And He's Not Even President!

[I've been away from my desk for most of the last 48 hours. Though I am not at all refreshed, I return inspired. I think. We'll see.]

On Sunday I wrote about the New York Times' report on Gov. Sarah Palin's style of leadership. Recall that I highlighted the following, which I believe the Times wants readers to believe counts against (wild guess!) Gov. Palin:

[…]four months ago, a Wasilla blogger, Sherry Whitstine, who chronicles the governor’s career with an astringent eye, answered her phone to hear an assistant to the governor on the line, she said.

“You should be ashamed!” Ivy Frye, the assistant, told her. “Stop blogging. Stop blogging right now!”

The Times does not expand upon this bit of news; I suggested that the Times chose not to because Ms. Whitstine's blog is kind of "out there," to say the least. (It is curious that the Times often provides links in its stories, but chose not to link to Ms. Whitstine's blog.) But there is no doubt in my mind the Times' anecdote -- gossipy as it is and utterly unsubstantiated -- was presented simply to identify Gov. Palin as the female successor to George W. Bush; like him, she "suppresses dissent." The tale is meant to impugn and indict. It is not meant to inform or clarify.

I wonder why the Times seems not to have placed this on its front page (from the Political Grapevine):

Bad Reception

For the second time in three weeks the Obama campaign has gone after WGN Radio in Chicago for having an Obama critic on its air.

The Chicago Tribune reports the station was besieged with phone calls and e-mails Monday in an effort to force the cancellation of an interview with David Freddoso, a reporter for the National Review and author of the best-selling book "The Case Against Barack Obama," which has been described as a "serious" biography by the Politico newspaper.

The campaign e-mailed supporters, "WGN apparently thinks this card-carrying member of the right-wing smear machine needs a bigger platform for his lies and smears about Barack Obama." The interview went ahead as planned.

Last month the station experienced a similar barrage of criticism for interviewing conservative writer Stanley Kurtz who had examined Obama's ties to former 1960's radical William Ayers. [Tribune link added]

I guess what I am to conclude from the Times' ostensibly stellar reporting on Gov. Palin's statecraft is that an inconsequential assistant to a small state's governor is a grave threat to civil liberties when she urges an arguably lame blogger to stop blogging. What I am also to conclude is that the Times does not consider it a grave threat to first amendment rights when the rather consequential Obama campaign publicly declares war on a critic's attempts to give voice. Of course, I can see the nuances here, as the Obama campaign is well within its own free speech rights to suppress, or try to suppress, voices it fears (and it clearly does fear those voices). All of this, or so it seems to me, makes the Obama campaign's actions eerily similar to George W. Bush's alleged penchant for stifling dissent, which is, I think, well within his free speech rights, too.

Doesn't this Obama campaign defense strategy prove one thing, namely, that Barack Obama represents four more years of George W. Bush?

But that can't be! Hence, I must be missing something.

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