Topic: Media Research Center
Conservative columnist Kathleen Parker has been a previous target of heathering by the folks at the Media Research Center for not strictly adhering to right-wing ideology. They're not done withher yet.
A Nov. 19 column by Brent Bozell rips her writing for the National Review, baselessly claiming that Parker criticized Sarah Palin in order to get on TV:
Another victim of the alleged decline of civility at NR was columnist Kathleen Parker, who we’re told received 11,000 nasty e-mails, “one of which lamented that her mother did not abort her.” Were NR readers upset with Parker, who spent the autumn months building a career in commentary on MSNBC by beating Palin like a pinata at a grade-school birthday party? You betchum.
What [New York Times reporter Tim] Arango did not document was the “erudition” in Parker’s salvos against Palin. She first earned brickbats with sentences like "If BS were currency, Palin could bail out Wall Street herself." Then when people criticized her, she penned a column comparing her conservative critics to Soviet thugs: “Anyone who dares express an opinion that runs counter to the party line will be silenced. That doesn't sound American to me, but Stalin would approve.” Parker also wrote a column suggesting McCain picked Palin because he was dazzled and/or aroused by her beauty, and compared the ticket to Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky.
By making a big deal out of Parker's deviation from the "party line" -- where it is verboten to say anything bad about Palin -- Bozell is proving Parker right.
P.J. Gladnick picked up the thread in a Nov. 19 NewsBusters post:
Suddenly popular Kathleen Parker is continuing on her new shtick: pretending to be conservative while bashing conservatives. Her latest effort in this gig is this Washington Post column titled, "Giving Up on God." As you can see, it resembles the fake "advice" that liberals often give to Republicans but in this case it is coming from somebody supposedly conservative. So let us now watch Parker with her latest bid to remain popular with the Georgetown party set[.]
[...]
Yes, sacrilege will earn you plaudits from your newfound liberal friends but don't expect to continue fooling people into thinking that you are conservative. That ship sailed weeks ago.
[...]
Does anybody else out there picture Parker giggling to herself as she thinks up the latest snarky shots to earn her brownie points from her liberal audience?
[...]
The liberals are sure to show you the door if you ever write like an authentic conservative again.
Who appointed Gladnick -- or anyone else at the MRC -- to be the arbiter of who is an "authentic conservative"?
