Where was the state-run media on the Van Jones debacle?

September 6, 3:05 PMColumbia Conservative ExaminerAnthony G. Martin

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As most of you probably know by now, Communist Van Jones, Barack Obama's new 'green jobs czar,' has resigned.  This is as it should be.  A self-described Communist has no business serving in the government of the United States in any capacity.

Jones' resignation comes as no surprise to those astute readers of online news sources, blogs, and other alternative media.  As more information became known concerning the extremist radical views of Jones, it was only a matter of time before he either resigned or got handed his pink slip.

Yet millions of Americans will be shocked tomorrow when they finally discover in a newspaper or on a TV news program that one of Barack Obama's top advisers has resigned.  They may not even know who Van Jones is.

The reason is not far to find.  The state-run 'mainstream media,' which includes most print media and television news, said absolutely nothing about Jones or his views until now.  CBS aired a story about Jones Saturday evening, but it focused only upon the fact that Jones recently referred to Republicans as 'a**holes.'

CBS missed entirely the true nature of the controversy surrounding Jones--the fact that he is a Communist and that his views are well-known in radical circles for being not only outlandish but quite subversive and anti-American.  While CBS was quick to focus on the least-important of Jones' misdeeds, i.e., the slur against Republicans, when it came to the nature of Jones' extremism they said nary a word. 

This prompted one observer to quip, “I’ve been waiting for the day when a prominent pol resigns and for print MSM readers it appears to be out-of-the-blue, though everyone on the Web knows the whole story.”  (From Mickey Klaus at Slate, via Instapundit).

In addition, Scott Johnson at Power Line gave the following scathing analysis of the failure of the state-run media to report what is obviously one of the biggest news stories of the entire Obama administration thus far:

Jones was also a perfect symbol of the dereliction of the mainstream media in the Age of Obama. Those who rely on the New York Times for their news, for example, will learn of Jones’s departure some time soon, but it will come as a great surprise to them, and well after the shouting is over. Whatever Jones said is already heard indistinctly, like a distant echo, in the Times’s lame overnight report. Byron York’s tabulation of words devoted to the recent revelations about Jones in the mainstream media as of Friday and Saturday provided a notable marker.  (Via Instapundit). 

When the vast majority of the traditional news outlets in the nation fail to report major news regarding the country and its government, citizens are kept precariously in the dark concerning vital news that they need to know in order to make informed choices.  CBS, ABC, NBC, MSNBC, CNBC, CNN, the New York Times, Newsweek, Time, the Washington Post, etc. are all so heavily invested in the success of the Obama administration, due to their obvious cheerleading role during the campaign and after the election, that they are loathe to report any information that may place Obama, the Administration, or the Democratic Congress is a negative light.

That is, until they are FORCED to do so by the circumstances such as the Jones resignation, except by then the 'breaking news' element of the scandal surrounding Jones is old news.

And this is precisely why the state-run media is an out of date, unnecessary component of news in this day and age, and online news sources, along with the news bloggers, are providing the bulk of the breaking news and in-depth political analysis the citizens need.

I should also be quick to point out that Fox News and Glenn Beck have been outstanding, notable exceptions to the media silence.

For more commentary on other issues, visit my blog at The Liberty Sphere.