Chronicle, Meet Chronicle

On the front page of yesterday's San Francisco Chronicle, an article headlined "Insatiable news sites feed us political trivia":

MSNBC host Martin Bashir led his program the other day with a lengthy discussion of a scandal the left-leaning cable network ominously called "Cookie-gate."

It stemmed from a campaign photo-op discussion GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney had with suburban Pittsburgh voters in which he mocked the cookies they were served as looking like "they came from 7-Eleven." They had been donated by a popular local bakery, and over the next several minutes the cable TV channel spun the story as an example of how Romney has trouble connecting with voters.

"Cookie-gate" was the latest in a series of near-daily items that have dominated the presidential campaign recently. Somehow rocker and outdoors enthusiast Ted Nugent, Democratic strategist Hilary Rosen, Romney's dog Seamus and President Obama's long-ago description of eating dog as a child have taken turns dominating the national conversation.

On April 13, this story made the Chronicle front page:

The role of women in this year's presidential election stayed on center stage Thursday after a Democratic consultant's comments triggered a new round of "mommy wars" - pitting mothers who are employed against those who stay at home.

Different authors, of course: the first story is by Joe Garofali, generally one of the better political reporters; the second is by Carla Marinucci, notorious for repeatedly writing stories about Susie Tompkins Buell's disappointment with the President. Same newspaper, though.

Note to The Chronicle: tut-tutting about the trivialization of politics is a lot more credible when you don't peddle the trivial shit yourself.