MISDIRECTION OR COMPLETE INCOMPETENCE?

There’s a long-time gossip columnist working for The New York Times named Maureen Dowd who used to appear on these pages. Years ago. Gene Lyons once described her as the queen of the Washington “Heathers” during the Clinton years. But she was around during the Bush I years, too, and stuck around through Bush II and Obama and Trump. Doubtless she’ll be around when AOC is inaugurated. MoDo has a way with words.

Sometimes not the best way with words. Back during the George W. Bush presidency, Ms. Dowd used strategically placed ellipses to make it appear that Dubyah had said something he didn’t. Then spent an entire column criticizing him for saying something he didn’t really say.

Then, instead of apologizing, she covered her tracks by including the whole quote in a later column. Perhaps so she could always say she quoted him fairly. (Better late than never, youse guys.) This page discontinued the column shortly thereafter.

But hack-job editing isn’t just a print phenomenon. The TV people have it down pat, too. Usually it’s late-night TV and comics who do it, and can get away with selective editing because they target public figures. How did you think producers for “The Colbert Report” and Jon Stewart’s old show made such smart people look like dopes? By taping them for two-hour interviews, then splicing tape where needed to get the most damning minute and a half.

Apparently the whole idea is rubbing off on the Sunday morning shows. Because NBC News had to apologize for a hit-piece by “Meet the Press” the other day.

No, we didn’t get this from Fox News or Breitbart. This is from The Associated Press:

The news show was discussing the Justice Department’s decision last week to drop its case against Michael Flynn, the president’s former national security adviser, when [host Chuck] Todd played a portion of an interview that [Attorney General William] Barr gave last Thursday to CBS News.

When Barr was asked by reporter Catherine Herridge what history would say about the decision, Barr replied that “history is written by the winner. So it largely depends on who’s writing the history.”

Todd said that he was struck by the cynicism of that answer.

“It’s a correct answer,” Todd said. “But he’s the attorney general. He didn’t make the case that he was upholding the rule of law. He was almost admitting that, yeah, this is a political job.”

However, “Meet the Press” didn’t include Barr’s full answer to Herridge’s question. Barr went on to say: “But I think a fair history would say that it was a good decision because it upheld the rule of law. It upheld the standards of the Department of Justice, and it undid what was an injustice.”

Those are two very different answers. Significantly different. But the one that made the original cut — the way NBC’s producers wanted— put William Barr in the worst possible light. Neat. And unfair.

NBC issued one of those “apologies, but.” Which is better than anything Maureen Dowd ever did. And NBC did it by tweet, saying it “inadvertently and inaccurately” cut the William Barr video. The network should have just stayed with “inaccurately” and left it at that.

Because the best this can be is grossly incompetent. The worst this can be is another argument for those who say there is a vast left-wing conspiracy against Donald Trump and all the president’s men. Either way, it is a valid reason why the media has lost so much of the public’s confidence and trust.

Somebody once said the only way an honest journalist should look at a politician is down his nose. But when caught cheating to make a public official look especially bad — that is, even worse than normal — those journalists might look at their audience, only to see the same look of contempt.