Remember, the WashPost and NYT cannot put the 9/12 protest on Page One this weekend
September 12, 2009 12:31 pm ET by Eric Boehlert
Not unless newspaper editors are going to create a brand new standard for covering large, D.C. political protests. Not unless for the mainstream media, angry conservative activists are more important than angry liberal ones.
Who knows how many mini-mob members are going to show up in the nation's capitol this weekend for the Glenn Beck/Dick Armey "grassroots" protest. But even if they defy expectations and 100,000-plus Obama haters show up, based on previous treatment of mass rallies in D.C., and Post and the Times must, in the name of consistency, keep the rallies off the front page.
Why? Because during the run-up to the Iraq War, mass gathering of liberal peace protesters were routinely kept off A1.
As I recently noted:
For instance, in October 2002, when more than 100,000 people gathered in Washington, D.C., to oppose the war, The Washington Post put the story not on the front page, but in the Metro section with, as the paper's ombudsman later lamented, "a couple of ho-hum photographs that captured the protest's fringe elements."
For that same 2002 anti-war rally, The New York Times also bungled its reporting. The day after the event, the newspaper published a small article on Page 8, which was accompanied by a photo that was larger than the article itself. And in the article, the Times falsely reported that "fewer people attended than organizers had said they hoped for."
In 2002, when more than 100,000 left-leaning activists took to the streets to protest the policies of a Republican White House, the event was quietly tucked inside the newspapers. For the 9/12 protest, we'll see if editors at the Post and Times maintain the same blasé approach.
Its not so much the finacial plunder that they represent as the deep emotional attachment I've invested in them.
Don't bweack my childwike nai, naiv, naivit, rivit...stupidity you guys.
GOP Sees Protest As an Opportunity:
Taxpayer March in D.C. Attracts Party Leaders, but Some Are Wary
Conservative protests are super-awesome!
Most of the rank-and-file workers there are generally liberal, yes. This is not a product of indoctrination or selective hiring but a reflection of the general demographic of the DC metro area (Al Gore won DC's 3 electoral votes in 2000 with 92% of the vote).
However, the editorial board, which is a separate section of the newsroom, is headed, controlled and influenced by Fred Hiatt and is remarkably neoconservative. Though they don't sit right next to the other newsroom reporters, they still wield a LOT of influence in the organization.
Add to that, that 80% of the bigwigs listed on the page 2 masthead acquired their jobs in the past 18-24 months. The brand new shiny managing editor, Marcus Brachli, comes to them from the Wall St. Journal (a NewsCorp organization). The Post's editorial board also endorsed the invasion of Iraq.
Such has left the Post clinging to it's fading gravitas -- they would continually remind the public "we broke Watergate, remember?" Ben Bradlee, at age 88, still works there as an at-large executive has no intentions of retiring (good for him - at 88 I hope to still be working too).
I was disgusted that they didn't cover the HUGE '02 protest, but later realized that reporters are instructed to be wary of appearing "too liberal".
Still, the Washington Post is no right-wing newspaper. That's what we have the Washington Times for.