Hewitt, Levin, Riehl pound Politico's prejudiced anti- Palin pitching

"The evidence of a Politico agenda is overwhelming"
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Bravo Hugh Hewitt, Mark Levin, and Dan Riehl, all of whom stepped up to the plate for Sarah Palin Monday against leftist Politico's latest disingenuous and vicious attack on her. All three hit it out of the park.

First, Hugh Hewitt, via his blog hosted by Townhall.com:

Sarah Palin tweets a shout-out for my Washington Examiner column.

[...]

Sarah Palin is right. The MSM remains awestruck, and for the obvious reason: The president is one of them --glib as they define it, credentialed with that which they value, and unburdened by any set of skills they don't have and thus find threatening (for example, successful business experience.)

Having foisted the president on us in 2008, the elite media will be working overtime to keep him propped up on the theory that a second term couldn't be any worse and might even get better.

The country couldn't afford that.

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Governor Palin is herself under one of the periodic attacks ginned up by her permanent opposition --nested among the MSM that isn't doing its job covering the president's whoppers. The MSM Presidential Praetorian Guard is quick to strike out at any critic of the president's --Michele Bachmann, for example, is also getting the treatment for a gaffe far less significant than the never-mentioned 57 states pratfall or similar Obama slips.

Incredibly, Politico.com did not dissect the president's press conference on Friday, but is leading this week's coverage with a relentlessly negative story on Palin.

The president is presiding like Chance the gardener over a Middle East in flames, refusing to do anything about skyrocketing deficits and a debt time bomb, is disconnected from the reality of why gas prices are soaring, all while his signature "achievement" has been declared unconstitutional, and the first news day after an eye-rolling White House presser and in the middle of a horrific disaster, the big feet of Politico are doing what? Blasting Sarah Palin?

The MSM is arrayed around the president, ready to defend him from any critics. That's the lay of the 2012 land. Get used to it.

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Next up, Mark Levin, in a Facebook Note:

The corporate hate for Sarah Palin at Politico is obvious. The latest is here.

But if you google Politico and Palin, the evidence of a Politico agenda is overwhelming. And the manner in which Politico's editors pursue their hate-Palin agenda is to cherry-pick the individuals they quote to make the point they want made.

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I certainly do not begrudge, but in fact encourage, liberals becoming conservatives or Democrats becoming Republicans. Reagan was a Democrat who famously changed parties. But I do not believe that individuals [George Will and Charles Krauthammer] touted by a left-wing "news" site as two of the leading conservative intellectuals, who stunningly opposed Reagan's candidacy while both were of mature age and mind, are necessarily reliable barometers in this regard.

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It is apparent that several of President George W. Bush's former senior staffers are hostile to Sarah Palin, including Karl Rove, David Frum, and Pete Wehner, to name only three. Pete is a good friend and a very smart guy. That said, Bush's record, at best, is marginally conservative, and depending on the issue, worse. In fact, the Tea Party movement is, in part, a negative reaction to Bush's profligate spending (including his expansion of a bankrupt Medicare program to include prescription drugs). And while Bush's spending comes nowhere near Barack Obama's, that is not the standard.

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Most of these Politico stories are little more than excuses to attack Palin, intended to damage her early on in case she should decide to run. This has been going on for some time now. If she is as weak as some think, why the obsession? Why the contempt? Moreover, Palin has used social media and other outlets to comment substantively on a wide range of issues and policies. In fact, she has spoken on a wider array of issues than Youtube governor Chris Christie, popular among most of these folks, and her positions have, for the most part, been solidly conservative. (Christie's positions on numerous issues important to conservatives are all but ignored by some of those complaining about Palin; indeed, the same could be said of potential presidential contenders Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich, Rudy Giuliani, and Mitch Daniels, among others.) My purpose in mentioning Christie here is to juxtapose the demands by "the intellectuals" on one politician versus another. Their inquisitiveness seems influenced by their political bias. That's not unusual, but it requires underscoring lest their opinions be viewed or promoted as objective.

As a Reaganite pre-dating Reagan's 1976 candidacy, the contempt for Palin does, in fact, remind me of the contempt some had for Reagan, especially from the media and Republican establishment, although no comparison is exact. I've not settled on a favorite would-be presidential candidate, but I also know media hit-jobs when I see them. I am hopeful more conservatives will begin to speak out about this or, before we know it, we will wonder why we are holding our noses and voting for another Republican endorsed by "the intellectuals" but opposed by a majority of the people.

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Our third batter is Dan Riehl, in this post at Riehl World View:

Matt Labash ... must make good coffee as I see he's been with the Weakly Standard for a while.

The name floats by on Twitter occasionally, if anything, causing me to wonder, who the hell is that guy, when it does. Frankly, I've never bothered to find out ... before now. So his beyond sophomoric to pitifully stupid and inaccurate shot at Sarah Palin is priceless, if insignificant. I wonder if Kristol will give him an extra fifteen minutes for lunch for a week, given that he provided the headline for Palin-obsessed Jonathan Martin's latest hit piece on her.

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He obviously strained to be clever, but is it even remotely accurate - even assuming you think the worst of Palin? No, of course it isn't, not in the least if you actually know anything, or pause to think, about who Sharpton and Palin are as personalities.

You see, the substance didn't matter at all to Labash. He knows the Beltway establishment and his bosses don't approve of her and she's been treated as fair game. Rather than say anything genuinely insightful, even if critical, he simply went for what might get him the most chuckles and pats on the back at some watercooler in Washington. That's not an action representative of someone considered to be a serious conservative voice. It's a wannabe, or, more accurately, a never will be. Really, now, how weak, how pathetic is such a misguided comparison? Frankly, using it is a tactic of someone with a genuine character flaw and over-riding need for approval and acceptance within the circles he calls home.

The criticism is so over the top, it would be beneath a serious person. It really is that pathetic, as well as wrong. Palin doesn't rush in to localities. She doesn't take up individuals as causes, file lawsuits, or promote herself outrageously like Sharpton. There simply is no comparison at all. It was purely a mechanism for Labash to flatter himself and try to impress ... friends, not say anything at all relevant to Sarah Palin.

And let's please dispense with this whole "influential conservative" meme, not only for Labash, but for most of the rest of the all too often foolish, self-congratulatory and self-professed elitists at TWS and many of our other Beltway publications.

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As I recently pointed out, combined, Limbaugh, Hannity and Levin reach upwards of 40 million people a week. Those people vote, a fact sometimes lost on the Beltway set - until they want the exposure each of them can offer. Then suddenly, it's all good! But no way would I characterize any of the popular talkers who actually are influential across the population as near fully in line with much of what one reads at our Beltway pubs like TWS and others

When you boil it all down, Labash and company talk to the inside the Beltway set and a relatively small number of individuals who give certain campaigns money.

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The vast majority of America doesn't even know who these people are.

But they do know who Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh and Al Sharpton are, not to mention that even Sharpton's income probably dwarfs that of a Labash, or some other Beltway hack. Ah, but they're important ... they're influential. Yeah, right. We know that because Jonathan Martin at the Politico told us so. Now that, ... that's a joke. When was the last time any serious conservative took that Palin-obsessed lightweight at his word?

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Three batters up. Three home runs against Politico's prejudiced pitching. The leftist website should just drop all pretense and change its name to Politiburo.

- JP