Sharyl Attkisson’s principled quest to destroy what’s left of her credibility
Attkisson quit CBS over ideological interference, and ended up at Heritage's terrible new website
Topics: CBS, cbs news, Benghazi, Benghazi conspiracy, The Heritage Foundation, Iran-contra scandal, Ronald Reagan, Media Criticism, Media, conservative media, Daily Caller, Breitbart, Editor's Picks, Media News, Politics News
Sharyl Attkisson has principles. The former CBS News investigative correspondent became a heroine to conservatives for her intense, unerring, borderline obsessive focus on Benghazi. She ended up resigning from the network in March, implying that her bosses were trying to censor her and infect her reporting with malicious political bias. With that act of career martyrdom she instantly became a candidate for canonization by right-wing pundits and activists, and an important figure in the ongoing Benghazi conspiracy, which assumes a certain amount of media complicity in covering up THE TRUTH.
Since then Attkisson has made the rounds with conservative journalists, helping to confirm their already firmly cemented belief that the mainstream media is infested with sneaky liberals who act on orders from the Obama White House. Meanwhile, the rest of us have been wondering where Attkisson would go to practice her brand of fiercely independent journalism – where she could be free from political influence and the corrupting forces of ideology.
Now we know. The Heritage Foundation.
The right-wing think tank debuted a brand new website yesterday called The Daily Signal, which, according to its founders, will offer “straight-down-the-middle journalism.” Attkisson has signed on to the site as a “senior independent contributor,” a title that has no actual meaning but does quite noticeably contain the word “independent.” The site’s launch featured an interview with Attkisson in which she decries the “tendency in the news media, on the part of some managers, to censor or block stories that don’t fall in line with the message they want sent to the viewers.”
Again, to escape ideological corruption, she went to the Heritage Foundation.
Attkisson’s a big get for the Daily Signal. Conservatives love her for her willingness to flog Obama scandals long after they’ve been debunked and/or ceased being relevant, so brings an audience of people who still get mad over Solyndra. And she’s a big-name journalist to whom media people still pay attention, even though she’s done some terrible work and her former colleagues thought she had a poorly concealed anti-Obama agenda. For now, the Daily Signal will have to lean heavily on whatever gravitas Attkisson provides because the rest of the site is just awful.
Here’s a sampling of their big stories from Day One:
Heritage employee Hans von Spakovsky approves of Benghazi select committee.
Republicans need to win to stop Obama.
How to amend the budget process with a clunky and utterly humorless reference to “Airplane!”
Benghazi. Benghazi. Benghazi. Benghazi. Benghazi. Benghazi. Benghazi. Benghazi.
The best of the bunch is this piece by Heritage Foundation vice president James Carafano, titled “How Obama Should Have Handled Benghazi.” The answer Carafano came up with may shock you:
President Obama had a perfect model for how to respond to the scandal in the wake of the terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi. He could have turned to the actions of another president — Ronald Reagan — to show him how to quickly regain the trust and confidence of Congress and the American people.
Wow. Ronald Reagan. What a curveball.
The way Carafano sees it, Obama should have taken a page from Reagan’s response to the Iran-Contra allegations, which was to “make sure the White House was doing everything possible to get the truth and the whole truth out.” Reagan’s heroic truth-exposing campaign against himself was documented in former Reagan official David Abshire’s book, “Saving the American Presidency,” which Carafano heartily recommends:


