Weeping, Wailing, and So On…

By now, I expect that most of you have heard about the Great Conservative Blogger Kerfuffle at the Washington Post – at least most of you who care about such things. Me, I admit to not caring all that much and what I know of the situation is pretty much all I care to know about it.

Because having me ‘splain would be too much, let me sum up. The WaPo is getting into the interactivity craze with both feet, which is a good thing. To that end, Jim Brady, the guy who is leading this interactivity charge, hired a conservative Republican guy named Ben Domenech to write a blog. Domenech is a young, up-and-coming party wonk, which, to my thinking, was the largest part of the problem. You don’t hire a speechwriter-turned-blogger to be a professional blogger. You hire an actual blogger to be a blogger. But what do I know, right?

Chaos ensued, as you might expect. Among that chaos came a good bit of evidence that in Domenech’s past, he did some plaigarizing. He resigned and apologized after doing the nearly-obligatory “wasn’t me” two-step. The left howled in triumph and castigated Brady for daring to become a tool of the three-headed Republican Cerberus called ChimpyMcBushHitlerCheneyRoveCo. Well, they did that howling after they howled at Brady for being a tool, etc. etc. etc., for hiring Domenech in the first place. ‘Cause, you know, one conservative blogger at the WaPo is the ideological equivalent of the Beer Hall Putsch.

So, anyway, that was last week. This week is the time for gazing at navels and ruminating and finding causes and learning lessons and all that stuff.

You could, if you wanted to, read a few columns about idological balance or vetting bloggers or how we barely escaped the world of 1984 when Domenech resigned, or you could save yourself the trouble and read this luscious morsel of a post from Villainous Cassandra.

A taste, to whet the appetite:

Are the half-vast editorial staff the only ones on the Reich Side of the B-sphere who are having difficulty getting our Hanes Ultrasheers in a wad about this little contretemps? We tried. Really we did.

But it was all so predictable.

You had your well-meant but tragically misguided Liberal Affirmative Action Program for Disadvantaged Conservative Ideas From Broken Homes. Because Lord knows, we have to give them something productive to do. Otherwise they’d be hanging out on street corners playing midnight basketball, doing cocaine deals, or slappin’ they nasty-a** ho’s upside the head. And of course, since the media elite:

1. 1. Eschew contact with soulless conservatives at all costs, and
2. 2. Don’t really believe conservatives have any real ideas of their own anyway…

…they didn’t bother to inject any real rigor into the selection process, relying instead on some sort of bizarre all-conservatives-are-grey-at-night approach to choose a 24 year old from an enormous pool that includes some very talented and experienced people.

If the HVES didn’t know better, we’d almost think we’d been subjected to the soft bigotry of low expectations… [sniff!]

You know, I have a heck of an idea, if Mr. Brady happens to come across The Shack. Aside from hiring me for a mere pittance, he could hire Villanous Cassandra to write one of his fine WaPo blogs and pay her good money to do it. He’ll get top value for his money and a hell of a writer.

How about it, Mr. Brady?

No related posts.

Category: Blogs and Blogging, Oh, THAT liberal media.