It’s only a few days ago that Other Side addressed the apparent partisan meltdown at the Ostrich in this little ditty, based on the column by Bob Herbert of the New York Times, the latter, of course, serving as the Svengali to our local editors.
Little did we know that the editors would oblige us by following up with a personal confirmation of the meltdown.
In a Friday “editorial," the NOTWIUN ran this little passage:
We need an immediate freeze on violent metaphors, overheated rhetoric and threats of violence and reprisals against political opponents. Continuing in the vein that we’ve seen escalating during this past year will threaten — indeed, already threatens — the foundation of our democracy, which depends on healthy political debate, not the verbal equivalent of all-out war.
In building up to this scolding, the editors listed a series of alleged offenses against Democrats, and somehow missed the news of offenses against Republicans. Bullets fired, for example. And cited alleged unhealthy rhetoric by Republicans while somehow not recalling any by Democrats
Perhaps the writer was constrained by his own word limits, and since D comes before R in the alphabet, he chose that way to deal with it. We’ll be watching for follow-up reports that balance the reporting, and will run them here to make sure you are fully informed, which is the best defense against such partisan journalism.
Selective memory is something we all know about; selective outrage is far more troubling, especially in one of the “foundations” of our democracy. Willfully uninforming on a selective basis is the height of unhealthy debate from the so called guardians of our freedom, but it becomes more common with each passing day.
They poop regularly on a major segment of their potential readership, and then can’t figure out why they’re going out of business.
And we trust them to be government watchdogs and to uphold the public interest?
Doesn’t say much for us as a public, does it.
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