Michelle Malkin dropped by Virginia paper

Written by Simon Maloy

Published

The public editor of the Virginian-Pilot (Norfolk, VA), Marvin Lake, announced in a November 14 Virginian-Pilot column that the newspaper had dropped right-wing pundit and author Michelle Malkin's nationally syndicated column from its op-ed page.

According to Lake, “readers often took issue with her [Malkin's] seemingly mean-spirited rantings and suggested that she be dropped.” The article also quoted Bronwyn Lance Chester, another Virginian-Pilot columnist, who said:

I think [Malkin] habitually mistakes shrill for thought-provoking and substitutes screaming for discussion. She's an Asian Ann Coulter. I also think that, like Coulter, she says outrageous things just to get TV appearances and book deals. She's the worst of what's wrong with punditry today. She adds absolutely nothing to genuine political discourse.

The Virginian-Pilot editorial board assessed Malkin as being “too stridently anti-liberal,” according to Lake. Media Matters for America has documented Malkin's baseless attacks against liberals and the mainstream media, as well as her false statements:

  • Malkin selectively quoted a New York Times editorial board member to portray a distorted image of the mainstream media's treatment of minority conservative politicians.
  • Malkin followed the right-wing magazine NewsMax in falsely accusing the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) of registering a terrorist to vote in Ohio.
  • Malkin referred to Women for Kerry (a “community” within Senator John Kerry's presidential campaign) as “an embarrassment to a nation at war.”
  • Malkin claimed “we've never had” fiscal responsibility from Democrats -- despite the fact that former President Bill Clinton reduced the federal budget deficit during each year of his presidency and ran surpluses in his final four budgets.
  • Malkin falsely claimed that Patrick Runyon and William Zaladonis -- the two veterans who were on the swift boat under Senator John Kerry's command in Vietnam the night Kerry received the injury that resulted in his first Purple Heart -- had accused Kerry of shooting himself on purpose.
  • Malkin advocated racial profiling; defended the internment of Japanese-Americans (and other ethnic minorities) during World War II; and called for the removal of Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta, claiming that he couldn't be objective on the issue of racial profiling because of his personal experience as an interned Japanese-American.

Malkin's column is nationally syndicated by Creators Syndicate. According to Malkin's personal website, her column “appears in nearly 200 newspapers nationwide.” In the past year, some of those papers have included:

The Miami Herald, The Kansas City Star, Akron Beacon Journal (Ohio), USA Today, Philadelphia Daily News, The Union Leader (Manchester, New Hampshire), The Dallas Morning News, Desert Dispatch (Barstow, California), The Washington Times, The Wall Street Journal, New York Post, Houston Chronicle, The Modesto Bee, The Detroit News, The Rocky Mountain News, The Boston Herald, The Hartford Courant, The State Journal-Register (Springfield, Illinois), The Bellingham Herald (MA), The Asheville Citizen Times, The Herald-Dispatch (Huntington, West Virginia), The Press-Enterprise (Riverside, California), The Star-Gazette (Elmira, New York), The Times (Shreveport, Louisiana), the El Paso Times, the Great Falls Tribune (Montana), The Lowell Sun (Massachusetts), the Lexington Herald-Leader (Kentucky), The Home News Tribune (East Brunswick, New Jersey), The Times Herald (Port Huron, Michigan), The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Florida Today (Melbourne, Florida), The Advocate (Baton Rouge, Louisiana), and the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle (New York).

Editor & Publisher, a newspaper trade publication, noted Malkin's “dumping” in a November 22 article titled "Virginia Paper Drops Columnist Malkin."