Conservatives Protecting Washington’s Liberal Elite? Looks Like.

This blog is eight years old.  In March 2006, the first 60 days of its existence, we warned conservative outlets like Fox News helped give the mainstream media freedom to express openly their progressive preferences. Now John Podhoretz, writing in the conservative New York Post,  pushes the same point:

the mainstream media — the prestige press and the network television commentariat — are committing sins both of commission and omission. At times, they act as the president’s blocking tackles in some respects, speaking with contempt and dismissal when the scandals are even mentioned.

When they are not actively working in his defense, the media’s managers are downplaying the scandal stories . . . and the failure to pursue them aggressively has the effect of quieting [scandals] down.

Why is this happening?

mainstream media heavyweights [are] liberated from the responsibility of covering Obama administration malfeasances because of the . . . alternative conservative media that have arisen over the past 20 years — talk radio, Fox News, and multiple websites.

Right[-wing] media means that the stories are being covered[, relieving the mainstream of] responsibility they might otherwise feel to do the job themselves. Even better, . . . the stories are being covered in such a way that the mainstream media can dismiss them and attack them.