E&P noted the latest setback for conservative bloggers today in a piece about “The Great ‘Kerry Photo’ Flap” that was first noted here last week.

As if the finding of the allegedly non-existent Associated Press source in Iraq, Capt. Jamil Hussein, wasn’t enough, conservative bloggers suffered another setback Friday in the far more trivial flap over a photo of Sen. John Kerry.

Although the truth about the photo first emerged within a couple of days here on The Democratic Daily, with a statement from Kerry staffer, Frank Lowenstein who was traveling in the Middle East with Kerry, some conservative bloggers when confronted with the statement, refused to note they were wrong. Then yesterday, “Greg Sargent at the liberal blog Talking Points Memo,” who had been doing more digging after the statement from Lowenstein was released, revealed that he had followed up with the reporters Lowenstein said were talking to Kerry in the photo in question.

E&P asks, “Does the above constitute spending too much time on a trivial matter? Yeah, probably. But what the heck.”

Trivial? What the heck? Hmmm… I personally don’t see the misrepresentation of a photo of a seated Senator to to trivial and I likewise don’t think that disputing that was a “what the heck” sort of way to spend time. The fact is that conservative bloggers have long been misrepresenting the facts for a very long time on the blogosphere. In fact, there are some who, when it comes to John Kerry, are still blithely keeping the “swift boat” memes alive. In truth, “The Great ‘Kerry Photo’ Flap” was just “swift boat Pas de Deux.” And as long as liberal bloggers allow these liars to get away with this they will continue to spread their lies across their network of conservative bloggers who knowing distort the truth for political purposes.

Media Matters noted today that “Warbloggers refuse to admit their errors in making fraud allegations against AP.” These warbloggers are among some of the same bloggers who perpetuated “The Great ‘Kerry Photo’ Flap.” And in the case of the “right-wing warbloggers, who for six weeks have been accusing the Associated Press of manufacturing a police source in Baghdad in order to spread insurgent-friendly “propaganda,”" they are now, as Media Matters notes “now steadfastly refuse to concede their mistakes in the wake the January 4 news that the police source in question, Jamil Hussein, does exist and has been identified by the Iraqi government.” No small surprise, as many of the same bloggers are refusing to admit the truth about the Kerry photo or take responsibility for their lies.

I will note that not all conservative bloggers are acting irresponsibly in both of these cases, but some just simply refuse to step up and act responsibly. There is an irony to the fact that these are the same bloggers who claim to be watchdogs on the so called “liberal media,” but when caught in their own web of lies, they blindly defend themselves and each other perpetuating the lies further. There is nothing but glaring hypocritical behavior here, and it’s a long established pattern with many of these bloggers.

“Selective Amnesia” seems to be all to prevelant in conservative circles, as liberal blogger Glenn Greenwald notes in of all places “The American Conservative.” It’s not just conservative bloggers who distort the truth, as noted here in the past and on other blogs, so too do conservative columnists who do double duty on the blogosphere.

It’s a sad statement on the deep partisan division in this country when we have folks who are hell bent on perpetuating lies for partisan political purposes. The credibility of these bloggers has been shot to hell, but sadly much like the boy king who they shill for, I fear they will continue to make things up. And liberal bloggers will continue to labor to expose the truth, trivial or not.

Memeorandum has a wealth of links to discussion on all the blog posts referenced in this post.

UPDATE: Malkin issues a correction of sorts… a weak one at that. Greg Sargent responds here.

UPDATE 2: Steve Gilliard weighs on the failures of the right wing blogosphere: “You get what you deserve.”

UPDATE 3: On The Daily Dish: The far-right blogosphere cops to yet another fact-free smear.

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