Snowden’s Treatment by “Journalists” and “Progressives”

A lot has been said about the hostility shown by “journalists” and “progressives” toward whistleblower Ed Snowden, so I won’t rehash old battles here.  I did want to touch on a couple revealing incidents, though, that mostly flew under the radar.

I only see ideology when it undermines my ideology

On June 30th, New York Times pop culture and media writer David Carr published a piece titled “Journalism, Even When It’s Tilted” where he uses Glenn Greenwald as a muse to discuss the role of advocacy in journalism.  Although Carr tries to stand on (his self-defined) middle ground – saying Greenwald “is an activist who is deeply suspicious of government and the national security apparatus” but “also a journalist” – he ultimately reinforces the standard narrative that only pro-government, militarist, pro-corporate journalists can operate without ideologies. To Carr, Greenwald’s defense of whistle-blowing in the face of attacks by pro-government journalists “seems more like a campaign than a discussion of the story he covered” where his “primary objective remains winning the argument.” Meanwhile, “an economic incentive for information absent a political agenda,” (i.e. the corporate tv, newspapers etc..) allows an “independent press” which is now eroding as the decline of traditional media gives way to the proliferation of “digital enterprises” with “partisan agendas.”

The issue with this line of reasoning is obvious – where the fuck have Carr and all the other MSM journalists now screaming “advocacy” and “bias” been while their newspapers pushed us into wars, totally missed the looming housing crisis, vilified worker organizing, gave platforms to anti-teacher zealots et cetera, et cetera.  The only reason he’s writing this article is because Greenwald happened to challenge, rather than enforce, Carr’s own ideology.  The thousands of stories every day which fly across his laptop screen praising corporate America or parroting leaks from administration officials give him no pause because he’s so immersed in mainstream ideology he doesn’t even notice.

Stay down, sit down. Don’t stand up for your rights

In addition to the ridiculous awakening of mainstream journalists to the dangers of ideological biases (that challenge their own), the other point I wanted to touch on is how many “progressive” supporters of president Obama have revealed their tiny, tiny balls.  A great example is the Campaign for America’s Future’s Bill Scher, who displayed hummingbird sized lluevos in a Bloggingheads.tv conversation with the Daily Caller’s Matt Lewis when he said of Ed Snowden

“I feel sad about what’s going to happen to him. Because he has basically traded his personal freedom, he will probably be incarcerated eventually because of a political opinion he has… This poor guy [throws] away his entire adult life” by saying “I can’t abide by this it’s not worth living in this world if it’s like this therefore jail and speaking my mind is a better option, which I just find painfully sad and misguided.”

Wow, so this is what “progressives” have come to – a complete refutation of idealism in any form.  This type of technocratic pussiness is pervasive among Democrats (and mainstream Republicans), but it’s rare that someone will just come out with it.  I understand being too scared to stand up for your own beliefs, but your fear of shame should at least illicit a fucking head nod and muttered “right on” or something when you hear about someone else doing it.  Scher’s complete discounting of principled political actions is just another sign of the American Left’s drift away from any coherent ideology worth defending.

The pro-establishment bias of most journalists and many prominent liberals comes as no surprise, but it is being cast into stark relief by the NSA revelations.  There are about a thousand other NSA-related topics I’d also love to get into, but I’ll save that discussion until the next big Greenwald story drops.