The Bridge

The Media Research Center reports that over the past week, the main stream media has spent 17 times as many broadcast minutes discussing, dissecting and analyzing the political ramifications of the Gov. Chris Christies' bridge scandal as they have discussing, dissecting and analyzing the President Obama's IRS scandal. Think about that for a moment.

There's absolutely no doubt that Christies' top political advisors launched a petty political attack again the Mayor of Fort Lee (for not supporting Christie) and that the lane closures that resulted at the George Washington Bridge inconvenienced thousands for a period of three days. It was wrong, stupid, and an prima facie example of why (even at the state level) government should be reigned in and its power reduced.

But contrast the bridge scandal to the IRS scandal (or for that matter the Benghazi scandal). Because of stonewalling by the Obama administration and studied disinterest by his trained hamsters in the media, the administration has gotten away with the political targeting of large numbers of American citizens, not at the entrance of the GWB, but across the nation. In a nixonesque move, the Obama administration targeted its opponents using the full power of the IRS, forcing them to expend time and money needlessly and reducing their ability to raise funds during the last presidential campaign. That wasn't petty, it was criminal. But if you'd like petty, consider that Obama shut down outdoor national monuments during a 17 percent shutdown of the Federal government solely to increase public discomfort.

Instead of holding a full news conference addressing the IRS scandal (as Christie did less than a week after the story broke), Barack Obama stonewalled. Instead of owning up to responsibility for the actions of the IRS (as Christie did less than a week after the bridge story broke), Barack Obama was largely silent. Instead of firing those responsible (as Christie did less than a week after the story broke), Barack Obama punted, allows miscreants to retire with full pension. Instead of directly and publicly apologizing for the actions of his administration (as Christie did less than a week after the story broke) Barack Obama obfuscated. An interesting study in contrasting styles of leadership.

The media will keep digging gleefully into the bridge scandal, hoping to find more juicy tidbits. It's disgusting but not the least bit surprising that the same level of media interest has not been evidenced by a true scandal with national, not local ramification.

The "bridge" vs. the "IRS." You decide which scandal deserves more national attention. The ask why the ratio of coverage is 17:1.

Update (1/13/2014):
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In coverage that is so over-the-top that it's literally become a laughing matter, the media has decided that a local "traffic holocaust" precipitated by the petty and stupid actions of the administration of Chris Christie is a perfect way to metaphorically assassinate a potential challenger of their newly chosen One — Hillary Rodham Clinton. Following the media's anti-Mitt Romney playbook, they may very well have succeeded.

Derek Hunter comments in a hilarious take on the recent main stream media coverage:

To CNN, thank you! Your wall-to-wall coverage in this time of national tragedy has been second to none. The courage you’ve shown in uncluttering your airwaves of the “phony scandals” you’ve been covering [very, very sparingly] over the past five years so we could know more and more and more about this is commendable ...

To the rest of the mainstream media, you too have shown courage in our time of need. When the three national network newscasts spent more time on the New Jersey traffic holocaust in 24 hours than the Internal Revenue Service targeting and intimidating American citizens over their political beliefs since July 1 by a factor of 44, I knew justice finally had come to America.

To Lois Lerner, wow. The word “hero” is thrown around a lot these days, but rarely is it so fitting. The way you refused to let the nation be distracted by hearing why you ordered the IRS to target political opponents of the president of the United States … it’s like, it’s like … it’s like it was you yourself standing in front of that tank in Tiananmen Square. And when you courageously went on a four-month paid leave before retiring with full benefits and pension rather than speaking or resigning will be taught in elementary schools well into the next millennium.

To Attorney General Eric Holder and the Justice Department, your leadership in launching a possible criminal investigation into the driving delays in New Jersey brought a tear to my eye. I only hope your efforts to uncover the cause of this brake pad genocide does not distract you from the important work of reading journalists’ emails and persecuting potential “leakers.” And I hope against hope this avalanche of idling didn’t delay delivery of any of the thousands of yet-unaccounted-for guns you forced gun stores to sell to Mexican drug cartels, then almost immediately lost track of. It’s “fast and furious,” not “traffic jam and furious,” right?

To Ambassador Christopher Stevens, Sean Smith, Glen Doherty and Ty Woods, nice try. Sure, you waited eight hours for help that didn’t come and wasn’t even sent. You begged for months for more security, but you were ignored because you weren’t causing people to move slowly across a bridge. Your continued attempts to distract attention from real issues facing Americans, such as getting home late from work, have failed as badly as your attempt to disrupt President Obama from getting sleep the night before a big fundraiser and campaign event in Las Vegas. If you wanted people to care, you shouldn’t have gotten yourselves murdered while your repeated pleas for help were ignored by President Obama and Hillary Clinton. You should have driven at a snail’s pace into New York, preferably in a Prius.

Perfectly said. It seems that the only way to combat the Obama's trained media hamsters is with the ridicule they so richly deserve.