Is Our Pundits Learning?

Hillary Clinton

The first rule of the Georgetown/Manhattan media establishment, for the last 23 years, has been that each and every piece of information about the Clintons must be presented in the most negative light possible. 

Yesterday, I ran across a piece by Ed Kilgore on the Washington Monthly site. Ed is very thoughtful and provocative, and he points out that the Hillary-hating commentariat has lumped Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush together upon this weekend's release of the Iowa poll:

It's natural every time a poll comes out showing either Hillary Clinton or Jeb Bush losing ground in the presidential contest people tend to lump them into the same category of front-runner-facing-existential-challenge-but-may-survive kind of hedge-betting. And that's particularly true when a big survey comes out that tests both fields in a key battleground, like this weekend's Iowa Poll.

What Ed is pointing to is further evidence of not only the depth of Hillary hating, but also the depth of the stupidity plaguing other members of our media corp.

We have been told that these polls are bad news for Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush, and left with the distinct impression that their positions in their respective parties are the same.

But Ed points out that Clinton's favored by 37 percent of Iowa caucus goers, or 45 percent if Biden is not included -- and as far as I can determine he has not announced. 

While Jeb is the favorite of only 6 percent of Republican caucus goers.

Then we go to the favorable/unfavorable Hillary is 77/19 among Iowa Democrats, that's a net +58. While Bush's ratio is 45/50, net -5. There is a wide gulf between +58 and -5. The point here is that you should be extremely skeptical of anything that you read or hear about Clinton vs. Bush in any major news outlet. 

I also read Joe Nocera's piece in the New York Times about the rape crisis at Ken Starr's Baylor University. I remember when Ken Starr was the hero of chin scratchers and dinner-party goers in Georgetown. He was once referred to in the Washington Post as a “Washington insider” while they gushed about how he had many friends, while Bill Clinton caused “humiliation.”

Now history's verdict has been written, and Bill Clinton has gone from having one of the most successful presidencies since WWII to being one of the three most popular men on planet Earth. Ken Starr, on the other hand, has seen his career go from cigarette lawyer to being “complicit,” according to Nocera, in helping hush up Baylor rape accusations until now.

Heck of a job commentariat!

You can expect me to be posting a little more frequently. Contrary to what I hoped for at the beginning of this cycle, the Clinton haters in the press have exposed themselves again. We'll be adding a lot of light so you can see what's really going on.

I think at the bottom of all this has to be the simple recognition that in the case of Ken Starr the Clintons are sometimes just better people than the folks that hate them claim.

Jeb does not equal Hillary. Ken Starr does not equal Bill Clinton.

Rarely is the question asked, “Is our pundits learning?”

Get over it.