Posted 8:15 AM by Gene

If the news biz were a simple unpretentious dispenser of half-truths one could tolerate it. But the moment it got that HIGHER CALLING it acquired a smell, a smell intensified by its biases, which again wouldn't be so bad except the HACKS forever assure us they HAVE NONE, rather like a bum exulting in his underarms. The smell further reeks with the biz' constant sales pitches, which allow it to make money while pretending to be populist, and thus avoid having to meet its readers' PREJUDICES so much as half-way.

The BIZ has suddenly decided in this Kane or Can or whoever it is has a good thing going. We are suspicious enough when a NEWSRAG cover-plugs it, but when the biz does the SHEEHAN or the ROBERTSON -- that is, when it sells the thing with ONE GOEBBELSIAN VOICE -- we are quite ready to SCREAM. And we KNOW the thing can't be any good because Robert "Over the" Hilburn, a man who has contributed his own few percentage points to LALA's circ GAINS, is SELLING it.

Why must consuming the news be a test of who cries UNCLE first?