YOUR LIBERAL MEDIA

You probably know -- a lot of people are pointing it out -- that this week's Newsweek cover story on Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton omits, curiously, any mention of the results of a recent Newsweek poll showing Clinton beating McCain, Giuliani, and Romney, and Obama trouncing Romney while running neck-and-neck with Giuliani and McCain.

Atrios said,

I bet this poll won't get any coverage. In fact, I couldn't even find coverage of it in Newsweek itself, aside from the linked press release.

Newsweek certainly is suppressing this story -- but look who's got it on the front page:


(Story here; huge Post homepage Hillary splash here.) (UPDATE: Well, the splash doesn't feature Hillary anymore, but it sure did this morning.)

Of course, Newsweek buried the story because "many people like Hillary and would vote for her" isn't a story the "liberal media" likes. The "liberal media" likes the story that Hillary is "polarizing" and no one can bear ever to think about Monicagate again or think about the "psychodramas" of Hillary and Bill's "complex" marriage. And if it's a choice between a story the press likes or the facts, the press will choose the story it likes.

The Post has a different motivation, of course. Murdoch would no more suppress a positive poll about Hillary than Thomas Harris would kill off Hannibal Lecter, or Oceania would announce that Goldstein will no longer appear in Two Minutes' Hates because he's in custody and no longer threatens the social order. Murdoch ran this story about Hillary's triumph -- Obama's numbers are never mentioned -- to scare his audience and keep them scared. She's the #1 boogey(wo)man, of course. And he'll keep doing that. (I'm convinced that this was a big part of Murdoch's line of thinking before hosting that fund-raiser for Hillary -- this and, probably, a belief that you should keep your friends close and your enemies closer.)

From the Post story:

..."For people who say she can't win, these polls show she is winning, she is moving, she is growing in reputation nationally within the party," [Clinton pollster Mark] Penn told The Post, adding that for "the first time in this poll [she is] defeating the likely opponents."...

EEEEK! EEEEK! Run for your lives! Vote Republican!

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LIBERAL MEDIA UPDATE: The New York Times cites the Newsweek poll today in a graphic sidebar to this article -- but only the questions about whether America is ready for a black, female, or Mormon president. The matchup poll numbers are ignored.