Feel The Whine

As McCain videos go, these aren't actually too bad. But I can't see the line of reasoning working that "the media is in the tank for Obama" when McCain has had a free ride from the media literally his entire career. Not to mention that several of the quotes in here are from Clinton surrogates at a time when they were trying to beat Obama in a primary election. Also, having Tucker Carlson comment in an objective fashion on anything is suspect. But the point is that the raw material is there to make pretty much whatever narrative to want, and this one is particularly designed to work the refs.





This is really the new tactic. Conservatives are whining about McCain's NYT op-ed being rejected (even though Rupert Murdoch's New York Post picked it right up). They're whining that the anchors of the three nightly news bureaus accompanied Obama to the Middle East and Europe. They're whining about this "media love". They're very transparently working the refs. And if it fails, they'll whine some more about the media delivering the election, and on and on. Once again, the very issue that liberals have been so successful in identifying and denouncing - media bias - is being co-opted by the right using the same methods.

But let's remember we've all seen the McCain Love video. It's called watching the last dozen years of political television. Indeed, the political press's reckless and giddy love for McCain is so universally acknowledged that McCain himself has often joked about the press as his "base." So what do we have here but a candidate who can't brook the idea of not campaigning on a wave of press adulation? And now he's framing his whole candidacy around a campaign of strategic whining about the claim that the political press is treating his younger opponent like he's been treated for over a decade. He's got the preening and envy of a sore losing runner-up for prom queen.

Thom Hartmann had some fun with a flak from the Media Research Center who was pitching this same whine, and he asked if it meant there should be a return to the Fairness Doctrine, and the guy froze.

A lot of these things are based on performance. Obama has pretty smoothly orchestrated this trip, while McCain has spent the past few weeks serving up gaffe after gaffe. Oftentimes you get the coverage you deserve. But hearing this whine job from the very conservative forces who have controlled the media engine for the last decade is truly laughable.

UPDATE: For those interested, here's a trip down memory lane. This wasn't even that long ago.

Such ground rules must go down easier with a tour of the grounds and a plateful of McCain-made ribs. (While, apparently, “objectivity prohibits a good reporter” like Reuters’ Jeff Mason from telling readers how tasty McCain’s ribs were, CBS’s Dante Higgins “is confident in reporting they were succulent and flavorful”). In return for dropping “political talk,” reporters got their candidate-cooked meal. And a tire swing. And Frank Sinatra tunes on the deck.

And McCain, in return, got press coverage depicting a relaxed, confident, regular-like-you-and-me-but-also-very-much-in-charge guy holding court at what could well be, as so many reporters noted, the future Western White House. (Could rib-grilling be the new brush-clearing? Just as manly - and sticks to reporters’ ribs!)