Monday, January 22, 2007

Saving Bipartisanship on a Sinking Ship

Worried about health insurance, the rise of the surveillance state, climate devastation, the takeover of government by corporate money, the prospect of endless war, etc? Don't fret, because the real issue of the day is BIPARTISANSHIP.

After the November 2006 elections I posted on NPR's attempt to distort the significance of the results, and NPR is back at it with a vengance. Not only is NPR picking a non-issue to focus on, but they the coverage they give is telling.

This morning Mara Liasson presided over a laugher. Imagine seriously trying to pass off the center-right Brookings Institute as moderate left! That's exactly what Liasson does! It explains how NPR can consider itself balanced when the range of their ideology extends from the Brookings Institute to the Hoover Institute which is presented as the "moderate right." Given NPR's strangled ideological boundaries, I guess Reagan would be a centrist, George H. W. Bush would be left-of-center and Bill Clinton would be far-left!

And who else does Liasson talk to in this sorry piece? Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute and Tom Mann of the Brookings Institute.

Sadly NPR doesn't deal with the real bipartisan issues that people are concerned about. For those reality-based numbers you'll have to go elsewhere. Or you can always go to npr.org and read this nonsense: "As part of our Crossing the Divide series, Melissa Block brings together the far left and the far right for a conversation with members of Congress Carol Shea-Porter and Bill Sali." Far left! Honestly, they're not kidding...

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