Friday, June 23, 2006

Political folks ... don't ... get ... it ...

I'd like to say a quick thanks to this guy for saving me the effort of refuting this stuck-in-the-Beltway piece from the Post fretting that The Daily Show is doing a disservice to democracy because it -- wait for it -- is making young people cynical about government!

You'd think journalists would know not to shoot the bloody messenger.

But political journalists, I've found, get quite defensive when you propose anything that challenges the convenient little tools they use to cover politics. Journalists have reduced politics to a neat and tidy red-blue divide akin to the Yankees and Red Sox. Everything fits neatly into that frame. Do not dare question the frame! Everything can be explained as benefiting one party or the other! There are no original thoughts!

And it never occurs to political journalists that young people aren't tuning out of political coverage because they're stupid. Quite the opposite. They know a sham when they see it.

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