Apparently, today is "Unintentionally-Revealing Comments Day" on MSNBC

[babylonsister]

http://mediamatters.org/blog/200911160038

Apparently, today is "Unintentionally-Revealing Comments Day" on MSNBC

November 16, 2009 3:30 pm ET by Jamison Foser


Earlier today, MSNBC's Pat Buchanan and Andrea Mitchell had an exchange that nicely illustrates much of the media's fundamental misunderstanding of what the word "authentic" means:

BUCHANAN: When I went into New Hampshire, I went down to a basement store, and they said "Get rid of the Florsheim shoes and the blue suits and the red ties. We're gonna go get you what we call North Country Clothes: brand-new sweaters that look very old and all that stuff." You saw me up there, Andrea.

MITCHELL: I know, you were authentic, Pat.

Old sweaters are not more "authentic" than Florsheim shoes and blue suits. Nor are they less "authentic." They're both just clothes. Yet Andrea Mitchell thinks that Pat Buchanan wandering into a New Hampshire store and, on the advise of some unspecified "they," discarding his typical outfit in favor of new sweaters that are designed to look old was a mark of authenticity.

(It goes without saying that if Al Gore told precisely the same story Buchanan told, he would not be praised as having been "authentic.")

And just a few minutes ago, Politico's Andy Barr was on MSNBC, talking about the AP fact-checking Sarah Palin's new book:

This fight with the AP she's got going on is kind of funny ... It seems like they really took that slam from her personally, and in that fact-check they're really maliciously going after her, kind of point by point.

"Maliciously"? This is the state of modern political journalism: When a news organization fact-checks false claims by prominent Republicans, a reporter calls it "malicious."

Me? I'd call it "journalism."

[Zoeisright]

1. Oh noes!!!111!!

Fact checking 'point by point'???? Whatever is the world coming to!!! How vile and malicious!!!11!!

:sarcasm:

[Uncle Joe]

2. It's seems that Andrea Mitchell is of the school that believes, sincerity is great

and once you've learned to fake that, you have it made.

Thanks for the thread, babylonsister.

[babylonsister]

3. Hi, Uncle Joe. I think she thinks the old pols did everything the right way

and has no room to readjust her viewpoint. She's an old dog plum out of new tricks.

[intheflow]

4. One need look no further than Andrea Mitchell's face job

to know she doesn't understand the meaning of "authentic."

[Jane Austin]

10. How cruel.

She had devastating acne scars and has had them treated as well as other work to improve her looks for television.

She can't help it that she wasn't born gorgeous.

[HipChick]

11. She should get her money back..

the 'work' doesn't look great...also, if you are going get work down, please get a necklift...

[Jane Austin]

16. Perhaps she needs another procedure now. n/t

[intheflow]

12. She was fine for tv before her plastic surgery.

She was a correspondent for years before her surgery. She wasn't "devastated" by her scars, I never even knew she was scarred until you just mentioned it, and honestly can't find anything in a quick google search that says any reason why she got the plastic surgery. So I'm not being cruel, I'm just saying that she had vanity plastic surgery, because she was successful then suddenly she went all plastic.

[Jane Austin]

15. Keep digging.

I well remember her before her surgery.

Her skin was very bad.

[intheflow]

17. Whatever.

What is your beef with this? Why do you give a shit what's said about Mrs. Alan Greenspan, who had a full and lucrative career pre-plastic surgery? You buy into the hype that to be on tv you have to be beautiful? Because again, she was on tv plenty before her surgery, so even the networks didn't buy into that with her. If she had been blacklisted for her acne scars then maybe you'd have a point, but as it is, it seems like you're just trying to pick a fight with me for no reason.

[Jane Austin]

18. Not for no reason..

I think you are cruel and weren't raised right.

As for Ms. Mitchell, I rail at her everyday for larding her program so heavily with republicans.

I mean, who cares what Rudy Giulliani thinks? He got about 3% of the republican vote. Why have him on? He is irrelevant.

I just think cruel comments about her looks are uncalled for. I think it's great she tried to improve her appearance.

I also think criticism of her practice of journalism is not only called for, it needs to be stepped up.

So not trying to pick a fight with you. But I am standing up against "lookism".

[intheflow]

19. You think I'm cruel and wasn't raised right

because I think a woman who was successful both professionally and in love still felt so inadequate as a person that she needed to spend untold thousands on elective surgery to alter her looks to fit into some perceived societal norm? And you think I'm the one suffering from "lookism"? Please. You and she are the ones suffering from "lookism" in that you are more concerned with superficial looks than what's inside.

You say her substance is more important, and you wish she'd take a harder line when questioning conservatives, yet you still think it's great how she buys into the CM pressures to look pretty (because it's more important for women to be pretty than be competent in the CM). That's playing both sides of it. You curse her willingness to go along with the status quo while you raise up the look that allows her to continue spouting the status quo on air. Maybe you should get out of the 18th century more, Jane. It's a whole new world for feminists now.

[malaise]

6. LOL

Great summary. :hi:

[Uncle Joe]

7. Hi, malaise

peace to you. :hi:

[malaise]

8. Back at yah

Uncle Joe :D

[Jane Austin]

9. I heard Andrea Mitchell say that

and she was definitely gigging him.

She saw the same irony Media Matters saw.

[emulatorloo]

5. AP is threatening Sarah Palin's Freedom of Speech by fact-checking her

Because as we know from Ms. Prejean, Freedom of Speech = say any crazy thing you want, and nobody get to criticize ir or fact check it.

[arcadian]

13. Fake = real to these people

It's called the Orwell full circle.

[Subdivisions]

14. I shoulda smacked him upside his head...

Been waiting for a chance to trot this pic out :). Now's as good a time as any.