Hot Air Archives
Remember the outrage when John McCain’s campaign kicked Maureen Dowd off of his airplane in Pennsylvania? (I don’t either) I wonder whether the same defenders of Truth and Journalism will bother to squeak up now that Barack Obama has cleared his own plane of dissenters. Reporters from the New York Post, Washington Times, and Dallas Morning News have been declared persona non grata after their editors endorsed McCain:
Remember the outrage when John McCain’s campaign kicked Maureen Dowd off of his airplane in Pennsylvania? (I don’t either) I wonder whether the same defenders of Truth and Journalism will bother to squeak up now that Barack Obama has cleared his own plane of dissenters. Reporters from the New York Post, Washington Times, and Dallas Morning News have been declared persona non grata after their editors endorsed McCain:
The
Obama campaign has decided to heave out three newspapers from its plane for the
final days of its blitz across battleground states — and all three endorsed
Sen. John McCain for president!
The
NY POST, WASHINGTON TIMES and DALLAS MORNING NEWS have all been told to move
out by Sunday to make room for network bigwigs — and possibly for the inclusion
of reporters from two black magazines, ESSENCE and JET, the DRUDGE REPORT has
learned. …
Some
told the DRUDGE REPORT that the reporters are being ousted to bring on
documentary film-makers to record the final days; others expect to see on board
more sympathetic members of the media, including the NY TIMES’ Maureen Dowd,
who once complained that she was barred from McCain’s Straight Talk Express
airplane.
This
seems like a strange time to upset the applecart. Why not do this a month
ago? Anyone could have predicted that the Post and the Times would
endorse McCain, and the Morning News was not much of a surprise, either.
Had
they acted a few weeks ago, they could have made it look like Team Obama wanted
to give secondary media outlets a chance. Now it just looks like
vindictiveness, and perhaps even worse. Obama and his supporters have
gotten vicious with reporters who ask questions and do research that put Obama
in a bad light, and this adds to the general pattern we’ve seen since the
primaries.
It also
looks a little self-indulgent. Obama’s clearing room on the plane for —
what? Documentarians who
will produce hagiographies about his historic importance.
That fits into another pattern we’ve seen for months, one marked with fake
presidential seals, The Barackopolis, and infomercials. In the coming Age
of Obama, only the worshipers will get front-row seats to history.
