Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center, it seems, will never forgive Katie Couric for exposing Sarah Palin for who she is.
At its annual "DisHonors Banquet," the MRC invented an award to give to Couric, "The Worst Reporter in the History of Man." (Funny, we might have given such an award to Noel Sheppard, who has issued more apologies for false and offensive content this year alone that Couric has in her entire career.)
The CNSNews.com edition of a lightly rewritten MRC press release touting the award includes a video purporting to contain some of the evidence in support of the "award." Among the clips is Couric stating, "Good morning. The Gipper was an airhead!"
This description of Ronald Reagan was Couric's introduction to a 1999 segment on Edmund Morris' just-released Reagan bio -- but as we've detailed, that was the advance word on the book, and even conservatives used the "airhead" phrase when discussing the book. It's dishonest for the MRC to single out Couric for using the word when even Dinesh D'Souza brought it up; the MRC continuing to obsess over it more than a decade after the fact borders on the pathological.
Conspicuous by its absence is any mention of the best piece of reporting Couric did: her interview of Sarah Palin, in which she managed to stump Palin on such innocuous questions like which newspapers she read.
It seems that the MRC has moved beyond mere Heathering and into full-on Mean Girls mode.
Meanwhile, Slate's David Weigel went to the MRC's shindig -- a "black tie appreciated" affair that featured Brent Bozell "wearing the kind of white tuxedo coat that James Bond prefers in Monaco" -- and points out how the MRC's anti-media campaign isn't working: "Barack Obama’s winning. The Huffington Post is providing AOL’s political coverage. MSNBC reverse-engineered Fox News’ approach to proud, ideological news analysis, and it’s beating CNN."
Weigel also noted that the evening's events -- ironically held in a building constructed by the federal government -- were underwritten in part by Republican mega-donor Foster Friess, one of the event's two "diamond" sponsors. The other one? "Anonymous."
It's quite funny that even people who give huge amounts of money to the MRC don't want to be associated publicly with it.
