-By Warner Todd Huston
When someone says “journalist” do you have a picture of a fedora-sporting, cigar chomping, agitator with jaded mien and independent mind, a man stubbornly outside the political establishment looking in and eyeing it all with suspicion? Do you get a flash of a writer that stands in opposition to entrenched powers, one looking out for the little folks ala an Upton Sinclair? If so you’ve been watching too many antiquated, black-and-white moves from the 1940s. Today, “journalist” simply means an extension of the Democrat Party. And now even the book parties held so “journalists” can launch their latest paean to liberalism is bought and paid for by leftists, the Democrat Party, and its operatives.
To disabuse you of that old-fashioned notion, on June 9, Washington Post star reporter Ceci Connolly had to cancel her appearance at her own book party when it became common knowledge that the whole thing was being paid for by a public relations firm run by Democrat operatives. The event was bought and paid for by Blue Line Strategic Communications, a public relations firm run by Democratic communications strategist Michael Meehan and former Senate Democratic official David DiMartino. Most recently DiMartino was a Sen. John Kerry staffer and Meehan worked as a senior staff member in the Senate for years.
So much for the idea of independent journalists.
Connolly, of course, isn’t the only one. There is a long, long list of “journalists” that jumped from the Old Media to Obama’s new administration when it stormed Washington, the most powerful of whom is senior Obama advisor David Axelrod, a former Chicago Trib. reporter. And this wasn’t a one-time Old Media culling, either. Just this month Teddy Davis, now former ABC News deputy political director, has quit to join the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), longtime Democrat operatives.
And there are many others. Just to name a few:
- Linda Douglas: Onetime CBS Congressional correspondent, later Obama healthcare media chief
- Geoff Morrell: Once an ABC News guy, now spokesman for Sec. Def. Robert Gates.
- Beverley Lumpkin: Once worked for both ABC and CBS, now she’s working for Obama’s Dept. of Justice
- Warren Bass: Former deputy editor of the Post’s Sunday Outlook, now working for U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice
- Dr. Sanjay Gupta: CNN/CBS reporter, then tapped for Obama’s Surgeon General (though his name was later pulled)
- Rosa Brooks: Went from L.A. Times columnist to an employee of the Defense Dept.
- Jay Carney: From Time Magazine to Vice President Biden’s office
- Peter Gosselin: From the L.A. Times to Treasury Se. Geithner’s office
- David Hoff: Once a blogger and reporter for Education Week, now he’s a communications staffer at the Dept. of Education
- Rick Weiss: Was a Washington Post reporter, now works for the White House
- Jill Zuckman: Went from the Chicago Tribune to the Dept. of Transportation
And proving that the door is not just one way, but a revolving one, Linda Douglas recently left the Obama Administration only once again to take up her pen as a “journalist.” In June Douglas took a job with the Atlantic as a vice president. Yeah, I’ll bet she’ll be real non-partisan in her future “journalism,” eh?
So, when someone tells you that American journalists are independent of politics, that they are the venerable fourth estate you can assure them that the press is more like a fifth column than a fourth estate and you can show them the cozy relationship that the press has with the Democrat Party as presented here. Then ask them to prove to you just how independent the press really is?
(Originally posted at BigJournalism.com)
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“The only end of writing is to enable the reader better to enjoy life, or better to endure it.”
–Samuel Johnson
Warner Todd Huston is a Chicago based freelance writer. He has been writing opinion editorials and social criticism since early 200 and before that he wrote articles on U.S. history for several small American magazines. His political columns are featured on many websites such as Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com, BigHollywood.com, and BigJournalism.com, as well as RightWingNews.com, CanadaFreePress.com, StoptheACLU.com, AmericanDailyReview.com, among many, many others. Mr. Huston is also endlessly amused that one of his articles formed the basis of an article in Germany’s Der Spiegel Magazine in 2008.
Huston has been a frequent guest on talk-radio programs to discuss his opinion editorials and current events and is currently the co-host of “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Conservatism” heard on BlogTalkRadio. Huston’s work has appeared on Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Neil Bortz, and Michael Savage. He has appeared on the G. Gordon Liddy show, dozens of local shows from coast to coast, and many blogtalk radio shows.
Mr. Huston has appeared on local TV news to discuss his writing, has been a guest of CNN’s blogger lunch, and has appeared on Breitbart TV’s B-Team show.
Warner is also the editor of the Cook County Page for RedCounty.com and has a blog on the Tribune-Owned http://www.chicagonow.com/blogs/publius-forum/ChicagoNow.com website. He is a well known writer on Illinois politics.
He has also written for several history magazines and appears in the book “Americans on Politics, Policy and Pop Culture” which can be purchased on amazon.com. He is also the owner and operator of PubliusForum.com. Feel free to contact him with any comments or questions : EMAIL Warner Todd Huston
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