"Gibbs blasts cable news"--that's the headline on CNN's website tonight. That's Robert Gibbs, and he means it.
The White House press secretary took the opportunity to blast the medium at Friday's press conference when asked about CNBC reporter Rick Santelli's recent tirade against the president's mortgage plan.
"I…think that it's tremendously important that for people who rant on cable television to be responsible and understand what it is they're talking about," Gibbs said. "I feel assured that Mr. Santelli doesn't know what he's talking about."
Gibbs also went on to criticize cable news coverage of the presidential campaign.
"If I hadn't worked on the campaign but simply watch the cable news scorekeeping of the campaign, we lost virtually every day of the race," he said. "If I would have just watched cable TV, I long would have crawled into a hole and given up this whole prospect of changing the country."
One of the reasons I started this blog four years ago was that I believed that cable news--The Cable Game--was the center of the action for news these days. And I sure feel right tonight! When I heard Chris Matthews refer to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner as being "like a child" in his puerile incompetence, that's when I realized that even the Obama suckups at MSNBC would not be able to enforce total loyalty to The One in the face of manifest ineptitude. And now we see signs of freethinking at CNBC and CNN, as well as Fox.
It's going to be a heckuva fight: On the one side, the entire power of the federal government. On the other side, the First Amendment and some pretty big corporations, and millions of loyal fans. So who will win? Stay tuned!
UPDATE: Video, courtesy of Politico.
