The White House And Glenn Beck Agree! Mainstream Media Is Failing At Its Job

by Glynnis MacNicol | 11:43 am, October 8th, 2009

» 10 comments

Obama press conference If you watch Glenn Beck with any regularity you know that he thinks the mainstream media is not doing their job (to be fair, the ACORN debacle and the NYT delayed response to it sort of suggests he’s right). Looks like the Obama administration agrees with him!

Michael Scherer has a particularly interesting piece over at Time this week about the White House’s summer of discontent with the mainstream media (the NYT and WaPo are called out in particular), its increasingly bad habit of picking up stories from Fox without doing the fact-checking, and how it has resulted in the White House deciding to hell with the media! They are going to do their own fact-checking.

All the criticism, both fair and misleading, took a toll, regularly knocking the White House off message. So a new White House strategy has emerged: rather than just giving reporters ammunition to “fact-check” Obama’s many critics, the White House decided it would become a player, issuing biting attacks on those pundits, politicians and outlets that make what the White House believes to be misleading or simply false claims, like the assertion that health-care reform would establish new “sex clinics” in schools. Obama, fresh from his vacation on Martha’s Vineyard, cheered on the effort, telling his aides he wanted to “call ‘em out.”

How does the White House manage to become a player? Looks like they may have finally got their own Glenn Beck (sans the chalk board) in the form of a veteran campaign strategist Anita Dunn who is a “devoted consumer of conservative-media reports and a fierce critic of Fox News, leading the Administration’s effort to block officials, including Obama, from appearing on the network.” She is also the person behind the White House blog “denunciations.”

So basically the White House is attempting to step into the deep-end of the blogosphere. Perhaps it’s inevitable — this is the Internet Presidency after all, and Obama does carry a Blackberry. But still. Is it really a good thing? Doesn’t deciding to respond to Glenn Beck et al. in kind merely elevate much of the nonsense Beck spews and simultaneously lower the White House a few rungs down the credibility ladder? Wouldn’t the more prudent approach be to figure out how Glenn Beck has out-Obama’d Obama, pinpoint what it is exactly that is so appealing about Beck and than address that fear instead (preferably with a chalk board!)? One more voice in the politico online din, even if it’s the White House’s, is going to end up being just that: one more voice.

Anita Dunn, barack obama, fox news, Glenn Beck, Michael Scherer, Time

ImNotBlue

Ahh… yes, now we’ve created the “The Ministry of Truth.”

The Ministry of Truth is involved with news media, entertainment, the fine arts and educational books. Its purpose is to rewrite history and change the facts to fit party doctrine, for propaganda effect. For example, if Big Brother makes a prediction that turns out to be wrong, the employees of the Ministry of Truth go back and rewrite history so that any prediction Big Brother previously made is accurate. This is the “how” of the Ministry of Truth’s existence. Within the novel Orwell elaborates that the deeper reason for its existence is to maintain the illusion that the party is absolute. It cannot ever seem to change its mind (if, for instance, they perform one of their constant changes regarding enemies during war) or make a mistake (firing an official or making a grossly misjudged supply prediction), for that would imply weakness and to maintain power the party must seem eternally right and strong.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ministry_of_Truth

I wonder… do you think the Obama Administration copied the description from Orwell directly, or did they bother to re-write some of it. Eh, who knows… come tomorrow, it will all go down the memory hole… and this will be the way it has always been done.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Chris-Jones/1384303476 Chris Jones

criticizing The White House = issuing “misleading” or “false” claims
KiKi

Could you clarify just what IS the nonsense Beck is spewing?
Some examples please….
ChrisNH

So this must mean what Obama meant by ‘hitting back twice as hard,’ which he declared he’d do without any regard to whether his ‘many critics’ would pound back themselves. Nothing Anita Dunn or Little Boy Gibbs do will reverse or even stifle the anti-Obama sentiment. And if Obama et al want to escalate things, then he’ll get as good as he gives. Does Little Boy Gibbs have the seeds to withstand three more years of this…especially if 2009 is seen as the easiest of them? Gee, I dunno. I’m going to say ‘No.’ And how ‘fierce’ is Dunn, anyway? Is SHE going to blunt the Fox machine? My guess is her efforts will be akin to pissing in the wind. I guess there must be some dweeb in the administration who, right now, is wondering how to roll FNC into their ‘Fairness Doctrine’ while the little ‘followers & swallowers’ at MSNBC ‘keep doin’ what they’re doin.’
Nachi

Ahh, Glenn Beck and all those who soundeth/thinketh like him – and there are many. May he/they all be rounded up and stripped down by their “God” to the core. And like King Nebuchadrezzar of ancient Babylon, may he/they all be sent away and have the mind of an animal until he/they all …square themselves with …God.
Animals indeed!
StewartIII

Why Obama should drop his fight against Fox News
http://www.dailyfinance.com/2009/10/08/why-obama-should-drop-his-fight-against-fox-news/
StewartIII

NewsBusters — White House Defends Attacks on Fox News: ‘They Will Say Anything’
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/lachlan-markay/2009/10/08/white-house-defends-attacks-fox-news-they-will-say-anything
ImNotBlue

Poetic, Nachi… But you know, when you grow up, hoping to silence and banish all those who disagree with you might not work out so well. You might have to compromise and accept that not everyone is going to agree with you 100% of the time. Or, you could stay arrogant and angry, and hope to get a job in the Obama administration. If I were you, I’d stop paying taxes now… you’re a shoo-in for a good government job!
http://www.facebook.com/people/Richmond-L-Gardner/1413378479 Richmond L Gardner

KiKi is absolutely correct. Mediaite is extremely vague about just what it is that right-wing critics are saying about the White House and how the traditional media has so miserably failed the American people.
It would help if y’all filled in the details about the screaming hysteria that the right wing in general and Fox News in particular have been criticizing the President with. t would also be enlightening to look at how many statemens get passed on on wholesale by the traditional media as though it wasn’t their job to fact-check anything.
lemans3427

@Kiki, @Richard : Hilarious commentary. Who doesn’t like a good laugh on a Friday?