Didn’t some wise editor at the Washington Post have the good sense to know that a suck-up piece headlined “White House Secretary Discusses Favorite Band” was going to look ridiculous on this week of all weeks?
The story is a hoot and a half—you’d never know from it that Jay Carney, press secretary and Guided Voices fan extraordinaire, is not acquitting himself all that well in the midst of the biggest First Amendment scandal anybody in town can remember.
It would look as if some Post scribe had decided to bail out a buddy and former reporter with a puff piece, if the reporter, Chris Richards, weren't a pop music critic and maybe unaware of the scandals. Maybe he was just so like wow! about Carney’s visit from the band that he had to write it up?
Still, editors should have said: Not this week, Chris. We’d look like fools.
Elsewhere in the Post, former managing editor Leonard Downey does take note of the chilling effect the Obama administration has had on the press.