As I noted the other day, in the 1920s, H.L. Mencken wrote, “It is the prime function of a really first-rate newspaper to serve as a sort of permanent opposition in politics.”
Obviously there’s far more than journalism these days than just newspapers. So outside of the Blogosphere, who’s doing the best job right now of living up to Mencken’s boast? Let’s ask a leading member of the state-run media’s own in-house stenography shop. Writing in her Newsreal column, Kathy Shaidle catches Eric Boehlert of Media Matters claiming:
It’s funny, because traditionally when the GOP plays hardball with journalists and denounces them as unfair, the Beltway press is deeply impressed and often in awe, as it was with the Bush White House for many of its eight years.
Obama, his advisers, and his policies have been relentlessly slimed on television by Fox News the way no other administration has in American history, as the cable channel has clearly morphed itself into the Opposition Party in America.
Oddly, I don’t think he means it as a compliment. But still, FNC should run with it proudly.
(Ron Ziegler still can’t be reached for comment.)
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