Posted by John Nolte Nov 18th 2011 at 2:06 pm in AOL/HuffPo Ad Hominem Alert!, Huffington Post, Politico, media bias Somebody missed the boat. But when you’re so full of your own arrogance and assume no one would dare leave port without you, those things tend to happen.
While MSNBC, CBS News, ”Daily Beast/Newsweek” and others have done superb work in covering the story of Congressional insider trading, Politico and AOL/Huffington have been the most obvious and egregious in their quiet crusade to ignore and/or wrist-flick this inconvenient story down the memory-hole.
But who knew that at the beginning of the week both outlets had only just begun to embarrass themselves.
First there was AOL/Huffington Post, whose front page screamed “HIT JOB FALLS FLAT“ within hours of Sunday evening’s “60 Minutes” investigative report. This particular segment featured our own Peter Schweizer, whose book “Throw Them All Out” finally uncovered the dirty little secret of how too many of our elected officials are able to go from Mr. Smith to Daddy Warbucks in just a few short years.
And then there was the Cain-obsessed Politico, that found a nothing-story about decade-plus old allegations of sexual harassment worthy of somewhere around 200 articles, but the revelation of legal (but immoral and corrupting) Congressional insider trading hardly worth a peep.
We now know why the the Huffington Post was so eager to protect the corrupt status quo and defend Nancy Pelosi even if it meant defending John Boehner. Yes, just a few days after HIT JOB FALLS FLAT ran, there they were, Nancy and Arianna, sitting in a tree s-c-h-m-o-o-z-i-n-g.
As far as Politico, as someone who saw that rag for what it is three years ago, it’s been extremely gratifying to watch the outlet all but ignore this story just days after baring their collective asses with a failed attempt to crucify Herman Cain with a nothingburger of a story that even left-wing media observers declared a nothingburger. To say the least, the damage Politico’s done to their brand has opened many eyes.
And if I have anything to say about it, just as this photo will forever define the Occupy movement, this hilariously revealing video of Politico’s Jonathan Allen assuring America that Congress isn’t corrupt, will forever define those in the MSM willing to protect, at any cost, their standing with DC insiders.
But a funny thing happened over the last week despite the best efforts of Politico and AOL/Huffington. Both the House and the Senate have agreed to hold hearings, and suddenly a bill that only last Saturday couldn’t get anywhere, now suddenly has no fewer than 60 co-sponsors.
Like I wrote yesterday, there will always be partisan lines of division amongst those of us in media and politics. But this particular story isn’t about Left or Right. This is about wrong and right and the appalling revelation that in the world of financial and land speculation, a world where there are winners and losers, some of our own Congress Members have been feathering their nests courtesy of an indefensible loophole carved out for themselves at the expense of those of us who trusted them with the high honor of national public office.
Listen, I’m not unsympathetic to Arianna’s plight. I get that the only god she worships is her Rolodex. And I understand that Politico has to protect its DC access and those 30 pieces of silver it’s counting on from cozy incumbents flush with 2012 advertising dollars. But right now both Houses of Congress are setting sail to pass what might be the most important piece of political reform in a generation, and they’re doing so while Politico and AOL/Huffington stand naked and befuddled on the dock thinking, “How dare they!”
The good news, though, at least for those us tired of the moral corruption amongst both our political and media class, is that thanks to the announcement of these hearings and the failure of AOL/Huffington and Politico to stop those hearings, this week has turned out to be what you call a twofer.
Big Journalism
