Keith Olbermann Suspended Indefinitely?

It seems to me that there's got to be more to this story than meets the eye.

MSNBC star Keith Olbermann donated money to several candidates, a news bomb dropped by Politico. In response, the president of MSNBC, Phil Griffin is shocked! Shocked! That there's gamblingpolitical donations going on in this establishment.

Come on, Phil. Really?

I'm not arguing that employees don't sign away all sorts of rights when they join any company. Nor am I saying that Olbermann wasn't aware of the policy (he obviously had to be). But I have to agree with Bill Kristol that suspending Olbermann for donating to candidates is squirrelly.

First, he donated money to candidates he liked. He didn’t take money, or favors, in a way that influenced his reporting.

Second, he’s not a reporter. It’s an opinion show. If Olbermann wants to put his money where his mouth is, more power to him.

Third, GE, the corporate parent of MSNBC, gives money to political organizations. GE executives and, I’m sure, NBC executives give money. Why can’t Olbermann?

Liberals scream about Fox Corporation's $1 million donation to the GOP and now Republicans are comparing Olbermann's misstep with it. But the truth is that there's nothing wrong with either donation; individuals and corporations should be free to donate to the candidate of their choice. Unless Politico can show a clear connection between Olbermann's donations and coverage of these candidates, the suspension is bogus.

Justice: Fox News Gets Front Row Seat at White House Briefings

After the Obama administration's failed boycott of Fox News, coupled with MoveOn.org's pathetic attempt to prevent this, Fox News gets a front row seat to White House briefings.

According to Hot Air, it was a unanimous decision by the White House Correspondents' board.

"The board ultimately was persuaded by Fox's length of service and commitment to the White House television pool," said the association.

Always nice to see people do the right thing.

The Tone-Deaf Liberal Media

Dear liberals, journalists (same thing) and nutjobs,
Despite your attempts to distract from the real story of the Journolist scandal (see Amanda Marcotte's piece, Writing Future Scandals So the Right Doesn't Have To, most people actually get what the problem is with having a listserv where you strategize how to cover news. Keep telling yourselves that speaking at a convention where, assumably, anyone can pay to attend, is exactly like being in a group that (a) no one gets to know about and (b) only people on the left are allowed to join. Yeah, those are exactly the same!

Fortunately, some liberals get the problem with Journolist:

Chuck Todd, political director and chief White House correspondent for NBC News, who was not part of Journolist, told me this:


“I am sure Ezra had good intentions when he created it, but I am offended the right is using this as a sledgehammer against those of us who don’t practice activist journalism.


“Journolist was pretty offensive. Those of us who are mainstream journalists got mixed in with journalists with an agenda. Those folks who thought they were improving journalism are destroying the credibility of journalism.


“This has kept me up nights. I try to be fair. It’s very depressing.”

Emphasis mine.

I've always told friends and family that sure, journalists are liberals, but most of them actually try to keep their biases in check and function as reporters and editors. It's possible to do this if you remain mindful of your own opinions and remain faithful to the idea that objectively presenting information is more persuasive than distorting the facts. But Journolist has turned that argument on its head; it has given the Rush Limbaugh's of the world the best evidence that there is indeed a liberal cabal planning news coverage and spinning events to favor certain (Democrat, liberal) candidates and disfavor (Republican, conservative) others. And worse for journalists is that no one remains untarred by this broad brush.

I'm sure Ezra Klein thought it would be really cool to allow liberal journalists to vent in private about the people and events they write about publicly, but doing so in this way is simply unethical. Journalists sitting around a bar talking about the events of the day is one thing, but I never met a reporter who talked with his buddies about how to prevent damage to one candidate from inconvenient information. That's not journalism. That's public relations.

Obama Signs Press Freedom Act Then Won't Take Questions

You can't make this stuff up.

There was some rich irony at the White House today -- President Obama signed the Press Freedom Act, and then promptly refused to take any questions.


The new law expands the State Department's annual human rights reports to include a description of press freedoms in each country. It seemed a good opportunity to showcase press freedom in this country.

Taking quesitons would require Teh One having to speak on the fly without blaming somebody else for everything that goes wrong with his administration. Can't have that.

I know it's getting stale, but can you imagine what would have happened had George W. Bush done this? Obama has ducked the press for months. He has mishandled the oil spill in the Gulf and the press has hardly whimpered. How much longer will they be willing to cover for him?

Obama the Bully

I'd feel sorrier for the press in the end if their love affair with Barack Obama had they not spent the last two years licking his boots and calling all critics "racists."

But it is good to see the MSM finally coming to the conclusion the rest of us came to a long time ago: Barack Obama is a bully who can't govern and is a thin-skinned (that's not racist), pouty-faced egoist who can't act statesmanlike to save his life.

Can you remember any other modern President, wagging a finger from on high, so directly and bitterly criticizing a new law passed by any state?

This is hubris at best and ignorance of the Constitution at worst. The U.S. was founded in part on the precept of states’ rights as an important counterweight to a rapacious federal government. Thus a President must step softly here, questioning gently but avoiding rancor and browbeating.

The law in question is Arizona's new immigration law, designed to deal with a state issue that the feds refuse to. God knows, expecting everybody to carry ID with them--like a driver's license--is clearly racist, right? Especially when you have to show it to check into a hotel, buy Sudafed, use your credit card, get money from your bank account, etc., etc.

President Obama is a big whiny baby and his immature attitude towards the presidency is rankling more than just Republicans these days.

Hmm, now that I think about it, nor can I recall any other modern President who has spent so much effort lambasting his immediate predecessor. Reagan didn’t do it to Carter. Clinton didn’t do it to the first George Bush.

And the worst part is, we’re barely calling out Obama the Bully on this behavior at all. We are becoming entirely too accustomed to it, failing to see it for what it really is: a striking lack of civility, and an overflow of divisiveness, from a President who had promised to give us precisely the opposite.

I'm waiting for Democrats to call the press racists.

Howell Raines: Wah, Wah, Wah, Fox News Is Mean

With Democrats set to ram through health care legislation that Americans don't want, Howell Raines asks the important question: why does Fox News get to keep telling the truth?

Through clever use of the Fox News Channel and its cadre of raucous commentators, Ailes has overturned standards of fairness and objectivity that have guided American print and broadcast journalists since World War II. Yet, many members of my profession seem to stand by in silence as Ailes tears up the rulebook that served this country well as we covered the major stories of the past three generations, from the civil rights revolution to Watergate to the Wall Street scandals. This is not a liberal-versus-conservative issue. It is a matter of Fox turning reality on its head with, among other tactics, its endless repetition of its uber-lie: "The American people do not want health-care reform."

Translation: Wah, wah, wah! How dare somebody not tell the same lies, fibs and provarications that the rest of us have for 50 years!

Yeah, that supposed system of objectivity worked really well when we had journalists reporting objectively on American victories in war. Oh, and let's not forget the objectivity shown by news outlets over, say Abu Ghraib, where we had the New York Times running endless page 1 stories designed to gin up opposition to the war in Iraq. This isn't even talking about the liars associated with these objective news outlets where fake but accurate is good enough to go to press.


Let's be blunt here: as someone who worked in the news business for years, I saw firsthand what goes into "objective" journalism. Some journalists do try very hard to give just the facts of a story. But don't think for a moment that reporters and editors check their biases at the door and don't ever allow their own opinions to slip into their writing. Just ask the restaurant owner who happened to piss off a reviewer somehow. Or the politician who doesn't lean left.

And Howell Raines, the former editor of the New York Times, knows about the power of the press. Journalists crowed about "bringing down" the presidency of Richard Nixon. They constantly sneered and slimed Ronald Reagan and showed nothing but contempt for any Republican president who actually tried to abide by the Constitution, as opposed to expanding the liberal welfare state as Democrats have done for nearly a century. Raines' bitter tears about the popularity and power of Fox News would be touching if it weren't so self-serving. If Raines' brand of journalism were winning their war, there would be little whinging about how one cable news outlet runs circles around every establishment journalistic network.

Raines complains that Fox cherry-picks its polls, yet does exactly the same thing. In choosing this Gallup poll over my previously linked Rasmussen poll, Raines is engaging in exactly the bad behavior he accuses Fox News of doing. The laughable part of Raines' complaint is that he is only unhappy because a different brand, a different look at news is using the same techniques he and his cohorts have used for half a century...and beating him at it.

There's never been anything objective in "objective" news, and every Journalism 101 student knows it. They recognize that the choice of words, pictures, headlines and placement all affect readership and the opinions that readers form about a subject. This is why the New York Times ran stories on Abu Ghraib on page 1 34 out of 37 days. It wasn't simply to inform viewers; it was to shape what they thought about that prison and also about our conduct of the war in Iraq. When journalists talk about comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable, they're not talking about merely covering events. They're talking about shaping policy.

Fox News understands this and so does Howell Raines and the grousers he represents. Americans also understand that journalists have biases, and they don't really mind. What they mind is when journalists like Raines lie about it.

UPDATE: More at Newsbusters.

No Hypocrisy Here: Patrick Kennedy Really Hates Bad Press Aimed at Democrat Misbehavior

But he wasn't crying when the press went after Mark Foley in 2006 rather than focusing on Iraq. That was sooo four years ago. From Hot Air:

Go figure that a scion of Camelot, who’s lived up to the family legacy in so many ways, would look dimly upon press coverage of politicians’ misbehavior. Funny, but I don’t remember many Democratic complaints about the sustained media swarm over Mark Foley in fall 2006 while Iraq was falling apart. I’m sure there’s an explanation for the difference somewhere.

Hey, when Dems get into tickle fights with staffers, that's no news. When Republicans send questionable texts to underage staffers, that's big news.

Things You Can't Say on WGN

Funny list that could have been compiled by any copy editor or micromanaging jerk. Is "killing spree" really the worst thing a news caster can say on WGN? He didn't even include my personal pet peeve: using "entitled" for "titled," as in "The book is entitled Making Money."

How News Is Made

Breaking News: Some Bullshit Happening Somewhere

More Polls to Make Lefty Heads Explode

Their campaign against Fox News seems to have backfired.

Americans do not trust the major tv news operations in the country- except for Fox News.

Our newest survey looking at perceptions of ABC News, CBS News, CNN, Fox News, and NBC News finds Fox as the only one that more people say they trust than distrust. 49% say they trust it to 37% who do not.

More Republicans trust Fox News than Democrats, and Democrats trust NBC more than any other outlet. These results aren't surprising and probably reflect a bit of the "echo chamber" mentality of the hard core of both parties. The interesting question becomes what do the mushy middle think of our media?

And interestingly enough, more people trust Fox News precisely because they think it isn't neutral and objective. As the press release says, it tells you where the future of news is heading; that is, that people no longer expect media people to be "objective" and would rather the biases be honest and upfront. I've thought for a long time that it's better to admit your bias (a la Keith Olbermann) and let the grownups determine for themselves what news they accept and what they reject, rather than trying to fool The People that you are completely objective and have no hidden viewpoints. Anyone who worked for their high school newspaper knows reporters and editors have viewpoints and frequently use the power of the press to push it (think civil rights, environmental issues, Watergate). Regardless of whether you thought Valerie Plame was newsworthy, it's arguable that pursuit of that story till somebody got convicted amounted to advocacy, not objectivity.

Democrat's Bad Behavior a "GOP Dirty Trick"

Now, I guess, reporters doing their job (asking uncomfortable questions) have mind control powers/

A spokesman for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee is describing the video above, which shows a Weekly Standard reporter getting pushed around by a DSCC consultant, Michael Meehan, as a "dirty trick" by "Washington Republicans."

DSCC spokesman Eric Schultz refused to go into detail about the incident, or to criticize Meehan, who confronted reporter John McCormack, in McCormack's telling, after the reporter followed candidate Martha Coakley down the street asking unwelcome questions.

Meehan is a veteran Democratic staffer, Bostonian, and Obama appointee to the Broadcasting Board of Governors. But friends said they found the video both inappropriate and out of character.

"It is no surprise that Washington Republicans are trying to use every dirty trick they have to throw the Coakley campaign off their stride, but we are determined to end this campaign talking about the issues that matter to voters, like creating jobs and lowering middle class taxes," said Schultz in a written statement.

We used to call guys who asked politicians "unwelcome questions" reporters, but that was sooo 2007, I guess.

Here's the video:


Kudos to McCormack for not allowing Coakley's thug to bully him. Somebody needs to give him (McCormack, not Meehan) a raise.

Is the photo of the incident a game changer?

Fortunately, You Have the Gold-Plated Witch on Wheels and Other Bloggers to Keep You Informed...

Nine Big Stories the MSM Missed or Ignored (or Gave Little Coverage To)

Since There Are Soon to be No Editors or Publishers...

Editor & Publisher to cease publication after 125 years.
...why would we need a publication for them?

Maine Reporter Fired for Offending Gay Lobbyists

Some stories leave you scratching your head. Take the case of the Maine reporter fired for sending a private e-mail opposing gay marriage to the Human Rights Commission.

Larry Grard fired off an angry e-mail to the Human Rights Commission after the HRC sent a press release claiming that Maine's gay marriage proposition died because of "hatred of gays."

Grard, who said he’d gotten no sleep the night before, used his own e-mail to send a response. “They said the Yes-on-1 people were haters. I’m a Christian. I take offense at that,” he said. “I e-mailed them back and said basically, ‘We’re not the ones doing the hating. You’re the ones doing the hating.’

“I sent the same message in his face he sent in mine.”

Grard thought his e-mail was anonymous, but the HRC Googled his name and discovered he was a reporter at the Waterville Morning Sentinel. The tolerance policde then demanded that Grard be fired and the weak-kneed sissies at the Morning Sentinel obliged.

According to Grard and his union, the Portland Newspaper Guild, he has never before had any disciplinary issues. Guild president Tom Bell said in an e-mail that a grievance has been filed on Grard’s behalf, and the Guild is awaiting a date for an arbitration hearing, which will probably take place in three or four months. “The Guild is defending the contract,” Bell said, “which requires that there be progressive discipline in situations like this.”

Grard said he wouldn’t be complaining if he’d been subjected to a lesser penalty, such as a reprimand or a suspension without pay, for his first offence. He said reporters frequently send personal e-mails from their own accounts during working hours without incurring management’s wrath.

Grard said he thinks his religious beliefs were a factor in his firing, calling it “anti-Christian bias.” “A lawyer said to me, ‘What if you’d agreed with [the Human Rights Campaign]? Would the company fire you for that? Of course they wouldn’t have,’” he said.

The Sentinel and the other MaineToday papers editorialized in favor of same-sex marriage.

Rarely do I support unions, but the PNG is doing the right thing by supporting Grard in a clearly arbitrary firing case. Grard should sue for wrongful termination, if it's possible.

Worse yet, the newspaper apparently is punishing Grard's wife Lisa for the incident.

The week after Grard was fired, he said, his wife, Lisa, who wrote a biweekly food column for the Sentinel as a freelancer, received an e-mail informing her that her work would no longer be needed.

Could it be that Lisa Grard was canned because the paper "didn't need" her work anymore? Possibly, but the circumstances are mighty fishy.

The Death of Newspapers

The inky wretch part of my soul just curled up with a huge pain in the gut after reading this:

As of yesterday, some section editors at all of the company's papers, including The News, will now report directly to Carr's team of sales managers, now referred to as general managers. In short, those who sell ads for A.H. Belo's products will now dictate content within A.H. Belo's products, which is a radical departure from the way newspapers have been run since, oh, forever.

Those sections mentioned in the memo include sports, entertainment, real estate, automotive and travel, among others.The memo doesn't mention Business or Metro by name, but there are references to "health/education" and "retail/finance"; these are not defined in the missive. Says the memo, Carr's sales force will "be working closely with news leadership in product and content development." Executive sports editor Bob Yates and Lifestyles deputy managing editor Lisa Kresl are quoted in the memo enthusiastically signing off on the unconventional marriage; says Kresl, "I'm excited about the idea of working with a business partner on an arts and entertainment segment."

The wall of separation between the business side and the editorial side of newspapers is an institution that prevented business considerations from influencing editorial decisions. This was important for the pursuit of news; sales reps dislike when you do investigative reports on advertisers. I can't imagine how this is going to improve news.

Short Takes

7 Stories Obama Doesn't Want You to Read

Jules Crittenden live mocks Michael Moore's letter to the President. Hilarious.

Americans don't want Obamacare. Not that Democrats give a damn what those yokels think.

PBS is changing the NewsHour in order to save it. Interesting look at how PBS is adjusting to the economic hard times. Orrin Judd has said that MSM could one day consist of government-funded organizations like PBS and NPR, with bloggers and citizen journalists on the outside.

Of Course They're All Partisan

If Fox Is Partisan, It Is Not Alone

In audience surveys from August 2000 to March 2001, Fox News viewers tilted Republican by 44.6 percent to 36.1 percent. More narrowly — 41.4 percent to 39.4 percent — so did the audience for MSNBC. The audiences of CNN, Headline News, CNBC and Comedy Central leaned Democratic.

Four years later, amid the Iraq war and President George W. Bush’s re-election campaign, the audience data had shifted. Fox News viewers had become 51 percent Republican and just 30.8 percent Democratic, while MSNBC viewers leaned Democratic by 41.7 percent to 40.4 percent. Viewers of CNN, Headline News, CNBC and Comedy Central grew slightly more Democratic.

By 2008-9, the network audiences tilted decisively, like Fox’s. CNN viewers were more Democratic by 50.4 percent to 28.7 percent; MSNBC viewers were 53.6 percent to 27.3 percent Democratic; Headline News’ 47.3 percent to 31.4 percent Democratic; CNBC’s 46.9 percent to 32.5 percent Democratic; and Comedy Central’s 47.1 to 28.8 percent Democratic.

The idea of an objective press is a 20th Century anomaly. From the beginnings of the U.S., the press was highly partisan, and it was that partisanship that was enshrined in the First Amendment idea of freedom of the press. The idea that it wasn't "news" because there was a slant was unprecedented.

In an age where more people have more access to news and opinion outlets and are better educated than at any time in our history, the pearl-clutchers are oh-so worried about disinformation. We should give people more credit for being able to figure out what's true and what isn't, what matters and what doesn't, and whether the immediate effects of this policy or that outweighs the longterm consequences of a particular action. The only people desperate to silence dissent are those desperately clinging to power.

Olbermann as "Pet Media"

This sums it up very well.

H/T: Olbermann Watch.

Is MSNBC a real news organization? More from Gibson.

White House Tries to Exclude Fox News from Interview

Hard to see how even Media Matters can defend this.

The only way to read this is that the administration was lying when it said White House officials would be available for interview by Fox News. Fortunately, as Allahpundit points out, the WH press corps closed ranks to support Fox News, not just on principle, but to ensure their own access when a Republican sits in the executive mansion.

Again, the more Obama's administration attacks Fox News, the more Fox News's stature grows and Teh One's diminishes.



Cassandra at Villainous Company notes,

The press did the right thing ... behind closed doors. But as of the time of this posting I don't see ABC, MSNBC, or CNN have any plans to inform their readers of today's events.

This is an outrage that Americans should be concerned about. During the George W. Bush administration, we were constantly told that he wanted to "stifle dissent" and shut down the press. Now, we have a president who actually wants to do these things.

Cross-posted at Common Sense Political Thought.

UPDATE: Anderson Cooper compares Obama with Nixon.

UPDATE x2: Moderate Democrats are concerned about the backlash against them from the White House's all-out push against critics. The strategy is doomed to failure; criticism of the President, any President, is normal. Expending one's energy attacking the critics makes the White House look petty and small. Remember, this President promised to bring "a different tone" to Washington and to listen to critics. Stunts like this, as well as bashing the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, rightfully concerns voters who thought they were getting something different.

UPDATE x3: Interesting view of this at Balkinization.

In the long run, it will probably be better for the Administration and future Administrations not to say that Fox and its successors are not "legitimate" journalists, but that they are not actually objective journalists; instead they are members of a new party or partisan press. That model of the press may be legitimate in the twenty-first century, but politicians have obligation to treat it as they treated an earlier model of journalism.

This isn't wholly true. "Objective journalism" has been a source of debate for first-year journalism students since the Dark Ages. This idea that reporters check their biases at the White House door is bogus, as the fawning coverage of Teh One during last year's campaign illustrates. And more to the point, the President of All of Us has an obligation to answer critics, not shut them out. Remember, the purpose of newspapers--and journalism in general-- is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.

Journalists Are Journalists No Matter What the Political Stripe

Thomas to White House: End Fox fight

Veteran White House reporter Helen Thomas on Monday advised the Obama administration to stand down and avoid fighting with Fox News and its correspondents...

"They can only take you down. You can't kill the messenger," said Thomas, who has covered every president from John F. Kennedy to Barack Obama.

Other than distracting from his disasterous fight over health care reform, picking a fight with a news organization is never a good idea. Journalists know they've struck paydirt when the target squeals.