This is why I hate journalism in its modern execution. The NY Times has a round up on health care reform (why they waited until August to do something like this only God knows) and in the section discussing conservative concerns about euthanasia and government funding for abortion, the best the NY Times – the most important newspaper in the world – can muster is “These concerns appear to be unfounded.”

Why must the media always be so mealy-mouthed? Why can’t they just say “this is untrue”? I don’t want the press to be an organ of either party, and when my guys stretch the truth they should investigate the claims and come to a conclusion pro or con then as well.

This is the kind of refusal to perform basic journalism that allowed the Times to help lead the nation into war in Iraq, among other mistakes.

“These concerns appear to be unfounded.” doesn’t cut it and its why the media is dying.

But longtime Washington hands warn that saturation coverage can diminish the power of his voice and lose public attention.

Ah-ha! Who are these Washington hands? Political veterans with no political axes to grind, I bet!

“I’m really perplexed. It’s unbelievable,” said Karen Hughes, Mr. Bush’s White House counselor. “They’ve taken his greatest political asset — his gifts as a communicator — and totally diluted them. It’s been especially notable in the last couple weeks.”

Um, what? That’s Karen Hughes, one of the top puppeteers that told Bush what to say and when to say it during his disastrous presidency. Karen Hughes has a mighty unhealthy relationship with the George W. Bush legacy, and it was her who allegedly help ghostwrite Bush’s “autobiography” A Charge To Keep. Surely there’s someone other than a Bushie hack that is concerned over this so-called overexposure.

“It’s a risk of overexposure,” said Joe Trippi, a political consultant.

Ah, well then… But wait!

Trippi continues:

“If you use it all up on health care, you may not be able to use it on something else. But if you’re going to risk using it all up, this is the one to risk it on.”

So Trippi doesn’t comport to the article’s main thesis. In fact, he says that using political capital to pass health care reform is a good thing.

The rest of the article cites no other Washington insider types on this issue. The sole voice of criticism is from Karen Hughes, a republican insider with a major role in crafting the public relations of the failed Bush administration (she also failed miserably in PR at the state department, a move that probably led to Americans being hurt or killed in the long run). The only place Hughes seems to have succeeded with PR is in getting NY Times reporter Peter Baker to carry her water.

Take a close look at the recent World Baseball Classic and you’ll see how far the sport has come in a short period of time. It is no longer a homogeneous, closed circle of local athletes, but rather an entire world of cultures.

Only 60 years ago, Jackie Robinson broke through a glass ceiling for African-American ballplayers, but since then there’s been a quiet inflow of many other cultures that has also changed the game dramatically.

Is this really an original thought? Surely in the last 60 years people have taken note of the cultural diversity of baseball – the fact that it has legions of fans in South America and Japan. Every year players come in to the league from those locales. It isn’t anything new.

And he winds up:

Because baseball’s power is unique. No game reflects the cultural diversity of our country on a day-to-day, team-by-team level as well as baseball.

Look, I know baseball fans love to rhapsodic about their game, but the exact same cultural diversity is true of the other two major sports in the country – football and basketball. Heck, even golf is more diverse than it used to be.

I wonder if sometimes the Times publishers don’t see any connection between lagging revenues and painfully obvious columns like this.

20081021_Miami_FL_EconForum0245, originally uploaded by Barack Obama (?).

I mean, who saw this coming??? Heh.

Mr. Obama has met challenge after challenge, growing as a leader and putting real flesh on his early promises of hope and change. He has shown a cool head and sound judgment. We believe he has the will and the ability to forge the broad political consensus that is essential to finding solutions to this nation’s problems.

In the same time, Senator John McCain of Arizona has retreated farther and farther to the fringe of American politics, running a campaign on partisan division, class warfare and even hints of racism. His policies and worldview are mired in the past. His choice of a running mate so evidently unfit for the office was a final act of opportunism and bad judgment that eclipsed the accomplishments of 26 years in Congress.

Given the particularly ugly nature of Mr. McCain’s campaign, the urge to choose on the basis of raw emotion is strong. But there is a greater value in looking closely at the facts of life in America today and at the prescriptions the candidates offer. The differences are profound.

Some campaign officials hope that Ms. Palin, an Alaskan, can broaden the ticket’s appeal in the Northwest, possibly gaining traction in states like Oregon and Washington, as well as shore up Mr. McCain’s standing with social conservatives who had, up to now, been lukewarm at best about his candidacy.

By this logic, Joe Biden should help to deliver Texas and South Carolina to Sen. Obama. Of course, he won’t, and the idea that a hard-right social con like Palin would do anything to help McCain in blue territory like the northwest is the kind of stupid that passes for Republican strategy nowadays.

Let’s go to the tape.

Oregon
2004: 52-48 Kerry
Current Bush Approval: 32%

Washington
2004: 53-46 Kerry
Current Bush Approval: 30%

If she helps anywhere, Palin will help in red states like North Carolina, where McCain is now being forced to spend campaign money in defense because Obama is so close to him there. Now the New York Times could have easily fact checked this absurd assertion from Team McCain. They have the vast research resources of the NY Times whereas I only have The Google. And yet…

UPDATE: Meant to add this

Oregon current polling: 48-42 Obama
Washington current polling: 50-39 Obama

By comparison Sen. McCain has a 3 point lead in North Carolina