Friday, March 4, 2011

You Should Only Report What I Say When I Tell You To...


Oh, if there's anything amusing about the year prior to a presidential election, it's watching potential candidates posture, criticize each other and make lots of mistakes.

This was Mike Huckabee's week with foot-in-mouth disease. At the start of the week, the former Arkansas governor and 2008 presidential candidate claimed that President Obama grew up in Kenya. (Not true, although the young Obama did live for a time in Indonesia with his mother and stepfather.) After criticism for spreading misinformation, Huckabee and his spokespeople blamed the media for escalating the story, claiming that he simply misspoke, confusing Kenya for Indonesia. (It happens a lot.)

He followed up that stellar performance with a page out of Dan Quayle's playbook, when he and conservative commentator Michael Medved discussed the poor example the newly Academy Award-winning Natalie Portman poses, given that she is pregnant and not married to the baby's father. And there she was accepting on Oscar for the whole world to see!

Huckabee said:
"...One of the things that's troubling is that people see a Natalie Portman or some other Hollywood starlet who boasts of, 'Hey look, you know, we're having children, we're not married, but we're having these children, and they're doing just fine.' But there aren't really a lot of single moms out there who are making millions of dollars every year for being in a movie. And I think it gives a distorted image that yes, not everybody hires nannies, and caretakers, and nurses. Most single moms are very poor, uneducated, can't get a job, and if it weren't for government assistance, their kids would be starving to death and never have health care. And that's the story that we're not seeing, and it's unfortunate that we glorify and glamorize the idea of out of wedlock children."


(I'm sure a lot of single mothers would argue with Huckabee's characterization of them, wouldn't you think?)

After much criticism, Huckabee once again has his defense at the ready. He says he wasn't criticizing Portman, but the "Hollywood media" distorted his comments. In fact, Huckabee praised Portman earlier today, and said he's glad she plans to get married.

I have a lot of problems with the media, but I find it tremendously interesting that whenever a politician like Huckabee or Sarah Palin makes an incorrect statement or one that people disagree with, they assert that the media that either misrepresented their words or blew them out of proportion. But only when they're being criticized, not when they're criticizing others.

Anyone want what's good for the goose and what's good for the gander?

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