Franken-Lies-And-the-Lying-Liars-Who-Tell

might think that Peggy "20,000 people" Noonan would have called back to apologize for her
misrepresentation. And she did. No, she didn't. She's awful.
Next call was to Christopher Caldwell, the Weekly Standard author of the "20,000
booed a succession of people" quote. Caldwell had written on behalf of the editors to give the
official Weekly Standard take on the memorial.
He said that viewers "tuned in on television to watch a solemn commemoration and
found a rally devoted to a politics that was twisted, pagan, childish, inhumane, and even totalitarian
beyond their worst nightmares."
He compared Kahn's speech to "a Maoist reeducation camp," a "sinister incident, unexampled
in recent American politics." He labeled the crowd a "mob." He said that "one of
our major political parties, or at least a sizable wing of it, appeared to be dancing a jig on the
grave of a particularly beloved fallen comrade."
"Most of those who watched this spectacle," Caldwell wrote authoritatively, "felt a
disgust bordering on shame."
style.
Huh. Why did he say "most of those" instead of "most of us"? Probably a question of
More bizarrely and libelously, Caldwell wrote, "The pilots and aides who died with
him were barely treated at all." That was just crazy. There were long, beautiful eulogies about
each of the aides. In fact, the speeches about Paul didn't start until nearly three hours into the
broadcast. A friend who had watched on TV told me, "I was wondering when they would get
to Paul already." (Yes, my friend is Jewish.)
How could Caldwell have overlooked the first three hours? It was all so puzzling. But
then a question occurred to me. Tucker hadn't seen the memorial before he talked about it on
national TV. Peggy, it seemed anyway, hadn't actually seen Trent Lott get booed. And as
TeamFranken was researching this chapter, the whole nastiness with Jayson Blair hit The
New York Times. Blair, as you will remember, was busted for making things up about events
he hadn't actually seen. Could it be, I wondered, that Caldwell, writing on behalf of the editors
of one of America's preeminent conservative journals, hadn't even seen the memorial?
Caldwell called me back. I asked him about the "pagan" characterization. Had he seen
the ecumenical prayer at the beginning? No. I asked him about the "crowd of 20,000 booing."
Had he seen that? No. How about the eulogies for the aides? Had he seen any of those? No.