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Oh The Irony

By Big Tent Democrat, Section Media
Posted on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 07:39:19 AM EST
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Michael Kinsley today:

There is something about the Web that brings out the ego monster in everybody. It's not just the well-established tendency to be nasty. When you write for the Web, you open yourself up to breathtakingly vicious vitriol. People wish things on your mother, simply for bearing you, that you wouldn't wish on Hitler.

Yep, Crossfire Kinsley decries the incivility. He defended Crossfire when Jon Stewart criticized:

A moment of surprising resonance in the campaign was Jon Stewart's Oct. 15 appearance on "Crossfire." Taking just a tad too seriously his recent appointment by acclamation as the Walter Cronkite of our time, Stewart begged the show's hosts to "stop hurting America" with their divisiveness. I used to work on that show, and I still think the robust, even raucous, and ideologically undisguised hammering of politicians on "Crossfire" is more intellectually honest than more decorous shows where journalists either pretend to neutrality or pontificate as if somebody had voted them into office.

Kinsley is a great writer no doubt but please no more decrying of the "incivility."

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    Oh The Irony | 5 comments (5 topical)

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    Intellectually honest? Intellectually honest? (4.00 / 1) (#2)
    by Bill Arnett on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 11:43:14 AM EST
    Kinsley is beyond hope of redemption. Jon Stewart was, and remains, absolutely correct that shows like crossfire are damaging to America.

    Look at the level to which they reduced public debate. And this:

    I still think the robust, even raucous, and ideologically undisguised hammering of politicians on "Crossfire" is more intellectually honest...

    As if conducting dual monologues where the players shout, insult, and talk right past each other in the most snide manner possible while trying to twist the words of the other side or bully them into submission is HONEST in any way, much less intellectually?

    Give me a break. High school and college debate teams are vastly superior to shows like crossfire any day of the week.

    The (5.00 / 1) (#4)
    by aw on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 12:01:09 PM EST
    only thing I ever got out of Crossfire was a splitting headache.

    Parent
    Civility (1.00 / 1) (#3)
    by koshembos on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 11:51:26 AM EST
    Of the many writers in the American MSM, Kinsley does rank quite high (in my scales too). One thing for Michael here, his complaint about incivility is civil; we have much worse.

    Wars are damaging for America; stupid TV programs are not. Let's not loose it and have a black and white view of totally everything. The Kramer/Richards approach to life should be discouraged.

    When the MSM, including people... (none / 0) (#5)
    by Bill Arnett on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 12:27:44 PM EST
    ...such as Kinsley, allow bush/cheney to spin a completely different reality that has no connection with REAL reality, then these programs and writers spreading the administration propaganda THAT ALLOWS BUSH TO GET US INTO UN-WINNABLE WARS that, agreed, are damaging to America, then they are complicit in damaging America.

    That's is a PRAGMATIC view, not one "los[ing] it and having a black and white view of totally everything", contrary to your unsupported viewpoint, which ignores the reality that whoever controls the media controls what people see and hear and facilitates fooling the weak-minded and those too lazy to seek information on their own.

    And the Kramer/Richards thing is so far detached from the nature of the topic here as to be incomprehensible.

    Parent

    not so (none / 0) (#1)
    by cpinva on Thu Nov 30, 2006 at 08:03:47 AM EST
    kinsley may, at one time, have been a "great" writer, though that's a matter of opinion. however, that time has long since passed, he's been phoning it in for several years now.

    he suffers, as do the majority of those in the media, from intellectual laziness: easier to be one of the herd, and just repeat the talking points, than to do any hard work. gives you that much more time to get to that "cottage" on nantucket, and hobnob with your equally rich, equally shallow media colleagues.

    he should do us all a favor, and retire.

    Oh The Irony | 5 comments (5 topical)

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