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I'm a fan of Glenn Greenwald, whose blog is now over at Salon.com. Although perhaps not terse and punchy enough for most attention spans, the guy has a sharp, discerning mind.
And boy is he upset today. The clip he includes of Chris Matthews, a relentless TV presence capable of reducing any topic to the ying and yang of Democrats vs. Republicans -- (after all, adversarial confrontations drive cable talk and ratings) -- is at first glance utterly routine. It is the same kind of clubby chatter we've all watched a thousand times. Which is why Greenwald's dissection of it is so spot on.
One of my beefs with the mindset of "objective" reporting is that I'm so often left wondering if anything really matters to those who practice it, and where fundamental truth rates in the criteria of a good story. Is everything really reduced to someone's horse race? Liberals vs. conservatives? NBC vs. ABC? New York Times vs. Washington Post?
As your man, Greenwald rightly points out, these folks are preening and posturing for each other, not the voters or their readers. It's an orgy of vanity and insider politics. Dan Froomkin posited on his blog that recent scoops at his paper have reacquainted reporters with the frisson of "calling bullshit" in his words.
What we witnessed on Matthews show demostrates that far more dizzying and heady than calling bullshit is being courtesan in the D.C. court. These folks worship at the gleaming brogans of power. I.F. Stone wouldn't be invited to be on Matthews show, were he still alive, much less accept. A guy like Stone who lived among the power elite without being subsumed by them like so much mitochondria, might say something untoward and cost somebody a cocktail party invitation. Same goes for the dear departed Molly Ivins. You ever see her on Matthews or any of the other bloviation half hours? Yeah, me neither.
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