As noted here at TCG many times, it's pretty obvious that General Electric has adopted a corporate strategy of sucking up to the Obama administration, as a way of protecting a) GE's bailout money, and b) encouraging the federal government to enact environmental rules and regulations, such as "cap and trade," that would beef up GE's renewable energy business--windmills, etc.
As that policy plays out, GE is happy to use its media assets to advance its corporate strategy. And so the libertarians at CNBC are muzzled, while MSNBC, in particular, is tasked with praising Obama and denouncing Obama's enemies. Robert Gibbs is fine, according to this logic, but Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews are better. And NBC, of course, can be relied upon to help out as needed: Just yesterday, NBC's White House correspondent, Chuck Todd, appeared on "Morning Joe" to declare that the Van Jones story was a waste of time.
But occasionally GE's overall policy breaks down. A case in point is NBC's wide-eyed reaction to Jimmy Carter's declaring that opponents of Obama were racists. Brian Williams and Andrea Mitchell were obviously thrilled at Carter's words (Williams was an intern in the Carter White House, btw), and so they played the story big, two nights in a row, declaring that "race matters," and that Carter's words had forced us all to "re-examine" (read: "wallow in") racial attitudes. Liberals love to wallow in racial politics for one big reason: It gives them a chance to feel morally superior to everyone else.
The problem, though, is that such talk is bad for Obama. Obama rarely talks about race, and when he does, it's bad for him--viz. the Henry Louis Gates controversy. If Obama wants to be president of all the people, it is simply not in his interest to emphasize his differences from most people. So talking up race and racial issues may make liberals feel good, but it's bad a black Democrat in the White House.
As Mara Liasson of NPR said on Fox yesterday, you would almost think that Carter is working for the Republican National Committee--trying to hurt Obama. Liasson was joking, of course, but she is 100% right. Upping the racial ante is not good for Obama. And yet liberals keep doing it--even liberals on the government payroll at NBC/MSNBC. It's not good politics, but they can't help themselves, because they really are kneejerk liberals.
H/T again, to Newsbusters.
