The hermeneutic circle of Media Matters

It’s an honor to be at the top of the list of Media Matters targets. And it’s an occasion to reflect on how the left’s media commissars operate. 

Media Matters has been going on for months about a so-called “right-wing bubble”–but in doing so intends to reinforce a real left-wing bubble that ensures liberals never hear criticisms of their worldview. (We conservatives do have our bubbles, but cannot completely evade exposure to left-wing views, which are ubiquitous in our media and popular culture. Even football is no longer safe.)

Take their criticism of my article on Obama’s repeated bullying of the Supreme Court (original emphasis):

Pollak excitedly claimed that by mentioning his support for gay marriage in his inauguration speech, Obama was trying to bully Supreme Court Justices who were in attendance that day. By stating publically his belief, Obama was attempting to intimidate (to “attack”) the judicial branch of the government because the Supreme Court has before it a pending case about gay marriage and the president’s comment meant he was instructing the Court on how it “ought to rule.”

That’s it–no attempt to rebut my argument, just a snarky summary thereof. What is convincing to Media Matters’ readers is not the substance of the organization’s critique (there is none), but the tone, which is meant to convey contempt and signal to readers that they need not even trouble themselves with the idea.

So much of the left operates this way, in so many spheres–the sarcasm that is the staple of left-wing humor, rather than true wit; the New York Times editorials that ignore facts for the sake of what is politically correct; half-baked Saturday Night Live impressions that substitute in the minds of smart journalists for the real thing; and so on. The worst that can be said about Fox News is that it pretends conservative viewpoints are “fair and balanced”; the best that can be said of Media Matters is that they don’t care when they are wrong. 

They know what their job is–to insulate the media from inconvenient facts and ideas–and they do it well.