If you notice I fill the blog up with media criticism along with election information. I think its important to help people realize when information is misinformation, advertising or just bad journalism.

Anyway Fark.com creator Drew Curtis has a very well written and informative article on the subject of media criticism in the Christian Science Monitor that I wanted to point to.

“The Clintons’ Latest Project is to Contrive Ways to Knock Barack Obama Off His White Horse and Muddy Him Up a Little”

This is what I call a “no crap” article. Why? Because it’s an entire article telling us something we already know in a way that makes it seem like it is giving us insight when really its just pulling together a ton of things we could have figured out by ourselves. It also often makes a person look bad or good for basically doing nothing.

Since the Obama/Hillary scuff there has been tons of these articles. Here is the premise. Hillary Clinton is going to try and beat Barack Obama in the primary by finding things that would make people want to vote for her and not him. Wow, fantastic, what a concept. So basically she is running for office in an election. Lets go to print I think we have a winner!

A few weeks ago the big news was that all of these candidates were going to raise money. “Hillary Plans on Raising Money, John Edwards Sets Goal of Raising Money, Mitt Romney Would Really Like to Raise Money!” Wow newspapers, wow.

Every election year its the exact same story. “Candidate X Is Set to Raise More Money This Time Than Was Raised Last Time” or, “Election Most Expensive Yet!” Isn’t that the point? Don’t things often grow over time? If the election didn’t cost more in 2008 than it did in 2004 I think we would have a pretty big problem with the economy. Another news flash for you? It took more dollars to elect George W. Bush than it did Herbert Hoover. Can you guess why?

Basically every one of these articles is stating the blatantly obvious. A candidate for a party’s nomination wants to win that nomination which will come at the expense of other candidates who want it. Meanwhile it will cost more, the likelihood that one of these candidates will belong to an ethnic group/gender or other population that has never been elected before will rise as will the amount of time covered on the election? Why?

1) That is what politicians do.
2) Things cost more over time and as the economy/population grows
3) There has only ever been white males over the age of 35 who have held the office but more than half the population is woman and an increasing percentage gay, black, hispanic or of other or mixed descent
4) There are more media outlets available to the consumer and more devices that need content.

I just wrote the meat of 90% of the articles being written. All I have to do is throw in some quotes from bloggers, ex campaign workers and “analysts” from some non-profit think tank or university and I would be golden.

As was about ten dozen other speculators who said Al Gore COULD announce his presidential run at the Oscar’s. But since they say COULD after writing sensational headlines and lead paragraphs with no real sources they get away with it.

Gore’s documentary An Inconvenient Truth did win the Oscar for Best Documentary Film, but Gore made no such announcement. So you would guess that all the articles being written about his possible run for president have now stopped. Oh quite the contrary, they are at an all time ‘08 high my friends!

Meanwhile the top H1 story at Drudge? “GORE MANSION USES 20X AVERAGE HOUSEHOLD; CONSUMPTION INCREASE AFTER ‘TRUTH’” Apparently the attempted assassination of the Iraqi Vice President (and stroke of Iraqi President) just aren’t newsy enough.

Man CNN has really been letting me down lately. You have all the coverage of Anna Nicole Smith and Britney Spears as if its actual news and a Web site growing with articles filled with nothing more than pure speculation.

The latest is from “CNN Political Analyst” Bill Scheider who speculates that Al Gore could use his Oscar speech to start his presidency. Which he could do. He could also use the speech to get up and say he was “wrong about this whole global warming thing” and then take a fruity drink in his hand and toss up a sombrero and start making out with Tipper like he did in 2000. the liklihood of both? About equal.

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