Pundits protecting their assets

This has been widely noted, but Glenn Greenwald's article at Salon really brings many of the various outrages of the Bush administration into focus.

One of the more powerful memes that is in wide circulation surrounds the essential liberal bias of the mainstream media, and there therefore reflexive anti-Bush prejudice (see anything by Eric Alterman for the voluminous evidence). As Greenwald deftly points out, the truth is far more insidious. When the essential motivations of the pundits and talking heads are distilled, they are transparently self-serving. As the authors of Freakonomics pointed out, we need to understand the underlying motivations of individuals to understand their behaviors. Nothing is different here. The inside the beltway punditocracy is quite rightfully fearful of a movement that they can do little to stop, namely, the continuing power of the internet to provide a DIY (do it yourself) alternative to the traditional approach to news analysis. The law of large numbers and the collective wisdom of the blogosphere is a classic "disruptive" technology that is disrupting the incumbent news gathering organizations. Clay Christensen at HBS has written extensively on disruption and innovation.

I think that the continued misreading of true American opinion by these same insiders is part and parcel of this same phenomenon. When Andrea Mitchell opines that "most americans" support a pardon of Scooter Libby and the actual number is 18%, that belies an impressive level of disdain for the actual level of public involvement and understanding of the current situation in which we find ourselves. I think that Mitchell and Russert and Matthews truly feel that the discourse on the blogs is an isolated freakshow and that they serve this unwashed NASCAR nation that they can spew their crap to, regardless of its basis in fact.

The truth, as the recent AG scandal has clearly pointed out, is that the number of people in this country that care, that are informed and are outraged is much larger than the number that the punditocracy has in their heads. 3200 dead soldiers, 25000 wounded and a petulant disdain for the Constitution will do that to a nation.