Once upon a time, Margaret "Maggie" Carlson was able to shuck and jive with the best of the career 'liberals.' There was Maggie calling Al Gore a "liar," there was Maggie, after the 2000 election, explaining that it was just so much fun to go after Al Gore.
She might have gotten away with it. Others had done similar in the past, the faux liberals running with the pack from chat & chew to chat & chew. Possibly all the hacks who came in from the cold to style themselves as "journalists" helped put her out of business?
No, twas Maggie herself that killed her career. (As it was Michael Kinseley himself that killed his. Sh! We're not supposed to talk about what really happened re: LA Times.)
Maggie shucked and jived according to the playbook (she's still using it). Career 'libs' always find success hailing the right-leaning (or the right) candidate/elected official as "authentic." They take swipes at the "loonies" (take your pick). They do that because the average viewer watching may just hear "And from the left . . . Margaret Carlson."
"From the left you say? Oh, I better listen!"
Then "from the 'left'" goes on to trash the genuine Democrat and the average viewer who has eight million other things to take care of in a day, pressing things, is supposed to be left with the message: ____ is so bad, even the "left" doesn't support him.
It's a cute little game and it's played out for years.
Not too many questions get asked. Like why "the left" is supposed to mean "Democrat"? Or why "the left" includes assholes schilling for KFC (SuperSize your brain, Paul Begala)? Or why "the left" would all loudly and proudly (those given TV time) distance themselves from Cynthia McKinney in 2002?
It's a world of James Carvilles and Begalas, a world of Margaret Carlsons and Cynthia Tuckers, a world where "up" is "down" and "left" is really right (wing).
So how did Maggie destroy her career?
Well, she's a woman so that's always going to factor in. Those chubby cheeks carried her through a certain age and looked appealing, now they just look ridiculous. Paul Begala can induce vomiting in many viewers just by appearing on camera, but there's always been a different standard for men.
(And especially a different standard for men who play "left." It's almost as though Central Casting sent out a memo: "Give me the most unnattracitive, the most annoying voices, the most effete to play the really left." Obviously, Alan Colmes heard of that cattle call.)
But here's how Maggie hurt Maggie the most. Men didn't like her. She never appealed to male viewers. Who did she appeal to? Some female viewers. They found her "independent" ("spunky" was another popular term in one test marketing sample).
They watched her demonize Al Gore repeatedly. It wasn't that unusual. The career "left" has done the same before and since. But Maggie 'authentisicm' fell into question once Bully Boy was sworn in.
What killed Maggie was her core group of supporters in any given sample audience were women. Women remembered her shucking and jiving. They didn't label it as such in real time. They thought she was being "independent." What her chirpy, airy character assassinations couldn't convey in real time, history did eventually.
They saw Bully Boy not as the 'caring' man Maggie swore he was, not as the 'honest' man Maggie swore he was. They saw the candidate she'd pimped for (from the "left") for what he was -- dangerous to women. Much more so than any hyper-inflated, cariacture of Bill Clinton could ever have been. The global gag rule was back. There was a reason Bill Clinton lifted it. They saw attacks on abortion, they saw attacks on gays and lesbians. They saw the Bully Boy for the ogre that he was. And while they might have been willing to write a pass for some of them (in a "those boys don't know any better"), they didn't show Mags the same sympathy.
Like another woman we're addressing this week, she seemed to think the viewers she could bring in were being pulled for Pax.
So now she's trying to resurrect her career and it hasn't been easy. Like other dress up "liberals" the first Bully Boy term was hard for her. She lost her cushy post at Time where her soft mind and writing were given free reign. Kinseley said, "Mags, come on over here with me, I'll set you up good and we can play 'liberal' dress up together." But that didn't reignite the career.
What's an out of work, frumpy minded, frumpy looking woman with no future left to do? Why root for Joe Lieberman of course!
Now some not so nice souls might point out that if she really believed all the things she's currently writing about Lieberman, she wouldn't have worked so hard to bury Al Gore in 2000.
(Lieberman was his running mate, after all.)
But that would be using something called "logic." There's no logic in the minds or professional lives of career 'liberals.' So she attacks Ned Lamont, whom she knows little of but she knows he's made some kind of anti-war noise and that's enough for the writer who enared her Luce money the old fashioned way.
She gets in some slams against the blogs because she's knows that's "hot" to do now.
She makes the plea for her boy Joe saying that if it were a general election, this fine upstanding Democrat, he could win. She avoids pointing out the reality -- in a general election, he'd win by garnering votes from Republicans. (Something most upstanding Democrats wouldn't have to consider their base -- but again, being a career liberal means never having to be logical.)
She's Mags the Simp once again. It played well once, it doesn't anymore.
[Those who need a refersher on Mags the Simp should go to The Daily Howler and search the archives.]
Career rehab? She could avoid trying to sound so earnest and desperate to please. Cokie Roberts never does. She never fails to display her contempt for America. It's a good move for her because she's not very likeable. National Pension Radio ignores that fact year after year but she remains the most highly exposed of the least liked on their roster.
"B-b-but," Maggie interrupts waving her hands at her own body, "I'm a tree stump. Cokie's statue-esque, like a good drag queen."
That is true. But she's not classy. That doesn't prevent her from presenting herself as that. No one buys her as classy (is she still serving that Frito pie?) but, like Joan Crawford before her, she knows if she brings the full force of her will down firmly, most will be too imidated to question her directly.
Mags, you rode the "career liberal" circuit for all it was worth. You were a little Kate Smith, singing your standard anywhere you wanted. Well times are hard, it's a Bully Boy economy, and you've found that there's no Atlantic City for "career liberals" to pasture out too. You're not alone in isolation -- just look at Bill Press.
You ran snapping with the mad dogs of the chat & chews. But you lacked the strength, everything was given to you once you demonstrated how mushy your supposed principals were. What can we tell you? Life's a Cokie . . . and then you die. Your career has.