Soccer Dad

The care and feeding of the administration

In the wake of the election, Instapundit quoted Across the Bow (which appears to be inactive):

"I think the media performed flawlessly during the two year election cycle. They managed the story, shielded their candidate, attacked the opposition, sat on damaging stories, and in short did everything a good state run media should do during an election cycle."

And as anyone following the ABC-Obama Health care story knows, the state run media continues to do its utmost to promote and defend the President. Now not only is ABC giving the President the opportunity to present his case before a studio audience, it has rejected an ad from a group opposed to the President's health care initiative. Whatever happened to a free press that wasn't wedded to the agenda of those in power? (via memeorandum) I guess the charade is over.

Now the administration (specifically the Justice Department) has run afoul of the US Commission on Civil Rights. Jennifer Rubin writes:

The Commissioners write that the previously announced efforts by the Justice Department to play an aggressive role in enforcing voting rights "ring hollow if they are not accompanied by swift, decisive action to prosecute obvious violators." The Commissioners ask that the Civil Rights Division advise the Commission of the rationale for dismissing the charges against defendants and of its evidentiary and legal standards for dismissing certain charges in cases of alleged voter intimidation." They further ask for information on "any similar cases in which CRD has dismissed charges against a defendant."

She concludes:

What is even more remarkable in this already eye-popping story is that an independent commission has been forced to take this matter up because the relevant oversight committees in Congress have failed to hold a single hearing concerning the matter. One would think those in Congress who squawked so loudly about alleged failure in the Bush administration to enforce civil rights laws and who objected so strenuously to "politcization" of justice by appointees meddling with the work of career attorneys would have shown more interest in the matter.

And, of course, the MSM has largely been silent too on this issue.

Still it's good to see that the electorate doesn't like everything they see and that the New York Times is reporting on some of this unease. (h/t Instapundit) It would be better if it were more devoted to reporting critically on the government, but at least it's acknowledging that not everyone is as happy with the President as its staff is.