Our MSM: Most Qualified = Least Covered, Part II
[Sigh] . . . . I addressed this last week, but apparently it’s already time for a refresher course.
The New York Times, in its haste to ensure that no one but Hillary, Obama, and Edwards gets any ink, begins what is supposedly straight reporting with the following:
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton is the front-runner and will probably win the Democratic presidential nomination. Rudolph W. Giuliani could do well in Mississippi. And the length of the presidential campaign is insane.
Read that first sentence again.
WTF?
First of all, I have yet to see any hard evidence that Hillary is indeed the "front-runner." The distance to Election Day ‘08 is so far that it renders such evaluations meaningless.
But it’s the second half of that sentence that really sticks in my craw. "[A]nd will probably win the Democratic presidential nomination"? Sez who? Robert Pear? And since when has he become The Grand Electoral Oracle 20 Months Out?
Sweet jumping Jeebus on a pogo stick. Note to Bill Keller: This is supposed to be a news piece. You know, that kind of writing that involves verifiable facts, not the author’s opinion? Particularly when he seems to pull his opinions out of his ass. I will be flatly astounded if Hillary is the nominee. I don’t give a rat’s ass how much ink they’re giving her now, or how many millions she raises - I don’t see a plurality of DNC delegates voting for her, and I don’t think she can win the general.
Pear then devotes the remainder of the first third to the following dubious conclusion:
Democratic governors pleaded with their presidential candidates to ignore the fringes of the party and focus instead on the “middle 20 percent” of the electorate with a pragmatic, problem-solving agenda.
Of course, the only guv that he quotes in support of this proposition is Tennessee Blue Dog Phil Bredesen, who disses Pelosi but doesn’t actually say anything about this "middle 20 percent" that Pear finds so compelling.
And then . . . then the piece’s hed is discarded utterly, in favor of interviewing long-time GOP tool and current Mississippi guv Haley Barbour about Hillary’s chances. Good ol’ Haley gets six - count ‘em, six - grafs all to his little ol’ self.
Pear next moves to a series of governors for comment. He gives a little extra space to PA’s Ed Rendell, who has the only intelligent comment in the entire piece (Pear’s "reporting" included):
“I think it’s insane,” Mr. Rendell said in an interview. “The media has created a two-year presidential election cycle that’s very destructive to American politics. And the political system is complicit. We front-load our primaries so much that four or five states decide who the nominees are going to be. It’s over by February. And then we have a God-awful yearlong presidential campaign, general election campaign, which is too long and lends itself to all these negative attacks.”
No shit. But blame Edwards, Hillary, and Obama and their handlers, and especially blame the MSM. The rest of us would be content to labor quietly in the trenches for another eight months, and not have to listen to the squawking of the punditocracy.
Pear quotes governors Barbour and Bredesen, Rell and Rendell, Baldacci and Pawlenty and Ritter and Sebelius. He also manages to get in references to GOP candidates Giuliani, McCain, and Brownback; to Dem candidates Clinton, Edwards, and Obama; and even to 2004 candidates Bush and Kerry.
So who’s missing?
Why, yes, that’s absolutely right. Not a single, solitary word about Bill Richardson.
In an alleged straight news story about both governors and presidential candidates, there is not a single fucking reference to the one person who not only fills both roles, but is also a major player on the national and international diplomatic stage.
Now, Bill’s not generally the type to allow others to label him, much less to marginalize him, and from what I’ve seen, he doesn’t take kindly to being ignored, either. But I hope he’s ready for this. The MSM have already staked out their turf, and have assigned roles to each of the players. Richardson is this campaign’s Howard Dean: the candidate who doesn’t fit the MSM’s insider narrative, but who could actually win, and who thus must be marginalized at all costs, at every opportunity.
I hate the MSM.
“So who’s missing? / Why, yes, that’s absolutely right. Not a single, solitary word about Bill Richardson.”
Nor, to be fair, any word about Dennis Kucinich. Whatever you or the MSM may think of him, he is running, and he is a Democrat.
I am not in anybody’s camp yet; it’s too damned early, and too much can and will happen between now and November 2008. But as of now, I’d rather vote for Richardson or Kucinich than any of the MSM-acknowledged Democratic candidates.
Full disclosure: I am not an independent; I am a Democrat, with all that that implies. I am committed to vote for the Democratic nominee in the 2008 presidential election. UK blogger jams o’donnell of The Poor Mouth (see my blogroll) says that he has long been a member of the Labour Party, “for my sins at times”; I could say the same about my Democratic Party membership, but when I think of the alternatives, I’ll take that yaller dawg any day.
Comment by Steve Bates — February 28, GMT @ 05:2836 AM
Yeah, I’m with you, Steve - whomever is the Dem nominee will get my vote, although sometimes I have to hold my nose a little harder than others.
And, yes, you’re right about Kucinich - and Gravel, and any of the others. I have certain very specific problems with Kucinich, but I’d vote for him in the proverbial heartbeat over any goddamn Republican.
For this post, however, I omitted all of them intentionally, simply because I was making the point that Bill falls into both categories that were ostensibly the subject of the article: He’s a sitting Guv who was actually attending the conference in question, and he’s a current presidential candidate - despite the fact that his name’s not Clinton, Edwards, or Obama. Of course, I also thought the point was rather obvious, but it’s clear the MSM disagree.
Comment by Administrator — March 01, GMT @ 04:121 AM