Now, Dave, be nice. Literacy was her thing. Insert joke about “My Pet Goat” here if you must. But Ms. Bush, a former librarian did good work promoting reading and literacy.

This is always brought up.

1. Are newspapers doing this right now?
2. Is anyone paying attention when they do?

Maybe I’m cynical but I’m doubtful on both fronts. I also reject the idea that bloggers are responsible somehow for picking up the news slack. The MSM has wounded themselves. Blogs and the blogosphere would exist even if the MSM had been doing their jobs for all this time.

Just like OW’s complaint about Newsweek’s Krugman story, there’s not an atom of substance about the events Ms. Obama attended–only commentary from watchers discussing whether they were too few, too many, or of the right sort.

The Republic is dying, and our press corps will hasten the day of our final demise.

Newspapers wouldn’t be dying if they did their damn job and report the news, rather than reprint talking points.

In essence, they’re just talking amoung themselves.

Obama knows this, that’s why he’s taking it straight to the people.

The real news now on TV comes from Letterman, Stewart and Colbert.

Media Matters rigorously follows Politico.com‘s swill.

Still, speaking as one of the few Luddite Defenders of Newspapers, the one thing that was appreciated about Politic.com when it came online is that it sucked some of the poison out of more credible news institutions.

It was odd that so few people realized that Politico.com was set up as a loss leader by a wealthy Republican heir specifically to write damaging articles on Dems. The Villagers immediately bowed to it because it had the veneer of credibility because the poisonous “journalists” were drawn from credible news organizations. It was “success by association.”

Few pointed out that those “journalists” were the worst of the worst of those institutions. Politico.com managed to suck many of those awful “reporters” out of better newspapers like snake venom poison from a wound. What was astonishing is that all that toxicity in one place didn’t send a clear signal that those that granted them credibility were bringing their own credibility into question.

If there is “success by association,” then by the same transitive property, ass ociating with Drudge-baiting linktrollers with barely as much credibility as the National Enquirer should work the same way.

For instance, PBS’s Gwen Ifill has an awful affinity for Politic.com “journalists.” Perhaps that shouldn’t be such a surprise, Gwen Ifill has been selling Republican insurance (AARP) on her Washington Week show for so long that at some point the money trumped her journalistic ethics.

But one of the sleaziest moments during the Democratic Presidential primaries was listening to Gwen Ifill regurgitate all of the most manipulative Republican talking points about John Edwards whose outspoken populism terrified the right wing more than any other Democratic candidate except for Kucinich. Ifill wraped up all the Republican talking points, tied them with a ribbon and then handed those Republican talking points like a gift to the Republican operative masquearding as a “journalist” for Politico.com, Roger Simon, for his “analysis.”

It was the sleaziest thing that any PBS NewsHour reporter had ever done. Even watching NewsHour reporter Judy Woodruff repeatedly turn to two Republicans to get “both sides” of the story was never as sleazy.

Ifill’s Republican talking point pushing interview with Roger Simon was in July 2007 but Glenn Greenwald had Politico.com pegged even earlier. And Media Matters did a smart analysis of the Politico.com/right-wing-Drudge connection.

It’s also noteworthy in retrospect that early in 2007 Politico.com actually invented the Republican talking point of “Slow Bleed” that was repeatedly used against Democratic leaders.

One week it was Obama’s office wear.
One week it was Michelle’s arms.
One week he’s doing too much.
One week–STEM CELLS!!–he’s not doing enough.
One week he’s so liberal he’s a fascist, communist, vegetarian, anarchist.
The next week he’s not liberal enough for the liberals and they are all turning against him.
One week it’s TelePrompTers.
This week–protecting the friggin’ “Historic office of the First Lady”

I so want them to keep up the stupidity and unhelpful idiocy.
What am I saying?–it’s not like they can help themselves.