I've been clucking and shaking my head for a while at the once-proud Washington Post, and their decline into national laughing stock, apparently it more of a steep decline than previously noted. First, there was a little dust-up because the columnist Dan Froomkin (one of the few WaPo entries in my RSS reader) was 'too liberal' or something, which is partially truth, at best; then in apparent response, the Post hired a mouth-breathing Republican partisan to provide balance. Or in other words, the Post's response to criticism of employing a slightly left of center reporter (Froomkin) was to hire an extremely right wing hack, who has never been a reporter. Nice equation there.
Well, this hack apparently is one of those guys who want to return to the 13th century, and bring the rest of us with him...
Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal: The Washington Post's Master Plan Unfolds...
Yesterday we saw the opening act of the Washington Post's master plan to discredit the right by giving airspace to Ben Domenech. Today we see the second act begin, as P.Z. Myers outs Domenech as somebody who (a) lies about the work and views of Stephen Jay Gould, and (b) is an out-and-out creationist who “take[s] Genesis literally” and believes that the “theory of evolution is a total crock”:
...
It's time to demand that Domenech give answers to the most pressing question of our day: Were there rainbows before Noah's flood?
Josh Marshall has a succinct summary of yesterday's announcement
The Washington Post, or rather its online incarnation, has managed to capture the essence of the silliness of the 'media bias' debate in one easily digestible set-piece of its own making.The right mau-maus Dan Froomkin's online column, gets the wet-behind-the-ears ombudsman to write a really silly column making her own job into a venue for dumping newsroom scuttlebutt on another reporter.
The idea, the notional claim, was that the questions -- or should we more gravely say, the concerns -- about Froomkin's column began with complaints from readers. Actually, not so. They started with a 'complaint' from a young GOP operative by the name of Patrick Ruffini who'd just come off working as official webmaster and blogger for Bush-Cheney 2004.
Like I said, mau-maued. And even pretty shabbily at that.
Now, is Dan Froomkin a 'liberal'? I figure he probably agrees with my politics more than Newt Gingrich's. But it is at most opinion journalism, aimed at hitting points of hypocrisy, deception or double-dealing in public officials. It's written by a credentialed journalist. And he hits both sides.
..
So, to 'balance' Froomkin, who may be a commentator with liberal tendencies, the Post goes out and gets a high octane Republican political activist who hits the ground running with a tirade of Red State America revanchism and even journalism itself.
update
Parenthetical note: too bad that FireDogLake is having moving problems with their URL - this WaPo snafu seems tailor-made for their particular brand of hyper-intelligent snark. For some reason, have not been able to access their new page since 3/15/06. Not sure why yet.
never mind. DNS problem on my end, fixed now.
Anywhoo, go here to read Jane Hamsher's take on the perscuffle (is that a word?)
Tags: Intelligent_Design, /media
Someone has their panties all bucnhed up from the looks of it! Funny moonbats on parade!
I suppose, though what I've read is a bit more nuanced. Just too bad that the left doesn't have the depth of the right's mighty media wurlizter to really discuss the issue with the depth it deserves.
Man the US media is fubar. From over here we just can't believe how far to the right it goes, how hysterical it can get and how come no one seems to mind...exagerations in part but you get my point. But then having lived abroad I have to say maybe the UK is just lucky to have that historical accident the BBC.
yes, I read the BBC too (as well as the Guardian UK), the major US Media is pretty tight with corporate power and by extension, the government. Profit is more important than truth.