Update (15:20 EDT): Fargo, N.D.-based radio host friend of NewsBusters Rob Port takes on this Newsweek item on his Say Anything blog today and eviscerates David Graham's article as error-laden and grossly misleading.
Newsweek -- the floundering weekly news magazine that was recently sold for the princely sum of $1.00 -- apparently assigns a pretty low value on the intelligence of its readers. Take yesterday's online article by David Graham on the reelection campaign of the at-large congressman for North Dakota: "Meet Earl Pomeroy, the Moderate Democrat Touting His Health-Reform Vote."
"Can one Blue Dog’s unorthodox ad strategy localize his election and head off the demise of another incumbent?" asked the subheadline.
Of course, both the moderate and Blue Dog tags bring to mind a Democrat that perhaps agrees with the liberal leadership of his party about half of the time, but is fairly independent and conservative-minded on a whole host of issues. Trouble is, this is precisely what Pomeroy is not, according to both the liberal Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) and the American Conservative Union (ACU).
The liberal ADA ranked Pomeroy as 85% liberal in 2009, equal to the score of outgoing liberal Senator Byron Dorgan, who announced his retirement in January of this year in part due to voter dissatisfaction with his toeing the liberal Obama/Pelosi/Reid line. Pomeroy also scored an 85 percent rating from the ADA in 2008, 2007. Pomeroy had a slightly more conservative rating of 80 percent in 2006 and dissented from the liberal line only 10 percent of the time in 2005.
