Hey kids, check out my nifty new tagline above. (Thanks to my web guru, Mark Jaquith, for the design.) You like? I think it’s a keeper.

If you don’t get the allusion, click on the asterisk for a refresher and then come on back here and read on. I’ve got a calm, cool, and collected bit to say about this.

Wall Street Journal editorial writer Bret Stephens appeared on Hugh Hewitt’s radio show last night to defend his paper’s strange and snotty treatment of the Eason Jordan “kerfuffle.” (Full transcript at Radioblogger.)

I found the following remarks, in which the cheesed-off Stephens contrasts what he considers irresponsible bloggers with their grown-up MSM counterparts, particularly amusing:

If someone is going to get attacked, and attacked really viciously, I think there is an obligation to give the other guy a chance to give his side of the story.

“This is what we here at the Wall Street Journal try to do,” Stephens told Hewitt, as opposed to the meanie, non-professional bloggers who raised questions about Stephens’ possible conflict of interest in the matter.

Oh, really? Because I didn’t get any phone call or e-mail from Stephens before he singled me out by name for a noxious personal attack in his Feb. 10 op-ed, which pooh-poohed the reporting on the Eason Jordan story done by us immature, amateur blogger-types. Reminder:

Did Eason Jordan, chief news executive of CNN, actually say the American military has deliberately killed journalists covering the conflict in Iraq?

It’s a serious question, at least to judge by the heat it’s generated. Google “Easongate” and you get 2,500 results. There is an Easongate.com Web site, on which more than 1,000 petitioners demand that Mr. Jordan release a transcript of his remarks–made recently in Davos–by Feb. 15 or, in the manner of Saddam Hussein, face serious consequences. Sean Hannity and the usual Internet suspects have all weighed in. So has Michelle Malkin, who sits suspended somewhere between meltdown and release.

Now, go back and look at what I did and what I wrote and explain to me how it’s possible to characterize my work as “somewhere between meltdown and release.” Compare my blog’s contribution to any of my male counterparts and explain to me how I deserve to be ridiculed as a psychological basket case by the august Wall Street Journal editorial board.

My e-mail, Mr. Stephens, is malkin-at-comcast.net.

Last week, I brushed aside the Wall Street Journal’s slap because 1) there were more important Eason-related developments to cover and 2) it pales in comparison to the attacks I regularly receive.

But Stephens’ sanctimony on the Hewitt show yesterday shouldn’t just slip by. Instead of acknowledging his own failure to pursue the story and plumb its full significance, Stephens deflected criticism by refusing to retract his ad hominem attacks on the Internet’s “usual suspects” and instead singling out Ed Morrissey of Captain’s Quarters for making “reckless” charges.

Captain Ed, as every reader of his excellent blog knows full well, is always a man who argues in good faith. He responded to Stephens with characteristic candor, promptness, and a correction/retraction. He is a model of the best the blogosphere has to offer. (He was also one of the most outspoken bloggers to challenge Stephens’ insult against me, and I deeply appreciate that.)

Question: While Captain Ed and others were digging up past quotes from Eason Jordan and other CNN employees to give the Davos remarks context, what was Bret Stephens doing? Slapping together a CYA sandwich and a side order of snark.

Stephens and the Wall Street Journal editorial board have no business lecturing the blogosphere about reckless cheap shots. They are masters of the art form.

Nevertheless, Stephens used his interview with Hewitt to complain about how he’s “suffered” at the hands of the blogosphere.

Oh, kerfuffle. No need to get emotional about it. We’re all grown-ups , right?

***
More here.

Power Line notes the WSJ’s silence on its reporting lapses.

And check out Andrew McCarthy’s smackdown of the WSJ’s embarrassingly bad editorial on the Real ID Act.

comments (0)   trackbacks (18)