Glenn wrote:

Two people have now said this, so I'm going to be receptive to the notion that there is something to it, but as of now, I completely disagree. He's talking to Kurtz - even uses his name - and says:

ARAVOSIS: Why give Brit Hume the opportunity, is the point, Howie. You're -- some people -- some people say are you left, some people say are you right. I think are you fair. I do not think Brit Hume is fair. There's a difference.

He's contrasting Brit Hume (not fair) and Howard Kurtz (fair).

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Hmm...I actually read this part completely differently than everyone on here. I think what John is actually doing is framing several questions - i.e. "Some people say 'are you left?' some people say 'are you right?' I think 'are you fair?' I do not think Brit Hume is fair."

IOW, what he is saying is that most people in the media frame every possible argument in terms of "are you left or are you right", but John is saying he prefers to frame it as "are you fair". I didn't read this as in any way having to do with John's opinion of Kurtz as a journalist. It would be different if the words "are" and "you" were reversed - that is "some people say you are left, some people say you are right, I think you are fair". Only then does your reading of this make any sense. Of course, I could be wrong...

should have read:

And that is unfortunate, because the work they each do (and how they do it)

I agree with everything in Glenn's post...

and yet... something about simply denying this conflation of Olbermann with O'Reilly bothers me.

Just to be clear. I'm not necessarily objecting to the comparison of Olbermann and O'Reilly. I think there are objections one can make to that, but I'm not really making those here.

My objection is to the idea that there "real reporters" like Brit Hume, Chris Matthews, Tim Russert and the like, and then there are "partisans" like Olbermann (and Bill O'Reilly).

IMO what changed journalism was when the networks stopped treating their news divisions as public services and started treating them as profit centers. At that point ratings began to matter, "news stars" began to receive exorbitant salaries and celebrity, and began showing up at the glitziest parties and owners' boxes, and a group that had once proudly considered itself made up of "ink-stained wretches" found itself not on the outside looking in, but rather on the inside looking out.

In several programs over the last few months, Colbert has said something to the effect of:

Facts have a liberal bias.

It's been delightful watching Glenn and similarly resourceful people poke a few fact-based holes into the puffery spouted by the mouthpieces posing as journalists.

My objection is to the idea that there "real reporters" like Brit Hume, Chris Matthews, Tim Russert and the like, and then there are "partisans" like Olbermann (and Bill O'Reilly).

On that we are in total agreement.

I just think Olbermann allows himself to be labeled "partisan" at least in part because of his "feud" with O'Reilly. However, even without that issue, the BigMedia (e.g., AP writers) would still be trying to have their way with Olbermann.

(But why give BigMedia anything to work with... make them do what they usually do, invent. ;~)

You must be lost.

Here are directions back to your village. It's missing another one of it's idiots.

http://newsbusters.org/

Karen,

For now, I'd let the market work for Olbermann...

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2007_04_29_archive.html#3516649480100308200

National journalists are as integrated into the Beltway elite culture as much as the political figures they are supposed to investigate and scrutinize.

Probably why the most critical reporting on the bogus pre-war Iraq intel was provided by outsiders Jonathan Landay and Warren Strobel from Kight-Ridder (now McCLatchy), which has never had a D.C. office.

Sorta like bloggers...

I didn't read this as in any way having to do with John's opinion of Kurtz as a journalist. It would be different if the words "are" and "you" were reversed - that is "some people say you are left, some people say you are right, I think you are fair". Only then does your reading of this make any sense. Of course, I could be wrong...

You make a very strong case -- so strong, in fact, that I question whether my original understanding is accurate, so I added an update.

... that Hume is a contributor to the American Spectator and the Weekly Standard. He hardly disguises his partisanship there.

"I just think Olbermann allows himself to be labeled "partisan" at least in part because of his "feud" with O'Reilly."

And wouldn't you rather that both networks set themselves apart from Fox, rather than adopt that model?

tiberius writes:

I'd happily start a movement to make that happen.

Buster, you couldn't start a bowel movement with a battalion of Fleet's enemas under your command.

If they had been digging on al queda and making us aware of what was going on it could have been stopped and then Iraq might never have happened.

No one this stupid could operate a computer or even survive a day without a team of bodyguards, so I must once again conclude that you are consciously, willfully full of shit.

Glenn:

As Atrios noted the other day, it is actually far from clear that Keith Olbermann is a "liberal" at all; what "liberal" policies specifically does Olbermann advocate?

What Olbermann actually is, first and foremost, is a critic of the government who adopts an aggressively adversarial posture towards the President and those in power. That actually is -- or at least used to be -- called "journalism." What ought to define the function of political "journalists" is that they exercise adversarial oversight over government officials. That is the only thing that makes a political press worthwhile.

Another way of saying this is that Olbermann is a liberal--in the 18th Century/Enlightenment/free speech/consent of the governed/separation of powers sense. And this really is the political dividing line in America today--18th Centrury liberalism vs. the plutocratic, theocratic authoritarianism of Versailles.

The type of journalism that Olbermann does is precisely the sort that the Adams Administration (our first monarchist regime) criminalized with the Alien and Sedition Acts. (See, for example, American Aurora: A Democratic-Republican Returns: The Suppressed History of Our Nation's Beginnings and the Heroic Newspaper That Tried to Report It). We've been through this before, and those who do remember it remember it as one of the most shameful episode in our nation's history.

What we have now is a sociologically-defined role of Versailles journalist--a "court reporter" in the "court of Louis XIV" sense of the word "court". There are three approved roles: stenographer, hagiographer and gossip. All are de facto court functionaries, as Glenn goes on to describe:

The defining role of a "journalist" -- especially national journalists -- is to serve as a status-quo-perpetuating spokesperson for Beltway power circles. As long as one fulfills that role, one is free to spout any pro-government ideological or political opinions one wants....

National journalists are as integrated into the Beltway elite culture as much as the political figures they are supposed to investigate and scrutinize.

It's a good thing that AP is attacking Kieth Olbermann. It shows that he's doing his job. And AP is doing theirs, in the Nedra Pickler era--much to the shame of what AP used to stand for.