A Ban Too Far

As Allahpundit writes at Hot Air, “It’s come to this: White House tries to bar Fox News from interviewing pay czar”:

Decide for yourself what the most disgraceful aspect of this is. Was it the fact that Gibbs told Jake Tapper explicitly on Monday that the White House wouldn’t try to dictate to the press pool who should and shouldn’t be included — before doing precisely that? Was it Anita Dunn going out of her way to say she respects Major Garrett as a fair reporter — before the administration decided he didn’t deserve a crack here at Feinberg? Or was it the repeated insistence by Dunn and Axelrod that of course the administration will make its officials available to Fox — before pulling the plug today?

The other networks deserve the praise they’re getting for standing up to the Baby-in-Chief, but if they had acquiesced in this freezeout, a precedent would have been set that would have been eagerly used by future Republican presidents to close them off too. And don’t think they weren’t all keenly aware of it.

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Further thoughts from Doug Ross of Director Blue, and Dan Riehl, who writes:

This weak administration is now certifiably insane. For the first time in my life I’m actually uncomfortable knowing that this guy has control of our military and Federal police forces. If he thinks he can simply shut down a member of the press on a whim, how long before he goes full Chavez?

Even moderate-conservative David Frum is asking, “Will the Rule of Law Survive Obama?”

Flashback: Obviously bias isn’t the issue with this administration; the direction of the bias is. As we noted yesterday, MSNBC, home of Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews, is now taking on-air emailed corrections from the White House.