed to me words I have no record writing and is still protecting a source who sent him an e-mail which cannot be verified.

And I'm sorry, I don't think this is minor or a disraction. I find it unseemly to attempt to defend yourself after commiting a major breach of journalistic ethics by repeating the unproven charges which landed us here in the first place. This stoppped being about Kos the minute TNR published an e-mail which they cannot confirm coming to me...read on

Jason Zengerle has a problem. Seems like one of the emails he got was a forgery. He says that he should have checked with Steve Gilliard first. Really? You mean do a little fact checking. He could have checked with a few other people  also, but hey...why bother right?

Update: Zengerle:

"I believe that this error is of a relatively minor nature-"

Printing a phony email is just a slight glitch, a minor error in his reporting style. Thanks for clearing that up Jason.

I missed this one by Noam Scheiber

Last year in The New Republic:

"Moderates must insist, à la Galston and Kamarck, that Democrats won't win back the White House unless they convince voters to trust them on national security, which means making the war on terrorism not just the party's top priority but its central preoccupation in 2008. We're not just talking about calling for a larger military, but something dramatic to signify the shift--like a plan to strike an Iranian or North Korean nuclear facility if need be...read on"

This man is crazy to think we need to attack somebody to regain some sense of authority. By the way, how has Iraq tuned out so far? (via Atrios)

Update: Sheiber responds to Atrios.