For years, NewsBusters has reported the unfortunate incidence of vulgarity and virulence in the liberal blogosphere, as well as how some prominent politicians and left-leaning media members have expressed concern regarding how such behavior negatively reflects on the Democrat Party.

On Friday, this invective hit a new low at Daily Kos when a piece that was quickly promoted to the highly-coveted "Recommended Diaries" list had an extraordinarily deplorable title -- which will NOT be printed here for what will be obvious reasons! -- dealing with relieving oneself on the likeness of former President Ronald Reagan.

This piece of detritus is so vile (h/t NBer lumpy) I won't dishonor the former president, or my readers for that matter, by linking to it; before curiosity sends you over there to see for yourself, be forewarned to do so with an empty stomach and the understanding that you will be revolted beyond your wildest imagination.

This raises an important question:

In today's episode of "As The Left Eat Their Own," a tape of Hillary Clinton complaining after Super Tuesday that activists from MoveOn.org "flood into these caucuses and dominate them and really intimidate people who actually show up to support [her]" was published at The Huffington Post Friday.

This has set off a predictably hostile reaction from the liberal blogosphere, and was considered such a bombshell that Barack Obama-loving MSNBC actually began Friday's installment of "Verdict" with this revelation.

But, before we get there, here's the text of Hillary's remarks (audio embedded upper-right):

Markos "Kos" Moulitsas has bought into the latest loopy conspiracy theory spinning around the left-wing Web.: that the Hillary Clinton campaign deliberately darkened a photo of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) to make him appear darker in skin tone than he actually is.

But as Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs points out Markos and other

...morons are hyperventilating over videos they are watching via the internet, and assuming that the orangey color of Obama’s face in one video is somehow “genuine,” while the desaturated color and slightly different aspect ratio in the Clinton video is a nefarious racist plot.

That sounds about right. Here at NewsBusters, we often make basic color and contrast adjustments for video captures from network TV. If we posted photos from TV screen captures without doing so, everyone would appear darker, regardless of their race or ethnic background.

Besides, Johnson points out, following Kossack logic, the Associated Press would be playing the race card too while oddly enough the Black College Wire is making Obama whiter:

Does the hatred in the Netroots know no bounds?

In 2006, one of their leaders posted a picture of Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.) in black face.

On Tuesday, one of the "Recommended Diaries" at Daily Kos featured a picture of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia in a Gestapo uniform (right) under the headline, "Today's Worst Person in the World" (h/t NBer Gat New York).

After some quotes from an Associated Press article about Scalia's views on "so-called torture," the DKos piece elaborated (with seemingly requisite vulgarity I might add while cautioning readers before they proceed):

Well, this will send the Kossacks into a tizzy! The Wall Street Journal has an op-ed by Dan Gerstein, "Decline of the Angry Left." Gerstein, a senior adviser for Joe Lieberman's various national campaigns, claims that the Daily Kos is finished as a mover and shaker in Democratic politics. After reading it over I think he is dead on with much of his analysis. The anger of the extremist, left as seen on a daily basis on the Daily Kos site has lost the contest for the hearts and minds of the Democratic Party. As Gerstein notes, he has been the target of the left before and this op ed certainly won't make him their newest American idol!

In fact, Gerstein might not make himself very welcome in many Democratic circles all the way 'round with his denigration of the party leadership at this time.

Perhaps nothing better illustrates the mental divide between left and right in this country than the starkly different reactions to the Newsweek blogs of new columnists, Markos Moulitsas and Karl Rove. The articles they wrote for Newsweek have already been covered in depth by Noel Sheppard which you can read here and here. It is the reactions to each of these columnists that are quite fascinating to read. In the case of Markos Moulitsas, the reactions from conservatives in the comments section were rather low key and primarily took the form of expressing policy differences.

In Markos Moulitsas's first column for Newsweek, the proprietor of the liberal website Daily Kos sadly personified exactly what's wrong with today's Democrat Party as well as the media: the inability to see things beyond the grips of Bush Derangement Syndrome.

In fact, you could diagnose the malady right in the headline, "Make the Bush Record the Issue." Maybe more surprising, Markos also pointed his pen at Ronald Reagan.

Someone ought to tell Moulitsas, who was hired to offer commentary concerning the 2008 elections, that neither of these former presidents is running for office next year.

Unfortunately, much as the Party members he supports, Kos seemed totally oblivious to this fact, and actually wrote a column about the current campaign that didn't mention a single candidate in it (emphasis added throughout):

It's certainly safe to say that conservatives rarely agree with anything written by liberal bloggers.

However, on Saturday, not only was there a prominent posting at Daily Kos entitled "Clinton News Network = CNN," which received 631 comments in only seven hours, but the website's proprietor, the esteemed Markos Moulitsas, wrote an article of his own that was highly critical of Clintonista James Carville's role at the cable network.

In the end, the hypocrisy was so thick you could cut it with a knife.

But before we get there, the first piece voiced displeasure with the recent shenanigans by CNN during Thursday's Democrat Presidential debate:

Here's something you don't see every day: a well-known liberal journalist slamming the owner of Daily Kos, Markos Moulitsas.

Yet, that's what happened on Wednesday's "Hannity & Colmes" when NPR's Juan Williams was invited on to discuss the recent hiring of Moulitsas by Newsweek.

In a rather stunning turn of events, Williams seemed absolutely disgusted by the announcement (video available here, relevant section begins at minute 3:37):

When Newsweek announced Tuesday that it was hiring Markos Moulitsas of Daily Kos to be a contributor during the 2008 presidential campaign, Kos told his readers, "Newsweek is ‘balancing' me out with someone that should make heads on our side explode."

As reported by the Washington Post moments ago, Moulitsas was quite prescient:

Newsweek has signed the president's former deputy chief of staff [Karl Rove] as a commentator who will turn out several columns on the 2008 campaign through inauguration day.

The Post continued (emphasis added throughout, h/t NBer Right2thePoint):

What liberal bias?

Remember that big announcement I promised earlier? Well, it’s now official.

Newsweek press release

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Tuesday, November 13, 2007

MARKOS MOULITSAS, FOUNDER AND PUBLISHER OF DAILYKOS.COM,
TO BECOME NEWSWEEK CONTRIBUTOR FOR 2008 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN

New York — Markos Moulitsas, the founder and publisher of dailykos.com, will become a Newsweek contributor for the 2008 presidential campaign, offering occasional opinion pieces to the pages of the magazine and to Newsweek.com.

"We have always sought to represent a diversity of views in Newsweek, and we think Markos will be a great part of that tradition," said Newsweek Editor Jon Meacham. "He will give our readers in print and online a unique perspective. As always, our job is to create the most energetic and illuminating magazine possible, and Markos will help us do that as the campaign unfolds."

It appears the good folks at HBO must have been extremely concerned that "Real Time" host Bill Maher was going to lose many of his viewers as a result of his tossing 9/11 truthers from the audience two weeks ago.

After all, Maher even admitted at the opening of the discussion segment of Friday's program, albeit almost apologetically, "I'm not going to pretend that we have ideological balance on this panel."

Ideological balance? Are you kidding?

Here were Maher's attendees this fine Friday evening in no specific order:

Whether or not one agrees with the political views of Markos Moulitsas, there's no getting around the fact his website has become not just a powerful force in the blogosphere, but is also shaping the Democrat Party.

This raises an important question: Why isn't there a conservative website like Daily Kos?

Providing some answers this week were Dean Barnett at the Weekly Standard and David Weigel of Reason.

Barnett accurately frames the issue (emphasis added throughout):

How pathetic are the posters on a large blog when its own founder berates them for being gullible fools for being easily scammed by an obviously phony story? Such was the case with the posters on the favorite "progressive" blog of the MSM, the Daily Kos, when its founder, Markos Moulitsas, tore into them for being suckers because they fell for a story about a supposed imminent U.S. invasion of Iran based on the fantasies of a blogger with a history of fabulist tall tales. To add insult to injury, Moulitsas even cited a "rightwing" blog to discredit the thread posted by Daily Kos blogger Maccabee who originated the Iran invasion fantasy:

Seriously, just because something online confirms your own viewpoint or prejudices or whatnot, it does not mean it's true.

Skepticism is a virtue.

Now the right-wingers are laughing at the gullibility of those who recommend Maccabee's diaries.

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