"Tea Parties" (Thank you, Rick Santelli) are happening all over America, "parties" which are clever, peaceful protests of the Barack Obama/Democrat bailouts, tax increases, swelling deficits, and spend-crazy shenanigans. This clip gives you just an idea:
But, take away the local TV stations and the occasional story in a newspaper, and you wouldn't know anything about this large and ever-widening grassroots protest. And, if the traditional press had its way, you never would.
John Hinderraker at Power Line writes: "For some reason, reporters and editors believe it is not news when thousands of people, all around the country, gather to protest the government's bailouts, trillions in debt, etc. And yet, when a mere forty people turned out in Connecticut for an ACORN-sponsored bus tour of homes owned by AIG executives, there were more media people covering the event than there were people on the bus. So let's see: conservative and libertarian opposition to the government's economic initiatives--not news. Far left opposition to the government's economic initiatives, no matter how few participate--that's news..."
An editorial in Investor's Business Daily pointed out that the "tea parties" not only involved thousands of people across America but that they were drawing citizens who had never engaged in any kind of public protest. And IBD also commented on the MSM's politically-driven "dereliction of duty."
...Bloggers and local press do cover these events, and to give credit due, so did Investor's Business Daily in a front-page story Feb. 28. But the national TV and print media are conspicuous by their absence. Some big news outlets see these events as atomized and unlikely to lead the nightly news. Others aren't interested because they're well outside media centers.
But the real reason the major media aren't interested in these protests is that they don't agree with them. In the final analysis, these affairs are really taking issue with the political party they helped elect without hiding bias in the last election.
That's why a small scrum of Acorn-financed wackos on a bus tour to intimidate AIG execs last weekend made the news while the tea parties didn't.
But unlike the staged, sparsely attended Acorn event, the tea parties are national, growing and indicative of a shift of public sentiment. If proof is needed, one need look no further than the attention the protests are getting from the Obama administration.
One of the biggest protests so far drew 15,000 on March 8 in Fullerton, Calif. But a Los Angeles Times blogger dismissed the event as "a radio stunt" because it was organized by local radio deejays. There was no explanation why the Times and other media were all over a 2006 immigration protest that was also called by deejays.
It wasn't far from Fullerton that President Obama chose to make a series of Southern California town hall visits in the wake of Santelli's criticism to sway the locals to reverse course and back his pro-spending agenda.
The media may have been dismissing the protests as insignificant, but Obama's political sharpies knew a challenge when they saw one.
The mainstream media only hurt themselves by ignoring news. If the Obama camp takes tea parties seriously, so should its toadies in the press.
