Who's minding the store?
So many things wrong with last week's "MC Rove" performance at the Radio and Correspondents dinner, which made the round of the websites and news shows. The right-leaning outlets all thought it was a fun bit of whimsy, demonstrating Karl Rove's sense of humor and play, while the left... well, the left felt otherwise.
Much of the criticism was based on the "white man rapping" angle, which I personally have no problem with. White men can rap along with the best of them - the talented ones can. However this... this excruciating debacle demonstrates that the list of things Karl Rove lacks include rapping talent as well as a soul.
My concern with this event isn't focused on Rove making a fool of himself, mocking Afro-American culture, joking about his ability to get away with multiple felonies and undermine the laws of the land, or even his modern equivalent of fiddling while Rome burns. Nor is it the otherwise very talented Colin Mochrie making a fool of himself; he's a comedian, and no one expects him to have integrity.
No, what really got me was David Gregory making a fool of himself. The entire premise of the Radio-Correspondents' Association dinner is suspect, and this year's event does nothing to dispel the very real suspicion that the press only wants to get closer to the politicians they are tasked with reporting on.In what I consider a grievous breach of professional distance, we see David Gregory camping it up along with the criminals that currently administer this great nation of ours. How can we possibly expect David Gregory to be impartial in his reporting when his professional detachment so easily goes out the window; he is clearly deriving such pleasure from his near-orbit with power can we still count on him to report on an event that may jeopardize his relationship with those whose company he covets?
When the history of the early 21st century is written, there will be chapters and chapters on the disgraceful abrogation of responsibility by the press during these past 7 years. As our freedom of speech and assembly are slowly but overtly eroded, freedom of the press is compromised from within, traded away in exchange for access and favors.
posted by Dan @ 9:08 PM
2 comments
2 Comments:
I told you it was painful.
I completely agree with you concerning the failure of the press to do its job in exposing the filth that now passes for government. But I disagree with your suggestion that this is phenomenon is limited to just the last seven years. For example, back in 1953, we had this from John Swinton, Chief of Staff of The New York Times, addressing a meeting of the New York Press Club:
"There is no such thing, at this date in the world's history, in America, as an independent press. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dares to write his honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand it would never appear in print. I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job. If I allowed honest opinions to appear in one issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone. The business of the journalist is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of Mammon, to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. You know it and I know it, and what folly is this toasting an independent press? We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes."
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