Axelrod said something about news organizations paying more attention to the type of stories they cover. That’s a huge issue. It’s not misrepresentation, talking things out of context and partisan harangues the WH spoke out against. It’s more fundamental: who controls and sets the tone of the 24-hour news cycle. Cable and particularly Fox hold that title more and more often.

All day cable and talk radio throw issues, event and personalities out there to see which will ‘stick’ and make it into the national b-cast news, and on to the morning print media and TV. I think the WH was reminding the press that the priorities of what they cover, not just how they cover it, are valid measures of journalistic integrity.

For example, did Palin claim that peer review of best medical practices was synonymous with ‘death panels‘ warrant the hours, even days, of coverage devoted to it? Did the McCain campaign really believe that Obama voted for pre-school sex education in the IL legislature as spun uncritically by many news outlets in 2008? Were these real stories? Did cable producers genuinely think these were real stories? No, they were clever distractions that changed the subject in a way that also appealed to and mobilized the viewership base.

What the media designates as news can be trivial, artificial or pumped-up enough to undercut real journalism. It’s a valid argument and one that is important in an age where reporters cover political ads as if they were news even if a campaign has no intention of releasing those ads to the public. But this is not a debate the White House should step into willy-nilly, if ever.

Hmmm...so three days after Axelrod makes this comment, a front-page NYTimes article speculated about an ‘old boys club’ operating in the WH. What was it based on? Four guys joined the boss in a pick-up basketball game! It was emphatically not based on complaints from within! Appropriately, the President called it ‘nonsense.’

This is Chicago Politics per usual, nothing new.

The President realizes that his approval ratings have dropped faster than any other President in the history of our nation, or at least since these polls have been taken. :)

It is always easier for all us to blame others rather than look in the mirror. Presidents and poltical parties are no different.

He just named Fox for the sensational rag channel that it is and its puny list of prime time viewers get all whiny after their right wing retards stir them up. Big deal.