One of the more amusing aspects of observing today's left-biased establishment media environment is seeing agenda-driven journalists directly or indirectly convey a clearly inflated sense of their outlets' self-importance.
A recent example of this came Friday from Jacob Silverman at Politico Magazine. In his writeup on conservative firebrand Charles Johnson, Silverman employed the comparative version of a word - "fringy" - rarely used in the political realm. Silverman described Breitbart and The Blaze as "even fringier" than ... well, let's try to figure that one out.
In his first eight paragraphs, Silverman only referred to one arguably conservative online outlet, the Daily Caller, while also bringing up the Washington Post and New York Times. But he also made sure to apply an out of order smear, likening Johnson's attention-getting abilities to "groups like the Westboro Baptist Church, the anti-homosexual group that pickets gay funerals." Geez Jacob, talk about not getting basic facts right. During the past decade, the Westboro nuts have mostly picketed the funeral services of soldiers killed in action overseas, not "gay funerals."
Silverman also seems not to have noticed that Al Sharpton's National Action Network, in creating a hostile environment around the nation for law enforcement, has been far more effective at "attention-mongering" and "outrage theater" lately.
Now let's go to the Politico writer's two key paragraphs:
Johnson’s personal story is in some ways the journalistic equivalent of how an Anakin Skywalker gets corrupted into a Darth Vader—in his case, a would-be one. It wasn’t all that long before Johnson became a villain of the media world that he was a young conservative darling, laureled with fellowships and awards and given internships at respected institutions like the New York Sun and the Wall Street Journal. He was an energetic cub reporter, willing to fly across the country to investigate a story on his own. For a time, it seemed that Johnson might follow a path trod by many young conservative writers before him and carve out a career on the right, where his obsession with opposition research and sense of grievance would be welcomed.
Instead, in only a couple of years, Johnson managed to cycle through a series of freelance jobs, leaving a trail of contested stories and frustrated editors behind him.. He made himself persona non grata at even fringier conservative outlets like Breitbart and The Blaze—all while holding himself up as a revolutionary and speaker of uncomfortable truths.
So Breitbart and The Blaze are "even fringier" than ... well, what?
By sheer proximity, one could infer that Silverman believes that the New York Sun was "fringy," or even that the Journal currently is.
But let's go to Alexa.com and see how things shake out:
Breitbart and The Blaze draw significantly more traffic than the Daily Caller, which Silverman treated as a (presumably mainstream) conservative site. Worldwide, they also outperform ... Politico. About 2-1/2 years ago, the Blaze and Politico were running roughly neck and neck. The Wall Street Journal's global Alexa ranking is 284.
Memo to Jacob Silverman: I'd suggest being a litle more careful about who you are calling "fringy." While acknowledging that an Alexa ranking is not the final determinant of how "fringy" a site might be, the fact is that The Blaze and Breitbart tend to break stories and deliver real news (e.g., the complete discrediting at Breitbart of Lena Dunham's detailed description of her alleged Oberlin College rapist) that the establishment press, certainly including the Politico, either completely fails to investigate, ignores, or works hard to downplay. The numbers appear to show that the way the Politico approaches and covers the news is causing it, and many of its other leftist media compadres, to become ever more "fringy" as time goes by.
As to Silverman's pathetic critique of Johnson, Charles can certainly defend himself. I'll just note that the Politico hasn't seen fit to give anywhere near the same amount of negative attention to the many unduly aggressive privacy invaders found on the left.
Just one example: In June 2010, Politico published an item giving author Joe McGinniss, who moved into a home next to former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin for the express purpose of digging up dirt on her and her family, a platform to complain about how she was "using Nazi tactics."
But somehow, McGinniss wasn't being "fringy."
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
