Howard Kurtz's Take on Self-Loathing Liberal Media: Naïve, Disingenuous, or Willfully Ignorant?

In his column today, Howard Kurtz takes me on over my post on the self-loathing liberal media -- and completely misses the point:

Here's what Arianna isn't telling you. When Newsweek hired Rove, the magazine also hired Markos Moulitsas. Kristol's once-a-week column is balanced on the Times op-ed page by Maureen Dowd, Paul Krugman, Frank Rich and Bob Herbert. And CNN almost never puts on conservative contributors without balancing them with libs; indeed, Snow appeared with Dee Dee Myers during his debut this week. So is Arianna saying the media shouldn't employ conservatives at all?

Of course that's not what I'm saying. Read the post again, Howie.

The point isn't that the MSM shouldn't employ conservatives at all. It's that they shouldn't employ unabashed propagandists like Snow, Kristol, or Rove -- people who have proven that they are willing to lie, obfuscate, and purposefully ignore the facts to further the agenda of the right's lunatic fringe. I may not often agree with Peggy Noonan or George Will or David Brooks or John Fund or David Frum or Tucker Carlson or P.J. O'Rourke or Tony Blankley -- but they aren't operating as propagandists for Bush/Cheney.

Karl Rove, as well as being one of the architects of the last seven years of disastrous rule, is an advisor to the McCain campaign. Which campaign is Markos Moulitsas advising, which covert CIA agent did he out, and which U.S. Attorney did he have fired?

Media outlets like CNN, Newsweek and the New York Times should absolutely include conservative voices in the mix. Just not those whose careers have been built on intentionally deceiving the American people.

The self-loathing liberal media's trend of embracing soulless shills and professional fabricators goes hand in hand with the look-the-other way ethos that gave us the "military analysts" scandal uncovered by the New York Times this week. And for Howie Kurtz not to make the connection between the two is either very naïve, very disingenuous, or willfully ignorant.

Related:
Arianna Huffington: The Self-Loathing Liberal Media

Follow Arianna Huffington on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ariannahuff

Comments

[NoFactsJustTruth]

Some are fully able to benefit from logic, Arianna, some others are compromised by an absolutism that prevents the benefit logic might deliver them, and then there are those that CHOOSE to sell-out their fellow man, intentionally confusing them just to rob them of any possible enlightenment from logic. Whether the Kurtzes of the world actually FEAR for their jobs and the whip of their corporate masters, or worse, they have NO fear yet STILL knowingly steal the ability to reason from less gifted for their own personal gain$, the TRUTH is that 'defenders' of blatant deceivers and 180-spinners are in many ways more damaging to perceptive reality than anything the roves and kristols could ever accomplish on their own.

I think for many sincere but less thoughtful types being targeted, the roves and snow-jobs are far easier to recognize as TRUE liars and hypocrites, somewhat limiting their effectiveness as manipulators. The Kurtzes, on the other hand, provide those 'big-time liars' with cover, and just enough plausibility, to confuse non-critical thinkers and allow them an excuse to escape any internal conflict and instead manufacture some pseudo self-righteousness.

As efforts are made by you and others to enlighten readers to the TRUE nature of some beasts, plagues of MSM Kurtzes these days seem determined to damage 'logic' and even reality itself.

Keep providing the TRUTH to others, Arianna, and perhaps the Kurtzes of the world will find a well deserved obsoleteness. Thank you.

[Zankee]

Truth is OF the beholders interpretation.., Honesty is OF the soul; wouldn't it be more prudent to persue "Honesty" -as the mainstay for corrections- and, SINCERELY punish the offenders accordingly..?
Truth is but a LIE in disguise....

Truth will reveal itself as Honor and Respect are restored....

[Zankee]

Arianna:

Awareness is the guide to "Enlightment".., your unyielding attempts to reveal the deceptions and lies, inspires the spirit to "post", and, "toast" to your Being.., keep your beacon focused on the hidden hazards.., it's a heavy "fog" we're in....

[Intrepid44]

It's not only our African-American brothers and sisters who are disgusted with the turn of the Clintons. I am thoroughly disgusted with Ms. Hillary's attempt to destroy Barack Obama so that if he does get the nomination, he will not win the general election so she can run in 2012.
FORGET IT HILLARY, YOU HAVE LOST ME FOREVER.

[letsgetsmart]

I just love those who say, lets be fair and admit that both sides have bad apples. Saying that the three that Arianna mentioned are on the same level with all others is purposeful blindness. The term liberal media is nothing but a sales job right out of Machiavelli. Steal a presidential election, approve mass ownership of media, have conservative moguls buy it all up, put out your message and blame all problems on the other side.. Takes a lot of nerve to do this or maybe a total disregard for most of the other citizens of this country. It is true that Arianna has shown her tastes and preferences between Obama and Clinton but then again who hasn't? I am not the biggest fan of her older track record but since Bush and crew got into power, she has been one of the few voices worth listening to concerning the direction of our good old USA. Even Keith shows a leaning toward Obama instead of an even keel. The point is that you all have brains and the opportunity, like this web site, to get the full story and other peoples views and make up your own minds. Just as long as you all get out of your homes this fall and vote dem for everything, we will get better.

[BuckarooBanzai]

It always amazes me that people can't tell the difference between a pundit with an point of view and a political operative. Sure there are conservative thinkers and, yes they are trying to promote a point of view and they should have a forum.

Political operatives like Rove, Snow and Kristol are not their to inform they are there to promote the specific interests of their party in what ever way they can.

A good example was Bill Kristol's hawkish position on Iran last fall. Because he was pretending to be a pundit he made it sound reasonable and necessary. In fact, we know now after the NY Times broke the NIE story, that the Republicans were deliberately ramping up the tension on Iraq to give their candidates more traction in November.

The NY Times, Newsweek and CNN have have turned over some of the most prestigious media platforms to party operatives who will use them to do the dirty work of their organizations.

ps. Howie: CNN canned Carville and Begala when they found they were doing Hillary's work rather than the network's. The same should hold true for Republicans.

[Sneaky]

"The point isn't that the MSM shouldn't employ conservatives at all. It's that they shouldn't employ unabashed propagandists like Snow, Kristol, or Rove -- people who have proven that they are willing to lie, obfuscate, and purposefully ignore the facts to further the agenda of the right's lunatic fringe."

Only if you agree they shouldn't employ unabashed propagandists who have proven that they are willing to lie, obfuscate, and purposefully ignore the facts to further the agenda of the left's lunatic fringe. Let's be fair, here, and admit that there's no shortage of folks on either side, and calling for the exclusion of one and not the other isn't entirely fair or balanced.

[nazcalito]

who are the lunatic fringe leftists employed by the mass media? I can't think of any offhand.

[MrBeale]

Howard Kurtz doesn't get it and he never will. He's done this same kind of sick, nihilistic equating before and he'll do it again. For him, there really is no difference between Rove and Kos because in his simple mind, one is conservative and one is liberal. Thus, they balance each other out, and there's no problem. Except Moulitsas never crafted policy for a Presidential administration. I can't defend Dowd because she's as petty and vile as Kristol. She just doesn't cheerlead for endless war.

But examinations such as this would require more than two seconds of thought from Kurtz and his empty vessel of a mind can't comprehend the distinctions a middle-school civics student could grasp. Kurtz not only has a made-up job, but he's bad at it.

[LewisWalsh]

I had previously respected the work of Howard Kurtz; I thought that he was performing a valuable service. I must now rethink my previous evaluation. His criticism of your well thought out views indicates to me that he has given way to corporate media pressure, those individuals and organizations that are primarily interested in the bottom line, and secondarily, in keeping their empires sacrosanct.

No one who has his faculties intact can believe that the individuals in question are serious thinkers who are only interested in the public good. The fact is that they are operatives, a kind of fifth column for the extreme right, or to be more accurate, the fascist right.

Please, Arianna, you must use the more accurate terminology in describing these people. They are not simply strumpets for a "lunatic fringe;" they are operatives for the fascist right.

[Mykel]

Attagirl, Arianna, you keep PUSHING those Neocon propagandist cockroaches right back into the dark corners they scurried from!

And another f*cking thing, the media is, by virtue of its questioning of authority, spreading of knowlege to the masses and empowering democracy, INHERENTLY LIBERAL.

[Albertde]

It would be if it were doing its job. Which it isn't.

[Forest]

You've articulated perfectly the differences in the MSM hiring a conservative journalist and hiring a conservative journalist who's lies proved they were an enemy of "the people." Maybe the Clintons know what they're doing by employing mirror tactics on those who've used their power to undermine democracy.

[Swegin]

The problem with Arianna's premise is that what she calls the "liberal media" is corporate MSM .... It goes well beyond self-loathing ..... these organizations and the people who manage them have no scruples ..... no integrity...... they have no interest in the truth ..... Their only concern is selling advertising based on the numbers of folks that read their rag or listen or view their tripe.

The hire a slime ball like Rove because they know he will sell advertising ..... end of story ...
It all about the Benjamen ..... They remain willfully ignorant of the harm they are doing to America in the process whoring after the almighty dollar.

[fightorleave2]

Uhm, Arianna, David Brooks is operating as a propagandist for Bush/Cheney, so is Peggy Noonan, and so is John Fund; Fund in particular is a hack and shill. If you want to get down to it so is Will. You will never hear Will say that McCain is a lying piece of dog shit. No, Will will claim that mccain is a hero, a straight talker, a lover of America, noble, brave, exuberant, Reaganesque. He will say all those things and more. Ariana, you are right that Snow, Rove or Kristol are as deluded and full of shit as Bush, Cheney, Perle, Feith, Rumsfeld, Rice, Wolfowitz, Hadley, as well as Powell, Gates and the rest whose names are not yet known, but most of these so-called thinkers on the right will spin it every which way so long as it doesn't help any of us who ain't part of the establishment.

[Prism]

Posts like these are why we will lose in November. Are we really to take Arianna's version of truth as ultimate truth? There are many of us who find much of what she is talking about right here at HuffPo in the form of endless distorted emphasis on Obama's strenghths and Clinton's weaknesses. We get a daily dose of sensational headlines and misrepresentations of the facts. HuffPo's editorial "truth" is terrifying to an old pragmatic Dem like myself who sees a daily smear campaign against the tougher more electable Clinton. We ARE damaging the best hope for reclaiming the
White House but the TRUTH IS it is not prickly poet Obama, but the feisty chick who has a breathtaking ability to reach out across the country by speaking in everyday prose. Physician heal thyself.

[Albertde]

The problem with Clinton is she will bring back the good old days - all of them. And start a new war while she is at it.

[professormoriarty]

Oh my God! Rove at Newsweek. I had not heard. I have loved my Newsweek, but I cannot subscribe any more. They could not offend me more if they put the Grand Wizard on their editorial board.

[evekendall]

I agree with you, Arianna, except for when you use the term "self-loathing LIBERAL media." The mainstream media has not been liberal for decades.

[LiberalBuzz]

I watched about five minutes of Tony Snowjob on CNN yesterday and about threw up. He was his usual lying self taking the point of view that being liberal or progressive was not much different than being a terrorist and that anyone who vote for anyone except republicans is anti American.

I am watching about 30 percent of the time I used to on CNN because of their nonstop turn to the right. It shows that they could care less about journalistic integrity and more about trying to get some of that rightwing audience. There are NO liberal voices on CNN and when I hear people say there are, I have to point out that they are basically colmes (I love how Al Franken could make his name appear in tiny print and wish I could too) who put up a token opposite from Neo Clowns and the Cons on CNN.

And as soon as Kurtz used the phrase "Libs" you could tell where his tiny mind was going. You don't see him refer to conservatives as "cons" do you? Which would probably be more accurate.

I wrote CNN and told them I rarely watch their version of The FoxNewsWhoreHouse anymore. That until they had REAL conservatives and REAL liberals on the show and not phony liberals appearing with KNOWN LIARS who helped lie us into war, they could kiss my butt goodbye.

Keep giving them hell Arianna.