Molding Opinion

A post from BooMan that highlights one of the key elements in the '08 election, and perhaps it's the one that bothers me the most: the role of the press.

It's one that's been bruited about since Clinton's presidency: the press didn't like Bill Clinton, and we're all paying the price. They did their part to throw the 2000 election to Bush by their treatment of Gore, and did it again in 2004 with Kerry. Now they're taking on Edwards and Huckabee, and it's become a litte too obvious:

You know it's coming and yet it's always somehow a surprise when it arrives. Joe Klein spent New Year's Eve blasting the front-running populists of both major American political parties. It's not just Klein. A healthy percentage of the Washington opinion writers have put their nose to the grindstone over this holiday season to slam John Edwards and Mike Huckabee for their populism. Populism seems to be a genuine fear that the Washington Establishment attacks without any regard for facts.

See also this comment on Joe Klein of Time, for whom I have no respect at all, and on Stuart Rothenberg, who makes no good showing at all. BooMan does an excellent job of dissecting the spin on both these turkeys.

Taylor Marsh does a nice summary of their treatment of Hillary Clinton. They favor Obama, Giuliani, and to a lesser extent Romney -- all fairly tame examples of the establishment. (OK, Giuliani's not so tame, but he's colorful, unlike the other two, who are bland to the point of ennui.)

The press decided early on that Dodd, Richardson, Biden, Paul, et al. are non-contenders, and so we never hear about them.

That makes me even more nervous than Bush's repeated power grabs. No so angry, considering that Bush was aided and abetted by both the Republicans and Democrats in Congress, but just as nervous: if you can't rely on the press for independent reporting, how can you make a decision about anything?