Sunday, October 14, 2012

I Didn’t Expect To Post Today...

...and then I saw this:

Washington Post reporter Dan Zak penned a "TV Review " for his paper after the vice-presidential debate which bragged that "based on their performances -- not their policies -- only Vice President Biden acted as though he could sit at the desk in the Oval Office and have his feet touch the ground."

But Zak was much harsher in his remarks during the debate on Twitter. He attacked Ryan as one of the perverts on "Law and Order: SVU." "35 min in, Biden is Det. Olivia Benson and Ryan is the perp-of-the-week. #SpecialVeepsUnit" The “perp of the week” on that long-running NBC show is often guilty of perverted sexual offenses in addition to murder.

He also demeaned Ryan on Twitter as a child: “My #VPdebate review coming soon: ‘A man debated a boy Thursday night on national television, and both were ultimately schooled by a woman.’”

It’s been clear for a while that the Mainstream Media are failing, gradually losing the allegiance of the news-consuming public. It’s been equally clear that they’re “in the tank,” as the saying goes, for the Obama Administration and (of course) for the Obama / Biden re-election campaign. Nevertheless, there are depths to which they hadn’t yet descended...until this scurrility.

I can think of only one reason the editors of a generally respected publication such as the Washington Post would tolerate this sort of calumnious derision of a public figure by one of its published writers: They hope that the paper can retain through tawdriness and shock what it’s been losing through partisanry and shoddy reporting. It now falls to us to ensure that the tactic fails them – indeed, that it costs them more heavily than all their transgressions against journalistic ethics to date.

Yet these people wonder why FOX News and the various Internet organs of news and opinion are “eating their lunch.” It is to laugh.

1 comment:

CGHill said...

"Generally respected"? The WaPo? Since when?