Liberals: Stop waving fingers at right-wing gargoyles
I have a dear conservative friend with whom I have lively conversations. He’s well-read (informed) and listens to others. But every now and then, I get a call from him in which his voice is raised to a near-hysterical pitch, and I can hear Fox News droning in the background. I give him my ground rule: Never call me until Fox has been turned off for at least 30 minutes.
Now, I can understand Dana Milbank’s concern that the gargoyles of the right are sending their paranoids off on violent rampages. But that column, following E.J. Dionne’s on the smearing of Shirley Sherrod, points to an unfortunate trend in which some liberal pundits seem to be regarding the right-wing hustlers as serious news people. (Dionne does makes excellent points on the “respectable media’s” timidity in handling the lies.)
I occasionally watch Fox to check in on the carnival but never worry excessively about its power. Sure it attracts many gawkers. So do car wrecks. Recall that Fox was in full flower in November 2008, when the American people elected a Democratic House, Democratic Senate and Democratic president.
As for the Sherrod case, I don’t blame Andrew Breitbart. He is what he is — a publicity hound dishing right-wing fantasy for money and fame. Discussing his “journalistic standards” is ludicrous.
Waving fingers at Glenn Beck and his like is pointless. Organizing a boycott of their advertisers would be a far more effective approach. Note what happened to Don Imus when he shot his mouth off in a beyond-the-pale way.
Blame for the Sherrod scandal belongs strictly on the shoulders of the Obama administration. That its smart boys bought into that propaganda without triple-checking the facts is what scares me.
BTW, if some nutbag goes off and kills a bunch of people on the basis of a report on Fox, that’s going to be very bad politically for the right wing. Americans, whatever their politics, are generally decent people.
Tags: conservatives, liberals, media, politics
Welcome to our nation’s capital, Dr. Berwick
Once Dr. Donald Berwick, the new head of the Medicare and Medicaid programs, pulls the arrows out of his back, he should get to work doing the job for which he is supremely qualified: fixing the government health insurance programs.
DR. DONALD BERWICK: TAXPAYER HERO
Remembering D Day, June 6, 1944
The Normandy countryside today
Souder, Blumenthal, Rand
I express wonderment at the rookie mistakes of Mark Souder, Richard Blumenthal and Paul Rand:
WHAT WERE THEY (POLITICIANS) THINKING?
Arizona and New Mexico: Odd couple
Several states are paired in the American mind. Vermont goes with New Hampshire, Nebraska with Iowa, Washington with Oregon and Arizona with New Mexico. That these state have very different personalities from their mates makes these couplings more interesting.
The NYT describes the contrast in policies and attitudes towards illegal immigrants in Arizona and its neighbor New Mexico. 
Yes, these neighbors are culturally very different. I wonder, though, whether New Mexicans would feel as lax about the matter if they had the same road systems and development.
