It’s always almost unbearably cute when a journalist suddenly realizes that this administration could care less about media transparency, or in fact anything that the media says that’s more substantial than “Barack Obama, you’re so dreamy!” Case in point: this article by Salena Zeto, where the author complains mightily that the Democrats are routinely locking out local reporters* from fundraisers attended by Vice President Joe Biden (including one, not incidentally, in Zeto’s home journalistic turf). Also, John Adams’ Sedition Act makes an appearance, which is generally considered to be bringing out the heavy (if usually inaccurate) rhetorical guns in articles like this one; I must admit, there’s something fun about watching the Other Side get scattershot-targeted like this**…
But I digress.
Anyway, of course the Democrats are shutting reporters away from Joe Biden. First off: Joe Biden. Thanks to some inspired idiocy on certain individuals’ parts, they’re stuck with the walking rhetorical disaster for some years yet – but if Joe Biden falls in the woods and says something dumb, and there’s nobody to hear it, did he really say anything? Well… yes, because he’ll be dumb enough to repeat it later; but the principle is sound. Second, even if Joe Biden was the second incarnation of Demosthenes the Democrats would still keep local journalists away, because local journalists are not from New York, Washington, Chicago, and/or LA – and thus do not particularly matter to the Beltway Democratic establishment. Why should they care what the flyover country media thinks, in other words?
Yes, I know, that’s stupid – but, remember: again, these are the people that picked Joe Biden to be the backup part for the Presidency.
*And the White House press corps, but nobody really cares about them at this point. Beds made, lying in them, yadda yadda.
**For the slow of brain: ‘lack of access’ does not equal ‘thrown in jail.’