The Post Works for the Webb Campaign

By Mark R. Levin

Where is the line between journalism and politics? This issue has always been hotly debated, but the media like to pretend that they are just reporting the news unencumbered by ideological or party influences. This is self-serving propaganda best disproved by the Senate race in Virginia. It was clear early this summer that the Washington Post was going to use every section of the newspaper to drive down Senator George Allen’s high positive ratings, and that’s exactly what it did. It undertook an unrelenting crusade against a man who was well-known to Virginians as a success governor and popular senator. Allen was beginning to develop a national following and there was talk of a possible presidential run.

This kind of unrelenting smear campaign which the Post unleashed doesn’t happen by chance. It involves numerous discussions and meetings among reporters and editors who strategize as if they’re running a political campaign. And so we read about “macaca” for weeks. Then there was the supposed “issue” about Allen’s Jewish mother. This was followed by phony stories about a deer’s head placed into a mailbox. And then the embarrassingly partisan Professor Larry Sabato serving up hearsay about Allen’s supposed use of the “n” word in college.

Meanwhile, the Post has given short shrift to Jim Webb’s past. His switch from Reagan Republican to Clinton Democrat is taken at face value. His disparaging comments about blacks and women are given a journalist back of the hand. Webb’s short and controversial tenure as Secretary of the Navy hasn’t piqued the Post’s interest at all. His lack of coherence and depth on scores of issues, which was apparent during the debates, are ignored completely. And Webb’s bread-and-butter for the last decade — his books — which are a potential treasure-trove of insights into the man, are said to be irrelevant.

The Allen-Webb campaign is the best example of the liberal media’s shared agenda with the Democrat party. It’s difficult to distinguish the so-called journalists at the Post from the political operatives working on the Webb campaign. Marvin Kalb and Howard Kurtz, among others, can spare us the arrogant lectures about the professional media. At least in talk radio and on sites like this we are honest about who we are and what we believe. We don’t wrap ourselves in phony claims of neutrality.