Lesser Theories: Take Two

WaPo: Falling Short on Fairness (Deborah Howell)

One more for the mythology cult that still believes in a liberal media:

Last Monday, a front-page story by John Solomon and Alec MacGillis implied that Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards couldn't have consulted for a hedge fund, Fortress Investment Group, or taken contributions from its employees without putting his liberal principles at risk.

Like all hedge funds, Fortress is for wealthy insiders, and Edwards is a rich trial lawyer. The facts are eminently worth reporting, but the tone of the story implied that consulting for a hedge fund, whose offshore tax havens he has decried, is incompatible with caring about the less fortunate.

Deeper in the story, we learned that all the major candidates have taken contributions from hedge funds; that hedge fund money and executives are important to the campaigns of former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani (R), Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.); and that Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) got more such contributions than Edwards. A general lead paragraph on all the candidates -- or a lead that focused on Edwards opposing hedge funds' tax havens and then consulting for a fund that had one -- would have been better than the lead that appeared on the story.

Susan Glasser, assistant managing editor for National news, thinks my criticism is unfair. "It is our job to weigh what politicians say against what they do. We believe it is our job to unearth and put before the public as much information as possible about aspirants to the presidency -- surely our readers are well equipped to judge the relevance of information such as that presented in our story about hedge funds and the 2008 political candidates."

So, in other words, the National editor for the Washington Post isn't going to devote any more time diving into the intricacies of Democratic politicians than they are Republican politicians. Funny ... when that sorta thing happens to our GOP friends, it's somehow proof of "liberal bias." I guess when it happens to Dems, it's just supposed to be overlooked? Hmm, I don't think so.

Kudos to Howell for at least owning up to the unfair coverage of Edwards. If only the NY Times had the testicular fortitude to comment similarly about Patrick Healy's coverage of Hillary. Or anyone at Politico had a backbone to challenge Roger Simon for his screed over Edwards:

Does John Edwards include Jews in his prayers? Or Muslims? Or Hindus? Or any other non-Christians?

He didn’t the other day. The other day, in order to commemorate those killed at Virginia Tech, Edwards led a prayer “in Christ’s name” at Ryman Auditorium, which bills itself as “Nashville’s Premier Performance Hall.”

Yeah, so enough with the "If Republicans did this ..." blather: the Edwards scenario busts that bubble. And enough of this "liberal bias equates with the holocaust" in terms of certitude. Only the most cracked of cracked pots is willing to go that far. Unfortunately, the less-cracked pots are more than willing to benefit from the clearly delusional drivel (not to mention Malkin's homages to child porn) that now pass for rightwing thought . Says a lot, don't it?