Regular readers know that I have a love-hate relationship with the Capitol Hill newspaper Politico. While I often link to stories from Politico, and I think there are many good pieces in the paper, on the whole I think Politico leans to the right. Perhaps more annoying, reading Politico you get the impression that all of its writers are of the too-cool-for-school variety, and their articles drip with unnecessary snark. A few days ago, I made some of these points in criticizing a recent piece by Politico writer Jonathan Martin which attacked Barack Obama for not appointing enough Republicans to his cabinet -- well before Obama had made any appointments at all. To me, Martin's article is typical of a lot of the stuff in Politico, and it is why Politico, despite the big ego of its writers, is what I read third after Roll Call and The Hill in the morning.
Anyway, I was curious to see what else Martin has recently written. Maybe that article was an aberration, right? Here are Martin's last five pieces:
Doves keep the faith as Obama team tilts right (11/27)
Bill Richardson: Downwardly Mobile? (11/24)
Obama skips church, heads to gym (11/23)
Whither the cabinet Republicans? (11/23)
Would-be appointees quizzed on guns (11/20)
Wow, if I had not told you these were news stories in Politico, you might have wondered if these headlines were plucked directly from the Drudge Report, because clearly, each of them has an anti-Democratic agenda.
The first one seems to be interesting in sowing dissent among Democrats (classic Drudge). The second one is typical Politico snark, snickering at Bill Richardson for taking a cabinet position that Politico seems to believe is a step down in prestige for the former Energy and UN Secretary and current New Mexico Governor. The third one wants to make Obama appear disinterested in religion and piety. The fourth one we've discussed: Martin would like to assail Obama for actions he has not yet taken. And the fifth one is a nice dig and a way for Martin to draw Obama as anti-gun. Great GOP hackery all around.
You will note that I called these "news" stories, and therein lies the problem. If these were opinion pieces, that would be one thing entirely, but they are not, and nowhere are they labeled as such. In fact, in four of these pieces, the word "news" appears in the URL. Only the Richardson piece is not a news article, as it appears on Politico's diary of the Obama transition. These are thus not news articles. They are slanted pieces, Matt Drudge-style, clearly written to push a particular viewpoint, in this case, a Republican viewpoint.
Does Martin's own bio provide any guidance for us? Let's take a look. This is lifted directly from the short bio provided by Politico:
Martin comes to Politico from National Review, where he wrote about politics for the magazine and the Web site. Prior to that, he worked for The Hotline covering topics ranging from gubernatorial contests to congressional leadership battles.
A former writer for the National Review? Shocking!
Look, just because a guy has written for a partisan body should not permanently disqualify him from professional journalism with what is meant to be a party-less publication. But to do so, we need one of two things: either Politico needs to point out that Martin is an opinion writer and not a news writer, or Martin, if he wants to write news, needs to actually do that instead of Republican hit-pieces.
Politico is new to the scene, and if it ever wants to be as good as Roll Call, it really needs to clean up its act.
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