Unstatesmanlike Conduct

by Todd Beeton [courtesy of MyDD]

Burnt Orange Report has been hitting back against the over the top anti-blogger bias found within the OpEd page of the Austin American-Statesman but in Sunday's paper, a frontpage "story" crossed a line even for this paper's low standards.

Editor & Publisher documents the atrocities:

-- The audience nearly staged a "faint-in" when Gore appeared (note use of '60s term).

-- Pelosi is so far left her title should include "(D-Beijing)." This would come as a surprise to many in the crowd who have criticized her timidity - and posed hostile questions in the Q & A..

-- The liberal blogosphere is "terribly self-confirming" -- not like the mainstream media! In a contradiction, he then noted that at the conference they "critiqued themselves."

-- It's shooting fish in a barrel "to paint liberals as overly intellectual types incapable of having fun unless reading Noam Chomsky counts, and its sure does for them." In fact, the convention was practically "party central," few attendees were "intellectuals," and only a tiny percentage, I would guess, are Chomsky lovers -- again, an outmoded stereotype.

[...]

And this appeared on the frontpage. Really? The piece immediately drew the ire of bloggers, which is to say an unending litany of blog posts, LTEs and phone calls until finally the story was removed from the website and the editor issued an apology. Apparently it was supposed to be funny but we just didn't get it, humorless bloggers that we are.

Readers expect front-page stories to speak directly and clearly about events and issues. Eliminating the possibility of misunderstanding from our work is a critical part of our daily newsroom routine. When we communicate in a way that could be misinterpreted, we fail to meet our standards.

Our front-page story Sunday about the Netroots Nation convention included doses of irony and exaggeration. It made assertions (that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi might find herself at home politically in Beijing, for example) and characterizations ("marauding liberals" was one) meant to amuse. For many readers, we failed.

In trying for a humorous take on the Netroots phenomenon without labeling it something other than a straightforward news story, we compromised our standards.

I actually think a humorous take could have worked if it had been even more over the top and not so dependent on the low hanging fruit cliches that this piece resorted to. Instead this editorial used the pretense of satire to hide an obvious contempt. Kudos to all those that hit back and put pressure on the paper. The fact that they thought they could get away with this half-assed attempt at humor on their frontpage is indicative of the extent to which they don't get us at all.