Jacob Weisberg Loses It

His tirade against Fox News would some have some semblance of coherence if it at least made a pretense toward intellectual honesty.

What’s most distinctive about the American press is not its freedom but its century-old tradition of independence—that it serves the public interest rather than those of parties, persuasions, or pressure groups.

What’s most distinctive about the American press is the extent to which they’ve become the cheering section for left-liberalism. This is not merely right-wing paranoia (or in my pro-choice pro-legalization case, libertarian paranoia); numerous studies and journalists confirm the media’s rampant sinestrophilia.

All industries suffer from some form of self-selection bias. Women are more likely to become nurses and teachers, men are more likely to work in construction and hard labor, conservatives are more likely to choose a military career.. and left-liberals are more likely to become journalists, something Weisberg should understand. 

To merely complain about a political view he disagrees with is his just and noble right as an American, but for the author of a book called The Bush Tragedy to sanctimoniously call for all right-thinking people to ignore the top-rated cable network because they’re illegitimately biased: 

 Whether the White House engages with Fox is a tactical political question. Whether we journalists continue to do so is an ethical one. By appearing on Fox, reporters validate its propaganda values and help to undermine the role of legitimate news organizations. Respectable journalists—I’m talking to you, Mara Liasson—should stop appearing on its programs. A boycott would make Ailes too happy, so let’s try just ignoring Fox, shall we?

The only word to describe such total lack of self-awareness, my friends, is hilarious.

UPDATE: Jay Nordlinger points out CNN also has newspeople. Does Anderson Cooper sound objective?

CNN has those, too. One of the CNN anchors is Anderson Cooper — he’s their star, as I understand it. The hurricane guy. When the “tea party” protests got going earlier this year, Cooper interviewed David Gergen. Gergen said, “They [Republicans and conservatives] still haven’t found their voice, Anderson. This happens to a minority party after it’s lost a couple of bad elections, but they’re searching for their voice.”

Then Cooper said, “It’s hard to talk when you’re teabagging.” He said this smirkingly.

He was referring to a sexual practice defined by the Urban Dictionary as follows: “the insertion of one man’s sac[] into another person’s mouth.”

 Would a Fox News anchor ever, ever say anything like this — ever? Can you conceive it? But that is what CNN anchormen do, apparently. When people tell you that CNN is a real news network, whereas Fox isn’t — I would just smile at them.

Don’t just smile, Jay. Laugh. Guffaw. Collapse on the floor in tears of pure unadulterated hilarity.