Morrissey: From JournoList to Brian Williams' Lips

Although the JournoListers are in denial, it's clear that talking points from the leftist listserv frequently found their way into the more "mainstream" media. Sometimes, major blogs served as the distribution point for the memes brewed up on the list. Ed Morrissey illustrates one such case where JournoLister Joe Klein took ammo from the armory that was JournoList, posted it in his blog at TIME magazine, and "mainstream" journalist Brian Williams fired the bullet points on NBC:

Keep that in mind when watching this clip from How Obama Got Elected, shown at the front end of an interview between Bill O’Reilly and John Ziegler, who pointed this Brian Williams report out to me. The meat of the point comes right at the beginning:

Now, I seriously doubt that Brian Williams ever participated in Journolist, and it’s not exactly a shock to see a network news anchor use a Time Magazine article as the basis of analysis on a major story. However, it does show that Klein successfully turned a Journolist strategy into media coverage on Palin, which makes his lack of honesty in sourcing those talking points even more of an issue.

The clip shows a scenario that was repeated on many media outlets, including, but not limited to the alphabet networks and major newspapers across America. The Journolisters' entire defense hinges on their claim that the list members who wrote for "progressive" websites and publications were distinct from the more "mainstream" media. But the clip blows enough holes in that argument to fill Albert Hall. Contrary to what Ezra Klein, David Korn and other Listers maintain, memes developed on JournoList were posted on nutroots blogs, and a willing "mainstream" media was only too willing to uncritically give them a much larger audience.

- JP