Mensch tracht, und Gott lacht

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Journalism At CNN

I noticed this morning while at the gym---they had the TV tuned to CNN and I had no choice in the matter---that below a "report" on Mitt Romney the caption read "Mitt Romney The Mormon Candidate."

Will the ineffable Obama be labeled "The Black Candidate"? Or Hillary "The Woman Candidate?" How about Rudy: "The Italian Stallion?" Edwards: "The Ambulance Chaser Candidate." I can't wait for the first Asian: "The Manchurian Candidate." Etc.

It really is quite amazing. Back in the days of BrokawJennngsRather the bias was more subtle, and therefore more amusing. Yet another of life's little pleasures down the drain.

9 comments:

Hunter Baker said...

I'd like to know from someone old enough to remember whether his father George Romney got this kind of treatment. I recall he ruined his own candidacy with talk about being brainwashed by someone, but the rest is pretty opaque to me. Knowest thou, good doctor Benjamin? Knowest anyone?

Jay D. Homnick said...

Hunter, in 1968 I was a 10-year-old politics freak who read every word in Newsweek and Time about the Presidential primaries. I did not feel allegiance to any party, despite my Grandpa telling me: "We're Jews, we're Democrats." I was never one to buy traditions unexamined.

So I picked candidates in each party. I rooted for McCarthy on the Democrat side and for Romney on the Republican side. I never read anywhere that George Romney was a Mormon. In fact, when I heard two years ago that Mitt is a Mormon (I did not hear it when he ran against Ted Kennedy or when he ran for Governor), I assumed he was a convert.

Ben's point is devastatingly accurate. This bean-counting, ostensibly to protect minorities, has provided cover for Liberals to air their prejudices without compunction.

Hunter Baker said...

Thanks for the memory, Jay. I thought that might be the case.

James F. Elliott said...

Will the ineffable Obama be labeled "The Black Candidate"? Or Hillary "The Woman Candidate?"

I'm going to have to assume you've been hiding under a rock and not noticing that this already occurred.

Tom Van Dyke said...

Good point, James, altho those seem to be self-designations. Obama's scholarly output so far has been about his blackness. And we may quote Mistress Hillary: "It's about time, if not past time, we had a woman president."

And although these are apparently the main qualifications for these candidates over their more experienced competitors, Fox News would never hear the end of it if it used those designations.

(Manchurian candidate. Good one.)

el duderino said...

Like you mean the story where Fox News suggested that Barack was trained as a youth by Islamic terrorists!? You're right, Fox News would never stoop to such levels!

Tom Van Dyke said...

Didn't say they'd never do it. Just said they'd never hear the end of it, as you prove here.

Evanston2 said...

Regarding the Obama Madrassa story, there is no dispute that Obama as a very young child (6 years old?) attended a madrassa. A few points:
- Fox failed completely in its responsibility to confirm the story in detail
- That said, the school official who was eventually contacted did not deny that Islam is currently taught at the school, just that it was not its primary focus
- Further, does anyone (including the school official) know what was taught at the school some 40 years ago at the time Obama attended? It could very well have featured a primary focus on Islam
- Conversely, attendance at this school is a commentary on the religion of Obama's parents, his father in particular, and they have and had every right to choose the best way to educate their son
- What really matters are Obama's beliefs and decisions as an adult

In sum, the whole "story" is a bunch of flapdoodle, and the lack of context on both sides (Fox's failure to investigate fully and the left's corresponding complacency with the testimony of one current school official) is a sad commentary on the state of "professional" journalism today. Makes the men in pajamas look more respectable...

James F. Elliott said...

Regarding the Obama Madrassa story, there is no dispute that Obama as a very young child (6 years old?) attended a madrassa.

Except for the fact that it was a totally secular children's school...

But what's fact in the face of firmly held belief? The mere buzzing of gnats. Your equivocating in the middle is belied by your thesis sentence.