What this country needs is more reporting -- or so right-wingers keep insisting, sort of. First, Rep. Michele Bachmann on Hardball:
What I would say is that the news media should do a penetrating expose and take a look -- I wish they would. I wish the American media would take a great look at the views of people in Congress and find out, are they pro-America, or anti-America? I think people would love to see an expose like that.
Rudy Giuliani is also disappointed in the level of journalistic inquiry:
GIULIANI: You can't even -- you can't even raise these issues. And, you know, God forbid somebody would do some reporting on Barack Obama's use of drugs. I guess that was the point that Mrs. McCain's lawyer made.
And it's true -- Mrs. McCain's lawyer did make that point in a letter to the New York Times.
It is worth noting that you have not employed your investigative assets looking into Michelle Obama. You have not tried to find Barack Obama's drug dealer that he wrote about in his book, Dreams of My Father. Nor have you interviewed his poor relatives in Kenya and determined why Barack Obama has not rescued them. Thus, there is a terrific lack of balance here.
Calls for more reporting are not uncommon, as readers of this space know -- we've asked for more coverage of the war in Afghanistan, U.S. torture policy, investigations at the Office of Special Counsel, and so on.
It's no secret -- at least, it ought not to be a secret -- that these particular calls to journalistic arms are part of a continuing campaign war on the press, slamming reporters for not covering the "real" stories, like Obama's own admitted flirtation with drugs. For the record, the Times did run a 1,700-word story titled "Old Friends Say Drugs Played Bit Part in Obama's Young Life." By "do some reporting," we can assume that what they really mean is: "We demand that, once again, you rehash this non-newsworthy but politically advantageous story for our benefit."
We wrote yesterday that the McCain campaign was having pretty good success exercising authority over what narratives the media presents -- like "measuring the drapes" -- but these latest open calls for more stories on Obama's college drug connection seem to be a bit too much, a bit too obvious and tactless. For now...
To read the rest of today's Altercation, click here.