Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Media? Democrats Are!
By Mitch Berg
It’s now been two solid weeks since Andy Birkey, acting in his capacity as a conduit for lefty talking points, gurgitated:
Have Michele Bachmann’s media gaffes and extreme conservative views driven her to speak mainly to conservative and Christian-right news outlets? Bachmann’s media appearances since her election create the impression of a member of Congress who is shy when not among friends, and perhaps a campaign that is concerned about what happens when a nonconservative microphone or camera is pointed in her direction.
So Rep. Bachmann – the conservative firebrand and lighting rod from the Sixth District – has consistently shied away from the regional, left-leaning media, which has engaged in bald-faced campaigns of context-mangling character assassination against every single Republican to the right of Arne Carlson in recent memory (see: Rod Grams, Norm Coleman, Alan Fine), and has been in the bag for every single DFL candidate for every single office in every election in recent history. Their claims – and those of their apologists – that outlets like MPR and WCCO are “balanced” are utterly disingenuous, and about as plausible as Flash claiming he’s a Centrist, my claims to be the “best” feminist in the Twin Cities, or the Minnesota Monitor’s claims to being “independent media”.
Hm.
In response, I wondered – would local lefty politicians be any different? So I sent invitations, two weeks ago, to the following:
- Senator Amy Klobuchar (Emailed and left a phone message for her press person)
- Senate Candidate Al Franken (Emailed and left a voice mail message)
- Rep. Keith Ellison (left a voicemail and an email)
- Rep. Betty McCollum (I left a message with her local press assistant)
- Minneapolis Mayor RT Rybak (Email sent).
- “Growth and Justice”
poobah Joel KramerPresident Dane Smith (email sent)
In this email, I told the truth; that Ed Morissey and I are overt conservatives – and that we pride ourselves on doing incisive, but fair, interviews. Not ambushes. Not slime jobs. Which is better than an awful lot of the Twin Cities’ media (to say nothing of the ever-hack-ier Monitor) can say.
Responses:
- Senator Amy Klobuchar: Nothing.
- Senate Candidate Al Franken: Nothing.
- Rep. Keith Ellison: Nothing.
- Rep. Betty McCollum – my “representative” did not respond.
- Minneapolis Mayor RT Rybak: I did get an automated response – but nothing else.
- “Growth and Justice”
poobah Joel KramerPresident Dane Smith: Eureka! Mr. Smith will appear on an upcoming Northern Alliance broadcast.
So – the obvious conclusions are that, even when faced with a chance to “reach across the aisle” to the half of Minnesota that is to the right of center, in a medium that pledges to be fair and even-handed (and has demonstrably delivered on that pledge over the course of four years), Minnesota’s elected DFL politicians and candidates are a bunch of snivelling cowards.
(Comments stating anything to the effect of “I’m glad they didn’t waste their time responding to a bunch of conservatives” will be mocked for what they are – the enabling of craven cowardice).
April 4th, 2008 at 7:39 am
that outlets like MPR and WCCO are “balanced” are utterly disingenuous-
bzzzt.. makes claims of facts not in evidence. Contrastingly, WCCO airs Pawlenty, Don Shelby (a moderate conservative), and MPR has more conservative guests than liberal ones.
The fact is, anything left of Strom Thurmond is seen by you as ‘liberal’ and biased, which is nonsense. The further fact is, you consider 1% of a scientific community supporting your position, and 99% opposed, as evidence of controversy, and any media outlet that doesn’t give your 1% equal time, is biased, in your slanted worldview.
April 4th, 2008 at 7:52 am
Untrue, and completely irrelevant.
April 4th, 2008 at 8:37 am
The further fact is, you consider 1% of a scientific community supporting your position, and 99% opposed,
Crock.
Also, we learn today that Data apparently has a rightwing slant:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7329799.stm
I’ll leave it to Ryan to clean up peev’s nonresponsive rants, non sequiturs and manufactured realities. I don’t argue withe the insane.
April 4th, 2008 at 9:27 am
Peev, I like Don Shelby, but you think he is a conservative? hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. Wew.
About a month ago he said he has no eveidence of this, but believes that the people on the boards of Big Oil are the same ones of the boards of Big Automobile. That is why the automobile manufacturers won’t make fuel effiecent cars.
He has also said there is no such thing as liberal media bias. And believes everything Algore says about global warming…I mean climate change….I mean climate crisis.
April 4th, 2008 at 9:32 am
Your local dems are too smart to sit still for a right-wing sucker punch eh? Guess you’ll have to go back to pranking MiniMoni with fake interview responses.
April 4th, 2008 at 9:37 am
Peeve said:
“Don Shelby (a moderate conservative), and MPR has more conservative guests than liberal ones.”
I don’t know which claim is more ludicrous. I suppose if your viewpoint is so warped that you consider Shelby a moderate conservative, then you could also believe that MPR has more conservative guests. In Peeve’s world, Arne Carlson is a right-wing extremist.
April 4th, 2008 at 9:51 am
Your local dems are too
smartThe word you’re looking for might be “cowardly”, “gutless”, or perhaps “afraid to deal with actual questions, as opposed to the softballs the likes of Don Shelby throw at ’em”.
You’re welcome.
April 4th, 2008 at 9:53 am
Good thing you’re not talking about the economy, I mean, I sure am glad those tax cuts in 2002 and 2003 are working so well, creating so many high-paying jobs.
Anything to deflect, obfuscate and distort. It’s nice to see the more things change, the more they stay the same.
And Mitch, is Bordkorb, or whomever ambushed Franken at the Fair last year, is THAT the kind of ‘non-ambush, incisive’ journalism you support and aspire to? I mean, you lauded him at the time, so I’m sure you really didn’t mind the ambush job it was, but since you CLAIM that you don’t ambish.. I mean really, which way is it? Do you support fair and incisive, or do you support Bordkorb?
Don’t be too shocked you didn’t get a response from various Democrats, I’m quite certain that Preznit Shrubby backhands crackpot lefty journalists too. As does Senator Snake Oil.
April 4th, 2008 at 10:25 am
DFL Don Shelby is a moderate conservative?!?!?!
:LOL:
That opinion of yours, Peev, explains a lot. Quite a lot.
April 4th, 2008 at 10:27 am
Your local dems are too smart to sit still for a right-wing sucker punch eh?
In addition to snark, mangy clown has now added insufferable ignorance to his commenting repertoire.
April 4th, 2008 at 10:28 am
I smell more limericks!
April 4th, 2008 at 10:29 am
….crackpot lefty journalists…
MAJOR REDUNDANCY ALERT!!!!!!!!!
April 4th, 2008 at 10:45 am
Good thing you’re not talking about the economy
Peev, I’m actually curious: why is it you think that a post about the media would talk about the economy?
I mean, I DO talk about the economy. Lots. But – and this is rather important – most posts have *a* topic. Not five or six. One.
If I want to write about another topic, I do.
I mean, I sure am glad those tax cuts in 2002 and 2003 are working so well
They did. They created immense employment, giving us four or five years of higher employment than under Clinton, WITH a war going on.
Economies have cycles. The subprime crisis has set things back. What goes down eventually comes up…
…as long as you don’t go jacking up taxes.
Anything to deflect, obfuscate and distort. It’s nice to see the more things change, the more they stay the same.
Like you writing off-topic comments? Sure, whatever. {shrugs}
And Mitch, is Bordkorb, or whomever ambushed Franken at the Fair last year, is THAT the kind of ‘non-ambush, incisive’ journalism you support and aspire to?
I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. Got a link? Because I don’t remember anyone “ambushing” Franken.
Please be specific.
Don’t be too shocked you didn’t get a response from various Democrats,
Truth be told, I’m not. The point wasn’t to book them (although interviewing Dane Smith will be fun!). Merely to show the double standard the Minnesota Monitor was whining about.
I’m quite certain that Preznit Shrubby backhands crackpot lefty journalists too. As does Senator Snake Oil.
Boy, I hope so. In fact, I’d LOVE to see President Bush literally backhand a crackpot lefty like Keith Olberman or Chris Matthews!
April 4th, 2008 at 11:14 am
Mitch, you’re assigning the peeve waaaay too much credit: you’re assuming he’s not dropped his lithium into the toilet. Look, a monkey!
xkcd had it right today, if you replace “blog comment” with “blog post.”
April 4th, 2008 at 11:36 am
Because I don’t remember anyone “ambushing” Franken.
I think he’s referring to Swiftee (who is not a journalist, as far as I know) when he visited Al Franken’s booth at the State Fair. Franken was hanging around amongst the public when Swiftee, after standing in line, approached him. That’s hardly “ambushing”.
I guess Peev holds everyone but himself to being factual.
April 4th, 2008 at 11:38 am
DFL Don Shelby is a moderate conservative?!?!?!
:LOL:
That opinion of yours, Peev, explains a lot. Quite a lot.
And that comes a day after he said that AC provides “intelligent comments.”
April 4th, 2008 at 11:42 am
“And Mitch, is Bordkorb, or whomever ambushed Franken at the Fair last year, is THAT the kind of ‘non-ambush, incisive’ journalism you support and aspire to?”
PV is talking about me; I think…that is, if you call walking up to a barking moonbat in a very public place and asking him a very simple question an “ambush”.
Problem is that I’m a well known moonbat crusher, not a journalist. That being said, I certainly don’t mind the li’l nippers out there aspiring to be a better pelt collecter than I…more the merrier!
Come to think of it, my wife did most of the moonbat shredding on that occasion…I was very, very proud of her!
http://restraininorder.blogspot.com/2007/08/frank-question-goes-unanswered.html
She totally PW3NED that ‘bat!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!
April 4th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
That’s right.
So, Peev – was that what you were talking about?
April 4th, 2008 at 12:40 pm
You know, I spent a good chunk of an hour this morning deleting comment spam from my site. In retrospect, they all read a bit like a Peev comment.
April 4th, 2008 at 1:04 pm
Oh, Peev’s left for the afternoon… I suspect it has to do with the other damn-fool comment he made.
I can’t believe our luck if Peev’s started to put a moritorium on his comments after making more than one double-dumbass statement.
April 4th, 2008 at 3:32 pm
No Badda,
Peev hasn’t left – he spammed Mitch’s recommendation of the Market Power blog. I’ve already hammered him there, but if anyone else wants to, he’s left plenty of fodder, as usual.
April 4th, 2008 at 7:17 pm
And of course the most telling thing about Peevs comments is that he never rebuted the origional post, the double- standard of the DFL, because he can`t. Instead re-directs to taxes, which he`s wrong about also.
April 13th, 2008 at 5:30 pm
We have no record of you contacting Mayor Rybak’s office requesting an interview and Mayor Rybak’s email does not have an automatic reply. Feel free to contact me directly to request an interview for Mayor Rybak at jeremy.hanson@ci.minneapolis.mn.us. Thanks.
Jermey Hanson
Communications Director
Office of Mayor Rybak
April 13th, 2008 at 10:18 pm
Mitch,
Posted on this at The UpsiderBlog:
http://www.hometownsource.com/blogs/index.php/2008/04/10/muzzling-going-mainstream/
Jeremy Hanson disputes that you ever e-mailed Mayor Rybak or that Rybak has an auto-reply. He also says he left a post here to that effect. Can’t find it.
Can you send me an e-mail and point me in the right direction?
Thanks.
October 24th, 2009 at 2:32 pm
[…] I know you’re busy – too busy to respond to your consituents, indeed! – but I think you oughtta make time for this offer from Michael Yon: One of the biggest problems with the Iraq War is that politics has frequently triumphed over truth. For instance, we went into Iraq with shoddy intelligence (at best), no reconstruction plan, and perhaps half as many troops as were required. We refused to admit that an insurgency was growing, until the country collapsed into anarchy and civil war. Now the truth is that Iraq is showing real progress on many fronts: Al Qaeda is being defeated and violence is down and continuing to decrease. As a result, the militias have lost their reason for existence and are getting beaten back or co-opted. Shia, Sunni and Kurds are coming together — although with various stresses — under the national government. […]
September 1st, 2011 at 7:48 am
[…] don’t. Rather, tell Keith Ellison, Betty McCollum, Al Franken and Amy Klobuchar, all of whom I’ve invited onto the Northern Alliance Radio Network in the past two years, none of whom have so much as responded. (In the interest of completeness, […]