Son of Talking Points?

Alright now, I'm trying to keep the holiday spirit all cheery and positive, but Media Matters (and an intellectually laughable local) just made this too easy for me ...

» From the White House's mouth to CNN's ... mouth?

Just another data point on the whole "talking points" meme. Among the last remaining bloggers who refuse to admit falling for the same trap (aka - Kevin "RINOs Among Us!!!" Whited), there's this other data point that highlights the clear double standard at play by our friends on the right:

I don't know that it's front page material, but if there is no editor at 801 Texas Avenue who thinks it more newsworthy than Page 11, then one can't help but wonder about the dangers of groupthink (and perhaps even journalistic incompetence) among the Chron newsroom editors.

(Greg note: so he's not sure it's page one material, page two is sortofa set page already, three full pages were taken up by advertisements ... which means there's clearly a conspiracy going on to keep this off the lesser of five possible pages ... four if you omit page A6, which only had a sixth of a page used for news. As clear a sign of "groupthink" as there ever was, by gum! I'm suddenly curious why groupthink would dictate relegating the story to page A11 instead of, oh ... say "not at all." I mean, if you're going to play the liberal media card, why do it halfway?)

And the constant "scorekeeper" references are odd. If groupthink prevails among the editors of the place, maybe someone DOES need to keep score, in an effort to prompt them to think a little more deeply about their choices! You have criticized the groupthink among editors yourself in the past, so I guess that even makes you a scorekeeper of sorts (at least every once in a while). The newspaper would surely benefit from a few more internal and external critical eyes (and less PR spin).

(Greg note: Defensive much? I'd say that when you whine about the story not getting the upper draw of four pages of print instead of the lesser, you might want to count yourself lucky to be tagged - properly - as a scorekeeper. Far more incendiary claims would be defensible.

FIrst up, the references to scorekeeper are deemed odd. But "[i]f groupthink prevails," then they're needed (and presumably less odd). And since the Chron's Public Editor has referenced groupthink, that makes him a scorekeeper (though it's not clear from this ramble as to whether the term is still "odd" or not).

Of course, I'm also reminded of the irony that Kevin sees such a need for the Chronicle to be prompted about thinking through their choices - to the point of warranting an exclamation point, no less! All while the Kevster himself refuses to answer to his own intellectual challenges on that newfangled open media thing called a blog - to the point of banning commenters who challenge his "objectivist" contentions! I believe this indicates an example of how the Houston Chronicle is more open than blogHouston. Irony for ya. Apparently there's one thing the scorekeepers fail to have on the Chron ... Scoreboard!!!)

Yeah, my pastor said I needed to laugh more. Blame him.

Anyways ... apparently, it's utterly impossible for conservative bloggers to fall for talking points to the point of parroting them on time and in the proper key (and shortly after a rightwing think tank pushes a financially "sponsored" idea), but it's entirely plausible for the Chron (and presumably the rest of the VLWC) to do so under the guise of "groupthink." Guess that's what passes for intellectual consistency on Houston/Spring's rightwing these days ;-)